This blog started off by focussing on NZ's smaller 3rd level airlines, past and present. It has evolved to trying to present some record of NZ's domestic airline operations and some of the larger charter operators, interesting NZ international airliner movements and photos I have taken around the country. Comments, corrections or contributions are welcome, Steve - westland831@gmail.com
reflections, updates and homilies from Deacon Mike Talbot inspired by the following words from my ordination: Receive the Gospel of Christ whose herald you have become. Believe what you read, teach what you believe and practice what you teach...
When does your neighbors property right limit your own rights? What if your neighbor built a fireworks factory next door? How about a large hog operation?
Three local companies are padding their coffers, and one of them has moved a step closer toward building a high-tech factory in Janesville.

EASY TO SWALLOW: Swallow Solutions, Madison, raised $441,000 from previous investors and hopes to boost that to $750,000 by the end of March, said Eric Horler, president and CEO.

The company is working on medical devices and beverages to help people with swallowing disorders. The new money will fund research and development of new products for followup treatment, Horler said.

Swallow Solutions main product, SwallowSTRONG, consists of a mouthpiece that measures tongue pressure, guides the patient through customized therapy and sends reports to the physician.

Weve had good growth from that, Horler said.

The FDA-registered device was developed in conjunction with UW-Madison and Veterans Administration researchers based on patents licensed from the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.

Released in 2012 and updated in 2014, SwallowSTRONGs early sales focused on VA hospitals. In this last year, we have really branched out into the long-term care market, Horler said.

Founded in 2009, Swallow Solutions, 401 Charmany Drive, has four employees and has raised $4.6 million, so far.

SHINING BRIGHTLY: SHINE Medical Technologies, Monona, has finalized a total of $11.5 million, invested over the last several years. The last portion was $3.7 million in convertible debt raised in 2015. Convertible debt can be repaid or turned into equity, or stock, at a later date.

SHINE wants to build a plant in Janesville that will manufacture a radioisotope, molybdenum-99, that decays to form technetium-99m, a substance used in millions of medical diagnostic tests yearly.

Company officials had their final hearing before the four-member Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Dec. 15, a 6-hour question-and-answer session, said SHINE spokeswoman Katrina Pitas.

We felt like the process went very smoothly, she said. NRC staff had endorsed the project in October.

SHINE expects to get word by the end of March if the commission will give its OK to the plant, Pitas said. If the project is approved, construction will start in 2017 and the factory should be ready to start test runs in 2018 with commercial production in 2019. Its expected to employ 150 people. SHINE currently has 25 employees.

The most recent funding will help us further refine the design, Pitas said.

The new financing round brings the total private investment, so far, to $13 million. SHINE also has been awarded up to $25 million by the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Nuclear Security Administration.

PHOENIX FINANCING: Phoenix Nuclear Labs, also in Monona, has received nearly $800,000 in convertible debt, bringing its total funding to $4.9 million.

Phoenix president Ross Radel said the money will help the company continue advancing its technology and manufacturing capability.

Phoenix makes neutron generators, and would provide those for SHINEs Janesville plant. Radel said Phoenix also would like to expand into a new market: providing instruments for quality control for use by companies that produce nuclear fuel.

Phoenix, which spun off SHINE in 2010, has 30 employees.

BIOFUEL FOR FLIGHT: Virent is getting props for its jet fuels environmental friendliness.

The company, 3571 Anderson St., is out with a report that says its bio-derived jet fuel  produced in Virents pilot plant in Madison  generated more than 50 percent less particulate matter emissions than conventional, petroleum-based jet fuel.

The report is based on lab tests, done in 2012, by Rolls-Royce and supported by the Federal Aviation Administration on hundreds of gallons of the jet biofuel, said Virent research development manager Brice Dally.

Fine-particle pollution can lead to heart and respiratory problems, experts say.

We believe Virents bio-derived SAK (synthesized aromatic kerosene) fuel has the potential to provide the aviation industry with a cost-effective solution to reduce jet engine particulate matter and greenhouse gas emissions without impacting engine performance, said Lee Edwards, Virent CEO, in a release.

Jet fuel is one of several non-petroleum, plant-based products Virent plans to manufacture. So far, the bio-jet fuel has gone through two stages of a four-stage review process, Dally said.
The town of Bristol is suing the newly minted village of Windsor over the villages recent incorporation, alleging that a recent state law that enabled Windsor to become a village is unconstitutional.

The lawsuit, filed in Dane County Circuit Court, asks a judge to declare Windsors incorporation void.

The lawsuit asks that after being restored to town status, any actions Windsor took as a village be declared void.

Windsor, which has a population of about 6,900 people, had been a town but became a village on Nov. 9 after a referendum six days earlier was overwhelmingly approved by voters. Incorporation was done mainly to protect Windsor from annexation, mainly by neighboring DeForest.

Windsor Village President Bob Wipperfurth said he was surprised by the lawsuit, because he said Bristol had supported Windsors incorporation. He had no other comment on it.

Bristols lawsuit alleges that the law allowing Windsor to incorporate was put into the 2015-17 state budget bill specifically to benefit Windsor alone and to avoid public debate of the bill, which it would have received had it been proposed separately from the state budget.

The unconstitutional procedure followed by the Wisconsin Legislature violates the right of (Bristol) to be heard in the legislative process, the lawsuit states.

Increasing use of omnibus legislation like the state budget bill to adopt laws that relate solely to one Wisconsin community is an important issue, the lawsuit states, as is the use of budget provisions to allow incorporations of towns in a manner which evades the general incorporation requirements of Wisconsin law.

Bristol says Windsors incorporation as a village will hurt the town because Wisconsin law gives villages extraterritorial authority over neighboring towns. That will harm Bristol and its residents, the lawsuit states, by increasing the cost of land regulation and development, limiting the growth of the towns tax base, and restricting the property rights of the town.

Joining the lawsuit as a plaintiff is Steve Knaus, of Sun Prairie, who owns land for development within 1 miles from the village boundary that would be subject to village zoning and land division review.

If the village exercises its purported authority over partitions in the town of Bristol, the town and its residents will be injured by the loss of property valuation which will result, the lawsuit states. Indeed, it was the negative impact of extraterritorial jurisdiction by the village of DeForest which was one of the factors prompting Windsor to seek incorporation.
The state Department of Transportation recently announced that traffic fatalities increased 13 percent last year in Wisconsin.

While 35 other states also reported increases, that is of little comfort to the families of the 556 people who lost their lives in Wisconsin tragedies that were entirely preventable.

Historically, about one-third of Wisconsins fatal crashes are caused by drunken drivers, many of whom are repeat offenders. AAA Wisconsins annual survey of traffic safety issues revealed that 78 percent of state residents are very concerned about the danger of impaired driving, and with good reason.

Wisconsin is the only state in the nation where a first-time offense for drunken driving is a citation, not a criminal charge. And not a week goes by without a news story about someone with DUI convictions approaching double digits. Wisconsins reputation for not taking this issue seriously is hardly unfounded.

Several bills targeting repeat offenders have been introduced during this legislative session, which ends this spring. The window of opportunity for action is quickly closing, and failure to act now would mean another year with even more lives lost.

While all the DUI legislative proposals have merit, AAA Wisconsin would like to focus the attention and support of both the public and lawmakers on one in particular, which we feel will make the most impact: strengthening the states ignition interlock program.

Rep. Dave Heaton, R-Wausau, and Sen. Van Wanggaard, R-Racine, have introduced Assembly Bill 266 and Senate Bill 222. It would strengthen incentives for drunken drivers to comply with state law requiring ignition interlock devices in vehicles driven by repeat drunken drivers, those who refuse a sobriety field test, and first-time offenders with a blood alcohol content of 0.15 percent and above. Ignition interlocks prevent vehicles from being started if alcohol is detected on a drivers breath.

The bill would reduce the temptation for offenders to simply drive with a suspended or revoked license, which is an epidemic in Wisconsin. It would also prohibit them from driving any other vehicle that does not have the interlock installed, closing a major loophole in the current law. The penalty for driving a vehicle without an interlock would be set significantly higher than the existing fine for not complying with the ignition interlock device requirement.

Ignition interlocks have been proven to significantly reduce repeat offenses by as much as 75 percent, according to some studies. They are also cost effective because the expense for the device is paid by the offender. Finally, they are strongly supported by DUI courts, law enforcement and the public.

According to AAAs survey, 82 percent of Wisconsin residents favor mandating interlocks for all drivers convicted of DUI.

The impact of keeping repeat drunken drivers off the roads is almost impossible to overstate. Not only does it directly reduce the potential for those offenders to cause deadly crashes, it also frees up law enforcement resources to combat other significant traffic dangers, such as distracted driving and speeding.

AAA Wisconsin joins our partners and colleagues in the law enforcement community and insurance industry, as well as other health and safety advocates in urging the Legislature to take action and make Wisconsins roads safer in 2016. Contact your state legislators and ask them to support Rep. Heaton and Sen. Wanggaards bill.
The movie Thank You, Dad by Hrach Keshishyan tells a story of an American-Armenian girl, named Virgy. Although, she had hardly ever see...
IceCon is a project funded by the Federal Science Policy Office (BELSPO) and aims at constraining past and current mass changes of the Antarctic ice sheet in the coastal area of Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. It comprises 6 partners of several Belgian and foreign institutions, i.e. Universite Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Royal Observatory of Belgium (ROB), University of Luxembourg (UL), Norwegian Polar Institute (NPI), and Aberystwyth University (AU).
MIAMI (TNS)  A Kuwaiti jet departed from the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, early Friday with a freed captive once suspected of being Osama bin Ladens adviser, leaving 104 war-on-terror prisoners in the remote detention center President Barack Obama wants closed.

Fayez al-Kandari, 38, was held at Guantanamo as Detainee 552 since May 2002. Although a war court prosecutor at one point prepared a case against him, he was never formally charged with a crime.

Al-Kandari was the last of a dozen citizens of the U.S-allied emirate taken to Guantanamo. With his departure, just 16 nations are represented in the prison; the majority of remaining captives are Yemenis.

He goes home with optimism and looks forward to resuming a peaceful life and to putting Guantanamo behind him, al-Kandaris Washington, D.C., based attorney, Eric Lewis, said in a statement.

He added that, after a medical examination at a Kuwaiti military hospital, al-Kandari would be remanded to a comprehensive rehabilitation program set up by the Kuwaiti government to help him reintegrate into Kuwaiti society after more than 14 years in detention.

Fourteen more releases are expected throughout the month, as well as more parole board decisions that could clear more so-called forever prisoners for transfer.

U.S. officials had been particularly leery about Kuwaiti repatriations after one detainee sent home in 2005 turned up in Mosul, Iraq, three years later as a suicide bomber, indicating the emirates monitoring system was lacking. At least seven Iraqis were killed in the attack.

But a national security parole board decided Sept. 8 that al-Kandari could safely go home to an inpatient rehabilitation program and robust security measures to include monitoring and travel restrictions. The rehab program, it noted, should last at least a year to achieve the necessary progress in his mental and behavioral health in order to reintegrate him with his family and society.

In the closing days of the George W. Bush administration, war court prosecutors swore out charges against al-Kandari alleging he was a confidant of bin Laden who fought at Tora Bora with al-Qaida forces resisting the U.S. invasion in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. But he was never formally charged at the war court, and in 2012 an Obama administration-era prosecutor dismissed the case.

Al-Kandari consistently denied the allegation, and claimed he was a charity worker in Afghanistan at the time of his capture.

By the time Obamas national security parole board reviewed his file last year, a U.S. military profile described him as a Kuwaiti al-Qaida recruiter and propagandist who probably served as Osama bin Ladens spiritual adviser.

It is not known what al-Kandari told board members to persuade them to lift his status as an indefinite detainee because, at the prisoners prerogative, both his written statement and the unclassified transcript of his hearing were not released for the public to see.

Al-Kandari was an active participant in the widespread hunger strike that swept through the prison in early 2013. He was being force-fed in April 2013, his lawyer said at the time, because the 5-foot, 6-inch man had withered to 108 pounds and had the waist of a small child.

Typically, freed captives leave the offshore prison similarly to the way they were brought there years ago  shackled and masked aboard U.S. Air Force cargo planes. Gulf nations, however, have made a point of fetching their freed captives to spare them such treatment and signal that their rehabilitation has begun. The Pentagon disclosed the transfer after al-Kandaris flight departed the base Friday morning.
If you sneeze when flowers bloom in the spring and tear up in the presence of a cat, your Neanderthal DNA may be to blame.

About 2 percent of the DNA in most people alive today came from trysts between ancient humans and their Neanderthal neighbors tens of thousands of years ago, recent studies have shown. Now, scientists are trying to determine what, if any, impact that Neanderthal genetic legacy has on our contemporary lives.

In a pair of papers published this week in the American Journal of Human Genetics, two research teams report that in many people, a group of genes that govern the first line of defense against pathogens was probably inherited from Neanderthals.

These same genes appear to play a role in some peoples allergic reaction to things like pollen and pet fur as well, the scientists said.

Its a bit speculative, but perhaps this is some kind of trade-off, said Janet Kelso, a researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and senior author of one of the new studies. Increased resistance to bacterial infection was advantageous, but may have resulted in some increased sensitivity to non-pathogenic allergens.

About 50,000 years ago, the modern humans who left Africa encountered Neanderthal settlements somewhere in the Middle East, scientists believe. On some occasions, these meetings led to couplings whose legacy is apparent in the genomes of people with ancestors from Europe and Asia.

Not everyone with Neanderthal DNA inherited the same genes. But the immunity genes appear to be more popular than others.

Among some Asian and European populations, the researchers found that these particular Neanderthal genes can be found in 50 percent of people.

Thats huge, said Lluis Quintana-Murci, an evolutionary geneticist at the Pasteur Institute in Paris and senior author of the other study. It came as a big surprise to us.

The findings imply that these Neanderthal genes must have served our ancestors well if they are still hanging out in our genome today, and especially at such high frequency, said Peter Parham, a professor of microbiology and immunology at Stanford School of Medicine. If the DNA werent valuable, it would have been flushed out of the human gene pool.

It suggests there was a benefit for the migrating modern human and the archaic human to get together, said Parham, who wasnt involved in the research. What has survived is a hybridization of those populations.

Both of the research groups report on a cluster of three genes  known collectively as TLR6-TLR1-TLR10  that make up part of the bodys innate immune response to invading bacteria and viruses.

The innate immune response is different from the acquired immune response that we get through exposure to pathogens, either through vaccines or simply getting sick. Innate immunity kicks in first, and if its successful, it can destroy a pathogen in a few hours, before we even know we are sick.

Because this innate immune response is so useful, it has been a strong site of positive selection over time, Quintana-Murci said.

Though both groups of researchers came to the same conclusion that Neanderthal DNA plays an important role in immunity, the teams were asking different questions at the outset of their studies.

Quintana-Murcis group is trying to understand how microscopic pathogens have influenced the human genome as our species has evolved.

Because infectious diseases have killed so many people throughout human history, it makes sense that genes involved in immunity would spread through natural selection.

For their new study, Quintana-Murci and his colleagues examined 1,500 innate immunity genes in people and matched them up with a previously published map of the Neanderthal DNA in the human genome.
The blast, which occurred outside a liquor shop, is being blamed at the banned Garo National Liberation Army (GNLA).

By India Today Web Desk: A blast in a crowded market injured at least nine people in Williamnagar Bazar in Meghalaya's East Garo Hills district today. The injured have in admitted to a local hospital where condition of three is stated to be serious.

The blast, which occurred outside a liquor shop, is being blamed at the banned Garo National Liberation Army (GNLA). Initial probe has revealed that an improvised explosive device (IED) was used to trigger the blast.

The GNLA is a group known for killings, kidnappings, extortion, bomb blasts and attacks on security forces. It has been fighting for a separate Garo region within the state.

The Garos are hill people living in Meghalaya state and neighboring areas of Bangladesh.




By India Today Web Desk: After Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Bajirao Mastani, Ranveer Singh will be seen in Aditya Chopra's directorial venture Befikre. The Gunday actor will romance Shuddh Desi Romance actor Vaani Kapoor in the film.

According to a report in Times Of India, Ranveer has been asked to beef up for Befikre. The Dil Dhadakne Do actor has never hesitated when it comes to flaunting his chiselled physique. The actor had to tone down a bit for his latest release Bajirao Mastani. It's said that the actor will be seen in a chocolate boy look in Befikre.

Ranveer is following the foot steps of Salman Khan and Aamir Khan for Befikre. Salman had to gain weight for his upcoming film Sutan and Aamir Khan also took the same way for his film Dangal.

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It's also said that Ranveer and Vaani will also learn basic conversational French as the script requires them to interact with local characters in the film.

With Befikre, Aditya is returning to the director's chair after a gap of seven years. Aditya has described Befikre as a light-hearted romance; his happiest movie; his youngest, riskiest film yet. The film's tagline reads - 'Those who dare to love', indicating that love will be a core element in Aditya's new film.
The reason behind Kishwer Merchant's decision to quit Bigg Boss 9 just two weeks before the finale is best known to her, but to the audiences, it looked like an emotional one.

By Vipra Shrivastava: In what could be termed as the toughest decision of her career, Bigg Boss 9 contestant Kishwer Merchant left the show, taking Rs 15 lakh home. Stuck in a task with co-contestant Prince Narula, who she considers to be her brother, Kishwer gave in after battling it out for 32-hours.

Five reasons why Kishwer Merchant possibly walked out of Bigg Boss 9



But why did she do that? The real reason came to the fore in last night's episode of the show. As the task entered its second night, the stake had been increased to Rs 15 lakh. Prince and Kishwer still hoped that the task will be cancelled if neither of them pressed the buzzer. Seeing their determination, Bigg Boss gave them an ultimatum. He asked Prince and Kishwer to mutually decide within one hour as to who will take the Ticket to Finale and who will take the money and go home.

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The two presented each other with their reasons for wanting to be in the finale--from emotional to practical, but they still couldn't arrive at a mutual decision. It was then that Kishwer said, "When Bigg Boss will ask I will announce the decision."

When the moment came, a teary-eyed Kishwer stood up and said, "Prince, mera bhai jayega finale mein, Ticket to Finale lekar, aur main aaj bahar jaungi Rs 15 lakh lekar." Even as the other housemates looked shocked at Kishwer's decision, Prince stood in silence. Within minutes, Kishwer packed her bags and bid adieu to everyone. Before stepping out of the house Kishwer hugged and joked with everyone. She walked up to Prince, who was crying bitterly, hugged him and said, "Kaun kehta hai ki rishtey nai bantey reality shows mein?"

Bigg Boss 9: After Kishwer's exit, Suyyash has a message for Prince



Did that mean that Kishwer had given up the show for him? Did we get to see one of the most strong headed and ambitious contestants of the show, Kishwer fall prey to her emotions? Or was it a decision based on practical reasoning, after all post Bigg Boss' ultimatum, it was clear that one of the two had to leave the show.

Hence, either she had the choice of keeping the money and leaving or staying and risking her entry into the finale as well as the prize money to another contestant. Whatever be the motivation behind her choice, Kishwer's decision has definitely changed the dynamics of the show.
The blast, also injured three coast guards and completely destroyed a patrolling vehicle.

By Reuters: Two Pakistani coast guards were killed today when a bomb exploded under their vehicle, police officials said, in a town in the southwest which has been hit hard by years of separatist violence.

The blast, which also injured three coast guards, completely destroyed the vehicle during a patrol on the outskirts of Jewani town in Baluchistan province, the police officials said. No one has claimed responsibility for the explosion.

Jewani lies in Gwadar district, whose port is at one end of the proposed $46 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor stretching from the Arabian sea to China's Xinjiang region.

Separatist groups in Baluchistan, one of Pakistan's poorest provinces, have waged violent campaigns over the past decade, saying the Pakistani state has failed to develop the impoverished region and instead plundered its natural resources.

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Much of the separatist violence over the past decade has targeted government personnel and security forces as well as non-Baluch ethnic groups.

Baluch activists say thousands of people have disappeared and there have been hundreds of extrajudicial killings in security force crackdowns.

The China-Pakistan Economic corridor offers Beijing a shorter and cheaper route for trade with the Middle East and Europe and could bring investment to the region, but poor security has raised doubts about the feasibility of the plan.

Last year gunmen stormed Jewani airport in Baluchistan, killing engineers and destroying radar systems.
BERLIN (TNS)  German police Friday announced the arrests of two asylum seekers in a series of New Years Eve attacks in Cologne, a development likely to inflame what already is a fierce battle over the status of hundreds of thousands of migrants whove flooded Europe in recent months.

The police said the two suspects were arrested around midnight in the same square outside the citys central train station where the attacks reportedly took place. The police said that during the arrests theyd uncovered photos and videos of sexual assaults as well as a list of threatening phrases to use to intimidate German women.

Federal police announced that they were investigating 31 other suspects  including an American  thought to be tied to the attacks. Eighteen of those are asylum seekers, police said.

Cologne police placed the number of suspects they were investigating at 21, and it was not immediately clear how or whether the two numbers overlapped. Under German law, the federal police are responsible for probing crimes that originated within the train station, while the city police are responsible for investigating acts outside.

Initial reports had put the number of young men present during the attacks at close to 1,000, though many were thought to be revelers and not attackers.

Still, on Friday the official tally of victims passed 200, and police reports continued to be filed. In addition to the attacks in Cologne, police are investigating similar though less numerous assaults in Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg and Stuttgart.

Meanwhile, police in Finland, which has accepted about 20,000 asylum seekers this year, reported that they had thwarted plans for similar attacks in that countrys capital, Helsinki. According to police, theyd received information that as many as 1,000 men were planning to assault women outside Helsinkis central train station on New Years Eve and had marshaled police there to deal with the possibility. Thus far, only three Finnish women have reported being assaulted by the crowd.

As in Germany  which has taken in more than 1 million refugees this year, most thought to be from Syria  the asylum seekers in Finland are predominantly young, unaccompanied men. Most are thought to have come from Iraq.

Police have said they dont think there is a connection between the attacks, but the apparent police efforts in Finland to prevent the assaults are likely to increase the criticism of German police, whove been slammed for a timid and slow response to the chaos and then for apparently attempting to cover up the extent of the mayhem. Many victims of the attacks have told German news outlets theyd pleaded with police for help but were left to fend for themselves. On Friday, the Cologne police chief was suspended, a step toward his likely dismissal.

As is the custom in Germany, police identified the arrested suspects with only partial names. One, Issam D., was described as a 16-year-old Moroccan, while the other, Mohamed T., was said to be a 23-year-old from Tunisia. Police said Issam D. was a known pickpocket.

Mohamed T. was reported to have been carrying what appeared to be a handwritten cheat sheet for sexual intimidation. The list had phrases in Arabic translated into German. The phrases included I want to (have sex), I want to kiss you, Big breasts, I have a surprise and most chillingly I will kill you.

Police said cellphones found on the suspects when they were arrested contained photos and videos showing attacks on women.

Meanwhile, federal police announced the nationalities of the 31 suspects they are investigating, a step that is likely to feed the debate over immigration. In addition to an American and two Germans, the group comprises nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, five Iranians, four Syrians, one Iraqi and one Serb. The police said 18 of the suspects are asylum seekers, and that most were suspected of physical assault and robbery.

No other information about those suspects was released.
By India Today Web Desk: A bullet-riddled body of an Assistant Sub-Inspector was found in Bihar's Vaishali district today. Locals spotted a body with bullet wounds in Hajipur's Manua area today morning. Police reached the spot soon after getting the information and took the body in its custody.

Preliminary investigations revealed that the body was of ASI Ashok Yadav, who was posted in Vaishali police station. Yadav was on leave since last three days. Unconfirmed reports said that the Yadav was shot multiple times from his own service revolver. The assailants took the weapon with them after killing the cop.

Yadav's body has been sent for postmortem and a murder case has been registered against unknown men. The incident comes just days after three engineers were killed in separate incidents in December, 2015 raising questions over law and order situation in Bihar.

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The main opposition party - BJP - has called the recent spate of murders in the state as the "return of jungleraaj (lawlessness)".


A conductor, working for a private bus company, was booked by the Bengaluru police for allegedly misbehaving with a girl on a Goa-Bengaluru bus on January 2 night.

By Aravind Gowda: A conductor, working for a private bus company, was booked by the Bengaluru police for allegedly misbehaving with a girl on a Goa-Bengaluru bus on January 2 night.

In her complaint, a 23-year-old college student accused the conductor of touching her inappropriately while she was sleeping in the bus, in the wee hours of January 3. On confrontation, the driver denied the act.

Later, the girl lodged her complaint with the Upparpete police in Bengaluru. However, police are unable to trace the driver and the conductor.

Police have summoned the management of SRS Travels, which operated the bus service, for an inquiry.
By India Today Web Desk: Police detained several students today who were protesting against a seminar on Ram Janmabhoomi in Delhi University (DU) campus. Students associated with National Students' Union Of India (NSUI) and left wing unions staged protest outside the venue of the seminar, which was addressed by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy.

Heavy security arrangements were put in place at the Delhi University following the protest. Authorities had to deploy a contingent of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police Force (ITBP) at the university to prevent the situation from going out of control.

The protest, however, had no effect on Swamy's event. Speaking at the seminar, he said, "We wanted to do this seminar in one room but our enemies did not let it happen. This event is not complete without the protest happening outside."

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"After partition, we decided that we will be having all faiths. When British left India, Parsis were offered reservation but they refused saying we have been taken care of very well. Similarly, Jews also feel safe in India. We were not a new country after partition. We accepted everyone but I still do not understand secularism," Swamy said in his inaugural address at the seminar.

The protest against seminar on Ram Temple in Delhi University is undemocratic and fascistic . Dr Rakesh Sinha (@RakeshSinha01) January 9, 2016

Swamy had earlier said that the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya would begin by the end of 2016 with the cooperation of the Muslim community.

The two-day seminar titled Shri Ram Janma Bhoomi Temple: Emerging Scenario is being organised at DUs Arts Faculty by Arundhati Vashishtha Anusandhan Peeth (AVAP), a research organisation founded by late VHP leader Ashok Singhal. Swamy is the chairman of AVAP.

Various student groups and teachers have been opposing the DUs decision to offer its campus for the non-academic event saying it is an attempt to communalise the campus.
The three will have to pay a fine of 125 million Egyptian pounds ($15.96 million) and return 21 million pounds to the state treasury

By Reuters: Egypt's court of appeals today rejected an appeal by former president Hosni Mubarak and his two sons over a three-year jail sentence for corruption, but the trio is unlikely to be imprisoned again having already served the sentences.

In May, an Egyptian court sentenced Mubarak and his sons to three years in jail without parole in a retrial on charges of diverting public funds and using the money to upgrade family properties.

The three will have to pay a fine of 125 million Egyptian pounds ($15.96 million) and return 21 million pounds to the state treasury. A court source told Reuters that Mubarak and his sons had paid 104 million during the trial period.

Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for 30 years before he was ousted in a popular uprising in 2011, and his sons Gamal and Alaa already spent at least three years each in prison for other cases.

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Mubarak's treatment by the courts since being toppled from the presidency has been perceived by his opponents as too lenient and raised doubts about Egypt's transition towards democracy.

Charges against him of conspiring to kill protesters during the uprising, centred around Cairo's Tahrir Square, were dropped, and some of his associates were released from jail.

Angry supporters of Mubarak gathered at the court, however, chanting in support of Mubarak after the verdict was read. They carried banners that say "Mubarak is innocent."




Bhat clarified that he had political and ideological difference with Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, who died on January 7, 2016, but he insisted that Mufti wanted to provide healing touch to people.

By Naseer Ganai: Breaking away from the past tradition, the senior Hurriyat Conference leader Prof. Abdul Gani Bhat today visited Fairview residence of Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, who died on January 7, 2016, at AIIMS in New Delhi, to offer condolences. Bhat described Mufti as sensitive Kashmiri, who have been strong advocate of India and Pakistan friendship. Though Bhat clarified that he had political and ideological difference with Mufti, he insisted Mufti wanted to provide healing touch to people.

Bhat, who met Mufti Sayeed before he formed coalition with right wing BJP at the same place, described Mufti as the embodiment of peace. Former chief minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed died on January 7, 2016, at AIIMS in New Delhi.

Bhat said Mufti was his life time friend and he always treated Mehbooba as his daughter. "Leave aside politics, in fact I had political difference with Mufti Sahab but don't forget he was my life time friend. Our friendship started from class room and you all know it better we always remember our class mates," Bhat said. He said former chief minister and he were never on the same page when it came to politics. "Our ideologies were poles apart but our hearts always beat for Kashmir," he said in an emotional speech.

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Bhat said Mufti was a curious listener and who talked very less. He said he was great human being who just wanted to put a balm on the wounds of Kashmiri people.

This is rarest of rare occasion when a separatist leader, who previously has remained chairman of All Parties Hurriyat Conference, has praised the mainstream politician. Bhat is executive council member of Hurriyat Conference led by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq.

Bhat praised Mufti for his advocacy of dialogue with Pakistan. He said Mufti efforts led to former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to visit Kashmir in 2003 and extend hand of friendship to Pakistan.

APDP's charges Mufti of human rights violation:

However, human rights organization Association of Disappeared Persons (APDP), which is seeking whereabouts of around 10,000 persons, who they say, have been subjected to enforced disappearance since 1989, accused Mufti of being involved in human rights abuses. "Mufti Mohammad Sayeed's death is being conducted by the government exactly the way he himself conducted his politics in Jammu and Kashmir, which was full of lies, opportunism and rhetoric." "Since the creation of People's Democratic Party (PDP), Mufti Sayed and his party workers have been carrying forward the rhetoric of peace with dignity, battle of ideas, healing touch, accountability etc. All these slogans in practicality turned out to be mere loud political propaganda to counter the peoples' narrative," the APDP statement said.

"As a human rights organization, we will restrict ourselves to presenting the facts related to the conduct and responsibility of Mufti Mohammad Sayeed for the human rights atrocities, which took place when he was in authority, as the Home Minister of India from 2nd December 1989 to 10 November 1990 and as the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir from 2nd November 2002 to 2nd November 2005 and 1st March 2015 to 6th January 2016," the APDP alleged releasing long list of alleged human rights violation incidents which took place during Mufti's tenure as Union Home Minister.

"In Jammu and Kashmir during the tenure of Mufti Mohammad Sayed as the Home Minister of India several massacres took place. Besides the massacres, the highest number of civilian killings by the Indian armed forces in the last 25 years took place in the year 1990. Killings, rapes and molestations, torture, and collective punishments through crackdowns and prolonged curfews created an atmosphere of war. Any person, who has lived the year of 1990 in the valley of Kashmir, is witness to the fact that it was the most dreadful period in terms of the violence perpetrated by the Indian State. It was during Mufti Sayed's tenure as Indian Home Minister, that the draconian Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) was invoked in Jammu and Kashmir in September 1990," the APDP said.

"In his recent tenure as the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir from March 2015 to 6th January 2016 a total of 192 people have been killed, amongst whom 50 are civilians, 90 are militants and 52 are armed forces personnel. During this last 10-month rule of Mufti Sayeed, seven probes have been appointed for probing human rights violations, as usual none has resulted into prosecution," the Human Rights body said.

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The APDP said during his three-year rule from mid 2002 to mid 2005, at least 6837 people were killed including 1784 civilians, 3898 militants and 1155 armed forces personnel. "In the same period around 176 cases of enforced disappearances and 127 custodial killings were reported," the APDP added.

ALSO READ:

7 leaders who died while in office

Mufti Mohammad Sayeed's 5-point legacy


Bengaluru police have lodged a complaint against a techie, from Maharashtra, for allegedly posting derogatory comments against Kannadigas on Facebook.

By Aravind Gowda: Bengaluru police have lodged a complaint against a techie, from Maharashtra, for allegedly posting derogatory comments against Kannadigas on Facebook.

Pritish Kumar Patil, who works in a reputed IT firm in Bengaluru, was booked under IPC Section 505 (statements conducing to public mischief) after he posted derogatory remarks in response to an article on the attitude of a bus conductor on the Logical Indian Facebook page.

The development came after Vivek, who represents the Samanya Kannadiga group on Facebook, sought action against the techie for his remarks.

"His comments were filled with hatred for Kannadigas. It did not warrant such extreme comments about us. We have sought legal action against him," Vivek said.

Following the incident, Patil deactivated his Facebook account. Police said that Patil later apologised for his remarks.

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Sailesh Gaur took 6 bullets while fighting the terrorists but did not leave his position. Salute!

By India Today Web Desk: The recent terror attack at the Pathankot Air Force base is suspected to be a try to destroy the high-end fighter jets, attack helicopters and missiles stationed there.

If not for our soldiers who fought the terrorists and neautralised them, India would have suffered huge monetary losses. In the gun battle that lasted more than 80 hours, India did suffer huge loss, as we lost 7 soldiers who sacrificed their lives for the nation.

Also read: Lt Col EK Niranjan was careless, says The Telegraph op-ed. Panned on internet

Sailesh Gaur was one of the 12 Garud Commandos deployed outside the Mechanical Transport area of the air base around 3 am. Their objective was to not let terrorists move ahead. Garud Commando Chief Gursevak Singh raged ahead despite taking three bullets, but breathed his last during the operation.

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Sailesh and along with his buddy pair Katal took charge and managed to keep the terrorists from proceeding any further. Meanwhile, Sailesh took 6 bullets but kept fighting. Both of them kept the operation on for over an hour and waited for back-up.

Sailesh was evacuated three hours later, and this 24-year-old is now fighting for his life at the hospital.


By India Today Web Desk: Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh claimed on Saturday that not Congress but the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi are opposing the GST Bill.

"The truth is that BJP, Narendra Modi and Amit Shah do not want GST but they are putting the blame on Congress," Ramesh claimed and asked BJP leaders to not spread "falsehood".

Claiming that the GST Bill is unable to see the green light because Modi is not in favour of the measure, Ramesh said the BJP government in Gujarat had also opposed the Bill.

"Congress has already made it amply clear that it is not at all against the GST Bill. We want its passage as early as possible. It was during UPA government that the bill was introduced in Parliament," Ramesh said.

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He termed the whole exercise of the Centre to get the bill passed, including Union Minister M Venkaiah Naidu's meeting Congress chief Sonia Gandhi to seek support for the bill, as an "eyewash and drama."

After the GST Bill was introduced in Parliament in March, 2011 by the then finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, it went to the standing committee on finance chaired by a senior BJP leader which gave its report two and half years later, after "undue" delay as Gujarat government and Modi were against it, the senior Congress leader said.

Ramesh said Congress only wants three changes in the existing bill to make it really "good and simple tax" which would benefit the consumers and not the industry.

Terming the present bill as neither good nor simple but only tax, he said Congress has sought a ceiling of 18 per cent, removal of additional one per cent tax and setting up of a judicial body and mechanism to address disputes between states and between state and the Centre.

The moment these three conditions are agreed to and necessary modifications made, Congress would ensure that the GST Bill is passed as soon as possible, Ramesh said adding the government is yet to respond to the proposals in a positive way.

Also read:

What is the GST Bill? What does it mean to you and me?

Modi woos Congress to get GST Bill off the govt's chest


No terror group will be allowed to disrupt the peace process with India, Pakistan Defence Minister Khwaja Muhammad Asif said today.

By India Today Web Desk: No terror group will be allowed to disrupt the peace process with India, Pakistan Defence Minister Khwaja Muhammad Asif said today. The minister said that strict action would be taken against those involved in terror activities.

Talking to a news channel, Asif said that Pakistan strongly opposed terrorism in every form as terrorists are enemy of humanity. He added that no terror elements would be allowed to derail talks with India.

"No terrorist organisation will be allowed to derail the dialogue process between Pakistan and India," Asif said.

Earlier, Asif had said that "some elements" want to "sabotage" the Indo-Pak peace talks through terror acts but they will not succeed in their nefarious activities.

Asif also said Pakistan has achieved immense success in elimination of terrorism through operation Zarb-e-Azb which is still going on.

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"Some of the militant groups have already been destroyed and those still remaining will also be dealt with as the operation is still going on," he told Geo TV.

"There is only one narrative and that is to eliminate the threat of militancy. I would request to highlight this aspect of our policy," he said.

The minister's statements came a week after six Pakistani terrorists infiltrated and launched a terror attack at the Pathankot IAF base. Reports suggest that the terrorists may belong to Jaish-e-Mohammad headed by Maulana Masood Azhar of the Kandahar hijack episode.

Also read:

Act against Pathankot attackers first, talks later, India tells Pakistan

Pathankot attack: Phone number of attacker's 'ustaad' traced to Pakistan


The trial period will not be extended and we will examine the trends and data, said Gopa Rai.

By India Today Web Desk: Amid speculations over the tenure of the odd-even experiment, Delhi government has made it clear that the trial period of the vehicle rationing scheme will not be extended beyond January 15.

"The trial period will not be extended, and we will be examining the trends and data collected during the trial period after January 15," Transport Minister Gopal Rai said.

The Delhi government in its reply to the Delhi High Court had categorically mentioned that 15 days is not enough to curb pollution, and hence there were rumours floating about the extension of the plan.

The high court had questioned the odd-even plan and even its feasibility. It had asked the Kejriwal government to explain the reasons behind various exemptions and also about the duration of the experiment.

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The high court also came down hard on the public transport and observed that the people are facing a lot of difficulties. The final verdict has been reserved for Monday, January 11.

The odd-even scheme had been introduced in the national capital to control the growing pollution and smog. Under this, cars having odd numbered license plates will run on odd days, and cars with even numbered license plates on even days.

After 10 days of implementation, there has been no visible dip in the levels of pollution according to different parameters, yet there has been a conscious attempt to tackle the polluted air.

Also read:

Odd-even plan: Delhi govt says 15 days not enough to control pollution

Odd-even formula: Will AAP's plan sustain for 15 days?


News coverage from Israel is often distorted if measured against the 'Code of Ethics' guidelines of journalism. The origins of bad news about a country thus lie with numerous foreign media. This project exposes one of many methods used.Bad News from the Netherlands has raised major international interest since it appeared on the web in October 2007. Many thanks are due to all those who have contributed news, ideas and financing. Support us to expand this project.Act against the biased media: start a bad news blog about another country. If you want to use this layout, please contact us at the e-mail address below.

Do It Yourself

The "Bad News Movement" is not a franchise, but consists of

independent initiatives of which Bad News from the Netherlands is the first. Yet as the initiator of the movement, we would like to make a few suggestions to those who want to establish similar projects:



1. Always keep in mind the target of the blog: showing only negative items about a country makes its society aware of how some of their media distort the image of Israel.

2. Focus on items from leading sources such as the government, major media, well-known institutions.

3. Do not concentrate on one or a few areas. Deal with as many major aspects of the country as possible: government, politics, justice, media, culture, civil society, etc.

4. Do not exaggerate issues beyond what is mentioned. A collection of bad news is bad enough without blowing up the facts. Let the facts speak for themselves.

5. While one can draw part of the information from the more sensational papers, let them not dominate the blog.

6. Do not emphasize ethnicity of people where it is irrelevant to the issue.

7. When necessary, provide comments on issues which require it, but try to present the majority of issues without comment.


This comes in after the US and China have already spoken in India's support.

By India Today Web Desk: The United Kingdom joined the growing list of countries condemning the attack on Indian Air Force (IAF) base in Pathankot, saying, "Pathankot attack is desperate and despicable."

UK Minister of State and Employement Priti Patel on Saturday said that Pakistan must act against the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack.

"India and Pakistan need to work with each other," Priti Patel added.

This comes after a senior State Department official from the US said that Pakistan should not come out with lame excuses to shield them as has been the case with the Mumbai terrorist attack.

"They (Pakistan) have said publicly that they are going to investigate. They have said publicly that they are not going to discriminate between terrorist groups. We look to see actions to back up those words," the official added.

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The official indicated that the US wants to give the civilian government time and space to act on its words and hoped that Pakistan would not repeat its past trend wherein it is seen reluctant in taking actions against terrorist groups under one excuse or the other.

"They said that they (Pakistan) would investigate it and we need to let that process go forward. But obviously we want to see that the perpetrators be brought to account (as soon as possible)," the State Department official said on anonymity.

Senior US government officials have been in close contact with their Pakistani counterparts in the aftermath of the attacks in Pathankot and Afghanistan's Majar-e-Sharif urging them to take right course of action which, if they do, would not only be a great confidence building measure but would also help improve relationship with India.

One of Pakistan's biggest ally's in the world China, too, has condemned the attacks.

China said on Monday it "condemns" the terror attack at Pathankot but hopes India and Pakistan will continue to "enhance dialogue regardless of disruptions".

"We condemn this attack," Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said. "China hopes India and Pakistan can continue to enhance their dialogue regardless of these disruptions."

The Foreign Ministry in Beijing suggested the attack might be an attempt to derail the recent improvement in bilateral relations, in the wake of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Lahore visit.

"At this juncture, this attack might be launched intentionally to disrupt this momentum," said Hua, adding that China hoped "India and Pakistan work together to maintain positive momentum".

Also read:

PM Modi visits Pathankot air base, says tactical response neutralised serious attack

US to Pakistan: Act fast on Pathankot attack perpetrators


Salwinder Singh is facing as many as five sexual harassment cases filed by lady constables posted in Gurdaspur district.

The Pathankot terror incident besides hinting a possible drug smuggler-terrorist nexus has also highlighted the colourful past of a senior police officer Salwinder Singh who is a prime witness in the case.

Salwinder Singh is facing as many as five sexual harassment cases filed by lady constables posted in Gurdaspur district. Sources said that the cases which were allegedly hushed-up by the police officers to save the cop earlier, were recently opened again after Suresh Arora joined as DGP.

Gurpreet Kaur Deo, IG (NRI Affairs) headed the departmental Sexual Harassment Committee had recently visited Gurdaspur and had recommended Salwinder's transfer a couple of days before he along with his cook Madan Gopal and his friend Rajesh Verma were abducted by the suspected Jaish-E-Mohammad terrorists.

Mail Today tracked down a couple of complaints and managed to speak to one of the complainants who is posted at district police headquarters at Gurdaspur.

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"Why are you asking this from me. You should also contact other girls who were harassed by him. We were harassed by him by making indecent comments," said one of the complainants not wanting to be named.

Another complainant said the SP had sought physical favours from her which she refused. "An anonymous complaint was made to the DGP. When IG visited we narrated the story," another complainant said.

When contacted Senior Superintendent of Police, Gurdaspur, Gurpreet Singh Toor refused to comment on the issue and said Salwinder has been transferred on administrative grounds.

"He has criticised me. If I speak against him he will say I am settling the score. No comments please," Gurpreet Singh Toor said.

Besides the colleagues, now a Hoshiarpur resident Karanjeet Kaur, 46, has claimed that she was in a live in relationship with Salwinder for five years and the cop deserted her after she gave birth to a son in 1999.

Karanjeet Kaur- who is a resident of Tanda area claimed that the cop had cheated her by saying that he was unmarried and had destroyed the evidences related to their relationship.

Karanjeet Kaur said that she had met Sakwinder Singh in 1994 when he was Assistant Sub Inspector and had rented out a home in Hoshiarpur. They got married on April 9,1994 in Jalandhar and she gave birth to a son after five years of relationship.

Click here to Enlarge Karanjeet Kaur with her son

"We lived together for five years at three places including Sir Hargobindpur, Kotli Surat Msllian and Dera Baba Nanak. We got married in Jalandhar and he used to visit my parental home at Hoshiarpur. Our neighbours and entire family stand a witness ," she told Mail Today.

When questioned why she did not raise the matter earlier Kaur said she had complained against Salwinder Singh but the police officials hushed up the case as he was influential.

"He deserted me When my son was seven month old. I complained against him to police authorities in Amritsar but they hushed up the case. I am ready for my son's DNA test to prove his paternity," Karanjeet Kaur said.

Salwinder Singh in a telephonic interview to Mail Today had recently said that he is innocent and the he has been wrongly accused of misconduct.

"My past life has nothing to do with this case. I am not a suspect. I am clean and ready for any investigation," Salwinder Singh said.

Meanwhile, the Punjab police on Friday ordered a probe into the bigamy allegations levelled by Karanjeet kaur.

"A fact finding enquiry has been instituted by the Director General of Police, Punjab to probe the bigamy allegations against Salwinder Singh.Dhanpreet Kaur, IPS, Senior Superintendent of Police, Hoshiarpur has been asked to conduct a fact finding inquiry into the allegations and submit a report at the earliest," a police department Spokesperson said.

Also read: Pathankot: Had told cops about attack well in time, says Gurdaspur SP


On Monday, the Punjab Police busted a major cartel and arrested three notorious smugglers. Their interrogation then led the investigators to constable Anil who was deployed with the 52nd Battalion of the Border Security Force.

By Rahul Kanwal: Days after the Pathankot terror attack rocked India, the Punjab Police arrested a BSF constable, who was allegedly involved in helping a cartel of drugs and arms smugglers infiltrate heroin and weapons into India.

On Monday, the Punjab Police busted a major cartel and arrested three notorious smugglers. Their interrogation then led the investigators to constable Anil who was deployed with the 52nd Battalion of the Border Security Force.

Mail Today managed to speak exclusively to BSF constable Anil after he was presented before the magistrate in Mohali. While walking out of the court complex, Anil admitted that he had been receiving money from his handler in Pakistan, a well known Lahore-based drug smuggler by the name of Imtiaz.

Anil told Mail Today, "I was attending a wedding in Taran Taran when I was approached by a group of people, who asked me why I was so poor in comparison with others in the force who had been able to build big houses. These people told me that they would help me get rich. They gave me two SIMs and told me that a person named Imtiaz would call me from Lahore."

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He started contacting Anil through the Pakistani SIM card. In the first installment Rs 50,000 were sent in cash to Anil. Later Rs 39,000 were deposited in the bank account of Anil's wife.

Anil's contact in Punjab was Gurjant Singh, aka Bholu. Singh had been arrested in 2010 while smuggling 26 kg of heroin into India. He was convicted and sent to jail for 20 years . However, in 2013 he was able to run away from custody while being taken to the Ferozpur government hospital for a routine medical examination. After escaping, Gurjant changed his identity and started operating again under the alias of Daljit Singh.

Mail Today managed to speak to Gurjant outside the court complex in Mohali. Gurjant explained the modus operandi. The smugglers mostly use two kinds of modus operandi to bring their consignments into India.

In the first instance, the Pakistani handler calls on the Pakistani SIM and asks the BSF jawan to identify which Pakistan Rangers post he can see in front. The BSF constable would WhatsApp his Google Maps location giving the handler a precise sense of where the compromised official was deployed.

After identifying the location of the BSF constable, the handler would then send his consignment at night to the fence.

The smugglers are usually more active in the winters when smuggling becomes easier because of the dense fog cover. The consignment would either be flung over the fence where Indian couriers were waiting to receive it. Else, the consignment was pushed into India through big plastic pipes. BSF jawans would be paid up to Rs 50,000 for facilitating each consignment.

The other modus operandi was to hide the arms and drugs in different parts of the Lahore-Amritsar train. The Indian official would be told the exact location of the consignment, which would be picked up once the train arrived in India. After the Pathankot attack the Border Security Force has been under heavy fire for failing to prevent the terrorists from entering Punjab.

But at the root of the problem of infiltration is drug terrorism, which ensures the handlers in Pakistan have a well oiled infiltration machine which can be deployed whenever required. SSP, GPS Bhullar, told Mail Today, "The Border Security Force constable was trapped with the inducement of riches. There doesn't seem to be much effort to stop infiltration by the Pakistani Rangers. This gives the terrorists easy access to the border on the Pakistani side. Some of the villages have farmland beyond the fence. These places are particularly vulnerable."

On Friday, Punjab Deputy Chief Minister and Home Minister Sukhbir Badal met Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh in Delhi and demanded extra deployment of Border Security Force personnel in Punjab.

Sukhbir told Mail Today, "In Jammu and Kashmir the number of Border Security Force personnel deployed is more than twice the deployment in Punjab. The recent terror attacks show that Punjab is now increasingly being targeted by the Pakistani terrorists. We want that deployment in Punjab be increased so that infiltration can be plugged effectively.

Watch:

Also read:



Floodlights at Pathankot air base turned up to help Pak terrorists?

Pathankot attack: BSF looks to locate point of border breach





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The prime minister today visited the Indian Air Force (IAF) base that was attacked by six Pakistani terrorists on January 2.

By India Today Web Desk: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today visited the Indian Air Force (IAF) base that was attacked by six Pakistani terrorists on January 2. During the 90-minute visit, Modi was briefed about the attack and the response initiated by security forces.

Air Force chief Air Marshal Arup Raha and National Security Guard officials briefed the PM about the attack and the counteroffensive launched against the perpetrators with the help of maps, aerial pictures and operational photographs. The air base was kept out of bounds for the media during the PM's visit.

"Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response," PMO tweeted after his visit to the airbase.

"Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride," another tweet said.

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Modi also went around the scene of the audacious attack and was shown the huge cache of weapons and ammunition recovered from the six attackers. Apart from top security officials, NSA Ajit Doval was also present at the air base.

The prime minister was taken around the Military Engineering Service Yard where the terrorists were first engaged by the security forces and the two-storey building for airmen's accommodation where the last two terrorists were killed after the structure was blown up by the security forces.

Modi also undertook an aerial survey of the forward positions along the India-Pakistan border.

ALSO READ | PM Modi visits Pathankot air base, conducts aerial survey of border areas


By India Today Web Desk: After justice was denied for nearly three months, a rape victim in Bihar has requested permission from President Pranab Mukherjee for mercy killing.

A resident of Saflapur village in the Arwal district in Bihar, the woman who is in her 20s has written a letter to the President asking him to intervene in the matter, as reported by IANS. The woman has levelled allegations against the police and has complained that they have been very lacklustre in their investigation, and the accused is scot free even to this day.

The victim had lodged a complaint on October 22 against her relative who was from her father's side, who is also said to be a defence personnel posted outside Bihar. She has also accused the family of the defence personnel of threatening her and her family.

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Also read:

Nirbhaya's parents demand fast track of rape cases


Noted lawyer Prashant Bhushan, representing the petitioners United RWAs Joint Action (URJA) argued that the high court failed to appreciate that "fraudulent manipulation of records by the discoms has resulted into huge loss, not only to the public exchequer but also to the consumers of Delhi".

By Harish V Nair: The Supreme Court on Friday fixed on January 18 for hearing a petition filed by group of RWAs challenging an order of the Delhi High Court, which ruled that the Comptroller and Auditor General cannot audit the accounts of Delhi's three discoms - Tata Power Delhi distribution Ltd, BSES Yamuna Power and BSES Rajdhani Ltd.

Noted lawyer Prashant Bhushan, representing the petitioners United RWAs Joint Action (URJA) argued that the high court failed to appreciate that "fraudulent manipulation of records by the discoms has resulted into huge loss, not only to the public exchequer but also to the consumers of Delhi". The Kejriwal government and CAG too told the court that it will be challenging the HC ruling. The court then deferred the hearing awaiting filing of all petitions.

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Bhushan said the auditing is necessary to find out whether the tariff determination has been done properly by the DERC and the companies. "There can be no iota of doubt to say that the HC erred to hold that the CAG audit of companies does not meet the test of public interest," the petition said.

The companies had successfully challenged the AAP government's January 2014 circular ordering an audit of the three discoms. The companies contended that they were not government entities and private companies were beyond the jurisdiction of the CAG.

Allowing the plea, the HC had said audit for determination of tariff is not expedient in public interest as the determination of tariff is on the sole domain of DERC which is well empowered to itself conduct the same.

"There can be no other audit by CAG at the instance of the state government when regulatory body, DERC, is already there to audit the accounts of discoms. Such populist measures without considering the ultimate advantage thereof, not only end up being contrary to public interest but also put unnecessary burden on the courts", the high court had said.

After the government-owned discoms was privatised in 2002, the private entities have held majority stake of 51 per cent in the discoms while the government is a minority shareholder with 49 per cent ownership.
The incident took place when the girl's friends were clicking selfies standing on a rock next to the fort close to Bandra Worli Sea Link when she fell of the rocks, reports said.

By India Today Web Desk: A boy and a girl on Saturday reportedly went missing after they fell into the sea while taking selfie in Mumbai's Bandra Bandstand area.

The girl's friend, who immediately jumped into the water to save her, is also reported to have drowned in the sea due to high tide.

Bandra police and fire brigade rescue operation team reached the spot and scanned the area but didn't find them.

The incident took place when the girl's friends were clicking selfies standing on a rock next to the fort close to Bandra Worli Sea Link when she fell of the rocks, reports said.

They had gone near the sea to enjoy their weekend.

ALSO READ:

Couple invites flak for posting insensitive photo in front of burning Dubai hotel



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Monkey cannot get rights to selfie, says judge


The Bengaluru police said, "Maulana Qasmi was always under suspicion for his activities. His latest hate speech in Kashmir was sufficient evidence for his anti-national activities."

Maulana Anzar Shah Qasmi is a Bengaluru-based cleric who was associated with madarsas.

By Mail Today: Close on the heels of the arrest of Bengaluru based cleric Maulana Anzar Shah Qasmi by Delhi Police Special Cell for his alleged links with terror outfit Al Qaeda, a few selected madarsas in Bengaluru and the communally sensitive Dakshina Kannada district have come under the scanner of the police.

"Maulana Qasmi was always under suspicion for his activities. His latest hate speech in Kashmir was sufficient evidence for his anti-national activities. Besides, his financial dealings with Pakistan-based terror group and contacts with the Al Qaeda have been exposed by anti-terror investigators," source in the Bengaluru police said.

"There have been sporadic incidents of communal violence in all these districts. When we traced the origins, many of those who triggered these incidences were influenced by teachers in madarsas. This is a dangerous trend, which needs to be kept under check," the source added.

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Two out of the three associates of Maulana Qasmi are supposed to be based out of Kodagu and Dakshina Kannada districts, which reported communal killings following disturbances relating to the birth anniversary celebrations of controversial ruler Tipu Sultan last year.

"We see a link among the clerics, particularly those known for their fiery speeches. Madarsas hosting such clerics are being monitored by security agencies. We are also supporting the surveillance activities," the source noted. Qasmi was born and brought up in Bengaluru and turned a cleric following his education in the city. He worked at a madarsa for 10 years in Byrasandra but was fired from it following some internal dispute.

It is said that Qasmi was in touch with al-Qaeda sympathiser Mohammed Abudl Rahman Katki who was arrested last year. The police are trying to establish whether Katki introduced Qasmi to other terror operatives in his network.

Meanwhile, the Delhi Police claimed that with the arrest of Qasmi, they have nabbed four suspected operatives of Al Qaeda. While Mohammed Asif, believed to be one of the founding members and the Indian head (amir) of AQIS's motivation, was held from Seelampur in northeast Delhi, another operative Abdul Rahman was nabbed from Jagatpur area of Cuttack in Odisha. The third arrest, Zafar Masood, allegedly acted as a financier for the module. He was arrested from mohalla Deepa Sarai in UP. They were all booked under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

"Maulana Qasim had met Mohammed Asif at a religious congregation in Bangalore, following which he was introduced to Abdul Rahman and Zafar Masood. He was asked to act as a provider of logistics support whenever the need aroused," a senior Delhi Police official said.

According to the police officers, the Special Cell has evidence of communication between Qasmi, Abdul Rehman and Zafar Masood, too, mostly carried out through voice over internet protocol (VoIP) services. The investigators have also traced a money trail connecting Shah and Masood.



Who Maulana Qasmi is Educated in Bengaluru; turned cleric in the city Qasmi is married and has of two sons and one daughter Worked in three different madrassas in Bengaluru Was fired from Byrasandra madrassa for his inflammatory speeches Joined the Tilaknagar madrassa from where he was dismissed recently for his provocative speech, but was readmitted after he tendered an apology Worked under the codename BITH for al-Qaeda operatives Extensively toured Karnataka, especially coastal districts where he delivered provocative speeches Allegedly indoctrinated youth to fight on behalf of religion Several Muslim clerics had taken objection to his style of preaching Was under police observation for over six months
US Secretary of State John Kerry today called up Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and asked him to find out the truth in the terror attack on the air base in Pathankot.

By India Today Web Desk: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today conveyed to US Secretary of State John Kerry who telephoned the Prime Minister, that Pakistan is "swiftly" carrying out investigations in a "transparent" manner into the terror attack on the air base in Pathankot and "will soon bring out the truth."

"Kerry extended full support to the Prime Minister to find out the truth in the Pathankot terror incident," a statement issued by the Pakistan PMO said.

According to the statement, Sharif told Secretary Kerry that "we are swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner and will bring out the truth. The world will see our effectiveness and sincerity in this regard, the Prime Minister added."

Kerry's call to Sharif came amid Indian intelligence reports suggesting that groups and people in Pakistan planned and executed the strike on the Pathankot airbase.

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Kerry said the US hopes that talks between India and Pakistan will continue despite the fact that terrorists have tried to thwart it because "continuation of India-Pakistan talks is needed in the interest of regional stability and the leadership role by both the Prime Ministers is required to ensure continuous dialogue," said the Pakistan PMO statement.

Sharif said Pakistan would not allow anyone to use its soil to carry out terror operations abroad, it added.

The statement said Kerry "lauded the Prime Minister's leadership role in such difficult environment, which was the exact the leadership needed in this situation."

Earlier, a senior State Department official said in Washington that the US feels that time has come for Pakistan to walk the talk on the promises it made both in public and in private conversations - that there would be no discrimination in its action against terrorist networks and bring the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack to justice.

He said Pakistan should not come out with lame excuses to shield them as has been the case with the Mumbai terrorist attack of November 26, 2008.


The student had accused Thampu of shielding the accused professor when she reported the matter to him last year.

By India Today Web Desk: The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) today sent a notice to St. Stephen's principal Valson Thampu in connection with a molestation complaint filed by a research scholar against a college professor.

The DCW notice said that the college administration has failed to take any corrective measures in the case and also asked Thampu to reply to the notice within 7 days failing which appropriate action will be taken "as per law."

"The complainant is unable to pursue her research as her guide, Mr. Y who is the accused in the sexual harassment case, has not been changed till date. She has requested for assistance in completion of her PhD and has sought access to the compounds and other research she has contributed to the project which is not being made available to her by Mr. Y," the notice stated.

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The student had accused Thampu of shielding the accused professor when she reported the matter to him last year.

In August, 2015, the research scholar had met Union HRD Minister Smriti Irani, who had then directed the Delhi University to ensure that her stipend was released on time and she was granted unrestricted access to the laboratory besides being assigned a new supervisor.

Also read:

I am Dawood Ibrahim, says St Stephen's principal Valson Thampu

St Stephen's lodges police complaint against student editor Devansh Mehta


Conservative Constitutional Reform: Is Texas Ground Zero? Stephen Griffin Has the needle moved on constitutional reform? Have off the wall ideas suddenly moved a bit closer to being on the wall? Those are my questions in the wake of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott's release of the Texas Plan, a proposal for constitutional reform. It features nine proposed constitutional amendments, to be enacted by a constitutional convention called by the states. The Texas plan is a detailed brief and I think deserves careful attention. My immediate reactions have mostly to do with constitutional theory, which I will make after the jump.



Part of me is wondering whether this is partly a move to lay down a marker at a time of extraordinary ferment in the country and especially in the Republican Party. I interpret four of the proposed amendments as coming pretty much solely from the libertarian wing of the party (which has always been strong in Texas). The other five are better characterized as promoting "states' rights" than libertarianism per se, although I may be off on that score.



But it could be meant as more than a policy marker. The Texas Plan does not just promote a few ideas for amendment -- it promotes them by advocating a convention called by the states. Republicans currently control 30 of the 34 state legislatures needed to call a convention. Whatever one thinks of the propriety of this idea, such a convention would be most likely controlled by state legislators -- loyal party members, in other words, but not necessarily supporters of Donald Trump, who looks like the nominee at this point. In a very real sense, ordinary Americans need not apply to this convention!



The practical political point this also raises is whether the liberal left needs to propose its own platform for such a convention. I believe it should! There is no lack of left liberal ideas for constitutional reform. Gov. Abbott's advocacy of the Texas Plan has upped the ante and liberals should not be caught out just saying no.



Now for two scholarly points.





One of the theory arguments I've pushed with respect to constitutional change and reform is called the "reverence feedback effect." The idea is that over time, the Constitution gets more venerated and revered as Madison predicted in Federalist 49. As this happens, it becomes more and more difficult to argue for reasonable reforms as times change on the basis that the Constitution is flawed. This tends to discourage advocacy of significant amendments because they can always be attacked by the opposition as un-American. So it's interesting how the Texas Plan deals with this issue. The Plan illustrates the reality of the feedback effect by explicitly reassuring its audience that the Constitution is not to blame! From my point of view, this forces the argument in a somewhat conspiratorial direction. The Plan labors to explain how we have gotten so far off track in arguing that all three branches (!) of the national government have deviated from the proper understanding of constitutional meaning. Given the long period of time involved, it's hard to see how such a deviation could have happened without the support of the American people, their state legislators, and even Texans (like LBJ!).



Another argument I like that is not widely shared is that it made a difference when FDR decided not to validate the New Deal through constitutional amendments. I don't contend this was the wrong decision, given the politics of the time and other considerations. I simply don't believe that it's plausible it had zero effects on later politics. The Texas Plan illustrates my argument in spades by focusing on the New Deal as the point at which the Constitution jumped the tracks. The Plan can do this because all that validates the New Deal, at least on the books so to speak, is several Supreme Court decisions, not amendments. And we all know how the Court makes mistakes! The signal lack of amendments during the New Deal makes it easier today to argue that its constitutional legacy is illegitimate. That's a nonstarter for many constitutional scholars, which I understand, but I hope they will reconsider the idea that you can do constitutional changes the size of the New Deal solely through "small c" means without paying an eventual political price. I hope that's not too cryptic. Older Posts Newer Posts Home
In an exclusive interview to Karan Thapar on Nothing But the Truth, former National Security Advisor (NSA) M K Narayanan on Saturday said we are investing too much in talks and Foreign Secretary-level talks have hardly met with any great success over the years.

By India Today Web Desk: In an exclusive interview to Karan Thapar on Nothing But the Truth, former National Security Adviser (NSA) M K Narayanan on Saturday said the deployment of NSG commandos to neutralise terrorists inside the Pathankot IAF base was a mistake.

"I think, there was a certain standard operating procedure (SOP), which I think should be followed in these cases; I am not sure whether they were followed it or not. One, I quite agree, that in terms of domain, protection etc, its not the NSG but the local armed forces, if they are not available the police which should have been used for such purposes. The NSG is basically a counter-terrorism force and they have a different mental attitude and approach...," Narayanan said.

"The NSG are used for pin-pointed counter-terrorism operations, they are not to be used basically for guarding large spaces. Neither the Garuds or the DSC are suited for the task nor for that matter the NSG. But, I think, there must be some valid reason behind the deployment of the NSG." the former NSA said.

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Narayanan wondered why the armed forces failed to foil the terror attack at Pathankot if the intelligence was so specific that there would be an attack in 24-hours time.

Decoding Pathankot attack, he said that based on his previous experience, the terrorists had most likely used the drug route to sneak into India and the nexus between the drug lords, local establishments helped them. Terrorists were introduced as drug dealers.

Speaking on India-Pakistan Foreign Secretary-level talks, Narayanan said, "There is an obsession, I think, on the Indian side particularly for talks." He said the upcoming Foreign Secretary-level talks have been invested with a certain level of glamour, which is totally uncalled for.

"If the reasons, I would say if the conditions are not fructuous then let us suspend it. I would not say call it off but suspend it. Wait and see what will happen," he added.



"If terror is the principle objective of the talks, etc, then, I think, we need to be clear what are we going to talk about and what have the NSAs talked about in the past... We are investing too much in talks, Foreign Secretary-level talks have hardly met with any great success over the years, he added.

However, the former NSA reminded India to be aware of its needs and said Pakistan's statements hold no answer to our nations safety and security.

ALSO READ:

PM Modi visits Pathankot air base, says tactical response neutralised serious attack

Pak, India foreign secretaries to meet on January 15: Sartaj Aziz


The website also sheds light on what may have been the freedom fighter's dying words.

By Press Trust of India: A British website, set up to catalogue the last days of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, has released what it claims are eyewitness accounts of the day he was reportedly killed in a plane crash in Taiwan on August 18, 1945.

The latest set of documents quote several people who were reportedly involved in the matter related to the accident as well as two British intelligence reports that revisited the crash site to establish the facts.

The website also sheds light on what may have been the freedom fighter's dying words, which reflected his devotion to the cause of India's freedom.

"For 70 years, there have been doubts in certain circles whether such a tragedy at all took place. Four separate reports each corroborating the other constitute irresistible evidence to the contrary," says a statement issued by www.bosefiles.info.



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The documents say that early in the morning on 18 August 1945, a Japanese Air Force bomber took off from Tourane in Vietnam with Bose and 12 or 13 other passengers and crew.

Also on board was Lt Gen Tsunamasa Shidei of the Japanese Army and the planned flight path was Heito-Taipei-Dairen-Tokyo.

The three-member Netaji Inquiry Committee, instituted by the government of India in 1956 and headed by Major General Shah Nawaz Khan of Bose's Indian National Army (INA), was told that since "the weather was perfect and the engines (of the aircraft) worked smoothly" the pilot decided to overfly Heito and proceed straight to Taipei, arriving there late morning or early afternoon.

Major Taro Kono, a Japanese Air Staff Officer and one of the passengers, told the committee: "I noticed that the engine on the left side of the plane was not functioning properly. I, therefore, went inside the plane and after examining the engine inside, I found it to be working all right."

He added the accompanying engineer "also tested the engine and certified its air-worthiness".

Captain Nakamura alias Yamamoto, the ground engineer in charge of maintenance at the airport, concurred with Major Kono "that the engine of the left side was defective".

He said the pilot told him "it was a brand new engine".

He went on to say: "After slowing down the engine, he (the pilot) adjusted it for about five minutes. The engine was tested twice by Major Takizawa (the pilot). After being adjusted, I satisfied myself that the condition of the engine was all right. Major Takizawa also agreed with me that there was nothing wrong with the engine."

However, soon after the aircraft was airborne there was, according to Colonel Habib ur Rahman - Bose's ADC and a co-passenger, a loud explosion.

He described it as "a noise like a cannon shot".

Nakamura, who was watching from the ground, said: "Immediately on taking off, the plane tilted to its left side and I saw something fall down from the plane, which I later found was the propeller."

Also read:

Netaji files: Tashkent angle may divulge new facts about Bose's death






Pakistan opposes the drone attacks and has condemned them as interference in its internal affairs.

By India Today Web Desk: At least five suspected Taliban militants were killed in a US drone strike in Pakistan's restive north-western tribal region, officials said on Saturday.

The CIA-operated spy plane attacked a hideout of the Pakistani Taliban in Mangroti area of North Waziristan, a senior security official said.

"Five militants were killed and several others injured in the attack," he said.

He said one of those killed was identified as Noor Saeed who was commander of outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan.

The death toll could not be verified through independent sources as the area is out of reach for the news media. It was the first strike of 2016 after at least 13 drone attacks last year.

Pakistan opposes the drone attacks and has condemned them as interference in its internal affairs claiming that the strikes kill innocent civilians and help militants to get more recruits.

--- ENDS ---
The lady stood in silence and was later escorted out of the rally.

By Reuters: A woman wearing Muslim hijab was escorted out of a rally for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump after carrying out a 'silent protest' during his speech. The woman stood silently in the stands as Trump made comments suggesting Syrian refugees were affiliated with Islamic State.

Several other protesters were also ejected from the same rally. As they were being escorted out, Trump supporters began chanting, "USA, USA."

The Republican presidential front-runner recently made headlines over his controversial statement calling for a ban on Muslims entering the United States.




Investigative reporting from the inner city to Wall Street to the United Nations This is the blogspot version InnerCityPress.com
Make your birthday special - by brewing a beer originally made on that date.

For a mere 25 euros, I'll create a bespoke recipe for any day of the year you like. As well as the recipe, there's a few hundred words of text describing the beer and its historical context and an image of the original brewing record.

Just click on the button below.
The European Space Agency's satellite array dubbed Swarm revealed that Earth's magnetic field is weakening 10 times faster than previously thought, decreasing in strength about 5 percent a decade rather than 5 percent a century. A weakening magnetic field may indicate an impending reversal, which scientists predict could begin in less than 2,000 years. Magnetic north itself appears to be moving toward Siberia.end quote from:The weakening magnetic field combined with a faster and faster moving magnetic north and south pole to me indicates the likelihood that we are either in a Geomagnetic Reversal right now or a Geomagnetic excursion right now. That is my perspective from studying all the data I have been able to find over the past few years now. Saying it may indicate it is coming or saying it is already here to me are both the same thing. The indications it is happening are already here so therefore it has already begun to happen possibly as early as the 1800s even though these things can take 10,000 years for a reversal or 1000 years for an excursion.The weakening Magnetosphere indicates it is ongoing along with the Magnetic poles moving faster and faster each year (North magnetic pole is moving faster each year towards Siberia).Later: It also could be an indication that humans on earth are draining away the magnetic field by generating electricity by breaking magnetic fields which might be tied to the Magnetosphere and the Geomagnetic molten magnetic core of earth as an electro-dynamo. The magnetosphere and magnetism are related to electricity and so is solar wind and the Magnetosphere and the molten core of earth. So, what humans may have been doing by generating electricity by breaking magnetic fields could be draining away our magnetosphere faster than the sun and the solar winds could replenish it, turning it towards what we now see on Mars and possibly Venus which are two of the world humans may have inhabited millions of years in the past along with the Asteroid belt that was blown up with nuclear weapons proven by a Soviet Probe there in the 1970s and repressed by the religions of the world at that time. Since this planet was blown up 65 million years ago this is likely where at least half of our genetics came from. The other half is likely from the Great Apes of earth.So, if our ancestors destroyed the planet that became the asteroid belt and they also compromised the magnetospheres in the past of Venus and Mars, then this might be a part of what is happening here too now starting around 2000.So, to say completely that any or all of these things are absolutely true wouldn't be correct.The correct thing to say would be for me: "That Earth is presently going through a excursion or Reversal is more than a Hyposthesis and has moved to a Theory for me.And I think that breaking the magnetic fields by generating electricity this way likely is depleting our Magnetosphere has also passed from a hypothesis to a Theory for me using the scientific method.However, neither of these scientific observations has yet moved to being a law as yet for me.However, since the life and death of all life on earth is in the balance theoretically speaking, it is important to quickly now establish if both these are laws to scientists of earth, unless we want to put our heads into the earth like ostriches to pretend everything is okay instead of searching for the truth for what actually will allow the human race to survive rather than completely going extinct eventually here on earth.
The Polluter Pays, but to Whom, How Much and On What Basis  Science or the Cult of Witchcraft ?
What You Can't Discuss:

This is a partial list of taboo topics within progressive-left venues around the Arab-Israel conflict. You cannot discuss this material because it undermines the "Palestinian narrative" of perpetual victimhood. This narrative is a club used by the Arab and Muslim enemies of Israel, along with their western progressive allies, to delegitimize that country in preparation for its eventual dissolution.



1) The centuries of Jewish dhimmitude under the boot of Islamic imperialism.



2) The recent construction of Palestinian identity, its connection to Soviet Cold War politics, and how this is an Arab people with a Roman name that refers to Greeks.



3) Arab and Palestinian Koranically-based racism as the fundamental source of the conflict.



4) The ways in which contemporary progressive anti-Zionism serves as a cloak for gross anti-Semitism.



5) The Palestinian theft and appropriation of Jewish history.



6) "Pallywood."



7) The historical connections between the Nazis, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Palestinian national movement.



8) The perpetual refusal of the Palestinian-Arabs to accept a state for themselves in peace next to the Jewish one.



9) The progressive portrayal of terrorists as those fighting a righteous war of "resistance."



10) The Arab-Palestinian indoctrination of children with Jew hatred.



11) Human rights violations against women, children, and Gay people in the Muslim Middle East.



12) The fact that violent Jihadis call themselves "Jihadis" and claim to love death above life.



This is only a partial list, so please let us know the many more that we are missing.
I WRITE NEWS ABOUT AND PUT NEWS ARTICLES ABOUT ISRAEL AND JERUSALEM PERTAINING TO BIBLE PROPHESY HAPPENINGS.JOEL 3:20 But Judah (ISRAEL) shall dwell for ever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.(THATS ISRAEL-JERUSALEM WILL NEVER BE DESTROYED AGAIN)-WE CHRISTIANS ARE ALL WAITING PATIENTLY FOR THE PRE-TRIBULATION RAPTURE TO OCCUR.SO WE CAN GO TO JESUS AND GET OUR NEVER DYING BODIES.SO WE CAN RULE OVER CITIES OURSELVES.WHILE JESUS RULES FROM DAVIDS THRONE FOREVER IN JERUSALEM.
This copy is for your personal, noncommercial use only. You can order presentation-ready copies for distribution to your colleagues, clients...
Archaeologists working on the Greek island of Krete have uncovered artifacts and structures that suggest the ancient city of Knossos was bigger and richer than previously thought, thus reports UPI Knossos is thought to be Europe's oldest city. It was an epicenter of Aegean and Mediterranean trade and culture, but historians thought that after a solid 600-year run of prominence during the Hellenic Bronze Age, the city suffered a decline in the wake of a socio-political collapse around 1200 BC.The site was discovered in 1878 by Minos Kalokairinos ( ). The excavations in Knossos began in AD 1900 by the English archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans (18511941) and his team, and they continued for 35 years. The palace was excavated and partially restored under the direction of Arthur Evans in the earliest years of the 20th century. Its size far exceeded his original expectations, as did the discovery of two ancient scripts, which he termed Linear A and Linear B, to distinguish their writing from the pictographs also present. From the layering of the palace Evans developed de novo an archaeological concept of the civilization that used it, which he called Minoan, following the pre-existing custom of labelling all objects from the location Minoan.The latest excavations suggest that Knossos had economic and political successes well into the Iron Age. Most of the new artifacts--bronze and other metals, jewelry, pottery and all sorts of status symbols--were recovered from burial sites. The archaeological haul reveals a city that was rich with trade well after the collapse of the Aegean palaces. Lead excavator Antonis Kotsonas, an assistant professor of classics at the University of Cincinnati, said in a press release "No other site in the Aegean period has such a range of imports. Even at this early stage in detailed analysis, it appears that this was a nucleated, rather densely occupied settlement extending over the core of the Knossos valley, from at least the east slopes of the acropolis hill on the west to the Kairatos River, and from the Vlychia stream on the south until roughly midway between the Minoan palace and the Kephala hill."The Knossos Urban Landscape Project over the past decade has recovered a large collection of ceramics and artifacts dating back to the Iron Age. The relics were spread over an extensive area that was previously unexplored. Kotsonas says that this exploration revealed considerable growth in the size of the settlement during the early Iron Age and also growth in the quantity and quality of its imports coming from mainland Greece, Cyprus, the Near East, Egypt, Italy, Sardinia and the western Mediterranean.
Less than eight miles south of Warsaw's centre, yet within its city limits lies Jeziorki. Suburban yet rural, provoking thoughts about development and progress. As well as plenty about human spirituality and consciousness.
TOLEDO -- Tensions ran high in the American Legion building as residents and hog farmers in the area addressed to State Sen. Dale Righter concerns they have about incoming hog farm operations coming to Cumberland County.

Some local residents have issues with the smells and impact hog farming might have on the local environment and property values wanting bigger distances between residences and the hog farms themselves.

Righter received a petition with 236 signatures calling for the state to increase the minimum setback distance between hog farm operations and the nearest occupied residence, other than any residences on the farm's property, from the current 1/4 mile to 1 mile.

Many of the residents who spoke out against the current setback distance, said it was not a large of enough distance, and that the strong odors from the farm can be smelled much farther than the state standard.

Debby Talle, the petition writer, said these odors are toxic and can take a toll on the body even at 1/4 mile out.

The Illinois Department of Agriculture reports that for farms with 1,000 to 6,999 animals, the setback distance from any occupied residence must be one-fourth mile plus 200 feet for each additional 1,000 animals over the first 1,000. From a populated area, the setback is one-half mile plus 440 feet for each additional 1,000 animals over the first 1,000.

Local hog farmers on the other hand who spoke at the forum said that this extended regulation on hog farms causes an unnecessary burden on the farmers.

The (extended) setbacks are going to make it considerably harder to build a farm in parts of the county, Cumberland County Board Chairman Floyd Holkenbrink said.

Those who spoke were either calling for or opposing the option to open the Livestock Facilities Management Act for amending, which details many of the rules regarding the distance a hog farm must be from a residence.

Terry Nash, farmer, said hog farms are essential to the economic growth of the county. He said the hog farms actually supports local corn and soybean farmers with a large portion of their crop going to the hogs.

Holkenbrink said these farms also provide a large amount of tax revenue to the county.

Ron Black combatted this claim saying that the odor from these farms lowers or prevents interest in residential development, which also generates property tax revenue. Black said a good majority of people live in the countryside, and they should not be subject to the odors that come from a hog farm.

Talle said the closer a resident is to the farm, the lower the property value, which she said was unfair to the homeowner.

Also, Holkenbrink said the county development in the past has taken place entirely because of hog farms in the area. He said the county has received a couple of grants in the past that allowed for miles long road construction because of the farms.

Talle said many of the arguments against the increased distance from a residence are mostly focused on the financial benefits and not on the potential health risks to those near the farm.

It kind of boils down sometimes to financial versus health and well-being, Tolle said.

David Sullivan, a hog farmer, said the problem with arguing the issue is that there is a severe amount of misinformation between the farmer and the residents.

There is a ginormous disconnect, and you can hear it tonight, Sullivan said.

He said the disconnect comes partly from both sides.

(Farmers) have to become better and not be defensive, but it's kind of hard to listen when someone attacks your way of life, he said.

Righter said the forum was merely for informational purposes, and he will be looking more into the issue even after the forum to get a better understanding of the issue.

This is a big, complicated issue, Righter said. Any change I make isn't just about Toledo and Cumberland County, it is about all 102 counties.
The Nebraska Chamber of Commerce & Industry will hold its 2016 Annual Meeting and Legislative Caucus at The Cornhusker Marriott hotel in Lincoln on Feb. 4.

Attendees will hear from Gov. Pete Ricketts, state lawmakers and policy experts while paying tribute to some of the states most accomplished business leaders.

The governor will address the noon luncheon. The afternoon will feature the state chambers annual business meeting, followed by three discussion panels on critical topics facing Nebraska.

The evening will include a reception beginning at 6 p.m., followed by the annual banquet and Nebraska Business Hall of Fame induction ceremony starting at 7 p.m. All of the days events, except the morning Board of Directors meeting, are open to the public.

If you wish to register or need more information, call the State Chamber at (402) 474-4422 or e-mail Charlie Volnek at cvolnek@nechamber.com. Register online at www.nechamber.net.
Lincoln Sen. Matt Hansen introduced the Automatic License Plate Reader Privacy Act (LB831) that would clarify standards for the use of automatic license plate readers.

Hansen said the Nebraska State Patrol and Lincoln Police Department use the readers in a limited way, so it is a good idea to talk about how to strike the right balance between personal privacy, liberty concerns and law enforcement needs.

Readers can be handheld, mounted on cars or signs, and used for monitoring secure entries, processing highway tolls or looking for stolen cars, for example.

"I don't think the (bill) I introduced would authorize so-called red light cameras," he said. "My goal was not necessarily to expand their use in Nebraska. My goal was to recognize that they are being used and codify best practices."

The ACLU of Nebraska has objected in the past to the potential for readers to be abused to track a person's movements outside of criminal activity.

Social networking accounts

Nebraska workers couldn't be forced by their employers to provide access to their personal social networking accounts under a measure introduced Friday by state Sen. Tyson Larson of O'Neill.

The bill (LB821), called the Workplace Privacy Act, would also prohibit managers from requiring subordinates to "friend" them on Facebook or otherwise add them to a contact list.

Employers would be barred from retaliating against workers for refusing to grant access to an account or reporting a violation of the act.

The measure would allow employees to file a civil court complaint for up to a year after any violation is discovered.

Breast cancer license plates

The Nebraska Department of Motor Vehicles would offer "Breast Cancer Awareness Plates" and make them available to drivers Jan. 1, 2017, under a bill (LB844) introduced by Lincoln Sen. Patty Pansing Brooks.

The license plates would feature a pink ribbon and include the words "early detection saves lives" on the bottom.

Seven other female senators cosigned Pansing Brooks' bill.

New health care option

Sen. Merv Riepe of Ralston has proposed legislation (LB817) that would create a new health care option enabling Nebraskans to contract directly with physicians for primary medical care.

His direct primary care bill would offer patients a range of comprehensive primary services, including routine care, regular checkups, preventive care and health care coordination for a flat, recurring monthly fee priced similar to a utility bill, Riepe said.

Riepe is a retired hospital administrator.
It starts at 5 a.m.

Teresa Thompson finds her husband, Dean, in the living room without his oxygen tank and has to get it for him. She tries to fall back asleep but can't, and now she's helping Dean get breakfast, letting out the dog, changing Dean's dry-erase board so he knows the day's agenda, helping with his pills, seeing him off to day camp, washing dishes, writing a blog, showering then finally eating herself.

Caring for a 70-year-old, 6-foot, 290-pound man with a traumatic brain injury is a fragile routine, says Teresa, 64.

The routine breaks when Dean's blood pressure reads dangerously high. Or when he disappears in the middle of the night, like he did last spring before turning up at a gas station five blocks from home.

Or when he falls, like he did in September, tumbling down the doctor's office steps and landing in an emergency room, spending three days in a hospital, then going to Tabitha Health Care for a night, back to the hospital for three more days then rehab for two months.

Rehab is like prison, Dean says. So is anywhere but home.

So he and Teresa stay here, in the two-bedroom house they bought at 51st and Benton just weeks before Dean's accident.

"I've been doing everything for 16 years," Teresa says.

"She's doing a good job, too," says Dean. "She's a good woman, and I call her Mother Teresa."

* * *

Dean's had bad luck his whole life when it comes to his body.

As a toddler in Montana, he crawled out of his highchair and fell down some stairs, knocking himself unconscious.

He rolled a tractor off a 20-foot cliff hauling trash while serving time in an Idaho prison in his early 20s. Knicked his arm with a chainsaw while working as a logger. Flipped a logging truck he'd overloaded before driving down a mountain road.

Then came 1999.

It's possible his brain was already battered, Teresa said, but that year's blow was the knockout.

Teresa was unpacking in Lincoln after getting a librarian job in Cedar Bluffs and moving from North Carolina. Dean was helping a farmer friend outside Knoxville, Iowa, where the couple had lived years before.

The man's tractor barely worked. Dean, a good mechanic who'd been "driving junk" his whole life, had to climb outside the tractor to get it started.

One day, his friend saw smoke in the field and came to check on him.

He found Dean unconscious; it looked like he'd been beaten.

"They found the tractor off in some weeds, still going," Teresa said.

It had rolled over Dean length-wise, crushing him from head to foot.

He spent a week in a coma, two weeks at a hospital in Des Moines and about three months at Madonna Rehabilitation Hospital. He lost his sense of smell, some hearing and the use of his right eye. The damage to his frontal lobe cost him cognitive function, emotional control and reasoning.

"Basically it killed me," Dean said.

The experience also jolted the Thompsons' only daughter, Kayla, a quiet student at College View Academy who had just turned 17.

"I didn't make a lot of friends," she said. "I think I had one friend named Jessica."

Her dad returned home right before Christmas, his fuse shorter than before. He and Kayla fought constantly for almost a year, to the point that she transferred to a boarding school.

Those first six years were hard, Kayla said.

Now 33 and a mother of two, she's learned to navigate her father's state of mind, although not as well as her mother.

"She is really the only one that gets along with him when he is in one of his moods," Kayla said. "She's a saint."

* * *

For years, Teresa essentially cared for Dean on her own.

Now she has some help: a nurse who visits weekly and sorts his 10 medications, a bath aid three times a week, and programs at Easterday Recreation Center that take Dean away from home and leave Teresa with personal time.

"Right now I have a very meaningful life," she said. "I'm able to reach out to people that are struggling too  much harder than I am."

She joined the state Brain Injury Association, serves on the board for the Southeast Nebraska Respite Network, and is active in the Nebraska Caregiver Coalition. In November, she accepted a proclamation from the governor declaring it National Family Caregivers Month in Nebraska.

She's written two short books about her experience and blogs for herself, caregiver.com and Outlook, a magazine for Seventh-day Adventists in the Midwest. Her picture was on last month's cover.

Her 500th blog on her personal page, Teresa Talk, was posted New Year's Eve.

Dean had folded the towels from the dryer without being asked, she wrote.

"As he put the last one away in the closet (leaving me with the washcloths to do), he came to announce at the door of my computer room that he would like to list all the ways he helps me around the house. Here's all I do, he said, (as I mentally prepared to discount all his assertions):

1. not much

2. very little, and

3. almost nothing

But Dean  such a social butterfly they had to switch churches  brings her laughter, love and a purpose for living, she wrote.

"What would I do without him?

"Maybe God isn't helping me with all the material things of the world these days either, but He's always there supplying me with intangible rewards that I wouldn't want to do without."

Teresa says she's following a "God-driven" path to care for her husband and family as well as help others care for their own.

"He finds a mission for you."
BEATRICE -- Beatrice pharmacy owner Tod A. Lundberg will be sentenced in March for defrauding Medicaid by billing customers for a name-brand drug but dispensing the generic version.

Lundberg, 50, pleaded guilty in Gage County District Court to a felony charge of fraud to obtain assistance of more than $500. In exchange, prosecutors will recommend a sentence of probation. He will also be required to make a restitution payment of $39,759.84.

An investigation of The Medicine Shoppe, 601 Court St., dates to January 2014 when a former employee contacted the Nebraska Medicaid Fraud and Patient Abuse Unit and agreed to be a cooperating witness in exchange for immunity.

The Medicine Shoppe had been a Nebraska pharmacy provider since 2000, and Lundberg had had a pharmacy license since 1993.

Court documents indicate the woman told authorities Lundberg had been billing the preferred brand-name drug Lovenox but dispensing the generic version of the drug. She said she noticed the scheme in early 2013 and said Medicaid was the primary payment source of The Medicine Shoppe.

When she confronted Lundberg about the discrepancy, court documents say, he told her that was the only way he could make money in the pharmacy world and that he could do it because Medicaid didnt send an explanation of benefits to clients so they were unaware what it was paying for.

The cost difference between the billed Lovenox drugs compared to the generic drugs distributed is estimated to be $1,800.

The worker told authorities she thought other generic drugs were being dispensed and billed as name-brand as well. She said Lundberg was the only one who entered data into the companys computer system and reviewed all claims before they were submitted to insurance.

She also said prescriptions that were dispensed but not picked up were still billed through insurance.

Authorities interviewed a customer of The Medicine Shoppe who was allegedly getting the generic version of Lovenox, an anticoagulant, but paying for the name brand. It was determined the customer had received both name-brand and generic versions of the drug.

When interviewed, Lundberg allegedly admitted to billing for Lovenox but giving the generic version of the drug. He told investigators the profits were going into the Medicine Shoppes business account. He was unable to say when he began the practice.
The whereabouts of a 28-year-old Lincoln man reported missing Monday are still unknown.

Craig Baxter, an optometry student, hasnt been seen since he left his sisters Lincoln home early Monday, heading to his first optometry rotation at Omaha Eye & Laser Institute. By noon Monday, his family reported him missing.

While the Lincoln Police Department is heading the search, other agencies have offered their assistance, including the Nebraska State Patrol, which lists Baxter as a missing person on its website.

More than 23,000 people have also joined the Facebook group, Craig Baxter Missing  URGENT PLEA FOR HELP, spreading news of his disappearance.

Baxter is described as 6-foot-1, 180 pounds with brown hair and green eyes. Anyone who sees Baxter or his SUV are asked to call Lincoln police at 402-441-6000 or 911.
When the first letter arrived in his mailbox, Tony Skov -- Mr. Critter Ridders at your service -- read it.

You are hereby ordered to cease and desist using the name Critter Ridders in your business ...

The letter came from lawyers for Safer Inc., a big company that owned a smaller company called Havahart, a company that manufactures live animal traps and animal repellents with clever names like Deer Off and Snake Away and Critter Ridder.

The Critter Ridder comes in spray or granular form and promises to ward off skunks, groundhogs, dogs, cats, squirrels, chipmunks and raccoons and is available at hardware stores nationwide.

It also comes with a trademark dated Sept. 7, 2004.

Skov read the letter when it arrived in late 2014 warning him to change the name of the company he and his wife started in 2010 -- and then he got out the phone book and found an attorney.

And the attorney told him not to worry. At least that's how Skov understood it.

He said, 'That is a piece of paper. That means nothing until they send somebody to your door.'

So when the next letter arrived, Skov tossed it without reading it. He did the same with the third.

Which turned out to be a pretty big mistake.

Because although he didnt get a fourth letter in the mail, he did get a sheriffs deputy at the door.

He was serving me papers for trademark infringement and thats when I got a different trademark attorney.

Dan Klaus at Rembolt Ludtke answered Skovs call for help in August and advised the business owner to indeed cease and desist.

I told him it was probably best to try to change their name, Klaus said.

The attorney also got Safer Inc. to drop its demand for damages and to agree to allow Skov six months to complete the transition from Critter Ridders to Critter Wildlife Management, LCC.

The lawyer figured the other company couldnt object to the word critter. Its probably not capable of being trademarked.

And there are plenty of other Critter Ridders out there, Klaus said, but only those that had the name prior to Sept. 7, 2004, can keep it.

Which is how trademarks work.

Its not necessarily big bad business trying to take down the little guy, the attorney said. Or that Havahart saw the Lincoln business as a threat to its bottom line.

In all fairness to the other company, they are required to monitor how people use the name or they could lose (trademark) protection."

To prove his point, Klaus offered examples. How Otis Elevator Co. had the trademark on escalators but didnt protect it and how Bayer owned Aspirin but let it slide and how cellophane used to be Cellophane.

For his part, Skov is over it, and he didnt let a harsh word against Havahart -- whose traps he uses in his little business -- pass his lips.

Hes just happy to be keeping his mom-and-pop company going at its slow mom-and-pop pace.

It aint about the money, its about happiness. I enjoy the job I do, chasing raccoons and squirrels and bats out of peoples houses.

Skov grew up loving critters, working at the Pet Ark on Normal Boulevard as a teenager and acquiring enough animals to populate an ark.

You name it, Ive had it.

Then he goes on to name it: crocodiles, snakes, rats, ferrets, chinchillas, hamsters, mice, fish.

He started his first small business, Tanks to You, in the late 1990s, setting up and maintaining aquariums for businesses. He did OK, Skov said, until a bigger aquarium business came along and Tanks tanked.

Eventually, he took a job with Stetson Wildlife, giving up a decade of plumbing work for lower pay and then, after a stint at Orkin, Critter Ridders was born.

The 47-year-old and his wife, Jayme, came up with the name one night sitting around the kitchen table with their kids.

The amiable Lincoln man was busy last week trapping tree rats (squirrels) in attics. The week before it was bats and in a few months hell be even busier, Skov said.

Everybodys having babies in the attic, and on top of that the bats wake up.

His new business cards are ready and the scratch pads are on order and the new website is set to go up soon.

His updated logo is already on the side of one of his two Toyota pickups, which is good news, although he is probably going to have to make some modifications.

His attorney told him he could keep only one of the two personalized plates that served as advertising for the business name he had to give up.

The Critter truck is OK, Klaus said. The Ridders probably has to go.
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Published by an old curmudgeon who came to America in 1936 as a refugee from Nazi Germany and proudly served in the U.S. Army during World War II. He is a former law enforcement officer and a retired professor of criminal justice who, in 1970, founded the Texas Narcotic Officers Association. BarkGrowlBite refuses to be politically correct. (Copyrighted articles are reproduced in accordance with the copyright laws of the U.S. Code, Title 17, Section 107.)
Lets get this out of the way early.

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln is not a Stormtrooper training academy.

But before "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" actor John Boyega showed up a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away as the reformed First Order soldier Finn, he was a teenage model posing for a series of stock photos with an education theme.

One of those photos depicts several smiling students standing in a line looking forward to the future.

About five or six years ago, the stock photo provided by the Getty Images ended up in a promotional poster for UNLs Career Services office, UNL spokesman Steve Smith said.

Who knew a fairly innocuous photo would turn out to have one of the biggest stars in the universe on it, Smith said.

A handful of posters remain on campus, directing students to counselors prepared to help them plan their route through college and into the job field.

Chris Schmidt, the London photographer who took the photos for Getty, commented on his Facebook page about capturing Boyega before he became a star.

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, I did an education themed stock photo shoot with a bunch of teenage students, he wrote. It turns out John Boyega did quite well afterwards. The force is strong with this one.

On his Twitter profile Friday, Boyega said the shoot helped him achieve his teenage dreams -- long before he could star in one of the highest grossing movies of all time.

Yep. Used the money for new trainers, the British actor tweeted, referring to shoes. The Air Force 1s lasted about 3 years.

UNL has no plans to remove the photo, Smith added, but university officials are relishing in the attention of the rising star.

Before he was a big deal in the Resistance, he was a big deal here on campus, Smith said. "Weve joked about putting a velvet rope up and charging admission to see the poster.
WASHINGTON -- The issue of whether Ted Cruz is constitutionally eligible to be president could not be more bogus. He is. Case closed.

I say this as someone who could scarcely be more concerned about the prospect of President Cruz. So concerned, in fact, that I have concluded, after much angsting, that President Trump would be preferable, given that nightmare choice. But notwithstanding Trump's typically ill-informed and situational insinuations (he didn't see any problem with Cruz having been born in Canada before Cruz posed a real threat), the constitutional requirement that the president be a natural-born citizen does not disqualify Cruz.

Article II, Section One, Clause 5 of the Constitution, setting out minimum requirements for the presidency, does not define the meaning of "natural-born citizen," a limitation intended, as John Jay wrote in a letter to George Washington, to "provide a strong check to the admission of Foreigners into the administration of our national Government."

Taken in a vacuum, "natural-born" is arguably ambiguous. It could be interpreted to apply to all who are citizens at birth, rather than those required to go through a naturalization proceeding to attain citizenship.

Or -- although this seems the more tortured analysis -- it could be interpreted to exclude those born outside the physical jurisdiction of the United States to citizen parents. That would include Cruz, who was born in Canada to a U.S citizen mother, and, therefore, automatically a citizen himself.

But even the strictest of constructionists do not argue for such a blinders-on approach. There is scant evidence of debate among the framers about the meaning of the term. Jay used it, underlined the word "born," and didn't clarify what he meant. Still, some of his own children were born abroad, and it makes little sense to assume he meant to exclude them from the presidency.

But previous interpretations from British jurisprudence and near contemporaneous legislation enacted by the new U.S. Congress all argue in favor of an interpretation that natural-born refers to anyone who is a U.S. citizen at birth, no matter where he or she was born. (Not that the framers were contemplating female presidents.)

The best analysis of this topic comes from two former U.S. solicitors general -- Neal Katyal, who served President Obama, and Paul Clement, who worked for President George W. Bush -- writing in the Harvard Law Review forum.

They conclude: "All the sources routinely used to interpret the Constitution confirm that the phrase 'natural-born citizen' has a specific meaning: namely, someone who was a U.S. citizen at birth with no need to go through a naturalization proceeding at some later time.

"And Congress has made equally clear from the time of the framing of the Constitution to the current day that, subject to certain residency requirements on the parents, someone born to a U.S. citizen parent generally becomes a U.S. citizen without regard to whether the birth takes place in Canada, the [Panama] Canal Zone or the continental United States."

The first source of interpretation involves the use of the phrase "natural-born" in British common law, which recognized that children born to subjects outside the empire were themselves "natural-born" subjects.

Second, just three years after the Constitution was drafted, the First Congress weighed in. The Naturalization Act of 1790 provided that "the children of citizens of the United States, that may be born beyond sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born citizens."

As Katyal and Clement note, that evidence is "particularly persuasive because so many of the framers of the Constitution were also members of the First Congress. That is particularly true in this instance, as eight of the 11 members of the committee that proposed the natural-born eligibility requirement to the Convention served in the First Congress and none objected to a definition of 'natural-born citizen' that included persons born abroad to citizen parents."

The natural-born requirement was not an obstacle to the candidacy of Barry Goldwater, born in Arizona before it was a state. It was not an obstacle to George Romney, born in Mexico to U.S. citizen parents. It was not an obstacle to John McCain, born in the Canal Zone.

There are ample reasons to oppose a President Cruz. The place of his birth is not among them.
The armed militia members who took over an administration building in the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge are a fringe element of society deserving of nothing but public contempt.

Sure there is a strain of antipathy toward the federal government that burns strongly in the American West and even in the heartland, in states like Nebraska.

But when Americans pick up weapons to take the law into their own hands they have crossed the line into criminality.

Ammon Bundy and his followers have deluded themselves into thinking that they represent an oppressed people. They say they want the land returned to its rightful owners.

The truth is that the land that Budys armed thugs are occupying already belongs to the American public, and the militia is preventing the law-abiding public from enjoying its natural beauty and recreational benefits.

The phrase returned to its rightful owners caught the attention of the Northern Paiute, a tribe that lived in the area until they were restricted to a reservation. Even now the Paiute are guaranteed access to the refuge for activities like hunting, fishing and gathering reeds for basket weaving.

Theres no support in the tribe for the rifle-toting militia. They need to get the hell out of here, said Jarvis Kennedy, a member of the tribal council.

Harney County Sheriff David Ward in a news conference told the armed militants, It is time for you to leave our community. Go home to your own families and end this peacefully.

Ammon Bundy is the son of Cliven Bundy, who led an armed rebellion in Nevada in 2014. Cliven Bundy briefly enjoyed positive comments from conservative leaders until he went on a racist rant.

The younger Bundy and his followers rolled into the wildlife refuge with the idea of supporting two area ranchers who reported to prison to serve sentences for starting fires on public land. But the ranchers, Dwight Hammond and his son Steven, issued a statement through their attorney disassociating themselves from Bundy.

Most conservatives have already distanced themselves from the militia occupying the wildlife refuge.

Every one of us has a constitutional right to protest, to speak our minds, GOP presidential candidate Ted Cruz said in Iowa. But we dont have a constitutional right to use force and violence and to threaten force and violence on others.

Federal officials having learned from previous sieges at Waco, Texas and Ruby Ridge, Idaho, seem to be planning to wait out the armed occupiers. The tactic may work. But when the lawbreakers finally leave, they should face charges. Theyve crossed the line and should reap the consequences.
What do you do when music has changed your life?

You follow where it leads. You look for ways to offer this transformative power to others.

So it is with Ryan Larsen, drummer and band leader for the Blues Messengers and owner of Roots Music Shop at 19th and Q streets. For a number of years, Larsen and his bandmates have helped young people develop musically and gain performance sensibility through what could be described as a band apprenticeship. In 2015, Larsen took the next step by partnering with the Lincoln Arts Council and Malone Community Center to offer Roots Music Education as a summer program for about 25 middle and high school students.

Larsen defines roots music as that which expresses the human condition; homegrown, often identifiably regional and universally relatable. As a young person adrift, he found his identity, community and mentorship among local players. He found the stories in the songs very powerful and developed a tremendous respect for those who weathered hard times with dignity.

To ground the students in the history of roots music, Larsen utilized segments of a PBS American Roots Music documentary as a springboard for discussion. Following the pioneers in a variety of musical movements brought the students to modern music. Participants were each asked to bring in their favorite song and apply their knowledge to identify musical influences and talk about the appeal of the music, instrumentation and/or lyrics. Students were encouraged to journal in response to questions like: What is one of the most difficult aspects of being a young person in todays society? How do artists/musicians express themselves? How do artists/musicians expressing themselves change culture?

The opportunity to meet and play with seasoned professionals was a high point of the series. Each week, a different musician would spend a few minutes telling students about their journey in music, information about the instrument(s) they play and demonstrate playing. The sessions were very interactive with students trying their hand at a variety of string, brass, percussion instruments and vocal styles.

Larsen describes it this way: Everyone was engaged, and it felt like friendly competition to see who could play a particular percussion part correctly. Playing with a live band was far more effective than working with recorded music. Students could experience the give-and-take collaboration among the musicians; learning when to be supportive and when its an individuals time to shine.

Roots Music Shop is located near the Malone Center, and Larsen offered rehearsal space or just a safe place to hang out. He encouraged students to talk with him if they needed an instrument or had an instrument in need of repair. Teaching and enabling young people who wish to pursue music or vocal instruction is part of Larsens business plan. Consequently, one of the young girls from the program is now taking private music lessons.

Thanks to support from the Pearle Francis Finigan Foundation, the Lincoln Arts Council, Roots Music Shop and the Malone Center, Larsen will be bringing Roots Music Education to the Malone Center students again in 2016. These experiences and relationships that extend well beyond the classroom deliver profound and life-changing experiences for all involved. Making music together makes a difference.

For more information about Art Makes Me SmART programming from the Lincoln Arts Council, contact Lori McAlister at 402-434-2787 or lori@artscene.org.
Tuesday - Bethany Womens Club (a city-wide service organization) monthly meeting 1:30 p.m. in Fellowship Hall of Bethany Christian Church, 1645 N. Cotner Blvd. Program Lip Sync, by LaDonna Jimenez. A creative and entertaining afternoon for members and guests. Hostesses: Kathy Hansen and Jeannette Nichelson. Annual membership dues: $5. Info.: call Jeannette, (402) 476-2466.

Wednesday  Women in Sales and Business (WISB) monthly luncheon meeting 11:30 a.m. at The Venue, 4111 Pioneer Woods Dr. Members share a 30-second commercial about their business. $18 fee includes lunch ($10 without lunch). Special treat: dessert bar. Register online or email wisblincoln@gmail.com.

Thursday - Home Economists in Home and Community to meet 1 to 4 p.m. t Christ United Methodist Church, 4530 A St. Program: "Changing Spaces, by Jeanine Bryant. Home economists in the Lincoln area are welcome as guests.

Next Saturday  Tea & Talk potluck lunch and program noon to 2 p.m. at Wood Bridge Apartments Office/Clubhouse, 7011 S. 22nd St. (22nd & Pine Lake Rd.). Guest presenter Becki Roberts discusses her service in the Peace Corps in Morocco from 2008-2010. Bring a dish to share such as salad, soup, appetizer, main course or dessert, a serving utensil for your dish, and table service. More info.: call Pat at (402) 617-8888 or Ginny at (402) 417-4725.

Coming soon - Lincoln Womens Connection South (affiliated with Stonecroft Ministries) meets 9:30 to 11 a.m. Tuesday, Jan. 19 at the Country Club of Lincoln, 3200 S. 24th St. Continental breakfast and program, $8. Featured speaker: Laura Gonella, Dawson, Neb., a former travel agent who moved to Nebraska, where she and husband Mark set up a 40-acre hobby homestead and orchard. She looks back with 20/20 hindsight and will share how Life is All in the Timing. Special feature: Caring for Our Birds in Winter, by Dave Titterington from Wild Bird Habitat (56th & Hwy 2 and 4840 Orchard), providing information on caring for different bird species in the winter. Reservations due Friday, Jan. 15; call Leslie at (40) 484-8842, or Emily at (402) 464-4593.

Coming soon - Women's Welcome Club of Lincoln luncheon meeting Feb. 9 at Country Club of Lincoln, 3200 S. 24th St. (No monthly luncheon meeting in January, but most interest groups will meet in January; refer to the monthly newsletter regarding time, place and hostess.) More info. at womenswelcomecluboflincoln.org.

Coming soon  100s of Lincoln Women Who Care event 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 11, 2016 at the Country Club of Lincoln, 3200 S. 24th St., sponsored by Smith Hayes and Cline Williams.

Coming soon  CHI Health St. Elizabeth Auxiliarys annual Valentine Day sale 7 a.m.to 4 p.m. Feb. 11-12 at CHI Health St. Elizabeth, 555 S. 70th St., on first level near Admissions. Wide variety of handcrafted items. Proceeds to benefit the Mobility Fund at St. Elizabeth.

Please email Womens Calendar items to dbuckley@journalstarcom
Just because you're retired doesnt mean you cant learn to kayak, master a new language, study Chinese culture or travel to Cuba. The Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln offers this and much more to Lincolns lifelong learners ages 50-plus.

OLLI offers courses, one-time classes, symposia, special events and travel opportunities to its growing membership. Most courses are six weeks long on topics ranging from Facebook to French cuisine. A member-driven organization, OLLI offers nearly 150 classes each year that are planned, organized and facilitated by members.

Curriculum Committee

Most courses are conceived in the OLLI Curriculum Committee. Lois Pasco and David Dyke co-chair this committee of about 60 people. The group is divided into subcommittees to focus on specific areas such as history, current events, science, art and literature.

Pasco says OLLI has an amazing and creative group of people serving on the curriculum committee and its subcommittees. According to Dyke, these subcommittees are where the work really takes place to plan, organize and facilitate classes.

From an idea to a course

Curriculum subcommittee members meet to offer and discuss ideas for possible courses. They also consider suggestions provided by members through evaluation sheets filled out at the end of every class.

De Tonack, co-chair of the science subcommittee, says course ideas can come from something a committee member has heard about, read in the newspaper or researched online. Some courses also come from current hot topics.

Marvin Almy says his contemporary issues subcommittee meetings are lively and members are always full of ideas for potential courses. This years election cycle offers fodder for many interesting classes.

Pasco says she and Dyke also work to make sure the course offerings are balanced and include a variety of topics for all areas of interest. If there is an area where classes are lacking, she researches to find experts or subjects to fill the void.

Finding instructors

When a subcommittee agrees on a class topic, the next step is to find an instructor to teach the class.

Dyke says this can become a challenge and he is continually amazed at the contacts committee members have in many different areas.

Instructors are usually a mix of current and retired faculty or others who have expertise in certain areas. These individuals are generous with their time and teach voluntarily without pay, he said.

Dyke says that instructors enjoy teaching OLLI classes because the people who attend really want to be there.

Willing volunteers

With a growing membership, Lincolns OLLI Curriculum Committee is challenged to continue to provide members new and affordable courses taught by interesting instructors.

As co-chairs of the Curriculum Committee, Pasco and Dyke say they're thankful for the passionate members of their subcommittees and their willingness to work to meet that challenge.

Almy agrees that serving OLLI on a committee or subcommittee takes a lot of time. But, he adds, We do it because we enjoy it.
MADISON  The Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP) is accepting applications for the 69th Alice in Dairyland, Wisconsins official agriculture ambassador. Application materials are due Feb. 8.

In this highly visible and fast-paced position, the 69th Alice in Dairyland will cultivate relationships with television, radio and print media outlets, write and deliver speeches and utilize social media to tell the stories of Wisconsin agriculture. Additional duties include developing and executing marketing plans, delivering classroom presentations and networking with industry professionals. Alice must also learn and retain information about the diversity of Wisconsin agriculture and be able to tailor that information to educate both urban and rural audiences.

Alice in Dairyland applicants should have considerable interest in Wisconsin agriculture, at least three years experience, education or training in communications, marketing, education or public relations and public speaking experience. Applicants must be at least 21 years old, female and a Wisconsin resident.

This one-year, full-time contractual position begins on June 6. The position holder will be headquartered in Madison and travel extensively throughout the state. The annual salary for Alice in Dairyland is $40,000 and includes holiday, vacation and sick leave, as well as use of a vehicle for official business. Reimbursement is provided for an individual health insurance premium up to $450 a month, as well as professional travel expenses.

To apply, submit a cover letter, resume and three professional references to DATCP by 4:30 p.m. Monday, Feb. 8. For application materials, go to http://datcp.wi.gov/Business/Alice_in_Dairyland/Recruitment.

Qualified applicants will be invited to a preliminary interview in February. The top candidates will be announced in March and the three-day final interview process, during which the new Alice will be selected, will take place May 5-7 in Dodge County.

For more information, contact Alice in Dairyland program manager, Becky Paris, at 608-224-5115 or email Rebecca.paris@wisconsin.gov.
Whats Going On includes upcoming one-time

events in and around Racine County such as breakfasts, dinners, car washes, rummage sales, parties and dances intended to be money-raisers by or in behalf of nonprofit community organizations, either held or requiring reservations within the next two weeks. Events held on a regular basis are not used. Announcements must arrive at The Journal Times by noon Tuesday before the desired Saturday publication date. Announcements may only be used one time. Send information to the Online Calendar at www.journaltimes.com/calendar and pick the Benefit-and-Fundraiser category; mail information to Community, 212 Fourth St., Racine, WI 53403; fax to Loreen Mohr, 262-631-1780; or send email to lmohr@journaltimes.com.

Check the TODAY listing in the Local section for other events taking place today.

Wednesday & Thursday

UNIFORM SALE

St. Lukes Health Pavilion Hallway, Lower level, 3801 Spring St., 7 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 13; and 7 a.m.-4 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 14. Brand-name scrubs, footwear and accessories manufactured for the healthcare industry including new uniform lines and themes will be sold. Special orders may also be arranged. A portion of the proceeds benefit the Volunteers in Partnership with Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare-All Saints, which in turn supports the program and equipment needs of Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare-All Saints.

Jan. 16

HEALING LILYS HEART FUNDRAISER

American Legion Hall Post 21, 504 58th St., Kenosha, 2 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 16. The event will feature live music, free food, a silent auction of donated items and 50/50 raffles. Tickets cost $10. Proceeds will benefit 6-year-old Lily Lachman who has been diagnosed with dilated cardiomyopathy and is waiting for a heart transplant. She is the daughter of Nicole Lachman, and Dan and Lisa Bella. To donate to the Lillian P. Lachman donation fund, visit any Chase Bank or go to www.gofundme.com/prayersforlily6.

Jan. 31

TRIBUTE TO LIFE ARCHIE WISE MEMORIAL BENEFIT

Classic Lanes, 5404 W. Layton Ave., Greenfield, noon, Sunday, Jan. 31. The benefit includes a 9-pin tap, silent auction items, raffles and a buffet dinner. The $35 entry fee includes three games of bowling, shoe rental (if needed), along with a buffet dinner following bowling. People may also attend the buffet at 3:45 p.m. for $20 and take part in the silent auction and raffles. To register a team of six bowlers, call Jerry Branski, chairman, at 414-333-8811. Participants who dont have a full team may still sign up and will be added to a team. Proceeds will benefit the Two Lives One Heart Foundation, an organization that assists and supports patients involved in the heart transplant process who can no longer accomplish everyday tasks due to heart failure. Racine County residents have benefited from the organization.
Workshops & Programs

SPECTRUM OFFERS ART CLASSES

RACINE  Spectrum School of the Arts, 600 21st St., is offering these fine arts classes:

Adult classes

Individualized Drawing or Painting, 9 a.m.-noon Wednesdays, Jan. 13-March 16. Fees: $95 (five weeks); $165 (10 weeks).

Learn to Use Your Digital SLR, 6:30-8:30 p.m. Mondays, Jan. 25-Feb. 22. Fees: $90.

Ceramics: Raku, 6:30-9:30 p.m. Wednesdays, Jan. 20-March 9. Fees: $125 (includes 25 pounds of clay, glazes and firings).

Black and White Film and Darkroom Class, 9 a.m.-noon Thursdays, Jan. 14-March 7. Fees: $165 (includes chemicals and use of darkroom).

Photo Outings (and Innings), 9 a.m., first Saturday of the month. Fee: $20.

Work in the Studios: Ceramics, Darkroom, Matting and Framing, $10 per hour or $65 per month.

Childrens classes

Design a class, workshop or a creative birthday party for a group of four or more people.

For more information or to register for classes, go to www.spectrumschoolandgallery.org or call 262-634-4345.

ART CLASSES OFFERED AT WUSTUM MUSEUM

RACINE  These workshops will be offered at Wustum Museum, a campus of the Racine Art Museum, at 2519 Northwestern Ave.:

Adult workshops

Participants ages 14 and older may take adult classes. Some classes require teachers consent.

Stamped Wearable Metals Workshop, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 23. Participants will cut out a simple shape in metal, punch a hole and stamp patterns, words and designs, finish with patina and polishing and hang finished products on a cord with a bead or two. Fees: $55 RAM members, $65 others.

3D Artwork Photo Shoot Demo, 5:30-6 p.m. or 6-6:30 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 21. Fees: Free, with advance registration.

Life Drawing, 10 a.m.-noon Mondays, Jan. 25-Feb. 15. Participants will investigate the human body form through the observation of nude models and learn composition, drawing techniques and the characteristics of light and proportion. Any type of drawing material or watercolor is welcome. Parental permission needed for ages 16-18. Fees: $56 RAM members, $70 others.

Water Soluble Oil Painting, 6-8:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Jan. 26-Feb. 16. Participants will create interesting compositions in still-life paintings while exploring water soluble oil paint, a versatile alternative to traditional oil paint which is easier to clean up and produces less fumes. Fees: $84 RAM members, $105 others.

Childrens workshops

Handbuilding with Clay: Ages 4-7, 9-10:30 a.m. Saturdays, Jan. 23-Feb. 13. Participants will learn the basic techniques of working with clay. Fees: $56 RAM members, $70 others.

Sculptural Ceramics: Ages 8-13, 11-12:30 p.m. Saturdays, Jan. 23-Feb. 13. Participants will create sculptural art pieces using hand building techniques and learn to make surface textures, build functional and nonfunctional vessels and construct dimensional ceramic artwork. Parents are welcome to register and create alongside their child for an additional cost. Fees: $56 RAM members, $70 others.

Online registration closes three days before class begins. For more information or to register, go to www.ramart.org.

ATTORNEYS OFFER FREE SEMINARS

RACINE  Attorneys Tim Crawford and Vince Hein will offer two seminars on how to protect homes from being sold to pay for nursing home care costs at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 12, and 11:30 a.m. Thursday, Jan. 14, at Infusinos Banquet Hall, 3201 Rapids Drive.

The following topics will be discussed:

How to get more money from Social Security

You should not be private paying for nursing home care

What do I need to do now to be able to stay in my home when I need help?

Now what? My spouse can no longer take care of me

Protect your home from being sold to pay for nursing home care costs

What bad things can happen if my parents put their home in my name?

Keep the nursing home from taking childrens inheritance

The Frozen Asset Rule and what it means for you

Reservations are needed, as meals will be served. For more information or to register, call 262-634-6659.

SENIOR GROUP OFFERS LECTURE

SOMERS  Adventures in Lifelong Learning (ALL), an organization of mostly retired people ages 55 and older, offers lectures on various topics.

Sister Pat Chaffee, a Racine Dominican, will share the stories she heard from Kurds, Yizadi and Christian refugees during her recent visit to Iraqi Kurdistan at the 2 p.m. lecture Monday, Jan. 11, in the University of Wisconsin-Parkside Student Center cinema, 900 Wood Road.

Chaffee, a Racine native and retired English teacher, has been active in peace and justice work since 1982 and has traveled to Nicaragua, El Salvador, Gaza, Afghanistan and Pakistan on missions of person-to-person ambassadors of peace.

Parking is available in the Student Center parking lot. A daily parking pass may be purchased at the Student Center Concierge desk for $4.

ALL is a program of UW-Parksides Center for Community Partnerships. For more information, call the ALL office at 262-595-2793 or go to www.uwp.edu (keyword ALL).

WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT CENTER WORKSHOPS

RACINE  These free workshops will be held the week of Jan. 4-8 at the Racine County Workforce Development Center, 1717 Taylor Ave.:

ProTech, 9 a.m.-noon Monday.

WDC Orientation, 1-3:30 p.m. Monday.

Ultimate Employee, Day One, 9:30-11:30 a.m. Tuesday.

First Impressions, 2-3 p.m. Tuesday.

First Steps to Starting a Small Business, 6-8 p.m. Tuesday.

Ultimate Employee, Day Two, 9:30-11:30 a.m. Wednesday.

Walk-In Staff Assisted Resume Lab, 1:30-3:30 p.m. Wednesday or 9:30-11 a.m. Friday.

Ultimate Employee, Day Three, 9:30-11:30 a.m. Thursday.

KeyTrain Orientation, 2-3 p.m. Thursday.

Financial Workshop: Financial First Aid, 10:30 a.m.-noon Friday.

The Job Application Process, 1:30-3:30 p.m. Friday.

For more information or to register for any of the above workshops, call Workshop Instruction at 262-638-6551, 262-638-6550 or go to www.wdc.racineco.com.
RACINE COUNTY  Darkness and thick fog couldnt stop Racine County Sheriffs deputies and K-9 dog Nitro from apprehending an Illinois man who punched a deputy then led deputies on a short chase along Highway C Friday night, sheriff officials said.

Racine County Sheriff Christopher Schmaling said Douglas Ray Welle, 36, of Mundelein, Ill., will likely multiple felony charges after leading deputies on a brief chase in Dover and Yorkville at about 7:45 p.m. Friday.

According to Schmaling, Welle was at a gas station near Highway 45 and Highway C in Yorkville when a sheriffs deputy recognized Welles GMC SUV from being involved in a crash earlier Friday. According to a press release from the Sheriff's Office the vehicle's passenger side airbags were deployed and it was missing its passenger side tires.

Information from the press release indicated that the deputy was assigned to the Village of Union Grove and was flagged down by a citizen at the Union Grove High School who reported that a person in the area of Highway 45 and Spring Street was trying to flag down cars. Upon arriving at the intersection, the deputy located the SUV in the gas station lot.

The deputy discovered that Welle had several outstanding arrest warrants from Racine and Kenosha counties as well as McHenry County, Ill., for writing bad checks, among offenses, and was considered dangerous, Schmaling said. The deputy went to place Welle in custody and Welle allegedly punched the deputy in the head, causing swelling and minor pain, Schmaling said.

Welle, who allegedly was intoxicated, got into his vehicle and sped westbound on Spring Street. The driver then stopped the vehicle about one mile west of Highway 45 and took of on foot northbound through a farm field, according to the release.

Deputies then chased Welle into a wooded area near the Southern Wisconsin Center in Dover, Schmaling said.

The area was dark and foggy, so deputies established a perimeter and called K-9 Nitro and his deputy handler to the scene, who quickly found the man lying in a field, Schmaling said. Welle continued to resist arrest and was bitten on the leg by Nitro before finally being subdued, Schmaling said.

Kansasville Fire and Rescue was dispatched shortly after 8 p.m. to tend to Welle. He was transported from a field via an ATV and was treated at Wheaton Franciscan Hospital in Racine before being taken to the Racine County Jail, where he faces four pending felony counts, including operating while intoxicated and battery to an officer, Schmaling said.

Deputies closed Highway C (Spring Street) between Highway 45 in Yorkville and Britton Road in Dover while they investigated the situation. No weapons were found at the scene or in the mans vehicle, which was towed to the sheriffs impound.{/span}

We are very fortunate that this did not escalate into something much worse, Schmaling said. Our deputies never lost sight of him and I cannot say enough about the work of Nitro. Despite the fog and the dark, he found the man in almost no time.
RACINE  The Racine Education Association handed in paperwork Friday in an attempt to toss four Racine Unified School District School Board candidates  including two incumbents  off the ballot for the upcoming elections.

The teachers union late Friday afternoon officially challenged the veracity and accuracy of the nomination petitions filed by:

2nd District incumbent John Koetz, 4165 Sheridan Rd., Mount Pleasant.

3rd District incumbent Pamala Handrow, 1601 Grand Ave., Racine.

6th District challenger Ernest NiA, 403 N. Memorial Drive, Racine.

6th District challenger Bryn Biemeck, 2412 Prospect St., Racine.

The four candidates are among 20 who filed petitions by Tuesday to run for a School Board seat. About a dozen REA members spent the past three days poring over almost all the nominations, looking for inaccuracies, illegible handwriting, or signatures from residents outside the district of the candidate, said REA president Aaron Eick.

As far as we could tell, some of the forms seemingly were not filled out correctly or show actual intention to violate the guidelines, Eick said.

District officials on Friday night notified candidates that their petitions had been challenged and gave them a list of the alleged inaccuracies. Candidates have until Monday to respond to the complaints, said Patricia Meyer, the school districts deputy clerk for elections. Meyer said she in turn must respond to the REAs challenges by the end of business Monday.

Political ploy?

While acknowledging the unions right to challenge the petitions, two of the affected candidates said the move was a purely political ploy to give REA-supported candidates a better chance.

I think they would like their candidate to run and win, NiA said. Thats America. Im not taking it personally.

NiA said with this being the first board election under the new system of district representation, residents might be confused about where they live. He also said he submitted more than 200 signatures.

Im fairly confident there will be enough left to stay on the ballot, NiA said.

Biemeck, who has previously run for School Board election, agreed the union had a right to challenge, but believed the groups intent was ill-natured.

Im disappointed they have taken this route, Biemeck said. I think Im a good candidate. It just goes to show how things have declined into political power plays.

Biemeck said the REA contended that 21 of her 107 collected signatures were either illegible or from out-of-district residents. Some of the signatures could be bad, she conceded, but she hopes not enough to be taken off the ballot.

Im disappointed that the REA union and their out-of-district funders will stop at nothing in preventing our community residents from the opportunity to vote for candidates, merely because the union perceives certain candidates may not support the REA agenda to take control of the school district and Board of Education, incumbent Koetz wrote in an email. The voters should be able to decide their representatives through the election.

Handrow, a current board member, said in an email that she was waiting to see exactly what was challenged in her petitions.

If the school district decides the nominating forms are proper, the REA could appeal that decision to the states Government Accountability Board, Eick said.
Indigenous Peoples of Tkaronto (Toronto)

The land I am standing on today is the traditional territory of many nations including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat peoples and is now home to many diverse First Nations, Inuit and Metis peoples. I also acknowledge that Toronto is covered by Treaty 13 signed with the Mississaugas of the Credit, and the Williams Treaty signed with multiple Mississaugas and Chippewa bands.
Joaquin El Chapo Guzman [US State Department backgrounder] was arrested Friday in Los Mochis, Mexico in a military raid conducted by the Mexican government that left 5 suspects dead and one Mexican official inured. Guzman escaped [JURIST report] Mexicos highest security prison, Altiplano, through a tunnel on July 11. In the early morning raid, Mexican authorities detained [CNN report] Guzman along with six other suspects. Guzman had fled the building and led the police on a street chase, but was ultimately captured with his head of security, Jorge Ivan Gastelum. Guzman was flown black to Altiplano, where he was detained [AFP report] before his escape. His brother-in-law, who was responsible for constructing the tunnel and coordinating the escape, is also currently detained. Mexicos President, Enrique Pena Nieto commended [press release, in Spanish] the joint efforts of the Attorney Generals office, the Armed Forces, and the Center for Investigation and National Security .

Mexicos Attorney General, Arely Gomez Gonzalez, explained [press release, in Spanish] on Friday that upon Guzmans escape, her office began an exhaustive investigation. After escaping through the tunnel, Guzman was moved through a ground vehicle to an airstrip where he and his brother-in-law departed on a plane to a mountainous region near Chihuahua. Here, investigators learned that Guzman had contacted film producers in hopes of being the subject of a biographical film. Investigators were able to trace communication efforts with the filmmakers, leading them to a ranch in Nuevo Pueblo, Durango in October. When Guzman fled the ranch, authorities located him by helicopter, but opted not to pursue him because he appeared to be accompanied by two women and a child. However, they were able to capture seven people who allegedly aided Guzman. Guzman was one of several drug lords that activists asked the ICC to investigate [JURIST report] in 2011. Commentators argue that Guzmans escape has increased [NYT article] already-strained US-Mexico relations.
[JURIST] Texas Governor Greg Abbott [official profile] on Friday called for [press release] nine new amendments to the US Constitution [text] in an effort to shrink the size of the federal government. Speaking at a political event in Austin, Texas, Abbott cited the intent of the founders in calling for a Convention of the States to cure the problems of the caprice of man that our Founders fought to escape. Abbott now joins Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio in seeking a bolstering of federalism, as Rubio espoused [USA Today op-ed] a similar idea in writing on Wednesday. Notable proposed amendments include giving states the power to override Supreme Court decisions and federal laws with a two-thirds vote.

The US Constitution enumerates [LII backgrounder] the power of the federal government, leaving all other powers to the states. Nevertheless, issues of constitutionality come up with frequency. Earlier this month, President Barack Obama announced [JURIST report] executive action on gun control, calling for better background checks and mental health treatment. In December, the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania [official website] ruled [JURIST report] that a state law banning convicted criminals from gaining employment in nursing homes and long-term care facilities is in violation of the US Constitution.
[JURIST] UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon [official profile] on Friday warned [statement] that the use of cluster bombs by a Saudi-led coalition against neighborhoods in Yemen may amount to a war crime. Cluster bombs spread bomblets over a wide area, many of which do not immediately explode, allowing the bomblets to kill or maim civilians long after a conflict ends. They were prohibited by the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions treaty [text, PDF] adopted by 116 countries, not including Saudi Arabia, Yemen or the US. Of particular concern, the coalition has utilized indiscriminate bombing on several civilian areas in the city of Sanaa, including a wedding hall, chamber of commerce and a center for the blind. In a field visit the UN confirmed use of these munitions, finding remnants of 29 cluster bombs.

This is not the first time the Saudi-led coalition has been accused of using cluster munitions, as Human Rights Watch [advocacy website] announced [JURIST report] the use of such bombing in May. In an attempt to mitigate the conflict between the Saudi-backed Yemen government and the Iran-backed Houthi rebels, the UN had inserted a human-rights representative. Yemen subsequently ousted [JURIST report] the UN representative, alleging biased reporting. The UN announced [JURIST report] earlier in January that the ongoing conflict is responsible for 8,119 civilian casualties, including 2,795 dead and 5,324 wounded.
I started this blog in December 2008. At the time I did not know if I would enjoy it or not, and whether I would get any response to it. I am enjoying it and people have responded. I made a silent pledge at the outset not to say much about my artistic intentions or the composition of the photograph. I would just talk about what led up to taking the picture and what it was like doing it.The discipline is actually not a strain for me, because I do not desire, and really have never been capable of discussing my intentions, artistic or otherwise. My wanting to take a photograph appears as fast as a bolt and without warning when I spot the subject. I then take it or not, depending on how brave, awake, or fumbling I am with the camera. I enjoy exploring, looking for things that stop me, or frighten me. To fear to take a picture usually means you want to take it.
3 held with 9.5kg gold

Police arrested three Indian gold traders based in Kathmandu with 9.5 kg illegal gold on Thursday night.
Female officers man police station in Makwanpur

Bhutandevi Police Station at Hetauda-10 in Makwanpur district has been run by women officers for the first time. It is the only station run by female police officers in the central development region.
India bars entry of ginger from Nepal

India has barred the entry of Nepali ginger, and Indian customs officials have been stopping shipments at the border even though all the paperwork is in order, traders said.
Prithvi Man Shrestha is a political reporter for The Kathmandu Post, covering the governance-related issues including corruption and irregularities in the government machinery. Before joining The Kathmandu Post in 2009, he worked at nepalnews.com and Rising Nepal primarily covering the issues of political and economic affairs for three years.
Nepal, Bhutan agree on six-point agenda to boost air connectivity and tourism

As per the initial consultation agreement, the two countries have decided to give permanent status to the air service agreement
Outside; looking in

We are always looking for a way to belong because we think belonging gives us identity
Police detains two females with 18 kg hash

Nepal Police has detained two females with 18 kilograms of hashish from Baglung on Friday.
The Gods are still leaving

Despite their theft finding national and international limelight, antiques from Nepal remain vulnerable as ever
Three parties are against the demands of Madhes

Three parties are against the demands of Madhes
UK prince to visit Nepal this spring

Prince Harry will be coming to Nepal on an official visit this spring, Kensington Palace has confirmed.
Anil Giri is a reporter covering diplomacy, international relations and national politics for The Kathmandu Post. Giri has been working as a journalist for a decade-and-a-half, contributing to numerous national and international media outlets.
Youth leaders call senior NC leaders to hand over leadership

The second generation of leaders in the Nepali Congress has appealed to their current leadership to hand over power to the youth leadership of the party.
1. Yes. Its important to cast my votes early and avoid the lines on Election Day.

2. Yes. With nearly two weeks of early voting, its a more convenient way to take part.

3. No. Its better to wait until Election Day, in case any last-minute information surfaces.

4. No. Im not planning to vote early or on Election Day. It isnt worth my time.

5. Unsure. It depends on how the campaigns are shaping up. Ill play it by ear.

Vote

View Results
A blog on Singapore defence and the SAF that goes Above & Beyond The Obvious -The views expressed on this blog are my personal views and/or opinion and do not necessarily reflect the views and/or opinions of the Advisory Council on Community Relations in Defence (ACCORD). Copyright  2009-2020. David Boey. All rights reserved. Follow us on Twitter @SenangDiri
2015 was set as the global deadline for achieving the Education for All goals launched at the 2000 World Education Forum in Dakar Senegal,

Key among the goals is improving all aspects of the quality of education especially in literacy, numeracy and essential life skills.

Various regional governments have responded by increasing annual education budgets.

However, various studies have revealed over the years that many children in Uganda are going school, but few are actually learning.

So, the one question that remains unanswered is Are our children learning?

Catherine Ageno filed the following report exploring some of the possible solutions from parents, education experts and other stakeholders.
Hun Sen and the man who would be king

Upcoming historical action flick Preah Sdech Kan will be the most expensive Cambodian movie ever made. But who is its 16th-century hero, and why is Hun Sen so fixated on his life?

Preah Sdech Kan will be the second film in which Ros Sophorn, a professional personal trainer and bodybuilder, will play a Cambodian king. VICTORIA MRCK MADSEN





On a sandy wasteland on the Chroy Changvar peninsula, north of Phnom Penh, a shirtless hero wielding a thick wooden cudgel spars with acrobatic assailants armed with theatrical swords.

The 36-year-old is a champion bodybuilder and personal trainer by trade, and looks barely flustered by the afternoons exertion.

But for the next few months, he will assume another persona: the role of 16th-century ruler Sdech Kan (also known as Sdech Korn). With a budget of about $1 million, the film in which he is soon to star will be the most expensive Cambodian film ever made.

Sophorn  who was once cast in the role of a king in a documentary about the Angkorian empire after sending a photo instead of attending a casting call  is coolly excited to take on the lead role.

With biceps and pectoral muscles reminiscent of Bokor Mountain, a smile as sweet as romduol flowers and a jaw that looks like it was carved from the sturdy stone of Angkor, the relatively inexperienced actor fits the archetype of the historic hero to perfection.

The cast have already been rehearsing on and off for weeks. VICTORIA MRCK MADSEN

He said he had never previously heard of Sdech Kan, but was nonetheless proud to take on the role.

It is difficult to describe what I like about this film, but I am very proud to be the main actor, he said, speaking as the sunset brought the days rehearsals to a picturesque close.

A battle for history Away from the rehearsal set, the portrayal of Sdech Kan as hero is a heated issue, half a millennium after his death. With scarce historical facts available, the tale of the Peasant King  a commoner who ascended to the throne through force  changes with the telling.

For some, the king is a hero and pioneer of equality  the persona Sophorn assumes in this million-dollar reimagining. For others, the hunky lead should by rights be playing a villain: a usurper who meets a fitting end when he is ultimately overthrown and beheaded.

As Sebastian Strangio writes in his recent book Hun Sens Cambodia, Historically, [Sdech Kan] has been treated as a cautionary tale  an example of the dangers that can follow the usurpation of the natural social order.

But recently the tale has been revived in a new light, thanks to one politician fascinated by the story of the 16th-century king: Hun Sen.

Cast members crowd around to watch rehearsal footage. VICTORIA MRCK MADSEN









The Cambodian premier is something of a Sdech Kan scholar: he funded research into the location of the kings ancient capital, and backed a flurry of tourism developments around the site. In 2006, he financed and wrote the foreword for a book on Sdech Kan by Professor Ros Chantrabot, deputy president of the Royal Academy of Cambodia.

Hun Sen has often drawn parallels between himself and Kan in his speeches, referring to the fact they were both born in the year of the dragon and their shared connection to Kampong Cham.

Its a fascination that attentive CPP oligarchs have not failed to note  and exploit.

Numerous statues of Sdech Kan that bear more than a passing resemblance to the prime minister have been erected around Cambodia, commissioned by tycoons seeking to curry favour.

The National Bank of Cambodia has issued commemorative coins modelled after the currency that Kan created, while Hun Sens bodyguards have even staged theatrical dramatisations of the story.

Strangio observes: In recent years, the story has been revived by a new official cult extolling Kans achievements and linking them with Prime Minister Hun Sen, who, by subtle implication, is presented as the reincarnation of the lost king.

The film will have a cast of hundreds. VICTORIA MRCK MADSEN

According to Swedish academic Astrid Noren-Nilsson  author of the forthcoming book Cambodias Second Kingdom: Nation, Imagination and Democracy  Hun Sen has been playing up the parallels since 2000.

No parallel intended

Writing in an email, she said that a set of similarities shared by the two rulers  the shared birth year and time spent in lowly roles in temples or pagodas before their rise to power  meant that an interpretation of the historical context of Sdech Kan can readily be transposed onto present-day Cambodia.

Speaking at the rehearsal, producer Hout Sithan denied that there was any intended parallel between Ros Sophorns muscled hero and Hun Sen, and that the prime minister was not involved with directing or financing the film.

The prime minister did not actively support the film, Sithan said, because it was about a commoner dethroning a king, which could be seen to be disrespecting Cambodias current monarchy.

If [Hun Sen] was involved, people might get confused and think that he made his own history, he said.

Instead, the film was the brainchild of a tycoon close to Hun Sen, who Sithan refused to name.

But Sithan said that despite the presence of an illustrious backer, funding had made the project hard to get off the ground. Before, we wanted to film it with Hang Meas TV but there was not enough money, he said.

The martial artists take a break. VICTORIA MRCK MADSEN

It will cost $1 million to make this film with a cast of 300.

If [Hun Sen] was involved, this film would have already been made a long time ago, he pointed out.

Now, Sithan said, the funding shortfall had been met by tycoon and ruling party Senator Ly Yong Phat, the so-called King of Koh Kong who has been accused at various points of land grabbing and employing child labour on his plantations. The costumes and sets are being provided by the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts.

Mao Ayuth, a secretary of state with the Ministry of Information who wrote the script and is now the driving force behind the film, will direct. Ayuth asked Post Weekend to direct questions to Sithan, while Ly Yong Phat could not be reached for comment.

Sithun said the film would be shot over five or six months in different provinces. I think we will finish everything and screen at the beginning of 2017, Sithan said.

For Sithan, whose previous work includes a Thai-produced documentary about the Angkorian empire, the appeal of Sdech Kans story was his status as a revolutionary fighter for equality.

He said the producers would try to make the film as historically accurate as possible while still making it entertaining and taking into account the lack of documentation of the period.

Hout Sithan is a producer and assistant director on the film Preah Sdech Kan. VICTORIA MRCK MADSEN

A contested legacy

Whether or not Sithans film is part of Hun Sens sphere of influence, it seems clear that the premier would appreciate the producers heroic, audience-friendly version of the kings story.

As Noren-Nilsson explained via email, the prime minister was fond of the Sdech Kan story because it conveyed certain key messages: the potential for social mobility, and the triumph of men with moral virtue.

She said that Hun Sen himself had written of these notions in his foreword to the book on the historical figure: Hun Sen writes that Kan was the originator of two conceptual innovations: freedom rights (setthi seripheap) and class struggle (tasou vannah).

These radical innovations were said to have predated the emergence of similar notions in Europe, making Cambodia the birthplace of democracy in the world.

Hun Sen notes these achievements of Sdech Kan as points for his own political vision, and thereby implies that these two concepts also provide a blueprint for contemporary politics.

Opposition leader Sam Rainsy, unsurprisingly views the Sdech Kan tale in a different light, calling him a usurper who assassinated a legitimate king.

Sdech Kan statues have been built across Cambodia. WIKICOMMONS

The tale of Sdech Kan In 1508, King Srey Sukonthor dreamed that a fire-breathing dragon drove him from his palace and wreaked havoc on the kingdom. Not long afterwards, he had a second dream in which two dragons circled the head of one of his military commanders, Kan. Kan was a member of the temple-slave class and his sister was a part of Sukonthors harem. Hearing portents of doom from all corners of the kingdom and his fortune-tellers, who said he would be overthrown by a man born in the year of the dragon like Kan, Sukonthor ordered Kan killed. After overhearing the plan, his sister warned Kan, who fled east and raised an army. He marched back in 1512 and took power for himself after Sukonthor was struck down by one of his aides, and took the royal name Srey Chetha. During his reign he introduced the first Cambodian currency, the sloeung, a gold coin inscribed with a scaled dragon, and ruled benevolently; however, after only four years, Sokunthors brother Chan Reachea returned from Ayutthaya with Thai troops and started a war that lasted nearly 10 years. In 1525, Kan was captured and beheaded by Reachea, who took the throne.

Subsequently, the usurper did nothing good for Cambodia, Rainsy said via email. It was Preah Srei Sokunbots younger brother who, after a long struggle, finally defeated and killed Sdech Kan (Korn) and acceded to the throne under the name of Preah Chan Reachea.

Preah Chan Reachea was a great King considered as a national hero who confronted foreign invaders on several occasions and, towards the end of his reign, liberated several Cambodian provinces from the Siamese (Siam was the precursor of Thailand). Whoever wants to be compared to Sdech Kan (Korn) must be a little bit insane.

Rainsy said he welcomed any production that would illustrate any part of Cambodias history for the education of our new generations.

But I have doubt on the relevancy of any piece that could entail a distortion of historical facts because the intention of its sponsors would be related to the megalomania of a political leader inspired by political calculation and manipulation.

As for Ros Sophorn, the machinations of Cambodian politicians weighing their legacies are a world away from the dusty area where he practises with the more experienced martial artists. The actors only worries, he says, are remembering his lines and perfecting martial arts moves.
The previous poll on Eastern NC NOW showcased what are many of OUR Constitutional Republic's certain obstacles to remain viable, where the top encumbrance to that continuance as a functioning Republic was the Biden /Harris Wide Open Southern Border. Understanding this overwhelming concern to real America citizens: Do you believe it important to challenge the veracity of those legislated concerns of Democratic Socialists by transporting Illegal Migrants to their Sanctuary cities, counties and states for their direct care?

Yes; test the depth of their sense of well being by giving Democratic Socialists an opportunity to enact all Sanctuary provisions in their communities to test how much they truly do care.

No; the Biden /Harris Wide Open Southern Border Project is designed to only inundate "Red States" to begin their Demographic Upheaval for the benefit of we Democratic Socialists, our politics.
Kendallville, IN (46755)

Today

Generally cloudy. A shower of rain or wet snow possible. High 44F. Winds WNW at 10 to 20 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy early with increasing clouds overnight. Low around 30F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph.
Last year, Mayor Eric Garcetti stood in Skid Row pledging to devote $100 million in city funds to the "war on homelessness." Months later, details on where the money was coming from or what it exactly it would be put towards still eluded the public. It was heartening that city officials recognized the growing homeless population and an imperative to act on it, but the solutions were not grounded or all-encompassing.

This week, the city of LA released a comprehensive report on what strategies and financial costs would be required to systematically wipe out homelessness in Los Angeles. The report calls the City Council's pledge of $100 million in homeless funding an "important first step," but would have to be "magnified significantly" over the next ten years to actually fund the end of homelessness in Los Angeles. According to the report, to fully tackle the homelessness epidemic in Los Angeles, some $1.85 billion would have to be spent over the course of a decade, reports the LA Timesand that's a number that "primarily the price of building or leasing new housing units," but not the expanded services and workers to provide them the report also recommends.

Last year, City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana and Chief Legislative Analyst Sharon Tso were put in charge of compiling the report, which that would act as a starting point for Los Angeles's first comprehensive plan to end homelessness in the city. The resulting document lays out several strategies officials believe will work in tandem to more effectively get people off the streets.

They offer the following as focal points for their plan:

Housing First

The report praises and advocates for a strong adherence to the Housing First approach, saying it "works to remove barriers to housing upfront in order to encourage better health outcomes for chronically homeless individuals." The Housing First philosophy is just as it sounds, putting the individual in long-term housing as a first step, and then applying social assistance to contribute to self-sufficiency.

Expand Rapid Re-Housing

Rapid Re-Housing involves taking individuals and families that are homeless and giving them rent vouchers for a specific period of time in an effort to give them footing to get back into the private housing market. It is thought to be more successful with people who are not chronically homeless. (It's also been very effective for families with kids, early evidence shows.) The report calls for an expansion of the program to quickly reduce the number of lower needs cases in the city.

Offering More Shelters and Storage Facilities

One short term solution the report offers is an increase in shelters and modifications in the services they provide. Currently, Skid Row is the central hub for homeless, necessitating long and costly commutes for many. A greater number of shelters around the city would ease access to case workers, health and social services, as well as laundry and hygiene facilities and allow people to "easily connect to the services they need to manage their personal well being."

Also suggested is expanding a safe parking program for those living in RVs and the creation of a mobile shower program that would travel the city offering a chance to wash up as well as connection to case management.

Acknowledge the Demographics of the Homeless

The report recognizes the need to distinguish the different types of homeless individuals to more effectively cater to the unique needs of each group rather than a one-size-fits-all approach. The report breaks down the homeless population into four demographics: individuals, families, youths, and veterans. Different services can be targeted towards each subgroup to maximize their individual effectiveness.

City Council asked the City Administrative Officer (CAO) and Chief Legislative Analyst (CLA) to put an extra focus on homeless youth, LBGTQ homeless, as well as homeless individuals with pets that are often denied access to shelter due to the animal. People under these circumstances might require extra levels of service that fit their unique situation.

"No Wrong Door"/Coordinated Entry System

The "No Wrong Door" concept advocates that any city department that regularly comes in contact with the homeless could be equipped to connect those individuals with social, medical, or housing resources. Places like libraries and public parks would be used as access point to get people into social service programs.

Integrated into the "No Wrong Door" policy would be a Coordinated Entry System, a standardized entry into social services databases that would ensure "detailed and verifiable tracking of metrics at the level of the individual." Homeless data with this increased level of individual information will help the city better analyze the effectiveness of their programs.

Increased Accountability in Government

The report advocates for the creation of a "Homeless Strategy Committee" made up of the mayor, CAO, and CLA. In addition, the position of "Homeless Coordinator" would be created and filled with an expert in the field. The Coordinator would report to the CAO, acting as the point-person between City Hall and homeless services. The Homeless Coordinator would be in charge on enacting any city plans on homelessness.

Rezoning

In a move that might ruffle the feathers of NIMBYs all over town, the report stresses a need to revisit the land use policies of the city, citing a need for greater density. Part of the reason for the housing shortage has been city plans that skew towards lower density in the face of a growing population. The authors urge the city to analyze "existing residential and mixed-use zoning and land use capabilities citywide, creating new citywide residential zoning maps with greater density in areas most capable of supporting it." The report does recognize how controversial rezoning can be, so they make a note of suggesting city officials work with local communities to "reconcile these citywide maps with their existing local neighborhood plans."

Mayor Garcetti called the report "the blueprint we need to guide our decision-making process," but it remains to be seen how much of these plans will actually be enacted, as the price tag is certainly steep. Also unclear is what effect the proposed $1.8 billion in state funding for housing mentally-ill homeless people will have on the overall price. The report's authors suggest everything from state and federal grants to fees on real estate transactions to help foot the bill, but admit that funding might have to come from a bond or tax hike. Though Mayor Garcetti has talked a big talk about ending homelessness, proposing a tax hike might be a tough sell if he's running for mayor again in 2017.

At least one city official seems confident about public support for the plan. Councilman Mike Bonin told KPCC that he's "impatient" about enacting the plan, claiming constituents in his Westside district cite homelessness as a top concern, even higher than traffic. He added that "we have to do a lot of work to get those funding streams in place," but that "people are hungry for proposed solutions." Bonin thinks that if "folks really believe the city and county are working together," they would be open to funding such an expensive plan.

 New cost estimates for homeless plan put L.A. officials on the spot [LA Times]

 Report: LA must spend $1.8+ billion over 10 years to fight homelessness [KPCC]

 Los Angeles Seems to Have Abandoned Its Homelessness State of Emergency Already [Curbed LA]

 Los Angeles Wants to Spend $100M on Housing and Services for Homeless People [Curbed LA]
From 3 p.m. Thursday to 3 p.m. Friday

<h2>Police calls

<h3>LA CROSSE

3:32 p.m., Entry to dwelling, 1600 block of Caledonia St.

7:19 p.m., Theft, 500 block of West Ave.

9:31 p.m., Entry to dwelling, 1500 block of Caledonia St.

10:55 p.m., Theft, 900 block of Zeisler St.

11:01 p.m., Domestic disturbance, 1900 block of Seventh St. S.

8:16 a.m., Entry to dwelling, 1600 block of Caledonia St.

10:24 a.m., Theft, 4300 block of Mormon Coulee Road

10:56 a.m., Theft, 4600 block of Mormon Coulee Road

11:33 a.m., Theft, 300 block of Vine St.

12:29 p.m., Property damage, 400 block of King St.

1:04 p.m., Property damage, 100 block of Third St.

1:15 p.m., Entry to dwelling, 1600 block of Caledonia St.

1:43 p.m., Property damage, 100 block of Third St.

2:23 p.m., Theft, 600 block of Fifth Ave. S.

<h3>ONALASKA

5:02 p.m., Property damage, 400 block of Eighth St.

9:19 a.m., Animal bite, 1900 block of Esther Drive

2:59 p.m., Domestic disturbance, 700 block of 13th Ave. S.

<h3>HOLMEN

11:43 a.m., Theft, 200 block of Holmen Drive

<h3>WEST SALEM

10:55 a.m., Entry to dwelling, 100 block of Buol Road

<h2>Fire Calls

<h3>LA CROSSE

3:02 p.m., Accident with injury, Tenth and Adams Sts.

4:27 p.m., First responders, 1100 block of Fourth St. S.

4:36 p.m., First responders, Hwy. 16 and Block of

4:39 p.m., First responders, 200 block of Campbell Road

6:31 p.m., First responders, 1700 block of Hagen Road

8:25 p.m., First responders, 2700 block of Harvey St.

8:40 p.m., First responders, 1200 block of Breidel Coulee Road

8:43 p.m., Accident with injury, 100 block of Fourth St.

11:27 p.m., First responders, 1400 block of Kane St.

11:29 p.m., First responders, 5200 block of Mormon Coulee Road

12:38 a.m., First responders, 200 block of Sixth St.

1:08 a.m., First responders, 300 block of Losey Blvd. S.

3:04 a.m., First responders, 400 block of Seventh St.

4:24 a.m., First responders, 1000 block of Charles St.

7:34 a.m., Accident with injury, 16th St. and South Ave.

9:17 a.m., First responders, 3800 block of Cliffside Place

9:41 a.m., Carbon monoxide report, 1000 block of Vine St.

10:46 a.m., Accident with injury, 2500 block of Travis St.

11:37 a.m., First responders, 700 block of Oakland St.

11:55 a.m., First responders, 300 block of Vine St.

1:02 p.m., First responders, 1600 block of Avon St.

2:18 p.m., First responders, 300 block of Jay St.

<h3>ONALASKA

3:32 p.m., Accident with injury, Main St. and Esther Drive

4:03 p.m., First responders, 1200 block of 10th Ave. N.

5:51 p.m., First responders, 5700 block of Koss Road

7:38 p.m., Structure fire or alarm, Hwy. 16 and Emerald Drive

10:41 p.m., First responders, 1300 block of Pinecrest Lane

11:39 p.m., First responders, 5600 block of Sunset Drive

12:33 a.m., Structure fire or alarm, 100 block of Gertie Lane

7:01 a.m., Accident with injury, Hwy. Z and ZM

7:35 a.m., First responders, 1200 block of Rudy St.

10:25 a.m., First responders, 2300 block of Franklin St.

<h3>HOLMEN

5:47 p.m., First responders, 3000 block of Cedar Ave.

7:38 p.m., Accident with injury, 600 block of Duffs Ave.

3:07 a.m., Accident with injury, Hwy. 53 and Briggs Road

9:07 a.m., Accident with injury, 600 block of Tamarack Trail

2:07 p.m., First responders, 7200 block of Bice Ave.

<h3>WEST SALEM

7:11 p.m., First responders, 300 block of Wagon St.

3:04 a.m., First responders, 800 block of West Ave.

7:04 a.m., Accident with injury, 4300 block of Hwy. Block of

<h3>BANGOR

5:27 p.m., First responders, 1600 block of Henry Johns Blvd.

9:09 p.m., Accident with injury, 3800 block of Hwy. 162

<h3>MINDORO

7:11 a.m., Accident with injury, Amundson Road and Hwy. C

<h3>ROCKLAND

8:21 a.m., First responders, 100 block of Ondell St.
Naohoua Tony Yang has been helping fellow La Crosse area Hmong residents nearly since he first moved to the area at age 14.

It started with translating where he could, then a part-time job and now a full-time position with the La Crosse Area School District.

Yang is the 2016 Martin Luther King Jr. Community Leader Award recipient. He will be presented with the honor at this years MLK Community Celebration at 7 p.m., Jan. 18 at the Viterbo University Fine Arts Center.

He said he was thankful and honored to accept the recognition for his work helping Hmong and other multicultural students in La Crosse.

Yang, who lives in Onalaska with his wife, Amanda, and their four children, moved to La Crosse from a refugee camp in Thailand. While working on his bachelors and masters degrees at University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, Yang took a part-time position with the then-Hmong Mutual Assistance Association, now the Hmong Cultural Community Center.

I thought maybe I could use my experiences and the things I learned in life to help these kids and support them in a way that might help them be successful, Yang said.

After graduation in 1996, he took a position as cultural liaison for the La Crosse Area School District. As part of his job, Yang has organized school programs to teach students respectful conflict resolution, self confidence, positive life skills and ways to explore career interests.

For a lot of our students, besides home, they dont have anywhere to go, Yang said. They are really looking forward to it because they are looking for someplace they can grow.

Yang says he hopes to help them think beyond today and guide them toward jobs and careers that will lead them to their own community involvement.

Our community and our country will depend heavily on how we raise those kids, Yang said.

Bill Coleman, a previous MLK leader award recipient and former co-worker of Yangs, said Yang deserved the award for his dedication to working with students and connecting them to their community, as well as the way they respect Yang as a role model.

If anything, I thought Tony should have won this thing long before me, said Coleman, who served on the selection committee.

When Coleman started at Lincoln Middle School, his name just kept coming up from families, from kids, from everyone, Coleman said.

The bottom line is they just want someone to listen to them, Coleman said.

Yang filled that role for a lot of students in La Crosse, he said.

Committee member Maureen Freedland met Yang through his work with AMOS Hmong Advocacy Task Force. Freedland had been on the committee when Yang came to ask for help linking young Hmong people with role models with tears in his eyes.

I saw Tonys compassion and his drive and his caring for these kids that hes working with. He really impressed me as a teacher who goes as far as he can to help his students, Freedland said.

Yang also worked with AMOS to develop a volunteer class to help La Crosses Hmong residents gain U.S. citizenship, a program that led to his own parents becoming citizens.

MLK committee chairman Curtis Miller said it was fitting that Yang was chosen this year, because his activism recognizes the inter-generational nature of bringing social justice to the community.

Theres always going to be another generation out there. Were recognizing this generation work of carrying on the promise that Dr. King lifted up for us, and the fulfillment of that promise is never in our hands, Miller said.

That idea is also represented by the events featured speaker, Sheyann Webb-Christburg, called the smallest freedom fighter by King when she participated in the Selma march at the age of 8. Webb-Christburg joined the movement with her friends parents, despite her own parents reluctance to get involved.

She wrote about how she wanted her father and mother to be able to vote, said Dr. Richard Breaux, who teaches ethnic and racial studies at UW-L.

Her story shows the role young people can play in transforming their communities, Breaux added.

Im really excited to see her here, Breaux said.

The celebration, emceed by UW-L multicultural adviser Bethany Brent, will also feature a collaboration between musical artist Mario Street of Impact Records and the Viterbo University Concert Choir. The League of Women Voters will also register people to vote.

The event is expected to bring more than 1,200 people to Viterbo Universitys Fine Arts Center, and the committee is prepared to provide audio and video to those too far away to see the stage.

The recognition of the holiday will extend beyond the ceremony into a second event featuring Webb-Christburg the next day. With Yangs help, Webb-Christburg will speak to La Crosse Area School District seventh-graders about her activist journey.

As part of this years celebration, area faith-based organizations, including the Congregation Sons of Abraham, English Lutheran Church and Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of La Crosse, are sponsoring a Civil Rights Movement film series.
During Gov. Scott Walker's bid for the GOP presidential nomination, Republican legislative leaders were frequently asked if the governor's absence had an adverse effect on the legislative process. Now that Walker is back in Wisconsin after exiting the race in September, Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, says it makes a difference having him around.

"Definitely," Fitzgerald said in an interview looking ahead at the new year. "Just him physically not being here  although the Legislature does their own thing on the budget  that probably isn't affected as much as individual pieces of legislation ... The idea that you can have a discussion with him on individual pieces of legislation, there's always value in that, and sometimes you get an angle you weren't thinking of. So, yeah, it's actually more important right now than it ever is, when you're back in session working on individual pieces of legislation."

With the number of remaining days in the current session dwindling, lawmakers have to move quickly and aggressively to drum up support for their proposals. Fitzgerald expects the Senate to be on the floor a few days in January, a few days in February and likely a few in March.

A top priority, Fitzgerald said, is to pass a package of economic development bills introduced after a statewide listening tour conducted by the Senate Economic Development Committee.

Those proposals, introduced by Sens. Alberta Darling, R-River Hills, and Rick Gudex, R-Fond du Lac, include efforts to improve broadband access, create regional investment funds, encourage research and development and cut through bureaucratic roadblocks that delay economic growth.

The Senate also plans to vote Jan. 20 on a bill that would overhaul the state's century-old civil service system. The Assembly passed its own version of the bill in October, but it has some differences from an amended version passed by a Senate committee the same month.

A key disagreement is over a "ban the box" provision in the original bill, which would remove questions about an applicant's criminal record from initial job application forms. Interviewers could ask about certain crimes later in the process.

The Assembly version kept that provision, but the amendment to the Senate bill offered by Sen. Steve Nass, R-Whitewater, would remove it.

"I think they'll work something out," Fitzgerald said. "If they dont, maybe one will convince the other its the way to go. Weve given the Assembly a heads up, 'Hey, this might come back and you might have to try to concur or not concur with the amendment thats there.'"

Regardless of that disagreement, Fitzgerald said, there is widespread support for the proposal within his caucus and he expects it to pass in some form.

He also expects to see votes on some education bills  mostly tying up "loose ends" from the budget  and public safety legislation, including Marinette Republican Rep. John Nygren's bills aimed at heroin and opiate abuse prevention.

It's unlikely, Fitzgerald said, that the Senate will pursue any major changes to the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation. The jobs agency has been plagued with reports of bad loans, accounting failures and high turnover long enough that many lawmakers in both parties agree changes are needed.

However, Fitzgerald said, he's concerned about throwing out the positive aspects of the agency and starting from scratch, noting that there are success stories at the local level in which WEDC has played a direct or indirect role.

"As much of a cloud thats been created at the top of the agency level and some of the things that have existed since day one  I'm starting to see those somewhat subside," Fitzgerald said.

Fitzgerald said he wouldn't definitively say the Senate won't take up any legislation this session dealing with WEDC, but he said there's a growing sentiment that the agency should be given some time to right itself under its new CEO hired this fall.

Asked about a package of bills introduced by Sen. Jon Erpenbach, D-Middleton, aimed at improving safety in the state's corrections facilities, Fitzgerald said he hadn't had a chance to review them yet but he'd be happy to work with Erpenbach on addressing those issues.

As for specific issues within the correctional system, like reports of assaults on juvenile inmates at the Lincoln Hills School, Fitzgerald said responsibility lies first within the governor's administration to address them. If the administration then comes to lawmakers asking for a legislative fix, it's their job to help, he said.
Visiting Madison Friday, U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson said no community is safe from the threat of terrorism, in the wake of several worldwide attacks linked to the Islamic State.

"I think the lesson in San Bernardino, or Fort Hood, Texas, or Chattanooga, Tennessee  so often it happens someplace else," Johnson told reporters. "You just see on the TV and you kind of think, well, my communitys immune. No communitys safe. I hate to say that. I wish that werent the reality, but it is and we have to face that reality."

The Republican senator held a national security listening session Friday afternoon at the state Department of Military Affairs Joint Force Headquarters, taking questions and feedback from public safety officials and constituents.

Johnson, who heads the Senate Homeland Security Committee, said the U.S. needs to face the threat of terrorism "upfront" rather than turning away from it. He said people are reluctant to believe people can think the way ISIS does, but the reality must be accepted.

"This threat of Islamic terror is real. Its growing. It can affect any community in America," he said.

Johnson also warned emergency management officials they should prepare for the threat of an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) or geomagnetic disturbance (GMD). Much like ISIS, he said, people think an EMP attack is too horrific to imagine. But he insisted the threat is real.

He said he's been "ridiculed" for mentioning those threats, but argued the country hasn't taken the steps it should to prepare for them. GMDs are naturally occurring, like solar flares, while EMPs are man-made disturbances to the nation's electric power grid.

Johnson also touched on the country's debt and deficit, which he said threatens its national security by way of the economy.

"America wont be able to exert its by and large very positive influence on the rest of the world if were not economically strong," he said.

He also said the U.S. should have left a stabilizing force behind in Iraq.

"I think Americas role in the world, as I look at it, is we cant afford to be the worlds policeman  but when it is in our national interest and we have the ability to stabilize and provide stability to a region we should. We have to deal with the here and now, but you cant ignore the lessons of history."
JERUSALEM (AP)  Roman Catholic officials said this week that a Franciscan priest who had been abducted by militants in Syria has been freed.

The custodian of the Catholic Churchs properties in the Holy Land said the priest, Rev. Dhiya Azziz, was released late Monday. The office of the custodian, Rev. Pierbattista Pizzaballa, said the priest was abducted by jihadis who had hoped to profit from the abduction.

The statement did not elaborate, and it was not clear which of the multiple militant groups in Syria had been holding the priest or whether a ransom had been paid.

Sir, the news agency of the Italian bishops conference, said the Iraqi-born Azziz was abducted on Dec. 23 as he traveled from Turkey to the town of Yacoubiyeh in Syrias northwestern Idlib province.

The Vaticans envoy in Aleppo, Monsignor Georges Abou Khazen, told the agency that Azziz had been treated well in captivity but was exhausted and needed to rest.

Sir said it was the second time that Azziz had been abducted. In July he managed to escape after a few days.
Bahamian pleads not guilty to stealing unreleased TV scripts  NEW YORK  A Bahamian man charged with hacking into celebrities email accounts to steal unreleased movie and TV scripts and private sex videos can be held without bail because hes a flight risk, a judge said Friday. The risk that Alonzo Knowles will flee was overwhelmingly established during a bail hearing after he pleaded not guilty to charges he violated copyright infringement and identity theft laws, U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer said. Knowles, a resident of Freeport, Bahamas, was arrested last month after meeting with an undercover federal agent in what prosecutors said was an effort to sell 15 movie and television scripts for $80,000.

Police: Couple ODs in hospital after daughters surgery  BIRMINGHAM, Ala.  Mary Ann and Wesley Landers posted a social media update earlier this week saying their 7-month-old daughters surgery for a congenital throat problem was a success. Family members and friends, including Tracey Bice, were both relieved and thrilled. Their excitement turned to disbelief on Thursday, when authorities found Mary Ann Landers unconscious from an apparent heroin overdose in the girls hospital room at Cincinnati Childrens Hospital Medical Center. Her husband, Wesley Landers, was found unconscious in the bathroom, also of an apparent overdose. Mary Ann Landers later died; Wesley Landers was revived and arrested on drug and weapons charges after authorities said they found a loaded gun in his pocket. Mary Ann Landers never used drugs as far as friends and family knew, and she married Wesley Landers only because he cleaned himself up after drug abuse that played a role in his divorce from another woman in 2010, Bice said.

Texas governor joins GOP calls for constitutional convention  AUSTIN, Texas (AP)  Texas Gov. Greg Abbott sought to lure Republican support Friday for calling the first U.S. constitutional convention since 1787, a new a priority for his administration that has bemoaned federal courts blocking state laws over gay marriage, abortion restrictions and voting rights. Conservative calls for states to get together and ratify new amendments to the Constitution are hardly new. Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio has even vowed to push for a convention in elected, though the idea is generating little buzz in the 2016 presidential race. His vision also goes beyond the most common GOP desire for a convention  to tack a federal balanced budget amendment onto the Constitution  and outlines a flurry of new state protections that would nullify federal laws and weaken the U.S. Supreme Court. One of his nine proposals would require a supermajority of seven justices  out of nine  to invalidate any state law.
Walker: Terror arrests validate anti-refugee stance  MADISON  Gov. Scott Walker says terrorism-related arrests vindicate his stance against Syrian refugees. Walker tweeted Friday asking if people still wonder why he raised concerns about ensuring that Syrian refugees coming into Wisconsin are safe. He included a link to a story about the arrests. Authorities arrested two men with ties to the Islamic State in California and Texas on Thursday. One of them, Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, is accused of traveling to Syria to fight. According to court documents, he came to the United States from Syria as a refugee. While living in Arizona and Wisconsin he communicated on social media about wanting to return to Syria to fight for terrorists and discussed fighting against the regime there in the past. Three of Al-Jayabs relatives were arrested in Milwaukee on Thursday.

2 found dead in Rice Lake apartment building  RICE LAKE  Two people have been found dead in an apartment building in a small northwestern Wisconsin city. Police say they were called to the apartment building in Rice Lake about 10:30 p.m. Thursday after a woman called Barron County dispatchers to report she heard a gunshot and screaming. Additional gunshots were reported before police arrived. Officers found a woman dead in the apartment and evacuated the building. Sheriffs deputies joined a search of the building and a man was found fatally shot. The investigation is ongoing.

Potentially dangerous cables could be buried in Wisconsin  MILWAUKEE  Records show there are eight sites in Wisconsin where potentially dangerous cables that were once used to power U.S. Coast Guard lights could be buried underground. Such a cable caused an explosion at a crowded Rhode Island beach last summer and injured a woman. Coast Guard records provided to The Associated Press show similar cables are buried under beaches, harbors and waterways at 48 sites in 12 states. The cables powered lighthouses, buoys and other beacons that have since been converted to solar power. Scientists say the explosion in Narragansett, Rhode Island, was probably caused by hydrogen that built up around a corroded underground cable. The Wisconsin sites include: Bayfield Harbor South Breakwater Light, Superior Entry South Breakwater Light, Kenosha Light, Milwaukee Breakwater Light, Milwaukee Pierhead Light, Sheboygan North Pierhead Light, Manitowoc Breakwater Light and Two Rivers North Pierhead Light.

Minnesota lawmaker tried to sway judge on companys behalf  ST. PAUL  A Minnesota legislator tried unsuccessfully last month to personally intervene with a judge who ordered a business owner in his district to pay a legal judgment of more than $240,000. State Rep. Jim Newbergers effort to win his constituent and one-time campaign donor a do-over drew a curt response from Stearns County District Court Judge William Cashman, who deemed the personal contact inappropriate. Newberger declined to discuss his advocacy when The Associated Press approached him Thursday, describing it as a private matter that he was surprised to see become public. The Becker Republican did, however, issue a statement Friday defending his action on behalf of Jeff Friedrich, president of CarCo Automotive Inc. based in Rice. As a legislator, I will always be a tireless advocate for my constituents in Sherburne and Benton Counties, Newberger said in the statement. In this instance, once I learned of a judicial rule barring my correspondence on behalf of a constituent, I respected it. Newbergers letter to the judge was a last-ditch attempt by Friedrich to reopen the lawsuit filed by another central Minnesota business, Finken Water Inc.
Man charges in 1990 homicide convicted on drug charges  FOND DU LAC  The man charged with killing a teenager in 1990 has been convicted in a separate drug case in Fond du Lac County. A jury on Thursday found 62-year-old Dennis Brantner guilty of all ten drug counts against him, including possession of narcotics. The Reporter Media says it took jurors 45 minutes of deliberation to reach the verdicts. Brantner, in a separate case, is accused of killing 18-year-old Berit Beck in July 1990 after she stopped in Fond du Lac while traveling from her home in Sturtevant to Appleton for a work seminar. Her van was discovered in a parking lot in Fond du Lac three days after she disappeared. Her body was discovered six weeks later. Brantner will stand trial on those charges in June.

Former Plover doctor charged with sexual assault  PLOVER  A former central Wisconsin doctor is accused of having sexual contact with female patients. A criminal complaint filed in Portage County Circuit Court charges Wilton Calderon with four felony sexual assault charges and six misdemeanor assault charges. Prosecutors say Calderon was working at Plover Family Practice when police got an anonymous tip that he was exchanging medication for sexual contact with a former patient. Investigators say theyve identified multiple female patients who have accused Calderon of sexual contact. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration assisted Plover police in the eight-month investigation. Calderon now lives in Old Lyme, Connecticut. He did not immediately return a call left at his home for comment.

Potentially dangerous cables could be buried in Wisconsin  MILWAUKEE  Records show there are eight sites in Wisconsin where potentially dangerous cables that were once used to power U.S. Coast Guard lights could be buried underground. Such a cable caused an explosion at a crowded Rhode Island beach last summer and injured a woman. Coast Guard records provided to The Associated Press show similar cables are buried under beaches, harbors and waterways at 48 sites in 12 states. The cables powered lighthouses, buoys and other beacons that have since been converted to solar power. Scientists say the explosion in Narragansett, Rhode Island, was probably caused by hydrogen that built up around a corroded underground cable. The Wisconsin sites include: Bayfield Harbor South Breakwater Light, Superior Entry South Breakwater Light, Kenosha Light, Milwaukee Breakwater Light, Milwaukee Pierhead Light, Sheboygan North Pierhead Light, Manitowoc Breakwater Light and Two Rivers North Pierhead Light.
It was a banner year for television in 2015, with a record 409 scripted series across broadcast networks, basic and pay cable networks and streaming services. But with all the talk of scripted programmings upswing, an intriguing subplot has emerged about whether reality TV is in a slump.

Although shows such as NBCs The Voice and ABCs Dancing With the Stars can still draw sizable audiences, the once-formidable genre has waned. Big bets such as Foxs Utopia and ABCs Rising Star flopped. And after 14 years, American Idol  once a ratings juggernaut  has begun its farewell season with a slimmer following.

Cris Abrego isnt worried. The former chief executive officer of 51 Minds, a production company specializing in reality TV productions, was recently tapped as co-chairman and co-chief executive of Endemol Shine North America (a role he shares with Charlie Corwin). He oversees operations of the company that produces everything from MasterChef Junior and Big Brother to The Real Housewives of Atlanta and The Biggest Loser. In all, the company produces nearly 100 unscripted series.

The Times spoke to Abrego, who has a book Make It Reality: Create Your Opportunities, Own Your Success coming out in May, about the state of reality TV industry. Here is an edited excerpt of that conversation:

Q: It feels like the reality TV industry has taken a hit. How do you think the genre is faring?

A: Were in a difficult spot. But this is why our business is so brilliant. Its a creative business and its up to us to really raise the bar again. Some of the best stuff on television right now is scripted. And some of the best stories right now are scripted. And I know my colleagues in scripted might argue this, but I attribute it to the success of unscripted back in the day.

Back in 1998 and 1999, scripted had become real stagnant  there was nothing edgy. And reality TV was going through the roof because it felt so real and authentic. Then all of a sudden, someone took a chance on a show about a cop who was dirty and featured an actor who was older. That show was The Shield on FX. And then all of a sudden we get two plastic surgeons, one of which is doing crazy things, on Nip/Tuck. Then we get (AMCs) Breaking Bad. They pushed the envelope in scripted. They had to get edgier and louder because unscripted was so real and so loud. So, yeah, were in a tough spot with unscripted. But its only a matter of time before the balance shifts again. Reality is not going away.

Q: When high-profile shows like Utopia fail, does that make it harder for you because it furthers the idea that reality is in a slump?

A: Unfortunately, this town operates a lot out of fear. The minute Utopia tanked, if you had the (guts) to walk in a room and pitch something similar to Utopia, nobody is going to buy it. If you really looked at unscripted right now, a lot of shows are doing really well, especially in cable. Even in broadcast, The Voice still does well. American Idol will probably come out and still do significant numbers. Will they be the numbers that Idol was doing five years ago? No. But compared to a lot of stuff out there, its still doing incredible. Endemol Shine North America is also building its scripted library  youve got shows like Kingdom and Hell on Wheels.

Q: Lets talk about Spanish-language networks. Traditionally, they didnt deviate from the tried-and-true combination of telenovelas and variety shows and talk shows. Now, were seeing them experiment in ways we havent seen before  and some of that is with reality TV.

A: The billennials that have now matured and have access to everything else, so they need more updated stories, different stories and more choices and brands that are not overly different than what you see in the general market. So were taking advantage of that with our own brands. Big Brother has been in the U.S. for 16 years. Theres no reason we shouldnt have a Spanish version, Gran Hermano, here in the U.S.

Telemundo, I have to give them credit, theyre the ones really leading the charge on this. Theyve got The Voice, they have the rights to The Walking Dead, which over-indexes anyhow with Latinos on AMC, so why not have that in Spanish? In addition to Gran Hermano, we also have a scripted series were doing with Telemundo. Its called El Vato, it looks like a Mexican Entourage.

Q: Is there a show out there that you wish was part of Endemol Shine?

A: If I had to pick, I would say probably Ninja Warrior. We watch it as a family. You can make 50 episodes of it. And its done really well. If I had come in four years ago and said, Hey, Im going to build one big jungle gym and Im going to run 50 people through it  I wouldve been kicked out of the room. That pitch wouldve tanked. But someone gave them a shot to do it and they did it right with the lights and the commentators and the execution. We did Wipe Out for the longest time. It pains me how many people loved that show and yet ABC took it off the air.

Q: What are the issues you find yourself talking about with people in the industry?

A: Its the ongoing conversation that is cresting now: the monetization of these direct-to-consumer services, these OTT (streaming) places and how theyre structured. Should you go it alone? Should you team up with the Hulus and such? Should you just buy into these guys and move on? Should you do it yourself, like were doing with Endemol Beyond? Those are a lot of the conversations going on, along with, in every genre, we need a hit. We need a big hit.
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(9) Apr 27 (6) Apr 26 (5) Apr 25 (8) Apr 24 (7) Apr 23 (8) Apr 22 (6) Apr 21 (5) Apr 20 (10) Apr 19 (7) Apr 18 (7) Apr 17 (8) Apr 16 (5) Apr 15 (6) Apr 14 (9) Apr 13 (11) Apr 12 (8) Apr 11 (5) Apr 10 (10) Apr 09 (7) Apr 08 (5) Apr 07 (9) Apr 06 (10) Apr 05 (5) Apr 04 (5) Apr 03 (7) Apr 02 (6) Apr 01 (5) Mar 31 (3) Mar 30 (3) Mar 29 (1) Mar 28 (5) Mar 27 (7) Mar 26 (8) Mar 25 (4) Mar 24 (8) Mar 23 (5) Mar 22 (4) Mar 21 (5) Mar 20 (7) Mar 19 (5) Mar 18 (8) Mar 17 (8) Mar 16 (3) Mar 15 (6) Mar 14 (9) Mar 13 (6) Mar 12 (6) Mar 11 (7) Mar 10 (6) Mar 09 (8) Mar 08 (5) Mar 07 (5) Mar 06 (6) Mar 05 (9) Mar 04 (7) Mar 03 (6) Mar 02 (5) Mar 01 (7) Feb 28 (8) Feb 27 (7) Feb 26 (4) Feb 25 (9) Feb 24 (6) Feb 23 (6) Feb 22 (7) Feb 21 (3) Feb 20 (6) Feb 19 (5) Feb 18 (5) Feb 17 (4) Feb 16 (4) Feb 15 (5) Feb 14 (8) Feb 13 (6) Feb 12 (4) Feb 11 (5) Feb 10 (6) Feb 09 (7) Feb 08 (6) Feb 07 (6) Feb 06 (6) Feb 05 (5) Feb 04 (5) Feb 03 (10) Feb 02 (9) Feb 01 (3) Jan 31 (8) Jan 30 (4) Jan 29 (9) Jan 28 (6) 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Abigail Adams was like a modern woman, even though she lived in colonial times.

She strongly supported the American Revolution, womens rights and education. She worked to get public schooling for girls. She was a smart businessperson during a time when women in the U.S. could not even own property.

Abigail Adams and her husband, John Adams, were also strong voices against slavery at a time when owning another person was legal in the U.S. Unlike some of Americas other founders  including George Washington and Thomas Jefferson  John and Abigail Adams did not own any slaves.

Journalist and author Cokie Roberts has written several books about women in the early days of the U.S., including Ladies of Liberty. She says Abigail Adams is best known for this phrase: Remember the ladies.

When the men were meeting in Philadelphia to think about creating a new country, breaking away from the British, she wrote to her husband and said, Well I suppose we will have to have to have a new code of laws and when you write those laws, remember the ladies, because all men would be tyrants if they could. And those have become some of the most famous words in the English language, or the American English language. Remember the ladies.

Roberts adds that nobody knows exactly what Abigail was arguing for at the time. She thinks Abigail, who was a strong supporter of womens rights, was probably arguing in favor of legal rights for women.

A life in letters

Abigail Smith was born in Weymouth, Massachusetts in 1744. Her father was a pastor and she received a fine education at home - but not a formal one at a school.

She married John Adams when she was 20 years old. John became a prominent lawyer in Boston.

Historians know a lot about Abigail and John Adams because they wrote each other many letters over the course of their marriage. And, unlike Martha and George Washington, the Adams did not burn their letters. More than 1,100 still survive.

Abigail and John often wrote to each other when they were apart.

First, during the American War of Independence against the British, John left the family farm in Massachusetts and stayed in the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was an important part of the Continental Congress there.

Journalist Cokie Roberts says Abigail managed the familys affairs while her husband was gone.

She was very good at math. We know that because even though women, married women, were not allowed to own property at that time, she bought and sold property all the time. And she made a very handy income which supported the family for long periods of time, when her husband was away and not making any money.

Abigail and John were apart again when he went to Europe as one of the first U.S. diplomatic ministers.

When John was in Europe, Abigail would see what people needed in America. She asked John to send items such as lace, cloth and handkerchiefs from Europe, then she would sell them at home to make money.

The separations were difficult for the couple. Cokie Roberts says, John Adams really could not function without her.

One example: When John was sworn in as president of the United States in 1796, Abigail was still at their home in Massachusetts. She was taking care of the familys farm, as well as John Adams mother, who was dying.

But John wanted Abigail at his side.

He wrote her letters every day saying, 'You must come, you must come. I cannot do this without you! Come, I can't do this! You must come!' The letters became more and more and more insistent. Because he really depended on her so mightily to help him make decisions about what was important and what political decisions he should make.

Eventually, Abigail was able to join her husband. They became the first people to live in the presidents mansion in Washington, D.C.  what we call today, the White House.

The house was still being built when they moved in. Abigail wrote that it was cold and drafty. She hung up the laundry to dry in the East Room. Today, the East Room is where formal dinners and important events are held.

Abigail Adams said her situation as first lady was one of splendid misery.

John lost the presidential election of 1800 to Thomas Jefferson. Then Abigail and John retired to their land in Massachusetts. She was 73 years old when she died in 1818.

Legacy

Three of her daughters and one of her sons died before she did. Two other sons survived her, including John Quincy Adams. He became the sixth president of the United States. However, Abigail did not live to see him elected president.

Until recently, she was the only woman to be both the wife and mother of a U.S. president. When George W. Bush was elected president in 2000, his mother, Barbara Bush, became only the second woman to have both a husband and a son be president.

Reaching back all those years to the 1700s, what many people say stands out the most about Abigail Adams is her relationship with her husband.

Journalist Cokie Roberts says they were a team.

The relationship with John was one that was very, very close, and quite romantic.

Sometimes Abigail Adams was an outspoken adviser to her husband. Roberts says she had an abrasive style and there were times when she could not hold her tongue. People complained about her, especially those from the opposing political party. Some called her Presidentess. The term was not a compliment.

If one is to believe White House lore, Abigail Adams still appears at the White House ... as a ghost. The White House Historical Association says, Abigail Adams hung laundry in the East Room, and contemporary staff can smell wet laundry and the scent of lavender.

Like Martha Washington before her, Abigail Adams set an example of what a political wife and a first lady could be. She was more outspoken than Martha, as well as more modern in her thinking and style. But both were treasured partners for their husbands, the first, and second, presidents of the United States of America.

Im Anne Ball.

What do you think are important qualities in the spouse or partner of a politician? Write to us in the Comments section and on our Facebook page.

Anne Ball wrote this story. Kelly J. Kelly was the editor.

_____________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

insistent  adj. demanding that something happen or someone do something

mightily adv. very much

prominent adj. well known and important

endured  v. to experience something painful for a long time

lace  n. a very light and thin cloth made with patterns of holes

handkerchief  n. a small cloth used for wiping your ears, nose, or face

drafty  adj. cold air moving through that makes it feel cold

outspoken adj. talking freely about what one thinks

abrasive  adj. having a rough, unpleasant quality

she could not hold her tongue  phrase. She was not able, or unable, to control what she said, and said things other's disagreed with.


Fugitive drug lord Joaquin El Chapo Guzman has been captured six months after his bold escape from prison.

He was one of the most wanted men in the world.

Guzman was arrested in a raid on a home before dawn in Los Mochis, reported USA Today. That city is in Guzmans home state of Sinaloa. The Mexican Navy said that marines acted on a tip about Guzmans location.

Guzman escaped from a maximum-security prison in Mexico last July 11. He broke out of the prison in a mile-long tunnel from his prison cell shower.

News outlets broadcast pictures of the elaborate shower and tunnel. A motorcycle carried him through the long tunnel, away from the prison.

Authorities have been hunting him ever since.

It was not his first time he escaped a maximum-security prison. The drug lord was first jailed after being forcibly returned, or extradited, from Guatemala in 1993. He escaped his maximum security prison in 2001. That time he was said to have escaped in a laundry cart.

He was found 13 years later in the seaside resort of Mazatlan. Guzman was returned to prison, only to break out again about 16 months later.

The Mexican government has been criticized for Guzmans escapes. Critics questioned whether El Chapo was able to buy off officials to escape.

Guzman is a wealthy drug lord. He is worth about $1 billion, say news reports. The U.S. wants him arrested for trafficking illegal drugs to this country.

If he is extradited to the U.S., he would be held at a maximum security prison in this country. That would make another escape very difficult.

CNN said the U.S. had a $5 million reward for his capture, and the Mexican government was offering $4 million for him as well.

Guzman is nicknamed Shorty for his small height.

Im Anne Ball.

Anne Ball wrote this story. Kathleen Struck was the editor.

________________________________________________________________

Words in this Story

bold  adj. not afraid of danger or difficult situation

tunnel  n. a passage that goes underground

shower  n. the area that holds the device to spray water on your body

elaborate  adj. planned or carried out with great care

laundry cart  n. a wagon to hold and move clean or dirty clothes


A 20-year-old Islamic State fighter executed his mother in front of hundreds in the Syrian city of Raqqa.

According to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, she had asked her son to leave the militant group and flee the city with her.

He shot his mother in a central square as others watched.

U.S. defense officials say people living in areas controlled by the Islamic State are increasingly forced to join the terrorist group.

In Raqqa, a city of 400,000 people, the militant group requires all men and boys at the age of 14 to register with the Islamic police for service.

Intelligence experts say that more than 34,000 foreign fighters from 120 countries have joined the group in Syria and Iraq. An official says that at least 6,000 of those fighters are Westerners. These numbers show a small increase since October 2015.

Patrick Skinner is a security expert with the Soufan Group. He says Western nations have made it harder for people, mostly young men, to join the militant group. But he adds, As long as people are willing to go there, they can get there.

Young people are drawn to jihad, or Islamic holy war. There is also evidence that the jihad message continues to appeal to European youth and women.

David Sterman is an expert with the New America International Security program. He says the average age of a foreign fighter is 24. And many of them are teenagers.

Sterman adds, Women continue to be quite well represented.

The Washington Post reports that 1-in-6 young people who go to join the IS terrorists are young women. They see romance in the role of terrorist's wife, the newspaper reported.

U.S. officials say they are worried that Russias entry into the Syrian conflict would bring more militants to the fight. A counterterrorism official says, It would not be surprising if ISIL features the Russian build-up as a tie into their apocalyptic narrative, and to help bridge the generational divide among jihadists with Moscows actions in Afghanistan and Syria as bookends.

I'm Jim Tedder.

VOA News reported this story. Hai Do adapted it. Kathleen Struck was the editor.

Does this execution shock you? Let us know what you think in our Comments section and on our Facebook page.
Heres your U.S. foreign policy quiz for the day:

Question 1 How many governments has the United States overthrown or tried to overthrow since the Second World War?

Question 2 How many of those governments had nuclear weapons?

Answer 0

Does that mean North Korea needs nuclear weapons to deter US aggression?

Yes and no. Yes, nuclear weapons are a credible deterrent but, no, thats not why North Korea set off a hydrogen bomb last Tuesday. The reason North Korea detonated the bomb was to force the Obama administration to sit up and take notice. Thats what this is all about. North Koreas supreme leader, Kim Jong Un, wants the US to realize that theyre going to pay a heavy price for avoiding direct negotiations. In other words, Kim is trying to pressure Obama back to the bargaining table.

Unfortunately, Washington isnt listening. They see the North as a threat to regional security and have decided that additional sanctions and isolation are the best remedies. The Obama administration thinks they have the whole matter under control and dont need to be flexible or compromise which is why they are opting for sticks over carrots. In fact, Obama has refused to conduct any bilateral talks with the North unless the North agrees beforehand to abandon its nuclear weapons programs altogether and allow weapons inspectors to examine all their nuclear facilities. This is a non-starter for the DPRK. They see their nuclear weapons program as their ace in the hole, their only chance to end persistent US hostility.

Now if we separate the hydrogen bomb incident from the longer historic narrative dating back to the Korean War, its possible to twist the facts in a way that makes the North look like the bad guy, but thats simply not the case. In fact, the reason the world is facing these problems today is because of US adventurism in the past. Just as ISIS emerged from he embers of the Iraq War, so too, nuclear proliferation on the Korean peninsula is a direct result of failed US foreign policy in the 50s.

US involvement in the Korean War precluded a final settlement, which means the war never really ended. An armistice agreement that was signed on July 27, 1953, ended the hostilities, but a final peaceful settlement was never achieved, so the nation remains divided today. The reason that matters is because the US still has 15 military bases in South Korea, 28,000 combat troops, and enough artillery and missiles to blow the entire country to smithereens. The US presence in South Korea effectively prevents the reunification of the country and a final conclusion to the war unless it is entirely on Washingtons terms. Bottom line: Even though the cannons have stopped firing, the war drags on, thanks in large part to the ongoing US occupation.

So how can the North normalize relations with the US if Washington wont talk to them and, at the same time, insists that the North abandon the weapons program that is their only source of leverage? Maybe they should do an about-face, meet Washingtons demands, and hope that by extending the olive branch relations will gradually improve. But how can that possibly work, after all, Washington wants regime change so it can install a US puppet that will help create another capitalist dystopia for its corporate friends. Isnt that the way US interventions usually turn out? Thats not compromise, its suicide.

And theres another thing too: The leadership in Pyongyang knows who theyre dealing with which is why theyve taken the hardline. They know the US doesnt respond to weakness, only strength. Thats why they cant cave in on the nukes project. Its their only hope. Either the US stands down and makes concessions or the stalemate continues. Those are the only two possible outcomes.

Its worth noting, that before Syria, Libya, Iraq, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Vietnam and the long catalogue of US bloodbaths across the decades, there was the Korean War. Americans have swept it under the rug, but every Korean, North and South, knows what happened and how it ended. Heres a short refresher that explains why the North is still wary of the US 63 years after the armistice was signed. The excerpt is from an article titled Americans have forgotten what we did to North Korea, at Vox World:

In the early 1950s, during the Korean War, the US dropped more bombs on North Korea than it had dropped in the entire Pacific theater during World War II. This carpet bombing, which included 32,000 tons of napalm, often deliberately targeted civilian as well as military targets, devastating the country far beyond what was necessary to fight the war. Whole cities were destroyed, with many thousands of innocent civilians killed and many more left homeless and hungry. According to US journalist Blaine Harden Over a period of three years or so, we killed off  what  20 percent of the population, Air Force Gen. Curtis LeMay, head of the Strategic Air Command during the Korean War, told the Office of Air Force History in 1984 . Dean Rusk, a supporter of the war and later secretary of state, said the United States bombed everything that moved in North Korea, every brick standing on top of another. After running low on urban targets, U.S. bombers destroyed hydroelectric and irrigation dams in the later stages of the war, flooding farmland and destroying crops You can glimpse both the humanitarian and political consequences in an alarmed diplomatic cable that North Koreas foreign minister sent to the United Nations in January 1951: On January 3 at 10:30 AM an armada of 82 flying fortresses loosed their death-dealing load on the city of Pyongyang Hundreds of tons of bombs and incendiary compound were simultaneously dropped throughout the city, causing annihilating fires, the transatlantic barbarians bombed the city with delayed-action high-explosive bombs which exploded at intervals for a whole day making it impossible for the people to come out onto the streets. The entire city has now been burning, enveloped in flames, for two days. By the second day, 7,812 civilians houses had been burnt down. The Americans were well aware that there were no military targets left in Pyongyang. The number of inhabitants of Pyongyang killed by bomb splinters, burnt alive and suffocated by smoke is incalculableSome 50,000 inhabitants remain in the city which before the war had a population of 500,000. ( Americans have forgotten what we did to North Korea , Vox World)

Get the picture? When it became clear that the US was not going to win the war, they decided to teach those rotten Commies a lesson theyd never forget. They reduced the entire North to smoldering rubble condemning the people to decades of starvation and poverty. Thats how Washington fights its wars: Kill em all and let God sort it out.

This is why the North is building nukes instead making concessions; its because Washington is bent on either victory or annihilation.

So what does North Korea want from the United States?

The North wants what its always wanted. It wants the US to stop its regime change operations, honor its obligations under the 1994 Agreed Framework, and sign a non aggression pact. Thats all they want, an end to the constant hectoring, lecturing and interference. Is that too much to ask? Heres how Jimmy Carter summed it up in a Washington Post op-ed (November 24, 2010):

Pyongyang has sent a consistent message that during direct talks with the United States, it is ready to conclude an agreement to end its nuclear programs, put them all under IAEA inspection and conclude a permanent peace treaty to replace the temporary cease-fire of 1953. We should consider responding to this offer. The unfortunate alternative is for North Koreans to take whatever actions they consider necessary to defend themselves from what they claim to fear most: a military attack supported by the United States, along with efforts to change the political regime. ( North Koreas consistent message to the U.S ., President Jimmy Carter, Washington Post)
LEXINGTON,Neb. - Two Lexington businesses recently were recognized for their continued support of the American Cancer Society Relay For Life of Dawson County.

Plum Creek Medical Group and CarBar Cattle Co. both contributed $1,500 or more in 2015, earning each business Gold Sponsor Awards.

Plum Creek Medical Group Relay team captain Tatiana Varona assembled her team of volunteers to accept the award. The team already has started fundraising for the 2016 event and members are looking forward to another great year.

CarBar Cattle Co. has been a Relay For Life Corporate Sponsor for more than 10 years. Owners Bruce and Julie Rickertsen know the impact of cancer personally and know their donation makes a difference in the fight against cancer.

The 2016 event already has several sponsorship donations and pledges for more, according to event finance person Pam Ackerman of Lexington.

Culligan of Cozad again has pledged to provide water at the event, Ackerman said. They have been sponsors for more than 15 years and it shows a commitment to the fight against cancer and to the people they serve in Dawson County.

Other designated sponsors include Shotkoski Hay Co of Lexington and Holdrege Irrigation of Holdrege (Signature Level - $250 - $499).

Other donations from area businesses include those from Eustis 66 Service of Eustis; Eustis Body Shop of Eustis; Randys Towing of Lexington; and Cozad Alfalfa of Cozad.

The levels of designated sponsorship are Presenting ($5000 and above); Platinum ($2,500 to $4,999); Gold ($1,500 to $2,499); Silver ($1,000 to $1,499); Bronze ($500 to $999); and Signature ($250 to $499). All designated sponsors business name will be printed on the back of the Relay participants T-shirt. All designated sponsors will receive a T-shirt as well.

Sponsorship requests will be mailed out Feb. 1. Anyone interested in donating may contact Ackerman at 308-324-2230.

The fight against cancer never stops in Dawson County. Organizers of the American Cancer Society Relay For Life of Dawson County will begin planning the 2016 event on Wednesday, Jan. 13, at the Cozad Middle School in Cozad.

The meeting starts at 6:30 p.m. and will be conducted by event chairperson Jennifer Norseen of Gothenburg. The meeting is open to anyone interested in learning more about Relay For Life, volunteers, team captains and team members. Discussion topics will include nominations for Honorary Chairpersons and overall event themes for 2016.

The date and place for this years Relay For Life has been confirmed for Friday, June 10, at Lexington High School, Norseen said.

The Relay will begin at 6 p.m with the survivors lap and end at 12 midnight after the luminary ceremony. Last year was the trial run for the shorter schedule and it worked well, Norseen said. Another advantage was the cooler weather during June instead of the hot weather of late July, she added.

With the shorter Relay, we didnt lose any of the celebration and emotional impact of a traditional all-night event, Norseen said. We are looking forward to seeing more teams participating this year.

For more information, attend the planning meeting or call Norseen at 308-325-2107 or email dawsonrelay@gmail.com To join the fight, go to www.relayforlife.org/dawsoncone and register.

Information about how to form a team or become involved in the American Cancer Society Relay For Life is available at RelayForLife.org. For more information about cancer, call the American Cancer Societys 24-hour help-line at 1-800-227-2345 or visit cancer.org.
Nicht Ihr Computer? Dann konnen Sie fur die Anmeldung ein Fenster zum privaten Surfen offnen. Weitere Informationen
Maine governor sorry for remark about 'young white' girls, Republican Gov. Paul LePage apologized Friday for his acknowledgment about out-of-state biologic dealers impregnating "young white" girls, calling it a blooper of the argot and adage he didn't beggarly to inject chase into altercation of Maine's heroin epidemic.LePage abhorrent reporters for unfairly absorption on the blooper in which he declared the biologic dealers as "guys with the name D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty" and added, "Half the time they charge a adolescent white babe afore they leave.""I was traveling impromptu, and my academician didn't bolt up to my mouth. Instead of 'Maine women,' I said 'white women,'" said LePage, who's white. He acclaimed that, according to the census, Maine is the nation's whitest state.When asked if the nicknames for the biologic dealers betoken they are black, LePage replied, "I don't apperceive area they're from. I don't apperceive if they're white, black, Asian."He aswell chastised the accumulated reporters, saying, "Get your active out of the sand, please." He added: "I apparently couldn't get so abounding of you actuality afterwards adage something foolish."The governor's animadversion Wednesday black in Bridgton drew criticism from Maine and above afterwards a Republican activist alleged absorption to it a day later.The altercation has accomplished the presidential campaign, area LePage is a arresting adherent of Republican New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, and the two campaigned calm as afresh as endure ages in New Hampshire. The Democratic National Committee has alleged on Christie to abandon LePage's comments. A backer for Christie's attack did not anon acknowledgment a buzz alarm and email gluttonous comment.The Bridgton accident was a boondocks hall-style affair in which the governor was asked about Maine's biologic epidemic. He has ahead talked about out-of-state biologic dealers getting the above supplier of heroin in Maine, but this time added the animadversion about biologic dealers impregnating women.Democratic accompaniment Sen. Linda Valentino said afterwards LePage's account appointment that she doesn't anticipate LePage is racist but that the animadversion was."The actuality that he wasn't cerebration about what he said is added advancing than what he said," Valentino said. "This shows how he absolutely feels."Juan Cofield, admiral of the New England Area Appointment of NAACP, denounced LePage's comments."It's abhorrent and divisive, and it's not effective to analytic the botheration of biologic acceptance or biologic ambidextrous or the botheration of accouchement getting built-in out of a ancestors setting," Cofield said.LePage is accepted for speaking his mind, and it sometimes gets him into trouble.He's aswell in the bosom of an different drive by political opponents to abuse him for his accomplishments that led an alignment to abolish a job action to Democratic House Speaker Mark Eves. An absolute address adumbrated LePage put burden on a allotment academy abettor and his apprenticeship abettor withheld a transaction afterwards acquirements that Eves was assassin as the organization's president.LePage has said on the attack aisle that he'd acquaint Admiral Barack Obama to "go to hell," and anon afterwards he was adopted to his aboriginal term, he told the Portland affiliate of the NAACP to "kiss my butt." He ahead likened the IRS to the Gestapo, alleged protesters "idiots" and said a political foe admired to "give it to the humans afterwards Vaseline."LePage said Friday that his "kiss my butt" acknowledgment was mischaracterized.He said he's amorous about acclamation the state's biologic problem. Maine was on clip for a almanac year for biologic balance deaths in 2015; the final abstracts accept not yet been tallied."I fabricated a aberration and I'm not perfect, but I will not stop acclimation myself and bringing the affair at hand: drugs, drugs and added drugs," he said. "We accept humans dying. We accept families getting destroyed."
U.S. to transfer al Qaeda suspect from Guantanamo to Kuwait,The United States appear a doubtable al Qaeda advocate to the government of Kuwait on Friday, abrogation a absolute of 104 inmates at the U.S. argosy bastille in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.The U.S. Defense Department appear the repatriation of Faez Mohammed Ahmed al Kandari, a Kuwaiti who had been captivated at Guantanamo for 13 years. It said in a account his apprehension "does not abide all-important to assure adjoin a continuing cogent blackmail to the aegis of the United States."Kandari, 38, was doubtable of getting a advocate and aswell may accept served as "spiritual adviser" to al Qaeda baton Osama bin Laden, according to a U.S. Department of Defense profile.Kandari was transferred on Friday to Kuwait, area he will be put into a rehabilitation affairs to advice him adjust into society, according to his advocate in Washington, Eric Lewis."Mr. Al Kandari is captivated to be traveling home and reuniting with his admired parents and ancestors afterwards all these years away," Lewis said.He said Kandari was the endure of 12 Kuwaitis who had been at Guantanamo, which the George W. Bush administering accustomed as a bastille for adopted agitation suspects afterwards the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.President Barack Obama, who campaigned in 2008 on a agreement to abutting the prison, angle it as a damaging attribute of bedfellow corruption and apprehension afterwards allegation that he affiliated from Bush. He is still alive on a plan to abutting it, admitting action from the Republican-controlled Congress.Earlier this week, the Pentagon appear two Yemeni detainees were transferred to Ghana. Kandari's absolution leaves 104 inmates at the prison, 45 of them already accustomed for transfer."It's a acceptable analogy of our accomplishment to dent abroad at the citizenry there and to try to boldness these alone cases in a way that's constant with our civic aegis interests," White House agent Josh Earnest said on Friday.General John F. Kelly, approachable administrator of the U.S. Southern Command, told reporters added Guantanamo inmates would be appear this ages but did not elaborate."I anticipate we can all artifice on whether 13 or 12 or eight years in apprehension is abundant to accept them pay for whatever they did, but they're bad guys," Kelly said on Friday."If they go aback to the fight, we'll apparently annihilate them."Kandari's absolution came afterwards the parole-style Periodic Review Lath bent in September that his apprehension was no best necessary.The board, accustomed by Obama in 2011, is comprised of six intelligence and civic aegis agencies. Afterwards detainees are accustomed for transfer, the U.S. government has to acquisition countries accommodating to yield them and accommodate the aegis arrangements.
Writers Note The theme of the story is the continuous feeling of marginalization within minority cultures in the case of the unnamed protagonist of the story, he feels marginalization both in his ethnic origins of being a Native American, as well as with his sexual preference. Set at an undisclosed Native American Reservation, this state of living as a minority since birth has led to the characters passive indifference towards many things. However, after a recent falling out with a former relationship, the protagonist is overwhelmed by a desire to set things straight, if only for immediate satisfaction. It aims at airing out the frustrations of those often singled out and discriminated against and seeks to open up readers - particularly those who are still prejudiced and biased over race and sexuality into understanding how hard it is to be on the other side of that discrimination.Red AlertA steady stream of cigarette smoke rises into nothingness from the stick I have just lit up. I wait in total darkness in the shadow of a trading post. A cab stops nearby at a reservation convenience store leaving its lights on, its beams splashing over me and the ground on which I stand. I count the twelve cigarette butts that start to pile up, giving me a rough estimate of how long Ive been standing here. Okay, maybe nothing accurate but I figure someone who got to smoke 12 sticks in one spot would have been waiting there for a reaaally long time, long enough to bore you into smoking a dozen cigarettes. I dont mind, though. Im a pretty patient guy, and this hasnt been the longest I stayed out here in the dark, waiting.Once at an experiment on human behavior back in the community college I went to, the local headshrinking society had people sign up to be guinea pigs. I figured theyre just gonna be observing me, so what the heck. I get extra credit for practically doing nothing. A bunch of us were led to a room and asked to be seated to wait for the testing proper to begin. We waited for hours. People got fidgety, then annoyed, then cranky. One by one the people left the room. I was last to leave after what seemed like half a day of sitting in that room. Turns out they were already testing us since we walked into the room, something about a persons breaking point or patience level or some other psychobabble. Sickos. The cab leaves and Im once again swallowed by the shadows. When is he coming out I begin to think if hes even home. The lights in his room say he is, though.Me and Kirk were together for the better part of college. I met him in Spanish class. We got paired up to do this presentation where I managed to mumble out what little Spanish I learned from class. We had to rehearse our parts though, and that meant seeing each other after hours. Didnt really expect anything to come off it, him being white and having a girlfriend at the time. I certainly didnt think hed ask me to hang out more after the great big Lost Tourist Needs Directions to the Bathroom Presentation of ours. Us Navajos were rarely seen going out with a white guy before, and living my life as a redskin, I could say that I was pretty much used to it by then.I take a drag, my face lit up a warm orange by the stirred embers from the deathstick in my mouth. I figure its getting late, and the last thing Id ever want to happen is to get mugged in some dark reservation dirt road, stalking an ex. Hnh. That came out unexpected. I never really thought of what I was doing as stalking before. I figure any man should be able talk to his man should he feel like it, insteada being cast aside like a person convicted without being given a fair trial, but I gotta admit, creeping in the shadows waiting for the guy to come out or even just show up does seem like the perfect description of stalking. A hunter among the hunted, like my people before me. Yeah, right.I take another drag, throw down the butt and stomp it out. That was the last of the pack and I aint sticking around without a cig. I barely have enough money for the bus, so the convenience store is out of the question. Besides, I never really got used to the looks I get whenever I come in in the wee hours at any convenience store. Colored guy walks in a 7-11 at night, you automatically think hes a bad guy. Sound the alarms. Raise the drawbridge. Grab your torches and pitchforks and all that jazz. Us Navajo get used to it, but then eventually gets tired of it altogether. I go on then and pull up my hood for the walk to the bus stop. Just then, a cop car pulls over, starts asking me questions.Can I help you, Sir Alright, what are you up toEvening, officer, is there a problem What did I not do this timeWe received reports on suspicious activity in this area and decided to check it out. You wouldnt happen to have noticed anything, have you Beat it if you dont want any troubleNope. Didnt see nothing. Sorry chief. Thanks for looking out for us though. Ill head home now I didnt do nothing, fascist pig.Alright, best you stay indoors, sir. This citys a dangerous place after hours. Youre lucky I dont have anything on you.Will do sir, yall stay safe now. Go home, white man.Thanks, you too. Yeah you better run.The fuzzcar pulls away. Since I was a kid I have been discriminated against because of the color of my skin. You cannott blame me now for thinking the worst out of people. You try going through those judgmental looks day after day.I round the last corner just in time to catch the bus leaving the stop. No sense chasing after it, everyone knows how bus drivers take pleasure in watching panting people shrink into the distance in their side mirrors. Buncha sadists. Wouldnt have to put up with them if I hadnt loaned my car to the folks. Bad enough I have to drive around in a beat up gas-guzzling clunker, the inconvenience of actually not having it just makes it worse. Mom accidentally drove off a dirtroad last week and banged up the transmission on their old SUV real bad, I had to lend them my ride while theirs stays at the dealer. I spend the last of my money on more smokes and decide to foot it.The walk home leaves me to my thoughts. I hate it when Im left to my thoughts. I get all overanalytical which tends to have me screw everything up. Id rather act on my toes, not really take the time to think things through. Sure, I ended up in more trouble than I hoped to be in, but even if I think everything through and everything works out fine, I get this nagging feeling that somehow, it wouldve been better had I left everything to fate. But then again, its that kind of thinking that got me in this situation with Kirk in the first place.Weeks after the Spanish Improv Theater, Me and Kirk were just hanging out at his dorm room, watching a crappy B-Movie with werewolves and aliens while having pizza and beer. We were laughing really loud and I dropped a pepperoni on my collar. Suddenly hecame onto me and we kind of took things from there. We had to keep it secret from everyone though, especially his girlfriend. Soon we were making the most of the private time we had together and one time we thought his girlfriend would be out of town for a week, she comes home a day early and catches us together in bed. Suffice to say they broke up and He didnt want anything to do with me ever since. Now call me old-fashioned but I think I deserve to give him a piece of my mind as well.I step in shit. This night keeps getting better and better. I try to find anything to wipe it off, but the immediate surroundings are surprisingly litter-free. Wheres trash when you need it I cautiously limp over to the gutter and try to scrape off the shit onto the sidewalk. I look around for the cops, half-expecting to see them and turn me in for some stupid offense or something. Im in shit and still I expect more. Story of my life. I light another ciggie, if only to mask the smell of shit. A lesser evil to my nostrils to negate the evil smell of shit.Like with the shit that went down between me and Kirk, I suppose the cigarettes also help me mask it out, as it leaves me in a state of calmness kinda like meditation what with the deep breathing as well. Right. I made that up. I should work as a speech writer for campaigning politicians with all the bullshit I use to justify my actions. I sit on a curb in front of a drugstore and take in the nicotine from my smokes. I once read somewhere that the effects of nicotine in the body works in a way which is kinda like how eating triggers pleasure when youre hungry. Not that cigarettes fill you up or anything, what Im trying to say is that when youre hungry, and you eat, youre filling a need that is currently lacking in you - in this case, food but what exactly does nicotine satiateMy thinking is interrupted by a tap on my shoulder from behind. Kirk.HeyHeyI saw you from my window. I couldnt see your face but I knew it was you. The steady glow of the cigarette could only mean you taking long drags again. He said.So was it you who tipped the cops thenYeah.Figured. Dont worry, it probably wont happen again.Yeah. It was getting kinda creepy, you hanging around the house like that. Anyway, I thought it was best to get it over with, once and for allI get up. As I turn to face him, I give him a huge punch to the jaw. The blow brings him to his knees as he spits blood out. That was all I needed to say. I tell him. I turned to walk home. I was tired and cold and hungry and all I wanted to do was get some rest and yet, I had a glow from within, a sense of lightness, like a huge burden was lifted from me. I revel in the thought, like a piece of me has been restored. But life catches up and I figure its probably just the buzz from the cigarettes.I light up my last cigarette, savoring every puff, I walk home. Not quite as justified as I thought I would be, but then again, when did I ever feel justified anyway Deep inside, Ill always feel something wrong. If not by my thoughts, then by those of others.
To buy one of my books, rent one of my flats, take one of my cruises on the Nile or just to contact me you need www.janeakshar.com




Ronald Reagan

The value of a man should be seen in what he gives and not in what he is able to receive.

Albert Einstein

If you have an important point to make, don't try to be subtle or clever. Use a pile driver. Hit the point once. Then come back and hit it again. Then hit it a third time - a tremendous whack.

Winston Churchill





It isnt so much that liberals are ignorant. Its just that they know so many things that arent so.

With integrity nothing else counts; Without integrity nothing else counts.

Winston Churchill





Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life, but define yourself.

Harvey S. Firestone





It is inaccurate to say that I hate everything. I am strongly in favor of common sense, common honesty, and common decency. This makes me forever ineligible for public office. H. L. Menken



Referenda insure all have a voice in land use decisions.

U.S. Supreme Court

Listen carefully to first criticism of your work. Note just what it is about your work the critics don't like - then cultivate it. That's the only part of your work that's individual and worth keeping.

Jean Cocteau
I once wrote a song about a killing spree, where I said it wasn't the ego shooters and it wasn't Marylin, wake up! The problems go way deeper, you know it. Let us act in a time where there hasn't happened anything in a long time. And I wrote how it was meant at the beginning of the video: 'Love thy neighbor, then such things don't happen, so simple!' But this context was lost on the day the dark cloud came over Germany the third time. The media ran amok, shot at anything. Frank Plaberg didn't mention the message of love in his show 'Hard but Fair'. ZDF and bild.de reported about the rapper whom authorities are investigating. On TV and the newsticker: Kaas next to Obama. I sat at home, couldn't believe that my nightmare just got real. I mean, if they had said 'Kaas saves mankind' but they made me out to be Marylin Manson.

No it wasn't Marylin, no it wasn't Counterstrike, no it wasn't Resident Evil, that is also wrong. It was everyone of us, everytime he didn't care that another human is suffering. Uuh we should all do something.

And they ask 'Whose fault is this shit?'. I am sure it is a mental illness that has sickened the bullie and the bullied because they misunderstand happiness. It is easy in a society, which teaches you that you suck if you're not wearing the nice shoes or drive the expensive car. That tells you that you won't get laid when you have pimples: 'Here buy some anti-acne cream, it'll make you happy.' And this is why our kids live in fear, feel worthless and then get sick. Don't we feel the necessity by now to show our kids a moral compass, that unites all the healthy values? Our kids need lessons in love and wisdom. Then they won't even wanna play violent games anymore. Just imagine how this world without fear would be like.

No it wasn't Marylin, no it wasn't Counterstrike, no it wasn't Resident Evil, that is also wrong. It was everyone of us, everytime he didn't care that another human is suffering. Uuh we should all do something.

And they ask: 'Why do you change the album? Don't you have the balls? Stand by your opinion!' And I ask for understanding, forgiveness, but it just doesn't feel right to me, let me explain why. Look, I listen carefully to what my gut says, and my gut says 'Kaas, love is your mission!' And another reason for the change is that everytime I hear this song now, it opens up the wound. So what is the song gonna do those affected by this, when I think about it, it makes my stomach feel sick. I never wanted to hurt somebody, I wanted to shake things up and bring hope to the ones being mobbed inside the classrooms. Turn your tragedy into triumph, turn your pain into acknowledged well-payed art. Forgive those that treated you badly and your live will transform from being like hell to being like heaven.
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For those of you who don't know - NC Spin is a little show broadcast each week, aired in the wee hours of the morning on obscure stations, and hosted by Tom "Grandpa" Campbell (once #2 to state treasurer Harlan Boyles (D).) I occasionally catch the show on YouTube when things are really, really, really slow.The show is billed as a great way to get the inside scoop on what's happening in Raleigh. But usually, you get little more than some super-sonic blinking by Chris Fitzsimon, some griping about roadside litter from Joe Mavretic, and a dramatic reading of the works of English philosopher Lord Fancypants (1546-1578) by John Hood. The greatest benefit I see in the show is that it so clearly illustrates how out of touch the crowd that makes their living inside the Raleigh beltline is frFitzcryin-eyes-closedom regular folks outside said beltline.The gang proceeded to beat up on Gov. Pat McCrory for asking Obama to halt the flow of Syrian refugees to North Carolina. The majority of the panel bashed the decision - citing this old saw that "most" of the refugees are women, children, and old people. The problem with that?Let's check in with that *right-wing conservative bastion* known as The United Nations. According to the UN, about two-thirds of what has been pouring into Europe has been MEN . Also, it's quite sketchy to define these refugees as "Syrian." UN data shows, for instance, that the refugee flow into Greece has included - in addition to Syrians - substantial representation from Afghanistan, Somalia, Pakistan, Iraq and "others."Instead of citing women from the region as non-threatening, you should consider the facts. Talk to anyone who has actually been in the middle of the conflict in the Middle East. They will tell you the jihadis are not shy about strapping bombs to women, children, the elderly, and even the mentally retarded. Hell, one of the Paris attackers was a female suicide bomber!It's not a racial thing. It's not a bigotry thing. You have a group of people who think of nothing more than a 1000 year Muslim caliphate ruling the world, and killing off all of the non-believers. (Hmmm. Seems like we've already had quite a conflict ONCE with a group that dreamed of dominating the world for 1000 years and killing off large groups of people who differed from them.)These are people in the 21st century living their lives in the 10th century. At that time, disputes got settled with violence. He who had the most toys WON. These are thousand years old beliefs that are not going to be changed with some social workers and a few government programs.The gang on NC Spin also got it terribly wrong on ethics. Grandpa Tom repeated the falsehood generated by Dallas Woodhouse that this TV reporter in Charlotte was getting revenge on Tim Moore for not hiring him. Never mind that there was one hell of an email paper trail indicating that Moore's people sought out this reporter FIRST as a potential employee and the reporter turned Moore down.The whole panel - Grandpa Tom, Blinkin' Chris, Dennis Wicker, and, of course, Professor Hood - stood with Binky and saw the allegations against Moore as little more than a PR failure. The Charlotte reporter popped Moore for not itemizing his campaign credit card charges. So did the state board of elections. The reporter also pointed out that Moore neglected to follow a law that he, himself, sponsored and pushed through the House in 2006. THIS was dismissed as "sensationalism" by the NCSpin panel.Our site took things a few steps further. We found that Moore reimbursed himself for "in-kind contributions," paid rent to himself for property he owns, and paid himself for working on his own campaign. Some may look at it and say: "Hey, it's his own campaign money. So what?"Well, Moore's campaign gets a lot of money from people with business in front of the House. If Moore (or any legislator, for that matter) runs up a huge credit card bill buying dinners and gifts for himself and his family, and then uses campaign contributions from special interests to pay said credit card bills, it looks like we've found a great way to circumvent ethics rules and launder bribes.It was interesting to see Democrat AND Republican pundits on the show shrugging off this whole development. The wagons simply get circled around one of their fellow cocktail party clique members. There but for the grace of God go I.Just like in DC, the Raleigh ruling class is scared to death of being found out and run out of town by the peasants who pay the bills.
In the southern part of Texas, In the town of San Antone, There's a fortress all in ruin That the weeds have overgrown.

You may look in vain for crosses And you'll never see a one, But sometime between the setting And the rising of the sun You can hear a ghostly bugle As the men go marching by, You can hear them as they answer To that roll call in the sky.

Colonel Travis, Davy Crockett And a hundred eighty more, Captain Dickenson, Jim Bowie, Present and accounted for.

Back in 1836, Houston said to Travis: "Get some volunteers and go Fortify the Alamo."

Well, the men came from Texas And from old Tennessee And they joined up with Travis Just to fight for the right to be free.

Indian scouts with squirrel guns, Men with muzzle loaders Stood together heel and toe To defend the Alamo.

"You may never see your loved ones", Travis told them that day, "Those that want to can leave now, Those who'll fight to the death, let 'em stay."

In the sand he drew a line With his army sabre; Out of a hundred eighty five, Not a soldier crossed the line.

With his banners a-dancin' In the dawn's golden light, Santa Anna came prancin' On a horse that was black as the night.

Sent an officer to tell Travis to surrender; Travis answered with a shell And a rousin' rebel yell.

Santa Anna turned scarlet: "Play deguello," he roared. "I will show them no quarter; Everyone will be put to the sword."

One hundred and eighty five Holdin' back five thousand, Five days, six days, eight days, ten; Travis held and held again.

Then he sent for replacements For his wounded and lame, But the troops that were comin' Never came, never came, never came.

Twice he charged, then blew recall. On the fatal third time Santa Anna breached the wall And he killed them one and all.

Now the bugles are silent And there's rust on each sword, And the small band of soldiers Lie asleep in the arms of The Lord.

~ ~ ~

In the southern part of Texas, Near the town of San Antone, Like a statue on his Pinto Rides a cowboy all alone.

And he sees the cattle grazin' Where a century before, Santa Anna's guns were blazin' And the cannons used to roar.

And his eyes turn sort of misty, And his heart begins to glow, And he takes his hat off slowly To the men of Alamo.
New Delhi - The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday arrested the founder of PACL Ltd over allegations the property company cheated investors of $6.8 billion, in what local media is calling the country's biggest financial scandal.

The arrest of Nirmal Singh Bhangoo comes 17 months after markets regulator the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) ordered PACL to return money to millions of investors, saying the company was running an illegal investment scheme.

The scheme promised depositors returns on investments in agricultural land, the regulator said.

PACL has argued it was selling land to customers and not investment schemes, and so was not subject to SEBI's regulations.

Reuters did not get any response to phone calls to PACL's head office in New Delhi on Friday.

PACL founder Bhangoo and three other company officials were arrested on Friday as part of the ongoing investigation into allegations of criminal conspiracy and cheating, said R.K. Gaur, a spokesman for India's Central Bureau of Investigation.

The case involves alleged collection of about Rs 45,000 crore ($6.8 billion) from roughly 55 million investors across the country, Gaur said, terming it a "Ponzi scheme case".

Indian regulators have stepped up scrutiny of unregistered investment products over the past two years, plugging regulatory loopholes that had long allowed unregulated entities to raise billions of dollars from small investors. Many people ended up losing their life savings in these schemes.

The founder of conglomerate Sahara India has spent the last 21 months in jail for not complying with a court order to return $5.4 billion to investors who put money in a 2008-11 time deposit plan that was later ruled illegal.

Sahara's business empire includes overseas hotels such as the New York Plaza and a Formula 1 racing team.

Reuters
On 3 October, 2008, nearly 28 months after announcing their Singur project and subsequently pumping in Rs 1,500 crore, Tata Motors chairman Ratan Tata announced he's pulling out of the state, praising Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and laying the blame entirely on Trinamool's door.

The chief minister was very persuasive in his desire for us not to move. We faced agitation not from the government, but from the opposition.You cannot run a plant with police protection. We cannot run a plant with walls broken. We cannot run a project with bombs thrown. We cannot run a plant with people intimidated."

The embers had not died even six years later. The TMC, now in power, launched a scathing attack on Ratan Tata when during a visit to the state the Tata Sons' chairman emeritus had said he could not see much of industrial development.

State finance and industries minister Amit Mitra said Tata was suffering from delusion and advised him to indulge in his hobby of flying, while urban development minister Firhad Hakim said he might have "lost his mind" after retiring as chairman of the conglomerate.

Bengal as a business destination sounded almost like an oxymoron.

So on Friday when the Bengal Global Business Summit kicked off with a glitzy short film that painted a rosy picture of the state, it required from all concerned a willing suspension of disbelief.

For her part, Mamata Banerjee left no stone unturned to woo the biggest captains of corporate India yesterday as if in penance for having single-handedly driven the Tatas out. She launched a passionate defence of her tenure and rolled out countless statistics to show that the much-touted 'poriborton (change)' is indeed here.

In the battle against historical perception of Bengal as a business-unfriendly state and her own past as a leader whose path to power was paved with anti-business rhetoric, Mamata laid out claims after claims.

With the BJP's central ministers seated on the dais, the TMC chief was also careful to avoid any discord.

"In a federal structure, if the state grows, the country also grows," she started, adding "it's a joint venture."

Touting that "Bengal is ahead in all parameters of business friendliness," the CM said: "We far exceeded India in growth of GVA, industry and agriculture.

"Our per capita income is double that of India. Our revenue generation has increased by 200% in four years, capital expenditure (asset creation) has increased by 600%.

"Our agriculture and rural development expenditure has increased 547%, planned expenditure has increased by 311%, spending on physical infrastructure has increased by 330%.

Pitching the state as a regional hub, the CM said Bengal can not only serve as the gateway to the 'seven sisters' (the north-eastern states), it can lead to the growth of entire region.

"A footprint in Bengal helps you to extend operations in the North-East, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Thailand, and entire south-east Asia, she said, reminding the industrialists about the upcoming network of Asian highways that will pass through the state.

"We have a new airport at Andal which offers tax free fuel and has already shown 40% growth," she said.

Industry needs land, and in an attempt to preempt the sensitive issue, Mamata Banerjee sought to assure investors that she has reserved enough of it.

"How much land do you need? We have a land bank, a land map, and land use policy. There are 5000 acres available for industry right now.

Thats a staggering change in stance from her maa, maati, maanus election slogan suggesting that Mamata has learnt her lessons the hard way. But industry will still be wary for a long time because not much has changed on the ground.

TMC's Singur protest hinged on the Left Front government's decision to "forcibly" take land from the farmers. It was followed by thousands of activists and party members laying siege at the factory site. Even in power, the chief minister had always maintained that her government will never go for "forcible acquisitions" and had, on countless occasions, claimed that she had been able to complete various projects through direct land purchase.

Bengal's inherent problem, though, lies in the reality that setting up of big industrial projects is a challenge because vast tracts of land are unavailable.

Sources in her own government reveal that almost 90% of the land bank is made up of small, scattered clusters which more often than not is mired in litigations or illegal encroachments. And even if there are big enough plots, these are unviable for manufacturing units in terms of infrastructure, situated as they are in remote areas.

In fact, during the last summit, the Chief Minister had reiterated her stand, urging the industrialists to go in for negotiation to purchase and acquire land directly from farmers, clarifying that Trinamool was not against land acquisition.

But the trouble is, few companies are keen on acquiring land on their own. The motive is not to deny the farmers a fair value but more a logistical issue of talking to and persuading hundreds of farmers and then collating the land. It becomes difficult to do so without government intervention. Delay in the project pushes up its cost manifold and ultimately results in abortion.

"Bengal is a power surplus state", said the chief minister on Friday. "We have a power bank. We miss loadshedding (power cuts) these days," she said, adding a touch of humour.

The fun evaporates though when one looks at data that reveal Bengal's power surplus is more the result of paucity of industries. The industrial demand for electricity has been growing only at 2-6% annually in recent years, compared to the 10-15% during 2001-2009, say power department officials according to a report in The Telegraph.

The TMC chief claimed that Bengal has a massive, unskilled and skilled workforce that is ready to be employed. She claimed that 'mandays' lost has come down to zero compared to the Left Front regime and there have been not a single day lost due to strike.

That is indeed heartening.

But underlying the gloss is the worry that Bengal's 'syndicate culture', where local musclemen and mafia, in cahoots with party leaders, have created a culture of extortion.

These rackets use an army of unemployed youths to arm-twist mostly construction business owners to accept materials on unreasonable terms.

So acute is the problem that Mamata Banerjee, during the recent inauguration of Sajjan Jindal's proposed Rs 800-crore cement plant, told "local people" in Salboni that they should behave themselves and not make life difficult for the JSW Group chief.

Be good to the Jindals. Let them do their work. We must not interfere in their internal business... Dont ask them for contracts and jobs, Mamata said last Wednesday.

Add to that Bengal's old scourge of militant trade unionism which has worsened due to squabbling among Trinamul factions.

What would bring relief to Mamata ahead of the April-May Assembly polls, however, is the blank cheque signed by all business captains, praising her as an agent of change who has turned around a moribund state into a hopeful one and has ushered in an era of business-friendliness through ease of doing business, single-point e-window for licenses and hands-on intervention.

Despite their large-hearted praise though, the captains of corporate India were rather thrifty in committing fresh investments. Instead they delivered figures that either included announcements made last year or projects that are still under way.

It is telling that the biggest proposal of fresh investment came not from the private sector but from the Centre when shipping minister Nitin Gadkari announced an investment of Rs 53,000 crore in ports and roads.

According to statistics from the state ministry of industries, between 2011 and September 2015, Bengal saw an investment of Rs 6,871 crore, working out to Rs 1,374 crore per year. It isn't the worst but in contrast, Gujarat received investments worth Rs 22,576 crore in the same period per year.

If there is no dramatic uptick in investment announcements today, the concluding day of the business summit, it can be safely said that it was high on rhetoric and low on numbers. Mamata did seem to have changed her stripes. And India Inc. will be mildly interested in West Bengal. But itll take a while before they will be invested in it.

Grand and glitzy as the event was, the carpet that was rolled out was in Mamatas favourite colour, blue. India Inc. will wait for it to turn to red.
Shillong: Nine people were injured  three of them critically  when Garo militants triggered a bomb blast on Saturday in Williamnagar, the district headquarters of East Garo Hills in Meghalaya, police said.

The Garo National Liberation Army (GNLA) militants planted the bomb at a wine store at the Williamnagar market, Meghalaya Director General of Police Rajiv Mehta told IANS.

"Nine people, including a woman, were injured. Three of them are in critical condition and have been rushed to the Tura Civil Hospital in West Garo Hills district," Mehta said.

He said police evacuated the market area and launched a search operation to look for any other explosives.

"The GNLA's attack on civilians is an act of cowardice and desperation. The GNLA has been experiencing a series of desertions in the recent past due to intense police operations," the police chief said.

Mehta said one of the perpetrators has been identified as Ajan Ch. Momin alias Jimmy, who was directed by Sohan D Shira, the self-styled military wing chief of the GNLA.

The GNLA, which claims to be fighting for a separate Garoland in western Meghalaya, is headed by police officer-turned-rogue Champion R Sangma, who is lodged in Shillong jail after being arrested from near the India-Bangladesh border in 2012.

IANS
New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to visit Pathankot in Punjab on Saturday for first-hand assessment of the situation at the Air base which was attacked by six terrorists last Saturday.

Sources said the visit is expected to take place on Saturday morning and details of the trip are being finalised.

Earlier on Thursday, security forces declared that the sprawling Air Force station in Pathankot in Punjab was fully sanitised after a massive combing operation spanning over three days.

"The combing operation at the Air Force station is over," a senior IAF official said, adding the entire area has been sanitised.

The sanitisation operation had been going on for the last three days ever since the six terrorists were gunned down after in a four-day gunfight.

The operation to ensure that no terrorist was hiding was carried out jointly by Army, NSG and IAF's Garud commandos.

PTI
Mumbai: Yoga guru Ramdev on Saturday said that Patanjali's atta noodles is on course to overtake Maggi as the top noodles brand in the country in the next few years, and the 'swadeshi' FMCG company will overtake all multinational firms in the consumer goods space, barring Hindustan Unilever (HUL).

"Patanjali atta noodles will soon oust Maggi as the top noodles brand in the country. Currently from about a 100 tonnes, our production of atta noodles will be increased to 300-500 tonnes," Ramdev told reporters at a conference in Mumbai.

"Barring HUL, we will overtake all other multinational companies. These companies are taking money out of the country," he added.

Patanjali, which is slowly capturing a bigger share in the market by introducing an array of products at a lower price, will also divert 100 percent of its profits towards social service, he said.

He added that Patanjali is keeping its production costs low compared with MNCs, in order to keep the product price reasonable.

In the next five to seven years, Patanjali expects to earn profits of Rs 5,000 crore to Rs 10,000 crore, and will divert it to non-profitable causes.

Ramdev said that his persistent campaign against black money and corruption over the last five years has created awareness among masses, but it will take time for the government to fulfill the aspirations of the people.

"We have been persistently campaigning against black money and corruption since the last five years. The result is that people are aware of realities. Also, the country got rid of dynasty politics and a man from a humble background, who sold tea for a livelihood became the prime minister. But it will take some time (for the government) to fulfill all the aspirations of the people," he said.

Ramdev is also planning to open a chain of schools across the country, based on vedic-cum-modern education called Acharyakulam, for which he is awaiting government permission.

"We will build a self-sustainable model, and every state should have two to three such educational institutions," he said.

PTI
Singling out top Congress leadership for stalling the goods and services tax (GST) Bill, finance minister Arun Jaitley on Saturday said some people get sadistic pleasure in obstruction, as most of the partys second-rung leaders are supportive of the key tax reform legislation.

It is obvious that not allowing the GST Bill to pass is giving some people a sadistic pleasure. But then, democracy has its own strengths, the last laugh is the best one, he said at the ET Corporate Excellence Awards in Mumbai Saturday evening.

When I speak to the mid-command of the party, I come back with a sense of optimism and when I meet them just before Parliament is about to commence, every morning I think the high command prevails over the mid-command.

The problem is not with our politics, the problem is only with a few individuals, Jaitley told an audience comprising the whos who of Indian industry. Multiple times he made references to many leaders within the main Congress being supportive of the GST Bill, and also questioned why his predecessors P. Chidambaram and Pranab Mukherjee did not think twice before introducing and pushing the Bill with a legal cap on the peak GST rate.

Stating that everybody, including regional parties and even United Progressive Alliance (UPA) allies like the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Nationalist Congress Party and the Janata Dal United are supporting the Bill, Jaitley said there is a complete coalition of those in support but only one party (the Congress) is the naysayer.

The Constitutional Amendment Bill to roll out the GST is stuck in the Rajya Sabha because of the stiff opposition by the Congress as the ruling National Democratic Alliance does not have enough numbers there. Jaitley called the Upper House, in which he also is a member, as the last bastion of obstruction.

He specifically mentioned the issue of tariffs which has become a bone of contention, saying it cannot be defined in the Constitution and warned that if we do it, a Constitutional amendment will have to be moved every time a natural disaster results in a change of the tariffs.

Jaitley also lauded the work done by Chidambaram during his tenure at North Block on resolving any possible issues between the Centre and states in the GST regime. Without going into details, his ministerial colleague at the power ministry, Piyush Goyal said if Congress continues to stall the passage of the Bill, there will be a few tricks under the finance ministers sleeves to ask them to follow suit which cannot be revealed now.

"Deception, double talk"

After calling the Venkaiah Naidu meeting with Sonia Gandhi an attempt to submerge detailing with optics, Congress on Friday blamed the BJP for creating a false smokescreen on the goods and services tax bill (GST). Congress insists that it is the RSS and Swadeshi Jagran Manch that have been holding up the legislation which is widely seen as an acid test for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's liberalizing credentials.

The Indian Express reports that the party whipped out speeches of Gujarat Finance Minister Saurabh Patel before the Empowered Committee of Finance Ministers, which looked into the GST, to argue that the Narendra Modi-led Gujarat government had stonewalled the legislation.

Deception, deceit and double-speak have become hallmarks of the Modi government vis-a-vis implementation of GST as also other economic reforms. The BJP government, including Prime Minister and the Finance Minister, has been putting up a false smokescreen by accusing Congress of obstructing GST, while the real truth is that GST stands consistently red-flagged for last nine years by RSS and Swadeshi Jagran Manch, Congress spokesperson Shaktisinh Gohil said, reports The Indian Express.

Modi and the BJP government are now camouflaging paralysis of governance and failure of leadership over the last 19 months to misguide people by stating that current day grave economic crisis as also deflation of economy is happening because of non-passage of the GST, Gohil said. The government has no interest in passing the GST Bill. It is interested only in doing politics on GST, he said.

GST is not being passed because BJP & PM Modi do not want it. BJP is deceiving people: Jairam Ramesh, Congress pic.twitter.com/XIeOgwbaEA  ANI (@ANI_news) January 9, 2016

"Butter up opponents, Mr Modi"

In its latest issue, the Economist argues that Modi will do well to dump the NRI crowd for a bit and deal with issues closer home. "If Modi is to secure any economic legacy, he may now have to spend more time on the art of buttering up opponents at home rather than fellow leaders abroad," says the London based newspaper in its GST story titled: One country but no single market.

Congress rebuffs suggestions of breakthrough

The Congress party on Thursday rebuffed suggestions of a breakthrough on a landmark tax reform, hours after the government said it had accepted the demands set by the main opposition party to back the measure.

The proposed goods and services tax (GST), India's biggest revenue shake-up since independence in 1947, seeks to replace a slew of federal and state levies, transforming the nation of 1.2 billion people into a customs union.

Supporters say the new sales tax will add up to two percentage points to the South Asian nation's economic growth.

The Congress party, the original author of the tax reform, has opposed what it calls the "flawed" version now before parliament, where it has been able to block a key constitutional enabling amendment in the Rajya Sabha.

How does the existing system work?

Taxes production more than consumption

Subsidises importers, hurts domestic producers.

Trade between states is taxed, through a central sales tax of 2%.

Some states impose duties on products entering from elsewhere in India.

What does Chief Economic Advisors report say?

Scrap the central sales tax and set two bands for the GST - a standard rate of 17-18% and a lower 12% rate for sensitive goods.

Alcohol as well as property transactions should be subject to the GST. In return, states could levy sin taxes on things like alcohol and tobacco of up to 40%.

Congress remains combative

"The government is using optics of meetings and is not serious about GST," senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal told reporters.

His comments came after Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu said the government had agreed to accept the opposition party's demands.

Naidu also said the government was willing to bring forward the next parliament session to pass the proposed goods and services tax (GST) bill if Congress backed the measure.

The minister met Congress chief Sonia Gandhi on Thursday to convey the government's decision. Gandhi did not assure him of her party's support, however.

"Sonia said they (Congress) will discuss among themselves and take a final decision," Naidu said.

We had invited Soniaji and Manmohan Singhji and discussed with them the GST and other bills. In the same context, as the Parliamentary Affairs Minister of the government, I met the Congress president and recalled to her that as per the discussion held earlier, the Congress should finalise its stand. They had raised some issues, which were answered by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. Since the government had already spoken to Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad and the Deputy Leader of the Congress in the House Anand Sharma in this regard, I reminded her that a quick decision should be taken and we should move forward immediately on the GST and the real estate bill, Venkaiah Naidu said.

But Sibal said the party was still waiting for written proposals from the government.

Congress wants the government to cap the GST rate at less than 20 percent, scrap a proposed state levy and create an independent mechanism to resolve disputes on revenue sharing between states.

The political slugfest between the two sides has ensured that Finance Minister Arun Jaitley's self-imposed deadline of April 1 for the GST's launch will be missed.

While Jaitley has yet to set a new date for the rollout, aides say passage of the constitutional amendment bill in February's budget session of parliament would allow them to implement it by October.

Yet even that deadline, which would fall in the middle of the tax year, appears optimistic, say economists.

"There is still a substantive legislative process that has to be completed," said Aditi Nayar, an economist at ICRA, the Indian arm of rating agency Moody's.

With Agencies
New Delhi: Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan attacked the Nitish Kumar government over the murder of an assistant sub-inspector of police in Hajipur, claiming a string of such killings showed that "jungle raj is back" and the chief minister is "helpless".

"There are three ministers from Vaishali region in Nitish government including two sons of RJD chief Lalu Prasad of whom one is also deputy chief minister," he said.

"Still, all this is happening in Vaishali. What will happen to the security of people when the police are not safe in Bihar. Why the Chief Minister is so helpless and silent on all this," Paswan, who is an MP from Hajipur, told PTI.

Paswan will be visiting his constituency on Sunday to take stock of the situation.

Training his guns at the ruling coalition in the state, the LJP chief claimed that this is the third such incident in Hajipur alone.

"He (Nitish) used to take pride in being called Sushashan Babu. After engineers, doctors and traders, now even police men are not safe. There is no government in Bihar. Extortion is being done openly. The situation in the state has become worse than what it was in 1990 when RJD ruled the state. When we used to say that jungle raj will be back if the Lalu-Nitish combine came to power, they used to react strongly. See the jungle raj is back in such a short span of rule," Paswan said.

ASI Ashok Kumar Yadav was shot dead by unidentified assailants and his body was found on Saturday in Manua village of Vaishali district.

Two engineers of a construction company, Brajesh Kumar and Mukesh Kumar, were gunned in daylight on December 26 in Darbhanga. Soon after, Ankit Kumar Jha, a Quality Engineer of Reliance IT, was found dead with injury marks on his body in Vaishali district.

In another incident, a foodgrain trader was shot dead by unidentified assailants in a locality under Yahiyapur police station in Bihar's Muzaffarpur district.

PTI
By Saeed Naqvi

How far will this latest escalation by Riyadh of the Shia-Sunni conflict go?

It looks like an act best described in Hindi by saying: Marta kya na karta? (what won't a dying man do to escape his fate?)"

It is possible to construct a theory that the hanging of the Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr was an expedient. Otherwise the hanging of 47 others, mostly Sunni extremist allied to the Islamic State, Al-Qaeda may have seemed one sided.

The existential danger the Saudis face is not the Shia uprising in Qatif and other pockets in the eastern province, nor is it Irans rise to power.

Riyadh is at sixes and sevens because of grave internal threats. Iran and the Shia arc are designed to externalise internal dangers. Strains in the coalition within the GCC and pronounced fissures in Saudi society are sought to be glued. The region is being directed to watch the menacing clouds of Shia ascendency all around them. This, it is hoped, will cause the Saudis to take their eyes off the one billion dollars a month unwinnable war in Yemen, the Syrian script meandering along routes inhospitable to Saudi purpose, an economy in decline, the Barack Obama-John Kerry team giving up the pretense of taking dictation from Riyadh  a screen is needed to obscure this frightful kaleidoscope.

The Shia threat is that screen.

Internal dangers may be peaking today but they are not of recent origin. The year 1979 will be etched in minds of the Saudi ruling elite for two earthshaking events: The Islamic Revolution which brought the Ayatollahs to power in Tehran and the siege of the great mosque in Mecca.

It was the latter event which shook the Saudi regime because the uprising was a massive expression of discontent against the Saudi monarchy. The concept of kings is anathema in Islam. This explains why to keep himself above opprobrium after the Mecca uprising and the Iranian Revolution, the anxious Saudi monarch labelled himself the Keeper of the Holy Shrines.

The leader of the Mecca uprising, Juhayman al-Otaybi, would have been at the head of the Islamic State directed against Riyadh had he been around today. Just as Riyadh blamed Iranian collusion in 1979, it has turned upon the Shia threat today.

More recently, the Saudis started paying a heavy price for helping create extremist insurgencies in Syria and Iraq when in December 2014 the Kingdoms northern border with Iraq was breached by Islamic State elements. Saudi General Oudah al Belawi was killed in the operation. Would this level of success across a border so heavily protected be possible without inside help? This is the kind of speculation which frightens the regime.

It cannot be disputed that Sunnis constitute an overwhelming majority of the worlds Muslims. But this overarching fact obscures nuances which cannot be wished away.

If the Sunni world of the Saudi dream is so coherent, why did Riyadh bankroll Abdel Fattah el-Sisis military to topple a thoroughbred Sunni Prime Minister, Mohammad Morsi? Because Riyadh is more scared of Muslim Brotherhood than it is even of the Shias. Brothers represent a strong anti-monarchy, political Islam, with a silent following in the Kingdom itself which has often erupted in the social media.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, another candidate for the Sunni alliance, donned the cloak of the Justice and Development only after Turkeys secular constitution stopped his Guru, Necmettin Erbakan from holding Prime Ministers office because the Refah Party he led was avowedly Islamist.

If Morsi as a Brother was unacceptable to the Saudis, how is Erdogan kosher for a Wahabi monarchy.

Riyadh has listed Sudan in its Sunni coalition. Records of the Mahdis war with the British from 1881 to 1899 describe the charismatic Mahdi as a Sufi. There are many question marks on the validity of Riyadhs coalition.

How does the Sunni coalition compare with the Shia axis sketched by Riyadh? The Kingdoms list of a Sunni alliance consists of heads of governments, not the people. A Shia alliance, if it were ever announced, would have peoples support.

There is no available declaration by Tehran of a Shia axis or a coalition. Tehran and Bahrain are overwhelmingly Shia. Over 65 percent of Iraq is Shia. Lebanon, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the Emirates, Egypt, Turkey, Sudan, Pakistan, all have substantial or influential Shia populations. Not long ago, a saying in the sophisticated circles of Cairo was: Sunna bil deen; Shia bil hawa  Sunni by faith but Shia by culture. This because of 200 years of Fatamids in the region.

The puzzle for most observers of West Asia is the composition of Yemen. Former Yemen strongman Abdullah Saleh is a Sunni but also a Zaidi like a majority of Yemenis?

The Ottoman Caliphate ended in 1924 but an Imamate, a system in which the Imam is the supreme leader, ended in Yemen only in 1962. The Imam as leader of the faith should not be mixed up with the Imam as keeper of a mosque like Delhis Jama Masjid.

After the battle of Karbala in 680 AD, one of Imam Hussains grandsons Zaid ibn Ali, crossed over to Yemen to continue the war against those who martyred Imam Hussain at Karbala. The appellation, Shia, did not reach Yemen until much later. This explains the Houthis becoming Shias later. In this framework, do Yemenis qualify as Sunnis in Riyadhs sectarian coalition?

Looking for details in the Shia-Sunni divide is as difficult as looking for needle in a haystack.

The purpose of current aggravation by Riyadh is two-fold: To throw a smokescreen on its precarious internal situation, and to give the Israel lobby in the US one more card to play against the rise of Iran. This is a common aim of Riyadh and Jerusalem. The job of the lobby is to give the sectarian divide traction in the US Presidential campaign, tilting the argument in favour of Saudis who may be persuaded to bankroll many undeclared projects. They could, for instance, finance Islamic militancy in the Caucasus as one more way to get at Vladimir Putin.
Islamabad: The foreign secretaries of Pakistan and India will meet meet in Islamabad on 15 January, Sartaj Aziz, the prime minister's advisor on foreign affairs, said.

Kashmir and all other outstanding issues will be on the agenda when Pakistan and India resume their comprehensive bilateral dialogue, Aziz said in the parliament on Friday.

The announcement came after Pakistan launched investigations into the Pathankot airbase attack, The Nation reported.

India had linked the foreign secretary level talks to Pakistan's action against the militants.

Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday chaired a meeting regarding Jaish-e-Muhammad organisation's involvement in the attack and Islamabad's response to New Delhi.

After the Pathankot air base attack, Sharif called Modi assuring him of "prompt and decisive" action against groups or individuals linked to the attack.

Seven security personnel were killed in the attack on the IAF base in Pathankot. Six terrorists, suspected to be from Pakistan, were killed during the gunfight that began on 2 January.

Pakistan and India will remain in contact as Islamabad believes it needed solid evidence for a stern action.

Aziz told the house that the foreign secretaries of both the countries would discuss modalities of comprehensive bilateral dialogue and its timeframe during the meeting in Islamabad.

"As per the joint statement issued during the visit of Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to Pakistan, the comprehensive dialogue would include all outstanding issues including the Kashmir dispute," he said.

IANS
US Secretary of State John Kerry dialled Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to talk on the Pathankot attack and conveyed the US view - that the Pathankot attack must not affect dialogue between India and Pakistan, which has broken new ground after three years of frost and barbs. Sharif has ordered a probe into the leads provided by India about the Pathankot airbase attack after Indian prime minister Modi put Pakistan on a 72 hour time frame for response but Sharif's officials are going the usual route, grumbling that they need "concrete evidence."

Nawaz Sharif reportedly told Kerry that Pakistan would not allow anyone to use its soil to carry out terror operations abroad. Sharif told Kerry that Pakistan is swiftly carrying out investigations into Pathankot incident and will soon bring out the truth, Pakistan media reports.

The Hindustan Times reports that Pakistani authorities conveyed the request for concrete evidence to their Indian counterparts after Sharif chaired a meeting of top officials Friday on the Pathankot attack.

The India-Pakistan foreign secretary level talks are scheduled for 15 January in Islamabad. Modi has reportedly told his cabinet colleagues that India needs to be strict about response from Pakistan on Pathankot if the talks are to move on. India claims that the banned terror group Jaish-e-Mohammed masterminded the Pathankot attack. The Hindustan Times reports on the parallels between the Pakistan rhetoric now and on the 26/11 investigations.

In the Pakistan backroom, it's the usual par for course. Defence Minister Khawaja Asif has on Friday said that any statement about the Pathankot attack before complete investigations would be premature. He said that the terrorists undermining Pakistans security cannot be our friends, reports Dunya News.

Strong action was taken against the enemies of peace in Operation Zarb-e-Azb, he said.

Responding to a question, the defence minister said that an opinion can be given on Pathankot attack only after completion of the investigations.

Sharif directed National Security Adviser Nasser Khan Janjua to remain in contact with his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval in a bid to keep renewed dialogue on track after the attack on Pathankot air base.

Another official said the information provided by India was "not enough" as it was just limited to telephone numbers and Pakistan might ask for additional information.

"We would like to have solid information to build a case for action otherwise courts intervene and the suspects will be bailed out," he added.

He said the meeting agreed that strong action would be taken after probe against anyone found guilty of involvement in the attack. The official said that the meeting also decided to speed up implementation of National Action Plan.

"JeM chief was in constant touch with 6 terrorists"

Maulana Masood Azhar, chief of the Pakistan based terror outfit Jaish-e-Mohammed was in constant touch with the six terrorists who stormed an Indian Air Force base in Pathankot in the early hours of 1 January and killed seven Indian soldiers.

New Delhi linked the scheduled Foreign Secretary-level talks to prompt response Islamabad takes on actionable intelligence provided by India on the Pathankot attack. Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar and his Pakistan counterpart Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry are scheduled to meet on 15 January.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi told his cabinet colleagues that bilateral talks would not resume until Islamabad took action against the terror group and he had made this clear during a phone call with Sharif, reports The Hindustan Times.

Action is a must. We are going to be very strict about it, Modi reportedly said at the meeting.

Former National Security Advisor Shivshankar Menon says "if six terrorists can stop you from discussing serious business with your biggest neighbour, for me, thats not a good signal to send."

India has shared the telephone numbers and the identity of the handlers with Pakistan and has asked it to act on these individuals, senior government officials have reportedly said.

India has identified JeM founder Maulana Masood Azhar, his brother Abdul Rauf Asghar, Ashfaq Ahmed and Kashim Jaan as the chief villains of the Pathankot attack.

While Azhar oversaw the operations, his brother Asghar and two others were in touch with the terrorists.

India has also given the details of two types of Pakistan-made drugs  Neuro Bedoxine and Dicloran  found on the bodies, as evidence.

A senior official said the government also decided to constitute a high-level committee to study the gaps in security along the Pakistan border, especially on the Punjab frontier. It is through a riverine stretch in the Bamiyal sector of Gurdaspur district that the terrorists involved in the Pathankot attack as well as the July 27 attack on the Dinanagar police station are believed to have sneaked into Indian territory.

Experts of the Indian Institute of Technology-Roorkee have been tasked with finding solutions to detect intrusions from a riverine route.

Terrorists spoke in Kashmiri: FIR

Gurdaspur Superintendent of Police Salwinder Singh, who is under a cloud for his account of the events that led to the snatching of his Mahindra XUV in which the terrorists reached Pathankot airbase, has said that the terrorists were also speaking in Kashmiri, reports The Indian Express.

Salwinder Singh's statement to the police is part of the First Information Report registered at Narot Jaimal Singh police station. Singh has said the terrorists dressed in army fatigues were talking in Punjabi, Hindi, Urdu and Kashmiri.

Nawaz Sharif chairs high level meet

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday chaired a high-level meeting and discussed the Pathankot terror attack as he directed officials to speed up work on the leads given by India, sources said.

Issues pertaining to national and regional security were discussed during the meeting, the Prime Ministers Office said in a brief statement.

The meeting was attended by Ishaq Dar, Minister for Finance; Nisar Ali Khan, Minister for Interior; Sartaj Aziz, Advisor on Foreign Affairs; Lt Gen (Retd) Nasser Khan Janjua, National Security Advisor; Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry, Foreign Secretary; Aftab Sultan, chief of Intelligence Bureau and other officials.

A source privy to the details said that the meeting discussed the Pathankot attack and the information shared so far by India.

The meeting decided to speed up work on the leads given by India, he said on anonymity.

Another official said that the information provided by India was not enough as it was just limited to telephone numbers and Pakistan might ask for additional information.

We would like to have solid information to build a case for action otherwise courts intervene and the suspects are bailed out, he said.

He added the meeting agreed that strong action would be taken after probe against anyone found guilty of involvement in the attack.

The meeting came as India said it is waiting for prompt and decisive action as promised by Sharif to Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a telephone call on Tuesday.

India has provided specific and actionable information in this regard to Pakistan.

On Wednesday, Pakistans army chief Gen Raheel Sharif reaffirmed zero tolerance for terrorist organisations and took a detailed review of overall internal and external security situation in the country.

He made the remarks while presiding over the Corps Commander Conference held at General Headquarters, a statement issued by the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) said.

In a pre-dawn attack on January 2, a group of heavily- armed Pakistani terrorists, suspected to be belonging to Jaish-e-Mohammed outfit, struck at the Air Force base in Punjab.

Who is Maulana Masood Azhar?

Maulana Masood Azhar was the general secretary of another terror group Harkat-ul-Ansar (HuA) in 1994 and was on a 'mission' in Jammu and Kashmir when he was arrested on 11 February the same year. When he was released, the HuA had been included in the US list of Foreign Terrorist Organisations which had compelled the outfit to rename itself as the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HuM). The Indian Express explains the re-emergence of JeM after years of staying low key.

However, Masood Azhar decided to float the new outfit JeM rather than rejoin his old outfit. He was also reported to have received assistance in setting up the JeM from Pakistans Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), the then Taliban regime in Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden and several Sunni sectarian outfits of Pakistan.

JeM, like other terrorist outfits in J&K, claims to using violence to force a withdrawal of Indian security forces from the state. The outfit claims that each of its offices in Pakistan would serve as schools of jihad. In its fight against India, he boasted that the outfit would not only "liberate" Kashmir, but also would take control of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, Amritsar and Delhi.

Masood Azhar, the amir (chief) of the outfit was arrested by Pakistani security forces on December 29, 2001, after pressure from India and other foreign countries following the December 13, 2001 attack on Indias Parliament. However, a three-member Review Board of Lahore High Court ordered on December 14, 2002, that Azhar be released.

With Agencies
Mexico City: Mexican authorities have recaptured fugitive drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, six months after his prison break, President Enrique Pena Nieto said on Friday.

Mexican marines have conducted extensive operations in the northwestern states of Sinaloa and Durango in search of Guzman since the 58-year-old drug lord's spectacular July 11 escape.

But neither Pena Nieto nor other authorities gave immediate details about the location and day of the Sinaloa drug cartel leader's arrest.

Pena Nieto's arrest makes for a major sigh of relief for the president, whose administration was humiliated by Guzman's prison break.

"Mission accomplished: We got him. I want to inform Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested," Pena Nieto wrote on Twitter, without elaborating.

A presidential spokesman confirmed the authenticity of the tweet to AFP, but declined to say more, adding that a press conference would be held later Friday.

- Clash in Sinaloa

News of his arrest came shortly after the navy reported that five suspects were killed in a clash with marines in the Sinaloa city of Los Mochis, but it did not indicate whether it was related to Guzman.

Six people were detained after the shootout, which broke out when marines were tipped off about the presence of armed men in a home, the navy said in a statement.

A suspected gang leader identified as Orso Ivan Gastelum Cruz was in the house but managed to escape, the navy said.

On July 11, after 17 months at the Altiplano maximum-security prison in central Mexico, Guzman slipped through a hole in his cell's shower, climbed on a motorcycle mounted on rails, and traveled 1.5 kilometers (one mile) through a tunnel.

US and Mexican law enforcement officials say Guzman then flew to his home turf at the Sinaloa-Durango state border, where he is revered as a modern-day Robin Hood.

More than a dozen prison and federal police officials have been arrested on charges of helping Guzman flee, along with several associates of the drug lord who worked from the outside on building the tunnel.

Marines nearly recaptured him in October in a remote mountain region straddling the two states. Authorities said Guzman injured his face and a leg while falling in the rough terrain, but special forces failed to nab him.

Guzman had been captured on February 22, 2014, in the Sinaloa resort of Mazatlan. He was found in a condo with his wife and their young twin daughters.

He had been on the lam for 13 years after escaping a first time in 2001 from another prison, in western Jalisco state, by hiding in a laundry cart. He had spent eight years in prison following his 1993 capture in Guatemala.

Questions will now likely turn on whether Mexico will extradite Guzman to the United States.

Pena Nieto had refused to hand Guzman over to the United States before his escape, but the authorities have since then secured an arrest warrant to extradite him.

- 'Lord of tunnels'

The man whose old nickname means "Shorty" had used the money from a drug empire whose tentacles reach Europe and Asia to dig himself out of trouble.

He is a legend of Mexico's underworld, with musicians singing his praises in folk ballads known as "narcocorridos," tributes to drug capos.

With his daring underground escapes and ability to sneak narcotics under the US-Mexico border, he also earned the nickname of "Lord of the Tunnels."

The bathtub in one of his houses in Culiacan, capital of Sinaloa, opened into an escape route into drainage systems that he used to flee from troops in early 2014.

US and Mexican authorities have regularly discover sophisticated tunnels with rails and electricity to ship marijuana, cocaine and other drugs into the United States, with cash and weapons coming the other way.

Born on April 4, 1957, to a family of farmers in La Tuna, Guzman had humble beginnings in a region known as a bastion of drug trafficking.

He dropped out of primary school to work in marijuana and opium poppy fields as drug consumption rose in the neighboring United States.

He was recruited by Guadalajara cartel boss Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo, the godfather of Mexico's modern drug cartels.

After Felix Gallardo was arrested in 1989, Guzman's Sinaloa drug cartel began its meteoric rise.

The mustachioed drug lord married an 18-year-old beauty queen, Emma Coronel, in 2007 and is believed to have 10 children with various women.

Guzman's family has paid dearly for his life of crime. One of his brothers was killed in a Mexican jail in December 2004 and a son was shot dead in a Culiacan shopping center parking lot in May 2008.

AFP
Seoul: North Korea has defended its latest nuclear test, citing the fate of two toppled West Asia-North Africa leaders, while flexing its military muscle by showing TV footage of a submarine-launched missile test. A commentary published by the official KCNA news agency late yesterday said the fate of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Muammar Gaddafi in Libya showed what happened when countries forsake their nuclear weapon ambitions.

It also warned South Korea, which resumed high-decibel propaganda broadcasts across the inter-Korean border in response to Wednesday's test, that its actions were driving the divided peninsula to "the brink of war". The commentary said Pyongyang's fourth nuclear test was a "great event" that provided North Korea with a deterrent powerful enough to secure its borders against all hostile

forces, including the United States.

"History proves that powerful nuclear deterrence serves as the strongest treasured sword for frustrating outsiders' aggression," it said. North Korea said the test was of a miniaturised hydrogen bomb  a claim largely dismissed by experts who argue the yield was far too low for a full-fledged thermonuclear device.

"The Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq and the Gaddafi regime in Libya could not escape the fate of destruction after being deprived of their foundations for nuclear development and giving up nuclear programmes of their own accord," the commentary said.

Both had made the mistake, the commentary argued, of yielding to Western pressure led by a United States bent on regime change.

Asking North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons was as pointless as "wishing to see the sky fall", it said, adding that the entire country was proud of its "H-bomb of justice". In addition to the KCNA commentary, the state Korean Central TV late yesterday released video footage of a purportedly new submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) test.

But South Korean media suggested the footage was an edited compilation of the North's third SLBM test, conducted last month in the Sea of Japan, and a different ballistic missile test from 2014.

The undated footage shows leader Kim Jong-Un, on board a military vessel in a winter coat and a fedora hat, looking on as a missile is launched vertically from underwater and ignites in mid air.

The video then cuts to a rocket flying through the clouds, suggesting the missile was able to reach such altitudes. But South Korean media said the images of a rocket rising through the clouds were in fact taken from footage of a SCUD missile test broadcast in 2014.

AFP
Colombo: Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena marked his first year in office on Friday by pardoning a Tamil Tiger rebel convicted of plotting to murder him a decade ago.

Sivarajah Jeneevan was sentenced last January to 10 years in jail for conspiring to murder Sirisena when he was irrigation minister in 2005.

The president welcomed Jeneevan onto the stage where he was making a speech to mark the anniversary, shaking hands with the former rebel and blessing him by touching him on his head.

Sirisena came to power promising "compassionate rule and stable country", and has already released a number of hard core rebels from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), who fought for secession for more than 25 years until their defeat in 2009 under Sirisena's predecessor, Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Sirisena's opponents have, however, accused him of weakening national security with the releases.

Sirisena has also promised to end corruption, rebalance foreign policy by reducing Rajapaksa's focus on China, and ensure the independence of the judiciary and civil service.

In line with UN recommendations, his government has pledged to establish a credible judicial process involving foreign judges to investigate allegations of war crimes during the bloody climax of the war against the LTTE.

Reuters
BAMAKO A Swiss missionary was kidnapped from her home in Timbuktu on Friday, nearly four years after she was abducted by Islamist militants from the same house, the Malian army and a local resident said.

There was no information on the attackers and no immediate claim of responsbility, but Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is active in desert areas north of the city and has a history of seizing foreigners and demanding ransoms.

In April 2012, militants kidnapped Beatrice Stockly and released her days later. She returned to her work as a missionary. A resident of Timbuktu who knows Stockly told Reuters she had again been abducted.

"I confirm that a European woman was kidnapped in Timbuktu at 3.30 a.m. (0330 GMT). A neighbour alerted the security forces around 6 a.m.," said army spokesman Souleymane Maiga.

French forces drove Islamist fighters from major urban centres in 2013 but they have intensified their insurgency with a series of attacks and roadside bombings last year.

Two militants attacked a luxury hotel in the capital Bamako on Nov. 20, killing 20 people, many of whom were foreigners.

Three Islamist militant groups including AQIM claimed responsibility for the hotel attack, which showed the militants extending their reach beyond the north.

In a separate incident, an unidentified gunman shot three people dead outside a Christian radio station in Timbuktu in December. A veteran jihadist called for a return to Islamic sharia law at a recent meeting attended by hundreds of locals near Timbuktu, an AQIM video showed this week.

HOSTAGE-TAKING

Dozens of Westerners were abducted by desert militants in West and North Africa in the five years before the French military operation in Mali in 2013.

There has been a lull since then, with many foreigners too frightened to visit. In the last known abduction attempt, two French journalists from Radio France International were killed in Kidal, northern Mali, in Nov. 2013.

Two Western hostages kidnapped in north Mali in 2011 are still being held by al Qaeda militants.

The Swiss foreign ministry in Berne said on Friday it was aware of the "alleged kidnapping" of a Swiss citizen in Mali.

"The Swiss local representative is in contact with the local authorities," it said in an email.

"For privacy and data protection reasons, no further information can be given at the moment."

France continues to fight militants in Mali and elsewhere in the desert region with a 3,500-strong counter-terrorism force called Barkhane. A 10,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping force (MINUSMA) is also present in Mali.

"We are on the lookout for information that might be helpful in locating her," MINUSMA spokeswoman Radhia Achouri said of the Stockly case.

(Additional reporting by Adama Diarra in Bamako, Souleymane Ag Anara in Kidal, Mali, Michael Shields in Zurich and Emma Farge in Dakar; Writing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg; Editing by Andrew Roche)

This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed.
Tom Campbell

An Octogenarian woman took her pre-teen grandson out to plant pine seedlings, explaining that one day they would grow into tall trees that provided shade and wood to build houses. The boy protested, saying that she wouldn't be alive to see them reach maturity. The wise elder agreed but quickly added that the boy and his children would enjoy their benefits.What would today's North Carolina be like if yesterday's citizens hadn't planted trees? If they had failed to invest for the future, had not built roads, schoolhouses, hospitals, universities and other public infrastructure? You can be sure there were folks at the time who said we couldn't afford them or didn't need them, timid or conservative souls who genuinely opposed Governor Cameron Morrison, Kerr Scott, Terry Sanford and legislative leaders who strongly advocated borrowing money to invest in both present and future needs. We can be thankful they did.That's the heart of the argument favoring passage of the $2 billion Connect NC bond referendum on the ballot in March. North Carolina has added some 2 million persons since the turn of this century and our state continues to grow. We face two choices: either we plan and build for the future or we stick our heads in the sand, refusing to acknowledge the needs and denying our responsibility to both current and future citizens.The last time we took such a big step was in 2000. Led by the state Chamber of Commerce, educators, leading citizens and our elected representatives we boldly passed a $3 billion higher education bond package for our universities and community colleges. Time has proved the wisdom of that positive decision by voters. Due to economic uncertainly and an unwillingness by leadership we have sat too long on the sidelines, deferring maintenance and neglecting needed new buildings, roads, water systems and other facilities best provided by the public.Passage of these bonds will not raise taxes, will not jeopardize the "debt cap" on state finances our leadership likes to maintain and, if traditional yardsticks prove reliable, should create more than 50,000 jobs in our state. The Connect NC package will build ahead for the next 50 years for our universities, community colleges, agriculture, state parks, local governments and National Guard. The only negative is that this referendum doesn't address transportation needs, but leaders have pledged to do so.As in times past, there are some vocal naysayers today who don't want government to undertake anything, but we can be glad that leaders in 1795 saw the need to build the nation's first public university, financing it with a lottery. We can point with pride to the 1839 public school referendum to build schools, the 1850 North Carolina Railroad, and 1921 and 1949 road bonds, among others. We can celebrate the Research Triangle Park, Community Colleges, University buildings, clean water systems and a plethora of other projects that would not have been completed without government assistance and public funding. Those past actions brought us to where we are today.Just as the wizened grandmother understood the necessity to plant for the future we must ask ourselves if we are naysayers, procrastinators or planters? We trust the overwhelming majority of North Carolinians will see the wisdom to pass the Connect NC bond referendum.
A New Zealand couple have likened their experience on a Qantas flight to child abuse, after departure delays and problems with the airline's food service.

Duncan Kemsley, Heather Smith and their 11-month-old son, Jeremy Kemsley, were originally due to arrive back in Christchurch from Johannesburg, via Sydney, on Tuesday.

Flight nightmare: Heather Smith with son Jeremy. Credit:Iain McGregor

Instead, they ended up arriving home on Friday afternoon.

Qantas said an issue with its plane flying from Johannesburg to Christchurch was to blame and had apologised to passengers affected by the delay.
In the weeks before Christmas, a senior executive from one of Dick Smith's competitors was in Sydney when he noticed something strange at a Dick Smith store.

Behind the desperate 70 per cent off clearance signs, workers were busy installing a new display for Samsung's telco range.

The executive fired off a message to Samsung questioning the wisdom of this when the iconic retailer appeared to be teetering on the edge of the abyss.

As Dick Smith's bankers pulled the pin on the chain this week, putting receivers in control of an operation owing more than $140 million to NAB and HSBC and $200 million to creditors, Samsung's new sales unit looks like a minor worry.
Administrators could be running councils across Sydney and NSW for up to nine months, after the government laid down its latest timetable for compulsory mergers.

In briefings this week, staff and mayors from councils facing mergers were told new councils should be established by the middle of this year but were given no guarantee over who would run councils until elections were held.

Those elections could occur as late as March 2017.

In a letter to mayors, the Minister for Local Government, Paul Toole, said under the Act the government could appoint administrators or existing councillors could continue to run the new entities.
Newtown may be one of the few places you can get a drink in the early hours, but try getting something to eat and it's a different story.

The City of Sydney council has cracked down on shops opening beyond their approved trading hours, enforcing development conditions as old as 1965.

Crowds outside the Marlborough Hotel in Newtown, which is open until 4am. Credit:Daniel Munoz

But the businesses  including two kebab shops and a convenience store on King Street  are clustered around bars such as the John Singleton-owned Marlborough Hotel that can remain open as late as 4am daily.

Istanbul on King, long a favoured late-night haunt for greasy food, is required to close at midnight under its 50-year-old DA (development application). But for more than a decade, owner Yasar Er has traded until 4am on weekends with little attention from authorities.
A man's body has been recovered after a search in waters off Sydney's northern beaches following the discovery of a broken fence at Queenscliff.

Police said the man died when his car drove off a cliff at the end of Queenscliff Road overnight.

There was no evidence the death was suspicious, and a report would be prepared for the Coroner, police said.

Police were called to the area at 1.40am on Saturday, following reports something had gone over a cliff.
Socialist/Democrat Bernie Sanders

This Bernie video is slick, and was produced to make him appear balanced on the 2nd Amendment issue, but the Democrat candidate lacks such a basic understanding of the guarantee to keep and bear arms that even this promo piece well manifests his long term pathetic misunderstanding of our Bill of Rights: Below.

Socialist/Democrat Bernie Sanders, elected many times from Vermont, and sworn to protect and defend the U.S. Constitution, is proved not to have the cognitive resources to understand that document, and believes that the Second Amendment is about hunting game . How can that be? How can a man of his advanced age not have the intellectual wherewithal to know the historical, legal, and guaranteed tenets of the Second Amendment. Hunting to feed one's family was always secondary to protecting one's family, and, moreover, saving one's Republic, by force if necessary.And this clown Sanders, here in the wake of Islamist Terrorists attacking Americans on our own soil, thinks he has the "right stuff" to be president of these United States. On the other side of the Democrat dais, the truth challenged Hillary B. Clinton wants legislation to sue gun manufacturers for the gun deaths of American citizens. What's next: Suing Ford Motors because a drunk, disgruntled construction worker plows his F150 headlong into a fully filled parked school bus at 80 miles per hour?This dearth of knowledge of our Second Amendment, of the Bill of Rights, screams the certainty of these Democrat candidates' feckless character, and limited intellectual abilities, while, ultimately, these political positions better suggests the basic incurious nature of the low-information electorate that demonstrably drives these Democrat primary presidential candidates' pathetic presentations of their poor political promise.Theirs is a desperate dance of Stupid intertwined between a core Democrat electorate, and candidates that will be finally sorted out, and, hopefully, defeated if we are to sustain our Republic. Today's core Democrat party has few patriots listed within their numbers, and, therefore as a political party, have no desire, and, or knowledge of how, or why we must save the United States Republic.You see, and as incredible as this may seem to the multitudes of core Democrat non patriots, there is an unspoken tenet to the 2nd Amendment: That real patriots would take up arms against a true domestic, despotic tyrant ... even if he did possess the allegiance of the United States Military. These essential patriots (scores of ex-military, ex-law enforcement) would fight to preserve the Republic; and we believe, in our true patriotic hearts, that at some the United States Military would turn back to patriotism, and as so goes the military, so would go practicing law enforcement, would also turn away from the elected despot, and turn back to protect the real America of promise and goodness, and away from the evil tyranny of an evil tyrant. This is a patriotic concept that Bernie and Hillary B., who have never been patriots, could never understand. This is why they desire, so much, the low-information voter over those patriots of courage and character.But trust me on this one truth: this verifiable idiot from Vermont, who thinks that the 2nd Amendment is only about hunting, and this pathological liar from New York, who thinks that ignorant Liberals may one day have the power to sue gun manufactures for the destructive actions of a few crazed gun users, should never be president, not if we are to continue this Constitutional Republic, which Bernie and Hillary B. are loathe to conceive ... You will never take away our right to protect ourselves, and save what our forefathers gave us - this nation.And don't worry Bernie: There would be some of us who still hunt.
Non-perishable Food Items Collected at Ascension

TWIN FALLS  Ascension Episcopal Church, at 371 Eastland Dr. N. in Twin Falls, will hold an ingathering of non-perishable food items for the Neighbors in Need pantry in January. Food items collected will be distributed through local community agencies to hungry families. A shopping basket is located in the gathering area of the church through Souper Bowl Sunday on Feb. 7.

Services of Holy Communion will be held at 8 and 10 a.m. Sunday, Dec. 10. Ascension Cafe will meet from 9:10 to 9:50 a.m., with the final class on the Gospel of Luke. Sunday School for children begins at 9 a.m. A fellowship coffee hour will be held after the 10 a.m. service.

On Wednesday, Holy Communion will be celebrated at 12:15 p.m. Bible Study meets at 11 a.m. The knitting group meets at 1:15 p.m. for fellowship and hand-work. All are welcome.

Information: www.episcopaltwinfalls.org or 208-733-1248. Ascension is handicapped accessible.

Unitarian Universalists to Discuss Start of New Year

TWIN FALLS  The Magic Valley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Twin Falls will discuss The Promise and Possibility of a New Year Sunday, Jan. 10 at its regular meeting. Ray Cross will host and Julie Merrick will be the presenter.

Donations on Sunday will be donated to the Idaho Food Bank.

The fellowship meets at 10:30 a.m. at the Vendor Blender & Event Center, 588 Addison Avenue W. in Twin Falls. All are welcome and child care is available.

Info: 208-734-9161.

Agape Luncheon Set for Wednesday

The Agape Ministry luncheon will be Wednesday, Jan. 13, at the Community Meeting Room at the Gooding County Fairgrounds at 11:30 am. The theme for the luncheon will be Salt and Light.

Anelise Rose of Gooding will share her testimony with the emphasis on being Salt and Light in this world. A native Californian, Rose and her family moved to Twin Falls and then to Gooding to start a Calvary Chapel in this area.

Sylvia Legaard, also of Gooding, will share musical selections.

Reservations are required for those wishing to have lunch, but the presentation is free to the public. Contact Carolyn Herzinger at 208-934-5700 by Sunday to make lunch reservations. Cost of the lunch is $8.50.

Hodges to Lead Methodist Services

Pastor Penny Hodges will lead the services during January at Twin Falls First United Methodist Church, 360 Shoshone Street East. Worship begins at 9:30 a.m.

Beginning Sunday, Jan. 10, a new class, Learning to Use My Bible, will be offered to children and youth, who will be dismissed from worship at 9:45 a.m. to meet in the Fireside Room. Participants will learn about the Bible and how to use it, and each one will receive a new Bible upon completion of the 10-week course. Etha Carruthers and Jean Dowd will lead the class.

For info, call 208-733-5872, or go to www.tffumc.com.

Send news of church events to Matt Gooch at mgooch@magicvalley.com. Deadline is 5 p.m. Wednesday for publication in the Saturday Religion section. Please insert Church News in the emails subject line.
PROVO, Utah  As the Provo City Center Temple nears its opening, one glassblower already has it created in glass.

Marge Rosebrook has been sculpting glass for almost 40 years, and for most of those years, shes specialized in creating LDS temples. She estimates she has made more than 75,000 temples over that time, and shipped them to every continent on the globe except for Antarctica.

And thats only because theres no temple there yet, quipped Sarah Asay, her business partner.

Rosebrook sculpts or stitches all her temples from unleaded Corning glass in a small 8 by 8 foot workshop at the end of Asays driveway in Provo. Rosebrook is a unique type of glassblower  she said the old term is a lampworker. She does not hand blow her glass, but uses a heat lamp that pumps heat and air out of the end, so she can work quickly, and adding the many intricacies to her sculptures.

To stitch her temples, Rosebrook starts with a small glass rod in her left hand, and a slightly bigger rod in her right. She runs the bigger rod through the flame to melt it, and then makes looping stitches onto the smaller rod. She builds rows until she has a wall or ceiling piece, then repeats the process for the rest of the piece. When she adds columns and spires, she uses a coil stitch to attach the rods.

Rosebrook is able to work bare-handed, with her fingers fairly close to the flame, even though the fire shooting from her lamp is more than 1,000 degrees, because the glass conducts light but not heat. But she always wears unique glasses made specifically for glass blowers that she attaches to her regular eyeglasses. The lenses protect her sight  she could go blind without them because of the brightness of the flame  and they also allow her see directly into the flame so she can see exactly what the glass is doing.

Details are very important to Rosebrook. She has never been to most of the temples shes sculpted, but she uses multiple pictures, from multiple angles, to get her details exact. She can tell you the unique features of every temple, such as how the Manti and Logan temples are almost identical in structure, but one (Manti) has two squared off columns on one end. She loves when she finds an aerial shot for a temple, because then she can check if it really is square or rectangular  something that is very difficult to ascertain with the bigger temples just from ground-level shots.

All Rosebrooks temples are handmade, but she makes them as uniform as possible, so every Salt Lake Temple looks like the Salt Lake Temple, she said. As she stitches, she makes small but important adjustments, correcting a loop here or leveling off an edge there.

I always end up with a slant, she said Wednesday, about one of the walls she was creating for a Manti Temple sculpture. Luckily, glass is something you can go back and fix.

Of course, Rosebrook can only fix a piece so many times  and she has a small can of rejects to show for it. If she works too much on a piece, it weakens the glass, causing it to be more prone to cracking. She also has to be careful about a piece cooling too quickly, because that itself can cause cracking as well.

Because shes been doing it for so long, she makes glassblowing look very easy. But she has the burn marks and memories to testify to how difficult it is.

I dont wear my nice clothes to do this, because Im liable to drop hot glass on them, Rosebrook said, showing off small holes in her pants. And every so often, I get cut or burnt, but its just an occupational hazard. Its got its dangers, but I think you can do more with glass than any other material.

Rosebrooks father was an artist who dabbled in glassblowing, but she learned the craft from an expert when she lived in California many years ago. When she moved to Utah in 1978, she was a new convert to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A neighbor learned of her talent, and asked her to repair a glass sculpture of an LDS temple. She then made others temples for the neighbor. She ended up working full time for Krystal Kreations, a glass store in University Mall. She supplied that business with LDS temples until it closed. Since then, she and Asay have worked together.

What she does is actually pretty rare as far as U.S. sculptors, Asay said. Ive never seen something she cant make. Shes so talented, and one of those artists who would make it, even if she wasnt paid.

When Rosebrook started creating temples, there were only about 20 LDS temples worldwide. That number slowly increased, and Rosebrook kept up, finishing her own glass temples just about when the real temple was dedicated and opened. That pattern followed until Gordon B. Hinckley became the LDS Prophet in 1995, and put a new emphasis on temple building  going from about 47 to 100 temples in just 15 years.
BOISE  Idaho doesnt have nearly enough doctors to implement a proposal to extend primary care coverage to the uninsured, the CEO of Kootenai Health said Friday.

John Ness told lawmakers on the Economic Outlook and Revenue Assessment Committee that Idaho has about 1,200 primary care physicians, which is well below national averages per capita, and many of them are over the age of 50 and will retire soon. He estimated Idaho would need several hundred more doctors to provide care to the 78,000 people in the Medicaid gap through the proposed program.

I applaud the governor, but we really want to make sure we have the manpower to implement that idea successfully, Ness said.

Most of the states primary care doctors are in private practice, Ness said, and wouldnt necessarily see Medicaid or uninsured patients. Assuming half of the states primary care doctors took part in the proposed Primary Care Access Program, Ness guessed each would have to take on 130 new patients. And many of these new patients would have problems such as hypertension, diabetes and chronic diseases, Ness said.

This is a population that has not had ongoing primary care, he said.

Ness said expanding the number of residency slots and programs that help pay doctors student loans could help to draw more of them to the state. Investing in a medical school in Idaho  the state doesnt have one  would probably be unrealistic, Ness said.

I think with all of the needs, frankly, in education, transportation, agriculture, etc., to take on the development of a medical school would really be an extraordinary commitment and it would be a very long-term commitment, Ness said.

Recruiting several hundred more doctors would be doable over five to six years, he said, but it wouldnt happen instantaneously.

Its very competitive out there, Ness said. Every state in the United States is looking for more primary care physicians.

The Department of Health and Welfare and the Otter administration are proposing a $32 million program, funded through existing cigarette and tobacco taxes, to connect the uninsured with primary care coverage. It would not cover prescriptions, hospitalizations or other medical expenses, and patients would pay fees on a sliding scale based on income.

Idaho has not expanded Medicaid to all of the poor, as the Affordable Care Act originally envisioned, and an estimated 78,000 Idahoans fall into the Medicaid gap where they dont qualify for Medicaid but are too poor to qualify for tax credits to buy insurance on the state exchange.

Yvonne Ketchum, the CEO of the Idaho Primary Care Association and the Community Health Center Network of Idaho, said the best solution would be to pass the Medicaid expansion plan recommended by Gov. C.L. Butch Otters Medicaid Redesign Workgroup, but that PCAP is better than nothing.

It wont solve 100 percent of the problem, she said. But if our heart is in the right place, it would solve some of the problems.

Many of the uninsured go to the states 60 community health centers now, and they have all agreed to take part in the program, said DHW spokeswoman Niki Forbing-Orr. This will help blunt the impact of the increase in numbers of people seeking primary care, she said.

Also, she said, it is unlikely all 78,000 uninsured would seek to enroll at once. PCAPs first year, she said, would show how much the doctor shortage would impact the program.

We certainly think this will be a gradual process, she said.

Ketchum said their network of clinics serves 160,000 patients a year. Depending on the year, about 47 percent of them are uninsured, although not all of them would qualify for PCAP  some of them might make enough to qualify for insurance on the exchange and simply choose not to buy it.

Forbing-Orr said the patient-centered medical home model, which has a patient work with a team of care providers, would also reduce the burden on the primary-care doctors involved, because patients would often be able to see a nurse practitioner or physicians assistant to help them with what they need.

If there are a lot of new patients who need acute care, helping them could be a challenge, Ketchum said. But the medical home model would lessen the burden on the providers by providing different ways to take care of the patients medical needs.

Theres a spectrum, she said. Some will need immediate care, some in the near future, and some who will need ongoing care but wont necessarily need to be seen all the time.

St. Lukes has 57 primary care providers in the Magic Valley, and St. Lukes would likely look to take part in PCAP if it passes, said Debbie Kytle, the St. Lukes east region administrator of physician services and population health.

There are a few things that we would need to put in place, but a lot of the core things that they have talked about, we have already been on that journey, she said.

Kytle said some of the improvements to care that St. Lukes has been implementing anyway align with PCAPs medical home model. For example, she said, St. Lukes has been developing a team-based primary care model, integrating mental health services into primary care and getting care coordinators to help those patients who have more serious problems navigate the health-care system.

All those elements (of PCAP) are very in line with things that we have been working on and programs that we have been developing, she said.

While a shortage of primary care doctors is a problem everywhere, Kytle said, having a new hospital in Twin Falls has been huge for recruitment. St. Lukes has attracted 18 more primary care doctors over the past five years and 11 physicians assistants and nurse practitioners in the past four, she said.

The shortage of primary-care doctors is a problem in Idaho, said DHW spokesman Tom Shanahan  the only areas where it isnt an issue are Ada and Blaine counties and the Idaho Falls area, he said.

Idaho does have a loan repayment program, run by the Idaho Bureau of Rural Health and Primary Care. The state sponsors slots at medical schools in Washington and Utah and then helps the graduates repay their loans if they return to Idaho to practice, with the money coming from fees paid by the medical students. Fourteen doctors are enrolled in it now. Forbing-Orr said this program is probably the states most effective doctor recruitment tool, but its limited by the money available.

We unfortunately cant help as many as wed like, she said.
BOISE  Idahos state agencies are requesting a 7.6 percent hike in spending for the 2016-2017 budget year, a state budget analyst told lawmakers Friday.

Public schools make up a little less than half of the budget, and officials there are requesting a 7.6 percent hike to $1.587 billion, Paul Headlee told lawmakers on the Economic Outlook and Revenue Assessment Committee.

Education spending went up 7.4 percent a year ago, an attempt to make up for deep cuts during the recession, and a substantial increase is also expected this year. Superintendent of Public Instruction Sherri Ybarra released her recommended budget in September 2015, and numerous lawmakers have said they expect this year to continue to fully fund the career ladder teacher pay plan that was approved during the 2015 session. Ybarra is requesting $801 million for teacher pay, which would boost starting salaries to $33,400 a year.

Other agencies are requesting a 7.7 increase, to $1.719 billion, said Headlee, who is deputy division manager for the Legislative Services Office.

These are requests from agencies, and dont necessarily reflect what Gov. C.L. Butch Otter will recommend when he releases his proposed budget on Monday. After that, the Joint Finance Appropriations Committee will hear agency presentations, go over the numbers and set the budget bills.

State revenue, Headlee said, has stayed above expectations. As of December, it was $99 million over what was budgeted.

Headlee also said the state still owes $63 million in payments incurred during 2015s severe fire season. He said lawmakers could choose either to take that out of this years spending or put it in next years budget.

Headlee also briefly touched on cigarette and tobacco tax revenue, expected to be a major topic during the 2016 session because the governors plan to pay for primary care for the uninsured calls for redirecting this revenue to health care and finding another way to pay for some other services.

The state is projecting that, while tobacco tax revenue will grow from a projected $12.5 million this fiscal year to $13.6 million by 2020, cigarette tax revenue will continue to fall, from $34.65 million in the current fiscal year to $28.9 million in 2020, according to numbers prepared by the Division of Financial Management.

That revenue is divided up now  about 87 percent of tobacco tax money goes to the general fund, while more than 70 percent of cigarette tax revenue goes to an assortment of dedicated funds such as aquifer recharge, the permanent building fund, schools and juvenile probation.

Otter is recommending a one-time transfer of $10 million to aquifer recharge and ending the cigarette tax funding that is scheduled to sunset in 2019; funding the school bond levy equalization program from the general fund; and putting an early end to two highway-related transfers that are set to sunset in 2019. Some cigarette tax money would continue to go to juvenile probation, the permanent building fund and two cancer-related funds, using the current distribution formula, with the rest going to the new health-care program.
NEW YORK  Fliers who dont have the latest drivers licenses will have a two-year reprieve before their IDs are rejected at airport security checkpoints.

Idaho is among those states that have refused to comply with the federal REAL ID Act passed in 2005, with opponents citing civil liberties, states rights and cost concerns, and many travelers had been worried that the Transportation Security Administration would penalize them because of a federal law requiring newer, more-stringent IDs at the start of this year.

But late Friday afternoon, the Department of Homeland Security said passengers could continue using their current IDs until Jan. 22, 2018. Some would have until Oct. 1, 2020. Idaho lawmakers had originally expected to debate making the states licenses REAL ID-compliant during this years session, but the extension likely means this will be put off, said Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Bert Brackett, R-Rogerson.

After those dates, passengers without the proper drivers licenses would have to use other federally approved forms of ID such as a passport.

Idaho passed a law in 2008 barring the state from complying with REAL ID. Until Fridays announcement, state lawmakers were working under the assumption that the current extension, which runs out in October of this year, would be the last. Now, starting in January 2018, if Idaho licenses are still not compliant with REAL ID requirements and if another extension is not granted, Idahoans will need to form another form of ID to board an airplane.

The Real ID Act set minimum standards for licenses in response to security concerns following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Enforcement of those requirements has repeatedly been delayed.
BOISE  Idaho once took some solace in its high school graduation rate.

No, our education spending may not have been as high as many would like. And sure, the go-on rate to college of high school seniors was in the cellar compared to other states. And yes, many of those students needed remediation in math and English to compete once they did get to college.

But that high school graduation rate  91.7 percent for 2008-2009  made the state feel its schools were accomplishing something.

It turned out to be a mirage.

In 2010-11, the state began following federal graduation reporting standards based on the number of students who started ninth grade and the number who graduated four years later. That system takes into account students who move in and out of a district.

Idaho was one of the last states in the country to get a tracking system that allowed the state Department of Education to make the calculation on graduation rates, state department officials say. Idaho reported its first graduation rate under the more accurate system last year for the 2013-2014 school year.

Idahos graduation rate plummeted to 77.3 percent.

The new rate left Idaho tied with Colorado for ninth-lowest graduation rate among states and the District of Columbia, according to a recent U.S. Department of Education report.

A graduation rate of 77 percent doesnt mean that 23 percent dropped out. The actual rate of students designated as dropouts for the class of 2013-2014 was 2.9 percent. Some of those 23 percent are students who work to complete their degree beyond four years, get a GED or are special education students who can stay in the system until they are 21. And included in that 23 percent are students who left a district and no one knows where they went next, state education officials say.

So the two graduation rates dont allow an apples-to-apples comparison. But such a dramatic difference  15 percentage points, to nearly one in four students not graduating  was unnerving to Idaho education and political leaders.

Lawmakers go into the 2016 legislative session Monday with new graduation rates hanging over them.

Weve been told, at least for the years I have been in the Legislature, we have a very high school-graduate rate, but we have a low rate going on to college, said Brent Hill, Idaho Senate president pro tem, said Thursday.

Thats where we are tying to put our emphasis. So I think this has caught us a little off guard.

House Speaker Scott Bedke said hes skeptical about the new rates and wants more information on how they were compiled. But if true, he said, it should trigger a state response in an affirmative way.

Gov. Butch Otter hinted that hell offer proposals for boosting the graduation rate, but declined to give details before his State of the State address Monday.

PERSONAL, ECONOMIC EFFECTS

The effect of students not finishing high school is far-reaching: There is the personal wreckage of ill-prepared students heading off into the workplace and facing a tough time getting a job. And its yet one more drag on generating an educated workforce that could command higher wages in a state at the bottom of the nations pay scale.

The level of skills in our workforce will be our No. 1 concern for our economy to grow over the next decade, said Jeff Sayer, whose last day as director of the Idaho Department of Commerce was Thursday. If our kids arent even finishing high school, it puts us that much further behind.

WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE NEXT?

Obviously we are not pleased with the number, said Richard Westerberg, a State Board of Education member. It cries out for some action.

Westerberg expects the State Board of Education to take a deep dive into the graduation numbers to find more about who is graduating and who is not. Are girls dropping out more than boys? Is the rural graduation rate higher or lower than the urban rate?

Once we understand that, we can figure out the why, he said.

Before Idaho can come to any conclusions about the graduation rate, said Sherri Ybarra, state superintendent of public instruction, it needs another year of data. Numbers for the 2014-2015 school year could be available by spring, state education officials say. This is just baseline data, she said.

Nonetheless, the nearly one in four students not graduating on time is sobering, she said. You kind of stand up and take notice.

Ybarra hopes the Legislature will provide $1.75 million this year to pay for a program to put mentors into schools as early as the eighth grade to help students stay in school and think about education after graduation. The plan is part of Gov. Butch Otters Task Force for Improving Education and was approved by the Legislature last year. Money could be available for districts that come up with research-based mentor plans for students.

WHAT ARE SCHOOLS DOING?

Throughout the Treasure Valley high schools deploy a variety of programs to keep students from walking out the door. Some examples:

 Columbia High School, Nampa School District:

Student are learning that high school isnt the end of education. We we are trying to do our very best to think beyond graduation, said Cory Woolstenhulme, principal. Students are required to take a class that helps them see the vision beyond a high school diploma and Columbia has hired college and career counselors to help students think about education options after graduation.

Columbia holds college and career fairs at the school where students can talk to people form the world of education and the workplace.

The school built flex time into its curriculum. The school works with students to get their work completed. Students meet with teachers through the day, for lessons as well as help when they struggle. Theyll get a note from the teacher inviting them to come by for a visit.

The changes are new to Columbia, so its too early to say what it means for the graduation rate.

Anecdotally, were seeing an effect, Woolstenhulme said. They are not giving up if they see they can get their stuff done.

 Vallivue High School, Vallivue School District:

Vallivue is working to connect kids to education through advanced-placement and dual-credit programs that can put college credits in students pocket before they even get a high school diploma. College credit programs can save students thousands of dollars in college costs and make post-high school education more financially possible, said Connie Benke, a Vallivue High School guidance counselor.

In 2006-2007, students at Vallivue High School earned 223 in college credits. In 2014-2015, the number rose to 2,746 in college credit.

With that kind of investment in their education, Benke said, leaving is less of an option.

BUT IS IT ENOUGH?

Schools throw a lot of resources at their drop-out problems, said Sandy Addis, National Dropout Prevention Center director. No one size fits all, he said. What works in the Mississippi Delta may not work in inner-city Detroit.

For many people, dropping out is seen as a school problem. But its really a community issue, Addis said.

Graduation rates change when a community, the mayor, the chamber, get serious about it and start changing the messages, Addis said. And that message is: We are saying to kids: You grow up here, you graduate. That is what we do.

BULLISH ON GRADUATING

Addis points to the Hart County Charter System, a school district of about 3,400 students in rural northeast Georgia about two hours from Atlanta. Eight years ago the graduation rate was 68 percent. And a large share of the students were dropping out in ninth grade.

The schools and the community got together to address the problem. They adopted a single value: Finish what you start.

Those words made it into storefronts around Hartwell, Ga., and onto the school districts website. The mascot is a grad dog  a bulldog wearing a mortar board.

School officials carried the message to lower classes, where students were given T-shirts with their graduation year printed on them, said Jay Floyd, superintendent.

A week before graduation, seniors wear their caps and gowns to the elementary school to show kids that they really can graduate.

Along with community support the school district is developing special programs in several elementary schools and pushing college and career readiness and agricultural research in upper grades.

Eight years later, the graduation rate is 93 percent.

Education has become something that is very important, Floyd said.
Few places in America provide an experience that matches the sheer magnitude of the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness, the largest contiguous unit of the National Wilderness Preservation System in the Lower 48. Its clear rivers, deep canyons and rugged mountains provide habitat for mountain lions, gray wolves, black bears, lynx, red fox, bighorn sheep, elk, moose and deer, among others. Wildlife distribution, abundance and diversity represent one measure of the natural value of wilderness.

As forest supervisor, my responsibility is to ensure the protection of wilderness characteristics within The Frank, as many of us call it. So when the Idaho Department of Fish and Game approached the Forest Service with concerns about the decline in the Middle Fork elk population and plans to address it, I had to carefully analyze the request. You see, IDFG seeks to use a helicopter to aid elk collaring activities, an activity prohibited in wilderness except in rare instances.

After receiving a formal proposal from IDFG, the Forest Service initiated an environmental analysis that weighed the possible degradation of wilderness character due to the decline of elk populations and the effect of using mechanized equipment in The Frank.

My decision is based on careful consideration that included analysis of information provided by a variety of public interests. In the end, I decided to authorize the limited use of helicopters by IDFG for monitoring elk in The Frank. While the use of mechanical transport, motorized equipment and aircraft landing are prohibited in wilderness, rare exceptions can be made. In this case, I am convinced that helicopter use is warranted for purposes of wilderness administration in this case.

IDFG will land helicopters in remote regions of The Frank to capture elk and fit 60 animals with GPS collars. Helicopter operations will take up to five days  not necessarily consecutive  beginning as early as mid-January and ending in March while elk are herded together.

My decision does not establish a precedent for future actions in The Frank or any other wilderness. Any future proposal will require a separate analysis with comprehensive public involvement and analyzed on its own merits, including an evaluation for proposed prohibited uses. I am obligated to protect the wilderness resource. On rare occasions, the authorization of helicopter landings is warranted, in order to provide for longer-term conservation of wilderness.

Communication among IDFG, conservation organizations and the Forest Service is critical to understand the cause of the Middle Fork elk decline while protecting the special character of The Frank. Through IDFGs study, we will gain vital information about elk population trends, and mortality causes that will inform greater understanding of wildlife population interactions and habitat requirements in the wilderness.

Im grateful to all who care about our federal lands and understand the special nature of The Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness. I look forward to continuing to work with all concerned about the management of The Frank.
Cheer

Good political leadership has as much to do with knowing when to kill a political idea as it does with knowing when to advance it.

Gov. C.L. Butch Otter showed that this week when he pooh-poohed a push from far-right legislators to target Planned Parenthood and refugee resettlement in Idaho when the 2016 legislative session begins next week.

For a guy who has been more than willing to drag Idaho along on his wild goose chases in the name of states rights (remember gay marriage, ag-gag, REAL ID?), the governor seems more than willing in this case to bow to the feds.

But on this one, hes right. Under the law, there simply isnt much Idaho can do to influence Planned Parenthood, which doesnt receive any direct state funding in Idaho. The group also does not donate the kinds of fetal tissue here that sparked an outcry through controversial videos that surfaced last year.

What is there to investigate? Otter asked again this week.

Same with refugee resettlement. Since calling for a nation-wide reassessment of screening processes, Otter has met with top federal screening officials and now says the feds know more than we thought they knew about refugees entering the United States.

We can only hope the GOPs farthest right lawmakers listen to their governor and refrain from introducing legislation on Planned Parenthood and refugee resettlement, now knowing the governor doesnt appear to back either notion.

Jeer

Things like this just arent supposed to happen  a baby, dead and discarded in a bag on a bridge over a canal in south Twin Falls.

Investigators are frantically trying to find the mother  and determine whether the baby was stillborn or left to die on a frigid New Years Eve.

Whatever the circumstances, someone failed the mother along the way.

Knowing the why not only allows us to understand what happened, Twin Falls County Sheriffs Sgt. Ken Mencl said. But if this person who found themselves in this situation needed additional help, were certainly in the right position to line that individual up with psychiatric services, medical services, a doctor. Anything along those lines, towards closure.

If only that help had come sooner.

Cheer

Congratulations to Jeff Harmon, the new vice president of administration at the College of Southern Idaho.

Harmon took the helm Jan. 1 and replaces Mike Mason, who retired.

Harmon should be an excellent fit and usher stability for a department rocked by an embezzlement scandal. A certified public accountant, hes worked at CSI for 24 years and is widely respected by his peers on campus and leaders in the community.

We wish him luck.
It was an address to reassure the nation, but succeeded in only reassuring mostly the core of the low-information variety of Democrats. For me, the address was mostly Democrat gibberish laced with ardent Liberal code words and phrases meant to rally the base, within their 'Group Think' construct.But, this is how Hussein leads and governs - always the candidate never the president - so there was nothing new here, and I, personally, felt less assured that America's amateur president has any real handle on the situation at hand, or meaningful understanding of the deadly and evil problem at large - he just talks ... mostly in coded Democrat speak As a Conservative patriot, what I understood from the Democrat's president was that: Hussein has great blame for congress; disingenuous, fallacious straw man arguments (this was a big part of his coded speak to Liberals); Islam is a Great and Peaceful Religion'; and that we need stronger gun control , which is nuts when one considers that San Bernardino, California has some of the strictest gun control in the nation, so ...Don't expect much from The Amateur to protect this nation. His record of doing so is abysmal at best, as if his greatest concern is not to offend American Muslims, because most vote Democrat ... imagine that.That evening, after the Obama 13 minute address, my wife did some Facebook research, where she found a Liberal cousin state:. This is the same "Save the Planet" cousin, who lamented after 9/11 that,Of course, you have to wonder, did I query the obvious. I did, which, of course, was:My wife's cousin, who is highly educated, and has a wonderful government job, is the core of the low-information Hussein Obama base of support, where style over substance is paramount.
My book The Lies We Were Told published by Bristol University Press. It features key blog posts from the past, with additional commentary and context. It was a finalist for the 2019 PROSE awards
About Me Mohd. Kamal bin Abdullah I am Mohd. Kamal bin Abdullah, who resides in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. I hold a post-graduate law degree from the United Kingdom. I blog to tell MALAYSIANS THE TRUTH. View my complete profile

Blog Archive
ECU program links scholarships to community service

Video by Cliff Hollis

Public Service Fellow Brittany Linkous volunteers at the Food Bank as part of the Public Service Fellows initiative.

Providing Service

Other ECU students serving as Public Service Fellows this semester:



Katie Antoszyk, a senior athletic training major from Concord; Myranda Fields, a junior athletic training major from Jacksonville; and Thomas Morris, a junior health and human performance from Garner; are providing first aid and emergency care to athletes at three Pitt County high schools  DH Conley, Farmville Central and Ayden-Grifton.

Allison Jackson, a business major from Rockingham developed marketing materials, planned events and obtained event sponsorships for the Pitt County Animal Shelter.

Natalie Hicks, an allied health sciences major from Greensboro, is providing in-hospital and outpatient treatment facilities in physical therapy at Granville Medical Center in Oxford.

Roderick Hall, a senior philosophy and political science major from Riegelwood; Janae Brown, a junior graphic design major from Knightdale; Destiny Johnson, a senior art major from Charlotte; Zack Cleghorn, a junior industrial engineering and technology major from Greenville; and Gilbert Combs, a senior regional and urban planning major from Elizabeth City; are working with the Art + Community Project is to build community and reduce crime through art making and installing art in a university neighborhood in Greenville. Read more about the Art + Community project. Other ECU students serving as Public Service Fellows this semester:

'It has opened my eyes'

Making volunteering affordable



ECU student and Public Service Fellow Allison Leigh Jackson volunteers at the Pitt County Animal Shelter.



Through the East Carolina University Public Service Fellows program, nursing student Aleigha Criego volunteers at the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina. In exchange she earns a $4,500 scholarship, thanks to a pilot program operating under a grant from the State Employees Credit Union Foundation. (Photos by Cliff Hollis)

She arrived as an unpaid intern at the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina, and now East Carolina University junior nursing student Aleigha Criego is having a hard time leaving.she said.Criego is working part-time this semester at Food Bank's warehouse and distribution center in west Greenville. She's updating a database of five Pitt County churches, civic groups and other nonprofits that focus on feeding hungry children. She's also helping to administer the Weekend Power Pack program, where kids are sent home from school on Fridays with backpacks filled with enough food to last the weekend.The Food Bank benefits from the 300 hours of office work that Criego is donating, and she benefits, too. Criego will earn a $4,500 scholarship from ECU under an initiative aimed at boosting the manpower available to local organizations that deliver critical community services.She is among 13 ECU students who are interning this semester at small nonprofits and local government agencies through ECU's Public Service Fellows program.Like many nonprofits, these agencies could use an extra pair of hands to get their work done. A college intern would help, but often there's no budget for that. The Public Service Fellows program attempts to solve both those problems.The initiative is a pilot program operating at ECU and two other UNC campuses under a $300,000 grant from the State Employees' Credit Union Foundation. The $100,000 that ECU received in April funded 20 fellowships. Seven interned over the summer.Heading up the initiative is Dr. Sharon Paynter, interim director of public service and community relations at ECU.Paynter said that after Criego and the other Public Service fellows complete their internships, she and others will determine if the initiative achieved its goals. If the evaluation is positive and the foundation chooses to renew the grant, Public Service fellows could become another effective tool that ECU uses to serve the region, Paynter said.Brittany Linkous, a junior from Tarboro, also is interning this semester at Food Bank as a Public Service Fellow.Crystal Andrews, the outreach coordinator at Food Bank's Greenville location, said having Criego and Linkous around the office has been a big help.Criego said it's been difficult to fit the internship into a semester already filled with difficult biology courses and clinical training. But she's glad she did.Criego, who hopes to attend medical school, said working at the Food Bank has taught her one important medical principle and a lot about life.Public Service fellow Sarah Cook is working 24 hours a week at the J.H. Sampson Community Development Center in Kinston-including two Saturdays a month-and will pile up 300 volunteer hours by the end of the semester.She is helping plan and organize a weekend academic enrichment program for boys and girls in grades 6 through 9. Kids from this neighborhood often struggle with science and math, so Cook is tutoring them on practical and effective ways to raise their scores on end of grade tests.A junior from Smithfield majoring in middle grades education, Cook said the internship has been a hands-on learning experience. She designed classes for the Saturday academies that offer test-taking tips and advocacy stills. There also are classes in aerobics and yoga, which "help them calm down with their breathing" when they take tests, Cook said.Cook said.She also is working with the community center director Margo Dawson to create a tutoring program at nearby Rochelle Middle School, where science and math test scores are low.said Dawson, who ticks off a list of Cook's other contributions: overseeing the math lab at the Saturday academies, co-writing the community center newsletter and creating forms for the after-school tutoring program.Cook said she has gotten back as much as she has given.Isaac Hopkins had considered volunteering as a physical therapist at a rural hospital or doctor's office. But as a parent with two young children, he confronted a financial roadblock.said Hopkins, who is a senior rehabilitation services major from Morehead City.Hopkins, like most of the fellows, is doing work that complements his major. He is interning as a physical therapy technician at Carteret General Hospital in Morehead City.Hopkins said.The internship, which required 450 hours of his time, worked so well that the hospital offered Hopkins a job, which he accepted.he said.Paynter said many of the interns believe the program enhances their academics.Jama Dagenhart, executive director of the SECU Foundation, said a decision probably won't be made about renewing the grants until April. She said so far she has received positive feedback.
This blog's purpose is to promote the novel, The Long Habit of Living, by Mark Zipoli. Posts have excerpts from the book and related visuals to give the reader a heightened literary experience. Oftentimes posts may refer to my championing the works of John Cowper Powys, Orhan Pamuk, Doris Lessing, Anita Brookner, and other heroes.
Your digital subscription includes access to content from all our websites in your region. Access unlimited news content and The Canberra Times app. Premium subscribers also enjoy interactive puzzles and access to the digital version of our print edition - Today's Paper.
WHAT HAPPENED TO THE DEMOCRAT PARTY? I can no longer remain in todays Demo Party that is now under the control of an elitist cabal of warmongers driven by cowardly wokeness, who divide us by racializing every issue and stoke anti-white racism, actively undermine our freedoms, are hostile to people of faith, demonize the police and protect criminals at the expense of law-abiding Americans, believe in open borders, weaponize the national security state to go after opponents.TULSI GABBARD
I know, I know, we just finished Thanksgiving, but Christmas is right around the corner, and I always want things a bit neater around the house before I start decorating. Add the fact that I'm having a small gathering at my house soon, and you'll be able to visualize the state of my home.Boxes of decorations have come out of the closets and up from the basement, and some Christmas items have already been taken to the consignment shop. Those not suitable for consigning will soon be on their way to the thrift shop up the street. You too probably have a few items you'd describe as "I like this, but can't seem to find a place for it." I decided to get rid of some of those, but naturally I've ordered a few new items, like a lighted swag for the porch.I've always loved decorating for Christmas and for most of my adult life have decorated my home to the hilt. When I was a child in New York, we always had a tree and outdoor lights and the occasional decorated windows, but I think that was the extent of our decorating. Remember putting artificial snow on windows? I'm sure I'm dating myself with that memory.I'm convinced my love of Christmas and my extreme love of decorating came from my other mother, my mother-in-law who enjoys everything Christmas. My boxes are filled with Christmas items she made and gave me over the years: the quilted tree skirt, the crocheted angel tree topper, stockings and aprons, you name it. We've always laughed about her having to have a roaring fire Christmas day, even when it was 75. Believe it or not, Atlanta temps can range from a chilly zero on up into the 70's. I recall a particularly frigid Christmas morning, back when I was in my twenties, when it was only 5.My collection of decorations grew by leaps and bounds when one of my girlfriends started visiting every year with her children to help decorate my tree. She was a master at making bows, so my home began to fill with bows, garlands, wreathes and more, plus whatever unique holiday knickknack she brought me each year. I now have so many decorations that I just pick and choose what to put out each December.I have more ornaments than I can possibly put on one tree, but still I have a hard time resisting new ones. When my mom stopped putting up trees, I inherited her collection of U.S. Capitol Historical Society ornaments and her original glass Woolworth ornaments. All of those go up every year. Then I have a friend who uses ornaments as place settings for our annual holiday gathering, so that's another 50 or so ornaments I've collected through the years. That's why I also have a four foot artificial tree to go with the big one. Yet here I sit contemplating going to a local Holiday Artist Market, where I'm sure to find something else I can't live without.First, though, I must get through the cleaning frenzy, which has now extended to the kitchen counters and cabinets. To clear the counters, I must make room in the cabinets. Do I really need the gazillion glass vases that have come my way over the years or all the Glad ware that seems to multiply? I think not. It may even be time to donate at least one set of silverware to the thrift shop. There's no telling where this frenzy could lead, but I do know it will end, at least temporarily, before the first holiday guest arrives.
@MichaelAuslen

Less than 24 hours after the state's last execution, Gov. Rick Scott on Friday signed the death warrant of a man convicted in two 1987 Jacksonville murders.

At 6 p.m. March 17 in the death chamber at Florida State Prison, Mark James Asay, 52, will be executed.

On Sept. 29, 1988, Asay was sentenced to death in Duval County for two separate murders, both committed with a gun in the early morning on July 18, 1987.

He and a friend drove to downtown Jacksonville, where they saw Asay's brother talking to Robert Lee Booker, according to information from Scott's office. Asay got in an argument with Booker, called him a racial slur, pulled a gun from his back pocket and sot Booker in the stomach. Booker died shortly after running from the scene.

As Asay and his friend continued driving around Jacksonville, they encountered Robert McDowell, a man Asay thought had cheated him out of $10 in a drug deal. He arranged to meet McDowell in an alley, where Asay grabbed him and shot him for times in the chest.

A jury in 1988 recommended a death sentence for both murders by a 9-3 vote.

In recent months, Scott has ramped up the pace on executions at the state prison in Starke after a Florida Supreme Court ruling halted the death penalty for most of 2015.

On Thursday night, the state executed Oscar Ray Bolin, convicted of brutally murdering three women in the Tampa Bay area. And the execution of Michael Ray Lambrix for two 1983 killings in Glades County is scheduled for Feb. 11.

The executions come as the death penalty in Florida is under scrutiny by the U.S. Supreme Court, which this summer will hand down a ruling in Hurst v. Florida. The court could rule sentences on Florida's 390-person death row unconstitutional, including those of Asay and Lambrix.
Michael-in-Norfolk disclaims any and all responsibility or liability for the accuracy, content, completeness, legality, reliability, operability, or availability of information or material displayed on this site and does not claim credit for any images or articles featured on this site, unless otherwise noted. All visual content is copyrighted to it's respectful owners. Information on this site may contain errors or inaccuracies, and Michael-in-Norfolk does not make warranty as to the correctness or reliability of the site's content. If you own rights to any of the images or articles, and do not wish them to appear on this site, please contact Michael-in-Norfolk via e-mail and they will be promptly removed. Michael-in-Norfolk contains links to other Internet sites. These links are provided solely as a convenience and are not endorsements of any products or services in such sites, and no information or content in such site has been endorsed or approved by this blog.
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Thoughts on the military and military activities of a diverse nature. Free-ranging and eclectic. Blog ego cogito ergo sum.
In his book Accounting for Tastes, Nobel Prize-winning economist Gary Becker wrote that differences in cultures causes considerable differences in preferences over goods, as with the taboo against eating pork among religious Jews and Moslems, or the tradition of filial obedience in Chinese and some other cultures. The economists traditional assumption of given and stable preferences over goods seems to be much more consistent with the influence of culture on preferences than with the influence of personal capital or other kinds of social capital". Becker was suggesting that culture has important implications in shaping an individuals preferences.

But how far does culture affect food choices and nutrition? A new study by David Atkin of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), to be published in the American Economic Review, attempts to answer that question. Atkin argues that migrants in India consume less because of food preferences, suggesting that people often lose out on nutrition when they migrate to a place where food habits are different. Migrants continue having their own regional food despite locally available, and probably more nutritious, food.

Atkin assembles National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) data for consumption and computes the calories consumed per rupee spent and finds that migrants consume less than non-migrants. When people move across states, they also carry their food preferences with them, he shows using data.

With time, these preferences do not seem to change. Migrants stick to their traditional diet and forego nutritional intake in the process. The most affected migrants, Atkin writes, would consume 7% more calories if they possessed their neighbours preferences.

In their widely acclaimed book Poor Economics, Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee argue that poor may be misinformed about the nutritional value and they may end up consuming more of tastier" food and less of nutritional food.

Moreover, people tend to be suspicious of outsiders who tell them that they should change their diet, probably because they like what they eat. When rice prices went up sharply in 1966-67, the chief minister of West Bengal suggested that eating less rice and more vegetables would be good for peoples health and easier on their budget. This set off a flurry of protests, and the chief minister was greeted by protesters with garlands of vegetables wherever he went," they write.

However, Atkin finds that lack of information is not one of the constraints among Indian migrants. He documents three striking findings.

First, that long-term migrants (those who had lived in a place for more than five years) still retained strong preferences for their origin-state food, and lose out on nutrition from locally available food, what he dubs as the implicit calorie tax".

Second, that literate migrants should be able to switch to nutritious food, but the paper suggests that among literate migrants, the calorie tax is higher.

Finally, migrants do not adjust their consumption according to the price of an available bundle of food items. They continue to consume the same amount of own-state food even when it becomes expensive, suggesting that they are not as price-sensitive as one would expect them to be.

Previously published research confirms that culture-borne preferences matter. In a 2012 study, economists Bart Bronnenberg of Tilburg University (Netherlands), Jean Pierre Dube of the University of Chicago and Matthew Gentzkow of Stanford University used data for present and past purchases for more than 38,000 households in the US to suggest that brand preferences persist longer than we imagine.

They also noted that it takes much longer for the gaps in consumption between migrants and non-migrants to close. By their estimates, it may take 20 years or longer to narrow the gap in purchases by 50%.

Shifts in preferences can also play a role in changing food consumption patterns. In a widely cited 2009 paper, economists Angus Deaton and John Dreze showed that while India is getting richer, people are consuming fewer calories than before even though relative food prices have remained more or less the same.

Since then, several competing hypotheses have been put forward to explain the decline. Some scholars have argued that the shift from agriculture to non-agricultural occupations, and increasing mechanization within agriculture, has led to a decline in calorie requirements. Economists Amit Basole and Deepankar Basu of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, argue instead that rising expenditure on non-food necessities has squeezed" the budget spent on food.

One possible answer to Indias calorie puzzle could be a rise in conspicuous consumptiona term coined by 19th-century economist Thorstein Veblen in his book, The Theory of the Leisure Class, signalling a concern for status and desire to lead a better" life.

No class of society, not even the most abjectly poor, forgoes all customary conspicuous consumption," Veblen argued. The last items of this category of consumption are not given up except under stress of the direst necessity. Very much of squalor and discomfort will be endured before the last trinket or the last pretence of pecuniary decency is put away."

In a 2007 study, Duflo and Banerjee showed that a median household in Udaipur spends a disproportionately large share on cheap luxuries such as alcohol, tobacco and festivals. Based on calculations from India Human Development Survey data, economists Melanie Khamis, Nishith Prakash and Zahra Siddique at IZA, Bonn, found that other backward classes (OBCs) spend close to 9% more on conspicuous consumption, and relatively less on food and education compared to those from the upper-caste groups. Such research suggests that a poor household is willing to cut spending on food in order to buy a new TV or a smartphone.

There are important implications of our results for policy: we have shown that status-signalling spending may be quite large among groups which are relatively poor and that people are myopic, driven by norms and signalling," wrote Khamis, Prakash and Siddique. Giving cash transfers/cash benefits to these groups might not lead to spending on education and health but also on visible consumption."

The warning of these researchers should not, however, mean an endorsement of Indias current food policy, which emphasizes the provision of subsidized foodgrain to the poor. As a Mint analysis of the latest NSSO data on consumption showed, poorer Indians, particularly in rural India, are eating less protein-rich and fat-rich foods compared to average consumption levels".

While improvements in the public distribution system may have increased their access to carbohydrate-rich food items such as cereals, rising prices of protein-rich and fat-rich items seem to have hit the poor hard, adversely affecting their diet."

Providing cheap grain is unlikely to solve Indias malnutrition problem.

Economics Express runs weekly, and features interesting reads from the world of economics and finance.

Comments are welcome at feedback@livemint.com

Topics
Kama Maclean is associate professor at the University of New South Waless School of Humanities and Languages. In the past decade, Maclean has worked across a range of topics related to north India, including nationalist mobilization, the politics of pilgrimage, theories of social communication and intercolonial histories.

Her forthcoming book, A Revolutionary History of Interwar India: Violence, Image, Voice and Text revisits the historiography of the Indian freedom struggle, which has been largely framed as a triumph for the Gandhian ideology of non-violence despite the fairly regular eruptions of anti-colonial violence that peppered British India in the early 20th century.

Maclean focuses on the politics of Indian nationalism from its moment of acceleration in the interwar period following the visitation of the Simon Commission, to factor in the political impact of the north Indian revolutionaries.

The following is an edited excerpt from the second chapter of the book titled That Hat: Infamy, Strategy and Social Communication".

A Revolutionary History of Interwar India will be published by Penguin Random House India later this year.

***

Jawaharlal Nehru, writing in his autobiography some three to four years after Bhagat Singhs death, intimates that Bhagat Singh was popular despite his violence. But as Nehru himself was acutely aware, as will become clear in later chapters, in the late 1920s there was no perfect consensus within the Congress movement that violence was inappropriate. Jawaharlal himself had argued, after Bhagat Singhs arrest, that the government had no right to condemn its use when they themselves made ample use of it.

In October 1930, after Bhagat Singh was sentenced to death, Nehru pointedly commented that:

the courage of Bhagat Singh is exceedingly rare. If the Viceroy expects us to refrain from admiring this wonderful courage and the high purpose behind it, he is mistaken. Let him ask his own heart what he would have felt if Bhagat Singh had been an Englishman and acted for England."

The widespread dissemination of the portrait in its many guises enabled a predominantly illiterate people to imagine Bhagat Singh independently of imperial allegations that he was a terrorist, and to visualise the legendary stories, songs, poems and sayings that quickly grew up around him. Disseminated widely, initially in the media, the photograph soon began to travel independent of print. Copied and distributed freely by political interest groups, the portrait proliferated and was soon to be found adorning walls and on badges, even in villages".

Received in the intense political context of the late 1920s and early 1930s, a period characterised by ongoing post-war negotiations about political reforms, the hubris of and intense agitation against the Simon Commission, bitter memories of the traumatic imperial violence displayed at Jallianwalla Bagh, and the repression of the Civil Disobedience Movement, Bhagat Singhs gentle gaze served to contradict British charges that he was a cold assassin, feeding rumours that he was innocent.

Those who knew of his guilt were able to forget the act of violence, reasoning that he was amply provoked by British oppression: as one Congressite argued in March of 1931, however one may disagree with the methods used by violent revolutionaries, hatred of the British rule had gone down so deep in the Indian heart that there are few Indians who do not acclaim Bhagat Singh and others of the same school of thought as heroes".

This too has been an enduring concept; relatively recent images of Bhagat Singh frequently position him in the company of other militant national heroes (including his contemporaries Chandrashekhar Azad and Subhas Chandra Bose), collected around the memorial built in homage to the victims of the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre, the event which serves as their provocation or justification.

The infamous hat photograph was taken a few days prior to the action in the Legislative Assembly, probably around 4 April, in the studios of Ramnath Photographers at Kashmiri Gate in Delhi. Jaidev Kapoor, the Hindustan Socialist Republican Army (HSRA) member who did much of the reconnaissance and planning for the attack, arranged for the photograph to be taken.

He specifically asked the photographer to make a memento of Bhagat Singh, specifying that our friend is going away, so we want a really good photograph of him". B.K. Dutt was photographed on a separate occasion, but with the same instruction. The first photograph he had taken did not come out, and he had to return for a second sitting which produced a portrait of Dutt gazing contemplatively beyond the frame.

While the photographs were being developed, Bhagat Singh and Dutt were attending the Legislative Assembly on a daily basis, closely observing the debate on the Public Safety Bill; their plan was to throw the bombs at the exact moment the president of the House moved to give his ruling, which happened on the morning of 8 April. A number of newspaper reporters were present in the Assembly at the time of the bombing, as were many political notables, both Indian and British, which no doubt added to the sense of excitement with which the so-called Assembly Outrage was initially carried in the press.

At Ramnath Photographers, however, production was delayed and Kapoor was unable to collect the photographs before the action took place, as was planned. The revolutionaries did not realise that Ramnath were also contracted to take photographs for the police, and had been summoned to the police station in Old Delhi, where Bhagat Singh was taken after his arrest on 8 April 1929, to photograph him. These police photographs have not yet surfaced, but were almost certainly used in the early investigation of the outrage", as the police ransacked all the hotels in Delhi with photographs of the accused".

The delay in collecting the photographs put the HSRA in a difficult position, as party worker Shiv Verma explained:

Our apprehension was: should we go for the photographs and this fellow is in league with the police, then he may hand us over ... but then we could not check our temptation. We took the risk. And Jaidevwith his finger on the trigger of the revolver standing behindand I went to the photographer, demanded the photographs. That photographer saw me, smiled and handed over the packet to me. I made the payment. Then he brought the negatives also and said: they are no good for me, you take them also. He did not charge anything for the negatives ... that is how the photographs were procured."

Jaidev Kapoor remembered it slightly differently, eliminating Vermas role in the collection and remembering a less congenial photographer, thus framing himself into a more daring role:

I was afraid that Ramnath had already given information to the police, and that they would be waiting for me. I had all these concerns, but still, I had to get the photographs. So, about three days after the action, I went to the shop. At first, he stared at me, but he said nothing. I just threw the money down on the counter and took the photographs. I took the negatives too."

We might see the discrepancy between these two oral accounts as part of an attempt to reinscribe individual agency into a narrative which has become dominated by Bhagat Singh, overlooking the orchestrations of the other HSRA members. In his oral history testimony Kapoor reported that he became depressed whenever he looked at the photographs the following day. Not only was he imagining the interrogation and torture that his friends were being subjected to, but he was aghast at the early media coverage of the action, which had been resoundingly negative.

The Lahore Tribunes editor had at the outset remarked that it was inconceivable" that any opinion about the attack could differ from that of the Delhi policethat it was the isolated act of mad men". The Hindustan Times, owned by the Moderate Congressite Madan Mohan Malaviya, lectured in an editorial to the perpetrators of the diabolical deed" that they were

doing more harm than good ... What India needs today is not so much coercion of the Government, as constructive national activity, unity, political education and a strong sanction behind national demands ... once Indians are politically conscious enough to staunchly stand up for their rights, without the raising of a little anger, without the ring of a single bomb, freedom can be attained."

It was the task of other HSRA members Shiv Verma, Sukhdev and Kapoor to turn this coverage to their advantage. The photographs would be pivotal to this. Sukhdev left Delhi for Lahore, taking with him the negatives, from which he had multiple positive photographs made.

Published with permission from Penguin Random House India.

Comments are welcome at feedback@livemint.com

Topics
Do we exclude writers from the theoretical canon on the grounds that they were, by our standards, racists and misogynists? Where do we forage in our history if, on those grounds, we exclude Hesiod, Aristotle, Saul of Tarsus, Augustine, Aquinas, Chaucer, Dante, Shakespeare, Montaigne, Voltaire, and those arrogant Germans I've mentioned? The intellectual commons looks pretty barren if we're fenced off from all those ideas.

The rise of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2013, along with the massacre of nine black churchgoers last summer in Charleston, South Carolina, created racial hysteria and gave rise to an anti-intellectual movement that has now extended to American campuses. Its promoters want to purge society-and our universities-of historical relics and symbols that they say glorify white supremacy and perpetuate racism.Ridding campuses of such controversial monuments may satisfy the emotionalism of these politically correct times, but it also will provide a false sense of closure to a complex chapter in our country's history. As the philosopher and poet George Santayana once wrote, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." Brutish attacks on dissenting views and intimidation tactics coming from some of today's campus activists reinforce that maxim; if all that changes is the direction of racial injustice, what is actually gained?The history of race relations in America, particularly in the South, is grim. Slavery, Ku Klux Klan terrorism, and the Jim Crow era, for example, were instances of systemic injustice with tragic lingering effects. But viewed in a different light, that history underscores our social progress and the factors that led to it.Take higher education. Once reserved for wealthy white males, it's now open to all qualified males and females from all income brackets. Meritocracy thrives where once it did not. This is not to say that all is well in terms of race relations on campus. But it is hard to take seriously middle- and upper-middle class students, attending the best colleges in the world, who claim that statues are oppressing them.Over the summer, according to Inside Higher Ed, students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Texas at Austin, Winthrop University, and Clemson University vandalized statues and paintings "linked to racist figures or ideas from the Confederate or Jim Crow days of the South." Officials at UT-Austin eventually removed a statue of Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy.In October and November, students from the College of William and Mary and the University of Missouri placed sticky notes with labels such as "rapist" and "racist" on statues of Thomas Jefferson and called for their removal. "Removing Jefferson's statue alone will not eliminate the racial problems we face in America today, but it will help cure the emotional and psychological strain of history," said the Missouri student who organized a petition to remove the statue.At Princeton, protesters demanded that school officials "acknowledge the racist legacy of Woodrow Wilson," the 28th U.S. President and former president of the university. University leaders have agreed to consider removing Wilson's mural from a campus dining hall.In addition to seeking the removal of certain statues and paintings, some student groups are calling for campus buildings named after racist historical figures to be renamed. Groups at UNC-Chapel Hill and Georgetown University, for instance, have already succeeded in this regard.Criticizing these trends in an opinion piece for the, history professor James Livingston raises an important "slippery slope" argument:Indeed, if history itself can be put on trial for possessing unsavory, "offensive" elements such as racism and bigotry, why not art, too? At the State University of New York at Buffalo, a black graduate student's art project, which entailed posting "White Only" and "Black Only" signs across campus, was heavily criticized by black students, prompting the administration to "[encourage] discussions...about negotiating the boundaries of freedom of expression."At the University of Kentucky, the president recently decided to shroud "a campus mural from 1934 that shows scenes from state history, including black workers in a tobacco field and a Native American with a tomahawk." That decision was made after two dozen black students complained. Given this atmosphere of campus intolerance, it's no wonder that top comedians are avoiding college venues . When everyone's offended and everyone's being microaggressed against, the chilling of expression-artistic or otherwise-is inevitable.As Ben Shapiro wrote in a June 2015 op-ed on Breitbart, "Offensiveness, justified or not, justifies the sledgehammer. In this respect, it becomes difficult to distinguish between the terrorists of ISIS jackhammering ancient idols in Iraq or the Taliban blowing up Buddhist statues in Afghanistan from those who would raze Confederate monuments. No one has to like Confederate war monuments and memorials, but every civilized person should recognize their historic and cultural value-even the value in constantly remembering their use for and association with evil causes including slavery and Jim Crow."Students and others offended by Confederate monuments should avoid those sledgehammers. Instead, a recent case from UNC-Chapel Hill can be used as a guide. For years, the university's "explicitly pro-Confederate" Silent Sam memorial (created in 1913 at the behest of the Daughters of the Confederacy) has been the subject of campus protest. To address student concerns and to "contextualize" Silent Sam's history, the school in 2005 erected a counter monument called the Unsung Founders Memorial, which commemorates the slaves and black workers who helped to construct the university.Unfortunately, some Chapel Hill students and protesters have recently demanded that Silent Sam and other similar monuments be removed entirely. This is the wrong approach. Better to fight offensive speech with more speech, such as the Unsung Founders monument. University leaders elsewhere should encourage students to embrace "contextualization" and, when feasible, to create counter monuments.R. Owen Williams, president of the Associated Colleges of the South, recently wrote an article for the Atlantic sympathetic to protesters' concerns about systemic racism on campus and in society generally. But Williams concluded, "Rather than [erase] the past, why not use it? Honoring and remembering are not the same. The soul of a nation is rooted in memory. But memory, like history, is a complicated and fallible narrative, vulnerable to error and manipulation. History matters much less if only the good parts are remembered...."Williams is on to something important. Rather than tearing down our history, rather than rewriting it, or even countering it, students who are offended by what they deem to be symbols of racism should use them to spur their own achievements. The black student at Chapel Hill who is repulsed when walking past Silent Sam should nod to the old fellow, raise his or her school books, and simply state, "so look at me now," and move on in smug satisfaction.Still, the urge to seek emotional resolution by extirpating the past is a powerful natural tendency for those who feel downtrodden. One of the first things the people of Eastern Europe did when the Iron Curtain fell was to bring statues of communist tyrants such as Lenin, Stalin, and Ceausescu crashing to the ground.Yet, the situation on American campuses is far different. The current angry response is not the immediate celebration of coming to life that occurred in Eastern Europe. Those who destroyed the statues of Lenin suffered directly from the Communist regime-they had family members hauled off to die in the Gulag Archipelago, or even spent time there themselves. Their own freedom, particularly of expression, was greatly restricted.But the students at Chapel Hill and Missouri are attending the top public universities in their states, quite often at others' expense. And their voices are not silenced; instead, every time one of them opens his or her mouth, it seems that a dozen media microphones rush to capture every word. Considerable time has elapsed since the great majority of racial injustices, and many black families have prospered in this country. For instance, the key leader of the Black Lives Matters protests at the University of Missouri, Jonathan Butler, is a graduate student and son of a millionaire What kind of place will the university become if small but loud groups-mobs, if you will-can erase the past, or the present? Indeed, to remove any traces of Thomas Jefferson, who did so much to advance the cause of freedom, does not signify a coming to life but a sort of death of the life of the mind and search for justice for all that he represented. Universities must try to avoid the anti-intellectual hysteria that is growing on the very campuses where preserving the past and open inquiry should most be upheld as ideals. That entails defending history, warts and all, even when the mob takes offense and refuses to recognize its value.
The First United Methodist Church would like to offer a short, informative class on modern Islam, with a focus on Islam among American Muslims built around the DVD "The Jesus Fatwah: Love Your Neighbor." If you are curious about how modern American Muslims practice and view their faith, if youre concerned about Muslim beliefs about women, violence, Shariah law, polygamy, or if you have questions about how American Muslims view this country, this class may be for you. There will be plenty of time for discussion and questions.
Brian Steffen spent a week exploring the Bitterroot Valley with his wife and five children this past summer  and he immediately started trying to find a way to live here.

We fell in love with western Montana, he recalled.

A fifth-generation Montanan, Steffen spent a decade as chief executive officer of Action for Eastern Montana, a nonprofit provider of federal and state programs with a multimillion-dollar budget. Coincidentally, while he was looking for a job here, the Missoula Family YMCA was in the midst of a five-month search for a new CEO.

My wife found the job online, I applied and the rest is history, he said.

With 310 active employees and an annual operating budget of $4.5 million, Steffen is now at the fore of one of the largest nonprofit organizations in town, which serves thousands of people every year of all ages. Hes only been here a week, but before he came out he researched his new workplace in depth.

I read every Missoulian article I could on it. I read dissertations that UM students wrote on different programs at the YMCA. I read every financial document I could get, he said. I spent a lot of time on it. So Ive done a huge amount of research  so its not so much learning about the YMCA, its seeing the real-world application of everything Ive learned.

Steffen sees his role as multifaceted.

The YMCA has a lot of programs, whether its fitness, youth programs, Special Olympics or preschool programs, he said. The role of the CEO is to coordinate all those programs and the work that they do and be a face for the organization out in the community. Ultimately the primary role is to ensure fiduciary responsibility and ensure the financial viability of the organization and make sure the fundraising goals and the grant obligations are met.

Steffen said that in the coming year, the organization plans to pump $100,000 into new equipment in the fitness room and the pool area. The organization is gearing up for its primary fundraiser of the year, the Annual Campaign, and Steffen said he hopes to raise $350,000. The organization also has subsidy programs to help low-income individuals and families gain access to services.

Were very focused on growing our membership and especially helping families become more aware of it, he said. We have a huge array of services for families. And everybody Ive talked to talks about how we have a market differentiation because of our family services. So were very focused on growing membership for our facilities, especially with regard to the family segment. We also are focused on growing our services through our preschools. We have several different sites around town. We have really taken a look at how we can best align those with the needs of families with young children around town."

The primary funding for the YMCA comes through child care programs and from more than 11,000 memberships of people using the facility.

Steffen said his first week has been busy, but his job in Glendive prepared him well.

"As Ive been working here so far, Ive sat in on a lot of meetings to coordinate the works of teams as well as plan for the fundraising goals for the organization, he said. Its very similar to my previous job. I had a lot of different teams I worked over and very similar budget amounts. Its stuff Im very comfortable with and enjoy.

Steffen graduated from Brigham Young Universitys marketing and advertising program, and he describes his key areas of expertise as financial analysis, program compliance and strategic planning. He has been involved with the Boy Scouts of America, the Dawson County School District Board of Trustees, the Grandview Retirement Home Board of Directors and the Energy Share of Montana Board.

His great-grandparents were some of the first homesteaders in Dawson County, and he was raised on a cattle ranch.

I feel a great honor to come to the YMCA of Missoula and stand on the shoulders of outstanding individuals who helped it become the tremendous organization that it is today, he wrote in a letter to his staff. I also feel imbued with a terrific sense of responsibility to help it grow and continue to be viewed as not only an important part of the greater Missoula community, but most importantly as a valuable part of the lives of the individuals and families that feel a sense of ownership in its programs and services.
HELENA  It was nearly 17 years ago that a pair of conservation-minded Montanans began a quest to help working ranchers and farmers keep their land in agriculture. In the recently passed federal budget bill, the initiative Rock Ringling and Bill Long spearheaded became a permanent part of conservation law.

Conservation easements are offered by a variety of state and federal agencies and nongovernment organizations to private landowners. The terms can range from payment for development rights to securing perpetual public access, but Ringlings organization, Montana Land Reliance, specializes in easements restricting subdividing in favor of traditional uses that maintain open space.

While the federal tax code is a maze of deductions and credits, the pre-2007 tax incentives allowed conservation easement donors to deduct between 30 and 50 percent of the value against their income, with deductions eligible for up to six years. The code worked well for landowners with sizeable incomes that could recoup the values of the easements. But for classic working ranches with plenty of land but lower incomes, often the numbers just could not add up.

Depending on your income you really couldnt use it, Ringling said. So you were leaving the entire donated value of the conservation easement in the dirt so to speak.

Inspired by the idea of putting land-rich, cash-poor landowners on a path to recouping their donations, in 1999 Ringling and Long approached former Sens. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Charles Grassley, R-Iowa.

Were a small land trust sitting in Helena, Montana, and we didnt know any better. So we went out and tried to sell this idea, Ringling said.

They first approached the lawmakers with an idea for a tax credit, but the senators were not interested in another credit in the tax code. Instead, staffers pitched the idea of raising the deductible value and extending the time period to take it. The bill offered landowners up to a 100 percent deduction against their adjusted gross incomes and extended the period to 16 years.

The changes meant that a land-rich, cash-poor landowner could deduct enough income to match the value of the easement while also adding flexibility to deduct more in economically down years.

With the bills language in place, the crash-course in Washington, D.C., politics became an odyssey of attending hearings and lobbying -- a process that lasted until 2007.

By God, one day we woke up and it got passed, Ringling said.

The passage led to an uptick in conservation easements, with ranchers and farmers wanting to maintain their land but waiting for the incentives to make financial sense, he said. But after the initial surge, it became clear that the seemingly continual need for Congress to reauthorize the incentives, at times retroactively, made on-the-ground planning increasingly difficult.

If youre a landowner youre generally working with a land trust for nine months, said Glenn Marx, executive director for the Montana Association of Land Trusts. Youre right on the cusp of a conservation easement, both parties agree to terms, but at that time the incentives might not be in place. The land trust can say theyre pretty sure Congress will reauthorize them, but it put everyone in a place of uncertainty. So that added a lot of stress and pressure at the end of the year not knowing.

The coalition of organizations responsible for the original legislation continued the push, this time to make the incentives permanent. That effort lasted until 2015 when the legislation, which received support from Montanas delegation and House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., among others, was included in last months tax reform package.

Its important to be able to plan for peoples taxes and for estate purposes into the future, and we need more than one-year extensions to do it, said Prickly Pear Land Trust Executive Director Mary Hollow. So thats probably the biggest advantage of no longer having to worry about constant lobbying to make these happen.

In the latest push for tax reform, those incentive programs not included in the budget bill are likely off the table for good, Ringling said.

Looking through the mirror today, if we wouldnt have gotten this made permanent we might never have gotten it done, he said. We probably wouldnt have had the political power to make it happen.

Marx applauded the achievement not only as a benefit for legacy ranching, but as a tale of perseverance.

One thing that I think is amazing is that these guys from Montana who were just driving down the road changed the way America is governed, he said. They affected national change in a tangible way thats an impressive, historical achievement.

With the tax incentives now permanent, Ringling believes the program can sustain the need for new conservation easements for the next two decades. Montanas aging ranching population and shifts in commodity prices will also dictate the market, he added.

Ringling estimates Montana Land Reliance spent up to $1 million on the effort, along with other organizations at the national level. Private land issues are not a priority for many federal lawmakers, but enough key senators and representatives saw the incentives as a program working for every private landowner in every state, he said.

Had I known it would take 16 years I probably wouldnt have done it, Ringling said. I still cant quite believe it happened. Its kind of nice to know because not everybody in the United States can wake up in the morning and say you helped pass a significant piece of conservation law.
BILLINGS  Montana officials are considering giving only partial approval to a $500 million silver and copper mine proposed beneath a wilderness area near the Idaho border, injecting uncertainty into a project that's been in the works for more than a decade.

Regulators have continuing concerns with the Montanore Mine's potential effect on surrounding waterways, said Tom Livers, director of the Montana Department of Environmental Quality.

"We're not sure we can approve the full mining plan that's been proposed," Livers told the Associated Press. "We're looking at what we can approve. Some may have to happen subsequently as we get more information."

A decision is expected in late January.

The project is sponsored by Mines Management Inc. of Spokane. It would disturb more than 1,500 acres and remove up to 120 million tons of ore from beneath the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness in Lincoln County, south of Libby.

Mines Management chairman Glenn Dobbs says anything less than full approval could make it difficult to attract investors or force a sale to a larger mining company that would delay the project.

Just last month, the mine appeared to have cleared one of its most significant hurdles when the DEQ and and U.S. Forest Service finalized a long-awaited environmental review of the project.

"To imply he (Livers) might not be able to approve the full mine plan in which his agency has been integrally involved in for 10 years is an absurdity," Dobbs said.

Livers said he was limited in what he could say about the state's intentions because a final decision had not been made. But he added that the agency was reluctant to approve a permit that has "legal weaknesses" because it would likely face a court challenge given strong opposition to Montanore from environmental groups.

Work on the mine site began around 1990 under different ownership but was suspended in 1991 due to low metal prices. Mines Management later took over and applied to the state for a mining permit in 2004.

The mine would employ about 500 people during the construction phase and about 350 during mining. A related 14-mile transmission line would be built to carry power to the site.

The mine entrance would be just outside the wilderness  a rugged, remote landscape that is one of a handful of areas in the United States where the government is seeking to restore grizzly bear populations.

The Fish and Wildlife Service has said mining excavation would lead to permanent changes in groundwater flows, including less water in Rock Creek and the Bull River.

Once a decision is made, Mines Management had planned to kick off a two-year, $30 million evaluation of the geology and characteristics of the area to be mined.

Dobbs said he had spoken with Libby officials and representatives of Montana's Congressional delegation about the issue since the DEQ first raised the possibility of a "phased approval" for the mine.

U.S. Sen. Steve Daines and Rep. Ryan Zinke, both Republicans, wrote in a Thursday letter to Gov. Steve Bullock that the project needs full approval.

A staged approval would "create uncertainty and further delay much-needed job creation and tax revenue for the Lincoln County community, which continues to face the highest unemployment rate in our state," they wrote.
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CFCC Students,

Ensuring your learning environment is harassment-free is a priority for Cape Fear Community College. We are sending you this e-mail to inform you about a new web-based educational training program called "Student Empower" that all CFCC students are required to complete.



The College is providing you with this training as part of an ongoing educational program regarding several topics relevant to college life, including but not limited to: discrimination, harassment, drug and alcohol use and sexual misconduct (Title IX), as well as resources for reporting and resolving related violence. This course highlights sensitive material and contains short interactive scenarios to which you will respond. The program will also inform you about the College's policies and procedures, and related state and federal law.



...



All students are asked to complete their course within 30 days of notification. E-mail reminders will be sent until the course is completed.



It is our hope that this opportunity will educate and empower CFCC Students in order to protect a learning environment that is precious to us all. Thank you in advance for your participation in the training program.



Go Sea Devils!



Sincerely,

Robert H. McGee, Jr.

Dean of Student Affairs



This is an official message from Cape Fear Community College and intended for current CFCC students. Ensuring your learning environment is harassment-free is a priority for Cape Fear Community College. We are sending you this e-mail to inform you about a new web-based educational training program called "Student Empower" that all CFCC students are required to complete.The College is providing you with this training as part of an ongoing educational program regarding several topics relevant to college life, including but not limited to: discrimination, harassment, drug and alcohol use and sexual misconduct (Title IX), as well as resources for reporting and resolving related violence. This course highlights sensitive material and contains short interactive scenarios to which you will respond. The program will also inform you about the College's policies and procedures, and related state and federal law....All students are asked to complete their course within 30 days of notification. E-mail reminders will be sent until the course is completed.It is our hope that this opportunity will educate and empower CFCC Students in order to protect a learning environment that is precious to us all. Thank you in advance for your participation in the training program.Go Sea Devils!Sincerely,Robert H. McGee, Jr.Dean of Student Affairs

Gender refers to a person's social or cultural identity "woman" and "man" are two categories which carry certain roles and expectations with them. What it means to be a man or to be a woman can differ greatly form one culture to another. Gender identity is how a person views their own gender and gender expression is how a person acts out gender in society...



Gender is complex and many people are starting to see the nuances...for example Facebook...offer(s) 50 options for gender on your profile including genderqueer, bigender and cisgender.

Four-year universities in the United States are gaining a reputation for forcing left wing viewpoints on their students. Blatant examples of indoctrination such as the University of Delaware's residential life program often attract a great deal of attention when exposed.But it seems counter-intuitive for local technical schools-community colleges, to many-to suffer similar impositions. Technical schools focus more on practical subjects than theoretical ones, reducing the chances of pushing a political agenda.But community colleges' lack of blatant indoctrination is coming to an end, due to recent actions taken by the federal Department of Education. The process began with the "Dear Colleague" letter issued in April of 2011, which required colleges and other educational institutions to change their evidentiary standards in cases of sexual harassment and assault to "a preponderance of the evidence." In addition, that letter recommended providing students with training on sexual assault prevention. Next, the Violence against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013 made offering this training to students mandatory. Schools that do not comply risk the loss of federal funds. My school, Cape Fear Community College in Wilmington, NC, is particularly vulnerable as an overwhelming majority of its students use federal Pell Grants.This fall, all CFCC students received an email directing them to take the "Student Empower" online course.Student Empower covers the basic issues one would expect to be addressed during orientation at any college: drugs and drinking and the risks that these activities present, and basic information on birth control and safe sex, including abstinence. While there may be some objections to a state school teaching its students about these issues, this basic information is non-controversial, especially when compared to other portions of the course.But the program goes beyond basic information on safety and health. Indeed, Workplace Answers, the company that created it brags on its website that the program "exceeds legal requirements." It is this excess information that seems to cross the line between education into indoctrination by pushing extreme outlooks on issues of gender, sexual violence, and harassment.Student Empower does not acknowledge the existence of any debates concerning its views on gender and presents controversial ideas about gender as settled science. It discusses these opinions in the same tone as its earlier coverage of safe sex and drug education. Student Empower says in a slideshow presentation:The program cautions students on their interactions with transgender people, warning not to ask a transgender person if they are pre- or post-op, and lists terms such as "transsexual" and "tranny" as offensive, unless the person chooses to be identified that way. In doing so, it creates considerable list of words that cannot be said. The program covers sexual orientation in a similar way, stating that a person can be attracted to all genders, the same gender, no genders or "anything in between."A subsequent slide provides the vocabulary advocated by the left on gender issues. Each definition includes a caveat on the use of the word, for instance the definition of "LBGT" warns that the term "queer" might still be offensive, and the definition of "straight" cautions against using the term "opposite gender." Again there is no indication that there is debate and disagreement with these terms or with the worldview that espouses them, which implies that this is the only correct way to see gender and sexual orientation.Student Empower covers student interactions providing examples in a series of live action videos called "Allies in Action." The stated purpose of the videos is to demonstrate the need to intervene when someone is in trouble. Perhaps, if left to that simple premise, it would not be a bad idea. People are likely to ignore a problematic situation assuming someone else will handle it-this is known as the "bystander effect."The first bystander situation presented, however, does not portray a situation that would ordinarily require a response. A trio of students observe a young woman speaking with a black man, "Dan." The students seem to dislike the way the young woman is speaking with him, speculating that she had found out he was gay and is now taunting him. The students approach the woman and berate her for bullying the young man, telling her to "get her homophobic show out of here."The rest of the videos in this program depict serious offenses, and situations almost all of which are criminal. While the videos are not shown consecutively, they contain the same characters and are the only live action videos in the program. This seems to imply that the girl's moderately rude behavior in the first clip (that may well be protected by the First Amendment) is on par with rape, or at the very least is an action that must be swiftly met with rebuke (that in itself looks like bullying).The program's foray into sexual assault prevention contains some improper insinuations, including the oft-repeated lie that 25 percent of college women are sexually assaulted.In its "Men as Allies" section, Student Empower states that "preventing sexual assault is about changing our cultural attitudes." It then links to several websites for men to visit to "take action as an ally." Among the listed sites is a site seeking to "redefine male strength." Another attempts to promote "positive masculinity" and a third asks men to pledge not to "commit, condone, or remain silent about violence against women."The entire section on sexual assault has a deeply accusatory tone, one that is enhanced by a "checklist" that asks men to admit to having privileges women do not in society, and to "own the fact" that this privilege might blind them to women's struggles. The list then instructs men to police their own language and jokes as well as the behavior of other men. The message is clear: men are the problem and they must change.If such a charge were directed at any other gender or race it would likely result in a very public condemnation from all corners of the campus. And the Student Empower program did receive some pushback: according to the official responsible for the letter, approximately ten students objected to its content as it violated their religious beliefs.The initial email informing students of the course stated that the course was mandatory. According to Robert McGee, the Dean of Student Affairs, that was merely an error made while copying the letter sent to faculty for their mandatory session-Student Empower is not in fact mandatory. However, the question whether it was in fact an error-or whether the school backed off after the complaints-lingers.At least for the time being. McGee said that, in the future, the college hopes to make this a part of the regular orientation, albeit in a more streamlined fashion. That doesn't make it okay. The fact that the school must put students through political indoctrination-whether officially mandated or discreetly forced on them-is just wrong. The problem stems from the federal Department of Education-but the individual schools should attempt to mitigate the damage rather than force it down our throats.
Mayor Bill de Blasio, in his latest attempt to address New York Citys homelessness crisis, unveiled a plan on Friday to add 300 shelter beds for older teenagers, an age group that advocates say is underserved and especially vulnerable to suicide and sex trafficking.

Many homeless adolescents are or were runaways. Often they have fled homophobia in their own families, only to find their sexual orientation unwelcome in traditional homeless shelters, which has led advocates to push the city to add to the 453 beds it now has for people ages 16 to 20.

The plan announced by the mayor will add 100 beds a year over the next three years to serve that same age group, a sizable increase but one that service providers say will still leave the system well short of the need.

They estimate the number of homeless young people at 3,800, some of them sleeping on couches and others living in the streets, sleeping on trains or finding shelter through prostitution. Half of the current beds are crisis beds and limited to stays up to 60 days, a restriction Mr. de Blasio said he was trying to get the state to expand to three months.
Protests flared in the cities of Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Belo Horizonte on Friday night over increases in bus fares, reflecting resentment over efforts by the municipal authorities to cover budget shortfalls during Brazils most severe economic crisis in decades. Anti-riot police units clashed with protesters in downtown Sao Paulo. The unrest drew comparisons to the much larger demonstrations that shook cities across Brazil in 2013, which also crystallized over increases in bus fares. Some of the demonstrators in Sao Paulo destroyed buses, ransacked banking offices and threw rocks and bottles at the police, who used tear gas. Clashes also erupted between the police and protesters in downtown Rio de Janeiro.
BERLIN  At least 231 children who sang in a boys choir led for 30 years by the brother of former Pope Benedict XVI were abused over a period of almost four decades, a lawyer investigating reports of wrongdoing said Friday.

The lawyer, Ulrich Weber, who was commissioned by the choir to look into accusations of beatings, torture or sexual abuse, said he thought that the actual abuse was even more widespread.

At a news conference in Regensburg, Bavaria, where the choir traces its roots to the year 975, Mr. Weber estimated that from 1953 to 1992, every third member of the choir and an attached school suffered some kind of physical abuse.
Mr. Arnold adopted the phrase wise use from Gifford Pinchot, the first head of the United States Forest Service (who said that conservation is the wise use of resources). In 1988 he held a conference, bringing together the likes of Exxon and the National Cattlemens Association, with the goal of seeding the West with grass-roots groups that could wrest control of federal land and give a local flavor to his Reaganite aims.

Arnold sent organizers into distressed rural communities to set up front groups with environmentally friendly sounding names that whipped up hostility against the government, said Tarso Ramos, the executive director of Political Research Associates, a research group that studies right-wing movements. What resulted, Mr. Ramos said, was a coalition of natural-resource companies, property developers and conservative activists working with a network of community organizations.

This coalition achieved success in pushing its agenda. By the early 1990s, politicians friendly to the Wise Use cause had introduced or passed legislation in nearly 30 states giving local governments and citizens expanded powers to lay claim to federal land. Among those politicians was Representative Helen Chenoweth-Hage, an Idaho Republican, who became notorious for mocking the Endangered Species Act by holding what she called endangered salmon bakes. There was also Gale A. Norton, the interior secretary under President George W. Bush, who once worked as a lawyer for the Mountain States Legal Foundation, which has billed itself as the litigation arm of Wise Use.

The Wise Use crowd got very close to the centers of power, Mr. Ramos said.

It also got close to the militia movement, experts say. In 1994, the National Federal Lands Conference, a Wise Use group that maintained that county governments should control federal land, published an article in its newsletter that bore the title Why There Is a Need for the Militia in America. Around the same time, Wise Use rallies often featured pamphlets from groups like the Militia of Montana, said David Helvarg, the author of the War Against the Greens. Nor was it a coincidence, said James McCarthy, a professor of geography at Clark University, that militia members in camouflage fatigues conducted armed exercises in the very federal forests in New Mexico that the Wise Use movement was trying at the time to pry away from Washingtons control.

There were many people who were active simultaneously in the Wise Use and militia movements and who saw them as different manifestations of the same larger cause, Mr. McCarthy said. However, it is also true that many Wise Use activists were uncomfortable with the militia coming into their fold.
This is anfan-site. Although Dave Sim posts a Weekly Update here every Friday and other exclusive articles , Dave Sim and Gerhard have no control over the other content of this site.
Attention Montana Tech students  the sixth annual Lighten Your Load Community Challenge wants you to join us. Put a team of five or six together. Only $20 per team member, or register individually and we'll put you on a team.

Weigh-ins for Tech students are from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 14, at the Y, 2975 Washoe Ave. Join us for the Saturday group workouts at the Butte Plaza Mall from 8:30 to 9:30 a.m. through March 26. There are prize drawings every Saturday. Details: 406-782-1266.
The burning mattress nearly scorched his hands, but Michael Schow tried to drag it from the mobile home as he yelled to the two young boys to get out.

Schows 8-year-old stepson, Brandon, and 5-year-old grandson, Cameron, had rushed from a bedroom just moments before on Thursday night, saying there was a fire.

The 43-year-old Butte man spied growing flames under Brandons bunk bed and dropped the mattress in the doorway. He knocked on his fathers bedroom door and implored him to wake up and escape.

In less than a minute, Schow evacuated the boys, his 8-month-old son and his 69-year-old father to a nearby pickup truck. His partner, Lisa Whittington, 33, was at work when the fire started.

Schow thought the boys had been playing video games. But it turns out they had found a lighter and used it to ignite toilet paper.

Schow said he was watching TV in the living room when the boys ran to him in a panic. He immediately jumped up and put the baby in a bassinet.

It was huge when I got back there. The entire mattress was engulfed, Schow said. I was 20 to 30 feet away. I didnt smell anything, I didnt hear anything.

After his family was safely ensconced in his pickup truck, Schow realized his cellphone and keys were on the kitchen table. He asked a neighbor to call 911.

And like an idiot, Schow said he went back inside his mobile home  now without power and thick with smoke. Wearing jeans, a button-down shirt, a work jacket and boots, he crawled toward the table to retrieve the items, as the smoke hovered above him.

Two family dogs would run from the smoke-filled home Thursday night, but a pet parakeet, Gumdrop, and a black cat, Sabrina, that Schow had rescued, were trapped inside and later found dead.

Sabrina was close to the door, she almost made it, Schow said. She hated to go outside. She was scared of the outside.

On Friday morning, Schow said he and his father were talking about the fire, how sweet the smoke smelled, how fast it spread and hot it was. The family spent the night at a Butte motel, where they will stay for an undetermined period of time.

Anna Fernandez-Gevaert, American Red Cross regional communications director for Idaho and Montana, said the organizations response in scenarios such as a house fire is to provide hotel accommodations for several days, food, clothing and essential prescription medications.

The aim is to meet immediate needs so they can get back on their feet and start the long process of recovery, she said, adding that facilitating connections with local community organizations can provide help well beyond what they need in the first few days.

Nicole Casebeer, chair for the Butte-Silver Bow Disaster Action Team, visited with Schow and Whittington on Friday afternoon, and said they are shocked, but positive.

Their positivity is the most important thing for them, Casebeer said.

On Friday, Schow spoke about the fires impact on Brandon and Cameron. He said they know its bad to have a lighter  that fire can be dangerous.

Theyre both in shock. Brandon didnt go to school today. I think its a lot to process for a little kid to know they caused that, Schow said, also admitting that he wants the boys to understand the impact without feeling blame from him.

Theyre too young to accept blame for anything, he said.

Schow has to be a rock, he said, for his family, especially his father, who is a cancer survivor.

To lose everything at one time, Ive never felt nothing like this, he said.  The uncertainty in the dead of winter with a brand new baby  the uncertainty is tough.
"Justices of the Supreme Court...shall be elected by the qualified voters and shall hold office for terms of eight years and until their successors are elected and qualified. Justices of the Supreme Court...shall be elected by the qualified voters of the State."

"A justice of the Supreme Court who was elected to that office by vote of the voters who desires to continue in office shall be subject to approval by the qualified voters of the whole State in a retention election at the general election immediately proceeding the expiration of the elected term. Approval shall be by a majority of votes cast on the issue of the justice's retention in accordance with this Article."

"A referendum on retention of an incumbent justice of the Supreme Court, as provided in S.L. 2015-66, is not an election for the office as required by Article IV,  16 of the North Carolina Constitution. The constitution requires an election in which opposing candidates may run for the office."

Does our state's constitution mean what it says? That's the question asked by a recent lawsuit filed in Wake County Superior Court. At issue is the constitutionality of recent changes to how justices are elected to the North Carolina Supreme Court. The case will not only require our courts to interpret laws in the ordinary sense, but also to weigh how much respect they give the words and meaning of our state's most fundamental document.In North Carolina, judges to our state's highest appellate courts are elected rather than appointed. Reasonable people can disagree on whether this is sound policy. In many states appellate judges are appointed by the governor, rather than elected by the People. Policy questions aside, the mandate of the North Carolina Constitution is clear During the most recent legislative session, Republicans at the General Assembly enacted legislation purporting toSpecifically, the legislation states that:Layman's translation: Incumbent justices on the North Carolina Supreme Court who want to keep their seats no longer have to face challengers in elections  they merely have to get the approval of a majority of voters. If they get majority approval, they stay in office. If the voters fail to approve the retention of a justice, the office is deemed "vacant" at the end of the term, and the vacancy is filled by a regular election. And importantly, this change was made via legislative enactment, not constitutional amendment.The changes do not sit well with Sabra Faires of Cary, North Carolina. Thanks to the changes, she cannot file for election to the Supreme Court, as there is no room for challengers. Attorney Michael Crowell of Tharrington Smith, LLP, is representing Ms. Faires in her challenge to the new law. Their main argument: the legislature purported to do by legislative decree something that can only be done via constitutional amendment.The changes obviously make life more comfortable for incumbent justices. It's much easier to win a retention election than to face a challenger. No surprise, then, that a Republican-controlled legislature made the retention election reforms at a time when conservatives occupy a majority of seats on our state's highest court. But the fact that a law is politically expedient does not make it unconstitutional  rather, the problem lies in how the legislature went about making this change.The meat of the lawsuit comes down to the Plaintiffs' claims in Paragraph 22 of their complaint The plaintiffs have a point. A retention referendum is almost certainly not what the framers of our constitution had in mind when they decided to require elections for justices of the North Carolina Supreme Court. Faires and Crowell intend to show that such changes have always been made via constitutional amendment, both in North Carolina and elsewhere.Crowell wrote in a firm press release The case will be heard by a three-judge panel, to be appointed by Chief Justice Mark Martin. Barring any extensions that may be granted, the state has until the end of December to file responsive pleadings or otherwise move to dismiss the case.
HELENA  When a rare artifact disappeared from the Montana Historical Society Museum in 2003, there were no suspects nor any real clues as to what happened to the Sioux pipe bag.

"It was kind of an unsolved mystery at the time," said Sgt. Jayson Zander with the Helena Police Department.

The pipe bag was one of many artifacts stolen from Montana museums in that era. The FBI began a case investigating the thieved relics. A suspect was named, but he died in 2005 before any charges were filed, Zander said.

More than a decade passed before the piece was thought of again. This summer, the chief of security for the museum began searching for the pipe bag online.

"Lo and behold, he found it listed on a collector website," Zander said.

It had been sold in Wyoming to a collector in Texas in 2009, he said. Helena police were then asked to assist.

"This particular type of pipe bag is very rare," Zander said. "I felt that we needed to look into it."

The green hue of the leather on the bag is distinctive and led to the retrieval of the artifact, he said.

"We were able to positively identify it as the same pipe bag," Zander said. "They (the auction house) had no idea it was stolen."

The bag had been purchased for $1,900. The auction company offered to refund the collector's money and the owner accepted.

Last week, the pipe bag was returned to Helena and the museum.

"This is a unique bag and it's beautiful," said Amanda Trum, a curator of collections at the museum.
WASHINGTON -- Ammon Bundy and the other armed militants occupying a federal facility at a wildlife refuge in Oregon have a beef with the administration -- the Teddy Roosevelt administration.

"It has been provided for us to be able to come together and unite in making a hard stand against this overreach, this taking of the people's land and resources," proclaimed Bundy, son of Cliven Bundy, the Nevada rancher who led a similar armed rebellion against the government two years ago. "If we do not make a hard stand, then we will be in a position where we won't be able to as a people."

But this "taking of the people's land," the "overreach" that moved these rebels to take up arms, occurred 108 years ago, when Roosevelt -- a Republican president and a great conservationist -- established the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, one of 51 such refuges he set aside, "as a preserve and breeding ground for native birds."

So why have the militants chosen this moment to "unwind all these unconstitutional land transactions," as Bundy put it? Perhaps it's because they think the political atmosphere now condones such anti-government activity.

You can see why they might think so. Several of the Republican presidential candidates have been encouraging lawbreaking, winking at it or simply looking the other way.

A few months ago, Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee and others rushed to defend Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk jailed for refusing to obey federal law. A federal judge had held her in contempt of court for refusing to recognize same-sex marriages, and the Supreme Court specifically declined to give Davis relief. But Cruz identified her jailing as "judicial tyranny" and said Davis was operating "under God's authority."

Donald Trump has put at the center of his campaign an extra-constitutional ban on admitting Muslims into the country. Marco Rubio said that if the law conflicts with the Gospel, "God's rules always win," and that "we are called to ignore" the government's authority. Huckabee and Rick Santorum signed a pledge not to "respect an unjust law that directly conflicts with higher law." Huckabee floated the notion of using federal troops to block people from getting abortions and questioned the Supreme Court's authority.

And, of course, there was the 2014 standoff in which Cliven Bundy, who refused to pay grazing fees for his use of federal land, got support or sympathy from Cruz, Trump, Huckabee, Rand Paul and Ben Carson. Cruz denounced the federal government for "using the jackboot of authoritarianism."

The rancher lost much of his support when he delivered a racist rant. But not all of it: Paul earlier this year had a private meeting with the elder Bundy that the rancher said lasted 45 minutes. As my colleagues Katie Zezima and David Weigel noted, Paul and Cruz have both campaigned to transfer federal lands in the West to private ownership.

Flirting with extremists helps conservative candidates harness the prodigious anger in the electorate. A poll released over the weekend by NBC, Esquire and Survey Monkey found anger is particularly intense among Republicans: Seventy-seven percent said the news makes them angry at least once a day (compared with 67 percent of Democrats). Seventy-three percent of white Americans are angered daily (vs. 66 percent of Hispanics and 56 percent of African-Americans).

So when some very angry people led by Ammon Bundy took over the (unoccupied) compound at the wildlife preserve over the weekend, the Republican presidential candidates reacted mostly with silence. A scan of tweets from Republican lawmakers also found nary a peep about the armed takeover of the federal facility. An admirable exception (and one whose low standing proves the rule) was John Kasich, whose strategist John Weaver suggested "a good federal compound for Bundy and his gang: a U.S. penitentiary."

Finally, in a radio interview Monday, Marco Rubio said the militants "cannot be lawless" -- though he added that he agrees with their complaints about federal lands. And Cruz, responding to a question, said he hoped Bundy's gang would "stand down peaceably" because "we don't have a constitutional right to use force and violence."

That was mild criticism -- Bundy had said he has no intention of using violence -- but better than the usual wink.

As it happens, Cruz also released a TV ad Monday protesting inadequate enforcement of the border. "The rule of law," he says in the ad, "wasn't meant to be broken." That's a fine sentiment. But to live under the rule of law we must follow all laws -- not just those we like.

Follow Dana Milbank on Twitter, @Milbank.

(c) 2016, Washington Post Writers Group
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MUSCATINE, Iowa  First National Bank of Muscatine has announced its 2015 Outstanding Employee of the Year is Mike Wilson, vice president and Trust Department manager.

In August of 2015, Wilson was the recipient of the banks Outstanding Employee of the Month Award for his display of exceptional customer service by helping a customer avoid a fraudulent scheme. Wilson joined the bank in 2008 as a Trust Relationship manager and was promoted to vice president in 2012. He and his wife, Dolly, have two grown children, Josh and Steven.
Bird migrations along the Mississippi River are always a seasonal spectacle, but a mild December caused higher bird numbers than usual. Mallard ducks began piling into Port Louisa National Wildlife Refuge just before Thanksgiving, with about 24,000 birds and then increased to 70,000 by Dec. 2. Other waterfowl species such as ring-necked ducks, northern pintails, gadwall, and Canada geese added up to about 76,000 birds at the peak of migration. The number of mallards remained between 40,000 to 50,000 until the end of duck season when birds began to disperse due to fewer disturbances. Many birds remained in the area over Christmas but recent freezing temperatures will likely force birds south. We also saw activity from greater white-fronted geese, which began moving through the area in good numbers in mid-December.

Waterfowl numbers typically peak in late November or early December in our area, but without freezing temperatures or winter storms, the birds stayed to feed and rest on the refuge. River levels also increased due to unusual December rains which created additional flooded habitat for waterfowl. Refuge wetlands along the Iowa and Mississippi Rivers are managed during the growing season to produce native food sources in advance of the fall migration. Birds feed on seeds from smartweeds, millets, and sedges, in addition to aquatic insects, to fuel up for their continued journey south. This year, refuge food sources were abundant enough to support the high bird numbers until it was time for them to move on.

Waterfowl surveys are completed during migration each fall. While numbers have been this high or higher in the past, it has been a few years since numbers reached above the 40,000 mark. In addition, good mallard population numbers across the flyway likely contributed to the number of birds seen along the Mississippi River. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service waterfowl population status report for 2015 reported the highest estimated numbers of breeding mallards since surveys began in 1955. While numbers were only slightly higher than 2014, breeding mallards in the northern prairies were 51% above the long term average. The 2015 waterfowl status report can be found at http://www.fws.gov/migratorybirds.

Much of the refuge is closed to public entry in the fall to provide sanctuary areas for migrating birds to rest and feed. However, in a rare case, four duck hunters entered the closed area on the Louisa Division on Sunday, Nov. 15. The hunters were observed by the refuge manager and an Iowa Department of Natural Resources conservation officer apprehended the individuals who had taken several birds. The hunters were unfamiliar with hunting on the adjacent Odessa Wildlife Management Area and boated past closed area signs. They were charged federally for trespass and illegal take of migratory birds under the National Wildlife Refuge System Improvement Act.

All refuge closed areas were again opened to public entry on Jan. 1. Visit the refuge and enjoy hiking the headquarters trails or the Louisa auto tour loop. The Horseshoe Bend Division has been flooded much of December, so check Iowa River levels or call the refuge headquarters at 319-523-6982 before venturing there. Hunting is allowed on the Horseshoe Bend and Big Timber Divisions and visitors are advised to wear hunter orange until state hunting seasons end.

The mission of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is working with others to conserve, protect, and enhance fish, wildlife, plants, and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people. We are both a leader and trusted partner in fish and wildlife conservation, known for our scientific excellence, stewardship of lands and natural resources, dedicated professionals and commitment to public service. For more information on our work and the people who make it happen, visit www.fws.gov.

Cathy Henry is refuge manager at Port Louisa National Wildlife Refuge. For more information on the refuge, call 319-523-6982 or visit www.portlouisafriends.org.
With the news of North Korea testing another nuclear weapon its leadership continues the fallacy of nuclear deterrence promoted by the nuclear powers of the world. This action by North Korea must be condemned just as the continued possession of nuclear weapons by all of the nuclear states. This action is against the growing international consensus for a universal treaty banning all nuclear weapons and making their possession illegal just as chemical and biological weapons have been prohibited.

In a year of U.S. presidential elections, where is the voice of reason? Who among the candidates or media has spoken to the legal obligations of the United States and all nuclear powers to work in good faith for the elimination of nuclear weapons? Particularly in view of the current climate science confirming that a small regional limited nuclear war using only one-half of one percent of the global nuclear arsenals has the potential to cause the deaths of more than two billion people from the ensuing climate change following such a war. Who has the courage to speak the truth and put forth a plan to eliminate these weapons?

Where is the media in its investigative obligation and engagement of dialogue on this issue in the campaign? Outlets like PBS continue to cover the arms race and modernization of our Trident submarines, each with the potential for the above scenario many times over, as though it is an acceptable outcome of global doomsday if they are activated. This is accepted without question as a fait accompli. We must ask the candidates if they are actually aware of this science and if so under what circumstance they are ready to end life as we know it  an act of ultimate state terrorism as they become de facto suicide bombers. For it would be only a matter of time before the global climatic effects of such a use would result in our own deaths. There can be no doublespeak in this response. You are either in favor of the status quo with existing arsenals that drive the arms race and push nations like North Korea to develop their own capabilities or you work in earnest to eliminate these weapons.

Time is not on our side. The chance of accidental or intentional nuclear war is placed by probability theorists at one percent per year or more. A child born today is not likely to reach her 30th birthday without some nuclear event occurring in their world. Is this the world we want for our children and grandchildren?

The candidates and the media must overcome their cowardice in addressing this issue at this critical time.

We must demand answers to these questions about the greatest imminent existential threat to our world. We cannot rely on the hope that someone else will take care of this or the notion that I cannot make a difference. In our democracy each of us has a duty and responsibility to be informed and to take action.

Robert Dodge, syndicated by PeaceVoice, is a family physician in Ventura, California. He serves on the board of Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles and on the board of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.
Saturday, January 9

big update

In the morning

Ambulance arrives

Dad runs off

Police come

"HELP!"

"MOLEST!"

"RAPE!"

OTW to IMH

At IMH

A guy in handcuffs

A frail teenage boy who had his wrists restrained and was accompanied by 3 police officers

A man who was talking to thin air

Seeing the doctor

Waiting for outcome

Leaving

San fran

















PANDA EXPRESS





Outside bf's house





Filet mignon with creamed spinach

Thaipan

Work

When I came back from San Francisco, I called my dad and said we could not delay it any longer. So we arranged a date for Saturday (today) for me to call the private ambulance and police to bring her to the mental hospital.I went to where my mom and dad stayed, and got a shock because they stayed in the middle of a busy tourist street right outside a popular MRT exit. It's like one of those places you see in the "Top 10 places you should visit in Singapore" lists. Like 100 people/min pass by the street. OK, bad sign #1.As per IMH's instructions to me, I called the ambulance, then I called the police to assist us, because mom was potentially violent. Police called back, said "" Well ok. Thank you police for caring for our wellbeing and safety. Bad sign #2.I waited at a nearby McDonalds, working on coding my portfolio while the ambulance made its way. My dad came out of the house and we discussed what to do later. 3 minutes before the ambulance arrived...: The house door, tell them they must push very hard to enter.: What do you mean? You are the one opening the door for them.: Huh? No, I will leave and wait in the car.: WTF? We talked about this. You HAVE to be there.: I don't want her to see me.: Did you think you could just run away and leave your wife alone while she is hauled into an ambulance by strangers?!: I thought I did not have to be there.: Fine, I can go up instead. Do you want me to go or not?: OK, you go.*we reach below the house*: Nevermind, I will go. Run to the macdonalds to hide.Went back to macdonalds, waited for an. Felt so bad for the ambulance guys. Must have been trying to talk to my mother for an hour.Got a call from my dad's phone.: Mum wants to speak to you.: OK.: Xinni, did you call the ambulance to take me to IMH?: Yes.Why? How can you do that? You betrayed me. Tell them to leave.You need help.: I gave birth to you. I breastfed you. I pray for you everyday. But you're so ungrateful. You're heartless. May God punish you.: You have to go.You are the mentally ill one. *more insults*: *hangs up*Then later, my dad tells me he is going off for an appointment.: WTF?!! Why did you schedule an appointment IN THE MIDDLE OF SENDING YOUR WIFE TO IMH?? : I made this appointment last week.. I have to go.: Go where?!: Nearby only.. meet my friend.: People are trying to get her to come down and you are running off to meet a friend?!Dad runs off in the middle of it all to meet his friend and leaves the poor ambulance guys alone with my mom.Mom tries to flee towards the MRT station.We call the police to restrain her.20 minutes later, police arrive. I am summoned to the MRT station.So they are crowding this busy MRT entrance. There are 2 police officers, 2 ambulance guys and a wheelchair. My dad's hiding in some corner. EVERYBODY is staring.I walk up to them.My mom sees me and starts screaming the usual insults at me in front of the passers by. She stares furiously at me. I stare blankly back at her knowing she can't manipulate me. I think I even smiled at her. I don't know why. I guess after 20 years of taking her abuse, I finally made a huge step for it all. The police and ambulance guys did not even know me but they defended me and knew that I was doing it for her own good. I really appreciated that.: Hi. So you are her...: Daughter.: SHE IS NO DAUGHTER OF MINE. SHE IS A BETRAYER. SHE WENT BEHIND MY BACK: *tells me my mom is trying to run away and they have to restrain her on the wheelchair and wheel her to the ambulance*: Sure.Then the police grab her by force and startto the wheelchair thingy. At this point, everybody is standing there watching the debacle. Tourists look confused and ask if they are allowed to pass. The police tell them to move on and stop blocking the entrance.My mom screamsandandand scratches the police officer. Of course this attracts more stares. Police officer warned her that he has a camera and is recording her actions and she cannot make false allegations.Worse,and my brother's name. Omg... I was like, I hope nobody I know is here if not they will be like omg dude whatsup is that crazy lady screaming your name and i'd have to say oh you know nothing much just a regular day sending my mom to mental hospital (   )We get into the ambulance and they drive us to IMH.One of the ambulance guys, who saw the state of the house, tells me that my mom's situation is very bad and jialat. He saysif not she will be out by 5pm. I thanked him for his advice.When the nurse sees her rambling and shouting at me she keeps muttering to other nurses that my mom is very sick.I go and wait at the other side of the hospital and sawI felt genuinely bad for them and the stigma around mental institutions. I mean just then, one of my friends in a chat made a joke about the mental institution being a 'funny farm' and stuff. I felt sad. The place was a sad place.A woman who sat next to me told me she was schizophrenic but now she is much better. I told her I was glad for her that she has it under control. She saw that I was programming (I was programming while waiting at IMH because I have shit loads of work to do) and asked what I was making. When my dad came she said "Hi uncle". My dad just grimaced lol.Anyway the doctor finally called us in. We explained everything to him and I passed him my 15 page report of her behaviors. He asked us about her family and history of mental illness and whether she was paranoid.He was really curious why my dad let her spend over 1 million of his money on renting properties and my dad said he could not refuse her or she would shout and quarrel with him. So I think the doctor knows that my dad is scared and enables her.He also asked us what we hoped to achieve. Remembering what the ambulance guy said to me, I asked the doctor to please admit her.The doctor said usually admitting is for suicidal/emergency cases and it might not happen. He has to speak with a senior doctor about it.Anyway we waited for the doctor to speak with my mom. After a few hours he came out and told us thatHoorah.We decided on Ward B2 for her, which is like $80 a day, because my dad said that Ward C has more crazy people and will turn her crazy (ofc I don't believe that). I think most of these costs will be covered byShe doesn't qualify for private wards because of her violent tendencies.We don't know what she is diagnosed with yet. I mean definitely hoarding but the doctor said she has other issues as well. I have to work with social workers to discuss plans from here.When we left the place we could hear her screams from outside and shouting from the staff and we caught a glimpse of them restraining her.I'm probably not going to visit her because I am the last person she wants to see. She thinks I am the mastermind of it all. Which I suppose is true, I planned everything but I know I did it for the good of my family. My brother and father are now busy throwing out as much stuff as possible which is liberating!Six flags whoo!!I went to the one in Vallejo. I puked in the middle of it all. D:My favourite ride is the Superman. The rest were quite underwhelming and many were closed for the Winter.While in downtown San Mateo I tried Burmese food from "Best of Burma". This is mango chicken with garlic noodle and it's really nice. Tastes similar to Thai food. Wow I typed "Manga chicken", but corrected myself.Shout out to this butter squid from thaipan @ Marine Parade (back in Singapore). Best squid I've EVER had. Better than any salted egg calamari.As I mentioned earlier, I am REALLY FLOODED WITH WORK!! T_TI got a Teaching Assistant position and faced with a recent change in syllabus, I have loads of material to prepare in too few weeks.Oh and Masters applications :( I almost done and got 3 people willing to write my letters of recommendation. I got 117/120 for TOEFL (27 for speaking, full marks for writing, reading and listening). But my GREs were awful. I got 96 percentile for Verbal because I spent all my time preparing for that. I ended up fucking up my Quant and it became 80th percentile. I'm working to strengthen my Statement of Purpose and Portfolio because of that.And FYP :( I have to get started soon.Honestly it really sucks to deal with life right now but I will manage I guess

Labels: family, food, san francisco, work

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Les emplois a Rennes sont abondants et varies. Il y a quelque chose pour tout le monde. Que vous soyez a la recherche dun emploi []
Les blattes ou cafards (Blatta orientalis) sont des insectes qui appartiennent a la famille des Blattoptera. Ils se caracterisent par leur forme allongee, leurs ailes []
Harry Smith presents his party's straw man argument equating the extra-vetting of refugees as the moral equivalent of the former Democrat Administration of FDR interning West Coast Japanese Americans, and denying refuge to all disparate Jews seeking asylum rather than certain murder, with these Jews having no possible Nazis in their midst: Below.

Should America accept Syrian refugees right now, as prescribed by the Obama Administration, or should Congress legislate to pause the process until a more proven vetting apparatus is in place to inhibit possible ISIS infiltrators? 10.84% Yes, Obama is right, we should show the refugees compassion, and admit them as soon as is possible. 79.52% No, Congress is right, we should pause the process to be more certain that terrorists aren't among them. 9.64% It does not matter. 83 total vote(s) Voting has Ended!

Considering the fact that the Democrat Mainstream media has taken a "hands-off" policy in regards to Democrat scandals for the purpose of providing cover to a Democrat Department of Justice's choices to not pursue criminal indictments on proved Democrat criminal behavior: Is there a double standard for the Democrat Mainstream media? 88.41% Yes, what is the practice for the Republicans should be proper for Democrats. 7.25% No, Democrats should be immune from serious investigation and prosecution because they care so much more. 4.35% I don't care, I prefer the low-information approach to life. 69 total vote(s) Voting has Ended!

For my part, I tire of this dishonest Simpleton, and his pathetically Liberal minions, who crave his bright, cherry Liberal narrative; like quasi journalist Harry Smith - D, lecturing Conservatives and patriots from his broadcast perch, where he spews his skewed vision of morality; such as, allowing Syrian refuges into our nation without a more robust screening process. Recently, 'Group Think' Democrat 'talking points' are trumpeted, as parroted by Democrat Journalist Smith, that "xenophobic Republicans" desire to return to the days of World War II, when Commander-in-Chief Franklin Roosevelt - a moderate Democrat by today's standards, but certainly no pacifist - allowed: Japanese Americans living on the West Coast to be interned; and Jews to be turned away from American safety, who were refugees escaping their certain Holocaust on the ship, S.S. St. Louis out of Hamburg in 1939. The St. Louis, waylaid, was forced to dock in the American protectorate of Havana, Cuba, rather than allow these Jewish refugees to disembark further north in Miami, due to the United State's strict immigration quotas had already been met for that year.This sad historical event, during President Franklin Roosevelt's second term, thus embellished by Democrat Journalist Smith is nothing more than a Liberal Straw Man argument, which does not hold up under minor scrutiny. truly, if Obama actually cared about Syrian refugees, he would have not cowardly backed off of his "Red Line in the Sand" threat , and it would have also helped if Democrats and Obama had not surrendered Iraq to ISIS and Al Qaeda. Furthermore, with Hussein's extra-limited plan of air strikes for the last 18 months, where around 75% of American "air power" return with their ordnance intact due to Obama rules of engagement, which are designed to limit any probability of collateral casualties, makes no mathematical sense.Back to the illogical rules of engagement and the logical math of the matter, which America's first Affirmative Action president , who breezed through some of America's "best schools", simply can't understand: One must be willing to accept the deaths of a relatively few innocents, while you degrade and destroy command and control of the very Islamist monsters that are murdering and, or displacing fellow Muslims and Christians by the tens of thousands. Remarkably, Democrat mouthpieces, like Harry Smith, are pathetically weak on the history of the two times - then in 1939, and in 1942 after Pearl Harbor. If Obama and core Democrats, like Smith, actually cared about these displaced Syrians, rather than play the role of the concerned Liberal and accept tens of thousands of refugees from Syria without the proper verification to restrict those possible Islamist Terrorists, why not use whatever military strength that America might still possess, after nearly 7 years of Obama neglect, to destroy ISIS in a portion of their nebulous caliphate, and create a safe zone for the Syrian /Iraqi refugees in, or near their homeland.Let's face it Harry/Hussein, it is not as if ISIS is reminiscent of the nearly 8,000,000 member battle-hardened Wehrmacht, with their vast supply of Panzers, Stukas or Messerschmitts, with Field Marshals, like Erwin Rommel, directing the Blitzkrieg. ISIS is disorganized, but certainly ruthless in their abject evil, and, honestly, if Hussein Obama had organized a coalition of 65 committed nations to confront them, the evil of ISIS would have already been defeated, then America's standing as a friend of the "Peace Religion" of Islam would be inestimably enhanced.Instead, Hussein does what he has done since the beginning of his tragically failed presidency, he blames with his condescending lectures, impresses his low-information electorate by working in dishonest straw man arguments as the basis for his many actions, thereby leaving the rest of us with far greater cognitive abilities, unimpressed and frustrated. Eventually, wisdom must prevail or the Republic is doomed, leaving true patriots to question: Does Hussein Obama even care?
Netflix has launched in South Africa as part of a roll-out to 130 new countries.

The service is priced in US dollars, with plans structured the same as in the US.

Its cheapest package costs $7.99 per month and offers a single stream in standard definition, while its most expensive plan is $11.99 and lets you watch up to 4 simultaneous streams in HD and UHD resolutions.

Netflix has confirmed that all new original programming will broadcast in its recently-added markets, including South Africa.

The company said it is going to create 31 new original series, two dozen feature films and documentaries, a range of stand-up comedy specials, and 30 original kids series.

The table below lists the original content Netflix has confirmed for the coming year.

Netflix-exclusive shows and movies  2016 Date Show/Movie Content type Jan-15 Degrassi: Next Class (All territories except Canada, Australia, and France) Kids Jan-23 Chelsea Does  Available in Ultra HD 4K Docu-Series Jan-29 Ever After High: Dragon Games Kids Feb-16 Better Call Saul (All non-US territories) (Episodes Weekly)  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series Feb-26 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword Of Destiny  Available in Ultra HD 4K Film March Pee Wees Big Holiday  Available in Ultra HD 4K Film 2016 Between  Season 2 Series 2016 BoJack Horseman  Season 3 Series 2016 Bottersnikes & Grumbles (All territories except UK and Australia) Kids 2016 Chelsea Handler Talk Show  2016 The Crown  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Danger Mouse (All territories except Germany, France, UK and Ireland) Kids 2016 Edgar Rice Burroughs Tarzan and Jane Kids 2016 Flaked  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Fuller House  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 The Get Down  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Grace and Frankie: Season 2 Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Jadotville  Available in Ultra HD 4K Film 2016 Justin Time: The New Adventures Kids 2016 Kazoops! (Global minus UK and Australia) Anime Series 2016 KONG  KING OF THE APES Kids 2016 Kulipari: An Army of Frogs Kids 2016 Love  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 The Magic School Bus Kids 2016 Marvels Daredevil: Season 2  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Marvels Luke Cage  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Marco Polo  Season 2  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Mascots  Available in Ultra HD 4K Film 2016 Marseille  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 The OA  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Peaky Blinders  Season 3 (US only) Series 2016 Popples (All territories except France) Kids 2016 The Ranch  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Some Assembly Required (All territories except Canada) Kids 2016 Special Correspondents  Available in Ultra HD 4K Film 2016 Stranger Things  Available in Ultra HD 4K Series 2016 Trailer Park Boys  Season 10 Series 2016 War Machine  Available in Ultra HD 4K Film 2016 Winx Club WOW: World of Winx Kids 2016 Word Party Kids Fall 2016 Cirque du Soleil  Luna Petunia Kids Not dated / 2017 onwards  First They Killed My Father Film  Lemony Snickets A Series of Unfortunate Events Series 2017 Las Leyendas Series 2017 True & the Rainbow Kingdom (All territories except Canada) Series 2018 Green Eggs and Ham  Available in Ultra HD 4K Kids

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Reports that North Korea has launched a fourth nuclear weapons test  backed by convincing seismic data  have caused widespread alarm.

North Korean officials announced in advance that the test would involve a totally different type of nuclear bomb from those trialled in previous years.

Following the test, North Korean state television lauded the first detonation of a hydrogen bomb as a national epoch-making event.

Moving to a new form of nuclear weapons technology will likely have significant implications for North Korea, although some experts have expressed scepticism about these claims and there are clear benefits for Pyongyang to exaggerate its nuclear capabilities.

While details of the test will remain unclear for some time, the term hydrogen bomb is also somewhat ambiguous, leaving further room for speculation about the true nature of North Koreas nuclear technology.

Fission devices

There are two basic types of nuclear weapons: fission weapons and fusion weapons.

First developed during World War II through the US-led Manhattan Project, fission devices (commonly known as atom bombs) create an explosion by splitting the nuclei of heavy atoms.

These type of weapons were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, killing hundreds of thousands of people.

The core of a fission weapon is composed of weapons-grade fissile material such as highly enriched uranium or plutonium, which on its own is not explosive.

When detonated, this core is compressed using conventional high explosives into a critical mass capable of sustaining a nuclear chain reaction.

Firing neutrons at the atomic nuclei in the core causes them to split (or fission) into several lighter nuclei, releasing energy and, crucially, more neutrons.

These extra neutrons create further fissions in the core that, in turn, release even more neutrons giving rise to a self-sustaining chain reaction.

This releases huge quantities of energy, many orders of magnitude greater than that of conventional explosives.

A totally different type of nuclear bomb

After the Soviet Union also developed fission devices in the late 1940s, the US began to work on new technology known as thermonuclear weapons or hydrogen bombs.

Thermonuclear weapons differ from atom bombs in that most of their explosive power comes from nuclear fusion, the binding together of light atomic nuclei, as opposed to fission or splitting atoms.

The explosive power of thermonuclear devices dwarfs that of fission devices: the most powerful pure-fission device tested by the United States was Ivy King, a 500 kiloton weapon.

This bomb was 50 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki at the end of World War II.

Yet Ivy King paled in comparison to Castle Bravo, the largest hydrogen bomb tested by the US, with a yield of 15 megatons.

While crude fission weapons obliterated two small Japanese cities, megaton-class thermonuclear weapons are comfortably capable of wreaking much more destruction, causing nuclear burns many miles from the blast site.

Although precise technical details remain highly classified, the basic two-stage thermonuclear weapon design was laid down by Edward Teller and Stanislaw Ulam in the early 1950s.

The first stage or primary consists of a fission device that, when detonated, provides the necessary energy in the form of X-ray radiation to trigger a fusion reaction in the second stage.

The secondary generally consists of dry fusion fuel, often lithium deuteride, and a sparkplug, a sub-critical mass of fissile material. Detonating the primary compresses the secondary, causing the sparkplug to undergo fission.

This releases neutrons that react with the fusion fuel to produce a mixture of tritium and deuterium, isotopes of hydrogen that are chemically similar but have different nuclear properties.

The extreme temperature provided by the primary then causes fusion between these hydrogen isotopes, releasing vast quantities of energy.

The North Korean test

The North Koreans claims imply they have successfully developed a thermonuclear weapon. But initial data suggests that this may not be the case.

While as yet unconfirmed by the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organisation, the seismic shock of the test registered 5.1 on the Richter scale.

This indicates an explosive yield somewhat less than the Fat Man device dropped on Nagasaki, and far less than the high yields typically associated with thermonuclear weapons.

However, it is possible North Korea has tested a third weapon type: a boosted fission weapon.

While this incorporates hydrogen isotopes and can be conflated with a hydrogen bomb, it is a technically distinct weapon.

A boosted fission device is essentially a normal fission device, similar to the Fat Man, with a small amount of fusion fuel added to its core. Upon detonation of the weapon, the fusion fuel is compressed and heated, undergoing nuclear fusion.

While some energy is released by this process, this is relatively small when compared to that released by fission.

The major contribution of the fusion reaction is to supply a large number of additional neutrons. These flood the core of the fission weapon, inducing many more fission reactions and significantly increasing the efficiency and so the yield of the weapon.

The efficiency of early fission weapons was relatively low: only 1.4% of the highly enriched uranium in the core of the Little Boy device dropped on Hiroshima actually underwent fission.

Boosting can increase this efficiency drastically without a significant penalty in terms of weight, making it an attractive design option for smaller missile systems.

Given North Koreas interest in this arena, it is possible that a boosted fission weapon was the aim of the most recent test.

Robert J Downes, MacArthur Fellow in Nuclear Security, Kings College London

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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The only people who will be angry at you for speaking the truth based on real facts are those who perpetuate a life of denial and deceit. Like a ray of sunshine through a crack into a room filled with ignorance and fear, truth seeks out those who are righteous. Y. M.
RALEIGH It's hard to reach the right conclusion when you start with false premises.That's why one of the most critical elements of public policy debate involves ensuring that those taking part in the debate base their recommendations on sound premises. If not, those recommendations could prove ineffective or even counterproductive in addressing real public policy concerns.Was the primary problem with American health care prior to 2010 the lack of access to health insurance? If not, the (not-so) Affordable Care Act has generated quite a bit of turmoil for no good reason. It's also diverted attention from reforms that might have alleviated more pressing health care concerns Are carbon dioxide emissions linked to an industrialized world pushing the earth's temperature to a tipping point, beyond which lies catastrophe and mayhem? If not, and the absence of any significant warming for more than 18 years suggests that the question is at least debatable, the ongoing international climate talks in Paris are unlikely to yield useful policies.To the extent that governments pursue ideas that would lead to the " wrenching transformation " former Vice President Al Gore once promoted, governments could be limiting the economic growth that would spur additional investments in innovations and new technologies that would address any real climate-related threats in the distant future.One of the most interesting debates in recent years involves income inequality and its impact on the health of the American economy. Those who spend time decrying inequality make, or at least suggest, a number of assumptions that serve as premises. Among them: Inequality is always bad. Inequality must derive from those with wealth and power taking advantage of those lacking those attributes. Addressing inequality requires redistribution of income and wealth.It's fortunate for those who would like to test those premises that economist Thomas Sowell devotes his latest book to the topic. Titled Wealth, Poverty, and Politics: An International Perspective , Sowell's book offers chapter after chapter of anecdotes, data, and lessons in geography and history. Those who complete the reading will have good reasons to question each of the premises listed above.Nearly half of the book reminds readers that geographic, cultural, and social factors have created inequality within and between nations throughout human history, regardless of any actions from a ruler or ruling class."Not only have equal economic outcomes been rare to nonexistent, the particular patterns of inequality in one era have differed greatly from the particular patterns of inequality in another era," Sowell writes.Political solutions to the perceived problem of inequality can lead to unintended consequences. Take, for example, the well-intentioned practice of providing welfare benefits. "The welfare state can reduce, or perhaps even eliminate, poverty in any material sense, but it also reduces the need for many people to earn income - especially when earning income reduces eligibility for government-provided benefits - and therefore widens income gaps and disparities."One of Sowell's most important contributions involves productivity, a factor left "in the dim background" by those seeking redistribution of incomes and wealth."In a world where rewards were based solely on merit, there would be no obvious reason to pay the brain surgeon and more than the carpenter was paid," Sowell writes. "But, in a world where productivity matters, this is no longer a question of the relative merits of individuals. What is far more important than merit-based 'social justice' to particular income recipients is the well-being of all the people who stand to benefit from what they produce. Introducing production into the discussion makes a big difference."Focusing on inequality distracts policymakers from pursuing paths that will yield the most benefits for purported victims of inequality, as Sowell warns near the end of his book. Take the distinct goals of boosting prosperity for all versus reducing economic "gaps" and "disparities.""Many people may be in favor of both these things, and think of them as complementary goals, when in fact beyond some point there are inescapable trade-offs that can make the two goals incompatible in practice, however desirable they may seem together in theory," Sowell warns. "If everyone's income doubles, for example, that will almost certainly reduce poverty but it will also increase economic 'gaps,' 'disparities,' and 'inequities.'""When prosperity is widespread, even if not equalized, that may be of more significance to those released from the worst deprivations of grinding poverty than would reductions in the statistical gaps between the poor and the rich," he adds. "A low-income mother whose sick baby's chances of dying in infancy have been cut in half, as a result of rising prosperity, is unlikely to think of this as inconsequential, much less a grievance, even if she learns that a rich mother's baby's smaller chances of dying in infancy have also been cut in half or by more than half."Readers seeking Sowell's solution to income and wealth inequality will find no answers. But they're also more likely to question whether the focus on eliminating inequality, "the victory of some abstract vision, in defiance of reality or in disregard of the truth and the fate of fellow human beings," is worth the trouble.
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We were unable to obtain the total membership count and type of membership count from the North Carolina Association of Educators (NCAE). After numerous requests, the NCAE refused to furnish the information. We do not have the authority to compel NCAE to turn over this information because, as a private entity, NCAE does not fall under the authority of the State Auditor. However, NCAE reported a total membership count of approximately 70,000 on their website as of October 27, 2015. We were not able to confirm this membership count.

Now that the North Carolina Association of Educators (NCAE) has defied an audit mandated by state law, what happens next?We at the Civitas Institute and the Center for Law and Freedom (CLF) have written extensively and asked questions about the Office of the State Auditor's statutorily-mandatedaudit. This investigation requires the auditor to certify the membership numbers of the NCAE and other groups that benefit from state-provided dues deduction privileges. Put briefly, local school districts and other state entities withhold membership dues from certain state employees association members' paychecks, saving the these groups time and money at the taxpayers' expense. But in the case of the NCAE, this withholding is only legal if the teachers' group maintains a membership level of 40,000 or more. For some time, State Auditor Beth Wood has been performing her investigation, and at long last her full report has been issued The verdict? The NCAE refused to comply with the auditor's investigation. From page 3 of the report:Here is a screenshot of the auditor's compilation of data on employees' association membership numbers:There are three important takeaways:, any withholding of dues for the NCAE must cease immediately. The organization benefits from the expenditure of state resources, yet at the same time refused to comply with the auditor's certification of their numbers. The labor organization cannot be allowed to take advantage of the government's helping it collect dues, but then claim that as a private entity it is under no responsibility to comply with statute., there can now be no realistic doubt that the NCAE's membership level is below 40,000. As Dr. Bob Luebke has written , it has for some time been likely that the organization is below the threshold to receive the checkoff benefit. The group's refusal to comply with the auditor's request makes it obvious that it is below the threshold, for otherwise the group surely would be eager to comply. The group is certainly nowhere near the 70,000-member level reported on its website., the legislature must enact a better system of overseeing state-provided dues checkoff benefits. The NCAE refused Woods's requests based on the fact that she does not have the statutory authority to subpoena documents from private entities. Either language needs to be added making the dues checkoff benefit conditional on complying with state auditor investigations, or the state should move towards a contractual system in which organizations negotiate with the state for dues checkoff benefits rather than receive them via statutory grant.And finally, and most importantly we should ask a more fundamental question - why is government in the business of withholding dues for private organizations in the first place? It's a question that lacks a compelling response. Perhaps instead of enacting better accountability for dues checkoff benefits, the legislature will do the right thing next session, and eliminate withholding dues altogether.
The Sheriffs Office is investigating a major injury car crash on Highway 29 early Friday afternoon that the California Highway Patrol labeled as attempted suicide.

A car shot off Highway 29 south of St. Helena at an estimated speed of over 100 mph, according to witnesses, the Napa County Sheriffs Office reported.

The vehicle went into a grove of trees and rolled over, sending the male driver to the hospital, according to Cal Fire.

The vehicle was found west of Napa Valley Wine Train tracks which parallel Highway 29, in the vicinity of Alpha Omega Winery.

The driver was airlifted to Queen of the Valley Medical Center with major injuries, said Sheriffs Capt. Keith Behlmer. He was conscious when he was in the helicopter, but said didnt remember anything about the accident, he said.

Witnesses said that the northbound motorist, driving a 1989 Oldsmobile with California tags, veered west across the road at a speed of over 100 mph, Behlmer said.

The CHP turned the case over to the Sheriffs Office after it was classified as an attempted suicide, Behlmer said.

The Sheriffs Office is early in its investigation. It is possible that the driver may have blacked out or lost control of the vehicle for various other reasons, he said.

The crash call came in at 1:05 p.m., Cal Fire said. The southbound lane of Highway 29 was backed up to the Franciscan Estate winery until mid-afternoon due to the investigation.
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, R, declared a state of emergency in Flint because of high lead levels in the city's drinking water. The action came hours after the U.S. Department of Justice told reporters that it is working with the Environmental Protection Agency to investigate the situation.

Snyder, in his declaration, said "the damaged water infrastructure and leaching of lead into the city's water caused damage to public and private water infrastructure, and has either caused or threatened to cause elevated blood lead levels, especially in the population of children and pregnant women, and causing a potential immediate threat to public health and safety and disrupting vital community services. . . ."

With this declaration, it will be possible for Snyder to request federal aid should he find that state and local resources are insufficient.

The city's water troubles began in 2014, after officials decided to change Flint's water source from the Detroit system, which draws from Lake Huron, to the Flint River. According to MLive, it is unclear whether responsibility for the decision lies in the hands of the city or the state, but it was forecast that switching to Flint River water would save the city around $5 million during a period of financial emergency.

In April 2014, just days after the change was made, residents began remarking on the water's cloudy appearance and foul odor.

By the next summer, parents were crowding into pediatricians' offices, panicked by the thought that dangerous amounts of lead had entered their children's bodies through the very fluid that was supposed to keep them alive.

Last September, their fears were confirmed: A study released by the city's Hurley Medical Center found that the proportion of infants and children with above-average levels of lead in their blood has nearly doubled since Flint switched it water source.

Jennifer Eisner, a public information officer for the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, confirmed in an email to The Washington Post that the state's own testing produced similar findings to the Hurley study.

Following these discoveries, Flint returned to receiving its water through the Detroit Lake Huron system in October. But now there are concerns that the river water did some damage to the water distribution system that must be dealt with, according to the Detroit Free Press, along with all the other health repercussions from the period before Flint switched back.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan reported the news that the U.S. Attorney in Detroit was looking into the contamination in Flint and Genesee County. Gina Balaya, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office, confirmed to the Free Press that "we're looking into it," declining to say whether it was being examined as a criminal or civil issue.

Dave Murray, a spokesman for the governor, told the Free Press that he will "cooperate fully" with the DOJ's investigation.

On Dec. 15, Flint Mayor Karen Weaver declared a state of emergency because of the water- a proclamation echoed by Genesee County Commissioners on Monday and Snyder on Tuesday.

In her declaration last month, Weaver made similar mentions of the public health hazards, citing the neurological side effects of lead poisoning as an imminent burden on the city's special education services and juvenile justice system.

"Lead affects children's brain development resulting in reduced intelligence quotient (IQ), behavioral changes such as shortening or attention span and increased antisocial behavior, and reduced educational attainment," according to the World Health Organization. "Exposure of pregnant women to high levels of lead can cause miscarriage, stillbirth, premature birth and low birth weight, as well as minor malfunctions."

These effects are believed to be irreversible.

Last week, following the resignation of his administration's Department of Environmental Quality director, Snyder issued a public apology.

"I want the Flint community to know how very sorry I am that this has happened," he said in a statement. "And I want all Michigan citizens to know that we will learn from this experience, because Flint is not the only city with an aging infrastructure.

He added: "I know many Flint citizens are angry and want more than an apology. That's why I'm taking the actions today to ensure a culture of openness and trust."

The state is making personnel changes to Department of Environmental Quality and inviting outside scientists who have worked on the issue to become collaborators, Snyder said.

"There was a dark cloud hanging over this city," Flint city council president Kerry Nelson said after Snyder's declaration Tuesday. "Now, I can see beams of light busting through."
After an armed group drew attention to an Oregon land-use dispute by seizing a building in the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge last week, the governments reaction seemed almost low-key.

The White House called the protest a local law enforcement matter and said the Federal Bureau of Investigation was merely monitoring the situation and offering support.

Although the police havent revealed much about their plans, it looks as though theyre willing to wait out the occupiers rather than charge in with guns blazing.

If so, thats good news for anyone who hopes this situation can be resolved peacefully. Sadly, not everyone seems to share that hope.

The Internet has been overflowing with demands for the protesters blood. Search Twitter for Oregon and drone strike and youll find tons of people proposing to give the Malheur activists the Anwar al-Awlaki treatment. TV host Montel Williams tweeted that the authorities should put this down using National Guard with shoot-to-kill orders.

I hope they pull a M.O.V.E. on those terrorists in Oregon, wrote the author Jess Nevins, alluding to a black militant group whose Philadelphia headquarters were bombed by the police in 1985, killing 11 people and destroying dozens of homes.

Nevins wasnt the only one to use the word terrorists.

Heavily armed domestic terrorists have occupied a wildlife preserve in Oregon, military historian Tom Mockaitis wrote in the Huffington Post. In the Daily Beast, columnist Sally Kohn complained about the federal governments hyper-passive response to such flagrant acts of menacing and threats of domestic terrorism. Former Homeland Security official Juliette Kayyem, now the host of a podcast called Security Mom, declared on CNNs website that the occupation in Oregon is terrorism by any definition.

Really? By any definition?

The question of what qualifies as terrorism is hotly contested, but the most compelling definitions hinge on whether the perpetrators target civilians. Political philosopher Tony Coady, for example, says that terrorism involves intentionally targeting noncombatants with lethal or severe violence for political purposes, while Peter Simpson, another academic, refers to acts of indiscriminate violence directed at civilians or nonhostile personnel.

That framework would certainly include Islamic States slaughter of 130 people in Paris in November. It would also include the racist massacre of nine worshipers at a Charleston, S.C., church last summer. But breaking into an unoccupied building?

The occupiers do have guns, and they have said theyre willing to use them if the cops come storming in. Yet they have no hostages, they havent fired at anyone, and if they do fire they will almost certainly not aim at a civilian but at someone professionally charged with removing them from the premises. You can call that a lot of things, but its absurd to call it terrorism.

Not everyone invoking the T-word has called for a quick assault. Kayyem, for example, noted that time is on the feds side and that it would be dumb to send in a SWAT team now.

Nonetheless, the words general effect is to inflame emotions. Theres a reason it has been applied to everyone from hackers to non-violent environmentalists: That makes it easier to justify a harsh crackdown.

If theres a legitimate frustration beneath the boiling rhetoric, its that a double standard is at work. Countless commentators have contrasted the governments cautious response to the Oregon occupation with the quick-draw cop in Cleveland who shot Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy who had been playing with a toy gun in a city park.

And indeed, Tamir suffered an abominable injustice, as have many other victims of excessive police force, from Eric Garner to Walter Scott. When the point of the comparison is to wish the police would use care and caution more often, the tweeters are absolutely right.

But when the point is to complain that the government isnt moving more swiftly in Oregon, theyre absolutely wrong. The killing of Tamir Rice shouldnt be a model for anyone.

Conflicts like this are haunted by the 1990s sieges in Waco, Texas, and Ruby Ridge, Idaho, where the feds confrontational tactics had lethal consequences.

After those disasters, the government changed its strategy. In 1996, for instance, Attorney General Janet Reno was more restrained against a Montana group called the Freemen, announcing that the FBI wanted no armed confrontation, no siege, no armed perimeter and no use of military assault-type tactics or equipment. (Theres a good chance she didnt just have the Freemens potential for violence on her mind: Militia leaders around the country had declared that theyd intervene if they felt the feds stepped over the line, turning a local conflict into a larger one.) The incident ended peacefully.

If the authorities are looking to their Freemen playbook now, its a sign they remember some of the lessons of the 1990s. Not everyone can say the same.

Jesse Walker, the books editor at Reason magazine, is the author of The United States of Paranoia, a history of American conspiracy theories. He wrote this for the Los Angeles Times.
Two women sexually assaulted in Napa County were able to speak their minds during sentencing of their attacker in Napa County Superior Court on Jan. 7.

Neither said they were entirely satisfied with the outcome. They had hoped their address to the court would lead to a jury trial and a longer prison sentence.

Mark Anthony Badal, 42, was convicted of felony rape of an intoxicated person and misdemeanor sexual battery, according to court documents.

Seven other felony charges were dismissed, including four counts of sexual penetration by a foreign object, two counts of forcible rape, and false imprisonment by violence.

Badal was sentenced to state prison for a total term of seven years, 288 days of which have already been served. That deal was struck in a plea bargain filed on Nov. 12, according to court documents.

Although Badal will spend time in jail and will be a registered sex offender for life, the victims said they were unsatisfied with the plea deal and the way prosecuting attorney Lance Hafenstein handled the case.

During her address to the court, Christine Trice, 42,  the victim of the sexual battery  requested that Judge Michael Williams withdraw Badals guilty pleas and reinstate his trial. Nearly bringing herself to tears, Trice recounted how she was drugged, sexually assaulted and held hostage by Badal.

She said that her victims rights had been violated, citing Marsys Law. According to the law, also known as the Victims Bill of Rights, victims can expect to be reasonably protected from the defendant, to have reasonable notice of all public proceedings, and to be heard (upon request) at any proceeding, including the plea and sentencing.

My victims rights have been repeatedly violated by not being informed of pertinent hearings and not doing all that could be done to keep me safe, Trice said.

Williams said he was unfamiliar with Marsys Law, but planned to uphold the plea bargain.

Hafenstein, a deputy district attorney, said later that the District Attorneys Office completely complied with the notification requirements of Marsys Law.

We feel that the six-year prison sentence (for rape) and lifetime sex offender registration given to the defendant is a just result, considering all aggravating and mitigating factors in this case, he said.

The rape victim, Bianca Harmon, 25, of St. Helena, said in court that Badal is extremely dangerous and is sure to strike again when he is released from prison. I dont feel safe, she said.

In court records, Harmon was known only as Jane Doe #1, and Trice was known as Jane Doe #2. Both asked that the Register use their true names as a way of putting faces on what are often considered stigmatizing crimes.

Were not happy that theyre not happy, Hafenstein said after Trice and Harmon had testified.

Badal was first arrested on Nov. 24, 2014, on suspicion of raping Harmon. Harmon had reported that Badal had gone home with her and her fiance in St. Helena after they had some drinks, according to the police report.

He approached her while she was sleeping in a chair, according to the police report. She said that he kissed her and penetrated her with his fingers, and when she realized it was not her fiance, she pushed him away, according to the report. She left the room and was allegedly raped again by Badal 10 minutes later while her fiances 14-year-old son slept next to them, she told police.

Following sentencing, Harmon said that she provided not only DNA evidence during the investigation, but also assisted the St. Helena Police Department in obtaining a recorded confession from Badal.

The sexual battery on Trice, who is from Sacramento, happened just days prior to Harmons rape at a home in unincorporated Napa County.

Badal, who had released from jail in November, was taken into custody after sentencing. In addition to jail time, Badal was ordered to pay financial restitution to both victims at an amount to be determined.

Badals attorney, Molly Hendry, said that she had no comment following the sentencing.
Islam is a religion of peace and tolerance. Through promotion of free debate on our website, New Age Islam encourages people to rethink Islam.
Jeff Denson performance and composing activities

Education/community outreach

Ridgeway Presents

Ridgeway Records

Renowned bassist/composer/educator/community activist Jeff Denson and a small group of colleagues have formed Ridgeway Arts, Inca multi-faceted San Francisco Bay Area-based 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation. Two years in the planning, Ridgeway Arts is built upon a series of initiatives designed to enhance and fortify the Bay Area scene, and to make a strong contribution to the national landscape of jazz and the arts in general.While Jeff Densons vision provides an extremely significant force, the spirit of partnership and collective effort are also major components of the organizations direction. Ridgeways imperative is built upon a four-pronged plan of expression, education, presenting and documentation, all with a clear focus upon revenue production leading to self-sustenance. They include:DownBeat Magazine praises Jeff Denson for his considerable gifts as an improviser, interpreter and sonic trailblazer..." The activities of his own ensembles as well as those of his two cooperative groups, all take place under the Ridgeway umbrella. They include The Jeff Denson Trio plus, a fixed trio of Jeff on bass, pianistand drummer Alan Hall , augmented by a special guest artist. For the past year, this guest has been the legendary alto saxophonist, with whom Jeff has had a decade-long relationship. In Summer 2015, the group released their debut Ridgeway Records release Jeff Denson Trio plus Lee Konitz. The band is just back from a highly successful October 2015 European tour to support the record, one of many US and international tours.Densons two cooperative ensembles are also part of the Ridgeway family. Electreo is an adventurous electric group, featuring Jeff on electric bass and vocals, with Grammy-winning virtuoso bassoonist Paul Hanson, and Hall on drums. The group has been performing regularly in the Bay Area and has been developing a strong and loyal audience for its unique and genre- defying approach to modern music. The San Francisco String Trio is a collaboration with another pair of internationally renowned musiciansGrammy-winning violinistand guitarist. Together they have developed The Sgt. Pepper Project to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the release of the groundbreaking Beatles album.All of these ensembles will be represented at the 2016 Association of Performing Arts Presenters (APAP) Conference in January as part of the UNITY Arts Alliance, of which Ridgeway and Jeff are founding members.Densons composing is multi-leveled. In addition to composing for his own small ensembles and Electreo, Jeff also composes large-scale works, and has been working on a three-act chamber opera entitled WEBS.The Educational/Community Outreach component has been developed in conjunction with the California Jazz Conservatory (CJC) under Dr. Jeff Densons position at the prestigious college as Director of Outreach and full-time professor. The program has a triple purpose of 1) exposing primary and secondary students to the profound legacy of jazz; 2) providing opportunities for young musicians to learn from and perform with top professionals of both local and national renown; and 3) fortifying the Bay Area scene to make it attractive to graduating students to remain in the area to make their professional contributions to the jazz legacy.Ridgeway Presents is the organizations curating program that will be launched in 2016 in five separate cities in the Bay Area. Presentations will feature national artists, local musicians of varying statures, and emerging student ensembles from the CJC and high school jazz programs. Part of the program is focused upon allowing young talent to share the stage with professionals to restore learning on the bandstand that has been such an important, but recently too often neglected element in the development of outstanding talent throughout the history of jazz. Final arrangements are being made in the development of the partnerships with venues and institutions that will be involved with the program. Ridgeway Presents will also be working nationally on exchange programs with the curating activities of other members of the UNITY Arts Alliance.Ridgeway Records has been conceived with an innovative plan in a partnership mode where the artists share revenue, team resources, marketing and distribution  all integrated within the overall plans of Ridgeway Arts.The first album  the aforementioned Jeff Denson Trio plus Lee Konitzwas released in the summer of 2015. There are currently four new projects in motion. Alan Halls six-member Ratatet, featuring Denson and Hanson, along with trombonist John Gove, vibraphonist Dillon Vado and Greg Sankovich on keyboards  and described by Hall as a modern-oddball-jazz sextet  will be releasing its debut album Arctic in March 2016. Denson takes another angle on his Trio plus concept with a new permanent quartet that adds Paul Hanson to the mix, and their recording will be issued later that year. The Sgt. Pepper Project, with its fresh and innovative take on the revered albums compositions is slated for early 2017 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the original release. Other upcoming albums will include the first album by Electreo, as well as Paul Hansons Homecoming, a sweeping exploration of Jewish music for a sextet of bassoon, violin, guitar, cello, bass and drumsDenson, who has developed a productive ongoing relationship with the famed Fantasy Studios, serves as producer and/or executive producer on all of the labels projects.Management and development assistance for all of Ridgeways activities is provided by an experienced and accomplished team of associates working directly within Ridgeway Arts, and are also supported on a national basis by the other members of the UNITY Arts Alliance.As extensive as the current programs may be, groundwork is being laid for additional projects including Ridgeway Publishing (educational books by Denson and other extraordinary educators); and a series of podcasts about the Bay Area scene with 27 episodes already recorded and new episodes being prepared for a national focus. With all of these initiatives, Ridgeways impact upon the Bay Area and national scenes will undoubtedly be a profound one.As Denson says: Ridgeway Arts is here to lend a voice to the remarkable creativity in our communities and to work to bring it to the people who are hungry for it.
More than 150 children of Armenia residents, who have migrated to Istanbul, Turkey, attend the underground school that functions at the Armenian Evangelical Church in the Gedikpasa neighborhood.

The schools cofounder and principal Heriknaz Avagyan told the aforesaid to Armenian News.

The school conditions have improved, Avagyan said. Today, the children can attend both the kindergarten and the school. () Numerous people from Armenia prefer enrolling their children in our school, since the studies [here] are conducted with Armenias [education] programs, and most [of these] Armenians [from Armenia] aim to return to Armenia.

The school was founded in 2003, and the local Armenian community as well as the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople provide great support to this place of learning.

In Heriknaz Avagyans words, however, the funding for this school remains a challenge for them. Unlike Istanbuls legally operating Armenian schools, which frequently organize fundraisers for their maintenance, no one goes to this underground school.

We cant organize fundraisers, Avagyan added. We are forced to resolve the matter through our means, with the help of kind people as well as the payment by the parents of the children attending the school.

But Heriknaz Avagyan informed with pleasure that some of their pupils have returned to Armenia, and this year they are getting ready to be accepted in the higher education institutions of the country.
Yelena Ghukasyan and Nagui Al-Wasfi had met during an online forum. Programmer Ghukasyan had asked a question along the lines of her profession, and Al-Wasfi had responded to it.

Nagui was living in Australia, Iin Armenia, Yelena said. After responding to my question posted on the forum, Nagui proposed to continue the contact via e-mail. () Thats how we began communicating. She added that at the time, she had never thought that they would form a family.

Nagui Al-Wasfi is Coptic, he was born in Egypt, but he lives in Australia for the past 35 years.

The hobby of Nagui, who is a biochemist by profession but now a court translator due to circumstances, is painting and sculpture.

After meeting Yelena, he came to Armenia, and while living in this country for about nine months, he opened an exhibition in capital city Yerevan.

His paintings on the topic of the 1915 genocide of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire were displayed in the exhibition, Yelena said.

The couple has been living in Australia for about 2.5 years now, and it is Yelena who preserves the traditions in this Armenian-Coptic family.

I love Armenian cuisine, Nagui noted. During my months in Armenia, I managed to visit historical and cultural places, see [Mount] Ararat up close, and interact with Armenians, who are hospitable.

Yelena, for her part, has learned to prepare Coptic food.

The couple plans to visit Armenia and open its second exhibition in Yerevan.
Armenias oldest Stepan Alikhanyan theatre located in the city of Gyumri staged 80 guest performances last year on occasion of its 80th anniversary. Art Director and head of the theatre, Levon Baghdasaryan, told the aforementioned to Armenian News  NEWS.am correspondent.

But the main event in honor of the theatres 80th anniversary wasnt held in any specific place since the building of the theatre hasnt yet been renovated. Apart from this, the Ministry of Culture hasnt responded to their letter requesting to award the title of Honored Artist to the talented actors of the theatre. Thus, they decided to hold the event next year, when the building is hopefully renovated and the artists are awarded the title which they deserve.

The jubilee will be entitled 80+1. We think this is an interesting solution, Baghdasaryan said.

Referring to the performances staged last year, the director said they had an unusual staging. This was the performance Little Red Riding Hood in Armenian and German. It turned out to be very interesting. The audience also took part in the performance: the children prompted the wolf the German words they had just learnt. The new character, the robot, speaks in Armenian and the wolf wants to turn it off, pushes a wrong button and the robot starts speaking in Armenian, and thus the audience has to translate for the wolf. Thanks to my modest knowledge of German, the text of the performance was written and the performance was staged before the arrival of the specialist from Germany. Consequently, he applauded to the theatre staff, said Baghdasaryan.

The performance was written in cooperation with the German Embassy in Armenia and the Berlin Art Hotel. The initiative will continue in 2016. Inspired with the success of the Little Red Riding Hood, we decided to stage a performance only in German and make a guest performance in Germany. To promote the Armenian culture and literature, we have chosen the tale The tailless fox by Hovhannes Tumanyan. The proceeds will be spent on the renovation of the theatre building with the help of German partners, the director noted.
Poland to buy K239 Chunmoo from South Korea

Baku court does not definitively terminate criminal prosecution of Yunus spouses

Liz Truss has no plans to resign

CSTO countries agree on draft agreement on standardization of military equipment

EU countries agree to sanction eight people and organizations over Iranian drones

ASPU supports process of unification of universities

Deputy Chief of Police on new draft law: 'Citizen of Azerbaijan' is extremely relative notion

Benny Gantz: Israel will not supply weapons to Ukraine

Saudi Arabia lifts ban on Turkish soap operas

Armenia lawyer arrested

Remains discovered during renovation of Ministry of Culture building in Tbilisi are transferred to Armenian Pantheon

Dollar goes up, euro falls in Armenia

IRGC special forces conduct helicopter operations on third day of exercises on border with Azerbaijan

MFA: France position on achieving Armenia-Azerbaijan peace is unchanged

Foreign Minister: Iran will not allow blocking its communications with Armenia

Kremlin: Russia does not intend to close borders amid introduction of martial law in four regions

EU mission delegation visits some border communities of Armenias Gegharkunik Province (PHOTOS)

Armenias Papikyan attends defense ministers assembly in India

Brusov university rector: Armenia education minister offered me a high position in new university, I declined

Putin imposes martial law in new territories of Russia

Yerevan to host Eurasian Intergovernmental Council meeting

Putin holds meeting of Security Council

Armenia MOD spox: Azerbaijan still preventing search operations

Iran announces retaliatory sanctions against EU

Russian Defense Ministry reports on strike on military facilities in Ukraine

Artsakh Foreign Minister receives Ruben Vardanyan

Israel calls Australia's refusal to recognize Jerusalem as capital of Israel 'pathetic decision'

Armenia to tighten penalties for overloading of trucks

Georgia, Azerbaijan, Turkey army elite units conduct demonstration military drills

Luxembourg parliament speaker: Azerbaijan aggression is direct attack on Armenia sovereignty

Russia Investigative Committee chief confirms theory of Crimean Bridge explosion accomplices

Uruguay vice president: We express our solidarity with Armenian people

GeoProMining's ZCMC has tripled tax payments to the state budget of Armenia

Yerevan judge to be arrested

Paul Krekorian unanimously elected as LA City Council President

ThePrint: Armenia eyes procuring Akash missiles, loitering munitions from India

Armenia MP to international colleagues: Azerbaijan intends to carry out new aggression

Ukraine military hits Energodar city hall

Armenia PM: We hope Azerbaijan will cooperate in clarifying destiny of our compatriots

Newspaper: Where is 1991 declaration by which Armenia, Azerbaijan once recognized each other's territorial integrity?

Azerbaijan fires at Armenia positions at midnight

PACE lawmakers call for Azerbaijan militarys immediate withdrawal from Armenia

Australia reverses decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel capital

Armenia MPs meet with European Parliament colleagues, reflect on recent Azerbaijan attack

Nouriel Roubini: In some sense, World War III has already started

EU considers paying Elon Musk to provide Starlink Internet to Ukraine

U.S. will continue to take practical, aggressive steps to make it difficult for Iran to sell drones to Russia

German Prosecutor's Office searches Deutsche Bank headquarters

Head of Germany's national cybersecurity agency fired amid reports of ties to Russia

Uruguayan Chamber of Deputies condemns Azerbaijan's invasion of Armenian territory

Spanish minister: EU is far from solution to energy crisis

Fake Azerbaijani names of Syunik province communities removed from Google Maps and Google Earth apps

Artsakh President presents details of meetings held in Yerevan to MPs

Lavrov: Russia sees no point in maintaining its previous presence in Western countries

UAE: OPEC+ decision has no political motive

Opposition to David Price: Right to self-determination is the right of people of Artsakh to survive

Iran is ready to negotiate with Ukraine to resolve ambiguities

Deputy Speaker of Armenian National Assembly: 47 PACE deputies made written statement condemning Baku's aggression

Lapid will discuss Kiev request for Israeli systems with Kuleba

Morawiecki: Poland is not afraid of losing EU funds

Armenian President meets with Sofia Mayor

Speaker of Armenian National Assembly to Norway FM: Withdrawal of Azerbaijani Armed Forces from Armenia is a priority

Nikol Pashinyan receives delegation headed by Norwegian Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt

Iran responds to Borrell's garden and jungle statement: EU needs to accept realities or it will continue to wither

Pashinyan: No one can accuse Armenia of evading its obligations

Congressman: U.S. was not active in terms of security in Armenia, but now situation is changing

Indian defense company Solar group says it has received orders from Armenia for 'Pinaka' missiles

Price: U.S. military aid to Azerbaijan will not be used for offensive purposes against Armenia

Military expert assesses possibility of new hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan

Russian Embassy: Armenians' attitude towards Russians who moved to Armenia remains very friendly

Clarification by Price: What Could Armenian-American military cooperation look like?

Armenian Defense Minister visits DEFEXPO exhibition in India

President of Artsakh talks about results of discussions held in Armenia

Borrell angers UAE with his comparison of world outside Europe to 'jungle'

Public Council formed in Artsakh

China Daily: Party's anti-graft efforts generate fruitful outcomes

Price: We demand that Azerbaijan return to its initial positions

Aghajanyan: This visit should be seen as another stage in dynamic development of Armenian-American relations

Ukraine will officially ask Israel for transfer of air defense systems

Head of National Assembly Commission: 2023 state budget turned out to be biggest in Armenia's history

Turkey conducts test launch of its own ballistic missile over Black Sea

Students of Brusov State University hold protest outside building of Ministry of Education and Science of Armenia

Armenia MFA: Yerevan has always openly and publicly stated its position on dialogue with Turkey

Military exercises of IRGC Ground Forces on border with Azerbaijan continue for second day in Iran

Blinken accuses China of violating status quo on Taiwan

Armenian Foreign Minister: We see Azerbaijan's unconstructive behavior

Izvestia: European banks stop accepting SWIFT-transfers from Russia

Mirzoyan calls on Cavusoglu to speak for himself

Norwegian FM visits Tsitsernakaberd Memorial Complex and pays tribute to victims of Genocide

Mirzoyan: We need to understand to what extent CSTO recognizes this aggression against Armenia

MFA: Armenian authorities apply to OSCE to send observers to border with Azerbaijan

NYT: Conflict between Turkey and Greece may cause split of NATO

Ararat Mirzoyan Details of peace treaty between Armenia and Azerbaijan were presented to Norwegian FM

Price of gas in Europe drops to almost $1,200 per 1,000 cubic meters for first time since June

Armenian Defense Minister meets with his Indian counterpart

First images of damage to Nord Stream are published

Erdogan's spokesman: Meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy is impossible now

Peskov redirects question of drone purchases from Iran to Russian Ministry of Defense

Secretary of Armenian Security Council presents consequences of recent Azerbaijani aggression to Brazilian ambassador

Trial of Robert Kocharyan and Armen Gevorgyan is held in Yerevan
YEREVAN. - Satiric animated series Kill Dim were shot for inspiring the Armenian soldiers. Cartoonist David Sahakyants told the aforementioned to Armenian News  NEWS.am.

The idea of creating animated series related to the Armenian Azerbaijani conflict came to David Sahakyants, his sister Nana Sahakyants and her husband Alexan Harutyunyan in 2012.

The authors of the series manifest their approach to the Armenian and Azerbaijani armies. They have created the character of a strong, attractive and combat capable Armenia soldier, and that of an Azerbaijani one which is associated with sheep.

For security concerns, the members of the creative team preferred to work secretly in the initial stage, but after numerous absurd comments they decided to come out into the open. We were advised to keep away from the Azeris. And I often left for Moscow then and took part in different events which were also attended by the Azeris. We also worked secretly because we didnt want the name of Robert Sahakyants to be on the lips of our neighbors. But when different comments were made about the authors of the animated series  there was even an opinion that the Azeris are shooting this  we revealed ourselves. There was no point in hiding any longer, Sahakyants said.

Each series is created on the basis of a specific event, which is apparently presented grotesquely. Our neighbors do so many stupid things, that I think the informational motives will be merely limitless, Savid Sahakyants said.

The shooting of each series took nearly 7 to 14 days. The members of the creative team tried to quickly react to any given event. Hayk and David Sahakyants worked on the first series, and were later joined by Nana Sahakyants.

David Sahakyants confesses that the process of shooting Kill Dim was absolutely fantastic. Those days passed very joyfully. We all gathered together, discussed which events to present and only then began shooting, Savid Sahakyants said.

After several series, which were circulated in YouTube, the Azeris began sending complaints to the website demanding to ban showing Kill Dim. But they achieved nothing and started attacking the official website of the animated series, which, according to Sahakyants, is protected. Id better keep silent about the Azeris comments. We ve even got information that our neighbors complained of Kill Dim at the highest level. Whats happening in Armenia? What are they shooting about us? they outraged. And this is so pleasant to hear, Sahakyants confessed.

In his words, they are not going to stop. The creative team has just paused a little in connection with their occupation and recent tension on the Line of Contact between the Azerbaijani and Karabakh Armed Forces, as well as on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. A very tense situation emerged last year, as a result of which our guys are dying. We decided that it would be incorrect to joke in such a situation, David Sahakyants said. But he promised that new series of Kill Dim will appear soon, since they inspire the Armenian soldiers on the border. We recently visited one of the military units in Martakert. The guys were inspired by our animation series. The Armenian Army has many Kill Dim fans. For this very reason we are going to continue our series,Sahakyants concluded.
A Superior Court judge ordered the Alamance-Burlington Board of Education to release previously undisclosed information about the circumstances surrounding the departure of a school superintendent in what media lawyer John Bussian said wasfor the public's right to know.Even so, former school board president Tony Rose disagrees with Bussian's interpretation of Superior Court Judge Michael O'Foghludha's ruling. The case surrounds a conflict between public records laws requiring disclosure of some information from closed meetings of government bodies and the confidentiality of government employees' personnel records.Rose said. He likened the newspaper's claims of victory to former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's information minister. Known ashe claimed Iraq was winning the war against the U.S.Rose said at issue in the case was whether employee information remains perpetually confidential after an employee leaves, and whether the school board acted lawfully.Rose said.Citing the state's open records laws, the Burlington Times-News sued the school board to force the release of closed meeting minutes involving discussions about former school superintendent Lillie Cox. Cox resigned her position under what the newspaper believed were unusual circumstances.O'Foghludha reviewed in private more than 40 pages of minutes taken in school board closed sessions. He ruled the bulk of them would remain secret because they involved confidential personnel details exempt from disclosure.But Dec. 7, O'Foghludha directed the school board to disclose a very narrow section of the minutes regarding policy issues related to Cox's May 2014 resignation and more than $200,000 in severance.in rendering a decision in favor of the public's right to know, Bussian said.said Adam Mitchell, a lawyer for Tharrington Smith, the Raleigh law firm that represented the school board.Mitchell said.Before O'Foghuldha got the case, Superior Court Judge Lucy Inman dismissed the newspaper's lawsuit without holding a hearing or reviewing minutes of the school board's closed session to determine if they contained information subject to public viewing.Bussian, representing the Times-News, went to the Court of Appeals, which refused to take the case. He appealed to the state Supreme Court, which assigned emergency status to the suit under the state's open records laws, and ordered the Court of Appeals to expedite its handling of the case.A three-judge panel of the Appeals Court heard heard the case in April, and ordered the trial court to review the minutes and determine if the board sealed any information that should have been disclosed.Bussian said O'FoghludhaHe said the judge ordered only a single paragraph to be disclosed because it sums upBussian said.The case demonstratesBussian said.Rose downplayed the significance of the paragraph, but said the board could not release it until the judge signs an order.He said the paragraph at issue involves a legal discussion the board had after board member Steve Van Pelt said he would not attend a closed meeting because he believed it was being held improperly. Rose said Van Pelt misinterpreted school board policy and Robert's Rules of Order in how to vote on a superintendent's termination.Cox's departurebut a resignation, Rose said.and complied with the law.Cox was subject to a performance review in August 2013,and the contract extension decision was not unanimous, he said. Cox was givenThe paragraph O'Foghludha ordered released involves the board asking its attorney for legal guidance, and the attorney explaining why Van Pelt was incorrect, Rose said. He believes that falls under attorney-client privilege, but the board is not fighting its release.Rose said.in their situation.But the school board isconfidential information, Rose said.and could open the school district to a lawsuit.
Saying the current plan is antiquated, a legislative agency on Monday recommended that the state scrap its three-tiered system for awarding economic development grants.said Sara Nienow, senior program evaluator at the General Assembly's Program Evaluation Division, to a meeting of the Joint Legislative Program Evaluation Oversight Committee.Nienow urged lawmakers to form a commission and develop a new strategy to identify and assist distressed communities as a replacement for the tier system. She recommended and end to the tier system for economic development programs by July 1, 2018.Some other state agencies and programs use the tier system for prioritizing state funds. Those include the Farmland Preservation Trust Fund, spay and neuter programs, state wastewater reserves and drinking water programs, public safety system grant programs, oral health programs, and low income housing tax credit programs.Nienow recommended that the state stop using the tier system for those programs by July 1, 2017.The N.C. Commerce Department currently breaks the state's 100 counties into three tiers, with Tier 1 being the most distressed economically and Tier 3 being the least distressed. The ranking primarily takes into account a county's average unemployment rate, median household income, percentage growth in population, and assessed property value per capita.Sen. Don Davis, D-Greene, said the system doesn't account for low-income communities that may be located in a wealthier county.Davis said.Davis pointed to Pitt County, in eastern North Carolina, as an example.Davis said.In her presentation, Nienow noted a similar effect in two Iredell County cities.Mooresville, in the southern part of Iredell County near Mecklenburg County, is faring better economically than Statesville, which is located further north in Iredell County, Nienow said.Nienow's recommendation got a positive reception from the committee, which instructed the staff to draft legislation to implement the recommendations.However, Rep. Nelson Dollar, R-Wake, cautioned against moving too swiftly.Dollar said.Jeff DeBellis, director of economic and policy analysis at the Department of Commerce, also discussed potential complications if counties were separated into subgroups. He said in come cases, the amount of data is so small that it's difficult to gauge.DeBellis said his department is recommending cooperation among counties where a low-income community may be near the border of a more affluent county.DeBellis said.DeBellis also suggested that instead of the General Assembly establishing a new commission to replace the tier system, that lawmakers ask the Commerce Department to do it.DeBellis said.
John Hood, John Locke Foundation chairman.

Pat McCrory, Roy Cooper, Richard Burr, and many other confirmed or potential candidates for statewide office in North Carolina have plans. They have strategies. They have backers, and staffers, and plenty of ideas for how best to win their elections in November of 2016. But there's a key variable required before determining how likely they are to succeed: the identity of the Republican nominee for president.The Democratic nominee will be Hillary Clinton. Everyone already knows that she will run a skilled, well-financed campaign that seeks to reassure the Democratic base and supporters of Barack Obama that she will protect the policy wins her party has enjoyed over the past seven years while also separating herself from the president on matters, such as national security, where he and most voters have clearly gone their separate ways.Clinton's GOP opponent, though, has yet to be determined. While I don't subscribe to the theory that the contest might last all the way to the Republican convention next summer, I do think it may take a while for GOP primary voters to settle on a victor. I further think that McCrory, Cooper, and other candidates in North Carolina will alter their campaigns to adjust to that victor.If Donald Trump ends up with the GOP nomination, for example, I see Cooper and other Democrats as greeting the outcome with great joy. Perhaps they will be mistaken, but they'll assume that Trump will prove to be a disastrous candidate in the fall. They will spend a great deal of time and resources attaching Trump's face and name to every Republican candidate for every office in North Carolina - who will, in turn, put as much distance as they can between themselves and the national ticket.If Ted Cruz is the GOP victor, Republican won't be as fearful and Democrats won't be as gleeful. The Cruz strategy will be to focus on turnout among likely GOP voters, emphasizing both his positions and his outsider status to attempt to energize conservative voters who may not have cast ballots in 2008 and 2012. Although many electoral analysts don't think a weak GOP turnout is the correct explanation for Obama's victories, few discount the renewed importance of get-out-the-vote efforts in 21st century politics. Still, Democrats have a strong ground game of their own, and a belief that Cruz will not attract enough swing voters to prevail in battleground states.In my experience, North Carolina Democrats are most nervous about the prospect of a Marco Rubio nomination. They believe he has significant potential to attract independents and moderate Democrats, including young and non-white voters, thus pulling apart the Obama coalition that narrowly won the state in 2008 and narrowly lost it in 2012. Again, I concede the Democrats could be mistaken.If nominated, Rubio will need to move quickly to heal his party's primary wounds and invest sufficient resources in a grassroots operation to ensure strong Republican turnout. The opportunity to vote against Hillary Clinton, in other words, won't be enough for conservative voters who believe that previous Republican victories for Congress haven't resulted in enough progress on conservative priorities in Washington.I don't mean to be unkind to the other Republican candidates for president, but I doubt seriously that either major party's candidates in North Carolina are developing strategies for any other outcome. I really think the GOP race is down to Trump, Cruz, and Rubio at this point. Each has a scenario, although I view Trump's as improbable.North Carolina is now a highly competitive state. While Republicans have won most of the recent contests, Democrats retain significant political strengths, including talented campaign operatives, a motivated donor base that desperately wants to regain power in Raleigh, and an energized base of left-of-center voters who disagree with the conservative policies enacted over the past five years.The races for governor and most other statewide offices will be hard-fought. Many will be close. Both parties will be hoping their respective presidential standard-bearers will help get them over the top. Only one will be right.
Despite widespread concerns over the security of the SHA-1 hash algorithm, the US Department of Defense is still issuing SHA-1 signed certificates, and using them to secure connections to .mil websites.

Since 1 January 2016, the CA/Browser Forum's Baseline Requirements [pdf] have banned the issuance of new SHA-1 certificates. Publicly-trusted certificate authorities are expected to comply with these Baseline Requirements in order to remain trusted by browsers and operating systems.

However, the US DoD is not a publicly-trusted certificate authority per se, and therefore it does not have to abide by the CA/Browser Forum's rules. With the exception of Apple platforms, most browser software does not include the DoD's root certificates by default. This means any secure site that uses a certificate issued by the DoD is unlikely to be trusted by a browser running on Windows or Linux, unless the user has explicitly installed the DoD's root certificates.

Even though the DoD does not have to abide by the CA/Browser Forum's rules, it is arguably a bad idea not to: The SHA-1 algorithm is now thought to be sufficiently weak that a well-funded attacker might be able to find a SHA-1 hash collision and hence impersonate any HTTPS website. It is also particularly surprising to see the DoD still using SHA-1 today when the US National Institute of Standards and Technology banned its use more than two years ago. Since NIST made this decision, the cost projections of finding a SHA-1 hash collision have reduced significantly.

On 4 January 2016, the DoD issued a SHA-1 certificate to necportal.riley.army.mil [site report], which is a SharePoint portal hosted by the United States Army Information Systems Command. It can be accessed remotely by Common Access Card (CAC) holders. The certificate is marked as being valid until 8 September 2017.

The DoD is America's largest government agency, and is tasked with protecting the security of its country, which makes its continued reliance on SHA-1 particularly remarkable. Besides the well known security implications, this reliance could already prove problematic amongst the DoD's millions of employees. For instance, Mozilla Firefox 43 began rejecting all new SHA-1 certificates issued since 1 January 2016. When it encountered one of these certificates, the browser displayed an Untrusted Connection error, although this could be overridden. If DoD employees become accustomed to ignoring such errors, it could become much easier to carry out man-in-the-middle attacks against them.

However, the latest version of Firefox no longer rejects SHA-1 certificates issued after 1 January 2016. This change was made to cater for users of certain man-in-the-middle products, which generate freshly issued certificates on the fly. Consequently, users of Firefox 43.0.4 who have installed the appropriate DoD root certificates will currently not receive any errors, or even warnings, when browsing to the site:

Google intends to block all SHA-1 certificates issued from 1 January 2016 with the release of Chrome 48. In the meantime, Chrome 47 affirmatively distrusts the SHA-1 certificate used by necportal.riley.army.mil because it does not expire until 2017.

Firefox will ultimately distrust all SHA-1 certificates by 2017, regardless of when they were issued, but Mozilla considered advancing this deadline to as early as 1 July 2016 when the new cost projections were realised.

More than 650,000 SSL certificates in use on the web are still using SHA-1, but this count has been rapidly falling since 2014. Nearly all of these certificates are due to expire by the end of 2016, in accordance with the Baseline Requirements; however, with most browser vendors contemplating an accelerated deprecation timeline, it is likely that many of these certificates will be replaced before the middle of the year.

With the US DoD PKI infrastructure seemingly still reliant on SHA-1, by the end of 2017, the DoD could account for a significant proportion of all SHA-1 certificates that are intended to be used by modern browsers.
John Hood, John Locke Foundation chairman.

However complicated you want to try to make it, the concept of free speech does not contain the right to shut other people up. Unfortunately, there is an entire movement of political activists right now who would not only disagree with my assertion but would seek to keep me from saying it, in a variety of contexts.For example, say I was not arguing this in a column but was instead attending a public forum at a University of North Carolina campus. If I was standing in line at the microphone, waiting my turn with other participants to say my piece to the audience, there are plenty of students and professors who would feel entitled to shout me down.Don't believe me? I have evidence. A couple of weeks ago, a small group of students disrupted a public forum at UNC-Chapel Hill and, ignoring the moderator and other students waiting their turn to speak, issued a list of absurd demands. Something similar happened last week at a meeting of the UNC Board of Governors, where a group of professors began shouting demands that included the ouster of incoming system president Margaret Spellings.There's another setting in which political activists might seek to limit my freedom of speech. Say that, instead of attending a public forum, I sought to express myself by creating a company to publish a book or produce a documentary on the First Amendment. Let's further say that my work included criticism of a politician for his or her stance on the First Amendment. If I sought to release my work while the politician was seeking election, many activists would think it proper for the federal government to prevent me from doing so.This is not really a hypothetical, either. It's the very subject of the Citizens United case. During the 2008 Democratic primaries, a conservative group named Citizens United wanted to release a film critical of Hillary Clinton and advertise its release on television. A federal law said it couldn't. After the fact, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down that law. Ever since, liberal politicians and activists have fumed about the decision. They promise to amend the free speech clause of the First Amendment to reinstate the original restriction.Finally, let's say that instead of starting my own company to produce print and broadcast content about free speech, I decided to contribute money to a preexisting group planning to do same, including content to be released during election campaigns. While I would not be directly speaking myself in this scenario, the free speech clause of the constitution does not specify how political expression may be conducted. We are entirely free to band together with other like-minded individuals and pool our resources to reach a larger audience with a common message.Again, however, there are plenty of activists who think there is no such right - that the individual right to speak, publish, or broadcast disappears when individuals join together in corporations or other groups. They are quite unhinged on the subject, in my experience, as they insist that because corporations are inanimate contractual relationships, they have no constitutional rights.Even my seven-year-old stepdaughter understands when I say that her school put on a wonderful Christmas play, I don't mean the building itself stood up on mechanical legs and began singing "Away in a Manger." I obviously mean that the teachers and students in the school have put on the play. To say Citizens United, the NAACP, or the Catholic Church exercises free-speech rights is obviously to say that the human beings who form, sustain, and operate these organizations are exercising these rights.Interestingly, few of these zealots have tried to argue that media outlets such as newspapers lack freedom of expression. They don't deny that editors have the authority to choose which letters or columns to run on editorial pages, or that the First Amendment applies to newspapers owned by corporations.I suppose I should stop speaking now. I don't want to give them any ideas.
22:27

six-nation Middle Eastern alliance agreed Saturday to characterize the recent attack on Saudi Arabia's embassy in Tehran as an act of terror, strong language that marks an even further escalation in a tiff that has embroiled the region for days.





Foreign ministers from the six Gulf Cooperation Council met in the Saudi Arabian capital of Riyadh, after which the alliance's Secretary-General Abdul Latif Zayani read a statement indicating that agreed to label last weekend's incident as terrorism.





Zayani himself a few days ago referred to the Saudi Embassy as a terrorist act, so this terminology isn't entirely new. Still, it is significant in that the six GCC countries -- Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates -- are now officially on the same page.




Lal Bahadur Shastri, India's second prime minister, was confident of subcontinental peace, which is why he signed the Tashkent Accord with Pakistan on June 10, exactly 50 years ago. But this collapsed due to his death hours later early January 11, an event that should be probed even though half a century has elapsed, veteran journalist Kuldip Nayar, a long-serving aide of the Indian leader, said. "Shastri was very sagacious. He firmly believed India could make peace with Pakistan but not with China," Nayar, who was Shastri's media advisor, reminisced in an interview with IANS, adding that it was the prime minister, who got then Pakistani president Field Marshal Ayub Khan to pencil in the words "without resorting to arms" in the first draft of the Tashkent Agreement. Under the agreement, the two countries agreed that their armies would return to the positions they held on August 5, 1965, the day they went to war for the second time after the partition of the subcontinent in 1947. "Ayub Khan was inclined but (Pakistani foreign minister Zulfikar Ali) Bhutto stormed out of the negotiations, saying he would denounce the president (back) home. After Shastri died (in circumstances that are still suspect), and thanks to Bhutto, whatever had been achieved at Tashkent collapsed in Rawalpindi (then the Pakistani capital), Nayar, still sharp as a razor in spite of his 93 years and possibly the only survivor of Tashkent, noted. Reinforcing this view, Nayar recalled Ayub Khan saying on the morning of Shastri's death: "Here lies the man who could have brought Pakistan and India close." Ayub Khan, in fact was one of the two front pall-bearers (on the left) who carried Shastri's coffin to the aircraft that transported it to New Delhi. Elaborating on Shastri's sagacity, Nayar pointed to a letter the then Shah of Iran, Mohammad Raza Pahlavi, wrote to Ayub Khan in the wake of the Chinese invasion of India in 1962, asking him to send Pakistani troops to beat back the invaders. "A copy was marked to (India's first prime minister) Jawaharlal Nehru, who sought (home minister) Shastri's comments. Don't accept it, Shastri said because it tomorrow, if Pakistan asks for Kashmir (still a sticking point between the two nations on which they have fought four wars), we'll be in a difficult situation," Nayar contended. Shastri had assumed office after soon after India's first prime minister died on May 24, 1964 in spite of the fact that it was widely felt that Nehru wanted his daughter, Indira Gandhi to succeed him. So how did Tashkent, now the capital of Uzbekistan but at that time part of the undivided Soviet Union, come to be chosen as the venue of the peace negotiations? "The Americans stepped in (after the 1965 war ended) but Shastri said 'No. They have given them (Pakistan) arms. We can't trust them. The Soviets stepped in; they said come to Tashkent, known for its kababs and good food. Shastri was a strict vegetarian, but he said, let's go." Though military cooperation between India and the Soviet Union had begun soon after the 1962 war with China, this took a quantum leap soon after the Tashkent Accord and today, India imports almost 70 percent of its armaments from Russia, the successor state after the collapse of the Cold War superpower. Nayar also said there was much bonhomie between the Indian and Pakstani delegations, as also between the journalists of the two countries who were reporting on the talks. "We (the journalists) were staying in the same hotel. Bahut milna julna tha. Saath khate peete the (There was much camadaraderia. We used to eat at drink together. After Shastri's death, all of them cam to sympathise with us). The next morning, even people on the street came to sympathise with us," Nayar recalled. As for the circumstances of Shastri's death hours after the Tashkent Accord was signed, Nayar said: "There is a general perception that he was poisoned, there should be an enquiry, even though a long time has elapsed. The government says there are certain papers whatever papers there are, make them public." Speaking about the future of India-Pakistan ties, Nayar saw great hope. "There are fringe elements (as evidenced in the attack on the Pathankot IAF air base soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dramatic visit to Lahore via Kaul after a state visit to Moscow), but everyone realises that peace must prevail," he said. "Had people like Lal Bahadur Shastri been around, all this would not have happened," Nayar concluded. (Vishnu Makhijani can be contacted at vishnu.makhijani@ians.in) --Indo-Asian News Service vm/tb ( 792 Words) 2016-01-09-15:11:35 (IANS)
The agitating Samyukta Loktantrik Madhesi Morcha in Nepal on Saturday announced a fresh agitation programme from January 12 to 22, after several rounds of talks with the government over inclusiveness in the constitution did not yield any result. The alliance of four regional parties of the southern plains has been protesting since four months in the Terai region and obstructing supply of goods at key Nepal-India entry points. The government and the agitating Morcha have held 25 rounds of talks. Asserting that the government has not exhibited seriousness over their demands, including making the constitution more inclusive and changing demarcation of seven federal units, the Morcha said the talks with the government was a flop show. In a press statement on Saturday, the Morcha said the constitution amendment proposal to meet the demands of the agitating parties was unacceptable to them. The government registered two amendment proposals in parliament to address the demands of the agitating parties to ensure inclusive representation of various ethnic minorities in various state organs. "The one-ethnic group centric mentality of the (erstwhile) ruler continues... People in the government have not stopped making blunt statements against the Madhesis and other deprived, marginalised communities so that it is difficult for them to sit in talks and seek a consensus," the statement said, while announcing the fresh stir. The Morcha said 58 people have lost their lives during the movement in the Terai region and the government was arresting Madhesis and charging them with false cases. It said the proposed amendments cannot be accepted as they do not address issues raised by Madhesis, indigenous communities, Tharus, Muslims and Dalits. According to the agitation programme, the Morcha will hold mass meetings at the district headquarters, cities and towns to "expose the wrongdoings" of the government. The Morcha would organise mass rallies and protest assemblies in all district headquarters on January 21, display paintings, photos and documentaries about the government's "suppression" on January 14, and stage other rallies on January 16, 18, 19 and 21. The Morcha will also mark January 19 as "Balidani Diwas" (day of sacrifice) in memory of those who lost their lives in the agitation. --Indo-Asian News Service giri/pm/bg ( 374 Words) 2016-01-09-19:27:35 (IANS)
A draft agreement on avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion convention was handed to Afghan authorities in the Joint Economic Commission (JEC) meeting held in February 2014. The treaty was drafted by Pakistani tax officials, Dawn online quoted official as saying on Friday.

"We had shared the draft with the Afghan government for a feedback and are currently awaiting response," the tax official said.

In a recent meeting of Pakistan-Afghanistan JEC in Islamabad, the Afghan authorities said Kabul has already sent their feedback through diplomatic channel.

However, the tax official said the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) did not receive any feedback.

To resolve the issue, Afghan authorities handed a copy to Pakistani officials in a recent meeting.

In the absence of any treaty on avoidance of double taxation between the two countries, Kabul has decided to tax Pakistan International Airlines.

--Indo-Asian News Service py/vm

( 182 Words)

2016-01-09-11:49:35 (IANS)
Realizing the importance of having a full-fledged Forensic Science Service, for effective enforcement of law and efficient administration of justice, the Government of Andhra Pradesh laid special emphasis on leveraging the advances in Science and Technology for prevention, control and detection of crime in a timely manner to ensure public safety, stability and security in the state which is paramount to overall development of the newly formed state. At a meeting in the presence of the Chief Secretary I.Y.R. Krishna Rao, held last night here, Dr. Gandhi P C Kaza, Advisor to the Government Forensic and Allied Police Support Services, briefed about the master plan for development of Forensic Science Services in Andhra Pradesh. Mr.Gandhi said that combined A.P. State Forensic Science Lab used to be the No. 1 in the country till 2007, catering the needs not only AP state but also the central agencies like CBI, CVC, RBI, in sensational cases. The residuary state of AP has now five Regional Forensic Laboratories in Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada, Guntur, Kurnool and Tirupathi. He said AP state FSL would Adopt a New Proactive Model in which before the incident is reported, the linking data relating to the evidences, crimes and criminals will be collected and stored in the online database for issuing timely alerts and actions to avert potential crimes and also apprehend the suspects before even the commission of crime. Establishing an effective Forensic Science facility is a key to ensure better public safety and public satisfaction and confidence in the governance process which can reduce crime rates and increase conviction rates, if properly planned and implemented, Chief Secretary Mr.Rao opined. UNI DP VV AR1231 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0415-529336.Xml
GRP sources here today said that after the threat, intensive checking was conducted at all the three railways stations but nothing was found.

The threat was received by the railway control room saying that explosion could occur in any stations between New Delhi and Lucknow.

" The checking was conducted at several stations last evening but nothing was found," a senior GRP official said.

This was the second time that such threat was received to blow up Lucknow railway station. Earlier on the New Year day, the New Delhi- Lucknow Shatabadi Express was detained at Ghaziabad station for an hour due to a similar threat.

Mr Modi would be visiting Varanasi and Lucknow following which the state police has issued a high alert in the state and the security arrangements have been spruced up.UNI MB SV RK1200

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"We have arrested a BSF jawan Anil Kumar for allegedly helping cross border smuggling," Gurpreet Singh Bhullar, SSP Mohali, told media.

"The BSF jawan was bribed by a notorious smuggler group during a wedding, who promised him of financial assistance," he added.

The SSP also asserted that there is no link established between this incident and the Pathankot terror attack.

He insisted that investigation is underway.

The BSF had on Wednesday busted a drug peddling racket from Punjab's Khemkaran Sector.

Six packets of heroin worth Rs. 30 crore, Pakistan SIM cards and mobile phones were seized from the peddlers.

"There was some suspected movement found at 1 in night. We got the information and accordingly took the action," BSF official Y.P. Singh said.

"Three people were smuggling at the border. We have recovered a Nokia phone and a Pakistani Sim. We haven't recovered any arms, but generally they don't come without it," he added. (ANI)
RALEIGH Many political pundits now consider North Carolina a battleground state . Some things, however, are not new.During the 1787-89 debates over ratifying the U.S. Constitution, for example, North Carolina's population was divided over the necessity of a new constitution and what became known as the Bill of Rights.After the framers drafted their document at the 1787 Philadelphia Convention, it was submitted to respective state ratification conventions for approval. According to Article 7 in the Constitution:Nine states approved the Constitution, and the new Union was formed. In some, the vote was unanimous (Georgia, 26-0, and New Jersey, 38-0). In others, the vote was divided (Pennsylvania, 46-23, and South Carolina, 149-73).Widespread criticism and skepticism, however, remained in key states: New York, Virginia, Rhode Island, and North Carolina. In New York, the recurring skepticism prompted Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay to pick up quills, dip them into inkwells, and pen 85 essays that became known as The Federalist - one of the best commentaries regarding the Constitution's meaning.In North Carolina, Edentonian James Iredell, using the pseudonym Marcus, explained the Constitution's meaning and pointed out the necessity of its adoption. Tar Heel Federalists, such as Iredell and William Davie, believed theneeded moresuch as more authority to tax and be able to have an army to defend the fledgling nation.A strong Anti-Federalist sentiment, however, remained in North Carolina. Many North Carolinians remembered the Parliamentary abuses before the Revolutionary War and questioned giving more authority to what would become the federal government.Tar Heel Anti-Federalists, including the influential yet somewhat reticent Willie Jones and the vocal and somewhat bumbling Judge Samuel Spencer, questioned handing any more power from the individuals and the states to the general government.Unlike other states, there were two ratification conventions in North Carolina. One was in Hillsborough (1788) and the other in Fayetteville (1789). James Madison, theremarked more than once that the state ratifying conventions provided the key to unlocking an understanding of the Constitution's meaning.That said, many historians consider North Carolina's ratification convention minutes to be the most revealing and balanced regarding the debate between Federalists and Anti-Federalists. (In most states, Federalists paid for transcribers, and many times convention minutes give the impression of erudite Federalists engaging Anti-Federalist ignorance; the Hillsborough minutes instead reveal a sophisticated exchange among delegates with opposing beliefs.)At Hillsborough, Anti-Federalists preferred a quick vote and dismissal while the Federalists desired opportunities to provide commentary for the record. Ultimately, the delegates debated and discussed such issues as defining local and state responsibilities and the necessity of paper money and religious oaths of office.Much debate centered on questions regarding taxation. In many ways, the Regulator spirit remained in many parts of North Carolina, and many delegates were concerned with local authority or wanted a declaration of rights added to the submitted constitution.In Hillsborough, the delegates voted, 184-84, neither to reject nor ratify the U.S. Constitution. Some historians have called thisIn subsequent months, debate continued not only in North Carolina but also in other states regarding the necessity of the Bill of Rights. After being assured that a declaration of rights would be added, in November 1789 North Carolina ratified the Constitution by a vote of 195 to 77 at the Fayetteville Convention. The Old North State finally had joined the new Union.In the end, North Carolina's heated political debate and strong dissent contributed significantly to ensuring that Americans have a Bill of Rights.
Stricter regulations, including fines for bringing plastic items, are in store for pilgrims to the famed hill shrine of Sabarimala in Kerala, as the state government intensifies its campaign to tackle the mounting pollution and waste generated by the millions of people who visit the holy site every year. The district administration of Pathanamthitta, where the shrine is located, has launched the Mission Green Sabarimala project this year to carry out focused awareness drives and plastic collection exercises, before tougher controls including a complete ban on bringing plastics, possible stop-and-search activities and fines are put in place over the next two years. Sabarimala, the abode of Lord Ayyappa, is sited within the protected Periyar Tiger Reserve in the Western Ghats, on the banks of the river Pampa. It attracts millions of devotees every year from across India, making it one of the largest annual pilgrimages in the world. The growing popularity of the shrine, leading to greater human activity in the forested area, has also resulted in deeper problems including water and land pollution, waste management issues and damage to wildlife; which the authorities are hoping can be greatly mitigated if the pilgrims become more environment-conscious and responsible. We are requesting Sabarimala devotees to not bring plastic bags, packets, bottles and containers with them or discard waste indiscriminately around the holy site and the river, said Pathanamthitta District Collector S. Harikishore. While it is understandable that people who travel for days, from other states for example, need to carry and store things, they can use alternatives such as bags made of cloth or other biodegradable materials, reusable containers and bottles. Lakhs of devotees from states including Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Maharashtra travel to Sabarimala during the annual pilgrim season from mid-November to mid-January. The shrine is also open for prayers on the first five days of every month in the Malayalam calendar. The Kerala government is relying on the co-operation of these pilgrims to advance the Sabarimala clean-up mission. Reducing the use of plastics is at the core of Mission Green Sabarimala projects awareness campaign. Volunteers from local schools, the womens self-help group Kudumbashree, the Kerala Forest Department, the states sanitation agency the Shuchitwa Mission, and the Travancore Devaswom Board, which administers the temple, are assisting in the implementation of the programme. Under the Mission Green Sabarimala project, the district administration has installed an additional 250 bins along the trekking route to collect garbage. Around 30 eco-guards have been posted along the Pampa and in resting areas for clean-up operations and to remind pilgrims that dumping clothes and waste in the river is a punishable offence. The recent practice of devotees discarding clothes in the Pampa has become a serious environmental issue due to the sheer numbers of pilgrims and volume of clothes that needs to be dredged out to keep the river clean. The Devaswom Board and private partners in the project have set up plastic exchange counters where pilgrims can deposit their plastic waste in exchange for cloth bags. There are hoardings, notices and signages along the pilgrim route and campaign volunteers have been distributing pamphlets to inform devotees about the new measures and recommending alternatives to plastic. The awareness drive has been intensified through the media, social networks and a dedicated website www.missiongreensabarimala.com has been set up to provide information and seek public participation in the project. The Kerala Water Authority is assisting in the installation of a Reverse Osmosis plant at the base of the trekking route to provide safe and clean drinking water. The Travancore Devaswom Board has also undertaken a project to install around 50 kiosks providing drinking water along the route. These kiosks are expected to significantly reduce the use of plastic water bottles, one of the major pollutants in the area. An estimated two million PET bottles are sold along the trekking path every year. The Mission Green Sabarimala project has largely focused on awareness building this year, but once the alternative infrastructure is in fully in place, tighter regulations will be imposed to keep the shrine and its surrounding regions clean, said Mr Harikishore. The Kerala High Court has already ordered for the strict implementation from February one of a blanket ban imposed by the State Pollution Control Board on the sale and stocking of plastic containers, plastic covers, polyethylene bags, and other plastic materials in and around the shrine.The authorities are also considering a ban on bringing plastic materials to Sabarimala and the use of PET bottles, said Mr Harikishore. The future ban could be backed by punitive measures such as fines and vehicle searches and frisking. Our larger aim is to make Sabarimala completely plastic free. We are hoping to have an effective alternative system in place before we impose a total ban so the visitors are not inconvenienced, he said. However, our earnest request to the devotees is that in keeping with the spirit of the pilgrimage, they contribute their share in maintaining the purity of the holy site and help protect the forests and wildlife in Sabarimala.UNI CR VV AR1300 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0415-529378.Xml
While CPI-M reserved its comment on the issue saying it is unnoticed, Congress said the Governors comment or statement must not offer any scope to commoner to read the meaning between the line.

Mr Roy said, ''the terrorists bodies should not be buried and deserved to be wrapped in pigskin.''

He tweeted, I seriously suggest Russian treatment to terrorists carcasses. Wrap them in pigskin, bury them face down in pig excreta. No chance of Houris.General Pershing put 50 Islamist Moro rebels in Philippines before a firing squad and shot 49 of them with bullets dipped in pig blood, Mr Roy added.

He, however, went on mentioning, The Russians, following General Pershings logic are reportedly burying Chechen rebels in pigskin with face down.

In the next tweet, defending his stand, Mr Roy said, Abuses pour in against my tweet about Russian treatment to suicide jihadis. Message is clear: PLEASE dont do this, itll be end of suicide attacks.UNI BB AD SV GC1338

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Mumbai bound ticket holders filed an FIR against Spice Jet for denying flying on time this morning from Dum Dum airport, aviation sources said. Some 199 passengers of Spice Jet were scheduled to fly around 0800 hours for Mumbai, but they were told by the airline authorities that due to bad weather in Mumbai the departure was delayed for an unspecified period. But the Spice Jet passengers protested when they saw other airlines flying their aircraft for Mumbai on time. They then lodged a complaint against the airline with the local police station. After about four and half hours delay, the Spice Jet authorities were making arrangements for another aircraft to carry the passengers to Mumbai.UNI PC AD SV GC1354 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0108-529447.Xml
Security forces burst teargas shells and resorted to lathicharge to disperse demonstrators in the Civil Lines near here who were protesting against the arrest of a youth by police today. Business and other activities came to a halt in the Civil Lines when people, mostly youths took to the streets at Maisuma and nearby areas, protesting against the arrest of a youth Roman Yousuf alias Ashiq by police at Gaw Kadal. However, when the demonstrators, raising ''pro-freedom'' and anti-police slogans tried to move towards Lal Chowk, security forces and state police immediately swung into action and stopped them near Budshah Chowk. The demonstrators later pelted stones on security forces, who resorted to lathicharge which had no impact. Later security forces burst teargas shells to disperse the demonstrators, who were regrouping and pelting stones by narrow lanes and bylanes. Shops and business establishments in Maisuma and adjoining areas were closed and traffic was also diverted through other routes.UNI BAS AE AS1440 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0153-529492.Xml
Keeping with the prestigious plan of Prime Minister Narendra Modi of giving quality education to the students of the country, two projects will be launched in Konkan next week. The projects being launched are the 'VPMs Council of Senior Scientists' and 'VPMs Centre for Career and Skill Development. Dr Vijay V Bedekar, Chairman of the Vidya Prasarak Mandal, (VPM) has announced the launch of the two projects here yesterday at the headquarters of the VPM. VPM, the educational institution here has classes from KG to Management and research wings. Dr Bedekar said that the need for having the Council, perhaps the only one in the state, was felt as a part of the desire of the VPM to impart quality education to the students of the VPMs Maharshi Parshuram College of Engineering, at Velneshwar of Ratnagiri district which took birth in 2012. He said some of his acquaintances floated an idea to make use of the talents in various sections of the society, especially those retired from services, and make the most use of them to guide the students of the colleges. Dr Bedekar said more than 25 renowned scholars and researchers have offered their services so far to the cause of the council. This will go a long way in building confidence among the students and enhance their knowledge Dr. Bedekar claimed. The other project which would also be launched on January 13, at the College campus is the Centre for Career and Skill Development, he informed. UNI XR NV ADG AN1440 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0169-529317.Xml
The United States on Saturday asked Pakistan to conduct a 'complete and thorough' probe into the terrorist attack on the Pathankot air base. Briefing reporters on January 7, John Kirby, the US State Department spokesperson, said that the country was in touch with Pakistan on this issue. "The Pakistanis (had) said they're going to investigate, so we look forward to seeing the results of that investigation," he said. Acknowledging that the US's 'relationship with Pakistan is complicated.and we don't always agree on everything', he reiterated that the need for Pakistan to be 'aggressive' in its counter-terror operations and to 'bring the perpetrators (of the Mumbai terror attack also) to justice.' While refusing to get into a debate on the timeframe for Pakistan to complete the investigation into the terrorist attack on the Pathankot air base, he stressed that the US would "like them to be done as quick as possible and transparently discussed when it's complete". Earlier, the Pakistani Government has asked for more and 'concrete' evidence instead of 'leads' to take action against the suspects of being involved in the terrorist strike on the airbase. India had earlier shared leads with Islamabad which mostly included intercepts of telephone calls made by the terrorists to their alleged handlers and the locations of the numbers which they had called in Pakistan. Later, Pakistan acknowledged that they had received the leads and had begun working on them. Sharif then called Prime Minister Modi and assured him of prompt action against the guilty. According to a statement issued by the Prime Minister's Office, the meeting reviewed the progress on the information shared by India and it was decides that the matter would be continued to discuss with New Delhi. Meanwhile, India awaits Pakistan's formal response to the shared leads and has expressed quick action from Islamabad so that the upcoming foreign secretaries talks are not hampered. Pathankot district was attacked by six terrorists from Pakistan on January 2. Seven security personnel were martyred and another 20 were injured in the attack. (ANI)
Working president of the National Conference (NC) Omar Abdullah today raised questions about who was governing the Jammu and Kashmir as no Governor rule has been imposed so far after the death of Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed on January 7.Taking to micro blogging site twitter today, Mr Omar said, More than 48 hrs after Mufti Sb's demise, no formal declaration of Governor rule and no Govt in place so now I have to ask who is governing. Mr Omar has yesterday said that president of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Mehbooba Mufti, who has been elected legislature party leader by the party MLAs, should be given time since she was still condoling the death of her father who breathed his last on Thursday morning at AIIMS, New Delhi.In a tweet yesterday he said, Why is BJP forcing this uncertainty on the state? Mehbooba, understandably, needs time to grieve but these guys?.He was reacting to a tweet by BJP state president Sat Paul Sharma who had said, We have decided that we will discuss this in four days. After the death of Mr Sayeed, the council of minister also ceases to exist.UNI BAS JN 1503 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0100-529735.Xml
Mr Modi took a round of the air base and saw the damaged mess building which was demolished by the security forces to neutralise the two terrorists hiding there. The Prime Minister also held meetings with the high officials of the security forces and investigating agencies.

The security forces had yesterday declared the sprawling Air Force station fully sanitised after a massive combing operation spanning over three days.

"The combing operation at the Air Force station is over," a senior IAF official said, adding the entire area has been sanitised.

Six terrorists were gunned down by the security forces after a four-day gun battle in the airbase. Seven Indian security personnel also lost their lives in the operation, jointly carried out by Army, NSG and IAF's Garud commandoes, to ensure that no terrorist was hiding in the air base.

Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar had also visited the base on January five.

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had earlier called up Mr Modi and promised action against the perpetrators of the attack.UNI XC DB ADG GC1549

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The Baheri Block Chief and her husband were today arrested by the police in connection with twin murder case of engineers on December 26. Benipur Sub Divisional Police Officer Anjani Kumar told UNI that Munni Devi and her husband Sanjay Lal Deo were arrested from their hideouts near Laheriasarai railway station. He said that the duo was apparently trying to flee the district. The police action followed issuance of arrest warrant by a local court on January 5. The court had also issued proclamation notice against the duo. Mr Kumar said though Devi and her husband Deo were not named in the FIR, they were one of the masterminds behind killing of Mukesh Kumar and Brajesh Kumar, engineers of a private construction company engaged in road construction. The police had earlier arrested one Pintu Lal, brother-in-law of Devi in connection with the killing. The two engineers were killed in broad day light by four motorcycle borne criminals who used sophisticated weapons to kill them for their refusal to pay extortion. The extortionists had demanded a sum of Rs 75 crore from the construction company for carrying out road construction work. However, the main accused, Mukesh Pathak, continued to evade arrest and was reported to have taken shelter in Nepal. The mastermind, Santosh Jha, behind the killing, was shifted to high security Bhaglapur Central Jail last night. UNI XC DH AD ADG AN1623 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0108-529585.Xml
Hundreds of people, mostly youths, took to the streets at Naugam on Srinagar- Charar-e-Shairef demanding the body of a militant Mohammad Yaseen Itoo who died after slipping from a hill near Line of Control (LoC) in north Kashmir recently.

Trouble started after security forces stopped the demonstrators at Chadoora bridge and refused permission to them to move towards the main chowk, leading to clashes. Traffic on the Charar-e-Sharief and Badgam was also diverted due to stone pelting.

Security forces and state police personnel resorted to lathicharge to disperse the demonstrators. Additional security forces and state police personnel were rushed to the area.

Meanwhile, thousands of people, including senior leaders of hardline Hurriyat Conference (HC) joined the Nimaz-e-Gaibana-Jinazah (funeral prayers in absentia) of Yaseen, who has been arrested several times in the past. He was missing for the past some time before the news of his death reached to his village this morning.UNI BAS AE AS1629

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RALEIGH In 1972, at the University of Georgia, our college newspaper staff opposed the proposal to change the name of the Henry W. Grady School of Journalism to the Henry W. Grady School of Mass Communications. Our reasoning was that journalism implies "truth" while "mass communications" does not.After all, the worst propaganda is still "communications."I think of that often these days, given what I see in the mainstream press every day, where the whole truth often is missing in action.Take, for example, the huge national story that ensued when Republican presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson suggested that people confronted by an armed mass killer should do something more than "just stand there" waiting to be shot.The media reacted with feigned horror, accusing him of showing a lack of respect for the people killed in the campus shooting in Roseburg, Ore., and saying that what he was suggesting was totally outrageous and unreasonable.But then, on its Nov. 22 show, "60 Minutes" interviewed Washington, D.C., police chief Cathy Lanier, who said killing or subduing a killer in such situations would be the "best option for saving lives before police can get there." The same nabobs who excoriated Carson for suggesting the same thing strangely had no comment. Even the "60 Minutes" correspondent never batted an eye when Lanier suggested the identical advice offered by Carson six weeks earlier.Here's another example of truth being a casualty in reporting. Republicans, joined by 47 Democrats, voted in the U.S. House last month to put a hold on the Syrian refugee program until it can be determined that the vetting process would catch Islamist terrorists using the refugee crisis as a means to enter the United States.President Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, along with most media commentators, criticized those urging caution of abandoning American values and being callous toward "widows and orphans," to use Obama's terms.However, in 2011, it was Obama and the State Department, under Clinton's leadership, who halted the processing of Iraqi refugees for six months after it was discovered that terrorists had used the program to enter the country to commit terrorist attacks.The media had a bout of amnesia again, never mentioning that Obama and Clinton had done exactly what they, and the media, were criticizing Republicans and others for wanting to do with regard to the Syrians. They also failed to point out an ABC News report from 2013 that found that "dozens of terrorists" had entered the country under the Obama program for Iraqi refugees.The media failed to put truth in the forefront in these reports. As a result, their selective reporting seemed more like propaganda than journalism.
PHO, General Secretary Dr I S Gilada urged the government to take strict action against blood bank, which are overcharging from the patients.

He also demanded a ban on the trade in blood and organs, making it a severely punishable crime.

Dr Gilada said that most of the private blood banks, despite collecting their blood supply from voluntary donors and blood donation drives, charge a deposit ranging from Rs.1000 to 2500 per unit of blood.

He said in case of failure to replace blood the deposit is forfeited.

Such blood banks also charge the blood processing fee of Rs 1700 to 2500 per unit, he said.UNI ST ADG AN1705

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Terming that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) came to power in Delhi by misleading the electorate, Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today said AAP government has not fulfilled any of its promises and has failed to deliver anything to the people. Addressing the gatherings in village Jonsh Muhaal, Othian, Kot Sidhu and Cheena Karam Singh during a Sangat Darshan programme of Rajasansi assembly segment here, the Chief Minister said it was a fact that AAP was a mirage, which attained power in Delhi by showing green pastures to people. However, he said AAP has been badly exposed before the people as it has failed to fulfill any promise made to them. Mr Badal said AAP was now squabbling to grab power in Punjab but the wise people would not fell prey to its tactics. Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) is only party committed for overall development of Punjab and prosperity of its people whereas the Opposition is interested only in plundering the state he added. The Chief Minister said it was on record that AAP was just a bunch of opportunists and defectors who have left one party or another to acquire power adding that when doors of all the parties were closed for them they had now joined AAP. He said the sole aim of these people was just to vest political power in the state. These defectors, who have been rejected by people time and again, have been frequently changing sides to suit their interests and they are least bothered about the state or its people, added Mr Badal. MORE UNI JS SW AS1620 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0293-529643.Xml
India's second Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, who succeeded Jawaharlal Nehru in June 1964, died in Tashkent soon after signing an agreement with President Ayub Khan of Pakistan, with Soviet Prime Minister Alexei Kosygin playing the mediatory role. January 11 will mark the 50th death anniversary of Shastri whose demise still remains shrouded in mystery. A few months ago, on September 26, 2015, in an interview to a TV channel, Anil Shastri, senior Congress leader and the elder surviving son of Lal Bahadur Shastri, demanded a thorough probe into the death of his illustrious father. Earlier, his younger brother Sunil wrote to union home minister to make public the files relating to the circumstances leading to the sudden death of their father. The suspicion of Shastri dying an unnatural death would seem ridiculous. His family members only need to read the accounts of the Tashkent talks by the persons who had accompanied Shastri to the capital of Uzbekistasn. A day-to-day account of the Tashkent parlays and Shastri's engagements has been recorded in great detail in books authored by C.P. Srivastava, the joint secretary to the prime minister and Shastri's information advisor Kuldeep Nayar, as also Inder Malhotra and Prem Bhatia, who were among the eminent journalists who were part of the Indian entourage to Tashkent. Shastri died in Tashkent at 1.32 a.m. (2.02 a.m. IST). According to Srivastava, on January 10 Shastri seemed to be particularly pleased with everything that had happened. At 4 p.m. he had signed the Tashkent declaration with Ayub Khan. Srivastava left Shastri at 10.30 p.m. to attend a press conference which had been convened by the Indian delegation to explain the Tashkent declaration to Indian and foreign correspondents. After this, he had just returned to his room when a call came from the prime minister's PA Jagannath Sahai, informing him that Shastri had been taken seriously ill. When he reached there, the prime minister was already dead. In order to secure a first-hand version of what had happened in the prime minister's villa after his departure at 10.30 p.m. and his passing way at 1.32 a.m. - three hours later - Srivastava had long and detailed conversation with Sahai and M.M.N. Sharma, members of his personal staff, who were both present and were attending on Shastri until the moment of his death. According to Srivastava's account, Sahai left Shastri's room at about 11.30 p.m. and then Ram Nath, the personal attendant, brought some milk which the prime minister drank. Ram Nath stayed on in Shastri's bedroom until half past midnight and left the room when the prime minister, who was already lying in bed, said that it was time for him to sleep. Sahai and Sharma were about to retire when, suddenly at 1.20 a.m., the prime minister appeared at the door of their bedroom and asked: 'Where is the doctor?' Jagannath Sahai answered: 'Babuji he is asleep right here. You may kindly return to your bedroom. I will bring the doctor immediately.' Sharma and another man got up to accompany Shastri back to his room. They both held the prime minister's arms but the prime minister walked back on his own. When about half way there, he began to cough and thereafter went on coughing incessantly. When they got to his bed, they asked the prime minister to lie down, which he did. Dr. Chugh and Sahai came running in, the doctor carrying his medicine cases. He checked the prime minister's pulse and gave him an injection. At the same time the doctor uttered the following words in deep anguish and despair: 'Babuji, aap ne mujhe mouka nahin diya.' (Babuji, you did not give me a chance). Dr Chugh continued massaging his chest and gave him artificial respiration, but nothing proved to be of any avail. Kuldip Nayar said he met Shastri for the last time on January 10 at the reception given by the Indian embassy in the prime minister's honour. Shastri told him that the return journey would be early because Ayub Khan had invited him to have tea with him at Rawalpindi. According to Nayar's autobiography Shastri had asked him to ascertain the reaction of the Indian press to the Tashkent Declaration. At the press conference earlier, he had been 'rudely' questioned on why he had agreed to hand Hajipir and Tithwal back to Pakistan. In India, leading opposition stalwarts like Ram Manohar Lohia, A.B. Vajpayee and Acharya Kriplani had strongly condemned the agreement. Nayar further states that Jagan Nath connected Shastri to his family at around 11 pm Tashkent time. Shashtri asked Kusum, his eldest and favourite daughter: 'Tum ko kaisa laga? (How did you react to it?)' She replied: `Babuji, hamein achha nahin laga (I did not like it' . He asked about amma, as Lalita Shastri was referred to in the house. `She too did not like it', was Kusum's reply. Shastri observed: 'Agar gharwalon ko achha nahin laga, to bahar wale kya kahengae? (If people in the family did not like it, what will outsiders say? The telephone call, according to Jagan Nath, appeared to have upset Shastri. He began pacing up and down in his room. For one who had suffered two heart attacks earlier, the telephone conversation, the journalists' attitude, and the walk must have been a strain. Nayar had asked Morarji Desai towards the end of October 1970 whether he really believed that Shastri did not die a natural death. Desai said: "That is all politics. I am sure there was no foul play. He died of a heart attack. I have checked with the doctor and his secretary, C.P. Srivastava, who accompanied him to Tashkent." This month, while celebrating the 50th anniversary of 1965 war, the country will recall the outstanding leadership of Shastri during the war and his slogan of Jai Jawan Jai Kisan. It is best to bury all such unnecessary controversies, forever. That will be the best tribute to a true Gandhian who never thought ill of anybody. He won't have us think ill of anybody. This is the legacy the Shastri family must preserve. (Capt. Praveen Davar is member of National Commission for Minorities. The views expressed by him are personal. He can be contacted at praveendavar@gmail.com) --Indo-Asian News Service pd/hs/vm/vm ( 1062 Words) 2016-01-09-17:21:36 (IANS)
The woman in her early 20s, who is a resident of Saflapur village in Arwal district, has sent a letter to Mukherjee in this connection.

"The rape victim has sought permission of the president for mercy killing as she was denied justice in her case despite knocking at the doors of all concerned officials," a relative said.

In her petition to President Mukherjee, the woman alleged that police were not playing their role in arresting the accused.

A medical test on the woman confirmed rape, police said.

A first information report was lodged against the accused -- said to be a defence personnel and posted outside Bihar -- at an all-woman police station in Arwal in October 2015.

As per the police complaint, the victim said she was raped by a close relative from her father's side on October 22.

But the woman said the accused has not been arrested so far and his family members have repeatedly threatened the victim's family to withdraw the case or face dire consequences.

Arwal woman police station officer in charge Kumari Babita told IANS over phone that investigation was on, but no arrest has been made.

--Indo-Asian News Service ik/pm/bg

( 235 Words)

2016-01-09-18:05:39 (IANS)
Darbhanga Superintendent of Police A.K. Satyarthi said the couple was arrested from the Darbhanga railway station, and both were interrogated by a police team.

Both were absconding after police issued an arrest warrant against them.

Munni Devi is pramukh (chief) of Bahedi block, and is known to be close to many political leaders.

According to police, the two engineers -- Brajesh Kumar and Mukesh Kumar -- were killed on December 26 by two motorcycle-riding assailants allegedly for not paying extortion money.

An official of construction company BSC-C&C Joint Venture Ltd. said a man named Mukesh Pathak, who works as a 'shooter' for gangster Santosh Jha, has been demanding levy since August from the company.

The official said Pathak called several times between December 16 and 20.

A police probe indicated the involvement of Santosh Jha's gang. He is currently lodged in Gaya Central Jail.

A Special Investigation Team (SIT) has been formed, led by Special Task Force Superintendent of Police Shivdeep Lande.

--Indo-Asian News Service ik/pm/bg

( 212 Words)

2016-01-09-18:17:35 (IANS)
Ahead of the five-match ODI series against India, starting Monday, Australian rookie pacer Joel Paris hailed the visiting batting line-up as 'world class' and said the home bowlers needs to focus on accuracy to tame it. "India's whole batting line-up is world class and they have been like that for a number of years. As for their record here, it's a new series, both teams start at 0-0. If we bowl really well and bowl in the channels we want to bowl in, we will give ourselves every opportunity of doing well. If we don't then as I have said, they have got world-class batters to take advantage of that," Paris said in a media interaction here. The 23-year-old uncapped seamer said he is pumped about making a mark in the series if he is included in the playing eleven. "More excited I guess but there is a bit of nerves obviously. If I get to play, it would be fantastic. So, little bit of nerves but I think that's a good thing. I will certainly be using that as a positive rather than a negative," Paris said.More UNI XC-TBA KU 1829 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0106-530108.Xml
Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee president Capt Amarinder Singh today condemned police brutality on the youth Congress workers in Mohali, who were marching towards the International Airport there. Capt Singh demanded suspension of police officers responsible for the brutal lathicharge of the youth Congress workers many of whom were left seriously injured, yesterday. The youth Congress workers were marching in a peaceful manner and they should not have been stopped from marching towards the airport, he said, while adding that they were only demanding naming of the airport after Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh, which is the demand of every Punjabi and every Indian. The PCC president said the unprovoked police action against the youth Congress workers also exposed Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badals double standards in saying something and doing something else. Had Mr Badal really been serious about getting the airport named after Bhagat Singh, he would not have allowed his police to rain lathis on our youth workers, he pointed out." Badal was actually colluding with Haryana to get the airport named after some RSS workers instead of Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh, he alleged. Capt Singh also issued a strict warning to all those police officers who were doing Badals bidding, telling them that one year was not a long period, after which they will be held accountable for all their unprovoked actions against the Congressmen.UNI XC RJ VN1851 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0293-530027.Xml
The Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun, has started mapping out wildlife in the Aravallis, besides ascertaining the land use and land cover in the area. It would assess the presence of major wildlife species in the Aravallis, especially leopards and other predators. Stating this here today, an official spokesman said it would help the Forest Department in identifying and conserving important habitats for future preservation of wild animals in the Aravallis. Haryana Minister for Forests, Wildlife & PWD Rao Narbir Singh yesterday launched an Eco-Restoration and Rejuvenation Project for Chakkarpur bundh in Gurgaon. Mr Singh said that the growing Gurgaon-Faridabad urban conglomerate was one of the most endangered urban landscapes. About 30 bundhs dating back to the colonial or post-Independence period existed here. Besides serving as important flood protection tools, these also helped in ground water recharge. But the city has grown around them and these structures are getting fragmented and encroached. Most of the bundhs, located right in the heart of the city and occupying prime real estate, have ceased to serve the purpose for which these had been built. Various citizen groups are demanding that these should be protected as green areas. The Chhatarpur bundh is 5.2-km-long starting from Chakarpur village to Sector 56, Gurgaon. It crosses three main east-west roads, and runs parallel to the two high-speed north-south roads in Gurgaon City. Mr Singh said the portion from Chakarpur village to Paras Hospital was being renovated by HUDA and the area from Paras Hospital to Sector 56 would be renovated by the Forest Department.UNI JS RJ CS1935 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0293-530141.Xml
Senior Superintendent of Police Batala Diljinder Singh Dhillon told that police has set up special nakas all over the district and intensified the security round the clock.

Police has taken out a flag march in various parts of the city which was led by SSP Batala Diljinder Singh Dhillon. DSP Headquarter Dilbag Singh and DSP City Jagbinder Singh also participated in the flag march. The dog squad was also pressed into the service and vehciles were searched with the metal detector.

GRP has also strengthened the security on the Amritsar Pathankot railway section. GRP Incharge Parmod Kumar said that railway section has divided in toe 4 sector where security personnel were deployed round the clock. UNI XC AE AN1949

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Nearly 200 Muslim intellectuals and religious scholars today paid homage to the martyrs of the Pathankot terror attack at Madanpura area of south Mumbai and took a vow to fight against the terrorism. The Muslims under the leadership of local MIM MLA, Waris Pathan as a mark of respect to the seven defence personnel, including one Lt Col of the NSG, who were killed in the the attack offered flower and illuminated the candle while paying the homage. On the occasion, Waris Pathan said that Muslim are against terrorism and we condemn the terrorist attack by Pakistan.UNI AAA RB CJ AJ AN2048 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0169-530395.Xml
The State's original process to adopt the more than 1,500 Common Core Standards failed to include meaningful input by educators and was not done in a sufficiently open and transparent manner.

The Common Core Standards may not be age-appropriate in early grades including K-2.

The Common Core Standards do not adequately address unique student populations, such as English Language Learners and Students with Disabilities.

The Standards are too rigid and need to be adaptable with more local school district and educator input.

There was not enough time for teachers to develop curriculum aligned to the Common Core because much of the sample curriculum resources were not available until after the Common Core Standards were already adopted in schools.

The State-provided curriculum created by the State Education Department (SED) is complicated and difficult to use.

There is widespread belief that the curriculum does not allow for local district input, lacks breadth, and is too one-size-fits-all.

There was a lack of State Education Department (SED) transparency and of parent, educator, and other stakeholder engagement in the development of the Common Core-aligned tests by the corporation hired by SED.

There are concerns that students are spending too much time preparing for and taking tests and that teachers were only "teaching to the test."

The Common Core tests do not properly account for Students with Disabilities and create unnecessary duplicative testing for English Language Learners

Today is the final meeting of the Academic Standards Review Commission ( ASRC ). The ASRC was tasked by General Assembly Senate Bill 812 with investigating Common Core and providing recommendations for replacing the controversial standards.After fifteen months of work, the ASRC is in the process of finalizing their reports and submitting them to the State Board of Education and General Assembly. Their work has been thorough and has included surveys, examination of other standards in other states, testimony from experts and testimony from parents.Today, Friday, December 18th, will be their last formal meeting as their work winds down. Having attended nearly all the meetings in person myself, I can say that this commission has has done some significant due diligence . The question now is, will the State Board of Education act on the commission's findings?One would hope so, given that this commission's findings mirror that which the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction was aware of years ago, yet failed to act on. This commission's findings also seem to be mirroring a process just now starting in New York.In particular, the NC ASRC's findings regarding the age and developmental inappropriateness of the early elementary standards, transparency and one-size-fits-all nature of the standards seem to be of concern in New York as well, according to a preliminary report issued by the New York Common Core Task Force.Their report says that New York needs to overhaul Common Core and develop "new, high quality, locally-driven New York State-specific designed standards." Sounds like New York is following North Carolina's lead. In fact, North Carolina is mentioned in the report.This report comes after the completion of a listening tour conducted across the state. At every stop of the tour, the majority of parents, teachers and students who showed up demanded the removal of Common Core For some perspective, the New York Task Force is hardly made up of 'anti-Common Core' people. Some of the bigger names in Common Core supporters are on the list, including Nancy Zimpher, Chancellor of the State University of New York. Just last year, Zimpher created a 'higher ed pro-common core coalition' calledwith the express aim of defending the standards.Also involved in this Task Force is Mary Ellen Elia, the new Education Commissioner for New York. Elia hails from Florida and had been an ardent Common Core and testing defender. Elia came to New York under unusual circumstances, as she was terminated from her post when several children died on her watch These preliminary key findings underscore what the ASRC in North Carolina has concluded as well.The State Board of Education has a chance to make real change and should be urged to take the ASRC's findings seriously. North Carolina should lead in education and can safeguard the future of our children by doing so.The State Board of Education should also bear in mind what the author of Senate Bill 812, Senator Jerry Tillman, said at the very first meeting of the ASRC The final meeting is today and will be held on the 7th floor of the Department of Education Building at 301 N. Wilmington Street in Raleigh. The meeting begins at 1pm. The public is encouraged to attend.
The cops arrested Baheri Block head of the district, Munni Devi, and her husband Sanjay Laldev from Darbhanga Junction when they were getting down from Janki Express.

It may be noted the two engineers of a private company were shot down broad day night in Darbhanga on last December 26.

According to reports, both the arrested had give shelter to criminals responsible for murder. (ANI)
A college girl who fell into the swirling Arabian Sea while clicking a selfie off a rocky beach here on Saturday and a youth who plunged into the water to save her were both untraced, police said. The Indian Coast Guard launched an aerial search to trace out the two missing people. The 18-year-old girl, identified as Tarannum Ansari, and her two friends Anjum Khan (19) and Kasuri Khan (19) slipped while clicking a selfie with their mobile phones and fell into the swirling seawaters off the rocky beach of Bandra Bandstand. On hearing their screams for help, local youth Rajesh Walunj jumped into the rising tidal waters and managed to rescue Anjum and Kasuri and later tried to save Tarannum. However, along with Tarannum, Walunj went missing in the waters and they were not found till late Saturday evening, said BMC Disaster Control. Police, fire brigade and the fishing folk from Worli were helping in the search operation in the sea waters near the Rajiv Gandhi Bandra Worli Sea Link. An Indian Coast Guard helicopter started sorties near Bandra Bandstand, opposite the Hotel Taj Lands End in the evening even as the high tide hampered both visibility and rescue operations. The three girl college students, hailing from Bainganwadi in the eastern suburb of Govandi and who study in different colleges, had come for a weekend picnic to Bandra Bandstand, a favourite with tourists, picnickers and couples, senior police inspector R. Dhavle told media persons. Dhavle suspects that Tarannum -- who was around 50 metres from the shore -- and Walunj may have been swept far away from the shore. --Indo-Asian News Service qn/pm/ ( 286 Words) 2016-01-09-21:13:35 (IANS)
Sending a tough message to Pakistan for the third time to act fast against perpetrators of the Pathankot terror attack, a senior U.S. state department official has here asked Islamabad to walk the talk on its promises to act tough against terrorists operating from its soil. He also asked Pakistan to conduct a complete and thorough probe into the terrorist attack on the Pathankot air base. The official said the US was in touch with Pakistan on this issue. The Pakistan had said they are going to investigate, he said. It should be aggressive in its counter terror operations and bring the perpetrators of the Mumbai terror attack also to justice, he said. According to officials, it would become very difficult for the U.S. Government to convince the Republican-controlled Congress to approve the sale of eight F-16s to Pakistan, if Islamabad is seen as reluctant in taking action against terrorist groups. Pakistan Defence Minister Khwaja Muhammad Asif, meanwhile, said "no terrorist organisation would be allowed to derail the dialogue process between Pakistan and India", reported Radio Pakistan. The minister said Pakistan has achieved immense success in elimination of terrorism through operation 'Zarb-e-Azb', and strict action is being taken against elements involved in terror activities. He said Pakistan strongly condemns terrorism in every form as terrorists are enemy of humanity. (ANI)
Congress leader Kulendra Daolagupu informed here that the party would meet the Governor on Monday next to claim majority and form the government in the NCHAC.

He further disclosed that three more executive members were also willing to join the party soon.

The 10 leaders who rejoined Congress today said they were lured by the BJP by false promises and alleged dictatorial attitude of Chief Executive Member Niranjan Hojai, leading them to come to Congress fold again.

Meanwhile, Hamjanan Langthasa, BJP state executive member, said since the state BJP leaders took the credit of forming the government in the NCHAC by toppling the Congress-led council, they should also take the responsibility of this recent political development in which BJP is reduced to minority. UNI XC-SG AD AJ AN2143

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The procession was received outside RKSD college here and later it reached Sanatan Dharam Mandir where the participants were honoured by SD mandir Sabha President Ravi Bhashan Garg and Dr

M S Shah. Garg and Dr Shah while speajking on this occasion appreciated the efforts made by the government to motivate the people to under stand the importance of girl child.

They also lauded the role played by media for creating social awakening on this important subject. Respresentatvies of various social organizations, officials and media persons were present on this occasion. UNI XC AJ AN2138

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Mohun Bagan defending tile began I-League campaign in style outclassing newly promoted Aizal FC 3-1 with double from Trinidad's Cornell Glen at Barasat Stadium here today.Striker Balwant Singh increased the tally for the mariners and after Pritam Kotal's own goal had put the away side on level term.Debutant Cornel Glen made his present felt on first day for the mariners scoring twice with first inside six minutes as the former Lajong forward received the ball on the left and calmly slotted it past the Aizawl custodian to score his first for the I-League champions.Ten minutes later Aizawl managed to restore parity via a Kotal own goal. The FC Pune City full back pushed the ball into his own net in an attempt to clear the ball from a Alfred Jayran shot. The scoreline was level inside 16 minutes.UNI PC CJ 2325 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0400-530555.Xml
An Assistant Sub-Inspector of police heading a raiding team was injured seriously when goons of a brick kiln owner attacked the party at Bijlichak Belwa village under Vijayeepur police station area in the district today. Police Superintendent Natasha Guriya said raiding party was attacked when it tried to nab criminals planning to commit crime. The police was attacked by the criminals with sticks in which the ASI Sishupal Singh sustained serious injuries. While the ASI has been admitted to the hospital, a massive manhunt is underway to nab the criminals, she added. The attack on the ASI has come close on the heels of gunning down of another ASI whose bullet riddled body was recovered from a place in Vaishali district this morning.UNI XC KKS AD AJ VN2244 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0108-530494.Xml
An earlier report by state-run news agency Ahram-online said three gunmen stormed the Bella Vista Hotel used by foreign tourists in Hurghada, and injured at least two foreigners.

However, previous media reports were different on the nationalities of the wounded tourists, according to Xinhua news agency.

The Ahram-online quoted Khaled Megahed, a health ministry spokesperson, as saying two Swedish tourists were injured in the attack and are being treated in a nearby hospital, while some security sources said the wounded tourists were from Denmark and Germany.

According to eyewitnesses, two of the three gunmen were killed by security forces.

The attack came hours after Egyptian affiliate of Islamic State claimed responsibility for an armed attack on a tourist hotel in Cairo.

Egypt has witnessed a growing wave of anti-security attacks in revenge for the crackdown on Islamists after the army-led ouster of President Mohamed Morsi in 2013.

--Indo-Asian News Service pku

( 192 Words)

2016-01-09-06:57:35 (IANS)
Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Friday presided over a high-level meeting to review the progress of the investigation into the Pathankot airbase attack as reiterated Islamabad's commitment to India. In the meeting which was attended by the Pakistan's top civil and military leadership, Islamabad reiterated their strong condemnation of terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. "It was noted with satisfaction that Pakistan's counter-terrorism campaign had made significant gains and that Pakistan's entire leadership and institutions were working in complete harmony to counter terrorism and extremism. The people of Pakistan have resolved that no terrorist would be allowed to use Pakistan's soil for committing terrorism anywhere in the world," the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. Discussing the Pathankot attack, they meeting condemned the terror strike and reiterated their commitment to cooperate with India to 'eradicate the menace of terrorism'. The meeting reviewed the progress made on the information provided by India and it was decided to remain in touch with New Delhi in this regard. Pakistan expressed confidence that they would remain committed to a sustained, meaningful and comprehensive dialogue process with India. Meanwhile, India is awaiting Pakistan's response on the information provided related to the Pathankot incident which is crucial to the upcoming bilateral talks scheduled for later this month. India's foreign ministry has said that Islamabad has been given actionable intelligence that those responsible for the planning and execution of the attack had come from Pakistan. (ANI)
South Carolina's Indian-American governor Nikki Haley's choice to give the Republican response to President Barack Obama's State of the Union address has fuelled speculation about her as a potential vice presidential pick. Born Nimrata "Nikki" Randhawa, to Sikh immigrant parents from India, Haley at 43 the youngest governor in the country will give the Republican response to Obama's final annual address to the Congress Tuesday night. A day later she will speak to Republican leaders gathered for the Republican National Committee's winter meeting in Charleston at a private event aboard the USS Yorktown in Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina, influential Politico reported citing sources. The following day, just before Republican presidential hopefuls gather for the debate, Haley is expected to have a private meeting with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, according to a source familiar with her plans. "All this comes on the back of a strong year that saw her prospects in the veepstakes improve as Haley signed off on legislation removing the Confederate flag from Columbia and oversaw a state battered by a tragic massacre and a massive flood," the Politico said. In August, at the RNC summer meeting in Cleveland, Haley was invited to be its luncheon headliner, the Politico noted. In recent months, Haley has fostered a close relationship with Christie as well as with two other Republican White House hopefuls: Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, it said. Over the course of the primary campaign, she has been exchanging text messages with all three candidates. Haley said Thursday she plans to address the challenges in South Carolina and the nation that she thinks are the most important in her Republican response to Obama's address. Haley declined to reveal details of what she plans to say, except to repeat that she is giving an "address" to the nation rather a "response" to Obama. "I certainly am not one to compete against the president or try to imply that I could be," Haley told reporters, according to Charlotte Observer. Haley's selection, the Observer said, is seen as part of the Republican Party's attempts to win over female voters, who will have a chance to elect the first female president if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee. But she called such talk a "waste of time". When asked about being given such an honour, she smiled and said she was humbled by it. "You have to know I always go back to that 5-year-old Indian girl that lived in Bamberg. That just wondered what was out there," Haley said. Haley was first elected South Carolina governor in 2010, becoming both the first woman and the first Indian-American to hold the top office in the state. She was re-elected in 2014. (Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in) --Indo-Asian News Service ak/tb ( 475 Words) 2016-01-09-10:57:35 (IANS)
Two Texas politicians made public details of an investigation into a terrorism suspect while it was still in progress, potentially jeopardizing the inquiry, three sources familiar with the matter said.Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick released statements on Thursday with details about the case contained in documents that were still under court seal, the sources said.Abbott was briefed on the case by the Texas Department of Public Safety, but was not informed that it was under seal, said Abbott's spokesman, John Wittman. The department, in an emailed statement, said it "does not discuss matters related to ongoing investigations."Patrick declined to comment.The statements from the two Texas Republicans concerned the arrest of Omar Faraj Saeed al-Hardan, 24, an Iraqi refugee who is accused of providing material support to Islamic State overseas.Abbott provided his statement in response to a later inquiry from a reporter, Wittman said.The US Department of Justice on Thursday released a statement about two hours after Abbott's statement was released.In his statement, Abbott urged Democratic President Barack Obama to halt the resettlement program of Syrian refugees so they can all be vetted to ensure they "do not compromise the safety of Americans and Texans."Republicans widely oppose Obama's plan to allow 10,000 Syrian refugees into the country, arguing that they pose a security risk to the United States. The Obama administration has rejected that assertion.Hardan, who appeared in court yesterday, entered the United States in November 2009 and lived in Houston, according to a court document.Other Republican politicians also seized on Hardan's refugee status, as well as another Iraqi refugee who was arrested on Thursday in Sacramento, California, and who US prosecutors publicly accused of supporting a foreign terrorist group, to renew opposition to Obama's refugee plan.At a campaign stop in Iowa on Thursday, presidential candidate and Senator Ted Cruz of Texas called for a "retroactive assessment" of refugees coming to the United States from "high risk" countries.The sources familiar with the probe said Abbott and Patrick's comments on Thursday forced federal authorities to wrap up their inquiries and rush out public statements and court papers on the case earlier than planned.Texas Democratic Party Deputy Executive Director Manny Garcia said Abbott and Patrick's utmost concern ought to be the security of Texas families, "not how to best score cheap political points."UNSEALED ON FRIDAYThe clerk of US District Court in the Southern District of Texas said Hardan's indictment was only formally unsealed on yesterday morning. Hardan was in custody at the time of Abbott's statement, but interviews of potential witnesses were still being conducted, the sources said.In California on Thursday, the US Justice Department unveiled charges against Sacramento resident Aws Mohammed Younis al-Jayab, 23, an Iraqi refugee. He was accused of traveling overseas to fight alongside terrorist organizations and lying to US authorities about it.Jayab made his initial appearance in federal court in Sacramento yesterday, before US Magistrate Carolyn Delaney, and was held without bail pending a preliminary hearing on January 22.After the hearing, public defender Benjamin Galloway said his client posed no threat to the United States. "Reports in the last 24 hours have grossly mischaracterized the nature of this case," he said.Jayab's brother, Samer Mohammed al-Jayab, 19, was also arrested in Sacramento on Thursday in an unrelated case from Wisconsin. He also appeared on Friday in court before Carolyn Delaney, on a charge of interstate transportation of goods worth more than 5,000 dollars.JAYAB, HARDAN LINKEDAws Mohammed Younis al-Jayab and Hardan communicated with each other in 2013, said sources familiar with the inquiry.The sources said Hardan is known as "Individual I" in Jayab's court complaint. It identifies Individual I as a Texas resident with whom Jayab corresponded in April and May of 2013. Jayab allegedly also mentored Individual I, giving him advice on weapons, strategy, and his apparent desire to travel to Syria to join militants there.Jayab told Individual I he got started in Iraq with a Kurdish militant group called Ansar al-Islam, led by an emir named Mullah Krikar, when he was "a little over 16 years old."In November 2013, Jayab flew to Turkey to rejoin Ansar al-Islam, according to the complaint, but quickly grew disillusioned by the violent clashes between it and other extremist groups in Syria, including Islamic State."Brother, this is the blood of Muslims shed at the hands of the State," he wrote a friend shortly before leaving to return to the United States, the complaint said.Jayab and Hardan's relatively brief time in the United States and Jayab's longstanding involvement with Ansar al-Islam distinguish them from scores of other defendants who were allegedly radicalized by militant groups in Syria, such as Islamic State, after living for years in the United States.More than 75 US residents allegedly radicalized by Muslim militants have been arrested since 2014.Hardan, who was granted legal permanent residency status in the United States in 2011, did not enter a plea when he appeared in court yesterday. He is charged with aiding Islamic State."He was prepared to take whatever action on his own behalf to assist the organization," Kenneth Magidson, US attorney for the Southern District of Texas, said after the hearing.Wearing glasses and a gray plaid shirt, Hardan told the judge that he made it through 11th grade at a school in Jordan. He said he was married and had one child.He also faces two charges about providing false information to US officials concerning his ties to Islamic State and being provided weapons training, the complaint said.REUTERS PS DS PR 0648 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0421-529157.Xml
The United Nations' special envoy for Yemen has suggested Geneva as a location for holding peace talks due to restart this month on ending conflict in the war-torn country, Saba news agency reported late on Friday.Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed made the suggestion in the Saudi Arabian capital Riyadh while meeting various members of the government of Yemen President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and political groupings leaning towards him, the pro-Hadi Saba agency reported.A coalition led by Saudi Arabia and its Sunni Muslim allies has been fighting the Shi'ite Houthi movement, which controls the capital, since March of last year.The warring sides held their latest round of peace talks in December but failed to find a political solution that would end the conflict, which has killed nearly 6,000 people. Negotiations are set to resume on Jan. 14.Former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who retains the loyalty of the armed forces despite having stepped down from office nearly four years ago after months of protests, joined forces with the Iran-allied Houthis in fighting the Saudi-led alliance trying to shore up Hadi.Saleh said today that he would not negotiate with Hadi's government, throwing into doubt the fate of the peace talks.The UN envoy is due to travel to Sanaa soon after his Riyadh visit. REUTERS AY GC1313 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0352-529400.Xml
Edward Archer, 30, was arrested soon after firing 13 shots at the police officer, Efe news agency quoted police as saying on Friday.

During his interrogation, the shooter "confessed to committing this cowardly act in the name of Islam".

According to him "the police defend laws that are contrary to the teachings of the Quran", Police Commissioner Richard Ross said.

According to the head of homicide unit, the shooter said "I follow Allah. I pledge my allegiance to the Islamic State and that's why I did what I did."

--Indo-Asian News Service py/vm

( 127 Words)

2016-01-09-14:03:39 (IANS)
Pakistan Defence Minister Khwaja Mohammad Asif today said his country would not allow any terror group to derail the peace dialogue process with India. Action was on against the forces involved in acts of terrorism, Mr Asif told Geo TV. He said Pakistan had achieved substantial success against terrorist elements under the ongoing operation 'Zarb-e-Azab'. The Minister said his country was committed to work against terrorism in all its form, as it was against humanity. Mr Asif's remarks came a day after Prime Minister Nawaz sharif reiterated Pakistan's commitment to cooperate with India on the leads provided on the Pathankot terror attack. The Foreign Secretaries of the two countries were scheduled to meet in mid-January, to work on the modalities of the comprehensive dialogue process, but India has now conveyed to Pakistan that talks depended on the action against culprits of the Pathankot terror attack.UNI XC NAZ RJ AE 1513 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0091-529569.Xml
More than 60 per cent of sorties against Islamic State in Iraq are carried out by the nation's air forces and about 40 per cent by the US-led coalition, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said today. Iraq's army last month scored its first success against Islamic State when it recaptured, with air support from the coalition, the city centre of Ramadi. Until then, it was the Iran-backed Shi'ite militias that were leading the fight against the hardline Sunni militants. Speaking at a ceremony in Baghdad broadcast live on state TV, Abadi said Iraq still needed foreign assistance for air cover, training and armament, but not for ground operations. Abadi renewed his call for Turkey to withdraw troops deployed in the region of Mosul, the largest city in northern Iraq which has been under Islamic State control since 2014. "This is a frank invitation to Turkey our neighbor to pull out its forces from Iraq," he said. "We will deploy every effort permitted by our rights and international law to make them leave," he added. Turkey deployed around 150 troops last month at the Bashiqa base, where it is training an Iraqi militia to fight Islamic State, citing heightened security risks. Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan yesterday said Turkish troops repelled an Islamic State attack on the base, killing 18 militants, adding that this incident vindicated the presence of the protection force. The Iraqi army later denied that any clash happened recently between Turkish forces and the militants.REUTERS SA AS1531 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0386-529647.Xml
Armed men shot dead a police officer and a soldier today while they were in their car in the Giza area, on the outskirts of Cairo, the state news agency said. "Immediately after the incident several moving and fixed checkpoints were deployed in the Muneeb area in order to crack down on the attackers and catch them," a security source was quoted as saying by the state news agency. Egypt is fighting a wave of Islamist militancy against security forces which started in the remote regions of the Sinai, but is increasingly spreading closer to the capital and focusing on targets previously considered safe such tourist resorts on the Red Sea. Yesterday two armed assailants attacked a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort town of Hurgada, wounding three foreign tourists. The Interior Ministry had said that one of the attackers was a student from Giza. REUTERS SA AS1536 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0386-529655.Xml
Nepal will start repairs and reconstruction next week for nearly a million homes damaged by last year's deadly earthquakes, the head of a state agency said torday, nearly nine months after the disaster left hundreds of thousands homeless. Two tremors last April and May killed 9,000 people, injured more than 22,000 and damaged or destroyed more than 900,000 houses, forcing many to brave freezing temperatures living in temporary shelters made from tarps and corrugated iron sheets. "We realise that the victims are very much in trouble. We'll start the reconstruction work from January 16," Sushil Gyewali, chief of the National Reconstruction Authority, told reporters. The agency was launched in September but political squabbling has delayed the deployment of 4.1 billion dollar pledged by foreign donors for reconstruction. UNICEF estimates that more than 200,000 families affected by the quakes are still living in temporary shelters at an altitude above 1,500 meters, where harsh winter conditions will continue through February. The delay has been blamed for more than a dozen deaths since the onset of winter, mostly of people over 65, according to domestic media reports. Gyewali said the agency would start training engineers, masons and other technicians and dispatch them to districts ravaged by Nepal's worst disaster on record. Kathmandu has said it needs to train 50,000 people and has pledged up to 2,000 dollars for each home destroyed by the quake. Gyewali added that his agency would offer up to 15,000 dollars in soft loans to each affected household for reconstruction. The disaster spurred the country's feuding politicians to set aside differences and adopt a new constitution after a seven-year delay. But the charter sparked protests by ethnic Madhesi groups, who blocked key trade crossings with India and brought on severe fuel shortages. Aid agencies say the shortages have constrained efforts to transport blankets, clothing and other essential relief materials to earthquake survivors in mountainous areas. "We are in the middle of winter now and still struggling to survive without any support," said Kanchhi Bika, an earthquake survivor, outside her tarp hut near Kathmandu. "I don't think the government really cares about us."REUTERS SA AS1539 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0386-529667.Xml
Suspected militants armed with knives wounded two Austrian tourists and a Swede at a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Hurghada on Friday evening, the interior ministry said. Security forces shot and killed at least one of the attackers after they stormed the beachside Bella Vista hotel, officials said, though there was no immediate information on the other, or on the condition of the tourists. Security sources said the attackers had arrived by sea and also carried a gun and a suicide belt. Officials said officers had tightened checks across the area and shut off roads. Norwegian Jon Torp told Norwary's VG newspaper that he heard at least 24 shots as the attackers moved around the hotel. "I was in my room when I heard someone shouting. I went out on the balcony and could see a man wave a black flag with white writings on it. He was yelling loudly," Torp told VG. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. But Egypt is fighting a wave of Islamist militancy and Islamic State, which has a black and white flag, claimed responsibility for the downing of a Russian passenger plane in October, killing all 224 people on board, most of them tourists returning home from the Red Sea resort of Sharm al-Sheikh, across the water from Hurghada. Security sources had earlier said two tourists had been injured, one from Germany and one from Denmark. But the Swedish Foreign Ministry confirmed that one Swede was injured and Expressen newspaper quoted the victim's father as saying he was "fine" in hospital. Armed men shot dead a police officer and a soldier today while they were in their car in the Giza area, on the outskirts of Cairo, the state news agency said. Islamic State said yesterday it had carried out an attack on Israeli tourists in Cairo on Thursday, in response to a call by the group's leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, to target Jews "everywhere". Security sources said those tourists were Israeli Arabs. Tourism is critical to the Egyptian economy as a source of hard currency, but has been ravaged by years of political turmoil since the revolution that ousted veteran president Hosni Mubarak in 2011.REUTERS SA AS1624 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0386-529732.Xml
Syria's government told a UN envoy today it was ready to take part in Geneva peace talks scheduled for January 25 but said it wanted to know which opposition figures would participate. Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem, who met UN envoy Staffan de Mistura in Damascus, also demanded a list of groups that would be classified as terrorist, Syrian state media reported. The Geneva talks are part of an international bid to end the five-year conflict that has killed an estimated 250,000 people. The plan for a hoped-for ceasefire envisages defining "terrorist groups" in Syria, one of the toughest issues facing diplomats. The Syrian government views all the groups fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad as terrorists, including rebels represented in a recently formed opposition council tasked with overseeing the negotiations. Syrian rebels and opposition politicians have expressed doubts over whether the peace talks will begin as planned. Earlier this week, they told de Mistura that first the Syrian government must stop bombing civilian areas, release detainees and lift blockades imposed on opposition-held areas. The outlook for the talks has been further clouded by increased tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran, which back opposing sides in the conflict. Tensions have risen since Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr. Moualem told de Mistura "Syria is ready to take part in the Geneva meetings at the proposed time, confirming the necessity of obtaining the list of terrorist organisations and the list of names of the Syrian opposition groups that will take part", state media reported. Opposition leaders are voicing misgivings over the new effort endorsed by the UN Security Council, not least because it does not address Assad's future, a point of contention between states on either side of the war. Syrian rebels said on yesterday there was global pressure on the opposition to make concessions that would prolong the war, adding to their doubts about the UN-led drive. One opposition official said the negotiating team would not be named before the Syrian government did so. Monzer Mahkous, representative of the opposition in Paris, said it was not certain the talks would go ahead as planned due to numerous unresolved issues.REUTERS SA AS1754 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0386-530007.Xml
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi today pledged to stamp out corruption this year amid criticism from the nation's highest Shi'ite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, that his government has done little to combat graft. Sistani, a reclusive octogenarian, enjoys almost mythological stature among millions of Shi'ite followers and wields authority few Iraqi politicians would openly challenge. Corruption within the officers corp was one of the reasons of the Iraqi army's failure to oppose the sweaping advance of Islamic State in 2014, according to the findings of an ad-hoc parliamentary committee. "2016 is the year of eliminating corruption, there is no such things as acceptable corruption and non-acceptable corruption," Abadi said in a speech at a ceremony to celebrate the anniversary of the Iraqi police force in Baghdad. Sistani yesterday renewed his calls to the government to reform the administration and combat corruption. "A year has lapsed and nothing has been achieved on the ground," his representative, Sheikh Ahmed al-Safi, told the worshippers in a sermon in Kerbala, a holy Shiite city south of Baghdad. REUTERS MI CS1838 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0387-530095.Xml
Rarely have I read a book about higher education that is so varied as Michael Roth's. As I'll explain, it is by turns intriguing, annoying, and challenging.Roth is the president of Wesleyan University, a liberal arts school in Connecticut. On his page , Roth declares,That certainly sounds good, but things have not been so placid and cerebral on the Wesleyan campus of late. Writing on Minding the Campus, Charlotte Allen points to recent events and concludes that at Wesleyan, it's "total PC all the time." The events center around the usual issues involving gender (fraternity houses are now a thing of the past) and free speech (convulsions over an editorial in the campus paper that dared to criticize the Black Lives Matter movement).The anti-free speech zealotry of some of the students particularly belies the idea that just because a school encourages serious intellectual and aesthetic work and has a superb faculty, its students will necessarily imbibe the excellent scholarly brew on offer.That point is pertinent to Roth's big argument, which is that America needs liberal education more than ever. He writes that the nation must "not abandon the humanistic frameworks of education in favor of narrow, technical forms of teaching intended to give quick, utilitarian results." He passionately advocates "broadly based, self-critical and yet pragmatic education" that addresses "the whole person" and enables him to "imagine a future worth striving for."All of that sounds very good. The problem is that Roth, who seems to be "preaching to members of the church of the liberal arts" (as Peter Wood writes in his review of the book in the fall 2014 issue of Academic Questions), never produces a scintilla of evidence that the sort of education he favors actually produces such wonderful results. That's the challenging part of the book and I will return to it later.What is intriguing about Beyond the University is Roth's personal foray into the realm of online education.Many higher education leaders and faculty members have been cool if not adamantly opposed to the move toward Massive Open Online Courses as a way for students to earn college credits. Roth writes, "Although at first skeptical, I have come to believe that we can use this platform to advance liberal education." He changed his mind after designing and offering a MOOC himself, a "rather traditional humanities class" entitled The Modern and the Postmodern , available on Coursera.Roth wondered how many students would want to take an online course about literature, history, and philosophy. He also wondered how much students would learn from his recorded lectures.To his great surprise, the course drew nearly 30,000 students, across the globe. Most of the students who reviewed the course gave it very high marks. Moreover, spontaneous order asserted itself, as study groups rapidly formed. Roth writes, "When I checked the site after dinner, I was astonished at the level of activity. Study groups were forming based on language and geography. There were Spanish and Portuguese groups, study units forming in Bulgaria and Russia and Boston and India."Not only were the students geographically diverse, they were also diverse in other respects. Some were retired teachers; others still in high school. Some were holding down full-time jobs. "The Modern and the Postmodern" proved to be very diverse without any effort at making it so.There's a lesson in that, but it would probably be lost on most education leaders, who are heavily invested in the idea that "diversity" only occurs if they fret over the percentages of students who are admitted based on their ancestry.What makes Roth's book annoying?It's annoying because he cannot resist taking nasty shots at some of the people who don't share his views about higher education. He misrepresents their arguments and impugns their motives.For example, Roth takes a misguided shot at Ohio University economist Richard Vedder. Vedder, as many readers know, has long argued that we have oversold higher education by luring in great numbers of students who have little interest in studying but still want credentials for employment. Vedder is not opposed to anyone studying the liberal arts, but Roth suggests to readers that he just wants higher education "to produce the equivalent of better farmers today."If Roth had bothered to look into Vedder's work, he'd have discovered that he doesn't want universities to have "narrowly utilitarian" missions. All he wants is to stop the waste of time and money that comes from the credential mania brought about by government educational subsidies.Even worse is the way Roth treats the National Association of Scholars (NAS). He acknowledges that NAS is not in the "make college utilitarian" camp, but says, "Rather than promoting the ever-expanding circle of the liberal arts...NAS would have us return to a common core of Western Civilization-by which they seem to mean European and American preindustrial values. They also seem to be very comfortable with the kinds of inequality that were characteristic of those societies."That deserves the academic equivalent of an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. Instead of explaining why his view of liberal education is better than that of NAS, Roth resorts to a quick smear. Liberal education should teach the lesson of being intellectually charitable toward opponents. Apparently he has forgotten it.That brings me back to the challenging part of the book-Roth's case for liberal education."A liberal education," he states, "should help us develop the intellectual and moral capacities to imagine a future that is worth striving for, and enhance our ability to create the tools for its realization." Sounds wonderful. Shouldn't we want almost everyone to have such education?And conversely, shouldn't we feel bad if we leave students behind with merely occupational training?The problem I have with Roth's claim-and he has a great deal of company here-is that it is only a claim. Nothing in the book demonstrates that his ideal of liberal education or any other actually transforms students from humdrum worker bees into deep, far-seeing thinkers.I am not saying that liberal education doesn't work and never has uplifting results, but questioning the assumption that it always or even frequently does. Maybe it's a conceit of intellectuals that the kind of education they enjoyed must be good across the board-that studying Homer necessarily makes you a much better human being than studying home economics does.Roth writes as if it were a settled matter that the kind of "pragmatic" liberal education he favors is superior to both the sort of Western liberal education favored by the NAS, and to college education that's mostly occupational training. Missing from the book is any reason to believe that.Many people whose college degrees are of the occupational sort that Roth looks down upon nevertheless become upstanding citizens who are "lifelong learners." Quite probably, some of the students who signed up for and liked Roth's MOOC are such individuals.Conversely, some who earned degrees at schools with shining liberal education curricula turn into the worst sort of authoritarian planners. The aspect of liberal education that Roth likes so much-imagining a better future-often leads people to believe that their particular imagining should be made obligatory for everyone else. Roth is blind to the possibility that his variety of liberal education might not always be best.In the end, I agree with Roth that colleges and universities shouldn't be turned into job training centers, a function they often don't perform well, at huge cost. But it would be just as bad if they all become like Wesleyan. The only way to find the right mix is for government to step aside and let all the various visions of education compete evenly for students and supporters.
Foreign Secretary-level talks are expected to be held on January 15, as India and Pakistan resume the comprehensive bilateral dialogue.The meeting between Indian Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar and his Pakistani counterpart Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry is scheduled to be held in Islamabad, Sartaj Aziz, Advisor to the Pakistan Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs, told the National Assembly yesterday. According to The Nation, the announcement in Pakistan's Parliament came after Islamabad launched investigations into the Pathankot airbase attack, ''despite finding the evidence insufficient''. Earlier, India linked the Foreign Secretary-level talks to Pakistan's action against militants after five terrorists from across the border had attempted to sneak into the Pathankot air base on January 2. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif held back-to-back meetings, which were attended by key Ministers, intelligence chiefs and Army chief Raheel Sharif. The Pak Advisor in a written reply during the Question Hour said that Foreign Secretaries would discuss the modalities of comprehensive bilateral dialogues and its time-frame during the meeting in Islamabad this month. Quoting from the joint statement issued during the visit of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to Pakistan, he said the comprehensive dialogue would include all outstanding issues, including the Kashmir issue. The derailed talks had got revived after Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a surprise stopover at Lahore on December 25 to greet Mr Sharif on his birthday, raising hopes for improvement in Indo-Pak ties. However, the attack on Pathankot airbase had damped hopes for a breakthrough until Pakistan acted against the mastermind of the recent attack. The Assembly was told that the Foreign Affairs Ministry would brief the National Assembly's standing committee on foreign affairs about Saudi Arab-Iran stand-off and Secretary-level talks between Pakistan and India on Tuesday.UNI XC SD RJ AE 1905 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0005-530179.Xml
Advisor to the Pakistan Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz told the National Assembly that the Foreign Secretary-level would be held on January 15, whereas any clarity on whether talks were on or not was yet to come from India.In fact, India has told Pakistan that Foreign Secretaries' meeting would depend on the action taken on the culprits of Pathankot terror attack. The meeting between Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar and his Pakistani counterpart Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry is otherwise scheduled to be held in Islamabad next week. According to The Nation, the announcement in Pakistan's Parliament came after Islamabad launched investigations into the Pathankot airbase attack, ''despite finding the evidence insufficient''. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has in the last two days, held back-to-back meetings, which were attended by key Ministers, intelligence chiefs and Army chief Raheel Sharif. The Pak Advisor in a written reply during the Question Hour, said that Foreign Secretaries would discuss the modalities of comprehensive bilateral dialogues and its timeframe during the meeting in Islamabad this month. Quoting from the joint statement issued during the visit of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to Pakistan, he said the comprehensive dialogue would include all outstanding issues, including the Kashmir issue. The derailed talks had got revived after Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a surprise stopover at Lahore on December 25 to greet Mr Sharif on his birthday, raising hopes for improvement in Indo-Pak ties. However, the attack on Pathankot airbase had dampened hopes for a breakthrough until Pakistan acted against the mastermind of the recent attack. The Assembly was told that the Foreign Affairs Ministry would brief the National Assembly's standing committee on foreign affairs about Saudi Arab-Iran stand-off and the Secretary-level talks between Pakistan and India on Tuesday.UNI SAD/NAZ RJ AJ 2002 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0091-530361.Xml
A fire briefly broke out at Kosovo's government headquarters today after opposition protesters threw petrol bombs at the building in protest over an accord with former master Serbia, a Reuters reporter said. Firefighters quickly doused the flames as police drove back several thousand demonstrators who had gathered to denounce a deal brokered by the European Union to give Kosovo's ethnic Serb minority greater local powers and the possibility of financing from Belgrade. Kosovo, which is majority Albanian, declared independence from Serbia with the backing of the West in 2008, almost a decade after NATO air strikes drove out Serbian security forces accused of killing and expelling ethnic Albanian civilians during a counter-insurgency war.REUTERS MI AN2042 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0387-530444.Xml
Yemen's government has reversed a decision to expel a UN human rights envoy after the original announcement caused an unnecessary "fuss", according to a letter from the Yemeni mission to the United Nations. The foreign ministry had declared the representative of the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), George Abu al-Zulof, persona non grata on Thursday over what it called unfair statements. "Because of the fuss created around the matter and caused by media reports ... the Yemeni government has decided to give more time to review the relationship with the OHCHR, in order to uphold the values of human rights," said the letter from Yemen's UN mission to Ban, seen by Reuters today. "For more cooperation between the government of Yemen and all organs and bodies of the United Nations, the government has decided to maintain the status quo of the country representative of the OHCHR representative in Yemen," it said. The letter was dated yesterday. A senior Yemeni official told Reuters on condition of anonymity that the reversal came in response to an appeal from Ban to Yemen's government. REUTERS MI VN2100 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0387-530458.Xml
Niger's constitutional court today approved 15 candidates for a presidential vote next month, including key opponent Hama Amadou, who was imprisoned two months ago upon return from a year long exile. The constitutional court's ruling is likely to increase pressure on Niger's government to free Amadou, seen as one of three leading contenders in the Feburary 21 battle for leadership of the impoverished, uranium-producing West African country. Niger authorities arrested Amadou, a former speaker of the national assembly, in November in connection with a probe into a ring of elites accused of obtaining newborns from "baby factories" in neighbouring Nigeria. Amadou says the charges are politically motivated amid what President Mahamadou Issoufou's opponents call a broader wave of repression ahead of the vote. "We welcome this decision which proves that our county is making progress consolidating the rule of law, thereby reinforcing democracy," said Malam Mahamane Sani, spokesman for Amadou's Moden party. He added that judicial authorities are due to rule on Amadou's appeal for a provisional release on January 11. Issoufou and former prime minister Seyni Oumarou, the candidate of the main opposition party, were also authorised to stand in the February vote. Legislative elections are due the same day. Issoufou, a key Western ally in the fight against Islamist extremism in the fragile Sahara region, is seen as the overall favourite to win next month. In the last election in 2011, Amadou placed third in the first round and then threw his support behind Issoufou in the second to help him win the presidency, although rifts emerged between them after his inauguration. Oumarou placed second. Some recent sources of tensions between the government and opposition appear to have been resolved, raising optimism that Niger will follow neighbours Burkina Faso and Nigeria which held peaceful elections last year. Niger completed changes to its electoral register recommended by the International Organisation of the Francophonie (OIF), the body said on Thursday. REUTERS MI VN2101 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0387-530464.Xml
Kolkata: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced that the Bengal Global Business Summit has attracted investment proposals worth at least Rs.2,50,104, crore ($37 billion).

Addressing industrialists on the concluding day of BGBS, Banerjee said the manufacturing sector has drawn proposals valued at Rs.1,60,958 crore.

Banerjee said the proposals received covered a wide range of sectors like mining, textile, power, IT and telecom, urban development, housing, tourism, health transport and education.

Very restrictively speaking, whatever we counted the investment proposals are not less than 2,50,104 crores, she said.
Bieganski is available for purchase on Amazon here . The introduction is below. Also, you can see a video presentation on Bieganski ...
We aim to publish articles by journalists or professionals that are usually not available in the mass media.
Ive been gone a while from the blogging scene. Some of my more regular readers no doubt noticed but did not hassle me about it. Thank you for that. Sinc...

6 years ago
Niamey (AFP) - Niger's constitutional court has approved 15 candidates for next month's presidential election, the interior ministry announced Saturday, including imprisoned opposition figure Hama Amadou.

Incumbent Mahamadou Issoufou, elected in 2011, is seeking another term and will also be up against chief opposition leader Seini Oumarou, former president Mahamane Ousmane and ex-planning minister Amadou Boubacar Cisse, among others.

At the start of the week the interior ministry put forward 16 names of potential candidates to contest the February 21 election.

Of these only Abdoul-Karim Bakasso, the leader of a minor party, was deemed "ineligible" by the court, Interior Minister Hassoumi Massaoudou told reporters.

His bid was rejected due to "the lack of a medical certificate," said opposition spokesman Ousseini Salatou.

Amadou, seen as one of Issoufou's strongest opponents, has been in prison since November 14, 2015 over allegations he was involved in baby trafficking.

The former prime minister and national assembly president fled the county in August 2014 to escape charges in the matter but was arrested after he returned last November.

Amadou has proclaimed his innocence and considers the legal process against him to be "political".

A legal decision on his latest demand to be freed provisionally is expected Monday.

Former agriculture minister Abdou Labo, who was also implicated in the affair and is currently out on bail, is also on the list of approved presidential candidates.

- 'Deteriorating political climate' -

The political climate in the arid Sahel state has been tense since Amadou joined the opposition in 2013.

The election commission late last month announced that the first round of voting would be held on February 21, followed by a run-off on March 20 if necessary.

The opposition has rejected the timeline, saying there had been no consensus on the dates.

The government on Saturday banned a march that had been planned by the opposition the following day to rally against what it called the "arbitrary arrests" of some of its supporters and to call for "transparent elections".

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According to opposition spokesman Salatou, the authorities said the march posed "a risk to public order".

Niger's influential tribal chiefs on Friday expressed their concern at the "deteriorating political climate".

Last month President Issoufou said the government had foiled a coup plot, a claim rubbished by presidential hopeful Boubacar Cisse.

Politicking aside, whoever wins the race for the top job will have to tackle the pressing issue of Boko Haram attacks from neighbouring Nigeria.

Boko Haram, which has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, has stepped up attacks on areas of Niger, Chad and Cameroon that border Nigeria while also continuing a devastating campaign of suicide and shooting attacks on home soil.

Electoral campaigning will get under way in Niger on January 30 for both presidential and legislative ballots.
Akin to floating hotels, river cruises offer one of the most leisurely ways to travel. As you weave through intimate waterways punctuated by UNESCO World Heritage Sites, castles, storied palaces and majestic landscapes, you can enjoy relaxed exploration and celebrated surroundings. Beyond the unhurried pace, river cruising offers one of the most immersive ways to experience new destinations. Every port offers local guides to lead you to lesser-visited destinations that many mainstream ships can't reach. And not only are the shore excursions authentic and relaxed, so are the onboard environments.

With fewer guests and spacious staterooms, riverboats offer more personalized experiences than traditional ocean liners. Plus, the all-inclusive price of your cruise factors in lodging, gratuity, onboard dining, shore excursions and more, eliminating extra fees. So, pack your bags and embark on one of these memorable sailings in 2016.

Fascinating Vietnam, Cambodia & the Mekong River

Slightly smaller than the Yangtze River but just as historically important, the Mekong River runs through some of Southeast Asia's most famous countries, like Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar and Vietnam. As you sail along Avalon Waterways' Avalon Siem Reap ship, you can watch daily life unfold as you cruise by with enriching port excursions to local markets, fishing tours and silk factory visits. Launched in 2015, the new ship accommodates only 36 passengers, allowing for a more intimate and customized onboard experience. The eight-day itinerary starts in Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh City and ends in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Waterways of the Tsars

A cruise on Russia's Svir and Volga rivers on a 13-day sailing aboard Viking River Cruises' Akun, Ingvar or Truvor ships, will take you to Moscow and St. Petersburg, allowing you to take in the fascinating sights of the Kremlin, St. Petersburg and opulent palaces and churches. Plus, during your voyage, you can learn about Russia's rich heritage and unique political culture as you sail to storied destinations in comfort. Best of all, while you're unwinding onboard, you'll have access to innovative features, like free Wi-Fi, flat-panel TVs and, in select staterooms, floor-to-ceiling glass doors.

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Danube Dreams

The Danube, Europe's second-largest river, provides more than just easy cruising -- it allows for stops at some of Europe's most famous ports, like Budapest, Munich, Prague and Vienna. Ships navigate to scenic old villages, busy cities and medieval fortresses, allowing for incredible scenery and immersive activities. And aboard AmaPanorama on AmaWaterways' 10-day eastbound Danube Dreams River Cruise itinerary from Prague to Budapest, you can enjoy new ship features, like suites appointed with two decks and wall-to-wall panoramic views. What's more, during your trip, you can enjoy tasting local wines from Austria's Wachau Valley and explore top sights like Vienna's iconic Opera House.

Amazon Adventure

The incredible biodiversity found along the Amazon River continues to make it one of the most popular routes for river cruise vacations. As you weave through the world's second-longest river, you'll be met with over a third of the world's animal species, including exotic birds, monkeys, dolphins and manatees. Plus, you'll catch sight of stunning trees and plant life, as well as quiet and quaint fishing villages. And on Abercrombie & Kent's nine-day Amazon Adventure itinerary, which is limited to only 18 guests, cruisers can enjoy an intimate onboard atmosphere, complete with well-appointed cabins that boast balconies and, in some staterooms, wrap-around panoramic windows.

The Golden Land

Touted as the longest river in Myanmar, the Irrawaddy River is the crown jewel of Myanmar's waterways. Forming in the Himalaya Glaciers, this scenic river, which is dotted with breathtaking natural landscapes, ancient temples and local seaside villages, also serves as a major commercial transport route. Connecting Myanmar's most famous cities of Mandalay and Yangon, this passage has become increasingly popular. And on Pandow River Cruises' 14-day Golden Land itinerary from Rangoon to Mandalay, guests have access to personalized service thanks to each ship's 2-to-1 passenger-to-crew ratio. Plus, the new suites on the Mekong Pandaw and Pandaw II ships offer spacious balconies, in-room espresso machines and large lounge areas.

The Rhine, Swiss Alps and Amsterdam

Originating in the breathtaking Swiss Alps and winding through Germany's fairytale villages and historic castles to Amsterdam's legendary canals, the Rhine River is one of the most picturesque rivers on the planet. Indulge in a springtime cruise to see thousands of bright tulips decorating the banks or enjoy excursions to Austrian Christmas markets during the winter. On Tauck River Cruises' 10-day southbound itinerary, which has a capacity of 130 guests and offers upscale accommodations appointed with marble floors and real hardwood, you'll travel in comfort as you take in art, architecture and storybook settings.

European Jewels

Glide through the continent's most compelling destinations, with imposing medieval castles, lush riverbank vineyards and ancient towns on three of the largest rivers: The Rhine, the Main and the Danube. From the Netherlands and Germany to France, Luxembourg and Hungary, the ever-changing scenery of Europe's mighty rivers will captivate you. And on Uniworld's 15-day sailing from Budapest to Amsterdam on the opulent Uniworld Maria Theresa, the gilded mirrors, jacquard printed wallpaper, antique vases and fine art are just as impressive as the picturesque landscapes.
On Tuesday, ABC Family becomes Freeform.

With 62 hours and counting, president Tom Ascheim took the stage at the Television Critics Association and explained why he believed the move was necessary. In doing so, he also acknowledged that the decision to move away from a differentiated, successful brand name had many in the industry scratching their heads.

"Often when people in the television world decide to change their name, they're solving a big business problem," he admitted. "Ratings are down, money stinks, they need to recruit an entirely different audience." But his younger-skewing network was suffering from none of those things. Instead, ABC Family is coming off its best financial year on record and has remained No. 1 in its core women 18-49 demographic for the second consecutive year.

"So, why mess with a good thing?" he asked, and then answered: "We, like any business, need to grow, and growth only comes from two places: You make your core customers happy and you get new customers." What he found in the extensive research that had been done over the past year is that his core viewers are, indeed, very happy; but that the other two-thirds who don't watch the network have a starkly different sense of what ABC Family is about. The latter, he revealed, over-index in only two attributes: "family-friendly" and "wholesome."

Read more: ABC Family Changing Its Name to Freeform

"We're delighted to be family-friendly and wholesome, but it's kind of specific and it's not particularly representative of who we are," he said of a network best known for juggernaut Pretty Little Liars. "And any great brand wants to create harmony between your audience, the content and your name, so we needed to do something [to close] this gap in perception between users and nonusers." Freeform, per the network's research, could do that.

Ascheim believes the new name not only elicits the moment of transition in the medium and a sense of "creativity" and "spontaneity" but also evokes that younger 14 to 34-year-old audience, whom he's dubbed "becomers." He added, "becomers really are in formation, kind of freely, so it seemed to speak to our target in a really specific, wonderful way."

Read more: ABC Family Plots Big Scripted Music Push as Focus Shifts to "Becomers"

Nearly 3,000 other names were considered in that process, with a dozen finalists tested before landing on Freeform. Among those previously considered: ABC Freeform and Disney Freeform, but ultimately Ascheim and his team decided that the network would benefit from detaching itself from those "hallowed brands" in this incarnation. "For our young audience, it's important for them to feel like they've discovered something on their own," he explained. "It's the essential quality of being young."
(Reuters) - A United flight en route to Denver from Anchorage, Alaska, was diverted on Saturday to Vancouver where a suspect was arrested due to "security concerns," authorities said.

United Air Lines Flight 1104 landed safely at about 4:30 a.m. local time in the western Canadian city, where it was met by law enforcement authorities, the airline said. There were 131 passengers and six crew members aboard the Boeing 737.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Richmond, British Columbia, said on Twitter that a suspect was taken into custody and operations at Vancouver International Airport were not affected by the incident.

Police said no other information was immediately available.

CNN reported that a "threatening message" was found on the aircraft.

(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Milwaukee and Amran Abocar in Toronto; Editing by Meredith Mazzilli)
Trafficking in children is a global problem affecting large numbers of children. Some estimates have as many as 1.2 million children being trafficked every year. There is a demand for trafficked children as cheap labour or for sexual exploitation. Children and their families are often unaware of the dangers of trafficking, believing that better employment and lives lie in other countries.
More than 1 million passengers boarded and disembarked planes at Bozeman Yellowstone International in 2015, the first year a Montana airport has breached seven figures, the airport announced Friday.

The final tally of 1,021,155 passengers is a 5.6 percent jump from 2014 for Bozeman, which surpassed Billings Logan International Airport as the states largest three years ago.

Billings had a good year also, tallying 869,845 passengers for 2015, about a 1.5 percent increase from the previous year, according to preliminary numbers released by airport director Kevin Ploehn.

Ploehn added that freight planes, a big chunk of business at the city-owned airport, are about 5 percent up leaving Billings and about 15 percent up coming into town.

Last year in Bozeman, Alaska Airlines expanded its seasonal nonstop service to Portland, Ore.; Delta Air Lines added nonstop service to Seattle and Tacoma; and United Airlines and Delta both increased mainline-size aircraft to Chicago, Denver and Minneapolis/St. Paul, Bozeman airport officials said in a news release.

Total flights totaled 80,559 in Bozeman for 2015, down 0.2 percent from the previous year.

Bozeman is now the eighth-busiest airport in the Northwest Region, which includes Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington.

Bozeman Yellowstone has increased business in recent years by subsidizing flights through guarantees. In 2012, the airport put up $1.6 million for a direct United Airlines weekend flight to Newark, N.J. The guarantee money was raised from Gallatin County tourism groups and businesses, then leveraged to gain a $950,000 federal air service grant for small communities.

Bozeman airport officials have said the guarantee helped them gain a direct flight to La Guardia International Airport in New York.

That flight now pays for itself and will likely remain without further subsidy, airport officials said in August.

Tourism and airport officials in Billings are exploring similar deals. Ploehn and Billings Chamber of Commerce President John Brewer traveled to Dallas and Atlanta last year to meet with representatives from American Airlines and Delta, respectively.
(Reuters) - Apple Inc has registered domain names related to automobiles, adding to speculation about the company's plans to develop an automobile. The iPhone maker registered the domain names, which include apple.car, apple.cars and apple.auto in December, according to domain information provider Who.is. MacRumors had first reported the news on Friday, but said the domain names could be related to Apple's CarPlay, which lets drivers access contacts on their iPhones, make calls or listen to voicemails without taking their hands off the steering wheel. While never openly acknowledging plans to build a car, Apple has been aggressive in recruiting auto experts from companies such as Ford or Mercedes-Benz. Car technology has become a prime area of interest for Silicon Valley companies including Google Inc, which has built a prototype self-driving car. (Reporting by Anya George Tharakan in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)
By Jorge Otaola and Richard Lough BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - In a huge embarrassment for President Mauricio Macri, Argentina's federal police chief said a manhunt was still on for two of the South American country's most notorious criminals hours after the government celebrated their capture. Earlier, the prosecutor's office released a statement confirming the detention of three fugitives convicted of drug gang-related killings who escaped from prison on Dec. 27. Macri congratulated the security forces on his official Twitter account. But as one of the three men, Martin Lanatta, was transferred under armed guard from a local police station in the farming province of Santa Fe, north of the capital Buenos Aires, confusion intensified over the whereabouts of his brother Cristian and a third man, Victor Schillaci. "We're still looking for the other fugitives," acknowledged Roman Di Santo, head of the Argentine Federal Police force. The 13-day search operation for the men has gripped the Argentine nation and the revelation that two remain on the run will deliver a humiliating blow to Macri. Their daring escape came two weeks after Macri took office. It raised concerns of outside help and a blame game erupted between Macri and officials in the government of former President Cristina Fernandez. The chaotic events on Saturday will likely raise further suspicions among Argentines that narco gangs played a hand in the jail break and ensuing game of cat-and-mouse with hundreds of security agents hunting them down. The trio were convicted over the 2008 killing of three businessmen in the pharmaceutical industry allegedly linked to an ephedrine trafficking gang in a high-profile case dubbed "The triple murder." Ephedrine is used for the production of methamphetamine. In the afternoon, Macri had applauded the security forces for recapturing the men and promised to fight the drug gangs that use Argentina as a transit point for smuggling South American drugs to Europe and the Americas. "We have a lot more work to do," Macri wrote on his official Twitter account. The high-drama operation has focused attention on the growing muscle of drug gangs in Argentina and raised questions over their political connections. "Drug trafficking has grown in the last decade like never before in our country because of the inaction or complicity of the last government," Macri said this week, vowing to take on the traffickers. In August, two months before the presidential election, Martin Lanatta alleged Fernandez's cabinet chief, Anibal Fernandez, was involved in the ephedrine trade and had ordered the triple murder. Anibal Fernandez has rigorously denied the accusation and prosecutors have not investigated the claim. The then-ruling party said the allegation was designed to hurt its presidential candidates and derail Anibal Fernandez's bid to become governor of Buenos Aires province. (Editing by Jeremy Gaunt and Meredith Mazzilli)
Buenos Aires (AFP) - Argentine police fired rubber bullets and tear gas Friday at protesting municipal workers who say they were sacked by the conservative party that took power in elections late last year.

The violence unfolded outside the city hall in La Plata, 60 kilometers (40 miles) south of the capital Buenos Aires.

A pro-business coalition called Cambiemos took power after the October election -- and later also ushered in Mauricio Macri as Argentina's new president.

In La Plata, the new Cambiemos mayor, Julio Garro, announced plans to "review" the labor contracts of some 4,500 municipal workers.

Most were on fixed-term contracts running through December 31. City hall extended them for three months pending a review. But now the workers say they are barred from going to work and have effectively been fired.

On Friday, town hall workers marched on the building and police protecting it opened fire with rubber bullets and tear gas, TV footage showed.

"They cracked down on us like back in the dark days," said protester Patricio Borda, referring to the country's violent military juntas in the 1970s and '80s.

"What the police did was irrational," Alejandra Gonzalez, one of the sacked workers, told local radio.

"They did not fire in the air, they shot to hurt us."

Macri's government has said it will look into the status of some 24,000 civil servants because of fears they do not actually hold jobs at all but rather just collect a salary.

Garro, writing on Twitter, blamed the demonstrations on opposition activists aligned with the previous president, leftist Cristina Kirchner, and said protesters had lobbed stones at police.

I'm sorry it happened today. A group of 200 individuals showed up outside city hall with clear political intentions," he said.
Benghazi (Libya) (AFP) - Artillery fire in Libya's second city Benghazi on Saturday hit a key power station that provides electricity to much of the country's east, a security official and an engineer said.

Mussa Suleimani, an engineer at the power station, said five of the six transformers at the facility were knocked out after it was struck on Friday evening and twice on Saturday.

He said that it was likely that power cuts which have plagued the eastern city, cradle of the 2011 uprising that toppled dictator Moamer Kadhafi, would worsen across the region.

"It is the fifth time in two months that the power station... has been hit," said Suleimani.

As a result, he said, outages of up to eight hours were to be expected in the area between Benghazi and the town of Musaed some 500 kilometres (300 miles) farther east near the border with Egypt.

"Specialised foreign firms will be needed to repair the transformers that have been damaged, but that will be difficult because of the bad security situation," he added.

A security official blamed "terrorists" for the attack.

"Howitzers were used in the attacks," said Captain Adnan al-Baba, a spokesman for a Libyan anti-terrorism squad.

He said for such guns to hit with precision "someone on the inside must supply the terrorists" with specific coordinates otherwise "it is impossible to target the power station".

Shelling of the nearby Tawergha camp for displaced killed a woman and wounded nine other people including a child, said Fadia al-Barghathi of the Al-Jalla hospital in Benghazi.

Pro-government forces have fought an array of armed factions, notably Islamists, for control of Libya's second city in the past 18 months.

Libya descended into chaos after the October 2011 ouster and killing of Kadhafi, with two governments vying for power and armed groups battling over its vast energy resources.
The Rev. David Graham feared that a mob was coming to burn down his church. The community meeting he had organized to protest the killing of a young Black boy by a policeman had stirred up trouble. So Graham stood before his congregation with a loaded gun and a Bible, told the women and children to get out of harms way, and prepared, alongside 21 armed men, to fight.

In the end, nothing came of it, but the reverends young daughter, Shirley, about age 6, was marked forever by the scene and others like it in the American South at the turn of the last century. As a result, she devoted her life to fighting racism and oppression as a writer and an activist. Unlike the contributions of her second husband, famed civil rights activist W.E.B. Du Bois, Graham Du Bois have largely been forgotten, but Komozi Woodard, a historian at Sarah Lawrence College, insists they were very much a power couple and that Graham Du Bois was Du Bois equal in many ways.

Du Bois couldnt have had that last important phase of his life without the partnership he had with Shirley [Graham Du Bois]. Komozi Woodard, Sarah Lawrence College

Born in Indiana in 1896, Graham achieved a level of accomplishment rare for women of the era, long before she married Du Bois, author of The Souls of Black Folk and father of Pan-Africanism. In 1932, she penned Tom-Tom, the first all-Black opera performed professionally in the U.S., which was seen by an estimated 25,000 people. She also authored biographical texts about Black historical figures like the inventor George Washington Carver and the poet Phillis Wheatley  all while raising two sons as a divorced single mother. In the 1940s, as the NAACPs membership increased tenfold, the 5-foot-2 powerhouse worked tirelessly as an assistant field director in New York City.

Du Bois was in his early 80s when he and Graham married in 1951, and she had a substantial influence on his later career. Du Bois couldnt have had that last important phase of his life without the partnership he had with Shirley, Woodard says. Before their marriage, Du Bois was in a sparring match with communists, says Gerald Horne, a historian at the University of Houston, but that quickly changed as he came to see his wifes logic. While older activists fought solely against racial discrimination, young lions like Shirley said no, economics is also affecting us and supported the Communist Party, Woodard adds.

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When Du Bois was arraigned as a suspected communist during the Red Scare, Graham Du Bois rallied to her husbands defense by giving speeches nationwide. She didnt wave a gun or a Bible, but she held sway over audiences, and Du Bois was eventually cleared. In 1961, the couple left the U.S. for Ghana because of anti-communist and anti-Black extremism, a move, Woodard says, that was engineered by Graham Du Bois, who was forced to leave behind her post as founding editor of the Black magazine Freedomways.

W.E.B. Du Bois died in 1963, and the much younger Graham Du Bois continued supporting radical causes. She was the founding director of Ghana Television, met with government officials in China and introduced Malcolm X to Ghanaian President Kwame Nkrumah. She embraced Malcolm X like a son and was instrumental in his success, Woodard says, by providing him with support and contacts. She may have been a controversial figure in her time, but its puzzling why Graham Du Bois never earned a bigger entry in history books. Perhaps because, for one, she could be too traditional, Horne says, referring to her role as a mother to Black activists like Malcolm X and to her use of language that often played into gender stereotypes. Also, W.E.B. overshadowed his wife, both in reputation and with privilege. The economic security that she got from marrying Du Bois helped stabilize her life, Woodard notes, and perhaps also diminished her legacy.



When Malcolm X was assassinated in 1965, Graham Du Bois took to Ghanaian airwaves to deliver a speech, titled The Beginning, Not the End, to help shape his legacy. She deemed Malcolm X the most promising and effective leader of American Negroes in this century, a stance that was not unanimously shared at the time.



Graham Du Bois died in China in 1977, an event deemed undeserving of a New York Times obituary, in contrast to her late husband, and no one took to the airwaves to hail her accomplishments. After all, most of the historical names revered as seminal Black activists and artists are male. But, as we know, thats only half the story.

Related Articles
BURNS, Ore.  Hes coming, a man on horseback shouted, waving a large American flag against the glistening backdrop of the snow-covered Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.



He was Ammon Bundy, the leader of a group of armed protesters who have occupied this federal refuge in southeastern Oregon for a week. Flanked by supporters, including his brother Ryan and spokesman LaVoy Finicum, Bundy made his way up the hill Friday to tell a swarm of reporters that he and his fellow occupiers were not planning to heed the sheriffs recent offer of safe retreat from the town, at least not yet.

We plan on staying, Bundy said. Im not afraid to go out of state. I dont need an escort.

The longer they stay  the occupation is in day eight  the more local people have gone to the refuge to try to understand the motivation of these men who traveled across three states to take over the nature reserve. And they seem to be leaving persuaded that the Bundy crusade is finally shining a light on an issue theyd like the nation to understand.

Yahoo News spent time with several locals visiting the refuge on Thursday and Friday.

Ammon Bundy, one of the sons of rancher Cliven Bundy, as he speaks at a news conference. (Caitlin Dickson/Yahoo News)

On Thursday, Joe and Becky Kingen, ranchers from Fields, about 112 miles south of Burns, paid a visit with their kids, Monte, 11, and 7-year-old Riata. Monte, an enterprising sixth-grade journalist, was seeking an interview with the Bundys  and wound up getting more access than many of the national news outlets whose reporters have been staking out the refuge for days.

Interviewing Ryan Bundy, young Monte Kingen asked, What do you hope to accomplish, to which Bundy replied, The best-case scenario, we hope to make it where you guys can ranch without the intrusion of the federal government. We want to be able to see you guys be free.

His parents also came with a purpose.

Wed like to thank them for what theyre doing here, Becky Kingen told Yahoo News, as snow began to fall outside the occupied U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service headquarters. Kingen said she and her family appreciate the effort to raise awareness about what the Bundys and others argue is an overreach of federal control of public lands.

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The Kingen Family. (Caitlin Dickson/Yahoo News)







Kingen said she hopes the outcome of the occupation is that the ranchers can take a hold of more of what happens with the land thats used around here.



Later that evening, when Ammon Bundy returned to the refuge following a brief meeting with Harney County Sheriff David Ward, he was greeted by several local ranchers eating pizza around a campfire. Among them was Rich Sampson, whose property is adjacent to the wildlife refuge.



Sampson said he and his neighbors were initially concerned about what was happening in their own backyard, but were put at ease once they saw the situation for themselves.



We walked down that road, not knowing what we were walking into and spoke to these people, said Sampson, sporting a shearling denim jacket and the kind of tan that comes from years of working outside. We went home and told everybody in our community, Were not frightened. Theyre cowboys. Theyre one of us.

While Ammon Bundy has reportedly owned a variety of small businesses in Arizona, where he lives, he and brother Ryan are two of notorious Nevada rancher Cliven Bundys 14 children. Bundy gained national headlines back in 2014 when he and a militia of his own held an armed standoff against the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, whod been sent to round up Bundys cattle in exchange for the million dollars of debt hed accumulated by failing to pay federal grazing fees for the past two decades.

Rich Sampson said he and his neighbors were initially concerned about what was happening in their own backyard. (Caitlin Dickson/Yahoo News)







Sampson said he didnt understand why the schools in Burns, some 30 miles away from the refuge, were still closed when the nearby Crane schools had reopened on Tuesday.



Weve gone on with our lives as usual, Sampson said, also noting that in the two times hed been to the refuge since Bundy and his crew set up camp, he had not seen a single firearm.



We were told you were a bunch of gun-totin crazies, he said. Where are the guns?



While a number of the protesters were, in fact, seen walking around the refuge with handguns holstered to their belts, the group does seem to be toning down its rhetoric since LaVoy Finicum camped outside with his rifle on Tuesday night in anticipation of an FBI raid.



The Arizona rancher had been prepared for a shootout if FBI agents pointed guns at him, telling NBC News at the time, There are more important things than your life.



On Thursday, however, Finicum told reporters that this is intended to be a peaceful occupation.



We want you to know the only reason that we have guns here is for our own personal protection and safety, he said. We should never ever point guns at each other.



Finicum continued to present a softer image on Friday, proudly showing off his daughters and their young children at a press conference.

LaVoy Finicum told reporters that this is intended to be a peaceful occupation. (Caitlin Dickson/Yahoo News)



Bundy also appeared subdued on Friday, humbly thanking all the people from the local community whove shared support, as well as food and supplies. He even sounded a bit choked up when talking about his determination to follow through with his mission: to return the federal wildlife refuge to the people of Harney County and to get Dwight and Steven Hammond, local ranchers whod been convicted of arson for burning federal land, out of prison.



When one reporter asked Bundy what he wouldve done if Sheriff Ward had tried to handcuff him during their meeting Thursday, Finicum advised him not to answer the question and he complied.

Bundy said the occupiers would consider Wards offer for free passage out of town, but insisted that they had no plans to leave yet.

Asked when the occupiers plan to leave the wildlife refuge, Bundy said, Not a minute too early.



Wards office released a statement Friday saying that because the people on the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge made it clear that they have no intention of honoring the sheriffs request to leave, Ward had no plans for further calls or meetings with Bundy.



However, the statement said, the sheriff is keeping all options open.
Tim Freeman risked a lot  even potentially being present for the birth of his own daughter  for the opportunity to compete on "Beat Bobby Flay" last summer.

The head chef at the Northern Hotel, Freeman duked it out on the Food Network television show on June 26 last year, despite the fact that his daughter's due date was within days of the trip. The episode, called Strike While The Irons Hot, airs Jan. 21 on Food Network.

The risk was real, but Freeman and his wife, Ailleen, decided the trip was worth it.

"We both talked about it many times, and we thought that it was an opportunity that I couldnt pass up," Freeman said. "Because you know doing something like that will lead to other things."

Freeman speaks Tagalog and Russian, learned from his time cooking in the Philippines and Russia, but English was just fine for Freeman to describe the city heat during his two whirlwind days in New York City last summer.

Hotter than crap, Freeman said. It was hot. Tons of people, you know. It was nice to be in a big city for a while, but I was happy to leave.

The heat followed Freeman inside the old warehouse where the Food Network films "Beat Bobby Flay."

At Freemans stove range on set, his personal wok brought from Billings was white-hot, then bright with flame.

And there was no escape from the heat after the competition concluded. Crammed into an interview booth, Freeman spent four hours after the throw-down verbally dissecting his performance on film. With a bright light shining in his face, little ventilation and no air conditioning, it was more than a little uncomfortable, he said.

While all that heat put a good deal of pressure on the Northern Hotel chef, it was nothing compared to the conditions Freeman has cooked under.

Theres a lot more pressure when you have to do it to keep your job, Freeman said. That was just fun. I mean if you win, if you lose, it doesnt matter.

Freeman is someone who performs well in a loud kitchen, something clear from his preferred cooking music.

The first day I walked into this kitchen (in the Northern Hotel) ... there was no radio in here," he said. "And Im like Hey guys, wheres the Slayer? Theyre like What do you mean? Every kitchen Ive ever been in in my life its Megadeth, Slayer, Slipknot, Pantera, Hatebreed ... angry music, but you put out beautiful food.

But the chef has started taking more quiet time lately. Freeman leads a busy life, and in the past month he's taken to shutting the previously always-open office door for five- and 10-minute blocks during the day to Skype with his wife, infant daughter and 2-year-old son Wyatt. Even his approach to cooking has taken on a more quiet, thoughtful approach.

As Im getting older, the more Im starting to really get interested in the science part of cooking and get away from the day-to-day grind on the line, Freeman said. Why, when you roast a vegetable, does it intensify the flavor? You know, thats the kind of stuff Im interested in as I get older. At the core of my bones, Im still a chef, I just am starting to pick up other interests now.

The stadium seating packed with an audience watching his every move contributed to the difficulty of cooking four dishes with a secret ingredient under a 20-minute time limit  all while dodging slow-footed camera operators.

Freeman at one point warned a cameraman to back up. The advice was ignored and moments later, a burst of flame from Freeman's wok caught the cameras fuzzy audio attachment, setting it alight.

He didnt listen to me, and I just said OK, well, cool man, you dont want to listen?' Freeman said. I just said, 'Ill set you on fire. As soon as I hit my ingredients into (the wok)  because you know theyre a little bit wet and that hot oil ... it creates a fire bomb.

The crew stomped out the fire while Freeman kept cooking.

Battling in the opening round against Steve Nookie Postal, former Boston Red Sox executive chef and current chef at Commonwealth in Cambridge, Mass., for the right to beat Flay, Freeman said his personal wok became an important part of the show. Though he says he doesnt watch cooking shows often, Freeman noticed the quality of the studio-provided wok on Flays show and decided to bring his own.

Freeman's personal wok has sandpaperlike handle  a craft secret, as he called it. When a wok heats up, the metal handle does, too. A chef can wrap a dish towel around it while the handle's hot, and the small fibers singe and stick to the metal, leaving an ideal no-slip grip when the towel is removed.

The wok grip trick came from one of the many Chinese chefs Freeman worked with while in Russia earlier in his career. As it turned out, those Chinese chefs had taught Freeman one more helpful trick for the competition.

Seeing the flatness of his stove range, Freeman knew it wouldnt work with his wok. The woks bowl-like structure is meant to spread heat. Freeman knew that with his wok sitting on the range, heat would intensify in a small spot and a focused point of heat, potentially hurting the quality of his dish.

So I pulled the (grate) out, flipped it upside down and I dropped it back down," Freeman said. "And the bottom of a kitchen burner is a really large metal ring, so the wok was able to sit down on that metal ring.

In an interview, Freeman slammed his fists on a table to emphasize the noise, which at the time of filming was so loud it caught the attention of another chef.

After the show, Freemans grand plans to sightsee in New York evaporated in the afternoon heat. He went back to his hotel room and ordered room service  a strip loin steak done medium, fries and a shrimp cocktail  and then Skyped with his family before resting until his flight the next morning.

I was so exhausted, like mentally and physically, because it was such a long day and the heat of the place kind of zapped the energy out of me, Freeman said.

As luck would have it, the risk was more than worth it. He was still able to witness the birth of his daughter, Madison Mara, on July 2.
Barcelona (AFP) - Catalonia's separatists on Saturday struck a last-minute agreement to form a new regional government that will work towards independence from Spain, with controversial secessionist leader Artur Mas stepping aside to seal the deal.

His surprise decision brings an end to more than three months of deadlock between Mas' "Together for Yes" secessionist alliance and the more radical, far-left separatist CUP party that together hold a majority in the Catalan parliament.

"This is not an easy decision, but it is a coherent decision," Mas told a press conference, saying he did what was necessary to save the independence drive in the wealthy northeast region of 7.5 million.

"I am stepping aside and will not be standing as a Together for Yes candidate for the re-election of president of the regional government," Mas said, naming Girona mayor Carles Puigdemont as his replacement.

Together for Yes won 62 seats in the 135-seat parliament in regional elections in September -- but were unable to form a government with the CUP, which held a crucial extra 10 seats, due to bitter disagreement over Mas.

The leftist party refused to give Mas its backing, resenting the austerity measures he implemented and corruption scandals linked to his party.

Reacting to the agreement, Spain's conservative government immediately issued a statement emphasising the importance of forming a new national government with "an ample parliamentary base" in order to "face the separatist challenge".

Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's conservative Popular Party is trying to form a coalition in order to stay in power after losing its absolute majority in parliament in legislative elections last month.

- Sunday parliamentary vote -

If a deal on the regional government had not been reached by midnight on Sunday, Mas would have had to call fresh elections in Catalonia, which would have come as a major setback for the independence drive.

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Just days ago, that had seemed inevitable, with Mas saying he was ready to call snap elections as his CDC party -- part of Together for Yes -- refused to consider fielding a different candidate for the presidency.

But after unexpectedly announcing on Saturday that he was stepping down after all, Mas said he supported Puigdemont as his replacement.

The 53-year-old is head of the association of pro-independence municipalities as well as mayor of the city of Girona, around a hundred kilometres (60 miles) north of Catalan capital Barcelona.

He is expected to be formally voted in as regional president in a parliamentary session to be convened on Sunday.

With its own language and customs, Catalonia already enjoys a large degree of freedom in education, health and policing.

But it wants more independence from the Spanish state, particularly where taxation is concerned, complaining it pays more to Madrid than it gets back.

Polls show that most Catalans support a referendum on independence but are divided over breaking from Spain.

A 2010 decision by Spain's Constitutional Court to water down a statute giving Catalonia more powers has added fuel to the fire and caused support for independence to rise.

In November, the separatists passed a motion in the Catalan parliament calling on the assembly to start drafting laws within 30 days to create a separate social security system and treasury, with a view to completing independence in 18 months.

Rajoy immediately filed suit against the move in the Constitutional Court, which annulled the independence motion last month.
Chicago (AFP) - The children of Flint, Michigan, are paying the price for a cost-cutting measure that poisoned their water supply after state authorities ignored months of health warnings about the foul-smelling water.

Accused of turning a blind eye to local residents who complained the discolored water was making them sick, the governor of Michigan has finally declared a state of emergency and promised swift action to help.

"This is an unfortunate situation that I do apologize for with respect to our responsibility," Governor Rick Snyder said Thursday after meeting with the city's mayor.

The US Justice Department this week launched an investigation into the handling of the crisis which has seen in a sharp spike in lead poisoning among Flint's children.

Filmmaker Michael Moore, who was born in the northeastern city of 100,000 people, has launched an online petition to have Snyder arrested for what he termed "callous," "reckless" actions.

"To poison all the children in an historic American city is no small feat," he wrote.

"Even international terrorist organizations haven't figured out yet how to do something on a magnitude like this," said Moore, who made his hometown famous in the 1989 documentary "Roger and Me" about the devastation wrought by the closure of General Motors' auto plants there.

- Hair loss, rashes -

Four years ago, Snyder named a state-appointed manager to take control of Flint's troubled finances -- effectively wresting control from elected officials under a controversial law.

As part of a cost-cutting drive, the city began drawing water from the Flint River in April 2014 rather than continue to buy it from Detroit.

The state's environment department approved the switch even though the city's treatment plant was not able to produce water that met state and federal standards, according to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Natural Resource Defense Council.

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Residents soon began complaining that the foul, cloudy water was making them vomit, break out in rashes and lose their hair.

A few months later the city had to issue several boil-water advisories after tests discovered harmful bacteria in the tap water. The treatment used to kill the bacteria ended up leaving cancer-causing contaminants behind.

State health officials continued to insist the water was safe to drink even after General Motors said in October 2014 that it would no longer use the city's water in its engine plant because it was too corrosive.

The corrosive water did more than damage engine parts. It also started to leach lead out of the old pipes that distribute the city's water.

One concerned mother contacted the Environmental Protection Agency in January after being rebuffed by city and state officials when she complained that her son would break out in a rash after a bath. She soon found he also had elevated lead levels in his blood.

- 'Manmade disaster' -

Lead exposure is harmful to everyone, but it can have devastating impacts on young children by irreversibly harming brain development. It has been shown to lower intelligence, stunt growth and lead to aggressive and anti-social behaviors.

But despite pressure from the federal environment agency, and water tests showing dangerous levels of lead in homes across Flint, it was months before city and state officials moved to fix the problem.

The state's environment ministry is also accused of using "flawed testing methods that appear to have been designed to underreport the lead content of residents drinking water," according to the lawsuit filed by the ACLU and NRDC.

Snyder eventually sought $6 million from the state legislature to cover the cost of reconnecting Flint to Detroit's water supply and the switch was completed in October.

That was after elevated lead levels were found in the water of four Flint schools and a local pediatrician released a study showing that the number of children with elevated blood-lead levels had doubled from 2.1 to four percent.

Mayor Karen Weaver welcomed the news that federal prosecutors were investigating Flint's water crisis, saying Tuesday "people need to be held accountable."

Weaver -- who is currently powerless to act without approval from the state-appointed manager -- declared a state of emergency at city level last month in an effort to sound the alarm.

The "manmade disaster," the text warned, will "result in learning disabilities and the need for special education and mental health services and an increase in the juvenile justice system."

She discussed the need for additional social services with Snyder, who agreed during their meeting to transition power back to local authorities.

The infrastructure repair bill could run as high as $1.5 billion, Weaver told reporters.
By Tom Perry and Mariam Karouny BEIRUT (Reuters) - An air strike reportedly killed dozens of people in a rebel-held town in Syria on Saturday as a U.N. envoy visited Damascus to advance preparations for peace talks planned this month despite opposition misgivings. Agreement was also reached for aid to be delivered on Monday to an opposition-held town besieged by pro-government forces where United Nations says there have been credible reports of people dying of starvation, sources said. Aid will be sent simultaneously to two villages blockaded by rebels. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 57 people were killed in the air strike, which hit a court house and prison in the town of Maarat al-Numan in Idlib province. It identified the jets as Russian, and said the court house was operated by the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front. Russia has been staging air strikes in Syria in support of President Bashar al-Assad since September. The building was struck with four missiles. The dead included 23 members of the Nusra Front, three women and at least one child, the Observatory said. Syrian officials could not immediately be reached for comment. The war has raged on since last month when the Security Council endorsed a plan for peace talks, a rare case of U.S.-Russian agreement over a conflict that has killed 250,000 people. The talks are due to begin on Jan. 25 in Geneva. The Syrian government told U.N. envoy Staffan de Mistura on Saturday it was ready to participate but wants to know who would take part from the opposition, Syrian state media reported. Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem also said it was important to see a list of groups that would be classified as terrorists as part of the new diplomatic process, flagging another potential complication. Damascus views all the groups fighting to topple Assad as terrorists, including rebels who support a political solution and are represented in a recently formed opposition council tasked with overseeing the negotiations. A statement from de Mistura's office described Saturday's meeting as useful and said the envoy had outlined preparations. "The Special Envoy is looking forward to the active participation of relevant parties in the Geneva talks. He will be continuing his consultations in the region," it added. Syrian rebels and opposition politicians have expressed doubts over whether the peace talks will begin as planned. Their concerns over the diplomatic bid include the absence of any mention of Assad's fate. Earlier this week, they told de Mistura that before negotiations the Syrian government must stop bombing civilian areas, release detainees and lift blockades imposed on opposition-held areas. AID DELIVERY AGREED FOR MONDAY "Can the international community achieve the implementation of this pre-negotiation stage in the few remaining days? If it can, there is no problem. But I doubt they can," Riyad Naasan Agha, a member of the opposition council, told Reuters. Another opposition official said on Friday the opposition would not name its negotiating team until the government did so. The outlook for the talks has been further clouded by increased tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran, which back opposing sides in the conflict. Tensions have risen since Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr. The aid deal agreed on Saturday will result in humanitarian supplies being sent to the opposition-held town of Madaya at the Lebanese border, and to two villages in the northwestern province of Idlib that are blockade by rebels. Aid agencies have warned of widespread starvation in Madaya, where some 40,000 people are at risk. The United Nations said on Thursday that Damascus had agreed to allow access to all three areas, but did not say when the delivery would take place. "Both date and time have been set. Aid will go to three towns on Monday morning, all at the same time," said a source familiar with the matter. A second, pro-Syrian government source confirmed the details. (Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Gareth Jones and Meredith Mazzilli)
After the United Nations called on Denmark to overhaul its harsh policies on refugee settlement, the Danish government threw the diplomatic body a few bones by modifying a controversial proposal to require that asylum seekers forfeit valuable possessions to apply for sanctuary.

The Scandanavian nation's parliament revised a pending bill to increase the limit of value on personal items that refugees would be to keep when seeking asylum. Originally, government officials would be able to seize items valued above 3,000 kroner ($440). The change raises the figure to 10,000 kroner ($1,460), Reuters reports.

The proposal is justified, supporters say, so that refugees with means of support aren't benefitting from public assistance, though critics insist it is only to discourage migration.

FULL COVERAGE: The Global Refugee Crisis

Integration Minister Inger Stjberg pointed out that items like watches, mobile phones, and family heirlooms would be exempt. There have been doubts as to whether one could be allowed to keep a wedding ring, Stjberg told a Danish news outlet on Friday, according to Reuters. And of course you can keep an ordinary wedding ring when you come to Denmark. The bill is set for a vote next week.

Changes to the bill came one day after the United Nations High Commission for Refugees issued an 18-page report condemning Denmarks treatment of migrants. Confiscation of items was high on their list on concerns, with the report stating that such practices were an affront to [refugees] dignity and an arbitrary interference with their right to privacy.

Members of Denmarks ruling conservative party say that these seized goods will help fund refugee benefit programs.

"In Denmark, if one can manage on one's own, one manages on one's own. It's a principle which must apply as much to asylum seekers as it applies to Danes," said Stjberg, according to Denmarks The Local. Last month, she compared refugee benefits to that of those seeking governmental assistance. "It is already the case that if you as a Dane have valuables for more than 10,000 kroner it may be required that this is sold before you can receive unemployment benefits, Stjberg said.

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While Denmarks policies have been called cruel and compared to the Nazis practice of seizing valuables from Jews during World War II, critics have also asserted that it is an underhanded attempt to discourage migrants from coming to Denmark. The U.N.s recent report said Denmarks policies were aimed at conveying a message to make it less attractive to seek asylum in Denmark. Along with confiscating valuables, the Nordic nation has cut benefits in half and delayed family reunification for refugeespolicies the government publicized with ads in Lebanese newspapers last year.

As Germany estimates it received one million migrants in 2015, and Sweden saw 150,000 asylum applications by the years end, fewer than 20,000 people sought sanctuary in Denmark last year.

Related stories on TakePart:





 Three Wounded Syrian War Veterans Flee to Europe

 Turkish Police Confiscate More Than 1,500 Faulty Life Jackets Made for Migrants

 Syria to Allow Food Aid to Town Where Residents Are Eating Grass and Leaves: Heres How to Help

Original article from TakePart
HARGEISA, Somalia (Reuters) - Dozens of Ethiopian and Somali migrants died in the waters off the breakaway Somalia region of Somaliland when their vessel failed mechanically in the course of the voyage and drifted in the sea, a regional Somaliland official said. Ahmed Abdi Falay, the chairman or governor of Sanag region, said the boat, which had started its journey from the port of Bossaso two weeks ago and was heading to an unidentified port in the Arabian Peninsula, was discovered by the Somaliland Coast Guard. "They climbed into the boat and were shocked to find the dead bodies of 10 people and 72 others who were in different stages of suffering, some of them in serious condition," he said from the port city of Maydh on Friday. The Coast Guard brought the 72 survivors and the bodies of the dead people ashore. The wounded are being treated and the dead are being buried. Another 96 bodies, from the same vessel, were discovered ashore by locals on Friday having been washed in with the tide, Falay added. Some three members of the crew of the stricken vessel were arrested as they tried to flee into nearby mountains and they will be questioned by authorities, the official said. Migrants from the Horn of Africa states have for many years made the perilous sea crossing in search of better life abroad, forced out of their countries by conflict, repression and economic hardships. (Reporting by Hussein Ali Noor; Writing by Duncan Miriri Editing by Jeremy Gaunt)
Kinshasa (AFP) - The elderly leader of the Democratic Republic of Congo's main opposition appeared in a video on Saturday looking tired and struggling to speak clearly as he gave a New Year's message to supporters.

Etienne Tshisekedi, the 83-year-old president of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS) who has been convalescing in Brussels since August 2014, stumbles over his words and halts several times in the three-minute video.

"I appeal to all who want change: work together to find adequate solutions to the country's problems. The rest of the message will be sent through the press," Tshisekedi says in the video.

"I will soon be among you so we can unite our efforts to win."

A source close to Tshisekedi's family said producing the video was a difficult process and took almost four days.

Political tension has risen in the DR Congo in recent months ahead of a presidential vote due late next year, which President Joseph Kabila, who has been in office since 2001, cannot contest under the current constitution.

No date has yet been set for the election, and late last year Kabila said he hoped to organise a "national dialogue" aimed at reaching a wide consensus to enable "appeased elections" to go ahead.

Tshisekedi, an opposition leader during the rule of strongman Mobutu Sese Seko, came second to Kabila in the fraud-tainted 2011 election.

His UDPS party, struggling with internal divisions, was the only major opposition group to have shown willing to negotiate with the government.

But in November Tshisekedi said the party "did not feel involved in the dialogue in the form that was announced by Kabila".
Hurghada (Egypt) (AFP) - Three European holidaymakers wounded in an attack in an Egyptian resort were in stable condition Saturday, as a witness recounted how the assailants burst into the hotel and stabbed guests.

An elderly Austrian couple and a young Swedish man were hospitalised after the assault Friday at the Bella Vista hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.

Tourism Minister Hisham Zazou said the assailants appeared to have been acting alone, and the hotel described them as "drugged young men".

He later said the wounded "will be released from hospital today", adding that "over the coming days we will announce even greater security measures to safeguard all tourists visiting Egypt".

Police shot dead one of the knife-wielding attackers and wounded another, saying one of them was carrying a "sonic gun".

A Swede who said he was the father of one of the victims, 27-year-old Sammie Olovsson, said they were sitting in the hotel restaurant when the assailants burst in and stabbed him.

"My son and me were eating in the restaurant and having a discussion," he told AFP in the Hurghada hospital.

The two men rushed in "very fast," he said. "They took knives and they tried to get Sammie here," he said, pointing to his chest.

"Then (they) said 'down on the floor' and we do that," he said, adding that he told his son, who was bleeding, not to move.

"I get up two times and they stayed there with the guns. When I got up later on they were not here," he said.

The hotel posted on its Facebook page pictures of the two other victims, spelled in hospital records as Renata Weisslen and Wilhem Weislan, both smiling.

"They are ok now," it said in a post. A doctor at the hospital told AFP they were a couple, both 72.

Zazou told AFP the two attackers were "not part of an organisation".

It was "an individually motivated attack. This is the initial finding," said Zazou, who was in Hurghada to visit the victims, adding that the investigation was still ongoing.

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A video published by Egyptian news websites appeared to show the wounded assailant receiving emergency medical treatment and being questioned on his identity.

He appeared to have been shot in both legs.

Zazou described the assailants as "amateurish" and said their motive was not yet clear.

The hotel added on Facebook that "two drugged young men" attacked the restaurant with a "fake gun" and "small knives".

A restaurant employee, who requested anonymity, told AFP one of the men shouted "there is no god but God" on entering, and carried a black banner that resembled the Islamic State group flag.

"The door opened and there was a man holding a knife and a black cloth with the (Islamic State group) flag on it," he said. Another held what appeared to be a gun.

"One of them said: 'There is no god but God. We will blow up this place'. The first attacked customers sitting at a table, with a knife."

- Previous attacks claimed by IS -

The incident further undermined efforts to repair the country's damaged tourism industry, coming a day after a Cairo hotel hosting Israeli tourists came under attack by men who hurled fireworks and fired birdshot.

The Islamic State group claimed that attack, which it said targeted "Jewish" tourists.

Police said they were Arab Israelis, and that the assailants had targeted policemen guarding the hotel and not them.

The jihadist group's Egyptian affiliate is waging an insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula, and dealt a body blow to the country's tourism industry by claiming to have downed a Russian airliner in October, killing all those on board.

The attack prompted Russia to suspend flights to and from Egypt, while Britain restricted flights to the Sharm el-Sheikh resort from where the doomed plane had departed.

After that tragedy, some major tourist operators suspended packages to Sharm el-Sheikh and Hurghada.

The resorts, famed for their pristine beaches and scuba diving, were promoted by Egypt as jewels of its tourism industry, and had previously attracted millions of holidaymakers, including Russians, Britons and Italians.

Egypt's tourism industry was dealt some heavy blows last year.

In September, eight Mexicans were mistakenly killed by security forces in the vast Western Desert.

And in June, police foiled an attempted suicide bombing near the famed Karnak temple in Luxor -- one of Egypt's most popular attractions -- when 600 tourists were inside.
Johannesburg (AFP) - A slew of racist comments on social media in South Africa have unleashed outrage and exposed deep hostility in the "Rainbow Nation" as it struggles with its demons 22 years after white-minority rule ended.

Irritated by rubbish left on a beach following New Year's Day celebrations, Penny Sparrow, a white real estate agent from the eastern coast province of KwaZulu-Natal, wrote a savage comment on Facebook.

"From now I shall address the blacks of South Africa as monkeys as I see the cute little wild monkeys do the same -- pick and drop litter," she said, in a posting that soon went viral.

The following day Chris Hart, an economic analyst often quoted in the media, came under fire for comments on Twitter about a growing "sense of entitlement and hatred towards minorities" in South Africa.

He has since been suspended from his position at Standard Bank, which said there were "racist undertones" in his comments.

The posts touched off a vicious cycle of hatred in a country still traumatised by decades of finely-tuned discrimination between the races under apartheid rule.

"I want to cleanse this country of all white people... We must act as Hitler did to the Jews," Velaphi Khumalo, a local government employee, wrote on another viral Facebook message as the war of words worsened.

He too has since been suspended by the Gauteng provincial government department, which condemned his "barbaric and racist utterances".

- Flood of insults -

Soon after Andrew Barnes, a white TV news anchor, was taken off air by local channel eNCA after mocking the pronunciation of a black government minister.

The flood of insults "has shone a light on the amount of work that still needs to be done to bring true reconciliation to South Africa," Mienke Steytler of South Africa's Institute of Race Relations (IRR) told AFP.

The ruling African National Congress (ANC) has filed charges of "crimen injuria" (intentionally impairing the dignity of others), against both Sparrow and Hart -- but not Khumalo.

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"We opened and laid charges against the people who originally started making these offensive statements," party spokesman Zizi Kodwa told AFP.

"These individuals must be punished because they are taking South Africa back... South Africa has never been so polarised as it is today racially.

"Khumalo reacted to an offensive comment which was made against black people."

Steytler slammed the ANC for "unacceptable discrimination" over its decision not to pursue charges against Khumalo.

In 2000, 72 percent of South Africans were reported to believe interracial relations were improving. By 2012, that figure had dropped to 39 percent, according to a government report.

The ANC has also floated the idea of laws criminalising "any act that perpetuates racism and glorifies apartheid".

But criminalising racism is not necessarily the solution, said Nelson Mandela Foundation CEO Sello Hatang.

He quoted the late president Mandela, saying: "In the end, reconciliation is a spiritual process, which requires more than just a legal framework. It has to happen in the hearts and minds of people."

- Party politics -

A clumsy attempt to apologise by Sparrow only stoked public anger after she appeared to blame her diabetes for her outburst.

And the country's largest opposition party, the Democratic Alliance, which has long been trying to shake off its reputation as a "white party", was left red-faced when it was revealed that Sparrow was a member.

The party fought to defend itself, lashing out at Sparrow for "dehumanising black South Africans" and expelling her.

Khumalo, too, presented his apologies, but the explosion of vitriol across social media continued unabated -- reflecting often-unspoken tensions within South African society.

"The weaker the economy is and the higher the unemployment figures are, the more frustrated people are and the more they are likely to lash out at each other," said Steytler.

South Africa is battling a 25 percent unemployment rate, slow growth and a sharply weakening currency, with the risk of junk status looming on the credit horizon.

"We have been living on a cosmetic rainbow nation since 1994," said Ronald Lamola, a former leader in the ANC's youth wing. "There will be no racial harmony without economic equality."
By Marcela Ayres BRASILIA (Reuters) - Five years before his arrest in a political corruption scandal, billionaire financier Andre Esteves was nearly banned from banking in Brazil due to irregular trading, according to a central bank document reviewed by Reuters. Central bank investigators recommended in October 2010 that Esteves, who founded and ran investment bank Grupo BTG Pactual SA until last November, should have been barred from managing financial institutions for six years due to "serious infractions" of banking rules between 2002 and 2004, the document showed. (http://reut.rs/1RszQku) The severe punishment under consideration was eventually reduced to fines for Esteves and the bank, but it showed Brazil's most influential dealmaker attracted regulators' scrutiny for more than a decade before his downfall last year. Esteves declined to discuss the case while BTG Pactual referred inquiries to securities filings at the time. Central bank director Sidnei Correa Marques, who ruled against the proposed ban, told Reuters in an interview he considered the crucial role of the bank and its CEO in the financial system when making his decision. Esteves was arrested in November and charged with obstructing a corruption probe at state-run oil company Petrobras by conspiring to help a Petrobras executive who was a potential prosecution witness flee the country. He denied any wrongdoing but stepped down as chief executive and chairman of BTG Pactual and passed control over Latin America's biggest independent investment bank to seven partners. After spending three weeks in prison, Esteves was released on house arrest last month pending trial. The investigation from a decade ago that could have derailed his banking career years earlier focused on nearly $3.8 billion (3 billion pounds) of trades between the bank, known then as Banco Pactual SA and Delaware-based Romanche Investment Corporation LLC. DELAWARE ENIGMA Romanche was created 15 years ago as a limited liability corporation, without public disclosure of its ownership, and the law firm at its registered address declined to comment. The company did not file annual tax reports in Delaware as required and still owes $1,004 there, according to public documents. The securities regulator CVM found in a separate probe that the trades served to transfer Banco Pactual's profits out of the country and potentially reduce the bank's tax bill. The central bank and CVM investigated alleged banking and securities infractions, leaving assessment of the tax impact to Brazil's federal revenue service, which declined to comment on the case. Reuters could not determine how the bank's tax payments were affected by the transactions. In a 2007 settlement, the CVM fined both firms, Esteves and another executive 8.1 million reais, or about $4 million at the time. BTG Pactual and Esteves did not admit to wrongdoing in the settlement. The CVM declined to comment. After its own probe, the team of central bank investigators called for a six-year banking ban for Esteves, a one-year ban for another executive responsible for trades on Sao Paulo's BM&F exchange, and a fine for Banco Pactual in the recommendation reviewed by Reuters. It said the bank was incurring "deliberate losses" via trades with Romanche which constituted "serious infractions in the management of a financial institution." But Marques, who had the final say in the case, decided against the proposed ban. In April 2013, after an additional investigation, he slapped fines of 100,000 reais ($25,000) on both executives and a fine of 25,000 reais for the bank. Marques said the punishment was proportional to the executives' actions, which did not have "harmful consequences" for the financial system. "When a bank is important systemically, important to the country, among the 10 largest, I have to be careful about getting rid of essential management at that financial institution," Marques said. A week before the recommendation reached Marques' office in early 2011, BTG Pactual helped the central bank rescue troubled mid-sized lender Banco PanAmericano SA, agreeing to take a stake in the bank. Marques did not comment on the transaction, which Esteves said at the time would broaden BTG Pactual's business portfolio. A knack for dealmaking also made Esteves, now 47, Brazil's youngest billionaire and the face of his country's decade-long economic boom. Harvard Business School named a dorm for Esteves after a "significant personal donation". However, his rise was punctuated by occasional brushes with regulators at home and abroad. In 2012, Italy's financial regulator fined him 350,000 euros ($375,000) for insider trading around a joint venture announced by Italian meat company Cremonini SpA in 2007. Esteves disputed the charges and in an appeal got the fine cut in half. But the case grabbed headlines just 10 days before BTG Pactual's initial public offering, forcing the bank to let investors back out if they wished. Since Esteves was snared in the Petrobras scandal last year, shares of BTG Pactual have lost about 50 percent and the bank was forced to sell assets and tap an emergency credit line from Brazil's deposit guarantee fund to allay fears of a cash crunch. (Graphic:http://tmsnrt.rs/1O9axzo) (The story adds dropped word in paragraph 9) (Reporting by Marcela Ayres; Writing and additional reporting by Brad Haynes; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)
Sydney (AFP) - Adventurer Tracey Curtis-Taylor on Saturday completed her epic flight from Britain to Australia, landing her vintage, open-cockpit 1942 Boeing Stearman in Sydney.

"I need a drink," she joked after finishing the final leg of the three-month journey which saw her contend with some treacherous weather in the air and logistical obstacles on the ground.

Modelled after pioneering aviator Amy Johnson's historic 1930 solo flight from England to Australia, Curtis-Taylor said her journey was a homage to female pilots of the past.

She said flying the open cockpit biplane had given her an "insight into something of what she (Johnson) went through getting here".

"The flying has been sensational and that's why you do it," she told reporters at Sydney airport shortly after her arrival.

"To fly something like this, low level, halfway around the world seeing all the the most iconic landscapes, geology, vegetation... it's just the best view in the world. It's the best adventure in the world."

Curtis-Taylor, who flew from Cape Town to Goodwood, England in 2013, took off from Farnborough on October 1, with a flight path over Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

The route of nearly 21,000 kilometres (13,000 miles) saw her stop in places such as Vienna, Istanbul and Amman before she headed to Pakistan and India and on to Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.

She crossed the Timor Sea to Australia this month.

Curtis-Taylor said she struck some bad weather, mostly in eastern Europe, as she flew the stick and rudder airplane with basic period instruments.

But as the journey involved frequent stops because of the plane's short range, many of her obstacles were not related to flying.

"I've lost my rag several times dealing with people on the ground," she said, adding that she spent seven hours trying to get fuel at one airport.

"In the end I just lay down on the tarmac and went to sleep with my head on my handbag."

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She said that it was an experience to fly over Australia, where her stops included the outback towns of Tennant Creek and Alice Springs and flying over the monolithic rock Uluru.

Curtis-Taylor, 53, said she would love to continue the adventure and fly up north along Australia's east coast.

But instead the plane, which the aviator said "did not miss a beat" during the epic journey, will be shipped to the United States.
CHARLESTON, S.C. (Reuters) - A small, suspicious fire broke out at the South Carolina home of a white former police officer who is charged with murder in the shooting death of an unarmed black man, local media reported on Saturday.

Vinyl siding was damaged at the home of former North Charleston police officer Michael Slager and an incendiary device was found at the scene, authorities told the Post and Courier newspaper in Charleston, South Carolina.

Slager is accused of shooting 50-year-old Walter Scott in the back as he ran away from the officer during a traffic stop in April 2015. The shooting was caught on video by a bystander and intensified a national debate on police treatment of minorities.

The fire at Slager's Hanahan home came hours after protests over the release of Slager earlier in the day.

The blaze was put out by a neighbor at about 9:30 p.m. local time on Friday, according to the newspaper. Police and fire officials were not immediately available for comment.

A police official told the newspaper that two people dressed in black were seen running away from the house and that an arson investigation is underway.

Slager, 34, is under house arrest, according to an attorney for Scott's family, after being released from jail on $500,000 bail on Monday. It is unclear whether he was at the house at the time of the fire.

A small group of demonstrators clashed during a rally at North Charleston City Hall on Friday morning.

In a heated exchange during the morning demonstration, long-time activists encouraged non-violent protests, while some younger demonstrators hinted that it was time to "disturb the peace" and fight violence with violence, according to the Post and Courier report.

Police have not said there is any link between the protesters and the fire at Slager's house later that night.

(Reporting by Harriet McLeod in Charleston, S.C.; writing and additional reporting by Brendan O'Brien; Editing by Tom Heneghan and Meredith Mazzilli)
Politics

For Democrats, a stable of surrogates ready to campaign

While Hillary Clinton rallied Democrats out West this week, her husband, former President Bill Clinton, carried her campaigns message through Iowa. Next week, when the Democratic frontrunner returns to Iowa herself, her daughter, Chelsea, will be courting supporters in New Hampshire. The family tag-team across the early voting states is just a glimpse of the stable of surrogates  including the president, vice president and first lady  on standby to help elect another Democrat to the White House in November. Its a weighty group of Democratic stars that Republicans acknowledge they simply cant match.

One of the things about being out of power in the White House is you dont have as many folks with a national profile. Kevin Madden, a Republican strategist who advised Mitt Romney during the 2012 presidential election

While surrogates dont win elections for candidates, high-profile backers can play a valuable role in attracting media coverage, targeting specific constituency groups, and pulling more people into events where the campaigns can collect voter information. Republicans have a handful of potential surrogates with national name recognition  including Mitt Romney and former President George W. Bush  though its unclear how the partys eventual nominee might use them in the general election, if at all. Come Election Day, however, even the best surrogate is unlikely to seal the deal with voters.
By Ahmed, Mohamed and Hassan CAIRO (Reuters) - Suspected militants armed with knives wounded two Austrian tourists and a Swede at a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Hurghada on Friday evening, the interior ministry said. Security forces shot and killed at least one of the attackers after they stormed the beachside Bella Vista hotel, officials said, though there was no immediate information on the other, or on the condition of the tourists. Security sources said the attackers had arrived by sea and also carried a gun and a suicide belt. Officials said officers had tightened checks across the area and shut off roads. Norwegian Jon Torp told Norwary's VG newspaper that he heard at least 24 shots as the attackers moved around the hotel. "I was in my room when I heard someone shouting. I went out on the balcony and could see a man wave a black flag with white writings on it. He was yelling loudly," Torp told VG. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. But Egypt is fighting a wave of Islamist militancy and Islamic State, which has a black and white flag, claimed responsibility for the downing of a Russian passenger plane in October, killing all 224 people on board, most of them tourists returning home from the Red Sea resort of Sharm al-Sheikh, across the water from Hurghada. Security sources had earlier said two tourists had been injured, one from Germany and one from Denmark. But the Swedish Foreign Ministry confirmed that one Swede was injured and Expressen newspaper quoted the victim's father as saying he was "fine" in hospital. Armed men shot dead a police officer and a soldier on Saturday while they were in their car in the Giza area, on the outskirts of Cairo, the state news agency said. Islamic State said on Friday it had carried out an attack on Israeli tourists in Cairo on Thursday, in response to a call by the group's leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, to target Jews "everywhere". Security sources said those tourists were Israeli Arabs. Tourism is critical to the Egyptian economy as a source of hard currency, but has been ravaged by years of political turmoil since the revolution that ousted veteran president Hosni Mubarak in 2011. (Additional reporting by Ali Abdelaty and Michael Georgy; Terje Solsvik in Oslo and Alistair Scrutton in Stockholm; Editing by Kevin Liffey and Andrew Heavens)
Britain's Flying Scotsman, the first steam locomotive to hit 100 miles an hour, returned to the tracks on Friday following a decade-long project to restore the world-famous engine.

Steaming and whistling, the legendary locomotive made its first test run after a 4.2 million ($6.1 million, 5.6-million-euro) full-scale restoration.

"It will be back hauling mainline rail tours, steaming proudly into the 21st century," said its owners, the National Railway Museum (NRM) in York, northern England.

The locomotive, built 93 years ago, successfully completed the test run on the East Lancashire Railway in northwest England, following restoration at the nearby Riley and Son workshop in Bury.

Rail enthusiasts gathered on the platforms at Bury's Bolton Street station to see the locomotive, some with tears in their eyes.

"It's such a spine-tingling moment. It's thrilling," said Tina Bywater, 67.

"I have always said if you could bottle steam, oil and coal, I would wear it as a perfume."

David Flood, 68, an ex-railway guard, said it was "a national symbol".

"It's on a par with stately homes," he said.

The Flying Scotsman will make a run from London's King's Cross terminal and York next month ahead of a programme of public services and events throughout 2016.

Built in 1923 in the northern town of Doncaster for the London and North Eastern Railway, the A1 class locomotive became famous when displayed at the British Empire Exhibition in the capital the following year.

- Restored to glory -

It hauled the first ever non-stop London to Edinburgh service in 1928, reducing the journey time to eight hours.

In 1934, the Flying Scotsman became the first locomotive to be officially clocked at 100 miles (160 kilometres) per hour.

British Rail retired the locomotive in 1963 and sold it to private owners, under whom it went on tours to Australia and the United States.

In Australia, it recorded the longest ever non-stop run by a steam locomotive, travelling 679 kilometres (422 miles) from Melbourne to Alice Springs.

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A fundraising campaign brought the Flying Scotsman back into public ownership in 2004 for 2.3 million.

Some 70 feet (22 metres) long and with a tender capacity of eight tons of coal and 5,000 gallons of water, Scotsman is estimated to have travelled around 2.5 million miles (four million kilometres).

During the painstaking restoration, Scotsman was carefully dismantled and each of the thousands of components checked for wear, with many needing replacement.

It was also fitted with equipment needed to comply with 21st-century regulations: a train monitoring recorder and a train protection and warning system.

"I'm near speechless. It feels like all the frustration and hard work is justified," said NRM engineer manager Simon Holyroyd as he watched Scotsman in action.

"It's always been known as the world's most famous steam locomotive and hopefully we will get it back up there in its rightful place."
Cologne (Germany) (AFP) - Police on Saturday fired tear gas and used water cannon to clear a rally in Cologne of the far-right xenophobic PEGIDA movement, after protesters hurled firecrackers and bottles at officers.

Sirens wailed and police told peaceful protesters to leave as they deployed water cannon to disperse the increasingly agitated crowd.

The initially peaceful rally against a shocking spate of sexual assaults during New Year's festivities in Cologne took an ugly turn when a group of far-right extremists began flinging projectiles at officers.

Police estimate that around 800 hooligans were among the 1,700 who took part in the PEGIDA march.

A PEGIDA spokesman urged "all participants to go home".

"The event is officially over," he said.

PEGIDA, which started life over a year ago as a Facebook group, has seen a revival as concerns grow over Germany's ability to cope with the 1.1 million asylum seekers it took in alone last year.
COLOGNE, Germany (Reuters) - German riot police fired water canon to disperse a demonstration by the anti-Islam PEGIDA movement in Cologne after protesters threw fire crackers and beer bottles at officers, according to a Reuters witness. Two people were injured in the clash. The riot police made a number of arrests. Police had called on demonstrators, some of whom had chanted "Merkel must go", to return to a square near the city's train station, from where they had set out on a march through Cologne. When they continued to throw fire crackers and bottles, police used two water canons to disperse the group. (Reporting By Joseph Nasr; writing by John O'Donnell; Editing by Toby Chopra)
By Caroline Copley BERLIN (Reuters) - Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. Gun dealers and vendors of deterrent devices such as sprays and alarms say sales have taken off since August, when Chancellor Angela Merkel opened Germany's borders to people fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa. Ingo Meinhard, director of the German association of gunsmiths and specialist gun dealers, said sales of scare devices had "at least doubled" in 2015, citing telephone surveys with his members. He said demand spiked up after the militant attacks in Paris on Nov. 13 and again after about 120 women complained of being mugged, threatened or sexually assaulted by gangs of men on New Year's Eve in Cologne at New Year. Similar but smaller-scale assaults on women have been reported in cities including Hamburg and Stuttgart. A Cologne martial arts instructor, Josef Werner, said inquiries for women's self-defense courses have increased fivefold. Since German laws put severe restrictions on the sale of firearms for private use, demand has risen for freely-available devices such as CS gas, pepper spray, body alarms and high performance flash-lights that can blind aggressors for up to three minutes. Kai Prase, director of Frankfurt-based DEF-TEC Defense Technology GmbH, said sales of pepper spray rose seven-fold in the final three months of last year. "Normally the first week of January is very quiet but this year it's been a strong week in terms of sales," Prase said, reporting high demand for sprays that fit inside a handbag. Nine of the top 10 bestselling items in the "Sport & Leisure" section on Amazon's German website on Friday were either pepper or CS gas sprays. The seventh-most popular item was a pepper spray shaped like a pink lipstick. On Friday, officials said asylum seekers were among those suspected of involvement in the Cologne violence. Pavel Sverdlov, director of the Soldier of Fortune gun shop in Berlin, said the rise in demand since August has been "really quite exceptional, I've never sold so many repellent devices." He said sales of blank guns had trebled and he had sold out of pepper spray. "The most recent events have alarmed many people, especially women," he said. (Editing by Noah Barkin/Ruth Pitchford)
The Root

Its rare to find someone who hasnt had a battle or two with Covid, but some Covid dodgers are still among us. While the Centers for Disease Control has estimated that more than 80% of children under the age of 18 have had Covid-19, a team of researchers from the University of California, San Francisco has discovered a phenomenon (after reviewing data from more than 1,400 people) that some people may never test positive for Covid or have symptoms due to a genetic mutation.
Riyadh (AFP) - Foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council, which groups Sunni Arab monarchies, expressed their "total support" Saturday for Saudi Arabia in its diplomatic row with predominantly Shiite Iran.

The GCC "forcefully condemns the attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran", said a statement, referring to the sacking of Riyadh's embassy and consulate by demonstrators angered over its execution of a prominent Shiite cleric and dissident.

The statement, following an extraordinary ministerial meeting of the six-member group, criticised "Iranian interference in Saudi Arabian affairs" over its denunciation of Nimr al-Nimr's execution a week ago.

It said Tehran's criticism had "directly incited the aggressions targeting Saudi diplomatic missions".

The GCC "totally supports decisions taken by Saudi Arabia to combat terrorism" and "has total confidence in the independence and integrity of Saudi justice".

Nimr was a highly respected cleric in Saudi Arabia's Shiite community who was behind demonstrations calling for better treatment of the minority, but he was executed for terrorism.

His death touched off anti-Saudi demonstrations elsewhere in the Shiite world, including the attacks in Iran. Riyadh was accused of silencing his criticism by killing him.

The GCC groups Bahrain, Kuwait Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

In response to the Iran incidents, Riyadh and Bahrain, which has a Shiite majority, severed diplomatic relations with Tehran. Kuwait recalled its ambassador, the UAE downgraded its ties, and Oman and Qatar condemned the attacks.

And they threatened Saturday to "take other measures against Iran if it continues its aggression", without spelling them out.
Geneva (AFP) - The head of the populist rightwing Swiss People's Party (SVP) Toni Brunner will resign in April, Switzerland's largest party said Saturday, just months after securing record support in general elections.

Brunner, who has headed SVP since 2008, informed party officials at a meeting in the northeastern canton of Thurgau on Saturday that he intends to step down when his mandate ends on April 23, the party said in a statement.

"After eight years at the helm of Switzerland's top party in terms of votes, he wants to once again concentrate on his political work as a parliamentarian and work on his farm," it said.

SVP management has proposed parliamentarian Albert Roesti to succeed him, the statement said.

The announcement came less than three months after Brunner on October 18 led SVP -- known for its virulent campaigns against immigration, the European Union and Islam -- to secure nearly 30 percent of votes in parliamentary elections.

The strong support came as surging numbers of migrants and refugees moving through Europe have heightened focus on the issue in Switzerland, even though the wealthy Alpine nation is yet to be significantly affected by the crisis.

"We have to make Europe less attractive and send a signal that we cannot give asylum here, not even to refugees of war," Brunner told AFP on election night.

The party took 65 of the 200 seats in the lower house, and subsequently claimed a long-coveted second spot in the seven-member Swiss government.

SVP said Saturday that the party's secretary general since 2009, Martin Baltisser, would also step down in April, when all party mandates will be up for grabs for a new two-year term.

SVP also said that it had created a working group, including Brunner, Baltisser and Roesti, to review the party structure.

"In the space of 25 years, SVP has gone from being a small party with 11.9 percent of votes to Switzerland's largest party with 29.4 percent voter support. But the party structure has hardly changed," it explained.
Jarnac (France) (AFP) - French President Francois Hollande on Friday visited the tomb of one of his most illustrious predecessors, Francois Mitterrand, to mark the 20th anniversary of his death.

Mitterrand, the enigmatic Socialist who was president from 1981 to 1995, is laid to rest in his native region of Jarnac, in the southwest.

His daughter Mazarine Pingeot, whose existence was only revealed to the public towards the end of Mitterrand's life, and one of his two sons, Gilbert Mitterrand, accompanied Hollande to the tomb, along with veteran Socialist minister Jack Lang.

Other wellwishers left a handful of red roses -- the symbol of France's Socialist Party -- on the tomb as well as the flag of the European Union, in a nod to Mitterrand's role as one of the architects of today's EU.

Early in his career, Hollande worked for Mitterrand as an economics advisor.

Mitterrand, who died in 1996 at the age of 79, remains a relatively popular figure in France two decades after his death with two-thirds saying in a recent opinion poll that they thought he had been a good president.

"Mitterrand allowed the left to rule for a prolonged period, which had never happened in the 20th century," said Alain Bergounioux, a historian who specialises in the French Socialist Party.
Paris (AFP) - Hundreds of mosques across France are participating in a major open-house event this weekend, offering visitors the opportunity to come in for tea and a chat about Islam in a country shaken by jihadist attacks.

Dubbed "a brotherly cup of tea", the weekend initiative took different forms with local mosques handing out hot drinks and pastries, offering guided visits, putting on debates and calligraphy workshops, and even inviting people to attend one of the five daily prayers.

Organised by the country's leading Muslim body, the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM), it aims to stimulate dialogue about Islam and create a greater sense of "national cohesion", a year after 17 people were killed in jihadist attacks in Paris targeting satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish supermarket.

"The objective is to create a space where people can be together and meet normal Muslim worshippers and all of our fellow citizens," CFCM president Anouar Kbibech told AFP.

The idea is to use the anniversary of the January 7-9 attacks to "highlight the real values of Islam, to set straight the cliches about links to violence and terrorism," he said, describing the venture as a "gesture of openness".

"Instead of dwelling on these tragic acts, it seemed more useful and important to celebrate 'the spirit of January 11'," he said, referring to the date last year when millions of people took to the streets in a mass show of solidarity.

- 'Preachers of hate' -

Following further attacks in November, in which jihadists killed 130 people, France declared a state of emergency which has seen police staging around 20 raids on Muslim places of worship. At least three have been closed on suspicion of radicalising their members.

In a small prayer hall in Ajaccio on the French island of Corsica, which was attacked on Christmas day, Jean-Francois, in his sixties, took up the invitation to visit.

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"If someone holds out their hand, I accept it and I shake it," he said, while drinking a steaming cup of tea.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve accepted an invitation to visit a mosque near Paris, and hailed the initiative.

France needs, more than ever, "the engagement of all Muslims in France," he said, while warning that "the self-proclaimed preachers of hate" in mosques would be dealt with severely.

Although not all of France's 2,500 mosques and places of worship are taking part, the most important ones are, including the Grand Mosque of Paris.

The event comes after a year which saw a surge in anti-Muslim acts in France, some of which targeted places of worship, although the number was much lower after the November bloodshed than after the January attacks.

France's five million Muslims often complain of discrimination, notably on the employment front.
Cologne (Germany) (AFP) - Chanting "Merkel out" and waving placards with slogans like "Rapefugees not welcome", xenophobic German PEGIDA protesters vented their fury Saturday against migrants after mass sexual assaults on New Year's Eve.

Amid clashes with police, the far-right protesters took aim at Chancellor Angela Merkel, accusing her of allowing migrants to run amok through her liberal stance towards those fleeing war

Tensions escalated when followers of the movement -- about half of them violence-prone hooligans, according to police -- marched and hurled beer bottles and fire crackers at police, screaming "where were you on New Year's Eve?"

Riot police beat back the agitated protesters with batons, teargas and water cannon in clashes that left three police and one journalist injured and in which police detained multiple demonstrators.

"Merkel has become a danger to our country. Merkel must go," one speaker earlier told the 1,700-strong crowd, which loudly echoed the call, expressing their anger at Germany's 1.1-million-strong migrant influx last year.

"Tolerance is the final virtue of a dying society," read another banner in the protest, organised by the local chapter of PEGIDA, the self-styled "Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the Occident".

The heated protest was held in the Cologne railway station area that was the scene of the New Year's Eve assaults, at which witnesses described the perpetrators as people of "North African or Arab" appearance.

Cologne police have come in for broad criticism for failing to stop the violence and being slow to report on it afterwards, a scandal that Friday claimed the scalp of city police chief Wolfgang Albers.

By Saturday police had received 379 criminal complaints of groping, assaults, thefts and two rapes. Federal police have said that a majority of suspects identified so far were of foreign origin, inflaming a debate over Germany's ability to integrate the influx of refugees.

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- 'Nazis out!' -

One PEGIDA speaker, a mother of four introduced only as Christiane, told the rally: "These women who fell victim will have to live with it for a long time. I feel like my freedom has been robbed."

PEGIDA started life over a year ago as a xenophobic Facebook group, initially drawing just a few hundred protesters in the eastern city of Dresden before gaining strength, peaking with rallies of 25,000 people.

Interest subsequently began to wane following overtly racist comments by founder Lutz Bachmann, and the surfacing of "selfies" in which he sported a Hitler moustache and hairstyle, but PEGIDA has seen a revival with the record influx of migrants.

The PEGIDA protesters Saturday were greeted by 1,300 leftist demonstrators who staged a counter-protest, chanting "Nazis raus!" (Nazis out!), as hundreds of the 2,000 deployed police separated the crowds.

"There is nothing right about Nazi propaganda," read one sign, while another said "Fascism is not an opinion, it is a crime".

"We are there to tell them to shut up. It is unacceptable for PEGIDA to exploit this horrible sexual violence perpetrated here on New Year's day and to spread their racist nonsense," said Emily Michels, 28.

Half a dozen Iraqi and Syrian refugees were among the counter-demonstration, together with a Jordan-born woman running their local shelter, Dana Khamis.

"I told them the demonstration is about women's rights and against sexism and against facism, and they said they wanted absolutely to be part of it," said Khamis, 27.

Earlier, up to 1,000 women staged a noisy protest carrying signs demanding "No violence against women" and "No means no! It's the law! Stay off of us!", banging pots and blowing whistles outside Cologne's famed Gothic cathedral.

"We want our safety back. We are against all violence against women," said protest organiser Martina Schumeckers, 57, a musician.

"I am standing here for all mothers, daughters, granddaughters, grandmothers, for them all to be able to move around safely, especially in our Cologne."
DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran's foreign minister has complained to the United Nations about Saudi Arabia's "provocations" towards Tehran, as a diplomatic crisis between the region's two major powers entered its second week. In a letter to the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies on Saturday, Mohammad Javad Zarif said "some people" in Riyadh seemed bent on dragging the whole region into crisis. The two powers, both major oil exporters, have been locked in a diplomatic battle since Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr on Jan. 2. Iranian protesters then stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations. Zarif said Iran had "no desire" to escalate tensions further, but offered no compromise as he placed the blame for the crisis, and the wider turmoil across the region, squarely on Saudi shoulders. "They (the Saudis) can continue to support extremist terrorists and promote sectarian hatred, or choose the path of good neighbourliness and play a constructive role in regional security," state news agency IRNA quoted Zarif's letter as saying in Farsi. Zarif said Sunni Saudi Arabia had engaged in a series of "direct provocations" towards Shi'ite Iran, including the execution of Nimr and what he described as "persistent mistreatment" of Iranian pilgrims visiting Mecca. Saudi Arabia says last week's executions were a domestic matter, and that Iran is the country pursuing sectarian division by casting itself as the champion of Arab Shi'ites. Zarif also portrayed Saudi Arabia as a threat to regional and global security in the letter, copies of which were sent to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the foreign ministers of several countries. "Most members of al Qaeda, the Taliban, Islamic State and Nusra Front are Saudi citizens or have been brainwashed by demagogues wielding oil money," IRNA quoted him as writing, in an unusually direct allegation. Saudi Arabia opposes extremist groups: it executed dozens of al Qaeda members last week alongside Nimr, and last month announced an Islamic coalition against terrorism. But the kingdom's ultra conservative Wahhabi clergy, which views Shi'ites as heretical, is a cornerstone of Saudi ruling legitimacy.X Riyadh says around 2,500 Saudis have gone to fight in Syria and Iraq, constituting one of the largest groups of foreign fighters, but only a fraction of the total number estimated to be in the tens of thousands. (Reporting by Sam Wilkin; Editing by Toby Chopra)
Tehran (AFP) - Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei Saturday urged all citizens, including those who do not approve of him, to take part in next month's parliamentary and Assembly of Experts elections.

While the electorate will pick 290 lawmakers on February 26 they will the same day select 88 members for the Assembly, a powerful committee of clerics that monitors the supreme leader's work.

The Assembly has the power to dismiss Khamenei, who is 76 and has led the Islamic republic since 1989, but its more likely and most crucial role will be in picking his successor.

In a speech to thousands in Tehran, Khamenei alluded to his death when drawing attention to the importance of polling day.

"As before, we insist everyone, even those who don't believe in the system and the leadership, come to the ballots, as the election belongs to the nation, and the system," Khamenei said.

The Assembly of Experts is Iran's highest clerical body. Its members, like would-be lawmakers, are heavily screened before the ballot, and Khamenei signalled their significant role.

"That day, when the current leader is not in this world, this committee should choose a leader who holds the key to the movement of this revolution," he said.

"Depending on the composition of the assembly they may choose a leader that stands up to the enemy's attacks, trust in God and continue the path of Imam (Khomeini)," Khamenei said, referring to the founder of the Islamic republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

"Or there is a possibility that they may choose someone with different characteristics as the leader," Khamenei added.

The comments underscored tension between Iran's competing political blocs over the elections and the future direction of the country.

The Islamic republic, formed in 1979, has swayed between conservatives and more moderate and reform-minded politicians since president Mohammad Khatami was elected in 1997.

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During his tenure Khatami, a reformist, and his supporters were backed by the electorate's voting-in of a supportive parliament but many of his planned changes were blocked by the Guardian Council, a conservative-led committee that can veto legislation.

Hassan Rouhani, Iran's current president, is a moderate and his allies are looking to make gains that could overturn the balance of power in a currently conservative-dominated parliament, potentially leading to social and political reforms he promised before being elected in 2013.

After the soon to be implemented deal with world powers on Iran's nuclear programme, Rouhani is seeking to make greater inroads in domestic policy.

However, he has faced criticism from hardline groups about the nuclear deal, with opponents warning it could lead to "infiltration" by the United States and derailment of Iran's revolutionary principles.

The US led the nuclear talks, which also involved Britain, China, France, Russia and Germany, culminating in the July 14 agreement with Iran.
Washington (AFP) - Jeb Bush's US presidential bid is boiling down to early voting New Hampshire, some associates say, while others envision his protracted battle for the Republican nomination stretching deep into the spring.

Either way, supporters and analysts agree it will be difficult for Bush, a former Florida governor and son and brother of two presidents, to emerge as the nominee given American conservatives' current appetite for anti-establishment candidates and the roiling ethno-nationalism of erratic frontrunner Donald Trump.

Bush launched his campaign as the prohibitive favorite, his main hurdle being overcoming foreign policies of his presidential brother George W. Bush.

Jeb's team, and a supporting SuperPAC, a fundraising entity allowed to raise an unlimited amount of money, raked in a stratospheric $100 million in early months.

Today his poll numbers are in single digits and other campaigns appear to count him out.

He is mocked relentlessly by Trump, who tweeted Friday that new figures showing his rival's poor favorability were "not good news for Jeb Bush."

Despite his command of the issues Bush has appeared stiff and frustrated at Republican debates.

In private, according to one major donor and acquaintance, Bush has expressed exasperation at the state of the race, and how a bullying tycoon with a tenuous grasp of foreign policy has commandeered the primaries.

"He's said he can't quite understand this phenomenon," the donor, who spoke under anonymity so he could discuss the campaign more freely, told AFP.

It has been distressing, the donor said, for Bush "to see someone like Trump rewarded for so many intolerant, outrageous, false statements that he says all the time."

With Bush running sixth out of 12 Republicans, averaging 3.3 percent in polls, his campaign reportedly has now cancelled television ads in Iowa, which votes on February 1.

Instead he redeployed many staffers to New Hampshire to blanket the state until the February 9 primary, members of his state leadership team said.

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"I've now come to a recognition that New Hampshire is probably do or die for Jeb," the donor said.

"I never would have thought that," he added. "But he has put so many resources into New Hampshire, it's like he's pushing all the chips into the center of the table."

- 'Volatile' primaries -

Bush is not alone. Fellow establishment candidates like New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and Ohio Governor John Kasich are crowding in for town-hall events as they make their stands in the all-important Granite State.

"It certainly doesn't look wonderful for Jeb Bush," observed Steffen Schmidt, an Iowa State University professor who has analyzed presidential races for 40 years.

"When you were supposed to be the establishment guy and now you're languishing at the bottom of the polls with Mike Huckabee and a bunch of other losers, it's tough."

And yet Schmidt insisted a long-term path exists for Bush beyond Iowa and New Hampshire, provided he does not tank there.

Wins in those early states carry huge psychological boosts, but the primary race is about winning enough overall delegates to earn the nomination.

Schmidt notes that Republicans in several large states like New York, Illinois, Ohio, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, which vote in March and April, and California and New Jersey in June, are more moderate and less likely to support Trump or today's number two candidate, conservative Senator Ted Cruz.

"The Republican establishment is going apoplectic with both Trump and Cruz," Schmidt said.

"If Bush is able to get some momentum and get his act together, he could go long."

That change in dynamic could take several weeks to coalesce, said Schmidt, stressing that Bush's large war chest would prove crucial down the road.

"In California it's not a ground war, it's an air war," he explained. "It's all television, and that's expensive."

New Hampshire state Representative Carlos Gonzalez, a Bush supporter, said he remained optimistic despite the poor polls.

"His game is up to par, and he'll do better than expected," Gonzalez said.

"I wouldn't say it's crunch time, because the whole primary season is very volatile."

Meanwhile he and other observers said Bush's team and SuperPAC Right to Rise ought to hit Trump even harder than they are presently doing.

Of the $99.3 million spend by independent groups on advertising in the campaign cycle up to January 4, 2016, just two percent went to spots attacking Trump, according to a Huffington Post analysis.

Political consultant Stuart Stevens, who strategized for Republican nominee Mitt Romney in 2012, said going negative on Trump is exactly what Bush should have done from the start, instead of making the "terrible mistake" of also attacking establishment rivals.

"There is no shame in losing a presidential race," Stevens told AFP.

"But to run and lose and in the process end up helping the person who most represents everything you oppose in the Republican Party and public life, that would be a tragedy."
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has warned that a Dutch advisory referendum in April on the bloc's association agreement with Ukraine could lead to a "continental crisis" if voters reject the treaty. In an interview published on Saturday by the Dutch daily NRC Handelsblad, Juncker said Russia would "pluck the fruits" of a vote in the Netherlands against deepened ties between the European Union and Ukraine. The April 6 referendum, whose result will be non-binding, was triggered by the raucously anti-European satirical website GeenStijl last year, which collected more than the 300,000 signatures needed under the law to force a vote. The website admitted that its reasons for seeking the referendum, to be held during the current Dutch presidency of the bloc, had less to do with its views on the EU's ties with Ukraine than with its desire for a vote on the bloc itself. "I want the Dutch to understand that the importance of this question goes beyond the Netherlands," NRC quoted Juncker as saying. "I don't believe the Dutch will say no, because it would open the door to a big continental crisis," he added. "Russia would pluck the fruits of an easy victory." A founding signatory of the Treaty of Rome that created the incipient EU in 1957, the Netherlands has cooled on European integration as fears about high immigration, slow growth and economic insecurity have grown. While most Dutch parties are pro-European, the anti-EU, anti-immigration and anti-Muslim Freedom Party of right-wing populist Geert Wilders is leading in polls and would win more seats than the entire Liberal-Labour coalition if elections were held now. But the association agreement, seen as a key step in the process of bringing the one-time Soviet republic out of Russia's orbit and closer to the EU's, could test the forces of anti-EU populism. Russian President Vladimir Putin is an unpopular figure in the Netherlands, where he is widely blamed for the July 2014 downing of Flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine that killed 298 people, two-thirds of them Dutch. Relations between Russia and the West hit a post-Cold War low over Ukraine, where Moscow annexed Crimea from Kiev last year and stands accused by Washington and Brussels of driving a separatist pro-Russian revolt in the east. In November, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said campaigners for a referendum were unwitting pawns of Putin. It is unclear how many signatories of the petition - 430,000 in a nation of 17 million - will turn out to vote. (Reporting By Thomas Escritt; Editing by Tom Heneghan)
Paris (AFP) - Scientists initiated Friday a last-chance manoeuvre to contact a long-silent robot-lab dropped more than a year ago onto the surface of a comet hurtling through our solar system.

Part of the European Space Agency's Rosetta mission, the Philae probe has yielded spectacular scientific results -- and a few moments of high drama -- since its near crash-landing onto comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in November 2014.

But it has been six months since mission control engineers at the German Aerospace Centre in Darmstadt have been in communication with Philae, and the odds of reestablishing contact are diminishing fast as the solar-powered probe speeds away from the Sun.

"The last clear sign of life was received from Philae on July 9, 2015," the German Space Agency said in a statement. "Since then it has remained silent."

Scientists sent a command to the fridge-sized robot to spin up its flywheel, initially used to stabilise the probe when it landed.

The hope is that so doing will "shake dust from its solar panels and better align it with the Sun", explained technical project manager Koen Geurts.

It is also possible, however, that the command -- routed through the Rosetta spacecraft orbiting the comet -- will never even reach Philae.

Several further attempts will be made, he added.

"It's an admittedly desperate move," Philippe Gaudon of the French National Space Agency told AFP. "It is very unlikely the robot will become functional again."

Mission managers believe that one of the lander's two radio transmitters, and one of its two receivers, have both failed. Even the remaining ones may not be fully functional.

The window of opportunity for making contact with Philae will close definitively toward the end of January, when the comet and its companion hardware will be some 300 million kilometres (185 million miles) from the Sun.

That's when the temperature is likely to fall below minus 51 degrees Celsius (minus 60 degrees Fahrenheit), the threshold beyond which Philae can no longer operate.

Story continues

The robot-probe -- packed with nearly a dozen instruments -- landed on 67P after a 10-year, 6.5-billion-kilometre journey piggybacking on mothership Rosetta.

It bounced several times on the craggy surface before ending up at an angle in deep shade, where it sent home some 60 hours of data before going into standby mode on November 15, 2014.

The lander's power pack was recharged as 67P drew closer to the Sun on its elliptical orbit, and Philae woke up on June 13.

After that, it made intermittent contact, uploading data, only to fall silent again on July 9.

The ground-breaking mission was conceived to learn more about the origins of life on Earth.

Comets are pristine leftovers from the Solar System's formation some 4.6 billion years ago. Many experts believe they smashed into our infant planet, providing it with water and the chemical building blocks for life.

Philae has found several organic molecules, including four never before detected on a comet.
Update: Information in this article about the type of bullet casings found has been updated and clarified at 10:34 a.m., Jan. 11, 2016.

A DNA profile taken from a bullet casing could not be discussed at the trial Friday of Patrick Neiss after the sample was found to be contaminated.

Neiss, 44, is charged with deliberate homicide in connection with the death of Frank Trey Greene who was shot to death outside his home in March 2013.

The suspect also faces charges for tampering with evidence for allegedly disposing of the weapon used in Greene's death.

Montana State Crime Lab Administrator Phil Kinsey said a casing found at the shooting scene had a complete DNA profile. But, the crime lab did not have the equipment to make a profile. The lab suggested sending the casing to DNA Labs International in Florida.

The Florida labs alerted the Crime Lab in May 2013 that the casing was somehow contaminated. Kinsey said the lab was not able to determine where the contamination came from and it could have happened in the Montana lab or in Florida.

Kinsey said the Florida lab was still able to create a DNA profile, but because it is unclear where the contamination came from, he couldn't testify as to who's DNA was found on the bullet casing.

Additional crime lab workers testified to Neiss having gunshot residue on his face and hands. There was also testimony that bullet casings found at the scene show similarities with the same weapon as the casings on bullets found around Greene's body. However, the actually bullets did not match any found at Neiss' home.

None of Greene's blood or DNA was found on the clothes Neiss was wearing when officers arrested him on March 8, 2013.

Chief Deputy County Attorney Juli Pierce told Yellowstone County District Court Judge Gregory Todd Friday she had no more witnesses to call for the prosecution.

Neiss' attorneys, Lance Lundvall and Lisa Bazant began their defense of Neiss by calling Yellowstone County Sheriff Deputy Joel Ketch.

Ketch testified briefly about the initial search for a weapon following Neiss' arrest. More defense witnesses are set to testify when the trial resumes Monday.

Greene and Neiss owned adjacent properties in Yellowstone County, west of Billings. Greene lived at 800 Homewood Park Drive, and Neiss lived about two thirds of a mile south on Homewood Park Drive, at 7200 Central Avenue.

Neiss and Greene had several run-ins during 2012. Neiss believed Greene had stolen a motor from him in 2007 while Neiss was in prison, according to court documents.

A woman Neiss was involved with, Amy Glen, said she had heard Neiss make threats in the past against Greene for stealing his motor but didnt believe they were serious threats.

Five .40-caliber shell casings were found around Greene's body as well as two spent bullets. All the bullet casings found were fired from the same gun, according to a report by the Montana State Crime Lab.

No .40 caliber handgun has been found.

Darlene Durand, Neiss' mother, testified many people fired guns on her property over the years.

Durand and Neiss lived together with Neiss' son at the time of Greene's death. Their property had many dilapidated trailers and structures, including a large tank. On the tank, in nine-foot letters, the word "motor" was written facing the direction of Greene's property.

Forensic pathologist Thomas Bennett testified Greene was shot three times, once in the back of the head. Bennett ruled the gunshot wound to the head as the cause of death.

Bennett did not identify any defense wounds on Greene. He also could not determine an accurate time of death.

Neiss was arrested March 8, 2013, at about 11 p.m. but released due to lack of evidence.

Neiss was arrested again in August 2014 and charged. He is being held in the Yellowstone County Detention Facility on a $500,000 bond.
Opponents of leading Democratic presidential contender Hillary Clinton believe they have found (another) smoking gun in the most recent batch of the former Secretary of States emails  this one proving that Clinton directed a member of her staff to have sensitive documents sent over a non-secure system.

Interestingly, while most of the focus of investigations into Clintons handling of classified material has been her use of a personal email system while running the State Department, the most recent eruption appears to be over the use of a non-secure fax machine.

Related: Heres Why the Benghazi Investigation Has Become a Political Sideshow

In emails released late yesterday, Clinton exchanges messages with aide Jake Sullivan in June 2011. The topic is unclear because of redactions, but Clinton is plainly anxious to get her hands on a set of talking points being developed for her.

Youll get tps this eve. Theyre coming together, Sullivan wrote at 5:51 p.m. on June 16.

At 7:52 the next morning, Clinton replied, I didnt get the TPs yet.

Sullivan informs his boss that the Department has had trouble sending the talking points through its system for secure fax messaging.

If they cant, turn into nonpaper w no identifying heading and send nonsecure, Clinton replied.

Related: The Benghazi Investigation Reaches a Dubious Milestone

The reaction among Clinton critics was quick and fierce. On its face, the former Secretary of State appears to be directing her staff to take material that they plainly believed ought to be sent via a secure method, and send it via a method that might make it susceptible to interception by unintended recipients.

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) said in a statement, Once again its clear Hillary Clinton prioritizes her personal convenience over national security. Its as if she thinks the rules just dont apply to her and is hypocrisy of the highest order. Any other federal employee found acting in such a manner would likely have their clearance revoked, employment terminated, and could face prosecution. Instead, Hillary Clinton is in the running for a major promotion. Its likely the more our enemies learn about her disregard for classified material, the more they are hoping she wins the presidency.

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Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA), also in a press release, said,

The State Departments latest Freedom of Information Act release contains a disturbing email that appears to show the former Secretary of State instructing a subordinate to remove the headings from a classified document and send it to her in an unsecure manner. It raises a host of serious questions and underscores the importance of the various inquiries into the transmittal of classified information through her non-government email server. How long has the State Department been aware of this email? Why is it just now being released? Was her instruction actually carried out? If so, has the FBI opened a criminal inquiry into these circumstances? President Obamas State and Justice Departments owe the American people swift and accurate answers to these questions. The former Secretary of State needs to finally come clean and be transparent about the email practices she used during her tenure at the department.

Related: Trump Gives Clinton a Boost as He Takes Aim at Gowdy on Benghazi

However, its not clear that the request was quite the smoking gun Clintons critics think it was. In her email, the former secretary directed staff to turn the talking points into non-paper before sending it through non-secure channels. In the State Department, the term non-paper appears to have a pretty specific meaning.

As about 30 seconds on Google will reveal, the Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual defines non-paper as, A written summary of a demarche or other verbal presentation to a foreign government. The non-paper should be drafted in the third person, and must not be directly attributable to the U.S. Government. It is prepared on plain paper (no letterhead or watermark). The heading or title, if any, is simply a statement of the issue or subject. (For example: Genetically-Modified Organisms.)

If what Clinton was doing in that email was specifying that the talking points were to be turned into an anodyne statement of facts that the department felt comfortable sharing with a foreign government  and that seems pretty likely given the context  its probably a stretch to suggest that the FBI will be opening a criminal inquiry about it anytime soon.

Top Reads from The Fiscal Times:
Oh, so you thought the Oculus Rifts price was too high? Wait until you see the leaked price of Sonys PlayStation VR headset. Forbes on Friday spotted an Amazon price listing for the PlayStation VR headset and it showed the device will cost $800, or more than the price of two PlayStation 4s.

MUST READ: 7 terrific Android apps you wont find on any iPhone

Sony was quick to send Forbes a message saying that it hasnt set any official price for the PlayStation VR yet while saying the price on Amazon was posted in error. Frankly, I find it extremely hard to believe that Sony would really price a product $200 more than its competition, especially when people are already complaining that the first-generation Oculus Rift is too expensive.

At the same time, its really not that surprising that these headsets are so pricey right out the gate. After all, this is brand-new technology and Sony and Facebook are smart enough to know that early adopters are willing to pay extra to get the newest products first, just as the early iPhone adopters did back in 2007. So while I dont think the PlayStation VR will really cost $800, a price in the $600 range isnt out of the question.

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Watch live streaming video of Sony's big CES 2016 press conference right here

Stop the madness: We don't need 4K smartphone displays

Sony's plan to make your phone battery last 40% longer

More from BGR: The 12 most innovative things we saw at CES 2016

This article was originally published on BGR.com
By Ron Bousso LONDON (Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell's bid to acquire BG Group was dealt a blow on Friday when a first major shareholder said it would vote against the $49 billion deal due to a weak outlook for oil prices and risks related to BG's assets in Brazil. Standard Life Investment's announcement came on the same day influential shareholder advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) endorsed the deal, saying the downturn in oil markets did not detract from its strategic benefits. The first public sign of dissent from a key investor was unlikely to scupper Chief Executive Ben van Beurden's drive to win the required shareholder support in a Jan. 27 vote. Few investors or analysts have openly challenged the deal's strategic benefits for Shell, which will become the world's top liquefied natural gas trader and a major offshore oil producer. But with crude oil prices languishing near 12-year lows of around $34 a barrel and forecasts of a slow recovery, investors have raised concerns about the viability of the cash-and-share deal that would increase Shell's debt burden. "We have concluded that the proposed terms of the acquisition of BG are value destructive for Shell shareholders," David Cumming, head of equities at Standard Life Investments, said in a statement. "This view is based on the downside risks to Shell's oil price assumptions plus the tax and operational risks surrounding BG's Brazilian asset base. Consequently we shall vote against the deal." A purchase of BG will increase Shell's exposure to risks in Brazil which is suffering its worse recession in decades. It will also bring Shell into closer partnership with Petroleo Brasileiro SA , or Petrobras. The state owned oil company is in the middle of a giant price-fixing, bribery and political kick-back scandal. Its nearly $130 billion of debt is also the largest of any oil company in the world and it faces increasing difficulty paying for massive offshore investments, many of them with BG. Standard Life is the 11th largest holder of Shell's B shares with a 1.7 percent stake. Shell B shares make up the share component in the cash-and-share acquisition that is expected to be completed on Feb. 15. COMPELLING RATIONALE ISS, which advises around 5 percent of Shell's medium and small shareholders, said they supported the deal "given the compelling strategic rationale, and the significant positive economics to be realised within a relatively short time frame." The current low oil price "may be of very little value in assessing the strategic opportunity of a transaction whose benefits will be realised over decades," ISS said in a report. Shell remained confident of winning the vote. "We continue to believe we have the broad base of shareholder support we need for the deal to complete," a Shell spokesman said. Guy Jubb, head of governance at Standard Life Investments, urged Shell to renegotiate the deal, announced last April. On Wednesday, Chief Financial Officer Simon Henry told analysts Shell had conducted stress tests that showed it could withstand oil at $50 a barrel over the next two years, its lowest estimate to date as it seeks to secure shareholder support, sources told Reuters. To weather such an environment, Shell plans to cut capital spending further below the planned $33 billion for 2016, delay share buybacks and extend scrip dividends, where investors are offered discounted shares instead of cash, Henry told analysts. ISS said that the combination would allow Shell to replenish oil and gas reserves, lower production costs and ensure dividend cover "at what seems an opportunistic point" due to BG's financial profile and the oil market's cycle. "There is credible evidence... that the price Shell is paying is reasonable even considering the decline in oil prices and oil stocks since the deal was announced." Royal Dutch Shell B shares were down 5.9 percent at 1757 GMT, compared with a 3.65 percent decline for the broader sector index. <.SXEP> (Reporting by Karolin Schaps; Editing by Alexander Smith, Adrian Croft and Bernard Orr)
Las Vegas (AFP) - John McAfee, the antivirus software pioneer and onetime international fugitive who is running for US president, said Friday he was shifting his campaign to the Libertarian Party.

McAfee made the announcement as he unveiled a cybersecurity platform and told reporters he was running for president to highlight the need for better cyber protections.

"We need a dedicated force of hackers focused on national security," McAfee said on the floor of the Consumer Electronics Show, where he was promoting a new mobile security product on which he is collaborating.

He said the United States is in danger "because we are decades behind the Russians and Chinese in weaponized software," while also highlighting the need to improve cyber weapons to counter threats from those countries.

"You can't just have defensive weapons in this world. You have to say, 'You push a button, we'll push a button.'"

The creator of the McAfee antivirus software in September announced his presidential run as part of his own "Cyber Party."

He said Friday that shifting to the Libertarian Party would make it easier to be on the ballot in all 50 states and he believes he is philosophically aligned with the party.

"I was a Libertarian before the word was coined," he said.

"I think the government is too large. I think people should be free to live their own lifestyles without interference from government."

McAfee, who on his own Twitter page refers to himself as an "eccentric millionaire," amassed an estimated $100 million fortune during the early days of the Internet in the 1990s, designing the pioneering anti-virus software that bears his name and which is now owned by Intel.

After cashing out, he became an intrepid adventure-seeker, arriving in Belize in 2009 after losing most of his fortune to bad investments and the financial crisis.

McAfee was briefly incarcerated in that country after police found him living with a 17-year-old girl and discovered an arsenal of seven pump-action shotguns, one single-action shotgun, and two 9-millimeter pistols.

He was living in Belize when police came looking for him to discuss the murder of his neighbor -- a crime for which he maintains his innocence.
Seoul (AFP) - North Korea has defended its latest nuclear test, citing the fate of two toppled Middle East leaders, while flexing its military muscle by showing TV footage of a submarine-launched missile test.

A commentary published by the official KCNA news agency late Friday said the fate of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Moamer Kadhafi in Libya showed what happened when countries forsake their nuclear weapon ambitions.

It also warned South Korea, which resumed high-decibel propaganda broadcasts across the inter-Korean border in response to Wednesday's test, that its actions were driving the divided peninsula to "the brink of war".

The commentary said Pyongyang's fourth nuclear test was a "great event" that provided North Korea with a deterrent powerful enough to secure its borders against all hostile forces, including the United States.

"History proves that powerful nuclear deterrence serves as the strongest treasured sword for frustrating outsiders' aggression," it said.

North Korea said the test was of a miniaturised hydrogen bomb -- a claim largely dismissed by experts who argue the yield was far too low for a full-fledged thermonuclear device.

"The Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq and the Kadhafi regime in Libya could not escape the fate of destruction after being deprived of their foundations for nuclear development and giving up nuclear programmes of their own accord," the commentary said.

Both had made the mistake, the commentary argued, of yielding to Western pressure led by a United States bent on regime change.

Asking North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons was as pointless as "wishing to see the sky fall", it said, adding that the entire country was proud of its "H-bomb of justice".

- 'Playing with fire' -

In addition to the KCNA commentary, the state Korean Central TV late Friday released video footage of a purportedly new submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) test.

Story continues

But South Korean media suggested the footage was an edited compilation of the North's third SLBM test, conducted last month in the Sea of Japan, and a different ballistic missile test from 2014.

The undated footage shows leader Kim Jong-Un, on board a military vessel in a winter coat and a fedora hat, looking on as a missile is launched vertically from underwater and ignites in mid air.

The video then cuts to a rocket flying through the clouds, suggesting the missile was able to reach such altitudes.

But South Korean media said the images of a rocket rising through the clouds were in fact taken from footage of a SCUD missile test broadcast in 2014.

North Korea first announced in May that it had conducted a successful SLBM test, a claim accompanied by pictures of Kim pointing at the missile as it blasted out of the water at a 45-degree angle.

A second SLBM test was carried out off the southeastern port of Wonsan in November but this was apparently a failure as only debris from its casing was seen in the sea and no traces of the flight were detected.

South Korean military officials say the North is continuing to actively pursue the development of SLBMs, which would take its nuclear threat to a new level.

The defiant message and video footage came as the international community scrambled to respond to North Korea's latest test.

While UN Security Council members discuss possible sanctions, world leaders have sought to build a consensus on how best to penalise leader Kim Jong-Un's maverick state.

South Korea on Thursday took unilateral action by switching on giant banks of speakers on the border and blasting a mix of propaganda and K-pop into North Korea.

The same tactic, employed during a dangerous flare-up in cross-border tensions last year, had seen an infuriated Pyongyang threaten artillery strikes against the loudspeaker units unless they were switched off.

At a mass rally held Friday in Pyongyang' Kim Il-Sung square to celebrate the test, senior North Korean ruling party official Kim Ki-Nam said Seoul was once again playing with fire.

"The United States and its puppets have wasted no time in driving the situation on the peninsula to the brink of war, resuming their psychological warfare broadcast," Kim said.
Beirut (AFP) - Russian air strikes Saturday on an Al-Qaeda run prison in Syria killed nearly 60 people, a monitor said, as aid needed in three besieged towns where people are reportedly starving was delayed.

The bloodshed came as UN envoy Staffan de Mistura met in Damascus with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem to prepare for peace talks between the government and the opposition.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the air raids that hit a building near a popular market in the northwestern Idlib town of Maarat al-Numan killed 21 civilians, 29 militants and seven detainees.

Thirty people were wounded, with many in critical condition.

The building houses a jail and a religious court run by Al-Nusra Front, Al-Qaeda's affiliate in Syria, said the Britain-based Observatory which relies on a network of sources in the ground.

A child and two women were among the civilians who died, while 23 Nusra fighters were among the militants killed.

Russian warplanes have been conducting strikes against the Islamic State organisation and other "terrorist" groups in Syria since September 30.

Although Al-Nusra and IS are both jihadist organisations, they are fierce rivals and regularly clash in Syria.

But Al-Nusra has formed an alliance -- dubbed the Army of Conquest -- with other rebel groups in Idlib, including the hardline Ahrar al-Sham.

Aid deliveries to Madaya, a town near Damascus surrounded by the army, and to Fuaa and Kafraya which are encircled by rebels in Idlib province had been expected Sunday.

But the Red Cross said the much-needed supplies cannot be delivered before Monday due to logistical problems.

- 'Logistical issues' -

"The distribution of aid will not take place on Sunday for logistical reasons; we are working hard for it to take place on Monday," said Pawel Krzysiek, spokesman in Damascus of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Tamam Mehrez of the Syrian Red Crescent had said "technically we are ready to begin distribution as early as Sunday, but if there are logistical issues it will be Monday at the latest".

Story continues

Madaya, home to 42,000 people, has become notorious in recent days because of people starving in the town.

It has been surrounded by regime troops for six months.

The Syrian government agreed Thursday to allow aid into Madaya as part of a deal that will see aid simultaneously reach 20,000 people trapped in Fuaa and Kafraya.

According to Doctors Without Borders, at least 23 people have starved to death since December 1 in Madaya.

The UN Security Council is to discuss the matter behind closed doors on Monday, although no decision is expected.

More than 260,000 people have been killed since the Syrian conflict erupted in March 2011 and millions have been forced from their homes but a solution to end the bloodshed has been hard to nail.

The UN envoy has been on a regional tour to shore up support for peace talks due to take place in Geneva on January 25 between the Syrian government and its opponents.

The talks are the first step in an ambitious 18-month plan, endorsed by the UN, to bring about a political transition in Syria.

After talks in Riyadh this week, De Mistura met Muallem in Damascus on Saturday and is next planning on visiting Tehran.

De Mistura's office said the envoy had a "useful" meeting with the Syrian foreign minister.

Muallem has confirmed his government would take part in the Geneva talks but was still waiting to receive the names of opposition figures who would also attend, the official SANA news agency said.
Dubai (AFP) - The next round of peace talks between Yemen's government and Iran-backed Huthi rebels scheduled for next week have been postponed, Foreign Minister Abdel Malak al-Mekhlafi said Saturday.

"The negotiations will not take place on the announced date of January 14," Mekhlafi said on the phone from Cairo.

"They will be postponed until January 20 or 23 because the Huthis rejected the date of January 14."

He said UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed would travel to the capital Sanaa on Sunday to "convince the Huthis to participate in the negotiations on the new dates".

The envoy would also seek "confidence-building measures" from the Huthis, including the lifting of their siege of Taez and allowing aid into the southwestern city, he added.

The next round of peace talks would be held in Geneva, said the Yemeni minister.

Yemen's government sat down with the rebels and their allies in Switzerland last month for six days of talks that ended with no major breakthrough.

A halt to the violence is sorely needed in the Arabian Peninsula's poorest nation, where the UN says fighting since March has killed thousands of people and left about 80 percent of the population needing humanitarian aid.
CASPER, Wyo.  A Riverton man who previously admitted to shooting two American Indian men was sentenced to life in prison Thursday.

A judge sentenced Roy Clyde to life in prison without the possibility of parole for shooting and killing 29-year-old Stallone Trosper in July while he slept at a detox center, said Fremont County and Prosecuting Attorney Patrick LeBrun.

Clyde, 32, received a second life sentence for the attempted murder of 50-year-old James "Sonny" Goggles, who was critically injured when Clyde shot him at the center.

LeBrun said he was satisfied with the outcome of Clydes case, because it guarantees that hell spend the rest of his life in prison.

Clyde pleaded guilty to the shootings in October as part of an agreement that spared him the death penalty, according to a report by the Associated Press.

Clyde is a former parks worker for the city of Riverton, which lies on the border of the Wind River Indian Reservation. He walked into the Center of Hope detox center on July 18 and shot both men, who were sleeping at the time.

According to witness accounts, Clyde then unloaded his pistol, walked outside and took off his shirt, then waited for police with his hands held high.

Trosper and Goggles are members of the Northern Arapaho Tribe. The shootings have outraged tribal leaders, who have called for a federal hate crimes investigation.

Victims' relatives were upset after Clyde pleaded guilty. Under questioning of his lawyer, Clyde said he was targeting transients regardless of their race  not specifically looking to kill American Indians, according to the AP.

Despite Clyde's denial, victims' relatives said after the hearing that they strongly believe Clyde targeted the men because they were American Indians.

Family members of both victims spoke at Clydes sentencing hearing on Thursday. Only Clydes defense attorney and Clyde himself spoke on his behalf.
NIAMEY (Reuters) - Niger's constitutional court on Saturday approved 15 candidates for a presidential vote next month, including key opponent Hama Amadou, who was imprisoned two months ago upon return from a year-long exile. The constitutional court's ruling is likely to increase pressure on Niger's government to free Amadou, seen as one of three leading contenders in the Feb. 21 battle for leadership of the impoverished, uranium-producing West African country. Niger authorities arrested Amadou, a former speaker of the national assembly, in November in connection with a probe into a ring of elites accused of obtaining newborns from "baby factories" in neighbouring Nigeria. Amadou says the charges are politically motivated amid what President Mahamadou Issoufou's opponents call a broader wave of repression ahead of the vote. "We welcome this decision which proves that our county is making progress consolidating the rule of law, thereby reinforcing democracy," said Malam Mahamane Sani, spokesman for Amadou's Moden party. He added that judicial authorities are due to rule on Amadou's appeal for a provisional release on January 11. Issoufou and former prime minister Seyni Oumarou, the candidate of the main opposition party, were also authorised to stand in the February vote. Legislative elections are due the same day. Issoufou, a key Western ally in the fight against Islamist extremism in the fragile Sahara region, is seen as the overall favourite to win next month. In the last election in 2011, Amadou placed third in the first round and then threw his support behind Issoufou in the second to help him win the presidency, although rifts emerged between them after his inauguration. Oumarou placed second. Some recent sources of tensions between the government and opposition appear to have been resolved, raising optimism that Niger will follow neighbours Burkina Faso and Nigeria which held peaceful elections last year. Niger completed changes to its electoral register recommended by the International Organisation of the Francophonie (OIF), the body said on Thursday. (Reporting by Abdoulaye Massalaki; Writing by Emma Farge; Editing by Tom Heneghan)
New York (AFP) - A New York police officer was shot and wounded while breaking up a street fight, Police Commissioner William Bratton and Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a rare pre-dawn press conference Saturday.

The shooting comes amid heightened security -- and paranoia -- following attacks in California and Paris, and one day after a man claiming allegiance to the Islamic State group shot and wounded a police officer in Philadelphia.

Although neither Bratton nor de Blasio addressed the issue, it was clear that the New York shooting was unrelated to terrorism.

Bratton said that around 2:10 am (0710 GMT) a plain clothes police officer in the Bronx borough was shot and wounded "in exchange of gunfire with a suspect."

The 25 year-old officer, identified as Rod Stewart, had responded with his partner to "numerous 911 calls reporting a large fight in the street with gun, bats and knives", Bratton said.

A fight had broken out at "a large jump up party with 100 to 200 people," and the fracas spilled into the street.

As back-up units arrived "officers engaged in a gunfight in which police officer Stewart was struck in the right ankle," Bratton said. The officer returned gunfire, "striking the male suspect four times."

Stewart was rushed to the hospital, where he was reported in stable condition. Five victims stabbed in the initial fight were also hospitalized, Bratton said.

Police said they arrested a 19-year-old, who has a history of arrests, in connection with the shooting.

Mayor De Blasio said he visited Stewart in the hospital, and declared that the officer was "an impressive young man" who had "distinguished himself."
By Katy Migiro NAIROBI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Kenyans called for swift action after a man appeared in court on Friday accused of stabbing his wife in the face with a 10-inch blade which had to be removed by surgeons, amid fears she might refuse to testify against him. The case has stirred outrage with the victim's name trending on Twitter in the East African country where violence against women is common but perpetrators often go unpunished. Photos of the woman in hospital with the handle of the knife protruding from her right cheek and of an x-ray, showing the blade passing from one side of her skull to the other, circulated on social media with calls for #JusticeforFatuma. "Women should demonstrate to show their solidarity," Luttah Night said on Twitter. "That case should move fast." Almost half of Kenyan women who have ever been married have been physically abused by their husbands, according to government data from 2008/9. Victims rarely seek redress due to social pressure and a lack of faith in the judicial system. Mohamed Deeq denied stabbing his wife, Fatuma Ibrahim, during a domestic quarrel when he appeared in court in Wajir in northeastern Kenya on Friday, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) said in a statement on Twitter. Deeq is being held at Wajir police station and will be charged on Jan. 13, Nicholas Mutuku, acting deputy DPP, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Photographs on social media showed Mutuku visiting the victim in a Nairobi hospital, where she was airlifted to on Thursday to have the blade removed from her face. It is not clear whether Ibrahim, a mother of four, will testify against her husband. One women's rights campaigner expressed fear that the matter could be settled using maslaha, a traditional form of Islamic law where cases are settled by religious leaders, usually with compensation. "If her people come and say: They have said sorry and they have paid us ten camels, the chances of her standing against the whole community... to go to court and testify against her husband are quite slim," said Teresa Omondi-Adeitan, deputy director of the Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA). Kenyan courts can rule not to withdraw charges if cases are deemed to be in the public interest. "When they (the DPP) go ahead and charge him, it doesn't matter if the wife decides she is going to retract because this matter now is in the hands of the state," said Kavinya Makau of the women's rights group Equality Now. Kenya's parliament deleted sections of a bill providing public funding for shelters for victims of domestic violence last year before passing it into law. (Reporting by Katy Migiro; Editing by Ros Russell)
Berlin (AFP) - A man who tried to attack a Paris police station last week had lived in a centre for asylum seekers in Germany, German investigators said, a finding likely to fuel criticism of Chancellor Angela Merkel's liberal stance towards war refugees.

The man was shot dead by French police on Thursday after he tried to storm the police station in northern Paris, brandishing a meat cleaver and wearing a fake suicide vest.

The assault took place exactly one year since the start of a series of jihadist attacks in France, beginning with the murder of 12 people at the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine on January 7 2015.

On Saturday, German investigators assisting the probe into the attempted police station attack raided an apartment at a shelter for asylum-seekers in Recklinghausen, in the west of the country.

Their statement said the man had lived at the shelter but gave no further details. No other attacks appeared to have been planned, it added.

A source close to the matter told AFP that the suspect had been registered as an asylum seeker.

But French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve cast doubt on the German claim.

"I cannot confirm this, quite simply because I am not at all sure that it is correct," Cazeneuve told France's iTele, and called on the media to exercise the "greatest care" in reporting the man's identity.

- 'IS flag and symbol' -

The news site Spiegel Online reported, meanwhile, that the man had already been classed by German police as a possible suspect after he posed at the refugee centre with an IS flag, but he disappeared in December.

The head of North Rhine-Westphalia's criminal police service, Uwe Jacob said the suspect had travelled to Germany in 2013 for the first time from France, where he had lived illegally previously for five years.

He had gone under seven different identities and given at least three nationalities on separate occasions - Syrian, Moroccan or Georgian, Jacob said, according to national news agency DPA.

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"We are not sure who he really was," said Jacob, adding that the man had already been imprisoned on several occasions for offences relating to illegal arms possession, drug trafficking and assault.

Welt am Sonntag said the man had drawn a symbol of the Islamic State organisation on the shelter's wall and had filed for asylum using the name Walid Salihi.

But French investigators said Friday the suspect appeared to have been identified by his family and was said to be a Tunisian named Tarek Belgacem.

Paris prosecutor Francois Molins had said the man was carrying a mobile phone with a German SIM card, with French media reporting that it contained several messages in Arabic, some of which were sent from Germany.

In Tunisia, a woman who claimed to be the man's mother confirmed that he had been living in Germany but denied he had any links to extremist groups.

She told a Tunisian radio station that her son had rung her to ask her "to send him his birth certificate. He was in Germany."

The link to the refugee shelter in Germany, and the apparent ease with which the subject was able to register with the authorities, risks further inflaming a debate over the 1.1 million asylum-seekers that the country took in last year.

Mindful of the political sensitivity surrounding the issue, Recklinghausen's mayor Christoph Tesche said it remains "our humanitarian and legal duty to provide shelter for those who flee their homes".

But it was also equally important to work "intensively with relevant authorities to ensure that people with such intentions cannot hide in our institutions," he stressed.

Tensions were already running high after a spate of sexual assaults and thefts during New Year's Eve festivities in the western city of Cologne, with police saying suspects of the crime spree were mostly asylum seekers and migrants.

Cologne police said Saturday they had recorded 379 cases of New Year violence in Cologne, as far-right protests erupted in the western city against the assaults.

Hamburg police said separately that they had received 133 similar complaints allegedly committed on the same night at celebrations there.

The latest link to the attacker in France risks fanning fears that would-be attackers are slipping into Europe's biggest economy amid a record refugee influx.

Such concerns were already raised when it emerged that two of the suicide bombers in the November 13 attacks in Paris were carrying passports that had been registered as they arrived on a Greek island with a group of migrants in October.

However, French investigators are not convinced that the two men, who blew themselves up near the Stade de France stadium, were the men in the passports.
Scientology had an eventful 2015, thanks to Alex Gibney's groundbreaking documentary Going Clear, but the creator of Hulu's new religious drama The Path insists her series has no ties to the controversial, Hollywood-friendly organization.

"The Internet is full of misinformation," writer and executive producer Jessica Goldberg told reporters at the Television Critics Association's winter press tour. Instead, Goldberg and the writers purposefully strove to "invent" her own ideal faith. "It wouldnt allow us the same sort of storytelling opportunities if we put it into something that already existed." she said.

The Path tells the story of a family at the center of a controversial faith-based movement struggling with relationships, marriage and power. Each hourlong episode will take an in-depth look at what it means to choose between the life we live and the life we want.

Goldberg also denied reports that she herself practices a religion similar to Scientology. "I'm a faith-interested person, but I dont follow anything," she said. "This show really came out of a more personal experience for me." In addition to growing up in Woodstock, N.Y., which she said was home to lots of "seekers" and "new crystal-y religions," Goldberg placed more emphasis on the "double whammy" of losing a parent and getting a divorce in the same year when it felt like "the frame for my life had crumbled."

She added: "Our goal is to look at both sides of religion  where it brings comfort and then also where it when you against the grain of the faith, that does provide cynicism.  There's also great comfort to be taken in having a frame for your life, and I think that is something a lot of us are seeking."

Read More: TV Premiere Dates 2016: The Complete Guide

That conflict is demonstrated in the couple at the center of the series, devoted follower Sarah (Michelle Monaghan) and her more conflicted husband, Eddie (Aaron Paul). The Path marks Paul's return to TV after his Emmy-winning run on Breaking Bad.

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"I wasn't really looking into jumping back into TV this quickly, but my reps called and said, 'You must read these first two episodes.' I read them and I just could not ignore the material. It was just so gripping, so beautifully written and well done," the actor said. "I just fell in love."

This marks the second religious series for Paul, who previously recurred on HBO polygamy drama Big Love before his breakthrough on Breaking Bad. "I find religion sort of fascinating," he said. "There's an endless amount of religions out there and everyone, as humans, [are] just desperately trying to find their questions to be answered."

Paul's interest in the subject comes as no surprise, given his family background and specifically his father, who is a Southern Baptist minister. "I had to read the Bible multiple times. I know the scripture. I am definitely drawn to that sort of story. When I read this, I was just blown away," he said. "[My character] is having some sort of doubt in the pilot episode, you come to realize, and so he's really searching for his questions to be answered and trying to find the truth."

In stark contrast to Eddie is Hugh Dancy's character. The actor, fresh off the acclaimed NBC series Hannibal, which was canceled in June, plays Cal Roberts, the charismatic face of the movement who struggles with personal demons as he attempts to take the organization into its next generation.

"I think, on the surface, he's having an easier time of it than [Hannibal's] Will," Dancy said when asked about comparisons between his characters on The Path and his previous show. "I love what I do, and in both cases I have loved the environment that I find myself in and the people I work with.  Tough, strange, messed-up scenes are all the better because I got to do them with these guys. The same is true for Hannibal."

Added Dancy: "I also like playing people who are a little more complicated."

The Path premieres March 30 on Hulu.

>>>>>>>
Caracas (AFP) - Venezuela plunged into a confusing political deadlock this week, as the opposition took control of the country's legislature but the socialist government vowed to block its reforms.

Here is an analysis of the different players in the institutional standoff, their strategic positions, and hazards in the recession-hit, oil-producing state.

- Government -

After 17 years in control, President Nicolas Maduro's socialist PSUV party has lost the National Assembly legislature to the center-right opposition, which is vowing to get rid of him and reform the economy.

But Maduro is seen as holding sway over the Supreme Court, where a legal battle is likely to play out. His side has applied to it to annul the assembly's reforms.

"The government has chosen the path of outright confrontation, raising once again the prospect of serious political violence," wrote Phil Gunson, an analyst with the International Crisis Group.

Meanwhile skeptics say Maduro's appointment of socialist hardliners to economic posts in a cabinet reshuffle this week bodes ill for change.

- Military -

The military could hold the key to resolving deadlock in a country prone to unrest.

The defense minister and head of the armed forces, General Vladimir Padrino, pledged the military's "absolute loyalty and unconditional support" for Maduro.

"The armed forces is a complex institution and its behavior in the event of a political crisis of such scale is difficult to predict," said Diego Moya-Ocampos, a London-based Venezuelan analyst with research group IHS Country Risk.

"The armed forces will play a key role behind the scenes. Crucially they will prevent any confrontation between Venezuelans or between pro-government and opposition groups."

- Opposition -

The opposition coalition MUD swore in a two-thirds majority in the assembly after winning December's elections.

However Maduro supporters say that "supermajority" -- which is large enough to give the opposition the power to launch constitutional measures to oust the president -- is not legitimate.

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Their claim is based on the fact that the Supreme Court has suspended three opposition lawmakers pending allegations of electoral fraud.

"The institutional crisis between the government and the legislature will escalate further as the MUD and the PSUV struggle to control the Supreme Court," said Moya-Ocampos.

He said the deadlock will likely cause instability and a worsening of economic hardship for ordinary Venezuelans.

- Venezuelan people -

December's vote was widely seen as punishment for the government by an electorate fed up with economic chaos.

"People are hoping their problems will be solved, but if the days go by and things go on like this, social tension will be exacerbated," said Asdrubal Oliveros, of Venezuelan research group Ecoanalitica.

The plunging price of oil has hit Venezuela's foreign revenues.

Venezuelans are having to queue for hours to buy rations of cooking oil, toilet paper and other basics.

Domestic worker Gilma Vasquez said she voted to "end the queues." But in the current deadlock, she says, "I am afraid that nothing will change."

- International community -

The United States and Venezuela's Latin American neighbors are watching closely.

Before the elections the United Nations expressed concern for jailed opposition leaders and the independence of the judiciary.

Long at odds with Maduro and his predecessor Hugo Chavez, Washington has called for a "transparent" resolution.

Maduro's Venezuelan Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez rejected that as "interference."

The Organization of American States called for "dialogue and peace." Its leader Luis Almagro warned Maduro against "distorting the voice of the people" after the vote.

"The fact that the opposition was able to achieve a peaceful, democratic change of leadership in the Venezuelan parliament may suggest there is light at the end of the country's tunnel," wrote Gunson.

"But for now no one can be sure it is not the headlight of an oncoming train."
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi praised the country's security forces on a visit to Pathankot air force base Saturday, one week after a militant attack left seven soldiers dead.

The premier flew to the base in northern Punjab state to conduct an aerial survey of the area near the Pakistan border, following the strike by gunmen whom officials suspect belonged to the banned Pakistan-based group Jaish-e-Mohammed.

It follows criticism from the Congress opposition of what it called a "grave security lapse" that allowed heavily armed militants to infiltrate the strategically important base, triggering two days of gun battles.

"Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response," Modi posted on Twitter after the visit, which included a briefing by top army and air force officials.

"Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride," he tweeted.

Security forces on Friday said they had finally sanitised the sprawling installation after a lengthy search operation, the Press Trust of India reported.

Modi called on Pakistan earlier in the week to take action against those behind the attack, in which six militants also died.

The PM's office said Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had given assurances that his government would take "prompt and decisive action".

The attack on Pathankot came just days after a landmark visit to Pakistan by the Indian premier raised hopes of improved relations between the nuclear-armed arch rivals.

Jaish-e-Mohammed staged a 2001 attack on the Indian parliament which brought the two countries to the brink of war.

The Pathankot attack coincided with a 25-hour siege near an Indian consulate in Afghanistan that left at least one policeman dead and 11 others wounded.
DUBAI (Reuters) - An Iranian poet who backed a reformist candidate in 2009's disputed presidential election has been detained amid a crackdown on artists and activists, a U.S.-based rights group said. The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran (ICHRI) said late on Friday that Hila Sedighi had been arrested at Tehran's Imam Khomeini Airport on Jan. 7 as she returned from the United Arab Emirates. Dozens of journalists, activists and artists have been arrested on charges such as "propaganda" since October in an apparent crackdown on free expression and dissent ahead of next month's election to parliament and the assembly that will choose Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's successor. Iranian officials have not commented on Sedighi's case. The ICHRI said her arrest was likely linked to an earlier suspended jail sentence she received in 2011 for her activism two years earlier. Sedighi was an active supporter of reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi in the 2009 presidential election. After hardline incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was returned to office, demonstrators took to the streets claiming the election was fraudulent, and Sedighi recited poetry at the protests. The hardline Revolutionary Guards and judiciary cracked down on the protests and placed Mousavi under house arrest, alongside fellow candidate Mehdi Karroubi, where they both remain. Conservative factions describe the events of 2009 as "sedition". Khamenei on Saturday said the protests were an "unsuccessful coup d'etat" orchestrated by Iran's enemies abroad. Sedighi was awarded the Hellman/Hammett prize for free expression by Human Rights Watch in 2012. Another Iranian recipient of that prize, journalist Isa Saharkhiz, was arrested in November. (Reporting by Sam Wilkin; Editing by Helen Popper)
The Montana Farm Bureau is protesting the federal decision to let bison feed on public grazing land in Central Montana.

The states largest agriculture group says allowing bison to graze on the 13,000-acre Flat Creek Allotment is a step toward establishing a wild bison herd in Montana, according to Bob Hanson, Montana Farm Bureau Federation president.

At issue is a request by the American Prairie Reserve to remove external fencing on the allotment to accommodate its bison. APR is a Bozeman-based wildlife group, which has for several years been buying private ranch land in Central Montana to create a private wildlife reserve for Bison.

APR already leases the Flat Creek Allotment, which was associated to one of the ranch properties purchased by the group. Cattle have been grazing the land.

The Bureau of Land Management announced the switch from cattle to bison recently, along with approval of removing fencing on the property to control grazing. BLM spokesman Al Nash said the AUMs, meaning the animal unit measurement that determines how much grass livestock are taking off the land, are no different after the switch to bison.

The American Prairie Reserve has the grazing rights on this particular piece of land already, Nash said. Their proposal was to move to year-round grazing of some bison instead, but AUMs are essentially equivalent.

APRs Hilary Parker said the request to take the interior fences down on the lease land was to accommodate the way bison graze. Bison roam farther from their water source than cattle.

The changes to the Flat Creek Allotment are not a step toward free-roaming bison, Parker said. The animals are managed as livestock. That doesnt mean the group wouldnt consider a free-roaming bison plan in the future if the state proposed one.

If the state decides it wants wild bison in that area, we would consider taking the fences down and would consider allowing those bison to go under state management, Parker said.

Two other grazing leases are amended to accommodate APR bison without incident. The first was the 12,000-plus-acre Telegraph Creek Allotment in 2005. The second was the 6,500-acre Box Elder Allotment in 2008.

Montana has considered establishing a free-roaming bison herd, but hasnt taken any action.

Whether APR participated with a state plan would depend on what Montana had in mind. APRs goal is to create a herd of 10,000 bison. The organization currently has more than 300,000 acres but has a goal of more than 2 million.

Its herd is somewhere in the range of 600 animals, the third largest herd in the nation.
SALTA, Argentina, Jan 9 (Reuters) - A Bolivian spectator was killed at the Dakar Rally on Saturday when he was hit by a Mitsubishi driven by Frenchman Lionel Baud during the seventh stage from Bolivia to Argentina, organisers said. "The organisation's medical service could only confirm, unfortunately, the death of the person involved (in the accident)," they said in a statement after the stage from Uyumi in Bolivia to Salta in northwest Argentina. Reports said the 63-year-old man was hit at the 82km mark of the stage. It was the 64th death in the history of the annual endurance race since 1979, which has included 23 competitors killed, and the sixth since it was moved from Africa to South America in 2009 for security reasons. The prologue stage to this year's event in Argentina was also marred by an accident when a Mini driven by Chinese Guo Meiling went into the crowd and injured eight spectators including three children and a pregnant woman. The Dakar Rally started out as a gruelling race from Paris across the Sahara to the Senegalese capital Dakar and remains one of the most formidable challenges in motorsport. (Reporting by Luis Ampuero in Buenos Aires; Writing by Rex Gowar, editing by Alan Baldwin)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Rep. Carolyn Maloney of New York is working on legislation to address the near-absence of women from corporate boardrooms and hopes to introduce it in the U.S. Congress next month. If it becomes law, companies would have to disclose the gender composition of their boards of directors, as well as policies and strategies related to gender diversity on their boards, she told Reuters in an interview on Friday. The legislation would be modeled after policies in Canada and Australia, she added. Maloney, a Democrat, said she plans to consult with women's groups, business organizations and other stakeholders on her draft at the end of January and soon after introduce it in the House of Representatives. Currently, there is little clear data on women in the top echelon of business leadership, which makes creating changes difficult, Maloney said. Mary Jo White, head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, called in November for more gender parity on boards, saying that 17.5 percent of the boards of Fortune 1000 companies are women, as are 19.2 percent of those of S&P 500 companies. Last spring, a collection of large public pension funds, including the California Public Employees Retirement System, asked the SEC to create new disclosures on board nominees' gender, racial, and ethnic diversity, as well as their professional backgrounds. Maloney, who represents a district that includes Manhattan, home to numerous corporate boards, said she has heard for years from constituents about low female board membership. The Government Accountability Office recently released a report showing it could take more than 40 years for boards to achieve parity if equal numbers of women and men joined each year, beginning in 2015. If only women filled vacancies, it would take until 2024 to reach parity, according to the study. "This slow turnover and the slow movement forward is concerning," said Maloney. "If I had a daughter born today she would be facing the same discrimination and challenges I faced." (Reporting by Lisa Lambert; Editing by Dan Grebler)
By Mark Hosenball and Julia Harte

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two Texas politicians made public details of an investigation into a terrorism suspect while it was still in progress, potentially jeopardizing the inquiry, three sources familiar with the matter said on Friday.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick released statements on Thursday with details about the case contained in documents that were still under court seal, the sources said.

Abbott was briefed on the case by the Texas Department of Public Safety, but was not informed that it was under seal, said Abbott's spokesman, John Wittman. The department, in an emailed statement, said it "does not discuss matters related to ongoing investigations."

Patrick declined to comment.

The statements from the two Texas Republicans concerned the arrest of Omar Faraj Saeed al-Hardan, 24, an Iraqi refugee who is accused of providing material support to Islamic State overseas.

Abbott provided his statement in response to a later inquiry from a reporter, Wittman said.

The U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday released a statement about two hours after Abbotts statement was released.

In his statement, Abbott urged Democratic President Barack Obama to halt the resettlement program of Syrian refugees so they can all be vetted to ensure they "do not compromise the safety of Americans and Texans."

Republicans widely oppose Obama's plan to allow 10,000 Syrian refugees into the country, arguing that they pose a security risk to the United States. The Obama administration has rejected that assertion.

Hardan, who appeared in court on Friday, entered the United States in November 2009 and lived in Houston, according to a court document.

Other Republican politicians also seized on Hardan's refugee status, as well as another Iraqi refugee who was arrested on Thursday in Sacramento, California, and who U.S. prosecutors publicly accused of supporting a foreign terrorist group, to renew opposition to Obama's refugee plan.

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At a campaign stop in Iowa on Thursday, presidential candidate and Senator Ted Cruz of Texas called for a "retroactive assessment" of refugees coming to the United States from "high risk" countries.

The sources familiar with the probe said Abbott and Patrick's comments on Thursday forced federal authorities to wrap up their inquiries and rush out public statements and court papers on the case earlier than planned.

Texas Democratic Party Deputy Executive Director Manny Garcia said Abbott and Patrick's utmost concern ought to be the security of Texas families, "not how to best score cheap political points."

UNSEALED ON FRIDAY

The clerk of U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Texas said Hardans indictment was only formally unsealed on Friday morning. Hardan was in custody at the time of Abbott's statement, but interviews of potential witnesses were still being conducted, the sources said.

In California on Thursday, the U.S. Justice Department unveiled charges against Sacramento resident Aws Mohammed Younis al-Jayab, 23, an Iraqi refugee. He was accused of traveling overseas to fight alongside terrorist organizations and lying to U.S. authorities about it.

Jayab made his initial appearance in federal court in Sacramento on Friday, before U.S. Magistrate Carolyn Delaney, and was held without bail pending a preliminary hearing on Jan. 22.

After the hearing, public defender Benjamin Galloway said his client posed no threat to the United States. Reports in the last 24 hours have grossly mischaracterized the nature of this case, he said.

Jayab's brother, Samer Mohammed al-Jayab, 19, was also arrested in Sacramento on Thursday in an unrelated case from Wisconsin. He also appeared on Friday in court before Carolyn Delaney, on a charge of interstate transportation of goods worth more than $5,000.

JAYAB, HARDAN LINKED

Aws Mohammed Younis al-Jayab and Hardan communicated with each other in 2013, said sources familiar with the inquiry.

The sources said Hardan is known as "Individual I" in Jayab's court complaint. It identifies Individual I as a Texas resident with whom Jayab corresponded in April and May of 2013. Jayab allegedly also mentored Individual I, giving him advice on weapons, strategy, and his apparent desire to travel to Syria to join militants there.

Jayab told Individual I he got started in Iraq with a Kurdish militant group called Ansar al-Islam, led by an emir named Mullah Krikar, when he was "a little over 16 years old."

In November 2013, Jayab flew to Turkey to rejoin Ansar al-Islam, according to the complaint, but quickly grew disillusioned by the violent clashes between it and other extremist groups in Syria, including Islamic State.

"Brother, this is the blood of Muslims shed at the hands of the State," he wrote a friend shortly before leaving to return to the United States, the complaint said.

Jayab and Hardan's relatively brief time in the United States and Jayab's longstanding involvement with Ansar al-Islam distinguish them from scores of other defendants who were allegedly radicalized by militant groups in Syria, such as Islamic State, after living for years in the United States.

More than 75 U.S. residents allegedly radicalized by Muslim militants have been arrested since 2014.

Hardan, who was granted legal permanent residency status in the United States in 2011, did not enter a plea when he appeared in court on Friday. He is charged with aiding Islamic State.

"He was prepared to take whatever action on his own behalf to assist the organization," Kenneth Magidson, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Texas, said after the hearing.

Wearing glasses and a gray plaid shirt, Hardan told the judge that he made it through 11th grade at a school in Jordan. He said he was married and had one child.

He also faces two charges about providing false information to U.S. officials concerning his ties to Islamic State and being provided weapons training, the complaint said.

(Additional reporting by Jon Herskovitz in Austin, Kristen Hays in Houston and Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento.; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh, Andrew Hay, James Dalgleish, Ross Colvin and Leslie Adler)
The small screen has become something of a playground for Hollywood stars. While some try their luck in front of the camera, others prefer to step out of the limelight with a behind-the-scenes role in the producer's chair.

After a wave of well-known movie directors lent their skills to TV series (Martin Scorsese, Steven Soderbergh, The Wachowskis, Guillermo del Toro, David Fincher, and more), small-screen shows are now attracting big-name actors looking to try their hands at production.

Robert Redford, for example, has teamed up with HBO to develop a miniseries based on the novel "Burgess Boys" by Elisabeth Strout, whose "Olive Kitteridge" has already served as inspiration for the network. The book, published in 2013, follows the story of two brothers haunted by the terrible accident that killed their father when they were children. As the pair return to their native Maine, tensions from the past resurface.

Jeremy Renner ("Mission Impossible") has been signed up to work on a new project with History. "Knightfall" is a six-parter set around the Knights Templar, warriors of the Crusades accused of heresy and obscene acts. Scheduled to air at the end of 2016, the actor could even star in one of the show's roles.

Jake Gyllenhaal is producing an anthology series for A&E looking at famous cults. The first season will focus on Jim Jones, founder of the Peoples Temple religious movement, which saw 908 members die in a mass murder/suicide in Jonestown, Guyana, in 1978.

These aren't the first familiar faces from Hollywood to produce TV series. Tom Hanks notably collaborated with Steven Spielberg on HBO's "Band of Brothers" and "The Pacific." In 2016, he will be teaming up with Brad Pitt to produce "Lewis and Clark", an HBO miniseries starring Casey Affleck and Matthias Schoenaerts.
Beirut (AFP) - Russian strikes Saturday on a prison complex run by Al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate in the country's northwest killed at least 39 people, including five civilians, a monitoring group said.

The strikes hit an Al-Nusra Front building, which lies near a popular market in Maarat al-Numan in Idlib province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The building housed the group's religious court and a jail.

Most of those killed were rebels imprisoned by Al-Nusra, while other victims included prison guards and Al-Nusra fighters.

Among the dead were five civilians, including a child.

Russian warplanes have been conducting air strikes against the Islamic State organisation and "other terrorist groups" in Syria since September 30.

Although Al-Nusra and IS are both jihadist organisations, they are fierce rivals and regularly clash in Syria.

Al-Nusra also has tense relationships with non-jihadist rebel groups that oppose its extreme interpretation of Islamic law.

In Idlib, it has formed an alliance with rebel groups, including hardline faction Ahrar al-Sham.

The Army of Conquest coalition has expelled regime forces from Idlib province.

The Britain-based Observatory has an extensive network of sources inside Syria and identifies casualties by the type of aircraft flown and the munitions used.

Syria's conflict first erupted with anti-government demonstrations in March 2011 but quickly morphed into a war that has left more than 260,000 people dead.
Moscow (AFP) - Russia opened an investigation on Saturday after a hospital doctor was captured on video punching a patient, knocking him to the floor and killing him instantly.

The shocking video of the attack in the southern city of Belgorod was aired repeatedly on state television and went viral on YouTube, while Russian media nicknamed the attacker "the boxer doctor."

The incident raised questions over a cover-up culture in state medicine, with investigators only announcing the probe several days later, after security camera footage was released online and shown on television.

In the video, the strongly-built doctor in medical clothing drags the bare-chested male patient from the examination table, asking him "why did you touch the nurse?" and pushes him out of the doorway.

When the patient returns, the doctor deals him a single blow to the face and a crash can be heard as the middle-aged man falls backwards onto the floor.

Meanwhile the doctor continues to scuffle with another man accompanying the patient, and it is only minutes later that the medics notice the patient lying motionless and attempt unsuccessfully to revive him.

Belgorod's Investigative Committee said in a statement released Saturday that the incident took place on December 29.

The doctor hit the patient in the face after he "kicked a nurse during a procedure," the investigators said.

"The cause of death of the victim was trauma to the skull and brain from hitting the back of the head on the hard surface of the floor."

- Death through negligence -

Russian media named the doctor as Ilya Zelendinov, a surgeon at the hospital, and the patient as 56-year-old Yevgeny Bakhtin.

Investigators said the doctor was suspected of causing death through negligence, for which he could serve up to two years in jail.

He has been fired from his job but remains free after signing a declaration that he will not travel during the investigation.

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Investigators denied any delay, saying they opened a criminal probe the day after the incident, after the hospital reported the death and a post-mortem showed a head injury.

The relatively minor charge reflects the fact there is "no grounds to say that the doctor wanted to murder the patient," investigators said.

"If the victim had stayed on his feet or hit his head on a less hard surface, the consequences would not have been so critical."

Health Minister Veronika Skvortsova has ordered the state health watchdog to carry out a check into the incident, state television reported Saturday.

Russian medics have long operated in a culture of secrecy, with patients having little recourse to compensation for medical errors.

Last year two Russians resorted to taking guns to hospitals and shooting dead doctors for perceived mistakes in their treatment. Both killed themselves at the scene.
After an armed group drew attention to an Oregon land-use dispute by seizing a building in the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge on Saturday, the governments reaction seemed almost low-key. The White House called the protest a local law enforcement matter and said the Federal Bureau of Investigation was merely monitoring the situation and offering support. Although the police havent revealed much about their plans, it looks as though theyre willing to wait out the occupiers rather than charge in with guns blazing.

If so, thats good news for anyone who hopes this situation can be resolved peacefully. Sadly, not everyone seems to share that hope.

The Internet has been overflowing with demands for the protesters blood. Search Twitter for Oregon and drone strike and youll find tons of people proposing to give the Malheur activists the Anwar al-Awlaki treatment. TV host Montel Williams tweeted that the authorities should put this down using National Guard with shoot to kill orders. I hope they pull a M.O.V.E. on those terrorists in Oregon, wrote the author Jess Nevins, alluding to a black militant group whose Philadelphia headquarters were bombed by the police in 1985, killing 11 people and destroying dozens of homes.

Nevins wasnt the only one to use the word terrorists.

Heavily armed domestic terrorists have occupied a wildlife preserve in Oregon, military historian Tom Mockaitis wrote in the Huffington Post. In the Daily Beast, columnist Sally Kohn complained about the federal governments hyper-passive response to such flagrant acts of menacing and threats of domestic terrorism. Former Homeland Security official Juliette Kayyem, now the host of a podcast called Security Mom, declared on CNNs website that the occupation in Oregon is terrorism by any definition.

Really? By any definition?

Not aiming at civilians

The question of what qualifies as terrorism is hotly contested, but the most compelling definitions hinge on whether the perpetrators target civilians. The political philosopher Tony Coady, for example, says that terrorism involves intentionally targeting noncombatants with lethal or severe violence for political purposes, while Peter Simpson, another academic, refers to acts of indiscriminate violence directed at civilians or nonhostile personnel.

That framework would certainly include Islamic States slaughter of 130 people in Paris in November. It would also include the racist massacre of nine worshipers at a Charleston, S.C., church last summer. But breaking into an unoccupied building?

The occupiers do have guns, and they have said theyre willing to use them if the cops come storming in. Yet they have no hostages, they havent fired at anyone, and if they do fire they will almost certainly not aim at a civilian but at someone professionally charged with removing them from the premises. You can call that a lot of things, but its absurd to call it terrorism.

Not everyone invoking the T-word has called for a quick assault. Kayyem, for example, noted that time is on the feds side and that it would be dumb to send in a SWAT team now.

If theres a legitimate frustration beneath the boiling rhetoric, its that a double standard is at work. Countless commentators have contrasted the governments cautious response to the Oregon occupation with the quick-draw cop in Cleveland who shot Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy who had been playing with a toy gun in a city park. And indeed, Tamir suffered an abominable injustice, as have many other victims of excessive police force, from Eric Garner to Walter Scott. When the point of the comparison is to wish the police would use care and caution more often, the tweeters are absolutely right. But when the point is to complain that the government isnt moving more swiftly in Oregon, theyre absolutely wrong. The killing of Tamir Rice shouldnt be a model for anyone.

Freemen playbook

Conflicts like this are haunted by the 1990s sieges in Waco, Texas, and Ruby Ridge, Idaho, where the feds confrontational tactics had lethal consequences.

After those disasters, the government changed its strategy. In 1996, for instance, Attorney General Janet Reno was more restrained against a Montana group called the Freemen, announcing that the FBI wanted no armed confrontation, no siege, no armed perimeter and no use of military assault-type tactics or equipment. (Theres a good chance she didnt just have the Freemens potential for violence on her mind: Militia leaders around the country had declared that theyd intervene if they felt the feds stepped over the line, turning a local conflict into a larger one.) The incident ended peacefully.

If the authorities are looking to their Freemen playbook now, its a sign they remember some of the lessons of the 1990s. Not everyone can say the same.
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia may take further measures against Iran after cutting ties with its regional rival this week, the Saudi foreign minister said on Saturday, in a major row over the kingdom's execution of a Shi'ite Muslim cleric. Adel al-Jubeir's comments came in a press conference after an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), convened to discuss tensions with Iran after attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions there. "We are looking at additional measures to be taken if it (Iran) continues with its current policies," Jubeir said, without elaborating on what these measures could be. The crisis between conservative Sunni kingdom and Shi'ite power Iran, both major oil exporters, started when Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr on Jan. 2, triggering outrage among Shi'ites across the Middle East. In Iran, protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations. Tehran cut all commercial ties with Riyadh, and banned pilgrims from travelling to Mecca. "The escalation is coming from Iran, not from Saudi Arabia or the GCC .... We are evaluating Iran's moves and taking steps to counter them..things will be clearer in the near future," Jubeir said. After the meeting the GCC, which comprises Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, condemned what they said was Iranian interference in the internal affairs of Saudi Arabia and the region. Jubeir also said his country had asked the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, of which Iran is a member, to convene an extraordinary meeting to discuss the aggression against its embassy. Iran has said the kingdom is to blame for the diplomatic crisis. In a letter to the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies earlier on Saturday, Iran's foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif complained about Saudi Arabia's "provocations" towards Tehran. (Reporting By Maha El Dahan in Abu Dhabi and Mostafa Hashem in Cairo; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia may take further measures against Iran after cutting ties with its regional rival this week, the Saudi foreign minister said on Saturday, in a major row over the kingdom's execution of a Shi'ite Muslim cleric. Adel al-Jubeir's comments came in a press conference after an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), convened to discuss tensions with Iran after attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions there. "We are looking at additional measures to be taken if it (Iran) continues with its current policies," Jubeir said, without elaborating on what these measures could be. The crisis between conservative Sunni kingdom and Shi'ite power Iran, both major oil exporters, started when Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr on Jan. 2, triggering outrage among Shi'ites across the Middle East. In Iran, protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations. Tehran cut all commercial ties with Riyadh, and banned pilgrims from traveling to Mecca. "The escalation is coming from Iran, not from Saudi Arabia or the GCC .... We are evaluating Iran's moves and taking steps to counter them..things will be clearer in the near future," Jubeir said. After the meeting the GCC, which comprises Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, condemned what they said was Iranian interference in the internal affairs of Saudi Arabia and the region. Jubeir also said his country had asked the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, of which Iran is a member, to convene an extraordinary meeting to discuss the aggression against its embassy. Iran has said the kingdom is to blame for the diplomatic crisis. In a letter to the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies earlier on Saturday, Iran's foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif complained about Saudi Arabia's "provocations" towards Tehran. (Reporting By Maha El Dahan in Abu Dhabi and Mostafa Hashem in Cairo; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)
London (AFP) - Proving that manliness can come wrapped in a skirt, design duo Sibling on Saturday stamped their style on London Fashion Week with a bold collection inspired by boxing and 1980s pop culture.

Queen's "Another One Bites the Dust" opened the show, held in the basement of the neo-Gothic Victoria House in the heart of the British capital, a fitting soundtrack to the British pair's punchy but light-hearted designs.

The catwalk became a ringwalk as male models paraded in thick woollen hoodies decorated with medals, inspired by boxers' robes.

Punchbags were fashioned into fabric travel bags while the hand-strapping worn by fighters and martial artists provided the inspiration for a set of mittens.

But pop stars as-well as pugilists were a driving force behind the collection, with the dominant royal blue palette a tribute to an album cover by 1980s pop diva Grace Jones, Sibling designer Cozette McCreery told AFP.

"The other person that was a huge influence was (Jean-Michel) Basquiat," one of contemporary art's leading stars and graffiti pioneer who died in 1988, she added.

The designers encouraged men to shun fashion conventions, showcasing a range of skirts also embellished with medals.

"We like legs," said McCreery. "As a girl, I'd be very happy if lots of guys showed more leg".

Earlier in the day, Astrid Andersen presented a comfortable and modern wardrobe inspired by urban street-wear, using a variety of materials including quilted nylon, denim and tweed in a collection she said was "focussed on fabric".

The palette ranged from grey to turquoise through to orange, and the young designer offered her own take on the male mitten, stretching all the way to the elbow.

Shows for the autumn-winter 2016 season began on Friday and will continue until Monday.

Men's Fashion Week will then up sticks and head for Milan and Paris before ending in New York.

Sales in men's fashion leapt by 22 percent in Britain to 13.5 billion pounds ($19.6 billion, 18 billion euros) between 2009 to 2014, according to market researcher Mintel.
A love story between an Israeli Jew and a Palestinian Muslim has become an unlikely bestseller, after Israel's education ministry refused to allow the book in the high school curriculum.

Dorit Rabinyan's "Gader Haya," which means "Borderlife" in English, was left off courses last week in a bid to avoid encouraging relationships between Jews and Arabs, sparking a ferocious backlash by Israeli cultural figures and a buying frenzy.

The country's main fiction chart announced on Friday that the book had shot to the top as a bestseller in book stores and online.

The chart does not provide numbers but Rabinyan's agent said over 5,000 copies had been sold in a week, a huge figure in Israel's small market with many book stores selling out.

New deals to sell the rights in Hungary, Spain and Brazil have been discussed, while publication in the US, France and other countries where translation deals had already been agreed will be sped up, the agent said.

Reflecting on the controversy, Rabinyan said that while she was "worried" about the future of Israeli democracy, she had been encouraged by the support she received.

"I think this whole march to bookstores is a demonstration," she told AFP. "It is not only my fans that buy Borderlife, it is the fans of Israeli democracy.

"By buying my novel they reconfirm their trust and belief in Israel's liberalism, in Israel's freedom of choice and speech."

- Left behind -

Borderlife, published in 2014, is 43-year-old Rabinyan's semi-autobiographical story of an Israeli woman who meets and falls in love with a male Palestinian artist in New York. The two later part ways as she returns to the Israeli city of Tel Aviv and he to Ramallah, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Relationships between Israeli Jews and Palestinians are extremely rare and are frowned upon by large parts of both societies.

The book was among the winners of the Bernstein Prize for young writers, an annual Israeli award for Hebrew literature.

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After requests to include it in the high school curriculum by a number of teachers, a committee initially backed the book, but was later overruled by senior ministry officials.

Among the reasons given was that "intimate relations between Jews and non-Jews threatens the separate identity," according to the protocol of a parliamentary debate on the issue.

This provoked fury from left-wing Israelis and cultural figureheads, many of whom have long been critical of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who formed a new right-wing government following his re-election in May.

In one video shared on social media in reaction to the controversy, Arabs and Jews kiss on camera to break what they call a taboo in Israeli society.

Rabinyan describes herself as a "proud Zionist" -- the Jewish political movement for creation and consolidation of Israel as a Jewish state -- but at the same time said pretending such relationships don't exist would be foolish.

"Literature is a mirror," she said. "(My critics think) if they eliminate the mirror maybe the reality will vanish as well."

"They see Palestinians as a mass, and (the Palestinians) see us as a mass as well. To look into each other's eyes, as happened between my characters, is very rare for an Israeli to experience."

The education ministry, in a statement on Thursday, appeared to row back from its previous position, stressing that the book was not totally banned from the curriculum.

"The book wasn't 'disqualified', but merely not included among the books studied" in the extended high school literature programme, it said.

The ministry added that while teachers were still permitted to study the book with their students, it wouldn't be included in the final exam.

The novel is the latest cause celebre in longstanding clashes between Netanyahu's right-wing government and cultural figures.

In June, Education Minister Naftali Bennett, leader of the rightwing Jewish Home party, pulled state funding from an Arab play which he alleged showed a Palestinian attacker in a sympathetic light.

The country's most famous living author, Amos Oz, declared in November he will not attend events at Israeli embassies across the globe due to the government's "radical" policies.
COLOMBO (Reuters) - Sri Lanka's new government on Saturday presented its plan for a new constitution aimed at devolving power and preventing the sort of ethnic tensions that led to a long and bitter civil war that ended in 2009. The move comes as reformist President Maithripala Sirisena's administration takes some steps to promote post-conflict reconciliation and address alleged war crimes committed during the 26-year conflict between government troops and Tamil Tiger rebels. Sirisena, who unseated former leader Mahinda Rajapaksa in a bitterly contested poll last year, promised a new constitution to strengthen democracy and fundamental rights. According to the document presented to parliament on Saturday, the government intends to strengthen democratic rights, promote national reconciliation and establish a political culture that respects the rule of law. The new constitution will also guarantee fundamental rights and freedoms that assure human dignity and promote responsible and accountable government, it said. "The main idea is to devolve power to the grassroot level and strengthen democracy in order to prevent another war," a ruling party legislator who is close to the president told Reuters, asking not to be named. Some opposition members, however, have alleged that the new constitution has been drafted to please some Western nations and to dilute the main religion, Buddhism, in Sri Lanka. The government has rejected such accusations. Ethnic minority Tamils were often favored for higher government positions under British colonial rule. After independence in 1948, many lost their positions as successive governments pursued language and other policies favoring the majority Sinhalese population. Tensions erupted into a fully fledged armed conflict in 1983 that only ended when government forces seized the last areas controlled by the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). "The extremists in the south and the north have caused the loss of thousands of young lives ... We must ensure reconciliation and harmony so that we will never go back to war. I believe now, through our past bitter experiences, we must prepare ourselves for future challenges," President Sirisena told the parliament. (Reporting by Shihar Aneez and Ranga Sirilal; editing by Digby Lidstone)
Sri Lanka's President Maithripala Sirisena marked his first year in office Saturday with a pledge to introduce sweeping constitutional reforms aimed at preventing the island returning to ethnic war.

Sirisena told parliament he wanted a new statute to guarantee the country will not see a repeat of a bloody ethnic conflict that claimed over 100,000 lives between 1972 and 2009.

"We need a constitution that suits the needs of the 21st century and make sure that all communities live in harmony," Sirisena said, adding that he was ready to shed executive powers in favour of a strengthened parliament.

"The extremists in the (Sinhalese majority) south and the (minority Tamil) north have caused the loss of thousands of young lives," Sirisena said.

"We must ensure reconciliation and harmony so that we will never go back to war."

However the president -- seen as a unifying figure in the until recently conflict-torn island since taking over from strongman leader Mahinda Rajapakse last year -- acknowledged the difficulty in crafting a constitution that would satisfy both sides.

Hardline Sinhalese oppose a federal system that would ensure more political power for minority Tamils, he said.

But minorities fear that a "unitary" constitution would see them lose out to the majority Sinhalese.

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on Saturday announced a planned "Constitutional Assembly" made up of legislators, who would seek public input and make recommendations for a new constitution.

In an interview with AFP this week, Sirisena said he was keen to abolish the island's all-powerful executive presidency and go back to a parliamentary-style democracy, which Sri Lanka had till 1978.

The new statute would be put to a nationwide referendum with hopes to complete the process early next year, he said in the interview.

Tamils who claimed they were discriminated against in education and employment took up arms in 1972 and battled against successive Sinhalese-dominated governments.

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While many of the grievances were addressed over the years, the militancy grew into a full-fledged guerrilla war with Tamil Tiger rebels controlling a third of the country's territory before they were eventually crushed in May 2009.

The offensive that defeated the rebels prompted allegations of widespread war crimes, including accusations that at least 40,000 Tamil civilians were killed by government forces.

Sirisena came to power partly on the back of support from the minority Tamils after pledging reconciliation and promising investigations into war-time atrocities.

He has spoken of political power-sharing as a means to address Tamil demands for autonomy.
By John Tilak and Nia Williams TORONTO/CALGARY (Reuters) - Suncor Energy Inc , Canada's largest oil producer, said on Friday it had extended its hostile bid for Canadian Oil Sands Ltd until Jan. 27. Suncor needs to secure at least two-thirds support from shareholders to succeed in the bid, which comes against a backdrop of tumbling global crude oil prices that slid to a 12-year low this week. Many producers in the oil sands region of northern Alberta are struggling to cover cash costs. In a statement on Friday, Canadian Oil Sands said it wanted its shareholders to take no action on Suncor's bid, reiterating its view that it is undervalued by the bid. Suncor bid for Canadian Oil Sands in October and later extended the offer until Jan. 8, promising shareholders improved operating efficiencies and a dividend boost. In response, Canadian Oil Sands has mounted a spirited defense of its independence, adopting a new shareholder rights plan that would act as a poison pill and urging investors to reject what it called a substantially undervalued Suncor bid. No alternate bidder surfaced for Canadian Oil Sands during this time. "When no competitor emerges, which is the case here, bidders have won two-thirds of the time," said Fasken Martineau partner Bradley Freelan, referring to a study on hostile bids that he co-authored. He added that Suncor was in a strong position in the fight. Syncrude in northern Alberta is Canada's largest single source of crude oil and Canadian Oil Sands' only producing asset, in which it has a 36.7 percent stake. The upgrading and mining project has capacity to produce up to 350,000 barrels per day but has been dogged for years by operating issues and missed production targets. Earlier this week, Suncor Chief Executive Steve Williams had said he would walk away from the deal if not enough shares are tendered by Friday's deadline. (Reporting by John Tilak, Nia Williams and Euan Rocha; Editing by Sandra Maler and Edmund Klamann)
An swirling dimensional gateway opens up over the Large Hadron Collider - and a glowing orb flies into it, in a video hailed as proof aliens are visiting Earth.

The video was posted on YouTube by Section 51 - a UFO fan channel.

Section 51 claims that the bizarre film was captured by American tourists - and warns that the dimensional gateway could summon interdimensional beings with a taste for human flesh.

Many YouTube commenters suggest that the video could actually be CGI - and its worth noting that Section 51 also has a video of Santa Claus flying over New York in a sleigh.

Section 51 says, More people have become more aware of the CERN project aggressive ambitions to explore the unknown dark universe many have pointed to signs that have people troubled if not terrified by the parade of symbolism used at the CERN facility itself.



At CERN headquarters a symbol of Shiva, the (Hindu God of Destruction) dancing the cosmic dance of death and destruction can be clearly seen at the CERN facility. Is this a Symbolic declaration of CERNs ultimate intention to bring on a new age of destruction to this planet?
The worldwide move toward cleaner energy continued to gain momentum in 2015. Actions at the state, national and international level are all sending an undeniable message that the rise of clean energy is here to stay.

As usual, states are leading on clean energy. In May, Hawaii became the first state in the nation to require that all electricity be sourced from renewable resources by 2045. In June, Vermont set its renewable energy requirement at 75 percent by 2032. Perhaps of most economic significance, California, the worlds eighth largest economy, upped its renewable energy requirement to 50 percent by 2030.

State leadership on clean energy is likely to continue into 2016. Oregon and Washington are expected to debate legislative bills this winter designed to reduce their consumers reliance on coal energy, increase renewable energy consumption or make meaningful progress on cutting carbon emissions. And both states appear set to bring policies before the voters as ballot initiatives if their elected representatives fail to accomplish the task.

Tax policy certainty

Of course, states werent the only ones leading in 2015. This December in Paris, all 196 nations attending the United Nations conference on climate change, including developing countries like China and India, agreed to stem their greenhouse gas emissions this century. With this global agreement, the world is now united around the goal of limiting the worst effects of climate change and deploying clean energy technology to curb emissions.

At the national level, clean energy won another important victory in late December when Congress passed long-term extensions of the wind energy production tax credit and the solar energy investment tax credit. The extensions trade certainty for an eventual phase down of the federal subsides. Under the new policy, the wind energy PTC will gradually phase out, eliminating federal subsidies to Americas most popular and often cheapest energy resource by 2020. No other major energy resource is on track to be free of federal subsidies by 2020, including coal, nuclear, oil and natural gas.

Meanwhile the 30 percent solar energy ITC has been extended in full through 2019, then it is set to phase down to 10 percent by 2022 for utility-scale solar developments.

These measured phase-outs of federal subsidies for wind and solar have been celebrated by the renewable energy industry for providing certainty and time to adjust. They have also been made possible by extraordinary cost reductions in wind and solar energy as the industry gained experience and technical know-how. Over the last six years wind energy has achieved 61 percent cost reductions and solar energy prices have dropped by a whopping 82 percent, with further cost reductions expected. Today wind and solar energy often out-competes natural gas as a low-cost energy resource.

With wind energy set to stand on its own and the federal subsidy for solar energy set to be dramatically reduced, now is the time for Congress to remove the long-standing subsidies for energy sources like coal, oil, natural gas, and other long-established energy industries.

Stalled in Montana

Unfortunately, utility-scale renewable energy development largely stalled in 2015 for Montana. Aside from a few community solar projects, Montana didnt add any utility-scale energy generation of any kind in 2015. We did, however, witness the decommissioning of the 46-year-old Corette coal plant near Billings. Looking ahead, it isnt a political statement to observe that Montanas coal plants including Colstrip wont last forever, perhaps not much past 2030. The same forces that are propelling clean energy forward are the ones weighing aging coal plants down: namely cost, environmental responsibility and flexibility.

In 2016 there will be a lot of continued discussions (and political posturing) about how to comply with the EPAs Clean Power Plan, which requires Montana to cut carbon emissions by 47 percent by 2030. While compliance is important, it shouldnt be the entirety of our state energy policy. We must also work to keep Montana, a historic energy exporter of about 50 percent of the energy we generate, competitive in a market that is rapidly moving away from fossil fuels and toward clean energy resources.
By Tiemoko Diallo BAMAKO (Reuters) - Armed men kidnapped a Swiss missionary from her home in Timbuktu on Friday, nearly four years after she was abducted by Islamist militants from the same house, Malian and Swiss authorities said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility but Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is active in desert areas north of the city and has a history of seizing foreigners and demanding ransoms. In April 2012, militants kidnapped Beatrice Stockly and released her days later. She returned to her work as a missionary. A resident of Timbuktu who knows Stockly told Reuters she had again been abducted. "I confirm that a European woman was kidnapped in Timbuktu at 3.30 a.m. (0330 GMT). A neighbour alerted the security forces around 6 a.m.," said army spokesman Souleymane Maiga. Four vehicles were used in the kidnap, said a military source in Timbuktu who declined to be identified. "One vehicle parked in front of the house and armed men got out and abducted the woman, while the other three cars secured the area from a distance," said the source. French forces drove Islamist fighters from major urban centres in 2013 but they have intensified their insurgency with a series of attacks and roadside bombings last year. Two militants attacked a luxury hotel in the capital Bamako on Nov. 20, killing 20 people, many of whom were foreigners. Three Islamist militant groups including AQIM claimed responsibility for the hotel attack, which showed the militants extending their reach beyond the north. CALL FOR SHARIA In a separate incident, an unidentified gunman shot three people dead outside a Christian radio station in Timbuktu in December. A veteran jihadist called for a return to Islamic sharia law at a recent meeting attended by hundreds of locals near Timbuktu, an AQIM video showed this week. Dozens of Westerners were abducted by desert militants in West and North Africa in the five years before the French military operation in Mali in 2013. There has been a lull since then, with many foreigners too frightened to visit. In the last known abduction attempt, two French journalists from Radio France International were killed in Kidal, northern Mali, in Nov. 2013. Two Western hostages kidnapped in north Mali in 2011 are still being held by al Qaeda militants. The Swiss foreign ministry formed a task force when it heard about Friday's kidnapping and was working for the woman's safe release, a statement said, adding that since 2009 it had advised against travel to Mali because of the high risk of kidnapping. "After the kidnapping of 2012, the ministry had pointed out to the affected Swiss national the high personal risk in Mali ... and strongly discouraged her from another stay in Mali," it said. France continues to fight militants in Mali and elsewhere in the desert region with a 3,500-strong counter-terrorism force called Barkhane. A 10,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping force is also present in Mali. (Additional reporting by Adama Diarra in Bamako, Souleymane Ag Anara in Kidal, Mali, Michael Shields in Zurich and Emma Farge in Dakar; Writing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg; Editing by Andrew Roche and Catherine Evans)
New York (AFP) - The suspect who shot and seriously wounded a police officer in Philadelphia while claiming allegiance to the Islamic State group was charged Saturday with attempted murder, the district attorney's office said.

Police said it was unclear whether the alleged assailant, Edward Archer, a 30-year-old local man, acted alone or as part of a wider conspiracy.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the suspect had traveled to Egypt and Saudi Arabia in recent years for reasons that were unclear on Saturday.

Archer, who was captured on a video surveillance camera opening fire at point-blank range, was in Saudi Arabia for a couple weeks in October-November 2011 and Egypt for several months in 2012, the Journal reported, citing a person familiar with the matter.

Homicide police Captain James Clark told a news conference Friday that Archer had "stated that he pledges his allegiance to Islamic State, follows Allah and that is the reason he was called upon to do this."

The episode comes amid heightened security in the United States following last month's assault by a radicalized Muslim couple in California that killed 14 people, and the November terror attacks in Paris.

The wounded policeman, Jesse Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in his left arm as he sat in his patrol car late Thursday in the northeastern city.

The Philadelphia District Attorney's Office tweeted Saturday that Archer was being held without bail after he was "charged with attempted murder and related crimes for the shooting of police officer Jesse Hartnett."

Stills captured from video surveillance and released to the press show the suspect opening fire as he walks towards the patrol car, extending his arm into the vehicle and then continuing to fire as he flees on foot.

Hartnett got out of his vehicle despite being wounded and managed to return fire, hitting the suspect, who was quickly arrested.

Authorities said they were astonished Hartnett survived.

It was unclear how the suspect obtained his firearm, which was stolen from police in October 2013, authorities said.
Managing your health care is moving increasingly to the palm of your hand -- with new smartphone-enabled technology and wearable sensors that examine, diagnose and even treat many conditions and ailments.

The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas saw the debut of new applications for "virtual checkups" and ways to treat pain, manage stress and monitor conditions such as diabetes.

French-based health group VisioMed introduced its Bewell Connect health management suite, which includes a smartphone app that communicates with its connected blood pressure and glucose monitor, thermometer and blood oxygen sensor.

"If I have all these indicators I can get a pretty good assessment of your health," said Benjamin Pennequin, research director for the group.

"This is like a personal virtual checkup."

But the app goes further: If you have symptoms such as chest pain or shortness of breath, it poses a series of questions and delivers potential diagnoses, and allows the user to share the data with a physician.

And a simple button on the app can connect you to a doctor: In France the app locates nearby providers in the national medical service, and Bewell is working to establish a network of connected physicians in the United States.

A hand-held connected device unveiled by Las Vegas-based startup MedWand allows consumers to measure temperature, heart rate, oxygen levels and includes a camera to examine the throat and inner ear to enable doctors to perform an exam online.

Lead engineer Terry MacNeish said the data from the $250 gadget allows for a more thorough exam than most other kinds of telemedicine.

"If you're just Skyping your doctor, it's just medical chat," MacNeish said. "With this we can get a picture of your tonsils, we can take your temperature. It's much more precise."

MedWand is in the pre-approval phase for clearance by the US Food and Drug Administration, and is expected to complete the process in 2016, according to inventor and CEO Samir Qamar.

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MedWand is working with existing telemedicine doctors and hopes to start selling the device in June in the United States and globally.

MacNeish said insurance companies are generally positive towards the product because a telemedicine exam costs less than one in a doctor's office.

"The patient saves a lot of time and so does the doctor," he said.

- Continuous monitoring -

Putting more health data in consumers' hands is a big theme at CES.

US-based medical device maker Omron unveiled its wrist-worn blood pressure sensor which delivers information to a smartphone.

"Most people only get their blood pressure checked at the doctor's office once or twice a year," said chief operating officer Ranndy Kellogg.

"This is continuous monitoring. If there is something wrong with your heart, you really want to listen."

Tech-savvy startups and others are introducing new ways to treat pain, in some cases taking techniques which have been around for decades and adapting them for smartphones and connected wearables.

NeuroMetrix debuted its Quell leg band, which blocks pain signals to the brain, and is an alternative to drugs for people suffering from debilitating pain related to diabetes or other ailments.

It recently received approval from the Food and Drug Administration.

NeuroMetrix founder Shai Gozani, a medical doctor who also has a PhD in neurobiology, said the device "triggers your brain to upgrade its pain modulation" by acting on the opioid receptors in the same manner as opiates -- but without drugs.

- Hacking pain -

While Quell is a device which treats pain anywhere in the body from a single band, iTens offers a smartphone-controled patch which attaches to specific muscles to treat pain, using technology known as TENS, or transcutaneous elenctical neuromuscular stimulation.

The technology has been around for decades in hospital settings but is only now hitting the consumer market with smartphone technology and sensor-embedded devices.

"The electrical impulse intercepts the pain signal before it reaches the brain," said iTens spokesman Scott Overton, showing the device on the CES floor.

Tech innovators have found other paths to effectively hack into the body's neural pathways for therapy.

Biotrak Health showcased a headband to help users control muscle tension that often leads to migraines and other kinds of pain.

The Halo headband "alerts you when you are tense and allows you to control your own tension," said spokesman Adam Kirell.

A wrist-worn device meanwhile from ReliefBand technologies takes aim at nausea associated with motion and morning sickness.

The device, which looks like a wristwatch, acts on the P6 or median nerve -- the same technique used in centuries-old treatment from acupuncture.
Paris (AFP) - Thousands of Kurds from across Europe marched through Paris on Saturday calling for justice on the third anniversary of the killing of three female Kurdish rebels in the French capital.

Organisers said 10,000 people joined the march, while police put the figure at 7,000.

The protesters denounced "crimes by the Turkish regime" -- saying that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was "massacring Kurds" -- chanting "No to impunity for political crimes" and "We are all Sakine, Fidan and Leyla".

Sakine Cansiz, 54 -- one of the founders of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) -- was murdered along with Fidan Dogan, 28, and 24-year-old Leyla Soylemez.

The women's bodies were found in the early hours of January 10, 2013 at a Kurdish information centre. They had been shot in the head and neck.

Sakine Cansiz's brother Haydar, who travelled from Germany for the march, told AFP: "Sakine's fight goes on. We will continue to march until we have obtained justice."

Carrying hundreds of flags in the red, orange and green of the PKK and pictures of the group's leader Abdullah Ocalan, the demonstrators marched to the site of the killings, where flowers had been laid in memory of the dead.

A Turkish national, 33-year-old Omer Guney, has been sent to trial charged with the killings, but investigators suspect Turkish intelligence may have played a role in planning the hit.

Turkey's MIT spy agency has previously denied playing any role in killing the three women.

A source close to the case said investigators believe the MIT is implicated in "the instigation and preparation of the killings", but have been unable to establish whether the service sponsored the hit or whether agents were acting on their own initiative.

The PKK launched its insurgency against the Turkish state in 1984, initially fighting for Kurdish independence although it now focuses on greater autonomy and rights for the country's largest ethnic minority.

The conflict, which has left tens of thousands dead, looked like it could be nearing a resolution until an uneasy truce was shattered last July.

Turkish authorities are waging a major military operation to crush the PKK in the Kurdish-dominated southeast of the country.
By Dave Graham LOS MOCHIS, Mexico (Reuters) - For years the world's most wanted drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman used tunnels to smuggle billions of dollars worth of drugs into the United States and to evade capture - until Mexico's government got wise to his game. Six months after a brazen jailbreak worthy of Hollywood, escaping a maximum security prison through a mile-long tunnel from his cell, Mexico's security forces turned the tables on Guzman on Friday. After tracking Guzman down to a house in Los Mochis, in his native northwestern state of Sinaloa, Mexican Marines chased the head of the infamous Sinaloa Cartel and his chief assassin through a drain and then nabbed them as he tried to flee by car. Security forces had identified a tunnel expert in Guzman's circle who was outfitting houses in Sinaloa, and that helped lead to the drug baron's capture, Mexico's Attorney General Arely Gomez said. "During the confrontation, Guzman Loera managed to escape through the city's drainage system, which had already been factored into the capture strategy," Gomez said late on Friday, as Guzman was whisked by helicopter to the same maximum security prison in central Mexico he broke out of in July. Guzman's arrest is a major boost for President Enrique Pena Nieto, who was highly embarrassed by last year's jailbreak, Guzman's second in 15 years. It is also a shot in arm for relations between Mexico and the U.S. government, heavily strained by last year's escape. Guzman now faces the prospect of extradition to the United States to face drug smuggling charges. The dramatic capture followed a six month-long intelligence operation. Gomez said Guzman was almost caught in October, when Marines in a helicopter zeroed in on him near a ranch in the rugged northern state of Durango. But the kingpin was spied in the company of two women and a young girl, prompting the Marines to hold fire and allowing him to slip their grasp. The encounter pushed Guzman deeper into Mexico's notorious "Golden Triangle", where the bulk of the country's opium and marijuana are produced, limiting his communications and cutting down his security detail to a small core. But for reasons that are unclear, El Chapo had by December decided to hide out in cities. The tunnel-builder began outfitting homes across the northern states of Sinaloa and Sonora. Authorities caught wind of it and began carefully watching a house in Los Mochis. They spotted unusual activity when a vehicle pulled up before dawn on January 7, and intelligence officials confirmed Guzman was on the property. The raid followed. After chasing him through a drain and stopping his getaway car, the Marines took Guzman and made an unscheduled stop - waiting for reinforcements at Hotel Doux, a love motel on the outskirts of town that rents out rooms for a few hours at a time. Guzman also slipped up, and his yearning for the silver screen helped bring him down. "Another important aspect which helped locate him was discovering Guzman's intention to have a biographical film made. He contacted actresses and producers, which was part of one line of investigation," Gomez said. (With reporting by Alexandra Alper; Writing by Simon Gardner; Editing by Kieran Murray)
Montana Gov. Steve Bullock has announced a change of policy promising to open hundreds of thousands of acres adjacent to Yellowstone National Park to bison wandering beyond park boundaries. This is an important step toward more enlightened and effective wildlife management and part of addressing the unfinished business between Americans and our countrys most-abused native animal.

With its creation as the first national park in 1872, Yellowstone quickly became the last bastion of wild bison, sanctuary for survivors of a population that had numbered in the millions before 19th-century Americans shot them nearly to extinction. The effort to save bison as a species launched the modern American wildlife conservation movement more than a century ago, and Yellowstones role as refuge proved essential to that cause.

But we just sort of saved bison. Most of the nearly 400,000 bison in the United States today are privately owned and managed as domestic livestock, many carrying cattle genes thanks to past attempts to improve bison through crossbreeding. Other bison endure as captives, confined in parks and refuges within high, stout fences. Relatively few bison qualify as wild and free-roaming. Those in Yellowstone approach true wildness.

State and federal agencies have for decades practiced a heavy handed management of Yellowstones bison  harassing, corralling and shooting them as they attempt to migrate out of the park during the regions long, hard winters.

Cattle ranchers regard Yellowstone bison as a threat. Ranchers fear that Yellowstone bison might one day  improbably, unprecedentedly  transmit disease to cattle. Some Yellowstone bison and elk carry brucellosis, a disease the cattle industry has effectively eradicated from livestock. Although bison have never been shown to transmit the disease to cattle in the wild, long-standing government policies aimed to keep bison within park boundaries.

Easing rancher concerns

Conservation groups and public agencies have worked constructively to ease real and perceived conflicts over wildlife  including bison  around Yellowstone. The National Wildlife Federation negotiated agreements with ranchers who held grazing rights to certain public land tracts adjacent to the park, paying fair-market value to change or eliminate livestock grazing where conflicts with bison could be an issue. A similar agreement resolved wildlife conflicts on a private ranch immediately north of the park, creating a conflict-free zone linking the park to other public lands.

Such agreements, negotiated on a willing-seller, willing-buyer basis, have helped establish 400,000 acres outside park boundaries where bison could roam with virtually no possibility of interaction with cattle  essentially eliminating the disease threat that ranchers fear.

Bullocks decision effectively adapts Montanas bison management to reflect the changing reality on the ground  a reality that argues for treating bison as wildlife in need of management, not as a menace to livestock that must be repelled.

U.S. National Mammal

Changes afoot for Yellowstone bison come as part of Montanans and Americans evolving relationship with bison, a species the U.S. Senate voted last month to name our National Mammal.

Last year, Montana issued an environmental impact statement analyzing opportunities to restore herds of wild bison to an appropriate landscape, such as public lands in and around north-central Montanas million-acre Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge  an analysis that lays down a compelling foundation for pursuing bison-restoration opportunities. Meanwhile, several Montana tribes also are making progress in establishing bison herds on tribal lands.

We cant restore bison to their historic numbers and distribution. Most of the landscape is too changed, developed and filled with people. But Montana does have places still suitable for wild bison to roam in meaningful numbers around Yellowstone and elsewhere.

In reconsidering Montanas relationship with bison around Yellowstone, Bullock is embracing a growing and long-overdue movement to fully welcome bison back from the brink of extinction  not just as livestock, captives or mere icons of the Old West, but as valued wildlife.
Diyarbakir (Turkey) (AFP) - Turkish security forces killed 18 militants from the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) as they battled the rebels in curfew-hit towns in the country's troubled southeast, the army said Saturday.

Sixteen were killed in the Cizre district of Sirnak province near the Iraqi border on Friday, while another two died in the Sur district of Diyarbakir, the army said in a statement.

Also in Sur, one soldier was wounded in a gun attack on Saturday while three other soldiers and a civil servant were also wounded when a remote-controlled bomb laid by militants was detonated, security sources said.

The security forces detained 58 members of the PKK in the town of Silopi in Sirnak on Friday as they attemted to flee the area disguised as residents, the army added.

A new upsurge of violence between the security forces and Kurdish rebels erupted in July in the wake of attacks blamed on Islamic extremists, shattering a fragile two-and-a-half year truce.

Silopi and Cizre as well as much of Sur have been under a blanket curfew since early December as Turkey security forces seek to flush out Kurdish militants from the towns.

The army says that that a total of 426 PKK members have been killed in the three towns since the current campaign started.

With the curfew-affected area closed to the outside observers and the media, it has not been possible to independently verify the figures.

The government says such measures are needed to drive out PKK fighters who have effectively taken over towns by erecting barricades and digging trenches, but Kurdish activists say the use of force has been wildly excessive.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said 3,100 Kurdish militants had been killed in 2015 in PKK strongholds in southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq.

The PKK launched a formal insurgency against the Turkish state in 1984, initially fighting for Kurdish independence although it now presses more for greater autonomy and rights for the country's largest ethnic minority. The conflict has left tens of thousands dead.
In recent months, the Turkish city of Izmir has transformed from a popular tourist spot into a migrant hub, populated by refugees preparing to cross the Aegean Sea to Europe. Shops once filled with souvenirs and tchotchkes now sell life jackets and flotation devicesbut it turns out not all vests for sale meet safety standards.

This week, police officers stormed a black-market life vest manufacturing operation in the coastal town and confiscated some 1,200 so-called flotation devices. Instead of providing buoyancy, the jackets were stuffed with absorbent materials, which would cause anyone wearing them to sink, BBC News reports. Officers also collected 300 fake jackets from migrants who had already purchased them.

Such life jackets are made of backpack material and filled with sponge. Because sponge is hydrophilic, it drags people down and causes them to drown, Sait Guderoglu, a top life jacket producer in the region, told the Hurriyet Daily News.

The operators of the illegal workshop were also violating child labor laws. Of the four workers in the factory, two were young Syrian girls.

Nearly one million people crossed the Mediterranean Sea in 2015, but the small and shoddy boats often used for travel can be treacherous. As smugglers dont supply life vests to migrants, theyre forced to purchase their own, and many cannot afford the $150 price tag for proper gear from a legitimate retailer. Capitalizing on refugees vulnerable position, illegal sellers offer theirs for roughly $10but the faulty vests are worse than wearing nothing at all.

Roughly 3,700 people drowned or went missing last year while trying to cross the Mediterranean, according to the International Organization for Migration. On Tuesday, 34 dead bodies were found along Turkeys shore. Images of the deceased migrants show several still wearing life jackets. Whether this black-market ring contributed to any of these deaths is unknown.

Story continues

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Original article from TakePart
For many of us, Twitters mainly useful for live-tweeting debates or catching up on the latest news headlines. But a tweet saved one girl in India from becoming yet another victim of human trafficking.

Radha Lohar, a 19-year-old from West Bengal, was riding a South Central Railway train from Hyderabad to New Delhi on Tuesday when she handed another passenger a letter that read she was being taken against her wish to the city, according to The Independent.

After informing the Railway Protection Force, the passenger sent a picture of the message to his relative, Divyansh Khunteta, who then tweeted it to the Ministry of Railways.

RELATED: Twitter Users Are Helping Flood Victims in India

Indian Railways officials were quick to act on the alert, notifying the train operator before the Railway Protection Force stopped the train at Ramagundam station and apprehended the suspected kidnappers.

The timely action of the railway officials, who acted on a tweet, enabled [the] rescue of an orphan girl, said a statement from South Central Railways.

Lohar had been working with a job placement agency before being taken to Delhi. A local NGO, known as Pratham, has her under protective custody with plans to take her back to West Bengal soon.

According to the 2014 Global Slavery Index, nearly 36 million people are enslaved worldwide. With India being home to more than a third of those kept in modern-day slavery, government entities, NGOs, and citizens are working to come up with solutions to the nationwide problemeven through a tweet.

Related stories on TakePart:





 How Red Sand Is Highlighting Human Trafficking

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 Indian Women Could Become Fighter Pilots Ready for Combat by 2017

Original article from TakePart
Nablus (Palestinian Territories) (AFP) - Two Palestinians tried to stab Israeli soldiers manning a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank on Saturday before being shot dead, the army said.

The attack occurred in the north of the Jordan Valley, according to a spokeswoman, who confirmed that the bodies of the two assailants were handed over to Palestinian authorities.

Twenty-two Israelis and an American have been killed in Palestinian attacks including stabbings, car rammings and gunfire targeting security forces and civilians since October 1. An Eritrean was also killed.

At the same time, 146 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, most while carrying out attacks.

Israel has employed a raft of security and punitive measures in a bid to stem attacks.

Overnight, the army demolished a house in the West Bank village of Surda belonging to a Palestinian who was shot dead on October 3 after killing an Israeli rabbi, the spokeswoman said.

In November, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to expedite house demolitions in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, which he said were "one of the most efficient tools" in discouraging Palestinian attacks.

The controversial practice, which critics claim amounts to collective punishment, is widely used in the West Bank and resumed in east Jerusalem in November after a five-year hiatus.

Also on Saturday, Israel returned the bodies of four Palestinians killed on Thursday during two attacks in the southern West Bank.

They were buried in the West Bank village of Sair.

Thousands followed their bodies as they were carried through the streets, according to an AFP journalist on the scene.

Mohamed Kawazbeh, the brother of one of those killed, described them as "four martyr heroes".

"We are proud of them," said Ziad Kawazbeh, a father of one of the victims. "You can't have a homeland without martyrs and to liberate our country we must sacrifice our martyrs."

Israel often retains the bodies of Palestinians killed during attacks, a measure that has drawn criticism from rights groups as well as Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

Since the start of the year it has returned the bodies of dozens of Palestinians to their families.
By Andrew M. Seaman The number of new cancer diagnoses in the U.S. is largely steady while the number of cancer deaths continues to decline, according to a new report from the nation's leading cancer advocacy group. This year, the U.S. will see nearly 1.7 million new cancer cases and nearly 600,000 cancer deaths, according to American Cancer Society projections published in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians. The report's authors point out that cancer continues to be a leading cause of death in the U.S., however, and new diagnoses for some cancers are increasing. "Its kind of a good news, bad news story," said ACS's Rebecca Siegel, who is based in Atlanta. Cancer deaths fell by 23 percent in the decade before 2012, the latest period for which data are available. The decrease represents about 1.7 million fewer deaths since rates peaked in 1991, says the report. The decrease is largely due to fewer deaths from breast, colon, rectal and prostate cancers. Also, there are fewer lung cancer deaths as a result of fewer people smoking. Breast cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death for women ages 20 to 59, and leukemia is the leading cause of cancer death among men ages 20 to 39. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death for older men and women. The number of new cancer diagnoses appears mostly stable in women. Among men, the rate of new cases fell 3 percent per year between 2009 and 2012, with the drop largely due to a reduction in prostate cancer screening. Rates of some cancers are increasing, including those often associated with obesity. For example, incidence and mortality rates for endometrial cancer are up, said Siegel, "likely due to the obesity epidemic." The report says endometrial cancer risk climbs 5 percent with every five-point gain in body mass index, which is a measure of weight in relation to height. Another area of concern are gaps between races, Siegel told Reuters Health. For example, black men have the highest rates of new cancer diagnoses and deaths. In fact, black men have higher diagnosis and death rates than non-Hispanic white men for every malignancy except kidney cancer. "The improvements in cancer prevention and early detection and treatment arent disseminated equally among the population," said Siegel. "Extending these improvements to underserved populations would accelerate a decline in death rates," she said. The report too says existing tools to fight cancer need to be applied to all segments of the population. Also, advancing the fight will require more research and funding. "A lot of progress has been made, but there is more work to do," said Siegel. SOURCE: http://bit.ly/1mL1Unx CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, online January 7, 2016.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States said on Friday it was disturbed by reports that five Hong Kong booksellers critical of China's leaders had disappeared. Lee Bo, 65, a shareholder of Causeway Bay Books and a British passport holder, went missing from Hong Kong last week, though his wife has said he voluntarily traveled to China and has withdrawn a missing person report. Four other associates of the publisher that specializes in selling gossipy political books on China's Communist Party leaders have been unaccounted for since late last year. The disappearances, and China's silence, have stoked concerns that they were abducted by mainland agents in shadowy tactics that erode the "one-country, two-systems" formula under which Hong Kong has been governed since its 1997 return to China. We are disturbed by reports of the disappearances," U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby told a regular news briefing. "We share the concern of the people of Hong Kong regarding these disappearances." He said the United States was closely following the issue and noted a Jan. 4 statement by Hong Kong's chief executive expressing concern about the potential implications of this case. "We share those concerns, he said. On Wednesday, Britain's Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said any abduction of people from Hong Kong to face charges elsewhere would be an "egregious breach" of Beijing's promises on how it would rule the former British colony. He said that after a two-day visit to Beijing there had been "no progress" on determining the booksellers' whereabouts, after raising the case with Chinese and Hong Kong officials. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said on Wednesday that China opposes "any foreign country interfering with China's domestic politics, or interfering with Hong Kong affairs." (Reporting by David Brunnstrom and Mohammad Zargham)
Jerusalem (AFP) - Vandals have destroyed dozens of crosses at a Christian cemetery west of Jerusalem, the Latin Patriarchate in the city said Saturday, urging Israeli authorities to bring the culprits to justice.

The church did not say who was behind the desecration but in recent years there have been a spate of hate crimes targeting churches and Christian cemeteries, with the perpetrators believed to be Jewish extremists.

"Salesian fathers responsible for the monastery in Beit Jamal reported that unknown persons desecrated their monastery's cemetery," the patriarchate said in a statement.

"The fathers reported also that tens of crosses were destroyed at their cemetery," it said, condemning the attack which apparently took place in December.

Beit Jamal is near the Israeli town of Beit Shemesh, west of Jerusalem.

Vandals had desecrated the cemetery of the Catholic monastery of Beit Jamal, which is run by the Salesian order, in September 1981, said the statement.

The patriarchate urged "the police... and the Israeli authorities in general to invest every possible effort" to bring to justice those responsible for this and past desecrations.

"We do hope that more efforts be made to educate all inhabitants of the country to respect each other despite their different religious backgrounds," said the English language statement.

In April, vandals had smashed gravestones at a Maronite Christian cemetery in a village near Israel's northern border with Lebanon.

In June, arsonists attacked the Church of the Multiplication in Tabgha, on the shores of the Sea of Galilee where many Christians believe Jesus fed 5,000 people in the miracle of the five loaves and two fish.

One building within the compound was totally destroyed in the blaze but the church itself was not damaged.

Hebrew graffiti was scrawled on another building that read "idols will be cast out" or destroyed -- part of a common Jewish prayer.

Two suspected Jewish extremists were charged in connection with the arson and graffiti, and Israel said it would compensate church officials for the damage.
Vietnam's civil aviation authority has accused Beijing of threatening regional air safety by conducting unannounced flights through its airspace to a disputed reef in the South China Sea, state media said Saturday.

The Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV) warned that the unannounced flights "threaten the safety of all flights in the region," according to a report in the Tuoi Tre Daily newspaper.

In quotes published in Vietnamese official online newspaper Zing.vn late Friday, CAAV director Lai Xuan Thanh said a protest letter about the flights had been sent to Beijing, as well as a complaint to the United Nations' International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

"Chinese aircraft have ignored all the rules and norms of the ICAO by not providing any flight plans or maintaining any radio contact with Vietnam's air traffic control centre," he added.

In the seven days to January 8, Vietnam logged 46 incidents of Chinese planes flying without warning through airspace monitored by air traffic control in the southern metropolis of Ho Chi Minh City, according to civilian aviation authorities quoted in the Tuoi Tre Daily newspaper report.

Chinese state media on Wednesday said two civilian planes landed on an island in the Fiery Cross reef in the contested Spratly Islands, which have long been at the centre of bitter wrangling between Vietnam and its giant neighbour.

The two "test flights" Wednesday followed an initial aircraft landing on Saturday, which prompted the first formal diplomatic complaint from Hanoi.

The Spratlys are claimed by Hanoi but controlled by Beijing, which has ramped up activity in the area by rapidly building artificial islands, including airstrips said to be capable of hosting military jets.

The recent flights, slammed by Vietnam as a "serious violation" of its sovereignty, have sparked international alarm, with the United States warning Thursday that the move would raise tensions in the disputed waters.

Story continues

The Philippines has also said it would file a protest.

China asserts ownership over virtually all the South China Sea, putting it at odds with regional neighbours the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan, which stake partial claims.

Several of these nations, including Vietnam, have also built facilities on islands they control, but at a significantly slower pace and smaller scale than Beijing.

Rioting broke out in Vietnam after Beijing sent an oil rig into contested waters in 2014, and at least three Chinese people were killed.

Since then the two sides have tried to mend relations. China's President Xi Jinping visited Hanoi in November but that visit also saw anti-Chinese protests.

Vietnamese officials said last week they had asked Beijing to investigate the ramming and sinking of a Vietnamese fishing boat by a suspected Chinese boat.

Hanoi has stepped up cooperation with the US, in what analysts say is a hedge against China's rising power.
New York (AFP) - A Vietnamese man pleaded guilty Friday in New York to supporting Al-Qaeda in Yemen, where he learned to build a bomb earmarked to blow up London's Heathrow airport.

Minh Quang Pham, who was arrested in Britain in June 2012 and extradited to the United States in February last year, faces a maximum sentence of life behind bars in the United States when he is sentenced on April 14.

The 33-year-old admitted one count of providing material support to Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, one count of conspiring to receive military training from AQAP and one count of possessing and using a machine gun.

"Pham provided material support to the highest levels of AQAP. Now all that awaits him is sentencing for his admitted acts of terrorism," said US Attorney Preet Bharara.

He left London, where he lived, in December 2010 for Yemen, where he received training from Anwar al-Awlaki, a US-born AQAP leader killed in a US drone strike in 2011.

Awlaki taught Pham how to create a bomb using household chemicals and directed him to explode such a device at the arrivals area at Heathrow airport, US prosecutors said.

Pham was stopped at Heathrow upon his return. Electronic files setting out his links to AQAP and a live round of armor-piercing ammunition capable of being used in a Kalashnikov assault rifle were found in his belongings.

AQAP was formed in 2009 after a merger between militants in Yemen and Saudi Arabia. The group has been linked to a string of attacks since its formation, including the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris in January 2015.

The group was also behind an attempt to blow up an American airliner over Michigan on Christmas Day in 2009.
Cologne (Germany) (AFP) - Around 500 women staged a noisy protest Saturday in the German city of Cologne against a shocking rash of sexual violence during New Year's festivities that was blamed on migrants.

Carrying signs bearing slogans like "No violence against women" and "No means no! It's the law! Stay off of us!", the women banged pots and blew whistles as they rallied outside Cologne's famed Gothic cathedral.

Others waved banners saying "Protect our women and children", as outrage grew in Germany over the spate of assaults.

Cologne police have recorded some 200 complaints, ranging from groping to two reported rapes during New Year's festivities.

Witnesses have said the assaults were perpetrated by men of "North African or Arab" appearance, inflaming a debate over Germany's ability to integrate about 1.1 million asylum seekers who arrived in 2015.

German federal police have so far identified 32 suspects, 22 of whom are asylum seekers, in connection with 76 offences, 12 of which had a sexual nature, the interior ministry said.

"We want our safety back. We are against all violence against women," said protest organiser Martina Schumeckers, 57, a musician.

"I am standing here for all mothers, daughters, granddaughters, grandmothers, for them all to be able to move around safely especially in our Cologne," she told AFP.
Tasha Adams: I still sometimes feel like I released him out into the world. I think of him like a grenade where I was always putting the pin back in."
More than 900 million people use WhatsApp on a regular basis, making the Facebook-owned app one of the most popular communication tools out there. WhatsApp offers encrypted instant messaging, voice calls and file transfers, making it a must-have app for many smartphone users. The app is available for a plethora of mobile operating systems, including computers, though it needs to be installed first on a smartphone.

Considering its massive popularity, its no surprise to hear that hackers are targeting WhatsApp users with specially crafted malware. On top of that, a serious bug might be used by some people to crash certain WhatsApp chats.

DONT MISS: This is the Netflix hack the world has been waiting for

Security firm Comodo Labs discovered a new malware attack that targets businesses and consumers who use the application. The phishing scheme attempts to convince users to click on links that hit their email disguised as an official email from the company.

Hackers are using various subject lines to convince you to click on the contents of the email, such as You have obtained a voice notification xgod, or A brief audio recording has been delivered! Jsvk. The body of the email contains imagery and text to convince you the email is from WhatsApp (see image below), but you shouldnt click on it. Better yet, report the message as spam as soon as you see it.

WhatsApp-phishing-email-malware

You should remember that your smartphone number is what identifies you in the WhatsApp network, so the company would have no reason to send you emails about anything. Moreover, your friends and family will send you pictures and audio recordings directly inside WhatsApp, and notifications will appear directly on the screen. No email is involved whatsoever.

The second threat you should know about involves emojis. A teenage hacker discovered that by entering thousands of emojis into a message, the app can be crashed both on the web and on mobile.

In WhatsApp Web, WhatsApp allows 6500-6600 characters. But after typing about 4200-4400 smiley browser starts to slow down, Indrajeet Bhuyan said. But since the limit is not yet reached so WhatsApp allows to go on inserting. So it crashes while we type and send and in mobile too when it [the mobile app] receives it overflows the buffer, and it crashes.

Story continues

The exploit crashes the app on PC (Firefox and Chrome), and on Android (Marshmallow, Lollipop and KitKat), while on iPhone it just freezes the app a few seconds, rather than crashing it completely. A video showing the bug follows below.

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This article was originally published on BGR.com
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House on Friday announced a new plan to fight propaganda from Islamic State and other violent extremist groups in the United States and abroad. The Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department will start a new task force to "integrate and harmonize" efforts to counter violent extremism in the United States, said Ned Price, spokesman for the White House National Security Council. The State Department will boost efforts to work with international partners - both inside and outside of foreign governments - on messaging against Islamic State and other violent groups in a "shift away from direct messaging," Price said in a statement. (Reporting by Roberta Rampton and Ayesha Rascoe; Editing by David Alexander)
Will the president defy the constitution and change the White House locks? Pundits worldwide have already begun taking aim at Americas Democratic and GOP front-runners ahead of this years presidential election. Yet for all the moaning over their stances on everything from gun control to refugees, Americans are at least assured of two things: a fair vote and a peaceful transition of power.

But serious concern is brewing in other parts of the world, including Taiwan, where a major vote could ruffle diplomatic feathers after eight years of relative calm. Current front-funner Tsai Ing-wens policies, according to Richard Bush of the Brookings Center for East Asia Policy Studies, would be seen as less China-friendly than her predecessors, creating at least the possibility that China will overreact and create a downward spiral of new tensions. The year ahead is also likely to see Portugals newly formed opposition cabinet  comprising an uneasy alliance between the socialists and communists  facing the litmus test of a new and likely center-right president. Meanwhile, the great African democracy that tested several nations throughout last year continues as we dive deeper into 2016.

Europe

Austria will hold a presidential vote this year, as will Iceland, where President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson has just bowed out of a run at a sixth term. This is good news for democracy in the land of fire and ice, where there are no constitutional term limits, which is a point of contention for those who felt burned by Grimssons anti-European fervor or frozen out of politics by his prior refusal to leave. Grimsson saw himself as the voice of the democratic will of the people, says University of Iceland history professor Gumundur Jonsson, but was really just continuing to cause division in his country. His departure allows for fresh faces to pop up on the political landscape before the June vote.

When presidents go for a third term and they dont have a lot of public support, it can lead to real problems.

Story continues

Hard hit by economic reforms and debt, many feared Portugal would follow Greece down the dark path of anti-austerity politicking, possibly sending shocks through markets or economies elsewhere. There were sighs of relief when the center right won the legislative election in October  followed by gasps when opposition socialists, determined not to keep warming the back benches, formed their first-ever coalition with what University of Lisbon professor Antonio Costa Pinto calls Portugals orthodox communists to secure the cabinet. A presidential election this month will likely see another center-right candidate win, but theres a big threat to the socialists in this coalition: Theyve gone to bed with those demanding steep increases in the minimum wage and some recovery for salaries and pensions trimmed by economic reforms. While their ability to deliver will depend on Europes beleaguered market and economy, it also leaves experts like Pinto predicting a divorce between the socialists and commies in about a year.

Africa

First, the good news: The opposition in Ghana has a great window of opportunity to ascend this year, says associate professor of African politics at Oxford Nic Cheeseman, and its expected to continue a democratic tradition begun in 1992. But that isnt the case for all the presidential elections set to take place across the continent this year. While African populations neednt worry as much about military coups as they have in the past, experts say, those clinging to power have simply found another way to stick around: by changing the constitution to suit their needs.

In Uganda, we may see less violence than the last election only because President Yoweri Musevenis cronies have better controlled the process leading up to elections, says Cheeseman. The 71-year-old leader has been in charge since 1986, having changed the constitution a decade back, and is expected to win again in February  despite a number of opposition candidates  owing to the worrying and incredible power of the incumbent, says Maria Burnett, a senior researcher in Human Rights Watchs Africa Division.

The Gambian president Yahya Jammeh is pursuing a fifth term, having ruled since a bloodless coup in 1994. During the last vote, regional West African observers refused to even go, says HRW researcher Felicity Thompson, noting that Jammeh has declared hell rule forever. Meanwhile, in the Republic of the Congo, 72-year-old Denis Sassou Nguesso is the most recent African leader to seek an extended tenure legislatively, with a referendum in October that extended term limits to three five-year terms while doing away with the age limit for candidates, which was 70.

In the nearby and similarly named Democratic Republic of the Congo, this could be a banner year for the country  if it democratically elects a new leader. But its also deeply concerning, warns Cheeseman, who says the 80-million-strong country could prove the riskiest of the bunch in terms of civil strife. Joseph Kabila, in looking to assure himself a third term, tried amending electoral law last year, which resulted in deadly Kinshasa protests. This prompted Kabila to ease off, but now hes threatening to delay elections while calling for a dialog. As in Burkina Faso and Burundi, Cheeseman says, When presidents go for a third term and they dont have a lot of public support, it can lead to real problems, with protests turning violent, possibly leading to military coups.

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The film Youth turns on a song. Released last month and starring Michael Caine, Jane Fonda, and Harvey Keitel, the movie begins as a royal messenger asks the aging composer Fred Ballinger (Caine) to conduct his most famous work for Prince Phillips birthday. Its not until the films final minutes that we finally do hear that piece: Simple Song #3.

Simple Song is up for a Golden Globe for best original song on Sunday, the only classical entry in a field dominated this and most years by pop stars. (Wiz Khalifa, Sam Smith, and Brian Wilson are nominated in the same category.) But Simple Song was written by David Lang, a contemporary classical composer with little prior film experience whose best-known work remains the Pulitzer Prize-winning Little Match Girl Passion.

So Simple Song represents something a little different for both Lang and the Globes. And a survey of its lyrics reveal that they also seem  a little different. They spin out, phrase over phrase, in a repetitive syntax that feels just shy of familiar:

I feel complete

I lose all control

I lose all control

I respond

Simple Song #3 must play a delicate emotional role in the film: Its both Ballingers most beloved work and one that transmits a hidden emotional message to his wife. But Lang was faced with how to write a conceivably popular song that amounts to, as he put it, something someone would whisper to their love: what people say to their lovers that they dont want anyone else to hear, he told me Wednesday.

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I was trying to think of how to convey to an audience what the most personal statement between this man and his wife would be, he said. Hes made this song, hes offered it to the world, and the world understands it in a particular way but thats not the way he understands it.

Story continues

That kind of really focused, personal communication is more like a whisper. Its not something you would sing or shout or yell or publish, its something youd whisper to a lover, said Lang.

So he chose an unusual text-assembly method.

I just typed in a Google searchI just typed, when you whisper my name I, he said. I got thousands of pornographic things and terrible things and things that were so specific I couldnt really use them. But I got a general catalog of what people say to their loved ones that they dont want anyone else to hear.

Lang then accumulated some of those results into a text, repeating some as necessary.

It worked, he said, because people share everything on the Internetthings you wouldnt want to say to your best friend, you have no problem broadcasting them to the world.

Return to the lyrics, and their unusual structure becomes more clear. When you whisper my name, I

I feel chills

I wake

I know on those lonely nights

I know on those lonely nights

I know everything

These sound like Google auto-complete suggestions.

In a way it doesnt matter what hes whispering to his lover. But the idea that he has this private communication, thats the thing, Lang said.

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It was the first time Lang had worked with Paolo Sorrentino, the Italian director behind Youth, though it was not the first time Langs music had been used in his films. Sorrentino licensed and chose various Lang compositions for La grande bellezza, which won the 2014 Oscar for Best Foreign Language film.

Lang collaborated with Sorrentino almost entirely by emailing him demo recordings. Sorrentino then would reply by email, essentially saying whether the music sufficiently moved him. As Lang told the Times: I kept sending demos of the song to Paolo, things that I thought were emotionally devastating. He would write back and hed say, Im sorry, I am crying a little, but I need to cry a lot.

Sorrentino never wanted Lang to describe his methodeither at music composition or text arrangementto him, which meant that when Simple Song finally made Sorrentino cry a lot, Lang never told him certain elements of its writing.I never ran [the text] by him. I never showed it to him, he told me this week. I never told him I got it from the Internet.

Read more from The Atlantic:

This article was originally published on The Atlantic.
CAIRO (Reuters) - Yemen's Saudi-backed government said on Saturday that peace talks due to be held on Jan. 14 would most probably be postponed beyond that date. "The thinking is to postpone the round of peace talks from mid-January to another date," spokesman Rajeh Badi told Reuters. A coalition led by Saudi Arabia and its Sunni Muslim allies has been fighting the Shi'ite Houthi movement, which controls the capital of Yemen, since March 2015. Negotiations to end the conflict were set to resume next week, with the U.N. special envoy to Yemen saying they would most likely take place in Geneva. Badi said the announcement by former president Ali Abdullah Saleh that he would not take part in the talks and the lack of Houthi commitment to carrying out their promises of releasing prisoners were amongst the reasons behind the push for postponement. Saleh, who enjoys the loyalty of the armed forces despite having stepped down from office nearly four years ago after months of protests, had joined forces with the Iran-allied Houthis in fighting the Saudi-led alliance trying to shore up President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. Saleh said on Friday he would not negotiate with Hadi's government. The warring sides held the latest round of peace talks in December but failed to find a political solution that would end the conflict, which has killed nearly 6,000 people. (Reporting By Mohammed Ghobari; Writing By Maha El Dahan; Editing by Digby Lidstone)
Fire victims thankful for help

Lynch told reporters, she woke up to use the bathroom at about 2.30 am on Wednesday, and as she was going back to bed, she saw bright flash of light and heard an explosion. When she investigated she realised that a car outside her home was on fire. The blaze quickly spread to the house, burning it to the ground.

Lynch was worried about her fate and how she and her child would survive without a home... until the Ministry came to the rescue.

From the time I was called by members of the ministry to today, I was treated with so much respect and courtesy. said Lynch. They made sure to help me as best as they could, and they gave me a very good reception. The Ministry attended to Lynchs family and others affected by the fire that gutted the house in Laventille. Families went to the Ministry yesterday afternoon and received clothing and a total of TT $1,640 in food support. They were also educated in the several grants that they could qualify for, which included a furniture grant, which is given to fire victims. The same was done for families in Morvant, and Rio Claro.

All recipients extended their thanks and appreciation for the quick response and support from the Minister, and staff of the Ministry.
WILLISTON  The company responsible for North Dakota's largest pipeline spill reported another leak on the same pipeline system Friday.

Meadowlark Midstream, a subsidiary of Summit Midstream, reported Friday that 187 barrels, or 7,854 gallons, of saltwater leaked from the pipeline Thursday afternoon about 15 miles north of Williston.

The spill occurred about 1 miles north of where a pipeline leak was discovered almost exactly a year ago on the same saltwater pipeline system, said Bill Suess, spill investigation program manager with the North Dakota Department of Health.

In this case, the spill did not contaminate Blacktail Creek or any other surface water, Suess said. Its still unknown if the latest spill contaminated groundwater, he said.

Health officials and the Oil and Gas Division are investigating. In this case, officials will take a close look at whats going on to cause two leaks in the same system, Suess said.

Anytime you have two releases from a single system, youre going to have a concern, Suess said.

On Jan. 6, 2015, the company discovered a pipeline leak adjacent to Blacktail Creek that involved an estimated 3 million gallons of brine. The contamination also reached the Little Muddy and Missouri rivers.

In that case, the North Dakota Industrial Commission alleges that the pipeline was leaking for more than three months before it was discovered. An investigation is still ongoing.

That segment of pipeline has been shut down since the spill was discovered, said Alison Ritter, spokeswoman for the Department of Mineral Resources.

In the latest spill, crews were able to shut down the pipeline within 15 minutes of detecting a problem due recent investments leak monitoring and detection, said a spokesman for Meadowlark Midstream.

The spill occurred at 3:36 p.m. Thursday and it was reported to state officials at 3 p.m. Friday, just under the 24-hour deadline to report spills, Suess said.

Crews were excavating the contaminated soils on Friday and health officials plan to visit the site again on Saturday. The pipeline continues to be shut down.

The incident has been fully contained and Meadowlark is working cooperatively with the appropriate state agencies, the company said in a statement.

No cause is yet known for either pipeline leak. The Industrial Commission has proposed $2.4 million in fines to Summit Midstream for the 2015 spill, alleging that the pipeline likely began leaking on or before Oct. 1, 2014, or 98 days before it was discovered.

The Williams County Commission has sent a letter to the Industrial Commission urging them to impose the entire fine, rather than their typical practice of suspending 75 percent to 90 percent of the fine.
What you need to know about the Octagon Art Festival on Sunday in Ames

news
Monastery to hold oblate meeting

The Oblates of Annunciation Monastery will hold a public meeting from 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday.

"Oblates are women and men of varied faiths who wish to associate themselves with a monastic community and live according to the Rule of St. Benedict as their lives permit," said Sister Patricia Schap, oblate director. "Oblates are supported by the prayers of the Sisters of Annunciation Monastery and through attending monthly meetings with other oblates."

The meeting will be held at the monastery, 7520 University Drive in Bismarck.

For more information, contact Sister Patricia at 701-255-1520.

Women's Club sets Jan. 14 schedule

Laurie Kimball, a registered nurse from Minneapolis, will serve as the speaker for the three Christian Women's Club meetings in Bismarck on Thursday. Her theme is "always moving on in life even without changing locations."

The brunch group will meet at 9:30 a.m. at the Bismarck Eagles Club, 313 N. 26th St. The theme is "A Clean Slate." Kimball will provide the special feature, and Lonna Sjomeling, of Mandan, will perform music. The cost is $8, and reservations should be made by noon Monday by calling 701-223-7127.

The midday connection will meet at 12:30 p.m. at the Municipal Country Club, 930 N. Griffin St. The theme is "One Day at a Time." Kimball will provide the special feature. The cost is $10, and reservations should be made by noon Tuesday by calling 701-751-2869.

The after five group will meet at 6 p.m. at the Municipal Country Club. The theme is "Under Construction." Kimball will provide the special feature. The cost is $12, and reservations should be made by noon Tuesday by calling 701-202-5570.

Artists Celebrating Christ accepts entries

Artists Celebrating Christ is accepting entries for its juried art show to take place April 14-17 at the University of Mary.

Entries must give glory to God in some manner. The show will accept all mediums.

Registration can be completed online at www.accartshow.com through Feb. 15.

For more information, email info@accartshow.com or call 701-400-2815.
China will consider developing a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier after it gains enough experience in operating large vessels, Senior Captain Zhang Junshe with the Peoples Liberation Army Naval Military Studies Research Institute said.

China Shipbuilding Industry Corp, which refitted the Liaoning and is building the second carrier in Dalian in northeastern Liaoning Province, has been researching nuclear-powered ships since 2013, PLA Daily reported Friday.

Du Wenlong, a senior researcher at the PLA Academy of Military Science, previously has said that it is highly possible that the navys next-generation aircraft carrier will be equipped with nuclear propulsion.

China already has nuclear submarines that require highly sophisticated technologies and manufacturing capabilities, so developing a nuclear carrier will not be difficult, he was quoted as saying.

Chinas long-term goal is to have at least four aircraft carriers. China is looking into nuclear propulsion and electromagnetic launching of aircraft to match the aircraft carrier capabilities of US Aircraft carriers.

Developing the design talent to design aircraft carriers

The PLA Navy was able to extract eight truckloads of detailed plans of the Liaoning (repaired Soviet carrier) from the Ukrainian vendors. These have been the foundation of the present activity. China is now facing the same reality that has dogged the efforts of all the major navies of the last century. The greatest restraint on naval expansion in the industrial age has been neither budgets nor disarmament treaties. It has in fact been the lack of drafting expertise to translate the design concepts of naval architects into the detailed compartment-by-compartment drawings that allow the shipbuilders to do their work (arguably, this has been a key problem for Australia with the new Air Warfare Destroyers)

Although the PLA Navy is pursuing multiple paths of technology transfer from overseas, both legitimate and covert, its shipbuilders must recruit and train sufficient expert indigenous design staff in very large numbers at a time when the Chinese navy is seeking to introduce many different new classes: submarines, cruisers, destroyers, frigates, amphibious ships, replenishment ships and light craft. In particular, the demands of the submarine force, both nuclear and conventional, must be a higher priority than the carrier force for the PLA Navy as a whole, and for the national leadership.

Chinas second aircraft carrier and its first operational combat carrier will set sail later this year based on current progress.

The first ocean-going aircraft carrier combat taskforce of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) Navy, led by the new aircraft carrier, will possess initial combat capability in 2018 or 2019, according to an insightful article in China Military sourced from Southern Weekly.

The carrier will be the first by a developing country with 50000 tons displacement running on conventional power and possessing a ski-jump take-off. This, the article says reflects Chinas small yet-quick-steps development guideline for its naval vessels and is conducive to forming combat capability as early as possible.

The second aircraft carrier will be equipped with the same phased array radar as those on the 052D destroyer. Other improvements may include installing advanced satellite communication system, electronic warfare system, and command and control system.

Compared with aircraft carrier Liaoning, the second aircraft carrier will have major improvements in the layout of the flight deck, hangar and island (superstructure) which will be more rational, resulting in saving of space improved overall performance, said the article.

The island of the second aircraft carrier is re-designed from that of the Liaoning as the Soviet Unions ship-borne radar and electronic equipment is large and heavy, leading to a large island on the Varyad (now Liaoning) and taking up the valuable space on the flight deck.

When modifying the Varyad, China didnt change the original island structure for stability and project simplification.

SOURCES  Defense World, South China Morning Post, National Interest
A new school for 180 students in the Dominican Republic will be built this spring thanks in part to the initiative of several North Dakota high school students.

Late last year, Shiloh Christian School senior Alex Delzer and friends at three other schools throughout the state organized a coin drive to collect money for a new school in Comendador, a city just across the border from Haiti.

The students raised $2,400 through students donations and checks written by a few parents. Delzers hoping to find local businesses willing to match that amount to increase the impact of their effort.

Delzer got the idea to hold a fundraiser collecting students spare change as a sophomore when he decided to run for state student council president the following year. He wanted to run on a platform that involved completing a service project.

He drew inspiration from a coin drive organized at Shiloh to raise money for the schools new commons area connecting the high school and elementary wings.

I thought that would be cool to do for someone else, he said.

He refined his idea at several youth leadership conventions, deciding that for someone else would mean for students in a developing country. He wanted to help build them a school.

He shared his vision with his uncle, who sits on the board of directors for VisionTrust, a charitable organization focused on helping children throughout the world.

Delzer got in touch with the director of VisionTrusts projects in the Dominican Republic and learned about the need for a new school in Comendador.

He opted to move forward this school year. Local businesses made in-kind donations to help the effort, including posters designed by KAT Communications that were printed by Image Printing.

His grandmother, Rep. Diane Larson, R-Bismarck, coordinated a lunch meeting with Delzer and State Superintendent Kirsten Baesler. Baesler, in turn, endorsed the project.

Next, Delzer contacted friends at several other North Dakota schools who agreed to organize similar coin drives Nov. 9-26.

Courtney Leben, a senior at Bismarck High School and public relations coordinator for her schools student council, jumped on board.

I think it was awesome that a student not only came up with this, but took the initiative to get other schools involved, said Leben, who made announcements over BHSs loudspeakers to publicize the project.

At her school, students could drop donations in a jar designated for one of four teachers. The teacher with the most money in his or her jar by Nov. 26 would receive a pie in the face at the next pep rally.

Delzer distributed buckets throughout Shiloh, spoke to teachers and made announcements during chapel.

Though he does not have any firm plans to travel to the new school in the Dominican Republic, he said VisionTrust organizes mission trips. Hed be interested in going if the opportunity arose.

We could literally help lay the bricks we helped pay for, said Delzer, adding hes learned a lot through organizing the project  mainly, to seize opportunities as they present themselves.

God really opened up some doors for me, he said. It was just one door after another, and, if I didnt walk through, it would have been my fault.
Japans Ministry of Defense Technical Research and Development Institute (TRDI) announced that a prototype of Tokyos first indigenously-designed fifth-generation air superiority fighter, the Mitsubishi ATD-X Shinshin, will make its maiden flight in February 2016 according to Sankei.com

The principal objective of the ATD-X Shinshin program is to develop a research prototype aircraft anadvanced technology demonstration unit to test the capacity of Japans defense industry to develop, among other things, a powerful fighter engine and various other indigenous stealth fighter aircraft technologies.

The program is meant to eventually produce Japans first indigenously-designed fifth-generation air superiority fighter, designated F-3, with serial production slated to begin in 2027, although various delays in the development of the ATD-X Shinshin prototype scheduled to be fully developed by 2018 make a later date more likely.

The reason behind the development of the F-3 is the refusal of the United States to sell to Japan the Lockheed-Martin F-22 Raptor stealth air superiority fighter in the 2000s. According to some media reports, Lockheed-Martin is playing an undetermined role in the development of the ATD-X prototype.

Among other things, the aircraft will feature 3D thrust vectoring capability.

The aircraft will be fitted with an active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar. The radar will have capabilities for electronic countermeasures, communications functions, and possibly even microwave weapon functions. The Shinshin is planned to have a flight-by-optics flight control system.

One full-scale ATD-X prototype has been constructed. Back in 2011, Japan decided to procure 42 F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighters, the first of which are scheduled to arrive at the end of 2016

SOURCES  The Diplomat, Senkai.com
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" ... How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practice the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, to influence or awe the public... "

[From George Washington's farewell address.]

Other Quotes:

"Don't worry about genius and don't worry about not being clever. Trust rather to hard work, perseverance and determination. The best motto for a long march is ' Don't grumble. Plug on.'....Be honest. Be loyal. Be kind. Remember that the hardest thing to acquire is the faculty of being unselfish. As a quality it is one of the finest attributes of manliness." Sir Frederick Treves

"...To be clear, the Constitution of the United States of America is the United States of America. They are one and the same. Any individual or agency which seeks to subvert the Constitution and wage political and/or rhetorical war on it, are self-declared enemies of the United States of America, as they are subverting and waging war on the United States of America." - Pat Dollard

The truth to the matter is that Obama lies but he does it with such finess that the easily fooled are easily fooled. ~ Norman E. Hooben

"Going for the grandest illusion of all, [Obama] ... told the New York Times: 'We've actually been operating in a way that has been entirely consistent with free-market principles.' Excuse me while I pick my jaw off the ground. Everyone knows -- or should know -- that putting more and more of the government in charge of more and more of the economy is entirely inconsistent with free-market principles. This means that the president's statement to the contrary is what is known as a big lie." --columnist Diana West



When you trust a stranger more so than your friend, you become stranger than the stranger; Barrack Husein Obama is a stranger. - Norman E. Hooben

We the peopleWe the people now have a New World Order that we the people did not order. Norman E. Hooben

"We are now in a great civil war of words and you have the honor of participating as a true patriot. The battle has not been won but you will be there when we are victorious. The pen is mightier than the sword and you will inscribe your name in the book of freedomand that, my friend is an honor

"If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a small chance of survival. There may even be a worse case: you may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves ." -

Winston Churchill

It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.

-

Ronald Reagan

Thomas Sowell

For those who promote a race they are called, "racists". For those that promote American they are called "American". For 'American' is a 'concept' and no racial tones are tolerated either in shades or sounds. -Norman E. Hooben

(In reference to Lourdes Galvan of San Antonio, Texas racial bigotry regarding American military heroes.)

Note to NATIONAL COUNCIL OF LA RAZA (

Hola! I know you are watching):

Will Rogers never met Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid. -

N. E. Hooben, July 2008

Harvard University was once an all boys school...today they have no balls at all. - N. E. Hooben

I will stand with the Constitution For The United States of America should the political winds shift in an ugly direction

Politicians are like vampires...

Whether its blood or money they want to suck it out of you till you die. ~ N. E. Hooben

(Norman E. Hooben in response to a writer who complained of not having the honor of serving in the U.S. Military)Back in the days of "The Lone Ranger" program, someone would ask, "Who is that masked man?" People need to start asking that question about Barack Obama. -N.E. HoobenThe Police State of Massachusetts is now imposing laws against nature. Massachusetts is by far the most un-Constitutional government of the State, by the State, and for the State than any among the the fifty that hold a star on the banner of freedom. It is run by Socialists and hypocritical so-called Christiansthe worst among them are the Catholics who go to Church on Sunday and forget what they Prayed for on Monday. - Norman E. Hooben - "A proud Catholic proud of my Faith. A proud Catholic NOT so proud of my Church!" - July 16th 2008 N. E. Hooben

When a people are satisfied with receiving gifts paid with their own taxes as a way of life Anarchy is sure to follow. - Fred Boutin 2008

From the first time I heard about the boogey-man as a child to the first time I got shot at in Vietnam, nothing in my entire lifetime, THAT'S NOTHING! has put more fear into me than this man Obama. - Norman E. Hooben - July 2008

We are here for only a mini-second in the sands of time. Then we become the dust that makes the sand; and the Hand of God molds us anew. Take care my friend and may God Bless... - Norman E. Hooben on the death of our dearly beloved pet dog, Stirling

The evidence is overwhelming!

In order to save America we must destroy the Socialst Marxist Party... - N. E. Hooben

"America is like a healthy body and its resistance is threefold: its patriotism, its morality, and its spiritual life. If we can undermine these three areas, America will collapse from within." -- Josef Stalin --

When it comes to lying, prudent people are guided by a Higher Authority driven by thou shall not written in stone. Whereas Bill Clinton has no Higher Authority to guide him, thou shall not has no conscious objections; for without a conscience there is no guilt. - Norman Hooben

The victor will never be asked if he told the truth. - Adolph Hitler

The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny. - James Madison, the Federalists Papers

There was a Chemistry professor in a large college that had some Exchange students in the class. One day while the class was in the lab the Prof noticed one young man (exchange student) who kept rubbing his back And stretching as if his back hurt.

The professor asked the young man what was the matter. The student told him he had a bullet lodged in his back. He had been shot while fighting communists in his native country who were trying to overthrow his country's government and install a new communist government.

In the midst of his story he looked at the professor and asked a strange question. He asked,'Do you know how to catch wild pigs?' The professor thought it was a joke and asked for the punch line. The young man said this was no joke. 'You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs find it and begin to come everyday to eat the free corn. When they are used to coming every day, you put a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming. When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the corn again and you put up another side of the fence. They get used to that and start to eat again. You continue until you have all four sides of the fence up with a gate in the last side. The pigs, who are used to the free corn, start to come through the gate to eat, you slam the gate on them and catch the whole herd. Suddenly, the wild pigs have lost their freedom. They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught. Soon they go back to eating the free corn. They are so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods for themselves, so they accept their captivity. The young man then told the professor that is exactly what he sees happening to America.

The government keeps pushing us toward Communism/Socialism and keeps spreading the free corn out in the form of programs such as supplemental income, tax credit for unearned income, subsidies, payments not to plant crops (CRP), welfare, medicine, drugs, etc. while we continually lose our freedoms- just a little at a time.

One should always remember 'There is no such thing as a free Lunch!' Also, 'You can never hire someone to provide a service for you cheaper than you can do it yourself.

You apparently don't share a sense of patriotism, Americanism, freedomism, or whatever kind of 'ism' that true Americans believe in... You do however, display a bit of socialism, communism, marxism or whatever kind of 'ism' that you make excuses for... ~ Norman E. Hooben (in response to an Obama supporter's views about the ACS census)

A nation that knows not from where it came, knows not where it is going! Today, Americans know too little about the foundations of our nation. The result is a nation now in chaos, its people unable to discern what is wrong with the transformation (paradigm shift) of our society and form of government that, if left unchecked, will destroy every facet of freedom, liberty and justice. The price of freedom is vigilance; the price of vigilance is knowledge. Many of America's founding documents are now available on the web. ~

Learn USA
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is shakira being represented as that goat? if so, lol.

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As a gazelle* yes

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I lol'ed

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Try Everything and still not get a hit! werq

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lol as if Shakira truly needed chart toppers to slay in life.

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Being someone who releases an album every four years, I think she's fine with her dozen of hits in the last decade, and her two big ones from this one.

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The seem to think Shakira's main demo is the usa. EL OH EL.

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YAAAASSS. The song is kinda catchy imo



She's improved a lot in singing in English. It sounds more clear than her previous work. Sweeet!

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my mom really wants to see this movie

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With Zootopia already sounding like a furry convention or amusement park, a song called "Try Everything' isn't helping things either.

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Those are some odd lyrics.

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I love this song so much loll

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Fijacion oral parte 1 and Piez descalzos are my fave Shaki albums. She Wolf was good too #sorrynotsorry

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She Wolf was a truly entertaining album. The hate is OTT. If anything is better than OFv2 and Shakira.

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I agree it was underwhelming to the GP because they were expecting something completely different from her after her previous album and she wanted to do her stuff but anyway. Great icon btw one of my faves part of the video.

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I like it :D

I need a new album ASAP. And a new tour as well.

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Praying for Shakira stans.

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I still haven't listened to her latest album, ooops.



I was going through her discography but then I got distracted by Mariah Carey and then got distracted from Mariah, with Kpop :(

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The Pittsburgh-based Beo String Quartet will visit Legacy High School on Monday to work with students and perform a concert.

In the morning, they will present a chamber music seminar to orchestra students, culminating in a student performance open to the public from 2:30-3 p.m. in the school's orchestra room.

Beo will hold a concert open to the public at 8 p.m. in the school auditorium.

The performance will feature two of the quartet's best-known works, Ravel String Quartet in F and Bartok's String Quartet No. 4. A freewill offering will be taken.

Beo is also visiting schools in Fargo, Grand Forks and Devils Lake this month.
The paintings of the King and Queen made by a British Army officer before they were taken to Vellore
Obvioulsy, Maine's Governor LePage has a major problem with "talking points". Although all Maine people want to support efforts to eliminate the state's growing drug trafficking and addiction, the Governor;s campaign to rally citizens to combate the epedimic became focused on him, rather than the issue.





Stan Laurel (left) and Oliver Hardymade dealing with conundrums part their comedy routine, but Governor LePage blames other for his "messes"

It could be funny exept it's so serious. Drug trafficking and substance abuse addiction is killing and debilitating people at a rapid rate and it's mostly young people who are the vistims.





"A cap on the number of opiate addiction patients that doctors can treat means many who want to take Suboxone can't get access to it. In Maine, the governor has reduced funding for the treatment."





Meanwhile, the governor's campaign to catch illegal drug traffickers created national negative news when LePage made a terrible reference to " white women " who he claimed were being impregnated by criminal drug sellers from New York City.





It's bad enough for the state's political leader to insinuate that the state's "white women" are being victimized twice - once by illegal drug dealers and again by the state's governor. Now, these ugly stigmas are drawing negative attention to Maine "the 'serene' way life should be" state, where things like illegal drugs are unnfairly sharing publicity with tourism campaigns.





Maine's governor, unfortunaely, is just a few legislative votes away from the launch of an impeachement campaign based on past actions. He's been severely criticized for abuse of power by interferring with the personal hiring of Maine House Speaker Mark Eaves as the president of the private Goodwill-Hinckley School. Nevertheless, Governor LePage just can't follow talking points. He should follow strict speaking bullets, especially while he cotnnues to incite controvery nearly everywhere he goes. Nevertheless, his negative publicity and incendiary rhetoric are very unbecoming of a chief executive and offensive to many people.





If Governor LePage really wants to make a difference to impact the Maine problem with heroin, and substance abuse trafficking, and addictions, he should recommend more funding for treatment and prevention. Additonally, it's imperative for him to stop blaming his own terrible mediia glitches on other innocent people.

























Labels: heroin white women, National Public Radio, substance abuse
But Gov. Paul LePage insisted he was being unfairly pilloried for "one slip-up." There's no leadership in defensive posturing.





Maine has a Latin state motto, translated from "Dirigo" meaning, "I lead". Nevertheless, Maine's current governor Paul LePage is preoccupied defending the controversial bruhahas he has created, rather than leading the state. In other words, Governor LePage can't make news unless it's "bad news". Certainly, he's not creating effective leadership. Instead, he's defening his inappropiate behavior.....again. Surely, Governor LePage knows better than to say words like "....kiss my butt..." when asked why he didn't attend an annual Martin Luther King breakfast, during his first gubernatorial term. That was only the beginning of his serial "slip ups"



LePage responded to the suggestion that he had a pattern of slighting the N.A.A.C.P.. Tell them to kiss my butt, he said.



Benjamin Todd Jealous, the president and chief executive officer of the N.A.A.C.P., said that Mr. LePages decision to inflame racial tension on the eve of the King holiday denigrates his office.





And now in 2016,

Maine Gov. Paul LePage Apologizes For 'White Girl' Remark





Maine's tough-talking governor admitted he made a "mistake" and apologized Friday for making what has been widely condemned as a racist remark at a town hall meeting. Even worse than the use of "white girl" was his reference to how illegal drug dealers are selling to Mainers and "impregnating" the state's white girls. (Governor LePage had no business making such a preposterous comment.)



But Gov. Paul LePage insisted he was being unfairly pilloried for "one slip-up."





The problem is that Governor LePage has made many more than "one slip-up". Indeed, the Governor's mistatements are more like mudslides, than slip ups. This was just one.

Governor LePage was on the defensive, again.

"I was going impromptu and my brain didn't catch up to my mouth," LePage said. "Instead of Maine women I said white women. ... If you go to Maine, you can see it's 95 percent white."



Then LePage went after the journalists who reported his gaffe.



"If I was perfect, I would be a reporter," LePage said. "If you want to make it racist, go ahead and do what you want."



Claiming to be paraphrasing the "Rocky" movies, he also said: "Youse don't like me and I don't like youse."



(By the way, NBC reports, no such quote appears to exist on the various movie quote databases. NBC reseachers checked out.)



LePage also slammed his state's media, saying they aren't reporting enough on Maine's growing drug problem. (Maine's news media since published data contrary to Governor LePage's accusation, giving the number of times the drug stories were reported.)





In other words, Governor LePage is flat wrong to blame the news media for words he used and that he acknowedges were wrong.





Governor Paul LePage is unable to lead Maine. He's constantly embroiled in controversy and could face impeachment if the movement to remove him from office gains momentum.





Maine Governor Paul LePage has defended a series of mouth "slip ups"

Meanwhile, Governor LePage continues to speak from his mouth instead of his brain. He wrongly blamed the news media for his inability to provide Maine with leadership. For example, at the end of the first Maine 127th legislature, Maine's legislators voted to overide the governor's veto of the state budget that would have closed state government, if it had passed. He's been ineffective ever since.





Unfortunately, Governor LePage began his gubernatorial leadership with a great deal of good will, even among his detractors. Sadly, through the Governor's own mistatements and bully style behaviors, he's become an ineffective political leader. Instead of leading, he appears to do or say anything, just to get attention, even if it means being on television and apologizing for mistatements.





Here's a WCSH6 news clip with Governor LePage defending his position on racism:

http://www.wcsh6.com/media/cinematic/video/78527596/governor-lepage-holds-press-conference-to-explain-his-personal-lack-of-racism/





Maine's tradition of providing the nation with exceptional political leadership has now been undermined by our governor who spends more time defending and apologizing than leading.

Labels: Maine 127th legislature, racism, WCSH6
Universities in Sweden possess a much additional record. Whether a person get ceos throughout the world what individual characteristic they rule your current most, next most of them may say creativity. That is what exactly is missing from all universities. This is your individual thing the item Sweden offers to every student. People also understand actual skills that happen to be inside necessitate correct now. That you are ready to solve problems. Anyone isnt just taught for you to think creatively. You might be additionally taught how you can use your creativity. Graduates regarding Swedens universities usually are known in the same way problem solvers.

By the point, you should fully learn why and so numerous international students decide on to help study within Sweden. Ones difference will be seen inside how high my own schools rank. But, a person currently realize why. My personal universities dont only focus in giving an individual general knowledge. They focus in creativity in addition to how you can apply the knowledge. The actual makes people ready with regard to a good career from graduation. Just like a person decide in which in order to check out university, we ask people to be able to recall these kinds of half a dozen reasons for you to study with Sweden.

1. Think extra creatively:

A university professor are right after quoted as saying the item university doesnt teach you to be able to do a good job; this is built to teach an individual the way to think. But, how is the item teaching you in order to think? To its majority of a worlds universities, the means teaching you in order to think critically. That is not your own same as learning to help think intended for yourself. You might be taught to think critically according towards the system the idea your own professor believes in. You may view this anytime people question its methods.

Universities with Sweden consider a great much other approach. They teach anyone in order to think critically just like virtually any additional university. But it is your framework approximately youre this is much different. You happen to be in addition taught to think independently in addition to creatively. You usually are encouraged to help not simply just question the non-academic world. You are taught to help question everything. This permits anyone your current ability to be able to retail outlet with the overall world differently. This also changes the ideas that you should come to.

You are not looking in the world including that is wrong in addition to you make use of been taught the appropriate way. People very easily go shopping with the world along with ask, is there a great much better way? This extra creative as well as less judgmental technique produces new ideas, not merely griping in regards to the world. Your method of teaching could be the main reason the item Sweden consistently ranks among your all innovative countries.

2. Possibly be challenged with regard to a reason:

There are usually a lot of horror accounts involving university courses which are difficult. University is meant to challenge you. But, ones common practice involving using certain courses in order to quickly weed you out serves little purpose. Universities throughout sweden are challenging, but they build your challenge approximately bringing in a person your current simplest you\'ll be, not only for you to see how much they can put a person through.

The difference that this makes is not hard to see. Overall, Swedens system regarding education is usually ranked among the top systems with the world. Sweden is additionally home to many secondary schools that happen to be individually ranked among ones worlds best. These kinds of rankings are not by Sweden itself. They are conducted via independent international organizations.

Another factor that makes universities inside Sweden stand out would be the focus of every course. They dont simply just focus at stuffing credits to acquire a good degree. These are specific on reasoning, rationality, and also just about all importantly, application. This can be in contrast on the quote it we discussed earlier. Universities within Sweden dont simply just teach an individual the best way to think. They teach you tips on how to apply your own knowledge.

3. Anyone doesnt merely sit in class:

A student sitting with class simply just to acquire a good credit will be seen with the world. Unfortunately, a lot of professors tend to be so engrossed in lecturing it they dont notice. They will certainly not even care, since them including being able to hear themselves talk and/or proving how smart they are.

You will probably not receive the particular from universities with Sweden. As my partner and i mentioned, your own focus is actually further at innovation as well as application. Professors want to realize you might be not only learning but will then apply ones learning. They call for you to help participate. You can be needed to demonstrate ones knowledge along with ability to make use of it.

4. Focus at environmental sustainability:

A huge focus in addition to global concern today is in environmental sustainability. Sweden can be one of an international locations the idea has intended the actual the priority. Similar to my own focus on utilizing knowledge, my country in addition to it is inhabitants consider youre very seriously. Whether you might be interested with furthering your own cause involving going green next you will find many kindred souls here.

The focus in sustainability is seen with Swedens rankings. My partner and i were named ones #1 inside sustainability among every country for the world. This really is due in order to multiple advances that this country features made? Focus continues to be issued to controlling greenhouse gas emissions in addition to building additional avenues regarding sustainable energy.

5. Its straightforward for you to apply:

Students from throughout the world consumed for you to study inside Sweden tuition-free, until recently. However, inside 2010, your current government passed the latest law, the item features altered ones transaction structure regarding international students by outside the eu/eaa. Your current new structure incorporates both the tuition expenses and also the application form fees.

The change provides likewise been accompanied through numerous scholarships which are exhibited to be able to students cover it\s tuition fees. Scholarship chances include financial waivers with regard to international students, in scholarships offered both because of the Swedish government in addition to from individual universities with Sweden.

There usually are absolutely no age limits when the item comes towards the university entrance exam, called sweat (or hogskoleprovet with Swedish), and also there is simply no need as being a Swedish citizen. However, you have to meet your expected permissions to apply for the course or perhaps program.

6. Experience precise diversity:

Diversity will be another biggest issue throughout my own world today. Throughout the last century, technology caused it to be less difficult for you to travel concerning the world. The additionally gives people straight into daily contact within additional cultures compared to ever before. This really is important the idea i realize not only in order to promote diversity but end up being comfortable throughout it.

Sweden is a very diverse country. But, this doesnt merely allow diversity. Similar to everything else we have looked at, Sweden functions difficult to be able to promote diversity. Sweden possesses consistently ranked among your simplest nations pertaining to equality at the world. This is additionally ranked among ones least complicated with gender equality and also lgbt rights. That is due to be able to Swedens overall progressive attitude.
The number of businesses owned by African American women grew 322 percent since 1997, making black females the fastest growing group of entrepreneurs in the U.S. It is clear that African American women are launching companies in growing numbers across the country.

More and more women of color have gone out on their own after having unsatisfying experiences in corporate America. While profitable, they have found it creatively constricting and even depressing being stuck in a cubicle all day long. That mundaneness recently caused Madison-area entrepreneur Taylar Barrington to take the leap and to break out of it.

"After college, I felt like that was what I was supposed to do  corporate job, 9-to-5. I jumped right into that," Barrington tells Madison365. "I didnt really have any mentors in my field, and my school was really small. I just felt like it was the thing to do; a right of passage. I got in there [corporate life] and I was like, Woah. This isnt it!

A native of Stone Mountain, Ga., and graduate of Florida A&M University, Barrington is the founder of the Taylar Barrington Creative Agency, a full-service visual marketing agency that utilizes the niche creative skills of young women to provide a multitude of services to clients. She is also the owner and president of MaverickHill, a lifestyle empowerment brand for collegiate women.

Barringtons "A-ha moment" came a few years ago when she was teaching graphic communications to special education high school students in Atlanta immediately after her corporate world experience. She remembers she used to do warm-ups with the kids where she would always ask them, "Whats your dream?"

"But one day, the kids turned it around and asked me, Whats your dream?" Barrington remembers. "And I thought, Thats a good question! Ive always just been very grateful for all of the opportunities that Ive had so I never really liked stop to think that this wasnt really what I wanted to be doing."

After that question was asked, Barrington really took some time to self-reflect. "I realized that I really wanted to dive into entrepreneurship full time," she says.

With this statement in mind  "Well-behaved women seldom make history"  Barrington launched MaverickHill, an inspirational portal to encourage young women to be leaders, motivators and history-makers through its products, programs and resources.

"I didnt start MaverickHill to be a start-up; it was just an idea to supplement my graphic design business," Barrington remembers of MaverickHill, whose purpose is to provide an unforgettable experience that adds to the evolvement of an ever-changing lifestyle. "It just has really grown into something I wasnt prepared for. "

Out of MaverickHill, Barrington recently launched UniversiTee Box in September, a re-invention of the campus care package. "The UniversiTee Box is a subscription service for pre-college, college women and young professional women. We mail out empowerment and fashion every month," Barrington says. "Weve basically found a way to reach our audience through vessels that they can relate to. The UniversiTee Box allows us to physically be a part of the lives of young women across the United States and to instill the values that are important for confident women leaders to possess."

Each month, women get a graphic t-shirt of a certain theme with the rest of the items in the box. "For example, Octobers box was breast cancer and domestic violence awareness month so everything in the box was related to that," Barrington says.

The UniversiTee Box is a great gift for a parent to give to their college student, Barrington says, or for somebody to give a friend.

"Its really a great value. The retail value is twice what you are paying for it," Barrington says. "I love it. Its really gotten a lot of great feedback. I get so many positive e-mails after every shipment from girls who just enjoy it so much and tell me how much it just brightens their day."

Barrington says the UniversiTee Box is all about affirmation. "I lost my dad last year and it was a really difficult time but I learned about the power of affirmation," she says. "When I was developing the concept of the UniversiTee Box, I knew I wanted empowerment to be a component, but I also wanted to make the lifestyle of affirmation habit forming. So, each month we send out a new affirmation, and its to affirm something specific about your life whether that is creating goals, being fearless, starting a new journey, or just about relaxing  giving yourself a break."

As Barrington transitioned her entrepreneurship lifestyle from her home in Atlanta to Madison a little over a year ago, she has noticed some distinct differences and challenges.

"Atlanta is kinda like a city of Chocolate Goodness," Barrington smiles. "Everybody is really on their grind, and it is very encouraging. There is easy access to people who are just like you and are doing what you are doing. It keeps you fueled."

In Madison, it was not the same case. "It took me awhile to find my community here," Barrington says. "And I have  through [Madison co-working community] 100 State, Ive found a community of black entrepreneurs who are just as motivated as I. We depend on each other to stay motivated."

But Madison has come with its challenges, and its been an adjustment. "There are times when Ive been the only black entrepreneur in the room. Ive felt like the elephant in the room, and even though nobody says anything, you can feel it," Barrington says. "Going from a city of Chocolate Goodness to spaces where I often am the only Chocolate Goodness is a challenge. But I feel like Ive been able to add perspectives. I come to the table with different insights. I think that that has been an advantage."

Barringtons personal mission statement is to creatively elevate young women in order to cultivate more motivators, leaders and history-makers. "I believe that you should be fearless," she says. "And if you have dreams that you want to achieve. You can.

"Youth has a special place in my heart," she adds. "Remember, I used to be a teacher. I think that it is very important that there be a balance in the visibility of options for our young people. Any chance I get to inspire, I try to do it. I cant change the whole world with what Im doing, but I can touch a life. Thats my goal. I aspire to inspire."

A big part of why she stepped out on faith to become an entrepreneur was because of young people urging her to find her dream. "Those kids in Atlanta  all special education students and almost all black  were always told all of their lives what they cant do," she remembers. "I feel like they needed somebody to tell them what they can do. So many other young people need that today, too.

"That one morning when they asked me what my dream was, and I was there to encourage them to follow their dreams  I felt like a hypocrite," she adds. "They really made me think. And a big part of me stepping out and following my dreams, I owe to those young people."

The twentysomething Barrington wants to continue to make that difference in young peoples lives here in Madison. Part of that, she feels, will be through helping to diversify the entrepreneurial scene here.

"Could you imagine what our economy would look like with a balanced business landscape and how beautiful that would be when you have an option to choose who you want to support and youre not forced into these nooks?" she asks. "Madison definitely has some work to do in that regard."

In the meantime, Harringtons goals moving forward are to continue to garner support for MaverickHill. "I want to continue to find the resources, knowledge bases, and support systems to grow the company as I know it can," Barrington says. "I want to continue to reach more girls. My niche, my heart, and my passion are with women. I want to continue to diversify the landscape not only with African Americans but also with women. Its our time, too."

And it is needed right now.

"Entrepreneurship has been historically driven by white males. I think that times are changing and you can see it happening in bigger cities. I think it should happen in Madison, too," she says. "Im excited for the future."
by Sen. Doug Whitsett

Attorney-client privilege is an uninfringeable pillar of our legal system. That system rightfully and unambiguously protects disclosure of those communications. Further, attorneys are specifically excluded from being compelled to testify regarding most communications with their client in any legal proceeding.

Regrettably, some state agencies are inappropriately manipulating attorney-client privilege as a shield against public disclosure laws.

The Oregon Department of Justice (DOJ) provides legal services to most state agencies. An Attorney General Opinion (Opinion) generally carries the force of law. Agencies are permitted to apply the Opinion as if it were law, until or unless it is overturned by the courts, or by an act of the Legislative Assembly.

Opinions issued by the DOJ are public record. Citizens who may wish to challenge an Opinion have full access to its wording and legal reasoning. Their attorneys may base their arguments on statutes, administrative rules or case law that they believe contradicts the Opinion.

However, Oregon law appears to be silent on the disclosure of legal advice provided by a DOJ attorney to an agency. Using that ambiguity in the law, agencies may simply ask their DOJ attorney for legal advice rather than requesting a formal written Opinion.

At least two state agencies are now declaring they are not required to disclose legal advice from their DOJ attorney. Further, they are refusing to disclose the advice, under the protection of attorney-client privilege, while using the same advice to enact administrative rules or written orders.

The Oregon Department of Energy (ODE) purportedly obtained advice from an attorney regarding the sale of the controversial Business Energy Tax Credits (BETC). That advice allegedly authorized third-party sales of BETCs at discounts that appear to be greater than allowed by statute.

Subsequent to the claimed receipt of that legal advice, ODE allowed BETC sales brokered by private third parties at up to at least 25 percent discounts. The agency also planned to create an administrative rule retroactively authorizing those BETC sales, allegedly based on the same legal advice.

ODE has refused to make the claimed legal advice available to the news media, the public, legislators and even to members of its own staff. The agency has even declined to disclose the source of the advice.

The management at ODE has based its refusal to disclose public information on claims of attorney-client privilege. The Oregon Attorney General appears to concur with that allegation.

The Oregon Water Resources Department (OWRD) claims to have received advice from its DOJ attorney authorizing its regulation of irrigation wells located on the historic Klamath Indian Reservation. OWRD did not regulate the wells prior to its alleged receipt of this legal advice.

The OWRD subsequently issued written orders shutting down many of those wells during the 2015 irrigation season. The agency has repeatedly denied requests to disclose the legal advice upon which it claims it based the regulation of the wells. OWRD claims the legal advice is privileged communication between the agency and its DOJ attorney.

The rules of discovery in a court of law generally do not apply to proceedings in administrative law. Citizens attempting to challenge the validity of those rules or orders are placed at an immense disadvantage when the administrative rules or written orders are based on undisclosed legal advice.

Their attorneys have no way of determining either the content of the legal advice or the legal reasoning upon which the agency based its rule or order. They may be prevented from discovering that critical information both by the rules of administrative law and the shield of attorney-client privilege.

According to Legislative Counsel, the team of attorneys who drafts and interprets state laws for the Legislature, no Oregon statute prohibits this misapplication of attorney-client privilege protection. The two state agencies appear to be within their legal rights.

I am deeply concerned that other state agencies will soon adopt this strategy to avoid disclosure of legal advice that they may subsequently use to regulate the public through administrative rule or order. This unacceptable abuse of attorney-client privilege by state agencies needs to be addressed.

For that reason, I have asked legislative Counsel to draft legislation for that purpose during the February session.

The proposed law will require an order expressed in writing, or an administrative rule adopted by an agency, to include a summary of any legal advice upon which the agency bases the validity or effect of its order or rule. To ensure that it is comprehensive and accurate, the content of the required summary may be appealed to the courts.

I fully expect the bill to meet strong resistance by those who may see its purpose as an attack on the sacrosanct doctrine of attorney-client privilege. That is neither the bills intent nor its legal outcome.

The bill actually safeguards attorney-client privilege. It requires no testimony or disclosure of claimed privileged, restricted or confidential information by either client or attorney. Further, it does not even require disclosure of the source of the legal advice.

However, the bill will require an agency to provide an accurate written condensation of the legal theories and precedents included in the legal advice upon which the agency bases an administrative rule or written order. That brief may be reviewed upon request by the courts to ensure a comprehensive and accurate summation.

All of the scandals that lead to the resignation nearly a year ago of former Governor John Kitzhaber amid allegations of corruption and influence peddling demonstrate the lack of transparency and accountability in our state government. Governor Kate Brown called for and promised greater accountability and transparency in her inaugural address.

This bill will help address the Governors promise by limiting the ability of agencies to shield their legal opinions from public scrutiny. It will go a long way towards making state government more responsive to the public it is intended to serve.

Senator Doug Whitsett is the Republican state senator representing Senate District 28  Klamath Falls
Afghan Taliban commander shot dead in Balochistan

ISLAMABAD: Unidentified assailants have shot dead a senior Afghan Taliban commander in Balochistan, two Taliban officials claimed on Friday.



Maulvi Muhammad Alam, loyal commander to Taliban supremo Mullah Akhtar Mansoor, was shot dead Thursday evening in Kuchlak area, some 25 kilometres from Quetta, Taliban leaders said on the condition of anonymity, as they were not authorised to speak to the media. I can confirm that Maulvi Muhammad Alam has been killed. Investigations are underway but we do not have details as to who is behind the incident, a Taliban leader, aware of the incident, said.



No group claimed responsibility for the killing. A senior Taliban leader said they are investigating motives behind what he called a high profile assassination. Meanwhile, Taliban sources said Alam led fighters against Taliban dissidents in Afghanistans Zabul province in recent days that left dozens of militants dead. Top Taliban commander, Mansoor Dadullah, who had rejected Akhtar Mansoor as the new chief, was among the rivals killed in Zabul. Although the Taliban routinely blame the Afghan intelligence for such target killings, some sources said it could be the result of Talibans internal rivalry.



Further, a Taliban leader said Maulvi Alam had strong influence in Zabul province and also sheltered many foreign fighters. The killing of the senior Taliban commander highlights the possible trend of revenge attacks in view of the Taliban infighting. However, inside Afghanistan, the Taliban factions have agreed on a ceasefire after religious clerics intervened and issued a decree to declare infighting as un-Islamic.




Azerbaijan and Nigeria interested in Pakistani defence products: Mamnoon Hussain

ISLAMABAD: President Mamnoon Hussain has said that Azerbaijan and Nigeria are interested in purchasing Pakistani defence products, including the upgraded JF-17 fighter aircraft.



Azerbaijan and Nigeria will soon become buyers of Pakistani products, he said during a meeting with a delegation of Rawalpindi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (RCCI) at the Presidency.



He said Nigeria had expressed its desire to buy Pakistani defence products, including JF-17 Thunder and Mashaq aircraft.



Referring to his recent visit to Azerbaijan, the president said he had discussed ways of enhancing cooperation between the two countries in different areas.



He said Azerbaijan did not allow foreign banks to operate unless they show $50 million as equity but at his request it had allowed the National Bank of Pakistan to function with $10 million of equity.



Exporters should benefit from such developments in friendly countries, he said.



Talking about the governments economic policies, the president said the priority was to extend all possible facilities to business community. Reduction of power tariff by Rs3 per unit for industrial sector is a part of this facilitation process, he added.



The government has been in constant contact with the business community to address different issues in cooperation with them. The countrys exports have witnessed increase consequent to the facilities extended by the government to the business community, he said.



The Ministry of Commerce has approved a three-year policy framework after consultation with all stakeholders to promote business activities and bring an end to unemployment.



He said restoration of law and order was inevitable for stabilising economy and enhancing trade activities in the country, adding that measures were being taken to eradicate terrorism. He reiterated the governments resolve to continue the Zarb-i-Azb military operation and uproot terrorism.



The president said the government was determined to end the energy crisis. Construction of dams has been started and the government was taking full advantage of solar energy, he said.



Urging the business community to enhance exports, the president said the government had signed free trade agreements with a number of countries and now the business community should benefit from all the agreements to boost exports.
Imran Khan urged govt to play role of a mediator

ISLAMABAD: Chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Imran Khan has urged the government to play role of a mediator so that tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran could be reduced in an amicable manner.



Addressing a press conference after meeting ambassadors of Saudi Arabia and Iran here, Mr Khan said both the countries should take steps for easing the ongoing crisis.



Pakistan, he said, should lead from the front to prevent sectarianism in the region.



He urged the government to take Iran into confidence about its stance on the matter.



The PTI chief condemned the militant attack on Pathankot airbase and said that instead of playing into the hands of conspirators, Pakistan and India should continue to engage with each other.



The dialogue process should not be derailed as the people of Pakistan and India wanted good ties.


Two opposing protest demonstrations in capital on SA-Iran issue

ISLAMABAD: The federal capital on Friday witnessed two opposing protest demonstrations over the Saudi Arabia-Iran row.



The participants of one of the protest rallies expressed concerns over the political executions in Saudi Arabia while the other group termed the criticism of Riyadh as a potential attack on the holy sites in that country.



The first rally was taken out from G-6 Imambargah to D-Chowk, where a set of concerns was presented to Foreign Office spokeperson Qazi Khalilullah, who was called there to prevent protesters from crossing into the Red Zone.



A large number of women and children, representatives of religious parties and even members of civil society participated in the rally.



The speakers decried political victimisation in Saudi Arabia and said anybody opposing the regime in that country was termed a terrorist and an anti-Islam activist.



Majlis-i-Wahdatul Muslimeen Secretary General Allama Amin Shaheedi said world leaders, including the UN secretary general, had condemned human rights violations in Saudi Arabia.



The other rally, organised by Tehreek Difa-i-Harmain Sharifain started from Melody Market and ended at Aabpara. The participants mainly belonged to religious seminaries of the proscribed Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat (ASWJ) and the Markazi Jamiat Ahle Hadis, with the support of several other religious parties.



The organisers of the rally exchanged harsh words with the management of Lal Masjid before and during Friday prayers over the parking of a truck-mounted loudspeaker outside the mosque. Local ASWJ leaders continued calling for active participation in the rally while the Friday sermon continued within the mosque.



In contrast with other such protests in the past, students from the main seminaries did not participate in the rally.



Maulana Fazlur Rehman Khalil, the founder of the banned Harkatul Mujahideen and the current leader of Ansarul Ummah, was among the keynote speakers.



The speakers said an international conspiracy was being hatched to damage the holy sites in Saudi Arabia, including Prophet Muhammads mosque and Kaaba. They said the attack on the Saudi embassy in Iran was part of this conspiracy.



The speakers also alleged that the protest demonstrations being held against the executions in Saudi Arabia were an attempt to fan sectarianism in Pakistan.
The man who infamously put the Bakken in the news for schemes of murder and a missing body will go to trial Jan. 25 in Washington state.

James Henrikson, 36, will be tried for multiple felony counts of murder-for-hire, conspiracy and solicitation of murder while he was running an oil trucking company near Mandaree. Hes charged with hiring the killings of his employee, Kristopher Clarke, who was bludgeoned to death in the truck-yard shop and whose undiscovered body is buried somewhere in the Badlands, and the shooting death of Doug Carlisle, an investment partner, who was shot to death in his home in Spokane, Wash.

Clarke was killed in February 2012 and Carlile in December 2013. The case against Henrikson started to unravel when Tim Suckow was arrested for the shooting and later confessed to his role in the Clarke murder.

Henrikson was arrested in September of 2014 and is being held in Washington, where U.S. attorneys have been working the case against Henrikson, Suckow and four other defendants who had various roles in the crimes. All of the other defendants, including Suckow, have pleaded guilty, but their sentencings have been delayed pending Henriksons trial, according to documents filed in the case. Henrikson had also pleaded guilty and then revoked his plea, setting the stage for this months trial.

Former Three Affiliated Tribes chairman Tex Hall is among witnesses scheduled to be called by the prosecution. Hall had a business agreement with Henrikson that allowed Henrikson to operate his trucking business on the reservation under Halls Maheshu Energy company, a relationship required for non-native businesses. Hall owns the truck-shop building where Clarke was slain.

Another prosecution witness is George Dennis, who was charged by North Dakotas U.S. Attorney Christopher Myers for making false statements to federal agents and not disclosing knowledge of Henriksons crimes. Court documents filed in U.S. District Court in Bismarck say that Dennis helped Henrikson remove Clarkes body from the Maheshu shop, helped bury it and destroy Clarkes belongings. Dennis is scheduled for trial in Bismarck in June.

An unresolved aspect of the case is the whereabouts of Clarkes body. Affidavits filed by the federal prosecutors say that Henrikson, with help from Dennis, buried him in the Badlands  apparently near the Theodore Roosevelt National Park North Unit  but that Henrikson later moved the body.
To quote Larry Kudlow: Free market capitalism is the best path to prosperity! Matters of business and free enterprise are discussed on this blog. Included are company press releases, 3rd party news articles and videos, articles and videos pertaining to small business, and white collar crime.
From Greg Swank, 12-4-2 You are about to read a list of 45 goals that found their way down the halls of our great Capitol back in 1963. As...
If this site benefits you in some small way, please consider donating any amount you wish.
Infrared image released by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) shows methane gas leaking from the the Southern California Gas Company's (SoCalGas) Aliso Canyon site near the Porter Ranch suburb of Los Angeles

For several weeks, Sam Mongeau's three-year-old daughter Bella has had a lingering cough, while other members of his family have experienced nose bleeds, headaches and fatigue.

Mongeau, 40, blames it all on a massive gas leak near his home in Porter Ranch, a sleepy middle-class community northwest of Los Angeles, where a state of emergency was declared by California's governor earlier this week.

"Everyone's been getting sick," Mongeau, a sales manager at an area auto dealership, told AFP.

"It's almost like you wake up every day from anesthesia, feeling groggy, tired."

The leak was detected on October 23 in an underground natural gas well at the Southern California Gas Company's (SoCalGas) Aliso Canyon siteone of the largest gas facilities in the United States.

The well sits about 8,700 feet (2,651 meters) underground, and the leak is thought to come from a broken pipe about 500 feet below the surface.

Repeated efforts to stop the leak by pumping liquid and mud down the well have failed, and the gas company is now drilling a relief well to intercept and plug the damaged well.

The operation is expected to take until late February or March.

'Get some fresh air'

That timeline is not soon enough for the area's 30,000 residents, many of whom say they are getting sick from the rotten-egg smell of the odorant put into the gas to help detect leaks.

The leak was detected on October 23 in an underground natural gas well at the Southern California Gas Company's (SoCalGas) Aliso Canyon site

"I have been getting nausea and headaches," said Linda Noel, 50, as she waited outside a center set up by the gas company to assist area residents. "Everyone in the family has been to the doctor or to urgent care.

"All I want is to get out of here and get some fresh air."

Suna Najar, 46, said she has been getting rashes on her neck and face, and her 12-year-old daughter regularly has nose bleeds.

"We are four in the family and they are offering to relocate us to one hotel room," she said. "You feel like this is totally out of your control and that you're at everyone's mercy."

More than 10,000 residents have so far been relocated by the gas company and hundreds more have asked to be moved. Two local elementary schools have shut down, and the students are being shuttled to other districts.

A resident (L) discusses her housing situation with a SoCal Gas employee at the SoCal Gas Community Resource Center in Porter Ranch, California

Meanwhile some 1,000 people have joined a class-action suit against SoCalGas, many encouraged by well-known environmental activist Erin Brockovich, who works for a legal firm and who has held several town meetings with residents.

Brockovich's story of taking on corporate America was made into a movie in 2000 that earned Julia Roberts an Oscar.

The gas company and health officials say the gas leaking from the facility poses not health risk. Experts however say the environmental impact will be significant, as methane is a potent greenhouse gas.

The leak is spewing about 1,000 tons of methane a day, experts say, the equivalent to pollution produced daily by 4.5 million cars.

"To put this into perspective, the leak effectively doubles the (methane) emission rate for the entire Los Angeles basin," said Stephen Conley, a scientist at the University of California in Davis.

"On a global scale, this is big."

Michael Mizrahi, a spokesman for SoCalGas, said while the company fully realizes that the leak has disrupted the lives of local residents and will have an environmental impact, it was doing its utmost to remedy the situation and was closely monitoring air quality in Porter Ranch.

He said crews were working around the clock to stop the leak, which has cost SoCalGas $50 million (46 million euros) so far.

"Everybody wants to call this an environmental disaster, I'm not going to use those words," he said. "We know this is a major incident and our goals are to continue to stop the leak and serve the community, period.

"We are doing the very best we can do."

Explore further California gas leak forces relocation of thousands since October

 2016 AFP
This graph illustrates black dots that show events in experiment records compared along a red line that depicts the number expected through Standard Model processes. Two black dots don't fall in with the red line. Adam Martin says the bump at 750 is "the most exciting." Credit: Adam Martin

Physicists around the world were puzzled recently when an unusual bump appeared in the signal of the Large Hadron Collider, the world's largest and most powerful particle accelerator, causing them to wonder if it was a new particle previously unknown, or perhaps even two new particles. The collision cannot be explained by the Standard Model, the theoretical foundation of particle physics.

Adam Martin, assistant professor of physics at the University of Notre Dame, said he and other theoretical physicists had heard about the results before they were released on Dec. 15, and groups began brainstorming, via Skype and other ways, about what the bump could mean if confirmeda long shot, but an intriguing one. He and some collaborators from Cincinnati and New York submitted a pre-peer-review paper that appeared on arXiv.org on Dec. 23.

This graph illustrates black dots that show events in experiment records compared along a red line that depicts the number expected through Standard Model processes. Two black dots don't fall in with the red line. Adam Martin says the bump at 750 is "the most exciting."

"It was so weird that people were forced to chuck their favorite theories and start from scratch," Martin says. "That's a fun area of particle physics. We're looking into the unknown. Is it one new particle? Is it two new particles?"

The paper considers four possible explanations for the data, including the possibility that it could indicate a heavier version of the Higgs boson. Further research could yield mundane explanations, Martin says, and the excitement could fade as it has many times in his career. Or it could open up new insights and call for new models.

"People are still cautiously optimistic," he says. "Everybody knows that with more data, it could just go away. If it stays, it's potentially really, really, really exciting."

Authors of paper, "On the 750 GeV di-photon excess," are Martin, Wolfgang Altmannshofer, Jamison Galloway, Stefania Gori, Alexander L. Kagan and Jure Zupan.

Explore further Physicists search for signs of supersymmetry

More information: On the 750 GeV di-photon excess, arXiv:1512.07616 [hep-ph] On the 750 GeV di-photon excess, arXiv:1512.07616 [hep-ph] arxiv.org/abs/1512.07616
Artist's conception of the "changing-look quasar" as is appared in early 2015. The glowing blue region shows the last of the gas being swallowed by central black hole as it shuts off. The spectrum is the previous one obtained by the SDSS in 2003. Credit: Dana Berry / SkyWorks Digital, Inc.

Astronomers with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) announced that a distant quasar ran out of gas.

Their conclusions, reported Jan. 8 at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Kissimmee, Florida, clarify why quasar SDSS J1011+5442 changed so dramatically in the handful of years between observations.

"We are used to thinking of the sky as unchanging," said University of Washington astronomy professor Scott Anderson, who is principal investigator of the SDSS's Time-Domain Spectroscopic Survey. "The SDSS gives us a great opportunity to see that change as it happens."

Quasars are the compact area at the center of large galaxies, usually surrounding a massive black hole. The black hole at the center of J1011+5442, for example, is some 50 million times more massive than our sun. As the black hole gobbles up superheated gas, it emits vast amounts of light and radio waves. When SDSS astronomers made their first observations of J1011+5442 in 2003, they measured the spectrum of the quasar, which let them understand the properties of the gas being swallowed by the black hole. In particular, the prominent "hydrogen-alpha" line in the spectrum revealed how much gas was falling into the central black hole.

The SDSS measured another spectrum for this quasar in early 2015, and noticed a huge decrease between 2003 and 2015. The team made use of additional observations by other telescopes over those 12 years to narrow down the period of change.

"The difference was stunning and unprecedented," said UW astronomy graduate student John Ruan, a member of the research team. "The hydrogen-alpha emission dropped by a factor of 50 in less than 12 years, and the quasar now looks like a normal galaxy."

This animation shows an artists conception of the changing-look quasar as it evolved from 2003 to 2015. The beginning of the animation shows gas falling into the central black hole, along with the first SDSS spectrum. The black hole then uses up all the surrounding gas, and it is shown with the spectrum recently obtained by the Time-Domain Spectroscopic Survey. The camera then pulls back to reveal the entire galaxy as the quasar shuts off, after which is looks like just another normal galaxy. The animation then fades into an artists conception of Hannys Voorwerp, a prior SDSS discovery that shows the record of a similar quasar shutting off. Credit: Dana Berry/SkyWorks Digital, Inc.

The change was so great that throughout the SDSS collaboration and astronomy community, the quasar became known as a "changing-look quasar." The black hole is still there, of course, but over the past 10 years, it appears to have swallowed all the gas in its vicinity. With the gas fallen into the black hole, the SDSS team were unable to detect the spectroscopic signature of the quasar.

"This is the first time we've seen a quasar shut off this dramatically, this quickly," said lead author Jessie Runnoe, a postdoctoral researcher at Pennsylvania State University.

Before Runnoe, Ruan and their colleagues could come to this conclusion, they had to rule out two other possibilities. A thick layer of dust could have passed through the host galaxy, obscuring their view of the black hole at its center. But, they concluded that there is no way that any dust cloud could have moved fast enough to cause a 50-fold drop in brightness in just two years. Another possibility is that the bright quasar in 2003 was just a temporary flare caused by the black hole ripping apart a nearby star. While this possibility has been invoked in similar cases, it cannot to explain the fact that the changing-look quasar had been shining for many years before it turned off.

The team's conclusion is that the quasar has used up all the glowing-hot gas in its immediate vicinity, leading to a rapid drop in brightness.

"Essentially, it has run out of food, at least for the moment," says Runnoe. "We were fortunate to catch it before and after."

The changing-look quasar is the first major discovery reported for the Time-Domain Spectroscopic Survey, one component of SDSS's fourth phase, which will continue for the next several years.

"We found this quasar because we went back to study thousands of quasars seen before," said Anderson. "This discovery was only possible because the SDSS is so deep and has continued so long."

Explore further New type of black-hole quasar discovered
It's our big toolbox; we get to go and play and tinker.

 Jason Laumb, principal engineer for coal utilization, discussing the Pilot Plant at the North Dakota Energy and Environmental Research Center. The Pilot Plant allows real world evaluations of energy generation products, leading to what will hopefully be a solution for carbon dioxide emissions.

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"Burns hurt worse than natural childbirth. Some days, I wanted to just rip out my skin because it itched so bad."

 Sonja Olson Nelson, who was injured Oct. 11 when she was driving on a stretch of N.D. Highway 1806, ran into a vehicle stopped sideways and got caught in a fire. She was rescued by two firefighters.

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I think its really in everybodys best interest to work with this program.

 Dave Phillips, feed specialist at the North Dakota Department of Agriculture, discussing new veterinary feed directives that require producers to get a veterinarians approval to use medicated feeds. The rules become effective Jan. 1, 2017.

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Cybersecurity is a topic of concern for everyone, whether civilian or military. Lots of people have gotten those messages from different agencies or companies that their data has been stolen.

 North Dakota Army National Guard Lt. Col. Ray Knutson. Beginning in 2018, North Dakota will be one of several states to complement a regional Army National Guard Cyber Protection Team.

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(Its) to foster continued and responsible development, but also to ensure that tax revenue is adequately sufficient to address the overwhelming and negative impacts presented by oil and gas activity on Fort Berthold.

 Three Affiliated Tribes Chairman Mark Fox, on what the tribal council wants from a oil compact with the state. The council and the state are in talks over objections the tribes have with changes made in the compact by the state.

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Oil price weakness is anticipated to last through next year, and thats the main reason for the continued slowdown.

 Department of Mineral Resources Director Lynn Helms, on why drilling has slowed in the oil patch.

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"The idea of going back to school to get a bachelor's degree in education is not appealing to someone already established in a career. It's such a hurdle to go through."

 Richard Rothaus, interim vice chancellor for academic and student affairs for the North Dakota University System. Three colleges plan to offer a master of arts in teaching degree for people with a bachelor's degree in a field outside education. The new programs aim to curtail North Dakota's teacher shortage.

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If you dont change the statute ... its almost like were thumbing our nose at the Supreme Court decision.

 Gail Wischmann, a Cass County employee from Fargo, urging legislative committee members to have the Legislature change the language in a law banning gay marriage in North Dakota. A Supreme Court ruling legalized same-sex marriage, overruling the state law.
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MERIDIAN, Mississippi -- A Meridian hunter has shot and killed a 428-pound wild boar.

Larry Carman tells The Clarion-Ledger that it took two shots from his rifle to put down the wild pig last weekend.

Carman says it took five people to load the hog in the back of his utility vehicle, maxing out its weight limit.

Carman says he and his friends couldn't believe the size of the animal, which also almost maxed out his 440-pound scale.

The boar had a set of frightening tusks, which Carman estimates were about 3 inches, adding that they were razor-sharp.

Officials say a single hog Carman's size could decrease food sources for native wildlife by thousands of pounds each year. For that reason, hunters are encouraged to neutralize wild pigs, especially sows, whenever possible.
GULFPORT, Mississippi -- Federal prosecutors say a leader of the Bloods street gang in Moss Point has been sentenced for trafficking marijuana, crack and powder cocaine in his hometown.

The Sun Herald reports Chief U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola Jr. sentenced 36-year-old Melvin Summers to 12 years in prison followed by two years of supervised release on trafficking and firearms charges. Guirola waived restitution and a fine because he said Summers did not have the ability to pay. He did order Summers to pay a $100 special assessment.

Summers took responsibility for his crime.

"I'm sorry," he told the judge. "I'd just like to have a second chance because I know I made mistakes. I'm only human. I'm sorry, and I'm sorry to my family."

The government was satisfied with the sentence on the drug-trafficking charge and dismissed a charge of unlawful transport of a firearm, though Summers had pleaded guilty to that charge.

Mike Hines, a Pascagoula police officer assigned to the FBI Safe Streets Task Force, said Summers had been under investigation since March 2012 after a confidential informant told agents Summers had been dealing large amounts of marijuana and had sold crack, powder cocaine and firearms from a home he rented on Hubert Street. Hines said Summers used the home strictly for his drug business.

Summers carried a submachine gun when he was dealing drugs.

Summers and his wife, Alicia Yvette Graves, 29, of Moss Point, were later indicted on another federal drug conspiracy charge as well as a firearms charge. In that case, the pair sold less than 50 kilos of marijuana in Jackson County between April 18 and April 23.
JACKSON, Mississippi -- Republican Steven Palazzo appears to have a smoother path to re-election in 2016 than he did in 2014.

Palazzo, the U.S. Representative from Mississippi's 4th Congressional District, had to fend off a slew of challengers in both the Republican primary and general election two years ago -- including former Congressman Gene Taylor.

This year, however, Palazzo will face no opposition in the Republican primary and only one opponent qualified to challenge him in the general election.

All four of Mississippi's U.S. House members will face at least one challenger this year, although none attracted an opponent who's expected to bring a large campaign fund or widespread name recognition.

Friday was candidates' filing deadline, and party primaries are March 8. The general election is Nov. 8.

Rep. Trent Kelly of the northern 1st District and Rep. Gregg Harper of the central 3rd District have one opponent each in the Republican primary. One Democrat is running in the 1st District and two in the 3rd.

The other two House members -- Democrat Bennie Thompson in the Delta's 2nd District and Republican Steven Palazzo in the southern 4th District -- are unopposed in the primaries. But each faces a general election challenger.

Mississippi does not have a U.S. Senate race this year.

-- Palazzo, of Biloxi, won the 4th District seat in 2010. The Democrat challenging him this year is Mark Dey Gladney of Gulfport.

-- Kelly, of Tupelo, won the 1st District seat in a 2015 special election after the death of Rep. Alan Nunnelee. Kelly is challenged in this year's Republican primary by Paul Clever of Olive Branch. The Democrat running is Jacob Aaron Owens of Booneville.

-- Thompson, of Bolton, won the 2nd District seat in a 1993 special election, and he is the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee. His Republican challenger, John Bouie II of Gulfport, lives outside the district. Although living outside the district is allowed in U.S. House races, it's generally a liability for candidates.

-- Harper, of Pearl, won the 3rd District seat in 2008. He is opposed in the Republican primary by Jim Giles of Pearl, who said in a news release Monday that he will work to stop the "Muslimification of our United States." In his own news release Friday, Harper said he has been endorsed by Republican Gov. Phil Bryant. Democrats running in the 3rd are Dennis Quinn of Magnolia and Nathan Stewart of Brandon.

Mississippi Press staff writer Warren Kulo contributed to this report.
The Afghan government announced a computerized national identity card system would be rolled out in 2010, five years ago.

But the cards are still yet to be issued.

There have been a number of stumbling blocks so far, but the inclusion of the word Afghan has been the most controversial obstruction.

From Kabul, Mudassar Shah has this report.

Hundreds of people, almost all men, have gathered here at this rally in Kabul. The angry protestors are demanding the word Afghan be included on the proposed National Identity Cards.

Shah Muhammad, 26, is among the protestors. He is a shopkeeper but closed his store to attend the rally.

I earn money for my family from the shop and we can survive for few days or so even if the shop is closed, but Afghan is my identity. It is the history of our ancestors and like a treasure for all of us. It is a trust (deposit) from our ancestors to pass on to next generation so I cant compromise at all on not including it on the computerized card, he says.

The police employed water cannons at the rally to stop protestors from entering government offices.

In response, the demonstrators started dancing on the Pashtun Watt square, in the center of Kabul.

Young men dancing in defiance

Khalil Kakar is a lawyer. He practices in Kabul and joined the rally.

The President of Afghanistan is the custodian of constitution but he has failed act according to the constitution. The constitution says that people who live in Afghanistan are Afghans, therefore the president is supposed to issue a decree to include word Afghan.

Those who joined the protest say they are angry the issue has not be raised in parliament.

The rally leader, Faiz Ahmad Zaland, says they will never compromise on their demand to have the word Afghan included on the card.

We will gather more people in front of Parliament and will block all main high ways leading to Kabul, if our demands not taken seriously, Faiz says.

The plan to make computerized identity cards was first proposed in 2010.

But the launch has continued to be delayed after ethnic minorities voiced opposition to the inclusion of the word Afghan.

They say that word will see ethnic minorities become politically marginalized.

Latif Abbasi is an ethnic Hazara. He argues the word Afghan does not apply equally to everyone.

The word Afghan is used solely for Pashtuns, while people of other clans and tribes also live in Afghanistan. So why should Afghan be written on their identity card? No other country has mentioned ethnicity in their identity cards so why should Afghanistan?

Ethnic minority groups say Pashtuns are not a majority, even though they are politically strong, and that is why they have resisted holding a census for several decades.

When the cards are finally rolled out, around 30 million Afghans are expected to get new ID cards in the initial stage.

The new system is expected to help improve security and ensure fair elections.

Shinkai Karokhail is a parliamentarian and political activist, from the Pashtoon tribe.

But first, she says, she is Afghan.

This is has become a political issue among AfghansIf the majority wants it then why are some of the people resisting not to have word Afghan? First, I am Afghan then I am Pashtoon, Tajak or Hazara or Uzebk or whatever, Shinkai says.

But not all ethnic minorities are against the plan.

40-year-old Mujib Azizi is a researcher in Kabul. He is Tajik but does not see any issue with using the word Afghan.

I am Afghan Tajik, therefore it should not be a big issue if the word Afghan is written on my identity card. I feel proud to be known as an Afghan and opposing the Afghan word is only for political scoring. Afghanistan has numerous other issues and it is not time that we should oppose and fight teach other.

Pervez Khan is a university professor who lectures in political science. The line has to be drawn somewhere, he says, otherwise the issue will get ridiculous.

People who oppose the word Afghan will also oppose the name of the country, Afghanistan, and later they will also object over currency, which is called Afghani. So will we change the country and currency names too to make them satisfied, he asks?

There is no doubt the debate over Afghan identity is set to continue.




The Gurudwara Bhai Biba Singh Temple was built in 1708, during the rule of Maharaja Ranjeet Singh.

Closed in 1942, the Sikh temple in Peshawar, Pakistan, is finally being reopened after six decades and a protracted dispute.

Shahab-ur-Rahman visited the place of worship to find out more.

The call to prayer is being delivered in this congested area of Peshawar Jughiwara, the area where the Gurudwara Bhai Biba Singh Sikh Temple is located.

The area is mostly inhabited by Muslims, but the local Islamic community has welcomed the reopening of the Sikh place of worship.

They are free to practice their religion. No one will interfere in their worship. Sikhs are citizens of this country. Islam teaches us brotherhood with all. There are no Sikhs in the area, but sill the Muslims of this locality will fully cooperate with the Sikh community, said Mohammad Dawood, a prayer leader at the local mosque.

The Sikh temple was closed in 1942 after a clash between Muslims and Sikhs, in which two Sikhs were killed.

The Sikh community has been struggling to get ownership of the 300-year-old temple since and finally they have succeeded.

The government has handed over rights of the temple to the Sikh community and renovation work is now underway. The temple is expected to be opened within the next month.

While some influential elders in the community initially opposed the idea, most, like Hajji Ibrahim Khan have come around.

We had reservations against the re-opening. This temple has been closed since 1942. After partition, no Sikhs remained in this area. Not a single Sikh is living around the temple. We had four points, protection of the girls school adjacent to the temple, that the road will not be closed for security, Sikhs will not purchase other property and a wall should be erected on top of the roof of the temple to protect Muslim population, Hajji Ibrahim says. 

Now we have written agreement and they are allowed. They are free to practice their religion. We will protect them. They are our brothers.

The protection of the girls school was one of the main demands of those who opposed the temple.

Khwaja Mohammad Akbar Setthi was part of the campaign against the opening of Gurudwara.

He says they signed the agreement for the sake of Pakistans image as a tolerant nation.

We had no objections to their worship. Sikhs are Pakistani citizens. But this building was allotted as a vocational training school. We accepted the agreement of re-opening just for Pakistans image. The building belongs to Sikhs and we honored that, Khwaja says.

Here in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, there is only one other temple where Sikhs can worship. And across the country there are less than 20 functional Sikh temples.

Its one of the reasons why the Sikh Gurudwara Perbandhak Committee worked hard to reopen the Gurudwara temple.

Committee member Sahib Singh says he believes the Sikh and Muslims community can peacefully coexist.

At partition the Sikhs were shifted to different places. Some were shifted to India and while others starts living in tribal areas of Pakistan. This temple was closed as Sikhs were few in number. Due to terrorism a huge population of Sikhs migrated from FATA to Peshawar. Now the Sikh population is more than 1,000 families.

After the partition between India and Pakistan in 1947, most Sikhs moved to India.

But in Pakistan, a Muslim-majority country, the government is working hard to support all religious minorities  providing funds for the upkeep of houses of worship for all faiths.

Sardar Suran Singh, who represents minorities in the provincial government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwam, says minorities in Pakistan can freely practice their religions.

In this country, which came into being in the name Islam, other minorities are free to practice their religion. The re-opening of this temple after six decades sends a positive message to the world that Pakistan is a free country where every religion can be practiced.

The re-opening of Gurudwara Bhai Biba Singh in this Muslim majority area, is being celebrated as an example of interfaith harmony.




Markers of mass graves of those killed by super typhoon Haiyan in Leyte province. (Photo: Madonna Virola)









When typhoon Haiyan ripped through the Philippines in 2013 it claimed thousands of lives.

In the wake of the destruction, one group, the Philippine Educational Theater Association, or PETA, helped to heal trauma in the community through theater.

PETAs program Lingap Sining or Nurturing Hearts through the Arts, worked with communities, students, teachers and parents in the countrys east, an area among the worst hit by the disaster.

Madonna Virola spoke to those involved in Palo, Leyte province.

Im passing by markers of mass graves, the gravesite of those killed by super typhoon Haiyan.

Sixteen-year-old Norlyn Boco is among the tens of thousands of survivors in the Visayas region.

The horrific day was the morning of November 8, 2013. People thought it was a normal typhoon, not understanding what a storm surge was.

Norlyn recalls what it was like when Haiyan hit.

Our house which was by the road was carried away by huge waves of sea water, which separated members of the family, she says.

I swallowed plenty of water and was saved by trunks from the trees and houses, which I held onto. I was crying hard, I lost hope and I just prayed while fighting for my life in an open space of water. One of my siblings died.

Funded by the Germany-based NGO, Terres de Homes, the Philippine Educational Theater Association, or PETA, moved into affected areas to debrief survivors and conduct theater workshops just weeks after the typhoon.

Michelle Calinawan, a member of the local theater group, the Palo Culture and Arts

Our house was totally washed out so we had to stay at the evacuation center. My mind was blank and I was only looking for food and missing relatives, she says.

PETA from Manila made us go through drawing and play activities to express our feelings and think about our next plan. I next helped in evacuation centers. I was healing while others healed, too.

Yeyin dela Cruz is project coordinator for PETA, conducting creative campaigns for safe schools and resilient communities explains more.

We believe in the power of theater not only to entertain, but to also transform the community, she says, So PETA explores theater for psychosocial support and disaster risk reduction.

Editha Maceda is a senior teacher at the San Joaquin Central School in the community. She says 67 of more than 400 pupils died during the typhoon, including one who was graduating valedictorian in Grade 6.

In telling their experiences, the students make use of drama, visuals, music, movements and creative writing.

It is not like a usual seminar where we just sit down. This is most enjoyable. The children love to move like in identifying hazards and disasters, she says.

There are pictures they have to choose from. The children are now more resilient. They are aware of whats happening around like when typhoon is signal number 2, they would remind me and we go home.

Yeyin dela Cruz says part of the healing is being empowered for a disaster.

So they rehearse to explore problems and solutions.

Like before the typhoon, they would depict their father to be drinking wine, children to be wasting time on the mobile phone and computer games, she says, After the typhoon, they depict themselves to be listening to news, asking their parents how they can be of help and managing their garbage so they dont clog in the drainage.

Municipal health officer Leo Calonia says stage plays like Padayon, a Waray local term for Move On offer good learning experiences.

The play depicts the story of an imaginary community devastated by a strong typhoon and how it stood up after the disaster.

It has been seen by nearly 8,000 people since its first tour in November 2014, he says.

Its holistic, participatory and healing that happens within the community, explains Calonia.

Leo Calonia has also joined PETA in its requests for more survivors to undergo theater workshops for healing. So far eight villages and 13 schools in Leyte province have taken part in the workshops.

In the meantime, student Norlyn is now able to sing with others.

Now I have the courage to share to inspire others because like me, I am a survivor, she says, I used to hide under the blanket so I wouldnt hear even the drops of rains. Theater helped me to get over the trauma.

And Norlyn tells the world through a song that while there is life, there is hope to realize her dreams.




PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania -- A man using a gun stolen from police said he was acting in the name of Islam when he ambushed an officer sitting in his marked cruiser at an intersection, firing more than a dozen shots at point-blank range, authorities said Friday. Both the officer and suspect were wounded during the barrage of gunfire.

The suspect, 30-year-old Edward Archer, also pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group when he was questioned after his arrest in the shooting late Thursday, police said.

Police Commissioner Richard Ross described the attack on Officer Jesse Hartnett, captured on a police surveillance camera, as an attempted assassination.

"He just came out of nowhere and started firing on him," Ross said. "He just started firing with one aim and one aim only, to kill him."

Ross said Archer told police he believed the department defends laws that are contrary to Islam. Police said there was no indication anyone else was involved. But Ross also said "it stands to reason there is more unknown than known."

Federal agents joined local police in the execution of search warrants at two Philadelphia area properties associated with Archer, investigators said.

Capt. James Clark, head of the homicide unit, said Archer told investigators: "I follow Allah. I pledge my allegiance to the Islamic State and that's why I did what I did."

Archer's mother, Valerie Holliday, told The Philadelphia Inquirer he has been hearing voices recently and that family asked him to get help. She also said her son felt targeted by police. She described him as devout Muslim.

The gunman fired at least 13 shots toward Hartnett and eventually got up next to the car and reached through the driver's-side window, investigators said.

Despite being seriously wounded, Hartnett got out of his car, chased the suspect and returned fire, wounding his attacker in the buttocks, police said. Other officers chased Archer and apprehended him.

Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in the arm and will require multiple surgeries, but was listed in stable condition. Archer was treated and released into police custody.

Ross called it "absolutely amazing" that Harnett survived. "It's nothing short of miraculous and we're thankful for that," he said.

Last March, Archer pleaded guilty to firearms and assault charges stemming from a 2012 case but was immediately released and placed on probation, court records show. Records also show he was scheduled to be sentenced Monday in suburban Philadelphia in a traffic and forgery case.

The attorney who represented him in the firearms case was unavailable to comment Thursday afternoon because he was in court, his office said. A message to his lawyer in the forgery case was not immediately returned.

Surveillance footage of the attack showed Archer dressed in a white, long-sleeved tunic. When asked if the robe was considered Muslim garb, Ross said he didn't know and didn't think it mattered.

"We've already established why he believes he did it, and that's probably enough," Ross said.

The 9 mm pistol used by Archer was recovered at the scene of the shooting, police said. It had been stolen from an officer's home in October 2013, investigators said. Officials said they were trying to figure how Archer got the weapon and whether it passed through other people's hands in the time since the theft.

The officer's father, Robert Hartnett, said his son was in good spirits.

"He's a tough guy," he said.

Hartnett served in the Coast Guard and has been on the Philadelphia force for four years. He always wanted to be a police officer, his father said.

When Hartnett called in to report shots fired, he shouted, "I'm bleeding heavily!" into his police radio.

Jim Kenney, in his first week as mayor of the nation's fifth-largest city, called Archer's actions "abhorrent" and "terrible" and said they have nothing to do with the teachings of Islam.

"This is a criminal with a stolen gun who tried to kill one of our officers," he said. "It has nothing to do with being a Muslim or following the Islamic faith."
Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Friday announced the selection of Edmund White as state author and Yusef Komunyakaa as state poet for 2016 and 2017.

"These talented, inspiring writers have each made remarkable contributions to the literary community in New York," Cuomo said in a press release. "Their work is a tremendous asset to us all and has served as a touchstone for many around the world."

White has written more than two dozen works of fiction, memoir and criticism, including the classic novel "A Boy's Own Story."

Komunyakaa lives in New York City and is Distinguished Senior Poet in the Creative Writing Program at New York University.

He served in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War and received a Bronze Star for his work as editor and correspondent for the military newspaper Southern Cross.

"The Emperor of Water Clocks," his latest book of poetry, was published in October.

New York State Writers Institute at University of Albany selected the state author and poet.

Cuomo announced that separately from the selections, Joseph Tusiani has been named poet laureate emeritus, recognizing his contributions to American and Italian literature.

Tusiani, age 92 of New York City, has published poetry in four languages: Italian, English, Latin and Apulian.
Warren County Democratic Committee on Friday announced it endorsed Democratic congressional candidate Mike Derrick.

"The full Warren County Democratic Committee unanimously and enthusiastically supports Mike Derrick," county Democratic Chairwoman Lynne Boecher said in a news release.

Derrick now has endorsements from nine of the 12 county Democratic committees in the 21st Congressional District.

Derrick, a retired Army colonel from Peru, is seeking the Democratic nomination to challenge U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-Willsboro, in November.

Matt Funiciello, the Green Party candidate in 2014, is laying groundwork to run again.
GREENWICH | Greenwich Free Library, 148 Main St., will host a free Raptors: Birds of Prey event at 3 p.m. Saturday.

The live animal demonstration will be presented by The Wildlife Institute of Eastern New York.

This is a family event, designed for both children and adults. All the birds on display have been rescued from life-threatening injuries and can no longer live in the wild.

The demonstration is sponsored by Greenwich Youth Center and Greenwich Free Library.

For more information, call Greenwich Free Library at 692-7157.
Warren County sheriffs investigators are seeking subpoenas as the agency looks into an alternative energy project that some believe resulted in the county being defrauded of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Subpoenas served on potential witnesses would compel them to cooperate and provide whatever evidence is requested as they look into whether the county has gotten the savings it was told it has through a geothermal energy project at Warren County Municipal Center.

The subpoenas could be issued in conjunction with a grand jury investigation, or without grand jury intervention.

Travis Whitehead, an electrical engineer and government watchdog, has analyzed the $4.3 million project and concluded the county did not get hundreds of thousands of dollars in energy savings that it was guaranteed by contractor Siemens Building Technologies. Whitehead filed a complaint with the Sheriffs Office seeking a criminal investigation.

Siemens has maintained its projects have saved the county money. A company spokeswoman issued the following statement Friday after a request for comment:

Siemens completed an energy savings project at the Warren County Municipal Center in 2008, which included the replacement of an aging heat pump system with a new, energy-efficient, geothermal heat pump and condensing boiler system, as well as the installation of a new energy management system and energy-efficient lighting throughout the building.

Siemens is proud of the work we have completed, which has provided the Warren County Municipal Center with an improved infrastructure that has reduced its energy consumption and its environmental footprint.

The Sheriffs Office did not use subpoenas during the investigation of a natural gas cogeneration project that was built at Westmount Health Facility, as it awaited a possible grand jury investigation. The purported savings from that Siemens project have been questioned as well.

Among the witnesses who refused to meet with police during the cogeneration inquiry was John Haskell, the former Thurman supervisor who was chairman of the county Facilities Committee, which oversaw the project.

The Sheriffs Office has requested assistance in the geothermal investigation from the Warren County District Attorneys Office, which was involved with the cogeneration investigation for years until determining that a special prosecutor was needed.

That determination occurred when the Sheriffs Office concluded there was probable cause to charge the county administrator with official misconduct, though no charges were filed.

The state Attorney Generals Office was given the case, but declined to file criminal charges and instead indicated it may take civil court action.

With the geothermal inquiry having just begun late last year, no such potential conflicts of interest have been identified, so the Sheriffs Office has been working with the office of Warren County District Attorney Kate Hogan.

Warren County Sheriff Bud York said he could not discuss the geothermal inquiry this week, other than to say it was progressing.

We are moving forward and awaiting replies from prosecutors, York said.

Hogan said she could not comment on the matter this week.

Glens Falls 2nd Ward Supervisor Peter McDevitt, who was among the first county supervisors to raise questions about the Siemens projects, has said he believes an independent engineer review is warranted. He said half of the cost would be paid by the New York State Energy Research Development Authority if the county chose a state-sanctioned firm.

We need an independent voice to tell us: Are we saving any real money? he asked.
After word spread about Adirondack Folk Schools financial struggles, donations starting pouring in.

Every time we turn around, somebody comes in or calls and says, You know, we cant let the Folk School close, said Rand Condell, president of the schools board.

Along with cash donations of about $3,000 since a Tuesday article in The Post-Star, the Folk School has gotten pledges for $450.

And, Condell, said, the school was gifted a $5,000 matching grant from an anonymous donor in the name of Richard Mandle, an engineer and scientist who was a longtime summer resident of the region.

The donation was not from the Mandle family, but from another family who has had a summer home in Lake Luzerne for five generations.

Since speaking to The Post-Star earlier in the week, Condell said the executive director of the Folk School left, saving the school the cost of that salary.

If Adirondack Folk School raises the additional money to secure the matching grant, Condell is hopeful of its future.

We are going to update our mailing to the 3,500 members on our list and I think when they know were close, theyll come through, he said.

I think well be able to make it, he said.

To make a donation, call 696-2400; mail them to Adirondack Folk School, P.O. Box 2, 51 Main St., Lake Luzerne, NY 12846; or go to www.adirondackfolkschool.org and click the donate link at the top of the page.

 Rhonda Triller

Helping fire victims

Local state troopers helped brighten Christmas for a Wilton family who lost their home to fire late last year.

The Nov. 24 fire on Donna Drive routed a family of seven, including five young children, from their home.

State troopers had assisted at the fire scene, and took up a collection among their colleagues to help the family. They were able to obtain Christmas lists for the children, and used the $1,000 or so that was collected to buy them Christmas presents.

 Don Lehman

Good for business

During a tour Thursday of AngioDynamics manufacturing facility in the Glens Falls Tech Park, U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer paused to wave through a window at employees working in the facilitys clean room.

A tour participant remarked on the fact the work was being done by people, rather than robots.

Robots dont vote, Schumer said, evoking laughter from several tour participants as the senator continued to wave and smile through the window.

 Scott Donnelly

Go for the green

John Bowe, 4-H and Family Living team coordinator at Cornell Cooperative Extension in Warrensburg, is always up for a challenge.

In the past, Bowe dyed his hair pink as part of a fundraiser, and this year he may wind up having to go green.

Bowe has issued a challenge to 4-H members to collect change through donation cans for the group. While asking for change, Bowe said the group would be happy to accept donations in any amount. The funds will be split between Warren County 4-H and sending Warren County youths to local camps.

Donations can also be made by dropping cans and bottles off at the Direct Deposit redemption center in Warrensburg.

If the group raises $500, Bowe, a diehard Patriots fan, will wear a green Jets shirt.

If donations reach $1,000, he will dye his hair green, and if the total hits $2,500 he will also have a 4-H clover cut into the back of his hair.

 Bill Toscano

Trivia in Granville

The annual showdown for trivia supremacy in Granville is scheduled for Jan. 30 at Granville Hook & Ladder.

The Granville Rotary Club will be the host for the event. Doors open at 6 p.m., and play begins at 7 p.m.

Teams can number up to six and there will be five rounds in the competition. There will be food and beverages, including beer and wine, for sale. There will be complimentary snacks and desserts.

The cost is $150 per team and $15 for spectators. Entry forms, which much be completed by Jan. 20, are available at Manchester Newspapers, 14 East Main St.

Proceeds from the event will be donated to the charity of the Rotarys choice.

For more information, call Dave OBrien at 866-1022 or Peter OBrien at 321-9640.

 Bill Toscano
Editor:

When Nikita Khrushchev said You Americans will vote yourself into socialism, it was more ominous than when he told President John Kennedy we will bury you.

The first prophecy about socialism is apparently becoming a reality, for we are silently, secretly and sideways slipping into socialism.

The second prediction probably worried President Kennedy during the missile crisis for there was nothing Kennedy could do other than what Nikita Khrushchev told him he might do after Sen. Kenneth Keating of New York state revealed to us all that there were nuclear armed Russian missiles in Cuba. Our intelligence knew nothing about the missiles before Keating revealed their presence as a missile threat, and it was even worse because our intelligence could not even tell President Kennedy where the warheads were located when Kennedy asked them. They gave him an incorrect answer.

I dont give advice unless asked, however, in my next letter I will offer my opinion and other thoughts and facts about socialism. Meanwhile, when a discussion group hosted by a well-known commentator, was asked if they ever lost any sleep over the possibility that our country may soon encounter chaos and/or collapse, nobody raised their hand. People talk about it, but nobody believes it.

STILING KNIGHT

Huletts Landing
collage.jpg

Dominique Mikell (left) and Phyllis Frazier.

(Gulfport Police Department)

GULFPORT, Mississippi -- Two people are in custody after Gulfport police responded to a call of a shooting at a local apartment complex Thursday.

According to Gulfport Police Sgt. Damon McDaniel, officers were called to the New Village Apartments on 34th Avenue around 10:45 a.m. Thursday. After arrival, officers found an adult male suffering from a gunshot wound to the upper torso.

Police learned a verbal altercation had taken place between the male victim and two other people -- identified as Dominique Mikell and Phyllis Frazier. The victim was apparently Frazier's ex-boyfriend.

During the course of the argument, Mikell pulled out a firearm and shot the victim. Then, while attempting to conceal the weapon in his pants, Mikell shot himself in the groin. Frazier then took the weapon as Mikell left the scene in a vehicle.

Frazier later attempted to flee the area, but was detained by police, who found Frazier in possession of the firearm used in the shooting and also learned she was a convicted felong.

Paramedics arrived on the scene and transported the victim to a local hospital for treatment of what was described as a non-life threatening injury, while Frazier was taken into custody and transported to the Gulfport Police Department.

A short time later, police were notified that Mikell had arrived at a local hospital seeking treatment for a gunshot wound. During treatment, he was found in possession of an undisclosed amount of a controlled substance. Police arrived at the hospital and, after treatment, took Mikell into custody and transported him to the GPD.

Mikell, 23, was charged with aggravated assault and possession with the intent to distribute marijuana. Frazier, 46, was charged with possession of a weapon by a convicted felon.

Both suspects were transported to the Harrison County Adult Detention Center under bonds set by Justice Court Judge Melvin Ray -- $70,000 for Mikel and $25,000 for Frazier.
The hurricane knocked out power across all of Cuba. Initially, there was loss of power in the western provinces, but later the entire grid c...
Hello from Minnesota! Cleaning out space, letting go of stuff that no longer fits on my journey. Reflecting on my travels, as an integrating two spirited, son, & father, handling things that used to baffle me, neither living in the past nor closing the door on it, blessed by the support of my emerging family of choice. Thanks to the ancestors, those who share this journey. Peace love joy. Wichozani! Mitakuye Oyasin, we are all related Wir sind all Verwanten nous sommes tous relies.
The tremor left large cracks in walls, damaged a bridge on the outskirts of the capital and caused a newly constructed six-story building to collapse. About 100 people were injured and of them 33 were critical, official sources said. Vehicular movement was stated to be normal in the state capital.

Soldiers remove debris from a damaged building in Imphal, capital of the northeastern Indian state of Manipur.

The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) team from Guwahati, which was engaged in rescue in Tamenglong district and Imphal besides other parts of state, was clearing debris and searching if anyone was still trapped, officials said.

To assess the safety of partially damaged public buildings and advise the state government on issues related to fix and retrofitting of these structres, the National Disaster Management Authority is deploying a team of experts. All six deaths were in the state while 70 people were injured.

The epicenter of the natural disaster, which shook the North-East region at 4:30AM was at Kabui Kjulen, 10 km from Noney sub-division of Manipur's Tamenglong district.

Manipur Chief Minister O Ibobi Singh said all offices, except those providing emergency services, will remain closed for two days, while educational institutions will be shut for seven days.

Media reports said five people were killed in neighbouring Bangladesh, but there was no official confirmation. "I appeal to people not to believe in them", he told reporters.

The Home Minister briefed Prime Minister Modi over phone about the situation and the steps taken for rescue and relief. He said, "I am trying to contact people and am monitoring the situation". Union Health Secretary B K Sharma also called up the state health departments in all the affected States and offered all possible help. C17 Globemaster & IL76 plane had been kept on standby at the Hindon airbase to respond to any further relief operations as and when needed. A team of engineers from Power Grid Corporation wil be sent to Imphal to assist the state government in restoration of power. Secretary, Health and Family Welfare, would also send a special team of doctors, including orthopedics, from Delhi to Imphal.
A Russian foreign ministry statement said Finland decided "a few days ago" to extradite both men.

Senakh was temporarily detained in August in Finland on the request of the US Justice Department, accusing him of cybercrime. He's accused of infecting computer servers with malware, resulting in millions of dollars' worth of criminal gains. Senakh fought his extradition in the Finnish courts. The extradition decision can not be appealed.

According to information obtained by Finnish national broadcaster Yle, Russia declared Senakh's detention illegal, but did not request his repatriation.

It is unclear whether another computer fraud suspect named by Russia, Alexander Sergeyev, will be deported.

Juhani Korhonen, counselor at the justice ministry, told Yle that Russian Federation did not have judicial grounds for demanding the suspect be sent back to his home country.

"We reaffirm our categorical objections to the extradition of Russian citizens to the United States where they are facing absurd kinds of punishment like imprisonment for more than 100 years", the statement said.

Russia has denounced the possible extradition by Finland of two Russian citizens to the United States on cyber-crime charges.

USA authorities are to escort Senakh out of Finland within a month.
collage.jpg

Ricky Treloar (left) and Darrin McDaniel

(JCSO photos)

ST. MARTIN, Mississippi -- Two men from the St. Martin community have been arrested in connection with the theft of an ATV in Vancleave, as well as a dirt bike motorcycle recovered during their arrest.

According to Jackson County Sheriff Mike Ezell, deputies responded to a vehicle theft call on Larue Road in Vancleave around 3 p.m. Tuesday. The victim advised that a 2006 Suzuki 400 ATV valued at $2500 had been stolen.

The victim learned of the theft when a friend, identified as Darrin McDaniel, contacted the victim advising he had seen someone riding the ATM down Larue Road.

On Thursday, deputies arrested 45-year-old Ricky Roger Treloar of 9412 Travis Avenue -- and McDaniel, who resides at the same address, after a 2014 Hawk dirt bike valued at $3,000 was found at the scene. The dirt bike had been reported stolen through the Ocean Springs Police Department.

Both men were charged with Grand Larceny, with McDaniel facing the additional charge of receiving stolen property.

Each charge carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in state prison and/or a $10,000 fine.
Lawmakers loyal to Maduro staged a walkout from the opening session of the new assembly. Newly sworn-in congressional president Henry Ramos Allup promised to promote an agenda of "constitutional and peaceful change" in a country still led by Chavez's successor, whom the opposition has threatened to remove from office by referendum within the next six months.

"Here and now, things will change", he said. Maduro dismissed accusations his government is attempting to subvert democracy in Venezuela.

The voting of the legislature's new leadership followed debate over whether to take the oath of 163 or 167 lawmakers following a Supreme Court ruling barring four elected representatives from taking their seats over allegations of fraud, depriving the opposition of a two-thirds majority.

"This National Assembly is not about revenge...it's not the Assembly of the opposition but the Assembly for solutions", Capriles urged this week.

In an unusual move, state TV was broadcasting interviews with the opposition lawmakers and political leaders, each one arriving like a rock star and setting off applause.

Since the late Hugo Chavez took power in 1999, this assembly had been entirely dominated by his followers.

Instead, from the public gallery, the wife of jailed opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez held up a sign reading "Amnesty Now", referring to what's likely to be the legislature's first order of business: a law freeing dozens of activists jailed during anti-government protests in 2014 that resulted in dozens of deaths.

The leadership vote underlined a perennial split within the opposition that has seen moderates and hard-liners exchange barbs since their coalition's landslide victory over the socialists in December 6 legislative elections.

Even without the two-thirds majority, the opposition should be able to pass most of the laws it wants, as the president has limited powers to veto legislation.

Three members of the right-wing MUD coalition and one from the socialist PSUV alliance from the state of Amazonas were suspended after a Supreme Court decision.

The MUD nevertheless insisted its legislators would all turn up to be sworn in on Tuesday.

Outgoing assembly president Diosdado Cabello, however, accused MUD of having "assassins pardoning themselves".

President Nicolas Maduro responded saying that Venezuela would "not accept imperialism".

The socialist president asked his top ministers to resign after the party suffered crushing losses in December 6 legislative elections.

But voters punished him for the state of the economy, in the toughest challenge yet to his authority.

Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) wrote a letter to President Obama on Monday calling for tough talk, sanctions and worldwide oversight following the Venezuelan elections that have shifted the political landscape away from Chavismo.

With the world's biggest known oil reserves, Venezuela has been suffering from a fall in the price of the crude, which has led to a deep recession.

"In the coming hours we will activate a contingency plan for the adoption and revision [of measures] in the field of economy - on the construction of a productive economy in the national, regional and local scale", Maduro told the Venezuelan AVN news agency, according to Sputnik.
Regularly ahead of the curve, the Review has opposed federal drug policy for nearly 50 years, was a lonely media voice against the massive freeways planned for Washington, was an early advocate of bikeways and light rail, and helped spur the creation of the DC Statehood Party and the national Green Party,

In November 1990 it devoted an entire issue to the ecologically sound city and how to develop it. The article was republished widely.

Even before Clinton's nomination we exposed Arkansas political scandals that would later become major issues. .

We reported on NSA monitoring of U.S. phone calls in the 1990s, years before it became a major media story.

In 2003 editor Sam Smith wrote an article for Harper's comprised entirely of falsehoods about Iraq by Bush administration officials.

The Review started a web edition in 1995 when there were only 27,000 web sites worldwide. Today there are over 170 million active sites.

In 1987 we ran an article on AIDS. It was the first year that more than 1,000 men died of the disease.

In the 1980s, Thomas S Martin predicted in the Review that "Yugoslavia will eventually break up" and that "a challenge to the centralized soviet state" would occur as a result of devolutionary trends. Both happened.

In the 1970s we published a first person account of a then illegal abortion.

In 1971 we published our first article in support of single payer universal health care

In 1970, we ran a two part series on gay liberation.

i

n 1965 we called for the end of the draft.

In the 1960s we proposed community policing
A New York City English teacher is suing the school district , saying she was dismissed after administrators balked at a lesson about the Central Park Five , five black and Hispanic men who were falsely accused of and imprisoned for attacking and raping a jogger.

The New York Daily News reports that the teacher, Jenna Lee-Walker, was told by administrators at the High School for Arts, Imagination and Inquiry that a 2013 lesson about the Central Park Five could stir riots and that she should take a more balanced approach. Over the next year and a half, Lee-Walker says, she was accused of insubordination, received a series of negative performance reviews, and was fired.

The Daily News reports that Lee-Walker says she was not given the contract-mandated 60 days of notice before being terminated and that she was retaliated against for discussing the case with students.

The case drew attention on Twitter, where teacher and activist Jose Vilon tweeted:

Good morning, all. Another teacher of color fired for teaching social justice. Dont mind me while I rage. //t.co/N5ewZvjha8 #educolor -- Jose Vilson (@TheJLV) January 8, 2016

Teaching race and religion can be perilous ground for teachers. In December, a Virginia district closed its doors for a day after parents were upset by a lesson that involved students writing a statement in Arabic in a lesson about Islam.

Districts often have legal backing for dismissing teachers whose classroom practices violate district or school board policy. In the late 1990s, Education Week covered two teachers who sued after being dismissed for controversial classroom practices, including allowing students to use profanity in creative writing. Both teachers lost their cases.
The biggest deals in the publishing industry in 2015 occurred outside of the trade sector. Unlike 2013, when the Random HousePenguin merger was completed, or 2014, when HarperCollins acquired Harlequin, the major trade houses did not make any major acquisitions last year. The biggest acquisitions in 2015 were in professional and educational publishing, led by the merger of the Macmillan Science and Education companies (excluding Macmillans U.S. higher education and trade properties) with Springer Science + Business. The merger was completed in May, with Macmillan parent company Holtzbrinck holding a 53% stake in the combined company, which was renamed Springer Nature.

In April, Scholastic reached an agreement to sell its educational publishing technology group to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for $575 million. The unit includes such products as Read 180, and it had revenue of $249 million in the fiscal year ended May 31, 2014. Scholastic said it intended to reinvest the proceeds from the sale, which closed in May, in its remaining operations, which publish and distribute books and other materials for the school and trade markets.

The biggest news in trade publishing was that the owners of the Perseus Books Group were again exploring the possible sale of the company. In 2014, the sale of Perseus to the Hachette Book Group and Ingram was called off at the last minute. In September 2015, however, Perseus CEO David Steinberger said that due to continued interest in the publisher, it had hired the investment banking firm Greenhill & Co. to set up a formal process to gauge the possibility of a sale. In February, Perseus got a new general partner when Centre Lane Partners acquired control of the investment funds that own Perseus. Industry insiders believe a sale is likely to occur; companies inside and outside the industry have been in discussions about an acquisition.

There were a few notable acquisitions last year involving companies that work in the library side of the publishing business. In the biggest deal, Japans Rakuten conglomerate paid $410 million to acquire OverDrive, which provides digital content to libraries. In 2012, Rakuten first entered the North American digital content market with its purchase of Kobo. One of Americas largest manufacturers, 3M, got out of the library market in the year when it sold its library unit to Bibliotheca.

One of the countrys largest independent audiobook publishers, Recorded Books, was involved with two deals last year. In January, the company acquired Tantor Media, and seven months later Recorded Books itself changed hands when the private equity firm Shamrock Advisors bought the company.

Acquisition activity in book retailing included the purchase of Nebraska Book Companys college stores by Follett Corp. In a process that spanned most of 2015, Books-A-Million was taken private by the family of executive chairman Clyde Anderson, which had owned a majority stake in the company.

The biggest deal in book retailing, however, did not involve an outright purchase. In early August, Barnes & Noble completed the spinoff of its college store division into a standalone company. Barnes & Noble Education began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on August 3. B&N retained its trade bookstore operations as well as its Nook business.

Book Publishing Acquisitions, 2015

Date Announced Buyer Target Comments Jan. 5 Microcosm Publishing Elly Blue Publishing Elly Blue became a Mirocosm imprint. Jan. 6 Recorded Books Tantor Media The purchase added 4,500 audio titles to Recorded Books. Jan. 7 Kampmann & Co. Spencer Hill Press The purchase added 117 titles to Kampmann. Jan. 15 Macmillan Science and Education Springer Science + Business The merger of the two publishers created the 1.5 billion Springer Nature company. Feb. 2 Rowman & Littlefield Gooseberry Patch The purchase added 200 titles to R&L. Feb. 3 Centre Lane Partners Perseus Books Group Centre Lane became Perseuss general partner. Feb. 23 ReaderLink Baker & Taylor The purchase added 500 titles to ReaderLink. Feb. 25 Lerner Publishing Egmont USA The purchase added 100 Group childrens titles to Lerner. Mar. 16 Peter Lang management group Peter Lang Publishing The Switzerland-based publisher has a U.S. division. Apr. 24 Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Scholastic educational technology group HMH acquired Scholastics educational technology group for $575 million. June 3 Dzanc Hawthorne Books The purchase added 40 titles to Dzanc. June 16 Hachette UK Nicholas Brealey The purchase included U.K.-based Brealeys U.S. unit plus the Davies-Black and Intercultural Press imprints. Aug. 3 Shamrock Advisors Recorded Books The private equity firm became major player in audiobook market. Sept. 24 New Harbinger Impact Publishers The purchase added 125 titles to New Harbinger. Oct. 28 HarperCollins The Midlist The niche purchase gives HC an e-book deal newsletter. Nov. 18 Athena Andreadis Candlemark & Gleam The author acquired the 28-title publisher. Dec. 17 Rowman & Littlefield Stackpole Books The purchase added 1,000 titles to R&L.

Publishing-related Acquisitions, 2015
The event on the theme: Industrialisation: The impetus for Ghanas economic growth, would aimed to create a conducive forum where key government officials, policy and decision-makers, the private sector, experts and other stakeholders would address Ghanas delay in implementing the initiatives in the 2011 Industrial Policy.

"Leading government officials , captains of industry, policy-and decision-makers, industrial experts, Civil society organzations, ploliticians, foreign businesses and investors, and the diplomatic community among others, will attend the conference to address issues emanating from the main theme," a statement issued in Accra by the management of Africa Business Media said.

EOBS 2016 was conceptualised to create the platform for the public and private sectors, industries, foreign investors, academia and other stakeholders to meet and deliberate on the ideas, issues and practices that would help Ghana to industrialise and become a fully-fledged middle income country, the statement said.
2 Refugees Arrested in the U.S. for Terror Ties

Terrorism-related arrests are increasingly commonly in the United States. Last year, nearly 70 people were reportedly arrested for involvement in actual terror plots or for providing material support to a terrorist organization. 2016 starts with two new arrests, this time in Texas and California.

The two arrests may be related and the accused may have had ties with each other, CNN reports. Both men are described as Iraqi-born Palestinians living as refugees in the United States, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ). Both are accused of lying to officials about their alleged ties to terrorist organizations.

The Texas Arrest

Omar Faraj Saeed Al-Hardan, 24, of Houston, is charged with attempting to provide material support to a terror organization and lying to American authorities. Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, 23, of Sacramento is charged with making a false statement involving international terrorism.

Al-Hardan appeared in court in Houston this morning but did not enter a plea to the charges that he supplied support to the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL (which is also known as ISIS to the dismay of many). He was appointed an attorney and scheduled for a bond hearing next week.

Details surrounding the charges were reportedly not discussed at today's hearing. Al-Hardan also faces two charges for providing false information to U.S. officials concerning his ties to Islamic State and receiving weapons training.

Granted legal permanent residency in the United States in August, 2011, Al-Hardan is not yet a U.S. citizen. He said he does not speak English well, and through an interpreter asked the judge to define an indictment.

The California Arrest

In a second related case in Sacramento on Thursday, the DOJ said Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, 23, who came to the United States in 2012 as a refugee from Syria, was arrested on a federal charge of making a false statement involving international terrorism.

The U.S. attorney for Sacramento, Benjamin Wagner, said in a statement there were no indications Al-Jayab had planned any attacks in the US. The two men may have been in contact with each other, a source familiar with the case said.

Related Resources:
Domingo Bullicio, 56, is reported to have turned his daughter,Antonia, into his personal sex slave as soon as she turned 15 after his wife had walked out on him with three of their other children.

Bullicio is reported to have fled after finding out that his daughter had finally mustered enough courage to speak to the authorities asking for help.

The news reports reveal that the police had finally detained him in a city near by called Loreto on an arrest warrant following a manhunt said to have lasted more than a month.

Antonia, who was found to be illiterate, told a local paper that she had been abused from an early age by her dad, and now receiving death threats since going public with her experience.

Antonia speaking on her experience said:

From the moment my mum left home I became my fathers wife. He abused me from the age of nine. He would hit me and used to chase me round the house with a lump of wood when he saw me chatting to a neighbour or simply wanted to abuse me. He threatened me constantly and I always feared for my life. He told me he would kill me if I said anything.

Im scared for my life and the life of my children because today Im receiving threats from my fathers siblings to withdraw my complaint against him.

Theyre not at all concerned about whats happened. I want him to rot in jail. I want justice to be done.

DNA tests are reportedly going on to determine ongoing to determine whether the children are actually Bullicio's.

He is reported to have registered the kids who are now being looked after by their mother, under his name and as his.
Speaking at the swearing in of 13 Judges and Magistrates in Accra, Justice Adjei noted that the recent Anas expose had painted the Judiciary black and the media had also over exaggerated the percentage of Judges and Magistrates who were indicted by Anas.

The 13 who were sworn-in were made up of five Circuit Court Judges and eight Magistrates.

According to Justice Adjei, who is also the President of the Association of Magistrates and Judges (AMUG), there was evidence that some Judges and Magistrates could not be corrupted.

We should rather have confidence in the Judicial Council, which has not relented in its constitutional mandate for disciplining judges who have flouted either a constitutional provision or law or code of conduct for Judges and Magistrates, he added.

The Court of Appeal Judge noted that the various nick names given to Judges as a result of the expose were unnecessary and that also sought to sink the image of the Judiciary.

Those who stock in trade is to artificially dent the image of Judiciary are spelling doom for the country and must stop forth with.

Any calculated attempt by some few individuals to attack the whole Judiciary without any basis must stop to straighten the dent caused to the entire Judiciary and restore the confidence of hardworking and upright Judges and Magistrates, he said.

He told the new Judges and Magistrates that their conduct were governed by the Constitution, Laws and Code of Conduct and an infraction of any of them may lead to judges removal from the Bench.

Sir Justice Adjei also reminded them that they did not own judicial powers but were only custodians.

Judges are not above the law. The Constitution provides equality before the law, he said.

He further advised them not to be insolent or discourteous as they may be removed from the Bench.

Judges should not develop the culture of insulting lawyers, litigants and witnesses, but I do not seem to suggest that Judges should compromise their duty to dispose of cases expeditiously, he added.

Sir Justice Adjei, urged his colleagues to abide by the Code of Conduct and the oaths they had sworn.
According to the the leader of the Group, Richard Nyamah, "Mrs Charlotte Osei as the chairman of the electoral commission is also a board member of the Ghana Reinsurance Company Limited. Evidence we possess show that Mrs, Osei before her appointment as EC chair and since her appointment has remained a member of the board of the company.

According to the group, "We demand that Madam Commissioner resigns her post as member of the board of directors of Ghana Reinsurance Company or as the Chairman of the electoral commission with immediate effect."

Even though, the Ghana Reinsurance Company Limited has explained that Mrs Charlotte Osei, has stopped being a director of the company as of the end of December 2015.

The group said "Failure to do any of the above, PNF will exercise all legal rights we have to ensure the right thing is done."

But Mrs Charlotte Osei speaking on Joy FM's Newsfile said, the group should challenge her in court and she will respond appropriately.

"Thats interesting. Im hoping that whoever made this allegation is going to file some petition so we respond when we get there"

"Im not sure I should be helping people on in this exercise. What is the definition of a public office is what I will primarily think of as a lawyer."
In an interview with Accra based Joy FM on Saturday, Charlotte Osei said you were not allowed because that is what is in the C.I. and the EC did not sit somewhere to create the C.I. it was with stakeholders. This time the media will be part of the special voting process.

There is a date where we will tell the stakeholders, all the parties who are entitled to special voting; security personnel etc that by this date we must have the list because we must put you on the register for that polling station. For the media, there will be an accreditation process and when they finish, you will be included and then you can vote, she added.

Meanwhile, the Electoral Commission has indicated that it will recruit 275 non-partisan professionals to collate results in the 2016 general elections in November.
The opposition New Patriotic Party has alleged it has discovered 76,286 potential names and faces of individuals in both Ghana and Togo register.

According to the party, the evidence is damning and shows that Ghana's register is bloated.

The party said, it remains concerned with the disparity in the total number of registered voters provided by the EC at different times during the 2012 election cycle.

Read more:

In a response to the NPP, the EC of Ghana rejected calls for a new voters' register for the 2016 elections.

In a statement, the EC said the Panel set up to look into concerns surrounding the call for a new voter register "finds the arguments for a new register unconvincing and therefore does not recommend the replacement of the current voters register."
According to reports the incident happened last Christmas eve (24, December 2015) after Williams Esther a angry house help poured hot water on her victim now suffering from severe burns on her chest, breasts, neck and a part of her face.

Confirming the ordeal by the Isheri division of the Lagos State Police Command, Williams Esther have been arrested and arraign before an Ikeja Magistrates court.

Im sorry. I was pushed by the devil to do it. I wish I didnt do it. After I did it, people were beating me before I was arrested. I feel bad. Im sorry. Everybody in the house makes trouble, not only me, says Esther in police custody.

The victim has been confined to the hospital bed since the incident and hasnt been able to breast feed her little baby.

Sometimes, I would see milk coming out of my breasts, which was a sign that my baby was crying but there was nothing I could do, says Mabel

The suspect will remain in police custody until she fulfils a bail of N500,000 condition imposed by the court and two sureties in like sum.
As reported by Punch the suspect identified as Uke John is a commercial okada rider who was out doing his business until he was stopped by a robbery suspect, 25-year-old Olamide Oyetakin who have just snatched a bag and was trying to escape from the scene because he was being pursued.

Read More:House help baths neighbour with hot water

Although, the suspect claims he have no connection with the robbery incident, he is presently in police custody and wont be released until after a thorough investigation.

I was working around Shitta area of Surulere when Oyetakin stopped me and said I should drop him somewhere. Before I knew what was happening, people came from nowhere and took both of us. They beat us before they handed us over to the police. They said we were robbers, says Uke John.

Fortunately for John, the real suspect Oyelakin verified his claims that he never knew John and he had only boarded his bike to escape.
The FRSC Sector Commander in the state, Mr Oluwasusi Familoni, disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Benin.

He attributed the reduction to intensive public campaigns embarked upon by the corps, as well as timely arrival of its operatives to accident scenes.

The sector commander recalled the promise of corps to reduce accident and death by 20 per cent and 30 per cent respectively in 2015.

According to Familoni, 754 persons were injured and 222 persons died in 244 road accidents that occurred in 2014 in the state.

He said in the corresponding period of 2015, 917 persons suffered injuries, while 163 died in 251 road traffic accidents in the state.

``We recorded more road traffic accidents within the towns and cities than along highways in the state.

The accidents result from reckless driving and disobedience to traffic light, rules and regulations.

``We will be more proactive in 2016 and ensure that no traffic law violator goes unpunished, he said.

He also said in 2015, 1, 483 traffic offenders were prosecuted in Mobile Courts with 1, 348 of them convicted, while 135 were discharged.
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Do not consider WebMD Blogs as medical advice. Never delay or disregard seeking professional medical advice from your doctor or other qualified healthcare provider because of something you have read on WebMD. You should always speak with your doctor before you start, stop, or change any prescribed part of your care plan or treatment. WebMD understands that reading individual, real-life experiences can be a helpful resource, but it is never a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment from a qualified health care provider. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call your doctor or dial 911 immediately.
Salami, who is the Group Head, North Central Two of First Bank PLC, made the call at a news conference in llorin.

He noted that this dependence was at the detriment of other important sectors such as agriculture and mining, saying exploring the potential in these sectors would provide alternatives to the country's dwindling oil price.

According to him, the Federal Government needs to revisit the existing Land Use Act to promote agriculture and provide the necessary support to farmers by way of creating international market for their produce.

Salami pointed out that Nigeria is blessed with competent and intelligent individuals that could move the country forward.

He suggested continuous and proper education on various economic issues, especially on how best to tackle the current financial challenges confronting the country.

On the issue of tax collection, Salami advised Nigerians to comply with tax collection policies for the nation to attain progress.

The financial expert called on the three tiers of government to utilise the fund gotten from such collections appropriately.
Mosto-Onuoha made the call on Saturday, while delivering a lecture at the maiden convocation at the Federal University, Lafia in Nasarawa State, titled: "Creating Wealth from Solid Mineral Resources.

According to him, if this is done, their activities can be monitored and it would contribute meaningfully to positive environmental and socio-economic development of the nation.

``Activities of artisanal and illegal miners should be formally recognised in order to bring them to the formal status of the sector and allow them to perform their duties efficiently and effectively.

``The government should organise the artisanal operators, land owners, and local authorities into cooperative bodies or stakeholders of the ventures with the government being involved in the supervision of the operations, he said.

Mosto-Onuoha said Nigeria should emulate countries like South Africa and other nations, which encouraged mining and witnessed economic growth; enhance revenue through export earnings, taxes, royalties and job creation.

``Before the advent of oil exploration, the solid minerals sub-sector contributed immensely to the economic growth of the country through the exportation of coal, gold, tin, columbite, zink among others, so what went wrong, he queried.

He said the federal government could create wealth and generate employment if it shifted attention to mining agriculture, tourism and other sources as the price of crude oil continues to fall.

Earlier, Prof Ekanem Braide, the Vice-Chancellor of the university, said the institution established in 2011, was able to organise its maiden convocation following co-operation among staff of the university, parents, students and host community.
Mr Femi Malik, an official of the state Ministry of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, who made this known to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Saturday in Lagos, said the ministry acted on a tip off.

Malik said that the ministry had solicited the assistance of the Police Rapid Response Squad at the state Secretariat in Alausa, to arrest the suspect.

The official said that the suspect confessed that her madam had taken her to Libya in 2010 to work in her shop as a hairdresser.

Ajijola, who claimed to have returned from Libya a month ago, said she contacted the girls and had made arrangement to take them to Abeokuta to obtain international passports.

Malik told NAN that the mother of one of the victims fainted when she learnt of the arrest of her daughter and had been rushed to the hospital.

Also, the father of one of the victims, who identified himself as Apostle Ogundeko, said a man he prayed for in his church offered to assist his 16 year-old daughter, Olabisi to travel abroad.

Ogundeko claimed that he was told his daughter, who is a tailor, would be taken to Germany where she would work and go to school.

He said he was shocked to learn that his daughter was being taken to Libya after he had paid N15, 000 for her medical check-up and the international passport.
Commander of the agency in Enugu state, Mr Anthony Ohanyere, made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Enugu on Saturday.

Ohanyere said that the situation in the country with regards to drug use among young persons, had made it necessary for civic education, supported by moral instruction to be brought back into school curriculum.

``Civic education and moral instruction should be re-introduced in all schools; this will help to reorient our youths from vices, crime and drug abuse.

``The principle that these disciplines will inculcate will also make the youths patriotic and harness their enormous energy and potentials for positive national engagements.

``The concepts and ideas like War Against Indiscipline (WAI) should be re-emphasized and fashioned to gain youths support and followership, he said.

Ohanyere called on the Federal Government to strengthen the law against child abuse and human trafficking in order to check people who distract children from attending school.

He called on private educational institution proprietors to support the government in making education cheap and affordable for all.
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The Word for Today devotional by United Christian Broadcasters (UCB) says:

Nothing could be further from the truth: God will not forget your work and the love you have shown as you helped his people. God sees you working behind the scenes day in and day out, caring for ageing loved ones, raising your children, encouraging others, and contributing where you can. Will Rogers said, We cant all be heroes. Somebody has to sit on the kerb and clap as they go by. So when you think youre too small to do big things, try doing small things with a big heart of love.

You never know what you can do until you try! James Sizoo said: Glamour isnt greatness, applause isnt fame, and prominence isnt eminence.

The man of the hour isnt apt to be the man of the ages. A stone may sparkle but that doesnt make it a diamond. People may have money but that doesnt make them a success. Its the seemingly unimportant people who determine the course of history.

The greatest forces in the universe are never spectacular. Summer showers do more good than hurricanes, but they dont get a lot of publicity. The world would soon die but for the fidelity, loyalty, creativity, and commitment of those whose names are unhonoured and unsung. Today God values what you do. Dont get discouraged and give up, for [you] will reap a harvest of blessing at the appropriate time (See Galatians 6:9).
Adebayo gave the advice at the 11th Matriculation of the institution in Sango Ota, Ogun.

"Students should desist from spending much times on social media devices like chatting, and concentrate more on their studies in order to meet competitive global market,'' he warned.

He implored matriculating students and under-graduates to empower themselves by acquiring additional skills and professional certificates to boost their future careers.

"Parents should advise their children to be of good behaviour and prepare to go the extra mile by ensuring that their wards key into various professional certificates available within and outside the university.

He told the students to take advantage of the accredited centre named ATLAS on the campus, which prepared students for professional examinations in Accounting and Personnel Management.

Adeyemi said the institution's skill development and resource centre would soon commence short-term skill acquisition training in various vocations for students of the institution.

According to him, this will prepare them for the highly competitive market as well as laying the foundation for a future as employers of labour.

He, however, lamented that low enrolment of students was one of the major challenges confronting private universities in Nigeria.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that a total of 449 students were admitted for the 2015/2016 academics session, including 427 undergraduate students and postgraduate students in four faculties.
Minister Joseph Mucheru, who until his appointment last month was a senior executive at Google Africa, told Reuters he wanted the law on sharing infrastructure to be in place within six months.

"I have no control over parliament but if it were my choice I would have them ready today," he said in an interview on Thursday.

Safaricom, 40 percent owned by Britain's Vodafone, is the biggest phone company in the country with about 67 percent of subscribers.

Rivals such as the Kenyan subsidiary of India's Bharti Airtel say Safaricom's huge slice of overall revenues is driving out competitors.

Safaricom has rejected claims it is a dominant player and says any measures designed to reduce its position would discourage investment in the industry.

Mucheru said the government was also preparing bills on access to information and data protection in a bid to attract more investors.

Parliament is dominated by President Uhuru Kenyatta's ruling coalition, so bills proposed by the government are likely to be passed.

Mucheru dismissed concerns about the size of Safaricom in the market, noting it was Kenya's largest listed firm by market capitalisation and delivered the biggest profits, but was still not in Africa's top 10 telecom companies.

"We are trying to grow our economy and if we are going to do that, we cannot be saying a $6 billion company is too big," Mucheru said.

Safaricom, which pioneered the popular mobile money transfer service M-PESA, has already opened up its distribution network to rivals to even the field, the minister said.

He said the proposed law details how telecom companies will share infrastructure such as base stations, adding: "Shared infrastructure will help competition."

Africa-focused private equity firm Helios is expected to conclude its purchase of Orange's stake in Telkom Kenya, the former state-owned telecom monopoly, this year.

Orange is leaving the Kenyan market after losing money on its 70 percent stake in Telkom, which it bought in 2007 for $390 million.

Equity Bank launched a new service called Equitel last year to take on Safaricom in the lucrative mobile financial services business.
According to multiple reports, the head of the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel was returned to the same prison he escaped from in a boost for the beleaguered government of Mexican president, Enrique Pena Nieto.

A senior Mexican official said the attorney general's office would quickly move to determine how Guzman could be extradited, but that it could be months before he would be sent out of the country.

After coming under fire for failing to send Guzman to the United States before he escaped the last time, Mexico said in July it had approved an order to extradite him north of the border.
An unintentional oversight in a new Texas law, enabling open-carry advocates to make the world even more dangerous, has opened up Texas state run psychiatric hospitals to guns. Formerly even law enforcement officers would lock up their guns before entering, now everyone is free to defend themselves.

This from the Austin American-Statesman:

Licensed gun owners can now bring their firearms into Texas' 10 state psychiatric hospitals. Before the state's new open carry law went into effect, guns were banned at those state facilities. No one  visitors, deliverymen and the like  could bring firearms anywhere on campus. Even local law enforcement officers, who were already allowed to bring their weapons into the facilities, regularly lock up their guns before entering Austin State Hospital out of an abundance of caution. Now visitors can bring guns into the buildings where patients live. Employees are still prohibited from bringing them on campus.

The stars at night, are big and bright. Makes it easier to aim.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility but Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is active in desert areas north of the city and has a history of seizing foreigners and demanding ransoms.

In April 2012, militants kidnapped Beatrice Stockly and released her days later. She returned to her work as a missionary. A resident of Timbuktu who knows Stockly told Reuters she had again been abducted.

"I confirm that a European woman was kidnapped in Timbuktu at 3.30 a.m. (0330 GMT). A neighbour alerted the security forces around 6 a.m.," said army spokesman Souleymane Maiga.

Four vehicles were used in the kidnap, said a military source in Timbuktu who declined to be identified.

"One vehicle parked in front of the house and armed men got out and abducted the woman, while the other three cars secured the area from a distance," said the source.

French forces drove Islamist fighters from major urban centres in 2013 but they have intensified their insurgency with a series of attacks and roadside bombings last year.

Two militants attacked a luxury hotel in the capital Bamako on Nov. 20, killing 20 people, many of whom were foreigners.

Three Islamist militant groups including AQIM claimed responsibility for the hotel attack, which showed the militants extending their reach beyond the north.

CALL FOR SHARIA

In a separate incident, an unidentified gunman shot three people dead outside a Christian radio station in Timbuktu in December. A veteran jihadist called for a return to Islamic sharia law at a recent meeting attended by hundreds of locals near Timbuktu, an AQIM video showed this week.

Dozens of Westerners were abducted by desert militants in West and North Africa in the five years before the French military operation in Mali in 2013.

There has been a lull since then, with many foreigners too frightened to visit. In the last known abduction attempt, two French journalists from Radio France International were killed in Kidal, northern Mali, in Nov. 2013.

The Swiss foreign ministry formed a task force when it heard about Friday's kidnapping and was working for the woman's safe release, a statement said, adding that since 2009 it had advised against travel to Mali because of the high risk of kidnapping.

"After the kidnapping of 2012, the ministry had pointed out to the affected Swiss national the high personal risk in Mali ... and strongly discouraged her from another stay in Mali," it said.
For the second year in a row, Gas & Electric Credit Union is paying a bonus dividend to its members.

The Rock Island-based credit union said it has returned a $250,000 bonus dividend to its members.

"As a credit union, we are owned by our members. So when we have a successful year, we feel it is important to give back to the members responsible for that success," said Daryl Empen, the credit union's president.

He indicated that the credit union's board of directors "felt strongly that we could return our excess earnings to our members, while maintaining our strong capital position and overall financial health."

The credit union ended 2015 with a net income of $625,000, returning nearly 40 percent of the profits to the members, Empen said. He added that last year was the first time members had received a bonus dividend since 2006.

Members who qualified for the bonus were paid dividends based on the interest they earned on their accounts or the interest paid over the year on their loans.

Empen said the credit union gives members regular dividends in the form of interest on checking and savings accounts. " ... Being able to give back even more to our members in the form of the bonus dividend gives us great satisfaction."

Gas & Electric consistently ranks in the top 1 to 2 percent for all credit unions in the country in returning value to its members, according to Callahan & Associates Return to Member Index.

A closed bond credit union, or a closed field of membership, Gas & Electric serves six different employer groups including employees, retirees and family members of MidAmerican Energy Co., City of Rock Island, Bitco Insurance Co., Illinois Casualty Co., Thomas Hammar CPAs, and the Rock Island District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Founded in 1935, Gas & Electric has 5,500 members and $70 million in assets. It has a branch office in the Clock Tower Building on Arsenal Island.
The Quad-City area may not have been a leader in the craft beer movement, but it's rapidly catching up.

There now are five locally owned breweries in the Quad-Cities, plus one in LeClaire, two in Geneseo, Ill., and one in Muscatine.

In addition, two of the established Q-C businesses recently opened tap rooms at secondary locations that offer beer only, no food, although patrons can order-in. And a new Moline brewery called Rebellion Brew Haus is expected to open by the end of this month.

Here's a guide.

Front Street Brewery, opened 1992

Pub and eatery, 208 River Drive, Davenport

Taproom, 421 W. River Drive, in the Freight House, Davenport

Available: About five-year rounds and one to three specials. Raging River is its signature beer, a reference to the Great Flood of 1993 that nearly swept away the business.

In the works: A combination beer/smoked fish/cheese tasting in late January. It'll be a reservation-only event on a Monday when the business normally is closed.

Pub and eatery, 563-322-1569; taproom, 563-324-4014; frontstreetbrew.com

Blue Cat Brew Pub, opened 1994

Pub and eatery, 113 18th St., Rock Island

Available: About six-year rounds, including three standards and three rotating specials. Standards include Off the Rail Pale Ale, described by co-owner Dan Cleaveland as a "stepping stone" to other craft beers.

Bent River Brewing Co., opened 1999

Pub and eatery, 1413 5th Ave., Moline

Brewery and tasting room, 512 24th St., Rock Island, serving beer, with food available from The Chef's Road Show food truck from 3:30-9 p.m. Mondays-Saturdays.

Available: About six year-rounds, with five seasonals. Uncommon Stout, a coffee-flavored brew is the leading choice, followed by Undercurrent IPA (India Pale Ale), Nick Bowes, one of the owners, said.

Moline pub and eatery is 309-797-2711; Rock Island brewery is 309-283-4811; bentriverbrewing.com

Great River Brewery, opened 2009

Tasting room, 332 E. 2nd St., Davenport

Available: About nine year-rounds with numerous seasonals and small batch beers. About 30 varieties are produced annually. Roller Dam Red Ale and 483 Pale Ale are the top-sellers.

No food is served, but it can be brought or ordered in. Patrons also can get a good view of the brewing process, with large windows opening into the production area.

Great River co-owner Scott Lehnert wants people to think of his business as a place where people can drop in to enjoy the taste of different types of beers, not a bar. His latest closing time is 11 p.m.; "bad things happen after midnight," he says.

Radicle Effect Brewerks, 2012

1340 31st St., Rock Island

Always available: Radicle Effect is a nanobrewery, making small batches of four kegs each, so it has only one of its own beers available at any one time. At present, that is Radicle Effect Pilgrim Warrior.

But the business also sells numerous hard-to-find beers and an assortment of high-end single malt scotches and bourbons.

You can bring your own food or order in. Pool and darts also are available. Although in the vicinity of Augustana College, its main clientele consists of "craft beer drinkers looking for a specific beer, a relaxed atmosphere and a place to hang out," employee Broc Nelson said.

Green Tree Brewery, opened 2015

309 N. Cody Road, LeClaire

Available: Seven flagship beers year-round, with three or four specialties. Its leading beer is Mintery Knight, a minty chocolate coffee stout. Food may be ordered in.

Owners Richard and Denise Day regard their business as a gathering place that in addition to beer also serves coffee.

Rebellion Brew Haus

(expected to open by the end of January)

1529 3rd Ave. A, Moline (between Bad Boyz Pizza and Dead Poet's Espresso)

Available: Five of its own craft beers at any one time plus 19 others on tap. The goal is to have a constantly changing variety. A kitchen will prepare appetizers plus six varieties of tacos.

Scott Hancock, owner of Bad Boyz Pizza is the owner of Rebellion, and Chris "Monkey" Miller is general manager and brewer.
DES MOINES  Under pressure from anti-abortion conservatives, Gov. Terry Branstad says he will pursue policy language as part of his 2016 legislative agenda stipulating that taxpayer funds go only to womens health care providers that do not include abortion procedures as part of their service options.

The new provision effectively would end state funding of Planned Parenthood clinics, something that GOP legislators, anti-abortion groups and social conservatives have sought since a series of videos were released by an anti-abortion organization that purportedly show Planned Parenthood officials discussing the sale of organs from aborted fetuses.

What were looking at is trying to provide for the services without providing the funding to groups that provide abortions, Branstad said in an interview. We are working with the Legislature, and weve had several meetings with the legislators on that and are working on language that is very similar to language that Sen. Joni Ernst proposed at the national level.

On Friday, President Barack Obama vetoed Republican-inspired legislation to repeal his health care law as well as cut federal funding for Planned Parenthood. The bill sought to end $450 million in yearly federal funding for Planned Parenthood.

At the state level, Branstad said he is looking to redirect funds for family planning, pregnancy prevention, abstinence and other services to state and county health departments, community health centers, hospitals and physicians' offices to provide important womens health services. The language, which Branstad said is similar to provisions adopted in other states, would not name Planned Parenthood but the effect would be to defund any abortion-services provider.

A governor cannot unilaterally say were going to terminate this contract with Planned Parenthood. Every governor that has tried has lost in court, so Ive said Im not going to do that, Branstad said. But Im very willing to work with the Legislature and come up with a better way to fund programs to help needy women that need family planning or pregnancy prevention but that can be done through groups that dont provide abortions.

Iowa officials say no state money goes for abortion services. But GOP lawmakers want to halt any government money going even indirectly to Planned Parenthood organizations in Iowa. Branstad has said he supports that but would not break the law or invite legal action by arbitrarily denying the private provider government grant money without a legal cause of action.

Branstad spokesman Ben Hammes said the timing of the change would depend on how the legislation was crafted once the 86th Iowa General Assembly convenes its 2016 session on Monday. He said the new policy language would not be included in budget documents his administration presents to lawmakers on Tuesday.

The state currently is in the process of switching over to a privately managed Medicaid system that will operate under new contracts, but Hammes did not envision a problem if the legislation is adopted by the Legislature once private managed care organizations are overseeing most of Iowas Medicaid programs.

Depending on the way its written could depend on when the contracts would be canceled, which could be anytime, he said. I dont believe theres a hang-up based on existing contracts. Thats the way I understand it.

Iowa Democrats in the House and Senate have opposed GOP defunding efforts. Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, has said Planned Parenthood provides important family planning, cancer screening and health services for women  some that help avoid pregnancies  and halting those services really ends up with more abortions, not less.

Gronstal said the Legislature could be in for a very long session if majority House Republicans and their Senate counterparts try to remove Planned Parenthood as a certified Medicaid provider during fiscal 2017 budget negotiations.

I dont think that you can do that, said Sen. Amanda Ragan, D-Mason City, co-chairwoman of the House-Senate health and human services budget subcommittee. The reason weve never done that before is because the feds say you cant do that.

Ragan said her main focus this session will be on the transition to Medicaid managed care and she would wait to see what the governor proposes before deciding how to proceed.

Getting into the nitty gritty issues of it this far out probably is not going to be productive, Ragan said Friday. When we get back to session and we all get on the same page, we can openly talk about how were going to solve any of the issues.

Angie Remington, public relations manager for Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, said her organization has been providing health care and education in Iowa for more than 80 years. It provided affordable, comprehensive care to 31,761 women and men in Iowa last year that included well-woman exams, contraception, cancer screenings, STD tests and treatments, abortion and more.

Gov. Branstad should consider the impact that our preventive health services and education programs have had on reducing rates of unintended pregnancy and sexually-transmitted infections in Iowa, as well as increasing access to family planning services like well-woman exams and contraception, Remington said in a statement.

There are already federal laws in place to prohibit the use of federal funds for abortion, except in rare cases, and the governor requires those payment requests to be submitted for him to approve personally. The only purpose taking away state funding would serve would be to deny access to critical, preventive health care to Iowans, especially vulnerable populations such as low-income families and individuals, young adults and the elderly, she said.

Iowans rely on us to provide high-quality, affordable reproductive health care and poll after poll has shown that Americans do not support defunding Planned Parenthood by a large majority, Remington said in her email statement. Gov. Branstad should focus on expanding health care to those who need it  not taking it away.
CEDAR RAPIDS  With 22 days until Iowas first-in-the-nation caucuses, its the silly season, Ted Cruz told a packed house Saturday afternoon in Strawberry Point, Iowa.

Cruz, the frontrunner in the Iowa caucus campaign, was referring to the millions of dollars of attacks ads  of more and more false and ridiculous lies attacking him for, among other things, his opposition to the Renewable Fuel Standard that sets the minimum volume of renewable fuel  ethanol  in transportation fuels and is seen by Iowa ethanol producers as key to their market.

Mark Wynthein of Arlington, who said that 90 percent of his corn crop is sold to an ethanol producer, asked Cruz to ease my mind in regard to reports that the Texas senator wants to eliminate the RFS.

Cruz was quick to say he opposes the RFS and has introduced legislation to phase out the mandate in five years as well as all other subsidies and mandates for all forms of energy.

Hes also calling for elimination of the EPAs blend wall that, Cruz said, makes it functionally illegal to sell gasoline with a higher mix of ethanol than 10 to 15 percent. Removing that cap couple expand ethanols market share by as much as 60 percent, he said.

It would be good to get rid of the blend wall, Wynthein said. However, simply removing that cap on ethanol sales would not be an immediate shot in the arm for corn and ethanol producers because American car makers dont produce enough cars that can burn E-25 or E-30 gas-ethanol blend.

Like Cruz, Wynthein doesnt like energy subsidies and mandates, but he wasnt convinced that Cruz isnt supported by opponents of ethanol.

It appears to me he has Big Oil money behind him and thats my fear that all of the influence when hes in the White House, Wynthein said.

He wasnt alone in that worry.

Im questioning the ethanol issue, said Linda Soules of Lamont, who was among the 150 or more people who crowded into the Home Cookin Restaurant to hear Cruz.

Im a farm wife, so thats my bread and butter, said Soules.

Cruz is the first candidate Soules has seen and she hasnt made up her mind who she will back in the Feb. 1 caucuses.

Next to her in the standing room only crowd, Carl Michels, who works in a Dubuque machine shop, said he decided within the past month to caucus for Cruz.

Im a lifelong Republican, but Im more of a conservative than a Republican and not happy with a lot of Republicans, Michels said. I know there are a lot of Republicans who arent happy with Cruz, so he must be doing something right.

Barb Feeney of Manchester likes Cruz because Washington is broken and he has the courage to stand up to the Washington status quo.

Too many Republicans are giving up who they are to fit in, Feeney said, so I admire someone who doesnt do that.

Cruz, she added, represents conservative values that mirror our Midwestern values.
The Davenport fire union president is saying the possibility of $260,000 in department budget cuts could not come at a worse time.

Ryan Hanghian, president of the Davenport Association of Professional Firefighters Local 17, said the department is coming off a record year in service calls while the union is just three months into a three-year negotiated contract.

"Our guys were informed that if the current budget decision goes through, come July 1, if nothing changes, they will demote six guys," he said. "We've never in the history of this department done demotions."

The City Council will go over the upcoming budget at a meeting today. Interim City Administrator Corri Spiegel said aldermen will discuss details of the operating budget, which includes personnel. She declined further comment.

The meeting begins at 8:30 a.m. in City Hall council chambers, 226 W. 4th St.

Fire Chief Lynn Washburn could not be reached Friday for comment.

Staffing levels have not changed much in 30 years, but Davenport firefighters are responding to far more calls than they ever have. They experienced a record year in 2015, responding to 17,564 service calls.

By contrast, firefighters responded to 5,800 calls in 1985.

"This is more than a 330 percent increase in the amount of calls with the same number of sworn personnel," Hanghian said.

Davenport has maintained about 140 firefighters since the mid-1980s.

As the department braces for possible cuts, Hanghian said the issue already is affecting morale.

"It's not good," he said. "The sentiment is not good. They're hurting."

The union has taken awareness of the possible cuts to the streets, asking residents to post a sign in their yards that states: "Fire truck closed today. Call your alderman."

Budget cuts to the police department are being discussed, as well.

Officer James Meyrer, president of Davenport's Union of Professional Police, which represents the police officers, said he has heard the department is going to make cuts totaling $355,000.

"Right now, we've been advised of no current layoffs," Meyrer said. "We're trying to work with the city to help with the situation as much as we can."

There were more than 160 incidents of shots-fired in 2015 in Davenport, he said.

"We don't want to lose any staff," he said. "We need everyone, but we want to work with the city and make sure we can provide the best job for the people of Davenport."

Davenport Police Sgt. Eric Gruenhagen, who is president of the Davenport Police Association and a member of the Union of Professional Police, said that during the past two administrations, the department has had to undergo cuts to the budget.

"Yet, according to (former) Mayor (Bill) Gluba's state of the city address, the city's population continues to grow, there are more businesses in the city, and Davenport is growing bigger," Gruenhagen said.

"On our front, call loads continue to go up," he said. "Theres no deficit of work. And any cuts will be cutting us to the bone."

The Davenport Police Association is a volunteer organization that is responsible for community outreach and fundraising for projects such as its annual gift collecting for the domestic violence shelters and the Thanksgiving dinner at the Handicapped Development Center.

Gruenhagen said the police department has not shown any growth in sworn officers since the 1970s.

Davenport, Gruenhagen said, "is the hub of the Quad-Cities. People come here to eat, shop, play and be entertained. Business is growing, yet our numbers have not grown to address the increased workload.

"Every time they cut us, and in my opinion, there's no fat to cut, they are making the challenges to the administration all the way down to the first day police officer more difficult. There's an enormous workload."

Interim Police Chief Paul Sikorski said it would be inappropriate for him to comment because no final budget proposals have been made. He added that people can learn more by attending the public meetings on the city's budget.
DES MOINES  Terry Branstad has partnered on some significant bipartisan agreements with a split-control state Legislature during his second stint as Iowas governor.

But the Republican governor last year struck out on his own in big ways, and that may have an impact on this years legislative session.

In 2015, Branstad used his authority as the states chief executive to close state-run mental health hospitals, shift management of a state-run health care program to private companies, create a tax break for manufacturing companies and veto millions of dollars devoted to public education.

Weve made some tough decisions, Branstad said in an interview Tuesday.

The question is whether those tough decisions will impact business conducted this year by state lawmakers.

Branstad defended his veto of $56 million for public education projects as unreliable budgeting. But the move upset many state lawmakers, especially Democrats, because the allocation was part of a compromise that helped end protracted budget negotiations between Statehouse Democrats and Republicans.

Yes, it does complicate the relationship, Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said. And it will make it tough this session.

Democrats also were dismayed by Branstads administration action to clarify state tax law regarding exemptions on manufacturing equipment. The resulting impact to state tax revenues will be more than $40 million annually, according to the states fiscal estimating agency.

Critics said the change should have been made through the legislative process, not by Branstad alone.

From our perspective, in a time when the governor says we cannot afford $55.7 million in one-time money for K-12 education, but hes willing to give away $45 million a year in perpetuity to the business world that just got a $300 million commercial property tax break, we think they are short-changing K-12 education in the state of Iowa, and theyre doing it directly by doing this, Gronstal said.

Lawmakers could write legislation to block the change from taking place; it is scheduled to go into effect July 1. But Republicans have not signaled a willingness to block it, and they crafted legislation in recent years to do exactly what Branstad did.

Democrats likely will call for more oversight of the states Medicaid program, which costs $5 billion annually to operate and serves more than 600,000 Iowans, now that Branstads administration shifted management from state offices to three private health-care companies.

But Republicans disagree with the need, saying the Legislatures normal oversight powers and duties are sufficient.

The question is do we need separate oversight, and Im not convinced we cant do it in our regular committees and in our oversight committee we have currently, House Speaker-elect Linda Upmeyer said.

For his part, Branstad has stuck by his decisions, despite the critics and the potential ripples in the Statehouse.

Im the governor of all the people of Iowa, and its my responsibility to see the state is well-managed, Branstad said. Its one of the reasons why I came back and ran for governor again.
CEDAR RAPIDS  Shes wrong about gun control, paid family medical leave and a host of other issues, and her proposals to rein in big banks and Wall Street dont go far enough, but Bernie Sanders will concede Hillary Clinton is right about one thing: Electability matters.

The question is, he said Friday night in Cedar Rapids, who is the stronger candidate?

When the crowd of 1,600, according to the Sanders campaign, began chanting his name, he replied: Not me. Us.

Thats because, the Vermont independent, who is seeking the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, said his is a peoples campaign of the people, by the people and for the people, and thats why were going to win this election.

Its time to make some history, Sanders told the Veterans Coliseum crowd that was larger than the one in that venue when Republican Donald Trump, who Sanders referred to as my dear, dear friend, Donald, visited in December.

Sanders, who campaigned in Toledo and Waverly earlier in the day, was interrupted several times by cheering and applause as he delivered his stump speech in which he called for a political and economic revolution to take back the country from Trump and the billionaire class whose greed is destroying this country.

Americas working class has to stand together as a people and have the courage to tell the wealthiest 1 percent they cant have it all.

Aint gonna happen, he said. Were going to change that.

Thats what Sonia McQueen came to hear.

Ive never been to one of these, said McQueen, who was visiting from Indio, Calif. Its an exciting process and I love Bernie.

She believes the proposals Mr. Bernie is offering  higher taxes on the wealthy, lower taxes on the middle class, and free tuition at public colleges and universities, for example, will help middle class families like hers and create more opportunities for young people.

That also appealed to her daughter, Kayla Newman, a Coe College nursing major, and her boyfriend, Chris Piplani, who is working on his MBA at the University of Dubuque.

I like his economic outlook, said McQueen, who works two jobs. If you make more, you should pay more taxes and it would be nice if I could keep more of my money in my pocket.

Bev Hannon likes Sanders economic policies, but shes been a supporter since he voted against the Iraq War.

It wasnt a popular thing to do, the former Jones County legislator said, but theres no better way to support our military than to keep them safe.

Khadidja Elkeurti, a 17-year-old Muslim-American native of Cedar Rapids, agreed that Sanders is not afraid to do whats right, such as supporting the rights of women and the LGBT community before it was politically expedient.

When IBEW activist Cindy OMeara began reading about Sanders, she discovered he seemed to be talking about everything we were fighting for.

Sanders acknowledged that he was virtually unknown in Iowa when he began campaigning here and was not given much of a chance to compete for the nomination.

The professional political class, he joked, described him as a nice guy, combs his hair very nicely, a GQ dresser, but said he would never be president because he didnt have a super PAC and big money behind them.

However, more than 450,000 people, including 35,000 in Iowa, have attended his campaign events and Sanders has received more contributions than any presidential candidate in history with the average contribution being $27.

That makes him confident he will win the Feb. 1 Iowa precinct caucuses.

I think the word has gone out and people now understand that given the enormous problems facing this country, it is just too late for the same old, same old type of politics and economics, he said.

So on Feb. 1 when the eyes of the nation and world are on Iowa, Sanders said the people of Iowa can play a historical role, a role that people for years will look back on and say, It began in Iowa, the political revolution.

Lets make history, Sanders said. Lets make a political revolution.
CEDAR RAPIDS  Twila Parker, 98, of Cedar Rapids, a former longtime Davenport resident, died Tuesday, Jan. 5, 2016, at Meth-Wick Woodlands in Cedar Rapids. Services in celebration of her life will be 1:30 p.m. Monday, Jan. 11, 2016, at Weerts Funeral Home, Kimberly at Jersey Ridge Road, Davenport, where the family will greet friends beginning at 11:30 a.m. Burial will be in Davenport Memorial Park.

Memorials may be made to the Vera French Foundation.

Twila Reed was born in 1917 in Selden, Kan., the eldest of two daughters of Ira W. and Isa M. Reed. At the age of 17, she came to Davenport, where she graduated from St. Ambrose College with a B.A. degree in history and certification in elementary education. She later earned her special education certification from the University of Iowa, a masters degree from the University of Illinois and administration certification from Western Illinois University.

Her career as an educator was both productive and enjoyable, having taught and served in various capacities with Davenport Community Schools for more than 27 years.

On Jan. 29, 1944, she married Dr. H.Eugene Parker. They had two children, Pamela and I. Reed. Dr. H.E. Parker preceded her in death in 1955. In 1957, she married Joseph Mason and became a mother to three stepchildren. Mr. Mason preceded her in death in 1961.

Following his death, Twila taught kindergarten and first grade at Davenports McKinley School before transferring back into special education. In 1963, she married William Lummer. A committed advocate for teens, she established a special program known as Teen Academic and Parenting Program, or T.A.P.P., and also coordinated the districts hospital/homebound program. Recognizing the challenges faced by teen mothers in completing their education, Twila founded and served as principal of the Green Acres School, where teen parents were able to attend classes in academic subjects and gain parenting skills while their babies received care within the school environment.

Although she retired from teaching in 1981, her civic involvement remained remarkably vibrant for many more years, including a longtime tenure on the Vera French Mental Health Board and the Vera French Foundation Board. She also served as a board member of Positive Parenting at Trinity Medical Center.

At Western Illinois University, Twila served on the Education Program Advisory Committee and was awarded the Arnold Salisbury Outstanding Leadership Award by the Department of Educational Administration.

She served on the Iowa State Council for Adolescent Pregnancy through the State Health Department, and was a charter member of the National Organization for Adolescent Pregnancy and Parenting (N.O.A.P.P.). In 1988, she was inducted into the Iowa Womens Hall of Fame in Des Moines.

Mr. Lummer preceded her in death in 1990.

Twila was a member of PEO Chapter IB for many years. She enjoyed international travel, including Australia to visit her daughter.

She is lovingly remembered by her daughter, Dr. Pamela Parker, Perry Bridge, Victoria, Australia; her son and daughter-in-law, Dr. I. Reed and Cynthia Parker, Cedar Rapids; grandsons, Robert (Jill) Parker, La Crosse, Wis., and Ned (Jacquelyn) Parker, Osage, Iowa; stepchildren and their families, Pamela Mason (Bill Sinn), Nisswa, Minn., Joseph (Mary) Mason, Castle Rock, Colo., and Maria Mason, Dubuque; and numerous friends.

In addition to her parents and her husbands, Twila was preceded in death by her sister, Nyla Reed Smith; and two stepchildren, Dean Lummer and Pamela Crawford.

Remembrances and condolences may be expressed to Twilas family by visiting her obituary at www.WeertsFH.com.
The domestic terrorists occupying the Malheur National Widlife Refuge Building near Burns, Oregon justify their actions with a highly selective  and largely fabricated  history of the federal lands they've seized. The truth is a lot sleazier.



In the revisionist histories of Al-Shabubba, Malheur was turned into a useful resource by hardworking smallholders who used pluck and determination to improve the land, until Theodor (sic) Roosevelt seized it from them to turn it into an "Indian reservation (without Indians)" which morphed into a wildlife preserve.

The reality is that the Paiutes who lived there were ethnically cleansed by the US Army, who then sold some of the land to speculators from out-of-state, who were dominated by a couple of crooked megabosses who used trickery, bribery, coercion and fraud to get the land at discount prices and force out their competition. Those welfare capitalists then made a killing by using heavily subsidized US federal infrastructure, such as railways, to get their products to market.

When those cattle-barons ran their business into the ground, they got bailed out by the federal government. The feds bought the land that they'd sold at subsidy prices to rich speculators, and ended up with a big piece of territory that, having been purged of its original residents, and having been worked to ruin through mismanagement and greed by unscrupulous robber-barons, turned into a wildlife preserve.

When Peter French first came to Harney County in 1872, for example, he represented Hugh J. Glenn, a businessman in Sacramento, acquiring land and cattle for what he would eventually incorporate (in California) as the French-Glenn Livestock Company. French would marry into Hugh J. Glenn's family, but only after their business partnership had been consummated, becoming one of the two major corporations that owned the vast majority of the ranchland in the county. Peter French acquired his land by any means necessary, but all of it had originally been acquired by and then from the federal government. Sometimes French bought it from discouraged family settlers, who were looking to move on; sometimes he forced them to move on, so they would sell their land to him. Sometimes he quietly fenced off and seized what would have otherwise been public rangeland; according to a General Land Office report of 1886-87, around 30,000 acres of commons had somehow found itself enclosed by French-Glenn fences. Another means of sidestepping the law was for his own employees to file homestead claims and then immediately sell the land to their employer (according to historian Margaret Lo Piccolo Sullivan, French-Glenn acquired around 27,000 acres between 1882 and 1889, of which around 16,000 were "purchased" from employees listed on the company ledger). There were many schemes. It was possible to buy land that had been surveyed as "swamp" from the government at very low prices, for example, if you promised to drain and use it. So sometimes French and others would flood the land first, rendering it swampland so as to lower the price. Sometimes they didn't even bother. In one of the most notorious bits of fiscal legerdemain, French purchased 50,000 acres of swamp land in 1877 from a previous owner who had certified it as swamp, before purchasing it, by technically crossing it in a boata boat drawn by mules. The regulatory agencies eventually caught up with these schemes, but by the time they did, most of the land had already been distributed among a very small number of hands.

Libertarian Fairy Tales: The Bundy Militia's Revisionist History in Oregon

[Aaron Bady/Pacific Standard]
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Sara Flowers, of Moline, had a rough end to the holiday season.

Last week, on Dec. 28, the 27-year-old Licensed Practical Nurse, or LPN, lost her job of six years at a plasma donation center in Moline.

The single mother of two quickly applied for the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, but did not qualify for emergency benefits.

My fridge was bare, she said. Youd be surprised how much food costs when youre buying it at the store and you dont have an income.

On Wednesday of this week, she sought help.

Upon arrival at the Churches United food pantry at St. James Lutheran Church, Bettendorf, volunteers told Flowers she lived outside their service area.

The food pantry, located at 1705 Oak St., primarily serves Bettendorf residents who live between the citys western limits and 18th Street, according to Caroline Hicks, coordinator of the pantry.

Despite her Moline address, volunteers sent Flowers home with a cartload of groceries, including ham, a dozen eggs, loaves of bread and toiletry items.

We help anybody, Hicks added. We dont turn anybody away, but we tell them where they should be going.

With her daughters  ages six and eight  back in class at Hamilton Elementary School, Molines newest school, Flowers plans to update her resume.

Trying to find a job when youre a single mom with two kids is difficult, she said as she unloaded groceries into her car.

She hasnt lost hope, though.

As one door closes, another one opens.

Medical marijuana

About 4,000 Illinoisans, including 26 patients under the age of 18, have been approved for medical marijuana use, the Illinois Department of Public Health reported this week.

Since the state agency began accepting applications about 16 months ago, nearly 30,000 individuals have started the process and just 5,200 people have submitted a complete application.

As of Friday, 22 dispensaries, not including Matt Sterns pot shop in Milan, had been licensed to sell the drug to qualifying patients. From now through Jan. 31, applicants can petition the state to add debilitating medical conditions or diseases to the program.
views and poetry from an anarchist perspective.
Life Alone support group

Are you grieving the loss of a spouse through death, divorce or separation? Coping with Life Alone is a nine-week support group for Christian men and women. The winter session starts at 7 p.m. Jan. 14 at St. Therese Catholic Church. Registration is $30 and need-based scholarships are available. For information, call Amy at 716-5214, ext. 236.

Martin Luther King Day celebration

Faith Temple Church is hosting the annual Black Hills Community Martin Luther King Jr. Day Celebration from noon to 1 p.m. Jan. 18, 2016 at the Rushmore Plaza Holiday Inn main ballroom. The guest speaker will be Pennington County Sheriff Kevin Thom. The event is open to the public. For more information, contact the Rev. Troy Carr at 342-4448 or 415-3873.

Family Heritage Alliance Luncheon

The Family Heritage Alliance Luncheon will take place on Jan. 12 at the Bethel Assembly of God Church, 1202 N Maple Ave. A catered lunch, for the cost of a donation, will be served at 11:30 a.m. FHAs Executive Director Dale Bartscher and FHA Lobbyist Norman Woods will share a preview of this years 91st South Dakota Legislative Session. Rapid City Mayor Steve Allender will also give a "State of the City" address. To register, go to FamilyHeritageAlliance.org or call 718-5433.

Financial Peace Life Lab

Learn how to use your income shovel to dig out using Dave Ramsey's debt snowball and budgeting tools from 9 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Jan. 16 at the Rimrock Exchange, 514 St. Joseph St. The Life Lab is free. For more information, call 342-5373 or register online at rimrockchurch.com.

Love and Respect marriage class

Westminster Presbyterian Church, 1012 Soo San Drive, is offering a seven-week class to enrich marriages Jan. 13. The class is called "Love and Respect," and is based on the work of Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. All are welcome, and child care is provided. To register, visit rcwestminster.com.
Regional Health and Westhills Village Retirement Community have partnered to reopen the facilitys on-site medical clinic.

Dr. Thane Gale described the partnership as a great opportunity to give residents more options for quality health care.

Some residents arent comfortable with traveling or driving anymore. This clinic gives them convenience, but safety too, Gale said.

He added that the clinic is set up to see non-emergency acute issues such as coughs and sore throats. It also performs blood draws, physicals and immunizations.

Having access to an on-site clinic allows us to provide health care in a timely manner, Gale said. We can handle a health issue like a cough before it becomes a problem like serious pneumonia, and possibly prevent admission to the hospital and needing IV antibiotics.

The walk-in clinic, which is located in the lower level of the main Westhills Village resident hall, has two exam rooms and is open Tuesdays from 1 p.m. 5 p.m.

Gale practices family medicine at the Aspen Centre in Rapid City, and sees his position as the supervising physician at the Westhills Village clinic as continuing the care he already provides to the community.

Patients at the clinic are seen by Ashley Neisen, certified physician assistant, who works with Gale at the Aspen Centre. The clinic also has two support staff, including Katie Heigh, an RN who performs the blood draws.

The on-site blood draws are a big hit with the residents, Neisen said with a laugh. She said the residents liked the convenience of being able to have blood drawn at the clinic rather than having to travel to a lab to have the procedure done.

Daryl Reinicke, CEO of Westhills Village, said they felt providing an on-site clinic would enhance services and quality of life. Providing this service on-site will lead to earlier interventions, which will then allow for greater outcomes for the patients. Additionally, we would expect to see less complications for the patient and assist in efficient use of other providers, which would include local hospital stays as well.

The clinic is addressing a key issue in our community, which is difficulties in accessing and acquiring ongoing primary care physician coverage.

The clinic opened in late November, and is already a big hit with the patients. I couldnt feel more welcomed," Neisen said.

One resident of the retirement community decorated the clinic's lobby for the holidays. Im enjoying getting to know and form relationships with my patients, Neisen said.
An honest essay has numerous characteristics: original thinking, a good structure, balanced arguments, and plenty more.

But one aspect often overlooked is that an honest essay should be interesting. It should spark the readers curiosity, keep them absorbed, make them want to stay reading and learn more. An uneventful article risks losing the readers attention; whether or not the points you create are excellent, a flat style, or poor handling of a dry subject material can undermine the positive aspects of the essay. The matter is that a lot of students think that essays should be like this: they believe that a flat, dry style is suited to the needs of educational writing and dont even consider that the teacher reading their essay wants to search out the essay interesting. You might want to have online essay editor service to boost your confidence in writing with an error-free output. Academic writing doesnt need to be  and shouldnt be  bland. The excellent news is that there is much stuff you can do to create your essay more attractive, while youll be able only to do such a lot while remaining within the formal confines of educational writing. Lets study what theyre.

Have an interest in what youre writing about

Dont go overboard, but youll be able to let your passion for your subject show.

If theres one thing bound to inject interest into your writing, its being fascinated by what youre writing about. Passion for a subject matter comes across naturally in your essay, typically making it more lively and fascinating and infusing an infectious enthusiasm into your words  within the same way that its easy to talk knowledgeably to someone about something you discover fascinating.

Include fascinating details

Another factor that may make an essay boring maybe a dry material. Some topic areas are naturally dry, and it falls to you to form the article more interesting through your written style and by trying to seek out fascinating snippets of knowledge to incorporate, which will liven it up a small amount and make the data easier to relate to. A way of doing this with a dry subject is to create what youre talking about that seems relevant to the critical world, as this is often easier for the reader to relate to.

Emulate the fashion of writers you discover interesting

When you read lots, you subconsciously start emulating the fashion of the writers you have read. Reading benefits you a lot, as this exposes you to a spread of designs, and youll start to require the characteristics of these you discover interesting to read.

Borrow some creative writing techniques

Theres a limit to the quantity of actual story-telling youll do when youre writing an essay; in the end, essays should be objective, factual and balanced, which doesnt, initially glance, feel considerably like story-telling. However, youll apply a number of the principles of story-telling to create your writing more interesting.

consider your own opinion

Take the time to figure out what its that you think instead of regurgitating the opinions of others.

Cut the waffle

Rambling on and on is dull and almost bound to lose the interest of your reader. Youre in danger of waffling if youre not completely clear about what you wish to mention or havent thought carefully about how youre visiting structure your argument. Doing all your research correctly and writing an essay plan before you begin will help prevent this problem.

Editing is a vital part of the essay-writing process, so edit the waffle once youve done a primary draft. Read through your essay objectively and eliminate the bits that arent relevant to the argument or labor the purpose.

employing a thesaurus isnt always a decent thing

Avoid using unfamiliar words in an essay; theres too great a likelihood that youre misusing them.

You may think that employing a thesaurus to seek out more complicated words will make your writing more exciting or sound more academic, but using overly high-brow language can have the incorrect effect.

Avoid repetitive phrasing

Please avoid using the identical phrase structure again and again: its a recipe for dullness! Instead, use a variety of syntax that demonstrates your writing capabilities and makes your writing more interesting. Mix simple, compound, and complicated sentences to avoid your paper becoming predictable.

Use some figurative language

Using analogies with nature can often make concepts more accessible for readers to know.

As weve already seen, its easy to finish up rambling when youre explaining complex concepts  mainly after you dont know it yourself. One way of forcing yourself to think about a couple of pictures, present it more simply and engagingly is to form figurative language. This implies explaining something by comparing it with something else, as in an analogy.

Employ rhetorical questions

Anticipate the questions your reader might ask.

One of the ways ancient orators held the eye of their audiences and increased the dramatic effect of their speeches was by using the statement. A decent place to use a statement is at the top of a paragraph, to steer into the following one, or at the start of a replacement section to introduce a brand new area for exploration.

Proofread

Finally, you may write the top interesting essay an instructor has ever read. Still, youll undermine your good work if its plagued by errors, which distract the reader from the particular content and can probably annoy them.
Spearfish  Black Hills State University students completing small business management courses put their classroom knowledge to use to help local charities in the Black Hills. And with the help of a new donation from BHSU alum Jim Moravec, students will be able to continue the hands-on project at a larger scale in the years to come.

Nine student groups built their own small business companies. Run by a student CEO, the students handled everything from creative development, marketing and accounting. The company proceeds, which were more than $2,000, were given to local charities. Jeff Wehrung, assistant professor of management at BHSU, had more than 50 students enrolled in the courses held in Spearfish and at BHSU  Rapid City.

This gives them a hands-on opportunity to experiment and see what they need to know to start and run a business, Wehrung said. We just throw them in.

This is the second year Wehrung has used this curriculum in his small business management courses. Students have had to raise their own funds to start the business, but thanks to a new donation from Moravec, 79, and his wife Laura, students will be able to petition for funds to start their businesses in the future. The Moravecs established the Jim and Laura Moravec Entrepreneurial Activities Fund to help students increase business knowledge and complete these projects on a larger scale.

The businesses included Touch of Relief, Wildlife Warriors, Turkey Warrior Obstacle Course, Bottles of Wishes, RackStar, LiveWire Survival, FitCal and Club MMXV.

Wehrung noted all the businesses had exceptional business strategies, noting the success of Touch of Relief, which raised more than $700 for breast cancer research. Touch of Relief offered massages during midterm week at BHSU. They group also partnered with other small businesses during their event to increase profits.

Club MMXV was a night club that opened in downtown Rapid City for one night. Wehrung was impressed with the groups marketing technique, which included filming their own commercial. The advertisement was to be aired in the Rapid City area, but ended up being broadcast across the state.

All these projects were awesome, Wehrung said. Its really neat because its such a mix of students.

Wehrung credits the mix of students in his small business management class for the great success.

You have business students who help with accounting and money management and corporate communication students who are just unbelievable with the advertising and marketing, he said.

Wehrung said he enjoyed watching the students pull concepts from the class and applying them to their business strategy.

This course is not only teaching them how to successfully open a business, but also learn the small mistakes you can make, he said. Its not always going to work perfectly, but this is how I can help them learn how to not make those mistakes when they enter the field.
Belle Fourche will again host the Cheyenne's annual Fort Robinson Outbreak Spiritual Run Jan. 12, with a short program welcoming the runners on their way through the community and a hot meal for the runners and support staff.

The 6 p.m. program at the AmericInn is open to the public before the Butte County Historical Society and Belle Fourche volunteers serve the runners their evening meal.

The annual run is technically a commemoration of the December, 1879, outbreak from Fort Robinson by Northern Cheyenne people seeking their way home to Montana from a reservation in Oklahoma where they had been sent by the U.S. government.

But founder and organizer Phillip Whiteman Jr. said, "We're not just running for our ancestors ... it's for all mankind."

This year's 20th year of the run through western South Dakota is noted in a proclamation by Gov. Dennis Daugaard, according to Eleanor Marousek, organizer for the local events.

About 85 runners and support staff are expected at the AmericInn as they ready for the final leg of the run to their homelands and tribal reservation in southeast Montana.

Whiteman said of the runners in the 20th annual run, "We have to continue to strive for goodness - we are all in the same boat together."

He added that Sweet Medicine, the Cheyenne medicine man of legendary proportions, taught "We need to harness our emotions."

"His spirit is still with us," Whiteman said.

The run emphasizes youth traditional values of unity, responsibility to self and others, and how to overcome adversity, according to Lynette Two Bulls, director of the run.

"In so many communities we concentrate on our differences," she said, adding that in Belle Fourche the community concentrates on commonalities.
Some decent news about South Dakota's economy in 2015 got the new year off to an encouraging start. Tuesday morning's Rapid City Journal reports that "the state's economy is strong, unemployment drops and tax revenues rise."

Recalling last year's bruising ballot battle over a minimum-wage increase in South Dakota, supporters of the measure, me included, can feel pretty good about the end result. The unemployment rate, at 3 percent, fell to its lowest level since before the 2008 recession, with total employment rising to above pre-recession levels. Meantime, sales and use taxes rose a bit over 4 percent, nearly a full percent higher than expectations.

This comes as no surprise, really, because in this consumer driven society of ours it just follows that higher wages will drive more purchases, which in turn stimulates the economy. The South Dakota Budget and Policy Institute showed that 80,000 South Dakota wage-earners would get an immediate $1.25 an hour raise. The resulting arithmetic means that the extra couple of hundred bucks a month of purchasing power for all those folks added $15 million a month to South Dakota consumer spending.

Based on that, I was mystified as to why Gov. Daugaard opposed the minimum-wage hike. He famously said, "this issue should be based on economics, not politics. There needs to be an analysis of how many jobs would be lost."

It seemed pretty clear to me that the economic argument favored a wage hike and not only were no jobs lost, but there was a net increase in new jobs over the year. Why Daugaard couldn't understand that is probably more of a reflection of his political tilt than a bow to common economic sense, the very mindset that he was opposed to. The economic argument was compelling, the political one self-serving.

My guess is that Daugaard was swayed by the siren song of the South Dakota Retailers Association (of which I'm a member in good standing), which forecast ominous results stemming from a minimum-wage increase. SDRA fought the issue with everything it had, even sending a spokesman from Pierre to Rapid City to weigh in against the measure at a public forum.

SDRA blanketed the state with an ad campaign that predicted a higher minimum wage would "trigger higher prices, layoffs, cuts in hours for workers and delays in making needed improvements."

No doubt there were some spot instances where some or all of those eventualities occurred, but it's clear from year-end summaries that South Dakota's economy moved forward nicely in the aggregate.

Did the wage hike by itself trigger the nice little boomlet South Dakota's economy had in 2015? You could argue that there were several, maybe many factors that made it happen. My view is that the surge in spending power by wage-earners had to play a significant role.

If there's a conclusion to be derived here, it's that finding ways to increase wages in South Dakota certainly doesn't lend itself to the economic woes that opponents of higher wages predict.
A national trend in which local paramedics make house calls is starting to take root in Nebraska. Firefighters in McCook are expected to start making visits to homes starting this month, the McCook Gazette reported.

Other communities in Nebraska, including Lincoln, should pay close attention. Community paramedicine offers a way to help local residents and make the local health care system more efficient.

The practice of utilizing fire department paramedics or private paramedics has skyrocketed in the past five years, fueled in part by provisions of the Affordable Care Act that penalize hospitals when surgery patients are readmitted.

In McCook, city officials hope the new program will reduce the number of emergency calls, as well as improve local health care. The program will target residents who have made frequent visits to the emergency room in the past, and those who are may require emergency ambulance service in the future.

The overall goal I think for us to minimize those transports and in turn lessen the emergency calls, McCook Fire Chief Marc Harpham told the Gazette.

In the home visits paramedics will do things like take blood pressure and other vital signs, check blood sugar, educate patients on how they can stay out of the hospital and reinforce previous messages on what people need to do to cope with chronic medical conditions.

One of the first communities to try community paramedicine was Forth Worth, Texas. Matt Zavadsky, a spokesman for MedStar in Fort Worth, said that when the program started there were only three in the country. Now there are about 230, he told the Journal of Emergency Medical Services.

In Omaha a pilot partnership between Immanuel Medical Center and Medics at Home, which is owned by Omaha Ambulance Service, provides follow-up care after area residents return home from a hospital.

Pending in the Legislature is LB543, introduced by Omaha Sen. Burke Harr, which is aimed at addressing some of the issues surrounding community paramedicine. Harr last year described the bill, which is still in committee, as an effort to get people talking about the concept.

One of the issues is how to pay for the programs. The Wall Street Journal reported last year that payment models are still evolving. Some are covered by grants, some by state Medicaid and some by Medicare programs that reward hospitals for innovative programs intended to save money. In McCook the Community Hospital Health Foundation has committed $10,000.

Previous attempts to introduce new ideas to Lincoln Fire and Rescue, like the experiment with sending alternative response vehicles (pickup trucks) to some emergency calls rather than fire engines, have not been greeted with enthusiasm. Change, however, is relentless. Community paramedicine is a trend that is worthy of study.

 Lincoln (Neb.) Journal Star
BAKER, Mont.  Cold weather and fog seems to have settled in in southeastern Montana, as the Craig and Wanda Pinnow celebrated the holidays while continuing winter chores.Their home was twinkling with multi-colored lights for the holidays, when we visited the ranch. The sheep were close to the buildings for shelter, while the cows were in the pastures.Weve had cold weather and fog over the past couple of weeks, said Wanda, who ranches with her husband, Craig, at Bracket Butte Ranch. A slight bit of snow, about an inch, fell the day after Christmas.On Dec. 18, the Pinnows put out mineral for the cattle.The young cows are consuming more mineral than the older cows, said Wanda, adding they are using a loose mineral.Due to the cold, the Pinnows have been supplementing the cows with hay bales a couple of times a week. Craig took hay bales out to the feeding ground on Dec. 19, and again, three days later.Craig needs to carry a gun in the tractor as a coyote ran beside the tractor today, when he was carrying two bales to the feeding ground, Wanda said. They thought the coyote was looking for mice that fall from the bales.Craig attended a workshop on Handling Calving Difficulty presented by Dr. Mortimer, veterinarian from Colorado State University. It was hosted by the Fallon County Extension Service in Baker, Mont. Topics at the workshop included Making decisions on the hows and whys of calving techniques and when to provide assistance.On Dec. 20, the Pinnows attended a church Christmas program; then a friend hosted a Christmas party. The next day, Craig helped friend Jake Wagner cut beef all day.On Dec. 22, after feeding animals, the Pinnows took panels down to the south pasture to use to help load a cow in the old herd that went lame.The cow was not walking very well, said Wanda, adding they felt that bringing the cow home would be easier on her, as she would not have to walk far for water and feed.Wanda is a member of the Baker CowBelles. She and Craig attended its Christmas party and supper later that evening.This group of 29 ladies in the Baker CowBelles teaches beef education in our local schools. We do a third-grade demonstration on how the cheeseburger will fulfill the My Plate guidelines for one meal, and a Wow the Cow class for the fifth-graders. The CowBelles then explain how our life would not be what it is today if we did not have beef by-products, Wanda said. We also hold a chili cook-off and have an educational table at the health fair and County Fair each year.Some of their family, and granddaughters, Mila and Morgan Hurley, arrived on Christmas Eve. With heavy fog but no snow on Christmas Day, son Leevon and family arrived.Wanda and Craig hosted 23 people for the holidays on Dec. 26.We had all three children and their families here for Christmas, including Craigs parents. Our nephews came to watch the Redskins beat the Eagles. Our team is in the playoffs! Wanda said.On Dec. 27, they awoke to temperatures dropping to 4 degrees below zero. The Pinnows fed animals again on that day, with their Christmas lights still twinkling at the ranch.The Pinnows wish everyone a Happy New Year.
PLACID LAKE  Lake ice can creak and groan, pop and tinkle. And when it opens up underneath you, it may not make a sound.

Thats what Ryan Sokoloski learned on New Years Day while leading a Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks tour of Placid Lakes frozen surface. One minute he was inviting the half-dozen participants to listen to the eerie sounds, and the next he was up to his neck in freezing water.

If I had a bunch of first responders and guys with scuba tanks wanting to do a class in ice water rescue and they said, Stand over there and wait for it to break, Id say no way, Sokoloski recalled with a relieved laugh a few days later. But in a way, Im glad this happened. It was a great way to remind people to never take the ice for granted.

Sokoloski was on a FWP First Day Hike at the Placid Lake State Park, following a route hed tested the day before. He was about 15 feet away from a spot where ice fishermen had set up their shack on New Years Eve. A test hole hed made 15 minutes before showed between 5 and 6 inches of ice, the level typically strong enough to support snowmobiles.

No spiderweb of cracks gave any warning about the ice failure. As he fell, another member of the party tried to grab him, and the ice gave way beneath her, too. Only submerged to her waist, she was able to roll back onto the solid surface.

But Solokoski found the edge of the ice disintegrating more as he tried to grab it. While lake ice can be remarkably strong and flexible when solid, it loses most of its integrity when broken. Each time he tried to lift himself out, the hole became larger.

Then the totally unexpected happened. In an ice hole 30 feet from shore, over water he knew to be about 12 feet deep, Sokoloski found something to stand on. His boots were sliding on a surface about 4 feet down, but he wasnt sinking. Two other tour members extended a ski pole and a snow shovel, and pulled him out of the water.

The whole incident lasted about 90 seconds.

The ledge Sokoloski found himself on was likely a very unusual version of a common lake ice effect. After a layer of ice forms, additional snow or rain can weigh the surface down and allow water to seep up and over. A new top layer of ice forms, but the water between stays liquid or slushy, like the creamy filling inside an Oreo cookie.

Usually, its only 2 or 3 inches of water under that first layer, said Missoula ice fisherman Adam Krantz, who was trying his luck on nearby Salmon Lake on New Years Day. Thats scary. When you go in up to your knees, thats terrifying.

Ice travelers watch for several danger signs when determining whether to cross a frozen lake.

Its good to know the lakes warm-weather characteristics, because weedy places in summer become underwater compost piles in winter. They actually generate heat, which can weaken ice. Creek inlets and outlets have flowing water, which affects the thickness above their currents. Places exposed to prevailing winds tend to take longer to freeze than more sheltered bays.

And sometimes there are just thin spots, Krantz said, pointing to an odd grayish spot on Salmon Lake about 30 feet from where he was fishing. The hole he was working was about 7 inches thick. The ice in the gray spot was probably just 2 inches, not enough to support a single person on foot.

The type of ice also makes a difference. Safety recommendations are based on inches of clear, blue ice. Slushy ice with lots of cloudy bubbles has just half the structural strength, inch for inch, of blue ice. The strength of ice over a flowing creek or river is typically 15 percent less than the same thickness of ice over still water.

Sokoloski said when he got home to take a hot shower, he was surprised at the appearance of his body. Hed been wearing a moisture-wicking shirt under fleece and a synthetic parka on his torso, and his skin looked normal.

But below he was wearing cotton jeans, and his legs were white from restricted blood flow. He recalled thin sheets of ice breaking off his pants as he walked from his truck to his house. After he warmed up, he was relaxing at home when another thing hit him.

About 5 p.m., we were sitting watching TV and all of a sudden, I was really tired, Sokoloski said. By 5:30, I couldnt keep my eyes open. I think it was the combination of the adrenaline rush from the fall and being slightly hypothermic, I was just burned out.

Condon resident Rick Ferguson was at Placid Lake to learn about ice safety  a lesson that provided more than he expected.

Ive been on out on Holland Lake two times, Ferguson said, holding a pair of broom handles with nail points connected by a string. A friend from Sweden told me about these. Theyre good to hang around your neck so you can pull yourself out if you fall in. But I dont think Ill be using them. This is one winter course well never forget.
A Stevensville man was charged with felony counts of intimidation and theft after he allegedly broke into an ex-girlfriends home and held her there against her will.

Jordan Lee Thompson, 22, appeared Friday before Ravalli County Justice Jennifer Ray on the felony charges and misdemeanor counts of partner or family member assault, unlawful restraint, criminal trespass to property, driving while license suspended and failure to have liability insurance.

Thompson was arrested after sheriffs deputies responded to a call of a disturbance on Wild Cat Lane in Hamilton and found the man driving his ex-girlfriends car.

The woman told a sheriffs sergeant that Thompson had been arrested before for partner or family member assault and that she had obtained a temporary order of protection against him.

Thompson allegedly showed up at her house about 7 a.m. on Jan. 5 and entered the home through a rear-sliding glass door that she had attempted to wedge shut with an iron fireplace poker.

When the woman told Thompson that he shouldnt be at her house due to the protective order, he responded I dont care, according to an affidavit filed in the case.

Thompson took her phone and then spent the night at the house.

The next morning, the woman said Thompson became angry after she smoked his last cigarette. Thompson allegedly placed her in a bear hug and then fell backwards while holding onto her. The womans chin slammed into a nearby couch.

When she attempted to flee out the front door, Thompson allegedly shut the door and locked it. She tried twice more to escape, but Thompson continued to shut the door.

During the argument, Thompson allegedly told the woman: You do not want to do this or I will have my mom take you out, according to the affidavit. The woman told the officer she believed Thompson was threatening to have his mother kill her if she followed through with leaving him.

Eventually, she managed to get out the door and run to a neighbors house to call for help.

Thompson left the scene in the womans car, which she had not given him permission to drive.

Ray set bail at $25,000.
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ALL NEW Rome the Second Time Book Updates at http://www.scribd.com/doc/34815572/UPDATES-to-Rome-the-Second-Time and ALL NEW GOOGLE MAPS versions of Rome the Second Time Book maps http://www.scribd.com/doc/56172132/Google-Maps-Versions-to-Rome-the-Second-Time-book-maps
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Tiny house being built in Salina to help homeless people in Missouri

For the fifth year and second in Salina, a local group is partnering with Tiny House Ministries to help homeless people in Missouri.
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Workforce and Literacy Initiative Goals

Goal #1: Double the number of associate and bachelor degrees awarded from institutions in the Northern Santa Barbara County region.

Goal #2: Foster the success of 1,000 North County adults per year in gaining basic literacy skills (reading with comprehension at 8th grade level) through education, community or workplace programs.

Goal #3: Double the number of career technical education (vocational/industrial) certificates awarded by target schools and training institutions in the Northern Santa Barbara County region.

Goal #4: Reduce by 50% the percentage of students unable to read at grade level (grades 3-11).

Goal #5: Increase the number of high-quality preschool and early child care slots available to working families, in the Northern Santa Barbara County region, by 1,500.
Cheikh Hadjibou Soumare, President de la Commission de l'Uemoa, ancien premier ministre sous Wade

Finalement, le president Macky Sall na pu que retarder la chute de Cheikh Hadjibou Soumare de la Presidence de la Commission de lUnion economique et monetaire ouest-africaine (Uemoa). En effet, au moment ou Macky Sall campait sur sa position soutenant que la Presidence de la Commission de lUemoa revenait a notre pays, le president nigerien, a sorti un protocole daccord signe en 2011 par lex-President de la Republique, Me Abdoulaye Wade, qui pronait la rotation de la Presidence.  Issoufou a demande a Macky, dun ton narquois, sil ne voulait pas respecter lengagement du Senegal et sil etait pret a lannoncer publiquement. Dans ce cas, son pays et lui seraient prets a prendre acte de cette decision , rapporte une source, membre de la delegation presidentielle. Finalement, le president Macky Sall sest plie a la decision nayant pu obtenir que Adjibou Soumare reste en poste jusquen juin 2016.
Archive

Lancien ministre de la Justice sous Wade a ete designe pour reprendre le flambeau des mains de Oumar Sarr, le secretaire general du Parti democratique senegalais (Pds) emprisonne le 19 decembre dernier. Cheikh Tidiane Sy doit presider la prochaine reunion du comite directeur du parti, ce lundi.

Alors que des responsables comme Babacar Gaye, Aida Mbodj ou Me Amadou Sall etaient pressentis au poste, Abdoulaye Wade a, par le choix de lancien garde des Sceaux, voulu eviter toute nomination qui ferait polemique et fragiliserait davantage son parti en pleine traversee du desert politique.
Facebook has gone from tenant to owner by paying $202 million for their 57-acre Menlo Park campus at 1 Hacker Way, according to the San Francisco Business Times. Only in Silicon Valley could such a considerable sum be considered a bargain price. Consider this: Sources tell the SFBT the figure was agreed on in 2011, when the social networking behemoth first leased the property from Sun Microsystems. To calculate what it would be worth today, look at the comps: Facebook paid nearly $400 million in February for 56 nearby acres.

The SFBT report points out that this sale was long expected; after all, the option to buy was forged when Facebook leaders signed the lease. What's interesting is that this is just a small piece of a huge development puzzle. The report contains a litany of plans for other properties: a 430,000-square-foot office designed by Frank Gehry; two more Gehry-designed buildings that are in the works; a 180,000-square-foot warehouse being converted to offices; proposals to potentially develop the former Prologis campus into offices, homes, and retail space. And there are hundreds of thousands of square feet of office space that the company is still leasing.

The SFBT says Facebook officials wouldn't comment for the story; but the report did reference company documents that say growth is trending. Facebook reports the employee headcount has grown from 8,348 in 2014 to 11,996 this year and that growth would "continue for the foreseeable future." At this rate, there will be a desk for all of them.

 Facebook goes from rent to own in Menlo Park in $202 million deal [San Francisco Business Times]
Many men may enter, but only one will leave with the crown. None, however, shall exit with his dignity.

Yet judging by this year's crop of bro brethren, there wasn't much of that to go around in the first place. And the assembled specimens of the male species, it should be noted, are giving it up for a good cause: the Mr. Marina competition, an annual fundraiser for the Leukemia and Lymphoma society. Further, like the Wall Street banking types these gentlemen very much resemble, they've been raking it in since 2012, raising $525,000 in total. Count it.

Without further ado, here they are, contestants for your hearts and minds. Perhaps you've seen them on Tinder or, better yet, "elitist dating app" The League. So, in that spirit, let's do some swiping, shall we?



BRADLEY THOMASMA

"STRAIGHT OUTTA DETROIT," Mr. Bradley Thomasma is "BUILT ON HARD WORK, A HANDSHAKE AND MOM'S HOMEMADE APPLE PIE."

That is all to say that Bradley is likely bankrupt, in one way or another.

"CALIFORNIA DREAMIN', I SET SAIL FOR THE GOLDEN COAST, WHERE I CAN NOW BE FOUND SPEARHEADING SOCIAL EVENTS, EXPLORING THE GREAT OUTDOORS OR CROONING ON STAGE AT YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD KARAOKE OR PIANO BAR."

Okay, I like this guy and would totally swipe right on a karaoke bro-sesh.



DREW CARTER

Ed Note: Okay, so Drew's boneheaded profile appears to have been written in the second person. Bear with him.

"YOU HEAD TO THE MARINA SAFEWAY EVERYDAY TO 'SHOP FOR GROCERIES.'

"SO WHAT IF YOURE NEVER REALLY GOING TO COOK ANYTHING BECAUSE ALL YOUR MEALS ARE PROVIDED BY YOUR TRENDY TECH JOB

YOU SWEAT IN THE GYM EVERYDAY, SHUNNING BREAD AND PASTA SO YOU CAN CRACK BEERS WITH YOU BOYS AND BRUNCH-HOP ON THE WEEKEND - ABS ARE STILL MADE IN THE KITCHEN

SO, POP ANOTHER ICE CHILLED BOTTLE OF CARPENE MALVOLITI BRUT ROSE MR. MARINA 2016, YOURE A GROWN MAN AND CAN STILL DRINK WITH THE LADIES. - MR. MARINA TWO-THOUSAND AND SIXTEEEEEN!"

Would personally swipe left on this thirst-monster, but your mileage may vary.



EDMO GAMELIN

"DESPITE FREQUENT VISITS TO FORT MASON, AN INBOX FULL OF CHUBBIES RECEIPTS, AND A CALENDAR HOLD FOR LIGHTNING TAVERN BUSINESS EVERY FRIDAY FROM 3PM ONWARD, EDMO IS NOT TO BE MISTAKEN FOR A TYPICAL MARINA BRO. No, this archaic species identifies as MARINA GENTLEMAN.

Swipe left due to patriarchal bullshit.



GARRETT RUHLAND

Meet Garrett, "A MAN WITH SIMPLE TASTES: BEER ABOVE 8% ABV, WHISKY THAT PREDATES MY LINEAGE, CIGARS FROM FORBIDDEN FRONTS, THE OCCASIONAL BOW TIE, AND SHORTS THAT RIDE HIGH ON MY THIGHS."

Nice thighs, would ride, **swipes right**



JAMES SMITH

"OFTEN SEEN AT PALM HOUSE DRINKING PUNCH BOWLS AND USING CHEESY PICKUP LINES ON WOMEN FROM ALL WALKS OF LIFE, DADDY, AS JAMES SMITH LIKES TO CALL HIMSELF  "

I'm going to stop you right there. That is some daddy-issue shit I am not gonna touch. Swipe to the left, to the left.



JOHN STEVICK

"HE'S TRIED. HE'S TRUE....HE BLEEDS RED WHITE AND BLUE. HE'S BEAUTY. HE'S GRACE...WHEN YOU'RE DOWN, HE'S YOUR ACE. HE'S BEEN AROUND THE WORLD AND HE PLANS FOR MORE, BUT I TELL YOU WHAT, AND ILL TELL YOU NOW...HELL ALWAYS BE YOUR STAND UP TALL, ALL FOR ONE AND ONE FOR ALL, ROOTIN-TOOTIN, FLAG SALUTIN, DREAM CHASING, LIVE LIFE WITHOUT THE CASING, MARINA MAN NEXT DOOR."

Sick flow, build me a "reclaimed wood" table and I'll swipe right.



KOREY WARZALA

"KOREY WEARS FITTED CHINOS, TAILORED WHITE BUTTON-DOWNS, TAN SUEDE SANDALS, COLOGNE, A CHEERFUL STRUT, AND THE BIGGEST SMILE IN THE BAY."

Go on....

"IF IT WERE THE LAST DAY HERE ON EARTH, HED GRAB THE BOYS, CRACK OPEN SOME BEERS AND THROW ONE MORE SET OF LAUGHS ON THE BOOKS."

Okay bro loves his bros, but is it just in a bro way, bro?

"HE IS THE MODERN RENAISSANCE MAN. HES A GUY WHO LOOKS LIKE HE HASNT EVER TRIED BECAUSE HE ACTUALLY HASNT - THE KID WAS BORN THAT WAY."

Literally the definition of privilege. Block him maybe.



MARK VALLEE

"AN AEROSPACE ENGINEER BY DAY"

**Immediately swipes right**

AND DRESSED IN 80S COSTUMES BY NIGHT, I TAKE PRIDE IN BEING A TRUE SAN FRANCISC-BRO. ON WEEKENDS, IF IM NOT ON A PARTY BUS DRESSED IN A SPACE CAT SHIRT AND GALAXY TIGHTS, YOU CAN FIND ME PLAYING VOLLEYBALL AT FT MASON. SUNDAY FUNDAYS, FLIP CUP, AND TAILGATES ARE MY JAM; TANK TOPS, COUNTRY CONCERTS, AND BREAKFAST BURRITOS WITH HAM!

**Immediately regrets swiping right.**



MICHAEL BECERRA

"IM A SILICON VALLEY MARKETING GUY WHO HAS WORKED AT APPLE AND GOOGLE."

Does this line work? It probably works.

"MY OTHER PASSIONS ARE MALE MODELING (YES, JUST LIKE ZOOLANDER) AND WORKING ON MY STARTUP AS CO-FOUNDER OF CREWMIX, A STARTUP APP USING TECH TO... "

Sorry, I stopped caring, but he's a model, so swipe as you see fit.



SEAN HARRIS

"SEAN HARRIS MAY NOT LIVE IN THE MARINA, BUT THE MARINA LIVES IN SEAN HARRIS.... ONE OF HIS BEST FRIENDS (ESSENTIALLY HIS SISTER) HAD A SUCCESSFUL BATTLE AGAINST LEUKEMIA IN HER EARLY 20'S, WHICH INSPIRED HIM TO PARTICIPATE IN A DATE AUCTION FUNDRAISER TO FIGHT CANCER A COUPLE YEARS AGO."

What, you expect me to make fun of that? I'll let him take us out.

"TO SEAN, RAISING MONEY FOR RESEARCH IS THE BEST THING WE CAN DO TO FIGHT SUCH A DEVASTATING ILLNESS WHICH AFFLICTS PEOPLE OF ALL AGES AND HEALTH CONDITIONS."

See you guys at the Competition, may the best man win, and hopefully reflect thoughtfully on masculinity and what winning really means outside of a capitalist paradigm.



Bro-Down For The Dude Crown: Scenes From The Mr. Marina 2015 Competition
A San Francisco startup has dived head first into the all important and contentions world of pizza. Attempting to meld super fast delivery, high quality pizza, and ease of ordering into a single experience, the company is now beta testing a pizza-ordering app (seriously) that promises to deliver made-to-order gourmet pizza in under fifteen minutes. And here's the thing: it actually works, and the pizza is delicious.

Oh yeah, and as they're in the beta phase, the first pizza is free.

The company, Pi Pizza, describes itself as "a hyper-fast artisan pizza delivery service," and has a kitchen (likely) in the Mission District. It is hard to say for certain, however, as the company doesn't list an address on their website and an email from SFist was not returned as of press time. The company only delivers at present to the Mission, and it's hard to image Pi Pizza cooking the pizza elsewhere as when this reporter tried the app out last night a freshly made (hot) pizza showed up roughly 15 minutes after I tapped the screen of my cell phone.

Pizza magic.

Pi Pizza is not messing around  after a customer selects one of the three offered options, and drops a pin on a map for a desired drop-off location, a screen pops up stating the status of dinner. When the pizza is done cooking one is able to watch, a la Uber or Lyft, as the pizza is driven through the streets of San Francisco to meet the customer wherever he or she happens to be (more on that later).

A text is then sent to the hungry person's phone, instructing him to be ready on the curb. A car pulls up, a pizza is passed off, and the driver drives away.

Much like Uber, payment is handled through the app, and the $20 price tag includes tax and tip. And because this is the Mission, the pizza comes with slightly odd but cool pieces of artwork.





Perhaps most excitedly, that the delivery needs no physical address combined with the sheer speed of delivery opens up an entirely new pizza game: ordering on the street, in a park, or while you grab a smoke outside of a bar.

But the question still remains, who made my pizza? More importantly, was it cooked in a commercial kitchen that had been inspected by the health department (another question posed in the as-of-yet unreturned email)?

We do know a bit about the company. Founder Evan Kuo explains Pi Pizza's backstory in a promotional video (linked at the bottom of this post), and the company has several prominent investors that include a Zynga co-founder (thanks VC guy for buying my dinner last night!).

But we can say one thing for sure: The thin-crust, roasted butternut squash, balsamic onions, fresh mozzarella, goat cheese, and fried sage leaves pizza was delicious.

Update: Pi Pizza got back to us, and addressed our concern regarding where the pizzas are being made.

"Our dough, toppings, and pizzas are produced in a commercial kitchen that we share with a number of other food businesses on Cesar Chavez," explained spokesperson Jessica Yen.

As to the artwork arriving with each pie? Yen noted that the company is "hoping to work with local artists and feature their work and/or create something together. This is one of our bigger goals, beyond making great pizza."



Photo by Jack Morse.



Photo by Jack Morse.

Related: The Best Pizza In San Francisco: A Definitive List


Last week was pretty quiet, all told, as everyone got into the New Year's Eve spirit, and this week brought news of the opening of Black Bark BBQ, coming next week in the Fillmore, and the nearby Wise Sons Bagel delayed yet again.

Also this first full week of the new year brings with it news of both big starts and big ends, most notably the closure of Lark Street Steak in San Francisco's Westfield Centre, which had its final day of service this past Monday. This is kind of surprising given the high-profile steakhouse's opening a decade ago, but all restaurants have a lifespan and the Lark Creek Group said it was "prudent to close" the place at this time, probably due to slumping sales. It remains to be seen what else might claim the swank space.

On the brighter side, we get news via SF Weekly of the soft opening of the sure-to-be swank Cadence from one of Maven's owners Jay Bordeleau, and former Chez TJ chef Joey Elenterio. It's located at 1446 Market Street, right near Alta CA, and it's attached to the already open bar, Mr. Tipple's Recording Studio. It's a sit-down restaurant, though, with its own cocktail menu and food, ranging from a high-end prix-fixe to cocktail snacks.

Fiddler's Green, the North Beach pub that shuttered this past October, will reopen. However, as Insidescoop notes, the ownership has changed. The owner of the building, Alex Kam Ho Lau, will now run the business with a targeted opening of around St. Patrick's Day.

In the spirit of new beginnings, the pie bakers behind Butter Love Bakeshop finally have a shop to call their own. Insidescoop explains that after five years of doing the pop-up thing, Esa Yonn-Brown and husband Josh Perez will open a cafe sometime in January in the outer Richmond.

If you're not into that whole "hand crafted with love" thing the folks over at Butter Love Bakeshop are offering, you may be inclined to try the robot-powered burger spot potentially heading to SoMa. Momentum Machines, which Hoodline helpfully notes is a technology company made up of "foodies and engineers with decades of robotics experience," looks to be trying to open a restaurant where robots cook burgers. The company's end goal regarding restaurant employees is "to completely obviate them," we're helpfully informed. No word yet on a potential opening date.

If all that robot talk has you down, stroll over to the soon-to-open Sababa, which Eater helpfully informs us will be a fast casual Mediterranean place from the people behind Bon Marche and AQ. A mid-spring opening is being targeted for the Financial District location, and the menu will be designed by chef and partner Guy Eshel.

The Mission got a new crepe option with the opening late last year of Delicioso Creperie, a Latin crepe spot with chef Gabriela Guerrero at the helm. Inside Scoop reports that the cafe is located in the Hamm's building.

Meanwhile, Berkeley is about to get a ramen spot from the people behind the much loved New York Ippudo. Eater informs us that the Tokyo-inspired ramen inspires long lines, and that this is part of an expansion for the brand after it partnered with Panda Express.

Back on this side of the Bay, following hints about this back in December, Hoodline reports that Mister Jiu's is "so close" to ready for its Chinatown opening. Chef Brandon Jew's long-awaited and personal project will focus on traditional Chinese recipes paired with a Californian focus on the local and sustainable. There's still no opening date, though.

Chefs Daniel Patterson and Roy Choi today announced more details regarding their upcoming collaboration  a fast-casual spot called LocoL (originally called Loco'l). Eater notes that the two are set to open the first location of the new restaurant in the Uptown neighborhood of Oakland, prior to planned openings in the Tenderloin and East Oakland as well. The location: the original Plum, turned into an expanded part of Plum Bar, which is already part of the Patterson empire and therefore not subject to any construction or lease delays.

And in a bit of good news for sushi lovers, Hoodline informs us that Ginza is now open in the Haight. The spot has both a lunch and dinner menu, and a happy hour.

On a bit of an odd note, San Francisco now has a "fashion showroom that's food instead of clothing items," Thoughts Style Cuisine Showroom owner tells Eater. Apparently, chef and owner Mu Chanma has come up with a "brunch and shades" sunglasses line (we're not sure what that means), and serves a mixture of Thai and Italian in the SoMa restaurant.

Oakland's Rumbo al Sur has closed after four years in business, reports Insidescoop. It had been run by Jack Knowles, who also owns San Francisco's The Chapel. Knowles didn't comment specifically as to why the place closed, other than to tell the paper that "[creating] and running a great restaurant takes a lot out of you."

The Mission's Coco Frio has closed after only four months in business, notes Eater, with owners Manny de Torres Gimenez and Katerina de Torres deciding to sell the business. It seems that after a fire at their other business, The Palace, and a death in the family, the two owners (they're married) decided to travel the world. When they return in a year, they both hope to reopen The Palace.

A lot of chefs seem to be on the move, with Louis Maldonado set to leave Spoonbar in order to be the culinary director of Mugnaini Imports in Healdsburg. Insidescoop has the story, noting that there was no beef, but rather Maldonado wanted to spend more time with his son.

Meanwhile, the Tenderloin's Huxley is losing founding chef Sara Hauman. Eater hips up to the fact that the departure is on good terms, and that Hauman is leaving to work at the aforementioned Mister Jiu's.

The new year will also bring with it a new guest chef series at Stones Throw, reports Eater. The chefs, which will cook one night each in the Russian Hill spot to raise money for charity, include Suzette Gresham of Acquerello, Val Cantu of Californios, and Dominique Crenn of Atelier Crenn.

This Week In Reviews

The Weekly's Peter Lawrence Kane took some time to visit Chubby Noodle's new location on Grant Avenue north of Columbus. Kane points out that the menu is less than 50 percent noodle related, and takes a moment to tell us about the loud music blasting at a "deafening" volume. After informing us that the unagi roll is "a lot of buck for the bang," Kane hips us to the real reason for his visit: the fried chicken. He loves it, saying that "its the kind you can eat every day," but be warned as you chomp down that spicy chicken: the tall boys of beer apparently have a "300 percent markup."

Kane also made his way to the Marina's two-month old Spaghetti Bros on behalf of the Weekly, and found the restaurant aiming for an "upscale but not stuffy" vibe. When it comes to the spaghetti, though, Kane seems on the fence. He mentions that there's almost nothing for vegetarians (although Kane doesn't hold it against the restaurant), and says the pasta noodles didn't seem fresh even though they're made in house. However, as a whole, he found a majority of the dishes "truly excellent" and recommends the spot  especially if you are itching for that old-school pasta joint vibe.

Meanwhile, the Chronicle's Anna Roth visits the finally opened Binis Kitchen kiosk near the Montgomery BART stop. Roth notes that the cook behind the kiosk, Binita Pradhan, grew her business out of La Cocina and focuses on traditional Nepalese food (where Pradhan is from). The go-to menu items are apparently the momos  "juicy little packets of meat and vegetables" (for all you veggies out there Pradhan makes a tofu version as well). At $6 for eight momos, Roth concludes that it's a great deal, and is clearly a fan herself.

Micheal Bauer took a moment out of his week to visit Chow on Church, and as he writes in the Chronicle, he leaves "ultimately disappointed" and throws some serious shade in the process. Bauer tells us that the spaghetti and meatballs "would be considered bland in a nursing home," and that the kitchen "team seems to be executing the menu by rote." In the end, he finds the only value to be ginger cake accompanied by pumpkin ice cream. Despite all of this, he gives the food two stars.

And for his Sunday review, Bauer drops by Nostra Spaghetteria, the retooled, more casual Mission pasta spot previously known as Plin, and still under the helm of chef-owner Alexander Alioto. He acknowledges that Alioto has talent and it's a challenging location, and he loves the seafood soup appetizer and still like Alioto's signature raviolo al uovo, but overall he finds the menu confusing  it's split between a create-your-own pasta dish option and a more chef-driven pasta section, along with some more preciously plated entrees. He calls the bizarre, raviolo-topped burger a "discombulated" mess of "gratuitous excess," and the service, he says, needs work. All told: two stars.


A gray wolf has entered Northern California, which conservationists take as a sign that the local population could be recovering from endangerment.

SF Gate reports that a wolf equipped with a radio collar (known as OR-25) entered California from Oregon in mid-December. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife says Or-25 is about 3 years old, and has a very dark (and lovely!) coat.

According to KRON, OR-25 could be following the scent trail of other wolves that have moved south, or might be looking for a mate. The Center for Biological Diversity's Amaroq Weiss said more wolves could follow.

This is kind of a big deal: the gray wolf hasn't been seen in California in 90 years, and were thought to be endangered. But in 2015, there were more frequent sightings, which is good! In August, a pack of gray wolves dubbed the "Shasta Pack" were spotted in the woods in Siskiyou County.

But while conservationists and wildlife enthusiasts are happy about this wolf takeover influx, ranchers are not so pumped. S.F. Gate notes that a calf was attacked and eaten by a wolf who was suspected to be part of the "Shasta Pack," but ranchers and farmers are not permitted to deal with wolves using lethal means. There are plans for wolf management in place though; in December, the S.F. Chronicle reported on the extent of the wolf conservation plan.

S.F. Gate notes that nearly 2 million gray wolves once lived in North America but were gradually killed off by European settlers and trappers who feared them (or wanted their fur). They had been driven to near-extinction in the continental U.S. by 1900.


SINGAPORE 60's: ANDY's POP MUSIC INFLUENCE IS A PERSONAL MUSIC, MEMORY TRAIL. BLOGGER DOES NOT OWN THE RIGHTS TO VIDEOS, AUDIO TRACKS AND IMAGES. THEY ARE UPLOADED FOR FUN, EDUCATIONAL, ILLUSTRATIVE PURPOSES AND HAVE BEEN CREDITED. BLOG IS NOT SPONSORED IN ANY WAY WHATSOEVER. INFORM BLOGGER OF COPYRIGHT ISSUES AND POST WILL BE DELETED IMMEDIATELY. DO NOT COPY THE POSTS; GET PERMISSION N CREDIT ME IF YOU DO. ANDY LIM LA (NOVEMBER, 2008) - ()
SIOUX CITY | This year's most popular piece of fitness equipment isn't something you can lift or push.

Instead, the trendiest thing for the newly health-conscious is one of the gadgets that can be worn on the wrist.

"It's seems like everybody wants a Fitbit," said Bart Wall, a sales associate with Target in Sioux City. "For people wanting to get back into shape for the New Year, you gotta have a Fitbit."

These compact step-counters have appeal for people of all ages, he said. The Fitbit is just one of many fitness trackers currently on the market in different price ranges.

"Even though Fitbits have been around for a while, they still have plenty of appeal," Wall said. "People like new gadgets and the Fitbit has plenty of appeal."

Many models can keep track of heart rate rhythm, calories counted and distances traveled in addition to other options.

That comes in handy for David McKnight, who works in Target's electronic department.

"I like wearing my Fitbit at work," he said. "It's amazing how many steps you take working retail."

The Fitbit also comes in handy when McKnight is at home.

"I try to reach 10,000 steps every day," he said "When (the Fitbit) reaches 9,500, it gives me the incentive to hit the 10,000 mark."

Wall says he doesn't need a fitness tracker to counts his steps: he has an 18-month-old son at home.

"My boy is all the workout I need," he said.

But Wall said he understands the appeal of the wearable activity tracker.

"I imagine it can be a bit of a fashion statement," he said. "If I was a Fitbit user, I'd either choose black, since it goes with everything, or I'd choose blue since I'm a (University of North Carolina) Tar Heels fan."

So far this year, Wall said customers haven't been abandoning more conventional pieces of fitness equipment like weights, resistance bands or yoga mats.

"When people want fitness equipment, they'll go with a brand name they recognize," he said. "They'll automatically ask for a Fitbit because that's what they're used to. Or they'll go to a P90X resistance band or a Jillian Michaels DVD because of their familiarity."

It doesn't matter if a customers wants to go high-tech or old school, Wall said he's happy that people are becoming more conscious about their health.

"The holidays are over," he said. "It looks like people want to start off the new year in a fit way."
DES MOINES | Under pressure from pro-life conservatives, Gov. Terry Branstad says he will pursue policy language as part of his 2016 legislative agenda stipulating that taxpayer funds go only to womens health care providers that do not include abortion procedures as part of their service options.

The new provision effectively would end state funding of Planned Parenthood clinics, something that GOP legislators, pro-life groups and social conservatives have sought since a series of videos were released by an anti-abortion organization that purportedly show Planned Parenthood officials discussing the sale of organs from aborted fetuses.

What were looking at is trying to provide for the services without providing the funding to groups that provide abortions, Branstad said in an interview. We are working with the Legislature and weve had several meetings with the legislators on that and are working on language that is very similar to language that Sen. Joni Ernst proposed at the national level.

On Friday, President Barack Obama vetoed Republican-inspired legislation to repeal his health care law as well as cut federal funding for Planned Parenthood. The bill sought to end roughly $450 million in yearly federal funding for Planned Parenthood.

At the state level, Branstad said he is looking to redirect funds for family planning, pregnancy prevention, abstinence and other services to state and county health departments, community health centers, hospitals and physicians officers to provide important womens health services. The language -- which Branstad said is similar to provisions adopted in other states -- would not name Planned Parenthood but the effect would be to defund any abortion-services provider.

A governor cannot unilaterally say were going to terminate this contract with Planned Parenthood. Every governor that has tried has lost in court so Ive said Im not going to do that, Branstad said. But Im very willing to work with the Legislature and come up with a better way to fund programs to help needy women that need family planning or pregnancy prevention, but that can be done through groups that dont provide abortions.

Iowa officials say no state money goes for abortion services. But GOP lawmakers want to halt any government money going even indirectly to Planned Parenthood organizations in Iowa -- something Branstad has said he supports.

Branstad spokesman Ben Hammes said the timing of the change would depend on how the legislation was crafted once the 86th Iowa General Assembly convenes its 2016 session on Monday. He said the new policy language would not be included in budget documents his administration presents to lawmakers on Tuesday.

The state currently is in the process of switching over to a privately managed Medicaid system that will operate under new contracts, but Hammes did not envision a problem if the legislation is adopted by the Legislature once private managed care organizations are overseeing most of Iowas Medicaid programs.

Iowa Democrats in the House and Senate have opposed GOP defunding efforts, with Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, noting that Planned Parenthood provides important family planning, cancer screening and health services for women -- some that help avoid pregnancies. He has said halting those services really ends up with more abortions, not less.

Gronstal said the Legislature could be in for a very long session if majority House Republicans and their Senate counterparts try to remove Planned Parenthood as a certified Medicaid provider during fiscal 2017 budget negotiations.

I dont think you can do that, said Sen. Amanda Ragan, D-Mason City, co-chairwoman of the House-Senate health and human services budget subcommittee. The reason weve never done that before is because the feds say you cant do that.

Angie Remington, public relations manager for Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, said her organization has been providing health care and education in Iowa for more than 80 years  providing affordable, comprehensive care to 31,761 women and men in Iowa last year that included well-woman exams, contraception, cancer screenings, STD tests and treatments, abortion and more.

Gov. Branstad should consider the impact that our preventive health services and education programs have had on reducing rates of unintended pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections in Iowa, as well as increasing access to family planning services like well-woman exams and contraception, Remington said in a statement.
SIOUX CITY | Siouxland Chamber of Commerce officials on Friday pitched their legislative wish list to Northwest Iowa lawmakers, who return to Des Moines for a new session on Monday.

Topping the chamber's list of priorities are education funding, various economic developments initiatives, reductions of corporate income taxes and continued investments in quality-of-life projects.

An estimated 50 people attended the early morning meeting at the Chamber offices, including six local lawmakers: Rep. David Dawson, Rep. Chris Hall, Rep. Ron Jorgensen, and Sen. Rick Bertrand, all of Sioux City, Sen. Bill Anderson of Pierson and Rep. Charles Holz of Le Mars.

The lawmakers highlighted topics important to their respective parties and their constituents, including budget concerns, school funding, quality-of-life improvements, stand-your-ground laws, eminent domain laws, the legalization of fireworks in Iowa and water quality.

Audience members voiced their concerns after the lawmakers spoke. Sioux City Schools Superintendent Paul Gausman asked lawmakers to support the renewal of the 1 percent sales tax used by K-12 districts across the state for infrastructure projects.

Gausman called the renewal of the tax, which is set to expire in 2029, the "highest legislative priority of the school board."

"(2029) sounds like a long time from now" Gausman said. "But ... weve actually bonded all the way out to 2029 on those revenues that will come in."

Since 1998, the tax has brought about $240 million to renovate, repair and replace schools in the district, Gausman said.

"We think an extension of the (tax) does make sense to at least give the school district the ability to maintain some of their funding mechanisms," said Sam Wagner, the Chamber's director of business retention.

Earlier this week, with Gausman by his side at a news conference in Des Moines, Gov. Terry Branstad unveiled his plan to extend the tax to 2049. The governor, however, has called for diverting some of the future revenues to water-quality projects. The first $10 million in new revenue each year would go to schools, and the remaining would go to water quality.

At Friday's meeting, Siouxland Chamber members praised local legislators for continuing to push the need for U.S. Highway 20 improvements to members of the Iowa Transportation Commission, which voted in June to fund $286 to finish the final 40 miles of four-lane expansion for the road.

In an interview after the meeting, Wagner said the Chamber strongly supports the protection of tax increment financing, which he said is Sioux City's main local economic development tool.

In addition, Wagner said the Chamber would like to see the Iowa Legislature simplify and reduce corporate income taxes.

Iowa has one of the most complicated income tax structures in the country, he said, which is a burden for residents and employers.

If we have to spend so much time explaining our tax code to perspective employers or to employers that are already here looking to expand, were losing.
SIOUX CITY | When Phil Hamman, 57, first heard about the grisly murders that occurred at Gitchie Manitou State Preserves on Nov. 17, 1973, he was overcome with emotion.

After all, his childhood friend Mike Hadrath, 15, was one of the victims shot to death in the nature preserve, northwest of Granite, Iowa, and southeast of Sioux Falls. He also knew Roger Essem, 17, and brothers Stewart Baade, 17, and Dana Baade, 14, who were also killed by Allen, David and James Fryer on that fateful night more than 42 years ago.

Hamman, a Sioux Falls native, was also familiar with Sandra Cheskey, then 13, who was raped by the Fryers but was the lone survivor of what many people still remember as the Gitchie Manitou Murders.

Now an East High School language arts co-teacher, Hamman has teamed up with his wife, Sandy Hamman, a Spalding Park Elementary School special education teacher, in writing "Gitchie Girl" -- a nonfiction book that documents the crime, the subsequent trial that convicted the Fryer brothers and, more importantly, gave Cheskey a chance to tell her story.

Scheduled to be released Tuesday, "Gitchie Girl" will be available at Amazon.com, Barnesandnoble.com as well as Drilling Morningside Pharmacy, 4010 Morningside Ave.

"(Cheskey) had spent her entire life trying to move beyond her past," Hamman said. "But now, she thought it was important to set the record straight if only for the sake of her children and grandchildren."

According to Sandy Hamman, Cheskey had been ostracized by classmates, even though she was the victim of a horrific crime.

"No matter where she went, (Cheskey) was known as the 'Gitchie Girl,'" Sandy Hamman, 51, explained. "At the time, Gitchie was known as a place where 'bad' teenagers would hang out and (Cheskey) acquired that reputation."

Hamman shook his head, noting that Cheskey didn't deserve such a reputation.

"(Cheskey) and her friends were simply at the park, building a campfire and singing songs," he said. "They were simply a bunch of kids who were at the wrong place at the wrong time."

In addition, victims of assault and violent crimes weren't encouraged to seek counseling back in the 1970s.

"Crime victims were supposed to, somehow, get back to their normal lives," Hamman noted. "(Cheskey) was forced to cope on her own and that was easier said than done."

Over the years, memories of the murders have remained vivid for both Cheskey and people familiar with the case.

"Growing up, I heard people telling me not to go to (Gitchie Manitou) because it was haunted," said Sandy Hamman who, like her husband, is a Sioux Falls native. "Everybody seemed to remember that was the place where all those teenagers were murdered."

Indeed, elements of the Gitchie Manitou murders were reportedly incorporated into the storyline for the second season of "Fargo" -- FX's critically acclaimed crime drama that is set, in part, in Sioux Falls in 1979.

Between fictionalized reinterpretation of the case as well as erroneous reporting of the case found on the Internet, Hamman said he knew he was the right person to tell the true story.

Apparently, so did Cheskey.

"(Cheskey) had read my previous books (2013's "Under the Influence" and 2014's "disORDER," both memoirs) and knew about my friendship with Mike Hadrath," Hamman said. "(Cheskey) gave me her blessing to do the book."

Though research and writing "Gitchie Girl" took more than a year, Sandy Hamman said she was amazed at the resiliency of Cheskey.

"Even after all she's been through, (Cheskey) is one of the most positive people I've ever met," Sandy Hamman said.

With the publication of "Gitchie Girl," Hamman said he wanted to give voice to all victims of violent crime.

This is why a portion of the proceeds from book sales will benefit both Cheskey and the Council on Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence of Siouxland.

"There's a human element to every crime as well as an aftermath," Hamman said. "Sandra Cheskey's story was one that needed to be told."
DES MOINES | In the wake of Gov. Terry Branstads unilateral actions to close mental health hospitals, shift management of a state-run health care program to private companies, create a tax break for manufacturing companies and veto millions of dollars of education funding, legislative Democrats are in no mood to forgive or forget as they begin an election-year session.

Branstad, the longest-serving governor in American history says its time to turn the page. He wants to focus on joint accomplishments  property tax reform education reform, expanding health care and broadband access, and accelerating improvements to the state transportation system.

Even with a split Legislature, weve been able to accomplish a lot of things, he said. This is a new year. We need to focus on the future and not look back at the past.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, agreed.

Dwelling on the past isnt productive, he said. Its clear the governor, once the Legislature adjourns, will do whatever the heck he wants to do. Thats the reality we will deal with.

It may not be that easy, warned House Minority Leader Mark Smith, D-Marshalltown, who said the relationship between the GOP governor and Democrats is damaged, but not destroyed.

He puts the onus on Branstad to demonstrate that lawmakers can trust him as they negotiate to find common ground on myriad issues. In 2015, lawmakers thought they had, but then the governor vetoed $56 million for public education projects, calling the use of one-time funds unreliable budgeting.

It wasnt only Democrats who were disappointed by that veto. House Speaker-Select Linda Upmeyer, R-Clear Lake, said Republicans were not happy with Branstads veto of funding because thats what we agreed to and thats what we hoped would happen.

The key to getting beyond last years disappointments may be a quick agreement on K-12 school funding.

The litmus test will be education funding, speculated Rep. Ken Rizer, R-Cedar Rapids. If we get that done in 30 days that will be an indicator of how the session will go. Im hopeful.

However, House Republicans and the governor seem to be proposing a 2 percent increase while Democrats want at least 4 percent.

It doesnt help that the governor has come up with plan to pit water quality funding against education funding, said Rep. Sharon Steckman, D-Mason City, a member of the House Education Committee. She was referring to Branstads proposal to extend a 1-cent sales tax earmarked for school infrastructure for 20 years, but share the revenue with water quality programs.

Rep. Todd Taylor, D-Cedar Rapids, assumes Upmeyer wants a honeymoon period when she is sworn in Monday as the first female Speaker of the House.

If she wants to get off on right foot, she will deal with education funding appropriately and early, he said. If not, it will send a loud message to us that she wants business as usual.

Its in her best interest to take that issue off the table or well use that in the election, Taylor added.

Election-year politics can make sessions in even-numbered years more interesting and often more difficult.

Smith doesnt think the November election will hinder legislative action, but Johnson predicted Democrats will want to spend a lot of time talking about privatizing the management of Medicaid and education funding.

Those issues are going to consume a lot of microphone time in the Senate every morning for a while, Johnson said, referring to senators speaking on points of personal privilege. They're going to try to politicize them because this is an election year. Theres just no question about it.

He also noted that at least two senators, Democrat Rob Hogg of Cedar Rapids and Republican Mark Chelgren of Ottumwa, are running for Congress and may be using their microphone time to deliver campaign-like speeches.

Steckman wouldnt be surprised if House Democrats dont use the same tactic to make their points.

When you're in the minority you feel thats all you have  your voice because the majority party doesnt have to look at bills and amendments offered by the minority, she said.

Election-year sessions are supposed to be 100 days  10 days shorter than odd-numbered year sessions. The need to get out on the campaign trail is motivation to finish our work early, Taylor said.

Smith agreed that the need to campaign, especially in a year House Democrats hope to regain the majority, will motivate people, but that isnt what will determine when lawmakers adjourn.

Whether that happens or not will depend on how things are proposed, how willing we are to work through these issues and for there to be compromise for that to be accomplished, he said. If theres not much willingness, then well be here quite a while.

Gronstal said its too early to know if lawmakers will meet the April 19 soft deadline.

Theres always a little more politics in the election years, he said. Ive always thought we should do the states business in this building and to our own political business after the sessions over. That would be my goal.
SIOUX CITY | Sioux City leaders say they aren't worried that $2.4 million in unpaid tickets issued to motorists caught speeding by automated traffic cameras remains in debt collector limbo.

In the four years since the city contracted with Redflex to install the mobile cameras, 94,357 tickets have been issued to drivers photographed exceeding the speed limit on Interstate 29, according to police data obtained by the Journal. Of the citations, 12,440, or about 13 percent, were sent to an outside collection agency and remain unpaid, with the drivers owing a total of $2,432,385.

The totals do not include unpaid tickets by drivers caught on camera running red lights. Data on red light camera collections was not immediately available.

Police Chief Doug Young said he isnt worried about people who dont pay their speeding tickets. For him, the cameras are a public safety matter.

Its just a process we go through in controlling traffic on I-29, he said. I dont have any concerns whatsoever about how much money is sitting out there. Its about safety to me.

We knew that going in, when we set these units up on I-29, that there would be a percentage of people that would not pay this fine, Young said.

Because traffic violations arising from the cameras are municipal civil penalties, motorists have less incentive to pay a fine than if they are caught speeding or running a red light by a law enforcement officer. Unlike the former, the latter violations are criminal penalties and appear on driving records.

If a driver ignores a criminal traffic citation and fails to appear in court, a warrant will be issued for his or her arrest, Young said. The owner's vehicle also can be towed.

Assistant city attorney Justin Vondrak said drivers with unpaid camera traffic tickets eventually could have their vehicles booted by Sioux City parking enforcement officers. He acknowledged that penalty is rarely enforced, however.

"There is nothing criminal we would really go after them for," Vondrak said.

At most, a delinquent ticket sent to a collection agency could harm the credit ratings of the licensed drivers. A spokesperson for the city's collection agency, Penn Credit, said the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania-based company reports delinquent tickets to credit bureaus on a case-by-case basis, meaning ignored tickets in collections won't always affect drivers' credit scores.

In Sioux City, about 87 percent of drivers pay speeding tickets generated by the I-29 cameras. Thats above the average of 70 percent in all the cities that Redflex maintains traffic cameras.

Were doing better than most is what weve been told by Redflex, Police Capt. Mel Williams said. I know were up for a review in changing collection agencies, but that decision hasnt been made.

Under its contract in Sioux City, Redflex gets $25 per citation, Vondrak said. Penn Credit receives 15 percent of the money it collects, with the remainder going to the city.

For example, if Penn Credit collected all of the unpaid fines from the I-29 cameras, the collection agency would receive about $364,857. RedFlex would receive about $310,000, and Sioux City would receive about $1.7 million.

Mayor Bob Scott said contracting with a collection agency is more efficient than having city staff track down delinquent tickets. That could mean paid overtime for city staff without guaranteed results, he said.

"Certainly we would like to collect the money," Scott said. We're going to have to rely on outside collectors because we're not going to pursue people way far away."

The city has the option to switch its collection agency, Police Capt. Williams said, which was made easier after the City Council approved an amendment in December to its current contract with Redflex to allow either party to opt out of the contract with a 90-day notice.

Scott said the city doesn't factor the uncollected funds into its budget.

The city tries to earmark traffic camera revenues for special projects, said Donna Forker, the citys budget and finance director. For example, the $2.2 million police station renovation was funded with Redflex funds.
Chronicles of my world travels and life as a perpetual nomad
Design completed the first national frigate "TCG Istanbul 's after the Navy on behalf of the Command and was built in Sedef Shipyard in Istanbul by the Defense Industry Undersecretariat, Turkey's largest and name of the equipped warships and board numbers were announced. Our country approved by the Turkish ship battle will be the main ship of the navy Lloyd (klaslandr be) learned the name TCG Anatolia was identified as. TCG designed 225 meters long Anatolia, will host the first in many respects. Redesigned runway for fighter planes and combat helicopters, made more convenient with a 12-degree slope. Thus aboard F35B class, 5th Generation can be in the hunt and bombers. 8 advanced warship to carry the helicopter, Aegean, Black Sea and Mediterranean in the theater and needed the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean 's that can be used. TCG will serve as the main ships of our Navy Anatolia, the swivel motor Osprey aircraft will allow you to make day and night operation capacity will also have a flight deck. Osprey helicopter although it contains many maneuvers when the aircraft will make many features known.

In addition to the 700 people at the same time bulunabileeg amphibious force of 400 thousand people in total vessels, marine landing craft can carry 8.

I don't care. Pass the popcorn.

via Milliyet.comThis part from the same article made me giggle like a school girl...Google Translate, you're drunk...go home. About 2 years ago I would have cheered this news and been excited by the thought of Turkey buying the F-35B and MV-22. Now? With Erdogan going crazy, the country tilting toward fundamentalist Islam and away from modernity, I find myself still wanting them to buy those aircraft...only because I know it will hamper their efforts.Of course this is another piece in the regional power play that's going to come to a head soon.We have Turkey vs. Saudi Arabia/GCC vs Iran. All three want to be top dog and all three are gearing for war.
Several people who I promote because I respect what they are doing, have reported being targeted by the abusers who are chasing me around the internet manipulating people against me. Police are involved.

snakeappletree is not the real life person upon whom the caricature is loosely based. It is a collaborative allegory legitimately created by an authorized design team. The moniker snakeappletree and alternyms xeno-heart-feather/blade, including other-level translations of hieroglyphic cartouche, are intellectual property of Ordo Octopia. All Rights Reserved. "Accreditation is everything." snakeappletree

quote quota

Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very seldom. I am not, as will be seen, in any sense attacking logic: I only say that this danger does lie in logic, not in imagination.



G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy





"Theres an unwritten compact between you and the reader. If someone enters a bookstore and sets down hard earned money(energy) for your book, you owe that person some entertainment and as much more as you can give."



Frank Herbert






There are many fitness goals out there that we desire. Some of us want to be leaner and others wish to put on muscle mass. The thing is, for you to achieve your fitness goals, you need to
The gravity of the existential threat we face from Islamic Jihad is truly of epic proportions. It is essentially a battle pitting free-civilized man against a totalitarian barbarian. What is at stake is the struggle for our very soul - namely who we are and what we represent. The lives that were sacrificed for individual rights and freedoms that we've come to cherish are being chiseled away from right under our noses by the stealth jihadists. And many of us are in denial and totally clueless.



The left's appeasement and pandering to evil is nothing new. What makes their utopian delusions so infuriating and unpardonable is that it is not only they who will have to pay the consequences, and deservedly, so, they are thwarting and undermining our best efforts at resistance and are thus dragging us down in the process as well.







By Peter Lancz,, the head of the Raoul Wallenberg World Campaign Against Racism.
Pictured left to right: Brian Forsyth (PSCG member), Simon and Neroli Greig.

Vincent Troy, age 32, of Upper Marlboro, was suspected to be under the influence of an intoxicant and subsequently arrested for DUI/DWI after he crashed his vehicle into a strip mall, causing an estimated $750,000 in damages.

The Calvert Marine Museum Patuxent Small Craft Guild (PSCG) maintains the historic boats in the museums collection, and preserves the art and skills of wooden boat building. These volunteers build and raffle a canoe each year to benefit on-going activities of the Guild.The winner of the 2015 canoe was Squadron Leader Simon Greig of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), stationed at Naval Air Station Patuxent River. Greig and his family are returning to Australia and are thrilled to take this unique memento of their time in Southern Maryland.There were over 3,000 tickets sold last year at the museums annual events, including the Maritime Festival, Patuxent River Appreciation Days and the summer concerts. The winning ticket was bought at the Barenaked Ladies concert in July.The 2016 canoe is on display in the Exhibition Building and tickets are on sale now for $1 each or six for $5 in the Museum Store or at the Patuxent Small Craft Center. They will be available at the museums annual events and 2016 summer concerts. The raffle winner will be announced in late November.The Maryland Department of Transportations State Highway Administration (SHA) announced that Church Street (MD 231) is now open to traffic. Church Street provides access to Main Street (MD 765) and downtown Prince Fredericks many shops and businesses.The $3.5 million contract is part of the ongoing streetscape project in Prince Frederick which includes:Raising the road profile at the intersection of Main Street and Church Street three feet to enhance driver visibility; Installing a raised brick island to create a right-turn lane from Main Street to Church Street; Constructing Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) compliant brick sidewalks on Church Street between Heritage Blvd. and Main Street and on Main Street between Old Field Lane and Armory Road; Installing bicycle compatible shoulders; Improving drainage in the projects limits and Resurfacing and restriping the road.While Main Street opened to traffic on October 30, 2015, Church Street has remained closed while storm drain and sidewalk work was being completed. Now that both roads are open to traffic, the contractor will utilize a flagging operation to do all necessary work: curb and gutter, sidewalk and other work along Main Street and Church Street. Click here for overall project information.SHA awarded the contract to Corinthian Contractors, Inc. of Upper Marlboro. Construction is projected to be completed in the fall of 2017, weather permitting. Crews are permitted to work between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. during the day, and between 9 p.m. and 5:00 a.m. overnight. Customers with questions about this projects may contact the District 5 Office at 410-841-1000 or toll-free at 1-800-331-5603 or by email at hgonzales@sha.state.md.us.The Calvert Shores Organizing Committee gathered more than 2,300 signatures over a 13-month period to petition the Board of County Commissioners (BCC) to consider a referendum to incorporate the municipality of Calvert Shores. The petition was submitted on November 4, 2015. The Calvert County Board of Elections recently verified the petition submitted by the Committee, finding that at least 25% of registered voters within the boundaries of the proposed municipality signed the petition, the legal requirement for verification. The boundaries include most, but not all, of the Chesapeake Ranch Estates (CRE), and extend out to Route 4, including the commercial center in Lusby. On January 5th the BCC appointed John Norris, III, county attorney, to serve as their liaison to the Committee.The next steps in the incorporation process are for the Committee to: Actively seek information and input from the county through the liaison Hold a Community Information Meeting at the CRE Clubhouse on January 11, 2016, at 7PM to discuss the draft Charter Hold a Public Meeting to collect testimony from the affected community on February 3, 2016, at 7PM at the Southern Community Center Submit a report on issues related to the proposed incorporation to the BCC within 90 days after receiving verification of the petitionCathy Zumbrun, the chair of the Committee, stated, "We are excited that this critical hurdle has been achieved so the community's decade's long quest to improve financial solvency and quality of life is one step closer to realization." For more information on the proposed municipality and the incorporation process, visit the web site at CalvertShores.org, or send an email to calvertshores@gmail.com.On January 6 at 12:18 am, CCSO units responded to a motor vehicle crash reported into a building involving fire. The building involved was the strip mall known as Bright Center West located at the intersection of southbound MD 4 at Chaneyville Rd. in Owings. Upon arrival it was confirmed that both the vehicle involved and the strip mallwhich contained Floral Expressions, Owings Cleaners, Andy Nails, and Tax Depotwere all on fire. The driver of the vehicle involvedVincent Troy, age 32, of Upper Marlborowas already out of the vehicle and being assisted by citizens. A check of the vehicle for other persons was negative and the scene was secured as EMS/FIRE handled their assignment fighting the fire.During further investigation it was determined that Troy was suspected to be under the influence of an intoxicant and subsequently arrested for DUI/DWI by DFC Durner.Cpl. Marty McCarroll managed the scene for the Calvert County Sheriff's Office and coordinated operations with Dunkirk Fire Chief Bill Rector.A NIXLE notification was sent out from the CCSO notifying the public of the event and to expect delays in the area into the morning rush hour times.Both County Roads and State Highway were notified to respond to the scene for both traffic road closures and to treat the roadways as they were iced over from the water used by the fire department to extinguish the fire.The State Fire Marshal was notified and responded to the scene to conduct their investigation with EMS/FIRE.A Calvert County building inspector was notified to respond and inspect the building for structural damage and occupancy restrictions.SMECO was notified and responded to handle all electrical power connections/disconnections and inspect the damage to their utility pole.Business owners were notified for Floral Expressions, Tax Depot, and Andy's Nails. The only business owner not notified was Owings Cleaners.EMS/FIRE units responded to assist from multiple jurisdictions to include PG County, AA County, and Charles Co.
IDCS J1426.5+3508 STSCI/NASA/ESA

Astronomers have used data from three of NASAs Great Observatories to make the most detailed study yet of an extremely massive young galaxy cluster.

This rare cluster, which is located 10 billion light-years from Earth, weighs as much as 500 trillion Suns. This object has important implications for understanding how these megastructures formed and evolved early in the universe.

The galaxy cluster called IDCS J1426.5+3508 (IDCS 1426 for short), is so far away that the light detected is from when the universe was roughly a quarter of its current age. It is the most massive galaxy cluster detected at such an early age.

First discovered by the Spitzer Space Telescope in 2012, IDCS 1426 was observed using the Hubble Space Telescope and the Keck Observatory to determine its distance. Observations from the Combined Array for Millimeter Wave Astronomy indicated it was extremely massive. New data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory confirm the galaxy cluster mass and show that about 90% of the mass of the cluster is in the form of dark matter, a mysterious substance detected so far only through its gravitational pull on normal matter composed of atoms.

We are really pushing the boundaries with this discovery, said Mark Brodwin of the University of Missouri at Kansas City, who led the study. As one of the earliest massive structures to form in the universe, this cluster sets a high bar for theories that attempt to explain how clusters and galaxies evolve.

Galaxy clusters are the largest objects in the universe bound together by gravity. Because of their sheer size, scientists think it should take several billion years for them to form. The distance of IDCS J1426 means astronomers are observing it when the universe was only 3.8 billion years old, implying that the cluster is seen at a very young age.

The data from Chandra reveal a bright knot of X-rays near the middle of the cluster, but not exactly at its center. This overdense core has been dislodged from the cluster center, possibly by a merger with another developing cluster 500 million years prior. Such a merger would cause the X-ray emitting, hot gas to slosh around like wine in a glass that is tipped from side to side.

Mergers with other groups and clusters of galaxies should have been more common so early in the history of the universe, said co-author Michael McDonald of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts. That appears to have played an important part in this young clusters rapid formation.

Aside from this cool core, the hot gas in the rest of the cluster is very smooth and symmetric. This is another indication that IDCS 1426 formed very rapidly. In addition, astronomers found possible evidence that the amount of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium in the hot gas is unusually low. This suggests that this galaxy cluster might still be in the process of enriching its hot gas with these elements as supernovae create heavier elements and blast them out of individual galaxies.

The presence of this massive galaxy cluster in the early Universe doesnt upset our current understanding of cosmology, said co-author of Anthony Gonzalez of University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida. It does, however, give us more information to work with as we refine our models.

Evidence for other massive galaxy clusters at early times has been found, but none of these matches IDCS 1426 with its combination of mass and youth. The mass determination used three independent methods: a measurement of the mass needed to confine the hot X-ray emitting gas to the cluster, the imprint of the clusters gaseous mass on the cosmic microwave background radiation, and the observed distortions in the shapes of galaxies behind the cluster, which are caused by the bending of light from the galaxies by the gravity of the cluster.

These results were presented at the 227th meeting of the American Astronomical Society meeting being held in Kissimmee, Florida. A paper describing these results has been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal [preprint: http://arxiv.org/abs/1504.01397].

NASAs Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, manages the Chandra program for NASAs Science Mission Directorate in Washington, D.C. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, controls Chandras science and flight operations.

The Spitzer Space Telescope is managed by NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. The Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena conducts science operations.

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy in Washington, D.C.

Images and more information about this study and Hubble, Chandra, and Spitzer:

http://hubblesite.org/news/2016/02
South Africa and Lesotho NASA

An astronaut aboard the International Space Station looked toward the horizon as the spacecraft sped across southern Africa.

The crew member used a short lens that mimics closely what the human eye seesin this case, a big panorama from a point over northern South Africa, looking southeast to the Indian Ocean.

The image shows many details, but one of the most striking is the political boundary defining the small country of Lesotho, one of the few places on Earth where a political boundary can be seen from space. The greener, more vegetated South Africa agricultural landscape (with a very low population density) contrasts with the less vegetated, tan landscape of the Lesotho lowlands, where more dense populations live. Lesotho is a small enclave of 2 million people completely surrounded by the Republic of South Africa (population 53 million).

The Katse Dam reservoir in Lesotho was built as part of an international agreement to increase the water supply to the many, rapidly growing cities of the distant Witwatersrand (lower left). In Africas largest water transfer project, water from the high-rainfall zone in the mountains of Lesotho is fed from Katse through tunnels dug beneath the Maluti Mountains. The water then flows 250 kilometers (150 miles) in rivers to the Witwatersrand, South Africas industrial heartland.

ISS crews can visually pinpoint the Witwatersrand by the scatter of small, but prominent, light-toned mine dumps full of the waste material remaining after the extraction of gold. The mine dumps are the main feature that crews can readily see because even large cities can be difficult to detect from space as the ISS rapidly flies past. More than 12.3 million people live in this major urban region.

One other detail stands out. A series of concentric lines indicates one of the Earths oldest and largest visible impact craters. The Vredefort impact crater was caused by an asteroid 10 kilometers (6 miles) in diameter that impacted the region about 1.8 billion years ago. The original crater is estimated to have been 300 kilometers (200 miles) in diameter. Today it is eroded and partly obscured by younger rocks.

Astronaut photograph ISS045-E-2492 was acquired on September 14, 2015, with a Nikon D4 digital camera using a 14 millimeter lens, and is provided by the ISS Crew Earth Observations Facility and the Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit, Johnson Space Center. The image was taken by a member of the Expedition 45 crew. The image has been cropped and enhanced to improve contrast, and lens artifacts have been removed. The International Space Station Program supports the laboratory as part of the ISS National Lab to help astronauts take pictures of Earth that will be of the greatest value to scientists and the public, and to make those images freely available on the Internet. Additional images taken by astronauts and cosmonauts can be viewed at the NASA/JSC Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth. Caption by M. Justin Wilkinson, Texas State U., Jacobs Contract at NASA-JSC.

Larger image
THE FREEZING temperatures that swept across Slovakia shortly after the New Year were not exceptional for this time of the year.

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However, the Slovak Hydrometeorological Institute (SHMU) issued several warnings concerning danger to health.

Especially hit by the cold spree were some districts in northern, central and eastern Slovakia, and not just in the mountains, culminating between January 2 and 5.

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SHMU also issued warnings for ice floods in the district of Liptovsky Mikulas in northern-central Slovakia, where low temperatures created ice barriers on rivers and streams, which caused water to flow on the ice surface and increase the river levels, the SITA newswire wrote.
"There is no question that the US has leverage over Saudi Arabia. It could cut off arms sales and transfers to Saudi Arabia, it could cut off support for the Saudi intervention in Yemen. It could ramp up the volume of its rhetorical denunciations."

However, the US government was very concerned that Saudi Arabia not blow up the Syria diplomacy, and that was clearly a higher priority for the United States currently than avoiding civilian casualties in Yemen, Naiman pointed out.

"The US was not jazzed about the Saudi intervention in Bahrain and was not jazzed about the Saudi intervention in Yemen. But the top US priority was the Iran nuclear agreement, and keeping the Saudis from screwing that up, so US objections on Bahrain and Yemen were muted."

Instead, the Obama administration had actively collaborated with the Saudis on Yemen, Naiman noted.

Senior US officials were finally starting to realize that their association with the Saudi war in Yemen was doing enormous damage to Americas global standing, University of Pittsburgh Professor of International Affairs Michael Brenner told Sputnik.

"The Obama people finally have awakened to the fact that the public relations disaster they have suffered by serving as hand-maidens to the Saudis has serious practical costs. However, they still will not bring any pressure to bear on Riyadh  much less break with them."

US officials had been trying to distance themselves from the slaughter in Yemen by careful use of phrases in public, but they did not seem to realize that this was a waste of time in the eyes of shocked observers around the world, Brenner insisted.

"Vague references to limiting collateral damage are meaningless in the eyes of all except Washington policymakers. Obama in particular never distinguishes between his words and deeds."

The United Nations estimates that as many as 2,795 civilians have been killed since the conflict began nine months ago.
The United States is one of the main producers and users of cluster bombs, which have been banned by 117 nations in 2008 due to the indiscriminate nature of such devices. However, neither the United States nor Saudi Arabia signed on to that treaty.

How many civilians have the United States and Israel killed with US-produced cluster bombs? Pierce asked. Any objection the United States has to their use would only be if a non-ally used them. Otherwise our objections must be seen as feigned.

Our indivisibility with our allies inculpates us in their crimes, leading to us being targeted, Pierce warned.

Barnard College Assistant Professor of Religion Najam Haider at Columbia University told Sputnik US policymakers could not have been taken by surprise by the latest documentation of the use of cluster bombs.

This has been the consistent US policy in Yemen, Haider, a member of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton, stated. The Saudis have been systematically targeting civilian populations and hospitals. They are also primarily responsible for the breaking of the ceasefire a few days ago.

The cluster munitions had been provided by the United States to the Saudis within the past two months, Haider pointed out.

Its hard to avoid cynicism given the fact that just last November the US government agreed to sell the Saudis $1.2 billion in bombs. These arent being used against al-Qaeda or Daesh affiliates at all. This is a humanitarian crisis that is ravaging the civilian population with the tacit support of the US.

The United Nations estimates that as many as 2,795 civilians have been killed since the conflict in Yemen began nine months ago.

Another 5,324 have been wounded, and the Saudi naval blockade has left approximately 1 million people internally displaced, with as many as 20 million people in desperate need of food, water, and medical supplies.
Plugging his own book, which discusses, among other things, "how poorly governments tend to handle battlefield reversals," the journalist suggests that "from the United States in Vietnam to the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, leaders often respond to defeat with disastrous decisions that only worsen their plight."

How this all relates to the Russian air contingent's operation in Syria, which, as noted above, has resulted in a 'battlefield reversal' of another sort  one in which the dark tide of Islamist jihad has been reversed, remains unclear.

Focusing instead on 'Putin's likely defeat', Tierney suggests that having "cultivated an image of the father of the Russian people" charged with "restoring the country as a world power," the Russian president may move "the conflict into a dangerous new phase," including intensified airstrikes and the deployment of ground forces, something which Russian officials have stated would not happen from the outset.

Giving the plot away regarding the real reasoning behind his piece, the journalist noted that "if Russia's defeat could trigger hazardous escalation, this doesn't mean a Russian victory is preferable. After all, if Assad somehow assumed a winning position, why would he negotiate a compromise peace that recognized the interests of all Syrian groups?"

Ultimately, Tierney slyly concludes, "the optimal opportunity for a peace deal may be a situation in which Putin believes a decisive triumph is not possible, but he can still save face by spinning the outcome as a success. In other words, he needs a story to tell the Russian people about the positive results of the mission. This narrative doesn't need to be true, but it does need to have truthiness, or a seeming plausibility. And so, to get Putin out of Syria, the United States might need to play along by avoiding boastful claims of a major Russian debacle."

How exactly Washington plans to 'get Putin out of Syria' in a situation where the Syrian government is not only holding the line, but making advances against the jihadists, remains unclear. If it will be by expanding its proxies' support to jihadist and rebel groups fighting against Damascus, why not just come out and say it? Why beat around the bush and create eloquent propositions about a Russian 'peace with honor' in Syria  a peace dominated by Washington which Moscow would never accept anyway?


MOSCOW (Sputnik)Japan fears an aggravation of the standoff between North and South Korea after the South's resumption of cross-border propaganda broadcasting directed at its Northern neighbor, Japanese Defense Minister Gen Nakatani said Saturday.

"There is a possibility of a repeated escalation of tensions between the North and the South Koreas. Japan's Defense Ministry continues to carefully monitor the unfolding situation on the Korean peninsula," Nakatani told reporters.

On Friday, South Korea resumed operating its propaganda broadcasting loudspeakers situated near the Korean Demilitarized Zone and directed at the DPRK. Despite a mutual 2004 agreement to switch off propaganda loudspeakers, a mid-2015 restart of broadcasting by South Korea led to an escalation of hostilities between the two sides. In August 2015, the two countries exchanged artillery fire, while North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un declared a quasi-state of war. The situation was later de-escalated on conditions of halting propaganda broadcasts.
TOKYO (Sputnik)  Komura is expected to arrive in Moscow on Sunday with a four-day visit, leading a delegation of lawyers. During his visit, Komura plans to meet Sergei Naryshkin, the speaker of Russia's lower house, State Duma, to discuss economic cooperation and the ongoing territorial dispute regarding the Kuril Islands.

"Prime Minister [of Japan Shinzo] Abe and President [of Russia Vladimir] Putin agree that it is necessary to continue a dialogue at the highest level During the visit, I would like to hold informative exchange of views in order to encourage this dialogue, Komura told RIA Novosti.

The Japanese official also said that he would possibly bring with him a message for Putin from Abe. Komura added that it remains undecided whether he would meet with Putin during his visit to Moscow.
For his part, Investor's Business Daily contributor Bill Peters noted that with the "shares of global oil majors like Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell, Total and BP" getting thrashed "since crude prices sank in 2014," the question which should be on investors' minds is "Would Aramco shares be any better?"

Echoing Gheit, Peters noted that given that "Saudi Aramco provides little information on finances or other measures of performanceany IP would come amid major strains for Saudi Arabia and the oil market overall."

Meanwhile, Oil Change International, an advocacy group for clean energy which has no love for big oil, nonetheless also suggests that Aramco's partial privatization, driven by Prince Mohammed's "reforming zeal," would be a mistake.

"It's not a smart economic move to sell off an asset when its value is at the bottom of the cycle. When governments are made desperate by low oil prices, they often make that mistake, giving foreign investors a bargain that well outlasts the commodity downturn." Given the existence of Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund, it makes even less sense.

According to OCI, not only would the involvement of multinational investors not serve "as a guarantee against corruption (it is often in fact the opposite)," but "partial privatization of Aramco would require publishing financial and reserves data that is currently secret."

Moreover, "Saudi Arabia is a signatory to the International Convention on Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), which allows investors to challenge governments in secret tribunals, with any compensation awards enforceable by seizing the state's assets in any of nearly 160 countries. While Saudi Arabia is still a long way off addressing the role of its oil reserves in climate change, the threat of investor compensation claims would have a chilling effect if and when action is taken."
On January 7 police chief Albers was dismissed after it emerged that his force already knew that asylum seekers were largely responsible for the attacks. When announcing the decision, Interior Minister of Nordrhein-Westfalens Ralf Jager said he wanted the police to regain the confidence of the public.

"In fact, a report from the riot police dated January 2 shows that details were taken from 71 people  most of whom were asylum seekers. It is not yet clear whether these people were involved in crimes," Bild reported on Friday.

A police source in Frankfurt explained to Bild why alleged crimes committed by migrants and refugees were slow to come to light.

"Offenses which are committed by criminal suspects who have a foreign nationality and are registered in a reception center we immediately put to one side."

"There are strict instructions from the authorities not to report about offenses committed by refugees. Only direct requests from the media about such acts should be answered," said the police officer.

A spokesman for the Hessen Interior Ministry confirmed the policy.

"The press office managers were advised that right wing extremists could exploit the issue of refugees in order to stoke sentiment against people seeking protection," said the spokesman.

The attacks against women in German towns and cities at New Year come after some similar reports from asylum centers in Germany last year.

In April 2015 Bayerische Rundfunk reported incidences of sexual assault and forced prostitution at an asylum center in Bavaria, which police refused to confirm.

Zustande in der Bayernkaserne: Berichte uber sexuelle Gewalt http://t.co/r4mZ8FQflA  Diane Dotzauer (@DianeDotzauer) 16  2015

'Sexual violence in the Bavarian asylum center: police won't confirm allegations,' reported Bayerische Rundfunk.

In October Bild reported that 15 women and children at an asylum center in Hessen had reported being sexually assaulted. Prior to that, in September local welfare organizations wrote to representatives of Hessen's Regional Assembly raising concern about rape, sexual assault and forced prostitution at the center.

"These are not isolated cases," they warned, citing mixed accommodation and sanitary facilities as some of the factors that put women and children at risk.

According to Saxony's Interior Minister, between January 1 and November 30 2015 there were "1006 incidents of brutality and crimes against personal liberty" reported at asylum centers there. These include three cases of manslaughter, 11 of attempted murder and six cases of sexual abuse of children, reported Bild.
The Dutch vote on Ukraine's association agreement with the European Union threatens a "continental crisis," the European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker told the Netherlands' NRC Hanelsblad newspaper in an interview.

The Netherlands is due to hold an advisory referendum on the association agreement in April. Over half of recently polled Dutch voters said that they would vote against Ukraine's association with the EU.

"As far as I can see, the Commission is not a very popular institution in the Netherlands. But as people go to the polls, the Commission has to say what is of European importance. I want the Dutch to understand that this issue transcends the Dutch interest. I sincerely hope that they are will not say 'no' for reasons that have nothing to do with the treaty itself. Let's not turn the referendum into a referendum on Europe," Juncker said.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Local media reported that some 300 municipal workers took part in the protest in La Plata, the capital of Argentinas Buenos Aires Province, on Friday. Some protesters were throwing stones at police officers.

Riot police attack public workers protest in #LaPlata Argentina. pic.twitter.com/CwremI76j8  teleSUR English (@telesurenglish) January 9, 2016

The police officers responded with rubber bullets and tear gas, reportedly injuring several people.

The incident comes after the La Plata mayor decided not to review 4,500 contracts for state workers that expired at the end of December.
Commenting on the situation in a recent article for the US business publication Quartz, Saeed Khan, a historian and lecturer at Michigan's Wayne State University, suggests that Riyadh's decision to execute al-Nimr was a deliberate strategy, one intended to provoke Tehran militarily, and based on the Saudis' growing desperation at home and abroad.

"Each act of incitement," Khan writes, "including Saudi Arabia's allegedly deliberate targeting of the Iranian Embassy in Sanaa, Yemen, is further indication of Riyadh's desperation to demonize Tehran in the court of world opinion." Unfortunately for the Saudis, this "is an exercise in futility, and one that casts doubt over the kingdom's own stability and sensibility. The United States' longtime ally is losing its iron-fisted grip over both its people and the region."

However, the historian warns, this loss of control, "coupled with Saudi Arabia's staggering arsenal and unprincipled ruling ideology, makes the kingdom incredibly dangerous  arguably more so than infamous Axis of Evil member Iran."

"Saudi Arabia contends that its provocations of Iran are a principled and urgent rejoinder to a dangerous sectarian rival. But the reality is that the kingdom seeks to distract the international community from its own significant internal weaknesses."

Economic Troubles
Among the emails released on December 31 were 275 documents that the State Department have since upgraded to 'classified' status. One of them was a confidential memo from Sydney Blumenthal dated April 2, 2011 , in which he passed on information that Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi "has nearly bottomless resources to continue indefinitely."

"On April 2, 2011 sources with access to advisors to Salt al-Islam Qaddafi stated in strictest confidence that while the freezing of Libya's foreign bank accounts presents Muammar Qaddafi with serious challenges, his ability to equip and maintain his armed forces and intelligence services remains intact. According to sensitive information available to this these individuals, Qaddafi's government holds 143 tons of gold, and a similar amount in silver," Blumenthal told Clinton.

The intelligence sources explained that the quantity of gold and silver is worth more than $7 billion, and "was one of the factors that influenced President Nicolas Sarkozy's decision to commit France to the attack on Libya."

"This gold was accumulated prior to the current rebellion and was intended to be used to establish a pan-African currency based on the Libyan golden Dinar. This plan was designed to provide the Francophone African Countries with an alternative to the French franc (CFA)."

According to this intelligence, several factors motivated the French president to back the US-led military intervention that toppled Qaddafi. Among them was a desire to gain a greater share of Libya oil production, and to increase French influence in North Africa, which was threatened by Qaddafi's long term plans to supplant France as the dominant power in Francophone Africa.
Require Congress to balance its budget.

Prohibit administrative agenciesand the unelected bureaucrats that staff themfrom creating federal law.

Prohibit administrative agenciesand the unelected bureaucrats that staff themfrom preempting state law.

Allow a two-thirds majority of the States to override a U.S. Supreme Court decision.

Require a seven-justice super-majority vote for U.S. Supreme Court decisions that invalidate a democratically-enacted law.

Restore the balance of power between the federal and state governments by limiting the former to the powers expressly delegated to it in the Constitution.

Give state officials the power to sue in federal court when federal officials overstep their bounds.

Allow a two-thirds majority of the States to override a federal law or regulation.

Abbott stressed his plan would strengthen the 10th Amendment which states, "the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Throughout his address, Abbott also warned that the federal government was straying from the path laid out by the founding fathers.

"These increasingly frequent departures from Constitutional principles are destroying the rule of law foundation on which this country was built," Abbott said. "We are succumbing to the caprice of man that our founders fought to escape. The cure to these problems will not come from Washington D.C. They must come from the states."
Since August, the administration has been resisting Congressional efforts to gather detailed immigration histories of these individuals, raising concern that the administration may be burying this information to cover up a flawed U.S. refugee screening process.

According to Congressional sources, most of the 41 individuals came from Muslim-majority countries such as Egypt, Uzbekistan, Albania, Pakistan, and Syria.

Nonetheless, Obama has been very vocal about widening Americas borders for immigrants and refugees including those from Iraq and Syria, where an American-led coalition continues to fight ISIS strongholds.

Many of these 41 individuals were caught plotting attacks on the United States, while others were accused of providing material support to terrorist organizations.

On Thursday, the Justice Department accused two Iraqi refugees legally living in the U.S. of working to provide material support to ISIS.

Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan, 24, was charged with aiding ISIS. He is a Palestinian-born Iraqi refugee who passed the U.S. screening process before being granted permanent legal residence in Houston in 2011.

However, the Justice Department says it was later discovered that he swore untruthfully on his formal application when applying to become a naturalized U.S. citizen.

Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, who entered the U.S. in 2012, traveled overseas to fight alongside terrorist organizations and lied to U.S. authorities about his activities, according to the Justice Department. His charges reveal that its believed he was fighting with various terrorist organizations.

He also is a Palestinian-born Iraqi.

Despite the fact that the number of immigrants linked to terror plots continues to rise, Congress in 2015 approved, as part of a yearly spending bill, a last-minute effort led by the Obama administration to fully fund refugee and resettlement programs.

According to the Senates immigration subcommittee, the U.S. can expect around 170,000 new immigrants from Muslim-majority countries in 2016.

A growing number of foreign-born terrorists are being identified operating within the United States, and yet the administration will not provide any information about their immigrant histories, one senior congressional source told the Free Beacon. And one can only imagine that for every identified terrorist, there are many more individuals around them who are radicalized, extreme or otherwise detracting from American society in ways beyond the threat of terrorism alone.
"They claim the US involvement is justified by reducing casualties, but instead US empowerment and support of Saudi Arabia is allowing Riyadh to inflict more civilian casualties in Yemen, not less. In other words, you throw fire and claim you are doing so to minimize the fire," al-Ahmed said.

The role of the United States in supplying weapons such as cluster bombs that are being used against a civilian population is a clear violation of international law, the professor pointed out.

"It is an amazing argument. The superpowers are playing with the lives of thousands of people especially those who are weak. And will this continue? Absolutely!"

This state of affairs was likely to continue for the foreseeable future, al-Ahmed claimed.

However, Riyadh would fail in its ambition to install a compliant puppet government over the Yemeni people in Sanaa, al-Ahmed predicted.

"The Saudis have a sense of entitlement that they are the regional superpower and they should decide on the type of government and policy for everyone. But they are deluded."

Saudi King Salman bin Abdul Aziz and his son, Defense Minister Mohamed bin Salman, had stumbled into a conflict they could not win, the professor warned.

"The Saudis cannot choose a form of government for Yemen. They want to decide other peoples governments for them. But that model is unsustainable. Its gone. I dont think the Saudis leaders even realize that. However, reality will set in very soon."

However, US media organizations were mainly covering the conflict from Riyadh  through Saudi eyes  and they were accepting uncritically the Saudi eversion of events, al-Ahmed observed.
"With regards to our relationship with Russia, we believe that the extent of trade we have with Russia is not in line with the size of our respective economies. We are both members of the G20 but we have very little trade, very little investment and so we wanted to change that," Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said during an interview with CNBC.

"Russia is a great power, Russia has 20 million Muslims living in it, Russia can play a positive role and we wanted to engage with Russia, we wanted to improve our relationship with Russia not at the expense of our relationship with any other country but for the sake of having better ties with Russia," the minister added.

According to al-Jubeir, "a process of encouraging trade, encouraging scientific exchanges, encouraging investment" has already been initiated.
Washington and its allies used the UN Security Council's resolution aimed at implementing a "no-fly zone" over Libya to their advantage. NATO unleashed a full-scale air campaign in Libya resulting in the victory of Islamists and Gaddafi's brutal murder.

"The then US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, like some ancient tribal barbarian (no offence intended to the latter) gloated and sneered over images of Gaddafi's bloody corpse," the Canadian academic remarks.

But NATO violence did not end there. The "Empire of Chaos," as journalist Pepe Escobar wittily labeled the United States, continued its "triumphant march" across the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region.

"Encouraged by their 'success' in Libya, the United States and some of its NATO 'allies', notably France, Britain and Turkey, turned their sights on Syria and its leader Bashar al Assad," according to Professor Carley.

Needless to say, Syria now lies in ruins just like Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. Remarkably, like in "the good old days," Washington and major NATO states have allied themselves with Muslim fundamentalists, including Jaish al-Fatah, Ahrar ash-Sham, al-Nusra Front and even Daesh.

Simultaneously Washington fomented a neo-fascist coup in Ukraine in 2014 aimed at disrupting Russia's attempts to solve the Syrian crisis through diplomatic measures.

"What is one to conclude about the conduct of the United States and NATO since 1991?" Professor Carley asks, "In what way can NATO now be described as a 'defensive' alliance?"

What lay beneath Washington's unwillingness to dissolve NATO after the fall of the USSR?

The truth of the matter is that the US has never been intended to dismantle the Alliance. Washington regards NATO as a political tool to coerce its competitors and partners into submission while pursuing unchallenged global dominance.

"Since 1991 the United States has become increasingly belligerent and reckless, like Wilhelmine Germany prior to World War I, but far more dangerous," the Canadian academic stresses.
Thoughts and postings from an Episcopal priest in the Diocese of Pittsburgh.
"It's a good business for the owners of US 'defense' contractors If the Sauds weren't buying lots of that hardware, then some very wealthy Americans would be significantly less wealthy than they now are. It's mutually beneficial. (Though not beneficial for the people those bombs and bullets are killing and maiming)," Zuesse adds.

The US-Saudi cooperation has evolved into a close symbiosis. It is hardly surprising that Washington refused to condemn the Saudi monarch for executing Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr. Furthermore, there are voices speaking in defense of Saudi Arabia and slamming Iran.

"Saudi Arabia is our ally, despite the fact that they don't always behave in a way that we condone I take the Iranian condemnation with a huge grain of salt This [in Iran] is a regime that tortures citizens routinely, that thinks nothing of executions, that still holds four Americans in jail," US Republican candidate Carly Fiorina said as quoted by Zuesse.
The terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino have compelled the White House to draw up new plans to counter online propaganda from Daesh (ISIL/ISIS) in order to prevent the terrorist group from attracting new recruits, US government officials said on Friday.

"Everybody realizes that this is a moment. . . to take advantage of," a senior official in the Obama administration told the Washington Post, explaining that though some of the measures had already been in development for months; attacks by Daesh members in Europe and the US in recent months have given the initiatives a new urgency.

The initiatives include a "counterterrorism task force" based at the Department of Homeland Security with the assistance of at least 11 other government departments or agencies, and the overhaul of a State Department program that is now being rebranded the 'Global Engagement Center.' However, the strategic changes are not being accompanied by a budget increase, acknowledged officials.
While it seems that several of those already charged will plead guilty to online child pornography crimes, a Vancouver teacher, Jay Michaud, who was arrested in July 2015, hopes his case will be dismissed completely.

The thing is, instead of shutting the site down right away, the FBI temporarily moved Playpen to its own server in Virginia and deployed a network investigative technique (NIT) in order to identify those logging in. Michaud's defense team now argues that by doing so, the FBI became the distributor of an "untold" amount of illegal material.

"There is no law enforcement exemption, or statutory exemption for the distribution of child pornography," Colin Fieman, one of the federal public defenders filing the motion to dismiss the indictment claimed during a phone interview earlier this week, Motherboard reported.


MOSCOW (Sputnik)Flight 623, en route to Toronto with 66 passengers on board, returned to Halifax shortly after takeoff as a precautionary measure, the Canadian Star, a news portal, reported Friday.

The airline denied previous media reports of smoke in the cockpit, the media outlet added.

There were no injuries reported in the incident, according to The Star.
The Snowshoe Series kicked off on Friday night (Jan. 8) at Woodbine Racetrack with St Lads Charger taking advantage of an early speed duel between the favourites and prevailing in a five-across finish.

The 14-1 shot, driven by Trevor Henry, followed in third-place as outsider Every Intention (Jody Jamieson) battled past Three Truths (Sylvain Filion) through a :25.4 speed duel in the first $17,000 division of the series. But after posting middle splits of :55.1 and 1:24.4, Every Intention was swarmed by the late-closers. St Lads Charger, who had tipped first over down the backstretch, prevailed by a nose in a career-best clocking of 1:54.3 and paid $30.40 for the upset win. Brown Dirt Cowboy (Rick Zeron), Hickory Terrific (Mike Saftic) and Hp Black Shadow (Mario Baillargeon) also spread across the track, finishing second through fourth, in the blanket finish with Every Intention fifth.

Victor Puddy trains St Lads Charger, a three-year-old Sportswriter colt owned by Randy Christopher of Rockwood, Ont., Limco Inc. of Chateauguay, Que., and Bill Manes of Rockwood, Ont. St Lads Charger was a $22,000 purchase from the 2014 Canadian Yearling Sale by his connections. He made his 2016 debut in the series a winning one and now has two (consecutive) wins from 11 career starts and $21,220 in total earnings.

Valedictory Series champion Shades Of Bay continued his winning ways in the opening leg of the Snowshoe with a 1:52 score in rein to driver Phil Hudon for trainer Sean Mehlenbacher.

The four-year-old son of Art Major, who was the 1-5 betting favourite, made his move from fourth at the :27.1 opening quarter. He took the lead by the :56.2 half-mile mark, but not before Swapportunity (Mario Baillargeon) got the jump start on him and swept from third to first. Once Shades Of Bay overtook that rival, he raced past three-quarters in 1:24.3 and drew off by more than three lengths down the stretch. Early leader Tower Of Power (Sylvain Filion) came through along the pylons to finish second over Swapportunity.

Shades Of Bay has won four of his five Woodbine races since he was purchased for $35,000 at the Harrisburg Mixed Sale in November by Toronto-based owner Timothy Kim. He now has five wins in 15 career starts and earnings totalling $60,604.

The lightly raced Rafa remains undefeated as he prevailed in the third and final division off a ground-saving trip, which was engineered by Sylvain Filion. Richard Moreau trains the four-year-old homebred son of Camluck, who is owned by Robin Morley of Mildmay, Ont.

Rafa, the 9-5 second choice on the toteboard, got a pocket trip behind Thoughtyoudlikeit (Randy Waples) while Pistopackinpiper (Trevor Henry) forged on to challenge for the leading role, but remained parked out through first-half fractions of :26.4 and :55.4. As Pistopackinpiper threw in the towel down the backside, 8-5 favourite Tylers Beach Boy (Jody Jamieson) rallied three-wide approaching the 1:24.2 third quarter mark and took over the lead into the stretch. However, Filion launched Rafa outside and swept by for the four-length score in 1:52.3. The victory was Rafa's third in a row and fastest yet. Tylers Beach Boy stayed for second while Shippen Out (James MacDonald) finished third.

Rafa returned $5.90 to his backers at the betting windows and pushed his lifetime earnings to $19,000 for his connections. The victory one of three on the 10-race card for Moreau, Canada's 2015 win leader.

The Snowshoe Series is for three and four-year-old pacers that are non-winners of two races or $30,000 lifetime as of October 31, 2015.

To view Friday's harness racing results, click on the following link: Friday Results - Woodbine Racetrack.
The $25,000 Open I Handicap Trot was the featured event on the Friday night program at The Meadowlands.

A highly competitive field of nine went to the gate, with Lindys Tru Grit a slight 2-1 favourite at post time.

There was plenty of speed off the gate as Uva Hanover, Opulent Yankee and Somebody As all left for position. Only two of those remained trotting after the first quarter as Opulent Yankee went off-stride on the first turn. Somebody As grabbed the racetrack through a :26.4 sharp opening quarter. Uva Hanover was content to sit the pocket behind the leader through a :55.2 half-mile. On the far turn, Lindys Tru Grit, who was stalking the leaders, made his move for the lead, which he reached past three-quarters in 1:24. It was his race to lose in the stretch, but Uva Hanover was guided off the pylons and began to reel in the favourite. Uva Hanover took over in mid-stretch and powered away to a sharp two-length score in a lifetime-best 1:52.2. Lindys Tru Grit remained second with Can Do rallying well to finish third.

The win was the 14th for Uva Hanover, whose earnings are approaching $350,000 lifetime. He is trained by Linda Toscano for Stake Your Claim Stable and Martin Sternberg. Fresh from his trip to Australia, Tim Tetrick guided the five-year-old gelded son of Cantab Hall to the victory.

A tepid pace and a pocket trip resulted in a 9-1 upset for March Awareness in the supporting feature, the $20,000 Open II, on Friday night at The Meadowlands. Allowed to sit behind the lone-leader Lauderdale, who wheeled off fractions of :28.1, :57.3 and 1:26.4, March Awareness slingshot by in deep stretch to score in 1:55 for Yannick Gingras.

The win was the 19th in the career of March Awareness, who has earnings of $219,740. Ron Burke trains and co-owns the six-year-old gelded son of Ken Warkentin with Weaver Bruscemi LLC.

Andy and Julie Miller teamed up to score a pair of trotting wins early on the card at The Meadowlands on Friday night with Magenta Man and Allerage Star.

Magenta Man scored in a non-winners of two condition event in a lifetime-best 1:55.4, while Allerage Star did not disappoint as the 2-1 favourite from post 10 in a non-winners of six trotting event.

Both trotters are owned in part by Jeff Gurals Little E LLC.

After sweeping the late Daily Double, Yannick Gingras bagged four winners on the card. Jim Marohn Jr., Andy Miller and Trond Smedshammer each won a pair.

Total handle on the 14-race program was $2,879,881.

Racing returns on Saturday, with first post time at 6:35 p.m.

(Meadowlands Racetrack)
Er is iets heel griezeligs aan de gang in Nederland. Dat wij geleidelijk aan in een totalitaire 'democratie' wegzinken wordt steeds ...
LABELLE, FL. -- A young male was an apparent murder victim at the Port LaBelle Inn this morning, presumably from a handgun bullet. On scene ...
Life happens and updating this blog gets pushed aside. So very close and yet still far enough away from the end of the year (2020). I am determined, thou...
The South Bays economy is in a strong place, but continued inflation and a likely recession are among the future challenges, experts predict.
A 23-year-old Castle Rock man was sentenced to more than four years in prison Thursday after pleading guilty to shooting another man in November.

Zachary Royce Cheesman pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree assault, one with a firearm enhancement and false reporting.

According to witnesses, Cheesman was driving recklessly Nov. 9 in downtown Castle Rock and nearly hit several pedestrians before Ceaser Dale Atchley confronted him about his driving. Cheesman was arrested after he shot Atchley in the chest with a .45 caliber pistol in the 900 block of Front Avenue in Castle Rock.

Cheesman was charged with first-degree assault for the shooting, second-degree assault for driving at Atchley, and six counts of reckless endangerment for driving towards the group of people. He was scheduled to go to trial next week; his attorney, Kevin Blondin, had said Cheesman would claim that he acted in self-defense.

But Cheesman instead pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of two counts of second-degree assault. Judge Michael Evans sentenced Cheesman to four years and one month in prison.

Cowlitz County Prosecutor Ryan Jurvakainen said accepting a plea to second-degree assault rather than first-degree assault was an appropriate resolution to this case. Atcheley approved of the plea agreement, Jurvakainen said.

After the shooting, Atchley was flown to Southwest Washington Medical Center in Vancouver by Life Flight helicopter. Shortly after the incident, his mother told KOIN TV that the bullet richocheted off his ribs and fractured them. According to Jurvakainen, Atcheley has recovered from his injury and appears to being OK.
Take a vote

The Chamber of Commerce supports the coal dock in spite of numerous voices from the medical profession against it. The Lummi Indian Nation and the majority of the population do not want the coal dock. A previous letter writer mockingly suggested we could all become park rangers instead. He lacks the same foresight as the Chamber of Commerce. Cant they realize if the coal dock was not an option, more jobs would be happening? What new business would want to come into a dirty coal town? It would be interesting if we could vote on it, instead of some officials deciding what is best for us.

Is Cowlitz County to be the dumping place for polluting industries other cities wont accept?

Mary Wallem

Longview

The vision thing

Differences in visions of growth. Commissioner Baagason has a knack for saying a lot without divulging anything. If you have to part ways with a CEO, thats the way to do it.

The people of Cowlitz County and caretakers of the Columbia spoke with intellect and passion to stop an ill-fitting, high risk propane/butane transfer facility. It seemed like the very next day an even worse, higher risk muddle of oil transfer/propane transfer/refinery facility was on deck. What the hey?

Because of the Columbia, all of the ports have a responsibility to one another and to all the people and things that share its magnificence. Trying to match nightmares with the Port of Vancouvers Vancouver Energy adds insult to injury. I have known only two port bosses able to blend revenue needs, family-wage jobs, and environmental concerns well. It is a tough job, and deserves high pay and high praise when it is done right. This commission is a good one, and I have faith they can find the right person for a complex, often thankless job.

Capt. Phillip A. Massey (ret.)

Kalama

Crooks in disguise

Each morning I open the paper hoping to read that the Bundys have gone home, and the Malheur Wildlife Refuge is once again open to the public. Like most tax cheats, the Bundys must use anger at government to ease their guilt; in their case, failure to pay over $1 million in fees for grazing rights on federal land. How hard can it be to get these self-absorbed crooks off of our land? Cut their power. Go in unarmed, arrest them, cuff them and prosecute them for trespassing. The Bundys must pursue their grievances in court. The longer we wait, the better they look. I have respect and sympathy for the Hammonds, I think they got a raw deal. The Bundys are a whole different matter. They have no right to cloak their crimes in patriotism.

Two key differences between the U.S. and the Middle East are our general respect for the rule of law and our spirit of compromise. Id advise those who take up the Bundys cause to be careful what you wish for.

Lawrence Studebaker

Castle Rock

Sold short

I have a challenge for area civic leaders, the CEDC, our elected officials, the business community, TDN, and the Kelso/Longview Chamber of Commerce to come up with a better future for our Cowlitz County community.

It appears to me that a focus on a coal dock future comes up with a bleak palette, with only black to paint with. We can do better, and should.

An anthropological study into any communitys progress tells us that communities thrive when they pursue a direction that all consider good, right, and best. The Port of Kalama is a good example to follow. They dont have to build and maintain nice parks, plan for a future with good job opportunities, or add to a desired aesthetic that makes others want to come and be a part of it. They just do it.

Please dont sell our Lower Columbia short. Add some color to our painting. We read about The Chambers endorsement of a coal dock with words like, Asian nations will need to burn coal and that coal from the Powder River basin in Montana and Wyoming is cleaner than other sources. Yes, this is an obvious bunch of hooey. Use clean brushes, please!

Allan Wise

Kalama
WASHINGTON  Republican lawmakers began the new year in Washington with new ideas about how to undermine the government in which they serve.

On Wednesday, the first legislative day of the year, House conservatives gathered with reporters for their monthly Conversations with Conservatives. When the questioning turned to the armed rebellion in Oregon against the authority of the federal government, these representatives of the United States stood with the rebels.

You have just a frustration that they feel the federal government is not listening to them anymore, and thats what leads to what so far has been a peaceful takeover  of an abandoned building, by the way  and the media, I think, is so quick to sort of cast aspersions on that group of people, declared Rep. Raul Labrador, an Idaho Republican and leader of House conservatives.

And I think civil disobedience has been something for the most part that the liberal media used to stand up for, but apparently theres some exceptions to that when us conservatives and pro-Second Amendment people are trying to exercise that same right of civil disobedience. So its pretty frustrating.

No, Congressman. Civil disobedience is when people break laws they think unjust and then peacefully face the legal consequences. The takeover of a federal wildlife facility in Oregon by armed men is sedition.

Yet not one of the 10 or so Republican House members on the panel criticized the takeover, and one, Rep. Steve Pearce of New Mexico, announced his refusal to pass judgment.

I just want to agree with Raul on this, said Kentucky Rep. Tom Massie.

You can disagree with their methods of protesting, but we wouldnt be talking about this today if they werent protesting, and so theyve drawn attention to it.

It was an inauspicious start to this election year and to the second session of the 114th Congress. The Republican majority began the year not by governing but with an ostentatious show of its hostility toward government.

The Houses first substantive piece of business for the new year: another attempt to repeal Obamacare (the 62nd, by the Democrats tally) coupled with another stab at cutting off Planned Parenthood, one of a dozen such efforts recently to scale back abortion rights and womens health care. In this latest attempt to repeal Obamacare (it goes further than the previous 61 because Republicans used a legislative maneuver that allows it to go to President Obama for a certain veto), Republicans abandoned their repeal and replace mantra in favor of just abolishing the massive health care law.

If we repeal Obamacare, the very first thing that happens is we go back to the best health care system in the world, announced Rep. Mo Brooks of Alabama, another participant in the conservatives pizza-and-Coke luncheon. We had health care six years ago, and it was the best, and thats where I want to go as a starter.

Brooks is given to exotic pronouncements (he declared in 2014 that Democrats were engaged in a war on whites), but his assertion that all was hunky-dory before the 2010 health care law recalls the good old days of lifetime coverage limits, coverage bans because of pre-existing conditions, discrimination against women, inability to carry health insurance between jobs, and obstacles to young adults staying on their parents policies.

Still there was, purely as a matter of doggedness, something impressive about this Obamacare vote. North Korea is testing nukes, Saudi Arabia and Iran are plunging the Middle East deeper into conflict  but congressional Republicans will not be distracted from their agenda.

Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., in a Wednesday news conference, said he would eventually come up with an alternative to Obamacare and something else resembling a legislative agenda in 2016. We are just beginning this decision-making process, he said. Nothings been decided yet.

But its hard to govern when your caucus is so hostile to government that it has sympathy for seditionists. Asked about the Oregon situation, Ryan deferred to Rep. Greg Walden, a member of GOP leadership who represents the area  and, as The Washington Posts Mike DeBonis noted, Ryan nodded agreement as Walden spoke.

Walden made clear that an armed takeover is not the way to go about it, but he had sympathy for the rebels. These people just want to take care of the environment  they really do, he said. And it is the government that all too often ignores the law.

Such as: when lawmakers sworn to uphold the Constitution applaud those who take up arms against the government.
"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844
Musings on Romance Fiction from an Academic Perspective
Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons













Since Alabama is one of my neighbor states and a place I do visit on occasion, I looked forward to finding some new tea-related info about my fellow southerners!According to a November article that appeared on Alabama.com , F. Scott Fitzgerald, best known for "The Great Gatsby," met his future wife, Zelda Sayre, at a tea in the now-abandoned Montgomery mansion known as Winter Place. "Joseph Winter Thorington, a descendant and former owner of the home, claimed Scott and Zelda were introduced by his aunt at a tea in the mansion's gallery," the article said. Winter Place is on the National Register of Historic Places, and I sure hope to receive word that someone is restoring this place. ( Click here if you'd like to see some terrific photos of the home today.)While I love and appreciate the Charleston Tea Plantation in South Carolina, it bothers me when I occasionally read that it is the only place where tea is being grown in the US. Tea is growing at quite a few places in the US, including Fairhope, Alabama. Last year, the US League of Tea Growers visited Fairhope and made a video of the tea production process there, and you can see it here . (This low-tech production looks like something I could try with my own backyard tea plant.) While I haven't yet visited the Fairhope Tea Plantation, I have enjoyed sipping some of the black tea produced there, which is sold at The Church Mouse , a darling shop in Fairhope (above) that sells British imports. It's definitely worth a visit if you're in the area!The company's Front Porch Special black tea blend was named one of the year's best Southern-made foods by Southern Living magazine. I haven't yet tried this company's tea, but tea friend Denise P. of Alabama loves these teas and says the company is "a real treasure to the tea world." So I guess some Front Porch Special tea is going on my bucket list of new teas to try in 2016!
Nimish Sawant

Googles Project Tango was first announced two years ago and has been in the experimental phase since. But on 7 January at CES, Lenovo announced that it will release the first consumer smartphone with Googles Project Tango hardware and software inside it, by June-July this year.

Project Tango lets you map the 3D space around you by using a combination of cameras such as a regular camera, an integrated depth sensing camera and a motion tracking camera. The 3D space mapping is done in real time and can help out with navigating within shopping malls and other internal locations. It also lets you interact with your real surroundings thereby adding a layer of augmented reality to the mix. You can read our complete lowdown on Project Tango.

The phone which will be released by Lenovo will be a consumer facing device and will come under $500 (approx Rs 33,400). The device is expected to come with a Qualcomm Snapdragon chipset and will have a display size under 6.5-inches. Lenovo will be using an RGB camera, a depth sensing camera module and a fish eye lens on its Project Tango phone - which will be arranged in a vertical module.

https://twitter.com/tech2eets/status/685289600395296768?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

https://twitter.com/tech2eets/status/685288996855889920?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Lenovo and Project Tango also announced an App Incubator Program which will help app developers working with Project Tango with engineering knowhow as well as with funding to see promising ideas achieve completion. Interested app developers can submit proposals to be part of this incubator.

Before the announcement Project Tango lead Johnny Lee showed some demos of what can be done with this project. He used the camera module on the prototype Project Tango tablet to measure the area of a room, find the height of a ceiling, play a game of digital Jenga with a colleague where in the Jenga blocks were visible only on the tablets.

https://twitter.com/tech2eets/status/685291261071241216?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

He also demoed real time 3D mapping of not just fixed objects but the crowds as well. After having 3D mapped the stage, he showed how you can virtually fit furniture into the space. He also proceeded to showcase a virtual pet which can actually follow you or interact with the elements in your 3D maps. Clearly the early adopters of Project Tango will be geeks who are working on AR/VR software products.

There wasn't any physical module on display, but Lenovo shared some pictures of prototypes on which it is working for this phone.

Project Tango is an exploration into giving mobile devices a human-scale understanding of space and motion.

The earlier smartphone announced by Google back in 2014, was an Android-based prototype 5-inch phone and developer kit with advanced 3D sensors. With the sensors, the phone is capable of tracking motion, and can build a visual map of rooms using 3D scanning. Google wants to combine these 3D sensors with advanced computer vision techniques that will help fork out newer innovations for indoor navigations, games and so on. Want to know more? Check out the video below.

Disclaimer: The correspondent is at CES 2016, Las Vegas. All travel and accommodation expenses are borne by Lenovo.
hidden

The entry of streaming pioneer Netflix in India is evolutionary in nature though its inaugural price is a bit on the higher side for what it offers, a leading US expert has said. "I would say that the current price is a bit on the high side for what Netflix offers currently and it will have to keep increasing content quantity and quality over time to justify the price point," said Puneet Manchanda, a professor of marketing at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan.

His areas of expertise are business in emerging markets, business in India and strategy and marketing issues. Netflix's global expansion is driven by three forces, he said. First, Netflix needs to convince investors that it can keep growing. With the broadband market size outside the US about six times the size of the US market, any significant growth in the future will come from large international markets such as India.

Second, a large global reach can be a strong bargaining chip for Netflix in obtaining distribution rights from content providers. Finally, Netflix's vision is to be a content provider itself - this expansion exposes a large part of the world to original Netflix content, he said. "In terms of entering India, Netflix can quickly capitalise on a large English speaking market.

But, for the Indian media landscape, the current entry is more evolutionary rather than revolutionary as the English speaking market already has access to a lot of Netflix's India content," Manchanda said. However, if Netflix can crack the vernacular market eg by producing content in local languages with local talent, it has the potential to be revolutionary, Manchanda said.

On Wednesday Netflix launched its service globally, simultaneously bringing its Internet TV network to more than 130 new countries around the world. "Today you are witnessing the birth of a new global Internet TV network," said Reed Hastings, co-founder and CEO of Netflix in a key note address at CES 2016 in Las Vegas.

However, Netflix will not yet be available in China, though the company continues to explore options for providing the service. It also will not be available in Crimea, North Korea and Syria due to US government restrictions on American companies operating there. Since its launch in 2007, Netflix has expanded globally, first to Canada, then to Latin America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. In India, the service will be available under three monthly packs -- Basic (Rs 500), Standard (Rs 650) and Premium (Rs 800). Besides, users will get a month of free trial.

PTI
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Land Minister`s son among 7 killed in Bangabandhu Bridge road crashes

Sirajganj, Jan 9 (UNB)- At least seven people, including the son of Land Minister Shamsur Rahman, were killed and 45 others injured in separate road crashes amid dense fog on the eastern side of Bangabandhu Bridge in Bhuapur upazila of Tangail district on Saturday. One of the deceased was identified as Rana Sharif, 33, son of Land Minister Shamsur Rahman. Akheruzzaman, officer-in-charge of Bangabandhu Bridge East Police Station, said the accidents took place in separate points close to the pillars no 25 and 40 of the bridge, leaving seven people dead and 45 others injured in the early hours of the day. In the first incident, a bus of Sarkar Paribahan dashed the rear of a cattle-laden truck around 7 am, leaving four people dead on the spot and 13 others injured. Later, within a moment, a northern region-bound truck from Dhaka hit a truck from behind and a number of vehicles, including a truck, a police vehicle, a private car, a bus and an ambulance, banged on the truck, leaving one dead on the spot and 34 others injured, said the OC. The injured were rushed to Sirajganj General Hospital, Tangail General Hospital and several clinics. Of the injured, one unidentified person died on way to hospital while Rana Sharif died at Tangail Hospital. The accidents occurred due to opaque visibility caused by dense fog, said the OC. Traffic movement on the bridge which was suspended in the morning following the accidents resumed around 3 pm.
Reform society first to feed 800 million starving people

Paul R. Ehrlich and John Hart :

The scientific community is split between two main approaches: "tinker with agricultural details" (TAD) and "mend societal fundamentals" (MSF).

Virtually everyone in the scientific community agrees that ensuring sufficient food supplies for a surging human population, which is set to grow by 2.4 billion by mid-century, will require serious work. Indeed, we have not even succeeded at providing enough food for today's population of 7.3 billion: Nearly 800 million people currently are starving or hungry, and another couple billion do not get enough micronutrients. But there is no such consensus about how to address the food-security problem.

The scientific community is split between two main approaches: "tinker with agricultural details" (TAD) and "mend societal fundamentals" (MSF). While the former approach has support from a clear majority, the latter is more convincing.

To be sure, the TAD camp has identified many important problems with current food production and distribution systems, and addressing them could indeed improve food security. Yields could be increased by developing better crop varieties. Water, fertilizer, and pesticides should be used more efficiently. Maintaining tropical forests and other relatively natural ecosystems would preserve critical ecosystem services, especially soil fertility, pollination, pest control, and climate amelioration. The trend toward rising meat consumption should be reversed. Stricter regulation of fisheries and ocean pollution would maintain the supply of marine protein essential to many people. Waste in food production and distribution should be reduced. And people should be educated to choose more sustainable and nutritious foods.

Achieving these goals, TAD supporters recognize, would require policymakers to give food security high political and fiscal priority, in order to support the needed research and action. Responsibility for launching programs to distribute food more equitably would also fall to governments.

But the TAD approach is incomplete. Not only would its short-term goals be extremely difficult to achieve without more fundamental societal changes; even if they were attained, they would probably prove inadequate in the medium term, and certainly in the long term.

To see why, let us suppose that, in 2050, the TAD goals have all been reached. More food is available, thanks to higher agricultural yields and waste-reducing improvements in storage and distribution. Improved environmental policies mean that most of today's forests are still standing and no-fishing zones are widely established and enforced. Ecosystems are becoming stronger, with many corals and plankton evolving to survive in warmer, more acidic water. Add an uptick in vegetarianism, and it appears that the global temperature rise could be limited to 3 Celsius.

As a result, the world could avoid famines by mid-century. But, in a human population of 9.7 billion, hunger and malnutrition would be proportionately the same as they are in today's population of 7.3 billion. In other words, even with such an extraordinary and unlikely combination of accomplishments and good luck, our food-security predicament would still be with us. The reason is simple: Our societies and economies are based on the flawed assumption that perpetual growth is possible on a finite planet. To ensure global food security - not to mention other fundamental human rights - for all, we need to recognize our limitations, in terms of both social and biophysical factors, and do whatever it takes to ensure that we do not exceed them.

Based on this conviction, the MSF approach demands that governments take steps to empower women in all areas of society, and ensure that all sexually active people have access to modern birth control, with women free to have an abortion, if they so choose. At the same time, governments must address inequality of wealth, and thus of food, not least by curbing corporate dominance.

Short of bringing the global population down to sustainable levels, MSF reforms are the world's only hope. But, as it stands, implementing them seems unlikely. The United States, the country that consumes the most, is moving in the opposite direction: women are struggling to hold onto their reproductive rights, wealth distribution is becoming increasingly skewed, and corporations are becoming even more powerful.

If this trend continues, in 2050, governance systems will be even more poorly equipped to deal with the fundamental problems of perpetual population and consumption growth or wealth inequality. As environments deteriorate from climate change, toxification, and loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services, people will have less time and energy for governance reform aimed at reducing inequality or preserving the environment. As a result, those in power will feel less pressure to arrange systems to provide food to those who need it most.

The social-biophysical system is replete with chicken-and-egg subsystems. Given that there is no obvious single vulnerable point in the system to initiate change, governments must address a range of issues simultaneously. Key starting points include purging politics of "big money"; introducing a more progressive tax system that effectively caps the income of the extremely wealthy; ensuring that policymakers have a basic level of scientific understanding; and strengthening women's rights, including access to free contraception.

Just as social and environmental problems can be mutually reinforcing, so can actions aimed at strengthening our social and environmental fundamentals. Only by focusing on these fundamentals, rather than merely tinkering with the details of food production, can intrinsic systemic linkages work to the advantage of future generations.

(Paul R. Ehrlich is Professor of Population Studies, Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford University. John Harte holds a joint professorship in the Energy and Resources Group and the Ecosystem Sciences Division of the College of Natural Resources at the University of California, Berkeley).


Russian doctor accused of punching patient to death

Radio Free Europe :Russian authorities opened a probe on January 9 after a hospital doctor was captured on a security camera punching a patient with a blow that killed him instantly.The incident took place in the southern city Belgorod on December 29 but the investigation was opened only days later after security-camera footage appeared on YouTube and was aired on national television. (https:/www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-si0d3rSPo)In a statement on January 9, Belgorod's Investigative Committee confirmed the incidentoccurred on December 29, but gave no explanation for the delay in investigating the crime.The statement said the doctor-identified as hospital surgeon Ilya Zelendinov-was suspected of causing death through negligence, for which he could serve up to two years in jail.In the video, the doctor in medical clothing drags the male patient from the examination table and asks him "Why did you touch the nurse?" before pushing him out of the doorway.The patient returns but the doctor throws a single blow to his face, sending the man falling backwards onto the floor.The doctor continues to scuffle with another man accompanying the patient.Minutes later, the medics notice the patient lying motionless and unsuccessfully try to revive him. The patient was identified as 56-year-old Yevgeny Bakhtin.
6 held over killing Shyamoly Paribahan staff in Savar

UNB, Savar :

Police in several drives arrested six people from different points of Hemayatpur in Savar upazila on the outskirts of the capital on Saturday in connection with killing a staff of 'Shamoly Paribahan'.

The arrestees were identified as Abul Kashem, Lutfur Rahman, Nukul Das, Azim, Khairul Bashar and Pocha Ghosh. Police said owners of 'Shamoly Paribahan' Ramesh Chandra Ghosh and Ganesh Chandra Ghosh had at loggerheads for long over business matter.

As a sequel to the dispute, Shasthi Ghosh, brother-in-law of

Ganesh Chandra, abducted motor mechanic of 'Shyamoli Paribahan' Asif Sardar Ratan on January 3. Later, family members of Ratan filed a case with Savar Model Police Station in connection with the incident.

Later, police arrested two employees of NR CNG filling station at Baliarpur in the upazila.

Based on the information gleaned from them, police recovered the body or Ratan from a heap of dirt behind the filling station on Friday night.

After the incident, police conducted a drive to arrest other perpetrators and arrested the six people, said officer-in-charge of Savar Model Police Station SM Kamruzzaman.
Minister`s son among 21 killed in road crashes

Land Minister Shamsur Rahman\'s son Rana Sharif (inset) including four people were killed and when a bus hit a cattle-laden truck at 7 am on Saturday on the eastern side of Bangabandhu Bridge in Bhuapur of Tangail amid dense fog.

Staff Reporter :At least 21 people, including son of land minister, were killed and 50 others injured in separate road accidents on the Bangabandhu Bridge and other parts on Saturday.The accidents took place due to dense fog and reckless driving, officials saidOf the deceased, eight in Tangail, three in Chuadanga, two each in Dhaka, Chittagong and Comilla districts while one each in Joypurhat, Pabna, Jhalokati and Bogra districts, reports our correspondents. At least nine people, including a son of Land Minister Shamsur Rahman, were killed and 50 others injured in two separate accidents on the approach roads to Bangabandhu Bridge on Saturday morning.Of the deceased, four were identified as Sherif Rana, 45, son of land minister, Tofazzal Hossain, 35, from Konabari of Sirajganj, Nur Alim, 42, and Sohel, 35, from Sujanagar of Pabna.Among the injured, five were also members of police and fire service. The accidents took place from 7:00am to 9:30am due to dense fog and reckless driving. Despite heavy fog since early morning, there was no on-duty police there to take any protective measures, locals said. The first accident took place at the end of east approach road on Bangabandhu Bridge in Tangail district around 7:00am and the second one at the end of the west approach road of the bridge in Sirajganj district around 9.30am.The massive accidents involved unprecedented chain collusions of at least 30 vehicles. The first accident occurred around 7:00am, in between the 30th and 40th pillar at the end of east approach road of the bridge, reports our Tangail and Sirajganj correspondents. The mayhem ensued as a Dhaka-bound passenger bus (Sarker Paribahan) from Pabna hit a cow-laden truck from behind. Two more buses and a micro-bus rammed immediately the bus and turned turtle on the bridge, leaving four dead on the spot and 20 injured, Wasim Ali, an assistant engineer of Bangladesh Bridge Authority (BBA), told The New Nation on Saturday afternoon. At least 25 vehicles hit one another in a row, including a passenger bus of Hanif Paribahan, National Paribahan, micro-bus, private cars and ambulance, at the end of the west approach road (between pillar No. 30 and 32) on the bridge in another accident around 9:30am.Five persons, including the minister's son Sharif Rana, were killed and at least 30 people were injured in the second accident.Rana was rushed to Tangail Medical College Hospital where doctors declared him dead, Tangail Sadar Model Police Station OC Nazmul Haque Bhuiyan said. "The two separate accidents were caused due to dense fog and reckless driving," said Wasim Ali.The deceased and injured were taken to Sirajganj and Tangail Sadar Hospitals. Among the deceased, four bodies were kept in the east police station of the bridge and two at Tangail Sadar hospital, said Akhirul Islam, Officer-in-Charge of Bangabandhu Bridge east police station.Among the injured, 30 people are being treated in Sirajganj Sadar Hospital and 20 in Tangail Sadar Hospital.Meanwhile, a long tailback ensued at the both end of the bridge following the accidents, leading to immense sufferings to the passengers. "Traffic on the bridge was disrupted for two hours after the accidents. The situation improved after 11:00am," Habibul Islam, a sergeant of Sirajganj Traffic Department, told The New Nation. He also said two pickup vans of Fire Service and police collided head-on on the spot when they went to rescue the injured, leaving five injured, including a police constable and three Fire Service men.In Chuadanga, three people were killed and 10 others injured as two passenger buses collided head-on at Joyrampur area under Damurhuda upazila of the district around 8:00am.Confirming the matter, Damurhuda Thana Officer-in-Charge Liaqat Hossain told The New Nation that the deceased could not be identified immediately.In Dhaka, two unidentified people were killed in separate road accidents in Bimanbandar intersection area and Sher-e-Bangla Nagar area in city.A motorcyclist was killed and a pillion injured in a road accident on Akkelpur-Jamalganj road in Awalgari area under Akkelpur upazila of the district around 9:00am in Joypurhat.The deceased was identified as Belal Hossain, 42, hailed from Deogram under Khetlal upazila of the district.In Pabna, a 24-year youth, Sweet, was killed and three others injured in a road accident on Pabna-Ishwardi road in Manoharpur area under Pabna sadar upazila around 8:00am.The deceased was the son of one Ajmat Ali, hailed from Choto Manoharpur village of the sadar upazila.Pabna Police Station's Officer-in-Charge Abdullah Al Hasan confirmed the matter to The New Nation.In Chittagong, two people were killed and one injured in different road mishaps in the district.The deceased were identified as Rasel, 22, son of one Aminul Islam, hailed from Natunpara of Hathzari upazila and freedom fighter M Abdul Haque, 70.In Jhalokati, a rural physician, Kabir Talukder, 55, was killed in a road accident on Rajapur-Bhandaria road at Kanudashkathi area under Rajapur upazila of the district around 1:30pm.Confirming the matter, Sub-Inspector Yusuf Ali of Rajapur Police Station said the deceased hailed from Galua Durgapur area of the upazila.In Comilla, at least two people were killed in separate accidents in Debidwar and Homna upazilas of the district.The deceased were identified as Dulal Mia, 35, hailed from Hiranal village under Kasba upazila of Brahmanbaria and Bashir Mia, 18, son of one Jiban Mia, hailed from Bhitikalmina village of the upazila.In Bogra, a 35-year old man was killed as a bus ran over him on Sariakandi-Chandanbaisha road at Debdanga area under Sarikandi upazila of the district around 2:30pm.The deceased was identified as Hafizar Rahman, hailed from Solartair village of the upazila.Besides, five people were injured in a road accident in Sherpur district.
Roads towards Tongi closed for today for Akheri Munajat

Roads towards Tongi will be closed for vehicles other than those carrying Bishwa Ijtema devotees on Sunday. Traffic police took the decision to close the roads from 3am to 6pm for the Akheri Munajat (final prayers).

The roads include that from Shahjalal International Airport to Gazipur's Bhogrha Bypass intersection via Uttara, According to Gazipur Traffic Police Assistant Superintendent Md Sakhawat Hossain.

On the Tongi-Kaliganj road, the ban will be in effect from Tongi to Pubail's Mirer Bazar.

Besides the Ijtema devotees, residents of Uttara, and air passengers and crew will also be able to use the Airport Road.

Others will have to use the Mirpur-Savar road. Shuttle-buses for Ijtema devotees will ply the roads, Hossain said.
Sea of devotees on Turag banks

Akheri Munajat at 10.30-11.20am today: 7152 foreigners from 95 countries joining congregation

Staff Reporter :With the offering of Akheri Munajat (final prayers), the first phase of the three-day Biswa Ijtema ends today (Sunday) on the bank of river Turag at Tongi of Gazipur district, some 20km off capital Dhaka.Talking to journalists at the Ijtema venue Deputy Commissioner (DC) of Gazipur SM Alam said the Akheri Munajat will be offered between 10.30am and 11.30 am. Around 30 lakh people from all walks of life are expected to join the Akheri Munajat seeking world peace and solidarity of the Muslim Ummah, according to organisers. About 7,152 devotees from some 95 foreign countries, including India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Egypt, Jordan, Algeria, Oman, Yemen, Sudan, Palestine, Tunisia, Bahrain, France, Kuwait, Somalia, Kenya, Germany, Switzerland, Canada, the United States, Iraq and Iran are taking part in the congregation, said the organizers.A five-tier security system is already in place to ensure peaceful holding of the event," the DC said.Meanwhile, two more devotees died on Friday night. The namaz-e-janaza of the two was held at the Ijtema ground after Fazr prayers on Saturday.President Md. Abdul Hamid, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, ministers, MPs, political leaders and senior officials are expected to join the final prayers along with millions of devotees.Bangladesh Nationalist Party Chairperson Khaleda Zia is unlikely to join the Akheri Munajat, according to party sources. She (Khaleda) is expected to join the final prayers from her Gulshan residence in city. Movement of vehicles on the Dhaka-Mymensingh highway and Tongi-Kaliganj road will remain suspended from 3:00am on Sunday for the concluding prayers, Police Super of Gazipur Mohammad Harun-ur Rashid told journalists.Besides, he said movement of all modes of vehicles from Abdullahpur to airport will also remain suspended. On Saturday, huge number of devotees, both from home and abroad, also continued to converge on the Ijtema venue for hearing the sermons from Islamic scholars.The second phase of Ijtema is scheduled to be held from January 15-17 on the same venue. Since 2011, Bishwa Ijtema is being held in two phases. Loudspeakers have been set up at all directions beyond the ijtema ground to facilitate people to listen as well as to participate in the Akheri Munajat.The Ijtema formally began with "Ambayan" (general sermon) after Fazr prayers at dawn on Friday. On Saturday, the second day of the Ijtema, passed off through discussions on various issues, including teachings of Islam and supremacy of Allah. The eminent Islamic scholars, in their sermons, have stressed on following the guidance of the holy Quran and the Sunnah. The sermons were translated into different languages of the world.
College student shot at in city

Staff Reporter :

A college student was shot at after two groups of students locked in clashes centering to have seats at a tea stall in front of the Ideal College in the city's Dhanmondi on Saturday afternoon at around 12.30 pm.

The bullet hit student was identified as Naimur Rashid Nabil, 18, inhabitant of Kalabhagn and a student of XII of the college.

He was admitted to the Dhaka Medical College and Hospital (DMCH).

A bullet was pierced at his heel of the right leg, the police official said.




Bangabandhu`s Homecoming Day today

The historic Homecoming Day of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman will be observed on Sunday. On January 10 in 1972, Bangabandhu returned to independent and sovereign Bangladesh after over nine and half months' captivity in a Pakistan jail. Bangabandhu was subjected to inhuman torture in the Pakistan jail where he had been counting moments for the execution of his death sentence that was pronounced in a farcical trial.Bangabandhu inspired the Bangalee nation. He was the inspiration of the freedom fighters.Under his undaunted leadership, the Bangalee nation earned the ultimate victory through the war. The defeated Pakistani rulers were finally compelled to release Bangabandhu from jail. The victory of the Bangalees attained its fulfilment with his release. The ruling Awami League (AL), its associate and front organisations and various socio-political organisations have chalked out elaborate programmes to mark the day.The programmes include hoisting of the national and party flags atop its all offices at 6.30 am, placing wreaths at the portrait of Bangabandhu at Bangabandhu Bhaban in Dhanmondi in the city at 7am.Awami League will also hold a discussion at Suhrawardy Udyan on Monday at 2:30 pm where Prime Minister and AL president Sheikh Hasina will join as the chief guest.President Abdul Hamid and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina have issued separate messages marking the day.In a message the President said, " Let us advance our country imbued with patriotism and liberation war-this should be our pledge in the Homecoming Day of Bangabandhu this year." In her message the Prime Minister urged all to come forward to build a 'Sonar Bangla' as dreamt by the Father of the Nation where there will be no difference the rich and the poor, and equal opportunity of prosperity will be available for all.
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NEWS AND VIEWS THAT IMPACT LIMITED CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT



"There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with

power to endanger the public liberty." - - - - John Adams


The Gay Courier has been established to provide news, information and info on, from and about the gay community, and other social events and happenings from around the world, from all sorts of sources, to all who are interested in this news, information and info! The postings are as is, and all copyrights and or ownerships are and remain with the original copyright-holder and or owner!
If you are looking for the new Immoral Minority posts, you should know that they can be found here at our new home Please stop by to get caught up on politics, join the conversations, or simply check out the new digs.
Monet rahapelien ystavat ovat viime vuosina loytaneet netticasinot ja olleet ihmeissaan. Verrattuna kotimaisen Veikkauksen kivijalkarahapeleihin puhutaan aivan eri tason palautusprosenteista ja lisaksi pelaaminen on aarimmaisen helppoa ja turvallista. Netticasinoiden maara on tana paivana todella suuri ja niita loytyy jokaiseen lahtoon, suurin ongelma aloittelevalla pelaajalla onkin tehda valinta siita, minka netticasinon valitsee. Kaikkien netticasinoiden mainospuheet naet lupaavat kauniita asioita ja niiden lapinakeminen on tietysti tarkeaa. Nyrkkisaantona voidaan kuitenkin jo kattelyssa todeta, etta jos valitsemasi netticasino on lisensoitu ETA-alueella, sen kanssa ei tule olemaan ongelmia, ellei niita itse jarjesta. Kay tutustumassa parhaisiin netticasinoihin osoitteessa www.ilmaiskierroksia.info!

Ensimmainen nyrkkisaanto on siis varmistaa, etta valitsemallasi netticasinolla on ETA-alueen lisenssi. Suurimmassa osassa tapauksista se on Maltan eli MGA:n lisenssi. Myos Viron, Englannin ja Gibraltarin lisensseja nakyy ja naissa valvonta on jopa Maltaa tiukempaa. Lopputulema on kuitenkin se, etta ETA-alueen lisenssi takaa suomalaisille verovapaat voitot seka sen, etta niita valvotaan kontrolloidusti. Maailmalla on iso nippu Curacaon lisenssilla toimivia netticasinoita ja niistakin suurin osa on laadukkaita. Ne eivat kuitenkaan ole suomalaisille asiakkaille verovapaita, joten emme suosittele niita.

Tana paivana markkinoille on ilmaantunut paljon ETA-alueella toimiva netticasinoita ilman rekisteroitymista. Jos tarkoitus on vain pelata yksittaisia pelikertoja, on varsin helppo suositella naita. Netticasinot ilman rekisteroitymista tarjoavat palvelun tunnistautumisen verkkopankin avainlukulistan avulla ja saman palvelun kautta tapahtuvat talletukset ja mahdolliset voittojen nostot silmanrapayksessa. Normaaleihin netticasinoihin pitaa asiakkaan rekisteroitya, tehda talletukset ja tunnistautua dokumenttien avulla. Tama on lisenssiehtojen mukainen kaytanto, eika kovinkaan monimutkainen, mutta silti monet asiakkaat haluavat yksinkertaista ja nopeaa palvelua. Toki normaalit netticasinot tarjoavat usein asiakkailleen laadukkaita talletusbonuksia ja erilaisia kampanjoita, joten kannattaa tarkkaan punnita, kumman ratkaisun valitsee. Kannattaa myos muistaa, etta tunnistautuminen tehdaan vain kerran, joten mikaan jatkuva riippakivi se ei ole.

Suomalaiset asiakkaat ovat netticasinoille tarkeita, joten kaikilla vahankin laadukkailla netticasinoilla on suomenkieliset sivut seka suomenkielinen asiakaspalvelu  suomenkielisyys kannattaakin ottaa netticasinoa valittaessa nyrkkisaannoksi. Vaikka tana paivana englanninkielisyys on harvoille ongelma, on suomenkielisten netticasinoiden maara niin valtava, etta suosittelemme niiden kayttoa. Rahansiirrot ovat tana paivana niin hyvassa mallissa, etta niiden kanssa tuskin tulee mitaan ongelmia. Kolme tarkeinta segmenttia: Suomalaiset verkkopankit, luottokortit (Visa, Mastercard) seka nettilompakot (Skrill, Neteller) loytyvat jokaisesta laadukkaasta netticasinosta. Viime vuosien trendiksi noussut verkkokauppa on kehittanyt rahansiirrot niin laadukkaiksi ja nopeiksi, etta niiden suhteen ei ole enaa vuosiin ollut ongelmia. Luonnollisesti netticasinot kayttavat naita samoja palveluita ja hyotyvat kehityksesta.

Naiden isojen linjojen jalkeen netticasinon valintaan vaikuttavat luonnollisesti tarjottavat tervetuliaisbonukset  uudet asiakkaat saavat tana paivana kovan kilpailun myota merkittavia etuja netticasinoilta ja niita kannattaa luonnollisesti vertailla. Erilaiset talletusbonukset, ilmaiskierrokset seka ilmaiset pelirahat tuovat suuriakin rahanarvoisia etuja ja niiden vertailu on ehdottomasti kannattavaa. Myoskaan useampien tilien avaaminen ja tervetuliaistarjousten kayttaminen ei missaan nimessa ole huono idea.

Kun edella mainitut asiat ovat mieleisia ja vaihtoehtoja on vielakin jaljella, mennaan jo nyansseihin. Toki pelivalikoima on yksi kriteeri, mutta taman paivan netticasinoissa tamakin asia on paasaantoisesti varsin samanlainen. Toki useamman samantasoisen netticasinon vertailussa kannattaa yleensa valita se, jossa on eniten peleja tarjolla. Vaikka omat suosikit loytyisivatkin useammasta, voi tulevaisuudessa mielenkiinto nousta joihinkin muihin peleihin ja silloin on tietysti mukavampaa, etta ne loytyvat valikoimista. Viimeisena voidaan nostaa esiin kaytettavyys  joidenkin netticasinoiden sivut ovat vilkkuvia, valkkyvia ja epakaytannollisia. Omaan silmaan ja kaytettavyyteen sopiva sivusto on luonnollisesti aina se paras valinta. Tarjonta netticasinoissa on tana paivana valtava ja jokaiselle loytyy varmasti se oma netticasino  onnea matkaan!
The sextoy market is growing quite rapidly in India right now.

Although it is not a big trend, it is a hot topic on the internet as it is secretly expanding its market.

In this article, we will focus on sextoy and introduce recommended sextoy for Indian beginners of sextoy by gender.

India, the birthplace of the Kama Sutra, is very strict about sex.

Also, premarital sex is basically not allowed. Therefore, there are many people who are sexually restricted.

But what happens when you continue to be sexually restricted?

Frustration may build up and you may end up taking your sexual stress out on your partner.

If you are able to adopt sextoy in a timely manner, you can get rid of those problems.

I want to have more exciting sex than Im having now.

I want more variation in masturbation

I want to get even stronger pleasure than I do on my own.

If you have any of these problems, please stay with me until the end.

What is sex toys for Indian?

Sextoy, as the name implies, is a toy used during sex and masturbation.

It is a generic term for vibrators, Egg-vibrators, Electric massagers, dildo, handcuffs and condoms.

They are used to make regular sex more exciting or to make masturbation more pleasurable.

Because sextoy is very stimulating, it can help you to get rid of the problems and frustrations of being in a rut of sex with your partner for a long time, or if you are unhappy with the lack of pleasure in sex with your partner.

The ability to satisfy your desires with movement, texture, and size, which cannot be done by a normal human being, can help you to be satisfied with sex and, as a result, improve your relationship with your partner.

It is also said to help improve sexual dysfunction (inability to get an erection or ejaculate) and difficulty in feeling during sex (insensitivity), which is attracting more attention than in the past.

In recent years, the demand for sextoy has increased due to the spread of smartphones and the Internet and the increasing number of people using online shopping.

Even those who are concerned about the appearance of sextoy (and find it difficult to purchase) can now easily obtain it by using mail order.

In the case of online shopping, most of the stores have taken steps to ensure that the contents of the products delivered to you are not revealed, so you can purchase them without your family members knowing.

Until a while ago, you had to go to the store where the adult goods were sold to buy them, so it was quite a hurdle to overcome.

Also, many people may have an image that sextoy is somehow embarrassing to own.

But nowadays, some of them are so stylish and cute that you cant believe they are sextoy at a glance.

More and more people are using them for travel and outdoor use because they are not too bulky and are suitable for carrying around.

Sextoy situation in India

Before introducing the recommended sextoy for Indians, lets talk about one of the sextoy situations in India in recent years.

In India, due to the high concentration of population, the following six cities have particularly high sales of sextoy in India.

Mumbai

Kolkata

Bangalore

Delhi

Chennai

Hyderabad

These cities account for roughly 70 percent of sextoy sales in India.

In the future, the percentage of sextoy use will gradually increase in other cities in India as well.

If you never talk about sextoy publicly, that girl in your neighborhood might be a sextoy user too.

If you are interested in sextoy, you dont have to suppress your desire for it.

What are Sextoys for beginner?

Among all sextoys, sextoy for beginners are vibrators, dildo, masturbators, Sex Lubricants, and condoms.

Sex Lubricants and condoms, which are familiar to people who have had sex, are also a great beginners sextoy.

I will explain the details of each toy later, but there are many sextoy products that are painful to use and can only be used after some anal expansion.

I assume that the Indian readers of this article are people who have not had much experience with sextoy.

If such people use professional sextoy suddenly, they are at risk of injury or trauma.

Therefore, to introduce sextoy, you need to start with a beginners version and gradually become familiar with it.

Advantages of using sextoy for Indians

There are three advantages of using sextoy for Indians

You can masturbate in a wide variety of ways.

Can have stimulating sex

Can develop new sexual zones

If you try to masturbate with your own fingers or hands, it tends to be a pattern.

However, with sextoy, you can easily masturbate in a variety of ways.

You will definitely be fascinated by the attraction of new stimulation.

Also, your daily sex life will be more exciting than ever.

There are many things in sextoy that are visually stimulating and give you a strong and intense feeling of pleasure.

This allows you to see your partners promiscuity in a way that you wouldnt normally see it.

When you are in a relationship, sex with your partner may become a pattern, but it can also eliminate these problems.

It can also lead to the development of new sexual zones (which is the training of sexual stimulation to allow you to feel orgasms).

For more information on the development of new sexual zones, see the following articles

[Women's Erogenous Zone]How to find and develop, 7 hidden sexual zones !![In India] In this issue, we will dissect the female erogenous zone! ..." Many of you may be like that. Men, in particular, shou...

Thus, the use of sextoy can only be a good thing for the men and women of India.

Sextoy for beginner men in India

So, lets continue with the recommended goods for Indian sextoy beginners.

For ease of understanding, we will introduce them by gender. Lets start with the men!

The following five goods are recommended for novice Indian sextoy men

Masturbator

Cock rings

Love Doll

Sex Lubricants

Toys for the prostate

Lets check each one in detail.

Masturbator

The masturbator is a sextoy for men that elaborately reproduces a womans vagina, mouth, and anus, and is one of the most popular sextoy products.

It is used by men to masturbate, and it is popular because it provides stronger stimulation and pleasure more easily than using hands.

Most are made of good quality silicone, and their softness is something that cannot be achieved with ones own hands.

They can provide stronger pleasure than a real womans vagina, so be careful not to overuse them. (You wont be able to have an orgasm in a womans vagina anymore.)

Again Male masturbators are a wonderful toy. I do not need any favourite timing, bothersome bargaining. You do not have to worry too much.

Revolutionize your masturbation time! ! !

Made in Japan is a wonderful kinky toy.#sextoysindia #SexToyIndia #Japanhttps://t.co/4k70QGzoTP pic.twitter.com/tRVdxTKPpa   SEXToys India PR  (@SextoysIndia) November 12, 2018

Some of them are disposable, while others can be washed and used over and over again, so its fun to buy a few to use depending on your mood.

If you want to know more about masturbator, please click here

Really pleasant male masturbation and how to do it Are you in a rut with your daily masturbation routine? I'm going to show you five ways men masturbate that you might ...

[For Beginners] How to choose and use a male masturbator without fail Gentlemen.Have you ever used a masturbator? The person who sees this article is probably the one who has not experien...

Cock Ring

A cock ring is literally a ring-shaped sextoy that is worn on a mans penis.

It maintains an erection by binding the penis with a ring of rubber and blocking blood flow.

It is sometimes used as an accessory to be worn on the penis, and may be made of metal or plastic as well as rubber.

In some cases, cock rings have parts or vibrators attached to them that stimulate the vagina, so they kill two birds with one stone, giving a woman pleasure while maintaining an erection.

Cock rings are also sometimes used to treat erectile dysfunction.

It can help with erectile dysfunction, where the penis doesnt get hard when you get an erection or doesnt last long when you try to insert it.

Men who are prone to breakage or who are unsure of the hardness and size of their erections can use a cock ring to increase the size of their penis and maintain an erection for a longer period of time.

Cock rings vary in price from around RS700 to over RS2000 with a vibrator function.

Some of them do not fit your penis, so you should check the size of the cock ring before you buy.

You should know the size of your partners or your own penis when it is erect.

[Penis enlargement] What is a cock ring? Types and usage Cock rings can make your penis bigger and harder. It also makes sex with women more fulfilling and increases your sat...

Love Doll

Love dolls, also known as Dutchwives, are dolls with the appearance of a woman who can experience simulated sex.

There are dolls that look like a woman, but they have no face and only have their breasts and lower torso cut off, and some dolls are so realistic that they can actually be mistaken for real women.

Some expensive dolls can cost more than 1 million yen, and the quality of the doll is easily influenced by the price.

The higher the price, the higher the quality of the doll will be, the closer it will be to the real woman, and the cheaper the doll will be, the less elaborate it will be, making it look like a real doll! Something is wrong! That is also true.

You cant go wrong if you choose a balance between price and taste.

There are stores that allow you to make custom-made love dolls, so you can create a girl of your choice.

You can make a girl of your choice. You can start with inexpensive love dolls at first, and once you get used to it, you can try custom-made love dolls.

If you want to know more about Love doll, please click here

Thorough explanation of the charm of sex dolls! Have you ever heard of sex dolls that are used primarily for pseudo-sex purposes? It is a doll that is quite close to...

Sex lubricants

Sex lubricants are used as a substitute for lubricating fluid during sex or as a lubricant for men to use masturbator rules.

It is not uncommon for women to have difficulty getting wet, depending on their physical condition, or to have difficulty getting wet due to their constitution.

Forcing the penis into the vagina at such times can cause painful intercourse.

There are various types of Sex Lubricants, some with a warming effect, some with a cooling effect, and some with a scent.

Changing the Sex Lubricant used during play is recommended as a good sex accent.

If you want to learn more about Sex Lubricants, click here.

What is sex lubricant?Explain the difference and usage of each ingredient The word "sex toy" may seem like a hurdle to overcome, but lotion is actually one of the most familiar sex toys. Many...

Toys for the Prostate

Another sextoy for men is prostate toys.

The most famous prostate toys include Enemagra, which was originally a prostate massager developed by an American urologist to treat an enlarged prostate line.

Modern prostate toys are imitations of Enemagra that have spread as sextoy for men.

Many people think of prostate toys as being used by gay men, but in fact they are often used by straight men.

What is the prostate?

The prostate is an organ found only in men. It is a walnut-sized organ located deep in the pelvis, just below the bladder, and its primary role is to protect and nourish sperm.

You cannot touch the prostate gland from outside the body, but you can touch it by inserting a finger or sextoy through the anus.

By inserting a finger or sextoy through the anus and touching the prostate and developing it, you can feel intense orgasms.

Orgasms felt in the prostate are mainly dry orgasms, which are orgasms that do not involve ejaculation. (You can also feel orgasms with ejaculation through prostate stimulation.)

The prostate is called the male G-spot, and dry orgasms can be much more intense than ejaculation.

Therefore, men who are able to develop a prostate can become addicted to the pleasure.

sextoy for beinner women in India

The following are the recommended goods for Indian women who are new to sextoy.

The following three are recommended for use by women who are new to sextoy.

Vibrator.

Dildo

Electric Masserger

Lets check out what each one is in detail.

If you want to check out womens toys, click here.

[BEST25]Sex Toys for Women in IndiaThat Can Help You Have an Orgasm There are many women who pretend to feel orgasm during sex. But don't worry, you don't have to pretend to feel orgasm...

Vibrators

A vibrator is a sextoy that vibrates with an Egg-Vibrator to provide stimulation and is often referred to simply as a vibrator.

Some vibrate as well as rotate, and there are many variations of sextoy.

It is quite a popular sextoy, and is well recognized by people who do not know much about sextoy.

Its usage is similar to that of a massager, but it is more compact and easier to carry than a massager, and many of them look as cute as a lipstick or a macaroon, so they are popular among women.

For a while, a famous influencer on twitter said, This is good! You may have heard of the topic of this article by introducing the recommended vibrators.

Vibrators are great for women to use on their own, but they are also recommended for men who have difficulty satisfying women with sex.

Since it is powered by electricity, it is far less tiring than moving your hands by yourself.

This makes it easier to satisfy a woman with sex because you can caress her for longer than usual.

Vibrators are mainly used on the female side, but they can also be used on men.

When used on men, they are used to attack the nipples and glans, and in both cases it is recommended to wear a condom for hygiene reasons.

Introducing how to use the vibrator, its purpose, and how to choose it! Vibrator uses the vibrations caused by the rotation of the motor to provide stimulation. It is one or two of the most...

Dildo

A dildo is a model sextoy made to mimic a male penis.

It can be made of silicone, elastomer (think of it as a material similar to PVC), metal or glass.

A dildo can be used by a man for his female partner during sex, or by a woman for masturbation to get pleasure from it.

They are mainly inserted into women, but some can be used in the male anus as well.

It is sometimes used synonymously with vibrators, but the vibrator is not the same thing as a vibrating device.

A model of a penis that does not vibrate is a dildo.

Some of them have suction cups that can be attached to the floor or wall so that you can enjoy realistic masturbation without using your hands.

For fun, there is a dildo made in the shape of your partners penis.

This one is also popular as a gift, and if youve been together for a long time and are having trouble finding a gift for your partner, you might want to pick one.

To learn more about dildo, please click here.

What is Dildo: Orgasms with Dildos for Men and Women A dildo is a model of a male organ that is used by women for masturbation and by men to stimulate the prostate gland. Th...

Electric Masserger

A Electric Masserger is a hand-held electric massager, also known as a handheld massager, and can usually be purchased at electronics stores.

It was originally designed to relieve stiff shoulders and back pain, so the hurdle of buying one in a physical store is quite low.

Many people may have seen or used it in some form or another, as it is often installed in leisure hotels.

Such a massager is highly recommended for beginners because it is easy for women to get pleasure from it when they use it during masturbation.

It is larger than Egg-Vibrator and vibrations are stronger than those of Egg-Vibrators and vibrators, so even just hitting the clitoris can give you a great deal of pleasure.

For those women who have never had an orgasm during sex with their man, the massager may be a good way to get a feel for what it feels like to have an orgasm.

It looks and feels like an electric massager, so you wont have to feel awkward if your roommate finds out.

If you are in a rut of having sex with your partner, if you want to feel an orgasm through masturbation, or if you are thinking of using a sextoy, why dont you try it from a simple massager?

To learn more about Electric Masserger, click here.

What is a massager? Introducing types, selection methods, and usage Originally, the Magic-wand vibrator and the massage machine were sold as a home massage machine used for the back and th...

How to choose a sextoy for Indian

Now that weve covered the different types of sextoy, heres how to choose one.

Especially if you are trying sextoy for the first time, pay attention to the following three points:  Does the size fit you (the partner)?

Does the size fit you (your partner)?

Is the environment able to produce sound without problems?

Price range

First of all, the choice of size is quite important.

Most sextoy are used against or inserted into the genitals, but the genitals are very delicate organs for both men and women.

For this reason, using an inappropriate size may cause damage.

Secondly, the environment should be able to produce sound without problems.

Some sextoys not only wear, but also rotate and vibrate. Its easier to get pleasure from something that moves than something that doesnt, but the fact that it moves means that the internal rotors make some noise.

If you live in a house with thin walls or if you have roommates, you may not be able to concentrate because of the noise, so it is best to choose one that is silent or has a low noise level.

Especially in India, where many people live with their families, it is very important that you dont have to worry about sound when you use it.

Finally, there is the price range.

The price range of sextoy ranges widely, from around RS500 at the cheapest to RS10,000 or more at the highest.

Its good to consider how much money you can afford and how much you want to buy.

Do you want your family to not find out about sextoy?

I live with my family and want to use sextoy without them finding out! If you are a man, you should buy a camouflage sextoy that does not look like a sextoy at first glance.

For men, there are many masturbators that do not look like a sextoy, and for women, there are vibrators that only look like cosmetics.

If you choose such a type, youll be safe in case your family members find out.

How to buy sextoys in India

The best way to purchase sextoy is through online shopping.

For more information on how to purchase sextoy, please see the article below.

Sextoy is one of them.

Therefore, you can easily get sextoy in India by using online shopping.

SexToysINDIA is a long established and stable sextoy store and you can have sextoy delivered to any place in India.

They also offer cash on delivery, so those who are worried about shopping with a credit card do not have to worry.

Of course, the latest security is in place, so your information will not be taken out when you use your credit card.

To begin with, many people may be concerned about whether they are legally allowed to purchase sextoy.

ikmAs it turns out, its not illegal.

Right now, it is not open to the public because the Indian adult market is still in the development stage, but it will gradually spread from now on.

Take advantage of sextoy and open the door to new pleasures and culture.

Cautions for Indians using sextoy

When using sextoy, keep the following three things in mind

Keep sex toys clean

Watch out for electrical leakage

Beware of the heat generated by the body while using a sex toy

As I mentioned earlier, many sextoy products are used for the delicate zone.

Therefore, it is most important to keep the sextoy itself clean. It is very important to keep the sextoy itself clean, because if a slight scratch is created by friction, bacteria can enter and breed there.

It is safe to wear a condom when using the masturbator, just in case.

In addition, many sextoy devices are powered by a power source, so if they are not waterproof, there is a possibility of electric shock or malfunction due to wetness.

Some may even develop heat during continuous use. If the fever becomes too much, you may get burned, so be careful.

If you get a fever during use, stop driving the sextoy immediately and refrain from using it.

You will enjoy sex more if you keep it safe and use it correctly.

Summary

What did you think?

In this article, we have introduced the recommended sextoy for the beginners of sextoy in India.

The sextoy market is growing rapidly in India and it will continue to grow steadily in the future.

As India is a rather closed-minded country, it can be difficult to be open about ones sexual habits and values.

However, being faithful to ones desires by properly dissolving ones sexual desire is very effective for ones physical and mental health.

If this is your first time to learn about sextoy, or if you are interested in using sextoy, why not give it a try?

Indian Sextoys for ur best! will introduce you to sextoy and other trivia about sextoy, sexuality, and sexuality for men and women.

I want to read more! If you think its a great idea, please bookmark it.
CARBONDALE  Most of the members of Faith Temple Church of God In Christ are kneeling in front of chairs, heads bowed, praying aloud or giving some sort of response to the pastor, who is also kneeling, barely visible, in front of a chair at the head of the room.

The pastor, Elder Burke A. Cawthon Sr., leads the dozen people in praying for a myriad of concerns: For children, the community and state, the president and other people and concerns.

When the prayer ends and everyone returns to sit in their seats, he gives a small sermon, talking in part about the demon-possessed boy in Mark 9:14-29. He walks those gathered through what happened when Jesus cast out the evil spirit, and his disciples were unable to. (Though many versions of the Bible leave off the mentioning of the word "fasting," the King James Version reads, "And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting.")

It's the beginning of the new year, and as Faith Temple has done for the past 36 years, its membership is turning attention to fasting, prayer and seeking God. Fasting is described as abstaining from food and/or drink as an element of private or public religious devotion, according to BibleStudyTools.com.

The one thing that Cawthon said he has learned about fasting is "that there are positive results that will come out of it, every time."

He points to testimonies from members claiming healing from certain sicknesses and deliverance from such conditions as financial challenges and has seen members becoming spiritually stronger.

"We see gifts in the church," he said. "We see the strength in the people. We see more of a jubilant, celebratory type of attitude among the people. Strength to endure temptations that will come in life.  You develop a spiritual strength that will help you endure things, whether it's in the spiritual realm or the natural side of things."

Experiencing personal triumphs

He first began to believe in the power of fasting and prayer during the start of these January consecrations at his church, decades ago; Cawthon said he was unemployed and in need of work. He said he fasted and prayed, asking God for a job. His prayer was answered, as he found work with the city of Carbondale, working there for 35 years until his retirement in March 2015.

He and his wife, Glenda, have also witnessed the power of prayer and fasting, as he noted when they prayed over the protection and safe return of the couple's son, Darius, then serving in Afghanistan as part of the U.S. Army. Cawthon believes God answered the couple's prayers; he said his son told them his work sometimes had him surrounded by armed guards.

Cawthon also believes that God heard his prayers to heal his mother from three bouts with cancer over a 10-year period. Approaching 80 in April, she is fine and well, he said. He also believes his praying led him to hear better from God, whom he feels led him to start the Carbondale Unity Felllowship Service, an alliance of ministers, and hold "Worship in the Wind" services outside in the parking lot in front of his church.

Cawthon, who has led the church since 2011, is a firm believer in fasting and prayer and its ability to 'quicker' get the attention of God.

"Prayer changes things," Cawthon said. "Prayer can change anything.  Prayer offered as faith  is the most valuable resource that we have, as a believer in Christ, to communicate with God."

Not the only believer in fasting

He said he fellowships with other pastors and churches who also believe in fasting and prayer. Others churches, like Benton's New Life Church of God, have also held fasts in the past and at others churches, like one in Marion, the subject is taught and individuals lead their own private fasts.

Though January is consecrated for the special fasting and prayer, Faith Temple members fast throughout the year  Tuesdays and Fridays, he said.

Faith Temple practitioners are encouraged to fast from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m., when they can break their personal fast. During the weeks of consecration leading up to revival, members meet at the church at 6:30 p.m. for the corporate breaking of the fast. Those who are taking prescribed medications, he tells ... "if you have faith to believe God and not take your medicine, so be it."

For those who take medications but desire to fast, Cawthon suggests they rise early, around 5 or 6 a.m., and eat a light breakfast and take their medication, "and begin to pray, begin to start your fast."

"God," he said, "will honor that."

Fasting gaining attention

Over the past few years, several books have been published on fasting and prayer, suggesting and prescribing ways to do it. Jentezen Franklin, in his 2008 book  "Fasting: Opening the Door to a Deeper, More Intimate, More Powerful Relationship With God"  describes several types of fasts, including a full fast in which the individual drinks only liquids, over a predetermined number of days; 'The Daniel Fast,' in which one abstains from meat, breads and sweets; and a three-day or a partial fast.

"The Daniel Plan"  the name of a book written by 'Purpose-Driven Life' author Rick Warren and medical physicians Drs. Daniel Amen and Mark Hyman  bills itself as a healthy lifestyle program. It is based on the Biblical story of Daniel, who as a Jewish captive under the authority of King Nebuchadnezzar, refused to eat the rich foods being served on the king's table. He, asked instead, to be served healthier foods, and after a 10-day period, looked healthier than those eating the foods from Nebuchadnezzar's table.

Sometimes, people craft fasts that do not involve food, but lead them to abstain from something considered to have too much influence in one's life.

Cindy Sifford, Youth and Discipleship secretary with the Church of God Illinois State Office, said she has heard of a youth leader there asking young people to refrain from using technology and social media for some time, maybe giving up texting on a Monday, television on a Tuesday and so on for the week.

"A lot of time, people will do it if there is a strong prayer need or illness or relationship issue or just something that you put more emphasis on than your daily prayer," Sifford said.

The group also is re-emphasizing fasting, noting on its calendar that Jan. 11 to 31 is the '21 Days of Prayer and Fasting,' observed statewide.
Southern Illinoiss high school juniors may have spent the past two-and-a-half years preparing to take the ACT college-entrance exam, but if state policy holds, theyll be taking the rival SAT instead this spring.

After offering the ACT for 15 years as part of the Prairie State Achievement Examination, the Illinois State Board of Education has agreed to contract with College Board to offer the SAT for free to Illinoiss 11th graders. The three-year contract will cost the state $14.3 million -- $1.4 million less than the ACTs proposal. ACT has filed a protest with the state, contesting the new contract.

While the matter rests in the hands of policymakers in Springfield, Southern Illinois educators said this state of limbo leaves students in the lurch.

Here we are two months away. Its just very unfortunate, said Greg Goins, superintendent of Frankfort Community Unit School District 168 in West Frankfort. And a lot of kids are going to pay the price, Im afraid.

And Goins said if College Boards contract is affirmed, itll be yet another transition for faculty, who have grown accustomed to helping students study for the ACT.

Further confusing matters, the K12 budget that Gov. Bruce Rauner approved this past summer did not include a line item to pay for any college-entrance exams. That leaves funding at the mercy of ongoing state budget stalemate. At Carbondale Community High School, Superintendent Steve Murphy said hes operating under the assumption that no test will be offered by the state this spring.

(Students still are free to take whichever test they want to  as long as they pay for it themselves.)

The confusion has led some districts in Southern Illinois to try to move forward with ACT testing anyway  albeit on students dimes.

Murphy said students will continue doing ACT prep during classes and after school. Administrators are meeting with juniors on Tuesday to encourage them to sign up for the ACT on one of the upcoming testing dates.

In Carterville, high school Principal Todd Rogers said ACT officials contacted him to set up a school-wide testing date. Hes moving forward, in the hopes that most students will choose to take the test.

Its frustrating, but in the meantime, were going to try to best prepare our kids for the ACT if they choose to take that test, he said. When we get more definitive information about when and how to take the SAT, well proceed from there.

On the other side of the admissions process, Southern Illinois Universitys Interim Provost Susan Ford said the changeover makes little difference for SIU personnel. The university accepts either the SAT or ACT. And while lack of preparation may skew Illinois students SAT scores for the next couple years, within the state, admissions personnel still will be comparing apples to apples.

The real issue, Ford said, is the impact of not offering a free college-entrance exam at all this year. The ACT costs either $39.50 or $56.50 to administer. Waivers are available in some cases, but Ford said the added cost is bound to negatively impact low-income students, who may not realize theyre eligible for merit-based scholarships until they get their scores back.

Its not inexpensive, she said. There are a lot of families that will just decide, We dont think youre going to go to college. Were not going to pay that expense. And that might be the kid that got the (high score).

To me, thats the crime. Thats the concern, she added.
Attending one of Southern Illinoiss community colleges may be that much more difficult for financially-strapped students this semester.

With the ongoing budget stalemate in Springfield, none of Southern Illinoiss colleges have committed to fronting Monetary Award Program funding to students this semester.

The state-sponsored MAP grant supports Illinoiss neediest students, helping them pay for classes, books, gas and living expenses. Lawmakers have yet to appropriate funding for the program this fiscal year, leaving students without support since the start of the school year.

Rend Lake College, Southeastern Illinois College and Shawnee Community College will not credit students accounts for the state grant. A John A. Logan College spokesman said college officials still are considering whether or not to do so.

I know theyre going to do everything they can for (students), but a full decision hasnt been reached yet, said JALC spokesman Steve OKeefe. The college fronted the money to students during fall semester.

OKeefe did not elaborate on how college administrators would support students left without their grant money.

For the regions other colleges, the lack of state funding for higher education has made resources extra scarce this year.

Normally we would front these grants, but this is not a typical year, said Terry Wilkerson, president of Rend Lake College. Students at the Ina-based college typically receive about $300,000 in MAP funding from the state.

None of the three colleges fronted money during fall semester either.

Administrators at Southeastern Illinois College in Harrisburg echoed Wilkersons concerns.

We need every penny weve got for cash flow to the general fund so we can keep things going and provide whats needed for our students, said Angie Wilson, SICs marketing coordinator.

Leveraging its more substantial resources, Southern Illinois University has agreed to credit students accounts this semester.

These grants are very important for a lot of students and make the difference between whether they can come back to school, SIU spokeswoman Rae Goldsmith said in October. Were doing this anticipating that when the fallout from the state budget is resolved, we will be reimbursed by the state.

During fall semester, 3,103 students received MAP grants for total cost of $5.9 million. Goldsmith said she anticipates similar numbers for spring semester.

A recent survey by the Illinois Student Assistance Commission found that about half of all colleges and universities that responded will front students grants this semester. The MAP program provided $373 million in income-based grants to Illinois students during the 2014-15 school year.
SPRINGFIELD  The Illinois House won't be meeting in Springfield next week as planned.

On Friday, House Speaker Michael Madigan sent a notice to his chamber canceling the two-day session next week. Madigan spokesman Steve Brown says the "workload was not there." House members are expected to return on Jan. 27, when Rauner is due to give his State of the State address.

The Illinois Senate will still meet next week. Senators are due back on Wednesday.

The schedule changes come as Illinois enters its seventh month without a budget for the fiscal year that began last July.
CAIRO  The federal government has rejected Alexander County Housing Authority boards recommendation to hire Sesser Mayor Jason Ashmore as its new executive director.

Board Chairman Andy Clarke said he received a call on Friday from a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development official in Chicago informing him that the decision was being rejected.

We choose the superior candidate and I believe that with all my heart, Clarke said. Now what theyre doing with all their so-called concerns, they are jeopardizing the wellness and livelihoods of the citizens that rely on the Alexander County Housing Authority.

Clarke said he was livid about the decision. Ashmore said he applied for the job after reading about the housing authoritys troubles in The Southern Illinoisan, and felt like his combined leadership experience and financial expertise would be a good fit. He planned to remain mayor, and commute from Sesser to Cairo, which is about an hour and 15 minute drive.

Concerns over residency

Clarke said part of HUDs initial verbal explanation for the denial was about the fact that Ashmore wasnt planning to relocate to Alexander County. A letter with more detailed information about the reason for the denial is expected to be mailed next week, according to the HUD official responsible for signing off on the new executive director.

Though Ashmore doesnt have any experience in public housing, Clarke said Ashmores leadership experience working in various state government positions  hes been employed locally by the Secretary of State and the Illinois Department of Transportation  and as mayor of Sesser, made him the most qualified of all applicants for the job.

Ashmore, 39, defeated incumbent Sesser Mayor Ned Mitchell in 2013 for that part-time elected position. Before that, he worked for the Secretary of States Marion Department of Motor Vehicles office from 2001 to 2004 as a public service representative. He was employed by IDOT from 2004 to February 2015, where he was last serving as assistant to the regional engineer. Ashmore was one of several state agency executives who lost their jobs after Gov. Bruce Rauner was sworn into office, in a cleaning house of non-union workers that is common during a change of administration.

Ashmore, who has a bachelors in business management from Mid-Continent University, has been without full-time employment since then. After being let go from IDOT, Ashmore said he wanted to take some time to focus on the mayors job and the financial situation facing Sesser. Ashmore said the town of less than 2,000 people was more than $1 million in debt when he came into office, and that he believes his experience working to stabilize the budget would serve him well in the Alexander County job.

You know, a lot of those issues are similar to Cairo, on a different scale, but stuff weve faced and still are facing, he said.

Black board members not present

Ashmore was one of four people interviewed by telephone for the job in December by three of five Alexander County Housing Authority board members, Clarke said. Board members Judson Childs and Irene McBride, the tenant representatives on the board, were both absent at the Dec. 15 special meeting of the board.

It was not clear to the newspaper by deadline why Childs, who in 2007 was elected Cairos first African-American mayor, and McBride  the only two black members of the board  were absent from the meeting at which Clarke said a consensus was reached to select Ashmore and forward his name to HUD for approval. Attempts to reach Childs and McBride Friday evening were unsuccessful, and Clarke said he did not know why there were not in attendance.

Why HUD's involved

HUD doesnt generally involve itself in the selection of housing authority directors by the boards of housing authorities, which are units of local government.

But HUD, specifically Maurice McGough, HUDs Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity Region V director or his designee, must sign off on the boards appointment of executive director for the Alexander County Housing Authority (ACHA) under a voluntary compliance agreement entered into between the board and HUD, effective in December.

McGough, reached at his office in Chicago on Friday, declined comment, but said a letter is being mailed to the housing authority early next week spelling out his reasons for the decision.

The compliance agreement between the housing authority and HUD states that it represents a voluntary and full settlement of a Title VI compliance review conducted by HUD in May 2014. Following that review, HUD cited the housing authority for numerous Title VI violations for alleged discriminatory practices in the housing of black residents  the housing authority was accused of segregating black residents into the family housing units in the worst condition  and for alleged discriminatory practices in the hiring, promotion and assignments of black employees.

Title VI, enacted as part of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964, prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color and national origin in programs and activities that receive federal funding. Though locally governed, housing authorities are nearly entirely funded by federal HUD program dollars. HUD's approval of the executive director is one of several requirements listed in the agreement.

The housing authority board has also entered into a voluntary compliance agreement to settle a Section 504 compliance review, which included citations of providing inadequate housing stock for people with disabilities required by the Rehabilitation Act of 1973.

Clarke said he believes the housing authority board has followed the rules outlined in the compliance agreement in its selection of Ashmore. Clarke said he believes this because in November, HUDs Region V Housing Field Office Director, Bill Wilkins, who is charged with overseeing public housing authorities in Illinois, attended a board meeting in Cairo and reviewed applications received for the job. Of the roughly 16 or so applications the housing authority received, Wilkins flagged eight of them as having met minimum qualifications, Clarke said.

Ashmore was among those eight, so Clarke said he doesnt understand how HUD could initially say Ashmore was qualified, and then reject his appointment.

Wilkins, interviewed by phone at his office on Friday, said he wasnt signing off on any of those eight candidates, but simply trying to help the process along and lend his expertise by giving all the applicants a cursory review. Wilkins represents public housing, and the compliance agreement is with fair housing. Both are units of HUD with different roles. Wilkins said he may have erred in lending a hand, as his efforts were apparently misinterpreted by the board

But even at that, Wilkins did question why the housing authority would interview only four of the eight candidates he flagged as potentially qualified.

He also noted that one of the questions asked specifically of each candidate was about whether he or she would be willing to relocate to Alexander County. Why would you put that question in there and then start a debate about whether they will live there or not? Wilkins asked.

Hiring Ashmore anyway?

Ashmore responded to the interview question that he would remain in Sesser, but would be willing to rent an apartment in the county if it would be helpful for him to have a place to stay on occasion during the workweek.

But both Ashmore and Clarke said they didnt think living in the county was necessary to performance on the job. I dont think thats an issue because I will give them 110 percent and I think thats all that matters, Ashmore said.

Clarke said its his desire to hire Ashmore immediately even without approval from HUDs Fair Housing office. He said its his desire to vote as soon as possible to hire him, and that he would very much lobby the other members of the board to do the same. It's not entirely clear to the newspaper what would happen if the board defies HUD, but it would likely represent a violation of the agreement, and unravel the settlement reached.
Hundreds of howls were heard on Friday as multiple hunters clothed in camouflage gear walked through the Orangeburg County Fairgrounds at the 51st Annual Grand American Coon Hunt to fellowship and shop with vendors from all over the United States.

Eddie Carter of Garland, North Carolina said hes been attending the Grand American for at least 10 years.

He left his hometown around 4 a.m. Friday to travel to Orangeburg and will leave this morning to head back to Garland.

Its just where hunters unite. Fishermen tell life stories. Hunters do the same thing, Carter said.

He said he doesnt attend the actual hunt, but comes simply to fellowship with his fellow hunters.

Hunters are a big family. We get here; we unite whether we know each other or not. You can talk for five minutes, and youll know everything about them, Carter said. "We swap stories, fellowship, and look.

Theyve got some really good dogs here."

Chad Caine traveled to Orangeburg from Strawberry Plains, Tennessee to attend the Coon Hunt.

Caine has attended the event for the past three years.

I enjoy all of the hunting gear that we get to look at, he said, adding that he enjoys hunting in the "flatlands."

Wayne Knowlton of New Zion is a 1994 winner of the Grand American Coon Hunt.

I was at the first coon hunt that Grand American ever started, Knowlton said.

People are often under the wrong impression about where the first coon hunt started, he said.

They thought it started right here (Orangeburg), but it didnt. It started two years outside of town at a house out in the country. Then, they got the fairgrounds and moved it here, Knowlton said.

He said he enjoys watching the dogs performance, meeting new people and winning.

There are a lot of new people, old acquaintances and old friends from years, Knowlton said.

Molly McDaniel of Orangeburg, who works for the Orangeburg County Fair, said she comes out to the coon hunt to help campers set up.

This is one of our largest events here at the fairgrounds. We have people that come from all over the United States. Our campers have come in this year from Missouri, Nevada, Tennessee, Alabama, Florida -- we have people from everywhere this year, McDaniel said.

Shopping is her favorite part of the coon hunt experience.

If you have never come out and experienced it, you need to come out and experience it. It is an experience everybody needs to go through. It is awesome, McDaniel said.

Jeff Shaver of Vincent, Ohio says hes been selling beef jerky at the Grand American Coon Hunt for more than 10 years. He doesnt participate in any of the activities at the Coon Hunt, but continues to come because he sells lots of beef jerky.

Curtis Denton of North Georgia said this is his first time attending the Grand American Coon Hunt. He said his number one reason for attending was to see the variety of dogs and to find breeders.

Denton also went to the treeing and bench show. Its nice to see a good dog work, he said.

He said he enjoyed each of the events and plans to return next year.

Reba Hughes of Orangeburg has entered her 8-year-old treeing walker, Ty, in the Grand American Coon Hunt and is trying to win the dog box and take home the title.

Ty won the Grand Night Champion title at the age of 2.

Hughes has been hunting since she was 12.

If I win, Im going to tell everybody I won it and get put in a magazine, she said, smiling.

Shes hunting against a lot of good dogs, Hughes said, adding, My dogs a good dog, too."

Reba's father, Timmy Hughes of Orangeburg, 45, said he has been attending the Grand American Coon Hunt ever since he was born. He enjoys competing.

We enjoy the adrenaline and winning. Im just a competitive person. The goal is always to win, he said.
The Orangeburg District of the United Methodist Church will host its annual leadership training on Sunday, Jan. 10, at Claflin University. Registration will begin at 3 p.m. in the W. Vernon Middleton Fine Arts Center. The event will offer leadership training sessions for all members of the United Methodist Church and others who hold or are interested in leadership positions within the church.

Session topics will address practical matters relevant to church mission/outreach opportunities, worship, youth ministry, multicultural advocacy and more.

The Orangeburg District is a member of the South Carolina Conference of the United Methodist Church. The South Carolina Conference has a rich history. It comprises churches of diverse congregations committed to ministering to others.

Claflin is affiliated with the United Methodist Church and a top-tier national liberal arts institution. The university is widely recognized for its outstanding academic programs and for providing an environment that enhances the spiritual development and growth of its students.

Parking and a shuttle service will be available in the Jonas T. Kennedy Health and Physical Education Center parking lot.

For more information, call 803-535-5462.
WASHINGTON -- So much of the time, we look at our blessed United States and seem to lose faith. But I have noticed something recently. This unaccustomed loss of faith is exaggerated when our judgments are limited to our country alone.

Forgive me a personal moment as I note that I am most unapologetically pro-America, while remembering that I have spent probably a good 70 percent of my life living overseas, reporting international issues. Thus, I write about American problems compared to those of other countries. (One of my wise friends always ends our discussions of our national problems by saying, "Compared to what?")

But I always eventually embrace the conclusion that it is not so much the comparison to other countries as it is an understanding of the basic human qualities -- the human nature -- that underlie our actions and attitudes.

Take our discussions on the violence toward women. Often I hear American women who have been raped or otherwise manhandled by men say something like, "Men in this country...." That is doubtless accurate when looking at the behavior of many men in New York, Los Angeles or Oklahoma City. But when you compare our rape statistics to those of Mumbai or Karachi or immigrant parts of England, we stand as an example of extraordinarily good male-female relationships.

Widely reported recently in the American press, in the wake of the shameful number of black men shot by mostly white police officers, have been complaints by victims prefaced with, "In this country ..." or "Only here ..." or "When slavery came to America."

Here we have the most misleading and most dangerously mistaken analysis possible, for it effectively denies the victims the solace and dignifying knowledge that they are part of a great sea change in American history and attitudes. In fact, by any possible measure, the U.S. is the least racially prejudiced country in the world and has done the most to erase prejudice.

When we look at race relations only inside America, it is easy to be frozen in one's own experience. When we rise above and beyond our necessarily limited view to look outward around the world, we are able to see such ugly practices everywhere. And that wider view gives us the space to see that we are not singularly targeted as evil, but that fear of "the other," far from being some uniquely American moral problem, is a broadly human crime. When we see it together, analyze it together and fight it together, it becomes a far less fearful human defect.

But it is perhaps America's important, and conflicted, attitudes about immigration that carry the most explosive potential.

The majority of American citizens seem to have decided that their country is utterly unique in its approach and intentions toward immigrants. Hear it in their repeated cries: "We are a country of immigrants! Immigrants made this country. We were made by open borders."

Except that America is, in fact, a nation of citizens -- people who have already made their commitment to this land. Open borders were never a belief of our founders.

And when we compare our openness to all others, well, there just is no comparison. America takes more refugees than the rest of the world put together. But the original American plan was demanding, indeed. Immigrants had to be healthy, had to have a sponsor here and had to study hard and prepare themselves for legal immigration. Citizenship took time.

Today, there is the notion on the part of more liberal Americans that foreigners need only walk across the border and sooner or later, they'll be granted amnesty. That is why we have between 11 million and 20 million illegal aliens waiting and expecting to be legalized. No wonder there is violence in their impatience to belong.

Now that we are already days into 2016, might we not pause and look at our singularly blessed and capable nation with a slightly new eye? A gimlet eye, if you will, one that stubbornly remembers the important reasons for our birth, that dismisses the unimportant historic ones and that realizes the modern-day definitions of ourselves are most accurate when employed in comparison to what other human beings have done.

This country is THE modern nation of the world. This country is, to a great extent, the Pilgrims' "City on a Hill," which they built with true religious piety, with collective parliamentary participation and with respect for all men. Simply because its virtues and values -- and political systems and structures -- are now spread to so many places on Earth, we are privileged to know its importance to mankind.

But we must always strive to do better, to not lose faith, as we mature as a nation.

-----

Georgie Anne Geyer has been a foreign correspondent and commentator on international affairs for more than 40 years. She can be reached at gigi_geyer(at)juno.com.
Rescue groups have agreed to take nearly two dozen horses surrendered by an Orangeburg County woman.

Orangeburg County Animal Control responded to a call on New Years Eve by a concerned citizen asking officers to report to a Bamberg Highway property, according to records obtained under the S.C. Freedom of Information Act.

There, officers met with a woman who signed over ownership of 22 horses to the county.

One of the horses died at the property and two had to be euthanized because of medical conditions.

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals reported on Friday that the organization assisted on Jan. 3 in the care of 19 horses that were seized from the property.

The horses were surrendered by the owner and removed by OCAC to the Orangeburg County Fairgrounds, the ASPCA reported.

OCAC immediately contacted the ASPCA for help after recognizing the need for equine expertise and proper equipment and supplies to care for so many horses, said Kelly Krause, an ASPCA spokesperson.

Krause said that the horses were surrendered by an overwhelmed caregiver and that they were in desperate need of medical care when the OCAC arrived at the scene.

We had an amazing response from the local equine groups and community, which has allowed us to complete the most important task of getting the horses placed as quickly as possible so they can begin their recovery, said Tim Rickey, vice president of ASPCA Field Investigations and Response.

Animal Control and ASPCA representatives worked together to find local shelters to place the horses.

We are now working to transport the horses to equine rescue groups in South Carolina. Rescue groups who have agreed to take in these horses include Big Oaks Rescue Farm in Greenwood, LEARN Horse Rescue in Ravenel and Dream Wranglers in Hollywood, Krause said.
Musings of an unabashed liberal about how the current administration of the US government is performing.
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India is getting ready to open up commercial coal mining to private companies for the first time in four decades, with the aim of shifting the world's third-biggest coal importer towards energy self-sufficiency.



Anil Swarup, the country's top coal bureaucrat, told Reuters on Friday the government has identified mines it plans to auction, and is now finalising other terms such as eligibility criteria for companies to take part and whether and how to set up revenue sharing.



He said a plan should be ready in the 2-3 months, setting a clear timeline on a plan that has previously only been vaguely marked out.



India has an ambitious plan to double its coal production to 1.5 billion tonnes a year by 2020, as part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's push to bring power to 300 million people who live without electricity, and give a boost to manufacturing.



It would also support the government's efforts to develop eastern parts of the country, which are resource-rich and hold most of India's coal reserves but have lagged the western states in development.



State-owned Coal India is on track to produce 1 billion tonnes a year by the end of this decade, and India is counting on private firms to produce the remaining 500 million tones - which may prove a tough target to achieve.



As of now, only Coal India and a small government-owned company are allowed to mine and sell coal in India.



"It's imperative that India opens up the sector so that private companies can bring in new technologies and the efficiencies that we keep talking about," said Dipesh Dipu at energy-focused Jenissi Management Consultants. "But I don't think private companies will be able to produce more than 100 million tonnes this decade as the process has yet to start."



The move is likely to attract coal block bids from Indian conglomerates such as the Adani Group and GVK, but the government may find it harder to lure big multinational miners such as Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton, Anglo American and Peabody Energy. Rio Tinto did not respond to requests for comment.



Coal prices are at multi-year lows amid global oversupply, and foreign companies have faced obstacles to investing in India, such as problems in getting land and environmental approvals. Some private companies also worry that the best quality mines would be left for Coal India.



Swarup was handpicked by Modi to lead a turnaround in the coal sector soon after the prime minister came to power in 2014.



Under Swarup's watch, Coal India has seen record production growth, and the government auctioned off a series of coal blocks successfully. Coal imports fell for a sixth straight month in December.



Until last year, India spent around $16 billion a year importing foreign coal, even though it sits on the world's fifth-biggest reserves of more than 300 billion tonnes.



Swarup said there were still some aspects of the plan to bring in private players that needed to be examined carefully.



The government, for example, has to make sure that companies do not under-report sales if a revenue-sharing model is adopted, he said.



Companies can do that by selling coal to their units at discounted rates, and by calculating the government's share based on that instead of the market price.



Swarup declined to say where the identified mines were located. Most of India's coal is in the eastern states of Jharkhand, Odisha and Chhattisgarh.-Reuters
Yemen's former president said on Friday he would not negotiate with the government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, throwing into doubt the fate of peace talks on ending the conflict in Yemen which are due to restart later this month.



Ali Abdullah Saleh, who enjoys the loyalty of the armed forces despite having stepped down from office nearly four years ago after months of protests, had joined forces with the Iran-allied Houthis in fighting a Saudi-led alliance trying to shore up Hadi.



The warring sides held the latest round of peace talks in December but failed to find a political solution that would end the conflict, which has killed nearly 6,000 people. Negotiations are set to resume on January 14.



"There will be no dialogue with the mercenaries who are seeking power ... there will only be dialogue with the Saudi regime," Saleh said in a television address on his television station, Yemen Today.



A coalition led by Saudi Arabia and its Sunni Muslim allies has been fighting the Shi'ite Houthi movement, which controls the capital, since March 2015.



The United Nations said UN Yemen envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed was in Riyadh and would be travelling to Sanaa "soon".



Riyadh sees the Houthis as a proxy for bitter regional rival Iran to expand its influence. They deny this and say they are waging a revolution against a corrupt government and Gulf Arab powers beholden to the West.



A growing diplomatic dispute between Riyadh and Tehran, triggered by Saudi Arabia's execution of a prominent Shi'ite cleric, has damaged the outlook for any resolution to the conflict in the Arabian Peninsula nation.-Reuters
Two armed assailants attacked a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada on Friday, wounding three foreign tourists, Egyptian officials said.



The Security Information Center of Egypt's Ministry of Interior said in a statement that two Austrians and a Swede had been injured while the attackers were trying to escape.



One of the assailants was killed by security forces and another was in custody, the statement said, adding that the attackers were armed with an air gun and knives. It said an investigation was underway.



Reports of what transpired at the hotel differed during the day. Security sources had initially said the attackers were armed with a gun, a knife and a suicide belt, and that they had arrived by sea to launch the onslaught on the beachside hotel.



They said security forces had killed the attacker wearing the suicide bomb, and that one of the injured was from Denmark and the other from Germany.



The Interior Ministry said earlier on Friday that one of the attackers was a student from the Cairo suburb of Giza.



Egypt is fighting a wave of Islamist militancy, which began as attacks on security forces in remote regions of the Sinai, but is increasingly focusing on targets previously considered safe such as the tourist resorts on the Red Sea.



The Islamic State militant group said on Friday that an attack on Israeli tourists in Cairo on Thursday had been carried out by its fighters, in response to a call by the group's leader, Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, to target Jews "everywhere".



Security sources said those tourists were Israeli Arabs. None was hurt and Egyptian authorities said the attack was aimed at security forces.



On October 31, a Russian passenger plane crashed in Sinai, killing all 224 people on board, most of them tourists returning home from the Red Sea resort of Sharm Al Sheikh.



Cairo has said it has found no evidence of terrorism in the crash, but Russia and Western governments have said the airliner was probably brought down by a bomb, and Islamic State said it had smuggled explosives on board.



Tourism is critical to the Egyptian economy as a source of hard currency, but has been ravaged by years of political turmoil since the revolution that ousted President Hosni Mubarak in 2011.-Reuters
Egypt's Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou said on Saturday that the government will announce additional security measures to safeguard tourists after an attack in the Red Sea resort of Hurgada left three injured on Friday.



Tourism is critical to the Egyptian economy as a source of hard currency, but has been ravaged by years of political turmoil since the revolution that ousted veteran president Hosni Mubarak in 2011.



"The welfare of the tourists visiting Egypt is of the greatest importance to us and will continue to be so. No stone will be left unturned to ensure their security," Zaazou said.



"Over the coming days we will announce even greater security measures to safeguard all tourists visiting Egypt," he said.



Suspected militants armed with knives wounded two Austrian tourists and a Swede at a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Hurghada on Friday evening.



Security forces shot and killed at least one of the attackers after they stormed the beachside Bella Vista hotel, officials said, though there was no immediate information on the other.



Security sources said the attackers had arrived by sea and also carried a gun and a suicide belt. Officials said officers had tightened checks across the area and shut off roads.



No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.



Germany updated its travel advice after the hotel attack, advising tourists in Hurghada not to go on any day trips from the resort for now and recommending they stay vigilant.



In response, the German arm of Europe's largest tour operator TUI said it was cancelling all day trips from Hurghada until the end of January.



It currently has about 3,100 German guests in Egypt, all of whom it said were fine. It said it would help those who wished to leave early, but that so far there had been only a few requests to return.-Reuters
A blog about the Civil War west of the Mississippi River
Global markets took a steep dive this week after China announced that it was depreciating its currency in an effort to boost its economy, which has been slowing recently. This sign of weakness sent Chinese and global stock markets sharply lower.

Many commodities markets dropped on fears that the worlds largest commodity buyer was in trouble. One of the hardest hit markets was copper, which fell to a seven year low at $1.99 per pound. Meanwhile, US agricultural products came under pressure as well, especially corn, which China uses to feed its pigs and poultry.

Crude cant stop slipping

Crude oil prices dropped near $32 per barrel this week, the lowest price in almost a dozen years. Prices are continuing to feel pressure from record-high supplies, and Chinese economic concerns added to dismal outlooks for global oil demand in the coming months.

The drop came despite growing turmoil in the Middle East, where tensions between Saudi Arabia (Sunni) and Iran (Shiite) are rising.

The two Islamic nations cut diplomatic ties after the Saudis executed a Shiite religious leader, which incited Iranian protesters to attack the Saudi embassy in Iran. Deepening the gulf between the two nations, Iran claimed Thursday that Saudi Arabia intentionally bombed the Iranian embassy in neighboring Yemen. The two nations are effectively fighting a proxy war in Yemen between the Sunni-led Yemeni government and Shiite Houthi rebels.

Under normal conditions, the fear of war between the Middle Easts two largest producers would cause an explosion in oil prices, but this weeks news barely garnered a small rally.

Some oil analysts take this muted response as yet another sign that prices could continue falling toward $20 per barrel, a price that hasnt been seen since the early 2000s.

Ethanol buried

As petroleum dropped this week, so too did ethanol, which is mixed into gasoline for automobile fuel. This week, ethanol futures dropped as low as $1.30 per gallon, the lowest price in over a year. Nearly 40% of US corn goes to make ethanol, which means that falling ethanol can hurt farmers bottom line.

As of midday Friday, March corn was worth $3.56 per bushel, near a one-year low.
A Casper man could serve up to seven years in prison after admitting to robbing another man at gunpoint last year.

Nicholaus Harford pleaded guilty in Natrona County District Court to one count of aggravated robbery. A plea agreement calls for him to serve five to seven years in prison. He will be sentenced later.

Harford, 25, is being held on bond at the Natrona County Detention Center pending sentencing.

Authorities say Harford pointed a gun at a man Sept. 13 and demanded the mans wallet and cellphone.

The robbery took place between 6:30 and 8:40 a.m. at East Fourth and Park streets, according to police reports. The victim told officers later that day his debit card had been used at the Common Cents store on Wyoming Boulevard. Officers went to the store and watched the security footage, which allegedly showed two people attempting to make purchases.

Authorities say those two people were Raechel Holmes and Andrew Michael Melikian, who also face charges related to the case.

Police found Harford at his Evansville home, according to the reports. During a search of the house, officers found a BB gun that resembled a firearm and a debit card belonging to the victim.
Lawmakers are proposing a bill to protect the privacy of students' social media accounts and to mandate that Wyoming Department of Education officials draft a statewide data privacy policy.

From Facebook to Instagram, Senate File 14 would prohibit teachers and school officials from requiring students to provide access to personal accounts. The bill includes a $1,000 fine for a first time violation of student data privacy, and a $2,500 fine for subsequent offenses.

Accounts created in school would be precluded from the privacy protections. Officials would still be allowed to access a students public account, and the bill would not inhibit law enforcement investigations related to information on students online accounts.

Wyoming is one of many states grappling with student data privacy, said Ken Decaria, government relations director for the Wyoming Education Association.

The bill is a catchall of rules. It addresses privacy in social media, but also how the state protects other private data collected about students, said Sen. Chris Rothfuss, D-Laramie, member of the Joint Education Committee. Rothfuss was also chairman of the Task Force on Digital Information Privacy that met last year.

Where some states drafted bills specific to Facebook or Twitter, Wyoming lawmakers used broad language to encapsulate the changing trends of social media, he said.

The bill includes a mandate for the Superintendent of Public Instruction to create a response to breaches of privacy, and protocol for collecting, storing and protecting student data. School districts, then, may use the state protocol as a guide. SF 14 also prohibits the department from sharing or selling student data.

State guidance on the issue of student privacy will be essential for small districts that lack the resources and expertise to draft their own plans, Rothfuss said.

The Department of Education already has a policy on data privacy, built partly on its own initiative. Legislators mandated a data security report form the education agency in 2014, and the department has updated it every year, said Kari Eakins, spokeswoman for the agency.

The state policy is a living document, because of the changing nature of technology, said Aaron Roberts, director of information management for the agency. It identifies policies and procedures, and that information has been made available to districts, he said.

But school districts, especially smaller ones, testified before the Digital Task Force that state guidance wasnt reaching them, Rothfuss said.

Dean Braughton, director of student support services for the Natrona County School District, said he was not aware of explicit direction from state Department of Education regarding students personal accounts.

Social media isn't been a problem in the district, he said. Those pages are blocked on school grounds through a state firewall. But protocol is not always cut and dry.

If its school district property and kids are using it, we dont do it unless there is a reasonable suspicion there that is dangerous or illegal, he said. Now, cell phones, that is not school district property, therefore we do not search cellphone data.

In some instances there is a fair expectation of privacy, if a student is corresponding online with a friend, for example, Decaria said. But the conversation on what constitutes public and private information is ongoing. The bill distinguishes between the two.

This has to be a discussion where we decide as a people, or as a state, where those lines are and how we go about this, he said.

The growing prominence of online bullying incidents is a concern, he said, but the bill does leave avenues in place for intervention in instances of cyber bullying.

School officials can appeal to parents if they are suspicious about a students activity online. But if a child is being bullied online, information for an investigation is also available through the victims accounts, Rothfuss said.

The reality is, if youre cyber bullying me, I have access to it also and of course I could disclose it, he said.

The bill will not likely change anything for teachers, Decaria said. In instances where something criminal is suspected, the police protocol will take charge.

It doesnt mean that there is no way to access that information, it just makes sure you go through the proper channels, Decaria said.

The legislative session begins Feb. 8 in Cheyenne.
March 1: Non-binding caucus meetings

Before or on March 1 in Wyoming, registered Republicans in each county will meet to select delegates to their county conventions by precinct. Precincts are neighborhood areas.

Any registered Republican can participate, but must be registered as a Republican at least 10 days before the meeting.

Delegates will make it clear who they support for president, but they can change their minds. If their preferred candidates drop out, they are free to select another candidate.

Caucus locations will be published in local newspapers and online. Larger counties may have more than one meeting place.

March 12: County conventions

Each county party will select delegates to the Republican National Convention in Cleveland. When the delegates are announced, the Star-Tribune will publish them in print and online.

Wyoming selects a total of 29 delegates. Each county gets either a delegate or alternate  with the party switching every four years which counties provide the delegates and alternates. Laramie County gets both a delegate and an alternate, based on its population. Delegates and alternates sign a pledge promising to support a specific candidate as long as he is still in the race.

Alternates will be expected to travel to Cleveland in case they are needed.

April 14-16: Wyoming State GOP Convention, Parkway Plaza Hotel and Convention Centre, Casper

In addition to the 12 delegates chosen at county conventions, 14 delegates will be chosen at the state convention. Also, three Republicans are automatic delegates who will travel to Cleveland and help select the president: GOP Chairman Matt Micheli, State Committeewoman Marti Halverson and State Committeeman Greg Schaefer.

July 1821: Republican National Convention, Cleveland

GOP presidential nominee will be chosen.

Source: Matt Micheli, chairman, Wyoming Republican Party
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By PAUL WOOD

The (Champaign) News-Gazette

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (AP)  It turns out that deer love animal crackers in a major way.

Dr. Cliff Shipley, a professor at the University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine, keeps about 80 deer, mule deer and elk on 15 acres near Homer Lake.

"Here you go, 404," he tells a hungry deer, and the others gather around to get the crackers from a bulk-sized plastic container.

Are there any deer among those animal crackers?

"I hope not," Shipley says. "That would make them cannibals."

But the deer don't eat flesh; 404, a favorite of Shipley's, licks my fingers, then moves in to try to take a chew out of my jacket on a brisk day out on the prairie.

"404 is very tame. She's my good girl. She loves having her chin scratched," the doctor says.

Shipley, a native of Iowa, bought the land in 2000. It had been a horse pasture; his family planted 5,000 trees.

"I'm a country boy," says Shipley, who had lived in Urbana before buying the land.

Shipley, who is turning 61, said he wanted to get back to the land, and he was able to combine his veterinary medicine specialty, arthroscopic artificial insemination, with the simple of joy of gentle beasts on the land.

Still, it means chores for himself every day, or for son Clint, who usually handles the urine collection.

The deer start to swarm the professor to get at the cookies.

"They're hooked on crackers," he adds.

The animals are penned off by breed; there can be a lot more than 80 of them in fawning season. They are sold to petting zoos, full-sized zoos and hunting parks and just for pets.

The Toronto Zoo is looking for some animals right now, but Illinois is a state where chronic wasting disease has been found, so it's off-limits for now. (None of Shipley's deer has the disease).

Ted Lock of Sycamore Farm in Indiana worked alongside Shipley in the UI vet school for years, and is impressed with the deer ranch.

"Cliff is an amazing guy, probably one of the most versatile veterinarians I ever met," Lock said.

"He got into the deer and elk business and I thought, 'Holy cow, what's he thinking?' But he's really made quite a go of it and really made a worldwide reputation in deer farm management."

Besides selling the deer and elk, the ranch also provides a service to hunters. Deer urine has monetary value, especially that of a doe in heat.

"I started working with deer a lot 15 or 20 years ago at the clinic," says Shipley, who is cutting back from 80-hour weeks as retirement seems ever more enticing. He says the ranch and other projects will keep him more than busy once he leaves the UI.

The deer are pampered to say the least. In captivity, a deer can live up to two decades, but 3 is a normal age limit out in the wild.

"We've seen a lot of coyotes around here," he said.

Alas, by 8 to 10 years old, deer tend to have worn down their teeth from all that vegetable matter.

Shipley walks on to another penned area where there are mule deer, which harken from the Plains States and Rocky Mountains. He found his first breeding group in Minnesota.

Mule deer look a little like mules around the ear. Shipley says Lewis and Clark gave them the name as they trudged westward in service of Thomas Jefferson. They discovered mule deer, as far as the American history is concerned, though Shipley notes the native Americans had known them by their own names for thousands of years.

Another difference from white-tailed deer is the black tip at the end of their tails.

One mule deer has broken antlers. Shipley gives him an extra handful of crackers.

Though the animals are penned off for breeding purposes, at one time early on Shipley had them all together.

"I used to run them all together and they all got along pretty well," he recalls.

All the deer and the elk seem to like animal crackers, but they also eat a lot of apples, some from UI orchards, Shipley said. They love carrots, plums and peaches.

Son Clint Shipley, who works in the UI's horticulture department, often gets the apples. Daughter Abriel Shipley, a UI graphic artist, runs the website, saltforkriverranch.com.

The professor has given tours to Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, church groups, even the USDA. Some of the younger tourists want the animal crackers.

"Yeah, you can have some, too," he tells them.

He shows off the white deer. "You should see them in the snow," he says. They're popular as pets, and seem extra-calm.

One white doe is with a buck, and she has an appetite. "410 can eat (the crackers) as fast as I can give them to her," he says.

For beverages, there's a choice of water or water.

There are watering tubes all over the ranch; a tube into the ground provides heat to keep the water from freezing.

Shipley moves over to the elk; there are five cows and one bull. Bull elks get names, Bonehead plus a number, all in honor of the original Bonehead.

Bonehead 4 is trying to herd his kin. He's imposing, even with antlers shorn. If you approach him, he'll back off, trained by pepper spray. But as soon as you turn your back, Shipley says, he'll start to move toward you aggressively.

"This bull is not tame," Shipley says. "I never turn my back on him. I cut his antlers off because he's a danger with them. He's got a 'tude."

Shipley knows not to let a dog get in with the elk. It would be goodbye, Fido.

"He wouldn't last 10 minutes," he says.

___

___

Information from: The News-Gazette, http://www.news-gazette.com

This is an Illinois Exchange story shared by The (Champaign) News-Gazette.
Country/State

Headline headline headline headline

Libya truck bombing kills at least 60 policemen, wounds 200

TRIPOLI, Libya  A massive truck bomb exploded near a police base in the western Libyan town of Zliten on Thursday, killing at least 60 policemen and wounding around 200 others, officials said.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack but a local Islamic State affiliate has been trying to gain a foothold in Zliten, spreading westward from its central stronghold in the city of Sirte along the North African countrys coast.

The U.N. special envoy to Libya, Martin Kobler, denounced the attack and urged Libyans to put their differences aside and unite to confront the scourge of terrorism. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned the attack as well as ongoing attacks by the Islamic State group on oil facilities near Sidra and called for a national unity government as the best way for Libyans to confront terrorism in all its forms.

The bombing was yet another reminder for Libyans that urgent progress is required toward empowering a unity government and rebuilding state bodies, Kobler said in a statement.

Hours after the blast, rescue crews at the scene had only managed to extract 60 bodies out of the wreckage, said a hospital spokesman, Moamar Kaddi. Libyan officials said they believed there might be dozens more dead.

The police base, where about 400 recruits were training, was used by Libyas border police, a Zliten security official said. Border police foiled numerous human smuggling attempts off the coast of Zliten last year. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

In Washington, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Thursday that the U.S. has not yet determined who is responsible for carrying out a cowardly act of terrorism and extended condolences to the victims and the families of those who were killed, and to the Libyan people. Earnest said the U.S. remains deeply concerned about Islamic State-inspired militants carrying out acts of violence in Libya.

Smugglers operating in Libya are notorious for responding with violence to any attempt to disrupt their lucrative operations, but there have been no reported incidents in which they used car bombs, suggesting that Islamic militant are more likely to have been behind Thursdays attack. Also, it was not immediately clear whether the attack was a suicide bombing, a hallmark method of Islamic militants.

In recent years, thousands of migrants seeking a better life in Europe sailed from Libya on rickety, overcrowded boats. Hundreds have drowned in those crossings.

Libya slid into chaos following the 2011 toppling and killing of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi. The oil-rich country is torn between an Islamist government based in the capital, Tripoli, and a rival, internationally recognized administration in the east. Meanwhile, a U.N.-supported unity government sits in neighboring Tunisia.

Residents in Libyan coastal cities have long expressed fears of the variety of smugglers and traffickers who run lucrative operations along the Mediterranean Sea. Authorities have echoed the same concerns, claiming they are unable to fully tackle these networks without international assistance.

Country/State

Headline headline headline headline

Israel army: 3 Palestinians killed after attacking soldiers

JERUSALEM  Palestinians brandishing knives attacked Israeli soldiers in two separate incidents in the West Bank on Thursday night before forces opened fire killing three assailants, the military said, in the latest violence in almost four months of near daily Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers.

The Israeli military said three Palestinians wielding knives rushed at troops Thursday evening at the Gush Etzion junction near Jerusalem, prompting the soldiers to open fire, killing two of them. The third attacker was wounded and taken to hospital.

The area has been a frequent target for Palestinian attackers lately.

About two hours later a Palestinian tried to stab soldiers near the West Bank city of Hebron before he was shot and killed by forces, the military said.

Many of the Palestinian attackers in recent violence have come from Hebron. The city is a frequent flashpoint for violence. Some 850 Israeli settlers live in heavily-guarded enclaves surrounded by tens of thousands of Palestinians.

Much of the animosity is over a key holy site, sacred to both Jews and Muslims

Since mid-September, Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers have killed 21 Israelis, mostly in stabbings, shootings and car-ramming assaults. At least 134 Palestinians died by Israeli fire, including 93 said by Israel to be attackers. The rest were killed in clashes with troops.

Israel says the bloodshed is fueled by a Palestinian campaign of incitement. Palestinians say it stems from frustration at decades of occupation.

15 Bangladeshi migrants found on highway in Nicaragua

MANGUA, Nicaragua  Police in Nicaragua say they have found 15 Bangladeshi migrants wandering lost on a highway after their smugglers abandoned them.

Police Commissioner Leonidas Roque said the migrants were being taken from Costa Rica to Honduras. That route takes them across Nicaragua on their way to the United States.

Roque told local media Thursday the migrants were found disoriented about 12 miles (20 kms) south of Managua.

The migrants said the smugglers had robbed them. They said they had walked for three days from the Costa Rican border.

They had paid the smuggler between $100 and $500 for the trip across Nicaragua.

One of the men said they had left Bangladesh because of political problems. They were taken to an immigration holding center.

US to help Guyana crack down on gold smuggling

GEORGETOWN, Guyana  The U.S. government is helping Guyana crack down on a massive smuggling operation that ships gold to New York, Miami, Europe and other countries in South America, authorities said Thursday.

Guyanese Mining Minister Raphael Trotman said the FBI and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security are helping track down the money generated by the smugglers. Guyana estimates that some 15,000 troy ounces of raw gold are smuggled out of the country each week via planes and boats, representing roughly 50 to 60 percent of production mined by its small- and medium-scale miners. Gold is Guyanas main export.

Trotman said the U.S. agencies reached out after they noticed large amounts of gold were being declared at American ports but not in Guyana.

Sydney James, who oversees Guyanas Special Organized Crime Unit, said several suspects have already been prosecuted and that several more cases will be filed soon.

We are now getting information we had always wanted from the federal agencies, he said. All the relevant departments are cooperating with us.

Miners Association spokesman Colin Sparman blamed the smuggling operation on buyers who fly to jungle mining camps with large suitcases of cash and offer miners higher prices than the governments gold board.

Sometimes miners do sell to them in a hardship situation where they need fuel or cash, but we tell miners to sell to the board or to licensed buyers, Sparman said.

Small miners earned $500 million from 451,000 ounces sold to the government board last year.

Guyanas gold exports generated nearly $1 billion in revenue in 2013. However, the price of gold slid to a six-year low in 2015 amid a sluggish global economy.

Mexico rescues 9 Cubans adrift off Caribbean coast

MEXICO CITY  The Mexican Navy says it has rescued nine Cuban migrants found adrift in a makeshift boat off Mexicos Caribbean coast.

The Navy said Thursday the private, Panama-flagged tanker ship Chem Venus spotted the Cubans on Tuesday.

The Navy dispatched a ship to pick up the seven men and two women at a spot about 30 miles (50 kilometers) east of Isla Mujeres.

It said they had been turned over to immigration authorities.

Mexico often gives Cubans temporary paperwork allowing them to reach the U.S. border, where special immigration policies allow them to stay.

Cubans long used the sea route, but in recent months many had preferred an overland route through Ecuador and Central America. Thousands are now stranded there after Ecuador established visa requirements, and Nicaragua refused them passage.

Civilian jets land on Chinese-built island, drawing protests

BEIJING  Two civilian jets landed on the airstrip of a new island China built in the South China Sea, drawing more protests over Chinas activities in disputed waters.

The China Daily newspaper reported Thursday the planes made the two-hour flight to Fiery Cross Reef from Haikou on the southern island province of Hainan.

It said the test flights on Wednesday proved the runways ability to safely handle large civilian aircraft. Photos showed one of the planes to be a China Southern Airlines Airbus A319-115.

An earlier test flight Saturday drew angry protests from Vietnam, Philippines and Japan.

Chinas building of seven islands by piling sand on reefs and atolls has been condemned by its neighbors and the United States, which accused China of raising tensions in an area where six governments maintain overlapping maritime territorial claims.

In Manila, visiting British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said freedom of navigation and overflight in the South China Sea was non-negotiable and urged rival governments to avoid provocative steps.

They are red lines for us, Hammond said, adding that as a major trading nation, Britain expects to continue exercising those rights.

Vietnamese Foreign Ministry spokesman Le Hai Binh said in a statement that Chinas action seriously violated Vietnams sovereignty and demanded China immediately stop and that it respect international law.

Philippine Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario warned that China may next impose an air defense identification zone above the contested region, as it did over the East China Sea, and said such a move would be unacceptable.

China has rejected calls for a halt in island construction, saying its claim of sovereignty over the entire area gives it the right to proceed as it wishes. It says the new islands are principally for civilian use but also help defend Chinese sovereignty.

Chinas robust assertions of its claims have sparked tense exchanges, mainly among China, Vietnam and the Philippines, over long-disputed and potentially oil- or gas-rich offshore territories also claimed by Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei.

Thats also creating new tensions with the U.S., which has refused to recognize the new islands as geographic features deserving of territorial waters and other aspects of sovereignty.

While Washington takes no formal position on the various sovereignty claims, it insists that disputes be settled peacefully and that freedom of navigation be maintained in waters through which more than 30 percent of global trade passes.

Fiery Cross Reef is the largest of the seven new islands that in total compose more than 800 hectares (2,000 acres) of reclaimed land. Its 3-kilometer (10,000-foot) airstrip is long enough to handle any plane operated by the Chinese military.

Another runway is being built on Subi Reef, with signs of similar work underway on nearby Mischief Reef. If all are completed, China would possess four airstrips in all on its South China Sea island holdings.

___

Associated Press writer Jim Gomez in Manila, Philippines, contributed to this report.
Air passengers have seen some changes recently at the security checkpoints at Tucson International Airport. Theres more to come, as the airport remodels the terminal beginning this year and plans to move and expand the checkpoints by early 2017.

The pace of those moves, staffing levels and screening policy changes could affect how long you stand in line for your next flight.

For now, Tucson passengers are getting used to full-body scanners that the U.S. Transportation Security Administration installed at TIA in September and gradually brought on line in time for the holiday travel season.

While the TSA has used full-body scanners since 2010, Tucson was left out because there wasnt enough room in TIAs narrow security corridors for the first generation of so-called backscatter X-ray body scanners.

Those machines were gradually removed by 2013, amid health concerns over radiation exposure and objections to the detailed, naked body images they displayed to screeners.

Their replacements, known as millimeter-wave scanners, emit a kind of electromagnetic radiation that is deemed safer, and they dont display a detailed body image.

And one fits into each of TIAs two concourse security checkpoints, along with a metal detector, baggage X-ray line and other equipment.

Its still a little bit of wedge, but its better security and the customers love it, said Charles Sparks, TSA assistant federal security director in Tucson.

By the spring of 2017, Sparks said, the security checkpoints will be relocated and widened to four lanes as part of a terminal reconfiguration project, from three lanes in the current narrow corridors.

With the new scanners, instead of a nude-like image shown by the X-ray scanners, operators see only a generic body outline of a man or woman. If the device finds a suspicious item, a red screen comes up and a box is superimposed over the suspicious area, resulting in a pat-down of that area only. If the scanner detects no suspicious items, the screen lights up green and the passenger is waved on.

Until recently, passengers could turn down a body scan and instead submit to a pat-down search. A week before Christmas, the TSA changed its policy so that some passengers may not be allowed to opt out of the scans.

Though some passengers still object to any scanning, the machines are popular with many travelers because they dont require passengers to remove their shoes, Sparks said, noting that the process is already familiar to frequent fliers.

People with artificial joints and other metallic medical implants also like the new scanners, because they can usually eliminate the need for a pat-down search.

Sparks said the TSA never guarantees that any traveler wont be subject to pat-downs or other screening measures, because the agency routinely makes random, detailed checks of passengers as part of is overall security procedure.

That includes random checks of passengers enrolled in the TSAs PreCheck program, or its international version, Global Entry, which allow passengers expedited screening without removing items such as shoes, belts and laptops in some cases.

Theres always a randomization aspect to everything we do, Sparks said.

EFFECT ON WAIT TIMES

The effect of body scanners on security wait times is unclear, another TSA official said.

In terms of time, between the machine and traditional screening, its kind of negligible, said Nico Melendez, a TSA spokesman. While there might be extra time associated with the machine, the assumption is were cutting down the amount of time we spend on patdowns.

Wait times are mainly a function of passenger loads and staffing, and the TSA constantly monitors flight departures to have the most lanes open when theyre needed, Sparks said.

We are staffed according to flight schedules. We get staffing numbers every year, so if you gain flights, or lose flights, thats factored in, he said.

At TIA, the TSA staffs its checkpoints most fully between 5 a.m. and 8 a.m., when theres a big push of Southwest Airlines, American and Delta flights. Some staffers are added around the noon hour and again between 3 to 4 p.m. to accommodate clusters of departures, Sparks added.

The lines for TSAs PreCheck program are open when the checkpoints are operating at full staff and at other times as staff is available, Sparks said.

Nationally, a TSA official told The Wall Street Journal last month that hours of PreCheck lanes had been cut as the number of enrollees has flattened.

The TSA doesnt disclose average security wait times for particular airports, but the agency posts wait times as submitted by passengers at MyTSA.com.

Security wait times at TIA are usually 20 minutes or less, and often 10 minutes or less, but they can grow to 30 minutes or more during peak times, according to MyTSA.

But security, not speed, is the TSAs top priority, TSA Administrator Peter Neffenger told Congress last year after major failures during testing of checkpoint security cost his predecessor his job.

PASSENGERS SAID

TO BE SATISFIED

Tucson passengers seem to be pleased overall with the airports security process. In a TIA passenger satisfaction survey presented to the Tucson Airport Authority board in December, 98 percent of passengers said they were very or somewhat satisfied with the screening waiting time, while 94 percent were satisfied with the screening process and 97.5 percent were happy with the courtesy of TSA employees.

Staffing levels have been an issue at some airports, according to union officials who have sparred with TSA management over related issues like mandatory overtime.

TSA employees voted in 2012 to be represented by the American Federation of Government Employees, though they cant bargain for wages and hours. TSA uses a lower wage scale than the federal general-services scale, with officers starting at about $25,500 annually, not including local differential pay.

OVERCOMING ATTRITION

Sparks said the TSA at the Tucson airport is nearly fully staffed at about 200 employees, though he is still awaiting a few more officers trained to use the new body scanners.

The Tucson operation typically loses one or two employees per month, Sparks said. Some have gone to the U.S. Border Patrol, which has hiring hundreds of new agents in recent years and pays more.

Melendez said the TSAs overall employee attrition rate is about 20 percent, far higher than the overall rate for federal employees.

Part of the reason for that, Melendez said, is that TSA positions require few qualifications, such as a high school diploma, and they are touted as a stepping stone to other government jobs.

This is promoted as a springboard to a federal career, Melendez said, adding that many TSA officers move on to the FBI, the Secret Service or the Federal Air Marshal Service. TSA officers are unarmed and rely on local law enforcement to handle lawbreakers.

We take pride in the fact that some of the other agencies want our employees because they have a proven track record.

Some TSA employees are in it for the long haul.

Tucson TSA officer Jeri Feagan joined the TSA in 2002 in Omaha, Nebraska, after being a stay-at-home mom and working in various customer-service and office jobs. Feagan, 57, came to Tucson last March with her husband, a retired carpenter, and transferred to TIA.

I wanted to work for government, with good benefits, all that. TSA just happened to be forming, and security at the airport just sounded really good. I felt I could come in here and do a good job and help keep the skies safe, she recalled.

Feagan said she likes the job, though it has its drawbacks.

I like working with the public, teaching people how the process works, and I think Im good at it, she said. The worst thing is just the hours, working holidays, working weekends, but we all knew that when we signed up.

TRAINED TO KEEP

THEIR COOL

Feagan said passengers can sometimes get testy but she doesnt let that bother her.

That makes it stressful sometimes but weve had a lot of training on how to keep our cool, how to handle somebody like that, and if anything ever gets out of hand we know were not alone, she said.

Feagans most unusual checkpoint find came while working in Omaha: They actually thought they could bring a cattle prod on an airliner.

An official of a union representing TSA employees in Arizona said the agency has shrunk since its inception in 2002, when it was so heavily staffed in the frenzy following 9/11 that some joked that TSA stood for Thousands Standing Around.

Through the years theyve gone through a large attrition which was probably appropriate, to an extent, said Dennis Piert, executive vice president of the AFGE Local 1250 in Phoenix and a TSA officer since 2002.

But Piert said the union has complained about the agencys practice of mandatory overtime, contending such practices could be minimized by proper staffing and scheduling.

CATCHING WEAPONS

The TSA took a huge hit to its credibility last June, when Homeland Security inspectors were able to sneak fake bombs and weapons past TSA checkpoints in 67 of 70 tests. That resulted in the firing of the TSAs acting director, a program to retrain officers and new calls to beef up staff.

Sparks said TSA officers in Tucson take their jobs very seriously and frequently find weapons and other banned items.

TSA officials point out the thousands of guns and other weapons they find every year, including in Tucson. A dozen guns were found at TIA in 2014, up from eight in 2013, according to TSA data compiled by the Medill National Security Journalism Initiative.

The TSA confiscated 75 guns at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport in 2014, the fourth-highest total in the nation.

And the TSA has found explosives in at least one case in Arizona. In 2011, TSA officials at the Yuma airport found a small amount of C4 plastic explosive in the bag of an Army soldier who had been in explosives training. He was arrested, though no malicious intent was found.
Episcopal parish to discuss traditions

St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church, 602 N. Wilmot Road, will explore the characteristics of a High Church at 9 a.m. Sunday, Jan. 10, according to press materials.

High Church refers to Anglican tradition that emphasizes formal liturgy.

For more information about the church, visit smallangelstucson.org or call 886-7292.

UA professor, architect to present on encyclical

Two parishioners at Our Mother of Sorrows Catholic Church will discuss the popes encyclical on the environment, Laudato Si, at Most Holy Trinity Parish, 1300 N. Greasewood Road, 6:30 to 8 p.m. Monday, Jan. 11.

Katie Hirschboeck is an associate professor of climatology at the University of Arizona, and Hank Krzysik is an architect specializing in sustainable designs.

The presentation is part of the parishs Theology Uncorked series, and will continue with a second presentation on the encyclical Monday, Feb. 8.

For more information, visit mostholytrinityparish.org or call 884-9021.

St. Philips will host program on grief

St. Philips in the Hills Episcopal Church, 4440 N. Campbell Ave., will host an eight-week program for anyone grieving a recent death.

The faith-based program takes place Tuesday evenings, 6:30 to 8 p.m., beginning Tuesday, Jan. 12 and continuing through Tuesday, March 1.

The series, called Walking the Mourners Path: Transforming Grief into Joyful Living, offers grief support for anyone coping with a death from within the last 24 months, according to press materials. Attendance is required for all sessions.

The program costs $75 and includes materials. To register, email Cameron Rau at mournerspath@stphilipstucson.org or call 440-2240.

Buddhist group holds relationship session

The Awam Tibetan Buddhist Institute, 3400 E. Speedway, will host a workshop about relationships 9 a.m. to noon Saturday, Jan. 16.

The workshop is part of a series on the application of Buddhism to daily life, and will examine how to approach relationships intentionally, according to press materials. The workshop costs $20.
The leader of a small, armed group occupying a national wildlife refuge in Oregon says the activists have no immediate plans to leave. After that announcement, Harney County Sheriff Dave Ward called off plans to speak with Ammon Bundy, who has repeatedly rejected Ward's plea for the small group of anti-government activists to leave the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. The activists want the government to hand over the land to the public to graze or do whatever they wish.

Close 1 of 6 Ranching Standoff Residents raise their hands as Harney County Sheriff David Ward addresses their concerns at a community meeting at the Harney County fairgrounds Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, in Burns, Ore. With the takeover entering its fourth day Wednesday, authorities had not removed the armed group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon's high desert country. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) Ranching Standoff A member of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters stands next to a fire Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Cheers erupted Wednesday evening at a packed community meeting in rural Oregon when a sheriff said it was time for a small, armed group occupying the national wildlife refuge to "pick up and go home." (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) Ranching Standoff Harney County Sheriff Dave Ward meets with Ammon Bundy at a remote location outside the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Three Oregon sheriffs met Thursday with the leader of an armed group occupying a federal wildlife refuge and asked them to leave, after residents made it clear they wanted them to go home. Ward said via Twitter that he asked Bundy to respect the wishes of residents. Ward said the two sides planned to talk again Friday. (Beth Nakamura/The Oregonian via AP) Ranching Standoff An American flag hangs on the sign at the front entrance of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Cheers erupted Wednesday evening at a packed community meeting in rural Oregon when a sheriff said it was time for a small, armed group occupying the national wildlife refuge to "pick up and go home." (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) Ranching Standoff A member of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters looks on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) Ranching Standoff A private sign welcomes visitors to the Diamond Valley, part of the Harney Basin in southeast Oregon, in mid-December 2015. The valley is home to large cattle ranches that rely on both private and public land for grazing. The prosecution of Dwight and Steven Hammond for burning public lands has brought fresh focus to the debate over how federal land is managed. (Les Zaitz/The Oregonian via AP) 1 of 6 Ranching Standoff Residents raise their hands as Harney County Sheriff David Ward addresses their concerns at a community meeting at the Harney County fairgrounds Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, in Burns, Ore. With the takeover entering its fourth day Wednesday, authorities had not removed the armed group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon's high desert country. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) Ranching Standoff A member of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters stands next to a fire Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Cheers erupted Wednesday evening at a packed community meeting in rural Oregon when a sheriff said it was time for a small, armed group occupying the national wildlife refuge to "pick up and go home." (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) Ranching Standoff Harney County Sheriff Dave Ward meets with Ammon Bundy at a remote location outside the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Three Oregon sheriffs met Thursday with the leader of an armed group occupying a federal wildlife refuge and asked them to leave, after residents made it clear they wanted them to go home. Ward said via Twitter that he asked Bundy to respect the wishes of residents. Ward said the two sides planned to talk again Friday. (Beth Nakamura/The Oregonian via AP) Ranching Standoff An American flag hangs on the sign at the front entrance of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Cheers erupted Wednesday evening at a packed community meeting in rural Oregon when a sheriff said it was time for a small, armed group occupying the national wildlife refuge to "pick up and go home." (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) Ranching Standoff A member of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters looks on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) Ranching Standoff A private sign welcomes visitors to the Diamond Valley, part of the Harney Basin in southeast Oregon, in mid-December 2015. The valley is home to large cattle ranches that rely on both private and public land for grazing. The prosecution of Dwight and Steven Hammond for burning public lands has brought fresh focus to the debate over how federal land is managed. (Les Zaitz/The Oregonian via AP)
Getting older doesnt mean you cant go out and have a good time.

And its never too late to meet new people or learn new skills.

Not to mention the health benefits of socializing.

Lucky for Tucsons seniors, there are plenty of opportunities to do just that  from social dances and clubs at senior centers to learning how to use a computer at the library.

After all, gathering together for a congregate meal at one of 13 different local senior centers, or signing up to join a club that meets for a game of canasta, mahjong or Mexican train fosters socializing  a very important health benefit for people of all ages, said Adina Wingate, director of marketing and public relations for the Pima Council on Aging.

Need some ideas? Read on.

Tucson Parks and Recreation offers a variety of activities with its Senior Activity Card, which costs $25 per year.

The card includes access to the Senior Club program, where participants play card games and board games, make crafts, use exercise equipment and go on day trips.

For example, The Golden Age Club #1  which plays mostly card games such as canasta and Mexican train  takes place at Randolph Recreation Center, 200 S. Alvernon Way, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. every Tuesday. The cost is free to members; $1 for non-members.

There are six other Senior Club locations in Tucson. For more information, go online to tucsonaz.gov/parks/senior-programs#club

Dance and listen to live music by Ken Novak and Ron Wagner from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. every Tuesday at the Udall Center, 7200 E. Tanque Verde Road. Cost is $4.50 for non-members; $3 members.

Bring your own drum or instrument to the Southern Arizona Council of Grandmothers at the Unitarian Universalist Church, 3601 W. Cromwell Drive. Its a monthly event that next meets 1 to 3 p.m. Jan. 16.

Learn how to use a computer at the Wheeler Taft Abbett Sr. Library, 7800 N. Schisler Drive. Dont worry about feeling lost. The class teaches very basic skills from learning what a mouse is and how to use it to how to turn the computer on and off. Its a two-part series that runs 10 a.m. to noon. Jan. 20 and 27.
The state attorney general filed a lawsuit against a Tucson firearms retailer accused of defrauding gun buyers of more than $14,000 last year.

Attorney General Mark Brnovich announced Thursday that his office filed a consumer fraud suit accusing John Thomas Rompel Jr. of scamming gun owners.

The complaint alleges Black Weapons Armory, which no longer is in business, and Rompel took payments for firearms and failed to deliver those firearms to consumers, states a news release.

"Arizonans have a right to bear arms, but this gun store collected money and left its customers' arms bare," said Brnovich.

"Consumers trusted this business to deliver the goods and services they purchased. Our intent in filing this lawsuit is to help these consumers get their hard-earned money back," Brnovich said.

In January 2015, Brnovich said his office received 15 complaints after the retailer closed. Consumers claimed they paid for firearms that were never ordered or received.
PHOENIX  Tucson and other cities with cellphone-tracking technology need not tell the public how it works because it also could help criminals evade the law, the state Court of Appeals has ruled.

In a unanimous decision, the judges rejected arguments by the American Civil Liberties Union that the public has a right to the information. They said that it would not be in the best interests of the state.

The ruling involves efforts by a freelance reporter being represented by the ACLU to expose not only the workings of a device owned by the Tucson Police Department but how it also can identify cellphones of others who are not suspects in criminal cases. Freelance writer Beau Hodai said the documents also would show whether police are getting search warrants before tracking someone or simply doing so on their own.

And while the decision specifically addresses the battle to get records from Tucson police, it sets legal precedent for those who would seek the same information from other agencies around the state.

At the center of the fight is a device called a Stingray. Whats already known is that it takes advantage of the way cellphones work: When a phone is within range of a cell tower, it essentially logs in to that tower. That ensures that the owner not only can connect to make calls but that the system finds that specific phone when someone is trying to call the owner.

In essence, the Stringray mimics a cellphone tower, logging in to it the same as it would for a regular tower.

That enables police, armed with information about the specific phone, to track it. And since the Stingray is portable, police can take it door to door to find the person they want.

Hodai said that raises questions about the information that might be gathered on those who are not targets. And he said the materials about how police can use it could show whether agencies are being candid with courts over the capabilities of the technology.

When the case finally went to the Court of Appeals, attorneys for the city said they were no longer using the device, though they have not gotten rid of it.

But they cited an affidavit from an FBI special agent who said that providing information about cell site simulators would provide adversaries with information necessary to develop defensive technology, modify their behaviors, and otherwise take countermeasures designed to thwart the use of the technology.

Appellate Judge Michael Miller, writing for the unanimous three-judge panel, said the ACLU never provided any evidence to contradict the affidavit. Miller said that means he and his colleagues have to accept it as true.

That logic frustrated Pochoda.

He pointed out that he never had access to the materials the city seeks to shield, meaning there was no way he could argue that its release would not harm the public interest. And Pochoda said the trial court never provided an opportunity to present any evidence to contradict the FBIs claims.

Its a Catch-22, he said.

Pochoda also argued that the concerns of the FBI, even if true, do not allow the Tucson Police Department to shield the information.

Theres a real question whether thats relevant to Arizonas Public Records Law, he said. And Pochoda said if Tucson isnt using the device, then the city cannot claim information about how it operates harms the Police Department.

But Miller, in the ruling, cited case law that says state law is not as narrow as Pochoda claims.

The best interests of the state standard is not confined to the narrowest interest of either the official who holds the records or the agency he or she serves, the judge wrote. It includes the overall interests of the government and the people.

The ruling was not a total loss for the ACLU.

Miller noted that a PowerPoint presentation that was withheld has more than technical information about the equipment.

It also provides guidance to law enforcement about how use of the equipment fits within the broader context of the rules of criminal procedure, such as obtaining search warrants, the judge wrote. And he said there is no reason that cannot be made public.

In December, Tucson police said it no longer used the devices.

It noted then that they were used in five police investigations since 2010. The city paid $408,000 in federal grant money to Florida-based Harris Corp. for a vehicle-mounted device and a backpack-sized device. That amounts to $81,600 per investigation.
The Otero family, descendants of Arizonas first land grantee, will hold its reunion this weekend at the Arizona Historical Society.

And its open to the public.

Anybody interested in Southern Arizona history is welcomed to attend, said Lydia Otero, professor of Mexican-American Studies at the University of Arizona.

The family line in Southern Arizona began with Torivio de Otero who received a land grant in Tubac, signed Jan. 10, 1789, from the king of Spain, making it Arizonas first recorded land transaction. The document is housed at the United States National Archives and is the oldest document in the collection at the Pacific Region location in Riverside, Calif., according to the familys website, www.theoteros.com, an online genealogy project organized by Diana DeLugan, an Otero descendant from Phoenix, according to the Otero Family History Project.

The Otero family planted its roots in Tubac, the first Spanish presidio in the Pimeria Alta (todays Southern Arizona and Northern Arizona) but stretches to Tucson and across Southern Arizona.

The Oteros were important in history. They represent many of the pioneer families that still connect with Southern Arizona history, Otero said.

The family held its first reunion in 1989 in Tucson.

This years festivities include a carne asada dinner Saturday at 5 p.m. and dance at the Arizona History Museum, 949 E. Second St. A proclamation from Gov. Doug Ducey will be read. Tickets are $20 per person.

Sundays activities, the 227th anniversary of the Otero Land Grant, include three presentations on genealogy and the Otero Family History Project by DeLugan and Lydia Otero beginning at noon. Entrance to the museum will run $4-$8 and the money raised from tickets sold for the presentations will be donated to the restoration of the Otero porch at the museum. The porch was saved when the historic Otero home, the first to be built outside the Tucson Presidios wall, was demolished by the city during the urban renewal of the 1960s, despite the citys promise to preserve the house.

Lydia Otero said Sundays workshops are intended to spur other families to explore their Southern Arizona roots and to organize family reunions.

Its a celebration of history which is very much needed, she said.
As the midterm elections come ever closer, it can feel as if were stewing in a cauldron of tribalism, of our side vs. their side with no middle ground and little agreement on much of anything. That makes it a good time to take a breath and realize the consensus weve reached on some issues that were incredibly contentious not long ago. It gives us hope in the angry days ahead.
According to breaking news, the Saudis, in the tradition of the Rufus T. Firefly school of foreign policy, servered ties with Iran after protesters in Tehran appear to have set fire to the Saudi embassy in riots over the execution of the Saudi Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr.



While charges and verdict against al-Nimr probably were trumped-up, and the execution probably a deliberate Saudi provocation, it was stupid in the extreme for the Iranians to not have guarded that building better. In fact, what better to remind the US of unpeleasant common history with Iran? How dumb can one be?



Immediately, this incident will be water on the mills of those who want to kill at least the implementation of the US-Iran deal that they were unable to stop. Perhaps the leak about US surveillance of Israel influencing US lawmakers and subverting Obama administration policy towards Iran has to be seen in this light.



After the incident, the Saudis, of all people, accuse Iran of supporting terrorism. These nasty Iranians. Clearly, the Saudis would never stoop so low. At the same time, US lawmakers, 'under the influence', try to move the goalposts and make Iranian missiles an issue, which never were part of the deal between the US and Iran, in an attempt to create an obstacle to the implementation of the deal. IMO these two - support of terrorism and the missiles - will be two dominant memes/themes in the new effort to stall implementation of the implemenation of the deal.



More, off the top of my head:

Share thoughts and post new developments as they emerge.

~ by confusedponderer
Help India!

Kolkata : Amid an impressive gathering of ministers, foreign delegates and industrial bigwigs, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banereje on Friday inaugurated her annual global investment summit projecting the eastern state as an ideal business destination, and called upon entrepreneurs to set up shop asserting that the government will work as their employee.

Months away from the assembly polls, the Banerjee government  battling criticism of being unable to attract big ticket industries  had gone all out in promoting the latest edition of the Bengal Global Business Summit, deputing ministers and high officials to various parts of the country and even foreign destinations to rope in business magnates and senior government functionaries.

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The months of intense lobbying saw the presence of industrial honchos like Reliance Group chairman and managing director Mukesh Ambani, Bharti Enterprises vice-chairman Rakesh Bharti Mittal, JSW Steel chairman and managing director Sajjan JindalL, and Hiranandani Group director Darshan Hiranandani besides ITC chairman Y.C. Deveshwar, and city-based businessmen like RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group chairman Sanjiv Goenka and Ambuja Neotia Group chairman Harshavardhan Neotia.

There was also a strong line up of government leaders, including Bhutan Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay, and four Indian union ministers  Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu, Power Minister Piyush Goel and Road Transport, Highways and Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari. Also present were Britains Employment Minister Priti Patel and Bangladesh Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed besides ambassadors and delegates from 25 countries.

Banerjee harped on her governments achievements since coming to power in May 2011.

There is big scope and hope in Bengal. There is cheap labour, sufficient power, skilled manpower. We have land bank, suitable policies on textile, industry and the likes.

Please invest in Bengal. Whatever help you need, from small-scale to capital industries to agro and culture industries from education to medium-scale industry wherever you need the help, our government will work as your worker. You would be the employer and I am the employee.

Referring to the various core groups set up by her government for industrial purposes, Banerjee said: Its my industrialist friends who are running the industry department and not us. We have set core groups for that.

She said her government has come up with a land bank, a land use policy and even a power bank.

We have 5,000 acres of readymade land. We have a power bank. We are a power surplus state, she said.

Jaitley affirmed the centres commitment towards contributing to West Bengals growth and said the government was looking at eastern states like West Bengal to enable the countrys economy grow an additional 1-1.5 percent.

If Bengal follows a policy which is investment- and business-friendly, I have not the least of doubts that the original glory which belonged to the state can always be restored.

I have come here to assure the Bengal government that all policy initiatives that it is going to take for the industrial growth of West Bengal, the central government will support as part of its constitutional obligation, said Jaitley.

Gadkari said the central government will invest around Rs.52,000 crore for strengthening the port and road infrastructure in West Bengal, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi scheduled to lay the foundation of the much-awaited deep sea port, the work on which begins from March.

Prabhu announced that the East-West Metro railway project, linking the satellite township of Salt Lake with Kolkatas twin city Howrah has been put on the fast track and would be completed in two and a half years.

But what would have been music to the ears of Banerjee and her government was the profuse praise from industrialists led by Ambani.

Rating West Bengal as one among the top in the country in terms of ease of doing business, Ambani recommended the state as an ideal destination for investment.

Bengal is (on) top of my list in term of ease of doing business. I have no hesitation in recommending Bengal as an ideal destination for investment to my investor friends from India and the world, he said.

Also present was Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, who called Banerjee a gutsy leader.

At the end of the day, Banerjee did not specify any figure, but claimed huge investment proposals and collaborations were announced today, which will definitely take Bengal to an altogether new level of development.
Help India!

By TCN News

Hyderabad: Maulana Abul Kalam Azad believed India is a land of multiple languages, religions and cultures, said Prof. Anwar Moazzam while delivering the 18th Foundation Day Lecture at Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU) on Friday.

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Speaking on the topic Maulana Azads Idea of India, Prof. Moazzam said that unfortunately today politicians are defining the personality and culture of India for which they are not qualified. It is for the academicians in universities like MANUU to do this job, he clarified.

Prof. Moazzam lamented there is no mention of Maulana Azad or his ideas in the current debate on the idea of India.

He argued that Azad was possibly the first and the only Indian thinker who accepted the Indian personality as a whole. In this wholesomeness there is no compromise of the cultural or religious identity of an Indian whether he is a Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Sikh or Jain.

Prof. Moazzam who is an expert on comparative religion juxtaposed Maulana Azads idea of India against two other significant and competing ideas of India: the constitutional idea of India and the Hindu nationalist idea of India as expounded in Golwalkars Bunch of Thoughts. He said the latter two are in direct conflict with each other. He also called for an academic debate on the viability of these ideas.

Tracing the concept of the idea of India he said perhaps Alberuni is the first traveler who defined what India is in his remarkable book Indica, a compendium of the countrys religion and philosophy, written in the 11th century. After him the person who praised India a multi-cultural civilization was Syed Jamaluddin Afghani in 1882 while he was visiting Kolkata.

The clarity of plurality of India as found in the works of Maulana Azad is found nowhere else.

It is necessary for a university like MANUU to not only to have intellectual discussion on this subject but also propagate it because it contains the core of Indian spirit, he said.

Vice Chancellor MANUU, Dr. Mohammad Aslam Parvaiz, in his presidential address, stressed that India will always remain a plural country. He called for a tolerant, assimilative and accommodative understanding of religion.

Registrar MANUU, Prof. S.M. Rehmatullah presented the vote of thanks and Media Coordinator, Mir Ayoob Ali Khan, conducted the programme.
Help India!

Patna : A police officer was found murdered in Bihars Vaishali district on Saturday, police said.

Ashok Kumar Yadav, an assistant sub inspector (ASI) posted in Hajipur district headquarters of Vaishali, was shot dead late Friday. His body was found on Saturday, a police officer said.

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Yadav left from police station on patrolling duty but did not return, the officer said.

According to the police, he was shot four times.

Ironically, Yadav was killed a day after Bihar police chief P. K. Thakur claimed crime was under control and that the crime graph had decreased.

Opposition BJP leaders had raised a hue and cry over killing of two engineers in Darbhanga district last month and other criminal incidents this month, and termed it as return of jungleraj in Bihar.
Global Poker Index: Fedor Holz Makes Top Five; Byron Kaverman Leads

January 09 2016 Martin Harris

Each week, the Global Poker Index releases a list of the top tournament poker players in the world using a formula that takes into account a players results over six half-year periods. For a look at the entire list, visit the official GPI website. Heres a look at the rankings as of January 6, 2016.

GPI Player of the Year

As we reported last week, Byron Kaverman finished December as the 2015 Global Poker Index Player of the Year in a tight race that saw him manage to hold off Anthony Zinno (who finished second), Steve ODwyer (third), and Nick Petrangelo (fourth).

Meanwhile the race for the 2016 Global Poker Index Player of the Year has already begun. Well begin reporting on that one soon once the first events of the 2016 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure complete.

Kaverman isnt necessarily looking to repeat his POY performance from last year, however, as he explained to us yesterday. Read what he had to say in GPI Player of the Year Byron Kaverman Says He's Not Looking To Repeat in 2016.

GPI 300 Top 10

Rank Player GPI Score Change 1 Byron Kaverman 4081.07 - 2 Steve ODwyer 3980.77 - 3 Anthony Zinno 3955.44 - 4 Nick Petrangelo 3955.15 - 5 Fedor Holz 3838.53 +4 6 Jason Mercier 3749.69 - 7 Kevin MacPhee 3693.49 -2 8 Bryn Kenney 3660.04 - 9 Martin Finger 3644.60 -2 10 David Peters 3636.17 +4

Kaverman also ended 2015 as the leader in the overall GPI rankings, and he continues to hold onto the No. 1 spot for the first week of 2015, making it 14 straight weeks in front. There was some movement among those in the top 10 during the first week of the year thanks primarily to the Triton Super High Roller Series $200,000 Cali Cup that played out last weekend as part of the World Poker Tour Philippines stop in Manila.

Fedor Holz ended 2015 winning the $100K buy-in WPT Alpha8 Las Vegas event at the Bellagio, and he began 2016 in similar fashion by winning the Trition SHR for a cool $3.463 million first prize. Holz topped a 52-entry field in that event, and earned enough GPI points as a result to jump from No. 9 to No. 5 in the overall rankings. Holz first cracked the GPI top 10 three weeks ago, with No. 5 representing his highest ranking thus far.

Runner-up David Peters likewise benefitted both financially (earning $2.309 million for second) and GPI points-wise as he moved from No. 14 to No. 10 this week. Peterss highest previous GPI ranking has been No. 5 (in late 2013).

Welcome to the GPI Top 300

Rank Player Total Score 271 Jonathan Karamalikis 1687.91 273 Seth Berger 1686.88 279 Anton Wigg 1667.56 281 Noah Schwartz 1662.80 282 Hui Chen-Kuo 1662.51 288 Nikolaus Teichert 1651.38 290 Vlado Banicevic 1650.06 292 Eugene Katchalov 1644.29 294 Giuliano Bendinelli 1642.55 295 Phil Laak 1633.37 297 Emrah Cakmak 1626.17 298 Mayu Roca 1619.23 299 Michael Linster 1618.66 300 Michael Telker 1614.66

There are 14 new names in the GPI top 300 compared to a week ago, with Jonathan Karamalikis the highest-ranked of the group after moving up from No. 304 to No. 271.

Eugene Katchalov also jumps back into the top 300 after being out for just a week. His No. 317 ranking a week ago marked the first time since the rankings began in 2011 that he was not in the top 300. Katchalovs highest-ever ranking has been No. 2 (in October 2011).

Biggest Gains

Rank Player Total GPI Score Change 125 Daniel Colman 2175.43 +78 140 Jens Lakemeier 2069.78 +67 230 John Holley 1791.54 +53 238 Je Wook Oh 1773.52 +53 202 Yingui Li 1868.06 +49

2014 Global Poker Index Player of the Year Daniel Colman starts off the year as the biggest gainer among players in the top 300, having jumped from No. 203 to No. 125 thanks to his sixth-place showing in the Triton Super High Roller Series $200,000 Cali Cup.

Biggest Drops

Rank Player Total GPI Score Change 296 Matt Waxman 1626.79 -110 218 Upeshka De Silva 1815.19 -74 165 Brian Hastings 1989.32 -64 277 Nick Yunis 1677.67 -62 207 Matthew Stout 1855.54 -60

Finally, looking at those who fell the furthest yet remained inside the top 300 this week, Matt Waxman took the biggest tumble, going from No. 186 to No. 296.

Incidentally, among players tumbling out of the GPI top 300 to start the year are Phil Hellmuth (who fell from No. 236 to No. 329), Martin Jacobson (from No. 273 to No. 352), and JC Tran (from No. 286 to No. 379).

What to Expect Next Week

As noted, the 2016 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure is underway with the $100,000 Super High Roller kicking off the 104-event series in a big way yesterday. Of the 49 entries in that one, eight of the current top 10 players in the GPI took part, with Nick Petrangelo (No. 4), Bryn Kenney (No. 8), and David Peters (No. 10) all returning to big stacks to start todays Day 2.

Be sure to follow PokerNews live reporting from the $100,000 Super High Roller here, and stick close as well over the next week-plus for coverage of the $5,300 Main Event, the $50,000 Single-Day High Roller, and the $25,000 High Roller.

To view both the 2015 Player of the Year and GPI overall rankings in their entirety, visit the official GPI website. While youre at it, follow the GPI on Twitter and its Facebook page.

Get all the latest PokerNews updates on your social media outlets. Follow us on Twitter and find us on both Facebook and Google+!

Sharelines Byron Kaverman is the top-ranked tournament player in the world for a 14th-straight week.

Fedor Holz's remarkable run sees him enter the Global Poker Index top five.
Uprooted Palestinians are at the heart of the conflict in the M.E Palestinians uprooted by force of arms. Yet faced immense difficulties have survived, kept alive their history and culture, passed keys of family homes in occupied Palestine from one generation to the next.
Our wildlife has always been a part of our different cultures in Africa. Our wildlife is part of who we are as Africans. When oh when did we lose the heartbeat of Africa? These are the words of the creator of a new initiative to get African people to start taking ownership for the future of Africas rhinos.

Alexia Abnett Trombas is determined to raise awareness across the continent of Africa to save the dwindling animals that belong to Africa. Her new organization is called the Southern African Fight for Rhino (SAFFR). We are African people fighting for African animals, she says.

We started working in this in October 2015, she said. We have only been going for a few months now but we are growing very quickly as our endeavors to reach out to people of all races in Africa gains momentum.

Foreign charities and donors are doing a fantastic job trying to save the rhino and to help fund anti-poaching units, but at the end of the day, it is the grassroots people who make a difference. I recently attended the Chiba Africa Forum and I came away realizing that China and Vietnam will probably never stop the demand, and even if they do, it will be too late for our wildlife. Alexia believes that it's time for grassroots education and action. It is our fight now! she exclaims.

We have so many events planned, and as time goes by we will launch press releases and event invitations. Our team is run off their feet already. One person cannot do all of this alone. Assisting me are Henriette Eksteen, Allan Neill Thomas Mutukwa, and Sharon Hoole.

Sam Nkomo was a young boy who spent his early years herding cattle in Zimbabwe.

He dreamed of becoming a professional guide and wanted to do something to protect the animals he saw in the wilderness. He achieved that dream and is an award-winning professional guide and anti-poaching trainer.

Sams public recognition started in 2014 when he engaged in a 500km walk across Zimbabwe, to the Victoria Falls.

His route took him to the Hwange National Park where the media had reported about the poisoning of elephants. At the time, Nikela News quoted Sam as saying, God gave Africa the gift of wildlife and we have a responsibility to look after them.

When Sam walks, he engages with communities along the route. The walk for SAFFR will start in March 2016, but there is a lot of preparation to be done. Alexia is excited. Sam will not undertake the walks alone she says. "Zelma, a white woman of some repute will walk with him and her details will be released to the press later. Of course, our supporters will join in the march as and when they are able. It's expected to take about a month to complete the walk."

When asked about the long-term goals, Alexia responds passionately: Its all about unifying African people to fight back: To stop all trade in wildlife at the source.

This is about African Unity regarding African Wildlife.The success of this whole initiative will empower the Africans into realizing that the resources belong to them. If they are able to stand up and fight back and be allowed to be involved in the decision-making process regarding their wildlife, that will be a victory. We anticipate people from all over the continent will walk this unity walk in the future.

There are going to be more events as the year unfolds, and media will be kept fully informed as they happen. Media coverage is vital to our success, concludes Alexia.
Beijing 'maximizes' efforts on DPRK nukes issue Updated: 2016-01-08 11:52 By Zhang Yunbi in Beijing and Dong Leshuo in Washington(China Daily USA)

Top Chinese and US diplomats have voiced close coordination in the efforts to denuclearize the Korea Peninsula.

In a phone talk on Thursday, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and US Secretary of State John Kerry discussed the nuclear test by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

"They discussed the highly provocative nature of North Korea's actions, and its grave threat to international peace and security and blatant violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions," John Kirby, the US State Department spokesman said in a statement on Thursday.

It said Kerry and Wang agreed that the US and China would continue to coordinate closely in the UN Security Council and with partners within the Six-Party Talks framework to take appropriate action.

China said on Thursday that it had "maximized its efforts" in addressing the Korean Pennisula nuclear issue, dismissing accusations that it had not done enough.

After Pyongyang conducted what it called its first hydrogen bomb test on Wednesday, a senior official with the Foreign Ministry "elaborated China's stance (on the test) to the leading official of the DPRK embassy in Beijing", Foreign Ministry spokewoman Hua Chunying said on Thursday.

Speculation of countermeasures was unfolding on the Korean Peninsula, including a report that Washington and Seoul were considering steps amid rising international criticism of the DPRK's fourth test since 2006.

Seoul's Defense Ministry said on Thursday that military leaders from the Republic of Korea and the United States discussed the deployment of US "strategic assets" in the wake of the test, The Associated Press reported.

Hua said China "expresses concerns over the development of the situation" and the country is calling on all parties to "get back on the track of resolving the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue through the Six-Party Talks".

The talks, which grouped the DPRK, the ROK, the US, China, Japan and Russia, stalled in December 2008. The first three nuclear tests were carried out in 2006, 2009 and 2013.

Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Chinese Ambassador to the US Cui Tiankai said "our goal is neither to contain nor to isolate the DPRK."

"A mutual goal of China and the US is to work together with the DPRK to promote the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and maintain the stability and prosperity of the Korean Peninsula," said Cui, who met US National Security Advisor Susan Rice on the issue on Wednesday.

"To reach this goal, the best and only realistic approach is through negotiations and conversations," Cui said.

"The Six Party Talks is such kind of mechanism," he said.

Cui said he and Rice both agreed that China and US would enhance communication and coordination on this issue.

Cui said China will try its best to help resume the Six-Party Talks, but it'll need the effort of the Six Parties involved.

"One of the major obstacles lies in that every side may hold a different opinion on what should be achieved through the talks," Cui said.

Yang Xiyu, a senior researcher on Korean Peninsula studies at the China Institute of International Studies, said it is a "lose-lose" situation and no single party is winning after the test.

The peninsula is drifting away from the goal of denuclearization, and any countermeasures taken by Seoul and Washington might only worsen the security situation on the peninsula, Yang said.

Meanwhile, China "participated in a constructive manner" in an emergency closed-door meeting of the United Nations Security Council in New York on Wednesday, according to Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua.

While doubts remained about the country's claim of testing a hydrogen bomb, the UN meeting "strongly" condemned the nuclear test.

A media statement said the Security Council members will "begin to work immediately on such measures in a new Security Council resolution".

In Seoul, Cho Tae-Yong, the first deputy chief of the Republic of Korea's presidential security office, said on Thursday that the country will resume propaganda broadcasts beginning at noon on Friday with loudspeakers in border areas with the DPRK.

Earlier broadcasts were stopped after an agreement was reached on Aug 25 to end a standoff with the DPRK.

Lao Chen in New York and agencies contributed to the story.

Contact the writers at zhangyunbi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily USA 01/08/2016 page1)
Interview with Chinese Consul General in Toronto Xue Bing Updated: 2016-01-09 23:01 (China Daily Canada)

Xue Bing, China's consul general in Toronto

Q: As consul general for China based in Canada's largest business city of Toronto, what issues would you like to see be given priority attention?

A: I am very honored to work with friends from all walks of life in Toronto and Ontario to further strengthen our relations. As you may recall, Toronto became the first offshore RMB center in North America last March. This showcases not only the achievement of a concerted effort from both sides, but also the significant role Toronto plays in linking our two economies.

This year marks the 45th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Canada. The bilateral relations are facing new opportunities, and local business communities are eager to do more business with China. There will be great potential for growth in trade if a free trade agreement can be reached between China and Canada in the near future.

Science and technology is another important area that can yield fruitful results through strengthened cooperation. In terms of investment cooperation, both countries need to create a more business friendly environment to attract and encourage mutual investment. And Canada is always welcome to take part in the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and explore industrial cooperation for common development with China in third party market. In addition, cultural and people-to-people exchanges also need to be enhanced.

Q: China attaches great importance to the friendly exchanges with Ontario, which is Canada's most economically advanced province. How could cooperation be strengthened?

A: Ontario plays a pioneering role in developing relations with China. In the first eight months of this year, trade volume between China and Ontario reached C$26.5 billion, an increase of 16.4 percent compared with the same period last year. The volume accounted for 48 percent of the total China-Canada trade.

In November, Premier Kathleen Wynne paid a successful visit to China, and brought back C$2.5 billion in investment that will create 1,700 jobs. It is in the best interest of both China and Ontario to further strengthen exchanges and win-win cooperation in more areas.

Ontario has also established a commercial technology transfer center in Jiangsu, and I hope more joint research and development programs will be carried out by both sides in such areas as clean and renewable energy, life science and nanotechnology.

The consulate general will spare no effort in continuing to work with the Ontario government for these common endeavors.
BC premier: Trade with China helps lift province Updated: 2016-01-09 23:54 By DAVID HOU(China Daily Canada)

British Columbia Premier Christy Clark (left) and Minister Teresa Wat (second from right) check out the new Huawei phone at Huawei's headquarters in Shenzhen during the China Trade Mission 2015. provided to China Daily

British Columbia Premier Christy Clark recently highlighted how essential foreign trade is to the province.

Clark offered a personal greeting at a fundraising gala hosted by the Richmond Centre BC Liberals on Nov 24 that attracted nearly 300 attendees.

Her opening remarks were decidedly focused on trade and emphasizing strong relations with China, as well as recognizing the Honourable Teresa Wat, BC minister of international trade, for her work in the area.

"Now you know why trade is important," Clark said to members of the business community. "You know that without trade, British Columbia, we can't grow. We are a province of a small, open economy in a very big, competitive world.

"And if we don't trade, we don't create wealth," she said. "And if we don't create wealth, we don't create jobs. And if we don't create jobs, we can't create the kind of fair society that we have in Canada where we have the opportunity to share resources, build a great education system, [and] build a great healthcare system.

Clark said that "without trade, we could never have built this country that is the envy of the world".

She lauded the growth of China-Canada trade relations and the diversification of Canadian trading partners in general. She noted that while the United States had been the main market for Canadian goods in the past, it is necessary to broaden British Columbia's economic scope. "When you've only got one customer, you only get one price," she said.

Clark also discussed her recent trade delegation to China last month, as she and roughly 200 business and community leaders formed one of the largest trade delegations in BC history.

The trip celebrated the 20th anniversary of sister-province relations between British Columbia and Guangdong, as well as the establishment of trade agreements with an increasingly environmentally conscious China.

She and Wat signed two Memoranda of Understanding during the trip, one on ensuring clean technology development and the other on trade and investment. The agreements extended from the municipal to the provincial, as both the city of Shenzhen and the province of Guangdong signed the deal.

"Historically, BC's cultural ties with Guangdong run deep," Wat said. "Most Canadians of Chinese descent come from Guangdong, and there are about 20,000 Canadians who live in Guangdong"

"Pierre Trudeau, the former prime minister (and new Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's father), was the first (leader) of a Western country to establish diplomatic relationship with China, so everyone in China remembers him," Wat said.
British Columbia promotes virtues of its wood products Updated: 2016-01-09 23:58 By LOUISA YOU(China Daily Canada)

Delegates on a trade mission from British Columbia watch how the Longhua Wooden Products Co Ltd uses high-quality BC wood at a factory in Dalian, China. provided to China Daily

British Columbia is always looking for ways to expand its lumber exports, particularly to such a large markets as Asia.

The annual British Columbia Forestry Asia Trade Mission to China and Japan went from Nov 27 through Dec 5. The trip was led by Steve Thomson, minister of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations. The delegation included more than 30 senior executives from forest companies and associations across British Columbia.

This trade mission was Thomson's fourth to China and Japan as forests minister since Premier Christy Clark tasked him with annual forestry trade missions to Asia.

In 2014, BC's forest industry supported more than 146,000 direct and indirect jobs across the province, and forest products accounted for 36 percent of all exports.

The forest sector currently represents $12 billion of the province's GDP.

"Japan and China are our second- and third-most important markets, so annually we go to make sure that we can continue to help build markets for our industry in those very important areas," Thomson said. "Trade missions are critical to the provincial strategy to secure new investment."

Canada Starts Here: The BC Jobs Plan, which seeks to manage economic uncertainty, called "expanding markets for BC products and services, particularly in Asia" a fundamental pillar of the economy.

In the words of Susan Yurkovich, president and CEO of the Council of Forest Industries, "[international] trade missions are vital for creating and maintaining strong bonds between the BC forest industry and our partners in overseas markets".

"These trade missions allow us to tell our story directly to our customers, reminding them that when they buy BC wood, they're not only getting the highest-quality products in the world, but they also know that those products come from sustainably managed forests," she said.

In 2014, China received 25 percent of BC's softwood lumber exports, totaling $1.43 billion, making China BC's second-largest market for softwood lumber products. Japan is the third-largest market with 13 percent, or $731 million.

The expansion and development of Asian markets for BC lumber is a large part of the forest sector's recovery from the worldwide recession in 2010. Jobs increased 7 percent, and exports were up 20 percent.

"[The United States] is our largest market but ... one of the very important approaches ... for the forest industry in British Columbia is to build a diversified market so we have lots of opportunities," Thomson said.
I have mentioned before that both my parents are medical doctors, and that they always wanted me to become a medical doctor too because as far as they were concerned  dad especially  medical doctorness was in my blood. Wrong.

When I realized that the doctor thing was not going to work, I decided to try the next best thing: nursing. I took all the prerequisite courses and passed, and I even made it into nursing school. I survived the first semester of Fundamentals of Nursing, and then, in the second semester, I tried even harder to survive Med-Surg (Medical-Surgical Nursing 1) and Psychiatric Nursing, but it did not happen.

I failed out of Nursing School, and I was sure my life was over. I did not have a backup plan, Plan B or anything, and I had not imagined myself doing anything else (although I loved writing) because at that time, nursing was my only career choice, and anything that resembled a writing career was a hobby and a joke, not actually an option. How could the daughter of two medical doctors become a writer? It was not possible.

After I failed out of nursing school, I tried to get into other nursing schools, but everyone rejected me. I got the classic, Although you meet all the requirements, we are sorry we have chosen other candidates. We wish you the best as you endeavor in your academic goals. That was the letter I got every time. I took extra courses to boost my chances, including chemistry which I did not like but managed to ace. That semester, my GPA was 4.0. Still, no one took me in. I stayed home for almost two years with no school and no work and there were too many times that I really thought that all my academic, financial, and career dreams were over.

As a Nigerian, not being a graduate is not really an option, and when you keep seeing other people graduate, you start feeling useless. I felt useless. Then while I was home, I discovered blogging. An online friend I had made from a Nigerian chat room had a blog, and she invited me via email to go read it. I read her blog, and there was absolutely nothing interesting on it, but it did not matter. What mattered was that I discovered there was such a thing as blogging. I did not have any money, so when I found out that Google would let me get my own space for free via Blogspot, I suddenly had a new outlook on life. And that was how I started blogging and telling my own stories. January 26th will make it 10 years since I started blogging, and I have not stopped thanking God for the grace to do this.

When I started blogging, I never wrote about what I was going through academically, financially, and personally, but whatever I did blog about, people left comments, and those comments inspired me so much. I decided to abandon my chase for a nursing career, and instead, I applied to more schools for a degree in Psychology. I was accepted into the University of Maryland and I had tunnel vision because all I wanted was to graduate. It was my second chance, my chance at not messing up academically and proving that I could do something.

FOX has a new show coming up soon, called Second Chance. The preview reminded me about my opportunity for a second chance and watching it allowed me to reflect on that time of my life. I enjoyed watching it and remembering the times I proved myself. Its about Jimmy Pritchard, a seventy-five year old disgraced sheriff and father who made all the wrong choices. He was a drinker, womanizer, and always put work ahead of family. But he was killed when he walked in on an ongoing armed robbery happening in his sons house. He did not stay dead for long because some wealthy scientists experimented and brought him back to life as a younger, better version of himself with physical abilities that he never had.

So, does being younger and stronger make him better, too? Does he recognize that a second chance has been given to him to possibly right the wrongs he did, or does he just have a second chance to do the wrongs again  maybe even worse this time? Watch the trailer below and try to guess.

Second chances are about redemption, starting over, fixing errors, etc, but for Jimmy, its a lot more than that for him. For Jimmy, it is mostly about family. I cannot wait to see what he does with his second chance. Second Chance premieres on Wednesday, January 13th 2016 9/8c on FOX. By the way, what kind of second chance would you like to have, and what would you do with it?
Are you a problem solver? Have you got the brainpower to solve these fiendishly difficult puzzles? Scroll down to find out.

On National Puzzle Day, weve collated some of the trickiest brainteasers for you to solve.

The Everest of numerical games, dubbed the worlds hardest Sudoku puzzle, was published by Arto Inkala, a Finnish mathematician.

Can you solve it? Click to flip and reveal the answer ...

9. The 'world's hardest logic puzzle

There's no escape from this green-eyed logic puzzle....

Did you give up? Here's the answer ...

8. Einsteins riddle

Photo: REX

When Einstein wrote this riddle he apparently said that 98% of the world would not be able to solve it:

There are 5 houses in five different colours.

In each house lives a person with a different nationality.

These five owners drink a certain type of beverage, smoke a certain brand of cigar and keep a certain pet.

No owners have the same pet, smoke the same brand of cigar or drink the same beverage.

The question is: Who owns the fish?

Hints

The Brit lives in the red house

The Swede keeps dogs as pets

The Dane drinks tea

The green house is on the left of the white house

The green house's owner drinks coffee

The person who smokes Pall Mall rears birds

The owner of the yellow house smokes Dunhill

The man living in the centre house drinks milk

The Norwegian lives in the first house

The man who smokes blends lives next to the one who keeps cats

The man who keeps horses lives next to the man who smokes Dunhill

The owner who smokes BlueMaster drinks beer

The German smokes Prince

The Norwegian lives next to the blue house

The man who smokes blend has a neighbour who drinks water

Here's the answer:

7. The George Boolos puzzle

Can you solve this riddle? It was created by US logician George Boolos shortly before his death in 1996.

Three gods A, B, and C are called, in no particular order, True, False, and Random. True always speaks truly, False always speaks falsely, but whether Random speaks truly or falsely is a completely random matter. Your task is to determine the identities of A, B, and C by asking three yes-no questions; each question must be put to exactly one god. The gods understand English, but will answer all questions in their own language, in which the words for yes and no are da and ja, in some order. You do not know which word means which.

6. Can you work out what spot this car is parked in?

Here's the answer...

5. When is Cheryl's birthday?

Photo: Kenneth Kong/Facebook

Cheryl and her birthday caused a furore after a confusing question involving two characters named Bernard and Albert went viral.

Cheryl gives her new friends, Albert and Bernard, ten possible dates to choose from when they enquire about her date of birth. She then tells Albert the month and Bernard the day of her birthday.

4. What way is the ballerina spinning?

This was created by Japanese Web designer Nobuyuki Kayahara. Which way do you think the ballerina is spinning?

3. Love in Kleptopia

"Jan and Maria have fallen in love (via the internet) and Jan wishes to mail her a ring. Unfortunately, they live in the country of Kleptopia where anything sent through the mail will be stolen unless it is enclosed in a padlocked box. Jan and Maria each have plenty of padlocks, but none to which the other has a key. How can Jan get the ring safely into Marias hands?"

2. The GCHQ Christmas quiz

Can you solve the puzzles that have stumped the world? This GCHQ Christmas puzzle has left thousands stumped.

Photo: GCHQ

1. Two spirals

Exam questions that divided the internet Hannah's Sweets The answer Step 1: Take the words from the question, and write it down as an equation - 6/n x 5/(n-1) = 1/3 Step 2: Multiply the 6 by the 5 and the n by the n-1. That gives you: 30/(n^2 - n) = 1/3 Step 3: Multiply the top-left by bottom-right and top-right by bottom-left Step 4: Subtract 90 from both sides, leading to your answer n^2 - n - 90 = 0 The answer You should create a table of four columns with the months at the top and the dates Cheryl gives after. "You can rule out some of the options. For Albert to have known the answer, he would have to have May and June as that is when 19 or 18 occur." The number 14 is the only one in both months but Bernard is now sure of the birth date. This means Bernard knows it is July 16. The cruel exam question The answer The answer depends on what type of person you are. "In reality, if too many people overuse a common resource then everyone in the group suffers," said the professor who set it. Why 5+5+5 doesnt always make 15 The answer A student was marked down for using the solution 5+5+5, with the teacher noting the correct working out should be shown as 3+3+3+3+3 using the repeated addition strategy. The 50 cent conundrum The answer 360 degrees in a circle divided by 12 x 2 coins = 60

Example questions from the 'hardest test in the world'
This is the first two pages or so of a 20 page essay I wrote some years ago. I've gone back to it several times, realizing it needed ...
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Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday visited the Pathankot airbase for a first-hand assessment of the situation a week after terrorists attacked it.

Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response, Modi later tweeted.

The prime ministers visit follows widespread criticism by the opposition of the governments failure in handling the assault. Modi also undertook an aerial survey of the areas along the Indo-Pak border and met family members of security personnel killed in the strike.

Air Force Chief Arup Raha and National Security Guard officials briefed the prime minister about the attack and the counter-offensive launched against the perpetrators. National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, Army Chief Dalbir Singh and the chiefs of the NSG and BSF were also present during the 90 minutes Modi spent at the airbase.

The prime minister was shown a huge cache of weapons recovered from the six terrorists. Officials of the NIA, which has taken over the probe into the attack, briefed Modi on the progress of their investigation.

Was briefed in great detail on how our forces neutralised such a serious terrorist attack. Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response. Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride, PM @narendramodi stated.

The Congress has been at the forefront of the attack on the governments handling of the Pathankot assault, which dragged on for four days and led to the loss of lives of seven security forces personnel. PM Modi diverted plane to Pakistan to greet Pak PM Nawaz Sharif on his bday, but took 8 days to reach Pathankot! the Congress tweeted on Saturday.

The party has questioned why Modi had not, despite overwhelming evidence, stated the terrorists that carried out the attack were from Pakistan. Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar had also visited the airbase on January 5 and admitted to gaps in security.

Sartaj Aziz, adviser to Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on foreign affairs, on Friday said the meeting of foreign secretaries of Pakistan and India, scheduled on January 15, was on track.

New Delhi has linked the foreign secretary-level talks to Islamabad's prompt and decisive action on the Pathankot terror attack, for which it has provided actionable intelligence.
The Pathankot attack is not a spontaneous response to recent developments; it is a manifestation of Pakistans national security strategy to pursue its revisionist agenda against India, says C Christine Fair, author of Fighting to the End: The Pakistan Armys Way of War, and an associate professor in the Peace and Security Studies Programme at Georgetown Universitys Edmund A Walsh School of Foreign Service. Fair, who earlier served as a political officer to the UN Assistance Mission to Afghanistan in Kabul, tells Bhaswar Kumar in a telephonic interview that there is a consensus within the Indian security establishment that India lacks the offensive capability to defeat Pakistan in a short war.

The January 2 attack on an Indian Air Force base in Pathankot was allegedly carried out by Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) operatives. What are the dynamics between organisations like JeM and Pakistans military and civilian establishments?



Pakistans Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) set up JeM as a competitor to the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), which the ISI had formed earlier. Before the formation of JeM, three Pakistani terrorists  Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh and Maulana Masood Azhar  were released by Indian authorities in return for hostages taken during the hijacking of the Indian Airlines flight IC-814 in December 1999. Azhar and the two other terrorists, upon their release in Kandahar, were ferried to Pakistan under ISI escort. Within a few weeks, Azhar announced the formation of JeM in Karachi.

LeT and JeM are ideologically distinct organisations. JeM, like the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban, is Deobandi; LeT is Ahle Hadees. Besides, JeM generally conducts suicide attacks, while LeT conducts high-risk missions where the goal is not to die but its operatives would still rather die than be taken captives.

These terrorist groups have an army major assigned to them. It is the majors responsibility to ensure the groups operatives are trained and they get the required resources. A major can, for example, authorise a small-level attack in Kashmir against an Indian army unit  an offensive that does not have major strategic implications. On the other hand, every attack outside of Kashmir has to have the army chiefs imprimatur, given the likely strategic implications  after all, if the Americans get upset and hold up coalition support funding, it is the army chief who will have to answer.

The Pathankot attack came within a week of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modis visit to Lahore and the resumption of talks with Pakistan. Have the terrorists and their handlers achieved their goal by creating a hurdle for the peace process?



If the attack is seen as an attempt to derail the nascent peace process between the two countries, it might be a misreading of the way in which Pakistan employs its jihadi assets to secure its strategic interests in the region. The attack on the air base is not a spontaneous response to recent developments. It is simply the latest manifestation of the Pakistani national security strategy to pursue its revisionist agenda against India.

Pakistan has called PM Modis bluff. Despite all the rhetoric, there is a consensus within the Indian security establishment  at least among those who draw their conclusions from data instead of speaking from nationalist sentiment  that India lacks the offensive capability to defeat Pakistan in a short war. That is important because there will only be a short war between India and Pakistan, due to the presence of nuclear weapons on both sides, if the former responds to such a provocation.

They did it at Gurdaspur, too. The Gurdaspur attack was not in response to the meeting between Modi and Sharif in Ufa. The timing of the Gurdaspur attack is important; it occurred after the reported Indian raid in Myanmar against militants. You will remember the statements issued after the Myanmar raid, warning that all other neighbours of India harbouring terrorists would receive the same treatment. You will also remember the Pakistani response to these statements. Gurdaspur was really about calling the Indian government out on its statements and bravado after the Myanmar incident.

Both these attacks  Pathankot and Gurdaspur  were conducted in and around tier-III cities or small towns. Unlike an attack on a city like Mumbai or Delhi, which will cause a massive uproar and have a galvanising impact on the populace  the Parliament attack, for instance  these were carefully calibrated probes to continue to test Indias red lines. We need to see this in tandem with the attack on the Indian consulate in Mazar-e-Sharif. Pakistan has been testing Indias red lines within Indian territory and in Afghanistan.

When you say Pakistan has called the governments bluff, are you referring to Pakistans civilian government or its military establishment?



The civilians are irrelevant in this case. This is all coming from the army. There is no rogue ISI, either. The ISI reports to the Pakistani army chief.

Dont you think that the recently revived dialogue process is the only way forward?



India should not be talking to Pakistan at all. Pakistan says it has a legitimate claim on Kashmir, which it does not. The Indian Independence Act of 1947 allowed the princely states to decide their fate. India possesses Kashmirs instrument of accession. The case of Junagarh and Hyderabad complicates the morality of Indias actions, but that is a different issue.

Pakistan could have made a claim for Junagarh at the UN but it has no claim over Kashmir. Pakistan also did not fulfil the first condition required for a plebiscite under the UN Security Council resolution on Kashmir. Of course, the Shimla agreement obviates that in any event.

As India continues to talk to Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir, it emboldens the Pakistanis and legitimises their narrative domestically. It fosters the belief among Pakistanis that their claim is entertained by India. The Pakistani army gets to tell its people that even the Indians know that they need to talk to us.

If Pakistan wants peace, it could have it by accepting the LoC as the formal border and desisting from sending terrorists across the border. By the way, that would technically be a concession from the Indian side since it has an instrument of accession for the whole of Kashmir. India should be willing to talk only when Pakistan is willing to ratify the LoC as the border.

Every time one of these attacks occurs, the benefit that Pakistan gets is that the international community calls for talks between India and Pakistan for resolving outstanding issues. In other words, the international community imposes a false equivalence between Pakistan and India. If you cannot punish Pakistan for its support to terrorist organisations, at least you can deprive it of any benefit.

The international community will have to change its talking points. If the international community, instead of calling for talks, says Pakistan needs to act like a responsible nuclear power that does not conduct proxy warfare against its neighbours, and that the changing of maps by bloodshed is not acceptable, Pakistan will be deprived of any benefit from such attacks.

According to reports, Nawaz Sharif has called PM Modi and assured him of action against the persons responsible



This is absolute dramebaazi. Sharif is an irrelevant actor in these matters.

Aside from military funding and support, consider the fact that Hafiz Saeeds Jamat-ud-Dawa (JuD), the rechristened LeT, gets money from the budget of Pakistani Punjabs government, which is run by Sharifs party. The government said it would run JuDs educational establishments, so JuD has a line item in every Punjab provincial government budget.

Besides, JeM enjoys political cover from the two factions of the Jamiat ul-e-Islami.

How can India build an effective deterrence against this form of sub-conventional warfare?



I do not see too many options that India has. It has not made the investments it needs to ensure deterrence against such acts by way of offensive superiority on its international border. Indias current conventional posture on the international border is of defensive competence instead of offensive superiority.

Defence modernisation for such deterrence requires reconfiguring your current military assets, which are bulky and easily detectable, into smaller units that can be forward-deployed much more rapidly without the intelligence footprint that Pakistan can easily detect.

It is about personnel policies. India does not need a huge standing army for such purposes as much as it needs special operators to conduct hot-pursuit missions into Pakistani territory without detection. Currently, India does not have a Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) or jointness among the different branches of its armed forces for seamless interoperability. Pakistan does not suffer from these shortcomings; it has jointness and it essentially has a CDS in the form of its army chief. Most disturbingly, Pakistans position has been significantly bolstered by American military largesse.

Lastly, but most importantly, there needs to be the political will to use these assets as and when required.

This is not a bad time to be an Indian. Successive governments have come to understand that if you remain focused on not having a large confrontation with Pakistan, Indias economy will continue to grow. But, you can have this attitude only if you are willing to suffer several casualties in attacks from Pakistan every year.

We have seen a resurgence of JeM in the recent past...



JeM had been defunct for years after it split in December of 2001. Its leadership was divided over whether they should turn their guns on Pakistan for aiding the Americans in bringing down the Taliban. Azhar said he would not turn against Pakistan even as members of his organisation revolted and went on to join Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

Azhar was kept in protective custody for years and allowed to grow his empire in Bhawalpur. The thinking of ISI was that as long as people were loyal to Azhar they would not turn their guns on Pakistan.

As part of its strategy to combat TTP, the Pakistani army contacted TTP commanders and gave them a choice to go back and fight in Afghanistan; this coincided with the elections in Afghanistan. The other important part of the strategy was that the Pakistani army revivified JeM to draw back the original defectors from JeM and redirect them to India.

In a piece I had written for India Today in September last year, I predicted the next attack would probably be conducted by JeM, instead of LeT. My colleagues at the UN who had been monitoring Al Qaida and the Taliban informed me a year ago that the JeM cadre was amassing at the LoC between India and Pakistan.

The move to revivify JeM is very much part of the Pakistani armys domestic security strategy.
India's home-grown Tejas light combat aircraft (LCA) might never fire a shot in anger at its Pakistani counterpart, the JF-17 Thunder. Yet, the Tejas is already squaring off against the JF-17. When the Indian fighter performs aerobatics at the forthcoming Bahrain International Air Show international aviation experts will directly compare it with the JF-17, which flew at the Paris Air Show in July.

The Tejas team is geared up to impress the experts in its international debut. Business Standard learns that the Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA), which oversees the Tejas' development, has put together a flying routine that "significantly surpasses any aerobatics display the fighter has presented earlier."



"So far, we have always flown with large safety margins in hand. At Bahrain, we will show the spectators what the Tejas can really do, how much energy the fighter has", says an ADA official closely associated with the preparations.

The "Made-for Bahrain" display routine will test the Tejas' limits in vertical climbs, high-speed runs, tight turns and the fighter's slow flying ability.

With the flight-test programme having recently cleared the Tejas for 8G turns (which create stresses on the aircraft that are eight times the force of gravity), the performance at Bahrain will include two 8G turns in front of the display stand. "We do not intend to return to India feeling we could have done more. Aerospace experts will scrutinise every performance, and recordings of these, over succeeding months. We hope to make it worth their while," says the ADA official.

Two Tejas fighters will fly to Bahrain for the air show on January 21-23. These fighters, along with three pilots, are already at an air base in Gujarat, practising their routine in sea level conditions akin to Bahrain. In mid-January, they will fly to Muscat, and then to Bahrain.

Air show performances serve various aims. Some displays are structured to entertain spectators with spectacular, but technically easy, flying. Others emphasise pilots' skills, such as close-flying displays. The Tejas, however, will present a "product demonstration", which showcases for potential customers the performance aspects that make it a good combat aircraft - such as the ability to climb quickly and turn tightly.

"A good 'product demonstration' must translate dry capability statistics into actual flying performance that makes an impact on potential customers", explains a veteran test pilot. As the Tejas has passed performance milestones in a flight-test programme that began in 2001, it has flown and climbed faster and turned tighter, transforming the sedate "flying displays" of the mid-2000s into today's exhilarating aerobatics.

Tejas pilots and ADA officials are confident the fighter will bear the stress of edge-of-the-envelope flying for several weeks. "The Tejas is often criticised for being too heavy. But that also makes it a structurally strong aircraft, with plenty of reserve strength to push the performance envelope," says a veteran Tejas test pilot.

While the Tejas aims to entertain the spectators, and enthuse the aerospace analysts, the primary intention of featuring it at Bahrain is for evaluation by prospective buyers, who study recordings of air show performances.

"Big aerospace corporations like Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Dassault have in-house media teams, which produce high-quality, professional recordings of their aircrafts' performances. ADA is handicapped in this respect", rues an official.

The JF-17 Thunder, which already equips three squadrons of the Pakistan Air Force (PAF), enjoys a lead of several years over the Tejas. Numerous press reports suggest that Sri Lanka has asked to buy the fighter, although Colombo denies this.

The JF-17 has also been more visible internationally. It debuted in 2010 in a static display at the Farnborough Air Show in the UK, and has flown in several air shows, most recently at Paris in July 2015.

However, the fourth-generation Tejas is technologically superior to the third-generation JF-17. Built of composite materials, the Tejas is more manoeuvrable, has better avionics and can carry more fuel and weapons. Eventually, however, customers seek assured production and delivery, and in that the JF-17 is ahead. Pakistan's Kamra factory has already delivered 66 fighters to the PAF, assembled for the most part with Chinese components. Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd has delivered only a single Tejas to the Indian Air Force.
Terrorist group praises Australias Israel position The Albanese Governments decision to no longer recognise West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel has been welcomed by listed terrorist organisation Hamas.

Major announcement on Marinus Link Anthony Albanese was with Jeremy Rockliff in Tasmania on Wednesday to make a major announcement on new under-sea transmission cables to connect the Apple Isle with Victoria.

Loud bang: Earthquake rattles town in Victorias north An earthquake has shaken a small Victorian town and is the latest blow for residents facing the threat of further flash flooding in the state's north.

Coatsworth slams AMAs response to Medicare scandal Former Deputy Chief Medical Officer Dr Nick Coatsworth says the survival of Medicare depends on "us cleaning up our own act" following allegations of the public system wasting billions of dollars.
WATERLOO, Iowa --- Local civil rights leaders have asked for the federal government to investigate the Sunday morning incident where a police officer shot and killed a Waterloo resident.

This is something we dont want to sweep under the rug, said Rev. Frantz Whitfield, president of the Waterloo chapter of the National Action Network. This is something thats much larger than Waterloo can handle. This is something that requires national attention, and we will do all we can to make sure that we get that done.

Authorities said police were called to gunfire at nightclub and saw a man pointing a gun at a crowd. The gunman ignored police orders to drop his weapon and fled, and a Waterloo officer shot Derrick Ambrose Jr., 22, a short distance away.

Following a brief meeting at Mount Carmel Baptist Church Sunday night, members of the Black Hawk County branch of the NAACP and the Waterloo chapter of the National Action Network talked with Ambroses family.

Sharon Goodson, of the NAACP, said the group were calling on the FBI and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to monitor and oversee the shooting investigation.

Goodson said the request came, in part, because of prior complaints about police actions and practices filed by African-American residents that the police departments internal affairs office designated as unfounded. She said the complaints included allegations of misconduct and unnecessary use of force.

Waterloo, Iowa, has the highest concentration of minorities, specifically African-Americans, in the state of Iowa and the highest disparities of racial injustice involving the Waterloo Police Department and African-Americans to match, Goodson said.

Goodson declined to say if she had been in contact with federal authorities.

The shooting is being investigated by the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, which is a standard practice for officer-involved shootings.
WATERLOO  The city of Waterloos insurance company has settled a wrongful death lawsuit over a 2012 police shooting.

Relatives of Derrick Ambrose Jr. took the city to court in connection with the brief foot chase outside a nightclub that led to Ambroses death.

In December, a district court judge signed off on a $2.5 million settlement with the citys insurance carrier.

According to court records, the estate will receive $1.255 million, which will go to Ambroses parents. Attorneys fees of $1 million will be split between the Tom Frerichs Law Office of Waterloo and the Spence Law Firm of Jackson, Wyo., which represented the family. A total of $244,246 will go to litigation expenses.

On Friday, Frerichs filed papers to dismiss the civil suit, which had been filed in U.S. District Court in Cedar Rapids.

As part of the settlement, the city and officers admitted no wrongdoing.

Frerichs couldnt be reached for comment, and Police Chief Daniel Trelka, also the citys director of safety services, declined to comment on the settlement Friday.

Local civil rights leaders called for a federal investigation. A 2013 grand jury probe declined to charge the officer, Kyle Law, and the decision was met with protests. The settlement comes amid a heightened national scrutiny of police shootings nationwide.

Ambrose, a 22-year-old Waterloo resident, died Nov. 18, 2012, of gunshot wounds after running from police following a disturbance outside a nightclub.

According to a synopsis of findings released by the Black Hawk County Attorneys Office following the grand jury session, Ambrose and his friends had been removed from the New World Lounge on Riehl Street following an argument. When an altercation started outside, Ambrose went to his car and obtained his 9mm Taurus pistol.

Law, who was in the area, saw the gathering and noticed Ambrose holding the handgun. The officer drew his own weapon and ordered Ambrose to drop his, and a pursuit ensued. Ambrose fled down a poorly lit street, according to the findings, and past a privacy fence where he apparently threw the Taurus.

Law didnt notice Ambrose disposing of the weapon and continued the chase until Ambrose tripped and fell. Ambrose ignored Laws commands to remain on the ground and started to rise. He turned toward Law, who thought he was about to be shot and fired two shots, according to the statement. Ambrose was struck in the rear right of the head and right leg and died at the scene.

The lawsuit alleged Laws statements didnt match the account of a neighbor who watched the events unfold and called 911. It said Ambrose didnt pose a treat and called the use of force disproportionate.
CEDAR RAPIDS  In the wake of Gov. Terry Branstads unilateral actions to close mental health hospitals, shift management of a state-run health care program to private companies, create a tax break for manufacturing companies and veto millions of dollars of education funding, legislative Democrats are in no mood to forgive or forget as they begin an election-year session.

Branstad wants to focus on joint accomplishments  property tax reform education reform, expanding health care and broadband access, and accelerating improvements to the state transportation system.

Even with a split Legislature, weve been able to accomplish a lot of things, he said. This is a new year. We need to focus on the future and not look back at the past.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, agreed.

Dwelling on the past isnt productive, he said. Its clear the governor, once the Legislature adjourns, will do whatever the heck he wants to do. Thats the reality we will deal with.

House Minority Leader Mark Smith, D-Marshalltown said the relationship between the GOP governor and Democrats is damaged, but not destroyed.

He puts the onus on Branstad to demonstrate that lawmakers can trust him. In 2015 the governor vetoed $56 million for public education projects, calling the use of one-time funds unreliable budgeting.

House Speaker-select Linda Upmeyer, R-Clear Lake, said Republicans also were not happy with Branstads veto of funding because thats what we agreed to and thats what we hoped would happen.

The key to getting beyond last years disappointments may be a quick agreement on K-12 school funding. Rep. Ken Rizer, R-Cedar Rapids, said, If we get that done in 30 days that will be an indicator of how the session will go. Im hopeful.

However, House Republicans and the governor seem to be proposing a 2 percent increase while Democrats want at least 4 percent.

It doesnt help that the governor has come up with plan to pit water quality funding against education funding, said Rep. Sharon Steckman, D-Mason City, a member of the House Education Committee. She was referring to Branstads proposal to extend a 1-cent sales tax earmarked for school infrastructure for 20 years, but share the revenue with water quality programs.

Rep. Todd Taylor, D-Cedar Rapids, assumes Upmeyer wants a honeymoon period when she is sworn in Monday as the first female speaker of the Iowa House.

If she wants to get off on right foot, she will deal with education funding appropriately and early, he said. If not ... well use that in the election. .

Election-year sessions are supposed to be 100 days  10 days shorter than odd-numbered year sessions. The need to get out on the campaign trail is motivation to finish our work early, Taylor said.
WATERLOO, Iowa --- A local grand jury has declined to charge a Waterloo police officer in the shooting death of a man in November.

Officer Kyle Law shot and killed 22-year-old Derrick Ambrose Jr. following a fight outside the New World Lounge on Nov. 18. Authorities said Ambrose had displayed a gun during the fight, ignored Laws orders to drop the weapon and ran off.

The incident met with public protests, and local civil rights groups called for a federal review.

This morning, Black Hawk County Attorney Thomas Ferguson released the results of a secret grand jury investigation into the shooting.

Following the grand jurys independent review and deliberation of the evidence, they returned a no bill  refusing to file an indictment, Ferguson said. He said the grand jury met for five days over a two-week period.

Ferguson said Law wasnt aware that Ambrose had disposed of his pistol after running down a dark street. Ambrose turned to look back toward Law, who, because of his training, felt Ambrose was drawing the gun and thought his life was in danger, Ferguson said. Law fired two shots, killing Ambrose.

Fergusons office released a summary of the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation probe, which lasted from the day of the shooting until March and interviewed about 70 lay witnesses in addition to experts.

According to the synopsis provided by the Black Hawk County Attorneys Office:

Ambrose and his acquaintances had been involved in an argument with others inside New World that night. Ambrose, his friends and the other party were removed from the nightclub. Outside, another altercation started, and Ambrose went to his car, which was parked on Riehl Street, to retrieve his 9mm Taurus.

Across the street, Officer Law was in the area watching the nightclub when he saw a number of people leaving the establishment and a fight start to break out. The fight moved from the parking lot to the middle of Broadway Street, and Law pulled his squad car closer and radioed what was happening.

Meanwhile, one witness called 911 and told dispatchers You guys have a guy out here with a gun, I believe, and theres a pretty big fight going on.

Law left his vehicle and saw Ambrose waving or pointing a handgun at people in front of him, according to the synopsis provided by the County Attorneys Office. Ambroses back was to Law, who approached, drew his duty pistol and ordered Ambrose to drop his gun.

Ambrose saw Law and ran, still holding the pistol. He headed down the 500 block of Riehl Street and went to the south sidewalk, which was extremely poorly lit, the synopsis states. The path took him past a 6-foot high privacy fence, where the Taurus was later found, indicating, according to the synopsis, he likely threw the gun while fleeing.

Ambrose continued on and tripped or lost his footing and went to the ground, his head away from Law. The officer ordered Ambrose to stay down, but Ambrose began to rise, and turned his head toward Law. Law believed his life was in danger and fired two rapid shots. Ambrose was struck in the right leg and the rear right of the head  it couldnt be determined which shot came first  and died at the scene.

Laws spent shell casings were about 40 feet away from Ambroses body.

Law was placed on administrative leave following the shooting and had since returned to duty. Waterloo director of safety services Dan Trelka declined a Courier request to release a photo of Law, citing concerns for his safety. The Courier was unable to obtain community reaction to the report for Thursdays print edition due to the timing of the release of the information.

Here is a summary of other findings of the Division of Criminal Investigation probe:

 Shots fired: Initial reports said officers were sent to New World Lounge for a report of a fight with shots fired. The investigation showed that dispatchers received a report of a fight and a man with a gun. But Officer Kyle Law was in the area and noticed the fight independent of the 911 call and approached after radioing dispatch. The evidence points to only shots being fired by Laws weapon at the end of the incident. Ambroses gun had 17 rounds in the magazine and none in the chamber. Laws weapon had 13 rounds in the magazine and one in the chamber, consistent with having fired two shots. Some witnesses reported hearing more than two shots, but there was no evidence of any other gunshots.

 License to Carry: The investigation showed that Ambrose had purchased his gun, a 9mm Taurus, in November and had obtained a permit to carry Nov. 13, five days before the shooting. The County Attorneys Office synopsis said Ambroses license to carry would have been invalid at the time of the shooting because he was intoxicated. His blood-alcohol level was .065, which is under the legal limit, but he also had THC  marijuanas active ingredient  in both his blood and urine. The presence of drugs in his system would have nullified the permit under Iowa law.

 Recordings: Law didnt activate his squad cars top lights, a move that would have started his dashboard camera, and he didnt turn on his body microphone.

 Stop: Witnesses reported hearing Law direct Ambrose to drop his gun, stop or get down before the shooting.

 Ditched gun: Ambroses pistol was found inside a privacy fence in the yard of a Riehl Street home, making it likely he tossed the weapon during the foot pursuit. It was found about 10 feet into the yard and about 29 feet from the location where Ambrose was shot. Ferguson said neither Law nor any other witnesses saw Ambrose dispose of the gun, so the officer thought Ambrose was still armed.

 Injuries: Ambrose had two gunshot wounds. One to the right side of his right leg near the knee, and the bullet lodged in his leg. The other was to the right rear of this head with an exit wound through the left forehead. It couldnt be determined which injury came first. Ambrose also had scrapes on an arm, possibly from falling during the foot chase.
Of all the destinations found on those proverbial bucket lists, New York is probably the most popular. A city of sweeping beauty, global culture, and with iconic landmarks almost everywhere you turn, it's as familiar to its 8 million residents as it is to daydreams on the other side of the world. Our love affair with the city is found through music, art, film, television and literature, and yet, somehow, The Big Apple still manages to live up to all of our expectations.

Where you stay in the city is probably immaterial when compared to what you can do there, but that doesn't stop some of the available accommodation from being simply jaw-dropping. It's an expense, sure, but the city's various penthouses, apartments and lofts are as weird and wondrous as New York itself.

A split cost here, a bit of saving there, and you might just be able to make yourself feel like a genuine Prince or Princess of the Five boroughs before you return home to your 9-to-5 routine in the rain...

20. The One That You Want

Located in Canon Hill, Brooklyn, this 140 per night architectural gem is a must for those of you who are looking to experience the finer things in New York. Jessica, the owner, is a delight and also makes the meanest breakfast in the city.
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Crisis Phone Numberspecial noticeIf you are a veteran in emotional crisis and need help RIGHT NOW, call this toll-free number 1-800-273-8255, available 24/7, and tell them you are a veteran. All calls are confidential.1-888-899-9377A Crisis Intervention Hotline has been established by the VA Heartland Network to assist veterans who may be dealing with a mental health crisis or difficult issue in their lives. The hotline will also aid family members or friends of veterans who need help in assisting a veteran in crisis.
EPRDF regime's self image of ethnically Balkanized Ethiopia, established by late Dictator Melese Zenawie. Freedom of Press is Dead in ethnocracy based irridentism. Fertile land is grabbed by foreign speculators, over 5 million are starving. 500'000 kids are on the streets. Millions are displaced by force. The regime is arming proxy warriors. Dams are built wantonly risking the existence of millions of indigenous people. Eritreans Moles are Ruling even after seceding in 1991.
Youve got a decent hand. Youre sure of it, but you dont want to bet everything on it because you know the game and know that youll lose. What do you do? That depends in part upon how strong your hand is (or isnt). For example, if you have an ace low flush, you might be tempted to fold, knowing you probably wont make money betting with it. On the other hand, if you hold a pocket pair, you may have enough confidence in the strength of your hand to bet all-in, hoping for a full house or better. In order to get the most from your hand, you need to understand what the odds are against each possible outcome. Heres how you can figure out whether or not you should push your luck with a particular hand.

The decision of the player to do the okbet login will provide him good return in the future. This is the platform that is considered as the reliable option. It provides the players with the high stake of the winning. Even a representative is there who will work to serve the people.

The Value of A Pair

Lets assume weve just dealt two cards and one player has three suited cards and another has four. If the first player bets, then hes going to win about half the time (assuming everyone else folds), so his expected return is 50 percent. The second player has a much tougher time. Hell have a good chance of winning only when he gets three of a kind, which happens 1/4th of the time. So he has a 25 percent chance of winning. When he makes the call, the third player has a 55 percent chance of winning. His expected return is 45 percent. Of course, if the first player loses, then the chances of the third player winning go way up  about 80 percent. All of these percentages are based on the assumption that all players will fold.

The value of the hand is calculated by taking the probability of winning times the amount you would win if you did win. This gives us a number between zero and 100. Well use $5 as our basic unit for calculating the value of the hands. If you had 10 chips and could choose any five, what would you pick? Well, wed obviously take the top hand, which is worth $50. The second best hand is a little bit worse  $45  since youre giving up some equity for the opportunity to win more. So now lets calculate the value of the remaining hands.

If the second player chooses a third card, his expected gain is $25, which represents the difference between the two hands. A fourth card increases the expectation to $30, while adding a fifth card drops it back down to $20. Since there are no sixth cards, the value of the hand is equal to the average of the five cards, which is $24.60.

The value of a suit

We can also figure out the value of a suit by looking at the value of each individual card within that suit. Lets say were dealing a standard deck of 52 cards. One person holds a KQ; the next person has a 7D; and the third has a 2S. Each person has a 20% chance of winning. What is the expected return of having this group of cards? Well, the KQ has a 5% chance of winning, the 7D has a 4% chance, and the 2S has a 3% chance. So the total expected return is 25%. The same logic applies to the other suits, where the probability of winning goes up as the value of the card decreases. For instance, the Aces have a 9% chance of winning, Kings have 8%, Queens have 7%, Jacks have 6%, and Tens have 5%. So the expected returns add up to 36%.

Now lets add all of these numbers together to get an estimate of the value of a hand. Assuming that each hand was equally likely to come up, our total would be 60 percent. But we know thats wrong! Not every hand is created equal. It turns out that a royal flush beats the rest of the pack pretty consistently. So were going to adjust our calculations to reflect this fact.

Royal Flushes

So far, weve assumed that all of the cards were equally likely to come up. Actually, most poker players believe that Royal Flushes are extremely unlikely. In fact, many experts estimate their frequency at less than 0.1 percent. To account for this, lets increase the probability of winning for each card in a Royal Flush by 10 percent. Now when we calculate the value of a Royal Flush, well find that its actually worth 62.5 percent of what it used to be. The value of the cards in each rank will still add up to 100, but theyre now weighted differently.

So what does this mean for you? Well, if you hold a Royal Flush, youre probably going to win about 75 percent of the time. And if you hold a hand like QJT, youll win about 75 percent of the time too. And if you hold a straight, youll win nearly 70 percent of the time. In short, the bigger your hand, the more likely you are to win. Of course, even though youre getting a higher hit rate, youll also tend to lose more often. So if you hold a straight, youre almost guaranteed to lose. But if you hold a Royal Flush, youre going to win about one-quarter of the time, and youll win about twice as much money. So youre almost certain to profit from such a hand, but youll also take a lot of losses.

Now, I mentioned that youll lose money on any hand. In fact, youll lose money roughly half the time. So if you hold a straight, youll lose about 25 percent of the time. If you hold a flush, youll lose about 40 percent of the time. And if you hold a pair, youll lose 35 percent of the time. In addition, if you hold a set  one of the two highest ranks  youll lose 35 percent of the time. Finally, if you hold a high card in the lowest rank, youll lose 30 percent of the time.

But the interesting thing is that youll lose less money on those losing hands than you do on winning hands. Why is that? Well, suppose you hold a straight. Theres a 65 percent chance youll win. But suppose you hold a pair instead. Theres a 65 percent chance youll win. But you lost on your last hand. So theres now a 75 percent chance that youll lose again. On the other hand, if you hold a straight and lose, theres still a 65 percent chance youll win again. So youre only losing about 15 percent of the time.

This means that you can minimize your losses by playing only hands that are reasonably likely to win. So if you hold a straight, youll probably lose around 25 percent of the time. But if you hold a flush, youll probably lose around 40 percent of the time. And if you hold a pair, youll probably lose around 35 percent of the time. And if you hold a set, youll probably lose around 35 percent of the time. But if you hold a high card in the lowest rank, youll probably lose around 30 percent of the time.

In summary, the higher the probability that youll win, the lower your loss percentage will be. And the lower the probability youll win, the higher your loss percentage will be. So the optimal strategy is to play only hands whose probability of winning exceeds your expected return. If you hold a straight, theres a 65 percent chance of winning, so youll lose around 25 percent of the time. If you hold a flush, theres a 65 percent chance of winning, so youll lose around 40 percent of the time. And if you hold a pair, theres a 65 percent chance of winning, so youll lose around 35 percent of the time. But if you hold a set, theres a 65 percent chance of winning, so youll lose around 35 percent of the time. And if you hold a high card in the lowest rank, theres a 65 percent chance of winning, so youll lose around 30 percent of the time.

Of course, you shouldnt ignore your opponents actions entirely. You should always give them credit for being smart, making decisions, and doing whatever it takes to beat you. But just remember that youre being punished for having a decent hand.
Jan 9, 2016 | By Benedict

On January 1, 2016, the Netherlands began its six-month Presidency of the Council of the European Union, taking over from Luxembourg. Ministerial meetings will be held at the National Maritime Museum in Amsterdam, where a partially 3D printed structurethe Europe Buildinghas been erected.

The Presidency of the Council of the European Union, responsible for arranging meetings and setting agendas within the EU, rotates among member states every six months. After holding the post for the last term, Luxembourg has now handed the baton to the Netherlands, whose government has created a unique 3D printed building in which meetings will be held.

To keep the EU on an even keel, the Netherlands has designated its historic National Maritime Museum and a nearby naval yard to function as the new headquarters of the presidency. Those locations are well suited to the task at hand, but the Dutch have pushed the boat out even further by building a brand new 20 x 35m, partially 3D printed structure on the site of the naval yard. The Europe Building, fully equipped for official ministry meetings and press conferences, will stand for the duration of the presidency, before being dismantled in July. Some 17,500 participants are expected to walk through its doors between now and then, by which time 135 meetings will have taken place.

The Europe Building is striking both in its appearance and its construction methods. With a keen eye for thematic consistency, Dutch temporary building specialist Neptunus was able to provide the foundations for a building which mimics the aesthetics of a ships sails. The canvas exterior of the building appears draped from its roof, giving the structure a distinctly nautical feel, perfectly fitting the bill for its surroundings. The structure also demonstrates a level of environmental consciousness, with solar panels installed to provide green energy and water taps fitted onsite to discourage the buying of water bottles.

As a country known for its forward-thinking views, it is perhaps no surprise that the Netherlands tasked local favorites DUS Architects to provide 3D printed parts for the exterior of the Europe Building. DUS, which has made waves over the last few years for its ambitious 3D printed canal house project, also in Amsterdam, used 3D printed bioplastic materials to create sections of the new buildings facade.

The 3D printed sections created by DUS take the form of blue, geometrically shaped benches, which fit snugly between the sails of the building and on which members of the public can sit and relax. "It is wonderful to see how passers-by sit in the wall, with the facade thus becoming a real public place to stay, said Martijn van Wijk of DUS.

The color of the 3D printed benches matches that of the EU flag, whilst the 3D printed patterns, which build up from large to small and from round to square, represent the multiplicity and variety of EU member states. The 3D printed parts are noticeably large, but presented no problems for the huge Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) XXL 3D printer being used by DUS at its 3D printed canal house location. That 3D printer, which has been appropriately named KamerMaker (room maker), is housed within a shipping container and boasts a colossal 2 x 2 x 3.5m build area.

The 3D printed benches have been finished with a lightly colored concrete padding, to contrast with the surrounding blue plastic. When the sun goes down on the naval yard, a two-minute cycle of pulsating spotlights illuminates each 3D printed seating area from behind the giant canvas sails. DUS was also ready and willing to get on board with the green aspects of the building project, with the prototype 3D printed benches able to be fully recycled when the presidency comes to its end and the building is dismantled.

The construction of the Europe Building has been a collaborative project, requiring the services of the aforementioned Neptunus and DUS, as well as Actual, an Amsterdam-based start-up responsible for parametric development and 3D printing; TenTech, for its engineering expertise; Philips, for its lighting services; and Heijmans, an innovations specialist and special partner in the project, for construction and assembly.

The successful implementation of the 3D printed benches at the Europe Building is sure to be seen as a good omen for the 3D Print Canal House project, which is due to be completed within the next two years.

Images: DUS Architects

Posted in 3D Printing Application

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Michael Tomasky in Democracy:

One of the most fascinating little documents of the Obama era, at least for a certain subset of us, is out there now under dissection by Columbia University professor Edward Mendelson and The New York Review of Books. Its nothing to do with ISIS or the election or gun policy. Its a letter Obama wrote to a college girlfriend about T.S. Eliot, and it transported me back in time to the Barack Obama of 2008 in a way that nothing has in quite some timealthough not, for reasons Ill explain, quite as merrily as Id have preferred.

The letter is pretty remarkable. Obama is describing to Alex his take on Eliots conservatism, which Obama in some ways finds appealing. Im no Eliot exegete, but I know enough about Eliots conservative and even reactionary views to find this a little disturbing. Whats interesting, though, is Obamas analysis of the basis of Eliots conservatism. In prose that toggles back and forth between the labored tones of the undergraduate and something considerably sharper than that, he writes:

Remember how I said theres a certain kind of conservatism which I respect more than bourgeois liberalismEliot is of this type. Of course, the dichotomy he maintains is reactionary, but its due to a deep fatalism, not ignorance. (Counter him with Yeats or Pound, who, arising from the same milieu, opted to support Hitler and Mussolini.)

And this fatalism is born out of the relation between fertility and death, which I touched on in my last letterlife feeds on itself. A fatalism I share with the western tradition at times.

Mendelson interprets this better than I could. Obama sees that Eliots conservatism differs from that of fascist sympathizers who want to impose a new political hierarchy on real-world disorder, Mendelson writes. Eliots conservatism is instead a tragic, fatalistic vision of a world that cannot be reformed in the way that liberalism hopes to reform it; it is a fallen world that can never repair itself, but needs to be redeemed.

Whats interesting here to me is not so much Obamas view of Eliot and what it tells us about his own world view; I hope, and think, that his views on these matters have changed in the last 30 years, although that line about his respecting a certain kind of conservatism rings true all these years later to anyone who read his 2006 book The Audacity of Hope, in which he praised conservatisms respect for tradition and its caution in defenestrating certain old things too heedlessly (this certain kind of conservatism that Obama respects is not the kind of conservatism we have in this country today, it should be noted).

More here.
John Gray in The Guardian:

Beautifully produced by New York Review Books in a new translation, by Damion Searls, with an illuminating introduction, Anti-Education consists of five lectures Nietzsche gave at the Basel city museum in 1872. (A sixth lecture was planned, but never delivered; portions of the series were used in his book Untimely Meditations.) Presenting his critique in the form of a series of dialogues between an old philosopher and a student companion, Nietzsche argues that education (he uses the German word Bildung, a term with multiple senses but that broadly means the formation of culture and individual character) has been degraded by being subordinated to other goals. Both the German gymnasium  the secondary school that prepared students for university  and universities themselves had forfeited their true vocation, which was to inculcate serious and unrelenting critical habits and opinions. Instruction in independent thinking had been renounced in favour of the ubiquitous encouragement of everyones so-called individual personality  a trend Nietzsche viewed as a mark of barbarity. As a result, education was dominated by two tendencies, apparently opposed but equally ruinous in effect and eventually converging in their end results. The first is the drive for the greatest possible expansion and dissemination of education; the other is the drive for the narrowing and weakening of education. The first extends education too widely and imposes it on a population that may not want or need it, while the second expects education to surrender any claim to autonomy and submit to the imperatives of the state.

There is more than a little truth in Nietzsches indictment. But to reach this nugget, you will have to wade through pages of Romantic gibberish about the aristocracy of the spirit and the privileges of genius, which foreshadow the absurd figure of the Ubermensch that he concocted in his later work as a redeemer for modern times. But when he observed that education was increasingly being shaped by external forces, Nietzsche was on to something important. A shift of the sort that was under way in 19th-century Germany began in the UK with the regime of monitoring and assessing research that was imposed in the late 1980s. Until that time universities had been autonomous institutions. Now they have to justify themselves as somehow increasing national output  a requirement that denies that intellectual life has value as an end in itself and assumes everything of importance can be measured.

More here.
Almost all the underworld war lords have some or other connection with politicians and respective governments. Time again this fast was established by IPS officers and media too. Now, Former Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar has claimed that the Indian government has a special relationship with underworld don Chhota Rajan, who was deported from Bali in November last year..The book, which was released last year, also was in the news for its disclosure that that at one point in the 1990s Dawood wanted to surrender.

Before getting deported to India, Raajan had spelled out the names of Mumbai Police an officer who has or has had links with Indias most wanted, Dawood Ibrahim. More over some sources even said he is going to expose the names of politicians and journalists who had underworld links but looking at his own future in Indian soil he yet not declared any names.. Rajan has proved one thing, and that is the biggest gangster worldwide wears khaki and khadi , and in India no gangster can survive without participation by police or politician. The motives and plot behind his arrival is not sure but Modi was keen in bringing Dawood to India but they caught Rajan. Rajan had earlier claimed that some in the Mumbai Police were in touch with Dawood Ibrahim. As per the report, Rajan told CBI during interrogation today that some retired Mumbai Police officers had acted as a bridge between Dawood and senior cops. Rajan, after his arrest, had also expressed reservation over plans to lodge him in a Mumbai jail, fearing that Dawood may target him there. Rajan was brought to New Delhi early today from the Indonesian tourist city of Bali by a joint team headed by CBI officials to face trial in over 70 cases of murder, extortion and drug smuggling in Delhi and Mumbai. He was taken straight to the CBI headquarters where he was subjected to a preliminary round of questioning.

Due to security concerns, Rajan, who has reportedly tipped Indian security agencies about the movement of Dawood Ibrahim and his aides, is unlikely to be taken to a Delhi court and instead a magistrate will be brought to the CBI headquarters for his remand. Upon his arrival here, he was taken into preventive custody of Interpol division of the CBI till the central probe agency completes legal formalities for registering a case of allegedly procuring fake passport and takes over the 70 cases handed over by Maharashtra government. Ahead of his arrival in India, Maharashtra government made a surprise announcement of handing over all the cases related to the underworld don to the CBI as the agency had expertise in handling such cases. This move comes barely a few days after the state Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis had been making claims that Rajan will be brought only to Mumbai.

Let it be plot or favour by BJP whats so ever but finally one dreaded gangster back to India. Maharashtra CM assured his security but no one believed his words and he was taken to Delhi. Anyways, Maharashtra is always over burdened with the heavy amount of expenses to secure the criminals and gangsters, from Abu Salem to Kasab and now Chota Rajan, hundreds of crores to be spent for protecting them where as farmers are committing suicide. State has many crucial issues to be addressed, govt collecting donations to do relief work but they can afford to spend for a gangster. Irony is that BJP will be taking extra care of this gangster who is called as Hindu terrorist by so called media.

Rajan had alleged that some members in the Mumbai Police have links with wanted terrorist Dawood Ibrahim. Which is world known fact, each gangster let it be Rajan, Dawood or Gawli had their Khaki shooters in department and Khadi goons to protect them. Many a times nexus between the men in khaki and the Mumbai underworld has come to light, More over now Chota Rajan accusing police officers as Dawood counterparts is purely his insecurity and fear. Ever since, late 90s, the methods adopted by encounter specialists of the Mumbai police to eliminate gangsters have come under scrutiny. These men were accused of carrying out fake encounters as agents of the underworld. Just three men, Pradeep Sharma, Daya Naik and Ravindra Angre have more than 240 encounters between them. Pradeep Sharma, who is in judicial custody, was arrested for ordering one such encounter. He has a staggering total of a 104 encounters to his credit.

Daya Nayak, with 85 encounters under his belt, was arrested for underworld links and owning disproportionate assets. He was reinstated in 2010, but has not been given any post yet. Ravindra Angre, responsible for 52 encounters, was arrested for assaulting and trying to extort money from a local builder and has been granted bail only recently. Rajans main areas of operation, according to information from intelligence reports and his arrested aides are printing counterfeit currency and drug trade. The Interpol listed him as a wanted man in 1995 for carrying out 17 murders. Rajan was believed to be operating in south East Asian countries and also believed to be passing information about Dawoods involvement in the 1993 blasts to Indian intelligence agencies. Irony is that worlds all top intelligence, Interpol and Rajans so called information could not nab Dawood so far, even Osama been laden was killed but Dawood was never ever caught or traced. Who will buy the argument of Rajan are such predicaments?

Government agencies might be taking all the credit for capturing Chhota Rajan, but if sources in Mumbai Police are to be believed, the infamous gangster was the architect of his own arrest. After more than two decades on the run from the authorities and his arch rival and former crime boss, Dawood Ibrahim, advancing age and the need to constantly look over his shoulder got to Rajan (55), and he decided to turn himself in. now he is right here in our country with all luxuries and security in jail..lets see how he will be bailed out or proven guilty.

[starbox]
The dramatic raid came six months after Guzman fled through a tunnel from a maximum security prison in a made-for-Hollywood escape that deeply embarrassed the government and strained ties with the US.

Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto announced the capture using his Twitter account: Mission accomplished: we have him.

Few had thought Guzman would be taken alive, and few now believe Mexico will want to try to hold him a third time in its prisons.

He escaped from maximum-security facilities in 2001 and on July 11 last year, the second breakout especially humiliating for the Pena Nieto administration, which held him for less than 18 months.

The capture had senior Mexican officials at a foreign ministry event gleefully embracing and breaking into a spontaneous rendition of the national anthem after interior secretary Miguel Osorio Chong delivered the news.

Guzman was held after a shoot-out between gunmen and Mexican marines at a home in an upmarket area of Los Mochis, a seaside city in his home state of Sinaloa.

The Mexican navy said that marines raided a home after receiving a tip about armed men there. They were fired on from inside the structure, it said. Five suspects were killed and six others arrested. The marines injuries were not life threatening.

You could hear intense gunfire and a helicopter  it was fierce, said a neighbour, adding that the battle raged for three hours.

Guzman may have been at the house and fled while his gunmen and bodyguards provided covering fire. The drug lord was later captured at the hotel Doux, a low-rise modern building on the outskirts of town.

Some reports said he tried to escape through storm drains. In 2014, Guzman evaded capture by fleeing through a network of interconnected tunnels in the drainage system under Culiacan, the Sinaloa state capital.

Marines seized two armoured vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher at the home in Los Mochis.
By Dan Olmsted

Over the past few weeks weve taken a look at some of the bad ideas that combine to cause the ongoing autism epidemic  including the very bad one that there is no epidemic.

In fact, that is the worst idea of all, because it stops discussion before it starts. If theres no epidemic, then theres no environmental factor in play. Autism is part of life, one might even say part of Gods plan. Ergo, we should put all our efforts into helping the affected while ignoring the causes and the calamity, as Hillary Clintons feckless proposal this week manages nicely.

You can see that play out in a recent spate of books by authors who want to normalize autism and make it seem, in the Church Ladys word, so very special, as opposed to so very disastrous.

Thus in the new Smithsonian, John Donvan and Caren Zucker find a few pre-Civil War case descriptions that might include autistic features and conclude, Still, the dominant narrative has been that real rates are going up, and the United States is in the midst of an autism epidemic, even though most experts see that as a highly debatable proposition. Moreover, the 'epidemic' story has helped crystallize the notion that 'something must have happened' in the near past to cause autism in the first place. Most famously, some activists blamed modern vaccinesa now discredited theory.

That paragraph shows the potency of the "no epidemic" premise -- no epidemic, no vaccine link to autism, no need to worry your pretty little head.

So much for bad ideas. Now for the best one: Listen to the parents. After pondering the trajectory of autism and thinking about reader comments, I realized this is really the universal antidote to the autism awareness and no epidemic idiocy.

First of all, most parents dont think autism is any kind of blessing. Discussing the book Neurotribes, Greg commented on AOA:

Bad Idea number 15, the neuro-diversity movement and autism as a gift: It's a gift to be a non-verbal kid, past early childhood and still in diapers. And, if you're high functioning autistic adolescent, sitting at home on your butt, unemployed and waiting for your aging folks to look after you, your autism is also most definitely a gift.

And Reader said:

Stoopid idea number 7: Pretending that autism is a good thing as in Neurotribes. Yeah it's just great that 30% of people with autism communicate not at all or minimally, 82% unemployment for adult autists, high number wandering and drowning deaths relatively, high murder suicide rates. High numbers with sensory and pain issues. It's just f'g great.

But the main reason to listen to parents is that they know what happened to their children. As The New York Times famously wrote: On Autisms Cause, Its Parents Versus Research. Yes, it is, and the steady drumbeat of parental testimony about vaccination, illness, regression and autism trumps the conflicted, contorted research.

As Sarah Bridges wrote in Spectrum magazine about RFK Jr.: In 2006, Kennedy wrote an article for Rolling Stone magazine called Deadly Immunity. The response to his piece was overwhelming: following the publication, Kennedy received thousands of letters and emails from all over the world. 'The astounding thing was how alike all of them were and that people from Mississippi to New Delhi shared such identical experiences. Here is the typical scenario I heard: A mother took her toddler to the doctor where he received a spate of vaccines, became ill that night, often with a fever, sometimes with seizures, then lost the language he had, developed stereotyped behavior and regressed into a looking-glass world of debilitated relationships and social isolation. Essentially,' Kennedy adds, 'their lives were plunged into unimaginable agony.' It seemed imperative to Kennedy to keep getting the story out to prevent the catastrophe from damaging other children.

Not listening to parents unites mainstream media and medicine. Listening to them unites RFK Jr., this humble blog, Andy Wakefield and many others. In no other universe but Autism Denial would this kind of evidence be dismissed as mere "anecdote" and relegated to the dust bin, while CDC studies exonerating the MMR and thimerosal are treated as gospel.

Last week I wrote about my adventures in the 1970s as a young investigative reporter. Im convinced, on the basis of long experience, that if journalists were as deaf to other concerns as they are to the reality of vaccine-driven autism epidemic, Richard Nixon would still be president (or something like that). The idea that we needed to listen to our readers was drummed into us. The idea that doctors need to listen to their patients  and, as Andy puts it, listen to the mother when the patient is an infant  is still the best idea in medicine.

As commenter Ottoschnaut put it: Bad Idea: 'Ignore the hundreds of thousands of first hand, eyewitness reports of parents who witnessed vaccine injury unfold in real time.'

That, of course, is why the discredited vaccine-autism debate rolls on, because thousands of parents know exactly what happened, way too credible and way too many to silence with appeals to conflicted, self-interested, shoddy research that suggest ordinary people cant be trusted, that wisdom belongs to the priestly class, in this case the medical, legal, and journalism establishments.

This cant last forever, especially when the damage keeps rising at the rates we are seeing now -- at epidemic rates. Our main task is to find the most effective and direct and immediate ways to blast through this denial of the age of autism, help sick kids and share the truth with anyone willing to listen. More and more people are.

--

Dan Olmsted is Editor of Age of Autism.
January 8, 2016

CAIRO  The first deputy for the Nubians in Egypts parliament, Yassine Abdel Sabour, is well-aware of the weight on his shoulders to deliver and achieve the demands of his people, who claim that the state has neglected Nubians for 120 years. In an interview with Al-Monitor, he underscores many of the problems Nubians suffer from, mainly health and sanitation issues, and the desire of the Nubian people to achieve their historical demand to return to the banks of the Aswan High Dam. He also expressed his fears of the demise of the Nubian language and criticized the state for overlooking the history and achievements of Nubians in public education curricula.

The full text of the interview follows:

Al-Monitor: As the first MP for the Nubians in parliament, what were the most noticeable obstacles you encountered during the elections?

Abdel Sabour: I did not encounter any difficulties or obstacles during my candidacy in the elections as the competition was between candidates belonging to interrelated families. However, perhaps the low turnout of voters was an obstacle after all, and allocating one parliamentary seat for the Nubians is not enough to achieve their demands and historical rights.

Al-Monitor: What are the main problems facing the Nubians judging from your electoral tours?

Abdel Sabour: The main problems facing the Nubians are the deterioration of health services, as there is no medical staff in hospitals and health units, given the lack of lodgings and suitable financial remunerations for such staff. We have 35 health units in addition to two big hospitals that lack doctors. Another problem is the lack of a sewerage network, which prompted Nubians to use the tanks under their houses, causing them to wear out and become another burden on the state. The state has allocated $14 million for replacing or renewing housing units, as they are considered shelter homes, but this remains insufficient. The solution lies in establishing a sewerage network, and there is a need to deal with agricultural expenses and canals, which caused underground water to increase, flooding villages in Nubia.

There is also another problem. For 52 years, Nubians have been hoping to return to the banks of the Aswan High Dam and to receive compensation, as 8,000 Nubian families were forced to leave their homes. Affected Nubians were promised to receive a house and 2 feddan [2.1 acres] of land in compensation, but this never happened under the pretext that the states budget did not allow it.

Al-Monitor: What are the most important laws regarding Nubians you will be proposing?

Abdel Sabour: Implementing Article 236 of the Egyptian Constitution, which gives the Nubian people the right to return to the banks of the Aswan High Dam, and implementing Articles 47 and 50, which affirm the preservation of different identities and the Egyptian heritage. This is in addition to general laws pertinent to all Egyptians, mostly the amendment of the right of demonstration, which must be amended so that [demonstrators] notify the Ministry of Interior of [their wish] to hold demonstrations rather than taking its prior permission, and to oblige people to preserve public facilities and not to sabotage roads. Also, officials are required to solve problems, hold discussions with demonstrators and determine places for demonstration. Demonstrations ought to be organized not suppressed, otherwise we would be creating a dictatorship.

Al-Monitor: Will you call for the adoption of a law to resettle the Nubian people on the banks of the Aswan High Dam? Do you expect the state to respond to that?

Abdel Sabour: We do not need to approve a new law. According to the constitution, Nubians have the right to return to the banks of the Aswan High Dam, and the parliament ought to respond to their demand. Should the parliament refrain from doing so, it becomes unconstitutional because it is not applying the constitution. The state ought to fulfill this demand. We believe the time is very appropriate for our historical demand to be fulfilled. It would be unjust to us if the state denied us our right.

Al-Monitor: Is the state insisting on not allowing the Nubians to own properties, giving them only their usufruct right?

Abdel Sabour: I call on the state to establish a resettlement committee for Nubians and then discuss the law at a later stage. Nubians are Egyptian citizens, and they have the right to own properties. However, there is no difference between the usufruct right and the acquisition right. We will not leave our territories.

Al-Monitor: Since you are the head of the teachers' union in Aswan, do you think public school curricula overlook Nubians' role in Egypt?

Abdel Sabour: Nubians have been ignored for 120 years, and they have suffered and kept silent for the sake of their nation. Therefore, Egyptian students do not know about them. The intentional neglect of Nubians' history is a crime against human history. It should be included in school curricula, as the whole world is interested in it, except for Egypt. Of course, I will ask the minister of education to include the Nubian history in the curricula as well as the heroism of its people.

Al-Monitor: You have mentioned that the illiteracy rate in Nubia is barely 1%. Why so?

Abdel Sabour: Nubians are naturally smart. The ancient Nubia had two schools, Aliba and Qarta, and they played a role in spreading education among their people.

Al-Monitor: How will you address the concerns of your district's people regarding the disappearance of the Nubian language?

Abdel Sabour: I ask all people interested in Nubian history to prepare a booklet to teach citizens of Nubia their language. The Nubian language is disappearing, especially among the new generation.

Al-Monitor: What are the main demands of Nubian women from the current parliament?

Abdel Sabour: They want job opportunities and small projects for them specifically, especially since they have high qualifications in producing handicrafts.

Al-Monitor: Did you take practical steps to forward your proposition to form a parliamentary committee that would visit Ethiopia and discuss the Renaissance Dam crisis with the Ethiopian parliament?

Abdel Sabour: I suggested the formation of a parliamentary committee to tackle the Renaissance Dam crisis, and I will submit my proposition to the foreign affairs' committee in the parliament in order to form the committee, hold meetings and have mutual visits with the Ethiopian parliament.

Al-Monitor: There are close ties between residents of Aswan and the people of Sudan. Will Aswan's MPs play a role in winning the Sudanese over in favor of Egypt in the Renaissance Dam issue?

Abdel Sabour: A public meeting between the Sudanese MPs and Egypt is scheduled soon. The Renaissance Dam issue will be tackled during this meeting. The Sudanese people realize the importance of the Nile waters for Egypt and are aware that the Renaissance Dam harms both Egypt and Sudan.
January 8, 2016

Former Chief of Staff and Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, a veteran of two intifadas, quit political life a year ago. During these last few months, away from politics and decision-making circles, Mofaz, like many others in Israel, has been following the latest round of violence. He links the attacks to the prolonged freeze in Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy.

Speaking with Al-Monitor, Mofaz criticized the absence of an Israeli diplomatic initiative and contended that Israel must be proactive and go on the offensive, not only defend itself from behind roadblocks and concrete barriers. Mofaz was careful during the interview not to get dragged into political attacks on the prime minister, but his words made clear how far the current leadership is from believing that the solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict lies in a diplomatic initiative.

The text of the interview follows:

Al-Monitor: Are you concerned by the possible collapse of the Palestinian Authority?

Mofaz: Such a scenario could turn out to be very damaging for us and the Palestinians. It could lead to chaos in the PA territory because there wont be anyone to assume responsibility for day-to-day life. The PAs defense forces, which currently maintain a reasonable level of security cooperation with Israel and have partial control of the area, will cease to exist. That means Israel will be forced to bear the entire burden and responsibility. The [Israel Defense Forces] will thus have to deploy far greater forces for this mission than it does today. The IDF will be the entity in charge of all civilian matters and that will be terrible. An additional intifada under such circumstances will not be long in coming, and this is therefore a starkly negative event  if it happens. Israel and the Palestinians have no interest in the manifestation of such a scenario.

Al-Monitor: In your assessment, is such an occurrence imminent?

Mofaz: I dont think we are currently close to the collapse of the PA; there are no such indications. Either way, this is not something that happens overnight. But as a negative, long-term process that evolves over a period of months or more, it could happen. Right now [Palestinian President] Mahmoud Abbas threatens such a thing because its part of his tactics, just like he has been threatening to resign and allow the PA to collapse because there is no cooperation on Israels part and there are no negotiations.

Is the governments policy strengthening or encouraging the PA as a stabilizing factor? The answer is no. But its still a far cry from this to a collapse.

The fact that there are no talks and there is no horizon of diplomacy and no Israeli plan undermines trust between the two sides by virtue of the fact that they are treading water. Standing in place is actually a retreat.

Al-Monitor: How would you define the current round of terror attacks?

Mofaz: It's not an intifada. I was commander of the paratroopers division in the first intifada and chief of staff in the second one. "Intifada" by its very definition is a popular uprising, and for now I dont see all of the Palestinian people rising up as they did then. In addition, we can also see that the events are not organized. What is organized? The incitement is organized. I think this issue of incitement, especially on the [social media] networks and among some of the Palestinian leaders and some of the terror organizations, is organized and we must use legislative and punitive tools against it.

On the other hand, we have to be more proactive and not to only put in place defensive measures. We add more and more security guards, more and more concrete barriers, more and more roadblocks. We have to be more offensive and proactive. We must make a diplomatic move combined with defense measures.

Al-Monitor: Is a diplomatic move relevant in the middle of terror attacks?

Mofaz: Its more relevant than ever, as I wrote in my plan. I think the borders and the security arrangements must be agreed on in the first stage. This is the first issue with which Israel will be required to deal in any future arrangement, considering that the future Palestinian state will be demilitarized. Put this on the table along with a timetable for the coming years to resolve the other issues. But present something to which the world can relate, and dont just say theres no one to talk to [on the other side].

The longer one accepts this attitude that there's no one to talk to and theres nothing to be done, the closer we move to a binational state. That sounds bombastic, but in the end, part of the public buys what you sell to it and that becomes part of the public opinion, and thats where were headed. I think the leadership must say that we can lead the way. One cannot keep blaming the other side and not do anything. We must initiate and lead, because our international de-legitimization is very harmful to us.

Israel would benefit by presenting the world with a diplomatic initiative. To come and say that we want to negotiate without discussing the finality of the conflict and without preconditions  such willingness would portray Israel in a positive light on the world stage as providing hope for both sides, as a state with a vision. In the long run, this would result in an end to the conflict and recognition of Israel as a Jewish state.

I think that part of this wave of terror is a result of Palestinian frustration and despair. Thats why I contend that we need a combined approach: As far as the security of the citizens of Israel is concerned, there are no concessions. I favor any measure necessary in order to provide security for the citizens of the state, and I did so as chief of staff and minister of defense during Operation Defensive Shield and afterward. But at the same time we have to put the diplomatic alternative on the table.

Al-Monitor: Launch an operation like Defensive Shield, now?

Mofaz: No. I am talking about the spirit of Defensive Shield, about an offense initiative. That's getting to them before they get to you. An operation like Defensive Shield, now, is not relevant. At the time we took control of all the areas of Judea and Samaria, entered 20 refugee camps and took back control of eight large cities in Judea and Samaria. What will you do now? Go from door to door collecting the knives? The scissors? At the time we searched for [explosives manufacturing] labs and terrorists.

I do think we should be taking more decisive and dramatic measures in the areas from which most of the terrorists have come in recent months, such as Hebron. For example, we should consider cordoning off the city and searching neighborhoods, launching offensive measures around Hebron. We have to be selective in our modus operandi, but to maintain the initiative and go on the offense. The issue of illegal aliens, for example, is not being dealt with. Several tens of thousands of Palestinians work in Israel without permits, and we must not put up with such a phenomenon. Its very dangerous.

In the end, its a question of policy. The equation is simple: The more limited your diplomatic measures, the narrower your room for maneuvering in the security sphere.

Al-Monitor: How do you see the attack at the bar on Dizengoff Street in terms of the terror wave?

Mofaz: As the wave of terror intensifies, we will see more security at schools and on buses. We should take more advantage of technology in the fight against terror; after all, large public areas are covered nowadays by cameras. In such an event, there should be a unit within the police that knows how to get to a scene very quickly and pass around the [perpetrator's] photo using existing technologies.

Al-Monitor: What did you think of the prime ministers speech after the attack in which he pointed the finger of blame at all the Arabs of Israel?

Mofaz: There was talk of a decision to collect all the weapons held illegally in Arab communities. This is a leadership decision, and the prime minister could have made it years ago. Why only now? Other than that, it was not an appropriate moment to announce it. To preach to the Arabs of Israel on such a day  and to preach at all  is divisive. The job of a prime minister at such times is to unify. Netanyahus message that evening was the exact opposite of coexistence.
January 7, 2016

A panoply of polling centers operate in Palestinian territories with the aim of monitoring economic and political issues. Although their survey results can be compelling, they can also be curious and sometimes corrupt.

Some of the many centers include the State Information Service, the Jerusalem Media and Communication Center, the Palestinian Center for Public Opinion (PCPO), the Panorama Center for the Dissemination of Democracy and Community Development, the Coalition for Accountability and Integrity (AMAN) and the Center for Development Studies at the Birzeit University.

One recent poll of Palestinians showed that 67% of respondents support the use of knives in fighting against Israel, while 31% oppose it and 37% believe the current fighting will escalate into an armed intifada. The poll's findings, published Dec. 14 by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PCPSR) in Ramallah, also showed 18% of respondents believe the confrontations will evolve to widespread, peaceful popular confrontations, and 66% believe that, if the current fighting develops into an armed intifada, it will help achieve Palestinians rights in ways that negotiations do not. Meanwhile, 51% believe that if the current confrontations remain as they are now, they can also contribute to achieving Palestinian rights.

PCPSR researcher Jehad Harb told Al-Monitor, Poll results are not as respected by Palestinian decision-makers as they are in Israeli and Western decision-making circles, although Palestinian polling centers have come to prove their seriousness and credibility and have gained expertise despite the fact that they still make mistakes. I do not think that foreign funding can affect the polls results, as polling centers enjoy transparency and publish their questions and results on their websites. Palestinians have become confident that these polls evaluate peoples opinions about topical issues.

However, several problems face polling centers in Palestinian territories. Chief among these is their lack of experience, as even the oldest of the centers were created after the Palestinian Authority (PA) was established in 1994.

Also, polled Palestinians often don't provide truthful answers, given their caution for security reasons, which may increase the error margin. Other problems include funding difficulties, the need to develop research and scientific skills, and a sometimes misinformed public.

Arab World for Research and Development (AWRAD) in Ramallah published results Dec. 10 showing 86% of Palestinians polled believe the current unrest is spontaneous, 70% believe that a limited number of Palestinians are taking part in it, 26% believe what is going on is a wide, popular intifada and 37% believe the unrest reflects Palestinians' frustration over the failed peace process. Also, 81% of the polled support armed attacks against Israel, while 53% believe an armed struggle is the best way to end the occupation.

AWRAD director Nader Said told Al-Monitor, There are popular Palestinian myths about the polling centers orientation, funding sources and political agendas, but our long experience of over 20 years in the field has managed to dispel a lot of these misconceptions, given the high quality that we provide. And despite the gap between the Palestinian political forces and the polling centers, the Hamas movement benefits the most from the polls, as it studies and analyzes them. Meanwhile, some Palestinian politicians attack us, not based on our scientific methodology, but because our results may not cater to their convenience.

For its part, the Opinion Polls and Survey Studies Unit at An-Najah National University in Nablus released the results of a poll in November in which 1,363 Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza took part. According to the results, 52% of the polled described the ongoing clashes between the Palestinians and Israel as an intifada, while 43% said it was a mass uprising; 52% supported a peaceful and unarmed popular intifada, and 43% supported an armed intifada.

Varying results are not surprising. Outcomes can be affected for innocuous reasons such as the phrasing of questions or the specific segment of the population polled. Other times, however, polls are intentionally skewed.

Bakr al-Turkmany, a legal adviser to AMAN, revealed to Al-Monitor some of the problems that centers face while preparing polls. Some Palestinian governmental institutions fail to understand the role of field researchers. In some cases, citizens fail to understand the terms and concepts used in the polls, which leads them to provide general answers that are not based on their understanding of the researchers concept. Add to this the public institutions lack of confidence in poll results, given their pre-judgments and anxiety over the poll results and findings, Turkmany said.

Another problem is that some centers design or finagle opinion polls to cater to their own orientations. Al-Zaytuna Center for Studies and Consultations noted in February 2010 that one undisclosed Palestinian polling center paid Palestinians to fill out hundreds of copies of poll questionnaires during the second half of 2009.

Some centers have reputations for poor accuracy. For example, before the official Palestinian legislative election results were announced in January 2006, some opinion polls called the election in Fatahs favor, but Hamas had already achieved victory at the time. This dealt a great blow to the polling centers credibility, even given that the opinions expressed by Palestinians during polls do not necessarily reflect who they vote for.

And then there is the matter of finding trustworthy workers. In an AMAN article published in January 2014, Palestinian researcher Fadel Soliman asserted that some field researchers and interviewers sit under trees by the side of the road and fill out most of the questionnaires. This is why polling centers should monitor and follow up on polls to ensure the field staffs integrity.

Hatem Abu Zayda, director of the Future Research Center in Gaza, voiced a different opinion. Polling centers are not charities, and they have political objectives. There are three factors that affect credibility. Chief among these is that polling centers are backed by Western countries and nongovernmental organizations, which try to influence the results in a way that serves the funders policies. Also, centers scientific methodology [can be] marred by a great deal of skepticism and lack of precision, not to mention the security aspect that affects their work in the West Bank. Many Palestinians fear to freely express their views so as not to be prosecuted by the [PA] and Israel, Abu Zayda told Al-Monitor.

While Palestinian polling centers do not claim to provide the most precise results, such results can reflect public opinion trends. Overall, such surveys remain an essential tool to assess trends, and they can be useful when setting Palestinian policies related to Palestinian factions or to Israel, as shown in the November 2015 opinion poll conducted by the PCPO in the West Bank. That poll addressed the future of Palestinians relationship with Israel, the popularity of Fatah and Hamas and whether Palestinians are satisfied with the performance of President Mahmoud Abbas.
January 8, 2016

RAMALLAH, West Bank  Unsurprising and underwhelming appear to best characterize the speech delivered by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Jan. 6 that led to widespread expressions of frustration among the Palestinian populace. In light of the political dead-end with the Israelis, everyone  except perhaps the Fatah movement that Abbas leads  had expected, or hoped for, a speech announcing potentially game-changing decisions or at least a way to move the Palestinian cause forward, beyond its current crisis.

Abbas in the speech reaffirmed the Palestinian leaderships commitment to the Palestinian Authority (PA) and its affiliated institutions, which he presented as a national achievement. In light of Israel's refusal to cease settlement building and return to the negotiating table, Abbas called for an international conference to compel Israeli compliance with resolutions related to the Palestinian issue. He also proposed that Hamas and other factions agree on the formation of a national unity government and take part in legislative and presidential elections, which he alleged Hamas was avoiding for fear of failure.

Responding to the speech, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) said that Abbas had failed to rise to Palestinians expectations for some clear decisions from their leadership, particularly in regard to relations with Israel. The faction also complained about Abbas' failure to express support for the intifada, ongoing since early October, which the various components of Palestinian society back as resistance against Israel.

One PFLP leader, Kayed al-Ghoul, told Al-Monitor that the speech had been a means to dispel rumors that Abbas was suffering from major health problems and to respond to Israeli assertions that the collapse of the PA is a foregone conclusion. Ghoul stated, The presidents speech was lacking and devoid of the substance that we expected. He also thought it unlikely that an upcoming meeting of the Palestine Liberation Organization's (PLO) Central Committee would lead to decisions capable of rescuing the Palestinian cause from internal division and the failure of negotiations with Israel.

Ismail al-Ashkar, a Hamas-affiliated member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, offered a different perspective, telling Al-Monitor, President Abbas speech did not surprise us at all because its content was already known, especially the accusations that Hamas did not want elections to be held and refused to hand over administration of the Rafah crossing to the PA.

Ashkar added that Abbas speech aimed at shifting the blame to others for the crises plaguing the PA and Fatah. He stressed that Hamas stood ready to hold elections and participate in a national unity government, but, he added, on consensual terms and after the complete implementation of the reconciliation agreement signed in Cairo on May 4, 2011. The agreement was supposed to have brought an end to the internal division and lead to developing a political plan for the coming phase. Ashkar in part blamed what he called Abbas' failure to properly manage the Palestinian cause and his lack of political ideas for creating the crises that have befallen the Palestinian people, including the siege of Gaza, closing of the Rafah crossing and ongoing Israeli settlement activities in the West Bank.

Fatah, unsurprisingly, painted Abbas speech as being positive in its presentation of internal or external matters as well as its renewed affirmation of the Palestinian peoples rights and insistence on the peace option, despite the difficult circumstances confronting Palestinians. One Fatah leader, Fayez Abu Aitah, told Al-Monitor that the most important aspect of Abbas speech was his call for an international meeting to compel Israels compliance with international resolutions, the formation of a national unity government and holding elections in the territories. He said the coming period would witness intensive meetings of the Palestinian leadership to agree on Central Committee mechanisms and decisions related to political, economic and security relations with Israel.

In a Jan. 6 televised statement, Hassan Asfour, former Palestinian Minister for State Negotiation Affairs, told the Ghad al-Araby channel that Abbas speech had been viewed by the presidential office as an exercise in reassuring Palestinians about Abbas' health, which is why it seemed a setback at the political level.

Various Palestinian analysts and observers believe the presidents speech confirmed the failure of the approach adopted by the leadership vis-a-vis Palestinian factions as well as Israel. Assaad Abu Shirkh, a political analyst and retired political science professor at Al-Azhar University in Gaza, concurred with the assessments that the goal of the speech had been to dispel rumors about Abbas health and Israeli assertions that the PA stands on the verge of collapse.

Abu Shirkh also told Al-Monitor that Abbas was trying to absolve himself of blame for the failure of the Palestinian movement. According to him, everyone had been waiting for Abbas to announce decisions that would reinvigorate and rescue the Palestinian national project, including a plan to lift the Gaza blockade and convene the PLO leadership. Abu Shirkh contended that the PA held a very strong card that for unknown reasons it refused to play, namely, listening to the Palestinian people instead of complying with US and Israeli wishes when it comes to negotiations and security cooperation as well as restoring cohesion among the Palestinians.

An-Najah National University political science professor Abdul Sattar Qassem thinks it would be best for Abbas to refrain from giving speeches, because he never offers political programs or outlooks beneficial to the Palestinian cause in them. Qassem believes Abbas should relinquish leadership of the PA, since his term officially ended in 2009.

Palestinians' skepticism about solutions being found to resolve their current crises and to move forward in relations with Israel might well be justified given the absence of any apparent official policies in this regard and a region marred in bloody sectarian conflicts.
January 8, 2016

DAMASCUS, Syria  Syrian regime and opposition forces are waging a fierce battle over al-Shaykh Maskin in southern Syria, a city critical to control of the old road between Damascus and Daraa and other essential supply and access routes.

Opposition forces and Jabhat al-Nusra had controlled the area for a year when the Syrian army launched an attack Nov. 14, supported by the Russian air force and Lebanese Hezbollah fighters. The army regained control of the Brigade 82 base near al-Shaykh Maskin and of Tel al-Hash in the citys northwest. Taking control of the Brigade 82 base paved the way for the regime to advance toward the northeastern district of al-Shaykh Maskin, but since then, the momentum has swung back and forth between the two sides.

Syrian Arab News Agency SANA said Jan. 5 the Syrian army had gained control of 60% of al-Shaykh Maskin, which is about 14 miles from Daraa city and 50 miles from the capital of Damascus. The opposition fighters and Jabhat al-Nusra launched numerous attacks against the Syrian army, which was able to foil them, the agency said.

But as of Jan. 6, according to the opposition-affiliated Orient Net website, the opposition had progressed and dealt several losses to the Syrian regime forces. The website added that preparations were in full swing among opposition fighters to regain total control of Brigade 82, one of the Syrian armys largest military bases and a consistent battle front between the two sides.

Ahmed Abu al-Shaim, one of the Islamic Muthanna Movement leaders participating in the opposition battalions operations in al-Shaykh Maskin, told Al-Monitor Jan. 3 via Internet on the Hangout app, The regime and its supporters are mobilizing their troops near Brigade 52 southeast of al-Shaykh Maskin, and in the southwest near the city of Daraa, in a bid to distract the efforts of our forces.

The regime and its supporters led us to suffer major material and human losses, he added.

Abu al-Shaim said that one of the most prominent field commanders in Hezbollah, known as al-Shabah (Arabic for "the Ghost"), was among the dead, according to regime-controlled Izra city hospitals. The hospitals receive wounded from the regime forces and bodies of regime fighters. Hezbollah, however, has yet to confirm the news.

Al-Shaykh Maskin city is strategically located at a crossroads between the provinces of Suwayda, Quneitra and the Damascus countryside, as well as the city of Daraa. Also, the city had once served as the largest regime bastion to defend the capital from any threat coming from the south  Israel and the opposition fighters.

Asked about the importance of the city for opposition fighters, a Damascus-based journalist who specializes in military affairs and known under the pseudonym Maxim Nasr, told Al-Monitor, The presence of opposition fighters in al-Shaykh Maskin city can serve as a springboard to launch attacks against regime forces in nearby towns, especially Izra.

Nasr added, The Syrian armys control of al-Shaykh Maskin enables it to control supplies in the entire southern region (Daraa, Suwayda and Quneitra), Damascus and its environs. This allows it to advance toward the vicinity of Daraa city, given that al-Shaykh Maskin city constitutes a strategic defense line for the armed opposition factions. This also leads the Syrian army to control the [old road between Damascus and Daraa], as well as the supply route between the two opposition bastions in the towns of Nawa and Busra al-Harir.

It should be noted that the opposition-controlled town of Busra al-Harir, located 12 miles east of al-Shaykh Maskin and about 55 miles southeast of Damascus, serves as a gateway for the opposition to the regime-controlled Suwayda province. In April, the regime had failed to control this town following several attempts aimed at opening a supply route between the Izra town in the countryside of Daraa and the Suwayda province and blocking al-Lajat countryside road before the opposition forces.

According to Nasr, the Syrian regime forces launched their attack on al-Shaykh Maskin after the opposition tried to advance north toward al-Suhailiya.

Controlling that area interrupts the regime forces supplies into Daraa and consequently leads the province center to fall in the hands of the opposition," Nasr said. "This paves the way for the opposition to advance toward the southern Damascus countryside," which is why the regime forces launched a pre-emptive operation, he added.

Khaled al-Matrood, editor-in-chief of the regime-affiliated al-Boseleh website, said in a Jan. 2 interview with Al-Mayadeen channel, Preparations are in full swing to entirely liberate the southern region, starting with al-Shaykh Maskin gateway, Ebtaa, Dael and Etman in the south near the city of Daraa, all the way to the area adjacent to the Quneitra countryside, especially the towns of Tel al-Hara, Enkhel and Jassem.

In light of the military developments witnessed on the battle fronts, al-Shaykh Maskin, the fourth-largest and fourth-most-populated city in Daraa province, is witnessing a large exodus toward nearby villages and towns such as Ebtaa, Dael and Tafas, according to a resident of al-Shaykh Maskin who requested anonymity. The resident, whom Al-Monitor contacted via Skype, also confirmed that food supplies and medicines were running out.
January 8, 2016

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey  We were supposed to be receiving visitors for condolences now, but we are still trying to get our dead, Mithat Ogut said bitterly. The middle-aged Kurd  visibly weak  is on a hunger strike. The reason: to press the authorities to let him have the body of his son, killed in clashes between the security forces and Kurdish militants that are raging in urban areas in Turkeys mainly Kurdish southeast since summer 2015. His son's body, he believes, has been left in the streets in Diyarbakirs historic Sur district, now a virtual war zone, cut off from the outside world amid round-the-clock curfews. Along with Ogut, five other Kurds have been on a hunger strike at the Human Rights Associations Diyarbakir office since Jan. 1, demanding the handover of two other bodies from Sur.

According to Kurdish politicians and families, at least 55 other bodies remain unburied in Cizre and Silopi, two towns in Sirnak province that remain under curfew as the security forces battle Kurdish militants entrenched in residential neighborhoods. The dead are believed to include both civilians and militants.

The plight of families unable to retrieve and bury their dead adds another grim aspect to the humanitarian drama unfolding in the cut-off districts. Many fear that the brunt Kurdish civilians are forced to bear  illustrated most grimly by several families forced to keep their dead children in deep freezers  could irreparably damage the Kurdish sense of belonging to Turkey.

A deep sense of mistrust in the authorities lingered among the hunger strikers, wrapped in blankets in a cold and dim room  the result of power outages. Al-Monitor spoke to them on Jan. 6. The women alternated between praying and small talk, while the men told their plight to occasional visitors who came to offer moral support. They all looked weary.

Portraits of their killed relatives hang on the wall. The three young men  Ramazan Ogut, Mesut Seviktek and Isa Oran  were all militants of the Patriotic Revolutionary Youth Movement (YDG-H), the armed youth wing of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). They were killed in clashes in Sur, where the security forces are trying to regain control, struggling with trenches and barricades the YDG-H has put in place to keep them away. The families believe their bodies are still lying in the streets in the besieged district.

For more than two weeks, Mithat Ogut has been trying to recover the body of his son, Ramazan, which, he believes, is abandoned at the Four-Foot Minaret, the ancient mosque where Tahir Elci, head of the Diyarbakir Bar Association, was gunned down in late November. Weve lodged an application with the prosecutors office. We want the bodies, Ogut told Al-Monitor. This is not compatible with Islam. The Religious Affairs Directorate must intervene. Im appealing to the whole world and all Muslims to help us get the bodies.

Ogut said the authorities had promised to call when they recover the body. We are not even sure whether the body is still there. They might even take it and bury it somewhere, he said, vowing to keep up the hunger strike no matter what happens.

Another hunger striker, Ihsan Seviktek, said the family had vainly sought help from the governors office, the prosecutors office and other local officials to retrieve the body of his brother, who was reported killed on Dec. 23. He confirmed his brother originally belonged to PKK units based in mountainous areas before recently joining the urban YDG-H groups. The authorities, he said, initially refused to acknowledge the killing and then said the ongoing clashes in Sur prevented the evacuation of the body.

Weve been told to fill the trenches so that they could go and take the body. Weve also been told to get a car and go take the body ourselves. They wanted us to sign papers that they would not be responsible [if something happens to us there]. They are virtually telling us to go there so they could kill us, Seviktek said. Its a shame for Turkey, its a shame for the world. Shame on those who speak of democracy, religion and faith. The body is only 500 meters [1,640 feet] away from here, not in some remote rural area. And for 16 days, the state has been refusing to give it to us.

Isa Orans father, Mehmet Oran, also spoke of officials raising the issue of trenches in return for the bodies. They tell us, Remove the ditches and we give you the bodies, as if the parents dug those ditches and put their children there. Thats how they are threatening us, he told Al-Monitor.

The families, he explained, fear that they, too, could be killed if they enter the conflict zone to retrieve their dead. A medical worker was shot dead while helping a wounded person in Cizre. We are scared the same could happen to us, Oran said. Well do whatever it takes to get the bodies. Its our humanitarian and moral right.

Asked about the claims of the families, an official from the governors office told Al-Monitor that no obstacle existed to recovering the bodies. Speaking on condition of anonymity, he argued that evacuating the bodies was up to the local Kurdish-run municipalities. The governors office, he said, has approved all applications on the issue, but the applicants never came back.

The controversy reached parliament earlier this week. In a written question to Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, seen by Al-Monitor, Sibel Yigitalp, a lawmaker for the pro-Kurdish Peoples Democratic Party, demanded answers to the following questions: On what legal ground are bodies left in the streets of Sur and their handover to families and burial prevented? For what reason is the right of burial  a basic norm in the law of war  ignored and withheld from both the dead and their families by denying permission for burial procedures and leaving the dead in the streets for days? Preventing the burial of the bodies and causing them to decompose violates their physical and moral integrity, and given the moral values of our society, does this not amount to torture of both the dead and society itself? What purpose is being pursued with this? How many bodies have been left in the streets so far? What is the breakdown according to districts?

The controversy, however, grew further on Jan. 7 with a regulatory amendment allowing the authorities to bury bodies unclaimed by families from the morgues for three days, which was reportedly a follow-up to an earlier government circular to prevent funerals from becoming [venues for] terrorist propaganda.

A total of 62 YDG-H members have been rendered ineffective in Sur  either killed or wounded  as of Jan. 2, according to the security forces. The security operations and clashes in the district are still going on, with the curfew now into its sixth week.
January 8, 2016

On the very first day of 2016, news agencies reported a bizarre story out of Turkey. At a press conference, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan referred to Hitlers Germany as an example of the political system he proposes for his country  a presidential system with a unitary state. This statement was, of course, seized by the press, with worrying headlines such as Erdogan cites Hitler's Germany as example of effective government.

A couple of hours later, the presidents office released an official correction. Reminding everyone that Erdogan has condemned the Holocaust and anti-Semitism as a crime against humanity, just like Islamophobia, the statement asserted that the president pointed to Hitlers Germany only as a very bad example of the presidential system. The statement blamed the media for the confusion, claiming the Hitlers Germany metaphor has been distorted by media outlets and has been used in the opposite sense.

Listening to the press conference live in Turkish, I thought that perhaps it would be more realistic to accept that Erdogan made a puzzling remark rather than accusing the media of distortion. True, Erdogan did not praise the Third Reich at all, and did not reference it as his model. But he should have calculated that any reference to Hitlers Germany without a disclaimer would have created such a buzz.

So, this was obviously a blunder on Erdogans side. But what kind? Opposition voices in Turkey see it as a Freudian slip, or even a well-calculated tactic to instill the seeds of the tyrannical model he really has in mind. I rather see a reckless reference in an already reckless, uncalculated remark, in which Erdogan made another mistake that many people missed. He said, We see this [presidential] model in the overwhelming majority of developed countries. However, as a simple Internet search would show, most developed countries are in fact either constitutional monarchies or parliamentary republics. The presidential system Erdogan promotes can be found in the good example of the United States, but also in many African and Asian dictatorships.

To see why Erdogan is so interested in bringing a presidential system to his nation, changing the century-old parliamentary system Turkey inherited from Europe, one has to look at his political career. Erdogan became the prime minister of Turkey in late 2003, and in the next decade he never advocated a presidential system. The executive power was in the hands of the prime minister, and Erdogan was happy with that.

Yet in late 2012, he apparently felt he needed a change. As prime minister, he had a self-imposed three-term limit, which would end in 2014. So, he either would retire or opt for a higher office, which was of course the presidency. But the presidency devised by the Turkish Constitution did not have the executive powers Erdogan wanted. So by 2012, Erdogans advisers and media supporters began cooking up the idea that a presidential system was a must for Turkey to become a more advanced democracy and a more influential global power.

When Erdogan was elected president in August 2014, his need for the presidential system became more urgent. Erdogan kept pushing for a major constitutional change, but his Justice and Development Party (AKP) never had the parliament supermajority to pass it. Hence, in August 2015, when Erdogan declared, The presidential system is now a de facto reality, he faced accusations of waging a coup against the constitutional order.

Now, Erdogan is emboldened by the AKP's electoral victory in November and is once again pushing for a presidential system. One criticism he faces is that arguably the only country with a really good presidential system, the United States, is a federation of 50 states, not a single, unitary state like Turkey. Political power is quite decentralized in the United States, whereas in Turkey it is very centralized and its combination with an all-powerful president would lead to an elected dictatorship.

This was the criticism Erdogan was trying to defuse in his controversial comment about Hitlers Germany. The reference, obviously, did not help Erdogan calm the fear that he is heading toward an elected dictatorship. But the real problem, in my view, was not that reference, which was corrected by Erdogans office. The real problem was in that very correction.

In the statement, it was in fact nice to read, If the [presidential] system is abused it may lead to bad management resulting in disasters, as in Hitler's Germany. This was a comforting admission of the fact that elected presidents can abuse a political system. But the remedy offered was not comforting at all, as it merely said, The important thing is to pursue fair management that serves the nation.

In other words, an elected president with a highly concentrated power could turn dictatorial, but would not if Erdogan pursues "fair management that serves the nation. So we should put our trust in the virtues of the leader. And since Erdogan is a very virtuous leader who serves the nation, the implicit argument is that we should not be worried about too much political power being concentrated in his hands.

What is painfully lacking here is an acknowledgment that virtue is ultimately relative, and a liberal democracy works not by such subjective definitions, but by systemic bulwarks against authoritarianism  such as separation of powers, an independent judiciary, a free press, decentralization of power and civil society. A political model that disregards all these checks and balances as illegitimate "tutelages" on the "national will," as we have lately heard from Erdogans supporters, will be inevitably authoritarian, no matter how much virtue it ascribes to itself.
Dearrius Portis

Dearrius Portis (Birmingham Police Department)

A man already charged with capital murder is back in the Jefferson County Jail on unrelated charges from a police pursuit.

The suspect, Dearrius Portis, 29, is charged with the July 2012 shooting death of 19-year-old Richard Carter outside of Mike's Crossroads on 3rd Avenue North. Portis was arrested on the capital murder charge in September 2014.

Court records show he bonded out on $150,000 in December 2014.

Portis was re-arrested Monday after an incident in the 3600 block of Court S in Birmingham's Ensley area.

According to the police report, Portis was seen driving at a high rate of speed. Police say the license plate was not registered to the vehicle he was driving.

Birmingham police officers said they tried to pull him over, but he sped up to try to elude them.

Police say Portis jumped out of the car and ran, allowing the car to crash into a curb at the intersection of 36th Street and Avenue O. Officers then pursued him on foot.

Police say when they ran by the car, they noticed a toddler crying in the backseat. An officer tended to her while the others went after Portis.

Portis allegedly broke into a house on 13th Street through a window to try to elude the police. He surrendered about 10 minutes later after "realizing he was surrounded."

A loaded handgun was found on the vehicle's front floorboard. The search unveiled another gun, heroin, and a digital scale.

Police say Portis' new charges include endangering the welfare of a child, possession of heroin with intent to distribute, felon in possession of a firearm, attempting to elude and possession of drug paraphernalia. He also has pending charges of criminal trespassing and criminal mischief.

When he was arrested, police discovered he also had an outstanding arrest warrant for domestic violence.

The new charges raised his bond amount by $350,000. However, his capital murder bond has now been revoked, according to Birmingham police.

The child was taken to the Department of Human Resources for protective custody.
Enough is enough.

Erin Edgemon's report on Raven Terese White, a pregnant 16-year-old who was fatally shot during a robbery at a Birmingham apartment complex, isn't just a heartbreaking story. It's an infuriating story.

It's frustrating to continue to see headlines from black communities highlighting senseless violence. It's maddening to realize that a young woman, months from motherhood, has been ripped from her grieving family.

My blood boils when I read comments from faceless racists who laugh at the plight of this community, throwing stones instead of offering solutions. No, Raven didn't live a perfect life -- but that life ended much too soon. That's what makes this a tragedy.

And I'm angry that I'll have to have yet another discussion with my youth group this Sunday about another young life lost to violence.

As always, RavenBarnes sidestepped the bickering and finger-pointing to cut to the heart of the matter:

"She was sixteen years old, pregnant----and working.

"This, to me, means that despite abstinence, this young girl knew that she was going to contribute as an adult in the life of her child.

"A teenager working, and a no good low life thief murders her.

"Rest in peace young lady."

I'm done with the accusations. It's time we start finding solutions.

Thanks to RavenBarnes and others who have their hearts in the right place.

If you'd like to nominate someone for Commenter of the Day, email me at ebowser@al.com. Just don't nominate yourself because that's very lame.
Investigators are trying to determine what caused an infant's death after he was found unresponsive at La Petite Academy at 2041 Medical Center Dr. in Homewood.

Four-month-old Micah Colin McMullen was found unresponsive in a crib on Dec. 16, said Jefferson County Chief Deputy Coroner Bill Yates. He was transported to Children's Hospital where he remained under treatment until his death on Dec. 22.

The cause of death has not yet been determined, Yates said.

Investigators and Homewood police are still investigating.

"We are heartbroken that a child from our school has passed away," said La Petite Academy spokeswoman Lydia Cisaruk. "Our thoughts and prayers are with the family during this difficult time."

Cisaruk confirmed that the Alabama Department of Human Resources has placed the day care on a probationary status for six months for "not meeting certain criteria related to the sleeping environment in an infant classroom."

"We are partnering with the Department to fulfill all conditions of the probationary status, including supplementary staff training on the full spectrum of child sleep-related practices. In addition, we have further strengthened our internal protocols, exceeding state guidelines, to ensure regulatory compliance," she said. "We will continue to work cooperatively with the relevant state and local agencies as they monitor our operations to confirm we fully meet or exceed all regulatory requirements. We take our responsibility as caregivers very seriously."

In the prepared statement, "Our staff is trained to handle urgent situations and followed our emergency procedures."
At least two of the men wanted for questioning in the shooting death of a Hoover husband and father gunned down on the doorstep of his Lake Cyrus home earlier this week were seen on surveillance video in Tuscaloosa, and authorities are now asking for the public's help in identifying them.

The photos were taken after the suspects left the Tuscaloosa area, and just prior to them returning to the Bessemer/ Hoover area, Hoover Capt. Gregg Rector said Friday evening. He gave these descriptions of those suspects:

Unknown black male wearing a dark colored hoodie with "FLY" on the front. Smaller letters underneath the word fly are believed to say, "FIRST LOVE YOURSELF."

This individual is believed to be 19 years old and attended Bessemer City High School. He is known to frequent the McCalla / Tannehill area, as well as Arlington Avenue and Roosevelt Park areas in Bessemer.

Second unknown black male wearing a long sleeved shirt with an unknown logo on the front and back. He was also wearing a baseball cap with an unknown logo on the front and side. This individual is a known associate of the suspect wearing the "FLY" shirt. He also frequents the Bessemer area.

Rector said at least two other people were in vehicles outside the store when the photos were taken.

They are sought for questioning in the Tuesday death of Mike Gilotti, a 33-year-old husband, father and Iraq war veteran, was shot to death about 4:55 a.m. just outside his home in the 5500 block of Park Side Circle in Hoover's Lake Cyrus subdivision. He was heading to the gym for a morning workout when police believe he encountered one or more suspects breaking into his car. One shot was fired, and Gilotti collapsed on his doorstep. He was later pronounced dead on the scene.

Investigators said they do not believe an overnight incident where someone fired shots at Vestavia Hills police is linked in any way to their case.

"The Hoover Police Department remains committed to solving this horrible and senseless crime. Detectives and Crime Scene investigators are working very hard gathering and analyzing evidence,'' Rector said. "We're not quite there yet, but we've made a tremendous amount of progress over the past three days. "

"For the suspects involved in this crime, it's time to worry, and it's time to be concerned about what the next few days may bring,'' Rector said. "It's also time to think long and hard about the exact role they played in this murder. I think it's safe to say that one of them has more to worry about than the others. We have a very clear goal that we're working toward and we're not stopping until we get it."

Hoover investigators have worked throughout the week following leads and processing evidence. On Tuesday, Rector said surveillance video obtained from a nearby resident provided officers with a suspect vehicle description, which was an older Ford F-250 pickup seen leaving the Lake Cyrus area very close to the time of the murder. About 11 a.m., Tuesday, just six hours after the slaying, Bessemer police officers were notified of an abandoned truck near the intersection of Roland Avenue and Elmore Street. This area is located near the Jonesboro and Burstall communities.

Some of the items recovered from inside the pickup truck were stolen during the rash of vehicle break-ins on Park Side Circle. The abandoned Ford F-250 was towed to Hoover for further evidence processing.

Rector said it was also reported that four unknown black male suspects were seen walking away from the truck and getting into a dark colored Jeep Cherokee. Detectives believe those individuals likely have ties to the Bessemer area.

Additionally, Rector said, the abandoned Ford F-250 was stolen late Monday night in a residential area of Tuscaloosa County. There were also multiple vehicle break-ins reported in the same area where the truck was stolen. These crimes occurred in the Highway 69 / Inverness area of Tuscaloosa County. It appears the suspects committed these crimes earlier in the night, prior to coming to Hoover.

Hoover police, assisted by Bessemer and Tuscaloosa lawmen as well as the U.S. Marshal's Service, have continued the intense investigation. "We have several detectives that are working solely on this case and it will remain, until solved, the number 1 priority of the Hoover Police Department,'' Rector said Thursday. "We continue to follow leads, conduct interviews, gather and process evidence and work with our partner agencies."

Gilotti, an Iraqi war veteran, served as a U.S. Army tank commander, first lieutenant and platoon leader in the 12th Cavalry Regiment. An Avon, Connecticut native, Gilotti worked at the State Farm claims office on Lakeshore Parkway. He and his wife had two young sons, ages 5 and 1. Co-workers said they were not authorized to speak about Gilotti but said the entire office is devastated. "Our hearts go out to his family, friends, and coworkers and he will be greatly missed," said State Farm spokesman Roszell Gadson.

His wife of eight years, Heather, heard the shot and called 911. His two young sons, Russell and Kevin, were inside the home. Since his death, neighbors have expressed concern about their safety. They've also burned candles and flown American flags in his honor.

Visitation for Gilotti will be held Sunday from 2 p.m. until 3 p.m. at Riverchase United Methodist Church. The funeral will follow at 3 p.m., according to his obituary.

Hoover police investigated five homicides in 2015. The city has had 21 murders over the past 10 years, and hasn't had an unsolved murder since 2004. "Our detectives are determined to solve this senseless crime. They already have more evidence than they had a few hours ago,'' Rector said. "We also know the suspects who were breaking into the cars are indeed the same suspects who shot Mr. Gilotti. These individuals are heartless and have no regard for human life. "

Investigators continue to ask for the public's assistance in helping solve this senseless crime. Individuals who have knowledge of these suspects and their identity are urged to come forward immediately. Sergeant Keith Czeskleba can be reached at 205-739-6795 or you may contact the Hoover Police Department at 205-822-5300. Tipsters can remain anonymous and be eligible for a cash reward by calling Crime Stoppers of Metro Alabama at 205-254-7777.
1-9 sunday highs us.jpg

A cold front is expected to bring a dose of cold air to Alabama by Sunday. Highs on Sunday in Alabama could stay in the 30s in the north to the 50s in the south. A reinforcing shot of cold air is expected by mid-week. (National Weather Service)

Get ready for winter to really make its presence felt.

The year's first batch of Arctic air is on its way southward and is expected to arrive in Alabama by Sunday, according to the National Weather Service.

And it's not expected to go anywhere fast -- meaning cold temperatures could linger through next week.

A little wintry precipitation will be possible in north Alabama on Sunday -- and there's another shot for wintry weather mischief in other parts of Alabama on Thursday.

A cold front will cross the state on Saturday, and a few strong storms are possible Saturday afternoon in northwest and extreme south Alabama, according to the Storm Prediction Center, which placed those areas under a marginal risk for severe weather.

The stronger storms could contain high winds, hail and frequent lightning, according to the National Weather Service.

The coldest temperatures so far this winter will follow close behind the front. Another reinforcing shot of Arctic air will follow at mid-week thanks to another front.

High temperatures on Sunday will be a stark contrast from today. (National Weather Service)

The National Weather Service in Huntsville said that highs in north Alabama will struggle to reach the mid-30s on Sunday, and a rain-snow mix is possible there early in the morning.

No accumulations are expected, however.

Parts of north-central Alabama will also struggle to escape the 30s on Sunday, according to the National Weather Service in Birmingham. And a stiff wind out of the north will make it feel even colder.

The National Weather Service in Mobile said that highs across south Alabama on Sunday will only reach the upper 40s inland to mid 50s at the coast, and Monday could even be a bit cooler.

Alabama could get another shot at some wintry precipitation mid-week, according to the National Weather Service.

A system expected to move through on Thursday could bring with it enough moisture to produce some frozen precipitation in Alabama, although forecast confidence is low at this point.
Robert Aderholt

Robert Aderholt represents the fourth Congressional district in Alabama. (AL.com file)

(Paul Beaudry)

J. Pepper Bryars grew up in Mobile and is now a writer living in Huntsville. You can reach him at mail@jpepperbryars.com.

Once upon a time in a capitol not so far away, Republican lawmakers were rarely held accountable for supporting bills that wasted tax dollars, increased debt, or made a general mess of our country.

Folks back home would regularly hear their congressmen and senators talk tough, but at the eleventh hour their votes often fell into the "yea" column of whatever bloated, big-government bill the establishment put forward. There wasn't much blow-back because many voters either didn't understand the bills, didn't care, weren't paying attention, or were just happy to get their share of pork when the slaughter was finished.

That's how it use to be, but conservatives in Alabama's fourth congressional district ought to remind U.S. Rep. Robert Aderholt, R-Haleyville, that the political landscape has drastically changed.

Aderholt was the only Republican member of Alabama's congressional delegation to vote last month in favor of a $1.8 trillion budget that was backed by the White House and Democrat leaders in the House and Senate.

The budget's ever-growing list of faults are outrageous. For starters, it adds $2 trillion to our national debt over the next 20-years, and in a staggering affront, it continues sending millions of our tax dollars to fund Planned Parenthood after its criminal abuses were exposed.

It also pays for the president's plan to resettle thousands of Syrians in our communities, despite a clear threat that Islamic extremists will infiltrate the refugee population. It expands a program allowing foreign workers into the nation at a time when a record number of Americans have quit looking for jobs. It permits federal funding for "sanctuary cities" which shelter illegal aliens and refuse to cooperate with federal immigration laws. The budget also failed to defund the president's unconstitutional executive amnesty efforts.

"I feel almost jubilant about what is in this appropriations bill," Nancy Pelosi said after the vote, adding that the Republicans "gave away the store."

She's right. They did.

Conservatives now understand that the stakes have never been greater. The liberal opposition has never been bolder, and our grassroots have never been as well informed and capable of being mobilized.

Simply put, this vote isn't fading into memory.

Aderholt represents a deeply conservative region of Alabama, stretching from the Mississippi to Georgia state lines, including cities as far north as Tuscumbia and as far south as the suburbs of Tuscaloosa, over to Jasper, Cullman, Guntersville, Gadsden, and Fort Payne. I'm sure the people in those communities don't approve of their congressman's support of this budget.

Aderholt defended his vote in a statement that said the "good news" was that the budget represented the "last vestiges" of former Speaker John Boehner's style of leadership, and that things would be done differently next year.

Wait a second.

Aderholt isn't some newbie who had to stand idly aside while this train wreck of a budget was written, negotiated, and passed. He's been in Congress for nearly two decades, longer than any current member of Alabama's delegation to the House of Representatives. Aderholt isn't a backbencher on an insignificant committee, either. The second sentence of his official biography touts that he is "a member of the powerful House Committee on Appropriations, which has jurisdiction over funding the operation of the federal government," and that he serves as chairman of one of its subcommittees.

With all that experience and clout, one would expect Aderholt to lead our state's fight against such an awful federal budget, or at the very least oppose its final passage. Instead, he voted "yea" along with a majority of Democrats.

Aderholt is known to be a fine and decent family man, and I'm sure he's done a great deal of good for his district, but with all that's at stake this is arguably a fireable offense. Unfortunately, it's too late to mount a meaningful primary challenge to Aderholt in this election cycle. The filing deadline has long passed, and his only challenger isn't a serious candidate.

But the congressman, and others who might follow his lead, should remember this: like our party's mascot, the great African elephant, conservative Republicans have long, long memories.
Workers wonder where theyll go when property values are shooting up in New York neighbourhood.

New York, US  The Parrilla Latina restaurant is just a block away from the Bronx Documentary Center, but getting there with Michael Kamber took a while. He kept running into people.

Classes start up again in a week, he shouted to a girl in a gaggle in front of the Immaculate Conception School.

Then he had to stop and ask Kelli Scarr, the centres director of grants and community relations, if she could help organise a dinner for an artist staying in residence.

And then there was the young man on the corner, outside the In and Out Market, who just wanted to say hello and introduce Kamber to his mother.

One of the friendliest places Ive ever lived, is how Kamber describes his Bronx neighbourhood.

Thats saying something considering hes lived all over the word as a news photographer.

Kamber learned to shoot on these streets and so, after he got tired of working in dangerous places like Iraq and Togo, he decided to start the Documentary Center here.

The stated mission of the centre is to share photography, film and new media with underserved Bronx communities and the cultural community at large.

The idea is to use these mediums to get people talking about important issues, globally and locally, according to the website.

Locally, a city plan to bring more affordable housing to the neighbourhood by redeveloping a major thoroughfare known as Jerome Avenue has become a hot topic.

So Kamber encouraged some of his photography students to go out and take pictures of the people who currently make a living there.

The result was the Jerome Avenue Workers Project, a series of portraits that were first exhibited in a Muffler Shop. One features Jose Cruz, standing with his arm resting on a car lift, in front of stacks of tires.

I think our kids are capturing a lot of dignity, says Kamber, describing the working class people who make up his neighbourhood. A proud culture thats already here.

Jerome Avenue is full of little automotive shops, as well as bodegas, barber shops and hardware stores.

Cruz, it says under his portrait, has been working on the strip for 25 years, ever since fleeing war in El Salvador.

Another shot shows Jeff Friedman, whose family has run the Drinks Galore beverage warehouse for 40 years.

The project also captured the worry people are feeling about where these people will go if these buildings are torn down.

Thousands of workers will be displaced, Kamber said. Its already having an effect.

Indeed, shuttered storefronts dot the street, which runs under a subway line. Kamber says developers are snatching up property because of Mayor Bill DeBlasios proposal to rezone the area to allow new residential construction.

Its part of an effort to create tens of thousands of new affordable apartments in New York, which is facing a severe housing shortage. But suddenly property values are shooting up, and many of the mom and pop stores here can no longer afford the rent.

Edwin Torres, a young Bronx resident who worked on the exhibit, cant escape the feeling that this is all about to change, and not necessarily for the better.

When Im about to hit the shutter button I feel like Im in a way saying goodbye, he said.

But some, like developer Keith Rubenstein of Somerset Partners, describe the Bronx as the next Brooklyn: a once working class neighbourhood now known for hip bars and cafes, not to mention rising rents.

There are signs that its already happening, like a new cafe and art gallery in the South Bronx.

Murals, painted by artists who moved here for the open spaces and low rents, dot the old piano factories and underused warehouses.

Rubenstein wants to build two towers of luxury apartments here.

He thinks the views of the Bronx River and proximity to Manhattan will attract young professionals and hipsters getting priced out of other neighbourhoods. He even took out a billboard attempting to rebrand the neighbourhood the Piano District.

He has taken flak, however, for hosting a party recalling a more unseemly image of the borough, with bullet-ridden cars as centrepieces and celebrities posing next to flaming barrels more commonly associated with homeless people trying to keep warm.

There was a backlash from longtime residents on twitter: #WhatPianoDistrict?

Rubenstein stresses that his development, which is not part of the Jerome Avenue rezoning and therefore not required to include affordable housing, will include new parks and esplanades that will be open to all local residents.

He says his experience hosting the party has taught him the importance of communicating with local residents, who have been turning up at local community board meetings to make their voices heard on rezoning plans.

Torres believes the community is ready to fight to stop chain stores and Big Box retailers from displacing local businesses.

The best way we can handle gentrification is to create a dialogue where we have a voice, he said.

Kamber agrees. I think its good to have growth but it cant be growth that is only for the wealthy. It has to be growth that incorporates and empowers people that are already here. We need these places as working places for the people, not as a way for millionaires to make more money.

The Mayors plan for Jerome Avenue has yet to be finalised. A public hearing is planned for Sunday, January 10.
The assembly may seem irrelevant to ongoing world conflicts, but it is a gesture towards some kind of global democracy.

Richard Falk is Albert G Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University and Research Fellow, Orfalea Center of Global Studies. He is also former UN Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights.

When thinking about the United Nations General Assembly on its 70th birthday it is hard not to be cynical and dismissive, yet it would still be wrong to join the chorus of detractors.

True, it seems irrelevant to the ongoing conflicts raging in the Middle East and Africa. It has failed to rid the world of nuclear weapons, solve the challenge of climate change, end the long ordeal of the Palestinian people, and seems to be little more than a talk shop where diplomats congregate.

It is painfully evident that the General Assembly lacks the political will to challenge any of the major states in the world, which even if challenged possess a right of veto in the Security Council, confirming the impression that the assemblys role is limited to the issuance of recommendations that sovereign states are free to ignore.





It is useful to recall that the General Assembly is the only gesture made by the UN to the idea that every sovereign state is equal before the law. All 193 UN member states take part in it, and do so on the basis of formal equality. Vanuatu has the same vote as China or the United States, which helps to explain both its core strength and weakness.

Some kind of global democracy

The strength involves a gesture towards some kind of global democracy in which relative power, size, and wealth does not shape UN activities, with the pluralism of the General Assembly encompassing all stages of development and every world civilisation.

ALSO READ: Ukraine crisis: Whats the UN doing about it?

In this respect, the assembly can claim to represent the human and global interest as well the aggregation of national interests. The universal participation of all states in the recently concluded Paris Climate Change Conference was greatly helped by its UN auspices.

The UN is not only a club of states, it is geopolitically entity controlled by the most powerful of these states, and can only be effective when these dominant states agree to act together... by

When we dwell on the weakness of the General Assembly or our disappointment that it does not live up to what a reading of the UN Charter would lead us to expect, we need to dig deeper to understand why this is so. A beginning of such understanding is an awareness that the UN as a whole can do no more or less than the P5 (or permanent members) of the Security Council want it to do.

In other words, the UN is not only a club of states, it is geopolitically entity controlled by the most powerful of these states, and can only be effective when these dominant states agree to act together, which they rarely do.

Historical highs

Revealingly, the General Assembly was not always as marginal as it now appears. There were two historical instances when it seemed that it would take the lead in shaping both global security and world economic policy.

The first instance occurred during the Korean War when the United States realised that it only was able to get authorisation for the use of force to defend South Korea because the Soviet Union was temporarily boycotting the Security Council due to its refusal to accept Communist China as the official UN representative of China.

The Soviet Union reacted to this procedural mishap by making it clear that it would never again allow the circumvention of its veto. The United States responded with the 1950 Uniting for Peace Resolution (UNGA Res 377A), which declared that in a peace and security situation that was deadlocked in the Security Council, the General Assembly had a residual responsibility to act on behalf of the UN.

Given the Cold War rivalry, this upgrading of the General Assembly would have had great significance if implemented, which never happened. The US came to realise that it could no longer command an automatic majority in the assembly, and might find itself the target of an adverse UN initiative.

The Soviet Union never felt comfortable allowing an external body any authority to question its security initiatives. And so these two antagonistic superpowers found common ground by allowing the Uniting for Peace approach to die a quiet death.

There was a second occasion on which the Genereal Assembly briefly captured centre stage. It occurred in the early 1970s when UN membership was greatly increased by former European colonies gaining political independence. These new states flexed their muscles though the medium of the Non-Aligned Movement.

These developments reached their climax in 1974 during the Sixth Special Session of the General Assembly when proposals for a New World Economic Order were put forward with great enthusiasm by consensus reached among this group of states then known as the Third World.

The world needs even a weak UN

This effort to challenge the way in which the world economy favoured the developed countries when it came to trade and investment alarmed the West, especially the United States and Britain. It struck back, contending that the General Assembly was an arena where irresponsible majorities could come to conclusions that did not reflect the true power balance in the world.

READ MORE: Ban Ki-moon: Stop ISIL in the name of humanity

Criticism of the General Assembly focused on the misleading effects of empowering tiny states by making them equal to the largest and most influential states. And so, this effort to spearhead world economic reform on the basis of UN authority faltered, and got nowhere.

Despite the failure of both moves, it would be a mistake to dismiss the importance of the General Assembly. It provides the world with its most authoritative meeting ground for world leaders. These political figures appreciate the assembly as a vital arena for the expression of views on leading issues of the day.

The universality of membership, inducing even states that are the targets of UN censure or sanctions to stay within the organisation, is the best evidence that its operations remain important. And if the right political will should emerge in the future, as is quite possible around climate change or regional security in the Middle East, then the potential for the General Assembly envisioned in the Charter might be quickly achieved. We all need to remember that the final acts in the drama of the UN unfolding have yet to be written.

Richard Falk is Albert G Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University and Research Fellow, Orfalea Center of Global Studies. He is also former UN Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial policy.
Among those captured are Joaquin Guzmans brother-in-law, a pilot and a member of his legal team.

Authorities in Mexico have arrested six people accused of helping drug kingpin Joaquin El Chapo Guzman escape from a maximum-security prison in July.

Among those captured are his brother-in-law and a pilot, who prosecutors say flew him out of town. Police believe the brother-in-law supervised the construction of the 1.5km tunnel that the notorious drug lord used to escape the Altiplano prison in central Mexico.

Guzman, the boss of the powerful Sinaloa cartel, is Mexicos most-wanted fugitive.



Today we are able to affirm that the group responsible for planning, organising and carrying out the escape from outside the prison has been broken up, the Associated Press quoted Attorney General Arely Gomez as saying on Wednesday.

Gomez told reporters the suspected mastermind of the escape was a member of Guzmans legal team who had access to Altiplano prison and was able to update him regularly.

The news comes days after the government announced that Guzman had been hit in the leg and the face after fleeing a failed operation to recapture him in northwestern Mexico earlier in October.

Gomez, who did not name any of the suspects, said that following his escape, Guzman travelled by land to the city of Queretaro from where he caught a small plane to a mountainous region of Sinaloa, his home state and stronghold.

OPINION: El Chapo Guzman in context

Authorities said the suspects conspired with officials inside the prison to plan, organise and execute the escape. About 23 prison officials and employees have also been arrested so far, with some facing criminal charges.

Julys escape was the second for Guzman in 15 years and a major embarrassment for Mexicos President Enrique Pena Nieto.

The notorious drug lord was first captured in 1993 in Guatemala, but he escaped from a prison in western Mexico in 2001 by hiding in a laundry cart.
Chinese media reports say 37-metre-high statue in Henan province was removed due to lack of government approval.

A giant gold-painted statue of Communist Chinas founding father Mao Zedong has reportedly been demolished because it lacked government approval, just days after images of it were widely shared on social media.

Images of the statue of a seated Mao towering about 37 metres over empty fields in the central province of Henan made worldwide headlines this week.

But the $460,000 structure has been destroyed, the Peoples Net news portal cited local officials as saying on Friday, adding that the reason was unclear.

The website is linked to the Peoples Daily, the official mouthpiece of the Communist Party.

It cited reports from unspecified media as saying the likeness of the man who ruled China with an iron grip for nearly three decades until his death in 1976 was not registered or approved by the local government.

Pictures circulating online  which could not be immediately verified by the AFP news agency  showed a gaping hole in the rear of Maos massive golden torso, and his head shrouded in black.

Devastating news: giant golden Chairman Mao statue torn down in Henan province, locals say https://t.co/Y8T370KSeM pic.twitter.com/SDnkvQmAYN  Tom Phillips (@tomphillipsin) January 8, 2016

Construction was reportedly funded by several local entrepreneurs and finished in December after nine months of labour, the HMR.cn portal said this week.

Despite being blamed for millions of deaths, Mao is still widely revered in China and credited with uniting the country.

Meanwhile, the Communist leadership tightly controls public discussion of history and seeks to use his legacy to shore up its support.

Chinas current President Xi Jinping has praised Mao as a great figure and revived some of his rhetoric and centralisation of power, while following the partys 1980s conclusion that he also made mistakes.

Some internet users criticised the statue, pointing out its location in Henan, the centre of a famine in the late 1950s resulting from Maos economic policies estimated to have killed as many as 40 million people.

Have you forgotten about the Great Famine, building that? asked one poster on Sina Weibo, a Chinese equivalent of Twitter.

Others questioned the statues resemblance to the Great Helmsman, who also launched the decade-long Cultural Revolution that saw violence and destruction nationwide.
Nearly 20,000 Syrians grapple with squalid conditions in informal tent settlements erected in remote areas of Jordan.

Ramtha, Jordan  In the chilly afternoon, children play among a row of makeshift tents, their wooden frames covered with plastic, cardboard and old rugs.

Five-year-old Randa curls up next to an unlit stove near her familys tent.

I dont like it, she cries. It is too cold.

Around 125 Syrian refugees live in this informal camp, erected near Ramtha in northwestern Jordan. Most are farming families hailing from the western Syrian regions of Hama and Homs, which have been heavily impacted by the countrys ongoing civil war.

These people are part of a nearly forgotten pocket of Syrias refugee crisis  the almost 20,000 Syrians who live in squalid conditions in informal tent settlements scattered throughout remote areas of the Jordan valley and beyond.

I came three years ago because it is easier to find work during the harvest, Hama native Omar Hameed, 29, told Al Jazeera. The animal trader fled Syria with his four children and his wife, who is now six months pregnant with their fifth child. Hameed worries about the conditions they are living in.

When it rains, water is pouring in, he said. The tents are flooded and covered with mud. Rats from the fields enter inside.

READ MORE: Syrians at Zaatari camp  We cant live here forever

Hameeds family survives on food vouchers distributed monthly by the World Food Programme. The majority of the refugees in this camp are registered with the United Nations and are entitled to monthly vouchers worth 50 Jordanian dinars ($70) per family.

But the vouchers, which can be redeemed for basic food items, are barely enough to feed a family for a month. To supplement the vouchers, many families work for under-the-table wages on the Jordanian farms where they have set up their tents. Some say they earn five Jordanian dinars ($7) for 12 to 14 hours of hard agricultural labour.

Inside these informal tent settlements, there is no heating, running water or toilets. Refugees must pay for the electricity that is strung out to them and the water that is shipped in. Agreements with landlords are informal and unwritten, adding to the families vulnerability.

Around by Muhammad

are involved in some form of labour.]

Since the Syrian war began nearly five years ago, 1.4 million Syrians, about half of whom are registered with the UN refugee agency, have sought refuge in Jordan, a country of seven million people.

Jordan has maintained an open-border policy, but the influx of refugees has overstretched the countrys already limited infrastructure and flooded the labour force, with Syrians undercutting Jordanian workers. Most Syrian refugees live in towns and cities, while around 100,000 live in the two main authorised refugee camps in the countrys north.

Those who cannot afford to pay rent, or who do not want to enter the formal camps due to restrictions, end up living in the informal settlements that have sprawled across Jordan in recent years.

Some had a nomadic background in Syria, but most live here simply because they cannot afford anything else, Marcello Rossoni, who leads an aid mission for the Italian NGO Intersos in northwestern Jordan, told Al Jazeera.

In 2014 there were 125 informal settlements in Jordan, hosting more than 10,000 people. The number of settlements has tripled to nearly 400 in the past year, with aid workers estimating that some 20,000 Syrian refugees live in self-made camps.

This number is likely to increase as the refugee population in Jordan grows and the financial situation of Syrians in the country worsens, aid agencies say.

Syrian refugees are not allowed to work in Jordan without a permit costing around 700 Jordanian dinars ($985), and although the employer is required to pay those fees, it is typically the refugees who ultimately bear the cost. Consequently, 99 percent of Syrian refugees in Jordan are either jobless or work illegally. Having exhausted their savings, many struggle to pay rents that are inflated dramatically from pre-crisis levels  up to 300 percent in some cases.

IN PICTURES: A challenging harvest for Syrian refugees in Jordan

Many of the makeshift camps in Jordan have been erected in inaccessible rural areas, where refugees live under constant fear of government eviction.





I came from Zaatari camp because my cousins are here, said Mahmud, 32, who fled from a village near Hama and spoke to Al Jazeera under a pseudonym.

Life in Zaatari is miserable; you cannot work, and you are stuck with nothing to do. I had started losing hope, Mahmud said, noting he left the camp with a temporary permission and never returned. Despite the harsh conditions, he said he prefers living in the informal settlement, because he can find work and be with his relatives.

All informal settlements are considered illegal under Jordanian law. As a result, only a handful of aid organisations provide limited assistance to the people living in these camps, despite conditions of abject poverty.

It is not easy being a refugee in Jordan, and its even harder for those living in the informal settlements, Muhammad Rafiq Khan, a child protection specialist with UNICEF in Jordan, told Al Jazeera. Around 90 percent of the families live below the absolute poverty line, and a quarter of children in the [informal settlements] are involved in some form of labour.

UNICEF supports 91 informal settlements across the country, providing water, sanitation and hygiene services, along with weekly informal learning opportunities for children who do not go to school, Khan said.

According to a report from the WFP and Reach, children in the makeshift camps are three times more likely to be out of school than those living in towns or inside formal camps.

The main reason for missing school is the distance. The [informal settlements] are located in remote areas Families are forced to send their children to work in order to cope with their basic needs, including food, Khan said.

This can be a crushing burden for a child.
Cologne police head faced criticism for his forces response to New Years Eve attacks and robberies by groups of men.

The police chief of the German city of Cologne has been dismissed amid mounting criticism of his forces handling of New Years Eve sexual assaults and robberies.

The state government of North Rhine-Westphalia said on Friday it was sending Wolfgang Albers into early retirement, and the 60-year-old commander said he understood the reasons why.

Many of the crimes have been blamed on foreigners in the country, which last year accepted about 1.1 million refugees  more than any other European nation.

But none of the 31 suspects has been accused of specifically committing sexual assaults, the aspect of Colognes disturbances that attracted most public outrage at home and abroad.

Cologne police say they have received 170 criminal complaints connected to the New Years festivities, 120 of them sexual in nature.

The German government said 31 suspects were briefly detained for questioning after the New Years Eve trouble, among them 18 asylum seekers.

READ MORE: Germany weighs deportations after sexual assaults

They include nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, five Iranians, four Syrians, two Germans and one person each from Iraq, Serbia and the US.





The states interior minister, Ralf Jaeger, said police chief Albers removal was necessary to restore public trust and the Cologne polices ability to act with a view to upcoming major events. Colognes annual Carnival is next month.

Albers had faced mounting criticism for the police response to New Years Eve attacks on women by groups of men within a 1,000-strong crowd described by police as predominantly Arab or North African in origin.

Reports of the harassment have fuelled calls for tighter immigration laws.

Government spokesman Georg Streiter said trouble in Cologne doesnt just harm our rule of law but also the great majority of completely innocent refugees who have sought protection.

Police failed to mention the attacks around Colognes main train station in their initial morning report on New Years Day, describing overnight festivities as largely peaceful.

Anyone who sexually assaults women must be held accountable before the law. Women's safety is paramount.  Mona Eltahawy (@monaeltahawy) January 8, 2016

Albers acknowledged that mistake earlier this week, but he dismissed widespread criticism that his officers reacted too slowly in response to reports of assaults and harassment of women.

However, an internal police report published in German media on Thursday characterised Colognes police as overwhelmed and described how women were forced to run through gauntlets of drunken men outside the station.

My heart is in #Cologne and my beloved #Germany. As someone who worked extensively on mob sexual assaults in #Tahrir I truly feel the pain.  Soraya Bahgat (@SorayaBahgat) January 6, 2016

Cologne Mayor Henriette Reker suggested on Friday that police had withheld information from her, including on the origin of suspects. She said that her trust in the Cologne police leadership is significantly shaken.

Earlier, Germanys interior ministry said federal police had detained 31 men on suspicion of committing crimes including theft, assault and, in one case, verbal abuse of a sexual nature.

Assaults elsewhere

Police in other European nations reported other cases in public places.

In Sweden, police said at least 15 young women reported being groped by groups of men on New Years Eve in the city of Kalmar.

https://twitter.com/ZaidJilani/status/684868368613126145

Johan Bruun, police spokesman, said two men, both asylum seekers, have been told via interpreter that they are suspected of committing sexual assaults. He said police are trying to identify other suspects.

In Finland, police said they received tip-offs on New Years Eve that about 1,000 predominantly Iraqi asylum seekers were intending to gather near the main railway station in Helsinki and harass passing women.

Police there said they received three complaints of harassment and detained several asylum seekers at the scene for alleged inappropriate behaviour.
Interior ministry says a colonel and conscript on their way to work in Giza were killed by unknown armed men.

Gunmen have shot dead two Egyptian police officers in the southern outskirts of the capital Cairo, the latest deadly attack on the countrys security forces.





Police colonel Ali Ahmed Fahmy and conscript Ramadan al-Burhami were killed as they made their way to work in Gizas Shabramant district, the Ministry of Interior said in a statement on Saturday.

The attack was claimed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group in a statement posted on messaging service, Telegram, the Reuters news agency reported.

Saturdays attack comes just two days after a man opened fire on a bus carrying Arab citizens of Israel outside a Cairo hotel.

No one was hurt in the attack, which was also claimed by ISIL in a statement published on social media.

ISIL attacks

Egyptian security forces have been the target of attacks by armed groups since the January 2011 popular uprising that brought down former president Hosni Mubarak.

The attacks have become more frequent since the removal of Egypts first freely-elected president, Mohamed Morsi, by the military in July 2013.

Although armed groups, such as the ISIL-affiliate Sinai Province, operate predominantly in the Sinai Peninsula, they have carried out attacks on the Egyptian mainland.

In November, masked gunmen killed four police officers in Giza in an attack later claimed by ISIL.

READ MORE: Egypt armed group pledges allegiance to ISIL

Earlier in October, ISIL claimed responsibility for bringing down a Russian Metrojet airliner that crashed shortly after take-off from Sharm el-Sheikh airport.

Russian and Western authorities concluded the plane was likely brought down by an explosive but Egyptian authorities rejected the claims.

Giza is Egypts third largest city after Cairo and Alexandria. It is located immediately adjacent to Cairo on the western bank of the Nile.
Nashaat Milhem tracked down to hometown after evading police for more than a week since January 1 fatal shooting attack.

Israeli police have killed a Palestinian citizen of Israel who was wanted for a fatal shooting attack in Tel Aviv more than a week ago.

Nashaat Milhem was shot and killed on Friday night during a shoot-out with Israeli officers in his hometown of Arara, situated in the Triangle region of central Israel.

Local media showed pictures of Melhems body, with a submachine gun next to it, outside what they said was an abandoned building that reportedly had served as his hideout.



UpFront  Will a third intifada help the Palestinian cause?

Milhem killed three people on January 1, including two Israelis when he opened fire in a bar in Tel Aviv, and later an Arab taxi driver.

Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli prime minister, congratulated the security forces, which he said in a statement had worked tirelessly, methodically and professionally to track down the suspect.

Police said a special-forces team closed in on Milhems hideout and killed him as he stormed out, shooting at them.

There were no police casualties from the incident.

Speaking to the local Arab48 news site, however, residents disputed the Israeli polices account of the incident and insisted that Milhem could have been arrested alive.

A small protest against his killing was subsequently staged in the village.

Milhem, 31, had previously spent four years in prison for charges related to a confrontation with an Israeli soldier, according to his former lawyer, who also described Milhem as mentally unstable.

The motives for Milhems attack remain unclear.

READ MORE: Palestinian lives dont count here

Gilad Erdan, Israels internal security minister, thanked Israelis on Twitter for showing vigilance, patience and understanding for the complexity of the police operation.

Constituting 20 percent of the total Israeli population, an estimated 1.7 million Palestinians carry Israeli citizenship and live in cities, towns and villages across the country.

Discriminatory laws

Comprised of Muslims, Christians and Druze, they suffer from more than 50 discriminatory laws that muzzle their political expression and limit their access to state resources, according to the Haifa-based Adalah Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights.

Days after the Tel Aviv attack, Netanyahu prompted the criticism of rights groups and Palestinian legislators in Israels parliament, the Knesset, when he called for an increased police presence in Palestinian towns and villages in Israel.

We will open new police stations, recruit more police officers, go into all the towns and demand of everyone loyalty to the laws of the state.

READ MORE: How does Israel stop Palestinians from protesting?

Netanyahu is using the opportunity to attack the whole community, as he has done for years, Jafar Farah, director of the Moussawa rights group in Haifa, told Al Jazeera.

More law enforcement is not the solution, Farah said. The solution is to deal with core issues from occupation to systematic discrimination.
Deaths in West Bank city bring total number of Palestinians killed in wave of violence since October 1 to 152.

Israeli troops have killed two Palestinians during an alleged stabbing incident near the central West Bank city of Nablus as a wave of violence continues without pause.

Ali Abu Mureem, 26, and Said Abu al-Wafa, 38, were both fatally shot by Israeli forces while allegedly attempting to stab soldiers at the Hamra military checkpoint in the northern Jordan Valley area of the occupied West Bank on Saturday morning.



UpFront  Will a third intifada help the Palestinian cause?

Speaking to Al Jazeera by telephone, an Israeli army spokeswoman confirmed that both suspects were killed near the Jewish-only settlement of Bekaot, adding: Israeli forces thwarted the attack and shot them.

In the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, more than 500,000 Israelis live in Jewish-only settlements that encircle Palestinian communities and dissect the regions territorial contiguity.

Saturdays deadly incident comes just a day after four Palestinian teens were shot and killed by Israeli forces in the village of Sair, situated in the central West Bank, while reportedly attempting to stab soldiers.

The Palestinian Authoritys Ministry of Foreign Affairs referred to Fridays killings as a dangerous escalation and part of a continuous series of crimes and field executions by Netanyahus government against Palestinians.

Also on Friday night, Israeli police killed Nashat Milhem, a Palestinian citizen of Israel who shot and killed three people on January 1, during what they called a shootout that followed a week-long manhunt.

READ MORE: Intifada or not, something powerful is going on

In mid-September, Palestinian protests against Israels ongoing occupation were sparked by increased right-wing Jewish settler incursions into the al-Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site for Muslims.

Israeli forces have responded to demonstrations in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip and within Israel by using force, including live ammunition, rubber-coated steel bullets, tear gas and stun grenades.

Since October 1, Israeli forces or settlers have killed at least 152 Palestinians, including unarmed protesters, bystanders and alleged attackers.

According to the Ramallah-based rights group Al-Haq, 22 of those killed since the beginning of October were children.

Indeed, the deliberate targeting of Palestinian children has become a notable feature of the Israeli occupation, the group said in a report published in December. Palestinian children also face daily trauma and humiliation by [Israeli forces].

Meanwhile, Palestinian assailants have killed 23 Israelis, including soldiers and civilians.
Several thousand ethnic Albanians protest against EU-brokered deal that will give ethnic Serbs greater local powers.

Ethnic Albanian protesters have clashed with police in Kosovo after its government agreed to an EU-brokered deal that gives ethnic Serbs in the territory greater local powers.





Several thousand demonstrators were involved in the clashes in Pristina on Saturday over the agreement, which many Kosovans fear will see neighbouring Serbia assert more influence over the country.

The deal could also open the way for Serbians living in Kosovo to receive financing from Belgrade.

Al Jazeeras Stefan Goranovic said tension between the government and those opposed to the deal had been building up for over the past few months.

They (protesters) are thinking that the Serbian state will be back through the back door in Kosovothey fear that with the finance from Belgrade, local authorities will be more connected to Serbia, he said.

Last month, opposition politicians threw tear gas into the parliamentary chambers in protest at the agreement.

Kosovo, which has an ethnic Albanian majority, declared independence from Serbia in 2008 with backing from Western states, while Russia and dozens of other states do not recognise its independence.
Residents fear rising rent and property values will force them out of city neighbourhood following redevelopment.

New York Citys Bronx neighbourhood has a reputation as being one of the poorest and toughest areas in the US.

Property developers are hoping to change that with the help of celebrities, but locals are not too enthusiastic about the redevelopment plan.

New York is planning to redevelop the major thoroughfare of the Bronx, known as Jerome Avenue, a place where many locals earn their living working in rented storefronts and car-repair shops.

We need these places as working places for the people here, not as a way for millionaires to make more money, Michael Kamber of the Bronx Documentary Center, who teaches school children in the neighbourhood, told Al Jazeera.

The citys plan to develop has yet to be finalised but it is already displacing small businesses that have long thrived in the area. Property values and the cost of rent are increasing.

Keith Rubenstein, a developer, thinks the Bronx is the next big thing in the New York real estate market. He wants to build thousands of apartments in another area along the Bronx River that is currently home to many abandoned or underutilised factories and warehouses.

Were taking whats a very highly underutilised industrial area with truck traffic and truck parking, and turning it into quality residential housing, with public accessible esplanades and creating parkland space for people who are already in the community, he said.

But local residents say they need more affordable housing.

Edwin Torres, a photographer, told Al Jazeera: We saw it happened to a lot of other neighbourhoods and were like, No way. Were ready to make sure what happens is done in the right way so that the poor and working class can continue to call the neighbourhood home.
Rose Hamid says she went to the rally in silent protest to show Trump supporters what a Muslim looks like.

A 56-year-old Muslim American woman was thrown out of a rally in support of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump following a silent protest.

Rose Hamid was forcibly removed by security guards from the hall in South Carolina on Friday, after standing up in the crowd while wearing a shirt saying: Salam. I come in peace.

Hamid, and a few other protesters with her, also wore yellow Jewish stars of David marked Muslim to recall the forced identification markers under Nazi Germany.

Video footage aired on CNN of the moment when Hamid was being escorted out, shows many Trump supporters shouting at her.

Hamid, who works as a flight attendant, told CNN that some shouted questions at her such as Do you have a bomb? Do you have a bomb?

But according to Hamid, her silent protest of the hateful rhetoric found in Trumps camp is mainly an element existing within the crowd mentality, as opposed to personal beliefs held by most Republicans.

This demonstrates how when you start dehumanising the other it can turn people into very hateful, ugly people, Hamid told CNN.

I have the sincere belief that if people get to know each other one-on-one, that theyll stop being afraid of each other.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has issued a press statement calling on Trump to offer a public apology for the action.

The image of a Muslim woman being abused and ejected from a political rally sends a chilling message to American Muslims and to all those who value our nations traditions of religious diversity and civic participation, Nihad Awad, CAIR national executive director, said.

Following the ejection of Hamid, Trump reportedly told the crowd of supporters at the campaign rally: There is hatred against us that is unbelievable. Its their hatred, its not our hatred.

Trump has come under fire from the public and politicians for repeated comments seen as planting fear of Muslims, including that they should carry specific identification cards and that mosques should be closed.
Competing protests have been held in Cologne, Germany in response to the series of violent assaults against women on New Years Eve.

About 450 supporters of the anti-Islam PEGIDA movement were facing off with 1,300 counter-demonstrators behind the citys main train station on Saturday, police said.

After bottles and firecrackers were hurled at officials, police cancelled the march by the far-right groups, a spokeswoman said. Police used water canon to disperse protesters.

The attacks on New Years Eve caused tensions in Germany because the victims described the offenders as foreigners and migrants, of which the country has accepted about 1.1 million this year  more than any other European nation.

Colognes federal police have said they received 170 criminal complaints connected to the New Years festivities, including 120 cases of sexual assaults.

The German government said 31 suspects were briefly detained for questioning. Eighteen of them were asylum seekers.

The detained included nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, five Iranians, four Syrians, two Germans and one person each from Iraq, Serbia and the US.

READ MORE: Germany to refugees  Leaving Afghanistan? Think again

Al Jazeeras Dominic Kane, reporting from the protests, said the left-wing demonstrators, who protested against PEGIDA, clearly outnumbered the right-wing protesters.

Police sources estimated that the left-wing demonstration was about four to five times as big as the right-wing march.

This shows the difference of opinion in the refugee debate that has been going on in Germany, our correspondent said.

Tougher laws

German chancellor, Angela Merkel, has proposed tougher laws which include expelling asylum seekers convicted of committing crimes in Germany, in response to the assaults.

Merkels party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), discussed on Saturday deportation for asylum seekers who commit crimes as an important facet of their new 10-point plan for the nations future.

At the two-day summit in Mainz the CDU discussed if asylum seekers should be expelled sooner. On Saturday, the party confirmed their plans.

What happened on New Years Eve are despicable criminal acts that demand decisive answers, Merkel said after a meeting among the top ranks of her CDU in Mainz.

The right to asylum can be lost if someone is convicted on probation or jailed, Merkel added.

The police chief of of Cologne was dismissed on Friday amid mounting criticism of his forces handling of New Years Eve sexual assaults and robberies.
At least 40 people killed in Saturdays strikes on Maarat al-Numaan town, Syria Civil Defence tells Al Jazeera.

Scores of people have been killed and over 100 others injured in Russian air strikes in Syrias Idlib province, Al Jazeera has learnt.

The volunteer-run Syria Civil Defence told Al Jazeera that Saturdays Russian air strikes targeted the town of Maarat al-Numaan, 290km north of the capital, killing at least 43 people and injuring at least 150 others.

Our volunteers are still in the area that was targeted by the air strikes. They are still trying to help those injured and affected by the attack, the coordinator for the Idlib Syria Civil Defence told Al Jazeera.

Many of those injured are in very serious conditions, the death toll is expected to rise, he added.

In another attack in Idlib province, the Syria Civil Defence said at least three people were killed and four others were injured in air strikes that targeted a school and a fire department in Ariha.

Voices from Syria: The safest place is the frontline

Known also as the White Helmets, the Syria Civil Defence is a group of volunteer rescuers formed in 2013 that now numbers more than 2,700 volunteers.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the death toll at 39, adding that the air strikes targeted a court and a prison in Maarat al-Numaan.

Anas Maarawi, a media activist in Idlib, told Al Jazeera that the attacks targeted a court and a prison controlled by al-Nusra Front in Maarat al-Numaan.

The first floor of the court was targeted in addition to a prison. We are getting reports that at least 53 have been killed in these air strikes, Maarawi said.

Syria ready to attend Geneva

In another development, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid alMuallem told the UN special envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, on Saturday that Syrian regime was ready to attend the talks in Geneva expected on January 25.

SANA, Syrias state news agency, said that Muallem stressed the necessity of having a list of the opposition groups who are going to attend the talks.

Syrian opposition: No ceasefire unless Assad goes

Muallem said that efforts for a political solution and the UN Security Councils latest, relevant resolutions are linked to the credibility of the efforts of fighting terrorism, including forcing the countries which support terrorism to stop backing it, SANA reported on its website.

The conflict in Syria, which has killed over 250,000 people according to the UN, will mark its fifth year in March.

The Syrian Observatory said last week that more than 55,000 people, including almost 30,000 civilians, have been killed in Syria during the year 2015 alone.
Adel al-Jubeir says Iran is escalating tensions in region as Gulf states pledge their total support for Riyadh.

Saudi Arabia has warned to take further measures against Iran if it continues to escalate tensions in the region.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir did not specify what form the measures could take as he spoke after a meeting of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) foreign ministers in the Saudi capital on Saturday.





We are looking at additional measures to be taken if it [Iran] continues with its current policies, he said.

Gulf states expressed their total support for Saudi Arabia during the meeting and said the GCC forcefully condemns the attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran, in a statement released after the meeting.

Saudi Arabia cut off diplomatic relations with Iran after protesters ransacked Saudi diplomatic buildings in several cities, including its embassy in Tehran.

Riyadh accused Iranian officials of turning a blind eye as the mob attacked and set fire to the buildings, saying repeated requests for help were ignored.

Irans President Hassan Rouhani condemned the attack on the embassy, which came after Saudi Arabia executed 47 people, including Shia religious leader Nimr al-Nimr, who it accused of inciting violence.

READ MORE: Saudi-Iran standoff- War or a grand bargain?

The episode came amid existing tensions between the two states, over the conflicts in Yemen and Syria.

Iran backs Syrian President Bashar al-Assads government against rebel groups, some of which are backed by Riyadh.

Tehran also backs Houthi rebels, who are fighting forces from the Arab coalition and the Yemeni government, which is backed by Saudi Arabia.

Jubeir accused Iran of spreading sectarianism in the Middle East and wanting to export its 1979 revolution to neighbouring countries, which are largely Sunni-led.

The Saudi Foreign Minister also called on an emergency meeting of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference to discuss the attack on the embassy.

The GCC is made up of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, and Oman.
Dozens of homes searched after Netanyahu calls for crackdown on Arab communities in wake of deadly Tel Aviv attack.

Israeli police have raided the homes of Palestinian citizens of Israel, including university students, as Israeli officials and lawmakers have called for a crackdown on Arab communities following a deadly attack in Tel Aviv.

After 31-year-old Nashaat Milhem shot and killed three people in Tel Aviv on January 1, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wasted little time in urging a crackdown on Palestinian citizens of Israel.

We will dramatically increase law enforcement services in the Arab sector, Netanyahu said. We will open new police stations, recruit more police officers, go into all the towns and demand of everyone loyalty to the laws of the state.



UpFront  Two-state solution is not a valid solution right now

His comments prompted sharp criticism from Palestinian members of Israels parliament, the Knesset, and rights groups.

Milhem, who was on the run for more than a week, was killed by police on Friday night during a shootout in his hometown of Arara, located in the Triangle region of central Israel.

Muhammad Abu Toameh, 23, is one of dozens of Palestinian students at Tel Aviv University whose apartment was raided by police under the pretext that they were searching for Milhem.

Abu Toameh, who is involved in left-wing student activism, recalled that he knew it was going on because we heard about a dozen apartments [each housing several Palestinian students] searched before us.

The officers knocked on Abu Toamehs door, informing him and his roommates that they were searching the building. But they didnt search any other apartments in our building, and we are the only Arab tenants here, he told Al Jazeera.

READ MORE: Palestinians in Israel camp for Right of Return

Before leaving, the officers ran background checks on him and his roommates, also Palestinian citizens of Israel, and searched through their personal belongings.

Obviously the person theyre looking for is not in my sock drawer or on my shelf, Abu Toameh said. The searches are just to show their authoritarian [character] and brutality.

Comprised of Muslims, Christians and Druze, an estimated 1.7 million Palestinians carry Israeli citizenship and are subject to more than 50 discriminatory laws that muzzle their political expression and stifle their access to state resources, according to Adalah, a Haifa-based legal centre.

If you're an Arab, especially an activist, you're seen as the opponent. The police's behaviour is like always: violence and humiliation. by Mohamad Osama Eghbariya, student activist

Amjad Iraqi, Adalahs international advocacy coordinator, said the wave of raids targeting Palestinian students in Tel Aviv  known as a sort of liberal bubble  shows that it happens to Arabs everywhere.

If a crime is allegedly committed by an Arab, then every Arab is automatically a suspect, he told Al Jazeera.

In the months before Milhems attack in Tel Aviv, protests escalated in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem; the Gaza Strip; and Palestinian parts of Israel.

Between October 1 and December 28, at least 250 Palestinian citizens of Israel were detained by Israeli police for protests and other activism.

Mohamad Osama Eghbariya, a Tel Aviv University student and activist with Abna al-Balada, a left-wing Palestinian movement that boycotts the Israeli Knesset, has been arrested several times for his activism in the past. He does not expect the searches to stop now that Milhem has been killed.

They claim these raids are random, but they are specially targeting Arab students, Eghbariya told Al Jazeera.

Its about two goals: firstly, scaring the Arab students; and, secondly, sending a message that Palestinians arent welcome in their own country.

A spokesperson for the Israeli police could not be reached for comment on Saturday.

As tensions soared in the West Bank and Gaza, Eghbariya said that the Israeli government tried to send a message to Palestinians in Israel: If youre an Arab, especially an activist, youre seen as the opponent.

The polices behaviour is like always: violence and humiliation, he added. Its impossible that this situation [Palestinians in Israel] are living continues as it is now.

READ MORE: Israel arrests Palestinian teenager over Facebook posts

In recent months, Netanyahus government outlawed the northern branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, while ultra-nationalist legislator Avigdor Lieberman launched a campaign to ban Balad, a Palestinian political party in the Knesset.

Asad Ghanem, a politics professor at Haifa University, said that increasingly harsh policies targeting Palestinians in Israel are designed to de-legitimise the Palestinian political struggle in Israel.

But Netanyahu and his political allies are not merely seizing the moment to push for new security measures, Ghanem told Al Jazeera.

In my view, people underestimate Netanyahu by thinking that hes solely opportunistic. Hes also deeply ideological in his anti-Arab and nationalist worldview, Ghanem said. The policies of the right-wing government lead to more and more extremism on both sides.

Back in Tel Aviv, student Abu Toameh accused the Israeli police of stockpiling the addresses of Palestinian students.

It shows that they are just categorising citizens according to ethnicity, he said. Israel treats us as if we are all guilty until proven innocent.

Follow Patrick Strickland on Twitter: @P_Strickland_
People found carrying offending material face up to five years in jail and those distributing seven years.

Thailand has brought in tougher new measures to deal with the spread of child pornography in the country, a move it hopes will protect vulnerable children.

People convicted of possesing indecent images of children now face up to five years in prison, and those found distributing content face seven years.

Possesing child pornography did not previously carry a jail term, but the government moved to criminalise it last year.

It also set up a new police taskforce to combat the exploitation of children.

Al Jazeeras Wayne Hay reports from Bangkok.
Pro-government supporters demonstrate against oppositions removal of Hugo Chavez portraits from the National Assembly.

Venezuelas President Nicolas Maduro has condemned the removal of portraits and photos of his predecessor from the National Assembly.

The speaker of the newly installed parliament ordered them to be taken down, after the oppositions landslide victory in parliamentary elections in December.



But pro-government protesters have been on the streets, calling for images of Chavez to be put up on every street corner.





Jorge Rodriguez, the mayor of Caracas, gave the order at a rally on Thursday to protest the decision.

Chavistas have been angered by a video playing non-stop on state media showing the Congress new leader, Henry Ramos, cracking jokes while ordering workers to haul away a giant billboard of Chavez.

I dont want to see Chavez or Maduro, Ramos says in the video, shot from a mobile phone on his first day on the job.

Take it all to Miraflores, or the rubbish, he says, referring to the presidential palace.

At the rally on Thursday outside the National Assembly in Plaza Bolivar, hundreds of government supporters dressed in red swore loyalty to Chavez and independence hero Simon Bolivar.

One protester dressed up as Uncle Sam pulling the strings of a cut-out Ramos.

I have to defend their honour for my children, my grandchildren and great grandchildren, said one protester, 77-year-old Eva Prada, who held images of both Chavez and Bolivar.

Maduro visited Chavezs mausoleum accompanied by the newly appointed cabinet to lend his support to the campaign.

In a fiery speech before dozens of military officers, he called the removal of Bolivars portrait from Congress the most-serious affront to the memory of the Liberator in the nearly 200 years since his death.

He ordered that every military family be given pictures of Bolivar and Chavez to hang in their homes.

I dont know how each of us should react, in our hearts and minds, when the entire fatherland has been undeniably desecrated, Vladimir Padrino, the defence minister, told troops at the mausoleum, which is in a historic fort atop a Caracas slum.

Chavez, who died in 2013 from cancer, is revered by millions of poor Venezuelans who benefited from social programmes like free housing and medical attention.

A stencil of his eyes, on giant red billboards and spray-painted on buildings, is the most ubiquitous image in the country.
We examine the global panic surrounding Chinas economy and what can be done to keep it going.

For the second time in a week stocks have fallen on Chinas stock exchanges, causing an emergency shutdown and intensifying concerns about the health of the worlds second largest economy.

Trading was frozen on both the Shanghai and the Shenzhen stock exchanges on Monday and Thursday after stocks plunged by more than 7 percent.

The drop, which is being linked to poor economic figures, tensions after North Koreas nuclear test and the spat between the Arab world and Iran, comes amid further data showing that Chinas economy is slowing down.

But what is heightening fears is that markets have continued to fall despite government intervention.

The feeze in trading, also known as a circuit breaker was introduced last summer after more than $3.2 trillion was wiped off Chinas markets in three weeks  an amount more than 10 times the size of the entire Greek economy.

In theory the circuit breaker should curb volatility, but it seems this weeks losses may have been triggered by a depreciation in the Chinese currency, the Yuan.

Charles Horne, an economy portfolio manager with consultancy firm China Policy, joins Counting the Cost to discuss the currency devaluation and the general lack of confidence in the Chinese economy.

Saudi-Iran and the coming Oil Wars

Relations between Saudi Arabia and its regional rival Iran have reached an all-time low after Riyadh severed diplomatic ties with Tehran.

The escalation in tensions came just a few days after the kingdom controversially executed a prominent Shia cleric.

Regional heavyweights, both countries hold one-quarter of the worlds proven oil reserves, but have been battling over regional influence.

Mamdouh Salameh, an international oil economist and a World Bank consultant on energy, joins the programme to discuss the Saudi-Iran crisis and whether oil could become the frontline in a new Cold War.

Sri Lanka opens doors to foreign investors

Twenty-five years after a brutal civil war, Sri Lanka is beginning to see a big increase in tourism numbers.

In 2015, almost 1.8 million people came to the formerly troubled island, up nearly 18 percent on 2014.

Elected a year ago, the government is now trying to turn Sri Lanka into a destination for foreign investors  the most important being foreigners. Individuals and companies will now be allowed to own Sri Lankan land.

Anushka Wijesinha, the chief economist at the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce, joins the programme to discuss the new investment drive.
Sri Lankas government begins work on new constitution, as its president marks one year in office.

President Maithripala Sirisena has pledged to introduce sweeping constitutional reforms aimed at preventing his country from returning to ethnic war.

He told parliament he wants a new statute to guarantee the country will not see a repeat of the civil war that ended in 2009.

That conflict came to an end after 25 years of fighting between the government and the Tamil minority.

According to a United Nations report, at least 40,000 Tamil civilians may have been killed in just the final months of the civil war.

The Sri Lankan government has promised the UN Human Rights Council that it will investigate the alleged war crimes.

So, is a new constitution a good start for reconciliation and stability?

Presenter: Sami Zeidan

Guests:

Rohan Edirisingha  Constitutional academic and former professor in the faculty of law at the University of Colombo.

Sutharshan Sukumaran  Co-editor of the Tamil Guardian.

Alan Keenan  Senior analyst and Sri Lanka project director at the International Crisis Group.
We look at the Saudi-Iran crisis reflected in the media; plus, US elections and horse race journalism.

The long-running conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran reached new heights this week after the kingdom severed diplomatic relations with Tehran.

The diplomatic rupture, which has heightened tensions in the Middle East, came after Saudi executed 47 people on January 2, including a prominent Shia cleric  Nimr al-Nimr.

Within hours of the death sentence being carried out, Iranian protesters ransacked the Saudi embassy in Tehran and started fires.

Iranian media had depicted Nimr as a peaceful dissident, and the execution as a provocative act. In Saudi Arabia, the national security narrative prevailed  Nimrs execution was justified as part of its war on terrorism.

The coverage in both countries and the international media, has since played up a sectarian divide  one that pits Sunni versus Shia  however this simplified binary fails to address the larger geopolitical issues involved.

Talking us through this geopolitical media battle are: Mohammed Alyahya, research fellow at the Gulf Research Centre; Borzou Daragahi, the Middle East correspondent for BuzzFeed News; journalist and author Azadeh Moaveni; and Salman Aldossary, editor-in-chief of the Saudi Asharq Al-Aswat newspaper.

Other stories on our radar this week: In Bangladesh, a court sentences two men to death for the murder of a secular blogger back in 2013; after nearly four months in a Turkish prison, Vice News journalist Mohammed Rasool has been released on bail; in Poland, the passing of a new media law has prompted resignations from senior journalists and complaints from press freedom groups and China has expelled a French journalist amid accusations that her article supported terrorism.

US elections and horse race journalism

In the US, the race for the White House is well under way and some news outlets have succumbed to syndrome known as horse race journalism. This is when journalists focus on candidates polling positions rather than their policies.

This coverage can leave voters uninformed, however for candidates doing well in the polls this can mean a lot of free publicity.

News editors tend to devote more airtime and column inches to whoever the polls say are leading the race.

The Listening Posts Will Yong looks at the use of polls in the US presidential election and what gets lost when outlets crunch the numbers more than they do proper journalism.

In the first few weeks of the year the gym can get rather crowded with all the people trying to achieve their New Year resolutions of healthier lifestyles and better bodies.

It has become pretty normal human behaviour which may have been the inspiration behind the latest video produced by a US-based health and fitness YouTube channel called Buff Dudes.

The video, narrated in the style of a nature documentary, is called Gym Wildlife and looks at the other kinds of human behaviour on display in gyms. We hope you enjoy the show!
We speak to Otto Perez Molina at a military prison as he waits to find out if he will stand trial on corruption charges.

In September 2015, the people of Guatemala took to the streets in an unprecedented and dramatic demonstration against the sitting President, Otto Perez Molina.

The country was upended when prosecutors revealed a multi-million-dollar corruption ring involving the president and members of his government.

I have my doubts that it will be a fair trial. And these doubts stem from how the CICIG has operated in the past, how they select the cases they prosecute, how they respond to the American ambassador's directives and how they intimidate judges and the Public Prosecutor's office. by Otto Perez Molina

The case was dubbed La Linea (the line), which is the codename for a hotline allegedly used to discuss and plan the operations by which importers paid tens of millions of dollars in bribes to avoid customs duty.

Perez Molina, a former army general and intelligence chief, who had been elected president in 2011, stepped down in September 2015 after Congress lifted his political immunity from prosecution following months of anti-corruption protests.

The investigation of the La Linea case would not have happened without the collaboration of CICIG  the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala, an independent entity set up by the United Nations and the government to support the Public Prosecutors office. But Molina accuses the committee of in fact being run by the United States in an effort to protect its geopolitical interests.

The investigation uncovered nearly 90,000 intercepted phone calls. The former president can be heard in one of them ordering his top tax official, Carlos Munoz, to fire a senior official and replace her with one they could trust. The president was pushing for the change presumably to ease La Linea operations.

This week on Talk to Al Jazeera, we join the former president of Guatemala, Otto Perez Molina, in prison as he waits to find out if hell stand trial on corruption charges.










POINT DE VUE JeM will put Islam on test and India, Pakistan, World-community in problem?

Alwihda Info | Par Hem Raj Jain - 9 Janvier 2016





Cornered JeM (and other Jihadis) bound to invoke Kashmir issue and may invite ISIS (or other Caliphate) in AF-PAK region if further cornered



--- Indians are relishing the media report that political and military leadership of Pakistan has agreed to take action against the leaders of Jihadi terrorist organization Jaish - e - Mohammed (JeM) which has carried out terrorist act at Pathankot Air-base in India in first week of January 2016 in which 7 security persons were killed and many more injured. But Indians and World-community do not understand that it is only political and military leadership of Pakistan which may become apologetic and defensive in case Pakistanis ( with or without some State actors) are found complicit in any terrorist attack in India but not the Jihadis of Pakistan (who, as per media, have already laid down the lives of ~ one hundred thousand Jihadis from India, Pakistan, Afghanistan etc for Kashmir) who will openly say that they have every moral and legal right to attack India unless India gives at least Muslim Kashmir (if not entire J&K) to Sunni Theocratic Pakistan.



The USA is popularly believed to be behind PM Modis recent visit to Pakistan, hence in order to keep Indo-Pak dialogue going, USA will ensure action against perpetrators of Pathankot terrorist attack. Therefore Indians and World-community should understand that given irrefutable evidence of involvement of JeM in Pathankot attack the Government of Pakistan is bound to take (under international pressure due to changed situation brought about by Islamic terrorism of ISIS etc) legal action against the leaders of JeM and other Pakistanis involved.



Thus cornered JeM (and other Jihadis and complicit State actors of Pakistan) are bound to invoke Kashmir issue and may even invite ISIS or Sunni Caliphate led by Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) by throwing a challenge to test Islam in AF-PAK region if these Jihadis are further cornered under international pressure by political and military leadership of Pakistan. In present global scenario, as given below, Jihadis of Pakistan have very high chances of plunging entire mankind in bloodbath through wars staring first between two nuclear countries India and Pakistan :-



(1)- The close link of China and Pakistan (after economic corridor in Pakistan provided by China) will come under severe pressure especially under the pressure of Pacific countries who will pressurize West to reign-in China the protector friend of North Korea who has destabilized the entire Pacific region by declaring that last week it has successfully tested a Hydrogen Bomb.< /div>



(2)- Present India is being led by PM Modi with projected (like 56 inch chest etc) and perceived macho-image. Hence nuclear India will not mind even for going in war with nuclear Pakistan



(3)- The sagging fortunes of Sunni ISIS got tremendous boost due to Iran - Saudi Arabia Shia-Sunni rift where Sunni Muslim Arab countries (KSA, Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain, Sudan) have severed or descaled diplomatic ties with Shia Iran after - Shia cleric execution in KSA and consequent attack in Iran on KSA Embassy - controversy.



(4)- Russia [already in conflict with West (USA & European Allies) due to Ukraine crises where Crimea has been taken by Russia despite Budapest Memorandum and Russian supported rebels have disturbed Donbass region of East - South Ukraine] is seen to be siding with Shias in Shia-Sunni conflict where for supporting Shia regime of Assad in Syria and for eliminating Sunni ISIS in Syria and Iraq - the Shia countries Iran, Iraq, Lebanon (of Hezbollah) are in coalition with Russia.



(5)- Above mentioned cornered JeM and other Jihadis of Pakistan may persuade KSA (if not ISIS) to go for Sunni Caliphate as mentioned at -

http://www.alwihdainfo.com/Peaceful-Kashmir-solution-impossible-after-Saudi-Arabia-sponsored-Caliphate_a26487.html



The said serious situation being faced by entire mankind is further exacerbated by one more factor. Instead of going for Regulated Global Political Order (RGPO) as mentioned at - http://aapress.com/editorial/editorial-after-122-usa-should-think-about-regulated-global-political-order/ - the so-called leader of free World, USA is projecting a hawkish leader (like Donald Trump or may be another hawkish leader) during on-going Presidential campaign in USA which is fed-up with timid policies of present Obama administration which has brought disrepute and humiliation to USA starting from (i)- 2012 terrorist attack on US Embassy in Benghazi, Libya killing US Diplomat and others (ii)- Ukraine crises since 2013 where Russia ultimately snatched Crimea from Ukraine (iii)- Emergence of ISIS in 2014 in NAME due to US policy failures in Iraq, Syria etc including leaving Assad in power even after he crossed so-called red-lines of using chemical weapons (iv)- Military intervention of Russia in Syria in September 2015 (v)

- Missile testing by Iran after 2015 nuclear deal (vi)- Hydrogen bomb testing by North Korea in 2016.



To which destiny, this economic and military superpower hawkish USA, will lead rest of the World - will be watched by entire mankind with holden-breath



Regards

Hem Raj Jain

(Author of Betrayal of Americanism)

Bengaluru, India





Dans la meme rubrique : < > Tchad : "une cuisante defaite" pour "les pessimistes" du Dialogue national (Abdelmanane Khatab) Tchad : lechec de la politique de lemploi, une opportunite entrepreneuriale ? Tchad :  aller au federalisme dans ce contexte, cest cautionner leclatement  (Dr Oguelemi) Pour toute information, contactez-nous au : +(235) 99267667 ; 62883277 ; 66267667 (Bureau N'Djamena)










Informations Russia [already in conflict with West (USA & European Allies)

Alwihda Info | Par Hem Raj Jain - 9 Janvier 2016



Bengaluru, India

Does USA understand - JeM will put Islam on test and India, Pakistan, World-community in problem? Dear Editor



Sub:- Cornered JeM (and other Jihadis) bound to invoke Kashmir issue and may invite ISIS (or other Caliphate) in AF-PAK region if further cornered



--- Indians are relishing the media report that political and military leadership of Pakistan has agreed to take action against the leaders of Jihadi terrorist organization Jaish - e - Mohammed (JeM) which has carried out terrorist act at Pathankot Air-base in India in first week of January 2016 in which 7 security persons were killed and many more injured. But Indians and World-community do not understand that it is only political and military leadership of Pakistan which may become apologetic and defensive in case Pakistanis ( with or without some State actors) are found complicit in any terrorist attack in India but not the Jihadis of Pakistan (who, as per media, have already laid down the lives of ~ one hundred thousand Jihadis from India, Pakistan, Afghanistan etc for Kashmir) who will openly say that they have every moral and legal right to attack India unless India gives at least Muslim Kashmir (if not entire J&K) to Sunni Theocratic Pakistan.



The USA is popularly believed to be behind PM Modis recent visit to Pakistan, hence in order to keep Indo-Pak dialogue going, USA will ensure action against perpetrators of Pathankot terrorist attack. Therefore Indians and World-community should understand that given irrefutable evidence of involvement of JeM in Pathankot attack the Government of Pakistan is bound to take (under international pressure due to changed situation brought about by Islamic terrorism of ISIS etc) legal action against the leaders of JeM and other Pakistanis involved.



Thus cornered JeM (and other Jihadis and complicit State actors of Pakistan) are bound to invoke Kashmir issue and may even invite ISIS or Sunni Caliphate led by Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) by throwing a challenge to test Islam in AF-PAK region if these Jihadis are further cornered under international pressure by political and military leadership of Pakistan. In present global scenario, as given below, Jihadis of Pakistan have very high chances of plunging entire mankind in bloodbath through wars staring first between two nuclear countries India and Pakistan :-



(1)- The close link of China and Pakistan (after economic corridor in Pakistan provided by China) will come under severe pressure especially under the pressure of Pacific countries who will pressurize West to reign-in China the protector friend of North Korea who has destabilized the entire Pacific region by declaring that last week it has successfully tested a Hydrogen Bomb.



(2)- Present India is being led by PM Modi with projected (like 56 inch chest etc) and perceived macho-image. Hence nuclear India will not mind even for going in war with nuclear Pakistan



(3)- The sagging fortunes of Sunni ISIS got tremendous boost due to Iran - Saudi Arabia Shia-Sunni rift where Sunni Muslim Arab countries (KSA, Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain, Sudan) have severed or descaled diplomatic ties with Shia Iran after - Shia cleric execution in KSA and consequent attack in Iran on KSA Embassy - controversy.



(4)- Russia [already in conflict with West (USA & European Allies) due to Ukraine crises where Crimea has been taken by Russia despite Budapest Memorandum and Russian supported rebels have disturbed Donbass region of East - South Ukraine] is seen to be siding with Shias in Shia-Sunni conflict where for supporting Shia regime of Assad in Syria and for eliminating Sunni ISIS in Syria and Iraq - the Shia countries Iran, Iraq, Lebanon (of Hezbollah) are in coalition with Russia.



(5)- Above mentioned cornered JeM and other Jihadis of Pakistan may persuade KSA (if not ISIS) to go for Sunni Caliphate as mentioned at -

http://www.alwihdainfo.com/Peaceful-Kashmir-solution-impossible-after-Saudi-Arabia-sponsored-Caliphate_a26487.html



The said serious situation being faced by entire mankind is further exacerbated by one more factor. Instead of going for Regulated Global Political Order (RGPO) as mentioned at - http://aapress.com/editorial/editorial-after-122-usa-should-think-about-regulated-global-political-order/ - the so-called leader of free World, USA is projecting a hawkish leader (like Donald Trump or may be another hawkish leader) during on-going Presidential campaign in USA which is fed-up with timid policies of present Obama administration which has brought disrepute and humiliation to USA starting from (i)- 2012 terrorist attack on US Embassy in Benghazi, Libya killing US Diplomat and others (ii)- Ukraine crises since 2013 where Russia ultimately snatched Crimea from Ukraine (iii)- Emergence of ISIS in 2014 in NAME due to US policy failures in Iraq, Syria etc including leaving Assad in power even after he crossed so-called red-lines of using chemical weapons (iv)- Military intervention of Russia in Syria in September 2015 (v)- Missile testing by Iran after 2015 nuclear deal (vi)- Hydrogen bomb testing by North Korea in 2016.



To which destiny, this economic and military superpower hawkish USA, will lead rest of the World - will be watched by entire mankind with holden-breath



Regards



Hem Raj Jain



(Author of Betrayal of Americanism)



Bengaluru, India





Dans la meme rubrique : < > India should enter into military-treaty to get US-boots on ground for retrieving Indian territory from China & Pakistan and for independence of Tibet Tchad : 17 membres du bureau executif de lUDT, allie a la majorite presidentielle, jettent leponge Tchad : un mort et plusieurs blesses dans un accident routier a l'Est Pour toute information, contactez-nous au : +(235) 99267667 ; 62883277 ; 66267667 (Bureau N'Djamena)




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But I Think He's a Non-Believer by Constance Daley Death of a Thug The Life and Horrors of Suharto by Andreas Harsono ___________________________ This Just In Sierra Club: McCain Ducked All 15 Key Votes On Green Laws (AR) A Work By AR's T.S. Kerrigan Is Chosen As 'Best Poem' By Wordpress Site Murder At Mile 63

The Deadly Assault and

Bush Administration Cover-Up

by S. Eben Kirkesby

and Andreas Harsono 5427 14th St. West, Bradenton, FL 34207 $6.99 Fish Fridays! Manatee Co.'s Only 24-Hr.

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Live Oak Bancshares in Wilmington, N.C., one of the largest 7(a) program lenders in the U.S. last year, has promoted Greg Thompson to chief operating officer.

Thompson steps into the newly created position after having been brought on recently to lead the $946 million-asset company's new e-Lending initiative. He will continue to report to Live Oak's president, Neil Underwood.

"[Thompson's] background in technology and operations makes him uniquely qualified to help us further scale the business," Underwood said in a news release Thursday.

Prior to joining Live Oak, Thompson served as the executive vice president of shared services at Square 1 Bank, which was acquired by PacWest Bancorp in October.

Live Oak was the country's second-largest Small Business Administration 7(a) lender in terms of dollar volume in fiscal year 2015, with $1.15 billion in loans.

The bank, which took the top spot on American Banker's Best Banks to Work For list in 2015, specializes in lending to niche borrowers such as veterinarians, funeral homes, dentists and small-town pharmacies.
Merchants Bancshares in South Burlington, Vt., has named an interim principal financial officer after its chief financial officer resigned.

Thomas Meshako resigned from the $2 billion-asset Merchants to "pursue other interests," according to a regulatory filing Friday.

Merchants will pay Meshako $110,000 in severance. Meshako, who was 54 at the time of Merchants' proxy statement in April, had been CFO since November 2014. He was previously the finance director at the $5.9 billion-asset Brookline Bancorp in Boston.

Merchants hired Eric Segal as interim principal financial officer, principal accounting officer and treasurer. Segal, 58, will serve in these roles while Merchants searches for a permanent replacement. Segal is head of the banking and financial institutions practice at CFO Consulting Partners in New York.

Merchants also retained CFO Consulting Partners for advice on its acquisition of Nuvo Bank & Trust in Springfield, Mass., which was completed last month.

Merchants announced in November that its president, Geoffrey Hesslink, would succeed Michael Tuttle as chief executive.

The company reported net income in the first nine months of last year of $10.3 million, up 7% from a year earlier.
WASHINGTON  Bankers and other anti-money-laundering experts are more pessimistic than ever as they head into the new year, facing a raft of problems that many fear are only going to get worse.

Regulators and institutions appear far apart when it comes to so-called "de-risking," in which banks drop businesses for fear of enhanced regulatory scrutiny, even while policymakers are stepping up their scrutiny of terrorist financing prevention in the wake of recent attacks.

"There is no greater issue for the AML community in 2016 than addressing de-risking," said John Byrne, executive vice president at the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists. "Failure to do so will harm prevention of human trafficking, drug trafficking, terrorism and of course, financial inclusion."

Following is the state of play for anti-laundering issues in banking  and why many feel 2016 will be a challenging year.

De-Risking

The concerns over de-risking have grown worse during the past several years, as many banks conclude that accounts associated with certain businesses that are considered more susceptible to criminal activity are not worth the regulatory headache of keeping open. Yet it's unclear what the solution is  and regulators appear in no rush to clarify their views.

"What we have been struggling with is, how do we manage the expectations from examiners, from law enforcement?" Richard Small, an executive director with Ernst & Young, said at a recent yearend event sponsored by the ACAMS. "How do you manage that risk when you don't know what it is [regulators] want you to do and then challenge why you are doing business with these people or types of businesses without any indication they are doing anything wrong?"

Speaking alongside Small at the same event, John Wagner, a managing director in the regulatory and compliance practice at Deloitte, said "we have reached a tipping point" where banks may now need written documentation outlining how they decide which customer accounts they decide to maintain, close and or deny.

"The regulators are expecting formal policies and procedures from institutions and to lay out what their criteria is and you go to a more formalized approach," Wagner said.

He added that even if an examiner told a bank client that it can use an informal approach, he would advise it to formally document the bank's risk appetite for a particular customer.

"What is your risk appetite for that customer, for that industry and or that geography and all of that needs to be thought through before you go in and bank a particular client," Wagner said.

But Byrne, who was moderating the discussion between Small and Wagner, suggested that having a formal de-risking policy would likely "exacerbate the problem."

It's unclear, meanwhile, if regulators even believe the problem is real. The World Bank conducted two surveys in 2015 exploring the scope of de-risking and found that it is occurring, but said the extent remained unclear. For example, one of the surveys on money remittance companies received only 25 responses from the 3,000 banks that were invited to participate.

The survey on correspondent banking also found that de-risking was happening, with 15 of the 20 responding large international banks indicating that they had seen a decline in correspondent bank relationships between 2012 and mid-2015, while local and regional banks indicated there was only a slight decline. However, the report noted that the large international banks were surveyed because they were reported to have been cutting off correspondent bank relationships.

Acting Undersecretary Adam Szubin said in a November speech that "Treasury takes assertions of de-risking seriously, and we are working hard to identify and address the factors that lead U.S. banks to terminate relationships," but added that the limited response to the World Bank survey's still makes the problem difficult to pinpoint.

"Even after these initial surveys, we don't have a complete picture quite yet. We still need more and better data to help us measure changes in the correspondent banking environment, and to better understand the extent to which de-risking is happening and why," Szubin said.

Personal Liability

But bankers are also concerned about a proposal from the New York State Department of Financial Services.

The state regulator issued a plan Dec. 1 that would hold the head of an institution's Bank Secrecy Act and anti-money-laundering program personally liable if it fails to meet expectations, particularly as it pertains to the transaction monitoring and filtering systems.

The agency said that after a number of investigations, it "uncovered (among other issues) serious shortcomings in the transaction monitoring and filtering programs of these institutions and that a lack of robust governance, oversight, and accountability at senior levels of these institutions has contributed to these shortcomings."

The goal of the DFS proposal is likely to have someone oversee the end-to-end implementation of the transaction and monitoring systems and also for institutions to dedicate more resources to those programs. But that can be challenging and expensive.

"One of the big issues I see is the communication between IT and compliance," said Alma Angotti, a managing director in the global investigations and compliance practice at Navigant. "Compliance thinks they are communicating what they need and IT thinks they are doing what compliance has asked them to do, but sometimes that is not the case."

She added that some institutions that have grown by acquisition might have several different transaction monitoring systems, making it difficult to put in place rules that work consistently across the different platforms.

Small suggested that if the DFS wants to rely on a single person being responsible for an institution's BSA/AML program it should make the chief executive or board of directors liable.

"As a compliance officer you don't have the kind of ability that I think others think they should have," Small said.

Wagner added that many of the decisions that are required to implement a properly functioning program, including a budget for staffing and other resources, are often not up to the compliance officer.

While the DFS proposal, which is still out for comment, would apply just to the state of New York, the department has a reputation for having a long reach because of its jurisdiction over many of the world's money-center banks. In the wake of the December mass shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., congressional lawmakers, including Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., are also pursuing legislation that would strengthen BSA/AML requirements and hold bankers liable for programmatic breakdowns.

Fintech

Policymakers are also increasingly worried by certain digital innovations, like virtual currency and marketplace lending, as well as the growth of prepaid cards as a money laundering threat.

The terrorists in the Paris attacks are reported to have had access to a Bitcoin wallet and used prepaid cards. Syed Rizwan Farook, one of the shooters in San Bernardino, also took out an unsecured loan from an online lender prior to the attack, according to media reports. It has left lawmakers and others asking if such new products are more susceptible to being utilized by terrorists.

"Terrorists are going to do whatever they can to exploit the financial system, and whether it is prepaid or if it's some kind of loan, they are going to take advantage of it," said Dennis Lormel, founder and president of DML Associates and a former chief of the FBI's financial crimes program.

However, he added that terrorists have a history of using prepaid cards and were using them when the U.S. first entered Iraq following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

"I think the attacks in Paris now bring us back full circle where prepaids were part of the scheme," he said.

According to media reports, the European Commission plans to step up its regulation of prepaid cards and virtual currency.

However, Brian Knight, associate director for financial policy at the Milken Institute, cautioned against leaping to conclusions, and suggested that just because a product was used by terrorists does not necessarily mean it is easier for terrorists to use.

"Is this innovative technology opening up options or potential vulnerabilities? It is reasonable to ask that question, but I don't think it is reasonable to assume that it is," Knight said.

Jennifer Shasky Calvery, director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, told reporters during an American Bankers Association conference that just because the terrorists used virtual currency does not necessarily mean it is a higher-risk product.

Speaking at the ACAMS event, Small, the former head of anti-money-laundering at the Federal Reserve Board, said some of the technology companies that provide financial services are realizing that they need to come under the regulatory fold.

"Some of these fintech companies that have said we are a technology company are starting to realize they need MSB licensing," Small said, referring to money-services businesses.

He also said that as their regulatory status changes from a technology company to a money-services business, they could be at risk of losing access to their bank accounts.

"Some of these smaller companies, if they get an MSB license  are they going to be in this position where banks are not going to want to bank them anymore. It is not the traditional MSB we are thinking about, but it is an MSB and there is a whole stigma that goes with that," Small said.
Over the past months, as Ted Cruz has steadily climbed in the polls and national exposure, the far left (and establishment right) have either gloated or fretted that Cruz winning the Republican nomination would leave him playing Barry Goldwater to Hillary Clinton's Lyndon Johnson. Unsurprisingly, this calculation comes from a woeful misreading of historical context, placing far too much emphasis on the candidates themselves and not the climate in which the 1964 election took place. Unfortunately for aged Democratic candidates who seem trapped in a time warp of '60s radicalism, the world has not remained stagnant with them, and for scandal-plagued Hilary Clinton, there is no longer a media black hole to cover her tracks.

By referencing 1964, Cruz detractors imply that he is an ideologically extreme candidate who will serve only to alienate a moderate majority straight into the arms of Mrs. Clinton. However, this analysis entirely omits the unique electoral situation in which Goldwater and Johnson squared off  one that is nearly the opposite of 2016.

Lyndon Johnson assumed the presidency not on merit, but through the assassination of an immensely popular young President Kennedy in the prime of his life. The shock to the country and the incredible outpouring of national grief cannot be overstated; it is difficult for Americans not present in those days to fully comprehend. It was in this atmosphere that Lyndon Johnson had less than one year to convince the nation that he was Kennedy's rightful successor and most capable of carrying on his legacy. Johnson masterfully maneuvered the uncharted territory of assuming the presidency in the nuclear age, simultaneously convincing Democrats and the nation that he was not only fit for the job, but was indeed Kennedy's heir. By maintaining Kennedy's staff (most of whom loathed him), he projected continuity. He acted as consoler-in-chief in a way that had never been attempted, soothing the nation in an hour of doubt and grief. He was no longer a little-known, little-respected Texas buffoon; he was, in a word, presidential.

Contrast this with the atmosphere in which the presumptive nominee will be forced to run. Clinton is seeking to inherit the office from an immensely unpopular, divisive president, whose policies have left the world in shambles at home and abroad. What's worse, she was an integral part of that administration, forcing her to walk the fine line of defending an unpopular administration while differentiating herself from it. While Johnson cloaked himself in the image of Kennedy, Clinton must, to the best of her ability, divert attention from her deep involvement in the disastrous Obama legacy.

Another and arguably more crucial difference between 1964 and 2016 deals with the vast leaps forward made in communication technology with the internet revolution and the modern media. In 1964, while he was well-known in Washington power circles, Lyndon Johnson was little known in the country at large. His womanizing, narcissism, racism, and thirst for power were largely unknown, allowing him to meticulously craft a public persona in preparing for a run at the presidency. Knowledge of his abrasive attitude and the questionable tactics he used to gain his Senate seat in 1948 were unknown outside Washington and Texas. Had his opponent Coke Stevenson had access to Twitter, history may well be very different today. Again, Hilary Clinton does not have this luxury. Her (and her husband's) sordid history is well-known, or being discovered by a new generation with easy access to historical backgrounds and a wide array of opinions. Sleazy politicians like the Clintons (as we have witnessed time and time again) have no advantage in the light of media scrutiny. While a lack of alternative media aided Johnson in 1964, and the Clintons in the 1990s, the information age has greatly broadened reporting from stuffy network broadcasting booths and the desks of highbrow New York Times editors. More than ever, the Clintons' filthy laundry is available for all to see in a way Lyndon Johnson's never was.

In a side-to-side analysis, Hilary Clinton and Lyndon Johnson have much in common. Both are politically malleable, bending their "convictions" to whatever is personally advantageous at the moment. For instance, Johnson voted against any and all civil rights legislation (even an anti-lynching bill) until his politically expedient "evolution" in the run-up to the 1964 election. The list of Hilary Clinton's "evolutions" are legion and will surely continue to mount as her campaign slogs on. Like Johnson, Clinton masquerades as a woman of the people and champion of the middle class despite possessing an immense fortune of dubious origin. Her magnanimity for us peasants persists only so long as the cameras roll.

However, Clinton most resembles Johnson in her lifelong quest for power, a desire that supersedes all else, including the national interest.

Johnson was adept at concealing his true nature from the American electorate, aided in no small part through his natural charm and the technological limitations of his day. Clinton lacks these advantages; her true, vicious nature is apparent to all who care to see it.

A conservative candidate such as Ted Cruz will not suffer the same disadvantages Barry Goldwater faced in 1964. Rather, righteous ideology will serve as armor when compared to the dark legacy and empty promises offered up by that latter-day Lyndon Johnson, Hillary Clinton.
The Obama administration appears surprised by the sudden eruption of Saudi-Iranian hostility after the Saudi government executed Shiite cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr and the Iranians responded by organizing/sponsoring/approving an attack on the Saudi Embassy in Tehran. Both sides have walked the rhetoric back just a bit in the last day or two.

The U.S. administration remonstrated both sides, but its most public worry appears to be that events would get in the way of brokering a peace agreement in Syria. State Department Spokesman John Kirby said, What we want to see is tensions caused by these executions reduced, diplomatic relations restored, so that the leadership in the region can focus on other pressing issues We have consistently urged everyone to deescalate tensions.

The secretary is very concerned with the direction this thing is going, said another one senior official. It's very unsettling to him that so many nations are choosing not to engage. With so much turmoil in the region, the last thing we need is for people not to be having conversations.

A former Obama White House Middle East adviser told Al-Monitor. To the degree that people hopefully wanted to see the Vienna process succeed, it required that Iran and Saudi Arabia be willing to sit at the same table and talk about a cease-fire and political process Our approach to the region has depended on a Saudi-Iran modus vivendi. That is all blown out of the water, at least for now.

It is very unclear why the Saudis decided to do this now, said another former Obama administration Middle East official. A complete puzzle.

No, it isnt.

This is what happens when a government -- namely the United States government -- mistakes talk for action -- when the Secretary of State equates sitting at a fancy table in Vienna with the willingness of the parties to engage in actual give and take diplomacy. When Americans believe countries will simply cede their national or societal interests, as they understand them, just because we want it.

Saudi-Iranian tension is not an impediment to resolving the Syrian civil war.

The Syrian civil war is a manifestation of Saudi-Iranian differences.

This is the reality of modern Saudi-Iranian relations since the Islamic Republic came to power in 1979. Its first manifestation was the Iran-Iraq war that killed more than a million people. It is what drives the arming and funding of both Sunni and Shiite jihadists from Uighurs in China to Bedouins in Sinai to Boko Haram in Nigeria to Libya to Syria to Iraq to Mali to Chechnya and Dagestan to Yemen. It is the 21st century incarnation of a 7th century war.

Secretary Kerry wants them to have a conversation. They want to win. He wants them to focus on the misery of Syria and the threat of ISIS. They want to win. He wants them to be civilized. They want to win.

Why now?

The Obama administration has had as its fundamental operating principle the removal of American forces from the Middle East, replaced by management of the region by regional players. But from the Romans through the Arabs, Crusaders, Mamelukes, Ottomans, British, and French this region never, ever ruled itself through nation-states. To think it would/could do so now is foolish at best.

The U.S. is not a traditional colonial or occupying power. Our primary interest is in the free movement of goods and people across the seas, including oil, but without necessarily managing the internal affairs of other people; at least not much. But the regional players knew that if they took action that severely threatened U.S. interests, we would defend those, and generally defend our regional friends.

The Saudis wanted an assurance of defense against Iran and were furious over the JCPOA in part because it didnt deal with non-nuclear issues. Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal told an interviewer:

There is awareness of this need to look at it not just from the nuclear issue but also in terms of Irans conduct in the area. (Emphasis added) And you know, were the ones who live there; were the ones who suffer from Irans politics and policies. If you look at the whole range of Iranian interference, you look at Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, Iraq, Bahrain, Yemen, theres a whole host of problems for us. With Iran being the initiator and the instigator and the inciter of instability and negative issues in the area.

The U.S. was unable to secure even its own national interests in the nuclear negotiation -- four Americans remained in Iranian prison and two more were arrested in the weeks following (one was actually Lebanese, but the Iranians thought he was American). The Iranian parliament approved the nuclear deal in October, but the language they voted on was not the same as the U.S. version of the agreement. Also in October, the Iranians showed off a new missile, which according to U.S. Ambassador Samantha Power, can carry a nuclear weapon. In December, an Iranian rocket came within 1,500 meters of the USS Harry S. Truman sailing in international waters in the Straits of Hormuz. At the end of the year, the Iranians announced that any strengthening of U.S. visa security (the purview of Congress) would be considered a violation of U.S. obligations under the nuclear deal. And all the time, Iranian forces were on the ground fighting in Syria.

In none of these cases, did the U.S. make more than a token protest, and in fact, invited Iran to sit at the Vienna peace table.

The Saudis fear a future without an American security umbrella, particularly as Iran rises to fill the American void. But it is hard (impossible?) to feel sorry for them. They created radical Sunni jihad (but a surprising amount of its financial and logistical support comes from Iran) and now they find it counterproductive. They opened a war against Iranian-supported Houthis in Yemen and now they can neither win it nor end it. They are struggling with a budget crisis they created by flooding the market. They are struggling with what appears to be the end of the Middle East oil payoff era mainly because Americans got really tired of paying the price in blood and treasure of keeping the pipelines open for people whose societal and political life is anathema. The Saudis are struggling with a population that has come late -- but come -- to an understanding that women are people and kings are not God.

Finally, understanding the U.S. will not help them, the Saudis picked up the gantlet the Iranians threw down. This is not the first brush in the war and it wont be the last.
Bashar Assad, admittedly, is not a good guy. He's minimally competent as a head of state, intolerant in the extreme of dissent, and bereft of popular support. He has received support, however, from an ally: Russia, in the form of Vlad the Impaler Putin. Putin also is not a good guy, with several opponents dying unexpectedly by unusual means and with some imprisoned because of excessive wealth. He has compounded this infelicity by confessing his admiration for Donald Trump.

This may suggest to some that we, the USA, should come in on the side of the "rebels" in Syria. Nothing could be farther from desirable or even acceptable. The rebels are Islamist and want to supplant the heretic Shi'ite Alawite regime with a sharia-compliant nation. This is in no one's interest  certainly not ours. The "rebels" we have so far spent half a billion dollars arming and supplying have immediately donated everything to the al-Nusra Islamists in Syria. John McCain famously said he could tell who were the good rebels by looking in their eyes. Well, thank God we didn't elect him.

To oversimplify, the enemy of my enemy is my friend  for now. So whatever Assad and Putin do in their own countries  leave Ukraine out of it for now  is beside the point. If they're going to kill ISIS, we're happy to oblige. Or...we should be. In fact, our elected representatives, and their appointees, and their catamites in the media, are horrified at the prospect of supporting, or being seen to support, such blackguards as Assad and Putin. No matter that they're working to kill those who plan to kill us. There are stains on their escutcheons that will not allow for approval.

Those devout Muslim Islamist/jihadists are in free range in this country, killing cops, attacking civilians, and we're concerned with the purity of soul of potential allies? If we should be able to form a stable alliance for the nonce, is there not some chance that we will be able to reform the miscreants? Do we not believe in rehabilitation? Improvement? Redemption?

Give me a break. If we had a reasonable president who had affection for America and an understanding of the world, we would not be having this conversation. Importantly, a unified American/Russian policy, for the moment, would counter the Islamic fundamentalism that has made a bloodbath of the Middle East and threatens the world. Once we reduce jihad to rubble, we can go back to...negotiating...our differences.

The obligation to survive trumps that to be nice.
In the aftermath of the violence that unfolded in Cologne over New Years Eve, the ineffective police response, and the police cover-up, the 60-year-old chief of police is out:

Cologne's police chief Wolfgang Albers, 60, was suspended from active duty in order to "restore public confidence" in the police force, said Ralf Jaeger, interior minister of North Rhine-Westphalia state.

Herr Jaeger should suspend himself next, for his ridiculous statement that I cited yesterday:

What happens on the right-wing platforms and in chat rooms is at least as awful as the acts of those assaulting the women, he said. This is poisoning the climate of our society.

While I think its appropriate for people in positions of authority to be held accountable for errors that endangered the public, I also think the end of the chiefs tenure is an example of how the West is playing tiddlywinks while the enemy is playing with all manner of violence. And for keeps.

Urgent action is needed all the way up the chain of leadership (not only in Cologne, but Germany, throughout Europe, and in the United States).

The newly elected pro-immigrant mayor of Cologne should resign. It was she who blamed women for being raped, and it she later suggested that women follow a code of conduct to avoid being raped. This code includes such brilliant ideas as requiring (requiring!) women to remain an arms length distance from strangers, to stay with their own group, and to ask for help from bystanders or witnesses if they feel threatened, among other absolute pearls of wisdom.

This is of course a completely misguided approach, as it focuses on what women need to do to avoid being raped, as if its their fault if they are raped, because, hey, they failed to follow the code of conduct.

Heres a thought, Frau Mayor: many people from Islamic lands have a code of conduct quite different from ours, and if wed stop importing them, we wouldnt need to start having behavioral rules for the civilized people, and we could all get on with life. It is the conduct of barbarians that is problematic, not our own.

But of course the mayor has said nary a word about the barbarians (aka migrants) and their penchant for rape and mayhem. In fact, she was a nearly lone voice standing out against reality, trying to peddle the idea that the perpetrators of the New Years Eve attacks were not migrants.

Though misguided at the core, I would like to briefly comment on the impracticality and imposition of the code of conduct the geniuses at the mayors office developed.

Stay at arms length: Try that in a crowded subway, for example, when 30-40 migrant men start groping you. Anyone whos lived in or visited a reasonably large city knows that its impossible to avoid close physical contact that, believe me, no normal person enjoys. Ride on a bus or subway during rush hour in a city with your face up against someones armpit while some weirdo presses up against the back of you, and you realize that arms length is an impossible standard.

Stay with your own group: In other words, you are no longer free. So if you want to go into a store while one or two of your friends want to get some coffee, you cant do it. You must stay together, like elementary school children on a field trip, holding hands and forming a human chain so as not to get split up.

Ask for help if you feel threatened: Duh. Although these days, you have to hope and pray the person you ask isnt some goon himself and trust that if you go to the police, they wont turn you away (as happened to at least one female victim over New Years Eve).

The mayor is shameful on every single level. She wants to import hordes of people who will destroy Germany. She blames rape victims. And she creates a code of conduct that not only is absurd, but causes one to wonder if it wont somehow become grounds to dismiss womens complaints of sexual assault and/or rape because they didnt follow the code. I know it sounds crazy, but we are living in crazy times.

The mayor needs to go.

And not just her. Merkel should resign posthaste. (Not that she will.)

So even if the police chief is out, and even if the mayor resigned, and even if Merkel resigned, the problem in Germany is the same problem that remains here: are there enough members of the electorate who grasp the nature of the threat and who understand how crucial it is to elect leaders who understand as well? And even if they do, the next question is, are there leaders out there who understand, who are willing to speak the truth, and who will take any and all action necessary to protect and defend their nations against savages seeking to impose Islamic law?

The Cologne police chief may be gone, but weve a world of idiots to contend with. Fixing that is no mean trick.

Hat tip: Atlas Shrugs and The Right Scoop
Thomas Lifson writes:

Despite intense official efforts at denial, the European public is beginning to understand that widespread sexual assault and rape are the corollary of mass immigration of young Muslim males. Rotherham, where 1,400 children were abused by organized Muslim gangs as police conspired to deny the horror for a decade and a half, is finally sinking in. Sweden, which welcomed Muslim refugees with extraordinary social benefits, is now the rape capital of Europe.

January 1 signifies new beginnings, while December 31 signifies the end of old things. Multicultural fantasies are long overdue for discarding, and the wave of sexual assaults across Europe may be the beginning of the end for the illusions that have gripped Europes political elites, media, and progressives.

Carol Brown writes:

The New Years Eve attacks by Muslim migrants in Cologne were originally covered up by the police and the media. But then news began to leak out about the devastating chaos that unfolded in and around the Cologne Cathedral. (See here, here, here, and here for prior coverage.) New information continues to emerge, as Pamela Geller reports on cell phones stolen from women who were attacked in Cologne showing up at refugee centers. Meanwhile, women continue to come forward to report rapes (often gang rape), and a handful of Syrians were arrested, including Syrian males as young as 14 who raped adolescent girls.

Daniel Greenfield also reports:

 Muslim refugees prowled, assaulting and robbing any woman they could find. A police officer described seeing crying women stumble toward him after midnight. He managed to rescue one woman whose clothes had been torn off her body from a group of her attackers, but could not save her friends because the mob had begun hurling fireworks at him. (snip) Desperate efforts were made to suppress the crimes that had been committed, but too many women had been assaulted. More than 90 complaints had been filed. There was no telling how many more women had been too ashamed to go to the police. Or how many thought that there was no point because the authorities would not be on their side, but on the side of the Muslim refugee rapists. A man spoke of being unable to protect his wife or teenage daughter from the mob. A British tourist fought against being forced into a car. A 17-year-old girl described being brutally violated and seeing other girls in the police station in the same condition. A 22-year-old woman recalled, When I called for help, they laughed. Even a volunteer policewoman had been molested. Katia remembered walking through a tunnel made up only of foreign men who assaulted her on all sides[.]

That the cathedral would be the site of this war zone is likely not a coincidence, but it certainly is an irony, as Greenfield writes: [w]hen the anti-Islamist group Pegida came out to protest last year, the Cologne cathedral turned out its lights to condemn them while pro-migrant activists smugly held up signs reading, Refugees welcome.

After news of the violence in Cologne began to leak out, it became clear that rapes and robberies were committed in several cities throughout Germany on New Years Eve, including Berlin, Munich, Dusseldorf, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Weil am Rhein, Frankfurt, Bielefeld, and Freiburg (here and here).

And now we are learning that this barbarity unfolded not just in Germany, but across Europe. As Pamela Geller writes, this appears to have been coordinated New Years Eve jihad terror attacks.

Zurich, Switzerland: As of this writing, six women have come forward to report being surrounded by several dark-skinned men who groped, molested, and robbed them. The police notedthat this is an unusually high number of sexual assaults for Switzerland (here and here).

Helsinki, Finland: Per News.com:

 Finnish police have revealed an unusually high level of sexual harassment in Helsinki on New Years Eve and said they had been tipped off about plans by groups of asylum seekers to sexually harass women. (snip) Helsinki deputy police chief Ilkka Koskimaki told AFP: There hasnt been this kind of harassment on previous New Years Eves or other occasions for that matter ... This is a completely new phenomenon in Helsinki. Security guards hired to patrol the city on New Years Eve told police there had been widespread sexual harassment at a central square where around 20,000 people had gathered for celebrations. Three sexual assaults allegedly took place at Helsinkis central railway station on New Years Eve, where around 1000 mostly Iraqi asylum seekers had converged. (snip) The suspects were asylum seekers. The three were caught and taken into custody on the spot, Koskimaki told AFP. (snip) Ahead of New Years Eve, the police caught wind of information that asylum seekers in the capital region possibly had similar plans to what the men gathered in Colognes railway station have been reported to have had, police said in a statement.

Salzburg, Austria: Per News.com:

similar sex attacks were carried out in Austria, but police didnt publicise the incidents to protect the privacy of the victims. The incidents only came to light after several females came forward to complain to local media. One identified as Sabrina S (not her real name) told Austrian newspaper Osterreich that she and her friends were attacked by a group of 10-15 men while walking home from a new club in the historic district of Salzburg. A friend was grabbed by one of the men and put into a headlock. Her face was in his jacket. He cuddled her and licked her face. She then said that she had no strength to free herself, she was completely at his mercy, Sabrina said. It was only after she managed to hit and kick the attacker that her group was able to flee. She claimed to be aware of many other incidents after posting a warning on Facebook. Some wrote me that they were greatly distressed at the state bridge, the Makartsteg or the railway station. A girl has even reported it to have been abducted almost New Years Eve at the Town Hall by a group, Sabrina said.

As Daniel Greenfield writes:

 The horrifying scene in Cologne is commonplace in the Muslim world. While many remember the horrifying sexual assaults of the Arab Spring in Tahrir Square, including the attack on Lara Logan, such incidents are actually commonplace in Egypt, especially around Eid Al-Fitr. It doesnt matter how the women are dressed. A 2006 story describes mass attacks on any and every girl in sight, whether a Niqabi, a Hijabi or uncovered. Whether Egyptian or foreigner. Even pregnant ones. 99% of Egyptian women report being sexually harassed. This behavior has [sic] is common in Muslim lands. In Iraq, its eight out of ten women. In Afghanistan, rape and honor killings are routine. And this is the population that Germanys mostly Muslim migrants are drawn from. What happened is inevitable and it will go on happening. More surveillance cameras and patrols wont stop it. Instead, as in the UK, it will go underground. Muslim men will groom and abuse troubled girls. The authorities will turn a blind eye until a decade later the story gets too big to be covered up. And by then thousands of lives will be ruined. The only way to stop it is to keep it out of Europe and America. (snip) Due to Germanys asylum laws, its unlikely that any of the foreign attackers will be deported for their crimesMuslim men who assaulted women know that they have nothing to fear because nothing will happen to them.  The only way for women in Europe to have a future is to fight the migration mob. Otherwise what happened outside the Cologne cathedral, what happens to the 99% of women in Egypt and what happens in the Islamic State will be their future.

And ours as well. Ours as well.

Huge hat tip to Atlas Shrugs for providing exceptional coverage of this story. Additional hat tips: Front Page Magazine, Breitbart, Bare Naked Islam, Counterjihad Report, The Telegraph
Widespread belief that the current federal government is corrupt has fueled Donald Trump's surprising resilience in the polls, suggests the head of the Gallup polling organization.

"A staggering 75% of the American public believe corruption is 'widespread' in the U.S. government. Not incompetence, but corruption. This alarming figure has held steady since 2010, up from 66% in 2009," writes Gallup chairman and CEO Jim Clifton at the firm's website.

In an article titled "Explaining Trump: Widespread Government Corruption," Clifton notes:

The perception that there's widespread corruption in the national government could be a symptom of citizen disengagement and anger. Or it could be a cause -- we don't know. But it's very possible this is a big, dark cloud that hangs over this country's progress. And it might be fueling the rise of an unlikely, non-traditional leading Republican candidate for the presidency, Donald Trump.

And Clifton suggests that Trump benefits from being a candidate who's "outside the system."

But think about that top-line number. Clifton calls it "staggering." And it is. Under Obama, three quarters of Americans now believe that the administration is corrupt. Among what would be considered traditional Western democracies, Gallup reports that only the populations of Spain and Portugal have higher percentages who think that about their governments (84% and 86%, respectively.)

Given the many scandals of the current administration (Fast & Furious, IRS, Benghazi, etc., etc.), it is not surprising that a higher percentage of Americans see their current government as corrupt than do the populations of the U.K. (46%) and Canada (44%). But more Americans now think their government is corrupt than do the people of Uruguay (40%), Estonia (44%), and even Malta (50%.)

Clifton's article is a perceptive analysis, and part of an overall series he has written about the negative impact of current federal policies on American business. Each is well worth a read.
The disciplined drones and diligent worker bees of the Hive do the Queen's* bidding, but they also provide feedback to the Queen from the world outside the Hive. This, in turn, informs the Queen's future instructions.

For a quarter-century the Hive has viciously swarmed anyone who dared describe Bill Clinton as a sexual predator and Hillary as his enabler. No more. The dam has been breached and the truth bared. If Bill Clinton's conduct does not fit the definition of a sexual predator, then the term is meaningless. If Hillary  in defending him, covering for him, lying for him, and besmirching his victims  is not an enabler, who is?

I think a couple things may be going on here. The strength of the Hive has waned, and its ability to control the narrative is in decline. Donald Trump, of all people, has proven too strong a force to be ignored. Even though, 20 years ago, alternative media was still in its infancy, one of its pioneers, Matt Drudge, was nonetheless able to break through the Hive's defenses and expose the Lewinsky affair. Today it's so strong it can occasionally overcome the Hive.

The Queen made a fateful decision in the spring of 1992, when Gennifer Flowers revealed her affair with Clinton. He was the only hope the Democrats had that year, and it was determined that he must be protected. The post-Super Bowl 60 Minutes interview, the pretty in pink press conference, the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy  all the stops were pulled. The Queen and the Hive went all in on Clinton, and they've been stuck with him ever since.

Until now. It's as though they're getting tired. The damned Clintons still keep up their outrageous behavior, and keep expecting the Queen to cover for them. It takes a lot of time and energy to destroy the Clintons' critics, and it's getting old. And then there's all the tawdriness associated with the criminal enterprise known as the Clinton Foundation, and being dead broke, and the $200,000 speaking fees from any schmuck who'll pay, and the Benghazi lies, and the email fiasco, and the overweening sense of entitlement, and on and on. It's just too much.

You get the sense that even the Queen is getting sick of it all.

And then there are people like Joseph DiGenova and R. Emmett Tyrell, Jr.  people you can't just ignore  saying that the FBI is going to recommend indicting her. This has got to temper your enthusiasm in coming to her defense.

I've talked about black swans, like Timothy McVeigh, and how they can change the political dynamic. A Hillary indictment would be a golden swan, virtually guaranteeing a landslide win for any Republican, Trump included.

While I respect DiGenova and Tyrrell, I'm not a buyer. Obama won't let it happen. He'd rather take the heat from FBI director Comey's resignation. Nixon fired Archibald Cox, and Obama can fire anybody who wants to indict Hillary. I suppose there's a scenario where Obama would hang Hillary out to dry, but thinking that through would require delving into the deep reaches of Obama's psyche, something I'm unwilling to do.

Bill Clinton is a despicable man, like all sexual predators. He's also a coward, as the record of his predation shows. Approaching women in the manner he did to, say, Paula Jones is dangerous. Women like Paula may have boyfriends or fathers or brothers who would be willing to physically assault anyone who behaved as Clinton did. I know guys like that. Bones get broken. But Clinton waited until he was the governor of Arkansas to unleash his inner predator and was thus assured of state trooper protection from any retaliation. As I've said before. He's a punk.

A punk embraced, quite recently, with open arms by all the Bushes, 1, 2, and 3. He's such a great guy, they love hanging out with him.

And these are the people who are supposed to have class?

Ill stick with my friends in flyover country.

*The New York Times

Fritz Pettyjohn was the chairman of Reagan for President, Alaska, in 1979-1980; is a co-founder of the Balanced Budget Amendment Task Force; and blogs daily at ReaganProject.com
A Muslim woman wearing a shirt saying "Salam, I come in peace" and a yellow star saying "Muslim" on it was ejected from a Trump rally in Rockhill South Carolina. While this woman's intentions may have been good, the way she expressed them was terrible.

The yellow star is most contemporaneously identified with the Holocaust of the Jews. Jews were forced to wear the yellow badge by the Nazis before they were killed, something that most Muslim countries denied even happened . Six million Jews were slaughtered in the Holocaust, and this Muslim woman compares her plight in America to their deaths. I think the number of Muslims killed in America for being Muslim is close to or equal to zero. For this woman to claim that whatever discomfort Americans have with Islam because of radical Islam is equivalent to the mass murder of the Jews is ridiculous and offensive.

But the yellow badge didn't start with the Nazis. It started with the Muslims .

The practice of wearing special markings in order to distinguish Jews and other non-Muslims ( Dhimmis ) in Muslim-dominated countries seems to have been introduced by Umayyad Caliph Umar II in early 8th century. The practice was reissued and reinforced by Caliph Al-Mutawakkil (84761), subsequently remaining in force for centuries. A genizah document from 1121 gives the following description of decrees issued in Baghdad: Two yellow badges [are to be displayed], one on the headgear and one on the neck. Furthermore, each Jew must hang round his neck a piece of lead with the word Dhimmi on it. He also has to wear a belt round his waist. The women have to wear one red and one black shoe and have a small bell on their necks or shoes.

It is doubly ironic, then, for a Muslim woman to wear a yellow badge, claiming oppression, when her ancestral coreligionists started the practice while oppressing the Jews.

Muslims in America are probably unhappy with all the emphasis on Islam and terrorism. I get it. But there is a problem in a large subculture of Islam, and Americans' fears are quite justified. No one is calling for Muslims to be harmed, but people are calling for protection from a Muslim influx into America for justifiable reasons.

If this woman really wanted to make friends, she would not have worn a yellow star. Instead her shirt would have said, "Muslims against radical Islam." I 'll bet if she had come with such a shirt, she would have been quite welcome at the rally, hijab and all.

But instead of admitting there is a problem with a large subgroup of her culture, she played the victim card in an offensive way. I don't have sympathy for that.
Here are 41 more reasons to distrust the administration when they tell us our screening process for refugees will protect us.

The Washington Free Beacon is reporting that 41 additional foreign-born individuals have been implicated in terrorist activities. That brings the total number of suspected terrorists who have entered the country legally to 113 since 2014.

But the congressional source who gave the information to the WFB said the Obama administration is dragging its heels on supplying lawmakers with immigration histories of these suspected terrorists. Yesterday, AT reported on two Iraqi refugees who had been indicted on terror-related charges. But the number of legal immigrants and refugees who passed our vetting procedures only to be discovered later to be terrorists may be much, much higher.

This calls into question our entire vetting process as the administration works feverishly to bring tens of thousands of more refugees to America.

Since August, however, the Obama administration has stonewalled Congressional efforts to obtain more detailed immigration histories of these individuals, prompting frustration on Capitol Hill and accusation that the administration is covering up these histories to avoid exposing flaws in the U.S. screening process. The disclosure of these additional 41 individuals linked to terror operationsmany already identified as immigrants, others immigration histories shrouded in secrecyhas stoked further concerns about flaws in the U.S. screening process and is likely to prompt further congressional inquiry into Obama administration efforts to withhold details about these suspects, sources said. As the number of legal immigrants connected to terrorism continues to grow, the Obama administration has sought to quash congressional inquiries and rally its allies behind an effort to fund efforts to boost the number of immigrants and refugees from the Middle East. Many of these immigrants have been caught by authorities planning terrorist attacks on American soil, while others were found to be involved in efforts to provide funding and material to ISIS, according to an internal list of migrant terrorists codified by congressional sources and viewed by the Free Beacon. A growing number of foreign-born terrorists are being identified operating within the United States, and yet the Administration will not provide any information about their immigrant histories, said one senior congressional source apprised of the issue. And one can only imagine that for every identified terrorist, there are many more individuals around them who are radicalized, extreme or otherwise detracting from American society in ways beyond the threat of terrorism alone. As congressional calls for increased screening methods go mostly ignored, local authorities are dealing with an uptick in terror-related crimes committed by legal immigrants.

Republicans share blame for this situation, having voted a budget bill in December that included full funding for refugee resettlement. What exactly are we buying with these funds?

With incidents and indictments of this nature continuing to rise, critics of the Obama administrations immigration policy are expressing concern about a last-minute funding effort in 2015 to fully fund refugee resettlement and visa programs. These priorities, which were granted full funding as part of a yearly spending bill approved by Congress last year, will permit around 170,000 new migrants from Muslim-majority countries to enter the United States in 2016, according to the Senates immigration subcommittee. The omnibus gave the green light for the administration to continue this failed immigration policy over the objections of the electorate, the senior Congressional source quoted above said. The Senate continues to uncover dozens of cases in which individuals accused of terrorism entered the country legally. Preventing and responding to these acts is an effort encompassing thousands of federal agents and attorneys and billions of dollars: In effect, we are voluntarily admitting individuals at risk for terrorism and then, on the back end, trying to stop them from carrying out their violent designs, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R., Ala.) warned last year as Congress considered the spending bill.

Sessions nailed it. This is absolute, incomprehensible madness. The political elites want to use Americans as cannon fodder in the war against "intolerance" and "Islamophobia."

We're not going to keep out every single terrorist who wants to come here as a refugee. But there is no doubt we can do a better job of screening. And if we can't improve our vetting procedures  something the Obama administration claims we can't do  then serious consideration should be given to halting the flow of refugees from countries where terrorism is rampant.
Okay, not quite. But Philadelphias new mayor, Jim Kenney, might as well have told yesterdays press conference on yesterdays attempted assassination of Officer Jesse Hartnett that the sky is green when he claimed that Islam had nothing to do with the assassination attempt. Americans believe that politicians often lie, but it is very rare for one to blatantly lie following presentation of the truth by a senior law enforcement official, only to be followed by yet another law enforcement official who reiterates the truth that contradicts the politicians lie.

Prior to the mayor speaking at a news conference broadcast live on all the cable news networks, Police Commissioner Richard Ross took the podium and stated that the suspect confessed to committing this cowardly act in the name of Islam. According to him he belief [sic] that the police defend laws that are contrary to the teachings of the Koran. This can be found beginning at 2:20 or so on the video of the conference below.

At 5:12, Mayor Kenney takes the podium, and after expressing his good wishes for Officer Hartnett and praising the police, he states words that will follow him for the rest of his career:

In no way shape or form does anyone in this room believe that Islam or the teaching of Islam has anything to do with what youve seen on the screen. That is abhorrent. Its just terrible and it does not represent this religion in any way shape or form or any of its teachings. And this is a criminal with a stolen gun who tried to kill one of our officers. It has nothing to do with being a Muslim or following the Islamic faith.

Mayor Kenney is reported to be a Catholic, so how he has the theological authority to make such a statement is unclear. He also ignores the violent verses in the Koran that call on Muslims to punish nonbelievers.

At 6:50, Ross calls upon a police captain for further details in response to a question about motive for the shooting. Mayor Kenney can be seen in the background as the captain says,

He stated that he pledges his allegiance to Islamic State, he follows Allah, and that is the reason he was called upon to do this 

Carol Brown notes:

It is incredibly obnoxious that Kenney had the temerity to speak for everyone in the room as if threatening to lower the boom of the thought police should anyone dare be thinking other than the way he assumed.

Is the mayor attempting to improperly influence a police investigation and subsequent judicial proceedings? Is he telling the FBI and Homeland Security to back away from the case and not treat it as a terror attack?

As of this writing, the White House has yet to offer any comment on the case. Given the Obama administrations history of denial, such as terming the Fort Hood attack by Major Hasan workplace violence, perhaps the mayor is doing President Obamas dirty work for him.

Kenny ran for mayor of Philadelphia actively courting support from Muslims and had pledged to fight Islamophobia.

Now he joins Joe Isuzu in the ranks of comical blowhard liars:
Donald Trump frequently tells crowds that he went to Wharton as a credential to prove that he is intelligent:

"I went to the Wharton School of Business," he noted several times. "I'm, like, a really smart person." "Why do you have to tell us all the time that you went to Wharton?" moderator Chuck Todd asked. "People know you're successful." "They know it's a great business school," Trump replied.

You might be forgiven for thinking from this, as I did, that Trump has an MBA from the Wharton School of Business. He doesn't.

He actually has an undergraduate degree for the two years he spent there. Yes, I said two years. Trump was not able to get into the Wharton School (undergraduate) when he applied to college. He spent his first two years at Fordham University  a respectable school, but nowhere near as rigorous as Wharton (either undergraduate or graduate). The circumstances of his admissions are not clear, but the Daily Caller suggested that Trump may have used a family connection to gain admittance.

So instead of saying, "I'm smart because I went to Wharton!" Trump should be saying, "I'm smart because I went to Fordham for two years, and then Wharton for my final two years!"

Trump apparently graduated Wharton without any honors. Like Obama, he refuses to release his grades.

Asked by The Daily Caller if Trump was willing to release his college records before he officially entered the race for the White House, a spokesman for Trump said Team Trump would "pass" on the opportunity in April.

In sum, Trump has no graduate degree from Wharton, or anywhere else, and there is no evidence that he was a distinguished student.

Why does any of this matter? Trump almost seems to be implying that he has an MBA from a top business school in America. He doesn't.

And worst of all, he doesn't talk like a smart person. He often doesn't even speak in complete sentences. He often speaks in a kind of abbreviated fashion that people have trouble understanding. Here is just one example:

Look, having nuclearmy uncle was a great professor and scientist and engineer, Dr. John Trump at MIT; good genes, very good genes, OK, very smart, the Wharton School of Finance, very good, very smartyou know, if you're a conservative Republican, if I were a liberal, if, like, OK, if I ran as a liberal Democrat, they would say I'm one of the smartest people anywhere in the worldit's true!but when you're a conservative Republican they tryoh, do they do a numberthat's why I always start off: Went to Wharton, was a good student, went there, went there, did this, built a fortuneyou know I have to give my like credentials all the time, because we're a little disadvantagedbut you look at the nuclear deal, the thing that really bothers meit would have been so easy, and it's not as important as these lives are (nuclear is powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many years ago, the power and that was 35 years ago; he would explain the power of what's going to happen and he was rightwho would have thought?), but when you look at what's going on with the four prisonersnow it used to be three, now it's fourbut when it was three and even now, I would have said it's all in the messenger; fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don't, they haven't figured that the women are smarter right now than the men, so, you know, it's gonna take them about another 150 yearsbut the Persians are great negotiators, the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just killed, they just killed us.

"Having nuclear"? "It would have been so easy, and it's not as important as these lives are"? "Nuclear is powerful, my uncle explained that to me"? "[T]he women are smarter right now than the men, so, you know, it's gonna take them about another 150 years"?

This is how a child talks. A smart person doesn't have to repeatedly say that he is smart; Ted Cruz doesn't start every speech by mentioning he went to Princeton and Harvard. A smart person doesn't use words like "stupid" or "dumb" to explain his opponents, and so on.

Donald Trump is not only pretending to be conservative, but pretending to be brilliant. He's not, and it is comical how people listening to his Gollum-like stream of consciousness self-dialogues think that he is. Even when he explains how it is simply not possible for a Wharton graduate to accuse Megyn Kelly of menstruating.

This article was written by Ed Straker, senior writer of NewsMachete.com, the conservative news site.
Situated 190 miles south of San Jose, California, is the small town of Coalinga  a name derived by losing the middle term from Coaling Station A and joining the leftovers. This town of 15,000 is mainly an agricultural community with Chevron and Aera Energy operating the towns only oil field. To reach Coalinga, you have to get off Interstate 5 and onto Highway 33. As you drive north towards the town, Coalingas oil field will come into view. You will see several oil pump jacks busy bobbing up and down doing their job. Now if you look closely, you will see animals  zebras, giraffes and horses not the usual kind, but pump jacks painted as animals. Each rooted to its own spot, these iron animals merrily raise and lower their heads, as if grazing in the field.

Photo credit: Arlette/Flickr

The Coalinga Iron Zoo was created back in the 70s by Jean Dakessian, a local artist who arrived in Coalinga with her husband and opened a restaurant and inn. She thought that if she decorated some of the pump jacks along the highway north of town, she might successfully lure drivers off the Interstate and into Coalinga and eventually to the doors of her new business. Since oil pump jacks are also referred to as "nodding donkeys" or "thirsty birds", it didnt take too big of a leap in imagination to arrive at her concept of the Iron Zoo.

Jean approached Shell Oil Company and they allowed her to paint one, which she turned into a large red bird. It received so much attention that, the head office of Shell gave her permission to paint another 23 pump jacks and also provided her the paint. Then Chevron asked her to paint their 34 pump jacks as well, so she ran a contest for designs. Soon the Iron Zoo became a community project.

"Families came out on the weekends, even the mayor and his family painted one. The response to the project was overwhelming, Jean said.

At its peak, the Iron Zoo had over fifty decorated pump jacks. Jean Dakessians Iron Zoo received national recognition from television and newspapers, even featuring on Ripleys Believe it or Not book.

That was a long time back. Over the decades many of the original derricks were decommissioned and turned to scrap while others were moved further from the road and out of sight. Only a handful of Jeans iron animals now remain. They are old, faded and rusted.

Photo credit: David Cohen/Flickr

Photo credit: Arlette/Flickr

Photo credit: Arlette/Flickr

Photo credit: www.sjvgeology.org

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Photo credit: The Shouting Grasshopper

Sources: Offbeat Travel / San Joaquin Valley Geology / Weird CA
If youre a Sprint customer with friends and family abroad, a traveller or just an avid follower of wireless news, you may already know that Sprint offers two global efforts. Their Open World offering gives customers headed to Mexico, Canada and Latin America unlimited calling and texting, along with 1GB of high-speed data, with more purchasable a la carte. Unlike their other plan, Global Roaming, unlimited 2G data is not included, so those looking to leave the United States behind for a bit may want to ensure theyll have access to Wi-Fi at their destination. In a number of other destinations, the plan gives you unlimited texting, discounted calling and high-speed data at $30 per GB. Global Roaming, on the other hand, gives customers all over the world unlimited texting, unlimited 2G data and calls for $0.20 per minute.

While a bit more expensive and inconvenient than domestic plans, they handily beat most options for travellers while eliminating the hassle of having to unlock your phone and buy a short-term plan from a local carrier. Both add-ons are free for existing customers to tack onto their plans, making them appealing even for those who are simply toying with the idea of travelling out of the United States. The fine print, however, does state that excessive international use may get your account restricted or terminated and that most of your use must occur in the United States, making these options less ideal for full-time globetrotters.

Advertisement

With all that recapped, Sprint has announced theyre adding these functions for travellers in 36 new destinations. The full list includes Austria, Luxembourg, Afghanistan, Macau, Bangladesh, Macedonia, Belarus, Malaysia, Belgium, The Republic of Malta, Bolivia, Montenego, Bulgaria, The Netherlands, Cambodia, Norway, Croatia, The Philippines, Estonia, Poland, Finland, Rwanda, Ghana, Serbia, Hong Kong, Singapore, Hungary, Slovenia, Iceland, South Africa, Indonesia, Taiwan, Kenya, Thailand, Liechtenstein and Turkey. Customers wanting to see the full list can do so at Sprints website, with separate sections for Open World and Global Roaming. There was no word given on the possibility or time frame of further expansion, but it seems, from the wording of the Newsroom post, that Sprint has latched onto the international-friendly U.S. carrier niche and will continue working to improve their standing in that regard.
(ANSA) - Nuoro, November 8 - A retired road inspector was allegedly killed by his neighbour with three gunshots at close range near the Sardinian city of Nuoro on Friday, police said. Antonio Longu, 71, was killed midmorning in the yard of his home in the village of Lula.

The prime suspect is the victim's neighbour, 74-year-old Mario Farris, who is being closely guarded in a Nuoro hospital after suffering a sudden illness. Longu and Farris lived in the same two-storey tenement block in Via Dei Mille.

It is thought the pair had a row over a TV antenna shortly before the murder.

Farris served over 20 years in prison for murdering his pregnant wife and throwing her body in a river in Germany in 1974. He returned to Lula after his release.

The last murder in Lula took place a year ago, when animal breeder Angelo Maria Piras, 40, was shot dead with a rifle on his farm. His brother and his brother's wife were arrested for the crime in November.


All the latest Ashbourne news. Ashbourne is an historic market town in Derbyshire. Situated on the southern edge of the Peak District, it is known as the 'Gateway to Dovedale' and the 'Gateway to the Peak District'. Ashbourne is famous for the annual Royal Shrovetide Football Match, which has been played since at least 1667, although its origins may date back centuries earlier. Ashbourne became a Fairtrade town in March 2005. The popular Tissington Trail, which follows the route of the former Ashbourne to Buxton railway, starts on the edge of town. Keep up to date with the latest news from the town by signing up for our newsletter.
Vandals broke into the cemetery and burned several wooden crosses, then threw them on the ground. The incident dates back to mid-December, but has only emerged in recent days. Police launch investigation, so far without result. Episode part of "price tag" attacks.

Jerusalem (AsiaNews) - Another act of vandalism against a Christian building in Israel. This time the extremist groups targeted the Beit Jimal cemetery of the Salesian monastery in Beit Shemesh, a town of about 94 thousand inhabitants situated 30 kilometers west of Jerusalem. Local sources said that the attack dates back to mid-December, but came to light only in recent days in response to a complaint filed with the police.

According to witnesses, unknown assailants entered the grounds of the cemetery, located about 500 meters away from the monastery. The vandals burned several wooden crosses present on the graves, then threw them on the ground.

The police in Beit Shemesh was informed of the facts on December 30 last year and launched an investigation.

The monastery of Beit Jimal, is a Catholic place of worship led by the Salesians and in the past has been the target of previous of attacks. The first dates back to September 27, 1981, when vandals burned at least thirty wooden crosses; the last took place in 2013, part of the "price tag" attacks, when the central part of the monastery was hit by incendiary bombs and the walls of the building defaced by writing "death to the Gentiles" and "revenge".

In the recent past Jewish extremists and settlers have targeted several religious sites. In recent years others places of worship have been attacked, including the church near the Upper Room, the Basilica of Nazareth, as well as other Catholic and Greek-Orthodox places of worship.

Muslim mosques and places of worship have also been targeted in what Israeli extremists call a "price tag" on Christians and Muslims for having "taken away their land."

Once such actions were limited only to areas on the border with the West Bank and in Jerusalem, but now have spread too much of Israel.
by Melani Manel Perera

The People's Movement against Port City organized a march against the project, financed by China. Untold damage to water, marine and biological resources in the area. Activists have an environmental impact assessment with 128 negative opinions.

Colombo (AsiaNews) - Hundreds of Catholics, fishermen, activists and ordinary citizens have taken to the streets of Colombo to protest against the reopening of the construction project of the Port City funded by China. Shouting "Stop immediately, the project that will kill the fishermen", the protesters expressed their concern about an initiative that could cause "incalculable" damage and irreversibly destroy " the whole areas water resources, marine and biological properties".

In the morning, 06th January, the People's Movement against Port City was held a public hearing over the EIA report at the Centre for Society and Religion (CSR) in Colombo. it was attended by more than 300 people. At the end of the public hearing, in the same evening they marched to the Department for the conservation of the coast and the Coastal Resource Management (Cccrmd) and presented a document to the same Department which was an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) of 400 pages, containing 128 negative opinions about the construction.

Aruna Roshantha, a Catholic fisherman and one of the protest leaders, told AsiaNews: "The reopening of the project will be a blow for all fishermen. The environment in which we live, and we fish will be completely destroyed".

The construction project of the port city comes under the mandate of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa and earmarks 1.5 billion by the China Communications Construction Co. Ltd., a holding company of China. From the beginning the project sparked the opposition of the local community, which succeeded in securing its suspension. Environmentalists and fishermen, however, have always feared that the Sri Lankan government could go back on its word and resume construction.

P. Nishanta, an Anglican pastor and member of the Christian Solidarity Movement (CSM) which is opposed to the port city, told AsiaNews: "This is not the only project that could develop Sri Lanka. The life of 15 thousand fishermen is endangered. Drinking water, the seabed and coral reefs will be damaged".
Taken down due to lack of authorization." Over 36 meters high and inaugurated in December, it had aroused mixed reactions.

Beijing (AsiaNews / Agencies) - The giant golden statue of Mao Zedong (pictured) that had been erected in Henan has been demolished due to a lack of authorization.

According to media reports state, the gigantic image, 36.6 meters high, was built on the initiative of some businessmen and some rural communities that had collected 3 million yuan (about 459mila dollars).

Made of steel and concrete and painted gold, the statue, which was completed in December, immediately aroused mixed reactions. Comments that appeared on Weibo, the main Chinese social media, in fact called it both "embarrassing" or "a tribute" to the father of modern China.

Some of the criticisms also questioned its construction in Henan, a region that suffered a famine caused by the economic policies of Mao in the late 1950s that lead to an estimated 40 million deaths.
by Card. Joseph Zen Ze-kiun

There is still so much optimism about dialogue between China and the Vatican, but the facts tell us that the government is taking possession of every space in the life of the Church: the ordination of bishops, control of seminaries, obligation to participate in celebrations with excommunicated or illegitimate bishops. Instead silence shrouds the fate of bishops in jail or under house arrest. The Vatican seems to want to leave the power to appoint bishops in the hands of the government. The return of Cardinal Casarolis Ostpolitik and the disappearance of the underground Church. An analysis by the bishop emeritus of Hong Kong, combative defender of religious freedom in China and the Territory.

Hong Kong (AsiaNews)  I have not spoken about the Church in China on my blog for some time now. Certainly not because I am too busy to do so (busy as I may be, I will never lose interest of our Church in China), not because I fear criticism of my ideas (at my age I have nothing to gain or lose).

No, the problem is that I'd like to give some good news, but, as you will note, my fate is that of the prophet Jeremiah. I have searched at length for some good news, but have found none. I realise that during this season of Christmas and the New Year, my complaints are somewhat extra chorum", but I cannot be a dog without a bark.



A.



I remember that at the beginning of last year the newspaper Wen Wei Po announced jubilantly that "relations between China and the Vatican will soon have a good development." Soon after, the Vatican Secretary of State said that "the prospects are promising, there is a desire for dialogue on both sides." I had my doubts about this unexpected wave of optimism, I saw no basis for this optimism. More than a thousand crosses were removed from the top of the churches (in some cases the churches themselves have been destroyed). After so long, we can no longer delude ourselves that this was anything beyond an episode of some local officials exaggerated zeal. Several seminaries have been closed. Students of the National Seminary in Beijing were forced to sign a declaration of loyalty to the Independent Church, promising also to concelebrate with illegitimate bishops (otherwise they would not receive a diploma at the end of their studies). The Government is continuously strengthening a church that now objectively is already separated from the universal Catholic Church; with enticements and threats they induce the clergy to perform acts contrary to the doctrine and discipline of the Church, denying their conscience and their dignity.

B.

In the latter half of 2015, there were some promising events which however failed to live up to expectations. Bishop Wu Qin-jing of Zhouzhi, ten years after his episcopal ordination, was finally installed as bishop, but has yet to pay the price of a compromise (see my blog of 14 July 2015).

Shortly after, Bishop Zhang Yinlin of Anyang was ordained. Even some usually cautious Catholic media rejoiced saying that everything had gone well. They pointed out that this ordination is the first after the last three years of contacts between Rome and Beijing, and also the first in Pope Francis pontificate, presenting the event as a good start.

It is this last statement that scares me, because the process included a "democratic election", the reading of a "decree of appointment by the (so-called) Episcopal Conference of China" and the canonically un-clear position of a co-consecrating bishop . A similarly abnormal process took place three years ago, does it deserve our rejoicing? (See my blog of 7 September 2015).

C.

In October comes the big news: A Vatican delegation was in Beijing, there was a meeting. The Holy See gave no news of it. Father Heyndrickx Jeroom broke the news (of course he knows everything). He says: "They did not discuss sensitive issues like Bishop Su Zhimin of Baoding still in detention, or such as Bishop Ma Daqin of Shanghai to house arrest for more than three years (but these problems should not be resolved before any negotiations? Otherwise Obviously there is no goodwill on the part of Beijing). They focused on the issue of appointing bishops (of which model? Like with Anyang?). After the meeting, the delegation paid a visit to Bishop Li Shan of Beijing and the National Seminary where they met with Ma Ying Lin (Father Heyndrickx said that these are signs of goodwill on the part of Beijing, I think instead that they were acts of homage imposed by Beijing)".

Later the Vatican Secretary of State also confirmed that there was a meeting and that it was "very positive" and this "would be part of a process that will hopefully end with an agreement." Pressed by some journalists as to whether there was real progress, Cardinal Parolin responded: "The fact that we speak is already positive." It seems that there is no agreement in sight as of yet.

D.

So what is the formula now under discussion for the appointment of bishops? As an old Cardinal out on the peripheries, I have no way of knowing, let alone guessing.

A recent article "A winter of darkness for religions in China" by Bernardo Cervellera on AsiaNews, says: "From information that has arrived from China it would seem that Beijings proposal is...: Vatican approval of the government recognized Council of Bishops,... [and] approval of the competency of this Council (and not the Pope) in the appointment of new candidates to the episcopacy who will be "democratically" elected (in short according to the suggestions of the Patriotic Association). The Holy See must approve the Councils appointment and has a weak veto only in "severe" cases, which must be justified if used. If the Holy Sees justifications are considered "insufficient", the Council of Bishops may decide to proceed anyway".

If this information is accurate, can the Holy See accept the claims of the Chinese counterpart? Does this approach still respect the true authority of the Pope to appoint bishops? Can the Pope sign such an agreement? (Pope Benedict said: "The authority of the Pope to appoint bishops is given to the church by its founder Jesus Christ, it is not the property of the Pope, neither can the Pope give it to others").

Do our officials in Rome know what an election is in China? Do they know that the so-called Episcopal Conference is not only illegitimate, but simply does not exist? What exists is an organism that is called "One Association and One Conference", namely the Patriotic Association and the Bishops' Conference always work together as one body, which is always chaired by government officials (there are pictures to prove it, the Government does not even try more to keep up appearances, it starkly flaunts the fact that they now manage religion!). Signing such an agreement means delivering the authority to appoint bishops into the hands of an atheist government.

This scheme is often compared to a (poorly defined) Vietnamese Model, but it is much worse. The Vietnamese model is based on an initiative that began with the Church in Vietnam, the true Catholic Church in Vietnam. In China on the other hand, the so-called Association and Conference hide the reality that it is the Government calling the shots.

Even in Eastern Europe of the past, such as in Poland and Czechoslovakia, it was the Church that took the initiative and then gave the Government veto power. In doing so, even if the government vetos a proposal for the hundredth time, it is still the Church that presents a candidate and makes the appointment. If the Government insists on a veto, it will only prolong the impasse, and it will still allow the Church time to look for a suitable candidate. But it is unthinkable to leave the initial proposal in the hands of an atheist Government who cannot possibly judge the suitability of a candidate to be a bishop. Obviously, if the Church gives in to pressure from the government, the only result  despite proclamations to the contrary  is that it will have sold out the pontifical right to appoint bishops. Can this happen? According to an article written by a certain Andras Fejerdy: "For pastoral reasons - that is, because the full administration of the sacraments requires completely consecrated bishops - the Holy See believed that the completion of the Hungarian Bishops' Conference was so urgent that it accepted a solution that formally did not upset the canonical principle of free appointment, but that in practice gave the regime a decisive influence in choosing the candidates.

UCAN News reports recent news from Chengdu (Sichuan): "Shortly after the visit of the Vatican delegation to Beijing, the Holy See approved the episcopal candidate elected in May 2014". Is this not exactly a case of "not upsetting the canonical principle of free appointment, but in practice giving the regime a decisive influence in choosing the candidates "?

E.

It is said that dialogue focused on the issue of the appointment of bishops, but there are many other pending problems, when and how will they be resolved?



The aforementioned AsiaNews article stated, again based on information received from China: "Beijing (demands) the Holy Sees recognition of all the official bishops, even the illegitimate and excommunicated ones." I wonder: is it only the government that makes these demands, without repentance of those concerned? Will the excommunicated only be released from excommunication or even recognized as bishops? Even without any act of repentance? Has the mercy of God come to this? Will the faithful be forced to obey these bishops?



So much remains to be resolved.



Illegitimate, even excommunicated bishops have abused the sacramental power (including ordination of deacons and priests) and judicial (assigning offices) and the Holy See seems to be without rebuke for them.

Legitimate bishops who participated in illegitimate episcopal ordinations, one, two, even three, four times, without ever having asked for forgiveness, or having received forgiveness from the Holy Father. Also those who took part in the so-called Assembly of Representatives of Chinese Catholics (the clearest symbol of a schismatic church).

Shortly after the Vatican delegation left Beijing, the government organized a large gathering of Church leaders, forcing on that occasion a celebration of all the bishops, legitimate, illegitimate and excommunicated. These are all objectively schismatic acts. The government now can string along a large number of bishops, resulting in an irrecoverable loss of dignity. If the Holy See signed some agreement with the Government without clarifying all these things, it will cause a severe wound to the conscience of the faithful.

F.

Obviously our underground communities are non-existent for the Government. But now is even the Vatican ignoring them in negotiations, to appease their Chinese counterparts? To "save the day" will we abandon our brothers and sisters? But they are the healthy limbs of the Church! (Of course, they too have their problems, especially when dioceses remain without bishops, which can only lead to disorder). Is silencing the underground community to please the government not a form of suicide?

In the recent negotiations there has been no mention of the case of Msgr. James Su Zhimin in prison for 20 years, nor of Msgr. Thaddeus Ma Daqin of Shanghai under house arrest for more than three years, because these issues have been deemed "too sensitive" !?

In early September, some of the Shanghai faithful who were in prison for a long time, along with their relatives, went on a pilgrimage to Rome to commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the outbreak of the great persecution on September 8, 1955. They were told: "Do not make any noise, the past is past, we have to look forward"!?

On a diplomatic level, the underground communities are the ace in the Holy Sees deck; if we amputate these limbs, what have we left in diplomatic standings to induce the other party to agree to our terms? By now, the government controls nearly all the official communities, while the underground communities are kept at bay by the Holy See. What do they still need to come to terms? They only need the signature of the Holy Father, a blessing, for this "Chinese Church." Beijing has no intention of negotiating, only making demands. After such a signature they will force the faithful of the underground community to come out and surrender to those who were illegitimate bishops for a long time, maybe even excommunicated, but now, with a clean slate, without even showing any repentance, leaning only on the Government for their legitimacy, have become bishops in their own right.

G.

What makes me restless is the sight of our Eminent Secretary of State still intoxicated by the miracles of Ostpolitik. In a speech last year, at a Memorial for Card. Casaroli, he praised the success of its predecessor in having secured the existence of the Church hierarchy in the communist countries of Eastern Europe. He says: "In choosing candidates for the episcopate, we choose shepherds and not people who systematically oppose the regime, people who behave like gladiators, people who love to grandstand on the political stage." I wonder: Who had he in mind while making this description? I fear that he was thinking of a Cardinal Wyszynski, a Cardinal Mindszenty, a Cardinal Beran. But these are the heroes who bravely defended the faith of their people! It terrifies me to realize this mindset and I sincerely hope that I am wrong.

On the day that an agreement is signed with China there will be peace and joy, but do not expect me to participate in the celebrations of the beginning of this new Church. I disappear, I will start a monastic life to pray and do penance. I will ask the forgiveness of Pope Benedict for not being able to do what he was hoping that I could do. I will ask Pope Francis to forgive this old Cardinal from the peripheries for disturbing him with so many inappropriate letters.

The innocent children were killed, the angel told Joseph to take Mary and the Child and flee to safety. But today would our diplomats advise Joseph to go and humbly beg for dialogue with Herod !?



P.S.

Please let it not be said that I believe the only line of distinction is that of official and underground. The vast majority of the clergy and lay people who belong to the official community are faithful to the authority of the Holy Father. Many are suffering enormously because of the abnormal situation of their Church, they are saddened by the weakness or lack of rectitude of their pastors, sometimes they even try to prevent them from falling further. In many cases a united clergy and a faithful people can defend their pastor from further bullying from the Authorities.
So I'm in a difficult situation and any help would be highly appreciated.Been in Australia with my partner for almost 3 years. We are currently on student visas (he is the main applicant, I am the second applicant on his visa on de facto basis).The plan was to apply for a 187RSMS visa, his employer was going to sponsor him.Then my partner's mum passed away and ever since then he's had anxiety, depression and severe hypochondria. For he past 9 months he has thought and talked about illness and death and nothing else. I have been trying to help him with no results, he lost his job, sponsor, spent all his money on doctors and specialists who keep telling him he's fine (except for his mental illness).When he lost his sponsorship my work, which I really like and which is the only place where I've been happy lately, has offered to sponsor me instead.While my boss is still gathering all the financial documents for my nomination, we went home for Christmas. He'd only bought a one way ticket because he was going to spend NYE at home, and then spend a bit of time with his dad while I had to be back in OZ to work. So I'm now in Australia and he is still in ItalyHe has not come back yet and he' saying that he is not sure he's coming back because, of course, in his head, he has all sorts of illnesses.Of course that leaves me with a lot of problems and anxieties, one of them is the fact that my current student visa is joint to his and I'm not really supposed to be here without him (unless he comes back of course). He's almost finished his course, he only has to hand in a couple of assignments but I'm worried that his school might cancel his (and my) visa if he doesn't come soon. These visas run out in March 2016.What I would like is not to depend on him, as he is not stable. I have a life here + an employer who is willing to sponsor me to stay, I have all my documents ready to apply... It just feel crazy that I might have to lose everything.So my main question is, if he decides not to come back can I apply for a RSMS visa just for myself even though until now I was the partner on his student visa? Wouldn't they wonder 'what happened to the partner?'Is there a short term visa that I can apply for, just so I know I'm not going to be kicked out of the country (in case they decide to cancel our student visas) while all this is unfolding? I've had 2 WH visa alreadyand I'm 31Any help or advice would be SO appreciated. Of course, on Monday, I will be seeing our immigration agent too.Thank youErika
The debates over user fees and ATC privatization are coming back to the forefront as Congress settles into its second session. The impetus this week came from a piece in Politico by U.S. Rep. Mike Pompeo, a Kansas Republican whose district covers Wichita. The proposals are brewing in the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee as part of the FAA reauthorization bill thats in the works for 2016, he wrote. Unfortunately, recent draft outlines of legislation would unduly burden the general aviation community. Most concerning is a proposal to add to or replace the current fuel tax system with user fees in order to finance a new air traffic regulator that would be run by a board of aviation interest groups.

GA organizations have already rallied against privatization, which would put airspace management under a not-for-profit company. It also would make user fees the likely source of funding, rather than fuel taxes. Meanwhile, Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa., who chairs the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, favors the idea along with a number of airline companies. The fight against user fees will continue,Jim Coon, AOPA senior vice president of government affairs, told AVweb via email.AOPA is opposed to all user fees and is focused on protecting general aviation for today and tomorrows pilots. We believe the FAA can be more efficient, especially in terms of certification and regulation and will comment on any legislative proposals when they are released, he said.

EAA Chairman and CEO Jack Pelton said hes concerned about any such proposals and sees more than the threat of fees. The current fight against ATC privatization is about who gets to control the national airspace system, he said in a statement. Any privatized system will not be governed by the principles of equal access currently defended by the FAA but rather by who has the greatest financial impact. In a privatized system where the major economic and political players would be the airlines and massive tech and retail companies desiring airspace for drone operations, personal and recreational aviation would have little chance for long-term survival.
9 January 2016 10:00 (UTC+04:00)

The 4th Global Baku Forum will be held on March 10-11.

The event organized by the Nizami Ganjavi International Center in partnership with the State Committee on Work with Diaspora, will bring together a number of heads of state and government, and well-known political figures.

The Club of Madrid, the Inter-Action Council and the Library of Alexandria are the partners of the forum which will be entitled Towards a multipolar world. About 300 representatives, including a number of influential political and public figures are expected to attend the forum, which will address ethnic, religious and political conflicts in the world, development of democracy, education, environment and energy security.

Albania, Latvia, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Montenegro, Croatia and Georgia have already confirmed their participation at the fourth Global Baku Forum.

The first Global Baku Forum was held in 2013 bringing together number of influential political leaders and statesmen.

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9 January 2016 15:45 (UTC+04:00)

From Jan.11, 2016, while withdrawing money from plastic cards a conversion fee equal to four percent will be charged, Azerbaijan Banks Association (ABA) told Trend Jan. 9.



The commission will be charged only during conversion operations for withdrawing from plastic cards. This measure is aimed at reducing the cash operations from plastic cards and stimulating non-cash payments.



"Some bank customers use cards not for their intended purpose, and us them only in order to cash out their funds," said the source in the association.



"In recent days, the population began to actively transfer manats to their dollar cards, and then withdraw dollars and sell them, which could lead to the emergence of black market. As a result, other citizens could not cash out their dollar funds from their cards, since the ATMs were empty within 30 minutes," said the association.



This decision does not concern the clearing conversion, ABA said.



"Those who carry out payments (in particular with online purchaes) from their manat cards or vice versa, would be billed through the existing conversion tariffs. So the conversion fee for them will be 0.5 percent as before, ABA said, adding that the new rule doesn't apply to withdrawals of currency, same as the one on the account."



The total number of payment cards in Azerbaijan reached 5.679 million units as of Nov.2015, of which 4.59 million units accounted for debit cards, according to the Central Bank of Azerbaijan.



The official exchange rate is 1,5642 AZN/USD as of Jan. 9.

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9 January 2016 12:55 (UTC+04:00)

Despite a little jump in oil prices as of January 8, it is hard to imagine that crude will witness major alteration in the first half of the current year.

Prices started to go down in early 2014 and have not shown any sign of improvement so far.

On January 7, the US benchmark crude-oil contract tumbled $0.7, or 2.1 percent, to reach $33.27 per barrel to strike the lowest close since 2004.

Asian markets closed mixed on the last day of 2016's first trading week. The week had seen the Chinese market shut down prematurely two times in order to stem rapid selloffs.

On January 8 a rally started after the latest figures pointing to robust US production even as a supply glut drags prices to about lowest on record. Crude recovered after its latest crash, with Brent rising close to 6 percent from its latest trough to above $34 per barrel. However, the rise was due to a recovery in Chinese shares, and warning must be given against reading too much into it.

Fereydoun Barkeshli, former general manager of National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) in OPEC and International Affairs told Trend January 8 that prices will remain low for half a year or so.

My perception is that during the first half of 2016 we will continue to witness a volatile market and even more downward pressure. However, by the second half prices will stabilize in the range of $45-50 per barrel, said Barkeshli, currently a private energy consultant and president of the Vienna Energy Research Group.

When prices started sliding in early 2014, most analysts missed no time to put the blame on Saudi Arabia's oil diplomacy and that there was a US-Saudi conspiracy to push down crude oil prices in an effort to exert pressure on Iran and Russia for obvious reasons.

But as time passed and especially when crude prices went bellow $50 per barrel and began to threaten US Shale oil production, market analysts turned to fundamentals and supply-demand in an effort to explain the fall in prices.

On the supply side, crude oil abundance all over the world and on demand side Chinese economic slowdown which has acted as the engine of oil demand consumption growth for the last ten years were responsible for the situation, according to Barkeshli.

I consider the above as an intrigue that required consideration. I do not believe that as long as there is no direct threat to actual and physical oil flow in the market, prices show any meaningful sensitivity, he stated.

Nevertheless, I personally believe that major oil companies are increasingly restless. The value of their share has fallen and stakeholders are uncomfortable. For the first time in eleven years, there is only one oil company in FORBE's top 100 companies. What I intend to say is that investment pattern in oil industry is in bad shape and that hurts IOCs as well as NOCs that might lead to a coalition to stabilize crude prices.

The same was said by Irans former representative at the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) Mohammad Ali Khatibi.

Putting aside non-economic factors which may alter the market, the existing situations do not indicate any rise to come in the first half of 2016, he said.

Supply is still going to outdo demand throughout the first half of the year, Khatibi stated, adding however that in the second half, a balance is expected to settle and the market will become more powerful.

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9 January 2016 10:33 (UTC+04:00)

Trans Caspian Pipeline project requires an effective diplomatic approach to Russia that would encourage Moscow to acquiesce to the supply of Turkmen gas to Europe, Dr. Michael Tanchum, a non-resident senior fellow with the Eurasian Energy Futures Initiative and Global Energy Center at the Atlantic Council believes.

Tanchum told Trend that with Turkmenistan possessing the fourth largest known natural gas reserves in the world, the export of large volumes of Turkmen natural gas to Europe in addition to Asia would be nothing short of a revolution in the natural gas flows in Eurasia.

Russia does not want to see such a threat to its market share in the EU and Turkey and in the current atmosphere of tense relations between Turkey and Russia as well as between Russia and the EU, Russia is likely to maintain its opposition to the TransCaspian Pipeline, he said.

Moscows firing of a cruise missile into Syria from the Caspian Sea was a potent reminder that Russia possesses the most powerful naval assets in the Caspian and can disrupt the maritime security environment if it so chooses, he said.

The proposal to construct only one string in the near future may be a clever attempt to make the pipeline less threatening to Russia, Tanchum believes.

Would Russia want to further antagonize the EU and Turkey over 5 billion cubic meters per year? The answer to that question depends on Moscow but also on how much Brussels is willing to back up its desire for Turkmen gas with a strong political commitment, Tanchum said.

He further said that in relation to the Trans Caspian Pipeline Projects implementation, the four-way cooperation between Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Turkey, and the EU is essential, especially to encourage international energy companies to join a consortium for the project.

He believes that in the case of the Trans Caspian Pipeline, the geopolitics are the main issue, not the economics.

Tanchum noted that Turkmenistan is already considering new gas markets and had already been working hard to diversify its export delivery routes and its export markets. Turkmenistans turnaround in attitude can be seen in the progress that has occurred with the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline, he said.

Facing the impending prospect of competition from Irans unfettered participation in global natural gas markets as well as a dangerous dependency on China as its sole major export market, Turkmenistan adopted a new policy orientation to expedite TAPIs construction, according to the expert.

Tanchum said that traditionally unwilling to do little more than deliver gas to its border, Ashgabat seems to have found sufficient motivation from Iranian competition and the loss of its Russian export market [previously Russia sharply reduced and in 2016 completely stopped gas import from Turkmenistan] to change course.

Turkmenistans new willingness to become involved in external pipeline projects enabled construction on the TAPI pipeline to begin in December 2015, Tanchum said.

Turkmenistan is already thinking seriously about EU markets, and some progress has been made in this issue, the expert said.

He noted that in the May 2015 Ashgabat hosted a quadrilateral Summit of Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Turkey and EU aimed to advance the export of Turkmen natural gas via Azerbaijan to Turkey and the EU.

The Summit resulted in the Ashgabat Declaration outlining the parties next steps for bringing Turkmen gas to Europe, and the European Commission Vice President in charge of Energy Union Maros Sefcovic emerged from the quadrilateral summit asserting that Europe expects supplies of Turkmen gas to begin by 2019.

--

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9 January 2016 13:40 (UTC+04:00)

By Elena Kosolapova

Russia has completely stopped buying gas in Turkmenistan since January 2016. This can stir this Central Asian countrys interest in the European gas market.

Russia's decision was expected. The export of Turkmen gas to Russia decreased tenfold over the past decade. Russia bought about 41-42 bcm a year from Turkmenistan in 2006-2008. The import has dropped to 10 bcm a year since 2010. The Russian Gazprom announced about the reduction of the Turkmen gas purchase by more than twofold - up to 4 bcm per year in 2015.

But even these supplies were problematic. The sides did not agree on the price of gas. Gazprom filed suit against Turkmengaz in the Stockholm Court of Arbitration with intention to revise the contract value of the purchased Turkmen gas as energy prices dropped in the world.

Turkmengaz announced that Gazprom has not paid for the already supplied Turkmen gas since early 2016. According to the Turkmen side, Gazprom simply went bankrupt because of the crisis and sanctions.

On one hand, the supply of gas in such small volumes has no role for the economy of both countries. Gazprom said in early 2015 that there is no technological need for the purchase of gas from abroad regardless of the source.

Gazprom said it is able to ensure both the needs of the market in any region of Russia and the supply of gas to its customers in Europe and, in the long term, in Asia, through own resources. Considering the fact that Russia, according to BP, ranks second in the world in terms of gas reserves - 32.6 trillion cubic meters, there's no point to doubt Gazprom's statement.

Gas supplies to Russia for Turkmenistan amounted in 2014, for example, to only one-third of total export volume, mainly due to the fact that more than 25 billion cubic meters were sold to China. In 2015, because of the significant reduction in exports to Russia, the share of export in Russian direction fell dramatically.

The fact that Ashgabat lost one of the export routes, which are only three, including China and Iran is important in the issue of termination of Turkmen gas deliveries to Russia. Of course, China remains the most important market, the demand for gas of which will only grow. For 10 years, the demand for gas in China increased by 4.5 times to 185.5 billion cubic meters in 2014.

There is another export route  Iran. Iran has huge gas reserves itself (34 trillion cubic meters, according to BP), which puts the country to the first place in the world. In addition, in the light of lifting of sanctions from Iran, the country may soon begin development of new gas fields and become from a partner to a competitor of Turkmenistan. So its not necessary to count on this route.

There may be another export route in the future  the construction of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline started in Dec. 2015, which will supply Turkmen gas to promising markets in South and Southeast Asia.

However, according to official statements, only the construction of this pipelines Turkmen section will last for 3 years. Building plots in the transit countries, counting security problems in the region, may take even more time. Therefore, this export route can be expected only in the long term.

It is most likely in such situation that Turkmenistans interest in European gas market will further increase. The Central Asian country has already done a great deal to supply gas to Europe.

The commissioning of the East-West gas pipeline in Dec. 2015, is intended to transport natural gas from the biggest deposit in the countrys eastern regions  Galkynysh  to European markets. Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey, lying on the route from Turkmenistan to Europe, are willing to be transit countries.

Many experts believe that for Turkmen gas, in order to become finally a reality in Europe, its only necessary the construction of a 300- km gas pipeline across the Caspian, which is not difficult from a technical point of view.

However, for this, Europe must become more resolute in its intention to get Turkmen gas and take part in the construction of the Trans-Caspian gas pipeline, in which is interested not less than Turkmenistan.

Otherwise, the statement of Maros Sefcovic, Vice-President of the European Commission for Energy Union, about the plans to get Turkmen gas in 2019 will be nothing but populism. When Turkmen gas is released to the huge Southern and Southeastern Asian markets, Turkmenistans interest in European market can vanish.

Turkmenistan ranks fourth in the world in terms of gas reserves - 17.5 trillion cubic meters of gas. Currently, the country produces more than 75 billion cubic meters of gas per year, and it is planned to increase production to 230 billion cubic meters by 2030, most part of which will be exported.

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9 January 2016 17:15 (UTC+04:00)

By Farhad Daneshvar

Iran has entered the 2016 with the good news of the removal of banking sanctions on exporting petrochemical products - a gift to Iranian banking sector, petrochemical industry and its Capital Market in particular the Mercantile Exchange.

On the second day of the New Year, Iranian sources reported that after five years of sanctions on the Islamic Republics banking system, Tehran finally received payments for exports of its petrochemical products through an international bank in Spain, a breakthrough for both Tehrans petrochemical industry and the financial system as well.

Petrochemicals and oil based products alongside with a range of agricultural products as well as metal and minerals are traded in Irans Mercantile Exchange (IME). The recent removal of sanctions on Irans banking system can be considered as a green light for foreigners to think of investing in the IME.

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has also vowed the removal of rest of the sanctions in the coming days which is expected to pave the way for foreigners to invest in the country and its commodities exchange of the IME.

Iran Mercantile Exchange was established in September 2007, following the merger of the agricultural and metal exchanges of Tehran. Trades in the IME are carried out in the spot, derivatives and secondary markets.

According to the Regulations Governing the Foreign Investment in the Exchanges and Over-The-Counter (OTC) Markets, foreigners wishing to invest in Irans capital market have to obtain a trading License from the Securities and Exchange Organization (SEO).

The IME announced that about $124 million worth of various commodities weighting over 0.292 million tons were traded in its domestic trading and exports halls between Dec. 26-31.

IME Total Market Data Dec.26.2015  Jan. 6.2016

Meanwhile, in December 2015, 1.42 million tons of different commodities were traded on domestic and export trading floors, including 0.814 million tons of various commodities worth more than $357 million in oil and petrochemical trading floor, 0.594 million tons of different products worth approximately $226 million in metals and minerals trading floor, and approximately 0.109 million tons of agricultural products worth $23 million in agricultural trading floor in the spot market.

Products

Officially, products and commodities are listed and traded in the IME in three classifications: Industrial Products and Commodities, Oil Products and Petrochemicals as well as agricultural products.

Ferrous and non-ferrous metals such as steel, different types of cement, coke, precious metals concentrate, and other basic products are traded in the industrial products and commodities classification in the industrial trading session from 10:30 to 12:00 (GMT+3.5 hours), in metals and minerals trading floor through semi electronic open outcry. Gold bullions are traded from 12:00 to 12:30 (local time) in the same trading floor.

The trades of oil products and petrochemicals are carried out from 13:30 to 16:00.

Products such as cereals, oilseeds, oilcakes, wheat, feed wheat, feed barley, yellow corn, maize, raisin, lentil, chick peas, sugar, meat, eggs, saffron and pistachio are traded in Agricultural classification in the fully electronic multi-commodity trading system.

Offerings and orders

Offerings of the commodities in the spot market are announced and notified 24 hours, before the trading takes place, through the exchange website so the sellers and clients would be able to place their orders with the brokers and rest assured for trading to be matched and cleared.

In the derivatives market the clients order their trades as per specifications of the futures contract and in accordance to the order types specified in terms of order validity and the price.

Tradable contracts in IME:

Seven types of contracts including cash, forward, credit and futures facilitated trade in the IME based on the settlement and clearing terms as well as conditions mentioned in the offering notice of the traded commodities.

1-Cash Contract

In this type of contracts, the buyer is obliged to pay in cash the total contract value in addition to broker's commission fees, and the seller is required to deliver the commodity within 3 days.

2-Forwards Contract

In this type of contract, the whole contract value is paid by the buyer and the seller is committed to deliver the product in specified date and time. This type of contract is considered as a financing instrument for sellers.

3-Credit contract

In this kind of contract, the product is delivered to buyer immediately, and its value will be paid to seller in maturity date. This type of contract is considered as a financing instrument for buyers.

4-Futures contract

Futures contract is a kind of contract in which the seller is committed to sell a certain amount of product at a given price in maturity date and in contrast, the other party undertakes to buy the product with the same characteristics in maturity date. In order to have both sides fulfill their obligations, they shall deposit a certain contract value as collateral to clearing house and in accordance with futures price fluctuations shall adjust the initial collateral. On their behalf, the clearing house can give the possession of a part of collateral to the other party as "concession of the occupation". The juridical meaning is that both parties permit clearing house to tenure the collateral.

5-Call Option Contract

A call option contract is a contract giving the holder the right, but not the obligation, to buy a specified amount of a commodity or a commodity-based security at a specified price within a specified time from the owner. The owner will be committed to sell the commodity or the commodity based security on holder's request.

6-Put Option Contract

A put option contract is a contract giving the owner the right, but not the obligation, to sell a specified amount of a commodity or a commodity based security at a specified price within a specified time to holder. The holder will be committed to buy the commodity or the commodity based security on owner's request.

7-Standard Parallel Forwards Contract

It is a kind of contract in which a given amount of commodity will be sold based on standard parallel forwards contract features. The contract value shall be paid in accordance with contract in settlement deadline and the commodity shall be delivered in maturity date. The buyer can sell the equivalent amount of purchased commodity via standard parallel forwards contract.

Taxes

According to Iranian law ten percent (10%) of income tax gained from sale of the commodities listed on the commodity exchanges and ten percent (10%) of the income tax of the companies whose shares have been listed for trading on the domestic or foreign exchanges and five percent (5%) of the income tax of the companies whose shares have been listed for trading on the domestic or foreign OTC markets shall be exempted with the approval of the SEO as of the listing year to the year during which they have not been de-listed from the listed companies on such exchanges or markets.

The companies whose shares are listed for trading on the domestic or foreign exchanges or on the domestic or foreign OTC markets shall enjoy a tax exemption for doubling the afore-mentioned exemptions provided that they have at least twenty percent (20%) freefloating shares at the end of their fiscal year as confirmed by the SEO.

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10 January 2016 10:00 (UTC+04:00)

The information that Turkey plans to introduce a visa regime with the 89 countries doesn't correspond to reality, Minister for the EU Affairs of Turkey Volkan Bozkir said, Anadolu agency reported.

"We strive to ensure that our citizens from October 2016 could attend the Schengen area without a visa, and continue to work in this direction. This information doesn't correspond to reality. People should trust the statements of the competent authorities", Bozkir said.

Earlier a number of Turkish media reported Jan. 7 that Turkey will on June 2016 start the visa regime with 89 countries, including Azerbaijan, at a request from the EU.

__

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Hundreds of Hillsborough County residents got the opportunity Friday to get their driver's licenses back.

Around 500 residents took part in the event. Judges slashed fines, fees, and made it easier for them to get their drivers licenses back. Most couldnt afford to pay in the first place.

I think were recognizing the economics of our community require some relief from that, said Public Defender Julianne Holt.

Rep. Dana Young, R-Tampa, partnered with the county to make the day happen.

The state of Florida has been very aggressive, suspending driver's licenses for things that have little to do with driving, Rep. Young said.

Judge Denise Pomponio was one of two judges presiding over Hillsborough County Drivers License Reinstatement Day.

Youve got to smile, sir," he said to one defendant, as the courtroom filled with laughter. "Youve got this look on your face like you dont want to be here!

Judge Pomponio dismissed scores of noise citations and slashed fees for speeding tickets and other moving violations.

That made it easier for Randall Simmons to get his license back after three months.

I cant describe it," he said. "To have it and lose it and be worried about driving. It feels really good to be legal."

The county is planning another event for April.


Big beautiful homes, sail boats docked in the backyards -- and dead fish?

Thats what people in a Gulfport community are dealing with.

Theres thousands of dead fish. Thousands, literally in our cove right here, said resident Dimitra Pastras.

Pastras says now when she enjoys the beautiful backyard view at her home she has to hold her nose. She says this sea of dead fish has been popping up for the last couple of weeks.

When it first happened it looked like snow, honestly. All of the whole top of the water was covered, she said.

The water behind their home flows into Bocaseiga Bay. Bay News 9s own Dr. Randy Shuck lives in the same community and had the smelly, rotting fish floating behind his home too. Luckily for him, he had a cleaning service.

The clean-up crew is actually interesting, Shuck said. The big white pelicans that come in, the buzzard hawks that come in. Weve had everything come in here so its kind of fun to watch. Its not fun to smell.

Its a sour smell and a sour sight. Dr. Shuck has his theory on what might be behind these funky fish.

Im thinking its got to be red tide, because the way its kind of coming as a bloom you see it and then they kind of drift away. The tides bring them in, the tides bring them out, he said.

We reached out to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission and they couldnt confirm if this fish kill was because of red tide. Officials said the people could find out what the cause is in a couple of days.
The Palmetto Police Department is investigating a well-known auto restoration shop in the area.

Slicks Garage has quite the reputation. After being featured on Discovery Channels "Highway to Sell," people drove their cars from all over to be worked on.

But now the shop in Palmetto is up for sale and some are questioning what is going to happen to all of the cars left inside.

Police are investigating the business for possible fraud after at least 15 customers filed reports complaining about the work being done there.

We have an on-going fraud investigation with several of the victims who have come forward, said Chief Scott Tyler. We executed a search warrant pursuant of that investigation.

Some of the customers complaining say they dropped their cars off years ago, only to never hear a word after.

Some customers said they dropped their cars off years ago, never to hear a word after that. (Summer Smith)

They did the interior and the paint and then it just sat, said Frank Barcellona. There was always an excuse.

Barcellona brought his 1955 Packard to the shop nearly four years ago, and paid $14,000 in advance for the work. To his surprise, it was never finished.

After hearing about the building being up for sale and not getting any returned phone calls, Barcellona decided to get his car back. On Friday, with help from the Palmetto Police Department, he was able to pick up his car and take it elsewhere for more work.

Im very thankful that not only was I able to get it, but that its all in one piece, he said. Theres a couple of trim pieces gone and some interior bows that go up in roof of car, but other than that it looks like its all there.

Others have not been so lucky and had to take their cars home in pieces.

Police said the owners told them theyre still in business, and they are only changing their address.

Christian "Slick" Humphrey and Jane Hunter, told police they bought a new shop in Miami and are currently moving everything from their Palmetto location to the new spot.

Police are looking into this to see if its true.

Right now it is a criminal investigation but no charges have been filed, said Tyler. Were working with the State Attorney office to review all of the evidence and complainants allegations as well as any evidence weve gathered at the scene.

Many like Barcellona are not wanting to take any chances and decided to take their cars now before the investigation is over.


This story was originally written Jan. 8, 2016, when the jackpot was at $800 million.

Your dreams have come true: youve won the $800 million Powerball jackpot.



But do you really get all $800 million?

As we all know, only two things are certain in life: death and taxes. And those millions aint tax-free.

Its not just the federal government that gets its share either. State governments may also collect tax on Lottery winnings. There may even be city taxes too.

The reason is, according to the Powerball website, winnings are considered income.

You will owe federal taxes immediately when you win, because the government requires the lottery to report all prizes over $600. The IRS will immediately withhold about 25 percent from the jackpot before the winner ever gets their lucky little hands on that cash.

And then, come next tax season, youll have to file your federal income tax return.. As you can imagine, with a sudden influx of hundreds of millions of dollars, your income tax rate is going to jump significantly. The top Federal Tax Rate is 39.6 percent of regular income. The Lottery will send you a W2-G form so you can figure out your actual taxes.



But it doesnt stop there. Many states will tax lottery winnings. Now, if youre a Florida resident, you dont pay taxes. However, many of the 44 states that sell Powerball tickets do. Those tax percentages can vary anywhere from 3 percent in New Jersey to almost 9 percent in New York or Maryland. New York City tacks on an additional city tax on those winnings as well. The Lottery statistics site US Mega.com has all the state tax information broken down.

Now, there are two ways to get your Lottery winnings: you can take the lump sum, or you can take annual payments over 30 years.

First, you should know that if you take the lump sum, you will not get $800 million minus the 25 percent tax.

According to the Powerball website, the winner gets all of the cash thats in the jackpot prize pool. But that amount is not the big $800 million sum. Analysts, including USA Mega.com, believe the number to be around $496 million (still not terribly shabby). The federal government takes its 25 percent, so the winner will get a lump sum of about $370,000,000, give or take a million. Then youll pay more taxes on those earnings in your income tax return the following year.

Now, if you decide you want the payments, here is how that works: Powerball pays out 30 payments over 29 years (with one payment immediately). According to USA Mega, that first payment is $26,666,667. The government then takes its 25 percent. The winner will get $20 million even for the first payment.

The Powerball people then take the rest of your winnings and invest it to fund the future payments.

If you take the cash amount, when you file your income tax, you will count that Powerball payout once. You don't file that money in subsequent years as a major source of income.



If you take the payments, you will have to pay taxes every year you get a payment because every year that payment counts as income. And as we all know, taxes can go up, and taxes can go up. So what you pay on that payout next year may be different than what you pay in taxes 10 years from now.



It gets even trickier. Remember how the Powerball website said it invests the rest of the jackpots to fund the future payments? This is what the website says:

"When you see an estimated jackpot annuity prize, we are estimating both sales and what the market's prices on certain securities will be. The annuity jackpot amount and the cash jackpot amount that we announce are always estimates until sales are final and, for the annuity jackpot, until we take bids on the purchase of securities."

So at the end of it all will you get $800 million before taxes? Maybe, maybe not.

The Powerball website goes on to remind players that, should they win, they have 60 days to claim their prize. They suggest using that time to get lots of financial advice before deciding what to do with that prize money.

By the way, the Florida Lottery says Powerball tickets are selling at a rate of over 16,000 per minute in Florida.
Hot on Oregon Coast: Clamming, Crabbing, Whales, Agates

Published 01/08/2016 at 5:53 PM PDT

By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff





(Oregon Coast)  Mostly good news for crabbing and clamming along the Oregon coast at the moment, while whales, birds and agates are the sizzling hot attractions. There's more to see than usual this January. (Above: Agate Beach in Newport).

The bad news for the Oregon coast is that razor clamming is closed for most of the area  from Tillamook Head south to the California border. Everything north of there is open, which means only the towns of Warrenton, Gearhart and Seaside allow razor clamming. All other towns along the coast are shut down.

ODFW said this is because of domoic acid levels in the shellfish. The Oregon Dept. of Agriculture (ODA) will continue testing for shellfish toxins as ocean conditions allow. Call the ODA shellfish safety hotline at 1-800-448-2474 before harvesting for the most current information about shellfish safety closures.

While harvesting of razor clams is open on Clatsop County beaches north of Tillamook Head, ODFW said clammers should be wary of high winds, large surf, and dangerous debris from flooding.

The agency also suggested trying bay clamming after dark, as some significant minus tides happen in the evening.

Take a headlamp or flashlight, warm clothing, and a spirit of adventure, ODFW said.

ODFW is reporting crabbing has been fair to good recently on the central Oregon coast's bays and in the ocean. Red rock crab  as well as Dungeness  is popular this time of year and can be caught with the same equipment for both. ODFW said Red rock crab are not present in all Oregon bays; good places to harvest them include the docks in Tillamook, Yaquina and Coos bays.

For wildlife viewing, the big highlight is a good proliferation of whales. They will still be plentiful for another week or so.

In the realm of birds, ODFW offered numerous suggestions. (At right: a ghost forest stump at Seal Rock).

The Twilight Eagle Sanctuary, located east of Astoria, just off of Hwy 30 is a great place to observe not only bald eagles, but a host of wintering waterfowl. The Nestucca Bay NWR near Pacific City is host to a variety of Canada geese, including the Aleutian, dusky, western and cackler races. Lots of Great egrets are being seen in Tillamook pastures, especially along the Nestucca, Tillamook, Trask and Wilson rivers. Raptors are also plentiful in these areas.

The biggest news along the Oregon coast is agates at the moment, which are smoking hot, due to recent erosion of beaches. It's also a good time to look for ancient shipwrecks that have uncovered (such as at Rockaway Beach), or remarkable oddities like red towers or ghost forests. Oregon Coast Hotels for this - Where to eat - Maps - Virtual Tours

Above: agate photo by Rock Your World agate shop in LIncoln City. Below: ghost forest stumps and red towers.







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If you're the kind of movie-goer who likes to walk into a theater having already read the book from which the film is based, then consider this a major heads up.

We compiled many of the flicks that are headed to theaters this year that are based off of a novel, be it a true story or a fantastical (and obviously fictional) tale.
For those who thought 2015s University of Alabama sorority recruitment video was over the top, the University of Miami's Delta Gamma chapter is ready to blow your mind.

The South Florida sorority has released a recruitment video that looks like something straight out of HBOs "Ballers." Bikini clad college women swim in rooftop pools, prance around on beaches, backflip off of boathouses into the ocean and skateboard along the waterfront.
Being a CEO comes with countless requirements, duties and tasks. Should passing a physical be one of them?

Oscar Munoz, CEO of Chicago-based United Airlines, underwent a heart transplant Jan. 6 after suffering a heart attack in October, according to the Chicago Tribune. The heart attack came about a month after he was named CEO of the well-known airline.

His hospitalization and surgery raise questions about the health of CEOs, many of whom are only required to take physicals after they've been hired, according to Crain's Chicago Business.

And even if a CEO undergoes a physical exam before he or she is hired, the results don't always sway boards' decisions.

"I've never seen anybody not hire the CEO they wanted because of the physical," said Christine DeYoung of Chicago-based DHR International.

Other companies aren't as demanding and "will make their best guess, based on looks or things that will come up discretely in the interview process," according to Bruce Hochstadt, MD, senior health management consultant for Chicago-based Willis Towers Watson.

Only time will tell whether boards will begin requiring the passing of a physical, but not doing so could evolve into a future problem. "In some cases, companies are billing out tens of millions of dollars to buy out an executive (from a previous employer) only to find out that the exec has an illness," Dennis Carey of Los Angeles-based Korn Ferry told Fortune.
Nurses will gather on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court Monday morning to protest non-compulsory union fees, which National Nurses United argues could be potentially detrimental to the healthcare industry.

On Monday, the court will hear arguments in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, a potentially landmark lawsuit brought by 10 California public school teachers that could put an end to forced union dues in the public sector.

National Nurses United warned the case poses a "significant threat to public health, safety and quality of life," according to a press release.

The case involves a challenge to the right of public unions to require employees who receive representation benefits  such as higher wages, safer working conditions and better benefits  to pay their fair share of representation costs. If the government rules in favor of the plaintiffs, the financial strength and political clout of government employee unions could be greatly diminished, according to The Beacon.

"As nurses our ability to have a collective voice for our patients is critical," said Martese Chism, a Chicago-based RN and member of National Nurses United. "Without the support of our union, nurses have little protection to speak out and challenge unsafe staffing or other eroding patient care conditions that happen all too often in our hospitals."
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Martin McCann in a scene from The Survivalist

A Northern Ireland-born film director has been nominated for a Bafta award.

Stephen Fingleton was named in the outstanding debut category of the British Academy Film Awards for The Survivalist.

The post-apocalyptic thriller, shot entirely in Northern Ireland, is set in a world where resources have run out.

The feature received critical acclaim following its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York. It will be released in cinemas and on-demand on February 12.

Mr Fingleton tweeted: "Very happy that The Survivalist has been nominated for a Bafta for best debut."

Nominations for this year's Bafta film awards were announced yesterday by TV personality Stephen Fry.

Richard Williams, chief executive of development body Northern Ireland Screen, said: "We are immensely proud of Stephen Fingleton and offer our huge congratulations to him and all the talented crew that made The Survivalist.

"A Bafta nomination, a Bifa [British Independent Film Awards] win and incredible critical acclaim are amazing endorsements for this new writer and director.

"The Survivalist is a wonderful film and we are delighted to have been able to support it from its early script development stage."

The Bafta nomination follows the British Independent Film Awards where Fingleton was named best debut director.

The Survivalist was developed with the support of the British Film Institute Film Fund and Northern Ireland Screen's New Talent Focus Scheme.

It boasts what Northern Ireland Screen hailed as stellar performances from Martin McCann, Mia Goth and Olwen Fouere.

Also on the Bafta shortlist are on-screen couple Eddie Redmayne and Alicia Vikander, who have both been nominated for their roles in transgender movie The Danish Girl.

Redmayne will go up against Leonardo DiCaprio, Michael Fassbender, Matt Damon and Bryan Cranston in the leading actor award category.

Meanwhile, Vikander will face some incredibly stiff competition from Cate Blanchett, Brie Larson, Dame Maggie Smith and Saoirse Ronan in the leading actress category.

Redmayne is also an early favourite to secure an Oscar nomination for his role as Lili Elbe, one of the first known transgender women to receive sex reassignment surgery. He has already been nominated for a Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Award for the movie.

Kate Winslet and Rooney Mara will battle it out in the supporting actress category.
Staff have been told that the firm wants between eight and 13 voluntary editorial redundancies with other non-editorial jobs also under threat

The publisher of the News Letter is to cut up to 13 editorial jobs in Northern Ireland.

Johnston Press also owns a chain of local papers.

Staff have been told that the firm wants between eight and 13 voluntary editorial redundancies with other non-editorial jobs also under threat.

The Edinburgh-based firm owns more than 200 newspapers across the UK.

In an email to staff, the group's editor-in-chief said there would be job cuts across the firm following "a challenging year".

A staff member said the announcement was "a shocking start to the year for staff".

They said that staff had been told just weeks ago that there were no editorial job cuts in the pipe line.

In 2014, Johnston Press reported a pre-tax loss of 24m. Underlying profits, which excluded restructuring costs, rose from 54m to 56m.

The chief executive, Ashley Highfield, received pay of 1.65m, including a 645,000 bonus. The company said it had no comment to make on the job losses.
Eagle-eyed guests staying at the LUX* Grand Gaube hotel in Mauritius may notice something curious when walking down one of its corridors. Room number 1025 appears to have disappeared. There's a 1024 and then a 1026, but no 1025.

What they don't know is that 1026 is where room 1025 used to be, and it is only used when the hotel is at full occupancy. It was in this room, five years ago tomorrow, that newlywed Michaela McAreavey was murdered.

The killing was a hammer blow to both this luxurious establishment - then named Legends Hotel Mauritius - and to the country's tourist industry as a whole.

By the end of 2011, the establishment had been renamed in a gala event and a new motto, "Lighter, Brighter", was introduced, although its manager insisted the rebranding had been in the pipeline for a couple of years and had nothing to do with Michaela's murder.

At the same time, Mauritian tourist chiefs were anxious to point out that this highly popular honeymoon destination was safe for overseas visitors and the tragedy that befell the Harte and McAreavey families was a gruesome anomaly on an island famed for its glorious sunshine, sandy beaches and azure seas.

Five years on and the idyllic island in the Indian Ocean continues to exert a huge pull for newlyweds, but not those from Ireland on either side of the border.

A representative from Sunway Holidays said: "The Mauritius market was very badly hit after the tragedy and it's considerably down on what it was, although we are seeing a slow but steady increase in people going there. There's reduced fight availability into Port Louis and other destinations like the Maldives are attracting holidaymakers from Ireland.

"While the LUX* Grand Gaube is among the hotels that Sunway offers packages to, it doesn't attract the Irish in the numbers it once did. It used to be one of the most popular hotels there and our guests loved it. My own brother had his honeymoon there."

With blanket coverage of Michaela's killing - and the trial which took place on the island a year later - few people here would have been unaware of a killing that shocked a nation.

"It was a high-profile case that really affected Irish people and they simply stopped going to Mauritius," according to travel-industry journalist Eoghan Corry. "It used to be a huge market for those willing to spend a lot and go long-haul for their honeymoon, but now that sort of spend has moved to places like the Seychelles and South Africa.

"Like a lot of Irish travel journalists, I was given a briefing from the Mauritius tourist board in the wake of the tragedy. They were stressing how safe the island was, but it wasn't something they could market their way out of when it came to Irish holidaymakers. Word of mouth is very important to us."

For other European holidaymakers, oblivious to the killing, Mauritius remains a popular destination. Mr Corry said: "It had no impact on other European countries because it got very little publicity there. Similarly, the case of two British tourists killed in Thailand, or that of the man who had his wife murdered in South Africa, had no impact on people travelling there from this country."

Those who do venture to the LUX* Grand Gaube are likely to experience a holiday to remember for all the right reasons.

It enjoys phenomenal ratings on TripAdvisor, with 93% of more than 3,000 reviewers classing the hotel as either "very good" or "excellent".

"We had an absolutely amazing time," wrote one English holidaymaker on TripAdvisor on Tuesday. "It's the kind of place where you just don't have to leave hotel premises. They have everything to make you feel welcome, to relax, pamper, entertain you during your stay."
The chain is opening in Ballyhackamore and another undisclosed site

Pizza Express is opening two new Belfast restaurants, creating dozens of jobs.

The Italian chain is launching a new eatery in the burgeoning Ballyhackamore district area of east Belfast - where Jamie Oliver is understood to be opening his first Northern Ireland restaurant - as well as another site elsewhere in the city.

The UK-headquartered brand, which is owned by Chinese group Hony Capital, currently has three Belfast restaurants, including one in the Victoria Square.

The latest branch in east Belfast will face stiff competition from a number of other Italian restaurants close by.

They include Il Pirata, Greens Pizza and Little Wing.

Pizza Express was unable to comment on the new restaurants, or to reveal the location of the second outlet.

But it is understood the chain will open both this year.

The latest set of accounts for Pizza Express (Restaurants) Limited showed that the business increased sales to almost 383m for the year to June 2015.

Its pre-tax profits have also increased by around 11% - shooting up to 76m for the same period.

Pizza Express, founded in 1965 by Peter Boizot, opened its first restaurant in London's Wardour Street.

It is the latest in a series of big-name chains to plan new restaurants in the province.

Italian eateries Azzurri and Carluccio's are to open this year, while burger joint Five Guys recently launched its first Northern Ireland outlet in Victoria Square.

Chicken chain Nando's is also to open a new restaurant at Boucher Road in the south of the city. As well as its two current branches in the city, it operates a third in Londonderry.

Pizza Express is currently applying for a drinks licence for its east Belfast restaurant, with the case due to be heard next month.

The new location on Upper Newtownards Road was formerly an Ulster Bank.

Pizza Express has built up a huge following over the years.

Observer food critic Jay Rayner is a big fan of the pizza chain.

"It's a very reliable product - service is slick, you can still have a grown-up experience with your kids and the price is not asphyxiating for what it offers," he said.

And last year Belfast Telegraph food critic Joris Minne said Pizza Express was "still the only Italian which does it every time with bullet-proof consistency, cast iron solidity, and the unshakeable certainty of tomorrow's sunrise".

He added: "But the remarkable thing is that it's all still very good value for money.

"The service is reliably patient, friendly and quick, the quality of the food is high, and it's a pleasant place."

Meanwhile, it is understood that ever-expanding coffee chain Caffe Nero is taking new unit close to the new Pizza Express in east Belfast.
Outraged teachers have set up a protest group to oppose a Stormont plan to hand out 500 jobs to teachers with less than three years' experience.

They are in contact with the Equality Commission to seek advice about how to challenge the policy.

The Teaching Workforce Scheme announced by Education Minister John O'Dowd late last year aims to replace up to 500 older teaching staff with newly qualified teachers.

It proposes encouraging teachers over the age of 55 to retire early. In return, schools must replace the retiring member of staff with a teaches who has qualified in the past three years.

More than 5,000 teachers have signed an online petition against the move, and now a new group called Equality For All Teachers has been formed.

Spokesman Christopher Kerrigan has been employed in a series of temporary posts for five years across the north west and would be excluded from any of the new jobs.

He described permanent jobs in teaching as "like gold dust" and said he was incredulous that the Department of Education would propose discriminating against more experienced staff.

"I didn't think after five years I would still be in this position," he added. "We don't get paid until the summer outside our daily rate, so you are scrimping the pennies. You don't want to be doing that for the rest of your life. You can't get a mortgage, you can't even get finance on a car. Everything is on hold.

"It has become a massive mess, and at the minute we are very afraid how this will affect our lives and families.

"It also affects the children because they are talking about putting teachers in there who could be fantastic but will have little experience. I remember in my first job I needed guidance.

"If you have three young teachers in one department, the standard of education is going to fall down. That is logical. You don't become a teacher by training, but by teaching in the classroom."

He also revealed another one of the group's members had been working temporary jobs for 10 years, and seven-and-a-half years continuously at one school. But if a job comes up at that school she will not be able to apply for it thanks to the proposed scheme.

On Tuesday the education committee heard from department officials about the scheme. It was explained that fewer than 50% of teaching graduates find jobs within three years. More than 50% of teachers who graduated more than three years ago have found jobs, however the exact percentage has not yet been released.

The Department of Education said that while teachers who qualified in the past three years would be eligible to apply for new positions, it was "continuing to explore whether we can go beyond this three-year period and still achieve the stated aims of the scheme".

"Further work will be carried out in the new year to finalise the cohort who will be eligible," a spokeswoman added.
A police officer and forensics expert attend the scene where the body of Conor McKee was discovered

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s. Picture By: Arthur Allison.

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s. Picture By: Arthur Allison.

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s. Picture By: Arthur Allison.

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s. Picture By: Arthur Allison.

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s. Picture By: Arthur Allison.

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s.

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s.

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s.

Pacemaker Press Belfast 08/01/2016: A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. The body was found in a house in Glenpark Street shortly before 22:30 GMT on Thursday. The man is understood to have been in his 30s.

A murder inquiry is under way after the discovery of a man's body in north Belfast. Inset: Murder victim Conor McKee

Detectives investigating the killing of a father in north Belfast have said he was the victim of a "particularly brutal murder".

Conor McKee (31) was discovered in an upstairs bedroom of his home in Glenpark Street by his mother at 10.30pm on Thursday.

Two men, aged 37 and 44 ,were arrested in connection with the crime on Friday night. The pair have been released on bail pending further enquiries.

Police appealed for information about a man seen in the vicinity of Conor's home around 6.15pm on Thursday evening.

Detective Chief Inspector Justyn Galloway added: ""This has been a devastating tragedy for the McKee family, particularly traumatic for [Conor's] mum, dad and close family.

"[This was a] particularly brutal murder, all the more traumatic for his mother who found him."

"The investigation is ongoing and I would continue to appeal for anyone with any information to come forward and contact detectives on 101 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111."

The cause of death has not yet been established but a post mortem examination is due to be carried out.

Detective Galloway revealed that the father-of-two had been bailed for drug offences before Christmas, confirming that drugs and other lines of inquiry were being investigated, though paramilitary involvement had been ruled out.

"Conor's lifestyle will form a part of our investigation, but I want to stress there's absolutely no justification for what happened to Conor and what his family are now going through," he said.

"Regardless of what may have gone before, it's important that people in the Ardoyne area come forward and tell us what they know and what they saw in and around Conor's home ."

Officers investigating the crime made three specific appeals for information.

Firstly, they want to hear about the man seen near Conor's home in Glenpark Street on Thursday at around 6.15pm.

Police also asked an individual who contacted officers in the early hours of Friday morning to get back in touch with detectives as a matter of urgency.

Finally, detective Galloway asked Conor's friends to engage with the police to build up a better picture of his movements and lifestyle.

Police stayed with the heartbroken McKee family throughout Thursday night.

"They are completely devastated and in fact traumatised by what went on," detective Galloway said.

"Not only the family, but also the local community there. It's important that we not only take these persons off the streets but prevent such a thing from happening again."

Yesterday, there was a heavy police presence in the Glenpark Street area, with a security cordon placed around the red brick terraced house where Mr McKee's body was found.

Neighbours and friends of the family said they were shocked by the news.

One woman who spoke to the Belfast Telegraph added: "It makes you worry when you're living here about what could happen because nobody knows what the whole thing is about. I would be worried. The mummy was the one who found him."

"He was a lovely fella, very quiet. He kept himself to himself. We grew up together - I lived across the street from him as kids and we would have played together. They are a lovely family and very decent people."

Another man in the area who knows the McKee family said: "He was a lovely, quiet fella. Things like that, you don't expect them to happen on your own doorstep. I'd known him growing up. [He was a] nice young lad."

Another woman added: "I know him and his family. He has two wee children. He was a lovely fella. It's shocking for everybody. No one knows the true outcome of what has happened yet."

Alban Maginness, the SDLP MLA for North Belfast, said the murder has had a devastating effect on the family, which has lived in the area for generations.

"The family are long-standing in that community - it's quite an inter-connected community and this really has shattered them," he added.

"The mother is a highly respected lady, very active within the Unison trade union and has done some very fine work for the union members.

"It's particularly shocking as the Glenpark area is a very quiet residential area."

"There's been no trouble there for a very, very long period of time. People are quite rightly shocked by this murder, especially the family."
Shocked witnesses last night described how they saw a man "clubbed like a seal" by thugs outside a popular Belfast bar.

The ferocious attack took place outside Maddens Bar - a popular Irish traditional music pub in central Belfast.

The victim, a man in his 30s, was rushed to Belfast's Royal Victoria Hospital after the vicious attack, in which a padlock concealed within a sock was used as a weapon.

Blood spattered the crime scene, with the victim ending up slumped against a pile of tyres at the back of the establishment.

Police forensic experts sealed off the scene and scoured the location for anything that could help them catch the callous attackers.

The whole area - which is at the rear of the CastleCourt shopping complex - is covered by a network of CCTV cameras.

A PSNI statement said: "The man suffered cuts and bruises to his head and was taken to hospital for treatment.

"Two males are reported to have fled the scene shortly after the attack".

A spokesman for the Northern Ireland Ambulance Service said they received a call summoning them to the incident at 3.50pm.

Drinkers at the popular bar said they heard ambulance service paramedics say they thought that the victim's neck had been broken.

Speaking at the crime scene, an eyewitness - who did not want to be named - told the Belfast Telegraph the brutal details of what had happened.

"It was like a murder scene," the reveller said.

"They clubbed him like a seal.

"I heard the paramedics say, 'I think his neck might be broken', as they fitted an inflatable support to the man.

"This was a premeditated attack. You don't hide a brass padlock in a sock and carry it around with you on the off-chance you might want to use it."
Conor McGregor posted photo on Instagram with the caption 'Put the fight game in the bag and step away from the vechicle'

Conor McGregor has apologised to gardai for being pictured with an air-soft gun in a social media post.

The UFC champion claimed that he was "simply rehearsing for a potential upcoming film role" when he was photographed with a replica weapon while wearing a balaclava.

McGregor hit the headlines this week when he was pictured in his 150,000 BMW car with the air-soft weapon. The picture was posted to his Instagram account at around 2am on Thursday with the caption Put the fight game in the bag and step away from the vehicle.

McGregor has also responded to Floyd Mayweather's racism claims with a strong Facebook rant that includes a message for the media and the Gardai.

Last week, Mayweather claimed that "racism still exists" following the success of Ireland's UFC hero McGregor, and suggested the Notorious only gets positive attention in the media because he is white.

And this week it emerged that Gardai in Crumlin will investigate after a pictures of McGregor holding what appeared to be a replica gun surfaced online.

Now McGregor has taken to Facebook to send a clear message following recent events. The Dubliner thanked the media and praised certain outlets for awarding him fighter of the year for 2015 but the main focus was on Mayweather.

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Expand Expand Expand Expand Expand Previous Next Close Conor McGregor, left, fights Jose Aldo during a featherweight championship mixed martial arts bout at UFC 194, Saturday, Dec. 12, 2015, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher) AP Champion: Conor McGregor celebrates after his first-round knockout victory Getty Images Conor McGregor, left, fights Jose Aldo during a featherweight championship mixed martial arts bout at UFC 194, Saturday, Dec. 12, 2015, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher) AP Conor McGregor reacts after defeating Jose Aldo during a featherweight championship mixed martial arts bout at UFC 194, Saturday, Dec. 12, 2015, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher) AP Conor McGregor celebrates after a first-round knockout victory over Jose Aldo in their featherweight title fight during UFC 194 at MGM Grand Garden Arena on December 12, 2015 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Steve Marcus/Getty Images) Getty Images / Facebook

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Whatsapp Conor McGregor, left, fights Jose Aldo during a featherweight championship mixed martial arts bout at UFC 194, Saturday, Dec. 12, 2015, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher)

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"Floyd Mayweather, don't ever bring race into my success again. I am an Irishman. My people have been oppressed our entire existence. And still very much are. I understand the feeling of prejudice. It is a feeling that is deep in my blood," wrote McGregor.

"In my family's long history of warfare there was a time where just having the name 'McGregor' was punishable by death.

"Do not ever put me in a bracket like this again.

"If you want we can organise a fight no problem. I will give you a fair 80/20 split purse in my favour seen as your last fight bombed at every area of revenue.

"At 27 years of age I now hold the key to this game. The game answers to me now."

Last week, Mayweather told fighthype.com: I dont really know the McGregor guy, never seen him fight.

I heard his name actually from one of the runners that works for our company, a little kid named Ken Hopkins, hes a runner and takes care of a lot of the daily business.

Whatever we need, he takes care of. Hes a cool little kid, I like him, and he does MMA. He told me about the guy McGregor.

They say he talk a lot of trash and people praise him for it, but when I did it, they say Im cocky and arrogant. So biased!

Like I said before, all Im saying is this, I aint racist at all, but Im telling you racism still exists.

McGregor also showed his humble side as he apologised for the recent picture of him holding the replica gun and stated he understands why the media have to report on such incidents.

"I apologise for having the air-soft in public. I was simply rehearsing for a potential upcoming film role," added McGregor.

"I understand that the more traffic a story can get the more revenue it generates. So I understand and respect that the media must create these stories and these situations even if at times it is at other people's expense.

"We've all got to eat. And I eat well. So I will not complain."

Over to you, Floyd.

Irish Independent
Ruined belongings are piled up in the street outside flooded homes

Ms Sturgeon went inside several properties to see for herself the damage caused by the floods

The clean-up is well under way in the town, and the Scottish Government has announced residents affected will be assisted with 12 million pounds of new funding

The First Minister also took time to speak with officials helping clear the mess left by flood waters

The First Minister spoke to residents in Canal Crescent and Ritchie Row, where homes were deluged when the River Don burst its banks on Thursday night

Scottish communities affected by severe weather are to be helped by 12 million of new funding, Nicola Sturgeon has announced.

The cash includes a 1,500 grant for every household, business premises or charity directly affected by flood water, and a 5 million fund for councils to replace damaged infrastructure.

The First Minister unveiled the funding boost as she visited the flood-hit north-east.

The area has been battered by heavy rain, causing severe disruption to travel, the evacuation of homes in some parts of Aberdeenshire and two severe flood warnings for Inverurie and Kintore.

It follows flooding across other parts of the country, including Tayside and the Borders, as a result of Storm Frank.

The funding is in addition to the 4 million announced by the Deputy First Minister in his budget statement, bringing the total package of support for those affected by the adverse weather to more than 16 million.

Ms Sturgeon has been under pressure from opposition parties to spell out what extra funding will be allocated to flood relief.

An extra 5.8 million will be made available to support households and business properties.

Councils which have suffered the most damage as a result of the flooding have been allocated a share of the fund, but people in any part of Scotland who have suffered flood damage can apply for a grant.

In addition to flood relief support, businesses whose ability to trade has been severely affected by flooding will be able to apply for an extra grant of 3,000 funded by the Scottish Government and administered by their local authority.

Additional funding of up to 5 million will be made available to councils to replace infrastructure severely damaged by flood waters, including support for the reinstatement of the A93 between Ballater and Braemar.

An Agricultural Floodbank Restoration Grant Scheme of up to 1 million will also be made available to farmers to restore damaged floodbanks, and discussions will continue next week with the industry on how the Government can support them through severe weather.

Ms Sturgeon said: "In the face of devastation Scotland's communities have rallied together and shown real strength. I have met with some local business owners who have made a real difference by offering vital support and once again I am amazed by the determination and dedication of all of our emergency services who are working around the clock to save homes and livelihoods.

"We do not yet have confirmation of consequentials coming from UK Government flood funds - however, now that the picture of those who need support is clearer, the Scottish Government is acting now to make sure that the people who need help get it."

Aberdeenshire Council has been given a 2 million share of the funding, while Aberdeen City Council has been allocated 500,000.

Dozens of homes were evacuated in Inverurie, Port Elphinstone and Ellon in the region as the swollen River Don sent flood waters racing down the streets on Thursday night and Friday morning.

Water also poured from the River Ythan, prompting the emergency services to mount an operation to rescue residents.

The Donside area, Keith, Huntly, Turriff, Kintore and parts of Aberdeen were also affected by the flooding.

The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) said it expects river levels to fall gradually, b ut a spokesman warned of the possibility of "residual impacts" in areas such as Kintore and Inverurie.

Ms Sturgeon, who was joined by north east MP Alex Salmond at the Inverurie Academy rest centre, said the emotional impact of the flooding was impossible to quantify.

She said: "I have spoken to people here and in Newton Stewart who have had their homes and businesses flooded and the devastation is heartbreaking.

"We want to help as much as we can but there's nothing you can say to someone to take away the pain of losing their personal possessions or seeing their homes flooded.

"That's the bit of this that is always going to be impossible to quantify.

"On the other side, the community spirit that we have seen has been heartwarming and quite incredible."

Ms Sturgeon again paid tribute to the work of the emergency services including police and fire crews.

Officers were on the streets of Inverurie helping people remove flood-damaged furniture, electricals, books and other items from their homes as the clear-up continues.

The First Minister spoke to residents in Canal Crescent and Ritchie Row, where homes suffered when the River Don topped its banks on Thursday night.

Some people were pumping out water while others used shovels and brushes to try to get rid of the remaining flood water.

Residents were throwing their damaged belongings in skips and electrical engineers were out tending to a sub station.

Ms Sturgeon entered several homes and told residents she was sorry to be meeting them under such circumstances, while wishing them the best as they tried to get their properties back to normal.

She said: "Our emergency services, police, fire, councils, utility companies, transport operators - everybody has pulled together.

"You can't exaggerate the devastation, but it has also brought out the best in communities as they respond."

Mr Salmond, MP for Gordon, said: "The north east of Scotland has been sorely tested over the last week and I think it has passed with flying colours in terms of the community spirit and people looking to help their fellow citizens in distress.

"In all of the people's houses I've been in today, they have had nothing but praise for the council workers, the police and the fire service who performed exceptionally well.

"But I think we should also emphasise the community spirit.

"The reaction of people has been extraordinary - right down to the 20 workers from Asda with their disinfectant, looking to help people clean up."

Scottish Labour's environmental justice spokeswoman Sarah Boyack renewed calls for a review of flood defence infrastructure.

She said: "It is vital that those affected receive this money as soon as possible. Families and local businesses can't wait for months for this support to actually arrive.

"Questions also need to be asked about how local authorities are expected to shoulder the burden for flood defences when the SNP plan to slash council budgets across the whole of Scotland."

Scottish Liberal Democrat MSP Alison McInnes , who lives in Ellon, one of the town's badly hit by flooding, said: "I'm pleased the First Minister has finally given us details of how the Scottish Government plans to help home owners, business owners and farmers affected by the recent flooding get back on track.

"Lessons need to be learnt on what's happened in Scotland since the start of 2016 because I still think this response took place at a snail's pace."

A Scottish Conservative spokesman said: "We welcome this much needed investment.

"The UK Government has made around nine million pounds available through the Barnett Formula, and that alongside today's announcement will be of great assistance."
The Duchess of Cambridge celebrates her 34th birthday today.

The past year has been busy for Kate, who gave birth to her second child Princess Charlotte, now aged eight months, last spring.

Prince George attended his first nursery class this week and was dropped off by his parents on Wednesday.

Highlights from Kate's 2015 public engagements include her inaugural Buckingham Palace State banquet - in honour of China's visiting President Xi Jinping - and her first visit to a prison, HMP Send near Guildford, Surrey.

Later this year the Duke and Duchess will tour India, their first visit to the Commonwealth country.

Kate and husband William are currently based at their Norfolk home Anmer Hall, near the Queen's private Sandringham estate.

With two small children to look after, it is unlikely the duchess will be celebrating into the small hours.

So a quiet candle-lit dinner at their country home could be planned by the Duke to mark the birthday of his wife, who was born at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, Reading, on January 9, 1982.

The couple were university sweethearts who met at St Andrews in Scotland before marrying in April 2011.
Stephen Doughty quit the Labour front bench live on TV in the wake of Jeremy Corbyn's reshuffle.

Jeremy Corbyn has insisted his reshuffle made Labour "stronger" despite being hit by a fresh resignation and accusations of "incompetence".

The Labour leader defended the shake up of his top team as it emerged that Alison McGovern was stepping down from heading a party poverty review.

The Wirral South MP has been infuriated by shadow chancellor John McDonnell's jibe that the Progress group - which she chairs - is "hard right".

She is set to spell out her reasons in an interview on the BBC's Sunday Politics, potentially fuelling a row between the Labour leadership and the broadcaster.

Mr Corbyn's office has filed a formal complaint after accusing the BBC of "orchestrating" the on-air resignation of Stephen Doughty from the front bench just before Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday. However, shadow civil society minister Anna Turley has said she had "no problem" with the corporation's actions.

Jonathan Reynolds and Kevan Jones also quit as shadow ministers citing policy differences with the leader and unfair treatment of sacked Europe spokesman Pat McFadden and shadow culture secretary Michael Dugher.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, McFadden accused Mr Corbyn and Mr McDonnell of an "attempt to demonise and delegitimise people and stop other voices being heard".

"The use of rhetoric like that is not what Jeremy promised when he took over.

"He said he would practise a kinder politics without personal attacks."

Mr McFadden said Mr Corbyn's world-view treated terrorists like "children" and undermined British values.

"This view of the world seems to separate the world into adults and children, and the adults are the West and the others - the children - are anti-West," he said. "That's not the way the world works.

"Blaming the West, blaming ourselves for their murderous actions is not robust enough in defence of what's good about our own society."

The promotion of Emily Thornberry to shadow defence secretary, replacing Maria Eagle, who supports the nuclear deterrent, has fuelled speculation that Mr Corbyn is planning to bring the party's position in line with his own unilateralist view.

Ms Thornberry and former London mayor Ken Livingstone, both opponents of Trident, are now jointly overseeing Labour's defence policy review.

Former soldier and Barnsley MP Dan Jarvis has said he would be " deeply uncomfortable" being a Labour candidate in 2020 if the party's manifesto pledged to get rid of the deterrent.

Mr Jones, a long-serving member of the defence team, told the Sunday Telegraph he viewed Mr Livingstone's influence as damaging. The close Corbyn ally recently suggested the UK could leave Nato, and argued that Russian president Vladimir Putin does not pose a military threat.

"Ken Livingstone hasn't got a clue what he is talking about. He is clearly not aware of the massive investment that Putin is making in not only upgrading Russia's nuclear capability but actually expanding it," Mr Jones said.

"If we are going to advocate unilateralism and withdraw from Nato that would only be welcome to President Putin. That would be dangerous for our national security and the British public would be against it."

Mr Jones said the "incompetence" of the protracted reshuffle was "very frustrating". "That has got to be laid at the leader's office's door," he said.

In an article for the Observer, Mr Corbyn tried to turn his fire on the Tories, accusing David Cameron of attacking democracy by cutting public funding for political parties and slashing the number of Westminster seats.

"For all the media sound and fury, last week's shadow cabinet reshuffle has made us a stronger, more diverse and more coherent leadership team," he wrote.

"Along with the huge increase in our party membership in the past six months, it will help make Labour a more effective champion of the people who need us to give them a voice, to win elections and change our country for the better."

Meanwhile in a possible sign of manoeuvring against Mr Corbyn, shadow work and pensions secretary Owen Smith has voiced interest in becoming leader.

"I don't think there's any vacancy right now," he told the New Statesman. "But I think any politician who comes into this to want to try and change the world for the better ... I think they're either in the wrong game or fibbing if they don't say, 'if you had the opportunity to be in charge and put in place your vision for a better Britain would you take it?'

"Yeh, of course, it would be an incredible honour and privilege to be able to do that."
Hongbin Liu "preyed on the vulnerabilities of his patients", Scotland Yard said

Hongbin Liu, who has been jailed for seven years

A practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine who raped one of his patients and sexually assaulted two others has been jailed for seven years, police said.

Hongbin Liu, 53, "preyed on the vulnerabilities of his patients" and carried out a string of sex assaults at two health centres in London, Scotland Yard said.

Liu, of Vauxhall Bridge Road in Victoria, pleaded guilty to one count of rape, one count of assault by penetration and two counts of sexual assault, at Wood Green Crown Court on Friday, the Met Police said.

He raped and assaulted a woman in her 40s, who cannot be named for legal reasons, at the Chinese Traditional Medicine Centre in Haverstock Hill in Camden, north London.

The woman visited the centre in February last year and agreed to see Liu as her usual therapist was not there.

During the acupuncture and massage consultation, Liu raped and assaulted her. On leaving the premises the woman went straight to a police station to report the offences, police said.

Liu was arrested, interviewed and provided a prepared statement denying the offences. He was bailed pending further inquiries.

In March last year, two more women reported they had been sexually assaulted at the Shu Jun Healthcare Centre on Wells Street, Westminster.

One of the victims thought that while giving her a massage, Liu took a picture of her with his phone, but officers were unable to recover the photographs.

Detective Constable Jane Tunnicliff, from the Met's Sexual Offences, Exploitation and Child Abuse Command, said: "This is a man who betrayed the patient-doctor relationship. Dr Liu preyed on the vulnerabilities of his patients.

"It is important that each and every one of us feel safe to seek treatment when we are ill or in pain. As police officers we strive to make our community safer for everyone - even behind closed doors."

Detective Inspector Lee Davison, said: "People who abuse their position of trust damage the fabric of our society and the impact of their actions on their victims can be great. We will pursue all such offenders to bring them to justice.

"I would encourage anyone who has suffered at the hand of another to report the matter to the police in the knowledge that they will be believed and supported."
Lemmy will be the toast of many pubgoers on the day of his funeral

Motorhead fans across Britain are flocking to pubs to raise a glass to Lemmy and watch the legendary frontman's funeral tonight.

Eulogies from friends and family of the late rock star will be given at a special memorial night being put on at The Wig And Gown pub in Holloway, north London.

The boozer said it had been overwhelmed by the number of fans wanting to pay their respects at the event tonight, where Lemmy's funeral will be livestreamed from America.

Akin Arrowsmith, 31, a barman from north London, was among those who got to the bar early for tonight's event.

He said: "I have been listening to Motorhead since I was about seven or eight.

"I was gutted when I heard Lemmy had died. My mum phoned me up and asked me if I was OK. I was lying in bed and had tears in my eye.

"We are going to give him a proper Motorhead send off - loud, messy and full of random chaos."

Suzanne Baker-Downes, a friend of Lemmy's who has organised tonight's memorial at the pub, said she had been "completely inundated" by thousands of people who want to attend.

She said: "Lemmy was a very popular guy."

Several other pubs in Holloway are hosting events to cater for the sheer number of fans who want to pay tribute to the rocker.

Around 150 Lemmy fans, many wearing black Motorhead t-shirts and leather jackets, descended on the Holloway pub to pay their respects to the 70-year-old who died over Christmas.

Motorhead classics including The Ace Of Spades blared out over the speakers before friends of Lemmy regaled the crowd with anecdotes about the star.

Ms Baker-Downes said: "I first met Lemmy at the Hippodrome rock night in January 1989.

"Upon being introduced Lemmy asked me 'Do you want to do some speed and come back to mine to look at my spiral staircase?'

"Bearing in mind I was 21 and straight off the Canadian banana boat I was scared stiff.

"I said 'No! And by the way we do have stairs in Canada you know.'

"Lemmy laughed himself silly and asked for my phone number and the rest is history.

"Let's just say that eventually I did indeed go to see that staircase."

A roadie who introduced himself just as Dave and worked for the band for seven years said: "You will hear a lot of things about Lemmy - icon, legend. All that is true.

"He was the best boss I ever had or will have, and more importantly he was a friend."

The crowd cheered and raised "a glass or six" to the late rock star.
The embattled boss of the Environment Agency should quit over his handling of the flooding crisis, MPs in some of the worst-affected areas have said.

Sir Philip Dilley faced intense criticism after it emerged he was on holiday in Barbados over Christmas while parts of the north of England were faced with a deluge.

Conservative Nigel Evans and Labour's Rachael Maskell said his behaviour had been "appalling" and his position was now "untenable".

Ms Maskell, who represents York Central, told BBC Radio 4's The Week In Westminster: "I think it's quite untenable now. This is somebody who is paid 100,000 to oversee the Environment Agency and, at its time of need, he wasn't here. And, therefore, I think it's quite untenable that he does stay in his position now."

Lancashire, Cumbria and Yorkshire were all hit by a series of devastating floods that have left thousands of homes and businesses ruined.

The agency chairman said that his absence - while distracting focus from flood-affected communities - had not affected the agency's performance but admitted he wished he had returned from the Caribbean sooner.

Mr Evans, MP for Ribble Valley, told the programme: "I think it's appalling. I know he's apologised but he said 'I can't guarantee there will never be a flood event while I'm away'.

"He clearly can't guarantee that, but what he should guarantee is that when something like this happens - 16,000 homes - he gets on the next plane, gets a pair of wellies on, gets knee deep in there and works out what the Environment Agency should be doing differently to ensure the flood defences are much, much better."

He added: "Yes I think he should go. Quite frankly, an amazing number of people gave up their Christmases ... and the guy in charge of the Environment Agency, overseeing how effective they are in dealing with these floods, thinks he can do it from Barbados. Well, I think he should spend more time in Barbados."
The Service Prosecuting Authority stressed no member of the Armed Forces would be prosecuted unless there was sufficient evidence

Hundreds of British soldiers have received letters questioning their role in claims of torture and murder during the Iraq War, as prosecutors confirmed more than 50 deaths are set to be examined.

Around 280 veterans have been sent documents telling them they were involved in an incident under investigation by the Iraq Historical Allegations Team (Ihat), a spokeswoman for the unit said.

Unlawful death cases involving 35 alleged killings have already been referred to the Service Prosecuting Authority (SPA) - the military equivalent of the Crown Prosecution Service - along with 36 cases of alleged abuse and mistreatment with "multiple complainants".

The SPA said it was also preparing to advise on an additional 20 cases of unlawful killing and 71 cases of mistreatment in the near future.

Andrew Cayley QC, the director of the SPA, said it "will not flinch" in prosecuting British soldiers where there is evidence of wrongdoing.

The former war crimes prosecutor said: "I have spent the last 20 years of my professional life advising and prosecuting in cases involving genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

"I know very well what these crimes look like. Make no mistake we will give all these Ihat cases the thorough scrutiny the law requires and if prosecution is warranted we will not flinch from proceeding.

"Equally I want to make it absolutely clear that no member of the British Armed Forces will be prosecuted unless there is sufficient evidence to do so."

UK forces withdrew from Iraq in 2009 although lawyers are continuing to refer cases to the Ihat, the Government-established criminal investigation into murder, abuse and torture claims linked to the six-year military mission.

The multimillion-pound inquiry's workload reached 1,515 possible victims by September, of whom 280 are alleged to have been unlawfully killed. Ihat's budget is set at 57.2 million, which runs until the end of 2019 - 16 years after the 2003 invasion began.

An Ihat spokeswoman confirmed that some of the letters sent to veterans in the last two years had been hand delivered by detectives and that there was "no obligation to respond".

"It is standard police practice to send letters as a means of contacting potential witnesses," she said. "Sometimes the letters are delivered by hand and it may be that if a potential witness is at home then the investigator will take the opportunity to ask a few questions."

A Ministry of Defence spokeswoman said: "The vast majority of UK service personnel deployed on military operations conduct themselves professionally and in accordance with the law.

"The MoD takes all allegations of abuse or unlawful killing extremely seriously. That is why we are ensuring that they are investigated to establish the facts."
A quiet celebration is thought to be on the cards for the Duchess

The Duchess of Cambridge will celebrate her 34th birthday today.

The past year has been busy for Kate, who gave birth to her second child, Princess Charlotte, now aged eight months, last spring.

Prince George attended his first nursery class this week and was dropped off by his parents on Wednesday - with pictures released of the two-year-old to mark the occasion.

Highlights from Kate's 2015 public engagements include her inaugural Buckingham Palace state banquet - in honour of China's visiting President Xi Jinping - and her first visit to a prison, HMP Send near Guildford, Surrey.

Later this year the Duke and Duchess will tour India, their first visit to the Commonwealth country.

Kate and husband William are based at their Norfolk home Anmer Hall, near the Queen's private Sandringham estate.

But with two small children to look after, it is unlikely the duchess will be celebrating into the small hours.

So a quiet candle-lit dinner at their country home could be planned by the Duke to mark the birthday of his wife, who was born at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, Reading, on January 9 1982.

The couple were university sweethearts who met at St Andrews University in Scotland before marrying in April 2011.

William has been working as a helicopter pilot with the East Anglian Air Ambulance since the summer, based out of Cambridge airport.
Police said the arrested man was known to the victim

A woman who was stabbed to death at a barber's shop has been named by police as 44-year-old Katrina O'Hara.

Police were called to Jock's Barbers in East Street, Blandford, Dorset, at 6.10pm, on Thursday January 7, and discovered Miss O'Hara who had suffered serious injuries in the incident and who died at the scene.

Her body was officially identified earlier today by her family who are being supported by specially-trained family liaison officers.

A Dorset Police spokesman said that a post mortem examination found that she died from two stab wounds to the chest in the incident which happened inside the barber's shop premises.

A 49-year-old local man, who sustained an injury to his wrist during the incident, has been arrested on suspicion of murder and is currently being treated in hospital.

The police spokesman said that the arrested suspect was known to the victim.

Detective Inspector Richard Dixey, of Dorset Police's major crime investigation team, said: "I would like to thank the public, in particular the local residents in Blandford, for their assistance, support and co-operation during this ordeal.

"Many witnesses have come forward with information and we have been able to locate a potential weapon - a knife - near to the scene of the incident.

"Family liaison officers have updated Miss O'Hara's family with these developments and our thoughts are with them at this tragic and most difficult time."

The case has been referred to the police watchdog, the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC), due to Dorset Police's "recent prior contact with people involved in this incident".
Abta says Egypt has suffered a "significant drop-off" in tourism after a series of terror attacks

British tourism in Egypt could suffer a slump following the latest terror attack at a Red Sea resort, an expert has warned.

Three European tourists were stabbed by two suspected Islamic State militants who attacked a hotel in Hurghada late on Friday.

It is the latest in a series of terror attacks in Egypt and comes less than three months after a Russian jet flying from Sharm el Sheikh exploded, killing all 224 people aboard.

Sean Tipton of Abta, the association of travel agents and tour operators, said Egypt has already suffered a "significant drop-off" in tourism in the wake of terror attacks.

He warned that the stabbings could further damage the industry.

He told the Press Association: "We have already seen quite a big drop-off in business to Egypt. We saw that after the Arab Spring, not because people were being attacked but because people had a general worry about demonstrations etc.

"Bookings started to pick up again a couple of years after the Arab Spring. But with what has happened in Sharm el Sheikh Airport and yesterday's attack it doesn't encourage people to travel to that destination.

"But I will say that British holidaymakers are very resilient. In other countries it takes very little for them to stop travelling to a destination."

Some 1,500 British tourists are estimated to be in Hurghada, which is one of the most popular Red Sea resorts with British tourists after Sharm el Sheikh.

The Foreign Office has not changed its travel advice and tour operators are still travelling to the area.

Mr Tipton said tourism is important to the Egyptian economy and the country has high levels of security to protect holidaymakers.

He said: "One of the reasons why the British Foreign Office has not advised against travel to the Red Sea resorts is because of the fact that Egyptians do have very high levels of security.

"They have advised against travel through the airport at Sharm el Sheik but they haven't advised against travel to the resort itself.

"Egyptians do take security incredibly seriously, but I think incidents like this show how important that is."

Egyptian tourism minister Hisham Zaazou visited the three injured tourists and vowed to beef up security at the resort in the wake of the attack.

He said: "I have just visited the three victims involved in the incident and am relieved they were not seriously hurt and will be released from hospital today. I conveyed my deepest regrets for what they went through last night.

"Unfortunately there is an active global challenge with many incidents in recent days and months throughout the world. The authorities in Hurghada acted very quickly and very effectively to deal with the local agitators whose goal was to further harm the tourism sector which is so important to Egypt's economy.

"Over the coming days we will announce even greater security measures to safeguard all tourists visiting Egypt. This follows the recent important announcement concerning the appointment of the international risk and security company Control Risks to assist us further to enhance airport security.

"The welfare of the tourists visiting Egypt is of the greatest importance to us and will continue to be so. No stone will be left unturned to ensure their security despite the global challenges we have witnessed in cities throughout the world."
Cabinet Secretary Sir Jeremy Heywood has said that Freedom of Information had a "chilling effect" on Whitehall

Cabinet Secretary Sir Jeremy Heywood's department has the worst record for transparency in Whitehall, with nearly six in 10 information requests denied, it was reported.

The man whose department is responsible for a cross-party review of the Freedom of Information (FoI) Act, has previously claimed it has a "chilling effect" on the effective running of government.

However it is feared any proposals may seek to water down the laws that facilitate the release of information, particularly facts that are damaging to those in power.

An investigation by the Daily Mail revealed the Cabinet Office, which handles enquires made to Downing Street, rejected 57% of requests, compared to the average of 34% across all Whitehall departments.

The department with the best record for transparency, UK export and finance, denied requests for only 6% of cases.

Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron told the newspaper: "Accountability and transparency are words that regularly come out of the mouth of the Prime Minister but these figures show that these words are hollow.

"Unlike the Prime Minister, I still believe that sunshine is the best disinfectant.

"The Cabinet Office should be leading by example, not trailing behind miserably."

The Independent Commission on FOI, chaired by former Whitehall mandarin Lord Burns, is said to be looking at changes that would undermine the Act, such as giving officials and ministers increased powers of veto and imposing charges on requests.

The figures, themselves obtained by exercising FoI, showed that between July and September last year the Cabinet Office received 497 requests under the Act.

In 290 of the cases the information was held, however just 55 were approved in full, compared to the 165, or 57%, that were "fully withheld".

In 39 of the cases some of the requested information was withheld, while 31 were yet to see a decision.

A Cabinet Office spokesman told the Daily Mail: "The Cabinet Office is absolutely committed to Freedom of Information, and we have led the Government's drive to publish more data more regularly than ever before.

'We are working hard to make our processes even more efficient."

Jonathan Isaby, chief executive of the TaxPayers' Alliance, said: "These statistics are extremely disheartening and demonstrate a worrying disregard for transparency and accountability.

"Unless there is a compelling reason to withhold information from the public, government departments must take the responsibility of responding to FoI requests seriously.

"Freedom of Information requests should be seen as a tool for healthy dialogue between us and those who govern us and treated as such."
Police said men aged 24, 22 and 18 had been arrested

Three men have been arrested and bailed after Jewish shoppers were reportedly pelted with gas canisters and had "Hitler is on the way" shouted at them.

The anti-Semitic incident is alleged to have happened at Tottenham Hale Retail Park, north London, at around 7.45pm on Wednesday, while the suspects were in a pick-up vehicle.

Jewish neighbourhood watch group Shomrim said they had been contacted by one of the victims who claimed a man in the vehicle also shouted "Heil Hitler", according to reports.

Scotland Yard said three men, aged 24, 22 and 18, were arrested on suspicion of a religiously aggravated public order offence and have been bailed to a date in late February.

All three suspects came forward to the police and remain in custody, the force said.

Anyone with information on the incident is asked to call the police on 101 or anonymously to Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.
A young British tourist has died while on holiday on an island in Thailand.

Friends have paid tribute to Luke Miller, who has died in the island of Koh Tao.

His death comes just days after he posted a New Year's Eve message on Facebook in which he told how he was "living the dream".

He wrote: "Can honestly say this new year I am living the dream of to the full moon party on a speed boat drink cocktails strawberry daiquiris living life to the full yolo so let's do this."

Joanne Doe wrote: "To think we were enjoying your photos seeing you live the holiday of a lifetime. This is such a shock. Will never forget that mental Christmas party at ours! At least you were living life to the full. Thoughts are with your family right now and Erin Laird xxxx RIP Luke Miller."

A Foreign Office spokesman said: "We are providing assistance to the family of a British national who has died in Koh Tao, Thailand. Local authorities are investigating the death and we will remain in contact with them."

A fundraising page has been set up to raise money to bring Mr Miller's body back to the UK. By 5pm more than 5,000 had been raised.

British backpackers Hannah Witheridge, 23, and David Miller, 24, were brutally murdered on a beach on the island in September 2014.

Miss Witheridge, from Hemsby in Norfolk, had been raped before she was killed, while Mr Miller, from Jersey, had been hit over the head before drowning in the sea.

Bar workers Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo, also known as Win Zaw Htun, were found guilty of their murders.

Brad Cotton wrote on Facebook: "R.I.P big brother Luke Miller, I love you forever and always you April Fool."

He added: "I would like to thank you all for all your support its been such a hard day for the whole family, my mum is so distraught and trying to support her is so hard but it's something I need to do, I might give Facebook a break for a few days just to focus on my family, Thankyou again."
Lara Casalotti, a mixed-race woman with blood cancer being treated at University College Hospital, needs a life-saving stem cell transplant

The family of a mixed-race woman desperate for a life-saving stem cell transplant after being diagnosed with blood cancer has launched a global appeal to find a donor.

Lara Casalotti, from Hampstead, north London, has yet to find a bone marrow donor to match her mixed Italian and Thai heritage.

The 24-year-old student and charity campaigner was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia, a quickly developing disease most common in people over 65, in December. She was working in Thailand and initially believed she had pulled a muscle in her back.

Miss Casalotti, who speaks five languages and is studying global migration at UCL, volunteers with young refugees and has previously worked at the UN.

Her family have launched the #Match4lara appeal in order to find a match and to increase awareness after discovering there is a lack of donors for ethnic minorities.

There is a severe shortage of ethnic minority donors on the Anthony Nolan register in the UK. According to figures only 20% of people from black, Asian and ethnic minorities who need a stem cell transplant will find a match.

The campaign has already attracted an increase in the number of donors, and the Match4Lara Facebook page has nearly 4,000 likes.

Miss Casalotti said: "I really can't express how grateful and touched I am by everyone who has helped raise awareness and has signed up to bone marrow registries in response to the campaign."

Her brother Seb, a 20-year-old medical student at Cambridge, said: "She wants to turn this into something positive for other people who are struggling to find donors by getting more people from mixed race and ethnic minority backgrounds to join a stem cell donor register."

Lara is being treated at London's University College Hospital. Her brother was found not to be a match.

Mr Casalotti said: "We've got to think as a community. There's no room for the attitude of only helping your own.

"There's no time to put this off or think 'I'll do it next week'. That could be too late for Lara. Please do it today."

Ann O'Leary, head of register development at Anthony Nolan, described Lara as "a truly inspirational and selfless young woman" adding that "somewhere out there, there's a potential lifesaver who could give her a lifeline."

Joining the Anthony Nolan register involves filling in a form and providing a saliva sample. Those who go on to donate usually do so via an outpatient appointment similar to donating blood - debunking the myth that donation is traumatic or painful.

People aged 16 to 30 can join the Anthony Nolan register at www.anthonynolan.org.

For more information on the campaign visit http://www.match4lara.com/ or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgnFZjqQ8Cw.
Women's rights activists, far-right demonstrators and left-wing counter-protesters took to the streets of Cologne on Saturday to voice their opinions in the debate that has followed a string of New Year's Eve sexual assaults and robberies blamed largely on foreigners.

Amid the heightened public pressure, Chancellor Angela Merkel's party proposed stricter laws regulating asylum-seekers in the country - some 1.1 million of whom arrived last year.

Police said that around 1,700 protesters from the anti-Islam Pegida movement were kept apart from 1,300 counter-demonstrators in simultaneous protests outside the city's main train station.

Pegida members held banners with slogans like "Rapefugees not welcome" and "Integrate barbarity?" while the counter-protesters pushed the message "refugees welcome".

Specifics of the New Year's Eve assaults and who were behind them are still being investigated. The attackers were among about 1,000 men gathered at Cologne's central train station, some of whom broke off into small groups and surrounded women, groping them and stealing their purses, cell phones and other belongings, according to authorities and witness reports. There are also two allegations of rape.

The Pegida demonstration on Saturday was shut down early by authorities using water cannons after protesters threw firecrackers and bottles at some of the 1,700 police on hand. Police said four people were taken into custody but no injuries were immediately reported.

Earlier, hundreds of women's rights activists gathered outside Cologne's landmark cathedral to rally against the New Year's Eve violence.

"It's about making clear that we will not stop moving around freely here in Cologne, and to protest against victim bashing and the abuse of women," said 50-year-old city resident Ina Wolf.

In response to the incidents, Ms Merkel said her CDU party on Saturday had approved a proposal seeking stricter laws regulating asylum seekers.

Ms Merkel said the proposal, which will be discussed with her coalition partners and would need parliamentary approval, would help Germany deport "serial offenders" convicted of lesser crimes.

"This is in the interests of the citizens of Germany, but also in the interests of the great majority of the refugees who are here," Ms Merkel told party members in Mainz.

However, she also reiterated her mantra on the refugee issue, insisting again "we will manage it".

Bonn University political scientist Tilman Mayer said he does not see the CDU proposal as either a change of course, nor one likely to dispel many Germans' concerns.

"This is just a building block in a chain of statements from the government and also the chancellor," he said on Phoenix television.

Though Ms Merkel has decried the assaults as "repugnant criminal acts that ... Germany will not accept", they provide fodder for those who have opposed her open-door policy and refusal to set a cap on refugee numbers.

Influential Hamburg broadcaster NDR said in an opinion piece posted online Friday that such crimes threaten to push xenophobia toward the "middle of the population" - which could lead to a backlash against refugees.

"And who is to blame mainly?" the editorial asked. "These young, testosterone-driven time bombs with their image of women from the Middle Ages."

Despite the harsh rhetoric, the case is not yet that clear and the investigation is ongoing.

Of 31 suspects temporarily detained for questioning following the New Year's Eve attacks, there were 18 asylum seekers but also two Germans and an American among others, and none were accused of specifically committing sexual assaults.

Cologne police on Saturday said more than 100 detectives are assigned to the case and are investigating 379 criminal complaints filed with them, about 40% of which involve allegations of sexual offences.

"The people in the focus of the criminal investigation are primarily from North African countries," police said. "Most are asylum seekers or people living illegally in Germany. The investigation into if, and how widely, these people were involved in concrete criminal activity on New Year's Eve is ongoing."

Witness Lieli Shabani told the Guardian newspaper the attacks appeared coordinated, saying she watched from the steps of the city's cathedral as three men appeared to be giving instructions to others.

"One time a group of three or four males would come up to them, be given instructions and sent away into the crowd," the 35-year-old teacher was quoted as saying. "Then another group of four or five would come up, and they'd gesticulate in various directions and send them off again."

National broadcaster ARD called the attacks a "wake-up call" that illuminates the difficulty that lies ahead for Germany of integrating the newcomers.

"But we must not give in to our fears," ARD said. "If we now take all the refugees into custody, if we erect fences around our homes and country, if we join the swing to the right that some of our neighbors have, then we give up all we have achieved."

Cologne's police chief was dismissed on Friday amid mounting criticism of his force's handling of the incidents, and for being slow with releasing information.

Speaking in Mainz, Ms Merkel said local authorities must not be perceived to be withholding information and urged that the case be "fully clarified".

"Everything has to be put on the table," she said.

The proposal passed by her CDU party's leaders would strengthen the ability of police to conduct checks of identity papers, and also to exclude foreigners from being granted asylum if they have been convicted of crimes and sentenced to terms even as light as probation.

"Serial offenders who consistently, for example, return to theft or time and again insult women must count on the force of the law," Ms Merkel said.
Artur Mas has been replaced as the Together For Yes alliance's candidate for regional government leader (AP)

Catalonia's pro-independence parties agreed on Saturday to appoint a new leader to enable the creation of a regional coalition government and reinvigorate a push for independence from Spain by 2017.

Carles Puigdemont was selected to replace Artur Mas as the Together For Yes alliance's candidate for regional government leader. Mr Mas announced the decision at a press conference late Saturday, ending months of negotiations.

The Spanish government, that considers the secessionist initiative to be unconstitutional and has used the judiciary to challenge it, appealed to Catalonia's leader to end the strategy of dividing and fracturing Catalan society.

"Dedicate your efforts to seeking solutions to your citizens' problems rather than to generating new tensions," it said in a statement.

Polls show that most Catalans support a referendum on independence, but are roughly evenly divided over breaking from Spain.

Mr Mas' ruling conservative Convergence party had joined forces with the Republican Left of Catalonia as Together For Yes to win 62 seats in the 135-seat regional parliament last September. However, Mr Mas needed 10 seats held by the radical, anti-capitalist CUP party to form a majority, and its leaders insisted he was not acceptable to them as the region's leader.

The CUP had repeatedly rejected Mr Mas' candidacy because of his past government's austerity policies and his party's links to corruption scandals, but said it would support another alliance candidate.

Mr Mas said he had agreed to "step aside" to allow the election of Mr Puigdemont, a move he said "guarantees the parliamentary stability of Catalonia".

He added it was "beneficial and appropriate" in order to secure the secessionist "project".

Mr Puigdemont is the mayor of the city of Girona and a member of Mr Mas's Convergence party. His appointment means new regional elections can be averted.

"New elections would have been the worst option for Catalonia," said Mr Mas.

He added he would not be retiring from politics, but was considering an ambassador-like role, taking the message that an independent Catalonia is a good idea overseas.
Officer Jesse Hartnett, who was ambushed by by gunman as he sat in his marked cruiser (Philadelphia Police Department/AP)

A man who ambushed a police officer sitting in his marked car, firing more than a dozen shots at point-blank range, said he was acting in the name of Islam, US authorities said.

Both the officer and suspect were wounded during the barrage of gunfire in Philadelphia.

The suspect, 30-year-old Edward Archer, also pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group when he was questioned after his arrest in the shooting, police said.

Police Commissioner Richard Ross described the attack on Officer Jesse Hartnett, captured on a police surveillance camera, as an attempted assassination.

"He just came out of nowhere and started firing on him," he said. "He just started firing with one aim and one aim only, to kill him."

Mr Ross said Archer told police he believed the department defends laws that are contrary to Islam.

Police said there was no indication anyone else was involved. but Mr Ross added: "It stands to reason there is more unknown than known."

Though Archer "clearly gave us a motive," Mr Ross said it is now up to police to see what the evidence shows.

Federal agents joined local police in searching two Philadelphia area properties associated with Archer, including the home where his mother lives.

Captain James Clark, head of the homicide unit, said Archer told investigators: "I follow Allah. I pledge my allegiance to the Islamic State and that's why I did what I did."

Archer's mother, Valerie Holliday, told The Philadelphia Inquirer he has been hearing voices recently and that family asked him to get help. She also said her son felt targeted by police, and described him as devout Muslim.

Jacob Bender, the executive director of the Philadelphia chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said he contacted about five inner-city mosques and found no-one who knew of Archer.

He said at this point, the motive still appears to be conjecture.

"I think the important point is not to lay the blame for this on the entire Islamic community," he said.

The gunman fired at least 13 shots toward Mr Hartnett and eventually got up next to the car and reached through the driver's-side window, investigators said.

Despite being seriously wounded, the officer got out of his car, chased the suspect and returned fire, wounding his attacker in the buttocks.

Other officers chased Archer and apprehended him.

Mr Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in the arm and will require numerous operations, but was in a stable condition.

Archer was treated and released into police custody.
The Taliban has been battling the US-backed government in Afghanistan for nearly 15 years and has recently stepped up attacks

Afghan officials are told hold talks with the US, China and Pakistan on reviving negotiations to end the Afghanistan war.

Afghan foreign ministry spokesman Ahmad Shekib Mostaghni said representatives will meet on Monday in Pakistan's capital to discuss a "road map for peace talks".

Kabul's delegation will be led by deputy foreign minister Hekmat Karzai.

The talks in Islamabad were agreed on during a visit to Kabul last month by Pakistan's army chief General Raheel Sharif.

The talks do not include the Taliban, which has been battling the US-backed government for nearly 15 years and has recently stepped up attacks.

Pakistan hosted a meeting of Kabul officials and Taliban representatives last summer, but the process collapsed after the announcement of the death of long-time Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar.

A subsequent power struggle within the Taliban has raised questions about who would represent the insurgents if and when talks with Kabul are revived.

Pakistan is believed to have influence over the Taliban, but relations with Kabul have been tense in recent months. The two countries have long accused each other of backing the Taliban and other insurgents operating along their porous border.

Afghan president Ashraf Ghani took part in a regional conference last month in Islamabad which called for the resumption of the Afghan-Taliban peace negotiations.

Mr Ghani was given a warm welcome at the meeting, which was also attended by US and Chinese representatives.
Two Palestinians have been shot dead after trying to stab soldiers at a West Bank checkpoint, according to the Israeli military.

The incident is the latest in more than three months of near-daily Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers that have killed 21 people, mostly in stabbings, shootings and car-ramming assaults.

At least 137 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire. About two-thirds of them are said by Israel to be attackers, while the others were killed in clashes with troops.

Israel says the bloodshed is fuelled by a Palestinian campaign of incitement. Palestinians say it stems from frustration at decades of occupation.

The death toll does not include three Israelis killed last week by an Arab gunman in Tel Aviv. The attacker was killed on Friday in a shootout with police special forces following a massive manhunt. His motives remain unclear.

On Saturday, the Israeli military demolished the West Bank home of one of the earliest lethal attackers. Mohannad Halabi, a 19-year-old law student from the West Bank, stabbed to death two Israelis in Jerusalem's Old City in early October before he was shot dead by police.

Israel recently revived house demolition as a punitive measure in an attempt to deter future attackers by establishing that their families could be harmed even after their own deaths.
A person carrying a surfboard crosses the puddle outside Drummond Central in Newcastle upon Tyne, which became an internet sensation with tens of thousands of people watching it on Periscope. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Wednesday January 6, 2016. See PA story SOCIAL Puddle. Photo credit should read: Tom White/PA Wire

A puddle that gripped the nation has been drained by two council workers unaware of its celebrity status.

Hundreds of thousands of Britons watched a livestream on the internet of people trying to negotiate their way around the puddle just off Jesmond Road West in Newcastle.

It was broadcast on the video app Periscope by staff at marketing company Drummond Central Ltd and quickly began trending on Twitter with the hashtag Drummondpuddlewatch.

But now it is no more as two engineers from Newcastle City Council, who were inspecting for flood damage, drained it away to clear the path.

Expand Expand Expand Expand Expand Previous Next Close Handout photo issued by Newcastle City Council of workers clearing away a puddle outside Drummond Central in Newcastle upon Tyne, which became an internet sensation with tens of thousands of people watching it on Periscope. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Issue date: Thursday January 7, 2016. See PA story SOCIAL Puddle. Photo credit should read: Newcastle City Council/PA Wire NOTE TO EDITORS: This handout photo may only be used in for editorial reporting purposes for the contemporaneous illustration of events, things or the people in the image or facts mentioned in the caption. Reuse of the picture may require further permission from the copyright holder. PA A person carrying a surfboard stands alongside the puddle outside Drummond Central in Newcastle upon Tyne, which became an internet sensation with tens of thousands of people watching it on Periscope. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Wednesday January 6, 2016. See PA story SOCIAL Puddle. Photo credit should read: Tom White/PA Wire PA Handout photo issued by Newcastle City Council of workers clearing away a puddle outside Drummond Central in Newcastle upon Tyne, which became an internet sensation with tens of thousands of people watching it on Periscope. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Issue date: Thursday January 7, 2016. See PA story SOCIAL Puddle. Photo credit should read: Newcastle City Council/PA Wire NOTE TO EDITORS: This handout photo may only be used in for editorial reporting purposes for the contemporaneous illustration of events, things or the people in the image or facts mentioned in the caption. Reuse of the picture may require further permission from the copyright holder. PA A sign stands in the puddle outside Drummond Central in Newcastle upon Tyne, which became an internet sensation with tens of thousands of people watching it on Periscope. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Wednesday January 6, 2016. See PA story SOCIAL Puddle. Photo credit should read: Tom White/PA Wire PA The puddle outside Drummond Central in Newcastle upon Tyne, which became an internet sensation with tens of thousands of people watching it on Periscope. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Wednesday January 6, 2016. See PA story SOCIAL Puddle. Photo credit should read: Periscope/PA Wire PA / Facebook

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Whatsapp Handout photo issued by Newcastle City Council of workers clearing away a puddle outside Drummond Central in Newcastle upon Tyne, which became an internet sensation with tens of thousands of people watching it on Periscope. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Issue date: Thursday January 7, 2016. See PA story SOCIAL Puddle. Photo credit should read: Newcastle City Council/PA Wire NOTE TO EDITORS: This handout photo may only be used in for editorial reporting purposes for the contemporaneous illustration of events, things or the people in the image or facts mentioned in the caption. Reuse of the picture may require further permission from the copyright holder.

A council spokesman said: "Two operatives from our structural engineering contractor were assigned to check the nearby subway following the heavy weather.

"As the path with the puddle is a busy route for cyclists and pedestrians, they thought they were being helpful by digging away a little bit of soil to clear the water - and were completely unaware of its celebrity status.

"Under normal circumstances we would all be very grateful to them for their initiative and helpfulness.

"Through the power of social media the puddle has provided a bit of fun for thousands of people - but with more rain forecast it was probably high time to pull the plug on its internet popularity."

There were also allegations that local Liberal Democrat councillors were to blame, with Labour council leader Nick Forbes tweeting last night: "Lib Dems have just demanded that the council removes #DrummondPuddleWatch immediately! Spoilsports!"
Bangladesh police are investigating the stabbing death of a convert to Christianity, while government officials are downplaying Islamic State claims of responsibility.

After Thursdays killing of a Christian homeopathic doctor in southwestern Bangladesh, the countrys home minister vowed to go after people attacking members of religious minorities.

We have been providing maximum protection to all minorities. We will do whatever necessary to crush the militants in Bangladesh, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal told BenarNews.

The people of Bangladesh are pious but they are not radicals. So, the militants will get no space in Bangladesh, he added.

The Islamic State extremist group claimed responsibility for stabbing to death 85-year-old Samir al-Din, a convert to Christianity, in Jhenaidah district, according to SITE Intelligence, a U.S-based group that monitors online communications and social media traffic among Islamic militants.

The soldiers of the caliphate were able to eliminate the apostate, named Samir al-Din by stabbing him with a knife, SITE quoted IS as saying.

But as he did in the aftermath of other recent attacks targeting foreigners and members of religious minorities, the home minister again rejected the claim that IS was responsible for the latest attack.

Police in Jhenaidah, meanwhile, said they were investigating al-Dins killing.

Mohammad Azbahar Ali Shaikh, an additional superintendent of police in the district, told BenarNews on Friday that al-Din was stabbed in the chest between 12:30 and 2 p.m. on Thursday inside his shop in Jhenaidah, about 200 km (125 miles) southwest of Dhaka.

Shaikh said a patient went to his shop for medicine but no one responded.

"Everybody thought he may have had died of heart attack. As he was placed him on the khatiya, people saw blood on his chest. His right hand bore a mark of injury," Shaikh said. A khatiya is a coffin-like open cradle in which dead bodies are carried.

Converted in 2001

The local church has shown us papers confirming his conversion to Christianity in 2001. But family members have told us that he used to offer prayers as a Muslim, Shaikh said, adding that al-Din had previously been a disciple of a Chisti Pir  or Islamic instructor - in Panchagarh, a district in northern Bangladesh.

The perpetrators were able to attack him and not be noticed because neighbors were watching a horse race on Thursday.

We do not know that he was killed for his faith; we suspect that a feud over land and money could have led to his death. Usually, militants slit the throat, Shaikh said. He was stabbed in the chest as the criminals do.

Patient Abdul Alim, 55, told BenarNews that al-Din was friendly.

This is a mystery why a friendly and elderly person like him as killed, Alim said.

Nirmal Rozario, the general secretary of the Bangladesh Christian Association, on Friday told BenarNews that he might have been killed for his belief.

We strongly condemn such attacks, he said, pointing out that the government had assured protection of all minorities in Bangladesh.

A Muslim-majority South Asian country of 160 million people, Bangladesh used to boast for religious harmony and tolerance for minority Hindus, Christians, Buddhists, Shiites and other faiths.

But minorities, secular bloggers and the foreigners have become the targets of the suspected Islamic militants since Sept. 28, 2015, when three motorcyclists shot and killed Italian aid worker Tavella Cesare in Dhaka. Less than a week later, Japanese national Kunio Hoshi was killed in Rangpur city in similar fashion.

Since then Christian leaders have been attacked as have secular writers and publishers. Even on-duty police personnel were hacked to death. The militants trademark machetes and knives were used in most of the attacks.
Toiy Charongan hangs sheets of unprocessed rubber out to dry at her and her husbands rubber farm in the southern Thai province of Phang Nga, Oct. 1, 2014.

Thailand is facing rising discontent among rubber farmers devastated by a plunge in the price of the commodity, one of the kingdoms top exports.

Rubbers farmers in 17 provinces in the south  the major base for the countrys production of natural rubber plan to rally on Tuesday to demand more action and a swifter response to their plight from the Thai government.

Farmers are growing desperate.

At least two of them have taken their own lives, according to reports. On Thursday, a photo of a farmer who had hanged himself circulated on social media and Thai news reports.

How many people have died already because of the slump? The government doesnt care about how many die, Roya Sela, a rubber farmer in Pattani province, told BenarNews.

But Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha, who earlier pledged financial assistance to rubber farmers and tappers spread out across 56 of Thailand's 77 provinces, says the government has done plenty to help them.

Last week, he threatened legal action against farmers who joined the upcoming rallies.

"Come on out. Come on out and be sued but I continue to perform my duty," Prayuth told a news conference in Bangkok, referring to Tuesdays planned protests by rubber farmers.

We have officials to talk with them. There is no need to rally because they wont get what they seek, Prayuth said in rejecting farmers demands for more governmental subsidies needed to offset low prices for rubber.

Meanwhile, Thai Federation of Rubber Farmers president Boonsong Nubthong told BenarNews that it had applied for a permit to rally on Tuesday at the Hat Yai rubber market in Songkhla province, a southern hub for rubber production in Thailand, but was still waiting for a reply.

The federation intends at the rally to call on authorities to intervene urgently to prevent prices from dropping farther and speed up the process of compensating farmers financially, among other demands, Boonsong said.

Farmers have complained that compensation payments have been slow to reach them or that these have been delayed by complex bureaucratic steps requiring that claimants meet stringent criteria, such as proof of land deeds, according to sources.

On Saturday, The Nation newspaper reported that political office holders in affected provinces were backing away from taking an active role in organizing the rallies, because of the prime ministers warning about possible legal consequences.

Under Article 44 of Thailands interim constitution, which the junta invoked last year, authorities can arrest citizens taking part in demonstrations or public gatherings that number five people or more.

Under a dollar per kilo

Thailand is the worlds No. 1 exporter of natural rubber, but prices for Thai rubber have dropped sharply on the international market in recent years. The industry employs two million people in the kingdom, including many migrant workers, according to the Rubber Research Institute of Thailand.

A bloated oversupply of natural rubber produced in Thailand and increased demand for petroleum-based synthetic rubber have contributed along with other factors to falling prices.

The price for natural rubber from Thailand has plummeted since 2011. Five years ago, sheets of ribbed rubber sold for 174 baht (U.S. $4.78) per kilo. Now they sell for 34 baht (93 cents) a kilo, according to statistics from the institute.

In November, the government approved a 12.75-billion baht (U.S. $350.6 million-) package of subsidies for rubber farmers to compensate them for lost income. Last month, the Thai junta also agreed to provide the struggling farmers with 5.05 billion baht (U.S. $139 million) in loans.

I will give sustainable assistance, which means they need to cooperate with me to reform the rubber farming, Prayuth told reporters on Thursday.

The subsidy package approved in November breaks down to payments to farmers of 1,500 baht (U.S. $41) per rai, a Thai land measurement unit, and the payments are capped at 15 rai for every farmer or landowner who puts in a claim. One acre equals 2.53 rai.

At the news conference, the prime minister said the government could only limit its compensation for farmers at that rate.

The money used to compensate is tax payers money. If we spend it on a certain group of citizens, others will ask for this and that too, Prayuth said, adding, The remedy of 1,500 baht per rai is the right solution.

The prime minister addressed the media only a week after traveling to Surat Thani province in the south, where he handed out compensation payments to some 20 rubber farmers.

From there, he traveled on to Hat Yai where he inaugurated the first phase of Rubber City, an industrial estate being built to promote investment in the southern rubber sector.

Cutting down, selling trees to get by

Hat Yai lies just outside Thailands restive borderland region known as the Deep South.

The largely Malay-speaking and Muslim region encompasses four districts of Songkhla and the provinces of Pattani, Narathiwat and Yala, where a separatist conflict has claimed the lives of at least 6,000 people since 2004.

The Deep South is impoverished and the rubber industry is a pillar of its economy. But the security threat from insurgent activity compounds the economic woes of local rubber farmers.

Rubber farming normally is done at night, when cooler temperatures are optimal for tapping sap from rubber trees.

Fears of night-time insurgent activity, however, have scared many farmers into tapping for sap in daylight. The end result, farmers say, is a rubber of poorer quality that wont sell as well.

Farmer Goseng Wae-kaseng, a father of five, owns a small rubber plantation in Yala province that occupies 5 rai (1.9 acres).

As a result of low prices for his product, his daily income is down to 400 baht (U.S. $11), he said.

The hardship has caused his two oldest children, sons aged 17 and 20, to migrate to neighboring Malaysia in search of jobs.

Three children remain in school. Dont ask me if I earn enough for them, he told BenarNews.

If I cannot find money on certain days, I have to cut down rubber trees and sell them to make do. I have cut down trees seven times already  five trees each time to make a thousand baht [U.S. $27.50], he added.

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In other news, Arizona state Senator John Kavanagh (R) wants to make it illegal to film police officers within 20 feet because "most cameras have great resolution where you dont really lose anything when youre 20 feet away." Okay.

Meanwhile, a North Dakota man was arrested in D.C. for plotting to kidnap First Dog Bo Obama.

And finally, Paul LePage says you should give him a break for saying racist things because he's a genuine idiot.

My brain was slower than my mouth, LePage, a Republican, told reporters at the state house in Augusta. The take-away is this: I dont really care what the press thinks about me. But I want the drug dealers to know: Im after them.
Assured Guaranty Ltd. and Ambac Financial Group Inc. filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Puerto Rico's revenue clawback strategy, fanning concern that a long, messy process lies ahead as the commonwealth seeks to restructure about $70 billion of public bond debt.

"As had been widely predicted and forewarned, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico has been sued by Wall Street insurers," Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla said in a statement Friday. "This latest development will force a race to the courthouse and with no legal framework to handle this impending litigation crisis both the Commonwealth and its creditors will soon face the opposite of due process and rule of law. This reality causes great uncertainty for all parties involved."

Garcia Padilla said Congress could have prevented the coming "litigation pandemonium" at no cost to the U.S. taxpayers.

"Congress can still prevent this humanitarian crisis from spinning out of control by immediately enacting the Puerto Rico Emergency Financial Stability Act of 2015," he said, referring to a bill introduced by House and Senate Democrats that would have established a short-term stay on creditor litigation until Congress takes action to allow Puerto Rico to restructure its debts. "Swift action from our congressional leaders is necessary and what the people of Puerto Rico deserve."

Puerto Rico on Jan. 4 failed to pay $35.9 million of interest on rum tax bonds issued by the Puerto Rico Infrastructure Finance Authority and $1.4 million in interest on Puerto Rico Public Finance Corp. bonds. In order to pay about $1 billion in other public sector debt payments, Puerto Rico said it diverted money from the income streams for the rum tax bonds, Puerto Rico Highway and Transportation Authority bonds, Convention Center District Authority bonds, Metropolitan Bus Authority bonds, and the Integrated Transportation Authority bonds.

On Dec. 29, Ambac and Financial Guaranty Insurance Co. delivered letters to Puerto Rico's government saying they considered the diversion of money from the PRIFA bonds to be illegal.

"Litigation is not the quickest route to a resolution," said Jim Spiotto, managing director of Chapman Strategic Advisors. "It's always time-consuming, expensive, and subject to appeal. Certainly Congress has before it various mechanisms to provide oversight to help Puerto Rico help itself to solve its problems."

Howard Cure, director of municipal research at Evercore, said Congress remains politically divided on how to respond to Puerto Rico's crisis.

"If Puerto Rico restricts its defaults to issues that have the ability to have their revenue stream clawed back, I don't think that, in and of itself, would pressure Congress to act," Cure said. "One of the questions facing Congress is not only to allow a Chapter 9 bankruptcy and also if they will expand it to include not only the various Authorities and enterprise systems, but the Commonwealth itself."

Cure added that Puerto Rico is now waiting on the Supreme Court to see if it will validate a local law that would allow the island's public corporations to restructure their debt. Lower courts have found the law to be unconstitutional.

"Congress also needs to decide about some kind of financial control board with real authority to set a budget and tax policy in order for the traditional muni buyers to re-enter the market," Cure said.

Before the year-end recess, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) set a deadline of March 31 for House committees with jurisdiction over Puerto Rico to come up with a workable solution for the commonwealth. Garcia Padilla has said he intends to hold Ryan to that promise.

U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) issued a statement on the lawsuit, saying that this is likely a tipping point in the island's debt debacle.

"Now, instead of using critical, scarce resources to pay its debts, Puerto Rico will be paying attorneys, fighting preventable litigation, and spiraling deeper into completely avoidable economic turmoil," Blumenthal said. "Congress can still - and must - act to stem this crisis, which is affecting 3.5 million American citizens in Puerto Rico, by passing my legislation to allow them to restructure their debts."

Last month, Blumenthal along with other Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) introduced the Puerto Rico Emergency Financial Stability Act.

Rep. Nydia M. Velazquez, D-N, said that the situation in Puerto Rico continues to deteriorate, affecting the lives of 3.5 million American citizens.

"We are running out of time," she said. "Congress must pass [House Minority] Leader [Nancy] Pelosi's [D-Calif.] legislation to prevent creditors from suing the Commonwealth and enact meaningful legislation to permit a broader restructuring of Puerto Rico's debt."

The suit was filed on Jan. 7 in United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico, names Garcia Padilla and other Puerto Rico government officials, seeks to have the clawback declared unconstitutional, and asks the Court to issue an injunction against its implementation.

"The Commonwealth has not satisfied the preconditions to the clawback and is disregarding the priorities of its own Constitution and the rule of the law," Dominic Frederico, president and chief executive officer of Assured, said in a statement released late on Jan. 7. "This confiscation of revenues pledged to bondholders is illegal. We encourage the Commonwealth to instead focus on measures that build market credibility and develop specific fiscal plans to address its critical issues, including revenue collection."

Cure said legal turmoil was predictable in the absence of a bankruptcy court and the protections that would come under it, given the differing interests of various creditors.

"The argument that the issuers are making is that you are only supposed to clawback if there is no other money," Cure said. "The whole concept is open to interpretation, and no one knows who will be settling that. It is only a matter of time before there will be other defaults. Normally a bankruptcy judge would make the call but in this situation we don't have that."

Cure also said he was unsure whether the insurers' arguments will hold up and that every dollar that Puerto Rico spends on lawyers and defending itself will reduce money that could go to bondholders.

"It was an inevitable lawsuit, but I am not sure what standing it has or how valid is. Without a judge refereeing, it could take years to be settled," he said.

Ambac president and chief executive officer Nader Tavakoli said that over the last several months, Ambac has attempted to engage the Commonwealth in consensual conversations toward finding amicable solutions for their asserted liquidity issues, only to be rebuffed.

"Instead the Commonwealth has committed itself to a 'scorched earth' strategy of blaming its fiscal and structural problems on lenders, Congress and others, in an effort to deflect responsibility and obtain retroactive application of bankruptcy laws," Tavakoli said. "Serious issues have been raised by the Governor himself as to whether the Commonwealth historically misrepresented its financial condition to fool the very lenders it now seeks to punish."

Tavakoli continued to say that Ambac remains hopeful that the Commonwealth will abandon such tactics, and turn instead toward good faith negotiations instead of confrontation.

"While we are optimistic that the government of Puerto Rico will begin to act responsibly, at this time we have no choice but to protect our stakeholders through judicial recourse," he said.

Mark Palmer, analyst at BTIG said that litigation is likely going forward as Puerto Rico opts to pay for public services before making its debt payments.

"The question is not whether the indentures provide for clawbacks, but the commonwealth's applications for those provisions," Palmer said. "Can Puerto Rico clawback when it has $9 billion in tax revenue on an annual basis? The insurers are arguing that the Commonwealth can't do that."

A spokesperson for Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah , chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said Hatch recognizes the debt challenges facing Puerto Rico, but based on the limited financial information that the government of Puerto Rico has chosen to provide, he and Senators Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) have put forward legislation that paired tax and other fiscal relief with a path to credible budgeting and transparency for Puerto Rico's opaque government financing.

"Unfortunately, Puerto Rico's government continues to withhold information, choosing instead to engage in questionable interpretations of what is meant by the rule of law and due process," the spokesperson said. "Chairman Hatch remains committed, as he has been for quite some time now, to finding solutions that work to resolve Puerto Rico's debt and fiscal challenges."
WASHINGTON  Christopher Brogdon, facing Securities and Exchange Commission charges for defrauding investors in senior-living facility financings, has been ordered by a federal court in New Jersey to create a plan to pay those investors.

Brogdon, who had agreed to the order from Judge Kevin McNulty of the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey, raised $168 million from 54 conduit municipal bond deals and $22 million from private placements during his 25 years in the nursing home business, according to the SEC.

The commission charged in a lawsuit filed with the court in November that Brogdon committed fraud through at least 43 entities he owns or controls by falsely claiming in offering documents that investors would receive interest from the revenues generated by the projects in which they thought they were investing.

Instead, he commingled investor funds and used the money for personal expenses and other personal business ventures, including restaurants and commercial real estate, according to the SEC.

His fraudulent conduct extended from at least 2000 to at least October 2015, according to the commission. At the time the lawsuit was filed, the SEC worried that Brogdon would not be able to make required payments to investors because many of the facilities he financed had a negative cash flow.

McNulty's Dec. 28 judgment, which includes Brogdon's wife Connie as a "relief defendant," enjoins Brogdon and his associates from violating securities laws designed to prevent manipulative and fraudulent practices. It also bars Brogdon from being an officer or director of an issuer and enforces a previously obtained asset freeze on at least 17 bank and securities accounts that the Brogdons hold either separately or jointly.

In addition to the asset freeze, the Brogdons will have to pay bondholders all of the accrued interest and principal outstanding on a total of 19 conduit muni bond deals and private placements.

The deals span from 1992 to December 2013 and include facilities in Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma, Illinois and other states. Under the judgment, the SEC can add other securities offerings to the current list of 19. However, the commission would first have to get Brogdon to agree. If Brogdon does not agree, the SEC would have to submit the request to the district court.

Because many of Brogdon's projects currently have a negative cash flow, the court order instructs Brogdon to submit a plan to a court-appointed monitor by Jan. 27 for a "fair, prompt and efficient disposition or refinancing" of any of 50 listed entities or assets that Brogdon controls either in full or in part, many of which are nursing homes and health care centers. The plan is supposed to detail how to use money from those assets to pay bondholders in full.

The monitor will have access to the Brogdons' financial information, including the details of the 50 entities' operations, and must also submit a quarterly report to the court and the SEC providing updates on the current status of the entities and each of their financial situations.

If Brogdon's plan to use his controlled entities and assets does not fully cover the necessary investor payments, he will then have to submit another plan that uses as much of his and his wife's currently frozen personal finances as necessary.

The payments are unlikely to end there as the SEC has yet to file its motion to determine the amount of ill-gotten gains Brogdon will have to disgorge. The court or the SEC has yet to file its motion to determine the amount of ill-gotten gains that Brogdon will have to disgorge to the SEC.

He has yet to file the motion to determine the amount of ill-gotten gains that he will have to disgorge to the SEC and has yet to file the motion to determine the amount of ill-gotten gains Brogdon will have to disgorge requires that, during the hearing on that motion, the allegations in the SEC's November complaint are accepted as fact.

The SEC cited several examples of Brogdon's misappropriation of offering proceeds in its complaint.

In one, for example, he raised money through two offerings in the spring of 2013 for a retirement housing development referred to in the complaint as the "Arcadia Project" in Conyers, Ga.

The offerings included certificates of participation in the Development Authority of Clayton County, Ga.'s revenue bonds and in the Savannah Economic Development Authority's subordinated mortgage health care facility revenue bonds, as well as Cherokee Financial COPs in a 10% promissory note issued by Arcadia Partners.

The confidential disclosure memorandum for the Cherokee Financial private placement, said that $1.4 million of the proceeds would be used to construct the Arcadia Project and that the private placement investors would be paid interest and principal from the revenues of the project.

Instead $177,936 of the proceeds were used to make quarterly interest payments back to the investors in the Cherokee Financial private placement and $644,158 of the proceeds were used to finance undisclosed expenses and payments, including some associated with Brogdon's restaurants and his wife's personal account.

In another example, Brogdon raised $2.15 million through COPs in the Development Authority of Clayton County, Ga.'s first-mortgage revenue bonds. Instead of using $425,000 of the proceeds as working capital for the facility that served as the source of payment of debt service on the bonds, Brogdon used it to pay loans on an unrelated nursing home and commercial property owned by one of his other companies.

He also used the money to pay an employee's salary at a company he co-founded and transferred $74,000 to his wife's personal account.

Brogdon is also facing a private lawsuit from Bank of Oklahoma Financial, a trustee for some of the retirement and nursing home deals involving Brogdon where the bonds eventually defaulted.

In the suit, BOKF, mirroring charges from the SEC, says that Brogdon continued making payments on a health care facility for years by improperly using funds from other bond issues to do so.
080116TZILU RELEASES CONTRACT FIGURES

By Aloysius Laukai



The Secretary for Technical Services, BENARD TZILU today released figures of sealing roads throughout Bougainville.



Speaking as the head of the division, MR. TZILU said that his Department did many work in 2015 and hope to do more in 2016.



He said that financial constraints have hindered many work that they could have completed last year.



MR. TZILU said that the Buka ring roads first Twenty Kilometers was won by JOMIK for 36 MILLION KINA and the next contract signed this week with RAIBRO Construction was for the next ten kilometers from HAGOGOHE to HALIA for 21 MILLION KINA.



He said that the Sealing of the Kieta to Buin road will cost 386 MILLION KINA.



MR. TZILU said that DEKENAI will work on the KIETA to TOIMANAPU road upgrading and sealing for 146 MILLION KINA whilst COBEC will work on the TOIMANAPU to KANGU road upgrading and sealing for 240 MILLION KINA.



He said that paper work have been completed and work will start soon on these roads.

Yesterday, the ABG Vice President, PATRICK NISIRA said that the ABG was committed to upgrading of these roads to enable farmers to have easy access to markets.



Ends




Botswana has been advised to continue to expand her infrastructure and also build and protect the countrys brand equity.

Frontier Advisory Deloitte & Touche Associate Director, Hannah Edinger made the observation in an interview with BG Business. She said that a countrys competitiveness depends on the capacity of its industry to innovate and upgrade. Botswana should therefore promote competition among companies and invest in and promote skills development.

She said companies gain advantage against the worlds best competitors due to pressure and challenge. Edinger said having strong domestic rivals, aggressive home-based suppliers and demanding local customers enhances competitiveness among companies. The government should also allow skills and talent inflow into the country, as well as adopt new technology and production processes to increase the countrys competitiveness. Edinger advised Botswana to adopt new marketing approaches and to upgrade and increase the sophistication of her products.





Edinger however said innovation and upgrading require investment in skills development and knowledge generation. It also requires investment in physical assets and investment in brand reputation, she said.

She commended the country for being ranked one of the best in Ease of Doing Business in Africa for 2015 and 2016. According to a World Bank report, out of 189 countries, Botswana is the 3rd easiest place for doing business in Africa and is ranked 72 in the world. Mauritius is placed top in Africa.

She reiterated that it was critical to build a coherent and compelling country brand by creating a good track record. Botswana has been rated as one of the most stable, peaceful, and transparent and has consistently been rated as the least corrupt country in Africa by Transparency International. Edinger said due to the dynamics of global business, countries like Botswana increasingly need to differentiate themselves and remain competitive.

The Deloitte company official said countries that have business models based on resources like oil and minerals should diversify their economies. A lot of African economies that heavily rely on resources, Botswana included, should diversify because the changing economic global reality is that we have to think differently, said Edinger. She challenged Botswana to continue to create an enabling environment for investments. The country should also get the basics right, particularly infrastructure development, health and primary education institutions.
Own something African. Whether youre a designer, retailer, or a general fashion enthusiast, thats the best piece of fashion advice youll hear this year. Africa is the next big fashion trend. Africa has been a place that most Western consumers just dont know much about. The media is only recently starting to feature stories about its commerce, culture and economic trends.

In 2015 there were no African brands selling in most North American stores, and where the raw materials are African, that message is not well-delivered or even sought-after. In the world of fashion, this represents a massive opportunity for fresh fashion ideas, business and growth. If you had bought into the notion that there is nothing new left in fashion, this is a reality check.

Part of the magic of African brands lies in the continent itself, which is still hidden from the spotlights of the connected world. In fact, there are three massive areas of newness in fashion: technology, sustainability and Africa.





Africa is ready for trade, and its potential is massive. As of June 2015, African countries held six of the 13 spots for the worlds fastest growing economies. The problem is that many of us are just not aware of the local market.

Luckily, e-commerce platforms like Kisua make shopping for African brands easy. Founder Samuel Mensah comes from a business and banking background and has a sharp focus on well-made designs that are fit for anything from cocktail parties to boardrooms. African businesses have a lot to offer as production partners, too.

Newcomer brands like Oliberte have capitalised on African innovations in manufacturing technology. Oliberte produces in Ethiopia with Hafde Tannery, one of the most progressive and sustainable leather tanneries in the world. Oliberte is noted as the worlds only Fairtrade certified footwear factory. Its recent collaboration with trendsetter Hype Beast to design a part of its collection was notably well-received.

Africa has powerful brand stories

Part of the magic of African brands lies in the continent itself, which is still hidden from the spotlights of the connected world. Powerful brand stories are taking the world by force, and Africa has no shortage of fascinating history, culture and stories. Stories brought to life with skilled production and quality raw materials make for memorable and significant business propositions.

Part fashion brand, part social enterprise TAARIK designs and hand-looms scarves employing traditional methods and motifs, and offers a coveted viewpoint for the new-world luxury market, where movements towards humble luxury and luxuriously sustainable designs are afoot.

And then theres Vogue, who chose Brother Vellies as one of its 2015 CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund winners. Founder Aurora James combines luxury with sustainability, social enterprising and African craftsmanship.

As an undisputed new frontier for fashion, African businesses will grow and disrupt the market with an army of talent the world has not yet known. Smart businesses are establishing long-term partnerships and investments in local trade that are built on sustainability and trust.

Buy something African. Your wardrobe and business will be all the better for it.




Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 09/01/2016 (2475 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

As the issue is being hotly debated across Canada, Brandonites continue to believe immigrants have a positive effect on their city, a recent Probe Research poll confirmed.

Thats good news, says the citys director of economic development, Sandy Trudel.

Sixty per cent of those asked said international immigrants have a positive effect, another one-quarter stayed neutral and 10 per cent selected negative effect when the poll was carried out in December. Those numbers are largely consistent with previous versions of the poll, which is carried out annually.

Bruce Bumstead/Brandon Sun file Brandon Sun Director of Economic Development Sandy Trudel addressing City Council. (File photo)

From our perspective, I look at no effect or positive effect as positive for our community, Trudel said.

The result is reassuring in the midst the debate about Syrian refugees, some of whom will be settling in the area, she added.

We know that there are several organizations that have made an application to privately sponsor (Syrians). At this point, one or two of those have received a nod that theyll be receiving some, but we dont have firm confirmation and then we have a few others that are in the process, she said.

Trudel said Brandon hosted 20 refugees in 2013 and 2014. Figures for last year havent yet been released by Citizenship and Immigration Canada. In the past decade, Brandon has welcomed a total of approximately 6,500 immigrants to the community.

Well over 80 per cent of the settlers in Brandon have transitioned from temporary status to long-term stays during the 10-year influx, which Trudel said is extremely high.

The executive director of Westman Immigrant Services said their impact is easy quantified.

Before the (influx), we had five spices: salt, pepper, ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard. Now we have a myriad of spices. You go into grocery stores now and we have a ton of different fruits and vegetables, Richard Bruce said.

Trudel said the Wheat City also shines in its ability to take in refugees  who often require additional, specialized support  thanks in large part to WIS.

Maybe we dont have enough capacity in some of the psycho-social support, those are the types of things you look at  just because they are coming from often war-torn communities or instances that require additional supports that another newcomer not coming from those situations might need, she added.

Trudel said this weeks announcement that Maple Leaf Foods is willing to hire up to 25 Syrians at its Brandon pork plant is positive, but its hard to say how helpful itll be until they know more about the incoming refugees.

Its obviously favourable that we know theres employment opportunity. For the most part, from a capacity side of it, well be able to accommodate the settlement of  Syrian refugees here. So thats two check marks, she said.

Our role from the citys perspective is (to ensure) the infrastructure and the networks are in place to offer the support for success.

The first step is to confirm that WIS has the capacity to help, which it does.

Then well be looking at all the other elements: what is the housing market looking like? What are the professional services  medical, dental? Then you reach out to the school division  do you have room within our schools? she said.

Trudel said a current issue is a deficit of Arabic language interpreters at the Brandon Community Language Centre.

In the past seven annual surveys, one-tenth of Brandonites polled have consistently said they believe immigrants have had a negative effect on the city.

Trudel isnt sure that number will ever change, but suggests the issue isnt solely with foreign newcomers.

With the welcoming of people, it doesnt matter if they are from Canada or outside Canada  it creates stress on internal infrastructure. For some individuals, that increased competition or pressure is seen as a negative, (so) its not that immigration is negative, its growth. Unfortunately, one cant separate the two, she said.

The single question, attached to an omnibus Probe poll of a representative sample of adult-aged Brandonites, was commissioned by Economic Development Brandon.

 tbateman@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @tombatemann
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 09/01/2016 (2475 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A lack of information about why moose meat was seized from indigenous hunters in Saskatchewan has caused a firestorm on the Prairies.

Ken Aube, director of enforcement and investigations with the Saskatchewan Ministry of Environment, wouldnt talk specifically about the investigation or why conservation officers raided two homes and seized meat on Pine Creek First Nation last month.

He did say, however, that in the majority of cases where wild game is seized, charges follow.

In order to prove cases, you need exhibits and you need evidence, so thats probably what the officers were looking for there, is evidence to prove a case, Aube said.

From April 2014 to March 2015, Saskatchewan conservation officers checked 13,110 hunters and trappers, according to a spokesman for the department. Those checks resulted in 531 wildlife-related charges.

First Nations hunters are allowed to harvest wildlife for sustenance on unoccupied Crown lands and other lands, according to the Saskatchewan Guide for Treaty and Aboriginal Rights for Hunting and Fishing.

Hunters are required to get permission from landowners when on private property, according to Aube, who said the department follows a hierarchy when allocating wildlife resources.

Conservation is first. First Nations and aboriginal hunting is second. And recreational hunting is third, Aube said. Treaty rights are respected and recognized.

In Manitoba, conservation officials banned moose hunting in several areas this season due to declining populations.

Westmans Turtle and Duck Mountain areas were both closed for hunting. There was one section of Duck Mountain where licensed hunters couldnt hunt moose, but indigenous and Metis hunters could.

Will Goodon, a Metis activist and hunter, said the Natural Resource Transfer Agreement states that First Nations people can hunt for food in the Prairie provinces.

They are constitutional documents that say Indian people can hunt for food, he said.

In 2004, Goodon was charged for hunting waterfowl without a provincially issued licence. He fought the charges and won on the basis that his harvesters card identified him as Metis with hunting rights.

Goodon said he is following the incident in Saskatchewan closely, but reserved judgment until all of the details are known.

Metis are awarded six big game tags annually, according to the Manitoba Metis Federations Laws of the Harvest. Those tags include one caribou, one black bear, one moose, one elk and two deer.

Goodon harvested a moose last year and said meat is often shared with his family and elders from the Boissevain area.

He said he would stand behind conservation officials in cases where it was proved hunters took part in an organized hunt or were selling meat commercially.

Brian Joynt, manager of game, fur and human-wildlife conflict with Manitoba Conservation, said Metis rights are somewhat fluid because there isnt one unified Metis group.

While the Manitoba Metis Federation created guidelines around hunting, he said there is no enforcement body.

Joynt said hunting by all hunters is one of the significant factors in the decline in moose numbers in the province.

In areas that arent under restrictions, Joynt said First Nations, Metis and other legal hunters cant be stopped.

The reality is we cannot infringe on a treaty right just because we think they might be harvesting too many.

 ctweed@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @CharlesTweed
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 09/01/2016 (2475 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A lead-footed mom has been ordered to do 30 hours of community service work for speeding along the Trans-Canada Highway at 170 km/h with her three children in an SUV.

The judge said speeding along the national highway is a growing problem.

Ive seen a concerning increase in the speeds of people who are being stopped on the Trans-Canada Highway, Judge Donovan Dvorak said in Brandon provincial court.

File Brandon court house

Dvorak said that when he began his legal career about 20 years ago, it was common to catch speeders at 20 to 35 km/h over the limit.

Now, as a judge, its not unusual for him to deal with speeders who were going along the Trans-Canada at 40 km/h to 60 km/h over the limit.

Dvorak made the observation on Thursday while sentencing Abir Aboukhamis for dangerous driving.

Aboukhamis, 37, of Toronto was caught going 170 km/h in a 100 km/h zone on the Trans-Canada east of Virden on July 4, 2014.

The speeds were clocked while she was being pursued by a police officer whod caught her in his radar.

At trial, court heard that Aboukhamis passed other vehicles as though they stood still. She also whipped through at 80 km/h construction zone at 154 km/h.

When the officer caught up and pulled Aboukhamis over, he noted that her three children  aged 10 years, eight years and three months  were in the SUV too.

The officer also noted that the vehicle had worn tires.

Aboukhamis testified that she was distracted by the scenery and didnt realize how fast she was going.

Sentencing was set for Thursday, and Crown attorney Rich Lonstrup asked Dvorak to impose a hefty fine and a one-year driving prohibition.

He argued that the mothers dreadful driving had put her own children, the police officer and citizens at risk.

The public at large, not just street racers or drunk drivers, need to be deterred from dangerous driving, Lonstrup said.

But defence lawyer Terry Hawtin said his client, a single mom who makes minimum wage at a bakery, couldnt afford a high fine.

Hawtin added Aboukhamis needs a vehicle to get to work, and to transport her children to school and daycare. Her eldest son is autistic and needs to be taken to special programs.

Hawtin suggested she be completely banned from driving for three months. For nine more months she could be confined to driving for work, and to get her kids to school and programs.

Dvorak noted the danger that Aboukhamis driving posed, but he also pointed out that she had no prior record and accepted that  besides this incident  she was a good mother.

The judge gave Aboukhamis a one-year conditional discharge with 30 hours community service work.

As to the driving ban, Dvorak adopted Hawtins suggestion for a three-month full ban followed by a nine-month partial one.

That Canada-wide ban may be academic, however. In Ontario, a first conviction for a driving offence under the Criminal Code brings a mandatory one-year licence suspension.

A suspended licence in one province prevents a driver from applying for one in another, although some provinces allow suspended drivers to apply for a limited permit for work or family purposes. Hawtin indicated Aboukhamis may move away from Ontario.

 ihitchen@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @IanHitchen
Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 09/01/2016 (2475 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Its shocking in Canada that we would have any veteran who is homeless, but it is a sad reality.

 Gen. Jonathan Vance, Canadas top military commander

For more than a century, Canadian soldiers have truly been in the thick of it.

Through service in some of the most war-torn regions, Canadian soldiers have fought and in many cases died valiantly in defence of the ideals of freedom. It is often said when a soldier enlists, he or she signs a blank cheque to their country  the debt is payable up to and including their life.

It is also said that when a soldier dies in the theatre of war, it has an element of finality to it  although the loss is tragic, it has some form of closure for the family.

Many current and former soldiers I have the pleasure of knowing take a very stoic view on death in war  its tragic, but a reality. When a soldier returns home with the scars of war though, it seems all rules are off. Its only the beginning, the starting point of a much larger battle. Its a battle many have lost and continue to lose years after their combat missions have ended and life as they know it was supposed to return to normal.

Often, the losses mount up and the ability to maintain some form of family life after service presents a much more difficult road to recovery. A March 2015 study came to light this past week that estimated 2,250 former Canadian soldiers use homeless shelters on a regular basis. Coupled with the staggering number of soldiers dealing with the debilitating effects of post-traumatic stress disorder, we clearly see veterans are an element of the population that we as Canadians continue to do an injustice to.

As of last month, the reported number of soldiers who had taken their own life since returning from the Afghan mission has climbed to 54  roughly one-third of the amount that were killed in active combat during that phase of the Afghan mission.

This city is tied to the military. We have a long-standing relationship with CFB Shilo and in the past Brandon has been tied to military forces from Germany as well. Many of the businesses in our community rely on proximity to the base and the population that calls it home. We are intertwined, which makes care for those returning from combat all the more important as they are often our friends and neighbours.

The aforementioned report also indicates veterans are more prone to episodic homelessness, stints of living without a roof over their head. In many cases, that homelessness is coupled with difficulties dealing with alcohol, substance abuse and mental health issues tied to PTSD. It creates a recipe for trouble in the general population, let alone those dealing with the horrific effects of having served in a war-torn country.

Canadas new Liberal government has a tall order in addressing some of these issues, the management of veterans in this country (including their mental well-being) being foremost. During last falls federal election, the Liberal party said that it would show an appreciation for veterans and ensure that no veteran shall be made to fight the government for benefits and support.

This statement alluded to the closure of Veterans Affairs offices under the Conservative administration, as well as the court battles some veterans were embroiled in as a result of a class-action suit against the federal government, a suit that cost in excess of $700,000.

However vague the governments promise may be, Canadians should expect big things out of the prime minister and his new Veterans Affairs Minister Kent Hehr on this portfolio, as it is of tremendous importance to this country.

The Liberals have taken an important first step, though, as the government has already announced it will hire hundreds of new  and in some cases former  employees for Veterans Affairs offices nationwide. A further move would be to hire some former veterans to the positions currently being organized within the framework of Veterans Affairs. It is often said the best person to talk to a soldier about their need is another soldier.

Whether aid comes by further assisting in early intervention, increased mental health awareness during and following service, transition programs for soldiers not deemed fit for active service anymore or better systems to transition to the regular workforce following service, Canadians could and should do more.

At the very least, we owe that to those who signed an open-ended contract, often paying with their lives.
Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 08/01/2016 (2476 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

On Tuesday, U.S. President Barack Obama hosted a press conference in which he gave a long, stem-winding speech, much of it off-the-cuff, about the many episodes of gun violence in the United States and his remedies for it. For those of us who have been longtime fans of this president, it was a vintage performance.

It also underscored several of his most prominent characteristics  a formidable intelligence and ability to communicate, as well as his continued inability to push his initiatives in a forceful manner.

When speaking about gun violence, Obama was actually brought to tears. He recalled the 2012 Newtown massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in which 20 children and six adults were senselessly murdered.

The president is not unique in his sadness and frustration at these episodes. However, he is unique in his ability to singlehandedly change the situation through presidential executive orders. This is a power Obama possesses. Not you, and not I. Not the Speaker of the House nor any cabinet secretary.

So here we are, in the final year of his two terms, some eight years, and we are now doing more than simply talking about gun control. Really? Is this what it has come to?

The administration is basically implementing two key changes to gun regulation in the U.S.  an increase in the number of federal government employees to handle licensing of gun purchases, and a change in the licensing of gun show dealers from being considered hobbyists to active gun dealers. This move, apparently, will add additional scrutiny to their licensing and restrict the flow of weapons to criminals.

As I wrote a few short weeks ago, some quarter of a million Americans will die from gun violence during Obamas eight years in office. That is far more Americans than have been killed at the hands of al-Qaida, ISIS, North Korea and the Mexican drug cartels during the same time.

Moreover, this is entirely a domestic issue for the president. It doesnt require consultation with the United Nations, Putin, Iran or China. This is an American issue and he is, after all, the commander-in-chief.

Executive orders, while they carry the force of law, can be overturned by the next president.

For all of his tears and public posturing, Obama has proven to be a paper tiger when it comes to gun control. These two initiatives are incredibly modest and likely to have little to no impact on gun violence.

Obama is, unquestionably, an incrementalist.

Where are the grand ideas about gun control? Perhaps nationalizing the gun industry, or the ammunition industry, would be a good start. Perhaps adding surtaxes that would make new gun purchases more prohibitive?

At the same time, Obama should ask gun owners to voluntarily contribute their weapons to the state for destruction. While it sounds like a small gesture, it has actually proven quite effective in many communities.

The approach should be multi-pronged  reducing the number of new guns being produced; restricting their rate of fire; encouraging gun surrenders; higher taxes on the purchase of weapons and ammo; tighter licensing of gun sales; and higher penalties for crimes involving guns. There are countless other ideas out there as well, including better treatment for those suffering through mental health issues.

There is, respectfully, no magic bullet solution.

We cannot eliminate risk from a society. We can, however, mitigate the amount of collateral damage. It wont be easy and it will certainly be controversial. It may be that the U.S. gun culture is too inculcated in their national fibre and impossible to change. That being said, the battle over gun control is a good fight. We should never simply give up the fight because of our doubts over a successful outcome.
An Opposition TD has warned that time is running out to bring any criminal cases as a result of the Moriarty Tribunal.

Social Democrat TD Catherine Murphy says the statute of limitations for action is about to expire - without any prosecutions taking place.
Two people have been arrested following a massive drugs haul worth 400,000 in the Midlands and Dublin yesterday.

A 35-year-old man was arrested after Gardai discovered 300,000 worth of heroin during the search of a car in Crumlin.
Wycombe 1 Aston Villa 1

Joe Jacobsons nerveless penalty stretched Aston Villas winless run under Remi Garde to 10 matches as Wycombe battled to a 1-1 FA Cup third round draw.

Captain Micah Richards side-footed Villa into the lead at Adams Park, only for full-back Jacobsons spot-kick to earn League Twos Wycombe a lucrative replay against their Premier League foes.

Jacobsons penalty evoked memories of his spot-kick exploits when Bristol Rovers dumped out Roy Hodgsons Fulham in their run to the FA Cup quarter-finals in 2008.

Villa wasted the perfect opportunity to kick-start Gardes miserable managerial stint, the Birmingham club still rooted to the Premier Leagues foot.

Wycombe squandered four fine openings in the first half, but refused to be overawed, keeping their composure to snatch the draw.

While visiting captain Richards side-footed home without issue, Garry Thompson prodded wide from eight yards and Sam Wood wasted three promising scenarios.

Wycombe striker Thompson missed the target despite Villa freezing after an initial clearing header from Jacobsons fifth-minute corner.

Then Wood laboured just too long before taking aim after ghosting in from the left. The 29-year-olds delay in pulling the trigger let Jores Okore slide in for just enough of a recovering block to take the sting out of the effort.

The ever-lively Gil shortly made Wycombe pay for that profligacy though, cutting in off the right and feeding Richards, lurking on the cusp of the box.

The former Manchester City defender produced a first-time finish to sit at odds with the hosts sluggish final-third play.

Villa failed to build on that advantage however, perhaps relieved to reach half-time with the 1-0 lead.

Wood volleyed high and wide from point-blank range after Bloomfields cross, handing Villa a real reprieve.

And Bloomfield split Villa open with a fine counter-attack pass on the stroke of half-time  only for the ball to remain just out of Woods reach.

Just when Villa expected to flex their top-flight muscle, the panicked defending which leaves them rooted to the Premier Leagues foot suddenly materialised.

Westwoods needless and clumsy challenge on Bloomfield gifted Wycombe a penalty - which Jacobson converted with ease.

The former Cardiff left-back sent Mark Bunn the wrong way to side-foot home and level the tie.

Wood then saw a challenging volley cleared off the line by Richards as Wycombe exerted yet more pressure.

Villa settled back to the task, only for Scott Sinclair to waste a fine chance by refusing to feed Leandro Bacuna, unmarked on the penalty spot.

Rudy Gestede, anonymous for the first hour, saw a shot deflected onto the corner of post and crossbar, compounding Villas frustrations as Wycombe held firm.
Egypt's tourism minister Hisham Zazou is expected to visit European victims of a suspected terror attack on a hotel in a Red Sea resort.

Three foreign tourists have been stabbed by two suspected Islamic State militants.

The attackers were shot by police and the area remains on high alert.

Egyptian Ambassador to the UK, Nasser Kamel has said holiday destinations are becoming targets: Terrorist organisations like ISIS are spreading ideology and some people are picking up this ideology of hate and trying to do crazy things.

So Egypt is not less safe than any of those places, we are all facing a threat and no place is 100% safe.
The US Mint will feature an Asian American on its currency for the first time when it issues a coin next week...
About Me MIchael Godfrey stumbling with humanity through a miasma of temporary existence View my complete profile
ISLAMABAD: The policy of import compression by the government to manage the balance of payments which was ...
Since the early 1990s, daily life in poor countries has been changing profoundly for the better: one billion people have escaped extreme poverty, average incomes have doubled, infant death rates have plummeted, millions more girls have enrolled in school, chronic hunger has been cut almost in half, deaths from malaria and other diseases have declined dramatically, democracy has spread far and wide, and the incidence of war--even with Syria and other conflicts--has fallen by half. This unprecedented progress goes way beyond China and India and has touched hundreds of millions of people in dozens of developing countries across the globe, from Mongolia to Mozambique, Bangladesh to Brazil.





Yet few people are aware of these achievements, even though, in aggregate, they rank among the most important in human history. [...]





Global poverty is falling faster today than at any time in human history. In 1993, about two billion people were trapped in extreme poverty (defined by the World Bank as living on less than $1.90 per day); by 2012, that number had dropped to less than one billion. The industrialization of China is a big part of the story, of course, but even excluding that country, the number of extreme poor has fallen by more than 400 million. Since the 1980s, more than 60 countries have reduced the number of their citizens who are impoverished, even as their overall populations have grown.





This decline in poverty has gone hand in hand with much faster economic growth. Between 1977 and 1994, the growth in per capita GDP across the developing countries averaged zero; since 1995, that figure has shot up to three percent. Again, the change is widespread: between 1977 and 1994, only 21 developing countries (out of 109 with populations greater than one million) exceeded two percent annual per capita growth, but between 1995 and 2013, 71 such countries did so. And going backward has become much less common: in the earlier period, more than 50 developing countries recorded negative growth, but in the later one, just ten did.





The improvements in health have been even bigger. In 1960, 22 percent of children in developing countries died before their fifth birthday, but by 2013, only five percent did. Diarrhea killed five million children a year in 1990 but claimed fewer than one million in 2014. Half as many people now die from malaria as did in 2000, and deaths from tuberculosis and AIDS have both dropped by a third. The share of people living with chronic hunger has fallen by almost half since the mid-1990s. Life expectancy at birth in developing countries has lengthened by nearly one-third, from 50 years in 1960 to 65 years today. These improvements in health have left no country untouched, even the worst-governed ones. Consider this: the rate of child death has declined in every single country (at least those where data are available) since 1980.





Meanwhile, far more children are enrolling in and completing school. In the late 1980s, only 72 percent of all primary-school-age children attended school; now, the figure exceeds 87 percent. Girls in developing countries have enjoyed the biggest gains. In 1980, only half of them finished primary school, whereas four out of five do so today. These leaps in education are beginning to translate into better-skilled workers.





Then there is the shift to democracy. Prior to the 1980s, most developing countries were run by left- or right-wing dictators. Coups and countercoups, violence and assassinations, human rights abuses--all formed part of regular political life. But starting in the 1980s, dictators began to fall, a process that accelerated after the Cold War. In 1983, only 17 of 109 developing countries qualified as democracies, based on data from Freedom House and the Center for Systemic Peace; by 2013, the number had more than tripled, to 56 (and that's not counting the many more developing countries with populations of less than one million).





As those numbers suggest, power today is far more likely to be transferred through the ballot box than through violence, and elections in most countries have become fairer and more transparent. Twenty years ago, few Indonesians could have imagined that a furniture maker from central Java would beat one of Suharto's relatives in a free and fair election, as Joko Widodo did in 2014. Nor would many have predicted that Nigeria, then still under military rule, would in 2015 mark its first peaceful transfer of power between parties, or that Myanmar (also called Burma) would hold its most successful democratic election the same year. Across the developing world, individual freedoms and rights are honored to a much greater degree, human rights abuses are rarer, and legislative bodies have more power.





Yes, many of these new democracies have problems. And yes, the march toward democracy has slowed since 2005--and even reversed in some countries, such as Thailand and Venezuela. But in many more--from Brazil to Mongolia to Senegal--democracy has deepened. Never before in history have so many developing countries been so democratic.





As states have become wealthier and more democratic, conflict and violence within them have declined. Those who think otherwise should remember that as recently as the 1980s and early 1990s, much of the world was aflame, from Central America to Southeast Asia to West Africa. There were half as many civil wars in the last decade as there were in the 1980s, and the number of people killed in armed conflicts has fallen by three-quarters.




RABAT: One volunteer firefighter has been killed and another injured in a forest fire in northern Morocco, where new...
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A Brisbane man accused of assaulting a paramedic originally sent to revive him has walked free from court.

Queensland Ambulance Service Assistant Commissioner Chris Broomfield labelled the alleged assault on a 24-year-old ambulance worker in the Airport Link Tunnel at Kedron a "disgraceful act".

Paramedics weren't able to save either of the women. Credit:Jorge Branco

"One assault is too many," he said.

"Any assault against a paramedic police officer, any health worker, for that matter, anyone in the public is one too many."
Each young man's life ended, just as it was beginning, by simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Daniel Christie was felled by Shaun McNeil in Kings Cross on New Year's Eve, 2013. Credit:Facebook By being in a place renowned for its excessive public drunkenness. The Liberal New South Wales government, then led by Barry O'Farrell, was under extraordinary public pressure to act decisively on alcohol-fuelled violence in the wake of Thomas Kelly's death in July 2012. Thomas Kelly died after being felled by a single punch on a night out in Kings Cross.

But like his then-counterpart in Queensland, Campbell Newman, he maintained greater enforcement of existing laws and increased penalties for violent, alcohol-related offences, rather than the so-called Newcastle solution was the key. A reduction in trading hours and venue lockouts was not worth the impact on the so-called "night-time economy", Mr O'Farrell staunchly argued, trying to balance the competing demands of pressure from his party's all-powerful backers, the alcohol lobby, with growing public anger. In Queensland, the LNP's opposition to reduced trading hours and lockouts, even in trial form, was equally as staunch, due to the predicted economic impacts on an industry that public records show donated nearly $375,000 of its $408,000 disclosed political donations between 2011 and 2014 to the party. Fast forward a year and a half and Mr O'Farrell again reiterated reduced trading times and 1am lockouts were not the key to reducing violence after Daniel Christie died in circumstances almost mirroring Thomas Kelly's death. By February, however, came the dramatic backflip.

Amid widespread anger over the second high profile coward's punch fatality, and despite the desperate warnings from the Australian Hotels Association the move would be "catastrophic", he recalled parliament early to immediately implement new laws to curb alcohol-fuelled violence. Last drinks were wound back from 5am to 3am in the Sydney CBD and Kings Cross nightclub precincts, 1.30am lockouts were introduced and blanket 10pm bottle shop closing times were instituted across the state. "This is about trying to send a very clear message to the industry that yes, you can continue to trade after 3 o'clock, but drinks will cease at 3 o'clock," he said. A year and a half on official figures on assaults and hospitalisations in the precinct are yet to be revealed, however, Professor Kypros Kypri of the University of Newcastle's school of medicine and public health, said independent evaluations have showed that in the past two years, there has been large reductions in police apprehensions for assault and emergency department presentations for alcohol-related serious injury. While still under evaluation, the new Mike Baird-led government looks set to make the measures permanent.

In Queensland, in a precariously balanced parliament, the Labor government cannot be so decisive. At the 2015 election, Annastacia Palaszczuk campaigned on introducing the Newcastle solution - with 2am last drinks and 1am lockouts - in Queensland but she requires the support of independents Billy Gordon and speaker Peter Wellington to pass new laws. The two Katter Party MPs, Robbie Katter and Shane Knuth, have indicated their intention to oppose their introduction. A number of concessions have already been made, much to the chagrin of Mines and Natural Resources Minister Anthony Lynham, a maxillofacial surgeon who joined the Labor Party after a long-standing campaign for action on alcohol-fuelled violence, after reconstructing countless faces bashed in inner Brisbane nightclub precincts. In the wake of Cole Miller's death, Dr Lynham said the Newcastle approach had been instituted in other cities, where time and again it had proven to reduce violence and injury.

"This fear-mongering campaign just has to stop by the nightclub proponents," he said. The only sure way the Palaszczuk Government has of introducing its last drinks laws in Queensland, is if, like the New South Wales Liberal Party, the Queensland LNP has a change of heart. While Shadow Attorney-General Ian Walker said after Cole Miller's death that the party was willing to negotiate with the government, its position remains one of opposition to reduced trading hours and lockouts. "We remain concerned that a focus on lockouts and closing times alone will not stop alcohol-fuelled violence," he said. "We were disappointed to hear this week that Dr Lynham has now said he will not move from his narrow position."
"They were making a motza out of loading young people up in the licensed premises, kicking them out and making the public bear the costs." Mr Brown led the charge for what was initially known as the Newcastle experiment and has, in the eight years since it was implemented, since become known as the Newcastle solution. In the face of a massive backlash from the 12 to 14 nightclub operators who were crying economic catastrophe, the Newcastle coalition, comprised of police, community and local council members, scaled trading hours back to 3am in the CBD and instituted a lockout that prevented patrons entering licensed venues after 1am. Assault rates dropped almost immediately and other cities and towns quickly followed suit in establishing the measures. It was a literal blood bath, most residents were too afraid to leave their houses. Tony Brown

Not only that, according to Mr Brown, in the eight years since it has been established, the city's night-time economy has improved. It is now, he said, a safe place people want to venture out for a drink. "It has totally transformed the Newcastle nightlife," he said. "In surveying the community, they have said there is much improved safety, more diversity of venues and more inclusiveness. "Not only that it has led to a much, much more prosperous night time economy.

"There has been a 100 per cent increase in the number of licensed premises, which has led to more jobs." This week, Queensland Attorney-General Yvette D'Ath reaffirmed the Labor Government's election commitment to instituting similar measures across the Sunshine State, after the issue of alcohol-fuelled violence was again thrust into the spotlight following the death of 18-year-old Cole Miller. But while the approach has many backers, particularly among the law enforcement and medical fraternities, it also has its detractors, fuelled largely by what outspoken Queensland MP and maxillofacial surgeon Anthony Lynham has this week termed a "scare campaign" on the part of the alcohol industry. Lockouts loosely based on the Newcastle approach were trialled in Melbourne in 2008 but abandoned in what many point to as a spectacular failure, when assaults and ambulance call outs in the area increased. Many proponents of the Newcastle approach say the fact that it was solely a lockout trial, not a combination of reduced trading hours and lockouts, led to its failure.

In a 2013 study, British anthropologist Anne Fox examined Australia's night-time economy, reaching the conclusion the problem of violence in the country's nightclub precincts was cultural, not attributable to alcohol. "In a nutshell, the central point of my report is that it is the wider culture that determines behaviour while drinking, not the drinking per se," she wrote. "While there are very good health reasons to reduce excessive drinking, you must influence culture if you want to change behaviour." The study was commissioned by alcohol production giant Lion, which, among it's array of beverages, produces Queensland's XXXX. Vivienne Crompton, a researcher at the Institute of Public Affairs Legal Rights project urged the Queensland Government to take the increased enforcement approach in 2013, saying in regards to lockout laws it should "take heed from Melbourne's own unmitigated failure".

"Increased police presence is the only way we can hope to reduce fighting on our streets," she said. "The proposed curfew is just a nanny-state, knee-jerk response that has no hope of stemming the violence." It's something Queensland police officer turned Bond University academic Terry Goldsworthy does not entirely agree with. "Lockouts have been proven to be effective in conjunction with reduced trading hours, I think the real question here is, 'do we need to be drinking until 5am?" he said. Dr Goldsworthy said a combined approach to the problem was required, not one or the other.

"Newcastle and other jurisdictions clearly show that approach has a substantial effect on the reduction of violent crime and you don't necessarily place it elsewhere as the liquor industry argues," he said. "But also, people are far less likely to act in an anti-social manner when there are plenty of police there. "You do need to weigh up the costs of policing and incarceration with the long terms costs of violent crime, like long term care and medical costs." For Newcastle's Mr Brown, however, the costs of what he terms a "modest reduction" in trading hours in comparison to the long-term effects on victims and their families makes what he thinks is an easy choice. "There is no greater incentive for the Queensland Government to act decisively than the tragic loss we have just seen in Brisbane," he said.
A woman is fighting for her life in hospital after a drunk man allegedly tried to punch her in the head after she refused him entry to a pub in northwest Queensland.

Police said the staff member, 36, had refused to let the man, 28, enter the hotel in the Mount Isa suburb of Parkside around midnight on Friday because he appeared to be too drunk.

Police believe the 36-year-old woman, a staff member at the hotel, had refused the man entry to the venue. Credit:Nine News Brisbane

She had been standing in the doorway of the Grace St venue when she was approached by the man.

"The employee was speaking with another woman when she was allegedly assaulted by the man causing her to fall the ground, hitting her head," a police statement said.
Berlin: Two asylum seekers have been arrested in connection with a series of New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Cologne, a development likely to fuel what already is a fierce battle over the status of hundreds of thousands of migrants who have flooded Europe in recent months.

The police said the two suspects were arrested around midnight in the same square outside the city's central train station where the attacks reportedly took place. The police said that during the arrests they had uncovered photos and videos of sexual assaults as well as a list of threatening phrases to use to intimidate German women.

A woman with a headscarf was allegedly attacked outside Coles in Beeliar for not saying 'merry Christmas'. Credit:AP

Federal police announced they were investigating 31 other suspects  including an American  thought to be tied to the attacks. Eighteen of those are asylum seekers, police said.
Seattle: For more than two decades, conservation groups have argued that a species of wolf and the rainforest in south-east Alaska where it lives are at risk.

While the groups have won strong restrictions on logging of the Tongass National Forest, the nation's largest, they have been denied in their efforts to win federal protection for the wolf.

Conservationists argue the Alexander Archipelago wolf is threatened. Credit:John Hyde / Wild Things Photography

This week, the US Fish and Wildlife Service denied them again: The agency determined that the wolf, known as the Alexander Archipelago wolf, should not be listed as an endangered or threatened species.

While the government agreed with conservationists that the wolf is declining in parts of its range and that loss of its habitat from logging is playing a role in that decline, it said the overall population of the wolf appears to be healthy.
Honolulu: Hawaii's last sugar plantation is getting out of the sugar-growing business, signalling the end of an industry that once powered the local economy and lured thousands of immigrants to the islands.

The Alexander & Baldwin company has said it will phase out sugar by the end of 2016. Its 14,600-hectare Maui plantation will be divided into smaller farms to grow biofuels and food crops. Some of the land will be irrigated to supply pasture to cattle ranchers.

Workers cut sugar cane at Hawaiian Commercial & Sugar, Hawaii's last sugar plantation, in Puunene. Credit:AP

All 675 people who work for the company's Hawaiian Commercial & Sugar subsidiary will be laid off. About half will be retained through the final sugar harvest.

"This is a sad day for A&B, and it is with great regret that we have reached this decision," Alexander & Baldwin chief executive Christopher Benjamin said.
Who turned in the top performances from Week 8? We have the answers
LED screen manufacturer Global Communication, which has two facilities in China, is now setting up a plant in Rajkot, Gujarat.

While it aims to invest about Rs 100 crore over the next five years, the company has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Gujarat government for an initial investment of Rs 15 crore.

"We have signed an MoU with the Gujarat government for setting up an LED screen manufacturing plant in Rajkot with an initial investment of Rs 15 crore. The new production facility will be commissioned by end of June this year, after which we will pump more funds as per requirements. In next five years, the company aim to invest about Rs 100 crore," said Jitendra Joshi, managing director of Global Communication. The company currently imports large-sized LED screens for supply to hotels, event management companies, malls, cinema halls and government agencies.

While the initial capacity at the Rajkot plant is being pegged at 300-500 square metres a day, it will be gradually expanded based on domestic demand, Joshi said.

As of now, the company has two production units in China which have a combined daily capacity of about 1,000 square metres.

"To produce large size LED screen at Rajkot plant, we will have to import machineries from China which we are likely to do by March this year. However, we will continue our Chinese operations for next few years," Joshi added.

The new plant currently generates direct employment for 50-60 people even as the company looks to add more manpower once commissioned. Talking about investment plans, Joshi that the project will be funded through the company's internal accruals. "If required, we will go to banks in future," Joshi added.
The Renault-Nissan plant in Oragadam near Chennai has reached a production milestone by rolling out the one millionth vehicle. The company also said it was in talks with the government to bring in electric vehicles.

The plant, which is the largest production facility in the world for Renault-Nissan, started operations in March 2010 following a Rs 4,500-crore initial investment. An additional investment of Rs 1,600 crore was made to create power train manufacturing facility and tooling.

The plant has introduced 32 new Renault, Nissan and Datsun models and derivatives to its production line.

RNAIPL plans to roll out around 270,000 units this year of which around 120,000 units will be for exported this fiscal, said Colin MacDonald, plant managing director, RNAIPL. The Renault and Nissan Motor Company plans to roll out around 330,000-340,000 units next financial year.

Guillaume Sicard, President of Indian Operations for Nissan, said a third car under the Datsun brand will be launched this year and a new model under Nissan badge is also on the anvil.

He said the strategy is to scale up exports so that the costs are recovered fast while the car brand is built in the domestic market.

However, going forward the company wants to bring down export contribution, while increasing domestic market.

The plant caters to both domestic and international markets. Nissan is Indias second largest car exporter with more than 600,000 units shipped to 106 countries since 2010.

Annual production volume has risen from an initial 75,000 units in the 2010 financial year, to over 200,000 by the year ended December 2015.

Commenting on launching e-vehicles in India, Sicard said, We are in touch with the government and working on the possibilities of bringing this technology to India. This technology is expensive, which means the government needs to put some incentives in place to support this technology. We are in discussions and the government is very proactive on this.



Christian Mardrus, Chairman of Nissan's Africa, Middle East and India region, and former Alliance Executive Vice President, commented our Chennai facility has, and will continue, to play a fundamental role in the development of our business in India. Todays milestone reflects the popularity of Nissan and Renault products in India and export markets, as well as the skill and dedication of our staff. It is also a measure of the high level of support we have enjoyed from the Tamil Nadu government.



Together, the manufacturing plant and R&D facility account for around 12,000 direct jobs in Tamil Nadu, with a further 40,000 in the Indian supplier chain, making an increasing contribution to the local economy.

MacDonald said that on average the plant has launched two new models each year across three brands since 2010.

The most recent model to be introduced at the plant was the Renaults Kwid in September last year. This will be followed in 2016 by the third Datsun-branded vehicle to be sold in India.
All set to kick-start his American dream in the New Year, Hyderabad's Shemanth Reddy would have been on campus in California by now, unpacked and getting to know his new friends. Instead, the 21-year-old computer science student is grappling with a sudden twist of events that has burst his bubble.

Reddy had heard about Indian students being sent back, but it was only after he came to know of his friend's plight that he had to take some tough decisions. "My friend was also headed for California. After spending almost 24 hours at the airport, immigration authorities in New York questioned him for five hours. He wasn't even given water to drink," says Reddy.

"They told him that the university he was to join wasn't a good one, so it was better for him to go back," elaborates Reddy, sharing how his friend isn't ready to discuss the ordeal yet. There were many other students who had to face the same thing, and his friend was fortunate in a way, continues Reddy -"at least he didn't have his personal phone messages checked; others faced that too."



This has made Reddy change his mind: he will chase his American dream afresh after a year.

According to news reports, close to 150 students travelling to the US to join universities in California have been sent back over the past few months.

On December 22, students headed to the US returned from Abu Dhabi, where they were locked up for over 16 hours during their pre-clearance (immigration) interviews. One of them was Amaresh Jana, who has shared his experience on Facebook. "They checked my WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, photo gallery, Gmail and bank accounts, and then after 16 hours of questioning, told me my visa was cancelled," shares Jana.

Fifty-four students were deported within 24 hours of Christmas Eve from 11 universities. A majority of these students were headed to the Silicon Valley University at San Jose and Northwestern Polytechnic University at Fremont.

As batches of students complaining of ill-treatment started coming in, the Ministry of External Affairs was quick to issue an advisory on December 23. Students seeking admission to the Silicon Valley University and Northwestern Polytechnic University were advised to "defer their travel to the US".

Proceeding with caution

Before that, Air India, acting on a tip-off from the US Customs and Border Protection Agency, stopped about 15 students from boarding a flight to the US - they were headed to the two universities.

While some were still hailing Air India as a good Samaritan for saving students from the trouble that awaited them at US immigration check points, the two universities started to hit back. Both are on the list of institutions approved for the Department of Homeland Security's Student and Exchange Visitor Programme.

The Silicon Valley University has put up online alerts about how the university was not blacklisted. Northwestern Polytechnic University has been more vocal in its defence. Its management sent a cease-and-desist letter to Air India accusing it of "tortious conduct" and unjustifiably "barring its students from travelling" to the US. It also sought an immediate apology and retraction of its statement about the university being "blacklisted" by the US State Department.

Northwestern Polytechnic University President Peter Hsieh believes the university's name has been "unfairly and permanently tarnished due to Air India's defamatory actions and because a relatively small percentage of our new students failed their customs interviews".

An Air India official shared how in cases of deportation, the airline that takes the passengers also has to bring them back, free of cost. "Air India is being singled out but it wasn't the only airline advising students or stopping them from boarding the aircraft," he states.

Immigration woes

Over the years, immigration authorities have grown wary of cases where newer residents in the country are unable to fend for themselves, says V Chowdary Jampala, president of the Telugu Association of North America. "There's a mushrooming of small firms in Andhra (Pradesh) and Telangana that are giving bad advice to students. They are being encouraged to join sub-standard universities and told part-time jobs would sustain their stay in the US," says Jampala.

Jampala believes consultant-led student migrations, as opposed to academic qualifications-led, also hinder the quality of students coming to the US. "The authorities have started looking into good academic credit as well as good financial credit," he says.

An advisory put out by the Ministry of External Affairs, which was made public on December 30, backs Jampala's words, suggesting that the denial of entry was due to unsatisfactory student interviews. It read: the US government has conveyed that the decision to deny entry to these students is not because of the corresponding institutions being "black-listed" but based on the assessment made by the US immigration authorities of individual applicants. According to the US government, the deported persons had presented information to the border patrol agent which was inconsistent with their visa status.

While the quality of students is up for debate, concerns about sub-standard education and fraudulent degrees are not unfounded. In January 2011, hundreds of Indian students, a majority of them from Andhra Pradesh, faced deportation possibilities when US officials raided the university they were enrolled in on charges of immigration fraud. Pleasanton-based Tri-Valley University, which worked out of a single building, made millions by admitting foreign students on student visas. Out of the 1,555 students it had, 95 per cent were from India.

And Tri-Valley is just one among at least half a dozen educational institutes that have been shut down or raided by US federal authorities in recent years over charges of immigration fraud. In 2014 alone, US authorities flagged about 150 of the 9,000-odd schools certified to accept foreign students for investigation as potential visa mills.

In light of recent events, Renuka Raja Rao, the country coordinator for US India Education Programme, has urged students to not blindly follow consultants and thoroughly check university credentials with the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, Council for Higher Education Accreditation and Abet.org.

A brighter future?

Despite the recent scare, the promise of a brighter future has kept the F1 visa applications rolling. According to an official report, Indian students contributed $3.3 billion to the US economy in 2014. For the spring semester alone, the Northwestern Polytechnic University was expecting 1,200 to 1,300 students from India.

"We turned down over 2,000 applications for this semester, almost all of which were from India. As such, we expect 4,000 or more new students from India per year, depending upon how many we accept," says Hsieh. Twenty to 40 students headed for the university didn't clear immigration interviews and were sent back, he adds.

Estimates show that the majority of students who were sent back are of Telugu origin; this comes as no surprise once statistics comes out to play. In 2015, out of 90,000 applicants, 4,000 made the cut for student visas, and a majority of the applications were from Hyderabad.

According to Washington DC-based think tank Brookings Institution, which studied student inflow in the US between 2008 and 2012, Hyderabad, at 26,220 was issued the most F1 visas from India, nearly 30,000 when combined with Secunderabad. Add to this 2,000 F1 visas from Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam each and you gain pace over others like Mumbai (17,294) and Delhi (8,728) in a hip and a scotch.

While a few students return home with newly-minted degrees, others try and make a niche in corporate America. Undivided Andhra Pradesh, reasons Jampala, has a large number of engineering colleges.

"During the information technology boom in the late 1990s and early 2000s, a majority of the students who migrated to the US were from the Andhra area," reasons Jampala, adding how since almost everyone in the region knows someone working in the US, the dream of a similar lifestyle remains alive and kicking.

And though the American lifestyle continues to be both aspirational and achievable, those like Reddy who are in limbo have to put their dreams on hold.
In an effort to boost the country's cyber security mechanism after the Pathankot terror attack, the government is planning to tie-up with international cyber surveillance experts.

According to sources, major cyber security firms from the United States and Israel have already had several rounds of discussions with different ministries involved - Telecom and Information Technology Ministry and Ministry of Home Affairs. In the last week of December, Gulshan Rai, cyber security coordinator, met an Israel-based cyber security company to this effect.

"The government is keen to tie-up with Israel on cyber security as they are the leaders in the sector. The plan is to plug the holes in our cyber security apparatus," said a senior official from the IT Ministry.

With the increased threat of cyber terrorism, the government is also planning to raise its vigil on the internet and monitor any possible communication between terror modules. The government also wants to ensure that content meant for radicalising youths, from outfits like Islamic State, doesn't find circulation in India.

Sources also said cyber security would be one of the main topics of discussion during External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj's visit to Israel starting January 15. Prime Minister Narendra Modi would also visit Israel later this year.

The government is planning to recruit, on contractual basis, cyber security experts and partner with top international cyber security firms. In December 2014, an expert group constituted by the Ministry of Home Affairs had submitted its report on "Roadmap for Effectively Tackling Cyber Crimes in the Country" after examining the global best practices. The group comprised of Rai, N Balakrishnan from Indian Institute of Science, Rajat Moona, director general of Center for Development of Advanced Computing, B J Srinath, director general of Indian Computer Emergency Response Team, Manindra Aggarwal, computer science professor at IIT-Kanpur, D Das, professor at IIIT Bangalore, and joint secretary Kumar Alok.

CLOSE WATCH Home ministry, IT ministry officials meet firms from US and Israel to plug the holes in cyber security apparatus

India to monitor communication between terror modules, block content meant for radicalising youths

Cyber security to be discussed during External Affairs Minister Sushma Swarajs visit to Israel starting January 15

Prime Minister Narendra Modi to visit Israel later this year

Indian cyber security market is about Rs 1,500 crore

Indian cyber security market is about Rs 1,500 crore. While the country has made enormous progress in sectors such as IT and e-commerce, cyber-security in India is at a nascent stage. Israel, which is the biggest player in the sector after the US, exported $6 billion worth of cyber-related products in 2014.

According to sources in information technology ministry, India and Israel are working on a mechanism to encourage start-ups from both countries to work on cyber security solutions. Discussions are also on to create a fund which could be used to roll out certain projects related to cyber security.
Performing several head-down positions while practising yoga, and other exercises like push-ups and lifting heavy weights may lead glaucoma patients to experience increased eye pressure, a new study has warned.

Glaucoma is a leading cause of irreversible blindness and can dramatically affect the quality of life for patients with moderate to severe visual loss.

Damage to the optic nerve occurs in glaucoma patients when fluid pressure inside the eye rises. Elevated intraocular pressure (IOP) is the most common known risk factor for glaucomatous damage.

For the study, researchers from the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai (NYEE) had healthy participants with no eye-related disease and glaucoma patients perform a series of inverted yoga positions, including downward facing dog, standing forward bend, plow, and legs up the wall.

They captured the IOP in each group at baseline seated, immediately assuming the pose, two minutes while holding the pose, right after they performed each pose in the seated position, and then again 10 minutes after resting in the seated position.

Both normal and glaucoma study participants showed a rise in IOP in all four yoga positions, with the greatest increase of pressure occurring during downward facing dog.

When the measurements were taken after the participants returned to a seated position and again after waiting 10 minutes, the pressure in most cases remained slightly elevated from the baseline.

"While we encourage our patients to live active and healthy lifestyles, including physical exercise, certain types of activities, including pushups and lifting heavy weights, should be avoided by glaucoma patients due to the risk of increasing IOP and possibly damaging the optic nerve," said Robert Ritch from NYEE.

"As we know that any elevated IOP is the most important known risk factor for development and progression of nerve damage to the eye, the rise in IOP after assuming the yoga poses is of concern for glaucoma patients and their treating physicians," said Jessica Jasien from NYEE. The findings were published in the journal PLOS ONE.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit the Pathankot air base today, which was attacked by suspected Pakistani terrorists on January 2.

During his visit, which comes exactly one week after the pre-dawn attack on the frontline air base by the terrorists, Modi is likely to meet Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel at the base along with other troops in the area.

Police sources in Chandigarh said that tight security arrangements were being made for the prime minister's visit.

Six terrorists and seven security personnel were killed in the attack.

Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval called up Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal on Friday and lauded the prompt role of the Punjab Police in providing timely inputs regarding the terrorist attack.

"The NSA lauded the most effective and commendable Punjab response to a most difficult challenge thrown at the country by terrorists at Pathankot," a Punjab government spokesman, quoting Doval's conversation with Badal, said here.

Sources said that Doval appreciated the response of the Punjab government, especially of the Punjab Police, "whose prompt inputs and zero-time coordination with the central forces" had helped in making counter arrangements and save critical assets of the air base, including fighter aircraft and attack helicopters.

Badal told Doval that the Pathankot, and the terrorist attack on Dinanagar town in Gurdaspur district in July last year, should be seen as "acts of disguised foreign aggression".

"In Punjab, we have been fighting the nation's war carried out by our enemies through proxy means. But we must regard it as acts of war and our response needs to be firm not in just words but in the form of better and professional preparedness and willing to take the enemy on," Badal said.

He emphasized on the need to strengthen the Border Security Force (BSF) strength in the Punjab sector to prevent any infiltration from Pakistan side.

Punjab shares a 553-km long international border with Pakistan.
The state of Jammu & Kashmir is set to get its first woman chief minister. People's Democratic Party (PDP) President Mehbooba Mufti is going to succeed her father, Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, who died on Thursday. One of the key architects of the party, Mufti is far from the traditional dynastic politician - she had a considerably significant role to play in furthering her party's "soft separatist" approach. Sushobha Barve, executive director of the Delhi-based Centre for Dialogue and Reconciliation, tells Shivam Saini what Mufti's prospective appointment as chief minister means for the state



How do you view Mufti in her likely role as the chief minister?



Mufti has been in politics for several years now. As the leader of a party and someone who played a major role in building it up, we have known all along that one day, if the party comes to power, she may become the chief minister. However, it is happening under not very pleasant circumstances. That, in itself, is a challenge for her, with her father's passing away. And once she becomes chief minister, she would be taking over under very difficult circumstances. She might have to face multiple challenges, but she's a woman of great courage and she has never turned back from challenges. How she would perform is something that cannot be predicted now, but I believe she will do her best to run the government.

One should really be proud that such a transition can take place in one of the most sensitive regions of the country. Kashmiri women have been always enlightened, more so than many other parts of India. There may be personal disagreement in terms of the views and policies of the party, but the women of Jammu & Kashmir would be very happy to see a woman become a chief minister.

How do you think her style of functioning would be different from her predecessors, which include Omar Abdullah, Farooq Abdullah and Mufti Mohammed Sayeed? What would make her stand out?



Her father and Farooq belonged to another age altogether. And then, Omar's style of functioning was also very different from his father's. At the end of the day, one should accept that a generational change is taking place. Although on many issues, she and her party converge, but she has been known to have her own independent views. That said, she would also want to take her party and the coalition partners along.

Do you see her reconfiguring her party's politics in the Bharatiya Janata Party-PDP alliance, given her strong espousal of what many call the 'soft separatism' approach?



We should, from Delhi and elsewhere in India, stop looking at the mainstream politicians of Kashmir as being "soft separatist". It is not easy to be a political leader in a region where separatism is very much alive. Therefore, we should trust their loyalty. Mufti, in my opinion, will not compromise on the interests of the state or the country.

What are some of the challenges Mufti is likely to face once she becomes the state's chief minister?



The fact that she has never served in the government is itself going to be a major challenge for her. However, ever since the new coalition government came into power in the state, she has been close to the decision-making process of her party and the government. So, she has surely learned enough from that.

Another challenge is the economic situation that the state is facing. Also, a key issue is how the state is going to help maintain close relations between Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh. Another challenge for her, as it is for other partners in the coalition, is to be able to address issues that are likely to polarise the Kashmir Valley. We're yet to see how she will also seek the help of civil society in that regard.

Given the growing dissent within her party, would Mufti be able to keep the PDP flock together?



The fact that [senior PDP leaders] Muzaffar Hussain Baig and Altaf Bukhari went to see the governor and give the message that they fully support Mufti is proof enough that she has the backing of her party. Every party in the country, for that matter, has dissenters. So, the challenge for her is no different from what other parties face.
The West Bengal government is likely to take back 12,000 acre land in Nayachar near Haldia in the state's East Midnapore district it had earlier allotted to NRI Prasoon Mukherjee led Universal Success Enterprises.

"We have initiated talks with Prasoon (Banerjee) to resume the land", the state's chief minister Mamata Banerjee told mediapersons here after the completion of the Bengal Global Business Summit.

"Resume", Banerjee later clarified implied the government's plans of taking back the land.

Following scrapping off of the Salim Group's chemical hub project - where Universal Success Enterprises had a stake - the government had allotted the land to the industrialist to build a 2,000 MW thermal project, an industrial park and an eco-tourism project involving a consolidated investment of Rs 26,000 crore.

The revised investment proposal also ran into trouble as environmental clearances could not be obtained from the union environment ministry on grounds of ecological impact in the region. The government has now decided to take back the allotted land in the island to develop eco-tourism projects encompassing fishermen's financial progress in the region.

To work it out, while Mukherjee will carry on with the planned real-estate investment proposal in Baruipur, options will be given to the former Salim Group's Indian partner to set-up a solar power project in Nayachar. In turn, the state government will take back the land it had allotted in the island way back in 2011.

Banerjee, immediately after coming to power had allotted 96 acres of land to Mukherjee for development of real-estate in the planned township near the state's capital.
If cheap labour, a ready land bank and surplus power were West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's selling points for the state on day one of the Bengal Global Business Summit, on the concluding day, she promised a tax-friendly regime.

We dont want to harass the industrialists. Our appeal is to all governments not to harass industrialists. Let them be in peace so that their flags fly high. I cannot go for raids every day. Sometimes I have the power, but I cannot bulldoze you. We have to see that businessmen also have flexible space. We have to give them mind relaxation so that they can come up with a vision. If they always think that oh god tax people are coming then they will be afraid," she told industrialists, most of which hailed from Kolkata.

The rationale according to Banerjee was that if industry flourishes then money would flow. If money flows then the country will be benefitted."



She however made a distinction from black money. "Black money is different. If you can bring back the black money and use it for development, we will be very honoured.





The message from the Summit for the business community was clear, Let us work together.Banerjee said, investment proposals amounting to Rs 2,50,000 were already there. These are concrete proposals. However, company-wise breakup for the same were not available though Chief Minister mentioned some of them: TCG Rs 20,000 crore, Zhongtong Rs 1,500 crore, Shree Cement Rs 500 crore, Ambuja Cement Rs 350 crore, Great Eastern Rs 1,700 crore.

Last year, the state had bagged investment proposals amounting to Rs 2,43,000 crore. Much of that was from the Centre or central PSUs.

Bengal is the destination for industrial growth today, it is the gateway for Asian countries. I have not counted all the proposals. It will take some time. But very conservatively it is Rs 2,50,104 crore. These are investment proposals already in hand, she said.

The Summit, according to to the Chief Minister, was excellent, fabulous, superb. All captains of the industry were there, Mukesh Ambani, Subhash Chandra, Sajjan Jindal, Rakesh Bharati Mittal. It was the best business conclave in India. Next year it will be even better, she said. The dates for next year's Summit has already been fixed for January 20 and January 21.

Our target is to make West Bengal the number one investment destination in India, said the Chief Minister. From Banerjee's side she has assured that she would not interfere with industry.

I was in the Opposition also, but we never disturbed industrialists, it is not in our nature, she said.

The agitation at Singur in the state against the Nano project was, of course, more than seven years back.
Niti Aayog Vice-Chairman Arvind Panagariya said rapid growth has come to India much later, whereas countries like China, Taiwan, Singapore and Korea experience it for extended years.

"Rapid growth has come to India much later. India also grew during the nine-year period, from 2003-2004 to 2011-12, at 8.3 per cent per year, which is the kind of growth Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and China experienced for an extended period of time," said Panagariya at Foresight-2016, an annual event hosted by a leading regional news channel.

"After 2011-12, it [growth] dipped below five per cent in 2013-14 and 2014-15. We are back to 7.5 per cent today," he added. During the rapid transformation in these countries, which took place in no more than three decades, each of these countries saw exports expanding rapidly and growth in labour-intensive industries such as apparel, footwear, assembling and food processing, he reasoned.

Later in the day, during his meeting with Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, Panagariya stressed the need to put in place mechanisms and operational guidelines to jointly pursue the national and sub-national development agenda.

"This calls for formulation of a strategic plan for the entire country by the Niti Aayog and similar exercise at the state and district levels," said a release from the chief minister's office.

Patnaik also pointed out that there would be net loss in central fund flow to the tune of Rs 1776.31 crore during 2015-16, despite the increase in devolution of central taxes from 32 per cent to 42 per cent for Odisha.

The chief minister also emphasised restoration of area development schemes for the development of backward areas.

De-linking area development programmes like the special plan for Kalahandi, Bolangir and Koraput districts, backward region grant fund and integrated action plan for left-wing extremism (LWE) affected districts from central assistance will seriously affect the development programmes in the backward and LWE-affected districts of the state. Support for the development of backward areas may be restored, added the statement.

The Odisha government asked for a single-window system for communication of annual allocation and sharing pattern of CSS to the state sufficiently in advance, preferably by mid-December of the preceding financial year for enabling the state to go for a realistic budget.

Odisha's contribution to the process of nation building in terms of use of its natural resources is significant.

Demands have been raised by the state government several times in the past before for declaring Odisha as a special category state, which has not yet been favourably considered. All the criteria for special category state are fulfilled by Odisha, except international boundaries. A special dispensation should be made in the case of Odisha in this regard, Patnaik suggested to the Niti Aayog vice-chairman.
The Payments Bank from India Post, expected to start operations by March 2017, has received proposals from 40 domestic and global companies for a partnership in the new venture.

"The process of setting up the Payments Bank is in progress," said Ravi Shankar Prasad, minister for communications and IT at an event here.

"We have so far received proposals from 40 global and local companies who want to sell insurance products, financial products, government-to-public services and private-to-public services with the Payments bank which is backed by the strong network of India Post," he added.

Earlier, the Department of Posts had stated that around 25 companies such as Deutsche Bank, State Bank of India, ICICI bank have shown their desire to partner India Post Payments Bank.

Global companies such as Barclays have also shown interest in joining the network of the payments bank.

In August this year, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) approved payments bank plans of 11 firms, including Paytm, Reliance Industries, Bharti Airtel, postal department and Vodafone.

According to RBI guidelines, the first branch of the Payments Bank has to be set up within 18 months. The bank will be able to bring out products such as demand deposits and remittances.

They will not be allowed to undertake lending activities and initially be restricted to hold a maximum balance of Rs 1 lakh per customer.

However, they will be allowed to issue ATM and debit cards as other prepaid payment instruments, but not credit cards.

The new unit of India Post will use the existing infrastructure of the postal department and will pay user charges to the department.

Under the Payments Bank, the initial plan is to have 650 main branches where the department has head or bigger post offices. Subsequently, 25,000 "spoke" branches will be set up while the other 130,000 post offices will act as business correspondents.

The minister today inspected the e-commerce parcel delivery centre in Mumbai, which is handled by India Post and is dedicated it to the nation.

The e-commerce parcel delivery arm of the postal department has made a business of around Rs 1,000 crore from the cash-on-delivery model, out of the more than Rs 95,000 crore cash-on-delivery business done annually, he added.
Arun Jaitley, Col. Rathore hold interaction with the Shyam Benegal Committee on Film Certification . .

Union Minister for Information & Broadcasting Shri Arun Jaitley, Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting Col. Rajyavardhan Rathore and I&B Secretary Shri Sunil Arora today held wide ranging interaction with the recently constituted Shyam Benegal Committee in Mumbai. The Ministry of Information & Broadcasting on January 1st, 2016, constituted an Expert Committee under the chairmanship of Shri Shyam Benegal to recommend broad guidelines for certification of films by the Central Board of Film Certification, CBFC. .

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Members of the Committee noted filmmaker Shri. Rakyesh Omprakash Mehra, advertising & communication expert Shri Piyush Pandey, veteran film journalist Ms. Bhawana Somayaa, NFDC Managing Director Ms. Nina Lath Gupta and Joint Secretary, Films, Shri Sanjay Murthy were present. .

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Shri Arun Jaitley observed that in most countries of the world there is a mechanism for certifying films and documentaries, but it has to be ensured that in doing so, artistic creativity and freedom do not get curtailed. He also said that the film certification guidelines needs contemporary interpretation and they should be made as non discretionary as possible. .

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Minister of State, Col. Rajyavardhan Rathore expressed confidence that the Committee of Experts under the Chairmanship of Shri Shyam Benegal would provide a holistic framework for interpretation of the provisions of Cinematograph Act and Rules for the benefit of the chairperson and other members of the CBFC Screening Committee. .

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Shri Shyam Benegal said there is a need to move towards a new system of grading films in terms of age, maturity, sensibility and sensitivity instead of censorship. .

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Shyam Benegal Committee will study the existing procedure being followed by CBFC for certification of original films, their dubbed versions as well as recertification of films for screening on other media platforms. The Committee will also study various directives of courts as well as notifications issued by other Government agencies like Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Ministry of Environment & Forests, Animal Welfare Board of India etc, which have a bearing on the process of film certification. The staffing pattern of CBFC would also be looked into in an effort to recommend a framework which would provide transparent, user friendly services. .

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CP/GV
PM visits Pathankot Airbase

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The Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi today visited Pathankot Airbase in Punjab, which was attacked by terrorists recently. .

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Senior officials of Defence Forces made a detailed presentation about their joint counter-terrorist and combing operation to tackle such a serious terrorist attack. .

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Prime Minister visited the relevant sites on the Airbase. He also made an aerial survey of the border area. .

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National Security Advisor Shri Ajit Doval, the Chiefs of Army and Air Force, NSG and BSF were present during the visit. .

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PRESIDENT OF INDIA ATTENDS 7THCONVOCATION OF VINOBA BHAVE UNIVERSITY . .

The President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee attended theseventh convocation of Vinoba Bhave Universitytoday (January 9, 2016) at Hazaribagh, Jharkhand. .

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Speaking on the occasion, the President said Vinoba Bhave University now had 24 post-graduate departments, 22 constituent colleges and 91 affiliated colleges offer teaching and research programmes in humanities, science, commerce, management, computer application, engineering, law, education and medicine. It has within its jurisdiction the ayurveda and homoeopathy colleges of the entire state of Jharkhand. Having completed two and half decades, Vinoba Bhave University is now quickly proceeding towards realizing its vision of becoming a modern twenty-first century institution and centre of excellence. .

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The President said universities cannot work in the isolation. They should contribute to betterment of society. Government has launched several important initiatives like Swachh Bharat Mission, Smart City Mission, Digital India, Make in India, Skilling India, and Start-up India. These initiatives have potential to change the destiny of India. .

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The President said India was well known for education and research in the past. There was a time when India played a leading role in the world as a centre of higher education. Renowned seats of learning likeTakshashila, Nalanda, Vikramashila, Valabhi, Somapura and Odantapuri enabled India lead the world for almost 1800 years. Cross fertilization of knowledge from across world took place here for centuries. .

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The President said in last three and half years he has visited more than 100 institutions and emphasized the need to improve international rankings of Indian institutions of higher education. There was no lack of merit on the part of our higher learning institutions. They however need to promote themselves better. Noble Laureates like Hargobind Khurana and V Ramakrishnanhave completed their studies in Indian universities. He said thanks to the efforts of the institutions concerned and his constant prodding, two Indian institutions have broken into the top 200 for the first time. He was confident many more would join these institutions soon. .

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The President complimented Shri Yashwant Sinha, former Union Minister for Finance and External Affairs on the occasion, who was conferred D.Litt. (Honoris Causa) degree. .

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AKT/ SH
Union HRD Minister Smt Smriti Zubin Irani Inaugurates New Delhi World Book Fair 2016 . .

We believe in Athithi Devo Bhavaa and in our tradition we worship our guests. We hope that the people from the Guest of Honour country, China will feel at home in India," said Smt Smriti Zubin Irani, Union Minister of Human Resource Development, while welcoming China as the Guest of Honour country at the 24th edition of New Delhi World Book Fair today at New Delhi to be held from 9 to 17 January 2016. The Fair is being organized by the National Book Trust, India in collaboration with the India Trade Promotion Organisation. .

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Talking about the India-China relationship since ancient times, she said that there is a mention of Chinese silk dress in Arthashastra which shows how Indian history finds mention of the country's relationship with China. She hoped that both the countries will strengthen ties both on the cultural as well as knowledge front. .

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Smt Irani appreciated efforts undertaken by the NBT to bring out 16 new titles under the Navlekhan series and hoped that it would also publish books in 22 major Indian languages. She also said that the children from various states of India including Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Manipur, Assam among others with select photographers would be sent as shodh yatris to countries like Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Thailand, Cambodia and their memoirs will be published in the form of books. .

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Shri Baldeo Bhai Sharma, Chairman, NBT said that on the lines of inspiration from Smt Smriti Zubin Irani, the Minister of Human Resource Development, the Trust has come up with a new Navlekhan series for young writers under the age of forty and has brought out 16 new titles. He also informed that the theme pavilion will display books beginning from bhoj patra to ebooks and will also display ancient scripts. .

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Mr Liu Zhenyou, eminent Chinese author; Mr Le Yucheng, Chinese Ambassador to India; and Shri Vinay Sheel Oberoi, Secretary, Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development also spoke on the occasion. .

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Earlier, Dr Rita Chowdhury, Director, NBT welcomed the guests present on the occasion. She hoped that through books, booklovers especially the young will get an opportunity to connect with the cultural heritage of India. .

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Later, Smt Smriti Irani inaugurated the Theme Pavilion and the China pavilion at Pragati Maidan. .

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GG\DS
German Chancellor Angela Merkel today backed a toughening of expulsion rules for convicted refugees, as protesters took to the streets against a shocking rash of sexual assaults blamed on migrants during New Year's festivities.

Both women's groups and supporters of the xenophobic PEGIDA movement mobilised in separate rallies in Cologne, as Merkel declared that refugees found to have committed a crime -- even those who have not been given jail terms -- should be required to leave Germany.

"If the law does not suffice, then the law must be changed" she said, vowing action to protect not just German citizens, but innocent refugees too.

Outrage is growing in Germany over the revelations that hundreds of women ran a gauntlet of groping hands, lewd insults and robberies in mob violence last week in the western city.

Most of the assailants were of Arabic or North African background, according to eye-witnesses, police and media reports.

The majority of suspects identified by federal police are also migrants, adding fuel to criticism of Merkel's liberal migrant policy -- which brought 1.1 million new asylum seekers to Germany last year.

Waving German flags and signs meaning "Rapefugees not welcome", "Germany survived war, plague and cholera, but Merkel?", hundreds of PEGIDA supporters shouted "Merkel raus" (Merkel out).

In response, counter-protesters, separated by police, chanted "Nazis raus" at the site, where earlier, some 500 protesters, mostly women, had held a noisy rally against sexist violence.

Banging pots and blowing whistles, demonstrators waved signs in German meaning "No violence against women" and "No means no! It's the law!" while read: "Protect our women and children."



Ahead of the afternoon rally, Lutz Bachmann, co-founder of PEGIDA ("Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the Occident") posted a photo of himself online wearing a t-shirt saying "Rapefugees not Welcome".

In a similar vein, the populist right-wing Alternative for Germany party, which polls show as having 10 percent support ahead of state elections this year, claimed the violence gave a "taste of the looming collapse of culture and civilisation".

The mob violence has played into popular fears, and threatened to cloud what had been a broadly welcoming mood in Germany where crowds cheered as Syrian refugees arrived by train in September.

Germany's conservative Die Welt newspaper said January 6, the day the scope of the violence became clear, "marks the beginning of a change in immigration policy" in an article outlining both "the benefits and the dangers of mass immigration from Muslim countries.
The Obama administration has asked some of the nation's biggest technology companies for help in the fight against terrorism as it announced steps to thwart the recruitment and radicalisation of extremists. Top administration officials met in San Jose, California, with representatives of Twitter, Apple, Facebook, and other Silicon Valley companies. In a seven-page memo sent in advance, the companies were asked for ideas on how extremist content online can be identified and removed, as well as help creating alternative messages, according to excerpts of the document obtained and described ...
Apple registers auto domain names, including 'apple.car'



Apple Inc has registered domain names related to automobiles, adding to speculation about the company's plans to develop an automobile. The iPhone maker registered the domain names, which include apple.car, apple.cars and apple.auto in December, according to domain information provider Who.is. MacRumors had first reported the news, but said the domain names could be related to Apple's CarPlay, which lets drivers access contacts on their iPhones, make calls or listen to voicemails without taking their hands off the steering wheel. While never openly acknowledging plans to build a car, Apple has been aggressive in recruiting auto experts from companies such as Ford or Mercedes-Benz.

Lenovo unveils first smartphone powered by Google's Tango



Lenovo Group has unveiled a smartphone that can see and maps out its surroundings with help from an Alphabet Inc 3D-scanning technology named Project Tango. The Chinese company will become the first to sell devices employing Alphabet subsidiary Google's Tango technology, which superimposes information and digital images onto displays of the real world. An infrared and wide-angle camera orients the user within indoor spaces and precisely maps the immediate environment - capturing the dimensions of a room or helping users navigate a shopping mall, for instance. The new handsets go on sale over the summer for under $500.

Time Warner pushes for binge-watching to take on Netflix



Hoping to keep viewers who are dropping cable subscriptions for online streaming services, Time Warner is negotiating to make full seasons of more shows available to pay-TV customers on demand, according to Time Warner Chief Financial Officer Howard Averill. Time Warner's cable networks, which include TNT and TBS, have "made it clear" to Hollywood studios that they want so-called "stacking rights," or the ability to air full seasons of shows they buy, Averill said. Meanwhile, Time Warner's Warner Bros studio recently sold a new show, Lucifer, to 21st Century Fox, that allows cable subscribers to view the entire first season on demand - the first time that Warner Bros has granted full-season rights to a broadcast network, he said. Investors have become concerned that TV producers may be jeopardising the long-term health of the TV industry for lucrative short-term deals with streaming providers like Netflix and Amazon.com, whose popularity is taking viewers away from regular TV watching. Netflix didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

Apple buys startup that sees what's behind your smile



Apple Inc bought the artificial intelligence startup, Emotient, that specialises in facial recognition technology that interprets people's emotions as they watch videos and other media. Apple confirmed the purchase without giving terms or describing its plans for the San Diego, California-based company. Emotient has tailored its facial-recognitionsoftware to advertising, media testing, audience response and research and other areas, according to its website.

Gmail creator joins Y Combinator's tech incubator



Y Combinator, Silicon Valley's largest startup factory, is rejiggering responsibilities at the executive level and adding more staff. Paul Buchheit, the creator of Gmail and of Google's onetime slogan, "Don't be evil," replaces Sam Altman as managing partner of Y Combinator's main accelerator programme, which helped launch companies including Airbnb, Dropbox, Reddit, and Stripe. Altman, who took over as Y Combinator president from founder Paul Graham in February 2014, revealed the changes in a blog post. He said he would now run the company's research group until hiring a full-time manager for that team. He plans to also split his time working on the incubator, as well as the YC Continuity and Fellowship investment programmes. Ali Rowghani, the former Pixar and Twitter executive, will continue to run the Continuity investment fund. Founded in 2005, Y Combinator said it's backed more than 800 companies that have a combined valuation of $30 billion.

Yahoo to reconsider sale of web business



Yahoo! Inc is considering an outright sale of its business, marking what could hasten a significant shift in the company's thinking as it faces pressure from activist shareholders. Just last month, Yahoo executives put forward a plan to spin off its main internet business, the latest of several strategies they've proposed over the past year to deal with slowing revenue. Now, that idea may be abandoned in favour of a sale, people familiar with the matter said. The company may need a new plan in the face of an expected proxy fight by an activist investor, said the people.

Twitter slumps to all-time low



Twitter Inc is at an all-time low just months after co-founder Jack Dorsey took the helm as chief executive officer. Since its 2013 initial public offering, the company has disappointed investors with slowing user growth and sales. While Dorsey aims to turn it around with product improvements, the moves haven't yet affected the company's numbers. Twitter shares fell 1.4 per cent to $19.98 at the close in New York, their lowest since the company's initial public offering in November 2013. The stock fell 35 per cent in 2015.
Volkswagen is unlikely to face US-style fines in Europe over its emissions scandal because of a softer regulatory regime and its home country Germany's determination to protect its car industry, EU sources and legal experts say. The carmaker has been embroiled in crisis since last September, when it admitted it had cheated US emissions tests using software known as "defeat devices". The US Justice Department is suing the German company for up to $46 billion for allegedly violating environmental laws - though some legal experts expect the final settlement to be far ...
In addition to the daily Joaquin Guzman, the world's most-wanted drug trafficker, was recaptured by Mexican authorities on Friday, six months after he humiliated the government by breaking out of jail for a second time. He returned to the same maximum-security facility he escaped from in July. Guzman, known as "El Chapo" and labelled the world's most powerful drug trafficker by the US Treasury Department, was nabbed early Friday after authorities tracked him to a home in northern Mexico and then chased him through sewage tunnels. He had been on the lam since escaping from a ...
Grown diamonds are expected to meet nearly 1.9 per cent of the global polished diamond sales revenue by 2018, according to Frost & Sullivan's research estimates.

Grown diamonds are cultivated from small diamonds in a greenhouse in carbon-rich environment maintained for 12-14 weeks. By the end of this period, the diamond seed, which has undergone a natural crystallisation process, results in a Type IIa rough diamond.

A recent report, Grown diamonds, a sunrise industry in India: prospects for economic growth, by the PHD Chamber of Commerce says the grown diamonds industry has the potential to employ over 1 million people considering production could touch around 150 million carats. It currently employs 2,000 people only across the globe for an estimated 360,000 carats.

Grown diamond polishing could be an answer to India's diamond industry blues, which is facing sluggish demand in international . Surat, the diamond capital of India that polishes eight out of ten rough diamonds in the world, has seen 20,000 people rendered jobless in the past few months. The Rs 90,000 crore industry is reeling from debt and default.

Vishal Mehta, chief executive officer of IIa Technologies, which grew 300,000 carats of Type IIa grade diamond last year, said, "India has invested heavily in diamond cutting and polishing and grown diamonds can offer a diamond source for the 21st-century consumer. Our largest jewellery export market is still the US and having an eco-friendly, conflict-free and origin-guaranteed source of diamonds is what Americans are looking for."





However, Dinesh Navadia, president of the Surat Diamond Association, does not buy this argument. "People do not understand the difference between synthetic diamonds and grown diamonds. The fact that grown diamonds are not artificial is known only to traders and industry insiders. As of now, no one would want to buy a grown diamond, even if the prices are 30-40 per cent less," he said.

Rough mined diamond supply is projected to decline from 125 million carats to 14 million carats in 2050, according to the PHD Chamber report. However, demand for rough diamonds is poised to rise to 292 million carats.

An estimated $13 billion worth of rough diamonds are mined every year. Only 15 new mines are expected to become operational in the next 40 years. Navadia, however, said the crisis in rough diamonds was likely to ease in the coming years as more mines were discovered.

"Brands like Pure Grown Diamonds have taken steps in the right direction by starting to work with retailers that sell both grown and mined diamonds. This is happening in the US and has been very successful. It will continue to other parts of the world as the grown diamond supply expands," Mehta pointed out.

Exports of cut and polished diamonds constitute 47 per cent of the gems and jewellery exports from India. The EU, the UAE, Botswana, Russia and India are the major exporters of diamonds worldwide, constituting 73 per cent of global exports (307 million carats).

India, the EU, the UAE, China and Israel are also the major import destinations, which comprise 376.76 million carats, or 90 per cent of global imports of diamonds from the rest of the world.

Prices of rough diamonds have increased by 70 per cent, while polished diamond prices have increased by only 30 per cent, resulting in profit margins of diamond manufacturers shrinking to 0.3-2.3 per cent.

KPMG, an international tax and accounting firm headquartered in the Netherlands, forecasts that by 2015, the global share of China's diamond processing industry will reach 21.3 per cent, while India's share will decline from 57 per cent to 49 per cent.
In another case of inconvenience being created because of VIP culture, Air India passengers were left stranded after a flight on Friday from New Delhi to Bhopal was delayed for seven hours following a holdup by some politicians.

The passengers of the delayed flight claimed that the Air India flight, which was scheduled to depart at 7:30 pm, left at 2:30 a.m.

"Our flight was delayed and then was ultimately cancelled. After that we told them to reschedule the flight and they did. But there was a politician who did not want us to reach on time because his Bhubaneswar flight was cancelled due to some unknown reason. He was also asking that his flight should be rescheduled," a stranded AI passenger, Maninder Singh, told ANI.

"We had to suffer a lot because of the minister. We had kids who were hungry and to add to that the flight got delayed. Initially they told us that the flight is delayed by 15 minutes, then half an hour and ultimately they cancelled the flight. The Air India manager did help us but the minister in the Bhubaneswar flight created a lot of ruckus and as a result our flight got delayed," he added.

Meanwhile, Tathagata Satpathy, Biju Janata Dal (BJD) MP, who was on the flight from Delhi to Bhubaneswar, said that Air India kept on delaying their flight as the carrier had posted the crew from their flight to the one in which Madhya Pradesh Minister Sartaj Singh was travelling.

"Air India flight from Delhi to Bhubaneswar was to take off at 6:20 p.m. But they kept on delaying it. When our aircraft was ready, we were then told that our flight will board after the Air India flight to Bhopal. It appeared as if crew from our flight was posted to Bhopal flight as MP Minister Sartaj Singh was one of the passengers on it," Satpathy told ANI.
Christina Hendricks has recently agreed to star in the upcoming sequel 'Bad Santa 2.'

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The Miramax and Broad Green Pictures sequel sees the return of Billy Bob Thornton's chain smoking, beer guzzling Father Christmas impersonator Willie and the 40-year-old actress is set to join him in a lead role, reports News24.com.

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It is being said that the filming will being next week in Montreal.

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The 'Mad Men' star will be portraying the character of Ivy League, an educated woman, who runs a charity and who falls for Willie, after he and his foul-mouthed, tough-as-nails mother Sunny Soke plots to steal the charity's cash.

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Christina is currently filming indie movie 'Pottersville' with 'Man of Steel' actor Michael Shannon.
Indian opener Shikhar Dhawan has said that his side is fully pumped up and preparing well for the upcoming ODI series against world champions Australia.

India opened their tour to Australia on a winning note as they claimed a 74-run win in the opening warm-up T20 match against Western Australia XI at the WACA Ground on Friday.

The 30-year-old, who scored 74 during a warm-up match, said that it was good to get a 100-run partnership with Virat Kohli (74) before the start of the main matches.

Speaking about the Australian line-up, Dhawan said that the visitors were not concerned about it and that they were only looking forward to focus on their game, news.com.au reported.

Australia will play without their key strike bowlers Mitchell Johnson, who had retired from the format and Mitchell Starc, who is recovering after ankle surgery.

India, which claimed a 3-0 win in the recently concluded Test series against South Africa, will aim to continue their winning momentum when they will take on Australia in a five-match ODI series, starting from January 12 in Perth.
With Pakistan assuring to take strong and prompt action against the guilty in the Pathankot terror attack, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Saturday expressed hope that Islamabad would take stringent action against the perpetrators of the attack.

"Pakistan Government has promised prompt and decisive action based on actionable intelligence provided very expeditiously by the Indian Government. And India awaits prompt action from Pakistan against the perpetrators of Pathankot attack," BJP spokesperson GVL Narsimha Rao said.

"I think unlike in the past, Pakistan's response has not been one of denial but one willing to take quick action .We will wait and see whether there will be a change in the manner Pakistan acts this time because the past does not inspire confidence. We hope that like there has been a change in tone, there will be a change in action too," he added.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has reached the Pathankot air base to take the first-hand assessment of the situation following the deadly terror strike.

Earlier, the Pakistani Government has asked for more and 'concrete' evidence instead of 'leads' to take action against the suspects of being involved in the terrorist strike on the airbase.

India had earlier shared leads with Islamabad which mostly included intercepts of telephone calls made by the terrorists to their alleged handlers and the locations of the numbers which they had called in Pakistan.

Later, Pakistan acknowledged that they had received the leads and had begun working on them. Sharif then called Prime Minister Narendra Modi and assured him of prompt action against the guilty.

According to a statement issued by the Prime Minister's Office, the meeting reviewed the progress on the information shared by India and it was decides that the matter would be continued to discuss with New Delhi.

Meanwhile, India awaits Pakistan's formal response to the shared leads and has expressed quick action from Islamabad so that the upcoming foreign secretaries talks are not hampered.

Pathankot district was attacked by six terrorists from Pakistan on January 2. Seven security personnel were martyred and another 20 were injured in the attack.
The Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas (MoPNG) has launched an Online Initiative to engage the LPG Consumers and Citizens of India in providing efficient and citizen friendly services in LPG distribution.

Following two online discussion forums have been launched and are available on myGov.in and mylpg.in for a) Citizen-Friendly Services; and b) Increasing LPG Coverage in the Country

LPG Consumers/ Citizens are requested to participate and share their thoughts on the respective forums online. Valuable suggestions/ comments are welcome and will be considered for improving the customer oriented services related to LPG Coverage & Delivery.

This initiative is one of the many initiatives for observing 2016 as the Year of LPG Consumers, announced by the Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas recently.

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Three tourists, a Swedish and two Austrians, were injured in an attack on a hotel in Egypt's Hurghada city late on Friday, media reports quoted Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou as saying.

An earlier report by state-run news agency Ahram-online said three gunmen stormed the Bella Vista Hotel used by foreign tourists in Hurghada, and injured at least two foreigners.

However, previous media reports were different on the nationalities of the wounded tourists, according to Xinhua news agency.

The Ahram-online quoted Khaled Megahed, a health ministry spokesperson, as saying two Swedish tourists were injured in the attack and are being treated in a nearby hospital, while some security sources said the wounded tourists were from Denmark and Germany.

According to eyewitnesses, two of the three gunmen were killed by security forces.

The attack came hours after Egyptian affiliate of Islamic State claimed responsibility for an armed attack on a tourist hotel in Cairo.

Egypt has witnessed a growing wave of anti-security attacks in revenge for the crackdown on Islamists after the army-led ouster of President Mohamed Morsi in 2013.
At least 30 militants were killed over the past 24 hours by the Afghanistan army during operations across the conflict-ridden country, the defence ministry said on Saturday.

According to the ministry statement, over 15 insurgents were also injured and arms and ammunition seized during the operations, Xinhua reported.

The statement said seven soldiers were killed during the crackdown against the insurgents.

Militancy has increased and counter-militancy operations have been stepped up in Afghanistan since last April when the Taliban launched its spring offensive in the country.
Afghan security forces launched operations to recapture Darqad district in Takhar province on Saturday, police said.

Police, backed by the Afghan army, started the operation around 2 a.m. (local time) and it will last till tmilitants are evicted, Xinhua quoted police spokesman Abdul Khalil Asir as saying.

The security forces have faced no resistance so far and the operation goes smoothly, the officer added.

Taliban militants who overrun Darqad district along the border with Tajikistan last October have yet to make a comment.
Three days after Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav laid the foundation stone of the Rs.140 crore Mughal museum, heritage conservationists here on Saturday demanded that the precious Kohinoor diamond be brought back to India.

According to the president of the Braj Mandal Heritage Conservation Society, Surendra Sharma, the Mughal museum in Agra should be the final resting place of the Kohinoor, the Peacock throne, and thousands of historical documents, including Akbarnama and Babarnama and 42 drawings of the Taj Mahal which are part of the 1942 report on conservation of the Taj Mahal, languishing in the British museum in London.

"We have sent a representation to the concerned minister in New Delhi and are looking forward to his response," Sharma told IANS on Saturday.

"Kohinoor belongs to India. It was taken away by the British from the Punjab maharaja and presented to the Queen on July 3, 1850," said social activist Shravan Kumar Singh.

Earlier, Nadir Shah who invaded Delhi, had acquired the priceless stone from Mughal ruler Mohammed Shah.

The conservationists also said original Mughal paintings, particularly miniatures and the Akbarnama, are in possession of the British Museum in London.

"The government of India should strive to secure possession of these valuable heritage pieces through persuasion and negotiations with the erstwhile colonial powers," they added.

The Kohinoor is a 106-carat diamond which was once the largest diamond in the world. It is now in the possession of the British royal family.

The Britsh came across the gem when they conquered Punjab in 1849 and Queen Victoria received it in 1851. The stone then weighed 186 carats.
Information and Broadcasting Minister Arun Jaitley said here on Saturday that there is a need to ensure that artistic creativity and freedom should never get curtailed while certifying films and documentaries.

Stating that the film certification guidelines needed contemporary interpretation, Jaitley, who is also the union finance minister, said these should be made as non discretionary as possible.

On Saturday, Jaitley met members of the committee, recently constituted to look into the revamp of the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC).

The committee is headed by eminent filmmaker Shyam Benegal while the other members include filmmaker Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra, adman Piyush Pandey and film critic Bhawana Somaaya.

The committee, which has been asked to submit its report in two months, also includes National Film Development Council Managing Director Nina Lath Gupta and Joint Secretary (Films) Sanjay Murthy.

Shyam Benegal, on the occasion, said: "There is a need to move towards a new system of grading films in terms of age, maturity, sensibility and sensitivity instead of censorship."

According to the information and broadcasting ministry, the Shyam Benegal committee will study the existing procedure being followed by CBFC for certification of original films, their dubbed versions as well as recertification of films for screening on other media platforms.

The committee will also study various directives of courts as well as notifications issued by other government agencies like the ministry of health and family welfare, ministry of environment and forests, Animal Welfare Board of India etc., which have a bearing on the process of film certification.

The staffing pattern of CBFC would also be looked into to recommend a framework which would provide transparent and user friendly services.
Even as Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif held parleys in Islamabad with Army Chief Gen Raheel Sharif and ISI chief Lt Gen Rizwan Akthar on Friday to ensure that the Pathankot attacks do not derail the peace process, Pakistan's former foreign minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri welcomed the "restrained and mature" responses by both the prime ministers and said the Pathankot attack was a "litmus test" for both the leaders.

"I think both the Prime Ministers have behaved very wisely. While the Indian media immediately resorted to finger-pointing, the Government of India did no such thing," said Kasuri in an e-mail interview to IANS.

Kasuri's reaction comes even as Islamabad is pushing for a sustained dialogue in the wake of the daring attack at an air base, where a sizeable number of Indian Air Force's MiG-21 fighter planes and Mi-25 attack helicopters were based. Seven Indian security personnel were killed in the attack.

Foreign Secretaries of both India and Pakistan were slated to meet in Islamabad next Friday even as New Delhi has linked the peace talks to Pakistan's response to the 'actionable evidence' provided on the role of Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed's involvement.

"I am glad that PM Nawaz Sharif has offered to cooperate with India on the leads it provides. That is the only answer to the terrorists. They will stop only when they feel that the peace process had indeed become irreversible and that none of their activities will succeed in disrupting the peace process," said Kasuri.

Accepting that the Pathankot attack was a "litmus test" for the leadership of both the countries, Kasuri said that it was crucial to the spirit of the joint statement on the irreversibility of peace process signed in New Delhi in 2005.

Recollecting the efforts taken under Pervez Musharraf's regime, Kasuri said that it was just after the peace process had begun that the Samjhauta Express blast took place in 2007. "The Samjhauta Express attack took place a day before my visit to New Delhi. I was advised to cancel my visit because of a large number of Pakistanis who had died in that attack. I refused to do any such thing and went ahead with my visit. My call in Delhi, after my arrival, was the hospital where injured Pakistanis were being treated," said Kasuri, who had authored the book, 'Neither a Hawk, nor a Dove'.

"Similarly, when my successor Shah Mahmud Qureshi went to India and the Mumbai attacks took place," he added.

(Preetha Nair can be reached at preetha.n@ians.in)
Union Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Irani on Saturday inaugurated the New Delhi World Book Fair 2016, and said guest of honour country China would feel "at home" during the event.

"We believe in 'Athithi Devo Bhava' and in our tradition, we worship our guests. We hope that the people from the guest of honour country China will feel at home in India," an official statement quoted the minister as saying.

Talking about the India-China relationship since ancient times, she said there was a mention of Chinese silk dress in Arthashastra which shows how Indian history finds mention of the country's relationship with China.

She hoped that both countries will strengthen ties on the cultural as well as knowledge front.

The fair, organised by the National Book Trust, India in collaboration with the India Trade Promotion Organisation, will be on till January 17.
Poor visibility caused by dense fog at the Bagdogra airport on Saturday forced Bhutan Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay to cancel his journey back to his country, officials said.

Scheduled to catch a Druk Air flight from Bagdogra airport back to his country, Tobgay who was on four day visit to attend the Bengal Global Business Summit in Kolkata, had to return to the state capital after his flight from Kolkata failed to land here due to poor visibility.

With as many as 11 flights cancelled, union MSME Minister Kalraj Mishra, who was slated to visit Siliguri, also had to drop his travel plans.

According to terminal manager (Bagdogra airport) Barun Kumar Das, 11 of the 12 scheduled flights had to be cancelled due to poor visibility. The only flight to take off was a Druk Air flight to Bangkok via Paro in Bhutan.

The dense fog also disrupted train movement with many long distance trains including the Teesta Torsa Express delayed by several hours.
Despite a series of dialogues, agitating students at Jadavpur University here on Saturday refused to end the over 24-hour-long siege of their vice chancellor over holding of students' union elections.

The students have been demonstrating following an advisory issued by the West Bengal higher department asking the state-run university to hold the elections after the assembly polls.

"I am hoping we can sort out the issue by discussions. I have faith in the students," Vice Chancellor Suranjan Das told IANS.

The vice chancellor, the pro vice chancellor and registrar of the university, along with executive council members spent the night inside the campus as protesting students demanded that the vice chancellor notify the elections on February 18.

The students have sought a tripartite meeting involving the executive council members, students' representatives and Bengal Governor Keshri Nath Tripathi, who is also the chancellor of the university.

"But we have not got any dates for the meeting. We believe that the university should exercise the autonomy it has to hold the students elections on February 18," a student agitator said.

State Minister Partha Chatterjee has criticised the agitation, saying a section of students was trying to malign the university's image.

The university has witnessed similar events in the last couple of years. In 2014, students carried out a sustained agitation demanding the removal of then vice chancellor Abhijit Chakrabarti for ordering a police crackdown on students.
Far from increasing the vulnerability of wildlife to predators, ecotourism actually helps conservation efforts, researchers say.

"There have been some claims that have drawn media attention, saying that nature tourism and ecotourism can hurt wildlife and can even make wildlife more vulnerable to predators and poaching," said one of the researchers Lee Fitzgerald from Texas A&M University in the US.

"We wrote to clarify that the opposite is well-known and supported with much research; that tourism can and often does protect large landscapes and the wildlife within those landscapes," Fitzgerald noted.

The researchers said that in many parts of the world tourism protects wildlife from poaching, which is arguably the much greater threat to wildlife.

They pointed out the world's very first national parks in the U.S. were created with tourism in mind and thousands of protected areas around the planet are at least partially justified by tourism.

I is difficult to imagine wild animals becoming so tame from their interaction with people they lose their fear of being eaten, the researchers said.

In Botswana, tour operators are bringing rhinos from South Africa for release into the wild to restore populations, study co-author Amanda Stronza from Texas A&M University pointed out.

And on the Mara Conservancy along the border of Kenya and Tanzania, ecotourism dollars directly fund anti-poaching measures, she noted.

The researchers explained that strong ecotourism programmes keep poachers at bay.

If the shield of ecotourism goes away, animals are not poached because they are tame, it is because large areas can then be infiltrated by poachers.

"We wanted to clarify this crucial point because there is no evidence to support the claim that ecotourism and nature tourism make animals vulnerable to poachers," Fitzgerald said.

The article appeared in the journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution.
At least eight people were killed and 42 injured when a bus carrying refugees overturned in Turkey, the media reported on Saturday.

The accident occurred in Hayran town of the province of Balikesir on Friday, Xinhua cited a report as saying.

The injured including seven in critical conditions were sent to hospital.

The bus was carrying refugees wanting to go to the Greek island of Lesbos, according to the report.

Police has launched an investigation into the accident, the report said.

More than 3,000 refugees fleeing war-torn Syria lost their lives on the way to Greek islands via Turkey, according to the International Organisation for Migration.

Over 600,000 refugees have reportedly reached Greek islands in 2015, in a crisis that has alarmed the European Union (EU).

The EU and Turkish leaders reached a deal in November for curbing the refugee influx from the Middle East to Europe.
The European Union will start easing from Saturday restrictions imposed on Japanese food imports over the Fukushima nuclear disaster, including vegetables and beef produced in the prefecture.

Tsuyoshi Takagi, cabinet minister in charge of rebuilding from the March 2011 quake, tsunami and nuclear crisis, on Friday welcomed the bloc's decision. At present, all food items from Fukushima except alcoholic beverages must be shipped with radiation inspection certificates, the Japan Times reported.

That requirement will be removed for vegetables, fruit excluding persimmons, livestock products, tea and soba (buckwheat), because the radiation levels of these items never exceeded permissible levels in 2013 and 2014, according to the farm ministry.

Other food items from the prefecture such as rice, mushrooms, soybeans and some fishery products - excluding scallops, seaweed and live fish - will remain subject to the requirement.

The EU move follows the agriculture, forestry and fisheries ministry's announcement in November 2015 that the bloc would ease the restrictions after gaining approval from the European Commission.

The decision also comes as the EU and Japan are in the midst of negotiations for a free trade agreement. In the talks, Tokyo is seeking the elimination of duties on Japanese vehicles, while Brussels is looking to expand exports through the reduction of tariffs on pork, cheese, wine and other agricultural products.

Aside from Fukushima, restrictions will remain in place for some items produced in 12 prefectures in northeastern, eastern and central Japan.

At least 14 countries, including Australia and Thailand, have abolished restrictions on Japanese food imports, while dozens of countries like South Korea maintain special rules.
A flawed resolution to the over four months' old agitation in the Nepal Terai could have serious security implications for neighbour India, which has an almost 1,100-km open border with the southern plains of the Himalayan nation, a senior Madhesi leader has warned.

"The government in Kathmandu is trying to obfuscate the issues that face the country right now through constitutional amendments couched in long-winded legalese...," Rajendra Mahato, Sadbhawana Party president, said.

"New Delhi should be careful about extending welcome to attempts to weaken the historic agitation that the six-million-plus Madhesis have been waging since August 16 last," Mahato, who is also a prominent leader of the ongoing agitation seeking amendments to the new Constitution, told IANS in an interview during a visit here.

For more than four months, the plains of the Nepal Terai have been simmering with protests against the country's new Constitution that was adopted by the Constituent Assembly on September 20 last year. The Indian states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar share open border with the Nepal Terai, which allows people unfettered access to each other's territory and religious, ethnic and cultural intermingling.

"If the ongoing agitation is sought to be defused without the Madhesis achieving their rightful goal, it may lead to an upsurge in violence and the Terai could emerge as a playground for forces inimical to southern neighbour India," warned the 57-year-old charismatic Madhesi leader who has not flinched from leading the agitation from the front.

He was severely injured in a clash with the police at Biratnagar on December 26 while staging a sit-in protest at the Jogbani-Biratnagar India-Nepal border.

After receiving initial medical care at the B.P. Koirala Institute of Health Sciences at Dharan in eastern Nepal, he was flown to India on January 1 and admitted to Medanta The Medicity in Gurgaon, New Delhi's suburb in Haryana, where he received expert medical attention for his injuries.

"The Madhesis will no longer take it lying down... For them it's now or never... Yeh aar ya paar ki ladai hai (this is a fight to the finish)," said Mahato stressing that a settlement to the Madhesi demands ought to be "proper".

"Aandolan lamba ho to bhi theek hai... par settlement proper hona chahiye (It doesn't matter if the agitation goes on for long... but the settlement should be proper)," asserted Mahato.

The Left-led Nepal government has held a number of rounds of talks with the leaders of the Samyukta Loktantrik Madhesi Morcha which has been spearheading the agitation for over four months - but without any breakthrough so far.

The Morcha has expressed dissatisfaction over the content of the new Constitution, including demarcation of the federal units, and called for an inclusive Constitution and citizenship.

The four major constituents of the Madhesi Morcha are: the Terai Madhes Loktantrik Party with Mahanta Thakur as president; the Sadbhawana Party with Rajendra Mahto as president; the Federal Socialist Forum-Nepal headed by Upendra Yadav; and the Terai Madhes Loktantrik Party-Nepal headed by Mahendra Yadav.

Nepal's Terai region stretches from the Mechi river in the east to the Mahakali river in the west and comprises Madhes in its eastern part and the tribal-dominated Tharuhat in the western region. It has traditionally suffered immense discrimination from the Kathmandu-centric ruling elite that has comprised predominantly the Brahmins (Bahuns) and Chhetris of the Nepal hills.

Madhesis' major demand is for the formation of two provinces in the Nepali Terai -- the Madhes extending from the Mechi river in the east to the Narayani river in mid-western Nepal and Tharuhat pradesh from the Narayani to the Mahakali river in the west.

The Madhesi protestors are demanding, among other things, a redrawing of the boundaries of the provinces in the Himalayan nation as proposed in the new Constitution; and representation in Parliament on the basis of population. Significantly, the Nepal Terai has almost 51 percent of the country's population and yet gets only one-third of seats in Parliament.

The Madhesis also seek proportional representation in government jobs and restoration of rights granted to them in the interim constitution of 2007 which the new charter has snatched away.

Over 55 people, including agitators and police personnel, have been killed during the four months of the Madhesi agitation.

(Deepak Goel has been a Nepal-watcher for more than 25 years. He can be contacted at deepak.g@ians.in)
The government had a special relationship with underworld don Chhota Rajan, said former Delhi Police commissioner Neeraj Kumar.

His statement came during a panel discussion on the inaugural day of the fourth edition of Delhi Literature Festival. The three-day festival got underway on Friday.

In a session titled "Bare it all", with journalist Avirook Sen, moderated by Madhu Trehan, the former Delhi Police chief, asked if there was a special relationship between the don and government, he said: "The short answer- yes there is".

As Trehan asked him whether its a speculation or fact, he said "its a fact".

Kumar's book "Dial D for Don", which was released last year, talks about his top operations, mostly related to the underworld and the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts. He has also revealed that he had three long conversations with Mafia don Dawood Ibrahim on June 10, 20 and June 22, 1994, when he was investigating the 1993 serial blasts as a Central Bureau of Investigation official.

Kumar also said that all hopes must not be pinned on Chhota Rajan to get to Dawood. "I don't want to give away all secrets. But you are close to the truth. Let us not pin all our hopes on Chhota Rajan," he said.

Speaking about his book, he said the title of the book 'Dial D for Don' was based on the conversations with Dawood. "The name of my book is based on my conversations with Dawood. My seniors were always kept in the loop about the conversations. I don't do anything without my seniors knowledge... because there are so many agencies involved," he said.

The former police officer also spoke about about some of the controversial cases in his career, including the Ansal Plaza shootout and the allegations that he had links with the underworld.
Assuring that her government will never harass any industrialist, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee called upon governments across the country to give industrialists their space and not bother them in the name of income tax raids.

"When I have the power I cannot go every day for raids, when I am in power, I cannot bulldoze you. We have to ensure there is some flexible system in place for the businessmen. We have to give them the space also," Banerjee said.

"If everybody is afraid -- oh my god the tax people are coming. I appeal to all the governments let the industry run in this manner, let the money flow from them, then the country will be benefited," said Banerjee.

The chief minister said her government's policy was to negotiate with industrialists if there was any issue.

"I can give you assurance that my government will not harass even one single industry (industrialist) where you have any problem. Even if there is any problem, we will negotiate, give you time to sort it out.

"If I bulldoze, that will give a bad name (to you). Because if there is bad name, prestige is lost and when prestige is lost everything is lost," said Banerjee.

She also suggested hiking CSR contributions by five percent instead of harassing the industrialists.

Banerjee, however, drew a distinction between harassment of industrialists and unearthing of black money.

"Black money is a different issue and harassing an industrialist is something different. If you can collect black money from wherever it is and use them for development, we will be very happy," the chief minister said.

But she said industrialists also have to keep the money with them to tackle some unforeseen disastrous situation, as also for the sake of the employees.

The Trinamool Congress supremo, who as an opposition leader earlier spearheaded a sustained and often violent anti-acquisition movement forcing Tata Motors to relocate the Nano manufacturing unit out of Bengal's Singur to Sanand in Gujarat, also said politicians should not launch a vendetta against industrialists.

"Politically, there should not be any vendetta. Vendetta can spoil everything. We, the politicians, must be broadminded. We will not allow anybody to disturb any of you," added Banerjee.
Governor's Rule was on Saturday imposed in Jammu and Kashmir which is without a government following the death of Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, officials said.



This is because Mehbooba Mufti has refused to take oath as the first woman Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir during mourning period.



The People's Democratic Party (PDP) on Friday had said that it would take at least four days for the swearing-in ceremony of the new Chief Minister.
Spice up 2016 with a boutique calendar of images of West Bengal's heritage Baluchari silk sarees celebrating the myth and magic of the 200-year-old craft.

Originating in the 18th century in a small village named Baluchar along the bank of river Bhagirathi in Murshidabad district of Bengal, the hub of the craft later shifted to Bishnupur in Bankura district, the capital of the Malla rulers.

Intricate mythological motifs depicting episodes from the Mahabharata and Ramayana are unique aspects of this style of weaving. It takes at least a week to produce one saree.

To promote and market the exquisite craft for an international audience, NGO FREED worked with photographer Surajit Hari for an exclusive calendar showcasing the designs and varieties. It was launched on January 7.

Bengali actresses Rituparna Sengupta, Koneenica Bandopadhayay and Rachana Banerjee have modelled the sarees for the calendar, said the NGO's secretary Somnath Pyne.

"In addition to generating awareness about the endangered craft, there is a training component to the project to skill the weavers," Pyne told IANS.

Baluchari has been granted Geographical Indicator status in India.
With less than a month to go before the first nominating contests in the US presidential race, Donald Trump and Ted Cruz lead the Republican pack, while Hillary Clinton has a commanding lead among the Democrats.

But in hypothetical head-to-head matchups, Clinton currently ties or trails the Republicans in each of the possible 2016 matchups tested, according to a new Fox News poll.

Real estate mogul and reality TV star Trump tops Clinton by three points (47-44 percent) and former Florida governor Jeb Bush ties at 44 percent each.

But Senators Marco Rubio (50-41 percent) and Ted Cruz (50-43 percent) perform best against the presumptive Democratic nominee. Rubio has a nine-point advantage and Cruz is up by seven.

Among Republican primary voters, Trump leads with 35 percent. Next is Cruz with 20 percent support. Rubio is third at 13 percent, while retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson is at 10 percent and Bush gets four percent.

Last month, it was Trump 39 percent, Cruz 18 percent, Rubio 11 percent, and Carson 9 percent.

On the Democratic side, former secretary of state Clinton commands 54 percent support for the nomination among Democratic primary voters, far outperforming Vermont senator Bernie Sanders at 39 percent. Former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley gets 3 percent.

While most Democratic primary voters are satisfied with their candidate choices (62 percent), many wish they had other options (38 percent) -- including 42 percent of Sanders supporters, and even 33 percent of Clinton supporters.

If the two current front-runners were to prevail as their respective party's nominees, voters would watch both with a high degree of suspicion: 62 percent say Clinton is not honest and trustworthy, and 55 percent think the same of Trump.

Democratic primary voters want the next president to be someone "who knows how to get things done in Washington" (70 percent) rather than someone "who is ready to shake things up in Washington" (28 percent).

Views among Republican primary voters are more divided: 51 percent get things done vs. 45 percent shake things up.

Trump accused former president Bill Clinton of having a "terrible record of women abuse." Trump claimed that nobody has more respect for women than he does.

Voters don't see it that way. By a 50-37 percent margin, voters think Bill Clinton is more respectful of women than Trump. Women say Clinton is more respectful by 55-31 percent.

Eighty-five percent of Democrats think Clinton is more respectful, while 68 percent of Republicans say Trump is -- including 66 percent of Republican women.

Among independents, 41 percent say Clinton, 34 percent say Trump and another 20 percent think there's no difference.

Overall, voters are twice as likely to say Bill Clinton's sex scandals have done more to hurt Hillary's political career: 46 percent say hurt vs. 21 percent help. Another 29 percent say they haven't made a difference.

Men and women are about equally likely to say the scandals have done more to hurt than help.

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
A huge fire on early Saturday burned down three flats of Mingalazay market, one of the major markets in Myanmar's Yangon region.

The fire broke out around 1.30 a.m. (local time) as explosions were heard during it, Xinhua reported.

Around 600 firefighters with 65 fire-engines rushed to the site.

The fire-torn flats collapsed and some firefighters were injured.

Yangon Chief Minister U Myint Swe inspected the outbreak.

Most of the shops at the fourth and third floors, which sell medicines, were destroyed.

It was the second time that the Mingalazay market was severely burned down with the first being on May 24, 2010.
The transformational role played by the Indian American community in the development of India-US relations and its future potential were underscored by India's Ambassador to the US Arun K. Singh.

Opening an event to celebrate the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas at the Indian embassy here on Friday, he also highlighted the importance of the day.

The event was well attended with enthusiastic participation by the Indian American community members representing various sectors including the government, business, professionals, artists, journalists and students.

Swadesh Chatterjee, a Padma Bhushan awardee from North Carolina, gave a talk on "Building Bridges: How Indian Americans Brought the US and India closer together".

Chatterjee recently published a book highlighting the contribution of Indian Americans in various fields including energy cooperation.

Satyam Priyadarshy, president of The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE), which has 61 chapters across 17 countries, spoke on "India's Flagship Projects and Indian Americans: Promising Possibilities".

He also underscored the ways in which the Indian American community can contribute to the India's organically connected flagship projects like Smart City Mission, Skill India, Digital India, Make In India and Swachh Bharat.
An Indian-American professor has devised a new method to characterise dark matter that can help hunt for the mysterious space phenomenon.

Sukanya Chakrabarti, assistant professor at Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, uses waves in the galactic disk to map the interior structure and mass of galaxies - like seismologists analyse waves to infer properties about the Earth's interior.

Her team used spectroscopic observations to calculate the speed of the three Cepheid variables - stars used as yardsticks to measure distance in galaxies - in the Norma constellation.

Chakrabarti used Cepheid variables to mark the location of a dark-matter dominated dwarf galaxy approximately 300,000 light years away.

In contrast, the disk of the Milky Way terminates at 48,000 light years.

"The radial velocity of the Cepheid variables is the last piece of evidence that we've been looking for," Chakrabarti said. "You can immediately conclude that they are not part of our Galaxy."

Invisible particles known as dark matter make up 85 percent of the mass of the universe.

"The mysterious matter represents a fundamental problem in astronomy because it is not understood," Chakrabarti added.

Her method for locating satellite galaxies dominated by dark-matter taps principles used in seismology to explore the interior of the galaxy.

"We have made significant progress into this new field of galactoseismology where by you can infer the dark matter content of dwarf galaxies, where they are, as well as properties of the interior of galaxies by looking at observable disturbances in the gas disk," Chakrabarti explained.

This new method to characterise dark matter marks the first real application of the field of galactoseismology.

"It is very similar to seismology in a sense because we're trying to infer things about the interior of galaxies and how much dark matter there is and how much there has to be to produce these disturbances," she pointed out.

The study further questions the standard paradigm that old stars populate the dark matter halo and young stars form in the gas-rich stellar disks.

Chakrabarti's findings have been submitted for publication in Astrophysical Journal Letters.
Having got himself into the groove with a half-century in a warm-up match, Indian opener Shikhar Dhawan asserted that the visitors are all geared up to give the Australians a tough fight during the upcoming limited-overs series.

Dhawan, who was in woeful form during the home series against South Africa late last year, smashed 74 off 44 balls as the tourists defeated Western Australia XI by 74 runs here.

"It was a good time to get into the groove with another batsman and good to get a 100-run partnership before the main matches starts. Whatever we needed out of this practice game, we got it, so we are happy about that," Dhawan was quoted as saying by the Australia media on Saturday.

"Of course we are quite pumped up and we are preparing well. We are just going to keep working hard and keep ourselves calm and focused for the matches to come. Even if they were there still we would have still done what we have to do. We just focus on what we have to do and whatever we are going to face over the coming matches from their side, we are going to take it as it comes," he added.

The Indian bowlers also did well with left-arm spinners Axar Patel and Ravindra Jadeja the pick of the lot, notching up identical figures of 2/13 from three overs. More importantly, uncapped fast bowler Barinder Singh Sran showed promise, recovering from a nervous start to pick up two top order wickets in his first match on Australian soil.

Dhawan was impressed with Sran's performance and felt that the 23-year-old from Punjab has brightened his chances of making his international debut during the tour.

"I feel it was a great boost for him, getting wickets at his first practice game. He's going to get (more) mature and he's going to get experience. He looks very fit and strong and a very good prospect for the Indian team," Dhawan said.

The Indians are due to play five One Day Internationals and three Twenty20s during their Australia tour.
Japanese Defence Minister Gen Nakatani and British Defence Secretary Michael Fallon in Saturday agreed to bolster bilateral cooperation.

Nakatani and Fallon met on Saturday in Tokyo. Fallon came to Japan for a meeting of foreign affairs and defence chiefs that was held on Friday, public broadcaster NHK reported.

Nakatani said it is meaningful that the ministers exchanged views on North Korea and China. He added that he wants to deepen defence cooperation through further discussions.

Fallon said certain parties in the region are changing the status quo not through negotiation but by force and intimidation. He said he wants to study ways to expand bilateral security relations.

Both condemned North Korea's latest nuclear test as a serious threat and agreed to continue sharing information on the issue and to step up cooperation.

They also confirmed that they will aim to sign a deal to allow their troops to provide each other with water, fuel and other supplies during disaster relief operations.
Linking poverty with obesity, a new study has found that children and adolescents from low-income families are more likely to be obese than their higher income peers.

Fewer resources like recreational programmes and parks and access to full service grocery stores appear to have a greater impact on the childhood obesity rate than race and ethnicity, the researchers explained.

"It illustrates that race and ethnicity in communities may not have a significant connection to obesity status once the community's income is considered," said senior study author Kim Eagle from the University of Michigan in the US.

"The findings reveal differences in the inequalities in the physical and social environment in which children are raised," Eagle added.

Using a model created from data on 111,799 Massachusetts students, the researchers showed that as poverty rises, so does the rate of obesity among children.

To correlate community rates of childhood obesity with lower income status, the students who were overweight or obese were compared with the students in each district who were eligible for free and reduced price lunch, transitional aid or food stamps.

Among the school districts, for every one percent increase in low-income status there was a 1.17 percent increase in rates of overweight/obese students.

"The battle to curb childhood obesity is critically tied to understanding its causes and focusing on the modifiable factors that can lead to positive health changes for each and every child," Eagle said.

The study was published in the journal Childhood Obesity.
Lal Bahadur Shastri, India's second prime minister, was confident of subcontinental peace, which is why he signed the Tashkent Accord with Pakistan on June 10, exactly 50 years ago. But this collapsed due to his death hours later early January 11, an event that should be probed even though half a century has elapsed, veteran journalist Kuldip Nayar, a long-serving aide of the Indian leader, said.

"Shastri was very sagacious. He firmly believed India could make peace with Pakistan but not with China," Nayar, who was Shastri's media advisor, reminisced in an interview with IANS, adding that it was the prime minister, who got then Pakistani president Field Marshal Ayub Khan to pencil in the words "without resorting to arms" in the first draft of the Tashkent Agreement.

Under the agreement, the two countries agreed that their armies would return to the positions they held on August 5, 1965, the day they went to war for the second time after the partition of the subcontinent in 1947.

"Ayub Khan was inclined but (Pakistani foreign minister Zulfikar Ali) Bhutto stormed out of the negotiations, saying he would denounce the president (back) home. After Shastri died (in circumstances that are still suspect), and thanks to Bhutto, whatever had been achieved at Tashkent collapsed in Rawalpindi (then the Pakistani capital), Nayar, still sharp as a razor in spite of his 93 years and possibly the only survivor of Tashkent, noted.

Reinforcing this view, Nayar recalled Ayub Khan saying on the morning of Shastri's death: "Here lies the man who could have brought Pakistan and India close."

Ayub Khan, in fact was one of the two front pall-bearers (on the left) who carried Shastri's coffin to the aircraft that transported it to New Delhi.

Elaborating on Shastri's sagacity, Nayar pointed to a letter the then Shah of Iran, Mohammad Raza Pahlavi, wrote to Ayub Khan in the wake of the Chinese invasion of India in 1962, asking him to send Pakistani troops to beat back the invaders.

"A copy was marked to (India's first prime minister) Jawaharlal Nehru, who sought (home minister) Shastri's comments. Don't accept it, Shastri said because it tomorrow, if Pakistan asks for Kashmir (still a sticking point between the two nations on which they have fought four wars), we'll be in a difficult situation," Nayar contended.

Shastri had assumed office after soon after India's first prime minister died on May 24, 1964 in spite of the fact that it was widely felt that Nehru wanted his daughter, Indira Gandhi to succeed him.

So how did Tashkent, now the capital of Uzbekistan but at that time part of the undivided Soviet Union, come to be chosen as the venue of the peace negotiations?

"The Americans stepped in (after the 1965 war ended) but Shastri said 'No. They have given them (Pakistan) arms. We can't trust them. The Soviets stepped in; they said come to Tashkent, known for its kababs and good food. Shastri was a strict vegetarian, but he said, let's go."

Though military cooperation between India and the Soviet Union had begun soon after the 1962 war with China, this took a quantum leap soon after the Tashkent Accord and today, India imports almost 70 percent of its armaments from Russia, the successor state after the collapse of the Cold War superpower.

Nayar also said there was much bonhomie between the Indian and Pakstani delegations, as also between the journalists of the two countries who were reporting on the talks.

"We (the journalists) were staying in the same hotel. Bahut milna julna tha. Saath khate peete the (There was much camadaraderia. We used to eat at drink together. After Shastri's death, all of them cam to sympathise with us). The next morning, even people on the street came to sympathise with us," Nayar recalled.

As for the circumstances of Shastri's death hours after the Tashkent Accord was signed, Nayar said: "There is a general perception that he was poisoned, there should be an enquiry, even though a long time has elapsed.

The government says there are certain papers whatever papers there are, make them public."

Speaking about the future of India-Pakistan ties, Nayar saw great hope. "There are fringe elements (as evidenced in the attack on the Pathankot IAF air base soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dramatic visit to Lahore via Kaul after a state visit to Moscow), but everyone realises that peace must prevail," he said.

"Had people like Lal Bahadur Shastri been around, all this would not have happened," Nayar concluded.

(Vishnu Makhijani can be contacted at vishnu.makhijani@ians.in)
The agitating Samyukta Loktantrik Madhesi Morcha in Nepal on Saturday announced a fresh agitation programme from January 12 to 22, after several rounds of talks with the government over inclusiveness in the constitution did not yield any result.

The alliance of four regional parties of the southern plains has been protesting since four months in the Terai region and obstructing supply of goods at key Nepal-India entry points. The government and the agitating Morcha have held 25 rounds of talks.

Asserting that the government has not exhibited seriousness over their demands, including making the constitution more inclusive and changing demarcation of seven federal units, the Morcha said the talks with the government was a flop show.

In a press statement on Saturday, the Morcha said the constitution amendment proposal to meet the demands of the agitating parties was unacceptable to them.

The government registered two amendment proposals in parliament to address the demands of the agitating parties to ensure inclusive representation of various ethnic minorities in various state organs.

"The one-ethnic group centric mentality of the (erstwhile) ruler continues... People in the government have not stopped making blunt statements against the Madhesis and other deprived, marginalised communities so that it is difficult for them to sit in talks and seek a consensus," the statement said, while announcing the fresh stir.

The Morcha said 58 people have lost their lives during the movement in the Terai region and the government was arresting Madhesis and charging them with false cases.

It said the proposed amendments cannot be accepted as they do not address issues raised by Madhesis, indigenous communities, Tharus, Muslims and Dalits.

According to the agitation programme, the Morcha will hold mass meetings at the district headquarters, cities and towns to "expose the wrongdoings" of the government.

The Morcha would organise mass rallies and protest assemblies in all district headquarters on January 21, display paintings, photos and documentaries about the government's "suppression" on January 14, and stage other rallies on January 16, 18, 19 and 21.

The Morcha will also mark January 19 as "Balidani Diwas" (day of sacrifice) in memory of those who lost their lives in the agitation.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Saturday asserted that the recent violence in Malda district was not communal strife but a fight between BSF personnel and residents of the area.

Banerjee, who at the two-day Bengal Global Business Summit here repeatedly asserted there was no communal tension in the state when asked to comment on the Malda violence, said the incident was distorted and misinformation was spread about it.

"It has been distorted and misinformed about what actually happened there. It was a struggle between the BSF and the locals and the state is not involved in any way in this matter," Banerjee told mediapersons at the summit.

"The scuffle was between BSF and the locals and that (the incident) is not within party, state government or state police. We just managed the situation," she said.

Strongly objecting to Banerjee's claims, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accused the chief minister of spreading misinformation.

"The chief minister is spreading misinformation and trying to wash off the responsibilities. If it was really a fight between the BSF and the locals then why the Kaliachak police station was attacked and as many as 11 police vehicles were torched?" BJP national secretary Rahul Sinha told IANS.

According to reports, protesting against remarks allegedly made to "hurt religious sentiments" in Uttar Pradesh, a large number of people on Sunday went on a rampage in Kaliachak, torching vehicles including those belonging to the Border Security Force (BSF) and also attacked a police station.

Sinha claimed the incident was orchestrated by the ruling Trinamool Congress to destroy records of its people's involvement in anti-national activities.

"The area is prone to cow smuggling, infiltration and fake note smuggling and records of all these activities are kept at the Kaliachak police station.

"With the NIA taking over the Pathankot probe, Trinamool is apprehensive that the agency may catch up with its activists and leaders involved in such anti-national activities. That is why this whole incident was devised so that the records in the police station can be destroyed,' added Sinha.

While the Centre has sought a report from the Banerjee administration, Sinha said Governor K.N. Tripathi has sent a report on the matter to the Centre.

Making similar accusations, BJP national secretary and party co-in-charge for the state Siddharth Nath Singh called for a central probe.

"The incident is not all communal rather it is the Trinamool which is trying to pass it off as a communal strife to cover its anti-national activities. So we have demanded a probe into the matter by a central agency," Singh told IANS.

While there has been speculation that union Home Minister Rajnath Singh may visit Malda, Singh claimed owing to pre-scheduled events, the senior leader will not be able to visit.

However, union minister and former party chief Nitin Gadkari is slated to attend a public meeting in Malda on Jan 18.

Police have so far arrested 10 people and booked them for several offences including arson and damage to public property.
The two-day Bengal Global Business Summit organised by the West Bengal government concluded on Saturday attracting investment proposals worth at least Rs.2,50,104 crore ($37 billion), Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced here.

Addressing industrialists on the summit's concluding day, she said the manufacturing sector has drawn proposals valued at Rs.1,16,958 crore.

Banerjee said the proposals have come from a wide range of sectors like mining, textile, power, IT and telecom, urban development, housing, tourism, health transport and education.

"Many MoUs have been signed and many are in the process. We are yet to make detailed estimates of the proposals. The investment proposals are not less than Rs.2,50,104 crore," she said.

The previous edition of the BGBS had netted investment proposals of Rs.2,43,100 crore, of which proposals worth Rs.95,000 crore have taken off and the rest are under process, the chief minister told the media.

Describing the latest summit as a total success, she exuded confidence that thousands of crores of additional investment will come to the state in the near future through ancillary industries.

Banerjee enumerated the achievements of her government since coming to power in 2011 and projected Bengal as the ideal destination for investments. "Our aim is to make Bengal the number one destination for business."

Among the sectors which got the largest chunks of investment are urban development (Rs.29,000 crore), mining (Rs.23,300 crore), transport (Rs.9,384 crore), IT and telecom (Rs.8,650 crore), power (Rs.8,462 crore), and micro, small and medium enterprises (Rs.50,000 crore over the next three years).

In manufacturing, the TCG group would pump in Rs.20,000 crore, while China's Zhongtong Bus Holding Company injects Rs.1,500 crore, and Great Eastern Rs.1,700 crore.

Banerjee said the Deocha-Pachami-Dewanganj-Harinsingha coal mine in Birbhum district, that envisages an investment of Rs.23,000 crore, would be inaugurated on January 18.

In the IT and telecom sector, Airtel would invest Rs.3,500 crore, while ITC Infotech has come up with a Rs.1,650 crore proposal.

HP, Oracle and Erricson would be partners in the Smart City project, while the state transport department has inked a MOU with the Calcutta Goods Transport Association for setting up a Rs. 5,000 crore logistics hub at Baidyabati in Hooghly district. The hub would provide employment for 10,000 people.

A freight terminal would come up in Howrah at an investment of Rs.2,000 crore.

In education sector, Amity University would pump in Rs.2,000 crore.

Bhutanese airlines Drukair entered into an MOU with the Bengal Aerotropolis Pvt. Ltd (BAPL) to use India's first private Greenfield airport at Durgapur in Burdwan district for technical stoppage or refueling.

The state government also announced three policies. "These are policy for start-ups, design policy and township policy including development of theme cities," the chief minister said.

Banerjee said her government was mulling setting up an eco-tourism hub over 12,000 acres at Nayachar of East Midnapore district.

She invited industrialists to set up projects by utilising 5,000 acres of land available with the government in industrial parks.

She said a deep sea port "Bhor Sagara" would come up in South 24 Parganas district for which the central government has already floated a tender. The state government has 26 percent equity in the project. Prime Minister Narendra Modi would lay the foundation for the work to commence in March.

Another port would come up at Rasulpur.

The state government has given land for expansion of the Bagdrogra airport in north Bengal, while small flights have started operating from Cooch Behar airport. She said efforts were also on to start air services from Malda and Balurghat.

The event saw an impressive gathering of industrial honchos like Reliance Group chairman and managing director Mukesh Ambani, Bharti Enterprises vice-chairman Rakesh Bharti Mittal, JSW Steel chairman and managing director Sajjan Jindal, and Hiranandani Group director Darshan Hiranandani besides ITC chairman Y.C. Deveshwar, and city-based businessmen like RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group chairman Sanjiv Goenka and Ambuja Neotia Group chairman Harshavardhan Neotia.

There was also a strong line up of government leaders, including Bhutan Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay, and four Indian central ministers - Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu, Power Minister Piyush Goel and Road Transport, Highways and Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari. Also present were Britain's Employment Minister Priti Patel and Bangladesh Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed besides ambassadors and delegates from 25 countries.
Manipur's Deputy Chief Minister Gaikhangam on Saturday visited Tamenglong district, where the epicentre of the January 4 earthquake was located, and distributed relief material to the quake-affected people.

Over 300 people are currently staying in relief camps in the district.

For the first time on the part of the state government, Gaikhangam on Saturday distributed over Rs.3 lakh in cash for the rehabilitation of the people, and also blankets and other relief material.

"The state government shall extend all possible assistance to the victims. If the relief measures are beyond the financial capacity of the state, then we will approach the union government. There is no difference on issues concerning rehabilitation," said Gaikhangam, who is also the state Congress president.

The minister, district collector M. Luikham and other officials visited the families.

Geologists from Delhi University, who visited the district on Saturday, said that after an earthquake it was natural for springs to emerge and for mild movements in the earth.

Based on the findings of experts, Gaikhangam said there is no dirty water spring polluting nearby water holes.

The experts said that in the eventuality of another tremor, people should move to higher ground which has less chance of caving in.

Meanwhile, a BJP team led by Prahlad Singh Patel, the party's national secretary in charge of the northeast, visited Noney and nearby areas, and interacted with the people.

BJP leaders have said the Manipur government has not doled out enough relief material.

"The BJP has been doing everything possible for the affected people," legislator Thongam Bisajit said.

The government, meanwhile, asked owners of high-rise buildings in Imphal town to furnish information about their structures.

In the January 4 earthquake, two market complexes and several high-rise buildings in the town were damaged. Reports said the construction was of inferior quality.
A college girl who fell into the swirling Arabian Sea while clicking a selfie off a rocky beach here on Saturday was untraced as well as a youth who plunged into the water to save her, police said.

The girl, identified as a teenager named Tarannum, slipped while clicking a selfie with her mobile phone on the rocky beach of Bandra Bandstand.

On hearing the screams of her two friends, local youth Rajesh Walunj jumped into the rising tidal waters to rescue her.

Both were not found till late Saturday afternoon.

Police, fire brigade and the fishing folk from Worli were helping in the search operation in the area near the Rajiv Gandhi Bandra Worli Sea Link.

The three girl college students, hailing from Bainganwadi in Govandi suburb, had come to Bandra for a weekend picnic, senior police inspector R. Dhavle told media persons.

Dhavle suspects that Tarannum -- who was around 50 metres from the shore -- and Walunj may have been swept far away from the shore.
Nepal was elected as a member of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) executive board on Saturday, representing the group of Asia-Pacific states for the term 2016-2018, government officials said.

Nepal's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Durga Prasad Bhattarai was also unanimously elected as vice president to the bureau of the executive board of the UNICEF for 2016, representing the Asia-Pacific region, according to officials of the ministry of foreign affairs.

"With this election, Nepal is availed yet another global stage to contribute to the work of the United Nations, this time in providing strategic guidance to its agency specialising in the children's causes," read a press statement issued by Nepal's Permanent Mission to United Nations in New York on Saturday.
South Carolina's Indian-American governor Nikki Haley's choice to give the Republican response to President Barack Obama's State of the Union address has fuelled speculation about her as a potential vice presidential pick.

Born Nimrata "Nikki" Randhawa, to Sikh immigrant parents from India, Haley at 43 the youngest governor in the country will give the Republican response to Obama's final annual address to the Congress Tuesday night.

A day later she will speak to Republican leaders gathered for the Republican National Committee's winter meeting in Charleston at a private event aboard the USS Yorktown in Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina, influential Politico reported citing sources.

The following day, just before Republican presidential hopefuls gather for the debate, Haley is expected to have a private meeting with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, according to a source familiar with her plans.

"All this comes on the back of a strong year that saw her prospects in the veepstakes improve as Haley signed off on legislation removing the Confederate flag from Columbia and oversaw a state battered by a tragic massacre and a massive flood," the Politico said.

In August, at the RNC summer meeting in Cleveland, Haley was invited to be its luncheon headliner, the Politico noted.

In recent months, Haley has fostered a close relationship with Christie as well as with two other Republican White House hopefuls: Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, it said.

Over the course of the primary campaign, she has been exchanging text messages with all three candidates.

Haley said Thursday she plans to address the challenges in South Carolina and the nation that she thinks are the most important in her Republican response to Obama's address.

Haley declined to reveal details of what she plans to say, except to repeat that she is giving an "address" to the nation rather a "response" to Obama. "I certainly am not one to compete against the president or try to imply that I could be," Haley told reporters, according to Charlotte Observer.

Haley's selection, the Observer said, is seen as part of the Republican Party's attempts to win over female voters, who will have a chance to elect the first female president if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee. But she called such talk a "waste of time".

When asked about being given such an honour, she smiled and said she was humbled by it. "You have to know I always go back to that 5-year-old Indian girl that lived in Bamberg. That just wondered what was out there," Haley said.

Haley was first elected South Carolina governor in 2010, becoming both the first woman and the first Indian-American to hold the top office in the state. She was re-elected in 2014.

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
Nine people were injured -- three of them critically -- when Garo militants triggered a bomb blast on Saturday in Williamnagar, the district headquarters of East Garo Hills in Meghalaya, police said.

The Garo National Liberation Army (GNLA) militants planted the bomb at a wine store at the Williamnagar market, Meghalaya Director General of Police Rajiv Metha told IANS.

"Nine people, including a woman, were injured. Three of them are in critical condition and have been rushed to the Tura Civil Hospital in West Garo Hills district," Mehta said.

He said police evacuated the market area and launched a search operation to look for any other explosives.

"The GNLA's attack on civilians is an act of cowardice and desperation. The GNLA has been experiencing a series of desertions in the recent past due to intense police operations," the police chief said.

Mehta said one of the perpetrators has been identified as Ajan Ch. Momin alias Jimmy, who was directed by Sohan D. Shira, the self-styled military wing chief of the GNLA.

The GNLA, which claims to be fighting for a separate 'Garoland' in western Meghalaya, is headed by police officer-turned-rogue Champion R. Sangma, who is lodged in the Shillong jail after being arrested from near the India-Bangladesh border in 2012.
Pakistan and Afghanistan will hold talks in March on a treaty to avoid double taxation and prevent fiscal evasion, an official said.

A draft agreement on avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion convention was handed to Afghan authorities in the Joint Economic Commission (JEC) meeting held in February 2014. The treaty was drafted by Pakistani tax officials, Dawn online quoted official as saying on Friday.

"We had shared the draft with the Afghan government for a feedback and are currently awaiting response," the tax official said.

In a recent meeting of Pakistan-Afghanistan JEC in Islamabad, the Afghan authorities said Kabul has already sent their feedback through diplomatic channel.

However, the tax official said the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) did not receive any feedback.

To resolve the issue, Afghan authorities handed a copy to Pakistani officials in a recent meeting.

In the absence of any treaty on avoidance of double taxation between the two countries, Kabul has decided to tax Pakistan Airlines.
The foreign secretaries of Pakistan and India will here on January, Sartaj Aziz, the prime minister's advisor on foreign affairs, has said.

Kashmir and all other outstanding issues will be on the agenda when Pakistan and India resume their comprehensive bilateral dialogue, Aziz said in the parliament on Friday.

The announcement came after Pakistan launched investigations into the Pathankot airbase attack, The Nation reported.

India had linked the foreign secretary level talks to Pakistan's action against the militants.

Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday chaired a meeting regarding Jaish-e-Muhammad organisation's involvement in the attack and Islamabad's response to New Delhi.

After the Pathankot air base attack, Sharif called Modi assuring him of "prompt and decisive" action against groups or individuals linked to the attack.

Seven security personnel were killed in the attack on the IAF base in Pathankot. Six terrorists, suspected to be from Pakistan, were killed during the gunfight that began on January 2.

Pakistan and India will remain in contact as Islamabad believes it needed solid evidence for a stern action.

Aziz told the house that the foreign secretaries of both the countries would discuss modalities of comprehensive bilateral dialogue and its timeframe during the meeting in Islamabad.

"As per the joint statement issued during the visit of Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to Pakistan, the comprehensive dialogue would include all outstanding issues including the Kashmir dispute," he said.
Ten key points top the NIA's agenda as it probes the audacious terrorist attack on the IAF base at Pathankot in Punjab that has caused fresh strains in India-Pakistan relations.

The National Investigation Agency, which took over the case on January 4 from Punjab Police, is to uncover the sequence of events from the time the terrorists, believed to be Pakistanis, sneaked into India to the attack.

Some 36 hours of fighting at the base left seven security personnel dead. All six terrorists were also killed.

The key points the NIA is investigating include mobile phone conversations between the terrorists and their suspected handlers in Pakistan, a Jaish-e-Muhammad letter, DNA samples of the terrorists, and their voice record samples.

Other issues being focussed on include ammunition the terrorists carried, their strategy, suspected involvement of locals, the route the terrorists took from the India-Pakistan border, the accounts given by a Punjab Police officer, his friend and cook after their abduction by the terrorists just before the attack, and a Pathankot map found from the police officer's car, an NIA officer told IANS.

"A 20-member team of NIA, led by an inspector general, has been camping in Pathankot to supervise the investigation. Our focus is on the key points," the officer told IANS.

An officer of the rank of superintendent of police has been appointed the chief investigating officer of the case, he said.

The NIA took over the case by filing three separate First Information Reports (FIRs).

These were filed in connection with the abduction of Gurdaspur Superintendent of Police Salwinder Singh, along with his jeweller friend and cook, the earlier killing of taxi driver Ikagar Singh, and the terrorist strike at the Indian Air Force station.

Another NIA officer told IANS that the lapses by the Border Security Force (BSF) in preventing the infiltration from Pakistan into Bamiyal sector adjoining Gurdaspur in Punjab and Kathua in Jammu and Kashmir were being investigated at the highest level.

The failure of Punjab Police, which looks after the security of areas near the border, was also under the scanner, the NIA source said.

The NIA is also trying to establish the identity of local residents who provided army fatigues and a walkie-talkie to the six terrorists after they infiltrated into Punjab, possibly on December 30.

The NIA officer said the DNA samples of the terrorists have been sent to Pakistan for establishing their identity. Voice samples of the terrorists have also been sought from Pakistan.

The statements of the police officer, his friend Rajesh Verma and cook Madan Gopal were being thoroughly analysed, the officer told IANS. All of them will soon face lie detector tests.

The statement of the officer's personal security officer, Kulwinder Singh, has also been taken.

The officer said the calls made from the mobile phone of the abducted victims were being analysed along with the number belonging to the dead Innova driver, Ikagar Singh.

The NIA team on Wednesday took police officer Salwinder Singh to the place near Kolian village, 25 km from Pathankot, from where he was allegedly abducted in his car along with the two others. The NIA team also took the officer to the place where he was dumped by the terrorists and to the spot where his car was found abandoned.

The NIA team is looking at what the officer did for nearly three hours after he and the others allegedly left a shrine in Kathua district at 9.30 pm on December 31 -- till they were allegedly abducted on the midnight of January 1.

The superintendent, who was transferred from Gurdaspur last week, had claimed that he, along with Verma and the cook, were stopped and abducted by four or five heavily armed terrorists near Kolia village.

He claimed that his senior officers did not initially take his information on the presence of terrorists seriously.

(Rajnish Singh can be contacted at rajnish.s@ians.in)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday arrived at the Pathankot IAF base that was attacked by suspected Pakistani terrorists last week.

Soon after landing at air base, which was targetted exactly a week ago on in a pre-dawn attack, Modi met senior Indian Air Force (IAF) and Indian Army officers.

Tight security arrangements were in place for the prime minister's visit. No one was allowed to enter the area near the Air Force Station (AFS), located 250 km from Chandigarh.

Six terrorists and seven security personnel were killed in the attack.

Security forces repulsed the attack and the terrorists were unable to harm any of the IAF's critical assets, including fighter aircraft and attack helicopters.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi was on Saturday briefed by senior defence and security officers about the terrorist attack, carried out by suspected Pakistani terrorists last week, on the Pathankot IAF base.

The prime minister arrived here on Saturday morning for an assessment of the attack.

Soon after landing at the air base, targetted exactly a week ago in a pre-dawn attack, Modi met senior Indian Air Force (IAF) and army officers.

Tight security arrangements were in place for the prime minister's visit. No one was allowed to enter the area near the Air Force Station (AFS), located 250 km from Chandigarh.

The prime minister was taken around the air base by the defence and security officers.

Modi is likely to fly to the border belt with Pakistan in Punjab in an IAF helicopter for a first-hand account of the security measures at the border.

The terrorists are believed to have infiltrated into India from Pakistan side by taking advantage of broken border fencing.

Six terrorists and seven security personnel were killed in the attack.

Security forces repulsed the attack and the terrorists were unable to harm any of the IAF's critical assets, including fighter aircraft and attack helicopters.
Giving a clean chit to the security forces for their handling of the counter-offensive against the terrorist attack on the Pathankot IAF base, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who flew in here on Saturday just a week after the attack, said he was satisfied with the "decision-making and its execution".

"Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response," Modi tweeted through his PMO India Twitter handle.

The prime minister, who arrived here on Saturday morning, was briefed by senior defence and security officers about the terrorist attack carried out by suspected Pakistani terrorists on the Pathankot Air Force Station (AFS).

The prime minister was taken around the air base by defence and security officers.

Since the base is a frontline and sensitive one, no live telecast of the visit was allowed. The media was kept away from the air base.

Modi's visit came just a day after security agencies gave an all-clear to the entire air base and said it was completely sanitised.

The operation against the terrorists had lasted for nearly 95 hours and the end of the combat part was announced on Tuesday evening. Combing of the entire base ended on Friday.

Soon after landing at the air base, targetted exactly a week ago in a pre-dawn attack, Modi met senior officers of the Indian Air Force (IAF), army and National Security Guard (NSG).

Modi was accompanied by National Security Adviser Ajit Doval. Indian Army chief General Dalbir Singh, and IAF chief Air Chief Marshal Arup Raha were also present at the air base during the visit.

"Visited Pathankot air base today. Had a detailed briefing from senior leadership of Army, Air Force, NSG & BSF," Modi tweeted.

"Was briefed in great detail on how our forces neutralised such a serious terrorist attack," he said.

"Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride," he added.

Modi was taken for an aerial survey of Punjab's border belt with Pakistan in an IAF helicopter.

He was briefed about the barbed wire fencing along the border and the need to strengthen the border belt with better and complete fencing and more ground troops to prevent infiltration by terrorists in future, army sources said.

Tight security arrangements were in place for the prime minister's visit. No one was allowed to enter the area near the Air Force Station (AFS), located 250 km from Chandigarh.

Six terrorists and seven security personnel were killed in the attack.

Security forces repulsed the attack and the terrorists were unable to harm any of the IAF's critical assets, including fighter aircraft and attack helicopters.
Brushing aside criticism over the handling of the counter-offensive against the terrorist attack on the Pathankot IAF base, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who flew in here on Saturday, a week after the attack, said that he was satisfied with the "decision-making and its execution".

"Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response," Modi tweeted through his PMO India Twitter handle.

The prime minister, who arrived here on Saturday morning, was briefed by senior defence and security officers about the terrorist attack, carried out by suspected Pakistani terrorists, on the Pathankot Air Force Station (AFS).

Soon after landing at the air base, targetted exactly a week ago in a pre-dawn attack, Modi met senior Indian Air Force (IAF) and army officers.

Modi was accompanied by Security Adviser Ajit Doval. The Indian Army chief, General Dalbir Singh, and the IAF chief, Air Chief Marshal Arup Raha were also present at the air base during the visit.

"Visited Pathankot air base today. Had a detailed briefing from senior leadership of Army, Air Force, NSG & BSF," Modi tweeted.

"Was briefed in great detail on how our forces neutralised such a serious terrorist attack," he said.

"Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride," he added.

Tight security arrangements were in place for the prime minister's visit. No one was allowed to enter the area near the Air Force Station (AFS), located 250 km from Chandigarh.

The prime minister was taken around the air base by the defence and security officers.

Since the base is a frontline and sensitive one, no live telecast of the visit was allowed. The media were kept away from the air base.

Six terrorists and seven security personnel were killed in the attack.

Security forces repulsed the attack and the terrorists were unable to harm any of the IAF's critical assets, including fighter aircraft and attack helicopters.
A police officer was found murdered in Bihar's Vaishali district on Saturday, police said.

Ashok Kumar Yadav, an assistant sub inspector (ASI) posted in Hajipur district headquarters of Vaishali, was shot dead late Friday. His body was found on Saturday, a police officer said.

Yadav left from police station on patrolling duty but did not return, the officer said.

According to the police, he was shot four times.

Ironically, Yadav was killed a day after Bihar police chief P. K. Thakur claimed crime was under control and that the crime graph had decreased.

Opposition BJP leaders had raised a hue and cry over killing of two engineers in Darbhanga district last month and other criminal incidents this month, and termed it as return of jungleraj in Bihar.
Union Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha on Friday said Posco has to take final decision over its proposed $12 billion steel project in Odisha.

"That is a decision for Posco to take," he told media persons to queries over the fate of stalled project in the state.

"We are very supportive to all companies including Posco. But, all have to follow all the rules and laws of the country to set up their projects," said Sinha.

His statement indicated that Posco has to bid for mines according to the amended Mines and Mineral (Development and Regulation) Act 2015, if it wants to run the proposed steel plant at Jagatsinghpur in Odisha, said industry sources.

Notably, the South Korean steel company is yet to make its stand clear over the proposed steel project while the Odisha government has urged the Prime Minister's Office to resolve the impediments facilitating to materialize the project.

Sinha, who held a meeting with Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and other officials of the government, also assured to cooperate with the state for carrying out various development projects.

He said the central government would assist the state government in providing fund for accelerated irrigation programmes, setting up new medical colleges and development of backward districts.

With the state raising the issue that the central government has stopped and slashed fund in various social programmes, Sinha said Odisha would get additional 10 percent fund following the recommendations of 14th Finance Commission that can be used for planning state specific programmes.

He also slammed the opposition Congress for obstructing Goods and Services Tax (GST) bill in Rajya Sabha and sescribed it as a big blow to the Indian democracy and economy.

"Congress is using every possible excuse to stall the GST Bill, which is affecting the economy of the country. The opposition party was raising unnecessary issues including (former IPL chief) Lalit Modi, (union minister) V.K. Singh, and intolerance issues, which have no basis, only to obstruct in passing the Bill," said Sinha.

He said the state's ruling Biju Janata Dal has already indicated in parliament that they are in support of GST Bill.

With the global economy facing slow down, he said India's economy, which was in a difficult situation when NDA assumed charge, is at very good health under the leadership of Narendra Modi government, and the country would withstand the global turmoil due to robust macro economy management.

Admitting that commodity sector including steel and metal in the country have been impacted due to global slowdown, he said these issues needs to be dealt with for growth of the sector.
A suspected jewellery thief was arrested in a village in Massachusetts after police found him wearing the same 'selfie' hat that he wore during a robbery.

Police arrested James Anderson, 65, during a traffic stop and recovered $10,000 worth of gold jewellery and wire cutters from his vehicle, palmbeachpost.com reported on Friday.

According to police, on Thursday night Anderson went into the Hyannis K-Mart and cut security wires from one of the jewellery case displays, stole it and left the store in his vehicle.

Based on the store surveillance video, the officers recovered the description of the thief and his vehicle.

Police said in the video, Anderson was seen wearing a winter hat that had the word "Selfie" printed on it.

After being reported, the police conducted a traffic stop in the area later that night.

One of the officers on duty noticed that a driver of a vehicle was wearing the same "Selfie" hat and clothing observed on the surveillance video.

Police arrested Anderson and charged him with larceny, a crime involving the unlawful taking of the personal property of another person, over $250 and possession of burglarious tools.
India's second Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, who succeeded Jawaharlal Nehru in June 1964, died in Tashkent soon after signing an agreement with President Ayub Khan of Pakistan, with Soviet Prime Minister Alexei Kosygin playing the mediatory role.

January 11 will mark the 50th death anniversary of Shastri whose demise still remains shrouded in mystery.

A few months ago, on September 26, 2015, in an interview to a TV channel, Anil Shastri, senior Congress leader and the elder surviving son of Lal Bahadur Shastri, demanded a thorough probe into the death of his illustrious father. Earlier, his younger brother Sunil wrote to union home minister to make public the files relating to the circumstances leading to the sudden death of their father.

The suspicion of Shastri dying an unnatural death would seem ridiculous. His family members only need to read the accounts of the Tashkent talks by the persons who had accompanied Shastri to the capital of Uzbekistasn. A day-to-day account of the Tashkent parlays and Shastri's engagements has been recorded in great detail in books authored by C.P. Srivastava, the joint secretary to the prime minister and Shastri's information advisor Kuldeep Nayar, as also Inder Malhotra and Prem Bhatia, who were among the eminent journalists who were part of the Indian entourage to Tashkent.

Shastri died in Tashkent at 1.32 a.m. (2.02 a.m. IST). According to Srivastava, on January 10 Shastri seemed to be particularly pleased with everything that had happened. At 4 p.m. he had signed the Tashkent declaration with Ayub Khan.

Srivastava left Shastriji at 10.30 p.m. to attend a press conference which had been convened by the Indian delegation to explain the Tashkent declaration to Indian and foreign correspondents. After this, he had just returned to his room when a call came from the prime minister's PA Jagannath Sahai, informing him that Shastri had been taken seriously ill. When he reached there, the prime minister was already dead.

In order to secure a first-hand version of what had happened in the prime minister's villa after his departure at 10.30 p.m. and his passing way at 1.32 a.m. - three hours later - Srivastava had long and detailed conversation with Sahai and M.M.N. Sharma, members of his personal staff, who were both present and were attending on Shastri until the moment of his death.

According to Srivastava's account, Sahai left Shastri's room at about 11.30 p.m. and then Ram Nath, the personal attendant, brought some milk which the prime minister drank. Ram Nath stayed on in Shastri's bedroom until half past midnight and left the room when the prime minister, who was already lying in bed, said that it was time for him to sleep.

Sahai and Sharma were about to retire when, suddenly at 1.20 a.m., the prime minister appeared at the door of their bedroom and asked: 'Where is the doctor?' Jagannath Sahai answered: 'Babuji he is asleep right here. You may kindly return to your bedroom. I will bring the doctor immediately.'

Sharma and Kapur got up to accompany Shastri back to his room. They both held the prime minister's arms but the prime minister walked back on his own. When about half way there, he began to cough and thereafter went on coughing incessantly. When they got to his bed, Sharma and Kapur asked the prime minister to lie down, which he did.

Dr. Chugh and Sahai came running in, the doctor carrying his medicine cases. He checked the prime minister's pulse and gave him an injection. At the same time the doctor uttered the following words in deep anguish and despair: 'Babuji, aap ne mujhe mouka nahin diya.' (Babuji, you did not give me a chance). Dr Chugh continued massaging his chest and gave him artificial respiration, but nothing proved to be of any avail.

Kuldip Nayar said he met Shastri for the last time on January 10 at the reception given by the Indian embassy in the prime minister's honour. Shastri told him that the return journey would be early because Ayub Khan had invited him to have tea with him at Rawalpindi.

According to Nayar's autobiography Shastri had asked him to ascertain the reaction of the Indian press to the Tashkent Declaration. At the press conference earlier, he had been 'rudely' questioned on why he had agreed to hand Hajipir and Tithwal back to Pakistan. In India, leading opposition stalwarts like Ram Manohar Lohia, A.B. Vajpayee and Acharya Kriplani had strongly condemned the agreement.

Nayar further states that Jagan Nath connected Shastri to his family at around 11 pm Tashkent time. Shashtri asked Kusum, his eldest and favourite daughter: 'Tum ko kaisa laga? (How did you react to it?)' She replied: 'Babuji, hamein achha nahin laga (I did not like it' . He asked about amma, as Lalita Shastri was referred to in the house. 'She too did not like it', was Kusum's reply. Shastri observed: 'Agar gharwalon ko achha nahin laga, to bahar wale kya kahengae? (If people in the family did not like it, what will outsiders say?

The telephone call, according to Jagan Nath, appeared to have upset Shastri. He began pacing up and down in his room. For one who had suffered two heart attacks earlier, the telephone conversation, the journalists' attitude, and the walk must have been a strain.

Nayar had asked Morarji Desai towards the end of October 1970 whether he really believed that Shastri did not die a natural death. Desai said: "That is all politics. I am sure there was no foul play. He died of a heart attack. I have checked with the doctor and his secretary, C.P. Srivastava, who accompanied him to Tashkent."

This month, while celebrating the 50th anniversary of 1965 war, the country will recall the outstanding leadership of Shastri during the war and his slogan of Jai Jawan Jai Kisan. It is best to bury all such unnecessary controversies, forever.

That will be the best tribute to a true Gandhian who never thought ill of anybody. He won't have us think ill of anybody. This is the legacy the Shastri family must preserve.

(Capt. Praveen Davar is member of National Commission for Minorities. The views expressed by him are personal. He can be contacted at praveendavar@gmail.com)
Six people, including a woman, were injured in a bomb explosion here on Saturday, police said.

"A total of six people including a woman were injured in the Improvised explosive device (IED) explosion in the William Nagar market around 1.15 a.m," a police official said.

William Nagar is the headquarters of East Garo Hills district in Meghalaya.

The official also said the explosion is suspected to have been carried out by members of the Garo National Liberation Army, a militant faction.
Agitating students at the Jadavpur University here have gheraoed their vice chancellor and other officials since Friday evening over holding of students' union elections.

The students have been demonstrating following an advisory issued by the West Bengal higher education department asking the state-run varsity to hold the elections after the state assembly polls.

"I am hoping we can sort out the issue by discussions. I have faith in the students," Vice Chancellor Suranjan Das told IANS.

The vice-chancellor, the pro vice-chancellor and registrar of the university, along with the executive council members spent the night inside the campus as protesting students have demanded the vice chancellor notify the elections on February 18.

The varsity has witnessed similar events in the last couple of years. In 2014, students carried out a sustained agitation demanding the removal of the then vice chancellor Abhijit Chakrabarti for ordering a police crackdown on students.
Congress leader Shakeel Ahmed on Saturday said no statement of BJP leader Subramanian Swamy could be taken seriously as "he would never walk the talk" and has a "personal interest" behind commenting on the Ram temple.

On Swamy saying that the proposed Ram temple in Ayodhya "will be built on the decided land only", the Congress general secretary said "Swamy's past track has not been good, as he never does what he says".

"He has been making all sorts of comments on issues. He is doing it just to ensure a Rajya Sabha seat for himself," the Congress leader told IANS.

Ahmed said he told Swamy personally that he was doing that to get a Rajya Sabha seat.

"We were participating in a TV channel debate. I told him there that he should stop doing it just for the sake of a seat in the Rajya Sabha," Ahmed said, adding that Swamy "laughed and did not say anything beyond it".

Swamy on Saturday said the Ram temple will be constructed on the disputed land and separate land will be allotted for construction of the mosque.

"We will build a mosque on the land across the Saryu river but the Ram temple will be built on the decided land only," he said in a seminar in Delhi University.
The Tibet region in China saw a record 3.63 million air passengers in 2015, up 15.2 percent from the previous year, regional civil aviation statistics show.

The region opened 13 new air routes in 2015, bringing its operating routes to 63. The number of cities linked to Tibet via air rose by seven to reach 40, Xinhua reported.

Five airports in Tibet handled over 36,000 landings and take-offs and cargo throughput of 29,000 tons in 2015, an increase of 16.8 percent and 16.3 percent year-on-year, respectively.

Tibet's civil aviation industry has been growing rapidly with a total investment of over 3 billion yuan ($457 million), becoming an important driver for the regional economy.

During the 13th Five-Year (2016-2020) period, Tibet will develop air express routes between the regional capital Lhasa and Chengdu, capital of neighbouring Sichuan province, and will open more air routes to other domestic cities, according to a regional civil aviation official.

Tibet will also encourage airline companies to open routes between Lhasa and Southeast and South Asian countries, said the official.
Two police constable were on Saturday hit by a speeding truck here, killing one of them, officials said.

The accident took place in Site 4 Industrial Estate around 6.30 a.m., when the two police constables -- Shyam Singh Malik and Mukesh Teotia -- were patrolling the area on their motorcycle. The truck hit them from behind.

Residents rushed the two constables to the Yashoda Hospital where Malik was declared dead, while Teotia was admitted in the ICU in a critical condition.

The truck driver tried to flee, but residents managed to nab him about a kilometre away from the accident site and took him to a police station where he was interrogated, said Superintendent of Police (City) Ajay Pal.
At least two security personnel were killed and three injured in an explosion in Balochistan's Gwadar district on Saturday.

Coast Guard personnel were patrolling when their vehicle hit a landmine in Jewni area of Gwadar, Dawn online quoted police as saying.

Two security personnel were killed on the spot whereas three sustained serious injuries, the police said. The injured were rushed to nearby hospital.

The blast also damaged the security forces' vehicle. The area was cordoned off and a probe have been initiated into the attack.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

Militants in the area have been targeting security personnel and politicians for last more than a decade.

In a separate incident in Dera Murad Jamali, security forces claimed to have foiled a major bid of terrorism by seizing weapons and arresting a suspected militant.

Security sources said one suspected militant was arrested and weapons were recovered in Naseerabad district.

Balochistan, the largest province of the country by area, is home to a low-level insurgency by ethnic Baloch separatists.

Al Qaeda-linked and sectarian militants also operate in the region.
US Secretary of State John Kerry spoke to Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif over the phone late on Saturday and expressed the hope that Pakistan and India will continue talks despite the recent attack on an Indian airbase.

Pakistan and India agreed last month to resume "comprehensive dialogue" after a break of nearly seven years. However, the militants attack on the Pathankot airbase has raised doubts if the talks would be held.

Pakistan Adviser on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz said on Saturday that the schedule of talks between foreign secretaries of Pakistan and India is still intact, Xinhua reported.

Aziz told reporters in Lahore that the two countries had agreed to hold talks on January 15.

He said India has neither confirmed nor cancelled the scheduled meeting so far.

Kerry rang Prime Minister Sharif amid speculations that the talks depend on action by Pakistani authorities on the leads India has shared with them about the attack.

The US secretary of state hoped in telephonic conversation with the Pkistani prime minister that "talks between both countries will continue despite the fact that terrorists have tried to thwart it", officials said in Islamabad.

"Continuation of India-Pakistan talks are needed in the interest of regional stability and the leadership role by both PMs is required to ensure continuous dialogue," a statement from Sharif's office quoted Kerry as saying.

Sharif told Kerry that Pakistan is "swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner and will bring out the truth".

"World will see our effectiveness and sincerity in this regard," Sharif was quoted as telling the US secretary of state.

He said Pakistan is eliminating terrorism on its soil and will not allow anyone to use Pakistani soil to conduct terror operations abroad, adding all state institutions are fully committed to eliminating terrorism.

"The US applauds prime minister's leadership role in such difficult environment, which was the exact leadership needed in this situation" Kerry said.
A Philadelphia police officer was shot and seriously injured by an assailant who said he had acted in the name of Islam, authorities said.

Edward Archer, 30, was arrested soon after firing 13 shots at the police officer, Efe news agency quoted police as saying on Friday.

During his interrogation, the shooter "confessed to committing this cowardly act in the name of Islam".

According to him "the police defend laws that are contrary to the teachings of the Quran", Police Commissioner Richard Ross said.

According to the head of homicide unit, the shooter said "I follow Allah. I pledge my allegiance to the Islamic State and that's why I did what I did."
Geo-political tensions, coupled with the depreciating Chinese currency and slow pace of domestic reforms, are expected to assert pressure on the rupee in the coming week, experts said on Saturday.

"The rupee value is expected to be under pressure due to weak global economic macros, especially the Chinese economic crises and the devaluation of yuan," Anindya Banerjee, associate vice president for currency derivatives with Kotak Securities, told IANS.

"Other factors such as weak domestic macros, coupled with slowdown in reforms will dent the Indian rupee further."

According to market observers, the rupee value is expected to be volatile. It is anticipated to hover around 66.50-67.20 to a US dollar in the coming week.

"The rupee looks weak with a key support of 66.45/50 and possibly trending towards 67.15/20. Worries over China's declining equities have pulled down global markets," Hiren Sharma, senior vice president, currency advisory at Anand Rathi Financial Services, told IANS.

However, the rupee could find support from increasing foreign funds inflows into the debt markets via central and the state governments bonds.

Last year, RBI had decided to raise foreign investors' exposure limits in central government's securities to five per cent of the outstanding stock by March 2018.

In another key decision, the central bank had set a separate limit for investment by foreign funds in state development loans, which are to be increased in phases to reach two per cent of the outstanding stock by March 2018.

The RBI's decision is expected to usher in around $2.5 billion by this fiscal end.

"The anticipated foreign capital influx into the central and the state governments bonds should help keep the rupee on a stable footing," Banerjee elaborated.

"A proactive central bank should also limit extreme volatility in rupee value."

On a weekly basis, the rupee weakened by 50 paise to 66.64 (January 8) to a US dollar from its previous close of 66.14 to a greenback (January 1).

The National Securities Depository Limited (NSDL) figures showed that the FPIs were net buyers during the week ended January 8 2016. They bought Rs.981.6 crore or $145.15 million in equity and debt markets from January 4-8.

In contrast, the data with stock exchanges showed that the FPIs sold stocks worth Rs.3,550.74 crore in the week under review.

On technical levels, the rupee has corrected close to 50 percent. It has a critical support at 65.90 and resistance towards 67.10/15.



"We expect USD/INR spot to hold the downside of 65.90 and move up towards 67.10/15. A close above it can prompt a sharp up move towards 68.20 to 68.50," Hemal Doshi, chief currency strategist, Geofin Comtrade, told IANS.

"Close below 65.90 will change the trend from bullish to bearish."

Even the strong US jobs data which was released on Friday, can inflict a blow to the rupee value. As a strong jobs market in the US will improve chances of a future rate hike by the US Fed.

Another rate hike by the US Fed will lead away more FPIs from emerging markets such as India, denting the equity and currency markets.
Akshay Mangla, assistant professor, Harvard Business School, who has studied education and the role of the state in India, tells Aditi Phadnis how the government needs to change the way it looks at the delivery of education



You have carried out a study of comparative models for the delivery of primary education in Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. Tell us what you've found. What works and what doesn't?



My research identifies distinct bureaucratic cultures across these two states. I refer to these as "bureaucratic norms", unwritten rules that influence how officials behave and interact with citizens. In Himachal Pradesh (HP), public agencies exemplify a deliberative model, meaning that they encourage discussion and collective problem-solving across the hierarchy. By contrast, state agencies in Uttarakhand are legalistic,reinforcing rules, procedures and hierarchies, often in a top-down fashion. Field-based evidence shows that deliberative agencies in HP implement primary education more effectively. Local officials have the discretion to adapt policies according to the needs of different regions. For example, they can modify the school calendar based on local weather and harvest conditions. This determines whether students can attend class and prepare for examinations. Further, the planning process in HP is highly participatory. State planners elicit input not only from departments but also from a broad network of non-governmental agencies, women's groups and other civic bodies, which are often closer to the ground. Finally, deliberative agencies help sustain participation from local communities, another critical factor in the comparative success of primary education in HP. When state officials enjoy the freedom and support to work with parents, schoolteachers and other stakeholders, they can address problems more effectively.

In Uttarakhand, by contrast, local officials are averse to taking independent initiative. They wait for orders to come from above and they regard women's groups and other civic bodies with suspicion. Local communities receive little support from state officials when they need it. As a result, parents often get discouraged when they approach the state, which undermines collective action.

Ultimately everything depends on the quality of bureaucrats. You say the state agencies in HP tend to attract higher quality personnel. What does HP do right and what can other states do to attract a similarly high quality of personnel?



Let me clarify two things. First, I am not suggesting that bureaucrats in HP are intrinsically "good" or more motivated than their counterparts in Uttarakhand. One can find committed officials in both states. Further, because state civil services have similar procedures for recruitment and promotion, one should not expect bureaucrats in HP to be of an inherently higher quality than those in Uttarakhand. Rather, the distinct norms that they are socialised into, while on the job, heavily influence their behaviour and shape how they understand and carry out their everyday duties.

Second, bureaucracies do not operate in a political vacuum. Public institutions evolve over time, often in response to their social and political environment. Political leadership in HP played a constructive role, especially in the initial stages of state formation. The political class relied on the bureaucracy to obtain fiscal resources from the central government, which facilitated the dispensation of patronage and provision of public goods. Bureaucratic initiatives were supported by the political class and then further reinforced by the local community. One must not overlook the fact that the hill region has relatively inclusive caste and gender norms, especially in comparison to the Gangetic plains.

And in the case of Uttarakhand...?



Uttarakhand shares a similar social fabric, yet the primary education system fares much worse. Political leadership in Uttarakhand offered little vision for developing the hill region, even after its separation from Uttar Pradesh. This pattern has historical antecedents. At independence, Uttarakhand was far more literate than HP. Communities in both the Garhwal and Kumaon regions had a long history of collective action. However, political leaders got strong incentives to leave their hill constituencies behind and seek power in Lucknow. The need to govern from afar reinforced legalism in the bureaucracy, which helped maintain stability and law and order. The bureaucracy learnt to thwart local demands, which it continues to do today. The lesson here is that bureaucracy matters, particularly at the local level. But for a culture of deliberation to take root inside the state, concerted effort is also needed from the political class.

You emphasise the external environment that pressures the state to produce results. Bihar has created a similar external environment: 50 per cent reservation for women in local bodies that appoint para-teachers, intense monitoring of their performance, a huge hike in their salaries How do you assess the Bihar experiment, given the abysmal results in terms of quality?



The Bihar experiment is among the most interesting in India. The state saw a major turnaround under Nitish Kumar, who put forward a developmental vision. His government greatly expanded access to primary schooling and helped raise attendance through schemes such as providing free bicycles to girls. Quality initiatives were taken with inputs from Pratham, Azim Premji Foundation and other organisations. From the outside, it appears that the state did everything right. As you point out, however, the quality of education remains abysmal. To understand why, one has to look inside the state. First, reforms were introduced from above, with little input from the lower-level bureaucracy. Institutional changes such as enhanced monitoring of para-teachers remained legalistic in nature. Local officials were asked to conduct inspections but were rarely consulted. Instead, they were pressured to apply rules and directives from above. Children enrolled in Bihar's government schools are largely first generation learners. The issue of how to connect their parents to the school system received little attention. The emphasis on legalism did have some merit. Bihar faced massive problems of law and order. Policy reforms to encourage rule-following were probably needed at that stage. Now that basic order has been restored, the question is how to move to the next stage and for reform institutions to carry out more complex tasks, like the delivery of quality education.

Having legislated the Right to Education (RTE), the challenge for India now is to deliver not just scale but also quality in primary education. With your extensive study, do you think this is doable?



To my mind, there is no paucity of laws and regulations governing the education sector in India. Missing are the capabilities of the state to effectively implement these laws. The notion that national legislation such as the RTE Act will fill the gap in learning by imposing uniform standards on infrastructure and other inputs seems mistaken. Educating children requires the joint initiative of schoolteachers, communities and the local administration. It cannot be prescribed from New Delhi. Both state and non-state local bodies need far greater autonomy and flexible resources to govern education themselves, along with routine guidance and oversight of learning outcomes to use their powers wisely. To that end, investment in school administration and local capacity-building is one place for the state to play a constructive role; the promotion of educational research and dissemination of successful models is another. A repository of best practices can be assembled for schools to learn from and adopt according to their needs. The state can also do a far better job of harnessing civic partners and the private sector in education. At present, private schools either grow unchecked or else face suffocating regulation, a suboptimal state of affairs. By promoting local initiative and innovation, quality education is possible in India. For this to happen, we must rethink the role of the state in education.
Another tumultuous week for China's stock markets has dealt yet another blow to global confidence in Beijing's policy makers. Each tripped circuit breaker and policy reversal has underscored the inherent contradiction China faces - between the leadership's desire for the certainty of state control and the benefits of free markets. This contradiction has been part of the Chinese economic system since pro-market reform began in the early 1980s. The government's model encouraged private enterprise, foreign investment and international trade while keeping the "commanding ...
China's stock market is crashing again. After two days this week with big and rapid declines - the latest of which shut off trading only a few minutes after the open - Chinese stocks are back in the neighbourhood of their mid-2015 lows. The raft of administrative measures that the Chinese government has used to prop up its markets since the big plunge last year seems to only have postponed further declines, rather than prevented them. Whatever the reason for the latest selloff, the big question is what the stock-market crash means for the Chinese economy. For more than a decade, the ...
As the current Tamil Nadu government wraps up its term in May this year, political parties in the state are gearing up to forge alliances that would suit them best for the ensuing Assembly elections.

The two major Dravidian parties - the ruling All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and its arch rival, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) - that have ruled the state for more than 50 years now, are the key contenders to form the next government.

This time, a third front has been formed ahead of the elections under the name, People's Welfare Front (PWF), which includes the two communist parties and smaller Dalit parties - Vaiko's Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (MDMK) and the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) led by Thol Thirumavalavan. National parties, the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), are yet to decide who they want to align with for the Assembly elections, expected to be held in the end of April or the first week of May.

Election fever has gripped the parties in the last few weeks, with the DMK making the first move. Party chief M Karunanidhi's son and party treasurer M K Stalin toured the state, albeit in formalwear - not white shirt and veshti, the traditional attire of a south Indian politician. His Namukku Naame (We, On Our Own) campaign has already reached its fourth phase. The party has also had meetings with Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK), led by actor-turned-politician Vijaya-kanth, as well as other parties.

The AIADMK's campaign began last week, with the party appointing 65,616 vote canvassers, one for every polling booth to meet each voter repeatedly before the elections. The party, which contested in the last Lok Sabha elections and notched up a significant victory in the state, has left options of an alliance open. On this, AIADMK President and Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa said the party would take the right decision at the right time.

The DMDK - which contested the last Assembly polls in alliance with the AIADMK but later sat in the Opposition - and the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) are yet to make up their minds, yet both have announced their senior leaders as chief ministerial candidates. Interestingly, the two regional parties had joined hands with the BJP in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.

Nearly three years after snapping ties with the Congress, the DMK's Karunanidhi has made overtures to the party. The BJP is trying to woo the smaller Dravidian parties to get more seats in the Assembly. To this end, its leaders have met DMDK leader Vijayakanth. State BJP President Tamilisai Soundararajan has said the party will not go with either the AIADMK or the DMK.

Jayalalithaa is on friendly terms with senior BJP leaders back in Delhi, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi. When she returned to Tamil Nadu after spending 21 days in a prison in Bengaluru over a disproportionate assets case, Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley met her at her house, at a time when she was not the CM.

Smaller parties such as the Kongunadu Makkal Desiya Katchi (KMDK), which had aligned with the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, have not confirmed any alliance so far. If the BJP strikes an alliance with the AIADMK, the DMDK and the others, who had opposed Jayalalithaa in the past, may gravitate towards other poles, according to observers of Tamil Nadu politics.

Political analysts said that while voters in the three districts of Chennai, Tiruvallur and Kanchipuram were disappointed with the ruling AIADMK after facing hardships in the recent floods, those in the southern parts of the state continued to have hope from Jayalalithaa's party.

If the AIADMK returns to power, it will be in a position to dictate terms to the BJP at the Centre as the latter doesn't have the numbers in the Rajya Sabha to pass important Bills.

The DMK has taken up recent issues such as corruption, law and order and the release of water from the Chembarambakkam lake that is said to have caused the floods in Chennai.

However, politics within the party could go against it in the Assembly polls. While Karunanidhi is unanimously accepted as party leader, his son Stalin garnered much of the limelight in the last few years. This did not go down well with Stalin's older brother and former Union minister M K Alagiri, who was eventually dismissed from the party.

Amid all this action, the party that has quietly moved its coin is Vaiko's DMDK. Contesting its first election in 2011, the party managed to get the status of leader of the Opposition in the Assembly. Although many criticised Vaiko's mannerisms, his party managed to wean DMK votes, said a political analyst. No wonder the BJP, Congress, PWF and even the DMK are all trying to interest the DMDK in an alliance.

The Tamil Maanila Congress founded by former Union minister and former Congress leader G K Vasan, would also be a candidate in poll alliance talks. The general view is that he had been soft on the AIADMK in the past, hence chances were that he would align with the ruling party.
The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) introduced in the winter session of Parliament recommends setting up a regulator, the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI). A regulator is a 'mini-state' with legislative, executive and quasi-judicial powers. Fusing all three aspects of the state into one agency is problematic, and requires particular care for achieving good outcomes. The current draft of the IBC requires many improvements on this score.

The IBBI will regulate insolvency professionals (IPs), IP agencies, information utilities (IUs) and resolution procedures. The entry of players needs to be monitored, and their behaviour needs to comply with standards specified through regulations. Violations of these standards must attract sanctions. In order to achieve malleability, many details of the insolvency process have been delegated to regulations to be specified by the IBBI.

While there is merit in proposing a new regulator, there is considerable scepticism about the performance of existing regulators in India, be it for regulation of professions (e.g. Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, Institute of Company Secretaries of India, Medical Council of India, Bar Council of India, etc) or regulation of industries (e.g. Reserve Bank of India, Securities and Exchange Board of India). If existing regulators have problems, why should we expect better from the IBBI?



Where have we gone wrong? The governance of existing regulators, including the composition of the board and its relationship with the management, is faulty. The procedures for writing subordinate legislation are neither well-defined nor transparent. The mechanisms for exercise of executive powers for conducting inspections and investigations are idiosyncratic and give arbitrary power to officials. Basic principles of rule of law are violated in the quasi-judicial function. Finally, feedback loops of accountability are feeble and fail to set off a continuous process of self-improvement.

Most existing regulators do not exercise a clear separation between their executive, legislative and quasi-judicial powers. The regulatory staff often controls the legislative functions supposed to be performed by the board of the regulator. The power to write law must vest with Parliament, or must be delegated to unelected officials under the control of the board, with requirements about due process.

Executive and quasi-judicial powers often get muddied. The wide-ranging executive powers given to regulators are not balanced with proper systems governing the application of administrative law. The concept of an administrative law wing like in the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is wholly absent in the Indian regulatory context. Quasi-judicial powers must be exercised by regulatory staff, who are at arms-length from the executive wing. The prosecution in a criminal case can never be the judge of its own cause.

There is no accountability of performance of existing regulators. The annual report should be a tool through which the public is able to judge the performance of the regulator. Lack of clarity in the laws also results in the regulator getting away with releasing minimal information on its performance. Recently, the Supreme Court came down heavily on the RBI for non-disclosure of information, emphasising that under the rule of law, punishments cannot be given in secret.

So how do we ensure that the IBBI performs better than existing Indian regulators? Sound regulatory governance requires considerable detail encoded into the primary law, which specifies all five aspects: board and governance, legislative function, executive function, quasi-judicial function and accountability. Conventional laws in India are skimpy on specifying these details, which is what has led to pervasive underperformance.

For a market to function properly, regulators must treat market participants as equal stakeholders. While framing regulations, the IBBI must consult relevant market participants. It must do detailed cost-benefit analysis to assess if a particular regulation solves a case of market failure. It must issue regulations in a transparent manner after deliberations at the board level. Surprises should not come about, where a regulation which is released today takes effect from tomorrow, without any warning.

The quasi-judicial function in the IBBI is special. Persons who write orders must not be involved either in writing law or in enforcing it. Hearings must take place, where the accused have an opportunity to present their point of view, and reasoned orders must come out in writing on the regulator's website. Efficacious methods for appeal must be available to those found guilty.

The establishment of sound processes for the legislative, executive and quasi-judicial functions will create an environment of rule of law. This generates accountability in and of itself. In addition, the IBBI must be required by law to publish an annual performance report documenting its performance according to well-defined parameters.

The current draft of the IBC does not specify these basic requirements in adequate detail. It does not provide sufficient clarity on the regulation making process of the IBBI, nor does it provision for a well-defined accountability mechanism for the regulator. The independence of the quasi-judicial function from the legislative and executive powers of the regulator is also not clearly spelled out. Now that the draft bill has been introduced, these are some of the issues that should be high on our minds when we think of bankruptcy reform and the associated enabling infrastructure.

Pratik Datta is at NIPFP and Rajeswari Sengupta is at IGIDR
Chahat, 6, has very little idea about what she is doing. But she does not hesitate for a second when asked to show her skills with a sword. She is one of the 50 boys and girls who are regulars at an akhara-cum-training-camp in Rori village, located on the outskirts of Ghaziabad district.

Her explanation, desh ka naam badhana hai (have to contribute to the countrys glory) on why she is part of this group does not quite match with the statements of the organisers, though. We are imparting mental and physical training to our children so that they are ready to take on the mentality of Islamic jihad, observes Chetna Sharma, a Meerut-based lawyer and president of Hindu Swabhiman. She has instrumental in setting up such camps in western Uttar Pradesh.

She recounts a number of stories of what she calls love jihad in and around Meerut. The strategy keeps changing but the motive of trapping innocent Hindu girls remains the same. Whether by organising pool parties or by enticing young minds through other means, there is definitely a conspiracy, says Sharma, sitting in her house while showing pictures of some recent incidents on her laptop.

Sharma is not alone in believing that something like this is going on. There are many others who see a wider design whenever any incident of Hindu girl falling in love with a Muslim boy comes to light.

One such incident was reported in Shamli district last month. In the last week of December, a mahapanchayat was called in Shamli to protest against the perceived failure of the police to trace a 23-year-old Hindu woman who had gone missing with a Muslim man in his early 40s. The mahapanchayat brought the latent communal tension to the fore yet again.

However, Jamiat Ulama-I-Hinds Moosa Kazmi says that it is unfortunate that incidents of a Hindu woman falling in love with a Muslim are given communal colour.

But the perception persists, and has reached even villages in the region. A number of people in Jadauga village  on the outskirts of Muzaffarnagar  kept referring to such incidents, giving the impression that all is not well between the two communities.

It is due to the perception that some Hindu groups like the one headed Sharma have decided to impart physical and mental training to young boys and girls. One such training camp is being held in the premises of a retired army official Parvinder Arya in Rori village. I have served in Kashmir and have seen the plight of Hindus there. I do not want the same thing to happen in western Uttar Pradesh, says Arya.

Sharma claims that 20 such training camps are operational in the region and within a year, her organisation plans to cover most of the villages in the region.

At each training camp, boys and girls are getting trained with lathis, swords, bow and arrow, among others, with occasional shouts of Jai Shri Ram and Jai Maha Kali. I want them to be physically fit and mentally strong to take on enemies once the situation arises, says Arya, as the trainees alternate between doing push-ups and sit-ups. The training camp currently has around 60 boys and girls. The one in Rori village has been running for the last two years. And, Arya claims that the trained boys have started camps in other villages as well.

What explains the radicalisation of Hindus in the region? Recent economic and political changes in the state and the region offer some answers. Number of Muslim MLAs in Uttar Pradesh went up from 56 in 2007 to 69 in 2009. What is more, the members of the community did even better in urban local body (ULB) elections.

Analysis of ULB elections of 2012 by AK Verma of the Kanpur-based Christ Church College shows that, In the 12 nagar nigams, though no Muslim was elected as mayor, 21.4 per cent Muslims were elected as members. In the nagar palikas, Muslims account for 31.9 per cent of the presidents and 33.86 per cent of the members. In the urban panchayats, 26.6 per cent of the presidents and 30.7 per cent of the members are Muslims. His research shows that in two western Uttar Pradesh districts of Saharanpur and Bijnor, Muslims swept the polls.

In a multi-cornered contest like in Uttar Pradesh, the votes of Muslims have become very significant for parties. Since the proportion of Muslims in the western part of the state is even more, they are sought after by political parties. Their growing representation in elected positions is a result of that, argues Sudhir Panwar, Lucknow-based political scientist.

Political empowerment of the community is perhaps a result of their growing clout economically. The thriving meat export business has been helpful in this regard. Uttar Pradesh accounts for nearly half of total meat production in the country and western Uttar Pradesh has been the centre of meat export business. Buffalo meat export, which was less than $3 billion in 2011-12, is now in excess of $4 billion. Most of the slaughter houses in the state are located in the western region, and the majority of them are owned by Muslims, according to reports.

Recently released census data also give some hints of how Muslims are recovering lost grounds vis-a-vis other communities. Only 33 per cent of Muslims work against the work participation rate of 40 per cent. However, most of all those who work are outside of agriculture. While 52 per cent of them work in industry and services, 7 per cent of them work as artisans.

More specifically about western Uttar Pradesh, two specific data show that Muslims have done well in the last few years. Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) data shows that from 2004-05 to 2011-12, the decline in the incidence of poverty among Muslims was at 2.51 per cent in rural areas and 2.8 per cent in urban areas as against the overall average of 2.06 per cent and 1.81 per cent, respectively.

The decline was much sharper in urban areas thanks to the growing demand of artisans (carpenters, masons, electricians, et cetera) in recent times. Last years Teamlease report had revealed that salary growth of skilled workers has been at par with young engineers. What perhaps also helps skilled workers in western Uttar Pradesh is the regions proximity to the Capital Region.

What is more, decline in poverty among self-employed Muslims in the the non-agriculture category has been even sharper in Uttar Pradesh, according to NSSO data.

The growing radicalisation of Hindus is perhaps a reaction to the rise in clout of Muslims.
Sixteen people were injured, most of them children, at one of Bangkok's upscale shopping malls today when a tent at an outdoor event came crashing down on them, officials said.

The accident at Siam Paragon shopping mall appeared to have been caused by strong winds that caused the tent to collapse, said Lt. Gen. Sanit Mahathaworn, Bangkok's acting police chief.

"Strong wind caused the tent to fly up, about one metre. Then wooden signs attached to the back of the tent flew off and injured nearby people," he said.

Among the injured were at least 12 children, aged 6 to 9, who were among dozens of people at an event called "Pokemon Day Dance Party" to celebrate Thailand's Children's Day, Sanit and other officials said.

"A mother and her child suffered broken legs. The mother was trying to protect her child from getting hurt," Sanit said. The injured were taken to a nearby hospital.

Siam Paragon issued a statement saying it "would like to regretfully apologise for the accident which injured a total of 16 people" on behalf of the event's organisers, which included other Thai companies. It said organisers sent all the injured to hospitals and by this evening only two remained hospitalised.

Sanit said that police would press criminal negligence charges against the owners of the company that installed the tent. They could face up to three years in prison and a 6,000 baht (USD 165) fine.
At least two Pakistani coastguards were killed and three others injured today when their vehicle hit a landmine in the strategically important Gwadar area in the restive Balochistan province.

The Coastguard personnels' vehicle hit the landmine in the Kaldan area of Gwadar, where the multi-billion dollars China-Pakistan Economic Corridor would end.

Five personnel were seriously injured in the explosion near the Iran border and two of them later died in the hospital, a security official said.

The vehicle in which the coastguard were travelling was badly damaged in the blast.

The security forces launched search operation in the areas after the explosion but no arrests had been made.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack but Baloch separatists often target security forces in the area.

The separatists want greater control over the resources which are in abundance in the province.

The strategically important Gwadar port is being developed under the ambitious USD 46 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.

The project would link China's western city of Kashgar to the Pakistani port of Gwadar on the Arabian Sea.

The project would pass through PoK and has been strongly opposed by India.
Human Resource Minister Smriti Irani today inaugurated the 24th edition of the New Delhi World Book Fair which commenced here with China as the guest of honour country and a theme presentation of the cultural heritage of India.

The nine-day fair, touted as the largest in Asia, is hosting about 30 countries in which a series of programmes including panel discussions, dramas, classical and folk dances, workshops, discussions, authors' meets, conferences, seminars and cultural programmes will be held.

Talking about the Chinese participation, Irani said, "I believe that 50 publishing houses and 9 eminent authors bring with them to this World Book Fair around 5,000 titles so that through this exchange our people across both nations can be enriched."



China was invited to be the guest country after the visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping here last year where he signed a memorandum of understanding with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

"During the visit of President Xi Jinpeng an MoU was signed with China's role in WBF and I am happy to note that promise that we made through paper has fructified in person," the minister said.

Referring to the growth of publishing business in both the countries the minister said, "Today we celebrate the exponential growth of the publishing business both in India and China."



Emphasising on the importance of publishing exchanges between China and India, Sun Shoushan, Vice Minister SAPPRFT said, "As one of the key international book fairs the NDWBF has set up an important platform for cultural exchanges of Indian classic and contemporary works which is now going on smoothly. "



"The important publishing exchanges between China and India have played an important role in cementing the friendship between people and promoting cultural exchanges between the two countries," he said.

This year the fair has introduced a special 'Navlekhan' programme which seeks to promote and publish young authors under the age of 40 writing in Indian languages.

Referring to the same Irani said, while this year they are being published in 6 regional languages by next year she assured that books in 22 languages recognised by the Constitution of India will be published.

Tickets to the fair, which is being held at the sprawling Pragati Maidan, will be priced at Rs 20 and sold from 9 AM till 5 PM at 47 stations of the Delhi Metro network from January 9-17. Schoolchildren and disabled are permitted free entry.

"I am happy to know that this WBF gives free invite and entry to children in school uniform, senior citizens and physically challenged," Irani said.
Five under-trial prisoners today escaped from Dhanera sub-jail in Sabarkantha district, police officials said.

"They managed to escape when they were taken out of their barracks for daily routine," Dhanera police inspector V M Chudasama said.

Jail warden Hitesh Rameshbhai lodged a complaint in this regard.

"We have issued an alert and launched a manhunt to nab them," Chudasama said, adding all the main roads going out of the districts were being watched.

One of them was an accused in a murder case, he added.
BSF jawans manning border outposts (BOPs) have arrested nine persons, including eight Bangladeshis, in Habibpur area here, a police official said today.

The 31 battalion of the Border Security Force arrested eight Bangldeshis who had infiltrated into the country from two the BOPs of Kedaripara and Beldanga under Habibpur police station last night, the official said.

They also arrested an Indian, who was their local contact, the official said.

The arrested Bangladeshis were aged between 25 and 30 years, the official added.

On being questioned, they said they were trying to locate the house of their local contact who had promised them jobs in several parts of the country, police said.

The local contact was also arrested by the BSF who handed them over to the Habibpur police.

The arrested were produced in the Chief Judicial Magistrate's court here today.
A Border Security Force Jawan has been arrested for allegedly helping smugglers in cross-border smuggling of drugs and ammunitions, Punjab police said here today.

The accused has been identified as Anil Kumar, a Jawan with 52 Battalion, posted in Rajasthan, a senior Punjab Police official said.

"Anil Kumar, 29, has been arrested from Rai Singh Nagar in Sriganganagar in Rajasthan," said Mohali SSP Gurpreet Singh Bhullar.

Kumar, who joined BSF in 2008, allegedly used to help smugglers in smuggling of drugs like heroin and arms and ammunitions from Pakistan in lieu of money, he said.

The police also found transfer of "ill-gotten" money in his bank accounts. "BSF jawan was made first payment of Rs 50,000 and then Rs 39,000 which was transferred into his wife's bank account in lieu of cross-border smuggling," SSP said.

The alleged involvement of BSF Jawan came to light following questioning of a drug smuggler, Gurjant Singh alias Bholu who along with his two associates was arrested on January 4 from Kharar here.

Bholu was in contact with Kumar through social networking site 'Facebook' and messaging service 'WhatsApp' for taking his help in cross-border smuggling of weapons and drugs from Pakistan, SSP said.

Bholu was also already in contact with Pakistan based smuggler identified as Imtiaz, who used to send delivery of drugs and arms and ammunitions, police said.

Last week, Punjab police had claimed to have busted a drug smuggling syndicate and arrested three persons from near here, and recovered Pakistani SIM card, mobiles, weapons and ammunition from their possession.

Besides, Bholu, two others who were arrested were Sandip Singh and Jatinder Singh alias Jindi.

Police have recovered one stengun of .9 mm, two pistols, two pistols .30 bore, one airgun, 190 live cartridges, 31 mobile phones, one Pakistani mobile sim card and one car from them.

Meanwhile, police also arrested one person identified as Deepak Kumar, resident of Ludhiana, who was allegedly involved in making fake driving licenses of Gurjant Singh and his associates.
Aam Aadmi Party today asked Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal to "stop bothering" about them and accused the SAD-BJP led regime of ruining the state.

"Chief Minister Badal should stop bothering about AAP and should focus on fulfilling promises made to the residents of Punjab during elections," AAP leader and Sangrur MP, Bhagwant Mann said.

Mann claimed that Aam Aadmi Party government at Delhi is doing a "great job" and people are "really happy" with the policies of government.

"Even the international media has been appreciating the work and even the Chief Justice of India has contributed in Odd-Even formula of government by pooling car while going to his office," he said.

Mann said that in order to boost the health facilities in Delhi, government has opened Mohalla Clinics in every mohalla.

A six-lane flyover in Delhi was completed before the scheduled time. And by striking off management quota in private schools, AAP government has given a equal change to every children of Delhi to study, he said.

Spokesperson and Head of Legal Cell, Aam Aadmi Party, Punjab, Himmat Singh Shergil accused Akali-BJP government of ruining the state with its "anti-people" policies.

He said the government has not even sufficient funds to pay salary to the government employees and government buildings are being mortgaged to run the daily affairs of the state.

Shergil criticized Badal government for the plight of industry. He said that because of insecurity and atrocities, Dalits are feeling insecure in the state.

Earlier in the day, Badal accused the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) of failing to fulfil the promises made before Delhi Assembly polls and alleged that the party came to power by "misleading" the public.

The party also rubbished the PPCC chief Amarinder Singh's



claims that the AAP was "creating chaos" in Punjab by distributing pamphlets in villages.

"The Congress which is responsible for the 1984 Anti-Sikh riots and Operation Blue Star has no right to talk about it," AAP's Punjab in-charge Sanjay Singh said.

"We are bringing Inquilab against corruption, drugs, mafia. We are fighting for change in the state," he said.

Asked about a poster in social media which allegedly shows Arvind Kejriwal asking people to go to Gurdwaras to celebrate militant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale's birthday on Feb 12, Singh said it's a "dirty politics" by the opposition.

"AAP has nothing to do with that," he said.

He said the ruling alliance in the state will break as the SAD is facing a "tough time" and the BJP will leave it.

"I also thank Mrs Sidhu (Navjot Kaur) for appealing people to vote for AAP. There are people in the BJP, the SAD and the Congress who are frustrated with their parties. They may stay in their respective parties but will get votes for AAP in Assembly polls," he said.
Former Hurriyat Conference chairman Abdul Gani Bhat today visited the residence of late Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed here to offer his condolences to the bereaved family.

"Yes, I went there to offer my condolences to the family. Mufti sahib was my class fellow," Bhat told PTI.

Bhat, belonging to the Mirwaiz Umer Farooq-led moderate Hurriyat Conference camp, said he paid tributes to his "good friend" Sayeed.

Describing Sayeed as a leader with a "vision to bring India and Pakistan closer", Bhat said, that he wanted the relations between the two neighbouring countries to be on sound and solid basis.

The Hurriyat leader said Sayeed was a strong votary of dialogue between the two countries to resolve all issues and wanted that they (Indo-Pak) should resolve all issues, including Kashmir, that way.

"Now that there is some progress on it, Sayeed is no more," he rued.
An Air India flight to Bhubaneswar from here was delayed by nearly eight hours allegedly due to some "VIPs" forcing the government-owned carrier to reassign the aircraft and its crew for Bhopal, a charge denied by the airline.

The flight - AI 073, which was scheduled to take off for Bhubaneswar from the Indira Gandhi International Airport here for its destination at 1820 hours yesterday, departed at 0210 hours early today, after getting rescheduled four times during this period.

"Our Air India flight from here was held back as the airline deployed the plane and crew bound for Bhubaneswar on its Delhi-Bhopal flight," BJD Member of Parliament Tathagata Satpathy, who was flying to Bhubaneswar by the same flight, told PTI here.

Satpathy said the airline had initially rescheduled the Bhubaneswar flight to 2230 hours due to fog.

Meanwhile, at around 2150 hours the airline announced cancellation of its Bhopal service, which was to depart at 2030 hours, following weather conditions at the IGIA, he said.

Satpathy alleged that Air India, however, later revoked cancellation of the Bhopal flight as weather conditions improved but pressed into its service the aircraft and the crew that was assigned for its Bhubaneswar service "due to pressure from a BJP Minister and two judges, after they called up airline chairman and Managing Director Ashwani Lohani."



It left the passengers of Bhubaneswar flight agitated and they all assembled at boarding Gate 29 A, protesting against the airline's "preference to VIPs".

"I pacified the protesters and also told them not to heckle any of the security person at the gate," he said, adding the flight finally departed after Air India deployed the crew of one of its flight that arrived from an overseas destination.

The carrier, however, said it did not give preference to any particular flight and the alleged delay was caused due to the heavy fog at the Delhi airport yesterday, which had sent flight schedule of all airlines including that of the Air India topsy turvy.

Due to heavy fog from yesterday morning and resultant delays, most of the crews' duty time was limiting later on in the day. Crews were planned as per their arrivals from earlier flights, back to Delhi and sequenced based on the duty time remaining, Air India said.

"At no time did AI give any preference to any particular flight. Arriving and available crews duty time remaining as per regulations was checked and they were scheduled for the flights based on time and sequence," it said.
The BJP state unit today accused Samajwadi Party of using 'Asha Yatra' (walk of hope) as a platform to campaign for upcoming state Assembly elections, a senior party official said.

Slamming SP today, BJP Kanpur chief Surendra Maithani said, "how this yatra can be an initiative to spread peace and harmony amongst people, when it was turning out to be a Samajwadi party event.

"SP has put all ranks of the local district administration into preparations for this yatra in view of the upcoming state Assembly elections. No one will be able to benefit from this march, nor will it improve peace and harmony of the city," he said.

"None of the BJP leaders or workers will participate in the yatra, nor will they support this," he added.

An initiative by Sri M's 'Manav Ekta Mission', the 'padayatra' from Kanyakumari to Kashmir started on January 12 last year, marking the birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda.

Along with district authorities, ruling SP has been engaged in repairing roads and footpaths on the way leading to the Green Park stadium, where the 'Asha Yatra' or the walk of hope will reach on Jan 12.

"Roads leading to the stadium have been lined with posters and banners of local SP leaders welcoming the participants of the yatra, making it an opportunity to strengthen their vote bank," Maithani alleged.

The Additional DM Avinash Singh said, "roads and footpaths have been cleaned and repaired especially for this yatra because the Chief minister Akhilesh Yadav will also be joining the event on Jan 12. Although, he will be attending the yatra only in the capacity of the State head and will not attend any other official event that day.

"It is wrong to label it as a government yatra. The district authorities have extended their assistance because the 'Asha Yatra' has been spreading the message of peace and harmony in the country," Singh added.

Led by Sri M, the yatra will reach Kanpur on January 9 and he would address students, senior citizens and social workers of the city in the next three days.

"Samajwadi party is leaving no stone unturned to make this yatra a success because its motive is to spread the message of peace and harmony," local SP leader Mahendra Singh said.

Sri M said that the main purpose of this march is to send a message of peace and harmony among people and not to gain any political mileage.

A public dialogue programme is being organised on January 10 and Sri M will also address students of Kanpur University on January 11.
A police Assistant Sub-Inspector (ASI) was shot dead by unidentified assailants and his body was found today in Bihar's Vaishali district.

Superintendent of Police of Vaishali, Rakesh Kumar said that the body of ASI Ashok Kumar Yadav was found from Manua village.

The SP said that the ASI, a resident of Buxar, was on leave.

The reason for killing is still not ascertained, the SP said adding investigation was on.

The body has been sent to Sadar hospital for post-mortem, Kumar said.
The Chinese capital Beijing will shut down 2,500 polluting firms in 2016 in its latest environmental protection efforts to reduce pollution as the city continues to be engulfed by smog most part of the year.

The Fengtai, Fangshan, Tongzhou and Daxing districts are required to close 2,500 enterprises at the end of this year while the whole city will finish the task in 2017.

Structural adjustment in recent years has led to a dramatic fall of heavily polluting and high energy-consuming companies in the Chinese capital.

But small polluting sources such as restaurants, hotels, garages, and bath houses are increasing, an official said.

Vice Mayor Li Shixiang ordered safety and risk assessment and comprehensive law enforcement in closure of small polluters, state run Xinhua agency reported.

Beijing aims to basically eliminate coal use in six downtown districts in two years and help 600,000 households shift from coal to clean energy in five years.

The capital, hit by bouts of heavy smog this winter, plans to reduce coal consumption by 500,000 tonnes in 2016 and close all coal-fired boilers throughout the city by 2020.

Despite Beijing's effort to limit air pollution, its average PM2.5 reading in 2015 stood at 80.6 micrograms per cubic meter, 1.3 times more than the national standard, official data showed.

Beijing's average PM2.5 density of the small deadly pollutedparticles rose by 75.9 per cent year-on-year in the period from November 15 to December 31, 2015 during which China has sounded its first ever red alert over pollution warranting a host of emergency measures.

Beijing witnessed continuous smoggy days this winter, due to highpollutionand unfavourable weather.

The local government issued red alerts, the highest, for heavy airpollutiontwice.

China has a four-tier warning system, with red as the most severe, followed by orange, yellow and blue.

Red alert warrants closure of schools, construction work and implementation of odd and even number plate rule for all vehicles.
Bollywood stars Akshay Kumar, Varun Dhawan, Sudhir Mishra and Sonakshi Sinha among others have given a thumbs up to megastar Amitabh Bachchan possibly being the new brand ambassador of the 'Incredible India' campaign.

Bachchan, 73, is the centre's "first choice" to replace Aamir Khan, whose contract for the tourism ministry's campaign has ended. The final decision is yet to be taken.

It has been reported Akshay was also among the choices for the position.

Calling Bachchan the right one, Akshay told reporters, "He should be given that (brand ambassador). He is an icon... It would be great."



"He is The perfect brand ambassador, true icon and the most appropriate person for incredible India," said actor Ranveer Singh.

Nawazuddin Siddiqui, who is sharing screen space with Bachchan in Sujoy Ghosh's upcoming production "Te3n", said, "I am happy. He deserves it."



Filmmaker Sidhir Mishra called the "Piku" star incredible.

"He is a great brand ambassador. So was Aamir. So is Mr Bachchan, so would be many other people. You can't praise him (Bachchan) enough, there is not much that hasn't been said about him. He is cultured, understands culture, understands India, he is very knowledgeable. Not just a film actor he is beyond that," Mishra said.

While Sonakshi feels there is none better than Bachchan for the post. "I think nobody represents art and cinema in our country like him. He has been doing that for so many years. No one is better than him to be the brand ambassador."



"He is definitely incredible. He deserves whatever honour he gets," said Varun.

Director Shoojit Sircar, who has directed Bachchan in two films "Shoebite" and "Piku", said he supports the actor in whatever he does.

"I am happy. Whatever he does, I am with him. He is a legend."



Sonam Kapoor said, "It's an apt ambassadorship. He was the brand ambassador for Gujrat, so it's a natural progression."



Filmmaker Subhash Ghai called Bachchan's likely appointment superb. "It's a great honour that he has become the ambassador."



Kabir Khan, Raveena Tandon, Shilpa Shetty, Bhumi Pednekar, Prateik Babbar, Ronit Roy and Darshan Kumar were among the other celebrities, who praised the government's choice.

The stars were speaking at the red carpet of 22nd Annual Star Screen Awards.
Ahead of the Assembly polls in West Bengal, the BJP has chalked out a programme to launch a massive campaign in the state by its central leadership.

Union ministers Nitin Gadkari, Rajnath Singh, Smriti Irani and party president Amit Shah will hold rallies across the state this month, party sources said.

The campaign would start with Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari's rally at Malda in North Bengal on January 18, while Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh will hold a public meeting on January 21 at Barasat near Kolkata.

Union HRD Minister Smriti Irani would address a rally at Burdwan on January 22, which will be followed by the rally of party president Amit Shah at Howrah on January 25.

The party would also organise processions, meetings and other modes of campaign statewide soon, the sources said.

Launching of the campaign by BJP senior leaders followed Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley's meeting with state leaders yesterday.

Ruling out electoral alliance with any of the three major political parties in the state, Jaitley had said the party would focus on key issues to carve out its own political space on the basis of issues where the party has clarity and where unrest is brewing among people at grassroot level.

"Those who have destroyed Bengal and those who have destroyed the country are now sending signals to each other," Jaitley had said referring to talks of an alliance between Congress and the CPI(M).

On the other hand, "the ruling TMC is trying to chart out its (own) course," Jaitley added referring to the other major political force in Bengal.

Jaitley had hinted that BJP's policies on economic development and party's views to prevent infiltration into the state, besides no compromise with 'anti-national elements', could be party's key focus area in the state.

Prasad said that Singh despite being the then Prime



Minister could not save his "guru" P V Narasimha Rao from insult even in his death as the Gandhi family did not allow his body to be taken inside the Congress headquarters.

"He has his own utility. I feel pity for him... This is his tragedy," he told a press conference.

The Rao government accorded Bharat Ratna to Sardar Patel and Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad in 1991 and 1992. "Was this the reason for the manner in which they treated Rao?" he asked.

It was Rao who politically empowered Singh, who served as Finance Minister under him, to go for major reforms.

While Congress accuses Modi of criticising it on foreign soil, it was Rahul Gandhi who trashed an ordinance approved by the Singh government when the Prime Minister was in the USA on an official visit, he said.

Prasad listed out several alleged scams that happened under the UPA government to target Singh, saying he maintained silence then and was using terms like "organised loot and legalised plunder" to attack demonetisation.

Asked if his government would probe Singh's involvement, he noted that probe in several cases had begun before the NDA came to power and asserted that "we are not into witch-hunt" and law would take its own course.

He also noted that several little known people who worked for the society were given Padma awards by this government.
Attacking the BJP over a seminar in Delhi University by party leader Subramanium Swamy on the Ram temple issue, the Aam Aadmi Party today said the saffron party should not use varsities to spread communalism and alleged that the move was aimed at the 2017 Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.

Terming it a "sensitive issue", senior AAP leader Ashutosh said that the case is pending before the Supreme Court and the decision on it should be by the judiciary and not outside.

The two-day seminar titled 'Shri Ram Janma Bhoomi Temple: Emerging Scenario' is being organised at DU's Arts Faculty by Arundhati Vashishtha Anusandhan Peeth (AVAP), a research organisation founded by late VHP leader Ashok Singhal.

Amid protests outside the Delhi University, senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy today went ahead with the seminar on the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya where he asserted that nothing will be done forcibly or against the law.

"We are not opposed to the move of discussion on Ram Mandir in the DU as we believe that the universities should be a place for healthy discussions of various issues. Our problem is using the seminar for communalising the atmosphere," Ashutosh said.

"There were riots in Muzaffarnagar before the Lok Sabha polls. Then there were communal riots in Delhi before the state polls. Ahead of Bihar polls, Dadri (where rumours of beef consumption led to killing of man) was exploited. And before the Uttar Pradesh polls, you (BJP) have brought up Ram Mandir issue again," he said.

"...We want politics over Roti Kapda aur Makan and not religion," Ashutosh said.

AAP's Delhi unit convenor Dilip Pandey also questioned the move of renting out the venue for the seminar as the varsity in the past had denied permission to the party to carry out party-related programmes in its premises.

He said the CYSS, party's student wing, is also agitating against the seminar in the campus.

He said that the BJP has not learnt from its mistakes and is "hell bent" on repeating them despite facing a drubbing in Delhi and Bihar.
A prestigious annual literary meet in Maharashtra has assumed political overtones with the ruling BJP taking objection to the sammelan's newly-elected president and writer Sripal Sabnis' comments on Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The chief state BJP spokesman Madhav Bhandari today criticised Sabnis, saying his comments on Modi were in "bad taste" and has "lowered the dignity" of the forthcoming 89th All India Marathi Sahitya Sammelan, of which he is the elected president.

In his controversial remarks made recently during his speech at a college near Pune, the writer had derided Modi's recent surprise meeting with his counterpart Nawaz Sharif at Lahore saying "a bullet could have hit him from any direction or a bomb exploded and we would have required to hold a condolence meeting for Modi instead of poet Mangesh Padgaonkar (who died recently)."



"No one should make such a statement about PM to seek publicity. While we accept political comments being made from a literary stage, this thoughtless and uncivil remark by Sabnis has lowered the dignity of the post of the Sammelan president," Bhandari told reporters here.

The BJP local unit at Pimpri near here, the venue of the proposed three-day literary event starting January 15, also organised a protest led by MP Amar Sable, in which an effigy of the writer was paraded on a donkey.

Sabnis, after his election as president of the Sammelan, had supported the "Award Vapsi" movement by writers against the Modi government on the issue of "growing intolerance".

The Marathi literary meet is going to take place in Pimpri-Chinchwad near Pune from January 15.
A BSF constable was today arrested in Sri Ganganagar district of Rajasthan for allegedly smuggling of drugs and weapons at the India-Pakistan boarder.

IG (BSF) Rajasthan Frontier, B R Meghwal, said that constable Anil Bhagat has been handed over to intelligence agencies from Punjab and they would interrogate him further to ascertain if he had links across the borders and if he was also involved in sharing information of strategic importance with Pakistan.

Bhagat belongs to Uttar Pradesh and was posted at Riasingh Nagar post in Sri Ganganagar sector of BSF.

Intelligence agencies had been tracking Bhagat for some time and tapped his phone before he was arrested and handed over to the agencies from Punjab this morning.

Meghwal said that the BSF has also been keeping an eye on such elements active in the border guarding force.

"We also had some inputs Bhagat being in communication with some elements from Pakistan," said Meghwal.

Bhagat was on the radar of the agencies from Punjab in the aftermath of the recent terror attack on Pathankot airbase.
A business development strategist, who recently slipped into a partially covered manhole at Carter road in suburban Bandra and fractured his leg, has slapped a legal notice on the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) seeking Rs 1.5 crore damages for its alleged negligence.

51-year-old Vijay Hingorani fell into the gutter after slipping from a partially covered manhole near Otters Club on November 29 last year and fractured his leg.

He claimed that because the manhole was not covered completely, he accidental fell into the gutter and broke his leg.

He also lost a job opportunity to work for a firm in Bengaluru where he was offered attractive remuneration with bonus and accommodation with effect from January 1 this year, according to the notice sent by his lawyer Laxman Kanal.

Hingorani, who was immediately given treatment at nearby Holy Family hospital soon after the incident, has asked for Rs 1.5 crore compensation from the civic body as medical expenses, physical injury and loss of livelihood.

The lawyer said his client was hospitalised for a week during which a steel plate was inserted in his leg. Thereafter, he was bed-ridden for another week and advised six months further rest as a result of which he could not take up the new job offer in Bengaluru.

Kanal said that Hingorani had vast experience in jewellery business, apparel and accessories and had expertise in business strategies and development. As a result of the injury caused by falling into the gutter, he lost a good job opportunity.

The civic body is responsible for maintaining and repairing all the manhole covers in the city and replace them if they break, said Kanal, adding that "this is a case of sheer negligence and hence compensation must be paid to his client failing which they would seek legal remedies.
Catalonia's separatists have struck a last-minute agreement to form a new regional government that will work towards independence from Spain, with controversial secessionist leader Artur Mas stepping aside to seal the deal.

"Together for Yes and the CUP have reached a deal to form a government and this will not go to (new) elections," a senior regional government source told AFP.

"There is an agreement. We will have a government and stability," Jordi Sanchez, president of the pro-independence Catalan National Assembly group, said on Twitter.

In September, Mas' "Together for Yes" secessionist alliance and the more radical, far-left CUP party together won a majority of seats in the 135-seat parliament in the wealthy, 7.5-million-strong northeastern region.

But the honeymoon was short-lived as "Together for Yes", which won 62 seats, battled with the CUP to form a government over the issue of Mas' leadership.

Despite more than three months of intense negotiations, the small party that got 10 seats refused to give Mas their backing, resenting the austerity measures he implemented and corruption scandals linked to his party.

If a deal had not been reached by midnight on Sunday, Mas would have had to call fresh elections, which would have come as a major setback for the region's independence drive.

He told a press conference today that he was stepping aside in order to strike the agreement with the CUP.

"I am stepping aside and will not be standing as a Together for Yes candidate for the re-election of president of the regional government," he said.

Replacing him as candidate will be Carles Puigdemont, head of the association of pro-independence municipalities, Mas added.
Catalonia's separatists have sealed a deal to form a new regional government that will work towards independence from Spain, the outgoing administration said today, just a day before the deadline.

"Together for Yes and the CUP have reached a deal to form a government and this will not go to (new) elections," a senior regional government source told AFP.
The half-a-decade-old row over schools operating in Nepal under India's CBSE system is about to get resolved, with authorities here issuing a three-month deadline for them to get recognised under the Nepalese government, in a regulation likely to benefit 15,000 students.

The Ministry of Education here issued a notice yesterday, asking the schools running under the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) system to register themselves within three months to get recognition from Nepal government, according to sources in the ministry.

The MoE has asked the schools to register themselves before the end of the current academic session. It has also warned that schools not registering themselves within three months would not be allowed to take new admissions in the fresh academic session.

Education Minister Giriraj Mani Pokharel told reporters: "If any school affiliated to CBSE fails to come under the government's purview, they would be barred from taking admissions in the new academic session."



There are some 15 schools in Nepal operating under CBSE system and except the Kendriya Vidyalaya operating within the premises of the Indian Embassy, Kathmandu, the rest are running without registering themselves with the MoE as there was no such provision in the Nepalese education law.

Some of these schools are also run by Indian-origin people.

However, after years of efforts by these schools and at an initiative taken by the Indian Embassy, the Nepalese government has finally agreed to register these schools and issued the notice to this effect.

"We take positively the government's notice and our school will soon apply for registration in the Ministry of Education," said Bhuvaneshwori Rao, principal of DAV Sushil Bishwobharati Higher Secondary School, a prominent school in Lalitpur district here operating under the CBSE system.

"Now our schools will not face any hassles from the authorities once it is registered under the Education Ministry," pointed out Rao.

The new regulation will benefit some 15,000 students enrolled in the schools functioning under the CBSE system.

There are six such schools running in Kathmandu alone.

The rest are operational in districts outside Kathmandu.

Earlier, a technical committee formed under the coordination of Education Secretary Bishwo Prakash Pandit had prepared a report recommending the government to regulate schools running CBSE curriculum in Nepal.

The report was presented in the Cabinet on January 1. The Cabinet had forwarded the report to its Social Committee for further study.

The Committee approved the report yesterday, according to Pokharel.

The first CBSE school had started operation in Nepal some three decades ago. Not only Indians, but many Nepalese students are also enrolled in these schools.
Former Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar has claimed that the Indian government has a special relationship with underworld don Chhota Rajan, who was deported from Bali in November last year.

Kumar made the assertion during a session at the Delhi Literature Fest late last evening with journalist Avirook Sen.

"The short answer- yes there is," Kumar said to Sen's question.

Kumar reiterated his statement when session moderator Madhu Trehan asked him whether this was a fact or just hearsay.

"If I say it, it is true," he said.

The former top Delhi police officer in his tell-all memoir "Dial D for Don" had claimed that he had received a call from Dawood Ibrahim in June 2013.

Kumar had written that post the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts, he had telephonic conversations with the fugitive mob boss on three different occasions.

The book, which was released last year, also was in the news for its disclosure that that at one point in the 1990s Dawood wanted to surrender.

Responding to a question, Kumar said that all hopes must not be pinned on Chhota Rajan in order to get to Dawood.

"There is hope in a manner of speaking, but let us not pin all our hopes on Chhota Rajan," Kumar said.

Chhota Rajan, a former aide of Dawood, is currently lodged in Tihar Jail.

The session also saw Kumar sharing some of his recollections from controversial cases over his long career, including the Ansal Plaza shootout and the Mandal Commission protests.
China's financial system is "largely stable" and forex reserves are "relatively abundant", the foreign exchange regulator said today despite the reserves posting its sharpest monthly fall on record in December.

The official remarks came after the Chinese yuan, under persistent depreciation pressure, dipped to a five-year low against the US dollar this week.

The State Administration of Foreign Exchange said in an online statement it will further facilitate cross-border trade and investment, and continue to promote the yuan's convertibility under the capital account in an orderly manner.

The administration will strengthen the monitoring of China's balance of payments, and improve the management of foreign debt and cross-border capital flows.

The statement came in the backdrop of China's foreign exchange reserves, the largest in the world, posting the sharpest monthly fall on record in December.

Foreign exchange reserves fell to $3.33 trillion at the end of last month, the lowest level in more than three years and down by $108 billion from November, the People's Bank of China said.

The fall in December extended a month-on-month decline of $87.2 billion dollars registered in November.
China is gripped with monkey fever as millions of Chinese braced to bid adieu to not so lucky year of sheep and welcome the year of monkey next month.

The Chinese lunar calendar assigns an animal symbol to each year in a 12-year cycle. According to the zodiac, 2016 is the Year of the Monkey.

The Chinese Lunar New Year, also known as the Spring Festival, falls on February 8 this year, ending the Year of the Sheep.

The monkey comes ninth in the 12-animal rotation, following the sheep and preceding the rooster. Others include rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, dog and pig.

According to the zodiac, people born during the Year of the Monkey are thought to be smart, lively and playful contrary to the outgoing year of sheep which was stated to be unlucky year for the new born.

Chinese stores, offices, homes and cars will be decorated with zodiac-themed trinkets weeks before the lunar new year, offering a boom for businesses across the country.

In Yiwu, Zhejiang province, the world's largest wholesale market for small consumer goods has entered the high season.

At the Festival Commodities Market, wholesale dealers can be seen hawking monkey-themed paintings, scrolls with traditional couplets, toys and lucky charms.

The scene is similar in the nearby city of Jinhua, where businesses are busy introducing their latest monkey products to customers.

"This year's major products are lucky paper with the Chinese character 'Fu' (happiness) and couplets on scrolls," a businesswoman surnamed Lu told state-run Xinhua agency.

"Gold ingots with monkey images are also very popular."



Even foreign businesses are cashing in on the monkey fervour, adding primates to imported watches, chocolates and charm bracelets found on e-commerce site Taobao.Com.

Meanwhile, a trailer for the film "Monkey King 2" starring Hong Kong actor Louis Koo has just been released.

The sequel to one of China's most successful domestic films will be released on the first day of Spring Festival, February 8.

Enthusiasm for monkey products shows the Chinese people's excitement for the country's biggest holiday, which is generally celebrated with family reunions and is a time of happiness, courage and hope, said Wang Kaiyu, a researcher at the Anhui Academy of Social Sciences.
Workers partially demolished a Chinese hospital with several doctors and a patient still inside, media reported today, burying bodies stored in its morgue under rubble and prompting an investigation.

Around 20 people dressed in military fatigues on Thursday destroyed part of Fourth Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University, Huiji district, in the capital of central Henan province, according to the public television channel CCTV.

"I was operating...(an X-ray) machine. The noise (of the demolition) was terrifying," Liu Chunguang, the hospital's director of radiology, told the channel.

"My patient was sitting beside me, shouting that there was an earthquake. The patient ran away, terrified," he said, adding that only a few doctors and one patient were in the hospital at the time.

Images published by Chinese media apparently taken at the site show several rooms with collapsing ceilings, holes through brick walls, swinging lights as well as masses of loose cables and debris.

The hospital's morgue was "razed", according to local newspaper Dahebao, and six of the bodies stored there covered in rubble, while medical equipment worth 4 million yuan (USD 600,000) was damaged.

Three hospital employees were injured during a confrontation with the demolition workers, CCTV reported.

Authorities in Huiji district told AFP today that they were currently investigating the incident but results would not be announced before Monday.

Yesterday they said they had not yet identified the people who carried out the demolition. The buried bodies had also yet to be recovered.

"It must be the business which is carrying out roadworks (near the hospital) which ordered this!" one person said in an online forum. Forced demolitions are frequent in China.

Other internet users criticised local media for not sufficiently covering the demolition, which only received widespread attention when it was picked up by CCTV.
As many as 40 domestic and multinational financial giants, including Citigroup, Barclays and ICICI Bank, have sought to partner India Post for its upcoming payments bank, Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said today.

"You have only got the in-principle approval, and other aspects like appointing a consultant are on, but already 40 big financial services groups from the country and abroad have evinced interest in a tie-up with the Postal Department," the Communications and IT Minister said while addressing postal employees here.

He named American banking giant Citigroup, British lender Barclays and the country's largest private sector lender ICICI Bank among those who have sent tie-up proposals.

Prasad said the department is aiming to get the bank operational by March 2017.

He said some of the requests are for selling insurance, while some seek to provide government-to-citizen and company-to-citizen services.

The Postal Department features in a list of 11 entities who were given the go-ahead by the RBI last August to set up payments banks, aimed at promoting financial inclusion through deepening the formal financial system by focusing on transactional banking.

India Post is the only state-run entity to feature in the list, which is populated by industrial houses like the Birlas, Ambanis, and Mahindras, apart from telecom biggies like Airtel and Vodafone.

The Department's reach, spanning 1.54 lakh touch points across the country, is its strength and the employees should leverage it for maximising revenue, he said.

Prasad said as against a dip of 2 per cent in 2013-14, the revenue of the department grew 37 per cent in FY15 and has jumped 120 per cent till December 2015. He, however, did not give the absolute figures.

Prasad, who was speaking after inaugurating an e-commerce parcel processing centre at Parel in central Mumbai, said the department has done cash-on-delivery based deliveries of Rs 1,000 crore in 2015.

Noting that the e-commerce market is around Rs 98,000 crore and is estimated to grow exponentially going forward, Prasad asked the employees to make India Post the largest e-commerce logistics company in the world.

Over 65 per cent of the e-commerce orders are from smaller towns, which can serve as an advantage to the Department due to its wide network, he said.

To develop the network, the department is getting all the post offices on the core banking platform and is also giving hand-held devices to postmen that can be used during deliveries and selling insurance by March 2017, he said.
Scores of former servicemen and city residents today paid homage to the security personnel killed during a terror attack at an Indian Air Force base in Pathankot.

Members of Elite India Foundation, an NGO which works for women empowerment, held a candle march to offer tribute to the fallen heroes, at the Jantar Mantar here.

"We took out a candle march and also appealed to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi to take appropriate action against terrorists," the NGO said.

The members of the Foundation were also joined by several former servicemen who also paid homage to the soldiers killed during the Pathankot attack.
A college principal was shot at by unidentified assailants near Mahuara village here today, following which several irate students of the institution clashed with police, leaving four of their personnel injured in the violence.

Principal Shiv Pratap Misra of Sri Shankar Inter College, Pushpnagar, was on his way to the institution when three bike-borne miscreants fired at him and looted his vehicle near Mahuara village in Didargang police station area this morning, SP (City) Vishal Kumar said.

Irate students of the college started protesting and later clashed with police which reached the spot after the incident, SP said.

The students indulged in brick-batting and arson, damaging several police vehicles, he said.

Circle officer Phulpur Satyendra Kumar Singh, Police Station in-charge of Didarganj Kumud Shekhar Singh and two constables were injured in the incident, he informed.

Personnel from nearby police stations were rushed to the spot alongwith PAC and the situation was brought under control.

Two of the policemen and the principal were undergoing treatment at a hospital and the hunt was on to trace the three miscreants, Kumar added.
Delhi Congress leaders along with locals today forcibly opened the newly-constructed elevated road from Mukarba Chowk for traffic, alleging that its inauguration had been delayed as Aam Aadmi Party had no time for it and, thereby, caused inconvenience to the people.

"The local residents decided to forcibly inaugurate the elevated road from Mukarba Chowk to Rohini Court and Saraswati Vihar to Mangolpuri Industrial area since the AAP leaders had no time for its inaugural although it was completed many days ago," former Congress MLA Deveder Yadav said.

Yadav, who led the locals and other Congressmen, said the foundation stone of the elevated road was laid down by the then Chief Minister Sheila Dixit in 2012 and that AAP was trying to claim it to be their government's achievement.

"They had put up hoardings that the elevated road will be completed by December 31, 2015 and it would be inaugurated on January 1, but it was kept closed because the leaders of AAP had no time for its inaugural," he said.

Reacting to the forced "inaugural" of the elevated road, Delhi Transport Minister Gopal Rai accused Congress of indulging in petty issues since it had nothing else to protest against the government.

"They have no other issue so they are doing this. The work on the elevated road had been fastest during the AAP government since its foundation stone was laid," Rai added.
Deepika Padukone's solo dance number "Mohe Rang Do Laal" in "Bajirao Mastani" may have been a hit but Pt Birju Maharaj, who choreographed the number, says the actress was initially worried about performing the song.

"I met Deepika in Delhi before the final shoot in Mumbai. That time I taught her some basic mudras of Kathak. Deepika told me that she was worried about the dance number as she was not Madhuri (Dixit)... I told her not to worry and she worked really hard to get the steps right," Birju Maharaj, 77, told PTI.

The exquisite dance number, set in the backdrop of a fort, has Deepika performing on a thumri to express her love for Bajirao (played by Ranveer Singh).

"I am very happy with the way the piece shaped up. Had it been a fast footwork and movement piece then there would have been a problem. But Deepika still managed to bring out a small fast paced piece brilliantly. She was not scared and did it beautifully."



Birju Maharaj watched the actress' "Happy New Year" to learn about her dance skills. In the 2014 film, Deepika plays a dance enthusiast.

"I had gone to watch 'Happy New Year' only with one motive that I have to see how Deepika dances as I have to choreograph her next. I believe, Deepika does brilliant acting but she should do more classical dance so that she can improve her dancing skills," he said.

Asked why he does not choreograph much for Bollywood, the dancer said, "I am not comfortable with every song. For me, dance is like connecting with the almighty. I cannot choreograph something, which is raunchy and demands loads of skin show. I know these are important for a film but I prefer to stay away from it."



The Kathak exponent credited the movie's director Sanjay Leela Bhansali, with whom he collaborated in "Devdas", for shooting the songs aesthetically in his films.

"Sanjay bhai has a brilliant aesthetic sense. He knows what suits better. He is a trained Odissi dancer. We share a strong bond since 'Devdas'. Our viewpoints match and that helps to bring out the best in both of us.
Denmark has kicked a foreign student out of the country for exceeding hourly part-time work regulations, despite Aarhus University's efforts to hang onto one of its top students, the school said today.

Marius Youbi, a 30-year-old engineering student, flew home to Cameroon on January 7 under an expulsion order requiring him to leave Denmark by January 8.

The Scandinavian country has some of Europe's strictest immigration policies, and has repeatedly tightened its regulations in recent months to deter foreigners from seeking a new life in the country.

Working part-time as a cleaner to help pay for his studies, Youbi was found to have occasionally exceeded the 15 hours he was allowed to work per week.

"We disagree with this decision from the Danish immigration service," university spokesman Anders Cornell told AFP.

The school's rector sent a letter to the immigration service's Agency for Recruitment and Integration on December 23 asking it to reconsider its decision, but the letter was not answered, Cornell said.

"Marius Youbi is one of the most talented students we have... The agency is able to reverse its decision and to not do so would be unfortunate," rector Brian Bech Nielsen wrote in the letter, a copy of which was sent to AFP.

"The country's laws should of course be respected, but the 'punishment' does not meet the 'crime' in this case," he wrote.

Youbi "has paid back the money he earned for those extra hours and he paid the fine as well. The Danish immigration service therefore considers that he has accepted his penalty," Cornell said.

A spokesman for the Danish agency, Jesper Wodschow Larsen, told AFP the decision "was taken in line with the rules in place."



Youbi, who was studying towards a bachelor's degree in engineering, still needs to write his thesis and do an internship with a Danish company in order to earn his degree, Cornell said.

Speaking to Danish Radio just before his departure, Youbi said he was "sad and disappointed, my work is wasted."



"This is four-and-a-half years that have gone up in smoke," he said.

"I built up something here in Denmark. I've made many friends here, I have family here that I'm leaving behind. It's hard to say goodbye to so much."



Youbi said he was still hopeful he could return to Denmark to resume his studies.

"I hope I'll be able to come back... First I'm going to go home and wait. Then I'll hope for the best," he said.
An Egyptian court today upheld a three-year jail sentence for former president Hosni Mubarak and his sons for embezzling millions of dollars' worth of state funds that were intended for the maintenance of official residences.

Mubarak, 87, and his sons -- Gamal and Alaa -- were charged of acquiring almost 126 million Egyptian pounds (USD 16 million) from the presidential palace budget and using the money for the construction and development of family-owned assets.

They are also charged with forging official documents and damaging public property.

In May 2014, Mubarak and his sons were sentenced to three years each in a maximum security prison on embezzlement charges.

Collectively, they were fined 125 million Egyptian Pounds and are required to repay 21 million Egyptian Pounds.

Mubarak and seven former security commanders, including his former interior minister Habib al-Adly, were cleared in 2014 of charges of killing anti-government protesters during the 2011 revolution.

The judge in the case said that Mubarak should never be tried for these charges.

The three-year jail sentences have already been served during the trio's time in pre-trial detention. Gamal and Alaa Mubarak walked free in May 2015 and Mubarak returned to Maadi Military Hospital where he currently resides.

According to Egyptian law, pre-trial detention is counted as time served towards any possible sentence.

Mubarak has spent most of his time in a military hospital since his arrest in 2011 after his ouster in popular uprising.
Three European holidaymakers wounded in an attack in an Egyptian resort were in stable condition today, as a witness recounted how the assailants burst into the hotel and stabbed guests.

An elderly Austrian couple and a young Swedish man were hospitalised after the assault yesterday at the Bella Vista hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.

Egypt's Tourism Minister Hisham Zazou said the assailants appeared to have been acting alone, while the hotel described them as "drugged young men".

Police shot dead one of the knife-wielding attackers and wounded another, saying one of them was also carrying a "sound gun".

A Swedish man who identified himself as the father of one of the victims, 27-year-old Sammie Olovsson, said they were sitting in the hotel restaurant when the assailants burst in and stabbed his son.

"My son and me were eating in the restaurant and having a discussion," he told AFP in the Hurghada hospital.

The two men rushed into the restaurant "very fast," he said. "They took knives and they tried to get Sammie here," he said, pointing to his chest.

"Then (they) said 'down on the floor' and we do that," he said, adding that he told his son, who was bleeding, not to move.

"I get up two times and they stayed there with the guns. When I got up later on they were not here," he said, speaking in English.

On its Facebook page, the hotel posted pictures of the two other victims, spelled in hospital records as Renata Weisslen and Wilhem Weislan, both smiling.

"They are ok now," it said in a post. A doctor at the hospital told AFP they were a couple, both 72.

Zazou told AFP that the two attackers were "not part of an organisation".

It was "an individually motivated attack. This is the initial finding," said Zazou, who was in Hurghada to visit the victims, adding that the investigation was still ongoing.

A video published by Egyptian websites appeared to show the wounded assailant receiving emergency medical treatment and being questioned on his identity.
Egypt's tourism minister was to visit today victims of an attack at a Red Sea resort hotel by knife-wielding assailants, as police investigated the latest blow to the country's tourism industry.

Hisham Zazou, who was expected to arrive in Hurghada in the afternoon, told AFP that a probe was still ongoing into yesterday's attack, in which two Austrians and a Swede were wounded.

The health ministry said they suffered knife wounds and were in stable condition. It was the second attack in as many days against an Egyptian hotel.

Police shot dead one of the assailants and badly wounded the other, after they targeted the tourists in the beachfront Bella Vista hotel.

The interior ministry said the assailants entered the hotel from a restaurant on the street front.

A video published by Egyptian websites appeared to show the wounded assailant receiving emergency medical treatment and being questioned on his identity.

He appears to have been shot in both legs.

Zazou described the assailants as "amateurish" and said their motive was not yet clear.

"If someone wants to claim that this is part of a terrorist group, it is a bit amateurish for that," the minister said.

"They used only knives. If someone wants to attempt really to create a terrible incident, he would not be using a knife."



The incident further threatened efforts to repair the country's damaged tourism industry, coming a day after a Cairo hotel hosting Israeli tourists came under attack by men who hurled fireworks and fired birdshot.

The Islamic State group claimed credit for that attack, which they said targeted "Jewish" tourists.

Police said they were Arab-Israeli tourists, and the assailants had targeted policemen outside the hotel and not the tourists.

The extremist group's Egypt affiliate is waging an insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula, and dealt a body blow to the country's tourism industry by claiming to have downed a Russian airliner in October, killing all the holidaymakers on board.

The attack prompted Russia to suspend flights to and from Egypt, while Britain restricted flights to the Sharm el-Sheikh resort from where the doomed plane had departed.

The Islamic State group said it had downed the plane by smuggling a bomb on board in the Sharm el-Sheikh airport.
Sister of dreaded gangster Santosh Jha and her husband were arrested today from outside Laheriasarai station in connection with gunning down of two engineers of a private road construction company here in the last week of December, police said.

Acting on a tip-off, a police team headed by Deputy Superintendent of Police Anjani Kumar Singh today arrested Munni Devi, who is head of Baheri block and sister of jailed gangster Santosh Jha and her husband Sanjay Laldeo.

The two were absconding and police had attached their property, Singh told PTI.

Santosh Jha, a history sheeter, presently lodged at Gaya jail is alleged to be behind the day-light killing of the two engineers on December 26 for extortion.

Two engineers of the private road construction company-- Brajesh Kumar and Mukesh Kumar--were shot dead by unidentified assailants on Darbhanga-Kusheshwarsthan state highway in Darbhanga district on December 26.

Non-payment of levy was said to be the motive behind the murder of the two engineers.

The Darbhanga killing had triggered widespread criticism across the country and opposition BJP had raised issue of deteriorating law and order situation in Bihar under Chief Minister Nitish Kumar headed grand secular alliance government.
Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today directed officials to complete work on 'Urban Haat' here by Baisakhi festival, for tourists to experience Punjab's art, culture and cuisine.

He visited 'Urban Haat' here this evening to review the progress of its construction work and directed officials to ensure that the project is completed soon so that it could be dedicated to the nation on 'Baisakhi', an official release said.

Being built over about 9.5 acres land in the heart of the city at a cost of Rs 9 crore, 'Urban Haat' has huge potential to attract tourists across the world visiting this city, Badal said.

The delicacies of Punjab, especially that of Amritsar, are renowned world over, so this place would emerge as a favourite destination for food lovers visiting the city, the Chief Minister said.

The officials appraised Badal that 'Urban Haat' would showcase the handicrafts of the city and give tourists an opportunity to savour authentic Amritsari cuisine, besides experiencing Punjabi traditions, craftsmanship and culture, the release stated.

He was also informed that apart from traditional Punjabi food, of other states would also be made available at 'Urban Haat', it stated.
Farmer Khudiram Majhi (55) died today of heart attack at Adampur village today, a police official said.

Majhi, who complained of uneasiness, was rushed to Burdwas Medical College and Hospital where he was decalred dead, the official said.

Khudiram's son, Tapas Majhi said that his father owned 5 bighas of cultivable land but continued loss of crops since last year had saddled him with an outstanding loan of nearly one and a half lakh.

This time too, his father had failed to obtain proper price for paddy, the son said adding this led to tension and affected his father's health.

Barobainan Gram Panchayat Upopradhan Bablu Bag said Majhi had loans of Rs 50,0000 with Adampur cooperative besides Rs one lakh loan with private institutions and banks.
An Iraqi man bragged about his experience fighting in Syria and the skills he developed as a teenage insurgent as he urged a fellow Iraqi refugee in the US to join him in what both hoped would be martyrdom, according to documents filed in federal court.

Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, 23, of Sacramento, described his experience fighting against Syrian government soldiers in heroic terms and promised in 2013 he would train Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan, of Houston, in how to use weapons and sneak into Syria to join the fight, according to an FBI affidavit unsealed in federal court in Sacramento.

The two Iraqi-born Palestinians used social media to discuss their plans, according to federal authorities. The communications provided the link that led to terrorism-related charges against the men this week.

Al-Jayab faces up to eight years in prison on charges of traveling to Syria to fight in late 2013 and early 2014 and lying to US authorities about his travels. Al Hardan faces up to 25 years in prison and is charged with attempting to provide material support for terrorists.

Al-Jayab's attorney yesterday criticised US politicians who he said "have grossly mischaracterized the nature and scope of this case" to tie it to the debate over whether the United States is doing enough to screen refugees.

"There is no threat that this man poses or no indication that he's engaged in any activity since his return two years ago. The only activities that were interrupted were his studies and his work," defense attorney Ben Galloway said outside the courtroom.

US Magistrate Judge Carolyn Delaney ordered him held without bail.

It's not clear how Al-Jayab and Al Hardan met online, although the FBI affidavit describes at least one apparently mutual acquaintance.

The criminal complaint against Al-Jayab recounts a series of communications with different people, none of whom is identified. One called "Individual I" is Al Hardan, according to Lauren Horwood, a spokeswoman for the US attorney in Sacramento.

Federal authorities say Al-Jayab emigrated from Syria to the United States as a refugee in October 2012, living in Tucson, Arizona, and Milwaukee until November 2013, when he went back overseas to fight.

He returned to the United States in January 2014 and lived in Sacramento. He has been a computer science major at a Sacramento community college since last fall.
Adventurer Tracey Curtis-Taylor today completed her epic flight from Britain to Australia, landing her vintage, open-cockpit 1942 Boeing Stearman in Sydney.

"I need a drink," she joked after finishing the final leg of the three-month journey which saw her contend with some treacherous weather in the air and logistical obstacles on the ground.

Modelled after pioneering aviator Amy Johnson's historic 1930 solo flight from England to Australia, Curtis-Taylor said her journey was a homage to female pilots of the past.

She said flying the open cockpit biplane had given her an "insight into something of what she (Johnson) went through getting here".

"The flying has been sensational and that's why you do it," she told reporters at Sydney airport shortly after her arrival.

"To fly something like this, low level, halfway around the world seeing all the the most iconic landscapes, geology, vegetation... It's just the best view in the world. It's the best adventure in the world."



Curtis-Taylor, who flew from Cape Town to Goodwood, England in 2013, took off from Farnborough on October 1, with a flight path over Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

The route of nearly 21,000 kilometres (13,000 miles) saw her stop in places such as Vienna, Istanbul and Amman before she headed to Pakistan and India and on to Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.

She crossed the Timor Sea to Australia this month.

Curtis-Taylor said she struck some bad weather, mostly in eastern Europe, as she flew the stick and rudder airplane with basic period instruments.

But as the journey involved frequent stops because of the plane's short range, many of her obstacles were not related to flying.

"I've lost my rag several times dealing with people on the ground," she said, adding that she spent seven hours trying to get fuel at one airport.

"In the end I just lay down on the tarmac and went to sleep with my head on my handbag."



She said that it was an experience to fly over Australia, where her stops included the outback towns of Tennant Creek and Alice Springs and flying over the monolithic rock Uluru.

Curtis-Taylor, 53, said she would love to continue the adventure and fly up north along Australia's east coast.

But instead the plane, which the aviator said "did not miss a beat" during the epic journey, will be shipped to the United States.
For the first time ever, a Sikh Pakistani Ranger has participated in the traditional beating retreat ceremony at the Wagah Border involving Indian and Pakistani forces.

People from both sides of the border welcomed the Sikh ranger, Amarjeet Singh, with a huge round of applause when he came for the ceremony, Dawn reported.

The surroundings filled with the sound of claps when he shook hands with the soldiers of Indian Border Security Force.

Amarjeet is a resident of Nankana Sahib, the holy city of Sikhs situated close to Lahore. He is said to be the first person ever from the Sikh community to join the Pakistan army.

Amarjeet joined the Pakistan army in 2005 and completed training this year, after which he was included in the defence forces on the Wagah Border, media reports said.

The paper further reported that Amarjeet said he was proud of being a part of the Pakistan army and would be happy to lay down his life for the nation.

Sikhs once thrived in each city of Pakistani Punjab until they migrated in huge numbers after partition in 1947.

The 'lowering of the flags' ceremony is a daily military practice at the Wagah Border.

The Border Security Force and the Pakistan Rangers have jointly followed it since 1959.
Chinese Police have arrested five suspects involved in poaching of endangered wild animals, including two snow leopards.

They were arrested on Tuesday after a two-month investigation, said the Public Security Bureau in Qinghai province.

Police seized bodies of two snow leopards and one golden eagle, both on the country's top protection list, as well as six bharals, six goitered gazelles and three argali sheep, which are also protected species, in the houses of the suspects, state-run Xinhua agency reported.

The five confessed to their poaching of endangered wild animals, said the bureau.

The case is being investigated by the police.

Qinghai in the east of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, boasts more than 70 protected wild animal species, such as snow leopards and Tibetan antelopes.

Under Chinese law, a person convicted of poaching and killing endangered wild animals can receive a life sentence.

Snow leopards are usually found in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and Pamir Plateau at altitudes over 3,500 meters, with a number of less than 5,000 worldwide, including about 2,000 in China.

Snow leopards have been spotted often in recent years in northwest China due to local ecological protection efforts.
Five persons have been arrested for allegedly trying to sell a rare sand boa here, police said today.

The snake, a rare species was seized by a special police team.

The Wildlife Cell of the Special Task Force (STF) of Madhya Pradesh Police with the help of Forest Department intercepted the five accused -- Brijesh Patel, Vijay Verma, Lokesh Mehra, Aman Saxena (all residents of Bhopal) and Pratik Bohra from Katni district.

"They were intercepted from Shahpura locality yesterday here when they were travelling in an SUV. We seized the sand boa, an endangered species of snake, from their possession," STF Assistant Inspector General of Police, Ashish Khare told PTI.

The action was based on a tip-off, he said, adding, "the accused were trying to sell off the snake for Rs 10 lakh. But this reptile may fetch Rs one crore in the international market."



All the five accused have been arrested under the relevant sections of the Wildlife Protection Act.

According to sources, the sand boa is used in making energy medicines and in black magic.

"We have now sent the snake to Van Vihar Zoo and animal rehabilitation centre-cum-national park here, after seeking permission from a court," Khare added.

Though believed to be a two-headed snake - with a head on at each end of its body - the tail end of the sand boa only resemblances a head and is part of the snake's defence mechanism to escape predators and to prey on smaller reptiles and rodents.
Police has filed a chargesheet in a local court against five Shiv Sena activists for inciting communal tension and violating prohibitory orders in a case here.

Those chargesheeted yesterday include president of party state unit Lalit Sharma, district president Narender Panwar, district general secretary Anand Perkash Goel and party activists Yogender Sharma and Bhuwan Mishra.

Police had registered a case against hundreds of activists and named five Sena leaders for inciting communal tension and violating prohibitory orders last year for taking out a procession without proper permission in Newmandi area on October 4, 2015.
An Air India flight to Bhubaneswar from here was delayed by five hours allegedly due to pressure by some VIPs, who forced the national carrier to schedule the aircraft along with its crew to Bhopal, a charge denied by the airline.

Air India operated its flight to Bhubaneswar at around 12.30 am today against its scheduled departure at 7.30 pm yesterday.

"Our flight from here was held back by Air India as the airline deployed the plane and crew bound for Bhubaneswar on its Delhi-Bhopal flight," BJD Member of Parliament Tathagat Satpathy, who was flying to Bhubaneshwar by the same flight, told PTI here.

Satpathy, who staged a protest outside the airport against the delay, alleged that Air India rescheduled its Bhubaneswar flight due to some VIPs, who forced the airline to assign the aircraft for Bhopal.

The national carrier, however, said it did not give preference to any particular flight and the alleged delay was caused due to the heavy fog at the Delhi airport yesterday, which had sent flight schedule of all airlines including that of the Air India topsy turvy.

Due to heavy fog from yesterday morning and resultant delays, most of the crews' duty time was limiting later on in the day. Crews were planned as per their arrivals from earlier flights, back to Delhi and sequenced based on the duty time remaining, Air India said.

"At no time did AI give any preference to any particular flight. Arriving and available crews duty time remaining as per regulations was checked and they were scheduled for the flights based on time and sequence," it said.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley today attacked Congress for stalemate in Parliament, saying some people are getting "sadistic pleasure" by not allowing the GST bill to get passed but it would eventually get through and the 'last laugh would be the best'.

The Minister also expressed hope that the Indian economy would do better in the coming fiscal on the likelihood of a good monsoon as the rains in the past had never remained deficient for three consecutive years.

The Minister was speaking at the ET Awards function here along with Railways Minister Suresh Prabhu and Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.

"Democracy doesn't work in that manner. It's obvious that not allowing the Goods and Services Tax (GST) bill to pass (is) giving some people sadistic pleasure. And then democracy has its own strength and the last laugh is always the best one."



The Constitutional Amendment bill to roll out the GST is stuck in the Rajya Sabha because of the stiff opposition by the Congress party though several regional parties, including the JDU, RJD and BJD, were in favour of the new indirect tax regime.

"Almost everyone is on board. I have never seen a complete coalition of regional parties supporting a particular proposal. Even the UPA allies are supporting it. RJD has said they are supporting it, the JDU has said they are supporting it, the NCP... So it is only one political party which is opposed to it.

"... When I speak to the mid-command of the party, I come back with a sense of optimism. And when I meet them just before Parliament is about to commence at 11 am every morning, I think the high-command prevails over the mid-command. The problem is not with the Indian politics, the problem I think, is with a few individuals.

On economic growth, Jaitley said it is a hard reality that



the rest of the world has slowed down.

"At the same time, everybody who analyses what's going on in India, also realises that if in an adverse situation we have potential to grow, let's say at 7.5 per cent, then the Indian normal cannot be 7.5 per cent.

"The Indian normal has to be higher... It's possible for us to achieve what the Indian normal is," Jaitley said.

He added that the government is working in the direction of taking India to a high growth path.

"We have taken several decisions over the last 19 months and each one of them (is) moving in one direction. The saving grace (is) that in terms of changing direction, India hasn't committed a mistake," he said.

Jaitley said the country will grow at 7-7.5 per cent and adding an extra 1-1.5 per cent growth to "get that cutting edge" would depend on several factors like monsoon and global growth.

"I think the world is not going to be extremely helpful in most areas... There are going to be crisis like situation thrown up by an economy somewhere around the world. And you would have multiple crisis.

"The last one week you saw the Chinese currency and oil prices both converging at the same and therefore creating an upheaval across the world and therefore what is our own ability to sustain this...," Jaitley said.
Bhutan Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay today returned to Kolkata after his flight failed to land in his country due to heavy fog surrounding the airport there, officials of the city airport said.

Togbay, who came to the city to attend the Bengal Global Business Summit, today took a flight to return home after the meet concluded.

However, due to heavy fog surrounding the airport, his flight could not land there and came back to the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport, the officials said.

He will not be able to return before tomorrow, the officials said.
Air Intelligence Unit of the Customs in Kochi international airport has seized foreign currencies equivalent to Rs 56 lakh from a passenger, who tried to smuggle the currencies to Sharjah by an Air India Express Flight.

Customs officials said the personnel of Air Intelligence Unit late last night effected the seizure of Saudi Riyals 3,12,000, USD 4150 and UAE Dirham 2090 equivalent to Rs 55,67,991 from the passenger, a native of Kannur, while he tried to smuggle the foreign currency.

The AIU officers have been regularly maintaining surveillances at the departure hall over the passengers bound for places like Dubai, Sri Lanka and Malaysia.

"At around 10 PM, after clearing the checked-in and immigration formalities, one passenger was intercepted by Customs Air Intelligence officer on suspicion that he was carrying some contraband goods. A detailed examination of his wallet, hand baggage and checked-in-baggage resulted in the recovery of foreign currency equivalent to Rs 55,67,991," a release issued by the AIU said.

Officials said all the bundles of currencies in the checked-in-baggage were cleverly concealed inside his pants pockets kept along with other used clothes and food items.

The passenger was detained by Customs Air Intelligence officers, it said.
Former Security Advisor M K Narayanan today called for suspension of the upcoming foreign secretary-level talks with Pakistan following the Pathankot terror attack and was critical of the decision to deploy NSG instead of the Army to defend the air base.

He also slammed the move to change commanding officers thrice during the attack, contending it was a cardinal rule not to change commanders during a battle.

"There is an obsession, I think on the Indian side particularly, for talks," he said, adding the upcoming foreign secretary-level talks have been invested with a certain level of glamour, which is totally uncalled for.

"If the reasons, I would say if the conditions are not fructuous then let us suspend it. I would not say call it off but suspend it. Wait and see what will happen," he told Karan Thapar on his show 'Noting But The Truth' on India Today channel.

Narayanan said Pakistan should take "decisive action" against top leadership of the JeM. However, he made it clear that this does not mean that there will be no more terror attacks.

Wondering whether India was "looking for lollipops" from Pakistan, Narayanan said, adding besides the NSA, the intelligence chiefs of the two countries should meet.

He said the NSAs should also meet away from the media spotlight and "summit diplomacy" should be avoided.

"Avoid high publicised talks," he said noting that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Pakistan on December 25 was certainly not a game changer.

Critical of the move to deploy the NSG rather than the special forces of the army during the Pathankot terror attack, he wondered if there were valid reasons for doing it.

"But I agree that neither the Garuds, NSG or the DSC was capable of defending the air base," Narayanan said, adding if there were valid reasons for their deployment, those should be made public.

He said there is a clear mandate of the NSG and the army could have been easily deployed because the air force base was a military area.

He also wondered if intelligence inputs about an impending attack were as precise as being made out now.

Narayanan said he was "baffled" why the army could not be moved in despite advance intelligence inputs.

He said that based on his previous experience, the terrorists had most likely used the drug route to get in. "This was part of the drug run," he said, adding drug traffickers have links with the establishment and the police.

The fact that the terrorists managed to sneak in through the same area which was used for launching the Gurdaspur attack six months back is "a pretty bad commentary on how we handle the border", he said.
: Welfare and Tourism Minister P Rajavelu today laid foundations of various infrastructure facilities in villages within Bahoor (reserved) constituency, which he represents in the Assembly.

In a release, he said development of concrete roads, construction of convention centres, drainage canals and tar sufaced roads in more than five villages would be part of the infrastructure the Corporation for Development of Adi Dravidars proposed to construct.

He said the government had studied the requirements of the facilities in the villages where the predominant members are Scheduled Castes.

The facilities would come up soon and as much as Rs 1.97 crore is being spent for it by the Corporation, he said.
Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi today welcomed President Pranab Mukherjee's directive to the Governors to stick to the Constitution.

The directive from the President to the Governors to respect the distinct authority and responsibility vested in each of the organs of the State and to perform their duties within the Constitutional framework has come at a right time following the overstepping of Constitutional limits by some Governors, Gogoi said in a statement.

"The manner, in which some Governors are mired in controversies for acting as agents of the RSS than Constitutional heads of their respective States, have brought disgrace to the high constitutional posts," he said.

In the backdrop of controversies involving some governors like those from Arunachal Pradesh and Tripura, the President yesterday asked Governors to perform their duties within the framework of Constitution.

In his New Year message to the Governors through video conferencing from Rashtrapati Bhavan, Mukherjee said they should respect the distinct authority and responsibility vested in each of the three organs of the State.
Jammu and Kashmir was tonight placed under Governor's rule with the process of new government formation following the death of Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed taking some time.

"Governor's rule has been imposed in the state of Jammu and Kashmir," a Home Ministry spokesperson said in Delhi.

The President cleared the recommendation of the Union Home Ministry for imposing Governor's rule on the basis of a recommendation from J-K Governor N N Vohra.

The state had to be put under Governor's rule in view of the reluctance of Mufti's daughter Mehbooba to take oath during the mourning period though her party has already conveyed to the Governor that 28 MLAs of the PDP legislature party backed her for the Chief Minister's post.

79-year-old Sayeed died on Thursday after a brief illness and since then there is a Constitutional vacuum.

PDP's coalition ally BJP has also indicated that it would take a decision on new government formation once the four-day morning period is over tomorrow.
The government is considering giving Aadhaar cards to Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) and a decision on it will be taken soon, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said today while inviting the diaspora community to actively participate in India's growth story.

In her address to the first limited edition of Pravasi Bhartiya Divas (PBD), Swaraj said it has been decided that women workers will be allowed to go to Gulf countries for employment only through government agencies to ensure they are not duped by recruiting agents or firms.

The PBD, webcast by almost all Indian Missions and Posts, was organised for the first time by External Affairs Ministry (MEA) after the government's decision to merge Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (MOIA) with it.

Earlier MOIA used to host the event. January 9 was chosen as the day for PBD as it was on this day in 1915 that Mahatma Gandhi, the "greatest Pravasi", returned home from South Africa to lead India's freedom struggle.

Asking the diaspora to participate in government's various flagship programmes including Skill India, Digital India and Clean Ganga initiatives, she said Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants the Aadhaar card scheme to be extended to NRIs.

"So far Aadhar card has been given to those Indians who live in India. It is not for non-resident Indians. But you will be happy to know that the Prime Minister wants the card to be given to the NRIs the way it is issued to people living in India.

"He even wants it for OCI (Overseas Citizens of India card) holders. The matter is under our consideration. No decision has been taken as discussions on it are underway. I hope soon you will hear about it," Swaraj said during an interaction following her address.

The government has so far issued Aadhaar cards to over 92 crore citizens. Under the programme, every citizen is to be provided with a 12-digit unique identification number for which biometric information is collected.

On restricting women from going to Gulf countries through the recruiting agencies, she said the decision has been taken to stop them from getting duped.

"We will send women only through government agencies," Swaraj said during an interactive session with Indian missions abroad.

Calling upon the diaspora to be part of the India growth story, she said "It is time for you to come back to India."



Effusive in praise of the Prime Minister, Swaraj said India's engagement with the overseas Indians has increased manifold because of his constant endevour to reach out to the community. Swaraj also mentioned Modi's Madison Square address in the US and at the Wembly in London.

"Your achievements in the countries of your adoption are a matter of pride... It is our responsibility to protect you and take care of you. Indeed, we are you and you are us," she said.
Foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council, which groups Sunni Arab monarchies, expressed their "total support" today for Saudi Arabia in its diplomatic row with predominantly Shiite Iran.

The GCC "forcefully condemns the attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran", said a statement, referring to the sacking of Riyadh's embassy and consulate by demonstrators angered over its execution of a prominent Shiite cleric and dissident.

The statement, following an extraordinary ministerial meeting of the six-member group, criticised "Iranian interference in Saudi Arabian affairs" over its denunciation of Nimr al-Nimr's execution a week ago.

It said Tehran's criticism had "directly incited the aggressions targeting Saudi diplomatic missions".

The GCC "totally supports decisions taken by Saudi Arabia to combat terrorism" and "has total confidence in the independence and integrity of Saudi justice".

Nimr was a highly respected cleric in Saudi Arabia's Shiite community who was behind demonstrations calling for better treatment of the minority, but he was executed for terrorism.

His death touched off anti-Saudi demonstrations elsewhere in the Shiite world, including the attacks in Iran. Riyadh was accused of silencing his criticism by killing him.

The GCC groups Bahrain, Kuwait Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

In response to the Iran incidents, Riyadh and Bahrain, which has a Shiite majority, severed diplomatic relations with Tehran. Kuwait recalled its ambassador, the UAE downgraded its ties, and Oman and Qatar condemned the attacks.

And they threatened today to "take other measures against Iran if it continues its aggression", without spelling them out.
Gunmen shot dead an Egyptian police colonel and a conscript west of Cairo as they travelled to work today, the interior ministry said.

The colonel, a traffic police district commander, and the conscript, who was driving, died in their car after coming under fire by the unknown assailants, the ministry said.

Islamic State group militants have claimed credit in the past for similar attacks in the capital and the Sinai Peninsula, where their insurgency is based.

The militants have killed hundreds of soldiers and policemen since the military toppled Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 and cracked down on his followers.

They also claimed responsibility for bombing a Russian airliner over Sinai, killing all 224 people on board.
The Madras High Court has made it clear that it had not adjudicated the merits of the demands made by the Railway Employees Co-operative Staff Union and directed the Labour officer-1 at Kuralagam to commence conciliation proceedings preferably in eight weeks.

Allowing a petition filed by Union Secretary, RC Cyril Thiyagaraj, Justice T.S. Sivagnanam said "if no consensus is arrived at during the talks, the officer should submit a report within four weeks."



"I make it clear that I have not adjudicated the merits of the demands raised by the petitioners Union nor the defenses raised by the management," the judge said.

The matter relates to a petition filed by the Union to quash the order passed by the Labour Commissioner in April last to the labour officer and consequently submit a failure report to government for referring the dispute for adjudication. The Union has challenged this.

Criticising the Labour Commissioner for preventing the Labour Officer from exercising her statutory duties, the judge said "but for his directive, the Labour Officer would have proceeded independently in the matter. The interdict issued by the Commissioner is as a result of misconception both on the legal and the factual positions."



Concurring with the submissions made on behalf of the Union Secretary, the judge said "as contended by Cyril, the Labour Officer had rightly understood the scope of the proceedings and proceeded to issue notice and fixed the date of conciliation as March 17 and April 24, 2015."



"The Labour Commissioner ought not to have put fetters on the exercise of jurisdiction by the Labour Officer who has a statutory duty which she is bound to exercise."



"Furthermore, the conciliation would terminate only after the failure report is received by the government, which has not occurred in the instant case and the attempt of the Labour Commissioner is to thwart the entire proceedings," the judge said.
Hindustan Zinc Ltd (HZL) will invest Rs 8,000 crore in the next 3-5 years as the Vedanta Group firm looks to expand operations and capacity.

The firm aims to take the existing ore production levels of 9.36 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) to 14 MTPA and finished metal production to 1.10 MTPA from 0.85 MTPA, Hindustan Zinc said in a statement.

"As the company celebrates its Golden Jubilee year, it is all set to invest another Rs 8,000 crore in the coming 3-5 years on expansion of its mines and smelting operations," it added.

Vedanta Group Chairman Anil Agarwal said: "When we acquired HZL as part of government's disinvestment programme in 2002, our focus was to make India self-sufficient in zinc.

"We are very proud that by adopting latest environment friendly technology, large investment in capacity expansions and continuous exploration, HZL is able to increase production five-fold and yet have reserves for another 30 years."



HZL, which is celebrating 50 years of existence in 2016, has mines located in Agucha, Sindesar Khurd, Zawar, Rajpura Dariba, and Kayad in Rajasthan. Its smelters are located in Dariba, Chanderiya and Debari, also in Rajasthan.

It was formed under an Act of Parliament on January 10, 1966 as an integrated zinc-lead-silver producing company.

In 2002, under the government's disinvestment programme, Hindustan Zinc was acquired by Sterlite, now called Vedanta Ltd.

The investment of Rs 12,000 crore in the past years have brought many changes in not just asset optimisation but also building new facilities into the business to give value to the shareholders, the statement said.

It produces 474 MW of captive thermal power and 274 MW of wind energy.

HZL CEO Sunil Duggal said the firm is exploring new areas where zinc could add value to consumers.

"We are exploring the possibilities of galvanizing of car bodies and structures to increase their life-span," he added.

The company is also looking to set-up a new fertiliser plant with a capacity to manufacture 0.5 MTPA of Di-Ammonium Phosphate in district Udaipur with an estimated investment of Rs 1,350 crore.
Over 50 children from Bihar working in bangle-making units in Talab Katta area of Old City here were rescued by police.

"The children were rescued during a cordon and search operation carried out by South Zone police under Bhavaninagar police station limits," Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (South Zone) K Babu Rao told PTI.

"We found 80 youngsters working in bangle-making units, out of whom 55 are children are below the age of 12 years. Seven persons who had employed the minors in the hazardous work have been taken into custody, and they are being questioned," he said.

The children were being paid a monthly salary of Rs 2,500, he said.

They were brought to another place and given food, he said, adding they would be handed over to the Child Welfare department.

The city police last year rescued around 500 children hailing from Bihar and Odisha who were working in hazardous industries in the Old City, and arrested several persons. Some of the kids were employed as bonded labourers, the police had earlier said.

The Hyderabad police has conducted massive search operations in different parts of the city for the past one year, based on complaints that some pockets of the city are becoming shelters for property offenders, snatchers and other criminals.
Mobile phone industry players of India and China will deliberate on cooperation opportunities to enhance handset manufacturing eco-system in the country.

"Chinese are keen to participate in the 'Make in India' campaign and establish mobile handset & component manufacturing facilities here," Mobile World (Shoujibao) Shenzhen Founder & CEO Wu said in a statement.

The deliberations between India and Chinese firms will take place at first 'China-India Mobile phone and Component Manufacturing Summit' on January 13.

It is being oraganised by Indian mobile phone industry body Indian Cellular Association (ICA) in association with Mobile World (Shoujibao)-- China's leading mobile industry service platform and technology media.

"This 1st ever China-India Mobile phone and Component Manufacturing Summit is the fructification of the high level visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to China during May, 2015," ICA National President Pankaj Mohindroo said.

India has set up a Fast Track Task Force at DeitY under Mohindroo to fulfill the objective to achieve production target for 500 million mobile phones by 2019 and generate employment for 15 lakhs people by 2019.

Major Chinese players like Techno, Gionee, Coolpad, Vivo, ZTE, Meizu and Huawei are expected to be part of the entourage, the statement said.

"I'm sure that the of both the countries will have ample opportunities to network and join hands during this Summit," Wu said.

The Indian Mobile Industry will be represented by major players like Micromax, Lava, Karbonn, Spice, Vodafone, Intex etc, the statement said.

Senior officials from the central and state governments, officials from Chinese Embassy will participate in the summit, the statement said.

In the current fiscal year, Chinese Xiaomi, Gionee, Coolpad and Vivo have already started manufacturing in India. However, they are required to import almost all the components used in making mobile devices due to absence of proper supply chain in the country.
Colourful kites of various shapes and size, flown by 90 participants from 15 countries, today dotted the sky here during the day-long international kite festival.

City mayor Bharat Danger inaugurated the festival, jointly organised by Gujarat Tourism and Vadodara Municipal Corporation this morning.

Around 90 kite flyer's from 15 countries across the globe participated in the festival of which special kite flying team from Maharashtra was the centre of attraction, officials said.

"The Kite Festival depicts our vibrant spirit. This festival is now generating much more employment. It is a major tourism event in the state and has boosted tourism," said Director, Tourism Corporation of Gujarat, Amit Thaker.

Vadodara MP Ranjanaben Patel urged people to remain careful while flying kites.

Former city mayor Umakant Joshi, settled in USA came for the festival and enthralled the audience as he flew some kites.

Civic body chief H S Patel, District Collector Avantika Singh and others were present on the occasion.
Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei today urged all citizens, including those who do not approve of him, to take part in next month's parliamentary and Assembly of Experts elections.

While the electorate will pick 290 lawmakers on February 26 they will the same day select 88 members for the Assembly, a powerful committee of clerics that monitors the supreme leader's work.

The Assembly has the power to dismiss Khamenei, who is 76 and has led the Islamic republic since 1989, but its more likely and most crucial role will be in picking his successor.

In a speech to thousands in Tehran, Khamenei alluded to his death when drawing attention to the importance of polling day.

"As before, we insist everyone, even those who don't believe in the system and the leadership, come to the ballots, as the election belongs to the nation, and the system," Khamenei said.

The Assembly of Experts is Iran's highest clerical body. Its members, like would-be lawmakers, are heavily screened before the ballot, and Khamenei signalled their significant role.

"That day, when the current leader is not in this world, this committee should choose a leader who holds the key to the movement of this revolution," he said.

"Depending on the composition of the assembly they may choose a leader that stands up to the enemy's attacks, trust in God and continue the path of Imam (Khomeini)," Khamenei said, referring to the founder of the Islamic republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

"Or there is a possibility that they may choose someone with different characteristics as the leader," Khamenei added.

The comments underscored tension between Iran's competing political blocs over the elections and the future direction of the country.

The Islamic republic, formed in 1979, has swayed between conservatives and more moderate and reform-minded politicians since president Mohammad Khatami was elected in 1997.

During his tenure Khatami, a reformist, and his supporters were backed by the electorate's voting-in of a supportive parliament but many of his planned changes were blocked by the Guardian Council, a conservative-led committee that can veto legislation.

Hassan Rouhani, Iran's current president, is a moderate and his allies are looking to make gains that could overturn the balance of power in a currently conservative-dominated parliament, potentially leading to social and political reforms he promised before being elected in 2013.
A local Islamic State affiliate in Egypt has claimed responsibility for an attack that killed two policemen in the country's Giza province.

Earlier today, Egypt's Interior Ministry said gunmen killed two policemen while they were on their way to work. However, the IS group claims it killed more than two officers, but did not give an exact number.

The Associated Press could not independently verify the online claim, but it bore the design and logo of the group's previous statements. It was circulated by the group's sympathizers on social media.

Today's attack came a day after two knife-wielding militants stabbed three tourists at a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea city of Hurghada. Earlier this week, the local IS affiliate claimed a hotel attack near the Pyramids that did not wound anyone.
Workers at an Italian factory were delighted by an unexpected Christmas bonus, receiving cheques for thousands of euros bequeathed to them by their late boss who died in June, reports said today.

Piero Macchi, the founder of Enoplastic, which produces screwcaps, synthetic corks and labels for drinks bottles, quietly changed his will shortly before he died, leaving staff at the company's Bodio Lomnago plant in the Italian Alps a total of 1.5 million euros (USD 1.64 million).

"It was all managed by his wife Carla, my mother, who sent a touching letter of thanks with each of the cheques," Macchi's daughter Giovanna, the current joint manager of Enoplastic, told Corriera della Sera newspaper.

The cheques landed just before Christmas, with new staff receiving 2,000 euros and the oldest staff 10,000 -- and some workers got even more when Macchi knew they needed it.

Macchi, a lover of both good wine and machinery, turned a hobby into a lucrative business when he founded Enoplastic in 1957 -- the company now produces 2.5 billion units a year and exports to more than 80 countries.

"We always think of ourselves as a big family and this Christmas present is a sign of that," one worker told the Varese newspaper.
Jadavpur University Vice-Chancellor Suranjan Das remained under gherao for more than 24 hours since last night by a group of students who insisted on holding of student union polls next month.

The protests began last evening after which the VC, Registrar Pradip Ghosh and senior officials of the state-run varsity were not allowed to leave their offices by the squattors.

All of them spent the Friday night in the campus and things were not resolved till tonight as students sat outside the office shouting slogans and raising placards.

"I believe in democratic rights but none of the rights are absolute and we all have to follow the Constitution and the legal framework. We will send the Chancellor a letter on the demands of the students. He is not in town now. After he comes we will meet him," Das told reporters from his office.

He said he has already appealed to the students to lift the agitation.

"I hope that things will soon be sorted out with the students. I am trying to negotiate with them," Das said.

The higher education department had recently issued an advisory to the state-run varsity saying that to avoid any disturbance during exams of different boards student elections should not be held in February.

Protesting against this, a small group of students from the university gheraoed the VC and other officials.

The students said they want the VC to notify on their behalf that elections would be held on time.

State Education Minister Partha Chatterjee said the students are not concentrating on their coming exams and holding protests which the government is not supporting.

Describing the students' agitation as a use of force over the University administration, the Minister expressed hope that good sense would prevail among the agitating students.

On many earlier occasions the group of students have similarly gheraoed the VC over various campus issues.

In 2014, Das's predecessor Abhijit Chakrabarti was gheraoed demanding a fresh probe panel in the alleged sexual harassment of a girl student. Fearing threat to life, he called police inside the campus which triggered a huge furore and the VC was forced to resign by the students.
Delhi Home Minister Satyender Jain has directed the department's deputy secretaries and additional secretaries to report directly to him without involving Home Secretary S N Sahai in every issue apart from public order, police and its service matters.

The order, that was issued yesterday, is likely to deepen the fissure between the government and the bureaucracy over the recent suspension of two special secretaries for allegedly refusing to sign Cabinet notes, a decision that was declared 'non est' (does not exist) by the Centre.

Matters apart from public order, police including railway and traffic police and establishment and service matters of police, will now be put up "directly" to Jain, according to the order.

"For all other subjects covered in the schedule of Allocation of Business Rules under heading 10 Home Department matter(s) shall be put up to the Additional Secretary (Home) by the Deputy Secretary (Home II) and Deputy Secretary (Home III) who in turn will put up such matters directly to the Minister-in-charge (Home)," the order read.

The move also assumes importance in light of AAP MLA Alka Lamba's recent allegations that Sahai was working to "weaken the elected government" of the national capital.

In a letter to Deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia, Lamba had alleged that Sahai was unhappy with Delhi government's decision to scrap Rs 800 crore project under Shahjanabad Redevelopment Corporation (SRDC).

Meanwhile, the government has not allocated any work to Yashpal Garg (special secretary for prosecution )and Subhash Chandra (special secretary for prisons), whose suspension was overturned by the Centre. Jain has appointed new officers in their place.
JD(U) today came down heavily on the government over presentation of some papers at Indian Science Congress in Mysuru, saying it smacked of "RSS backed agenda", which is very "disgusting, ridiculous and dangerous".

"Indian Science Congress is held every year since the year 1914 but we had never seen such a drama-like situation in the Congress as we saw in Mysuru where its main objective to promote the cause of science was missing.

"The RSS backed agenda was seen at such a place. It is very disgusting, ridiculous and dangerous for the unity and integrity of this country as talking about one religion at such functions is nothing but to provoke sentiments of other religions," party President Sharad Yadav said in a statement.

He noted that it was for the first time that people heard at the Science Congress about Lord Shiva as an environmentalist while someone presented a paper on the medical effects of blowing of conch (Shankh).

Yadav was refererring to the 103rd Indian Science Congress that concluded on Thursday in Mysuru, where a paper presented by the Chairman of Madhya Pradesh Private University Regulatory Commission on Lord Shiva hailed him as the greatest environmentalist in the world.

Calling Shiva as Lord of Mount Kailash, the paper talked about his powers of providing purified water to human beings.

A lecture by an additional commissioner of Kanpur talked about about blowing the conch (shankh) to achieve health and wellness.

Yadav felt that such papers should not have been presented and talked about at the event.

This congregation looked like a "circus" as was rightly said by one of the Nobel laureates, who went to the extent of saying that he would never again attend the Indian Science Congress, the JD(U) President said.

He also recalled that at last year's Congress in Mumbai, a session titled "Ancient Sciences through Sanskrit" had dwelt on aviation technologies.

Noting that the session talked about aircrafts which could travel to planets and that speakers also dwelt on how Indians flew planes before the Wright brothers did, Yadav said it was "ridiculous".

At the last year's Science Congress in Mumbai, a session titled "Ancient sciences through Sanskrit" had dwelt on aviation technologies in Maharishi Bharadwaj's Vaimanika Shastra, attracting ridicule.

"Sensitive conferences like Indian Science Congress which is held every year goes through a rigorous scrutiny like which are the papers being presented and who are presenting the papers and so many other things are intensely verified. But in the context of Mysuru Congress, any scrutiny did not seem to have taken place and it was held with other motives of the current government.

"I oppose this kind of action and the government should come out with a strong statement so that such things are not repeated in future," the JD(U) President said.
Jadavpur University Vice Chancellor Suranjan Das and other officials were kept confined in their office since last evening by a group of students demanding holding of union elections next month.

A university official said that the protests, which began last evening, were still continuing and there was no signs of the gherao being lifted yet.

"I hope that things will soon be sorted out with the students. I am trying to negotiate with them," Das told PTI.

There was no report of any health problems of the officials following the confinement till now, the official said.

The state higher education department had recently issued an advisory to the state-run varsity saying that in order to avoid any disturbance during exams of different boards, student elections should not be held in February.

Protesting against this, a small group of students from the university gheraoed the VC and other officials.

The students said they wanted the VC to notify on their behalf that elections would be held on time.

On earlier occasions too the group of students have gheraoed the VC over various campus issues.

In 2014, Das's predecessor Abhijit Chakrabarti was gheraoed demanding a fresh probe panel in the alleged sexual harassment of a girl student. Fearing threat to life he called police inside the campus which created a huge furore and Chakrabarti was forced to resign.
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has said that Kakinada was poised for fast growth next to Visakhapatnam and Tirupati, after receiving the smart city tag.

Addressing the Janmaboomi-Maavuru programme at Parlovapeta Kakinada limits here yesterday, he said the port city was set to become a hub of economic activity after its inclusion in the smart city list.

"Kakinada would soon be declared as a clean city, free from open defecation. Another Rs 36 crore project was being implemented to supply water connections to the poor. About 3600 and more houses would be constructed under Centre government sponsored scheme, Naidu said.

Also, the salt creek between the NTR Bridge and the Indrapalem junction would be developed as a tourist spot, spending Rs 90 crore, he added.

Despite heavy deficit in the budget, the CM said the government was determined to go ahead with the development and welfare scheme as scheduled by mobilising resources.

On criticism by Opposition for not fulfilling election promises especially those to the Kapu community, Naidu said he was commited to include Kapus in backward class list.

Already, a finance corporation has been constituted for the Kapu community with Rs 100 crore corpus fund to look after their requirements. A Commission is also being constituted to go into the demands of Kapus and a decision would be taken soon after receiving its report, he said.

The government's aim was to include Kapus in the BC list without affecting the existing quota. Hence the Kapus (predominantly concentrated in the coastal districts) need not have any apprehension, he said.

Later, Naidu inaugurated the three-day long beach festival at NTR beach in Vakalapudi village here.

Deputy Chief Minister Nimmakayala Chinarajappa, Finance Minister Yanamala Ramakrishna, in-charge minister Devineni Uma, Kakinada MP Thota Narasimham, District Collector H Arunkumar, SP Ravi Prakash and several MLAS were among those who attended the event.

(Reopens BES10)



After inaugurating the beach festival in Kakinada last night, Naidu said, Hope Island in Kakinada will be transformed into an attractive tourist place.

"Hope Island, Mada forest, Konaseema tourism circuit will be developed with an amount of Rs 90 crore under the 'Swadeshi Darshan' scheme," he said.

The Chief Minister said his government gives special attention to tourism sector as it has tremendous potential to provide employment opportunities and increase the financial position of the state.

Amusement park, convention centre, water sports facilities will be developed within five km range of Kakinada, he said, adding, "Roads will be developed along the coast line from Srikakulam to Nellore with an intention to develop tourism places in the state."



Road line between Kakinada and Visakhapatnam will be developed and water system will be developed between Kakinada and Pondicherry, Naidu added.

Apart from nine mega festivals held in the state, including Rayalseema Food festival, Kakinada beach festival and Araku Tribal festival, soon Godavari festival will also be organised in Rajahmundry, Naidu added.

He also said that starting January 10, a three-day business summit will be held in visakhapatanam, a number of business giants will take part to explore their ideas.
US Secretary of State John Kerry today called up Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and asked him to find out the truth in the terror attack on the air base in Pathankot.

Sharif, during the telephonic conversation, told Kerry that Pakistan is "swiftly" carrying out investigations in a "transparent" manner into the terror attack on the air base.

"Kerry extended full support to the Prime Minister to find out the truth in the Pathankot terror incident," a statement issued by the Pakistan PMO said.

It said Sharif "told Secretary Kerry that we are swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner and will bring out the truth. The world will see our effectiveness and sincerity in this regard, the Prime Minister added," according to the statement.

Kerry's call to Sharif came amid Indian intelligence reports suggesting that groups and people in Pakistan planned and executed the strike on the Pathankot airbase.

Kerry said the US hopes that talks between India and Pakistan will continue despite the fact that terrorists have tried to thwart it because "continuation of India-Pakistan talks is needed in the interest of regional stability and the leadership role by both the Prime Ministers is required to ensure continuous dialogue," said the statement.

Sharif said Pakistan would not allow anyone to use its soil to carry out terror operations abroad, it added.

The statement said Kerry "lauded the Prime Minister's leadership role in such difficult environment, which was the exact the leadership needed in this situation.

Foreign Secretaries of India and Pakistan are scheduled



to meet this week as part of the revival of the peace process that was agreed upon by Sharif and Prime Minister Narendra Modi when the latter made a surprise visit to Lahore on December 25 on his way back from Kabul to New Delhi.

Sharif's Advisor on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz yesterday said that Foreign Secretary-level talks are "intact" and Pakistan was following the leads provided by India which has linked the talks, scheduled for January 15, to Islamabad's decisive action on the Pathankot terror attack.

"We are investigating the Pathankot incident while the foreign secretary-level talks between India and Pakistan are intact," he said at a function in Lahore.

Replying to another question, Aziz said: "Let me tell you the talks are intact and will take place as per schedule."



He, however, did not mention the progress Pakistan has achieved on the leads provided by India.

"We are investigating the Pathankot incident," was Aziz's answer when he was asked by a reporter in this regard.

Modi's historic visit to Lahore was hailed by many as a master stroke, but as has been the case with previous Indian peace initiatives, it was followed by a terror attack from inside Pakistan by those groups who are against any improvement in the ties between the two neighbours.
Two Palestinians attacked Israeli soldiers manning a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank before being shot dead today, an army spokeswoman said.

The attack occurred in the north of the Jordan Valley, the spokeswoman said.

Twenty-two Israelis, an American and an Eritrean have been killed in Palestinian attacks including stabbings, car rammings and gunfire targeting security forces and civilians since October 1. At the same time, 146 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, most while carrying out attacks.
Union Minister Nitin Gadkari today urged universities and technical education institutes to carry out society-oriented research for economic growth of the country and to tackle the problem of unemployment.

"In order to tackle the problem of poverty and unemployment that the country is facing, knowledge must be turned into wealth," Gadkari said here.

"Universities should adopt a society-oriented approach while carrying out research," he said while speaking at the inauguration of an international conference on 'Opportunities and Challenges in Technical Education' organised by Indian Society for Technical Education (ISTE).

On the issue of farmers' suicides, Gadkari, Union road transport and highways minister, suggested using agro waste to produce different things of utility.

"Apart from cultivating crops, farmers should also utilise agro-waste to produce things like ethanol so that their financial condition improves and they do not take extreme steps," he said.

He asked the educational institutions to help the farmers on this front.

Gadkari distributed ISTE's 'Vidyabhavan National Award' to Prof Ram Meghe Institute of Technology and Research.

All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) chairman Anil Sahastrabuddhe, Maharashtra minister Pravin Pote, MP Anand Adsul and others were present on the occasion.

Gadkari also inaugurated an exhibition.

Gadkari said these included Rs 2,087 crore project at



JNPT, Rs 1,633 crore project at Paradip, Rs 811 crore project at Mumbai, Rs 263 crore project at Kandla, Rs 3,500 crore project at Kolkata port and Rs 425 crore project at Ennore.

Besides, he said work on 15 projects worth Rs 6,700 crore would be started before March 31.

In addition, he said, 32 projects worth Rs 4,651 crore had been completed and resulted in augmenting ports capacity by 70 MTPA.

Another set of 46 projects worth Rs 28,040 crroe would result in augmenting the capacity of India's major ports by 360 MTPA, he said.

The minister said apart from converting 111 rivers across the country into waterways, the agenda including developing smart cities at major ports.

He said 1,620 Km stretch on Haldia-Varanasi on Ganga was being developed and tenders were out for projects worth Rs 4,000 crore.

"We will begin work before March 31 on these," he said and added that stress was being laid on movement of coal to 13 power projects.

Efforts are also on to reduce the turnaround time of the ships.

Also on the priority is development of coastal areas in 13 states which will benefit 10 lakh fishermen, he said adding, the government planned low cost housing and other initiatives for them.

Gadkari said development of shipping sector along with highways will contribute at least 2 per cent to India's GDP.
A lioness today died in Etawah district's 'Lion Safari', prompting Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav to remove the Chief Forest Conservator.

Tapasya, a three-and-a-half-year-old lioness brought from Gujarat on December 28, died early this morning, director of the safari, Sanjay Srivastava said.

Tapasya, who came along with another lioness Jessica and a lion Pataudi, was taken ill soon after her arrival and was being treated by local as well as doctors from Bareilly, he said.

The post-mortem was performed by a team of doctors from Bareilly, Srivastava added.

The 'Lion Safari' is the pet project of the Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh.

Taking serious cognisance of the incident, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has directed to immediately remove Chief Forest Conservator S K Upadhyaya.

"The CM has directed to remove the chief forest conservator immediately," an official spokesman said in Lucknow.

He said that a high-level committee has been constituted headed by retired IAS officer V N Garg to probe into such incidents.
Maharashtra Finance minister Sudhir Mungantiwar today advised the corporates to work in districts with low Human Development Index (HDI), a move that will help accelerate development of Maharashtra.

"Corporates should work in districts with low HDI. Public and Private Sector companies are implementing various projects at numerous locations through their CSR funds. If all this work can be brought together, the development of state can be accelerated," Mungantiwar said.

He said the move will also help in fulfilling the dream of Dr B R Ambedkar who championed the cause of equality for all in the society.

"While utilising CSR funds, if the districts with lower HDI are considered and if the local needs and problems are accounted while planning the CSR projects, Dr Ambedkar's dream, where all are equal, will come true," he added.

The minister said the corporate sector can be of help in areas like sanitation, tree plantation, skill development, development of Anganwadis through their CSR funds.

"Today there are 97,000 anganwadis in the state and the government is planning to digitise and make them 'smart'. Corporate world can give their assistance in these projects as well," he said.

He added that all the information related to government CSR projects will be made available on a website to be developed soon.

"We will provide all the necessary assistance required to the corporates. India will lead when Maharashtra will be number 1 in various development areas, so we should work together to bring the state and the nation to the frontier," he said.

Yesterday, the first meeting of corporate leaders as part of the 'Maha CSR' was organised by Government of Maharashtra at Raj Bhavan.

The meeting was organised to seek the involvement of corporates in the implementation of various social and welfare programmes of the government.
Kishwer Merchant and Mandana Karimi's enmity was undoubtedly one of the highlights of the current "Bigg Boss" season but the TV actress says she looks forward to hanging out with the Iranian beauty outside the show.

Kishwer is the latest contestant to be evicted from "Bigg Boss Nau", though her elimination happened during a task and not on the basis of audience's votes.

The 34-year-old "Kaisi Hai Yaariyan" actress said Mandana is fake inside the Bigg Boss house and she hopes to know the "real" Mandana once the show ends.

"I have said since the beginning that Mandana is fake on the show. She herself said once that this is not her true behaviour and she is very different in real life. So, you never know Mandana and I might become best of friends once we meet outside. I look forward to knowing her," Kishwer told PTI.

"Mandana cried a lot during my eviction. I told her I will not keep grudges against her. Whatever happens in the house, stays there. There wouldn't be anyone from the house, whom I won't meet after the show finishes."



In a first for the reality show, the actress got evicted after she stood second in the 'Ticket to finale' task, which has been won by Prince Narula.

The task had a condition under which the one, who presses the buzzer first, will have to leave the house with a specific amount of cash prize.

Though she called her eviction "unfair", Kishwer said she felt Prince has a bigger fan following, hence a better chance of winning the trophy, so she decided to press the buzzer and leave the house with Rs 15 lakhs.

"My eviction has to be the most unfair till now. I worked so hard from past 13 weeks and gave my best in the task just to get evicted in the end. I did not want to leave. My aim was top 5. But I budged because I felt Prince had a better chance of winning the show than me, even though I was a stronger contestant than him."



Now out of the house, Kishwer wants her "brother" Prince to win and the actress will "definitely" be voting for him.

"I will vote for him. He should win. He was my only competition in the house. I think if he does not win, then it means the show is rigged.
John McAfee, the antivirus software pioneer and onetime international fugitive who is running for US president, said he was shifting his campaign to the Libertarian Party.

McAfee made the announcement as he unveiled a cybersecurity platform and told reporters he was running for president to highlight the need for better cyber protections.

"We need a dedicated force of hackers focused on national security," McAfee said on the floor of the Consumer Electronics Show, where he was promoting a new mobile security product on which he is collaborating.

He said the United States is in danger "because we are decades behind the Russians and Chinese in weaponised software," while also highlighting the need to improve cyber weapons to counter threats from those countries.

"You can't just have defensive weapons in this world. You have to say, 'You push a button, we'll push a button.'"



The creator of the McAfee antivirus software in September announced his presidential run as part of his own "Cyber Party."



He said yesterday that shifting to the Libertarian Party would make it easier to be on the ballot in all 50 states and he believes he is philosophically aligned with the party.

"I was a Libertarian before the word was coined," he said.

"I think the government is too large. I think people should be free to live their own lifestyles without interference from government."



McAfee, who on his own Twitter page refers to himself as an "eccentric millionaire," amassed an estimated $100 million fortune during the early days of the Internet in the 1990s, designing the pioneering anti-virus software that bears his name and which is now owned by Intel.

After cashing out, he became an intrepid adventure-seeker, arriving in Belize in 2009 after losing most of his fortune to bad investments and the financial crisis.

McAfee was briefly incarcerated in that country after police found him living with a 17-year-old girl and discovered an arsenal of seven pump-action shotguns, one single-action shotgun, and two 9-millimetre pistols.

He was living in Belize when police came looking for him to discuss the murder of his neighbour -- a crime for which he maintains his innocence.
A meeting convened by the Union Home Ministry on the issue of repatriation of Brus in six relief camps in Tripura remained inconclusive, Mizoram Chief Secretary Lalmalsawma today said.

The meeting held in New Delhi yesterday was chaired by Union Home Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi while the Tripura Chief Secretary was not present, Lalmalsawma told PTI.

"We informed the Home Ministry officials that the Brus refused to return to Mizoram despite repeated arrangements made by the Mizoram government in the relief camps for the repatriation," he said.

The Mizoram government expressed the opinion that it would be a futile exercise if more repatriation attempts are made in future, he said.

Lalmalsawma said the time or venue of the next meeting was not fixed to discuss the issue in future.

The last attempt to repatriate the Brus during June 2 to September 4 last year was a complete failure as not a single Bru appeared before the Mizoram officials in the six relief camps to be identified as bona fide residents of the state.

The arrangement was made to repatriate over 20,700 Brus belonging to 3,455 families who have fled from Mizoram due to ethnic clashes in the 1990s.
Mexico is willing to extradite drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman to the United States, a federal law enforcement official said. It's a sharp reversal from the official position after his last capture in 2014.

"Mexico is ready. There are plans to cooperate with the US," said the official yesterday, who spoke on condition anonymity because he wasn't authorised to comment.

But he cautioned that there could be a lengthy wait before US prosecutors can get their hands on Guzman, the most-wanted trafficker who was recaptured Friday after six months on the run: "You have to go through the judicial process, and the defence has its elements too."



Top officials in the party of President Enrique Pena Nieto also floated the idea of extradition, which they had flatly ruled out before Guzman's embarrassing escape from Mexico's top maximum security prison on July 11.

"He has a lot of outstanding debts to pay in Mexico, but if it's necessary, he can pay them in other places," said Manlio Fabio Beltrones, president of Pena Nieto's Institutional Revolutionary Party.

But even if Mexican officials agree, Guzman's attorney Juan Pablo Badillo told the Milenio newspaper that the defence already has filed six motions to challenge extradition requests.

"They can challenge the judge, challenge the probable cause, challenge the procedure," said Juan Masini, former US Department of Justice attache at the US Embassy in Mexico.

"That's why it can take a long time. They won't challenge everything at once ... They can drip, drip, milk it that way."



Guzman, a legendary figure in Mexico who went from a farmer's son to the world's top drug lord, was apprehended after a shootout between gunmen and Mexican marines at the home in Los Mochis, a seaside city in Guzman's home state of Sinaloa.

The operation resulted from six months of investigation by Mexican forces, who located Guzman in a rural part of Durango state in October but decided not to shoot because he was with two women and a child, said Mexican Attorney General Arely Gomez.
Pop star Miley Cyrus reportedly plans to ask "Hunger Games" actor Liam Hemsworth to marry her sometime this year.

According to a source, the "Wrecking Ball" hitmaker is ready to be a bride and wants to get married soon with Hemsworth, Hollywood Life.

"Miley obviously likes to do things originally and on her own terms and would like to ask Liam to marry her," the source said.

Cyrus, 23, is reportedly doing all she can to make her relationship with the 25-year-old actor last. She is apparently giving up her racy performances to tone down her social media presence.

The source added, "If he doesn't pop the question again then she would do it with no questions asked. They are working on getting back together and being official and all signs are pointing to being married. They are very determined to have everything work out like it was supposed to originally."



Rumours of Cyrus and Hemsworth back together emerged last week after they were spotted kissing at an Australian music festival called Falls Festival in Byron Bay on Saturday, January 2 night. She recently skipped a performance to spend more time with Hemsworth.
A 9-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a youth during a school function in Central Mumbai following which the accused has been arrested, police said today.

The alleged incident took place during a school gathering in Dadar area last night, a senior police official said.

"The accused, who apparently works in the school canteen, has been arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting the class V student," he said.

As the victim did not return home, her aunt went to the school and saw her weeping near the toilet. After the girl narrated her ordeal, a complaint was lodged by her family at the Shivaji Park police station, the official added.

A case under relevant section of IPC has been registered and investigations are underway, police said.
An Egyptian court today rejected an appeal by former president Hosni Mubarak and his sons to quash a three-year jail sentence for embezzling USD 16 million from funds meant for the maintenance of presidential palaces.

Mubarak, 87, and his sons -- Gamal and Alaa -- were charged of acquiring almost 126 million Egyptian pounds (USD 16 million) from the presidential palace budget and using the money for the construction and development of family-owned assets.

They are also charged with forging official documents and damaging public property.

In May 2014, Mubarak and his sons were sentenced to three years each in a maximum security prison on embezzlement charges.

Collectively, they were fined 125 million Egyptian Pounds and are required to repay 21 million Egyptian Pounds.

Mubarak and seven former security commanders, including his former interior minister Habib al-Adly, were cleared in 2014 of charges of killing anti-government protesters during the 2011 revolution.

The judge in the case said that Mubarak should never be tried for these charges.

It was not immediately clear, however, how long Mubarak would remain in detention. His sons were freed in October.

Mubarak has spent most of his time in a military hospital since his arrest in 2011 after his ouster in popular uprising.
North Korea has defended its latest nuclear test, citing the fate of two toppled Middle East leaders, while flexing its military muscle by showing TV footage of a submarine-launched missile test.

A commentary published by the official KCNA news agency late yesterday said the fate of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Moamer Kadhafi in Libya showed what happened when countries forsake their nuclear weapon ambitions.

It also warned South Korea, which resumed high-decibel propaganda broadcasts across the inter-Korean border in response to Wednesday's test, that its actions were driving the divided peninsula to "the brink of war".

The commentary said Pyongyang's fourth nuclear test was a "great event" that provided North Korea with a deterrent powerful enough to secure its borders against all hostile forces, including the United States.

"History proves that powerful nuclear deterrence serves as the strongest treasured sword for frustrating outsiders' aggression," it said.

North Korea said the test was of a miniaturised hydrogen bomb - a claim largely dismissed by experts who argue the yield was far too low for a full-fledged thermonuclear device.

"The Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq and the Kadhafi regime in Libya could not escape the fate of destruction after being deprived of their foundations for nuclear development and giving up nuclear programmes of their own accord," the commentary said.

Both had made the mistake, the commentary argued, of yielding to Western pressure led by a United States bent on regime change.

Asking North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons was as pointless as "wishing to see the sky fall", it said, adding that the entire country was proud of its "H-bomb of justice".

In addition to the KCNA commentary, the state Korean Central TV late yesterday released video footage of a purportedly new submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) test.

But South Korean media suggested the footage was an edited compilation of the North's third SLBM test, conducted last month in the Sea of Japan, and a different ballistic missile test from 2014.

The undated footage shows leader Kim Jong-Un, on board a military vessel in a winter coat and a fedora hat, looking on as a missile is launched vertically from underwater and ignites in mid air.

The video then cuts to a rocket flying through the clouds, suggesting the missile was able to reach such altitudes.

But South Korean media said the images of a rocket rising through the clouds were in fact taken from footage of a SCUD missile test broadcast in 2014.
When North Korea claimed triumphantly that it had tested its first hydrogen bomb this week, it was roundly and predictably condemned by the United States, China, Russia, Britain, France and India, countries estimated to possess a combined total of more than 15,000 nuclear warheads.

Non-nuclear powers condemned the test, too, including Japan, the country that was on the receiving end of the only atomic bomb attack in history, the US bombing that ended World War II in the Pacific in 1945.

But while most of the world, East and West, agrees that no one wants North Korea to be an effectively functioning nuclear power, a question that can't be escaped lurks behind the condemnation: How much right do nations have to tell other nations what to do? Moreover, how much of a right do nuclear powers, which have no intention of giving up their own arsenals, have to demand others to give up theirs?



North Korea, of course, says none.

In a show of defiance and nationalist pride that is so characteristic of the North, masses of North Koreans filled Pyongyang's Kim Il Sung Square on Friday, which happened to also be leader Kim Jong Un's birthday, to celebrate their military's new crown jewel. Fireworks and dancing parties were held after the rally.

"This hydrogen bomb test represents the higher stage of development of our nuclear arms," Pak Pong Ju, North Korea's premier, told the crowd, which officials said was 100,000-strong. "It will go down in history as a perfect success and now the DPRK is proud to be ranked among nuclear states possessing hydrogen bombs. The Korean people can demonstrate the stamina of a dignified nation with the strongest nuclear deterrent."



The North's official name is the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

With its latest test, which may or may not have been of an H-bomb outside expert opinion remains divided it is treading further down a dangerous, but well-worn, path.

As has been the case with every nation that went nuclear, possession of such weapons is seen by the North's regime as a strategic necessity. That's why decades of pleading with and punishing the North simply haven't worked.

Developing a credible nuclear force is in the long run cheaper for Pyongyang and far more likely to be successful than building and maintaining the massive and highly sophisticated conventional forces that would be needed to deter the United States. Though mega weapons like the H-bomb have become largely irrelevant to superpower military planners, who now have the technology to conduct precision attacks that are far more effective and less likely to generate universal condemnation, it's the kind of threat that still works for Pyongyang.
Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister M Venkaiah Naidu today expressed hope that the GST bill will be passed in the Budget Session of Parliament.

Addressing the Confederation of Real Estate Developers Association here, Naidu expressed the hope that Parliament will be able to pass the new taxation law in the Budget Session.

On his recent meeting with Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, he said, "We sought the Congress support to pass the GST Bill in the interest of the nation but not on political grounds".

"I clarified to (Congress chief) Sonia Gandhi at my last Thursday's meeting that the government has already incorporated a provision to cap the peak GST rate."



He also claimed that this was something that UPA's GST bill did not have.

The 122nd Constitution Amendment Bill on GST is stuck in the Rajya Sabha mainly due to stiff opposition from the Congress. The Congress is demanding inclusion of a provision to cap the maximum GST rate at 18 per cent in the Constitution Amendment Bill. However, the government is opposed to this.

Finance Minister at an award function in Mumbai today too said, "You can't start putting tariff in Constitution, it is an illogical demand".

The other two changes sought by Congress in the GST bill are removal of one per cent additional tax on inter-state transfer of goods and a Supreme Court judge headed dispute resolution panel.

"GST would check corruption in taxation departments. Our GST Bill is more advanced than in many other countries," Naidu said.

On the proposed Real Estate Bill he said the new legislation will help check unethical practices in the real estate business on one hand and help protect the interests of consumers.

Naidu had on January 7 met Congress president Sonia Gandhi and sought cooperation for early passage of the GST Bill and the Real Estate Bill and even offered a Parliament session.

But the Congress, which has been seeking three key changes in the GST Bill, including a constitutional cap on the GST rate at 18 per cent, to support it - has not cleared its stance.
Russian strikes today on a prison complex run by Al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate killed at least 57 people and wounded 30 others, many critically, a monitor said, giving a revised toll.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the air raids on an Al-Nusra Front building prison near a popular market in northwestern Idlib province killed 21 civilians, 29 militants and seven detainees.

The building in Maarat al-Numan housed the group's religious court and a jail.

The Britain-based Observatory, which relies on a large network of sources inside Syria, said a child and two women were among the civilians killed in the strikes.

A statement said that among the militants killed were 23 Nusra fighters.

"The toll from the Russian raids on the Al-Qaeda-run prison has risen to at least 57 killed and 30 wounded, many in critical condition," said the Observatory which had earlier given a toll of 39 dead.

Russian warplanes have been conducting air strikes against the Islamic State organisation and "other terrorist groups" in Syria since September 30.

Although Al-Nusra and IS are both jihadist organisations, they are fierce rivals and regularly clash in Syria.

Al-Nusra also has tense relationships with non-jihadist rebel groups that oppose its extreme interpretation of Islamic law.

In Idlib, it has formed an alliance with rebel groups, including hardline faction Ahrar al-Sham.

The Army of Conquest coalition has expelled regime forces from Idlib province.

Syria's conflict first erupted with anti-government demonstrations in March 2011 but expanded into a war that has left more than 260,000 people dead.
Nepal's agitating United Democratic Madhesi Front today said it would launch a fresh protest campaign from next week, in the ongoing political crisis over the country's new Constitution.

The 10-day protest campaign will start from January 12, said leaders of the front while issuing a press statement that rejected the constitution amendment proposal introduced in Parliament.

The Madhesi leaders also accused the government of not being serious towards the talks being held with them. However, the previous protest programmes will also continue in the coming days, they said.

The campaign includes protest rally, baton rally, and photo exhibitions, among others.

The Front is planning to mark January 19 as a 'Balidan Diwas' or day of sacrifice in memory of those who lost their lives in the ongoing Madhes agitation.

So far, around 50 people, including a dozen security personnel, have been killed in the five-month agitation.

The Indian-origin Madhesis have been protesting against the new constitution that divides the country into seven provincial units.

Their major demands include re-drawing of provincial boundaries, proportionate representation and allocation of Parliament seats on the basis of population.
Executives from 25 news organisations, including The Associated Press, have sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry urging him to press Iran to release jailed Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian.

The letter said Iran should recognise that independent journalism is "a fundamental human right" and free Rezaian.

"The United States has considerable leverage with Iran right now to press that point, and we urge you to continue to do so," the executives wrote yesterday.

Rezaian, 39, was born in California and holds both US and Iranian citizenships. He was convicted in closed proceedings last year after being charged with espionage and related allegations. The length of his sentence has not been disclosed publicly.

"Iran has never offered any evidence that even makes a pretense of justifying this imprisonment," the news executives wrote.

They noted: "Many of our organisations employ journalists who, like Jason, operate in countries, like Iran, that do not always hold a high regard for the free flow of information. We understand the risks involved."



Still, the letter continued, "we depend on the United States and other democratic countries to stand behind the values that Jason represents."



Media organisations represented in the letter included the AP, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN.

The Post has vigorously denied the accusations against Rezaian. Post Publisher Frederick J Ryan Jr said in December that the United States, other governments and businesses should keep Rezaian in mind when considering improved relations with Iran.

"If the callous regime in Tehran imprisons and abuses a fully accredited and innocent journalist, what might they do to a visiting delegation?" Ryan said.
Pakistan's Defence Minister Khwaja Muhammad Asif has said that no terrorist group will be allowed to derail the dialogue process with India.

Talking to a news channel, he said that strict action is being taken against elements involved in terror activities.

"No terrorist organisation will be allowed to derail the dialogue process between Pakistan and India," Asif was quoted as saying by the Radio Pakistan today.

The minister said Pakistan strongly condemns terrorism in every form as terrorists are enemy of humanity.

Earlier, Asif had said that "some elements" want to "sabotage" the Indo-Pak peace talks through terror acts but they will not succeed in their nefarious designs.

Heavily-armed terrorists last week attempted to storm the Air Force base in Pathankot. The attackers were believed to have infiltrated from Pakistan and there was speculation that they may belong to Jaish-e-Mohammad headed by Maulana Masood Azhar of the Kandahar hijack episode.

Asif said Pakistan has achieved immense success in elimination of terrorism through operation Zarb-e-Azb which is still going on.

"Some of the militant groups have already been destroyed and those still remaining will also be dealt with as the operation is still going on," he told Geo TV.

Asif also said there is no difference between military and civil government over the issue of fighting militancy.

"There is only one narrative and that is to eliminate the threat of militancy. I would request to highlight this aspect of our policy," he said.
Former Mizoram Governor Aziz Qureshi today said nobody should be killed for consuming beef even though "I am against cow slaughter".

"How can we kill somebody for eating meat, even if it's beef," he told reporters here as he emphasised he is against cow slaughter.

Qureshi, who has served as Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh Governor as well in the past, opined "intolerance" in the country has "risen" since the Modi government came to power.

Qureshi however supported the Prime Minister's recent Lahore stopover to meet his Pakistani counterpart and said war cannot be a solution to any problem talks can be.

The former Governor also claimed "Qureshi" community is being "harassed" by the authorities in the name of beef even if they keep meat of buffalo, goat or other animals.

Speaking of Ram Mandir at Ayodhya, Qureshi said everybody would follow the court ruling in this regard.
North Korea warned of war as South Korea today continued blasting anti-Pyongyang propaganda across the rivals' tense border in retaliation for the North's purported fourth nuclear test.

North Korean propaganda is filled with threats of violence, but the country is also extremely sensitive to criticism of its authoritarian leadership, which Seoul resumed in its cross-border broadcasts yesterday for the first time in nearly five months.

Pyongyang says the broadcasts are tantamount to an act of war. When South Korea briefly resumed propaganda broadcasts in August after an 11-year break, Seoul says the two Koreas exchanged artillery fire.

Speaking to a massive crowd at Pyongyang's Kim Il Sung Square, a top ruling party official said the broadcasts, along with talks between Washington and Seoul on the possibility of deploying in the South advanced US warplanes capable of delivering nuclear bombs, have pushed the Korean Peninsula "toward the brink of war."Pyongyang's rivals are "jealous" of the North's successful hydrogen bomb test, Workers' Party Secretary Kim Ki Nam said in comments broadcast on state TV late yesterday.

South Korean troops, near about 10 sites where loudspeakers started blaring propaganda yesterday, were on the highest alert, but have yet to detect any unusual movement from the North Korean military along the border, an official from Seoul's Defense Ministry, who refused to be named, citing office rules, said today.

The South's Yonhap news agency said Seoul had deployed missiles, artillery and other weapons systems near the border to swiftly deal with any possible North Korean provocation, but the ministry did not confirm the reports.

Officials say broadcasts from the South's loudspeakers can travel about 10 kilometers (6 miles) during the day and 24 kilometers (15 miles) at night.

That reaches many of the huge force of North Korean soldiers stationed near the border and also residents in border towns such as Kaesong, where the Koreas jointly operate an industrial park that has been a valuable cash source for the impoverished North.

Seoul also planned to use mobile speakers to broadcast from a small South Korean island just a few kilometers (miles) away from North Korean shores.

While the South's broadcasts also include news and pop music, much of the programming challenges North Korea's government more directly.

"We hope that our fellow Koreans in the North will be able to live in (a) society that doesn't invade individual lives as soon as possible," a female presenter said in parts of the broadcast that officials revealed to South Korean media.
A New York police officer was shot and wounded while breaking up a street fight, Police Commissioner William Bratton and Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a rare pre-dawn press conference today.

The shooting comes amid heightened security -- and paranoia -- following attacks in California and Paris, and one day after a man claiming allegiance to the Islamic State group shot and wounded a police officer in Philadelphia.

Although neither Bratton nor de Blasio addressed the issue, it was clear that the New York shooting was unrelated to terrorism.

Bratton said that around 2:10 am a plain clothes police officer in the Bronx borough was shot and wounded "in exchange of gunfire with a suspect."



The 25 year-old officer, identified as Rod Stewart, had responded with his partner to "numerous 911 calls reporting a large fight in the street with gun, bats and knives", Bratton said.

A fight had broken out at "a large jump up party with 100 to 200 people," and the fracas spilled into the street.

As back-up units arrived "officers engaged in a gunfight in which police officer Stewart was struck in the right ankle," Bratton said. The officer returned gunfire, "striking the male suspect four times."



Stewart was rushed to the hospital, where he was reported in stable condition. Five victims stabbed in the initial fight were also hospitalised, Bratton said.

Police said they arrested a 19-year-old, who has a history of arrests, in connection with the shooting.

Mayor De Blasio said he visited Stewart in the hospital, and declared that the officer was "an impressive young man" who had "distinguished himself.
US President Barack Obama will meet with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull at the White House later this month, where the two leaders will discuss a range of issues, including cooperation in Iraq and Syria and ratification of the trans-Pacific trade deal.

The meeting between the leaders will take place on Jan 19. This would be Turnbull's first trip to Washington since assuming office.

"During the meeting, they will highlight the extraordinary breadth of the US-Australian alliance, and discuss a range of bilateral, regional, and global issues, including our cooperation in Iraq and Syria, our trade relationship, the successful conclusion of negotiations of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, and other developments in Asia and the Pacific," White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest, said.
France today paid hommage to four Jewish hostages killed at a kosher supermarket in Paris a year after a spate of jihadist attacks that began with a deadly assault on the Charlie Hebdo weekly.

Tributes were also paid to Clarissa Jean-Philippe, a young policewoman who was also killed by the gunman who went on to carry out the supermarket siege, with President Francois Hollande unveiling a plaque in her honour in the Paris suburb of Montrouge where she died.

A total of 17 people were killed in the January 2015 attacks which rocked France and touched off a wave of Islamist violence that reached a head in November when a group of gunmen and suicide bombers unleashed mayhem in Paris, killing 130.

The 26-year-old policewoman was killed on January 8 by Amedy Coulibaly, the gunman who went on to attack the Hyper Cacher supermarket in east Paris. Three shoppers and an employee were killed by Coulibaly before he was killed in a police raid.

A gathering to remember the victims will be held outside the supermarket after sundown on Saturday organised by the Jewish umbrella group CRIF.

"Despite continuing traumatic feelings, life has returned to normal with a renewed sense of fraternity," said Haim Korsia, France's grand rabbi.

Also this weekend, mosques around the country are opening their doors to visitors in a move to "highlight the real values of Islam, to set straight the cliches about links to violence and terrorism," Anouar Kbibech, head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith, told AFP.

Commemorations will culminate in a public event tomorrow in the Place de la Republique, the vast square that became the rallying point for "Je Suis Charlie" solidarity movement, and for similar movements after the deadly November 13 attacks.

There, a 10-metre oak will be planted as a "tree of remembrance".

Veteran French rocker Johnny Hallyday will perform "Un Dimanche de Janvier" (One January Sunday), a song recalling the vast mobilisation that saw 1.6 million people march in Paris on January 11, 2015.
A four-nation conference on Afghan reconciliation process will be held here on Monday to explore ways to create a consensus for talks between the Taliban and Afghanistan's government, officials said today.

The four-nation group was set up last year to expedite the process of reconciliation in the war-torn country after decades of bloodshed.

"Representatives of Pakistan, Afghanistan, China and the US will participate in the preparatory talks," an official said.

Pakistan will be represented by Foreign Secretary Aizaz Chaudhry, Afghanistan by Deputy Foreign Minister Hekmat Khalil Karzai and China and the US by their respective special envoys for Afghanistan and Pakistan region.

The official said the four countries will set the platform for talks and also prepare an agenda for the second round of parley.

The first round was held in July but the process was suspended in the same month after news of Taliban chief Mullah Omar's death was announced.

The second round may take place towards the end of the month if the four nations agreed on the minimum agenda, the official said.

It is believed that the process of peace in Afghanistan will be testing for parties due to strong opposition within Afghanistan towards any peace with Taliban.
Congress today hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his visit to Pathankot Air Force base a week after the terror attack, saying it has got relegated to a mere "photo op".

"Eight days after the Pathankot terror incident depicting failure of Modi Govt on National Security & fight against terror, PM's belated visit has got relegated to a mere photo op.

"Need of the hour is to ensure action by Pakistan against Jaish-e- Mohammad, a through review of internal security safeguards and affixing responsibility for security lapses. We hope Modiji will inform the nation about action taken on these key issues," AICC Communication Department chief Randeep Surjewala told reporters here.

In a photo tweet on party twitter handle, Congress also told the Prime Minister that "he celebrates the birthday of Pakistani Prime Minister with great enthusiasm but it takes him eight days to take care of Pathankot."



"PM Modi diverted plane to Pakistan to greet Pak PM Nawaz Sharif on his b'day, but took 8 days to reach Pathankot!," the party said in another tweet.

"There is no action on terror. Whether Modi government will run like this (Karte Nahin Aatank pe waar, Kya Aise he chalegi Modi Sarkaar)," Congress said coining a new slogan to attack Modi government.

The party had been targeting Modi government after the Pathankot attack citing BJP's Lok Sabha poll slogan "bahut hua seema par waar; Abki baar Modi sarkaar" (enough of attacks on the border; this time it is Modi government which will respond).

The Prime Minister today visited the strategic Pathankot Air Force base for a first-hand assessment of the situation in the aftermath of the terror attack last Saturday.

Six terrorists, believed to owe allegiance to Pakistan- based Jaish-e-Mohammed were gunned down by the security forces after a four-day gun battle. Seven Indian security personnel also lost their lives.

The operation to ensure that no terrorist was hiding was carried out jointly by Army, NSG and IAF's Garud commandos.

Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar had also visited the base on January five.
The police have apprehended a juvenile in connection with the murder of a 46-year-old man in south-west Delhi's Ranhoula area.

The juvenile was tracked down with the help of the mobile phone of the deceased, which he had taken away after the incident which took place on January 2, DCP (southwest) R A Sanjeev said today.

During interrogation, it emerged that the juvenile was in an inebriated state and had an argument with the victim, Ajay Kalra, before he allegedly hit him on his head with a stone, said police.

However, the cause of the argument -- and hence the motive behind the murder -- could not be ascertained.

It was Kalra's landlord in Ranhola who found the body near his house and informed the police, following which a case of murder was registered, said police.

The juvenile, who went absconding after the incident, was apprehended yesterday from Ranhola area by a police team, Sanjeev added.
President Pranab Mukherjee today asked educational institutions to encourage local talent of innovation and it should be supplemented by the industry to achieve a marketing value.

Addressing the 7th Convocation of the Vinoba Bhave University here, he said Jharkhand is rich in mineral resources and has a number of engineering and steel industries, which should back the efforts made by the colleges and universities to nurture talents.

"Local talent of innovation would have to be encouraged by educational institutions and supplement it by the industries to create a marketing value," Mukherjee, who is on a two-day visit to Jharkhand, said.

He said the state has 34 per cent of the country's proven coal reserves and 28 per cent of the iron ore reserves, besides having huge deposits of other minerals like mica, uranium and bauxite.

A number of key industrial companies are operating in sectors such as mineral resources, engineering and steel from the state and this factor should be a key input for promoting entrepreneurship and innovation, he said.

During the function, Mukherjee conferred the degree of D.Litt (honoris causa) on former Finance and External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha for his unique contribution to the Indian economy, international relations, and public service.

Mukherjee also asked the authorities and the industry to provide financial help to deserving candidates and to ensure comprehensive socio-economic developments.

Noting that only in the recent past two Indian educational institutions have figured among the 200 world class institutions, the President asked the universities, IITs, NIITs and other institutions to work towards excellence and be recognised at the international level.

"In the recent past, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore and IIT, Delhi have figured in the list of 200 world's top class institutes. But the other IITs, NIITs and universities should work towards achieving this goal," he stressed, adding that what was needed in this regard was coordination and putting the ingredients in a proper fashion by the institutions to reach that level.

Terming Jharkhand as a land of patriots, he said the university has been appropriately named after Acharya Vinoba Bhave, who was a great saint, freedom fighter, a staunch advocate of non-violence and is considered the spiritual successor of Mahatma Gandhi.

(REOPENS DEL40)



Mukherjee said the commitment of young civil servants towards service and not "any dogma or ideology" gives him confidence and hope.

During the event held at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, he said the young officers will be makers of a new India in the next 30-35 years.

He said the fresh batch of officers should protect India's diversity which celebrates and "nourishes on languages, customs and religions" and ensure that India takes its rightful place in the comity of nations through peace and harmony and not "quarreling with anybody".

"When we (India) began our journey there were many doubting thomases who expressed their deep suspicion about the experiments which India were making just after the partition on the basis of religion and having trauma of the Partition looming large over the scenario.

"How fiercely they debated on whether or not India should have a federal system. In the long of history of 400-500 years of India it was under the imperial power. There was not a natural federation of the states," he said.

In the course of his nearly 30-minute address, Mukherjee also looked back on his long political journey, observing how he was at the "twilight" of his active career spanning over five decades.
Scores of protesters from various outfits today staged demonstrations at Delhi University's Arts Faculty against a two-day seminar on Ram Janmbhoomi temple, following which they were detained by police.

BJP leader Subramanian Swamy delivered the inaugural address for the seminar titled "Shri Ram Janma Bhoomi Temple: Emerging Scenario" which is being organised by Arundhati Vashishtha Anusandhan Peeth (AVAP), a research organisation founded by late VHP leader Ashok Singhal.

"Elaborate security arrangements were made in Delhi University's North Campus. Several protesters were detained after they gheraoed the venue and tried to create obstacles," a police official said.

The protesters including that from left-affiliated student wing's All India Students' Association (AISA), Democratic Students' Foundation (DSF), Students Federation of India (SFI), Congress-affiliate National Students Union of India (NSUI) and AAP's Chhatra Yuva Sangharsh Samiti (CYSS) staged demonstrations outside the protest venue and were detained later.

The protesting outfits had approached the university earlier this week demanding that it withdraw the permission rather than allowing such a seminar alleging it would "communalise" the campus and push "saffron agenda".

The university authorities have been maintaining that they have nothing to do with the subject of the seminar and the organisation had booked the venue for the event which is available to outsiders for hiring.
Ridley Scott is in early negotiations to come aboard and direct "The Prisoner", the screen version of the 1968 Patrick McGoohan British TV series.

This has been a plum project at Universal for some time with numerous A-list scribes including Christopher McQuarrie writing drafts, reported Deadline.

The most recent version was by "The Departed" scribe William Monahan. The film is being produced by Bluegrass Films Scott Stuber and Dylan Clark.

Numerous writers are circling to do that, and the elbowing by several top actors has also begun.

"The Prisoner" is a former government agent who abruptly resigns from his job and finds himself imprisoned in an idyllic yet bizarre seaside village isolated from the world by the sea and mountains.

He can't escape because he knows too much, but that doesn't stop others trying to capture him for his knowledge.
South African President Jacob Zuma today denounced what he called the "demon of racism" following a slew of discriminatory insults on social media.

Speaking to a stadium of supporters at the annual birthday celebration of the ruling African National Congress, Zuma said "a tiny minority" of South Africans still longed for the days of apartheid white minority rule.

"It is clear that there is a tiny minority in our country that still harbours a desire for separate amenities and who idolise apartheid era leaders," he said at the stadium in Rustenburg in the North West province.

"These people do not represent the true character of the new South Africa. They are living in the past."



His comments come at a time of heightened tensions in the country after several South Africans aired racist views online.

On Tuesday, the ANC, in power since the country's first democratic elections in 1994, launched legal action over a white realtor's Facebook post that compared black beachgoers to monkeys.

The party also targeted a white economic analyst who wrote on Twitter of a growing "sense of entitlement and hatred towards minorities" in South Africa.

A black local government employee was suspended from his position on Friday after posting that South Africa should be "cleansed" of whites, saying "we must act as Hitler did to the Jews".

"We call on all people of this country to work together and defeat the demon of racism and tribalism," said Zuma.

The ANC has said it will pursue the criminalisation of racist comments.
Saudi Arabia's Deputy Crown Prince and Defence Minister Mohammed bin Salman will arrive here tomorrow to discuss with the Pakistani leadership details of its 34-nation military alliance to fight terrorism, days after the visit of Kingdom's foreign minister to the country.

"Saudi's deputy crown prince is expected to arrive on Sunday for talks on bilateral and regional security issues, including the new alliance and Saudi-Iran tensions," an official said.

His visit comes amid Saudi's push to get Pakistan to join its 34-nation coalition of Muslim countries to fight against terrorism and the Saudi-Iran tensions following the execution of leading Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr along with 46 others, garnering condemnation from Shias across the region.

The Saudi defence minister is coming to discuss the "finer details" of the coalition. He is expected to meet his Pakistani counterpart Khwaja Asif along with the army chief Gen Raheel Sharif and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, a government official was quoted as saying by The Express Tribune.

"We welcome the Saudi initiative in line with our policy to support all regional and efforts to counter terrorism and extremism," the official said.

Despite a feeble welcome to the idea and hesitated readiness to join it, Pakistan has shown weariness for the alliance which would bind its troops to become part of military operations out of Pakistan, observers say.

Saudi Arabia on the other hand is not willing to let Pakistan sidestep the offer as it is the sole Muslim nation with nuclear weapons and has a highly professional military force, they say.

Mohammed is arriving just four days after Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al Jubeir visited Pakistan and held wide ranging talks with Prime Minister Sharif, Prime Minister's Advisor on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz and the army chief.

Pakistan says it agrees with the Saudi initiative to fight terror as it is also part of Islamabad's policy to oppose militancy in its all forms and manifestation. But the problem is due to another part of Pakistan's defence policy which is against deploying its troops for combat roles outside the country without approval by the UN.

Last year, Islamabad had refused to join another Saudi initiative to launch airstrikes against Yemen.

The second issue is Pakistan's close ties with Iran which is not part of the 34-nation alliance. Internal pressure is mounting on Pakistan not to take sides by joining the alliance.

Pakistan's Shia-Sunni fault-line is sharp and yesterday supporters of Iran and Saudi Arabia held separate protests in support of the two countries.
Elaborate security arrangements are in place for the four-month Ardhakumbh mela in Haridwar with 15 companies of the central paramilitary forces deployed in the fair area, besides an aerial vigil on sensitive and crowded ghats.

Uttarakhand DGP B S Sidhu informed this here today during an inter-state meeting with the officials of police force, railways and central security agencies in the mela control room.

Sindhu reviewed the security preparations for the event and laid emphasis on the better coordination between the security personnel and the officials.

The mela began on January 1 with an average of one lakh people taking a dip in the Ganga everyday. The proper event will be formally declared open on January 12 by Chief Minister Harish Rawat at a ceremony in Haridwar.

Sidhu said that a vigil has been stepped up along the ghats with CCTV cameras installed throughout the mela area and checking has been intensified.

Mobile escorts besides additional security personnel are being deployed in trains coming to Haridwar to keep a watch and deal with any emergency, he said.

15 companies of the central para-military forces including the CRPF, CISF, RAF and ITBP have been deployed in the mela area, he said.

Arrangements have also been made for periodic aerial vigilance by drones of the most crowded ghats like the Har Ki Pauri to keep a tab on dubious elements identified by the security forces, state and local intelligence units, the DGP said after the meeting.

Patrolling along Uttarakhand's borders with Uttar Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh have been intensified for security reasons, he said.

The first snan of the Ardhakumbh is scheduled to take place on January 14 on the occasion of Makar Sankranti, which will be followed by nine ritual baths on auspicious dates spread over a period of four months till April when the event draws to a close.
Kerala Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala has urged the media to show maturity while breaking in a highly competitive environment.

Inaugurating a media seminar, the senior Congress leader also batted for "self imposed regulations" for mediapersons to ensure that right information is disseminated through their medium.

"Mediapersons should show maturity and it is essential for establishing peace in society," he said last evening in the presence of senior Muslim League leaders, including Panakkad Hyderali Shihab Thangal and state Industries Minister P K Kunhalikkutty.

"Kerala media gives utmost importance to peace in society. At the same time, a self-imposed regulation is required to ensure that no wrong is delivered while competing for breaking news," Chennithala said.

The Home Minister also highlighted the role played by the media in "exposing" forces trying to undermine things envisaged in the Constitution.
A Pakistani-origin man, whose mother was on dialysis but would not let him donate his kidney, tricked her in to the transplant - by pretending he was already selling his organ on eBay.

Imran Najeeb, 34, had offered his mother Zainab Begum a kidney after her own suffered damage and were only functioning at 25 per cent. But she refused because she did not want him to put his own life "at risk" by helping her.

The clever bank manager, who is one of six siblings and is the eldest son, then told his mother he was already donating his kidney anyway, and was selling it on the auction site.

He took advantage of the fact that his mother cannot read or write English and showed her a picture of a kidney on Google Images, telling her it was his kidney for sale, the Mirror reported.

He told her: "Look mum, I'm selling my kidney on eBay and someone from China is going to pay me 10,000 pounds for it."



His tactic worked when his 52-year-old mother replied: "Why would you sell your kidney to a complete stranger when you could give it to me?"



Najeeb said: "That was the moment of truth. It was through anger her true emotions came out. I realised she did want my kidney and it was just concern for me that was stopping her.

"As a child, you sometimes have to play your parents. I had to do this to trick her into accepting my kidney as I was just so desperate to help her."



The family's ordeal began around eight years ago when Najeeb's mother began feeling ill, lost weight and started suffering from headaches and high blood pressure. Tests showed she had kidney damage and were only functioning at 25 per cent.

She ended up on haemodialysis at hospital three or four times a week and the grandmother of 13 lost out on quality time with her family.

Najeeb, from Blackburn, Lancashire, recalls: "Dialysis was physically and emotionally draining for my mum.

"Although my mum initially agreed, she then changed her mind and told me she didn't want to take my kidney.

"She said if anything happened to me, she would never forgive herself. We were both trying to be selfless but I desperately wanted to donate to her. I even asked the doctors if I could donate anonymously without my mum knowing but they told me they couldn't legally do this."



However, it was when Najeeb overheard his mother talking to his cousin in Pakistan on the phone and discussing the possibility of buying a kidney and having the transplant abroad, he thought he had to trick her so that she agrees.

The mother and son have now undergone their respective operations and are recovering well.
Sri Lankan police today arrested a woman lawmaker of the ruling United National Party over the abduction of a 34-year-old man in a suburb here recently.

Hirunika Premachandra was arrested after Attorney General Yuwanjana Wanasundera Wijayathilake yesterday asked the police to take her into custody in relation to the last month's abduction in Dematagoda, said police spokesman Ruwan Gunasekera.

Premachandra's security personnel had used her jeep to abduct the man. Although the six security personnel were promptly arrested and later released on bail, pressure mounted on the police to arrest the lawmaker.

The man told the police that he was taken to Premachandra's office to be seen by her after being abducted.

After a long delay, the police acted on the advise of the Attorney General to arrest Premachandra.

The abduction followed by the arrest has come as an embarrassment for the government which has been complaining about high handedness of the previous Mahinda Rajapaksa regime.
Sri Lankan parliament today began a process to formulate a new constitution with Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe presenting a resolution to set up Constitutional Assembly of all members for the purpose.

In a special session today, Wickremesinghe moved the resolution in parliament to set up Constitutional Assembly (CA) of all members and a steering committee of 17 members to draft the new constitution.

"We will have the whole parliament formulating the constitution unlike the previous instances when the constitutions were drafted outside parliament," he said.

The new constitution will replace the current executive president headed constitution adopted in 1978.

The resolution noted that there shall be a Committee of Parliament referred to as the "Constitutional Assembly" which shall consist of all MPs, for the purpose of deliberating on, and seeking the views and advice of the people, on a new constitution for Sri Lanka, and preparing a draft of a Constitution Bill for the consideration of Parliament in the exercise of its powers under Article 75 of the Constitution.

It said the Speaker of Parliament will be the Chairman of the Constitutional Assembly and there will be seven Deputy Chairmen of the Constitutional Assembly, who shall be elected by the Constitutional Assembly.

A Steering Committee consisting of the Prime Minister (Chairman), Leader of the Opposition, Leader of the House, the Minister of Justice, and not more than 11 other Members of the Constitutional Assembly will be appointed by the Constitutional Assembly.

President Maithripala Sirisena in his address said the time has come to formulae a new constitution in keeping with the demands of the 21stcentury.

He warned that extremist elements both in the south and the north may try to scuttle the process.

He denied opposition's accusations that the new constitution is being drafted to please the international community based on their advise.

Sirisena, since coming to power, has reduced his presidential powers and strengthened key areas of governance by setting up independent commissions on police, judiciary elections and public service.
The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) today issued a show-cause notice to St Stephen's College principal Valson Thampu asking him to explain why no action has been taken against the professor accused of molesting a research scholar.

The Commission's chairperson, Swati Maliwal, who had summoned Thampu last year in connection with the case, also asked him to refrain from making public statements and declarations on the merits of case as the matter is sub-judice.

Thampu, who has been under attack for months for allegedly shielding the professor, had yesterday asserted in a Facebook post that supporting the teacher was the most "heroic" thing ever done by him.

"I have been informed that you have written several posts on your Facebook wall regarding this particular sexual harassment case wherein you seem to be taunting the complainant.

"In one post after your appearance before the Commission, you had stated that 'had the girl approached you directly for relief you would have helped her'. In another post you accused the victim of making a false and malicious complaint at the behest of one of the teachers of the college," she said in the notice.

"You have gone ahead and called the complaint a 'diabolic lie' citing that a 85 per cent disabled man could never sexually assault a girl. It is shocking that despite the sexual harassment case pending before the court of law, you have in complete abuse of your authority passed comments and provided a clean chit to the accused professor," she said.

Maliwal has also sought to know why no action has been taken against the professor accused of sexually harassing the student, and recommended that college administration takes corrective steps for immediate relief to the complainant, mandated under Sexual Harassment at Workplace Act, 2013.

The DCW has given Thampu one week to reply to the show-cause notice, failing which appropriate action will be initiated as per law.

Maliwal said Thampu's Facebook posts indicated that he was



pursuing a "personal vendetta" against the complainant.

"From your Facebook posts, it appears you are following a personal vendetta against the complainant and have handled such a sensitive issue in a frivolous manner which is extremely unbecoming of the authority you hold," she said.

The complainant had approached police in July last year, alleging she was molested by Kumar, a Chemistry professor with 85 per cent disability, supervising her research.

She had also accused Thampu of "shielding" the assistant professor when the matter was reported to him. The allegations against Thampu had prompted certain sections of students, teachers and women rights group to demand his resignation.
Amid protests outside the Delhi University (DU), senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy went ahead with a seminar on the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya where he asserted that nothing will be done forcibly or against the law.

"Construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya is 'mandatory' for revival of our culture. We have started and we will not give up until it is made but nothing will be done forcibly and against the law. We have full faith that we will win in the court," he said in his inaugural address at the two-day seminar.

Claiming that former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi had promised him of support for the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, Swamy appealed to Congress to come forward and support the cause.

"Rajiv Gandhi had personally told me that Ram Mandir will be built and whenever he will get an opportunity he will also help and the first help he did was that despite party opposition, he started the television serial on Ramayana which created a new excitement in public," he said.

"He had said they will permit the foundation laying, too. He had also said in his campaign for 1989 elections that there should be Ram Rajya in the country. I hope Congress will also come forward and support as this is not just our demand but that of the country," he added.

Swamy had earlier this week said that the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya would begin by this year-end with the cooperation of the Muslim community.

Delhi: NSUI protests over Ram Janmabhoomi Seminar in DU pic.twitter.com/h7BJNkdbW4  ANI (@ANI_news) January 9, 2016

"In our country , over 40,000 temples have been demolished, we never say that all those should be reconstructed...But there cannot be a compromise on three of them -- Ram Janmabhoomi temple, Krishna temple in Mathura and Kashivishwanath, if Ram Temple is constructed there will be easy way for others, discussions can be done but not compromise," he said.

"Ram Mandir is an aim for us. And when the Muslims leaders had committed that if it is proved that there was temple earlier, they will let us reconstruct it there, not fulfilling that commitment can be contempt of court," he added.

The two-day seminar titled "Shri Ram Janma Bhoomi Temple: Emerging Scenario" is being organised at DU's Arts Faculty by Arundhati Vashishtha Anusandhan Peeth (AVAP), a research organisation founded by late VHP leader Ashok Singhal.

There was strong opposition from the student groups to DU's decision for allowing such a seminar alleging it would "communalise" the campus and push "saffron agenda".

The protesters including that from left-affiliated student wings AISA, DSF, SFI and Congress-affiliate NSUI, staged demonstrations outside the protest venue and were detained later.

Swamy, who is the chairman of AVAP, delivered the inaugural address at the seminar which will see historians, archaeologists and law experts discussing various topics including "Lord Ram's character and values, and their impact on Indian culture", "History of the Ram temple and related archaeological findings", "Legal issues around Ram temple" and "Experience and future of Ram temple".
Syria's foreign minister says it is ready to attend peace talks later this month in Geneva but that the government wants to see lists of the opposition groups who will attend and the "terrorist" groups that will not.

State agency SANA says Walid al-Moallem made his comments today while meeting in Damascus with UN envoy Staffan de Mistura.

The Syrian government refers to all those battling to overthrow President Bashar Assad as terrorists and has said the talks should focus on battling terrorism.

The opposition wants Assad to step down as part of any peace deal.

The UN is urging the two sides to meet January 25 in an effort to end the conflict, which has killed more than 250,000 people and caused a massive refugee crisis.
Tata Motors owned Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has achieved a record global sales in 2015 with the premium luxury vehicles' manufacturer retailing 4,87,065 vehicles, its highest figure yet and a five per cent increase from previous year.

The record-breaking sales figure came despite a slowdown in China with Britain overtaking Beijing as the luxury car brand's most important market.

The two brands together sold more than 1,00,000 vehicles in the UK in a calendar year for the first time last year, which included a 30 per cent increase in British sales of Jaguar, much of it attributable to the launch of the XE.

Last year, sales in China slumped by 24 per cent to 92,474, as a result of a slowdown in what is among the world's fastest growing automotive market.

Europe was the company's largest sales region in 2015 with sales of 110,298, up 28 per cent year on year; and with a growth of 21 per cent over 2014 figures, a total of 100,636 Jaguars and Land Rovers were bought by customers in the UK.

Andy Goss, Jaguar Land Rover's group sales operations director, said the new figures meant that the group had doubled sales since 2009 because of new launches.

"This has been a significant year for Jaguar Land Rover, with updated models being introduced across the range, as well as the addition to our portfolio of the completely new Jaguar XE and Land Rover Discovery Sport.

"Customer response (to the XE and the Discovery Sport) has been extremely positive and there have been record retails across the UK, North America and Europe," he said.

"2016 promises to be another exciting year, with the start of sales of the Range Rover Evoque Convertible and the Jaguar F-Pace, along with further all-new and refreshed vehicles," he added.

The group said that US sales were up by 25 per cent while sales in Europe - where Jaguar Land Rover has traditionally struggled in markets such as Germany - rose by 28 per cent.

Highlights from 2015 saw Land Rover sell more than 4,00,000 vehicles for first time, a 6 per cent increase compared to 2014 and Jaguar achieve its best performance in a decade with sales of 83,986 vehicles, a 3 per cent rise.

Land Rover's new Discovery Sport, which replaced the Freelander2, proved a hit with sales of more than 10,000 a month, second only to the best-selling Range Rover Evoque.

During last year, JLR announced the doubling of the size of its UK engine manufacturing centre and confirmed that it had agreed a manufacturing partnership with Magna Steyr to build some future vehicles in Graz, Austria.

In March 2015, it confirmed a 600-million pounds investment across its Castle Bromwich advanced manufacturing plant, Whitley advanced design and development centre, and the National Automotive Innovation Centre to support product creation and advanced vehicle manufacturing in the UK.
NDA partners TDP and BJP today began discussions on seat-sharing for the elections to the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) on February 2.

BJP MLA Chintala Ramachandra Reddy, city BJP president Venkat Reddy and city TDP president and MLA Maganti Gopinath were among those who took part in the talks.

Telangana State Election Commission announced yesterday that nominations would be accepted from January 12 to 17. Polling would be held on February 2 from 7 am to 5 pm, while counting of votes will take place on February 5.

The opposition Congress, BJP and TDP have alleged that reservation of divisions (wards) for elections has not been done properly. The total number of divisions is 150.

As many as 24 Assembly constituencies of Telangana come under the GHMC limits. Congress and MIM alliance had emerged triumphant in the last elections in 2009.

Campaigning began even before the poll notification was issued. TRS, led by Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, has kickstarted its campaign with hoardings coming up everywhere.

The Chief Minister's son and IT and Panchayat Raj minister K T Rama Rao and other ministers have been visiting various residential localities.

TRS, though the ruling party of the state, is not known as a major force in Hyderabad, which has a population of about 60 lakh. Notably, it had not contested the last GHMC polls in 2009.

Rama Rao has sought to reach out to the city residents who hail from Seemandhra region amid the allegations by opposition that TRS insulted and intimidated this section of the population during the agitation for separate state.

TDP-BJP alliance which won 15 Assembly seats under GHMC in the last Assembly elections is keen to do well again.

Senior BJP leaders including Union Ministers Nitin Gadkari, Radha Mohan Singh, Hansraj Ahir and Bandaru Dattatreya have campaigned in the last few days.
Police rescued a teenage boy, who was kidnapped on Wednesday from here and arrested five accused in connection with the crime, senior police officials said today.

"Chaitanya Ashtankar (14), a student of a Christian Missionary school, was abducted by a gang of four persons on January 6 from near his residence in Manish Nagar in South City area, while he was returning from school," Deputy Commissioner of Police (Zone) Shailesh Balkawde and Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime) Ranjan Kumar Sharma told reporters here.

On receiving the information, the police swung into action, with the Maharashtra Energy Minister and district Guardian Minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule directing them to ensure that he is rescued unharmed, the officials said.

After two days, the accused made a demand of Rs 50 lakh as ransom from the boy's father, they said.

The police traced the phone call and laid a trap to nab the kidnappers.

Yesterday, the boy was rescued from a forest area, and five persons were arrested in this connection, the DCPs said.

Bawankule visited the victim's residence last night after the boy was reunited with his parents, the officials said.
An 18-year-old girl reported



missing from Chennai two days ago was found loiterinng in the city and rescued by police.

The girl did not return home since Thursday last and the parents had lodged a complaint with a police station in Chennai, police said.

The city police noticed the girl loitering near the District Collectorate last night and inquiry revealed that she left her home after her mother scolded, they said.

After handing her over to a shelter home, police alerted police in Chennai. Her parents expected to reach the city to take her, they said.
In a mark of honour, the birth anniversary of 17th Century Madurai ruler Thirumalai Naicker will be celebrated as a government function, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa announced here today.

A legendary king in the history of Tamil Nadu, Thirumalai Naicker (Circa 1584-1659) was known for his courage and grit and he was the most reputed of all the Madurai Nayak rulers, Jayalalithaa said.

Credited for several achievements including building many temples and his palace "Tirumalai Nayak Mahal," in Madurai representations were received from general public to celebrate his birth anniversary as a State function, she said in an official release.

"I am very happy to announce that his birth anniversary on the Thai Poosam day (Tamil month Thai, Poosam star) will be celebrated in Madurai as a government function," she said.

This year, Naicker's birth anniversary falls on January 24 and the Chief Minister said she has ordered officials to celebrate it as State function.
Thousands of Kurds from across Europe marched through Paris today calling for justice on the third anniversary of the killing of three female Kurdish rebels in the French capital.

The protesters denounced "crimes by the Turkish regime" -- saying that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was "massacring Kurds" -- chanting "No to impunity for political crimes" and "We are all Sakine, Fidan and Leyla".

Sakine Cansiz, 54 -- one of the founders of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) -- was murdered along with Fidan Dogan, 28, and 24-year-old Leyla Saylemez.

The women's bodies were found in the early hours of January 10, 2013 at a Kurdish information centre. They had been shot in the head and neck.

Sakine Cansiz's brother Haydar, who travelled from Germany for the march, told AFP: "Sakine's fight goes on. We will continue to march until we have obtained justice."



Carrying hundreds of flags in the red, orange and green of the PKK and pictures of the group's leader Abdullah Ocalan, the demonstrators marched to the site of the killings, where flowers had been laid in memory of the dead.

A Turkish national, 33-year-old Omer Guney, has been sent to trial charged with the killings, but investigators suspect Turkish intelligence may have played a role in planning the hit.

Turkey's MIT spy agency has previously denied playing any role in killing the three women.

A source close to the case said investigators believe the MIT is implicated in "the instigation and preparation of the killings", but have been unable to established whether the service sponsored the hit or whether agents were acting on their own initiative.

The PKK launched its insurgency against the Turkish state in 1984, initially fighting for Kurdish independence although it now focuses on greater autonomy and rights for the country's largest ethnic minority.

The conflict, which has left tens of thousands dead, looked like it could be nearing a resolution until an uneasy truce was shattered last July.

Turkish authorities are waging a major military operation to crush the PKK in the Kurdish-dominated southeast of the country.
China's Tibet region has received a record 3.63 million air passengers in 2015, up 15.2 per cent compared to the previous year, making the aviation industry an important driver for growth of the regional economy.

The plateau region opened 13 new air routes last year, bringing its operating routes to 63, statistics showed.

The number of cities linked to Tibet via air rose by seven to reach 40.

Five airports in Tibet handled more than 36,000 landings and take-offs and cargo throughput of 29,000 tons in 2015, an increase of 16.8 per cent and 16.3 per cent year-on-year, respectively, state-run Xinhua agency reported.

Tibet's civil aviation industry has been growing rapidly with investments of over 3 billion yuan (USD 457 million) becoming an important driver for the regional economy.

During the 13th Five-Year (2016-2020) period, Tibet will develop air express routes between the regional capital Lhasa and Chengdu, capital of neighboring Sichuan Province, and will open more air routes to other domestic cities, according to a regional civil aviation official.

Tibet will also encourage airline companies to open routes between Lhasa and Southeast and South Asian countries, said the official.
Some unidentified assailants have allegedly beaten to death a 42-year-old man in Wazirganj township here, police said today.

The deceased was identified as Sanjay Jaiswal, a trader.

Late last night, Jaiswal was stabbed and beaten with iron rods near the Wazirganj police station, they said.

The wife of the deceased Ramawati has told police that her father-in-law was also killed in a similar manner about three year ago.

A case has been registered against unidentified persons and investigations are on, police added.
Two Palestinians tried to stab Israeli soldiers manning a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank today before being shot dead, the army said.

The attack occurred in the north of the Jordan Valley, according to a military spokeswoman.

Twenty-two Israelis, an American and an Eritrean have been killed in Palestinian attacks including stabbings, car rammings and gunfire targeting security forces and civilians since October 1.

At the same time, 146 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, most while carrying out attacks.

Israel has employed a raft of security and punitive measures in a bid to stem attacks.

The army overnight demolished a house near the West Bank city of Hebron belonging to a Palestinian who was shot dead on October 3 after killing an Israeli rabbi, the spokeswoman said.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in November vowed to expedite house demolitions in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, which he said were "one of the most efficient tools" in discouraging Palestinian attacks.

The controversial practice is widely used in the West Bank and resumed in east Jerusalem in November after a five-year hiatus.

Also today, Israel returned the bodies of four Palestinians killed on Thursday during two attacks in the southern West Bank.

They are set to be buried later in the village of Sair, close to Hebron, according to Palestinian sources.

Israel often retains the bodies of Palestinians killed during attacks, a measure that has drawn criticism from rights groups as well as Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

Since the start of the year it has returned the bodies of 26 Palestinians to their families.
Two young men were arrested in the UAE over their selfie in front of a New Year's Eve hotel fire and have been subsequently released after investigators found "no criminal intent".

The duo arrested for posting a selfie on social media with the Address Downtown fire in the background have been released, Attorney General of Dubai Essam Al Humaidan was quoted as saying by the state-run WAM agency.

The of the arrest and release of the two men comes after a couple were similarly criticised on the night of the fire for taking what was deemed to be the "most inappropriate selfie ever" smiling together with the burning hotel in the background.

The Attorney General said that the Public Prosecution in Dubai has decided to release the two young men following a thorough investigation and review of the posted picture and case file and after listening to all witnesses.

The case against them has been closed since "no evidence of criminal intent was established".

The Attorney General called on individuals to exercise caution and discretion when posting any material on social media and refrain from spreading rumours, defaming others or violating other people's freedom.

A huge fire ripped through the luxury Dubai hotel near the world's tallest tower Burj Khalifa, injuring 16 people, just a few hours before the emirate celebrated the new year with a spectacular fireworks display.
A British website, set up to catalogue the last days of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, has released what it claims are eyewitness accounts of the day he was reportedly killed in a plane crash in Taiwan on August 18, 1945.

The latest set of documents quote several people who were reportedly involved in the matter related to the accident as well as two British intelligence reports that revisited the crash site to establish the facts.

The website also sheds light on what may have been the freedom fighter's dying words, which reflected his devotion to the cause of India's freedom.

"For 70 years, there have been doubts in certain circles whether such a tragedy at all took place. Four separate reports each corroborating the other constitute irresistible evidence to the contrary," says a statement issued by www.bosefiles.info.

The documents say that early in the morning on 18 August 1945, a Japanese Air Force bomber took off from Tourane in Vietnam with Bose, 12-13 other passengers and crew. Also on board was Lt Gen Tsunamasa Shidei of the Japanese Army and the planned flight path was Heito-Taipei-Dairen-Tokyo.

The three-member Netaji Inquiry Committee, instituted by the government of India in 1956 and headed by Major General Shah Nawaz Khan of Bose's Indian Army (INA), was told that since "the weather was perfect and the engines (of the aircraft) worked smoothly" the pilot decided to overfly Heito and proceed straight to Taipei, arriving there late morning or early afternoon.

Major Taro Kono, a Japanese air staff officer and one of the passengers, told the committee: "I noticed that the engine on the left side of the plane was not functioning properly. I, therefore, went inside the plane and after examining the engine inside, I found it to be working all right."



He added the accompanying engineer "also tested the engine and certified its air-worthiness".

Captain Nakamura alias Yamamoto, the ground engineer in charge of maintenance at the airport, concurred with Major Kono "that the engine of the left side was defective".

He said the pilot told him "it was a brand new engine".

He went on to say: "After slowing down the engine, he (the pilot) adjusted it for about five minutes. The engine was tested twice by Major Takizawa (the pilot). After being adjusted, I satisfied myself that the condition of the engine was all right. Major Takizawa also agreed with me that there was nothing wrong with the engine."



However, soon after the aircraft was airborne there was, according to Colonel Habib ur Rahman - Bose's ADC and a co-passenger, a loud explosion.

He described it as "a noise like a cannon shot".

Nakamura, who was watching from the ground, said: "Immediately on taking off, the plane tilted to its left side and I saw something fall down from the plane, which I later found was the propeller.
The UN Security Council on strongly condemned the "heinous" suicide bombing claimed by Islamic State extremists that killed dozens in Libya and called on rival groups to speed up the formation of a unity government.

More than 50 people were killed in the attack on Thursday on a police training school in the coastal city of Zliten, a security source said, in the deadliest single attack in Libya since the fall of Moamer Kadhafi.

The 15-member council described the suicide bombing as a "heinous act" and said those responsible should be brought to justice.

It also condemned a separate attack the same day on a checkpoint in Ras Lanouf, home to a key oil terminal, in which six people died including a baby.

The council "urged all parties in Libya to join efforts to combat the threat posed by transnational terrorist groups exploiting Libya for their own agenda by urgently implementing the Libyan political agreement" setting up the unity government, said a statement.

The United Nations brokered the unity government deal that was signed by politicians last month, but the agreement does not have the full backing of Libya's rival parliaments.

Libya has had rival administrations since August 2014, when an Islamist-backed militia alliance overran Tripoli, forcing the government to take refuge in the east.

EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini yesterday met in Tunis with the prime minister-designate of the new unity government, Fayez al-Sarraj, and unveiled a 100-million-euro aid package.
An under-trail lodged at the district jail, situated at Neemka village here, allegedly committed suicide in his barrack this morning, police said.

Mukesh, from Solada village in Palwal district, had been under-trail for the last four months in an attempt to murder case and allegedly killed himself by hanging from a ventilator using a towel, a police spokesperson said.

Jail Superintendent Deepak Sharma said no suicide note has been found from the site hence reason behind Mukesh's decision to end his life is not clear to the authorities.

Police said the body was handed over to the family of the deceased after post-mortem.
The US State Department condemned Israel's decision to expand the boundary of an existing West Bank settlement bloc, saying it hinders attempts to reach a peace agreement with the Palestinians.

Israel's defence ministry in late December added a compound in the West Bank to the jurisdiction of the Gush Etzion regional council, near Jerusalem.

State Department John Kirby said yesterday that "continued settlement activity and expansion raises honest questions about Israel's long-term intentions and will only make achieving a two state solution much more difficult." He added that the United States remains "deeply concerned" about the move, "which effectively creates a new settlement on 10 acres in the West Bank."



The Palestinians claim the West Bank, along with east Jerusalem, as parts of their future state. They consider all Israeli construction there to be illegal a position that is backed by the international community. Israel says settlements along with other core issues like security should be agreed upon in peace talks.

Negotiations collapsed in 2014, in part over the issue of settlements.

The compound at Gush Etzion is located south of a junction that has been scene to multiple attacks by Palestinians against civilians and soldiers over the past three and a half months.

Hagit Ofran of the Israeli anti-settlement group Peace Now said a settler group bought the compound legally from a church in Sweden. She said it was not clear when people would move in.

"Now the compound is part of the municipality, so it is official," she said, adding that since it no does not belong to any specific existing settlement, her group is calling it "a new settlement."



The move came amid near-daily Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers that killed 21 people mostly in stabbings, shootings and car-ramming assaults. At least 134 Palestinians died by Israeli fire, including 93 said by Israel to be attackers. The rest were killed in clashes with troops. Israel says the bloodshed is fueled by a Palestinian campaign of incitement. Palestinians say it stems from frustration over lack of hope in obtaining statehood.
The United States deported a former Salvadoran defence minister who was accused of human rights crimes during his country's 1980-1992 civil war.

Jose Guillermo Garcia, 82, was seen arriving at San Salvador's international airport with 131 other Salvadorans forcibly expelled from America yesterday, to cries of "murderer, murderer" from waiting rights activists.

The US embassy in El Salvador informed authorities that Garcia, a retired general who served as minister from 1979 to 1983, was deported after his application to stay in the United States was rejected by an immigration appeals court.

A US judge had signed his deportation order for his role "in the commission of human rights violations during El Salvador's civil war," it said.

El Salvador's military government at the time was backed by the United States in a conflict against leftwing guerrillas who were supported by the Soviet Union and Cuba. More than 75,000 people died in the war and more than 7,000 went missing.

A coordinator for El Salvador's Human Rights Commission, Miguel Montenegro, told AFP that Garcia was minister when a San Salvador archbishop, Oscar Romero, was murdered during mass in 1980, and when the Salvadoran army massacred 800 people in the village of El Mozote the following year.

"He would have much to confess in court," Montenegro said.

However that prospect is removed in El Salvador under a 1993 amnesty law pardoning those who committed rights crimes during the civil war.

In April last year, the United States deported another former Salvadoran defence minister from the civil war period, Carlos Eugenio Vides, who was in office from 1984 to 1989.

Other retired Salvadoran military officers also went to America after the war.

A colonel who was minister for public security between 1989 and 1992, Inocente Orlando Montano, is in a US prison serving 21 years for migration fraud and perjury.

Spain is seeking his extradition on accusations of having participated in the murder of seven Salvadoran-Spanish Jesuit priests and two women in 1989.
The United States is "disturbed" by reports of the disappearance of five Hong Kong booksellers from the Chinese semi-autonomous city, a US State Department spokesman has said.

The missing men all worked for Mighty Current, known for books critical of Beijing, which closely monitors and controls dissenting voices.

The men are feared to have been detained by Chinese authorities, adding to growing unease that freedoms in the former British colony are being eroded.

"We are disturbed by reports of the disappearances of five people associated with the Mighty Current publishing house and we share the concern of the people of Hong Kong regarding these disappearances," State Department spokesman John Kirby said yesterday.

"We're following the issue closely," he said.

Kirby made reference to a January 4 statement by Hong Kong's chief executive Leung Chun-ying "expressing concerns about the potential implications of this case, and we share those concerns."



Pro-democracy lawmakers, activists and residents fear that Beijing is trampling the "one country, two systems" deal under which Hong Kong has been governed since it was handed back by Britain to China in 1997.

The two sides agreed Hong Kong was to preserve its freedoms - which include freedom of speech - and way of life for 50 years. Chinese law enforcers have no right to operate in the city.

In 2014, tens of thousands of protestors brought parts of Hong Kong to a standstill for more than two months after Beijing imposed restrictions on candidates for the city's next leader.
A US drone strike in Pakistan's restive northwestern tribal region killed at least five suspected Taliban militants, officials said here today.

The CIA-operated spy plane attacked a hideout of the Pakistani Taliban in Mangroti area of North Waziristan, a senior security official said.

"Five militants were killed and several others injured in the attack," he said.

He said one of those killed was identified as Noor Saeed who was commander of outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan.

The death toll could not be verified through independent sources as the area is out of reach for the media. It was the first strike of 2016 after at least 13 drone attacks last year.

Pakistan opposes the drone attacks and has condemned them as interference in its internal affairs claiming that the strikes kill innocent civilians and help militants to get more recruits.
Top officials of the Obama administration have met leading Internet companies in Silicon Valley in an effort to build cooperation with them in combating online radicalisation and recruitment by terror groups.

"This meeting is the latest in the administration's continuing dialogue with technology providers and to ensure we are bringing our best private and public sector thinking to combating terrorism," a senior administration official said after the meeting was over in San Jose yesterday.

The meeting was attended by the White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough, Assistant to the President for Counter Terrorism and Homeland Security Lisa Monaco, US Chief Technology Officer Megan Smith, among other senior administration officials.

Representatives of a number of leading Silicon Valley companies including Google, Facebook, Yahoo and Microsoft attended the meeting.

The meeting comes after Obama's call in his address on December 6 for government and technology community to work together to combat terrorism and counter violent extremism online.

"This engagement is a result of that call. The administration is committed to taking every action possible to confront and interdict terrorist activities wherever they may occur, including in cyberspace," the official said.

Earlier in the day, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest, said the goal of the engagement was to find additional ways to work together to make it even harder for terrorists or criminals to find refuge in cyberspace.

Earnest said this was an opportunity to be a robust discussion about ways they can make it harder for terrorists to leverage internet to recruit, radicalise, and mobilise supporters to carry out acts of violence.

Earnest said there was precedent for this kind of cooperation with tech companies, when they had worked together to combat child pornography and hoped to find common ground with them



"Many of these technology companies that are participating in the meeting today are run by patriotic Americans who don't have any desire in seeing their technology being used to aid terrorists, or make it easier for terror organisations to recruit followers and incite them to carry out acts of violence," he said.
The US feels that time has come for Pakistan to walk the talk on the promises it made - both in public and in private conversations - that there would be no discrimination in its action against terrorist networks and bring the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack to justice.

Amid Indian intelligence reports that groups and people within Pakistan planned and executed the strike on the Pathankot airbase, a senior State Department official said Pakistan should not come out with lame excuses to shield them as has been the case with the Mumbai terrorist attack.

"They (Pakistan) have said publicly that they are going to investigate. They have said publicly that they are not going to discriminate between terrorist groups. We look to see actions to back up those words," the official added.

The official indicated that the US wants to give the civilian government time and space to act on its words and hoped that Pakistan would not repeat its past trend wherein it is seen reluctant in taking actions against terrorist groups under one excuse or the other.

"They said that they (Pakistan) would investigate it and we need to let that process go forward. But obviously we want to see that the perpetrators be brought to account (as soon as possible)," the State Department official said on anonymity.

The official also expressed a sense of satisfaction over the reaction by the Nawaz Sharif government on the first few days of the attack.

"It is not about believe. We have to take the word that they have given. They have said that they are going to investigate. Let them do that," the official said when asked if they believe in what Pakistan is saying this time.

Senior US Government officials have been in close contact with their Pakistani counterparts in the aftermath of the attacks in Pathankot and Afghanistan's Majar-e-Sharif urging them to take right course of action which, if they do, would not only be a great confidence building measure but would also help improve relationship with India.

Referring to the outpouring of support for India among the US lawmakers in the aftermath of the Pathankot attack, the officials indicated that in the absence of a concrete action by Pakistan against these terrorist groups, it would be a tough call for the Obama Administration to push for any new military aid for Pakistan to through the Congress.

"We understand this is a challenging time. This is a complicated relationship. We do not agree with Pakistan about everything...We look to see actions to back up those words," the official added.

According to officials, it would become very difficult for the US Government to convince the Republican-controlled Congress to approve a sale of eight F-16s to Pakistan if Islamabad is seen as reluctant in taking action against these terrorist groups.

Over 20 lawmakers from both the Republican and Democratic parties have come out in support of India, officials pointed out.
Supreme Court judge Justice F M Ibrahim Kalifulla today advised the subordinate judiciary to utilise the services of Alternative Disputes Resolution (ADR) mechanism to bring down the huge number of pending cases.

He said the subordinate judiciary lags in referring cases to mediation forums. In this context, he recalled an amendment to Civil Procedure Code in 1999 and brought into effect in 2002, enabling out of court settlement of disputes through the Alternative Disputes Resolution (ADR).

The judge was speaking after inaugurating the regional conference on mediation, involving the states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh and Union territory of Pondicherry.

He noted that between 2005 and 2015, 38,592 cases were referred to mediation and conciliation centres in Tamil Nadu, of which only 6,359 were settled, constituting 18 per cent.

"It shows we have our own shortcomings. A total of 8,644 cases lapsed. This data reveals the unmotivated state of affairs as far as mediation is concerned in the state."



The five aspects requiring immediate attention were referring cases to mediation, lack of skills, disinclination shown by litigants, poor infrastructure and a reasonable honorarium, he said.

Chief Justice of Madras High Court Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul said litigants win cases by spending more money than relief and added that the element of fight should be reduced in litigations.

"Reaching an amicable settlement to both parties is a social issue," he said.

Chief Justice of Chattisgarh High Court Justice Navin Sinha suggested that mediation be made a compulsory pre-litigation requirement at least for certain types of cases as was being done in the United States.

Making mediation attempt compulsory before a case is filed can bring down the number of cases filed, he said.

Justice Satish K Agnihotri, who also spoke, cited the Vedas, describing Lord Krishna as the first ever mediator and invoked Prophet Mohammed, to lay stress on mediation and conciliation as an effective alternative to adversarial litigation system to settle/prevent cases.

He said Lord Krishna attempted mediation between the Pandavas and Kauravas and that Prophet Mohamed had said one who turns to amicable settlement turns to prosperity.
Vietnam's civil aviation authority has accused Beijing of threatening regional air safety by conducting unannounced flights through its airspace to a disputed reef in the South China Sea, state media said today.

The Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV) warned that the unannounced flights "threaten the safety of all flights in the region," according to a report in the Tuoi Tre Daily newspaper.

In quotes published in Vietnamese official online newspaper Zing.Vn late Friday, CAAV Director Lai Xuan Thanh said a protest letter about the flights had been sent to Beijing, as well as a complaint to the United Nations' Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

"Chinese aircraft have ignored all the rules and norms of the ICAO by not providing any flight plans or maintaining any radio contact with Vietnam's air traffic control centre," he added.

In the seven days to January 8, Vietnam logged 46 incidents of Chinese planes flying without warning through airspace monitored by air traffic control in the southern metropolis of Ho Chi Minh City, according to civilian aviation authorities quoted in the Tuoi Tre Daily newspaper report.

Chinese state media on Wednesday said two civilian planes landed on an island in the Fiery Cross reef in the contested Spratly Islands, which have long been at the centre of bitter wrangling between Vietnam and its giant neighbour.

The two "test flights" Wednesday followed an initial aircraft landing on Saturday, which prompted the first formal diplomatic complaint from Hanoi.

The Spratlys are claimed by Hanoi but controlled by Beijing, which has ramped up activity in the area by rapidly building artificial islands, including airstrips said to be capable of hosting military jets.

The recent flights, slammed by Vietnam as a "serious violation" of its sovereignty, have sparked alarm, with the United States warning Thursday that the move would raise tensions in the disputed waters.

The Philippines has also said it would file a protest.

China asserts ownership over virtually all the South China Sea, putting it at odds with regional neighbours the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan, which stake partial claims.

Several of these nations, including Vietnam, have also built facilities on islands they control, but at a significantly slower pace and smaller scale than Beijing.

Rioting broke out in Vietnam after Beijing sent an oil rig into contested waters in 2014, and at least three Chinese people were killed.
Security forces will not take any claim about sighting of suspected terrorists lightly and act fast to verify the information, a senior Punjab police official said today.

"We will take information (about suspected terrorists) very seriously and act fast on the same to verify the claims," DIG, Border Range, Kunwar Vijay Partap Singh said today.

The effort is to either authenticate the presence of militants or completely rule it out, the DIG added.

However, police did not receive any information about sighting of suspected terrorists today, Gurdaspur SSP Gurpreet Singh Toor said, adding "We will continue to remain alert."



Notably, Punjab police came under severe criticism after reports emerged that police, initially, did not take seriously information provided by SP Salwinder Singh about abduction of his and two associates by terrorists. However, state police has denied it.

After six terrorists striking at Air Force base station at Pathankot, security forces have been on their toes as many locals in and around Gurdaspur district claimed to see terrorists, promoting the security officials to launch extensive search operation to authenticate their claims.

The first information about presence of two terrorists emerged in Gurdaspur district on January 6 when a farmer, Satnam Singh, of Pandher village claimed to have seen two men in army fatigues moving in suspicious manner when he was working in the fields.

Not taking any chances, area around Tibri cantonment area was cordoned off and security officials in a joint operation of Punjab Police, BSF, SWAT team and Army launched extensive search operation in Pandher village in Gurdaspur.

During this operation, drone, chopper, dog squad and bullet proof vehicles were pressed into service to trace the location of suspects.

As security officials were busy in conducting their search operations, another witness identified as Lovepreet Singh claimed that two suspects in army fatigues had inquired about Tibri cantonment area.

However, security forces had to call off their extensive search operation yesterday after they found no suspected terrorist.

A day before yesterday, Punjab police launched a major



combing operation at a house near the Tibri cantonment area after it got information of two suspects.

However, security officials did not find anything suspicious during six-hour long operation.

Yesterday, another villager claimed that he had seen "two suspects" in army fatigues at sensitive Tash Pattan area near the Indo-Pak border.

Security officials immediately swung into action but again nothing suspicious was found.

Notably, Director General of Police (DGP), Punjab directed the cops to augment night time deployment of the police in the state in the wake of terrorists attack at the Pathankot Air base.
The police today arrested five persons including a woman in connection with the alleged gangrape of a minor girl here in South Dinajpur district.

The woman allegedly took the victim, the daughter of a friend of hers, to a house at Khadimnpur locality in Balurghat town from her home on some pretext on January 7, police said.

She then handed her over to the four men and left the place while the class IX girl was allegedly raped by one after another.

On returning home, the girl narrated what had happened to her parents who lodged a complaint with the police.

Suspecting that the woman used to earn money this way, the police are questioning her.

The woman Alo Sarkar and the four men-- Rintu Das, Prasenjit Kundu, Shankar Sarkar and Sanjit Mohant-- were arrested today.
A 20-year-old woman has been apprehended by security agencies for allegedly stealing belongings of commuters travelling in the Delhi Metro.

The incident occurred yesterday around 2:00 PM at the Chhatarpur station when a 30-year-old woman complained to on-duty CISF personnel that her bag had gone missing from the X-ray baggage scanner while she was getting frisked.

Officials said the security personnel immediately scanned CCTV footage of the area and found a different woman picking up the bag from the scanner and boarding the next available train from the station.

The said woman, a resident of Gurgaon, was apprehended by CISF personnel from the M G Road station and her interrogation led to the disclosure of her involvement in other thefts in the past in the rapid rail network operational in the national capital region.

She was handed over to Delhi police and is under arrest, they said.
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu today urged citizens to work hard for the development of the state and consider people of Singapore and Dubai as their "role model".

Addressing a public meeting at Alankanpalli, he said people of Singapore and Dubai worked sincerely in developing their countries.

"We (the people) too have to work with commitment to develop our state, which is suffering with deficit budget and with many teething problems," he added.

Naidu also urged residents to face the drought with courage.

"People should not fear of drought. Drought should fear to enter in to this area," he said, adding they should depend on "dug-out ponds" to store water for improving ground water, for which government has sanctioned one lack ponds for every district.

"I am taking all steps to bring Godavari water to Rayalaseema to develop sustainable agriculture for flourishing this region," he added.

"Steps will be taken to complete 'Buggavanka' works and flights will be operated between Kadapa and Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Amaravathi (the new capital) soon", Naidu added.

He said that his government is investing Rs 500 crore (to purchase) medical equipment for providing best medical care to the poor.

Meanwhile, Naidu also inaugurated ten social welfare schools, eight primary health center buildings, 21 Stri sakti bhavans.

The Chief Minister also laid foundation stone for the 'Haj House' and for a 50-bed hospital to be constructed at Rajampeta.

District incharge Minister G Srinivas Rao, Information Minister P Raghunath Reddy and senior officials were present on the occasion.

(REOPENS DEL 132)



Questioning the critics, Naidu said that they have even said that BJP will be the loser as traders would be the biggest hand.

He said that even in 1978, similar steps were taken by the then Janata party government, of which the present BJP was also a part. The dimensions of the problem are much more serious and bigger now, he said.

Naidu said that ever since the Modi government took over, it had been working against those who hoard black money. He said that government even gave chance to people to make voluntary disclosures and pay the taxes.
Yemen told the United Nations that it has rescinded its decision to expel the leading UN rights official in the country, diplomats said.

The Yemeni foreign ministry announced a day earlier that it had declared George Abu al-Zulof persona non grata, accusing him of lacking impartiality in his reporting on the human rights situation.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon had urged the Saudi-backed government to reverse its decision and allow Zulof to stay, warning that Yemen would be falling short of its obligations by "impeding" UN human rights work.

Diplomats said Yemen's foreign ministry had notified the United Nations yesterday that the decision had been reversed and was to send official confirmation.

Relations between the United Nations and the government of President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi have become testy over the world body's increasingly vocal criticism of the Saudi-led coalition's air campaign in Yemen.

Earlier yesterday, Ban said he had received "troubling reports" of cluster bomb attacks on January 6 on the rebel-held capital Sanaa and warned that the use of these munitions "may amount to a war crime."



Cluster bombs are banned under a 2008 international convention, although Saudi Arabia and the United States are not signatories.

The UN chief said he was "deeply concerned about the intensification of coalition airstrikes and ground fighting and shelling in Yemen, despite repeated calls for a renewed cessation of hostilities."



He is "particularly concerned about reports of intense airstrikes in residential areas and on civilian buildings in Sanaa, including the Chamber of Commerce, a wedding hall and a centre for the blind," said the statement.

UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed was in Riyadh yesterday for talks on renewing a ceasefire in Yemen, which faces the threat of famine amid the dire humanitarian crisis.

Yemen descended into chaos when the coalition began airstrikes in March to push back Iran-backed Huthi rebels who had seized Sanaa.

More than 5,800 people have been killed and 27,000 wounded since then, according to UN figures.

Yemen's government sat down with the rebels and their allies in Switzerland last month for six days of talks that ended with no major breakthrough.

The UN envoy has called for a new round of talks on January 14 but the sides have yet to confirm that they will attend.
By Barbara Lewis and Kirstin Ridley

BRUSSELS/LONDON (Reuters) - Volkswagen is unlikely to face U.S.-style fines in Europe over its emissions scandal because of a softer regulatory regime and its home country Germany's determination to protect its car industry, EU sources and legal experts say.

The carmaker has been embroiled in crisis since last September, when it admitted it had cheated U.S. emissions tests using software known as "defeat devices".

The U.S. Justice Department is suing the German company for up to $46 billion for allegedly violating environmental laws - though some legal experts expect the final settlement to be far lower.

Other countries have also acted - Brazil and South Korea, for example, have both imposed fines of well over $10 million on VW for cheating on emissions.

But although VW says 8.5 million of the 11 million vehicles world-wide that contain banned software are in Europe, no European national authority has ordered any penalties so far.

EU sources and lawyers say it would be surprise if the firm received any significant fines in the European Union.

While the bloc outlawed defeat devices in 2007, there are no defined penalties for using such software to mask emissions. Under U.S. law, by contrast, carmakers must identify and describe any emissions control devices, meaning they can be pursued for omission or wrongful declaration, widening the scope for punitive action.

EU states are also reluctant to mete out tough financial penalties, because of an unwritten rule in the 28-member club that some national interests are sacred, according to the EU sources - and Germany's car industry has traditionally been one of them.

VW, Europe's biggest motor manufacturer, employs more than 750,000 people in Germany, and has been a symbol of the nation's engineering prowess. VW, Daimler and BMW, Germany's big three German carmakers, hauled in revenues of 413 billion euros in 2014, far bigger than the German federal budget, which stood at just under 300 billion.

Even if the European Commission wanted to impose penalties on VW, its powers are curbed. The EU executive can directly only impose financial sanctions on trade and competition issues. Lucas Bergkamp, a partner at law firm Hunton and Williams in Brussels, said any change to that "would be a huge step".

"In general when companies are already in great difficulties due to some crisis, European governments tend to be understanding and will not necessarily seek the imposition of all possible penalties," he said, adding he could not comment on VW specifically.

VW also declined to comment on anything pertaining to possible fines in Europe.

LAWSUIT THREAT

Britain has said it could prosecute a vehicle manufacturer if there were proof it knew or was reckless when supplying false information, for which there is an unlimited fine on conviction.

But proving recklessness is a high hurdle - it remains unclear who at Volkswagen knew what and when, while the company itself has blamed a small cadre of employees.

Lawyers say a bigger financial threat to VW than any EU regulatory fines is likely to come from private litigation. Lawyers are gathering investors for group actions in Europe and hundreds of lawsuits on behalf of enraged drivers have been filed in the United States.

The VW scandal has exposed the weaknesses of the regulatory system in Europe, where there is no EU-wide authority with oversight of car testing - like the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) - but instead a patchwork of 28 national agencies with varying standards.

A vehicle approved in one country can be sold across the bloc, which environmental campaigners say allows carmakers to take their pick from national regulators.

However European Commission proposals, expected over the coming weeks, will add some teeth to the EU regulatory regime and penalties for excessive emissions could start to bite around the start of the next decade.

Some members of the European Parliament and environment campaigners want an independent EU-wide regulator, along the lines of the EPA.

European Commission spokeswoman Lucia Caudet did not entirely rule out establishing such a body, but said there were other ways to improve oversight.

"All options are on the table, but greater oversight can be achieved without the need for another EU agency," she said, adding it was too soon to give detail of a proposal expected "in the coming weeks".

The International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT), which alerted the EPA to Volkswagen's use of defeat devices to trick regulators, has said mandatory, independent testing of cars once they are in use is crucial to good regulation.

EU PLAN

EU sources said the European Commission proposal was expected to ensure greater independence of the private firms that test car emissions in the bloc, which typically have worked very closely with the national regulators.

The proposal, which would then face around 18 months of vetting from the European Parliament and member states before it can become law, could also hand powers to the European Commission to verify that cars on the market conform with standards and to exact clear penalties if they do not.

The sources said the plan from the EU executive would be viewed as far too ambitious by some member states and not ambitious enough by members of the European Parliament.

The parliament has set up an inquiry into whether the European Commission has done enough to police the car industry, but the Commission also faces counter-pressure from the industry and member states.

Even at the height of the VW scandal, in October last year Germany led the dilution of separate new rules to restrict how much pollutants cars are allowed to emit above official limits, EU sources said.

The sources said that Germany was supported by Britain, which is unwilling to hand extra powers to Brussels; Prime Minister David Cameron, whose party includes several Eurosceptic lawmakers, is seeking to renegotiate Britain's relationship with the EU ahead of a referendum on membership of the bloc.

The difference in the tone struck by U.S. and European authorities was underlined this week; even as the United States announced its legal action, the European Commission said it was giving VW an extra month - until the end of January - to explain why carbon dioxide levels emitted by cars were higher than stated.

For breach of carbon dioxide limits, there are clear penalties that so far have never needed to be enforced because EU cars - even allowing for Volkswagen's discrepancies - have as an average across the EU fleet been well below the legal limit of 130 grams per kilometre (g/km).

But the target becomes more challenging in 2021 when a 95 g/km limit takes effect and the penalty for breaking that law will be 95 euros for every gram above the limit.

"When we get to the 95 gram target, things (fines) could get more interesting," said Julia Poliscanova, policy officer at campaign group Transport & Environment.

(Additional reporting by Alissa de Carbonnel in Brussels, Andreas Cremer, Ilona Wissenbach and Georgina Prodhan in Frankfurt and Caroline Copley in Berlin; Editing by Pravin Char)
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday arrested the founder of PACL Ltd over allegations the property company cheated investors of $6.8 billion, in what local media is calling the country's biggest financial scandal.

The arrest of Nirmal Singh Bhangoo comes 17 months after markets regulator the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) ordered PACL to return money to millions of investors, saying the company was running an illegal investment scheme.

The scheme promised depositors returns on investments in agricultural land, the regulator said.

PACL has argued it was selling land to customers and not investment schemes, and so was not subject to SEBI's regulations.

did not get any response to phone calls to PACL's head office in New Delhi on Friday.

PACL founder Bhangoo and three other company officials were arrested on Friday as part of the ongoing investigation into allegations of criminal conspiracy and cheating, said R.K. Gaur, a spokesman for India's Central Bureau of Investigation.

The case involves alleged collection of about 450 billion rupees ($6.8 billion) from roughly 55 million investors across the country, Gaur said, terming it a "Ponzi scheme case".

Indian regulators have stepped up scrutiny of unregistered investment products over the past two years, plugging regulatory loopholes that had long allowed unregulated entities to raise billions of dollars from small investors. Many people ended up losing their life savings in these schemes.

The founder of conglomerate Sahara India has spent the last 21 months in jail for not complying with a court order to return $5.4 billion to investors who put money in a 2008-11 time deposit plan that was later ruled illegal.

Sahara's business empire includes overseas hotels such as the New York Plaza and a Formula 1 racing team.

($1 = 66.6721 rupees)

(Reporting by Aditya Kalra; Writing by Sumeet Chatterjee; Editing by Mark Potter)
Andrew Lesky, 43, arrested and charged with two counts of aggravated assault, a third-degree felony and two felony counts of possession of a dangerous weapon by a restricted person.

LOGAN  Andrew Lesky, who is charged with attempted aggravated murder and aggravated kidnapping, appeared in 1st District Court Friday, claiming his rights to a fair trial are being violated. The 44-year-old former Idaho man has been in jail since being arrested and charged in October 2014 with allegedly threatening a couple with a gun.

Leskys newly assigned public defender, Chad Hutchings said his client had filed the writs of habeas corpus to argue he was being treated unfairly by deputies and should be transferred to a different jail. He also requested the county attorneys office be removed as prosecutors in the case, claiming they had illegally intercepted private letters between the defendant and his then attorney, Shannon Demler.

During the hearing, Demler testified that he didnt think he had received all of the mail Lesky had sent to him from jail. He told the court of a conversation he had with county attorney, Spencer Walsh, in May 2015. During that exchange, Walsh disclosed to him that investigators had mail which should have been private under the attorney-client privilege. Demler said, Walsh had told the investigators to destroy the mail, after he had learned about it.

Demler told of another experience when jail deputies gave him a packet of mail that included a letter Lesky had written to him with a list of witnesses that should be subpoenaed for his trial.

Earlier in the day, Deputy Jennifer Moser testified about Leskys treatment at the jail, saying he had to be closely monitored for breaking rules. She described how during the past 14-months he has been moved between medium and maximum security for threatening jail staff, destroying jail property, refusing to follow orders and other violations.

Logan City Police detective Robert Olsen told the court he was reviewing some of Leskys mail after they learned of a postcard the defendant sent from the jail. The card had asked a friend to dispose of some stolen items that were at a mobile home trailer in Franklin, Idaho.

An inmate who has been incarcerated at the same time, testified how Lesky offered him $1000 to lie and give a false statement to back up his defense.

Lesky was arrested after reportedly trying to shoot his ex-girlfriend outside her apartment. It is also alleged he threatened her and another man with a handgun and a knife. He faces a total of 10 felonies and 17 misdemeanors.

The hearing will continue January 15 when Lesky is expected to take the stand in his defense.

<hr /><p style=text-align: center;>will@cvradio.com
Girl Scout Troop 96026 prepared hundreds of military care packages to be shipped to troops overseas. The care packages contained items donated by J.A. Garcia Elementary School students and staff. The event was sponsored by the American Red Cross-Services to the Armed Forces.

SHARE Security Service Foundation donated a $10,000 check Dec. 7 to the USO of South Texas, officials said. The funds will be used to buy food and baby supplies, provide free lunches and purchase a computer for the USO computer room. The USO of South Texas provides services to Nueces, Kleberg, Aransas and San Patricio counties. Bob Paulison (from left), USO of South Texas past chair; Nancy Allen, USO of South Texas president and chief executive officer; David Villarreal, Security Service Federal Credit Union Ingleside branch manager; Irma Trujillo, Security Service Portland branch manager; John Pasch, USO chair; Crystal Gomez, Security Service Aransas Pass branch manager; and Julie Balboa, South Texas vice president for Security Service and vice chair for the USO of South Texas, participated in the presentation.

NEC kin may apply for scholarships

Nueces Electric Cooperative is accepting applications from high school seniors for its Ramiro De La Paz Scholarship program and the Washington D.C. Youth Tour Leadership Program trip. To be eligible to enter either program, students must be a dependent or have a legal guardian who is a Nueces Electric Cooperative or NEC Retail Member.

Ramiro De La Paz educational scholarships have been presented to 68 area students since 2004. For 2016, the Co-op has increased the number of awards from six awards to twelve awards. All scholarship applications are required to be postmarked on or before Feb. 12.

For 27 years, co-ops across the county have been sending students to Washington, D.C., for the annual Youth Tour Leadership Program. Four lucky youths will join approximately 150 other Texas delegates as they travel to Austin and Washington D.C. Winners receive the all-expense paid trip, spending money, and shirts to wear each day they are on the trip. This unique adventure gives students the opportunity to watch history come alive with VIP tours of monuments. Delegates end the week with a celebration aboard a Potomac River Boat. To enter, students must complete an entry form and write a short 300-500 word essay. The deadline for Youth Leadership applications is Jan. 29.

Information and applications can be found at www.nueceselectric.org.

AHA seeking knit red hats for infants

The American Heart Association is seeking handmade crocheted or knit red hats to provide to newborns born this February, American Heart Month, as a part of the national Little Hats, Big Hearts project. This is the first time the Coastal Bend will participate.

With Little Hats Big Hearts, the American Heart Association raises awareness of cardiovascular diseases, the No. 1 killer in the United States, and congenital heart defects, the most common type of birth defect, occurring in one of 100 babies. Hats will be given to each baby born in Corpus Christi in the month of February. The American Heart Association is working with the mother-baby units and Neonatal Intensive Care Units in area hospitals, so donations of red hats in both premature and newborn sizes are needed. The American Heart Association is also accepting donations of red yarn to help those who will be knitting or crocheting hats. Yarn must be cotton or acrylic, medium to heavy weight and machine washable and dryable.

All mailed-in donations must be received at the American Heart Association's Corpus Christi Office by Jan. 15. In-person donations can be made between Jan. 4 and Jan. 15 during regular business hours at the office. The mailing and in-person address is: 500 N. Shoreline, Ste. 203N.

Information: www.heart.org/littlehatsbighearts

Area women submit material for book

University of North Texas Press announced the release of "Tales of Cooking is From Trans Pecos to the Piney Woods and High Plains to the Gulf Prairies," edited by Frances Brannen Vick.

The publication contains stories and more than 120 recipes, from long ago and just yesterday, organized by the 10 vegetation regions of the state. Mary Margaret Campbell, director of George West Storyfest, and Jean Granberry Schnitz, former president of the Nueces County Legal Secretaries Association, submitted contributions.

Vick is a retired director of the University of North Texas Press. In retirement, she has co-authored "Petra's Legacy," winner of the Coral Horton Tullis Award for the best book on Texas history and "Letters to Alice: Birth of the Kleberg-King Ranch Dynasty"; and edited Literary Dallas. She is past president of the Texas Institute of Letters, Texas State Historical Association, The Philosophical Society of Texas, and is a Fellow of the Texas Folklore Society and the Texas State Historical Association. She lives in Dallas.

Compiled by Natalia Contreras
Rachel Denny Clow/Caller-Times A water taxi has been proposed for linking travelers from the Sports Entertainment and Arts District to North Beach once the Harbor Bridge is removed. (shot 1/30/14)

SHARE Contributed Rendering The Harbor Bridge relocation project received final approval from the federal government Friday. This rendering shows what the new bridge will look like.

By Chris Ramirez of the Caller-Times

The federal government has given final approval of plans to build a new Harbor Bridge.

The Federal Highway Administration signed a Record of Decision on the $1 billion project late Friday.

"This is a monumental decision for the Coastal Bend and the State of Texas," Port authority chairwoman Judy Hawley said. "Having a world class 21st century bridge will support the state's economic growth for decades to come."

The team of Flatiron Constructors Inc. and Dragados USA Inc. was tapped in May to design and build the new span, but could not begin construction until the document was signed and civil rights complaints associated with the project were settled.

Local politicians reacted to the news Friday with relief and excitement, and said the development illustrated teamwork between various government agencies.

"This is another example of how working together can move even more than mountains," Nueces County Judge Loyd Neal said. "This close collaboration has undoubtedly changed the face and economic capability of South Texas for generations to come."

The 1950s-era bridge, with its Napoleon hat-shaped design, is regarded as the very symbol of Corpus Christi, linking the city's Northside with North Beach. State transportation officials want to move and raise it to accommodate taller vessels through the Corpus Christi Ship Channel.

Transportation officials in 2014 named the so-called "red route" as the preferred path for the new bridge. That option places the new bridge about 1,000 feet west of the existing one and carves a path through Hillcrest, one of Corpus Christi's historically black neighborhoods.

Erin Gaines, an attorney for Austin-based Texas RioGrande Legal Aid, which represents residents living in the project's path, hadn't seen the document Friday night. She hoped it honored terms of a voluntary relocation and buyout agreement brokered last month by the port, the City Council, the local housing authority and the Texas Department of Transportation.

The port agreed to pay as much as $20 million to purchase properties in Hillcrest, which is bounded by West Broadway Street, Floral Street, Martin Luther King Drive and the right of way of the proposed Harbor Bridge.

"We'll have to look carefully at the (ROD document) ... to make sure it includes those mitigations," Gaines said. "It's our intent to continue to educate residents of these neighborhoods about ... the terms of these agreements and their options moving forward."

The highway administration's signature likely kills a federal investigation into whether the state violated the civil rights of residents living in Hillcrest and nearby Washington-Coles, another black community, when it chose the red route.

In an April 3 letter, Hillcrest residents Jean Salone and Rosie Porter wanted investigators to look into whether selection of the red route "lacked adequate consultation with and mitigation for the predominantly minority communities affected."

Gaines would not say whether residents would continue to push for legal action against the project.

Mayor Nelda Martinez acknowledged the port's investment and leadership, describing efforts to make the bridge project a reality "a historic win" for the region.

"This new world class bridge will have global reaches and significant economic multipliers for our Coastal Bend families for many years to come," she said.

The span has a vertical clearance of 138 feet. Transportation officials envision the new bridge to be six lanes with a minimum 205-foot vertical clearance above the 400-foot-wide ship channel.

Twitter: @Caller_ChrisRam

Harbor Bridge Replacement Project Moves Forward
CALLER-TIMES FILE Former CCISD spokeswoman Kim Sneed (left) will replace retiring Lynn Kaylor as Flour Bluff ISD spokeswoman.

SHARE

By Beatriz Alvarado of the Caller-Times

A 24-year veteran of the Flour Bluff ISD will retire this month and her position will be filled by a former Corpus Christi ISD spokeswoman, a news release states.

Lynn Kaylor will retire Jan. 30 and Kim Sneed will take her place. Sneed will start the new position Jan. 19, the release states.

Sneed has worked as a communication specialist for the Corpus Christi ISD for 10 years. She earned a bachelor's degree in marketing from Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi and bother her children attend Flour Bluff ISD.

Sneed has 15 years of experience in communications and public relations, the release states.

Twitter: @CallerBetty
A student threatened to harm his family but did not make threats against a school.

SHARE

By Julie Garcia of the Caller-Times

Two men were found dead, and a woman later died, from gunshot wounds sustained early Tuesday in Beeville.

The Bee County Sheriff's Office responded to the shooting about 6:30 a.m. in the 4200 block of Charco Road, according to a county news release made available on social media.

Officers found two men, identified as Barry Garcia and Marc Fuentes, dead from "apparent gunshot wounds," the release stated.

A woman, Rosalinda Posada, also sustained a gunshot wound and was taken to Christus Spohn Hospital Beeville. Posada died at the hospital.

The sheriff's office and Texas Rangers are investigating. Several law enforcement agencies stayed on scene for more than eight hours.

Coastal Bend College-Beeville closed the campus Tuesday "to allow the Bee County Sheriff's Department to conduct their investigation into this morning's incident on Charco Road."

About 3 p.m., the college lifted a lockdown on the dormitories, but said students were not allowed to "roam campus or have visitors," according to its Facebook page. Around the same time, Charco Road was reopened to traffic.

This is the second investigation into deaths in the town of about 13,300 people in the past few weeks.

In August, a man was arrested on suspicion of capital murder and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in connection with the death of two women at a house in the 1700 block of Garfield Street.

About 3:30 a.m. Aug. 22 police responded to several calls of fights at a party and someone running over several people at that location, Detective Gregory Baron told the Caller-Times in August. Sabrina Villagomez was taken to Christus Spohn Hospital Beeville and was released.

Baron said Pablo Garnica Jr. got into his pickup, and as he was leaving he struck three women. Maria Lucia Martinez died at the scene, and Emilee Barrera died en route to the hospital, he said.

Pablo Garnica Jr. remains in Bee County Jail on those charges, plus two outstanding felony warrants.

Twitter: @Caller_Jules
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO/CORPUS CHRISTI POLICE DEPARTMENT Police are looking for a man who acted like he had a gun when he robbed a dollar store Thursday.

SHARE CONTRIBUTED PHOTO/CORPUS CHRISTI POLICE DEPARTMENT Police are looking for a man who acted like he had a gun when he robbed a dollar store Thursday.

By Julie Garcia of the Caller-Times

Police are looking for a man who acted that he had a gun when he robbed a dollar store Thursday.

About 10 p.m. a store employee walked outside the store, located in the 2900 block of Holly Road, to retrieve merchandise and was followed by a man when she re-entered the store, police said. The man was wearing a blue hooded sweatshirt with the hood pulled over his head and a dark blue bandanna over his nose and mouth, according to a police news release.

The employee believed the man was armed with a gun because he pointed an object at them through the front pocket of his sweatshirt, police said. The suspect demanded money and ran out the store once he had it in hand.

Camera surveillance caught footage of the robbery, and images were obtained from the video. If you recognize the person in the photos or have any information, contact Corpus Christi police at 361-886-2840. If you would like to remain anonymous, call Crime Stoppers at 361-888-8477 or submit the tip online at www.888TIPS.com.

Twitter: @Caller_Jules
GABE HERNANDEZ/CALLER-TIMES Prosecutor Retha Cable

SHARE

By Krista M. Torralva of the Caller-Times

The Texas State Bar is reviewing allegations a top Nueces County prosecutor engaged in professional misconduct.

First Assistant Retha Cable has 30 days to respond to grievances filed by defense lawyer and former judge Angelica Hernandez, according to a letter from the state bar dated Dec. 30.

"After receipt of the lawyer's written response, the Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel shall investigate the complaint to determine whether there is just cause to believe that the lawyer has committed professional misconduct or suffers from a disability," the letter states.

Hernandez accuses Cable of having private conversations with judges to gain favor in cases. Private conversations about cases, called ex parte communication, is prohibited. Hernandez cites three cases in two grievances, both dated Nov. 30.

"It is a common pattern and practice for Retha Cable to resort to these types of tactics," Hernandez wrote in one of the grievances.

Two of the grievances accuse Cable and 214th District Judge Jose Longoria of engaging in unethical conversations about cases involving Hernandez's clients.

Longoria declined to comment on the specific cases but disputed the claims.

"I don't ex parte with lawyers," Longoria said.

Cable declined to comment to the Caller-Times and referred questions to her attorney late Friday.

"I don't believe it is ethically appropriate under the rules for a lawyer to comment on matters that are pending before the grievance committee, which is confidential by law," Cable's lawyer David Bright said.

District Attorney Mark Skurka declined to answer questions but said in a text message: "No disciplinary action has ever been taken against her. She is one of our most experienced and dedicated prosecutors. I'm not going to comment on the possible existence of any possible grievance, if one exists. The is wholly within the jurisdiction of the State Bar to determine the validity of any allegations against any attorney."

Cable received her law license in 1993 and has no public disciplinary history with the state bar, according to the bar's website. She is the office's top supervisor under Skurka.

In one case, Hernandez accused Cable of going to Longoria alone to convince him to change his order for a defendant facing several charges, including a murder charge, to be committed to a state hospital after a mental competency evaluation found him incompetent to stand trial.

In another case, Hernandez accused Cable of privately asking Longoria to cancel a hearing for which prosecutors were not prepared.

"I am fearful of her retaliation against him and me for filing this grievance but it cannot continue," Hernandez wrote in one of the grievances.

The grievance also cites a 2014 capital murder trial in which Hernandez was not involved. However, in a hearing in January 2015, the defendant Trinity Ringelstein's lawyers called Cable to testify and accused her of asking another lawyer for a favor involving having an inappropriate conversation with 148th District Judge Guy Williams.

Cable testified she asked lawyer Gabi Canales, who is friends with Williams, to talk to him about rescheduling a trial to accommodate Cable's schedule.

Lawyer Terry Shamsie called that ex parte communication. "It wasn't really like that," Cable said.

"I contacted a friend of mine and asked for advice and asked about a reset," Cable explained. "And they said they wouldn't feel comfortable going to the judge and I said, 'You're right, I was wrong and I got this,' and she said, 'I knew you would,' and that was the end of our conversation," Cable said.

Twitter: @CallerKMT
Friday, January 8, 2016 at 4:36PM

Just like Apple has recently made their Apple SIM available to travelling LTE-enabled iPad customers, it looks like Microsoft may be looking to sell its own SIM cards and data service subscription to Windows 10 users with tablets and PCs that can accommodate SIM cards.

A new Cellular Data app will work in concert with the Microsoft SIM to access prepaid data services with no contracts or commitments and will use the same account that customers use to pay for apps on the Windows Store. It also appears that the service will only access data in the country where it was bought, no roaming will be allowed. It looks like Microsoft will limit the service to France, the UK and the US at first.

Source: Thurrott.com
"It was obvious from day one the truffle industry was going to be an export industry That's really part of what we're trying to do here - grow the industry and generate information of use to both small and large growers, and hopefully develop a great export industry that will benefit everybody."
The region considers itself an independent republic, but only three other non-UN states recognise its sovereignty. Nagorno-Karabakh's successful attempt to break away led to a war between Azerbaijan and Armenia. A ceasefire was declared in 1994, but border tensions remain high and internal displacement of ethnic Azeris and Armenians is an unresolved issue.
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Our Promise: Welcome to Care2, the world's largest community for good. Here, you'll find over 45 million like-minded people working towards progress, kindness, and lasting impact.

Care2 Stands Against: bigots, racists, bullies, science deniers, misogynists, gun lobbyists, xenophobes, the willfully ignorant, animal abusers, frackers, and other mean people. If you find yourself aligning with any of those folks, you can move along, nothing to see here.

Care2 Stands With: humanitarians, animal lovers, feminists, rabble-rousers, nature-buffs, creatives, the naturally curious, and people who really love to do the right thing.

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Applications are invited by Military Engineer Services. MES is looking out for 580 Mate (Tradesman) posts. To know more about pay scale, eligibility, how to apply, selection procedure and important dates scroll down.

Name of the post and Number of posts



Mate: 580 Posts.

Category Wise Vacancy Details:

Electrician

Refrigerator Mechanic

Fitter General Mechanic

Carpenter

Mason

Pipe Fitter

Painter

Veh Mechanic

Fitter

Upholster

Valveman

Who is Eligible for the Military Engineer Services Job?

Qualification:

Candidates interested to apply for the above post must be qualified as per the organisations requirement. Qualification becomes manadatory to test the skills and their perseverance in doing a certain job.

Candidates should have Matriculation pass from a recognized Board and Industrial Training Institute pass certificate.

Age Limit: 18-27 years.

Pay Scale: Rs. 5200-Rs. 20200 with grade pay Rs. 1800/-

How Candidates are Selected for Military Engineer Services Job?

Candidates interested in the above job must be aware of the selection process of this organisation.

Candidates will be asked to give written exam which will be followed by an interview. These two factors determines the selection of the candidate.

How to Apply for Military Engineer Services Job?



Candidates who are interested to apply for the above mentioned jobs must see that they are eligible for this job. Once they find themselves eligible they can apply for this job through post in a prescribed format.

Do not forget to send the applications along with other necessary documents.

Important Dates Associated with the Military Engineer Services Job?



1. Last Date to Apply: 15th January 2016.

2. Last Date to Apply far flung areas): 23rd January 2016.

3. Date of Written Examination: 6th March 2016.
Applications are invited by Union Public Service Commission. UPSC is looking out for 35 Various Posts. To know more about pay scale, eligibility, how to apply, selection procedure and important dates scroll down.

Name of the Post and Number of Posts

1. Joint Directors- 3 Posts

2. Agricultural Engineers- 2 Posts

3. Medical Officers/ Research Officers- 2 Posts

4. Senior Examiners- 4 Posts

5. Senior Scientific Officers Grade- II (Armament)- 4 Posts

6. Senior Scientific Officer Grade- II (Chemistry)- 1 Post

7. Senior Scientific Officers Grade- II (Engineering)- 4 Posts

8. Senior Scientific Officer Grade- II (Metallurgy)- 1 Post

9. Economic Officers- 2 Posts

10. Deputy Assistant Director- 1 Post

11. Senior Grade of Indian Information Service in Ministry of Information & Broadcasting- 6 Posts

12. Assistant Director Grade- II (Industrial Management and Training)- 2 Posts

13. Assistant Director Grade- II (Leather and Footwear)- 1 Post

14. Deputy Director (ER)- 2 Posts

Who is Eligible for the UPSC Jobs?



Qualification:

Candidates interested to apply for the above post must be qualified as per the organisations requirement. Qualification becomes manadatory to test the skills and their perseverance in doing a certain job.

To know more about the required qualification in detail log on to this organisation's website.

How Candidates are Selected for UPSC Job?

Candidates interested in the above job must be aware of the selection process of this organisation.

Candidates will be asked to give written exam which will be followed by an interview. These two factors determines the selection of the candidate

How to Apply for UPSC Job?



Candidates who are interested to apply for the above mentioned jobs must see that they are eligible for this job. Once they find themselves eligible they can apply for this job through post in a prescribed format.

Do not forget to send the applications along with other necessary documents.

What are the Important Dates?

1. Last Date of Online Application: 28th January 2016.

2. Last Date for Printing of Completely Submitted Online Application: 29th January 2016.
Welcome to SwanseaOnline - your home for the best news, sports and what's on coverage of the city.

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Follow us on Facebook and Twitter | Swansea City news | Ospreys news | InYourArea
While some London residents are complaining about the noise and behavior of supercar owners on city streets, others are cashing in on the supercar invasion that takes place every summer in the British metropolis. No, Im not talking about obvious winners such as hotels, restaurants and other businesses, Im talking about supercar chasers, the folks that run around filming the cars.

23-year-old Paul Wallace is one of them  he owns the SuperCarsofLondon YouTube channel that has produced its fair share of interesting videos in recent years. It looks like it made a fair amount of money too, as the channel has racked up more than 65 million views since it was founded five years ago.

According to a report from Metro, Wallace managed to turn his childhood dream into a reality and upgrade from a Vauxhall Astra 1.6 to a used Audi R8 worth 50,000 ($83,755), thanks to revenues from the ads associated with the supercar videos.

Wallace, a student from Watford living with his parents, says he makes up to 1,750 ($2,931) a month, a sum that is said to cover payments on the Audi, insurance, tax, and general running costs.

It is a dream come true. It is surreal knowing I started this all from filming supercars. Owning a car like this is what I have always dreamed of. It looks amazing inside and out, it drives fantastic and sounds brilliant, Wallace says, adding that he would like his next car to be a Lamborghini Aventador.

However, on the description of one of his videos with the R8 there is a list of companies titled My First Supercar Sponsors. It is not clear whether these firms contributed money on the car or are just technical sponsors. Either way, Wallace is one happy man  scroll down to see the R8 and hear his impressions about it.

By Dan Mihalascu

VIDEO


Londons primary Ferrari dealership, HR Owen Ferrari, has just been named the best dealership for the Italian company in the world.



The dealer beat over 200 other Ferrari dealerships worldwide and has received a 2015 Ferrari Formula One car, which it will be able to display at its showroom on Old Brompton Road in South Kensington.

The award was given at the Ferrari world dealer conference late last year, with the automaker deciding on a winner after examining every aspect of the business. For example, it assesses the training and expertise of staff, if a dealer offers a demonstrator of every model, customer satisfaction and the typical time needed for servicing a car. H.R. Owen Ferrari managed to score the maximum in all categories.

H.R. Owens Ferrari brand director James Champion commented: To become a Ferrari dealership in the first place requires exemplary service in all areas, so to be named the best of an already impeccable set of dealers, is one of our proudest achievements to date.

The dealership is expected to display the F1 car at numerous events across the year. Its a rolling chassis, which means it isnt fitted with an engine, but still quite a sight to behold.

PHOTO GALLERY
Sergio Marchionne admitted that he will stop trying for a new merger and will instead focus on how to make FCA more competitive.



The Italian-Canadian executive has been vividly campaigning for a merger with GM for the most of last year, without the slightest hint of success. In fact he revealed on Monday that he met Mary Bara less than a month ago in Washington: I dont think I will have another coffee with her. It wont happen again in the future, said FCAs boss.

GMs board had vetted and rejected Marchionnes proposal earlier in June, with the executive continuing to apply pressure, up until now as it appears. He also said that he received proposals from non-ideal partners and that hes planning to concentrate on achieving his ambitious targets in order to make Fiat-Chrysler stronger, including the increase of deliveries by about 50 per cent in the next three years.

The separation of Ferrari from FCA raised around 4 billion euros ($4.4 billion) for Fiat-Chrysler and increased the combined value of the companies, including Ferrari.

Now, its time to start working on the announced 48 billion-euro expansion plan, with Sergio Marchionne already trying to deal with slowing demand in China and the drop in Brazils market, which lead him to delay the new models planned for Alfa Romeo and Maserati and focus more in the mainstream market with Jeep and Fiat.

Its time for FCA to bring in a car executive to run the company, Erik Gordon, business professor at the University of Michigan said to Bloomberg. There is nothing left for Marchionne to do that he is good at.

The 63-year old plans to retire at the end of 2018 and he still faces a huge task. We went back to concentrate on the 2018 plan which would boost Fiat Chryslers value and its position in a deal, said Marchionne. The difference is that it wont be me to do it. It will be someone elses duty.

PHOTO GALLERY
Cartoon Brew: What is it about stop-motion that you love so much?

Robert Morgan: As a kid, I always found stop-motion creepy. I love horror and making nightmarish films, and stop-motion animation is perfect for that. The way everything moves has an unnatural, uncanny feeling, a weird jerkiness. Everything is somehow alive and dead at the same time.

Building tension is a large part of your work. How do you do it?

Robert Morgan: When you establish something, there is a certain expectation in the audience for what happens next. So my job is to simultaneously satisfy that expectation, but deliver in a slightly different way. The audience more or less knows whats going to happen, but it turns out to be not exactly what they thought. Its about creating a threat to hang over each scene.

With horror, its important to decide what to show and what not to show. How do you make those decisions?

Robert Morgan: Some things are more powerful unseen, and some things are more powerful when they are seen. It depends on the thing that youre suggesting. When its something mundane, like a man following you down the street, we all know what a man looks like, so you dont need to show him. But when its something very specific that the audience has never seen before  like the scene in David Cronenbergs Videodrome, where a videotape is inserted into a sexual opening in the stomach of the main character - well, as Cronenberg himself said, how do you suggest that? Youve just got to show it.

You direct animation and live-action films. What do you perceive as the main difference between them?

Robert Morgan: In a way, audiences read live-action differently from animation. In my live-action films, I need a certain credibility to make them work. Whereas in animation, credibility is unimportant; in fact, incredibility is better. With animation, theres already a distance; thats not a person youre looking at, its a symbol of a person. That distance allows me to express things in a very different way from live-action. If the events in my animation happened to real actors in a gritty, realistic way, I couldnt imagine people actually enjoying my work in the same way. Animation allows you to experience and enjoy stuff because it is too indirect to be truly hurtful. Its a kind of almost abstract violence.

In my live-action films, I need a certain credibility to make them work. Whereas in animation, credibility is unimportant; in fact, incredibility is better.Robert Morgan

Your work is about violence and nightmares, but also quite emotional.

Robert Morgan: Thats true, but its a very primal kind of emotion  and thats exactly what animation is really good at. I always think of my characters as extremely basic organisms. The things they want and need are very basic, which is why my characters are often reduced to worms and maggots. They are simple, primal organisms with simple, primal urges.

However, this doesnt mean my characters cant evoke complex emotions in the viewer. It just means that they are not complex. People find the main character in Bobby Yeah to be quite ambiguous. They kind of like him, but hes ugly and violent, although hes also sort of cute and tender as well. He evokes all of those different emotions, even though he is just a basic organism.

Do you regularly have nightmares?

Robert Morgan: On the contrary, my dreams are extremely boring. I dream about things like doing the dishes. Its unfortunate, really. Having nightmares would make it so much easier for me to come up with ideas.

Bobby Yeah makes one face during the whole film, which is a unique filmmaking choice.

Robert Morgan: I made my very first student film out of papier-mache, and I didnt know how to animate a facial expression with that. More importantly, I couldnt really imagine what expressions he would have other than afraid. The film was about a character having a nightmarish experience, so what else would he be doing? Hes not going to be smiling, is he? Afraid is his only mood, so I left it at that. It worked, so Ive been doing it since.

Doesnt a fixed expression restrict your storytelling or acting?

Robert Morgan: Actually, I found it to be the opposite. It opens up the character, and allows the viewer to project onto it. Have you ever seen a beetle struggling to push massive mountains of rabbit poo, or something? You feel his struggle, right? The beetle doesnt need to be gritting his teeth; you can feel it through his performance, and the context.

During your Animateka retrospective, you said Bobby Yeahs process was entirely improvised from start to finish. No synopsis, script, or storyboard.

Robert Morgan: I spent a long time writing scripts with lots of rationalizing and analyzing, and asking what everything meant all the time  and I was just really bored of that. I wanted to see what would happen if I created a strong character, and a world for him to move around in, and what that would suggest to me. Id animate a bit, then edit and watch the film from the beginning up to the new bit; then Id ask what could happen next. The great thing about this process is that I was never thinking where it was going. At any point, anything could happen. Ive tried to be really open to that.

If you write a script, you start becoming very rational. That has its uses, and Ive made films like that, but my goal for Bobby Yeah was to make a film where the concept of analysis is just a joke. I wanted the film to feel like a dream, stream-of-consciousness, completely unpredictable. And the best way for me to be unpredictable is basically to not have any idea what Im doing. [Laughs] If I didnt know where it was going, if I was surprising myself about what would happen next, then surely the audience would feel the same. That was my theory.

Bobby Yeah is 23 minutes long. How do you keep the audience interested when they have no idea where the film is going?

Robert Morgan: The character, and his performance, takes you through, particularly when Bobby Yeah is confronted with those red buttons. The audience becomes Bobby when he wants to press the button, and knows something terrible might happen, but he cant stop himself. Its that push and pull that the audience can relate to. The audience doesnt necessarily like him, but they understand him.

You used to sell Bobby Yeah online. How did that go?

Robert Morgan: The income was kind of OK, but not nearly enough. To be honest, I kind of gave up on selling shorts online. I used to sell Bobby Yeah for just 99 cents, for which you could stream and download the film  and people were still pirating it. They just wouldnt pay, but theres really no use complaining. Its just the way it is. Id rather have people see my work, than not.

When real funding stopped being available, I realized I had to make a decision: either I just dont make films anymore, because there is no funding, or I stop complaining about it and, you know, make something!Robert Morgan

European shorts are mostly made through state funding, but theres none in Britain anymore. Are you still able to make your shorts?

Robert Morgan: The thing is  and this is part of the reason why I made Bobby Yeah  when real funding stopped being available, I realized I had to make a decision: either I just dont make films anymore, because there is no funding, or I stop complaining about it and, you know, make something! Its hard work, but the idea of not doing it is too depressing. Deciding not to be a filmmaker anymore is not an option.

For me, the trick is just to make shorts on really low budgets. But actually, if you compare Bobby Yeahs cost, like 3,000, to The Separations 70,000 budget, you see theres not a big leap in terms of quality. The only difference is I cant live off of it. Im supporting myself through part-time teaching.

Did you consider commercial work to support yourself, instead of teaching?

Robert Morgan: Id like to do commercials, but its hard to imagine what I would sell with my style. I mean, really, what would it be? Maybe some public information-type of film, like an anti-smoking advert. Rather than using my style to sell something, using it to warn people about something. Actually, now that I think of it, I could imagine people asking me for that sort of thing.

Dumb Ways to Die, Robert Morgan-style?

Robert Morgan: Yes, with stop-motion animated blood and slime! You know, I wouldnt turn that down.

Why do you think people enjoy your shorts?

Robert Morgan: I dont know, actually  its bizarre. But I like my films. And my rationale is that if I like them, for whatever reason, there must be others liking them as well. Because contrary to what people may think, Im actually a very normal person.

Whats next for the very normal Robert Morgan?

Robert Morgan: Ive been developing three feature films over the past few years. This year, Im going to push all of those forward, and hope one of them gets some traction, funding-wise. Weirdly, theres more prospect to make a feature film in Britain than a short, because at least you can sell a feature, which makes it easier to get funding. But the downside to features is they  or at least mine  require a certain budget, so it can take quite long to gather the necessary funds.

Im hopeful, but its really easy to get disappointed by these things. Thats why Im also going to start working on a new short film of my own, to keep myself sane. I might try and do another film like Bobby Yeah. Its a really fun way of making a film: Just entertaining yourself, because you dont know whats going to happen next.
Photo: Deborah Pfeiffer

Penticton's Memorial Arena sustained some damage as a result of recent snow.

According to communications officer Simone Blais, during the last few weeks, snow built up on the north side of the arena roof.

The snow slid down this week, landing on a flat-roofed addition containing two dressing rooms. It damaged rooftop heating units and caused a partial collapse of the ceiling inside the dressing rooms.

The dressing rooms will be closed until at least next week while the extent of the damage is assessed.

Outside inspections indicate there is more snow that could slide off, so the area has been cordoned off for public safety.

Mayor Andrew Jakubeit said user groups won't be impacted by the repairs.

It's the latest in a string of recreation facility woes in recent months.

McLaren Arena was closed in December due to an electrical problem.

The Penticton Community Centre leisure pool reopened in late November, after being closed for repairs.

It, along with the rest of the aquatic facility, had been closed for a tile replacement project. But, when the leisure pool was refilled with water, some of the drains cracked, requiring additional maintenance.
At Only Natural Pet, we believe products are only as good as the ingredients and care that go into them. Believe it or not, many pet products contain ingredients with known health risks in addition to unnecessary and inappropriate fillers. At Only Natural Pet, every product and ingredient are scrutinized for health and safety.
Alexei Kondratenko was more or less alone in the world when he was drafted into military service in Ukraine in August 2014.

Kondratenko, now 31, was living on his own in Kiev, the capital, working as a welder. He had served in the army from 2003 to 2005, and, he said through interpreters, he wondered why it took so long for him to be called up when his country began fighting Russian-backed separatists and Russian troops in the spring of 2014.

I wanted to defend my country, he said.

Six months later, while driving through Luhansk, the vehicle he was riding in was blown up, killing a fellow soldier and injuring several more.

Of the survivors, Kondratenko had the most severe injuries, said Father Stepan Sus, director of the Center for Miliary Chaplaincy of the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Lviv. Sus, who visited the Chicago area for an Advent mission in December, first met Kondratenko when he was recovering from his injuries in a military hospital in Lviv.

Kondratenko lost his left hand and part of his arm, had his spleen removed and still has shrapnel spread through the left side of his body, said Sus, who helped translate for Kondratenko. His vehicle  something like a Humvee  was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade, according to Kondratenko.

He has been in the Chicago area since September, working on rehab and most recently being fitted with a prosthetic hand that uses the electrical impulses generated by his arm muscles to control its movements. He arrived in the city through the generosity of the Ukrainian community here, as well as with some help from Archbishop Cupich and other members of a U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops delegation who visited Ukraine in June.

Archbishop Cupich and Archbishop Joseph Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, the USCCB president, visited to see the scale of humanitarian suffering in Ukraine, where clashes between armed separatists and Ukrainian armed forces continue despite a peace agreement.

Ukraine, which was ruled mostly by Russia and other neighboring countries for centuries, regained full independence in 1991 after the collapse of the Soviet Union, but relations between the Russian Federation and Ukraine deteriorated with the annexation of Crimea by Russia and incursions in another nearby Ukrainian territory in 2014. Separatists continue fighting in the eastern region of the country.

A delegation of Ukrainian religious leaders visited Washington, D.C., in November to plead for more humanitarian aid from the U.S. government. According to a statement they released, 8,000 people have died and more than 17,000 have been injured and wounded. The number of those displaced is over 1.39 million, with 174,000 children among them.

Ukraine was not prepared for this war, Sus said. Ukraine was not expecting this war.

Sus and the military chaplaincy were already working with Ukrainian Catholics in the United States, especially with St. Joseph the Betrothed Ukrainian Catholic Church, 5000 N. Cumberland Ave, before Kondratenkos case came to their attention. Parishioners at St. Joseph had already raised money to send one wounded Ukrainian soldier to London for a prosthetic leg.

We have already raised around $300,000 this year, said Father Mykola Buryadnyk, pastor of St. Joseph the Betrothed, from many people, many people who do not want to be recognized.

Jaroslaw Dzwinyk, an orthopedic surgeon at Swedish Covenant Hospital worked with orthotist Gene Bernardoni and Ballert Orthopedic, a clinic that provides prosthetics, and approached Buryadnyk and said that they could to help a wounded Ukrainian soldier here, if the parish could sponsor someone.

Buryadnyk contacted Sus, and they identified Kondratenko as a good candidate.

There are so many people who need help, Sus said. We are looking for those who are most in need.

Kondratenko, whose mother and grandmother are both deceased, had no family to help him. Ukrainian Catholics in the United States and the military chaplaincy in Lviv got all the paperwork in order to request a visa.

Then the U.S. State Department turned down the visa application, apparently for the same reasons Sus thought he was a good candidate for help: he had no job or family in Ukraine.

They thought he wouldnt come back, Sus said.

Thats when Archbishop Cupich and Archbishop Kurtz of the USCCB came into the story. Sus escorted them on a visit to the military hospital in Lviv as part of a trip to Ukraine in June, and he asked them to bring the issue to the attention of U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt when they met with him the following day.

I saw that Archbishop Cupich was from Chicago, and I thought he would be interested, Sus said. He saw that everything was prepared, and he said, This is the reason for my trip to Ukraine.

It was providence, Buryadnyk said.

Two hours after the archbishops scheduled meeting with the ambassador, the phone call came: Kondratenkos visa had been approved.

Kondratenko arrived in Chicago in September, and has been undergoing rehab. He was first fitted for a mechanical prosthesis, and more recently, with the bionic hand that allows him move it with the electrical impulses in his arm, at the cost to the clinic  a discount of $50,000 to $60,000.

He has also enjoyed the hospitality of families from St. Joseph the Betrothed and has toured the sights in Chicago.

Hes met lots of people who provided him mercy, Buryadnyk said. Hes been taken care of by people he had never met before. Its a good sign for the Jubilee of Mercy. The community welcomed him with warmth.

Sus said Kondratenkos visa is renewable for up to 10 years in six-month increments, as long as Kondratenko needs treatment. The military chaplaincy is staying in touch, and Sus said there should be no worries that Kondratenko will violate the terms of his visa.

Well vouch for him, he said. We want to be able to send more people.
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Police have charged a 25-year-old Chattanooga man with rape after getting a DNA match tying him to the crime scene.

Arrested in the incident that took place Sept. 23, 2014, was Joshua Orlandus Wells.

Police were summoned to Memorial Hospital, where a woman had arrived saying she had been raped inside her vehicle at an unknown location.

She said she did not remember too many details of the incident because she had taken one and a half Xanax pills.

She said she was at the Brainerd Walmart when she saw two black males she did not know. She said she was unsure if they spoke to her first or she spoke first.

She said they left together and she followed them to several locations. She said finally one of the men got into her vehicle and drove her to an unknown location.

She said he stopped at what appeared to be a dark alley. He turned off the ignition and locked the doors.

The woman said she said "no" when he told her to take off her clothes.

She said he proceeded to hit her in the right temple, pull down her pants and rape her.

A full sexual exam was performed on the woman at the hospital. The findings were sent to the TBI Lab.

Police said during the processing "a CODIS match was found to belong to Joshua Wells."


Tennessees upcoming tourism news is consolidated for your convenience below. For a complete list of Tennessee events, visit tnvacation.com/calendar.



Ongoing



Union City  The traveling exhibit In the Footsteps of Sergeant York remains open through Feb. 14 at Discovery Park of America.



Jan. 8-9



Spring City  Matt Cordell performs a tribute to Jason Aldean on Friday and to Elvis on Saturday 7:30 p.m. ET at the Tennessee Valley Theatre.



Jan.

8-10Chattanooga  An expert crew shares a two-hour Sandhill Crane viewing cruise 10 a.m. ET and 2 p.m. ET on the River Gorge Explorer.Jan. 9Chapel Hill  Local Tennessee wineries and heavy hors doeuvres are featured at the Taste of Horton 2016 6 p.m. CT at Henry Horton State Park Lodge. Tickets are $40 for meal and membership.Cookeville  Win prizes and meet WestSide merchants 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. during the WestSide Scavenger Hunt at the Cookeville Depot Museum.Nashville  Experience a musical journey with scenery from around the world and from NASA science data during Bella Gaia as part of Dome Club 6 p.m. CT at Adventure Science Center.Jan. 10Nashville  Its your last chance to see Ink, Silk and Gold: Islamic Art from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and Shinique Smith: Wonder and Rainbows before they close at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts.Jan. 12-17Memphis  Matilda the Musical brings its heart-warming story to Memphis at The Orpheum Theatre. Tickets range from $25 to $125.Jan. 14Nashville  Enjoy music by Choro Nashville, a six-member acoustic music group that performs century-old Brazilian music 6-8 p.m. CT in the Frist Center Cafe at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts.Jan. 16Maryville  Hansel and Greta Opera by Humperdinck is performed as a full opera by the Knoxville Opera Company 11 a.m. ET in the Main Gallery of Blount County Public Library.Granville  The Sutton Ole Time Music Hour has its 400th performance of the syndicated radio show 6 p.m. CT in the Sutton General Store.Jan. 16, 28Bristol, TN/VA  Local community members can share their Tennessee Ernie Ford stories, photographs and memorabilia as part of History Harvests 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. ET Jan. 16 and 1-5 p.m. ET Jan. 28 at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum.Jan. 16-17Elizabethton  Learn from Tennessee crafters in watercolor painting 9 a.m. to noon ET Jan. 16 and sewing 1-4 p.m. ET Jan. 17 as part of the Traditional Arts Winter Workshops at Sycamore Shoals State Historic Park.Jackson  See the latest and greatest at the Gun and Knife Show 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. CT Saturday and 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. CT Sunday at the Fairgrounds in Jackson.Jan. 17Nashville  Let Freedom Sing is an annual music tribute to the triumphs of the civil rights movement performed by the Nashville Symphony 7 p.m. CT at the Schermerhorn Symphony Center.Jan. 19Memphis  The Science of Beer brings together professional and home brewers while educating attendees on breathalyzer chemistry, the history of beer and beer making and PTC Paper and Bitter genetics 6:30-9:30 p.m. CT at The Pink Palace Museum.
Smisek's abrupt United exit amid investigations into dealings with the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey was a "ding dong, the witch is dead" moment for many. But United directors such as Munoz, who was on Smisek's Continental and then United board, seemed to have underestimated the ill will that built up against him and by extension the airline through declines in service quality.
Illinois air travelers won a nearly two-year reprieve to use their driver's licenses and identification cards to get through airport security and onto a plane, despite the state's continuing failure to adopt more stringent federal standards for issuance of its IDs.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security on Friday afternoon announced that air travelers with driver's licenses or ID cards issued by states and territories that are not in compliance with Real ID Act standards can continue to use those cards until Jan. 22, 2018.

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The shift gives breathing room to Illinois, which had expected its driver's licenses and IDs to be inadequate for air travel, including domestic flights, as early as this spring.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security last fall declined to give Illinois a third deadline extension for meeting the Real ID Act standards put into place in 2005. As a result, it was expected that Illinois travelers by the middle of this year would need to present a passport or be subject to extra security checks unless Illinois was able to get another extension for compliance.

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Homeland Security Secretary Jeh C. Johnson on Friday said, "over the next two years, those states that are not Real ID compliant are strongly encouraged to meet the requirements of the law."

States that want to make their ID cards compliant must take a variety of steps, including incorporating anti-counterfeit technology into the card, verifying the applicant's identity and conducting background checks for employees involved in issuing driver's licenses.

Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White still plans to seek another compliance extension, said spokesman David Druker. Also, White's staff is talking with members of the General Assembly about potential legislation to fund the changes necessary to bring the state's ID cards up to the federal standards.

The cost for that effort is estimated at $50 million to $60 million. The costs, as well as concerns about protecting individual privacy, have been stumbling blocks so far.

Illinois is among five states and one territory that are not in compliance with the act and do not have extensions in place. As of Sunday, its driver's licenses and IDs will no longer be adequate for entry into federal buildings and military bases that require IDs for entry.

The potential impact of those changes does not appear to be far-reaching.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security left it up to individual facilities to figure out acceptable alternative ID requirements. Some possibilities include asking for another form of identification or asking federal employees to escort their visitors into the building, a Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman said Friday.

The Northern District federal court, which includes the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse downtown and a courthouse in Rockford, will continue accepting Illinois driver's licenses and IDs. Courts were exempted from the new requirement to protect public access to court proceedings, according to a court spokeswoman.

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At Naval Station Great Lakes near North Chicago, entrance practices will remain the same, said spokesman John Sheppard. All visitors must be vetted in advance by the military or hosted by a specific member of the military. Illinois driver's licenses have not been sufficient documentation for entry in recent years.

If a federal facility does not require an ID for entrance now, that will not change, said Amanda DeGroff, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security. The Kluczynski and Metcalfe federal buildings in the Loop, for instance, do not require IDs for entrance.

Residents who plan to visit federal offices that require IDs should check in advance to see how entrance requirements have changed, DeGroff said.

The Great Lakes office of the General Services Administration, the administrator for federal buildings in this area, did not respond to requests for information on revised ID requirements at local buildings.

kbergen@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @kathy_bergen
Democratic Rep. Luis Gutierrez of Illinois leads a rally outside the White House to urge President Obama to grant temporary protected status to some immigrants already ordered to be deported. (Michael Reynolds / European Pressphoto Agency )

Reporting from Washington  President Obama had long endured the "deporter-in-chief" label, shedding it only in 2014 when he used executive action to stop the removal of millions of otherwise law-abiding immigrants in the U.S. illegally.

Then, over the recent holiday season, deportations began again. In weekend raids, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents targeted parents and children who had arrived from Central America, reigniting anger at the White House from within his own party.

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The swift action, which caught many Democrats off-guard, threatens to blur what had been a stark contrast between the party's position and that espoused by leading Republican presidential candidates, most notably Donald Trump, who proposed tough ways to keep migrants out.

Obama administration officials have said they are stepping up the removal of those who had already been given deportation orders.

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All three Democratic presidential candidates have distanced themselves from the White House action. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus is demanding an audience with Obama.

Democrats on Capitol Hill conveyed their anger during a private session hosted by Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) and administration officials last week in the Capitol. One leading lawmaker, Rep. Luis V. Gutierrez (D-Ill.), held a protest Friday outside the White House.

We're upset. I don't know who was advising that this was a smart move to make at the holidays.  Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-Whittier), chairwoman, Congressional Hispanic Caucus

"We're upset," Rep. Linda T. Sanchez (D-Whittier), chairwoman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, said in an interview. "I don't know who was advising that this was a smart move to make at the holidays.  Parents are keeping kids home from school, many are not going to work or are afraid to even leave the house to buy groceries. They're literally tearing apart families."

The administration, though, has made it clear there will be no immediate slowdown of the operation that resulted in the apprehension of 121 adults and children last weekend.

Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson acknowledged "the reality of the pain" the removals cause families. But he framed the operation as part of a broader strategy, announced with Obama's executive action in 2014, to prevent another surge of unaccompanied migrant children from Central America.

In the summer of 2014, an unprecedented 68,000 unaccompanied minors from mostly Central American countries showed up at the southern border, overwhelming authorities. The new raids are focusing on parents and children who arrived that year.

A large number of families illegally crossed the border from Mexico last fall, setting off worries of a new influx in 2016.

"This should come as no surprise," Johnson said in a lengthy statement last week. "I have said publicly for months that individuals who constitute enforcement priorities, including families and unaccompanied children, will be removed."

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The tough move, though, threatens to erode the goodwill that Obama's executive actions created among the Latino and immigrant community after years of rising deportations under his administration.

Many Democrats view the Central Americans not as immigrants but refugees fleeing violence in Honduras and elsewhere, most recently El Salvador, where gang violence has flared. The two countries have rivaled for having the world's highest homicide rate.

Democrats have also criticized the federal family detention facilities along the border that serve as holding facilities while migrants await hearings or deportation, calling the centers unsuitable for children.

Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton "believes the United States should give refuge to people fleeing persecution, and should be especially attentive to the needs of children," said campaign spokeswoman Xochitl Hinojosa. "She believes we should not be conducting large-scale raids and roundups that sow fear and division in our communities."

In a letter to Obama on Thursday, another top Democratic contender, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, said he was "extremely disappointed" in the action and urged the White House to provide temporary protection to the migrants.

"These raids contravene President Obama's directive to 'more humanely' enforce our nation's immigration laws," Sanders wrote.

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As part of its broader strategy, the Department of Homeland Security has beefed up Border Patrol operations and cracked down on smuggling and trafficking rings. Congress approved $750 million in aid to the Central American

nations as part of the year-end budget deal to improve the underlying problems of poverty and public safety that cause many families to flee.

Though many of the raids have been underway in southeastern states, California's lawmakers have taken a particular interest in the issue.

At a Friday news conference, Rep. Norma Torres (D-Pomona), an immigrant and the first Guatemalan American elected to Congress, urged restraint and a focus on deporting criminals.

lisa.mascaro@latimes.com
"It was these little contained moments of joy, watching animals frolic," she said as she extolled the show's pleasures to me afterward. "It made you wish that all human beings could be that way too. It's that hope: Can't we all just get along?"
Laura De La Fuente holds poster boards filled with photos of her late boyfriend Esau Castellanos, who was shot to death in March 2013 by police who said he fired on them. I want to know the truth, she said. I know he had no gun. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)

The account the two Chicago police officers provided about the fatal shooting of Esau Castellanos came to a dramatic conclusion.

After following Castellanos' car as it sped at about 80 miles an hour and then crashed on a Northwest Side street, they said, they approached the wreckage. Then, they said, Castellanos opened fire, forcing them both to dive to the ground to dodge the bullets before they killed Castellanos  firing 19 shots and hitting him three times.

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Almost immediately, though, the officers' account of the March 2013 shooting began to fall apart. No gun was found on Castellanos. Officer Juan Martinez, who told detectives he had been shot in the head, was never shot; he suffered just scrapes and bruises.

Then, two years later, the officers' account shifted as they suggested for the first time that a second man might have been in the car with Castellanos, a father of three from Mexico who worked as pizza delivery man and hoped someday to open his own restaurant.

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The FBI told the Tribune on Friday that it was conducting a civil rights investigation into Castellanos' death, one of a handful of questionable police shootings that had been referred to federal authorities by Chicago's Independent Police Review Authority, which investigates allegations of police misconduct.

An IPRA spokesman said the agency referred the matter to the FBI in the weeks after the shooting.

Why the federal investigation remains open some two years after the FBI became involved is unclear.

"The FBI will continue to collect all available facts and evidence and will ensure that the investigation is conducted in a fair, thorough and impartial manner. As this is an ongoing investigation, we are not able to comment further at this time," said Garrett Croon, a spokesman for the bureau.

Cook County prosecutors are working with the FBI, according to Sally Daly, a spokeswoman for State's Attorney Anita Alvarez.

Questions about Castellanos' death come as the city is under scrutiny for police-involved shootings and how investigations of those shootings are handled  not only at the scene but in the days, weeks, months and even years after as they are litigated in the courts. A brief reference to the case was contained in 3,000 pages of emails related to police shootings that the city released on New Year's Eve. Among those emails were some from IPRA.

The U.S. Department of Justice has opened a civil rights investigation into the Chicago Police Department's use of force, while the FBI office in Chicago is known to be examining some shootings, including that of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald in October 2014. Disturbing video of McDonald being shot 16 times prompted murder charges against Officer Jason Van Dyke and the firing of police Superintendent Garry McCarthy.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel, in particular, has come under fire, as has IPRA for its flawed investigations. The city's Law Department, which defends the city against lawsuits, has also been the subject of scrutiny in recent days for how it deals with claims of police misconduct. The mayor announced that an outside law firm would conduct a review of the department.

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The city is representing Martinez and his tactical unit partner, Officer Shawn Lawryn, in a federal civil rights lawsuit by Castellanos' survivors, who allege that his shooting was unjustified. Daniel O'Connor, the attorney for Castellanos' family, said Castellanos was unarmed and posed no threat to the two officers.

"The city told his daughter that her dad was shooting at the police and that's why he's dead," O'Connor said in an interview Friday. "They put it all over the news about how he was a bad guy and how these cops dove for cover and valiantly returned fire. It was a lie.

"The guy just had a bad accident," O'Connor added. "He needed medical attention. He didn't need to be shot."

Both officers had been on active duty until Friday night, when the Tribune asked the department about their status.

Interim Superintendent John Escalante responded that he had been unaware of the FBI investigation but was now placing both officers on administrative duty.

"I recently learned the FBI has an active investigation into an officer involved shooting which has been open for more than two years. Upon learning of this, I have ordered that both officers be immediately placed on administrative duties," he said in an emailed statement.

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However, records show that city attorneys and IPRA had both been told of the FBI investigation. It was unclear what former Superintendent McCarthy had been told.

Lawryn declined to comment, and Martinez could not be reached. Lawyers for the city also declined to comment.

Martinez said in a deposition that he had been interviewed by the FBI  perhaps in the summer of 2013, he said. Lawryn said in his deposition that he had referred FBI agents to his lawyer.

Chicage Police Department officer Juan Martinez describes the situation that led to the fatal shooting of Esau Castellanos during a deposition with Daniel O'Connor, the attorney for Castellanos' family. (Chicago Tribune)

Chicage Police Department officer Shawn Lawryn describes the situation that led to the fatal shooting of Esau Castellanos during a deposition with Daniel O'Connor, the attorney for Castellanos' family. (Chicago Tribune)

At the time of the shooting, Martinez had been on the force for 14 years and had completed a stint at the police academy training other officers. Lawryn had been with the department about six years. Both were assigned to a tactical unit in the Albany Park police district, wearing plainclothes and driving an unmarked car.

Castellanos, who was from the state of Michoacan, had worked as a dispatcher and a delivery driver, but he did not have a driver's license. He pleaded guilty in 2009 to a drug conspiracy charge and was sentenced to two years of probation, court records show.

Castellanos drew the two officers' attention just before 3 a.m. on March 16, 2013. According to their sworn statements, Martinez was at the wheel as they drove east on Wilson Avenue near Pulaski Road. Castellanos, in a Honda Civic, turned right onto Wilson. His girlfriend said he had gotten off work at 11 p.m. and was on his way to visit his uncle. His blood alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit, records show.

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Martinez and Lawryn estimated that Castellanos was traveling at least 80 mph, according to their depositions.

They followed, traveling at 50 to 60 mph, thinking he might have been fleeing from a crime, though they did not know of any, according to their depositions. They never turned on their blue lights or siren, nor did they radio to other officers that they were following a speeding car, they said.

Moments after they spotted Castellanos, he sideswiped a car before crashing near Kimball Avenue  a handful of blocks from where they began their pursuit. Martinez said he trained the car's spotlight on Castellanos and that he and Lawryn got out of the car and told Castellanos to show his hands. Martinez said he saw a blue steel revolver pointed at him; Lawryn was less sure of the kind of handgun, but he was certain that Castellanos had a gun, according to the depositions.

The officers dove for the ground as gunshots rang out, they said.

"As I see the gun, I'm trying to get out of the way of that bullet, and I'm diving to my right," Martinez said in his deposition last January.

O'Connor then asked, "What bullet was that?"

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"I'm trying to get away of where he's aiming the weapon, where the weapon is being aimed," Martinez said.

Lawryn's account was similar.

"I saw a gun," he said.

Then he, too, said he dove to avoid being hit.

Lawryn fired 15 shots, Martinez four. Castellanos was hit three times  in the chest and back, and a graze wound to the head.

"This is happening in seconds. This isn't a minute or so," Lawryn said in his deposition, taken last February. "The last thing I ever want to do is be in a shootout. I saw a gun. I heard the gunshots. I saw the glass being blown out. I saw him tracking me. I was in fear for my life."

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Lawryn immediately handcuffed Castellanos, who died at the scene.

The men looked in the car but never found a gun. Officers who investigated the case also never found one.

Martinez said he could not explain what happened to the gun, but he insisted that Castellanos had shot at the officers. Indeed, Martinez said he believed he had been shot because he was bleeding from his head, but it appears to have been a scrape from diving to the ground. Lawryn, too, said he and Martinez had been shot at and suggested that two holes in his bulletproof vest might have been from gunshots.

Neither could explain why no gun was found.

" Just because there's not a gun found," Martinez said in his deposition, "doesn't mean he didn't have a gun."

Martinez and Lawryn's car was not equipped with a video camera; by state law, unmarked police cars do not have them, officials said.

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During his deposition, Martinez suggested for the first time that a second person might have been in the car. He said he never told detectives investigating the shooting about a second person.

Lawryn was more sure that a second person was in Castellanos' car, but like Martinez, Lawryn acknowledged he never told investigators about a second person.

Questions surrounding Castellanos' shooting seem numerous, though none as pressing as why Martinez and Lawryn opened fire at Castellanos. A federal court jury may ultimately decide whether the officers bear responsibility for Castellanos' death. A trial over the family's lawsuit is scheduled for October.

Laura De La Fuente, Castellanos' girlfriend at the time of his death, said her loss was compounded by a lack of a satisfactory explanation for the shooting.

"I want to know the truth.  I know he had no gun," she said. "Yeah, maybe he was drinking.  But it doesn't mean you shoot a person because he was hitting cars."

O'Connor said he was seeking answers for Castellanos' children. He said they deserve the truth about their father's death.

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"Effectively, this was a two-man firing squad," he said. "He had no weapon. The police had no business killing him."

Chicago Tribune's Annie Sweeney contributed.

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Chicago police investigate a fatal shooting in a car at 51st and Halsted streets in the Back of the Yards neighborhood on Jan. 9, 2016. (Chris Sweda / Chicago Tribune)

At least three people have been killed and nine others wounded in shootings since late Saturday morning, police said.

About 8:30 p.m. Saturday, two people were killed while attempting to rob a store in the 1300 block of West 87th St., said Officer Hector Alfaro, a Chicago police spokesman. An employee at the store, Z&S Food & Liquor, 1351 W. 87th St., saw the robbery in progress and shot both suspects, according to police.

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The suspects, who were pronounced dead at the scene, have been identified as Keshawn Marzette, 15, of the 8300 block of South Throop Street, and William Larson, 17, of the same address, according to the Cook County medical examiner's office.

Both autopsies are scheduled for Sunday.

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About 2 p.m., a man was killed and a woman was wounded in the Back of the Yards neighborhood, police said.

Officers responded to the 5200 block of South Peoria Street and found a woman with gunshot wounds and a man fatally shot in the back, said Officer Veejay Zala, a police spokesman. Both victims were 19 years old.

The Cook County medical examiner's office identified the man as Erick L. Lacey, of the 5100 block of South May Street.

Police initially had said that the woman was dead at the scene, but she was still alive after being hospitalized, Zala said.

A few blocks away and at the same time, a 17-year-old boy was shot in the buttocks in the 5400 block of South Bishop Street. He was taken to Stroger Hospital, where his condition stabilized, said Officer Kevin Quaid, a police spokesman.

It was not immediately clear whether the two shootings were related.

A car involved in the fatal shooting ended up at 51st and Halsted streets. A woman who was driving was taken from the car and put into an ambulance following the shooting, but another person remained in the car, according to a witness.

Up to three dozen relatives of the young man who they believed had been shot in the car filled a gas station lot at the corner of 51st and Halsted, anxiously waiting for official word Saturday afternoon. A gray Hyundai remained in the street, its back window shattered.

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One woman pulled up in a truck, sobbing loudly, and needed help being taken out of the vehicle.

"Why won't (police) let them see him?" asked an uncle, as the boy's father and other relatives craned for a look.

Some were angry and spoke as if more violence were inevitable.

"This ain't over. This ain't over," a young man muttered loudly outside the gas station. He called the neighborhood a "war zone" and said, "They just be dropping people over here."

Police towed the car, which upset family members who believed a loved one's body was in the back seat. A detective told them that police were trying to preserve evidence.



"Would they do that if it were their fellow officer?" asked Erick Lacey, who believed the body in the car was that of his son, Erick Lacey Jr.



The police officer told the family that the shooting took place nearby, but not outside the gas station.



Lacey said his son was a "good kid" who was working at UPS and planned on joining the Navy.



Lacey's stepmother, April Graham, said Erick Lacey Jr. was an innocent victim and not involved with gangs. She said he was just going to the store on his day off.



"They shoot at anybody and everybody," she said of gangs.

In other shootings:

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At 2:45 a.m. Sunday, an 18-year-old man was shot in the Back of the Yards neighborhood, Alfaro said. He was in the 5400 block of South Justine Street when a silver sedan drove up and someone inside fired shots. He was hit in the back, side and ankle and taken to Stroger Hospital. His condition was stabilized.

At 12:20 a.m. Sunday, a 27-year-old man was shot in Back of the Yards, Alfaro said.

He was on the sidewalk in the 5400 block of South Aberdeen Street when someone walked up, showed a gun and announced a robbery. He tried to push away the gun when the would-be robber fired, hitting the man in the thigh. He got himself to St. Bernard Hospital, and his condition was stabilized.

At 3:10 p.m. Saturday, two 30-year-old men were shot in the West Pullman neighborhood, Alfaro said. They were in the 12100 block of South Normal Avenue when one was shot in the leg and the other was shot in the ankle. Both went to Advocate Christ Medical Center, and their conditions were stabilized.

Daywatch Weekdays Start each day with Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox. >

At noon, a 31-year-old man was shot in the Englewood neighborhood, Estrada said. That shooting happened on the 7100 block of South Vincennes Avenue.

He was shot in the leg and taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where his condition was stabilized, said Jose Estrada, a police spokesman.

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Shortly before 11:45 a.m., a 17-year-old boy walked into Mount Sinai Hospital and said he had been shot in the 3100 block of West Roosevelt Road in the Lawndale neighborhood, Estrada said.

The boy, who was being uncooperative with police, was wounded in the leg. Police were investigating, but preliminary reports indicated the wound may have been self-inflicted.

At 11:35 a.m., a 22-year-old man walked into Roseland Hospital with a gunshot wound to the upper back, Estrada, said.

The man told police that he had been shot in the 10900 block of South King Drive in the Roseland neighborhood, Estrada said. The man's condition was stabilized, Estrada said.

When officers went to the area where the man said he had been shot, they couldn't find any signs of a shooting, police said.
The posturing over a new contract continued Friday between Gov. Bruce Rauner and the largest state employee union, with the administration saying it would consider whether to refer the dispute to a labor panel but so far failing to do so.

The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 31 asserted that talks collapsed Friday because Rauner's negotiators "said they would refuse to participate in any further bargaining sessions and claimed that negotiations are at an impasse." AFSCME executive director Roberta Lynch said the union does not think impasse has been reached.

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Rauner spokesman Lance Trover disputed that, saying in a statement that the administration's negotiators asked the union whether talks had reached impasse. Trover, however, did not say that the governor had declared impasse.

Instead, Trover said the administration "will now decide if the previously agreed dispute resolution process should be considered."

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The two sides signed a deal in September that says any disagreement over whether or not impasse has been reached would be reviewed by the Illinois Labor Relations Board. Rauner might have an advantage in that venue; he appointed the board members.

As of Friday evening, however, neither side had asked the board to intervene, the labor board's executive director said.

Declaring impasse is a legal move that would set the stage for Rauner to try to impose his own terms without a contract deal in place. The union could resist those changes by going on strike.

The state has never declared impasse in contract negotiations with AFSCME, which takes the lead on negotiating contracts for roughly 40,000 state employees. Similarly, state workers have never before gone on strike.

AFSCME's Lynch said the union might seek a different remedy if Rauner declares impasse.

"If they will not return to the table, our union will take legal action," Lynch said. "It is a violation of state labor law for a party to declare impasse where none exists."

The two sides have been in talks for nearly a year over a new contract to replace the one that expired in June.

Rauner entered the talks with a list of two dozen demands ranging from reducing overtime and time off to slashing the state's contribution to health care. The union countered with a request for pay raises, better health benefits and a boost in overtime pay for prison workers.

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In an attempt to secure an agreement before the new year, Rauner offered $1,000 bonuses to state employees if a deal was reached by the start of the year. After that deadline had passed, the administration said it would still pay the bonuses if an agreement was reached, but only to workers who missed fewer than 5 percent of their assigned work days by June 30. But the two sides remain far apart on contract terms.

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Womens rights activists, far-right demonstrators and left-wing counter-protesters all took to the streets of Cologne, Germany on Jan. 9, 2016, in the aftermath of a string of New Years Eve sexual assaults and robberies in Cologne blamed largely on foreigners. (Sascha Schuermann / Getty Images)

COLOGNE, Germany  Women's rights activists, far-right demonstrators and leftwing counter-protesters took to the streets of Cologne on Saturday to voice their opinions in the debate that has followed a string of New Year's Eve sexual assaults and robberies in the city blamed largely on foreigners.

Amid the heightened public pressure, Chancellor Angela Merkel's party proposed stricter laws regulating asylum-seekers in the country  some 1.1 million of whom arrived last year.

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Police said that some 1,700 protesters from the anti-Islam PEGIDA movement were kept apart from 1,300 counter demonstrators in simultaneous protests outside the city's main train station.

PEGIDA members held banners with slogans like "RAPEfugees not welcome" and "Integrate barbarity?" while the counter-protesters pushed the message "refugees welcome."

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Police said four people were taken into custody and the PEGIDA demonstration was shut down early by authorities using water cannons after protesters threw firecrackers and bottles at some of the 1,700 police on hand. No injuries were immediately reported.

Police drive back right-wing demonstrators using a water cannon during protests in Cologne, Germany, on Jan. 9, 2016. (Monika Skolimowska / AP)

Earlier, hundreds of women's rights activists gathered outside Cologne's landmark cathedral to rally against the New Year's Eve violence.

"It's about making clear that we will not stop moving around freely here in Cologne, and to protest against victim bashing and the abuse of women," said 50-year-old city resident Ina Wolf.

Specifics of the New Year's Eve assaults and who were behind them are still being investigated. However, the reports have fueled new calls for tighter immigration laws in Germany.

In response to the incidents, Merkel said her CDU party on Saturday had approved a proposal seeking stricter laws regulating asylum seekers.

Merkel said the proposal, which will be discussed with her coalition partners and would need parliamentary approval, would help Germany deport "serial offenders" convicted of lesser crimes.

"This is in the interests of the citizens of Germany, but also in the interests of the great majority of the refugees who are here," Merkel told party members in Mainz.

However, she also reiterated her mantra on the refugee issue, insisting again "we will manage it."

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Bonn University political scientist Tilman Mayer said he doesn't see the CDU proposal as either a change of course, nor one likely to dispel many Germans' concerns.

"This is just a building block in a chain of statements from the government and also the chancellor," he said on Phoenix television.

Though Merkel has decried the assaults as "repugnant criminal acts that ... Germany will not accept," they provide fodder for those who have opposed her open-door policy and refusal to set a cap on refugee numbers.

Influential Hamburg broadcaster NDR said in an opinion piece posted online Friday that such crimes threaten to push xenophobia toward the "middle of the population"  which could lead to a backlash against refugees.

"And who is to blame mainly?" the editorial asked. "These young, testosterone-driven time bombs with their image of women from the Middle Ages."

Despite the harsh rhetoric, the case is not yet that clear and the investigation is ongoing.

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Of 31 suspects temporarily detained for questioning following the New Year's Eve attacks, there were 18 asylum seekers but also two Germans and an American among others, and none were accused of specifically committing sexual assaults.

Cologne police on Saturday said more than 100 detectives are assigned to the case and are investigating 379 criminal complaints filed with them, about 40 percent of which involve allegations of sexual offenses.

"The people in the focus of the criminal investigation are primarily from North African countries," police said. "Most are asylum seekers or people living illegally in Germany. The investigation into if, and how widely, these people were involved in concrete criminal activity on New Year's Eve is ongoing."

National broadcaster ARD called the attacks a "wake-up call" that illuminates the difficulty that lies ahead for Germany of integrating the newcomers.

"But we must not give in to our fears," ARD said. "If we now take all the refugees into custody, if we erect fences around our homes and country, if we join the swing to the right that some of our neighbors have, then we give up all we have achieved."

Cologne's police chief was dismissed Friday amid mounting criticism of his force's handling of the incidents, and for being slow with releasing information.

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Speaking in Mainz, Merkel said local authorities must not be perceived to be withholding information and urged that the case be "fully clarified."

"Everything has to be put on the table," she said.

The proposal passed by her CDU party's leaders would strengthen the ability of police to conduct checks of identity papers, and also to exclude foreigners from being granted asylum if they have been convicted of crimes and sentenced to terms even as light as probation.

"Serial offenders who consistently, for example, return to theft or time and again insult women must count on the force of the law," Merkel said.

David Rising and Dorothee Thiesing, Associated Press
House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, center, flanked by Rep. Buddy Carter R-Ga., left, and Rep. Richard Hudson, R-N.C., speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington about the arrest of two Iraqi-born men who came to the U.S. as refugees and were indicted on terrorism-related charges by federal authorities. (Susan Walsh / AP)

LOS ANGELES  The U.S. refugee program came under fresh criticism Friday after federal authorities revealed that two Iraqi-born men arrested on terrorism-related charges had come to America as refugees.

While there was no evidence the men intended or planned attacks in the United States, Republican lawmakers already concerned about the federal government's ability to properly vet Syrian refugees said the cases highlight weaknesses in the program that put Americans' safety at risk.

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"How many ticking time bombs are we going to bring in in this refugee program without a proper vetting system in place?" Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas and chairman of House Homeland Security Committee, said at a news conference.

He and other GOP lawmakers urged the Senate to pass legislation to block refugees from Iraq and Syria until screening is improved. The House passed a bill in November.

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The uproar comes after weeks of fervent debate in Washington and on the presidential campaign trail about tighter security screens in the wake of attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California.

Immigrant advocates said they have full confidence in the vetting process and that tens of thousands of Iraqi refugees have been successfully resettled under the program.

On Thursday, federal authorities in California accused 23-year-old Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab of Sacramento of traveling to Syria to fight and lying to U.S. officials about it. Al-Jayab had come to the United States as a refugee in October 2012, and discussed on social media how he fought against the regime in Syria as a teen, authorities said.

In Texas, 24-year-old Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan of Houston was indicted on charges that he tried to provide material support to the extremists. Both suspects are Palestinians born in Iraq, authorities said.

The U.S. annually accepts 70,000 refugees from around the world, including people fleeing violence, religious persecution and war, and has announced plans to increase the number to 85,000 this year.

Since the 2001 terrorist attacks, about 785,000 refugees have arrived in the country, and fewer than 20 have been arrested or removed over terrorism-related concerns, according to the State Department.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Friday the screening of refugees is rigorous and thorough. He repeated the administration's opposition to proposals that would impose a religious test or bar individuals from the U.S. based on their ethnicity.

"That doesn't represent who we are as a country and, most importantly, it's not going to keep us safe," Earnest said.

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More than 127,000 Iraqi refugees have arrived in the United States since October 2006, with the largest numbers headed toward California, Michigan and Texas, according to State Department statistics. Some Iraqis go through the U.N. refugee agency, while some can apply directly to the refugee program in Jordan, Egypt and Iraq.

Melanie Nezer, vice president for policy and advocacy at the Jewish refugee agency HIAS, said she worries the recent backlash might place law-abiding refugees under suspicion. She said she has confidence in the government's screening measures and that these are continually updated by federal intelligence officials.

"The vast majority of refugees, including Iraqi refugees, have not caused any harm to our country and will not cause any harm to our country," she said.

Federal authorities said Al-Jayab promised to provide weapons training to Al Hardan and advised him on how he would be assigned to the battlefield once he arrived in Syria. While authorities say Al Jayab fought twice in Syria, including with a group eventually linked to Islamic State, there is no indication that Al Hardan actually traveled there.

Al Hardan became a legal permanent resident of the United States in 2011 and applied in 2014 to become a U.S. citizen, authorities said. Al-Jayab was interviewed by immigration officials in 2014 for his green card and did not disclose his recent travel to Syria, authorities said.

Security screenings for immigrants and travelers have come under increased scrutiny because of recent attacks. Rules have been tightened for visa-free travel to the United States and lawmakers have vowed to look into the fiance visa program, which was used by the husband-and-wife attackers in San Bernardino who killed 14 people last month.

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On Friday, senior White House officials and members of the president's national security team traveled to Silicon Valley to seek tech industry help to stop the Islamic State and other groups from radicalizing people online.

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Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a campaign stop at the Flynn Center of the Performing Arts in Burlington, Vt., Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016. (Charles Krupa / AP)

Say what you want about his flimsy policy knowledge, his unadulterated blurting and his intolerance for facts  and I've said plenty  but Donald Trump is a master at setting the agenda.

Every couple of weeks he spits an idea into the ether  usually of the same gelatinous integrity as most loogies  and it magically finds itself regurgitated at every cable news program, late night show, campaign trail press gaggle and American dinner table.

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The latest? Campaign rival Sen. Ted Cruz's eligibility to become president.

Before you rush to Google, don't bother. Cruz is totally eligible to become president. But that hasn't stopped us from entertaining Trump's newest spitball as a thing to "Discuss" with a capital "D."

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A brief tour of Trump's previous talkers reads like a syllabus from Faber College.

There was the week-plus we spent debating what he meant when he said blood was coming out of Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly's "whatever." He ultimately claimed "nose."

Then there was the time we almost didn't at all believe him when he said he was talking about Carly Fiorina's "persona" when he said, "Look at that face! Would anyone vote for that? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president?"

More recently we studied Trump's use of the word "schlonged" to describe Obama's defeat of Hillary Clinton in the 2008 election. No, seriously  we studied it.

Behold, a Washington Post column: "Donald Trump's 'schlonged': A linguistic investigation," in which Harvard University's Steven Pinker is asked if it's possible Trump was not, in fact, using a derogatory word for male genitalia.

"Many goyim"  that's non-Jews, for all you non-Harvards  "are confused by the large number of Yiddish terms beginning with 'schl' or 'schm' (schlemiel, schlemazzle, schmeggegge, schlub, schlock, schlep, schmutz, schnook) and use them incorrectly or interchangeably," Professor Pinker postulates. So, instead of taking at face value that the man who has called women bimbos and slobs and repeatedly curses on the campaign trail used sexist slang to describe Hillary Clinton, we'll actually entertain the idea that he just reached for the wrong Yiddish. Oy vey.

Worse than the name-calling and "Animal House" humor, though, are the conversations that seem to have a veneer of substance  and so are debated substantively, usually to the detriment of everyone involved.

First Trump lures you in by starting with an actual issue, like immigration or terrorism. But a few incoherent non-sequiturs later, it goes where no one in his or her right mind  or who was running for president  would ever take it. And a week later you're actually discussing whether President Dwight Eisenhower's horrific "Operation Wetback" is something we should legitimately revisit.

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Or, instead of binge-listening to "Serial," you find yourself reading up on the legal precedent for repealing the 14th Amendment. And whether we could actually get Mexicans to pay for a wall on the U.S. border  to keep themselves out.

When Trump word-vomited that Muslims should be banned from entering the United States in response to the Paris terrorist attacks, all sorts of mind-numbing nonsense followed. Real, human people with grown-up jobs actually defended this by comparing it to the Japanese internment camps of World War II.

There were columns asking, "Is Donald Trump's conditional bar on Muslims' entry into the United States a shocking outrage, or just similar to the 1979 policy adopted by Democratic President Jimmy Carter?" Don't strain too hard to figure out which the author thinks it is.

When pressed on the constitutionality of religious tests and the immorality of banning roughly one-quarter of Earth's population from visiting America on the basis of religion, his spokeswoman simply replied to me during a CNN segment, "So what? They're Muslim."

"So what? They're Muslim" is the perfect encapsulation of just how shallow, anti-intellectual, absurd and grotesque the era of Trump truly is. So why do we continue to throw ourselves down these rabbit holes of inanity?

Are we so bored by the real world that we eagerly leap into Trump's cartoonish fantasies just to escape the monotony of solving actual problems  such as, Where's all my money gone? And: What happened to Baltimore? Or: Holy heroin epidemic!

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Either we are so completely overwhelmed by these heavy, seemingly intractable issues that fiddling with Trump's childish playthings instead is a kind of catharsis, or he really is a harbinger of the way politics will be handled in the future: devoid of any substance, nuance or civility.

Until we have our answer, I'll see you next time  to question the necessity of child labor laws.

Tribune Content Agency

S.E. Cupp is a Washington-based CNN contributor and author of "Losing Our Religion."

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On Thursday evening, Barack Obama used the bully pulpit of the presidency to raise awareness about gun violence and ways to address it. Skeptics who tuned in to the CNN town hall at George Mason University may have been reassured by his words. But the obvious reason he was talking directly to citizens about this topic is that there isn't a whole lot else he can do.

With Republicans in control of both houses of Congress, Obama has no hope of getting gun control legislation approved. In December, the Senate voted down a bill to bar gun sales to anyone on the federal terrorism watch list. After the 2012 school massacre in Newtown, Conn., it rejected a bill to require background checks for all firearm purchases.

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So on Monday, the administration announced several steps it would take using executive authority to address the problem  primarily by striving to make it harder for people who are forbidden to own guns to get them. They are small changes, but worth trying.

One is a crackdown on sellers who do a regular business selling guns but don't obtain licenses to operate as federal firearms dealers  and therefore don't have to do background checks. This is a huge loophole for those rendered ineligible because they have criminal records or are mentally unfit.

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Hobbyists and collectors who make occasional sales are not required to get licenses, but those "engaged in the business" are. Yet a study by Mayors Against Illegal Guns found that "nearly a quarter of a million guns are sold each year by unlicensed high-volume sellers on a single website alone: Armslist.com."

The administration reportedly considered requiring licenses for anyone selling more than a specified number of weapons. But in the end, it chose to focus on what Attorney General Loretta Lynch called the "totality of circumstances."

This approach may prompt some sellers to get licenses to be safe, but the vagueness that existed before remains  letting some go on skirting the law and making some prosecutions chancy. Whether it will have a real impact is an open question.

A more promising step is doing more to identify individuals whose mental health history disqualifies them. The Social Security Administration will draft a new rule to assure that the background check system will have information on "the approximately 75,000 people each year who have a documented mental health issue, receive disability benefits and are unable to manage those benefits because of their mental impairment, or who have been found by a state or federal court to be legally incompetent." The White House also promised to "remove unnecessary legal barriers preventing states from reporting relevant information" about those with mental illness.

Obama also wants to improve the efficiency of the background check system, which had to handle 22.2 million requests last year, by adding FBI personnel and updating technology. That should not be controversial. Dylann Roof, the accused killer of nine people at a South Carolina church in June, was able to buy the gun he allegedly used in the attack only because of a lapse in the system, according to FBI Director James Comey.

Obama didn't oversell what he's doing. As he wrote in an op-ed in The New York Times, "These actions won't prevent every act of violence, or save every life  but if even one life is spared, they will be well worth the effort."

What the administration has embraced are incremental changes that hold some potential to reduce the amount of gun crime and violence in America. Until Congress is prepared to take bigger steps, they're appreciably better than nothing.
The College of DuPage paid a former TV journalist $2,500  about $30 per minute  to moderate two recent public forums held to gather input on the school's next president, records show.

Anne Kavanagh, an award-winning reporter who started a media consulting company after leaving WFLD-Channel 32 several years ago, emceed the two December meetings in which district residents, faculty and students were invited to offer opinions on selecting a new leader for the state's largest community college  an institution plagued by allegations of questionable spending and ethical violations.

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Both forums were held Dec. 14 at the Glen Ellyn campus and some officials were concerned the events could get contentious. Some of the 17 members of the presidential search committee, chaired by former state House Speaker Lee Daniels, attended the meetings.

The afternoon session lasted 46 minutes. The evening meeting took just 37, according to videos of the forums.

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Neither led to controversy.

At the start of both sessions, Kavanagh set the ground rules, which included limiting remarks to three minutes and focusing on the future. She then spent the rest of the time calling speakers to the microphone.

Records show Kavanagh's deal came at the request of consultant Bill Hay, whose Chicago-based firm is leading the presidential search.

The college's financial office was informed of Kavanagh's participation  and asked to process her contract  by communications consultant Chris Robling, an ally of former board of trustees Chairwoman Katharine Hamilton who had been working as a special assistant to the interim president. He left the position, for which he donated his salary to the school's foundation, after Hamilton's resignation last month.

Robling, who is also a former journalist, said he recommended Kavanagh for the job because he wanted someone who could keep the crowd focused.

"It was a pleasure to recommend Anne Kavanagh, who is one of the best people at what she does between Maine and California," Robling said. "Bill made the decision and he made a great decision."

Kavanagh's contract  to host the two forums and do background research  called for all communications between her company and the college to remain confidential unless it became the subject of a Freedom of Information Act request.

"They wanted someone who understood the issues and would do the research," Kavanagh said. "It was really important to them that it went well."

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Under school policy, the board did not need to approve the expense because it was less than $15,000.

Trustee Dianne McGuire said she was outraged by the payment. She has repeatedly criticized recent board decisions and said the decision to hire Kavanagh was an example of questionable spending and patronage hiring.

"Not only was there no transparency in this decision, one has to wonder why, with a vice president of marketing and external relations and a staff of PR professionals on campus, we just didn't utilize our own staff and save the taxpayers some money?" McGuire asked.

sstclair@tribpub.com

jscohen@tribpub.com

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An unfunded mandate to increase juror fees caused the 16th Circuit Court to come in slightly over budget in the last fiscal year, and is just the tip of the iceberg for Kane County, which is on the hook for about $3 million in mandates.

County officials are compiling a list of how much unfunded mandates cost Kane County taxpayers and the preliminary total is around $3 million. Executive Financial Director Joe Onzick recently gave an update on the county's efforts to obtain a dollar amount of unfunded mandates from county departments.

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Unfunded mandates is one of the topics of a study released by the Task Force on Local Government Consolidation and Unfunded Mandates. The task force was convened last year by Gov. Bruce Rauner. A main driver of "high property taxes and other local taxes in Illinois is unfunded mandates, primarily imposed by the state," the report said. "Local governments must determine how to pay for these unfunded mandates, leaving fewer resources available for local governemnts to perform their core missions."

"The number of new unfunded mandates has skyrocketed over the last few decades," the report stated. The Illinois Municipal League identified 266 new unfunded mandates imposed on its members since 1982, "an average rate of 8 new unfunded mandates per year," according to the report.

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The average annual cost for municipalities is $100,000 to $250,000 while the average cost for unfunded mandates is between $250,000 and $500,000 for counties, the report stated.

Onzick's office is compiling a list of those costs for county board review.

One example of an unfunded mandate is a December 2014 Senate bill that changed the number of jurors required in a civil case from 12 to six while also increasing the amount of pay for jurors from $10 to $25 for the first day and $50 every day after, which left counties scrambling to fund the pay increase without any help from the state. The law took effect June 1.

A bill amending the increase was proposed in 2015 giving counties some breathing room, but the last action was taken in October and the bill is stalled, according to the Illinois General Assembly's website.

"I think it's one of the casualties, unfortunately, of what is happening in Springfield," said Brian Pollock, chairman of the Kane County Legislative Committee.

The state of Illinois has been operating without a budget for this fiscal year since July. Pollock said the amended bill has not been a big issue like funding 911 centers or buying road salt. Legislators did pass a bill authorizing payment for those two expenses last month.

The increase cost Kane County about $16,100 from June 1 through the end of the fiscal year in December, according to county documents. The cost for a full year is expected to be about $250,000, officials said.

Another unfunded mandate passed last year requires the county provide interpreters for anyone involved in a civil case who needs one. The estimated cost will be $200,000, according to county documents. The bill requires judges provide an interpreter for anyone who is a party or witness in a civil action and is not capable of understanding the English language or capable of expressing themselves in English, according to the state's website. Civil cases can include divorce or small claims courts. Interpreters are already provided in criminal cases.

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The county's Legislative Committee is considering tackling the issue of unfunded mandates as a legislative goal this year and may get a boost from the task force's report. While the report deals heavily with consolidating local governments, there are specific recommendations for dealing with unfunded mandates.

Among the recommendations in the report:

Conduct an annual state review of unfunded mandates on local governments

Pass a constitutional amendment on unfunded state mandates requiring the state to reimburse local governments and school districts for increased expenses relating to future state mandates.

Future unfunded mandates need to be characterized as "not reimbursable" and must pass each chamber by a three-fourths majority.

Allow the governor to use veto power to insert "if economically feasible" language into any legislation authorizing new unfunded mandates on local governments or school districts.

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Create an Economic Feasibility Exemption allowing local governments, school districts and community colleges or universities to be exempt from compliance with unfunded mandates if it is not affordable.

Gloria Casas is a freelance reporter for The Courier-News.
"We were just trying to get through the holidays as it was, but this really was a slap in the face," she said. "If I would have known that's all he would have to serve, I probably would have said no to the plea deal and taken my chances with a trial."
A highly volatile bottle of liquid methamphetamine was seized Friday from a "shake and bake" mobile meth lab in the second of two major drug busts in Wilmington over the last three days, Wilmington police said.

Benjamin Hoover, 27, and Mala Diloreto, 29, both of 213 N. Water St., Wilmington, were arrested Friday and charged with possession of methamphetamine, a Class X felony, after police pulled their vehicle over for a traffic violation in the alley behind their apartment, Wilmington Police Chief Phillip Arnold said.

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Police found a 1-liter bottle of liquid methamphetamine that was bubbling, an indication it was in cooking process, Arnold said. Police determined it contained 570 grams of liquid methamphetamine.

Wilmington police requested the assistance of the Illinois State Police Methamphetamine Response Unit.

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"That thing can act like an (rocket propelled grenade) if it goes off," Arnold said of the substance.

Police evacuated the 213 N. Water St. building for more than five hours while a state police officer, wearing a protective hazardous material suit and respirator, stabilized the liquid by releasing some of the pressure, he said. Wilmington Fire Protection District were on the scene in case of explosion or fire.

Hoover told officials the final step to finish the cooking process was to add Drano, a chemical used to unclog plumbing pipes and septic tanks, Arnold said.

"We don't think they were doing this to sell, we think it was just for personal use," he said.

Hoover and Diloreto had just moved into the apartment, and were "basically flopping there," he said.

The vehicle, which had Ohio license plates, was used as a mobile meth lab, known as a "shake and bake," Arnold said. Hoover was driving on a suspended Pennsylvania driver's license, he said.

Hoover was also charged with possession and transportation of methamphetamine precursor, also a Class X felony, and possession and transportation of methamphetamine manufacturing material, a Class 2 felony, Arnold said. Because he was driving a vehicle, he was also charged with unlawful use of property to possess methamphetamine, a Class 2 felony, he said.

Two days earlier, Wilmington police and the Drug Enforcement Administration seized 52 packets of heroin weighing 15.9 grams and with 5.8 grams of marijuana from a Wilmington home, Arnold said.

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Larry Mikesch, 52, of 164 N. Harbor, Braidwood, and Jason Gregory, 40, of 30720 W. Frontage Road, Wilmington, were arrested and charged with posession of controlled substance with intent to deliver, a Class 1 felony, Arnold said.

Police obtained a search warrant to go into the house after receiving a tip from an informant, who purchased drugs from the pair, he said.

"By their own admission, they were one of the largest suppliers of heroin to our area," Arnold said.

"After their arrest, the two admitted to selling more than 400 hits of heroin per week," a Wilmington police press release said. "They told agents that they travel to Chicago every two to three days to pick up another supply of heroin that they then sell for a profit."

Mikesch and Gregory are being held in the Will County jail in lieu of $250,000 bond. No bond information is available for Hoover and Diloreto, who are also being held in the Will County jail.

Erin Gallagher is a freelance writer for the Daily Southtown.
A Channahon woman spent six hours in the county jail after she allegedly sneezed on a bailiff at the Will County Courthouse.

The 24-year-old was in court Wednesday for a traffic case when she landed herself in jail for the offensive sneeze. Before the sneeze, the woman had been warned by the bailiff to behave in court. According to police reports, she had been putting her feet up on the chairs and being loud during court proceedings, Will County Sheriff's Deputy Chief Tom Budde.

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A short time later, the woman walked up to the bailiff and let her sneeze and snot loose on the bailiff, according to the police report.

"(She) walked right up to the bailiff and sneezed on her and started blowing mucus on her face," Budde said, citing police reports. He noted someone in the courtroom witnessed the incident and provided a statement to police.

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The woman was jailed on probable cause for misdemeanor battery, but was later released. Formal charges from the Will County State's Attorney's Office had not been filed, but the woman has been directed to return to court in the coming weeks  at a date that was not disclosed  in connection with the incident, officials said.

A spokesman for the office said the case remains under review. Misdemeanor battery charges can be punished by probation or up to a year in jail.

Daily Southtown Twice-weekly News updates from the south suburbs delivered every Monday and Wednesday >

The Channahon woman's attorney, Eric Blatti, was not in the courtroom at the time of the alleged sneeze, but said his client denies the incident. Blatti wondered aloud how anyone could force a sneeze.

"As far as I know, a sneeze is an involuntary act; unless she has magical powers I'm not aware of," he said.

While battery charges typically conjure up images of people taking swings at each other, Budde noted the law states that any contact of an "insulting or provoking nature" can be considered battery. He noted he once represented a client, post conviction, who was charged with battery after hitting someone with a bag of Doritos. Will County judges also have been known to toss people from their courtrooms  or in some cases, put them in jail  for disruptions such as yawning too loudly, swearing at court deputies or talking.

Generally, though, those incidents are few and far between.

"If you act up in court, the judge is right there," said Will County Sheriff's Deputy Chief Jerry Nudera, who works with the sheriff's support staff, including court security. "So most people are going to behave themselves when they're in court."

The woman is scheduled to appear again before Judge Raymond Nash on Monday in connection with her traffic case.

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Alicia Fabbre is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.
The people who sat in Roger Pilcher's barber chair over the years were getting more than just a haircut. They were also getting a friend for life.

Now, after nearly 50 years in the business, the owner of American Hair Lines is hanging up his scissors.

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"I've had a wonderful career," Pilcher, 72, said.

But a shop Pilcher owned in West Dundee that he called "real successful" was also real trouble for a while in the 1980s.

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After a competitor was denied permission to put up a second pole in 1984, village officials said Pilcher's spinning barber pole in front of his shop violated a local ordinance against moving signs.

"They sent me a letter saying I had 10 days to stop the barber pole (from moving) or I'd be subjected to fines of $50 to $500 a day," Pilcher said.

He asked the village to consider amending the ordinance but was denied. Instead, he was told to turn the barber pole off or face being arrested, he said.

"It was the silly saga of the barber pole," he said. "I had a petition signed by several thousand people, almost all the businesses and residents in town. Everybody thought it was ridiculous."

The Courier-News wrote several articles about his year-long fight with the village and soon the Associated Press picked up the story, he said.

"I received letters from people all over the United States saying, 'Stick to your guns,'" Pilcher said. "The story got really out of hand but eventually I won because they were fighting a losing proposition trying to tell me my barber pole couldn't rotate."

Eventually, the village agreed to a grandfather clause that allowed him to keep the pole turning.

"My clients mean the world to me," Pilcher said. "I've got men clients that I've been doing since I started. We've established a friendship. I've seen their kids being raised. I can honestly say I have some of the nicest clients you can possibly imagine."

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It was at the suggestion of lifelong friend Jack Sabo, owner of Studio One Hair Design in Elgin, that Pilcher sign up for barbering college in the late 1960s after returning home from serving in Vietnam.

"Jack convinced me. He said, 'It's a good way to make a living. You're inside in the summer with air conditioning and in the winter you're inside with heat.' I thought to myself, 'I think maybe I'd be good at that,'" Pilcher said. "So I went to barbering school and became a barber."

When he joined Sabo's staff as apprentice, the shop was one of the few at the time that specifically catered to men.

"We were the absolutely first guys in the Elgin area doing men's hairstyling," Pilcher said. "It had never been done in the Elgin area. It was being done in Chicago but not out here in the suburbs. We were the first to be shampooing, precision cutting, spraying. These local gentleman were saying, 'Are you putting hairspray in my hair?'"

Studio One Hair Design was the talk of the town, Pilcher said.

"We were so busy. We were servicing everybody from bank presidents, judges and attorneys and police chiefs. Just everybody," he said. "It was a real success."

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After two years as an apprentice, Pilcher took his journeyman barber exam to get licensed and opened his own two-chair shop, called Beau Gentry, in downtown Elgin.

Beau Gentry, he explained, means "well-groomed local gentleman."

"It was very successful. I was there for eight years. Then I sold the shop but I didn't sell the business," he said.

Pilcher decided to open up a six-chair shop in the Tonde shopping center, now Century Plaza, in West Dundee.

After about a decade there, he sold the shop and name and opened another he called American Hair Lines.

"After a couple of stiff martinis I figured out that name," he said with a laugh. "I thought it was clever and thought people would remember it. I'd hand people business cards and say, 'American Hair Lines, not to be confused with American Airlines.' So many people over the years would comment on my shop name."

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That shop, at Routes 72 and 31, was the site of the "silly saga of the barber pole."

After about a decade in the West Dundee location, Pilcher and his barber pole moved into the stripmall next to El Sombrerito in Carpentersville.

After another successful eight years, he decided to move again and open up a one-chair shop at 12 N. Wisconsin St., in Carpentersville.

"I called it my little retirement shop," he said. "I wanted a small shop where I didn't have any employees."

That's where he's spent the last 15 years.

Pilcher, who's married with two adult children, said he's led a fortunate life.

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"I feel very proud of my career. I'm proud of my kids. I've had a wonderful life," he said.

In his retirement, he and his wife, Sheri, plan to spend their winters in Arizona.

"That's always been my dream," Pilcher said. "We have a home out there so we'll spend winter there and summer here."

As for his clientele, which boasts about 200 names, Pilcher sold his book of business to Fox River Spa & Salon, 314 W Main St., (Huntley Road), Carpentersville.

"I wanted my guys to have another quality barber to go to, where they could be comfortable and get a good cut," he said. "Seems like they got a great thing going over there."

Fox River Spa & Salon owner Julie Bevel said the salon, which recently launched its barbershop, "is grateful for the opportunity to help him retire happy."

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"We've got the utmost respect for the work Roger put in around the community," she said.

West Dundee resident Jim Juengling said he'll miss the haircuts he's gotten from Pilcher for the last four decades.

"We certainly did become friends over the course of that," he said. "Roger watched my kids grow up. We share a lot of stories about my kids being in his shop. I wish him the very best. I think it's wonderful he's able to do this. But I'm going to miss him."

When Carpentersville resident Nathan Spain and his wife moved to the village from Chicago in the late 1980s, he continued to see his Chicago stylist for several years.

"I did not want to change," Spain said. "I tried a couple of people locally and was just not satisfied. Finally, someone mentioned that just around the corner by Otto Engineering Roger had a one-chair shop."

Spain was sold.

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"Roger has never given me a bad haircut," he said. "The most underappreciated professionals are bartenders or hair stylists and barbers. That certainly is true of Roger. When waiting to get my time in the chair I saw how he's able to interact perfectly with the person who is in the chair. He knows his clients well. He knows the subjects they like to talk about. He knows their family. He has those wonderful people skills."

Spain also credits Pilcher for "saving my life in an indirect way." During one of their conversations, he told the stylist he'd been short of breath and he wasn't happy with his current general internal medicine doctor.

"Roger immediately got on the phone and called one of his clients who was a top doctor at Provena. By that afternoon, Roger called and said, 'I talked to so-and-so and he would like you to call him,'" Spain said.

He made the call and that doctor referred Spain to a new cardiologist.

"That's the kind of Rolodex that Roger has and that's the kind of follow-through he has," Spain said. "A person could say, 'That's fine. That's his issue.' But he didn't."

He said Pilcher is an all-around "fabulous person."

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"I know we're all going to miss him greatly," he said.

Erin Sauder is a freelance reporter for The Courier-News.
The City of Highland Park's animal control officer is investigating a report that a large cat, like a cougar or mountain lion, was spotted walking in an open area west of the Hybernia subdivision in northwest Highland Park, according to police.

Authorities said they do not know what type of animal was seen, though they said at this point, police are not characterizing the report as a coyote sighting. Photos of paw impressions have been forwarded to state experts who may be able to help identify the animal, police said.

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On Thursday morning, authorities said, a resident of the 2300 block of Ridge Road reported seeing a large, feline-type animal walking in an open area west of her house, which itself is west of the Hybernia subdivision between Park Avenue West and Half Day Road. No photographs or video footage of the large cat were obtained, according to police.

"She observed a large, muscular, sandy-colored cat with a long thick tail that was the length of its body," said Sgt. Chris O'Neill of the Highland Park Police Department. "She estimated the animal to be at least six feet long from head to tail and she believed it was a mountain lion."

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The animal was observed in morning daylight from a distance of about 100 feet, O'Neill said.

"The citizen reported being familiar with wildlife, having previously seen feral cats, coyotes and deer," he added. "She stated that the animal was none of those."

The city's animal control officer obtained photos of the animal's paw impressions and sent them to the Illinois Department of Natural Resources for help identifying the source of the tracks. Samples of animal waste also were provided to the IDNR on Jan. 8. Police are awaiting the results.

"Identifying animal paw prints in the snow is challenging, especially for animals that we don't encounter on a regular basis," said Highland Park Deputy Police Chief Timothy Wilinski, of the decision to consult with state experts. "We want to be confident in the information we provide to the public. We'll update our community alert when we obtain reliable information."

Police said they have not gotten any other reports of large cat sightings.

Authorities issued an alert saying residents should be careful when spending time outdoors with children and pets. They also were urged to immediately report sightings of suspicious animals on the police department's non-emergency line, (847) 432-7730, and take photographs, if possible.

kberkowitz@pioneerlocal.com

Twitter: @KarenABerkowitz
The village of Fox Lake has hired a new interim police chief, a nearly 40-year law enforcement veteran who most recently led the Algonquin Police Department.

Russell B. Laine, who has served as chief of three police departments, will be sworn in at a Fox Lake Village Board meeting Tuesday evening, village officials said in a statement Friday.

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Laine is replacing Michael Keller, a deputy chief at the Lake County sheriff's office, who came to Fox Lake "on loan" after a tumultuous period in the department last fall.

In the two weeks leading up to Sept. 1, Fox Lake's police department saw the launch of an internal investigation, the resignation of its chief and the fatal shooting, later ruled a suicide, of a top lieutenant.

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Fox Lake's former chief, Michael Behan, retired after being placed on leave amid an internal probe into how the department handled a scuffle between an officer and a man who was arrested in December 2014. Three officers who acknowledged wrongdoing in the incident received suspensions last month.

Days after Behan's departure, Lt. Charles Joseph Gliniewicz was fatally shot in what authorities ultimately ruled a suicide, saying he feared years of alleged criminal activity would soon be exposed.

"More than anything, we need to bring proven leadership and stability to the FLPD so we can implement changes to modernize the department and ensure that we are doing everything we can to deliver professional and effective public safety services to our residents," Village Administrator Anne Marrin said in a statement.

A panel including Fox Lake Mayor Donny Schmit, Trustee Jeff Jensen, Lake County Undersheriff Ray Rose, Keller and Marrin unanimously chose Laine from a pool of dozens of applicants, according to the statement from the village.

"It's an honor to be asked to serve the residents of Fox Lake and to work alongside Fox Lake police officers," said Laine, 65. "I am fully aware of the very real challenges that this community and its police department have faced in recent months. It is my job to work every day to help our officers deliver on their primary mission, which is to serve our residents admirably. We will set this department on a course for long-term success. So, while making sure we're delivering on our day-to-day duties, we'll also be taking a fresh look at the department's policies, procedures and its overall crime-fighting strategy with an eye towards improving in all areas."

According to an Illinois House resolution honoring Laine after his retirement as Algonquin police chief in 2014, Laine was born in Waukegan and is an Army veteran who earned three Bronze Stars and a Purple Heart while serving as an infantry medic in the Vietnam War.

He worked as a paramedic at Memorial Hospital of DuPage County in the 1970s before switching to a career in law enforcement, working as a police officer in Streamwood and Bartlett, eventually becoming Bartlett's chief, according to the resolution.

He also served as police chief in Edgerton, Wis., between 1982 and 1985, when he was appointed police chief in Algonquin.

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Marrin has said the village intended to select an interim chief to oversee reforms before selecting the person they want to lead the department for the long haul.

The village and Laine have agreed on a one-year contract, which could be extended, according to the statement.

"Our residents expect and deserve top-notch leaders delivering what is our most important service, which is keeping our community safe. We are looking forward to working closely with Chief Laine in the coming months to continue the progress we have made in recent months to update our policies and procedures, bring needed training and resources to our officers, and update our overall efforts to keep Fox Lake safe," Schmit said in the statement.

lzumbach@tribpub.com

Twitter @LaurenZumbach
Gov. Bruce Rauner signs Executive Order 15-15, creating the Local Government Consolidation and Unfunded Mandate Task Force, which aims to find efficiencies and streamline local government functions, on Feb. 13, 2015, in Elmhurst. (John J. Kim, Chicago Tribune)

It doesn't take too much prodding to get DuPage County Board Chairman Dan Cronin to talk about government consolidation.

It's his baby  and it's been his baby for several years, since DuPage County enacted the ACT Initiative, a state approved pilot program allowing the county, with citizen support, to consolidate smaller governments whose boards are appointed by the county by taking them into the county government fold.

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So it was no surprise that Cronin this week was proud to point out that DuPage's work was featured prominently in the report from Gov. Bruce Rauner's Task Force on Local Government Consolidation and Unfunded Mandates. However, other local officials were critical of some recommendations that could trim or target agencies that provide services to local residents.

The task force was formed about 11 months ago to look at how Illinois can save money and cut property taxes by allowing governments to consolidate, cooperate and cut down on state-mandated expenses.

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Cronin, a member of the task force, said he found the spotlight on DuPage County "uncomfortable at times," but said he hopes the attention will effectively convey to other counties and legislators that consolidation is, in fact, achievable.

"A lot of folks are cynical," Cronin said. "They say, 'I appreciate your sentiment,' or, 'You're not going to be able to get rid of that government or consolidate that tax.' Yes, we can. It's hard work. It's incremental. And it takes time. But it pays dividends."

According to Cronin and the state report, the DuPage dividends include: a projected $116 million in taxpayer savings through shared services; $20 million in savings since overhauling employee benefits for county workers; and $6.9 million in savings since closing the county's youth home and instead partnering with Kane County to provide youth detention services.

State and local officials are thinking savings could be available statewide, and for that reason, the State Legislature already is considering allowing Illinois' 101 other counties to develop their own consolidation programs.

That also was in the state report dealing with government consolidation. Another of the report's recommendations already has been adopted. A four-year moratorium on creating any new local governments  unless that new government is a result of consolidating two or more existing local governments -- became law Jan. 1.

Other recommendations could be adopted, too, such as allowing Illinois citizens to consolidate or dissolve local governments by referendum, allowing coterminous townships to consolidate with their municipalities, making it easier for townships to consolidate and allowing counties to keep their existing form of government, even if a successful referendum dissolves the townships into the county.

In all, the report has 12 recommendations concerning consolidation, and another 15 concerning unfunded mandates.

But some government officials want to make sure people understand the report is just that  and not a something that's ready for consideration by the Legislature.

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"It is not a bill," said State Sen. Linda Holmes, D-Aurora, a member of the task force. "It will never all be incorporated into state law."

That's important to Holmes, because she criticizes sections of the report that indicate the main unfunded mandates that affect local government are all related to public pensions, public unions and collective bargaining, worker's compensation and adoption of the prevailing wage.

"The governor is putting in his right-to-work and turnaround agenda into (the report)," she said.

Aurora Mayor Tom Weisner said the report is only viable "if we don't have to swallow everything whole."

"There are things I would be able to support, thing I think would need further discussion  which is fine  and things I wouldn't touch with a 10-foot pole," he said.

He said the report contains "a little bit of everything." He added that consolidation "is not the worst thing in the world."

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He said government cooperation that creates efficiencies and saves money, rather than consolidation, seems more viable. He pointed out that Aurora and Naperville have created a cooperative relationship on several items. Most recently, both cities agreed to discuss merging their Emergency Telephone Service Boards that oversee emergency 911 communications. That could result in savings of millions of dollars.

Indeed, in the sections of the 400-page report that deal with case studies, most are examples of cooperation between governments, rather than consolidation. In some cases, state law makes it impossible for governments to consolidate, which is why a number of the report's recommendations deal with the Legislature simply amending state law to allow it. Consolidation itself would be done locally by a referendum of the people.

"It's making sure we don't create a layer" that gets in the way, Holmes said.

As far as unfunded mandates go, while the report addresses a handful of them, it also points out that the Illinois Municipal League had identified 266 unfunded mandates that have been imposed on municipalities since 1982  an average of about eight a year.

And the Illinois Association of School Districts reported 145 unfunded mandates on schools since 1992. That's an average of about six new ones a year.

"We haven't looked at unfunded mandates for 28 years, so, yes, review them (every two years)," Holmes said.

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A number of the recommendations in the report concern consolidating and dissolving township government, which doesn't surprise Aurora Township Supervisor Bill Catching.

"They've been trying to get rid of us for years, and (townships) don't go away because we provide needed services very efficiently," he said.

He pointed out that in the case of Aurora Township, the owner of a $100,000 house pays about $105 a year in taxes to the township.

"If someone absorbs us, that $105 isn't going to go away," he said.

Still, he said there is plenty of room for discussion of consolidating townships, and cooperation between townships. For instance, Aurora Township handles General Assistance cases for Blackberry and Kaneville townships, because those smaller, rural townships have no staff.

"I think every elected official worth his salt is looking at ways to save money," Catching said. "Consolidation, cooperation, privatizing  they're always on the table."

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Officials also pointed out that just because the Legislature allows something, it might not fit a local situation.

Cronin said while the ACT Initiative has helped DuPage County, it should be seen as a guide for other counties, not a "one size fits all" model.

"You could take our playbook and use it at other places, but you have to have some sort of assessment," he said. "We (DuPage County) engaged in conversation. We found common ground. It's really hard work, and you have to have a good understanding of what the potential is in your particular area."

Steve Lord is a reporter for the Beacon-News. Marwa Eltagouri is a reporter for the Chicago Tribune.

slord@tribpub.com
The Naperville Police Department will continue to oversee the certification program that people must obtain before being allowed to sell or serve alcohol rather than switching to an online program, the Naperville Liquor Commission has decided.

Mayor Steve Chirico, who chairs the commission, had asked commissioners to consider ending the Basset training program as a cost-saving measure for the city.

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"All of those who have received Basset training here don't necessarily work in Naperville, (and) the feeling is there are online courses available and this is a state license anyway," Chirico said. "I felt it was time to eliminate this training on a local level and not extend our resources. Given the online option, doing the training sessions here seems less efficient."

Commissioner Scott Wehrli said he was opposed to the idea, arguing that he believed in-person training is more effective than taking a computer program.

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"When Naperville began offering Basset training some time ago, it was soon recognized as a leader in the state, and I believe having it done locally provides a higher degree of safety than 'distance learning,' which will be debated forever," Wehrli said. "Having the group learning provides a unique experience for those that are receiving this training, people that are often in their 20s and 'new' drinkers themselves."

Commissioner James Ostrenga agreed, saying that he questions the validity of online training when it can't be verified who is actually taking the test or how much attention is being paid.

"People that take the training and test here aren't texting on their phones or allowed to sleep in class," he said.

City staff told commissioners the program actually made a $30,000 profit in the past six months or so, in part because no-show fees are charged to those who fail to attend. More than 2,000 people have been trained in the past year.

A new Basset law now in effect requires that all Illinois Basset cardholders renew their certificate every three years. Chirico said one option would be for business owners to become certified and then offer the training to their employees.

"As a businessman myself, I feel I should be told what's expected of me and then follow the rules," Chirico said. "It's up to me to do what's right and face the consequences if I don't."

Chirico added he did not like taking a police officer away from other duties for the four-hour training sessions.

Wehrli suggested that one option could be to employ a retired sworn officer to handle the training.

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"Having someone with a law enforcement background is key," Wehrli said.

David Sharos is a freelance writer for the Naperville Sun.
Ten-year-old Aidan Maguire, left, looks over a book of photos that document the newborn medical odyssey taken by his sister, Grace, 5, right. (Susan Frick Carlman / Naperville Sun)

Grace Maguire's favorite tune is "Fight Song." It's a perfect fit for a little girl who started her life fighting to live.

The Naperville 5-year-old isn't shy about breaking into song, performing a medley that culminated in her unofficial anthem for a visitor on a recent day as her family prepared to take part in a fundraising effort they support every year, out of gratitude.

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Diagnosed just after birth with pulmonary hypertension, a condition that hinders oxygen flow, Mike and Sharon Maguire's third child developed complications almost immediately after a distinctly uncomplicated birth at Central DuPage Hospital.

Sharon Maguire related that Grace's newborn vital signs initially appeared mostly normal, although her oxygen was slightly low  and falling. And then things began to happen fast. Within a few minutes, she was whisked off to the newborn intensive care unit.

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"The next time we saw her, she had a ventilator attached to her," Sharon Maguire said.

Grace Maguire was born Jan. 2, 2011, after a routine pregnancy and labor - but then spent most of her first two weeks on life support after quickly developing serious complications traced to pulmonary hypertension. (Maguire family / Handout)

Treatments began right away, but the infant was not responding well. When the doctor came into the hospital room in the middle of the night to summon the couple to the NICU, they knew it was serious. Grace was being prepared for a move to Children's Memorial Hospital in Chicago, now Lurie Children's Hospital, which was better prepared to treat her acutely serious condition.

"Your whole life just kind of changes," said Sharon Maguire, 40, who grew up in Naperville and lived quite close to Lurie Children's Hospital for a time before she and her husband, a Lisle native, moved back. "We had the chaplain baptize her."

With time critically short, it was reassuring, she said, when the helicopter airlifting their baby was equipped with a highly experienced nurse, respiratory therapist and a pilot whose final day of work before retiring was that day. Sharon Maguire said his previous personal best of 14 minutes' air time from CDH to Lurie Children's Hospital was shaved to 12 minutes.

The medical teams took over from there, beginning a constant watch over Grace's every function that would continue until her release.

"It was just one of those moments when you realize you are completely in the hands of these doctors and nurses," Sharon Maguire said.

It was a long eight weeks of hospitalization for the baby, who spent 11 days on life support in a specialized unit, aided by extracorporeal membrane oxygenation. The treatment uses machinery to drain blood from the body, oxygenate it and return it to the bloodstream.

The family set up a Caring Bridge page, an online health journal that enabled them to share details of their baby's medical journey.

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"People were praying for us, all over the world," Sharon Maguire said. "That meant so much to us."

Grace Maguire, center, is an energetic 5-year-old who keeps up with her sister Abby, 7, and brother Aidan, 10, shown flanking their mom, Sharon. (Susan Frick Carlman / Naperville Sun)

During that two months, there were advances and setbacks  and then Grace rallied unexpectedly and was suddenly cleared to go home.

The family joyously celebrated her homecoming and agreed the following January to express their appreciation for her remarkable rebound by taking part in the Aon Step Up for Kids event, an 80-story climb up the Aon Center that benefits Lurie Children's Hospital.

This will be their fifth year of making the climb. Sharon Maguire said this year's dozen-strong team includes Grace's brother Aidan, 10, and sister Abby, 7, and their grandparents, aunts, uncles and a neighbor or two.

"We always end up with more," she said.

The team, the Amazing Grace Steppers, is taking donations for the Jan. 31 climb through Lurie Children's Hospital's website.

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Viewed in retrospect, Sharon Maguire said, the experience gave the family a deeper understanding of the goodness of strangers and the meaning of genuine gratitude.

"You never want to find yourself in a crisis, but the things that we've learned from Grace and the things that happened really changed us," she said.

As Sharon Maguire told her daughter's story, Grace raced through the family's south Naperville house with her siblings, her energy apparently boundless. Her mom said the little girl brings joy wherever she goes.

"There's just something about Grace," she said.

scarlman@tribpub.com

Twitter @scarlman
Northwest Indiana's five casinos ended 2015 on a positive note, with four casinos posting increased year-over-year revenues in December and a fifth holding steady with the same revenues.

The casinos collectively raked in $82.88 million in December, a 3.8 percent increase over December 2014 revenues, according to a monthly report issued Friday by the Indiana Gaming Commission.

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This was a better performance than all the casinos combined in the overall Chicago market, which had a 0.6 percent increase in revenues last month.

Dan Nita, senior vice president and general manager of Horseshoe Hammond, attributed the increase to the weather.

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"We had really good weather compared to last December. It helped out," Nita said.

He said the positive numbers helped bring up the year's total revenues to show a 0.2 percent increase over 2014 revenues.

"For all intents and purposes, we broke even compared to 2014. With all the competition, that's a good sign," Nita said.

Ed Feigenbaum, editor of Indiana Gaming Insight, said the local revenue increase was on par with the state's numbers, which showed a collective increase of 3.2 percent.

"It's the second straight December of year-over-year increases," he said.

According to the monthly report, Ameristar in East Chicago took in $20.09 million last month compared to $18.72 million the previous December. Blue Chip in Michigan City took in $13.62 million compared to $13.08 million, Horseshoe Hammond raked in $36.44 million compared to $35.81 million and Majestic Star I in Gary brought in $7.31 million compared to $7.17 million.

Majestic Star II in Gary took in about $5.42 million in both months.

Locally, the revenue hikes came while attendance numbers dropped at all the casinos except Blue Chip.

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Feigenbaum said this is partially due to the number of video terminal slot machines popping up in Illinois taverns and other businesses.

"It looks like (those machines) are keeping some people out of the casinos, but not the higher-dollar players," Feigenbaum said.

Nita said the video slot machines in Illinois are diverting the casual players from casinos in Northwest Indiana.

"But the average customers, the ones who want to be rated and to get comps, they're still very consistent," Nita said.

At Ameristar, 190,899 people came through the turnstile last month compared to 206,480 in December 2014. Blue Chip had 196,008 compared to 191,988 and Horseshoe had 328,069 compared to 346,111. The two Majestic Star casinos had a combined attendance of 146,452 compared to 161,890 the previous December.

Karen Caffarini is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
A Cedar Lake couple has been charged in Lake Superior Court with five counts of neglect of a dependent and one count of misdemeanor animal cruelty after police found deplorable living conditions in their home.

Chad E. Delacruz, 30, and Nicole L. Delacruz, 29, of the 13400 block of Edison Street, are charged with placing their children, ranging from ages 3 to 10, in a situation that endangered their life or health, and with knowingly or intentionally neglecting three dogs and two rabbits, which were removed from the couple's home in mid-December.

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Lake County police Detective Michelle Dvorscak was called Dec. 13 regarding an emaciated dog that had been eating out of garbage cans at a Citgo gas station at 133rd Avenue and Whitcomb Street for about two days before a Lake County Animal Control Center investigator picked him up. When Nicole Delacruz tried to claim the dog at the animal control center, staff noticed the children were wearing dirty clothing, smelled badly and also appeared to be victims of neglect, the probable caused affidavit states.

When investigators visited the home, they found what appeared to be feces on the driveway and sidewalk leading to the house, the yard filled with garbage and a broken-down car, and a strong odor or urine and feces inside the house. After obtaining a search warrant, investigators went to the home Dec. 17, where they found fleas were jumping from the carpet, which was covered with clothes, children's toys, remnants of food and garbage, and other filth, including apparent animal feces and urine, court records state. The odor was so bad that officers could only stay in the residence for a short time before having to step outside for fresh air, records state.

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The dog that had been eating garbage was about 20 pounds underweight, had numerous broken teeth and medical conditions that included sarcoptic mange, records state. Three rabbits were living in their own feces in two separate cages, with no food or water. The cages appeared not to have been cleaned in quite some time, records state. There were two cats inside the home, but repeated attempts over several hours to capture the animals were unsuccessful as they climbed into holes in the walls and under furniture and objects littering the residence. The cats were left inside the home. Two dogs and three rabbits were taken to the Highland Animal Hospital for examination, records state.

Police also found no working lights in either bedroom. A German shepherd dog in a crate on one of the bedrooms was described as emaciated, with patches of missing fur and sores on its coat. Investigators also documented lockable "gates" in the doorway of each bedroom, which they think may have been used to keep children inside the rooms, records state. There was also half of a solid door at the hallway entrance, which could be secured so no children or animals could leave the hallway or bedrooms and possibly creating a deadly situation should the residence catch fire, records state.

Court records indicate that Lake Superior Court Judge Thomas Stefaniak Jr., conducted hearing on Dec. 21 and found probable cause to keep the children in the custody of the Indiana Department of Child Services.

Ruth Ann Krause is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
Valparaiso Pistol and Rifle club chief instructor Bob Trulley speaks about his opinion on President Obama's executive order on Thursday, Jan. 7, during a club gathering. (Kyle Telechan, Post-Tribune)

Some local gun advocates argue President Barack Obama's executive order calling for more control on gun sales hurts law-abiding gun owners more than it does criminals.

Obama announced a number of changes he plans to pursue, including requiring all firearm dealers to be licensed with the federal government and for all dealers to perform background checks on buyers.

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The president referenced the "gun-show loophole," where some authorities argue that gun dealers are able to skirt regulations. Local and federal officials have called out local gun shows in Lake County in the past few years for helping provide guns to criminals in the region and Chicago.

"Individuals are skirting federal law, especially at these gun shows," Lake County Sheriff John Buncich said. "There's a lot of illegal gun sales."

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Buncich stressed he supports Second Amendment rights and doesn't want to take guns away from people. He noted, however, that hundreds of guns from Lake County show up in Chicago crimes every year.

"We just need to do something to stem the violence," Buncich said. "It's not going to hurt the law-abiding citizens."

Not everyone agrees, however. Bob Trulley, a St. John resident and chief safety instructor of the Valparaiso Pistol and Rifle Club, said that in his view, Obama's order could mean anyone wanting to sell a gun, even just once, might have to register with the federal government, which Trulley said he would have no idea how to do.

He also said that the requirements won't stop people from just making deals in the parking lot of a gun show or anywhere else they might not be watched.

Trulley said that, instead, the president should focus more on punishing those who break the law.

"That's where his thrust should have been, more to prosecuting those who do criminal acts, not making me a criminal for going to a gun show," he said.

Doug McMillan, a Porter County resident and treasurer with the North Porter County Conservation Club, said he was concerned with another component of Obama's order, involving the mental health checks with the Social Security Administration as part of background checks. McMillan said this could violate federal law protecting the release of health information.

"That's pretty intrusive," he said.

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McMillan also said criminals would continue to find ways to get guns.

"It's the law-abiding, responsible people that are the ones that are restricted, which is totally backward," he said.

Several gun advocates also questioned the legality of an executive order. Bob Harrison, a Wanatah resident who serves as president of the Valparaiso Pistol and Rifle Club, said he was upset by the move, calling the order illegal.

"He's breaking the law," Harrison said. "Congress and the Senate are breaking it, too, by letting him do it."

Even some law enforcement officials aren't convinced the executive order will prove effective. East Chicago police Chief Mark Becker said the executive order will likely just prove more of a hassle for regular citizens than criminals.

"I think what we have found is if a person wants a gun, they're going to get a gun," Becker said. "I'm not quite sure what this program is going to do, other than require average citizens to jump through a bunch of hoops."

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He added that felons, who aren't legally allowed to possess a gun, can still use straw purchases or have someone else who can legally buy a gun purchase one for them, to skirt the crackdown on gun show dealers.

"I know that sounds frustrating to people, but that's the reality," he said.

tauch@post-trib.com
Joey Lax-Salinas of St. John is creating a photo project to capture the largest commercial library of Northwest Indiana images, including this shot of downtown Valparaiso's ice rink. (Joey Lax-Salinas)

If you've lived in Northwest Indiana long enough, or for too long, it's easy to forget our richness of diversity, natural treasures and iconic festivals.

Our little corner of the state comes with a long-suffering reputation  region rats and Hoosier bumpkins stuck together on an industrial island with a smokestack skyline. Our casual coast along Lake Michigan too often appears to be a casualty of bad press and good riddance.

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Because of this, we feel shunned by the rest of the state, ignored by Chicago and mocked by passing motorists. So when a breath of fresh air seeps into this dreary imagery, it feels like a gasp of needed oxygen to an emphysema patient.

This is how I felt while browsing through the refreshing photographs of Joey Lax-Salinas. The 34-year-old St. John shutterbug is compiling an extensive collection of photos and images of every city and town in this five-county region, starting with his hometown of Hammond.

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"He's amazing," Hammond Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr. said. "Joey takes photos of a 130-year-old city and he makes it look beautiful."

Lax-Salinas initially donated digital photos with commercial licenses to the city and the Hammond Port Authority. McDermott's office later purchased more than 30 formatted photos of the city and, just last month, started displaying them as public art.

"We hung them all over City Hall," McDermott said.

Lax-Salinas is appreciative of the mayor's support in his artwork, which he hopes will lead to other municipalities interested in his work.

"The mayor has shared many of the photos and he connected me with several other local business people and do-gooders," said Lax-Salinas, a 2003 Indiana University graduate.

He has a knack for capturing insightful photos of communities that best reflect their history or image, each one comprising the collective mosaic of Northwest Indiana.

"I'm just amazed with bewilderment," he explained.

All of us should be so lucky to see our region through such rose-colored curiosity.

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Using his natural artistic talents, optimum lighting and photography software programs, Lax-Salinas makes otherwise nondescript city buildings, roadside signs and rural landscapes come alive with his editing skills.

Over the past decade, Lax-Salinas has captured more than 500,000 digital images of Northwest Indiana, most of them saved on external hard drives kept in a bank's safety deposit box.

"Obviously, they're very important to me," Lax-Salinas said while showing samples of his work. "I'm adding more photos that I took over the summer as I'm going into editing mode this winter season."

For the past several years, he's been working on a project to create the largest and most commercially available library of stock photos for Northwest Indiana. City halls, town squares, welcome signs, aerial views, and so on.

You can find his collection at www.nwistockphotos.com, which is separated into 51 albums for each community, from Brook to Schneider and Chesterton to Winfield. Some albums are loaded with photos, such as Crown Point, Valparaiso and Hammond. Other albums have less to offer, such as Hanna, San Pierre and Wheatfield.

Many rural towns have only so many old barns, historic courthouses and main street intersections to identify them on a map.

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His photos are featured on the covers of several Northwest Indiana town planner calendars, mailed to residents a few weeks ago. His photo of the old Lake County Courthouse in Crown Point was used on the cover of the Yellow Pages phone book for 2014-15.

"It all started with people asking to use my photos for various purposes, and then I got into licensing," said Lax-Salinas, who also does video and photo marketing work for car dealerships, real estate firms and homebuilders.

In the spring of 2013, one of his photos, "TriBeCa, NYC," was used as an entire wall image at a high-end restaurant in Morocco, Casablanca. That same year, he captured a photo of a severe storm cell swirling into rural Cedar Lake. The image found its way onto the front page of a newspaper and then was selected for display by the Newseum on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

"I started taking all these photos because I had a hard time finding stock photos of our region. And if I did find photos, they were usually outdated," said Lax-Salinas, who also is an amateur storm chaser.

Similar to when he chases a storm, he first plots out his plan of attack before taking photos across Northwest Indiana. He draws a map of targeted locations, checks the weather prediction, and even the trajectory of the sun, for lighting purposes.

"Yeah, it gets pretty intense," he said, rolling his eyes at his photography passion.

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Lax-Salinas uses a Canon 5D Mark 2 digital single-lens reflex camera, with intentions of upgrading it in the next six months. For readers who are fellow photographers, he uses a standard lens (24-105), a telephoto lens (100-400) and a fisheye lens. For editing, he uses numerous software programs.

"Some photos go through four or five software processes before they are complete, at least in my eyes," explained Lax-Salinas, a self-confessed binge photographer. "I don't like shooting in the winter, so I do most of my shots from May through November."

The savvy, fast-talking Lax-Salinas has learned that it's not only the quality of a photo that matters, but also the metadata attached to it. It's one thing to take a photo and massage it for reproduction. It's quite another thing to license it and market it.

Certain images from his impressive body of work have been featured on "Good Morning America," "World News with Diane Sawyer" and "The Weather Channel." His photos pop up on search engines without most of us knowing who captured the image.

For an example, type in "Soho New York City" into a Google Images search. His streetscape photo typically pops up in the top five images.

"It's probably my most stolen and reused photo," he said with a shrug.

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Take a peek at his work of our area and you also may come away "amazed with bewilderment," as I did.

jdavich@post-trib.com

Twitter @jdavich
Everyone who lives here knows what the Indiana Dunes means to the area. Let's hope that 2016 brings an end to the privatization of our beach at Indiana Dunes State Park.

Almost everyone who knows the details of this proposal know how bad it is and what a terrible precedent it would set. How could the Indiana Department of Natural Resources ever say "no" to any other private commercial venture in this state park or in any other if the banquet center is built on the beach?

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If profitability is the only criteria needed to approve a project in a state park, then how could the DNR say "no" to a hotel or a craft brewery in the park?

The state park is part of the public trust. We enable our state government and its representatives to protect special places for their unique landscapes, cultural history, or their plants and animals, recreation, etc. They protect them for us.

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To allow this to be turned over to a private and for-profit entity is a betrayal of that trust, pure and simple.

As part of this trust, it requires public funding and maintenance or that whole philosophy goes out the window.

The state of Indiana should fund the pavilion reuse project and reject any new building on the beach. Tell the governor and your state representatives to protect our state park and our beach from private development interests. They are ours.

Jim Sweeney

Schererville

Send us your view

Letters to the editor should be no more than 300 words and must include the author's name, address and telephone number for verification. Send letters to ptvoice@post-trib.com.
A ruling in favor of a lawsuit that aims to prevent a proposed gun shop and range in Niles from locating within five miles of several schools would violate the Second Amendment, an attorney for the owners of the facility argued during a recent court hearing on the case.

In a hearing Wednesday afternoon at the Richard J. Daley Center, Circuit Court of Cook County Judge Franklin Ulyses Valderrama considered the arguments made by an attorney for the plaintiff in the case, Skokie-base advocacy group, People for a Safer Society, and lawyers for the defendants named in the suit, which include the gun shop owners and the village of Niles.

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An additional hearing on the case is scheduled for Feb. 9.

Valderrama dismissed a lawsuit filed by People for a Safer Society against the village last June. Like the initial suit filed in October 2014, the amended complaint filed last July seeks to annul a special-use permit for the gun shop and range dubbed the Sportsman's Club and Firearms Training and bar any other gun-related business from opening up shop at 6143 Howard St. The Niles Village Board approved a special-use permit for the business in July 2014, and the board voted again last summer to extend the permit by an additional six months.

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To address the concerns outlined by Valderrama in his June ruling on the case, Tony Hind, an attorney for People for Safer Society, named 6143 Howard Partners, the company that plans to open the gun shop and range as a defendant in the amended suit alongside the village of Niles. Attorneys for the village and gun shop owners subsequently filed motions to dismiss the complaint.

Jim Argionis, an attorney for 6143 Howard Partners, told Valderrama Wednesday that the advocacy group "is seeking unconstitutional relief" by asking the judge to bar any gun-related business from the property. He added that it wasn't the place of the court to "step into the shoes of Niles and come up with legislation."

Argionis said People for a Safer Society did not have "the proper standing to bring this type of action" because none of the members of the group owned any adjoining property. He also said the harms alleged in the complaint were "hypothetical and potential."

In response, Hind said the suit did not violate the Second Amendment because the group wasn't seeking to bar anyone from bearing arms, but was asking the judge to review a legislative decision that allowed for the creation "of a singular gun mecca" in an area surrounded by schools. Hind added that several members of the advocacy group, including NewHope Academy, a school for students with emotional disabilities, and three facilities owned by Lifeway Foods, were located within close proximity to the site.

"The idea we have to wait until a harm is visited upon a plaintiff or, God forbid, a child, is wrong," he said, adding that the existence of the gun range and shop posed "a real and present threat of harm" to group members.

Mike Connelly, an attorney for the village, said the amended lawsuit filed by the group last summer is essentially "the same complaint" the judge previously dismissed.

The suit alleges that the existence of the gun shop and range would result in decreased enrollment at NewHope Academy and endanger the current and prospective student body. The suit also alleges employees of Lifeway Foods would be endangered by the presence of the business "more extremely than the public at large."

Connelly said these allegations are "not factual," but instead conclusions drawn without any supporting evidence.

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"You can't simply leap to: These are guns and therefore people are in danger," he said.

Valderrama asked Hind to address the issue of whether the allegations were or were not factual and if the harms alleged in the complaint were specific to the plaintiffs versus the public at large.

Hind said the suit outlines the general harms posed by the gun business and the way in which they become more extreme given the proximity of the plaintiffs involved.

"I think we have a very strong case," said Denyse Stoneback, founder of People for a Safer Society, following the hearing. "I'm hopeful the judge will rule in our favor."

The advocacy group has lobbied the village of Skokie for several months to sign onto the suit as a plaintiff. Village leaders have declined citing several reasons, including the possibility that any involvement in the litigation may undermine the village's own legal standing and position on home rule rights.

Lee V. Gaines is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.
During a visit to Chongqing Municipality, Chinese President Xi Jinping touted the development concepts of innovation, coordination, green development, opening up and sharing. He believed they have been derived from domestic and international experiences and based on analysis of the economic and social development trends and relevant laws.

He said the new development concepts, which are focused in the nation's 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020), would serve as a baton, leading the direction, indicating the path and opening a new evolution frontier.

The whole society should implement the central leadership's requirements, put actions in line with new development concepts to uphold innovation, emphasize coordination, advocate green development, cultivate openness and encourage more sharing.

2016 is the first year for China to implement the 13th Five-Year Plan. People should work hard together, so as to kick off for a good start to lay a solid foundation for completing the building of a moderately prosperous society by 2020.

Comments by Xu Xiujun, associate researcher with the Institute of World Economy and Politics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences; comics drawn by Wang Yuling

The opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Panview or CCTV.com.
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Soldiers escort Joaquin Guzman Loera, alias "El Chapo", upon his arrival to the hangar of the Attorney General's Office, in Mexico City, capital of Mexico, on Jan. 8, 2016. After an early morning raid in northwestern Mexico's Sinaloa State's town of Los Mochis by Mexican police and marines on Friday, Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquin Guzman Loera was recaptured, six months after his second prison break.

After an early morning raid in northwestern Mexico's Sinaloa State's town of Los Mochis by Mexican police and marines on Friday, Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman Loera was recaptured, six months after his second prison break.

The news was broken by President Enrique Pena Nieto, who took to Twitter, saying "Mission accomplished. We got him. I want to inform all Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested."

In a second message, he thanked security forces for this "important victory...for Mexico."

In a raid on a house in Los Mochis at 6am, security forces exchanged shots with suspected accomplices of Guzman, leaving at least five dead and six captured, the Secretariat of the Navy announced Friday.

Mexican daily El Universal reported that authorities were currently submitting Guzman to genetic and photographic tests to fully ascertain whether they have arrested the right man.

The raid was planned after receiving a tip-off that armed men were present in a house of the town's Scally neighborhood.

Upon arriving at the house, the marines were met with gunfire. They returned fire, and one soldier was lightly injured in the exchange. His life is not in danger, according to medical sources.

During the operation, around 100 soldiers and one helicopter were deployed around at least eight streets of the Scally neighborhood.

Houses, cars and even sewers were searched as the police learned that Orso Ivan Gastelum Cruz, the Sinaloa cartel's boss in the northern part of the state, was also present. However, the Secretariat of the Navy confirmed that Gastelum Cruz managed to escape.

Four vehicles were seized in the raid, including two armed cars, as well as a rocket launcher and several other weapons.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency sent a message on Friday to the Mexican government, congratulating them for the recapture of Guzman, saying "this is a great day for justice and for the objectives of Mexico and the U.S."

This is the third time Guzman has been captured, after being arrested in 1993 and 2014. However, he has pulled off two daring escapes from maximum-security prisons. In 2001, he was wheeled out by a janitor in a laundry cart. In 2015, his allies dug a tunnel about a mile long right into his jail cell at the Altiplano prison in central Mexico, sparking concerns that police and prison officials may have been involved.
A reporter interviews an employee from Lenovo Group Ltd at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the United States. Lenovo executives said the company will abandon the iconic Motorola name for its premium handset division. [Photo/Xinhua] Tech giants to work together on phones that create 'on-screen 3-D experiences'

Lenovo Group Ltd entered the high-end smartphone market on Friday by introducing its latest three-dimensional technology and letting go a piece of history.

The Beijing-based Lenovo showed off a smartphone that can overlay digital 3-D objects with the real environment on display using cameras, sensors and built-in software at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the United States.

The company said the prototype uses Google Inc's Project Tango technology to create "on-screen 3-D experiences". The first handset that carries the technology is expected to be launched by this summer, according to Lenovo.

Chen Xudong, head of the company's smartphone business, pledged more "pioneering innovations" for future products, saying technology edge and eye-catching designs are ingredients for buyers who are willing to spend more than $500 on a smartphone.

Also on Friday, Lenovo executives said the company will abandon the iconic Motorola name for its premium handset division. Lenovo purchased Motorola Mobility - the first company to produce cellular phones - from Google for $2.9 billion a year ago.

The legendary Android smartphone maker will still carry the familiar M logo but will be simply called Moto.

The Moto division will play a key role in grabbing market shares high-end sector.

Chen said the re-branding move was not mean to end a time-honored brand but to make it stronger.

"Moto devices mainly target segments above 3,000 yuan ($450) while devices bearing Lenovo logo target for the lower-end market."

Other strategies include trimming product types so that the company can focus on the development of flagship products.

Antonio Wang, an analyst from International Data Corp, said Lenovo is trying to add more innovations to its products in a bid to boost its presence in the top-tier market.

"The executives have realized lack of innovation is hurting company's growth and they are solving this problem," he said.

Other Chinese vendors are also moving toward the above-3,000-yuan market even as global giants Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd showed signs of slowdown.

Lei Jun, CEO of China's second-largest smartphone maker Xiaomi Corp, said the company is set to introduce a premium device bearing Qualcomm Inc's latest chipset in February. Sources familiar with the new device, likely to be named Mi 5, said it will be the most expensive smartphone the company has ever launched.

LeTV Holdings Co Ltd, another local vendor, has also released its 2016 flagship using the same Qualcomm chip used in the Mi5. The device is believed to be priced at about 3,500 yuan.

Chinese firms already account for about 80 percent of the country's smartphone market, according to research firm Gartner Inc. But the iPhone and Galaxy series maintained control over the top-tier market in 2015. As profit margins in inexpensive markets become thin, Chinese companies are set to enter the more profitable high-end segment, it said.

China slump may hit Apple shipments

Lackluster iPhone sales in China could crimp global smartphone shipments of United States tech major Apple Inc during the first quarter of this year, research firm International Data Corp said on Friday.

Apple's global smartphone shipments during the January-March period will be 30 percent lower than the 14.5 million units it shipped during the same period a year earlier, according to James Yan, IDC's handset researcher based in Beijing.

"Worse-than-expected iPhone 6S/6S Plus sales were the key reason (for the decline)," Yan said. Apple's latest rollouts only accounted for about 70 percent of the iPhone sales.

The IDC findings echo a Nikkei research earlier this week, saying Apple is cutting production of the iPhone 6S/6S Plus models by about one-third in the starting months of 2016. A number of Apple suppliers have already trimmed revenue estimates.

China was Apple's biggest market by sales in the fiscal year ended in September 2015. The country was responsible for more than a quarter of the whopping $233.7 billion annual net sales, said Apple.
Posters advertising Chinese language used by Japanese shop owners in an attempt to attract buyers during China's Golden Week, 2015. Around 400,000 tourists from the Chinese mainland visited Japan and spent nearly 100 billion yen, or around $830 million in shopping during the National Day holiday week. [Photo/IC]

Japanese companies are still bearish when it comes to expanding or setting up new businesses in China, a new survey said.

Only 38.1 percent of the Japanese companies were willing to expand their business in China over the next two years, the lowest reading in the past 17 years, said the survey published by the Japan External Trade Organization.

Japanese businesses cited falling sales, rising purchasing and labor costs, waning development potential, less acceptance to high value-added products and strict management as reasons for the bearishness.

About 51.3 percent of the respondents preferred to maintain the present status, while 5.1 percent wanted to cut investments, said Yoshihisa Tabata, director-general of the Beijing office of the JETRO.

The rest of the respondents preferred to either curtail their operations or withdraw completely from China and move their business to other countries, he said.

However, Tabata said: "Despite the economic slowdown in the country, not all Japanese companies are pessimistic about China's economic future."

The general mechanical equipment sector, for example, despite the less promising performance in North China, saw sales in southern and eastern part of China surge, he said.

With increasing purchasing capacity, it is believed that consumption on high-quality products by China's expanding middle class will last till 2020, said Tabata.

According to the governmental organization that promotes trade and investment with other countries, Japanese companies in Hubei province, Beijing and Shanghai are more willing to expand their operation in the future, with 51.3 percent, 42.9 percent and 38.5 percent of respondents willing to extend business in 2016. Japanese companies in Guangdong, Shandong and Liaoning provinces are less willing to branch out.

Japanese companies in the manufacturing industry are less willing to expand business in the upcoming two years, with only 34.9 percent of them willing to expand the business, including the food industry, transport machinery equipment industry, chemical and pharmaceuticals industry, general mechanical equipment, electrical machinery equipment and metals industry.

The non-manufacturing industry is more optimistic, with 43.9 percent willing to expand operations in China, including those involved in the wholesale and retail, communication software and transportation industries.
Workers sort parcels at a delivery company in Fuyang, Anhui province.[Photo/China Daily]

China's top 10 provinces will get priority to establish comprehensive cross-border e-commerce pilot zones, a top official said.

Most of these cities are those with good infrastructure, trade and a strong e-commerce base, Zhang Ji, assistant minister of commerce, said on Friday.

His comments came after the executive meeting of the State Council on Wednesday decided to extend the success of the China (Hangzhou) Cross-Border E-Commerce Comprehensive Pilot Zone across the country.

Zhang, however, clarified that the zone selection would be based on rational distribution across the east, central and western regions.

China currently has 10 cities, including Shanghai, Chongqing, Zhengzhou and Shenzhen that are entitled to carry out import and export for cross-border e-commerce and more than 20 cities such as Changsha and Shenyang that can undertake cross-border e-commerce for exports.

"The newly selected pilot zones should replicate the experience of Hangzhou and establish their own development reality," said Zhang at a news conference held by the State Council Information Office in Beijing.

After six months' development, cross-border e-commerce transactions in Hangzhou grew from less than $20 million in 2014 to $3.04 billion by November. At least 12 new cross-border e-commerce business parks have been built and attracted about 330 enterprises.

The city's exports between January and November of last year stood at $39.92 billion, up 3.8 percent on a year-on-year basis, markedly higher than the rate of Zhejiang province and the national average.

The new zones will include a one-stop financial service system, exchangeable information, mutually recognizable administration and interdependent law enforcement among different government departments.

Zhang said the objective of the trial is to gain experience for the country. It is a new area of innovation rather than a haven of indulging policies. Other regions should explore boldly within the confines of current policies and their capacity. Experience accumulated in the trial can be reproduced and used by other regions.

Li Guanghui, vice-president of the ministry's think tank, the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, said more cross-border e-commerce pilot zones will attract export-oriented firms, advance the growth of new business models and lead to efficient administration.

"This will provide more job opportunities and help the Chinese export industry reorient itself and win more advantages," said Li.
A model stands next to a Hyundai Genesis car on display at an auto expo in Houston, the United States. [Photo/Xinhua]

Hyundai Motor Co is weighing plans to build its new luxury Genesis cars in China to overcome import tariffs that add 25 percent to the sticker price and are seen as inhibiting the company's ability to compete with locally made BMWs and Audis.

South Korea's biggest automaker still needs to reach an agreement with a local partner, said Cho Won-hong, Hyundai's chief marketing officer. BAIC Group currently makes the Sonata and Elantra in a joint venture with Hyundai, though Cho would not say whether the two sides were discussing Genesis production.

"China has a high tariff and that makes our vehicles more expensive than competitors, which makes it difficult to be profitable," Cho said. "There are a lot of issues that need to be solved before we could go in. But we will definitely go in."

Hyundai is seeking ways to turn around the China business after sales of its predominantly mid-market lineup fell last year for the first time since 2007 on a slowing economy. One option is to tap into the luxury segment as cuts in sales taxes and looming limits on vehicle registration prompt buyers to splurge on the most expensive car they can afford.

"Hyundai has no choice," said Heo Pil-seok, chief executive officer of Midas International Asset Management in Seoul. "It's difficult to expect quantitative growth in the auto market, so companies have to promote luxury models and brands to bring up the profits."

China is the biggest market for Hyundai, accounting for 21 percent of sales last year. The US accounted for 15 percent of the company's 4.96 million cars sold in 2015.

Hyundai's deliveries in China fell 5.1 percent for the year to 1.06 million units, weighed down by an economy likely growing at its slowest pace since 1990.

Most of the world's top luxury brands makers, including BMW AG and Volkswagen AG, manufacture in China to avoid the taxes that put imported vehicles at a disadvantage.
Students from a vocational school operate numerical control equipment at an exhibition that features educational exchanges between China and ASEAN member countries in Guiyang, Guizhou province, in August, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]

Guiyang, the capital of Guizhou province, on Friday opened the doors to China's first laboratory that will evaluate the asset value of big data.

The laboratory has been set up by the Guiyang municipal government, China National Institute of Standardization, Data Science Research Institute of Tsinghua University, 3 Golden Beijing Technologies Co Ltd and Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Ltd. The laboratory will assess the data assets of enterprises to unlock more value, said sources.

Guiyang will be built into a model in terms of big data practice, application and standardization construction by relying on advantages of the five parties in national standard setting, core algorithm of big data, talent reserves and enterprise assets evaluation.

The five parties signed a cooperation agreement in November 2015 in Beijing to set up a big data resource base in Guiyang.

On Friday, the first nationwide big data alliance for innovation in the financial industry was set up in the city.

Yang Huisheng, the executive secretary of the alliance, said: "Our goal is to participate and promote the formulation of national and industrial standards through the standardized construction of big data.

"The current data resources still have some problems, for instance, the degree of standardization, accuracy, completeness and utility value is low, which greatly reduces the value of data," said Yang.

He said that the alliance will carry out the theory and practical research of big data financial innovation, analyze and develop information and data through utilizing the technology of mobile Internet, Internet of Things and cloud computing.

It will also put forward suggestions for enterprises' innovation and acceleration of technological advancement and industrial upgrading, and provide nationwide guidance and services for financial technology.

Du Hu, the co-founder of Baihe Finance, the subsidiary of matchmaking websites Baihe Network Co Ltd, said: "As an Internet enterprise, we have abundant data and hope to find partners to plan and organize our data on the platform, and help us in finance services."

Fan Xiaoxin, the chairman and president of 3 Golden Beijing Technologies, who is also the director of the alliance, said the alliance will play a great role in promoting the development of big data finance.
Alex Xu, sales director of Le Xiang Technology Ltd, poses for a picture with the company's virtual reality headset DeePoon VR M2 on December 7, 2015 at the International consumer electronics show (CES) held in Las Vegas. [Photo/Provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

As top companies in the virtual reality headset industry, such as Oculus, HTC, and Sony showcase their virtual reality eyewear at the International consumer electronics show (CES) held in Las Vegas, Chinese companies also made their presence felt.

DeePoon VR , a domestic consumer-targeted VR manufacturer owned by Shanghai-based Le Xiang Technology Ltd, announced an all-in-one VR headset at the CES held through Wednesday to Saturday.

Compared with the inexpensive VR goggles that link up with smartphones to provide an immersive experience while you watch videos or play games, the all-in-one VR headset, shipped with built-in motherboard and chip to work with computers or operate independently, is currently the high-end industry standard for VR enthusiasts.

Named DeePoon VR M2, the new device is equipped with a Samsung 2K resolution OLED display and is powered by the Android system.

"The product launch ceremony will be held in March in Beijing," said Chen Chaoyang, the CEO of Le Xiang Technology Ltd. According to Chen, M2 will be a VR device that focus on video games.

According to the company, the performance of the device may rival Samsung's Gear VR.

In December, Le Xiang received $30 million B-roll investments from Xiaomi-backed Chinese video streaming site Xunlei and Shanghai-based Internet company kingnet.com.

According to Lv, the chief technology officer of Le Xiang, the company has signed global strategic cooperation agreements with microprocessor supplier ARM. The latter firm will provide front buffer and context priority support to DeePoon VR.

Lv graduated from Princeton University and used to be one of the heads of Intel's core algorithm team.

"Currently, the domestic market share of DeePoon VR has surpassed 63 percent," said Le Xiang.

In July 2015, Le Xiang unveiled its DeePoon head mounted display, an online crowdfunding goggle that works with smartphones to provide an Oculus-like VR experience.

During this year's CES, there are more than 40 exhibitors displaying the next wave of immersive multimedia for virtual reality systems and environments, gaming hardware, software and accessories designed for mobile, PCs and consoles.

"The VR industry will generate $30 billion in revenue by 2020, with VR games accounting for nearly half of it. Hardware, films and theme parks rooted in VR will generate the other half," said China Daily, citing the estimate report from research consulting firm Digi-Capital.

According to research firm Tractica LLC, worldwide (excluding China) VR revenue this year will likely be close to $500 million, mainly driven by demand for VR headsets, content, and content creation tools such as cameras from the United States, West Europe and Asia.

In China, the VR market is on track to generate 5.7 billion yuan ($880 million) in revenue, a nearly threefold year-on-year increase, according to iResearch Consulting Group, a Beijing-based research company.

It further estimated revenue is set to exceed 55 billion yuan by 2020 because of a foreseeable demand surge. By then, the sector's size will likely be comparable to the early days of the smartphone market.
Jan-Christer Janson (front left), professor of technical biochemistry at Uppsala University of Sweden, and Okimura Kazuki, head of the Japan Science and Technology Agency, together with other scientists, receive the 2015 state science and technology awards at a ceremony in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Friday. President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang also attended. ZHOU WEIHAI/CHINA DAILY

The 2015 state science and technology awards honoring the contributions of 295 research projects and seven foreign experts were bestowed at a ceremony in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Friday, but the highest award remained vacant.

The state science and technology awards comprise five award categories, of which the Preeminent Science and Technology Award is the highest.

The top prize has previously been awarded to 25 scientists, including China's "father of hybrid rice" Yuan Longping, since it was established in 2000. There were one or two winners each year except 2004, the first time there was no recipient.

"We can only express regret over the vacancy this year," an unidentified official from the National Office for Science and Technology Awards, which is in charge of collecting nominations and organizing the voting, was quoted by People's Daily as saying.

The official said that the country's first Nobel laureate in medicine, Tu Youyou, who won the 2015 Nobel Prize for Medicine in October, was not nominated for this year's prize. The nominations, submitted by more than 130 government agencies, research institutes and individual scientists, were made from early November to mid-December 2014.

In other award categories, this year saw a trend in which the average age of principal winners of the State Natural Sciences Award was just 47.6.

Pan Jianwei, 45, a quantum scientist at the University of Science and Technology of China, won the top prize in the State Natural Sciences Award category.

The quantum communications equipment developed by Pan's team was applied to ensure communication security in the 18th Party Congress in 2012 and at the parade in September to mark the 70th anniversary of victory in the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression (1937-45).

Some large-scale scientific projects, such as the Beijing-Shanghai High-Speed Railway, have won awards as well. But experts said it becomes increasingly difficult to give the credit to some individuals, since China is initiating more mega-projects.

Jiang Fengyi, top winner of the State Technology Invention Award, said: "More than 60 researchers had contributed to the program. But according to the restricted number, we can only have six apply for the award."

Chen Yanjing, a professor of geology at Peking University who won the National Award for Technological Invention, said "the prize should recognize innovative ideas instead of researchers' specific work".
Officials taking measures to address shortage of storage facilities for record amount of grain

China's combined grain reserve stands at a historic high, and the country will further increase its storage capacity this year to absorb the mounting stockpile, a senior government official said on Friday.

A farmer sunbakes his wheat harvest in Liaocheng, Shandong province. [Photo/China Daily]

Ren Zhengxiao, head of the State Administration of Grain, told an annual grain circulation work conference in Beijing that the authority will take steps this year to increase the country's grain storage capacity, by encouraging more private warehouses to participate.

The storage expansion is aimed at protecting farmers' interests amid a saturated domestic grain market, he said. The national grain reserve is at its highest point in the country's history, and China's grain production has increased annually for 12 consecutive years.

China Business News reported that the combined grain reserve stands at 230 million metric tons, the largest such reserve in the world.

Ren said that about 42 percent is corn, and in major corn production areas such as Heilongjiang province, it is as high as 50 percent. The corn stockpile is expected to reach 200 million metric tons by April, the amount the nation consumes in a year, Reuters reported.

Xu Shaoshi, head of the National Development and Reform Commission, said at the work conference that China's grain prices face increasing downward pressure and there is less and less room for the national grain purchase and storage policies to stabilize the grain market and protect farmers' interests.

"We need to stick to the market-oriented path, to ensure that the market has the decisive say on agricultural product prices and on the government protecting farmers' interests," he said.

Meanwhile, the development of grain storage facilities still lags behind the growth of the reserves, he said. And the high price difference between domestic and imported grain works against domestic grain sales.

On the international market, wheat cost 771 yuan ($117) less per ton than domestic products by the end of last year, and rice and corn cost respectively 745 and 790 yuan less than domestic produce, he noted.

Although China has taken measures to limit the amount of imported major grains, many domestic producers have been increasing their imports of corn substitutes, such as barley, sorghum and distillers' grain.

Ren said that the administration will push forward the exports of more processed grain products and allow more grain storage facilities, equipment and technologies to compete on international markets.
Some fish are captured out of Chagan Lake in Northeast China's Jilin province on Jan 8. [Photo/Xinhua]

About two hundred fishermen gathered on Chagan Lake to capture fish in a traditional way that has been practiced for nearly a thousand years. Fishermen cast thousand-meter-long net through holes that they've drilled on frozen lake. They later use horses to winch the net and harvest the fish. This old fishing technique attracts tourists to visit Chagan Lake where a Guiness World Record was created for the largest amount of fish capture with one net weighing 84,000 kg.
By Gu Jianjun, Post Doctorate, Department of World Development Strategy, Central Compilation and Translation Bureau

When the first light of 2016 enlightens the earth, people are filled with beautiful expectations towards the New Year. What will the world look like? What will China look like? On the New Year's Eve, Chinese President Xi Jinping sent his greetings to express his blessings for the Chinese and the world.

Xi had focused on world peace and development, expressing China's voice, put forward the nation's plans, initiated construction on a community of shared destiny; welcomed the world to embrace mutual benefits, and expand China's "circle of friends."

In 2015, China's leaders have participated in international conferences, bringing substantial progress to the "Belt and Road Initiative," while contributing to the United Nations 2030 agenda for sustainable development and the global fight against climate change.

Xi visited ten countries, attended 9 international conferences, and stepped on foreign land for 42 days. He proposed a new type of international relations, community of shared destiny, Belt and Road Initiative, which have receive global recognition and support. China will play a positive role to promote the adjustment of global governance in 2016.

The world is big, while challenges are complicated. The world is looking for answers from China.

As a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council and the world's second largest economy, the international community expects Beijing to contribute to world peace and development. China is a responsible major country, which will not be absent from international affairs.

In 2016, China will start the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020) to achieve its first centennial goalcompleting the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects.

We need to offer more compassion, responsibility and action for war-torn nations.

In 2016, the world is confronted with various challenges. The Syrian Civil War, refugee crisis and terrorism continue to ferment on a global scale. Beijing is making great efforts to resolve such challenges in a spirit of solidarity.

China welcomes the world with an open heart to extend our hand to those facing difficulties and expand our "circle of friends."

As a responsible country, China will never pursue global hegemony. Beijing joins hands with the world to construct win-win partnerships.

International community should work together for peace. By turning antagonism to synergy, hostility to friendship, we will forge a community of shared destiny.

We have only one earth, one home for the peoples of all nations. Let's compare the earth to a ship and all countries to the crew, only when everybody adheres to a community of common destiny, sharing weal and woe and helping each other, can the ship plough through and arrive in the harbor of civilization and happiness.
China must lower corn prices to stop the imports of corn substitutes, including barley, sorghum and distillers' grain, a senior agricultural official said on Saturday, as the country is faced with a mounting stockpile of corn.

Chen Xiwen, deputy director of the Central Rural Work Leading Group, said in a forum on rural affairs in Tsinghua University that the country must make efforts to stop the imports of corn substitutes through the lowering of corn prices.

China's combined grain reserve is already standing at a historic high point of about 500 million metric tons, he said. The Central Rural Work Leading Group is China's top rural affairs decision-making agency.

Ren Zhengxiao, head of the State Administration of Grain, said in a work conference on Friday that about 42 percent is corn, and in major corn production areas such as Heilongjiang province, it is as high as 50 percent. The corn stockpile is expected to reach 200 million metric tons by April, the amount the nation consumes in a year, Reuters reported.

China imported about 30 million tons of corn substitutes in 2015, which are not part of the country's import quota for agricultural products.

"The imports of corn substitutes have increased several times in recent years ... and no matter how much the domestic corn production increased, their market share has been edged out," he said.

Chen said the country should also take measures to ensure that the country's corn stockpile will not increase any further, as part of measures to clear the stockpile.

"We must also change the situation in the Northeastern provinces where the State-owned warehouses are absorbing all the corn stockpile," he said.

Chen said the country must have a variety of market entities to compete in the storage of corn in the Northeastern provinces, the country's major corn acreage areas.

Chen said that the country has come to a point when it must reform the current reserve-based crop price support mechanism to adapt to the mounting grain reserve.

"There are no policies that can remain unchanged for more than 10 years. If we do not reform the mechanism, there will be more problems on the way," he said.

Chen added that China could still lower the corn support price this year to reduce the reserve, but measures must be taken to protect farmers' interests so that the country will not suffer a major drop in grain production.
BEIJING - The Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP) dismissed a resurfacing hypothesis that nuclear radiation due to burning of uranium-containing coal is the primary cause of smog.

The MEP said in a Saturday statement that nuclear radiation has no correlation with smog, and the country's atmospheric radiation is stable with no uranium-rich particles detected, based on a recent MEP-led research.

The hypothesis first emerged in 2013 as an Internet article which claimed that some coal mines in Erdos city of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region contained radioactive substances of which half life extend over hundred million years, including uranium.

The article said these substances enter the atmosphere as radioactive powder after coal is burned, and they are the primary cause of smog.

Experts participating in the MEP-led research found that the content of Uranium-238 in coal and waste rock samples in Erdos are 6.3 to 57.7 Bq/kg and 14.6 to 87.2 Bq/kg respectively, the same level as the national average.

Erdos has both uranium and coal mines. The MEP said the Daying Uranium mine has not been exploited, and neither has the coal mine which lays more than 100 meters beneath the uranium mine.

According to readings from 167 atmospheric radiation monitoring stations across the country over the past decade, the radiation level has been stable, with no uranium-rich particles detected, the MEP said.

Experts also analyzed the content of uranium isotopes in air particles and found the intensity is of the same level as its natural intensity in soil.

Zhao Shunping, a researcher with the Radiation Monitoring Technical Center of the MEP, said the atmospheric radiation level is absolutely normal, and the content of uranium in air particles is too minute to exert any influences on people's health.
An employee counts yuan banknotes at a bank in Huaibei, Anhui province June 22, 2010.[Photo/Agencies]

The Chinese authorities need to address three fundamental economic and governance issues this year.

First, given the mismatch between its strategic deployment and tactical design, it has to restructure the economy, and devise innovative strategies for the Belt and Road Initiative and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, which will have long-term effects among others, on society, politics, governance and national defense.

Yet having a top-level tactical design is only the beginning, especially because China still lacks complementary practical plans to implement its strategies. Tactics should be flexible, so that they can be adjusted according to circumstances and can achieve the strategic goals.

Many parties such as industrial enterprises, financial companies and governments at various levels have adopted a wait-and-see attitude toward the Belt and Road Initiative. The huge number of files, research projects, meetings and seminars on the initiative have yielded few valuable action plans making the initiative look more like a movement than a strategy.

Also, many tactical departments are slow or reluctant to act when it comes to making implementable action plans; they talk about opportunities and gains but seldom mention the challenges, risks and losses.

Second, short-term policies will not generate truly innovative enterprises. Although China has not shown any signs of a systemic economic crisis, it still faces a progressive decline in the marginal effects of its monetary and fiscal policies, external and internal economic pressures, and a slowing economy.

Urging people to start new businesses and encouraging them to pursue innovation by, for example, making good use of the Internet may be aimed at stimulating market vitality. But that it is easy to register a new business does not mean it is also easy to make it a success. Therefore, the authorities should ensure their policies to promote entrepreneurship and innovation are targeted at the right people and industries.
President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi shake hands at a press conference in New Delhi, India, Sept 18, 2014. [Photo/Xinhua]

I recently had the opportunity to interact with students and faculty of Peking University, which I first visited way back in 1982. At that time, there were barely a dozen Indian students in China; today, some 14,000 Indians are studying here.

During the intensive interaction, I was struck by the high level of warmth and interest the students and faculty displayed toward India. For me, it was a potent symbol of the infinite distance India and China have traveled together and a strong indicator of the potential of closer engagement.

As we have entered a new year - and I complete my tenure in China - it is a time to reflect on the successes of the past year. During his visit to India in September 2014, President Xi Jinping emphasized: "China and India have a combined population of over 2.5 billion. If we speak with one voice, the whole world will listen, and if we join hands, the whole world will pay attention." On that occasion, our leaders articulated the vision of closer developmental partnership between India and China.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to China in May 2015 took up the momentum. The two visits showcased the high level of personal rapport between our leaders and coined a new term, "hometown diplomacy". Modi has met with Xi and Premier Li Keqiang as many as eight times over the last 18 months.

India welcomes China's participation in our development campaigns such as "Made in India", "Digital India", and "Smart Cities". And we are happy to note that investments from China are flowing into India.

Indian companies, too, can play a greater role in China's strategic initiatives such as "Made in China 2025" and "Digital China", which emphasize innovation, and research and development. India's strengths in information technology and knowledge industries converge well with these aspirations. Also, India is a global lead player in pharmaceuticals and can slot into China's health strategy. With asymmetrical trade being a mutual concern, such initiatives can make economic engagement more sustainable.
WASHINGTON -- Facing increased threat of violent extremism at home, the United States on Friday unveiled new initiatives to fight homegrown violent extremists, including establishing a task force and a global engagement center.

The initiatives, announced by Ned Price, spokesperson of the White House's National Security Council, are intended "to improve our international and domestic efforts to counter violent extremism."

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice will establish the Countering Violent Extremism Task Force, a new organization that will integrate and harmonize domestic efforts on fighting violent extremism at home, Price said in a statement.

Moreover, the State Department will establish the Global Engagement Center, which "will allow us to place an intensified focus on empowering and enabling the voices of international partners, governmental and non-governmental."

The Obama Administration, particularly since the White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism in February 2015, has focused on strengthening its effort to prevent violent extremists from radicalizing and mobilizing recruits at home and abroad, the statement said.

"The horrific attacks in Paris and San Bernardino this winter underscored the need for the United States and our partners in the international community and the private sector to deny violent extremists like ISIL fertile recruitment ground," it added, using the acronym for the militant group Islamic State (IS).

IS is responsible for the massive terror massacre in Paris, France on Nov. 13, in which 130 people were killed and more than 350 others wounded in a series of well-coordinated shooting and bombing attacks.

On Dec. 2, an armed U.S. couple believed to be radicalized by IS launched a shooting attack in a social services center in San Bernardino, California, killing 14 people and wounding 21 others.

A suspected gunman who shot and seriously wounded a police officer in the U.S. city of Philadelphia Thursday night confessed that he had pledged allegiance to IS, US police said Friday.

The U.S. government has listed attacks perpetrated by homegrown extremists, especially those who are inspired by the radical groups abroad like IS, as one of the major security threats it is facing.

Additionally, some senior officials from the White House and President Barack Obama's national security team, are meeting in Silicon Valley, California Friday with representatives from a number of leading technology companies, to follow up on Obama's call in his Dec. 6 address for the government and private sector to work together to combat terrorism and counter violent extremism online.

IS has been actively engaged in an online campaign aimed at recruiting young people overseas and inciting them to launch terror attacks against targets in the United States and other Western countries.
China rebuffed on Friday a US claim that Beijing's approach to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea has failed, saying the key to solving the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue does not lie with China.

South Korean soldiers draw down a cover from loudspeakers, just south of the demilitarized zone separating the two Koreas, in Yeoncheon, South Korea, January 8, 2016. [Photo/Agencies]

"The cause and crux of the Korean Peninsula issue does not lie with China, nor does the key to solving the issue," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at a news briefing.

Still, Hua said China will seek a solution, calling for joint efforts by all sides under the framework of the Six-Party Talks. The talks, which brought together the DPRK, the Republic of Korea, the United States, China, Japan and Russia, stalled in December 2008.

US Secretary of State John Kerry said in a phone conversation with Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Thursday that China's approach to the DPRK "has not worked and we cannot continue business as usual".

China has said it was not notified before the DPRK conducted what it said was a hydrogen bomb test on Wednesday and "firmly opposed" the test.

The Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Friday that Wang told Kerry that Beijing is willing to communicate with all parties, including the US, on the situation on the Korean Peninsula.

Also on Friday, Reuters cited a source as saying that the DPRK is seeking a peace treaty involving the US, China and the ROK to formally end the Korean War, and will not stop its nuclear tests until it gets one.

"This explosion is mainly for the United States to see," the source said, referring to the nuclear test. "The main objective is to persuade the United States to enter into four-country negotiations to end the war so that there can be everlasting peace on the Korean Peninsula."

Fan Jishe, a researcher of US studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said, "China has done much more than what it should do on the issue." He said the US did not want to make tangible efforts, including talking about signing a peace treaty, but sought to shift its responsibilities to China.

Xinhua News Agency said in a commentary on Friday that "hostile US policy is the key reason behind the DPRK's nuclear brinkmanship".
CAIRO - Three tourists, a Swedish and two Austrians nationals, suffered minor injuries in an attack by unidentified gunmen targeting a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea city of Hurghada on Friday, MENA quoted Egyptian Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou as saying.

An earlier report by state-run news agency Ahram-online said three gunmen stormed the Bella Vista Hotel used by foreign tourists in Hurghada, injuring at least two foreign travelers.

However, previous media reports were different on the nationalities of the wounded tourists.

The Ahram-online quoted Khaled Megahed, a health ministry spokesperson, as saying that two Swedish tourists were injured in the attack and are being treated in a nearby hospital, while some security sources said the wounded tourists were from Denmark and Germany.

According to eyewitnesses, two of the three gunmen were killed by security forces.

The attack came hours after Egyptian affiliate of Islamic State claimed responsibility for an armed attack on a tourist hotel in Cairo.

Egypt has witnessed a growing wave of anti-security attacks in revenge for the crackdown on Islamists after the army-led ouster of President Mohamed Morsi in 2013.
(Photo : Reuters) The People's Bank of China releases a zodiac coin every Lunar New Year based on the Chinese Astrology.

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Monkey zodiac coins, equivalent to 10 RMB (USD $1.50), can be reserved at the China Construction Bank in Lujiazui starting January 8, according to Chinese State Media. The window for reservations opened at exactly 7:30 a.m. on Friday.



The new zodiac coin comes as a delight to coin collectors and Chinese Astrology believers.



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The People's Bank of China releases a zodiac coin every Lunar New Year based on the Chinese Astrology.



The Chinese zodiac calendar possesses a cycle of 12 years, with each year represented by an animal. One Chinese Astrology cycle commences with the year of the Sheep and will end with the year of the Horse.



The Monkey zodiac coins is the second 10-Yuan coins to be circulated by the People's Bank of China.



The decision to release the new coin comes after the release of the Monkey stamp last week, which caused a public stampede.



A total of 500 million Monkey zodiac coins will be released all over China. In Shanghai alone, approximately 23 million coins are slated for release.



The number of coins released into circulation this year will be higher than last year's production of only 80 million Sheep zodiac coins. The release of the Monkey zodiac coins also comes earlier than last year's release of the Sheep zodiac coins - on February 6, 2015.



The 10-yuan coin is adorned by the figure of a monkey with a peach-shaped lantern and plum flowers (symbols for 'festive cheer'). On the other side of the coin is inscribed the monetary amount, along with the current year.



Collectors are only allowed to reserve a maximum number of 5 coins and it can be picked up by January 16.



China's cental bank issued its first Chinese New Year zodiac coin in 2003. This coin series is believed to bring happiness and good fortune for the year.



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(Photo : Getty Images/Li Feng) People walk through Olympic Park during a spell of heavy smog in this photo taken in Beijing, China, last month. Beijing's local government said its inspectors are keeping a close watch on some 20,000 sources of pollution among key industries under its supervision.

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Beijing's environmental authorities imposed fines amounting to $28 million for various infringements against the city's anti-pollution ordinances last year.



The Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau did not offer a comparative full-year figure, or elaborate which industries were fined. But the state-run news agency Xinhua says the $15 million in pollution fines collected by local authorities over the first nine months of 2015 were almost double the amount levied during the same period in 2014.



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China's Communist Party only recently begun to acknowledge the environmental cost of more than 30 years of unfettered economic expansion throughout the country, according to Reuters.



In August, Chinese lawmakers passed an amendment to an anti-pollution law in order to grant the state new powers to punish offenders and impose a cap on coal consumption, which experts blame for the smog that regularly engulfs some of China's most cosmopolitan cities.



Beijing's local government said its inspectors are keeping a close watch on some 20,000 sources of pollution among key industries under its supervision.



The bureau said that local authorities last year registered some 181 infringements against the city's regulatory ordinances on water and other areas. The offenders were ordered to pay a total $11 million in fines.



The city also registered around 2,000 violations against air pollution ordinances in 2015, and collected fines amounting to $6.6 million from the offenders.



The average density of PM2.5 -- airborne particulate matter that penetrates deep into the lungs -- in China's capital rose by some 75.9 percent year-on-year between November and December last year, according to official data quoted by Xinhua.



Experts say toxic air pollution kills around 1.6 million people in China each year. The smog that frequently smothers Beijing, in particular, has come to symbolize the problem.



The central government is currently advancing development policies that allow environmental agencies both the technology and the political wherewithal to confront persistent polluters and the corrupt local government officials that protect them.



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(Photo : Reuters) China has sent its diplomats to the US and South Korea to discuss ways to approach North Korea's latest nuclear test

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Amid pressure from the international community to cut ties with North Korea, China has instead given diplomacy another chance by sending top level diplomats to the United States and South Korea to discuss ways of dealing with Pyongyang's latest belligerent move following the detonation of a nuclear weapon.



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Wu Dawei, China's chief negotiator for the Korean Peninsula, spoke to his South Korean counterpart and promised to cooperate closely with Seoul when the United Nations Security Council adopt appropriate measures and suitable action against the latest action of the rogue state.



"China will never accept North Korea as a nuclear-possessing country," Wu asserted.



South Korean diplomat Hwang Joon-kook said his country is seeking close South Korea-China cooperation in coming up with appropriate harsh actions against North Korea.



Meanwhile, reports indicate that Yun Byung-se of South Korea and Wang Yi of China had a separate telephone meeting on Friday to discuss possible sanctions against the erring nation.



The Chinese Foreign Ministry also confirmed that Wang was able to talk with US Secretary of State John Kerry on Thursday and stated China's position on the North Korean issue.



Wang reportedly explained that China is eager to work with the United States and other concerned countries to put a lid on North Korea's threat.



"No matter what happens, [all parties] should adhere to the objective of denuclearization of the peninsula and maintain peace, stability in the peninsula," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said.



Kerry was allegedly disappointed with China's approach to Pyongyang's recent brazen action saying that such an approach to the issue 'had failed.'



In a statement, Kerry said the United States will leave it to China on the kind of approach it will take to curb North Korea's threat, but he was quick to point out that such approach had already failed and had not worked.



While the United Nations has imposed on North Korea over the years, China has been a critical ally of the North Korean government, supplying the country with food and gas and trading supplies.



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TagsNorth Korea, Chinese diplomats, Pyongyang, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Hua Chunying, Korean peninsula
(Photo : Reuters) The billionaire head of a popular clothing firm has gone missing in China, fuelling speculations that he is in police custody being interrogated

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Another executive has gone missing in China. This time, it's the Chairman of China's most popular fashion firm, Metersbonwe.



Zhou Chengjian, chairman of Metersbonwe and China's 62nd richest man, has been missing since Wednesda,y according to his company staff, prompting media speculation that he may be in detention and being interrogated by the police as part of the government's anti-corruption drive.



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In a statement to the Shenzhen stock exchange where Metersbonwe is listed, staff said they has not been able to reach Zhou or the secretary of the company's board for days.



Sources privy to Zhou's disappearance said that the billionaire Chairman may have been detained by the Chinese police in connection with an insider trading case.



Zhou's disappearance came two weeks after Fosun International Trading Chairman, Guo Guangchang, China's 'Warren Buffett", disappeared only to resurface after four days. It was later revealed that he had been helping out the police in ridding the financial industry of corruption.



Guo heads one of the largest private conglomerates in China and was linked years ago to a corruption case.



Metersbonwe top level officials have announced that trading in its shares would remain suspended to protect investors' interests until Zhou resurface.



The Chinese government has stepped up its anti-corruption campaign, focusing its manhunt on the financial sector following a stock market rout that rocked global markets last summer.



Hurun, a wealth magazine publisher, estimates Zhou's net worth at $4.1 billion.



Reports indicate that Zhou started his business from scratch as a poor tailor and slowly built his Shanghai-based Metersbonwe to become one of China's largest and most popular clothing chains.



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TagsMetersbowne, Chairman Zhou Chengjian, financial sector, China's anti-corruption campaign, Shenzhen Stock Exchange
(Photo : Getty Images/Feng Li) A sentry stands guard outside the Great Hall of the People, where the Communist Party of China (CPC) holds its annual plenum. The CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) investigated 37 ministerial level Chinese officials on charges of graft last year.

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China has punished another 119 people in a continuing crackdown on government corruption.



The state-run news agency Xinhua said the Communist Party of China (CPC) named the wrongdoers in a report made public recently on the website of the CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), which is now being led by Li Shulei, a trusted aide to China's President Xi Jinping.



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The report details a wide gamut of corruption cases, including bribery, illegal bonuses, fraud and embezzlement. Those found guilty have been meted punishments ranging from official warnings to removal from office. Those found guilty of offenses that carry criminal liability have been turned over to the courts.



The Chinese government is encouraging innovation and creative entrepreneurship among the country's businessmen, and analysts say corruption is a stumbling block to that national objective. Carnegie Endowment, the global think tank organization, estimates that corruption denies China around three percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) each year.



More than 42 percent of the companies sampled in a World Bank survey conducted in 2012 meanwhile said they believe firms in their industry pay bribes to public officials in order to secure government contracts. Some 11.6 percent of the companies sampled in the same survey reported that they had experienced at least one bribe request during six transactions dealing with utilities, government permits, licenses and taxes.



The results of a more recent survey conducted by Charney Research indicates that the city of Beijing is China's most corrupt metropolis. Some 43 percent of the company representatives interviewed by Charney Research in the Chinese capital claimed their firms had to pay bribes to continue operations.



Paraphrasing a previous Xinhua report, Reuters says that some corrupt Chinese officials have learned how to conceal huge troves of ill-gotten wealth by living lives of apparent frugality.



Chinese authorities investigated some 37 ministerial level Chinese officials on charges of graft last year. Ten of those investigated occupied positions in the central government, while nine others worked in state-owned enterprises, according to state media.



In all, the CCDI investigated a little more than 29,000 thousand Party members in connection with corruption charges in 2015. China's corruption watchdog organization actively encourages the Chinese public to report corrupt government officials. The commission has received some 270,000 tips from the public since 2013.



In that same time frame, the CCDI turned over some 8,400 pieces of evidence to the courts for proper judicial action.



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(Photo : YouTube Screenshot) The Chinese government has recognized the exemplary contributions by two US scientists - W. Ian Lipkin and Peter Stang - to the country during the International Cooperation Award in Science and Technology on Friday in Beijing.

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Two American scientists were among seven people who received the International Cooperation Award in Science and Technology in Beijing, China on Friday . The two researchers were awarded for their respective outstanding services to the country.



The two awardees - W. Ian Lipkin, director of the Center for Infection and Community, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, and Peter Stang, chemistry professor and former dean of science at the University of Utah - were both surprised and honored when their names and works were recognized.



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Dr. Lipkin, who considers this honor to be the greatest award a scientist can ever receive, is proud to say that he took part in China's new era of science. In an interview with Xinhua, Lipkin recalled that three years ago he received an invitation from the vice president of China's Academy of Science, Chen Zhou, amid the SARS outbreak. He was asked to assess the state of the epidemic, determine gaps and devise a strategy to contain the deadly virus or reduce its prevalence. After the outbreak was controlled, Lipkin further helped in establishing centers that can quickly detect and respond to emerging infectious disease threats.



His academic efforts focused on teaching and advising young scientists, encouraging Chinese scientists to return to the mainland and devote their knowledge in the field of drug diagnostics and discovery. Until now, he remains a consultant with the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Chinese Academy of Science and the Ministry of Health.



Peter Stang, the other awardee, also said he was not expecting to receive the prestigious recognition. Stang's contribution includes partnering with Chinese chemists following a visit to the Institute of Chemistry at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.



Stang not only praised the expertise of Chinese chemists but also expressed his personal interest in China's culture, history, people and food. China is so close to Stang's heart that his 10-peorson research team is composed of seven Chinese researchers.



"I hope China will continue to strongly support science and technology," Stang said. "Future economic wellbeing and the health and wealth of people all over the world depend on new discoveries and developments in science and technology."



The awards were presented on Friday by state leaders including President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang. Aside from the two US awardees, there were also five other recipients from different countries, namely, Italy's Carlo Rubbia, Japan's Kazuki Okimura, Russia's Evgeny Velikhov, Sweden's Jan-Christer Janson, and the Netherlands' Joannes E. Frencken.



The International Cooperation Award in Science and Technology has awarded 101 foreigners and two international organizations since 1995.



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TagsScience, International Cooperation Award in Science and Technology, highest honor in China, Ian Lipkin, Peter Stang
(Photo : Getty Images) Google has advertised as many as 60 jobs in Beijing and Shanghai, hinting at a renewed comeback to China.

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Google Incorporated is hiring more than 60 people in China - from software engineers to communications managers - after a five-year gap following a fallout with the Chinese authorities.



Google has since moved to Hong Kong City. But it has advertised a lot of job opportunities on several social media websites which is creating a buzz. On LinkedIn, the company advertised as many as 60 jobs in Beijing and Shanghai.



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Google has declined to comment on this news regarding its return to the Chinese mainland, neither confirming nor denying the reports. It is, however, seriously recruiting a wide range of professionals in Shanghai as well as in Beijing. The job openings range from interns to executives, ad sales, software development, customer service, creative and technical services, across marketing, business development, product management, and client relations.



This could indicate another phase of Google's renewed China strategy. Google's Beijing and Shanghai offices will hire these people in China to work on Google Play online store and the company's mobile business. This recruitment drive is part of the company's vision to expand its ground presence in the world's most populous country.



Google halted its operations in the Chinese mainland in 2010. Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Alphabet Inc., the parent of Google, mentioned early this past November that approximately 500 employees were working in the company's China unit. Most employees are in its research and development and marketing departments, offering advertising services for Chinese companies that are aiming to go global.



Google already has a 500-strong workforce in China that serves the global market, while working on different projects. It began its return to China with artificial intelligence provider Mobovi Inc. in October 2015 and currently plans to open up an app store exclusively for Chinese users.



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The unknown can be frightening for anyone, no matter the stage or season. Anytime we step outside our comfort zone and try something new, we may hear that little voice of doubt inside that says, "Can I really do this?" How loud and clear that voice is depends on one's mindset.
Thousands of protesters demonstrated in front of Norwegian embassies across USA, including Washington DC on Friday, asking the Norwegian government to return the five children to their parents. The children were taken in custody by the child services on allegations that the parents "occasionally slapped" their kids, and indoctrinated them with Christian faith.

Protests are expected to be staged in 24 countries on 8th and 9th January, which include Slovakia, Ireland, India, Poland, Russia, Canada, and Romania.

The child welfare services or Barnevernet has even started the process of adoption of Ruth and Marius Bodnariu's three sons and two daughters.

The children were seized last November from Marius, who is a Romanian citizen and an IT engineer working in Norway, and Ruth, a Norwegian.

Trouble for the Romanian Pentecostal family started when one of their daughters told her teacher about their parents' belief that "God punishes sin."

The case of the daughters, 9-year-old Eliana and 7-year-old Naomi, reached their principal, who called up the Barnevernet, telling them also that the children were also disciplined by "occasional" slaps.

Slapping a child is treated similar as physical abuse in Norway, while Bodnariu terms it as a "light punishment." Supporters who know the Bodnarius say that government's assertion that the children were physically abusive is unproven.

"Lately they are trying to characterize it as an abuse case. It never started as such. The teacher said that we need to bridge the gap between us and this family because they have radical Christian principles and we know that right now, everything that was considered decent two decades ago is considered 'radical,'" Pastor Christian Ionescu of Elim Romanian Pentecostal Church in Chicago told the Christian Post.

"You cannot indoctrinate your children in one religion and you cannot tell them about God and the attributes of God because that is offensive to so many people. Then it developed as an abuse case once Barnevernet understood that you cannot go against the family based on religious accusations of indoctrination," Ionescu added.

Bodnariu said that the school and the child services thought that the parents were "very Christian," which "creates a disability in children."

The children have been put in separate homes, and have limited visitation rights, wherein the parents can visit their four-month-old infant son twice a week, and two other sons, 5-year-old Matthew and 2-year-old John, only once a week. They are not permitted to even see their daughters.

"Barnevernet is going ahead with the process of adoption because they say that such a long time has passed and now it is going to be traumatic for the children to be returned to their parents," said Ionescu.

Bodnariu said that Barnevernet first wants to "take away the parents' rights" in a "fylkesnemdna," (county council hearing) for which the date has not been decided yet.

The couple will challenge Barnevernet in the Superior Court of Norway, even as their online petition has received over 50,000 signatures.

Ionescu noted that the Barnevernet cannot begin the adoption process without the case being heard by the court.

"It's unclear and they use very vague language [about what beginning the adoption procedure means,] but it is absolutely incomprehensible to seek more information about the family and to assess them some more but in the meantime go ahead with the adoption process. They cannot, usually in the United States and in many countries, you cannot start the process for adoption until the last decision of the judiciary, of the courts, has been made. They are going parallel with that," he said.

The child services did not reportedly evaluate the parents before taking the decision to separate the children from family. A month after Barnevernet had removed the children from their homes, they said they want to evaluate Ruth and Marius, but the evaluation has been deferred till February.

Barnevernet has a record of seizing children from families because of slightest of issues, most notably from families of immigrants where one or both parents is a foreigner.

As many as 40 percent of all the children in the custody of Barnevernet belong to non-Norwegian families, according to NewsinEnglish, an online magazine.

Norwegian human rights lawyer and activist Marius Reikeras said that an estimated 70,000 children are in Barnevernet custody, and that the government has been proven guilty four times by European Court of Human Rights, for violating due process of fair trial.
20 Colorado churches greet New Year by praying for 28 straight hours in 'David's Tent' gatherings

Around 20 churches in the U.S. state of Colorado greeted the New Year by worshipping God for 28 straight hours.

The churches held a prayer group called "David's Tent," modelling it after the Old Testament practice of continually "ministering to the Lord." They began praying on Jan. 1 and finished at 10 p.m. the next day, according to Charisma News.

They used the Bible verse Psalm 132 as their theme. It says: "I will not give sleep to my eyes, or slumber to my eyelids until I find a place for the Lord, a dwelling place for the mighty God of Jacob."

The church congregations sang songs that ranged from classical English hymns such as "Amazing Grace" to contemporary Spanish songs, which members of the Vida Abundante praise team danced to. Sometimes, their worship styles were lively, while other times it was quite peaceful and solemn.

One of the attendees, Pastor David Boyd of Vineyard Church said an event such as the one is the perfect opportunity to tell God that Christians love and honour Him, and that they are longing to draw closer to Him and see His glory manifest in the church.

"That is a backdrop to understanding the need for worship and prayer in events like these around the nation," he said. "The focus is simple: Worship Jesus. Give attention to God and listen for His voice."

Another attendee, 27-year-old Evan Way, who is a graduate of a ministry school in Redding, California, is grateful that he was able to attend the prayer gathering because he was able to renew, restore, and refresh himself in the eyes of God.

"I found some answers and my hopes for strength and clarification were met because of God's presence," he said.

As for worship leader and intercessor Mark Weaver, he said he is a huge fan of the multi-ethnic flavour and unity of the body of Christ that he sees at "David's Tent" gatherings.

"Besides getting together before God, I love coming together for these things. He remains the focus, but really all the other things are unimportant, except the unity. That's where God says He commands a blessing," Weaver said.
Alabama sues U.S. government for failing to consult state over Syrian refugee settlement

Alabama filed a lawsuit against the U.S. federal government on Thursday to stop refugee settlement in the state, saying the Obama administration failed to consult states over the issue.

It is the second state after Texas to sue the government as Syrian refugees have been resettled in various states.

Republican Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley is one of several governors, mostly Republicans, who are against the resettlement of Syrian refugees in their states following the Nov. 13 terrorist attacks in Paris.

Texas earlier filed a lawsuit on the matter to block six Syrian refugees from settling in Dallas.

The Alabama lawsuit states that the federal government has not complied with a portion of the Refugee Act of 1980 on regular consultation with states.

"We are the one who secure the people of this state and protect the people of this state. We need to have the information on refugees as they come in to allow us to do that," Bentley said.

However, Kristi Graunke of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Immigrant Justice Project, said the lawsuit "has no legal merit, and the state of Alabama has no authority under the Constitution to block the settlement of refugees."

However, an expert told WND that the lawsuit has a chance to stop refugee resettlement.

Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel of the Thomas More Law Center, said it is based on the 10th Amendment.

"Thomas More Law Center's position is that there is a constitutional claim and that claim is based on the 10th Amendment," he said.

The U.S. State Department has settled Muslim refugees in 180 U.S. cities and towns. The refugees came from Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burma and other countries.

The law center has been preparing a case to challenge the constitutionality of the federal government's authority on the refugee programme, which is administered by the State Department along with the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement.

According to the 10th Amendment, states are guaranteed certain rights that are not spelled out in the Constitution as belonging to the federal government.

Thompson said even if Alabama and Texas win the cases, the federal government would be allowed to send refugees to states.

"The word 'consultation' is so vague that if federal government calls whatever state representative and says, 'OK, we're going to send 10 refugees to the state of Alabama and they've all been checked out,' and the state says no, it has no impact," he said.

He said "consultation" doesn't mean "agreement," adding that "It just means you have to talk to somebody."

"But under the 10th Amendment we would claim that the Constitution says the federal government in no way has the right to commandeer state funds to fund or promote a federal programme," he said. "And that argument goes to the fact that once the refugee comes into the state, all kinds of state taxpayer money is being used to take care of the welfare of that refugee."
Armed men kidnap missionary in Mali, Christian radio station attacked

Armed men kidnapped a Swiss missionary from her home in Timbuktu on Friday, nearly four years after she was abducted by Islamist militants from the same house, Malian and Swiss authorities said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility but Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is active in desert areas north of the city and has a history of seizing foreigners and demanding ransoms.

In April 2012, militants kidnapped Beatrice Stockly and released her days later. She returned to her work as a missionary. A resident of Timbuktu who knows Stockly told Reuters she had again been abducted.

"I confirm that a European woman was kidnapped in Timbuktu at 3.30 a.m. (0330 GMT). A neighbour alerted the security forces around 6 a.m.," said army spokesman Souleymane Maiga.

Four vehicles were used in the kidnap, said a military source in Timbuktu who declined to be identified.

"One vehicle parked in front of the house and armed men got out and abducted the woman, while the other three cars secured the area from a distance," said the source.

French forces drove Islamist fighters from major urban centres in 2013 but they have intensified their insurgency with a series of attacks and roadside bombings last year.

Two militants attacked a luxury hotel in the capital Bamako on Nov. 20, killing 20 people, many of whom were foreigners.

Three Islamist militant groups including AQIM claimed responsibility for the hotel attack, which showed the militants extending their reach beyond the north.

In a separate incident, an unidentified gunman shot three people dead outside a Christian radio station in Timbuktu in December. A veteran jihadist called for a return to Islamic sharia law at a recent meeting attended by hundreds of locals near Timbuktu, an AQIM video showed this week.

Dozens of Westerners were abducted by desert militants in West and North Africa in the five years before the French military operation in Mali in 2013.

There has been a lull since then, with many foreigners too frightened to visit. In the last known abduction attempt, two French journalists from Radio France International were killed in Kidal, northern Mali, in Nov. 2013.

Two Western hostages kidnapped in north Mali in 2011 are still being held by al Qaeda militants.

The Swiss foreign ministry formed a task force when it heard about Friday's kidnapping and was working for the woman's safe release, a statement said, adding that since 2009 it had advised against travel to Mali because of the high risk of kidnapping.

"After the kidnapping of 2012, the ministry had pointed out to the affected Swiss national the high personal risk in Mali ... and strongly discouraged her from another stay in Mali," it said.

France continues to fight militants in Mali and elsewhere in the desert region with a 3,500-strong counter-terrorism force called Barkhane. A 10,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping force is also present in Mali.
Christians who fled extremist terror in Mali return to the churches that were reduced to ruins

While the world's attention is focused on the threat of the Islamic State in the Middle East, Christians in northern Mali have returned to their shattered communities after French forces wrested control back from Islamist groups.

Churches were desecrated and looted when the region fell under radical groups in 2012. French forces were able to take control but the reconstruction is slow and costly, and peace talks between the government and mainly Tuareg armed groups are still ongoing.

Dr Mohamed Ibrahim Yattara, president of the Baptist Church in northern Mali, told World Watch Monitor most Christians who fled the region had now returned to their homes but their churches are "in ruins".

He said the church there has lost most of its buildings and valuable property, including vehicles. The damage done by the extremists has also affected the church's work in the area of community provision. In Timbuktu, the church's water project set up over a period of 20 years has been rendered unusable as most of the materials were stolen.

Dr Yattara also expressed disappointment that the government and international community was not helping the church rebuild.

"So far nothing has been done," he said. "Actually, with regard to the current post-conflict situation, we have no means to undertake reconstruction projects. We can only rely on the generosity of people of good will to walk with us in these efforts of reconstruction."

But he remains grateful that the church is at least still there and was not wiped out completely by the radical groups.

While Mali remains a difficult place for Christians - it was ranked No 7 on Open Doors' 2013 World Watch List for persecution - Dr Yattara is determined that the churches will continue doing what they were called to do.

"We had this feeling that jihadists wanted to wipe out any trace of Christianity in the north of Mali. But God in his goodness has not allowed such an eventuality," he said.

"The church is still there and most of the believers have returned, albeit in very difficult conditions, without external assistance or the financial resources needed in such circumstances.

"And despite such adversity we are determined to resume our ministries because after all, this northern Mali is ours. We have the right to freely exercise our faith and we are firmly committed to make this happen."
ISIS second in command and spokesman Adnani wounded in Iraq coalition airstrike

The chief spokesman of the Islamic State (ISIS) was seriously injured in a recent airstrike in Iraq's Anbar province, reports said.

A statement from Iraq's Joint Operations Command said Thursday that Syrian-born Abu Mohammed al-Adnani was wounded after coalition airstrikes hit the Iraqi town of Barwanah, CNN reported.

"Adnani was first moved to the city of Hit for treatment after 'losing a large amount of blood.' He was then transferred to Mosul under tight security," according to the spokesman for Iraq's Joint Operations Command.

"He was given two bags of blood to help stabilise his medical condition."

The spokesman also told CNN that authorities had been chasing Adnani for more than a month prior to the airstrike.

Al-Adnani, who was born as Taha Sobhi Falaha, is believed to be second in line to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. He is considered as "ISIS most public figure'' because of the many audio recordings he had produced to promote the caliphate.

He was officially labeled a terrorist by the U.S. State Department in August 2014, describing him as "the official spokesman for and a senior leader" of ISIS. He reportedly obtained his post after becoming "one of the first foreign fighters to oppose coalition forces in Iraq.''

In June 2014, the terrorist leader became the first to declare a "caliphate" for parts of Syria and Iraq, indicating ISIS' aim of not just being a terrorist group but a governing entity as well. He was also vocal in calling for attacks outside the region, including his assertion that ISIS supporters in the West have a religious duty to launch lone-wolf attacks, CNN said.

Earlier between 2005 and 2010 during the Iraq conflict, Adnani was captured and spent time in custody at the U.S. detention facility in Camp Bucca

In May last year, a reward of up to $5 million was raised for any information leading to his arrest. That statement noted his "repeated calls for attacks against Westerns and (his having) vowed 'defeat' for the United States,'' the report said.
Kidnapped Swiss Christian freed amid Mali unrest

Separatist Islamist rebels have released a Swiss Christian woman kidnapped by a private militia on April 15 amid political turmoil in Timbuktu, Mali, according to a Swiss foreign ministry statement.



Compass Direct News said that armed members of the militant Islamic group Ansar Dine handed Beatrice Stockly to Swiss diplomats on Tuesday, Reuters reports.



Before rebels captured Timbuktu on 1 April, most Westerners had reportedly left due to fears of being kidnapped and passed on to Al-Qaeda cells.



"The terrorist group's North African branch, Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), has been holding Westerners for millions of dollars in ransom payments from previous kidnappings in recent years," said the CDN story.



"Stockly, a Christian social worker in her 40s, had refused to leave Timbuktu, 439 miles northeast of the capital, when it fell to Tuareg rebels and Islamist extremists.



"She was in good health 'considering the circumstances', according to the Swiss foreign ministry statement. Ansar Dine militants took custody of Stockly after a shootout with an unidentified private militia that had seized her and wanted to sell her to AQIM."



Ansar Dine, which has imposed sharia (Islamic law) in areas under its control in the north, then handed Stockly to the Swiss government without demanding a ransom, according to Agence France-Presse. Stockly is reportedly safe in Burkina Faso.
Priest tells of despair in Mali

A missionary priest in Mali ministering to displaced people has described their desperate struggle to flee fighting and Islamist extremism as violence intensifies in key parts of the country.

In a message sent over the weekend to Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need, Fr Zacharie Sorgho described the events that led to the liberation of the strategically important town of Diabaly last Thursday.

Fr Sorgho, whose parish of Nioro du Sahel in north-west Mali has welcomed people fleeing the conflict, said: "One morning, there was an armed assault [by Islamist rebels] in the city of Konna and other southern cities.

"This created a great fear in the city and everyone was in a state of confusion. People were fleeing and there were cries of despair."

Fr Sorgho praised the intervention of French troops who were crucial to the liberation of the city.

"After intense fighting, Konna was freed from the hands of the jihadist Muslims. But then they attacked the town of Diabaly and took it. They used people as human shields."

The priest related how Islamists had confiscated mobile phones, preventing people from communicating with the outside world, and mingled with residents, stopping the French and Malian soldiers from conducting targeted strikes against them.

"After intense fighting, the city of Diabaly was retaken by French and Malian soldiers. Everyone is rejoicing."

Describing the background of the conflict, he said: "For a long time rebel groups in northern Mali imposed their laws and spread terror among the northern people by amputating hands, giving strokes of the lash, committing sexual violence against women and girls, and so forth.

"The misery was great and the media spoke about the situation every day, but nothing was done at either national or international level.

"Rebel groups and Islamists thought they were already victors and masters of the country.

"They really want to impose laws and apply Shari'a throughout the country."

It is estimated that up to 400,000 people have fled from northern Mali or other conflict areas.

Fr Sorgho said: "We have welcomed those displaced by the war.

"Many people had already fled  following the attacks of Gao, Timbuktu and Kidal  and they had found refuge in our area on the border of Mauritania and Senegal.

"So far a number of families have welcomed these refugees as guests and helped them.

"But, with multiple air strikes and armed interventions, we are seeing many more people

coming to us.

"They are taking their children and parents and fleeing the conflict in the north.

"Many have come to us with nothing  except a backpack containing a few personal items."

In 2011 Aid to the Church in Need gave more than 135,000 to help projects in Mali and is preparing to send emergency help for refugees in the Diocese of Mopti, in the centre of the country, where thousands of displaced persons have gathered.
School for gays opening in September in Georgia: Where 'kids have full permission to be themselves'

A transgender woman, who identifies as a male, will open a private school for homosexuals and transgenders in Georgia this September.

The "Pride School Atlanta" will teach children K-12 [kindergarten up to 12th grade] and will operate from a space provided by the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Atlanta (UUCA).

According to its website, the school aims "to provide LGBTQQIAA [Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Questioning, Intersex, Ally, and Asexual] students, families and educators a safe, fun and rigorous learning environment free of homophobia [dislike of or prejudice against homosexual people] and transphobia [intense dislike of or prejudice against transsexual or transgender people] a place that honors their identities so they can be themselves, find themselves, and find friends and mentors who can help them navigate the challenges of life and education."

Christian Zsilavetz, 45, school founder, said she never felt support while teaching as a male in public schools so she decided to put up her own school where children could be open about their homosexuality or gender identity.

"Kids have full permission to be themselvesas well as educatorswhere there's no wondering, 'Is this teacher going to be a person for me to be myself with?' This is a place where they can just open up and be the best person they can be," Zsilavetz told the Associated Press.

She said the school aims to reduce the risk of suicide, drug and alcohol use, and depression.

"They're less likely to get pregnant, when they don't really want to get pregnant," she said.

The school promotes that "all students will have the freedom, responsibility, and support to create their own individualised curriculum, education, and school climate through trust and democratic decision-making processes."

The establishment also does not believe homework or tests are necessary. Its website states that there will be "no mandatory homework or testing. Students are free to discover what, when and how they prefer to learn, trusted that their natural curiosity and desire to pursue personal goals will lead them to a rigorous and rich education."
South Carolina lawmakers defy Supreme Court, file bill withdrawing recognition of same-sex marriage

Lawmakers in South Carolina have filed a bill seeking to withdraw recognition of same-sex marriage in the state in defiance of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling last June.

"I represent the people, and the people have shown several times that they are opposed to this, and are in favour of traditional marriage," Republican state Rep. Bill Chumley said, according to GoUpstate.com and WND.

Chumley was joined by fellow Republican state Rep. Mike Burns in filing the South Carolina Natural Marriage Defense Act that seeks to "define marriage as between one man and one woman."

Derek Black, a University of South Carolina law professor, said it's "the task of the courts to interpret the Constitution and it is the task of legislators to act in accordance with the Constitution and other validly enacted laws."

According to the Tenth Amendment Center, "state non-cooperation would certainly gum up the works, creating, as James Madison foresaw, impediments and obstructions to enforcing the federal demand to recognise gay marriage. It would bar state officials from issuing marriage licences to gay couples, setting up a confrontation with the federal government like we saw in Kentucky."

It predicts that the bill would lose in court.

"Under the original Constitution, marriage was unquestioningly a matter left to the states and the people. In Federalist #45, Madison asserted that all objects that concern 'the lives, liberties and property of the people,' would remain outside federal jurisdiction," it said.

However, it said that the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling "represents a usurpation of power."

"Nevertheless, in the American political system today, all courts ... and federal authorities defer to the Supreme Court. ... The effectiveness of the South Carolina Natural Marriage Defense Act would rest entirely on the willingness of the state to maintain resistance," it said.

It said lawmakers in Alabama, Oklahoma and Michigan aim to get the government out of the marriage licensing business altogether.

"This strategy would avoid direct confrontation with the feds and likely prove more effective long-term because it would not be subject to challenge by federal courts," the centre said.

New Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin earlier issued an order to remove clerks' names from marriage licences, benefitting Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, who refused to issue marriage licences to same-sex couples after the June ruling.

The minority in the 5-4 U.S. Supreme Court same-sex marriage decision had warned that it would create constitutional conflicts.
Zika virus 2016: Virus linked to newborn birth defects

There's a rare mosquito-borne virus that's causing panic in Latin-American countries. The Zika virus, which is mainly spotted in Asia and Africa, started spreading in Brazil last year. Colombia, Mexico, Venezuela and nine more countries were also affected.

Late in December 2015, the virus was spotted in Puerto Ricothe country's first case, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Experts are now concerned that the virus might reach mainland United States next.

What's alarming is that the virus, transmitted by the mosquito species, Aedes aegypti, is associated with microcephaly in newborns, a condition in which babies are born with abnormally small-sized head.

In the Tuesday report published by the Brazilian Ministry of Health, it indicated that there were more than 3,000 babies in the country born with microcephaly and experts suspect that the virus may be responsible for the cases.

Although the connection between the virus and the said condition has not been established, the Brazilian Ministry of Health has warned pregnant women to keep consulting with their doctor. The ministry also advised pregnant women to observe proper measures in keeping their home environment free from disease-causing mosquitoes.

Researchers didn't pay much attention to the Zika virus, until recently. The virus was first discovered in 1947 in Uganda. It is carried by the same mosquito species that transmit chikungunya virus, yellow fever and dengue fever.

According to the CDC, the virus commonly causes fever, joint pains, rash and red eye or conjunctivitis. These symptoms usually tend to be mild only lasting for days to a week. Severe cases of the illness that require hospital admission is rare.

Currently, there is no vaccine to prevent the illness; there is also no medication intended for the treatment of Zika.

Apart from the recommendations from the Ministry of Health, CDC also advises travelers to take steps in protecting themselves from mosquito bites, especially when going to regions where Zika virus is known to be present.
Johnny Carrabba was a customer of Common Bond Cafe & Bakery, the upscale boulangerie on Westheimer and Dunlavy, since the day it opened in May 2014. Now he's the owner.

And under the accomplished restaurateur's watch, he hopes to improve operations while retaining the quality of the world-class bakery. In short, he said he plans to lavish some love on the place.

As first reported by CultureMap, Common Bond was sold to Carrabba and business partner George Joseph about a week and a half ago. The partners acquired the business  put on the map by world-class pastry chef Roy Shvartzapel --from original owners Brad Sanders and his mother, Kathy Sanders.

Carrabba, the owner of two Carrabba's restaurants in Houston as well as Mia's and Grace's, said he felt he understood Common Bond (and what it needed to improve) because he grew to know the business first as a customer. So when the opportunity to buy it came his way, he decided it was the right.

"Common Bond always intrigued me. I loved the brand. I loved the product," he said. "So I bought 50 percent. We closed the deal 12 days ago and I've been there every day for 12 days."

Why acquire the bakery/cafe? "I'm going to tell you the truth. I have a philosophy and I've already had it. And it came to my head with Common Bond: Nothing is going to be successful unless it's loved."

His plans for loving Common Bond include expanding parking (he's already leased a lot about half a block away to provide more parking), and building a commissary to ease crowding in the kitchen and provide product more efficiently.

"I just want to embrace it and see what can happen," he said.

Carrabba heaped praise on the Common Bond staff, which includes executive chef Jillian Bartolome and chief boulanger Drew Gimma, both of whom were part of the original opening staff. Houston-raised Shvartzapel (a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., whose internships included working with Alain Ducasse, Jean-Georges Vongerichten and Daniel Boulud, and whose professional resume includes Bouley Bakery in New York, Pierre Herme in Paris, elBulli in Spain, Balthazar in New York, Cyrus in Healdsburg, Calif., and Thomas Keller's Bouchon Bakery in Beverly Hills, Calif.) announced he was leaving Common Bond in Feb. 2015 to pursue his own business interests.

Carrabba underscored that it is not his intention to make drastic, wholesale changes to the Common Bond formula. "I don't want people to think I'm a big businessman who is going to come in here and change Common Bond," he said. "Common Bond has been going strong for two years. I want to come in and understand it and love it. I want to see what it can do."

When Shvartzapel first opened the store he and his investors had aspirations of growing the brand. Carrabba still doesn't rule that out. But he said the original store first needs to streamline operations and simplify its strategy in order to get more production in customer hands.

"Would I want it to grow? Absolutely," he said. "But I don't want it to grow to become just another national chain."

Carrabba said he and his company president Hieu Ngyuen are currently working on improving Common Bond's business model and operations.

Bartolome said Carrabba and Ngyuen are passionate about maintaining the quality and integrity that Common Bond is known for (Houston Chronicle restaurant critic gave it a four-star review in September 2014).

"If anything, I think that they offer the opportunity for us to raise the bar even higher for an even wider audience," Bartolome told the Chronicle. "It is part of our standard to always strive to be better; no matter how great people already think we are, we can always do better, make better product, make our employees even happier, make our guests even happier. This is a step towards improving upon something that's great, I think our guests and employees will see Common Bond become better than ever."
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AUSTIN -- Texas State Board of Education member Thomas Ratliff gave Gov. Greg Abbott a lesson in parody late Friday, issuing a "Public School Parent Bill of Rights" that mimicked Abbott's proposals for overhauling the U.S. Constitution.

"There's an old saying, 'Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery,'" wrote Ratliff, a Republican from Mount Pleasant. "I hope Governor Abbott receives this suggestion in that vein."

Ratliff offered seven changes to state law that mirror the nine proposals Abbott made earlier Friday to amend the U.S. Constitution.

Where Abbott suggests allowing a two-thirds majority of the states to override a U.S. Supreme Court decision, Ratliff proposes authorizing two-thirds of school districts to override a Texas Supreme Court decision. Where Abbott wants to prohibit the U.S. Congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one state, Ratliff wants to block the Texas Legislature from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one school district.

Ratliff also suggests requiring state lawmakers to "constitutionally fund public schools," a nod to the effort by Abbott and other Republicans to persuade Congress to pass a balanced budget amendment.

READ RATLIFF'S BILL OF RIGHTS

READ ABBOTT'S PROPOSALS

More than 600 school districts are suing the state over Texas' method of funding public schools, arguing the current finance system is inequitable, inadequate and creates an unconstitutional statewide property tax.

Earlier Friday, Abbott unveiled his nine proposals during a speech at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, an Austin-based conservative think tank.

"We are succumbing to the caprice of men that our Founders fought to escape," Abbott said, calling for a constitutional convention to consider his proposals. "The cure to these problems will not come from Washington D.C. They must come from the states."

"I want to applaud his desire to maintain a separation of powers and uphold the conservative principle of government closest to the people is the most accountable to the people," said Ratliff, one of the 15-member board's more moderate Republicans. "I would like to imitate this proposal with the following list that mirrors his concepts."

Representative from Abbott's office did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Ratliff, answering a text about his proposals, denied that his proposals amounted to satire.

"I'm SERIOUS!" he insisted. "A true conservative approach towards limited government and local control."
Police are investigating a fatal shooting at an apartment complex in northwest Houston.

According to initial information, one person was shot about 9 p.m. Friday in a courtyard at the Hunter's Chase apartments, 10000 Hammerly, Houston police said.

The shooting victim, who has not been identified, was later pronounced dead at an area hospital.

The circumstances that led to the shooting were not immediately known. HPD homicide detectives were still questioning possible witnesses late Friday.

Houston police patrol officers could be seen searching through bushes inside the complex.

Anyone with information is asked to contact Crime Stoppers at 713-222-TIPS.
Surgeon hit with multiple counts of child sexual abuse

A Harris County physician arrested Friday has been charged with multiple counts of abusing four children.

The Harris County Sheriff's Office said one of the victims of Ricky Haywood-Watson II, 37, made revelations last year about Haywood-Watson's repeated abuse of the children, whose ages range from 4 to 10.

Haywood-Watson has been charged with super aggravated sexual assault of a child, continuous sexual abuse of a child and indecency with a child.

Haywood-Watson is being held on $400,000 bail. His arraignment is set for Monday.

A spokeswoman for Baylor College of Medicine confirmed Friday that Haywood-Watson was a surgery resident at the college. He has been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation.

Suspect in slayingof college student will return to Texas

DENTON - A man arrested in Arizona as a suspect in the fatal New Year's Day shooting of a North Texas college student will not oppose his return to Texas to face the accusation.

Marine Cpl. Eric Johnson is accused of killing 20-year-old University of North Texas student Sara Mutschlechner.

The Marine Corps disclosed Friday that Johnson, also 20, has been discharged from the service under "other than honorable conditions" because of the accusation.

Denton police say Mutschlechner was shot in the head after an exchange of words between people in her vehicle and a group of five or six men in a sport utility vehicle.

Denton police spokesman Shane Kizer says Johnson waived extradition in Yuma, Ariz., on Thursday. He will be returned to Texas within 10 days.

From staff and wire reports
AUSTIN  Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has decided to fight a federal judge's order to overhaul a foster care system that the judge described as "broken" and unconstitutional.

In a motion filed Friday, Paxton asked U.S. District Judge Janis Graham Jack to delay her ruling so the state could argue an appeal before a higher court.

"The court's finding of a constitutional violation is fatally flawed," Paxton's office wrote in a 14-page petition, which requested the delay by next Thursday.

At the same time, Paxton's office filed a notice of appeal to the 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, which is based in New Orleans.

The moves serve to extend a long-running battle over the adequacy of the foster care system, which serves about 12,000 children designated as being in "permanent" foster care.

The lawsuit, filed in Corpus Christi by the Children's Rights, a New York-based advocacy group, alleged that Texas officials violated the rights of the kids by moving them around repeatedly; placing them in unsafe care; keeping them there too long; failing to employ enough caseworkers; and not properly investigating and inspecting homes, among other allegations.

Jack ruled in the group's favor last month, issuing a scathing 255-page order that concluded that children "almost uniformly leave state custody more damaged than when they entered."

The judge's ruling required the state to improve caseworker turnover rates, enact new policies that allow children to speak privately to caseworkers, better track child-on-child abuse and stop placing long-term foster care children in unsafe environments. It also set a plan for a court-appointment special master to craft and implement more reforms.

Paxton's motion argued that Jack erred by ignoring precedents for handling complaints by foster children and improperly condemning the entire system. It also said the ruling was "so broad that it fails to give the defendants fair notice of its parameters and is virtually impossible to follow."

Paul Yetter, the lead lawyer for the advocacy group, called the motion "disappointing, but sadly predictable."

"The state needs to stop fighting and start fixing," Yetter said. "This system is broken, and children are being hurt."
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Six months after tunneling out of the maximum security Altiplano prison, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman Loera was re-captured for the third time by Mexican Marines on Friday in a high-risk raid of the drug lord's compound, and later a motel on the outskirts of Los Mochis, Sinaloa.

Gruesome photos of the aftermath of the raid that left five people dead and one marine wounded were provided to mySA.com by ElBlogDelNarco on Friday.

The set of images provided by the cartel news site shows several bodies riddled with bullets along with high powered firearms, including a loaded grenade launcher, found inside of the home.

RELATED: Video shows captured drug lord 'El Chapo' Guzman escorted onto flight under heavy guard

Photos of the raid come after the Sinaloa Cartel leader escaped from two maximum security prisons over a 15 year span.

Mission accomplished: we have him., Mexico President Enrique Pena Nieto tweeted on Friday. I want to inform the Mexican people that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested.

The Mexican Navy said in a statement that marines raided the home after receiving a tip about armed men at the home. They were fired on from inside the structure, it said.

RELATED: Internet reacts to drug kingpin Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman's third capture with memes

Five suspects were killed and six others arrested. The marine's injuries were not life threatening. Marines seized two armored vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher at the home, the statement added.

Photos of the arms seized showed that two of the rifles were .50-caliber sniper guns, capable of penetrating most bullet-proof vests and cars. The grenade launcher was found loaded, with an extra round nearby. An assault rifle had a 40-mm grenade launcher and at least one grenade.

RELATED: Drug cartel leader Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman has been caught, Mexican president tweets

Some in Mexico had doubted Guzman would allow himself to be captured alive, and others doubted that Mexico's government  given the successive embarrassments of his two escapes from prison  would want to hold him again in a Mexican prison. "Many people had doubted he could be recaptured," Mexican security analyst Raul Benitez said. "It is a big success for the government."

The United States filed requests for extradition for Guzman on June 25, before he escaped from prison. In September, a judge issued a second provisional arrest warrant on U.S. charges of organized crime, money laundering drug trafficking, homicide and others.

MMedina@mySA.com

Twitter: @MariahMedinaaa

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
The Constitution's framers, James Madison in particular, made a promise to the first generation of U.S. citizens about how their proposed new federal government would work in the future.

"Each of the principal branches of the federal government will owe its existence more or less to the

favor of the state governments, and must consequently feel a dependence," Madison wrote about the balance of power.

Gov. Greg Abbott on Friday, holding up that particular essay by Madison, told a raucous crowd of conservative activists that that deal had gone belly up. At the Texas Public Policy Foundations policy symposium in Austin, he repeated crowd-pleasing lines bashing the federal government  and then went further than he ever has, proposing nine amendments to the Constitution and urging the formation of a state convention to approve them.

However, given the legislative super-majorities required to adopt any amendment, it's incredibly difficult to rewrite the country's governing document.

Nevertheless, Abbott's proposed amendments, which would require 34 states to request a convention and then 38 states to approve any amendment, include:

Prohibit Congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one

State. Require Congress to balance its budget. Prohibit administrative agencies  and the un-elected bureaucrats that

staff them  from creating federal law. Prohibit administrative agencies  and the un-elected bureaucrats that

staff them  from preempting state law. Allow a two-thirds majority of the states to override a U.S. Supreme

Court decision. Require a seven-justice super-majority vote for U.S. Supreme Court

decisions that invalidate a democratically enacted law. Restore the balance of power between the federal and state governments

by limiting the former to the powers expressly delegated to it in the

Constitution. Give state officials the power to sue in federal court when federal officials

overstep their bounds. Allow a two-thirds majority of the states to override a federal law or

regulation.

The announcement puts Abbott not just well within in the mainstream of Republican governors, but at the forefront of a growing dialogue on the right ever since they lost two consecutive presidential elections. Maybe Abbott and the other governors, like former Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, wouldn't push so hard to amend the Constitution if a Democrat wasn't in the White House, but here we are.

Abbott drew effusive praise from Texas Republicans after his speech, and the news made its way to the national stage rather quickly. Democrats derided it as tea party nonsense. All of which amounts to a measured political win for Abbott, not only bolstering the conversation around amending the Constitution but boosting his influence among his supporters. He made it clear that he would urge state lawmakers to take up the issue when they meet in 2017 and, hopefully, prompt White House hopefuls to comment on his plan.

It has already provided ample fodder in the Republican primary. In December, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio endorsed the idea of a constitutional convention, specifically mentioning amendments to require a balanced budget and to set term limits for members of Congress.

"One of the things I'm going to do on my first day in office is I will put the prestige and power of the presidency behind a constitutional convention of the states," Rubio said in Iowa.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson are behind it. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, in 2014, proposed a constitutional amendment "to prevent the federal government or the courts from attacking or striking down state marriage laws," and has repeatedly left the door open to a convention.

"And if Congress will not act, passing the constitutional amendments needed to correct this lawlessness, then the movement from the people for an Article V Convention of the States  to propose the amendments directly  will grow stronger and stronger," Cruz wrote in the National Review last year.

Even so-called establishment Republican Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who has come under intense scrutiny from the GOP's activist base, has backed a balanced budget amendment via a constitutional convention.

Overall, Abbotts announcement was a big win for tea party-bred activists who have tried for years to get major state and federal politicians to endorse the convention idea publicly. In 2013, they kicked off the initiative at -- where else? -- near George Washington's home at Mount Vernon, welcoming about 100 legislators from 32 states to talk about how they could form a convention of states.

"If it starts to become a serious presidential issue, we could get it done in 2016," Mark Meckler, the president of Citizens for Self-Governance, a group leading the cause, told The Washington Times late last year.

The idea is now, arguably, as mainstream in today's Republican Party as tax cuts are, and Abbott did more than his part on Friday to help the cause.
The summers final Live on the Waterfront concert was held Wednesday evening at Prince Arthurs Landing. The popular series in Thunder Bay has completed nine weekly shows that began on July 13. Wednesdays concert was unique as it was held one hour later in the evening to mesh with the 10 p.
Say what you will about California governor Jerry Browns policy choices, but when it comes to his choice of poets, he has exceptional taste. On December 4, he announced his selection of Dana Gioia to succeed Juan Felipe Herrera as the states poet laureate. Gioia, who served as chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts under President George W. Bush and currently teaches poetry and culture at the University of Southern California, says that one of his top goals as laureate is to reach rural communities. It would be very easy for a California poet laureate to spend the majority of time in Los Angeles and the Bay Area, which are huge, culturally vibrant regions, Gioia told me by e-mail. I wont ignore those areas, but the majority of California is rural or agricultural. I want to start planning from the beginning how to reach those areas. Gioia says he will begin by focusing on high schools and public libraries.

Born and raised in Hawthorne, a working-class city south of Los Angeles, and surrounded by Sicilian-speaking relations . . . in a largely Mexican neighborhood, Gioia said that the public library was indispensable to his education. I was raised in a town where the only cultural institution was the local library . . . I would never have gone to Stanford and Harvard without that placewhich always made me feel welcome. High schools and libraries are the foundation of literacy and public culture in the state, he noted, and creating opportunities for people to practice and appreciate poetry in these institutions is a small way to broaden its audience and enrich the cultural life of the state.

Reaching rural and general audiences has preoccupied Gioia for years. As the head of the NEA, he launched the Poetry Out Loud initiative in 2006 to encourage high school students to memorize and recite great verse. He also established Big Read grants, which support community reading programs, and oversaw initiatives funding theater groups in all 50 states to put on high-quality productions of Shakespeares plays.

Gioias own poetry ignores the current fashion for obscure, partially fragmented free verse whose allusions and assimilated jargon appeal mostly to academics and other poets. The author of five slim, accomplished volumes, including his forthcoming 99 Poems: New and Selected, Gioialike Robert Frost, about whom he has written oftenis both accessible and complex, dealing with everyday experiences and emotions in subtle and surprising ways. In Pity the Beautiful (2012), he writes:

The tales we tell are either false or true,

But neither purpose is the point. We weave

The fabric of our own existence out of words,

And the right story tells us who we are.

It is in this task of telling the right story, however imperfectly, for himself and for others that sets Gioia apart from many contemporary poets who have reduced poetry to a mere tool of self actualization or some (usually overwrought) political struggle.

Gioias criticism, which has recently included essays on contemporary Catholic writing and the little-known poet Dunstan Thompson, has often examined the role of the poet in society. In his provocative 1991 essay for The Atlantic, Can Poetry Matter?, Gioia called attention to the paradoxical situation of contemporary poetry, still largely true today, in which thousands of books of poems were published every year and hardly any of them read. Poetry is a universal human art, Gioia wrote recently in Poetry as Enchantment. Despite postmodern theories of cultural relativism that assert there are no human universals . . . there is no human society, however isolated, that has not developed and employed poetry as a cultural practice. Poetry does matter, and always will, Gioia suggests, but how much it matters will depend on whether poets begin taking the riskand it is exactly thatof writing for the general public.

Writing for what we used to call the common reader . . . doesnt mean dumbing things down, Gioia told me. It is possible to bring the best of poetry to a broad audience without condescension . . . The common reader is not an idiot. He or she is a lawyer, doctor, farmer, soldier, scientist, minister, civil servant. He noted that that one of his Mexican uncles who served in the Merchant Marines brought a case of books, including poetry, to read on his voyages. People forget how immensely popular the early Modernists were with readers. Frost, Eliot, Cummings, Jeffers, Millay, and Hughes all sold well.

While todays poets have mostly lost the ability to converse with a mixed, general audience, Gioia said, I would like to help broaden the audience for poetry. Im just one guy in a big state, but it seems worth a try. It certainly does.

Photo by Nancy Ostertag/Getty Images
Undateable Live 2016 Mid-Season Return and New Musical Guest: Weezer & Backstreet Boys

Undateable Live is back with the 2016 mid-season return. Check out the report below for a look at the new episode as well as a breakdown of some of the big new musical guest, including Weezer and Backstreet Boys.

The official plot synopsis for tonights all new episode of Undateable Live, titled A New Year's Resolution Walks Into a Bar, reads (via TVSeriesFinale):

Danny is determined to prove he's a great lover in the wake of a shocking revelation by Charlotte (Whitney Cummings). Elsewhere, Candace tries to spice up her relationship, and the crew celebrates when Shelly sheds pounds.

An official NBC press release details the return of the series and the upcoming musical guest:

UNDATEABLE IS BACK == THE LIVE COMEDY RETURNS WITH NEW EPISODES AND MUSICAL GUESTS BACKSTREET BOYS, WEEZER AND CHARLIE PUTH

Charlie Puth (Jan. 8), Weezer (Jan. 15) and the Backstreet Boys (Jan. 29) Join the Gang as NBCs Live Comedy Sings in the New Year

"UNIVERSAL CITY, Calif.  Jan. 7, 2016 -- Undateable (Fridays at 8 p.m. ET/PT) returns with a brand-new live episode on Friday, January 8 with Grammy Award and Golden Globe Award nominee Charlie Puth set as musical guest. On January 15, acclaimed rock band Weezer arrives on set, and chart-topping sensations the Backstreet Boys perform January 29. This seasons musical guests have also included Nico and Vinz, Kodaline, Saint Motel, Meghan Trainor, American Authors, Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness and Alessia Cara.

B

e sure to tune into the all new episode of Undateable Live, tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on NBC.

Be sure to follow us on Twitter @OffBeatClass for all the latest news and updates.

&amp;amp;amp;am&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;

 2016 The Classical Art, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.

TagsUndateable Live, 2016, Mid-Season, Return, New, Musical, Guest, Weezer, Backstreet Boys
BEREA, Ohio -- Berea's MLK Week will be a little different the 26th time around.



The candlelight march will take place this year on the legal holiday honoring Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday: Monday, Jan. 18.



The former Sunday songfest has been replaced by a musical legacy service at Baldwin Wallace University before Tuesday's keynote address.



Leaders of local nonprofits will hold a Wednesday forum at BW called Socially Responsible Careers.



The university's Student Diversity Council will take a long day's field trip on Saturday, Jan. 23, to the Freedom Center in Cincinnati.



Besides Songfest, two other features from last year at BW will not return: an interactive maze and an exhibit at Ritter Library.



Tuesday's keynote speech will be delivered by the Rev. Marvin McMickle, president of Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School in Rochester, New York, but better known in Greater Cleveland as the long-time pastor of the influential Antioch Baptist Church and as president of the Shaker Heights school board, the local NAACP and the local Urban League.

McMickle will talk about building communities of trust. His speech is part of Enduring Questions: The Mark Collier Lecture Series.



As always, a new year means a new theme for the annual week. This year's theme is "Living the Legacy."



J.T. Hairston Sr., BW's assistant dean of students, has led MLK Week for all of its 26 years, bringing together several community organizations to commemorate the slain civil rights crusader. This year, said Hairston, "People wanted to do something a little different to give it a new feel and energy."



Most MLK Week events are free and open to the public. But two are closed: Saturday's Freedom Center trip and Thursday's annual MLK Day of Learning, in which students from Baldwin Wallace and Berea-Midpark High School's Realizing Your Potential club work with fourth graders from Grindstone Elementary School.



Here is the week's schedule of public events:

9 a.m., Monday, Jan. 18: Prayer breakfast, Mt. Zion of Berea, 572 Pearl St.

7 p.m., Monday, Jan. 18: Candlelight march, starting and ending at Durst Welcome Center, 115 Tressel St.

7 p.m., Tuesday, Jan. 19: Legacy service featuring the BW Voices of Praise and Berea-Midpark High School Choir, John Patrick Theatre, Kleist Center for Art and Drama, 95 E. Bagley Road.

8 p.m., Tuesday, Jan. 19: Keynote speech by Rev. Marvin McMickle.

Noon, Wednesday, Jan. 20: Socially responsible careers forum, Sandstone 3, Strosacker Hall, 120 E. Grand St.

7 p.m., Wednesday, Jan. 20: Creative Expressions--Media Presentation, featuring work by students from Berea-Midpark High School and BW's Upward Bound program, Cuyahoga County Public Library Berea Branch, 7 Berea Commons.

12:15 p.m., Thursday, Jan. 21: Chapel Worship Service, Lindsay-Crossman Chapel, 56 Seminary St.

For more information, see

.
timothy j. mcginty july 2013.jpg

A group of prominent Cleveland pastors cancelled a meeting with Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty.

(Marvin Fong, The Plain Dealer)

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A meeting between Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty and a group of prominent Cleveland pastors has been cancelled.

The Federation of Network Ministries had planned to talk to McGinty about a grand jury's decision not to indict two Cleveland police officers in the shooting death of the 12-year-old Tamir Rice. County prosecutors recommended no charges against the officers.

Cleveland police officer Timothy Loehmann shot Tamir seconds after his partner, Frank Garmback, pulled their cruiser to a halt in front of the boy at the Cudell Rec Center on Nov. 22, 2014.

The officers were responding to a report of a guy with a gun at the rec center. Tamir was carrying an airsoft pellet gun that resembled a real firearm.

A man told a Cleveland dispatcher that the gun was "probably fake," but that message was not relayed to the officers.

McGinty said that "indisputable" video evidence showed Tamir was reaching for the waistband of his pants as Garmback pulled the cruiser to a halt. He said Tamir's death, while tragic, was the result of a "perfect storm of human error."

The Federation had planned discuss the case with McGinty on Jan. 22. The meeting would have been private. But a member of the group said that pastors met with U.S. Rep. Marcia Fudge Saturday morning, and she convinced them to cancel the meeting, asking them instead to support McGinty's opponent in an upcoming Democratic primary.

Fudge endorsed McGinty's opponent, Parma Safety Director and former assistant county prosecutor Michael O'Malley, in December.

The group of clergy may also back O'Malley, one of the pastors, Bishop Eugene Ward, said Saturday afternoon.

"We're going to have to meet with Mr. O'Malley first to make sure that he has our needs, and the needs of all of the people of the community in mind," Ward said. "It's important that he hears from us and we reach some kind of understanding."

A meeting between McGinty and the United Pastors in Mission scheduled for Jan. 6 was also cancelled after the pastors said they wanted to focus on Tamir's family.

"Twice groups of pastors have invited the prosecutor to meet with them and discuss their concerns," Joe Frolik, spokesman for McGinty's office, said Saturday evening. "Twice we've accepted, and now twice those groups have cancelled. We remain ready to talk whenever they are."

McGinty has met privately with members of the clergy before and will continue to do so, Frolik said.

In the wake of Tamir's death, local leaders need to come together around issues like banning replica guns and adding body and dash cameras to local police forces, McGinty said through a spokesman.

"If we do something positive to achieve reform, then Tamir will not have died in vain," he said.
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A new round of protests over a grand jury's decision not to indict two Cleveland police officers in the fatal shooting of the 12-year-old Tamir Rice is slated to begin Saturday.

Demonstrators will plan to protest at the Cuyahoga County Justice Center starting at noon to demand accountability from public officials following Tamir's death.

Officers Timothy Loehmann and Frank Garmback responded to a report of a guy with a gun at the Cudell Rec Center Nov. 22, 2014. Tamir was carrying an airsoft pellet gun that looked like a real firearm.

Loehmann shot Tamir seconds after Garmback pulled their cruiser pulled to a halt in front of the boy at the rec center.

County prosecutors recommended no charges against the officers. McGinty said "indisputable" evidence showed Tamir was reaching for the waistband of his pants as Loehmann and Garmback's cruiser pulled to a stop.

Protestors took to the streets of Cleveland in the days following the grand jury's Dec. 28 decision. More than a hundred demonstrators participated in the first protest, but attendance dropped off after that.

A second weekend protest is scheduled for 4 p.m. Sunday at the Cudell Rec Center.

Blacks Lives Matter Cleveland is organizing this weekend's demonstrations.

Cleveland.com reporter Patrick Cooley will tweet live from today's protest.
ambulance.jpg

A Cleveland woman remains in serious condition at MetroHealth after being involved in a hit-skip accident on Cleveland's West Side Tuesday morning.

(File photo)

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Cleveland police are still searching for the driver of a cargo van that hit a woman in a crosswalk on Cleveland's West Side, dragging her more than 50 feet.

The 61-year-old victim remains at MetroHealth in serious condition, a hospital official confirmed Friday evening.

The accident occurred about 7 a.m. Tuesday morning at the intersection of Puritas Avenue and West 150th Street, Sgt. Jennifer Ciaccia said. The woman was in the crosswalk, crossing West 150th Street, when she was hit by a white cargo van turning right.

The woman was dragged more than 50 feet before the van drove away from the scene, headed north on West 150th Street. A witness told police the van's driver appeared to be a middle-aged man.

Anyone with information on the accident is asked to contact Cleveland police accident investigators at 216-623-5295.
North Ridgeville police sign new.JPG

North Ridgeville police said an armed standoff ended peacefully Friday night.

(Patrick Cooley, cleveland.com)

NORTH RIDGEVILLE, Ohio -- A two-hour standoff between North Ridgeville police and an armed man ended peacefully Friday night, police said.

Officers were called to a Mills Road home about 5:45 p.m. for a report of a disturbed man armed with several guns. Attempts to talk to the man out of the house were initially unsuccessful. The man refused to come to the door to talk, police said.

A Lorain County SWAT team was called when negotiations broke down. Officers eventually reestablished contact with the man and convinced him to come out of the home and surrender, police said. Firefighters took him to a nearby hospital for evaluation. It is unclear if he will face charges.

People who live in the neighborhood were barred from returning to their homes during the standoff.

No additional details were available Saturday morning.
Rob Portman and John Kasich

In this Nov. 1, 2010 file photo, Rob Portman, center, and John Kasich, right, rally together with then-U.S. Rep. John Boehner of Ohio. Portman and Kasich won their respective races for U.S. Senate and governor the following day.

(Al Behrman, The Associated Press)

CLEVELAND, Ohio - U.S. Sen. Rob Portman endorsed Gov. John Kasich for president Saturday, calling him a "leader who has a proven record of delivering results."

Portman will serve as a national co-chair of Kasich's campaign.

News of the endorsement trickled out late Friday night, when sources close to Kasich and Portman confirmed to cleveland.com that an announcement was imminent.

On the surface, such a development might not seem surprising. Top Ohio Republican backs another top Ohio Republican. That's how it always works, no?

In most cases you would be correct. But Portman's case is somewhat special.

Consider that he served in the White House under President George H.W. Bush and later returned for two high-profile posts under President George W. Bush. Family loyalties might have compelled Portman to get behind Jeb Bush's candidacy.

Consider that several past Portman aides are working to elect Marco Rubio. Perhaps Portman pondered joining forces with his Senate colleague from Florida. Then there is Ben Carson, who until last week had a longtime Portman adviser running his campaign.

To put it another way, Portman's backing never was a slam-dunk.

With the exception of Treasurer Josh Mandel, who is Rubio's top supporter in Ohio, before Saturday every other Republican officeholder elected statewide already had endorsed Kasich's bid. Portman's neutrality fueled quiet speculation.

Maybe he favored Kasich but didn't want to upset his patrons in the Bush family. Or maybe Portman preferred Bush but didn't want to embarrass Kasich.

Portman's tough re-election race this fall also might be a factor. It cuts both ways, though.

Picking a favorite now could upset national Republicans who could be helpful to Portman this year. But a popular governor - Kasich recently has enjoyed record-high approval ratings in Ohio - could be helpful to Portman, too. So could the governor's allies at the Ohio GOP, which voted Friday to endorse Kasich. Not that their support ever was in doubt.

In his endorsement of Kasich, Portman took a shot at former Gov. Ted Strickland, the senator's likely Democratic challenger this fall.

"John turned Ohio around at a tough time and I believe he can do the same for our country," Portman said. "John inherited a mess from former Governor Ted Strickland. Under Governor Strickland, Ohio lost over 350,000 jobs and ranked 48th in job creation, as companies left Ohio for other states."

A Strickland campaign spokesman later fired back, calling Portman a Washington "insider" who "always puts the interests of the D.C. establishment over Ohio's working people."

By coming out publicly for Kasich now, Portman gives Kasich a well-timed boost. The New Hampshire primary is one month from Saturday. Bush and Kasich are among the cluster of center-right establishment candidates fighting for second place there.

Portman is a fixture of that center-right establishment, a pragmatic conservative who was on Mitt Romney's short list for vice president four years ago. He is a skilled fundraiser and weighed his own presidential bid for 2016. He is a Dartmouth College alum, meaning some New Hampshire stumping might be on the agenda. And he remains close with Romney, who has yet to endorse a candidate.

(Worth noting: The Washington Post reported this week that when Romney was weighing another run for president, he privately consulted with Portman.)

Fair or not, many will see Portman's decision to get off the sidelines as a statement against Bush. Sure, many also will see Portman's choice of Kasich as fait accompli.

But Portman has shown he can be tremendously helpful to his allies. He campaigned relentlessly for Romney in 2012 and for Senate Republicans in 2014.

The true value in his endorsement will be in how much Portman does for Kasich.
Chip-Joseph-Retirement.JPG

Chip Joseph poses at his retirement luncheon with Karen Wukela, director of operations for the nonprofit. She got a lot of laughs with her T-shirt.

(Michael K. McIntyre/PD)

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Chip Joseph has gone fishin'.

The longtime executive director of the Y-Haven residential treatment center for homeless, drug-addicted men spent his last day on the job Friday.

He enjoyed a no-frills retirement buffet lunch at the Downtown Y, shook a lot of hands, then prepared for a Saturday morning departure on his annual fishing trip to Costa Rica with the Rev. Walt Jenne, pastor of St. Basil the Great Catholic Church in Brecksville, and two other buddies.

A colleague wore a yellow smiley face T-shirt with the words: "I survived Chip Joseph." The soon-to-be retiree got a kick out of it.

His longtime friend Nick Loparo, who was headed home to pack for the Costa Rica trip, shook Joseph's hand after lunch and needled him: "I need to get one of those shirts, but it will say, 'I survived vacation with Chip Joseph.'"

Chip Joseph is a survivor. The 67-year-old former heroin addict kicked the habit 30 years ago and helped many other addicts do the same, through Y-Haven, Alcoholics Anonymous or just by offering support.

"I've known him for over 45 years. We hung out way back when, and we're sober together," said Loparo. "We've got history, which is a big, big thing. It means a lot."

"We used together and we're sober together," said Joseph. "There is life after heroin."

Joseph served in the Peace Corps in Korea and worked for many years for Catholic Charities in Northeast Ohio. He finished law school at Cleveland Marshall College of Law, but never took the bar exam, he said, because he couldn't take the time off from his Catholic Charities job to study for it.

He's been at Y-Haven for nearly two decades, after writing the application for the grant that got it started. And he spent his time not just helping addicts kick a habit but to rebuild self-esteem. He started a Y-Haven choir and began an artistic partnership with Cleveland Public Theatre in which Y-Haven residents write and perform an autobiographical play each year.

He had this to say to those who attended his sendoff:

"The people that hired me, when I get to the interview, they said, 'Chip, we hope you can help us put the 'C' back in the YMCA.' So I tried to do that over the years," he said, referring to "Christian" in "Young Men's Christian Association."

Joseph never minces words, and he didn't Friday.

"My only hope is that going forward the YMCA keeps the 'C.' That's their biggest challenge. I'm hoping that that will come to pass, because I don't think that it's true today."

Joseph later expounded, saying he hopes that the Y maintains a focus on doing good works for the underprivileged in the urban core.

After the fishing trip, Joseph plans to do some traveling and some consulting, and will spend a lot of time with his special needs daughter, Kristen, 32.

Tim Gladman, 58, popped in to say hello on his way to work. Not long ago, he was at Y-Haven kicking a crack cocaine habit. For the second time.

"I knew what I had to do, when I messed up, I knew what to do -- go to Y-Haven and get my foundation again," Gladman said. "He said, 'You know what to do. Just do it.

"For the ones that make it and for those who don't, for everybody who set foot in the building, Chip was a godsend," said Gladman, who now works as a residential advocate at another treatment facility.

Joseph said he's proud of all of the addicts who have reclaimed their lives and are working in the community.

"Last year, when they mandated in Cleveland that you change your water meters, my doorbell rings on a Saturday and I open it and there's a big guy standing there and he gives me a big hug. The water man? Y-Haven. You see them every place," Joseph said. "They're out there in the community. And they're doing good."
After a rough start for markets in 2016, "Fast Money" traders looked ahead to what they would want to own in a year.

Worries of an economic slowdown sent most major indices around the globe lower this week, and U.S. stocks followed suit. The three major American averages all shed about 6 percent or more of their value.

In that environment, trader Tim Seymour looked for upside in one particularly battered segment, emerging market stocks. He sees oversold conditions in the iShares MSCI Emerging Markets ETF , which has fallen 8 percent already this year.
"If the Communist Party is really stimulating, they are doing a terrible job of it," Cramer said. (Tweet This)

In Cramer's opinion, the Chinese stock market is floundering around the way the U.S. stock market did before we knew that aggressive, dynamic portfolio insurers could drive the entire market down with S&P futures.

"They aren't as clueless as our authorities were in 1929, but they do make themselves look like fools who are running things here in 1987," the " Mad Money " host said.

The events of the Chinese stock market this week have led Jim Cramer to realize that the Communist Party has no idea what it is doing. They are making things up as they go along, and investors in the U.S. are asking too much from China .

Look, I'm not saying we've lost China. I am saying that the real worries about China don't have much to do with its stock market.

The real rub for Cramer is that in the world of marginal growth, China has basically been the main buyer of every raw good out there. Now it has turned into a seller, dumping everything from aluminum to steel into the world market.

The problem with China is that, unlike the United States, China was a place for emerging markets to sell goods, especially natural resources. Without Chinese demand, there will be too much of everything that involves commercial construction, notably the metals and mining equipment.

Read more from Mad Money with Jim Cramer

Cramer Remix: The unspoken truth behind $20 oil

Cramer: This is when the selling will stop

Cramer's market anxiety survival guide

The loss of China translates into a loss of global growth and emerging growth. The impact to the economy is felt in the ripple effects by every U.S. company that exports goods overseas.

"Look, I'm not saying we've lost China. I am saying that the real worries about China don't have much to do with its stock market," Cramer said.

Cramer thinks the weakness in the Chinese stock market is less about stocks, and more about the real economy. It is a mere reflection of the Chinese government's lack of transparency, total lack of knowledge and insight on how a stock market should actually work.

"As for the Chinese economy, it might be growing, but it is no longer responsible for the demand needed to gobble up the goods of other countries, which have relied on China's endless growth for years," Cramer said.

And that is the real problem. In a world with not enough growth, China is a massive problem that seems to be getting worse with time.
Scott Rothstein | Getty Images

No one would have predicted at the start of 2015 that Valeant Pharmaceuticals , a Canadian drug giant, would have lost more than 60 percent of its share price in two months. But in October, short seller Citron Research accused the company of engaging in bogus transaction to inflate revenue. While nothing has been proved and some people aren't convinced the company has done anything wrong, the damage has already been done  retail investors who owned this quickly growing stock, whether on their own or in mutual funds, have lost a lot of money.

If it feels like you've heard this story before, it's because you have. Over the last few years, many short sellers have accused companies of committing nefarious acts  Bill Ackman compared Herbalife to Bernie Madoff; Jon Carnes accused Silvercorp of misdeeds; Carson Block brought down Sino-Forest. All of these stories have at least one thing in common: Blindsided investors end up losing big money. Many are also left wondering if there was anything they could have done. Why does it seem as though the professionals  fund managers and analysts  are caught as off guard about these kinds of allegations as the regular investor? And is there anything that can be done to avoid getting crushed?

Beware short sellers

In many cases, fraud is extremely difficult to uncover, especially when teams of analysts have numerous stocks to oversee, said Richard Teitelbaum, author of The Most Dangerous Trade: How Short Sellers Uncover Fraud, Keep Markets Honest, and Make and Lose Billions. Long only-focused mutual fund managers also don't have as much incentive as short sellers to call out a company for fraud. In many cases, a mutual fund manager will see something and just not buy that stock, he said. "They might get suspicious, but they're going to say, 'I won't pursue it' and leave it at that," he said. "There's not really an impetus to [devote resources to] push the matter further."

Some analysts also have an incentive not to call out a company for fraud, said Ryan Modesto, an analyst at Toronto's 5i Research, a retail investorfocused analysis firm that claims it's conflict-free. In many cases, financial firms are courting companies for business, and a too-negative report could impact that relationship. Yet many investors don't realize that and often treat reports as gospel, he said. Short sellers, though, make money when a stock falls, so they're actively looking into companies that may have problems. Some people do wonder if these firms are just saying things to cash in, but Teitelbaum doesn't think that's the case.

"They're performing a public service," he said. "What they're doing is saying capital has been misallocated and that it's not a good place to put your money. To say they're manipulative is a poor defense on the part of companies who should be paying more attention to accounting regulation." Investors should remember that anything can happen  a company can go bankrupt or fraud can occur  without warning. It's also difficult to catch someone who's purposely trying to game the numbers, said Teitelbaum. Remember how caught off guard everyone was when Enron went bust. However, there are some things investors can do to better ensure they have a stock that's on the up and up.

Pay attention to the negative

Modesto may be a stock researcher now, but he learned about company fraud the hard way. When Sino-Forest was accused of fraud in 2011, the company stock tanked, but Modesto, then just a retail investor, bought in. He thought he was getting a deal. Many institutional managers were still bullish on the stock, and he figured they must be right  after all, this short seller was relatively unknown at the time. That was a big mistake. The stock kept falling. He got out two months later, just before the company delisted from the Toronto Stock Exchange. It was an embarrassing moment, but he learned a valuable lesson: Listen to the naysayers. Most stocks have one or two, if not more, analysts who have a negative rating on a company. Pay attention to what they have to say and see if anything stands out. Going negative isn't easy, he said, and many are going out on a limb to say what they really think.

It's your money and the buck stops with you. Do your research, and make sure you are comfortable with the company. Richard Teitelbaum Author

"Why are they so negative on the stock?" he asked. "Is there something there that you should have considered? In every market, there's a buy and a sell  you don't want to only look at positive information to back up a thesis."



Check the CEO's history

When you're looking into a company, check into the CEO's past. If they've made big mistakes in previous jobs, then it's possible that they'll make mistakes again. Take Gaston Bastiaens, the CEO of Lernout & Hauspie, a speech-recognition technology company. The company went bankrupt in 2001 because of a major fraud, and he was eventually sentenced to three years in prison.

watch now

If people looked into his history, they may not have been surprised by what occurred, said Teitelbaum. In 1992 he joined Apple as a vice president to help launch the Apple Newton PDA, a predecessor to the iPad. The launch was a failure, said Teitelbaum. In 1995 Bastiaens was hired as CEO of computer software company Quarterdeck, where he went on an acquisition spree that ended up hurting the company. He left the business a year later and joined Lernout. "The companies that he had run ended up being disasters," said Teitelbaum, adding, "You have to ask yourself, How is this guy running a company? There's a saying about history: '[History] doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes.'"

Watch out for serial acquirers

It can be harder to catch a fraud if the company is rapidly acquiring companies, added Teitelbaum. It's much easier for executives to hide a lack of organic growth when a business is growing rapidly through M&A, he explained. Of course, not all acquirers are hiding something, but these operations do require some additional due diligence, said Beth Hamilton-Keen, the CFA Institute's chair of the Board of Governors. Pay close attention to leverage, she said, noting that many acquirers, including Valeant, have taken on a lot of debt to finance all of their buys. As purchases get more and more expensive, it can get harder for the company to "digest" that debt. As a result, these companies need to generate higher and higher returns on these acquisitions. In many cases, these rapid acquirers have accounting reserves, which a company can set up when it buys another business in order to pay for costs, such as business integrations and layoffs. It's legal to do, but most people don't track them, said Teitelbaum. As more accounting reserves are set up, "they become more and more difficult to keep track of and can be used to bolster earnings when needed," he added.

Dig into the footnotes
Roboterra robot making kits on display at CES 2016 in Las Vegas. Harriet Taylor | CNBC

Roboterra is a small San Jose, California-based start-up with a big ambition: teaching kids around the globe to code. At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Wednesday, it launched a cloud-based robotics coding platform it's calling Castle Rock, that works alongside its robot-in-a-box, Origin Kit. The Origin Kit is Roboterra's third-generation kit and costs $429. It contains more than 85 types of components manufactured in China. With this kit and and a downloadable app, students can build, program and interact with their robot. The goal is to teach high school and middle-school kids C++ programming. "The learning that happens at college level  we want to move this down to 10-year-olds," said CEO Yao Zhang. Like many of her team, Zhang is originally from China and attended university in the U.S (she has a Ph.D. from Columbia University). Roboterra has drawn engineers from Apple , Tesla and Google X Lab.



Roboterra CEO Yao Zhang speaking at CES 2016 in Las Vegas. Harriet Taylor | CNBC

The company has partnered with schools in China and ran its first U.S. pilot program in the fall with 30 Silicon Valley students completing the 20-hour program. In China, Roboterra hosts annual events in which robots created by different schools battle in an arena. "The most common situation is that so many schools have never heard about robotics. They are excited about the opportunities for STEM but there's no way for them to enjoy this fun," said Zhang. The company is increasingly drawing interest from schools in less-privileged districts, something Zhang and her team are particularly excited about.

"There is strong demand for this way of learning," she said. "Kids learn by doing, trying, experimenting, failing and trying again," said director of campus operations Tom Burns. "Our product is one that can go in the hands of kids and they can try, they can fail and they can try again."

The company just raised $4.5 million in Series A funding from Silicon Valley venture capital investors at a $25 million valuation. Its products are set to go on sale in RadioShack at a yet-to-be determined date, and the company is in talks with Brookstone and toy distributors.

A Codrone drone on display at CES 2016 in Las Vegas. Harriet Taylor | CNBC

Another company that's using robotics to teach kids to code is RoboLink. The company has created Khan Academy-style three minute instructional videos students can follow to build and program a minidrone. It's CoDrone product  which costs $139  was chosen as one of the top 10 most innovative products at CES by the Last Gadget Standing competition. In addition to selling robot kits and offering video tutorials, the company has two other pricing models. For $145 per week for eight weeks, its team will go into schools and teach the curriculum, or schools can come to their learning center (the company is San Diego-based) and pay $160 per month for a two-hour session. In each session, students build a fully functioning robot and customize its behavior using C programming language. "As they assemble and play with the robots, they learn fundamental principles of science and technology in a fun and challenging environment," says the website. Right now RoboLink is working with 20 schools.

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Her health was at risk. But in Missouri, doctors could do nothing.
Community members participate in a forum about Insure Tennessee Thursday at the Baptist Memphis Education Center.

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By Kevin McKenzie of The Commercial Appeal

Memphis leaders are preparing for a full-court press to revive Gov. Bill Haslam's Insure Tennessee plan, facing what could be a tough sell politically during a presidential election year.

Local leaders say Haslam's plan for using $1.7 billion a year in federal Medicaid expansion dollars to provide health coverage for Tennesseans should be a slam dunk. But University of Memphis Professor Cyril F. Chang, a health care economist, likened the relationship between the federal offer of Medicaid expansion and Tennessee as "two porcupines trying to make love."

"How do they do it?" Chang asked more than 100 people at a community forum Thursday on the campus of Baptist Memorial Hospital-Memphis.

"You do it slowly and you do it carefully and you do it torturously," he said. "And so far, we have not done it."

State Sen. Brian Kelsey, R-Germantown, who opposes Insure Tennessee, doubts it will find Republican support in the state Legislature during this presidential election year.

"I don't think any Republicans will be looking to expand Medicaid this year," Kelsey said by email. "The cuts to hospitals under Obamacare do not begin until next year, so most Republican legislators want to wait to elect a new president to repeal and replace Obamacare."

Hospitals have until 2017 before cuts in special federal payments for treating larger numbers of uninsured and low-income patients take hold, Kelsey said. The nation's hospitals accepted the gradual disappearance of those payments with the understanding that Medicaid expansion and more insured patients would replace the lost federal revenue.

Craig Becker, president of the Nashville-based Tennessee Hospital Association, agreed the election year will make it difficult for Insure Tennessee's reconsideration. To move the needle, the hospital association will focus on education.

"We're going to spend a good part of our time doing education of both the Legislature and the public in trying to get them to understand a whole lot better about what Insure Tennessee is, and more importantly I guess, what it isn't," he said. "And it isn't Obamacare."

A survey of Tennessee registered voters highlighted the power of education to sway opinions on the issue. The survey of 789 voters in January 2015 found that when first asked about Insure Tennessee, 44 percent of Republicans, 60 percent of Democrats and 46 percent of independent voters supported it.

After hearing arguments for and against the governor's plan, voter support rose to 60 percent of Republicans and 61 percent of Democrats and independents.

Insure Tennessee could cover more than 67,000 Shelby County adults, about 7 percent of the county population, who don't have enough income to qualify for the subsidized health coverage offered through the Healthcare.gov marketplace, Chang said.

"Most of these individuals, they are working and they are working food services, construction, cleaning, maintenance, sales and transportation and others," he said.

With Insure Tennessee from 2014-16, Shelby County could have brought in as much as $325 million "at no extra cost to us," Chang said. The economic impact could affect 35,000 hospital jobs and generate more than $2 billion.

Memphis' business community has supported Insure Tennessee, and Greater Memphis Chamber CEO Phil Trenary said he received criticism last year after telling legislators at a local restaurant gathering something similar to "that if you look at this, anyone who doesn't vote for this is a moron."

He said he found excuses from lawmakers last year in Nashville, out-of-state people lining the hallways and too few voices from Memphis and elsewhere in the state.

"We got there too late, we got there without enough force and we got our butts kicked," said Trenary. Chambers of commerce in Memphis, Nashville, Knoxville and Chattanooga have allied to speak with one voice this year, he said.

Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell considers Insure Tennessee a "no brainer," but said a Plan B involving education is needed with dim prospects for the bill this year. County government provides $28 million a year to Regional One Health as a safety net hospital.

Luttrell also said the difference is at the ballot box.

"We have not done a very good job at mobilizing for the long-term," he said. "The NRA does."

Said Chang: "My last word is that let's hope the porcupines will succeed."
It may be a new year, but it's the same old same old with the Tennessee legislature  in particular the Shelby County delegation.

A description of the delegation listed on Zoominfo.com says it is "a non-partisan group of Tennessee legislators who share a common goal: ensure that Shelby County and the City of Memphis receive the best possible representation in the General Assembly."

Yeah, right.

That may be true on occasion, such as during luncheons when the legislature is in session. But the perception back home is that the Shelby County delegation is rarely, if ever, on the same page. And unless it's on the floor of the state House and Senate or during meals, members are rarely in the same place when constituents are around.

That was painfully obvious last Tuesday during a legislative town hall meeting at the National Civil Rights Museum ostensibly organized by the Shelby delegation. Except that only Memphis Democrats were at the meeting  all but one of whom is African-American.

Not a single Republican in the 19-member delegation bothered to show up.

"I would have loved to have been there, but I just couldn't," said Republican state Rep. Mark White, citing a scheduling conflict.

White said he is keenly interested in the ongoing debate over public education  specifically the takeover of struggling Memphis schools by the state-operated Achievement School District, which was the primary topic at the meeting.

Democratic Rep. Karen Camper, who chairs the Shelby delegation, sent out notices about the town hall to each member on Dec. 17. A follow-up reminder went out on Monday.

Fellow Democratic Rep. G.A. Hardaway insists the snub was deliberate. Except for two or three GOP members, "they pretty much ignore us. As soon as they got the supermajority, that's when the arrogance set in."

That's simply not so, says Republican state Sen. Mark Norris of Collierville, the Senate majority leader. Norris was in Nashville on other legislative business Tuesday. He also did not attend another legislative gathering a day earlier at Memphis Pink Palace Museum.

Norris said he alerted Camper's office beforehand that he had a conflict. He also said the organizers did not seek input from all members before scheduling the meeting.

"They just announced they were doing this. Nobody reached out to try to find a date where we could all get together for a town hall meeting."

As a result, the well-attended gathering was noticeably one-sided  racially and politically. Since Democrats have virtually no power in Nashville, it was also no doubt fruitless.

This is not to suggest that local GOP lawmakers care nothing about the needs of Memphians. But I do wish that our delegation would try harder to get on the same page every once in awhile.
Shelby County Health Department, 814 Jefferson

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By Linda A. Moore of The Commercial Appeal

A facelift is not enough to solve the problems with the Health Department's aging headquarters, so the county could opt for a full reconstruction.

On Monday, the Shelby County Commission will vote on a $396,000 contract with local architects brg3s for preliminary architectural and engineering work toward the construction of a new Health Department building at 814 Jefferson.

The plan is to replace the circa-1950 building, which includes a 1967 and a 1971 addition. It will cost significantly less than a renovation, said Tom Needham, county public works director.

Constructing a new, smaller building will cost the county about $19.9 million, compared with study estimates that put renovations to "today's standards" at $31 million, Needham said.

"Sometimes renovating sounds like it's the most cost effective and sometimes renovating is not the most cost effective," he said.

The county began conducting comparison studies on renovations versus new construction at the request of Commissioner Heidi Shafer.

Now in her second term, Shafer remembers as a new commissioner how projects were presented with the assertion that new construction was cheaper than renovating.

So she asked for numbers to prove it. The county has since come up with a mechanism that compares renovations costs to new construction.

"It's actually been a pretty good little tool when it's been used," Shafer said.

The current 124,000-square-foot building, which houses 318 employees, is not compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act, is "loaded with asbestos" and a report from 2009 shows that the facade is in disrepair and is in danger of falling off, Needham said.

The new building will be about 90,000 square feet, he said, although the exact size and configuration will depend on whether some personnel will be shifted to other Health Department locations.

And, it will be based on recommendations from the new director, Alisa Haushalter, Needham said.

The commission will vote on her appointment on Monday.

The architects' early work will involve meeting with the professionals at the Health Department to determine their needs, said Stephen Berger, managing principal with brg3s.

"We're going to be getting with everyone, finding out what their future needs will be and making sure we can implement those in the new project," Berger said.

The intent, Needham said, is to move employees around at the site while construction is underway, allowing clients to be served at the Jefferson location during construction.

The schematic stage is expected to take about a year, Needham said. No completion date has been set, but it will be sometime after 2018.
Mark Weber/The Commercial Appeal April 10, 2014  Whitney Achievement Elementary third grader Destiny Washington, 8, works out math problems with a calculator while taking a TCAP practice exam during class Thursday afternoon. Recently the Center for Reinventing Public Education released a listing that ranks Achievement School District as the No. 1 among portfolio districts for measures to improve schools.

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By Kayleigh Skinner of The Commercial Appeal

A few students at Whitney Achievement Elementary School in Frayser will fall asleep on brand new mattresses tonight thanks to a donation from Tempur-Pedic.

The company donated 86 mattresses to students in need Friday afternoon.

Students and teachers at Whitney were in the spotlight last year when a photo of a teacher walking students home went viral. The school, one of nine Frayser schools in the state-run Achievement School District, received national media attention for its "Walking Program," where teachers walk students home from school every day.

"It feels great knowing that national community partners like Tempur-Pedic are paying attention to Frayser and get excited about becoming a part of the story," said Tim Ware, executive director of the Achievement Schools.

Tempur-Pedic originally planned to provide the mattresses to Whitney's teachers as part of the company's "You're Important. Sleep Like It" campaign, but the educators requested they go to the students instead.

"These teachers are dedicated to their students and they work hard for them  during the school day and after," said Terry Brophey, vice president of marketing said in a press release. "It was no surprise that when we offered to send them Tempur-Pedic beds...they asked if we could take care of some of their students instead. We're honored to fulfill that request and provide students with a great night's sleep."
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If there was ever a time for Memphis and Shelby County's elected leaders to act in a statesmanlike manner, the OPEB bomb dropped by the Tennessee attorney general this week makes it imperative they find a way to do so.

Herbert Slatery III issued an opinion saying that Shelby County was not obligated to assume the defunct Memphis City School district's $1.1 billion other post-employment benefits (OPEB) liability obligation unless the County Commission voted to do so.

The debt "shall remain the obligation of the town, city or special school district," Slatery said in the opinion, which does not carry the force of law.

The ruling, however, did not exactly specify who is responsible the liability.

County commissioners Wednesday strongly indicated the massive obligation is not one they intend to take on, and who can blame them?

Memphis Chief Legal Officer, Bruce McMullen said the city isn't responsible for the liability of a special school district created by the state, and would fight any lawsuits to pay the money.

And, Shelby County Schools' officials, who already are battling serious funding issues, would be extremely happy to be relieved of the responsibility.

Whichever government entity gets saddled with the OPEB obligation could be thrown into a devastating financial crisis.

That is where the statesmanship comes in, something county Mayor Mark Luttrell promoted Thursday when said the best solution is for the city, county and the school system to sit down to hammer out an arrangement, without the heavy hand of the state or the courts.

That is the statesmanlike way of dealing with this, and we urge Luttrell to take to the lead in making it happen.

Luttrell is right in saying that someone is going to have to assume responsibility for the $1.1 billion obligation.

It would be better to work out some kind of agreement among the city, county and school district, rather than spending possibly millions of taxpayer dollars in legal fees on a protracted court fight that could result in a court ruling that could place one of the entities in financial jeopardy.

No one will win if the city and county mayors, or members of the SCS school board, the County Commission or the City Council take a not-my-problem stance.

We agree with Luttrell's statement that "regardless of who's at fault, we can't just leave our school system's employees twisting in the wind. We've got to work collectively to see what we can do to move the needle on this issue. I think it starts with the school system coming forth with a plan."

That would be a good start, but that should not be a unilateral step. Would it not be better if Luttrell first pulled together a task force made up of representatives of the city, county and school district to gauge everyone's mindset on the issue, and see if the task force can jointly come up with a solution?

That could save a lot of fractious discussion over a plan, if one can be worked out, later on.

Slatery's ruling is a serious matter for Memphis and the school system, or maybe even the county if a judge disagrees with the attorney general's opinion that the county is not on the hook for this $1 billion obligation.

If there ever was a time for statesmanship to prevail, it is now.
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Ernest Seger

Germantown

Your Jan. 8 editorial cartoon compared the Oregon rancher protests to the Islamic State. But these protesting ranchers are not even close to being the Islamic State.

IS beheads men on camera, enslaves women, rapes boys, forces 12-year-old girls into marriage and purges the countryside of Iraqi Christians, Shia Muslims, Kurds and other so-called infidels. Protesting the prison sentence of a couple of ranchers is not the same as proclaiming a religious state based on mass death.

They neither block traffic, nor burn nearby stores to the ground. They do not throw rocks at police. They do not want to overthrow the United States. True, there is much that can be said against this movement. But there is no merit in comparing Americans who are protesting to terrorists who would destroy America.
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By Jeffrey Lewis

North Korea sometimes seems less of a place than an idea or an absurdist fantasy.

The latest New Yorker depicts Kim Jong Un on its cover as a child playing with toy missiles. What other world leader gets this treatment? What other country is so alien, so downright weird, that it celebrates the anniversary of its independence by creating its own time zone? What other country could prompt U.S. intelligence officials to seriously speculate that a nuclear test was retaliation for disrespecting a state-run all-female pop group? What other country has a state-run all-female pop group?

The North Koreans don't think they are absurd. The country continually touts its scientific, technological and industrial developments to show that it is a modern, dynamic world power. Nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles have a starring role in this narrative.

"The spectacular success made by the DPRK in the H-bomb test this time is a great deed of history, a historic event of the national significance as it surely guarantees the eternal future of the nation," the Korean Central News Agency stated this past week, trying a bit too hard. North Korea is threatening our security, sure, but it really wants to threaten our notion of where it fits in the world  or, rather, our notion that it does not.

It wasn't that long ago that North Korea merely aspired to the nuclear club. When the Soviet Union collapsed, North Korea was left in a bad way. It seemed plausible, back then, that the North might bargain away its nascent nuclear program in exchange for an end to international isolation and assistance from the outside. Unlike, for example, the recent nuclear deal reached with Iran, the 1994 Agreed Framework between the United States and North Korea explicitly exchanged nuclear capabilities for better relations with the United States. North Korea wanted to be seen as normal and for the Kims to be treated as legitimate world leaders. And the United States was happy to pat the Kims on the head for a while, presuming that their regime would collapse sooner rather than later.

Yet here we are, 20 years later. The Kims have held on, even while much of their country has starved. After the Agreed Framework collapsed in 2003, North Korea was left to develop its nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. North Korea's leader, a grandson of founder Kim Il Sung, welcomed 2016 "with the thrilling explosion of our first hydrogen bomb."

While the explosion Wednesday was too small to be caused by what we normally think of as a thermonuclear weapon  a two-staged device with megatons of nuclear yield  the more likely possibilities are not comforting. What North Korea probably did was test a "boosted" device that uses a gas of deuterium and tritium, two hydrogen isotopes. This is an essential technology for reducing the size and weight of nuclear weapons. If North Korea is going to fit nuclear warheads on the long-range missiles it has paraded through Pyongyang, boosting is a significant step.

Would North Korea still trade away its nuclear technology for legitimacy? From time to time, it has looked like Pyongyang might be open to making concessions and cutting another deal. When North Korea kidnapped two American journalists in 2009, it was willing to release them in exchange for a meeting with former president Bill Clinton. It is bizarre to use a kidnapping to force a high-level meeting for the sake of appearing normal, but that's North Korea for you.

Not long after that, however, North Korea released a film that turns the Clinton story on its head. It is called "The Country I Saw," and the title is instructive: This is a (terrible) movie dramatizing how North Koreans want others to see them. Like any good piece of propaganda, it has long scenes dedicated to didactic dialogue in which characters explain the message in the most painfully earnest way. The movie ends with Clinton visiting North Korea  this time to pay tribute to the country's leaders, who have humiliated the United States and Japan by conducting successful tests of ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons. A country that produces that sort of storyline doesn't seem like a country ready to bargain away its nuclear weapons.

Indeed, North Korea's announcement of a hydrogen bomb seems to rule out disarmament except under conditions that might as well include gracing Kim's ample posterior with a gentle peck. The North Koreans also have denigrated the nuclear deal with Iran and ascribed the fall of Libya's Moammar Gadhafi to his disarmament agreement with the United States. It seems inconceivable now that this North Korean government would abandon the nuclear weapons programs it has developed at such a great cost.

It is understandable that we would want to deny the North Korean regime any legitimacy. It is an ugly government that does ugly things to its own people and its neighbors.

Yet we should be honest with ourselves about what our revulsion entails. We are refusing to deal with the North Koreans  whether we justify it, as President George W. Bush did, by comparing them to children who throw their food on the floor or whether we hide behind meaningless policy catchphrases, like the Obama administration's "strategic patience." We are forgoing any meaningful opportunity to slow or constrain their nuclear development. We are not making any effort to open their appalling system; in fact, we are helping close it off.

Perhaps one day we'll stop laughing and notice that a brutal, nuclear-armed North Korea that terrorizes its citizens and its neighbors isn't all that funny. They'd like that.

Jeffrey Lewis is the director of the East Asia nonproliferation program at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies. He wrote this for The Washington Post.
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By Kathleen Parker

WASHINGTON  It is axiomatic that congressional Republicans will oppose anything smacking of "gun control," which may as well be read as "Your mama."

Thus, it comes as no surprise that President Obama's announcement of executive actions to clarify and enhance federal gun laws prompted reflexive, hyperbolic responses from the right.

Marco Rubio said Obama is "obsessed with undermining the Second Amendment," while Ted Cruz averred, "We don't beat the bad guys by taking away our guns; we beat the bad guys by using our guns."

Spoken like a true, Canadian-born Texan who has been busy burnishing his "outsider" Outdoor Guy image. What's next? Cruz drinking the warm blood of a freshly slain (unarmed) beast?

House Speaker Paul Ryan criticized the president for a "dangerous level of executive overreach" and for circumventing congressional opposition  as though Congress has been working feverishly to reduce gun violence. Rather, Republicans focus their laser beams on Obama's and the Democratic Party's political motivations, shocking to none, and remind us that we already have enough gun laws.

This may well be true, but couldn't we stand to tweak them a bit? Or, perhaps, enforce them? And, isn't it possible to reduce the number of guns in the wrong hands without surrendering our Second Amendment rights or invoking the slippery slope of government confiscation?

Of course it is  and we can.

Obama made an artful and poignant counterargument to the usual objections Tuesday during a news conference from the White House. He reminded those gathered, including many who have lost family members to gun violence, that other people also have rights  the right to free assembly or the right to practice their religion without being shot.

In fairness to the gun lobby, which may not deserve such charity, one can understand reservations about limiting access to guns. What is less easily understood is the refusal of Republicans to take the reins of any given issue and do something constructive rather than invariably waiting to be forced into the ignoble position of "no."

It is one thing to be in the pocket of the National Rifle Association. It is another to do nothing and then assume a superior posture of purposeful neglect, as though do-nothingness were a policy and smug intransigence a philosophy.

The steps Obama is trying to take won't save every life, but they seem minimally intrusive and could have significant effects. Summarizing briefly, he's clarifying existing law and more tightly defining "gun dealer" in order to impose broader background checks; upgrading technology for improved information-sharing and safer guns; increasing relevant workforces to speed up background checks; and closing loopholes that have allowed criminals to buy guns online and elsewhere with a separate set of rules. Or no rules.

Giving the FBI more resources to modernize its system will help. So will giving $500 million to mental health services aimed at keeping guns away from people determined to hurt themselves or others.

Requiring shippers to report stolen guns will also be helpful  and investing in smart technology could be a game changer. As Obama said, tearing up at mention of the Sandy Hook shooting that took the lives of 20 first-graders, if we can keep children from opening aspirin bottles, surely we can prevent their pulling the trigger on a gun.

As to expanding background checks, only the criminal or the suicidal object to waiting a day or two before taking home a gun. And, if the government doesn't complete the process within three days, seller and buyer can proceed anyway.

What concerns most people, meanwhile, are those weapons, especially semiautomatics with large magazines, whose only purpose is to kill people. Many argue that no current law could have prevented any of the mass shootings in recent years, but is this sufficient justification for doing nothing when doing something could make a difference we may never know about  the child who didn't die because new technology prevented him from firing a pistol? The Islamic State-inspired terrorist who didn't murder holiday revelers because he failed an online background check?

Obama's actions won't go unchallenged, needless to say. And much political hay will be threshed, bundled and sold to Republican primary voters in the meantime. But GOP voters should be as skeptical of those ringing the gong of doom as they have been of Obama. In a civilized society, more guns can't be better than fewer.

Contact Kathleen Parker at kathleenparker@washpost.com.
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DO YOU have a Boulevard Aristide-Briand near you? Or do you send your child to school in a Jules-Ferry or a lycee Emile Combes? If so, you are already familiar with key names in the construction of the French Republic.

Between them, these three politicians were responsible for free state schooling, obligatory education for girls and the rock of state neutrality towards religion on which la Republique is built: the principle of laicite.

The term is very much in the news, with a new laicite charter being introduced into schools this autumn alongside classes in morale laique. Presenting the charter, Minister for Education Vincent Peillon explained: Everyone is free to have his own opinions but no one has the right to contest teaching content or miss a class in the name of religious precepts.

Public debate over the Muslim community in France pops up in the news regularly and is nearly always related in one way or another to perceived challenges to this element of the Constitution. Peillons remarks refer also to repeated evangelist pressure to alter class content, in particular regarding the theory of evolution. A recent example was the proposal to swap two Christian holidays with Jewish and Muslim ones: confusing whether France was secular or multi-religious.

Left and Right politicians often unite to initiate laws to protect laicite. Once the source of conflict with the Catholic Right over private education funding, the principle, an important element in the integration process, regularly generates ill feeling these days among extremist sectors of the Muslim community. That is why, a century after the original 1905 law, several new laws have been passed to protect it.

First, a few explanations. Laicite does not translate well. Secularity is close but confusing. Laicite is not easy to define either. It has evolved over two centuries and is evolving still. The concept was born of the Revolution, which guaranteed freedom of conscience to all and first separated State and Church.

Napoleon backtracked, signing a concordat with the Vatican in 1801 that was to poison Church-State relations during the 19th century and put laicite on the back burner for much of it. (For historical reasons, this concordat still applies in Alsace and Moselle.)

Having been suppressed by the Vichy regime (along with liberte, egalite, fraternite  without which laicite could not function), the principle was cast in the constitution of the Fourth Republic in 1946  the State is indivisible, laic, democratic and social  and remains firmly in that of todays Fifth.

To understand the concept is to go a long way towards understanding the French. Maybe it could be defined as their permanent search for a delicate balance between sharing what they all hold in common, the Republic, and catering for diversity.

It is the principle that protects both personal and collective liberty and, as such, is the responsibility of both State and citizen. The indivisibility of the State is the States refusal to recognise any religious or ethnic community. France is one. There are two major dates in the history of laicite: 1881 and 1905. In 1881-82, Minister of Education Jules Ferry decreed school to be publique, gratuite et laique  state-run, free and non-clerical.

Teaching in French to a national programme provided children, whatever their linguistic background or beliefs, with the theoretical possibility of equal opportunity.

It created a framework in which adults could bring no pressure to bear on pupils to adhere to any philosophy, religion or political idea. That remains the basis of the French educational system today.

The 1905 law, engineered by Emile Combes and Aristide Briand, enforced the neutrality of the State and State institutions through the separation of the Churches and the State. Since that date, the State recognises no religion and therefore cannot directly fund any either.

If the same law grants the individual total liberty and privacy regarding beliefs, there is one condition: they must not disturb public order.

Given the repeated trauma that religion has caused in Frances recent history  from the Wars of Religion to the expulsion of the Huguenots and the Dreyfus affair  this means no proselytising and nothing that could be remotely interpreted as such.

It also explains why, in France, religious belief is far more than a private matter. Things spiritual belong to the realm of intimacy. It is extremely unusual to see anyone wearing any conspicuous religious symbol in public. To do so is perceived as a deliberate act, a message to others.

It is unthinkable to ask someone what their religion is and most people will be frankly embarrassed by anyone saying what theirs is. When Nicolas Sarkozy publicly announced he had appointed Frances first Muslim prefect, he sent shockwaves throughout the land.

Knowing this helps in understanding intense French reaction to young girls wearing veils. It is seen not only as an unacceptable way of bringing religion into the public sphere, but also a form of peer pressure on other girls to do the same. Which takes us back to Jules Ferry and neutrality in the classroom.

This insistence on the privacy of beliefs was of course also reinforced after World War II by the fate of Frances Jews under the Vichy regime, and the obligation to publicly show their religion by wearing the yellow star. As a result of the trauma of State responsibility in their deportation and extermination, no statistics may be made regarding peoples religious beliefs, ethnic origin or colour.

All citizens are not only equal, but remain neutral in the eyes of the State.

The mosque debate

The 1905 law was finally well accepted by both Catholic and Protestant churches in France, who benefited financially when the State handed existing buildings and their costly maintenance over to local authorities. But the State cannot fund new religious buildings.

Hence the mosque-building debate and recent legislation allowing local authorities to contribute. For with generous donations from Saudi Arabia and Muslim foundations abroad pouring in, the inherent risk of encouraging fundamentalist movements to develop in France is obvious.

Under the Nicolas Sarkozy government, the training of imams in France to Republican principles was considered.

But the State cannot finance religious education either. The impasse has been paradoxically circumvented by the Catholic University offering courses, and Algerian imams due to work in France being trained in French and laicite at the government-funded Institut Francais in Algiers.

Conspicuous symbols and full-face veils

After a number of potentially inflammatory cases in which some schools were confronted with Muslim girls wearing Islamic headscarves, legislation was passed in 2004 banning the wearing of any conspicuous religious symbol or sign in state schools. Never specifically aimed at the Muslim community (kippas, large crosses and Sikh turbans fall under the same category), the new law, despite fears it would be perceived as discriminatory and arouse further reaction, had the almost immediate effect of calming the situation, though some veiled Muslim girls and turbaned Sikhs found their way to private schools.

But this legislated solely for public schools, not privately run establishments. In March of this year, Fatima Afif, an employee dismissed in 2008 from the privately run Baby Loup creche in the Yvelines for refusing to remove her headscarf, won on appeal for wrongful dismissal on the grounds of religious discrimination.

New legislation is now under consideration to cover pre-school structures and religious symbols in the workplace, none of which are currently covered by law.

When, in late July, a police officer in the town of Trappes stopped a fully veiled young women for an ID check in the middle of Ramadan, he did not know he was unleashing days of rioting. But Cassandra, 22, was not infringing any law on laicite. This time it was the one against dissimulating the face in the public sphere, put into effect by the Sarkozy government in 2011.

Introduced ostensibly as anti-terrorism legislation, many felt its real purpose was more anti-veil. In fact, the number of women in France wearing the niqab is extremely small, and the number of women fined likewise.

Laicite with an adjective

The latest solution of Frances politicians to calm the debate has been to add adjectives. Sarkozy invented laicite positive, in which the government took into account the existence of religious groups in France.

He created a representative Muslim council, through which to address the Muslim community in France. Representative of only a portion of Frances Muslims, many of whom are non-practising, it has created more problems than it has solved.

The Hollande government has coined laicite apaisee, a low-profile approach in which negotiation would replace legislation as the best way of winning over those who regard the principle with suspicion.

True laicistes believe the principle cannot survive any moderating tags. It must exist alone.

Universities oppose campus headscarf ban proposal

In early August, Le Monde published a report signed by members of the Haut Comite de lIntegration (HCI), a body no longer briefed to deal with laicite since the creation of a separate mission last April. It called for a Muslim headscarf ban in universities.

Government replies were swift but hardly in unison. Minister of the Interior Manuel Valls stated evasively that the subject needed to be considered, while Genevieve Fioraso, Minister for Higher Education, warned that we should avoid problems where there are none.

For Gerard Blanchard, president of La Rochelle University, and vice-president of the national CPU, Conference des Presidents dUniversite, laicite is not an issue on his campus or anywhere in France. We have 14% foreign students in La Rochelle, mostly from South East Asia, and we only ask women students to take off their veils in science laboratories, for safety reasons. That has never posed a problem.

The University Presidents Conference has issued a public statement against any specific university ban. For Blanchard, the over-mediatised debate that burst upon us mid-summer is without foundation. He is adamant that he has never had a complaint from a teacher. An environmentalist, he is far more concerned by pressure that could be brought on teachers to introduce non-scientific versions of the origins of the universe into the syllabus. No university teacher should ever have to submit to any pressure on the content of his teaching.

Jean-Loup Salzmann, president of the CPU, and president of Paris XIII, in the heart of Seine- Saint-Denis, one of the most multi-cultural universities in France, firmly believes in laicite, but sees no need for new laws on the campus. His main concern is elsewhere. He is angered by the incongruity of the State promoting laicite on the one hand, while financing the Catholic universities on the other.

Expressing a personal opinion, he said: The main issue for these young Muslim women, who have enough problems coping with family pressure, is to achieve independence and emancipation through their studies, whether they wear a veil or not. An anti-veil law would achieve the opposite of what we want. Many of these women would then not have access to university at all.

How the principle of laicite is applied today

NICOLAS Cadene, chairman of the Observatoire de la Laicite, a watchdog committee created last April by President Francois Hollande to report on how the principle of laicite is applied in France today, spoke to Connexion.

Can you define this difficult concept for our readers?

Laicite is a principle which allows us all to live together. It is not a ban on religion or religious practices. On the contrary, it guarantees believers and non-believers alike the freedom to express themselves, to practise or not to practise a religion as they choose, on condition that public order is not disturbed. The State adopts an attitude of total impartiality towards citizens, who are all equal in the eyes of the State.

Do the current religious bank holidays not favour one religious group?

Christian festivals have, for the majority, become traditional holidays with little religious significance. Still, the State does not want to be seen as favouring one religion over another. In 1905, there was no Muslim population. But I dont think this poses a real problem. Employees can use their RTT (recuperation of unpaid overtime in the form of days off) as they wish. The Stasi Commission (set up by President Jacques Chirac in 2003) went a long way towards identifying issues in the workplace. We shall build on that.

The conspicuous religious symbols ban was seen as directed only at women. Is that not a form of discrimination?

If people set out to present themselves in a way which is obviously a proselytising or a provocative attitude, that is not acceptable. It is not so much what people wear or their physical appearance, as the reason behind the choice. This is one of the subjects we shall be working on.

Islam has no clerical hierarchy. Isnt the laicite legislation trying to apply to individuals a law aimed at an institution? Doesnt the 1905 law need to be adapted?

Not at all. The principle enables us all to live together. But, of course, we must avoid situations in which one group feels stigmatised by the law. That is one of our major subjects of reflexion. But there is no question of adapting the principle to new circumstances. It is one of bringing people to understand that laicite is not a ban on religious practice but a system of personal freedom and helping them to adapt to the principle.

There has been talk in the press over banning the Islamic headscarf at university. [The full-face veil is already banned anywhere in public].

The State has a duty to protect minors from any form of ideological persuasion, hence the headscarf ban in schools. University is a world of adults. But the Republic has a duty to protect its citizens against the dangers of extremism. Some people attribute to laicite powers it simply does not have. There is an urgent need for strong political action, at state and local level, in order to resolve the many problems the threat of extremism has brought to certain sectors of society.

The Observatoire has published its first report, a history and background to the concept. What else has it achieved?

We helped draw up two important documents: the laicite charter and the syllabus for non-religious morality for schools. Both take effect this year. In addition, our report has pinpointed situations needing close attention in public administrations and local authorities (non-Metropolitan France included), as well as in the private sector.

How do you see your work developing?

We need a better definition of laicite that reiterates the States position of neutrality and is more clearly understood by all, in France and at an international level. We are drawing up guidelines for the application of laicite and religious practice in the workplace, and in the wake of the Baby Loup issue [see main article], for pre-school structures. We must show people how to react to situations. Overreaction is one of the major problems we face, when so much could be achieved by negotiation and taking things calmly.
AT least 7,000 people demonstrated in Nantes on Saturday as part of a long-running campaign to stop an airport being built on a piece of wetland rich in wildlife.

Naturalists say they have discovered five new species living in the bocage nantais around Notre-Dame-des-Landes, including a rare type of newt, shrew and three types of plant not previously seen there.

They have written to the environment ministry saying the latest discovery is another reason why the airport works should be halted.

The airport project has been hit by repeated delays for 40 years because of a strong local campaign to preserve the natural environment. About a dozen rare species are known to live in the area, including bats and kingfishers.

Police said 7,200 people took part in this weekend's protest, some in tractors, which blocked the peripherique ring-road in Nantes. Organisers put the turnout figure at closer to 20,000.

The march comes ahead of a court ruling on Wednesday concerning 11 families and four farmers who are refusing to be expelled from their properties to make way for the building work.
FORECASTERS are warning of fierce winds across a large part of France on Sunday evening, potentially gusting up to 140kph in the Pyrenees.

Meteo France says the windy weather will cross France from west to east, hitting the Atlantic coast from Brittany down to the Pyrenees first, then crossing France to the Ardennes down to the Swiss border.

Gusts of up to 120kph are forecast for the Vendee, 140kph for the Pyrenees, 120kph in the Alps and 110kph in the north-east of France.

On Saturday, Meteo France had already placed most of northern and western France on a yellow alert because of the risk of flooding, storms and strong winds. The forecaster says people should be careful practising outdoor activities or near water.
This mornings Daily Mail reports that the British Medical Association has been accused by the NHS of instigating illegal action in pursuit of the upcoming strike by junior doctors.

A since-deleted blog post on the BMA website, which was shared via its Twitter account, appeared to encourage supporters to break rules on sympathy strikes and picket numbers.

The article is described by the paper as having been written in the language of hard-left campaign groups, and has apparently been disseminated by Momentum, Jeremy Corbyns grassroots campaign group.

Dr Yannis Gourtsoyannis, a senior member of the BMAs junior doctors committee, called on members of the public and unrelated unions to swell picket lines.

He is quoted as saying: A victory for the Junior Doctors would signify the first real crack in the entire edifice of austerity in the UK. Please stand with us. And when you need us, ask us. We will stand by you.

This combative language suggests that elements behind the upcoming strike have more extensive ambitions than resolving the contract dispute at the heart of it  and that could be bad news for the strikers.

One of the criticisms levelled at the Governments latest trade union reforms is that they are taking aim at a paper tiger: the likes of Len McCluskey might talk a big game, but the unions are simply not the potent political threat they were in the 1970s.

The language employed by Gourtsoyannis, and the tactics he advocates, risk doing serious harm to the cause he purports to be serving.

First, intimidatory mass pickets and news reports of illegal action will squander the stock of sympathy that any NHS staff enjoy with the general public, whilst lending credence to the Governments own combative stance in the minds of swing voters.

Andrea Jenkyns, one of the Tories on the Health Select Committee, has already claimed that the upper echelons of the BMA are more committed to bringing down the Tories than getting the best deal for their members and ensuring patient safety is not compromised.

That is also a more acute risk: that in their determination to up the stakes, the hard left will make it much harder for the Government to compromise.

Once you establish in the public discourse that a strike is a test of the Governments virility, a resolution will take longer to reach and the terms will be tougher.

Prolonged industrial action by doctors hurts one group above all others: patients.

Many of the doctors involved in the strike  indeed, almost certainly the overwhelming majority  are acting in good faith. They must recognise that allowing their action to be hijacked by the hard left is contrary both to their interests and those of the people in their care.
Close

Now the digestive system of Otzi, a well-preserved body of a 5,300-year-old European Iceman, seems to be interesting.

His body was discovered in 1991 in the Alps, which might tell us more about the pattern of migration of prehistoric man.

The European Academy of Bozen's Frank Maixner, one of the authors, said that Otzi gives a lot of data about the prehistoric Europeans.

"We have many skeletons from that period, but we can see his organs, his clothes... He provides a huge package of information," Maixner said, according to New Scientist.

His digestive tract was pretty exciting, as "His stomach was completely filled - he ate quite a lot before he was murdered," Maixner added.

They found the bacterium Helicobacter pylori, a common human virus. It represents a pure Asian origin.

"The extant European population of H. pylori is known to be a hybrid between Asian and African bacteria, but there exist different hypotheses about when and where the hybridization took place, reflecting the complex demographic history of Europeans," the team wrote.

"Here, we present a 5300-year-old H. pylori genome from a European Copper Age glacier mummy. The 'Iceman' H. pylori is a nearly pure representative of the bacterial population of Asian origin that existed in Europe before hybridization, suggesting that the African population arrived in Europe within the past few thousand years," the team added.

This bacterium is still existent in Europe, even though it is a hybrid of strains from Eurasia and Africa, reports The Telegraph.

Three years ago, scientists had another interesting discovery about Otzi the Iceman. He had been hit with an arrow and was clubbed to death.

The study was published in the Jan. 8,2016 issue of the journal Science.

See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare
Close

A UK-based study led by research experts from the University of Southampton discovered new evidence linking brain inflammation to Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia.

According to Medical News Today, the study which is due to appear in the medical journal Brain suggests blocking a protein responsible for inflammation of the brain as a feasible way of treating the neurodegenerative disease that has already affected 47.5 million people across the globe with as many as 7.7 million new cases reported each year.

The study involved a careful examination of brains of dead human patients and lab mice. The scientists explained that brain inflammation is largely due to a build-up of immune cells known as microglia.

"These findings are as close to evidence as we can get to show that this particular pathway is active in the development of Alzheimer's. The next step is to work closely with our partners in industry to find a safe and suitable drug that can be tested to see if it works in humans," exclaimed lead author Diego Gomez-Nicola as quoted saying by Independent.

In their lab experiments, the researchers applied a drug on mice to block a receptor protein linked to microglia build-up in the mice's brains. After the mice were given medicine, they exhibited fewer memory loss and other behavioral problems associated with Alzheimer's and other types of dementia.

The new findings are bound to stir the interests of many neuroscience experts around the world.

"While this basic science research provides strong evidence, the challenge will now be to develop medicines for people with dementia, so we await the development of clinical treatments with interest. Too often, this has been the stumbling block in turning observations in the laboratory into a workable therapy," commented Dr. Mark Dallas of the University of Reading as mentioned by BBC News.

Dementia is neurodegenerative disease that severely impairs memory, cognitive skills, and normal behavior. Alzheimer's disease accounts for 60% to 70% of all cases of dementia.

See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare
Close

The World Health Organization (WHO) has approved a third supplier to manufacture a vaccine for cholera with the intention of doubling the global stockpile.

The WHO announced on Friday that South Korean firm, EUBiologics, is expected to produce about three million doses of the oral vaccine that combats against the bacterial infection. Cholera, which typically spreads through water, causes severe diarrhea and dehydration, and can lead to death within hours.

Stephen Martin, who is from the WHO's epidemic diseases unit, stated that with the additional number of vaccines being produced, the total amount that would become available for countries that are in dire need of it could reach six million. It takes two doses of the vaccine to provide full protection against the bacteria.

Martin added that introducing a third supplier will definitely help out with the demand since last year's "demand was greater than [the] supply." Haiti and Sudan had asked for a greater supply of the vaccine but were turned down because of a shortage.

"Sudan and Haiti last year made requests to WHO for supplies of vaccines to conduct pre-emptive vaccination campaigns that could not be filled because of the global shortage," WHO said in a statement reported by NBC News.

Last year, the bulk of the vaccines from the WHO's stockpile went to Iraq. The country had a massive immunization campaign after reporting more than 2,800 cases. The campaign ended at the end of the year and the WHO has declared the outbreak over.

The addition of the third supplier is expected to reduce the cost per dose from $1.80 to $1.45.

The other two suppliers are Indian company Shantha Biotechnics of Sanofi Pasteur and Swedish company, Crucell. Last year, Shantha Biotechnics was the sole producer of the oral vaccine for the stockpile, providing the WHO with three million doses, which protected 1.5 million people from the disease. Crucell manufactures the vaccine but does not provide any to the WHO's stockpile.

The stockpile, which was started in 2013, has led to the use and distribution of more vaccines within the past few years than in the 15 years prior to the beginning of the program. The Vaccine Alliance GAVI had donated $115 to help fund the program.

Every year, there are about 1.4 to 4.3 million cases of cholera with about 142,000 deaths.

This year, many of the doses from the stockpile will be going to Haiti, where a vaccination campaign will start this month. A total of 240,000 people are expected to get the vaccine.

See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare
Killings Of Palestinians In West Bank Hit Ten Year High

By Ali Abunimah

09 January, 2016

Electronicintifada.net

Palestinians carry the body of Ahmad Kawazba during his funeral in the West Bank village of Sair near Hebron on 6 January. The teenager was shot dead the day before by Israeli forces who say he attempted to stab a soldier. (Wisam Hashlamoun/ APA images)

The first days of 2016 offered no let up in the surge of violence that began in early October, provoked by Israels assaults and incursions in occupied East Jerusalems al-Aqsa mosque compound.

Since the start of January, at least five Palestinians and three Israeli citizens have been slain.

The latest deaths came after the number of Palestinians killed in violence in Israel and the occupied West Bank hit a 10-year high in 2015.

By the end of the year, at least 136 Palestinians had been killed and nearly 14,000 injured in the West Bank, according to the UN monitoring group OCHA, the highest figures since 2005.

Twenty-four Palestinians were killed in Gaza, the vast majority by Israeli forces firing at demonstrators across the boundary fence, and around 1,500 were injured.

Israeli casualties from violence by Palestinians in 2015 were the highest recorded since 2008, with 24 deaths and 350 injuries, according to OCHA.

Four youths killed

On Thursday evening, Israeli forces shot dead four Palestinians from the village of Sair, near Hebron in the occupied West Bank.

Three cousins, Ahmad Salim Abd al-Majid Kawazba, 21, Alaa Abed Muhammad Kawazba, 17, and Muhannad Ziyad Kawazba, 20, were fatally shot near the Gush Etzion bloc of Israeli settlements north of Hebron.

An Israeli army spokesperson alleged that all three were armed with knives and attempted to attack Israeli soldiers guarding the Gush Etzion junction, Maan News Agency reported.

The Palestinian news site Quds quoted local sources who said the three young men all worked as laborers inside present-day Israel.

A short time later, 16-year-old Khalil Muhammad al-Shalalda was shot dead by Israeli forces after he allegedly attempted to stab a soldier at the Beit Einoun junction near Hebron, according to Maan News Agency.

No Israelis were reported injured.

Khalil al-Shaladas brother, Mahmoud, was fatally shot by Israeli occupation forces during confrontations near Beit Einoun junction on 13 November.

As news of the killings spread, residents of Sair gathered at the family homes of the dead youths and confrontations broke out with Israeli occupation forces.

Sair villagers have witnessed intense violence by Israeli forces in recent months. At least 10 villagers have been killed since the start of October, including the November execution in a Hebron hospital room of Abdallah Azzam al-Shalalda and the killing of a disabled father of a young baby in December.

On New Years Eve, Israeli occupation forces seized a plot of land belonging to Sair villager Ismail Abed Rabbu al-Shalalda in order to set up a military post, a provocation likely only to further inflame tension.

On Wednesday this week, thousands of people in Sair attended the funeral of Ahmad Younis Ahmad Kawazba.

In his memory, Kawazbas high school posted this YouTube video of him reciting the Quran over the schools loudspeaker system:





Kawazba was buried next to his friend and schoolmate Mahmoud al-Shalalda.

A day earlier, the 18-year-old Kawazba was shot by Israeli soldiers at the Gush Etzion junction, where Israel claims he tried to stab a soldier.

The Israeli soldiers detained the wounded person and closed the main road, according to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights.

An Israeli ambulance took Kawazba to an unknown destination, PCHR added, and hours later his body was handed over to the Palestinian Authority.

Hebrons District Attorney Alaa Tamimi told the Maan News Agency that an autopsy indicated the youth had received no medical treatment and had been allowed to bleed to death.

More than half the Palestinians killed since October were shot dead by police and soldiers during what Israel says were attacks or attempted stabbing and car ramming attacks on its forces and civilians.

But investigations have found that Israeli forces are using lethal force when alleged Palestinian attackers do not pose an immediate threat, as part of what human rights groups have previously condemned as a shoot to kill policy used as a matter of first resort.

In some cases, Palestinians were slain when there was no attack attempt, despite police and army claims.

Israeli forces have routinely deprived injured Palestinians of urgent medical care, allowing them to bleed to death.

Pub shootings

On New Years Day, a gunman opened fire at patrons of the Simta pub in central Tel Aviv, killing its 26-year-old manager Alon Bakal and a customer, Shimon Ruimi, 30, a civilian employee of the Israeli army.

At least six other people were wounded.

Security camera footage showed the gunman in a grocery store next to the pub. Moments later he pulled an automatic weapon from a backpack and began firing at the patrons.

The suspect was identified by his father as Nashat Milhem. Muhammad Milhem had seen the security camera footage in the media and called police.

Nashat Milhem, a Palestinian citizen of Israel from the town of Arara in the north, had served a prison sentence for attacking an Israeli soldier and attempting to grab his weapon in 2007.

After attacking the pub, Milhem allegedly commandeered a taxi driven by Amin Shaban, a 42-year-old Palestinian citizen of Israel from the town of Lydd.

Police said that the taxi headed north from central Tel Aviv and, as it approached a police roadblock, Milhem shot Shaban and dumped his body.

Milhem then stole the car, but abandoned it after a short distance and escaped on foot.

An Israeli police spokesperson said that Shaban was gravely injured when he was found and died in hospital.

In Lydd, Yousif Shaaban, a relative of the victim, told local media that a video camera was installed in his cousin Amins taxi and that the family have asked police to let them see what occurred in the car.

The day after the shootings, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave a televised speech outside the pub. Haaretz described it as a harsh, shameful, near-racist diatribe against Israels Arabs, the term the Tel Aviv newspaper uses to describe the 1.5 million Palestinian citizens of Israel.

On Tuesday, Israeli police arrested Muhammad Milhem, the suspects father.

Authorities accuse him of helping his son evade capture, despite the fact that it was Muhammad Milhem who alerted police that he suspected his son of being the shooter.

Police say that Nashat Milhem used a licensed firearm stolen from his father, who owned it for his work as a guard with a private security firm.

A court in Haifa extended Muhammad Milhems detention on Thursday for an additional three days.

Police have so far detained eight members of the Milhem family, most of whom have been released, despite the fact that relatives, including Muhammad Milhem, have repeatedly denounced Nashats alleged crimes and urged him to surrender.

We implore you, its tearing our family apart. Mother and father and everyone are traumatized by what were going through. Think of your parents and your siblings and turn yourself in, Nashats brother Jawdat pleaded.

This is police helplessness, a lawyer for the Milhem family told Israeli media in reference to the arrests. In the end they will arrest the whole family. The Shin Bet [secret service] is under pressure. No one in the family has any connection to what the son did.

Nashat Milhem is still at large and Israel believes he has fled to the occupied West Bank, where the Palestinian Authority has reportedly agreed to assist Israel in tracking him down.

(Update, Friday, 8 January: Israeli media report that Milhem was tracked down and killed by police near his hometown of Arara.)

Delayed funerals

Across the occupied West Bank, Palestinian families continued to bury loved ones whose bodies had been withheld by Israel.

Thousands attended the funeral of 19-year-old Muhammad Saed Ali in occupied East Jerusalem on Tuesday after Israel returned his body which it had held for 88 days.

I hugged my son after he was held three months in the Israeli morgue. I hugged him, talked to him, warmed him and forgave him, Alis mother told the Maan News Agency.

Ali, who lived in Shuafat refugee camp, was shot dead after injuring two Israeli soldiers in a stabbing in occupied East Jerusalem on 10 October.

Families in Hebron held a joint funeral for 14 Palestinians on 2 January. Their bodies were among 23 transferred by Israel to the Palestinian Authority the previous day.

The bodies of at least 80 Palestinians slain during alleged attacks, including several children, have been withheld from their families.

Israel began transferring many of them at the end of December, imposing restrictions on their burial.

Israels treatment of the bodies effectively makes it impossible for Palestinians to properly examine them and determine the circumstances of their deaths.

Security coordination

While the deaths of Palestinians sometimes make headlines around the world, the full scale of the routine violence perpetrated by the Israeli occupation rarely does.

In the first week of 2016, Israeli forces carried out nearly 80 raids into Palestinian communities in the West Bank. They arrested dozens of Palestinians, including nine children, and demolished several homes in Jerusalem, according to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights.

On 6 January, Israeli forces raided the Red Cross offices in occupied East Jerusalem and detained Samer Abu Eisheh and Hijazi Abu Sbeih. The two Jerusalemites, recently profiled by The Electronic Intifada, had been staging a sit-in to defy and protest Israeli orders banishing them from their city.

It was, all in all, a typical week.

Meanwhile, Israel praised the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas for exceptionally good cooperation with Israeli occupation forces.

The Israeli government is reportedly considering rewarding the PA with various concessions in order to help it impose more order on the Palestinian street.

In recent days, Abbas has repeated his occasional threat to end the PAs so-called security coordination with the Israeli army and Shin Bet secret police.

Abbas said that the executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization would take a decision at a meeting next week.

Security coordination has been almost universally condemned by Palestinian political factions and civil society, where it is widely viewed as collaboration. But few expect Abbas will ever voluntarily end the practice.

Abbas, for his part, has previously described the PAs assistance to Israel to suppress protests and resistance against the occupation as a sacred duty.

Ali Abunimah Co-founder of The Electronic Intifada and author of The Battle for Justice in Palestine, now out from Haymarket Books. Also wrote One Country: A Bold-Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse.


None Of The Above

By Rosemarie Jackowski

09 January, 2016

Countercurrents.org

"Are all democrats and republicans unethical? Absolutely not, but their membership in a corrupt organization does put them in a bad light."

How many times have you heard someone say that there is no one to vote for? Only someone who has been living in the democratic/republican bubble would ever make that statement. There is no shortage of candidates. There is a shortage of informed voters. There is a shortage of voters with enough information to look outside the D/R bubble.

In many states there is a write-in option; that means that there are an infinite number of potential candidates. In states where there is no write-in option, the democratic electoral process is compromised.

The problem is not too few; the problem is that there are too many citizens who would be great candidates. So many candidates, that selecting and electing any one of them is a difficult process. Here are just a few names for your consideration: NADER, Jill Stein, Cindy Sheehan, Edward Snowden, Cornel West, Angela Davis, Barbara Ehrenreich, Jeremy Hammond, Jeffery Sterling, William Blum, Jeremy Scahill, Mickey Z, Amy Goodman... Apologies to the hundreds of others not listed here.

The flawed democratic/republican system is designed to produce flawed candidates. Why is this? A really qualified candidate would push against the party machine. Ethics, honesty, and transparency would come first - the party would come second. The party system depends on cronyism for survival.

Are all democrats and republicans unethical? Absolutely not, but their membership in a corrupt organization does put them in a bad light. Having an "R" or "D" behind candidates names can overshadow their virtue because of party affiliation. Voters know that a vote for a candidate is also a vote for the party - and the party has power to corrupt. Just consider how the presidential debates are done now, compared to the time when the League of Women voters was in charge. Think of how 'the fix is in' with the Super Delegates for Clinton. Think about party influence in the Congress.

How do we change this? There are many hurdles. Ballot access rules are a major problem. The rules are different in every state. A law suit has been filed. We need to support 'Level the Playing Field' - but that is just the beginning. It does not go far enough. It does not address all of the issues.

Level the Playing Field v. FEC (LPF II) On August 27, 2015, Level the Playing Field (LPF), Dr. Peter Ackerman, the Green Party of the United States and the Libertarian National Committee (collectively plaintiffs) filed a new, second lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia challenging FEC regulations and actions as they relate to sponsorship and conduct of federal candidate debates. Level the Playing Field v. FEC, No. 1:15-cv-1397-TSC (D.D.C. filed Aug. 27, 2015) (LPF II).

http://www.fec.gov/pages/fecrecord/2015/october/ltpfvfecII.shtml

The biggest problem in defeating the democrats and republicans is that they are organized. We are atomized. This is a serious problem. The psyche of democrat/republicans is different from Independents and third party members. Members of the D/R party are usually group-thinkers. Independents, Socialists, Greens, etc. tend to be free-thinkers. How can we convince each other to back only one candidate? That is the only way our voices will be heard.

Our work would not be like herding cats. That would be easy by comparison. What we have to do is like channeling butterflies to fly in single file against a 100 mph headwind, with crosswinds. It is an almost impossible feat to develop a fair, open, transparent electoral system - but we have something going for us that just might make success possible. Timing - timing is everything. The time in history is right - right now for a dramatic change. The level of discontent is at an all time high. If change is ever going to happen, it has to be now. This is a 'now-or-never' challenge. The planet and our children cannot wait. The stakes are too high.



One of the greatest challenges facing voters in this election is 'distracted voting'. How can we keep the focus on important issues: war, torture, justice, health care, xenophobia, ballot access, the Black Budget, the environment, the risk to the electric grid... Somehow these issues are often overlooked with all the glitz and personality issues of the candidates.

We will have to do many things simultaneously. We cannot wait.

First, we must select just one or two candidates. Jill Stein is one of those with the most name recognition, so she might be a good choice. Barbara Ehrenreich has an admirable body of work, and also name recognition. Mickey Z is a well-respected activist and author of twelve books.

Second, we need someone with skill in crowdsourcing to come forward and put the information out. Every voter has to know that there is now a real choice.

Third, we need everyone else to help spread the word.

Do we need campaign slogans? Maybe, maybe not. How about this: "Captives of the GOP no more". How about this: "Free from the DNC, at last". Someone else will surely come up with something better.

Do we need a party name? Do we need some way of identification - a way of defining ourselves? How about: "The Butterfly Party"? Butterflies are free. Someone else can surely come up with a better name.

Or, on the other hand, maybe we don't want an organized political party. That would make us just like the D/Rs. Maybe we should just organize around issues and candidates. Forget about having any party organization. Parties are subject to corruption and cronyism. Maybe we should be free of any kind of organization that depends on leadership and has a system of hierarchy. No committees. No commissions. No meetings. Just action around issues and candidates.

"No matter that patriotism is too often the refuge of scoundrels. Dissent, rebellion, and all-around hell-raising remain the true duty of patriots." Barbara Ehrenreich

The time is right. Now all we need is a little luck, and the rebellion can begin.

Rosemarie Jackowski is a Peace Activist, Advocacy Journalist, and author of "Banned in Vermont". She has been the Socialist Candidate for VT Attorney General. dissent@sover.net




Brahmanical Arrogance

By Anand Teltumbde

09 January, 2016

Countercurrents.org

On 27 November DailyO.in, a web edition of the India Today, published an article by one S.N. Balgangadhara, who is a professor in Ghent University in Belgium titled as Which intolerance is growing in India?. It was a response to the indignation spreading against him for his abusive references to Dr Ambedkar while speaking in an international conference at the English and Foreign Languages University (EFLU), Hyderabad. Instead of being apologetic, he justified his contempt for Ambedkar and repeated his ridicule saying that he outshines the genius of Alia Bhatt. Pedestrian insults and invectives as such are not new for Ambedkar but never before anyone in any public intellectual forum had used such a foul language for him. While the right wing ruling establishment is mouthing limitless love and displaying inexhaustible devotion to Ambedkar, it is interesting to hear someone known to be engaged with theorizing greatness of Hindu culture and tradition showering abuses on Ambedkar with impunity.

Balgangadhara may never admit association with the Sangh Pariwar as many of his ilk do but he has repeatedly admitted being a Brahman, and that too with worthless pride. Before that Arun Shouri-- let it be said in his favour that he was not as idiotic as Gangadhara -- in his Worshipping False God had marshaled his pedestrian facts with an aura of discovery to argue that Ambedkar was not a maker of the constitution of India. He and many of his detractors among Dalits did not realize that their belabouring the point was completely off the mark as Ambedkar himself had disowned the constitution and exposed the Brahmanic conspiracy to use him as a hack. He had also said that he did not have any association with the Sangh Pariwar but the fact remained that he was a chosen one to head the most happening ministry to be, the ministry of disinvestment, in the first ever BJPs cabinet under Atal Behari Bajpeyi. Balgangadhara too would claim no connection with the Sangh Pariwar but the language he speaks in and arguments he proffers inadvertently reveal the truth that he belonged to the same tribe that masked its Hindutva with a secular veneer. In the euphoric excesses the BJP establishment has been committing in eulogy to Ambedkar, this episode uncovered the deep rooted hatred for Ambedkar in the Brahmanic camp.

Balgangadhars Antics

The three days international conference in which Balgangadhara spoke was on the force of law and the law of force on Derridas theology and hence obviously Ambedkar or Ambedkrites did not constitute the subject matter except perhaps in illustration of Derridas negative theology. Other speakers for instance did not bring them in. But he went berserk calling Ambedkar an idiot and wondered how Columbia University awarded doctorates to him. Incidentally, he needs to be reminded of another, equally hallowed institution, London School of Economics also awarding him a Doctor of Science, incidentally the first one to be given to any Indian. He also called a person (he did not name him but people guessed it was Narendra Jadhav who brought out three volume of Ambedkars essential writings) an idiot. Well, it may be so as a plethora of unethical reproductions of Ambedkars books in the guise of editing are truly not defensible intellectual works. Then he made derogatory remarks on Islam and Christianity. His speech was fraught with abusive slangs bereft of scholarship becoming of the theme and standing of the conference. For instance, he kept on using bullshit for all that is generally held sacred by the people, perhaps to illustrate the apophaticism in Derrida. He did not spare even the host in EFLU calling it a madhouse obviously directing his ire against its faculty and students having relatively better representation of the non-Brahmans. The next day, when some senior professors engaged with his references to caste and untouchability, he directly mounted vitriolic attack on them and remarked that the students should think about their future when they were taught by incompetent, idiotic assess with caste certificates, obviously referring to Dalits, Adivasis and OBCs. Likewise, he spilled his scorn while responding to a question by a Muslim faculty saying that he was spreading terror.

Both students and faculty in his audience were aghast at such brazenly casteist and communalist statements. He unashamedly kept repeating that he was a Brahman. It was particularly audacious to speak at a place like Hyderabad known for its campuses that have history of Dalit resistance. The entire lecture was replete with not only demoralizing remarks against the reserved category of students and faculty but punishable in law under IPC sections 295 (A), 154 (A), and 298, and various sections of the Atrocity Act. There was no question, however, of EFLU authorities, which did nothing to stop him committing these crimes, resorting to legal action against him. The reaction of others also came quite late, more than a week after the event, by way of a petition made by the EFLU faculty to the Vice Chancellor on 11 November although the Deccan Chronicle had carried small news on 6 November itself that Osmania students contemplated to lodge a police complaint against him. In response to this building of anger, Balgangadhara wrote his above said response complaining against the Ambedkarites for their expression of indignation for his unruly statements. Terming that as intolerance, he did not realize that if Dalits had been intolerant, he would have been physically attacked right there.

Terrorism, not Intolerance

Firstly, calling murders of Dr Narendra Dabholkar, Com. Govind Pansare and Dr Kalburgi or violence and fatal assaults on ordinary citizens (as in Dadri, UP; Udhampur, Jammu and Kashmir), etc., as intolerance is erroneous and gross understatement. The right word for it is terrorism. Because this social violence by organized gangs backed by the complicit state is not just a behavioural characteristic of certain individuals or groups as non-toleration of the opinions different from ones own but the terrorist acts against those who dare to oppose them. Balgangadhara amply gave a glimpse of his hyper wisdom justifying lynching of Dadri murder using fabricated facts that Mohammad Akhlaq was lynched and his son Danish was brutally beaten for having stolen a cow from the stables of another person. They deserved it as people were lynched in ancient Europe and America for stealing cattle. He made similar foolish remarks about Kalburgi that he was himself an intolerant man and also went on suspecting his moral and intellectual integrity that put the legendary Chhota Rajan to shame. He insinuates that his murder might have had to do with his allegedly loose morals. The quality of simile and his overall arguments in these snippets of wisdom would rather firmly establish him as an idiot. Instead, the hundreds of intellectuals, artists, litterateurs who returned their awards to the government in symbolic protest against its complicity in these acts were rather idiots, ignoramuses exhibiting an abysmal ignorance of human history. More than 135 scientists who had drawn a picture of apocalypse, saying peace and harmony in the country are being threatened by a rash of sectarian and bigoted acts that have recently escalated were also idiots to say so! It is only the Brahman in Balagagadhara who was an epitome of wisdom!

What is his claim to wisdom beyond raising such idiotic questions as Is there a caste system in India? and indulging in quibbling of words like Worlds without Views and Views without the World (an extended title of his Ph D thesis), which the Brahmans are traditionally good at. As for the caste question, his answer is in negative accusing the British missionaries who brought with them the Christian theology, especially the Protestant theology, mired by its corrupt clergies and other evils of Catholic religion, having interpreted Indian society as caste society. So the castes against which the entire shraman tradition revolted and which the majority of Hindu Dharmshastras vehemently protected were a chimera, a figment of imagination of the Christian clergies which were inexplicably taken as real by all of us! He dished out such nonsense through the Centre for the Study of Local Cultures (CSLC) at Kuvempu University, at Shimoga, of which he was a director. The hidden Brahmanic schema of his research was exploded by many. A casual glance at the various write-ups by and about him reveals that he belongs to the long live Sanatana Dharma brigade. He is shrewd enough to weave a cobweb of words to fool the West to sit up and take notice of him as profound scholar. But make no mistake; he basically belongs to the pseudo scholars brigade of the Pariwar to intellectualize its decadent project.

Return to Ambedkar

It is no surprise then that Ambedkar who challenged Brahmanism will be an anathema to such a person. Ambedkar did not indulge in sterile quibbling of words passed as scholarship; he dealt with substantive issues of humanity through the integration of theory and practice towards the goal of establishing a society based on liberty, equality, fraternity, unlike arm-chaired pontifications of Balgangadharas of this world. Ambedkar may be wrong, grossly wrong, as any human. But calling him an idiot is just exhibiting ones own idiocy. To comment on Ambedkar demands high degree of intellectual honesty and integrity, which apparently Balgangadhara does not possess. He is contemptuous of asses with caste certificates but does not have an elementary intellect to understand that this hackneyed argument of merit has repeatedly boomeranged at those who made it. While it is not the justification of reservations, which I always considered having been detrimental to Dalits in net terms, but this merit argument could be simply busted by the history of slavery the so called (upper caste) meritorious people gave this subcontinent so rich in natural endowment. They should be ashamed of their past but instead they seek to recreate it through their hindutva project.

It is not the matter of dealing with some abusive Balagangadhara, who can be easily dealt with by any ordinary Dalit. It is a matter of knowing what the entire hindutva camp really stands for. On the one hand it seeks to create a cult of Ambedkar by memorializing everything that he set his foot on but on the other it condemns him as intellectual nobody. It is this hindutva core Balagangadhara inadvertently exposed, which is of value to the people in general and Dalits in particular. This hydra-headed camp would unleash Balagangadharas to test out waters with provocative statements and distance itself from its consequence. It wanted to puncture the entire Ambedkarite project by making out castes in India as mithya and colonial conspiracy. It is no scholarship; it is the Goebbelss infamous stratagem to keep repeating a big enough lie until it is taken as plausible and eventually accepted by people as truth.

(I would express my thanks to Karthik Navayana, a research Scholar at EFLU for providing me necessary material)

Anand Teltumbde is a writer and civil rights activist with CPDR, Mumbai.




Printer Friendly Version Video Evidence Of Environmental Disaster Underway In Vizhinjam By Joseph Vijayan 09 January, 2016

Countercurrents.org Here are two videos that show the enviromental destruction caused by dredging for the Vizhinjam Transit Harbour Project! One shot on January 2, 2016 after the dredging started and the other shot in February, 2015. These two contrasting videos show how a unique marine ecosystem is being destroyed in the name of development. First video shows an ecosystem in destruction. The second video shot before the dredging started shows a heavenly ecosystem underwater. It is a unique ecosystem rich with corals, sponges and other forms of marine life. Do not think that all our sea bottoms are like this. There are only very few such areas. The area is close to only Wedge Bank in India, and one of only 20 in the entire world. This is like our Silent Valley forest in the land. Unfortunately, it is being destroyed forever Video Shot in 02 January 2016- After the dredging began This underwater video was taken on 2 January 2016 by a team of divers under the leadership of Robert Panipillai of the group "Friends of Marine Life" based in Trivandrum. The location is just 200 to 500 mts off the Vizhinjam coast in Trivandrum, Kerala where dredging is being done Adanis as part of constructing a port. Among fishers this sea bottom area is known as "Perumakkallu" rich with various life forms and fish habitats.. Look at the pipefish (seahorse) pathetically feeling its destroyed habitat.. I have the video of the same area taken in February 2015 so rich with sponges, corals and other forms of life.. Now this area is getting submerged with dredging materials and sediments... Should we support this port construction that kills such marine ecosystems? Posted by Josph Vijayan on Friday, January 8, 2016 Video shot in February 2015 , before dredging Earlier I posted the underwater video off Vizhinjam coast after the dredging was started by Adanis. Now here is the video clip of the same area known as "Perumakkallu" shot in February 2015. This video was also taken by Robert Panipillai's group of divers. You can see the richness of the marine ecosystem in this area with corals, sponges and other forms of marine life. Please do not think that all our sea bottoms are like this. There are only very few such areas. This is like our Silent Valley forest in the land. Unfortunately we cannot see this in open. Thanks to Robert and team we are lucky to have a glimpse of it. But this is getting destroyed. You should see this video in the context of the Supreme Court Order dated 16th December 2015 on the Vizhinjam case. It reads like this, "Learned Counsel representing the Port Trust and the State of Kerala undertake, that if the action of construction is interfered with by this Court in this case, the Port Trust as well as the State of Kerala will restore the environmental status to its original position." The case is still on and the petitions filed by me and few others to stay dredging and other construction activities at Vizhinjam is still pending before the Supreme court. Meanwhile one justice on 6 Jan 2016 has recused himself from hearing the matter. It is going to come up before another bench on 13 Jan 2016. Will the supreme court be kind enough to stay this destructive activity by fully funded by Govt of Kerala? Can this environment be restored by anyone after it is destroyed by Adanis? Posted by Josph Vijayan on Friday, January 8, 2016







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MIKE LAWRENCE / COURIER & PRESS Supervisor Caleb Rice (right) and mechanic Keith Nall diagnose a semi-truck engine brought into Evansville Cummins Crosspoint's shop recently, December 10, 2015.

SHARE MIKE LAWRENCE / COURIER & PRESS Evansville's Cummins Crosspoint branch manager Ken Hurst at the facility located at the intersection of U.S. 41N and Hwy 57, December 10, 2015. Cummins Crosspoint facility located at the intersection of U.S. 41 and Highway 57. Supervisor Caleb Rice (right) and mechanic Keith Nall diagnose a semi-truck engine brought into Cummins Crosspoints shop recently. Diesel mechanic Peter Tang (left) hands a diagnostic cable to Seth Titzer as the pair works on a concrete mixing truck. Titzer recently received a diesel tech scholarship from Cummins Crosspoint in Evansville.

Seth Titzer wasn't sure about the direction of his future until he got his hands dirty working on diesel engines.

The Boonville High School graduate started taking diesel tech classes at the Southern Indiana Career and Technical Center after he heard about them from a cousin.

"It was different than regular school, just sitting in the classroom," Titzer said. "You got to get out in the shop and learn something that you were actually interested in."

Titzer recently received a diesel tech scholarship from Cummins Crosspoint in Evansville, which means he will work around 20 hours a week as an intern and the company will pay his college tuition at Vincennes University.

The scholarship program, which started last year, is just one of several community involvement efforts Cummins Crosspoint initiated recently.

"One of the things I am most proud of is the relationship we have with (the Tech Center)," said Cummins Crosspoint Branch Manager Kenneth Hurst. "I believe there is a huge gap in career opportunities."

The Cummins vision of community involvement started with the previous owner, Dave Smithson, Hurst said, and Cummins Inc., but within the past 18 months there has been a "push" to increase it.

"We want to make the communities we live in great," Hurst said.

Hurst retired from his rank as colonel from the Army Special Forces in 2011, while living with his wife in Tampa, Florida.

He said both Cummins Inc. and Cummins Crosspoint were instrumental in smoothing his transition from a long career in the military to a new career in the civil engineer force.

"Cummins is a real champion of what they call the 'right environment' and is also a great place to work," he said.

Cummins Crosspoint LLC was formed in 2006 when Cummins Mid-States merged with Cummins Cumberland to form the new distributorship, which operated under a joint venture agreement with Cummins Inc.

Cummins Inc. acquired full ownership of the Evansville location, one of 15 Cummins North American distributors, in August.

The 51-employee company provides sales, parts and services for all Cummins engines in Southwestern Indiana, Western Kentucky and southeast Illinois.

"Evansville is a really interesting market and it is a really great place to be in a distributorship," Hurst said. "We have on-highway fleet trucking, but we also have all of the heavy-industrial industries such as mining."

Much of Cummins' engines also go to power boats that push the barges on the Ohio River. The company provides generator and backup generator support, including many police and fire departments, hospitals and schools.

Cummins is a multinational Fortune 500 company that operates and serves customers around the world, founded in 1919 by Clessie Cummins, a self-taught mechanic and inventor, and William Irwin, a local banker.

"I like being associated with a global company that has a very local feel," Hurst said.

Hurst joined the the Tech Center's advisory board and the board for Keep Evansville Beautiful to strengthen the company's ties to the community.

Julie Welch said first impressions are a "big deal," and when people consider moving to a city they want to know two things: is it beautiful and is there stuff to do?

The executive director of Keep Evansville Beautiful approached Hurst last year about ways to clean up the discolored fence encompassing Cummins Crosspoint.

"We were trying to improve the appearance from the airport down to Highway 41," Welch said.

Hurst answered by joining Keep Evansville Beautiful's board and helped it to push a $10,000 grant through the Cummins Foundation, based out of Columbus, Indiana.

The grant funds the relandscaping of the intersection at Highway 41 and Highway 57. They are sprucing up the medians and corners of the intersection to make it more "aesthetically pleasing," she said.

"One of the things that we always hear from the industry is that, when they fly somebody in from the airport, they don't want to take them down 41 to get to downtown because the road is just an embarrassment," Welch said.

More than two million vehicles travel through the area every year from a 10-county area, Welch said.

"We truly believe it will help with the economic development of the area," she said.

Presently Cummins Crosspoint has a 71 percent employee participation rate, which is the percentage of time employees have donated to community service.

Cummins Crosspoint also donated service to USS LST-325 to help them get their generators running.

John Hatton, the chief engineer of the LST, said Cummins Crosspoint has proved supportive of the ship and is a "generous public-minded business."

"I think they go out of their way because they see (the LST) as a value in the community," Hatton said.

A few years ago as the LST was nearing the end of its contract in Evansville, Hatton said many other cities vied for the ship to contract with them.

Around that time is when Cummins Crosspoint offered services to assist the ship's generator. Hatton said it was an example of the local support they had in Evansville.

"Were they the primary reason (we stayed)? No, but they were a piece of that puzzle, though," he said. "It's a great help to us to have a company here locally that is so willing to help us out. That makes our job a lot easier."

Hurst said Cummins Crosspoint has nine veterans on its staff and understands the importance the ship brings to Evansville.

Cummins is the largest independent diesel manufacturer in the world, and Hurst said Titzer is getting experience comparative to what professional diesel workers do because of his internship.

"I wouldn't be in this chair, or in the shop if it wasn't for this scholarship," Titzer said. "I probably wouldn't be able to afford to go to college if it wasn't for Cummins."
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If you are offended by humor rooted in religion, please stop reading here.

If you continue, please know you may find the following words to be offensive, just as I do, but nonetheless provocative of some serious reflection on faith matters.

The words are from a 1960s record album by "The Slightly Irreverent Chad Mitchell Trio."

"God made the World in six days flat.

On the seventh he said, 'I'll rest.'

So he let the thing into orbit swing

To give it a dry run test.

A billion years went by,

Then he took a look at the whirling blob;

His spirits fell as he shrugged,

'Oh well, it was only a six-day job.'"

I object to the notion that God let our beautiful world spin without attention for any period of time, a billion years, some thousands of years, not even for a moment. I believe God has intervened in our human history, the son of God came to be among us and God continues to be engaged with our salvation.

What I find affirming in these irreverent words  and in common with many believers  is the unhesitating acknowledgment that "God made the world." What scares me, though, is that we have messed it up. The world God has given us to cultivate and care for needs our attention.

The 2015 encyclical of Pope Francis, Laudato Si', is unique among expressions of faith leaders regarding the environment. Francis addresses his thoughts not just to Catholics, not just to Christians, not just to the Jewish, Christian and Muslim children of Abraham, but to every person on our planet. We all share this common home, believers and nonbelievers alike. And I believe God does not shrug us off as "only a six-day job." God is not out there. God is among us.

Before the world meeting on climate change in Paris, Francis offered several themes to consider in his encyclical. Lest anyone object that a pope has no scientific standing, please consider what Francis has chosen to emphasize:

The ecological reality is a summons to renew our relationship with God, one another and the common home we share.

We are part of creation, and we have the responsibility to protect the only home we have for our human family, now and for generations to come.

We are all connected.

Countering the irreverent words at the beginning of this conversation, here are some prayerful words to ponder, from Laudato Si':

"God of love, show us our place in this world

as channels of your love

for all the creatures of this earth

for not one of them is forgotten in your sight.

Enlighten those who possess power and money

that they may avoid the sin of indifference,

that they may love the common good,

advance the weak,

and care for this world in which we live.

The poor and the earth are crying out.

O Lord, seize us with your power and light,

help us to protect all life,

to prepare for a better future,

for the coming of your Kingdom of justice, peace, love and beauty.

Praise be to you! Amen."

Paul Leingang is the former editor and columnist for The Message, the weekly newspaper of the Diocese of Evansville. He currently serves as communications consultant for the Association of United States Catholic Priests.
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EVENTS

Sisters of St. Benedict of Ferdinand Workshop: "Introduction to Centering Prayer," 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Jan. 16 at the Benedictine Hospitality Center at Kordes Hall on the grounds of Monastery Immaculate Conception in Ferdinand. Presenters are Sisters Kathy Bilskie and Celeste Boda. Cost is $75 and includes lunch. Registration deadline is Wednesday. For more information or to register, call 800-880-2777 or 812-367-1411, ext. 2915 or visit thedome.org/programs.

Black History Lecture: "Speak What We Feel, Not What We Ought to Say" presented by Dexter Brewer, judicial vicar and vicar general for the Diocese of Nashville, Tennessee, 7 p.m. Feb. 2 in St. Bede Theater at Saint Meinrad Seminary and School of Theology in St. Meinrad. The lecture is free. Parking is available at St. Bede Hall and in the Guest House and student parking lots. Call Mary Jeanne Schumacher at 812-357-6501.

Center for Congregations workshop: "Improving Your Online Presence," 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Feb. 4 at Lutheran Church of Our Redeemer at 1811 Lincoln Ave. Digital marketing professional Zac Parsons will offer congregational leaders a basic understanding of how people access and experience the congregation's website and other online tools. The cost is $10 per person and includes lunch and workshop materials. To register, call 812-618-2012 or visit centerforcongregations.org.

Saint Meinrad Archabbey Library Gallery: St. Meinrad, an exhibit of wall hangings "Healing the Earth" by artist Joanne Weis, through Feb. 28. The exhibit is free and open to the public. For library hours, call 812-357-6401 or 800-987-7311, or visit saintmeinrad.edu/library/hours/.

Teaching from the Book of Revelation: 11 a.m. every Sunday until completion at Church of God of Prophecy, 3407 Bellemeade Ave. Speaker is Bishop William Gaddis (free). Call 812-459-2359.

The Mighty Acts of God in Zion: The Storyline of the Bible: 7-8 p.m. on Tuesdays in the fellowship hall of St. Ananias Orthodox, 4411 Washington Ave.

Old Friendship Church Celebrate Recovery Program: 7 p.m. on Fridays at Oak Hill Christian Center, 4901 Oak Hill Road.

Traditional Roman Catholic Latin Mass: 3 p.m. every Sunday at St. Paul's Chapel, 629 E. Louisiana St.

meals

Lenten Fish Fries: 4:30-7 p.m. Feb. 12 through March 18 at Nativity Catholic Church, 3635 Pollack Ave. Menu includes fried catfish or baked tilapia dinners. Call 812-476-7186.
ERIN McCRACKEN / COURIER & PRESS Pharmacist Brian Perry laughs as he talks with a customer over the counter after filling his prescription at Pauls Pharmacy on the Westside on Friday morning. Hoosier lawmakers are looking at legislation that could require a prescription to receive pseudoephedrine medication at pharmacies.

SHARE Hoosier lawmakers are looking at legislation that could require a prescription to receive common cold medicine with pseudoephedrine from stores and pharmacies. ERIN McCRACKEN / COURIER & PRESS Pharmacist Brian Perry counts Oxycodone tablets to fill a prescription at Paul's Pharmacy on the Westside on Friday morning. ERIN McCRACKEN / COURIER & PRESS Pharmacist Brian Perry uses the computer to look at a prescription as he works filling medicine and answering customer's questions at at Paul's Pharmacy on the Westside on Friday morning. ERIN McCRACKEN / COURIER & PRESS Pharmacist Brian Perry talk to a customer on the phone while working at Paul's Pharmacy on the Westside on Friday morning. Although Indiana lawmakers are are looking at legislation that could require a prescription to receive pseudoephedrine medication at pharmacies, Paul's has been requiring this already for sometime.

By Zach Osowski

INDIANAPOLIS  Lawmakers are determined to do something about pseudoephedrine medication during the 2016 session but are weighing options and looking for an effective way to stop meth production while not inconveniencing allergy sufferers.

The possibility of making pseudoephedrine drugs prescription only is still on the table but the first bill filed regarding medications used in the cooking of meth doesn't go that far.

That bill, authored by Sens. Randy Head and Jim Merritt, would require pharmacists to conduct an on-site consultation with someone wanting to buy medication like Sudafed. The bill says pharmacists would then determine if the person does indeed need Sudafed or if they should try another allergy or congestion medication without the pseudoephedrine ingredient.

As written, the bill would also bar anyone convicted of a drug-related felony from purchasing Sudafed under any circumstances.

The authors said this new law will cut down on the number of people who buy Sudafed just for meth cooks. Currently, there is a limit on how much Sudafed a person can buy in a two-week time frame and over the course of a year. But meth cooks pay people, known as "smurfs", to buy the ingredients for them. If a cook has enough smurfs, the limitations on how much one person can buy are rendered moot.

The idea with the bill is the consultation will discourage people from attempting to buy the Sudafed for the wrong reasons and, if they do talk to the pharmacist, the pharmacist will be able to tell if they are making up symptoms.

Jacob Mayer, a pharmacist at Paul's Pharmacy in Evansville, said it might be easier for Indiana to just go prescription only for medication like Sudafed.

"I know that makes it difficult for the patients," Mayer said. "But it's probably the best route to take."

Mayer said he hasn't read proposed Senate Bill 80 thoroughly but thinks the idea of interpreting symptoms is probably best left up to doctors.

"Pharmacists are necessarily trained to diagnose symptoms," he said. "We know a lot about the medications and drugs."

At the west side Paul's Pharmacy, head pharmacist Brian Perry said prescriptions are mandatory for pseudoephedrine medications.

"Anyone who gets Sudafed here needs a prescription," Perry said. "We made that decision a few years ago."

As for the proposed SB 80, Perry said he's never had an issue talking to someone who might need more information about a product.

"That's never been a problem for me and I think any other pharmacists you talked to would probably feel the same way," he said.

House Speaker Brian Bosma said something needs to be done to stop people from obtaining Sudafed for illegal purposes. Indiana has led the nation in meth lab busts for the last three years.

Bosma tapped Rep. Ben Smaltz, R-Auburn, to author a bill making pseudoephedrine prescription only during Organization Day back in November. That bill has not been filed yet.

Bosma said he is willing to look at all the options when it comes to changing how people purchase Sudafed, whether it be the SB 80 approach, prescription only or simply barring convicted felons from purchasing Sudafed.

That latter approach has been taken by a few different states with some success, Bosma said.

"We're going to have a healthy conversation about all those options," Bosma said. "With the goal of making the raw materials for methamphetamine more difficult for the bad guys to get their hands on."

Bosma said ultimately he doesn't care which way the General Assembly goes as long as the final choice cuts down on Indiana's meth production.

"We have to have a solution to being the meth cooking capitol of the country for three years now in a row," he said. "There are options on the table and we're going to have a conversation about which one is the most effective, which also has the least burden on law-abiding Hoosiers."

Sen. Jim Tomes, R-Wadesville, has said for years he is against making Sudafed or similar medications prescription only. He said he doesn't want to make it more difficult for people who just want allergy medication to purchase. Tomes isn't sure yet on whether or not SB 80 is too burdensome on Hoosiers.

Presently, only two other states  Oregon and Mississippi  have prescription only legislation on the books. It has been introduced in Indiana in the past, but has failed to gain any traction due to fears of inconvenience and increased health costs.

Local prosecutors in Southwestern Indiana think making Sudafed prescription only might be the only option left to try and stop meth labs. Warrick County Prosecutor Mike Perry told the Courier & Press back in December that law enforcement has pretty much tried everything else to slow down meth production.

Banning over the counter sales of Sudafed has the support of the Indiana Association of Prosecuting Attorneys.

SB 80 has been assigned to the Family and Children Services Committee. No hearing date has been set.
DANIEL R. PATMORE / SPECIAL TO THE COURIER & PRESS Daniel Wertz Elementary School Principal Douglas Mills (center) tells the story of Ruby Bridges to first-grader Amalya Mudd (left) and kindergartner Ashlyn Stepro (right) during the Martin Luther King, Jr. and Great Leaders Day assembly in the school gym Friday.

SHARE Mayor Lloyd Winnecke speaks to students, teachers and parents during the Martin Luther King, Jr. and Great Leaders Day assembly in the school gym Friday. DANIEL R. PATMORE / SPECIAL TO THE COURIER & PRESS Daniel Wertz Elementary School Principal Douglas Mills (center) tells the story of Ruby Bridges to first-grader Amalya Mudd (left) and kindergartner Ashlyn Stepro (right) during the Martin Luther King, Jr. and Great Leaders Day assembly in the school gym Friday.

By Megan Erbacher of the Courier and Press

Age doesn't matter when it comes to being a great leader.

A child as young as 6 years old can be a leader, Daniel Wertz Elementary School Principal Douglas Mills said at an all-school assembly Friday morning. Mills sat in front of the kids and told the story of Ruby Bridges, a civil rights activist that at 6 years old overcame adversity and broke boundaries by being the first black child to attend an all-white school in New Orleans in the 1960s.

"Would you be brave enough?" Mills said. "Even at 6 years old, you can make a difference."

The assembly was an early celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and his leadership skills, as well as a celebration of student leaders. Mills recognized 16 kids, one student from each homeroom, for their accomplishments in going above and beyond in the classroom and community. The students model the "Daniel Wertz way" on a daily basis, Mills said, and were named "super citizens."

"I encourage all of you to be kind and to strive to be the best that your talents allow," he said.

Third-grader Trinton Storey said he was surprised to see his parents at school Friday morning. Storey, 9, said it was awesome to earn the award.

For him, being a super citizen means: "To do good in class. To get good grades. Treat people with respect and be nice."

Storey's parents, Candace and Kevin, were both proud of their son.

"I'm a crier," Candace Storey said. "So I knew I was going to cry. But he's a great kid, so I knew he had it in him."

"I'm a little shocked," Kevin Storey said, teasing his son. "I wish he acted that way at home."

King had a great message, Mayor Lloyd Winnecke said to students  that we're all equal.

Winnecke said he ran for mayor four years ago because he didn't like how people were treating each other in the community.

"Nice matters," Winnecke said. "It does matter how you treat people. And if you don't treat people they way you want to be treated, then we're going to have some problems."

Everyone won't agree on everything, Winnecke said, and that's OK. He challenged students to simply respect another's opinion and be nice.

Mills reminded students that the mayor is a "normal guy" who chose to run for the leader of Evansville.

"All of these famous people that we hear about, they're just regular guys or regular girls," Mills said. "And you can be one of those people, too."
The City Council meets on January 4, 2016. (Video capture)

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By Shannon Hall of the Courier and Press

If you want to ask questions or make a public comment during a city council meeting, or any public meeting, there's a chance your voice may not be heard when you want.

For the second time within a few weeks, public comments at open meetings have come into question. While governing bodies don't have to allow public comments during meetings, most local boards, councils and commission allow the public an opportunity to talk.

Public meetings allow people to attend, but public hearings are the only time people are guaranteed a chance talk to the governing bodies during meetings.

Last week, the Evansville City Council sailed through its agenda before landing on the commission and committee appointees. The council voted without hearing from the nominees or the public.

Several people in attendance stood up and shamed City Council members for not allowing the public to give input before the council voted on who would be appointed to the Economic Redevelopment Commission and the Police Merit Commission.

City Council President Missy Mosby said she was surprised by the public's reaction.

"If you go back to each year ... in the past to my knowledge, there hasn't been public comment (before appointments)," she said.

Last year during commission appointments, the council asked if the three nominees for two ERC openings wanted to speak before voting.

This year, none of the council members said they wanted to hear from the nominees. Mosby said none of the council members asked to hear the nominees before voting either.

The City Council allows public comment during miscellaneous business, and posts a signup sheet.

"I just think it's a good practice, if people have taken the time out of their day to come up there," Mosby said.

People can also turn in a comment card to the City Clerk's office as another option to have their voice heard, she said.

What can the public talk about?

A few weeks ago, the Newburgh Town Council president stopped a woman, former council candidate Melinda Mitchell, from speaking during the public comment portion of a meeting. Newburgh keeps a signup sheet and usually allows an unlimited amount of time to talk to the council. During the meeting a few weeks ago, the council allowed two other people to speak for at least 10 minutes each.

Council President Bill Kavanaugh thought Mitchell was reiterating comments from the previous person, and didn't want to put anymore time into the subject. Mitchell, who was Kavanaugh's opponent during the November election, was told to stop talking.

When she continued trying to speak, Kavanaugh threatened to have police remove her from the meeting. Police declined to act.

Presidents of boards or councils have the right to stop people from talking.

Jodi Woods, general counsel for The Indiana Association of Cities and Towns, said if a council wants to allow public comment, it's good to have a time limit and to discourage people from cursing.

"What we recommend is if you have a comment period, that you have comments at that time," Woods said. "You have limitations because it's still your meeting and you still have the business of governing to get done. Everyone should have the opportunity to talk."

Setting a time limit lets everyone a chance to speak, but also keeps someone from talking for three hours.

Warrick County School Corp. board meetings allow people to talk at the beginning of the meeting about anything they want. After the board goes through its agenda, it allows the public to speak once more about any of the items on the agenda.

It's up to the president of the council or commission to decide if public comments during meetings should be allowed, how long is enough or if the topic is relevant.

In the past few months, the Warrick County Council has received complaints about the county's solid waste management district and its curbside program. One member of the council sits on the district's board, but as whole, the council isn't involved with the curbside service.

The members listened to the complaints, but said they aren't connected to the decisions made by the district.

Other governing bodies and public comment

Most government bodies will allow people to call and ask to be on the agenda if they have a comment or item to discuss with the legislative body. But not all of them have public comment section penciled in as part of the overall meeting. If a city council, or any governing body, allows a public section, they can limit the number of people who talk or how long they talk, according to Indiana's open door law.

Warrick County Commissioners do not have a public comment part for their meetings, but most of the time, they allow people to pop up to clarify or ask a question.

"If someone has questions or a problem, I prefer to have them put it on the agenda so we can research it and give them an appropriate answers," Warrick County Commissioner Don Williams said. "There's so many times people come in and have a pretty decent problem and in order to answer, we've got to do a little bit of research."

Before the commissioners close their meetings, sometimes people approach them to give one last comment, and Williams said he usually allows that even if it's not on the agenda.

Evansville Vanderburgh School Corp. board of trustees give the public an opportunity to comment at the end of the meeting after all the items have been voted on or discussed.

School Board President Mike Duckworth said the board asks people to keep their comments to about three minutes and stick to comments rather than questions.

"It's a business meeting. It's not a question-and-answer session," he said.

If people want to talk to the school board, like most elected officials, the EVSC school board does posts its emails and phone numbers so the public can contact them at any time.

"We want to be fair, but we want to keep the business approach to (the meetings)," Duckworth said. "We are accessible."

Despite public comment not being required, he thinks its important for the school board to allow to people to talk during its meetings.

"It's the people's business. Everything we do is public record. Everything we do is usually utilized in taxpayers' dollars," Duckworth said. "I think sometime the people feel shunned and the last thing we want to do."
JASON CLARK / Courier & Press Archives Co-managers Connie Carrier (R) and Anthony Tony Bushrod (D) work at the Vanderburgh County Voter Registration Office at the Civic Center in Evansville in 2009. These are the only two positions in county government held by persons serving under the two party chairmen.

SHARE JASON CLARK / Courier & Press Archives Co-managers Connie Carrier (R) and Anthony Tony Bushrod (D) work at the Vanderburgh County Voter Registration Office at the Civic Center in Evansville in 2009. These are the only two positions in county government held by persons serving under the two party chairmen.

By Thomas B. Langhorne of the Courier and Press

Vanderburgh County removed more than 10,000 voters from the rolls in December, possibly years after getting the greenlight to do so.

The delay could have rendered recent voter turnouts artificially low and unnecessarily inflated voter rolls.

Local officials struggled to explain why the mass voter registration cancellations were done last month, activity that a state elections official said could make Vanderburgh unique among Indiana's 92 counties.

Connie Carrier and Tony Bushrod, co-directors of the Vanderburgh County Voter Registration Office, said the voters were designated "inactive" after failing to respond to a mailing. They subsequently failed to cast ballots in two consecutive federal elections. But Carrier and Bushrod did not agree on which two elections. Bushrod cited the 2012 and 2014 elections, and Carrier said it was 2010 and 2012. In fact, state law says voting in any election in the two-year period between federal elections keeps an "inactive" voter on the rolls.

Asked why the county waited three years to cancel 10,000 voter registrations, Carrier called it an "oversight" but cautioned that she does not know.

"Nothing illegal was done," she said.

Brad King, co-director of the Indiana Election Division, said he knows of no other county in the state that has recently removed so many people from its voter rolls. King cautioned that he has no direct knowledge of the circumstances in Vanderburgh County, which currently has about 134,500 registered voters.

Carrier said the Election Division may have done a statewide residency address confirmation mailing to millions of registered voters, as it did in 2014, and that could have resulted in the voter removals. Such a mailing would be designed to identify inaccurate registrations. The county doesn't do its own mailings because of the cost.

But the Election Division reported it did no statewide postcard mailings in 2010 or 2012. The must recent one before 2014 occurred in 2006 under a federal court order. That mailing, which ultimately purged some 300,000 names from the voter rolls, was the first.

The technological guardian of Indiana's voter rolls could offer only a partial answer.

Quest Information Systems, the Indianapolis-based company that maintains Indiana's Statewide Voter Registration System, confirmed that Vanderburgh County's canceled registrations involved undeliverable mail. But pinning it to one mailing is problematic. Quest officials said the statewide database could offer a variety of dates for a variety of mail types for each of 10,000-plus canceled voters.

There is one possibility that likely would generate as many questions as answers.

The mailing that ultimately generated Vanderburgh County's voter registration cancellations could have been the one that went out in 2006. If local officials let "inactive" voter designations that stemmed from the decade-old mailing sit for that long before canceling some of the registrations, King said, no law would have been broken. There is no official deadline.

"It would still be able to be processed at this point, assuming that the records had not been," King said.

Carrier is a Republican candidate for county clerk this year, which would make her Vanderburgh County's top elections official. She and Bushrod, a Democrat, are appointed to their $55,583-per-year jobs by the chairmen of the respective local parties. Each has been there since 2001, maintaining support bases in their parties and surviving several transitions to new party chairmen.

Whatever happened, Carrier said, no one's voter registration was canceled without just cause.

"If (the voter registrations) weren't meant to be canceled, they would not have been canceled," she said.

The rules

The 2014 statewide residency address confirmation mailing was preceded by enactment of a statute that requires the Indiana Election Division to send such a mailing in each even-numbered year. The 2014 mailing, which went to about 4.4 million registered voters, was the first under the new law.

The state sent a first-class postcard to each active voter, with a second postcard sent to any voters whose first mailing was returned as undeliverable. The registration record of any voter who did not respond to the second mailing, or for whom that mailing also was returned as undeliverable, was marked "inactive."

An "inactive" voter's registration can be canceled if he fails to vote in two consecutive federal elections  and any other election in that period  and if he does nothing else to update his voter registration.

For those designated "inactive" as a result of the 2014 mailing, the second consecutive federal election will occur Nov. 8.

"Federal law does not permit registrations to be canceled simply because a person does not vote," King said. "You can have a person register when they're 18 years old, never vote until they're 80  but as long as they live at the same address and don't have any other intervening, disqualifying event, they stay on the registration rolls."

As it happens, the 2014 mailing did result in reams of new "inactive" voters in Indiana. In a report generated on Nov. 3, the Election Division pegged the number of "inactive" voters in Vanderburgh County at 34,426.

But Bushrod said the number of "inactive" voters is zero. King responded, "I don't understand that."

Bushrod and Carrier disagreed on some things. He said the more than 10,000 canceled voters included people the Voter Registration Office had determined were dead or incarcerated or who had notified the agency that they moved out of state. Carrier said the list was exclusively comprised of people who had not voted in 2010 and 2012.

The two voter registration co-directors even provided different numbers for the total cancellations, Bushrod pegging the number at 10,364 and Carrier naming 10,253.

___

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State Reps. Wendy MacNamara, Tom Washburne, Holli Sullivan and Gail Riecken joined State Sens. Vaneta Becker and Jim Tomes at Meet Your Legislators.

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By Tim Ethridge

While Southwest Indiana legislators managed to speak on all the issues presented at a public meeting on Saturday morning, they aren't as confident that all can be addressed in a nine-week session in Indianapolis that already is a week old.

Six legislators  Sens. Jim Tomes and Vaneta Becker, and Reps. Gail Riecken, Wendy MacNamara, Tom Washburne and Holli Sullivan  took part in the first of three Meet Your Legislators sessions sponsored by the League of Women Voters at Central Library.

There were no surprises among the representative questions from 150 or so attendees, with the main focuses on road and bridge funding, school testing, Sunday alcohol sales, the meth problem, and gender-specific restrooms. "In a short session, there are a lot of unglamorous things that have to be done," said Washburne. "It's difficult to completely address all of the issues."

In Indiana, shorter sessions are held in even-numbered years and longer ones, when two-year budgets are set, in odd-numbered years. This year's session, by law, must end no later than March 14.

The legislators agreed that road funding and school testing likely will be their main concentrations. Becker doubted that a Sunday liquor sales bill  which pits package store owners who prefer to be closed on Sundays against grocery and big-box operations  would make it to the house floor. Meth will be much debated, as will the Tomes-sponsored "bathroom bill," part of a larger discussion on rights for all, including the LGBT community, which wasn't addressed.

These were addressed:

ISTEP testing: The audience wasn't at all happy with the continued problems with student testing and teacher accountability being tied to those malfunctioning tests. They don't feel the state's attempt to fix the system have worked, to the detriment to the students, teachers and schools. Washburne traced the problem to the 2001 federal "No Child Left Behind" law which ties school funding to test scores. MacNamara, an educator, agreed that ISTEP has been a "fiasco." All said steps will be taken, starting with not enforcing sanctions this year.

Road funding: Cheryl Musgrave, a candidate for Vanderburgh County Commission District Three, noted that funding has not kept pace with need as she asked the question. The legislators pointed out that, for one year only, there is a bill to provide $418 million on top of the usual $100 million to cities and counties for road and bridge repair. An additional gas tax was suggested, with Becker noting that 6-7 cents per gallon might tip the balance. Asked their opinion, the audience split 50-50 on whether that was a good idea. Sullivan hinted a toll might be needed to make an I-69 bridge possible.

Pseudoephedrine sales: How to keep common cold medicines such as Sudafed from being "cooked" into methamphetamines is the challenge. Washburne pointed out efforts to change coatings to keep over-the-counter medicines from being used illegally. "The Holy Grail is uncookable phedrine," said Washburne.

Sunday alcohol sales: A package store owner asked for support in curbing Sunday sales, noting the extra training and regulations imposed on liquor stores that aren't faced by big-box stores and groceries. He had a supporter in Tomes, who said, "Six days should be enough to get you some booze."

Bathrooms: Tomes has put out a bill making it a crime for a male to enter a female restroom and vice versa. "Don't you want privacy when you use the restroom?" He says it isn't directed solely at LGBT members while also aiming barbs at media reports on his bill. The other legislators passed on comments, though Riecken later said that, at this time, she doesn't support the suggestion.

Saturday's session will be replayed on WNIN public television at 8 p.m. Friday, Jan. 15, and 5 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 17. The remaining sessions are set for Feb. 13 (with television replays on Feb. 19 and 21) and March 12 (with replays on March 18 and 20).
Michael Conroy / Associated Press Archives In this June 26, 2015 file photo, same-sex marriage supporters cheer at the Statehouse in Indianapolis after the Supreme Court declared that same-sex couples have a right to marry anywhere in the United States. Months after a divisive religious objections law thrust Indiana into an unwanted national spotlight, gay rights supporters and religious conservatives are preparing for another potentially bitter debate, this time over enshrining LGBT protections into state law.

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By The Associated Press

INDIANAPOLIS (AP)  Indiana lawmakers will consider a proposal that would throw out the state's contentious religious objections law and replace it with a statute its sponsor says aims to protect six fundamental rights.

It is unclear how much support the bill might garner as legislators face a debate over a push to extend LGBT civil rights protections following last spring's uproar over whether the religious objections law would permit discrimination against gays and lesbians.

Under the new bill, state government and courts would give "the greatest deference" on six issues: the state constitutional rights to worship, religion, exercise of religion, speech, assembly and bear arms.

Bill sponsor Sen. Michael Young, a Republican from Indianapolis, said the religious objections law became too convoluted and should be replaced by recognizing the importance of multiple rights.

"We want those protected at the highest standard," Young said. "It protects our freedom."

Advocates of civil rights protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people maintain that Young's bill is aimed at derailing their push.

Peter Hanscom, of the business-backed pro-LGBT group Indiana Competes, said the proposal isn't a solution for concerns that the Legislature was legally permitting discrimination.

"Let's not address this by creating, potentially, another problem," Hanscom told WISH-TV.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to consider the bill on Jan 20, but Republican Senate President Pro Tem David Long has held back from fully endorsing it.

"What Sen. Young's bill will do if it gets a hearing  and I think it will  is to maybe go in a direction we should have gone and deal with all First Amendment rights, and not just one particular issue with religious rights but say all constitutional rights are equal, and maybe there ought to be a standard for all of them," Long said.

Indiana University law professor Robert Katz, who testified against adoption of the religious objections law last year, questioned why the bill would enshrine only six of 37 sections of the state Constitution's Bill of Rights  including several religious rights  and leave out others, such as the right to equal privileges and immunities.

"It would effectively amend the Indiana Bill of Rights to create a two-tiered system of rights," Katz told The Indianapolis Star.
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Ronald Adams

Evansville

What in the world is happening to our once-great nation?

The Declaration of Independence mandates that we have a right to life, but abortionists allow for the wanton murder of the unborn. Unethical doctors promote the "humane" destruction of ailing seniors through the decadent procedure of euthanasia. Caring for our aging parents is apparently too much of a burden for family members accustomed to carefree lifestyles.

We don't have to wait for America's enemies to slaughter our people; we are willingly doing the job ourselves. Scripture dictates that homosexuality and same-sex marriages are abnormal and immoral. yet corporate executives and unscrupulous politicians zealously promote these practices, all in the name of diversity and inclusiveness.

As a former member of the Armed Forces, I can no longer identify the humane country for which I so proudly served years ago. Secularism has displaced the Christian principles upon which this country was founded. God save us from a state of continuous moral decline.
Earlier this week, Mozilla was forced to backpedal on banning new SHA-1 digital certificates because the move completely cut off some Firefox users from the encrypted Web. It appears that Google saw the problem coming.

Instead of banning all digital certificates signed with SHA-1 and issued after Jan. 1, Google plans to only "untrust" those that originate from public certificate authorities.

This decision takes into account that some companies might still use self-generated SHA-1 certificates internally on their networks, or that some antivirus programs and security devices will continue to generate such certificates when inspecting HTTPS traffic.

[ ALSO ON CSO: Mozilla mulls early cutoff for SHA-1 digital certificates ]

Man-in-the-middle HTTPS traffic interception is generally frowned upon by privacy advocates because it breaks the trust between users and servers and because, if done incorrectly, can expose users to serious attacks. However, it has some acceptable uses.

For example, some companies might install HTTPS traffic inspection devices at the network perimeter to ensure that sensitive corporate data is not leaked over encrypted traffic. Many antivirus programs also inspect HTTPS traffic locally on computers using man-in-the-middle techniques in order to detect whether malware is being served through such connections.

Such applications and systems re-encrypt the traffic between users and websites by creating new certificates for those connections using self-generated CAs (certificate authorities). The root certificates of those CAs are not trusted by default, so they need to be manually deployed on the computers and devices whose traffic is to be intercepted, so that users' browsers will trust the mock website certificates signed with them.



SHA-1, an aging hashing algorithm, is in the process of being phased out because it is theoretically vulnerable to attacks that could result in forged digital certificates and it's only a matter of time before someone gains the capability to do so.

As a result, the CA/Browser Forum, a group of certificate authorities and browser makers that sets guidelines for the issuance and use of digital certificates, decided that new SHA-1-signed certificates should not be issued after Jan. 1, 2016.

SHA-1 certificates issued before this date will continue to be trusted until at least July 1, 2016, depending on the browser, but no later than Jan. 1, 2017.

Mozilla decided to stop trusting SHA-1 certificates in Firefox that were issued after Jan. 1. At first glance this shouldn't have had much impact, because trusted public CAs are not supposed to issue new such certificates after that date.

However, the browser maker did not consider the fact that some HTTPS inspection systems and applications might continue to generate SHA-1 certificates as replacements for the real ones served by websites. Because of this it started receiving reports from users of such systems who could no longer access any HTTPS websites, even if their real certificates were signed with the more secure SHA-2 function.

Mozilla decided to lift the SHA-1 ban, at least temporarily, in Firefox 43.0.4, released Wednesday.

"The latest version of Firefox re-enables support for SHA-1 certificates to ensure that we can get updates to users behind man-in-the-middle devices, and enable us to better evaluate how many users might be affected," the company said in a blog post. "Vendors of TLS man-in-the-middle systems should be working to update their products to use newer digest algorithms."

Google also plans to ban SHA-1 certificates issued after Jan. 1, starting with the next stable version of Google Chrome -- version 48. However, the company said in blog post in December that it will only ban certificates that meet three criteria: are signed with SHA-1, are issued on or after Jan. 1 and chain back to a public CA.

"Note that sites using new SHA-1 certificates that chain to local trust anchors (rather than public CAs) will continue to work without a certificate error," the company said.

Since self-generated root CA certificates like those used by man-in-the-middle HTTPS inspection systems are not "public" CAs, their users should not be affected. This might be a solution for Mozilla too when it decide to reinstate the ban.
Megan Baroni

Robinson & Cole has promoted attorneys Megan Baroni and April Condon to partner. Both work in the Stamford office. Baroni focuses on environmental litigation and compliance. She has a bachelors degree from Syracuse University, a masters degree in environmental management from Yale University and a law degree from Pace University. Condon handles complex commercial lease negotiations and commercial real estate development. Condo n has undergraduate and law degrees from Georgetown University.

John Minnec

Colangelo, an Omnicom Group (NYSE: OMC) subsidiary in Darien, has named John Minnec president, with founder Rob Colangelo becoming executive chairman. Minnec joined Colangelo in June as general manager. Previously, he was as a senior executive in the Chicago office of DCI Artform. He also worked for Fuse msc, River North Group, Havas and FCB Global. He has a bachelors degree from Eastern Illinois University and studied in the executive education program at the University of Pennsylvanias Wharton School.

Bob Guidotti
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HARTFORD -- Sitting in the hearing room at the Capitol, Charla Nash listened Friday as her attorney described her life three years after being mauled by a friend's pet chimpanzee.

Nash, who lost her hands and face but received a successful face transplant, has been recovering from her injuries in a nursing facility outside Boston.

"(She lives) in total darkness, without eyes, without hands, without her face, permanently scarred emotionally, psychologically and physically," said her attorney, Charles Willinger, of Bridgeport. "She'll never be able to see (daughter) Briana and, maybe even worse, she'll never be able to hold her hand.

"She has endured and continues to endure loneliness, despair and suffering beyond anyone's comprehension in this room."

And, Willinger said, it is all the fault of the former state Department of Environmental Protection, now the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection.

Nash made the rare public appearance in support of her bid to sue the DEEP for $150 million in damages.

The hearing was convened by state Claims Commissioner J. Paul Vance Jr., who is the gatekeeper aspiring litigants like Nash must get through in order to take their case to court.

Over the past few months, Willinger and opposing counsel in the Attorney General's Office have argued over Nash's claim on paper. On Friday, they spent two hours presenting oral arguments to Vance.

The commissioner gave the sides until Aug. 31 to present additional documentation before he renders a decision.

"I feel the DEP failed to do their job, and as my lawyers have stated, I hope and pray that the commissioner will give me my day in court," Nash told reporters with her slightly slurred voice afterward. "And I also pray and I hope this never happens to anyone else again. It's not nice."

Nash was attacked Feb. 16, 2009, by Travis, a 200-pound chimpanzee that was frequently seen in public accompanying owner Sandra Herold. Travis was shot and killed by responding Stamford police; Herold has since died.

Nash's attorneys have argued there is overwhelming evidence that DEP officials, who first learned of Travis after he escaped in downtown Stamford in 2003, grew more concerned but never exercised their authority to seize the unpermitted chimp.

At Friday's hearing, Willinger cited emails that were provided to Vance, showing how the matter was bounced between environmental administrators and DEP police just months before the attack.

He also noted that, in contrast, the DEP did not shy away from seizing a 16-pound gibbon from a Fairfield home.

The attorney general's office argued the DEP would likely have had to take Herold to court over Travis and that outcome would have been uncertain, given the primate did not have a record of dangerous incidents.

"The state did not own or possess the chimp, nor did it have any role in letting it loose on Mrs. Herold's property that day," Assistant Attorney General Maite Barainca told Vance.

Barainca also argued that unless the Legislature specifies otherwise, the state cannot be held liable for failing to enforce regulations.

"The threat of damages from a single instance of regulatory failure might make an overwhelmingly beneficial regulation an unaffordable luxury," she said.

Both sides cited court and claims commissioner decisions they felt upheld their arguments.

Willinger said the state should not worry about Nash's lawsuit setting any precedents.

"This case is clearly a unique case, very peculiar and particular facts," Willinger said. "So this is not something that will be precedent-setting and grind government to a halt."

While briefly speaking with reporters, Nash attempted to be positive about her condition.

"Well, now, with the doctors, I'm exercising, I've gained some weight and I'm hoping that in the future I still can be on the list to get hands," Nash said. "But I'm still working to get stronger and they told me I'm improving."

But Willinger spoke of her mounting legal and medical fees and noted her successful face transplant is "virgin territory."

"No one knows how long her face will even last," he said.

brian.lockhart@scni.com; 203 414 0712; http://twitter.com/blockhart1
It is early evening, Dec. 24. My wife and I and our daughter Julia are headed to my sons house in Stratford for Christmas Eve. Its to be a joyous evening.

We travel down Clinton Avenue toward State Street to get on I-95. Then we see the lights  not Christmas lights; instead their evil twins  bursts of red and blue rocketing from the roofs of Bridgeport Police patrol cars and ricocheting off the low, darkened store fronts of State Street.

Yellow tape is everywhere. State Street is closed and the line of cars on Clinton Avenue now making u-turns and heading back up the street.

This is not good, I say. We bypass the scene and get to Stratford. We spend an evening awash in the warmth of each others love and carry on a tradition of taking turns reading pieces of Clement C. Moores Twas The Night Before Christmas.

But on this particular night before Christmas, on State Street, 14-year-old Luis Colon, sent by his mother from their Wood Avenue apartment to get something at a store, got caught in the middle of yet another out-of-court settlement, Bridgeport style.

Police say 23-year-old Michael Majors and 17-year-old Trey Kaiser approached a group of men standing outside the Stylz barber shop at 1156 State Street and Majors opened fire. Colon, who police said they believed was not a target, was shot in the chest. He was pronounced dead a short time later at St. Vincents Medical Center.

Another family left torn apart. A 14-year-old son sent to the store, never to come home.

On Christmas Day, after a wonderful morning spent with a family together, Julia and I went to the scene. Stylz was open. A man in maroon leather - from head to foot - came out the door. Moments earlier, another man had come out with a bucket of water and sloshed it over the blood at the curb.

Its not likely the gun used to kill this boy was obtained legally. So all the background checks in the world probably would not have prevented this particular incident. The gun rights people have a point. The guns used in Sandy Hook and San Bernardino, Calif., were obtained legally, they point out. (Credit Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and the Connecticut legislature for making military-grade weaponry illegal in Connecticut.)

But however you slice, parse, analyze, apologize, criticize, philosophize around the issue, we have a problem: there are too many guns around and regulation of them is, obviously, insufficient.

No one step is going to end the gun slaughter thats been going on in the United States. Thoughtful, incremental steps will put us moving in the right direction.

President Obama announced last week some things hes going to do, like turning up the heat on gun sellers who do not have federal licenses, and therefore are not required to perform background checks on purchasers.

Interestingly, it is a Connecticut group, co-chaired by a Bridgeport minister, that likely contributed to the presidents decision to he president to use his executive muscle. The group is CONECT, Congregations Organized for a New Connecticut, and its co-chair is the Rev. Anthony L. Bennett, pastor of Mt. Aery Baptist Church, at 73 Frank Street, on the edge of the citys Hollow neighborhood. It is a coalition of 25 churches, synagogues and mosques from New Haven and Fairfield Counties representing more than 15,000 people from different races, ethnic groups, faith backgrounds, and both cities and suburbs. CONECT is affiliated with a national organization called the Metro Industrial Areas Foundation (MIAF).

Since starting its Do Not Stand Idly By campaign in 2014, CONECT has gathered the support of 82 mayors, police chiefs, county executives and governors around the U.S. in, among other things, pressing gun manufacturers to tighten distribution systems and invest in research and development of so-called smart gun technology.

The campaign also seeks to use the leverage of public sector buying power to press gun manufacturers to engage and respond to these two areas. The public sector, according to CONECT, represents 40 percent of the market for gun manufacturers - gun purchases for local, state, and federal law enforcement and the military.

In fact, in October, Bennett and other MIAF people held a press conference in front of the White House to urge the president to take executive action on the gun issue.

Since then, he and CONECT members have been to Chicago, for the annual conference of the International Association of Chiefs of Police and to Washington to meet with the Justice Department and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

This is an issue where its not us versus the police. We have police chiefs with us and we can do this together. Make the gun manufacturers see that there responsibility is more than just manufacturing guns, Bennett said Friday.

Michael J. Daly is editor of the editorial page of the Connecticut Post. Email: mdaly@ctpost.com.
Hear that sound? Listen closely. Its 11 men, Connecticuts most-depraved villains, rotting on unDeath Row in the Northern Correctional Center up in Somers.

Id like to lead everyone in a cheer for them. Say stare decisis out loud. Its pronounced STAR-ee dah-SIGH-sis.

Theyre waiting for their next meal, their next exercise hour, their next phone call. Most of all, theyre looking forward to their next court date, their next 15 seconds on TV or the next time the newspapers dredge up the shocking crimes that got them where they are today.

Validation of what an animal you are certainly breaks up the monotony.

Last August, Supreme Court Justice Richard N. Palmer revealed a big rift on the court, leading a fragile 4-3 majority to say that the 2012 repeal of the death penalty also applied to the 11 previously convicted capital felons.

Once the death penalty was overturned, executing guys such as Russell Peeler Jr., the Bridgeport drug dealer who ordered the January 1999 murders of an 8-year-old boy and his mother, would become cruel and unusual punishment and a violation of the state Constitution, he wrote.

On Thursday, the states Division of Criminal Justice tried to take another bite from the apple, raising more issues that they claimed Palmer did not address last summer.

The hearing brought out the split for the public to ponder, and signaled a possible new coalition led by Chief Justice Chase T. Rogers. Questioning was led by Justice Peter T. Zarella and Justice Carmen E. Espinosa, both of whom believe the 11 men should die.

Rogers, who sided with the minority in August, seemed very concerned that less than six months after ruling that the 2012 repeal meant the 11 should get life sentences, the court was being put into a position to overturn itself, embarrassingly.

Thats where stare decisis comes in. Its the coveted theory that court precedent holds up over time. Rogers was really concerned about precedent. Its a big reason why she could join Palmer this time. She certainly focused most of her questions to Assistant Public Defender Mark Rademacher and Assistant States Attorney Harry Weller on precedents.

The hang-em-high faction, led by Zarella and Espinosa, was framing things from the other side, possibly in attempt to persuade new Justice Richard A. Robinson to come along for the ride to the death chamber.

The state Constitution is very important to the high court. The ornate echo chamber where it sits dates back to 1913. Behind the justices seven chairs is a huge painting by Albert Herter named The Signing of the Fundamental Orders of the Constitution 1638-39. It was the Colonial eras first written constitution. The painting shows a dimly lighted room with Thomas Hooker, Roger Ludlow and John Haynes, whos holding the document.

The court rarely overturns precedent. Rademacher said it never does. Weller talked about a couple cases, including a search-and-seizure case.

Of course, the court was put in this position by the fraidy cats in the General Assembly back in 2012. It was a General Assembly election year and majority Democrats were fighting their inner soft-on-crime selves, so they wrote the law to be prospective, meaning only those convicted of capital murder after the implementation date would spend life in prison.

To add fuel to the fire, on Jan. 27, 2012, Joshua Komisarjevsky was sentenced to death for the horrific Cheshire triple murders of July 2007. Komisarjevskys partner-in-crime, Steven Hayes was convicted and sentenced to death in 2010.

The calls for retribution and vengeance in the General Assembly were loud and long that spring of 2012, heading into the election. Its no surprise that the Legislature punted the issue.

And its no surprise that Palmer (who also wrote the ruling that said another legislative half measure  the states civil union law for same-sex couples  was unconstitutional, setting the table for same-sex marriage) led the majority that said you cant push anybody to the death chamber if you cant execute everybody.

During the trials and the sentencing hearings, capital felons get day passes from prison. Theyre centers of attention. They force the living to look at them and remember the violence. The appeals can go on for years, costing millions of dollars.

According to the Department of Correction, the unDeath Row dwellers are not allowed to tune in on their appellate Court and Supreme Court appeals. Certainly Peeler didnt see the Supremes doing their death dance the other day.

Im hoping the court circles the wagons around stare decisis. Id rather pay the $120 a day to house these animals until they need coffins, rather than putting them to sleep like beloved pets.

You wont hear it, but 11 men will be breathing, behind bars, forgotten until they age out of the prison system and die of natural causes.

Ken Dixons Capitol View appears Sundays in the Hearst Connecticut Newspapers. You may reach him in the Capitol at 860-549-4670 or at kdixon@ctpost.com. Find him at twitter.com/KenDixonCT. His Facebook address is kendixonct.hearst. Dixons Connecticut Blog-o-rama can be seen at blog.ctnews.com/dixon/
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SHELTON  Each one of the 11 shovels leaning against a wall in Mayor Mark Laurettis office represents a ground-breaking success from his 13 terms as mayor.

That represents a lot of heavy lifting, Lauretti said Friday.

And the 12th and 13th shovels may soon be on their way.

On Tuesday night, the Planning and Zoning Commission is expected to give John Guedes final approval to rehab the four-story, former Spongex building on Canal Street into some 60 condos.

Once that gets approved, he can get started, Lauretti said.

And once Guedes finishes that project, he intends to turn the adjacent 1.7-acre Rolfite building into a street-level restaurant and upper-story offices.

Lauretti has no intention of seeing the downtown redevelopment stop there.

Government has to play the role of facilitator as opposed to leader, then a private developer can lead the way, the mayor said.

Lauretti took U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., on a tour Friday of downtown Shelton development as well as the existing brownfield sites, particularly the former Chromium Process factory.

The mayor is hoping to get some additional federal aid in remediating and demolishing the former heavy metal site. But whether the happens, in a tough economic time for the Environmental Protection Agency, is questionable.

The federal budget is tight for the next decade, Murphy said. Its unlikely that EPAs budget is going to triple.

Federal grants for remediation, he said, have been in the hundreds of thousands, not the millions.

Still, Murphy said, the whole country should foot the cleanup bills arising from brownfields in the Northeast.

The whole reason South Carolina, Alabama and Texas get to grow today, economically, is because we grew 100 years ago, he said. But we grew when we didnt know what we were putting in the walls and the ground, so we now have a bill the whole country needs to pay ... because the rest of the country got the benefit of the industrial expansion that happened in the Northeast.

Murphy said he has to be creative to get help turning Connecticuts brownfields into flowing greenbacks.

Im going to introduce legislation that gives tax incentives to developers for remediation, he vowed.

Lauretti and James Ryan, the soon-to-be-retiring president of the Shelton Economic Development Corporation, said Murphy can do a lot in advocating for Shelton and the Valley.

Lauretti said the Senator made a good point when he told you the rest of the country prospered from what Connecticut and New England provided.

The members of Congress and the Senate should watch that show Made in America. Lauretti said ...We made everything on the planet here in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island from military uses, textiles, machines ... the list just goes on and on, and Connecticut was in the forefront of that.

Ryan said Murphy showed he can cross party lines by being a Democrat who came to visit Lauretti, a prominent Republican long-term mayor.

Hes not shy and high profile, Ryan said of Murphy. He obviously can get support.
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Wilton gave the country a couple of very successful women this past year. Immunology researcher Taylor Feehley and actress/comedian Abby Elliott both made the 2016 Forbes 30 Under 30 list.

Feehley, a 26-year-old PhD candidate at the University of Chicago, is making strides in the field of food allergy research.

According to Forbes, she has developed a new way of looking at food allergies that has led to the potential development of a new probiotic that would allow people with food allergies to safely eat those foods.

"I would love to see kids with peanut allergies be able to go to school and eat peanut butter and jelly with their friends," Feehley said.

Being included in Forbes' list was a surprise for Feehley, who received an email letting her know she was anonymously nominated in October, but didn't know she made the list until the morning Forbes released it.

"It was a great surprise to start the new year," she said. "I never expected this; never ever. I'm so honored, and frankly I'm still in shock because it's so meaningful. I love what I do but never thought it would have such a great impact to get me recognized by a publication like Forbes."

While the recognition is a personal feat, Feehley says she's more excited for what it could mean for her filed of study. She hopes it will draw attention to food allergy research and finding a way to end the danger.

"As wonderful as the recognition is, the most important thing to me is to do the most powerful science I can," she said. "I want my research to make it into hospitals and make people happier and healthier."

Feehley, who graduated from the Wilton public school system, was not always interested in the sciences. It wasn't until the end of high school that she decided, to the surprise of people who knew her, that she would specialize in science.

But she says she has much support from her parents, family and mentors, including Dr. Cathrine Nagler at the University of Chicago.

"This is her award as much as mine," Feehley said.

Feehley, who is one of just seven females represented in Forbes' list of 30 Under 30 in science, says being trained by strong women has helped her in a field still dominated by men.

"Soon, we will have more really excellent women to balance out the gender ratio," she said.

Over in Hollywood, Elliott, 28, was raised in Wilton and attended Immaculate High School in Danbury. The daughter of actor Chris Elliott is best known for appearances on "How I Met Your Mother" and "Saturday Night Live," and a starring role in Bravo TV's "Odd Mom Out."

Immaculate High School took a moment to celebrate the alumna's accomplishment on Facebook, posting:

"One of our alumna has just landed a spot on Forbes annual '30 under 30' list. Congratulations to Abby Elliott '05! Abby was involved in fine arts/theater at IHS, playing the leading role in Grease as a senior.

As cited in the Bravo article below, 'Given how often she makes us laugh as Jill's sister-in-law Brooke Von-Weber on 'Odd Mom Out,' we're not in the least surprised that the Saturday Night Live vet is being honored by the publication.' Mustang Pride!"
36 hours in Havana

Submitted by: Juana

Travel and Tourism

Havana

Society

01 / 09 / 2016



Havana is an old city where the old and the modern are in contrast. No other city in Latin America, or perhaps the world, can claim to be having just the kind of moment that Havana is experiencing now after so many decades gasping for change. For visitors, the capital is a mash-up of past and present, freedom and restriction. Havana is no longer frozen in time, at least not completely.



Officially, some limits for Americans remain in place. Despite restored relations with Cuba, tourism is still banned by the embargo. But for those who reach Havana under the 12 categories of legal travel, or without permission, and for the rest of the world, the city is ready to amaze.

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Double murder trial day 4: A star witness for the prosecution backed out in the courtroom

The prosecution case in chief has to change its line up of witnesses when one decides not to take the stand when called to do so Tuesday morning.
As countless people clamour for a recipe they think might bag them a mate, others are starting to wonder: do we need to worry if our partner leaves the house with cookware?

by Samantha Selinger-Morris
Dear Bel

My partner and I (early 40s) have been together almost a year. Our relationship is great, we want to spend the rest of our lives together. He divorced ten years ago  a difficult split, no affair involved, amicable now.

I have met all his family and get on well with his two teenagers and they have said they like me.

The problem is that I want to move in together and, if that goes well, to get married in another year or so. He says he is anxious about both of these aims because of his past and that he doesnt see marriage as important.

I was in a ten-year relationship where I never wanted marriage. Now it feels important  the idea of him being my husband, of us being proud enough of our relationship to want to cement it.

The fact that he still says he feels anxious about marriage or living together makes me insecure. I feel threatened by the relationship he had with the ex he loved enough to marry.

He has to maintain a relationship with her for the children, but I hate him relating their conversations to me.

Last night, he started telling me something and added: I was only saying this to Janet earlier.

Why tell me? I dont want to hear about her any more than I have to. Does he mention her because shes still important  or is this normal?

They speak regularly  most days. It feels too much. She is still Mrs and the mother of his children while Im just Miss Jones, the girlfriend.

I worry he may still love her and thats why hes not fully committing to anyone else.

She is attractive and slim, while I am also slightly overweight. But he tells me Im beautiful, we have great sex and talk all the time.

The only thing we argue about is the above. He says he no longer has feelings for her, that I am the only woman he wants to be with.

But if he did truly love and trust me, he wouldnt fear commitment. I dont want to lose him, but my anxiety about his past casts a cloud over our relationship.

Am I right to feel insecure? Which one of us has the biggest issues with his past, and how do we deal with it?

As I write this, Im crying as I feel so much love and Ive never been so happy  other than I feel threatened by his past.

It feels like he wanted her more than he wants me now. No matter how much the love of my life cares for me, I worry that shes still his ultimate love and thats why he cant commit.

MAGGIE

When you read todays second letter, youll see I remind Melissa that most people carry baggage.

Troublesome family members can be one problem; an attractive and pleasant ex is quite another. Your mention of your weight reveals so much; no matter how often your lover tells you how gorgeous you are and how much he loves you, you are choosing not to listen.

Im sure there is absolutely nothing wrong with your figure, but you are putting his ex-wife on a higher pedestal than he does. In your unedited letter you actually use the word superior to describe her. Unless you tackle your crippling insecurity, this wonderful relationship is in real danger of hitting the rocks.

You ask, Am I right to feel insecure? and suggest that he, too, has issues with his past.

By that you mean that since his marriage ran its course and the split was hard for them both, he has not managed to leave all those complicated feelings behind.

I happen to think this is far more normal than youd suspect  and its certainly how I feel about my ex. When youve spent a large part of your life with somebody, why should that shared history and affection end  especially in a case like this, when there was no dramatic affair, just a falling out of love?

To me, marriages that end in bitterness, recrimination and hostility are the unnatural ones and I think your boyfriend and his ex-wife should be congratulated for maintaining a civilised friendship for their childrens sake.

Im sorry, but I think it perfectly fine for him to talk to her, and when you object to him mentioning her in passing your jealousy sounds unreasonable.

Were he to propose tomorrow, you would certainly feel more confident, and happily plan a wedding and a future. Because he is holding back, you are creating a scenario of enduring passion for his ex-wife which will (if you allow this to continue) damage the happiness you are sharing now. So be careful.

The future you long for can only come about if he feels you are offering him peace, joy, security, enjoyment and love  and he will certainly not feel that way if you continually become huffy (even by a raising of the eyebrows) if he mentions his ex-wife.

I can readily understand why, in your 40s, you long to settle down and be Mrs Somebody.

And if your account of your mutual love is true, I see no reason why that shouldnt happen in time. You have been together for a relatively short time, so why not try to be more patient?

If you try to shackle love with chains, you can stop it flying for ever.

But, in the words of William Blake, if you kiss the joy as it flies you can enjoy lasting happiness. Try to relax into the present moment. If you stop going on about the future, your man might start.

Dear Bel

Ive been with my boyfriend for ten years, we met in school and grew up together. We went to different universities and have now moved in together away from our home town.

Everything is rather idyllic  until I consider his family. My boyfriends uncle and father are very racist. They can also demoralise people around them and I have often been at the end of their wrath.

While I dont normally rise easily to an argument, I have to avoid seeing them on any occasion. My boyfriend defends them at all costs and we often argue over spending time with them because he defends their behaviour.

My boyfriend will often invite them over or not tell me theyre coming to avoid my disdain. I have tried to hold my tongue, but when he forces me into situations with them I often cant hide my dislike  and that erupts into a huge argument.

I know its not his fault, and hes nothing like them, but I hate how he defends them and forces me to see them. I know that this situation is only going to get worse if we get married, but I love him. Do I have to love his family, too?

MELISSA

The short answer is No  but then nothing is that easy, is it? As regular readers know, problems with in-laws are a regular feature of this column  most commonly daughters-in-law at loggerheads with the husbands parents.

Its always sad  especially when the older people feel cut off from their beloved grandchildren  but, as daughters-in-law have smartly pointed out, there are always two sides to an issue.

With that in mind, I wonder what your boyfriends father and uncle say about you? Might they tell each other furiously: She looks down her nose at us? Since you use the word disdain I suspect thats likely.

But I feel sympathy for you. If people regularly express views you find abhorrent and cause conflict as well, then what are you supposed to do? It would take a saint to put up with it  and the said saint might be accused of dishonesty for doing so.

The thing that bothers me is the fact that you are allowing this issue to cause great rows between you and your boyfriend  a situation far from idyllic.

Your relationship began when you were very young and survived the parting at university; therefore, it has a good sound base and should not be thrown away.

But since you are contemplating marriage, both of you need to compromise and work out a way of dealing with his family.

Although it is natural (perhaps) for him to be loyal, surely it should be equally natural to understand the point of view of the woman he loves. After all, as a couple you are already a new family, and all youve shared equally deserves loyalty.

I dont think he should have to choose between you and his father; on the other hand, he must not ignore your feelings.

Its unwise of him to invite them to visit behind your back, but it is also unwise of you to be open with your disdain.

I dont see why you should have to listen to racist comments (Id loathe that, too) but since you cant change the attitude, then why not leave the room to (say) put the kettle on.

All of us have to realise that if you are sharing your life with another human being, you have to accept that most come with baggage of some description. A relationship will only succeed if compromises are made.

You dont mention your boyfriends mother or any other family members. If you have no serious objection to them, why not put yourself in charge of the visits by extending the invitations  so that the two men you dislike are diluted?

If that wont work, you must sit down with your boyfriend and discuss a way forward. Dont use an accusatory tone, but ask him gently if he can see why the things these men say upset you so much.

Ask him if he is hurt by your rejection of them, and therefore defends them more than he should.

Tell him how important it is to work out a way of coping with no damaging rows  and no dishonest surprise visits, either.

You dont say how far away they live, but it might be an idea for your boyfriend to visit them rather than the other way around.

And then, when you do have to be in the same room, Im sorry but you just have to fix a smile on your face and put in a performance of being bright and breezy  if you love him enough to control your feelings.

And finally: Bitter? No, I am simply realistic

Such an interesting email arrived on January 2 from Mark Oliver, taking me to task in the most gentle and intelligent way.

Mark said very many kind things about my column, then went on to make this point: In recent years I have noticed a change in the tenor of your responses, an increasing undertone, unless I am mistaken, of anger and odium, of bitterness, of world-weary misanthropy.

The change is illustrated in a response you gave (December 26) in which you stated that the world is filled with vile people. You described one woman as a horrible b**** and spoke of your disillusionment, of your shattered optimism.

TROUBLED? WRITE TO BEL... Bel answers readers questions on emotional and relationship problems each week. Write to: Bel Mooney, Daily Mail, 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TT, or e-mail bel.mooney@dailymail.co.uk. A pseudonym will be used if you wish. Bel reads all letters, but regrets she cannot enter into personal correspondence. Advertisement

Is humanity so vile, Bel? Is the idea that there are no bad people, only badly loved people, mere sentimentality?

This point is well-made and worth considering. The response referred to was to a man who celebrated his 30th wedding anniversary on Facebook, only to be trolled by a woman who said his wife had been a trollop in the past. Mark is correct to say that I did confess to a feeling of disillusionment, due to the nastiness of online comment and social media.

So I stand guilty as charged  sort of. But Mr Oliver overstates his case! World-weariness is sometimes about right, but I dont feel misanthropy. Not hating my fellow men and women, I am nevertheless simply realistic.

Every day the news brings stories of cruelty and abuse at home and abroad, so I disagree that there are no bad people. Sentimentality or wishful thinking? Both, I reckon.

In a subsequent email, Mark elaborated: Perhaps my message says that to understand is to forgive, that those who need our love most are those who appear to deserve it least.

I have the idea that deep down we are all enlightened. But enlightenment is difficult. Much easier to point the finger.
Taking a child to nursery school for the first time is a rite of passage for any young mother. Letting go of that little hand and sending them off into a room full of strangers can seem a daunting step.

It was no different for Kate, waving off Prince George this week as he started at his Montessori school near their Norfolk home.

Its the latest part of her attempt to give him and baby Charlotte as normal an upbringing as possible  a plan which is to be commended, however impossible it may be.

Kate Middleton waved Prince George this week as he started at his Montessori school near their Norfolk home, in the latest part of her attempt to give him and baby Charlotte as normal an upbringing as possible

I have not always been a fan of Kate, but it is increasingly clear she could teach other celebrity mums a thing or two about raising children.

Yes, we think its all so easy for them. They have money, servants, nannies  everything to make life easy. But growing up in a goldfish bowl must, at times, be a living nightmare. And most end up raising obnoxious, over-privileged brats.

Certainly, too many of them seem incapable of offering the stable, disciplined existence that is surely key to raising a well-adjusted child.

There is Angelina Jolie and her rainbow brood, traipsing around the world in private jets with a troupe of nannies in tow.

There is Victoria Beckhams tribe, as much an accessory to her fashion career as her collection of Hermes handbags. There are Gwyneth Paltrows kids, raised on mung beans and self-styled sanctimony; or Kate Winslet and her three children by three different fathers.

I dont doubt that each woman loves her offspring dearly  but I do fear for the longer-term effects of their unorthodox parenting.

For proof of that, we need look no further than Madonnas 15-year-old son, Rocco, who refused to return home to his control-freak mother in New York at Christmas. He preferred the anonymity of dad Guy Ritchies traditional family home to the madness of life on tour with the mistress of pop. And who can blame him?

So I salute Kate and William for their bid to give their youngsters some sense of normality. Some have criticised them for retreating from public life. It is true that last year the Cambridges did fewer royal engagements than 94-year-old Prince Philip.

But the longer their children are allowed to grow up away from the spotlight the better  not just for their sakes, but for the future of the monarchy. And if that means seeing less of Kate and William, then its surely a price worth paying.

True talent is ageless, Dakota

Fifty Shades Of Grey actress Dakota Johnson is outraged that her mother Melanie Griffith can no longer find work in a Hollywood that is, she claims, ageist and sexist.

Curious. The likes of Helen Mirren, Judi Dench, and Maggie Smith have never been busier.

Perhaps Dakota should realise the secret to an enduring career isnt endless plastic surgery like her mothers, but talent.

Fifty Shades Of Grey actress Dakota Johnson is outraged that her mother Melanie Griffith can no longer find work in a Hollywood that is, she claims, ageist and sexist

After Prince Andrew visited the devastation in York, comedian Stephen Mangan tweeted: Cant imagine anything worse after being flooded than Prince Andrew turning up. I can. It could have been Fergie.

Having been away for two weeks, Id missed social media sensations Suki and Immy Waterhouse and their sisterly selfies. But Im puzzled by the picture of them on the beach in tiny bikinis  taken from behind. How do you take a selfie from behind? Is there some remote, rear selfie stick I havent heard about?

Or is the latest accessory your own bottom-snapper?

Im puzzled by the picture of them on the beach in tiny bikinis  taken from behind. How do you take a selfie from behind?

Oh do put a cork in it!

Irritating to hear the Chief Medical Officer, Sally Davies, on Radio 4s Today programme telling us that drinking anything except a sip of communion wine will increase the risk of cancer and lead to an early death.

Nanny Dame Daviess advice on alcohol seems not targeted at sensible drinkers, but the Paul Gascoignes of this world.

Still, listening to her certainly had an impact on me  I wanted a stiff gin and tonic at 8am.

Hilarious that production of the BBCs new Top Gear has been held up because new star Chris Evans cant drive and talk at the same time. Try finding a woman who doesnt!

Adele loved the beaded Burberry dress she wore for the Oscars so much that shes revealed shes had a custom-built glass cabinet made in her home to display it. As you do. Would this be the same Adele who insists fame hasnt changed her?

Westminster Wars

Comrade Corbyn has just completed the longest and most humiliating reshuffle in history. One result? He installed as his new shadow defence secretary Emily Thornberry  who supports his anti-Trident stance. This, in the very week North Koreas demented dictator Kim Jong-un claims to have set off a hydrogen bomb. Makes you worry when Kim seems the saner of the two.

I know panto seasons nearly over, but the Simon Danczuk farce is getting ridiculous. Who needs the Ugly Sisters when youve got one ex-wife who worked as an escort but claims youre the sex pest, another whos addicted to bosomy selfies and a girlfriend whos spilled the beans about you texting a 17-year-old dominatrix who sells her toenails online? The poor man shouldnt be deselected, he should be certified  if only to protect him from this hideous harem of harpies.

Strictly Come Dancings husband-hoover Kristina Rihanoff is reported to have been paid 150,000 to appear on Celebrity Big Brother. Fresh into the madhouse, she revealed to millions that she is three months pregnant with lover Ben Cohens baby.

I didnt know how to break it, she simpered, what to say, when to say, I wanted everyone to hear.

Not least of all Bens wife of 11 years, Abby, and their two young daughters.

What a monster.

The only solace for Abby Cohen is that, in the inimitable words of Strictly judge Craig Revel Horwood, the union will no doubt in the lng run prove a complete dis-ast-er, darling.

Strictly Come Dancings husband-hoover Kristina Rihanoff is reported to have been paid 150,000 to appear on Celebrity Big Brother. Fresh into the madhouse, she revealed to millions that she is three months pregnant with lover Ben Cohens baby

Abuse is vile in any language

The PC brigade say we must be very careful with the language we use when discussing the mugging and sexual abuse of German women in Cologne by around a thousand mostly Muslim men on New Years Eve.

More than a hundred women have made complaints to the police, two for rape. Yet we are expected to turn a blind eye to the background: that nearly a million new migrants have entered Germany in the past nine months alone, mostly young Muslim men from a culture that subjugates women.

Why should we be very careful about our language? Whether it be in Arabic or English  a rapist is a rapist.

For some unfathomable reason, Stephen Fry is now greeting tourists when they arrive at Heathrow with a guide to British etiquette on the airport video screens.

This ridiculous parody of an Englishman explains that we all love queuing, eating in pubs, are obsessed with the weather and have a famous Queen.

I wonder if he means Elizabeth?

Elton's Little lookalike

Elton John once said he wanted Justin Timberlake to play him in the biopic of his life. Looking at those pictures of him over Christmas, being pushed around in a wheelchair at Disneyland, Id say Little Britains Matt Lucas would be more suitable casting.

Elton John is in danger of having Little Britain's Matt Lucas play him in the biopic of his life, after being pushed around Disneyland in a wheelchair over Christmas

How M&S messed up

The boss of Marks & Spencer is to depart after a disastrous festive season for their fashion department. As an M&S devotee, I can tell you how they got it so wrong.

The fabulous designs we wanted, such as the much-heralded olive suede trench coat, were sold out before they had even hit the shops.
Today, freedom of speech in British universities is under heavier assault than ever before, says human rights activist Maryam Namazie (pictured)

This week marked the first anniversary of the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris.

The atrocity was a brutal attack not just on human life but also on the principle of free speech, one of the pillars of human civilisation. In the aftermath of the killings, people across the world united to express their support for that essential liberty.

Yet today, freedom of speech in British universities is under heavier assault than ever before.

In this case, the weapon of destruction is not the barrel of a gun but the proclaimed desire to maintain student safety by turning university campuses into safe spaces where students will be shielded from anything they might find offensive.

Within our society, there should of course be safe spaces  such as womens refuges  for victims of violence, discrimination and abuse. But it is wrong to hijack this concept as a means of stifling open debate within the higher education system.

By their very nature, universities should be unsafe spaces where orthodoxies are challenged and opinions questioned. Why go to university at all if you feel you have to be protected from views you dislike? That is a recipe for intellectual paralysis. Indeed, most human progress stems from a willingness to embrace unsafe or offensive ideas.

Moreover, what is considered offensive or hate speech is highly subjective. All too often the limits of speech are set by those with the loudest voices or the most political influence, like religious bodies or student unions or the state authorities. Once the limits are set, its a slippery slope. Limiting free speech silences and censors dissenting voices which most need to be heard.

That has certainly been my recent experience of British university life. I am an Iranian-born ex-Muslim woman who campaigns against Islamism and is critical of all religions, including Islam.

The central theme of my work is the promotion of equality, secularism and universal rights for all, including ex-Muslims, Muslims and migrants.

This week marked the first anniversary of the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris. The atrocity was a brutal attack not just on human life but also on the principle of free speech, one of the pillars of human civilisation

Despite my progressive outlook, my opposition to Islamism has led to regular attempts to silence me through so-called safe space policies. To the safe space brigade, I must be ostracised because of my supposedly offensive stance on Islam, even though I am the target of frequent abuse and even death threats.

In one recent example of this trend, the Islamic society at Goldsmiths University in south London tried to get my talk to the students Atheist Society cancelled on the grounds that I would violate their safe space policy by inciting hatred and bigotry. When this attempt to gag me failed, the Islamic Society president and its brothers sought to create a mood of fear and intimidation at my talk.

It was the same story at Warwick University in October, when the student union tried to bar my talk to the Warwick Atheists, Secularists and Humanists Society (WASH) because I am, apparently highly inflammatory and could incite hatred on campus. Fortunately, the student unions decision provoked a wave of protests, and my visit was able to go ahead.

By their very nature, universities should be unsafe spaces where orthodoxies are challenged and opinions questioned. Why go to university at all if you feel you have to be protected from views you dislike? Maryam Namazie, human rights activist

But these two cases show very clearly how safe space policies are being used to silence critics by promoting the Islamist narrative, which conflates criticism of Islam and Islamism with bigotry against Muslims.

The Goldsmiths Islamic Societys approach is all the more absurd given that it has invited speakers who defend jihad and the death penalty for apostates.

In the fashionable tale of victimhood cultivated by Islamic Society leaders and their Student Union allies, there is a deeply patronising view of Muslim students as a single, homogeneous body with one regressive mindset. But this is completely false.

During my talk at Goldsmiths, Muslim women and migrants of Muslim background spoke up against the aggressive behaviour of the Islamic Society members.

I have also received letters from other Muslims at the talk who agreed with me, but felt too intimidated to act. So when student unions side with Islamic societies against people like myself, they are not protecting Muslims against bigotry, but siding with Islamists.

In their campaign to stifle free speech, the safe space ideologues seek to equate offensive speech with real harm. But their argument could hardly be more hollow. The expression of ideas, even if offensive and hurtful, is not the same as causing mental or physical injury.

Thats not to say that hate speech doesnt exist. Groups like Britain First express hatred against migrants, Muslims and apostates every day. But you cant stop hate speech by stifling free expression. Free expression is vital for any society. And it is not free unless it is free for everyone, including those whose views are deemed distasteful and even hateful, as long as they are not inciting violence.

What we need is not more restrictions on free speech, but the opposite.
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Princess Mary has released an adorable photograph of her twins, Prince Vincent and Princess Josephine, cuddling a koala during the family's Christmas holiday to Australia to mark the siblings' fifth birthday.

The Crown Princess of Denmark stepped behind the camera for the holiday picture and also captured two individual portraits of the young royals leaning against a tree in a forest to commemorate their birthdays.

As the youngest children to Prince Frederik and Princess Mary, the twins are used to being the centre of attention and all eyes were on the pair again on Friday as they celebrated their birthdays at home.

In one of their birthday portraits the twins were seen posing together alongside a koala - a clear nod to Princess Mary's Australian roots.

Princess Mary has released an adorable photograph of her twins, Prince Vincent and Princess Josephine, cuddling a koala during the family's Christmas holiday to Australia to mark the siblings' fifth birthday

The Crown Princess of Denmark stepped behind the camera for the holiday picture and also captured two individual portraits of the young royals leaning against a tree in a forest to commemorate their birthdays

Wearing a grey jacket and striped jumper, Prince Vincent can be seen leaning against a tree in the portrait, which is believed to have been taken in Denmark

Wearing a bright blue cap over his blond locks, Prince Vincent can be seen staring intently at the camera as he stands next to his sister with the small koala nestling in-between them for the official photograph.

Princess Josephine looks her usual sweet self in a bright pink and yellow straw hat and an orange-print dress. The photograph could have been taken at the Bonorong Park Wildlife Centre  a sanctuary in Tasmania that the royals have visited on previous years.

The royal family arrived back in Denmark just before New Year's Eve following a fun-filled trip to Australia with stops in Perth, Byron Bay and the Gold Coast, where the twins' 10-year-old brother, Prince Christian, was rescued by a lifeguard after getting caught in a rip.

The twins were born on 8 January 2011 at Copenhagens Rigshospital with Prince Frederik entering the world 26 minutes earlier than his sister.

Their birth was marked with 21-gun salute as Prince Frederik fronted national and international press to announce their arrival.

The twins' grandparents Queen Margrethe II and Henrik, the Prince Consort and their young cousins, Prince Joachim's children, are all believed to have joined together for the fifth birthday celebrations.

Princess Mary's twins Princess Josephine and Prince Vincent turned five on Friday (two-year-old twins pictured at Grasten Castle in 2013)

The young Danish royals are used to being the centre of attention, pictured at seven-months on board the royal yacht

They are often pictured together playing, eating ice cream or on royal duties with the family (pictured: twins, then four, eat yoghurt in April 2015 on Denmark's Organic Day)

Princess Mary and Prince Frederik welcomed the twins on January 8, 2011 at Copenhagen University Hospital (pictured at 10 months old in Sydney)

The other two photographs taken of the twins look as though they may have been taken in Denmark.

Princess Josephine can be seen leaning against a tree wearing a quilted gilet and brown winter jacket over the top to protect her from the cold.

Her twin brother adopted a similar pose for his portrait and also donned winter clothes for the snap, wearing a grey jacket and striped jumper.

Vincent and Josephine have grown up in the public eye alongside their elder siblings Prince Christian, 10, and Princess Isabella, eight.

On April 14, 2011 the twins were photographed with their parents at the chapel of the Church of Holmen on the day of their christening.

Princess Mary wore a royal blue dress and white floral headpiece for the occasion, where the twins' full names were announced: Josephine Sophia Ivalo Mathilda and Vincent Frederik Minik Alexander.

Prince Vincent was born 26 minutes before his sister Princess Josephine, pictured at 13 months old in Switzerland

Special occasion: They will celebrate their birthday with a party at home with extended family and the release of a photo

The twins were christened on April 14, 2011 and their full names - Josephine Sophia Ivalo Mathilda and Vincent Frederik Minik Alexander - were announced

The twins have taken part in royal duties over the years including cutting a ribbon for Denmark's Organic Day in April 2015 and taking part in a tree planting on the family's royal visit to Greenland.

Photos taken over the years show the twins share more than matching blonde hair and blue eyes.

They are often seen playing in the snow or eating ice cream together and standing side by side on family outings.

The young prince and princess have grown into their personalities with Josephine often pictured pulling funny faces.

During the family's annual Hubertus Hunting event last year the cheeky princess could be seen from the Eremitage Castle balcony pulling a series of hilarious poses, with Vincent often joining in on the fun.

In July 2015 Josephine broke her arm in a horse riding lesson and was later seen sporting a blue cast.

In November 2011 the twins accompanied their parents on an official visit to Australia, here they are pictured at Admiralty House at 10 months old

Princess Josephine, then four, was left with a blue cast after she broke her arm falling off a horse in 2015

Then three-year-old Vincent and Josephine played in the snow with their mother on a skiing holiday to Switzerland in 2014

Princess Mary, Prince Frederik and their then three-year-old twins attend the annual summer photo call for the Royal Danish Family at Grasten Castle in 2013

The twins joined their elder sister Princess Isabella to cut a ribbon at Denmark's Organic Day in April 2015

The then three-year-old twins visited the Danish royal residence Chateau de Cayx for a photo shoot in June 2015
A passionate advocate for a fairer world, young Lara Casalotti's life is now being threatened by her own diverse heritage.

The 24-year-old has always embraced diversity  she speaks five languages, studies global migration, volunteers with at-risk youth and marginalised groups, and has worked at the UN and Human Rights Watch.

But now it is Lara who is in need of help.

She is battling acute myeloid leukaemia, and is in desperate need of a life-saving bone marrow transplant, prompting her family to launch a worldwide appeal for help.

Being mixed race - half Thai and half Italian - means finding a bone marrow donor is that much harder.

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Lara Casalotti, 24, from London, is facing a race against time to find a bone marrow donor after being diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia at the beginning of December

The yoga fanatic thought she had pulled a muscle in her back and was suffering a shortness of breath, but not realising the severity of the situation, travelled to Thailand to help work on a project with migrant workers

Her only brother was told last week that he is not a match.

Just 0.5 per cent of people on the Anthony Nolan donation register in the UK are from East Asian backgrounds, while 1.5 per cent have European heritage.

And this shortage of ethnic minority donors is mirrored across registers the world over.

The result is that just 20 per cent of people from black, asian, minority ethnic backgrounds who need a stem cell transplant will find a perfect match.

Lara's family, who live in Hampstead, London, have now launched an international campaign, not only to find a match for Lara, but to raise awareness in a bid to help other blood cancer patients from ethnic minorities who are desperate for a life-saving donation.

The 'Match4Lara' Facebook page has already seen more than 3,300 people 'like' the page and a spike in donor sign ups as a result.

Lara said: 'All my friends and family have been amazingly supportive from the very beginning.

'It was a shame to find out that my brother wasn't a match but in no time my family had got the donor appeal up and running.

'It is quite surreal how fast the message has spread and keeps spreading.

'I really can't express how grateful and touched I am by everyone who has helped raise awareness and has signed up to bone marrow registries in response to the campaign.

'Thank you all so much.'

Lara's brother Seb, a 20-year-old medical student at Cambridge, said: 'Lara's in good spirits despite being in pain, feeling nauseous and her hair falling out.

'She's such an amazingly strong person, always fighting for others, and this is just another challenge for her.

While she was in Thailand her pain became worse and her Thai aunt insisted she see a doctor. Tests revealed she was suffering blood cancer. Doctors said she now needs a bone marrow transplant, but her brother Seb, pictured right, discovered last week he is not a match

Due to the fact Lara is half Thai, half Italian, finding a donor is much harder. There is a worldwide shortage of donors from ethnic minorities, prompting her family - her brother and parents, pictured - to launch a worldwide campaign to find Lara a donor, but also to urge people to sign global bone marrow donation registers

'She wants to turn this into something positive for other people who are struggling to find donors, by getting more people from mixed race and ethnic minority backgrounds to join a stem cell donor register.'

Lara, who volunteers for the DOST Centre for Young Refugees in London among other charities, was diagnosed with blood cancer only last month, while working in Thailand.

'It all happened really quickly,' said Seb. 'Just a few months ago, Lara and I were travelling in India together and when we got back, she was excited to work on her Masters.

Lara is currently being treated at University College Hospital in London, where she is receiving a combination of three chemotherapies

'She was fit and healthy, loving her yoga and had endless energy for her charitable work with refugees.

'She was doing amazing things with her life.'

In early December, Lara thought she'd pulled a muscle in her back, and was getting a bit out of breath on short runs.

Not realising anything was seriously wrong, she flew out to Thailand where she was working with a professor from Oxford on conditions for domestic migrant workers.

'While she was there the pain she'd been having down one side of her body suddenly switched to the other side. That's when she started to get worried,' said Seb.

'Our aunt, who lives in Thailand, insisted Lara saw a doctor.

'She was given a blood test and, to everyone's immense shock, discovered she had leukaemia.

'We flew out to see her straight away and then all came home together a few days later. We spent Christmas in hospital as a family.'

Lara, who is being treated at London's University College Hospital, was put on a combination of three chemotherapies and told she needed a stem cell transplant.

But first she must find a donor.

Seb said: 'Strangely, I'd joined the Anthony Nolan register just a few months before at a donor recruitment drive at my college.

'At the time, it just felt like a no-brainer; I spat into a tube and that was that, not realising that a few months later my sister's life would depend on other people doing the same thing.

'I remember being told by the volunteers that people from mixed race and ethnic minority backgrounds were underrepresented on the register.

'So when we were told that Lara needed a donor, I knew that she'd find it harder to find a match due to our diverse background.

Lara's family spent Christmas in hospital by her side, as they waited for news on whether Seb was a match

Seb said: 'She's (Lara) such an amazingly strong person, always fighting for others, and this is just another challenge for her. She wants to turn this into something positive for other people who are struggling to find donors, by getting more people from mixed race and ethnic minority backgrounds to join a donor register'

'But I was shocked to find out there was only a one in four chance of me, as her brother, being a match for Lara.

'It's ironic because I think most people would say they'd donate stem cells for a loved one, but wouldn't do it just for any old person.

'But more often than not, you can't actually help your family  so we've got to think as a community.

'Everyone needs to sign up to Anthony Nolan and help someone else.

She (Lara) wants to turn this into something positive for other people who are struggling to find donors, by getting more people from mixed race and ethnic minority backgrounds to join a stem cell donor register Seb Casalotti, Lara's brother

'There's no room for the attitude of only helping your own, otherwise most people would never find a donor.'

Despite hoping for the best, Seb was told this week that he was not a match.

And so now, the blood cancer charity Anthony Nolan is now searching the world's combined registries for someone whose tissue type matches Lara's.

Ann O'Leary, head of register development at Anthony Nolan, said: 'Lara is a truly inspirational and selfless young woman, and somewhere out there, there's a potential lifesaver who could give her a lifeline by donating their stem cells.

'What many people don't realise is how easy it is to join the Anthony Nolan register  it simply involves filling in a form and providing a saliva sample.

'If you're one of the privileged few who goes onto donate, 90 per cent of the time this will now take place via an outpatient appointment which is similar to donating blood.'

Lara needs to have a transplant soon, so the family have started an urgent appeal to boost donor sign-ups worldwide.

'We have a big bunch of 11 cousins, living all over the world, from America to Thailand and Tanzania, and we're all very close  but it's Lara who is the glue that keeps everyone together, making sure we all stay in touch regularly,' said Seb.

The 24-year-old has always embraced diversity  she speaks five languages, studies global migration, volunteers with at-risk youth and marginalised groups, and has worked at the UN and Human Rights Watch

Lara's brother, Seb added: 'It's all a bit embarrassing for Lara as she's very humble and hates being the centre of attention. But she knows how important this is, and what a difference it could make for anyone who is mixed race and looking for a donor.' He urged people to waste no time, and sign a register today

'Now all the cousins are springing into action to start a global campaign for Lara.

'We're all pitching in, wherever we are in the world - from building a website to contacting universities.

'We're doing big pushes in America and Thailand, as well as the UK, to bust the myth that donation is painful and get more people signing up.

'It's all a bit embarrassing for Lara as she's very humble and hates being the centre of attention; she hardly even uses social media apart from posting about refugee issues.

'But she knows how important this is, and what a difference it could make for anyone who is mixed race and looking for a donor.'

Seb added an urgent message: 'Anyone joining the register is obviously great at any time.

'It takes time for the labs to test your tissue type and add you to the register.

'There's no time to put this off or think "I'll do it next week". That could be too late for Lara. Please do it today.'
A ground-breaking treatment is giving hope to the families of children suffering from a rare and deadly brain tumour.

No child has ever survived diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG), with most dying within a few months of diagnosis after suffering rapidly worsening symptoms of sight and speech loss, then paralysis.

But there is new hope in an innovative technique that delivers drugs directly to the tumour, rather than intravenously, using micro-catheters  tiny tubes  placed surgically into the brain.

Ground-breaking: The new technique delivers drugs directly to the tumour. Pictured, how the treatment works

This method bypasses the membrane wall known as the blood-brain barrier, which stops intravenous drugs passing from the bloodstream.

And targeting the tumour directly without damaging healthy cells means there is a reduced risk of side effects such as hair loss and nausea.

But at 35,000 a time, the operation does not come cheap. Neurosurgeon Professor Steven Gill, of the Bristol Royal Hospital for Children, who is using the technique, is relying on the generosity of the public to fund a clinical trial.

A charity, Funding Neuro, has raised 680,000 of a 900,000 online target for the trial  with 300,000 being given by a single mystery donor in September.

The push has been backed by pop star Emeli Sande, who performed at a gala event to further boost the coffers.

One of Prof Gills first trialists was five-year-old Gughi Grasselini, who has been given a second chance at his childhood thanks to the procedure.

Once unable to walk and given just weeks to live, Italian-born Gughis tumour has shrunk dramatically since treatment began, and he is walking again. Though weak, he is even well enough to go swimming.

Brain cancer is notoriously under-funded compared with other cancers. Figures from charity Brain Tumour Research reveal that of the 4.5 billion spent on UK cancer research from 2002 to 2012, just 35 million  less than one per cent  was spent on brain tumour research.

Sue Farrington Smith, chief executive of Brain Tumour Research, lost her seven-year-old niece Alison to DIPG in 2001.

Brain-tumour research is currently about 20 years behind other cancers, she says. The fact that we simply dont know what causes brain tumours is shocking.

Research relies heavily on the generosity of the general public. So its not surprising charities such as Funding Neuro are resorting to crowd-funding methods to raise funds for such an important trial.

About 40 UK children are diagnosed with DIPG brain tumours every year. It is the most horrendous death, says Funding Neuro chief executive Sharon Kane.

Keira Wrenn, of Lincolnshire, pictured, was the first British child to use the ground-breaking tumour treatment

They are trapped inside their bodies, but completely aware of everything that is happening to them.

Until now, radiotherapy, which shrinks the tumour temporarily, has been the only treatment available. Chemotherapy is ineffective due to the blood-brain barrier.

Prof Gill and his team will be using the pioneering system called convection enhanced delivery (CED), and the trial will involve 18 children.

First, the child has a detailed MRI scan of the brain to make a model of the tumour and plan where to position the tubes to deliver the chemotherapy.

Then, under general anaesthetic, an incision is made in the scalp and tiny 1mm-wide plastic guide tubes are implanted by a neurosurgical robot.

The treatment tubes are fed through these and connected to a titanium port the size of a small button inserted into the skull behind an ear. The port acts as an entry for drugs to be administered.

The technique uses the blood-brain barrier to the doctors advantage, as it also serves to keep the drug in the brain.

Procedure: Keira, seven, pictured in hospital, went through a 13-hour operation during the treatment in October

The drugs do not get into the blood system so you dont get any of the side-effects you might associate with chemotherapy such as hair loss and nausea, and it carries on working for several weeks, says Prof Gill.

Operations carried out so far have been funded through charitable support and royalties from Prof Gills surgeries.

Keira Wrenn, a seven-year-old from Lincolnshire, is the first UK child to have the treatment. She was diagnosed with a DIPG tumour in August 2014 after she collapsed while swimming on holiday.

Radiotherapy shrank her tumour to half the size, but Keira remained terminally ill.

Her parents read about Prof Gills work online and asked that she be considered for the innovative treatment.

Keira underwent a 13-hour operation to fit the port and administer the chemotherapy drugs in October, and now has chemotherapy every six weeks.

Its still very early days, but we have hope now while before we had none, says her mother Emma, 31.
With Benedict Cumberbatch bringing Richard III to TV and even Ed Sheeran being measured up for a tabard, the Middle Ages are back with a vengeance  and leading the charge is Dan Joness epic Wars of the Roses drama-doc

Condensing the real history of the Wars of the Roses into four hours of TV is not easy. The 30-year conflict raged from the 1450s to the 1480s and involved dozens of noble families

Rain has been slashing sideways against the forbidding walls of Bamburgh Castle for about seven hours.

Were all tired, wet, cold and hungry and tempers are starting to fray.

To lighten the mood the cameraman pretends to run over the director in his van. It was meant as a joke, but he very nearly succeeds, and now everyone is at boiling point.

Our expensive camera is malfunctioning and when the filming kit works, my brain doesnt.

The effort of condensing the lethal politics of medieval Northumberland into pithy 20-second TV soundbites is suddenly taking its toll.

This is the first day of filming my new medieval TV series, Britains Bloody Crown, and Ive begun to wonder whether battling it out in the real Middle Ages mightnt have been more comfortable. What the hell are we doing to ourselves?

The answer is actually quite simple. Last spring I was asked to adapt for the screen my best-selling book The Hollow Crown: The Wars Of The Roses And The Rise Of The Tudors, which tells the story of one of the most devastating conflicts in British history  a series of wars that tore the nation apart in the late Middle Ages.

Britains Bloody Crown tells the story of Richard III (Darren Bransford), Edward IV (Tom Durant-Pritchard) and the Earl of Warwick (James Oliver Wheatley)

The aim was to make four films that, while true to fact, blended documentary and drama with the same kind of sizzling, sexy, gory intensity that we see in big-budget series like Game Of Thrones  HBOs epic fantasy history set in an alternative Dark Ages, where the Wars of the Roses are mashed up with dungeons, dragons and a disconcertingly large amount of full-frontal nudity.

Just like Game Of Thrones, I wanted to deliver sharp and punchy storytelling, focusing intensely on human relationships to explain high politics.

Above everything else, I wanted the shows to demonstrate my belief that history  when well told  beats the pants off any work of fiction.

Theres certainly been no better time to do that. In TV terms, the Middle Ages are hot. In fact, theyre everywhere.

George RR Martin, the original mind behind Game Of Thrones, drew his inspiration from 15th-century England.

The BBC has had huge success with The White Queen, based on Philippa Gregorys historical novel, and more recently with an adaptation of Bernard Cornwells Last Kingdom, set in Anglo-Saxon times.

Later this year BBC2 will screen four dramatisations of the Shakespeare history plays, featuring Benedict Cumberbatch as his own distant relative, Richard III.

Just like Game Of Thrones, I wanted to deliver sharp and punchy storytelling, focusing intensely on human relationships to explain high politics (pictured Edward IV with his Queen, Elizabeth Woodville)

Even pop star Ed Sheeran is in on the act, appearing in The Bastard Executioner, set in 14th-century Wales.

Yet condensing the real history of the Wars of the Roses into four hours of TV is not easy.

The 30-year conflict, which raged from the 1450s to the 1480s, involved dozens of noble families  mostly allying themselves with rival branches of the Plantagenet dynasty, known as the houses of Lancaster and York  and numerous abrupt shifts in power.

That means the period is notoriously hard to explain without dissolving into long digressions on aristocratic feuding across many generations, where everyone has the same name (usually Henry, Edward, Richard, Margaret or Elizabeth) and they all change their loyalties more frequently than their underwear.

My producers and I decided to make a series of interlocking but stand-alone drama-documentaries, telling four of the greatest tales of the age.

During filming we were given the run of Britains greatest buildings  the Tower of London, Westminster Abbey, York Minster  usually shooting at dawn, when everything was still and silent.

We also visited some rather more poignant locations  including the bleak field where the Battle of Towton took place in a blizzard in 1461 and where 28,000 men were reported to have died on a single day, their blood running in thick streams across the frozen ground.

These documentary sequences, blended with drama shot in studios in Bucharest, Romania, combine to bring four of the most exciting episodes in the Middle Ages roaring to life.

1. THE MAD KING

The first episode reveals the origins of the Wars of the Roses  a poisonous feud between the kings cousin, Richard Duke of York (played by Steffan Boje), and the kings wife, Margaret of Anjou

The first episode reveals the origins of the Wars of the Roses  a poisonous feud between the kings cousin, Richard Duke of York, and the kings wife, Margaret of Anjou, Shakespeares she-wolf of France.

The episode starts with a bang. Or rather, an ominous bang-bang-bang  the sound of a mallet pounding a wooden stake into Dover Beach, before the severed head of the kings leading adviser, the Duke of Suffolk, is roughly impaled upon it.

In the ensuing battle between Richard and Queen Margaret we see them vying to replace poor, butchered Suffolk  both acutely aware that seeking the highest power in 15th-century England was to accept almost certain destruction.

The notion pulses constantly through the programme, even as the horse-hooves thunder and the splatter count rises.

2. THE KINGMAKER MUST DIE

Here we chart the catastrophic disintegration of relations between King Edward IV and the man who put him on the throne, Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick  better known as Warwick the Kingmaker.

How can a man call himself a true king, I ask, when he is beholden to one of his subjects? The answer is in the shows title.

Spoiler alert? Well, maybe. But I guarantee you will enjoy finding out how and why  while the ladies might appreciate the hunk factor of the uber-rugged and very beardy James Oliver Wheatley, who plays Warwick.

3. THE PRINCES MUST DIE

The most controversial film in the series tackles the infamous disappearance of the Princes in the Tower (pictured: Edward V played by Alexandru Fainsi)

The most controversial film in the series, tackling the infamous disappearance of the Princes in the Tower.

Richard IIIs nephews (Richard and Edward V) were removed from power and disappeared while under their uncles protection in the Tower of London in 1483  for years historians have argued about how much culpability Richard bore for their presumed deaths.

The film is raw, and occasionally painful, as I try to show just how a man like Richard  with his record for loyalty, bravery, talent and nobility  came to preside over one of the most heinous crimes of the Middle Ages. The answer is subtler than we often hear.

I do not accept the monstrous Shakespearean hunchbacked caricature of Richard, though neither do I spare him the condemnation he deserves.

Its an interesting look at the traps, and agonies, of power in the Middle Ages (though I expect the usual bags of letters written in green ink from diehard Ricardians who wont admit their hero had any flaws, let alone ordered murder).

4. A MOTHERS LOVE

In many ways Im proudest of the final episode of the series, which charts the last gasps of the Wars of the Roses and the amazing rise of the Tudors through new eyes.

Our hero, in fact a heroine, is Margaret Beaufort, who gave birth to Henry Tudor (played by Gabriel Zaharia) when she was just 13 years of age, in a lonely castle in plague-ridden west Wales.

She ended her life having established the royal dynasty that produced Henry VIII  not bad for a single, teenage mum.

This is a tale of survival, courage and maternal love but also a serious examination of the limits (or not) of female power 500 years ago.

The experience of creating these films has taken me across the country and deep into our troubled past.

This is the Wars of the Roses reborn, as Ive always wanted to show it. I hope you enjoy the ride.

MEET THE MAIN PLAYERS

THE POWER BROKER

Warwick the Kingmaker (James Oliver Wheatley)

Warwick, or Richard Neville, was one of the wealthiest and most powerful peers of his age, gaining his kingmaker epithet after switching sides in the Wars of the Roses and overthrowing two kings. He met his demise at the hands of Edward IV at the Battle of Barnet in 1471.

THE PLAYBOY PRINCE

Edward IV (Tom Durant-Pritchard)

Charismatic Edward wrested the throne from Henry VI in 1461 and managed to establish peace in the latter years of his reign, until his death in 1483 sparked renewed scraps over the throne. He married the commoner Elizabeth Woodville, much to the displeasure of his brother Richard III.

THE SUPER-VILLAIN

Richard III (Darren Bransford)

Wicked uncle Richard is the suspected culprit behind the disappearance of his brother Edwards sons, who have become known as the Princes in the Tower. He took the throne after Edwards death but was slain at the Battle of Bosworth two years later  only for his remains to be found in 2012.





AND THE OTHER KEY CHARACTERS

THE TIGER MOTHER

Margaret Beaufort (Andreea Sovan)

The Tudor matriarch was instrumental in the plotting that led to her son Henry VII snatching the throne in 1485. She gave birth to Henry as a 13-year-old widow and was grandmother to Henry VIII

THE ALPHA FEMALE

Margaret of Anjou (Alexandra Popescu)

At times leading the Lancastrian army during the Wars of the Roses, Margaret was queen of England from 1445 to 1461 and from 1470 to 1471. She governed in husband Henry VIs place during his bouts of insanity and arguably sparked the Wars of the Roses by offending the Yorkists

THE MAD KING

Henry VI (Voicu Hetel)

Henry was king from 1422 to 1461 and 1470 to 1471. Said to have spent a year asleep after receiving bad news about English lands in France, his unstable mental state made for a weak rule and the wars broke out during his reign. He was killed while imprisoned by his successor Edward IV

Britains Bloody Crown continues on Channel 5 on Jan 14 at 8pm (catch up with Ep 1 on Demand 5).
The Hateful Eight Cert: 18 Time: 2hrs 47mins

Rating:

The director Quentin Tarantino was there in person for the premiere of his new film, The Hateful Eight, and warned us of the ordeal we were apparently in for.

About 20 minutes in, he said (and I paraphrase), youll feel so cold youll wonder if the air conditioning has been turned on.

Thats how cold a Wyoming winter is, he enthused, particularly when its captured on ultra-widescreen, 70mm film.

The Hateful Eight: Quentin Tarantinos screenplay, occupying that uncomfortable ground between self-parody and self-indulgence, is slow and overwritten (pictured: Kurt Russell and Samuel L Jackson)

Oh dear. In my experience, when a director starts talking about types of film stock and debating the merits of 35mm or 70mm, there tends to be something wrong with the underlying project.

So it duly proves with The Hateful Eight, in which the real problem facing the audience was not the cold but the simple challenge of staying awake.

My goodness, does the first half of what is portentously billed as The Eighth Film by Quentin Tarantino go on.

As a writer always inclined to the prolix, Tarantino takes his verbosity to new lengths this time around, undeniably establishing an interesting premise but then overworking it almost to death with banter, badinage and, inevitably, an awful lot of cussin.

Once it dawns that nothing resembling real action is going to happen for a very long time, this snowbound opening seems to go on and on and on.

No wonder certain screenings  including the premiere  come complete with a 12-minute interval.

Of course, there are compensations. Ennio Morricones score  much of it, Morricone and Tarantino admit, recycled from music left over from The Thing made by John Carpenter in 1982  is menacing, modern and magnificent.

Jennifer Jason Leigh is terrific as the clearly unhinged Daisy, who is regularly struck violently in the face by her captor but still bounces insanely back to make fun of the fate that awaits her

And its always nice to see Samuel L Jackson  a Tarantino regular since Pulp Fiction in 1994  back in the saddle.

But while the Ultra Panavision 70, a type of film not used since Khartoum in 1966, Im told, undeniably captures the wide-open wintry spaces of Wyoming quite beautifully, its surely equally undeniable that Tarantinos screenplay, occupying that uncomfortable ground between self-parody and self-indulgence, is slow and overwritten.

Which after the Oscar-winning brilliance of his last outing  Django Unchained  is particularly disappointing.

The two films book-end the American Civil War, with Django being set just before, and Hateful a modest but unspecified number of years after.

It also slowly becomes apparent that the two pictures share a bounty-hunting theme too, with Jackson playing Major Marquis Warren, a Civil War veteran turned bounty hunter who, with a blizzard fast approaching, flags down what an on-screen chapter heading  a typical Tarantino touch  has already told us is The Last Stage To Red Rock.

The only problem is its already occupied by another bounty hunter, John Ruth (Kurt Russell), whos taking his prisoner, Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh), to be hanged at Red Rock, and he definitely doesnt want any company.

Another typical Tarantino trope  the stand-off  liberally peppered with yet another one (the N-word) duly ensues, until the garrulous Warren talks his way in.

I cant tell you how long this all takes or how many words are involved but no sooner have the new threesome set off though the snow than they encounter a fourth.

Considering theres a blizzard comin, there seem to be a whole lot of fellas walking around, notes Warren dryly.

Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins), who claims to be the new sheriff of Red Rock, duly climbs on board. Whats goin on  you all havin a bounty hunters picnic?

The second half is a huge improvement as the pace quickens, twists are revealed and we build to the inevitably messy climax (pictured: Quentin Tarantino, Tim Roth, Kurt Russell and Jennifer Jason Leigh)

Half the hateful octet are assembled; the rest await at the next stop, Minnies Haberdashery. Were not even halfway, not remotely.

This is a film of uneven performances and strange decisions.

Leigh, for instance, is terrific as the clearly unhinged Daisy, who is regularly struck violently in the face by her captor but still bounces insanely back to make fun of the fate that awaits her.

Jackson is splendid too, which is just as well as, boy, does he have a lot of lines.

Other fondly remembered Tarantino veterans, however, such as Michael Madsen and Tim Roth  Reservoir Dogs alumni both  are modestly disappointing; the former simply underwhelming as a quietly menacing rancher, while the latter gives it the full Terry-Thomas as the English hangman heading for his next appointment at Red Rock.

IT'S A FACT Quentin Tarantinos parents chose his first name because of its similarity to Western character Quint Asper, played by Burt Reynolds in the Sixties TV series Gunsmoke. Advertisement

As for the strange decisions: why, having deliberately chosen a film format ideal for capturing the biggest landscapes, does Tarantino set two-thirds of the film inside Minnies Haberdashery?

Especially since the format seems to be one of the reasons behind a dispute between the distributor and some cinema chains, restricting the number of screens the movie will be shown at.

You surely have to be a professional cinematographer to appreciate what it brings to the finished film: certainly I couldnt see it.

Just as I couldnt see what all the nonsense about a letter that may or may not have been written by Abraham Lincoln was about either.

The second half is a huge improvement as the pace quickens, twists are revealed and we build to the inevitably messy climax.

The hallmark blend of dark humour, ripe language and enough blood to earn it an 18 certificate will certainly keep core Tarantino fans happy, but for the rest of us  less easily persuaded of the great mans much-vaunted talents  theres the definite feeling of a very long shaggy-dog story that hasnt quite been worth the effort.

SECONDSCREEN

A War Cert: 15 1hrs 41mins

Rating:

Partisan Cert: 12A 2hrs 4mins

Rating:

A War is a Danish film about the conflict in Afghanistan, and from the moment we see a single file of soldiers advancing nervously through that barren landscape I was pretty sure I knew where we were heading.

Sure enough, an unfortunate member of the patrol duly stands on an improvised explosive device (IED) and pays the dreadful price.

But that was almost the last predictable thing to happen in an almost invisibly crafted film that manages to be both original and startlingly topical by addressing the highly emotive subject of soldiers being tried in civilian courts for decisions made or acts carried out in the heated chaos of war.

Part of the undeniable power of A War is that many of us will find ourselves thinking that we might have made similar decisions in such circumstances (pictured: Pilou Asbk and Tuva Novotny)

The young Danish film-maker Tobias Lindholm, whose last film,

A Hijacking, became a firm festival favourite three years ago, adopts a naturalistic, almost fly-on-the-wall style here that flits between the exhaustingly tense tour of duty being undertaken by the Danish troops and the domestic travails faced back home by one of their wives as she struggles with her three young children single-handed.

In a film that cleverly never rushes to set the scene, it takes a while for us to discover that Maria (Tuva Novotny) is married to the Danish commanding officer, Claus Michael Pedersen, played by Pilou Asbk, one of the stars of A Hijacking but perhaps best known here as Kasper the political spin-doctor from Borgen.

Pedersen is a good and well-liked officer  we know that  and we see him dealing with difficulties faced both by his troops and the local population with thoughtfulness and compassion.

But hes already lost one man, so when he faces losing another in a fearsome firefight, its not altogether a surprise that the fine print of his rules of engagement get lost amid the adrenalin-fuelled mayhem.

Part of the undeniable power of the film is that many of us will find ourselves thinking that we might have made similar decisions in such circumstances.

The rest is taken up with Pedersen and his family facing up to the legal consequences, which slows the pace but doesnt lessen the impact of this well-acted, morally challenging and thoroughly thought-provoking drama. Highly recommended.

Partisan: Australian director and co-writer Ariel Kleiman establishes a strong sense of place in a film that intrigues but never comes close to delivering enough explanation, at least for commercial audiences

Partisan is also inspired by a theatre of war, although here the location  along with the date  pass unspecified.

But the ruined tower blocks give a distinctly post-Balkans flavour to this strange, underwritten picture in which the handsome, charismatic and highly controlling Gregori (Vincent Cassel) leads a secretive commune of refugee women  all attractive, all single mothers  and their children.

But just when were assuming that Gregori is motivated by sex, Australian director and co-writer Ariel Kleiman presents us with another explanation.

Gregori, in the full knowledge of the women, is training their children to be doorstep assassins. And, not surprisingly, as they enter their less biddable teens, some of them are beginning to rebel.

Kleiman establishes a strong sense of place in a film that intrigues but never comes close to delivering enough explanation, at least for commercial audiences.
War And Peace Sunday, BBC1

Rating:

Beowulf: Return To The Shieldlands Sunday, ITV

Rating:

The form with any review of any adaptation of Tolstoys War And Peace is to first declare whether you have read the book or not, so here you are: I have read the book and also I have not read the book.

I have read the book and also not read the book because I largely skipped the war bits, which are very, very, very boring.

The book I read was War And Peace But Mostly Peace or, if you prefer, simply Peace. And it was quite good, Peace.

Callum Turner, Gillian Anderson, Stephen Rea, Tuppence Middleton, Paul Dano, Lily James, James Norton, Jack Lowden, Aisling Loftus, Jessie Buckley and Jim Broadbent star in War And Peace

Also, it was considerably shorter than the original, which runs to six billion words or something, and is the size of a house.

The BBCs last adaptation was in 1972, when it was the first great event of colour television. You can watch it now, as its available on YouTube.

It was a sensation at the time, following on from the sensation that was The Forsyte Saga (1967), which was the last great event of black-and-white television, but it doesnt stand up that well.

It is quite stagey, and almost cartoonish, with Helenes bosom heaving from her frock, as poor Pierres eyes stand on stalks. (In this instance Pierre was played by Anthony Hopkins, at his most hammy.)

Still, that was told in 15 hour-long episodes, whereas this, as adapted by Andrew Davies, only gets six. Ive said that as if its a bad thing, whereas I am actually in favour.

If we are going to do this, then lets do it quick, and if the war has to be somewhat excised, then so be it. I can live with that, and have lived with that. Its no sacrifice. Very, very boring, that war.

This first episode was, indeed, fast, and opened in the modern way.

That is, with tracking camera shots, such that everyone was in motion at one of the regular soirees as held by Anna Pavlovna Scherer (the delicious Gillian Anderson).

Davies introduced all the characters clearly, which is an achievement in and of itself  there are 45 named parts in this adaptation  as we travelled from St Petersburg to Moscow, swiftly taking in the major players.

So theres Pierre (Paul Dano), the kindly, socially awkward idealist, and theres brooding Prince Andrei (as played broodingly by James Norton) and theres Natasha Rostova (Lily James) who is meant to be an excitable, innocent teenager at this point in the narrative, but skipped about so much like Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm I rather yearned for someone to throw her in a cupboard and lock the door.

Taken at such a quick gallop, the major players can only be types, and it was the minor characters that made this feel truly alive.

That is, Rebecca Front as pushy Anna Drubetskaya, Stephen Rea as the ruthless Kuragin and Jim Broadbent as old Prince Bolkonsky, father of Andrei, who sends his son off to war with a gruff Off you go, then, but whose body language communicated such sadness and love.

This was fantastic to look at, generally, with mises en scene so lavish and spectacular  those palaces!  that it made todays super-rich look rubbish, made it look as if they live in back-to-backs in Bradford with outside toilets.

Davies has sexed this up  a bit of incest, Natasha clambering naked from her bath  because Davies is cheeky in that way, but it did not jar.

As far as I can recall, from having read Peace, the incest is implied, and until someone locks Natasha in a cupboard, Im guessing she will have to bathe every now and again. Better skippy and clean than skippy and stinky, Im thinking.

There was some war  did the armies on both sides look rather sparsely populated to you? BBC saving on the budget?  but with Brian Cox as General Kutuzov, it was almost bearable.

Beowulf: Return To The Shieldlands has a terrific cast, boasting Joanne Whalley, but there were episodes of Crossroads I believed in more than this, and as for the special effects, where are we?

I am not gripped by this, but unlike Beowulf: Return To The Shieldlands, I will watch again.

This Beowulf, as a character, bears as much resemblance to the hero of the Anglo-Saxon poem as a table might.

This Beowulf, as a series, aims for Game of Thrones but it is, in fact, sub-Merlin.

It has a terrific cast, boasting William Hurt and Joanne Whalley, but there were episodes of Crossroads I believed in more than this, and as for the special effects, where are we?

Back in 1972? Set in some mythical place as populated by fantastical, murderous monsters scuttling across the landscape, and who may have escaped from Doctor Who (circa 72), this is ultimately a family saga of the most familiar and tiresome kind.

Our eponymous hero (Kieran Bew), who is hunky but bland beyond belief, returns to pay his respects to the man who raised him (now deceased, but played in flashback by Hurt), his own father having been killed by one of the monsters when he was but a little boy.

On his return, he encounters his jealous stepbrother and his ambitious stepmother (Whalley) and while they are all arguing and making for their swords Im thinking, Hang on, there are murderous monsters out there, but no one appears to pay them any heed.

No one says: Mind how you go, what with these murderous monsters out there and all.
The ongoing tussle between private schools and Delhi government is getting murkier by the day.

With the government recently scrapping the management quota from the admission criteria, right in the middle of the ongoing admission season, both private schools and parents have been left in a lurch.

On Friday, a large number of school representatives met to decide on the further course of action regarding the governments latest order.

With the government recently scrapping the management quota from the admission criteria, right in the middle of the ongoing admission season, both private schools and parents have been left in a lurch

More than 200 representatives from various private schools conducted a meeting and unanimously decided on two ways to deal with the current situation.

First, they have decided to write to the government requesting for some alterations. If that fails, the schools will consider the second option where they move to court.

The representatives from the schools were asked to submit their viewpoints regarding the entire matter. We are looking at all the legal implications and we might move to court against the decision. We are exploring all the options, SK Bhattacharya, President of Action Committee for Unaided Private Schools, told Mail Today.

More than 200 representatives from various private schools conducted a meeting and unanimously decided on ways to deal with the current situation. Pictured, parents fill up forms for nursery admissions in the Capital

The Delhi government on Wednesday decided to scrap the management quota and all other reservations except the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) category in private schools for nursery admissions.

The move has resulted in a tug-of-war between the schools and the government.

The Action Committee, which had moved court in 2014 after Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung had notified the scrapping of the management quota, also said the matter is still sub-judice and hence, the recent announcement amounts to a contempt of court.

A single bench had then granted autonomy to schools to decide on the quotas.

The government had challenged the judgment seeking a stay before a division bench, but the matter is still pending. A hearing on the matter is scheduled for January 21.

The government should have taken the decision either before the commencement of admission season or after consulting the court. We will first write to the government requesting them to make some alterations, if not, we will move to court, Bhattacharya said.

Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, while defending the move, said, Whatever high court has said in its order, we are only enforcing them in the admission criteria, that is why we have scrapped the quota system.

There were several criteria which contained quota over quota.

Management quota was one of the biggest sources of corruption in admission that we scrapped.

Government is getting good response from parents association on this decision.

While the government called the management quota the breeding ground for the biggest scandals in the education sector in the country, the schools believe that the issue at hand is not about scrapping the management quota.

It is about autonomy which has been guaranteed to them by the Supreme Court and the Constitution and is being interfered with.

Private schools under the constitution have been given certain autonomy which is being interfered by the successive government. Certain decisions like admissions, fixation of fees and appointment of teachers falls under the schools jurisdiction and the government should not interfere with it, a prominent Delhi school principal told Mail Today.

R C Jain, chairperson of Delhi State Public Schools Management Association, which has over 2,000 schools as its members, said, Having management quota or not having it is a schools autonomous decision, the government cant snatch that right. If there is any corruption in the name of quota or there is an exchange of money, the government can impose a check but why scrap it altogether?

The government has also scrapped 62 arbitrary and discriminatory criteria listed by the schools on their websites for admissions.

However, the 25 per cent quota for the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) remains. Sisodia also alleged that private schools were spreading confusion about the governments decision to scrap management quota in nursery admissions.
Concerns regarding the Pathankot operation have been conveyed to PM Narendra Modi

The government has taken a note of the stories emanating from about the Pathankot operation.

Sources say that the stories portray the idea that the operation should have been handled by the army and not the NSG and the concerns regarding this have been conveyed to PM Narendra Modi.

The government has maintained that it the entire operation was a well-coordinated multi-agency one.

There is strong view that the turf war among various forces resulted in a section peddling the unfounded theory.

Bhushan hits out

Arvind Kejriwals friend-turned-foe Prashant Bhushan has joined the brigade criticising the chief minister for the controversial advertisement issued by the Delhi government showing the CM from behind in a mufflerman avatar promoting the odd-even formula.

Bhushan said the SC has prohibited partisan propaganda and the use of photographs.

The advertisement is a clear violation of SC order as it has prohibited the use of government finances in any kind of propagation, he said.

SC intervention

With several posts in the Central Information Commission lying vacant for very long, the Supreme Court has decided to intervene in the issue.

SC asked the government to appoint three Information Commissioners (ICs) in the Central Information Commission (CIC) within six weeks.

The apex court said it has already granted the time sought by the Centre and they should now appoint the ICs within the given time period.

The bench was hearing the plea of the central government filed against the November 6 Delhi High Court order asking it to appoint three ICs at the apex transparency panel.

President Pranab Mukherjee reminded Governors to perform their duties within the framework of Constitution

Prez's reminder

President Pranab Mukherjee in his new years message to Governors reminded them to perform their duties within the framework of Constitution.

The observation comes soon after controversies involving some governors like those from Arunachal Pradesh and Tripura created a stir.

Tripura Governor Tathagata Roy had courted controversy from time to time through his tweets.

In his video message from Rashtrapati Bhavan, the President said they should respect the distinct authority and responsibility vested in each of the three organs of the State.

Niti appointment

The government has appointed Amitabh Kant, secretary in the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP), as full-time chief executive officer of Niti Aayog.

Kant, who has been helming some of the marquee initiatives of the Narendra Modi government, will take over the job after his retirement as secretary, next month.
Days after the Pathankot terror attack rocked India, the Punjab Police arrested a BSF constable, who was allegedly involved in helping a cartel of drugs and arms smugglers infiltrate heroin and weapons into India.

On Monday, the Punjab Police busted a major cartel and arrested three notorious smugglers.

Their interrogation then led the investigators to constable Anil who was deployed with the 52nd Battalion of the Border Security Force.

The Punjab Police arrested a BSF constable, who was allegedly involved in helping a cartel of drugs and arms smugglers infiltrate heroin and weapons into India

Mail Today managed to speak exclusively to BSF constable Anil after he was presented before the magistrate in Mohali.

While walking out of the court complex, Anil admitted that he had been receiving money from his handler in Pakistan, a well known Lahore-based drug smuggler by the name of Imtiaz.

Anil told Mail Today, I was attending a wedding in Taran Taran when I was approached by a group of people, who asked me why I was so poor in comparison with others in the force who had been able to build big houses. These people told me that they would help me get rich. They gave me two SIMs and told me that a person named Imtiaz would call me from Lahore.

He started contacting Anil through the Pakistani SIM card.

In the first installment Rs 50,000 were allegedly sent in cash to Anil.

Later Rs 39,000 were allegedly deposited in the bank account of Anils wife.

Anil's allegd contact in Punjab was Gurjant Singh, aka Bholu.

Singh had been arrested in 2010 while smuggling 26 kg of heroin into India.

He was convicted and sent to jail for 20 years.

However, in 2013 he was able to run away from custody while being taken to the Ferozpur government hospital for a routine medical examination.

After escaping, Gurjant changed his identity and started operating again under the alias of Daljit Singh.

Family members and people near the mortal remains of Lt Col Niranjan Kumar, who was killed in the Pathankot terror attack, at his home in Bengaluru

Mail Today managed to speak to Gurjant outside the court complex in Mohali.

Gurjant explained the modus operandi.

The smugglers mostly use two kinds of modus operandi to bring their consignments into India.

In the first instance, the Pakistani handler calls on the Pakistani SIM and asks the BSF jawan to identify which Pakistan Rangers post he can see in front.

The BSF constable would WhatsApp his Google Maps location giving the handler a precise sense of where the compromised official was deployed.

After identifying the location of the BSF constable, the handler would then send his consignment at night to the fence.

The smugglers are usually more active in the winters when smuggling becomes easier because of the dense fog cover.

The consignment would either be flung over the fence where Indian couriers were waiting to receive it.

The consignment was pushed into India through big plastic pipes.

BSF jawans would be paid up to Rs 50,000 for facilitating each consignment.

The other modus operandi was to hide the arms and drugs in different parts of the Lahore-Amritsar train.

The Indian official would be told the exact location of the consignment, which would be picked up once the train arrived in India.

After the Pathankot attack the Border Security Force has been under heavy fire for failing to prevent the terrorists from entering Punjab.

But at the root of the problem of infiltration is drug terrorism, which ensures the handlers in Pakistan have a well oiled infiltration machine which can be deployed whenever required.

SSP Mohali told Mail Today, The Border Security Force constable was trapped with the inducement of riches. There doesn't seem to be much effort to stop infiltration by the Pakistani Rangers. This gives the terrorists easy access to the border on the Pakistani side. Some of the villages have farmland beyond the fence. These places are particularly vulnerable.

Border Security Force soldiers patrol the border fence at Bamial border in Pathankot

On Friday, Punjab Deputy Chief Minister and Home Minister Sukhbir Badal met Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh in Delhi and demanded extra deployment of Border Security Force personnel in Punjab.
Delhi Police Special Cell arrested Bengaluru-based cleric Maulana Anzar Shah Qasmi in connection with alleged links to terror outfit al-Qaeda

Close on the heels of the arrest of Bengaluru-based cleric Maulana Anzar Shah Qasmi by Delhi Police Special Cell for his alleged links with terror outfit al-Qaeda, a few selected madarassas in Bengaluru and the communally sensitive Dakshina Kannada district have come under the scanner of the police.

Maulana Qasmi was always under suspicion for his activities. His latest hate speech in Kashmir was sufficient evidence for his anti-national activities. Besides, his financial dealings with Pakistan-based terror group and contacts with the al-Qaeda have been exposed by anti-terror investigators, source in the Bengaluru police said.

There have been sporadic incidents of communal violence in all these districts. When we traced the origins, many of those who triggered these incidences were influenced by teachers in madrassas. This is a dangerous trend, which needs to be kept under check, the source added.

Two out of the three associates of Maulana Qasmi are supposed to be based out of Kodagu and Dakshina Kannada districts, which reported communal killings following disturbances relating to the birth anniversary celebrations of controversial ruler Tipu Sultan last year.

We see a link among the clerics, particularly those known for their fiery speeches. Madrassas hosting such clerics are being monitored by security agencies. We are also supporting the surveillance activities, the source noted.

Qasmi was born and brought up in Bengaluru and turned a cleric following his education in the city.

He worked at a madrassa for 10 years in Byrasandra but was fired from it following some internal dispute.

It is said that Qasmi was in touch with al-Qaeda sympathiser Mohammed Abudl Rahman Katki who was arrested last year.

The police are trying to establish whether Katki introduced Qasmi to other terror operatives in his network. Meanwhile, the Delhi Police claimed that with the arrest of Qasmi, they have nabbed four suspected operatives of al-Qaeda.

While Mohammed Asif, believed to be one of the founding members and the Indian head (amir) of AQISs motivation, was held from Seelampur in northeast Delhi, another operative Abdul Rahman was nabbed from Jagatpur area of Cuttack in Odisha.

Bengaluru-based cleric Maulana Anzar Shah Qasmi worked at a madrassa for ten years in Byrasandra (Picture for representation only)

The third arrest, Zafar Masood, allegedly acted as a financier for the module. He was arrested from mohalla Deepa Sarai in UP.

They were all booked under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

Maulana Qasim had met Mohammed Asif at a religious congregation in Bangalore, following which he was introduced to Abdul Rahman and Zafar Masood. He was asked to act as a provider of logistics support whenever the need aroused, a senior Delhi Police official said.

According to the police officers, the Special Cell has evidence of communication between Qasmi, Abdul Rehman and Zafar Masood, too, mostly carried out through voice over internet protocol (VoIP) services.

The investigators have also traced a money trail connecting Shah and Masood.

Illegal madrassas in Malda raise brows

By Soudhriti Bhabani

As unrecognised madrassas have come majorly under scanner following the Burdwan accidental blast probe in October 2014, there are still hundreds such Islamic education institutions that are being run illegally across West Bengals northern Malda district.

They are functioning right under the nose of district administration with no government officials making any effort to crack down on these units.

Areas like Kaliachak, Golapganj, Sujapur, Sahabazpur, Mojjampur and Baliadanga are Muslim-dominated pockets that house a number of illegal madrassas  located within 40km radius of Malda district headquarters English Bazar.

Vehicles were set on fire after clashes between two groups at Kaliachak police station in Malda

According to rough estimates, there are 32-odd madrassas that are recognised in Malda district but on the other hand the total number of illegal madrassas in the district stands somewhere between 150 and 200.

Sources said that there has been a trend where illegal finances are being pumped in to purchase government land and set up Islamic education institutions illegally across the rural outskirts of these districts.

Many of these madrassas are allegedly encouraging antinational sentiments among minority students.

They are doing a brain wash so that they can easily fall prey to become jihadis, said Malda district BJP leader Biswapriya Roychowdhry.

Asked about the total number of madrassas in Malda, district magistrate Sharad Devidi seemed to have no actual knowledge of the situation of ground zero.

I have no idea about it. State education department would be able to give you the exact figure. I will have to check with them, the DM told Mail Today.

Devidi also said that there was no official record available about the actual number of unrecognised madrassas in Muslim-dominated areas across the district.

After 2014 Burdwan blast it had been noticed by central investigation agencies that several illegal madrassas were being used by Islamist terrorists to train new recruits, including women.

Purnea tense after mob attack

By Giridhar Jha

The situation remained tense but under control on Friday in the Purnea district of Bihar, a day after an irate mob ransacked Baisi police station while protesting the derogatory remarks made against the Prophet allegedly by Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha leader Kamlesh Tiwari.

The peaceful protest march, taken out by a local minority wing of the Islamic Council of India, turned violent when the mob stormed into Baisi police station and set vehicles on fire causing substantial damages to government property.

Taking stock of the situation, Bihar DGP PK Thakur said that antisocial elements in the procession had taken advantage of the situation to cause trouble.

Meanwhile, senior officials of the district administration and the police were camping in Baisi to prevent any flare-up.

Purnea district magistrate Pankaj Kumar Pal said that the law and order situation at Baisi and adjoining areas was under control and a section of armed police had been deployed there as a precautionary measure.

The violence in Purnea apparently caught the local administration off guard since it had not apprehended any trouble during the procession.

According to sources, the organisers had taken prior permission to take out a peaceful rally against Tiwaris allegedly blasphemous statements but a section of protesters chose to vent their anger by resorting to violence.

Eyewitnesses said that the procession had remained peaceful and a memorandum addressed to the President was submitted to the local officials but a certain section of the mob took to violence on their way back.
Scores of protesters from various outfits on Saturday staged demonstrations at Delhi University's Arts Faculty against a two-day seminar on Ram Janmbhoomi temple, following which they were detained by police.

BJP leader Subramanian Swamy delivered the inaugural address for the seminar titled Shri Ram Janmbhoomi Temple: Emerging Scenario which is being organised by Arundhati Vashishtha Anusandhan Peeth (AVAP), a research organisation founded by late VHP leader Ashok Singhal. Elaborate security arrangements were made in Delhi Universitys North Campus.

Several protesters were detained after they gheraoed the venue and tried to create obstacles, a police official said.

BJP leader Subramanian Swamy stirred up the hornets nest in Delhi University on Saturday holding a seminar on the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya

The protesters, including that from left-affiliated student wing's AISA, DSF, SFI, Congress-affiliate NSUI and AAPs CYSS staged demonstrations outside the protest venue.

The protesting outfits had approached the university earlier this week demanding that it withdraw the permission rather than allowing such a seminar alleging it would communalise the campus and push saffron agenda.

The university authorities have been maintaining that they have nothing to do with the subject of the seminar and the organisation had booked the venue for the event which is available to outsiders for hiring.

BJP leader Subramanian Swamy stirred up the hornets nest in Delhi University on Saturday holding a seminar on the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya.

Amid vociferous protests, he assured that nothing will be done forcibly or against the law.

However, he asserted that construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya is mandatory for revival of our culture.

We have started and we will not give up until it is madeWe have full faith that we will win in the court, Swamy said in his inaugural speech.

Claiming that former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi had promised him support for the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, Swamy appealed to Congress to come forward and support the cause.

I hope Congress will also come forward and support us as this is not just our demand but that of the country, he added.

Swamy had earlier this week said that the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya would begin by this year-end with the cooperation of the Muslim community.

Ram Mandir is an aim for us. And when the Muslims leaders had committed that if it is proved that there was temple earlier, they will let us reconstruct it there, not fulfiling that commitment can be contempt of court, he added.

Attacking BJP over the seminar, the Aam Aadmi Party said the move was aimed at the 2017 Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.
India-born Nobel laureate and president of the UK-based Royal Society Venkataraman Ramakrishnan has come down heavily on doctors who try to cure homosexuality as a disease or a mental illness.

In an interview to Mail Today, Ramakrishnan dubbed such practitioners of modern medicine as unethical and behind times in their approach.

I do think it is unethical. Such (Gay cure) doctors are behind times, said Ramakrishnan, who won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 2009.

India-born Nobel laureate and president of the UK-based Royal Society Venkataraman Ramakrishnan dubbed doctors who try to cure homosexuality as a disease or a mental illness as unethical

He was in the Capital to deliver a lecture On Nobodys Word: Evidence and Modern Science organised by the British Council on Friday.

However, he added that he was speaking on the issue as a citizen of the world, as his expertise was in Molecular Biology.

Urging doctors to follow rational evidence rather than cultural prejudices, Ramakrishnan, who is also the deputy director of the Medical Research Council, Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, said there is nothing wrong or abnormal in being gay.

In a sting operation last year, Mail Today had exposed some qualified and reputed doctors in Delhi who claimed to cure homosexuality through a series of dubious procedures such as giving electric shocks or nausea-inducing drugs and prescribing testosterone or talk therapy, leading to public outrage and crackdown against the doctors by the Delhi Medical Council.

Ramakrishnan said that such procedures will only help to make homosexuals tremendously guilty and repressed.

Citing the example of British code breaker Alan Turing, Ramakrishnan recalled how Gordon Brown, the former British prime minister had to issue an unequivocal apology to Turing in 2009, 55 years after his death, for the horrifying and utterly unfair treatment meted out to him by the authorities.

Regarded as the father of modern computing, Turing saved thousands of lives during the World War II by decrypting Nazi messages and shortening the war by two years, but ended up taking his own life after being convicted of homosexual activity and was forced to undergo chemical castration to suppress his homosexual urges, through a series of injections of female hormones.

Urging doctors to follow rational evidence rather than cultural prejudices, Ramakrishnan said there is nothing wrong or abnormal in being gay

Admitting that people, including doctors and scientists, are influenced by a host of factors such as family, culture, society and religion, the Royal Society president said the best way to escape cultural negativity was by developing a rational outlook.

People are not just defined by their profession. Nobel laureates in Nazi Germany used to look down upon Jewish science as inferior, Ramakrishnan said, adding the best way to get out of biased mindset was by looking hard at evidence, opening up mind and developing a kind of tolerance.

The Nobel laureate, who, by his own admission, is used to getting vitriolic e-mails in capital letters, which he referred to as the internet equivalent of shouting at him angrily, by his critics for his outspoken views, said that 200 years ago, it was more dangerous to see a doctor than to see one.

Modern science based on how things work and rational evidence is just 350 years old, he said.

The birth of Reformation in Europe, 350 years ago, saw a new view based on observation and experiments giving rise to predictions which others could test and distrust towards authority.

The scientific method of testing protects us from false belief. Science is self correcting, he said.

It is not bad to be wrong, what is bad, is to deliberately falsify.

Medicine has changed dramatically in the last 250 years. Life expectancy in the early 17th and 18th century was similar to that of 2,000 years ago.
Taking exception to the directive of the Censor board to delete abusive language from his upcoming film Jai Gangaajal, acclaimed director Prakash Jha said he had never tried to glorify the cuss words through his movies.

Talking to Mail Today in Patna on Saturday, Jha said that the Censor Board of Film Certification (CBFC), headed by Pahlaj Nihalani, had objected to the use of certain words, including saala in the movie.

I have moved the tribunal after the revising committee of the board suggested multiple cuts, he said.

The censor is now raising objections to words like saala but my previous film Gangaajal had much more abusive words that were passed without any cuts at that time, said Jai Gangaajal director Prakash Jha

Let us see what happens. After the tribunal verdict, the option of moving the courts is always there.

The filmmaker, who has made socially relevant movies such as Damul, Mrityudand, Apaharan and Rajniti over the years, said his movies never glorified the use of cuss words.

The censor is now raising objections to words like saala but my previous film Gangaajal had much more abusive words that were passed without any cuts at that time, he said.

Actually, the characters in my movies are drawn from the real life. They speak the kind of language which suits them, he said.

If I ever try to change it, my films will not stand.

Accusing Nihalani of having his own agenda, Jha said the recent stance of the censor board was harming the cause of the creative movie makers.

He said that the board first wanted to give A certificate to the film and later offered U/A after suggesting multiple cuts as well as beeps to mute the so-called abusive words.

But I cannot accept such changes, he added.

Meanwhile, Jhas film, in which Priayanka Chopra plays the lead role of an upright police officer, has also offended a Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Nitin Navin in Bihar.
January blues are unlikely to be an issue for many in the Citys investment banking community.

Over the next few weeks, staff at the big Wall Street operators will find out their bonuses for 2015, followed by the large European operations in the early spring.

Senior London-based figures say that last year, like 2014, was OK but not stunning, which will still translate into six-figure rewards for thousands of traders and deal makers.

Bonus city: January blues are unlikely to be an issue for many in the Citys investment banking community

A handful at the very top will make multiple millions by advising on huge deals such as the troubled Shell-BG takeover, but hundreds lower down the food chain are also in line for what, by most peoples standards, will be an enormous payday.

The point is this: for all the complaints emanating from the banks about how they have been treated by politicians, regulators and the media, the pay cheques continue to roll in regardless. This, if nothing else, should drive home the fact that this is not the time to start going soft on the banks.

George Osborne laid the groundwork for a less punitive attitude to the banks in his Mansion House speech in the summer, which was interpreted as calling an end to banker bashing.

The Chancellor is adamant that any new settlement with the finance industry will not involve a more lenient approach.

But the clumsy ruling-out of Tracey McDermott, a hard-hitting official, from the race to become the next head of the Financial Conduct Authority, is just the latest episode to give a poor impression.

The New Year fireworks have barely been cleared away and already it looks as though 2016 could be the year the banks are given a clean sheet, even though their past sins are still dragging like chains around the ankles.

A review by the FCA into banking culture that would have examined ethics and pay was dropped. In similar vein, the regulators have decided not to publish the findings of a probe into investment advice given by bank salesmen and independent advisers, and that no action will be taken against HSBC for helping clients stash their cash in Swiss bank accounts.

Giving up? A review by the FCA into banking culture that would have examined ethics and pay has been dropped

It is easy to see why the banks want to draw a line under the retribution. The big four  HSBC, Lloyds, Barclays and RBS  have been forced to pay almost 50bn for misconduct since the financial crisis, for behaviour ranging from Libor and forex rigging to the mis-selling of PPI policies.

They may have to pay a further 19billion for unsettled issues such as mortgage backed securities in the US, according to ratings agency Standard and Poors.

This toxic legacy has made the banks uninvestable in the eyes of many, including leading fund manager Neil Woodford. That is not good news for a Chancellor who desperately wants to get Lloyds, and further down the line RBS, off the taxpayers books.

A fair amount of the back-pedalling seems to be linked to HSBC. The bank levy, which was hitting HSBC hardest, is being scrapped and replaced with a tax that will penalise mutuals such as the Nationwide along with the new challenger banks.

But considered objectively, the fear that HSBC will move its HQ out of Britain due to our supposedly heavy regulation does not hold water.

A move to Hong Kong  which really means being run by Beijing  does not look attractive with the current market turmoil, and the US regulators which fined it for money laundering are at least as tough as ours.

Links: The bank levy, which was hitting HSBC hardest, is being scrapped and replaced with a tax that will penalise mutuals such as the Nationwide along with the new challenger banks

The Chancellor may be impervious to special pleading by the banks, but what is for sure is that it will not be for want of trying on their part.

An analysis by the Mail of official records showed Osborne had 87 meetings with banks since he moved into Number 11.

I wonder how many he has had with steel industry bosses, whose factories have been allowed to close with never a hint of the bailout money showered on banks.

In the US, bank lobbying is a hot issue. Robert Reich, a professor at Berkeley and a former secretary of labor in the Clinton administration, points out that Wall Street banks have been spending around 10million in the third quarter of last year alone in an effort to kill off more financial regulation.

Our banks are doing the same, but the public has no idea how much is being spent, even though in the case of RBS it is our money being used to lobby against measures that should be in our interest as consumers and taxpayers.
Liverpool's Royal Albert Dock has been sold by developers Arrowcroft for 43million to investor Aberdeen Asset Management.

The site has more than 400,000 sq ft of hotel, leisure, retail and office space and is home to tenants including Holiday Inn, Premier Inn, The Beatles Story, Gusto and Miller & Carter as well as a number of independent companies.

The former working dock was built in the 1840s and was saved from dereliction by Arrowcroft in the early 1980s and restored. Today it comprises the largest Grade 1-listed collection of buildings in the country and is a Unesco World Heritage Site.

Sold: Liverpool's Royal Albert Dock has been sold by developers Arrowcroft for 43million to investor Aberdeen Asset Management

Nicholas Hai, chairman of Arrowcroft, said: We take great pride in having restored these magnificent historic buildings and in so doing led the regeneration of Liverpools waterfront and created an attraction that has global recognition.
Coins are 'legal tender' but this does not mean banks must take them

Savvy spender would then cash in coins at bank and pay off card bill

A savvy spender's ingenious system to gain credit card rewards came unstuck and left him with 29,300 worth of 100 coins, as the Royal Mint launched a crackdown on special coins it advertises as legal tender.

The This is Money reader, who wishes to be known simply as James, would buy high value commemorative coins from the Royal Mint in bulk on a credit card to gain airline points before cashing them in at the bank and paying his bill.

Despite promoting the coins on its website as legal tender, the Royal Mint has staged a crackdown and told banks not to accept them - and the legal definition of the phrase means they do not have to.

Cunning ruse: James would bulk buy commemorative coins on his credit card to gain airline points and then cash them in at the bank. Some of his pile of coins is pictured here.

This is Money has obtained a copy of a letter from Royal Mint sent to banks that says: 'The coins are issued for commemorative purposes only and are not intended to be used as cash.'

It states on its own website that they are legal tender. However, a misunderstanding over what this means has led some buyers to believe the coins are guaranteed to be able to be spent or cashed in at banks.

In fact, legal tender, means 'that a debtor cannot successfully be sued for non-payment if he pays into court in legal tender.'

James said: 'This means that my merry-go-round of miles-generating cash is over, however, surely it also means that the many thousands they have sold to people across Britain are now worthless.

'Either it's worth 100, 50 or 20 or it isn't.'

'I bet there are many more who purchased these coins as collectors' items perhaps thinking they would be worth something in a few years and reassuringly told that they can drop them into a bank account at any time - only it now it appears you cannot.'

The huge pile of coins was racked up by James as part of a plan to secure bumper credit card rewards. Having seen that the Royal Mint website confirmed they were legal tender he believed he was onto a sure thing and would buy them on a card, cash them in and pay off his bill.

James said: 'I am someone who has a bit of an addiction to frequent flier miles. I've done various things over the years to generate more miles - and the only way to generate such things is by spending on a credit card.

'The Royal Mint provided me with a free way of generating spend, because what I would do is to purchase the face value coins of 20, 50 and 100 and max out my credit card.

'The coins arrived, with no charge for shipping and then I would simply take them to the bank and pay off the credit card.'

James originally earned 2.5 miles per pound spent, until MBNA dropped the rate to 1.25 miles. The system made him enough for a round trip for him and his wife to fly business class to Hong Kong on their honeymoon in November.

A recent letter sent to a bank branch from the Royal Mint has told staff to no longer accept coins over the counter and that customers should be referred to them instead

The plan worked fine until James went into his local HSBC branch to cash in 29,300 worth of 100 coins and suddenly came unstuck.

He says that when he entered the branch, as he usually would to cash them in, the bank accepted the deposit. This is Money has seen the deposit slip.

The branch manager then chased after him as he was leaving the branch and advised that it could no longer accept them.

He was in the bank for two hours arguing his case to no avail.

In the end, he popped into a branch of Santander who accepted the bulk of the coins. When he went back in the next day to deposit a further 8,000, he was told it too had received the memo and would no longer accept them.

A letter dated 5 January 2016 sent to a bank branch from the Royal Mint told staff to no longer accept coins over the counter and that customers should be referred to them instead

A picture of James'huge stash of commemorative coins. They are marketed as 'face value' and 'legal tender' - but many Britons may be confused and surprised to see what these terms actually mean

The coins, such as the 100 'face value' Buckingham Palace coin issued last year are limited edition and are described by Royal Mint as legal tender. They also have a 14 day returns policy.

But its terms and conditions section on the website describes legal tender as having 'a very narrow and technical meaning in the settlement of debts.'

It adds: 'In practice this means that although the face-value UK coins in denominations of 5, 20, 50 and 100 are approved as legal tender, they have been designed as limited edition collectables or gifts and will not be entering general circulation.

'As such, UK shops and banks are not obliged to accept them in return for goods and services.'

The Royal Mint has launched a succession of special coins in recent times and earlier this week This is Money received another complaint from a reader who received a coin as a Christmas present and was angered to find out that nobody would accept it.

A new 50 coin commemorating the Queen's record reign as a British monarch was launched just before Christmas by the Royal Mint with a limited run of 100,000.

However, it only appears to be after Christmas that the Royal Mint further clarified the coins' status on its website and wrote to banks.

This is Money phoned a customer services hotline and posed as a potential buyer of a coin. The adviser said that the coins can only be used to settle court debts, or paid to an individual if they accept it as a form of payment.

She told us that the coins could no longer be cashed in at the bank.

Free flights: The airmiles have allowed James to fly for free across the globe

A Royal Mint spokesman said: 'Banks have never been obliged to accept face value coins, although some may have decided to do so at their own discretion.

'Legal tender allows UK coins to be accepted for payment of debts in court, but only circulating legal tender coins are designed to be spent and traded at businesses and banks.'

It adds that the 14 day returns policy came into force in February 2015 and that some coins which it predicts will be popular have a limit of ten per household to allow all collectors a fair chance to get them.

Some of the coins have proved popular last year. The Big Ben 100 coin for example sold out in 11 days when it went on sale - and some are now selling on online marketplace eBay for more than 130.
Supermarket giant Sainsburys is launching a fresh assault on high street discounters Aldi and Lidl by doubling the size of its budget chain Netto.

This bold challenge comes just 72 hours it was revealed Britains third biggest grocer had made a 1billion bid for Argos owner Home Retail Group.

Now the Mail has discovered that Sainsburys has put in ten planning applications for new Nettos in the North of England. This will take the number of Netto stores to 25 from the current 15.

Competitive: Supermarket giant Sainsburys is launching a fresh assault on high street discounters Aldi and Lidl by doubling the size of its budget chain Netto

Chief executive Mike Coupe has been forced to take steps to prepare Sainsburys for the future.

Britains supermarkets have faced fierce competition from online rivals such as Amazon as well as the discounters.

Next week Sainsburys, along with rivals Tesco and Morrisons, will report just how much the low cost rivals have eaten in to sales. The Big Four grocers have been losing market share to Aldi and Lidl.

Sainsburys is the only supermarket that has attempted to break into the discount sector.

In June last year it teamed up with Danish grocer Dansk Supermarked to relaunch Netto in the UK.

Both Sainsburys and Dansk have invested 12.5million each into a separate stand-alone business which initially opened five trial stores in the North of England by the end of last year.

A further ten stores have already opened or are about to open and Coupe had said he would take a decision around now over whether to roll the concept out around the country.

Planning applications: Sainsburys has put in ten planning applications for new Nettos in the North of England

Sources say the trial has been a success but Sainsburys wants to take a cautious approach to expanding further.

A version of Netto previously traded in the UK, from 200 stores. But it closed and the properties were sold to Asda in 2010.

Dansk chief executive Per Bank has said that the new version would be a different concept. He believed the new chain would benefitting from lessons learnt from the battles Netto has had with Lidl and Aldi on mainland Europe.

Next week Sainsburys is exepected to be the strongest performer of the big four players.

But analysts still think its underlying sales will fall by 0.7 per cent for the 14 weeks covering Christmas, compared to a year ago.

Analysts at Shore Capital said that compared well to the other major players.

It said Sainsburys food and non-food operations were well set up for Christmas and the post peak time.

Discounting: Sainsbury's is battling to keep ahead of discount rivals Aldi and Lidl

Tesco is expected to show that it continues to battle falling sales. Investors will be searching for any sign the turnaround by chief executive David Lewis is working when it delivers its update on Thursday.

Analysts at broker Exane BNP Paribas expect the firm to post sales down by 2.5 per cent over its six-week festive period compared to a year ago.

This reflects concerns about the amount of shoppers visiting its outlets and its level of discounting.

Its a similar story at Morrisons. The City expects sales to fall by 2 per cent, in the nine-week festive period compared to a year ago.

Sainsburys confirmed planning applications had been lodged.
Departing: Deputy group chief executive Mike Rees will leave on April 30

Standard Chartereds second-in-command is leaving the emerging markets bank and stands to earn more than a million pounds after he quits.

Deputy group chief executive Mike Rees will leave on April 30 but will be paid the remaining 737,530 of his 1.1million salary up to the end of 2016.

Rees, 59, also stands to benefit from deferred share awards that have not yet been vested, which at todays prices would be worth more than 2.7million, taking potential earnings after he stops working to 3.4million.

His departure is the latest in a series of changes brought about by chief executive Bill Winters, who replaced Peter Sands in June.

Winters announced plans to cut 15,000 jobs when he took over and vowed to pull Standard Chartered out of countries where it is underperforming.

But its ambitious strategy for growth has been dampened by slowdowns in Asian markets and pressure from regulators.

Shares dropped 38.5 per cent in 2015. Yesterday they closed down 0.3p at 505.5p.
Libyan woman whose rape claims shocked the world is sent BACK to Gaddafi

A lawyer who gained worldwide attention after accusing the Libyan regime of having her repeatedly raped has been forced back in to the country.

Iman al-Obeidi burst into a Tripoli hotel full of breakfasting Western journalists to tell how she was repeatedly violated by 15 men for two days after being abducted by drunken Libyan security guards.

As she told her story she was tackled by government minders and bundled away.

She then fled in fear of her life to Tunisia with a defecting soldier, ending up in the Qatari capital of Doha, where she was awaiting resettlement as a refugee.

Stopped: A Libyan Ministry of Information official grabs Al-Obeidi as she revealed her ordeal to western journalists at a Tripoli hotel in March Violence: Western journalists who tried to protect Al-Obeidi during her interviews at the Rixos Hotel were beaten

But this morning Qatari authorities forced her and her family on to a military plane rebel and took her to rebel-held Benghazi.

Al-Obeidy, who has now gone into hiding in the city, said the Qataris, who deported her despite repeated pleas from the UN, beat and handcuffed her before forcing her onto the aircraft.

On March 26 Al-Obeidy told reporters she had been taken from a checkpoint east of Tripoli and held against her will for two days while being beaten and raped by 15 men.

She later fled Libya to Tunisia with the help of two defecting Gaddafi army officers and their families.

Escaped: Iman al-Obeidi fled to safety in Tunisia after fearing for her life but has now been returned to Libya Disguise: Al-Obeidi demonstrates how she concealed her identity with a traditional headscarf as she fled from Libya to Tunisia

Members of the rebel-run Transitional National Council organised her flight to Qatar.

But she is now back in Benghazi, which saw a bomb blast outside the Tibesti hotel on Wednesday.

Al-Obeidy spoke to CNN from the city.



She said that, besides beating her and forcing her onto the plane, the Qataris took everything from her and her parents, including cell phones, her laptop, and money.

Military aid: The two defecting soldiers who transported Al-Obeidi from Tripoli to the Tunisian border using their army documents

In Washington, State Department deputy spokesman Mark Toner said he was 'very concerned' about her safety.

Sybella Wilkes, spokeswoman for the United Nations' refugee organization, added that Al-Obeidi was a recognized refugee.

And she said there was not any 'good reason' why she was deported from Doha, where she sought refuge last month.
Up to 8.3billion worth of compensation for delayed flights across Europe is going unclaimed, experts have said.

Specialists say passengers are due compensation of up to 430 if their flight is delayed over three hours, cancelled with less than 14 hours notice or if they are denied boarding.

But 'hundreds of thousands' of plane passengers are simply unaware that they have the right to claim compensation if they are inconvenienced.

Up to 8.3billion worth of compensation for delayed flights across Europe is going unclaimed, a claims company has revealed

Under European law, they can claim 180, 290 or 430, depending on the length of the flight, said claims company Flight Delays.

Claims firm Flight Delays the vast majority of people do not follow through on their claims because they are 'fobbed off' by airlines, do not have the expertise to question their decisions or 'give up too soon'.

Others believe they cannot claim because of the time that has passed and some wrongly assume they cannot because they have not kept their 'booking confirmation'.

Some claims can be rejected because of 'extraordinary circumstances' but this defence does not apply to the 'vast majority' of cases, a Flight Delays spokesman told MailOnline.

He added: 'In many cases, passengers are simply not aware of their legal rights.

'The Regulation has been in place since 2005 but it is only over the last two years or so that there has been a notable rise in public awareness of the possibility of making such claims.

Under European law, passengers (file photo) can claim 180, 290 or 430, depending on the length of the flight

'Despite this... many hundreds of thousands of passengers who are entitled to make a claim but have not yet done so.'

AIRLINES FAILURE TO INFORM PASSENGERS OF COMPENSATION Article 14 of an EU law 'on compensation and assistance to passengers in the event of denied boarding and of cancellation or long delay of flights' stated the following: 'The operating air carrier shall ensure that at check-in a clearly legible notice containing the following text is displayed in a manner clearly visible to passengers: "If you are denied boarding or if your flight is cancelled or delayed for at least two hours, ask at the check-in counter or boarding gate for the text stating your rights, particularly with regard to compensation and assistance".' Advertisement

Around 842million passengers travel through the EU every year, according to Eurostat.

Flight Delays used an estimate of one per cent delayed flights, over six years, to calculate that around 50million passengers were due compensation.

It went on to claim the average compensation was 350 and that half of claims are successful, arriving at a total 'black hole' of claims worth 8.3billion.

The company also blasted airlines for not clearly informing customers that they can claim.

It cited an EU regulation, introduced in 2005, which stated airlines must present a 'clearly legible notice at check-in' to inform passengers that they can obtain full information about their rights to compensation

Flight Delays says it has secured 6,000 successful claims for passengers over the last 24 months adding: 'That number is rising daily.'

Passengers (file photo) are due compensation if their flight is delayed over three hours, cancelled with less than 14 hours notice or if they are denied boarding

Most cases are settled before a court hearing but some, like Mr Rundell's, whose name has been changed, go all the way.

THE NUMBERS BEHIND THE DELAYS Passengers travelling through the EU each year: 842million

Passengers within six year claims limit: Five billion

Number of flights delayed over thee hours, cancelled, denied boarding: One per cent or 50million

Valid claims: 50 per cent or 25million

Average payout per claim: 350

TOTAL (25million x 350): 8.3billion at large Advertisement

His British Airways (BA) plane from Tampa, Florida, to London Gatwick was running late, meaning he would miss his connecting flight.

BA booked him on a direct flight to London Heathrow instead, but he arrived three hours later than he was supposed to.

The claim was worth less than 500 but BA instructed DLA Piper, one of the biggest law firms in the world, and the claim was defended all the way to the final court hearing, Flight Delays said.

BA tried to defend the claim by saying the first leg of the flight was operated by American Airlines and there for 'outside the scope' of the regulation.

They also tried to argue that Mr Rundell, who had to pay 95 to get to Heathrow to collect his car, did not arrive more than three hours late based on his arrival time at Gatwick.
Police said the nanny, 52-year-old Susan Conway-Lally, had a blood-alcohol content of .32, four times the legal limit to drive

Authorities say firefighters had to use a pry bar and ax to enter a Massachusetts apartment to rescue a baby whose nanny was so drunk she couldn't figure out how to open the door.

The nanny, 52-year-old Susan Conway-Lally, pleaded not guilty on Thursday to child endangerment and was released on personal recognizance.

Firefighters were called after the child's mother arrived at her Salem home on Wednesday to find her four-month-old daughter inside crying and Conway-Lally unable to open the door which was deadbolted shut.

Police say Conway-Lally smelled of alcohol, had a blood-alcohol content of .32, four times the legal limit to drive, needed help standing and had to be led to a police cruiser.

A near-empty 750-milliliter bottle (about 25 ounces) of Cossack Vodka was in her bag.

Conway-Lally, a former legal secretary, told The Salem News she has struggled with alcohol her whole adult life and is sorry.

'I have a very, very bad alcohol problem,' she said outside of court on Thursday. 'I thought I had it under control. I don't.'

Conway-Lally, a grandmother, had been hired by the baby girl's parents on the website Care.com after they checked her references and conducted a background check.

According to the police report, her first day went fine however Conway-Lally told The Salem News that when she had gone to work the previous day, she had a hangover and had another drink with the hopes of it going away.

During the ordeal, police said the child's mother was 'frantic' as the responding officer tried to instruct the nanny on how to open the deadbolt lock, which usually requires turning a knob or latch.

Conway-Lally reportedly mumbled 'Seriously, all right, give me a minute', sounding as though she had marbles in her mouth, according to The Salem News.

After several minutes, the child's mother begged for the officer to force his way in with him repeatedly kicking the door before entering using the pry bar and ax - leaving the door destroyed.

Once they were able to enter the apartment, the infant's mother ran to her child and placed her in her arms.

Firefighters were called after the four-month-old child's mother arrived at her Daniels Street apartment on Wednesday to find her daughter inside crying and Conway-Lally unable to open the door

Police said following an examination by an ambulance crew, the child was unharmed and was found to be in need of a new diaper and was hungry.

A notebook filled with entries indicating feedings and naps showed the nanny's last entry to be at 12.20pm, three hours before the infant's mother arrived at the apartment.

The entries that followed were described as a series of pen scratches, according to police.

Conway-Lally, who had previously faced drunk-driving charges, noted that after struggling with alcohol she had gotten sober but that a string of setbacks including the death of her fiance triggered a relapse, according to The Salem News.

She said outside of court on Thursday that it was not an excuse for her actions and that she has not only let down the couple but also her family. She said the incident was maybe a 'wakeup call'.
A young mother, who wishes to remain anonymous, claims the 'hipster terrorist' Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab said he wanted to marry her after they met at a flea market in 2014

A young mother has revealed how the man dubbed 'hipster terrorist' creeped her out by trying to chat her up at a flea market when she was 18.

The woman, who wishes to remain anonymous, said Iraqi-born Palestinian Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, 23, approached her at the Denios Flea Market in Roseville, California, in 2014 and said he wanted to marry her.

Al-Jayab, who came to the US as a refugee in 2012, was arrested Thursday in Sacramento on the federal charge of making a false statement involving international terrorism.

A year after settling in Sacramento he is alleged to have flown to Turkey and then on to Syria before posting on social media that he was fighting with various terrorist organizations, including Ansar al-Islam (later to become ISIS) in Syria.

When he returned to the US he allegedly told US Citizenship and Immigration Services that he had traveled to Turkey to visit his grandmother.

The woman, now married with a child, said: 'I saw him at a local flea market I was there wit (sic) my friends an he kept staring at me.

'He would come to where I was at I think he was selling rugs cause he was always pushing a cart of rugs.

'He told me that I was the most beautiful girl in the world and he wanted to marry me.

'He got my phone number from a friend and he texted me he didn't speak much english.

'I thought he was creepy because he said he wanted to marry me right when he saw me.'

She says he went on to text her and Facebook her.

Federal officials say the Al-Jayab was living a double life - one as a refugee starting a new life in America and another as a young man anxious to return to the Middle East to fight in the Syrian Civil War.

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Al-Jayab, 23, (pictured) was arrested on Thursday in Sacramento, California on charges he was plotting to travel to Syria to join the al-Nusra Front terrorist organization

The woman said she found him 'creepy' because he said he wanted to marry her 'right when he saw him'. She said he continued to text and Facebook her after they met at the Denios Flea Market in Roseville, California

He was dubbed 'Hipster terrorist' after his Facebook pictures showed him posing with a full hipster-style beard and wearing Ray-Ban sunglasses and a flannel shirt.

In a 20-page affidavit the FBI claims that as soon as Al-Jayab arrived in the United States in 2012, he began saying he wanted to return to Syria to 'work,' which the FBI says is believed to be a reference 'to assisting in and supporting violent jihad'.

It says it appears he wanted to assist the 'Front,' which the FBI says was 'likely a reference to al Nusrah Front,' considered a terrorist organization affiliated with Al Qaeda in Iraq.

Authorities said he fought with various terrorist organizations, including Ansar al-Islam, which in 2014 merged with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant after Al-Jayab had returned to the US.

In another message, Al-Jayab describes first joining the fighting shortly after he turned 16.

Al-Jayab returned to the United States in January 2014 and lived in Sacramento. He has been a computer science major at a Sacramento community college since last fall.

If convicted, Al-Jayab faces a maximum statutory penalty of eight years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Federal authorities say he also encouraged a Texas man to join the civil war against the Syrian government and promised to teach him how to fight.

He allegedly promised to train 24-year-old Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan of Houston how to use weapons and advised him on how he would be assigned to fight once he arrived in Syria.

'O God, grant us martyrdom for your sake while engaged in fighting and not retreating; a martyrdom that would make you satisfied with us,' Al-Jayab wrote to Al Hardan, according to court documents.

Authorities say there is no indication that Al-Jayab was planning any sort of domestic attack on the US

Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan (left) is escorted from the Bob Casey Federal Courthouse on Friday in Houston. Al Hardan was indicted charges related to accusations he tried to provide material support to ISIS

The two men's social media communications provided the link that led to their terrorism-related charges, it has been revealed.

Al Hardan, an Iraqi-born Palestinian has since been held without bond on charges of trying to provide support to the Islamic State group. He faces up to 25 years in prison.

He told the judge he lives in a Houston-area apartment, is married and has a child.

Saeed Faraj Saeed Al Hardan said his brother told him Friday in a telephone call from the Federal Detention Center in Houston that he is innocent of the charges he faces.

Saeed said their family had always felt that 'ISIS is no good' and 'ISIS is not Muslim' and that his brother was looking forward to becoming a US citizen.

He said he never heard Al Hardan express support for the group.

Authorities say there was no indication either man, who are both Palestinians born in Iraq, was planning attacks in the United States

Since Al-Jayab's arrest, three of his relatives in Wisconsin have also been taken into custody.

Al-Jayab's brother, Samer Mohammed Al Jayab, is being sent back to Wisconsin to face unrelated allegations that he conspired to transport stolen cell phones and computers across state lines.

He was arrested in California while visiting Al-Jayab and was released on $25,000 bond Friday.

Two other relatives, Younis Mohammed Al Jayab and Ahmad Waleed Mahmood, appeared in federal court in Wisconsin on Friday.

They also were ordered released without cash bond.

Prosecutors in Wisconsin say the three bought iPhones, a laptop and a TV that they believed to be stolen from Chicago and transported to Milwaukee

Al Hardan and Al-Jayab's (pictured right) social media communications with each other provided the link that led to their terrorism-related charges, it has been revealed
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott sought to lure Republican support on Friday for calling the first U.S. constitutional convention since 1787 - a new a priority for his administration that has bemoaned federal courts blocking state laws over gay marriage, abortion restrictions and voting rights.

Conservative calls for states to get together and ratify new amendments to the Constitution are hardly new.

Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio has even vowed to push for a convention if elected, though the idea is generating little buzz in the 2016 presidential race.

Abbott is now hoping his weight as governor of the nation's biggest conservative state can revive momentum in an enduring but perennially unattainable dream of some Republicans.

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Texas Gov. Greg Abbott calls for a convention of states to amend the Constitution during a speech at the Texas Public Policy Foundation in Austin, Texas on Friday

Abbott called on Texas to take the lead in pushing for constitutional amendments that would give states power to ignore federal laws and override decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court

His vision also goes beyond the most common GOP desire for a convention  to tack a federal balanced budget amendment onto the Constitution  and outlines a flurry of new state protections that would nullify federal laws and weaken the U.S. Supreme Court.

One of his nine proposals would require a supermajority of seven justices  out of nine  to invalidate any state law.

His other amendments include requiring Congress to balance the budget, allowing two-thirds of the states to override a U.S. Supreme Court decision and allowing a two-thirds majority of the states to override a federal law or regulation - rights that the states do not have.

'The Supreme Court is a co-conspirator in abandoning the Constitution,' said Abbott, the state's former attorney general and a former Texas Supreme Court justice

He unveiled his plan to a friendly audience of conservative policymakers in Austin, but outside, others called the prospect of a convention far-fetched

'The Supreme Court is a co-conspirator in abandoning the Constitution,' said Abbott, the state's former attorney general and a former Texas Supreme Court justice.

'Instead of applying laws as written, it embarrassingly strains to rewrite laws like Obamacare.'

TEXAS GOVERNOR GREG ABBOTT OFFERS NINE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS 'TO REIN IN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT' 1. Prohibit Congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one State 2. Require Congress to balance its budget 3. Prohibit administrative agenciesand the unelected bureaucrats that staff themfrom creating federal law 4. Prohibit administrative agenciesand the unelected bureaucrats that staff themfrom preempting state law 5. Allow a two-thirds majority of the States to override a U.S. Supreme Court decision 6. Require a seven-justice super-majority vote for U.S. Supreme Court decisions that invalidate a democratically enacted law 7. Restore the balance of power between the federal and state governments by limiting the former to the powers expressly delegated to it in the Constitution 8. Give state officials the power to sue in federal court when federal officials overstep their bounds 9. Allow a two-thirds majority of the States to override a federal law or regulation Advertisement

Texas in recent years has been a recurring defendant in major cases before the Supreme Court.

In March, the court will hear oral arguments over the state's sweeping abortion restrictions that would leave Texas with fewer than 10 abortion providers, down from more than 40 in 2012.

Abbott unveiled his plan to a friendly audience of conservative policymakers in Austin, but outside, others called the prospect of a convention far-fetched.

'There is no remote possibility that is going to take place,' said Lino Graglia, a conservative professor of constitutional law at the University of Texas at Austin.

'Just to get any constitutional amendment is virtually impossible.'

For states to call an assembly, it would require approval from 34 legislatures.

Over the past four decades, 27 states have endorsed the idea at one time or another, including Texas at a time when the state was controlled by Democrats.

Convention proposals were also introduced or discussed in about three dozen legislatures last year.

Shortly after Abbott took office last year, the Texas Legislature failed to endorse a more narrowly focused convention on conservative ideals.

Some Republicans blamed the defeat on fears of a 'runaway' convention that would take on myriad issues.

Abbott said on Friday that he wants Texas lawmakers to give their support next time around in 2017.

Earlier this week, Sen. Marco Rubio (pictured on Saturday in South Carolina) said if elected president he will advocate for the states to call a constitutional convention to impose term limits on members of Congress

Earlier this week, Rubio said if elected president he will advocate for the states to call a constitutional convention to impose term limits on members of Congress.

He says creating term limits must come from a grassroots movement because members of Congress will never do it themselves.

The United States has not held a constitutional convention since George Washington himself led the original proceedings in Philadelphia in 1787.

Last week, Abbott criticized President Barack Obama's plan to move ahead with possible executive actions on guns in a tweet in which he told the Commander-in-Chief to 'come & take' the state's guns.

Abbott challenged Obama after the president said in his weekly radio address that he is looking for ways to keep guns out of the hands of 'a dangerous few' without depending on Congress to pass a law on the fraught subject of gun control.

Obama made his announcement as a Texas law allowing licensed handgun owners to openly carry their weapons in public went into effect.
The exquisite sound of Colognes cathedral choir drifted out into the cool night air of the citys main square on Wednesday evening. A Holy mass, celebrating the visit of the Wise Men to Jesus's cribside, was packed with worshippers marking the 12th day of Christmas in this fiercely Christian part of Germany.

As the service ended and families poured out onto the pavement, an 18-year-old German girl called Michelle stood under bright arc lights nearby giving an interview to a television crew.

She and a group of friends had been sexually attacked in the same cathedral square by gangs of marauding men a few days before, on New Years Eve. The girls were chased, cornered and intimately groped before their mobiles and wallets were stolen.

The men were all foreigners, and when we protested, in German, they did not understand us, said Michelle during the interview.

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Crowds of people gather outside Cologne Main Station in Cologne, Germany, on December 31. More than 120 women were attacked in Cologne on New Year's Eve

She is just one of 120 women who were abused that horrific night in the square, which is dotted with bars, nightclubs and coffee shops, and is where Cologne locals have seen in the New Year for centuries.

The men, speaking Arabic and seemingly either drunk or high on drugs, moved around in large groups among a gathering of around 1,000 male migrants and deliberately targeted women. The men easily outnumbered the 190 police officers on duty, who were quickly overwhelmed.

In other cities across Germany, including Stuttgart, Dusseldorf, Hamburg, Munich and Berlin, where a tourist was sexually assaulted by five men right in front of the famous Brandenburg Gate, it was the same disturbing story.

Nearly 50 women in Hamburg complained to police about sexual harassment by North African men, who called them bitches, shouted Fikki, fikki to indicate they wanted to rape them, and chased them like cattle around the streets.

Michelle, one of the victims, described being surrounded by a group of 30 'angry' men

One victim there was a 19-year-old girl called Lotta, whod gone out to celebrate in a chic dress and high heels with friends. While they were walking from one nightclub to another, they were surrounded by men of foreign origin who separated the girls from each other.

I was suddenly alone, said Lotta. Twenty to 30 men were standing round me  every time a hand went away from my body, the next one arrived. I felt helpless.

Like her friends, the teenager was sexually assaulted, had her hair pulled and was finally thrown to the ground after the men had finished with her.

In Stuttgart, women complained of sexual attacks by trouble-makers with an immigrant background and 15 other Mediterranean men of Arabic appearance.

When one group of young girls refused these mens advances, their boyfriends were beaten up. One girl who fought off an attacker ended up in hospital with a broken nose and deep cuts to her face.

The attacks have sounded the alarm bell in Germany over the consequences of mass migration. A country dogged by guilt over its Nazi past, it has enjoyed its recent role as saviour of Europe, welcoming in foreigners from the war-divided Middle East and Africas poverty hotspots.

When the migrants began arriving in their thousands each day last summer, there were welcoming parties across the country. We love refugees! proclaimed banners outside reception centres.

Yet that warm hospitality is now being replaced by fear, as a society renowned for its good order begins to buckle under the strain  and to worry if it has made a mistake.

Figures this week revealed that 1.1 million newcomers registered for asylum in Germany in 2015. Many more  including potential jihadists and opportunists pretending to be refugees  are suspected of slipping in under the radar since August, when German Chancellor Angela Merkel controversially announced she would welcome all Syrian migrants who knocked on the door. Mrs Merkel has since dramatically changed her tune, saying this week that she wanted to stem the flow of migrants into the European Union, while keeping all borders open.

Yet the influx into Europe since she made her grand gesture shows no sign of abating. German ministers say 3,200 migrants a day continue to enter the country.

Denmark began passport checks on its border this week, and border controls have also been imposed by other countries including Sweden and Hungary, threatening Mrs Merkel and the EUs cherished Schengen agreement, allowing free movement between member states.

All this is raising questions from ordinary Germans, and this week provoked confessions from their political masters. Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere admitted the New Year crimes against women by such large numbers of men from a migrant background were a new departure for the country.

Mrs Merkel said: Everything must be done to identify the guilty parties without regard to their background or origins. We must send clear signals to those who are not prepared to abide by our laws. Questions arise over whether some groups are subscribing to misogyny.

Her words were clearly carefully chosen to avoid specifically linking migrants with these attacks against women. But the truth is the mass assaults have clear echoes of the sex crimes in Cairos Tahrir Square in Egypt in 2011, during celebrations welcoming the so-called Arab Spring, when groups of men violently harassed women.

Lara Logan, a CBS reporter, was sexually assaulted by a mob in scenes reminiscent of those in Germany. Her clothes were torn off, and between 200 and 300 men took pictures of her naked body as her attackers raped her with their hands over and over again.

Another deeply worrying aspect of the New Year horror in Cologne also emerged this week.

Many Germans, including some of the victims themselves, have accused authorities of a conspiracy of silence over the assaults to stop criticism of the mass immigration policy pursued by Mrs Merkel and her politically-correct supporters. The mainstream media in Germany has, until recently, toed the Government line; a top public broadcaster, ZDF, recently refused to run a segment about a rape case on its prime-time crime-watch show because the dark-skinned suspect was a migrant.

The programmes editor defended her decision, saying: We dont want to inflame the situation and spread a bad mood. The migrants dont deserve it.

German police in Cologne's Cathedral Square, Germany, after hundreds of women were assaulted by gangs of men on New Years Eve . The Cologne police force has also been accused of deliberately hushing up the New Year scandal

Cracks only began to show just before New Year. Bild, Germanys largest daily newspaper, broke ranks by accusing officials of conducting a campaign of deception on a massive scale by burying bad news on migration. It reported that drug gangs involved in organised crime were actively recruiting newly-arrived migrants from the vast temporary camps where they live.

The Cologne police force has also been accused of deliberately hushing up the New Year scandal. It issued an official press release the following day describing the celebrations as exuberant, but mostly peaceful. The release has since been retracted, and last night it emerged that police chief Wolfgang Albers is to resign.

Broadcaster ZDF had to apologise for a cover up after it failed to report the Cologne story for three days, even though it knew about it.

The men had been in Germany for just two weeks

And until Thursday, a week after the attacks, there had been silence from Mrs Merkels ministers about the backgrounds of the perpetrators. Initially, they insisted there was no evidence that new migrants were involved in the violence.

A leaked police report which emerged 48 hours ago showed this was far from the truth. It revealed that one of the Cologne attackers said: I am Syrian. You have to treat me kindly: Mrs Merkel invited me.

The report by a senior officer added: When we arrived [at the square] our vehicles were pelted with firecrackers. On the cathedral steps were a thousand people, mainly of immigrant background, who were indiscriminately throwing fireworks and bottles into the crowd.

Women literally had to run the gauntlet through the mass of drunk men in a way you cant describe .many came to officers shocked and crying to report sex assaults. We were unable to respond to all the offences. There were just too many.

Another unnamed officer told a Cologne newspaper that 14 of those questioned on the night were from Syria and one from Afghanistan.

Thats the truth, though it hurts to say it, he added. They had definitely only been in Germany for a few days or weeks.

By yesterday morning, police had arrested only two of the alleged sex attackers, who said they had immigrant backgrounds. Videos of the crowds, together with the howl of fireworks and the shrieks of women they assaulted, were found on their mobile phones.

Officers also found a note on one of the men containing Arabic to German translations for phrases including nice breasts, Ill kill you and I want to have sex with you.

Both have now been released due to lack of evidence.

Crowds of people gather in front of the main railway station in Cologne, western Germany, on New Year's Eve. Until Thursday, a week after the attacks, there had been silence from Mrs Merkels ministers about the backgrounds of the perpetrators

So far, 18 asylum seekers have also been detained out of 32 other men suspected of theft and violence but not sexual impropriety. The 32 include Algerians, Moroccans, Iranians, Syrians, an Iraqi Serb, an American and two Germans. The involvement by foreigners flies in the face of Germanys PC lobby which has ruthlessly called critics of Merkels migration programme Nazi or racist.

Take 59-year-old Akif Pirincci, an outspoken Right-winger and German writer of Turkish origin, who has warned that Christian Germany is becoming Islamic.

His books, one of which is called Germany Gone Mad, were best-sellers until last autumn, when big publishers and bookshops chose not to distribute them any more. It is the first time since the Nazi era that such censorship has occurred.

In another controversy, Catholic journalist Matthias Matussek lost his job at the respected German newspaper Die Welt after he posted his views on Novembers massacre in Paris on his personal Facebook page, saying mildly: I think that the terror in Paris will move our (German) debate about open borders and  young Muslim men in our country in an entirely new and fresh direction.

Despite the censorship, unpalatable truths have still slipped out. Last month, the interior ministry in the large south-west state of Baden-Wurttemberg published figures on criminal offences committed by asylum seekers between January and November 2015.

They made alarming reading. Asylum seekers represent one per cent of the population of the state but were involved in five per cent (27,255) of all registered crimes, among them 1,000 cases of grievous bodily harm, 22 of attempted murder, and 700 of domestic burglary. The highest number of offenders were Syrians, committing 5,576 of the offences.

Andre Schulz, head of Germanys criminal police association, said recently that in his experience 10 per cent of the migrants would turn to criminality, including theft, sexual assault or drug dealing.

The policy has been to leave the German population in the dark ordinary citizens are being played for fools, he declared.

Meanwhile, an academic report this week claims that hundreds of thousands of young male migrants arriving in Europe will threaten the peace and stability of Germany and other Western nations. Out of those who came last year, 69 per cent were men, 18 per cent were children and just 13 per cent were women.

Dr Valerie Hudson, a professor at Texas A&M university, warns that the skewed sex ratio is a recipe for disaster: Crimes such as rape and sexual harassment become more common in highly masculinised societies, and womens ability to move about freely without fear within society is curtailed. In addition, demand for prostitution soars.

This morning, police had arrested only two of the alleged sex attackers, who said they had immigrant backgrounds. Officers also found a note on one of the men containing Arabic to German translations for phrases including nice breasts, Ill kill you and I want to have sex with you

At Pocking, a well-kept Bavarian town, the headmaster of the grammar school wrote to parents last summer telling them not to let their daughters wear skimpy clothing. This was to avoid misunderstandings with 200 migrants who were put up in the schools gymnasium before being moved on to a proper camp in the autumn.

The letter said the migrants were mainly Muslim, and speak Arabic. They have their own culture. Because our school is directly next to where they are staying, modest clothing should be worn ... revealing tops or blouses or miniskirts could lead to misunderstandings.

Even charity workers have been horrified by the behaviour of some of the new guests.

Last autumn in Bonn, the Refugees Welcome organisation made an embarrassed online apology for incidents of sexual harassment at a party it helped organise to make migrants feel at home.

A letter also sent last year by prominent womens groups to the Integration Minister in the state of Hesse, central Germany, where a huge camp housing 6,000 migrants has been set up in the town of Giessen, described a culture of rape and violence.

Women and children are unprotected here. This situation is opportune to those men who already regard women as their inferiors and treat unaccompanied women as fair game. There are numerous rapes, sexual assaults and forced prostitution.

The worry is that same rape culture has now spilt out onto Germanys streets

What is most concerning is that the Cologne attacks were carried out in a public square, with thousands of witnesses, by men who did not cover their faces, grinned at the police, and were clearly not worried about the repercussions.

This was not an organised gang: it was simply men looking for sex on New Years Eve who had gathered after contacting each other on their mobiles.

Even now, Colognes pro-migrant mayor, Henriette Reker, still appears to be in denial. At a Press conference, she contradicted police by saying that newly-arrived migrants had not been to blame.

She said that, to prevent future attacks, women should follow a new code of conduct soon to be published online by the council. They should keep strangers at arms length, stick together in groups, and not get split up even if they were in the party mood.

One prominent local councillor and lawyer, Judith Wolter, admitted in an open letter to the people of Cologne that the cathedral square and adjoining areas has now become a no-go area  especially for women. It must be assumed that there is a high security risk here in the evening and night hours.

It is not just Germany. Other European countries with large numbers of male migrants also endured a spate of New Year sex attacks. Women in Switzerland and Austria were targeted. Yesterday, Viennas police chief, Gerhard Purstl, provoked outrage when he warned women not to go out alone at night.

Even now, Colognes pro-migrant mayor, Henriette Reker, still appears to be in denial. At a Press conference, she contradicted police by saying that newly-arrived migrants had not been to blame. She said that, to prevent future attacks, women should follow a new code of conduct soon to be published online by the council

In Helsinki, Finland, which took in 32,479 asylum seekers last year (almost all men, two-thirds from Iraq), police said they had stopped incidents similar to those that took place in Cologne by blocking 1,000 migrants from celebrations at the citys Senate Square.

Extra security guards, hired by police for the night, said there was trouble when 2,000 other migrants caused widespread sexual harassment in the square.

The police explained: There hasnt been this kind of harassment on previous New Years Eves. This is a completely new phenomenon.

They added that sexual assaults in parks and on the streets had been unknown in Finland before record numbers of asylum seekers arrived in 2015.

In the Swedish town of Kalmar, some 15 women aged between 17 and 19 said theyd been attacked on New Years Eve in the town square, as well as on a dance floor.

Anxious girls do not know if they dare go out

The country took in 160,000 migrants last year, mostly young men  the highest proportion compared with the population of any country in Europe.

As in Cologne, the men allegedly encircled their victims, before groping and assaulting them. When one victim told them to leave her alone, they did not understand because they could not speak English, said Police Commissioner Monica Oldin.

We are a bit worried that something is going to happen in the future, she added. And, of course, the girls are anxious and do not know if they dare to go out.

When I visited Colognes cathedral square this week, the Christmas tree was being taken down as police stood watching as womens groups demonstrated over the attacks.

Germany is having to confront the harsh result of welcoming in huge numbers of men from a culture which denigrates women and abhors the social rules of a modern European society.
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A 'demon' bushfire, which has already wiped out an entire town in Western Australia, is so large it has created its own weather system.

The small township of Yarloop, which is located about 120 kilometres south of Perth, was decimated with 95 homes lost following an unpredictable bushfire.

Due to the heat from the blaze rain clouds have formed which can cause hazardous conditions for firefighters who are still trying to control it, according to ABC News.

Neil Bennett from the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) told the news channel the size and scale of the fire is the problem, because even small gusts of wind can start another flare up.

Residents evacuating from Treendale - 40 minutes south of Yarloop - said ash and burnt wood was falling from the sky and blanketing cars and houses

A spot fire burns in Cookernup after ash from the Waroona bushfire was blown into the area.

A smoke plume fills the horizon over Waroona as the bushfire burns out of control

Firefighters battling an out-of-control fire as it ripped through Yarloop in Western Australia on Thursday

The blaze - which has burnt through 58,000 hectares of land - is now moving in a southwesterly direction towards Shires of Waroona and Harvey

A 'demon' bushfire, which wiped out an entire town in Western Australia, is now so large is has created its own weather system

Due to the heat from the blaze rain clouds have formed (pictured) which can cause hazardous conditions for firefighters

Neil Bennett from the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) told the news channel the size and scale of the fire is the problem, because even small gusts of wind can start another flare up

'When you have a fire, you're going to have obviously very hot conditions and air is forced to rise due to those hot conditions and if you have enough moisture in the air, you are then going to form clouds,' he said.

'And the reason for that is that the fire is throwing out lots and lots of particles of soot, carbon, and those tiny little particles form what we call condensation nuclei that the water vapour can condense onto.

'The other problem that you face with a cloud such as that is that it develops 'up and down drafts' within the cloud and those up and down drafts create gusty and variable direction winds.'

No heavy rain is forecast until Sunday but humid conditions could bring relief and slow down the blaze, which is still burning.

The blaze - which has burnt through 58,000 hectares of land - is now moving in a southwesterly direction towards Shires of Waroona and Harvey, with firefighters issuing emergency warnings for the regions.

Warnings are also still in place south of the South Coast highway in the Dalyup area, east of two people's bay, and the Shire of Serpentine-Jarrahdale.

Warnings are also still in place south of the South Coast highway in the Dalyup area, east of two people's bay, and the Shire of Serpentine-Jarrahdale

Smoke from the Waroona bushfire covers the sky north of Bunbury. No heavy rain is forecast until Sunday but humid conditions could bring relief and slow down the blaze, which is still burning

The small township of Yarloop, which is located about 120 kilometres south of Perth, was decimated with 95 homes lost following an unpredictable bushfire

The town, which has a population of 545, has lost about homes, historic buildings, workshops, factories, the post office, a fire station and part of a local school,

The intense heat of the bushfire has caused the Samson Brook bridge, near Yarloop, and the asphalt on it to buckle and collapse

Buildings have been completely flattened by the fire and left as rubble on the ground

The town, which has a population of 545, has lost about homes, historic buildings, workshops, factories, the post office, a fire station and part of a local school, Fire and Emergency Services Commissioner Wayne Gregson said.

On Friday, a Department of Fires and Emergency Services spokeswoman told the Daily Mail Australia three residents from the same family who were previously unaccounted for have since been found, but three further individuals were still missing from the region.

The fire is said to have been sparked by lightning early on Wednesday morning.

The spokeswoman said there were 'Department of Fire and Emergency Services, Department of Parks and Wildlife and Volunteer Bushfire Brigades' working to ease the flames.

Emergency Services have described the losses within Yarloop as 'catastrophic'

It was a blaze that left the tiny town of Yarloop, which has a population of 545, devastated

Residents of Waroona and the surrounding area listen to a community briefing at the temporary bush fire evacuation centre at the Murray Leisure Centre in Pinjarra

A request for interstate assistance has also been made.

Two evacuation centres have been set up at the Leschenault Leisure Centre in Australind - half an hour south of Yarloop - and the Murray Leisure Centre in Pinjarra - 45 minutes north of Yarloop.

Department of Fire and Emergency Services incident controller Greg Mair spoke to a crowd of about 600 at the temporary Australind centre.

More than 4,200 homes in the region are still without power.

Another 100 people are reportedly stuck on Preston Beach, 25 minutes east of Yarloop on an isolated stretch of land separated by water and dense national park bushland.

They are expected to remain there until they can be safely evacuated, as WA police assist them.

Incident Controller Greg Mair gives a briefing to residents of Waroona at the temporary evacuation centre

Firefighters from the Department of Fire and Emergency Services, Department of Parks and Wildlife and Volunteer Bushfire Brigades all worked together on Friday to contain the blaze

The small West Australian township of Yarloop appears to have been virtually wiped out by the fire

Terrified and burnt: A not-for-profit animal rescue organisation set to work transporting lost pets to their animal shelter, away from the blaze

The fire that swept through Yarloop was described by locals as horrendous

A request for interstate assistance to combat the fires has been made

Others described the unpredictable bushfire as a 'demon fire' after it tore through the town

The Western Australian reports that Yarloop Bowling Club president Ron Sackville said the fire had ripped through the main street of the town.

'There's very little of Yarloop left. I couldn't get all the way down there but understand the steam museum is gone ... the post office survived, the pub is gone, the bowling club survived,' Mr Sackville told Radio 6PR.

'Fortunately I have a firefighting pump and house and managed to save our house and the horses that were in the paddock - they are in the backyard now.

'But I look around 360 degrees and everything is burnt to a cinder. I think the post office is the only building left standing [in the main street]. The fire was horrendous.'

Not-for-profit organisation K9 Rescue Group were photographed comforting terrified dogs that had been left behind or misplaced in the fir.

Many of the dogs, with singed fur and trembling eyes, were wrapped in blankets and taken from the bush fire evacuation centre at the Murray Leisure Centre in Pinjarra to their animal shelter in Mandurah.

Trees smoulder after a major bush fire close to the town of Waroona in Western Australia

Grim faces: At least 95 houses have been left devastated by the fire which ripped through the small town

Ash-filled clouds rise above the town of Australind - where an emergency evacuation centre has been set up

The dogs were loaded up in carriers and shipped an hour north to Mandurah - safe from the fires

The government pledged it would do what it could to help the community at this time

Volunteers drop of supplies to a bush fire evacuation centre at the Murray Leisure Centre

The sky takes on a terrifying shade of black as the bushfires sweep through Yarloop and the surrounding area

Despite choking smoke and poor visibility fire crews continued to tackle the fire

Emergency Services Minister Joe Francis said the government would do what it could to help the Yarloop community.

'To lose one-third of a township, one-third of those houses, people's homes is obviously going to be very challenging for that community,' he said.

'Our absolute number one priority is obviously to fight the fire and try and get it under control as quickly as possible so that less people's homes and livelihoods are at risk.'

Yarloop resident Kate Barry said she lost her home in the blaze, but had no idea how bad the bushfire was until a local firefighter told her she had to evacuate.

She and her four children, aged between six and 19, managed to flee with their family photos, but everything else was probably destroyed when the home was razed.

'There were no flames, just smoke. You couldn't breathe, it was just raining ash,' she said.

Dense clouds of smoke can be seen rising in the distance as the fire spreads rapidly

Fire crews did their best to stop the fire spreading but it was a losing battle

All that the nasty fire left behind was scorched earth and devastation

Trees and other foliage go up in flames as the bushfire goes on relentlessly in Yarloop

All that is left of this car is a burnt out shell after the bushfire had finished with it

Plumes of smoke rise high into the sky as the Yarloop bushfires show no sign of abating

Ms Barry said her children could still not comprehend that they had lost everything.

'But at least we're alive,' she said.

Carolyn Foeken said she had to bolt from Cookenup to Busselton with her two grandsons.

'We don't know if we've got a home or not,' she said.

The out-of-control and unpredictable blaze, which was sparked by lightning on Wednesday, has doubled in size overnight due to strong winds and has now burnt more than 53,000 hectares.

Residents' houses were left in heaps of iron and stone because of the fire

Hundreds of terrified people attend a community meeting at the Leschenault Leisure Centre about the bushfires threatening south west Australia
A butler who worked at the Hamptons estate of Ron Perelman has been arrested after charging thousands of dollars on credit cards issued to his fellow employees.

Frank Squadrito was charged with grand larceny on Friday after he allegedly spent $9,105 on hotel rooms, taxi rides and other expenses in New York City this past October to protest being fired by the billionaire businessman according to The East Hampton Star.

Squadrito, 26, was terminated just days prior to his shopping spree - for making an unauthorized purchase on a coworker's American Express card.

Caught: Frank Squadrito (above) was charged with grand larceny on Friday in East Hampton, New York for allegedly making $9,000 in unauthorized charges

Swank: Squadrito had been working as a butler for billionaire businessman Ron Perelman at his East Hampton estate the Creeks (above), but was fired in October

Squadrito told police he began working for Perelman in May at the Creeks, his sprawling 57-acre estate in East Hampton.

The young man was provided with lodging on the property during his employment but was not given his own credit card, forcing him to borrow a coworker's card whenever he had to make any purchases for Perelman or the estate.

He borrowed one of these cards on October 8 when he was sent to Manhattan to buy clothes, but also used the card at a restaurant, Landmarc, to buy himself dinner.

When he returned to the Creeks later that night he was told he had been fired, and while the exact reason remains unclear, Squadrito told police he believes it was because of the unauthorized food purchase.

On his way out that night, Squadrito admits he copied the numbers on four of his coworker's American Express cards.

Roughly a week later, he went on a spending spree.

'I just lived it up,' Squadrito told police.

'I used the credit card numbers to make numerous purchases, including hotel rooms and taxi fares.'

Living the life: Squadrito (above) was fired after using a coworker's company card to buy himself dinner, which had not been approved

Hanging: After Squadrito (above) was fired he stole the numbers from four of his coworkers' company cards, and used them for hotel rooms, taxis and other expenses

He almost got away with it as well, until one of Perelman's financial executives noticed the charges and traced them back to the former butler, identifying him by his signature.

That man alerted security at the Creeks who in turn notified the police, who arrested Squadrito on Thursday when he returned to the property to retrieve some personal belongings he had left behind when he was fired in October.

Squadrito was arraigned on Friday, at which point his lawyer told the judge that the young man came from 'a family of means' who lived in an 'affluent suburb' outside Syracuse and were prepared to pay full restitution.

That restitution is only around $3,000 according to Squadrito though, who according to his lawyer has been having trouble recently as he is bipolar and off his medication.

He was released on $2,500 bail and will next appear in court on February 11.

Happy: Ron Perelman, 73, is currently married to his fifth wife, Dr. Anna Chapman (above in August)

Not so happy: Perelman divorced his fourth wife, actress Ellen Barkin, in 2006 after six years of marriage

It is not clear just how long it took for Perelman's team to realize that Squadrito had been making charges to four company cards.

Perelman is worth an estimated $12.2billion according to Forbes, with his company MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings Inc. owning stakes in a number of major companies, including makeup giant Revlon.

The self-made billionaire is incredibly generous with his money as well, having donated hundreds of millions of dollars over the years to charitable groups, nonprofit organizations and institutions such as the Guggenheim Museum, the World Trade Center Memorial and Carnegie Hall.

He is also responsible for establishing the Revlon/UCLA Womens Cancer Research Program and the annual Revlon Run/Walk For Women.

Perelman, 73, is currently married to his fifth wife, Dr. Anna Chapman.

The couple were wed in 2010, four years after Perelman's contentious divorce from his fourth wife, the actress Ellen Barkin.

Barkin reportedly received $60million in the divorce following six years of marriage, and earned another $20million after auctioning off all the jewelry Perelman gave her during the course of their relationship at Christie's.
'I didn't even realize that he had cut me. I thought I'd got punched. But then I saw all this blood and I'm like, 'Oh s***, this is not good,' she said

man lunged at her, and slashed her face so badly she needed 150 stitches to her left check, she tells Daily Mail Online

Nikki Pagliaro was just 20 yards from her front door when the unthinkable happened.

She had been aware of footsteps behind her and hurried her pace. Now the man had rounded on her and was standing in front of her.

He told her not to worry; he wasn't going to hurt her. And then he lunged. Without warning or motive he slashed her face and disappeared into the night.

It is exactly one week since Nikki, 28, became a victim of the New York slasher on January 1 - just a day after he had been freed by a judge, even though the court knew about his appalling arrest record.

Now in an exclusive interview with Daily Mail Online, she has relived the ordeal, told of her relief at her attacker's arrest on Wednesday and shared her fears this could happen again.

Victim: Nikki Pagliaro, 28, was just 20 yards from her front door on January 1 when she was approached by a man who said 'don't worry, I won't hurt you', when slashed her across the cheek

As she was: Nikki Pagliaro tells Daily Mail Online of her ordeal: 'I think it's a reminder that life can change in an instant and when I tell you how lucky I feel I really mean it.'

Under arrest: Kare Bazemore, 41, was arrested after the second slashing attack in New York within a week. He had been freed the day before the attack on Nikki Pagliaro

With remarkable compassion in the face of such horror, she has spoken of her hope that her mentally unstable assailant  Kari Bazemore had been arrested at least 30 times previously - gets the help he needs so that nobody else suffers at his hands.

Bazemore's family told the New York Daily News he has a 15-year history of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, and had been off his medication since last being released from psychiatric care.

Nikki told Daily Mail Online: 'I know that the system is messed up. I really hope they start paying attention more to what happens when you don't deal with something straight away. I hope they can make an example out of this.

'He's not mentally stable and hasn't been for a very long time. I guess he did this to me but am I going to get angry about it?

'What's that going to do for me? I just want to get better and stay positive.'

She continued: 'For now there is relief that he's not in my neighborhood but I'm concerned this could happen again. If it's not him it could be somebody else.'

On the evening of her attack Nikki had dinner with her cousin and his girlfriend in the East Village before catching the subway back to her home in the South Bronx.

It was almost 9 o'clock by the time she was making the brief walk from the station to her front door.

She was looking forward to the following day  a friend and she planned to go swimming, part of a New Year's resolution. She had bought a new swimsuit that day.

She recalled: 'I noticed there was somebody walking behind me right when I was crossing the street to get to the block where my building is and immediately I'm like, something's wrong and I kept walking.

'He was behind me, I kept focused on the building then he came up next to me, came out in front of me and stopped and said "Don't worry I'm not going to hurt you" and then slashed me and then ran. The whole interaction was seconds and it felt like forever at the time.'

Second victim: Amanda Morris (pictured before the attack, left, and after, right) was viciously slashed in the face on her daily commute to work

Second slashing: Amanada Morris was on her way to work on Wednesday morning was attacked by a stranger at about 6am in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York City on January 6

Caught: Police in New York City have arrested the man (right) responsible for slashing a 24-year-old woman's (left) face on Wednesday. He has been identified as 41-year-old Kari Bazemore

He then flees, as Morris runs into a nearby diner to seek help after the attack. Witnesses said she was bleeding and had facial injuries

Detectives are searching through surveillance footage in hopes of finding a suspect in the incident, which occurred outside Malibu Diner (pictured)

In those fateful seconds  time that Nikki describes as surreal  she felt no pain. Instead she locked on details of her attacker  the green of his sweatshirt, the red of his jacket, the white spots on his forehead, his uneven complexion.

She explained: 'I didn't even realize that he had cut me. I thought I'd got punched. But then I saw all this blood and I'm like, 'Oh s***, this is not good.'

She didn't feel afraid she said, 'As soon as he ran off I thought this is done, it's over, now I've got to deal with this and there was blood everywhere.'

Nikki made it back to her building where she called her boyfriend, Dan, who held her and put pressure on her face as neighbors called the cops and an ambulance.

She was taken to Lincoln Hospital, South Bronx. The next few hours are all, she says now, a blur. She received 150 stitches to the deep gash on her left cheek.

She recalls the officers of the 40th precinct who were by her side as 'amazing'. She said: 'They were with me pretty much the whole way through. They said we're going to look at video footage, this is going to be a thing now that you're going to have to help us figure out.'

Little did she imagine that the mystery of her assailant's identity would only be resolved when he attacked another girl  24-year-old Amanda Morris - on West 23rd Street in Chelsea on Wednesday.

Nikki knew the moment she saw surveillance footage of the attack and the attacker's odd, disjointed gait that she was watching the same man as had attacked her.

She said: 'As soon as I saw the video I felt it was too familiar the way that he approached her. The fact that she couldn't see what the blade was. It's exactly the same approach.'

Bazemore, 41, was arrested when a member of public recognized him near St Patrick's Cathedral. He alerted police and followed him until cops could arrest him.

Nikki received a call from the cops shortly after midnight asking if she could ID her attacker from a selection of photographs.

It was 1am when detectives arrived at her South Bronx home and she picked Bazemore out right away.

HOW COULD JUDGE LET 'SLASHER' OUT AFTER SEEING THIS RAP SHEET? Kari Bazemore had a rap-sheet with at least 30 arrests. Judge Laurie Peterson saw these - THEN set him free. 1997: Fare beating. Outcome unknown 1997-2000: Marijuana possession, multiple arrests. Outcome unknown June 30 2000: Second-degree criminal trespassing. Pleaded guilty April 5 2001: Theft and third-degree criminal trespassing. Pleaded guilty January 6 2009: Transit violation. Pleaded guilty November 7 2009: Resisting arrest, third-degree sexual abuse, forcible touching. Charges dismissed December 8 2012: Theft and third-degree criminal trespassing. Pleaded guilty April 6 2013: Disorderly conduct and third-degree criminal possession of a weapon. Pleaded guilty July 11 2013: Disorderly conduct. Pleaded guilty August 17 2013: Forcible touching. Outcome unknown August 26 2013: Forcible touching. Charges dismissed August 27 2013: Forcible touching, sexual abuse. Charges dismissed February 11 2015: Grand larceny. Outcome unknown July 20 2015: Public urination. Outcome unknown October 21 2015: Fare beating. Pleaded guilty December 30 2015: Misdemeanor assault. Decision pending * RESEARCH BY NEW YORK POST Advertisement

She recalled: 'I guess they could make an arrest and a connection with the two cases. The next morning I had to go down to the police line-up.'

Nikki visibly blanches as she recalls coming face to face with her attacker once more, as she had to at Thursday's ID parade.

She said: 'I hyperventilated when I saw him. Your body tells you this is the guy - I had a very negative, visceral feeling.'

'It could have been so much worse. That's something I still get a little reflective about and I pause about Nikki Pagliaro

It has since transpired that Bazemore had been arrested and bailed just two days before attacking Nikki, when he was charged with punching a woman on on Sixth Avenue in Manhattan.

Detectives have since linked him to at least five attacks since early November and he will likely be charged with at least three of those crimes.

Yet where it might be understandable for Nikki to feel anger that her attacker was allowed to be on the street with such a litany of violence and misdemeanors behind him, she chooses instead to focus on how lucky she feels that her injuries were not worse.

She said: 'I'm incredibly supported and he's not. I think it's a reminder that life can change in an instant and when I tell you how lucky I feel I really mean it.

'It could have been so much worse. That's something I still get a little reflective about and I pause about.'

She added: 'Time really does slow down when you think about what could have happened and I'm not ready for anything worse to happen.'

For now Nikki is in what she describes as 'psychological purgatory', dealing with her ordeal as best she can, uncertain how it will affect her and play out over the coming weeks and months.

She is nervous out on the street, has trouble sleeping and has rarely been on her own since the attack, with her boyfriend, Dan, protectively by her side.

She is looking forward to getting her stitches out on Monday and returning to work at Elite Daily, owned by Daily Mail Online's parent company dmg media, where she is Creative Director on Tuesday.
One call saved her boyfriend and potentially countless others lives.

Soraya, a Lebanese-Australian, posed as a travel agent to stop her 25-year-old Afghan-Australian partner Abed, from going to Syria to fight alongside terrorist group ISIS.

After ten months leading a double life, Soraya put on a false accent and told Abed that his flight had been cancelled, stopping him from joining the terror organisation, she told The Weekend Australian.

Iraqi Shiite fighters display, upside down, the flag of the Islamic State as Australians at home fight for their loved ones not to go over. One woman pretended to be a travel agent to stop her former partner leaving

DEAD AUSTRALIAN JIHADIS Amira Karroum (Amira Ali) (NSW) 22 Tyler Casey (Yusuf Ali) (NSW) 22 Sharky Jama (Abu Tawba Alsomalee) (VIC) Caner Temel (NSW) 22 Abdul Salam Mahmoud (Abu Hamza al-Sudani and Yassin Ali) (NSW) age unknown Jake Bilardi (Abu Abdullah al Australi) (VIC) 18 Mohammad Ali Baryalei (Abu Omar) (NSW) 33 Suhan Rahman (Abu Jihadi al Australi) (VIC) 23 Mahmoud Abdullatif (VIC) 23 Zakarayah Raad (Abu Yayha ash Shami) (NSW) 22 Adam Dahman (VIC) 18 Roger Abbas (VIC) 23 Yusuf Toprakkaya (VIC) 30 Sammy Salma (VIC) 22 Mustapha al-Majzoub (NSW) 30 Ahmad Moussali (NSW) age unknown Ahmed Succarieh (Abu Asma al Australi) (QLD) Zia Abdul Haq (Abu Yusseph) (QLD) 33 Ahmad Mohamad Al-Ghazzaoui (NSW) unknown age Source: The Daily Telegraph Advertisement

In the exclusive interview Soraya and others named in the article's identities were concealed to ensure their safety.

Last October Soraya found Abeds airline tickets to Syria.

She told The Weekend Australian: I hate the word radicalisation. But I knew if he crossed that line, he was going to kill other people.

And for these reasons Soraya spied on her former partner, giving up her whole life to stop him joining a growing army of people fighting on the frontline across the world.

A private high school tutor by day and a spy by night, Soraya followed Abed, reading his phone messages and keeping a close eye on where he was going.

Abed fell into the crux of the terror organisation after attending lectures at the Markaz Imam Ahmad mosque. He met a man who introduced him to the Crew.

These people represented the terror organisation across Sydney and lived in pockets all over the city, with a combination of people online and in person.

The mosque says it has a clear stance against terrorism and condemns those who advocate the killing of innocent human beings and denied it was involved in any recruitment for ISIS.

Abed who had not been religious to begin with, became increasingly more interested in his faith as as he grew older.

The mosque gained notoriety by provoking outrage when it auctioned a flag associated with Islamic State in 2014.

The mosque said any suggestion it supported terrorism was unfounded and pointed out that the flag has been existence for more than 1000 years.

They do it for love. They will kill for the love of Allah, said Soraya.

I could create doubt and I could grab him by his feet and kiss them and beg him to love me more than he loved killing somebody else.

The mosque gained notoriety by provoking outrage when it auctioned a flag associated with Islamic State in 2014.

But the problem began, in Sorayas opinion, when he interpreted the concept of 'jihad' in the Koran to mean holy war.

They tell them I swear, Allah will love you if you do this, I swear youre going to go to heaven and Allah will love you more by giving you things, and youre one of us, said Soraya.

And if he didnt continue to believe them that they threatened to kill him.

Soraya was consumed by Abed and made sure he stayed connected to his family, friend and others in the community.

I had to be smart on the ball all the time. I gave up my life, she said.

Acting NSW Police Commissioner Catherine Burn, who oversees the forces counter-terrorism work, said: Families and friends are front and centre in that regard.

People like Soraya are the centre of the ISIS conflict according to acting NSW Police Commissioner Catherine Burn, who oversees the forces counter-terrorism work

They really are the first to notice changes in attitudes, habits and appearances and if they do, we have some chance of pulling a vulnerable person back from the brink of radicalisation, added Commissioner Burn.

Soraya was so involved in his life but is now no longer with Abed.

She is convinced that she did the right thing and says that it still makes her very emotional to think about.

Meanwhile The Daily Telegraph released a list of Australian jihadis fighting with Isis in Syria and Iraq in April.

By state the most known fighters come from New South Wales and in total 60 people with one unknown member has been revealed across Australia, 19 of which have died.

Soraya was convinced pretending to be a travel agent and telling Abed that his flight had been cancelled was still the right thing to do to save him and countless others involved in the war with ISIS
Hundreds of British soldiers who served in Iraq have been hounded by investigators over claims of torture and murder.

They have received letters questioning their role in the alleged abuse of suspected insurgents on the front line.

Forces chiefs and MPs last night condemned the despicable witch-hunt.

Some veterans are even handed the letters personally and quizzed on their doorsteps by taxpayer-funded detectives.

Hundreds of British soldiers who served in Iraq have been hounded by investigators over claims of torture and murder

The soldiers are told that an incident they were involved in is under investigation by the Iraq Historical Allegations Team (IHAT). They are then asked to give evidence about their involvement  and the role of other soldiers.

About 280 soldiers have received a letter in the past two years, and veterans say it is only a matter of time before every soldier who served in Iraq gets one.

They fear they could face murder charges for split-second decisions made on the battlefield more than ten years ago.

Last night, it was reported that IHAT has sought advice from the Service Prosecuting Authority (SPA) over unlawful death cases involving 35 alleged killings.

The SPA  the military equivalent of the Crown Prosecution Service  is also preparing to advise on an additional 20 cases of alleged unlawful killing.

SPA director Andrew Cayley QC, a former war crimes prosecutor, told the Independent that his team would not flinch in prosecuting British soldiers where there was evidence of unlawful killing and torture.

But he added: Equally I want to make it absolutely clear that no member of the British Armed Forces will be prosecuted unless there is sufficient evidence to do so.

Veterans say it is only a matter of time before every soldier who served in Iraq gets one, while others say they have been quizzed on their doorsteps by taxpayer-funded detectives

Colonel Richard Kemp, a former commander of British forces, said he had been contacted by two soldiers, who had described how they were exploited by tax-payer funded detectives.

He told the Mail: I know how much pressure it puts on them to be put under suspicion of a serious crime.

The idea that such a large number of soldiers should be accused of crime is a disgrace, and the Government should stop it.

'These soldiers did not sign up to go and put their lives on the line only to spend what could be the rest of their lives being hounded for their loyalty.

War heroes, military families and politicians have all called for ambulance-chasing lawyers to stop harassing soldiers who had simply been doing their duty.

Former sergeant Richard Catterall, pictured, served in the military for more than 20 years. Forces chiefs and MPs last night condemned the despicable witch-hunt

IHAT has received hundreds of allegations against British soldiers in the past few months, meaning the number of veterans receiving letters is likely to rise significantly this year.

Soldiers are also receiving letters out of the blue by a second inquiry assessing whether the families of dead Iraqis should be given compensation.

These letters warn that the inquiry has the power to apply to the High Court to compel the attendance of witnesses.

The Government set aside 57 million five years ago for the investigation of 152 allegations of ill-treatment and unlawful killing of civilians.

Now the number of cases being examined by the 145-strong IHAT unit  submitted by legal firms Leigh Day and Co and Public Interest Lawyers  has passed the 1,500 mark.

Despite no convictions so far, Mark Warwick, a former police officer who leads the unit, says it has been overwhelmed with cases.

Col Kemp said that in some cases, soldiers were quizzed on their doorsteps as investigators earning as much as 33 an hour out of the Ministry of Defence budget handed them a letter appealing for information.

The letter is being handed to them personally and they are using it is an excuse to talk to the person when they meet them, he said.

Some of the soldiers are not being told they are not obliged to speak. It seems they are using underhand tactics to try and get these soldiers to talk, Col Kemp said. This is exploiting their weaknesses as they are used to obeying orders.

Some of IHATs concluded cases are being handed to a second body, called the Iraq Fatality Investigations (IFI), which is an inquest-style inquiry looking at compensation.

Former sergeant Richard Catterall was quizzed by the IFI even after his case was thrown out by IHAT. Investigators had concluded he acted in self-defence when he shot dead an Iraqi armed with an AK-47.

I want to make it absolutely clear that no member of the British Armed Forces will be prosecuted unless there is sufficient evidence to do so. SPA director Andrew Cayley QC

He received a letter, seen by the Mail, from IFI investigators in July last year. He said: I got a letter completely out of the blue. I was scared that I would have to revisit things that happened so long ago.

Colonel Bob Stewart, a Tory MP, said: I am fed up with efforts by ambulance-chasing lawyers and even the MoD itself, through IHAT, who dig for dirt on our soldiers in combat so that prosecutions can be brought against them.

'The pressure put on veterans and indeed serving personnel when the representatives of such people come knocking on their doors is intolerable.

Going to court to defend themselves against sharp-tongued barristers is every soldiers worst nightmare. It is utterly despicable and wrong. Why should it be hanging over their heads?

Iraq veteran Andrew Holmes, 39, said every soldier was looking over their shoulders and waiting for a letter.

He said: This has got to stop. There is a lot of worry among soldiers at the moment. We are obeying the rules so why are they prosecuting us?

Asked if he had a letter, he said: Not yet. Everyone will get one. He said if he did, he would give it back to David Cameron, because I did nothing wrong.

Last night, an IHAT spokesman confirmed the team knocked on soldiers doors and asked them questions.
An Islamic cleric who defends domestic violence is among a string of extremist speakers touring British universities unchallenged, the Mail Investigations Unit can reveal.

Egyptian cleric Fadel Soliman spoke at five such events last year, using them to refer Muslim students to an online lecture series in which he speaks in favour of hitting women and outlines the Islamic case for sex slavery and polygamy.

Mr Soliman told students at Sheffield University that watching his lectures could be a turning point in their lives.

In his extraordinary videos, he advises physical punishment for wives who have displeased their husbands, saying the hitting must be done with a small stick.

Egyptian cleric Fadel Soliman (pictured) spoke at five such events last year, using them to refer Muslim students to an online lecture series in which he speaks in favour of hitting women and outlines the Islamic case for sex slavery and polygamy

Explaining why it is necessary, he says that when a husband is unhappy with the behaviour of his wife, after passing through two stages of non-physical interaction, the next stage must involve something physical, in order to escalate the intensity of the warning.

The preacher is one of several extremists being permitted to espouse their views unchallenged at Britains universities  in a possible breach of the Governments counter-extremism strategy, Prevent. Since September, universities and colleges are legally required to have policies to stop extremists radicalising students on campus. This includes an obligation to ensure those espousing extremist views do not go unchallenged.

The Mail revealed yesterday how CAGE  the notorious organisation which called Islamic State killer Jihadi John a beautiful young man  has participated in at least 13 university events since September, calling on students to sabotage Prevent.

The true implication of the spanking is to sound an alarm that the husband has passed to a new stage of serious displeasure. Egyptian cleric Fadel Soliman

Another group, MEND, an Islamist organisation whose director has condoned the killing of British troops, appeared in at least ten events on campuses across the country last term.

And a speaker from an organisation which mocked last years Charlie Hebdo terror attack in Paris spoke at a student event despite having being refused permission, using the platform to tell students the State was fundamentally racist and they should oppose Prevent.

Home Secretary Theresa May said the revelations show universities need to do more to stop damaging, extremist rhetoric going unchallenged on campuses.

Up to 19 universities where the Mail identified extremist-linked speakers or events could now face an inquiry by the Higher Education Funding Council for England, it is understood.

Lord Carlile, one of Britains top legal experts, said last night that universities that allowed Mr Soliman to speak unchallenged had failed in their duty of care. He said: This is a person who has given at least tacit approval to what sounds like criminal behaviour. Universities really should not be permitting people like this on to their campuses.

Mr Soliman is thought to have spoken at Nottingham, Leicester, Leeds, Manchester and Sheffield universities. He urged young Muslims to watch his disturbing 30-part video series endorsing violent and extreme practices.

In one, he suggests it is acceptable for a man to hit his wife, if she repeatedly goes out and refuses to say where shes going. He says: The hitting must be done with a small stick and should not be painful, adding: The true implication of the spanking is to sound an alarm that the husband has passed to a new stage of serious displeasure.

The preacher is one of several extremists being permitted to espouse their views unchallenged at Britains universities  in a possible breach of the Governments counter-extremism strategy, Prevent. Mr Soliman explained the hitting of wives should be carried out with a small stick (pictured)

WHAT IS MUSLIM ENGAGEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT (MEND)? It is the extremist-linked organisation known for its links with radical Islamists - including one who said every Muslim should be a terrorist. And now Muslim Engagement and Development (MEND) is turning its attention towards universities. The controversial group has taken part in no fewer than ten university events this term, the Mail can reveal. MEND, previously called iEngage, was removed as administrative support to the all-party parliamentary group on Islamophobia in 2011, due to concerns that it was linked to extremism. It has defended several extremists, including in 2010, radical preacher, Zakir Naik, who stated that every Muslim should be a terrorist. The groups then chief executive, Mohammed Asif, wrote to Theresa May, to protest against her ban on Naik. And its outreach director Azad Ali has repeatedly drawn criticism for his extreme views, suggesting the killing of British troops is justified, questioning whether the Mumbai attacks were terrorism, and that democracy, if it means at the expense of not implementing the Sharia - of course nobody agrees with that. At one MEND-linked event called Muslim Women in the West at SOAS on 25 November, speaker Zara Huda Faris told young women that Islamophobia is so bad in the UK it is comparable to the plight of Jews in Germany during the rise of the Nazis. Also speaking was Sahar Al Faifi who suggested Islamic State is a creation of power structures in the West who its within their interest to fuel Islamophobia. MEND also took part in other university events in the North of England and the Midlands. Last night MEND said there had never been any substantiated links between its organisation and extremism and all allegations to the contrary are false. The organisation denied it had any role in organising the Muslim in the West event at SOAS. The spokesman added: Universities are required to comply with the Prevent statutory duty. If you consider that a breach of this duty may have occurred, we suggest you put these concerns to the university directly. A SOAS spokesperson said: As a university, we provide a forum for speakers who speak on a variety of subjects and represent different viewpoints. These events were legal and no concerns were raised with us by local police or Prevent officers. Advertisement

In another video he says it is forbidden for men and women to engage in frivolous talk, that men and women should lower their gaze and avoid unnecessary eye contact, especially with lust. He says Muslims should avoid interacting with members of the opposite sex, even at work, and women should not wear perfume as it arouses men. In other videos, he outlines the Islamic case for sex slavery and polygamy.

At an event at the University of Sheffield on December 3, Mr Soliman urged 120 Muslim students: Put these videos on your Facebook pages, share it with people. He was also allowed to speak at the University of Manchester last month, despite concerns being raised by university staff. At the event, the cleric said: They told me not to say anything controversial.

Mr Soliman denies he supports domestic violence. He said: I have provided the Mail with a detailed response to the allegations which are published in this article and informed them in detail why I am not guilty of the things which they allege against me. Once the paper is published, I will respond to the allegations on my own website.

Its within their interest to fuel Islamophobia. Its within their interest to sell more weapons. Its within their interest to make the Middle East unstable. Speaker Sahar Al Faifi

He has a strong following among young female students. The Sheffield event  which was not formally segregated but at which men and women sat on opposite sides of the hall  had an audience of more than 100 students, mostly female.

Beforehand, groups of young women could be heard discussing how much they love Mr Soliman  even making swooning gestures and fanning themselves. One woman in her early 20s, who travelled from London, told others how excited she was to see the cleric in person.

Debora Green, Head of Student Support and Wellbeing at the University of Sheffield, said: 'External speakers play a central role in university life and allow students to be exposed to a range of different beliefs, challenge other peoples views and develop their own opinions.

'Like all universities, the University of Sheffield adheres to UUK guidelines and we have our own protocols and procedures that have to be satisfied before external speakers are given the green light to speak at campus events. This event was no exception.

'The University takes its role in preventing people being drawn into terrorism extremely seriously and is committed to protecting the safety of our staff and students. We are actively involved in the Government's Prevent strategy and have had strong partnerships with the police and security services for a number of years.'

Another organisation allowed to speak unchallenged at recent university events is MEND  a radical Islamist group that has been associated with a number of extremist statements. MENDs head of community development, Azad Ali, has suggested the killing of British troops can be justified.

He has also said that the 2008 Mumbai attacks, in which a gang of Islamist militants slaughtered more than 160, were not terrorism and that implementing Sharia law was more important than democracy.

Last year MEND supported hardline Indian preacher Zakir Naik  who claims that every Muslim should be a terrorist  calling on the Government to revoke a ban on him travelling to the UK. Despite this, it was permitted to host ten university events last term.

SUPPORTERS OF THE NOTORIOUS BLIND SHEIKH: WHAT IS THE ISLAMIC HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION? The so-called Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) is best known for when - in an extraordinary insult to those murdered by terrorists - it bestowed Islamophobes of the Year awards to the murdered staff of Paris magazine Charlie Hebdo. But speakers from this controversial organisation were repeatedly welcomed onto university campuses last term, with no opposition presented to their views. Like Cage and Mend, the IHRC has been involved in the Students not Suspects university movement, which campaigns against the governments counter-extremism policy, PREVENT. The group had speakers at two of such events and on both occasions their claims went unchallenged. Lena Mohamed, an IHRC advocate, chaired a SOAS talk called Preventing Prevent on 29 September, where she encouraged students to sabotage PREVENT. At a similar event at the University of Manchester, Mrs Mohamed spoke on the panel even though she had been refused permission to do so. She denied extremism was an issue at universities, and also described the state as fundamentally racist. The university said they had refused her permission to speak because they were not provided enough notice to make the necessary checks. At the end of the event, when an audience member asked what can be done about extremism in universities, she appears to deny extremism is a problem on campuses. She says: Islamic extremismits pretty much stayed level for a number of years now. There has, however... exponential rise in far-right extremism. She adds: I admire this idea that there is a problem with extremism, especially as the government defines it. The IHRC, claims to be a non-profit organisation, working with different organisations from Muslim and non-Muslim backgrounds, to campaign for justice for all peoples. However, their main focus appears to be supporting Islamic extremists. Individuals they have supported include the Blind Sheikh, Omar Abdel Rahman, who is currently serving a life sentence in the US for his part in the first blowing-up of the World Trade Centre in 1993. The IHRC also provides a resource page on its website directed at encouraging students  and even schoolchildren - to disrupt anti-extremism measures at schools and at university campuses. The page provides a link to a model motion for students unions to use to campaign against Prevent. Under a section titled How to fight back, the web page states: If you have been approached by a PREVENT officer or feel that you will be referred to one based on questions asked by your teacher / lecturer/ GP / social worker etc contact us for advice and support. We can help you respond to their Islamophobic questions, explain your rights and explore options to challenge them if they try to refer you to Channel. A spokesman for the IHRC said: Our opinion on the racism of the British state and the various institutions, including the media, can be found in various articles on our website. Likewise, our opposition to PREVENT is well documented and our views are shared by many individuals and organisations, from unions, teachers, lecturers, students, lawyers and academics to some politicians, the spokesman added. As a human rights organisation we support everyones rights, regardless of whether we agree with them. He said the resource page was for organisations to share materials ideas and resources. They denied they had been involved in organising any of the events. A SOAS spokesperson said: As a university, we provide a forum for speakers who speak on a variety of subjects and represent different viewpoints. These events were legal and no concerns were raised with us by local police or Prevent officers. A University of Manchester spokesman said Lena Mohamed was told she would not be able to join the panel at the Students not Suspects event because the request was made far too late. The spokesman added: Our due diligence procedures cannot be completed in such a short space of time. The University of Manchester is committed to Free speech within the law. Advertisement

At one MEND-linked event, at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, speakers suggested the treatment of Muslims was akin to Jews under the Nazis. They also suggested IS had been created by power structures in the West. One speaker, Sahar Al Faifi, said: Its within their interest to fuel Islamophobia. Its within their interest to sell more weapons. Its within their interest to make the Middle East unstable. These views went unchallenged at the event, entitled Muslim Women In The West.

Another group given platforms at student events is the Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC). It is notorious for bestowing an Islamophobes of the Year award on the murdered staff of Paris magazine Charlie Hebdo.

Like CAGE and MEND, IHRC has been involved in the Students Not Suspects university movement, which campaigns against Prevent. An advocate of IHRC, Lena Mohamed, was invited to lead a talk at SOAS in September, where she encouraged students to sabotage counter-extremism measures at universities.

At an event in Manchester, Mrs Mohamed denied extremism was an issue at universities and said the State was fundamentally racist. Yesterday a SOAS spokesman said the school was confident it upheld its duties under Prevent, adding: We provide a forum for speakers who ... represent different viewpoints. We encourage open debate and aim to create an atmosphere where all perspectives can be aired and challenged.

MEND said there had never been any substantiated links between it and extremism and all allegations to the contrary are false. It denied it had any role in organising the Muslim Women In The West event at SOAS.

IHRC said: Our opposition to Prevent is well documented and our views are shared by many individuals and organisations, from unions, teachers, lecturers, students, lawyers and academics to some politicians. As a human rights organisation, we support everyones rights, regardless of whether we agree with them.

Students are at greater risk of being radicalised by Islamic State as a result of CAGEs campus campaign, warned former reviewer of UK terror legislation Lord Carlile (pictured)

Mail is praised for exposing how our students are at risk

Students are at greater risk of being radicalised by Islamic State as a result of CAGEs campus campaign, a former reviewer of UK terror legislation warned last night.

Lord Carlile said universities, including Kings College London, SOAS, Manchester and Birmingham, that allowed representatives from the controversial group to speak unopposed at student events last term had been irresponsible.

CAGE is helping the propaganda put out by IS by misleading students into believing they were being spied on and victimised, he said.

He led a furious reaction yesterday to the Mails revelation that extremists have been allowed to spout their views unchallenged at UK universities. Students attending the talks would be more vulnerable to being radicalised as a result of such messages and CAGE was unwittingly helping the IS cause, Lord Carlile said.

Somebody convinced by CAGE that the West has it in for Muslims, and that it treats them in a seriously discriminatory and unjust way, will be low-hanging fruit when it comes to Islamist recruitment. Apologists for what happened in Paris  for example on the basis that no children were killed  are misleading students.

He called on the universities involved to investigate the events concerned. The universities revealed in the Daily Mail investigation are extremely reputable I would expect them all to re-examine their policies as to what is permissible on their campuses, he said.

Other experts also criticised universities for not doing more to hold extremist views to account.

Terror expert Professor Anthony Glees said CAGE were craven apologists for terrorism and exactly the kind of non-violent extremists the new Prevent rules for universities were supposed to crack down on.

This is very disturbing. Universities are providing a safe space for CAGE to brainwash young people, he said.

I hope that the outcome will be the exclusion of CAGE from our campuses and particularly from Islamic student societies.

The universities revealed in the Daily Mail investigation are extremely reputable I would expect them all to re-examine their policies as to what is permissible on their campuses. Lord Carlile

The Mail is doing us a huge national service by exposing the activities of CAGE in such detail. Rupert Sutton, director of Student Rights  run by the Henry Jackson Society think-tank  said: Extremism on university campuses remains a serious issue.

The sheer number of events logged last term where extreme or intolerant speakers spoke without challenge suggests too many universities are not properly enforcing their own speaker policies.

Groups like CAGE have sought to undermine counter-extremism work for years, so it is no surprise to see them now targeting students.

The toxic message of persecution and oppression spread at these events risks driving anger and misplaced grievance in students, while urging those best-placed to notice the signs of radicalisation in vulnerable individuals to boycott policies designed to ensure those people get help is disgraceful.

Last night Birmingham University said CAGE had not been referenced on the application or the promotional material for the event it hosted, adding it takes the threat of extremism on campus very seriously.

Kings College London said it had not been aware of all the speakers in advance of a CAGE event held there but added that it did not consider they had incited hatred or violence.
A Christchurch family's experience on a Qantas flight has been described as borderline 'child abuse' after they endured departure delays, problems with airline food and fluctuating temperatures in the cabin of the plane.

Duncan Kemsley, Heather Smith and their 11-month-year-old son Jeremy Kemsley arrived in Christchurch Airport four-days late when their flight from Johannesburg taxied due to airline issues.

Although the couple said that the major airline had done a 'really good job' of booking hotels for people, the service on board had been very poor, especially for those travelling with children.

Christchurch family Duncan Kemsley and Heather Smith (pictured) described their experience on a Qantas flight as borderline 'child abuse'

The flight which was due to reach Christchurch on Tuesday arrived on Friday when 'about ten seconds into the acceleration there was a big bang,' said Mr Kemsley to Fairfax media.

'We just taxied off and sat on the tarmac for about three-hours waiting for something to happen,' he added.

The couple's flight was rescheduled to leave Johannesburg at 11pm on Wednesday but was delayed a further day, till 1am Thursday morning.

When the family finally got back onto the plane, the air conditioning was faulty causing the plane to become very hot.

'We actually had to strip the babies again and keep them cool,' said Ms Smith.

The air conditioning then began to leak, 'basically pouring out of the ceiling' and became 'freezing' added Ms Smith.

Ms Smith and her partner Mr Kemsley had been travelling with their 11-month-old son Jeremy and said that there were a number of children on board. They waited four-days to fly and 15 hours for food on board

The next hurdle the family faced was waiting 15 hours for a meal when accompanied by young children.

'There was no food on the plane,' said Ms Smith.

'What really annoyed me is the business class people got a food service and there were a lot of kids in economy class that went 15 house and they didn't feed them.

'With a baby it felt like child abuse,' she added.

They said the experience would have been funny had it not been for the amount of children on board.

Although both Mr Kemsley and Ms Smith thought they had done a good job finding accommodation while the flight was delayed they said that Qantas' service was like 'child abuse' travelling with an infant

Daily Mail Australia has contacted Qantas for comment.

Qantas released a statement to Fairfax media explaining that necessary check were to be completed following a problem with the plane.

Qantas said: 'The family's flight was delayed due to a problem with one of the aircraft's engines which was replaced in Johannesburg.'

He also confirmed that 'economy meals were not loaded onto the aircraft due to a catering issue.'

Qantas apologised for the lengthy delays and the 'inconvenience' caused to passengers and said they had been in touch with the family since.
Police attempting to recover a car and body from the ocean sparked a rescue effort themselves when their boat's engine failed and was smashed onto nearby rocks.

The boat and its crew were attempting to recover the car and driver from water at the north end of Sydney's Manly Beach, when it lost power and became stuck on rocks about noon.

Attempts by those aboard another police launch to pull the vessel off the rock shelf failed, and the boat was slammed against the rocky shoreline by waves, with an officer still aboard.

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The police vessel as it was washed onto rocks at Queenscliff, near Manly, on Saturday

The police vessel washed up on rocks near Queenscliff in Sydney's northern beaches on Saturday afternoon

Many beachgoers took to social media to post images of the beached vessel

Two police vessels in the water near Queenscliff beach before one police boat lost power and was washed onto the rocky shoreline

Members of the police dive team (pictured) found the body of a man and a car submerged in water around 11.30am on Saturday

Police believe the man drove through a chain-link fence is positioned at the end of Queenscliff Road (pictured)

The man's car fell off the edge of a cliff (pictured) in Queenscliff, 16km north of Sydney CBD

Posts on social media indicated the boat was still beached about 7pm.

A police spokeswoman told Daily Mail Australia neither of the officers on board the boat were injured in the incident.

Police would remove the vessel from the rocks as soon as it was safe to do so.

The man in the car died after he drove the vehicle off a cliff and into the water about 1.40am on Saturday.

Officers searched the area at the top of the cliff and Marine Area Command began searching the water shortly after witnesses called police

His death is not suspicious and a report will be prepared for the coroner, police said shortly after finding the man and the car in the water at 11.30am in Queenscliff, about 16km north of Sydney's central business district.

Witnesses called police in the early hours when they heard a loud bang and saw the fence at the end of Queenscliff Road was broken and saw lights coming from the water, according to police.

Officers searched the area at the top of the cliff and Marine Area Command began searching the water.

Helicopters were also used to search from above but nothing was located and the search was suspended until Saturday morning when the light was better.

Divers continued searching the water around 10.30am Saturday.

Visibility was initially a concern because of the recent heavy rainfall.

Debris from the car reportedly washed up on nearby beaches on Saturday.

If anyone has any information, they are asked to call Northern Beaches detectives or Crime Stoppers at 1800 333 000.

Dive teams searched the water near Manly Beach and helicopters were called to search from above
Downing Street was accused of a referendum stitch-up last night after the Foreign Secretary declared that he cant envisage campaigning to leave the EU.

Philip Hammond, a one-time Eurosceptic, said he was confident that the Prime Minister would secure a good deal to remain in the Brussels club, which he would then back.

At the same time, Treasury Secretary Greg Hands extolled the virtues of EU rules on free movement, saying migrant workers are a fantastic thing to have.

Eurosceptic ministers are unhappy that  while colleagues are free to make pro-EU comments  they face the sack if they speak in favour of leaving. So-called collective responsibility on the topic will only be lifted once the Prime Ministers negotiations are complete in February or March.

Free debate: Downing Street was accused of a referendum stitch-up after ministers made pro-EU statements in public, while Eurosceptics face the sack if they speak in favour of leaving

In the meantime, any minister who publicly criticises the renegotiation or speaks in favour of Britain leaving could be disciplined. Tory high command is issuing regular instructions on lines to take which Eurosceptics claim have a pro-EU bias.

Insiders also claim that junior ministers are being licensed to make media comments on the benefits of EU membership. And Whitehall departments have been told to drum up stories which suggest membership helps Britain, sources said.

Eurosceptic ministers say the situation gives the Government time in which it can make the case for remaining in the EU without answer. Last night Robert Oxley, of Vote Leave, said: Its unacceptable that Eurosceptic ministers are gagged, while the Government machine is being deployed in favour of staying in.

Yesterday, Mr Hammond said he cant envisage breaking ranks to campaign against EU membership if Mr Cameron secures a renegotiation deal. The Foreign Secretary  who has previously said he would back a Brexit if the relationship does not change  told BBC Radio 4s Today programme: Our first challenge is to get the right deal, and we are making good progress on that. I cant envisage us negotiating a deal which the Prime Minister thinks is good enough to recommend to the British people and which I feel I want to campaign against.

Significantly, his remarks were immediately seized upon by the Britain Stronger In Europe campaign, which said they were a significant blow to the leave groups.

Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond (pictured), a one-time Eurosceptic, said he was confident that the Prime Minister would secure a good deal to remain in the Brussels club, which he would then back

FOREIGN SECRETARY PHILIP HAMMOND'S REMARKABLE EU-TURN 'If the choice is between an EU written exactly as it is today and not being a part of that then I have to say that I'm on the side of [leaving].' Philip Hammond in May 2013 'I can't envisage us negotiating a deal which the Prime Minister thinks is good enough... and which I feel I want to campaign against.' On Radio 4 yesterday Advertisement

Meanwhile, during a visit to the RBS headquarters in Edinburgh, Treasury Secretary Mr Hands said: I think migrant workers are, in general, a fantastic thing to have. Weve just got to make sure that we dont make our system overly generous. Last night Number 10 denied there were any double-standards. A senior Downing Street source said: The Prime Minister is clear that he wants to get a better deal from Brussels.

If he gets that, he has always said he will campaign for Britain to remain in a reformed EU. That is exactly what Mr Hammond has said. But Mr Cameron has also made clear if we do not get a better deal he rules nothing out.
Charged: Lisa Scalia's, 31, was arrested for allegedly rolling on top of her child while high on drugs

A baby girl from New Jersey is likely to die after being accidentally smothered by her mother who was high on heroin at the time, say police.

Eight-month-old Olaia Marie Mejia was hospitalized last week at AtlantiCare Regional Medical Center, City Campus, in Atlantic City, on Sunday, and later transferred to St. Christophers Hospital for Children in Philadelphia after authorities responded to a call about an unresponsive baby on Sunday.

Police say that they found 34 bags of heroin and 10 oxycodone pills mother Lisa Scalia's, 31, home on Sunday and arrested her shortly after, according to Press of Atlantic City.

An investigation discovered that Scalia was under the influence of drugs at the time of the incident.

Scalia was jailed on 1000,000 cash bail, reported NJ.com.

A medical team was able to revive the baby at the scene before they transferred her to the hospital where her father Marco Mejia said the child is in her final days.

Mejia wrote on his Facebook on Thursday that he wishes for people to respect his privacy as he mourns his daughter's dire fate.

'First off I want to thank everyone for all the love n[sic] support,' Mejia wrote on Facebook.

'I now have to give u[sic] the bad news that these will be my daughters last days.'

Mejia thought his daughter might push through at first.

'Everyone one please keep praying for my little baby girl,' he wrote.

'She is in bad shape! But I know she is a fighter because she's a mejia... and if we all pray together we can give her the strength to survive this.'
Malcolm Turnbull will make his first official visit to the White House as Prime Minister to meet US President Barack Obama.

The White House visit follows an uncomfortable exchange between the two leaders in November last year, when Turnbull was caught off-guard at Obama's casual invitation to visit him in Washington.

Fighting Islamic State and the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement will be key talking points at the meeting on January 18 and 19.

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Malcolm Turnbull (L) will make his first official visit to the White House as Prime Minister to meet US President (R) Barack Obama.

The White House visit follows an awkward exchange between the two leaders in November last year, when Turnbull was caught off-guard at Obama's unexpected invitation

'The alliance with the United States is fundamental to Australia's national security', the Prime Minister's office has said.

Australia has contributed air power to the US-led coalition fighting the group in Iraq and Syria

'Our two countries are closely linked in every way - economically, culturally, historically and above all sharing the same values of freedom, democracy and the rule of law - at home and around the world,' read a statement from the Prime Minister's office.

The original invitation to attend the White House was picked up by camera microphones at the APEC 2015 summit in the Philippines.

'One of the things I'm going to announce, is that I'm going to invite you to Washington,' Mr Obama whispers to the prime minister.

'One of the things I'm going to announce, is that I'm going to invite you to Washington,' Mr Obama whispers to the prime minister who repeatedly failed to catch what the US President was saying

'Sorry?' Mr Turnbull replies.

'I'm going to say that I'm going to invite you to Washington and I hope you accept,' the president repeats.

'You're going to what?' Mr Turnbull repeated.

'Oh yeah, good certainly,' Mr Turnbull replies when he finally understands Obama's casual invitation.

The two leaders are also expected to discuss the ratification and implementation of the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

'The Prime Minister shares President Obama's enthusiasm for the transformative opportunities the TPP provides for creating jobs, higher incomes and increased wealth,' a prime minister's office statement said.

Mr Turnbull will also seek to promote Australia as a trade and investment investment destination to the US Chamber of Commerce.

President Obama extended an invitation to Mr Turnbull during last November's economic summit in Manila.

Mr Turnbull will also seek to promote Australia as a trade and investement investment destination to the US Chamber of Commerce.
This autumn, it will be ten years since David Cameron addressed his first Conservative conference as party leader. His words that day in October 2006 would now be completely forgotten, were it not for one very telling phrase.

It was time, he said, for the Tories to stop banging on about Europe.

Ten years on, Mr Camerons party has still not heeded his plea. Indeed, if, as now seems probable, the Government holds the long-awaited referendum on our EU membership in July, then the sound of people banging on about Europe is likely to become a deafening roar.

This week, Mr Cameron pushed the issue to the fore once again. Yielding at last to political reality, he conceded that once his paper-thin European renegotiations are over, his Cabinet ministers will be free to throw their weight behind either side of the debate as they see fit.

Knowing his party was badly split, Harold Wilson adopted the suggestion that they should let the British people decide for themselves whether Britain stayed in the European Community with a referendum in 1975. To those who have followed Mr Camerons position, the origins of the 1975 referendum should look extremely familiar

All very noble, and certainly the right thing to do, but for the fact that Mr Camerons hand was so obviously forced.

For weeks, Westminster had been buzzing with rumours of splits and walkouts. Some accounts even claimed that unless Mr Cameron allowed a free vote, he might lose as many as four or five Cabinet ministers, among them Iain Duncan Smith, Chris Grayling and John Whittingdale. So, to put it bluntly, he simply had no choice.

All the same, the spat is a telling reminder that if one issue, more than any other, has the potential to throw Mr Camerons Government off course, leaving his Cabinet badly divided and his party split in two, then it is Europe.

I dont doubt, by the way, that the Prime Minister himself finds the issue tedious and irrelevant. That telling phrase  banging on  speaks volumes about his fundamental lack of interest.

But he is wrong. Indeed, I think that not only does the European issue pose a potentially deadly threat to the unity and effectiveness of the Government, but it remains by far the biggest existential question that we face as a nation.

The plain fact is that ever since our colonial Empire broke up in the Fifties and Sixties, Britain has been faced with a dilemma. And what we have never quite decided, as a nation, is whether we want to become part of a larger European super-state. This involves surrendering much of our sovereignty in the name of the common good, or standing alone, detached from our neighbours, like a North Atlantic version of Australia or Japan.

Whatever your view, it is surely blindingly obvious that this is a subject worth banging on about.

Far from being some footling irrelevance, of interest only to Westminster weirdos, its arguably the single most important political decision our generation will ever take.

Why did Mr Cameron, therefore, dismiss it so casually ten years ago? Why do worldly, pro-EU Tory grandees such as Michael Heseltine and Ken Clarke sigh and roll their eyes whenever the issue is raised?

The answer, I fear, is obvious. As matters stand, Britain sits neatly on the European conveyor belt. We are, admittedly, some way behind our Continental neighbours, but we are on the conveyor nonetheless, trundling relentlessly towards the EUs explicitly stated goal of ever-closer union.

For the Euro-enthusiasts, therefore, the very act of questioning our membership represents a disgraceful act of popular insubordination. For, of course, the truth is that European unity has always been a project driven by elites  politicians and mandarins, diplomats and bureaucrats, businessmen and academics  over the objections of large swathes of the general public.

As the Left-wing historian E. P. Thompson put it back in the Seventies, European enthusiasts tended to associate it with bougainvillea, business jaunts and vintage wines.

Heaven forbid that their cherished dream might be rejected by ordinary people whod never even sniffed a vintage wine!

As a result, Europe has never been a very democratic project. True, the EU has no fewer than two parliament buildings, in Strasbourg and Brussels  which, of course, speaks volumes about the ridiculous corruption of its bureaucracy.

But the EU has always been keener on lecturing other people about democracy than on allowing the man and woman in the street to decide its future.

The most famous example came in 2008, when the Irish rejected the Lisbon Treaty, which considerably strengthened the power of the EU over its member states.

For weeks, Westminster had been buzzing with rumours of splits and walkouts. Some accounts even claimed that unless Mr Cameron allowed a free vote, he might lose as many as four or five Cabinet ministers, among them Chris Grayling (left), John Whittingdale (centre) and Iain Duncan Smith (right)

Brussels promptly instructed the Irish government to hold a second referendum, and offered a series of trivial and meaningless corrections and clarifications.

This time, with their economy in free-fall after the world financial crisis, the Irish people dutifully fell into line.

At least the Irish had a vote, though. British voters were never given a chance to deliver a verdict on the Lisbon Treaty  or indeed on the Single European Act and Maastricht Treaty, which preceded it. Even when Britain joined the Common Market on New Years Day 1973, the public never had a chance to express its opinion.

For pro-European politicians, that was probably just as well, since only two years beforehand, seven out of ten people had told pollsters they were against it. What about the 1975 referendum, though? I hear the Euro-enthusiasts say. The public voted to stay in then, didnt they?

Well, yes, they did, by a margin of two to one. But the story of the 1975 referendum is, I think, enormously revealing  and it offers some worrying clues to the likely outcome in a few months time.

To those who have followed Mr Camerons position, the origins of the 1975 referendum should look extremely familiar.

Then, as now, the referendum was basically a fudge, designed to paper over the cracks in a bitterly divided party.

For Mr Cameron today, read Labours Harold Wilson in the early Seventies: another smooth, clever, Oxford-educated pragmatist, with no very strong feelings one way or the other, but determined above all not to rock the boat.

Knowing his party was badly split, Wilson enthusiastically adopted his colleague Tony Benns suggestion that they should let the British people decide for themselves whether Britain stayed in the European Community.

As Prime Minister from 1974, Wilson himself pretended to be neutral.

In reality, though, he tipped the balance as far as he could towards the Europhile camp.

For Mr Cameron today, read Labours Harold Wilson in the early Seventies: another smooth, clever, Oxford-educated pragmatist, with no very strong feelings one way or the other, but determined above all not to rock the boat

For almost a year, Wilson and his Foreign Secretary, Jim Callaghan, conducted a meaningless diplomatic exercise, trudging around the capitals of Europe in the pretence that they were renegotiating the fundamentals of our Common Market membership.

Callaghan later admitted that the renegotiation was a complete joke. The low point, he wrote, came when nine Foreign Ministers from the major countries of Europe solemnly assembled in Brussels to spend several hours discussing how to resolve our differences on standardising a fixed position of rear-view mirrors on agricultural tractors.

And when he found himself haggling over import levels of apricot halves, he felt not so much a Foreign Secretary as a multiple grocer.

Does this sound familiar? It certainly ought to.

For this is effectively what Mr Cameron has been doing for the past few months, hopping around the Continent waving his little wish-list. As he explained in November, he wants to protect the single market for members outside the euro, slash red tape, exempt Britain from the call for ever-closer union, and restrict EU migrants access to in-work benefits such as tax credits.

But much of this is pointless blather, and the last two demands have already been rejected out of hand by his European counterparts.

In essence, Mr Camerons renegotiation exercise is no more than a glorified public relations gimmick.

Note that just yesterday his Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, felt free to declare that he cant envisage voting for Britain to leave the EU, while anti-EU ministers still feel gagged.

You dont have to be Nostradamus to predict that in the coming weeks the PM will return in triumph from his latest Continental trip, waving a piece of paper and proclaiming our national sovereignty safe.

Thats precisely what Harold Wilson did in March 1975, when he returned from Europe to tell his Cabinet they had substantially achieved our objectives. Indeed, given our current position, the minutes from that meeting make revealing reading.

According to Wilson, his efforts had ensured that the Common Market would now be firmly under the political direction of the Governments of member states  which, as we know, turned out to be completely untrue. He went on to explain that the cohesion of Western Europe might well be disrupted if we were to leave the EEC, which is precisely what Euro-enthusiasts are always saying today.

And on top of that, he insisted the Community was not now developing in a federalist direction; as long as we remained members we could prevent it developing in that way.

According to Wilson, his renegotiations had ensured that the Common Market would now be firmly under the political direction of the Governments of member states  which, as we know, turned out to be completely untrue

Really? Well, how did that one turn out?

Even at the time, sceptics insisted that this was all smoke and mirrors. On the Left, Tony Benn insisted that Britain was now trapped on a federal escalator. And on the Right, Enoch Powell repeatedly warned that by subordinating itself to Brussels, Britain was throwing away its distinctive political and legal traditions.

But the No campaign never stood a chance.

Lined up against it were all Britains major newspapers, its big businesses and the leaders of the mainstream parties.

The Yes campaign spent some 1.5 million; the No campaign had a derisory 133,000.

Little wonder that as the June Referendum Day approached, polls showed the Yes campaign building an unassailable lead, and the result was that thumping two-to-one victory.

Even then, few commentators thought the referendum had been an edifying spectacle. In effect, the government bought victory with funds from Britains big firms, downplaying the reality of our reduced sovereignty while making a right old hullabaloo over non-existent renegotiations.

Whatever you think of the European issue, the 1975 referendum was bad for democracy, bad for Britain and bad for Europe.

Instead of being honest with the electorate about the consequences for British self-determination, Wilson and his allies deliberately pretended there were no downsides.

As a result, most people believed they were voting for a limited common market, not an ever-growing federal union.

Although Tony Benn was wrong about an awful lot of things, he was right about one very big thing. The EU is, indeed, a federal escalator.

The principle of ever-closer union is explicitly written into its founding document, the 1957 Treaty of Rome.

It is one of the things that David Cameron claimed he wanted to change.

But according to the President of the European Parliament, the German politician Martin Schulz, there is simply no chance of changing it.

A ctually, I suspect Mr Cameron does not really care one way or the other. He just wants to get the referendum out of the way with as little damage to his Government as possible.

This might be good for him, and even for his party. But it would not be good for Britain.

He should have the decency to drop the fiction of his meaningless renegotiation.

He should come clean about the likely future evolution of the EU, and he should fight his case on its merits.

Since there are strong arguments on both sides, so crucial an issue deserves a wide and honest debate. It should not be left to a handful of self-selected mandarins, nor should it be swept under the carpet with blithe assurances that theres nothing to worry about.

The European issue is the single greatest question we face. It cuts to the heart of our national identity; our self-image as a great trading nation but also a land apart; our distinctive history, our institutions and our traditions.

For too long this matter has festered beneath the surface of British politics, and for too long debate has been crippled by bribes, scare stories, fantasies and downright dishonesty.

The British people deserve a proper argument, a clean fight and a fair choice.
An Iraqi refugee helped sneak up to 3,000 asylum seekers into Britain as part of a massive people-smuggling ring, a court was told yesterday.

Basak Ahmed Sleman, 33, abused his permission to stay in the country by illegally smuggling 20 people a day into the UK five days a week since May 2015, it is alleged.

He is fighting extradition to Belgium, having been accused of being a linchpin in a gang running a major human-trafficking operation bringing entire families into Britain from the continent stowed away in lorries.

An Iraqi refugee helped sneak up to 3,000 asylum seekers into Britain as part of a massive people-smuggling ring

Despite a string of previous convictions for using fraudulent identity documents, Sleman has been given leave to remain in the UK, the court heard.

Sleman, who has lived in the UK for 15 years, has pledged to use human rights legislation to fight extradition to Belgium, where he would stand trial and faces prison if convicted.

He argues that sending him to stand trial across the Channel would breach Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights which safeguards privacy and family life.

During a brief hearing at Westminster Magistrates' Court yesterday, he refused to be extradited.

Sleman and Shamel Zorab, 37, are wanted by the authorities in Belgium for their connections to a Kurdish criminal network which exploited asylum seekers.

The ring is thought to have earned millions from migrants  many fleeing war and humanitarian disasters in the Middle East  who are desperate to be smuggled into the UK from Belgium.

During the hearing, Carl Kelvin, prosecuting, said Sleman had 'worked five days a week trafficking up to 20 people on each occasion, including whole families, for financial gain as part of a criminal network'. Urging magistrates to deny the Iraqi bail, he said: 'It is feared, if released, this person would fail to surrender. This person has a previous conviction for having false registration cards and possessing improperly obtained identity documents belonging to somebody else.'

Both alleged people-smugglers were detained on European Arrest Warrants on Thursday as part of an operation co-ordinated by the National Crime Agency. Sleman was arrested in Birmingham and Zorab in Eccles, Manchester. Ten suspected people-traffickers have already been arrested in Belgium and await trial there.

Up to 20 stowaways were smuggled into Britain five nights a week, Westminster Magistrates Court was told

They are accused of taking money from migrants they brought across Britain's porous borders. The migrants, including Iraqis, Iranians, Afghans, Indians and Pakistanis, would be loaded into trucks at motorway service stations before crossing the Channel.

Euan Macmillan, for Sleman, said: 'He is a refugee in this country. He is an asylum seeker from Iraq who has been in this country for 15 years.

'He has never left the country for those 15 years because he has no identity documents.'

Zorab, also from Iraq, also refused to be extradited. He has several convictions in the UK, including a burglary in 2012, driving offences and community order breaches, the court heard. He has lived in Britain since at least 2003.

Deputy chief magistrate Emma Arbuthnot remanded both men in custody until Thursday.
The police chief of Cologne has been sacked after his force was slammed over its handling of a string on New Year's Eve sex attacks by migrants.

Wolfgang Albers was heavily criticised for the police's response to the attacks on women by the groups of men among a 1,000-strong crowd.

German authorities have now identified 31 people, including 18 asylum-seekers, as suspects in Cologne on New Year's Eve one of several such incidents in Europe.

Police at first failed to mention the attacks around Cologne's main train station in their initial morning report on New Year's Day, describing overnight festivities as 'largely peaceful.'

Albers, the former police chief, acknowledged that mistake earlier this week, but he dismissed widespread criticism that his officers reacted too slowly in response to reports of assaults and harassment of women.

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Wolfgang Albers was heavily criticised for the police's response to the attacks on women by the groups of men among a 1,000-strong crowd

Emergency: Cologne (pictured) is in virtual lockdown after a mob of Arab and North African men sexually assaulted and robbed hundreds of women on New Year's Eve

Scrawl: A note found on one of the Cologne New Year's Eve sex attack suspects written in Arabic and translated to German contained lurid phrases such as 'nice breasts' and had the words 'I'll kill you'

Officers described the 31 offenders as being predominantly of Arab or North African origin.

The 31 included nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, five Iranians, four Syrians, two Germans and one person each from Iraq, Serbia and the United States.

Eighteen of them were classed as asylum seekers.

None of the 31 has been accused of specifically committing sexual assaults, the aspect of Cologne's disturbances that attracted most public outrage at home and abroad.

Cologne police say they have received 170 criminal complaints connected to the New Year's festivities, 120 of them sexual in nature.

Albers' dismissal comes amid a flurry of disconcerting allegations over the behavior of foreigners at a time when large groups of migrants, mostly from Syria, are flooding into Europe.

Officers found a note on one of the men containing Arabic-German translations for phrases including 'nice breasts', 'I'll kill you' and 'I want to have sex with you'.

Twelve more people are being sought in connection with 121 complaints from women attacked on the last night of the year.

Anxiety: A police report showed they lied over the involvement of asylum seekers in the attacks to create a climate of fear and mistrust. Reporter Nick Fagge spoke to migrants in Cologne, not involved in the attacks

People protest in front of the main station in Cologne, Germany, on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016. The poster reads: 'No to Racism, No to Sexism'. More women have come forward alleging they were sexually assaulted and robbed during New Years celebrations in the German city of Cologne, as police faced mounting criticism for their handling of the incident. (AP Photo/Hermann J. Knippertz)

However, an internal police report published in German media on Thursday characterised Cologne's police as overwhelmed and described how women were forced to run through gantlets of drunken men outside the station.

Cologne Mayor Henriette Reker suggested Friday that police had withheld information from her, including on the origin of suspects. She said that her 'trust in the Cologne police leadership is significantly shaken.'

Government spokesman Georg Streiter said the chancellor wants 'the whole truth' about the events in Cologne and 'nothing should be held back and nothing should be glossed over.'

Reputation: 'The image of Cologne (pictured) has suffered a crack,' said the managing director of Cologne tourism, Josef Sommer

He said the trouble in Cologne 'doesn't just harm our rule of law but also the great majority of completely innocent refugees who have sought protection.'

Reports of the harassment have fueled calls for tighter immigration laws in Germany, particularly from politicians opposed to Chancellor Angela Merkel's open-door policy that allowed nearly 1.1 million people fleeing war and poverty to enter the country last year.

Ministry spokesman Tobias Plate said those detained were believed to have been members of the crowd in front of the Cologne railway station on New Year's Eve.

Plate said authorities were investigating whether the assaults were connected to reports of similar offenses in other German cities.

Police officers patrol in front of the main station of Cologne, Germany, on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016. More women have come forward alleging they were sexually assaulted and robbed during New Years celebrations in the German city of Cologne, as police faced mounting criticism for their handling of the incident

Visitors have cancelled planned holidays, women fear to venture out alone and the far-right runs its hands with glee as its dire predictions of crime following in the wake of unchecked migration appear to be coming true.

Hoteliers and trade fair officials said the first cancellations from holidaymakers who planned visits to the ancient city on the Rhine had started in the wake of the attacks.

'The image of Cologne has suffered a crack,' said the managing director of Cologne tourism, Josef Sommer. The city tourism office admitted to receiving 'dozens' of emails and phone calls from tourists concerned with safety in the city.

Germanys far-right National Democratic Party (NPD) said ordinary people are now afraid to go out.

Spokesman Klaus Kraemer told MailOnline: German people are now frightened to go to the train station or other open spaces where they may encounter large numbers of refugees.

They have become afraid of foreigners. They are now looking over their shoulder when they are in the train station to see who is behind them.

Head of Cologne police, Wolfgang Albers, attends a news conference, in Cologne (file photo)

North Rhine-Westphalia Interior Minister Ralf Jaeger attends a press conference in Duesseldorf, Germany, yesterday

A refugee worker told MailOnline how public opinion in Germany is turning against refugees, saying: 'The perception of refugees has changes with each new incident like this.

'Most people used to have sympathy for them, but that is changing, you can see it in people's attitude and hear it in the way they talk about foreigners.'

Police in other European nations reported cases of similar trouble in public places, particularly near train stations, fueling speculation the events might have been coordinated.

In Sweden, police said at least 15 young women reported being groped by groups of men on New Year's Eve in the city of Kalmar.

Police spokesman Johan Bruun said two men, both asylum-seekers, have been told via interpreter that they are suspected of committing sexual assaults. He said police are trying to identify other suspects.

In Finland, police said they received tipoffs on New Year's Eve that about 1,000 predominantly Iraqi asylum seekers were intending to gather near the main railway station in Helsinki and harass passing women.
Families who have digital smart energy meters installed in their homes could find the devices are being used to spy on their habits, campaigners have warned.

A Mail investigation has discovered how marketing firms are targeting data collected by smart meters, which reveal how customers use their gas and electricity, and hoping to turn the information they provide in to a steady stream of cash.

Experts say the devices might be used to provide companies with clues to information about customers' lives which can be used for profit.

Families who have digital smart energy meters installed in their homes could find the devices are being used to spy on their habits, campaigners have warned

Privacy campaigners fear that in the most extreme cases sensitive data could be sold onto healthcare companies which could try and sell specially targeted goods and services to these customers.

Firms must ask customers' permission before examining in depth data or selling it on to third parties.

But experts fear that many customers who sign up for a smart meter may not be aware of how their data will be used.

A spokesman for privacy campaign group Big Brother Watch said: 'A smart meter will monitor your homes energy consumption, creating a honeypot of data which energy insurance and marking companies will inevitably be hungry for.

'These companies will be monitoring our every move whilst in the home.

'Energy is an essential which we all use, exploiting that data for alternative purposes such as marketing, advertising is a concern and should be flagged in clear language to anyone thinking about installing a smart meter in their home.'

Under Government plans, 50 million homes will be fitted with a smart meter by 2020 in a 11bn drive. Currently around 5,000 properties a day are being fitted with one.

The gadgets allow customers to see on a screen how much exactly their energy costs as they use it.

Information is fed directly to energy companies removing the need for meter readings or estimated bills.

Energy firms benefit too, because they can easily see when demand for gas and electricity is at its highest and jack up energy prices accordingly.

Alternatively, they can lower costs when demand is low.

Although energy firms will have to foot the bill for providing the devices, they are not allowed to directly charge customers for installing smart meters.

But they are expected to claw back these costs in other ways.

Privacy campaigners fear that in the most extreme cases sensitive data could be sold onto healthcare companies which could try and sell specially targeted goods and services to these customers

Experts say firms are eying up the steady stream of data that the devices provide about customers' lifestyles as a way of making a profit.

Personal data has been dubbed the 'new oil' by marketing firms, who say that the clues it provides about our lifestyles and spending habits.

Companies can use this information to reap huge profits by selling the data on or hitting customers with targeted deals.

Gas and electricity firms will be able to use smart meters to collect information about how customers use energy as frequently as every half hour.

This could reveal details such as which rooms and gadgets clients use most regularly, as well as when homeowners are in or out and even what time they are going to bed or how many cups of tea we make.

A family whose meter showed their home is losing a lot of heat compared to other neighbouring homes, might be a ripe target for insulation or a new boiler.

By contrast someone who uses a lot of energy at peak prices could be identified as a profitable customer and offered extra perks to keep them on the company's books.

A document by data firm Pitney Bowes describes smart meters as a 'once in a generation business opportunity for energy providers'.

It says its software will allow energy firms to use smart meters to 'clearly identify the most profitable customers' and 'optimise customer contact by using smart meter data to get relevant offers to the right customers at the right time through their preferred channel'.

It will also help firms to 'cross-sell, up-sell and retain customers'.

IT firm SAP Hana says on its website its smart meter data analysis will help firms 'increase revenue by up-selling new energy service'.

A family whose meter showed their home is losing a lot of heat compared to other neighbouring homes, might be a ripe target for insulation or a new boiler

UK data firm Onzo's website says smart meter data will allow energy firms to 'better target sales campaigns based on individual customer's behaviour'. Already around 2 million smart meters are in place in homes across Britain in the first stage of the roll out.

There have been fears that energy firms might try to use the two-hour long installation visits to sell products to homeowners.

However, the Government has ordered energy firms to adhere to a strict code. This bars them from marketing items to customers without prior permission and from closing a sale during the visit.

A spokesman for SmartEnergy UK, the energy industry-funded body, responsible for publicising the smart meter roll out, said: 'The consumption data collected is protected by the Data Protection Act and can only be shared with third parties with a customer's consent.

'Consumers own their own data and the decision about whether this can be shared with third parties rests soley with them. No sales can take place during a smart meter installation visit.

'If energy suppliers wish to undertake marketing at the installation consent from the customer has to be obtained prior to the appointment.'

A spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: 'Smart meters will help hardworking families and businesses to take control of their energy use, bringing an end to estimated bills and helping bill payers to become more energy efficient.

'They're part of this Government's commitment to make Britain's energy infrastructure fit for the 21st century.
Once upon a time, guests could enjoy the house cocktail before dinner in a Louis XVI-style dining carriage, followed by a film in the cinema car or even a haircut. All this as the worlds fastest locomotive clattered between the two main cities of the UK.

Nine decades on, there were echoes of the golden age of steam yesterday  sort of.

True, the journey was not one of the worlds great railway adventures  a 16-mile trip from Bury to Rawtenstall and back, at a provisional top speed of 25mph.

And there was no Louis XVI dining car, either.

Who cared? All that mattered was that the Flying Scotsman is back on track.

And, crossing Burys Roche viaduct yesterday, it looked quite magnificent. We have lost Concorde.

The last Vulcan can fly no more. HMY Britannia is a floating museum and the Routemaster bus a collectors item. But one beloved icon of British engineering refuses to give up. A month after our last coal mine closed, this coal-powered colossus, built in 1923, is back.

Back on track: The Scotsman on Roche viaduct yesterday

During its 40-year, two million-mile working life, the Flying Scotsman enthralled trainspotters and the public alike.

Dismissed in 1963, it went on to enjoy a turbulent retirement. It would tour the world, bankrupt one owner and cost others millions. This latest overhaul alone has taken an entire decade and cost 4.2 million.

Some feared they might never see it move under its own steam again. But yesterday, smoke billowed once more from the famous double chimney as an army of enthusiasts savoured that evocative blend of coal, oil and steam.

It was steam buff heaven as the train left Burys Bolton Street station yesterday for several test runs ahead of last nights first passenger journey since 2005 (tickets 103 a head, including five-course dinner).

In due course, The Flying Scotsman will return to its owner, the National Railway Museum in York, where it will be on free public display.

Next months celebratory journey back along the main line between London Kings Cross and York will be followed by a grand return to Edinburgh Waverley in May and then a UK summer tour, from Somerset to Fife.

Yet it has been rebuilt at the Bury engineering works of Riley & Sons, hence its historic reappearance here for this weekends series of trips along the East Lancashire Railway.

For now, the engine is painted not in its famous apple green but in its matt black wartime livery, which made it less obvious to enemy planes  with no nameplate.

Driving a beast like this is an art

It was always going to get dirty and scratched during repairs, so theres no point putting the smart livery on until weve finished, explains Noel Hartley, of the National Railway Museum, one of the lucky few authorised to drive the Scotsman.

Aside from a few new dials, the cab is little changed from November 30, 1934, when this locomotive made history. On a descent in Lincolnshire, it became the first train officially recorded at 100mph.

Driving a beast like this is an art.

Anyone can make it go forwards or backwards, says Noel Hartley. But if you drive it like youve stolen it, the firemans going to have a hell of a job keeping up.

His essential controls are the regulator (throttle), brake and reverser (gear stick). Most important are the water gauges, he adds. These two glass boxes show the level of water in the boiler. Ideally, you want those three-quarters full.

To the rear, the tender full of coal includes a vital innovation  a narrow corridor. This enabled the driver and fireman to walk through to the carriages, meaning two crews could swap mid-journey without stopping the train.

In 1928, the London-to-Edinburgh run was the longest non-stop service in the world.

It was precisely this sort of boast which made the Flying Scotsman a post-World War I emblem of modern Britain. Clever marketing saw the engine star in British cinemas first talkie in 1929, called  what else?  The Flying Scotsman.

'Driving a beast like this is an art': Essential controls are the regulator (throttle), brake and reverser (gear stick), most important are the water gauges

In 1932, its crew spoke by telephone to the crew of the Imperial Airways aeroplane Heracles overhead, as both machines travelled north at 90mph. Was there no end to the technological genius of the British Empire?

A year later, a race staged along a two-mile track beside the river Ouse in Cambridgeshire pitted a speedboat and plane against the Scotsman. The plane had the edge over the speedboat  but neither beat the train.

No one dwelt on the fact that the Scotsman was, in fact, English. Built in Doncaster, it was one of more than 50 A1 locomotives designed by Sir Nigel Gresley.

The Flying Scotsman tag had been coined in 1875 to describe the Special Scotch Express service between London and Edinburgh. It was in 1923 that the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) gave the name to a specific engine and made it a star exhibit at the Wembley Empire Exhibitions. A legend was born.

Through the Twenties and Thirties, the celebrity loco drew crowds up and down the East Coast main line just to catch a fleeting glimpse.

In World War II it served as a general workhorse. Come peace, though, the Scotsman was no longer deemed a symbol of a new Britain but a relic of the old one. Post nationalisation in 1948, the new management would come to regard grimy steam engines as an embarrassment.

Full steam ahead: The restored loco, built in 1923 rolls into Bolton Street station in Bury

Disgracefully, when the centenary of the London to Edinburgh route was celebrated in 1962, the Flying Scotsman was not even invited to the party.

A year later it was packed off to the scrapyard. But if British Rail could see no future for it, Alan Pegler, steam addict and heir to an industrial fortune, could. He paid 3,000 for the Flying Scotsman and considerably more for restoration work. Initial steam excursions proved popular. Then it all went wrong.

Pegler decided to take the Flying Scotsman on a patriotic promotional tour of the U.S., with a Winston Churchill lookalike, a team of Shakespearean actors and hostesses in tartan miniskirts. By the time it reached California, Pegler was bankrupt and his train impounded.

The Flying Scotsman cost him his marriage and home, he told me in 2004, but he had no regrets.

Another rich industrialist, Sir William McAlpine, of the construction dynasty, came to the rescue and shipped the Scotsman home.

It makes people do the stupidest things Pete Waterman

His big idea was a tour of Australia, where, in 1988, the engine smashed another world record by puffing away non-stop for 442 miles.

Back in Britain, Sir William teamed up with record producer and steam nut Pete Waterman to breathe new life into the Flying Scotsman, but the costs were astronomical and the pair eventually sold out to another doomed consortium. Waterman certainly doesnt share Peglers blind love for the engine. Its got a curse and it makes people do the stupidest things, he admitted in 2004 as the Flying Scotsman came up for sale yet again.

Thankfully, a hefty National Lottery grant and a donation from Sir Richard Branson saved it for the nation. In 2005, the new owners, the National Railway Museum, realised that a complete overhaul was required. Now we are finally seeing the results.
The government department run by Sir Jeremy Heywood has the worst record in Whitehall for releasing information to the public.

Figures suggest the Cabinet Secretarys nickname of Sir Cover-Up is fully deserved  as his office has an appalling record on transparency.

Nearly six in ten of all Freedom of Information requests to the Cabinet Office are rejected outright, with nothing at all made available to the public.

Across Whitehall, information is withheld in 34 per cent of cases on average when it could potentially be released.

For the Cabinet Office, the figure is 57 per cent  compared to only 6 per cent for the department with the best record on transparency.

Last night critics said the Cabinet Office was trailing behind miserably on openness and accused David Cameron of hollow words on the issue.

Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron said: Accountability and transparency are words that regularly come out of the mouth of the Prime Minister but these figures show that these words are hollow.

Unlike the Prime Minister, I still believe that sunshine is the best disinfectant.

The Cabinet Office should be leading by example, not trailing behind miserably.

Sir Jeremy Heywood pictured in November

Nearly six in ten of all Freedom of Information requests to the Cabinet Office are rejected outright, with nothing at all made available to the public

Sir Jeremy has been nicknamed Sir Cover-Up over his attempts to block the release of sensitive documents to the Chilcot Inquiry, and for presiding over a culture of secrecy in Whitehall.

He has criticised the Freedom of Information Act, which allows anyone to ask for government documents and data and has exposed major public sector scandals.

Sir Jeremy claims it is having a chilling effect on day-to-day government business as officials fear they cannot give frank policy advice.

A review  ordered by ministers and run out of the Cabinet Office  is looking at a series of options which could undermine the Act.

These include new powers for officials and ministers to reject requests and also to charge for the process, which is currently free.

Critics say this could take Britain back to a dark age of very little government accountability.

Official figures for July to September last year show the Cabinet Office  whose figures include enquiries made to No 10 Downing Street  received 497 requests under the Act.

Of that total, some 290 were considered resolvable because the information was held. Of those, just 55 were granted in full  or 19 per cent.

That compares to 165 which were fully withheld with no information released  57 per cent of the total. In 31 cases a response had not yet been provided, while in 39 cases information was partially withheld.

In November it emerged that a senior Whitehall mandarin who reported directly to Sir Jeremy was condemned by judges as disingenuous and evasive over a three-year battle to block an innocuous FoI request.

A Cabinet Office spokesman said: The Cabinet Office is absolutely committed to Freedom of Information, and we have led the Governments drive to publish more data more regularly than ever before.
through NZ for one year exploring and photographing its beauty

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New Zealand is widely known for its breathtaking natural beauty, culture and conservation, but to clearly portray these elements in a photograph is no easy feat.

Professional photographer, Johan Lolos, has done just that. He traveled the breadth of the small island nation's mountains, lakes and rivers last year and produced a series of remarkable photos of his adventures.

'After my year travelling in Australia - I was a white sand beach guy and then I traveled to New Zealand's South Island, and was totally overwhelmed by the beauty of the snowy alps, lakes, and mountains,' Mr Lolos told Daily Mail Australia.

Cardrona ski resort: Professional photographer Johan Lolos travelled New Zealand taking beath-taking photo's of the small island nation's natural beauty

Lake Gunn, Fiordland National Park: New Zealand is widely known for its breathtaking natural beauty, culture and conservation, but to clearly portray these elements in a photograph is no easy feat.

Crucible Lake, Mt Aspiring National Park: 'After my year travelling in Australia - I was a white sand beach guy and then I traveled to New Zealand's South Island, and was totally overwhelmed by the beauty'

Lake Wanaka: 'I was just totally inspired by this wilderness and untouched beauty which is something you can only get in New Zealand'

Lake Rotoiti, Nelson Lakes National Park: A substantial mountain lake within the borders of Nelson Lakes National Park in the North Island

Roys Peak, Wanaka: Wanaka is the best place to live In New Zealand', Mr Lolos lived in the South Island town for six months

'I was just totally inspired by this wilderness and untouched beauty which is something you can only get in New Zealand.'

Mr Lolos lived in Wanaka, in New Zealand's South Island, for six months where he was able to pick up some free lance photography work taking snaps of the regions beautiful alpine terrain.

Wanaka is the best place to live In New Zealand  but my favorite part is all the Fiords , they are just insane, it's untouched just like Jurassic Park or something,' he laughed.

Fiordland is in the south-western corner of the South Island. The picturesque setting boasts deep and winding lakes through through sloping sides of the snow-capped Southern Alps.

Hooker Lake & Mt Cook: 'My favorite part is all the Fiords , they are just insane, it's untouched just like Jurassic Park or something'

Lake Gunn, Fiordland: Mr Lolo is surrounded by the snow-capped Southern Alps in New Zealand's South Island

Queenstown: 'Mr Lolos credits working alongside some local photographers' that inspired him to take the beautiful images

Milford Sound, Fiordland National Park: The intrepid traveler said he made countless friends and memories on his journey,

Lake Wanaka: The self-taught lensman said aspiring photographers need to find their individual style to be able to take beautiful photos

Mr Lolos credits working alongside some local photographers , 'I got work alongside some amazing Kiwi photographers in Wanaka, and joined them on a few hikes to some amazing locations. This was a great time to learn from local knowledge,' he said.

For aspiring photographers Mr Lolos every lensman needs to find their individual style that is most comfortable and natural to them.

'Everyone can find a style  the tip I could give is to go out and explore and shoot and shoot again. The key is experience. Take a 1000 shots until you feel really comfortable  you have to feel comfortable.'

The intrepid traveler said he made countless friends and memories on his journey, which he captured on his Instagram page.

'When I arrived in NZ, I had 25,000 followers at the time, and I left the country with 165, 000. I would never have imagined such huge support for my New Zealand photo's from followers from all over the world.'

Moke Lake, Queenstown: A small lake near the suburb of Closeburn in Queenstown, in the South Island of New Zealand

Bay of Islands, Northland: The Bay of Islands is a New Zealand enclave encompassing more than 140 subtropical islands by the country's North IslandMt Ngauruhoe, Tongariro National Park

Mt Ngauruhoe, Tongariro National Park: Mount Ngauruhoe is an active volcano or composite cone in New Zealand

Roys Peak, Wanaka: A mountain in New Zealand, standing between Wanaka and Glendhu Bay

Whale Bay, Northland: A beautiful beach curtained with lush native bush in New Zealand's North Island.
A Muslim woman was removed from Donald Trump's campaign event in South Carolina on Friday after standing in silent protest following one of the Republican front-runners controversial immigration comments.

Rose Hamid, 56, attended the event in Rock Hill wearing a hijab and a shirt that read 'Salam, I come in peace,' hoping that her presence might manage to change the opinion some Trump supporters have about members of the Islam faith.

She positioned herself directly behind Trump, and when he began to speak about Syrian refugees being banned from entering the United States and suggested that many had ties to ISIS, she silently stood up out of her seat.

Police immediately escorted her out of the event while the audience booed the woman and yelled at her to 'get out,' with one man screaming; 'You have a bomb, you have a bomb.'

After Hamid had been removed, Trump said to the audience; 'There is hatred against us that is unbelievable. It's their hatred, it's not our hatred.'

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Gone: Rose Hamid (above in teal shirt behind Trump) was kicked out of Donald Trump's event in Rock Hill, South Carolina on Friday night

Reason: Hamid, who sat directly behind Trump, stood in silent protest when he suggested that Syrian refugees had ties to ISIS

Awful: As she was removed from the venue she was booed and one individual yelled; 'You have a bomb, you have a bomb' (Trump above on Friday)

'I figured that most Trump supporters probably never met a Muslim so I figured that I'd give them the opportunity to meet one,' Hamid told CNN about her decision to attend the event after the incident.

'I really don't plan to say anything. I don't want to be disrespectful but if he says something that I feel needs answering I might - we'll just see what strikes me.'

Prior to her protest she said that things had been going well, and that the people she spoke with seemed receptive and eager to talk.

'The people around me who I had an opportunity to talk with were very sweet,' said Hamid, who was not even offended when one individual commented that she 'didn't look scary,' but 'like a good one' while they were standing in line.

Everything changed however when she decided to stand.

'The ugliness really came out fast and that's really scary,' said Hamid.

Major Steven Thompson of the Rock Hill Police Department said that Hamid was removed because police were briefed beforehand that 'anybody who made any kind of disturbance' would be escorted from the premises.

Trump meanwhile has not spoken about the incident, but did write about the event on Twitter Friday night, saying; 'Great even in SC tonight! Fire Marshall would not let everyone in-- 5,000 turned away. Thank you for coming!'

Outlook: Hamid, with is president of Muslim Women of the Carolinas, said she holds no ill will towards the audience, blaming Trump's hate speech instead

Impressive: Hamid (above with her daughter at her wedding in November) is the co-founder and president of Muslim Women of the Carolinas and writes a column for The Charlotte Observer about her faith

Background: Hamid (above with her son in Mecca in September) was raised in America after being born to a Colombian mother and a Palestinian father

Despite her treatment and the abuse she received from the audience, Hamid was quick to excuse the individuals and place the blame on Trump and the comments he has made over the course of his campaign.

'This demonstrates how when you start dehumanizing the other it can turn people into very hateful, ugly people,' she said.

'It needs to be known.'

Hamid, who is the co-founder and president of Muslim Women of the Carolinas and writes a column for The Charlotte Observer about her faith, had been discussing Trump just days before during an appearance on a local radio program, Charlotte Talks.

She was raised in America after being born to a Colombian mother and a Palestinian father, and a 2009 World Hum profile offers some insight into just why she believes she can change people's misconceptions and Muslims.

Hamid, a flight attendant, decided in 2005 to begin wearing her hijab at work.

Some criticized her for doing so post-9/11, including coworkers, but she managed to take it all in stride.

'Theres a saying of the Prophet that the person who gives salutations first is the most blessed,' Hamid said in that interview.
was living with his family as

Pictures have emerged of the grubby condo where the

He was tracked down after he contacted producers and actors to make a Narcos-style biopic of his own life

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New photographs have emerged of the condo where notorious drug lord Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman was finally recaptured after escaping a maximum security jail as Mexico warns it is ready to extradite him to the United States.

The cartel leader was arrested on Friday after a 4am raid on a house in the town of Los Mochis, located in the kingpin's home state of Sinaloa, which ended in a bloody shootout.

Pictures reveal the less-than-luxurious surroundings where the millionaire, along with his beauty queen wife Emma Coronel Aispuro, and their children, lived as fugitives from the Mexican authorities.

Children's toys, most likely belonging to his four-year-old twin daughters, are seen scattered across the home. A dead body lies in the corner of a room - a casualty of the police shoot out. Beds stripped from the police raid and belongings are rifled through as forensic teams work through the crime scene.

After his arrest, Mexican marines returned El Chapo to the same Altiplano jail he was able to tunnel out of in July last year - becoming the first inmate to escape the prison which is considered the most secure in the entire country.

He's unlikely to stay there for long as Washington, which requested his extradition last June before his escape from jail, is almost certain to seek extradition since his recapture. The drugs lord faces at least seven indictments across six states in the United States.

Now Mexican authorities have confirmed the country is willing to extradite the recaptured drug lord - a total reversal of the government's position after his last capture in 2014.

If the extradition goes ahead, it is likely El Chapo will spent the rest of his life in jail without the possibility of parole.

An official said 'Mexico is ready' for an extradition and 'there are to cooperate with the U.S.' although he warned the legal process could be lengthy and Guzman's attorney is saying he'll battle extradition in the courts.

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Photos emerge of condo where Mexico's most notorious drug kingpin, Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman, was found and arrested

Pictures reveal the less-than-luxurious surroundings where the millionaire and his family were living as fugitives from the Mexican authorities

A crime scene investigator, in full body suit, carries out work in the condo of one of Mexico's most infamous drug kingpins

A dead body lies in the corner of a room after the marine raid on the home in Los Mochis, Mexico in the early hours of Friday

Inside one of the houses that were searched on the eve by marines special forces during the military operation which resulted in the recapture of Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman

A marine stands guard next to a manhole of the sewer system through which the drug kingpin used to try and escape during the raid

Got him! Notorious drug lord Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman Loera has been recaptured six months since he escaped from Mexico's most secure prison

U.S. Department of Justice spokesman Peter Carr told CNN : 'I can confirm that it is the practice of the United States to seek extradition whenever defendants subject to U.S. charges are apprehended in another country.'

Five cartel gangsters were killed and another six were also arrested in the raid, while one Mexican marine sustained non-life-threatening injuries. A vast arsenal of weapons was seized, including rocket launchers, machine guns and armored vehicles.

'You could hear intense gunfire and a helicopter; it was fierce,' a neighbor told CBS about the three hour battle.

The cartel leader and an accomplice fled from agents through a filthy sewer, before emerging into the street where they stole cars and took off. But authorities were able to catch up with them and the cartel leader was brought back to a nearby hotel while police waited for back up, Gomez said.

In a picture of his arrest at the hotel, El Chapo is stood still wearing the dirty tank top, which showed off several fresh scratches on his arms after his sewer escape.

The Friday morning raid also ended in the capture of El Chapo's right-hand man 'El Cholo', a hitman who was also on the run from the law.

It appears to have been El Chapo's narcissism that led to his downfall after he began the process of making a biopic, similar to that of Netflix's popular Narcos show on the life of infamous Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar, which tipped off authorities to his whereabouts.

El Chapo, which means 'the short one' in Spanish, had even started to contact producers and actresses through intermediaries to tell his 'rags to riches' story, which was what finally helped police track him down. The names of the stars he approached have not yet been confirmed.

After his eventual arrest El Chapo was marched from a military vehicle by three soldiers - showing their faces in full sight - to the Mexican attorney general's hangar at an airbase in New Mexico.

Notorious drug lord Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman has been sent back to the same prison he escaped from six months ago. Pictured, soldiers - showing their faces in full sight - march the drug lord to the Mexican attorney general's hangar at an air base in New Mexico

Despite tunneling out of the maximum security facility in July, Mexican marines were set to drop off the cartel leader at the Altiplano jail overnight

El Chapo showed little emotion as he was dragged across the runway in front of dozens of Press and government officials

The drug kingpin, who was wearing a blue tracksuit, was marched into the Mexican attorney general's office before being taken to jail

El Chapo was escorted into a helicopter by Mexican marines - who had their faces covered - who will take him to the prison he escaped from back in July 2015

A handcuffed El Chapo was led into the helicopter by marines as he was taken back to jail after six months on the run from the law

Journalists took pictures of the captured drug lord as he was paraded at a federal air base near New Mexico on Friday evening

Military action: El Chapo was apprehended in an early morning raid in the town of Los Mochis, in the drug kingpin's home state of Sinaloa and 1,300 miles away from the jail he escaped from

After being briefly paraded in front of journalists, El Chapo was bundled into a helicopter by Mexican marines - who had their faces covered - and set off towards the prison near Toluca.

Attorney general Arely Gomez told the Guardian that the vain drugs lord was caught after he tried to make a biopic of his life, similar to that of Netflix's popular Narcos show, based on the life of slain Colombian kingpin Pablo Escobar.

'He established communication with actors and producers, which formed a new line of investigation,' Gomez said. She refused to confirm which stars had been approached for the film.

El Chapo may have fancied himself as Mexico's answer to the infamous, Colombian drugs lord who became one of the most powerful and violent criminals of all time.

Escobar's Medellin Cartel came to control more than 80 percent of the cocaine shipped to the U.S. by the 1980s until he was finally killed in 1993.

The first of a series of four films based on El Chapo's life, called The Great Escape, was due to be released on January 15. But the millionaire may have been wanting to tell his life story in his own words before he was recaptured.

Mexican police say the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and U.S. Marshals aided in El Chapo's recapture. El Chapo was seen being bundled on to a plane by security officials on Friday afternoon.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto wrote on his Twitter account on Friday: 'Mission accomplished: We have him.'

Back to jail: It is not yet clear whether El Chapo will be extradited to the US, but he was seen being bundled on to a plane by security officials late on Friday afternoon

Arrest: El Chapo was apprehended while he was staying in the relatively isolated Hotel & Suites Doux in the town of Los Mochis in the state of Sinaloa

El Chapo was escorted to a SUV with a white towel over his head before being taken to an airport - but his destination is not known

Covered: Officials covered El Chapo's head with a white towel as they escorted him onto a small plane after his arrest Friday morning

En route: It is unclear where Mexican officials are taking the drug kingpin. The US has previously asked El Chapo be extradited

Mexican officials revealed that a firefight at a house in Los Mochis earlier on Friday was related to the raid that saw fugitive El Chapo recaptured.

He is believed to have fled under the cover of gunfire from his henchmen before being arrested later at a motel alongside his most-trusted bodyguard.

In a picture of his arrest, El Chapo stands in a bedroom, where a photo of a scantily-clad woman hangs in the background - his hands shackled in handcuffs in front of him as he stares off to the side of the camera, still wearing the grey, filthy tank top he was caught fleeing in.

Online, many have mocked his appearance as a far cry from the multi-millionaire's glamorous lifestyle.

One commenter even tweeted: 'All that drug money and he hasn't got a clean vest to go out in?'

In the other photo, he sits in a car with his right-hand man, with his hand held up to his chin in thought.

The man seen slumped alongside El Chapo in the back of the police van is his chief hitman Orso Ivan Gastelum Cruz, known as 'El Cholo' - a nickname commonly used to refer to young people in Mexican gangs.

LIke El Chapo he too was on the run, having escaped from prison in 2009.

His girlfriend, the winner of Miss Sinaloa 2012 was gunned down and killed by the army during a manhunt for him in 2012.

The Mexican Navy said in a statement that marines acting on a tip raided a motel in the town of Los Mochis around 4:30am. They were fired on from inside the structure.

Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman has been returned to Almoloya de Juarez, Mexico's maximum security prison which was considered to be most secure in the country until his escape last July

El Chapo had tunneled out of his cell in the shower area (pictured) - one of the few places which is not covered by CCTV at the jail

The drugs lord used an adapted motorcycle, which sits on a rail in an underground tunnel, to make his escape from the Altiplano maximum security prison

Authorities discovered the motorcycle, rigged on a special rail system with two metal carts in front of it, which he used to flee through a 1.5-kilometer (one-mile) long tunnel under the shower space of his prison cell

Accomplice: El Chapo's hitman Orso Ivan Gastelum Cruz, known as 'El Cholo', after he was taken into custody following the shootout

Dead: Forensics officers carried a body out of the house where five of El Chapo's henchmen were shot dead during the raid on Friday

A Mexican law enforcement official said authorities located El Chapo several days ago, based on reports that he was in Los Mochis, which is 1,300 miles north west of the high security Altiplano prison he escaped from. The official says authorities even searched storm drains in the coastal city.

At an afternoon press conference, the Mexican president announced El Chapo's arrest and thanked those who spent months tracking down the criminal.

'Today, Mexico confirms that its institutions have the capabilities that are necessary to face and overcome anyone who threatens the tranquility of Mexican families,' Nieto said.

El Chapo's arrest 'demonstrates that when Mexicans work together, there is no adversity that can not be overcome', he added.

Nieto had earlier tweeted: 'My appreciation to the Security Cabinet of the Government of the Republic for this important achievement for the rule of law in Mexico.'

At the hideout, marines seized two armored vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

Photos of the arms seized suggested that Guzman and his associates had a fearsome arsenal at the non-descript white building in which he was hiding.

Two of the rifles seized were .50-caliber sniper guns, capable of penetrating most bullet-proof vests and cars. The grenade launcher was found loaded, with an extra round nearby. And an assault rifle had a .40 mm grenade launcher, and at least one grenade.

The Mexican Navy said in a statement that marines acting on a tip raided a motel in the town of Los Mochis around 4.30am

Magazine: At the building marines seized two armored vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher

Good news: Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced the arrest of notorious drug kingpin El Chapo from the courtyard of the presidential palace on Friday

Above, a view of a street in Los Mochis in the aftermath of the predawn shootout with Mexican marines

Man holes are opened in the Los Mochis street near where El Chapo was captured on Friday after he fled down a sewer

From the air: Helicopter circle around the neighborhood where El Chapo was taken into custody on Friday. El Chapo has a lot of supporters in his home state of Sinaloa

Lookout: Members of the Mexican military stand guard near the building where El Chapo was taken into custody on Friday

Mexican authorities say the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency and U.S. Marshals aided in El Chapo's arrest

Down below: A member of Mexican Navy Force points with his weapon into a sewer during military operations after recapturing Mexican drug lord El Chapo

Finally: El Chapo's arrest was a big win for the Mexican government, after his embarrassing escape over the summer. Above, two Mexican marines patrol the street near where El Chapo was arrested Friday

Armed: A man rides a bike down the street in Los Mochis, Mexico on Friday as a Mexican marine stands guard

A Twitter account that has previously been linked to El Chapo, which uses the handle @ElChap0Guzman, posted two tweets two days before the drug lord's capture.

The first, translated from Spanish, said he was 'busy and happy' and enjoying life with his children. A second said: 'My only purpose this year is to be with my family, appreciate those who love me and tell ordinary people to go f*** themselves.'

Guzman faces multiple federal drug trafficking indictments in the U.S. as well as Mexico, and was on the DEA's most-wanted list.

The DEA says it was 'extremely pleased' with El Chapo's recapture. On its Twitter account, the agency congratulated Mexico's government on catching Guzman, saying it saluted 'the bravery involved in his capture'.

After Guzman was arrested on February 22, 2014, the U.S. said it would file an extradition request, though it's not clear if that happened.

The Mexican government at the time vehemently denied the need to extradite Guzman, even as many expressed fears he would escape as he did in 2001 while serving a 20-year sentence in the country's other top-security prison, Puente Grande, in the western state of Jalisco.

It is unclear if the Mexican government will extradite El Chapo, given his most recent escape. El Chapo is wanted in the states of Arizona, California, Texas, Illinois, New York and Florida.

He is the first 'public enemy number one' since Al Capone in Chicago, where authorities have demanded he is handed over to the US.

J. R. Davis, president of the Chicago Crime Commission, said: 'The two escapes by Guzman demonstrate that even the most 'high security' Mexican prisons are not equipped to hold Guzman.'

The Justice Department had no immediate comment on whether it will push for extradition.

U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch called El Chapo's recapture 'a victory for the citizens of both Mexico and the United States, and a vindication of the rule of law in our countries'.

In a statement, Lynch said Guzman 'will now have to answer for his alleged crimes' and congratulated Mexico's government, but did not directly address the sticky issue of extradition.

Senator John McCain tweeted his congratulations to the Mexican authorities and added: 'Now let's extradite him to the US.'

El Chapo has been on the run since July, when he used an elaborate underground tunnel to break out of a maximum-security prison in central Mexico.

A Twitter account that has previously been linked to El Chapo, which uses the handle @ElChap0Guzman, posted two tweets two days before the drug lord's capture

The first, translated from Spanish, said he was 'busy and happy' and enjoying life with his children. A second (pictured) said he loved his family and valued people who loved them, but that 'everyone else can go f*** their mothers'

Senator John McCain tweeted his congratulations to the Mexican authorities and added: 'Now let's extradite him to the US'

HITMAN 'EL CHOLO' WAS ALSO ON THE RUN AND HIS BEAUTY QUEEN GIRLFRIEND WAS KILLED DURING 2012 MANHUNT El Chapo was detained alongside his right-hand man El Cholo, a notorious hitman who was also on the run from jail. The drug lord's number two escaped from prison on 2009 and had been in hiding since, and it is likely he was aware of - or was even involved in - his boss's daring escape last year. El Cholo's real name is Orso Ivan Gastelum Cruz and his nickname is commonly used to refer to young people in Mexican gangs. His former girlfriend Maria Susana Flores Gamez, a 20-year-old Mexican beauty queen, was killed in a raid by the Mexican army in 2012 - the same year she won Miss Sinaloa. She was in the company of dangerous drug traffickers when she died and her body was found laying next to an assault rifle. El Cholo (right) - El Chapo's right-hand man - was captured alongside the drug lord. The hitman's beauty queen girlfriend Maria Susana Flores Gamez (left) was killed in a raid by the Mexican army in 2012 Gamez, 20, was in the company of dangerous drug traffickers when she died and her body was found laying next to an assault rifle Advertisement

Altiplano, considered the most secure of Mexico's federal prisons, also houses Zetas drug cartel leader Miguel Angel Trevino, and Edgar Valdes Villarreal, known as 'La Barbie,' of the Beltran Leyva cartel.

Guzman dropped by ladder into a hole 30ft deep that connected with another 5ft-high tunnel, which was fully ventilated and had lighting.

Rich man: El Chapo's fortune was once estimated at $1billion. Above, a mugshot taken after El Chapo's last capture and imprisonment

Authorities also found tools, oxygen tanks and a motorcycle adapted to run on rails that they believe was used to carry dirt out and tools in during the construction.

The tunnel terminated in a half-built house in a farm field.

Guzman's cartel is known for building elaborate tunnels beneath the Mexico-U.S. border to transport cocaine, methamphetamines and marijuana, with ventilation, lighting and even railcars to easily move products.

Since El Chapo broke out of jail in July, Mexican police and military have been desperately tracking the cartel boss.

In September, authorities thought El Chapo escaped the country to Costa Rica, after one of his sons posted a photo to Twitter tagging their location in the Central American country. But authorities were unsuccessful in finding him.

The next month, marines tracked El Chapo down to a mountainous region in Sinaloa.

Soldiers engaged in a shootout with El Chapo and his cartel thugs, and he got away yet again.

However, at the time it was reported that El Chapo appeared to have broken his leg fleeing from authorities.

This is the second time that El Chapo has been recaptured after using his influence to break out of prison.

He was first caught by authorities in Guatemala in 1993, extradited and sentenced to 20 years in prison on drug-trafficking-related charges.

He is believed to have escaped in 2001 in a laundry cart, although there have been several versions of how he got away. What is clear is that he had help from prison guards, who were prosecuted and convicted.

During his first stint as a fugitive, Guzman transformed himself into arguably the most powerful drug trafficker in the world. His fortune was estimated at more than $1billion, according to Forbes magazine, which listed him among the 'World's Most Powerful People,' ranked above the presidents of France and Venezuela.

He was finally tracked down to a modest beachside high-rise in the Pacific Coast resort city of Mazatlan, where he had been hiding with his wife and twin daughters.

He was captured in the early morning of February 22, 2014, without a shot being fired.

Head down: El Chapo pictured above in February 2014, when he was captured the last time he broke out of jail

Before they reached him, security forces went on a several-day chase through Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa state. They found houses where Guzman supposedly had been staying with steel-enforced doors and the same kind of lighted, ventilated escape tunnels.

Born 58 years ago, according to Interpol, he and his allies took control of the Sinaloa faction when a larger syndicate began to fall apart in 1989.

Even after his 2014 capture, Guzman's Sinaloa Cartel empire continues to stretch throughout North America and reaches as far as Europe and Australia.
Canada-based British adventurer Tracey Curtis-Taylor has finally made it to Sydney Airport after three months of flying nearly 27,000 kilometres in a restored Boeing Stearman.

The Spirit of Artemis reached Sydney at 1.30pm to mark the end of her trip from the United Kingdom to Australia on Saturday, flying over iconic landmarks such as the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House.

Ms Curtis-Taylor told Daily Mail Australia that although she is tired following her three-month trip and the 'relentless pressure' that's come with it it has 'been sensational'.

Canada-based British adventurer Tracey Curtis-Taylor has finally made it after three-months to her final destination at Sydney Airport flying nearly 27,000 kilometres in a restored Boeing Stearman

The Spirit of Artemis reached Sydney at 1.30pm to mark the end of her trip from the United Kingdom to Australia on Saturday, flying over iconic landmarks such as the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House

Sydney: The pilot posted on Facebook to let people know they could see her fly across the harbour

The aviator posted to Facebook to tell the public they could watch her fly over Sydney Harbour as there would be no access to her or the plane at the international airport.

She has enjoyed the Australian leg of her trip which pays homage to Amy Johnsons 1930 journey from England to Australia because she imagines it to be most similar to the conditions her hero would have experienced.

'Flying in Australia has been like a throw-back to 1930,' she said.

'It is the outback dirt strips and the pioneering mentality where everyone comes out to meet you when you land, and do what they can to help.'

Highlight: She has describes seeing Uluru as one of the best moments of her three-month trip

Desert: This leg of the trip was added on to Amy's original journey

Flashback: The pilot says flying in Australia is like flying on the 1930s

Incredible images of Ms Curtis-Taylor flying over the Opera House in her emerald-green biplane have been posted to Twitter, but she ranks another Australian landmark a little higher.

'Uluru was memorising, rising up from the desert like that,' she said.

'It was one of the top iconic moments on the trip.'

Scenery: She is proud that she has seen the world in a way not many people can

Complete: Her journey ended in Sydney on Saturday

Her other top moments were flying over the Dead Sea in formation with an Israeli Military pilot, negotiated the limestone cliffs of Phang Nga Bay Bay in Thailand and soared over the stunning temples of Myanamar.

'Very few people get to see the world the way I have, hopefully I have captured that,' she said.

The pilot steered through the skies to the spectacular jungle-clad islands made famous as Scaramangas secret lair in the James Bond movie, The Man With The Golden Gun before reaching her final destination.

Flying solo: Tracey Curtis Taylor during her recreation of Amy Johnsons famous flight. She celebrated Christmas on the island of Bali

In the air: Supported by The Mail on Sunday, Curtis-Taylor is the first woman to fly from Britain to Australia in an aircraft (pictured) similar to Amy Johnsons Gypsy Moth

Her homage to the Khao Phing Kan and Ko Tapu islands  where Christopher Lee fights a deadly duel with Roger Moore at the climax of the 1974 film  was one of the many highlights of her adventure.

The 53-year-old prepared for the final leg of her journey, having arriving in Darwin, Australia, on Friday.

She has flown across 23 countries, travelling nearly 27,000 kilometers over 93 days  all in honour of Johnson, the first woman to fly solo from Britain to Australia.

Planning: It took five years to organise the trip and now it is over she will move on to the next adventure

'I think people have forgotten what happened only 75 years ago,' she said.

'I believe what she did is the finest solo achievement in history.

'All I can do is put a spot light on that and celebrate what she achieved.'

The self-styled bird in a biplane has battled atrocious weather in Eastern Europe, traversed the undulating dunes of the Arabian desert, and been greeted by royalty, even taking a prince for a ride.

Supported by The Mail on Sunday, Curtis-Taylor is the first woman to fly the route in an aircraft similar to Johnsons Gypsy Moth  although she has avoided the prangs that hampered Amys flight 85 years ago.

She spent Christmas Day in Bali, getting into the mood by donning a Santa hat, before taking off on New Years Day for a gruelling seven-hour flight across the Timor Sea to Darwin.

Recreating history: Amy Johnsons 1930 solo flight took her from Croydon to Darwin in Australia, a 10,000-mile trip. Tracey Curtis-Taylors route will be 3,000 miles longer as she has had to avoid sensitive areas in the Middle East, is taking in landmarks such as Ayers Rock and has decided to end her trip in Sydney, about 2,500 miles from Darwin

Adventure: She's flown past Scaramangas secret lair in the James Bond movie, The Man With The Golden Gun featuring Christopher Lee (left) and Roger Moore (right)

An accomplished pilot and passionate admirer of the derring-do of the pioneers of aviation, Curtis-Taylor began her trip in Farnborough on October 1.

She has been planning the trip over the last five years, meeting Johnson's family and gaining sponsorship within the aviation industry.

Driven: The pilot is passionate about shining a light on the trip Johnson made all those years ago

'It has driven me for the past five years.

'It is not just about the flying it is about getting the story out there.'



Curtis-Taylorencountered unforeseen difficulties almost as soon as she crossed the Channel; she had to borrow a Total fuel card from a fellow pilot to refuel her 1942 Boeing Stearman because the French would not accept cash or credit cards.

Well travelled: Along the way, she has stopped in Bucharest, Abu Dhabi (above), Calcutta and other locations

Then storms and driving rain forced her to land in a disused grass airfield in Hungary, narrowly avoiding a lone mushroom picker, and she found herself turning back after skimming low over trees in Transylvanias Carpathian mountains because of poor visibility.

After a marvellous, exciting, exotic stay in Istanbul, she met RAF Tornado pilots in Akrotiri in Cyprus, among the forces bombing Isis in Syria, who gave her brandy sours.

Finished: She says that Johnson's journey was the most important solo adventure in history

The situation in the Middle East forced her to divert from Johnsons original route, flying over what she describes as Israels epic and grand biblical landscapes.

And in Jordan she was enthusiastically greeted by Prince Hamzah, the son of King Hussein and Queen Noor, and his wife Princess Basmah.

Reaching the Arabian desert days later, Curtis-Taylor was thrilled to come across camels, recalling: Im always excited to see animals from the air and the first sight of camels, great herds of them, prompted squeals of delight.

In Asia: At Agra in India, she saw the Taj Mahal (above) loom like a large pearl out of the mist and in Myanmar she swooped down over jungle flowering with purple lilac and a wonderful plain of red temples, thousands of them, as far as the eye could see.

In Karachi, Pakistan, 2,000 schoolgirls turned out to meet her, singing, dancing, and wearing headbands with miniature green biplanes attached.

She said one of the most common questions she was asked was how she went to the toilet while in the air, explaining that she didnt need to as she rarely flew for more than five hours at a time.

She also revealed that, while flying, she only eats the occasional biscuit or muesli bar to stave off hunger, and prefers to listen to the hum of the engine rather than music on an iPod.

Exotic: After a marvellous, exciting, exotic stay in Istanbul (above), she met RAF Tornado pilots in Akrotiri in Cyprus, among the forces bombing Isis in Syria, who gave her brandy sours

Having given a ride to Princess Reema Bint Bandar Al Saud in Saudi Arabia, she took Prince Nikolaos of Greece, the son of former King Constantine II, on a trip over the mountains in southern Balochistan in Pakistan almost exactly where Amy would have passed over.

At Agra in India, she saw the Taj Mahal loom like a large pearl out of the mist and in Myanmar she swooped down over jungle flowering with purple lilac and a wonderful plain of red temples, thousands of them, as far as the eye could see.

In another reminder of her predecessor, she found the field in the city of Rangoon where Amy had crash-landed in heavy monsoon rain, damaging her plane and ending her chances of breaking the world record to Australia.

Skilled: The pilot has been flying for thirty years, Johnson had been flying for one when she set out on her adventure

She describes it as a very 'poignant experience'.

'Flying over you see there is no-where to land,' she said.

'It is a city carved into the jungle, Amy lurched in to land in a field, hit a ditch broke a wing and her under-carriage but took off three days later.'

'She showed enterprise, endurance and stamina.'

Alive: Both female pilots made it to their final stops in Australia alive, but not without incident

The plane will now be shipped to Seattle where Ms Curtis-Taylor will fly it from one coast to the next.

'Life is about the great projects,' she said.

'I just want to get airborne and move in three dimensions.'

Amy Johnson was just 25 when she completed the journey, learning to fly the year before she set off. Ms Curtis-Taylor has been flying for 30 years.

Ms Curtis-Taylor's journey was expected to be 21,000 kilometres, but she ended up completing 27,000 kilometres on her epic three month journey.

Ms Curtis-Taylors principal sponsors are Boeing Aerospace and Artemis Investment Management.

Vintage: The airplane is a similar age and style to the one used by Johnson
about how vaccinations can cause autism and other

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg took his baby daughter Max to get a vaccination on Friday and posted the moment to his personal page to the dismay of ant-vaccination activists.

'Doctor's visit -- time for vaccines!,' wrote Zuckerberg on his Facebook wall along with a cute snap of Max in a colorful and geometric patterned onesie.

Most commenters on Zuckerberg's page thanked the billionaire for 'protecting other children,' by getting his child vaccinated.

At the doctor: 'Doctor's visit -- time for vaccines!,' wrote Zuckerberg on his Facebook wall along with an adorable snap of Max in a colorful and geometric patterned onesie.

Some of those who posted on the page were autistic people or parents of children with autism who endorsed him for debunking the 'myth' that vaccines cause the neurodevelopmental disorder.

'As someone with autism, with a son with autism, as someone who is constantly watching good people put their own children at serious risk because of old, fraudulent fears of vaccines and autism... thank you for being sensible,' wrote Stuart Duncan.

'Thank you for doing what's right and also for showing everyone else that it's the right thing to do as well,' wrote Stuart Duncan.

'As a paediatrician, I'd like to thank you personally, not only for immunizing that beautiful baby, but also for making it public. Thank you,' wrote Jo Gates Beltre.

An army of anti-vaccination supporters also jumped at the opportunity to comment on Zuckerberg's choice to vaccinate his daughter.

Support: 'As a paediatrician, I'd like to thank you personally, not only for immunizing that beautiful baby, but also for making it public. Thank you,' wrote vaccination supporter Jo Gates Beltre

Disapproval: 'Herd immunity is a myth. Btw: the woman who contracted the Measles at Disneyland was fully vaccinated. Vaccines are largely ineffective,' wrote Colleen Kelly in a fiery post

'Herd immunity is a myth. Btw: the woman who contracted the Measles at Disneyland was fully vaccinated. Vaccines are largely ineffective and even if they don't result in Sudden Infant Death Syndrome or Autism Spectrum Disorder, as they did for 9 year old Hannah Poling: they are extremely unhealthy and filled with toxic levels of aluminium, human DNA (there are no studies about how our bodies react to foreign DNA)?! - They say that Thermimosal (another known neurotoxin was removed), but I can't trust the pharmaceutical industry, wrote Colleen Kelly.

'Medical doctors are usually given very little education on vaccines in medical school, and the info they are given is generally from the pharmaceutical industry that makes the vaccines. So doctors generally are not educated as to the ingredients and effects caused by vaccination,' wrote Cynthia Raiser Jeavons.

Anti-vaxxers believe that ingredients in in vaccines may put children at risk of developing autism and other harmful diseases.
One of the last remaining killer whales in the UK has died - raising fears of extinction for the population.

The orca, known as Lulu, was killed after becoming tangled in fishing gear in Scotland, a post mortem examination revealed.

Researchers believe the mammal - one of only four females in the group - had been trapped for several days before she was discovered beached on the island of Tiree on Sunday.

One of the last remaining killer whales in the UK has died after being found washed up on a beach in Scotland

A post mortem examination revealed the orcan, known as Lulu, was killed after becoming tangled in fishing gear

It is the first time a killer whale is known to have died in Scotland in this way.

Lulu was one of a pod of orcas that patrol the waters around the Hebrides and eastern Irish coast.

Scientists now believe there are just eight animals remaining in the pod, the only resident orca community in British waters.

But in a report after conducting an necropsy on Lulu, scientists at the Scottish Marine Animal Strandings Scheme said Lulu's death was clear.

'We found convincing evidence that she had become chronically entangled and this was the most likely cause of her death,' they said.

They found wounds consistent with a rope wrapping around the tail and trailing behind the animal.

They added: 'The lesions are very similar however to those we see from creel rope entanglement in baleen whales. This is the first killer whale we have seen which has been entangled, although we have had an increase in entanglement incidence in other large cetaceans over the past year.

'These types of mortality are particularly tragic, however from examining this case we should be able to learn a little more about a poorly understood population.

Lulu was last photographed just off Waternish, in the Isle of Skye in July 2014. It was found washed up on a beach in the Island of Tiree on Sunday

Lulu was last photographed by the Whale Dolphin Trust from its specialised research yacht just off Waternish, in the Isle of Skye in July 2014

'We have samples to examine age, reproductive status and pollutant burden, and this will form part of future studies.'

Entanglement is the most commonly observed cause of death recorded for minke whales in Scottish waters.

But the exact numbers and scale are unknown.

There have been at least four whale deaths caused by entanglement in Scottish waters in the past 12 months.

But more than a sixth of surveyed minkes - the most common species of whale found in Scottish waters - have been damaged by fishing equipment, an investigation revealed in 2014.

No calves have been born since researchers first began tracking the West Coast orcas in the 1980s, with some biologists claiming pollution in the water has led to high rates of infant mortality.

Scotland's only resident family of killer whales are doomed to die out.

The mammal is believed to have been trapped for several days before she was discovered beached on the island of Tiree (pictured) on Sunday

Scientists found 'convincing evidence' that she had become chronically entangled and this was the most likely cause of her death

The small, isolated population of five males - and now - three females have never produced offspring since studies began, raising fears that it faces imminent extinction.

Last year Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust scientists observed one of the group's males, known as John Coe, with a large area of his tail fluke missing. Consultations with experts suggest that this was almost certainly the result of a shark attack.

Dr Andy Foote, a world-renowned expert on the species, believes time has run out for them.

The marine biologist - now based at the University of Copenhagen - has been studying the group with the Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust and the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group since 1992.
A mother whose four-year-old son was stabbed to death by his mentally ill father has urged people to show 'compassion' rather than judgement over the Port Lincoln tragedy.

Julia Trinne's young son, Luca, was killed by his father David Janzow in July 2014 - and Janzow was given a lifetime supervision order after a judge ruled he was 'mentally incompetent'.

She said she was 'saddened' by Monday's murder-suicide which saw Damien Little shoot his sons, Koda, four, and nine-month-old Hunter before shooting himself and driving off a wharf at speed.

In a Facebook post, Ms Trinne said: 'My heart goes out to the recent family whose two little boys lives were taken only days ago by their father.

Damien Little shot his sons Koda, four, and nine-month old Hunter, (pictured together with the boys' mother Melissa) before shooting himself and driving off Brennans Wharf in Port Lincoln at high speed

I will keep sending love and prayers to these beautiful little boys and I will continue to be bewildered, without judgement, as to what on earth could make a previously acknowledged decent and loving person to carry out such a horrific act.

'Sometimes we will never know the answers to such questions.'

She raised concerns about some of the social media posts circulating with 'judgement, anger and ignorance'.

'Some people are choosing to take the approach of wondering why these parents are being remembered as nice guys, who lived ordinary lives, when really, all they are now is 'child killers'.

Julia Trinne's young son, Luca, was killed by his father David Janzow in July 2014 (pictured together)

South Australia Police revealed on Friday that Mr Little, 34, and his two sons suffered gunshot wounds before they plunged off the end of Brennan's Wharf in Port Lincoln on Monday

'Wow. Just wow. Really? Maybe because these 'ordinary' guys became unimaginably unwell.

'How about spending time exploring how and why these parents got to this point and what can be done to reduce the alarming number of similar cases.

'It's important for people to feel what they need to feel  and anger is part of that, but let's not unpack there with judgemental and non-beneficial viewpoints, and especially at such an early stage without all of the necessary information.'

South Australia Police revealed on Friday that Mr Little, 34, and his two sons suffered gunshot wounds before they plunged off the end of Brennan's Wharf in Port Lincoln on Monday.

Family and friends earlier told Daily Mail Australia that Mr Little had become depressed over the past two years, but he did not seek treatment as he did not want to appear 'weak'.

Four-year-old Koda (left) and nine-month-old Hunter are pictured together in this family photograph

The family were living in a small shed as they tried to build their 'dream home' on 2.5 acres of land overlooking Boston Bay

He had been living in a shed with his wife Melissa and their two sons as he struggled to build the house of his dreams on 2.5 acres of land overlooking Boston Bay.

Mrs Little has released an emotional statement saying she hopes her husband, who murdered their two children, will be remembered as a well-respected and valued member of the family.

'My two precious boys have left this world too soon and my heart is broken,' she said.

'Damien was my childhood sweetheart who became my loving husband. He was also a father who loved his two children very much.

'Damian, I loved you so much you have left a huge hole in my heart, our memories I will Cheris forever.'

Janzow (left) was given a lifetime supervision order after a judge ruled he was 'mentally incompetent', pictured (right) is Mr Little

A little girl is pictured leaving a floral tribute for the dead little brothers at Brennan's Wharf

Ms Trinne, from Adelaide, also spoke about how her world fell apart when her young son was killed by her husband 18 months ago.

She claimed there was 'no warning' and said his mental illness spiralled out of control in a very short period.

'My little boys and I lived with a man who had always been kind, gentle and loving. Always. You won't find a person who says otherwise.

'A man who also suffered from a mental illness, who sought treatment and did all the things we thought were needed to keep him in the best space possible.

'For us, there was no warning. Some tiny little hints that only now could be looked back on as slight indicators, but besides that - absolutely no warning.'

She argued that her husband should not just be remembered for the horrific act he committed in a 'moment of uncharacteristic madness' but fir the many 'wonderful things' he did prior to that.

'He shouldn't be known solely as this man who committed the most horrific act imaginable. He was many wonderful things to many people for all 36 years of his life prior to that morning,' she said.

'Dave became acutely unwell in a short period of time with absolutely tragic consequences. Next month, further information will be released with the findings of what contributed to this. Things that need to be said & which will be said.'

Family members were seen on Wednesday raising glasses of Jonnie Walker red label in tribute for Damien Little and his sons Koda and Hunter - but domestic violence campaigner Phil Cleary says it's 'unthinkable'

Former sportsman Phil Cleary (left) lost a loved one to violence on August 26, 1987, when his sister Vicki was stabbed to death outside her work

She urged people to support those around them who suffer with mental illness.

'Entire family support is needed, as is the awareness, support, and understanding from the wider community.

'A lot also needs to be said for our health system, or lack thereof, but that is for another time.

'I get the impression that people out there would be satisfied for me to hate Dave. That hate and anger is the way in which I should respond to our devastation. They won't be getting that from me.'

Her post came after domestic violence campaigner and former MP Phil Cleary condemned a family tribute to the Port Lincoln father as simply 'unthinkable'

'Why are we expressing sympathy for a man who drove a car into the sea, deliberately killing his two children?

'In time, those people, I hope, will understand the absurdity of what they are doing,' said Mr Cleary, who lost his sister Vicki to domestic violence on August 26, 1987.

In an interview with Daily Mail Australia, Mr Cleary expressed outrage over the fact people were treating Little like a 'victim', when it was Damien's wife Melissa dealing with the devastating aftermath.

However Mr Cleary said he understands why Ms Little has made the 222-word statement:

'I understand why Melissa would make those comments, because it's nearly impossible for her to condemn the father of her children.

'To condemn the father of her children and to acknowledge what he's done is so soul-destroying that it is almost impossible to say faithfully and honestly what he's done.

'I understand why she has said that. I don't criticise her for it.'

Point of view: Domestic violence campaigner Phil Cleary said: 'It's turning a killer into a victim.'

An array of floral tributes has swelled on Brennan's Wharf - where Damien Little drove himself and his two children to their death on Friday
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Two men have been confirmed dead while others remain missing in a destructive fire that continues to ravage Western Australia with at least 131 homes taken and tolls expected to rise.

The inferno has swept across around 71,000 hectares since it was sparked by lightning on Wednesday, and the battle continues.

Weather conditions have eased and fire crews are making progress to contain the fire, the Department of Fire and Emergency Services said on Sunday.

However a bushfire emergency warning remains for Yarloop, south of Perth, which was flattened on Thursday as the fire remains out of control and moves east.

Two men aged in their 70s have been confirmed dead in the small town, with authorities working to locate more missing persons.

Harvey, Cookernup and Wokalup residents have been warned there is a threat to lives and homes, while emergency warnings have also been released for areas east of Waroona and Hamel.

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The ferocious fire in Yarloop, where at least 131 homes have been torn apart by the inferno as residents in the small township are advised to evacuate immediately

Four missing Yarloop residents, whose names have not been released, are unaccounted for in the raging blaze which was worsened on Saturday

Commissioner Gregson said resources were being stretched and that the threat of the fire remained high: 'There's some very tired firefighters out there in need of some relief.'

Watch and act, as well as advice warnings remain for a number of nearby areas in Western Australia.

The two bodies discovered are believed to belong to men aged 73 and 77 who were recovered on Saturday from separate burnt-out homes.

The bodies have not been formally identified but the families of the both men had been advised of the discovery.

It is believed the 73-year-old man is Malcolm Taylor, a cancer survivor who requires a hearing aid.

One family member, who did not want to be named, said she feared Mr Taylor had perished because no one had heard from him since Thursday before the fire ripped through the town, and he had not registered himself with authorities.

Hed told family he would be staying to defend his property, who have since seen footage on the news of his razed house and the remains of his burnt out car.

He goes to bed early, around 7.30pm, so were worried that he turned off his hearing aid and went to sleep and then the houses went up so quickly, the family member said on Saturday.

Authorities are warning residents in West Australia's Harvey, Cookernup, Yarloop, Wokalup to evacuate immediately unless they are equipped to defend their homes against the ferocious blaze

Residents evacuating from Treendale - 40 minutes south of Yarloop - said ash and burnt wood was falling from the sky and blanketing cars and houses

A spot fire burns in Cookernup after ash from the Waroona bushfire was blown into the area.

Firefighters battling an out-of-control fire as it ripped through Yarloop in Western Australia on Thursday

A 'demon' bushfire, which wiped out an entire town in Western Australia, is now so large is has created its own weather system

Due to the heat from the blaze rain clouds have formed (pictured) which can cause hazardous conditions for firefighters

Around one third of the homes in Yarloop have been lost in the blaze that ravaged the rural town on Thursday

It is believed the 73-year-old man is Malcolm Taylor, a cancer survivor who requires a hearing aid. One family member, who did not want to be named, said she feared Mr Taylor had perished because no one had heard from him since Thursday before the fire ripped through the town, and he had not registered himself with authorities

One minute the houses were there and the next they were gone.

He would have been well and truly asleep and his house is the first one on that street that went.

She said Mr Taylor had gas bottles outside the house which were likely to have blown up.

If Malcolm was all right, he would have rung someone by now, she said.

Police are awaiting DNA results to confirm the identities of the two men.

Further forensic work will need to be undertaken once it is deemed safe to do so, and reports will be prepared for the WA coroner, a WA Police spokesman said.

Warnings are also still in place south of the South Coast highway in the Dalyup area, east of two people's bay, and the Shire of Serpentine-Jarrahdale

Smoke from the Waroona bushfire covers the sky north of Bunbury. No heavy rain is forecast until Sunday but humid conditions could bring relief and slow down the blaze, which is still burning

The small township of Yarloop, which is located about 120 kilometres south of Perth, was decimated with 95 homes lost following an unpredictable bushfire

The town, which has a population of 545, has lost about homes, historic buildings, workshops, factories, the post office, a fire station and part of a local school,

The intense heat of the bushfire has caused the Samson Brook bridge, near Yarloop, and the asphalt on it to buckle and collapse

Buildings have been completely flattened by the fire and left as rubble on the ground

Emergency Services have described the losses within Yarloop as 'catastrophic'

Inquiries are ongoing into other people who have not been accounted for, he added.

On Friday, a Department of Fires and Emergency Services spokeswoman told the Daily Mail Australia three residents from the same family who were previously unaccounted for have since been found.

Yarloop resident Kate Barry said she lost her home in the blaze, but had no idea how bad the bushfire was until a local firefighter told her she had to evacuate.

She and her four children, aged between six and 19, managed to flee with their family photos, but everything else was probably destroyed when the home was razed.

'There were no flames, just smoke. You couldn't breathe, it was just raining ash,' she said.

100 of the 545 residents had been evacuated on Thursday and around one third of the homes have been lost, Emergency Services Minister Joe Francis said.

Residents of Waroona and the surrounding area listen to a community briefing at the temporary bush fire evacuation centre at the Murray Leisure Centre in Pinjarra

Incident Controller Greg Mair gives a briefing to residents of Waroona at the temporary evacuation centre

Firefighters from the Department of Fire and Emergency Services, Department of Parks and Wildlife and Volunteer Bushfire Brigades all worked together on Friday to contain the blaze

The small West Australian township of Yarloop appears to have been virtually wiped out by the fire

Terrified and burnt: A not-for-profit animal rescue organisation set to work transporting lost pets to their animal shelter, away from the blaze

The fire that swept through Yarloop was described by locals as horrendous

A request for interstate assistance to combat the fires has been made

Others described the unpredictable bushfire as a 'demon fire' after it tore through the town

Premier Colin Barnett met with residents at an evacuation centre and said the state government would help rebuild Yarloop, however he was not sure all 545 people would retun.

I'm sure there will be a Yarloop, but probably not a Yarloop of its previous size, he said.

The blaze near Waroona, a 10-minute drive north, has been so devastating it has created its own weather system - with rain clouds causing hazardous conditions for fire crews.

'We're seeing conditions that we've not seen before on this type of fire, particularly when it went through Yarloop,' Fire Commissioner Wayne Gregson said at the meeting.

He said there were some very tired firefighters out there in need of some relief.

Four firefighters have been injured, while two helicopters and 60 firefighters from NSW are assisting in the fight against the savage bushfire.

Many homes in the region are still without power and residents have been warned not to rely on the main water supply.

Trees smoulder after a major bush fire close to the town of Waroona in Western Australia

Grim faces: At least 95 houses have been left devastated by the fire which ripped through the small town

Ash-filled clouds rise above the town of Australind - where an emergency evacuation centre has been set up

The dogs were loaded up in carriers and shipped an hour north to Mandurah - safe from the fires

The government pledged it would do what it could to help the community at this time

Volunteers drop of supplies to a bush fire evacuation centre at the Murray Leisure Centre

The sky takes on a terrifying shade of black as the bushfires sweep through Yarloop and the surrounding area

Despite choking smoke and poor visibility fire crews continued to tackle the fire

Dense clouds of smoke can be seen rising in the distance as the fire spreads rapidly

Fire crews did their best to stop the fire spreading but it was a losing battle

All that the nasty fire left behind was scorched earth and devastation

Trees and other foliage go up in flames as the bushfire goes on relentlessly in Yarloop

All that is left of this car is a burnt out shell after the bushfire had finished with it

Plumes of smoke rise high into the sky as the Yarloop bushfires show no sign of abating

Residents' houses were left in heaps of iron and stone because of the fire

Hundreds of terrified people attend a community meeting at the Leschenault Leisure Centre about the bushfires threatening south west Australia

The calm before the fire: This Yarloop resident managed to take a photo of the fire in its earlier stage
One of the survivors of the Egyptian hotel terror attack has spoken for the first time about the moment a jihadist tried to stab him in the chest with a knife and slashed him in the neck four times.

Sammie Olovsson, 27, from Sweden, told friends he was in a stable condition and recovering in hospital in Hurghada after he was repeatedly attacked by one of the jihadis.

The two attackers, armed with a pellet gun and knives, targeted tourists at the outside restaurant of the Bella Vista Resort near the Red Sea. Three tourists were injured while one jihadist was shot dead and the second attacker was wounded and captured alive by security forces.

Sammie Olovsson said he was recovering in hospital in Hurghada after he was stabbed four times, suffering several wounds to his neck. He said he was 'lucky' the attacker didn't sever any of his arteries of organs

Sammie said that the knife only cut some muscles in his neck but no arteries or nerves, and confirmed that he would be able to leave the hospital today

Shortly after the attack, Sammie updated his Facebook profile, saying he was 'lucky' to have deflected the blows of the knife when the attacker tried to stab him in the chest.

He said that the knife only cut some muscles in his neck but no arteries or nerves, and confirmed that he would be able to leave the hospital today.

Samie's father Jan-Eric Olovsson, 64, told the Swedish Expressen newspaper that they were having dinner in the restaurant when the attackers stormed in.

'Everything went really fast. We sat there and ate and then they showed up,' he said.

'I thought they came from outside. I myself had the gun pointed at me three times, and Sammie was stabbed with the knife.'

'I told him to lie still,' he said, recalling how his son lay in a pool of blood. 'I got up a few times and when I saw it was clear, I ran out on the street and tried to get hold of an ambulance.'

Renata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both Austrian nationals, and were also wounded in the attack.

The Olovssons' trip was organised by one of Sweden's largest tour operators, Apollo. The company's head Peter Browall said guests were given the option of relocating after the attack.

'Some have decided to do so. Not all have. This is done based on individual dialogues we have with them,' he said.

Hurghada is 'a small destination for Apollo Sweden', Mr Browall said. He could not provide any figures, but said interest in Egypt had dropped following recent attacks.

Zainab Feili, a young Swede who survived Friday's ordeal unharmed, described a scene of chaos. 'Everybody just ran. We hear shoot. Everybody cries. It was awful,' she said.

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Shortly after the attack, Sammie updated his Facebook profile, saying he was 'lucky' to have deflected the blows of the knife when the attacker tried to stab him in the chest

Survivor: Three tourists were injured while one jihadist was shot dead and the second attacker was wounded and captured alive by security forces

Renata Weisslein was also wounded in the attack after two jihadis tried to carry out a massacre inside the hotel's restaurant

Despite the horrific attack at the Bella Vista Hotel, the Red Sea resort's pool and sun loungers were still busy early this morning

Tourists returned to the pool in the morning after the attack at Bella Vista Hotel

The hotel said that the attack took 'less than four minutes' as two 'drugged men' attacked three tourists

Life appears to have returned to normal as these two men take some time out to relax by the seaside

A large number of tourists were seen boarding coaches upon leaving the Bella Vista hotel

Additional security personnel have been deployed at the entrance of the hotel following the attack

The Bella Vista Resort released a statement on social media, claiming the two attackers were 'drugged'

A post on Bella Vista Hotel Facebook page dismissed rumours surrounding the attack as 'nonsense and c**p'

Security forces said the attackers arrived by sea to launch the onslaught on the beachside Bella Vista Hotel, in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.

They claimed to have killed an attacker and have seriously wounded a second armed with a knife.

The interior ministry denied initial reports that the terrorists were wearing suicide vests, confirming that no explosive devices were found at the scene.

The two attackers entered the hotel's outdoor restaurant at the front of the building and randomly started to attack the tourists.

The attackers were reportedly carrying the black flag of tawheed with the shahada, the Muslim testament of faith, written it white. The symbolic flag is commonly used by ISIS.

Egyptian authorities today said the dead attacker was a 21-year-old student from the Cairo neighbourhood of Giza as video emerged of his accomplice being questioned as he lay injured in the aftermath.

The video, which was posted to Facebook and picked up by Egyptian media allegedly shows the wounded attacker being questioned while lying bloody and bandaged on the floor.

He is filmed wearing only his boxers and moaning in pain as men with medical gloves slap his face and attempt to give him CPR  despite him being conscious.

'Where are you from?', they ask. 'What's your name, your name!?'

Throughout the man appears confused as he tries to answer their questions.

'How old are you? 31? 30?' one man asks.

Egypt's Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou visited the resort today and said that the attackers aim was to damage the country's tourism industry. He also promised greater security measures will be announced in the coming days

Egypt's Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou visited the resort today and said that the attackers aim was to damage the country's tourism industry.

'Over the coming days we will announce even greater security measures to safeguard all tourists visiting Egypt.

'This follows the recent important announcement concerning the appointment of the international risk and security company Control Risks to assist us further to enhance airport security.

'The welfare of the tourists visiting Egypt is of the greatest importance to us and will continue to be so.

'No stone will be left unturned to ensure their security despite the global challenges we have witnessed in cities throughout the world,' he said.

All three wounded tourists, reportedly two Austrians and a Swede, were taken to hospital, where one was treated and discharged, the security statement said.

Security officials had initially said the attackers wounded two tourists, a Dane and a German, but such discrepancies are common in the immediate aftermath of terror attacks.

A member of the hotel's management staff who witnessed the incident told AP that said the attackers sneaked into the Bella Vista from a hotel next door, accessing the facility from the beach.

The slain attacker, he said, appeared to want to take a female tourist hostage, dragging her into the hotel's lobby with his knife held against her neck when he was shot dead by a policeman.

Hurghada is more than 100 kilometres from Sharm el Sheikh, which lies across the red sea at the bottom of the Sinai peninsula

Interrogated: The second attacker was seriously wounded by Israeli security forces who repelled the two knifemen after the injured three tourists

Killed: Security forces said they killed one of the attackers who had arrived by sea to launch the onslaught on the beachside Bella Vista Hotel, in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada

Police have shot dead one of the gunmen and a second was injured

Pictures reportedly from the scene posted by Egyptian media Youm7 shows the black ISIS flag and a suicide device (top left)

Egyptian security services outside the entrance to Bella Vista Hotel, where the incident happened in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada

Cleaners try to clean up the large blood stains on the pavement outside the entrance of the Bella Vista Hotel

Ahmed Abdullah, governor of Egypt's Red Sea Governorate, visited some of the injured tourists from the terrifying attack. Renata Weisslein, 72, (pictured left) was one of the tourists hurt last night

The attack came just hours after the local affiliate of the Islamic State claimed responsibility for an attack a day earlier on a hotel in Cairo near the Giza Pyramids. No one was hurt in the Thursday attack.

British couple Kyle Hadden, 24, and Mark Higgins, 43, arrived in Hurghada just hours before the attack.

'We were just walking along the beach after dropping our bags off in the room when we heard five gunshots,' Mr Hadden told MailOnline.

'We thought they were fireworks, but then got back to our hotel and had a Facebook message from a friend asking if we were ok.'

The couple are staying in the hotel next to the Bella Vista Resort, just a few minutes away.

'When we looked outside we saw a lot of police cars going past. Hotel staff told us the hotel [Bella Vista] was about 30 minutes away - but I can see it from here - it's the next one along,' he said.

'The only updates we're getting is from my mum who's worried sick,' he told MailOnline from his hotel.

Mr Hadden, who works for the ambulance service said he had reported their concerns to holiday company Thomas Cook before they traveled and had asked to go to Turkey instead because of safety concerns.

'We spoke to Thomas Cook before we came saying we didn't want to go. They said it would be fine to travel and that everything would be fine.'

Mark Nolan, 36, arrived back from the Red Sea resort town of Hurghada on Tuesday, but told MailOnline he and his family spent the entire time on the resort as it was too dangerous to leave.

'We booked the trip just a few days before the Russian plane bombing, but when I contacted First Choice to cancel - they wouldn't listen and wanted to charge me 35 per cent,' said Mr Nolan, an electrician from London.

Kyle Hadden, 24 (right) and Mark Higgins, 43, (left) were walking on the beach in Hurghada when they heard gunshots

Police and security forces have increased their presence at the scene in the wake of the attack

A member of the hotel's management staff who witnessed the incident said the attackers sneaked into the Bella Vista from a hotel next door, accessing the facility from the beach

Once there, Mark, father of two daughters aged three and two said he felt unsafe and that the guests they spoke to were also only there because they couldn't get their money back.

'At the airport the security is quite good but then you're travelling on these empty desert roads.

Mr Nolan said there were police road blocks in front of his resort, which near the Bella Vista Hotel.

'There were metal detectors at the door - but everybody just walked round them.

'You can't leave the resort and there are no excursions - you wouldn't dare get on a bus to go and see the pyramids, which is why we went to Egypt in the first place.'

An official statement from the Egyptian Ministry of the Interior said the attack was carried out by two individuals armed with an 'air gun and knives'.

The statement added that one of the attackers had been killed and the second was in custody.

Egypt has been battling an insurgency by Islamic militants led by the Islamic State's affiliate.

The insurgency has been focused in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula but has frequently spilled over into the mainland since the ousting in 2013 of the Islamist president Mohammed Morsi.

The Hurghada attack is a dangerous precedent since Egypt's Red Sea resorts have done better than elsewhere in the country in withering the slump suffered by the vital tourism sector in the five years of turmoil since a popular uprising toppled longtime ruler Hosni Mubarak.

Egyptian media Youm7 reports this is one of the attackers killed by security forces

The incident happened at the Bella Vista Resort in the city of Hurghada, by the Red Sea (file photo of the city)

Thursday's attack was also significant in that it targeted a hotel in Cairo, a heavily policed city, at a time when security appeared to improve in recent months after a series of disruptive bomb attacks.

Egypt's tourist industry was decimated after the downing of a Russian passenger plane over Sinai in October.

The local Islamic State affiliate has claimed it downed the aircraft with a bomb. All 224 people on board were killed in the crash, mostly Russian tourists.

The Friday evening attack came just hours after the local affiliate of the Islamic State claimed responsibility for an attack a day earlier on a hotel in Cairo near the Giza Pyramids. No one was hurt in the Thursday attack.
Crown court judge Shamim Qureshi, pictured, is also sitting in the Sharia Muslim Appeals Tribunal

A Muslim Crown Court judge has been granted permission to sit on a 'Sharia court' to rule on disputes such as marriage breakdowns in accordance with Islamic principals.

Judge Shamim Qureshi, who ordinarily sits at Bristol Crown Court has been granted permission by judicial authorities to act as the 'presiding judge' at the controversial Muslim Arbitration Tribunal (MAT).

The 'court' was established in 2007 by hardline cleric Sheikh Faiz-ul-Aqtab Siddiqi, who was a leading figure in protests against Charlie Hebdo magazine after 11 of their journalists were massacred by Muslim extremists.

According to the Telegraph, Home Secretary Theresa May is set to launch an independent review into the MAT following allegations that the Muslim court undermined the rights of women.

Campaigners have claimed the tribunal, which is based in Nuneaton, Warwickshire, is discriminatory towards women and often rules unfairly in favour of men.

According to the tribunal's website, it specialises in Islamic divorce, inheritance law and Islamic wills, family meditation and mosque dispute resolution.

It was established under the 1996 Arbitration Act on a statutory basis and as a result its decisions can be upheld by English courts.

In 2008, in its first ruling, MAT decided an inheritance case involving three sisters and two brothers. in accordance with standard Sharia principles, the male heirs should be given twice as much money as the women.

According to the Telegraph there is no suggestion that Judge Qureshi has been involved in any controversial decisions with the Tribunal.

However, in March 2015 he ordered hardline Christian preacher Mike Overd to pay a 200 fine and pay 250 compensation after the former paratrooper quoted offensive passages from the Bible concerning homosexuality in public.

Cross bench peer Baroness Cox has introduced a private member's bill in the House of Lords to dramatically restrict the powers of Sharia courts.

Cross bench peer Baroness Cox, pictured, has introduced private member's bill to restrict the powers of Sharia courts

Baroness Cox told the House of Lords: 'The Bill will strengthen the position of vulnerable women who need protection from exploitation. It will ensure that all such women, whatever sect or creed, get the help they need to enjoy full lives.

'There can be no exceptions to the laws of our land which have been so painfully honed by the struggle for democracy and human rights.'

Baroness Cox said her bill will address a number of major problems in the country including: 'The suffering of women oppressed by religiously sanctioned gender discrimination in this country; and a rapidly developing alternative quasi-legal system which undermines the fundamental principle of one law for alla matter of especial significance as we mark the 800th anniversary of the signing of Magna Carta.

'The Bill is also strongly supported by many organisations concerned with the suffering of vulnerable women, including the Muslim Womens Advisory Council, Karma Nirvana, Passion for Freedom as well as by the National Secular Society: I am grateful to them all.'

Baroness Cox used an example of a man who wanted a doctor to perform an illegal operation on his wife so he could sell her to a Pakistani man who would marry her and receive a British passport.

She said there are approximately 100,000 Islamic marriages in the UK which are not registered with the civil authorities.

She revealed: 'A consultant gynaecologist described to me a request from a 63 year- old man for a repair of the hymen of his 23 year-old wife.

'The gynaecologist refused as this is an illegal operation, whereupon the man became intensely angry, claiming that doctors in his town, not far from London, frequently undertake this operation under another name.

'He wanted this surgical procedure for his wife in order to take her back to their country of origin to marry another man. Her next husband could then obtain a visa to enter the UK. He would probably abuse and then divorce his wife and marry another or more wives here.

'The man who asked for this operation said that he earned about 10,000 for effecting this arrangement, which was very helpful as he was unemployed. Such shocking cases surely cannot be allowed to continue.

'The rights of Muslim women and the rule of the law of our land must be upheld.'
Hes dubbed the crankiest crocodile in Australia for his naughty conduct but Elvis the five-metre saltie still got a generous gift for his 50th birthday.

The king of croc and roll devoured half a cow carcass to celebrate, locking jaws around the tasty hunk of meat in front of a crowd at the Australian Reptile Park on the Central Coast of New South Wales.

The 500kg croc can be seen twisting the slab around in a signature death roll - the prehistoric beasts method of drowning their prey and dismembering the meal for easier digestion.

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Holy cow: reptile park staff present Elvis the 5-metre saltwater crocodile with half a cow carcass

Operations manager at the park Tim Faulkner said Elviss annual birthday meal was a pivotal part of the resident man-eaters routine.

For him its like being in the wild. He gets to kill something thats big, take it in the water, death roll it and rip a bit of meat off, he said.

A crowd watched the reptile park staff lure the apex predator out of the water with the carcass before he launched the ferocious attack.

Elvis moved to the park in 2007 after running amok in Darwin Harbour, where he was notorious for attacking fishing boats.

Come and get it: Devouring the annual birthday slab of meat is a pivotal part of the crocodile's routine

On a roll: The 500kg croc can be seen twisting the slab of meat around in a signature death roll

Elvis moved to the park in 2007 after running amok in Darwin Harbour, where he was notorious for attacking fishing boats

Elvis is fed by keeper Billy Collett after attacking a lawn mower in his enclosure earlier in 2011

Before arriving to the park he had a brief stay at a breeding farm where he ate several stablemates.

He cemented his reputation as Australias crankiest croc in 2011 after he broke two of his teeth attacking a lawnmower that a zoo employee was using in his closure.

The colossal croc is one of the crowd favourites at the popular park, where he lives in his own enclosure on account of his short-temper.
Two men who were swimming at a closed NSW beach on Friday afternoon owe their lives to the surf lifesaver who braved dangerous conditions to rescue them.

Hawks Nest lifesaver, Ashleigh Searle, 21, was on duty when she was alerted that three men were drowning off a closed section of Bennetts Beach.

She jumped into action immediately, according to police, and located two of the men in the surf, with their heads underwater, and their hope for survival lost.

Ashleigh Searle says she was 'just doing her job' when she saved two men from drowning on Friday

'They had gone under the water and said their goodbyes and she pulled them up and somehow paddled them in, Sergeant Jeff Farmer from Port Stephens Local Area Command said.

'Nothing's certain but if it wasn't for her those boys certainly wouldn't be here.'

Unfortunately during the rescue she was unable to locate one of the men, a 20-year-old from Wahroonga, Sydney, who is still missing in spite of a thorough search of the area on Saturday.

Ms Searle said I was just doing my job' but has been labelled a hero.

'If an iron man had done that, you would still say it was incredible,' said Sgt Jeff Farmer.

Police say the men were warned about the dangerous conditions on the closed section of the beach by surfers, but decided to swim anyway, coming into trouble 'immediately'.

One man managed to swim 500 metres back to shore to raise the alarm for his three friends.

The men were swimming at a closed section of a NSW beach when they got caught in a rip

Ms Searle sprang into action to save the men in the dangerous conditions.

'She's got on the buggie and gone down there, she told us she was frightened but she just pushed on,' Sgt Farmer said.

'She paddled out on a rescue board, and found two of the boys.'

The incident happened at around 4pm, the boys waited on the beach until the search was abandoned at night fall, a search the next day also failed to yield results.

Surf Lifesaving duty officer Glen Dunkley has commended Ms Searle's efforts.

'She's done an excellent job to get them to shore safely,' he said.

Bennetts Beach was closed at the time of the incident, it is believed the men were caught in a rip when they got into trouble.

Police will continue the search for the man on Sunday but hope that they will find him alive is fading.

The missing man's parents are in Hawks Nest after being contacted by police when he went missing and a beachside vigil was held on Saturday.
An Arab Israeli gunman who killed three Israelis in Tel Aviv was tracked down to his hiding place yesterday after sniffer dogs discovered his unburied faeces near his make-shift hideout.

Nashat Milhem was killed in a shootout with police one week after he opened fire at a busy Tel Aviv bar killing two people and wounding several others. He is also thought to have killed a taxi driver.

After closing in on his hideout in his hometown of Arara today, he attacked police with the same sub-machine gun he used last week before he was shot dead in security forces.

Shot: Nashat Milhem. the suspected attacker of a Tel Aviv bar last week was shot and killed in a shootout with police

Manhunt: Security forces have been hunting Arab Israeli Milhem for a week, after they suspected him of killing three people and wounding several others

Police spokeswoman Luba Samri said the gunman 'was found in a building', that he came out shooting at the special forces and 'was then shot and killed'.

The gunman was earlier identified earlier as Nashat Milhem, an Arab from northern Israel after his father spoke to Israeli media in the hours after the attack on January 1st.

Police sources reportedly told Isreali newspaper Haaretz that they thought Milhem had accomplices, as 'he didn't look like someone who was in hiding for a week without contact with anyone'.

His relatives say they were not updated of new intelligence regarding Milhem's location before the raid took place at 11am local time.

Hakim Younis told Israeli Channel 10 TV that he witnessed some of the incident from his home.

Hideout: Security forces were on high alert trying to trace the attacker, usually suspects are caught quickly. Above, police in the hours after the attack on January 1st

The shootout happened in Milhem's hometown of Arara, northern Israel, where residents expressed their disappointment he wasn't caught alive

'I was sitting on my balcony with my cousin ... when suddenly, shooting began, hundreds of bullets, like in a war,' Younis said, adding that he then went inside and didn't see anything further.

The incident came amid more than three months of near-daily Palestinian attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers.

Israelis are used to quickly resuming their daily routines following attacks because assailants are usually swiftly captured or killed. But the Tel Aviv shootings left Israelis jittery because Milhem, who was considered armed and dangerous, was on the loose for a week.

Milhelm's relatives had said he was 'traumatized' after a cousin was shot dead in a 2006 police arrest raid. At the time, police said they were searching for weapons and claimed the shooting was in self-defense.

Police find terrorist who killed 3 people last week in tel aviv. Terrorist opened fire at police in Arara(north).Officers shot & killed him.  Micky Rosenfeld (@MickyRosenfeld) January 8, 2016

Milhelm served time in an Israeli prison after being convicted of attacking a soldier and trying to steal his weapon. But he was also described by residents of the upscale Tel Aviv neighborhood where he worked as a grocery store delivery man as being well-liked and trusted.

Israeli Arabs, who make up a fifth of the country's 8.4 million people, enjoy full rights but have long complained of unfair treatment in areas such as housing and employment opportunities.

Killing spree: Milhem is suspected of opening fire and killing two people last week at the busy Simta bar (pictured)

Many identify more with their Palestinian brethren in the West Bank and Gaza and with Palestinian nationalism rather than with Israel.

The near-daily Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers have killed 21 Israelis, mostly in stabbings, shootings and car-ramming assaults.

At least 134 Palestinians died by Israeli fire, including 93 said by Israel to be attackers. The rest were killed in clashes with troops. These figures do not include Milhelm's victims.

Alon Bakal, (pictured) was the manager of the bar and was one of the first victims to be named
The QMUL university student was travelling with two other teenagers

Mohammed Amoudi attended CAGE event just before he was stopped in Turkey and sent back to the UK

A British student who was arrested in Turkey on suspicion of planning to join ISIS, attended an event at his university featuring a speaker who said Muslims were 'feared and hated' in the West.

Mohammed Amoudi sat at the front of the event, organised by the controversial rights group CAGE, which shot to the public's attention after describing Jihadi John as a 'beautiful young man.'

Moazzam Begg, director of CAGE, told the audience that the manner in which the position of Muslims today was 'almost identical' to the discrimination and hate faced by Jews during the Holocaust.

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One of the 17-year-old boys who was detained in Turkey alongside his 17-year-old cousin and another 19-year-old man (pictured being stopped at the airport) had written jibes about the murder of Lee Rigby online

Moazzam Begg, director of the the controversial rights group CAGE, told the audience that the manner in which the position of Muslims today was 'almost identical' to the discriminate and hate faced by Jews during the Holocaust

Mr Begg spoke about his time in Guantanamo Bay before saying how the West's decision to invade and bomb Muslim countries was the reason for the emergence of ISIS.

He described how ISIS and al-Qaeda were 'born in the torture dungeons of Egypt and Syria and Britain'.

Another speaker at the event was preacher Haitham al-Haddad, who has previously received criticism for suggesting that apostates from Islam should be sentenced to death by stoning.

A Queen Mary University of London spokesman told The Times: 'All panel members at this event were approved in advance by the university. The event... passed without incident or cause of concern.

Amoudi was studying physics at the time when he was at Queen Mary University of London last year and was laos a member of Striving Muslims, a small evangelical Islamic group.

He was stopped in Turkey along with two young north west London schoolboys over concerns they were intending to cross the border into Syria.

It was later revealed that one of the 'naive and impressionable' teenage boys who was stopped in Turkey had written jibes about the murder of soldier Lee Rigby on social media.

The teenager, who cannot be named for legal reasons, made comments on social media criticising the 'eruption' of public grief over the murder of solder Rigby, who was brutally killed near the Royal Artillery Barracks in Woolwich, south east London in May 2013.

One of the teenagers attended Preston Manor School in Wembley, where students were recently told that weekly prayer sessions must be taken only in English amid fears of radicalisation.

The teens, all from Brent, north west London, were stopped at Sabiha Gokcen International Airport in Istanbul when an officer checked their passports and ordered for them to be taken to a 'risk and analysis' centre

CCTV footage showed how an immigration officer checked the passports of each of the teenage boys before telling them they will not be able to proceed to the arrivals hall. They are then escorted to a 'risk and analysis centre' in the airport by officials.

All three teenagers were later put on a return flight to London and taken into custody at a high-security police station for questioning.

Officials swooped on the group within minutes of their flight touching down in Istanbul and the trio were brought back to Britain where they were questioned at a high-security London police station on suspicion of preparing acts of terrorism.

Sources in Turkey said there is some evidence the three communicated with terrorists about how best to evade the authorities but none of them are believed to be connected to any high-profile ISIS terrorists.

How CAGE tried to host an event in a primary school

By Paul Bentley, Lucy Osborne And Tammy Hughes For The Daily Mail Investigations Unit

A Daily Mail investigation revealed that CAGE once tried to use a primary school to host an event involving extremist speakers.

Police alerted the school about the planned event two days before it was due to go ahead.

Staff had no idea that its hall had been booked by CAGE or that it was to be used to showcase some of Britains most notorious Islamists.

One of the planned speakers was a cleric who has defended stoning and female genital mutilation.

Another was the head of Hizb ut-Tahrir  the organisation that wants to create an Islamic Caliphate with Sharia Law.

The talk was due to be held on the evening of November 5 on the site of the Chobham Academy in Newham, East London.

The school is understood to have believed the event was connected to a local community football team.

CAGE denies misleading the school or an event booking company over the nature of the talks.

But a source close to the 1,800-pupil Chobham Academy said the event would never have been approved had staff known CAGE was involved.

The source told the Mail the event was stopped only after intervention by the police, who are understood to have been monitoring CAGEs activities.

The three British teenagers who were stopped in Turkey were allegedly on their way to Syria to join ISIS. Istanbul has become a well-known stop off point for British jihadis wanting to flee to join terrorist in Syria

One of the two 17-year-old boys is believed to have attended Preston Manor School in Wembley, north west London (pictured)

ISIS has developed a reputation for its horrific brutality, regularly carrying out public executions and floggings

He was just a guy making football bookings and hed booked the hall for an event, the source said. He wasnt a name that came up on Google.

No booking was made for CAGE. No mention was made of a political event of any kind. The school and the booking company found out it was CAGE two days before it was due to happen.

Someone in the local police contacted the school to say, were they aware of this thing that was being advertised on websites? They were shocked.

The CAGE member who booked the event was thought to regularly play football at the school  which is set in the heart of the Olympic Village and regularly hires out its sports pitches and event spaces to the community.

The source added: The main thing for the school is that it was cancelled. The school is trying to educate young people in London and particularly in a sensitive part of London. All the stuff they are educating them about would have been undermined.
Two Iraqi-born refugees arrested on terrorism charges allegedly used social media to discuss their plans for returning to Syria to fight in the civil war.

Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, 23, was arrested on Thursday in Sacramento, California on charges he was plotting to travel to Syria to join the al-Nusra Front terrorist organization.

Omar Faraj Saeed al Hardan, 24, was arrested in Houston, Texas on Thursday as well on three charges of trying to provide material support to the Islamic state.

Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan (left) is escorted from the Bob Casey Federal Courthouse on Friday in Houston. Al Hardan was indicted charges related to accusations he tried to provide material support to ISIS

It has been revealed Al Hardan was communicating on social media with a Sacramento man, Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, about plans to travel to Syria and fight in the civil war

Al-Jayab, 23, (pictured) was arrested on Thursday in Sacramento, California on charges he was plotting to travel to Syria to join the al-Nusra Front terrorist organization

The two men's social media communications provided the link that led to their terrorism-related charges, it has been revealed.

Al-Jayab promised in 2013 he would train Al Hardan in how to use weapons and sneak into Syria to join the fight, according to an FBI affidavit unsealed in federal court in Sacramento.

'O God, grant us martyrdom for your sake while engaged in fighting and not retreating; a martyrdom that would make you satisfied with us,' Al-Jayab wrote to Al Hardan, according to court documents.

Al-Jayab said he had already fought in Syria, starting when he turned 16, according to messages between the two men quoted in court documents.

He promised to provide weapons training to Al Hardan and advised him on how he would be assigned to the battlefield once he arrived in Syria.

Authorities say there was no indication either man, who are both Palestinians born in Iraq, was planning attacks in the United States.

Al-Jayab (pictured in this courtroom sketch) is currently being held without bond in Sacramento

Authorities say there is no indication that Al-Jayab was planning any sort of domestic attack on the US

Court documents rely heavily on Al-Jayab's social media communication, much of which is in Arabic, travel records and Internet IP addresses. Prosecutors did not provide additional information.

In several messages, Al-Jayab criticized Islamic State for killing Muslims, although he later described fighting alongside the group.

'If it weren't for the State's bloodletting, I would have been the first one to join it,' he said, according to the FBI.

Social media and other accounts say that as soon as he arrived in the US, Al-Jayab began saying he wanted to return to Syria to 'work,' which the FBI says is believed to be a reference 'to assisting in and supporting violent jihad.'

It says it appears he wanted to assist the 'Front,' which the FBI says was 'likely a reference to al Nusrah Front,' considered a terrorist organization affiliated with Al Qaeda in Iraq.

A few days later, he described, during earlier fighting, emptying seven ammunition magazines from his assault rifle during a battle and executing three Syrian government soldiers.

California boy: Al-Jayab (pictured) was born in Iraq to Palestinian parents, but emigrated to live in the U.S.

It's not clear how Al-Jayab and Al Hardan met online, although the FBI affidavit describes at least one apparently mutual acquaintance.

Authorities say Al-Jayab, who emigrated to the US in 2012, fought twice in Syria, including with Ansar al-Islam, which merged with the Islamic State after he had returned to the US.

He told authorities he had traveled to Turkey to visit his grandmother, which prosecutors say was a lie that could send him to prison.

Al-Jayab returned to the United States in January 2014 and lived in Sacramento. He has been a computer science major at a Sacramento community college since last fall.

He faces up to eight years in prison on charges of traveling to Syria to fight in late 2013 and early 2014 and lying to US authorities about his travels.

Al-Jayab's attorney on Friday criticized U.S. politicians who he said 'have grossly mischaracterized the nature and scope of this case' to tie it to the debate over whether the US is doing enough to screen refugees.

'There is no threat that this man poses or no indication that he's engaged in any activity since his return two years ago,' defense attorney Ben Galloway said outside the courtroom.

Poses: Al-Jayab takes up a brooding post next to a Toyota car in this picture posted to his Facebook

Armed: The complaint in federal court in Sacramento said Al-Jayab (pictured) came to the United States from Syria as a refugee in October 2012

The only activities that were interrupted were his studies and his work.'

Meanwhile the US refugee program came under fresh criticism after the two men's arrests this week.

Republican lawmakers already concerned about the federal government's ability to properly vet Syrian refugees said the cases highlight weaknesses in the program that put Americans' safety at risk.

'How many ticking time bombs are we going to bring in in this refugee program without a proper vetting system in place?' said Texas Republican Rep. Michael McCaul at a news conference Friday.

He and other GOP lawmakers urged the Senate to pass legislation to block refugees from Iraq and Syria until screening is improved. The House passed a bill in November.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Friday the screening of refugees is rigorous and thorough.

He repeated the administration's opposition to proposals that would impose a religious test or bar individuals from the U.S. based on their ethnicity.

'That doesn't represent who we are as a country and, most importantly, it's not going to keep us safe,' Earnest said.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Carolyn Delaney ordered Al-Jayab held without bail on Friday.

Al Hardan faces up to 25 years in prison and is charged with attempting to provide material support for terrorists. He is being held without bond.

He told the judge he lives in a Houston-area apartment, is married and has a child.

Travels: While living in Arizona and Wisconsin, Al-Jayab (pictured) communicated on social media about his intent to return to Syria to fight for terrorist organizations and discussed his previous experience fighting against the regime in Syria.

Saeed Faraj Saeed Al Hardan said his brother told him Friday in a telephone call from the Federal Detention Center in Houston that he is innocent of the charges he faces.

Saeed said their family had always felt that 'ISIS is no good' and 'ISIS is not Muslim' and that his brother was looking forward to becoming a US citizen.

He said he never heard Al Hardan express support for the group.

Al-Jayab's brother, Samer Mohammed Al Jayab, is being sent back to Wisconsin to face unrelated allegations that he conspired to transport stolen cell phones and computers across state lines.

He was arrested in California while visiting Al-Jayab and was released on $25,000 bond Friday.

Two other relatives, Younis Mohammed Al Jayab and Ahmad Waleed Mahmood, appeared in federal court in Wisconsin on Friday.

They also were ordered released without cash bond.
He has written a moving Facebook post to call for an end to cyber bullying

Cliff said it began while the 16-year-old was at Alamo Heights High School

His brother Cliff said the sophomore had been bullied for several months

David Molak was found hanged in his own Texas backyard on January 4

The heartbroken brother of a sophomore who hanged himself after being tormented online for months has written a touching Facebook post urging for an end to cyber bullying.

David Molak, 16, was tragically found dead in his own backyard in Texas on January 4 after months of being bullied over social media, say his family.

His brother Cliff said the family were devastated by the loss of David who had been left a 'shell of a person' by the constant abuse.

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Cliff Molak (left) has written a moving message to his little brother David (right) who took his own life after being cyber bullied for months

'In today's age, bullies don't push you into lockers, they don't tell their victims to meet them behind the school's dumpster after class, they cower behind user names and fake profiles from miles away constantly berating and abusing good, innocent people,' wrote Molak on Facebook.

He said that the bullying had first began back in October while his little brother was at Alamo Heights High School.

Using sites such as Instagram, his tormentors had posted vicious messages such as: 'Let's put him in a body bag' and 'We're going to put him six feet under,' KSAT 12 reports.

Cliff said the attacks had pushed David to the brink and he had twice attempted to end his life, once by taking an overdose and another by driving into a pole.

But things had appeared to be going better for the 16-year-old, who was undergoing therapy, after he moved to a new private school.

Sadly, his cyberbullying followed him to the new school.

After an incident where a group of around eight members invited the teen into a private chat only for him to be verbally abused and kicked out, David committed suicide.

Cliff said that his brother had hung himself as the 'ultimate display' for his bullies to try and hold them accountable.

'He was a kind soul. He didn't know how handle the situation,' he added.

David was first alerted as missing on Monday, January 4. Officers were able to track his cellphone to the family backyard where he was discovered dead.

David's brother Cliff said the whole family had been left devastated by the loss of the 16-year-old sophmore

The San Antonio Police Department is now looking into the case and Alamo Heights Independent School District Superintendent Kevin Brown said that the school is working with police to investigate the claims.

Brown added that the school 'had a role to play' to deal with cyber bullying and that they tried to preach good character.

Alamo Heights High School Principal Dr. Cordell T. Jones said officials were working with students to help them come to terms with their grief.

'I've had a full range of emotions from smiling and laughing as I think about David loving Mrs. Caudill's 2nd grade class at Woodridge to shedding some tears as I think about him not growing up to be the wonderful man I envision him being,' Jones wrote in an announcement made to the student body.

Cliff is now calling for an end to cyber bullying and the pain it can inevitably cause.

He warned that while social media allowed teens more freedom than ever before, it was down to families and schools to make sure it wasn't being abused to make victims' lives miserable.

'The households and the school systems are failing,' he warned. 'The only way to end the suffering in this nation whether it be from bullying or discrimination is not to highlight differences between groups of people, but to focus on the importance of accountability and ultimately character.

'The only way to heal this country and our communities is to accept and embrace the notion that we have to begin character building from the ground up before the elementary level or our society will never recover.

'It is my dream for the healing of this nation to be David's legacy.'
The 60-year-old security guard who was allegedly involved in a physical altercation with James Packer at the billionaire's casino is 'the gentlest man on earth', according to his son.

Dr Iskandar Chaban, 60, failed to recognise the media mogul and the casino's senior executive Ishan Ratnam and tried to block them as they approached the venue, just hours after Mr Packer's girlfriend Mariah Carey performed.

The Syrian-born doctor has claimed that Mr Packer screamed abuse, pushed him out of the way and ordered him to be 'fired immediately' after the incident on New Year's Day.

His son, Ali, has now come forward to say that his father is a 'gentle doctor' who would not hurt anybody, according to theHerald Sun.

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Billionaire businessman James Packer allegedly screamed abuse at a security guard, pictured is Mr Packer with his girlfriend Mariah Carey

Dr Iskandar Chaban, 60, (left) failed to recognise Mr Packer (right) and attempted to block him as he walked towards Melbourne's Crown casino

He has been working at Mr Packer's casino for three years to 'pay his mortgage and university fees for his three children' and has lived in Australia for 25 years.

He claimed he collapsed and was taken by ambulance to hospital in 'pain and distress' after the altercation with Mr Packer and Mr Ratnam.

The guard said he felt he was treated 'like a criminal' when the pair allegedly pushed him aside at the bridge entry to the main gaming floor, before demanding that he be sacked on the spot.

'I stopped their path just to have a word with them,' he told the Sunday Herald Sun.

'Before I could even say a single word, they both started screaming at me using the most terrible language. They then both pushed me out of the way.'

'I pressed my alarm as I didn't know who these crazy men were, it was terrifying.'

The couple spent Christmas in the upmarket ski resort of Aspen before ringing in the new year at his Crown casino in Melbourne where Mariah performed for revellers

The Syrian-born doctor has claimed that Mr Packer (pictured) screamed abuse, pushed him out of the way and ordered him to be 'fired immediately' after the incident on New Year's Day

Crown Melbourne confirmed a 'minor incident' had taken place involving Mr Packer and Mr Ratnam following a misunderstanding by a security officer.

The security officer, who has worked at the casino for three years for MSS Security, was escorted from the premises and suspended, but Crown claimed he has now been reinstated.

Mr Chaban had allegedly been warned by radio that a VIP was approaching, but he claimed he had 'no idea' who the men were at first.

'How they treated me was inhuman. James Packer treated me as if I was nothing,' he said.

The father-of-three, 60, who was treated in hospital for back pain and shock for around seven hours, has enlisted the help of a Melbourne law firm.

The alleged verbal and physical confrontation took place at around lunchtime on New Year's Day.

Mr Chaban, who moved to Australia from Syria 25 years ago, claimed his only error was his failure to recognise Mr Packer.

It occurred just hours after Mr Packer's girlfriend, Mariah Carey, performed for a 1500-strong VIP audience at the casino.

The verbal and physical confrontation took place at around lunchtime at Melbourne's Crown casino on New Year's Day

The couple spent Christmas in the upmarket ski resort of Aspen before ringing in the new year at his Crown casino in Melbourne where Mariah performed for revellers.

A spokesman for Crown Melbourne said: 'A contract security officer, working inside the resort was radioed that a VIP was approaching his position, but failed to recognise Mr Packer, moving in front of him to attempt to physically block him from entering the casino and causing a collision,' the statement said.
A 17-year-old student's pregnant selfies have caused a raging debate at her Virginia high school after the principal said that the photos wouldn't be allowed in the yearbook.

The editor-in-chief of the yearbook at Mount Vernon High School in Alexandria wanted to include the snaps to show student life as it really is instead of the glossy, idealized version of high school so often memorialized.

Two pages of the book were dedicated to the lives of teenage mothers who attend the school, including Hannah Talbert, whose bare-belly selfies have caused quite the controversy.

According to editor-in-chief Anderson Bonilla, Principal Esther Manns has said she will not allow the photos of Hannah Talbert, a junior at the school, to be featured in the yearbook.

A bare-belly photo of 17-year-old Hannah Talbert was banned from the yearbook at Mount Vernon High School in Alexandria, Virginia

The editor-in-chief of the yearbook said he wanted to include Talbert's story to show life as it really is at the high school, where there is more than one teen mom

According to editor-in-chief Anderson Bonilla, Principal Esther Manns said she will not allow the photos of Talbert, a junior at the school, to be featured in the yearbook for Mt Vernon High School (pictured)

'I had no idea it would turn into something much bigger,' Talbert told ABC News.

The yearbook includes a feature about Mount Vernon High School's immigrant students, and another showing classmates who are learning English.

There is a page that gives tips on how to help students cope with grief after losing a friend. And two pages are dedicated to the teen moms.

'We want to show the real world of what Mount Vernon is,' said Bonilla. He made the theme of the Surveyor 'Where we really live.'

'We wanted to report something worth knowing,' he said.

A statement from Fairfax County Public Schools spokesman John Torre said that Manns 'raised concerns' about some of the photos in the yearbook and has asked for students to make sure they had permission to use them.

Torre added that Manns had not made any final decisions about the photographs in the yearbook, which is due out this spring.

Talbert documented her pregnancy on Instagram through photos of her growing belly. Now she documents the life of her little boy.

She is now a proud mom, balancing the care of her seven-month-old with a full load of International Baccalaureate courses.

She originally didn't know the pictures would be featured in the yearbook, but when she found out, she gave a sign of approval.

'I'm going to buy a yearbook, and me having a baby was a big part of my life,' said Talbert, who recently turned 17.

Her father, Mac Talbert, said he was 'disappointed' by the idea that the school might remove the photos from the yearbook.

Talbert documented her pregnancy on Instagram through photos of her growing belly and now documents the life of her seven-month-old boy

'I'm kind of disappointed that the school wanted to take it out,' he said, adding that the photos might make other teen moms feel less alone. 'Hannah's not the only kid who has had to face this. She's taking it head-on

The case pits the First Amendment rights of high school students against the concerns of administrators who worry about the long-term impact of the photos, especially in the context of sensitive issues, including teenage pregnancy.

Manns told the students that she feared Talbert would regret showing her stomach later in life, according to ABC, but Talbert disagrees.

'I think it's just skin and just a baby in there. I'm not trying to be provocative,' she said. 'I think it's because I'm 17.'

Bonilla said he left his meeting with the principal believing that she had decided the photos of Talbert would not appear in the yearbook.

She did not, however, submit any written decision on the pictures. Under the school district's policies, students can appeal a decision in writing.

Bonilla also said he believes that the students are on firm ground in publishing the photos.

In the US Supreme Court case Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, justices ruled that principals could censor articles on such sensitive subjects as pregnancy and divorce in student publications since the publication carries the 'imprimatur' of the school.

But district policy spells out that principals can censor only material that they believe will cause a disruption or that is 'harmful to juveniles'.

Torre said that Manns gave the students a list of conditions to be met before the yearbook is published, including written consent from students to publish pictures and quotes, removal of racially charged words and principal approval before publication.

Bonilla said that he is seeking legal representation at the Student Press Law Center in what he calls a violation of First Amendment and due process laws.

Talbert's parents have been very supportive of her pregnancy and her plan to continue her education. Here she is pictured shortly after giving birth

Talbert said she is a proud mom, balancing the care of her baby with a full load of International Baccalaureate courses

'We knew we would face challenges but we never knew it would go that far,' Bonilla told ABC.

The Student Press Law Center released a statement to ABC News about the yearbook incident.

'Common sense should carry the day and the school should realize that violating student free expression rights in an attempt to deny the existence of teen mothers is harmful to the community, the families, and the students involved,' the statement read.

The editor-in-chief said that he included the pregnancy photo spread in part to give teen mothers a voice.

'We are actually giving a realistic view of what these girls go through,' Bonilla said. 'She's still here. She's getting her education. That's what we're trying to show the school.'

Having a child and attending high school is not easy, Talbert said.

She rises before many of her classmates to get her son ready for day care and has to keep an eye on him while she does homework. She spent part of her 17th birthday at the pediatrician's office with him.

She is not ashamed to be a teen mother and, with financial support and heavy-duty babysitting help from her parents, she plans to pursue her dream of attending Penn State University and becoming a surgeon. She said she's excited to be in the school's yearbook.

'I think that it's important to be in there because there are a lot of teen moms at our school and it's a really big misconception that you can't be successful or happy or anymore,' she told ABC.

Her parents have been very supportive of her academic pursuits.

'A lot of teen moms drop out of school, and she's trying to show that you can still go to school and get an education,' Tracy Perkins, Talbert's mother, told ABC. 'Going to school full time and doing all that stuff yes, it's hard but she's still doing it and she's doing it successfully.'

And she wants other girls who find themselves unexpectedly pregnant to know their lives aren't over.

'I don't think I'll regret it,' Talbert said of appearing in the yearbook. 'That would be like saying I regret having my son, and I don't.'
Donald Trump is known for throwing out hecklers, but on Thursday he wanted to make sure one was punished for speaking out.

The GOP presidential candidate demanded that a man's coat be confiscated as the protester was thrown out of his rally at the Flynn Center of the Performing Arts in Burlington, Vermont.

As the audience cheered him on, Trump urged security not to give the man his coat.

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Donald Trump demanded that a man's coat be confiscated as the protester was thrown out of his rally at the Flynn Center of the Performing Arts in Burlington, Vermont on Thursday

The man was just one of a number of protesters who showed up to Trump's rally in Bernie Sanders' home state, with many holding up signs supporting the Democratic presidential candidate

'Get him out, get him out of here. Don't give him his coat,' the frontrunner said as he stood at the podium, where he had previously been discussing his campaign's 'unbelievable momentum'.

'Keep his coat. Confiscate his coat,' he continued. 'You know, it's about 10 degrees below zero outside.'

'No, you can keep his coat. Tell him we'll send it to him in a couple of weeks,' Trump finished as his supporters laughed.

It is not known if security complied with Trump's demand.

The man was just one of a number of protesters who showed up to Trump's rally in Bernie Sanders' home state, with many holding up signs supporting the Democratic presidential candidate.

Every rally attendee was asked if they planned to vote for Trump before they were allowed into the rally, according to the New York Daily News.

Those who answered 'no' were escorted out of the building.

'I'm taking care of my people,' Trump said in a statement.

'Keep his coat. Confiscate his coat,' Trump said as his supporters cheered him on. 'You know, it's about 10 degrees below zero outside'

Every rally attendee was asked if they planned to vote for Trump before they were allowed into the rally. Those who answered 'no' were escorted out of the building

Pictured is one of the protesters who was escorted out of the building during Trump's rally

'Not people who don't want to vote for me or are undecided. They are loyal to me and I am loyal to them.'

Trump later blamed the security guards at the Flynn Center for not controlling the disruptive crowd, saying it was reflective of the problems of America as a whole.

'This is why we're losing control of our country,' he told his audience.

'We lose control of our country 'cause everybody's afraid to do anything. They're afraid to lose their jobs.'

On Friday a Muslim woman was removed from Trump's campaign event in South Carolina after standing in silent protest following one of his controversial immigration comments.

Rose Hamid, 56, attended the event in Rock Hill wearing a hijab and a shirt that read 'Salam, I come in peace,' hoping that her presence might manage to change the opinion some Trump supporters have about members of the Islam faith.

She positioned herself directly behind Trump, and when he began to speak about Syrian refugees being banned from entering the United States and suggested that many had ties to ISIS, she silently stood up out of her seat.

Police immediately escorted her out of the event while the audience booed the woman and yelled at her to 'get out,' with one man screaming; 'You have a bomb, you have a bomb.'

After Hamid had been removed, Trump said to the audience; 'There is hatred against us that is unbelievable. It's their hatred, it's not our hatred.'
The Justice Department's Office of Inspector General has ruled that the DEA 'substantially wasted government funds' by paying an Amtrak employee more than $850,000 for information that was available for free.

An Amtrak secretary, who was not publicly identified except as a 'secretary to a train and engine crew,' was paid a total of $854,460 over twenty years to be report on passengers who may have been smuggling drugs.

However, the train company's own police agency is already in a joint drug enforcement task force that includes the DEA. That task force can obtain Amtrak confidential passenger reservation information at no cost.

DEA 'substantially wasted government funds' by paying an Amtrak employee more than $850,000 for information that was available for free

U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration also inappropriately agreed to pay an airport security screener to become a confidential source when that information was freely available, the Inspector General found.

However, the Transportation Security Administration worker never provided any information of value to the agency, Washington Examiner reports.

The Inspector General, which has jurisdiction to review all programs and personnel of the DEA, FBI and other government agencies, called it a 'substantial waste in government funds.'

In a ruling, the body stated that the annual payments of around $43,000 to the Amtrak employee had 'violated federal regulations relating to the use of government property.'

'The OIG also concluded that the DEA agents exceeded the terms of the Amtrak employees CS classification when they directed him to gather specific information for them,' the report continued.

Drug Enforcement Administration Administrator Michele Leonhart may face pressure after the ruling that the payments had 'violated federal regulations relating to the use of government property'

The office of Amtrak Inspector General Tom Howard had previously declined to identify the secretary or say why it took so long to uncover the payments.

Howard's report on the incident suggested policy changes and 'other measures to address control weaknesses that Amtrak management is considering.'

Amtrak is officially known as the National Railroad Passenger Corp. and is not a government agency, although it has received tens of billions of dollars in federal subsidies and is subject to the U.S. Freedom of Information Act.

Passenger name reservation information is collected by airlines, rail carriers and others and generally includes a passenger's name, the names of other passengers traveling with them, the dates of the ticket and travel, frequent flier or rider information, credit card numbers, emergency contact information, travel itinerary, baggage information, passport number, date of birth, gender and seat number.

Amtrak's inspector general said the secretary provided the passenger information without seeking approval from Amtrak management or police, but Amtrak's own corporate privacy policy expressly allows it to sell or share personal information about its customers and passengers with contractors or a category of others it describes as 'certain trustworthy business partners.'

It was not immediately clear whether the DEA has rules against soliciting corporate insiders to provide confidential customer information in exchange for money when providing that information would cause the employee to violate a company's or organization's own rules or policies.

The DEA does not publish on its website its staff manuals or instructions for employees.

Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley said the hundreds of thousands of dollars in payouts were unnecessary

The Amtrak secretary was allowed to retire, rather than face administrative discipline, after the discovery that the employee had 'regularly' sold private passenger information since 1995 without Amtrak's approval.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, the senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, called the $854,460 an unnecessary expense in a letter to DEA Administrator Michele Leonhart.

Grassley said the incident 'raises some serious questions about the DEA's practices and damages its credibility to cooperate with other law enforcement agencies.'

It's not unprecedented for law enforcement to have professional people who are informants employed in transportation and other industries, said a federal law enforcement official who is familiar with the incident involving Amtrak.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the person was not authorized to speak on the record.
Foreign spouses could now be under greater threat of deportation after the Home Office unveiled new forms that makes it easier for their spouses to report the breakdown of a relationship.

The forms, available on the gov.uk website, is intended to help the immigration department identify illegal immigrant easier.

However, campaigners claim that the forms could make it even easier for spouses in abusive relationships to be controlled by the partners.

Declaration: Informants can alert UK immigration that their marriage or civil partnership has broken down

Worrying: Professor Brooks has expressed that the form may be 'more useful as a threat that may intimidate non-European citizens into remaining in relationships they wish to leave for fear of removal from the country leading to potential abuse'

According to the instructions on the gov.uk site, the forms allow a spouse to inform the UK Visa and Immigration department (UKVI) 'of a relationship breakdown' and give permission to UKVI for information about the estranged partner to be used.

In particular, the Public Statement form requires the spouse to sign and confirm that the dissolution of the marriage.

It says: 'I do not live with them and that I do not intend to live with them as my spouse or partner in the future.'

The forms apply for both marriages and civil partnerships.

Currently, spouses and partners with spousal visas are free to stay and work in the UK but they may face deportation if their relationship ends.

Immigration: Currently, spouses and partners with spousal visas are free to stay and work in the UK but they may face deportation if their relationship ends

Professor Thom Brooks of Durham University, a leading authority on immigration law and policy, said in an official statement: 'The government is taking clear aim at bogus marriages that allow migrants to reside in the country on a false basis.

'Ministers will hope that more estranged people come forward to inform the Home Office to improve their detection of anyone overstaying their visa  but they have not thought this through'.

Further, Professor Brooks has expressed that the form may be 'more useful as a threat that may intimidate non-European citizens into remaining in relationships they wish to leave for fear of removal from the country leading to potential abuse'.

A Home Office spokesman told The Independent: ' When a relationship between a British citizen and a person with leave as a partner ends it should be reported to the Home Office.

'An assessment will be made as to whether cancellation of the partners visa is appropriate.'
Adolf Hitler's autobiography Mein Kampf was an instant sellout when it hit bookstores in Germany for the first time since the Second World War.

More than 15,000 advance orders were placed, despite the initial print of 4,000 copies, with one copy even put up for resale on Amazon.de for 9,999.99 (7,521.43).

Mein Kampf, which means My Struggle, returned into the public domain on January 1.

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A copy of Hitler's Mein Kampf - A Critical Edition stands on a display table in a bookshop in Munich, Germany

A 1941 edition of Adolf Hitler's 'Mein Kampf' ('My Struggle') lies at the library of the Deutsches Historisches Museum (German Historical Museum)

Ian Kershaw, a Briton who is a leading biographer of Hitler, joined Friday's book presentation and said it was 'high time for a rigorously academic edition of Mein Kampf' to be made available.

'For years, I have considered the lifting of the ban on publication long overdue,' Kershaw said.

'Censorship is almost always pointless in the long term in a free society, and only contributes to creating a negative myth, making a forbidden text more mysterious and awakening an inevitable fascination with the inaccessible.'

Germany's main Jewish group, the Central Council of Jews, said it has no objections to the critical edition but strongly supports ongoing efforts to prevent any new 'Mein Kampf' without annotations. Its president, Josef Schuster, said he hopes the critical edition will 'contribute to debunking Hitler's inhuman ideology and counteracting anti-Semitism.'

Copies of a 2,000-page, two-volume annotated version of Mein Kampf will go on sale on January 9 after three years of labour by scholars at Munich's Institute for Contemporary History.

The new version, which will cost 59 euros (43), has some 3,500 annotations.

Authors argue that the critical edition will serve to 'deconstruct and put into context Hitler's writing' with the aim to demystify the 800-page rant.

The annotated version looks at key historical questions, the institute said, including: 'How were his theses conceived? What objectives did he have? And most important: which counterarguments do we have, given our knowledge today of the countless claims, lies and assertions of Hitler?'

Jewish community in Germany criticised the decision to reprint the anti-Semitic book, questioning whether it was necessary to propagate the inflammatory text again

Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, said 'it would be best to leave 'Mein Kampf' where it belongs: the poison cabinet of history'

Education Minister Johanna Wanka has argued that such a version should be introduced to all classrooms across Germany, saying it would serve to ensure that 'Hitler's comments do not remain unchallenged'.

'Pupils will have questions and it is only right that these can be addressed in classes,' she said.

But the Jewish community in Germany criticised the decision to reprint the anti-Semitic book, questioning whether it was necessary to propagate the inflammatory text again.

Charlotte Knobloch, leader of the Jewish community in Munich, said she could not imagine seeing 'Mein Kampf' in shop windows.

Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, told AFP that not only would 'Holocaust survivors be offended by the sale of the anti-Semitic work in bookstores again', but that he also failed to see a need for a critical edition.

'Unlike other works that truly deserve to be republished as annotated editions, 'Mein Kampf' does not,' he said, arguing that academics and historians already have easy access to the text.

First edition of Mein Kampf signed by Adolf Hitler. The Nazi dictator wrote the book in 1924 while he was in jail in Bavaria for treason after his failed coup

Versions of the book will also hit bookstands in France, causing an outcry in the Jewish community there

Roger Cukierman, the president of the council of Jewish institutions, called the planned French reprints 'a disaster'

A German edition of Adolf Hitler's 'Mein Kampf' (My Struggle) is pictured at the Berlin Central and Regional Library

And even though it should be studied and German students taught about the devastating impact it had, Lauder said 'the idea that to do so requires an annotated edition with thousands of pages of text is nonsense.'

'Now, it would be best to leave 'Mein Kampf' where it belongs: the poison cabinet of history.'

Versions of the book will also hit bookstands in France, causing an outcry in the Jewish community there.

Roger Cukierman, the president of the council of Jewish institutions, called the planned French reprints 'a disaster'.

'Such horror can already be found on the internet. What would happen if Mein Kampf also becomes bedside reading?' he said.
Victim: Pictured, a young Kaoru Hasuike who was kidnapped by North Korean spies on a beach in 1978

On the evening of July 13, 1978, Kaoru Hasuike and his girlfriend, Yukiko Okudo, rode bikes to the summer fireworks festival at the beach near their home at Kashiwazaki, 140 miles north of Tokyo.

As they watched the display from a remote stretch of sand, one of a group of four men standing nearby asked Kaoru for a light  then pounced, gagging and blindfolding the couple, who were put in canvas sacks and loaded on to an inflatable raft where they were injected with drugs.

Kaoru woke the following evening in North Korea.

Yukiko was nowhere in sight, and his captors told him his girlfriend, a 22-year-old farmers daughter who worked as a beautician, had been left behind.

Cocky and intelligent, 20-year-old Kaoru was top of his law class at Tokyos prestigious Chuo University, but cared little for politics and knew almost nothing about Korea.

He launched a furious tirade at his abductor. The response was chilling: If you want to die, this is a good way to do it.

Then his captor explained he had been abducted to help reunify the Korean Peninsula.

After all the pain his Japanese forefathers had inflicted on Korea, the man continued, it was the least Kaoru, who had benefited from his countrys rapacious colonial exploits in Korea, could do.

Precisely how Kaoru would hasten reunification was not explained, though it was hinted he was to train spies to pass as Japanese, or perhaps become a spy himself.

Kaoru was appalled and astonished. But he was by no means alone. People had begun to disappear from Japans coastal areas in the autumn of 1977.

A security guard on holiday at a seaside resort had vanished in mid-September. In November, a 13-year-old girl, Megumi Yokota, walking home from badminton practice in the port town of Niigata, vanished just yards from her familys front door.

Some were lured on to aircraft by the prospect of lucrative jobs abroad; others, like Kaoru and Yukiko, were transported by boat to North Korea by an elite unit of the countrys commandos.

North Koreas bizarrely confrontational behaviour continues to this day, of course.

Last week it announced it had successfully tested an H-bomb, prompting South Korea to resume its loudspeaker propaganda broadcasts across the border.

The families of the missing spent years searching for them, checking mortuaries and hiring private detectives. Only five, out of what may be hundreds, were ever seen again.

Nobody knows exactly how many were taken, but the mountain of evidence sent to me over the years does indeed suggest hundreds.

Yukiko Hasuike, pictured before her kidnap and after, was put into a canvas sack and gagged by her captors

Megumi Yokotas family put their lives on hold, making sure that one of them was always at home in case she returned. Every morning, her father walked along the shore, examining the objects brought in by the tide. During the day, her mother circled the town on her bicycle, checking train and bus stations.

For the next 20 years, they received little attention. But after a shocking international incident in 1987 laid bare the North Korean conspiracy and made it clear what had probably happened to Megumi, she became the poster girl of a growing movement to highlight the plight of the abducted.

Her story has since been told in four documentaries, an animated movie, a two-volume comic book, a television drama and two songs. But she has never returned.

The regime in the North Korean capital Pyongyang insists she committed suicide while undergoing treatment for depression. Her parents believe she is still alive.

As a North Korea specialist I am obsessed with the question of why that country went to the trouble of snatching ordinary Japanese people from beaches and small towns.

Certainly some were employed as spies in South Korea, or to recruit people to live in North Korea. I heard tales of Japanese brides being shipped to North Korea to marry Japanese Communists who had defected, and then sent out to Asia and Europe to seduce and abduct young Japanese tourists.

Some were used to teach spies fluent Japanese so they could pass as Japanese nationals abroad.

Others had their identities stolen, enabling North Korean terrorists to travel undetected under Japanese passports.

Tragic loss: Megumi Yokota, pictured in 1977, was taken by North Korean agents and never seen again

Two such agents planted a bomb on a South Korean airliner in 1987, killing all 115 passengers and crew.

The more I researched, the more stories of lives sacrificed to a half-baked ideological agenda emerged.

The most plausible explanation for the abduction programme is that it was part of a larger plan to unify the two Koreas, humiliate Japan and spread the ideology of Kim Il Sung, supreme leader of North Korea from 1948 to 1994.

Historian Tessa Morris-Suzuki wrote: The apparently senseless campaign of kidnappings becomes slightly more comprehensible if it is seen not so much as a bizarre method for obtaining language teachers, but rather as linked to dreams of destabilising Japan via revolutionary cells, composed either of kidnap victims themselves or of North Korean agents.

Meanwhile, the political climate in Japan allowed the abductions to continue almost entirely uninvestigated.

In the 1970s, Japan looked more favourably on Kims regime than on Park Chung Hees military dictatorship in South Korea.

Mindful of the pain Japan had inflicted on Korea in colonial times, its Left-leaning media, intellectuals, and politicians were loath to criticise Korea and, when rumours about the abductions occasionally arose, they were dismissed as products of anti-Korean prejudice.

The North Korean regime found it generally took a year and a half to break down the abducted into a state of psychological helplessness, during which time they could be taught the Korean language and brainwashed into the regimes Communist ideology.

The process had been tried with couples, but it was observed that the presence of a partner encouraged the abducted to resist.

On the other hand, an abductee who was completely isolated for too long was more difficult to control; loneliness had a way of turning into depression and suicide.

But if the couple were separated, trained, and then reunited, they could serve the state together, each functioning as a hostage with which to manipulate the other.

It would turn out that Yukiko had endured the same indoctrination routine barely a mile from Kaoru: learning Korean, studying the regimes ideology, wondering whether she could survive in this strange country.

Then in May 1980, after enduring endless isolation and indoctrination about the virtues of North Korea and the iniquities of Japan, Kaoru received rare good news.

His girlfriend Yukiko had not been left in Japan: she had been snatched too and was in the next room. Would he like to see her? Yes, Kaoru quickly replied.

He and Yukiko married three days after reuniting. It wasnt the wedding theyd dreamed of, but it meant that theyd face their uncertain future together.

Their first home was a traditional one-storey house an hour south of Pyongyang, located in one of the many mile-square, guarded Invitation-Only Zones that dotted the citys suburbs.

The newlyweds fell into a routine. Every morning, after being woken up Big Brother-style by an announcement coming from the loudspeaker that is installed in every North Korean house and workplace, Yukiko prepared a traditional Korean breakfast before Kaoru went for a run past identical white cottages to the barbed-wire fence surrounding the compound.

Once a week, the theatre on the second floor of the neighbourhood centre screened movies, usually educational films filled with revolutionary propaganda.

There are no other tools in art and literature as powerful as cinema in educating people in a revolutionary manner, wrote Kim Jong Il, who took over as leader from his father.

His favourite movies were said to be Friday The 13th, Rambo and Godzilla. One of the most popular movies of the time was Pulgasari, the Godzilla remake directed by Shin Sang Ok, the South Korean film director who had been abducted in 1978 along with his glamorous ex-wife Choi Eun Hee, known as the Elizabeth Taylor of South Korea.

Shin and Choi, pictured, wereSouth Korean celebrities but spent almost a decade as prisoners of North Korea

They were kidnapped in the hope they would revitalise the North Korean film industry. Kim Il Sung treated them like (captive) royalty and in return they made seven films before escaping during a film festival in Vienna in March, 1986.

Most evenings, Kaoru and Yukiko stayed at home and watched the news on one of the two official television stations.

At 8pm, the news would end and a movie would begin.

Kaoru realised when he was first abducted that he needed to learn Korean to survive. Within nine months, he could read the official newspaper with the aid of a dictionary.

The articles were unlike anything hed ever seen  pages of praise for the leader interspersed with denunciations of South Korea, Japan and the US.

He was shocked to hear talk of war: in North Korea, the assumption is that war is inevitable and the scenario for the battle against America is cast in apocalyptic terms.

It will begin with a surprise attack by the US at the 38th Parallel, which separates North from South Korea.

The North will repel the invaders and flatten South Koreas capital Seoul with rockets, before dispatching its special forces to meet up with the thousands of North Korean sleeper spies in the South who will unify the peninsula in weeks.

It was the fall-back plan that most terrified him. If the North was overrun, every citizen was to repair to the system of underground tunnels and the mountains and fight a guerrilla campaign.

In preparation, Kaoru kept a backpack filled with candles, matches, and food.

To prepare for his encounter with the US military, he memorised one English phrase: We are abducted Japanese. Please help us!

When Kaoru and Yukiko had children, they were tied even more firmly to North Korea. The couple gave their son and daughter secret Japanese names, Shigeyo and Katsuya, when they were born in 1981 and 1985.

But their birth gave Kaoru a sense of hope for the future: Dreaming about their future made our lives more bearable.

Ex Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and ex North Korean leader Kim Jong Il at their first summit

Then, in January 1988, everything changed. The North Korean female terrorist Kim Hyon Hui confessed to bombing Korean Air Flight 858 and set in motion a series of events that would eventually unravel the entire abduction project.

Once the Japanese government learned that she had received language training from a Japanese national in North Korea, it was forced to raise the abduction issue with the regime.

But whenever Japanese diplomats uttered the word abduction, their North Korean counterparts would stand up and leave the room in protest.

Whats more, the North Koreans turned the tables on them. Hadnt the Japanese abducted hundreds of thousands of Koreans, using the men as slave labour and the women as sex slaves?

It was not until a decade later in 1997, when Japanese negotiators substituted the phrase missing people for abductees that the North agreed to investigate their whereabouts.

The following year, Yoshiro Mori  soon to become prime minister of Japan  made a proposal that allowed Pyongyang to save face.

What if North Korea moved any missing persons to Beijing, Paris, or Bangkok? Then they could claim they had been living there all along.

The North Koreans were intrigued, and amid wider political negotiations aimed at bringing about a rapprochement between Japan and North Korea, it seemed, there might be light at the end of the tunnel.

Eventually, in 2002, after four years of negotiations, Kim Jong Il agreed to play ball, up to a point.

While the Japanese government maintains North Korea has abducted more than 250 of its citizens and continues to do so, Kim Jong Il declared there had been only 13, and that eight of them (Megumi Yokota included) were dead.

Yukiko Okudo and Kaoru Hasuike, circled, return to Japan in 2002 after years of captivity in North Korea

Among the five declared survivors were Kaoru and Yukiko, who were permitted to return home to Japan temporarily in 2002  without their children.

They decided not to return to North Korea and it took another 18 months of negotiation before the youngsters were released.

Today, Kaorus discoloured, uneven teeth are the only evidence of his time in North Korea. He has completed his degree and is now working toward a postgraduate degree in Korean studies. He makes a living translating from Korean and writing his own books.

He recently informed the Japanese government that he no longer needs the stipend awarded to abductees to compensate them for their ordeal.

Yukiko is a cook in a local kindergarten; daughter Shigeyo is a postgraduate student; her brother Katsuya earned a degree in computer science from Waseda University and works at a bank in Seoul.

When we met in the spring of 2011, Kaoru was polite but wary.

He feared for the abductees who remained in the North and was determined not to offend Pyongyang.

Critics have portrayed him as a kind of tragic mulatto  a man caught between two cultures, unable to choose; or, worse, as a sleeper waiting for instructions from his North Korean spymasters.

He struck me more as a man who survived his ordeal by living as normally as possible. So where did he fit with in with regard to Japan and North Korea?

Right in the middle, he said with a sigh. When I was in North Korea, I was told a lot of unpleasant things about Japan. How could I live bearing the sins of all my ancestors?

Over dinner, I asked him: Why do you think you were abducted?

He flashed an odd smile. Ive thought about that a lot. The whole thing is still a paradox to me. There was no real reason for our abductions, or at least no reason that makes any sense.

We were taken in order to be used as a bargaining chip. That is the only conclusion I have come to.

 Robert Boynton, 2016
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Student nurses and midwives turned out in their thousands as they marched from St Thomas's Hospital to Whitehall to make their protest against the Government's decision to scrap bursaries and replace them with loans.

Secretary Jeremy Hunt said the decision to replace bursaries with loans had to be taken for financial reasons and if done 'right' could see up to 20,000 more nursing posts in place by 2020.

Students could face up to 50,000 in debt beginning in 2017, which could make training and studying difficult as many students already have financial obligations and children.

They were also supported in their fight to keep bursaries by Green Party leader Natalie Bennett and shadow health secretary Heidi Alexander, as well as the Royal College of Nursing and trades unions.

Thousands of student nurses, midwives and supporters take part in a protest march to oppose the scrapping of nursing bursaries. Debts of up to 50,000 could be incurred if the Government's plans to cut bursaries go forth

In the 2015 Autumn Statement, Chancellor George Osborne, announced that NHS bursaries, which are paid to student nurses to cover living costs while they are studying and carrying out hospital work experience, will be abolished and converted into student loans that will have to be repaid

The Government's proposal to scrap the bursary will start in 2017. New plans will ask future nurses, midwives and other allied health professionals to pay up to 50,000 to train to care

Among those who addressed the students at the rally was shadow health secretary Heidi Alexander who was roundly cheered as she told them the Labour Party is on their side before reading out a message of support from leader Jeremy Corbyn.

Relaying a message he sent her earlier today, she said: 'I admire our brilliant NHS staff and their work.

'We must keep nursing bursaries for the next generation so that nurses can qualify, help all of us and not be lost to the profession.

'Support for our NHS and the brilliant work that all the staff do will always be there from the Labour Party.'

She herself added: 'I think the Government is taking a huge gamble with the future of the NHS and you need to know that the Labour Party will fight them every step of the way.

'First it was the junior doctors and now it is the student nurses. We will oppose them and we will not let them put the future of the NHS at risk.'

Future nurses and midwives will find it extremely difficult if not impossible to pay their debt off as many have children and other financial obligations

Secretary Jeremy Hunt said the decision to replace bursaries with loans had to be taken for financial reasons and if done 'right' could see up to 20,000 more nursing posts in place by 2020

Doctors and nurses stand together as they march in protest of the Government's recent proposal to get rid of bursaries beginning in 2017

A dog getting ready to take part in the protest holds a bag that reads: 'Don't Let Your NHS go to the Dogs'

Unite general secretary Len McCluskey, said they did a 'fantastic job' and that they had 'no right to be subjected to an attack by this government'.

Under current conditions, student nurses and midwives get an annual NHS bursary between 1,000 and 4,000 while they study, which they do not have to pay back, and are exempt from tuition fees.

But they will be scrapped from August 2017, a move which critics have said will leave them and student occupational therapists, speech and language therapists, podiatrists and radiographers facing thousands of pounds of debt when they graduate.

Consultation on the policy will begin later in the year, but more than 150,000 people have signed an online petition calling for the plan to be scrapped and the NHS bursary retained, and Parliament is expected to debate the issue on Monday.

A woman holds a sign that reads,'They'll Replace Kidney Machines with Rockets and Guns', during a protest in London against plans to cut bursaries

The bursary is seen as a way of compensating students for the long hours their courses require

Protesters were supported in their fight to keep bursaries by Green Party leader Natalie Bennett and shadow health secretary Heidi Alexander, as well as the Royal College of Nursing and trades unions

Student nurses work at least 37.5 hours a week, which includes nights, days and weekends, making it difficult for them to get part-time jobs on top of assignments and studying

The petition says that students are required by the Nursery and Midwifery Council (NMC) to have done at least 4,600 hours while studying and half of those are in practice.

Sylvie Duval, chairwoman of the Royal College of Nursing's (RCN) student council, said the bursaries were an 'essential financial support' and taking them away and replacing them with student loans would 'pile on more personal financial pressure to an already overstretched part of the health care workforce'.

She said: 'We are deeply worried about what this move means for the future of the NHS, our future colleagues and above all, patient care.'

RCN chief executive Janet Davies, who addressed the crowd in Whitehall, added: 'Student nurses and midwives are the profession's future and their voices and concerns must, and should be listened to.'

Anthony Johnson, a 22-year-old student nurse studying at London's King's College, helped to organise the rally and said the bursary was seen as a way of compensating students for the long hours their courses require.

He said: 'The bursary was a way for us to afford to live. Taking it away means student nurses are having to mortgage their futures. As the lowest paid professionals we will also have to get into 56,000 of debt, so will never be able to pay it off.'

Mr Johnson said high numbers of nurses or midwifery students have children or are mature students, and therefore already have financial commitments, meaning they cannot afford the debt, while bringing in a loan would put off those from low socio-economic backgrounds.

He added: 'Ninety two per cent of students currently studying say they wouldn't have been able to do the course if they hadn't had a bursary.

'We are students and all we ever wanted to do is have the opportunity to show that we care for patients, and that is being taken away from us. It is going to destroy our NHS.'

Green Party leader, Natalie Bennett (centre) joins NHS student nurses, midwives and supporters in a protest march against the Government's decision to scrap bursaries. She's holding a sign with another protester that reads: 'Bursary Wars: Episode V, The Students Fight Back'

The Royal College of Nursing claims a fear of debt will put people off becoming nurses as thousands of protesters take to the streets of London

A dog that was preparing for the protest was holding a bag which reads: 'Don't Let Your NHS go to the Dogs'

Critics have said this move will leave student nurses and student occupational therapists, speech and language therapists, podiatrists and radiographers facing thousands of pounds of debt when they graduate

A mom and her daughter join thousands of student nurses and midwives as they march through London to protest against the Government's decision to scrap bursaries and replace them with loans

Jenny Leow, 31, a trainee occupational therapist at London South Bank University, said she would not have been able to train without the bursary.

She said: 'Axing the NHS bursary will disproportionately affect poor, older and working class students.

'The richest 1% - the banks and biggest corporations - have caused a financial crisis that the Tories are determined that we should pay for. The money is there, it is just with the wrong people.

'The bursary or bust campaign proposes that on February 10, when junior doctors are staging a full walk-out, that all NHS students walk out for half a day as well in solidarity and to present a united NHS that is fighting not only for ourselves but also for our patients.'

More than 150,000 people have signed an online petition calling for the plan to be scrapped and the NHS bursary retained

Sylvie Duval, chairwoman of the Royal College of Nursing's student council, said the bursaries were an 'essential financial support'

Shadow health secretary, Heidi Alexander, told protesters that the Labour Party is on their side before reading out a message of support from leader Jeremy Corbyn. She said that the Government is taking a 'huge gamble with the future of the NHS'

Bursary or Bust: The plan was unveiled in last year's Comprehensive Spending Review and is expected to free up around 800 million a year in Government spending

A student from London's King College said that '92 per cent of students currently studying say they wouldn't have been able to do the course if they hadn't had a bursary'

A Department of Health spokesman said: 'We need more home-grown nurses in the NHS because they do an amazing job caring for patients, but currently two thirds of people who apply to become a nurse aren't accepted for training.

'Our plans mean up to 10,000 more training places by the end of this parliament, with student nurses getting around 25 per cent more financial support whilst they study.'

Nicola Pickstone, 35, an A&E sister at a London hospital who attended the rally with her two-year-old daughter Annabel and 10-month-old son Alastair, said nursing training was tough.

She said: 'You work 37.5 hours a week, nights, days, weekends, so it is very difficult to get a part-time job on top of those hours as well as doing assignments and studying.

'I am here to support all of my student nurse colleagues and the future student nursing colleagues, because I think it is just going to be absolutely disastrous if the bursaries are stopped.

'There will be fewer people applying for courses, there will be fewer maturer students applying for courses. Those that want to do it as a second career or have been touched by the health service so want to work in it, people that have already got children or mortgages - these are the people that we are going to lose.'

The Government said the bursary changes will allow more people to be trained, but the thousands of student nurses and supporters disagree and believe without the bursary it will be more difficult for nurses to train and study

An NHS student nurse holds a sign that reads 'Save Our Bursary because One Day We May Save Your Life' during a march in London

Under current conditions, student nurses and midwives get an annual NHS bursary between 1,000 and 4,000 while they study

The plans have been heavily criticised by unions including Unison and the Royal College of Nursing (RCN), which described it as 'a crushing blow'

Marching under the 'bursary or bust' campaign, they also proposed that all NHS students join junior doctors for a half-day walk-out on February 10
The Cleveland school cop has since been placed on administrative leave

Cicero said to 'raise your kids not to play with fake guns stupid b***h'

He claimed the young boy's mother was only interested in making money

A Cleveland school police officer has been placed on administrative leave after he posted an obscene rant to Facebook branding Tamir Rice's mother a 'stupid b***h.'

Twelve-year-old Rice was shot dead by police officer Timothy Loehmann last year after he was spotted playing with a toy gun. Last month, prosecutors declined to file charges against the cop responsible.

Two days later, Cleveland Metropolitan School District officer Matt Cicero took to Facebook to write the angry post.

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Two days after prosecutors declined to file charges against the cop who shot Tamir Rice, 12, Cleveland Metropolitan School District officer Matt Cicero took to Facebook to write the angry post

Cicero also posted a meme of a man holding up two guns to the camera with the caption 'Quick, which one is a BB gun? Oops, too late... you're dead'

'Tamir rices momma just want money,' he wrote. 'Lets make the proper changesraise your kids not to play with fake guns stupid b***h.

'All this media because the are not getting what they want Again pleeeeze anyone who does not like what I post..unfriendly me or block me your not worth my time.'

When someone objected to the message, insisting that a child playing with a toy gun 'did not become a sold platform for the death penalty' and that the cop responsible should have been charge with negligent homicide, Cicero was quick to respond.

He wrote: 'You pull out a gun you get shot. I don't have time to ask questions and coddle kids that wave guns around.'

Cicero also posted a meme of a man holding up two guns to the camera with the caption 'Quick, which one is a BB gun? Oops, too late... you're dead.'

Twelve-year-old Rice was shot dead by police officer Timothy Loehmann last year after he was spotted playing with a toy gun

The school police officer, who worked in the same district as Tamir Rice, has since taken down all his social media pages.

Cleveland Metropolitan School District spokeswoman Roseann Canfora confirmed to Raw Story that Cicero had been placed on administrative leave while an investigation was underway.

'While we respect every employee's right to freedom of speech, with those rights comes a responsibility to do so in ways that are appropriate and sensitive to others, particularly to the people we serve,' she wrote in a statement to NewsNet.

CEO Eric Gordon admitted the comments were 'particularly insensitive, considering that Officer Cicero works for the school district that served Tamir Rice and his family.'

'Even as we grieve the tragic loss of this child to his family and to our entire school community, we are mindful of the very difficult job of our safety forces in our schools and our communities.

'Neither our citizens nor those who police our communities should be painted with a broad brush, and I don't believe we will ever find solutions to such complex issues through Facebook posts - especially posts that further divide us.'

City Councilman Jeff Johnson has now called for the officer to be fire over his remarks which she branded as disrespectful to women and African-Americans.

'The fact that he's so insensitive and he's placing the blame of Tamir's death on Tamir, for me that's enough for him to be not working with children in the Cleveland school system.'

This still from surveillance footage shows Tamil Rice, 12, running around a park with a fake gun moments before being shot and killed by Cleveland police officers

Mother: Samaria Rice, mother of Tamir Rice, had admitted before the decision was announced that she didn't think the cops would be indicted

Samaria Rice (center) watches surveillance footage of her son Tamir's shooting during a news conference in Cleveland, Ohio in March

Last month Cleveland prosecutor Tim McGinty confirmed that the Grand Jury in the Rice case had decided against indicting patrolmen Loehmann and Frank Garmback for their role in the deadly shooting.

Rookie cop Loehmann gunned down the child on November 22, 2014, after responding to a 911 call from someone who said there was 'a guy with a pistol', adding that it was 'probably fake'.

Shocking surveillance footage shows Garmback speeding up to the scene in his patrol car and skidding to a halt before Loehmann gets out and fires.

In a statement shortly after the announcement, attorneys for Tamir's family renewed their calls for the Department of Justice to investigate the shooting.

It read: 'It has been clear for months now that Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty was abusing and manipulating the grand jury process to orchestrate a vote against indictment.

'Even though video shows the police shooting Tamir in less than one second, Prosecutor McGinty hired so-called expert witnesses to try to exonerate the officers and tell the grand jury their conduct was reasonable and justified.

'It is unheard of, and highly improper, for a prosecutor to hire "experts" to try to exonerate the targets of a grand jury investigation.'

McGinty said on Monday the child's death was a 'perfect storm of human error'.

Footage of the shooting prompted protests and a nationwide debate about the use of force by police, as well as sparking a Justice Department investigation into Cleveland Police.

After the grand jury decided not to press charges against the officers involved in the incident, celebrities including famous musicians, athletes and actors voiced their outrage over the decision and their support for Tamir's family.

But Rice's mother Samaria voiced her disappointment with NBC star LeBron James, who she feels snubbed her son.

In an interview with News One, Tamir's mother Samaria Rice said she felt let down by the silence from LeBron over her son's death.

'I think it's quite sad that LeBron hasn't spoke out about my son,' Rice said.

LebRon's silence in the aftermath of the grand jury is surprising given his displays of support in similar tragic cases.

In 2012, he tweeted a picture of his team wearing hooded sweatshirts in honor of Trayvon Martin and just this past year, he wore a 'I can't breathe' t-shirt while warming up for a game against the Brooklyn Nets - in honor of Eric Garner, a man killed by police in Staten Island, New York City.

Last month, LeBrown was asked by ESPN why he had been vocal about other Black Lives Matter causes, but not with Rice - a fellow Cleveland boy.

Cleveland Police Chief Calvin Williams said they will now review the officers' case to see if there should be any disciplinary action.

Tragedy: Tamir (pictured left, and right with his mother) was gunned down on November 22, 2014, by rookie cop Timothy Loehmann. Prosecutors have said the death was a 'tragedy' but insisted it wasn't a crime

Samaria Rice, who was the target of Cicero's rant has been campaigning for justice with the help of a league of support

Tamir was playing in the park in the build-up to the shooting and was reportedly pointing the weapon at people - prompting concern from someone near the park.

The toy weapon did not have an orange clip on - which would have warned officers the gun wasn't real.

The officers were told by a dispatcher that there was a man with a gun, but did not pass on information that the boy was young and the gun was probably fake.

When Loehmann got out of the car, Tamir was dead within 10 seconds.

Tamir died during surgery a day after the shooting, and his family has repeatedly questioned why the case has dragged on.

McGinty told a press conference on Monday that Tamir's death was a 'tragedy' and 'regrettable' but 'is not by the law that bides us a crime'.

He added that there was no evidence of misconduct by police.

'The outcome will not cheer anyone, nor should it,' he said.

The evidence that it was not a crime, according to McGinty, was recently enhanced video showing Tamir was actually advancing towards police and drawing the fake gun from his waist.

When announcing the decision, McGinty said he backed the grand jury's findings.

'We all lose, however, if we give in to anger and frustration and let it divide us.

'We have made progress to improve the way communities and police work together in our state, and were beginning to see a path to positive change so everyone shares in the safety and success they deserve.

New on the job: Rookie cop Loehmann (pictured left during his swearing in ceremony) gunned down the child on November 22, 2014, after responding to a 911 call from someone who said there was 'a guy with a pistol', adding that it was 'probably fake'

Scene: A combination of still images taken from a surveillance video shows Cleveland police officers arriving at Cudell Park on a report of a man with a gun just moments before Rice was gunned down

Spot the difference? The gun in the top right of this picture is a replica of the toy gun Tamir Rice was carrying the day he was shot. Prosecutors say it was missing an orange cap on the tip of the barrel that would have identified it as a toy

'When we are strong enough together to turn frustration into progress we take another step up the higher path.'

Tamir lived across the street from the recreation center and went there to play nearly every day.

When they arrived, the officers said they repeatedly yelled at Tamir to put his hands up, although investigators found no evidence of that.

Garmback said the windows of the cruiser were rolled up.

In the video, Tamir walks toward the cruiser as it moves toward him. It's unclear even in an enhanced version of the video whether Tamir was reaching for the gun or had his hand on it when Loehmann shot him.

McGinty, however, said this higher-quality video shows Tamir was advancing towards the pair.

The boy lay unattended for about four minutes until an FBI agent who is a trained paramedic arrived and began administering first aid.

The Cleveland police department also has come under tense scrutiny after a U.S. Department of Justice investigation found that officers were too quick to use force against suspects and that the system to investigate civilian complaints was 'woefully inadequate.'
British expats could be banned from claiming tax credits for four years, as David Cameron tries to convince Eastern European countries to accept his EU deal.

The Prime Minister is considering whether to apply a four-year tax credits ban to British expats who have relocated abroad for four years or more, when they return to the UK.

It could come as part of a compromise deal Mr Cameron is negotiating with fellow EU leaders.

But those from the Visegrad countries, of Slovakia, Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic, are proving difficult to convince.

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David Cameron, pictured at his press conference with Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban on January 7, is considering applying a four-year tax credits ban on British expats after Eastern European countries claimed he was being discriminatory

Mr Cameron initially proposed the four-year in-work benefits ban for migrants arriving in the UK from other EU countries.

However, the proposal sparked outrage in Hungary, with the country's Prime Minister Viktor Orban insisting that Mr Cameron was discriminating against EU migrants.

For us it is very important that we are not considered as migrants, he said this week. Words matter here. Hungarian is a very culturally defined nation and language. It plays a very important role in our politics.

So we would like to make it quite clear that we are not migrants into the UK. We are citizens of a state that belongs to the EU who can take jobs anywhere freely within the EU.

So we do not want to go to the UK and take away something from them. We do not want to be parasites It is very important that those Hungarians who are working well and contribute to the British economy should get respect and should not suffer discrimination.

Discrimination is not something we can accept.

To appease the Visegrad countries' claims of discrimination, Mr Cameron is considering a compromise which would see the same rules applied to British citizens.

The ban would only apply to new arrivals in the UK from other EU countries - potentially including British citizens who have lived abroad for four years or more.

On a trip to Hungary this week, Mr Cameron also met with the Hungarian President Janos Ader. Mr Cameron is considering applying the same in-work benefits ban to UK citizens who relocate abroad for more than four years, on their return to the UK - in an attempt to appease other EU member states

Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, pictured right on January 8 alongside Defence Secretary Michael Fallon Japanese escort ship Izumo, said he cannot 'envisage' campaigning against the Prime Minister in the referendum

But the suggestion has proved controversial with British expats, who face missing out on four years' of tax credits.

The suggested ban wouldn't apply to EU migrants who have already settled in the UK.

Mr Camerons suggestion to lock EU migrants out of in-work benefits for four years is the most controversial of his four EU renegotiation proposals.

The others are: to increase competitiveness across the EU; to better insulate EU countries which have their own currency from the Eurozone; and to increase the sovereignty of national parliaments.

The Prime Minister hopes to get an agreement for his renegotiation deal at the EU Council in February.

PHILIP HAMMOND SAYS HE CAN'T IMAGINE CAMPAIGNING AGAINST THE PRIME MINISTER AT EU POLL Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond today said he would find it hard to 'envisage' campaigning against David Cameron in the referendum. Mr Hammond, who is generally considered a eurosceptic, told the Today programme he did not expect to take advantage of Mr Cameron's decision to allow ministers to take their own view. Several cabinet members were reportedly ready to quit rather than stick to a pro-EU line mandated by No 10. Mr Hammond said: 'Our first challenge is to get the right deal and we are making good progress on that. 'It is a painstaking task because we have got 27 partners to bring along with us, but we are making progress. 'Then the Government will make a decision about whether it can make a recommendation to the British people on the back of that deal to support Britain's continued membership of the European Union. 'The Prime Minister has made clear individual ministers will be free to express their views.' He added: 'I can't envisage us negotiating a deal the Prime Minister thinks is good enough to recommend to the British people and which I feel I want to campaign against.' Advertisement

Ive put on the table the four-year proposal and that proposal remains on the table, he said.

It wont come off the table unless something equally important is put in its place.

Im open to listening to ideas. Im not going to give you a running commentary on those ideas but Im very clear about the aim that we need to achieve here.

There is an increasing sentiment in Downing Street that Mr Cameron is on the way to creating a deal with EU leaders that would enable him to recommend voting to stay in the EU.

He has pledged to have an in-out referendum on the EU before the end of 2017, but it is widely expected to be called for this summer.
Legendary presenter: Ed Stewart died aged 74 in Bournemouth just days after suffering a stroke

Former television presenter and BBC Radio DJ Ed 'Stewpot' Stewart has died in a hospital in Bournemouth aged 74.

He had suffered a stroke just a few days earlier.

Stewart's former brother-in-law Adriano Henney posted the news on Twitter.

He wrote: 'Sad to report sudden passing of my former brother in law #EdStewart #StewpotEd after short illness - Fun guy - Huge loss.'

Devon-born Stewart had a broadcasting career that's lasted for more than five decades, including working as an announcer, film critic and rugby reporter according to the BBC.

He was one of the first presenters on Radio 1 when it was launched in 1967.

The following year, Stewart began presenting children's show Junior Choice, which later became his trademark radio show.

On television, Stewart was best known for children's favourite Crackerjack, which he hosted from 1973 to 1979.

Mostly recently, Stewart presented a Christmas edition of Junior Choice for BBC Radio 2 in 2015.

Bob Shennan, Director of BBC Music, said in a statement: 'Everyone at Radio 2 is extremely saddened to hear of the passing of Ed 'Stewpot' Stewart.

'Ed has been a stalwart of popular music broadcasting for many years and over the past few Christmases, he brought back Junior Choice to the delight of millions of loyal listeners.

'We are thinking of Ed's friends and family at this difficult time.'

Presenter and former colleague David Hamilton also paid his tribute.

Ladies' man: Ed Stewart with models (from left) Dawn Luther, Sally White, Alison Norfolk, Diana O'neill, Carole Bell and Rachel Buchan

Radio career: Stewart (front row, second from left) was one of the first DJs on Radio One after its launch. Here, Radio One DJs pose for a group photograph outside Broadcasting House in London after the BBC announce their new line up in 1967. Back row (left to right); Tony Blackburn, Jimmy Young, Kenny Everett, Duncan Johnson, Robin Scott (controller), David Ryder, Dave Cash, Pete Brady, David Symonds. Middle Row (left to right); Bob Holness, Terry Wogan, Barry Alldiss, Mike Lennox, Keith Skues, Chris Denning, Johnny Moran, Pete Myers. Front row (left to right); Pete Murray, Ed Stewart, Pete Drummond, Mike Raven, Mike Ahern, and John Peel

Decades later: Fifteen of the original Radio 1 DJ's line-up on the steps of All Soul's Church, central London, in a recreation of the original publicity photograph taken 30 years ago that launched the new station. From left to right - back row: Tony Blackburn, Jimmy Young, Robin Scott (first controller), Duncan Johnson (squatting), Dave Cash and Pete Brady; Middle Row: Bob Holness, Terry Wogan, Keith Skues, Chris Denning and Pete Myers; Front row: Pete Murray, Ed Stewart, Pete Drummond, Mike Ahern (Died 5/10/2009) and John Peel. Those missing from the original picture are Barry Aldiss, Kenny Everett and Mike Paven, all deceased; Mike Lennox, Johnny Moran, Dave Rider and David Symonds who were not able to attend

Speaking on BBC News, Hamilton hailed Stewart for his versatility.

He said: 'Like all of us, radio was his first love. But also, he did very well on television. He was one of the hosts of Crackerjack for a long time, he did Top Of The Pops and he had his own programme.

'He was one of those radio people who did also work well on television.'

There has also been an outpouring of tributes to the much-loved presenter on Twitter.

Television presenter Noel Edmonds wrote: 'In '67 Ed Stewart heard a DJ audition tape, liked it, passed it to Kenny Everett and my career was born. Stewpot I owe you everything xN'

Fan club: Ed Stewart, at the Weekend Mail Ball at the Lyceum Ballroom, London. He had a broadcast career that spanned more than 50 years

Playful: Ed Stewart at Westminster Children's Hospital with Tony Wallace of Battersea and Micolino Santoro of Rushden Northamptonshire for the television programme he was recording

Coronation Street star Les Dennis posted: 'Sad to hear Ed 'Stewpot' Stewart has died. A great broadcaster and a nice man.'

Celebrity astrologer Russell Grant tweeted: 'So sad to hear an old DJ colleague of mine Ed Stewart 'Stewpot' has passed over. I last worked with him on Radio Mercury. Happy memories.'

Stewart was due to lead a music quiz tour around the UK this year, which has now been cancelled according to the organisers.

He had been busy promoting the tour before suffering from the stroke.

In his last tweet on January 3, Stewart wrote: 'I'm sharpening my crackerjack pencil as we speak in anticipation of my music quiz tour this year. Mind you, it's not as sharp as me!'
The statue of colonist Cecil Rhodes is protected by strict planning laws and the property's Grade II* listed status means the Oxford college would struggle to remove it.

Oriel college sparked a national debate last month when it announced it would remove a plaque dedicated to Rhodes, in response to a student anti-racism campaign.

The anti-Rhodes lobby claimed the 19th century mining magnate, who helped Victorian Britain colonise much of Southern Africa, held opinions that now offend modern values.

Rhodes was one of the era' most famous imperialists, with Rhodesia - now Zimbabwe and Zambia - named after him.

Any attempts to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes from Oriel College, Oxford, will be blocked by planning regulations, heritage experts have claimed

The unobtrusive 4in statue can be found half-way up Oxford's High Street (pictured) at Oriel College

Oriel will start a six-month 'listening exercise' after the campaign group said forcing ethnic minority students to walk past the 4in memorial amounted to 'violence' as Rhodes paved the way for apartheid.

Even if it bowed to pressure from the student protesters, attempts to remove the statue will be blocked by planning regulations, according to heritage experts.

Legal requirements say decisions 'must have special regard to the desirability of preserving the building' including 'features of special architectural or historic interest which it possesses', The Times reported.

Julian Munby, of Oxford Archaeology, said the statue was an essential part of the design of the building.

He said: 'I don't see why Historic England would agree to it.' Although Historic England does not have the final say, it would be consulted and its advice would not be taken lightly.

Chris Smith, director of planning at Historic England, added: 'The stories of human suffering and triumph that are embodied in historic places should be spoken about, understood and debated as an essential aspect of our national culture.

'The building is among the top seven per cent of buildings which are afforded special protection.'

If the removal were rejected by the city council, the college may have to appeal to the secretary of state, which could rack up a six-figure legal bill.

Campaigners argued the statue subjects them to 'violence' on a daily basis and leaves them 'oppressed'

Ntokozo Qwabe, pictured, has led the student group campaigning against the statue of Cecil Rhodes

The campaign to remove the unobtrusive statue on Oxford's High Street - which has been there since 1911 - followed the Rhodes Must Fall student protest in South Africa.

A statue of Rhodes was removed at the University of Cape Town after it was attacked as a symbol of oppression.

The student group is led by Ntokozo Qwabe, whose education was funded by the scholarship set up by Rhodes, which led some to accuse him of hypocrisy. Rhodes Scholarships finance an Oxford education for students from former British colonies.

Mr Qwabe has also faced criticism for saying French flags should be taken down as they are a 'violent symbol' akin to the Nazi swastika and writing how he 'did not stand with Paris' in the wake of the terror attacks last November.

Oriel has been heavily criticised by the likes of Tony Abbott, a former Rhodes beneficiary, Mary Beard, Jacob Rees-Mogg MP and Trevor Phillips for trying to 'destroy history'.
At least 39 people died in a suspected Russian airstrike today in Idlib

It comes after photos of emaciated children emerged from the town, where at least 23 people have starved to death

Photos taunt starving Syrians with fish and chips, and fridges stuffed with food

Syrian regime supporters are trolling the people starving in Madaya by posting pictures of their dinner on social media.

Using the hashtag 'In solidarity with the Madaya siege', they ridicule media reports that emerged last week showing emaciated children starving because the Syrian regime has blocked aid from reaching the town which lies northwest of Damascus.

In one picture on Facebook, a user posts a picture of his kitchen table - laden with food, and writes in Arabic: 'Directly from my house I have fried fish, tabouleh, casserole and pepsi #Madaya #in_solidarity_with_madaya'.

Cruel taunts: Syrian regime supporters are trolling the people starving in Madaya by posting pictures of their dinner on social media

A Russian Today reporter tweets 'in solidarity the Madaya siege'

Another picture posted is of a bowl overflowing with vegetables with the caption: 'Please, we want the hashtag with a picture of food - say how it tastes... in solidarity with Madaya.'

One man posts a selfie in front of his stuffed open fridge writing 'From the heart of my fridge, solidarity with Madaya.'

Madaya is home to 42,000 people and has become notorious in recent days because of the cases of starvation recorded there.

The Red Cross says some food is available in the city, but only for the few that can afford it.

Pro-regime supporters accuse the rebels in the town of stealing aid delivered and then selling it to the people at high prices.

However the town has been besieged since early July by government forces and its Lebanese Shia Islamist Hezbollah allies.

It is just one of many towns under siege by government forces.

According to Doctors Without Borders, at least 23 people have starved to death in MSF-supported centres in Madaya since December 1.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has said he will allow humanitarian access to the town of Madaya, and called for a halt to all attacks on civilians in the conflict, ahead of peace talks later this month.

The pictures ridicule media reports that emerged last week showing emaciated children starving because the Syrian regime has blocked aid from reaching the town which lies northeast of Damascus

Another picture posted is of a bowl overflowing with vegetables with the caption 'Please, we want the hashtag with a picture of food - say how it tastes... in solidarity with Madaya

Residents in Madaya have been reduced to eating 'grass soup' and cats as food aid is unable to reach the town

Emaciated Syrians besieged by President Assad's forces have made desperate pleas for food and water as more than 40,000 people face starvation.

The war in Syria has killed an estimated quarter of a million people in nearly five years, ravaging the country and creating a breeding ground for radical Islamists as regional allies and global players back different sides in the conflict.

The United Nations hopes to convene talks between Damascus and the Syrian opposition on Jan. 25, and the blockade of Madaya, near the border with Lebanon, has become a focal issue for Assad's opponents.

'The decision of the Syrian regime to allow humanitarian access in Madaya is a first step in the right direction,' Federica Mogherini, the EU's foreign policy chief, and the bloc's Commissioner for Humanitarian aid and Crisis Management, Christos Stylianides, said in a joint statement on Friday.

'The European Union welcomes it and expects it will be fully implemented and extended by all parties to all the cities under siege.'

A new Syrian opposition group created to oversee peace negotiations has also demanded that Damascus halt the bombardment of civilian areas and use of barrel bombs, and urged it to release detainees before the talks, calls echoed by Mogherini and Stylianides.

'It will be important to implement concrete confidence building measures in support of the upcoming intra-Syrian political talks scheduled to start at the end of January: an end to attacks on civilians, to aerial bombardments and sieges of civilian areas,' they said in the EU statement.

Blockades have become common in the war, with government troops holding rebel-held areas near Damascus under siege for several years and, more recently, rebel groups blockading some territory loyal to Assad, who has the military backing of Iran and Russia.

According to Doctors Without Borders, at least 23 people have starved to death in MSF-supported centres in Madaya since December 1

Starving Syrians trapped in the besieged towns of Madaya, Kfarya and Foua are being forced to eat cats and dogs and have surgery without anesthetic after vital supplies were cut off, activists have warned

An air strike on a prison run by al Qaida's affiliate in Syria Jabhat al-Nusra has killed at least 39 people, according to activists

Warplanes fired four missiles that hit an Islamic court that includes a jail as well as a nearby road linking the court with a market

It comes as an air strike on a prison run by al Qaida's affiliate in Syria Jabhat al-Nusra has killed at least 39 people, according to activists.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 39 people were killed, including many fighters from the Nusra Front as well as detainees, in the north-western town of Maaret al-Numan.

The Observatory said warplanes fired four missiles that hit an Islamic court that includes a jail as well as a nearby road linking the court with a market.

The Local Co-ordination Committees, another activist group, said the air strike killed 51.

The war in Syria has killed an estimated quarter of a million people in nearly five years

Residents look for survivors in a site hit by what activists said were airstrikes carried out by the Russian air force in the rebel-controlled area of Maaret al-Numan town in Idlib province

An injured man is rescued after airstrikes hit a building in what activists said were carried out by the Russian air force in the rebel-controlled area of Maaret al-Numan town in Idlib province
The mother of a fugitive teen who invoked 'affluenza' as a defense in a 2013 fatal drunken-driving accident took $30,000 from a bank account and cut ties with the boy's father before fleeing to Mexico, law enforcement officials say.

Tonya Couch and her son Ethan Couch were arrested in Mexico last month after he missed a meeting with his probation officer.

The bank withdrawal, and December 3 phone call telling her husband and Ethan Couch's father he'd never see them again, were documented in Tonya Couch's arrest warrant released on Friday.

She is being held in Tarrant County on $1million bond on a charge of hindering apprehension of a felon.

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Tonya Couch (above) appears in court in Fort Worth, Texas, Friday on a charge of hindering the apprehension of a felon

Her bond has been set at $1million, but her attorney has filed a motion to have it reduced to $15,000. In the motion filed, Couch's attorney argues that 'the amount of bail set is unreasonable'

As she appeared before Judge Salvant in a bright yellow jumpsuit and glasses stuck in her curly hair, she told Salvant (above) that her belongings and passport were taken by authorities in Los Angeles

Ethan Couch remains in custody in Mexico after winning a delay on his deportation back to Texas, where he could face jail time.

In her initial court appearance in Texas on Friday, Tonya Couch complained about her first night in jail.

Tarrant County Judge Wayne Salvant advised Tonya Couch of the charge of hindering the apprehension of a felon at the hearing Friday.

Her bond was set at $1million, but her attorney has filed a motion to have it reduced to $15,000.

In the motion filed, Couch's attorney argues that 'the amount of bail set is unreasonable'.

The judge said he would not rule on that motion until a previously scheduled hearing Monday.

If Couch is released on bond, whether it's the current amount or a lower sum of money, Salvant told her that she will have to follow several conditions, including wearing an ankle monitor and turning in her passport, The Dallas Morning News reported.

As she appeared before Judge Salvant in a bright yellow jumpsuit and glasses stuck in her curly hair, she told Salvant that her belongings and passport were taken by authorities in Los Angeles.

Tarrant County Sheriff Dee Anderson, who was in the courtroom Friday with several sheriff's deputies, said that Couch complained about her stay in the jail, according to The Dallas Morning News.

Arrival: Tonya Couch, center right, is escorted off a flight after her arrival to the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport in Grapevine, Texas Thursday

Couch, mother of Ethan Couch, a fugitive teenager known for using an 'affluenza' defense in a deadly drunken-driving case, waived extradition and was sent to Texas from California to face a charge of hindering the apprehension of a felon

Anderson said that she didn't sleep much.

'I explained to her that this was a jail, not a resort,' Anderson told reporters.

Couch, was returned to Texas on Thursday from California to face the charge.

Airport police officers escorted Tonya Couch, who was sporting a navy blue colored jacket and black pants, off of a flight after it landed at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.

The mother was then escorted by police officers and shackled at the ankles to be taken to jail in Tarrant County.

Last week she was deported from Mexico, shortly after she and her 18-year-old son, Ethan Couch, were taken into custody in the resort city of Puerto Vallarta.

A judge ordered her returned to Texas during a hearing Tuesday in Los Angeles.

Ethan Couch is currently being held at an immigration detention center in Mexico City after winning a court reprieve that could lead to a weeks- or even months-long legal process in Mexico.

Authorities believe the pair fled Texas in November as prosecutors investigated whether Ethan Couch had violated his probation in the deadly 2013 drunken-driving wreck.

They disappeared shortly after a video surfaced on Twitter showing what appears to be Ethan Couch at a party where people were drinking and playing beer pong.

While in Mexico, the spoiled rotten 'affluenza' teen spent more than $2,000 on hookers and booze at a Mexican club, but when his money ran out, he offered up a Rolex watch as collateral.

Prior to being caught by authorities, Couch and his mother Tonya went to a strip club in Puerto Vallarta called Harem on the evening of December 23, where employees said he partied the night away.

Tonya Couch (right) is escorted by a sheriff's deputy as she arrives at the Tarrant County Jail in Fort Worth Thursday

Ethan Couch is currently sitting in a jail fighting efforts to extradite him to Texas. Above he is pictured after he was taken into custody in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

According to ABC News, Couch, who was extremely drunk after having several drinks, was 6,000 pesos short on his bill, which is roughly $345.

A waiter at the club had to escort Couch back to his hotel when he could not pay the bill in the early morning of December 24.

He nor his mother had any cash to pay the remainder of the bill so he gave the waiter his Rolex watch as a guarantee that he would repay his $345 debt the next day, ABC News reported.

However, the club was closed December 24 and December 25. Employees at the club told ABC News that the pair was never seen again.

The mother-son duo moved into a condo in Puerto Vallarta without notifying staff at the hotel they were leaving.

Mexican law enforcement finally nabbed them December 28 after they fled into the country from their hometown of Fort Worth, Texas December 19 with their dog.

Tonya Couch's attorneys previously released a statement saying she had done nothing illegal.

'While the public may not like what she did, may not agree with what she did, or may have strong feelings against what she did, make no mistake - Tonya did not violate any law of the State of Texas and she is eager to have her day in court,' lawyers Stephanie K. Patten and Steve Gordon said in a statement last week.

If convicted, the mother faces up to teb years in prison.

After the deadly crash, Ethan Couch pleaded guilty in juvenile court to four counts of intoxication manslaughter and two counts of intoxication assault causing serious bodily injury and was sentenced to ten years' probation.

He received only probation after a defense expert argued that Couch had been coddled too much by his wealthy parents, a condition the expert called 'affluenza.'

The condition is not recognized as a medical diagnosis by the American Psychiatric Association, and its invocation drew widespread ridicule.
A Swiss missionary has been kidnapped from her home in Timbuktu in northern Mali, just four years after she was abducted by ISIS militants from the same house.

Beatrice Stockly, who is in her 40s, was kidnapped on Friday by suspected jihadists who scaled the walls of her home to carry out the attack, according to authorities.

The armed men arrived in four cars, according to a local resident, and footprints in the sand show the route they took into Ms Stockly's home.

'One vehicle parked in front of the house and armed men got out and abducted the woman, while the other three cars secured the area from a distance,' said the source.

Swiss missionary Beatrice Stockly arrives by helicopter from Timbuktu, Mali, after being handed over by a militant Islamic group Ansar Dine, in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, in 2012. Ms Stockly has been abducted for the second time in four years from her home in Timbuktu

There has been no immediate claim of responsibility, but al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is active in desert areas north of the city and has a history of seizing foreigners and demanding ransoms.

'People were sleeping but neighbors heard the noise  the woman screamed a lot,' said Bilal Mahamane Traore, a town councilor in Timbuktu. 'Not a single neighbor, though, called security forces.'

Army spokesman Souleymane Maiga added: 'I confirm that a European woman was kidnapped in Timbuktu at 3.30am. A neighbour alerted the security forces around 6am.'

The abduction is the first in the area since the kidnap and murder of two French journalists in late November 2013, in Kidal.

People were sleeping but neighbors heard the noise  the woman screamed a lot. Bilal Mahamane Traore, a town councilor in Timbuktu

'There is no doubt that the perpetrators are jihadists,' said a Malian security source, adding that searches had begun and two people had been arrested in Timbuktu.

In Bern, the Swiss foreign ministry said it was 'aware of the apparent kidnapping of a Swiss woman in Mali' and was in contact with her relatives and the local authorities.

The ministry said its crisis management centre had 'formed a task force immediately after the kidnapping incident was announced,' and that it was 'committed to achieving the release of the Swiss citizen in good health'.

Ms Stockly was first kidnapped in April 2012, but returned to her work as a missionary after being released just days later.

She returned to live in Timbuktu the following year after the town was freed in a French-led military effort.

Beatrice Stockly (centre) on board a helicopter on her way to Ouagadougou airport on April 24, 2012, after being adbucted for the first time by an extremist Islamic group. She returned to her home in Timbuktu a year after the kidnapping

The ancient Malian city of Timbuktu was once a popular tourist destination before a series of attacks by Al Qaeda-linked gunmen in 2012. Entire swathes of the north remain beyond the reach of both the Malian army and foreign troops

The missionary was said at the time of her first abduction to be the last Westerner living in the desert city, which she refused to leave when it fell to Islamist Ansar Dine rebels on April 1 that year.

Two weeks later, special forces from Burkina Faso swept into rebel-held northern Mali aboard a helicopter and whisked her to safety in a pre-arranged handover by Islamist rebels.

Stockly at the time appeared tired but in high spirits on the helicopter flying her to the Burkina capital Ouagadougou after Ansar Dine handed her over in Timbuktu.

'I am offering you freedom chocolates,' she told the officials, security personnel and an AFP journalist on the helicopter, after fumbling through her leather satchel and, with a beaming smile, producing chocolate.

Ansar Dine's 2012 assault on Timbuktu had been backed by fighters from Al-Qaeda's north Africa branch, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).

At the time a loose alliance of Tuareg and Islamist rebels took advantage of the political chaos in Mali's capital that followed a March 22 army coup by capturing the country's vast desert north, including Timbuktu.

The Swiss foreign ministry stressed on Friday that it had warned against travel to Mali since December 2009 'due to the high risk of kidnapping'. Pictured, an extremist fighter in Mali

Stockly's capture that year brought the number of hostages seized in the Sahel region to 24, 20 of them held by AQIM and another Islamist group, the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO).

Almost all were subsequently released, but three foreign hostages seized, a South African, a Swede and a Romanian remain in captivity.

The Swiss foreign ministry stressed on Friday that it had warned against travel to Mali since December 2009 'due to the high risk of kidnapping'.

The jihadist fighters were chased from Mali's vast remote north in 2013 by a French-led military intervention.

A regional French counterterrorism force is still conducting operations in the area.

But entire swathes of the north remain beyond the reach of both the Malian army and foreign troops.

Extremist groups have intensified their insurgency in recent months with a series of attacks and roadside bombings.

Two militants attacked a luxury hotel in the capital Bamako on November 20, killing 20 people, many of whom were foreigners.

Three Islamist militant groups including AQIM claimed responsibility for the hotel attack, which showed the militants extending their reach beyond the north.
Hunter S. Thompson was portrayed as a gun-loving, drug-inhaling outlaw journalist by Johnny Depp in 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas' - but nothing compares to the reality of Thompson's daily intake.

Listed in E. Jean Carroll in the first chapter of her 1994 book Hunter: The Strange and Savage Life of Hunter S. Thompson is the to-do list of cigarettes, alcohol, and drugs that Thompson consumed before gearing himself up to write at midnight, reports The Independent.

Hunter, who committed suicide at age 68, wouldn't awaken until 3pm, and then he would start his day Chivas Regal and a Dunhill cigarette.

From there it would descend into a blur of Chivas, Dunhills, coffee and cocaine.

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Hunter S. Thompson, circa 1976, was a gun fanatic - who ended up taking his life with one of his guns

Hunter's actual daily routine (above) was published in the 1994 biography Hunter: The Strange and Savage Life of Hunter S. Thompson

Hunter consumed innumerable cigarettes, several glasses of Chivas Regal, beer, Margaritas, marijuana, champagne, and much cocaine over the course of a day, according to a biographer

By 6pm, still having not eaten any food, the 'Gonzo' journalist would take the edge off with some marijuana.

At 7pm, he'd have his lunch - hamburgers, fries, tomatoes, taco salad, and coleslaw - but not without two Margaritas and two Heinekens.

Dessert would be a snow cone - over which he would pour three or four jiggers of Chivas.

By the time most of us would be headed to bed - or passed out cold - Thompson was just getting started.

At 10pm, he'd drop some acid. That was followed by a triple whammy of Chartreuse, cocaine, and marijuana.

By 11:30pm, he was ready for some more white powder.

Finally, at midnight, after a cornucopia of substances that would send most of us to the emergency room, if not the funeral home, Thompson would be ready to write.

Johnny Depp (above) played Thompson in 'Fear and Loathing' - and the two became friends in real life

Throughout the night, he would write while consuming more cocaine, Chartreuse, pot, Chivas, coffee, cigarettes, and gin. But it wasn't all unhealthy - he'd throw in a glass of orange juice.

By 6am, he was ready for a soak in the hot tub, which he would top off with champagne, Dove Bars, and Fettucine Alfredo.

At 8am, he'd pop some Halcion, a prescription drug for insomia - one that comes with a warning not to consume with alcohol or other drugs.

Amazingly, he would fall asleep within 20 minutes.

Even more amazingly, he would continue to wake up each morning - until February 20, 2005, when he took his own life with a gun.

Depp interviewed Thompson at the Viper Room, which he part owned, in Los Angeles

Thompson reached the peak of his literary career in the mid-Seventies after his books, Hell's Angels and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, were published to great success.

His writing broke from conventional reporting and straddled both fiction and non-fiction, a unique approach dubbed 'Gonzo journalism' which turned him into a counter-culture icon and won him legions of fans.

Fear and Loathing was adapted into a 1998 movie starring Johnny Depp as Hunter's surrogate writer persona, Raoul Duke.

His ashes were shot out of a cannon that Johnny Depp paid for. Friends including then-Senator John Kerry and actor Jack Nicholson attended the bizarre ceremony.
She may be only one week old but this mischievous baby rhino already knows how to run rings around her mother.

The as-yet-unnamed New Year arrival at Knowsley Safari Park on Merseyside is clearly in a huge hurry to discover everything about her new surroundings, and has been busy exploring the nursery pen under the watchful eye of her mother Meru, 21.

The not-so-little lady  she already weighs an impressive 7st  is the latest of the rare rhino species to be born at the safari park, which belongs to Knowsley Hall and its estate, owned by Lord and Lady Derby. 'It is almost as exciting as having one of my own,' says Lady Derby.

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Catch Me If You Can: She may belong to an endangered species, but this young white rhino is so full of life she cannot resist scampering past her mother, Meru

Galloping around the nursery pen can be thirsty work when you're only one week old

'We will be inviting the public to help us to name her on social media. Rhinos are very maternal and it is really touching to see the way the mother cares for her newborn.'

John Moss, rhino-keeper at Knowsley, says: 'We're really enjoying monitoring her as she explores her new surroundings. She's already so mischievous as she runs around her mum, copying her mannerisms.'

His colleague Jason Doherty, rhino team leader at Knowsley, says: 'We have a 100-acre space here for our rhinos to grow. That helps us keep up such a consistent breeding programme, which ranks us as one of Europe's top white rhino breeding groups.'

The new arrival is the 19th calf to be born at the safari park.

Thank goodness mum is there to provide some welcome sustenance at Knowsley Safari Park

Phew, I'm bushed: After all that running around, there's nothing like a siesta...and while the baby rhino gets set for 40 winks, Meru keeps a watchful eye

Tragically, white rhinos are one of the world's most hunted animals  there are only an estimated 20,000 left in the wild. In 2014, more than 1,200 were killed by poachers for their horns, which are used in traditional Chinese medicine, and which are more valuable on the black market than diamonds.

Knowsley Safari Park helps to fund the work of the Lowveld Rhino Trust in Zimbabwe, with 30,000 raised so far in direct sponsorship from the Derby family, visitor donations and fundraising activities.
A British tourist has been found dead in a swimming pool on the same island where two backpackers from the UK were stabbed to death.

Luke Miller, 27, from Newport, Isle of Wight, was reportedly found floating in the pool on the Thai island of Koh Tao.

It is the same island where David Miller and Hannah Witheridge were killed by two Burmese men in 2014.

Luke Miller (right), 27, from Newport, Isle of Wight, was reportedly found floating in the pool on the Thai island of Koh Tao

The circumustances around Luke Miller's (left) death remain unclear, as investigations began yesterday when his body was found

The circumustances around Luke Miller's death remain unclear, as investigations began yesterday when his body was found.

His death comes just days after he told friends and family on Facebook that he was 'living the dream' in Asia.

He wrote: 'Can honestly say this new year I am living the dream of to the full moon party on a speed boat drink cocktails strawberry daiquiris living life to the full yolo so let's do this.'

Mr Miller flew to Thailand with a friend from the Isle of Wight on December 22 for a five-week holiday, according to The Telegraph.

Today tributes flooded in for him on his Facebook page.

Joanne Doe wrote: 'To think we were enjoying your photos seeing you live the holiday of a lifetime. This is such a shock. Will never forget that mental Christmas party at ours!

'At least you were living life to the full. Thoughts are with your family right now and Erin Laird xxxx RIP Luke Miller.'

Brad Cotton said: 'R.I.P big brother Luke Miller, I love you forever and always you April Fool.'

He added: 'I would like to thank you all for all your support its been such a hard day for the whole family, my mum is so distraught and trying to support her is so hard but it's something I need to do, I might give Facebook a break for a few days just to focus on my family, Thankyou again.'

Luke Miller (left) from the Isle of Wight has tragically died while on holiday in Thailand

Luke Miller's death comes just days after he told friends and family on Facebook that he was 'living the dream' in Asia

A Foreign Office spokesman said: 'We are providing assistance to the family of a British national who has died in Koh Tao, Thailand. Local authorities are investigating the death and we will remain in contact with them.'

Zaw Lin and Win Zaw Tun were sentenced to death for the killing of British backpackers Miss Witheridge, 23, and David Miller, 24, whose battered bodies were found on a beach in 2014.

Miss Witheridge, a University of Essex student from Hemsby, Norfolk, and Mr Miller, of Jersey, who had just completed a civil and structural engineering degree at the University of Leeds, met on Koh Tao while staying at the same hotel.

A cleaner heading home in the early hours of the morning of September 15, 2014, came across their battered bodies on Sairee Beach.

Ms Witheridge had been savagely raped and beaten to death and Mr Miller had been beaten unconscious and left to drown in the incoming tide.

The incident happened on the same island where David Miller and Hannah Witheridge were killed by two Burmese men in 2014

Although Mr Miller's family called the verdict 'justice', the trial of the two Burmese migrant workers was plagued by accusations of human rights abuses.

The pair, apprehended soon after the pair's bodies were found, initially confessed to the crime only to retract their statements amid claims they were extracted by torture.

Meanwhile, police were criticised for not properly securing the crime scene and conducting more than 200 random DNA tests. They also released names and pictures of suspects who turned out to be innocent and mishandled crucial DNA evidence.

The case has cast a light on not only Thailand's deceptive image as destination of relaxation and safety, but also potential flaws in its judicial system, where the death sentence is regularly handed down for minor drug offences and corruption among authorities remains a concern.
Seemingly nonchalant, hands in his pockets, the ringleader of the Paris attacks strolls into a Metro station wearing garish orange trainers. It is 10.14 pm on the night that stunned the world.

Having slaughtered up to 20 people in cafes and bars with an automatic rifle just an hour earlier, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, 28, has abandoned his AK-47 and his rented black Seat car at Montreuil, an eastern suburb of the French capital

With police flooding the city, he might be expected to disappear into the night. But, chillingly, his murderous work is by no means over.

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Nonchalant: The mastermind behind the Paris massacres, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, 28, is pictured taking a train on the night of November 13, just an hour after he slaughtered up to 20 people in cafes and bars with an automatic rifle. But rather than flee the city, he returned to its centre to view his bloody work

Instead, from Montreuils Croix de Chavaux station and accompanied by an unidentified man, he takes Line 9 straight back to the city centre, the scene of his appalling crimes: first to revel in the aftermath, and then to orchestrate yet more carnage.

These remarkable pictures, the first to show Abaaoud on the night of the attacks that killed 130 people on November 13, are from surveillance film released yesterday, along with a more precise account of the monstrous sequence of events.

Evil: Abaaoud, who opened fire on cafes and bars in the Paris suburbs on November 13, then took a train back to the city centre to orchestrate the attack on the Bataclan theatre, where 90 people died

In another image, one of Abaaouds fellow Islamic State (IS) fanatics, Brahim Abdeslam, is shown inside the Comptoir Voltaire cafe at 9.41 pm, walking between seated customers, seconds before he activates his suicide belt.

Witnesses saw white smoke coming from his coat, followed by two flashes. He landed on a table where two young men were seated, a gaping hole in his back.

Feathers from Abdeslams anorak filled the room. Mercifully, while several customers were seriously injured, he killed only himself. His blood was later found to show traces of cannabis.

Meanwhile, with the journey from Croix de Chavaux to central Paris taking around 25 minutes, by 11pm Abaaoud was mingling with horrified witnesses to his carnage in the 10th arrondissement.

Perhaps doing so sharpened his sense of satisfaction as he surveyed his dreadful handiwork. Some recalled how clean-cut and relaxed he seemed; some remembered his orange trainers.

Abaaoud then drifted towards the Bataclan concert hall, where 150 people were still being held hostage. Crouching in a doorway, he directed the final murderous scenes unfolding inside by whispering instructions into his mobile phone. In all, 89 men and women died in the theatre.

Earlier phone records showed Abaaoud had similarly controlled Bilal Hadfi, one of the bombers who blew himself up at the Stade de France.

The Paris prosecutor, Francis Molins, said records showed Abaaouds phone was in the vicinity of the city centre attacks until 12.28am. Only then did he melt away. For four nights he slept in a thicket near the A86 autoroute.

Attack: In another image, one of Abaaouds fellow Islamic State (IS) fanatics, Brahim Abdeslam, is shown inside the Comptoir Voltaire cafe at 9.41 pm, walking between seated customers, seconds before he activates his suicide belt

The following day, Abaaoud, his female cousin Hasna Ait Boulahcen and other gunmen died in a police raid on an apartment in the northern Paris suburb of Saint Denis. Abaaoud was still wearing his orange trainers.

Investigators said Abaaoud and the others died when an unidentified accomplice detonated a suicide vest. The 5,000 rounds fired by police didnt touch them.

Fanatic: Feathers from Abdeslams anorak filled the cafe after he detonated his suicide vest, killing himself and injuring customers

It later emerged that Abaaoud had pictures of locations in Birmingham stored on his smartphone, raising the possibility that his cell was planning atrocities in Britain.

Other footage that emerged yesterday showed that Brahim Abdeslam, his brother Salah Abdeslam and another jihadi, Mohamed Abrini, travelled to Paris from Brussels in a Renault Clio in the early hours of November 13.

They headed first to Charleroi, an hour south of Brussels, where they are understood to have picked up weapons. At 4pm they headed to the French-Belgian border and at 5.40pm the trio stopped at a service station. Surveillance footage shows Abrini and the Abdeslam brothers get out of the Clio before walking around the station shop.

The car, rented by Salah Abdeslam, was found abandoned in the 18th arrondissement of Paris. Salah, who managed to escape police, is still on the run, the most wanted man in Europe.

Yesterday it emerged that Belgian police found three suicide belts, explosives and Salahs fingerprint at a Brussels flat that may have served as a bomb factory.

Prosecutors said Salah Abdeslam might have hidden in the flat after the November 13 attacks. They are working on the theory the explosive devices used in the massacre could have been made there.

The discovery was made on December 10 during a search of an apartment in the Schaerbeek area of the Belgian capital, but investigators would not say why they waited a month to announce it. The flat, on Rue Henri Berge, was rented by someone using a false name, possibly another suspect now in custody over the attacks, they said.

It emerged last week that the three teams dispatched by IS to attack Paris received instructions in real time via mobile phone from someone in Brussels.

Horror: A French policeman assists a blood-covered victim near the Bataclan theatre, where 90 people were killed on the night of the Paris attacks after ISIS gunmen opened fire on the crowd

Survivor: Rescue workers help a woman after the massacre at the Bataclan theatre, which Paris mastermind Abaaoud took a train back to the city centre from the suburbs to help orchestrate

STOPOVER FOR SUPPLIES EN ROUTE TO THE NIGHT OF CARNAGE IN PARIS On their way to Paris from Belgium, three of the jihadists  Salah Abdeslam, Brahim Abdeslam and Mohamed Abrini  were seen on CCTV cameras as they stopped off at a service station on the French-Brussels border. Salah, 26, the only terrorist to survive, remains on the run as Europes most wanted man. The three terrorists were heading for Paris in a car rented by Salah, who was taken out of the capital after the attacks by an accomplice. Three of the Paris jihadists - Salah Adbeslam, Brahim Abdeslam and Mohamed Abrini - were seen on CCTV stopping off at a service station on the French-Brussels border The three terrorists were heading for Paris in a car rented by Salah, who was taken out of the capital after the attacks by an accomplice Salah (left), 26, the only terrorist to survive, remains on the run as Europes most wanted man. Belgian authorities have issued an international arrest warrant for Mohamed Abrini (right) Advertisement

The Brussels choreographer has not been identified. An estimated 250 jihadists have returned from Syria and are on the loose in France.

A state of emergency remains in place across the country following the attacks, with police and soldiers flooding all major cities and towns.

Yesterday, President Francois Hollande led tributes to Clarissa Jean-Philippe, a policewoman shot dead by a terrorist the day after the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January 2015.
Slager was caught on camera shooting Scott eight times as he ran away from a traffic stop April 2015

The fire broke out hours after protesters rallied at North Charleston City Hall

He has been placed on house arrest and begins trial on October 31

Said two people dressed in black were seen running away from the house

Police said an incendiary device in a glass cocktail bottle was found at scene

A small fire broke out at the former South Carolina home of the ex-cop recently released on bail after being charged with killing unarmed black motorist Walter Scott in April.

Authorities said the flames damaged vinyl siding and that an incendiary device in a glass cocktail bottle was found at the scene where Michael Slager used to live.

Slager was released on a $500,000 surety bond and placed on house arrest on Monday.

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Freed, for now: Michael Slager (left, in court on Monday) was released from prison on Monday on a $500,000 bond. Slager has been charged with shooting at Walter Scott (right) eight times during a traffic stop as he was running away

On April 4 a cell phone video recorded by a bystander captured Slager, 34 firing eight times at Scott, 50, as he ran away from a traffic stop. He was indicted on a murder charge in June.

A neighbor reportedly put out the fire at the Hanahan address around 9.20pm, according to The Post and Courier.

Police said two people dressed in black were seen running away from the house.

No injuries were reported and an arson investigation is underway.

Authorities said neither Slager nor any of his family members are still living at the house, according to WCSC.

The house is reportedly vacant.

Flames broke at the home hours after protesters held a rally at North Charleston City Hall to protest Slager's release from jail earlier this week.

Two dozen people gathered outside the Charleston County jail on Tuesday, a day after Slager was allowed to return home.

The group shouted, 'We want Slager back in jail!' and one woman yelled, 'There is a murderer on the loose!'

Consequences: Slager faces the possibility of 30 years to life in prison without parole if convicted of murder. Pictured above in court on Monday

A bystander recorded the shooting in dramatic cellphone video that sent shockwaves across America

Slager will remain under house arrest until his trial is set to begin next Halloween.

Judge Clifton Newman refused to set bond in September, saying Slager's release would 'constitute an unreasonable danger to the community.'

But on Monday Newman said he was troubled by the delay in Slager's trial and decided to grant him bail.

He added that Slager would only be able to leave his home for court hearings, as well as to see his lawyers and doctors and attend church. He also must not contact the victim's family.

A statement from the National Action Network founded by Al Sharpton was read at a news conference. It says the decision to release Slager will reflect negatively on South Carolina.

James Johnson, the South Carolina president for the civil rights group, on Saturday asked that the public not automatically assume that blame for the fire fell on the protesters.

Johnson said Slager had 'a lot of enemies'.

'It doesn't have to be the protesters out there doing something to his home,' he told The Post and Courier.

Slager faces 30 years to life without parole if convicted of murder.

Slager's attorneys had requested a speedy trial that would begin in March or April, but prosecutor Scarlett Wilson said the state wanted to begin in November.

Wilson is also prosecuting Dylann Roof, the white suspect in the killings of nine black parishioners at the Emanuel AME church last year, in a July trial.

She said the state Supreme Court order protects her from trying other cases before that one.

After the cell phone video was released, Slager told investigators that Scott tried to grab his gun and Taser after he pulled him over during a traffic stop.

Walter Scott, Sr. and Judy Scott, parents of Walter Scott, look on during a bond hearing for former police officer Michael Slager in September. Some of Scott's family members were present when it was announced they'd be awarded $6.5 million on Thursday

But Wilson told the court that Scott was running away from the officer and that the only time Slager picked up the Taser and dropped it by Scott's body after shooting him dead.

Slager's wife and parents broke down in tears in the courtroom after Newman announced his decision to let the former cop go home, according to The Post and Courier.

Walter Scott, the father of the slain man, also addressed the judge, saying he often goes to the cemetery to visit his son's flower-bedecked grave.

'If we let him out, he's going to go home to see his wife and children. All I can look at is a pot of flowers,' Scott said.

'I hope you allow me reasonable bond to work on my case,' Slager told the judge who said 'these are excruciating issues for the court to deal with.'

Justin Bamberg, the attorney for Scott's family, said they were disappointed by the ruling but respected it.

He also urged the community to remain 'as peaceful as we have been'.

'Know that at the end of the day, the justice system is going to run its course,' he said.

In October a $6.5m settlement was reached with Scott's family after it was approved by the North Charleston City Council in a 10-0 vote.

Walter Scott's brother Anthony said the family plans to donate some of the money from the settlement to disaster relief for victims of the recent floods in South Carolina.

The mayor said that since the shooting, North Charleston police have been outfitted with body cameras. Slager was not wearing one.
More than 100 senior Church of England liberals will today increase pressure on the Archbishop of Canterbury to support reforms aimed at stopping the 'vilification' of gay Christians.

In a strongly worded open letter to Justin Welby, the signatories  who range from bishops and cathedral deans to MPs  call on the Church to 'repent' for treating gay people like 'second-class citizens'.

The letter will heighten tensions at a week-long meeting of the world's Anglican leaders which begins in Canterbury tomorrow, at which the Archbishop hopes to avert a permanent split between warring factions in the Church.

In a strongly worded open letter to Justin Welby, the signatories  who range from bishops and cathedral deans to MPs  call on the Church to 'repent' for treating gay people like 'second-class citizens

The Mail on Sunday revealed last week that conservative leaders from Africa and Asia are threatening to walk out unless liberal British and American clerics abandon their support for gay marriage and openly gay bishops  or are disciplined.

In a fierce attack on the conservatives, the letter says the Church should acknowledge it had treated gay people as 'a problem to be solved rather than as brothers and sisters in Christ to be embraced and celebrated', making them 'feel like second-class citizens in the Kingdom of God'.

It urges the Anglican leaders to repent for the suffering they had caused by 'accepting and promoting discrimination', and says they should be 'prophetic' in their actions and 'Christ-like in your love towards our LGBTI [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex] brothers and sisters who have been ignored and even vilified for too long'.

The 105 signatories of the letter include 20 cathedral deans  nearly half the country's total  such as the Dean of St Paul's Cathedral, David Ison, and the gay Dean of St Albans, Jeffrey John.

Others to add their name to the letter are eight retired bishops, including the former Bishop of Oxford Lord Harries, and one serving bishop, the suffragan Bishop of Buckingham Alan Wilson.

Though no senior diocesan bishops publicly backed the letter, other high-profile signatories include seven archdeacons, academics such as the Master of Trinity Hall College at Cambridge University, and former Tory MP Sir Tony Baldry.

More than 100 senior Church of England liberals will today increase pressure on the Archbishop of Canterbury to support reforms aimed at stopping the 'vilification' of gay Christians

Dean Ison said: 'I believe that it's imperative for us to remember that while we seek to engage honestly, lovingly and respectfully with our differences of context and scriptural interpretation, our discussions are actually about the lives of sisters and brothers who have often been rejected and victimised on the grounds of their sexuality.

'The Church should be the first place that they feel they can come to, to find love and acceptance rather than judgment.'

The Church has been bitterly divided over the issue of homosexuality since the American branch of Anglicanism ignored official policy in 2003 by consecrating Gene Robinson, an openly gay bishop.

It further inflamed passions last year by approving gay marriages in church.

The letter comes after one leading conservative, Uganda's Archbishop, Stanley Ntagali, said he would withdraw from the meeting unless 'godly order' was restored, which would almost certainly require the expulsion of the liberal Americans.

There has also been mounting concern over rumours that Archbishop Welby will attempt to maintain a 'communications blackout' at the meeting by asking the leaders to hand in all mobile phones and laptops before it begins.

Conservatives may avoid attending evensong with their fellow leaders in Canterbury Cathedral tomorrow night if they feel their demands are not being met.

A spokesman for the Church of England said: 'The Archbishops will have an opportunity to discuss the letter when they meet.'

To see full letter and all signatories, click here.
Within the next year (or two) London commuters will be able to travel to work in more comfort and from a greater distance as the electrification of the rail line extends west into South Wales.

Journey times will be shortened by about 20 minutes, making the commute from Bristol, for example, around 80 minutes rather than 100.

And the new service will be on longer trains, with 20 per cent more seats and legroom.

Homeowners will benefit, too. Prices in London are sky-high, with the average home costing a staggering 531,000, and commuting from further west - even taking into account the cost of the rail season ticket - could be a more affordable alternative.

All aboard: The property market in Bristol is already benefiting from the new rail line and reduced journey time to London

Bath

Annual season ticket: 7,567

New journey: About 60 minutes

The exodus west has been under way for some time in Bath, which explains why its property prices have appreciated by 42 per cent in the past decade, according to estate agents Knight Frank, compared to 30 per cent in the rest of England and Wales.

About half of our buyers come from London, says Luke Brady, of Savills, Bath. They are attracted to period properties, within walking distance of the station.

The ambience and the architecture draw incomers to the city centre. For those seeking bucolic charm, the nearby villages of Biddestone, Kington St Michael and Lacock fit the bill.

However, if you want more house for your money, try nearby Chippenham where the average price for a semi-detached was 205,072 last year and detached homes sold for 341,969.

Bristol

Annual season ticket: 7,736

New journey: 80 minutes

Bristol has one of todays hottest property markets outside London, with prices up 46 per cent in the past decade, according to Knight Frank. There is no disguising what is fuelling this appreciation.

Everybody is talking about the new train service, says James Toogood, of Knight Frank. Buyers from the south-east get better homes for their money. Popular districts such as Clifton and Redland are selling well, so too are villages such as Abbots Leigh, Backwell and the Magmas.

According to Rightmove, the majority of sales last year were terraced properties with an average price of 236,950. Flats sold for 193,459 on average. For a good value family home in an up-and-coming area, Toogood recommends Totterdown where a three-bedroom, period terraced house costs about 320,000.

In pretty Chew Valley on the outskirts of Bristol, this detached five-bedroom house has the potential to be extended. There is a large garden and sauna. 750,000 (Knight Frank: knightfrank.co.uk, 0117 9114921)

Newport

Annual season ticket: 11,124

New journey: About 2 hours

Some people will question the wisdom of re-locating to Newport, given its less than glowing reputation. A few years ago a poll by the Office for National Statistics found Newports residents were some of the most dissatisfied in Wales.

To these doubters, the only answer is  do the maths. Last year the average semi-detached sold for a mere 154,201 and you could buy a detached home for 240,798.

For the 531,000 cost of an average London property you can pick up a four-bedroom cottage, with more than an acre of land. Newport is undergoing a dramatic facelift. Friars Walk, the centre of a 90 million regeneration project including a department store, 30 shops, restaurants, cinema and new bus station, opened recently. Newport locals will soon be far cheerier.

This three-bedroom property is the only detached house on Ryder Street - a rare gem in the sought-after Pontcanna district, close to the city centre. The master bedroom comes with a spacious bathroom and a dressing room. 475,000 (Savills: savills.com, 02920 368 930).

Cardiff

Annual season ticket: 12,228

New journey: 1 hour 45 minutes

With commuting times to Cardiff at about 1 hour and 45 minutes, even after electrification of the rails, the Welsh capital will be out of range for most daily commuters

However, the extra trains  12 services every two hours  will make for a more comfortable journey, something which will tempt second-home buyers and those who travel to London infrequently.

Lifestyle buyers love outlying areas around Abergavenny and the Usk Valley, says Samantha James, at Savills. Then theres the Vale of Glamorgan, also just outside Cardiff, which has a lovely coast.
Creating artificial gravitational fields that humans can manipulate and observe may seem like an idea from science fiction, but one researcher is now looking to turn the concept into a reality.

Andre Fuzfa from the University of Namur has proposed a method that would allow humans to control gravity, and says its achievable with current technologies.

In the mathematically supported proposal, Fuzfa describes the device which would take on this task, and be used to observe how magnetic fields bend space-time.

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Andre Fuzfa from the University of Namur has proposed a method to produce and detect gravitational fields, and says its achievable with current technologies.

TESTING EINSTEIN'S THEORY Fuzfa describes the experiments, which he assures do not tap into the principles of new physics. In the first setup, large, stacked superconducting coils are used to generate an artificial gravitational field. The second experiment detects the field through highly sensitive interferometers, which contain light-storing cavities in the arms. The experiments so far have shown, weakly, that artificial fields generated by electric currents can be detected through a change in space-time geometry. The scientist writes that the effect is a result of the equivalence principle. The experiment would require major resources, but if successful, it would give humans the power to control the last of four fundamental forces, not within our grips. Advertisement

The paper, How Current Loops and Solenoids Curve Space-time, expresses the scientists frustration at the passive studies of gravitational fields.

To push past the current limitations, Fuzfa says research must employ a device that uses superconducting electromagnets, like the technologies at CERN or the ITER reactor.

We finally propose an experimental setup, achievable with current technology of superconducting coils, that produces a phase shift of light of the same order of magnitude than astrophysical signals in ground-based gravitational wave observatories, the paper says.

Fuzfa describes the experiments, which he assures do not tap into the principles of new physics.

In the first setup, large, stacked superconducting coils are used to generate an artificial gravitational field.

The second experiment detects the field through highly sensitive interferometers, which contain light-storing cavities in the arms.

The experiments so far have shown, weakly, that artificial fields generated by electric currents can be detected through a change in space-time geometry.

The scientist writes that the effect is a result of the equivalence principle.

The equivalence principle, at the very heart of Einsteins general relativity, states that all types of energy produce and undergo gravitation in the same way, Fuzfa writes.

The most widespread source of gravitation is the inertial mass, which produces permanent gravitational fields.

At the opposite, electromagnetic fields could be used to generate artificial, or human-made, gravitational fields, that could be switched on or off at will, depending whether their electromagnetic progenitors are present or not.

The experiment would require major resources, but if successful, it would give humans the power to control the last of four fundamental forces, not within our grips.

The research claims electromagnetic fields could be used to generate artificial, or human-made, gravitational fields, that could be switched on or off at will, depending whether their electromagnetic progenitors are present or not.

Current research, the scientist argues, observes and aims to understand gravitational fields, but makes no attempts to change them.

Somehow, studying gravity is a contemplative activity: physicists restrict themselves to the study of natural, pre-existing, sources of gravitation, the paper says.

Generating artificial gravitational fields, that could be switched on or off at will, is a question captured or left to science-fiction.
Rating:

The Nadler Victoria is brand new. It opened on January 1 and is the latest edition from a group that aspires to turn budget accommodation on its head.

Robert Nadlers first offering was Base2Stay in Earls Court, now under the Nadler name.

Theres a concept: no restaurant, no bar, no gym or spa. Just a comfortable design-led room with its own mini-kitchen featuring a microwave, Nespresso machine, Brita water filter and fridge. Lead-in price is 120.

Impressive: Rooms feature taupe walls, slinky lighting, a proper desk and a large walk-in shower

This one is round the corner from Buckingham Palace in the old Girl Guides building (Nadler says Victoria is the new Knightsbridge, obviously). There are 73 rooms.

Its like arriving at a smart office building, albeit one where the two members of staff on reception are boundlessly warm and friendly. Im even shown to my room  and have been upgraded two categories because so few people have checked in.

Taupe walls, slinky lighting, proper desk, large walk-in shower, pocket-sprung bed. Everything pristine. All information is on the TV, which is annoying  such as that the ironing board is stored under the bed.

Five-star service at four-star prices is another of Nadlers mantras. I wouldnt argue with that.

Prime location: The Nadler Victoria is located near Buckingham Palace, in an former Girl Guides building

What I do wonder is whether visitors to London actually fancy the idea of using a microwave. Wouldnt they prefer some human contact at breakfast?

Theres a great Italian coffee shop round the corner, says the receptionist. And hes right.

One feature that certainly works is the rolling Pathe News screen in the lobby, showing royal events going back decades. And the hotel is opposite the new St James Theatre. So youre hardly going to feel isolated.

Theres stiff competition in the budget market in London but the Nadlers are right up there in the lead pack.
Im not sure how I found myself in the Arctic Circle, clinging on for dear life in a small, fast, inflatable boat.

I knew a holiday in Norway was never going to be about sipping sangria in the sun, but as I bounced through the waves I doubted whether I would survive to tell the tale.

At least Id started off my four-day break a bit more gently, by flying to Trondheim, a sophisticated city with wooden waterfront restaurants and an atmospheric cathedral, then jumping aboard the Nordland Railway  the Arctic Express  to the town of Bodo.

Fast and furious: An inflatable makes its way through the Saltstraumen, a wild churning area of sea stretching for hundreds of yards

I sat back and watched the scenery turn wilder  farms became forests, hills became mountains and rivers were replaced by fjords.

I clambered off the train wrapped up in my warmest hiking gear, expecting it to be freezing. Instead, I found a fine, modern town basking in sunshine.

During my stay I walked up to the top of Keiservarden for what locals insist is the best view in the world, and decided to take a gentle cruise.

But this being Norway, that somehow turned into a trip on a high-powered inflatable in the Saltstraumen, a wild churning area of sea stretching for hundreds of yards.

Its caused by the worlds strongest tide which funnels down a narrowing fjord between two islands near Bodo.

Hold on tight: Simon poses for a photo prior to his ride on the inflatable which sent him bouncing around

There are whirlpools up to 20ft deep and 30ft across. I have to be careful, said our captain. Some of them are big enough for the boat to fall in.

After about 30 minutes splashing through waves, we arrived at the Saltstraumen, just as the maelstrom reached fever pitch  the point of high tide.

Three million litres of water a second squeeze through the channel. Not surprisingly our little boat bounced around in a great natural white-knuckle ride.

After such an exhilarating adventure, I thanked the stony-faced Norwegian and asked his name but I could have guessed it. The man who had just tackled the worlds strongest tide was, of course, called Cnut.
She left her adopted home in the US to return to Australia for the holidays.

And it seems as though Tammin Sursok's time Down Under had left her feeling nostalgic.

The 32-year-old Pretty Little Liars star was reflecting on her childhood on Friday when she shared a faded snap of herself as a giddy four-year-old to Instagram.

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Brave girl: Tammin Sursok shared a faded snap of herself at four years old, gleefully posed with a circus clown standing behind her

The actress is seen gleefully posing with a circus clown in the sweet flashback.

She is dressed like a doll with a bow in her hair and excitedly looks up at the camera while the clown standing behind her moves her arms up and down like a puppet.

'Me at 4. I was never afraid of anything', she wrote in the accompanying caption.

Back at home: Tammin returned to Australia with her husband Sean McEwen and two-year-old daughter Phoenix to enjoy the summer

Expanding the brood? Tammin revealed that her husband Sean is desperate to expand their family

In late December Tammin returned to Australia with her husband Sean McEwen and their two-year-old daughter Phoenix to enjoy the summer.

The family could soon be expanding however, if her husband has anything to do with it.

Earlier this week Tammin appeared on Today where she revealed that Sean is desperate to expand their brood, saying: My husband keeps trying to have a baby with me everyday.'

'He would like five kids. Of course he could have five kids, because he didn't have to give birth to a ten pound baby!' she joked.

Oh baby! My husband keeps trying to have a baby with me everyday,' she told the Channel Nine's Today Show

The mother-of-one went on to detail that when Phoenix was born she weighed in at a whopping ten pounds (four and a half kilos) even though she was born three weeks prematurely.

Tammin and Sean were married in 2011, and after 11 years together, are still as loved up as ever.

The brunette beauty has previously hinted that she and Sean have considered relocating back to Australia in the hope of raising Phoenix Down Under.
He made their second anniversary a special one by getting down on bended knee and proposing.

So it's only natural that George Burgess and his new fiance Joanna King were still celebrating the following day.

The couple toasted their engagement and marked 24 months of dating on Friday when they spent a romantic afternoon together down at Sydney's iconic Bondi Beach.

Happy news: George Burgess and new fiancee Joanna King celebrtaed their engagement and two year anniversary on Friday with romantic Bondi beach date

In a photo posted to Instagram from the day, Joanna is glowing as she cuddles up to her betrothed.

Flashing a beaming smile, she raises her left hand to his chest, casually showing off her new diamond sparkler.

Meanwhile in a second snap the pair are seen sitting with a view of the water as they wait for the sun to go down.

George and Joanna's engagement came just days after his brother Sam tied the knot with writer Phoebe Hooke.

Beach date: The couple sat and watched the sunset with a view of the water over North Bondi

Cute: Joanna was dressed in a purple leopard print frock for the day

They announced the happy news via social media with George sharing a photo of the ring alongside the words: 'She said yes!'

Joanna, who is orginally from Adelaide, works as a model with contracts with brands like Speedo, Bras N Things and Megan Gale's Isola swimwear, under her belt.

Back in November last year, George shot down rumours of an impending engagement for the loved up couple.

'No definitely not,' he told Daily Mail Australia, adding: 'There's no pressure on me [to be next down the aisle after brother Sam], so no pressure on me at the minute, I think.'

Engaged! George proposed to his girlfriend of two years on Thursday announcing the news on social media

Cheers! Sam and Joanna happily rang in the New Year together with no sign of a ring then

But perhaps the genetically-blessed couple were swept up in the romance of Sam and Phoebe's wedding day.

They both posted shots together on social media during the big day, with Joanna captioning hers: 'A day of love'.

Meanwhile, George spoke sweetly of his beautiful date, captioning his picture of the pair: 'As well as an @armani suit to make me look good I had this beauty of a women to help me as well! Winning!!'

Held tightly in his arms, Joanna flashed her pearly white smile as she flaunted her fabulous figure in a low-cut satin gown.

Inspired? The couple attended brother Sam Burgess and Phoebe Hooke's nuptials just days before the New Year, where George was a groomsman

'Winning!': The loved-up couple posted images several images from the big day
Dame Maggie received her 13th  57 years after being a contender as most promising newcomer

More than half a century has passed since Dame Maggie Smith was first up for a Bafta film award. And the nominations keep coming.

Yesterday the veteran actress, 81, received her 13th  57 years after being a contender in the most promising newcomer category.

It is believed to be the longest span ever between a performer's first Bafta nomination and their most recent.

But while Dame Maggie could be celebrating when the awards are handed out on February 14, the team behind the latest James Bond movie won't be.

Spectre is the first 007 film since 2002's Die Another Day not to be nominated for a single Bafta.

Other snubs include Charlotte Rampling, 69, and Dame Helen Mirren, 70, who have both been overlooked despite critically acclaimed roles.

Dame Maggie is nominated for best actress for The Lady In The Van.

She has won the award four times before, most recently in 1989 for The Lonely Passion Of Judith Hearne.

Her first nomination, for most promising newcomer, came in 1959 for her role in Nowhere To Go as a disillusioned ex-debutante who aids a conman after he escapes from prison.

She lost out to Canadian actor Paul Massie.

Eddie Redmayne, 34, is up for best actor for his role as Lili Elbe in The Danish Girl, about the first male-to-female transsexual.
As if following her father Ray Winstone into acting didnt inspire rivalry enough, now Made In Dagenham actress Jaime Winstone is competing with him for the biggest bump.

Jaime, 30, who is expecting her first child with DJ boyfriend James Suckling next month, shared this snap online in which she and her heavily bearded father lift up their tops to expose a pair of bulging bellies.

Its a bump off, miss you already Papa, wrote Jaime, who stayed with the Sexy Beast star in Essex over Christmas.

As if following her father Ray Winstone into acting didnt inspire rivalry enough, now Made In Dagenham actress Jaime Winstone is competing with him for the biggest bump

Talking recently about the new addition to her family, she said: Dad cant wait to meet his grandchild.

Its a beautiful time for us as a family and its brought us even closer than we already were.

But while Jaime has good reason for an expanding waistline, what is Rays excuse?

It's feathers and furs for Golden Globes girls

The cold snap sweeping the UK has everyone wrapping up warm this week. Over in LA theyre also bringing out the furs.

Dame Helen Mirren, 70, attended a Golden Globes party at the Chateau Marmont with a thick grey faux-fur scarf snuggled around her neck. The British star is nominated for best supporting actress for her role in Trumbo.

Saoirse Ronan, 21, who is also hopeful for a gong for her role in British film Brooklyn, sported white plumage atop her chic ivory outfit.

Dame Helen Mirren (left), 70, attended a Golden Globes party at the Chateau Marmont with a thick grey faux-fur scarf snuggled around her neck while Saoirse Ronan (right), 21, who is also hopeful for a gong for her role in British film Brooklyn, sported white plumage atop her chic ivory outfit

Meanwhile, Bradley Coopers publicity-prone ex Suki Waterhouse arrived with a crimson-hued, fur stole draped round her arms.

No nominations for professional red-carpet star Suki, 24, but her flimsy dress assured her some much sought- after attention.

A weekly email sent out by Culture Minister Ed Vaizeys staff on his departments comings and goings contains a curious boast. Regarding the New Year honours, it claims: Ed tweeted individual congratulations to around 70 recipients. Dont Ministers of State have better things to do with their time?

Oscar-winning director Tom Hooper has launched an attack on British actors, saying most of them are emotionally repressed unlike Eddie Redmayne, the hero of his latest film The Danish Girl.

Hooper  who has also worked with Dame Helen Mirren, Colin Firth, Ben Whishaw and Helena Bonham Carter among others  says: Most English actors are in some kind of dialogue with their own reserve or they are emotionally repressed, not like English directors I assure you, who have a very fluent contact with their emotions.

Oscar-winning director Tom Hooper has launched an attack on British actors, saying most of them are emotionally repressed unlike Eddie Redmayne (pictured), the hero of his latest film The Danish Girl

Dogs, not children, at Fifi Geldof's wedding

Not only is Bob Geldofs daughter Fifi giving her dog Lola the role of ring-bearer at her forthcoming wedding, but she is now granting special treatment to all her four-legged friends.

When the 32-year-old ties the knot with sand artist Andrew Robertson this year, she will ban all children except for her late sister Peachess tots, Phaedra and Astala, in favour of her canine guests, who she says are compulsory.

Id rather people didnt come than came with their children who I dont know, explains Fifi. Its just more mouths I dont know to feed. And wedding feeding costs serious cash. I dont need extra expenditure on tiny strangers!

Couldnt her father, who is worth 32 million, help foot the bill?

Sir Ian's in a flap over Bafta snub

Sir Ian McKellen has not taken well to yesterdays news that his film Mr Holmes, in which he plays the celebrated sleuth, was overlooked for a Bafta nomination while The Revenant, starring American heart-throb Leonardo DiCaprio, is up for eight awards next month.

Sir Ian McKellen vented his frustration about missing out on a Bafta nomination online and posted this photograph from the set of his film Mr Holmes

The 76-year-old thespian decided to vent his frustration online and posted this photograph from the set of his film, released last year, in which he is feeding chickens with one hand and holding a cigarette in the other.

Leo may have had to battle a CGI grizzly, grumbles McKellen, but on the set of Mr Holmes, as we filmed on a farm in East Sussex, we contended with real-live chickens, sheep, bugs and BEES!

What a stinging riposte!

YOU CAN QUOTE ME ON THAT...

Somebody told me I was a national treasure. I said: Darling  anybody who can teeter across the stage after the age of 70 is deemed a treasure, however vile they are.

Sheila Hancock

I gave my larky Turkish barber a New Year tip. He said: May you die in bed aged 99, shot by a jealous husband. 

Gyles Brandreth

Colin always wore white cotton trousers. It is my belief that he wore white to camouflage his dark nature.

Michael Jacques, author of a new book on Princess Margarets friend Colin Tennant, aka Lord Glenconner

At my age, the only worthwhile New Year resolution is to see in another one.

Sir Bernard Ingham, 83

You kidding? I loved it. With four little kids, I cant even remember what its like to get into my own bathroom alone.

Matt Damon on shooting solo scenes for The Martian
She's not shy of showing some skin to flaunt her enviable figure, regularly posting bikini-clad selfies on social media.

But the Californian winter had Nicky Whelan's petite body under wraps on Thursday, with the Australian actress bundling up in a thick felt coat and jeans to attend the opening of an atelier in Beverly Hills.

The 34-year-old treated fans to a glimpse of her cleavage, sporting a sheer black t-shirt and matching bra beneath her beige outerwear.

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All wrapped up: Nicky Whelan hid her figure beneath a huge beige coat but treated admirers to a glimpse of her cleavage in a sheer black top as she attended the opening of Mark Zunino's Atelier in Beverly Hills on Thursday

She paired her outfit with some black jeans, adding some suede grey boots to the winter ensemble.

The former Neighbours starlet showed off a healthy looking tan after recently spending the holidays in her native Australia, keeping her make-up to a minimum with just some mascara and lip-gloss.

Nicky added a pair of silver hoop earrings to complete her red carpet look.

The Australian actress was among guests at the opening of fashion designer Mark Zunino's Atelier, sharing snaps of the glamorous event on social media afterwards.

Glowing: Nick'y skin looked flawless with a make-up look that highlighted her natural beauty

Striking a pose: Nicky posed with former Real Housewife of Beverly Hills Carlton Gebbia (left) and the designer as they perused his work

In one image she cosied up to the designer and former Real Housewife of Beverly Hills Carlton Gebbia.

Captioning the shot, she wrote: 'Beautiful dresses such a dream for us ladies.'

Nicky recently returned to the US after spending Christmas in her native Australia.

Sharing photographs of her trip with fans, the beauty posed in a string of barely-there bikinis as she made the most of the balmy summer temperatures.

Nicky shot to fame as Heidi 'Pepper' Steiger in Neighbours and was a regular character for two year before jetting to the U.S. to pursue other acting roles.
The Jenner sisters are used to trying to one-up each other in the style department.

But on Friday, both Kendall and Kylie stepped out in very functional attire, albeit for very different purposes.

Kendall opted for sportswear for her outing in West Hollywood and Beverly Hills.

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Low-key: on Friday, both Kendall and Kylie stepped out in very functional attire, albeit for very different purposes

Chic vs casual: Kendall flashed her abs in trendy leggings and crop top while elsewhere in the city Kylie Jenner opted for comfortable workout gear

Hot or cold? Her raven locks were up in a tight, neat bun, and she draped a grey zip-up off her arms to help ward off the slight chill in the air

The newly minted 20-year-old supermodel flashed her amazing abs after a workout when she stopped in for lunch at a coffee house.

A simple black crop top ensured a clear view of her toned tummy, while some black yoga pants provided a look at her lengthy, slender legs.

Her raven locks were up in a tight, neat bun, and she draped a grey zip-up off her arms to help ward off the slight chill in the air.

See more of the latest pictures of Kendall and Kylie Jenner as they step out in sports gear

Meter maid: Black Nike trainers, a pair of purple-gradated aviator sunglasses and a small leather handbag finished off her active look

Black Nike trainers, a pair of purple-gradated aviator sunglasses and a small leather handbag finished off her active look.

Kylie, 18, was far more conservative in her choice of outfit for her lunch with friend Harry Hudson at ritzy Sugarfish Sushi.

The youngest Jenner opted for a grey t-shirt under a blue puffy coat that she kept unzipped.

She did add some slight sex appeal with some clingy grey sweatpants that hugged her famous curves.

Friendly lunch: Kylie, 18, was far more conservative in her choice of outfit for her lunch with friend Harry Hudson at ritzy Sugarfish Sushi

Cool caller: The youngest Jenner opted for a grey t-shirt under a blue puffy coat that she kept unzipped

Sunny? Kylie's own pair of aviator shades and a small brown backpack rounded out her casual ensemble

And it looked like Kanye found yet another fan for his model of Yeezy trainers as well.

Kylie's own pair of aviator shades and a small brown backpack rounded out her casual ensemble.

As she left the restaurant, the KUWTK star stayed on her phone, and soon whipped out a furry red keychain.

Of course she still managed to cause a small scene, as she motored out of the parking lot in the white Ferrari that Tyga gifted her for her 18th birthday.

Kylie and Tyga's relationship status is currently unknown, as allegations of him cheating on her with a Brazilian model only recently surfaced.

A bit of drama: Of course she still managed to cause a small scene, as she motored out of the parking lot in the white Ferrari that Tyga gifted her for her 18th birthday

At least it's a nice car: Kylie and Tyga's relationship status is currently unknown, as allegations of him cheating on her with a Brazilian model only recently surfaced

Enjoying the good life? Tyga was also spotted out and about with a buddy in Calabasas, CA
This year's Celebrity Big Brother has received tireless praise over its diverse housemate pickings.

And nothing highlighted the show's varied offering more than the audacious task the celebrities were forced to take part in during Friday night's episode.

Split into two groups, Big Brother handed out a series of facts about an undisclosed housemate, with each team then asked to match the statement to the correct person - with some shocking results.

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Admitting: This year's Celebrity Big Brother has received tireless praise over its diverse housemate pickings - including David Bowie's provocative ex-wife Angie who made some candid confessions

Already shrouded in his fair share of controversy, the challenge saw David Gest forced to reveal that he once performed oral sex on a girl while still at school - and on school property.

'When I was young, there was a young girl who I took into the bathroom and I had oral sex with her,' he explained as the rest of the celebrities gasped in shock.

But things were only just getting started as the task saw Angie Bowie confess she was once late to her own wedding because she was caught up in a threesome.

'We were both late,' she claimed, adding that the groom was also involved in the act.

See more CBB news as Angie Bowie and David Gest make shocking sex confessions

The big reveal! Already shrouded in his fair share of controversy, the challenge saw David Gest forced to reveal that he once performed oral sex on a girl while still at school - and on school property

Shocker: But things were only just getting started as the task saw Angie Bowie confess she was once late to her own wedding because she was caught up in a threesome

A disappointed Darren Day was also made to confront the demons of his past as his fact stated he previously spent 2000 a week on his cocaine habit.

Hanging his head down in shame, the housemates then reassured the British actor that they loved him, before he replied with a coy smile: 'I love you too, guys.'

Stephanie Davis also opened up about her relationship with former One Direction star Zayn Malik, revealing: 'It was four to five years ago. We were young and it was puppy love but we had a great time.'

Moment of truth: All the superstar guests were forced to make extremely candid confessions about life on the outside

Darren's confession: A disappointed Darren Day was also made to confront the demons of his past as his fact stated he previously spent 2000 a week on his cocaine habit

Gemma Collins also got descriptive about her 'designer vagina', claiming: 'It's brand new, basically,' before Danniella Westbrook admitted she had received 'six boob jobs,' the last of which was only 'a couple months ago'.

But they weren't the only ones who admitted going under the knife as Christopher Maloney owned up to his three hair transplants.
Celebrities and socialites alike flocked to the annual Portsea Polo in Melbourne on Saturday.

And the 22-year-old daughter of former Australian Prime Minister, Frances Abbott was also in attendance at the coveted event, with her beau Lindsay Smith by her side.

A summer casual dress code was no problem for the fashion graduate who donned a floral frock and paired it with relaxed accessories to show off her style.

Summer style: Frances Abbott donned a floral frock and paired it with relaxed accessories for the Portsea Polo event

Frances wore a cream lightweight dress with delicate spaghetti straps, that in a slight fashion faux pas showed off her black bra straps underneath.

The frock covered in a vintage inspired pattern of red roses and intertwining leaves, complimented her bronzed tan.

She donned a charcoal coloured wide brimmed at and wore her caramel coloured locks to the side over her right shoulder.

Her look was finished with a fresh pedicure, her toes covered in a coat of black polish, and tan wedges for navigating the grass.

Happy snaps: Her beau Lindsay Smith joined her in the Hampton's inspired marquee, and wore a smart white collared shirt paired with casual chino style pants

Her beau Lindsay Smith joined her in the Hampton's inspired marquee, and wore a smart white collared shirt paired with casual chino style pants.

Lindsay opted for a clean shaven look, a change from the rugged stubble he is often sporting.

For the smart casual look Lindsay finished his outfit with a pair of brown boots, and a dark brown leather belt the stand out pieces in his ensemble.

Lindsay wrapped his arms around Frances for the snap in front of the media wall, and pulled her in close while they laughed together.

Loved up: The pair were first seen out together publicly in early May 2014 and have made regular appearances on the social circuit

The pair were first seen out together publicly in early May 2014 and have made regular appearances on the social circuit together.

While Frances was often seen attending events with her younger sister Bridget, Lindsay has fast replaced her and seen on her arm while they're out and about.

As the daughter of former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, Frances is no stranger to high profile events, yet she seems to be a fan of the more casual polo.

Frances and Lindsay attended the same event together last year, and after being together for just over a year and a half it appears that the young couple are still very much loved up.
They recently treated their daughter Azura to quite an extravagant second birthday party, complete with a flower wall, designer outfits and top catering.

And now Anthony Minichiello and wife Terry Biviano have hit back at critics claiming the celebrity couple spoil their little girl too much.

Speaking to Daily Mail Australia from the Magic Millions races on the Gold Coast on Saturday, 35-year-old Anthony said: 'At the end of the day we don't care what anyone else thinks. She's our daughter and we shower her with as much love as we want'.

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Hitting back: Anthony Minichiello and wife Terry Biviano have hit back at critics claiming the celebrity couple spoil their two-year-old girl Azura too much

His 41-year-old wife Terry, who has made no secret she loves dressing her little girl in designer threads, added: 'As first time parents especially, it's very difficult not to spoil your child but we definitely try and restrain ourselves'.

'But you know what, we love a party and if we want to celebrate our daughter's birthday, then why not. It's not for everyone else. It's for her and it's for us,' the shoe designer continued.

The couple treated Azura to a lavish second birthday last month.

The outdoor soiree involved elegant pink and white floral walls, along with a delectable menu including meringues, lollipops, cake pops, dessert cups, strawberry scones and macarons.

'Nothing better than coming home to my baby girl': Terry embraces Azura in a scenic window shot which she shared onto her Instagram

Doing it their way: Speaking to Daily Mail Australia from the Magic Millions races on the Gold Coast on Saturday, 35-year-old Anthony said: 'At the end of the day we don't care what anyone else thinks'

Furthermore, little Azura was dressed in a stunning Tutu du Monde designer ensemble, while Terry sported an magnificent head crown designed by Viktoria Novak.

Shedding more light on her views towards critics, Terry told DMA on Saturday: 'We don't live our lives for anyone else or anything else and people can be critical but at the end of the day we are the best parents we can be'.

'We adore our child, we have taught her amazing morals and beliefs and to be kind and generous and sweet and grateful and well-mannered and she's all of that.'

'I think it's very hard as a parent not to want to spoil your child and I think to do it now is probably better than spoiling her later in life, because she doesn't understand what money is or how much things cost so for us we spoil her with love,' she added.

Family of three: Terry acknowledged, 'As first time parents especially, it's very difficult not to spoil your child but we definitely try and restrain ourselves'

Also explaining the pair's philosophy to seize the day and not have any regrets, she said: 'When we look back on our lives, we want to look back and have celebrated amazing milestones and moments together'.

'People will always judge and that's their opinion and that's OK but they don't know what Anthony and I are like as parents.'

Terry and Anthony, who tied the knot in January 2012, welcomed Azura into the world in December 2013.

In December the couple forked out big bucks on their daughter over Christmas by gifting the toddler with an extravagant rose gold and diamond bracelet.

Lavish: In December the couple forked out big bucks on their daughter over Christmas by gifting the toddler with an extravagant rose gold and diamond bracelet

The jewellery is identical to a bracelet Terry owns and the pieces are both custom-made.

The mother-daughter bracelets are a delicate rose gold chain with a diamond 'A' initial in the centre and a custom-designed piece by Nader Jewellers in Sydney.

Nader Jewellers were unable to comment on the price of the pieces when contacted by Daily Mail Australia, but the company are known for their pricey and one-of-a-kind items.

Terry is also known for her expensive taste in jewellery and is often spotted wearing a gold Cartier bracelet worth $8800.
They have just enjoyed an idyllic trip to Thailand.

Yet it was business as usual for Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and Jason Statham as they touched down in Los Angeles on Friday, ahead of Sunday night's Golden Globes Awards.

The British duo, who have been dating for five years, were perfectly in sync in low-key yet glamorous ensembles with both opting for denims and statement jackets.

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Back to reality: They have just enjoyed an idyllic trip to Thailand yet it was business as usual for Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and Jason Statham as they touched down in Los Angeles on Friday

Rosie, 28, looked every inch the superstar even in her casual threads as she sported a loose-fitting grey jumper topped off with a leather jacket boasting a shearling collar.

The Plymouth-born beauty could not conceal her supermodel pins in skin-tight ripped jeans which she tucked into a pair of heeled, suede ankle boots.

Tucked under her elbow was a stunning woven tote in a khaki-hue - the exact same colour as Jason's stylish bomber jacket, making the couple look incredibly coordinated.

Leather lady: The British duo, who have been dating for five years, were perfectly in sync in low-key yet glamorous ensembles with both opting for denims and statement jackets

The model and actress, who launched her modelling career aged just 16, shielded her sun-kissed face with a pair of retro-style tortoiseshell sunglasses, slightly unnecessarily in the evening light.

She scraped her trademark blonde locks into a tight ponytail while keeping her make-up minimal with just a slick of pink lip gloss.

Despite the low-key nature of the look, Rosie was sure to pay attention to detail as she added a delicate pair of silver earrings with a coordinating ring.

Glamorous pair: Rosie, 28, looked every inch the superstar even in her casual threads as she sported a loose-fitting grey jumper topped off with a leather jacket boasting a shearling collar

Jason, 48, looked typically handsome in his utility-style jacket, a season must-have, with a simple black, crew-neck T-shirt worn underneath.

The Snatch star, who hails from Derbyshire, went for straight leg black jeans with matching trainers featuring a thick white sole - offering a splash of brightness to the dark look.

He kept his trademark buzzcut under wraps in the confines of a youthful snap-back hat.

Hollywood hardman: Jason, 48, looked typically handsome in his utility-style jacket, a season must-have, with a simple black, crew-neck T-shirt worn underneath

Sunnies at night: The model and actress, who launched her modelling career aged just 16, shielded her sun-kissed face with a pair of retro-style tortoiseshell sunglasses, slightly unnecessarily in the evening light

The duo looked slightly subdued as they left the airport - perhaps feeling the holiday blues after enjoying their spectacular holiday awash with jaunts to the beach while drinking in the country's breathtaking scenery.

During the trip, Rosie posed for an impromptu photoshoot snapped by her Hollywood hardman, sharing the results of his handiwork on her Instagram account on Wednesday.

The esteemed model, who is also a lingerie designer for high street giant Marks And Spencer, looked incredible in the black and white photo, displaying her perfectly sculpted physique in all its glory.

Snap happy: During the trip, Rosie posed for an impromptu photoshoot snapped by her Hollywood hardman, sharing the results of his handiwork on her Instagram account on Wednesday

Rosie can be seen striking a pose up against the wall of their luxury holiday home, wearing nothing but a black sports bra and nude briefs.

Her muscular stomach is on full display in the lingerie, and she casts a seductive gaze out into the distance.

The star captioned the image: 'When your man takes your photo...@jasonstatham'.

They're back! Despite missing the beach life, the Hollywood superstars are no doubt thrilled to be back in LA ahead of Sunday night's Golden Globes Awards

Rosie has been keeping her followers updated about her leisurely lifestyle while on holiday, sharing numerous sunbathing selfies.

Rocking a black bandeau bikini with gold band detailing at the bust and displaying her plump pink pout, Rosie looked like she'd just stepped off the set of a photoshoot as she basked in the sunshine.

Despite missing the beach life, the Hollywood superstars are no doubt thrilled to be back in LA for the 73rd Golden Globe Awards which kicks off on Sunday evening in Beverly Hills.

The couple were joined by a host of big names landing at LAX, excitedly preparing for the Golden Globes on Sunday evening.

Game Of Thrones star Emilia Clarke, Into The Woods hunk Chris Pine and rapper 50 Cent were all spotted making their way through the airport.

Travelling in style: Emilia Clarke looked incredible in a multicoloured jacket as she landed at LAX on Friday ahead of the Golden Globes

Keeping it casual: The Game Of Thrones beauty dressed her outfit down with a pair of skinny jeans and suede shoes, carrying a leather handbag over one arm

Double denim: Chris Pine cut a casual figure as he strolled along in jeans and a matching jacket

Making his way: Rapper 50 Cent was also seen making an arrival at the airport




She tied the knot in October last year, clad in an wedding dress with a neckline that plunged to her navel.

Now, two months after her big day, Channel 7 personality Liz Cantor, has revealed that it was her mother who had the final say of which dress she would don down the aisle.

Speaking to Daily Mail Australia as she attended Queensland's Magic Millions races on Saturday, the 33-year-old explained that she had been struggling to narrow down the dress she would wear when marrying her beau Ryan Lysaught.

Mother knows best! During Queensland's Magic Millions races on Saturday, Liz Cantor,33, revealed to Daily Mail Australia that her mother gave the go-ahead for her to don her famously plunging bridal gown

'I found Brides By Francesca in Sydney stocked this Israeli designer, Berta, and there were three dresses I loved equally', she said.

'I couldn't decide between them so I asked mum to come with me and choose', she continued, before adding that the dress with the most revealing neckline ended up being chosen.

She then quipped: 'That was the one I thought she would say "No way", and she picked it!'

'I asked mum to come with me and choose': Liz explained that she had been struggling to narrow down the dress she would wear when marrying her beau Ryan Lysaught

When quizzed why her family matriarch had chosen such a revealing garment for her big day, Liz simply replied: 'She thought Ryan would like it'

When quizzed why her family matriarch had chosen such a revealing garment for her big day, Liz simply replied: 'She thought Ryan would like it'.

'She was like, "You're a modern bride, and if I was your age I'd pull it off and take the risk".'

Liz's daring choice of bridal attire came after she and Ryan posed underwater for their wedding photo shoot.

Carpe diem! 'She was like, "you're a modern bride, and if I was your age I'd pull it off and take the risk'

The dramatic photos, taken off the coast of Indonesian island Nusa Lembongan, picture the enamored pair kissing as they waded through the coral-encrusted underwater environment.

'With work we always do these posey staged photoshoots and I didn't want my wedding shots to feel like work. I wanted them to feel genuine', the weather presenter explained.

'We're both water babies- Ryan was a surf lifesaver and I am an ex-competitive surfer- and we just feel so ourselves and at home in the ocean', she added.
They haven't been pictured together since October, sparking speculation that their marriage is in trouble.

But Cheryl's husband Jean-Bernard Fernandez-Versini appeared to dispel the rumours when he uploaded a snapshot to Instagram, in which his wedding band was clearly visible on his left hand.

The French businessman struck a pose alongside a male friend during a night out at a bar, and the silver ring was evident as he crossed his arms.

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Making a statement: Cheryl's husband Jean-Bernard Fernandez-Versini appeared to be sending a message about his marriage as he showed off his wedding band in a new Instagram snap

He captioned the shot: 'Neon art exhibition... Stunned'.

Jean-Bernard's statement comes after Cheryl shared what could have been a thinly veiled message to her restaurateur beau to Instagram on Thursday.

On full display: The French entrepreneur's ring was on display in the image

'Sending love to all the women out there trying to love themselves in a world that constantly tells them not to,' read the post, which came just days after her husband shared an equally ambiguous snap.

Jean-Bernard shared a cryptic quote of his own on Instagram about 'mean people' as speculation continues to mount about his relationship with the pop princess, who he hasn't been seen with since October.

The French businessman uploaded a message reading: 'Mean people don't bother me a bit. Mean people who disguise themselves as nice people bother me a whole lot.'

'Don't come for me unless I send for you', he added in the accompanying caption.

His followers were concerned by the resentful-sounding post, querying whether it was aimed at Cheryl and telling him to think positive.

See the latest updates on Cheryl amid claims that her marriage is in trouble

Something to say? Cheryl did little to quash rumours there is trouble in her relationship as she shared what could have been a thinly veiled message to her restaurateur beau on Instagram on Thursday

What's going on? She's been plagued by claims her 19-month marriage to husband Jean-Bernard Fernandez-Versini is on the rocks

Shirtless selfie: Earlier this week, JB showed off his abs on Instagram post tattoo session as he shared a cryptic quote about 'mean people'

Jean-Bernard also shared a shirtless snap of himself after getting his very first tattoo, with his left bicep wrapped in clingfilm.

Revealing his rippling six pack, the restaurateur was seen wrapping an art around his tattoo artist's shoulders, sharing a post about how inspiring he is.

'This guy... Went from hell to have a family, beautiful KIDS, success and happiness and do what he loves to do', he posted.

'Thank you for the great experience and inspiration man - and for the tattoos.'

Taking a stand: The French restaurateur appeared to take a thinly-veiled dig at someone, prompting his followers to query whether it was Cheryl

On the rocks? The couple, who wed following a whirlwind three-month romance in 2014, haven't been seen together since October

Beaming: This comes after Cheryl shared an upbeat photo of herself on Tuesday

Jean-Bernard's social media spree comes after Cheryl posted a more upbeat photo of herself on Tuesday, flashing a beaming smile for the camera.

The 32-year-old star also revealed she was heading back to the studio to work on new music, much to the delight of her fans.

The X Factor judge is said to have asked brother Garry Tweedy to stay at her plush London home. The pair are very close and Gary also moved in with the star when her first marriage to Ashley Cole collapsed.

A source told The Sun: 'He and Cheryl are extremely close. Hes part of her entourage and is by her side for practically all her work commitments.

'He needs to be in London for a base, and Cheryl has a big house that needs to be filled. It goes without saying that at a time like this shell need his support.'
US states say Volkswagen stonewalling emissions probe

Volkswagen has been uncooperative with US states probing its emissions-cheating technology, citing German privacy law in refusing to share documents, two prosecutors said Friday.

The German auto giant has fallen far short of its public pledges of cooperation, said sharply worded statements from the attorneys general of New York and Connecticut, who are leading a VW probe by more than 40 US states in parallel with an ongoing US federal investigation.

"Volkswagen's cooperation with the states' investigation has been spotty -- and frankly, more of the kind one expects from a company in denial than one seeking to leave behind a culture of admitted deception," said New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman.

Volkswagen has been uncooperative with US states probing its emissions-cheating technology, prosecutors say Paul J. Richards (AFP/File)

"It has been slow to produce documents from its US files, it has sought to delay responses until it completes its 'independent investigation' several months from now, and it has failed to pursue every avenue to overcome the obstacles it says that German privacy law presents to turning over emails from its executives' files in Germany. Our patience with Volkswagen is wearing thin."

Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen, one of six state officials leading the probe, said the states will "seek to use any means available to us" to hold Volkswagen accountable.

"I find it frustrating that, despite public statements professing cooperation and an expressed desire to resolve the various investigations that it faces following its calculated deception, Volkswagen is, in fact, resisting cooperation by citing German law," Jepsen said.

The statements come on the heels of a lawsuit filed Monday by the US Department of Justice that seeks more than $20 billion in damages and said its probe was "impeded and obstructed by material omissions and misleading information provided by VW."

Volkswagen has repeatedly apologized for the scandal in which it admitted installing emissions-cheating technology on more than 11 million diesel engines worldwide, in vehicles of the model years 2009 through 2015.

In response to a request for comment Friday, a Volkswagen spokesman said the company has been responsive to US officials.
US ramps up war on IS propaganda, recruitment

The White House intensified efforts Friday to fight propaganda and recruitment by extremist groups such as the Islamic State, announcing a new task force and pressing Silicon Valley to help out.

The renewed push comes in response to frustration that the IS group has managed to lure and recruit followers in Europe and the United States to launch deadly attacks without detection by intelligence services.

It also comes amid greater awareness that the recruitment and operational planning by violent extremists is making use of the Internet and other electronic communications in ways that can avoid detection by intelligence.

An image taken from a propaganda video released by the Islamic State's al-Furqan Media allegedly shows IS fighters raising their weapons

Added to that is a frustration that US efforts to counter the Islamic State group and Al-Qaeda propaganda over the Internet have shown poor results.

"The horrific attacks in Paris and San Bernardino this winter underscored the need for the United States and our partners in the international community and the private sector to deny violent extremists like ISIL fertile recruitment ground," said National Security Council spokesman Ned Price, using another acronym for the IS group.

The immediate move was the formation of a new unit, the Countering Violent Extremism Task Force, by the Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department, to coordinate their efforts to fight extremism domestically.

At the same time, the State Department will cut back its direct efforts at countering propaganda by violent extremist groups, in what appeared to be an admission that they haven't worked.

Instead, the emphasis will be on supporting international partners of the United States -- both governmental and non-governmental -- in their programs to neutralize such groups' promotional activities.

- Tech giants pressed to help -

As that was being announced, White House top security officials were to meet leading Internet companies in Silicon Valley in an effort to build cooperation with them.

High on the agenda will be how to make it harder for terror groups to use the Internet to recruit supporters and prevent them using technologies like encryption to mask their activities, according to the agenda of the San Jose meeting obtained by AFP.

Underscoring the high importance of the meeting, President Barack Obama's Chief of Staff Denis McDonough will lead the delegation from Washington.

The group will also include Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, the directors of the National Security Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, according to the agenda.

From the tech industry, top executives from Apple, Facebook, LinkedIn, Dropbox, Microsoft, Twitter, and YouTube were expected to attend.

The talks come amid mounting frustration in Washington that the Islamic State group, Al-Qaeda and other groups have been able to use publicly available technology to build their influence and hide their activities from even the most advanced US intelligence operations.

Without any hint it was coming, on December 2 a married couple sympathetic to the Islamic State group slaughtered 14 people and injured 22 others in an attack with automatic weapons on a holiday office party in San Bernardino, California.

Days afterward, Obama called on "high-tech and law-enforcement leaders to make it harder for terrorists to use technology to escape from justice."

"The goal here is to find additional ways to work together to make it even harder for terrorists or criminals to find refuge in cyberspace," said White House spokesman Josh Earnest on Friday.

Key issues on the agenda of the Silicon Valley meeting include how to make it tougher for terrorists to leverage the Internet to recruit, radicalize, and mobilize followers, and making it harder for terrorists to use the Internet to facilitate and operationalize attacks.

The meeting though raises a challenge to some of the world's top tech companies, wary of being seen to cooperate with and share data with the US or other governments.

Earnest said that there are precedents for Silicon Valley's social media giants working with security officials, such as in fighting child pornography.

"Technology leaders are patriotic Americans. They don't have any desire for child pornographers or would-be terrorists to be using their tools and their technology to harm innocent people," he said.

"I do think there is an opportunity for there to be a robust discussion about ways we can make it harder for terrorists to leverage the Internet to recruit, radicalize and mobilize supporters," he told reporters.

A rose and flag stand atop a fence surrounding the scene of the massacre in San Bernardino, California, December 21, 2015 David McNew (AFP/File)
UN Security Council to discuss aid to besieged Syria towns

The UN Security Council will meet Monday to weigh urgent efforts to deliver badly needed aid to three besieged towns in Syria, the council presidency said Friday.

Syria's government has authorized UN aid deliveries to the towns, including Madaya, which is northwest of Damascus and near the Lebanese border.

At least 23 people in a health center there supported by Medecins Sans Frontieres have starved since December 1, the group said on its website, adding that many more are at risk. Six of the dead were aged one year or less.

Lebanese Sunni Muslims gather at the Masnaa crossing on the Lebanon-Syria border blocking the road leading to Damascus in protest of the ongoing siege on the Syrian town of Madaya, on January 8, 2016

A first round of relief deliveries was expected to arrive over the weekend, UN officials said.

Madaya, surrounded by pro-government forces, is in dire need of medical supplies as well as food. The other two towns, Fuaa and Kafraya in the northwest, are besieged by rebels.
Iran accuses Saudis of 'sectarian hate-mongering'

Iran told the United Nations on Friday that it does not want to escalate tensions in the Middle East, even as it took a swipe at Saudi Arabia for "sectarian hate-mongering."

Saudi Arabia was "spreading delusional hype about Iran" after failing to derail the nuclear deal reached with world powers, Tehran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

"We have no desire or interest in escalation of tension in our neighborhood," Zarif said in the letter, obtained by AFP.

Saudi Arabia is "spreading delusional hype about Iran", Tehran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif (pictured) said in a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Atta Kenare (AFP/File)

Saudi Arabia cut off diplomatic ties with Iran on Sunday after angry protesters ransacked and set fire to the Saudi Embassy in Tehran over the execution of Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr.

The tensions between the Sunni and Shiite powers have reverberated across the Middle East and the Muslim world, complicating efforts to resolve conflicts in Syria and Yemen.

"Iran has called for Islamic unity in the face of Saudi sectarian hate-mongering," Zarif wrote.

The foreign minister called for unity to confront extremists and said Riyadh must make a "crucial choice" to either "continue supporting extremist terrorists" or "play a constructive role in promoting regional stability."

Iran and Saudi Arabia have repeatedly accused each other of backing extremist groups who are wreaking chaos in the Middle East.

Zarif accused Riyadh of waging a "senseless aerial campaign targeting the people of Yemen" and of thwarting efforts to reach a ceasefire and begin political negotiations to end the conflict there.
Vietnamese pleads guilty in US over Al-Qaeda link

A Vietnamese man pleaded guilty Friday in New York to supporting Al-Qaeda in Yemen, where he learned to build a bomb earmarked to blow up London's Heathrow airport.

Minh Quang Pham, who was arrested in Britain in June 2012 and extradited to the United States in February last year, faces a maximum sentence of life behind bars in the United States when he is sentenced on April 14.

The 33-year-old admitted one count of providing material support to Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, one count of conspiring to receive military training from AQAP and one count of possessing and using a machine gun.

An image grab taken on April 16, 2014 from a video by Al-Malahem Media, the media arm of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), allegedly shows AQAP jihadists listening to their chief Nasser al-Wuhayshi at an undisclosed location in Yemen

"Pham provided material support to the highest levels of AQAP. Now all that awaits him is sentencing for his admitted acts of terrorism," said US Attorney Preet Bharara.

He left London, where he lived, in December 2010 for Yemen, where he received training from Anwar al-Awlaki, a US-born AQAP leader killed in a US drone strike in 2011.

Awlaki taught Pham how to create a bomb using household chemicals and directed him to explode such a device at the arrivals area at Heathrow airport, US prosecutors said.

Pham was stopped at Heathrow upon his return. Electronic files setting out his links to AQAP and a live round of armor-piercing ammunition capable of being used in a Kalashnikov assault rifle were found in his belongings.

AQAP was formed in 2009 after a merger between militants in Yemen and Saudi Arabia. The group has been linked to a string of attacks since its formation, including the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris in January 2015.
McAfee shifts presidential run, unveils cybersecurity plan

John McAfee, the antivirus software pioneer and onetime international fugitive who is running for US president, said Friday he was shifting his campaign to the Libertarian Party.

McAfee made the announcement as he unveiled a cybersecurity platform and told reporters he was running for president to highlight the need for better cyber protections.

"We need a dedicated force of hackers focused on national security," McAfee said on the floor of the Consumer Electronics Show, where he was promoting a new mobile security product on which he is collaborating.

John McAfee talks to the media on December 13, 2012 in Miami Beach, Florida Joe Raedle (Getty/AFP/File)

He said the United States is in danger "because we are decades behind the Russians and Chinese in weaponized software," while also highlighting the need to improve cyber weapons to counter threats from those countries.

"You can't just have defensive weapons in this world. You have to say, 'You push a button, we'll push a button.'"

The creator of the McAfee antivirus software in September announced his presidential run as part of his own "Cyber Party."

He said Friday that shifting to the Libertarian Party would make it easier to be on the ballot in all 50 states and he believes he is philosophically aligned with the party.

"I was a Libertarian before the word was coined," he said.

"I think the government is too large. I think people should be free to live their own lifestyles without interference from government."

McAfee, who on his own Twitter page refers to himself as an "eccentric millionaire," amassed an estimated $100 million fortune during the early days of the Internet in the 1990s, designing the pioneering anti-virus software that bears his name and which is now owned by Intel.

After cashing out, he became an intrepid adventure-seeker, arriving in Belize in 2009 after losing most of his fortune to bad investments and the financial crisis.

McAfee was briefly incarcerated in that country after police found him living with a 17-year-old girl and discovered an arsenal of seven pump-action shotguns, one single-action shotgun, and two 9-millimeter pistols.
US lawmakers aim to strip Bill Cosby of presidential medal

A bipartisan group of US lawmakers was set to introduce legislation Friday that provides President Barack Obama authority to revoke the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Bill Cosby, the actor-turned-pariah facing several rape accusations.

The medal was established half a century ago as the nation's highest civilian honor, but in July Obama acknowledged there was no mechanism for officially revoking the award.

Members of Congress are moving to empower the president to do just that, rolling out a bill that also provides criminal penalties for anyone who publicly displays such a medal that has been stripped.

Last week a bipartisan group of US lawmakers were also set to introduce legislation to allow President Barack Obama to revoke the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Cosby

"Cosby has admitted to drugging women in order to satisfy his sexual desires, and, therefore, the federal government should not recognize Cosby with an honor like the Presidential Medal of Freedom," said a draft of the measure provided by the office of House Republican Paul Gosar, the bill's main sponsor.

His office said the measure would be introduced Friday.

Cosby, 78, was charged last week with felony sexual assault, the first to stem from a series of allegations that have ruined his image as an affable patriarch in the wildly popular 1980s television hit "The Cosby Show."

More than 50 women have accused Cosby of drugging and sexually molesting or raping them -- allegations the veteran television and movie showman has vehemently denied.

Gosar said that while there is a legal presumption of Cosby's innocence, the actor's admission to drugging several women puts him "outside the bounds of whom we should admire in our society."

"Like so many Americans, I am sick and tired of watching the rapid decline of our culture right in front of our eyes," he said Thursday.

"It is time to reclaim our nation's moral compass."

Fifteen Republicans and two Democrats are sponsoring the bill, according to a Gosar aide.

It remained unclear whether the legislation could pass Congress, or if the president would sign it.

"We'll take a look at the proposal if Congress takes a vote on it," White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters Thursday.

"Symbolic commemorations are always difficult to deal with," he added, expressing concern about creating a precedent with regard to "trying to undo medals."

Comedian Bill Cosby salutes as he arrives at a ceremony to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom on July 9, 2002 at the White House in Washington, DC Manny Ceneta (AFP/File)
Philippine Catholics join huge parade, pray for miracles

Barefoot men and women praying for miracles hurled themselves above mammoth crowds in the Philippines Saturday to touch a religious icon in a frenzied Catholic parade that rescue workers said left one person dead.

Fervent scenes of devotion played out as a life-sized statue of Jesus Christ, called the Black Nazarene, was wheeled through Manila's narrow streets, home to one of the world's largest religious gatherings.

Risking life and limb, shoeless men and women chanting "Viva!" (Long Live) ran over heads and shoulders to touch the icon, with white handkerchiefs or towels.

Police said about 1.5 million people took part in the 4.5-mile parade of the Black Nazarene statue in Manila on January 9, 2016 Ted Aljibe (AFP)

"If family members get sick we would give them sponge baths with it [the towel or handkerchief]. That way we wouldn't spend money on doctors," said Dang Villacorta, 36, wife of a Manila office messenger.

Beach tents mushroomed at a seaside park overnight Friday as pilgrims, some sprawled on the grass on plastic ground sheets, waited for the parade to begin at daybreak.

"The Nazarene our Lord gave meaning to my life," Nino Barbo, a 30-year-old high school dropout with an upper arm tattoo and a metal earring told AFP.

The construction worker said he gave up a day's pay for the sixth year in a row by skipping work to touch the statue, which many Filipinos believe can heal the sick and bring good luck.

One of those seen rushing the icon-bearing float was a man holding aloft a baby.

Pilgrims jostled for position to shoulder lengths of rope to win the the honour of pulling the float forward.

Police said about 1.5 million people took part in the seven-kilometre (4.5-mile) parade, which runs from the park to the icon's home inside the downtown Quiapo church.

The parade is expected to continue until midnight (1600 GMT).

A 27-year-old male participant lost consciousness as the tropical sun bore down on the procession just before noon, Philippine Red Cross secretary-general Gwendolyn Pang told AFP.

"They (Red Cross doctors on the scene) could not revive him anymore and he was declared dead," she added.

The Red Cross said about 220 people were treated for wounds, dizziness, and symptoms associated with low blood sugar, with 18 requiring hospitalisation.

Critics contend that the parade is idolatrous, but Church authorities say it is a vibrant expression of faith in one of the world's most fervently Catholic nations.

More than 80 million of the Asian nation's 100 million people consider themselves Catholics.

"The people reach out to it [the icon] because they have a personal relationship with God," said Monsignor Hernando Coronel, the parish priest of Quiapo.

"They come to me and say the Lord has performed miracles for them. To the devotees he is for real," he told reporters earlier in the week.

Coronel said a male member of his parish who regularly joins the annual parade told him his son regained his full sight after being accidentally shot in an eye with a shotgun pellet.

A woman member also told him her granddaughter miraculously revived after drowning.

Crowned with thorns and bearing a cross, the Nazarene statue was brought to Manila by Augustinian priests in 1607, early on in Spain's 400-year colonial rule.

It is believed by some to have been partially burnt and blackened when the galleon carrying it caught fire on a voyage from Mexico, another Spanish colony at the time.

A man clambers above fellow devotees as he tries to touch the life-sized Black Nazarene statue during an annual religious procession in Manila on January 9, 2016 Ted Aljibe (AFP)
Eruption of online race hatred exposes S.Africa's woes

A slew of racist comments on social media in South Africa have unleashed outrage and exposed deep hostility in the "Rainbow Nation" as it struggles with its demons 22 years after white-minority rule ended.

Irritated by rubbish left on a beach following New Year's Day celebrations, Penny Sparrow, a white real estate agent from the eastern coast province of KwaZulu-Natal, wrote a savage comment on Facebook.

"From now I shall address the blacks of South Africa as monkeys as I see the cute little wild monkeys do the same -- pick and drop litter," she said, in a posting that soon went viral.

Pictures by Dutch photographer Pieter Boersma at an exhibition acknowledging the role played by South Africas neighbours in the struggle against apartheid at the opening of a dialogue on xenophobia at the Center for Memory in Johannesburg Mujahid Safodien (AFP/File)

The following day Chris Hart, an economic analyst often quoted in the media, came under fire for comments on Twitter about a growing "sense of entitlement and hatred towards minorities" in South Africa.

He has since been suspended from his position at Standard Bank, which said there were "racist undertones" in his comments.

The posts touched off a vicious cycle of hatred in a country still traumatised by decades of finely-tuned discrimination between the races under apartheid rule.

"I want to cleanse this country of all white people... We must act as Hitler did to the Jews," Velaphi Khumalo, a local government employee, wrote on another viral Facebook message as the war of words worsened.

He too has since been suspended by the Gauteng provincial government department, which condemned his "barbaric and racist utterances".

- Flood of insults -

Soon after Andrew Barnes, a white TV news anchor, was taken off air by local channel eNCA after mocking the pronunciation of a black government minister.

The flood of insults "has shone a light on the amount of work that still needs to be done to bring true reconciliation to South Africa," Mienke Steytler of South Africa's Institute of Race Relations (IRR) told AFP.

The ruling African National Congress (ANC) has filed charges of "crimen injuria" (intentionally impairing the dignity of others), against both Sparrow and Hart -- but not Khumalo.

"We opened and laid charges against the people who originally started making these offensive statements," party spokesman Zizi Kodwa told AFP.

"These individuals must be punished because they are taking South Africa back... South Africa has never been so polarised as it is today racially.

"Khumalo reacted to an offensive comment which was made against black people."

Steytler slammed the ANC for "unacceptable discrimination" over its decision not to pursue charges against Khumalo.

In 2000, 72 percent of South Africans were reported to believe interracial relations were improving. By 2012, that figure had dropped to 39 percent, according to a government report.

The ANC has also floated the idea of laws criminalising "any act that perpetuates racism and glorifies apartheid".

But criminalising racism is not necessarily the solution, said Nelson Mandela Foundation CEO Sello Hatang.

He quoted the late president Mandela, saying: "In the end, reconciliation is a spiritual process, which requires more than just a legal framework. It has to happen in the hearts and minds of people."

- Party politics -

A clumsy attempt to apologise by Sparrow only stoked public anger after she appeared to blame her diabetes for her outburst.

And the country's largest opposition party, the Democratic Alliance, which has long been trying to shake off its reputation as a "white party", was left red-faced when it was revealed that Sparrow was a member.

The party fought to defend itself, lashing out at Sparrow for "dehumanising black South Africans" and expelling her.

Khumalo, too, presented his apologies, but the explosion of vitriol across social media continued unabated -- reflecting often-unspoken tensions within South African society.

"The weaker the economy is and the higher the unemployment figures are, the more frustrated people are and the more they are likely to lash out at each other," said Steytler.

South Africa is battling a 25 percent unemployment rate, slow growth and a sharply weakening currency, with the risk of junk status looming on the credit horizon.

"We have been living on a cosmetic rainbow nation since 1994," said Ronald Lamola, a former leader in the ANC's youth wing. "There will be no racial harmony without economic equality."

In 2000, 72 percent of South Africans were reported to believe interracial relations were improving. By 2012, that figure had dropped to 39 percent, according to a government report Anna Zieminski (AFP/File)
US 'disturbed' by missing Hong Kong booksellers

The United States is "disturbed" by reports of the disappearance of five Hong Kong booksellers from the Chinese semi-autonomous city, a US State Department spokesman said Friday.

The missing men all worked for Mighty Current, known for books critical of Beijing, which closely monitors and controls dissenting voices.

The men are feared to have been detained by Chinese authorities, adding to growing unease that freedoms in the former British colony are being eroded.

US State Department Spokesman John Kirby says his country is concerned about the disappearances of five people associated with publishing house Mighty Current Mandel Ngan (AFP)

"We are disturbed by reports of the disappearances of five people associated with the Mighty Current publishing house and we share the concern of the people of Hong Kong regarding these disappearances," State Department spokesman John Kirby said.

"Were following the issue closely," he said.

Kirby made reference to a January 4 statement by Hong Kong's chief executive Leung Chun-ying "expressing concerns about the potential implications of this case, and we share those concerns."

Pro-democracy lawmakers, activists and residents fear that Beijing is trampling the "one country, two systems" deal under which Hong Kong has been governed since it was handed back by Britain to China in 1997.

The two sides agreed Hong Kong was to preserve its freedoms -- which include freedom of speech -- and way of life for 50 years. Chinese law enforcers have no right to operate in the city.
Australia bushfire kills two, destroys scores of homes

At least two people have died in a bushfire which has destroyed 121 homes in Western Australia, reports said Saturday as officials admitted the emergency was not yet over.

Fire crews found two bodies in burnt-out houses in Yarloop, some 110 kilometres (70 miles) south of Perth, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported, citing police. Another two people are missing.

The bodies have not been formally identified but are believed to be those of two men in their 70s who had been reported missing after fire tore through the old mill town early on Friday, destroying scores of homes.

Firefighters battle a fire near Yarloop in Western Australia, where the out-of-control blaze more than doubled in size in 24 hours FIRE AND EMERGENCY SERVICES (FIRE AND EMERGENCY SERVICES/AFP)

That number of houses rose to 121 on Saturday after a fuller assessment, as hundreds of firefighters continued to battle the huge blaze which threatens nearby areas.

"It is still a cause for concern," Fire and Emergency Services Commissioner Wayne Gregson told reporters of the blaze.

"It has been a very challenging fire for us -- it's still a challenge, (we're) not out of the woods yet."

Residents of Yarloop and other towns in the area were advised to evacuate if possible, with an bushfire emergency warning still in place.

"There is a threat to lives and homes in Harvey, Cookernup, Wokalup and surroundings areas," the Department of Fire and Emergency Services said on its website.

"Unless you are ready and prepared to actively defend your property, evacuate to the south via the South Western Highway if safe to do so," it said.

Western Australia's Premier Colin Barnett said the event had been declared a natural disaster, a measure which gives residents access to greater financial support.

But he admitted that the damage bill was going to be a "large one".

Bushfires are common in Australia's hotter months, with four deaths in Western Australia last November.
Two Palestinian knife attackers shot dead: Israeli army

Two Palestinians tried to stab Israeli soldiers manning a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank on Saturday before being shot dead, the army said.

The attack occurred in the north of the Jordan Valley, according to a spokeswoman, who confirmed that the bodies of the two assailants were handed over to Palestinian authorities.

Twenty-two Israelis and an American have been killed in Palestinian attacks including stabbings, car rammings and gunfire targeting security forces and civilians since October 1. An Eritrean was also killed.

A Palestinian protester walks past burning tyres during clashes with Israeli security forces near Nablus in the occupied West Bank Jaafar Ashtiyeh (AFP)

At the same time, 146 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, most while carrying out attacks.

Israel has employed a raft of security and punitive measures in a bid to stem attacks.

Overnight, the army demolished a house in the West Bank village of Surda belonging to a Palestinian who was shot dead on October 3 after killing an Israeli rabbi, the spokeswoman said.

In November, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to expedite house demolitions in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, which he said were "one of the most efficient tools" in discouraging Palestinian attacks.

The controversial practice, which critics claim amounts to collective punishment, is widely used in the West Bank and resumed in east Jerusalem in November after a five-year hiatus.

Also on Saturday, Israel returned the bodies of four Palestinians killed on Thursday during two attacks in the southern West Bank.

They were buried in the West Bank village of Sair.

Thousands followed their bodies as they were carried through the streets, according to an AFP journalist on the scene.

Mohamed Kawazbeh, the brother of one of those killed, described them as "four martyr heroes".

"We are proud of them," said Ziad Kawazbeh, a father of one of the victims. "You can't have a homeland without martyrs and to liberate our country we must sacrifice our martyrs."

Israel often retains the bodies of Palestinians killed during attacks, a measure that has drawn criticism from rights groups as well as Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.
'Super weekend' rallies in Taiwan ahead of presidential vote

Tens of thousands gathered in Taiwan Saturday as rival presidential candidates took to the streets for "super weekend" rallies.

It is the last weekend of campaigning before the vote for president next Saturday, when the embattled ruling Kuomintang (KMT) is expected to be defeated.

Tsai Ing-wen of the main opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is forecast to take the leadership as the KMT struggles for public support, due to scepticism over its China-friendly policies and anger at the island's stagnating economy.

Tsai Ing-wen of the main opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is forecast to take the leadership in Taiwan as the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) struggles for support Sam Yeh (AFP)

But KMT candidate Eric Chu still managed to garner massive crowds on the streets of Taipei Saturday afternoon, with the KMT saying 150,000 turned out for his rally.

Chu walked alongside current president Ma Ying-jeou in a march through central Taipei as supporters donned fancy dress, waved the national flag, sang and held up "Victory" signs.

Chu has emphasised the importance of stable relations with China, saying a vote for the traditionally Beijing-sceptic DPP would be a step backwards.

"We are marching together for Taiwan's stability and let's look to victory and success on January 16," he told the crowds.

Supporters said they were afraid the DPP would bring instability.

"The DPP is pro-independence and I worry tensions will rise with China if it were to take power," said supporter Peng Yu-chia, 45, a housewife with two children.

"I want a secure life and stable society for my children to grow up in," she added.

Finance worker Kuo Feng-hsiang, 25, said he thought the KMT was a safer bet for the economy.

"Even though Ma hasn't done that well, I'd like to give the KMT another chance. I think Chu can do better," he said.

Ma also spoke to supporters, promising the KMT would improve its performance.

"Tsai talks about maintaining the status quo and stability, but it won't fall from the sky," said Ma.

Taiwan is self-ruling after it split from China in 1949 following a civil war on the mainland, but Beijing still considers it part of its territory, awaiting reunification.

Ma has overseen a rapprochement with China since he took power in 2008, leading to trade deals and a tourist boom, and culminating in a historic summit with Chinese president Xi Jinping.

But many voters feel it is big business that has reaped the benefits, not ordinary people, and there are growing concerns over Beijing's influence.

Tsai's rally will take place later Saturday in the city of Kaohsiung in southern Taiwan, the DPP's heartland.

She spoke to supporters in the coastal village of Fenggang, her father's hometown, Saturday morning.

"Let this place become the hometown of the president on January 16," she said.

Tsai visited a temple in the village, which is in southernmost Pingtung county, and was given a platter of buns by officials.

Members of her own family also welcomed her with flowers and leaf-wrapped glutinous rice bundles.
Egypt hotel attack victims stable, witness recounts ordeal

Three European holidaymakers wounded in an attack in an Egyptian resort were in stable condition Saturday, as a witness recounted how the assailants burst into the hotel and stabbed guests.

An elderly Austrian couple and a young Swedish man were hospitalised after the assault Friday at the Bella Vista hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.

Tourism Minister Hisham Zazou said the assailants appeared to have been acting alone, and the hotel described them as "drugged young men".

Police and security stand guard outside the Bella Vista Hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort of Hurghada on January 9, 2016 Mohamed el-Shahed (AFP)

He later said the wounded "will be released from hospital today", adding that "over the coming days we will announce even greater security measures to safeguard all tourists visiting Egypt".

Police shot dead one of the knife-wielding attackers and wounded another, saying one of them was carrying a "sonic gun".

A Swede who said he was the father of one of the victims, 27-year-old Sammie Olovsson, said they were sitting in the hotel restaurant when the assailants burst in and stabbed him.

"My son and me were eating in the restaurant and having a discussion," he told AFP in the Hurghada hospital.

The two men rushed in "very fast," he said. "They took knives and they tried to get Sammie here," he said, pointing to his chest.

"Then (they) said 'down on the floor' and we do that," he said, adding that he told his son, who was bleeding, not to move.

"I get up two times and they stayed there with the guns. When I got up later on they were not here," he said.

The hotel posted on its Facebook page pictures of the two other victims, spelled in hospital records as Renata Weisslen and Wilhem Weislan, both smiling.

"They are ok now," it said in a post. A doctor at the hospital told AFP they were a couple, both 72.

Zazou told AFP the two attackers were "not part of an organisation".

It was "an individually motivated attack. This is the initial finding," said Zazou, who was in Hurghada to visit the victims, adding that the investigation was still ongoing.

A video published by Egyptian news websites appeared to show the wounded assailant receiving emergency medical treatment and being questioned on his identity.

He appeared to have been shot in both legs.

Zazou described the assailants as "amateurish" and said their motive was not yet clear.

The hotel added on Facebook that "two drugged young men" attacked the restaurant with a "fake gun" and "small knives".

A restaurant employee, who requested anonymity, told AFP one of the men shouted "there is no god but God" on entering, and carried a black banner that resembled the Islamic State group flag.

"The door opened and there was a man holding a knife and a black cloth with the (Islamic State group) flag on it," he said. Another held what appeared to be a gun.

"One of them said: 'There is no god but God. We will blow up this place'. The first attacked customers sitting at a table, with a knife."

- Previous attacks claimed by IS -

The incident further undermined efforts to repair the country's damaged tourism industry, coming a day after a Cairo hotel hosting Israeli tourists came under attack by men who hurled fireworks and fired birdshot.

The Islamic State group claimed that attack, which it said targeted "Jewish" tourists.

Police said they were Arab Israelis, and that the assailants had targeted policemen guarding the hotel and not them.

The jihadist group's Egyptian affiliate is waging an insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula, and dealt a body blow to the country's tourism industry by claiming to have downed a Russian airliner in October, killing all those on board.

The attack prompted Russia to suspend flights to and from Egypt, while Britain restricted flights to the Sharm el-Sheikh resort from where the doomed plane had departed.

After that tragedy, some major tourist operators suspended packages to Sharm el-Sheikh and Hurghada.

The resorts, famed for their pristine beaches and scuba diving, were promoted by Egypt as jewels of its tourism industry, and had previously attracted millions of holidaymakers, including Russians, Britons and Italians.

Egypt's tourism industry was dealt some heavy blows last year.

In September, eight Mexicans were mistakenly killed by security forces in the vast Western Desert.

And in June, police foiled an attempted suicide bombing near the famed Karnak temple in Luxor -- one of Egypt's most popular attractions -- when 600 tourists were inside.

The Red Sea resorts of Sharm el-Sheikh and Hurghada previously attracted millions of holidaymakers before a spate of terror attacks in 2015

Sammie Olovsson, a 27-year-old tourist from Sweden, recovers in bed at the Nile hospital in Egypt's Red Sea resort of Hurghada on January 9, 2016 Mohamed el-Shahed (AFP)
Gulf monarchies back Saudi in row with Iran

Foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council, which groups Sunni Arab monarchies, expressed their "total support" Saturday for Saudi Arabia in its diplomatic row with predominantly Shiite Iran.

The GCC "forcefully condemns the attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran", said a statement, referring to the sacking of Riyadh's embassy and consulate by demonstrators angered over its execution of a prominent Shiite cleric and dissident.

The statement, following an extraordinary ministerial meeting of the six-member group, criticised "Iranian interference in Saudi Arabian affairs" over its denunciation of Nimr al-Nimr's execution a week ago.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir speaks at a Gulf Cooperation Council press conference in Riyadh on January 9, 2016 Ahmed Farwan (AFP)

It said Tehran's criticism had "directly incited the aggressions targeting Saudi diplomatic missions".

The GCC "totally supports decisions taken by Saudi Arabia to combat terrorism" and "has total confidence in the independence and integrity of Saudi justice".

Nimr was a highly respected cleric in Saudi Arabia's Shiite community who was behind demonstrations calling for better treatment of the minority, but he was executed for terrorism.

His death touched off anti-Saudi demonstrations elsewhere in the Shiite world, including the attacks in Iran. Riyadh was accused of silencing his criticism by killing him.

The GCC groups Bahrain, Kuwait Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

In response to the Iran incidents, Riyadh and Bahrain, which has a Shiite majority, severed diplomatic relations with Tehran. Kuwait recalled its ambassador, the UAE downgraded its ties, and Oman and Qatar condemned the attacks.
Thousands of Kurds protest in Paris over women's murders

Thousands of Kurds from across Europe marched through Paris on Saturday calling for justice on the third anniversary of the killing of three female Kurdish rebels in the French capital.

Organisers said 10,000 people joined the march, while police put the figure at 7,000.

The protesters denounced "crimes by the Turkish regime" -- saying that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was "massacring Kurds" -- chanting "No to impunity for political crimes" and "We are all Sakine, Fidan and Leyla".

Thousands of Kurds demonstrate in Paris on January 9, 2016 denouncing 'crimes by the Turkish regime' Thomas Samson (AFP)

Sakine Cansiz, 54 -- one of the founders of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) -- was murdered along with Fidan Dogan, 28, and 24-year-old Leyla Soylemez.

The women's bodies were found in the early hours of January 10, 2013 at a Kurdish information centre. They had been shot in the head and neck.

Sakine Cansiz's brother Haydar, who travelled from Germany for the march, told AFP: "Sakine's fight goes on. We will continue to march until we have obtained justice."

Carrying hundreds of flags in the red, orange and green of the PKK and pictures of the group's leader Abdullah Ocalan, the demonstrators marched to the site of the killings, where flowers had been laid in memory of the dead.

A Turkish national, 33-year-old Omer Guney, has been sent to trial charged with the killings, but investigators suspect Turkish intelligence may have played a role in planning the hit.

Turkey's MIT spy agency has previously denied playing any role in killing the three women.

A source close to the case said investigators believe the MIT is implicated in "the instigation and preparation of the killings", but have been unable to establish whether the service sponsored the hit or whether agents were acting on their own initiative.

The PKK launched its insurgency against the Turkish state in 1984, initially fighting for Kurdish independence although it now focuses on greater autonomy and rights for the country's largest ethnic minority.

The conflict, which has left tens of thousands dead, looked like it could be nearing a resolution until an uneasy truce was shattered last July.

Turkish authorities are waging a major military operation to crush the PKK in the Kurdish-dominated southeast of the country.

The three women's bodies were found in the early hours of January 10, 2013 at a Kurdish information centre, after being shot in the head and neck Thomas Samson (AFP)
Next round of Yemen peace talks postponed: minister

The next round of peace talks between Yemen's government and Iran-backed Huthi rebels scheduled for next week have been postponed, Foreign Minister Abdel Malak al-Mekhlafi said Saturday.

"The negotiations will not take place on the announced date of January 14," Mekhlafi said on the phone from Cairo.

"They will be postponed until January 20 or 23 because the Huthis rejected the date of January 14."

Supporters of Shiite Huthi rebels shout slogans, raising their weapons during a rally against the Saudi-led coalition, on December 17, 2015 in Sanaa Abdel Rahman Abdallah (AFP/File)

He said UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed would travel to the capital Sanaa on Sunday to "convince the Huthis to participate in the negotiations on the new dates".

The envoy would also seek "confidence-building measures" from the Huthis, including the lifting of their siege of Taez and allowing aid into the southwestern city, he added.

The next round of peace talks would be held in Geneva, said the Yemeni minister.

Yemen's government sat down with the rebels and their allies in Switzerland last month for six days of talks that ended with no major breakthrough.
15 candidates approved for Niger presidential race

Niger's constitutional court has approved 15 candidates for next month's presidential election, the interior ministry announced Saturday, including imprisoned opposition figure Hama Amadou.

Incumbent Mahamadou Issoufou, elected in 2011, is seeking another term and will also be up against chief opposition leader Seini Oumarou, former president Mahamane Ousmane and ex-planning minister Amadou Boubacar Cisse, among others.

At the start of the week the interior ministry put forward 16 names of potential candidates to contest the February 21 election.

Niger President Issoufou Mahamadou, pictured on August 5, 2014, was elected in 2011 and is seeking another term Brendan Smialowski (AFP/File)

Of these only Abdoul-Karim Bakasso, the leader of a minor party, was deemed "ineligible" by the court, Interior Minister Hassoumi Massaoudou told reporters.

His bid was rejected due to "the lack of a medical certificate," said opposition spokesman Ousseini Salatou.

Amadou, seen as one of Issoufou's strongest opponents, has been in prison since November 14, 2015 over allegations he was involved in baby trafficking.

The former prime minister and national assembly president fled the county in August 2014 to escape charges in the matter but was arrested after he returned last November.

Amadou has proclaimed his innocence and considers the legal process against him to be "political".

A legal decision on his latest demand to be freed provisionally is expected Monday.

Former agriculture minister Abdou Labo, who was also implicated in the affair and is currently out on bail, is also on the list of approved presidential candidates.

- 'Deteriorating political climate' -

The political climate in the arid Sahel state has been tense since Amadou joined the opposition in 2013.

The election commission late last month announced that the first round of voting would be held on February 21, followed by a run-off on March 20 if necessary.

The opposition has rejected the timeline, saying there had been no consensus on the dates.

The government on Saturday banned a march that had been planned by the opposition the following day to rally against what it called the "arbitrary arrests" of some of its supporters and to call for "transparent elections".

According to opposition spokesman Salatou, the authorities said the march posed "a risk to public order".

Niger's influential tribal chiefs on Friday expressed their concern at the "deteriorating political climate".

Last month President Issoufou said the government had foiled a coup plot, a claim rubbished by presidential hopeful Boubacar Cisse.

Politicking aside, whoever wins the race for the top job will have to tackle the pressing issue of Boko Haram attacks from neighbouring Nigeria.

Boko Haram, which has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, has stepped up attacks on areas of Niger, Chad and Cameroon that border Nigeria while also continuing a devastating campaign of suicide and shooting attacks on home soil.

Electoral campaigning will get under way in Niger on January 30 for both presidential and legislative ballots.

Opposition figure Hama Amadou, pictured on November 6, 2013, has been in prison since November 14, 2015 over allegations he was involved in baby trafficking Issouf Sanogo (AFP/File)
San Francisco mayor sworn in amid raucous demonstration

SAN FRANCISCO (AP)  San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee was sworn in to a second full term Friday amid a raucous demonstration by dozens of protesters angry over a 26-year-old man's shooting death by police last month.

Demonstrators calling for the removal of the city's police chief drowned out Gov. Jerry Brown as he administered the oath of office to Lee before hundreds of guests at San Francisco City Hall. The protesters booed and shouted throughout the hourlong ceremony, disrupting Lee and other speakers and the posting of the color guard.

But the mayor carried on, praising San Francisco's diversity and vowing to keep the city a place for newcomers and old-timers alike.

His critics say he has done just the opposite in his five years in office, courting new tech money while ignoring the city's stubborn problems with homelessness and a lack of housing.

Lee also faces fallout from the Dec. 2 shooting death of Mario Woods by five police officers in the city's gritty Bayview neighborhood. The officers say he refused commands to drop an 8-inch knife.

Lee remarked Friday that 2016 in the Chinese calendar is the year of the monkey, and people born in such a year are optimistic and energetic.

"They are confident, inventive, but they are also restless," Lee said. "That sounds, I think, a lot like San Francisco."

About 75 protesters were at the event, said Eileen Hirst, chief of staff of the San Francisco Sheriff's Department. Ten were detained and escorted out, but there were no arrests.

"There was a lot of noise but certainly no violence," Hirst said.

The protesters yelled for the firing of Police Chief Greg Suhr. At one point, Lee addressed their chants with, "Thank you. We heard you."

Dian Wolfwood, 20, was among those booted from the building. He said police need to be held accountable.

This is Lee's third swearing-in. He was tapped in January 2011 to fill the remainder of now-Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom's term.
Man who allegedly went to DC to kidnap Obamas' dog arrested

WASHINGTON (AP)  Officials in Washington say they've arrested a North Dakota man who allegedly traveled to the nation's capital to kidnap a dog belonging to President Barack Obama.

D.C. Superior Court documents say Secret Service agents interviewed Scott D. Stockert of Dickinson, North Dakota, at a Washington hotel after receiving information that he was on his way to the capital to kidnap a "pet" owned by the first family. The first family has two Portuguese water dogs, Bo and Sunny. Officials arrested Stockert after finding weapons in his car.

A court document says that Secret Service agents interviewed Stockert on Wednesday after they received information from a Secret Service office in Minnesota that Stockert "was on his way to Washington, D.C., to kidnap the pet that belongs to the first family." During the interview, agents asked Stockert whether he had access to any weapons, and Stockert acknowledged having two guns in his truck. Agents searched the truck and found a shotgun and rifle as well as a machete, a billy club and ammunition. The court document says Stockert was not a registered gun owner and that he was charged with violating District of Columbia laws on carrying a rifle or shotgun outside a home or business.

File-This Sept. 10, 2013, file photo shows Sunny, foreground, and Bo, Portuguese water dogs belonging to President Barack Obama and his family, walking with White House employee along the West Wing of the White House in Washington. A North Dakota man who allegedly traveled to the nations capital to kidnap a dog belonging to President Barack Obama has been arrested. D.C. Superior Court documents say Secret Service agents interviewed Scott D. Stockert of Dickinson, North Dakota, after hearing from Secret Service agents in Minnesota that he was on his way to Washington to kidnap a pet owned by the first family.(AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, File)

According to court documents, Stockert told agents that he was "Jesus Christ" and that his parents were President John F. Kennedy and actress Marilyn Monroe and that he came to Washington to announce he was running for president. His attorney, Michael Madden, did not immediately return an emailed request for comment late Friday. His telephone voicemail was not accepting new messages.

Online court records show Stockert was ordered released from custody Friday but must wear an ankle monitor.

The first family's search for a dog to join them at the White House was widely publicized. On election night in 2008, then President-elect Obama said that his daughters, Sasha and Malia, had "earned the new puppy that's coming with us to the White House." Bo, a male Portuguese water dog, joined the family in 2009 and was a gift from then Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy. Sunny, a female Portuguese water dog, joined the family in 2013.

The dogs have been a regular presence at White House events. Late last year, they accompanied first lady Michelle Obama to receive the White House Christmas Tree and to welcome children to the White House during a preview of the home's holiday decorations. The decorations included larger than life replicas of the two dogs.

___
Refugee program decried after Iraqis' terror-related arrests

LOS ANGELES (AP)  The U.S. refugee program came under fresh criticism Friday after federal authorities revealed that two Iraqi-born men arrested on terrorism-related charges had come to America as refugees.

While there was no evidence the men intended or planned attacks in the United States, Republican lawmakers already concerned about the federal government's ability to properly vet Syrian refugees said the cases highlight weaknesses in the program that put Americans' safety at risk.

"How many ticking time bombs are we going to bring in in this refugee program without a proper vetting system in place?" Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas and chairman of House Homeland Security Committee, said at a news conference.

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, center, flanked by Rep. Buddy Carter R-Ga., left, and Rep. Richard Hudson, R-N.C., speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, about the arrest of two Iraqi-born men who came to the U.S. as refugees and were indicted on terrorism-related charges by federal authorities. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

He and other GOP lawmakers urged the Senate to pass legislation to block refugees from Iraq and Syria until screening is improved. The House passed a bill in November.

The uproar comes after weeks of fervent debate in Washington and on the presidential campaign trail about tighter security screens in the wake of attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California.

Immigrant advocates said they have full confidence in the vetting process and that tens of thousands of Iraqi refugees have been successfully resettled under the program.

On Thursday, federal authorities in California accused 23-year-old Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab of Sacramento of traveling to Syria to fight and lying to U.S. officials about it. Al-Jayab had come to the United States as a refugee in October 2012, and discussed on social media how he fought against the regime in Syria as a teen, authorities said.

In Texas, 24-year-old Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan of Houston was indicted on charges that he tried to provide material support to the extremists. Both suspects are Palestinians born in Iraq, authorities said.

The U.S. annually accepts 70,000 refugees from around the world, including people fleeing violence, religious persecution and war, and has announced plans to increase the number to 85,000 this year.

Since the 2001 terrorist attacks, about 785,000 refugees have arrived in the country, and fewer than 20 have been arrested or removed over terrorism-related concerns, according to the State Department.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Friday the screening of refugees is rigorous and thorough. He repeated the administration's opposition to proposals that would impose a religious test or bar individuals from the U.S. based on their ethnicity.

"That doesn't represent who we are as a country and, most importantly, it's not going to keep us safe," Earnest said.

More than 127,000 Iraqi refugees have arrived in the United States since October 2006, with the largest numbers headed toward California, Michigan and Texas, according to State Department statistics. Some Iraqis go through the U.N. refugee agency, while some can apply directly to the refugee program in Jordan, Egypt and Iraq.

Melanie Nezer, vice president for policy and advocacy at the Jewish refugee agency HIAS, said she worries the recent backlash might place law-abiding refugees under suspicion. She said she has confidence in the government's screening measures and that these are continually updated by federal intelligence officials.

"The vast majority of refugees, including Iraqi refugees, have not caused any harm to our country and will not cause any harm to our country," she said.

Federal authorities said Al-Jayab promised to provide weapons training to Al Hardan and advised him on how he would be assigned to the battlefield once he arrived in Syria. While authorities say Al Jayab fought twice in Syria, including with a group eventually linked to Islamic State, there is no indication that Al Hardan actually traveled there.

Al Hardan became a legal permanent resident of the United States in 2011 and applied in 2014 to become a U.S. citizen, authorities said. Al-Jayab was interviewed by immigration officials in 2014 for his green card and did not disclose his recent travel to Syria, authorities said.

Security screenings for immigrants and travelers have come under increased scrutiny because of recent attacks. Rules have been tightened for visa-free travel to the United States and lawmakers have vowed to look into the fiance visa program, which was used by the husband-and-wife attackers in San Bernardino who killed 14 people last month.

On Friday, senior White House officials and members of the president's national security team traveled to Silicon Valley to seek tech industry help to stop the Islamic State and other groups from radicalizing people online.

___

Associated Press writers Matthew Daly in Washington and Don Thompson in Sacramento, California, contributed to this report.

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rep, Michael McCaul, R-Texas, holds a copy of one of the indictments, as he speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, about the arrest of two Iraqi-born men who came to the United States as refugees and were indicted on terrorism-related charges by federal authorities. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, about the arrest of two Iraqi-born men who came to the U.S. as refugees and were indicted on terrorism-related charges by federal authorities. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
As crunch time nears, the reserved Jeb Bush flashes emotions

MEREDITH, New Hampshire (AP)  2016 Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush describes himself as a policy nerd, and insurgent rival Donald Trump has tagged him "low energy." But Bush is reaching deep to show voters the man inside as he fights for his political survival ahead of the New Hampshire primary vote.

In the competition to decide who will face likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in the general election, billionaire Trump leads national polls among an unpredictable mix of a dozen hopefuls with vastly different visions for the party and the country.

But Bush, the former governor of Florida who has been in the rear of the pack and fighting for survival, is speaking more passionately at campaign stops, and not just in outrage toward Trump. He's offering a closer look inside his heart  chiefly as the father of a former drug addict  than he has over the past year in his unexpectedly difficult campaign for the presidency.

In this Jan. 5, 2016, photo, Republican presidential candidate, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush speaks at the New Hampshire Forum on Addiction and the Heroin Epidemic at Southern New Hampshire University in Manchester, N.H. (AP Photo/Mary Schwalm)

"What I learned was that the pain that you feel when you have a loved one who has addiction challenges and kind of spirals out of control is something that is shared with a whole lot of people," Bush told about 300 addiction recovery advocates this week at a conference near Manchester. New Hampshire has become a center of the nation's renewed battle with heroin.

Bush's elaboration about the ordeal that he says put his family "through hell" came as the one-time front-runner showed renewed confidence campaigning in New Hampshire.

He was talking about his daughter, Noelle, who was arrested in 2002, accused of trying to fill a fraudulent prescription for Xanax, a powerful anti-anxiety medication. The arrest was a public spectacle for Bush, then a first-term governor of Florida planning to seek re-election.

He has mentioned the episode briefly during the current campaign, among the precious few personal struggles he divulges about his very public family. In May, he mentioned the difficulty of having a loved one suffering dementia, a reference to his wife's elderly mother.

With his daughter's ordeal long past, Bush said he called Noelle this week to seek her permission to discuss its impact on him. Though the wonkish Bush made certain to point out the drug treatment policy enacted during his tenure as governor, he also said the public exposure enlightened him about the plight of others.

Bush said often last year that people knew him as the son of former President George H.W. Bush and brother of former President George W. Bush, "but I'm going to have to show who I am, show my heart."

Yet he seldom went further than offering the story of meeting his wife-to-be while traveling in her native Mexico as an exchange student in high school.

Other candidates have compelling personal stories they tell with passion. Former tech company CEO Carly Fiorina, who also attended the addiction forum, has talked about losing her stepdaughter Lori to a drug overdose in 2009. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio talks with pride of his upbringing by Cuban-born parents.

While Bush shares little about his life in a dynastic Republican family, he has become more passionate with the anecdotes he shares about his time as governor.

Bush's contempt for Trump bubbled over Wednesday when he was asked by New Hampshire voter Tom Emanuel to explain why he called his Republican rival "a jerk" last month.

Bush, who often discusses action he took improving care for Florida's disabled, lashed out at Trump for mocking a New York Times reporter who is disabled during a campaign event last year.

"When anybody  anybody  disparages people with disabilities, it sets me off," Bush said.

In this Jan. 8, 2016, photo, Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush speaks during a town hall meeting at Dyar's Diner in Pendelton, S.C. Bush is trying to reach deeper to show voters the man inside as he fights for his political survival ahead of New Hampshires Republican presidential primary. (AP Photo/Richard Shiro)
Man charged with attempted murder in shooting of Philly cop

PHILADELPHIA (AP)  A man who investigators say claimed he shot and wounded a Philadelphia police officer in the name of Islam was charged Saturday with attempted murder.

Edward Archer also was charged with aggravated assault, assault of a law enforcement officer and several firearms crimes. He is being held without bail.

A preliminary hearing is scheduled for Jan. 25. The Defender Association of Philadelphia, listed in court documents as representing him, couldn't be reached Saturday for comment.

In this frame from a Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016 video provided by the Philadelphia Police Department, Edward Archer runs with a gun toward a police car driven by Officer Jesse Hartnett in Philadelphia. Archer, using a gun stolen from police, said he was acting in the name of Islam when he ambushed Hartnett sitting in his marked cruiser at an intersection, firing shots at point-blank range, authorities said. (Philadelphia Police Department via AP)

Authorities say Archer, 30, of Yeadon, fired at least 13 shots toward the officer as he patrolled his usual west Philadelphia beat shortly before midnight Thursday. They say Archer fired repeatedly as he raced toward the officer's car, then reached into the driver's side, still firing, hitting the officer three times.

Officer Jesse Hartnett, although seriously wounded, was able to get out of his car, chase the man and return fire, wounding him in the buttocks, police said. Other officers chased Archer and apprehended him about a block away.

Investigators said Archer told them he was "following Allah" and pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, and he believed the police department defends laws that are contrary to Islam.

Investigators believe Archer traveled to Saudi Arabia in 2011 and to Egypt in 2012. They are investigating the purpose of those trips, FBI special agent Eric Ruona said.

"It's definitely an area of great investigative interest to us, and we are working with our (Joint Terrorism Task Force) partners in trying to sort out what he was doing there," Ruona said Saturday.

Archer's mother told The Philadelphia Inquirer her son had been hearing voices recently and had felt targeted by police. She said the family had asked him to get help.

An attorney who briefly represented Archer in a 2012 case told WCAU-TV on Friday that his client was "always looking over his shoulder."

"He was very impulsive, he was very paranoid," Doug Dolfman, who represented Archer for three weeks after being hired by his mother, the station reported.

Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in the arm and will require multiple surgeries, but was listed in stable condition at a hospital. Archer was treated and released into police custody.

In March, Archer pleaded guilty to firearms and assault charges but was immediately released and placed on probation. Court documents also indicate he was scheduled to be sentenced Monday in suburban Philadelphia in a traffic and forgery case.

The 9 mm pistol recovered at the scene of the shooting had been stolen from a fellow police officer's home in October 2013, and investigators were trying to find out how Archer obtained the weapon and whether it passed through other people's hands since the theft.

An investigator takes a box from one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

An investigator takes a box from one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Law enforcement standby as investigators work the scene at one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Investigators work the scene at one of the residences, center, where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

This undated photo provided by the Philadelphia Police Department shows Edward Archer, who police say ambushed a Philadelphia police officer at point-blank range with a stolen gun on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016. (Philadelphia Police Department via AP)

This undated photo provided by the Philadelphia Police Department shows Philadelphia Police Officer Jesse Hartnett. A gunman ambushed the police officer in his marked cruiser at an intersection, striking him multiple times in the arm during a barrage of bullets and fleeing before being apprehended, officials said Friday. (Philadelphia Police Department via AP)
As Iraq fights Islamic State, violence rises in Shiite south

BAGHDAD (AP)  As the sun sets over Iraq's southern city of Basra, Ahmed Hilal rushes to lock his door. At night, every knock sends his heart beating faster. In the morning, the father of three or someone he trusts walks his children to school, barely five minutes away.

Fear has become part of daily life amid a surge of violence in Basra, where rampant crime, kidnappings and extortion have become commonplace. Marauding Shiite militiamen drive around in cars with tinted windows and without plates, while local clans wage bloody feuds.

"If someone knocks on the door, I pray to God that nothing bad will happen," said the 40-year-old Hilal, a school employee. "Any sound of shooting, even if it's far away, scares us. "

In this Dec. 19, 2015 photo Ahmed Hilal grieves by his nephew's poster Ali Hussein was shot dead by thieves in broad daylight to steal his car, in Basra, 340 miles (550 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, Iraq. Local officials blame the lack of security forces, many of them have been dispatched to front lines, for the soaring thefts, armed robberies, kidnapping for ransom, bloody tribal disputes and drug trafficking. Residents complain that political infighting over government posts and growing influence of Shiite militias have exacerbated the situation and weakened the role of the remaining security forces in the province. (AP Photo/Nabil al-Jurani)

Basra and Iraq's southern Shiite heartland were spared from the Islamic State group, which seized much of northern and western Iraq in 2014. But as Iraq has struggled to combat the group, security forces have increasingly been redeployed from the south, leaving a security vacuum that has been filled by unruly militias and criminal gangs.

Local officials blame the lack of police for soaring theft, armed robberies, kidnappings for ransom, bloody tribal disputes and an uptick in drug trafficking. Residents complain that infighting over government posts and the growing influence of Shiite militias have exacerbated the situation.

Last month, Hilal's nephew was shot and killed in broad daylight by car thieves. The young man's last moments were caught by the surveillance camera of a nearby store. The video shows him trying to run away from the car with the keys after pulling over. One of the attackers chases after him and guns him down before the carjackers speed away.

A Basra security official said an Iraqi military division of about 8,000 troops redeployed from the region in late 2014 to join the fight against IS, along with a police battalion of about 500 troops, leaving nine incomplete police battalions and only one army battalion for the entire Basra province, which has a population of about 3 million.

The result, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss security matters with the media, has been a wave of armed robberies targeting homes, cars, jewelry stores and currency exchanges, as well as a resurgence in tribal clashes and an increase in drug trafficking from neighboring Iran to Gulf Arab states.

Local officials contacted by The Associated Press declined to give specific figures on the violence, but Basra councilman Ahmed Abdul-Hussein was quoted by the al-Mada local newspaper as saying that police registered 1,200 criminal cases in the past four months, mainly killings, kidnappings, robberies and tribal disputes.

Basra, about 550 kilometers (340 miles) southeast of the Baghdad, is Iraq's second-largest province and home to about 70 percent of its proven oil reserves of 143.1 billion barrels. Located on the Persian Gulf and bordering Kuwait and Iran, it is also Iraq's only outlet to the sea and the hub for most of the country's oil exports of nearly 3.8 million barrels a day. Last month, daily exports averaged about 3.215 million barrels from Basra.

Several Basra residents, who spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity fearing for their safety, painted a picture of pervasive lawlessness. Armed tribesmen fight each other and sometimes besiege oil fields, demanding jobs for their sons, they said.

A truck driver described how gunmen opened fire as he was driving on the highway one night in November, just north of Basra. They forced him to pull over, grabbed him and took him to a nearby farm, where they held him for five days. He was released after his family paid $10,000 in ransom.

Traumatized, the truck driver left his job and is now unemployed.

"I'm afraid that I might get kidnapped again and this time, we have no money to pay anymore," he said.

Basra governor Majid al-Nasrawi recounted a November heist in which a gang robbed employees of a local security company who were on their way to their office from a bank with the equivalent of nearly $1 million in cash for company salaries. Police arrested some of the gang members in December but only retrieved about half the money.

In October, gunmen stole about 600 million Iraqi dinars (about $500,000) in salaries from the state-run South Oil Company, said al-Nasrawi.

Outside Basra, dozens of militants driving SUVs raided a camp for falconry hunters last month in a remote desert area in Samawah province, abducting up to 26 Qatari hunters. Since then, there has been no word on their fate.

In an effort to boost security, the governor recently announced a door-to-door campaign to disarm tribes in Basra's northern suburbs. He warned provincial security forces and pro-government Shiite militias they would be disarmed, sacked and prosecuted if they take part in tribal fighting.

The Interior Ministry dispatched an intelligence unit to Basra last month to help contain the situation. Iraq's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, also raised the alarm in a recent Friday sermon, denouncing the tribal disputes that have "left dozens of innocent people dead" in Basra.

In recent months, Basra activists have staged protests to demand the resignation of senior local officials and better security and public services. They also recently launched a campaign entitled "Stop the Killing" to draw attention to the violence, activist Haider Abdul-Amir Salman said.

Like many of his friends, Salman said his family has faced attacks and threats. They survived unharmed when gunmen tossed a bomb into their home in September. The 40-year-old doctor and father of two said he escaped a kidnapping attempt on him and his son.

"Basra is suffering," said Salman. "And the crimes won't stop as long as weapons are everywhere and the tribes protect the criminals."

_____

Associated Press writer Nabil al-Jourani contributed to this report from Basra, Iraq.

_____

Follow Sinan Salaheddin on Twitter at https://twitter.com/sinansm

In this Dec. 19, 2015 photo suspects murderers and thieves in the police custody at police headquarters in Basra, 340 miles (550 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, Iraq. Local officials blame the lack of security forces, many of them have been dispatched to front lines, for the soaring thefts, armed robberies, kidnapping for ransom, bloody tribal disputes and drug trafficking. Residents complain that political infighting over government posts and growing influence of Shiite militias have exacerbated the situation and weakened the role of the remaining security forces in the province. (AP Photo/Nabil al-Jurani)

In this Dec. 19, 2015 photo a policeman displayed weapons used by murderers and thieves, at police headquarters in Basra, 340 miles (550 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, Iraq. Local officials blame the lack of security forces, many of them have been dispatched to front lines, for the soaring thefts, armed robberies, kidnapping for ransom, bloody tribal disputes and drug trafficking. Residents complain that political infighting over government posts and growing influence of Shiite militias have exacerbated the situation and weakened the role of the remaining security forces in the province. (AP Photo/Nabil al-Jurani)

In this Dec. 18, 2015 photo security forces deploy in Basra, 340 miles (550 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, Iraq. Local officials blame the lack of security forces, many of them have been dispatched to front lines, for the soaring thefts, armed robberies, kidnapping for ransom, bloody tribal disputes and drug trafficking. Residents complain that political infighting over government posts and growing influence of Shiite militias have exacerbated the situation and weakened the role of the remaining security forces in the province. (AP Photo/Nabil al-Jurani)
FIFA ethics judges send written verdict to Blatter

ZURICH (AP)  Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini can now launch appeals against their eight-year bans from football after FIFA's ethics committee judges sent them full written reasons for the verdicts.

Lawyers for Blatter and Platini needed the documents received Saturday to file formal appeals with FIFA, world soccer's governing body.

FIFA refused Platini's request last month to bypass its process and appeal directly to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

"The adjudicatory chamber of the independent ethics committee has fulfilled its commitment to provide the grounds for the respective decisions to Mr. Blatter and Mr. Platini within the first half of January 2016 as they had previously been informed," the judges said in a statement

Blatter wants to be cleared before the Feb. 26 FIFA election congress.

Platini has given up on being a candidate to succeed his former mentor Blatter but wants to clear his name and retain his presidency of European soccer body UEFA. Platini's communication team told The Associated Press that they received all the documents needed on Friday night and will likely lodge their appeal with FIFA on Monday.

Blatter and Platini deny wrongdoing but were judged last month to have broken ethics rules on conflicts of interest, breach of loyalty and offering or receiving gifts.
16 injured, mostly kids, in Bangkok shopping mall accident

BANGKOK (AP)  Sixteen people were injured, most of them children, at one of Bangkok's upscale shopping malls Saturday when a tent at an outdoor event came crashing down on them, officials said.

The accident at Siam Paragon shopping mall appeared to have been caused by strong winds that caused the tent to collapse, said Lt. Gen. Sanit Mahathaworn, Bangkok's acting police chief.

"Strong wind caused the tent to fly up, about one meter. Then wooden signs attached to the back of the tent flew off and injured nearby people," he said.

Among the injured were at least 12 children, aged 6 to 9, who were among dozens of people at an event called "Pokemon Day Dance Party" to celebrate Thailand's Children's Day, Sanit and other officials said.

"A mother and her child suffered broken legs. The mother was trying to protect her child from getting hurt," Sanit said. The injured were taken to a nearby hospital.

Siam Paragon issued a statement saying it "would like to regretfully apologize for the accident which injured a total of 16 people" on behalf of the event's organizers, which included other Thai companies. It said organizers sent all the injured to hospitals and by Saturday evening only two remained hospitalized.
Blast in crowded market injures 8 in India's northeast

GAUHATI, India (AP)  A blast in a crowded market in India's troubled northeast on Saturday wounded at least eight people, three of them seriously, police said.

Police officer Davies Marak blamed the outlawed Garo National Liberation Army, a militant group, for the explosion at a liquor shop in Williamnagar, a district headquarters of Meghalaya state.

Marak said the injured were hospitalized in East Garo Hills district, 235 kilometers (145 miles) west of Shillong, the state capital. An improvised explosive device was used in the attack, he said.

The GNLA is a group known for killings, kidnappings, extortion, bomb blasts and attacks on security forces. It has been fighting for a separate Garo region within the state.
Mozambique park sees wildlife numbers grow in wake of war

JOHANNESBURG (AP)  Lions are getting pregnant and the waterbuck population is soaring at one of Mozambique's main national parks, once the scene of fighting during a civil war which virtually wiped out the park's lions, elephants and many other species.

The 15-year conflict that killed up to 1 million people ended in 1992, and some former battlefield foes are now working together as rangers at Gorongosa National Park, where foreign donors and conservationists helped launch a turnaround on a continent accustomed to bad news about wildlife welfare.

Still, the park remains vulnerable to poachers and other problems. Tourism dropped in 2013 and 2014 during sporadic violence linked to the rivalry between Renamo, Mozambique's main opposition group, and its former adversary during the civil war, the ruling Frelimo party. The park is also in Sofala province, an opposition stronghold in central Mozambique.

In this webcam image taken and supplied by WildCam Gorongosa, baboons walk at a watering hole in the Gorongosa National Park, central Mozambique. Lions are getting pregnant and the waterbuck population is soaring at one of Mozambiques main national parks, once the scene of fighting during a civil war whose combatants virtually wiped out the parks lions, elephants and many other species. (WildCam Gorogosa via AP)

Gorongosa became a national park under Portuguese colonizers in 1960. The decade that followed is considered the park's heyday; actors John Wayne and Gregory Peck and author James Michener went on safari there, according to the park's website.

The civil war began in 1977 after Portugal's exit from Mozambique. Fighters killed Gorongosa's elephants for their ivory and slaughtered other animals, emptying a once-teeming landscape. Widespread poaching continued after a peace deal.

Today, there is a lot to see, thanks largely to a 2008 deal in which a non-profit group founded by American philanthropist Greg Carr pledged at least $1.2 million annually to the restoration of Gorongosa for 20 years. More funding came from European governments, the United States Agency for International Development and other donors.

Workers have built tourism facilities, planted trees and relocated buffalos, hippos and elephants from neighboring South Africa into Gorongosa; money has flowed to poor local communities whose support for the park is seen as indispensable.

"Things are really starting to go quite fast," said Marc Stalmans, director of scientific services at Gorongosa, which encompasses 1,570 square miles (4,070 square kilometers) and was expanded to include the mountain of the same name in 2010.

The numbers tell a remarkable story of recovery, particularly at a time when populations of threatened species are under pressure from poachers and human encroachment elsewhere in Mozambique and in much of the rest of Africa. Even so, the counts in Gorongosa are generally far below what they were before the war.

The estimated elephant population went from 2,500 in the early 1970s, to fewer than 200 in 2000, and more than 500 in 2014. Similarly, researchers have counted nearly 60 lions, double the number a few years ago, but below the estimated 200 in 1972.

Four lions were pregnant in December, and at least one of them has produced a litter, Stalmans wrote in an email to The Associated Press.

"The biggest cause of mortality is lions becoming 'by-catch' in snares and traps set for antelopes by the poachers," Stalmans said. "A significant percentage of our lions have lost toes or part of a paw to snares and traps but managed to break loose. Some unfortunately die."

The waterbuck population is more than 34,000, 10 times the figure recorded 40 years ago. It is likely the single largest group of waterbuck in Africa, according to park managers.

Jen Guyton, an ecologist working in Gorongosa, believes one reason that waterbucks have bred so fast is because, unlike other antelope, they like eating weeds that replaced grasses on floodplains, a change in vegetation possibly related to the massive loss of wildlife during the war. Experts have noted significant changes in the ecosystem, apparently linked to the animal slaughter, and are trying to understand them.

Another theory is that waterbuck survived the civil war in greater numbers than other species, and are simply growing in population at what is considered a normal rate.

Most of the park is inaccessible by road. To keep track of wildlife, researchers have installed 50 motion-sensitive cameras, amassing several hundred thousand images. Some cameras can only be reached by helicopter, including in limestone gorges. Some cameras were destroyed by elephants or inundated by rising rivers and were replaced.

Under Gorongosa's "WildCam" project, online volunteers help sort the vast amount of data, logging onto an interactive website and identifying animals in photos, noting how many are visible and reporting what they are doing ("resting" and "eating" are options).

The wildlife resurgence has led to new challenges, including conflict between villagers and elephants encroaching on farmland. Also, the goal of a park reliant on its own revenue is distant  it reported just 2,300 tourists in 2015, far below visitor numbers in major parks in, for example, South Africa and Kenya.

Gorongosa's last rhinos, a species under heavy threat today, were wiped out in the 1970s. One day, park managers hope, rhinos will again roam there.

___

http://www.gorongosa.org/

http://www.wildcamgorongosa.org/#/

___

Follow Christopher Torchia on Twitter at www.twitter.com/torchiachris

In this webcam image taken and supplied by WildCam Gorongosa, a bird and other wildlife drink at watering hole in the Gorongosa National Park, central Mozambique. Lions are getting pregnant and the waterbuck population is soaring at one of Mozambiques main national parks, once the scene of fighting during a civil war whose combatants virtually wiped out the parks lions, elephants and many other species. (WildCam Gorogosa via AP)
Moldova: 20 hurt after gas bottle "explodes" at restaurant

CHISINAU, Moldova (AP)  Authorities say 20 people have been injured, three of them seriously, after an explosion lunchtime at a restaurant in the Moldovan capital.

Spokeswoman for the Exceptional Situations Service, Diana Turcan, said preliminary findings indicate the blast occurred after a bottle of gas exploded Saturday at the "La Soacra" restaurant in downtown Chisinau.

A spokesman for the Burns Center, Valerian Cirimpei, said 12 people were hospitalized at the unit, with two suffering serious burns to their respiratory tract. Eight were hospitalized at the Emergency Hospital and one woman is in a serious condition.

Turcan said fire fighters extinguished the blaze in 15 minutes. It spread over a surface of 55 square meters (590 sq. feet).
Cyclists to face 10 summit finishes in 2016 Spanish Vuelta

MADRID (AP)  Spanish Vuelta riders will face 10 summit finishes this year, one more than last year.

Organizers on Saturday unveiled the route for the 21-stage event from Aug. 20-Sept. 11, a race that again will provide a high level of difficulty that should favor strong climbers.

The Vuelta will begin with a team time trial in the northwestern region of Galicia, and finish with a flat stage in the capital of Madrid. For the first time, it will pass through the mountains of Aubisque, in French territory, and will also return to Bilbao in Spain's Basque region.

The route includes a 39-kilometer (24-mile) individual time trial. Riders will have two rest days to complete the 3,277-kilometer (2,036-mile) event.
Close it? Campaign seeks to shutter NYC's Rikers Island jail

NEW YORK (AP)  Inside and outside of New York City's government, chatter is increasing about a once-unthinkable idea: shutting down the notorious Rikers Island jail complex.

A coalition of dozens of advocacy groups says it intends to pressure the mayor and other elected officials to take a stand, arguing the 400-acre island in the East River where most of the city's 10,000 inmates are held is too broken to be fixed, plagued by a culture of brutality, misconduct and corruption.

They are up against a formidable opposition that derides the effort as a fantasy that ignores political and practical realities.

FILE- This June 20, 2014, file photo, shows Rikers Island, New York's biggest lockup. A growing advocacy movement is gearing up to pressure New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio to spend considerable capital to shut down the scandal-scarred jail complex, which they argue is too broken to reform. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)

Backers of the shut-it-down movement say the fundamental problem with Rikers is the very nature of the isolated and decades-old jail compound itself. They propose drastically decreasing the inmate population through changes in bail, diversion programs and other means, and then building a collection of new, better-designed jails in the city's five boroughs, where defendants are arrested and tried.

"This issue is no longer fringe; it's now mainstream," said Glenn Martin, founder of the nonprofit group JustLeadershipUSA, which seeks to decrease the number of Americans behind bars. "This is much more political than it is policy, and it requires people spending political capital and having the courage to do it."

Modeling their efforts on the nearly decade-long successful effort to change the state's harsh Rockefeller-era drug laws, advocates are specifically targeting Mayor Bill de Blasio, framing the effort as a legacy piece for the liberal Democrat who was swept into office with a promise to fix inequities in the nation's largest city.

De Blasio's criminal justice coordinator, Liz Glazer, didn't dismiss the idea, noting the administration is trying to reduce the number of people who go to jail.

"We definitely subscribe to the idea that things need to change in a fundamental way," Glazer said. "There are a lot of ways that can happen. Certainly moving off the island is one of them."

But Glazer noted that doing so would be neither easy nor necessarily up to the city alone. The inmate population would have to be cut in half "to even be in the ballpark," she said, adding that leeway on bail requires the approval of state lawmakers and that faster court processing times are up to multiple stakeholders.

The push for changes at Rikers began in 2014 after reports by The Associated Press on dozens of deaths there that highlighted poor supervision, questionable medical care and failure to prevent suicides.

Progress has been modest. The administration has invested tens of millions to recruit and train new guards, appointed a reform-minded commissioner who has reduced the use of solitary confinement, and overhauled how 16- and 17-year-old inmates are jailed.

But violence remains high, with overall use-of-force figures and jailhouse stabbings and slashings up, even as the inmate population continues to decline.

Opposition to shuttering Rikers comes not just from those in neighborhoods that could conceivably absorb the new jails, but also from some who see the effort as inherently risky and others who reject the notion that the complex is unsalvageable.

"I can't think of anything less politically realistic than building jails across communities in the five boroughs, so I prefer to focus my reform efforts on what's possible and doable," said Councilman Rory Lancman.

The powerful correction officers' union boss, Norman Seabrook, said he also opposes the idea, arguing advocates should pressure the city to invest in rebuilding the dilapidated Rikers "rather than just simply saying, 'Burn it down.'"

A spokesman for City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito said she is studying the idea.

Among those who supported the idea at a recent forum on the issue was City Comptroller Scott Stringer, who said that while city officials continue to implement federally mandated reforms to curb guard brutality and misconduct, they should also envision a world without Rikers.

"We need to create a 21st-century corrections system that is a national model, rather than an urban shame," he said. "As we implement the consent decree, I believe we must also plan for the day when Rikers Island can be safely and responsibly closed."

____
Syrian government ready to attend peace talks in Geneva

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP)  The Syrian government announced Saturday it is ready to attend peace talks later this month with the opposition in Geneva as a new airstrike in northern Syria killed and wounded scores of people, including many militants.

But Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem said Damascus also wants to see lists of the opposition groups who will attend and ensure that "terrorist" groups will not be represented.

State news agency SANA said al-Moallem made his comments Saturday while meeting in Damascus with U.N. envoy Staffan de Mistura. Al-Moallem's comments came shortly before opposition activists said an airstrike had killed at least 39 and wounded dozens of others.

In this photo released by the Syrian official news agency SANA, Syria's Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem, second right, meets with U.N. Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura, second left, in Damascus, Syria, Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016. Syria is ready to attend peace talks later this month in Geneva but the government wants to see lists of the opposition groups who will attend and ensure that "terrorist" groups that will not, the country's foreign minister said Saturday according to SANA. (SANA via AP)

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 39 people were killed, including many fighters from al-Qaida's affiliate in Syria, the Nusra Front, as well as detainees in the northwestern town of Maaret al-Numan. It said the targeted area included a jail and a courthouse run by Nusra Front.

The Nusra Front is one of the country's most powerful factions and is opposed to peace talks with the government, saying its aim is to step up an Islamic state in Syria. The group is fighting against government forces, the Islamic State group as well as some U.S.-backed rebel factions. Much like its rival, the Islamic State group, the Nusra Front imposes its own vision of Islamic Shariah law in territories it controls  including Islamic courts and prisons.

The Syrian government has been carrying out airstrikes for years, which activists say have killed thousands of people. Russia began its own air campaign on Sept. 30 saying its airstrikes are meant to weaken the Islamic State group and other "terrorists" in Syria.

The Local Coordination Committees, another activist group, said the airstrike killed 51. The group posted a photo on its Facebook page showing several bodies covered with blankets and lined on a pavement. Another showed two dead bearded young men being loaded into an ambulance.

Syria-based activist Hadi Abdallah wrote on his Twitter account that the air raid killed 43 and wounded more than 100, claiming it was carried out by Russian aircraft.

The "terrifying massacres was carried out by Russian warplanes," Abdallah wrote, without saying why he believed they were Russian.

Conflicting casualty figures are common in the aftermath of airstrikes in Syria.

The Observatory said the warplanes fired four missiles that hit the Islamic court, which includes a jail, as well as a nearby road linking the court with a market.

De Mistura arrived in Beirut later Saturday and boarded a plane heading to Qatar, airport officials said in Beirut on condition of anonymity in line with regulations. He arrived in Syria on Friday and earlier this week, he met Syrian opposition officials in Saudi Arabia  a main backer of some of the rebel groups trying to remove President Bashar Assad from power.

A statement Saturday from De Mistura's office described his meeting with al-Moallem as "useful" and said the U.N. envoy is "looking forward to the active participation of all relevant parties" in the upcoming talks.

The Syrian government refers to all those battling to overthrow Assad as terrorists and has said the talks should focus on battling terrorism.

The opposition wants Assad to step down as part of any peace deal.

The U.N. is urging the two sides to meet Jan. 25 in an effort to end the conflict, which has killed more than 250,000 people and caused a massive refugee crisis.

Conferences in Geneva in 2014 failed to bring about a settlement, though this round is seen as particularly urgent after the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution last month endorsing a transitional plan for Syria.

The Syrian opposition is demanding some gestures by the government ahead of the talks including lifting sieges imposed on rebel-held areas, releasing some detainees and ending airstrikes.

Also Saturday, International Committee of the Red Cross spokesman Pawel Krzysiek told The Associated Press that aid convoys could reach the rebel-held border town of Madaya on Monday. The town has been under siege since July and the government said it will allow aid to flow inside.

Krzysiek added that aid won't be able to reach Madaya and the two besieged northern Shiite village of Foua and Kfarya before Monday "for logistical reasons."

"Right now, preparations are underway. We are loading the trucks and sending the movement notifications," Krzysiek said.

____

Mroue reported from Beirut.
Things to know: The armed standoff in Oregon

BURNS, Ore. (AP)  A small, armed group has been occupying a remote national wildlife refuge in Oregon for a week to protest federal land use policies.

The leader of the group  Ammon Bundy  has repeatedly rejected calls to leave buildings at the refuge despite pleas from the county sheriff, from many local residents, and from Oregon's governor, among others. The standoff is a battle of wills between Bundy and Harney County Sheriff David Ward, who has become the public face of efforts by federal, state and local law officials to end the occupation peacefully. Bundy  who is not an Oregonian  insists he speaks for the interests of Harney County residents. But Ward says the community wants him to go.

HOW DID THIS START?

Cowboy Dwane Ehmer, of Irrigon Ore., a supporter of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, rides his horse at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Three Oregon sheriffs met with leaders of an armed group to try to persuade them to end their occupation of the federal wildlife refuge after many local residents made it plain that's what they want. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

The group seized buildings at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge on Jan. 2 following a peaceful rally in support of two Oregon ranchers facing additional prison time for convictions of arson. The group says the case of the father-and-son ranchers, Dwight and Steve Hammond, is emblematic of onerous federal land use policies that make it difficult for ranchers, loggers and others in the West.

EXACTLY WHO IS OCCUPYING THE REFUGE?

The group calls itself Citizens for Constitutional Freedom. Ammon Bundy hasn't provided exact numbers but it's believed there are about two dozen people involved - some from as far away as Arizona and Michigan. Ammon Bundy is one of the sons of rancher Cliven Bundy, who was involved in a 2014 Nevada standoff with the government over grazing rights. Ammon Bundy says they will leave when there's a plan in place to turn over federal lands to locals.

WHAT ARE THE AUTHORITIES DOING AND HOW ARE LOCALS REACTING?

Federal and local officials have not moved to oust the group or arrest them. Harney County Sheriff David Ward met Thursday with Bundy. He has said the group needs to go so locals can get back to their lives. While some in the local community are sympathetic to Bundy's group, Ward was cheered at a packed community meeting in Burns, Oregon, on Wednesday evening when he said the group needed to leave.

WHY IS LAND USE SUCH A HOT TOPIC IN THE WEST?

The federal government manages most of the land in many Western states. It owns 85 percent of Nevada, 66 percent of Utah, 62 percent of both Idaho and Alaska, and 53 percent of Oregon. While ranchers and others object to what they say are unfair rules, environmentalists say mining, logging and ranching have run roughshod for decades on public land and left a legacy of pollution for taxpayers to clean up.

WHO ARE THE HAMMONDS?

Dwight Hammond and his son Steven Hammond have distanced themselves from Bundy's group and reported to prison Monday. The Hammonds were convicted of arson three years ago and served no more than a year. A judge later ruled that the terms fell short of minimum sentences requiring them to serve about four more years. Federal officials repeatedly accused the ranchers of breaking environmental laws and declining to follow rules. Over the years, officials refused to renew some of the family's grazing allotments and increased fees on others. They also restricted access to water sources used by the Hammonds. In the local community neighbors described them as kind and generous, supporting charitable causes.

WHERE IS THIS HEADED?

That's anybody's guess. The strategy of law enforcement seems to be to show Bundy and his followers that most local residents want them to leave, and that way avoid a confrontation. With the Hammonds voluntarily going to prison, Bundy's end-game is not clear. He has been using the occupation to speak out for more local control of public lands. Bundy said Friday that at some point he will accept Sheriff Ward's offer of an escort out of the refuge to assure safe passage. Bundy also floated the idea of "transferring what we are doing" to a group local of supporters. On Saturday, a convoy of more than a dozen pickup trucks carrying armed men arrived at the wildlife refuge. Some of the men carrying rifles told journalists they were there to help with security, The Oregonian reported.

Burns resident Steve Atkins, left, talks with Ammon Bundy, right, one of the sons of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, following a news conference at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Bundy, the leader of a small, armed group occupying a national wildlife refuge in Oregon says the activists have no immediate plans to leave. Atkins said, the majority of the people of Burns wanted them to leave. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Ammon Bundy, center, one of the sons of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, speaks with reporter at a news conference at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Bundy, the leader of a small, armed group occupying a national wildlife refuge in Oregon says the activists have no immediate plans to leave. Bundy spoke to reporters Friday, a day after meeting with a local sheriff who asked the group to go. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

LaVoy Finicum, center, a rancher from Arizona, speaks to reporters as his family looks on, left, during a news conference at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Ammon Bundy, the leader of a small, armed group occupying a national wildlife refuge in Oregon says the activists have no immediate plans to leave. Bundy spoke to reporters Friday, a day after meeting with a local sheriff who asked the group to go. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Cowboy Dwane Ehmer, of Irrigon Ore., a supporter of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, holds a U.S. flag as he talks with a journalist next to a manned watch tower Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. A small, armed group occupying the wildlife preserve has said repeatedly that local people should control federal lands, but critics say the lands are already managed to help everyone from ranchers to recreationalists. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Cowboy Dwane Ehmer, of Irrigon Ore., a supporter of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, holds a U.S. flag as he rides his horse in the refuge Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. A small, armed group occupying the wildlife preserve has said repeatedly that local people should control federal lands, but critics say the lands are already managed to help everyone from ranchers to recreationalists. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Ryan Bundy, one of the sons of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, walks to a news conference at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. The small, armed group occupying the wildlife preserve has said repeatedly that local people should control federal lands, but critics say the lands are already managed to help everyone from ranchers to recreationalists. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Ryan Bundy, one of the sons of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, walks to a news conference at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. A small, armed group occupying the wildlife preserve has said repeatedly that local people should control federal lands, but critics say the lands are already managed to help everyone from ranchers to recreationalists. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

A member of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters looks on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Cheers erupted Wednesday evening at a packed community meeting in rural Oregon when a sheriff said it was time for a small, armed group occupying the national wildlife refuge to "pick up and go home." (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

A member of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters stands next to a fire Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Cheers erupted Wednesday evening at a packed community meeting in rural Oregon when a sheriff said it was time for a small, armed group occupying the national wildlife refuge to "pick up and go home." (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

An American flag hangs on the sign at the front entrance of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. Cheers erupted Wednesday evening at a packed community meeting in rural Oregon when a sheriff said it was time for a small, armed group occupying the national wildlife refuge to "pick up and go home." (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Cowboy Dwane Ehmer, of Irrigon Ore., a supporter of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, rides his horse Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. The leader of an American Indian tribe that regards the Oregon nature preserve as sacred issued a rebuke Wednesday to the armed men who are occupying the property, saying they are not welcome at the snowy bird sanctuary and must leave. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Cowboy Dwane Ehmer, of Irrigon Ore., a supporter of the group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, rides his horse Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016, near Burns, Ore. The leader of an American Indian tribe that regards the Oregon nature preserve as sacred issued a rebuke Wednesday to the armed men who are occupying the property, saying they are not welcome at the snowy bird sanctuary and must leave. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Jesse Svejcar expresses his opinion during a community meeting with Harney County Sheriff David Ward, right, Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, in Burns, Ore. With the takeover entering its fourth day Wednesday, authorities had not removed the armed group occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon's high desert country. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Georgia Marshall, a rancher, expresses her opinion during a community meeting with Harney County Sheriff David Ward Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, in Burns, Ore. With the takeover entering its fourth day Wednesday, authorities had not removed the group of roughly 20 people from the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon's high desert country. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Merlin Rupp, 80, voices his opinion to Harney County Sheriff David Ward during a community meeting at the Harney County fairgrounds Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, in Burns, Ore. With the takeover entering its fourth day Wednesday, authorities had not removed the group of roughly 20 people from the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon's high desert country. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Harney County Sheriff David Ward arrives to a community meeting at the Harney County fairgrounds Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, in Burns, Ore. With the takeover entering its fourth day Wednesday, authorities had not removed the group of roughly 20 people from the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon's high desert country. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)
Latest: Penn says Guzman interested in film about life

MEXICO CITY (AP)  The latest on Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman who was recaptured six months after he escaped from a maximum security prison: (all times local)

10:45 p.m.

U.S. actor Sean Penn writes in his article in Rolling Stone magazine that Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was interested in having a movie filmed about his life.

FILE - In this Oct. 8, 2015 file photo, Sean Penn speaks during a forum with young entrepreneurs during the IMF and World Bank annual meeting in Lima, Peru. Late Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016, Rolling Stone magazine published an interview that Guzman apparently gave to Penn in his hideout in Mexico months before his recapture. In the article and interview, Penn describes the complicated measures he took to meet the legendary drug lord. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)

Penn purportedly met with Guzman in late 2015, before the drug lord's capture by security forces, at an undisclosed hideout in Mexico. The interview appeared late Saturday on the magazine's website.

Penn writes that Guzman wanted Mexican actress Kate del Castillo, who facilitated the meeting between the men, involved in the project.

"He was interested in seeing the story of his life told on film, but would entrust its telling only to Kate," Penn wrote in the article.

___

9:40 p.m.

A Mexican law enforcement official says recaptured drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman's secret interview with actor Sean Penn helped authorities locate his whereabouts.

Guzman was arrested early Friday after a shootout in his home state of Sinaloa that killed five and injured one marine.

Mexico Attorney General Arely Gomez said Friday that Guzman's contact with actors and producers for a biopic helped gave law enforcement a new lead on tracking and capturing the world's most notorious drug kingpin.

The official, who spoke Saturday on condition of anonymity, said it was the Penn interview that led authorities to Guzman in a rural part of Durango state in October. They aborted their raid at the time because he was with two women and child.  Katherine Corcoran.

 Corrects that Sinaloa is his home state.

___

9:30 p.m.

Rolling Stone magazine reports that the meeting between drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman and U.S. actor Sean Penn was brokered by Mexican actress Kate del Castillo.

The magazine's website has a two-minute video it says is the first ever exclusive interview with Guzman. It is in Spanish and in it Guzman sits in front of a chain link face and speaks to a camera. He is wearing a print blue shirt and dark baseball cap, but his face is clearly visible. Accompanying the article is a picture of Penn shaking hands with Guzman.

In the interview, when asked about whether he is responsible for the high level of drug addiction in the world Guzman responds: "No, that is false, because the day I don't exist, it's not going to decrease in any way at all. Drug trafficking? That's false."

___

8:40 p.m.

Rolling Stone magazine is reporting that Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman met with U.S. Sean Penn in his hideout in Mexico months before his recapture by Mexican marines in his home state of Sinaloa.

In an article published late Saturday in the magazine, and authored by Penn, the actor describes the complicated measures he took to meet the legendary drug lord. He discusses topics ranging from drug trafficking to Middle East politics with Guzman.

The article follows reports that Guzman had reached out to Hollywood about filming a biopic of his life.

___

6:15 p.m.

A Mexican federal official says that the quickest recaptured drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman would be extradited to the United States is six months.

The official, who was not authorized to talk to the press and spoke on condition of anonymity, says even that is not likely because lawyers file appeals. He says the appeals are usually turned down, but that each one means a judge has to schedule a hearing.

"That can take weeks or months, and that delays the extradition," he says. "We've had cases that take six years."

The U.S. has sought Guzman's extradition and a Mexican law enforcement official says the country is prepared to do it.  Katherine Corcoran.

___

5:40 p.m.

Argentine author and journalist Diego Fonseca says he was approached by a publishing house he can't name in 2012 and told that Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was looking for a biographer. He would be taken to an airport in a location to be revealed later.

"They would move me from place to place and I wouldn't carry a cellphone," Fonseca says. "He wanted to tell his story before he got turned in."

The messages came to the publishing house from various telephones and a doctor who was supposedly close to Guzman. After a while they stopped.

"They pulled back. All of sudden they were worried about the security of El Chapo," Fonseca says.

___

5:25 p.m.

Mexico's attorney general says Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman wanted to make a biopic, and his lawyers' conversations with actors and producers helped lead authorities to his capture. But Malcolm Beith, author of "The Last Narco: Inside the Hunt for El Chapo, the World's Most Wanted Drug Lord," says that doesn't sound like the Guzman he studied to write his 2010 book.

Beith says Guzman doesn't like the star aspect of being a top drug lord, unlike the late Colombian drug kingpin Pablo Escobar. Guzman doesn't live an ostentatious life and prefers to go around in blue jeans and baseball cap.

"The narcissism there was more for power and control of the business," he says.

But Beith speculates that Guzman could want such a project for financial reasons, to leave money for his family since the Mexican and U.S. governments have seized so many of his properties in the last year in an effort to shut him down.

___

4:45 p.m.

Drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman's lawyer says that his client "shouldn't be extradited to the United States or any other foreign country."

Juan Pablo Badillo says that is because "Mexico has laws grounded in the constitution. Our country must respect national sovereignty, the sovereignty of its institutions to impart justice."

Badillo earlier told the Milenio newspaper that the defense already has filed six motions to challenge extradition requests. He said several months ago that the extradition requests from the U.S. were the reason Guzman escaped.

___

2:30 p.m.

A Mexican federal law enforcement official says the country is willing to extradite recaptured drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman to the United States. That's a sharp reversal from the government's position after his last capture in 2014.

The official says "Mexico is ready" for an extradition and "there are to cooperate with the U.S." He spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to comment.

He also cautioned that extradition might not come soon. Experts say the legal process could be lengthy and Guzman's attorney is saying he'll battle extradition in the courts.

Guzman was recaptured Friday, six months after breaking out of the country's top maximum security prison.

Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is made to face the press as he is escorted to a helicopter in handcuffs by Mexican soldiers and marines at a federal hangar in Mexico City, Mexico, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced that Guzman had been recaptured six months after escaping from a maximum security prison. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)

Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, right, is escorted by soldiers and marines to a waiting helicopter, at a federal hangar in Mexico City, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016. The world's most wanted drug lord was recaptured by Mexican marines Friday, six months after he fled through a tunnel from a maximum security prison in an escape that deeply embarrassed the government and strained ties with the United States.(AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

Federal Police and soldiers patrol on the perimeters of the Altiplano maximum security prison in Almoloya, west of Mexico City, Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016, where Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, head of the Sinaloa drug cartel, is being held after his recapture on Friday. Guzman was sent back to the maximum-security prison from where he escaped last July 11 through an elaborate tunnel that was dug to shower stall. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

Forensic experts document the scene where one man was killed by security forces during the firefight that ensued to capture Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman in a house under construction in Los Mochis, Mexico, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016. Guzman, a legendary figure in Mexico who went from a farmer's son to the world's top drug lord, was apprehended after a shootout between gunmen and Mexican marines. (AP Photo/Christian Palma)
More armed men visit site of Oregon wildlife refuge standoff

BURNS, Ore. (AP)  A group of armed men from around the Pacific Northwest who arrived at a wildlife refuge on Saturday morning left several hours later after people leading an occupation of the refuge told them they weren't needed.

Todd MacFarlane, a Utah lawyer acting as a mediator, said occupation leader Ammon Bundy and others were concerned about the perception the armed visitors conveyed.

"This was the last thing in the world they wanted to see happen," MacFarlane told The Oregonian (http://is.gd/gSSbJN).

A man stands guard after members of the "3% of Idaho" group along with several other organizations arrived at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge near Burns, Ore., on Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016. A small, armed group has been occupying the remote national wildlife refuge in Oregon for a week to protest federal land use policies. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Bundy didn't request the presence of the Pacific Patriot Network, he said, and has "tried to put out the word: 'We don't need you.'"

The network, a consortium of groups from Oregon, Washington and Idaho, arrived at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge midmorning in a convoy of about 18 vehicles, carrying rifles and handguns and dressed in military attire and bulletproof vests.

Some of the men told journalists they were there to help with security for the group that has occupied the headquarters of the refuge since Jan. 2.

Their leader, Brandon Curtiss, said the group came to "de-escalate" the situation by providing security for those inside and outside the compound.

One of the original occupiers of the refuge, LaVoy Finicum, said earlier on Saturday that the network's help is appreciated, but "we want the long guns put away."

Bundy has repeatedly rejected calls to leave buildings at the refuge despite pleas from the county sheriff, from many local residents and from Oregon's governor, among others.

On Saturday, militants drove government-owned vehicles and heavy equipment around the compound, saying the trucks and backhoes now belong to the local community. They also covered the national refuge sign with a new sign saying: "Harney County Resource Center" in white block letters over a blue background.

The Harney County Joint Information Center put out a statement on Saturday, saying they continue to work for a peaceful solution.

"The FBI's investigation is ongoing so it would not be appropriate to provide details at this time," the statement said.

The local school district announced there would be classes on Monday, after a week without school because of safety concerns.

___

Information from: The Oregonian, http://www.oregonlive.com

Men stand guard after members of the "3% of Idaho" group along with several other organizations arrived at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016, near Burns, Ore. A small, armed group has been occupying a remote national wildlife refuge in Oregon for a week to protest federal land use policies. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

A man stands guard after members of the "3% of Idaho" group along with several other organizations arrived at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016, near Burns, Ore. A small, armed group has been occupying a remote national wildlife refuge in Oregon for a week to protest federal land use policies. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

A man standing guard pushes the media aside after members of the "3% of Idaho" group along with several other organizations arrived at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge near Burns, Ore., on Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016. A small, armed group has been occupying the remote national wildlife refuge in Oregon for a week to protest federal land use policies. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)
Italian police: US woman found slain in her Florence flat

ROME (AP)  An American woman, her neck bruised and scratched, was found slain in her apartment in Florence on Saturday, Italian police said.

A police spokeswoman, Maddalena Carosi, said the women has been identified as Ashley Olsen, 35, and had been living in Florence for some time. Florence prosecutors have opened a murder investigation.

Police wouldn't comment on Italian news reports that the woman had been strangled until an autopsy can be performed, but they did confirm Olsen had scratch marks and bruises on her neck.

Italian forensic police officers stand outside an apartment where 35-year-old American woman Ashley Oslen was found dead, in Florence, Italy, Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016. Italian police say the woman has been found slain in her apartment with bruises and scratches on her neck, but wouldnt comment on Italian news reports that the woman had been strangled until an autopsy is performed. (Maurizio Degl'Innocenti/ANSA via AP)

Police also declined to comment on Italian news reports that Olsen's boyfriend, described as an Italian artist living in Florence, became worried when he didn't hear from the woman for a few days and asked the apartment's owner to open the door.

Local TV reports said the body was found on a bed in the apartment, which is located in Florence's historic center.

TV and local newspaper accounts said the body was identified by the victim's father, who reportedly teaches at a Florence school.

La Repubblica daily said Olsen loved art and had organized events connected to the art world.

The ANSA news agency said Olsen was born in Florida.
Sunday, January 17

Today is Sunday, Jan. 17, the 17th day of 2016. There are 349 days left in the year.

Highlights in history on this date:

1595 - France's King Henry IV declares war on Spain.

1759 - Holy Roman Empire declares war on Prussia.

1852 - Sand River Convention establishes South African Republic of Transvaal.

1871 - Determined to improve public transportation in San Francisco, wire manufacturer Andrew Hallidie patents the cable car.

1893 - Hawaii's monarchy is overthrown as a group of businessmen and sugar planters force Queen Liliuokalani to abdicate.

1945 - Soviet troops and Polish forces liberate Warsaw, more than five years after it fell to Nazi Germany; Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg, credited with saving tens of thousands of Jews, disappears in Hungary while in Soviet custody

1959 - Federal State of Mali is formed by Union of Republics of Senegal and French Sudan.

1961 - In his farewell address, U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower warns against the rise of "the military-industrial complex."

1977 - Convicted murderer Gary Gilmore, 36, is shot by a firing squad at Utah State Prison in the first U.S. execution in a decade.

1990 - The Colombian Medellin cartel says it has lost the drug war and offers skeptical U.S. and Colombian authorities an end to terror in exchange for a pardon.

1993 - The United States unleashes a shower of Tomahawk cruise missiles against a nuclear fabricating plant 13 kilometers (8 miles) from Baghdad, delivering the point that Iraq must comply with U.N. resolutions.

1994 - An earthquake devastates suburbs in the San Fernando Valley, California, killing 61 people and injuring over 10,000.

1995 - Japan's deadliest earthquake in 70 years slams Kobe and other western cities, killing more than 5,000 people.

1996 - Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, the spiritual leader of Egypt's main Muslim radical faction, is sentenced to life in prison by a U.S. court for plotting to blow up the United Nations and other New York-area landmarks.

1997 - In Dublin, with little fanfare, a court grants the first divorce in Ireland's history.

2000 - A Berlin court convicts Johannes Weinrich of murder and attempted murder and sentences him to life in prison for the 1983 terrorist bombing of a French cultural center in then-West Berlin, which killed one person and injured 23.

2004 - About 10,000 Muslim women march through Paris to protest against France's plan to ban head coverings from public schools.

2005 - Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas orders his security forces to prevent attacks against Israel and investigate the most recent deadly shooting of Israelis.

2006 - In his first statement since becoming Israel's acting prime minister, Ehud Olmert says he wants to resume final peace talks with the Palestinians and take harsh action against Israeli squatters in the West Bank.

2007 - Jainal Antel Sali Jr., a top leader of the al-Qaida-linked Abu Sayyaf rebel group in the Philippines who was accused of kidnapping three Americans in 2001 and of masterminding one of Southeast Asia's worst terror attacks three years later, is killed by Filipino army forces.

2012 - Scientists confirm that 15 pounds (7 kilograms) of rock collected recently in Morocco fell to Earth from Mars during a meteorite shower.

2013 - Algerian special forces launch a rescue operation at a natural gas plant in the Sahara desert and free foreign hostages held by al-Qaida-linked militants, but estimates for the number of dead vary widely.

2014 - President Yoweri Museveni refuses to sign a Ugandan bill that would criminalize homosexuality, saying they should instead be rehabilitated.

2015 - Indonesia brushes aside last-minute appeals by foreign leaders by executing by firing squad six people, including five foreigners, convicted of drug trafficking.

Today's Birthdays:

Leonhard Fuchs, German physician (1501-1566); Benjamin Franklin, U.S. statesman and scientist (1706-1790); Anton Chekhov, Russian dramatist (1860-1904); Alphonse Capone, U.S. gangster (1899-1947); Betty White, U.S. actress, (1922--); James Earl Jones, U.S. actor (1931--); Muhammad Ali, U.S. boxer (1947--); Jim Carrey, Canadian actor (1962--).

Thought For Today:
Man charged with attempted murder of Philadelphia officer

PHILADELPHIA (AP)  A man who investigators say claimed he shot and wounded a Philadelphia police officer in the name of Islam was charged Saturday with attempted murder.

Edward Archer also was charged with aggravated assault, assault of a law enforcement officer and several firearms crimes. He is being held without bail.

A preliminary hearing is scheduled for Jan. 25. The Defender Association of Philadelphia, listed in court documents as representing him, couldn't be reached Saturday for comment.

In this frame from a Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016 video provided by the Philadelphia Police Department, Edward Archer runs with a gun toward a police car driven by Officer Jesse Hartnett in Philadelphia. Archer, using a gun stolen from police, said he was acting in the name of Islam when he ambushed Hartnett sitting in his marked cruiser at an intersection, firing shots at point-blank range, authorities said. (Philadelphia Police Department via AP)

Authorities say Archer, 30, of Yeadon, Pennsylvania, fired at least 13 shots toward the officer as he patrolled his usual west Philadelphia beat shortly before midnight Thursday. They say Archer fired repeatedly as he raced toward the officer's car, then reached into the driver's side, still firing, hitting the officer three times.

Officer Jesse Hartnett, although seriously wounded, was able to get out of his car, chase the man and return fire, wounding him in the buttocks, police said. Other officers chased Archer and apprehended him about a block away.

Investigators said Archer told them he was "following Allah" and pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, and he believed the police department defends laws that are contrary to Islam.

Investigators believe Archer traveled to Saudi Arabia in 2011 and to Egypt in 2012. They are investigating the purpose of those trips, FBI special agent Eric Ruona said.

"It's definitely an area of great investigative interest to us, and we are working with our (Joint Terrorism Task Force) partners in trying to sort out what he was doing there," Ruona said Saturday.

Archer's mother told The Philadelphia Inquirer that her son had been hearing voices recently and had felt targeted by police. She said the family had asked him to get help.

An attorney who briefly represented Archer in a 2012 case told WCAU-TV on Friday that his client was "always looking over his shoulder."

"He was very impulsive, he was very paranoid," said Doug Dolfman, who represented Archer for three weeks after being hired by his mother, the station reported.

Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in the arm and will require multiple surgeries, but was listed in stable condition at a hospital. Archer was treated and released into police custody.

In March, Archer pleaded guilty to firearms and assault charges but was immediately released and placed on probation. Court documents also indicate he was scheduled to be sentenced Monday in suburban Philadelphia in a traffic and forgery case.

The 9 mm pistol recovered at the scene of the shooting had been stolen from a police officer's home in October 2013, and investigators were trying to find out how Archer obtained the weapon and whether it passed through other people's hands since the theft.

In this frame from a Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016 video provided by the Philadelphia Police Department, Edward Archer runs with a gun toward a police car driven by Officer Jesse Hartnett in Philadelphia. Archer, using a gun stolen from police, said he was acting in the name of Islam when he ambushed Hartnett sitting in his marked cruiser at an intersection, firing shots at point-blank range, authorities said. (Philadelphia Police Department via AP)

This undated photo provided by the Philadelphia Police Department shows Philadelphia Police Officer Jesse Hartnett. A gunman ambushed the police officer in his marked cruiser at an intersection, striking him multiple times in the arm during a barrage of bullets and fleeing before being apprehended, officials said Friday. (Philadelphia Police Department via AP)

This undated photo provided by the Philadelphia Police Department shows Edward Archer, who police say ambushed a Philadelphia police officer at point-blank range with a stolen gun on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016. (Philadelphia Police Department via AP)

Police Commissioner Richard Ross speaks with members of the media during a news conference Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Philadelphia. A gunman ambushed a police officer in his marked cruiser at an intersection, striking him multiple times in the arm during a barrage of bullets and fleeing before being apprehended, officials said. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Police Commissioner Richard Ross speaks to members of the media during a news conference Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Philadelphia. A gunman ambushed a police officer in his marked cruiser at an intersection, striking him multiple times in the arm during a barrage of bullets and fleeing before being apprehended, officials said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Mayor Jim Kenney speaks with members of the media during a news conference Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Philadelphia. A gunman ambushed a police officer in his marked cruiser at an intersection, striking him multiple times in the arm during a barrage of bullets and fleeing before being apprehended, officials said. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

An investigator takes a box from one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

An investigator takes a box from one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Law enforcement standby as investigators work the scene at one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Investigators work the scene at one of the residences, center, where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

An investigator works the scene at one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Law enforcement standby as investigators work the scene at one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Investigators work the scene at one of the residences, center, where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Investigators prepare to enter one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Investigators prepare to enter one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Investigators prepare to enter one of the residences where the suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer, who is accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range, said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

In this frame from a Thursday, Jan. 7, 2016 video provided by the Philadelphia Police Department, Edward Archer confronts a police car driven by Officer Jesse Hartnett in Philadelphia. Archer, using a gun stolen from police, said he was acting in the name of Islam when he ambushed Hartnett sitting in his marked cruiser at an intersection, firing shots at point-blank range, authorities said. (Philadelphia Police Department via AP)
LMAX Exchange takes 1st place in close Clipper Race leg

AIRLIE BEACH, Australia (AP)  LMAX Exchange has beaten Great Britain by 42 seconds in a 1,600-nautical-mile Australian leg of the Clipper Round the World race.

The two yachts spent the last 48 hours under near match-racing conditions, but LMAX Exchange edged ahead just before the finish line late Saturday at Pioneer Bay in the Whitsunday region in north Queensland state.

Garmin finished third about 90 minutes later.

Final overall race placings will be determined when all the yachts have completed the leg that began in Hobart, Tasmania, last week.

The race features 12 identical 70-foot (21-meter) yachts. The 10th Clipper race began in London in August, and has completed about half of the 40,000-nautical-mile race.
University dean suing Rolling Stone seeks text messages

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (AP)  Lawyers for a University of Virginia dean who's suing Rolling Stone magazine are asking a judge to force the subject of a debunked article about an alleged gang rape on campus to reveal text messages and other communications in the case, saying it would expose the woman as a "serial liar."

Attorneys for Associate Dean Nicole Eramo, who's seeking more than $7.5 million in damages from the magazine, said in recent court filings that the woman referred to only as "Jackie" in the November 2014 article should have to turn over the documents because there's no evidence that the alleged assault occurred, The Richmond Times Dispatch reports (bit.ly/1RssyiB).

That would "require Jackie to admit that her concern is not being outed as a victim of sexual assault, but rather being exposed as a serial liar who invented people, events and text messages," attorneys for Eramo wrote.

Eramo sued Rolling Stone in May, saying she was cast as the "chief villain" in the discredited piece in her role as the top administrator dealing with sexual assaults at the Charlottesville school.

An investigation by Charlottesville police found no evidence to back up Jackie's claims that she had been raped by seven men at the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house in September 2012. Rolling Stone retracted the article and the magazine's managing editor and article's author both apologized.

Eramo's attorneys said they want Jackie to hand over her communications with the associate dean, other university officials and the magazine's author, among other things.

Jackie's lawyers blasted Eramo in court documents, saying Jackie shouldn't have to disclose private information because she's not a party to the lawsuit and should be protected as a victim of an alleged sexual assault.

"What is tragic about this case is that Dean Eramo apparently believes she can rehabilitate her reputation by attacking a student she herself counseled and whom she referred to support groups and additional counseling following her report of sexual assault," the woman's attorneys wrote.

The National Organization for Woman has called on University President Teresa Sullivan to intervene and put a stop to what they call the "re-victimization" of Jackie.

"Your dean's demands recite nearly every false argument made to undermine victims of sexual assault. It is exactly this kind of victim blaming and shaming that fosters rape culture, re-victimizes those brave enough to come forward, and silences countless other victims," NOW President Terry O'Neill said in a letter to Sullivan.

University officials declined to comment.

Samuel Bayard, an attorney for Rolling Stone, said via email that he could not comment on the case.

___
Canada PM condemns pepper spraying of Syrian refugees

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP)  Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is condemning the pepper spraying of a group of Syrian refugees in Vancouver, which police are treating as a hate crime.

Police said the incident happened Friday night when people had gathered outside the Muslim Association of Canada Center during a "welcome night" for newly arrived Syrian refugees. A man wearing a white hoodie apparently rode by on a bicycle and sprayed 15 to 30 people, police said.

"This isn't who we are  and doesn't reflect the warm welcome Canadians have offered," Trudeau posted on Twitter on Saturday.

Nawal Addo, a 16-year-old of Syrian background who grew up in Canada, said she was standing outside with some refugees who were waiting for a bus when everyone began to cough and feel their eyes burning.

"We saw people coming out from the building and they were in worse condition than us," she said. "Their eyes were really puffed up. They weren't able to open their eyes."

She said it appeared the fumes had gotten inside the entrance, where it affected people more powerfully in the enclosed space. Some were children, including a girl who was about 2, Addo said.

Some people were vomiting and a few had to be taken away by ambulance, including the toddler, she said.

Addo said she didn't see the man on the bicycle. "There was only one witness, and he didn't even see his face," she said.

Vancouver Police Sgt. Randy Fincham said no one has been arrested.

"Although the motive for the pepper spraying is unknown at this time, investigators are treating it as a hate-motivated crime, until determined otherwise," he said in a news release.

B.C. Premier Christy Clark, Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson and federal Immigration Minister John McCallum also expressed outrage at the attack.

"This attack in no way represents their new home," McCallum said in a statement.
Jeremy Corbyn: My reshuffle made Labour stronger

Jeremy Corbyn has insisted his reshuffle made Labour "stronger" despite being hit by a fresh resignation and accusations of "incompetence".

The Labour leader defended the shake up of his top team as it emerged that Alison McGovern was stepping down from heading a party poverty review.

The Wirral South MP has been infuriated by shadow chancellor John McDonnell's jibe that the Progress group - which she chairs - is "hard right".

Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said his reshuffle had made Labour stronger

She is set to spell out her reasons in an interview on the BBC's Sunday Politics, potentially fuelling a row between the Labour leadership and the broadcaster.

Mr Corbyn's office has filed a formal complaint after accusing the BBC of "orchestrating" the on-air resignation of Stephen Doughty from the front bench just before Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday. However, shadow civil society minister Anna Turley has said she had "no problem" with the corporation's actions.

Jonathan Reynolds and Kevan Jones also quit as shadow ministers citing policy differences with the leader and unfair treatment of sacked Europe spokesman Pat McFadden and shadow culture secretary Michael Dugher.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, McFadden accused Mr Corbyn and Mr McDonnell of an "attempt to demonise and delegitimise people and stop other voices being heard".

"The use of rhetoric like that is not what Jeremy promised when he took over.

"He said he would practise a kinder politics without personal attacks."

Mr McFadden said Mr Corbyn's world-view treated terrorists like "children" and undermined British values.

"This view of the world seems to separate the world into adults and children, and the adults are the West and the others - the children - are anti-West," he said. "That's not the way the world works.

"Blaming the West, blaming ourselves for their murderous actions is not robust enough in defence of what's good about our own society."

The promotion of Emily Thornberry to shadow defence secretary, replacing Maria Eagle, who supports the nuclear deterrent, has fuelled speculation that Mr Corbyn is planning to bring the party's position in line with his own unilateralist view.

Ms Thornberry and former London mayor Ken Livingstone, both opponents of Trident, are now jointly overseeing Labour's defence policy review.

Former soldier and Barnsley MP Dan Jarvis has said he would be " deeply uncomfortable" being a Labour candidate in 2020 if the party's manifesto pledged to get rid of the deterrent.

Mr Jones, a long-serving member of the defence team, told the Sunday Telegraph he viewed Mr Livingstone's influence as damaging. The close Corbyn ally recently suggested the UK could leave Nato, and argued that Russian president Vladimir Putin does not pose a military threat.

"Ken Livingstone hasn't got a clue what he is talking about. He is clearly not aware of the massive investment that Putin is making in not only upgrading Russia's nuclear capability but actually expanding it," Mr Jones said.

"If we are going to advocate unilateralism and withdraw from Nato that would only be welcome to President Putin. That would be dangerous for our national security and the British public would be against it."

Mr Jones said the "incompetence" of the protracted reshuffle was "very frustrating". "That has got to be laid at the leader's office's door," he said.

In an article for the Observer, Mr Corbyn tried to turn his fire on the Tories, accusing David Cameron of attacking democracy by cutting public funding for political parties and slashing the number of Westminster seats.

"For all the media sound and fury, last week's shadow cabinet reshuffle has made us a stronger, more diverse and more coherent leadership team," he wrote.

"Along with the huge increase in our party membership in the past six months, it will help make Labour a more effective champion of the people who need us to give them a voice, to win elections and change our country for the better."

Meanwhile in a possible sign of manoeuvring against Mr Corbyn, shadow work and pensions secretary Owen Smith has voiced interest in becoming leader.

"I don't think there's any vacancy right now," he told the New Statesman. "But I think any politician who comes into this to want to try and change the world for the better ... I think they're either in the wrong game or fibbing if they don't say, 'if you had the opportunity to be in charge and put in place your vision for a better Britain would you take it?'

"Yeh, of course, it would be an incredible honour and privilege to be able to do that."
Chinese medicine practitioner jailed for sex attacks on patients

A practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine who raped one of his patients and sexually assaulted two others has been jailed for seven years, police said.

Hongbin Liu, 53, "preyed on the vulnerabilities of his patients" and carried out a string of sex assaults at two health centres in London, Scotland Yard said.

Liu, of Vauxhall Bridge Road in Victoria, pleaded guilty to one count of rape, one count of assault by penetration and two counts of sexual assault, at Wood Green Crown Court on Friday, the Met Police said.

Hongbin Liu, who has been jailed for seven years

He raped and assaulted a woman in her 40s, who cannot be named for legal reasons, at the Chinese Traditional Medicine Centre in Haverstock Hill in Camden, north London.

The woman visited the centre in February last year and agreed to see Liu as her usual therapist was not there.

During the acupuncture and massage consultation, Liu raped and assaulted her. On leaving the premises the woman went straight to a police station to report the offences, police said.

Liu was arrested, interviewed and provided a prepared statement denying the offences. He was bailed pending further inquiries.

In March last year, two more women reported they had been sexually assaulted at the Shu Jun Healthcare Centre on Wells Street, Westminster.

One of the victims thought that while giving her a massage, Liu took a picture of her with his phone, but officers were unable to recover the photographs.

Detective Constable Jane Tunnicliff, from the Met's Sexual Offences, Exploitation and Child Abuse Command, said: "This is a man who betrayed the patient-doctor relationship. Dr Liu preyed on the vulnerabilities of his patients.

"It is important that each and every one of us feel safe to seek treatment when we are ill or in pain. As police officers we strive to make our community safer for everyone - even behind closed doors."

Detective Inspector Lee Davison, said: "People who abuse their position of trust damage the fabric of our society and the impact of their actions on their victims can be great. We will pursue all such offenders to bring them to justice.

"I would encourage anyone who has suffered at the hand of another to report the matter to the police in the knowledge that they will be believed and supported."
Swansea will play Jonjo Shelvey despite transfer speculation

Alan Curtis plans to pitch Jonjo Shelvey into Swansea's FA Cup tie at Oxford amid reports that the England midfielder could leave in January.

Playing Shelvey at the Kassam Stadium would cup-tie the 23-year-old if he were to move on in this month's transfer window, but Swansea boss Curtis has again insisted he wants the former Charlton and Liverpool midfielder to stay in south Wales.

"It's fair to say that Jonjo will play on Sunday and hopefully he will show everybody what he's capable of," said Curtis, who takes charge in a permanent capacity for the first time after being promoted from the caretaker role he had held since Garry Monk's departure on December 9.

England midfielder Jonjo Shelvey is set to return for Swansea's FA Cup tie at Oxford

"From there we will look at it in terms of the league fixtures to come."

Shelvey has only started once in Curtis' five games in charge with Crystal Palace and Newcastle are reportedly keen to recruit the six-times capped international.

But Curtis said he told Shelvey as recently as Friday that he wants him to remain at the Liberty Stadium.

"I would want him to stay, yeah, absolutely," Curtis said.

"I spoke to him (on Friday) and told him that. I feel that he's got a huge part to play.

"He's not in the team at the moment and there's always going to be speculation about good players.

"Jonjo's a current England international so there's going to be speculation about him moving on.

"We feel that he's a huge part of what will be a difficult run-in."

Curtis will rest several regulars against League Two Oxford ahead of a crunch Barclays Premier League relegation battle against Sunderland on Wednesday night.

French left-back Franck Tabanou, who cost Swansea 3.5million last summer but who has figured in only two Capital One Cup ties since leaving St Etienne, will be among those given an opportunity.

Tabanou criticised former manager Monk earlier this season when he complained about a lack of game-time and hinted that he could return to France in January.

But Curtis said: "He could play a huge part and we hope he will do. He's certainly got the ability.

"We have barely seen Franck play but he is training now (after injury) and he has got an unbelievable left foot.

"He is as good a left-footed player as I've seen. He smashes the ball for fun.

"I have been watching video clips of him. I actually sat him down the other day and said: 'Franck, who is that man?'.

"He is going past people, beating two or three players and smashing it in from 30 yards, taking free-kicks, penalties. I haven't seen that fella before."

Even though Swansea will have a makeshift look about them at Oxford, Curtis promises they are treating the competition seriously.

"Whatever team we put out it will be a strong side," he said.
12m in new funding for flood-hit Scottish communities

Scottish communities affected by severe weather are to be helped by 12 million of new funding, Nicola Sturgeon has announced.

The cash includes a 1,500 grant for every household, business premises or charity directly affected by flood water, and a 5 million fund for councils to replace damaged infrastructure.

The First Minister unveiled the funding boost as she visited the flood-hit north-east.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon hugs a local resident during a visit to flood-hit Port Elphinstone in Aberdeenshire

The area has been battered by heavy rain, causing severe disruption to travel, the evacuation of homes in some parts of Aberdeenshire and two severe flood warnings for Inverurie and Kintore.

It follows flooding across other parts of the country, including Tayside and the Borders, as a result of Storm Frank.

The funding is in addition to the 4 million announced by the Deputy First Minister in his budget statement, bringing the total package of support for those affected by the adverse weather to more than 16 million.

Ms Sturgeon has been under pressure from opposition parties to spell out what extra funding will be allocated to flood relief.

An extra 5.8 million will be made available to support households and business properties.

Councils which have suffered the most damage as a result of the flooding have been allocated a share of the fund, but people in any part of Scotland who have suffered flood damage can apply for a grant.

In addition to flood relief support, businesses whose ability to trade has been severely affected by flooding will be able to apply for an extra grant of 3,000 funded by the Scottish Government and administered by their local authority.

Additional funding of up to 5 million will be made available to councils to replace infrastructure severely damaged by flood waters, including support for the reinstatement of the A93 between Ballater and Braemar.

An Agricultural Floodbank Restoration Grant Scheme of up to 1 million will also be made available to farmers to restore damaged floodbanks, and discussions will continue next week with the industry on how the Government can support them through severe weather.

Ms Sturgeon said: "In the face of devastation Scotland's communities have rallied together and shown real strength. I have met with some local business owners who have made a real difference by offering vital support and once again I am amazed by the determination and dedication of all of our emergency services who are working around the clock to save homes and livelihoods.

"We do not yet have confirmation of consequentials coming from UK Government flood funds - however, now that the picture of those who need support is clearer, the Scottish Government is acting now to make sure that the people who need help get it."

Aberdeenshire Council has been given a 2 million share of the funding, while Aberdeen City Council has been allocated 500,000.

Dozens of homes were evacuated in Inverurie, Port Elphinstone and Ellon in the region as the swollen River Don sent flood waters racing down the streets on Thursday night and Friday morning.

Water also poured from the River Ythan, prompting the emergency services to mount an operation to rescue residents.

The Donside area, Keith, Huntly, Turriff, Kintore and parts of Aberdeen were also affected by the flooding.

The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) said it expects river levels to fall gradually, b ut a spokesman warned of the possibility of "residual impacts" in areas such as Kintore and Inverurie.

Ms Sturgeon, who was joined by north east MP Alex Salmond at the Inverurie Academy rest centre, said the emotional impact of the flooding was impossible to quantify.

She said: "I have spoken to people here and in Newton Stewart who have had their homes and businesses flooded and the devastation is heartbreaking.

"We want to help as much as we can but there's nothing you can say to someone to take away the pain of losing their personal possessions or seeing their homes flooded.

"That's the bit of this that is always going to be impossible to quantify.

"On the other side, the community spirit that we have seen has been heartwarming and quite incredible."

Ms Sturgeon again paid tribute to the work of the emergency services including police and fire crews.

Officers were on the streets of Inverurie helping people remove flood-damaged furniture, electricals, books and other items from their homes as the clear-up continues.

The First Minister spoke to residents in Canal Crescent and Ritchie Row, where homes suffered when the River Don topped its banks on Thursday night.

Some people were pumping out water while others used shovels and brushes to try to get rid of the remaining flood water.

Residents were throwing their damaged belongings in skips and electrical engineers were out tending to a sub station.

Ms Sturgeon entered several homes and told residents she was sorry to be meeting them under such circumstances, while wishing them the best as they tried to get their properties back to normal.

She said: "Our emergency services, police, fire, councils, utility companies, transport operators - everybody has pulled together.

"You can't exaggerate the devastation, but it has also brought out the best in communities as they respond."

Mr Salmond, MP for Gordon, said: "The north east of Scotland has been sorely tested over the last week and I think it has passed with flying colours in terms of the community spirit and people looking to help their fellow citizens in distress.

"In all of the people's houses I've been in today, they have had nothing but praise for the council workers, the police and the fire service who performed exceptionally well.

"But I think we should also emphasise the community spirit.

"The reaction of people has been extraordinary - right down to the 20 workers from Asda with their disinfectant, looking to help people clean up."

Scottish Labour's environmental justice spokeswoman Sarah Boyack renewed calls for a review of flood defence infrastructure.

She said: "It is vital that those affected receive this money as soon as possible. Families and local businesses can't wait for months for this support to actually arrive.

"Questions also need to be asked about how local authorities are expected to shoulder the burden for flood defences when the SNP plan to slash council budgets across the whole of Scotland."

Scottish Liberal Democrat MSP Alison McInnes , who lives in Ellon, one of the town's badly hit by flooding, said: "I'm pleased the First Minister has finally given us details of how the Scottish Government plans to help home owners, business owners and farmers affected by the recent flooding get back on track.

"Lessons need to be learnt on what's happened in Scotland since the start of 2016 because I still think this response took place at a snail's pace."

A Scottish Conservative spokesman said: "We welcome this much needed investment.

"The UK Government has made around nine million pounds available through the Barnett Formula, and that alongside today's announcement will be of great assistance."

Ms Sturgeon walks past belongings ruin by the floods

The First Minister spoke to residents in Canal Crescent and Ritchie Row, where homes were deluged when the River Don burst its banks on Thursday night

Ms Sturgeon paid a surprise visit to residents in Port Elphinstone, Aberdeenshire

The First Minister also took time to speak with officials helping clear the mess left by flood waters

The clean-up is well under way in the town, and the Scottish Government has announced residents affected will be assisted with 12 million pounds of new funding

Ms Sturgeon went inside several properties to see for herself the damage caused by the floods
Man held in Ghana as police hunt killer of ex-EastEnders actress and her sons

Police have reportedly arrested the suspected killer of an ex-EastEnders actress and her two sons.

Arthur Simpson-Kent was captured in Ghana after fleeing the UK following the death of his partner Sian Blake and their two children, Zachary, eight, and four year-old Amon, according to reports.

Scotland Yard launched a murder investigation after their bodies were discovered in the garden of the family home in Erith, Kent.

Sian Blake was murdered alongside her two children in Erith, Kent (Metropolitan Police/PA Wire)

According to The Daily Mirror, officers arrested Simpson-Kent, 48, in a town in the western region of Ghana.

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: "Detectives have today, Saturday, 9 January, been made aware of an arrest in Ghana.

"We are currently working alongside the Ghanaian authorities but are not in a position to discuss further at this time."

Detectives discovered the bodies of Ms Blake, 43, and her two sons last Tuesday and said "significant attempts" had been made to conceal the family's remains.

All three had died as a result of head and neck injuries, police said.

It is understood concerns about domestic violence were raised by a relative of Ms Blake to the NSPCC on December 16, information which was passed on to the Metropolitan Police and Bexley Council.

A missing persons investigation was launched on the same day after police visited the home, but the bodies were not discovered until around three weeks later.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission has been launched into Scotland Yard's handling of the case.

Ms Blake's sister Ava said Simpson-Kent will have to "answer to God" if he was responsible for their deaths.

And she revealed her sibling had told their mother, Pansy, that she wanted to get out of her relationship "a long time ago".

Ms Blake had motor neurone disease - a fatal, rapidly progressing illness which affects the brain and spinal cord - and was reportedly looking "very frail" before she vanished.

The BBC reported that locals in the area where Simpson-Kent had been hiding contacted police on realising he was a wanted man after seeing his image on social media.

Around 10 armed officers descended onto the beach where he was spotted hiding between some rocks, according to reports.

Police called out to him and he gave himself up. He was found with a knife in his possession but had not used it in a threatening way, the BBC reported.

Officers from Interpol, the international crime-fighting agency, were involved in the arrest alongside Ghanaian police.

He has been taken to a local police station and is expected to be flown back to the UK for questioning shortly.

Pictures showed Simpson-Kent handcuffed and sat on a stool with police at his side shortly after he was detained, and others of him being driven away in a vehicle.

ITV news said a police spokesman had confirmed his arrest, revealing: "He was at a hideout in Western Region. With the kind of collaboration between the police and public that we have, we managed to nab him there."
Tributes to Briton who died 'living the dream' in Thailand

A young British tourist has died while on holiday on an island in Thailand.

Friends have paid tribute to Luke Miller, who has died in the island of Koh Tao.

His death comes just days after he posted a New Year's Eve message on Facebook in which he told how he was "living the dream".

The Foreign Office said it is providing assistance

He wrote: "Can honestly say this new year I am living the dream of to the full moon party on a speed boat drink cocktails strawberry daiquiris living life to the full yolo so let's do this."

Joanne Doe wrote: "To think we were enjoying your photos seeing you live the holiday of a lifetime. This is such a shock. Will never forget that mental Christmas party at ours! At least you were living life to the full. Thoughts are with your family right now and Erin Laird xxxx RIP Luke Miller."

A Foreign Office spokesman said: "We are providing assistance to the family of a British national who has died in Koh Tao, Thailand. Local authorities are investigating the death and we will remain in contact with them."

A fundraising page has been set up to raise money to bring Mr Miller's body back to the UK. By 5pm more than 5,000 had been raised.

British backpackers Hannah Witheridge, 23, and David Miller, 24, were brutally murdered on a beach on the island in September 2014.

Miss Witheridge, from Hemsby in Norfolk, had been raped before she was killed, while Mr Miller, from Jersey, had been hit over the head before drowning in the sea.

Bar workers Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo, also known as Win Zaw Htun, were found guilty of their murders.

Brad Cotton wrote on Facebook: "R.I.P big brother Luke Miller, I love you forever and always you April Fool."
Slovak PM says will fight to keep immigration to a minimum

BRATISLAVA, Jan 7 (Reuters) - Slovakia will fight against immigration from Muslim countries to prevent attacks like the shootings in Paris and assaults of women in Germany, Prime Minister Robert Fico said on Thursday, declaring that multi-culturalism was "a fiction".

Fico has made immigration the key element of his campaign ahead of a March 5 parliamentary election and his government has filed a lawsuit against the European Commission's plan for mandatory quotas to share out 120,000 asylum seekers among the EU's 28 member states.

"Not only are we refusing mandatory quotas, we will never make a voluntary decision that would lead to formation of a unified Muslim community in Slovakia," Fico told reporters in Bratislava.

Linking the influx of migrants into Europe to the November attacks in Paris and reports of 90 women in the German city of Cologne being assaulted, he said: "Multi-culturalism is a fiction. Once you let migrants in, you can face such problems."

Fico's anti-immigration stance finds an echo with voters in Slovakia, a Catholic country of 5.4 million with a largely homogenous society and next to no experience as a destination for immigrants.

It received only 169 asylum requests last year. But it is being asked to take in 802 migrants under the European scheme that it is challenging.

His tough views are to various degrees shared around central Europe. Prime Minister Viktor Orban's government in Hungary has also challenged mandatory quotas in court, and Orban has repeatedly said the influx of refugees into Europe threatens to undermine the continent's Christian roots.

The new Polish conservative government has spoken in favour of stemming migration, saying they cannot repeat the mistakes of other countries. However it said it would stick to its predecessor's commitment to take in about 7,000 migrants.

Though Slovakia took 149 Christians from Iraq late last year they faced a frosty reception and plans to lodge them with local volunteer families had to be abandoned after public protests.
Syrian refugees face another winter in flimsy shelters

By Alaa Kanaan

BAR ELIAS, Lebanon, Jan 8 (Reuters) - Syrian refugee Hussein Hammoud is banking on a broom handle to protect his 12 children from the winter cold. He is using one to prop up the flimsy shelter that has already collapsed once this year under the weight of snow in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley.

"The snow brought down the tent on our heads, it broke the wooden frame," said the 37-year-old from southern Aleppo, a refugee from the war that has been raging in neighbouring Syria for nearly five years. "The assistance reaching us is very little in winter - no blankets, no mattresses."

More than 1 million Syrians are enduring another winter as refugees in Lebanon. For some, it is their fifth in a row, displaced by a war that has driven 4.4 million Syrians into neighbouring states from where many are trying to reach Europe.

While the first snow has melted at Hammoud's camp in Bar elias, rainfall permeates the plastic sheets that fail to fully shield those underneath from the elements. Some bear the emblems of U.N. aid agencies. Others are advertising hoardings.

The snow-capped mountains of nearby Mount Lebanon are visible from the camp comprising around 30 tents separated by a dirt pathway that turns to mud in winter. It is one of more than 3,000 such settlements scattered across Lebanon.

"We have no fuel. Nobody is giving us fuel, and the water in the tent is this much," said a woman in a purple scarf who gave her name as Umm Khalaf, holding her hands apart to show how badly it had flooded.

The winter brings other problems, too. Refugees in remote areas stranded by snow cannot reach shops to buy food and water.

"Clean water freezes in the tanks, sanitation becomes an issue, and diseases can spread more easily," said Fran Beyrtison, Lebanon representative of aid agency Oxfam.

"Lebanon and the UN recently issued an appeal to help up to 2.9 million vulnerable people. The international community needs to fund this appeal urgently to allow aid to reach people in need," she said. The appeal, for $2.5 billion, includes vulnerable Lebanese in addition to Syrian refugees.

UNHCR, the U.N. refugee agency, has provided support including stoves, blankets, mattresses and "insulation kits" that include insulating foam and timber, though these are designed for refugees living in larger buildings, said Dana Sleiman, UNHCR spokeswoman in Lebanon.

"We did our best to make sure that refugees are able to stay as warm and dry as possible this winter and avoid some of the issues we saw last year, like flooding," she said.

For Umm Khalaf and others at Bar elias, another problem is explaining the situation to their children.
Israeli soldiers shoot dead two Palestinian assailants -army

BEKAOT CHECKPOINT, West Bank, Jan 9 (Reuters) - Israeli troops shot and killed two Palestinian men who tried to stab soldiers at a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, the Israeli military said, part of a wave of violence now in its fourth month.

The soldiers were not injured in the confrontation at Bekaot checkpoint in the northern West Bank and Israeli forces "thwarted the attack and shot the assailants," said the military. The Palestinian Health Ministry confirmed the two men were dead.

Palestinian stabbing, car-ramming and shooting attacks have killed 21 Israelis and a U.S. citizen since Oct. 1. Israeli forces or armed civilians have killed at least 139 Palestinians, 89 of whom authorities described as assailants. Most others have been killed in clashes with security forces.

Commentators say the surge in attacks has been fuelled by the collapse of U.S.-sponsored peace talks in 2014, the growth of Jewish settlements on land Palestinians want for a future state and Islamist calls for the destruction of Israel.

Also stoking the violence has been Muslim opposition to increased Israeli visits to Jerusalem's al Aqsa mosque complex, which is the third holiest site in Islam and is also revered in Judaism as the location of two biblical temples.
Israeli soldiers shoot dead two Palestinian assailants - army

BEKAOT CHECKPOINT, West Bank, Jan 9 (Reuters) - Israeli troops shot dead on Saturday two Palestinians who tried to stab soldiers at a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank, the military said, as a surge in violence showed no sign of abating.

Now in its fourth month, the wave of bloodshed has raised fears of wider escalation a decade after the last Palestinian uprising subsided.

The military said in a statement the two Palestinians had tried to stab soldiers at Bekaot checkpoint.

"The forces thwarted the attack and shot the assailants," it said.

The Palestinian Health Ministry confirmed the two men were dead.

A Palestinian taxi driver, who asked not be identified, disputed the military's account, saiyng the men had not got out of their vehicle.

"We were three cars awaiting our turn to cross, the two men who were killed were in the car ahead of mine. The soldiers signaled to them to come forward. When they got there, they opened fire at the car," he said.

A military spokeswoman, asked about the taxi driver's account, said the incident was still being reviewed.

Since Oct. 1 Israeli forces or armed civilians have killed at least 139 Palestinians, 89 of whom authorities described as assailants. Most others have been killed in clashes with security forces.

Palestinian stabbing, car-ramming and shooting attacks have killed 21 Israelis and a U.S. citizen. That number will rise if authorities deem a Jan. 1 Tel Aviv shooting that killed three people as a pro-Palestinian attack.

"NATIONALISTIC, TERRORIST ATTACK"

Internal Security Minister Gilad Erdan indicated that was indeed the motive of the shooter, an Israeli Arab citizen who was killed in a shootout with police on Friday after a week-long manhunt. Palestinian militant groups have mourned him as a martyr.

"The assessment forming is that this was a nationalistic terrorist attack," Erdan told Channel Two News.

Commentators say the surge in violence has been fueled by the 2014 collapse of U.S.-sponsored peace talks, the growth of Jewish settlements on land Palestinians want for a state and Islamist calls for the destruction of Israel.

Also stoking the violence has been Muslim opposition to increased Israeli visits to Jerusalem's al Aqsa mosque complex, which is the third holiest site in Islam and is also revered in Judaism as the location of two biblical temples.
Germany's Merkel toughens tone on migrants as protesters gather

By Andreas Rinke and Joseph Nasr

MAINZ/COLOGNE, Germany, Jan 9 (Reuters) - Migrants who commit crimes should lose their right to asylum, German chancellor Angela Merkel said on Saturday, toughening her tone as crowds gathered in Cologne angered by mass assaults on women on New Year's Eve.

Nearly two dozen asylum seekers were among those suspected of carrying out the attacks, police said this week, heightening tensions over immigration and fuelling criticism of Merkel's refusal to place a limit on the numbers of migrants entering the country.

"The right to asylum can be lost if someone is convicted on probation or jailed," Merkel said after a meeting of the leadership of her Christian Democrats (CDU) party.

"Serial offenders who repeatedly rob or repeatedly affront women must feel the full force of the law," Merkel told journalists in Mainz, promising a reduction over the longer term in the flow of migrants to Germany.

Under German law, asylum seekers are typically only deported if they have been sentenced to at least three years in prison, and providing their lives are not at risk at home.

About 1,700 police officers were on the streets of Cologne as protesters, including members of the anti-Islam PEGIDA movement, waited for official permission to march through the city.

At a separate left-wing protest, more than 2,000 mostly women gathered close to the train station where many of the attacks, including muggings and sexual assaults, happened.

"No means no. Keep away from our bodies," read one sign held by a demonstrator.

Merkel's conservative party said it wanted to reduce and control migration to Germany, and send those who had been refused asylum home promptly.

"We want to reduce the hurdles for the deportation and expulsion of foreigners who have committed a crime," the party said in a statement. Such a move would require a change to German law.
Recently, the prestigious US newspaper, The New York Times (NYT), commenting on the bloody war waged by the ISIS or Islamic State in the Iraq-Syria region, conceded that the mother of IS was the Iraq "regime change" and the father of IS was Saudi Arabia. It is something more known to experts of the region and many intelligence agencies, including in India.

But the NYT description is not fully accurate. The first regime change was in Afghanistan earlier, when the Soviet-backed secular regime headed by Najibullah, was sought to be toppled by a "good terrorist" force called the Taliban, trained and armed primarily by the US and some of its NATO allies.

The Uzbek warlord Abdul Rashid Dostam and Tajik militant Ahmed Shah Massoud were given the most modern arms and massive funds. After the Soviet troops left, the Afghan leader Najibullah was not allowed to stay for too long, and was dragged out of a UN building and hanged. So much for imperialist respect for the UN and humanitarian treaties.

So the NYT conjecture is not innocent. Shades of Islam are important. The Saudis, Qatar, Bahrain etc are Sunni. Iran, Iraq, Hezbollah are Shia, as are many in Yemen (the Houthis), and the ruling minority of Alawites in largely Sunni Syria.

Journalists like Robert Fisk are fully aware of the Saudi role, and the fact that the anti-Syria "good terrorists" like the Free Syria Army armed and funded by the US, no longer exist and have been absorbed by al-Nusra, an affiliate of al-Qaeda.

The ruling Saudi dynasty is strongly Wahhabist like the ISIS. It recently beheaded an eminent Shia cleric. Yet the NATO has taken no action against the Saudis.

The imperialist game was given a rude shock by the resolute Russian intervention in Syria backed by Iran and Hezbollah. The earlier Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu's tirade against the US-Iran deal was precisely the fear of a Iraq-Iran-Syria-Hezbollah line up.

Israel has not forgotten it's only ever defeat by Hezbollah, which was armed by Syria. But the Russian support to Syria is a game changer. Since it's pinpoint bombing of IS forces, the Syrian forces with its Kurdish allies, have made significant gains. The coalition forces have also, by example, had to follow suit.

The rogue Erdogan government in Turkey has given free access to the IS, as well as buying stolen oil from the IS. The Russians have aerial photographs of oil being loaded on tankers in the presence of Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's son Bilal. They had earlier circulated a list of 40 countries supporting IS at the recent G-20 meet.

Is India safe from all this? Certainly not!

The US is aware that the Taliban "good terrorists" are now linked with the Pakistani army. Modi's foreign policy and national security teams are weak, especially the latter which has become very controversial after Pathankot.

It should be remembered that Maharaja Ranjit Singh had a governor in Kabul. In any case it is in India's interests to have a secular Afghanistan. But where is the Afghan policy? Where is the West Asia policy? Which international actors are our friends, or could be our friends?

Foreign policy cannot be reduced to meeting foreign leaders, arms deals or exorbitant bullet train deals, but careful analysis of how to strengthen India's international standing and stature.
Perhaps some day a book will be written on Pathankot, a significant space in the long history of India-Pakistan relations, following the Partition. It was handed over to India, clearing the route for a corridor to Kashmir, and the wound has festered ever since, in the hearts and minds of those who could never reconcile themselves to this division.

And so every now and then, the borders between the two Punjabs will erupt in fresh terrorist assaults, just as the borders along Kashmir erupt. These are serious, long term issues of intelligence and careful manning. There is no doubt that there are misguided efforts to foment trouble in both Punjab and Kashmir - possibly by non-state actors, and it would be surprising if the government is unaware of it. However, yes, as with most of these incidents where terrorists look like any one of us, it is difficult to immediately spot someone who might even be dressed (as apparently they were in this case) in uniforms.

Given the complicated situation, how much does the media really know? And should it have felt emboldened to give a blow-by-blow account on what was undoubtedly a top secret operation meant to flush out terrorists from an air base? And how much of this information is authentic in the first place? There are many troubling questions. Yes, there are channels and newspapers which were and are reporting "responsibly", but there were also plenty of others who just decided to raise the decibel levels and begin to conduct their own inquiry regarding who the "terrorists" were and what was their motive.

In this world of instant news, should a high-security operation like this been constantly discussed, or should the media now begin to draw a line between what affects the country's security - and the news fare that we must indeed learn about. And should there be a more detailed investigation conducted at a later stage, when more information is available?

Or am I being old fashioned and regressive?

Because, in these days of transparency, nothing is sacrosanct? And should we, the news consumers and citizens, have the right to an immediate, if somewhat incomplete and often erroneous idea of the situation at "ground zero".

The fact that there has been such confused reporting on the Pathankot incident makes it obvious that the press has been trying to pick up information from its own sources attributing some amount of bumbling to the government. Inferences are also being made about the involvement of drug cartels and so on.

Without much clarity on the big picture - security issues, foreign policy, relations between the two countries - everything has become fair game. Yes, ours is a chaotic democracy and it is fair to question. But not everything about this operation will be known for a long time.

So should it be assumed that journalists and media must have instant access to all that is going on - even at a sensitive air base? And should doubts be constantly raised about the veracity of the information being put out by the government?

These are troubling questions - and we will need to see a change in the coverage of terrorist attacks. In the meanwhile, one can only hope that there is some empathy for those who thanklessly patrol our borders, and undertake other gruelling security measures. They must not be demoralised.
Can India and Pakistan ever have normal neighbourly relations?

The question is relevant in the context of the terrorist attack on Pathankot Indian Air Force base, just on the heels of a surprise goodwill visit by Prime Minster Narendra Modi to Lahore. Of course, the chain of sordid events have taken a predictable path.

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayees Lahore bus visit was followed by Kargil. And before that, unconditional release of over 90,000 Pakistani prisoners of war by India in 1971 was reciprocated by Pakistan with exported terror for over two decades into Punjab in the guise of the Khalistan movement.

Troubles

But before we make efforts to find an answer to the question raised in the beginning of this article, we have to ask ourselves yet another question. Can Pakistan learn to live at peace with itself before it can do so with the rest of the world, including India?

Over the years, after General Zia-ul-Haq became the president and introduced a high dosage of Islamic fundamentalism into the education system and governance, violence has become central to Pakistans social and political life. With majority Sunnis throwing bombs at the minority Shia mosques and vice-versa.

It is not a Kafir dominated India where Muslims are not safe, but in Pakistan, a declared Islamic state. The Pakistan Army which owes allegiance to the theocratic state, has waged a war, against Taliban, who are also throwing bombs, shooting people and getting killed in the name of Islam.

Killers and victims, on both sides, swear in the name of the same faith! Those who are always at each others throats can hardly think of leaving neighbours undisturbed.

Why is Pakistan so prone to politics of hate and bigotry? The reasons lies in the mindset and ideology that triggered the demand for the creation of Pakistan. Till 1937, Mohammad Ali Jinnah was a leader without any worthwhile following.

After he changed his ideological tack, from a secularist to a rabid Muslim, spewing venom against Hindus, over 90 per cent Muslims of undivided India accepted him as their unquestioned leader.

In contrast, Gandhi, who all his life bent backwards to win the support of Muslims and had spoken of love and inclusiveness, could not gain the support of even 10 per cent of the Muslim population. Ironically, Jinnah was not a practicing Muslim  he enjoyed his evening drink and loved sausages. Both are forbidden in Islam.

But all this was ignored because he worked for vivisection of India and spoke against its timeless pluralistic culture. He was loved for his hate of Hindus and Sikhs.

In essence, what Jinnah preached was rejection of pre-Islamic culture and traditions on an ancient land by those who had converted to a new faith, mostly under duress. Bulk of the Muslims could not reconcile with the idea of living as equals with those (Hindus) who they had suppressed and persecuted for over 600 years.

Pride

Misplaced pride in the past and the fear of uncertain future propelled the demand for a separate Islamic nation. Now the same hatred is eating into the idea of Pakistan. For long it was said that Pakistan was run by three As  Allah, Army and America.

But now the three As have fallen apart.

The mullahs and military that collaborated for long to destroy India are now often at loggerheads  as seen in the military action in Waziristan region and the retaliatory Taliban sponsored massacre of school children by army men in Peshawar followed by hangings of many Taliban activists by the government.

The third leg of the Pakistani tripod, the US, has over the years given up the policy of equating both India and Pakistan to keep Islamabad in good humour so as to ensure its support against the erstwhile Soviet Union. With the collapse of communism in 1991, the days of cold war are over and Pakistans importance in American scheme of global politics has dropped considerably.

Following 9/11, the menace of terror has emerged as a defining issue for the US state policy. And to make matters worse for Pakistan, the country is known, not only as an epicenter of terror, but also a failed state.

Powers

Meanwhile Indias global profile has improved, thanks to its stable democracy and growing economy. The new perception in Washington is to align with India in wake of the growing fear among East and South Asian nations of an increasingly aggressive China.

The idea is to build a chain  with India at one end and Japan at other  terminals to contain Beijing. For the first time probably, the prime minister of Pakistan has shown the courtesy of calling his Indian counterpart and promising action against those who had trained on Pakistan soil and waged the attack in Pathankot.

India will have to wait and watch how far Islamabad goes on Nawaz Sharifs assurance on dealing with jihadi/army elements responsible for the Pathankot attack. May be over the next few weeks we can find an answer to the question we started with  whether India and Pakistan can ever learn to live as normal neighbours.
Le Parti Socialiste a trouve son sauveur : cest Khalifa Sall.

Tout un symbole, rien que sa personnalite. Ne parlons pas de son charisme : lhomme est espoir.

Le futur candidat KAS comme lappelle ses amis, est tres experimente, a un discours ouvert, pense que leconomie est une chose importante, entre autres. Nen jetez plus : cest lui quon veut, semble dire la base naturelle du PS. De par le Senegal en plus. Phenomene rare en 2014 Khalifa Sall bat a plate couture le Premier Ministre Aminata Toure : on peut presque affirmer que certaines localites ont du se sentir plus concerne par lelection municipale de la ville de Dakar que parla leur !?!

Trois Senegalais sur quatre (75%) ou plus souhaitent que lactuel secretaire general du PS ne soit pas candidat a la presidentielle de 2017 et ouvre la voie aux jeunes de son parti, Khalifa Sall etant non seulement le mieux place des personnalites du PS mais aussi sa candidature est majoritairement attendue par les militants de base du PS et les sympathisants car presentement il est le seul qui peut assurer le retour du PS au pouvoir en 2017.

Cette candidature est souhaitee car Khalifa Sall represente bien ce changement incarne, voulu, tant desire par tout un Senegal !

Il a beau etre silencieux, le spectre de sa candidature hante le pouvoir actuel et empeche le locataire du palais de dormir. Surtout depuis quil caracole en tete des intentions de vote des senegalais pour la presidentielle de 2017 et que la ville de Dakar quil dirige represente 680087 electeurs soit 14 % de lelectorat.

De plus Khalifa controle presque la region de Dakar qui represente aussi 1 543 512 electeurs soit 30,4% de lelectorat et commence a avoir des sympathisants partout au Senegal avec limplantation des mouvements tels quADK And Dollel Khalifa dont ADK Bambey qui vient detre lance le 19 decembre 2015 dernier temoigne de lenvergure nationale de Khalifa Sall.

Alors Macky Sall a peur et il a decide darreter la mer avec ces bras. Peine perdue !

Khalifa si kaw si kanam !

MackySall voit en Khalifa Sall un adversaire serieux alors il le bloque partout et a tout prix : lemprunt obligataire, acte 3, la gestion des ordures de Dakar qui est une competence transferee, les projets dembellissement des arteres de Dakar et de la place de lindependance, etc.

Sa derniere carte se jouera peut-etre sous forme dun eventuel deal avec certains responsables du PS.



Vive Khalifa Sall! Bambey vote Khalifa Sall !
Suspected al-Qaeda member Maulana Anzarshah Qasmi, who was arrested by the Delhi Police in Bengaluru on Wednesday, allegedly planned suicide bombings in Delhi in which high-profile personalities may be among the targets.





Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba is also linked to the plot, the police said on Friday.

Qasmi, 50, has been brought to Delhi on a transit remand and is being interrogated at Delhi Police special cells office in south Delhis Lodhi Colony. He is being questioned over an FIR registered with special cell police station. The charges are under sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code and relevant sections of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.



Qasmi is the fourth al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) suspect to be nabbed in the past one month. The three earlier arrests were made in Uttar Pradeshs Sambhal district. Sources said Qasmis name cropped up during the questioning of arrested AQIS suspects Zafar Masood, Mohammed Asif and Abdul Rehman.



Zafar and Abdul confessed to have been in constant touch with Qasmi, while Asif told the police that he met Qasmi at a religious congregation in Bengaluru. The police have recovered incriminating documents from Qasmi and seized laptops which allegedly contained propaganda videos and speeches. According to the police, Qasmi was working with AQIS head Sanaul Haq and had been tasked with setting up AQIS recruitment networks.



The police said the inputs about the terror groups were received by a special cell officer last month upon which he immediately informed his seniors. It is suspected that the groups might also target crowded places in Delhi through suicide bombings and grenade attacks.



The groups have already infiltrated some terrorists into India through Jammu and Kashmir and other international borders, a police officer said. The specific inputs also reveal that two suspected LeT operatives, Dujana and Ukasha, will be leading the alleged operation.



The special cell has alerted its sources across India, particularly in Jammu and Kashmir, to launch technical surveillance.



Qasmi was a resident of Iliyasnagar in Bengalurus Banashankari 2nd Stage. Qasmi was a cleric at a mosque in Banshankari and had moved to Iliyasnagar last month. He was picked up from his friends house at 9.30 pm on Wednesday. On Thursday, a court remanded Qasmi in police custody till January 20.



In July 2015, the special cell had also registered an FIR against unknown persons suspected to be associated with extremist militant group Islamic State (IS) and allegedly conspiring terror attacks in the capital and other cities. In August, the police had also detained a 50-year-old man from outside Iraqi embassy at south Delhis Sri Aurobindo Marg over suspected links with Islamic State.
The Aam Aadmi Party government has advised its MLAs to rope in volunteers to assist parents in filling up online forms under the Economically Weaker Sections category for nursery admissions.





Also, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia will meet such parents in Connaught Place area on Sunday, an Education Department official said.



The MLAs will make sure the volunteers are present in their offices to help those who are having a hard time filling online forms.



We have been asked by the Education Minister to assist parents filling up online forms under the EWS category for nursery admission, Chandni Chowk MLA Alka Lamba told Deccan Herald. We have been told that parents flock to area MLAs offices during the nursery admission process. We have been told to be prepared, she added.



The city government, in a first-of-its-kind initiative, has launched a centralised system for admissions to nursery classes under the EWS category to check malpractices by school managements and harassment of parents.



The Directorate of Education (DoE) said that admissions to nursery classes under the EWS category in private unaided schools (non-minority) recognised under Delhi School Education Act Rules, 1973 will be made through a computerised lottery system, against the 25 per cent reserved seats for them. The EWS admission process at institutions recognised by the Right to Education Act, 2009 will continue to be offline.



Sources in the Education Department said that MLAs have welcomed the city governments move. They are happy that EWS nursery admissions have been made online because they have been swamped by queries related to nursery admissions, an official said.



But educationalists said that the online process is marred by glitches. The governments software has many flaws like the location of schools are not accurate and one has to have a mobile number to initiate the process of EWS nursery admission, said Ashok Agarwal, national president of All India Parents Association.



Even the list of schools uploaded by the government is not clear as to which schools are recognised under Delhi School Education Act Rules, 1973, and those under the Right to Education Act, 2009, he added. It makes it all the more difficult for the EWS parents to approach schools and fill in forms as they couldnt make out which schools require online forms and those with offline applications.



The Education Department acknowledged there were glitches with the software but said a team was working to set them right.



The nursery admission process started on January 1 and the filling of forms will continue till January 22. The first list of shortlisted candidates will be out on February 15, and the admissions to the entry-level classes end by March 31.




Swamy, who is the chairman of AVAP, delivered the inaugural address at the seminar which will see historians, archaeologists and law experts discussing various topics including "Lord Ram's character and values, and their impact on Indian culture", "History of the Ram temple and related archaeological findings", "Legal issues around Ram temple" and "Experience and future of Ram temple".



Amid protests outside the Delhi University, senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy went ahead with a seminar on the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya where he asserted that nothing will be done forcibly or against the law."Construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya is 'mandatory' for revival of our culture. We have started and we will not give up until it is made but nothing will be done forcibly and against the law. We have full faith that we will win in the court," he said in his inaugural address at the two-day seminar.Claiming that former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi had promised him of support for the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, Swamy appealed to Congress to come forward and support the cause."Rajiv Gandhi had personally told me that Ram Mandir will be built and whenever he will get an opportunity he will also help and the first help he did was that despite party opposition, he started the television serial on Ramayana which created a new excitement in public," he said."He had said they will permit the foundation laying, too. He had also said in his campaign for 1989 elections that there should be Ram Rajya in the country. I hope Congress will also come forward and support as this is not just our demand but that of the country," he added.Swamy had earlier this week said that the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya would begin by this year-end with the cooperation of the Muslim community."In our country , over 40,000 temples have been demolished, we never say that all those should be reconstructed...but there cannot be a compromise on three of them -- Ram Janmabhoomi temple, Krishna temple in Mathura and Kashivishwanath, if Ram Temple is constructed there will be easy way for others, discussions can be done but not compromise," he said."Ram Mandir is an aim for us. And when the Muslims leaders had committed that if it is proved that there was temple earlier, they will let us reconstruct it there, not fulfilling that commitment can be contempt of court," he added.The two-day seminar titled "Shri Ram Janma Bhoomi Temple: Emerging Scenario" is being organised at DU's Arts Faculty by Arundhati Vashishtha Anusandhan Peeth (AVAP), a research organisation founded by late VHP leader Ashok Singhal.There was strong opposition from the student groups to DU's decision for allowing such a seminar alleging it would "communalise" the campus and push "saffron agenda".The protesters including that from left-affiliated student wings AISA, DSF, SFI and Congress-affiliate NSUI, staged demonstrations outside the protest venue and were detained later.
A British website, set up to catalogue the last days of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, has released what it claims are eyewitness accounts of the day he was reportedly killed in a plane crash in Taiwan on August 18, 1945.



The latest set of documents quote several people who were reportedly involved in the matter related to the accident as well as two British intelligence reports that revisited the crash site to establish the facts.



The website also sheds light on what may have been the freedom fighter's dying words, which reflected his devotion to the cause of India's freedom.



"For 70 years, there have been doubts in certain circles whether such a tragedy at all took place. Four separate reports each corroborating the other constitute irresistible evidence to the contrary," says a statement issued by www.bosefiles.info.



The documents say that early in the morning on 18 August 1945, a Japanese Air Force bomber took off from Tourane in Vietnam with Bose and 12 or 13 other passengers and crew. Also on board was Lt Gen Tsunamasa Shidei of the Japanese Army and the planned flight path was Heito-Taipei-Dairen-Tokyo.



The three-member Netaji Inquiry Committee, instituted by the government of India in 1956 and headed by Major General Shah Nawaz Khan of Bose's Indian National Army (INA), was told that since "the weather was perfect and the engines (of the aircraft) worked smoothly" the pilot decided to overfly Heito and proceed straight to Taipei, arriving there late morning or early afternoon.



Major Taro Kono, a Japanese Air Staff Officer and one of the passengers, told the committee: "I noticed that the engine on the left side of the plane was not functioning properly. I, therefore, went inside the plane and after examining the engine inside, I found it to be working all right."



He added the accompanying engineer "also tested the engine and certified its air-worthiness". Captain Nakamura alias Yamamoto, the ground engineer in charge of maintenance at the airport, concurred with Major Kono "that the engine of the left side was defective".



He said the pilot told him "it was a brand new engine". He went on to say: "After slowing down the engine, he (the pilot) adjusted it for about five minutes. The engine was tested twice by Major Takizawa (the pilot). After being adjusted, I satisfied myself that the condition of the engine was all right. Major Takizawa also agreed with me that there was nothing wrong with the engine."



However, soon after the aircraft was airborne there was, according to Colonel Habib ur Rahman - Bose's ADC and a co-passenger, a loud explosion.



He described it as "a noise like a cannon shot". Nakamura, who was watching from the ground, said: "Immediately on taking off, the plane tilted to its left side and I saw something fall down from the plane, which I later found was the propeller."

He also maintained that the maximum height gained by the aircraft was 30-40 metres. He estimated "the plane crashed about 100 metres beyond the concrete runway" and immediately caught fire in the front portion.



Colonel Rahman recounted: "Netaji turned towards me. I said 'Aagey Say Nikaleay, Pichey Say Rasta Nahin Hai'. (Please get out through the front; there is no way in the rear.)



"We could not get through the entrance door as it was all blocked and jammed by packages and other things. So Netaji got out through the fire; actually he rushed through the fire. I followed him through the same flames.



"The moment I got out, I saw him about 10 yards ahead of me, standing, looking in the opposite direction to mine towards the west. His clothes were on fire. I rushed and I experienced great difficulty in unfastening his bush-shirt belt. His trousers were not so much on fire and it was not necessary to take them off."



Rahman was in woollen uniform, whereas Bose was in cotton khakis, which, it was assessed, caught fire more easily.



Rahman added: "I laid him down on the ground and noticed a very deep cut on his head, probably on the left side. His face had been scorched by heat and his hair had also caught fire and singed.



"Netaji enquired from me in Hindustani: Aap Ko Ziada To Nahin Lagi?" (Hope you have not been hurt badly). I replied, I feel that I will be all right. About himself he said that he felt that he would not survive."



Bose added: "Jab Apney Mulk Wapis Jayen To Mulki Bhaiyon Ko Batana Ki Mein Akhri Dam Tak Mulk Ki Azadi Ke Liyay Larta Raha Hoon; Woh Jangi Azadi Ko Jari Rakhen. Hindustan Zaroor Azad Hoga, Oos Ko Koi Gulam Nahin Rakh Sakta. (When you go back to the country, tell the people that up to the last I have been fighting for the liberation of my country; they should continue to struggle, and I am sure India will be free before long. Nobody can keep India in bondage now.)"



Lieutenent Col Shiro Nonogaki, who was on the flight, said: "When I first saw Netaji after the plane crash, he was standing somewhere near the left tip of the left wing of the plane. His clothes were on fire and his assistant (Col Rahman) was trying to take off his coat."



There were variations in the details provided by Rahman, Nonogaki, Kono, Takahashi and Nakamura. They were giving evidence 11 years after the accident.



But in essence there was no disagreement between their testimonies on the fact of the crash and Bose suffering severe burns and injuries as a consequence, the website notes.



Netaji was rushed to the nearby Nanmon Military Hospital in a critical condition. In September 1945, British authorities in India sent intelligence teams comprising of Messrs Finney and Davies, H K Roy and K P De to Bangkok, Saigon and Taipei to enquire about the whereabouts of Bose and, if possible, to arrest him. They, instead, returned with the story of the crash.
An Assistant Sub-Inspector of Police (ASI) and a contractor were shot dead, and firing took place outside the residence-cum clinic of a noted doctor in separate incidents in Vaishali district, police said today.



The incidents prompted Union Minister and Hajipur MP Ramvilas Paswan to attack Chief Minister Nitish Kumar by claiming that "jungle raj was back" in the state.



The body of ASI Ashok Kumar Yadav, who was on leave, was found in Manua village today, Superintendent of Police Vaishali, Rakesh Kumar, said.



The ASI was killed allegedly by unidentified assailants and the reason behind the murder is yet to be ascertained, the SP said.



Dr P N Jha of Sadar Hospital, who conducted the post-mortem, said four bullets were found from the body of the policeman and the bullets appear to be those used by police.



In another incident, sand contractor Himanshu Kumar was gunned down allegedly by unknown persons and his body was found from near Bidupur bazar this morning.



The SP said investigation is on. Meanwhile, over twelve rounds of firing took place outside the residence-cum clinic of a noted physician of Hajipur, Vivekanand Jha, at around 11 PM last night when the doctor was inside, Town Inspector Shankar Jha said.



The incidents prompted Ram Vilas Paswan to attack the Nitish Kumar government claiming a string of killings showed that "jungle raj was back" and the Chief Minister was "helpless".



"There are three ministers from Vaishali region in Nitish government including two sons of RJD chief Lalu Prasad of whom one is also Deputy Chief Minister," he said.



"Still, all this is happening in Vaishali. What will happen to the security of people when the police is not safe in Bihar. Why the Chief Minister is so helpless and silent on all this," Paswan told PTI.



Paswan will be visiting his constituency tomorrow to take stock of the situation. "He (Nitish) used to take pride in being called 'Sushashan Babu'. After engineers, doctors and traders, even policemen are not safe. There is no government in Bihar. Extortion is being done openly.



"The situation in the state has become worse than what it was in 1990 when RJD ruled the state. When we used to say that jungle raj will be back if Lalu Nitish combine came to power, they used to react strongly. See, jungle raj is back in such a short span of rule," Paswan said.



Besides Paswan, president of Lok Janshakti Party, its senior coalition partner BJP too slammed the Grand Alliance government of JD(U)-RJD-Congress on the series of crimes.



"Even as the sequence of bank loot, extortion demand to officials of construction companies are yet to stop, criminals now started targeting policemen," senior BJP leader Sushil Modi said in his statement.



"By killing ASI Ashok Kumar Yadav in Hajipur, criminals have posed a serious challenge to the state government. A month and a half back, an inspector was beaten to death at Lalganj in Vaishali district itself," he said.



Seeking to drive a wedge among ruling coalition partners, the senior BJP leader asked Lalu Prasad to break his silence over spate of crimes in recent times and answer "how long the rein of terror by criminals will continue?"



"RJD having the maximum number of 81 MLAs in the ruling coalition has a greater responsibility towards people than JD(U). Lalu Prasad should answer as despite his suggestion why the state government was not initiating strong steps against criminals?" he asked.



BJP ally and HAM(S) president Jitan Ram Manjhi also took a dig at the Nitish Kumar government over law and order situation.



"Police which promises to provide security to people are themselves not safe in Bihar. Not only crimes have increased in the state, but its nature has also changed," Manjhi, former chief minister, said.



He said, "I had told people during election campaign that if Grand Alliance comes to power, criminals would go out of control. Today, people are realising this."



HAM spokesman Vijay Yadav said that the party has decided to stage agitation in all the district headquarters on January 12 on farmers' issue as well as the rise in crime graph.
Even after the Bangladesh War, the Indian Navy did not have any facility to train intelligence officers. The director of Naval Intelligence relied on the RAW, the Intelligence Bureau and the Naval Attaches in our embassies for secret information.





Thankfully, the army extended a helping hand and offered a seat to the navy in the Intelligence Staff Officers Course at the army school for spooks in Pune.



To my luck, in 1972, I was picked for the course. Two weeks in the spy school, I had a feeling I was in the wrong place. Day after day, all that 66 of us in the course did was to stand around sand models showing the battleground complete with rivers, mountains, forests, toy tanks, howitzers and helmeted soldiers. Some of us  the handpicked future battle commanders  holding long cues either commanded the Narak Force (read Pakistanis), or the Chandal Force (the Devilish Chinese) engaged in an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation with the goody-goody Swarg Force (India being swarg, heaven), indulging in a fierce tactical battle based on intelligence reports handed to both sides written on small pieces of paper.



With no naval role to play in these skirmishes, I got bored and one day was caught yawning during a lecture on Locks & Keys. Ticked off, I explained that while at sea we guys were virtually under lock and key for weeks with the odd chance of drowning, and the army locks were too burly for the navy. Poppycock, said the lecturer.



The most exciting day was the visit to the torture tools museum in the school. The Captain-in-charge gave us a spooky rundown on the grand display of nail-pullers, garrotes, vise, and the whips. I liked the kurbash from Turkey. Its lusty thongs were made from the hippopotamuss hide.



More scary torture devices included the pendulum. The victim was tied firmly to a bench and placed under a giant half-moon blade dangling from a pulley, positioned a few feet above his naked torso. The victim was given a trailer of its capability  a fat manila rope was chopped like a cucumber with the blade, and the victim was warned that his torso would meet the same fate if... Immediately the guy lying on the bench started singing the tune the torturer wanted to hear.



All of us admired the water torture for its simplicity and deadly effect. The victim was tightly secured to a long back chair with his forehead raised to the ceiling. And above his head hung a water pot with a tiny hole at the bottom. As the water drops fell on the victims head, he laughed inwardly at the stupidity of the torture. But after an hour or so, the drops hitting the head every second felt like a hammer banging him. He screamed for mercy and admitted the crimes he had not even committed.

The Captain then showed us the women-only Chinese torture device known as tean zu. It used six wooden sticks, all linked by a string. The sticks were placed around and between the ladys fingers, and as the strings were pulled, it had a crushing effect on the fingers.



We mumbled and the Captain quickly stated, We do not use torture in any form. What you are looking at here is what the Brits left behind in 1947. They are for educating you people, just in case you fall into the enemys hands.



As he led the class to other exhibits, I walked to the table where the kurbash was displayed. When no one was looking, I tried the whip on the back of a sofa and imagined myself whiplashing the posteriors which, in my opinion, deserved the whiplashing. Just then the Captain walked past me. Bemused at my Marquis de Sade pose with the kurbash, he said, Sorry Lieutenant, we cant lend it to you.




That it pre-dates Angkor Wat, that it inspired the construction of the Angkor itself, that it is located picturesquely at high altitude, and above all, that it has been coveted and fought over by two countries on the borders of which it lies  what other compelling reasons could a travel bug with wheels for feet ask for! So here I am, heading out with my family, from Siem Reap to Preah Vihear, 210 km away, an off-the-beaten-track jewel in Cambodias crown, 625 metres above sea level, bordering Cambodia and Thailand.





Our drive takes us three hours on good motorable roads, flanked by tracts of land with cassava chips drying under a blazing sun, palm groves and pastoral environs to reach the foot of the Dangrek Mountains. En route we halt at few places to watch the making of palm jaggery, brewing of toddy and crafting of utilities and artefacts using coconut shell.



Mystic mountains



Once at the base of Dangrek, our passports are checked and we are issued tickets to ascend the mountain. We change vehicles here to climb uphill since four wheel drives are the only vehicles that can negotiate the several hairpin bends along the steep, almost vertically inclined serpentine road, leading to Preah Vihear, meaning sacred monastery. The more adventurous visitors and perhaps those not short charged on time we observe, wend their way to the temple on foot along the same road.



Our driver Narin, who also doubles up as a guide, informs us that it would take us a good two hours if we choose to follow them! The Ancient Pathway on the east side of the temple with over 2,000 ruined stone staircase through the forest, or a newer flight of wooden steps that runs parallel to it, are alternative ways to reach Preah Vihear, time permitting. A pair of stone lions flanks the path and the stairs themselves are guarded by sculpted nagas, the multi-headed serpents.

We wonder at the presence of soldiers on our ascent and upon arrival at the temple as well. In fact, the armed men seem to be living here with their families as we observe little kiosks out of which their wives sell cold and hot drinks and small items of snacks while their children run around and play. Narin comes to our rescue again as he narrates Preah Vihears history. Often referred to as the Temple in the Sky, Preah Vihear had been a bone of contention between Cambodia and Thailand, resulting in several armed conflicts between them, through many decades.



It was awarded to Cambodia by a ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in 1962. Yet, the land surrounding the temple remained mired in controversy, coveted by both countries. Conflicts notwithstanding, the temple was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2008. A more recent ruling, in 2013 by the ICJ, gave Cambodia sovereignty over this area also.



It is evident at once that gunfire exchanged in the region between the two countries has damaged the temple significantly. Narin tells us that even today the surrounding areas are infested with land mines. We climb a few steps to come upon the awe-inspiring monument that looks magnificent even in ruins. A trio of flags  that of UNESCO, Cambodia, and the World Heritage, flutter on top of the iconic first gopura or tower, which is actually Gopura 5. Unlike most temples of the time that were built on an east-west axis, Preah Vihear is laid out along a north-south processional axis. The five towers defining the temple complex spike majestically heavenwards, aligned along a 2,600-foot-long central causeway that proceeds dramatically to the edge of a cliff.



Ancient architecture



The roof of Gopura 5, built in the Koh Ker architectural style, is missing. Remnants of carvings with traces of red paint used in its decor are visible in places. Each of the towers is embellished with exquisite carvings, revealing episodes from Hindu mythology. We walk the length of the temple accompanied by the ceaseless songs of cicadas, emphasising the sounds of Cambodian summer. The towers, each one accessed by a flight of steps, are separated by long esplanades, marking a change in height.



The temple towers are so structured that until we pass each gateway, we do not get to see the temple towers in entirety at one shot from any single point. A faded depiction of the Churning of the Ocean of Milk, one of the masterpieces of Preah Vihear, is visible on the pediment above one of the doors to Gopura 4. While sections of the temple complex are in a fairly good state of preserve and reveal the exceptional architectural and sculptural quality of construction, the central sanctuary is a pile of rubble.

The foundation stones of the temple near Gopura 1 stretch to the edge of the cliff as it plunges precipitously, a 500-metre vertical drop to the plains of the Preah Vihear province below. The view of the plains from here is spectacular.



Originally built as a Hindu temple to honour Shiva, Preah Vihear is an emblem of Cambodian pride that pre-dates the famed Angkor Wat. Though not as large as Angkor, it is considered the most prominent of the Khmer Empires architectural wonders. In fact, the design and layout of Preah Vihear, with its galleries surrounding the central sanctuary, served to inspire the architecture and alignment of Angkor, built 300 years later.



A Shivalinga brought from Laos was originally installed in the temple sanctum. One of the most venerated pilgrimage sites during the Angkorian era, Preah Vihear was built by a succession of seven Khmer kings, beginning in the 9th century during the reign of Prince Indrayudha, son of King Jayavarman II, the founder of Khmer empire.



The temple was completed in the 12th century, during the period of Suryavarman II, when the construction of Angkor Wat was begun. However, with the decline of Hinduism in the region, Preah Vihear became a Buddhist house of worship, palpable by the statues of Buddha in one of its sanctums which is active to date.



Fact file



Reaching: Preah Vihear is 210 km from Siem Reap, Cambodia. Since no public transport plies on the route, private cabs may be hired to undertake the three-hour journey.



Accommodation: Siem Reap has plenty of budget and star hotels to suit all pockets.



There are neither boarding-lodging facilities nor hotels/restaurants to catch a quick bite i and around Preah Vihear. The closest town, Sra Em, 30 km away, has modest eateries.


Tata Motors owned Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has achieved a record global sales in 2015, with the premium luxury vehicles manufacturer retailing 4,87,065 vehicles, its highest figure yet and a five per cent increase from previous year.



The record-breaking sales figure came despite a slowdown in China with Britain overtaking Beijing as the luxury car brands most important market.



The two brands together sold more than 1,00,000 vehicles in the UK in a calendar year for the first time last year, which included a 30 per cent increase in British sales of Jaguar, much of it attributable to the launch of the XE.



Last year, sales in China slumped by 24 per cent to 92,474, as a result of a slowdown in what is among the worlds fastest growing automotive market.



Europe was the companys largest sales region in 2015 with sales of 1,10,298, up 28 per cent year on year; and with a growth of 21 per cent over 2014 figures, a total of 1,00,636 Jaguars and Land Rovers were bought by customers in the UK. Andy Goss, Jaguar Land Rovers group sales operations director, said the new figures meant that the group had doubled sales since 2009, because of new launches.



This has been a significant year for Jaguar Land Rover, with updated models being introduced across the range, as well as the addition to our portfolio of the completely new Jaguar XE and Land Rover Discovery Sport.



Customer response (to the XE and the Discovery Sport) has been extremely positive and there have been record retails across the UK, North America and Europe, he fruther added.



2016 promises to be another exciting year, with the start of sales of the Range Rover Evoque Convertible and the Jaguar F-Pace, along with further all-new and refreshed vehicles, he added.



The group said that US sales were up by 25 per cent while sales in Europe  where Jaguar Land Rover has traditionally struggled in markets such as Germany  rose by 28 per cent.



Highlights from 2015 saw Land Rover sell more than 4,00,000 vehicles for the first time, six per cent increase compared to 2014, and Jaguar achieve its best performance in a decade with sales of 83,986 vehicles, a three per cent rise.



Land Rovers new Discovery Sport, which replaced the Freelander2, proved a hit with sales of more than 10,000 a month, second only to the best-selling Range Rover Evoque.



During last year, JLR announced the doubling of the size of its UK engine manufacturing centre and confirmed that it had agreed a manufacturing partnership with Magna Steyr to build some future vehicles in Graz, Austria.




India is running out of patience and may defer resumption of its stalled dialogue with Pakistan, which is yet to act against any of the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) terror plotters behind the recent attack on the Pathankot Air Force base in Punjab.





If Pakistan does not act over the weekend on the information provided by India on the terror plot, New Delhi may defer Foreign Secretary S Jaishankars proposed visit to Islamabad for a meeting with his counterpart A A Chaudhry on January 15. A final decision is likely to be taken early next week.



The meeting between Jaishankar and Chaudhry was to mark resumption of India-Pakistan parleys as Comprehensive Bilateral Dialogue after a two-year hiatus since January 2013.



Radio Pakistan on Saturday quoted Khwaja Muhammad Asif, defence minister of the neighbouring country, stating that no terrorist group would be allowed to derail the dialogue process between Islamabad and New Delhi.



His comment was in line with the statement Islamabad issued on Friday after Pakistan Prime Minister M Nawaz Sharif reviewed the progress of his governments actions on the information provided by New Delhi. India, however, wants Pakistan to translate words into action promptly and act against JeM founder Maulana Masood Azhar, his brother Abdul Rauf Ashgar and close aides Ashfaq Ahmad, Hafiz Abdul Shakur and Kasim Jaan.



Officials told Deccan Herald on Saturday that New Delhi had expected Islamabad to take at least some action against the JeM by now.



They pointed out that five days had passed since National Security Advisor Ajit Doval had shared with his Pakistani counterpart Naseer Khan Janjua details of the plotters, who had coordinated the attacks from the outfits headquarters in Bahawalpur in Pakistan.





That we are running out of our patience and anxiously waiting for them to act has been conveyed to Pakistan government, a senior official said in New Delhi. India is also understood to have made it clear that it would be difficult for Jaishankar to visit Islamabad and meet Chaudhry, until and unless Pakistan government acts against the JeM.



Jaishankar, who is on a tour to Tokyo, will return to New Delhi on Sunday. He and Doval are likely to brief the Prime Minister on Monday about Islamabads response to information provided by New Delhi on the terror plotters.



Meanwhile, sources noted that New Delhi had never officially announced the Foreign Secretary-level talks on January 15. Hence, there is no question of calling off the engagement. New Delhi is ready with an alternative plan for Jaishankar to visit Male to discuss bilateral issues with Maldivian government, around the same time next week when he was to visit Islamabad. The Foreign Secretary is also scheduled to visit Sri Lanka from January 17.




An Odisha MP sitting on a midnight dharna and passengers venting anger at Madhya Pradesh PWD Minister Sartaj Singh accused of using his influence to reschedule a flight set the Delhi airport on the boil.





The airport witnessed high drama on the intervening night of Friday and Saturday with Bhubhaneswar-bound passengers protesting against Air India for rescheduling their flight to Bhopal, which they felt was done at the behest of the minister and two judges.



The fliers had reached the airport at 7:30 pm on Friday but were informed that the flight would be delayed. It would have landed in Bhubhaneswar around 9-9:30 pm but it reached the destination only at 4:30 am on Saturday after the ordeal.



All hell broke lose when the Air India authorities on Friday late night announced the boarding for Bhopal after initially cancelling the service. The Bhubhaneswar fliers were in for a rude shock when they found out that pilots and crew assigned for their flight were being shifted to the Bhopal flight.



BJD MP Tathagata Satpathy, who was flying to Bhubhaneswar, sat on a dharna.

It is sad that Air India is behaving like this. Just because there were some VIPs, one BJP minister and two judges, the Bhopal flight will go but the Bhubhaneswar flight will not go, he said.



He, however, did not name Singh or the judges.



Two international flights, a British Airways flight to London and an Indigo flight to Dubai were also delayed.



Other fliers got into an argument with the airline officials, who assured that they would be flying soon to their destinations. Senior journalist Rajdeep Sardesai, who was also flying to Bhubhaneswar, tweeted, Its close to 1 am; neither Bhopal nor Bhubaneshwar AI flights have left; dharna continues; this is Indias national carrier!



Meanwhile, Singh, who was in the eye of the storm, denied his involvement in the episode. I did not speak to Air India top bosses. When I was talking to Air India officials to understand why a decision to cancel Bhopal flight was taken due to shortage of pilots, an MP and a co-passenger gathered support from other passengers and politicised the entire issue, Singh told Deccan Herald in Bhopal.



Air India denied any wrongdoing, saying: At no time did AI give any preference to any particular flight. The available crews duty time remaining as per regulations was checked and was scheduled for flights based on time and sequence.


A 27-year-old financier was hacked to death by a gang of four men in Subramanyapura police limits on Friday night. The deceased has been identified as Sandeep Reddy, a resident of Raghavendra Layout in JP Nagar. Reddy was also a BJP leader, police said.





According to police, Reddy was returning home around 11 pm by his car when the assailants accosted him near Brigade Millenium building on Puttenahalli Road. They picked a fight with him and dragged him out of the car. Fearing his life, Reddy started to run for safety, but the suspects chased and attacked him before fleeing in a car. The police on night patrolling noticed the body of Reddy lying in a pool of blood and rushed him to a nearby hospital where doctors declared him dead on arrival, police said.



Preliminary investigation indicated involvement of Nagaraj, a one-time friend of Reddy, in the murder. Reddy had borrowed around Rs three lakh from Nagaraj a few months ago, but had delayed the repayment. Nagaraj had warned Reddy of dire consequences if he failed to pay the money. Both had fought over the issue a week ago and Nagaraj had vowed to teach Reddy a lesson, police said.



Reddys body was handed over to the family members after a post-mortem at KIMS.

He was unmarried and was staying with his parents, said the police.



Mechanic killed

In another incident in Chandra Layout police limits, a mechanic was hacked to death by unidentified persons late Friday night. The deceased was identified as Shivamadhu, 40, a resident of Vinayaka Layout and a native of Channapatna.



He was returning home from a birthday party when the assailants attacked him near Vinayaka Temple.



Police on night patrol found Shivamadhu badly injured and shifted him to a nearby hospital, where he was declared brought dead.


German luxury car brand Mercedes-Benz sold 13,502 units in India between January-and December 2015, its highest-ever in the country.





With a growth of 32 per cent (January to December 2014: 10,201 units), this is also the straight third year of growth for the company, Mercedes-Benz said.



The SUV portfolio comprising the GLA, GLE and GL-Class emerged the strongest with 100 per cent growth in the January-December 2015 period.



The company also witnessed a strong sales drive from the exclusive and top-end performance brand Mercedes-AMG and the Dream Cars portfolio, which grew by 54 per cent.



The luxury sedans comprising the CLA, C-Class, E-Class and the S-Class achieved record sales volumes and grew stronger by 42 per cent, the company said.



We are happy to witness such a strong growth despite unexpected sales challenges faced in the key markets of Chennai and Delhi. Our efforts are not just limited to sales success or creating a memorable customer experience; but over the years, we have strived to create value to the society and work towards its sustainable development, at large. I am glad that our comprehensive strategy is paying off and we have been able to achieve what we set out for in the beginning of the year, Mercedes Benz India Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Roland Folger said.



In 2015, Mercedes-Benz India also added three new products (GLA, CLA and the Mercedes-Maybach S500) to its local production portfolio and doubled the production facility to become the countrys largest luxury car manufacturer.



Furthermore, Mercedes-Benz increased its cumulative investment in production facility to Rs 1,000 crore, the highest for any luxury carmaker in India.


Amid protests by student wings of the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party, senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy on Saturday addressed a controversial seminar on Ram Janmabhoomi in Delhi University.





The police detained several students protesting outside the event venue.

A contingent of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police Force also had to be deployed in the varsity to prevent the situation from going out of control.



Ram temple

Construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya is mandatory for revival of our culture. We have started and we will not give up until it is built. But nothing will be done forcibly and against the law, Swamy said in his inaugural address at the two-day seminar.



He claimed that former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi had promised him to support the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.


After maintaining silence over the incidence of violence at Kaliachawk in Malda district on January 3, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee broke her silence on Saturday and called it a clash between local residents and the BSF.





On January 3, a mob of some 50,000 people surrounded the Kaliachawk police station and set it ablaze, along with 11 police vehicles. The incident, which received significant attention from the online community, was touted as a communal incident, with BJP and RSS supporters lashing out at Trinamool Congress-run state governments policy of minority appeasement.
Prime minister Narendra Modi on Saturday visited the Indian Air Force station in Pathankot to receive an on-the-spot briefing about the terror attack and how the security forces killed six perpetrators after three days of gun battle.





I had a detailed briefing and noted with satisfaction the decision-making and its execution and the considerations that went into our tactical response. I was briefed in great detail on how our forces neutralised such a serious terrorist attack, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted after visiting the airbase.



While the security agencies gunned down six ultras, as many as seven Indian soldiers including a NSG officer lost their lives. Close to 20 personnel were injured too in the terror strike on the Indian military installation.



Modi was accompanied by the National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, Army Chief Gen Dalbir Singh Suhag, IAF chief Air Chief Marshal Arup Raha and heads of Border Security Force and National Security Guards.



A senior IAF officer from the Garud commando team briefed Modi.

The prime minister was taken around the military engineering service yard where the terrorists were first engaged by the security forces and the two-storey billet for airmen's accommodation where the last two terrorists were killed after the structure was blown up by the security forces.



Criticism

The prime minister's comments assume significance as it comes in the wake of sharp criticism within a section of the security establishment that came down heavily on the government for its handling of the Pathankot incident.



The government's decision to rely more on the NSG and Garud commandos, relegating the Army to a secondary role, was widely criticised by military officers, who argued that using Army would have been far effective as infantry troops have wide experience in tackling terrorists in a large area  the base is spread over 1900 acres of area - because of their years of experience in Jammu and Kashmir.



There were two infantry divisions in Pathankot with 15,000 soldiers each, in addition to two armoured brigades. Also there were several Army Special Force (Paras) units in the vicinity in addition to many other Army formations in Punjab and Jammu region.



Yet only a small group of Army troops were roped in the operation in the first day.


Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Saturday said Pakistan is swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner into the terror attck on the air base in Pathankot and will soon bring out the truth.





This was conveyed by Sharif to US Secretary of State John Kerry who telephoned the Prime Minister.



Kerry extended full support to the Prime Minister to find out the truth in the Pathankot terror incident, a statement issued by the Pakistan PMO said.



It said Sharif told Secretary Kerry that we are swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner and will bring out the truth. The world will see our effectiveness and sincerity in this regard, the Prime Minister added, according to the statement.


Maulana Anzarshah Qasmi, the city-based cleric arrested by the Delhi police for his alleged links with al-Qaeda, went on a radicalisation spree and successfully radicalised a large number of youth for about five years. The Bengaluru City police never acted on the requests of the State Intelligence Wing (SIW) to monitor his activities.





The SIW had prepared a list of three such clerics in the State - one each in Kalaburagi, Vijayapura and Bengaluru (Qasmi) - in 2010 itself. The SIW had repeatedly requested the Bengaluru police to closely monitor Qasmi for showing dangerous trends.



We wrote three letters to the then City Police Commissioner Raghavendra Auradkar requesting that the movements of Qasmi and his radical activities be monitored. We had even requested the police to register cases against Qasmi, detain him and interrogate if need be. Despite our letters and sharing ofinformation, the police never acted, a former police officerwho served in the Intelligence department told Deccan Herald.



The SIW lacks powers to book cases and effect any arrests. Otherwise, we would have booked Qasmi, detained and interrogated him. This could have given crucial leads about his involvement in terrorist activities, he said and suspected that he might have influenced the minds of a large number of youths.



We collected a huge quantity of data containing hate speeches of Qasmi in 2010. We were convinced that Qasmi was in constant touch with many outfits in foreign countries, but we could not trace his handlers outside India. The City police would have identified the handlers had they acted on our letters, the officer said.The SIW decided to write to the City police, recommending action against Qasmi after hearing his speeches. The SIW even told the police to register cases if need be and take measures to prevent him from radicalising youths, he said.



They believed that Qasmi might have acted as a recruiting agent for a few outfits besides playing a lead role in their financial transactions. Auradkar was not available for comment.



Under the scanner since 2007



The first time Qasmi came under the police radar was soon after the 2007 attack on the Glasgow international airport, carried out by Kafeel Ahmed, a resident of Karisandra in Banashankari 2nd stage.



A Wahabi, Qasmi is believed to have radicalised Kafeel during his frequent visits to his mosque at Banashankari. The SIW started tracking elements that were radicalising youth after the arrest of Dr Sabeel Ahmed and Kafeel Ahmed in the airport attack case. A retired officer in the SIW said, While SIW established the innocence of Kafeels parents, they were convinced that Kafeel was radicalised by a cleric.






The January 4 earthquake has left a severe impact on Manipurs education sector as several schools have suffered extensive damages, so much so that the state government has decided to shut all educational institutes shut for a week.





And losses other than the material ones have been huge.



Victor Meitei, a student of Class III, wants to become a doctor when he grows up but the 6.8-magnitue earthquake seems to have imperilled his dream. Victors school building has collapsed in the earthquake and uncertainty looms over the future of his education.

Our mud house has also developed cracks but I am very sad because my school has collapsed, Victor told Deccan Herald in front of the destroyed building of Wangmataba Manissang Upper Primary school.



Thye child comes from a very poor family and his parents, who work as daily-wage labourers, and can only afford his education in government school. As of now, the teachers also do not when classes will resume in the school where 80 per cent of the students are orphans.



Victor is not the only one as many school buildings have perished in the quake, raising a serious question mark over the students future.



We are lucky that classes were not on when the quake struck. The government is aware of the weak condition of the school building. In Manipur, only poor students study in government schools, one of the school teacher, who did not wanted to be identified, told Deccan Herald.



The earthquake has added to the woes of the north-eastern states education sector, which has already been crippled by factors like strikes and blockades caused by ethnic unrest, insurgency and other agitation.



For several decades, many schools have been used for housing security forces. For the helpless parents, sending their wards to Delhi or Bengaluru or private schools have been the available options. Many schools have also been affected by last years flash floods.



For past few years, on an average 100 working days of schools and colleges have been wasted due to strikes. The calendar year is never completed. Many things in the syllabus are missed or skipped affecting the quality of education, said Moirangthem Angamba, president of Democratic Students Alliance of Manipur. It wants immediate resumption of classes and also ensuring that the students are safe inside.


Delhi Transport Minister Gopal Rai said on Saturday that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government has no plans to extend the odd-even vehicle number rule beyond January 15.





The minister also reiterated that the government will not end the car rationing campaign to arrest the rising level of pollution in Delhi before January 15. The Delhi High Court will give its order on Monday on the petitions challenging the government 15-day campaign.



The minister defended the legality of the road rationing plan as there were provisions under Section 115 of the Motor Vehicle Act enabling the city government to impose such car curbs.



Some 5,893 defaulters have been challaned so far by traffic police, revenue department and transport department for violating rules, said Rai on the ninth day of the campaign. About 1,943 autorickshaw drivers have been penalised by the transport department.
The government is considering a proposal to issue Overseas Citizen of India or OCI cards up to fifth or sixth generation of expatriate Indians, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said on Saturday.





Delivering the keynote address on the occasion of the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas, Swaraj said the proposal of issuing Aadhaar cards to Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) was also under consideration.



So far Aadhar cards have been given to those Indians who live in India. It is not for Non-Resident Indians. But you will be happy to know that the prime minister wants the card to be given to the NRIs the way it is issued to people living in India, she said, calling upon the Indian diaspora to join Make in India, Skill India and Digital India campaign launched by the Narendra Modi government.



The Person of Indian Origin or PIO cards were issued to expatriate Indians or their descendants only up to fourth generation.



The Centre had in 2014 discontinued issuing the PIO cards and decided to issue only OCI cards to all.



A foreign national can get an OCI card if he or she was eligible to become citizen of India on January 26, 1950, or was a citizen of India on or at any time after January 26, 1950, or belonged to a territory that became part of India after August 15, 1947.



The son or daughter or grandson or grand-daughter of such a foreign national can also get a OCI card provided his or her country of citizenship allows dual citizenship in some form or other under the local laws. The minor children of such person are also eligible for OCI cards. A person, however, will not be eligible to get a OCI card if he or she ever had been a citizen of Pakistan or Bangladesh.



After the discontinuation of the PIO scheme and its merger with OCI scheme, a person is eligible to get a OCI card if he or she at any time had held an Indian passport or he or she or either of his or her parents or grandparents was born in or was permanent resident in India, as defined in the Government of India Act, 1935, and other territories that became part of India thereafter.



The government was considering a proposal to expand the OCIs eligibility criteria to entitle the descendants up to fifth or sixth generation of the expatriates to get the benefit.


The Basava Krishi award, instituted by the Lingayat Panchamasali Jagadguru Peeth of Kudalasangama, for this year will be conferred on Manik Sarkar, the Chief Minister of Tripura.





The announcement was made by Basava Jaya Mrutyunjaya Swami. The award which consists of Rs one lakh cash and a memento will be given at a ceremony in March, the Swamiji said.



The award is in appreciation of Sarkars tireless service towards the welfare of farmers, labourers and the working class, he added.



The Swamiji also said a meeting has been organised at Sindhudurga in Maharashtra on January 19. The meeting will be attended by chief ministers of Goa, Karnataka and Maharashtra, farmer leaders to resolve the Mahadayi issue peacefully with Dr Rajendra Singh, a water expert from Rajasthan, he added.
Home Minister G Parameshwara sees no merit in the trifurcation of Bangalore University. Any such move would dent the identity of the varsity, he has said.





His reaction comes months after the university trifurcation has been approved and is awaiting Governors assent. Parameshwara had served as higher education minister.

Addressing the gathering after being felicitated by the Bangalore University Employees Welfare Association here on Saturday, the minister said that instead of dividing the varsity into three units, the government should have bifurcated the same to maintain good standards.



He said that Bangalore University has its own brand value akin to Bengaluru.

The government of the day had decided to opt for trifurcation owing to the growing

number of colleges and students.



The historical university is now caught in a quandary. It would have been best if the varsity was bifurcated. Even when I was the Higher Education minister, I was of the opinion that the varsity should be bifurcated, he said.



Too late for reversal

The minister later clarified to the media that it was too late to reverse the governments

decision. Stating that the university campus had shrunk from 1,200 acres to 1,000 acres owing to encroachments, he said that the authorities should make concerted efforts to protect the land.



He said that former vice chancellor Siddappa had worked toward planting around two lakh saplings, and the present vice-chancellor too should take up similar measures.


Pushing for the use of technology to check traffic violations, Home Minister G Parameshwara on Saturday said that the City traffic police would instal nine more interceptors and additional CCTV cameras to capture speeding vehicles.





He was addressing hundreds of schoolchildren at the 27th National Road Safety Week, organised by the traffic police and the Department of Transport at the Kanteerava stadium.



In Bengaluru, about 700 people were killed in road accidents last year, while about 10,000 people died in road accidents in the State. The City witnesses high number of accidents every year. Hence, the government has made helmet mandatory for pillion riders, as per the Supreme Court order. Apart from criticisms from a few quarters, a large section of the people have welcomed the decision, the minister said.



On the sidelines of the programme, he said that the inmates of the Parappana Agrahara central prison would be released on Republic Day based on old guidelines.



We will adopt new guidelines after the cabinet approval, he said. The minister hinted at the possibility of extending the deadline for bars and restaurants in the City on all days of the week. I will hold a meeting with the Excise department and decide on the issue, he said.



On the occasion, hundreds of students from 43 schools took part in a colourful parade. An exhibition of road safety equipments, traffic regulation devices and photographs related to road safety was put up outside the stadium.



Rs 70 cr collected as fine

In 2015, the Bengaluru traffic police collected a record amount of Rs 70.44 crore as fine for traffic violations and the number of cases booked was around 76.26 lakh.



This is the highest cases booked and fine collected till date. In 2014, about 74.36 cases were booked and fine amount collected crossed Rs 65.92 crore. In 2012 and 2013, about 53 lakh cases were booked and the fine collected was around Rs 55 crore. Among traffic violations, riding without helmet and wrong parking topped the list, at 17 lakh and 21 lakh, respectively.


The footpath was barely walkable. But, even as Abhay struggled, lugging his heavy bag on that stretch, a motorcyclist in great haste blocked his way. Pulling out his smartphone, Abhay clicked a snap in anger, posted it on Facebook and Twitter, promptly tagging the police.





The response was quick. A dedicated social media team at the traffic control room immediately took note, referring the complaint and picture to the nearest station. The vehicles registration number was now firmly on record for further action!



Driven by such rare social media linked official activism, the Twitter account of Bengaluru Traffic Police (@blrcitytraffic) has garnered 74,200 followers over the years. Its Facebook page is on the radar of 3.52 lakh Bengalureans! Also active is its WhatsApp number, 7259100100, a dedicated line for commuters to report traffic congestions.



Yet, despite this proven power of social media to link users and official agencies, the platform remains grossly underutilized by Bengalurus other critical civic departments. Agreed, the traffic police have a constant, daily connect with the public. But so do BBMP, BWSSB, BESCOM, albeit to a lesser extent.



Marginal presence

On Facebook, the Palikes official page has merely 3,340 likes! The BBMP commissioners page is marginally better with 4,771 people liking it. However, this has not emerged as a popular, structured forum for the public to register their complaints. They can only post the complaints as a response to the commissioners frequent posts on what the Palike does.



But BBMP insists that it receives a flood of public problems linked to garbage not being picked up, lack of streetlights, bad roads and the pathetic state of footpaths. Yet, a closer look shows that a proper grievance redressal mechanism through the platform has not emerged. On his part, the Mayor Manjunath Reddy has been more proactive on Twitter, regularly tweeting on BBMP programmes.



Special Commissioner, Finance, Kumar Pushkar says that all the problems highlighted on the Palike Commissioners page are sent to grievance cell or concerned officers. "Once the issue is addressed, a post is sent on the Commissioner's FB page stating that the problem is resolved, he informs.



In his analysis of multiple city civic agencies, Tinu Cherian, a social media activist with over 2.25 lakh Twitter followers, finds the Palikes social media strategy relatively poor. They are not very active. There is no structured mechanism for people to post complaints and get them redressed, he points out.



BWSSBs absence

BWSSB too fares poorly on the social media front. Both its Facebook pages, created during 2011-12 have been inactive for long. There are hardly any posts informing the public about the Board. A few complaints are posted but there are no replies! A Twitter account (@bwssbchairman) carries just one message tweeted in 2012. The account has only 157 followers.



Board Chairman T M Vijay Bhaskar acknowledges BWSSBs lack of social media presence. I have instructed an officer to create accounts in Facebook and Twitter to post BWSSBs updates. We will do it. At present, we have deployed two staffers at the newly opened reception counter in Cauvery Bhavan to ensure the consumers grievances are heard through proper channels, he says.



Despite other online and offline avenues to post complaints, social media has clearly emerged as the easiest mode to lodge their grievances. For lakhs of people in the IT sector, this platform is far simpler. Most people dont even know what number to call if there is a problem. Facebook and Twitter are the easiest. Use these to share information both ways, suggests Cherian.



The benefits can be mutual. As Additional Commissioner of Police, Traffic, M A Saleem explains, social media has helped the police to be more alert and responsive. Before, the police used to be aloof. Now, there is a change from a force concept to a service concept. It has also helped police get information much faster than earlier.





(with inputs from Naveen Menezes, Nivedita Jain)
DeVier Posey: How ex-Ohio State player learned to handle adversity

From medical challenges to setbacks his senior year at Ohio State, DeVier Posey has long been learning to harness his pain.
Aircel-Maxis deal: judge posts case against Marans for 18 Jan

The court of Special Judge O P Saini in Delhi, looking into cases related to the 2G scam, has fixed 18 January as the date for consideration and taking cognisance of the complaint filed by the Enforcement Directorate against the former telecom minister Dayanidhi Maran, his brother Kalanithi Maran, his wife Kaveri Kalanithi and others in a money laundering case.

The complaint is a spin-off of the corruption case lodged by the Central Bureau of Investigation in the Aircel-Maxis deal.

The complaint alleged that Rs 742.58 crore was paid for Dayanidhi Maran by two Mauritius-based companies through Sun Direct TV Pvt Ltd (SDTPL) and South Asia FM Ltd (SAFL).

The two companies are owned and controlled by Kalanithi Maran, and the money was utilised by these companies for their business, the complaint alleged.

Dayanidhi Maran obtained the proceeds of crime (Rs742.58 crore) by camouflaging it as capital contribution in SDTPL and SAFL and thus committed the offence of money laundering under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, the complaint said.

SDTPL is owned and controlled by. Kalanithi Maran and Kaveri Kalanithi, who are the chairman and director of the company respectively. It received the proceeds of crime, Rs549.03 crore, for. Dayanidhi Maran in the guise of foreign investment, which was consumed by it in its business, the complaint said.

SAFL received Rs193.55 crore for Dayanidhi Maran by projecting it as capital contribution received by the company.

This amount was also consumed by SAFL in its business.

The ED has already attached the assets of Dayanidhi Maran, Kalanithi Maran and Kaveri Kalanithi and other accused equivalent to proceeds of crime of (Rs742.58 crore).
Pakistan is reported to have sought more evidence from India on involvement of Pakistan-based terrorists in the brazen attack on the Pathankot Air Force base even as Pakistan's army and the ISI have joined Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in condemning the attack. But, despite Prime Minister Nawas Sharif chairing a second high-level meeting on the Pathankot terror attack in Islamabad on Friday, Pakistan seems to be in no mood to take action against the attackers. Pakistan thinks that the evidence shared by India - three phone numbers  are not enough to prove Pakistan's involvement in Pathankot terror attack. It wants India to share DNA samples of the slain terrorists. The Times of India reported that two numbers - +92-3017775253 and +92 300097212 - to which calls were made by two of the six terrorists, who had attacked the crucial air base in Punjab, are from Pakistan. Moreover, a day after intelligence sources claimed that India has identified Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Maulana Masood Azhar and three others as the mastermind of the Pathankot Air Force base terror attack, a report today confirmed that the two phone numbers to which calls were made by the perpetrators are from Pakistan. Although India has made it very clear that the Nawaz Sharif government will have to act ahead of holding the foreign secretary-level talks, Pakistani authorities believe the evidence given by India will not stand in a court of law as they have serious doubts that Pathankot attackers came from Pakistan. Media reports further say that Pakistan is expecting India to share DNA samples of the dead bodies of the terrorists killed in Pathankot. Sources have also ruled out a 'time-bound action' by Pakistan. Meanwhile, Pakistan today said it has "reviewed progress" on the leads provided by India which has linked foreign secretary-level talks to Islamabad's decisive action on the Pathankot terror attack.



Meanwhile, in the ongoing investigations by National Investigation Agency (NIA) on the Pathankot terrorist strike, post mortem examinations of the bodies of the terrorists killed have been conducted at Pathankot civil hospital on 7 January 2016. Body tissues of the terrorists have been preserved for DNA sampling. During investigations, DNA samples have been collected from the vehicles used by the terrorists and the same are being sent for forensic examination. Footprints suspected to be of the terrorists, have been lifted by forensic experts from Bamihal village in the border area and from within the Air Force station and have been sent to Central Forensic Science Lab (CFSL) for examination. All the arms and ammunitions used by the terrorists in the attack have been seized. These include AK series rifles, pistols, grenades and assorted ammunition. Other articles found on the bodies of the terrorists and from the crime scene and suspected to belong to the terrorists have been seized. These include food articles and medicines carried by the terrorists. Search of the Air Force station campus is being conducted to recover any trace evidence left behind by the terrorists. NIA has summoned SP Salwinder Singh who claimed to have been abducted from a personal vehicle which was hijacked and later used by the terrorists on the night of 31 December 2015, to NIA headquarters for questioning in connection with the investigation. Four NIA teams are camping in districts of Punjab to verify the facts and examine witnesses in close cooperation with Punjab Police.










Germany`s ruling parties promised on Friday to crack down aggressively on migrants who commit crimes, after assaults on women in Cologne on New Year`s Eve stoked debate about Chancellor Angela Merkel`s welcoming policy towards refugees. Some 121 women are reported to have been robbed, threatened or sexually molested there by gangs of mostly drunk men between 18 and 35 years old while out celebrating. Cologne`s police chief has said the perpetrators appeared to be of "Arab or North African" origin and the head of the police union in the region was quoted by German daily Die Welt as saying there were "definitely" refugees among them. In response to the assaults, Merkel`s Christian Democrats (CDU) have called for tougher penalties against offending asylum seekers, according to a draft paper seen by Reuters ahead of a meeting of the party leadership in Mainz. The paper says refugees and asylum seekers who have been sentenced to prison or probation should be barred from eligibility for asylum. This sentiment was echoed by vice chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, who is also leader of the Social Democrats (SPD), coalition partners to Merkel`s conservatives. "Why should German taxpayers pay to imprison foreign criminals," Gabriel said. "The threat of having to spend time behind bars in their home country is far more of a deterrent than a prison sentence in Germany." Cologne police have not confirmed that refugees were among the attackers on New Year`s Eve, but Arnold Plickert, chief of the police union in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia said there was no doubt in his mind. "The suggestion that nothing points to refugees as being among the attackers is wrong in my view," Plickert told Die Welt. "There were definitely refugees among the perpetrators." The CDU paper calls for lower barriers to deport criminal asylum-seekers, increased video surveillance and the creation of a new criminal offence for physical assault. The assaults have raised doubts over whether Germany, which took in 1.1 million refugees last year, can succeed in integrating the latest wave and prompted renewed calls for limits on the number of new arrivals. A new poll for public broadcaster ARD showed Merkel`s popularity rising 4 points to 58 per cent and support for her conservative bloc up to 39 per cent. Peter Tauber, general secretary of the CDU, rejected the idea of a cap but appeared to acknowledge that some refugees were not respecting German laws. "There are many refugees that are happy to have survived, to have made it here and who are looking for jobs. These people who can contribute to our country are welcome," he told German broadcaster Deutschlandfunk. "But clearly there are also some who haven`t understood what kind of opportunity they`ve been given." Julia Kloeckner, leader of the CDU in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate who is seen as a possible successor to Merkel one day, told ZDF television the attacks had been a wake up call for Germany. "I think we really need to take off the blinkers," she said.








A heavyweight funder in K-12 education, the Walton Family Foundation, announced it is doubling down on its investments in school choice with a $1 billion plan to help expand the charter school sector and other choice initiatives over the next five years.

That investment will match what the foundation has poured into K-12 initiatives since it first started its education philanthropy 20 years ago.

In a new report detailing its five-year strategic plan, the foundation identified 13 cities and states it intends to work ina decision it says was driven by growing demand for new schools and research showing academic gains among some charter school students.

When we look at charter performance in the urban core, in parts of the country that have the most perniciously unfixable academic outcomes in the country, we see exciting breakthroughs of charter schools at scale, said Marc Sternberg, the director of the foundations K-12 education program."Its a combination of results and a surge in demand that conveyed to us that theres a real opportunity to have impact.

A June study from Stanford Universitys Center for Research on Education Outcomes found that students in charter schools in 41 cities significantly outperform their district counterparts in reading and math, while the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools estimates that more than 1 million students are currently on waiting lists for charters.

Big Footprint

The Walton Family Foundation is the philanthropic arm of Walmart founder Sam Waltons heirs and long has been a major supporter of school choice.

(The Walton Family Foundation provides grant support for Education Weeks coverage of school choice and parent-empowerment issues.)

One can hardly turn around in the charter school sector without bumping into a benefactor of the Walton Family Foundation. Nearly one-quarter of all charter schools nationally have received startup funds from it, according to the report.

In addition to charters, the foundation supports private school choice and regular school districts willing to dip their toes into school choice.

This newest round of funding will focus on expanding school choice options in low-income communities in cities such as Los Angeles, and New Orleans, developing teachers and school leaders, and supporting strategies to help parents navigate school choice.

The Walton Family Foundation was among the first major K-12 philanthropists to invest in charter schools, and has helped shape the sector as it is today. Theyve played a real role in pushing for the growth of the charter management sector and networks of charter schools in order to prioritize going to scale, as they like to refer to it, said Jeffrey R. Henig, a political science and education professor at Teachers College, Columbia University, and co-editor of the book The New Education Philanthropy.

But the foundations investment strategy is changing.

Initially, it focused on creating competition in K-12 to improve the overall system. The foundations latest report says it has learned thats not enough. Parents need help in choosing schoolssuch as citywide enrollment systems, said Sternberg.

Families need access to real-time information. Families need easy transportation options. We need government to do its job and authorize high-quality schools, he said. We now know that there are some key enablers outside of the school that have to be in place.

But the $1 billion announcement has not come without its critics. Among them: the American Federation of Teachers, which released a report last June saying Waltons investments in charters are irresponsible.

This is not about public charters ... or about ensuring parents have great choices for their kids, AFT President Randi Weingarten said in a statement.

This is about the fundamentally flawed Walmart model that destabilizes and diminishes public education.
MILAN (Reuters) - Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi pledged to relaunch his Forza Italia party this year and force out the centre-left government of Matteo Renzi, according to an interview with daily Il Giornale on Saturday.

Berlusconi, 79, has kept a low profile since he was convicted of tax evasion and banned from public office in 2013, but promised to return to the front lines of Italian politics and strengthen his party, which he said was weakened by his absence.

This year "will be the year of the battle against the regime of the left which suspended democracy", Berlusconi told the paper, referring to Renzi, who took office in an internal power struggle within his Democratic Party (PD) but has yet to win a parliamentary election.

Berlusconi called for parliament to be dissolved and new elections, adding his own ousting was "unconstitutional".

The media magnate won three national elections over 14 years before he was hamstrung by a tax fraud conviction and sex scandals.

He dismissed suggestions of friction between Forza Italia and the other two parties of the centre right, the anti-immigrant Northern League and the far-right Brothers of Italy, adding the three would present a united front in upcoming mayoral elections this year in Rome, Milan, Naples and Bologna.

The centre-right has often been divided since shortly after a 2013 parliamentary election. The League has maintained hardline opposition to the government while Berlusconi has wavered between modest opposition and collaboration with Renzi.

If all three centre-right parties joined forces, according to opinion polls, they could be a threat to Renzi's PD, which is the only major party on the centre-left.

The next parliamentary election is due in 2018, but commentators speculate it could come earlier as a result of instability in Renzi's ruling coalition.

"My commitment is to take Forza Italia back to above 20 percent so that the centre-right can win the elections at the first round, surpassing 40 percent," Berlusconi said.

A new electoral law introduced by Renzi requires a run-off ballot between the two largest parties if none obtain 40 percent of votes in the first round.

(Reporting by Agnieszka Flak; editing by Gavin Jones and Digby Lidstone)
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia may take further measures against Iran after cutting ties with its regional rival this week, the Saudi foreign minister said on Saturday, in a major row over the kingdom's execution of a Shi'ite Muslim cleric.

Adel al-Jubeir's comments came in a press conference after an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), convened to discuss tensions with Iran after attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions there.

"We are looking at additional measures to be taken if it (Iran) continues with its current policies," Jubeir said, without elaborating on what these measures could be.

The crisis between conservative Sunni kingdom and Shi'ite power Iran, both major oil exporters, started when Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr on Jan. 2, triggering outrage among Shi'ites across the Middle East.

In Iran, protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations. Tehran cut all commercial ties with Riyadh, and banned pilgrims from traveling to Mecca.

"The escalation is coming from Iran, not from Saudi Arabia or the GCC .... We are evaluating Iran's moves and taking steps to counter them..things will be clearer in the near future," Jubeir said.

After the meeting the GCC, which comprises Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, condemned what they said was Iranian interference in the internal affairs of Saudi Arabia and the region.

Jubeir also said his country had asked the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, of which Iran is a member, to convene an extraordinary meeting to discuss the aggression against its embassy.

Iran has said the kingdom is to blame for the diplomatic crisis.

In a letter to the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies earlier on Saturday, Iran's foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif complained about Saudi Arabia's "provocations" towards Tehran.

(Reporting By Maha El Dahan in Abu Dhabi and Mostafa Hashem in Cairo; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)
Aftermath of a Saudi airstrike on Yemen's capital Sana'a on Wednesday (Khaled Abdullah/Reuters)

Human Rights Watch has said that the Saudi-led coalition is using cluster bombs in its aerial intervention in Yemen's civil war.

HRW said the cluster munitions were dropped on Yemen's capital Sana'a, controlled by the Ansar Allah (Houthi) movement, on Wednesday. While saying that it was unclear if civilians had been killed or wounded, the organization asserted that "the deliberate or reckless use of cluster munitions in populated areas amounts to a war crime".

Residents of two Sana'a neighborhoods described the attacks between 5:30 and 6 a.m. on Wednesday. Houses, a school, and vehicles were covered in pockmarks characteristic of the damage from cluster bombs. The nearest military installations were 600 to 800 meters away.

Human Rights Watch said photographs "showed unmistakable remnants of cluster munitions, including unexploded sub-munitions, spherical fragmentation liners from sub-munitions that broke apart on impact, and parts of the bomb that carried the payload". It identified the weapons as US-made BLU-63 anti-personnel/anti-materiel sub-munitions and components of a CBU-58 cluster bomb.

Each air-dropped CBU-58 cluster bomb contains 650 submunitions. The US transferred 1,000 of the bombs to Saudi Arabia sometime between 1970 and 1995.

HRW has documented the use by coalition forces of three types of cluster munitions in Yemen, while Amnesty International documented a fourth type.

Saudi Arabia and allies launched the aerial intervention in March 2015, trying to halt the advance of the Ansar Allah movement that had forced the Government to leave Sana'a for the port city of Aden to the south.

Earlier this week, the UN almost 2,800 civilians have been killed in Yemen since March, with another 5,300 injured.
Re: Non EU Citizen Planning to obtain MBA in Switzerland Quote: dro And the tax code is another reason why I hate the US. That is completely rediculus that citizens have to pay taxes to the US if they don't live or work in that country. . RBT CBT will never happen. As you plan your future, do be aware of what it means to be a US tax payer resident abroad. Given how expensive Switzerland is, you do need to fully understand how your US tax burden will further impact your cost of living here.



Your tax obligations to the US will continue as long as you hold the blue passport - which will be at least the next 12 years (or 10, if new legislation comes into force) if you are aiming towards Swiss citizenship. And be aware that Swiss citizenship is never a given, you might never be granted it despite fulfilling all the criteria, despite being a good neighbor, villager, and tax payer.



So make your plans with the burden of US taxes in mind.



In addition to Medea's coments, there are some other issues that you should consider. One is the way the US views pension savings, which does not work at all with the way Swiss pensions are set up.



You are young, so perhaps retirement planning isn't even on your radar yet... but do be aware of the difficulties placed on US citizens in Switzerland in this respect. Your pension contributions and those of your employer are taxable in the year of contribution, as income on your US taxes. The amount might not be large cwhen you start out, but as you grow older, and presumably more successful, you will find that US tax on your yearly total pension contribution can be very painful.



And of course tax obligation to the US means that many do not get the benefit of low Swiss taxes. (We pay far more to the US than we do to Switzerland.)



We would have been better off financially had we stayed in the US.



But of course, financial opportunity isn't everything.



There are many other reasons to consider a move to Switzerland. Just do your research, and again, eyes wide open.



Wishing you all the best. While I agree wholeheartedly with that sentiment, realistically a reversal ofCBT will never happen. As you plan your future, do be aware of what it means to be a US tax payer resident abroad. Given how expensive Switzerland is, you do need to fully understand how your US tax burden will further impact your cost of living here.Your tax obligations to the US will continue as long as you hold the blue passport - which will be at least the next 12 years (or 10, if new legislation comes into force) if you are aiming towards Swiss citizenship. And be aware that Swiss citizenship is never a given, you might never be granted it despite fulfilling all the criteria, despite being a good neighbor, villager, and tax payer.So make your plans with the burden of US taxes in mind.In addition to Medea's coments, there are some other issues that you should consider. One is the way the US views pension savings, which does not work at all with the way Swiss pensions are set up.You are young, so perhaps retirement planning isn't even on your radar yet... but do be aware of the difficulties placed on US citizens in Switzerland in this respect. Your pension contributionsthose of your employer are taxable in the year of contribution, ason your US taxes. The amount might not be large cwhen you start out, but as you grow older, and presumably more successful, you will find that US tax on your yearly total pension contribution can be very painful.And of course tax obligation to the US means that many do not get the benefit of low Swiss taxes. (We pay far more to the US than we do to Switzerland.)We would have been better off financially had we stayed in the US.But of course, financial opportunity isn't everything.There are many other reasons to consider a move to Switzerland. Just do your research, and again, eyes wide open.Wishing you all the best. Last edited by meloncollie; 09.01.2016 at 22:41 . Reason: correction
Late Introduction



Just wanted to say Thank You to everyone here for being a huge wealth of information, which has helped me settle into Swiss life a lot faster than I expected.



I'm a 'trailing spouse' whose partner lived here for two years previously and always wanted to come back. He's got his dream and I get an adventure.



In the U.K., I was a Business Travel Consultant for 10+yrs and might return to that once my business German is up to scratch. I don't 'do' stress, but the last few years in that industry have been very challenging and upsetting at times, so maybe a career change is in order....



Thanks again for all sharing your knowledge and experiences. It does make a difference. Hi,Just wanted to say Thank You to everyone here for being a huge wealth of information, which has helped me settle into Swiss life a lot faster than I expected.I'm a 'trailing spouse' whose partner lived here for two years previously and always wanted to come back. He's got his dream and I get an adventure.In the U.K., I was a Business Travel Consultant for 10+yrs and might return to that once my business German is up to scratch. I don't 'do' stress, but the last few years in that industry have been very challenging and upsetting at times, so maybe a career change is in order....Thanks again for all sharing your knowledge and experiences. It does make a difference.
Escaped Mexican drug lord Joaquin Guzman, better known throughout the world as "El Chapo," has been captured.

Or at least that's according to Mexico's president, Enrique Pena Nieto, who took to his official twitter account to announce the big news.

Mision cumplida: lo tenemos. Quiero informar a los mexicanos que Joaquin Guzman Loera ha sido detenido.  Enrique Pena Nieto (@EPN) January 8, 2016

"Mission accomplished: we have him," the tweet reads in English translation. "I want to let the Mexican people know that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been detained. Savvy news readers will recall that Guzman, who is the alleged head of the Sinaloa Cartel, was first captured in early 2014 and escaped from his Mexican prison in July via a reportedly elaborate tunnel.

UPDATE 2:29 PM EDT: According to the CNN, the arrest came when Mexican marines, acting on a tip, raided a house in Los Mochis during the early morning hours. Five people were killed and one marine was wounded in the confrontation.

More: Mexican navy captured "El Chapo" Guzman in early morning operation in Sinaloa state, official says. https://t.co/3HEArJqzTu  CNN Breaking News (@cnnbrk) January 8, 2016

UPDATE 2:40 PM EDT:

Arsenal of weapons - including sniper rifles, grenade launcher - were seized during raid that recaptured #ElChapo https://t.co/Uqd0pXRcBw  CBS Los Angeles (@CBSLA) January 8, 2016

UPDATE 2:42 PM EDT:

DEA on capture of 'El Chapo': "We congratulate the MX Government and salute the bravery involved in his capture." pic.twitter.com/32rxfZTnS1  ABC News (@ABC) January 8, 2016

UPDATE 2:45 PM EDT: According to an anonymous source for the Associated Press, the five people killed in the gunfight were confederates of Guzman, but he was captured unharmed with five other suspects. The Mexican Navy also told the AP that the wounded Marine did not suffer any life threatening injuries.

UPDATE: 4:00 PM EDT:

JUST IN: Image of captured drug kingpin El Chapo https://t.co/DLXNYQ0ezB https://t.co/HY91JCygjl https://t.co/DLXNYQ0ezB  The Lead CNN (@TheLeadCNN) January 8, 2016

UPDATE 11:45 PM EDT: The New York Times is reporting that Guzman will be taken back to Antiplano, the very same maximum security prison he escaped from six months ago.

UPDATE Saturday, 1/9/16: According to The Guardian, it was Guzman's interest in making a biographical movie about his life and his attempts to contact with film producers and actors for the project that led authorities to his location.
American Idol saved the best audition moment for their last and final season. Nashville native Tristan McIntosh, 15, showed up to the Idol auditions with her guitar and a heavy heart. She may have had great supporters cheering her on, but she still wished her mom could be there with her, too.

"Me and my mom are like really close," Tristan said, "She kind of knows me better than I know myself, and it's just a really weird feeling that she's not here for something of this magnitude."

Tristan performed Mickey Guyton's "Why Baby Why" while playing the piano. Jennifer Lopez compared the young vocalist to superstar Alicia Keys, and also said she believes Tristan's military mom would be proud. After the judges praised her talent, Tristan got an incredible surprise. Her military mom all the way from Middle East, came around the corner to surprise her. The moment was full of emotions even judge Keith Urban teared up.

Watch the emotional and unforgettable moment below, and have the tissues handy!
The Powerball live drawing is set to take place tonight - find out when and how to watch the live reading online.

UPDATE: The winning numbers are 32, 16, 19, 57 and 34 and Powerball 13



The Powerball lottery has increased to a $900 million prize, and millions around the nation will be glued to their screens awaiting the results. The prize money continues to rise, with the last 18 drawings resulting in no winning tickets.

And many are still hoping to get in on a chance to change their lives completely.

"Sales are going crazy right now," California State Lottery spokesman Russ Lopez told the Los Angeles Times. "We're not surprised. Any time the jackpot gets to this point, Californians especially get very excited about it."

The Powerball live drawing is being aired live on television starting at 10:59 p.m. ET on a variety of different stations, depending on where you live. Check this list for which channel your state is airing the drawing.

Watch The Powerball Live Drawing Online Or Through Mobile Devices



So what if you're not near a TV and want to see the live Powerball drawing? Luckily, the Powerball website has a live stream to the drawing, which you can find here. There's also an app where you can watch the live Powerball drawing on iOS or Android.

Keep Up With The Powerball Live Drawing Via Social Media



Want to follow along with others who are watching the Powerball live drawing? Use #Powerball on Twitter.
We, the safai karamcharis, are on the Bhim Yatra to tell the country and government to Stop Killing Us! through manual scavenging of dry latrines, sewers and septic tanks. The Bhim Yatra, in honour of B R Ambedkar, is travelling across the country for 125 days through 500 districts in 30 states from 10 December 2015 and will end in Delhi on 13 April 2016the eve of the 125th birth anniversary of B R Ambedkar. We call on everyone to support our struggle to fulfil Babasahebs dream of achieving our right to life, liberty and equality.

From generation to generation, safai karamcharis have been forced to manually scavenge societys human excreta from dry latrines, sewer lines and septic tanks. For decades, we have been telling this country and its government to stop the violence and discrimination against us. Our fundamental rights to life and dignity are being constantly violated with no regret or remorse. The 1993 manual scavenging prohibition law was never implemented and no convictions were made during the 20 years that it was in force. In 2013, Parliament passed the new Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and Their Rehabilitation Act; in 2014 the Supreme Court passed judgment on our public interest litigation to prevent deaths in sewer lines and septic tanks and to compensate those who died since 1993. The government has made and remade laws and schemes. Time and again, deadlines and dates were set to end manual scavenging. Nothing changed. Manual scavenging, the manifestation of untouchability and caste oppression, shamelessly continues till date. Deaths continue to occur with alarming frequency. It is hypocritical that our politicians and parliamentarians miss no opportunity to praise Ambedkar, while they allow Dalits to die day after day in manholes, across the country. Bhim Yatra will place this shame before the public and hopes to stir the nations conscience.
Why appoint another censorship committee to do what a previous one has done?

A time-worn strategy to deflect controversy is to form acommittee. So it comes as no surprise that rather thanacknowledge that it went wrong in appointing Pahlaj Nihalani, whose main qualification appears to be his devotion to Narendra Modi, to head the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC), the Modi government has asked veteran film-maker Shyam Benegal to head a panel to create a holistic framework for the CBFC. No one questions either Benegals credentials or those of the others on the panel, or the very real need to look again at the entire process of film certification in India. But one must ask the need for such a committee when the government already has a fairly detailed set of recommendations put forward by another committee.

In February 2013, the previous United Progressive Alliance government had appointed Justice Mukul Mudgal, former Chief Justice of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, to head a committee tasked to do precisely the same thingexamine issues of certification under the Cinematograph Act, 1952. Were its recommendations unacceptable to this government, or has it chosen to ignore them because the previous government constituted the committee?
To understand the outcome of the Paris talks on climate change, it is important to refl ect on the key clauses of the Paris Agreement and the processes that led to its adoption. This article offers an initial assessment and a discussion of whether the views of the developed or developing countries (or both) prevailed. The developing countries went to Paris with some clear objectives and principles. Though some aspects were diluted, they got their red lines protected but they did not manage to get all their positive demands accepted.

1 Introduction The Paris Agreement adopted by the 21st Conference of Parties (P21) under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on 12 December 2015 was the outcome of major battles on a multitude of issues, especially between developed and developing countries.
A fact finding committee on the impact of floods and relief work in Viluppuram and Cuddalore district in Tamil Nadu finds that Dalits are discriminated against when it comes to distribution of relief material and allocation of funds.

The coastal districts of Tamil Nadu have been severely affected by the 2015 floods in Tamil Nadu following unprecedented heavy rainfall. Though everyone has been affected, it was found that Dalits bore the brunt of the disaster. Non-governmental organisation (NGO) accounts, newspaper reports and reports by social activists and political leaders corroborated the same. On the basis of these accounts, the Intellectual Circle for Dalit Actions (ICDA) conducted a one-week long field inquiry to assess the loss of lives, property and the damages faced by the Dalits during this disaster.

The survey covered villages from Marakkanam in Viluppuram district to Parangipettai and Kurinjipadi in Cuddalore district.

During the fact-finding conducted in 18 villages it was found that hundreds of houses belonging to Dalits were damaged partially or completely. Eleven Dalit families have lost all the important documents they had in possession. Thousands of daily wage labourers have lost their means of livelihood and in almost all the villages the danger of an epidemic was imminent and people, especially children, women and elderly people were suffering from health disorders.

Evidences of Discrimination

In the flood hit areas like, Ambedkar Colony, Kanthadu and Church Street, in Marakkanam, Purushothaman Nagar, Annavalli, Stalin Nagar, Ambedkar Nagar, Watrayan, Karikuppam and Kongaranpalayamin Cuddalore, Pudhuchattiram, Mission Theru in Parangipettai, Thondamanatham, Onankuppam, Aalampadi, Boothampadi, RoattuPottaveli and Keezhapudhuppettai in Kurinjipadi, Kalkunam, in Vadalur area, Kaduvetti and Karunguli villages in Vadalur, there was discrimination in distribution of relief materials by NGOs, political parties and the government. Though the flood equally affected both Dalits and non-Dalits, we could not find a single relief camp where both Dalits and non-Dalits were given shelter and this amounts to the tangibility of discrimination in practice. This resonates with the discrimination Dalits and Irular community faced during the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami and the 2011 Cyclone Thane respectively.

In most of the villages the relief material was brought to Dalit villages after getting caught in local power relations, where both the dominant castes and locally powerful politicians prevented and delayed the distribution of relief material. Villages where there is large-scale discrimination in practice like, Kaaduvetti, Varagurpettai and Onankuppam, the relief materials brought by the NGOs for distributing among the Dalits was prevented by the dominant castes. Moreover, the unaffected dominant caste villagers pillaged all the materials.

There was fraudulence reported in the distribution of government announced relief amount (originally Rs 5000) to be given to the affected families. However, in Roadupottaveli and Annavelli villages the amount distributed was Rs 4100 and Rs 4600 respectively. At Alamelumangapuram village, the dominant caste members opposed the medical camp organised by the district administration and forced the authorities to cancel it.

Recommendations

1) Right now a certain amount of relief has been given to landed farmers for crop loss. But landless agricultural labourers have been off work for almost 40 days and they do not foresee regular agricultural labour work at least for the next 6 months. The government should fix a minimum relief amount and distribute it properly avoiding bribery.

2) The government is found taking into account only households affected by flooding up of inundated water. There were houses, which were partially damaged likeroofs and walls, which are not taken into account. Moreover, domestic animals like poultry and cattle should also be included in its estimation of loss.

3) The media has already exposed the existence of caste-based discrimination during such big natural disasters. This situation still exists in our society because of the failure to fight continually against the caste system both ideologically and in terms of practice. The lack of will on the part of the state to fight against all forms of practices of untouchability and discrimination stands exposed in these situations. The government should show interest in conducting common feasts, village panchayat meetings as avenues to propagate abolition of untouchability. The central government sponsored district level untouchability removal programmes and schemes should be strictly implemented.

4) The government should avoid misusing the Scheduled Castes Sub Plan (SCSP) funds to distribute relief amount for the affected (both Dalit and non-Dalit) victims or using them for other welfare programmes. Instead it should distribute the flood relief amount only from the Centres National Disaster Relief Fund and not misuse the SCSP funds which are meant for empowerment of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes.

5) The 300 Dalit workers at the saltpans in Marakkanam are highly affected by the floods. They have no work from March, when the salt-making season begins. Keeping in mind the welfare of the saltpan workers, the government should provide assistance similar to the one provided for fishermen during the fishing-ban season.

6) The Disaster Management Department run under the Revenue department should be changed and in its place a central government sponsored District Level Disaster Management Commission should be established. The AdiDravidar Departments participation should also be ensured in the Commission.

7) Ten Dalits (Arunthathiyars-8 and Adi Dravidars-2) of Periyakaatupalayam died during the floods. The 115 families of the village were given shelter in a relief camp. The government should immediately rehabilitate and relocate them without showing any apathy.

8) In the rain-affected districts of Chennai, Kanchipuram, Thiruvallur, Villupuram and Cuddalore, to remove garbage and clear the mess, conservancy workers were brought by the state government from all over Tamil Nadu. This is almost tantamount to state-endorsed casteism. The government should avoid doing this during disasters and instead encourage and campaign that the affected citizens irrespective of caste should come out and help each other and involve in cleaning the mess and clearing the garbage.

9) ICDA condoles the death of conservancy worker Palanichamy (42) of Sholangapalayam in Erode district who was brought to Chennai and was involved in clearing garbage and had died due to work pressure. We also condemn the government for putting up such pressure on the hapless work force. The conservancy workers who had cleared tonnes of garbage in a short time should be provided an enhanced salary based on their contributions.

10) The water that was released from the second mine in Neyveli Lignite Corporation (NLC) was the reason for the inundation of water in Vadalur and Kurinjipadi areas resulting in loss of lives and heavy loss of property. The state government should monitor in future that this is not repeated and should demand compensation from NLC for the loss.

11) To avoid any omissions and disparity in the assessment of loss of properties in flood and distribution of relief material, the government should appoint a committee consisting members from the government, political parties, NGOs, media representatives and social activists. ICDA demands that the whole process of assessment and distribution of relief material shall be done through this committee.

[The fact-finding committee included Anbuselvam, an independent researcher based in Puducherry, Stalin Rajangam, a writer based in Madurai, A Jeganathan, a researcher based in Madurai and J Balasubramaniam, an academic based in Madurai.]
Why do transgender persons migrate to Tamil Nadu from Kerala despite the latter having high development indicators? A comparative study looks at the experience of the transgender community and their citizenship rights.

Belongingness towards a nation is reaffirmed through citizenship. Citizenship is associated with diverse rights of an individual in relation to their community and society. The multiple dimensions associated with citizenship have evolved since modern democratic countries came into existence.

Sexual citizenship is a term that was coined in the 1980s when third wave feminism had established its space. The idea was recognised globally as it contributed to the diversity as well as integrity of the idea of citizenship.

In this article, I have analysed the evolution and formulation of citizenship theories in the context of transgender people in India by looking at the achievement of citizenship rights of transgender people in Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

Understanding Sexual Citizenship

T H Marshall (1950) in his essay Citizenship and Social Class has divided citizenship into three partscivil, political and social. Civil citizenship is about individual rights such as freedom of speech, right to own property and right to justice. Further, the political and social rights imply the right to exercise political power, right to economic welfare and resources such as health, education, etc. The idea of citizenship has been evaluated by the West through multiple schools of thought. Marshall said that every citizen has the right to their social and economic needs and they shall be ensured by the state.

The discourses and practices of citizenship transformed following the unprecedented economic growth in the post-World War II era when despite increased participation of people in public life, the relations of domination and subordination existed. There was tension between the universal notion of citizenship with the plurality of social identities of marginalised groups (Purvis and Hunt 1999). This tension is evident from the following. Civic republican thought exerted that the state shall act to protect citizens in their exercise of rights while individuals can act rationally to advance their own interests. That also meant that peoples political identities as active citizens and individuals right to participate in community affairs were more important over their localised identities (Oldfield 1990). Counterpoising it, Miller (1998) proposed that the role of citizenship is to discipline the subjects in the cultural realm in capitalist social formations in the pretext of reinforcing ones own right.

The idea of disciplining and homogenising citizenship was criticised by many feminists due to its gender-blind nature. Most of this citizenship is premised on institutionalised heterosexuality, thus the sexual minorities lack legal protection from discrimination or harassment. Therefore they have limited access to civil, political, social, cultural and economic rights affecting their individuality.

Transgender in India

Across India, transgender people are called by different names such as hijras, Khusras, third-sexes, neutrals and eunuchs. All of these point out the inappropriateness of the sexuality of these individuals. Though historical evidence in India indicates the presence of transgender persons since long time, it is largely ignored. Vatsyayanas Kamasutra is an important treatise that traces back the presence of transgender persons to the fourth century. Valmiki Ramayana, the Hindu epic, also talks about their presence. With the advent of the colonial period, sexual identities were viewed and interpreted through the lens of Victorian morality. Section 377 of Indian Penal Code was framed in this context by Lord Macaulay that criminalised voluntary carnal intercourse against the order of nature.

After independence, India framed a constitution that ensured equality, liberty and freedom as fundamental rights. India also endorsed the universal declaration of right to equality, protection from discrimination. But different studies (Bharat and Chakrapani 2014; Peoples Union for Civil LibertiesKarnataka (PUCL 2001, 2003) point out that often such human rights declarations are violated in the case of transgender issues in India. A report on the human rights violations against transgender persons (PUCL 2001) has reported that the prejudice they face has translated into violence in public spaces, police stations and even at homes. Most of the transgender persons have had to move out of homes to live by revealing their identities either forcefully or by themselves. The discrimination also extends in terms of deprivation of educational and job opportunities which in turn further leads to their powerlessness in the civil, social, economic and political spheres (Magre 2012).

Similar but Different

With high literacy rates, strong social indicators and various progressive caste and gender movements, Kerala and Tamil Nadu are similar in many respects. But the recognition for transgender people took different trajectories in these states. The threatening situation that exists regarding the lives of transgender persons has been consistently reported by various social activists as well as progressive forums in Kerala. Many of these individuals in Kerala have migrated to cities beyond the geographical boundaries of the state to escape the social prescriptions and marginalisation they faced. Some of them are forced to remain in the state due to various constraints by concealing their sexual identity. It raises questions about the welfare orientation and high human development indicators of Kerala (Nair 2015).

However Keralas neighbouring state, Tamil Nadu, has reached far ahead in establishing and understanding the third genders historical, cultural and political factors. Tamil Nadu has taken affirmative actions such as formation of Transgender Welfare Board, comprehensive sex education programmes in schools, vocational training centres, access to free and concessional housing schemes and free sex realignment or reconstruction surgery (SRS) in selected government hospitals for transgender persons.

Nevertheless in the last five years, Kerala has indeed achieved a gradual progress in the visibility of transgender population within the state. The separate policies and recent discussions in the legislative assembly for the welfare of transgender persons depict an evolving situation in Kerala.

Fieldwork

A two-month long field study explored the lived experiences of transgender people who were forced to migrate from different parts of Kerala to Chennai in Tamil Nadu. Detailed interviews were conducted with 10 transgender persons who were engaged in different jobsfrom peon to sex work, in Chennai. The interviews aimed to understand the reasons for their migration and their experiences before and after migration.

The difference between the two states in terms of evolving the idea of sexual citizenship and the influence of the history, culture, literature and religion was also discussed.

Being Transgender in Kerala

Kerala has never promoted the transgendered people or even recognised their presence. A majority of the respondents pointed out that the people in Kerala never acknowledge the presence of transgender people in the state. One of the respondents initially believed that she was mentally ill, until she found someone with similar feeling.

I went to mental hospital because of them. I explained to the doctor that I am perfectly fine. The doctor said it is all about hormonal problem; we can inject hormones. I was always kept unconscious. They gave me 15 tablets a day. I went mad in the hospital after seeing other patients. I even wanted to die due to mental pressure. I tried running away from the hospital but the guards caught me. You know those guards, right? They are trained to be like that. I stayed there for one month.

The precarious situation of transgender persons in Kerala also stems from the strong patriarchal hold in the society (CDS 2008). Though women in Kerala have high education and employment records, they face several problems, ranging from property rights, rapid growth and spread of dowry, and rising gender-based violence (Kodoth and Eapen 2005). As one of the respondents pointed out, being a woman is a big deal in the state, on top of that for a man to be a woman is even more difficult.

For that matter, to be a woman itself is a big question (in Kerala) as the respect for female individuals is evidently very less. On top of that for a man to be woman is a question that they call them chandhupottu (character in a movie who wanted to be identified as a different gender from the one ascribed).

Moreover, the rigid religious principles across all religions have always projected that being transgender is sinful. There have been circumstances where the church has denied their right to be part of the service.

By then, the entire world came to know this and the pastor in my church asked my father not to bring me to the church. They said that I am a sinner. I was not allowed to attend the funeral of my uncle also.

The immense scare of the breaking the normative structure exists among them. Those who are associated with them are also under threat. It is difficult for them to survive there because even educated individuals do not consider it important to stand up for their rights. The absence of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that could strongly fight for the rights of transgender people has also reduced the opportunity to share their concerns and grievances. The NGOs that work for the sexual minorities have kept their identity concealed in localities where they have their office. The staff informed that this is due to the possibility of objection from the neighbourhood. Apart from this the cultural aspects also contribute to the hostile attitude of the people.

The popular media has also played its part in fanning this prejudicetransgender people have been projected as a subject of contempt. All these factors together make an impression that heterogeneous norms are the right way of living in Kerala.

Transgender in Tamil Nadu

The visibility of transgender persons through multiple platforms is evident in Tamil Nadu. Such spaces have contributed in creating a livable space for the third gender. The Koovagam festival and the history behind it are important for fighting for the rights of transgender persons. In this festival the participants marry the lord and re-enact the ancient myth of Lord Vishnu who married by taking the role of a woman called Mohini. Tamil literature especially Sangam literature, Manimeghalayam, Devaramthiruvarthakaland Tholkapiyam clearly depict the presence of transgender persons and has celebrated their presence. Such influences have had an impact on the people regarding their presence, according to Priya Babu, an activist who is a transgender. She also pointed out that educational institutions in Tamil Nadu were supportive unlike the ones in Kerala.

In Tamil Nadu all the major colleges are continuously working on transgender issues. Last year we had a film made and screened in all these colleges like Loyola and Womens Christian College. I was a part of it. So I know how effective it was. We also arranged a session for the students to interact with us. Awareness is important.

Support from political parties has also contributed to their welfare (Nair 2015). The Tamil Nadu government established an exclusive welfare board for transgender persons in 2004. Nirvana surgery (where people undergo an operation to change their biologically assigned sex) was also provided at a subsidised rate. The effect of these was evident in the life of the transgender where most of them led a life that was free of harassment and ostracisation. They rented houses, worked in various organisations and many of them married as well.

Long time back, people in Tamil Nadu may have been prejudiced. But now things have changed. Look at me, everybody in the street knows me and they are very supportive. So the community should come out and ask for their rights or strong pillars which can create a noise should fight for their right. Sabdham (voice) is necessary.

Chennai has always recognised transgender persons. None of the transgender persons is sad about their decision to migrate to the city. But they do agree that they had to struggle in terms of language and culture. They were sad to leave their family. While many migrate and move out of the state, many of them due to various circumstances have to stay back and lead a concealed life.

I was the youngest of my family. I did not have many responsibilities to take care of. So it was not as complicated as many of my friends.

Conclusions

Despite the different similarities in the sociopolitical circumstances of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, the transgender people choose to migrate to Tamil Nadu from Kerala due to the enabling treatment evolved for them in Tamil Nadu and hostility towards them in Kerala.

The acceptance and political recognition of the population by the government plays a crucial role in achieving the rights of these individuals which is evident here. This acceptance happens through multiple factors that are evolved due to unique sociopolitical and cultural factors.

The perspective of sexual citizenship could contribute to the transgender policy as well as other structural changes in the society for sexual minorities. The objective should be to create a space within the community, ensure the redistribution of resources and a shift from looking at transgender persons only as recipients of welfare benefits.

References

Bell, David and Jon Binnie (2000): The Sexual Citizen: Queer Politics and Beyond, Cambridge: Polity.

Magre, Bhupali (2012): Understanding Education and Employment of Hijaras of Mumbai, MA thesis, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.

Chakrapani, V and Bharat, S (2014): Getting to Zero? A National Survey on HIV-related Stigma and Discrimination in Urban India, New Delhi: UNDP India, http://www.in.undp.org/content/dam/india/docs/HIV_and_development/HIV%20related%20stigma%20Low%20Res%20all%20pages%20LR.PDF.

Foucault, M (1991): Governmentality, The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, G Burchell, C Gordon and P Miller (eds), Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf.

Centre for Development Studies (2008): Gendering Governance or Governing Women? Politics, Patriarchy and Democratic Decentralisation in Kerala, India, Thiruvananthapuram: CDS.

Kodoth, P and Eapen, M (2005): Looking Beyond Gender Parity: Gender Inequities of some Dimensions of Well Being in Kerala, Economic & Political Weekly, Vol 40, No 30, pp 327886, available at http://www.epw.in/journal/2005/30/special-articles/looking-beyond-gender-parity.html.

Marshall, T H, (1950): Citizenship and Social Class and Other Essays, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Miller, T (1998): Technologies of Truth: Cultural Citizenship and the Popular Media, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Nair, C G (2015): Coming Out, Ever so Gingerly, Hindu, 13 September, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/kerala/kerala-state-view-coming-out-ever-so-gingerly/article7646564.ece.

Oldfield, A (1990): Citizenship and Community: Civic Republicanism and the Modern World, London: Routledge.

Peoples Union for Civil LibertiesKarnataka (PUCL-K), (2001): Human Rights Violations against the Sexual Minorities in India: A PUCL-K Fact-finding Report about Bangalore, http://www.pucl.org/Topics/Gender/2003/sexual-minorities.pdf.

 (2003): Human Rights Violations against the Transgender Community: A Study of Kothi and Hijara Sex Workers in Bangalore, http://www.pucl.org/Topics/Gender/2004/transgender.htm.

Purvis, T and Hunt, A (1999): Transformations in the Discourses and Practices of Citizenship, Social and Legal Studies, Vol 8, No 4, pp 457482, http://sls.sagepub.com/content/8/4/457.short.
A campaign to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes in Oxford University has gained currency among a section of students and intellectuals. However this method does not address his legacy of racism and colonialism and merely sanitises our uncomfortable past.

The ongoing Rhodes must fall movement at Oxford University demanding the destruction or removal of the statue of Cecil Rhodes, the British coloniser of Africa, raises several important questions. This movement is instructive on how not to use (or misuse) history when engaging with the present.

Not Celebrating Racism

In the first place the movement is counterproductive. Not many in Oxford were even aware of the existence of the Rhodes statue, let alone celebrating Rhodes or the racism and colonialism that he practised. Undoubtedly the movement has brought Rhodes, who was otherwise sinking into oblivion, back to life. This long dead man does not deserve all the attention that the enthusiastic protestors are showering on him now. Allowing him to sink into oblivion was a better way of fighting him and his blatant racism.

It seems that the current movement in Oxford is inspired by the removal of Rhodes statue in Cape Town in South Africa in April 2015. Ostensibly the current movement wants to decolonise Oxford and education in general by erasing symbols that celebrate colonialism and racism. However, equating the survival of a statue from the past to the celebration of colonialism and racism at present is nothing but populist oversimplification, and a highly political act of using history to tickle sentiments in the present.

The superficiality of this movement becomes clear if we care to consider a few examplesthe pyramids of Giza and the Taj Mahal of Agra were made using slave labour extensively. Today, when we travel long distances and spend loads of money to see these, and then take photographs in front of them, do we celebrate slavery? No one would suggest that. Installing a new statue of Rhodes in the 21st century could be interpreted as a celebration of racism and colonialism. But the existing statue was installed almost a century ago, when, historically speaking, this world was a different place, whether we like this fact or not. Destroying a statue a century later does not sanitise that uncomfortable past.

Contrary to the understanding of the protestors in Oxford, the statue of Rhodes does not celebrate racism and colonialism, it actually acts as a reminder of our ugly racist past, a reminder that reappearance of such an ugly past must be avoided at all costs. The remains of the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz in Poland is a great example of this kind of reminder. When millions of tourists attend guided tours of the camp at Auschwitz, they do not celebrate our horrific history, instead they become more aware of the horrors of history that must be avoided in our present and future.

Dangerous Method

However, one needs to appreciate the intention behind the movement, that is, to fight racism and colonialism. Nor is it possible to deny that Rhodes was a racist individual. It is not the aim, but the method that is highly problematic and dangerous. The modus operandi of sanitising the past by physical destruction or removal of historical objects is dangerous. The protestors are insisting on being blind to the dangerous possibility of gross appropriation of this method. The method of Rhodes must fall can easily be appropriated for purposes quite opposite to that of the present movement. Consider a dangerous, but quite strong, possibilityfollowing the logic of Rhodes must fall, the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) may well demand further destruction of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya built in the 16th century. For the Rhodes must fall activists the Rhodes statue is a symbol of racism and colonialism, for the RSS the Babri Masjid is a symbol of what they claim to be centuries of Islamic oppression of the Hindus. To the protestors in Oxford, Rhodes statue is a vulgar celebration of racism and colonialism; to the RSS the Babri mosque is a vulgar celebration of Muslim oppression of Hindus. The method, that is physical destruction of historical objects, is the same in both cases. The aim is seemingly differentin Oxford it is to fight racism and colonialism, in India it is to fight alleged Islamic oppression.

On a closer look, the difference lies only in the specificity of the aim, but the core of the aim is rather similarto erase oppressive or allegedly oppressive past, to make the past comforting to our contemporary eyes as well as minds. This aim has already been realised through the method of physical destruction of past objects, resulting in horrific destructions drawing global condemnationthe RSS partially demolished the Babri Masjid in December 1992 causing Hindu-Muslim riots in many parts of India. The Talibans in Afghanistan tried to erase the so called heretic past by destroying ancient Buddha statues in Bamiyan in 2001, the Islamic State in Syria similarly destroyed art objects in Palmyra earlier in 2015.

Thus, supporting Rhodes must fall would mean giving up our moral and logical argument against such dreadful acts by the RSS, the Talibans, and the Islamic State, an argument which many would very much like to retain. And, retaining such argumentative weapon against the RSS and other organisations anywhere in the world requires an outright dismissal of the method of physical destruction or removal of past objects. And, we must be uniform in dismissing such method. We cannot selectively dismiss that method, as selectivity would only allow subjective distortions to slip in.

The path to Rhodes removal is a dangerous one, and some paths are better not to be treaded on. If we make the statue of Rhodes fall, it will bring down many others with it.
The Bafta Awards is the biggest night on the UK film calendar and there's just five weeks to go until the 2016 winners were announced - it doesn't seem five minutes since we were getting excited about the 2015 ceremony.

Yesterday morning, the nominations were announced with Carol and Bridge of Spies leading the way with nine nominations each - including a nod in for Best Film.

However, while many of the big films and stars were in the mix as expected, there were a few noticeable omissions... we take a look at the Bafta snubs that did cause a bit of a stir.

Mad Max: Fury Road has a large presence in the technical categories, it was one of the big snubs from the Best Film nominations. The movie is in the Best Picture mix at the Golden Globes and has been picking up critics' awards left, right, and centre.

While all the films that are in the Best Film categories are worthy nominees, it would have been nice to see Bafta recognise that the blockbusters have a place in the awards mix. George Miller was also overlooked for Best Director.

Mad Max: Fury Road - which was one of the most acclaimed movies of 2015 - did pick up nominations for Cinematography, Editing, Production Design, Costume Design, Make Up & Hair, Sound and Special Visual Effects.

Charlotte Rampling is an actress that was expected to be in the mix at all of the major award ceremonies for her stunning performance in 45 Years. However, Rampling and the film in general really has been overlooked when it comes to award nominations.

Sadly, Rampling has missed out on a Best Actress nomination once again and it looks like her chance of an Oscar nod has perhaps gone. While 45 Years has been recognised in the Best British Film category, this is a movie that should have picked up more Bafta nominations.

Having said that, the Best Actress category really is a tough one and you could easily have added a handful more names to the list. One of the big surprises came in this category as Maggie Smith received a nod for her fantastic turn in The Lady in the Van.

This was to be the only nomination for The Lady in the Van as if failed to pick up a Best British Film nod, which is a real shame as it is a gem of a movie.

Johnny Depp was another name that was overlooked as he failed to pick up a Best Actor nomination for his central performance in gangster film Black Mass. Depp has been nominated by the Screen Actors Guild but was also overlooked at the Baftas. Depp's performance in the film is widely regarded as one of the best of his career but Black Mass was totally overlooked by Bafta yesterday.

Despite having a stellar 2015 with roles in Mad Max: Fury Road, Legend and the upcoming The Revenant, Tom Hardy was another actor who was overlooked. While a nod for his performance in Mad Max: Fury Road was unlikely, perhaps a Best Supporting Actor nomination for The Revenant could have been expected.

When it comes to the Baftas, I am very much in favour for celebrating British movies. In recent years, the Baftas have fell more in line with the movies that the Golden Globes and the Oscars have nominated... and 2016 is no different.

While all of the Best Picture nominees are terrific - The Big Short, Carol, The Revenant, Bridge of Spies, and Spotlight make up the list - it would have been nice to see a British film in the mix. I know that there is a Best British Film category where homegrown movies are celebrated, but there really should be a British film in this mix here and I cannot understand why a film like Brooklyn has been overlooked.

Room is a movie that has been whipping up a storm in the U.S. and has been picking up award nominations all over the place. While Brie Larson has picked up a Best Actress nod for her performance, the film has not picked up as many nominations as perhaps expected.

Room is based on the novel of the same name by Emma Donoghue - who adapted her own book into a screenplay. Donoghue has picked up a nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay but it missed out on Best Film and Jacob Tremblay was overlooked for Best Supporting Actor.

Suffragette was another movie that was making a lot of noise back in the autumn and many expected to be a major threat come the awards season. That is not how it has played out for the film, and it has been overlooked once again with no nominations at all, despite wonderful performances from Carey Mulligan and Anne-Marie Duff.

Another British film that did not get any love from Bafta yesterday morning was Spectre. Despite being one of the most successful British movies of all time, the Bond film failed to pick up a single nomination.

The EE British Academy Film Awards take place on Sunday 14 February.

by Helen Earnshaw for www.femalefirst.co.uk

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WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. (TMO) said late Friday that it has agreed to acquire Affymetrix Inc. (AFFX) for $14 per share cash, or $1.3 billion, which represents a premium of about 52 percent to Affymetrix's closing price Friday. Subject to approval from Affymetrix shareholders, Thermo Fisher expects the deal to close at the end of the second quarter. Thermo Fisher intends to use cash on hand and short-term debt to finance the transaction. Shares of Affymetrix, which had been halted at $9.21 prior to the announcement, surged $4.59 or 49.84% to $13.80 in after hours. Both companies boards of directors have unanimously approved the transaction. Affymetrix's eBioscience offering for cellular analysis will enhance Thermo Fisher's leading biosciences capabilities. Specifically, the company specializes in a range of antibodies, multiplex RNA, and protein and single-cell assays. The transaction is expected to be immediately accretive to Thermo Fisher's adjusted EPS, adding $0.10 of accretion in the first full year of ownership. Thermo Fisher expects to realize total synergies of about $70 million by year three following the close, consisting of about $55 million of cost synergies and about $15 million of adjusted operating income benefit from revenue-related synergies. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann.
Holidu, a Munich, Germany-based search engine for holiday rentals, raised 5m in Series A funding.

The round was led by EQT ventures with participation from Venture Stars, Senovo, Chris Hitchen and other angel investors.

The company will use the funds to accelerate growth and expand operations.

Founded in July 2014 by brothers Johannes Siebers and Michael Siebers, Holidu is a global price comparison platform for holiday homes globally, from simple to stylish, from chalet to finca, from rustic shack to elegant mansion properties. According to the companys web site, Holidu scans and aggregates over 3m rentals from vacation rental websites globally.

The company currently employs 20 people and is continuing to hire people.

FinSMEs

09/01/2016
NEW DELHI Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI)on Friday arrested the founder of PACL Ltd over allegations the property company cheated investors of $6.8 billion, in what local media is calling the country's biggest financial scandal.

The arrest of Nirmal Singh Bhangoo comes 17 months after markets regulator the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) ordered PACL to return money to millions of investors, saying the company was running an illegal investment scheme.

The scheme promised depositors returns on investments in agricultural land, the regulator said.

PACL has argued it was selling land to customers and not investment schemes, and so was not subject to SEBI's regulations.

Reuters did not get any response to phone calls to PACL's head office in New Delhi on Friday.

PACL founder Bhangoo and three other company officials were arrested on Friday as part of the ongoing investigation into allegations of criminal conspiracy and cheating, said R.K. Gaur, a spokesman for India's Central Bureau of Investigation.

The case involves alleged collection of about 450 billion rupees ($6.8 billion) from roughly 55 million investors across the country, Gaur said, terming it a "Ponzi scheme case".

Indian regulators have stepped up scrutiny of unregistered investment products over the past two years, plugging regulatory loopholes that had long allowed unregulated entities to raise billions of dollars from small investors. Many people ended up losing their life savings in these schemes.

The founder of conglomerate Sahara India has spent the last 21 months in jail for not complying with a court order to return $5.4 billion to investors who put money in a 2008-11 time deposit plan that was later ruled illegal.

Sahara's business empire includes overseas hotels such as the New York Plaza and a Formula 1 racing team.

($1 = 66.6721 Indian rupees)

(Reporting by Aditya Kalra; Writing by Sumeet Chatterjee; Editing by Mark Potter)

This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed.
London: A British website, set up to catalogue the last days of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, has released what it claims are eyewitness accounts of the day he was reportedly killed in a plane crash in Taiwan on 18 August, 1945.

The latest set of documents quotes several people who were reportedly involved in the matter related to the accident as well as two British intelligence reports that revisited the crash site to establish the facts.

The website also sheds light on what may have been the freedom fighter's dying words, which reflected his devotion to the cause of India's freedom.

"For 70 years, there have been doubts in certain circles whether such a tragedy at all took place. Four separate reports each corroborating the other constitute irresistible evidence to the contrary," says a statement issued by www.bosefiles.info.

The documents say that early in the morning on 18 August 1945, a Japanese Air Force bomber took off from Tourane in Vietnam with Bose and 12 or 13 other passengers and crew. Also on board was Lt Gen Tsunamasa Shidei of the Japanese Army and the planned flight path was Heito-Taipei-Dairen-Tokyo.

The three-member Netaji Inquiry Committee, instituted by the government of India in 1956 and headed by Major General Shah Nawaz Khan of Bose's Indian National Army (INA), was told that since "the weather was perfect and the engines (of the aircraft) worked smoothly" the pilot decided to overfly Heito and proceed straight to Taipei, arriving there late morning or early afternoon.

Major Taro Kono, a Japanese Air Staff Officer and one of the passengers, told the committee: "I noticed that the engine on the left side of the plane was not functioning properly. I, therefore, went inside the plane and after examining the engine inside, I found it to be working all right."

He added the accompanying engineer "also tested the engine and certified its air-worthiness".

Captain Nakamura alias Yamamoto, the ground engineer in charge of maintenance at the airport, concurred with Major Kono "that the engine of the left side was defective".

He said the pilot told him "it was a brand new engine".

He went on to say: "After slowing down the engine, he (the pilot) adjusted it for about five minutes. The engine was tested twice by Major Takizawa (the pilot). After being adjusted, I satisfied myself that the condition of the engine was all right. Major Takizawa also agreed with me that there was nothing wrong with the engine."

However, soon after the aircraft was airborne there was, according to Colonel Habib ur Rahman  Bose's ADC and a co-passenger  a loud explosion.

He described it as "a noise like a cannon shot".

Nakamura, who was watching from the ground, said: "Immediately on taking off, the plane tilted to its left side and I saw something fall down from the plane, which I later found was the propeller."

He also maintained that the maximum height gained by the aircraft was 30-40 metres.

He estimated "the plane crashed about 100 metres beyond the concrete runway" and immediately caught fire in the front portion.

Colonel Rahman recounted: "Netaji turned towards me. I said, 'Aage se nikaliye, peeche se rasta nahin hai' (Please get out through the front; there is no way in the rear.)

"We could not get through the entrance door as it was all blocked and jammed by packages and other things. So Netaji got out through the fire; actually he rushed through the fire. I followed him through the same flames.

"The moment I got out, I saw him about 10 yards ahead of me, standing, looking in the opposite direction to mine towards the west. His clothes were on fire. I rushed and I experienced great difficulty in unfastening his bush-shirt belt. His trousers were not so much on fire and it was not necessary to take them off."

Rahman was in woollen uniform, whereas Bose was in cotton khakis, which, it was assessed, caught fire more easily.

Rahman added: "I laid him down on the ground and noticed a very deep cut on his head, probably on the left side. His face had been scorched by heat and his hair had also caught fire and singed.

"Netaji enquired from me in Hindustani: Aap ko zyada to nahin lagi? (Hope you have not been hurt badly). I replied, I feel that I will be all right. About himself he said that he felt that he would not survive."

Bose added: "Jab apne mulk wapas jayen to mulki bhaiyon ko batana ki main aakhri dam tak mulk ki azadi ke liye ladta raha hoon; woh jangi azadi ko jaari rakhen. Hindustan zaroor azad hoga, us ko koi gulam nahin rakh sakta. (When you go back to the country, tell the people that I have been fighting for the liberation of my country till my last breath; they should continue to struggle. India will definitely be free, no one can keep it enslaved.)"

Lieutenent Col Shiro Nonogaki, who was on the flight, said: "When I first saw Netaji after the plane crash, he was standing somewhere near the left tip of the left wing of the plane. His clothes were on fire and his assistant (Col Rahman) was trying to take off his coat."

There were variations in the details provided by Rahman, Nonogaki, Kono, Takahashi and Nakamura. They were giving evidence 11 years after the accident.

But in essence there was no disagreement between their testimonies on the fact of the crash and Bose suffering severe burns and injuries as a consequence, the website notes.

Netaji was rushed to the nearby Nanmon Military Hospital in critical condition. In September 1945, British authorities in India sent intelligence teams comprising Messrs Finney and Davies, HK Roy and KP De to Bangkok, Saigon and Taipei to enquire about the whereabouts of Bose

and, if possible, to arrest him.

They, instead, returned with the story of the crash.

PTI
Pathankot: Under attack from the Opposition over the way the Pathankot terror attack was handled with Indian security forces taking four days to neutralise the terrorists, Modi went on location Saturday and said he is satisfied with the Indian counteroffensive which, incidentally, has come in for widespread flak.

Not to be outdone, Union Minister Uma Bharti called the Indian response the world's best anti terror operation.

Accompanied by National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, Modi flew to the strategically important air base where Air Force chief Air Marshal Arup Raha and National Security Guard officials briefed him about the attack and counteroffensive launched against the perpetrators with the help of maps, aerial pictures and operational photographs, defence sources said. Army chief Dalbir Singh and chiefs of NSG and BSF were present during the visit.

After his visit to the airbase, the prime minister's office tweeted his remarks:

Visited Pathankot air base today. Had a detailed briefing from senior leadership of Army, Air Force, NSG & BSF: PM pic.twitter.com/S6JngIopcY  PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 9, 2016

Was briefed in great detail on how our forces neutralised such a serious terrorist attack: PM @narendramodi after visiting Pathankot  PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 9, 2016

Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response: PM @narendramodi  PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 9, 2016

Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride: PM  PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 9, 2016

Modi also went around the scene of the audacious attack that exposed the chinks in the armour of the Indian security establishment and was shown the huge cache of weapons and ammunition recovered from the six slain perpetrators. Seven Indian security personnel were also killed during the assault.

It was worlds best anti-terror operation: Union Minister Uma Bharti on #Pathankot pic.twitter.com/KZDPSH5afp  ANI (@ANI_news) January 9, 2016

The prime minister was taken around the Military Engineering Service Yard where the terrorists were first engaged by the security forces and the two-storey billet for airmen's accommodation where the last two terrorists were killed after the structure was blown up by security

forces, before undertaking an aerial survey of the forward positions along the Indo-Pakistan border.

Security forces had on Friday declared the sprawling Air Force station fully sanitised after a massive combing operation spanning over three days.

PTI
Days after the United Jihad Council claimed responsibility for the three-day terrorist attack on Pathankot air force base that began on 1 January, details emerged about the identity of the gunmens handlers: Jaish-e-Mohammad founder Maulana Masood Azhar, his brother Abdul Rauf Asghar, Ashfaq Ahmed and Kashim Jaan.

And now, an audio clip  featuring a monologue  has popped up on JeM websites, reportedly celebrating the Pathankot attack and mocking India.

The clip, uploaded to alqalamonline.com, features startling disclosures about how the attack was executed, reports The Times of India and states that the 13-minute address by JeM was transcribed by a magazine in Bahawalpur, Azhars hometown.

After proudly proclaiming that, Indians who kill unarmed Muslims in Kashmir are now dragging their own dead, the speaker in the clip proceeds to suggest that, The big nation is now crying and accusing others like a coward.

Repeatedly referring to the attack as some sort of miracle, the speaker lauds the attackers who managed "in this cold for 48 hours without sleep and food" to fight tanks and helicopters and kept killing Indian forces.

And after praising the attackers, it was time to play possum.

Why do Pakistan's leaders bow before India's allegations? Why do they shame us? asks the voice. DNA reports that the clip also mocks Indias apparent confusion at the total number of attackers: First, they said there were six mujahideen, then they said five, then four. Such a big country is in tears. They are pointing an accusing finger like cowards.

Amidst all this, an editorial piece in Pakistani daily Dawn points out that while the Pathankot attack may indeed have temporarily derailed the wave of goodwill for India-Pakistan relations in the wake of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Lahore visit on Christmas day, saner heads must prevail. "Islamabad should avoid dealing with the Pathankot affair the way it responded to the Mumbai attacks," writes IA Rehman in the editorial.

He goes on to mention the age-old 'excuse' that terrorists who attack India are also out to attack Pakistan. He appeals to Islamabad to realise that "(if) some non-state actors in Pakistan can seriously threaten India and thus precipitate an India-Pakistan clash, then they can also find some other ways to undermine the Pakistani state... (and threaten) the integrity of Pakistan itself."

With foreign secretary-level talks set to take place on 15 January, we hope that the powers-that-be on either side pay more heed to Rehman than the mocking words of Jaish-e-Mohammad.
By Nisha Susan

A friend of mine used to say to anyone whod listen that she didnt care what politicians were motivated by  as long as their policies were good. Were they doing things for attention, for distraction or for stealing credit from some hardworking and innovative civil servant? Why should you care, she would say.

Ive been mulling this lately. First, when I read about Maneka Gandhis Ministry of Women and Child Development recently squaring off against Arun Jaitleys Ministry of Corporate Affairs. This was on the question of whether it should be mandatory for companies to disclose if they had formed internal complaints committees to deal with sexual harassment (as the law requires them to). Gandhi thought it perfectly reasonable that companies say yes we complied or no, we goofed. Jaitley thought it would hurt the companies tender hearts.

In the last couple of weeks, Ive had occasion to think about Gandhis motivations again when she proposed that private companies extend maternity leave from 12 to 26 weeks. Unfortunately, shes done the extra service of claiming all mothers need to breastfeed as an irrefutable body argument for maternity leave. The Labour ministry has agreed to the proposal and now its left to see if the Maternity Benefits Act, 1961 gets amended.

Folks in the corporate world have responded to this news with everything from cautious promises of compliance to the appalled (and practised) conviction that this will ensure that even fewer women are hired. Others have pointed out that this move leaves out women in the informal sector and even some in the government. There have also been plenty of sharp reminders that in the absence of paternity leave, this proposal enforces the same old futile ideas of child-rearing: Mommy does it all and must continue to do it all.

All the best doctors and gynaecologists, Gandhi is quoted as having said, recommend seven months of exclusive breast-feeding. This is on top of a pre-birth month in which mothers can prepare for the babys needs, she feels.

The rules our patriarchal world sets for mothers, both at home and at work, continue to be strict. And anyone who argues? You can squash them with the seeming mountain of Biology or the shimmering mirage of Culture (this is how we do it here, baby).

Now, the rules at work insist that women forget those other rules totally, pretend they didnt have to get up extra early to ensure the clothes are folded, the meals are hot, fresh and varied, and children are served tiny hand and tiny foot. They must stay at work as late as possible to impress everyone of their ability to bust ass. They must not appear distracted by thoughts of that other Home world. They must certainly not take leave for months on end to meet the demands of that other world.

Maternity leave is a very particular kind of Home intersects Work in the Venn diagram of life. The establishment would like to keep it all separate, but sadly for them, women have acquired a taste for being paid for their labours.

And because the rules are getting entangled, we also have some peculiar knots. In the US, infamous for having minimal to no paid maternity leave, breastfeeding is now almost a religion. While in India, where the number of working women is actually dropping in the formal sector, we now suddenly might have a new legislation that cites breastfeeding and childcare for paid leave.

Surely maternity leave should not only be to enable women to be dairy animals? This argument is based on a series of false notions: that women want six months off to breastfeed, that all women should (and can) breastfeed, that all infants take to breastfeeding.

A 2013 WHO study shows that breastfeeding has no long-term benefits. An even newer study looked at 8,000 pairs of children, including pairs of siblings (so as to eliminate class and income differences), and came to the same conclusion. A formula-fed baby in a family is just as likely to thrive as his or her breast-fed sibling. The author of the study, Cynthia Cohen said, We need to take a much more careful look at what happens past that first year of life and understand that breast-feeding might be very difficult, even untenable, for certain groups of women. Rather than placing the blame at their feet, lets be more realistic about what breast-feeding does and doesnt do.

A 2010 review of 50 years of research tells us something else that is interesting. Children whose mothers went back to work before they were three years old didnt show any particular problems later on when compared to those whose mums stayed at home. No problems either in their behaviour or in their academic performance. This review also noted a silver lining: children whose mothers went back to work when they were toddlers were less likely to develop anxiety or depression.

So is Maneka Gandhi simply being strategic since a body argument is harder to refute than a social argument? As my friend would say, why care what the politicians motivations are? I dont, and if Maneka Gandhi thinks that breastfeeding is a great way to ensure no one fights maternity leave, good for her.

However, here is what would be nice: to have separate ministries for Women and for Child Development, so that the former jockeys for womens rights whether or not they have anything to do with children. Such a ministry would perhaps think differently about how to ensure womens rights are protected at work.

Our troubles at work do not begin and end with sexual harassment. They do not begin and end with breastfeeding or maternity leave. It continues to be that we women enter the world of work with no sense that we are entitled to it. It continues to be that our employers, peers and even our government like to ring the enormous gong of Biology and Culture over our heads all the time. All the time that we are trying to think about work.

The world is full of government policies and frantic people who want to promote breast-feeding, and thats okay. Wouldnt it be great to have just as many government policies that announce that its perfectly normal (Biology! Culture! Money!) for women to work and for men to want to look after the children?

Nisha Susan is a writer and co-founder of the online womens magazine The Ladies Finger.
After calling the Venkaiah Naidu meeting with Sonia Gandhi an attempt to submerge detailing with optics, Congress on Friday blamed the BJP for creating a false smokescreen on the goods and services tax bill (GST). Congress insists that it is the RSS and Swadeshi Jagran Manch that have been holding up the legislation which is widely seen as an acid test for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's liberalizing credentials.

The Indian Express reports that the party whipped out speeches of Gujarat Finance Minister Saurabh Patel before the Empowered Committee of Finance Ministers, which looked into the GST, to argue that the Narendra Modi-led Gujarat government had stonewalled the legislation.

Deception, deceit and double-speak have become hallmarks of the Modi government vis-a-vis implementation of GST as also other economic reforms. The BJP government, including Prime Minister and the Finance Minister, has been putting up a false smokescreen by accusing Congress of obstructing GST, while the real truth is that GST stands consistently red-flagged for last nine years by RSS and Swadeshi Jagran Manch, Congress spokesperson Shaktisinh Gohil said, reports The Indian Express.

Modi and the BJP government are now camouflaging paralysis of governance and failure of leadership over the last 19 months to misguide people by stating that current day grave economic crisis as also deflation of economy is happening because of non-passage of the GST, Gohil said. The government has no interest in passing the GST Bill. It is interested only in doing politics on GST, he said.

GST is not being passed because BJP & PM Modi do not want it. BJP is deceiving people: Jairam Ramesh, Congress pic.twitter.com/XIeOgwbaEA  ANI (@ANI_news) January 9, 2016

"Butter up opponents, Mr Modi"

In its latest issue, the Economist argues that Modi will do well to dump the NRI crowd for a bit and deal with issues closer home. "If Modi is to secure any economic legacy, he may now have to spend more time on the art of buttering up opponents at home rather than fellow leaders abroad," says the London based newspaper in its GST story titled: One country but no single market.

Congress rebuffs suggestions of breakthrough

The Congress party on Thursday rebuffed suggestions of a breakthrough on a landmark tax reform, hours after the government said it had accepted the demands set by the main opposition party to back the measure.

The proposed goods and services tax (GST), India's biggest revenue shake-up since independence in 1947, seeks to replace a slew of federal and state levies, transforming the nation of 1.2 billion people into a customs union.

Supporters say the new sales tax will add up to two percentage points to the South Asian nation's economic growth.

The Congress party, the original author of the tax reform, has opposed what it calls the "flawed" version now before parliament, where it has been able to block a key constitutional enabling amendment in the Rajya Sabha.

How does the existing system work?

Taxes production more than consumption

Subsidises importers, hurts domestic producers.

Trade between states is taxed, through a central sales tax of 2%.

Some states impose duties on products entering from elsewhere in India.

What does Chief Economic Advisors report say?

Scrap the central sales tax and set two bands for the GST - a standard rate of 17-18% and a lower 12% rate for sensitive goods.

Alcohol as well as property transactions should be subject to the GST. In return, states could levy sin taxes on things like alcohol and tobacco of up to 40%.

Congress remains combative

"The government is using optics of meetings and is not serious about GST," senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal told reporters.

His comments came after Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu said the government had agreed to accept the opposition party's demands.

Naidu also said the government was willing to bring forward the next parliament session to pass the proposed goods and services tax (GST) bill if Congress backed the measure.

The minister met Congress chief Sonia Gandhi on Thursday to convey the government's decision. Gandhi did not assure him of her party's support, however.

"Sonia said they (Congress) will discuss among themselves and take a final decision," Naidu said.

We had invited Soniaji and Manmohan Singhji and discussed with them the GST and other bills. In the same context, as the Parliamentary Affairs Minister of the government, I met the Congress president and recalled to her that as per the discussion held earlier, the Congress should finalise its stand. They had raised some issues, which were answered by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. Since the government had already spoken to Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad and the Deputy Leader of the Congress in the House Anand Sharma in this regard, I reminded her that a quick decision should be taken and we should move forward immediately on the GST and the real estate bill, Venkaiah Naidu said.

But Sibal said the party was still waiting for written proposals from the government.

Congress wants the government to cap the GST rate at less than 20 percent, scrap a proposed state levy and create an independent mechanism to resolve disputes on revenue sharing between states.

The political slugfest between the two sides has ensured that Finance Minister Arun Jaitley's self-imposed deadline of April 1 for the GST's launch will be missed.

While Jaitley has yet to set a new date for the rollout, aides say passage of the constitutional amendment bill in February's budget session of parliament would allow them to implement it by October.

Yet even that deadline, which would fall in the middle of the tax year, appears optimistic, say economists.

"There is still a substantive legislative process that has to be completed," said Aditi Nayar, an economist at ICRA, the Indian arm of rating agency Moody's.

With Reuters
MADRID Catalonia's acting head Artur Mas said on Saturday he would step down in order to clear the way for the formation of a pro-independence Catalan government after five years driving the separatist movement in the wealthy Spanish region.

Catalonia, which accounts for a fifth of Spain's economic output, has been unable to form a government since a regional election in September due to disagreements between the pro-independence parties which together gained a majority.

The pro-independence movement fractured earlier in January when a minority party in the regional bloc, CUP, said it would not back the business-friendly Mas's bid for another term due to deep political differences over such issues as an independent Catalonia's membership of NATO and the European Union.

"I am going to step to one side. I will not offer myself as candidate for (the pro-independence coalition) Junts pel Si for my re-election as president of Catalonia," Mas told a news conference in Barcelona.

Mas, in power since 2010, said he backed the mayor of the Catalan region of Girona, Carles Puigdemont, as his successor.

Following Spain's inconclusive parliamentary election last month, Mas's resignation might now force the country's ruling centre-right People's Party (PP) and the opposition Socialists to reconsider a grand coalition, which they had earlier ruled out, to stand up to a strong separatist Catalan administration.

Mas said the agreement reached with the CUP would see two of its delegates included in the Catalan parliament with Junts pel Si. The parliament will vote on the new candidate on Sunday.

If the parties fail to agree on a new candidate by Jan. 11, new regional elections will automatically have to be called.

(Reporting by Angus Berwick; Editing by Gareth Jones)

This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed.
Mexico City: The world's most-wanted drug lord was recaptured in a daring raid by Mexican marines Friday, six months after he fled through a tunnel from a maximum security prison in a made-for-Hollywood escape that deeply embarrassed the government and strained ties with the United States.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced the capture of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman using his Twitter account: "Mission accomplished: we have him."

Few had thought Guzman would be taken alive, and few now believe Mexico will want to try to hold him a third time in Mexican prisons. He escaped from maximum-security facilities in 2001 and on 11 July, 2015, the second breakout especially humiliating for the Pena Nieto administration, which only held him for less than 18 months.

The capture had top Mexican officials at a Foreign Ministry event gleefully embracing and breaking into a spontaneous rendition of the national anthem after Interior Secretary Miguel Osorio Chong delivered the news.

No sooner than Guzman was apprehended, calls started for his immediate extradition to the US, including from a Republican presidential candidate, Florida Sen Marco Rubio.

"Given that 'El Chapo' has already escaped from Mexican prison twice, this third opportunity to bring him to justice cannot be squandered," Rubio said.

The United States filed requests for extradition for Guzman on 25 June, before he escaped from prison. In September, a judge issued a second provisional arrest warrant on US charges of organized crime, money laundering drug trafficking, homicide and others. But Guzman's lawyers already filed appeals and received injunctions that could substantially delay the process.

Mexico said after the 2014 capture of the cartel boss that he would be tried in his home country first, with officials promising they would hang on to him. After his escape in July, the talk on Friday about keeping and trying Guzman almost as a matter of national pride wasn't so overt.

"It would be better for the Americans to take him away," said Mexican security analysis Raul Benitez.

Pena Nieto said he personally issued the order to recapture Guzman and heaped praise on Mexican agencies for their coordinated effort. "Careful and intensive intelligence work was carried out for months" leading up to the arrest, he said.

Pena Nieto gave a brief live message Friday afternoon that focused heavily on touting the competency of his administration, which has suffered a series of embarrassments and scandals in the first half of his presidency.

"The arrest of today is very important for the government of Mexico. It shows that the public can have confidence in its institutions," Pena Nieto said. "Mexicans can count on a government decided and determined to build a better country."

Guzman, a legendary figure in Mexico who went from a farmer's son to the world's top drug lord, was apprehended after a shootout between gunmen and Mexican marines at a home in an upscale neighborhood in Los Mochis, a seaside city in Guzman's home state of Sinaloa.

Authorities first located Guzman several days ago, based on reports that he was in Los Mochis, said a Mexican law enforcement official who was not authorized to be quoted by name said.

The Mexican Navy said in a statement that marines raided a home after receiving a tip about armed men there. They were fired on from inside the structure, it said. Five suspects were killed and six others arrested. The marine's injuries were not life threatening.

"You could hear intense gunfire and a helicopter; it was fierce," said a neighbor, adding that the battle raged for three hours, starting at 4 am. She refused to be quoted by name in fear for her own safety.

Guzman may have been at the house and fled while his gunmen and bodyguards provided covering fire from the house, said a second federal law enforcement official, who also agreed to discuss the operation on condition of anonymity. Guzman was later captured at the hotel Doux, a low-rise modern building on the outskirts of town.

Some reports said he tried to escape through storm drains. In 2014, Guzman evaded capture by fleeing through a network of interconnected tunnels in the drainage system under Culiacan, the Sinaloa state capital.

Marines seized two armored vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher at the home in Los Mochis, the navy's statement added.

Photos of the arms seized showed that two of the rifles were .50-caliber sniper guns, capable of penetrating most bullet-proof vests and cars. The grenade launcher was found loaded, with an extra round nearby. An assault rifle had a 40-mm grenade launcher and at least one grenade.

"The arrest is a significant achievement in our shared fight against transnational organized crime, violence, and drug trafficking," the Drug Enforcement Administration said in a statement.

The US Justice Department commended the Mexicans for their work as well. "I salute the Mexican law enforcement and military personnel who have worked tirelessly in recent months to bring Guzman to justice," Attorney General Loretta Lynch said.

After his first capture in Guatemala in June 1993, Guzman was sentenced to 20 years in prison. He reportedly made his 2001 escape from the maximum security prison in a laundry cart, though some have discounted that version.

His second escape last July was even more audacious. He slipped down a hole in his shower stall in plain view of guards into a mile-long tunnel dug from a property outside the prison. The tunnel had ventilation, lights and a motorbike on rails, illustrating the extent to which corruption was involved in covering up the elaborate operation. Noise of the final breakthrough from the tunnel was obvious inside the prison, according a video of Guzman in his cell just before he escaped.

Mexico launched a huge manhunt and a couple of months later tracked him to the mountains of his home state, arresting a pilot who allegedly flew Guzman to the region hours after his escape. Guzman was said to have narrowly escaped an earlier capture and injured a leg and his face while fleeing marines in the rugged terrain.

AP
ANKARA/BAGHDAD An attempted attack by Islamic State on a military base in northern Iraq shows Turkey's decision to deploy troops there was justified, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday, suggesting Russia was stirring up a row over the issue.

But Iraq's military later denied that the militant group had attacked or clashed with the Turkish forces "recently".

Turkey deployed a force protection unit of around 150 troops to northern Iraq in December citing heightened security risks near Bashiqa, where its soldiers have been training an Iraqi militia to fight Islamic State. Baghdad objected to the deployment.

The head of the Sunni militia said his fighters and Turkish forces launched a joint "pre-emptive" attack on Islamic State around 10 km (6 miles) south of the base on Wednesday because the militants were building capacity to launch rockets at it.

"Our forces managed to detect the position of these rockets so they conducted a preemptive strike," Atheel al-Nujaifi, former governor of the nearby Islamic State-controlled city of Mosul, told Reuters.

"This operation was ended without a single rocket being launched at the camp," he said.

Erdogan said no Turkish soldiers were harmed while 18 Islamic State militants were killed.

"This incident shows what a correct step it was, the one regarding Bashiqa. It is clear that with our armed soldiers there, our officers giving the training are prepared for anything at any time," he told reporters in Istanbul.

Iraq's military denied the reports.

"The joint operations command denies there was a terrorist attack on the position of Turkish forces in Bashiqa by the terrorist Daesh (Islamic State) recently," said a news flash on state television.

It "denies what was relayed in some media outlets from the Turkish president about clashing between the Turkish forces inside Iraqi territory and the terrorist Daesh whether in Bashiqa or any other areas."

DIPLOMATIC DISPUTE

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi accused Ankara last week of failing to respect an agreement to withdraw its troop deployment, while majority-Shi'ite Iraq's foreign minister said Baghdad could resort to military action if forced.

Erdogan said the problems over the deployment only started after Turkey's relations with Russia soured in the wake of Turkey shooting down a Russian fighter jet over Syria in November.

"They (Iraq) asked us to train their soldiers and showed us this base as the venue. But as we see, afterwards, once there were problems between Russia and Turkey ... these negative developments began," Erdogan said.

Turkey, he said, was acting in line with international law.

The camp in Iraq's Nineveh province, to which Sunni Muslim power Turkey has historic ties, is situated around 140 km (90 miles) south of the Turkish border.

Iraqi security forces have no presence in Nineveh since collapsing in June 2014 in the face of a lightning advance by Islamic State.

Ankara has acknowledged there was a "miscommunication" with Baghdad over the troop deployment.

It later withdrew some soldiers to another base in the nearby autonomous Kurdistan region and said it would continue to pull out of Nineveh. But Erdogan has ruled out a full withdrawal.

Nujaifi said the international coalition bombing Islamic State targets in Iraq and Syria had supported ground forces with air strikes in Wednesday's operation.

The coalition said it launched four strikes near Mosul on Wednesday, but a spokesman said they were not in direct support of the Turkish-Iraqi operation at Bashiqa.

(Additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Ayla Jean Yackley in Istanbul; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Humeyra Pamuk, Ralph Boulton, Hugh Lawson and James Dalgleish)

This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed.
BANGUI Hundreds of peacekeepers from Democratic Republic of Congo on a U.N. peacekeeping mission in Central African Republic will withdraw, a spokesman said on Saturday, after they failed an internal assessment.

The historically turbulent former French colony suffered an intensification of violence in 2013 when mostly Muslim rebels known as Seleka seized power in a coup.

Since then, militias drawn from the Christian majority have launched reprisal attacks and thousands of people have been killed and around a million displaced despite efforts by U.N. and French peacekeepers to restore order.

"It is confirmed that the Congolese unit will withdraw from MINUSCA," said Vladimir Monteiro, spokesman for the U.N. mission in Central African Republic. "The contingent will leave and not be replaced."

Asked about whether the withdrawal could jeopardise security, Monteiro declined to give an immediate comment, saying a further announcement would be made next week.

In August, three Congolese peacekeepers in Central African Republic were accused of raping three female civilians, including one minor. Congolese Justice Minister Alexis Thambwe said at the time the allegations would be investigated.

It was not immediately clear whether such allegations were the main factor behind the decision to withdraw Congolese troops. A U.N. spokesperson in New York earlier said that the U.N. review of Congolese troops assessed the equipment, the vetting procedures and overall preparedness of the contingent.

This month, the U.N. said it was investigating new allegations of sexual abuse of minors by peacekeepers.

According to the U.N. peacekeeping website, there are 809 Congolese troops and 123 police deployed as part of the 11,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping mission in Central African Republic, known as MINUSCA.

Paris also plans to draw down its troops in the country, which originally numbered around 2,000, once a transition back to democracy is complete.

A run-off presidential vote is due on January 31, with former prime minister Anicet Georges Dologuele placing first in the initial round without securing an outright majority.

(Reporting by Crispin Dembassa-Kette; Writing by Emma Farge; Editing by Tom Heneghan)

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New York: A man claiming allegiance to the Islamic State extremist group shot and seriously wounded a policeman in Philadelphia, opening fire multiple times at point-blank range with a stolen police gun before he was arrested, officials said on Friday.

The apparent assassination attempt comes amid heightened security in the United States following last month's assault by a radicalized Muslim couple in California that killed 14 people, and the November terror attacks in Paris.

Policeman Jesse Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in his left arm as he sat in his patrol car late Thursday in the northeastern city. "I'm shot. I'm bleeding heavily," he yelled in a dispatch call.

Authorities said they were astonished he survived.

Philadelphia police commissioner Richard Ross called the attack "absolutely chilling" and described the officer's injuries as "very, very serious."

Stills captured from video surveillance and released to the press show the suspect opening fire as he walks towards the patrol car, extending his arm into the vehicle and then continuing to fire as he flees on foot.

"If that doesn't just make the hairs on your neck just rise when you see that, it's scary," Ross told reporters.

The officer got out of his vehicle, despite being injured, and managed to return fire, hitting the suspect, who was quickly arrested.

"He stated that he pledges his allegiance to Islamic State, follows Allah and that is the reason he was called upon to do this," homicide police Captain James Clark told a news conference.

Police said the suspect, named as Edward Archer, 30, has a criminal record, but that it was unclear whether he acted alone or as part of a wider conspiracy.

"He doesn't appear to be a stupid individual, just an extremely violent one," said Ross.

Ross, said he was "absolutely amazed" that Hartnett, an officer with five years experience, had survived. "This man fired at least 11 shots from a nine millimeter at close range," he said.

'Nothing to do with Islam'

Police said it was unclear how the suspect obtained the firearm, which was stolen from police in October 2013.

"That is one of the things that you absolutely regret the most, that an officer's gun is stolen and it is used against one of your own," Ross said.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney praised Harnett's bravery but urged people to draw no link between the criminal act and Islam.

"That is abhorrent, it's terrible and it does not represent the religion in any way, shape or form or any of its teachings," Kenney said.

"This is a criminal with a stolen gun trying to kill one of our officers. It has nothing to do with being a Muslim."

Thursday's shooting is likely to raise further concerns about the threat posed by homegrown extremists within the United States, inspired to act by Islamic State jihadists based in Iraq and Syria.

Muslim community activists have already decried what they call an unprecedented anti-Muslim backlash in the wake of the Paris attacks.

Elsewhere on Friday, two suspects with alleged ties to the Islamic State group were due to appear in court in California and Texas.

Aws Mohammed Younis al-Jayab, an Iraqi-born Palestinian, was arrested on Thursday and came to the United States from Syria as a refugee in 2012.

He is accused of fighting in Syria for various terror groups.

Another Iraqi-born Palestinian, Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan, was due to make an initial court appearance after being indicted in Texas for providing material support to the Islamic State group.

The head of the FBI, James Comey, told lawmakers last year that upwards of 200 Americans have traveled or attempted to travel to Syria to join IS extremists.

AFP
Uh oh, there they go again, just as one feared. Pakistan has opted to employ verbal band aids and ointment to sandpaper Indias abrasions after Pathankot. Thats all it is and nothing more when we read headlines like Pakistan prime minister, Army chief and ISI head have all condemned the attack.

It is too much to expect New Delhi to find grand virtue in the fact that the three of them are on the same page.

Condemnation cuts no ice, it is a cheap commodity and you can buy it by the bushel in the political firmament. And this togetherness is of no direct concern to India and, in itself, utterly pointless.

This was going to be the sticky part when we gave the ultimatum demanding action. Even that possibly orchestrated flame and fury from the JeMs Maulana Masood Azhar indicting the Sharif government for bowing to India could well be theatrics on order. Where is Nawaz Sharif bowing to India?

There has to be something more tangible than just agreement that terrorism is a very bad thing.

The next step, if one estimates the direction that Islamabad is taking, is to suggest a meeting of the two national security advisors (NSAs) so that the issue can be discussed and a combined operation mooted. That is a nice way of bringing the currently frozen agenda back to life and yet, giving nothing away.

Now, if this collective will is the first of several steps we should keep the door open just a tad, not much, just a chink to see if some light falls in.

Like, okay, your three prongs on the trident are in a row, now what. Are you going to hit the camps, give India their wish list of terrorists (or at least start the process) and globally accept that this was an operation planned and conceived in Pakistan.

Can Nawaz Sharif say 'sorry'? It is a simple word but without it there is not even a starting point. Without it being on record India gets no starting point.

There is also a concern, and it is not an idle one, that Pakistans PR machine will try to move the blame onto India. It is your cop who was corrupt. It is your people who aided the terrorists. It is your forces that were inept.

You.

You.

You.

You guard against it. We can conduct our own investigation and shore up the weak spots but let it not put us on the back foot.

The evidence is stark. There can be no surrender on the demand that Pakistans authorities make an admission..

And we have to be very clear that without that acknowledgement mere announcements of intent do not have the traction for India to revert to cordiality. There has to be more, much more. PM Modi should wait till Monday and then exercise his options and not pander. What Pakistan would want is to create the illusion that it is ready to talk and be accommodating but it is India who is being petulant and sulky and not coming to the negotiating trouble.

Seen in isolation, the fact that Nawaz Sharifs government, the army and the ISI are on the same page is of no value to India. If this is the only offer, New Delhi must throw away the book and write its own script.
By Pratik Karki

Seventh in a series of historical documents, the present Constitution of Nepal promulgated on 20 September, 2015 with almost 90 percent approval is the first Constitution in the history of this nation to have been drafted and promulgated by a democratically elected Constituent Assembly. Yet, over 100 days later, the Constitution continues to be met with a series of protests, especially in the Terai/Madhesh region of Nepal, where it is labelled discriminatory.

There have been over fifty deaths, mostly that of protestors but also policemen and a huge polarisation within the country. There has also been a border blockade at the Nepal-India border, which has resulted in serious difficulties in a country that is yet to recover from the devastating April earthquake. For a country with deep historical and people-based ties with India, the official Indian statement rather than welcoming the Constitution, tersely stated We note the promulgation in Nepal today of a Constitution

Instead, India has been seen as taking sides in a complex dispute and the term unofficial blockade attributed to India by a considerable section of Nepali citizens and the Nepali establishment as well. The Indian Ministry of External Affairs continues to stress on the need for consensus despite the understanding that democratically written Constitutions in divided societies are essentially documents of the best possible compromise. This article presents the primary demands of the protesting United Democratic Madheshi Front (UDMF), and analyses the contentious provisions of the Constitution of Nepal along with the Constitutional Amendment Bill that is currently in the second stage of deliberations in Nepalese Legislative-Parliament.

The 11-point demands of the currently agitating UDMF primarily revolve around:

Definition of Nepal as a multi-national State rather than a monolithic national State Execution of multilingual policies in all federal, provincial and local bodies. Clear provision regarding marital citizenship in the Constitution and not in federal law. Guarantee of the principle of Proportional Inclusion in all State organs at all levels. Population as the primary criteria for constituencies for the lower House, ie House of Representatives, as well as representation in the Upper House, i..National Assembly on the basis of population. Demands for a Federal demarcation with two autonomous provinces in the Terai/Madhesh region.

Defining Nepal

The definition of the nation and the State of Nepal can be found in Articles 2 and 3 of the Constitution. Article 2 defines the nation to be  All the Nepalese people, with multiethnic, multilingual, multi-religious, multicultural characteristics and in geographical diversities, and having common aspirations and being united by a bond of allegiance to national independence, territorial integrity, national interest and prosperity of Nepal, collectively constitute the nation whereas Article 3 (1) defines the State of Nepal to be an independent, indivisible, sovereign, secular, inclusive, democratic, socialism-oriented, federal democratic republican State.

It is clear from a literal reading of these provisions that the definition of the nation is neither monolithic nor prioritising of any one ethnicity, language, culture or religion but instead attempts to celebrate the multiple differences inherent in the citizens of Nepal. Given that the federal structure of Nepal is an evolution from an essentially unitary State and not from the coming together of two or more nations, it is unlikely that the definition of Nepal will be changed to include a multi-national character.

The language issue

The current Constitutional provisions regarding language are enumerated in Article 6 and Article 7 of the Constitution. Article 6 provides that All languages spoken as the mother tongues in Nepal are the languages of the nation whereas Article 7 (1) declares Nepali to be the official language in Nepal. However, Article 7 (2) provides space for a multi-lingual policy in the provinces in the Terai/Madhesh region by stating A State may, by a State law, determine one or more than one languages of the nation spoken by a majority of people within the State as its official language(s), in addition to the Nepali language Further Article 7 (3) allows for other issues related to language to be decided by the Government of Nepal on the recommendation of the Language Commission, which shall, as per Article 287, be constituted with a representation of the States within one year of the commencement of the Constitution.

The latest Nepal Census of 2011 lists 123 languages as being spoken as mother tongues in Nepal.

As the chart shows, Nepali is the mother tongue of almost half of the overall population of Nepal, and is mostly understood throughout the country, including the overall Terai/Madhesh region where it is the single largest language spoken as a mother tongue (3.5 million Nepali speakers compared to 3 million Maithili speakers). While the use of a neutral language such as English can be academically mooted, it is impractical and not the demand of the protestors. It is clear that the State cannot practically implement a multilingual policy for all of the different languages spoken in the country. However, the Constitution has left enough scope for multilingual States, and the same is possible in the States that have been carved out in the Terai/Madhesh region under the current Constitution.

Citizenship

Citizenship has always been a contested arena in Nepali politics, given the open border between Nepal and India and lax record keeping on both sides of the international border, giving rise to allegations of people holding dual nationalities. However, as widely and inaccurately reported in some sections of the Indian media, the Constitution of Nepal does not discriminate against its citizens on the basis of ethnicity. The Constitution does however have gender discriminatory provisions, but those have not been the targets of protests from the UDMF. The Constitution also continues with the previous categories of descent, naturalization and honorary citizenship and a new category of non-resident Nepalese citizenship with socio-cultural and economic rights. Further, through Article 289 (1) it seeks to limit certain top executive and constitutional posts such as the President, Vice-President, Prime Minister, Chief Justice, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Chief of State, Chief Minister, Speaker of a State Assembly and chief of a security body to citizens by descent. However, even this Article is not the focus of sustained protests by the UDMF, given that most of the Madheshi citizens in Nepal are citizens by descent.

Article 11 (6) of the Constitution of Nepal provides that, A foreign woman who has a matrimonial relationship with a citizen of Nepal may, if she so wishes, acquire the naturalised citizenship of Nepal as provided for in the Federal law 

The criticism of the UDMF is that the phrase (as provided for in the federal law) makes the status of Indian women married to Nepali men (mostly from the Madheshi community) subject to a constitutional flux, and hence would probably make their children unable to receive citizenship by descent. However that is not true and foreign women married to Nepali citizens have been continuing to receive naturalised citizenships even post the promulgation of the current Constitution of Nepal, as per the provisions of the existing Citizenship Act, 2006. Nevertheless, this is an arena where there is consensus among all the major political parties, and the impugned provision should either be removed through a constitutional amendment or a statement clarifying the provision should be issued by the government as well as the major political parties.

Guarantee of proportional inclusion at all levels

The Interim Constitution of Nepal 2007 created a basis for an inclusive State. As a result of this the concept of affirmative action was introduced in Nepal. Thus forty five percent of government jobs are now reserved for different categories such as women, indigenous nationalities, Madheshis, Dalits, people with disabilities and people from backward region. In addition, Article 18 (3) dealing with the Right to Equality allows for the making of special provisions by law for the protection, empowerment or development of a wide range of classification. This classification can be further seen in Article 42 (1) dealing with the Right to Social Justice which provides that The socially backward women, Dalit, indigenous people, indigenous nationalities, Madheshi, Tharu, minorities, persons with disabilities, marginalised communities, Muslims, backward classes, gender and sexual minorities, youths, farmers, labourers, oppressed or citizens of backward regions and indigent Khas Arya shall have the right to participate in the State bodies on the basis of inclusive principle

The fact that Article 42 (1) uses the term inclusive principle rather than proportional inclusive has seen protests from the UDMF who fear that this will be used to sideline Madheshis and other groups from their rightful participatory share in all organs of the State. The fear however, is not based on a sound constitutional footing. The current Constitution of Nepal clearly accepts the principle of proportional inclusion. The term proportional inclusive is used in the Preamble as the basis for an egalitarian society and is further used in Article 38 (4) and Article 40 (1) guaranteeing women and Dalits respectively the right to participate in all bodies of the State on the basis of the principle of proportional inclusion. It is also used in Article 50 as part of the Directive Principles of the State. Similarly, Article 285 (2) regarding the constitution of government service states that positions in the federal civil service as well as all federal government services shall be filled through competitive examinations, on the basis of open and proportional inclusive principle.

With the discussion of the Constitutional Amendment Bill in the Nepalese Legislative Parliament the term on the principle of inclusion in Article 42 (1) looks set to be replaced with the term on the principle of participatory inclusion and this demand has been fulfilled. However, it is necessary to add that the concept of proportional inclusion has yet to be properly clarified and problems are bound to crop up regarding the implementation of these provisions.

Population as the primary criteria for constituencies

The Constitution of Nepal provides for a 275 member House of Representatives with 165 directly elected and 110 proportionally elected members. Article 84 (1) (a) provides for the delimitation of constituencies based on geography and population. This has been contentious, as the UDMF have been arguing that this discriminates against the Terai/Madhesh regions where 51 percent of the total population of Nepal resides. The language to the Constitutional Amendment Bill accepts this argument and the primacy of population has been recognised through the proposed amendment to Article 84 (1) (a) with the delimitation of constituencies now being on the basis of population and geographical necessity and specialisation. Further the proposed amendments to Article 286 (5) and 286 (6), cement the primacy of population while also guaranteeing that sparsely populated mountainous districts with huge natural resources are not left unrepresented.

The representation to the National Assembly, as per Article 86 is based on the equality of the federal units and not on the basis of population and thus following the American and South African model of second chambers, rather than the Indian model. This ensures that the interests of the States that have a much larger population do not overwhelm the interests of smaller States. Of course, there is no right or wrong model, simply different constitutional designs, but with the possible amendment to the relevant provisions of the Lower House, it is likely that equal representation for the different federal units rather than the primacy of population shall continue at the National Assembly.

Demands for a federal demarcation with two autonomous provinces

This is the most contentious issue and one that has continuously been put forward as the bottom-line of the UDMF, and is the reason of their continued objection to the Constitutional Amendment Bill as it is silent on the seven State model. Article 56 (3) of the Constitution regarding the federal structure states that There shall be States consisting of the Districts as mentioned in Schedule-4 existing in Nepal at the time of commencement of this Constitution. The twenty districts of the Terai/Madhesh region (out of a total of seventy five districts in Nepal) are divided within the seven States as following:

The framers of the Constitution have valued linkage with India in the design of federal units. Six of the seven States have borders with India in the Terai, and given the importance of India as a trade and transit partner, this is understandable. In the context of the UDMFs border blockade as a tactic under the current agitation, it is clear that other States would like to have some connection in the Terai with the Indian border. However, the UDMF wants a federal design with two provinces in the Terai/Madhesh region.

The seven State model was supposed to have been developed on the basis of both identity as well as capability. However, there was a lack of consensus regarding the number of States. The State Restructuring Committee of the first Constituent Assembly had itself proposed two models: either a six State model or a eleven State model. In the run up to the promulgation of the current Constitution, the consensus among the major parties was for a six State model which was changed to a seven State model following violence in the western part of the country. However, violence continues in the Terai/Madhesh region demanding the inclusion of three eastern districts (Jhapa, Morang and Sunsari) in State number 2 and two western districts (Kailali and Kanchanpur) in State number 5. There also have been calls to create a eight State model. While the claims of the Madheshis and the Tharus are justified, the loss of access to India for the other States, mixed demographics in these contentious districts and the legitimate claims of other indigenous groups apart from Madheshis over these districts make a quick solution on this issue very unlikely.

The solution to this can perhaps be found through Article 295 (1) under the Transitional Provisions chapter that provides that the Government of Nepal may constitute a Federal Commission for making suggestions on matters relating to the boundaries of States. The use of this provision along with a creative reading of the amendment provisions of the State boundaries could provide an acceptable solution. However, it is imperative that any solution takes into account the interests of all the affected parties, and be time bound so as to prevent the repeat of these issues in the future.

Despite the challenges, one has to remember the massive advances that have taken place in the Nepalese constitutional space over the past decade. Nepal has moved on from a constitutional monarchy to a republic, from a unitary system to a federal order and a secular character from a Hindu nation. In addition, there is a mixed electoral system, affirmative action, additional fundamental rights and a one third guarantee of women representation in the federal parliament. The current Constitution is flexible to amendments and therefore will continue to reflect the desires of the Nepali nation. However, it is necessary for all the parties to the current crisis to display restraint, maturity and flexibility to ensure that the dialogue now moves on to the proper implementation of this historic Charter.

Text of the Constitutional Amendment Bill at the Legislative-Parliament

The first Constitutional Amendment Bill presented to the Legislative Parliament on 15 December, 2015 and currently being discussed in the Nepali Legislative-Parliament seeks to address the concerns of the Terai/Madhesh region. A total of 103 lawmakers have made a total of 24 revision proposals to the Constitution Amendment Bill.

The text of the Constitution Amendment Bill as originally proposed is:

A Bill to amend the Constitution of Nepal

1. Short Name and Date of Issue:

a. This amendment shall be called Constitution of Nepal (First Amendment) 2015.

b. This amendment shall be immediately come into force.

2. Amendment to Article 42 of the Constitution of Nepal: The phrase on the principle of inclusion has been replaced with on the principle of proportional inclusion in Article 42 (1) of the Constitution of Nepal (hereinafter referred to as the Constitution).

3. Amendment to Article 84 of the Constitution: The phrase on the basis of geography and population has been replaced with on the basis of population and geographical necessity and specialisation in Article 84 (1) of the Constitution.

4. Amendment to Article 286 of the Constitution:

a. Article 286 (1) (5) has been replaced with the following:

(5) The Election Constituency Establishment Commission shall use population and geography, as the basis for representation while determining election constituencies shall do the following:

1. Using population as the primary basis and keep the ratio of population and number of members represented as equal as possible

2. Ensure that such demarcation will provide each district as they exist at the promulgation of this Constitution, with at least one election constituency.

b. The phrase While determining election constituencies in Article 286 (6) to be followed by the addition of the words population and geographical necessity.

The unofficial English version of the Constitution of Nepal (without the latest amendments) can be accessed here.

The author is a teacher and practicing lawyer, based in Kathmandu
Florida's "netroots" and professional "media blogs" are digested in the two columns immediately below. The to the right summarizes hand picked articles, punditry and editorials about Florida politics. The far right column incorporates both permanent links and specialized news digests which are customized as necessary (now featuring news about Rubio's campaign, and the latest on Jeb).
Tobias Lindholm  writer and director of A Hijacking, writer of The Hunt  back with another emotionally tense exploration of ordinary men under extraordinary pressure in A War (Krigen), Denmarks official Oscars submission for Best Foreign Language Film and now on the shortlist for a nomination. Claus (Pilou Asbaek: Lucy) commands a company of soldiers in Afghanistan, pushing back against the Taliban but with a frustrating mandate to minimize involvement with the locals, even when they flat-out ask for help. And often, even protecting his own men proves impossible, when a single misstep can set off an IED and turn a routine patrol into a medical emergency. Almost imperceptibly, Lindholm layers on stresses and strains so that, by the time Claus issues an order in the heat of an intense firefight that later comes under question, we are as stunned as he is to be second-guessed. Didnt he do the right thing? If he didnt, then what would have been right at that particular moment?

This is a war movie for how we have redefined war in the 21st century, as nervous occupations and guerrilla ambushes, where there is sometimes little distinction between civilians and combatants and there is no clear battlefield; its not a political film but one about the impossible situation politics puts soldiers in today. It is one of the more compassionate depictions of how soldiers are impacted by battle that Ive seen: Claus and his soldiers are not impervious tough guys but are profoundly changed by their experience. And the moral dilemmas they must resolve arent only on the battlefield but also at home: Claus is recalled to Denmark to face a military inquiry into his actions, and how he deals with that must also take into account the needs of his family; his wife, Maria (Tuva Novotny: Eat Pray Love), has been holding the fort and coping with their three small children on her own. A War is smartly nuanced about Clauss quandary, implicitly acknowledging that there is no one set price of integrity, but that something must be paid.
2000 - 2022   24 .-   .       focus-news.net,                 () .                  24 .                 24      .       .       24 .
Diageo (DEO -1.14%) announced last month that it will begin selling an alcohol-free version of its Guinness brand of beer in Indonesia this year. There is some risk to hurting the brand, but if executed properly the upside more than justifies the move.

Why alcohol-free Guinness in Indonesia?

Indonesia has the largest population of Muslims in the world. Because of religious restrictions in the country, beer sales were restricted in mini markets. While still being sold in supermarkets and restaurants, many Indonesian people choose not to consume alcoholic beverages. Since these restrictions went into effect, sales of Guinness and Diageo's other alcoholic beverages have fallen 40% year-over-year, according to CNBC.

Indonesia is an important market for Diageo, ranking fifth in sales for the beverage giant. The creation of Guinness Zero, its alcohol-free offering, will help ensure that it remains a major market, if not become an even more lucrative one.

Concern about brand damage

My initial concern about this product is that it would damage the image of Guinness, one of Diageo's best-known brands. It's possible that Guinness purists will be put off by the creation of a non-alcoholic version, or that other customers would purchase it by mistake -- though, the latter is certainly a minor concern. While it may have been safer to produce an alcohol-free stout and call it something else, a different color scheme and selling exclusively in Indonesia will reduce customer confusion while allowing the alcohol-free version to benefit from the Guinness brand.

Diageo management has said that it has, "no plans to roll out Guinness Zero beyond Indonesia." It's hard to say whether or not Diageo will stick to this, as the global market for non-alcoholic beer is larger than one might guess. Sales of no-alcohol beer topped 18.7 million barrels last year, according to Esquire. This is larger than the combined sales of the entire U.S. craft beer industry.

Diageo tailors its products based on ingredient availability and local tastes. The use of sorghum in Guinness Foreign Extra Stout in Nigeria serves as a case in point. Sorghum is a species of grass that's an important food source for subsistence farmers in parts of Africa and Asia. Nigeria is one of its largest producers and when barley imports were banned for a few years in the late 1980s and early 1990s brewers began to use sorghum instead. The ban was lifted, but the preference for beer with sorghum remains. The company should continue to follow this blueprint -- be it including sorghum or removing alcohol to cater to local tastes.

Cost is minimal

Diageo's goal is to increase its share of the Indonesian alcohol-free market from 7% to 10%. The company's financing ability and scale allow it to operate in ways that smaller competitors can't. It currently produces Guinness Zero in Ireland and pays a 10% duty along with transportation costs. Diageo has invested around $1 million to launch Guinness Zero and is building a new plant in Bali that will improve the margins for its Indonesian offering by reducing transportation costs and import taxes.

One small piece of the puzzle

This won't be a needle-mover on its own for Diageo, but these kinds of localized products are what make the company special. Diageo has global appeal with brands like Smirnoff, Captain Morgan, and Johnny Walker. And it uses its resources and operational expertise to succeed in local markets with products such as Yeni Raki and Crown Royal.

Guinness Zero is another example of Diageo using this strategy. It should improve sales in Indonesia, and if we get to a point where there is adequate demand from people in Western countries for the taste of Guinness without the effects of alcohol, Diageo management may choose to test it here as well.

I'm happy with the current path the company is on and look forward to holding my shares for a long time.


When stocks dove at the beginning of last week, I bought shares of Bank of America (BAC -1.52%). My rationale was fourfold.

1. Valuation

Bank of America is a valuation play. Its shares trade right now for a 27% discount to book value, or roughly in line with its tangible book value (its shareholders' equity less goodwill and other intangible assets). Meanwhile, it isn't unreasonable to think that in good times, shares of the North Carolina-based bank will trade for "two times book," as an old industry adage goes.

This is a hunch, not a guarantee. But it's based on my analysis of the way the bank industry has worked since the Civil War, when American banking began to assume its modern shape.

Banking is cyclical. It always has been, and at least until compelling evidence proves otherwise, I assume it always will be. This reality can, and at least in my opinion should, be leveraged to buy low and sell high.

2. Growing profitability

Bank of America's problems since the financial crisis have revolved around high legal expenses, elevated loan losses (particularly from its credit card portfolio), and nonpermanent expenses associated with servicing subprime mortgages inherited in its 2008 acquisition of Countrywide Financial.

But all of these problems are now in their final throes:

A legal opinion in the second quarter of last year time-barred new claims against Bank of America for misrepresenting the quality of mortgages originated by Countrywide and sold to institutional investors. These claims have cost the bank $28 billion -- this excludes fees paid to lawyers and other litigation expenses, which add $35 billion more. But thanks to the legal opinion, Bank of America was able to reduce its estimate of outstanding "representation and warranties" claims by $7.6 billion. The ruling also staunched the inflow of new claims, reducing it from over $2 billion a quarter to just $220 million.

The biggest issue in terms of loan losses sprang from Bank of America's pre-crisis strategy to issue credit cards to everyone (and their mothers) with little regard for creditworthiness. "To drive growth, we gave cards to people who couldn't afford them," CEO Brian Moynihan told Fortune's Shawn Tully in 2011. This cost the bank three full years of profits during the best of times, or $60 billion. However, because credit card loans are generally charged off within six months of entering delinquency, the problem had largely been dealt with by the end of 2010.

Finally, following in the footsteps of Citigroup, Bank of America set up a separate division (sometimes referred to as its "bad bank") that was tasked with servicing crisis-related toxic and noncore assets, and, eventually, removing them from the bank's balance sheet altogether. At its peak, this unit employed 41,800 fulltime workers. In the latest quarter, meanwhile, this had fallen to 11,000. As this drops further (it should eventually reach zero), so will the excess servicing expenses associated with delinquent loans.

Taken together, these three factors explain why Bank of America's profitability has finally started to emerge from under the cloud of the financial crisis. To this end, the third quarter of last year marked the first time since 2008 that the $2.2 trillion bank had reported four consecutive quarters of solid profits.

3. Virtuous cycle

As Bank of America's profit improves, so too will the valuation of its stock.

It's long been said that bank investors should "buy at half of book value and sell at two times book." This rule, while imprecise, rings true with Bank of America.

Shares of the nation's second biggest bank by assets bottomed out after the crisis at roughly 25% of book value in 2011 (the same year Warren Buffett invested in Bank of America), but they have been on an upward march ever since. This progress should continue, if not accelerate, so long as Bank of America's profits continue to grow.

4. Capital return

Finally, boosting its dividend and share buybacks should serve as an additional catalyst for Bank of America's stock.

Investors have been clamoring for the bank to increase its dividend after the bank reduced its quarterly payout to only a penny a share at the nadir of the crisis. The bank responded last year with a fourfold increase. But while it now pays out $0.05 per share each quarter, that's still a fraction of its potential.

If Bank of America can earn 1% on its assets after tax, which seems probable, it will have $22 billion in earnings to dispose of each year. Most of this, according to CEO Moynihan, will be returned to shareholders. And assuming that it allocates a third of this to dividends, which is a standard percentage for banks, it could be paying out $0.20 a share in the not-too-distant future.

More importantly, assuming Moynihan is serious about buying back stock, as he intimated to Fortune's Tully in 2011, then shareholders could see the value of their stakes improved further. As William Thorndike covers in his excellent book The Outsiders, the best returns over the past 50 years have been driven in large part by appropriately timed stock buybacks. With Bank of America's still stock trading at a meaningful discount to its book value, every dollar spent on buybacks would, at present rates, increase its book value by $1.37.

In sum, while I've been critical of Bank of America in the past, I can't help but think it will indeed succeed at fully and finally recovering from the financial crisis. This could still be a handful of years out, but I'm in no hurry. I bought the stock for my retirement account and plan on holding it for many years.
As we barrel headlong into 2016, one issue that promises to take center stage, especially with elections just 10 months away, is marijuana.

Marijuana expands, but roadblocks remain

Over the previous two decades marijuana has been practically unstoppable. With the exception of a few notable defeats -- the defeat two months ago of Issue 3 in Ohio, which attempted to approve medical and recreational marijuana at the same time, and Florida's medical marijuana defeat in 2014 -- marijuana's expansion continues.

In two decades, 23 states have approved the use of marijuana for select medical ailments, and since 2012 four states (along with Washington, D.C.) now allow for the sale of marijuana to adults for recreational use. Medical marijuana opens new treatment avenues for select patients dealing with chronic or terminal illnesses, while for states the retail sale of marijuana provides another source of revenue that can help fill relatively small budget gaps.

Yet in spite of marijuana's triumphs at the state level, its progress at the federal level needs to be measured with a magnifying glass. With the exception of loosened standards concerning clinical research, marijuana remains just as illegal on the federal level now as it was two decades ago. The only difference today is the federal government has taken a hands-off approach to enforcing federal laws, and is instead allowing the states to regulate the drug.

There are a lot of potential roadblocks for marijuana, and most of them revolve around its safety profile. Lawmakers are concerned about what long-term use might do to a person's body or psyche; they're worried about the consistency of the product being developed (especially as it relates to edible products); and they're worried about potentially adverse societal impacts such as an increase in crime rates or instances of driving while under the influence of marijuana.

This invention could address a major marijuana concern

In many instances these concerns are not easily addressable with the flip of a switch. However, a new invention that's currently in clinical testing could resolve the ongoing concern about marijuana users driving under the influence.

As announced in early December, Oakland-based Hound Labs, in collaboration with scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, have invented a portable breathalyzer that can detect and measure the level of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, in an individual's breath. THC is the psychoactive component of marijuana that can lead to impairment. Not only does the breathalyzer detect THC, but it also functions as an alcohol detector, allowing law enforcement on-the-spot readings that could aid in the determination of whether or not a driver is impaired.

The current standard for determining whether or not an individual is driving under the influence of marijuana involves a blood test. This isn't necessarily the best test because THC can remain in a person's bloodstream long after they've smoked marijuana, and it doesn't necessarily demonstrate whether or not a driver is impaired. Having an on-the-spot device handy will allow law enforcement to remove impaired drivers from the roadway while also ensuring that drivers who aren't impaired aren't unreasonably prosecuted. Realistically, it's a device that could potentially save lives (and save the legal system a lot of money).

Though Hound Labs' devices are undergoing clinical testing in the first quarter of this year, if all goes well (which is the expectation of its CEO Mike Lynn), they'll be in the hands of law enforcement and interested consumers by late 2016. Clinical testing will involve legal medical marijuana patients at the University of California, Berkeley's campus, and the tests will look to replicate readings from traditional intoxication readouts. Lynn has suggested that the units could price under $1,000 for law enforcement and should be less expensive in a less durable form for consumers.

One problem potentially addressed, quite a few to go

Hound Labs' innovation could go a long way to addressing one of the primary concerns of lawmakers, but it still doesn't answer the basic question of whether or not marijuana is safe to be used over the long-term.

You'll get no shortage of longtime users who'll suggest that marijuana has next to no long-term effects -- and that very well may be the case. For instance, marijuana overdoses in 2015 totaled exactly zero, as compared to an estimated 46 people who die daily from prescription opioid overdoses. Another study conducted in Australia earlier this decade on nearly 2,000 young adult marijuana smokers between the ages of 20 and 24 discovered that marijuana has little to no long-term effect on cognition.

But for each positive finding, there are even more negative clinical studies. For decades researchers focused almost exclusively on the dangers of marijuana. Only within the past decade have they really turned their attention to examining the potential benefits of marijuana. Developing a balanced profile of marijuana's benefits and risks is going to take time, and regulators simply don't want to make a hasty decision on possibly rescheduling the drug before a fuller safety picture is available.

While we wait for Congress to act (which is in itself not guaranteed), existing marijuana businesses continue to face extraordinarily tough challenges. For example, marijuana-based businesses have practically no access to basic banking services. From a line of credit to something as simple as a checking account, banks are simply unwilling to risk potential federal prosecution. Regardless of whether or not marijuana is legal within a state, federal law rules the roost with banks, and marijuana the plant is still illegal on the federal level. Marijuana businesses are also dealing with higher taxes than normal businesses because they're unable to take business-related deductions.

For prospective investors, this translates into major concerns. There's no denying that marijuana has an extremely high ceiling of potential if approved, but Congress's impetus to act simply isn't there. For marijuana stocks it means the likelihood of ongoing losses. What investors need to ask themselves is whether or not the company they're buying has a strong enough cash runway to survive until Congress (potentially) changes its tune. My guess is there may not be many investable businesses left by that time.
After President Obama cried while announcing a series of commonsense executive actions on gun control, his rare display of emotion stirred plenty of debate.

Would the steps he outlined have prevented any of the recent mass shootings? Why is he circumventing Congress again? Were his tears even real?

All good questions.

Yet heres another one that we ought to consider: Why would someone cry over gun control and mass shootings while simultaneously freeing more terrorists?

Seriously, does that make any sense at all?

During Mr. Obamas Town Hall, Guns in America televised live from George Mason University, his exchange with Taya Kyle, widow of American Sniper former Navy SEAL Chris Kyle was illuminating.

The president acknowledged that Americas murder and violent crime rates have steadily declined for years while gun ownership has skyrocketed. He also recognized the limitations of laws in preventing gun violence, noting some criminals will be able to get their hands on firearms even if theres a background check.

Despite knowing the facts, his position didnt budge an inch.

Nor has his position on emptying Guantanamo.

He knows our intelligence authorities report that nearly 1 in 3 ex-detainees are confirmed or suspected of returning to terrorism, yet just this month hes releasing 17 more hardcore jihadists. And of the 107 left, were talking about Bin Laden bodyguards, bomb makers, weapons trainers and other dangerous men still committed to kill Americans.

If thats not bad enough, Team Obama continues to spin the world on all things Gitmo -- from recidivism, to cost, to what would happen if they make it stateside.

On recidivism, in shady accounting that even Bernie Madoff would envy, the White House has changed its talking point to say less than 10 percent have returned to terrorism. But when you dig a little further, that blanket stat only pertains to under their watch, thus not counting anyone who left under the Bush administration. Nice.

On cost, they cite $3 million a year, per detainee. Well, thats because 2,000 troops are assigned to guard them, the same number who took care of 780 detainees. Which means each detainee has his own doctor or nurse, because the medical unit is still about 100. Lets not forget the 4 catered halal meals a day, with imported dates and roasted meats. And just think, Mr. Obama says theres nothing Islamic about jihadists. So why the month long nightly Ramadan feasts?

On moving them to the U.S., federal judges could release them onto Main Street. Thats because we didnt have battlefield detectives chasing them in Afghanistan and Pakistan, so there isnt enough evidence to convict most in court. About half of the detainees are held in indefinite detention, which would get struck down by activist judges as soon as they arrived in Colorado, Kansas and South Carolina, if the White House plan goes through. Not to mention turning those states into terrorist targets.

So whats up?

Americans are being misled on a massive scale, thats what. On gun control and terrorists.

But why?

Because the Obama White House is committed to a far left ideology -- determined to transform America.

Their vision of our nation was forged right here on university campuses, places now run by the anti-war, flower power generation of the 1960s. Indoctrination centers where the U.S.A. is portrayed as a racist country known for slavery, Jim Crow Laws, decimation of Native Americans and the A-Bomb.

Seen from that Ivory Tower, American power is the problem. Therefore anyone challenging us must have a legitimate grievance, so the theory goes. Which explains the obsession to free terrorists, and one-sided peace overtures to hostile dictators in Iran and Cuba. Weakness towards others, like in Russia, China, Syria and North Korea.

Can anyone picture Amnesty International running America? Like John Lennon said in his epic song "Imagine," "it's easy if you try."

Folks in the faculty lounge also view average Americans as the problem. To them, were clearly not responsible enough to own guns. Just a nation of violent bubbas, low-information voters.

Thankfully, the Congress has stood tough on both guns and Gitmo. Yet in his last year, President Obama and his inner circle will do everything in their power to rule by decree.

So even though weve now seen a commander-in-chief who cries over strawman arguments, Americans ought to see right through it.
Days before President Obamas State of the Union speech, the Fox News poll asked voters to assess whether the White House had mostly succeeded or mostly failed at handling national priorities. The results are clear, as voters consistently say the administration has mostly failed.

The poll, released Friday, shows the worst rating is on ISIS: 65 percent think the administration has mostly failed on dealing with the Islamic extremist group, while 23 percent say it has mostly succeeded.

CLICK TO READ THE POLL RESULTS

In addition, 58 percent of voters feel the White House has mostly failed to make the country safer (34 percent say succeeded). Thats a significant change from how voters felt the first time Fox News asked in June 2012. At that time, 55 percent said mostly succeeded and 32 percent said mostly failed. This is the only area that shows such a shift since 2012.

To be sure, there are extreme partisan divides in the assessments, with more than 8 in 10 Republicans responding negatively on each issue area tested and Democrats being mostly supportive. However, more than half of independents say Obama has mostly failed in each instance.

On other issues, views are only slightly less negative. Overall, 26 percent of voters say the administration has mostly succeeded on handling illegal immigration, while 62 percent feel the opposite.

And despite Obamas signature health care law, by a 53-41 percent margin, voters say the administration has mostly failed on improving health care.

Voters also arent impressed with how Obama has done on keeping his most transparent administration ever promise: 59 percent feel hes mostly failed on running a transparent administration.

Thirty-four percent think the White House has mostly succeeded on improving the countrys image, while 60 percent say mostly failed.

Thirty-one percent say Obama has improved race relations, while 59 percent think hes mostly failed on this too.

Some of the best ratings are on the economy. Yet even there, 40 percent say Obama has mostly succeeded in improving things compared with 51 percent mostly failed.

Meanwhile, the number who feels optimistic about the economy has dropped to 49 percent, down from 58 percent a year ago. And most voters, 76 percent, continue to rate economic conditions negatively (43 percent only fair and 33 percent poor).

Only 28 percent would describe the country as strong and confident right now (71 percent disagree).

Currently, 42 of voters approve of the job Obama is doing as president, while 53 percent disapprove. A year ago it was 42-52 percent. His highest job rating came in the weeks after his first inauguration: 65 percent approved and just 16 percent disapproved (January 2009). Obamas record low was 38 percent approval in September 2014.

Pollpourri

President Obama took new executive action on guns this week. The poll asked voters how concerned they were, in general, about Obamas use of executive orders permanently altering the countrys system of checks and balances: 65 percent are at least somewhat concerned. Republicans (88 percent) are more likely than independents (66 percent) and Democrats (43 percent) to express concern.

The Fox News poll is based on landline and cellphone interviews with 1,006 randomly chosen registered voters nationwide and was conducted under the joint direction of Anderson Robbins Research (D) and Shaw & Company Research (R) from January 4-7, 2016. The full poll has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.
A North Dakota man who allegedly planned to dognap Bo  one of the White House pooches  was arrested in Washington D.C. this week, according to court documents.

Scott Stockert was charged Wednesday after Secret Service agents were alerted that a man was intending to steal the Portugese water dog, according to Politico. The first family has two water dogs, Bo and Sunny.

Stockerts car was found to contain a 12-gauge shotgun and a black bolt action rifle, as well as over 300 rounds of ammunition. He was arrested at a Washington hotel and charged with illegally carrying a rifle or shotgun outside a home or business.

You picked the wrong person to mess with, Stockert reportedly told police. I will f--- your world up, he said, before later claiming he was Jesus Christ and that his parents were John F. Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe.

Online court records show Stockert was ordered released from custody Friday but must wear an ankle monitor.

The first family's search for a dog to join them at the White House was widely publicized. On election night in 2008, then President-elect Obama said that his daughters, Sasha and Malia, had "earned the new puppy that's coming with us to the White House." Bo, a male Portuguese water dog, joined the family in 2009 and was a gift from then Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy. Sunny, a female Portuguese water dog, joined the family in 2013.

The dogs have been a regular presence at White House events. Late last year, they accompanied first lady Michelle Obama to receive the White House Christmas Tree and to welcome children to the White House during a preview of the home's holiday decorations. The decorations included larger than life replicas of the two dogs.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Occams Razor isnt some teenage slasher flick from the Halloween or Scream genre. Its a philosophical, mathematical and scientific tenet that asserts that the simplest, most-obvious explanation of events is often the correct one.

Named after Middle Ages philosopher and Franciscan friar William of Ockham (despite the spelling difference), most people who toil on Capitol Hill probably wouldnt recognize Occams Razor if it sliced a gaping wound in their forearm.

But thats the nature of politics. Often the reasons for various Washington political phenomena are stacked with intrigue, Machiavellian skullduggery and conspiracy.

One can only imagine the torrent of political theories that filtered through the Capitol this week when Rep. Steve Israel -- a New York Democrat, top lieutenant to House Minority Leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi and potential candidate to succeed her or House Minority Whip Rep. Steny Hoyer down the road -- unexpectedly announced his retirement from Congress.

It has been an incredibly humbling opportunity to serve my community, Israel declared in a statement. I will miss this place and the people I have had the privilege to serve.

Thats the customary, bathos, boilerplate that accompanies many congressional departures.

But he also spoke of an opportunity to write a second novel. His previous book, The Global War on Morris, mocked the extremes of government surveillance. In a brief chat, Israel joked about replacing Daniel Murphy (who just signed with the Washington Nationals) at second base for his beloved New York Mets. Still, Israel says hes fed up with fundraising and call time.

This is a peculiar but essential political liturgy in which lawmakers carve out wide swaths of their day to hunch over a telephone and dial for dollars. The ritual is necessary -- especially in a possible swing district like Israels in an expensive media market -- just to stay competitive.

There is no practice that lawmakers abhor more than call time. Members of Congress sometimes grouse about the enhanced interrogation methods that the United States uses on detainees at Guantanamo Bay. But call time is so brutal it surely rivals waterboarding as inhumane treatment under the Geneva Convention.

Israel took to the New York Times to pen an Op-Ed about the practice. He wrote that talking to customer service with a cable company is a more enjoyable version of call time than what members of Congress have to deal with.

But Israels station in Congress was a little different from most. Surely something more was afoot than call time when he announced he was quitting.

Israel was believed to have an inside track on navigating the House Democratic Caucus leadership ladder -- perhaps after the eventual retirement of Pelosi, California, and/or Hoyer, Maryland.

In 2009, Israel was just hours away from announcing a primary challenge to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y. Then-New York Gov. David Paterson, also a Democrat, appointed Gillibrand to succeed Hillary Clinton who became secretary of State.

Fox was told at the time that Democratic Sens. Chuck Schumer, N.Y., and Bob Menendez, N.J., asked President Obama to intervene to clear the field for Gillibrand in the primary.

Israel never ran against Gillibrand.

As a result, Israel settled back into the House. In late 2010, Pelosi tapped him to head the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the national organization charged with getting Democrats elected and reelected to the House.

After Democrats failed to win back the House in 2012, Pelosi told Democrats she would only stay on as leader if Israel would serve another term as DCCC chairman.

Much has been documented over the years about a rivalry between Pelosi and Hoyer -- two native Marylanders vying to lead Democrats in the House. When Pelosi became speaker, she contrived a position for another lawmaker from Maryland, Rep. Chris Van Hollen.

Pelosi made Van Hollen assistant to the speaker. Some viewed Pelosis move as a rebuke to Hoyer. And over the years, political observers estimated that she might have been engineering a course for Van Hollen to succeed her in the Democratic ranks, potentially leapfrogging Hoyer.

But that talk waned once Van Hollen decided to run for the Senate seat of retiring Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md.

And much like Pelosi designing a special position for Van Hollen, she concocted a unique leadership post for Israel to hone the Democrats messaging.

Israel is 57. Pelosi is 75. Hoyer is 77.

With Van Hollen out of the picture, Pelosis maneuver seemingly gave Israel a special place in the Democratic ranks. Here was a roadway for Israel to perhaps succeed Pelosi or at least matriculate in leadership should vacancies eventually occur.

Thats what made Israels retirement announcement so vexing.

In a presidential year in New York, an incumbent Democrat like Israel would still have a decent shot to his seat this fall -- even though he underperformed Obama by nine points on the 2012 ballot. The 2018 midterm is another story.

Plus, its a real challenge for the Democrats to regain the majority in the House until after the 2020 census.

Israels abrupt retirement announcement Tuesday evening just as lawmakers jetted back into Washington for the first time this year launched shockwaves throughout the Capitol.

Im very surprised, said House Democratic Caucus Vice Chairman Rep. Joe Crowley, New York.

It was unexpected, said House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rep. Xavier Becerra, California. Say it aint so, Joe.

About the only member of the House Democratic leadership who wasnt taken aback was Assistant Minority Leader Rep. Jim Clyburn, South Carolina.

Ive been watching his demeanor change the past few weeks, Clyburn said. Im a very observant guy.

Its not unprecedented for lawmakers to return to Washington after the holidays and time with family and decide to cash it in, though Israel is said to have mulled this decision for months.

Just this week, two other senior lawmakers announced their retirements in addition to Israel: Reps. Jim McDermott, D-Wash., and Lynn Westmoreland, R-Ga. But that post-holiday factor didnt halt the congressional rumor mill from spinning into a frenzy to explain Israels decision.

Surely there was something more.

Some theories which reverberated through the building late Tuesday:

Was there scandal?

Maybe its his health.

Israel fell out of favor with Pelosi and needs the money from the book contract, suggested one senior aide.

Israels retirement means Pelosi is leaving.

Israel's retirement means Pelosi isnt leaving.

There was no shortage of conjecture.

Not a lot is aboveboard on Capitol Hill. Thats why everyone in Congress goes all Grassy Knoll when an announcement like Israels explodes like a bombshell.

Or, in the case of Steve Israel, perhaps one can apply Occams Razor.

The simplest, most-obvious explanation is often the most accurate.

Maybe it just about the call time. The desire to write another book. And thats that. Occams Razor doesnt score a lot of credibility in a conniving joint like Capitol Hill.

Sure there could be a tough re-election in 2018 to say nothing of 2016. And maybe the fact that Pelosi and Hoyer dont appear to be departing anytime soon amplifies the decision.
A Minnesota judge called a man who killed and cut up his wife more than 18 years ago a "terrible person" on Friday, then sentenced him to more than 13 years in prison, saying he deserved more time behind bars than called for in the man's plea agreement with prosecutors.

Ramsey County District Judge Salvador Rosas told Norman Bachman Jr. at his sentencing Friday that he wouldn't have agreed to the plea deal Bachman received and that he deserved a longer sentence. But he acknowledged that prosecutors and the family of Toni Bachman agreed to it.

"You're a terrible person. ... You deserve more (time) than what I'm going to give you here today," the judge said.

Rosas told the 53-year-old Anoka man he could reduce his sentence to 10 years if he helps authorities find his wife's remains. While Bachman has helped in several searches since he pleaded guilty to manslaughter in October, her body remains missing.

Toni Bachman was 38 when she disappeared from her White Bear Township home in 1997. Investigators always presumed she had been killed, but the case went cold due to a lack of evidence. Norman Bachman was finally arrested in April and confessed in October.

Bachman said he and his wife had argued and that she was planning to leave him after she become romantically involved online with a man from West Virginia. He claimed she hit him, so he grabbed her around the neck and strangled her. He said he kept her body in their basement for a couple days, then chopped her up and put the body parts in three garbage bags. A few days later, he said, he drove to a rural area about two hours from a home that he knew from his childhood, dug three holes and buried her parts.

Rosas asked Bachman if he had anything to say before being sentenced.

"It's been a hard time for me  hiding for so many years, carrying this around with me. This secret," Bachman replied.
Two men born in Iraq who came to the U.S. as refugees had court dates in California and Texas Friday on terror-related charges, as investigators say one of the men wrote that he wanted to travel to Syria because he was "eager to see blood."

The judge in Texas ordered 24-year-old Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan to be held without bond as he faces charges of trying to provide support to the Islamic State group.

Al Hardan, who speaks Arabic and used an interpreter in court, said he lives in a Houston-area apartment, is married and has a child. He said he earns about $1,800 per month, but did not say his occupation.

He was the 80th person charged under federal law in an ISIS-related case since April 2013, and the first in 2016.

A criminal complaint unsealed Thursday accused 23-year-old Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, of Sacramento, Calif., of traveling to Syria to fight alongside terrorist organizations and lying to government investigators about it. He appeared in court Friday afternoon.

The court session lasted only six minutes, and Al-Jayab said nothing during the hearing.

He is due back in court on January 22nd for a preliminary examination and where he will hear formal charges.

Neither side spoke after the hearing but I captured a few seconds of sound from the defense attorney as he walked out.

In addition to writing that he was "eager to see blood," Al-Jayab also claimed that he wanted to learn "long range shooting," and that "God has facilitated" his travels, court documents show.

The documents did not indicate whether the two cases were connected. However, the affidavit says Al-Jayab communicated with an unnamed individual living in Texas in April 2013 to see if he could receive training in various weapons.

Both suspects are Palestinians born in Iraq, according to investigators.

Authorities say Al-Jayab, who came to the U.S. from Syria in October 2012, discussed plans to return to Syria and fight alongside terror groups with several other individuals on social media. The complaint says Al-Jayab was living in Wisconsin and Arizona during this period.

Social media and other accounts say that as soon as he arrived in the United States, he began saying he wanted to return to Syria to "work," which the FBI says is believed to be a reference "to assisting in and supporting violent jihad."

Al-Jayab criticized ISIS in several messages for killing Muslims, saying "If it weren't for the State's bloodletting, I would have been the first one to join it", according to the FBI, although he later described fighting alongside the group.

In one communication with the Texas contact, dubbed "Individual I", Al-Jayab described, during earlier fighting, emptying seven ammunition magazines from his assault rifle during a battle and executing three Syrian government soldiers.



According to the complaint, Al-Jayab traveled to Syria from Chicago via Turkey in November 2013. He remained in Syria until the following January and fought alongside several terror groups, including Ansar al-Islam, which merged with ISIS in 2014 after Al-Jayab had returned to the United States. He settled in Sacramento following his return to the U.S.

The complaint alleges that Al-Jayab lied about his travel and ties to terror groups in October 2014 when he was interviewed by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. At one point, Al-Jayab allegedly claimed that he had traveled to Turkey to visit his grandmother.

U.S. Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner said in a statment that there was no indication Al-Jayab was planning any terror attacks in the U.S., though he represented a "potential safety threat."

Ben Galloway of the federal defender's office is Al-Jayab's attorney. He did not immediately return telephone and emailed messages Thursday. Al-Jayab faces up to eight years in prison if convicted of making a false statement involving international terrorism.

In the Texas case, the indictment of Hardan states that beginning in May 2014, Hardan "did unlawfully and knowingly attempt to provide material support and resources ... training, expert advice and assistance, to a foreign terrorist organization, namely the Islamic State of Iraq."

The indictment claims that Hardan, who arrived in the U.S. in 2009 and became a legal permanent resident in 2011, concealed his association with ISIS on his citizenship application in August 2014 and lied about receiving machine gun training when he was interviewed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

"Based on the facts, as we know them, today's action may have prevented a catastrophic terror related event in the making and saved countless lives," Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said in a statement.

"This is precisely why I called for a halt to refugees entering the U.S. from countries substantially controlled by terrorists," Texas Gov. Greg Abbott addedt. "I once again urge the President to halt the resettlement of these refugees in the United States until there is an effective vetting process that will ensure refugees do not compromise the safety of Americans and Texans."

Later Thursday, federal officials confirmed that three of Al-Jayab's relatives had been arrested in Milwaukee. They said those arrests were not related to national security and there was no threat to the public.

Fox News' Michael Lundin and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
An attorney who worked tirelessly for the release of at least a half dozen wrongly imprisoned men now faces possible disciplinary action.

A five-day hearing is scheduled to begin Monday for Chris Mumma, who's accused of violating rules of professional conduct in a case involving Joseph Sledge, who was imprisoned for almost 40 years for a double murder before being released one year ago.

Some of the men whom she helped free from prison plan to attend the hearing, including Greg Taylor, the first person exonerated by the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission that Mumma helped establish.

The attorney who leads the North Carolina State Bar's prosecution declined to discuss the case, as did Mumma and her attorneys.
Weeks before "affluenza" teen fugitive Ethan Couch was arrested in Mexico with a cheap disguise of dyed hair and beard, his mother had pulled $30,000 from a bank account and told his father he'd never see them again, according to her arrest warrant.

Just how far the mother and son planned to get with the $30,000 and the pickup truck they used to drive across the border was unclear.

When arrested, the pair had made it about 1,200 miles to the Pacific coast resort town of Puerto Vallarta, where a pizza delivery order led authorities to their apartment.

Details of the cash withdrawal and the warning were released Friday, when a Tarrant County judge set a $1 million bond for Tonya Couch on a charge of hindering apprehension of a felon.

Her son remains in custody in Mexico after winning a legal delay of his deportation back to Texas.

Ethan Couch's case drew national attention and derision when he sentenced to 10 years' probation for a 2013 drunken driving wreck that killed four people and injured several others, including passengers in his pickup truck.

A defense witness argued that Couch had been coddled by his wealthy parents, a condition the expert called "affluenza." The condition is not recognized as a medical diagnosis by the American Psychiatric Association, and its invocation drew ridicule.

Law enforcement officials say Tonya, 48, and Ethan, 18, fled to Mexico after a video surfaced that appeared to show the teen at a party drinking alcohol. If he was also drinking, it would violate his probation and could lead to jail time.

Law enforcement officials believe the mother and son had a going away party shortly before driving across the border in her pickup truck, making their way to Puerto Vallarta. They were first tracked to a resort condominium after ordering pizza. They had moved on by the time authorities arrived, but a witness directed police to an apartment in Puerto Vallarta's old town.

When they were arrested, authorities said Ethan Couch appeared to have tried to disguise himself by dying his blond hair black and his beard brown.

Telephone and email messages left with the Tarrant County sheriff's office and Tonya Couch attorney Stephanie Patten were not immediately returned Saturday.

According to the arrest warrant affidavit, Ethan Couch was "scared" after the video surfaced and did not respond to a Dec. 3 call from his probation officer to report for a drug test. He also did not appear for a scheduled meeting with the officer on Dec. 10.

A search warrant of bank and phone records found Tonya Couch had withdrawn $30,000 from a personal account and there was no other activity after Dec. 3. That day she also called her former husband Fred Couch to say he would never see them again.

Phone numbers used by the mother and son were no longer active after that date, according to the warrant.

Fred and Tonya Couch divorced in 2006. Authorities have previously said they had no evidence Fred Couch, who owns a North Texas sheet metal factory, was involved in helping Tonya and Ethan Couch flee.
A security official in Burkina Faso says several suspected Islamic militants have launched a rare attack near the West African nation's border with Mali.

Witness Alassane Hamidou said at least two people were wounded in Monday night's attack.

Hamidou told The Associated Press that his life was spared by the attackers because he's Muslim and they were looking for Christians.

The security official who confirmed the attack spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to the media.

It wasn't immediately clear who was behind the violence, though neighboring Mali is home to an array of extremist groups.

Burkina Faso has largely been spared jihadi violence destabilizing nearby countries. However, a Romanian security officer working at a mine in Burkina Faso was kidnapped nearly five months ago.
RICHMONDDominion Virginia Power is proposing to help Jamestown Island weather rising seas as part of $85 million in conservation and environmental investments to assuage critics of its plan to erect towering transmission lines across an historic section of the James River.

The utilitys so-called mitigation projects are laid out in a proposed memorandum of agreement filed with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The proposal is being reviewed by more than two dozen historic preservation and conservation groups, among others.

The Army Corps Norfolk office is assessing Dominions proposal to erect the transmission towers across the James, some nearly matching the height of the Statue of Liberty. It expects to act on the proposal this year.

Opponents who have seen the Dominion mitigation proposals are not swayed, contending that the utility should select another route for the transmission line or bury it under the river. The towers would be within view of Jamestown and other historical attractions.

I feel really strongly that this is irreplaceable landscape, Joel Dunn, president and CEO of the Chesapeake Conservancy, said Friday. We need to avoid impacts to it as much as possible.

Approved by Virginia regulators, the Dominion project would suspend a 500-kilovolt transmission line across 4.1 miles of the James River on 17 steel towers, with some rising nearly 300 feet above the rivers surface.

Dominion said it investigated alternative routes and concluded it settled on the best path. Burying the transmission line, it has said, would multiply the cost of the project and add a layer of complexity to any future repairs.

The company has said the transmission line is needed to serve a growing customer base and to ensure reliable power in the Tidewater area.

Dominions mitigation plan calls for land conservation, shoreline protection, environmental initiatives and the rehabilitation of the seawall at Jamestown, among other proposals. Besides Jamestown, the section of the river the transmission line would cross includes the Capt. John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail and historic Indian sites.

In a statement, Dominion said its aim is to find a solution that meets the electrical requirements, is cost effective, and minimizes or mitigates as much as possible the impact of the historical, cultural and environmental resources of the region.

The statement concludes, We believe this agreement helps accomplish this goal.

A leading opponent of the project, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, said it was reviewing Dominions mitigation proposals but is disappointed Dominion remains committed to its river route.

Its premature to tell what our exact response will be, said Sharee Williamson, associate general counsel for the trust. Our goal will definitely remain the same: to make sure this place is protected.

Jamestown archaeologist Bill Kelso said he had not studied Dominions proposals, but remains opposed to transmission towers that would be visible from the island settled by Europeans more than 400 years ago.

Its such a pristine section of one of the most important rivers in the United States, he said.

That said, he acknowledged the island is kind of the poster child for climate change. Portions of Jamestown are steadily eroding amid fierce storms and rising seas, he said.

The National Park Service estimates a 1 1/2-foot rise in sea level would put 60 percent of the island under water.

Tom Walker, chief of the regulatory branch at the Army Corps Norfolk office, said the corps continues to gather information from all parties.

We anticipate getting some good input from the consulting parties and we will use that to help form our final decision in the process, he said.
JERUSALEMAn Arab gunman who killed three Israelis in Tel Aviv last week was slain Friday in a shootout with police special forces, authorities said, following a massive manhunt that put Israelis on edge amid months of near-daily Palestinian attacks on civilians and soldiers.

The gunman was hiding in a building in his hometown of Arara in northern Israel, said police spokeswoman Luba Samri. As the special forces closed in on him in the residential area, he came out shooting, she said.

Authorities had identified the gunman as Nashat Milhem who opened fire at a bar on a busy Tel Aviv street on Jan. 1, killing two people and wounding six others in chilling video that was caught on security cameras at a health food store next door. He later also shot and killed an Arab taxi driver.

Milhem fired at police Friday with the same gun he used in the Tel Aviv shooting, Samri said.

In the security video, a man with short dark hair, glasses and a black bag over his shoulder was seen scooping up nuts from the health food stores bulk food section, putting them in a plastic bag, and then emptying them back. He then walked to the stores entrance, placed his backpack on a shopping cart, and removed a gun from it before stepping outside and opening fire into the bar. He then was seen running away along busy Dizengoff Street.

Police said that after tossing his cellphone, Milhem hailed a cab that took him to northern Tel Aviv, where he killed the driver, also a member of Israels Arab minority, and escaped in the taxi before abandoning it.

Authorities got their first lead when Milhems father, Mohammed, recognized his son from the security video that was broadcast on TV.
If you're going to engage in a foreign policy capitulation, might as well do it when everyone is getting tanked and otherwise occupied. Say, New Years Eve.

Heres the story. In October, Iran test-fires a nuclear-capable ballistic missile in brazen violation of Security Council resolutions prohibiting such launches. President Obama does nothing. One month later, Iran does it again. The administration makes a few gestures at the U.N. Then nothing. Then finally, on Dec. 30, the White House announces a few sanctions.

They are weak, aimed mostly at individuals and designed essentially for show. Amazingly, even that proves too much. By 10 p.m. that night, the administration caves. The White House sends out an email saying that sanctions are offand the Iranian president orders the military to expedite the missile program.

Is there any red line left? First, the Syrian chemical weapons. Then the administration insistence that there would be no nuclear deal unless Iran accounted for its past nuclear activities. (It didnt.) And unless Iran permitted inspection of its Parchin nuclear testing facility. (It was allowed self-inspection and declared itself clean.) And now, illegal ballistic missiles.

The premise of the nuclear deal was that it would constrain Iranian actions. Its had precisely the opposite effect. It has deterred us from offering even the mildest pushback to any Iranian violations lest Iran walk away and leave Obama legacy-less.

Just two weeks ago, Irans Revolutionary Guards conducted live-fire exercises near the Strait of Hormuz. It gave nearby U.S. vessels exactly 23 seconds of warning. One rocket was launched 1,500 yards from the USS Harry S. Truman.

Obamas response? None.

The Gulf Arabsrich, weak and, since FDR, dependent on America for securityare bewildered. Theyre still reeling from the nuclear deal, which Obama declared would be unaffected by Iranian misbehavior elsewhere. The result was to assure Tehran that it would pay no price for its aggression in Syria and Yemen, subversion in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, and support for terrorism.

Obama seems not to understand that disconnecting the nuclear issue gave the mullahs license to hunt in the region. For the Saudis, however, its not just blundering but betrayal. From the very beginning, theyve seen Obama tilting toward Tehran as he fancies himself Nixon in China, turning Iran into a strategic partner in managing the Middle East.

This is even scarier because it is delusional. If anything, Obamas openhanded appeasement has encouraged Irans regional adventurism and intense anti-Americanism.

The Saudis, sensing abandonment, are near panic. Hence the reckless execution of the firebrand Shiite insurrectionist, Sheikh Nimr Baqr al-Nimr, that has brought the region to a boil. Iranians torched the Saudi Embassy. The Saudis led other Sunni states in breaking relations with Tehran.

The Saudis feel surrounded, and its not paranoia. To their north, Iran dominates a Shiite crescent stretching from Iraq, Syria and Lebanon to the Mediterranean. To the Saudi south, Iran has been arming Yemens Houthi rebels since at least 2009.

The danger is rising. For years, Iran has been supporting anti-regime agitation among Saudi Arabias minority Shiites. The Persian Gulf is Irans ultimate prize. The fall of the House of Saud would make Iran the undisputed regional hegemon and an emerging global power.

For the United States, that would be the greatest geopolitical setback since China fell to communism in 1949. Yet Obama seems oblivious. Worse, he appears inert in the face of the three great challenges to the post-Cold War American order. Iran is only the most glaring. China is challenging the status quo in the South China Sea, just last week landing its first aircraft on an artificial island hundreds of miles beyond the Chinese coast. We deny Chinas claim and declare these to be international waters, yet last month we meekly apologized when a B-52 overflew one of the islands. We said it was inadvertent.

The world sees and takes note. As it does our response to the other great U.S. adversaryRussia. Whats happened to Obamas vaunted isolation of Russia for its annexation of Crimea and assault on the post-Cold War European settlement? Gone. Evaporated. Kerry plays lapdog to Sergei Lavrov. Obama meets openly with Vladimir Putin in Turkey, then in Paris. And is now practically begging him to join our side in Syria.

There is no price for defying Pax Americana  not even trivial sanctions on Iranian missile-enablers. Our enemies know it. Our allies see it  and sense theyre on their own, and may not survive.

Charles Krauthammer is a columnist with The Washington Post Writers Group.
3D Printable Universal Building Toy Adapter Kit Indicates How Technology Will Affect Toy Industry: Click-A-Brick

The Click-A-Brick crew have announced their last minute deal schedule on both Amazon and the Click-A-Brick site. The company wants to give last minute shopping parents the chance to save on educational gifts for children. Last minute deals will run December 17-22.

--

A new, free, 3D-printed universal adapter kit for popular building toys is a good indication of how 3D printing will affect the toy industry in the future, the team at Click-A-Brick says.

Calling it "just about the best thing to happen to construction toys," Charlie Sorrell at Fast Company says the Free Universal Construction Kit allows people to print building blocks that act as adapters to enable different popular building block sets to be joined together.

The kit, when printed, consists of 80 pieces that interconnect building blocks from Lego, Duplo, Fischertechnik, Gears! Gears! Gears!, K'Nex, Krinkles (Bristle Blocks or Stickle Bricks), Lincoln Logs, Tinkertoys, Zome, and Zoob.

A creation of F.A.T. Lab and Sy-Lab, the adapter kit is accessible as a bundle of files that are downloadable under a Creative Commons non-commercial license, meaning people can share and modify it and, because it's non-commercial, it sidesteps copyright issues.

"Opening doors to new creative worlds is one major reason we created the Free Universal Construction Kit," the designers are quoted as saying. "Another is that we believe expertise shouldn't be disposable and that children's hard-won creative fluency with their toys shouldn't become obsolete each Christmas. The simple fact is that no toy company would ever make the Free Universal Construction Kit. Instead, each construction toy wants (and indeed, pretends) to be [a child's] only playset."

The availability of the Free Universal Construction Kit file is an excellent example of how much 3D printing -- which has been around for decades, but has only recently gained mainstream momentum -- can change an industry, including the toy industry, Click-A-Brick Co-Founders Jason Smith and Georg de Gorostiza say.

"We've already seen that people 3D print their own Legos, so seeing this universal adapter kit isn't terribly surprising," Smith said. "It's just another indication of how power is shifting to consumers with the ability to easily create items from plastic for themselves. Currently, we're hearing a lot about female characters being left out of action figure playsets that are marketed toward boys. Right now, people take to Twitter or Facebook to share their anger with companies for leaving out female characters, but in the future, it's not hard to imagine that people will just go ahead and print their own. Consumers are no longer interested in being dictated to by companies about what they want. They are simply creating what they want."

Not only would the team at Click-A-Brick not have a problem being included in the Free Universal Construction Kit, Smith jokes, but would even consider it an honor to be recognized among the building toys already included in the kit.

For more information about us, please visit http://www.clickabricktoys.net/

Contact Info:

Name: Rob Swystun

Organization: Click-A-Brick Toys LLC

Phone: 855-976-3664

Source: http://marketersmedia.com/3d-printable-universal-building-toy-adapter-kit-indicates-how-technology-will-affect-toy-industry-click-a-brick/98892

Release ID: 98892

For more information visit r



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TANGENT  Linn County Sheriff's Office deputies responded around 10:40 a.m. Saturday to the report of a kidnapped child at Dover Wood Products.

That report turned out to be false.

An investigation revealed that Ignacio Cervantez-Castaneda, 44, of Tangent was searching for his 6-year-old daughter, whom he believed had been kidnapped and taken to the location. He was also in possession of a rifle.

However, deputies learned that all of the man's children were, in fact, safe at home and that no kidnapping had taken place. Cervantez-Castaneda had left his residence sometime Friday evening after an argument with family members.

The suspect was contacted in the field across the road from Dover Wood Products and detained without incident by members of the Albany Police Department and Oregon State Police, then transported to Samaritan Albany General Hospital for a medical and mental evaluation. Cervantez-Castaneda was cited and released while at the hospital for charges of criminal trespass with a firearm. The rifle was seized by deputies pending the outcome of the investigation.

The Linn County Sheriff's deputies were assisted by members of the Oregon State Police, Albany Police Department and the Lebanon Police Department.

Authorities said that there are indications that drug use was a factor in this incident.

The investigation is continuing.
The Oregon State University Herbarium, already the largest collection of plant specimens in the state, is expanding.

After knocking down a wall in Cordley Hall to increase the collections floor space from 2,600 to 2,800 square feet, workers came in this week to install 60 new archival storage cabinets.

The expansion makes room for the latest addition to OSUs holdings of dried plant material: two collections of lichen samples gathered by the U.S. Forest Service totaling an estimated 150,000 specimens.

It will make us one of the largest lichen collections in the United States, said Aaron Liston, director of the OSU Herbarium.

The lichen specimens were gathered from more than 2,000 locations around the West and should provide an important reference source for researchers, Liston added.

At each location, they collected every lichen they could find, so its a very intensive sampling at a large number of sites, he explained. Its a very thorough representation of the diversity of lichens in the Western United States over the last 20 years.

OSUs herbarium dates back to the 1880s and has been bolstered over the years by the incorporation of other institutional collections, most notably those of the University of Oregon and Willamette University. The addition of the lichen samples will bring OSUs holdings from 425,000 specimens to about 575,000, making it one of the 25 largest herbaria in the country, according to Liston.

The growth spurt comes at a time when many institutions are shutting down their herbaria.

We are definitely bucking that trend, Liston said.

Most of the funding for the expansion comes from the National Science Foundation, which provided a $150,000 grant to cover the cost of the archival storage cabinets and their installation. The foundation is also paying for an additional graduate student to work in the herbarium for the next three years. OSU spent about $15,000 on the remodeling work.

The lichen specimens are currently being processed, and other plant specimens will be moved from their current locations to fit them into the collections classification system. About 20 of the new cabinets will be needed to absorb the additional specimens, but that will still leave 40 others to hold still more samples as they come in.

Were well set for the next 10 to 20 years of growth of the collection, Liston said. This is really an investment in the future.
With response to Wednesday's article "Obama's Gun Action May Do Little"  it's nice to know that the Gazette-Times wants to put front-page focus on the most notable news of the day. North Korea testing an H-bomb? No, no, we need to spotlight a think piece from this one professor who thinks that our epidemic of gun violence is incurable, as there's no possible way he can see to limit gun usage. What's sad is that's not even the main focus of the article. Plenty of it focuses on more practical criticisms of the president's action (such as how more may be needed). But the article's framing puts typical "criminals can always get guns" rhetoric front-and-center for the front page portion. Crowd-pleasing, but not correct in practice.
The city of Corvallis is ramping up for a substantive campaign of public outreach as the City Council works to implement four of its major goals of this two-year term.

The chairs of the task forces working on the goals meet at 4 p.m. Tuesday at the Madison Avenue Meeting Room, 500 S.W. Madison Ave. The group will consider a plan that includes three community workshops in March as well as an online survey that will be created by HDR, a consultant the city has hired to work on the vision and action plan goal.

The other three goals are housing development, a sustainable budget and a climate action plan. The four task forces have been meeting since the beginning of the council term in January 2015 and are scheduled to complete their work by the end of this year.

In other public meetings:

Monday

 The Corvallis Community Relations Advisory Group meets at 7 p.m. at the Madison Avenue room. The panel, which is working on livability issues involving the city and Oregon State University, will discuss a draft neighborhood livability survey and best practices of other college towns in dealing with town/gown issues.

 The Philomath City Council meets at 7 p.m. at City Hall, 980 Applegate St. and will discuss appointments to the Budget Committee and the Park Advisory Board, hear an annual fiscal audit and hold a first reading on an ordinance on public rights of way.

Tuesday

 The Corvallis King Legacy Advisory Board meets at 5:15 p.m. at Osborn Aquatic Center, 1940 N.W. Highland Drive.

 The Corvallis Historic Resources Commission meets at 6:30 p.m. at the downtown fire station, 400 N.W. Harrison Blvd. Commissioners will hold a public hearing on an application to replace a door at Waldo Hall, part of Oregon State Universitys Historic District.

 The Corvallis Budget Commission holds its orientation session at 7 p.m. at the Madison Avenue room. The commission, which consists of the nine city councilors plus nine citizen volunteers, will hold public hearings this spring on the 2016-17 fiscal year financial plan for the city.

Wednesday

 The Corvallis Chamber of Commerce hosts its annual economic forecast lunch from noon to 1:30 p.m. at the Corvallis Country Club, 1850 S.W. Whiteside Driver. Speakers will be Tom Nelson, manager of the Corvallis-Benton County Economic Development Office and Shawna Sykes, an economist for the Oregon Employment Department.

The forum is free, but lunch costs $15 for members and $20 for nonmembers. RSVP at www.corvallischamber.com or call 541-757-1505.

 The Corvallis Community Policing Advisory Committee meets at 3 p.m. at Community Outreach Inc., 865 N.W. Reiman Ave.

 The task force working on the Corvallis City Council housing development goal meets at 6 p.m. at the Madison Avenue room.

Thursday

 The Corvallis Civic Beautification and Urban Forestry Department Advisory Committee meets at 9 a.m. at the Parks and Recreation Department, 1310 SW Avery Park Drive.

 The Corvallis City Council is holding a 6 p.m. work session at the Madison Avenue room. Councilors will discuss a recommendation from City Manager Mark Shepard that the council eliminate its three standing committees and use council work sessions to handle the committee work. Councilors cannot make a decision at a work session. The public is welcome, but there is no visitor time.

 The Corvallis Library Advisory Group meets at 7:30 p.m. at the Corvallis-Benton County Public Library, 645 N.W. Monroe Ave.
bohlah at 9-01-2016 09:59 AM (6 years ago) (m)

Police in Argentina have arrested a man accused of fathering eight children with his daughter during a 22-year reign of terror.

Police in Argentina have arrested a man accused of fathering eight children with his daughter during a 22-year reign of terror.

Domingo Bullicio, 56, allegedly turned his daughter Antonia into his sex slave when she was just 15 after his wife walked out on him with their three other children.



He reportedly fled the rundown property in Villa Balnearia in the northern province of Santiago del Estero after the victim, now aged 37, went to authorities seeking help.



Police detained him in the nearby city of Loreto on an arrest warrant after a manhunt lasting more

than a month.



He was pictured in the back of a police truck after his detention.



Antonia, who is illiterate, told a local paper today she had been abused from an early age by her dad and had received death threats since going public with her ordeal.



According to MirrorUK, she said:

From the moment my mum left home I became my fathers wife. He abused me from the age of nine.



He would hit me and used to chase me round the house with a lump of wood when he saw me chatting to a neighbour or simply wanted to abuse me. He threatened me constantly and I always feared for my life. He told me he would kill me if I said anything.



Im scared for my life and the life of my children because today Im receiving threats from my fathers siblings to withdraw my complaint against him. Theyre not at all concerned about whats happened.



I want him to rot in jail. I want justice to be done.

Bullicio, known to friends as Vernacho, is facing a court quiz on Monday.



DNA tests are ongoing to determine whether the children are his. He is said to have registered the youngsters, who are still being looked after by their mum, as his own.



Many of the rapes she claims she suffered took place in front of the youngsters, who will be quizzed as part of the ongoing investigation.



The case has been compared in Argentina to the abuse Elizabeth Fritzl suffered at the hands of dad Josef.



She was held captive for 24 years in the basement of her large family home in the town of Amstetten, Austria.



The abuse by her dad, now serving life imprisonment, resulted in the birth of seven children and one miscarriage.



Cleveland kidnapper Ariel Castro killed himself in prison in 2013 after being sentenced to life plus 1,000 years for imprisoning three women in his Cleveland home for a decade while repeatedly molesting and assaulting them.



He fathered a girl with one of his victims.



In February 2014 police in the Dominican Republic arrested a man accused of kidnapping a teenager and fathering eight children with her during a terrifying 12-year hostage ordeal.





For more scintillating and juicy stories, follow the official Naijapals accounts On Twitter - https://twitter.com/Naijapals and Facebook - www.facebook.com/naijapals Domingo Bullicio, 56, allegedly turned his daughter Antonia into his sex slave when she was just 15 after his wife walked out on him with their three other children.He reportedly fled the rundown property in Villa Balnearia in the northern province of Santiago del Estero after the victim, now aged 37, went to authorities seeking help.Police detained him in the nearby city of Loreto on an arrest warrant after a manhunt lasting morethan a month.He was pictured in the back of a police truck after his detention.Antonia, who is illiterate, told a local paper today she had been abused from an early age by her dad and had received death threats since going public with her ordeal.According to MirrorUK, she said:From the moment my mum left home I became my fathers wife. He abused me from the age of nine.He would hit me and used to chase me round the house with a lump of wood when he saw me chatting to a neighbour or simply wanted to abuse me. He threatened me constantly and I always feared for my life. He told me he would kill me if I said anything.Im scared for my life and the life of my children because today Im receiving threats from my fathers siblings to withdraw my complaint against him. Theyre not at all concerned about whats happened.I want him to rot in jail. I want justice to be done.Bullicio, known to friends as Vernacho, is facing a court quiz on Monday.DNA tests are ongoing to determine whether the children are his. He is said to have registered the youngsters, who are still being looked after by their mum, as his own.Many of the rapes she claims she suffered took place in front of the youngsters, who will be quizzed as part of the ongoing investigation.The case has been compared in Argentina to the abuse Elizabeth Fritzl suffered at the hands of dad Josef.She was held captive for 24 years in the basement of her large family home in the town of Amstetten, Austria.The abuse by her dad, now serving life imprisonment, resulted in the birth of seven children and one miscarriage.Cleveland kidnapper Ariel Castro killed himself in prison in 2013 after being sentenced to life plus 1,000 years for imprisoning three women in his Cleveland home for a decade while repeatedly molesting and assaulting them.He fathered a girl with one of his victims.In February 2014 police in the Dominican Republic arrested a man accused of kidnapping a teenager and fathering eight children with her during a terrifying 12-year hostage ordeal.

Post Reply I have been reporting on latest news from Nigeria for almost 10 years now. I report on every possible news area I come across, but always ensure my reports are compiled with dignity and fact to uphold my personal values and duty as a journalist Posted: at 9-01-2016 09:59 AM (6 years ago) | Addicted Hero
Letv, Aston Martin reveal AutoLink Rapide S at CES News oi -GizBot Bureau

Chinese internet conglomerate Letv and luxury sports car brand Aston Martin on Thursday revealed the first results of their collaboration -- an Aston Martin Rapide S that incorporates the Letv Internet of the Vehicle (IOV) system at CES.

Aston Martin and Letv signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) last month to confirm research projects that include the development of connected electric vehicles through to manufacturing consultation on future electric vehicles.

SEE ALSO: These 15 Fitness Trackers and Gadgets Will Make Sure You're Healthy!

"After a few months' efforts, we finished the integration of an Aston Martin vehicle and the Letv IOV system. We have successfully equipped this supercar brand with over 100 years of history with an 'Internet brain'," Ding Lei, co-founder, global vice chairman and China and Asia Pacific CEO of Letv Super Car, said at the ongoing four day International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

The ideation and engineering of the Aston Martin Rapide S project has developed a new concept for the centre console and instrument panel. The centre console is now a 13.3-inch high-definition touch screen and the instrument panel is now a 12.2-inch thin-film transistor (TFT) screen incorporating electronic instrumentation and gauges.

The original human-machine interaction (HMI) has also been updated by integrating Letv's latest speech recognition technology. "Aston Martin is renowned for the beauty and quality of its hand-crafted cars.

SEE ALSO: 10 Best Headphones launched at the biggest tech show of 2016

The integration of Letv advanced connected technologies into this bespoke environment is a natural progression as we look to the future demands of our customers," Andrew Palmer, CEO of Aston Martin, said in a statement. Letv first showed this technology in November 2015 and has released a product, using this technology, specifically developed for automotive applications.

Source IANS

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BlackBerry could ditch BB10 for two Android phones this year News oi -Sudhiir

BlackBerry is choosing Google's Android OS over its BB 10. BlackBerry has announced that it would release at least one Android Smartphone every year.

SEE ALSO: Lenovo will phase out Motorola branding in new overhaul

BlackBerry CEO John Chen confirmed its plans about his company's plans to launch an Android Smartphone. He spoke about the developments to Roger Cheng of CNET at CES 2016. Last year, Blackberry launched the Android BlackBerry Priv Secure Smartphone. It is rumored that BlackBerry is working on another Android Smartphone, the BlackBerry "Priv" that could have a physical keyboard this year.

SEE ALSO: Microsoft is creating its own SIM card for cross-carrier data access

The company announced that the BlackBerry Priv will be available via T-Mobile, Spring and Verizon in the US. The Smartphone will also be launched ins several regions in Asia. The BlackBerry Priv smartphone launched last year is is one of the most secure android smartphones. BlackBerry has been struggling to be profitable.Earlier, in an interview with Bloomberg, John Chen said that BlackBerry was looking at margins and not volumes.

However, if BlacBerry does not perform well this year even with the new Android based Smartphones, it would not make any point to make phones at all.

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Pushkar-Gayathris Vikram Vedha showcases that a film can be made in any language or for any audience, can be told with the premise & outcome without deviating and keeping the narrative tight.
U.S. Department of Defense

Press Operations

News Transcript

Presenter: Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook January 07, 2016

Department of Defense Press Briefing by Pentagon Press Secretary Cook in the Pentagon Briefing Room

PETER COOK: I wanted to start today by addressing events in Afghanistan earlier this week. The Department of Defense has identified the service member who was killed in action on Tuesday in Marjah in Helmand province.

He is Staff Sergeant Matthew K. McClintock, a native of Albuquerque, New Mexico, a veteran Green Beret on his third tour of duty.

He was a member of the Washington National Guard and assigned to the 1st Battalion, 19th Special Forces Group Airborne in Buckley, Washington. He leaves behind a wife and an infant son. Our thoughts and prayers are with them and his entire family during this difficult time.

The two service members injured in Tuesday's attack on U.S. and Afghan forces were safely evacuated to Kandahar where they received further treatment.

Staff Sergeant McClintock died in support of Operation Resolute Support, which is helping to keep Americans safe here at home, and helping to provide a better future for the Afghan people.

Separately, I want to update you on two meetings the secretary had today. The secretary traveled to the State Department this morning to meet with Secretary Kerry and other members of the administration to discuss coordination on various lines of effort in the counter-ISIL campaign. This meeting is the latest in a series of regular meetings between the secretaries to discuss synchronization and mutual reinforcing efforts in the counter-ISIL campaign.

Today's meeting focused on next steps following continued progress against ISIL in Ramadi, as well as efforts to cut ISIL supply lines between Mosul and Raqqah. They also discussed the strategy to enhance our counter-messaging efforts.

After that meeting, the secretary returned here to the Pentagon where he received an update from PACOM commander, Admiral Harry Harris. They discussed recent events on the Korean peninsula, including North Korea's latest provocative act, as well as steps to further our military-to-military dialogue with allies in the region.

And with that, I'd be happy to take your questions.

Q: Peter, two things along those two issues. Was -- on the meeting this morning between Secretary Carter and Secretary Kerry, can you tell us, first of all, some of the other people who were at -- present at the meeting? And was this a discussion that involved military strategy? Are there any changes to military strategy or any other military implications that we should be aware of?

And then a second one on Admiral Harris  the phone call. Is there any additional information that the U.S. now has about what type of test North Korea actually conducted? And what other I guess details can you give us about what they -- what the U.S. is learning over time about it?

MR. COOK: First of all, with regard to the meeting with Secretary Kerry, I was not there, but we'll try to get for you a full list of the other attendees who were part of that. It was, again, hosted by the State Department. There was a discussion, as I understand it, of the ongoing effort -- the counter-ISIL effort. The secretary, of course, talking about the military side of the campaign both in Iraq and in Syria.

And, you know, there was again a discussion of the various lines of effort consistent with the meetings they've had in the past. And again, the secretary meets with Secretary Kerry on a regular basis, but this is a specific series of meetings that they've had both here at the Pentagon, as you know, and at the State Department, looking at the particular lines of effort from representative agencies in the counter-ISIL campaign.

So, there was a discussion, of course, of the military side of this campaign, and specifically the progress that's been made in recent weeks, not only in Iraq, but in Syria as well.

With regard to the situation in North Korea, again we -- the government has concluded that a nuclear test took place, but we're still assessing new information we've received at this point in time. But our analysis again indicates that it's not consistent with the North Korean claims of a hydrogen bomb test. We're continuing to receive information and analysis, and we'll over the coming days we hope receive even more information that might give us a better understanding of exactly what took place there.

Q: Can you -- can you say whether or not the Air Force plane that's collecting samples has arrived there yet?

MR. COOK: Again, I'm not going to get into the -- we have a variety of means with which we can analyze what's taken place there.

I'm not going to get into the details about what all those resources are, but we are using as many resources as we can to try and get a better picture of exactly what took place.

Q: Peter, I want to go back to Afghanistan. I know you talked about this two days ago, but at the time you said you didn't have all the facts and didn't want to jump the gun.

Help us understand again how these U.S. special operations forces who were in a train, advise and assist role, are so close to combat operations that they can take such substantial casualties, including one killed and two wounded? How is that?

MR. COOK: Jamie, American special operations forces in Helmand province are in this train, advise and assist role in which they accompany -- can accompany Afghan forces, have accompanied in the past, were so on this particular occasion. It was part of a clearing operation, as I understand it, in Marjah. And their role is to assist, again, provide their unique training and advice to the Afghan forces. And as they confront an objective, it is the Afghan forces that take on the objective, and the U.S. forces assume, if you will, a support position, and over-watch position.

And that's been the way they've conducted these operations in the past. This was a circumstance in which they, as I understand it, came under fire. And this incident took place, and Staff Sergeant McClintock lost his life, unfortunately.

Q: When we -- when this -- when we get an explanation about what's going on in Iraq, for instance, with the raids like the one in -- (inaudible) -- the distinction is drawn between a raid, which is an in-and-out operation and not designed to take and hold territory in which, again, a U.S. special operation force lost his life, as opposed to taking and holding and being embedded with forces that are taking and holding territory in defensive operations.

This operation in Afghanistan seems a lot like that kind of direct ground offensive. The U.S. troops are embedded right with the Afghan forces. Is there a difference between what's happening in Afghanistan and what's going on in Iraq?

MR. COOK: Well --

Q: In terms of the combat role?

MR. COOK: Sure. I don't want to -- they are different circumstances, each case is different. So, first of all, I would suggest that we want to look at these as individual circumstances.

We have had special operations forces playing this role with Afghan special operations forces in Helmand province previously. This was not the first time they've accompanied. And they are conducting this role in support of the Afghan forces, trying to bolster them.

They are in harm's way. That is abundantly clear, just as those forces accompanying the Peshmerga in this particular raid you mention in Iraq are in harm's way. In both instances, they are not in the lead. They are as support and in a backup role, if you will, for lack of a better word. But that does expose them to risk. And that is clearly what happened with Joshua Ruer in Iraq, and in this instance as well.

Everyone should be clear that those American forces are at risk. This is a combat situation, but they are not in the lead intentionally. They're in support of these forces that the United States is trying to provide additional support, training. We're trying to bolster those forces so they can conduct these operations eventually on their own and secure their own country with respect to Afghanistan.

And in this particular instance, this was Helmand province. This was a clearing operation, consistent with what this train, advise and assist mission has been all about.

Q: Again, you say -- you used the words 'in harm's way' several times.

MR. COOK: Sure.

Q: The U.S. military doesn't have any reservation about saying U.S. troops are in combat in Iraq. Do you have any reservation about saying the same thing about Afghanistan?

MR. COOK: This was clearly a combat situation in which U.S. forces that were accompanying Afghan forces who were in the lead, found themselves in a very difficult, dangerous situation. That is crystal clear. And we know that there are Americans putting themselves at risk in Afghanistan and Iraq in these positions.

We take that very, very seriously. And obviously, there can be some terrible consequences here. They are carrying out an important mission in support of the Afghan government, in support of Afghan security forces. And again, this staff sergeant lost his life doing something important that is helping to protect Americans here at home, also trying to ensure that Afghanistan has a better future.

Q: Just one more. Why isn't there more transparency about what's going on in Afghanistan? In Iraq, for instance, we get daily release on how many airstrikes we've conducted. We have regular briefings about what's going on on the ground. In Afghanistan, not so much. Why not?

MR. COOK: Well Jamie, I'm trying to provide you as much information as I can about this particular incident Tuesday. These news events were unfolding as we discussed them. We've got -- I encourage you to reach out to the folks with Resolute Support who have even more information, to provide you even more, I hope, tick-tock of these events if you need them.

But we're doing everything we can to provide as much information about the ongoing activities of American forces in Iraq, in Afghanistan and elsewhere around the world. You're absolutely right. People need to know what they're doing. We're trying to provide as much information as we can about their role -- their important role going forward.

And I would just highlight again the secretary himself went to Afghanistan not too long ago to highlight the service of those troops; what it is they're doing; the important role that they're carrying out in Afghanistan. And that's just one part of a larger effort. We'd like to draw attention to what they're doing, the important work that they're doing and into the future in Afghanistan.

Q: Peter, how many Chinese flights have landed on the Spratly base in recent days? And does the Pentagon plan to respond?

MR. COOK: My understanding is, and let me just double-check one thing here, that we can now confirm that there may have been three flights that have landed. I want to double-check my notes here because I just received this information.

There may have been three flights that have landed of a civilian nature on one of the islands in question in the South China Sea.

Q: And does the Pentagon plan to respond?

MR. COOK: Well, we clearly are concerned by these flights, as we indicated in the past. And we're concerned by all of these activities being conducted by the Chinese in disputed islands in the South China Sea. We call on all parties -- as you know, Jennifer, we don't pick sides in these disputes, but anything being done by any country to try and raise tensions over these disputed islands, and to try to militarize or engage in reclamation activities in these islands, we think only adds to instability in the South China Sea.

We call for a diplomatic resolution to these issues in the South China Sea. And certainly, these flights do nothing to foster further stability and understanding in that part of the world -- a very important part of the world to the United States and others.

Q: And does the Pentagon plan to respond to the North Korean nuclear test?

MR. COOK: Well, we -- first of all, Jennifer, as you know, we're there every day in South Korea. More than 28,000 U.S. forces on the Korean Peninsula right now. We stand resolutely with our South Korean allies. Our commitment to them is ironclad and we will do everything we can to ensure their defense. We continue to coordinate carefully with the South Koreans. The secretary spoke with his counterpart yesterday; expect that there will be ongoing coordination with the South Koreans with regard to this issue and this provocative act by the North Koreans.

Q: And finally, six Democratic congressmen have written a letter to the White House about the Iran -- the second Iranian missile test, the two missile tests -- ballistic missile tests that took place this fall, demanding a response.

And can you give us more details about that second ballistic missile test that took place in November? Can you confirm that it was a ballistic missile test? And is there going to be a response?

MR. COOK: I can tell you that we are continuing to review this situation carefully, along with our colleagues in the interagency. And this -- this is a situation that we're going to monitor very, very carefully. This is -- these are issues of significance to the Department of Defense and to the entire interagency. And we're working with our colleagues at the United Nations, at the State Department as well.

But at this point, this is something that we're continuing to review right now as to what the appropriate response is.

Q: But did the second test take place?

MR. COOK: I'm not going to be able to confirm for you exactly what took place there.

Q: Why are you so reluctant to confirm something that -- that privately officials are telling us did take place?

MR. COOK: I'm not going to, from this podium, not going to confirm and get into questions about intelligence gathering with regard to this information.

Q: Following up on North Korea. Has the Pentagon or Defense Department received any requests from South Korea or the Japanese government since the nuclear test earlier this week in terms of assistance, additional military equipment to help counter the threat from North Korea?

MR. COOK: We're in ongoing conversations -- we are with the South Koreans and with our other allies in the region, about steps -- additional steps that may or may not need to be taken in order to respond to the latest actions from the North Koreans. We're confident that we, again working in lockstep with the South Koreans, can respond appropriately to this action. We'll continue to view with them all options that need to be considered at this point.

But again, this -- we have an iron-clad commitment to the South Koreans. This was a provocative act by the North Koreans and it does nothing to further stability in the Korean peninsula. And we're clearly very, very concerned about what's taken place there.

Q: And the incident in Afghanistan, can you bring us up to speed on the fate of the two helicopters that extracted of the U.S. personnel from -- (inaudible). There were two helicopters left behind. Have they been removed from the scene?

MR. COOK: My understanding there was one helicopter that was damaged during the course of events. And it has been lifted and removed and taken to Kandahar. So, every one has been recovered safely, and the helicopter itself has also been recovered.

Yes?

Q: Going back to Marjah again. Congressman Ryan Zinke said today that he's been contacted by members of the special operations community involved in this operation, and said that there were some issues with rules of engagement, specifically that the quick reaction force and air support for an AC-130 gunship was delayed and/or denied.

Meanwhile, people in this building and from Resolute Support have said that all support was rendered in a timely manner. Can you rectify these discrepancies?

MR. COOK: I think you've heard from the folks at Resolute Support who have told us the same thing, that there's no indication at this point that there was any delay. There was an effort to respond as quickly as possible to this particular situation, given the ongoing fighting that was taking place. And we don't have any indication that there was any delay here.

Everyone there was recovered safely, thankfully. The helicopter has since been recovered. And obviously, happy to listen to whatever concerns the congressman may have, but there's no indication that we're aware of that there was any delay whatsoever; that this was an ongoing situation in which there was fire in the area and there was a quick response force, as you said, that was sent to that region.

And obviously, everything needed to be taken into account for their safety as well. And we feel confident based on what we know right now that there was no delay and there was every effort made by the commander to try and address the situation in the appropriate fashion.

Q: (inaudible) -- South Korean newspapers. -- (inaudible) -- provide a nuclear umbrella to South Korea. Can you give us what you can?

MR. COOK: I'd just reiterate that our commitment to Korea is ironclad. And we have -- the secretary himself was in South Korea not too long ago meeting with his counterpart. And our -- just to be crystal clear to the North Koreans and to everyone else that this is one of our strongest allies in the world, and we going to do everything we can to maintain the security of South Korea.

Q: Also -- (inaudible) -- discussing the placement of U.S. strategic assets to Korean peninsula. (inaudible) -- some more what -- (inaudible) -- and what is -- (inaudible)?

MR. COOK: I'd just reiterate that we're going to continue to coordinate closely with the South Korean government, the ministry of defense, on steps that need to be taken, if additional steps need to be taken to ensure the strength of the alliance and the defense of South Korea. And we're not going to get into all those options being discussed at this time, but again, our commitment to South Korea is ironclad. And there should be no misunderstanding about that whatsoever.

Q: (inaudible) -- any -- (inaudible) -- also -- (inaudible) actions to North Korea regarding this nuclear test?

MR. COOK: I'll just stand by what I've said here about our commitment to South Korea, our concerns about what the North Koreans have done, and our willingness to -- to stand by our allies in the region and to do what's necessary to protect them from the North Korean threat.

Yes?

Q: A South Korean official said that they're in talks with U.S. officials regarding the deployment of certain strategic weapons to South Korea. Can you give us details on what this discussion entails and what those strategic weapons might be?

MR. COOK: As I just said here, we're in close communication, close coordination with the South Koreans. I'm not going to get into a list of options on the table, but this is something that is an ongoing discussion that we have on a regular basis already with the South Koreans. But in light of recent events, has only stepped up the contact that we're having with the South Koreans and the communication we're having to make sure that they are assured, other allies in the region are assured that everything is being done to ensure the sanctity of the alliance and our commitment to South Korea moving forward.

Q: Secretary Carter and Minister Han met in November for the SCM. And so --

MR. COOK: Yes.

Q: They both said that the deployment of the THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) not on the table for discussion at that time. Is that now part of these discussions that are ongoing?

MR. COOK: We still have not had formal consultations on the THAAD system with the Republic of Korea; no decisions have been made on a potential deployment of the THAAD to the Korean peninsula.

And again, this is -- this is part of a larger discussion that we'll continue to have with South Koreans about capabilities and about the alliance moving forward, but there's been no formal discussions about THAAD deployment.

Q: But does the North Korea test increase the urgency for those -- for discussing that specific -- (inaudible)?

MR. COOK: It increases the urgency for us to continue our coordination with the South Koreans and to consider every possible option that should be considered to further the defense of South Korea. And again, to play our part in the region in ensuring stability.

Q: And one last one. The last time this sort of test happened back in 2013, the U.S. flew B-2 bombers from Missouri all the way to South Korea, kind of as a show of force. Are you considering that sort of move again? And if not, something similar to that?

MR. COOK: I'll just reiterate again that every day should be a show of force on the Korean peninsula from the United States military. Again, more than 28,000 troops there. We will consider other options as needed if we need to bolster our presence there. We're satisfied we have the capabilities we need to deter North Korea and to ensure the defense of our ally, South Korea.

Yes?

Q: Yesterday, the Pentagon announced that it would be reviewing the 1,100 approximately Silver Stars and service crosses that have been awarded in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001. Is that a reflection of the building thinking that the four Medals of Honor that have been awarded for Iraq over eight years of service there, from 2003 to 2011, and the 13 that have been awarded in Afghanistan, weren't enough and didn't reflect actually the number of men and women that put themselves at risk, and that, you know, they have done acts of valor that haven't been recognized at that level?

MR. COOK: This is not -- this is an indication more than anything else, not that anyone was inappropriately recognized, but that there have been some concerns expressed that perhaps there was -- there needs to be greater recognition; there needs to be a review of those awards that were handed out, and that's what this will be -- a review of those decisions.

And there's no presumption at this point as to exactly what we'll -- what could potentially change, but the sheer number that are being reviewed here, over 1,000, would indicate that there is the possibility of change going forward. But this was done, again, at the urging of some outside groups, some veterans as well. And -- and that's why this is taking place at the time.

Q: Is there any sentiment at all that perhaps there should have been more Medal of Honor winners for --?

MR. COOK: There's no -- there's no presumption at this point, but there's certainly been some of those concerns raised, again, by veterans and outside groups. And this is in part a response to that, and an appropriate review to determine if indeed certain servicemembers deserved different recognition than perhaps they received initially.

Yes?

Q: I have a scheduling question and one on Afghanistan.

The meeting this morning between Secretary Carter and Secretary Kerry and some other officials was on Secretary Kerry's public record and not Secretary Carter's. I'd like to know why something as important as that was not on the public schedule for the secretary of defense.

MR. COOK: It was a decision made by the State Department. It was hosted at the State Department. We made information available to you now about the meeting itself. We don't post every single of the secretary's meetings with Secretary Kerry.

There have been others this week, for example, that are not on his public schedule. This was a closed event, not open to the press. And the State Department made a decision to post it, and I'll leave the State Department to speak for itself.

Q: So we should have the expectation when there are meetings happening about the war against the Islamic state, we should go to the State Department to find out if such meetings are being scheduled? I mean, in the past, those meetings have been posted so that we know. We didn't have to go to the State Department. So I hope --

MR. COOK: That's not actually -- that's not actually accurate. There have been past meetings of this kind that have not all been posted. And we will -- we will, again, make every effort we can to try and provide information to you on those meetings. You raise a good point about the schedule. We do have a weekly schedule for the secretary that we try and post and have as accurate and as current as possible.

In this instance, this was a meeting hosted at the State Department and they chose to post it, and that's fine by us.

Q: Well, if I could just put in a request that those -- some assurance from the podium that meetings of that serious nature, given that they're about the war, that the public know what effort is being made at the top level on --.

MR. COOK: We will continue to provide updates on the schedule on these and other matters, and we'll make every effort we can to share that with you.

Q: Okay. And then on Afghanistan, I want to follow up on one of Jamie's questions. One of the war now is that often we don't find out about where U.S. forces are outside of the wire until there are casualties because so many of them are Special Forces and Special Operators, which means the public does not know where its forces are being deployed.

And I wanted to know, we know there are 3,000 Special Operators. Is there any way we can get some specificity on where they're deployed?

And also, I'd like you to take a question about what happened in the larger battle. Because in the past, we have been afforded some detail about why a servicemember has died on behalf of this nation and the -- the idea that only those in a train, advise and assist role gives us no detail. There was this 20-hour battle involved.

I'm asking for some detail and some clarity on what's being asked of U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Because right now, the most common way we find out about such missions is through casualties. And I'd like to know if you could take that question, if there's any way we can really find out some of the areas that these 3,000 are deployed.

MR. COOK: I'm happy to take that question. You know, Nancy, that with regard in particular to Special Operations forces, we don't disclose much, if anything, about their activities in part because of operational security, and we're going to continue to do that for the obvious reason.

In this particular instance, as I mentioned before, this was a clearing operation, as I understand it. Resolute Support can provide you with more detail on exactly the operation itself, the tick-tock if you will. We've asked them to provide that to you. And we'll provide what detail we can on exactly what's taking place here and with regard to other -- other U.S. forces. But we're going to be very careful about what we disclose about special operators for understandable reasons.

Q: Right. I understand. But if you're able to provide a tick-tock, I just want to kind of put on record that as of now, we don't know what's being asked of U.S. troops in Afghanistan. And I'm hoping that there's some way to somehow respect the operations --

MR. COOK: There's a lot being asked of U.S. forces in Afghanistan. And just to be crystal clear, and this is a perfect example of that. This is a challenging environment, a dangerous environment. And -- and we've made you and others aware of about Special Operators assisting, training, advising, assisting these Afghan forces and being out in the field with them in places like Helmand province. We've disclosed that before.

And we'll provide information as we get it about their role and what they're doing out there. In this particular instance, there was a clearing operation in which they were with Afghan forces in Helmand Province, we have disclosed that there were U.S. forces in Helmand Province previously, and we're providing the information as to what took place specifically that resulted in the death of Staff Sergeant McClinton.

Q: Could we get, then, just a list of where roughly the other 3,000 are so we have some sense of where they're being deployed?

MR. COOK: We'll try and get that for you in terms of where they are in Afghanistan specifically. They're -- you know, there are some in Helmand Province and there are some -- so we'll get those -- as much information as we can for you.

Q: But just to follow up, Peter, these troops are in combat, you don't dispute that.

MR. COOK: This was clearly a combat situation. Their mission, as you know, Jennifer, is to assist the Afghan forces, to train, advise and assist. They can accompany, they play a support role, but they are there able to defend themselves and at risk as we have seen painfully in this particular instance.

Yes, Christina.

Q: Peter, earlier this week, you said the expeditionary targeting force has -- the plans have moved forward on that. Without giving away operational details, can you explain what you mean by moved forward?

MR. COOK: As we said, this was a force that was going to be put in place to be able to disrupt ISIL and to conduct operations that we felt would be helpful in putting even more pressure on ISIL as we've continued to apply pressure both in Syria and in Iraq.

We feel confident that their capabilities will provide us the opportunity to do that to again play a disruptive role. And I will just characterize for you that they are now in a position to carry out the work that the secretary expects of them, but I'm not going to get into details as to exactly where they are, what they're doing at this particular moment in time, but we're confident that this is an important capability that will help our effort going forward.

Q: So they physically moved --

MR. COOK: I'm not going to get into details about where they are at this particular moment in time other than to say that this effort, as the secretary has directed, is moving forward and we believe this capability will make a difference for us again in Iraq specifically.

Q: And I have one last question. Does Prime Minister Abadi or the Iraqi government have to okay -- do they have to okay the moving into place, or is it just individual operations?

MR. COOK: Operations, the ETF and our other operations in Iraq will be carefully coordinated with the Iraqi government. The secretary discussed this with Prime Minister Abadi on his recent trip to Iraq. And again, we feel confident that this is an important capability that will bolster the Iraqi government's own efforts to try and take back territory and take the fight to ISIL. Yes, Joe?

Q: Peter, if I could get a reaction from you on Iran's Saudi Arabia tensions right now. Is the Pentagon concerned about that? And do you think that kind of tension could complicate the situation, the security situation in the region, mainly in Iraq and in Syria?

MR. COOK: As we mentioned previously, we're of course concerned by any of these escalating tensions and the potential for an impact. But right now, we're not seeing an impact on the counter-ISIL campaign specifically, but we would encourage both sides here to de-escalate the situation because we don't think it's productive or helpful at this point and remains a -- remains a risk to the region.

It's not helpful. We would ask for cooler heads to prevail here and for both sides to do what they can to try and lower the tension level here because it's not conducive to the -- to the important fight that needs to be waged against ISIL, and that's clearly our -- one of our biggest concerns right now, and we'd like to see -- we'd like to see these tensions reduced because of that.

Yes?

Q: Is there any communication between DOD and China, like PLA, on the nuclear test?

MR. COOK: I'm not going to get into discussions up here. If we've got conversations to read out between the secretary, we'll provide those to you. At this point. we believe, obviously, that China has an important role to -- to play here. And, again, given their influence and their relationship with North Korea, we would hope that China would play a -- a helpful role here, going forward.

Q: Peter, I -- a Dr. Peter Pry, who's an expert on electromagnetic pulse, suggests that the North Koreans are really aiming toward more of a neutron type of bomb, to emit greater gamma rays, rather than radiation, given the low yield.

Has the Defense Department been looking at something like this as part of their strategy to create more of an EMP impact, as a -- from the North Korean standpoint?

MR. COOK: I'm not aware of this particular report. And what I can tell you at this point is, again, we've -- we've looked at the test that took place, and, again, our initial analysis is that it's not consistent with what the North Koreans have themselves described.

We're still waiting to get further information ourselves, but -- so I can't comment specifically on -- on this report and this particular suggestion about this particular report, so.

Q: But he says that in -- in the last thee to four detonations, they've been working on miniaturization. They've all been purposely low-yield -- up to about 10 kilotons -- and that this is a purposeful area, to try and miniaturize so they can put it on a warhead and be able to put it into a satellite and spin it around the world and let it loose whenever they choose.

MR. COOK: I will just reiterate that, no matter what they did the other day, it was a provocative act. It was not helpful to peace and stability on the peninsula, and it clearly remains an area of significant concern for the United States and for our allies.

And because of that, we're going to continue to do everything we can to address the North Korean challenge, standing side by side with South Korea and with our other allies in the region, and that we'll continue to, obviously, carefully watch what's -- what the North Koreans do going forward.

MR. COOK: One last question here, and then I'm going to move on.

Q: Did North Korea notify to the United States for their nuclear test?

MR. COOK: I'm not aware of any notification that was provided to the U.S. government.

Q: Your U.S. intelligence -- they don't have any information --

MR. COOK: I thought your question was did the North Koreans notify us of their plans to hold a test. And, again, I'm -- to my knowledge, the North Koreans did not provide any notification to the United States or anyone else that they were going to conduct this test.

MR. COOK: One more question there, and then --

Q: Just, quick question. (inaudible ) last week, where India was (inaudible) of two -- (inaudible) -- one in Afghanistan at -- (inaudible) -- consulate, and another one was inside India, at the air force base, which there's a tussle between India and Pakistan because Afghanistan -- the prime minister -- (inaudible) -- Pakistan (inaudible) the new prime minister -- (inaudible) -- and then he call him yesterday.

And then, first time, Nawaz Sharif said that the -- the Indian -- (inaudible) -- attack inside (in ?) India's concern. Any comments of what's going on on these terrorist attacks?

MR. COOK: This is a situation between India and Pakistan, and we encourage their continued communication and efforts to address these issues. And the communication is a -- is a hopeful sign that they will be able to address these concerns, but I'll leave it to the governments of Pakistan and India to respond to this particular situation.

Q: The reason I was asking because there are -- the defense minister of India was here and the secretary of -- (inaudible) -- in India and also he made all of these comments. Between -- the relations between the U.S. and India are moving as far as a comprehensive strategy concern and other issues.

MR. COOK: Yes. Well, the secretary was pleased to welcome his counterpart from India here not too long ago, and again, this -- feels very good about the relationship with India, the military-to-military relationship that we have. And he's going to continue to foster that relationship in the best way he can and continue to encourage partners in the region, countries in the region to try and do everything they can to reduce tensions in the region.

Q: Thank you very much, sir.

MR. COOK: Thank you all very much.

-END-

http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Transcripts/Transcript-View/Article/641929/

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KC-135s surpass 100,000 combat hours

By Tech. Sgt. Terrica Y. Jones, 379th Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs / Published January 08, 2016

AL UDEID AIR BASE, Qatar (AFNS) -- The KC-135 Stratotanker fleet at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar, flew more than 14,700 sorties in 2015 accumulating 103,419 combat hours in support of Operations Inherent Resolve and Freedom's Sentinel.

"We provide refueling to every flying unit in the area of responsibility which is Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and Afghanistan and supported 12 coalition nations," said Lt. Col. James Murray, the 340th Expeditionary Air Refueling Squadron director of operations. "We support aircraft 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year so they can do their mission."

Murray said over 60 KC-135s took part in achieving over 100,000 combat hours. Each KC-135 crew flies an average of seven hours a day and off-loads an average of 50,000 gallons of fuel per mission.

Murray said keeping an operations tempo of this magnitude is herculean.

"Imagine 12 airplanes flying 24 hours a day, it's incredible," he said. "If we were not out there to give gas to all our receivers they we would have to fly shorter missions."

Murray said the KC-135's combat hour achievement was possible because of active-duty, Reserve and National Guard Airmen.

"There are different Air Force components like active duty, Reserve and Air National Guard out here," Murray said. "There are also different types of tankers on the ramp, with different modifications, so usually a new crew has to be trained or certified in everything that we have here at AUAB. Having an aircrew trained gives us the flexibility to go out and fly any tanker, and our squadron does internal training to make that happen."

Senior Airman Timothy Weber, a 340th EARS boom operator, shared what it was like to be part of the combat hour milestone.

"The tempo can become intense here," Weber said. "You have to adapt because it's busy and the environment is so dynamic. You can take off with a plan and it can change drastically when you are in the air, but it gets exciting and I get to see it happen right in front of me, I love flying."

Murray said the 340th EARS surpassed 100,000 combat hours without realizing it because it happened faster than the unit anticipated.

The combat hour achievement is the result of various units at Al Udeid AB working together to make the mission happen, Murray said.

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Military Strikes Target ISIL Terrorists in Syria, Iraq

From a Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve News Release

SOUTHWEST ASIA, January 8, 2016  U.S. and coalition military forces have continued to attack Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant terrorists in Syria and Iraq, Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve officials reported today.

Officials reported details of the latest strikes, noting that assessments of results are based on initial reports.

Strikes in Syria

Fighter and attack aircraft conducted three strikes in Syria:

-- Near Ayn Isa, two strikes destroyed three ISIL fighting positions and suppressed a separate ISIL fighting position.

-- Near Manbij, one strike destroyed three ISIL staging areas.

Strikes in Iraq

Bomber and fighter aircraft and rocket artillery conducted 23 strikes in Iraq, coordinated with and in support of Iraq's government:

-- Near Qaim, one strike struck inoperable coalition equipment denying ISIL access in support of coalition operations.

-- Near Haditha, two strikes struck two separate ISIL tactical units and destroyed three ISIL fighting positions.

-- Near Irbil, one strike suppressed an ISIL heavy machine gun position.

-- Near Kisik, two strikes struck an ISIL tactical unit, destroyed an ISIL fighting position and suppressed an ISIL mortar position.

-- Near Mosul, seven strikes struck four separate ISIL tactical units and destroyed six ISIL fighting positions, an ISIL tunnel, four ISIL assembly areas, an ISIL bunker and an ISIL command and control node.

-- Near Qayyarah, one strike struck an ISIL petroleum refinery.

-- Near Ramadi, six strikes struck two separate ISIL tactical units and destroyed 16 ISIL fighting positions, 13 ISIL heavy machine guns, an ISIL obstacle, an ISIL bomb cluster, an ISIL house bomb, 11 ISIL vehicle bomb-making facilities, three ISIL staging areas, two ISIL sniper positions, two ISIL tunnel entrances and denied ISIL access to terrain.

-- Near Sinjar, one strike suppressed an ISIL light machine gun position.

-- Near Sultan Abdallah, two strikes struck an ISIL tactical unit and destroyed four ISIL fighting positions, four ISIL assembly areas and an ISIL command-and-control node.

Task force officials define a strike as one or more kinetic events that occur in roughly the same geographic location to produce a single, sometimes cumulative, effect. Therefore, officials explained, a single aircraft delivering a single weapon against a lone ISIL vehicle is a strike, but so is multiple aircraft delivering dozens of weapons against buildings, vehicles and weapon systems in a compound, for example, having the cumulative effect of making those targets harder or impossible for ISIL to use. Accordingly, officials said, they do not report the number or type of aircraft employed in a strike, the number of munitions dropped in each strike, or the number of individual munition impact points against a target.

Part of Operation Inherent Resolve

The strikes were conducted as part of Operation Inherent Resolve, the operation to eliminate the ISIL terrorist group and the threat they pose to Iraq, Syria, and the wider international community. The destruction of ISIL targets in Syria and Iraq further limits the group's ability to project terror and conduct operations.

Coalition nations conducting strikes in Iraq include the United States, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Jordan, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Coalition nations conducting strikes in Syria include the United States, Australia, Bahrain, Canada, France, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and the United Kingdom.

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Outgoing Southcom Commander Outlines Mission

By Lisa Ferdinando DoD News, Defense Media Activity

WASHINGTON, January 8, 2016  The role of U.S. Southern Command is unique among the combatant commands, Southcom's outgoing commander said at a Pentagon news conference today.

Marine Corps Gen. John F. Kelly, who is retiring after more than four decades of service, shared his thoughts on Southcom's mission.

Southcom is responsible for all Defense Department security cooperation in the 45 nations and territories of Central and South America and the Caribbean Sea, an area of 16 million square miles.

'It's all about broadening and deepening partnerships down there, to say the least,' Kelly said. 'I will tell you that the partners we have in Latin America and the Caribbean like the United States and want to be associated with the United States.'

Kelly added there are few countries that 'didn't get the memo' about democracy and human rights, but added that 'some of that is even turning around.'

Southcom works with allies in the region to deliver advice, education and assistance, Kelly said. Other priorities are countering transnational organized crime, counterterrorism, drug interdiction, building partner capacity response, and detainee operations.

Drug Interdiction Important Mission

'We've had a tremendous year of interdiction of cocaine,' the general said. 'The way we've partnered with various nations has allowed us to interdict ...191 metric tons of cocaine, and that's after it left Latin America.'

The No. 1 partner in fighting drug trafficking is Colombia, Kelly told reporters. He said Colombia interdicted hundreds of metric tons of cocaine before the drugs left the country, and eradicated tens of thousands of coca plantation bushes and hundreds of cocaine labs.

The United States needs to stay involved in the process of helping Colombia, he said.

'Let's not throw away a success story," he added. "We have to stand and continue Plan Colombia, in my opinion, for another 10 years.'

Proud of Service Members Serving at Guantanamo

Kelly also outlined detainee operations at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, another Southcom mission.

'My mandate from the president, through the secretary of defense, is to make sure that we're in accordance with all laws and regulations that the detainees as long as they are down there are treated well, treated humanely, and well taken care of medically and otherwise,' he said.

'We do that superbly. I'm very, very, very proud of my soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines that are at Guantanamo that execute this mission as well as they do,' he said.

Gold Star Father

The sacrifices of his own service are not the only ones Kelly has endured. His son, Marine Corps 1st Lt. Robert Kelly, was killed in action in 2010 in Afghanistan.

'It doesn't matter how they die," he said. "To lose a child, ... I can't imagine anything worse than that. When you lose one in combat, in my opinion, there's a pride that goes with it.  He didn't have to be there doing what he was doing. He wanted to be there. He volunteered.'

When Gold Star families ask him if it was worth it, the general said, he tells them that what is important is that the person who died thought it was worth it. 'That's the only opinion that counts,' he said.

Those who choose to serve, whether in the military or as police or federal agents, are 'special people' who are doing what they wanted to do, and are with the people they wanted to be with when they lost their lives, Kelly said.

'Gold Star families are special, to say the least,' he said.

The one thing the families would ask, he said, is that 'the cause for which their son or daughter fell be carried through to a successful end.'

Navy Vice Adm. Kurt W. Tidd, assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff, will receive his fourth star and succeed Kelly as Southcom commander Jan. 14.

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U.S. Department of Defense

Press Operations

News Release

No. NR-009-16 January 08, 2016

Readout of Secretary of Defense Carter's Call with Japan Defense Minister Nakatani

Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook provided the following statement:

Today U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter called Japan Minister of Defense Gen Nakatani to discuss the recent North Korea nuclear test. Secretary Carter and Minister Nakatani both agreed that the nuclear test by North Korea is an unacceptable and irresponsible act that undermines regional security and stability. Minister Nakatani stated that the test was a clear violation of the United Nation's Security Council resolutions and condemned the act. Secretary Carter agreed with this view and commended the high level of coordination between the United States and Japan after the test. The secretary noted that utilizing the Alliance Coordination Mechanism under the 2015 Guidelines for U.S. -Japan Defense Cooperation exemplifies this close cooperation.

Secretary Carter reaffirmed steadfast U.S. defense commitments to Japan and allies in the region. Both agreed that trilateral cooperation with the Republic of Korea is critical to deterrence and maintaining peace and security in Northeast Asia and beyond, and they reiterated their commitment to continue close trilateral cooperation and information sharing.

http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/642034/

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Congo's forgotten war: The militia of Mambasa

By Claude Muhindo Sengenya

MAMBASA, 8 January 2016 (IRIN) - In spite of the death more than a year ago of key commander Paul Sadala, known as "Morgan", his Simba militia continue to wreak havoc in Mambasa, a vast territory of more than 35,000 square kilometres in Ituri Province, in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

On the night of 5th and 6th of December, armed militiamen attacked two Mambasa mining facilities, located between the towns of Niania and Isiro.

During the attack, 47 people were kidnapped, one woman was gang-raped by nine assailants, and a horde of valuable goods was carted off into the forest. This was just one of several incidents in December. Some 40 other civilians, most of them women, were also kidnapped from the Bakaiko mining area, also by Simba militia.

"We have no news of these hostages," Alfred Bongwalanga, administrator of Mambasa Territory, told IRIN.

And this doesn't seem to be the end of the violence in the region, which is home to some 500,000 people. In mid-December, Simba militia distributed leaflets threatening to attack two other localities: Mabukusi and Epulu.

"The security services have collected leaflets from several different villages," Bongwalanga told Radio Okapi. "It's just like what already happened in Makubusi. They warn us in advance before carrying out their assault," he said, referring to a previous attack on that village in November.

A thriving militia

Mambasa civil society president Kiski Maulana told IRIN that Simba militia attacks across Ituri Province over the past year have seen hundreds of civilians, the majority of them women, abducted  many of them also raped. The militia also burn down people's huts, forcing them to move.

"Since Morgan's death (in April 2014), two other leaders have taken the helm, Manu and Mangaribi, close allies of the former rebel chief," said Maulana. "Until these two leaders are apprehended, the Simba militia will always be active."

The Simba militia is a broad term for several Mai Mai groups operating in the region. The number of fighters is unknown. According to Bongwalanga, they are most active in Bakaiko, an isolated region located where the territories of Mambasa, Beni, and Lubero intersect.

"Here, they surround mining areas and villages, kill a certain number of civilians, kidnap others, rape the women, and steal valuable goods, like minerals," he said.

Local journalist Wasukundi Makeom, from the community TV/radio station Mazingira, told IRIN that the Simba militia are simply criminals, lacking any obvious political agenda.

Maulana agreed. "They have no clear ideology," he said. "All they do is sabotage the efforts of the Okapi Wildlife Reserve (a UNESCO World Heritage site that occupies about one fifth of the Ituri forest). These are simply criminals involved in poaching and the trafficking of natural resources: notably minerals and wood. They have no desire to one day rule Mambasa."

"And to get arms and weaponry, they attack the Congolese soldiers tasked with protecting certain mining facilities and the Okapi Wildlife Reserve," added Bongwalanga. "They are obviously doing well, because there are now fewer soldiers on these sites."

'To be a woman is a misfortune in Mambasa'

Human rights group GADHOP has been documenting cases of sexual violence against women perpetrated by Simba militiamen, recording 150 abductions and rapes in 2015 alone.

These aren't just traffickers of natural resources, these are also groups waging a campaign of sexual violence, explained GADHOP permanent secretary, Jeremie Kasereka Kitakya.

"When they surround the mining areas and the villages, they also take the fleeing women to their camps and use them simply as sexual slaves, and that goes on for several months," Kitakya said.

Last September, IRIN travelled to Manguredjipa, in the neighouring territory of Lubero, and met up with a group of women who had just escaped from the Simba militia and who spoke of the pain of living as sex slaves in their forest camps.

"In Mambasa, to be a woman is really a misfortune," said Kasoki, a woman in her 40s who escaped in July 2015 after spending about a month as a captive. "The militia attack the villages, and in addition to stealing everything, they also rape the women. Worse still, they take the victims with them into the bush to keep them as sex slaves.

"On the way, as well as after we arrive, we are obliged to have sex with the men, who take it in turns to rape us, without respecting our menstrual cycles. I have never had to live through such an ordeal."

As sex slaves, the women can't have children, even if a militiaman gets them pregnant.

Anne, a 14-year-old orphan whose parents were killed when she was still a baby, recalled what happened to her during her three months of captivity in early 2015.

"When we became pregnant, the militiamen forced us to have abortions. They kicked us in our stomachs to kill the foetuses.

"One day, the militiaman who had become my partner and who I was living with in the bush even wanted to cut my stomach open to check that my foetus was dead. If it wasn't for the intervention of his friends, I think I would have been killed."

Some of the women try in vain to escape. They are quickly tracked down, recaptured, and taken back to camp. Torture is the best they can expect, if the rebel leaders decide to spare their life.

"I tried to escape one day," another former abductee, Kavira, told IRIN. "But the militiamen drove me to their chief, Morgan. After taking off my clothes, Morgan and his close friend Manu (short for Emmanuel) picked up some palm tree branches to torture me. They hit me hard on the back, all over my body.

"I had injuries everywhere. I will never forget that day," she said, showing IRIN the scars that still marked her back.

The need for a big military campaign

Several sources in Ituri told IRIN there has never been a joint operation by the UN force (MONUSCO) and the Congolese army (FARDC) against the Simba militia.

"What I know is that there have never been joint operations in the proper sense of the term," Laurent Sam Oussou, a MONUSCO spokesman in Ituri, told IRIN.

"We have two operating bases in the Mambasa region, in Biakato and Madimba. The Congolese army have just installed their 31st brigade in Mambasa. On the ground, we do regular patrols. This presence can facilitate the preparation of joint operations."

But for GADHOP, military intervention is urgently needed to rescue the region from Simba violence.

"At the moment, the army seems to be concentrating on foreign armed groups. It forgets that the militia, like the Simba, are also committing atrocities," warned Kitakya.

"If we launch large-scale military operations, the Simba won't resist. They are not well enough equipped or organised to do that."

Makeo, the local journalist, also urged the Congolese government to boost its military and police presence in Mambasa.

"The security forces are absent and weakly represented in numerous villages. The militia take advantage of this to attack the civilians, as they know any intervention will come late, especially in isolated forest regions and numerous villages that aren't accessible on foot.

"It is necessary therefore to restore the authority of the state, to open up these places again."

MONUSCO's Oussou urged the people of Mambasa to trust and support the UN peacekeepers.

"They must continue to give us information and break away from these militia. There are also people who have made pacts with the Simba to enrich themselves, by trafficking the natural resources. They must stop this behaviour to allow us to bring an end to these militia."

cms/oa/ag

Theme (s): Conflict, Gender Issues, Governance, Security,

Copyright  IRIN 2016

This material comes to you via IRIN, the humanitarian news and analysis service of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations or its Member States.

IRIN is a project of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

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UAE top commander injured, 3 Blackwater mercenaries killed in Yemen

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

Tehran, Jan 8, IRNA -- The commander of the UAE forces in Yemen was injured and three Blackwater mercenaries, including a French officer, were killed in the province of Ta'iz on Friday.

"The special unit of the Yemeni army and popular forces attacked the convoy of the UAE and Blackwater forces in al-Sanameh region in the western part of al-Waziya of Ta'iz," a Yemeni military source announced on Friday.

The UAE has recently hired Blackwater forces to replace its regular soldiers in Yemen to fight against the Yemeni army and Ansarullah fighters.

The Saudi-led coalition of Arab countries comprises nine countries excluding Oman. They have launched an all-out aggression against the Yemeni nation since March 26 to help return the former fugitive Yemen president Mansour Hadi to power and prevent the Ansarullah revolutionary forces to regain power.

Yemen's infrastructure, including hospitals, schools and people's houses have been destroyed so far.

Thousands of Yemeni people, including children and women, have been killed and tens of thousands of them have been displaced.

More than 80 percent of Yemen's infrastructure has been totally razed down.

2050**2050

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NAVSUP FLC Bahrain Provides Logistics Support to French Aircraft Carrier Charles de Gaulle

Navy News Service

Story Number: NNS160108-08

Release Date: 1/8/2016 11:17:00 AM

From Naval Supply Systems Command Fleet Logistics Center Bahrain Public Affairs

MANAMA, Bahrain (NNS) -- Navy Supply Systems Command Fleet Logistics Center (NAVSUP FLC) Bahrain supported resupply efforts for French aircraft carrier FS Charles De Gaulle (R 91) during its port visit to Naval Support Activity (NSA) Bahrain in early January.

Charles De Gaulle has been operating in the Arabian Gulf since Dec. 7 and conducting missions with U.S. and coalition partners in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) terrorist organization.

NAVSUP FLC Bahrain helped the aircraft carrier and three accompanying French ships maintain mission readiness by providing transportation and logistical support.

According to French Navy Lt. Guillaume Florczyka, who oversaw the onload for Charles de Gaulle, 80 percent of the resupplied parts were for aircraft and critical to current operational needs.

'It's difficult to get supplies out on mission and not be able to make port calls at our usual ports,' said Florczyka. 'It's easier for us to work with [NAVSUP FLC Bahrain] than civilian agencies.'

'NAVSUP FLC Bahrain takes great pride in the services we provide to the fleet every day, and it's our honor to provide a little bit of that same customer-focused service to our French allies,' said NAVSUP FLC Bahrain Executive Director Brian Sterner. 'Our support of Charles De Gaulle is yet another demonstration of the flexibility, reliability, and expertise of the NAVSUP FLC Bahrain team.'

The carrier's previous resupply was in early December while the ship was at sea. The port call in Bahrain provided sailors with a much needed opportunity to unwind off the ship as well as receive critical supplies.

The three other French ships resupplied during the port call include air defense destroyer Chevalier Paul (D621), anti-submarine frigate La Motte-Picquet (D645) and command and supply ship Marne (A630).

This port visit came less than two weeks after the U.S. Secretary of Defense, Ashton Carter and Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Central Command, Vice Adm. Kevin Donegan visited Charles De Gaulle at sea Dec. 19 in a move that demonstrated the interoperability and partnership between the naval forces of France and the U.S. in the fight to degrade and ultimately destroy ISIL.

NAVSUP FLC Bahrain has more than 160 military and civilian personnel providing logistics support in the 5th Fleet area of operation. The command is one of eight fleet logistics centers worldwide in the NAVSUP Global Logistics Support (GLS) enterprise.

NAVSUP GLS provides global logistics for a global Navy. The organization is made up of more than 6,500 military and civilian logistics professionals operating from 105 locations worldwide providing an extensive array of integrated global logistics and contracting services to Navy, Marine Corps, joint operational units and allied forces across all warfare enterprises.

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USS Texas Visits Subic Bay During Indo-Asia-Pacific Deployment

Navy News Service

Story Number: NNS160108-02

Release Date: 1/8/2016 8:47:00 AM

By Lt. j.g. Eric Wooten, USS Texas Public Affairs

MANILA, Republic of the Philippines (NNS) -- Virginia-class fast-attack submarine USS Texas (SSN 775) arrived in Subic Bay Jan. 5 for a visit as part of its Indo-Asia-Pacific deployment.

With a crew of approximately 135, Texas conducts a multitude of missions to enhance proficiency of the submarine fleet.

Texas is the second submarine of its class commissioned by the United States and is operated by some of the Navy's finest and most well-trained officers and enlisted personnel.

'Texas Sailors are hardworking and downright dedicated,' said Master Chief Machinist's Mate Daniel Kloepfer, Texas's chief of the boat. 'Maintaining a forward-deployed nuclear submarine is not an easy task and Subic Bay will allow for some much deserved rest for the crew.'

For many crew members, this is their first visit to the Philippines.

'I can't wait to get to the Philippines for the first time,' said Electronics Technician 2nd Class Keagan Garber. 'I'm looking forward to exploring the great outdoors.'

Measuring more than 377 feet long and weighing more than 7,800 tons when submerged, Texas is one of the most technologically advanced submarines in the world. This submarine is capable of executing a multitude of missions including anti-submarine warfare, anti-surface ship warfare, strike, surveillance and reconnaissance, irregular warfare, mine warfare and shallow water operations.

Built in Newport News, Virginia, from 2002-2004, Texas established its home in Groton, Connecticut, before transferring to Pearl Harbor in 2009. The boat is sponsored by former first lady Laura Bush.

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U.S. Navy hypes Russia and China's challenge to its maritime superiority

People's Daily Online

By Yuan Can (People's Daily Online) 14:48, January 08, 2016

The U.S. is to strengthen its naval power in order to compete with rising Russian and Chinese military capabilities, the Chief of U.S. Naval Operations wrote in a recent strategy report.

John Richardson, Chief of U.S. Naval Operations, explained that the U.S. navy has to deepen operational relationships with other services, agencies, and industry partners who operate with the Navy to support their shared interests. Richardson's latest strategy, called 'A Design for Maintaining Maritime Superiority,' was unveiled on Jan. 5, 2016.

According to the new strategy, the U.S. is currently confronted with emerging rivals such as Russia and China, the nuclear ambition of North Korea and Iran, and the expansion of global terrorism.

In the report, Richardson identifies three forces that have profound implications for the United States Navy: the forces at play in the maritime system, the force of the information system, and the force of technology entering the environment as well as the interplay between them.

As for their emerging rivals, the report indicates that the Russian Navy is operating with a frequency and in areas not seen for almost two decades, and the Navy of Chinese People's Liberation Army is extending its reach around the world.

'Their goals are backed by a growing arsenal of high-end warfighting capabilities, many of which are focused specifically on our vulnerabilities and are increasingly designed from the ground up to leverage the maritime, technological and information systems,' said Richardson.

As the scope and complexity of the challenges they face change, there is a demand for a different approach. Of course, the competitors themselves have changed, too. The U.S. strategy must reckon with the pace of global technology, increased globalization, more heavily trafficked oceans and potential adversaries' fast-emerging new weaponry, said Richardson in the document.

Richardson also mentioned that the report will guide behavior and investment, both in 2016 and in the years to come. "More specific details about programs and funding adjustments will be reflected in our annual budget documents," said Richardson.

In response to the latest report released by the U.S., Yin Zhuo a military expert told CCTV that PLA Navy is speeding up its development in recent years. However the U.S. claims that PLA Navy impose threat to its navy. 'This is another kind of China Threat theory,' said Yin, 'The U.S. aims to strive for its naval status and funds shares among U.S. Army, U.S. Navy and U.S. Air Force.'

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ICRC concerned about Yemen hospital strikes

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 1:52PM

Amid Saudi Arabia's unrelenting military aggression against Yemen, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has expressed alarm about attacks targeting hospitals in the country, warning that lack of medical supplies has put the life of millions of people at risk.

In a report, the ICRC's outgoing health coordinator in Yemen, Monica Arpagaus, said hospitals are no longer the safe places they used to be as they have been repeatedly targeted by airstrikes.

The regime in Riyadh started the campaign on March 26, 2015. Over 7,500 people have been killed in airstrikes ever since.

"We have incidents where hospitals have been targeted and patients have been injured and staff have been killed," Arpagaus stated.

The Saudi campaign has been meant to undermine the Houthi Ansarullah movement and restore power to the fugitive former president, Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi, who is a staunch ally of Riyadh. Yemen is also reeling from a blockade imposed by Saudi Arabia.

'Drugs, medication and medical supplies have been prevented from crossing frontlines into hospitals which desperately need these supplies," Arpagaus added.

International organizations have repeatedly censured Saudi Arabia for the airstrikes on Yemen's infrastructure, including hospitals and schools, saying the campaign is taking a huge toll on the civilian population.

The ICRC report estimated that more than 100 combat sorties have targeted health care facilities over the past months of the campaign.

Shortage of medical supplies is threatening the lives of the injured, the report said, and doctors have to treat patients in damaged buildings, with poor equipment.

The ICRC called for the removal of barriers for the delivery of medical supplies as well as an end in attacks on health care facilities.

In Sana'a, anti-Saudi demo

Yemenis in the capital, Sana'a, and elsewhere have held demonstrations on an almost weekly basis in condemnation of the Saudi aggression.

On Friday, thousands of Yemenis took to the streets of the capital in protest against the Saudi airstrikes and the use of cluster bombs by Saudi warplanes.

The demonstrators urged the United Nations to prevent the regime in Riyadh from using the weapons against the people of Yemen.

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South Sudan govt. moves to share power with rebels

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 11:36AM

South Sudanese President Salva Kiir has taken several steps toward implementing a stalled peace accord and sharing power with the rebel forces in the country.

In a decree broadcast on state radio, President Kiir announced the appointment of 50 individuals to a would-be transitional parliament under the August 2015 peace accord.

The new parliament members have been named by the opposition faction led by former Vice President Riek Machar.

Under the deal, the MPs who had in 2013 been sacked because of siding with the rebels in the then fresh civil war in the country will be reinstated.

Kiir also agreed to share ministerial posts with the rebel forces.

According to the panel which oversees the implementation of a peace deal, President Kiir's faction would be given 16 ministerial posts, including those of defense, national security, finance and justice.

Rebels loyal to Machar will get 10 posts, including those of the minister of oil and humanitarian affairs.

Under the accord, Machar is to return to the capital, Juba, to assume responsibility as vice-president, a post from which he was sacked in 2013.

However, no timeline has been given for when the rebel leader or his ministers would take up their posts. Machar has yet to travel to the capital to take his position.

The developments come months after the warring sides in South Sudan clinched an accord to end the civil war that has killed thousands of people and displaced more than two-million others in the country.

Machar signed the agreement on August 17, 2015 while the South Sudanese president signed the peace deal about ten days later, on August 26 last year.

The power-sharing deal, which was brokered by the East African regional bloc IGAD, aimed to end the civil war in the world's youngest nation.

South Sudan plunged into chaos in December 2013, when fighting erupted outside the capital, Juba, between troops loyal to Kiir and defectors led by Machar.

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Saudi Arabia escalates airstrikes in Yemen

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 11:7AM

Saudi aircraft have intensified their airstrikes in Yemen, targeting Sana'a for the second day after dropping cluster bombs on the capital.

The central Ma'rib province came under the heaviest of attacks and was targeted by 20 airstrikes on Friday, Yemen's al-Masirah TV said.

Saudi jets bombed Sarvah in Ma'rib, causing extensive damage to the city's infrastructure, the report said.

A residential area in Ta'izz Province was also hit, as well as a number of houses in al-Jawf Province.

According to Yemeni media, the house of a prominent cleric in the small town of al-Ghail in Jawf was also targeted.

Saudi warplanes also bombed Sana'a a day after carrying out dozens of airstrikes in what residents described as the heaviest aerial attacks yet in nine months of aggression.

The Human Rights Watch confirmed cluster bomb attacks against residential areas of the Yemeni capital, saying it could amount to 'a war crime.'

Al-Masirah TV also reported a Saudi Apache helicopter having crashed in Yemen's northwestern Hajjah Province.

It was not immediately clear whether the chopper had been shot down by Yemeni armed forces or crashed due to technical reasons.

The Yemeni army and allied forces, meanwhile, clashed with Saudi forces at the al-Tawl border crossing, which links the northwestern province of Hajjah to Saudi Arabia's Jizan.

On Tuesday, Saudi warplanes destroyed a rehabilitation center for the blind in the Alsafyeh neighborhood of Sana'a.

A spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights later confirmed that the aerial raid had struck the al- Noor Center for Care and Rehabilitation of Blind in the capital.

The regime in Riyadh began the military attacks against Yemen on March 26, 2015. The airstrikes are supposedly meant to undermine Houthis and restore power to Yemen's fugitive former President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi.

More than 7,500 people have been killed and over 14,000 injured since the Saudi airstrikes began in late March.

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Venezuela army vows loyalty to President Maduro

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 6:5AM

Venezuela's army has announced "absolute loyalty" to President Nicolas Maduro, amid a standoff between the government and the opposition-controlled parliament, which is seeking to oust him.

General Vladimir Padrino, the defense minister and chief of armed forces, said on Thursday that the country's military was resolute in its support for Maduro.

"The president is the highest authority of the state and we reiterate our absolute loyalty and unconditional support for him," Padrino said.

This came after the center-right opposition laid claim to a majority in the parliament  the National Assembly  that would allow it to restrict the powers of Maduro.

The opposition also wants to use the mandate to remove Supreme Court judges, appoint key officials such as a new attorney general and a national comptroller, and even rewrite the constitution.

The portraits of former President Hugo Chavez were removed from the assembly building during the first regular legislative session on Wednesday.

Padrino criticized the removal of the photos, and so did the government, which vowed to fill the streets of the capital, Caracas, with the pictures of Chavez and Simon Bolivar, the country's 19th-century independence icon.

Also on Thursday, the socialist government applied to the Supreme Court to nullify any legislation passed by the new assembly.

The government also said the opposition's majority in the National Assembly is illegitimate as the assembly swore in three anti-government lawmakers who had earlier been barred from the parliament by the Supreme Court in an injunction sought by Maduro.

The move gave the opposition a super-majority in the legislative body.

"This is an illegal parliament and therefore its decisions are illegal and null. The decisions made in that circus they have set up should be ignored," said Pedro Carreno, the deputy head of the ruling United Socialist Party.

Carreno also accused the opposition of plotting a coup against the socialist government.

The opposition United Democratic Roundtable won a victory over Maduro's United Socialist Party in a December 2015 vote, and took control of the National Assembly for the first time since 1999, when Chavez had risen to power.

Newly-elected National Assembly Speaker Henry Ramos Allup has said he would find a way to have Maduro ousted within six months. Maduro's presidential term will end in 2019.

The opposition accuses Maduro's government of mismanaging the economy and leading the oil-rich country to poverty.

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139 Taliban militants killed across Afghanistan

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 12:54AM

About 140 members of the Taliban militant group have been killed in a series of Afghan army operations against the extremists across the country.

Provincial police chief, Brigadier General Abdul Rahman Sarjang, said on Wednesday that 120 Taliban terrorists have been killed in an offensive in the Marjah district of the southern province of Helmand since Monday.

"We have had a lot of achievements from this operation and we will continue until we free Marjah from Taliban," he added.

Sarjang also said that the main road leading to the restive district, which remained blocked for two years, is now open to traffic.

The top Afghan security official further noted that police forces have beefed up their presence in Marjah, giving assurances that Taliban could not stage a comeback.

Elsewhere in the country, Afghan army troops backed by security forces killed nearly 20 Taliban militants in a series of mop-up operations.

The Afghan Interior Ministry said in a statement on Wednesday that 19 militants were killed and two others injured in a series of operations carried out in the provinces of Ghazni, Herat, Kandahar, Laghman, Paktia, Paktika, Sar-e Pol and Urozgan.

The statement added that one Taliban member was also arrested during the offensives, without providing any information about potential casualties among soldiers and security forces.

Afghan soldiers also confiscated light and heavy weaponry and defused several rounds of improvised explosive devices.

Afghanistan is gripped by insecurity 14 years after the United States and its allies attacked the country as part of Washington's so-called war on terror.

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The Taliban's Rare Winter Offensive In Afghanistan

January 08, 2016

by Frud Bezhan

The Taliban is waging an unusually aggressive campaign of violence in Afghanistan this winter, unleashing deadly bombings in the capital, threatening to overrun a strategic southern province, and attacking a foreign consulate.

Afghanistan's mountainous terrain and heavy snowfall have traditionally prompted a winter lull in fighting, with the militants using the colder months to rest and regroup ahead of an annual spring offensive.

There are several reasons why there has been no letup this winter, marking a seeming shift in the Taliban's decade-long insurgency.

Bargaining Chip

The Taliban is trying to strengthen its negotiating hand amid a renewed international push to revive peace talks with the militant group, say analysts.

On January 11, Afghanistan and Pakistan are set to hold a first round of talks also involving the United States and China to try to agree a comprehensive road map for peace. Pakistan, which is said to wield considerable influence over the Taliban, hosted a breakthrough first round of talks in July.

'The surge in winter violence in Afghanistan appears to be timed with the pressure on Pakistan to induce the Taliban to join peace talks,' Mohammad Taqi, a U.S.-based Pakistan political analyst, said.

'Pakistan seems to be betting on its Taliban proxy gaining a toehold such as in Helmand Province' -- where the Taliban is engaged in fierce fighting with Afghan and U.S. special forces after threatening to overturn several districts -- 'and then to present that as a fait accompli to the Afghan government and the U.S.'

Taqi added that whether or not the Taliban gains new territory, the violence will be used as leverage in talks.

The Washington Post last month quoted Western and Afghan officials as saying that 'the Taliban now holds more [Afghan] territory than in any year since 2001,' when the U.S.-led invasion ousted the Taliban regime that controlled much of the country.

Information gathered by the United Nations through October suggested UN security officials also rated the Taliban threat level as 'high' or 'extreme' in more Afghan administrative districts than at any time since 2001.

It is unclear whether the Taliban, which has previously maintained it will not hold talks with Kabul, will be represented in the Islamabad talks. Afghan officials have said they expect the militants to join the peace process at a later time.

'The Taliban keep themselves open to different scenarios,' said Thomas Ruttig, co-director of the Afghanistan Analysts Network, an independent think tank in Kabul. 'One, taking over the country again by military means. Second, if that's not possible, to get a part in government through talks. In both scenarios, making military gains helps.'

Power Play

Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansur is trying to tighten his grip on power, and analysts say the high-profile attacks could boost his standing within the fractured group.

Mansur was declared the new Taliban leader in July after the Afghan government confirmed that Taliban spiritual leader Mullah Mohammad Omar had died in Pakistan in 2013. But a leadership tussle ensued and some Taliban commanders have refused to recognize Mansur. A breakaway Taliban faction has openly challenged the new leadership.

Mansur was seriously injured in a firefight at a meeting of Taliban militant commanders in neighboring Pakistan in December, exposing the divisions.

'Mullah Mansur wants to show that he is the leader and that he can do what Mullah Omar did,' said Abdul Waheed Wafa, the director of the Afghanistan Center at Kabul University.

As of November, about 7,000 members of the Afghan security forces had been killed this year, with 12,000 injured, a 26 percent increase over the total number of dead and wounded in all of 2014.

Crowded Battlefield

A number of new actors have entered the scene in Afghanistan recently, contributing to the surging violence as rival militant groups vie for territory and influence.

The breakaway Taliban faction, the High Council of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, announced its arrival in November. Led by Mullah Mohammad Rasul, a former Taliban governor, the group has clashed with rival Taliban fighters for months.

Gunmen loyal to the Islamic State (IS) group are also increasing their footprint in Afghanistan, where they are attempting to establish a regional base. IS militants have been engaged in an escalating tit-for-tat war with government militias in eastern Afghanistan. Meanwhile, the Taliban's special forces have reportedly been deployed to hunt down the extremists.

'One of the factors for a very violent last six months has been the emergence of another Taliban group and also Daesh,' said Wafa, using an Arabic phrase for IS. 'There are a lot of reports from eastern Afghanistan of a bloody fight between the Taliban and Daesh.'

Pakistan-India Peace

There are also suspicions that elements within the Pakistani military establishment that have supported the Taliban are using the militants to attack Indian interests in Afghanistan and derail overtures from the Pakistani government toward New Delhi.

Pakistan and India recently agreed to relaunch peace talks, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a surprise visit to Pakistan to meet Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in December, the first by an Indian head of government in more than a decade, hours after visiting Kabul.

But analysts warned that two attacks on Indian interests recently -- a siege on the Indian consulate in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e Sharif that ended on January 4 and a deadly assault on an air base in India -- could undermine peace efforts.

'The attack on the air base in Pathankot was timed to scuttle the Modi-Nawaz peace move,' said Taqi. 'It was calibrated to target a military facility and not unleash havoc like the 2008 Mumbai attacks,' he said, referring to the coordinated bombings and shootings by a Pakistani-based militant group that killed more than 160 people and brought the archrivals to the brink of war.

'This recent attack throws a spanner in the talks and yet will not trigger a military response from India,' Taqi added.

The latest attacks in India and Afghanistan have been linked to Pakistani militant outfits. The four gunmen who attacked the Indian consulate in Mazar-e Sharif are believed to be members of the banned Jaish-e-Mohammed militant group, which is based in Pakistan.

Before being killed, the gunmen wrote an Urdu-language message in their own blood stating that their goal was to avenge the killing of Afzal Guru, a member of the group who was hanged in 2013 for his role in the 2000 attack on the parliament building in New Delhi.

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/taliban-rare-winter-offensive/27477046.html

Copyright (c) 2016. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Turkish Fighter Jets Violate Greek Airspace Over Aegean Sea Again

Sputnik News

13:48 08.01.2016(updated 13:52 08.01.2016)

A formation of four Turkish fighter jets violated Greek air space in the northeastern Aegean Thursday, the Greek Defense Ministry said, adding that two of the aircraft were armed.

The intruders strayed into Greek airspace three times and on each occasion Greek air defenders scrambled interceptors to identify the Turkish jets and chase them off, the Athens-based daily newspaper Kathimerini reported on Friday.

"Ankara's provocative actions are meant to tell the world that Turkey does not recognize the existing air and sea borders in the Eastern Mediterranean,"Greece's former deputy military chief of staff Frangoulis Frangos told the Moscow-based newspaper Rossiiskaya Gazeta.

Turkey refuses to recognize a 10-mile airspace zone around Greek islands in the Aegean Sea, which led to at least 1,300 airspace violations in 2015, 31 of which took place over Greek territory.

Turkey has a long history of straying into Greek airspace, with incidents rising over the past several years to 2,224 in 2014.

Intruding flights over Greek territory more than doubled in 2015, compared to the previous year.

 Sputnik

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Authorities Lose Track of US Hellfire Missile, Wrongly Ship Weapon to Cuba

Sputnik News

07:00 08.01.2016

An inert air-to-surface Hellfire missile, produced by the United States and intended for training purposes in Europe, was shipped to Cuba by mistake, local media report.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  US authorities have tried to retrieve the missile from the Cuban government for over a year, The Wall Street Journal said on Thursday citing people familiar with the matter. The officials have also been working on establishing what actions led to the mistake made in 2014.

The missile manufacturer, Lockheed Martin, sent the weapon to Spain from Orlando International Airport in early 2014, after acquiring permission from the State Department.

The Hellfire missile was later used in a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) military exercise, according to media reports. Following the training, it was eventually delivered to Germany, and was expected to be loaded on a Florida-bound flight. However, officials discovered that the missile was for unclear reasons placed on an Air France flight to Havana.

People familiar with the incident said US authorities have been concerned that Cuba could share the sensitive military technology with such nations as China, Russia and North Korea, according to media reports.

At present, the US State Department is probing whether the redirection of the weapon was a criminal act.

 Sputnik

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'Alarming' outbreak of violence in new area of South Sudan uproots 15,000, UN reports

8 January 2016  Fighting between armed groups and Government soldiers and an apparent breakdown in law and order in South Sudan's Western Equatoria state, with hundreds of houses burned down or looted, has uprooted 15,000 people over the past five weeks, and 500 a day are now pouring into Uganda, the United Nations refugee agency reported today.

'Sporadic gunfire is commonplace, and there has also been an increase in crime involving car-jackings, attacks on Government property, looting of civilian homes and sexual assaults reportedly by armed youth,' UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) spokesperson Adrian Edwards told a news briefing in Geneva.

"Overall, these are alarming developments for a region of South Sudan that has until now been relatively stable," he added.

The country, which only gained independence in 2009 after breaking away from Sudan, its northern neighbour, was thrown into turmoil when conflict erupted between President Salva Kiir and his former Vice-President Riek Machar two years ago, killing thousands, displacing over 2.4 million people, 650,000 of whom fled abroad, and impacting the food security of 4.6 million.

Just last month the Security Council increased the strength of the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) by over 1,000 to a ceiling of 15,000 troops and police, citing protection of civilians "by all necessary means" as its top priority after repeated ceasefire violations by both the Government and opposition undermined UN and regional efforts to restore peace and stability.

Mr. Edwards reported that a recent UN mission to Yambio, 300 kilometres west of Juba, the capital, found nearly 200 houses burnt down and several hundred others looted. People have taken refuge in the town centre or moved to nearby villages. UN estimates put those displaced in Western Equatoria's Yambio and Tambura counties at 15,000 since the start of December.

The violence is also driving people to flee hundreds of kilometres to the southeast to neighbouring Uganda where 500 refugees have been registered every day since the beginning of this week  a quadrupling in recent numbers. As well as the violence, refugees cite food insecurity due to failed crops as a reason for their flight.

Last month, UNHCR reported that fighting in Western Equatoria, which until then had been spared much of the violence that has hit other parts of the country, had displaced over 4,000 people into a remote region of north-eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

As of 6 January, registered new arrivals, most in the Dungu area, had risen to 6,181, some 4,164 of them South Sudan nationals and 2,017 Congolese, who had been living as refugees in South Sudan. The influx there has continued into 2016 but at a much reduced rate, with the Government refugee agency recording 268 in the past week.

The implications for humanitarian access to an estimated 7,400 refugees living in Western Equatoria are very worrying, Mr. Edwards said. UNHCR is in contact with Government authorities regarding the security of those refugees and has agreed on additional UNMISS force protection through increased patrols as well as support to relocate refugees to safer areas.

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Chad: UN provides emergency funds for tens of thousands displaced by Boko Haram violence

8 January 2016  With nearly 200,000 people in Chad in need of urgent aid  50,000 of them uprooted by Boko Haram terrorists from Nigeria  the United Nations emergency fund today announced a $7 million grant, the second in five months, and called on international donors to provide much more.

"This funding is crucial, because in spite of all the efforts made by humanitarian actors since the beginning of the year 2015, the situation remains of deep concern," UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) Chad Director Florent Mehaule said.

"The humanitarian response faces several challenges, including difficulties in accessing the populations in need due to insecurity, as well as a lack of resources," he said.

The funds come from the UN Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF), set up 10 years ago to provide immediate financing for both sudden-onset and long-festering crises, which in August awarded $21 million to UN partners in Sudan and Chad to sustain basic services and protection for millions of people who have fled Sudan's strife-torn Darfur region.

The new aid will assist over 50,000 Chadians forced by violence and insecurity to flee the islands of Lake Chad over the past six months for refuge in dozens of displaced people's sites, villages and districts in the prefectures of Baga-Sola, Bol, Daboua, Kangalom and Liwa.

In addition, 15,000 Chadian returnees from Nigeria, 14,000 Nigerian refugees and over 700 third-country nationals need urgent aid. The displacements have also affected vulnerable host communities, among whom 112,000 people are in need of assistance.

"Our priority through this CERF funding, is to bring life-saving assistance to the people mostly affected by this crisis: displaced persons, refugees, and vulnerable host populations, whose livelihood activities - fishing, agriculture, and pastoralism - are limited by insecurity," Stephen Tull, UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Chad, declared.

With nine CERF-approved projects over the next six months, UN agencies along with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and State services will provide food, protection, health, and education.

The funds will be managed by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), the World Food Programme (WFP), and the World Health Organization (WHO).

The situation remains very volatile in the lake region, where over 16,000 newly displaced people, not covered by this CERF allocation, have been identified in the western area due to the latest military operations.

"CERF is the main donor for this crisis," Mr. Tull said. "Considering the severity of the situation, this funding alone will not cover all needs. Broader donor mobilization is essential in order to respond to most urgent needs and also  in medium and long term  to support the development of this region, including access to basic services and the strengthening of livelihoods."

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US Drone Strike Kills at Least 17 IS Militants in Afghanistan

by Ayaz Gul January 08, 2016

A suspected US drone strike Friday killed at least 17 Islamic State militants in eastern Afghanistan shortly after the extremist group beheaded seven people in the same area, said officials and residents.

The violence occurred in the remote Achin district of Nangarhar province, which borders Pakistan. The volatile district is where IS is believed to have setup its strong bases.

Ataullah Khogyani, a provincial governor spokesman, told VOA that six Taliban insurgents were among those beheaded by Daesh, the Arabic acronym for IS. He added that while the executions were being carried out missiles fired by an unmanned US aircraft hit the area, killing 17 Daesh fighters, including several key commanders.

Sources tell VOA the beheadings took place in the afternoon shortly after Friday prayers in front of local villagers and a member of the Afghan National Army was also among the victims. Khogyani, however, would not confirm it.

The Taliban this week launched attacks against IS bases in two districts around Achin, killing dozens of fighters of the rival group and evicting them from these areas, according to local officials.

This is not the first time IS has beheaded people in Afghanistan after establishing its footprint in the country.

On Wednesday, Afghan Acting Defense Minister Masoom Stanekzai told VOA that the government has formed a special force to counter Islamic State in eastern parts of the country.

IS has been active in several districts of Nangarhar, where it launched multiple attacks on government facilities.

IS militants have also been engaged in fierce fighting with the rival Taliban in the province. Dozens of insurgents reportedly have been killed in the fighting between the two militant groups.

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South Sudan Rebels Hail New Power-Sharing Deal

by James Butty January 08, 2016

Rebels loyal to former South Sudan Vice President Riek Machar are hailing a power sharing deal reached Thursday with the government as a positive breakthrough, one that they say brings their country one more step closer to peace.

The agreement, signed Thursday in Juba, allocates a total of 30 ministries for a proposed transitional government of national unity. It gives the South Sudan government 16 ministries, including finance and planning, defense, information, national security, and justice and constitutional affairs. The rebels got 10 ministries, including petroleum, interior, labor, mining, and land, housing and urban development. Foreign affairs and transport were given to a group of former political detainees not aligned with either the South Sudan government or the rebels. Other political parties in South Sudan got two.

Ezekiel Lol Gatkuoth, secretary for foreign affairs of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement in Opposition, said the rebels will abide by the agreement even if it doesn't meet all their demands.

"We cannot say that we are satisfied with what we have, but this an agreement that we have signed on to. Anything that we have signed on to, even it is not satisfying what we wanted, we must implement it as it is. So we are happy with the ministries that we have selected starting with the ministry of interior, ministry of petroleum, and ministry of higher education, science and technology, ministry of energy and dams, ministry of education and water technology, and ministry of humanitarian affairs," he said.

Gatkuoth said their 10 ministries are geared toward delivering well-needed services to ordinary South Sudanese.

Gatkuoth said the rebels have submitted the list of their parliament members to the Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission (JMEC), set up by IGAD to monitor the implementation of the August peace agreement.

'So this is a serious breakthrough, and we congratulated the people of South Sudan for waiting, and now finally they will have a government in place soon," he said.

According to the Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission timetable, a government of national unity should be in place by January 22, 2016, with rebel leader Machar as first vice president of Sudan.

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Thousands Flee as South Sudan Violence Intensifies

by Lisa Schlein January 08, 2016

The United Nations refugee agency reports thousands of people in South Sudan's Western Equatoria State are fleeing from growing violence and criminality. The outflow adds to the already huge problem of displacement both inside and outside this conflict-ridden country.

The UNHCR calls the violence between armed groups and government forces in Western Equatoria State particularly alarming because the region, until now, has been relatively stable.

South Sudan's two-year-long civil war has produced one of the world's largest humanitarian emergencies. More than 2.3 million people have been forced to flee their homes, including some 650,000 who have sought refuge in neighboring countries.

Besides the localized fighting among warring factions, UNHCR spokesman Adrian Edwards says an apparent breakdown of law and order in and near Yambio, some 300 kilometers west of the capital, Juba, also is causing people to uproot themselves.

"Sporadic gunfire has become commonplace,' Edwards said. 'There has also been an increase in crime involving sexual assaults against women and children and girls, carjackings, attacks on government property, looting of civilian homes reportedly by youth. There was a recent U.N. mission to Yambio that found nearly 200 houses were burnt down in the neighborhood of Ikpiro, which is in the north of the town, and several hundred others were looted. People have taken refuge in the town center, in Yambio, or moved to nearby villages."

The UNHCR estimates that 15,000 people have become displaced in Western Equatoria State since heavy clashes broke out in the region's capital early last month.

The agency reports the violence is also causing people to flee across borders. Since the beginning of this week, it says about 500 refugees have been arriving in neighboring Uganda every day -- a quadrupling of recent numbers.

Refugees say they also are fleeing because of a shortage of food, due to failed crops.

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Last Kuwaiti prisoner at Guantanamo repatriated

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 10:57PM

The last Kuwaiti inmate at the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has been transferred to his country, the Pentagon says.

After spending more than 13 years in the notorious detention facility, Faez Mohammed Ahmed al-Kandari was transferred to Kuwait on Friday. He was accused of being an al-Qaeda propagandist.

The Pentagon said in a statement that al-Kandari's detention 'does not remain necessary to protect against a continuing significant threat to the security of the United States.'

Al-Kandari is slated to undergo a rehabilitation program to help him reintegrate into society, Eric Lewis, his lawyer in Washington, said.

Lewis noted that al-Kandari was the last of 12 Kuwaiti inmates who had been kept at Guantanamo.

The release reduced the number of detainees at the prison to 104, 45 of them already approved for transfer, according to Reuters.

'It's a good illustration of our effort to chip away at the population there and to try to resolve these individual cases in a way that's consistent with our national security interests,' Josh Earnest, White House spokesman, said Friday.

Guantanamo was established by former president George W. Bush's administration as a prison for alleged foreign terrorism suspects following the September 11, 2001, attacks in the US.

As many as 775 suspects are said to have been brought to the facility ever since its establishment.

Washington claims the prisoners are terror suspects, but has not pressed charges against most of them in any court. Many detainees have gone on hunger strike for months to draw attention to their plight at the US military prison.

President Barack Obama had promised to close the Guantanamo Bay prison in his 2008 election campaign, citing its damage to America's reputation abroad. However, he has so far failed to deliver on that pledge due to stiff opposition from Congress.

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Russian Hacker Sandworm Blamed For Ukraine Power Outage

January 08, 2016

by RFE/RL

U.S. cyberintelligence firm iSight Partners said it is certain that a Russian hacking group known as Sandworm caused last month's unprecedented power outage in Ukraine.

'We believe that Sandworm was responsible,' iSight's director of espionage analysis, John Hultquist, told Reuters.

ISight and other cybersecurity companies had been leaning toward blaming Sandworm, a nebulous, Moscow-based hacking group that has been strategically aligned with the Russian government, because of the Ukraine hackers' use of BlackEnergy malware associated with Sandworm.

U.S. security agencies have suspected that Russia was behind the Ukraine power outage as well as similar attacks in the United States and Europe, but have not publicly named any culprits to date.

Ukraine's state security service has blamed Russia for the blackout affecting 80,000 customers in western Ukraine on December 23.

ISight came to the conclusion it was Sandworm based on its analysis of BlackEnergy 3 and KillDisk malware used in the attack, and intelligence from 'sensitive sources,' Hultquist told Reuters.

Hultquist said it is not clear whether Sandworm is working directly for the Russian government. The group is named Sandworm because its malware is embedded with references to the 'Dune' science-fiction series.

'It is a Russian actor operating with alignment to the interest of the state,' Hultquist said. 'Whether or not it's freelance, we don't know.'

To date, Sandworm has primarily engaged in espionage, including a string of attacks in the United States using BlackEnergy that prompted a December 2014 alert from the Department of Homeland Security, according to iSight.

That alert said a sophisticated malware campaign had compromised some U.S. industrial control systems.

While no outages or physical destruction was reported as a result of those attacks in the United States and similar ones in Europe, some experts said that may be simply because the attackers did not want to go that far.

ISight said the earlier attacks outside Ukraine may have been experimental in nature.

"ISight believes the activity is Russian in origin and the intrusions they carried out against U.S. and European SCADA systems were reconnaissance for attack," an iSight spokesperson told Infosecurity Magazine.

'It's not a major stretch to conclude the difference in the outcomes of the attacks in the Ukraine versus those in the U.S. were an issue of intent, not capability,' Eric Cornelius, managing director of cybersecurity firm Cylance Inc. and a former U.S. homeland security official responsible for securing critical infrastructure, told Reuters.

ISight said Sandworm has been staging attacks against Ukrainian officials and media for some time. During Ukrainian elections last fall, for example, Sandworm's 'malware of choice,' BlackEnergy, was allegedly used in destructive attacks against Ukrainian media.

With reporting by Reuters, Daily Beast, and Infosecurity Magazine

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/russian-hacker-sandworm- blamed-ukraine-power-outage/27474835.html

Copyright (c) 2016. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Going After Terrorists Online, White House Meets With US Tech Companies

by Molly McKitterick January 08, 2016

Fighting the battle against terrorism on the Internet, the White House and its top law enforcement officials met Friday with the nation's biggest technology companies in San Jose, California.

The list of government participants reveals just how seriously the Obama administration is taking the threat posed by Islamic State and others on social media. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, FBI Director James Comey and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper were there with President Barack Obama's chief of staff and his top counterterrorism adviser.

They were expected to brief executives from tech companies on how terrorists use technology, including encryption, and to discuss ways to use technology to make it harder for terrorists to use the Internet for recruiting and mobilizing followers.

The meeting agenda, leaked to various news organizations, also called for a discussion on how the government and tech companies can 'help others to create, publish and amplify alternative content that would undercut' the Islamic State.

Obama had signaled in a December speech that he was going after terrorists online, saying he planned to 'urge high-tech and law enforcement leaders to make it harder for terrorists to use technology to escape from justice.'

A senior administration official confirmed Friday that this meeting was part of a larger push, saying it "is the latest in the administration's continuing dialogue with technology providers and others to ensure we are bringing our best private and public sector thinking to combating terrorism.'

The tech companies, which included Apple, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and LinkedIn, say they remove violent content when it appears. They have also expressed reluctance to interfere with constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech.

In a December study, researchers at the George Washington University Program on Extremism concluded that "media plays a crucial role in the radicalization and, at times, mobilization of U.S.-based ISIS sympathizers."

The researchers identified some 300 American and/or U.S.-based IS sympathizers active on social media who were spreading disinformation and interacting with like-minded individuals.

"Some members of this online echo chamber eventually make the leap from keyboard warriors to actual militancy," the researchers warned.

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Drug Lord 'El Chapo' Recaptured in Mexico

by VOA News January 08, 2016

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto says authorities have captured fugitive drug lord Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman, who brazenly escaped from prison through a secret underground tunnel seven months ago.

The president announced Guzman's capture in a brief announcement in Spanish Friday on Twitter: 'Mission accomplished. We have him.'

A Mexican official told The Associated Press that Guzman was arrested after a shootout with Mexican marines in the city of Los Mochis in Sinaloa, Guzman's home state.

Acting on a tip, authorities said a squad of Mexican marines raided a house in Los Mochis at dawn Friday, and gunfire broke out immediately.

Mexican officials said five suspects were killed and six others arrested. One of the marines was slightly wounded.

U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch called the capture 'a victory for the citizens of both Mexico and the United States, and a vindication of the rule of law in our countries.'

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said it was 'extremely pleased' with the news.

Lynch did not mention Guzman's possible extradition to the United States. The kingpin faces charges in multiple jurisdictions across the United States. The U.S. has sought his extradition, though Mexico in the past has said he would serve sentences in Mexico first.

Mexican federal authorities had been focusing their manhunt since October on a mountainous region of Sinaloa, in northwestern Mexico. Tracking teams had reported it appeared that Guzman had been injured while fleeing marines in rugged terrain near the borders of Sinaloa and Durango states.

Guzman's July 11 prison escape - his second in the past 14 years - was accomplished through a 1.5-kilometer-long underground tunnel, dig in secret from his cell to a nearby village. It was a major embarrassment to the administration of President Pena Nieto, which had been praised for its aggressive push against Mexico's top drug lords.

Guzman was first captured in 1993, but escaped in 2001 with the help of prison guards. After more than a decade on the loose, he was recaptured early in 2014, with the help of intelligence that U.S. authorities provided to Mexico.

Mexico has issued arrest warrants for more than 20 former officials, guards and police officers for their alleged participation in Guzman's escape last year. Ten civilians are also in detention.

Guzman escaped through a rectangular hole found underneath a shower of his prison cell, moving through a fully-ventilated tunnel equipped with electric lighting. Authorities also found a motorcycle modified to run on rails; the vehicle apparently was used to haul tools and dirt away from the subterranean site during construction.

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China wary as S.Korea, US discuss deployment

People's Daily Online

(Global Times) 09:09, January 08, 2016

China on Thursday expressed concern over the current developments on the Korean Peninsula, urging all members of the Six-Party Talks to return to the negotiation table after South Korea and the US discussed deploying strategic weapons in response to North Korea's nuclear test.

Analysts believe the deployment on the Korean Peninsula will further aggravate tensions in Northeast Asia and risk upsetting China and Russia.

Peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia meet the common interests of all concerned, foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said Thursday at a regular press briefing.

China is determined to advance denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula and settle the nuclear issue through the Six-Party Talks, she said.

The talks stalled in 2008, with the North quitting the process in 2009.

South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Lee Sun-jin and US Forces Korea commander Curtis Scaparrotti on Wednesday discussed the deployment of US strategic assets on the Korean Peninsula, including a nuclear-powered submarine, the F-22 stealth combat fighter and the B-52 bomber, a South Korean military official said Thursday.

South Korea also said it would resume propaganda broadcasts by loudspeaker into North Korea from Friday, which is likely to infuriate Pyongyang, Reuters reported.

'The military deployment is possible as the US will not dismiss the chance to expand its military presence in the Asia-Pacific region, neither will its ally Japan,' Lu Chao, a researcher at the Liaoning Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times.

Moreover, the US is overreacting as military deployment would only aggravate tensions in the region and the situation may spiral out of control, especially if there are any incidents, he said.

US President Barack Obama spoke to his South Korean counterpart Park Geun-hye Thursday. The two agreed to forge a united and strong international response and that North Korea should pay the corresponding price, the Yonhap News Agency reported.

Obama also said the US would take measures to ensure the security of its allies, including Japan, during a phone conversation with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe Thursday morning, the Xinhua News Agency reported.

After North Korea last tested a nuclear device in 2013, Washington sent a pair of nuclear-capable B-2 stealth bombers on a sortie over South Korea in a show of force. At the time, North Korea responded by threatening a nuclear strike on the US.

North Korea's official media announced it had successfully conducted its first hydrogen bomb test at 10 am on Wednesday, its fourth nuclear test.

No pollution

Separately, US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Wednesday that China should take the lead in tackling North Korea, Reuters reported Thursday.

'China has total control,' Trump said on Fox News. 'They have total control over North Korea, and China should solve that problem. And if they don't solve the problem, we should make trade very difficult for China.'

'Trump is being ignorant and ridiculous. China was not informed in advance and has also been a victim of the test as a neighbor of North Korea,' said Lu.

The test site, in the northeast of the country at the Punggye-ri nuclear site, is only 100 kilometers from the Chinese border.

According to sample tests on water, air and soil in Northeast China's border cities, together with weather forecasts for the coming week, North Korea's nuclear test will not cause any pollution in China, the Ministry of Environmental Protectionannounced on its website Thursday.

The US should take the major responsibility, said Lu, as according to the North Korean statement, the test was mainly targeting the US. It was also a result of the failed US policy to hold a contradictory approach to address the nuclear issue of North Korea.

The US, European Council members and Japan would seek to expand existing UN sanctions against Pyongyang if the latest North Korean nuclear test was confirmed, several Western diplomats said, Reuters reported.

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DPRK begins propaganda broadcasts across border after S.Korea's resumption

People's Daily Online

(Xinhua) 16:18, January 08, 2016

SEOUL, Jan. 8 -- The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on Friday began its anti-South Korea propaganda broadcasts in border areas in response to Seoul's resumption of anti-DPRK broadcasts, Yonhap news agency reported.

A government official was quoted as saying that the DPRK military began anti-South Korea broadcasts in some of its frontline units with loudspeakers, aimed at preventing DPRK soldiers from hearing broadcasts from the South.

The South Korean military resumed propaganda broadcasts from noon as planned at 11 locations along the inter-Korean border, installed with a set of large loudspeakers.

The resumption, which Pyongyang had called as a 'direct act of declaring war,' came in retaliation for what the DPRK claimed was its first successful test of a 'hydrogen bomb' on Wednesday.



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Germany Considers Deploying Troops Near Libya to Train Government Forces

Sputnik News

21:57 09.01.2016(updated 22:02 09.01.2016)

Berlin is considering the deployment of between 150-200 troops near Libya to assist with the training of the Libyan armed forces, Der Spiegel reports, citing internal German army plans.

'According to internal [government] plans, German soldiers could, along with Italian colleagues, begin to train the Libyan armed forces within the next few months,' the German daily reported on Saturday.

For safety reasons, the newspaper noted, the forces would be deployed to neighboring Tunisia.

The mission, aimed at helping to stem the spread of the Daesh (ISIL/ISIS) terror group in Libya, could involve between 150 to 200 Bundeswehr troops, and would be modelled along Berlin's ongoing mission training Kurdish Peshmerga fighters in northern Iraq.

The German Defense Ministry has not denied the report, a Defense Ministry spokesman saying only that now is 'not the time for speculation about a military deployment, but rather for diplomatic negotiations,' according to Deutsche Welle.

The mission, Der Spiegel explains, would be possible only after rival factions in the war-torn country agree to form a unity government.

Descending into chaos in 2011 following a Western-backed military effort to oust Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, Libya's internationally recognized government was forced in 2014 to retreat to the eastern city of Tobruk.

The possible deployment comes amid Germany's growing involvement in the Western coalition's war against Daesh. On January 6, Berlin confirmed that it would be deploying an additional 550 troops to missions against Islamist militants in Mali and Iraq. Last month, German lawmakers voted to send a frigate, Tornado reconnaissance aircraft and up to 1,200 troops to the region. German involvement does not include a direct combat role.

 Sputnik

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New US sanctions on Iran will undermine JCPOA: MP

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 3:52PM

A senior Iranian lawmaker says possible adoption of new sanctions against Iran by the US will harm a nuclear agreement reached between Tehran and the P5+1 group of countries last July.

The US is creating obstacles in the way of implementing the nuclear agreement, dubbed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), to express its dissatisfaction with its absence in Iran's markets, Chairman of the Iranian Parliament (Majlis) Committee on National Security and Foreign Policy, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, said on Friday.

The US sought to advance its own economic interests in the JCPOA but we are witnessing in practice that the United States has been denied the chance for presence in Iran's markets, Boroujerdi added.

The JCPOA, reached between Iran and the P5+1  the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia plus Germany  in the Austrian capital of Vienna on July 14, 2015, puts limits on Iran's nuclear activities in exchange for the removal of all economic and financial nuclear-related sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

In a letter to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on October 21, 2015, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei enumerated certain points on the implementation of the JCPOA and issued directives to be heeded in that regard, among them the government's duty to check the imports of goods from the US.

Congress to vote on fresh new sanctions

The Foreign Affairs Committee in the US House of Representatives on Thursday approved a bill that would limit President Barack Obama's ability to lift anti-Iran sanctions as stipulated in the JCPOA.

The bill is designed to prevent the removal of certain Iranian individuals and financial institutions from the US Treasury Department's sanctions list, until Obama assures Congress that they were not involved in Iran's ballistic missiles program or alleged terrorist activities.

The House committee's bill, which is scheduled for a vote in the full Congress this week, targets more than 50 individuals and entities included in an attachment to the nuclear agreement, as well as the Treasury's 'Specially Designated Nationals' list.

Boroujerdi further said that Iran and six world powers are likely to start implementing the JCPOA in the near future, adding that European countries will have an active presence in Iran's markets but the US would be denied such an opportunity.

"This is while the Americans sought to increase their economic revenues through the JCPOA," the Iranian lawmaker added.

He warned that the adoption of the new US bill would violate and undermine the JCPOA.

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Analysts: Nuclear Deal Plays Role in US Response to Iran, Saudi Crisis

by Pamela Dockins January 08, 2016

The U.S. response to the rift in relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran may be influenced, in part, by a U.S. desire to see the Iran nuclear deal implemented, according to analysts studying the crisis.

'What is paramount is for [U.S. President Barack] Obama to protect the Iran deal,' said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran analyst with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

In a Friday forum, Sadjadpour said there is currently not a clear U.S. 'siding' with Saudi Arabia, whereas in the past, the U.S. had been in 'lock step' with the Gulf kingdom against Iran. That change has angered Saudi officials.

"If [the Iran nuclear deal] is at the top of your agenda,' Sadjadpour said, 'that means that the administration's perspective is that they are going to try to do everything they can to de-escalate tension with Iran.'

Secretary of State John Kerry said Thursday that nuclear negotiators could be 'days away' from implementing the agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. Launching the agreement would be the culmination of nearly two years of intense negotiations among Iran, the U.S. and other world powers.

Sadjadpour said a U.S. goal is to hold back on penalties against Tehran that could potentially trigger a response that would unravel the deal.

Regional resolutions

On Monday, State Department spokesman John Kirby said the U.S. had 'expressed particular concerns' over Saudi Arabia's execution of Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr. He also said the U.S. condemned the attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran that were launched in response to the execution.

'Ultimately, solutions to problems in this region must come from leaders in this region,' Kirby added.

Analyst J. Matthew McInnis of the American Enterprise Institute said the Saudis are concerned about what they view as a U.S. shift that began with the Iran nuclear talks  'not so much to fully pull away from Arab states,' McInnis said, 'but to rebalance in Iran's favor.'

He added that the U.S. is now trying to allow regional states more room to work out issues for themselves.

Similar sentiments were echoed by Frederic Wehrey, a senior associate in the Middle East program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

'One of Obama's visions for this region, at least in the Gulf, is equilibrium,' Wehrey said.

Fear of empowered Iran

Analysts say there are ongoing concerns among U.S. Gulf allies that Iran would be empowered by the sanctions relief it would receive as a result of compliance with provisions in the nuclear deal. They fear an empowered Iran could be destabilizing for the region.

The Saudis, and to a lesser extent the other Gulf Cooperation Council countries, are 'paranoid' when it comes to Iran, said analyst Simon Henderson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

'Saudi Arabia is the most important country on its side of the Gulf, and Iran is the most important on its side,' Henderson said.

Saudi Arabia severed ties with Iran after protesters stormed the Saudi missions in Tehran. In Iran, mass protests over the cleric's execution have continued.

There are signs, however, that the tension may be starting to abate.

Kerry said he had spoken to his counterparts in Iran and Saudi Arabia and received assurances that they would not allow their rift over the Shi'ite cleric to affect their willingness to work cooperatively to help resolve Syria's crisis.

Saudi Arabia, Iran and the United States are part of the International Syria Support Group. The group was instrumental in crafting a plan for a U.N.-mediated political transition in Syria. The U.N. intends to launch an initial meeting on the plan with the Syrian government and opposition this month.

Also, in an interview with The Economist, Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman said a direct war with Iran was something that Saudis 'do not foresee at all.'

He said Iranian escalation had 'already reached very high levels' and Saudis would try hard 'not to escalate anything further.'

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Daesh attempted to raid Turkey base in Iraq: Sources

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 11:26AM

Daesh Takfiri terrorists have reportedly attempted to carry out an attack against a military base used by Turkish forces deployed to northern Iraq without Baghdad's approval.

On Friday, unnamed Turkish military sources said Turkish soldiers had repelled the attack on the Bashiqa camp in Iraq's Nineveh Province, Reuters reported.

According to the sources, Turkish soldiers killed 17 Daesh militants who tried to infiltrate into the camp, located about 140 kilometers (90 miles) from the Turkish border.

Tensions have been running high between Baghdad and Ankara since December 4, when Turkey deployed 150 heavily armed soldiers backed by 20 to 25 tanks to the base.

Ankara claims it is training Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga fighters battling Daesh, which currently controls swathes of land in Iraq.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi immediately objected to the move by Turkey, calling on Ankara to withdraw its troops from the country.

Turkey initially claimed the deployment came after an approval from Iraq, but later acknowledged that there was a "miscommunication" with the Iraqi government over the matter, and agreed to withdraw its forces.

Ankara later relocated some of its forces to another base inside the Iraqi Kurdish region, with Abadi saying Turkey had failed to respect the agreement to pull its forces out of Iraqi soil.

Turkey has agreed to continue to pull its forces out of Nineveh, but Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erodgan has ruled out a full withdrawal from Iraq.

The Iraqi premier has warned of a military response to the matter if it is not resolved.

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Daesh terrorists claim deadly bomb attack near Libya's Sirte

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 11:28AM

Daesh Takfiri terrorists have claimed responsibility for a bombing attack at a security checkpoint, which claimed the lives of six people, including an infant, in a northern Libyan town.

On Friday, Libya's Daesh branch, which calls itself IS Barqa Province, released a statement claiming the attack which took place in the town of Ra's Lanouf, located east of Sirte.

According to the statement, the bombing was carried out by a militant using an explosive-packed car on Thursday.

Earlier in the day, some 65 people were also killed and 130 others wounded in another bombing attack on Thursday at a police training center in the northwestern city of Zilten.

No group or individual has yet claimed responsibility for the first incident.

Over the past months, Daesh, which is mainly active in Iraq and Syria, has extended its acts of terror to Libya, among a number of other countries, and tried to strengthen its foothold in the North African country.

The extremist terrorists have exploited the chaos in Libya and seized parts of Sirte, a city on the country's Mediterranean coast, since February 2015.

Following the Thursday blasts, Martin Kobler, the United Nations special representative for Libya and head of the UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), condemned the acts of violence, urging all conflicting sides in the North African nation to work to settle differences and form a unity government.

"I am shocked at this reprehensible terrorist attack," the top UN officials said, adding that "every wasted day in failure to implement the Libyan Political Agreement is a day of gain for Daesh."

He was referring to the UN-backed agreement signed between rival political groups in Libya last month on the formation of a unity government. However, the deal is yet to be implemented.

Libya has been dealing with instability since 2011, when the country's then dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, was overthrown and armed groups as well as regional factions engaged in a conflict.

The capital is controlled by a political faction, called Libya Dawn, allied with powerful armed forces based in the city of Misrata. The faction has reinstated the old parliament, known as the General National Congress (GNC), in the capital.

The internationally-recognized government of Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni is based in the eastern city of Bayda, with its elected House of Representatives in Tobruk.

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South Korea resumes anti-North broadcasts

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 7:20AM

South Korea resumes its propaganda broadcasts into North Korea across the border and Pyongyang increases the number of forward-deployed troops.

The measures ratchet up tensions following North Korea's announcement of successful testing of a hydrogen bomb.

While the US and its allies have cast doubt on the testing allegation, they have pledged to launch a 'united and strong' response and the UN Security Council has threatened North Korea with new sanctions.

On Friday, South Korea resumed high-decibel propaganda broadcasts across the border as North Korea celebrated its leader Kim Jong-Un's 32nd birthday.

The broadcasts include a mix of everything from music to news and rhetoric against the North Korean government. They are reminiscent of psychological warfare tactics that date back to the 1950-53 Korean War.

North's reaction

Last year, similar broadcasts prompted Pyongyang to threaten artillery strikes against the loudspeaker units unless they were switched off.

On Friday, North Korea was reported to have increased the number of troops at some forward-deployed units as South Korea readied to restart the broadcasts.

A South Korean official said the military had heightened the level of alert around the locations where the propaganda was being broadcast.

There was no immediate North Korean response but the broadcasts are likely to draw a furious reaction.

Seoul vowed to retaliate against any attack on the equipment and raised its cyber security alert level.

South Korea also said its foreign minister would speak with his Chinese counterpart later on Friday and the US called on China to end 'business as usual' with Pyongyang.

China role and US threats

China, which is an ally of North Korea, said it was willing to communicate with all parties, including the United States.

The Global Times, an influential Chinese tabloid published by the ruling Communist Party's official People's Daily, said in an editorial it was unfair to expect China alone to bring about change in Pyongyang.

'There is no hope to put an end to the North Korean nuclear conundrum if the US, South Korea and Japan do not change their policies toward Pyongyang," it said.

In the US, Republicans and Democrats in the House of Representatives prepared to further tighten sanctions on North Korea.

It was unclear how more sanctions would deter North Korea, which has conducted four nuclear tests since 2006 while Washington has cranked up pressure.

A South Korean military official was reported as saying that Seoul and Washington had discussed the deployment of US strategic assets on the Korean peninsula.

Media reports said those assets could include B-2 and B-52 bombers, and a nuclear-powered submarine.

In 2013, North Korea threatened a nuclear strike on the US after Washington sent a pair of nuclear-capable B-2 stealth bombers on a sortie over South Korea in a show of force.

Announcing the hydrogen bomb test on Wednesday, the North Korean leader said the weapons would be needed to protect North Korea from what he called 'US aggression.'

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S Korean Parliament Adopts Resolution Condemning North's Nuclear Test

Sputnik News

12:29 08.01.2016(updated 12:30 08.01.2016)

The resolution states that the nuclear test was a serious provocation and threatens regional security, and will further increase international pressure and isolation of North Korea.

TOKYO (Sputnik) The South Korean parliament adopted a resolution Friday condemning North Korea's suspected hydrogen bomb test, local media reported.

Earlier this week, Pyongyang reportedly carried out the first test of a hydrogen bomb. The international community has condemned the test as provocative and undermining stability in the region.

According to the Yonhap news agency, the resolution was approved unanimously by 207 lawmakers. The document states that the incident was a serious provocation and threatens regional security, and would further increase international pressure and isolation of North Korea.

Earlier in the day, the upper house of the Japanese parliament adopted a similar document.

North Korea declared itself a nuclear power in 2005 and conducted nuclear tests in 2006, 2009 and 2013, having earlier withdrawn from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty that it ratified in 1985.

The United States, Japan and South Korea, as well as Russia and China, took part in talks on denuclearization of the Korean peninsula with North Korea from 2003 until 2009, when Pyongyang withdrew from the talks.

 Sputnik

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Seoul broadcasts pushing Korea to brink of war: Pyongyang

Iran Press TV

Sat Jan 9, 2016 8:50AM

North Korea has warned that the South's resumption of anti-Pyongyang propaganda broadcasts on the border could push the Korean Peninsula to "the brink of war."

Seoul on Friday unleashed a propaganda barrage across the border, ratcheting up tensions following Pyongyang's announcement of successful testing of a hydrogen bomb.

In the first official reaction to the broadcasts, head of North Korea's ruling Workers' Party propaganda department Kim Ki-nam lashed out at the move.

"Jealous of the successful test of our first H-bomb, the US and its followers are driving the situation to the brink of war by saying they have resumed psychological broadcasts and brought in strategic bombers," Kim said.

The broadcasts include a mix of everything from music to news and rhetoric against the North Korean government. They are reminiscent of psychological warfare tactics that date back to the 1950-53 Korean War.

On Friday, thousands of people gathered in central Pyongyang in a show of support for North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on his birthday.

While the US and its allies have cast doubt on North's testing allegation, they have pledged to launch a 'united and strong' response and the UN Security Council has threatened North Korea with new sanctions.

North Korea's state news agency said Friday in a statement that Pyongyang would continue to develop its nuclear program as a means of deterrence against potential acts of aggression from the United States.

Video of submarine

North Korea, meanwhile, released the video of what it called a new submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) test.

South Korean media cast doubt on the footage, saying it was an edited compilation of the North's last month SLBM test in the Sea of Japan and a different ballistic missile test dating back to 2014.

A South Korean military official was reported as saying that Seoul and Washington had discussed the deployment of US strategic assets on the Korean peninsula.

Media reports said those assets could include B-2 and B-52 bombers, and a nuclear-powered submarine.

In 2013, North Korea threatened a nuclear strike on the US after Washington sent a pair of nuclear-capable B-2 stealth bombers on a sortie over South Korea in a show of force.



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Those for Saudi-Iran war not in their right minds: Saudi minister

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 9:18AM

Saudi Arabia's Defense Minister Mohammed bin Salman says those pushing the idea of a war between his country and Iran are "not in their right minds."

"A war between Saudi Arabia and Iran is the beginning of a major catastrophe in the region, and it will reflect very strongly on the rest of the world. For sure we will not allow any such thing," the young minister and deputy crown prince told The Economist.

A war with Iran is "something that we do not foresee at all, and whoever is pushing towards that is somebody who is not in their right mind," he added.

Several world leaders have expressed concern about Riyadh's decision to cut its diplomatic ties with Iran.

The severing of the ties came after the execution of the prominent cleric Sheikh Nimr Baqir al-Nimr, and vociferous protest by Iran at the killing.

Some Saudi allies, including Djibouti, Bahrain and Sudan, took Riyadh's lead to sever relations with Iran.

Iranian officials have criticized Saudi Arabia's abrupt move, saying Tehran has always acted with self-restraint to Riyadh's actions.

They have cited a Sept. 24, 2015 crush that killed 465 Iranians during Hajj rituals in Saudi Arabia and the kingdom's police killing of about 400 Iranian pilgrims in 1987.

On Wednesday, Iran's President Hassan Rouhani said Saudi Arabia's recent move was aimed at covering its policy failures in the region.

The new Saudi leader King Salman has taken aggressive steps over the past year since coming to power in spite of Iran's overtures to ease tensions.

In the days since the execution of Sheikh Nimr, Riyadh has done nothing to halt an escalation in confrontation, demonstrating a level of comfort with brinkmanship.

On Thursday, Iran said Saudi warplanes had attacked its embassy in the Yemeni capital, Sana'a, and injured some staff. Tehran said it will submit a report on the incident to the United Nations.

Political analysts believe the kingdom's measures are rooted in domestic reasons as the new regime seeks to reassert itself and project power among the vassal states.

Saudi Arabia is running a patronage system which has expanded with the outbreak of the Islamic Awakening in the Arab world as Riyadh tries to smother the movement.

Hence, a deliberate muddling of waters in ties with Iran is viewed as a bid by the kingdom to impress those vassal states.

'The diplomatic rupture with Iran triggered by the execution of a Shia cleric was probably a side effect of a decision taken by Saudi Arabia for domestic reasons, rather than the outcome of a deliberate ploy to enrage its regional opponent,' Reuters said in a news analysis on Thursday.

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Syrian army kills several Takfiri militants in Homs

Iran Press TV

Fri Jan 8, 2016 5:1PM

The Syrian army has struck heavy blows to the foreign-backed Takfiri militants in the central province of Homs, leaving a group of them dead and injured.

Field sources told Syria's official news agency, SANA, on Friday that the army and its allied forces engaged in fierce clashes with Daesh terrorists in al-Qaryatayn town, southeast of Homs City.

The clashes left at least 13 terrorists dead and injured and destroyed one of the militants' vehicles along with all weapons and ammunition inside it, according to the sources.

The Syrian forces have been engaged in fierce battles with Daesh terrorists near al-Qaryatayn since they took the town of Mahin and the villages of al-Hadath and Hawarin and their surrounding areas from the Takfiri militants late last month.

Meanwhile, the Syrian army targeted the terrorists in the villages of Hawsh Haju and Si'in al Aswad, 20 kilometers north of Homs City.

The operations left a number of terrorists dead and destroyed the militants' command posts along with all the weapons and ammunition inside them.

Al-Qaeda-affiliated groups such as Ahrar al-Sham, Islamic Front and Homs Legion are reportedly stationed in the northern countryside of Homs.

Last month, militants began evacuating al-Wair, the last district under their control in Homs, under a ceasefire deal reached with the government.

Syrian forces have recently been making rapid advances against terrorists, who are committing heinous crimes against all ethnic and religious groups in several parts of the Arab country.

The advances of the Syrian government forces against Daesh and other terrorist groups have been expedited by the air cover provided by Russia, which began on September 30 at the request of the Damascus government.

The crisis in Syria, which flared in March 2011, has so far claimed the lives of over 250,000 people and displaced nearly half of the country's population within or out of its borders.

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Syrian Army Repels Daesh Attack Near Deir ez-Zor Military Airport

Sputnik News

21:04 08.01.2016(updated 21:20 08.01.2016)

The Syrian armed forces repelled another major attack of Daesh (also known as ISIL) terrorists near Deir ez-Zor airbase, FNA reported.

During the armed clashes, at least 33 terrorists were killed.

According to a representative of the Syrian Army, Daesh terrorists started an offensive from the strategic hilltop of Tal Kroum, targeting the frontline positions of the Syrian military forces at the Southeastern perimeter of the airbase.

'However, the ISIL's [Daesh] offensive was short-lived, as the Syrian army alongside the National Defense Forces (NDF) fought off the terrorists attempting to bypass their first line of defense near Tal Kroum,' the official told Fars News.

Deir ez-Zor is the seventh largest city in Syria located to the northeast from the country's capital of Damascus, which had repeatedly became a place to armed clashes between Syrian forces and terrorist militias.

Earlier it was reported, that government forces have made major advances in the area and regained control over several heights in the al-Tahrda Mountains, east of Deir ez-Zor military airport.

 Sputnik

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Taking the Ground Back: Syrian Army Further Liberates Aleppo

Sputnik News

17:22 08.01.2016

The Syrian Army alongside the National Defense Forces (NDF) attacked Daesh militants' defense lines in the eastern part of Aleppo province and regained control over a strategic road.

Syrian forces and their allies finally restored security in the entire surroundings of Najjarah village. They launched an attack on Daesh positions and took control over the Najjarah-Aisheh axis, a military source told FARS News.

Government forces seized Daesh's weapons and ammunition in the Najjarah region as well as destroyed the militants' network of tunnels used in their combat strategy.

On Thursday, the army foiled a Daesh attack on the highly strategic Kweiris airbase in the eastern part of Allepo.

The Daesh offensive started on Wednesday. The militants used suicide car bombs to retake al-Najjarah village, north of the Kweiris airbase. The Syrian Army reacted immediately and destroyed the car bombs before they reached the village.

Then, the militants were forced to withdraw from the area, after having sustained heavy damages.

Najjarah village was cleared of terrorists by the Syrian Army and popular forces earlier this week.

 Sputnik

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Ankara's Curfew Targeting Kurdish Rebels Comes Under European Scrutiny

by Dorian Jones January 08, 2016

Turkey's policy of using indefinite curfews in its battle against the Kurdish rebel group PKK is facing growing criticism and scrutiny.

With the curfews affecting hundreds and thousands of people, and in many cases leaving them with no access to electricity or water, the European Court of Human Rights is now hearing a case calling for an immediate suspension of the policy. But the Turkish government has staunchly defended its actions as essential in the battle against terrorism.

The deaths this week of three prominent female activists of Kurdish civil society in the town of Silopi has highlighted the curfew policy. The bullet-ridden bodies of the women were found after they called for help, having been wounded.

A state official denied accusations that they had been executed by security forces. But both local and international human rights groups claim the curfew policy now enforced across much of the predominantly Kurdish southeast of Turkey is leading to the indiscriminate killing of civilians by the state.

Dr. Samet Menguc, general secretary of the Istanbul Medical Chamber, headed a delegation of health workers to the region subject to the curfews. He said a de facto war situation existed and that both the local people and the health workers were suffering extreme hardships and even deaths.

The delegation's report accused security forces of killing an ambulance driver and wounding others. It also said thousands of people under curfew could not access basic medical facilities or even bury their dead.

Case against Ankara

In the case before the European Court of Human Rights, Riza Turmen, a former judge of the court representing Turkey and a member of the opposition Republican People's Party, said there was a strong case to be made against Ankara.

'The curfew touches upon the right to life, the ban on ill treatment, on deprivation of liberty, because the curfew ... is not precise and it covers the whole province sometimes,' he said. 'Day and night, they cannot leave their house, for water, and for food, and for health services. So this is, of course, certainly is a disproportionate measure.'

Ankara strongly defends the policy, claiming it is facing an unprecedented threat to public order from Kurdish rebels. But Turmen said the European Court heeds calls for an immediate interim ban on curfews, which could put Ankara and the Council of Europe on a collision course.

'It's a contractual obligation that the government should comply with,' he said. 'If the government refuses to comply with such an interim measure, then it becomes a political issue between Turkey and the Council of Europe because the committee of the ministers of the Council of Europe has the obligation and duty to supervise that the decisions of the court are complied with.'

But with Europe's leaders looking to Ankara for cooperation on handling the migration crisis and countering the Islamic State militant group, the council may be reluctant to stand up to Turkey, which observers say Turkish leaders could be banking on.

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Defence Secretary announces closer defence ties with Japan

8 January 2016

The Defence Secretary has announced the UK will look at taking part in a joint military exercise with Japan to tighten defence relations.

During Michael Fallon's first foreign visit of 2016, he said that he would like to further develop the UK's defence cooperation with Japan and will pursue the possibility of a joint exercise involving RAF Typhoon aircraft visiting Japan in 2016 following their deployment on a Five Powers Defence Arrangement Exercise. This follows a visit by an RAF A400M to Miho Airbase in Tottori Prefecture in October 2015.

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said:

'Japan is our closest security partner in Asia and I want to significantly deepen defence cooperation between our two nations.'

'We will do that through joint exercises, reciprocal access to our military bases, military personnel exchanges and cooperation on equipment, including a new air-to-air missile.'

Further additional cooperation could include mine hunting in the Gulf; cooperating to improve amphibious capability; and improving counter-IED (Improvised Explosive Device) capability. The UK also welcomed increasing Japanese participation in NATO exchanges and joint exercises.

On the visit to Japan with Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond the Ministers met with their counterparts Minister of Defence H.E. Mr. Gen Nakatani and Minister for Foreign Affairs of Japan, H.E. Mr. Fumio Kishida. They welcomed progress in defence and security co-operation over the past year and reaffirmed the dynamic strategic partnership between Japan and the UK.

The Ministers confirmed that Japan and the UK would cooperate to tackle global security challenges, including through disaster relief and a greater role in UN peacekeeping. Recognising Japan as its closest security partner in Asia, the UK welcomed Japan's recent Legislation for Peace and Security, and supported Japan playing a more proactive role in securing global peace, stability and prosperity through its policy of "Proactive Contribution to Peace" based on the principle of international cooperation.

Japanese Minister of Defence H.E. Mr. Gen Nakatani said:

'I am happy to reunite with Ministers Hammond and Fallon in Tokyo after gathering one year ago for the previous 2+2.'

'Last year, the UK published the SDSR. In this, the UK reaffirmed its commitment to its presence as a global power. The SDSR highlighted Japan as the closest security partner in Asia, and I highly regard this statement. In the same year, we have reformed our legislation concerning peace and security. Through these processes, our two nations have confirmed the further commitment of the stability of the world.'

'We will continue our discussions at the Defence Ministerial Dialogue tomorrow. I personally look forward to further strengthening the bilateral partnership.'

Recognising the shared challenge posed by malicious cyber activity, the Ministers also decided to strengthen information-sharing and cooperation in cyber security. It was also confirmed that the two nations intend to conduct a joint research project in 2016 with UK-US-Japan military cyber analysts and are aiming to conduct joint cyber exercises with Japan.

It was also agreed to deepen cooperation on defence equipment and technology. Following the success of the first round of talks on the Co-operative Research Project on the Feasibility of a Joint New Air-to-Air Missile (JNAAM), the Ministers confirmed discussions would move to the second stage.

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The Standard-Times publishes news of special events and programs. We do not accept items detailing regular weekly sermons or schedules. Items will be run only once.

Church news can be submitted by email at standard@gosanangelo.com or by fax to 325-659-8133. Forms also are available in the Standard-Times lobby from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. Deadline for submission next week is Wednesday before the date of publication. Dates, times, address and a publication number are required.

Belmore Baptist

Belmore Baptist Church, 1214 South Bell St. at Medina, will have "Journey to India" as the theme of a mission adventure activity for Belmore's Girls in Action and Acteens from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Jan. 16 at the home of Rhonda Buchanan.

Call 325-651-4661 for more information.

Christian Breakfast Fellowship

Christian Breakfast Fellowship, Kenny Blanek's Village Cafe, 2100 W. Beauregard Ave. will have Blaine Smith as the speaker at 6:30 a.m. on Thursday. The title to his talk is "Be Good."

Call 325-653-6866 for more information.

Community Hills Christian

Community Hills Christian Church, 3309 Knickerbocker Road, will hold a performance of "Oh What Love" from the Watoto Children's Choir traveling from Africa at 6 p.m. Jan. 19. Seating is limited.

Call 325-949-7517 for more information.

First Christian

First Christian Church, 29 N. Oakes St. will hold election of officers at 5:30 p.m. Monday.

Call 325-949-8395 for more information.

First Presbyterian

First Presbyterian Church, 32 N. Irving St., will resume it's Agape Feast free lunch at Wednesday at 12:37 p.m. in the youth center. All local high school students are invited to a free lunch and short devotional.

Call 325-655-5694 for more information.

First United Methodist

First United Methodist Church, 37 E. Beauregard Ave. will begin a new sermon series "Am I _______to believe in God?" on Jan. 17

Call 325-655-8981 for more information.

Lifepoint Baptist

Lifepoint Baptist Church, 810 Austin St., will resume the AWANA program from 6-7:30 p.m. Sunday. Following the Sunday morning service, there will be a fried chicken lunch with all the trimmings. The cost is $5 per person and $20 maximum per family, with proceeds to benefit the Missions trip next summer.

The O.W.L.S. luncheon will be 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Tuesday in the fellowship hall.

Lifegroups will meet in the fellowship hall to assist in a service project for shut-ins on Wednesday.

Call 325-655-9319 for more information.

St. Luke United Methodist

St. Luke United Methodist Church, 2781 W. Ave N, will begin the spring semester of T.G.I.W. (Thank God It's Wednesday) from 5:30-7 p.m. Wednesday. The program is open to children in kindergarten through fifth grade.

Call 325-949-1545 for more information.

Sierra Vista United Methodist

Sierra Vista United Methodist Church, 4522 College Hills Blvd., will show the movie, "Inside Out", at 4 p.m. Sunday in Chapel Hall. Children's and youth programs begin on Wednesday.

Call 325-944-4041 for more information.

Southland Baptist

Southland Baptist Church, 4300 Meadow Creek Trail, will hold "Sermons Sung," a worship service of music and drama examining the stories behind seven familiar religious hymns, at 9:45 a.m. Jan. 17. The service was written by Preston Lewis. The dramatic portions of the service will be directed by Angelo State University theater senior Tyler Hastings and will feature six ASU theater majors and SBC church members in period costumes. Music will be provided by SBC's Adult Sanctuary Choir and Southland Orchestra.

Call 325-949-9633 or visit info@southlandbaptist.org for more information.

 Staff report
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By Ernest Herndon

CENTREVILLE, Miss.  While politicians, pundits and pollsters debate the plight of Syrian and other refugees, a group of Christian college students is quietly making plans to go to Europe and provide humanitarian aid.

Tori Lynn Stone, 21, of Centreville, is one of six Trevecca Nazarene University students who decided to put her compassion into action in a global crisis. Stone plans to leave in June and spend a year in Croatia and Serbia helping refugees fleeing from Syria and other Middle Eastern hotspots.

"I come from a Christian perspective. That does make it a little bit different," Stone said. "As a Christian I think that it's OK to be fearful, but I also think that God calls us to do things in spite of our fear out of love and compassion."

Though she understands Americans' fear of terrorists, Stone admits to being saddened by some of the anti-refugee rhetoric she's heard.

"I think so many un-Christlike things have been said about it and just demeaning things to people. It could be said in a nicer way than things I've seen," she said. "I truly believe we are called to live beyond our fear."

Stone grew up in Centreville, went to Gloster Nazarene Church and is now a senior at Trevecca in Nashville, Tennessee, where she is on track for ordination in the Nazarene Church.

In 2014 she took a 2-week study-abroad trip to Romania and Bulgaria. Last summer she went on a 2-week mission trip to Croatia, where she worked with Nazarene missionaries among the Roma, a marginalized group also known as gypsies.

"When I was over there this summer I can honestly say that I already felt God kind of calling me back to Eastern Europe," she said. "I didn't know what that looked like and I fought it a lot, mostly because I didn't want it to be an impulsive thing."

She talked to a trusted professor about it.

"I told her I felt like I was called to, but I was so scared and I didn't want to," Stone said. "I loved to travel but I always said I would never live out of the country. That wasn't in the plan."

Unknown to her at the time, five other students had consulted the same professor with similar feelings during the same week.

"We had no idea that each other had gone," Stone said.

Meanwhile, the professor had been talking to missionaries in Europe who said they needed a team to come work with refugees.

The students prayed about the situation for six weeks. Stone had never fasted but she skipped lunch two days a week during that period and spent the time in prayer.

At the end, "I said, 'Yes.' I didn't really know what I was telling God yes to," she said.

The students met with the professor and came up with tentative plans. Stone and another woman will work with missionaries along border areas in Croatia and Serbia, possibly staying at refugee camps.

"A lot of it's going to be the simple stuff, showing them that they're cared for, giving them necessities like toothpaste and hats, because it's cold," she said.

The decision to go shocked Stone's mother, Pam Stone of Centreville.

"Her first answer was just, 'No, no,' " Tori said. "That's all she could say, which is understandable. but she told me that night it was going to take some time for her to get used to it."

Pam admits that "I flipped."

"This is not where I want my child to be," she said. "But her words to me were, 'Mama, if you knew what God has done in my life and you knew the past six weeks, you would know this is where God wants me to be.'

"I cried for a while and prayed about it and decided if this is where God wants her to be, I'm behind her 100 percent. I can't say I'm happy about it."

The Rev. Stephen Deese wasn't surprised by Tori's decision. Deese, who now leads a church in Indiana, was pastor at Gloster Church of the Nazarene from 2009 to 2013.

"We know that she got a call to ministry while we were there, and we knew that God had some good things for her," Deese said. "We knew God was going to use her in some form or capacity, so we're excited."
Journey House opened in Kansas City, Mo., as a place for women released from prison to have a place to live. Nuns also live in the house and help the women get on their feet and stay out of trouble. Families connected through the church have gotten involved by regularly providing food and necessities for the women. They brought Christmas dinner and gifts for residents and nuns on Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015. The living room was full as a prayer was said before the meal. (Jill Toyoshiba/Kansas City Star/TNS)

SHARE Journey House opened in Kansas City, Mo., as a place for women released from prison to have a place to live. Nuns also live in the house and help the women get on their feet and stay out of trouble. Rose McLarney, right, one of the nuns, offered to give three of the residents, Lori Borroughs, from left, Jackie Headley and Sher Bialczyk a ride to the Plaza on Wednesday, Dec. 16, 2015, rather than take the bus to apply for a job. (Jill Toyoshiba/Kansas City Star/TNS) Journey House opened in Kansas City, Mo., as a place for women released from prison to have a place to live. Nuns also live in the house and help the women get on their feet and stay out of trouble. Families connected through the church have gotten involved by regularly providing food and necessities for the women. They brought Christmas dinner and gifts for residents and nuns on Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015. As Gabrielle Smits, center, encourages her to come over, 7-year-old Audrey Coppinger of Kansas City hands Erin Elwell her gift. (Jill Toyoshiba/Kansas City Star/TNS) Journey House opened in Kansas City, Mo., as a place for women released from prison to have a place to live. Nuns also live in the house and help the women get on their feet and stay out of trouble. Families connected through the church have gotten involved by regularly providing food and necessities for the women. They brought Christmas dinner and gifts for residents and nuns on Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015. Residents Jackie Headley, from left, Erin Elwell and Laneen Mason look at their gifts as Gabrielle Smits gets in on the excitement. (Jill Toyoshiba/Kansas City Star/TNS) Journey House opened in Kansas City, Mo., as a place for women released from prison to have a place to live. Nuns also live in the house and help the women get on their feet and stay out of trouble. The facility is in a former residence for priests in training. Residents share a meal on Tuesday, Dec. 15, 2015; Georgia Walker, center, executive director of Journey to a New Life, talks with the women. (Jill Toyoshiba/Kansas City Star/TNS)

By Donald Bradley

KANSAS CITY, Mo.  The morning is cold and dark when Sister Rose McLarney comes out of the old brick building on Beacon Hill and opens the gates to the street.

She then goes back inside and, there in the warm kitchen with coffee almost ready, the women who live upstairs come down to talk. Big things, little things. McLarney, 75, a sister of St. Joseph of Carondelet, listens, the women's ease and candor settling in more each day since they arrived at the new Journey House  dates they can cite immediately.

"Because that's the day we got out of prison," said Sher Bialczyk, 53.

For years, the Catholic nuns here lived in the quiet peace of a convent. Now they share a home with 15 younger women who have been stabbed, beaten, molested, hooked on drugs and served time.

"I don't think the sisters knew what they were getting in to," one of the women said. "I've seen them go count to 10."

The idea of Journey House  viewed at first as a crazy idea by four old nuns, a take the nuns did not totally reject  is that they would help the women with job searches, life skills, rehabilitation and health care while keeping them off the streets and out of trouble.

The sisters quote Scripture; the women speak something else. But these two groups have come together, an embrace of one's need for help and the other's will to give it. That goes both ways.

The nuns say the women gave them new purpose, stoking hearts that answered a calling long ago. A few times that calling has come in the middle of the night from a woman needing a ride home.

The nuns pull on their robes and head out.

"I've seen parts of this city I didn't know existed," said Sister Gabrielle Smits, at 72 the youngest of the group.

The oldest, Sister Martha Niemann, 87, smiled and said: "I like it here  there's always something going on."

Georgia Walker, a former nun and executive director of Journey to New Life, the organization that opened the house, has a rap sheet herself. She's been arrested more than once for trespassing at the Honeywell plant in Kansas City and Whiteman Air Force Base to protest nuclear weapons.

In January, Walker, 68, became a Catholic priest, sort of. Catholic canon law rejects women priests. Walker rejects canon law.

Niemann has a gambling problem.

"Addiction is very lonely," she said.

A lot of sharing goes on at Journey House.

The women from prison say the place is the closest thing to a home they've had in years.

"I don't really have family  not anymore," said Sandy Lightell, 48. "The sisters are my family now. I will never be able to repay them for what they've done for me. Like everyone here, I've done drugs and I've done crime, and I know God is working through them to get to us.

"They've taught me to give something in my heart and I never want to hurt them."

Bialczyk said: "I don't want to be anything else than what I am right now."

Only one woman has been told to leave. She would not stop using drugs. The nuns watched from the window as she walked away that day, her suitcase refusing to stay latched and the contents spilling onto the street.

They prayed for her then and think about her still.

"Sometimes we have to lift each other up," Walker said. "But there's not a day I regret coming here."

Last spring, the Missouri Department of Corrections announced that it would convert the Kansas City Community Release Center into a prison. For years, the facility was a halfway house for men and women leaving prison. The new prison would be for men only.

That meant women might have to stay longer in prison because they couldn't be released without a place to live.

About that same time, the Society of St. Pius X was looking for a buyer for a building that had been used for priest training. The society pitched the building to Operation Breakthrough, a large urban child care provider.

Breakthrough director Sister Berta Sailer declined, but said she knew someone who might be interested. Sailer is on the board for Journey to New Life.

The nonprofit was set up two years ago to help people leaving prison make the transition back into society. Housing had been a constant challenge. Walker first floated the idea of opening a home for women and McLarney, chairwoman of the Journey board, told her she was crazy.

Then McLarney and the others got on board, and people said they were all crazy.

The whole thing appeared moot because Journey didn't have money to buy the building anyway. It had been built in 1925 and McLarney thinks it was used as some kind of hospital for the blind.

But then a donor  who wanted to remain anonymous, wrote a check for $347,000 to buy the place.

"Journey could never have done this on our own," McLarney said.

After remodeling and furnishing  with virtually everything donated, including labor by 75 volunteers  Journey House opened in September. The home now has a waiting list after quickly filling to its zoning limit of 15 women.

"Berta calls this place a miracle," said Smits, who jumped at the chance to be part of it after living 30 years in the convent.

She had been a chaplain at St. Joseph Medical Center.

"There I worked with the dying," she said. "Here these women have a second chance.

"Our mission has always been to love the dear neighbor. This is our opportunity to do that. Here we see how truly broken our world is."

Susie Roling, a caseworker at Journey to New Life, knows all the sisters well.

"They are doing what Jesus would do, reaching out to society's forgotten population," Roling said. "They are giving these women love, dignity and a fresh start, which is not what they would get from their PO (parole officer) or a halfway house."

The women range in age from 23 to 55. Some are estranged from family. Almost all had been imprisoned at the Chillicothe Correctional Center for nonviolent crimes mostly associated with addiction.

Tiffany Norris, 26, tells about the night her father's heart stopped in an intensive care unit. It was 1:30 a.m. She woke McLarney.

"She got up and took me to the hospital," Norris said.

McLarney waved off that story.

"I'm an old nurse  middle of the night means nothing to me."

On a recent morning as coffee dripped, a woman came through the kitchen with a basket of laundry. Others grabbed cereal boxes. Some checked the calendar on the refrigerator.

Talk was mostly about jobs and classes and drug tests and court cases.

One had already come home from an overnight shift at a 24-hour hamburger joint on Broadway.

Women rush out to the bus stop.

None of them has a car?

McLarney shook her head and smiled.

"They struggle for cigarette money," she said.

Some, like Veronica Pullen, 43, spend time upstairs in the computer room, where the equipment was donated by Avila University to help with job searches, studying and re-establishing family ties.

Pullen had been a wife, mother and truck driver living in Maine until going to prison. She was addicted to opiates. She had no way to talk with her children until finding them on Facebook.

Now she often wakes to her young daughter's words, "Hi, Mommy," which sometimes make her cry.

"I want my life back," Pullen said.

The women do all the cleaning and cooking.

"We get to come and go  they just like to know where we are," said Laneen Mason, who hopes to land a job as a nursing assistant.

Everyone is expected to be present at evening supper in the big dining room. On a recent night before mealtime, Bialczyk talked excitedly on the phone.

"Really! Really!"

When the call ended, Walker asked what happened.

"AC/DC's coming to town," Bialczyk said.

Walker rolled her eyes. "I thought you got a job."

After grace at the table, Walker, as usual, warned the women about using poppy-seed dressing.

"Throws off their drug tests," McLarney explained.

When the place first opened, the thought was that a typical stay would be 30 days. Now it's looking more like 90. But that's OK, McLarney said. What happens here is too important.

"It's one thing to say we see God in everyone  here we live it every day. This is the walk."

At 10 p.m., the long day at Journey House ends. McLarney, the early riser, already sleeps.

Gates closed, lights out, hearts stoked.
Carolyn Cole/Los Angeles Times/TNS Syrian refugee Ahmed Fankhoor, 18, lives with his brother in Zaatari refugee camp, where he has no job or prospects for his future. I dont know what to do. I cant do anything here, Ahmed said. I have no money. His parents remain in Syria.

SHARE Carolyn Cole/Los Angeles Times/TNS Fatima Kilani waits for the bus that will return her to Syria on Dec. 15 in Zaatari Refugee Camp. She was taking too much luggage, which is a problem, as the drop off area is in a dangerous area. Carolyn Cole/Los Angeles Times/TNS Syrian refugee Nour al Din Dakhl Allah, 40, is the father of Ayaa (left), 18 months, and baby Hiba, 4 months, and husband of Nawal Qaddah (at right), age 35. The family has suffered many loses, including the death of a young cousin recently. They have lived in Zaatari refugee camp for three years. The family is from Tsil, Syria, which is in rebel controlled territory.

Many cant afford pricey trip to Europe

By Patrick J. Mcdonnell

ZAATARI CAMP, Jordan  The child is inconsolable. She clings to her grandmother, who knows what the girl may only sense: that this could be their final embrace, here at a makeshift bus station on the fringes of a refugee metropolis.

Passengers grimly board the waiting bus. The driver, unaccountably jovial, shakes his head as he tosses bulging backpacks, duffel bags and suitcases into the baggage compartment.

"Please don't take too much with you," he says, knowing few will heed him.

Luggage will only complicate matters when crossing the border and negotiating rebel lines  tense moments, sometimes punctuated with sniper rounds and mortar shells.

The little girl is named Ayaa; she is 18 months old, and her grandmother is leaving. Her father, Nour al Din Dakhl Allah, his eyes red, finally wrenches her from the arms of his mother-in-law.

"Say goodbye," he whispers. "Wish your grandmother the best."

This bus stop on the edge of a refugee camp in the Jordanian desert has become a bleak way station in the story of Syria's long-running civil war. Tens of thousands of migrants have streamed in since the worst of the violence began in 2012. But even with the war still raging, many have been boarding buses to go back.

A few have funerals to attend; some are homesick, or eager to reunite with loved ones. But for others, the ongoing saga of death and mayhem at home has become less unbearable than life in this camp, with its boredom and impermanence, its safe, clustered dwellings that belong to no one.

Soon, the matriarch boards the bus and looks out through the bus window, her features distorted in the smudged glass. The senseless death of another grandchild, across the border in Syria, made necessary her doleful journey back.

Ayaa keeps her eyes fixed on the bus.

"Her grandmother reared her," says the father. His daughter flails her arms toward the blurry figure in the bus window.

The father leaves the bus depot and puts the girl on the handlebars of his bicycle, which kicks up dust as he pushes it deep into the warren of the camp.

From its highest perch, Zaatari camp extends into the distance like a shimmering mirage. White cubicles and canvas tents with blue United Nations lettering advance in orderly columns bisected by dirt lanes. Beyond the fences lies a desolate landscape of parched scrub and brown earth stretching to the horizon.

Nowhere else in the world are Syrian refugees so densely packed as in Zaatari, where 79,000 people occupy slightly more than two square miles of barren terrain. If it were a city, it would be Jordan's fourth largest.

While international attention has focused on Syrians fleeing to Europe, relatively few of the 4 million who have left since 2011 can afford the smuggling fees and other expenses needed to get there. Most have settled in neighboring Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey, each of which houses more than 1 million displaced Syrians.

The great majority live not in organized camps, but crammed into apartments, homes and ad hoc dwellings, struggling to pay rent and feed families adrift. In a sense, those in Zaatari, overseen by the United Nations, are the fortunate ones.

The camp has evolved since its founding in July 2012 from an anarchic assemblage of tents to an orderly, midsize city, infused with entrepreneurial zeal. It has two field hospitals, two supermarkets, nine schools, nine clinics, more than 80 mosques and more than 3,000 shops.

There are vegetable stands and cellphone kiosks, bicycle repair outlets and bakeries, restaurants, barbershops, beauty salons and wedding boutiques. Some shops have caged songbirds outside, a common ornament in Syria.

Mothers push strollers along the Champs Elysees, as the bustling main commercial drag is known. Each week, 80 babies are born.

These days, hardly anyone in Zaatari sleeps in tents, but rather in prefabricated trailers with satellite dishes and jury-rigged electrical wiring. Communal kitchens and shared sanitary facilities, which residents rejected, have given way to family-built toilets and simple kitchens with gas stoves in each home.

Compared with the hovels where many refugees live in Lebanon, Zaatari offers five-star accommodation. But there is no escaping the claustrophobia. Residents are fenced in. They can leave only with permission from Jordanian authorities.

As much as they can, people in the camp have struggled to re-create their lives in Syria.

"When I first got here, I didn't know what to do," recalls Ali Saleh Jibraail, 36, who ran a falafel shop in Damascus' Midan district, scene of heavy fighting in 2012.

Much of Midan, including Jibraail's falafel stand, was destroyed. Jibraail and many residents fled south to Jordan.

"I realized there was a demand here, so I decided to do what I knew to do best: falafel," Jibraail says.

Now he is known as Abu Abdullah, and his shop, open seven days a week, is a favored hangout for both residents and camp staff, including international aid workers and Jordanian police officers. He's known throughout the camp for his version of falafel.

With proceeds from his bustling food stand, Jibraail could have arranged for his family  two wives, two daughters, four sons  to make the journey to Europe. But he thought the trek too hazardous. Besides, he says, life here is not so intolerable.

"The main problem here is that there's not enough work for people, not enough to do," Jibraail says. "I employ as many as I can, but most people have nothing to do, even if their basic needs are taken care of."

He escorts a pair of visitors to his modular home, a block away. He has replaced the drab white front with a multihued facade suggesting a substantial, if rustic, Syrian abode. Inside, he is building a fountain of blue tile, like the ones that tinkle in the courtyards of Syrian villas.

Across the Champs Elysees, on a side street of identical white modules, Ibrahim Hariri and his family reflect on their more than three years at Zaatari. They are members of the prominent Hariri tribe from southern Syria's Dara province, where most of Zaatari's residents have their roots. More than 3,000 members of the Hariri clan now live in the camp, relatives say.

Like other extended families here, many have arranged their trailers to be near loved ones, creating tight-knit, self-supporting hamlets amid the camp's sprawl.

"I would go back in a minute if I could," says Hariri, 62, a retired policeman.

When he and loved ones fled three years ago, he says, "we expected to be gone for one month. Now all these years later, we are still here. Maybe I will go back soon."

His mother, 85, and father, 90, are here, along with six children and 26 grandchildren. They all live nearby, mostly in adjoining cubicles. Like so many others, he complains of boredom and a sense of being penned in. He passes the days chatting with relatives, catching up on family gossip and sharing the latest news from Syria.

"To some extent we have managed to re-create the life we had in Syria," Hariri says. "To be truthful, I don't feel comfortable when I leave the camp anymore. I want to be back."

All here have seen the televised images of Syrians packed into boats bound for Europe  and of the often tragic aftermath as flimsy craft capsized at sea.

His son, Mutaa Hariri, 35, draws on a water pipe in the family residence, where carpets cover the floor. "If we had a chance to go legally, say to Canada or to Europe, of course we would go," he says. "But we saw the pictures of the bodies of drowned kids washing up on shore. We don't want that to happen to our children."

Outside, children with blue backpacks imprinted with UNICEF logos are arriving home from school. Fayza Hariri, Ibrahim's wife, hugs several of her grandchildren. "I want them all before me," she says.

These days, the predictability of camp life contrasts dramatically with a daily drama unfolding at the camp's small transport depot, where the buses leave for Syria.

Last summer, at the height of the migrant crisis, as many as 500 people a week boarded the buses. Some, despairing of any future in Jordan, choose to go home, whatever the risk. But many others are bound for Europe via Turkey, preferring to travel through Syria, with all the risks, rather than buy expensive plane tickets from Amman to Istanbul.

U.N. personnel try to dissuade everyone from returning.

"We tell them it's not safe to go to Syria," says Sophie Etzold, U.N. associate protection officer at Zaatari. "But we can't force them to stay. At the end of the day, it is their decision."
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Bruce Bishop, San Angelo

Progressives unmasked

The "progressives" are beginning to realize that they are unstoppable. Despite the best efforts of the voters to elect people who promise to stop the growth of government, our "progressive" president continues to destroy the country unabated. His anointed successor, Hillary Clinton, lies in wait, protected by the mainstream media.

The "progressives" came to power by pretending to "care"  about the poor, about the kids, about the environment, about any noble-sounding thing that would get the simple-minded to vote for them.

The "progressives" appeal to the uninformed by promising to redistribute the wealth. In reality, their only goal is to accumulate wealth and power for themselves.

The method used by the "progressives" was to grow the government in a thousand ways, using a thousand pretexts. They created hundreds of bureaucracies, all with some vague aim to "do good." These bureaucracies do more harm than good, but they continue to grow and gain power. Nothing can stop them from growing, and nothing can force them to do whatever they were created to do.

Government workers are notoriously unmotivated, unproductive, uncaring and often incompetent. There are exceptions, but not enough to justify their existence.

Government workers get paid two or three times what they would be paid for the same job in the private sector. They get paid whether they do their jobs or not. It's often difficult to fire them. Many get lavish perks and bonuses  even when their mission is failing miserably, such as the Department of Veterans Affairs.

These bureaucracies are allowed to grow and gain power, with no accountability, because they support the "progressive" goal of total government control. The term for this is totalitarianism.

The "progressives" fear nothing  not the voters, not the Republicans, not the terrorists. Oh, wait they fear Donald Trump!
Butterflies in plight: Monarch migration is in Texas. But wait, is this all of them?
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(TNS) -- Boston is showing off a preview of a radical redesign of its website, promising to overhaul how citizens get information about and from the city.We heard so many times, I had no idea I could do this on the citys website, said Lauren Lockwood, the citys chief digital officer.The city launched a pilot of its new website  pilot.boston.gov  on Jan. 7, which Lockwood said will be tweaked and improved in the coming months. She said the decision to build the website in public will eventually lead to a better end product.Over the next several months, well be building on the site and well be changing it, adding new concepts to it, adding content, said Lockwood. We can learn a lot from people by launching early and iterating often.The citys current website  cityofboston.gov  is too hard to navigate, Lockwood said, noting there are about 20,000 individual pages right now.The new site has a clean, modern feel, complete with a new logo for the city: a capital B with a red line underneath, which represents, in part, the Freedom Trail.One of the new websites signature features is what the city is calling Topics, which are designed to make information easier to find.For example, instead of going to the Public Works page to report an unplowed street, then going to the Transportation Departments page to find information on parking bans and so on, any important information about winter will be on the same page under a topic called Winter Is Coming.Sections for starting a business and having a car in the city are also live on the pilot site, and more will be coming soon, Lockwood said.Boston launched its first website  called Boston Cyber Hall  on Dec. 29, 1995, a milestone that was celebrated in a City Hall newsletter next to instructions for sending an email with an attachment.
Situated in a Silicon Valley high-rise, the offices claim half the second floor. Theres a spread of monitors, sometimes two to a desk, that sit beneath the long windows. A whiteboard for code and wire framing spans one wall. Glass doors are etched in motivating maxims: Think Bigger, Inspire, Design in Progress. And for furnishings, the space is outfitted in a shout of purples and lime green upholstery. Think startups. Think Google. Think incubators. Thats the vibe at 250 Hamilton Ave. Yet heres the hook: This is City Hall.Welcome to Palo Alto, Calif.s first Civic Technology Center . In April 2015 the center opened its doors as a hub for municipal innovation initiatives and city IT services. The vision for the center is to become a co-creation space. Here, companies and startups can pitch partnership ideas. Citizens can participate in hackathons and meetups. Staff can find tech support via an Apple-like Genius Bar. Its all the amenities of a startup but packaged for government.When people come to see me at City Hall, said Jonathan Reichental, Palo Altos CIO, they check in electronically at our reception desk and they do a kind of double take. They're like, Wait, is this City Hall? Because it doesn't look or behave like it.The astonishment serves as an affirmation of sorts. When Reichental, now an award-winning civic innovator, signed on as Palo Altos CIO in December 2011, he didnt enter a brightly lit IT department humming with ingenuity. It was, to put it diplomatically, a work in progress.I don't really know how it got to the place where it was, Reichental said. But over the course of several decades IT was stuck in different areas of the city. It was the 1970s furniture-wise, and everything from the ceiling, to the tiles, to the carpet and filing cabinets just didn't reflect the mission we were on to be a leading digital city.Not long after joining the IT department, Reichental began monthly field trips to Silicon Valley tech companies. His team made trips to Apple, Facebook, Google and a slate of others to ideate on potential civic tech. Recalling, Reichental said the trips were spirit lifters, inspiring, semi-revelatory and all of a sudden grievously dismal. For no sooner would they return to their offices, then a pall would settle: Two narratives had collided.We'd go into these great tech environments, so open, colorful, with little kitchen areas and lots of lights. Then we would come back to City Hall, to our dark cubicles and 1970s decor. It was horrible, Reichental said.Somewhere in those visits, Reichental said he recognized that the momentum to innovate  an endeavor arguably energy-intensive  wouldnt be sustainable against a dichotomy of competing messages. Leadership could command and encourage, but the effects would be short lived if the walls were yellowing, the desks scuffed and the tools outdated. Its a hard truth, especially poignant in the cash-strapped world of government, but where things happen often denote how things happen.At the time, however, all he could do was chart innovation strategies and toil ceaselessly to achieve them. Such efforts werent in vain. Reichental led the city to pioneer a number of advancements. In his four years, he has been a catalyst for modernization, digitizing business applications, budgets, permitting, civic engagement, 311 services, emergency management systems and more. These were in addition to a city website revamp, a lineup of hackathons, overhauling a 25-year-old legacy phone system, and establishing Palo Altos first open data portal and policy.What the Civic Technology Center represents, Reichental said, is an attempt to systematize the current drive for innovation with a design that pairs efforts with a functional office space and aesthetic. He credits City Manager James Keene for making the wish a reality. A little more than two years ago, Reichental approached Keene with his request. He had no expectations, just a decisive recommendation and a lot of hope.I recall going to the city manager and I said, We've got to spend some money and create a working environment thats consistent with our ambitions, Reichental said. And I remember his answer was funny, he said, Jonathan, of course you do! I was expecting you to do that.The conversation set off a chain reaction of team planning. Reichental spelled up a moderate budget. Staff proposed features and sketched office layouts, and this led to blueprints, which gave way to a flurry of approvals, and eventually, the sheetrock started to fall. Push forward two years and the result is a consolidated IT department that doubles as a community innovation hub. Startups arrive weekly, the community occasionally takes tours and recruitment has boomed. Compared to reports from his colleagues in different cities, Reichental said Palo Alto is seeing a tremendous demand from job seekers with more than 200 applicants for every IT opening  typically, Reichental said his CIO peers in other municipalities see 10 to 12.Its like government as a startup, he said. Its just been a success on multiple levels.However, Reichental does not see workplace renovations as universal remedies for civic innovation. Success required a concerted effort before the walls came down. Palo Alto had already cultivated a vibrant community of civic innovators, citizens, companies and nonprofits that were waiting when the doors opened. Likewise, on the inside, staff members were ready to apply entrepreneurial innovation strategies. If leadership and staff werent in a place to utilize such a space, Reichental said it wont work. Similarly, without a community of citizen collaborators, civic tech is just tech.I think the No. 1 thing is you have to have a vision, he said. What is it that you're trying to do? What's the end game look like?What this shakes out to are real-world questions, organizational questions, and questions that influence resources and aims. Reichental suggests that officials ask themselves  media hype aside  if their leadership, department heads and staff are sincerely committed to working like a startup. This means taking risks, experimenting and applying urgency to concepts like iterative design, open workspaces and user-centric development.You can't just say, Oh I like the look of it, I'm going to do it. Really, you've got to have a compelling story, said Reichental. What I was able to say was, I'm here because this is the birthplace and heart of Silicon Valley, and we can't just be another government IT shop. We ought to be doing innovative things and reflect the community we serve.
New York City officials on Thursday announced a landmark settlement of a sweeping 2013 lawsuit over NYPD surveillance of Muslims that alleged the police intelligence division unconstitutionally deployed informants and infiltrated mosques.The settlement reiterates NYPD legal duties to not base investigations on religion or ethnicity and installs a civilian representative appointed by the mayor inside the NYPD to monitor investigations of political and religious activities for legal compliance.The NYPD as part of the deal agrees to follow practices complying with a 1985 federal court decree governing probes of political activities -- basing investigations only on "articulable and factual" information, limiting use of undercovers to situations where no less intrusive means is possible, and ensuring that investigations aren't ended.The police department also agreed to remove from its website a report titled "Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat," which critics said had encouraged religious profiling by over-generalizing and exaggerating domestic Muslim radicalization.The NYPD does not admit to any wrongdoing in its past practices or pay any damages, and police officials said that other than the new civilian representative, the settlement largely codifies practices it is obligated to follow under the 1985 case, known as the "Handschu guidelines."The 2013 lawsuit alleged that the police had gone overboard in reaction to fears of terrorism, targeting Muslims for investigation based on protected First Amendment activities and surveilling mosques -- labeling some "terrorist enterprises" -- without a sufficient factual basis.In 2014, the NYPD announced that it was disbanding a so-called "demographic unit" that had used techniques designed to develop intelligence on the Muslim community that had been at the center of the controversy, but it has not been clear what functions may have been shifted to other units.In addition to a lawsuit in Brooklyn federal court, the New York Civil Liberties Union and other groups asked a federal judge in Manhattan to review activities relating to Muslims under the 1985 Handschu guidelines."This settlement is a win for all New Yorkers," NYCLU legal director Arthur Eisenberg said in a statement. "It will curtail practices that wrongly stigmatize individuals simply on the basis of their religion, race or ethnicity. At the same time, the NYPD's investigative practices will be rendered more effective by focusing on criminal behavior.""We are committed to strengthening the relationship between our administration and communities of faith so that residents of every background feel respected and protected," Mayor Bill de Blasio said. "New York City's Muslim residents are strong partners in the fight against terrorism, and this settlement represents another important step toward building our relationship with the Muslim community."NYPD intelligence chief John Miller said, "The proposed settlement does not weaken the NYPD's ability to fulfill its steadfast commitment to investigate and prevent terrorist activity in New York City."Although the New York cases were settled, another lawsuit filed in federal court in New Jersey by Muslims in that state who were targeted by the NYPD intelligence efforts remains alive.That lawsuit seeks monetary damages on behalf of some plaintiffs. Last year, a federal appeals court in Philadelphia said the suit could go forward, ruling that terror fears did not justify discriminatory scrutiny of Muslims.
(TNS) -- In Lewiston, Maine, a police officer goes head to head with a skunk. The cop loses and returns to the station reeking.In Auburn, the deputy police chief forgets to close his sunroof during a winter storm. Oops! The SUV is full of snow the following morning and the deputy chief has earned a new nickname.At the Androscoggin County Sheriff's Department, deputies mourn the passing of a character from the TV show "Adam 12."Cops as ordinary people. Who knew? Until social media came along, few people outside of police circles got to see and hear these stories from the lighter side of law enforcement.And let's be honest: There is a lot of that."People think we write tickets and stop cars all day long, but we really handle some crazy calls," said Lewiston police Sgt. Robert Ullrich, who single-handedly runs that department's Facebook page. "The average Joe has no idea. I think it's important for the public to know how much we really do."When Lewiston police Sgt. Wayne Clifford was sprayed by a skunk during an ill-conceived animal rescue in November, Ullrich was inspired. After clearing it with the stinky Clifford, he posted the story and photos on Facebook, and readers pounced on it. It was a lesson learned: In this day of instant news and nonstop social interaction, it's sometimes OK for a police officer to laugh at himself when things get weird."Sometimes I think we're afraid to show our human side," Ullrich said. "I'm trying to get the word out to the troops to open up a little bit."In Bangor, has garnered what some might deem a cult following: Some 87,000 people go to the page for insider jokes, offbeat photos and tales of cop versus criminal that are at times masterfully written."Going through reports at the first of the new year surprised me," an officer wrote on the Bangor Police Department Facebook page this week. "It is apparent that many people did not turn over a new leaf. Of course, I have no idea if they actually went to the gym or started drinking less. I take that back, I don't know if they went to the gym."The Bangor brand of wit comes from police Sgt. Tim Cotton, who manages the Police Department's Facebook page and who is not afraid to take on the old cliches, including the under-the-breath comment, "I smell bacon!" when police are around and the persistent rumor that no police officer anywhere can resist the sweet call of doughnuts.Cotton's posts are so well-crafted, it's easy to make the assumption that his background is in writing.Nope."I've written police reports for 27 years," Cotton said. "If you don't count that, I have zero writing credentials. ... I did have a fantastic English composition teacher in high school named William Prest. I did very poorly in his class. But that was not his fault. He was a fantastic teacher."In Bangor, police have the art of social media interaction mastered. Here in Androscoggin County, the cops are just getting started.When Eric Samson took over as Androscoggin County sheriff at the start of 2015, the department's Facebook page had 1,000 likes, meaning 1,000 people were actively following them."We wanted to double that number," Samson said, "and we figured the best way to do it was to appeal to different audiences."Enter the fluffier side of police work: photos of inmates crocheting hats for local children; spiffy new coffee mugs; stories of cool dogs doing cool things.Samson asked his officers to keep the Facebook page in mind if they stumbled into funny, interesting or embarrassing situations, and especially if they had photos to include. That would require that the officers have the ability to laugh at themselves, Samson said, "but most of the guys in patrol have good senses of humor."Samson manages the department's Facebook with the help of Chief Deputy William Gagne.The Facebook page now has 3,380 likes, meaning the department was able to more than triple its following.Police aren't simply posting the fun stuff to entertain the masses. They have ulterior motives."As much as you can do to get people to interact with your page," Samson said, "the more they're going to pay attention to what's going on with the department."By garnering followers, police departments can push out information about new hires, community events, parking bans and the like. Social media is also a way for police to solicit help from the public in solving mysteries.In Greene last year, an unidentified woman was found wandering along a back road in the wee hours of night. County sheriff's deputies had no idea who she was, so they posted a photo on Facebook. Within hours, the woman was identified and the matter resolved.In Auburn this week, police discovered on an apartment door. "Nock hard," the sign stated, misspelling and all, "but not like you the police."By Wednesday afternoon, more than 500 people had viewed the photo, 46 had commented and 209 had shared it. Not bad for a page that's just starting to get more playful to engage its audience.Then there's Auburn's Deputy Police Chief Jason Moen who, in late December, left his sunroof open overnight during a snowstorm. A picture of his truck's snowy interior was posted on the Auburn Police Department Facebook page and the story was picked up by media as far away as Boston All you can do is laugh, Moen told a reporter.Which, when you get right down to it, is kind of the point of social media.Apparently we have a tell tale knock?? Might be time to change our knocking techniques to keep them guessing?
Researchers at Georgia Tech, with colleagues at Hunan University and the Institute of Metal Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, have devised a novel, efficient electrolysis approach for hydrogen evolution directly from native biomassescellulose, lignin and even wood and grass powdersto hydrogen at low temperature. A paper on their work is published in the RSC journal Energy and Environmental Science.

Using an aqueous polyoxometalate (POM)phosphomolybdic acid (H 3 [PMo 12 O 40 ] and silicotungstic acid (H 4 SiW 12 O 40 )as a catalyst at the anode, the raw biomass is oxidized and electrons are transferred to POM molecules by heating or light-irradiation.

Polyoxometalates (POMs) are a subset of metal oxides that represent a diverse range of molecular clusters with an almost unmatched range of physical properties and the ability to form dynamic structures that can range in size from the nano- to the micrometer scale. Heavy interest in POMs began in the 1990s.

In the current work, protons from biomass diffuse to the cathode and are reduced to hydrogen. The electric energy consumption can be as low as 0.69 kWh per normal cubic meter of H 2 (Nm3 H 2 ) at 0.2 A cm2only 16.7% of the energy consumed for the reported water electrolysis. Unlike the traditional electrolysis of alcohols, a noble-metal catalyst is not required at the anode.

Resources
GREENSBORO  Area law enforcement agencies could lose bonus dollars after the federal government suspended a program allowing them to reallocate money seized in criminal raids to pay for training, equipment and other needs.

The federal asset forfeiture program, run by the U.S. Department of Justice, allowed law enforcement agencies to keep up to 80 percent of money seized in criminal cases, most notably drug raids. That money could then be used for law enforcement projects not funded by an agencys jurisdiction.

The program is now on hold indefinitely because of budget cuts in a recently passed spending bill, according to a Dec. 21 letter that M. Kendall Day, the chief of the Justice Departments asset forfeiture and money laundering section, sent to law enforcement agencies across the country.

While we had hoped to minimize any adverse impact on state, local, and tribal law enforcement partners, the Department is deferring for the time being any equitable sharing payments from the program, Day wrote. The Department does not take this step lightly. We explored every conceivable option that would have enabled us to preserve some form of meaningful equitable sharing.

The news stunned local law enforcement agencies, which didnt receive any advance notice that the decision could be coming.

We did not have a clue until we got that letter, Guilford County Sheriff BJ Barnes said. And neither did anybody else. It truly was, all of a sudden, the Grinch that stole Christmas.

Barnes has for years used forfeiture funds to pay for a host of projects and improvements, ranging from gas masks and computers for deputies to the purchase and construction of three substations throughout the county. In the last fiscal year, the sheriffs office spent more that $600,000 in federal dollars, the bulk of it on law enforcement equipment. The year before that, the sheriff spent nearly $1.2 million, most of it on buildings and other physical improvements, according to county data.

Weve bought bulletproof helmets and vests, vehicles, computers, Barnes said. Weve used it for these things, and so the taxpayers have not had to pay for them.

Forsyth County has used forfeiture dollars to buy a force-training simulator, and to pay for the initial costs of eight new positions. In High Point, Police Chief Marty Sumner spent money on training, expanding the police stations evidence room, outfitting police officers with flashlights and paying private labs for DNA testing to avoid backlogs at the State Crime Lab.

These are all things that the city would have to some way find a way to budget for, Sumner said. Some places get this money and buy things theyd like to have but dont need. We typically spend it on what we need.

Other agencies use the money to enhance existing operations. In Rockingham County, Sheriff Sam Page has used forfeiture money to pay for undercover vehicles, body cameras and related technology, officer training, weapons, and as matching funding for various grant programs, among other things. Losing that funding source, he said, would leave the sheriffs office unable to fight crime at the same level it does currently.

What the federal forfeiture asset program does is help law enforcement provide technology, equipment and training that we normally couldnt get because of funding, Page said. It also saves tax dollars. Were using money from the bad guys to do good things in our communities.

At times, the civil arm of the federal forfeiture program has attracted controversy, with cases where people have had their assets seized without committing a crime. That isnt the case here, officials said, as the criminal forfeiture program requires careful reporting and imposes tight restrictions on spending.

We dont do anything until money has been adjudicated as being ours, and we are very limited in how we can spend it, Barnes said. We have to report everything, and if we misuse the funds, they can take that money away.

Barnes reached out to U.S. Rep. Mark Walker for help, and the National Sheriffs Association issued a statement condemning the Justice Department action.

The forfeiture program is not canceled permanently  federal officials are calling it a temporary deferral  and payments could be restored if the budgetary climate improves.

In the meantime, agencies dont have to return existing forfeiture money. But without a timeline for when the program might resume, law enforcement officials are mired in uncertainty.

This affects small communities and large communities, Page said. It affects every law enforcement agency in America.
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In two of the sketches, a tiger climbs downward, away. Fragile.

In one, a tiger stares at the viewer with piercing eyes. Fierce.

All three sketches by the late artist Robert Dallet were positioned on a handmade Hermes tapestry hanging in Greenwichs Bruce Museum.

Let me show you what a tiger actually means, said Tom Kaplan, founder of Panthera, a global organization dedicated to wild cat conservation.

Kaplan strode up to the tapestry and lifted up the bottom corner. On the other side was a sweeping, lush landscape of trees and rivers.

Thats the ecosystem, said Kaplan. See, its whats beneath them that were able to save.

The tapestry was one of six items auctioned off Friday at the launch of the Bruce Museums latest exhibit, Fierce and Fragile: Big Cats in the Art of Robert Dallet.

The Parisian luxury brand Hermes picked Panthera as its charity of 2016, partnering with the organization to create the two-year internationally touring exhibit to raise awareness and funds for wildcat conservation efforts.

The Bruce Museum will offer free admission for the duration of the exhibit, Jan. 10 through March 13.

A show like this makes great, good sense for us, said Peter Sutton, executive director of the Bruce Museum. Its about saving nature. And thats worth doing.

How it started

The conversation that sparked the collaboration, and the eventual tour, occurred about two years ago in an apartment building in Paris, France.

Kaplan was neighbors with Pierre-Alexis Dumas, the creative director for Hermes and a family friend of artist Robert Dallet.

They got to talking, both having an appreciation for art and aesthetics.

Hermes had a family collection of Robert Dallets paintings of big cats. At the same time, Kaplan, also an art collector, was hearing from his private curator, Dominique Surh, about having a wild cat exhibit.

Theyre fascinating animals and theyve always been in art. The story of themselves and in human culture is a fascinating one, said Surh.

And so Kaplan called up the Bruce, which has launched international touring exhibits before.

Were better known outside of Greenwich than inside of Greenwich. Were entrepreneurs as far as museums go, said Sutton, who was also a friend of Kaplan.

He and Surh said the museum was well-suited for the exhibit because it focuses on both art and science.

Its an extraordinary niche we have  its so old-fashioned, its ahead of its time. Art and science were once always lumped together, said Sutton.

He said the exhibit also fulfills the Bruce Museums philanthropic mission.

The title is well-chosen: fierce and fragile. Theyre scary animals but they have a very precarious future. Its our fault. Its mans fault, it is.

The exhibit

Robert Dallets 60 paintings, which come from the Hermes family collection and that of Dallets son, Frederic Dallet, create a mosaic in shades of amber in the exhibit rooms of the Bruce Museum.

The large cats are caught on canvas in snapshots: a lioness eating an antelope, one leopard licking another, a jaguar eyeing something out of the frame. The paintings are meticulously detailed.

Look at the eyes and see what they can tell you about yourself and about nature, said Dumas.

The eyes of Dallets tigers are striking. They light up in the final room of the exhibit: an enclosed space where paintings of wild cats are illuminated on the far walls and speakers project the sounds of the different cats in their natural habitat. Peepholes on adjacent walls require the viewer to press their eyes on a lens which shows a sequence of paintings, including an up-close view of a lion devouring an antelope.

Its about being on this planet in harmony with nature. In a balanced harmony. We know we depend on nature to survive, so if we destroy nature, we destroy ourselves, said Dumas.

Both Dumas and Kaplan said participating in wild cat conservation efforts is for the cats good and our own. Art inspires empathy, which encourages people to care about the animals and environment that share their planet, Kaplan said.

This project is the victory of hope over despair in a world that has gone mad, said Kaplan.

Its time to look again at these works and understand what Robert Dallet has been trying to understand and tell us through his life, said Dumas.

In some ways, they said, the exhibit is also a homage to an under-recognized artist.

He was extremely gentle, humble, respectful. But he was sad. It was hard for him to acknowledge that most of the animals he loved and drew had disappeared. Vanished. Gone, said Dumas, who was close with Dallet until the artists death in 2006.

The descriptions beside each painting of the big cats include the statistics: Leopards have gone extinct in six countries, and potentially six more. Cheetahs were eliminated from 77 percent of their historical range in the world. And there are more tigers in private zoos in the United States than wild in the world.

Resurrection is a tall order, but we may be witnessing it, said Dumas. We will take Dallets voice and make it roar.

SFoster-Frau@scni.com; @SilviaElenaFF
So this is what it comes down to between General Electric and the state of Connecticut. Its a shakedown. Like in those gangster movies when a couple of hairy guys lean over the counter and tell the old man at the register, Nice place you got here. Be a shame if something happened to it. Then the old man forks over his protection money and they go away. Until next time. Same idea here with GE and their corporate goons. Nice state you got here, be a shame to have to lay off all those people, stop ordering materials from local suppliers and contributing to the underlying tax base. I know, not as catchy, but you get the gist.

Last spring as Gov. Dannel P. Malloy rolled out his budget recommendations, which included significant increases on some corporate taxes, the good fellas over at GE went into a full-on swoon. Youre driving us out of the state, they wailed, even though its been widely reported that the industrial giant has for decades managed to pay a lower tax rate than Al Capone ever did.* As reported in these pages last month, regardless of what Connecticuts tax rates are, GEs actual state tax payments have been a measly 1.6 percent of profits over the last five years. Malloys increases would have meant how much more exactly? A raise to 2 percent maybe?
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Thirteen years after it was launched in the Greenwich district, the International Baccalaureate program represents a successful venture ... and a work in progress.

A new district report highlights the varying fortunes of IB in the school system. At The International School at Dundee  which was the first school in the district to implement IB  the program is thriving with top academic results and booming admissions. But its record is less triumphant at New Lebanon School and Western Middle School. Educators in those two buildings have embraced IB, but theyve struggled to carve out enough time to meet all of their program goals while juggling other recently implemented initiatives and responding to student demographic challenges.

Challenges

IB is a learning model that emphasizes critical-thinking skills, interdisciplinary coursework, citizenship and an understanding of different cultures. IB is supposed to shape, but not replace, the districts own curriculum at ISD, New Lebanon and Western.

It became the magnet program theme at those three schools because it is supposed to foster rigorous academics and support students character development.

School officials stand behind their belief in IBs potential, but they also acknowledge the difficulty of running the program. Consistently meeting the IB requirements represents a significant challenge  especially when educators have to balance the program with other commitments including the districts digital learning initiative.

The districts focus on the DLE, although exciting and timely, prevents us from having the needed time for the extensive professional development IB demands, New Lebanon Principal Barbara Riccio wrote in the report. IB is a time rich philosophy from training to the time needed to support teachers with their implementation.

Riccio and the other principals at Greenwichs five magnet schools, Superintendent of Schools William McKersie and consultant John Curtin wrote the report, which was presented at this weeks school board meeting.

Western Principal Gordon Beinstein pointed to a similar predicament. In addition to IB, the school is also running digital learning and this year launched the Advancement Via Individual Determination college-readiness program in seventh-grade.

With the numerous curriculum, district and school initiatives  finding the time for professional development for the untrained staff has been very difficult, Beinstein wrote.

Westerns high employee turnover rate has had an impact as well. Twenty-eight of Westerns 62 certified staff members have been hired in the past four years, meaning that they missed the first-level IB training that was offered in 2010 and 2011.

Student demographics present another complicating factor to the IB mission at New Lebanon and Western. Many of the children at those schools  such as those who are learning English as a second language  need to work on basic academic skills, which leaves less time for them to work with teachers on developing the more advanced critical-thinking inquiry skills emphasized by IB.

At New Lebanon, overcrowding acts as another impediment.

There is little space for collaborative activities, which is a key aspect of IB learning, Riccio wrote. Children and teachers need to collaborate frequently to achieve the transdisciplinary results of the IB learner. We are compromised to have cross grade level experiences and common teacher planning times across grades and disciplines because there is simply no room.

Finally, all three schools, ISD included, face the obstacle of not having a full-time teacher serving as an IB coordinator, which is a full-time position in many IB schools outside Greenwich.

Varying results

From one vantage point, the academic outcomes at the IB schools are decidedly mixed. While ISD stands out as one of the perennially top-performing elementaries in the district and the state on standardized tests, students at New Lebanon and Western lag behind their peers in Greenwich by wide margins on those exams every year.

The demand for magnet seats correlates with academic performance. ISD has long wait lists, with 160 applications for 22 seats in the current school year. In contrast, Western and New Lebanon together received only about 20 applications for places in the current year.

As much as the magnet theme, high academic performance is an important magnet feature, administrators wrote in the report. If the magnet program is to be successful in Greenwich, it is important for us to both raise achievement in the magnet schools and broaden our definition of success beyond absolute levels of achievement.

Despite the achievement gap between ISD and New Lebanon and Western, administrators are still optimistic about the latter two schools academic prospects. When their results are adjusted for student need factors  including eligibility for free or reduced-price lunches, being a non-native English speaker or receiving special education  students at all of the IB schools perform as well as or better than their peers at other schools in the state with similar demographics, according to the report.

The report also points to a number of examples of IB paying off in the classroom at each of the three schools. At New Lebanon, staff said that a teacher-training partnership launched in the past school year with Columbia Universitys Teachers College has made their IB assessments more rigorous. At ISD, students partner with cultural institutions, including the Guggenheim Museum and the Greenwich Audubon for IB units and participate in a pen pal program with an IB school in Kyoto, Japan. Western staff said IB helps them to develop students critical-thinking and communication skills and instill in them the importance of citizenship.

IBs benefits are not limited to academics, New Lebanon faculty said. Mental-health staff at the Byram elementary incorporate IB principles into their work with students. A drop from 42 office referrals for student-behavior issues in the 2012-13 school year to 22 referrals in the past school year reflects the effectiveness of IBs character-development standards, Riccio wrote.

Looking ahead

IBs long-term future at ISD, New Lebanon and Western appears assured.

Staff at ISD and New Lebanon have already started preparing for evaluations by IB officials in the next school year. Western will get re-evaluated in 2018.

The framework and the staff have worked to create IB units of high quality, Beinstein told Greenwich Time. Its working in the classroom.

School board Chairman Laura Erickson said that she, too, is optimistic about IBs future at New Lebanon and Western.

The district has every expectation that over time and with the appropriate resources, the IB program at New Lebanon and Western will show growth in student achievement and appeal to families interested in an IB education.

But tackling the obstacles to implementing IB will take time. Plans are well underway for a new building for New Lebanon, but students and staff will likely have to make do with the current building and then temporary accommodations for at least two more school years.

Despite the building inadequacies, many New Lebanon parents said that they are still pleased with what their children are learning in the classroom.

I think the program itself is great, said Clare Kilgallen, whose three sons attend New Lebanon. It does lead to rich inquiry. It doesnt hand the kids the answer. It helps them try to figure out what the answer is and come up with good questions and figure out solutions.

ISD Principal Terry Ricci, who has led the school since it received its IB authorization in 2003, suggested that school officials take a long-term view in assessing the programs success.

It took several years for us to put our program into place and then build a school, Ricci said at the school boards meeting this week. We didnt have the space issues that New Lebanon has. We were able to focus on putting together a good academic program.

When we started back in 2000, our curriculum was very meager. We had to develop IB units, and we didnt have the substance that we have now. ISD has come a long way and so certainly have the Greenwich Public Schools as well.

pschott@scni.com; 203-625-4439; twitter: @paulschott
In a bit of a PR mess up, Motorola Mobility CEO Rick Osterloh announced the other day that parent company Lenovo will be phasing out the Motorola brand, and that created confusion as to its future. To set the record straight, Motorola has issued a statement on its official blog.

Motorola Mobility, as a company, continues to exist and keeps a central role in Lenovo's smartphone business, and is in charge of all smartphone engineering, design and manufacturing within the corporation. However, products will feature the Moto brand, as opposed to Motorola, as it sounds more contemporary, while still being synonymous with the traditional brand, the statement says.

That said, product packages will still have Motorola printed here and there, it just won't be the brand used prominently for marketing. The batwing logo will not be lost either, and will continue to be used extensively, in marketing material too.

The Vibe brand will coexist alongside Moto and Lenovo corporate branding will be found both on product packaging and promotional content, to remind consumers that the company is among a select few, which can offer a complete experience from smartphone through tablet to PC.

We'll need some figuring out to do on our end - does the Motorola Moto G (3rd gen) become simply Moto G (3rd gen)?

Source
We understand the urge to have your flagship LG V10 gold-plated, and the gold bath adds an extra bit of flair to curved-body Samsung high-end models Galaxy S6 edge and Note5. But what about that Nokia 230 that you keep in your car's glove box for backup, or use as a secondary phone for basic needs?

Now Vietnamese specialists in the field of luxury customization Karalux can have the 230 gold-plated in 24K yellow gold too, to match your smartphone attire. We're only assuming that once you're looking into gold-plating, you have a smartphone to boot, but even if the unassuming Nokia feature phone is your primary means of communication, at VND 1,500,000 ($67) the treatment is still a bargain.

That's the price if you bring in your own Nokia 230, but for VND 2,800,000 ($125) the company will happily pull a ready gold-plated one off its store shelves. So in effect, the gold-plating costs more than the phone itself. But who's to say that you can't have some bling just because you refuse to be bothered with constant notifications and want a battery life longer than a day.

Source
Hey there, my name is Ricky, US editor for GSMArena. I've just attended CES for the first time in my life and I wanted to sit and write about what I saw there while my mind was still fresh with all the electronic goodies and gadgets that I have seen over the past 4 days.

I am currently sitting at the Las Vegas International Airport about 3 hours early to my flight back to New York. I wanted to use this time to give you a look behind the scenes of what goes on at an event like CES, outside of the device announcements, which we report on anyway.

The madness of the CES press day

By now you are probably aware that CES opens its doors to the press earlier than it does for the general public. It's what is called the Pre-CES day - the most important day for us tech journalists because it is then when most major brand names hold press events to announce new products and pull the sheets off of the latest and greatest tech. This is where the bulk of our coverage comes from. It's a never ending sequence of press events - a rollercoaster ride of sorts.

As this was my first time attending CES I had no idea what to expect at all. And as fate would have it, I was all on my own as I was the only editor from our website to attend the show this year.

I am still quite new to the GSMArena team, which I have nothing but wonderful things to say about. They've been nothing but helpful and their dedication to bringing the newest of the news to you all is contagious.

Believe it or not, getting these photos you see on the website to a remote team is not an easy task, especially when there are hundreds of other people trying to do the same thing in the same room. Wi-Fi becomes useless in a room with probably thousands of other Wi-Fi devices all trying to transmit signals within a narrow radio spectrum. With Wi-Fi off the list, I had to resort to physically tethering my Nexus 6P's T-Mobile connection to my laptop.

You might be able to predict where this goes. My laptop does NOT have a USB Type-C port, but I did have the Type-A to Type-C cable that Huawei generously included with the Nexus 6P. This cable's length is anything but generous, being barely more than 6 inches long. And on top of that, at some events (I am looking at you Samsung) I had to operate the whole lot standing upright in a crowd of people with nowhere to sit or put down my stuff while reaching above my head with my camera to capture photos of the keynote. Ah, I was beginning to discover "the joys" of tech journalism.

Events took place one after another and, thankfully, my schedule worked out to where I had just enough time to travel to the next venue. I swear I must have arrived to almost every event within 20 seconds of it actually starting. It was intense.

CES Floor - trending products and technologies

You gotta understand the convention center where CES is held is huge. Gargantuan even. I've heard that MWC and IFA are even larger than CES, and I can only imagine their scale after what I've seen here.

The more high-profile booths (Samsung, Intel, Huawei, and LG) were packed with people at ALL TIMES, making it difficult to even walk around without bumping into someone, let alone doing my job.

A common theme that I saw among TV sets was HDR picture and 8K TVs. More and more TV makers are using OLED technology, which offers deep luscious blacks and gives the best contrast possible making for an awe-inducing visual experience.

The IoT (internet of things), was another leitmotif at CES this year, especially with Samsung and LG's new appliances that can talk to your smartphone and other smart devices. Samsung and LG showed off new refrigerators that had large displays embedded in the doors to serve as a central hub for notes, lists, apps, and interconnectivity with other smart "things" around the house.

Hoverboards were prohibited on the actual floor, except where exhibitors dedicated testing areas for these two-wheeled beasts of their own. Though, these were not as apparent as drones were seen all over. There were so many drones being shown off on the floor that you can clearly see this whole trend is only going to get bigger and bigger.

In terms of phones, I would have to say that, personally, I saw Huawei really embracing the US market with the announcement of the Huawei Mate 8 (hands-on here), a phone that tries to stretch the flagship envelope even further.

Huawei also announced two new women's watches designed around the specs of the original Huawei Watch (hands-on here). I found Huawei's women's watches prettier than Samsung's Gear S2 Classics (hands on). Though, I mean this purely from a visual point of view and I am not comparing features.

I was also very impressed with Honor, a sub brand of Huawei's whose target market is the millennial demographic. Those who want to individualize themselves while making a statement with the tech they own. I attended Honor's event which kicked off with a choreographed performance of dancers wearing metallic suits on hoverboards.

This actually did a great job of changing the energy in the room and getting everyone pumped for what Honor had to announce. They used the tagline "no nonsense" which pretty much gives you an idea of what to expect.

Honor announced the 5X, a phone with midrange hardware and flagship-grade build quality for a $200 dollar price tag, unlocked (check out the Honor 5X hands-on here). It's also a Dual-SIM phone with expandable memory and a metal back.

I can predict Huawei to reach top 5 phone makers in the US within the next 3 to 5 years. With the success of the Nexus 6P and now its official entry into the United States with its flagship Mate 8 and Honor's 'mini-ship' 5X, Huawei's beautiful hardware and well-thought out software will surely give the US market the desperate refresh that it needs.

Wrapping it up

Just over a year ago, I was applying for a job where I'd be working as a Samsung representative within a Best Buy. At the time I thought this couldn't get any better - I'd get to play with new [Samsung] phones, tell people about what they can do, troubleshoot software issues, and show customers how these devices benefit their lives. It's actually thanks to this job that I crossed paths to join the GSMArena team, but that's a story for another time.

Being in the position of a budding tech journalist today, I realize how wrong I've been about the supposed benefits of this past opportunity. My job today is something I'd only dreamed of. I get to reach out to an immensely wider public and I get to see and play with every imaginable gadget way ahead of it reaching the stores.

That's me playing with a prototype cyber phone from Japan, called Robohon.

And the highlight of CES for me was the opportunity meet and greet other journalists who share the same passion as me. I got the chance to chat, mingle, and exchange contacts with some of the popular tech bloggers who I'd been following for years.

I've been baptized by fire. Attending one of these big industry events is what takes you to the next level in this job and I am looking forward to the next one. I enjoyed CES, I really did. But as I am leaving Las Vegas, I am doing so with a sigh of relief. It was tons of fun, but I am glad it's finally over. New York, here I come.




Haiti - Agriculture : IDB brings $2,4M to the SMASH program of the BRANA





Friday, in the Etoile du Nord in Carrefour Vincent (Drouillard), the US Agency for International Development (USAID), the Inter American Development Bank (IDB), and the National Brasserie d'Haiti SA (BRANA), have joined the sorghum farmers to celebrate the integration of the IDB to the program Smallholders Alliance for Sorghum in Haiti (SMASH), the alliance of small sorghum farmers in Haiti, launched in 2013 by the BRANA.



Peter Mulrean, Ambassador of the United States in Haiti, Jose Matthijsse, the Director General of BRANA, Gilles Damais, the Head of IDB operations in Haiti and members of the private sector, among others, participated in this activity.



IDB by joining SMASH provides a grant of 2.4 million US dollars, which is in addition to 3.4 million of the BRANA and to the 1.7 million of USAID. "The subsidy granted by IDB group will help increase the number of producers participating in the program. They will benefit from the technical support of the program's agronomists to increase local production," declared Gilles Damais, Head of IDB operations in Haiti.



Recall that the SMASH project aims to increase the incomes of about 18,000 Haitian small farmers who sell local sorghum improved to the BRANA, for the manufacture and marketing of beverage Malta H (a product purchased and consumed by Haitian). SMASH is a partnership quite innovative between a bilateral donor (USAID), a multilateral lender (IDB), and private companies to improve the Haitian value chain, and thus sustainably increase the incomes of farmers.



The Ambassador Mulrean declared "SMASH is a Haitian program for the Haitians. BRANA, is an institution in Haiti and farmers participating in SMASH program will have a reliable buyer for their local sorghum for years to come. The US Government is committed to working with its Haitian counterparts to increase the number and quality of this type of partnership in Haiti."



So far, SMASH engaged 3,100 farmers. The participation of the IDB will expand the program to more farmers in more regions with a growing potential of sorghum, including Limonade and Malfety in the North and Northeast departments; Croix des Bouquets, Cabaret and around Port-au-Prince in the West; Les Cayes, Camp Perrin and Cavaillon in the South.



The IDB support will also add to the program of measures designed to strengthen the resilience of crops to climate change, to reduce the vulnerability of buyers and producers of the supply chain.



See also :

https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-16258-icihaiti-agriculture-idb-engages-in-the-smash-program-of-the-brana.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-11661-haiti-agriculture-brana-and-usaid-celebrate-the-sorghum-harvest.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-9049-haiti-agriculture-important-agreement-between-brana-and-usaid.html



HL/ HaitiLibre






















Haiti - News : Electoral Zapping...





Senate President denies

Friday, during a press briefing Andris Riche, the Senate President has insisted that the Senate has no objection to the opening of Parliament scheduled January 11 next "The blocking of the opening of Parliament is not in our agenda. We can not put ourselves in the way of an obligation to the Constitution." However, he recalled that the opening of Parliament may not take place, if the Head of State does not route the Senate a copy of the CEP letter confirming the election of various candidates and that, in order to respect the procedures and regula of the Upper House.



Meanwhile, Andris Riche, today announced he made provisions for the registration of new parliamentarians and validation of their powers, indicating he sent that same day, a note to the newly elected officials to assist them in their paperwork for ensure parliamentary comeback, Monday, January 11, 2016.



Jude Celestin conditions once again its participation in the second round...

According to Augustin Jinaud, Spokesperson of Jude Celestin candidate for the presidency under the banner of "Alternative League for Progress and Emancipation of Haiti (LAPEH)," Jude Celestin will not launch his campaign and will not participate in the election of January 24, as long the recommendations of the Independent Commission will not be applied." Another reason mentioned after having condition his participation successively, among other to a Verification Commission, to the departure of Moise Jovenel and the resignation of the members of the Provisional Electoral Council (CEP)...



Remember that in case of withdrawal of LAPEH candidate, CEP will apply Article 43.1 of the Electoral Decree, which states "In case of withdrawal, in the interval of two (2) rounds of one of the candidates admitted to the second round this candidate is replaced automatically by the one who, in the first round, followed immediately and so on..." in this case is Moise Jean Charles (Pitit Dessaline) 222,646 votes 14.27% that would take place in the second round against Jovenel Moise (PHTK).



Roudy Stanley Penn, spokesman of the Electoral Council, decloared while speaking of the candidate Jude Celestin "Until he sends us a letter to say he gives up, he will be on the ballot for the final round and people will be able to vote for him."



The CEP technically ready for the January 24 poll

"All is technically ready for the elections scheduled for Sunday 24 January" this is what suggested Friday Me Mosler Georges, Executive Director of CEP indicating that the distribution of sensitive materials through the 10 departments geographic country will begin Sunday, January 10, 2016.



The PNH ready for the second round

Thursday, Commissioner Frantz Lerebours, spokesman of the National Police of Haiti (PNH) announced on a radio of the capital, that the police institution is prepared to provide security for the second round of elections, scheduled January 24, 2015.



HL/ HaitiLibre


















Korean Movie | 2014

 Drama

Directed by Kim Se-yeon ()

Written by Kim Se-yeon ()

96min | Release date in South Korea: 2016/01/21

Synopsis

Working at a transgender bar, Min-a is a female with male genitals. When her colleague is assaulted by a male customer, she steps in to help, only to accidentally kill the assaulter. At the court, Min-a insists that she had no choice  she had to protect her colleague - but the situation is not favorable to her. Taking advantage of her sexual identity, the prosecutor drives the case as if the murder were a result out of jealousy, and Min-as own lawyer does not pay attention to her situation. Not until Min-a is placed in a mens jail and is seized with terror do the human rights issues for transgender people emerge. Min-a is finally transferred to a prison for females, but still she suffers from misunderstanding. Presenting the transgender human rights issues as a court drama, this film tries to correct the myriad misunderstandings toward transgender people. Director Kim Se-yeon made this film based on a true story about a transgender person jailed with male inmates. This is also a court drama that embraces the conventional styles rather than new techniques. (NAM Dong-chul)



Festival

Busan International Film Festival (2014) - Korean Cinema Today-Panorama

Source
Lantern shines light on Charleston-style fare

Casey Maness displays a dish of shrimp and grits at the Lantern, a new restaurant in the Charleston Inn.

Cutline

In the galley of a Coast Guard ship, Casey Maness cooked like a cook and cooked like a chef.

We did breakfast, lunch and dinner for the regular crew and then in the ward room, where the officers eat, they get served tableside plated every evening for dinner, she said.

During four years in the Coast Guard, Maness served on board rescue boats with a crew as small as 12 and on 270-foot cutters with 100 sailors. She moved to Asheville and had a job managing the nutrition program and the kitchens for a company that owned treatment homes for teenage girls.

Then David Payne and Shelle Rogers found her. The couple had recently bought the Claddagh Inn on North Main Street and rebranded it as the Charleston Inn (restoring one of its earlier names).

David and Shelle I guess recruited me through a friend of theirs, Maness said. They said Hey, do you want to open a restaurant, and I said, Absolutely I do.

I started cooking them at the bed and breakfast before we started the restaurant, she added. Weve put on several meals trying to dial in our menu and figure out what works and what they liked and what they didnt and how we could improve it.

The Lantern opened about three weeks ago.

The menu will change seasonally based on locally sourced ingredients but the Charleston theme will remain a standard. Manesss experience at sea is evident in many of the choices.

Appetizers include Lobster MacnCheese ($10), Charleston Cheese Dip ($8) and mussels ($10). The Lantern serves up Creole Cobb salad ($10), She Crab soup ($6) and Louisiana Gumbo ($9). Entrees include Lobster tail for $35, crab cakes ($16), zucchini fritters ($12), filet mignon ($28), Sweet Tea Fried Chicken topped with jalapeno slaw ($18), Meatloaf Burger, local apple brandy ground beef with vintage cheddar cheese ($15), shrimp and grits ($16) and shrimp etouffee ($15). Maness also prepares a variety desserts.

Dinner hours are 5 to 9 p.m. Thursday through Monday.
The remains of Claire Hewitt are brought to St Ciaran's Church, Hartstown, for her funeral mass

Crowds of mourners turned out yesterday to pay their respects to the "amazing" woman who was the first person to be killed on the roads this year.

Claire Hewitt (47), of Hazelwood Avenue, Clonsilla, died in the early hours of last Sunday when she was hit by a car only metres from her home.

The mother-of-two was walking with a friend, who remains in hospital, across Hartstown Road in west Dublin after a night out when tragedy struck.

Her husband, David, daughter Jolie, son John Paul and extended family were chief mourners at yesterday's funeral mass. The congregation at the Church of St Ciaran in Hartstown was told of Ms Hewitt's love for life in a touching tribute paid by her daughter.

"I don't need to remind people how much of a lovely, caring woman my mother was," Jolie said. "She was an amazing woman and I can see here how much she was loved in the community and how much everyone cared for her. Obviously, she loved to talk to everybody - you'd just walk to the shop and she'd start talking to you."

Ms Hewitt worked as a carer at St Joseph's Centre for people with intellectual disabilities in Clonsilla, and her daughter thanked the hospital for making the job so enjoyable for her.

"She loved all the women she looked after and she loved all the staff. She had a lot of time for you all," she said.

Jolie joked that her mother worked as a travel agent on her days off because she would constantly look up holidays while keeping track of her when she was working on a cruise ship.

"She knew where I was before I knew where I was," said Jolie. "She was on that ship tracker, seeing where the ship was. It was like she was always with me.

Singing

"I know my mam's not with us now, but she's always in our hearts and she's with us in spirit, and I know that."

Gifts brought to the altar included a microphone because of her love of singing, betting slips to represent her fondness for horses, an angel and a paintbrush.

"Anyone who knew my mam well knew she loved a tin of paint and a paintbrush and redecorating the house, even if it was against my dad's will," said Jolie.

A set of hands was also among the gifts to show Ms Hewitt's dedication to her job, in which chief celebrant Fr Joe Coyne said she went "beyond the call of duty". He spoke of the joy when she had brought Christmas presents to the hospital only a few weeks ago.

"Claire went the extra mile," he said.

He also spoke of the "circle of love" that had gathered around the family in the days after her death. Among those in the congregation were workmates, staff and students from Hartstown Community School, where John Paul is a pupil, and Deputy Mayor of Fingal Jack Chambers.

Colleagues placed a bible and crucifix on the coffin and donation boxes for St Joseph's Hospital were placed at the end of the church. A prayer was said for the friend who survived the tragedy. Ms Hewitt was afterwards laid to rest in Dardistown Cemetery.

The 24-year-old man who was driving the car and has an address in Hartstown is to appear at Blanchardstown District Court at the end of the month.
A father and son have been remanded on bail after being charged with helping an armed robber escape from prison.

Derek Brockwell (54) attacked prison officers after he was brought to Tallaght Hospital for treatment last year and fled custody.

Yesterday morning, James Donoghue (58) and his son Alan Donoghue (32) were arrested by gardai in Co Meath and brought to Rathfarnham Garda Station in Dublin before appearing before separate courts.

James Donoghue appeared before Tallaght District Court accused of aiding and abetting the escape of a prisoner, contrary to the Criminal Law Act, 1976. The incident allegedly took place at Tallaght Hospital on February 17, 2015.

Gardai said that Mr Donoghue, of St Oliver's Park in Ratoath, Co Meath, is facing trial by judge and jury in the Circuit Court on the charge.

Judge Patricia McNamara remanded the accused on bail to appear again before Tallaght District Court on a date in February.

Charged

Garda Aine Bolton said Mr Donoghue was arrested at 7am this morning and taken to Rathfarnham Garda Station, where he was charged at 10.59am.

Gda Bolton said the accused was handed a true copy of the charge sheet and he made no reply to the charge after caution.

The garda said she had no objection to bail, subject to a number of conditions.

Judge McNamara remanded Mr Donoghue on bail in his own bond of 200.

As part of his bail conditions, he must surrender his passport and not apply for new travel documentation. He must also sign on twice a week at Ashbourne Garda Station.

Defence barrister Barry Murphy applied for free legal aid, saying Mr Donoghue is unemployed and on social welfare. Judge McNamara assigned solicitor Declan Fahy on free legal aid.

Gda Bolton said the DPP has directed trial on indictment in the Circuit Court on the charge and Judge McNamara remanded Mr Donoghue on bail to appear before Tallaght court again on February 19 for the service of the book of evidence.

Meanwhile at Navan District Court, James Donoghue's son, Alan, was charged with the same offence as his father.

Alan Donoghue, whose address is also St Oliver's Park in Ratoath, was also granted bail subject to similar conditions that were imposed on his father.

Evidence of arrest, charge and caution in Alan Donoghue's case was given by Detective Garda David Connolly of Tallaght Garda Station.

He is also facing trial in the circuit court and is due to appear before Navan District Court again on February 26 next.
A man who sexually assaulted a woman as she slept in her bed following a party has been given a two-and-a-half-year suspended sentence.

Stephen McCarthy (23) initially told gardai when questioned that he "tripped and landed on top of" the victim.

McCarthy, of Esker Hills, Portlaoise pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to sexual assault at a house in the city in June 2013.

Suspending the sentence, Judge Martin Nolan said it had been a "particularly disturbing event" for the woman and it was "reprehensible" that McCarthy did not make candid admissions to the gardai at the time.

However, he took account of McCarthy's guilty plea, his lack of any previous convictions and the fact that 2,000 in compensation had been accepted by the victim as a "token of remorse".

The judge also ruled that the press was free to name McCarthy but not identify the victim.

Judge Nolan remarked that McCarthy had travelled to Australia to work after the incident but returned when he was told the gardai were "looking for him".

He noted McCarthy had been in custody since December 7.

"The question I have to decide is, does Mr McCarthy deserve a further period of custody?" the judge said. "It seems to me by reason of the good mitigation that that type of sentence is not necessary."

Previously, Garda Mary Brophy agreed with the prosecution that the woman had gone to sleep in her bedroom at about 1.30am following the party and awoke later that night feeling "something weird".

McCarthy had his fingers in her vagina and was moving in to kiss her. She screamed and jumped out of bed.

Her sister came up to the room but found no one there. She went to another room and saw McCarthy there but suspected he was just pretending to be asleep.

He was later arrested and initially told gardai that he had tripped, landed on top of the victim and she had screamed.

He had been released without charge following his garda interviews and a few months later had left to work abroad.

As soon as he became aware he was to be charged, he returned home.

He co-operated and Gda Brophy became aware during interviews that he was "of limited intelligence".

Ashamed

The woman outlined in her victim impact statement that her life had been changed for ever in a way she had no control over. She said the idea that the safest place you could be was at home in your own bed had been taken away from her.

The defence said his client apologised and was deeply ashamed of himself.

McCarthy had been drinking all day, had little recollection of what happened and accepted the victim's account.
Workers of all grades voted 221-2 in favour in strikes  which are likely to come in the form of one or two-day stoppages. Picture: Caroline Quinn

Luas workers have voted overwhelmingly for industrial action in a move that could see widespread disruption from early next month.

Workers of all grades voted 221-2 in favour in strikes - which are likely to come in the form of one or two-day stoppages.

SIPTU organiser Owen Reidy told the Herald that turnout was 99pc, which he said sends a "very strong message" to the company.

The decision to strike centres on a row over pay, with Luas drivers seeking to be paid in line with their counterparts across the public transport sector.

The drivers insist their pay has been "stagnant" in recent years and is now significantly below that of drivers in Irish Rail.

These demands total 30m over five years, it is understood.

SIPTU members will meet next week to discuss the possible timing and form of the industrial action they will conduct.

Extensions

In a further statement last night, the union said its members feel their levels of pay are unacceptably low.

"Since it started operation in 2004, the Luas network has grown rapidly, with several extensions added and new developments planned," the statement said.

"Correspondingly, during this period passenger numbers have also consistently increased. Transdev successfully retained the contract to operate the Luas network in September 2014.

"The company has consistently returned annual profits from the operation of Luas.

"Our members believe they are underpaid, particularly when compared with Irish Rail.

"They do not accept that the current contract between Transport Infrastructure Ireland and Transdev, concerning the operation of the Luas network, restricts possible pay increases to the consumer price index, as has been claimed by their employer."
Game on! IU to resume series with Kentucky starting in 2025-26.

Kentucky coach John Calipari confirmed at SEC media day the two schools have agreed in principle to restart their annual regular-season series.
This domain has expired. If you owned this domain, contact your domain registration service provider for further assistance. If you need help identifying your provider, visit https://www.tucowsdomains.com/
The Mumbai Police have summoned filmmaker Karan Johar to record his statement in connection with the controversial All India Bakchod (AIB) Knockout event that was held in December 2013. HT tried to contact Johar, who is currently in London, through SMS and phone calls, but he was unavailable for a comment. The event was inspired by US celebrity roasts  an event where a celebrity is mocked  and it featured Johar as the Roastmaster or host.

AIB Roast was held at Worli and its video was put up online a month later, but it ran into controversy after social activist Santosh Daundkar approached a city court in February 2014, calling the content of the roast vulgar. The court then ordered the police to register an FIR and submit an investigation report.

Read: Who said what in AIB Roast case

Johar was named as an accused in the case, for allegedly saying obscene words during the show. We have summoned Karan Johar, which essentially means he will have to come to the Tardeo police station to give his statement. His statement will be an important part of the charge sheet that is yet to be submitted to the court, said an officer from the Tardeo police station. The officer added they have not been able to talk to Johar personally as he is in London.

Read: AIB up for another Roast

We are in touch with his advocate, who is coordinating with us. We will take his statement in a few days, the officer said.

The police said they will also summon actors Arjun Kapoor, Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone. The officer said section 295 of the IPC (punishment for hurting religious sentiments) has been added to the FIR, but the police need the permission of the states chief secretary before submitting the charge sheet in court.
The fourth Delhi Literature Festival thats being held this weekend has an interesting line-up that includes many politicians and journalists.

The three-day fest being held at Dilli Haat in INA will see a range of perspectives explored, ideas challenged, and possible solutions debated by an interesting line-up of panelists and moderators including authors, politicians and journalists.

Quite unusually for a festival of this kind, a large number of state and central government officials will be hosted at the event that was inaugurated by Delhis art and culture minister Kapil Mishra, among other dignitaries.

Journalist Barkha Dutt with Arvind Kejriwal at the 2014 festival. (HT Photo)

As befitting the capital, the line-up at the Delhi Literature Festival and the topics under discussion are suitably political.

Everyone in todays world is interested in politics and current affairs. So, the aim is to make sure the youth remains engaged not only with literature but the happenings around, says Kunal Gupta, advisor to the Delhi Literature Festival society.

Read: Writers withdraw from Bengaluru literature fest

Author Omair Ahmad, agrees. One of the important aspects of democracy is to debate with people we necessarily wont, he says.

Naturally, hot button topics like the debate on tolerance and a few personalities who have been in the thick of the action will be part of the festival. Sessions to look forward to include the Coming of the Age of Tolerance and The Idea of India. Columnist Sudheendra Kulkarni, who was attacked by the Shiv Sena for launching a former Pakistan foreign ministers book in Mumbai, will be part of the panel discussing the growing environment of intolerance. He hopes to make a strong case for building a strong India-Pakistan relationship even against the backdrop of the Pathankot terror attacks.

Writer and politician Shashi Tharoor with journalist Sandeep Choudhary at the 2015 fest. (HT Photo)

We shouldnt let terrorists derail the peace process. Not only politicians, artists should also consistently raise their voices he says.

Delhis rich cultural and political history will form an essential part of the festival, that has been taglined Aapka Apna.

Delhi is littered with the ruins of people we dont really care about, says Ahmad. It is this cultural history that he wishes to touch upon during the discussion of his

book The Storytellers Tale, which will be moderated by author Madhulika Liddle.

Other authors who will discuss their books include journalist Sankarshan Thakur and William Dalrymple. Sankarshan Thakur will be in conversation with News Nation journalist Ajay Kumar on his book Brothers Bihari and the Nitish Kumar-Lalu Prasad Yadav alliance in Bihar while Dalrymple will be launching his latest book, Return of a King: The Battle of Afghanistan and follow it up with a discussion. This will be followed by a discussion that will no doubt touch on world politics as well.

Former Delhi CM Sheila Dixit at the 2013 festival (HT Photo)

There is also a focus on the world of publishing and its changing topography in the digital age. Rather puzzlingly, in the era of social media and microblogging, author Vikas Swarup, the current external affairs ministry spokesperson (best known as the author of the novel Q & A, which was adapted into the film Slumdog Millionaire) will be on a panel that discusses Blogs versus Books.

These panel discussions will be interspersed with poetry readings and live musical performances.

Writer F Scott Fitzgerald once stated that the beauty of literature is that You discover that your longings are universal longings, that youre not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.

It is this sense of belonging that perhaps Aapka Apna Delhi Literature Festival hopes to promote. Naturally, the Dilliwalas special interests will feature.

Issues that will be discussed during the fest will deal with what bothers the people of Delhi and what really engages them, says Kriti Upadhyaya, the events media co-ordinator.

It will be interesting to see how this heady mix of politics and literature comes together, and whether this platform will encourage healthy debate that is free of rancour.

WHERE: Dilli Haat, opposite INA market

WHEN: January 8-10

CONTACT: delhifestival@gmail.com
Where do you put Star Bestsellers in your body of work?

It is surprising how many people remember the show. People may perceive it as successful today. But it was not revived after the first season. It may not have brought a lot of financial success to the channel, but it did create a lot of buzz.

What do you remember about directing an episode for the show?

Although I was already directing some episodes for CID and Aahat, I remember it distinctly. The story centred on the dilemmas of middle-class parents in Mumbai, who believe a gangster killed in a police raid on a hotel, resembles their travel agent son who resides in Bangalore.

The episode was called First Kill and the main investigator was played by Abhimanyu Singh, who went on to play a firebrand student leader in Anurag Kashyaps Gulal. But there were some other actors, who were very good at their job, such as Manoj Joshi, Sandeep Kulkarni and Anant Jog.

The show was a refreshing first for Indian TV and it gave a platform to newcomers like Anurag Kashyap, Tigmanshu Dhulia and me to showcase our work as filmmakers.

What did you think of the hour-long format?

It was Shailja Kejriwals idea. The length gave us the opportunity to consider each episode a film. Most of us were waiting for our first big film and in Star Bestsellers, we could lend a film-like treatment to every episode.

To make every story appear different was a challenge. It involved all the effort and pain that goes into making a full-length film. We didnt have the luxury of a big budget, but we still tried to impart a cinema-like quality to the episodes.

From HT Brunch, January 10, 2016

Follow us on twitter.com/HTBrunch

Connect with us on facebook.com/hindustantimesbrunch

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West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday called on business leaders to invest in the state fearlessly.

Addressing the Bengal Global Business Summit 2016, with finance minister Arun Jaitley in attendance, she claimed her government would return to power in the assembly elections slated for April-May.

Rail minister Suresh Prabhu, road and transport Nitin Gadkari and power and coal minister Piyush Goyal were also present at the summit, as were leading industrialists such as Reliance Industries Ltd chairman Mukesh Ambani, Niranjan Hiranandani (MD Hiranandani group), Sajjan Jindal (chairman, JSW group), YC Deveshwar (chairman, ITC), Rakesh Bharti Mittal (vicechairman, Bharti Enterprises) and Sanjiv Goenka (chairman, RP-Sanjiv Goenka group).

RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani said his company is keen to grow in the state. We have already invested Rs 5,000 crore in West Bengal through our telecom arm, Reliance Jio. We will further invest in connecting 40,000 villages, 2,800 colleges, all rural and urban schools and all hospitals, he said, adding West Bengal is one of Indias top states on ease of doing business, which Hiranandani endorsed.

The chief minister claimed that Bengal Global Business Summit 2015 had tied up investment worth Rs 2.43 lakh crore, and Out of that, investments worth Rs 94,000 crore has already fructified and the remaining are in the pipeline.

On Friday, Japanese logistics giant Kawasaki-Rikuso Transportation Company announced plans to invest in setting up an ultramodern cold storage facility at Singur in Hooghly district, the former home of the aborted Nano factory.

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Tragedy followed by embarrassment seems to be par for the course far too often in the Indian context. The terrorist attack at Pathankot was a deeply disturbing affair, as it came within days of Prime Minister Narendra Modis unexpected outreach to Pakistan through a visit to that country during Prime Minister Nawaz Sharifs granddaughters wedding. For a moment, I rejoiced at the prospect that in all the dark clouds could disperse just a little and let in a glimmer of sunlight. But that was not to be. The spectacle of the two prime ministers walking hand-in-hand at Lahore airport evidently convulsed jihadi figures and inimical strategic actors in Pakistan enough to put their diabolical plans into effect immediately.

India and Pakistan are back to familiar, uncertain waters. Can the political and bureaucratic elites in both countries who instinctively mistrust each other after being politicised through a long blame game over the emergence of Bangladesh in 1971 and the insurgency in Punjab and Kashmir in the 1980s focus on reachable objectives? Modi, who more than walked the talk, now needs to give a long hard look at framing his Pakistan policy as he aims to keep India secure while continuing engagement in view of the strategic imperatives of peace and regional economic cooperation.

Read | Some elements want to sabotage talks with India: Pak defence minister

The first priority to pursue is, of course, security; to ensure that we do not see the repeat of military installations (and potentially entire towns) being held hostage by a small band of terrorists for days on end. For that we need a candid, public assessment of the failures of the operation to counter the terrorists at Pathankot. This is important because there is a 91-km stretch along the India-Pakistan border that is not fenced owing to difficult, riverine terrain. As it is now increasingly plain, the handling of the Pathankot operation was riddled with blunders, raising serious questions about our preparedness.

The Punjab Police either did not take the account of superintendent of police Salwinder Singh, whom the terrorists abducted, or its leadership could not summon enough resources on time to launch a hunt for the SUV they were travelling in. There appear to be technical challenges in pinpointing their location but systems ought to have been in place to respond to such an intrusion in a sensitive military zone. Influential policy practitioners have wondered if established processes for decision-making were followed such as the convening of the Crisis Management Group, which includes representations from key ministries and security services.

Read | Missed clues, security gaps in run-up to Pathankot airbase attack

And well-regarded military analysts have pointed to decision-making flaws during the counter-terrorist assault. As Lt. Gen. HS Panag (retd) has written, no lead agency or overall commander was appointed. He goes on to say that the General Officer Commanding of the 29 Division ought to have been put in charge, the preventive security of the air base was not beefed up, an infantry battalion should have manned the perimeter and patrolled the wall from outside, the air base itself was poorly guarded, there were no electronic sensors to detect movement and the periphery is not lit up, and a key air force base was being guarded by poorly trained personnel. I am surprised that this escaped the notice of terrorists and their handlers for so long.

The principal focus of the government should now be on identifying gaps and assigning responsibility within rather than mainly expending energy on blaming actors in Pakistan, however warranted that is. The prime minister also has the difficult task of calibrating his engagement with Pakistan, to be able to balance the promise of last months atmospherics with the domestic pressures he is bound to face. Sabre-rattling narratives are understandable, and often necessary, reactions to disturbing events. But they cannot always be guides to policymaking. The problem with reprisals is that military or covert objectives are difficult to identify without the risk of escalation. This is not in Indias interests.

But there are things that New Delhi will expect of Sharifs government in the days ahead. First, cooperating with India during the investigation, as he has promised. The Pakistani commentariat is not persuaded by claims from India that Pathankot was masterminded by Pakistan State actors. They point to the insurgency in the tribal areas and the high incidence of targeting Pakistani military targets to argue that non-State actors are a law unto themselves. The Indians counter saying the brazenness and efficiency of the Pathankot operation and the very infiltration into Punjab could not have materialised without the active assistance of the Pakistani military.

The only way to settle this for the Sharif and Modi governments is to cooperate in unravelling the conspiracy. And if it is established that non-State actors like the Jaish-e-Mohammed or the United Jihad Council were behind this, then India must insist that Sharif muster up the nerve to go after these elements, however risky it may be for him. Mr Sharifs penchant has been to forge a range of political alliances, including with extremist groups, which offer him cover from the military and at the same time enhance his business interests. But now is the time for him to make tough choices. He should realise that the India relationship cannot prosper without him showing courage on the domestic front.

Read | Fix governance gaps to avoid Pathankot-like security challenges

The Modi government has done well to manage the domestic narrative so far. BJP leaders have clarified that dialogue should go on and the RSS has backed the PMs policy with one senior leader even characterising ties between both the countries as relations souring between two brothers. The internal debate is, however, by no means settled. More attacks will certainly unsettle the united front on display now. The task for Modi is to bring the full weight of international pressure on Pakistan to investigate and prosecute the perpetrators. The NDA must use continued engagement on the NSA and the foreign secretaries channel to uncover the truth about Pathankot and underline that Sharifs credibility is on the line in New Delhi. Frankly, Pathankot has ensured that terrorism is the only agenda item for now on the bilateral calendar. If Sharif cannot work the system to keep India safe, then policymakers here are bound to lend a greater ear to arguments that speak about the benefits of a freeze.

chanakya@hindustantimes.com

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This Sunday morning I want to share a wonderful story that should make all of you sit up and smile. Though hard to believe, its a true tale. More than that, its a story that refreshes ones faith in mankind and, for those who wish to so interpret it, it could also be a sign that there is, occasionally, a helpful God high in heaven.

The story was told to me on Christmas Eve by my good friend and neighbour Dipankar Gupta, Indias foremost sociologist and one of the best informed pundits on television. I mention all of this so that you know he wouldnt lie because what follows is, truly, stranger than fiction.

The story starts in the late 80s, when the Sikh situation was at its troublesome worst. At the time, Dipankar was on a research trip to Jehanabad in Bihar with a group of colleagues. His travels brought him into contact with the District Collector (DC), a lady called Amita Paul. Although they didnt know each other, their conversations established a rapport and, as you will soon discover, a measure of trust.

Late one night Ms Paul summoned Dipankar for urgent advice. She had stumbled upon something unsettling and wanted to consult someone. Thats when the story started to emerge.

Earlier that day, in her kacheri, Amita Paul had come across a Sikh who, as Dipankar put it, was all trussed-up. Actually, thats a euphemism but I dont want the gory and disturbing details to distract you. This story leads in a different direction.

On questioning this gentleman, Ms Paul discovered he was Canadian and by profession a taxi driver. His name was Amarjit Singh Sohi and he had come to India to visit his family in Punjab. There he had joined a troop of actors and then travelled with them all the way to Jehanabad.

This was such an unlikely set of circumstances that the local police found it suspicious and suspected Mr Sohi could be a terrorist. Ms Paul, on the other hand, believed him. Rather than let him be arrested  or, indeed, worse  she had him transported out of her district and, hopefully, to safety. Unfortunately, her colleagues in the civil or police service were less discerning. So, not long afterwards, Mr Sohi was re-arrested, thus undoing Amita Pauls good work.

Im not sure of the precise details hereafter but Im told Mr Sohi spent months in detention, possibly under TADA, including, perhaps, a stint in solitary confinement. But, eventually, he was released and returned to Canada.

Now this is where the story becomes truly incredible. Nearly 30 years later, Amarjit Singh Sohi is a member of Justin Trudeaus cabinet and Canadas Minister for Infrastructure and Communities. I dont know how he recalls his unfortunate experience in India but, clearly, it hasnt affected his career or his success.

Unfortunately, I doubt if Ms Paul has got the recognition she deserves. In fact, Id be very surprised if she hasnt been made to suffer for what she did. In India such good deeds are more likely to arouse suspicion than bring forth praise.

Today, however, there is an opportunity to make up for that lapse and also take a step that Justin Trudeau would truly admire and respect. It might even win the hearts of most Canadians. Why doesnt the government appoint Amita Paul high commissioner to Canada? Frankly, in todays circumstances, I cant think of anyone who would be a better choice.

The views expressed are personal

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Here is an excerpt from a purported meeting between top policy makers agonising over whether we should talk to Pakistan:

Top boss: We cant give up talking to Pakistan. If we call off the talks well be playing directly into the terrorists hands.

Big shot: The people want peace. Thats why we want the Ghulam Ali concert to be held.

Flunkey: Is he a terrorist?

Big shot: No clue. I havent heard him sing.

Sceptic: But our leaders have been talking and meeting and yet the terrorists keep coming.

Top boss: You must realise Pakistan is no ordinary country. It has non-State actors.

Big shot: Terrorists are non-State actors. Nawaz Sharif is a State non-actor.

Top boss: To simplify things, Ive made a chart of all their power centres. 1) State actors  a rare breed; 2) State non-actors  most of the administration; 3) Non-State actors including 3a) bad Taliban  Taliban in Pakistan; 3b) Good Taliban  in Afghanistan; 3c) Bad terrorists  terrorists against Pakistan; 3d) Good terrorists  against India; 4) State within a state  Pakistan army; 5) State within a State within a State  ISI; 6) Rogue elements within 1&4&5; 7) pseudo-State actors  the Hurriyat; 8) sectarian outfits; 9) Dawood Ibrahim and 10) non-State non-actors  the people. All of them gang up with and fight with everybody else. To make things interesting, terrorist outfits constantly change their names, the Jaish-e-Something becoming the Lashkar-e-Something else or the Harkat-e-Whatever whenever they feel like it. So theres absolutely no point talking only to Nawaz Sharif. Why, sometimes even Nawaz refuses to talk to Sharif.

Sceptic: Yes, whats the point in talking peace if he cant deliver it?

Top boss: The solution is  we must talk to all of them.

All: Hear, hear.

Sceptic: What if the terrorists attack again?

Big shot: Talk harder. We could even stage a cross-border raid and give them a severe talking-to.

Sceptic: What if they still dont listen?

Top boss: We must nag them into submission.

All: Thank God, we now have a strategy. Hurray.

Minion: Er ... what should we talk to them about?

Top boss: Good point. So that you all know what to talk about, Im playing the video of the last India-Pakistan talks between the advisors of both countries:

Pak envoy (loudly): We must as good neighbours strive our utmost to mend relations between our two great countries ...

Indian envoy (muttering to himself while the Pakistan envoy is holding forth): Oh yeah? Really? Ha ha. Bloody terrorist. Bloody terrorist. Bloody terrorist. Bloody terrorist.

Indian envoy (loudly): We owe it to our people and future generations and the world to bring peace ...

Pak envoy (mutters to himself while the Indian envoy is talking): Balderdash. Utter rubbish. Bloody hypocrite. We want Kashmir. Gimme Kashmir. Gimme Kashmir. Gimme Kashmir. Gimme Kashmir.

manas.c@livemint.com

Manas Chakravarty is Consulting Editor, Mint

The views expressed are personal

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Nobody was able to correctly forecast the outcome of the two assembly elections last year  in Delhi first and then in Bihar. Most pre-poll surveys and exit polls couldnt predict that in Delhi, Arvind Kejriwals AAP would stun its opponents, particularly the BJP, and that in Bihar the unlikely combo of Lalu Prasad and Nitish Kumar would make a clean sweep. Most psephologists, Delhis dime-a-dozen political pundits and news TV channels got it horribly wrong. Now India lurches towards another season of polls  one that will begin in three months with elections in four states, West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, and in one union territory, Puducherry. While those same psephologists, pundits and channels will soon swing into action with surveys, analyses and forecasts, it may be worth assessing why these elections, particularly in the four states, are important for the two major national parties  the BJP and the Congress.

Both have much at stake in them. The BJP would be keen to make amends after its recent humiliating defeats with some electoral gains, if not wins  it is eyeing Assam with serious intent; and the Congress, which was marginalised in the 2014 parliamentary elections, would want to consolidate its political authority as the principal Opposition party by trying to win again in Assam and Kerala, where it is now in power, and also try and gain through alliances in Tamil Nadu and even in West Bengal. But its not going to be easy for either of them.

To begin with, in two of these states, the fight is between regional parties with little or no presence of the two national biggies. In Tamil Nadu, it is between K Karunanidhis DMK and chief minister J Jayalalithaas AIADMK, with both the Congress and the BJP at best playing bit roles. It will be the DMKs first state elections after the split between Karunanidhis two sons, Stalin and Alagiri, and an alliance with the Congress cannot be ruled out. That may be because chief minister Jayalalithaa has an iron-grip over her party and faces very little anti-incumbency sentiment among the voters. Little wonder that the BJP is keen on an alliance with her party.

Read | BJP hits bulls eye before Tamil Nadu elections

In West Bengal, the main battle is between chief minister Mamata Banerjees TMC and the Left alliance led by the CPI(M). But the TMC could retain power  it has swept the recent civic body polls and there has been little backlash from controversies such as the Saradha scam. The middle class urban voter may be a bit dissatisfied with her government but Ms Banerjee can count on a loyal rural vote bank. The CPI(M) and CPI, although technically national parties, are almost like regional parties with footprints only in West Bengal, Kerala and Tripura. With its cadre base in Bengal rapidly depleting, the Left can hope to only improve its tally in the assembly and not really aim at winning. Both the Congress and the BJP are marginal players here with limited relevance.

Its a different story in Kerala. In this southern state, for the past eight elections (that is, since 1980) power has oscillated between the Congress and the CPI (M), each forming the government alternately. Here the BJP can at best play a spoiler  its alliance with a local organisation representing the backward Ezhava community, and its efforts to woo the Dalits, can wean away votes from the Left, thereby, giving it some inroads in the state but more importantly weakening the CPI(M) to the benefit of the Congress.

The only somewhat head-to-head battle for the two could be in Assam, where the incumbent Congress has seen an exodus; the BJPs influence has been rising, as has been Badruddin Ajmals AIUDF, a regional party representing the interest of Assams Bengali speaking Muslims. The BJP could play up Hindu sentiments and try to ensure that the AIUDF and the Congress dont become allies. But for now, its all up in the air.

Read | Tarun Gogoi to be CM candidate in 2016 Assam polls: Rahul Gandhi

Heres what you can expect. A near-continuous, high-decibel election season. Right into 2017. After this years polls, the focus will shift to next years in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, not to mention Uttarakhand, Manipur, Goa and later Gujarat. India votes.

The author is the editor-in-chief of Hindustan Times. He tweets as @sanjoynarayan.

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To decongest Metro stations, the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) has found a unique way. Since a passenger can stay for 170 minutes irrespective of number of stations he/ she has to travel, the Metro has linked the stay in a Metro station to the amount paid for the ticket.

For instance, if a passenger has purchased a ticket for Rs 18 or less, he/she is entitled to stay in Metro only for 65 minutes. Sources said that this is being done to discourage couples from spending time at Metro stations.

Keeping in view the gradual increase in the length of the Metro network, the maximum permissible time limit for stay within the system for commuters is being revised from 170 to 180 minutes. The new time limit will be implemented from Monday. Additionally, in order to control overcrowding inside the stations, we have decided to rationalise the maximum time limit of stay in station premises permissible to each Metro commuter according to the length of their journey, said a DMRC spokesperson.

The maximum permissible time will now be divided into three time slots  passenger paying up to Rs 18 will be permitted to stay for 65 minutes, passenger paying up to Rs 23 will be able to stay for 100 minutes and passengers paying above Rs 18 will be permitted to stay for 180 minutes.

The new time limit has been fixed after calculating the maximum possible time that a commuter can take to travel specific distances. This measure is expected to reduce the crowding at Metro stations up to a certain extent, the spokesperson added.

Violators will not be fined till January 31 but from February 1, DMRC will start fining Rs 10 for each hour. The stations covered within the three time slots from each station will be displayed at all the stations so that the commuters clearly know within how much time they should exit from the system based on the destination they are travelling to.

Every month, more than one lakh commuters are penalised for overstaying in the system. Penalties of Rs 10 per extra hour (maximum Rs 50 as per DMRC business rules) will be imposed (as per existing business rules) for any breach of the time limit from February 1 onwards, the spokesperson added.
A 42-year-old man allegedly tried to commit suicide by consuming poison outside the residence of Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal in the Civil Lines area on Friday morning. He was rushed to the hospital after he started frothing at the mouth and was admitted for treatment. His condition is said to be stable, police said.

Anoop Singh, who had come to meet Kejriwal at the Janta Darbar at the CMs residence, reportedly consumed a termite-kill liquid on the way. While he was sitting at the Janta Darbar waiting to meet Kejriwal he started frothing at the mouth and fell unconscious. He had come to the chief ministers residence with his wife. She told us that he was upset as he had been falsely implicated in a sexual abuse case by a woman in their neighbourhood. She stated that he wanted to meet the chief minister in this regard, police said.

A case of sexual assault was registered against Singh by a woman in southwest Delhis Dabri village area and he had been reportedly depressed since then.

Someone had then told him that he must approach the CM for help following which he had asked his wife to accompany him to the Janta Darbar to seek help. While the darbar meeting was on, Singh started complaining of uneasiness and then fell unconscious. The people in the meeting rushed him to the hospital and also made a PCR call. We recovered the bottle of the termite kill from the spot. His condition is stable, DCP, North, Madhur Verma said.
Delhi transport minister Gopal Rai on Saturday said that government has no intention to continue the odd even scheme after January 15.

We will carry out a review after 15th. Currently there is no plan to extend it further, said Rai.

The Aam Aadmi Party government had on Friday told the Delhi high court that it may extend the odd-even scheme beyond the 15-day trial period, saying it has a definite positive effect against air pollution in the capital.

For 15 days from January 1, private cars are being allowed on the citys roads every other day to try to reduce pollutant levels, which regularly hit 10 times the World Health Organizations safe limits.

Read| Odd-even formula: People leave cars at home, opt for Metro, buses

Cars with odd-numbered licence plates have been directed to ply on odd-numbered dates, and those with even-numbered plates on the other days.

Till now 5893 challans have been issued to violators. The money collected from challan will be used in giving subsidy to those planning to buy bicycle. We want to promote use of cycle, said Rai.

Delhi transport minister Gopal Rai takes a visit during the trial of the odd-even car scheme at ITO in New Delhi on Thursday. (PTI)

Government helpline has received 13500 calls till now and transport department has formed 66 teams to check the traffic jams on Monday and Tuesday.

The government on Thursday had said that the road-rationing plan was working and would not be cut short as pollution levels in the city had dropped considerably. A week into the 15-day trial run, the city government, battling criticism that the odd-even formula for private cars had failed to clean citys dirty air, had said the concentration of finest particles, known as particulate matter 2.5 (PM 2.5), had fallen significantly.

Sixty micrograms per cubic metre is considered the maximum safe level while the World Health Organization recommends 25 micrograms. These tiny particles released by factories and motor vehicles can cause respiratory distress and have also been linked to cancer and heart disease.

Read| This winter more polluted, but driving curbs helped: SC-appointed body
Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) issued a show cause notice to St Stephens College principal Valson Thampu on Saturday, in relation to the sexual harassment case filed by a research scholar against a professor of the college.

The research scholar had filed a complaint of sexual harassment against her research guide and colleges chemistry departments associate professor Satish Kumar and accused the principal of trying to shield him.

Earlier too, DCW had summoned Thampu in the same matter in September and he had assured that he would help the research scholar in every possible manner.

A notice has been sent to Thampu, as he has still not changed the research scholars guide, as directed by DCW and also written several Facebook posts allegedly taunting the complainant.

According to the notice sent by DCW, the Internal Complaints Committee of the college did not complete the inquiry into the complaint of the research scholar within the stipulated time of 90 days, as per the Sexual Harassment at Workplace Act, 2013.

In fact, a senior UGC official, who was deputed to investigate the particular sexual harassment case, has shown several glaring anomalies in the manner St Stephens dealt with the case.

DCW has also taken cognizance of the numerous Facebook posts, which Thampu has been writing about the case in support of the professor. In one of the posts, he had even called the case a lie spread by a teacher of the college.

This case has been stretching for a long time and the victims PhD is also not progressing. Her career has also been stalled. Further to add to the insult, principal keeps on writing on Facebook, so we had to send this notice,said Swati Maliwal, DCW chief.

The principal has been asked to reply to the notice within seven days of receipt of the letter, failing which action could be taken against him. It is strongly recommended that the principal takes corrective steps for immediate relief to the complainant. The honble court will decide the merits of the sexual harassment case and the principal should refrain from any public statements and declarations on the merits of this particular sexual harassment case as the matter is sub-judice, said Maliwal. Thampu could not be reached for comment on the matter.
Women students pay an average of Rs 2,958 more than men for undergraduate hostels every month and Rs 2,614 more for postgraduate hostels, a study has found.

The study  conducted by a group of students running a campaign against discriminatory hostel timings  found that while women paid a monthly average of Rs 8,083 while staying in undergraduate hostels, male students paid just ` 5,125 per month. At the postgraduate level, women students paid a monthly average of Rs 7,140 while their male counterparts paid just Rs 4,526.

The study was conducted on charges paid for ten months in 13 undergraduate hostels and 12 postgraduate hostels. Women pay Rs 29,580 more at the undergraduate level and ` 26,140 more at the postgraduate level for over ten months, the study conducted by Pinjra Tod campaign said.

The campaign, which began last August, is made up of women students from DU, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Jamia Millia Islamia, Ambedkar University and National Law University.

Women have to fight a lot of social stigmas and prejudices to be able to study in universities. The university should be financially aiding them and not penalizing them for it by making it difficult for them to manage their expenses. We have not covered all the hostels in our study, but some of the main ones, said Devangana Kalita, a member of the campaign.

University officials, however, said that hostels are run on a noprofit-no-loss basis and there is no discrimination. The university and colleges have no role in deciding the hostel charges. All hostels have their own governing body which decides the hostel charges. These charges are at a no profit no loss basis. The charges can differ based on facilities provided but there is no discrimination, a senior DU official said.

The study also claimed that the postgraduate mens hostels do not require any hostellers to vacate their hostel after every session. However, postgraduate women hostels ask women hostellers to vacate their rooms after each sessin. It is only at the MPhil level that women can stay on like their male counterparts, Kalita said.

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A contaminated operation theatre at a state-run hospital in Madhya Pradeshs Barwani district blinded 60 people in November last year, a Kolkata laboratory has said in its report.

We have received an email from the laboratory officials today which states this finding. It comes as a stark contrast to the till now notion of drugs containing fungal infection, said Gauri Singh, principal secretary health in the MP government, about the surgeries at the hospital between November 16 and November 20.

The report said the swabs collected from the operation theatre had bacterial infection which later on because of poor post operative care multiplied to become a serious viral infection.

It may be recalled that the two-member committee which was appointed by the Union Health Ministry had pointed out in its report that the operation theatre needed renovation and was not in a condition where an operation should be performed.

So far it was assumed that the eye wash or the ringer lactate had fungal infection which caused the loss of eyesight among the patients, and the state government had even banned the firm, along with 18 other drugs, in the wake of the botched eye surgeries.

Mentioning that an official meeting on this case has been scheduled today itself for January 12, a discussion will be held regarding the action to be taken by the health department towards the doctors.

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Former Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar has claimed that the Indian government has a special relationship with underworld don Chhota Rajan, who was deported from Bali in November last year.

Kumar made the assertion during a session at the Delhi Literature Fest late on Friday evening with journalist Avirook Sen.

The short answer- yes there is, Kumar said to Sens question.

Kumar reiterated his statement when session moderator Madhu Trehan asked him whether this was a fact or just hearsay.

If I say it, it is true, he said.

The former top Delhi police officer in his tell-all memoir Dial D for Don had claimed that he had received a call from Dawood Ibrahim in June 2013.

Kumar had written that post the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts, he had telephonic conversations with the fugitive mob boss on three different occasions.

The book, which was released last year, also was in the news for its disclosure that that at one point in the 1990s Dawood wanted to surrender.

Responding to a question, Kumar said that all hopes must not be pinned on Chhota Rajan in order to get to Dawood.

There is hope in a manner of speaking, but let us not pin all our hopes on Chhota Rajan, Kumar said.

Chhota Rajan, a former aide and ally of Dawoods, is currently lodged in Tihar Jail.

The session also saw Kumar reminiscing about some of the controversial cases from his long career, including the Ansal Plaza shootout and the Mandal Commission protests.
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) is gearing up to counter the Trinamool Congress in the upcoming West Bengal assembly polls by showcasing the industrial drive which was initiated under former chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjees rule.

As part of their strategy, the CPI (M) has scheduled a padyatra on January 16, with both the starting and ending points of the procession strategically chosen  Singur, where the padyatra will start, was the site of the aborted Tata Motors factory in Hooghly, while Salboni, where it will end, was the site of a proposed iron and steel factory in West Midnapore.

The Singur project was later abandoned in wake of current CM Mamata Banerjees movement against land acquisition, while Sajjan Jindal suspended operations at the steel project in Salboni citing technical reasons.

In September 2008, when Tata Motors declared that it would abort the Singur project, the party decided to intensify its campaign to generate public opinion in favour of the revised compensation package the Left government had announced. To protect the project, we even decided not to get into any political confrontation with Trinamool and refrained from attacking Mamata Banerjee in public speeches, a CPI(M) central committee member told HT on Saturday.

To mount pressure on Banerjee, CPI(M) patriarch Jyoti Basu had even issued a public statement, requesting the Opposition to rise above politics and co-operate with the government in starting the project. However, none of the strategies worked and the Nano manufacturing unit eventually came up at Sanand, Gujarat.

With its upcoming padyatra, the CPI(M) aims to bring Singur and Salboni under focus once again.

This is a fresh effort to bring Singur and Salboni under focus. People must remember who initiated the industrial drive, said CPI (M) state committee leader Shyamal Chakraborty.

After a public meeting at Singur, the procession will move through different blocks of the district. Meetings will be held at Tarakeshwar, Pursura, Arambagh, Hajipur, Ramjibanpur, Chandrakona and Keshpur. The last rally will be held at Salboni on January 22, where two other processions from Haldia and Bishnupur in Bankura will merge, he added.

The party wants Bhattacharjee  who laid the foundation for both projects  to flag off the padyatra from Singur so that people, especially the youth and the unemployed, get the message that it was Left Front that initiated the industrial drive which the current TMC government has showcased at the Bengal Global Business Summit.

CPI(M) leaders, however, are not sure whether an ailing Bhattacharjee would be able make it to Singur on January 16. Party insiders said Left Front chairman Biman Bose and other leaders would be present at Singur.

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It seems a lost walkie-talkie or a handheld transceiver saved the Pathankot airbase from suffering large-scale damage.

The transmitter, carried by the four terrorists who kidnapped the SP to use his vehicle to reach Pathankot, was left by mistake in the SPs car when they disembarked from the vehicle in the wee hours of January 1. The transmitter was to be used to contact the other team of two (or more) terrorists within the base to launch a coordinated attack. A similar transmitter has been recovered from near the area where the two terrorists were killed.

The reason that the terrorists did not launch the attack even 24 hours after they arrived is because they could not contact the other team which was already inside the base or was to get in touch with them on arrival on the walkie-talkie, said a senior Punjab intelligence officer. This day-long wait by the terrorists gave ample time to security agencies to secure the base and call in additional forces to fight the terrorists.

During their conversation in the SPs vehicle they kept saying that their mission would be known to all by the morning, which means that they had planned to strike the minute they landed inside the base. But they did not attack till they were engaged by the security forces the next morning. It could well be because they could not get in touch with the other team, he added.

Non-significant device

Interestingly, when SP Salwinder Singhs car was recovered around 7 am and the walkie-talkie recovered, the military intelligence was informed by Punjab Police during their first meeting with them hours later. The military intelligence men apparently pooh-poohed the recovery saying it was a non-significant device which was available off-the-counter for use in marriages and for coordinating events.

The walkie-talkie was taken away to the police station where the vehicle was kept and since it went out of range it did not catch any sound. However, had it been kept in range near the boundary wall, it could have caught the sounds of the other team of terrorists trying to get in touch with this team. But it did not occur to anyone to do that. We are all wiser after the event, said the cop.

What corroborates, to some extent, this possibility is the frantic number of calls made by the Pakistani handlers of the team of four terrorists on Rajesh Vermas mobile number through the day while the terrorists were inside the air base. Verma, the jeweller friend of the SP was with him when they were kidnapped and was left in the car to die when the terrorists abandoned the SPs vehicle near the air force base.

The terrorists had used Vermas number to talk to their handlers in Pakistan during the journey. The phone was in active use till the morning when at around 9.30 am terrorists informed their handlers that they had entered the base. The battery of the phone would have died down after that as all the calls made later could not get through. On interception since the SPs vehicle was recovered, the phone showed no more activity. Intelligence agencies noted that the Pakistani handlers continued trying to get in touch with them till the evening on Rajeshs number, probably trying to coordinate the two teams.

Punjab intelligence gives clean chit to Ikagar

A detailed inquiry by the Punjab intelligence into the possible role of taxi driver Ikagar Singh in facilitating the terrorists has found no incriminating evidence against him.

Ikagar was using one mobile phone, and which he was carrying that night, shows no prior contact with Pakistan. His phone was used to receive calls from Pakistan between 9.30 pm and 11.30 pm on December 31.

He lived at Bhagwal village, which is barely 1 km from the border, but his general movement of the past one year, tracked through the call detail records, did not show him frequenting the roads used by drug smugglers. Intelligence sleuths said there were three other phone numbers registered in his name, which were being used by his family. They too are clear, said a top intelligence officer.

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The Centre has fallen back on a century-old document signed between the British-India government and princely states in an attempt to save the Ganga, a key initiative of the National Democratic Alliance government.

Citing a 1916 pact, an affidavit filed by the ministry of environment and forest to the Supreme Court on Thursday said that hydroelectric projects on the Ganga will be subjected to a 100-year-old rule that they ensure the natural flow of the river does not fall below 1,000 cusecs.

Work on more than 24 hydroelectric power projects in Uttarakhand was stopped in 2013 shortly after vast portions of the state were devastated by flash floods. Much of the destruction was blamed on unplanned urbanisation that stifled the Ganga.

The ministry of environment and forests (MoEF), while pushing for work to be resumed on three of the 24 stalled projects in the hill state, referred to a conference held in Haridwar in December 1916 which was attended by eminent social leaders, including Bharat Ratna Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya.

It was concluded in the conference that a constant unfettered flow of river Ganga should be maintained and 1,000 cusecs water in natural stream and course in all seasons of the year will be ensured, the government said, treating it as the basis for its new policy.

According to the ministry, the natural course of water in the river has to be maintained while designing any structure across the three main streams contributing to the Ganga  Alaknanda, Bhagirathi and Mandakini.

When the Supreme Court bench headed by Justice KS Radhakrishnan (since retired) stayed the clearances to the projects in 2013, he ordered fresh environmental assessment.The Bhyunder Ganga, Khirao Ganga and Lata Tapovan projects named in Centres affidavit are among five projects ready for operation. The remaining two  Alaknanda and Kotlibhel IA  need to undergo a considerable design change in to meet the policy stipulation, the government said while seeking nine months to cover the remaining projects.

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High drama and confusion reigned at Delhis IGI airport on Friday after an Air India flight to Bhubaneswar was delayed by eight hours, allegedly under pressure by some VIPs to divert its crew to another flight.

The Delhi-Bhubaneshwar flight was scheduled to depart at 6.30 pm on Friday, but took off only at 2.30 am on Saturday. Journalist Rajdeep Sardesai, who was on the Bhubaneshwar-bound flight, alleged that AI had asked its pilots to leave that flight and instead fly to Bhopal because there were two judges and a Madhya Pradesh BJP minister, Sartaj Singh, on board.

BJD MP Tathagatha Satpathy, who was also travelling to Bhubaneswar, protested against AI by holding a dharna at the airport.

The airline, however, denied giving preference to the Bhopal flight. At no time did AI give any preference to any particular flight, an AI spokesperson said.

Incidentally, the Bhopal flight, which was to depart at 7.30 pm, was also delayed, and left around the same time as the Bhubaneswar flight.

Air India creates new history. Asks pilots to move from Bhubaneshwar flight to Bhopal flight because MD is rung up by judges on board! Sardesai said in a tweet. One BJP min of state from MP and two judges on Bhopal flight. Is that reason enough for AI MD to ask pilots to move from one Flt to other? he said in another tweet.

Sardesai also uploaded a video of Satpathy on the social networking website. This is a very sad state of affairs  the way Air India is behaving. Just because some BJP state minister and two other judges were there, they said that Bhopal flight would go and Bhubhaneshwar flight will not go, Satpathy said in the video.

But Singh, who is Madhya Pradeshs PWD minister, rubbished the allegations and accused AI of harassing him by its mismanagement and carelessness.

This (Satpathys accusation) was all a rumour. Who told the MP that I had a talk with Air India CMD Ashwani Lohani? The fact is that I had to suffer for eight hours at the Delhi airport because of Air Indias mismanagement and carelessness, Singh told HT.

The minister said that he had reached the Delhi airport in time to catch his flight to Bhopal, but after the boarding call was made, an announcement proclaimed that the flight had been cancelled.

I was not in a position to leave the airport. There was no announcement as to what the passengers should do in case of cancellation of the flight  would they have been accommodated in the morning flight? Singh said, adding that he was going to write to AI about its mismanagement and carelessness.

The minister said it was about 11 pm when they were told that flight will depart. Finally, the flight took off at 2.30 am.
An audio message celebrating the terrorist assault on Pathankot airbase has been posted on a website linked to the Jaish-e-Mohammed, which India has blamed for the attack.

The thirteen-minute message  posted on alqalamonline.com, the website of JeMs weekly magazine Al Qalam  stopped short of claiming responsibility for the attack and criticised the Pakistan government for bowing before allegations made by India.

India has sought prompt and decisive action against the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack, saying it has provided Pakistan actionable intelligence in this regard.

The message, read out by an unidentified man, claimed four mujahideen entered the Pathankot airbase at 3am on Saturday and fought for 48 hours against tanks, armoured vehicles and helicopters.

It also eulogised Afzal Guru, who was convicted and executed for his role in the 2001 attack on Indias parliament, saying the attack was part of the jihadi empire created by his death.

The attackers in Pathankot had told a hostage that they intended to attack the airbase to avenge the hanging of Afzal Guru. Terrorists who attacked the Indian consulate in the Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif at around the same time scribbled a message in blood that the assault was revenge for Afzal Guru before they were killed.

The message posted on the website also referred to the confusion about the number of attackers at Pathankot and made disparaging mentions of some of the Indian security personnel who were killed, including Lt Col EK Niranjan of the National Security Guard and Fateh Singh.
Maulana Syed Anzar Shah, the 51-year-old cleric arrested by the Delhi Police special cell from Bengaluru, allegedly radicalised over 10 suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) operatives who were among those accused of plotting the assassinations of several right-wing leaders in 2012, police sources said.

Shah was operating a website www.ittagullah.com for motivating youths towards jihad and frequently visited the states of Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Karnataka, among others to deliver provocative speeches.

He himself was inspired by al Qaeda founder chief Osama bin Laden, they said.

Previously associated with LeT, Shah was connected with al Qaedas Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) module that was busted in December 2015 by the special cell with the arrest of three AQIS militants, including the modules India head Mohammad Asif, said police.

Read | Al Qaeda-linked Bengaluru madrasa teacher sent to police custody

This is the fourth arrest in the ongoing operation against AQIS. Those indoctrinated by Shah included Dr Zafar Iqbal Sholapur, Dr Nayeem Siddique, Abdul Hasan who were prime conspirators in the 2012 assassinations plot.

Eleven LeT militants were arrested in August 2012 in connection with the conspiracy and the case was later transferred to National Investigation Agency (NIA) which submitted a chargesheet against 12 of 25 accused for criminal conspiracy and other charges in February 2013, said a special cell officer.

Interrogation of the arrested LeT operatives had revealed that they were motivated by the provocative speeches delivered by Maulana Syed Anzar Shah, the then imam of Masjid-eNoorani in Bangalore. Shah was not named in the case as investigators did not have sufficient evidence against him. Being the imam, he used to deliver hate speeches during the Jummah Sermons and Bayaans (Friday sermons) intended to motivate young Muslim boys towards Jihad, said a senior special cell officer.

Read | Bengaluru: Madrasa teacher arrested for al Qaeda links

After the arrest of suspected LeT militants, the officer said, Shah went underground for a few months as his name surfaced as prime motivator and instigator and he feared that NIA officials will arrest him as well in connection with the conspiracy.

During that time Shah even planned to flee to any Gulf country. Shah, the officer said, used his contacts in Gulf countries to obtain Azad (free) Visa.

He had even visited Pakistan a few years ago. Two passports have been recovered from his possession.

About his latest involvements, the officer said, Shah was acting a motivator and instigator on behest of suspected AQIS militants Mohammad Asif and Abdur Rehman, who was arrested from Cuttack soon after Asif s arrest in Delhi last month.

Shah was introduced to Asif by Rehman whom he had met at a religious congregation in Bangalore in 2014-15.

Shahs interrogation has revealed that he had played a key role in radicalising Umer Hyderabadi, a resident of Hyderabad, and sending him to al Qaedas training camps at Waziristan along the Afghanistan-Pakistan borders with the help of Asif and Rehman. Asif had asked him to act as a provider of logistics support whenever the need arose.

The special cell officials claim they have evidence of communication between Shah, Rehman and another arrested AQIS member Zafar Masood, too, mostly carried out through voice over internet protocol (VoIP) services. The investigators have also traced a money trail connecting Shah and Asif, the official said.
Habib-ur-Rehman Khan, the ADC and co-passenger of Subhas Chandra Bose, told a committee that the leaders clothes were on fire when their plane crashed in Taipei on August18, 1945, and burst into flames.

Khan, who survived and went on to become Pakistans additional defence secretary after Partition, recalled the crash during his testimony to the three-member Netaji Inquiry Committee instituted by the Indian government in 1956. The panel was headed by Maj Gen Shah Nawaz Khan of Boses Indian National Army.

His testimony was mentioned in the committees little-known report, now released by Ashis Ray, a senior London-based journalist who has been posting archival and other documents on a website to substantiate reports that Bose did not survive the plane crash.

Boses relatives recently launched a fresh drive to pressure the Indian government to declassify all secret documents on Netaji so that the question of whether he survived the plane crash could be settled once and for all.

The report includes several testimonies but Khans is significant and includes Boses quotes immediately after the crash. No sooner the plane was airborne than there was a loud explosion, according to Khan, who described it as a noise like a cannon shot.

Khan, who died in 1978, recounted: Netaji turned towards me. I said Aagey se nikaleay, pichey se rasta nahin hai (Please get out through the front; there is no way through the rear). We could not get through the entrance door as it was all blocked and jammed by packages and other things. So Netaji got out through the fire; actually he rushed through the fire. I followed him through the same flames.

Read | UK website releases new documents on Netaji

He continued: The moment I got out, I saw him about 10 yards ahead of me, standing, looking in the opposite direction to mine towards the west. His clothes were on fire. I rushed and I experienced great difficulty in unfastening his bush-shirt belt. His trousers were not so much on fire and it was not necessary to take them off.

Khan was in woollen uniform, while Bose was in cotton khakis, which, it was assessed, caught fire more easily.

Khan went on: I laid him down on the ground and noticed a very deep cut on his head, probably on the left side. His face had been scorched by heat and his hair had also caught fire and singed.

He further narrated: Netaji enquired from me in Hindustani: Aap ko zyada to nahin lagi? (I hope you have not been hurt badly). I replied, I feel that I will be all right. About himself, he said that he felt that he would not survive.

Bose added: Jab apney mulk wapas jaye to mulk-ki bhaiyon ko batana ki mein akhri dam tak mulk-ki azadi ke liye larta raha hoon; woh jangi azadi ko jari rakhen. Hindustan zaroor azad hoga, Oos ko koi ghulam nahin rakh sakta. (When you go back to the country, tell the people that till the last moment, I fought for the liberation of my country; they should continue to struggle, and I am sure India will be free before long. Nobody can keep India in bondage now.)

Bose was then rushed to the nearby Nanmon Military Hospital in a critical condition.

A post of Rays website said further revelations about what happened after Bose was admitted to the hospital will be made on January 16.

Read | Declassification of Netaji files from Jan 23, 2016: PM Modi

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Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Manoj Tiwari on Saturday said that he did not call Bollywood actor Aamir Khan a traitor despite what had been published in a few dailies, and added that efforts were being made to tarnish his image.

Whatever I said in the standing committee is secret. And if the talks of the committee are coming out in public, then it is illegal. I have never used the word traitor for Aamir Khan. I can never say a word like that for him in my entire life, Tiwari was quoted as saying by ANI.

Read more: Aamir is no longer face of Incredible India campaign: Govt

I would give a notice to the newspapers who have published this false news. I am a responsible citizen and I can never use a word like that. The newspapers are trying to tarnish my image by publishing false news, he added.

He also said that newspapers should apologise and should also mention the name of the source who gave them this false news.

Read more: Whoever is the brand ambassador, India remains incredible: Aamir

The BJP MP, however, said that Aamir Khan should not be the brand ambassador of Incredible India now as what he said is against the campaign.

Anyone who is the face of Incredible India should not say that India is not a place to live in, ANI quoted Tiwari as saying.

Anyone who is the face of "Incredible India", should not say that India is not a place to live in: Manoj Tiwari pic.twitter.com/nWFdeKDn3y  ANI (@ANI_news) January 9, 2016

Earlier media reports had said that the BJP MP had called Aamir Khan a traitor at a Parliamentary Standing Committee meeting on Friday in which members sought an explanation from the Tourism Secretary for replacing actor Khan with Amitabh Bachchan as the brand ambassador of the Incredible India campaign.

It is good that Aamir Khan has been taken out of the (Incredible India) campaign. He is a traitor, he should be thrown out, the BJP MP from North East Delhi was quoted as saying in several media reports.

Meanwhile, the Opposition has started a political war with the Centre over Aamir Khans ouster as Incredible India ambassador.

BJP's intolerance marches unabated & unchecked. Now, BJP MP Manoj Tiwari calls Aamir Khan traitor. Will Modiji define 'Nationalism' for us?  Randeep S Surjewala (@rssurjewala) January 9, 2016

Even Aam Aadmi Party was quick to attack the BJP . Manoj Tewaris statement is proof that BJP/RSS has talent deficit.There is not one Gajendra Chauhan but too many in SANGH PARIWAR.I pity, tweeted Ashutosh.

Manoj Tewari calling Aamir Deshdrohi is the most hilarious statement I heard in recent past. Mr Tewari please grow up and look mature.  ashutosh (@ashutosh83B) January 9, 2016
Pakistan has sought concrete evidence from India for acting against elements involved in the Pathankot attack instead of the leads provided so far by New Delhi, raising apprehensions that the probe into the incident could be going the way of the 26/11 investigation.

Sources in Islamabad told Hindustan Times that Pakistani authorities had conveyed the request for concrete evidence to their Indian counterparts after Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif chaired a meeting of top officials on Friday to discuss the assault on Pathankot airbase.

The development comes less than a week before a planned meeting of the foreign secretaries of the two sides in Islamabad on January 15 to frame the schedule and modalities for the new comprehensive dialogue process.

Read | Pakistan should act against Pathankot attack perpetrators: US

India has linked the talks to its demand for prompt and decisive action against the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack, which has been blamed on the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed.

In the aftermath of the 2008 Mumbai attacks that was carried out by the Lashkar-e-Taiba, Pakistan repeatedly sought concrete evidence against the suspects, including LeT commander Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, even though India provided several dossiers. The Pakistani trial of the seven suspects in the 26/11 attack has made little headway.

Pakistans investigation of Pathankot certainly seems to be going in the same direction of the investigation into Mumbai. There will be pretensions of action but no serious moves, said G Parthasarathy, a former high commissioner to Pakistan.

The JeM has a special relationship with the ISI because it shares a Deobandi affinity with the Afghan Taliban. It is important for the ISI in both Afghanistan and India. The Lashkar-e-Taiba will be the main group used against India but the JeM will also be kept in play, he said.

Following Fridays meeting chaired by Prime Minister Sharif, an unnamed senior official was quoted as saying by Dawn newspaper: We are expecting evidence beyond leads and information to proceed as per our law.

Read | Working on leads provided by India on Pathankot attack: Pakistan

The Dawn reported the officials comments provided an insight into Pakistans planned response to India.

Indian officials earlier said Islamabad had been given intercepts of telephone calls made by the attackers to their Pakistan-based handlers, the Pakistani phone numbers they called and the locations of these numbers. The external affairs ministry spokesperson had described this information as actionable intelligence.

Soon after receiving the information from India, Pakistan had acknowledged some leads had been shared that were being investigated. Sharif had also telephoned his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi and assured him of prompt and decisive action.

The JeM has been banned by Pakistan but continues to be active in several parts of the country, including the southern part of Punjab province.

Though a statement issued by Sharifs office on Friday had said that the Prime Minister had reviewed the progress on the information shared by India, sources said no action had so far been taken against the JeM or its leaders.

Sharifs government has traditionally been reluctant to act against terror groups based in Punjab, including the JeM and Lashkar-e-Taiba, because of fears of a blowback in the province that is the main base of the Prime Ministers PML-N party.

The meeting chaired by Sharif on Friday was also attended by the military top brass, including army chief Gen Raheel Sharif and ISI chief Lt Gen Rizwan Akhtar. The statement issued after the meeting contended that Pakistans entire leadership and institutions were working in complete harmony to counter terrorism and extremism.

Read | US expects Pakistan to work on Pathankot attack leads given by India
Blowing hot and cold, the US says it expects Pakistan to thoroughly investigate the terrorist attack on the Pathankot air force base and bring the perpetrators to justice, but could not force its pace.

The Pakistanis said theyre going to investigate, so we look forward to seeing the results of that investigation when its complete, state department spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on Thursday.

But as for how long its going to take and the scope of it, I think you need to be talking to folks in Islamabad about that, he said.

Asked if the US had reached out to Pakistan after India named banned terror organisation Jaish-e-Muhammad JeM and its chief Maulana Masood Azhar as being responsible for the Pathankot attack, Kirby said: Of course, were talking to Pakistan about this.

But he gave no details of the specifics of diplomatic discussions and simply repeated the government of Pakistan itself has condemned this attack and made clear that theyre committed to investigate it.

So lets let them do that and lets see where the investigation goes. We obviously would like to see it investigated too, as completely and as thoroughly as possible, so that we can better understand what happened, Kirby said.

Taking Islamabads statements on face value, the spokesperson said, The government of Pakistan has also said that theyre not going to discriminate between terrorist groups as part of its counterterrorism operations.

Pakistan knows well the threat of terrorism. It is a regional challenge that requires real regional solutions, he said, and we want Pakistan to be a part of those solutions.

Reminded that after the Nov 2008 Mumbai terrorist attack in which six American were killed too, the US had asked Pakistan to act, but to no avail, a defensive Kirby said nobody can look at the US counterterrorism record over the last decade or so and say were not doing anything.

The countries in the region too could do more, he said Which is why we continue to encourage bilateral, multilateral efforts in the region to get at this particular threat.

The relationship with Pakistans complicated, I get that. And we dont always agree on everything, he acknowledged.

And I cant speak for how long it might take them to complete an investigation or the degree to which they intend to be transparent about it after theyve completed it.

And as for the Mumbai attackers, weve said and Ill say it again today: We obviously want to see all the perpetrators brought to justice, Kirby said.

We know that that can take a long time. It took an awful long time to bring Osama bin Laden to justice, but we did. So it can be hard.

Asked about a former CIA analyst Bruce Riedels opinion that Pakistani spy agency ISI was behind the terrorist attack in Pathankot and also in Mazar-e-Sharif, Kirby said he was not in a position to confirm the veracity of his conclusions.

The US didnt have an independent assessment of who was behind this attack, he said. A, it just happened two days ago; B, its being investigated by the Pakistanis. Theyve condemned it, we condemned it, Kirby repeated. Lets let their investigation move forward and well see where it goes.

Its not for us to ascribe a timeline to somebody elses investigation, Kirby said. Well certainly defer to Pakistani authorities to determine their own timelines and their own deadlines.

Asked if he believed the Pathankot attack was carried out to derail the peace process between India and Pakistan, Kirby said: I have no idea what the motivation for that attack would be.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has left for Pathankot and will be arriving at the airbase around arriving at airbase later in the day .

According to reliable sources, Modi will also conduct an aerial survey of Punjabs border areas and address soldiers at the air base.

District administration officials, however, claimed there was no confirmation yet about the visit.

Punjab Police deputy inspector general Kunwar Vijay Pratap Singh told HT that tight security arrangements were already in place.

There is large media presence outside the airbase, which witnessed a terror attack that left seven security personnel and at least six terrorists dead almost a week ago.

Meanwhile on Friday, security forces declared that the sprawling Air Force station in Pathankot in Punjab was fully sanitised after a massive combing operation spanning over three days.

The combing operation at the Air Force station is over, a senior IAF official said, adding the entire area has been sanitised.

The sanitisation operation had been going on for the last three days ever since the six terrorists were gunned down after in a four-day gunfight.

The operation to ensure that no terrorist was hiding was carried out jointly by Army, NSG and IAFs Garud commandos.

The Pathankot attack, in which seven security personnel were also martyred, has been blamed on the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed.

(With inputs from PTI)
Congress hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday for his visit to Pathankot air force base a week after the terror attack, saying it is a mere photo op.

Eight days after the Pathankot terror incident depicting the failure of Modi government on National Security and the fight against terror, PMs belated visit has got relegated to a mere photo op, Congress said.

Need of the hour is to ensure action by Pakistan against Jaish-e- Mohammad, a through review of internal security safeguards and affixing responsibility for security lapses. We hope Modiji will inform the nation about action taken on these key issues, AICC Communication Department chief Randeep Surjewala told reporters in New Delhi.

In a photo tweet on party twitter handle, Congress also told the Prime Minister that he celebrates the birthday of Pakistani Prime Minister with great enthusiasm but it takes him eight days to take care of Pathankot.

PM Modi diverted plane to Pakistan to greet Pak PM Nawaz Sharif on his bday, but took 8 days to reach Pathankot!, the party said in another tweet.

There is no action on terror. Whether Modi government will run like this (Karte Nahin Aatank pe waar, Kya Aise he chalegi Modi Sarkaar), Congress said, coining a new slogan to attack the NDA government.

The party has been targeting Centre after the Pathankot attack, citing BJPs Lok Sabha poll slogan bahut hua seema par waar; Abki baar Modi sarkaar (enough attacks on the border; this time the Modi government will respond).

The Prime Minister on Saturday visited the strategic Pathankot air force base for a first-hand assessment of the situation in the aftermath of the terror attack that began last Saturday.

Six terrorists, believed to owe allegiance to Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed, were gunned down by the security forces after a four-day gun battle. Seven Indian security personnel also lost their lives.

The operation to ensure that no terrorist was hiding was carried out jointly by army, NSG and IAFs Garud commandos.

Defence minister Manohar Parrikar had also visited the base on January 5.
The crime investigating agency (CIA) of the SAS Nagar police arrested a Border Security Force (BSF) jawan, who used to help the three drug smugglers  Gurjant Singh, Sandeep Singh and Jatinder Singh  in cross-border smuggling of drugs, arms and ammunition, from Sriganganagar (Rajasthan) on Friday.

The crime investigating agency (CIA) of SAS Nagar police arrested a Border Security Force (BSF) jawan, who used to help the three drug smugglers  Gurjant Singh, Sandeep Singh and Jatinder Singh  in cross-border smuggling of drugs, arms and ammunition, from Sriganganagar on Friday.

Anil Kumar, a constable with the 52 Battalion, posted near Sriganganagar, is presently on police remand till January 10.

Read more: Arrest of smugglers: Passport, transport dept officials under scanner

As per the police sources, Anil used to help the herion smugglers in getting the contraband and arms and ammunition smuggled from Pakistan in lieu for money. His account showed transactions of `39,000 and `49,000 on two occasions, while he also received cash amounting to `50,000 from the accused in another instance.

Anil used to keep in touch with accused Gurjant through WhatsApp, while he used Facebook to keep in contact with the other two smugglers.

Pakistan-based smuggler Imtiaz had got the three accused in contact with Anil and had got the deal executed.

The CIA wing of SAS Nagar police had arrested the accused, including Gurjant Singh alias Bhollu, 26; Sandeep Singh, 25, residents of Tarn Taran and Jatinder Singh alias Jindi, 34, a resident of Ludhiana, on December 29 with cache of arms and ammunition smuggled from Pakistan. The police had also recovered mobile phones and a Pakistan SIM card from their possession. The accused were in regular touch with the Pakistani drug suppliers over phone.

GURJANT MET PAK SMUGGLER IN THAILAND ON FAKE PASSPORT

Accused Gurjant had rented an accommodation in Sunny Enclave in Kharar under fake identity of Gagandeep Singh, hailing from Jalandhar and had even got a passport issued under this name. He had used this passport to travel to Thailand, where he had met Imtiaz.

NARCOTICS, ARMS SMUGGLED THROUGH RAJASTHAN

The accused used to smuggle narcotics, arms and ammunition from Pakistan via Rajasthan on regular intervals. The accused have admitted that they used to smuggle narcotics from Hindumalkot village in Rajasthan through FerozepurFazilka side. They admitted to have smuggled about 2.71 qunital of heroin from across the border till date, which they used to send to Delhi, and from there to the rest of the country.

The accused had brought in arms and ammunition, including sten gun, one 9 mm pistol, three .30 bore pistol along with live cartridges and Pakistani mobile SIM card through this route.

POLICE TRACKING THE GANG SINCE SEPT

The police had registered a case against the smugglers on September 1, 2015, following a loot of an ATM. On December 29, the police received information regarding the gang moving round in the area and traced the accused to a saloon in Kharar from where two accused -- Sandeep and Gurjant -- were arrested with a Swift car carrying weapons. The car recovered from the accused was stolen from Ludhiana on gun point. Sandeep and Gurjants interrogation had led to the arrest of Jatinder Singh, from whom the police recovered more weapons.
Congress chief Sonia Gandhis proposed visit to Srinagar on Sunday has set the grapevine abuzz in Jammu and Kashmir over a potential political re-alignment of forces even as the state was placed under governors rule.

A home ministry spokesperson said in Delhi on Saturday night that governors rule has been imposed in the state of Jammu and Kashmir after President Pranab Mukherjee cleared the recommendation of the governor NN Vohra.

A Raj Bhawan spokesperson said governors rule came into effect from January 8.

However, the talk throughout the day in the state -- technically without a government since the death of Mufti Mohammad Sayeed  swirled around Gandhis visit, described by both the Congress and PDP as purely personal and only to offer condolences to the family of the former chief minister.

What has added fuel to the speculations is Muftis daughter and heir apparent Mehbooba Mufti unwilling to take charge immediately and ruling BJPs delay in officially confirming its support to her, despite saying it is ready to back her.

Read| J-K: Confident about continuation of alliance with PDP, says BJP

The PDP said on Friday that its leader Mehbooba was unwilling to take oath as the next chief minister even after the four-day period of mourning was over on Sunday.

Congress has made no formal announcement to offer support to Mehbooba but sources in the party say that the ball is again in PDPs court.

On Friday, leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha and former state chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad had visited Muftis grave in Bijbehara in south Kashmir fueling speculations that it was aimed at offering the olive branch to the PDP on government formation.

After the assembly polls last year threw up a hung house, the Congress had offered unconditional support to the PDP which later decided to go with the ideologically opposite BJP.

PDP sources said that during her visit Sonia Gandhi was likely to visit the family and meet Mehbooba at their Fairview residence in Srinagars Gupkar area.

Senior PDP spokesman Nayeem Akhtar on Saturday said that Mehbooba might need more time than the traditional four-day mourning period.

She is not escaping her duties as the co-architect of the party but its a huge loss for her, so she might take more time, he added.

Congress too downplayed the visit saying Muftiss long association with the party is the only reason for Gandhi to be in Srinagar.

Read: Mehbooba Mufti, the unseen face behind PDPs rise in Valley

Mufti Sahib has been with Congress for a long time. For 11 years he was the Congress president in the state. He did leave Congress and joined Janata Dal and later formed PDP but we again formed an alliance with PDP, said Congress state president Ghulam Ahmad Mir.

BJP general secretary Ram Madhav, the architect of the alliance with the PDP, was in Srinagar on Friday to meet party legislators and decide on extending support to Mehbooba.

Deputy chief minister Nirmal Singh had a closed-door meeting on Saturday evening with top leadership of the party to discuss the developing situation.

According to sources, the meeting was attended by BJP state president Satpal Sharma, party general secretary Ashok Kaul and former state president Jugal Kishore Sharma.

The BJP leaders discussed the emerging political situation. The leaders deliberated about the stand of the party on governance and also on how to carry forward the agenda-of-alliance. They decided to wait for any course of action till Sunday when the mourning period of former CM Mufti Sayeed ends, the source added.

A meeting of the BJP legislators is also scheduled on Sunday evening.

Speaking to HT on Saturday, BJP state spokesman Sunil Sethi said all decisions will be taken in a meeting of legislators on Sunday.

PDP leaders, however, insisted that Mehbooba has full support of the Prime Minister and the alliance would form a government soon.

There is no question of going with one party or the other. The alliance with BJP is rock solid, said senior PDP leader Altaf Bhukari.

Read: After Sayeeds demise, coalition quirks to test Mehboobas mettle

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Passengers of an Air India plane in Delhi were delayed for several hours on Friday allegedly because the airline was eager to help out an MP government minister and two judges on another flight.

Air India allegedly asked its pilots to leave a Bhubaneswar-bound flight, which was scheduled to leave Delhi at 7.30 pm, and instead fly to Bhopal because the plane to MPs capital had judges and BJP minister Sartaj Singh among its passengers.

The Bhubaneswar flight finally left at 2.30 am, harassing passengers among whom were Orissa MP Thathagatha Satpathy and senior journalist Rajdeep Sardesai, who live-tweeted the midnight drama at the airport .

Air India cancels flight to Bhopal citing 'technical' problem: real reason: a pilot says duty time is over!!  Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) January 8, 2016

Two judges and @DILIPtheCHERIAN on Bhopal flight force air India to get a back up crew to get plane to fly! Good luck! Only in India!  Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) January 8, 2016

One BJP min of state from MP and two judges on Bhopal flight. Is that reason enough for AI MD to ask pilots to move from one Flt to other?  Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) January 8, 2016

Biju Janata Dal leader Satpathy, who protested against Air India by holding a dharna at the airport, alleged the flight to Bhubaneshwar finally flew at 2.30 am.

It's close to 1 am; neither Bhopal or Bhubaneshwar AI flts have left; dharna continues, this is India's national carrier!  Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) January 8, 2016

This is a very sad state of affairs--the way Air India is behaving. They first announced that they had cancelled the Bhopal flight. And just because some BJP state minister and two other judges were there, they said that a Bhopal flight would go and a Bhubhaneshwar flight will not go, said Satpathy in a video uploaded by Sardesai on Twitter.

The Bhubaneswar flights passengers got into an argument with Air India staff at the airport and were furious at the VIP culture.

Tathagatha Satpathy stages a dharna outside the gate at airport! pic.twitter.com/xrucxzvecx  Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) January 8, 2016

There was a politician who did not want us to reach on time because his Bhubaneswar flight was cancelled due to some unknown reason. He was also asking that his flight should be rescheduled, stranded AI passenger Maninder Singh complained.

Air India denied giving preference to the Bhopal flight. At no time did AI give any preference to any particular time, the airline said in a statement on Saturday afternoon.
The recently-opened Books and Bricks Cafe is a first-of-its-kind all-American diner in Srinagar. The interiors are done in brick, wallpapers are pages from a Readers Digest collectors edition and on the shelves are books ranging from Thomas Hardy to Zadie Smith. Inside, co-owner Danish Yousuf  a 27-year-old post-graduate in financial management from Middlesex University in UK  is found mostly in the kitchen, helping out the chef.

Around three kilometres away, on the citys arterial Residency Road, stands a unique restaurant on a truck called In Fusion. As office-goers and students crowd the vehicle for biryani and noodles, its 29-year-old owner Fahad Jeelani  a former software engineer with Wipro in Bengaluru  is busy taking orders and directing the cooks.

Yousuf and Jeelani represent an upcoming generation of Kashmiris  youngsters who studied and worked outside, but returned to the Valley as entrepreneurs. And, not only food, they are in almost every sector you can imagine  from restaurants to e-commerce websites, from web-magazines to adventure sports.

Kashmirs economy is virgin, and the natural resources untapped. Government jobs have shrunk. As a result, you have young people starting own ventures, said Shakeel Qalandar, an industrialist who was a part of the C Rangarajan panel formed by the central government in 2010 to formulate policies for creating job opportunities in Kashmir.

Yousuf started the cafe in December with his childhood friend Arsalan Sajad, an MBA from the same British university who returned to the Valley after working in Edinburgh for a couple of years.

In Kashmir, times are a changing and so are opportunities. And thus, a cafe like this. You need to reclaim this land from the narrative of conflict, said Yousuf.

In Fusion, owner Jeelani says the project required an initial investment of around Rs 20 lakh which he raised from his family, own savings, and some part as loan. His second food truck is set to come out on Srinagar streets in a few weeks.

Abid Rashid, a 24-year-old computer engineer, has come up with an Android app called Pipe last October. The content sharing app, which is being currently fixed for bugs, has registered more than 500 downloads. Rashid, an IT graduate from Delhi, is also a part of a start-up which has launched an e-wallet platform called MyRahat.

Its much like PayTM, but a business-to-business service, explained Rashid, alluding to the popular e-wallet company, adding that transactions to the tune of Rs 50 lakh take place through the platform per month.

But the political turmoil does take a toll for some entrepreneurs.

Danish Mir (27), founder of Kashmir Basket  an e-retail website selling traditional products  said he stays in Mumbai most of the time so that his backend work gets done smoothly, without the hassles of everyday strikes and internet bans.

Technological infrastructure is quite essential for an e-commerce start-up, and thats not up to the mark in Kashmir. Plus, there are the political problems and natural disasters, said Mir, a native of Baramulla in north Kashmir who graduated in law from Pune.

Kashmir Basket incurred severe losses during last years floods but Mir didnt back out. He, in fact, started his next venture  Go Kash Adventure, a travel-cum-adventure-sports company four months ago.

The government maintains that the state has been doing its best to support entrepreneurial ventures by the youth.

MI Parray, director of the Jammu and Kashmir Entrepreneurship Development Institute, said in the last five years it has helped more than 6,000 ventures, which have in turn created an employment opportunity of at least 30,000 people.

For many entrepreneurs, on the other hand, the conflict is an opportunity in disguise.

Journalist Asem Mohiuddin returned to the Valley a few years ago after doing his post-graduation in mass communication from Bengaluru and working with The Hindu. Now, his weekly magazine The Legitimate News is set to be launched, with a website already up.

Every media house here writes about the armed conflict. I want my publication to focus on the issues that Kashmiris face every day, especially in the healthcare and education sector, said Mohiuddin.

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WAZIR

Director: Bejoy Nambiar

Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Farhan Akhtar, Aditi Roy Hydari

Rating: 2/5

In theory, Wazir ticks all the boxes  a script by Vidhu Vinod Chopra and Abhijat Joshi, the exciting genre of the thriller, a cast of Farhan Akhtar and Amitabh Bachchan, and a short run time of just over an hour-and-a-half. If thats all youre looking for in a Hindi film, youll doubtless leave entertained. But if youre looking for more  strong characters, nuance, believability  be prepared for disappointment.

Akhtar plays Danish, an officer with the Delhi Anti-Terrorist Squad, whose picture-perfect life is turned on its head when his child is killed during a shoot-out. His wife Ruhana (Hydari) blames him for what happened and leaves, and hes depressed enough to end things with a gun to the head. A literal light at the end of the tunnel stops him from pulling the trigger, and he finds a wallet that leads him to a wheelchair-bound chess wizard named Pandit Omkarnath (Bachchan), who runs a workshop that combines chess and dance.

Read: Amitabh Bachchan injured in Kolkata shoot

Pandit has been scarred by a personal tragedy much like Danishs, and this draws the two men together. Up to this point, Wazir is gripping. Akhtar owns the screen with his compelling, wounded presence. Unfortunately, the moment Pandits story arc kicks in, the film begins to unravel. The death knell is rung when Neil Nitin Mukesh fetches up inexplicably, hamming as if his life depended on it, and accompanied by a hovering, holographic image of a flaming knife. Its an onslaught of such tackiness that you begin to lose hope. The film is further hobbled by a shoddily-thrown-together romantic angle and lack of character development. Pandits life is threatened, and were never sure why Danish cares so much.

John Abraham in a still from Wazir.

What really hurts Wazir is the fact that the mystery itself is thin, illogical and predictable. The twist looms over you from the halfway mark, and is so ridiculous that you begin to hope it wont happen; yearn for a smarter reveal. But in vain. The climax is as you feared, except much noisier, as if volume equalled cinematic power. Ultimately, Wazir feels like an opportunity squandered. Its one of the few Hindi films that could have benefited from more run time. Mores the pity.

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A nine-year-old girl was allegedly sexually assaulted in a washroom of a Dadar school by a 19-year-old contract employee on Friday evening.

The Shivaji Park police said the incident took place a day before the visit of state education minister Vinod Tawde to the schools annual cultural event. They have arrested the man, who is attached with the caterer of the school canteen.

The police said that the accused and three others have been staying in the school auditorium for about four months now. Though he is an employee of the caterer managing the school canteen, he has been in-charge of the school hall.

Preliminary investigations revealed that the girl missed her school bus and was handed over to her class teacher. After her parents were informed, her teacher left her in the attendants quarters in the school premises and left.

The attendants son was taking care of the girl as the woman was yet to arrive. The boy soon left for his tuition and the attendant arrived minutes later. When she went to fill some water, the girl went to the washroom alone on the second floor near the auditorium. This is when the accused spotted her, said Gulab Patil, inspector with Shivaji Park police.

The police added that when the girls aunt reached the school to take her home, she saw the accused going down the staircase and enquired about her. He was evasive. The girl was later found bleeding in the washroom. The police were informed soon after.

However, when HT spoke to the principal, he claimed to have no knowledge of outsourced employees staying in the school premises.

Ours is a semi-government aided school, headed by a trust. They may have leased out the hall to the caterers, about which I have not been told. So I did not know these people actually lived here, the principal said.

A case has been registered under section 376 of the Indian Penal code, which is punishment for rape and also under relevant sections of Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO).
An 18-year-old woman slipped and drowned at Mumbais Bandra Bandstand while she was taking a selfie with her friends on Saturday morning. A man who tried to save her may have died too.

Tarannum and her two friends were at Bandstand in the Fort for a picnic.

The woman slipped. A youngster named Ramesh Walunj tried to save her, but unfortunately both fell down in the sea. Rescue operation is going on, said Mumbai police spokesperson Dhananjay Kulkarni.

The fire brigade and two boats of Mumbai police are searching for the youngsters but are held up by high tide, officials said. Later in the afternoon, coast guard also sent a helicopter to scour the area.

Eye witnesses told the police that the three girls were standing close to the edge and fell in as they failed to judge the depth of the water.

Walunj, a driver, was passing from near the fort when he heard cries for help.

Knowing how to swim, he dived in to save the girls. He managed to bring two girls to safety and went in the water for his third save but was washed away due to the strong current.

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The police have summoned the owner of a shelter home for children in Gautam Budh Nagar, two days after some inmates rescued alleged forcible conversion.

The police have called the shelter home owner, Joshua Devraj, for questioning and have received some documents from the management of the shelter home which are being checked for their authenticity.

Read more: Forced to eat cockroach-infested food: Children rescued from shelter

We are likely to get a report by tomorrow to establish whether the shelter home was being run legally or not. Employees of the shelter home are also being questioned. The contact numbers given on the pamphlets of the Emmanuel Seva Group, which runs the shelter homes, are found to be defunct, said Rakesh Yadav, deputy superintendent of police (circle 3), Greater Noida.

On December 29, the city police and an NGO had raided the shelter homes of Emmanuel Seva Group at Greater Noidas Naya Haibatpur village, following a complaint by a mother of three children who were lodged at the shelter home. According to police, she had alleged that the employees of the shelter home were not allowing her to meet her children. On Tuesday, during their counselling, the rescued children had allegedly said that they were being beaten up for not reciting hymns from the Bible and being kept in a poor condition, police said.

We are in the process of compiling the report which includes the statements of all the 30 children rescued from the shelter homes of the group from Greater Noida and Meerut. We have already submitted a primary report to the police about the allegations levelled by the rescued children that they were beaten up and forced to eat cockroach-infested food for not reciting hymns from the Bible, said Satyaprakash, programme manager, FXB Suraksha NGO, which conducted a raid at shelter homes in Greater Noida and Meerut.

On Thursday, when HT contacted the owner of the Emmanuel Seva Group, he had confirmed the raid. Yes, there was raid at the shelter home but right now I cannot tell you much about it. Will tell you later. However, he did not respond to repeated calls and messages on Friday.

Ashwani Kumar, in-charge of Bisrakh police station said, A case was registered at the Bisrakh police station following the raid. The children had alleged torture by the caretakers and we are investigating their claims.

During an interview with HT, three of the rescued children had alleged that they were being forced to sleep on the floor where rodent poop was scattered. A nine-year-old boy, who was rescued after three years, claimed that he was suspended from the ceiling fan and beaten up. They said they were not allowed to step out of the shelter home and were allowed to meet their parents only once in a month for 15 minutes.

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The arrest of BSF constable Anil Kumar by the Crime Investigating Agency (CIA) of SAS Nagar police in connection with cross-border smuggling has not only brought to fore the nexus between BSF personnel and drug smugglers, but has also led to the revelation as how some these security persons guarding the border are using technology to aid smugglers.

Compromising with the security of the nation, some BSF personnel are sharing their positioning along the border through mobile phone application, including WhatsApp and Google maps, for just a few thousand rupees.

Anil Kumar through WhatsApp and Google map used to share his posting along the border to facilitate the smugglers in cross-border smuggling, said Gurpreet Singh Bhullar, SSP, SAS Nagar.

He added, We are probing into the roles of other BSF jawans who may have aided in cross-border smuggling. BSF is also holding an internal probe to trace the moles in the security forces.

Gurjant and his brother Gurbir, who died in 2013, acted as couriers as they had their land on both sides of the border. Gurbir had contacts in the BSF, which he used to exploit for easy movement of smuggled drugs and arms. We are retrieving his contacts in BSF and probing their role, Bhullar said.

Anil Kumar (29), a resident of Amritsar, had joined BSF in 2008 and was a constable with the 52 Battalion, posted near Sriganganagar, during the time of his arrest. Kumar admitted to the police that it was during a marriage in Tarn Taran in January 2014 that he met a group of cross-border smugglers, who put him in touch with Pakistan-based smuggler Imtiaz Ali. And it was Imtiaz who had put him in touch with Gurjant . Since the last seven months, he had been in regular touch with them through WhatsApp and Google map.

Anils involvement in the crime was revealed during the interrogation of the three herion smugglers -- Gurjant Singh alias Bhollu, 26; Sandeep Singh, 25, residents of Tarn Taran and Jatinder Singh alias Jindi, 34, a resident of Ludhiana  who were arrested by the police with cache of arms and ammunition smuggled from Pakistan on December 29.

BSF men under scanner earlier as well

In 2009, Gurjant was introduced to one Hardev Singh, a BSF jawan and a resident of Jalandhar, who was posted at Khalra border. Hardev had helped the smugglers bring 70-kg herion from across the border.

Then in 2010, they had on two different occasions smuggled narcotics weighing 16 kg each along with two pistols from Pakistan with the help of BSF personnel. They then came in contact with Gurdev, a BSF personnel posted at Fazilka border. He had helped Gurjant smuggle 22.5-kg opium, three .3 bore pistols and two.9 mm pistols.

Both Hardev and Gurdev were arrested by the Punjab Police.

Nigerians helped in disbursing smuggled narcotics

The narcotics smuggled from Pakistan through Rajasthan and Ferozepur-Fazilka border was handed over to the Nigerians, who used to act as agents to dispose of the narcotics in different parts of the country.

Man who helped smugglers get passport arrested

Meanwhile, the Punjab police have also arrested Deepak Kumar (29), who had helped Gurjant procure passport, driving licenses, adhaar card and other identity proofs on fake identity. Police have recovered two passports in the name of Gurjant Singh, while two driving licenses and other documents each in the name of Gurjant, Sandeep and Jatinder.

Deepak earlier used to run a mobile shop and through software had created fake identities for the accused to facilitate them get documents like passport, driving license and adhaar card. We are probing role of government officials, including cops, who carried out the mandatory verification for issuing the passport, said Bhullar.

Modus operandi

 Most easy way is throwing the consignments across the border which is collected later by the smugglers concerned later.

 There are villagers whose land is on both sides of border who are allowed to cross border by the BSF for agricultural purposes and many a times they act as couriers, just as Gurjant and his brother Gurbir.

 Underground pipes are used to push the consignments through across the border.

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Congress leader member Aman Arora formally joined the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Saturday.

He joined the party in the presence of AAP leader Sanjay Singh and Sangrur MP Bhagwant Mann.

Son of former Punjab minister Bhagwan Das Arora, who passed away in 2000, Aman is the third leader to have deserted the Congress for the AAP in the past three weeks.

In December last, the Congress was left red-faced after former MLA from Bholath, Sukhpal Singh Khaira, shifted loyalty, leaving the party struggling to find a new face there. Days later, chairman of the Congress Punjab intellectual cell, Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal, left too.

Aman, 41, who was considered close to Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh, resisted all efforts by party leaders to hold him back.

The AAP is emerging as a better party than the conventional political players. Its policies and programs are public-centric, and being in politics, I want to serve the people, Aman told HT.

Aman has contested assembly elections twice  in 2007 and 2012  from Sunam constituency in Sangrur district. He, however, lost to SADs Parminder Singh Dhindsa both times.
Punjab agriculture department is going to launch a campaign to kill rats across the state to protect rabi crops.

After the whitefly attack turned the last kharif season into a disaster, the state government, it seems, has decided to go all out to restrict rodents from damaging rabi crops, particularly wheat.

For this, the two-day campaign from January 12-13 is being launched to poison rodents in the fields.

As per available information, farmers will be provided zinc phosphide to spray near mud holes in order to save their crop from further damage.

Bathinda chief agriculture officer Kabul Singh Sandhu said they had been receiving multiple complaints from rural areas about serious attacks of rats on wheat crop.

These rodents feed less on the grains but break the stem of the standing crop by chewing, which results in damage, Sandhu said.

He added that farmers will be provided zinc phosphide powder at village and block levels on 80% subsidy.

Moreover, demonstrations regarding proper use of zinc phosphide will be given to farmers. The treatment can help them protect their crop from further damage, Sandhu said.

He further said the use of zinc phosphide had no effect on the health of the crop.

Though we have no data on loss wrecked by rodents, but major damage to wheat and sugarcane crop has been noted over the years, said Sandhu.

Notably, wheat crop sown with zero tillage technique was more prone to attack by rodents.

It has become a headache for farmers to control the population of rodents, which has necessitated this campaign.

Bachittar Singh, a farmer from Phul village, said they had earlier adopted many desi nukhse (home remedies) to control the menace but the rodents continued to damage their crop.

The population of rats is only increasing, inflicting severe damage to standing crop, he said.

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In another blow to faculty members of Panjab University (PU) on retirement age, the Union government on Friday told the Punjab and Haryana high court that it was not a centrally funded institution.

Appearing before the bench of justice Amol Rattan Singh, assistant solicitor general Chetan Mittal said the meaning and scope of centrally funded institutions pertained to those institutions which were exclusively funded by the central government through the ministry of human resource development (MHRD) or the University Grants Commission (UGC).

The central government response came on the query posed by the high court.

The Centre has made it clear that the MHRD enhanced the age of superannuation from 62 to 65 of teachers engaged in classroom teaching and who were occupying teaching positions on regular employment against sanctioned posts in centrally funded higher and technical educational institutions in 2007. The state governments were also requested to do the same in view of shortage of experienced teachers. But it categorically said the PU was not a centrally-funded institution for the purpose of 2007 circular as some part of the funding was made by the state government (Punjab).

The court has now asked the MHRD to submit funding details of central universities and the central-government funded institutions such as the Indian Institute of Technology (IITs), Indian Institute of Management (IIMs) on the next date of hearing on January 20. The high court bench orally observed that it was now clear that the PU received a grant of 92% from the central government and the funding pattern of these institutions could help in settling the controversy.

The HC was hearing a petition filed by faculty members of PU in which they are demanding enhancement of retirement age from 60 to 65. The high court has stayed retirement orders of over 30 such petitioners in the past one year. The Centre does not recognise PU as the central university, but the petitioners are claiming that it is a centrally funded university as it is getting up to 92% grant from the MHRD. Punjab and Centre both are not in favour of increasing the retirement age.
Strengthening its team in Pathankot and Gurdaspur in wake of the Pathankot attack, the Punjab government on Friday ordered transfer of three IPS and three PPS officers with immediate effect.

Akhil Chaudhary, who was ASP, Dinanagar, has been posted as SP (D), Pathankot, in place of Jaspal Singh. Gulneet Singh Khurana, attached with commissioner of Ludhiana, has been posted as SP, Gurdaspur. Surinder Lamba, attached with commissioner of Amritsar, has been posted as assistant superintendent of police, Dinanagar. Jaspal Singh, SP (D), Pathankot, has been posted as SP, Pathankot.

Meanwhile, DGP Suresh Arora has directed all SHOs, DSPs/ACPs, SPs/ADCPs and senior officers posted in the districts to be present at the stations and not to leave the stations without the prior permission of the competent authority.

The DGP has also directed all zonal IGPs and commissioners of police to work out a scheme to ensure regular presence of police personnel in all police stations and police posts in the state, especially at night time, to ensure 24x7 availability of police for prompt support and response to citizens.

Announcing this here on Friday, a Punjab Police spokesman said that on the DGPs directions, all zonal IGPs and commissioners of police had been asked to prepare a night policing plan for the districts/ areas in their jurisdiction. Zonal IGPs and CPs would send daily reports to the DGP about details of static and mobile police deployment during night. The night-time police deployment would be checked by deputing senior police officers from police headquarters on a regular basis.

Meanwhile, Punjab Police have appealed to the public to immediately report any suspicious activity/persons on police emergency numbers 100 or on 181-Punjab Police Helpline.
The Punjab and Haryana high court on Friday granted bail to United Akali Dal (UAD) president Mohkam Singh and SAD (Amritsar) leader Bhupinder Singh, who were booked on charges of sedition over the radicals Sarbat Khalsa organised on November 10.

The high court bench of justice MMS Bedi observed that the two leaders had been named in the police first information report (FIR) but no specific allegations were levelled against them.

Mohkam was arrested on November 23 and Bhupinder Singh on November 21. Their lower courts had rejected the bail pleas of the two leaders, following which they moved high court.

The two leaders were accused of instigating youths to commit breach of unity and integrity of the country. The authorities had also alleged that during the Sarbat Khalsa at Chabba village in Amritsar, the slogans raised were aimed at spreading hate among communities.

Without expression of any opinion on merits, in view of the nature of the allegations against the petitioner, they can be granted the concession of bail, justice Bedi said, according to the leaders counsels, Parminder Singh Sekhon and Simran Jit Singh.

The counsels said the court had ordered the bail of the two leaders, directing that they be released upon furnishing bail bonds/surety bonds to the satisfaction of the chief judicial magistrate/Illaqua magistrate.

Meanwhile, Bhupinder Singh withdrew another petition filed to seek quashing of the FIR after the court termed it pre-mature.
The row over demolition of mazar at Palasaur village near Taran Taran deepened on Saturday as it came to light that the orders to pull down the structure came from the Akal Takht and Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC).

On Thursday, some Sikh activists had demolished the structure following which 69 persons were booked and a protest was staged.

Sources said on the complaint of some Sikh devotees against mazar managers Jasjit Singh and Jaspal Singh, the SGPC had sent an inspection team to the spot, nearly 20 days ago, under the supervision of Jasbir Singh Khalsa, employee of the dharam parchar wing of the SGPC.

After inspection, on December 23, 2015, Khalsa, in his letter to SGPC secretary (dharam parchar), said,  Mazar managers have brought down the wall of the gurdwara complex with an intention to extend the mazar area. You are requested to write to the senior superintendent of police (SSP) to take action against the culprits.

Acting on the report, SGPC additional secretary Simarjit Singh brought the matter to the notice of Akal Takht jathedar Giani Gurbanchan Singh on December 24. Replying to SGPC additional secretarys letter, Sukhdev Singh, office in-charge of the Akal Takht said: As per the direction of the Akal Takht jathether, take action on the basis of the inspection team report.

On December 31, additional secretary of dharam parchar wing Sukhdev Singh Bhoora wrote to Tarn Taran SSP: The inspection team of the SGPC have found that mazar managers have demolished the outer wall of the gurdwara that has hurt Sikh sentiments. As per directions of the Akal Takht jathedar, you should action on the basis of the inspection report.

Khalsa said when police did not take the matter seriously; the SGPC assigned me the duty to get the controversial building demolished.

Talking to HT, Sikh preacher Sukhpreet Singh, one of those who have been booked for demolition, claimed, The building which was demolished was a khandar (uninhabited) few years ago. There is no proof that the area was a religious place ever. Few years ago, some persons converted it into a mazar and now are making efforts to extend their area by building more mazars.

The Sikh devotees of the village have been opposing their move since long, he said, adding that police have falsely booked innocent youth in the case.

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The industrial town of Batala was put on a high alert on Saturday, following intelligence inputs that it could be a soft target for terrorists after the deadly attack on the Pathankot airbase that left eight troopers dead.

Sources told HT that eight companies of the Border Security Force (BSF) were deployed in the town, more than 70 km from Pathankot, as the authorities called in Indian Reserve Battalion (IRB) and CRPF reinforcements.

Batala inspector-general, border range, Amritsar, Lok Nath Angra confirmed the alert but said it was a general warning.

Another senior police officer, who pleaded anonymity, told HT that all the sensitive areas at the Pakistan border along Dera Baba Nanak had been sealed, with eight new bunkers built.

A special police team of 25 specially-trained cops laced with sophisticated weapons and night vision cameras have been deputed at the control room they will act spontaneously in case of an untoward incident, the officer said.

The officer said the town had been divided into three parts and additional police force was called from the rural areas to the headquarters.

Instead of these, 124 personnel of the IRB and CRPF each have been deputed in the town to conduct patrolling in three shifts, he said.

Batala SSP Daljinder Singh, along with paramilitary forces, also took stock of the situation in the city. He was no available for comment despite repeated attempts by HT.

There were also reports that the authorities had pressed drones into service after few city residents claimed to have sighted the UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles). The police, however, denied the reports.
He had taken six bullets in his stomach and the terrorists at the Pathankot airbase were still targeting him, but he continued braving the bullets till he fell unconscious after nearly half an hours fight.

Sailesh Gaur, an elite commando of Garud Commando Force, along with his 11 colleagues, continued safeguarding the assigned area.

Doctors at the Pathankot military hospital, where he is recuperating, claimed that Gaur would be fit in a few days to resume work. In the attack on January 2, Gaur was assigned to protect the mechanical transport wing at the airbase where the Garud team was divided into six teams of 11 each. This was the vital part of the airbase that terrorists had targeted.

He provided a strong resistance to the terrorists and continued for nearly half an hour even after getting six bullets in his body. The Garud commandoes were assisting the National Security Guards in the gunbattle that killed six heavily armed terrorists.
Predatory dinosaurs performed a ritual, bird-like dance to woo their mates, according to paleontologists who have studied huge scrape marks left behind by the animals in the US.

The findings are based on huge scrape marks left behind in 100 million years old rocks in the prehistoric Dakota sandstone of western Colorado, US.

These are the first sites with evidence of dinosaur mating display rituals ever discovered, and the first physical evidence of courtship behaviour, said lead researcher Martin Lockley, professor of geology at the University of Colorado - Denver.

Read: Mating made easy as dogs get a site of their own

This is physical evidence of pre-historic foreplay that is very similar to birds today, said Lockley, who also discovered evidence of mating areas at Dinosaur Ridge, a National Natural Landmark, just west of Denver.

Modern birds using scrape ceremony courtship usually do so near their final nesting sites. So the fossil scrape evidence offers a tantalising clue that dinosaurs in heat may have gathered here millions of years ago to breed and then nest nearby, he said.

This illustration shows theropods engaged in scrape ceremony display activity, based on trace fossil evidence from Colorado. (AP)

This new fossil evidence supports theories about the nature of dinosaur mating displays and the evolutionary driver known as sexual selection.

Since prehistoric times, males looking for mates, have driven off weaker rivals. Females, meanwhile, have chosen the most impressive male performers as consorts.

Similar sexual selection behaviours are common in mammals and birds. But until now scientists could only speculate about dinosaur mating behaviour, assuming it might be similar to that of their modern relatives, the birds.

The scrape evidence has significant implications, Lockley said.

The study was published in the journal Scientific Reports.

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Nearly twenty-five years ago, Amarjeet Sohi was released from a jail in Bihar, after a 21-month incarceration under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Prevention Act or TADA.

The next time Sohi travels to India, he will do so as a Canadian cabinet minister, handling the critical portfolio of infrastructure and communities.

While Indian prosecutors accused him of being a Khalistan extremist, no formal charges were ever filed. He maintained his innocence and the case against him was dismissed for lack of evidence.

Despite the trauma of that period, Sohi holds no rancour towards India, and maintains a close connection to the nation where he was born in 1964, in a village near Sangrur, Punjab.

What happened to me is something I wish does not happen to anyone at all. But I have strong ties to India, those ties are still very strong and they will remain very strong, said Sohi, who last visited India in 2013.

I go back to India to visit my family. We have an extended family in our village (Banbhaura) and one of my sisters is in India, he said in an interview with Hindustan Times.

Read | Justin Trudeau sworn in as Canadian PM, 4 Indian-origin MPs in cabinet

As he comes to grips with his portfolio in Prime Minister Justin Trudeaus cabinet, Sohi isnt sure yet if it will include matters that will form part of the bilateral engagements between India and Canada. But he added, I personally do want to explore those opportunities as a Member of Parliament, whether it ties into the infrastructure portfolio, I dont know at this time.

Sohis remit has three principal focal points in terms of investment -- public transportation, social infrastructure and green infrastructure. Much of that ties into his passion for human rights and social justice.

That partly emanates from his nightmarish imprisonment in Bihar: The experience that I went through kind of shaped my thinking in those areas. Thats why I strongly believe in creating communities where you feel part of it, where you feel your rights are not violated. I try to use those very difficult experiences to do some of the work we can do to build stronger communities.

Even after that exceptional experience aside, Sohis journey has been fascinating. He immigrated to Canada in 1981 and was a municipal bus driver before being elected to the city council of Edmonton in the province of Alberta.

His election to parliament last year too was dramatic -- he won the Edmonton Mill Woods constituency by 92 votes after a recount, defeating then incumbent minister of state Tim Uppal.

We knew if we win this riding (electoral district), it will be by a very close margin so we were prepared for that, Sohi said.

Read | Canadas badass defence minister Harjit Sajjan juggles IS, migrants

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A video of a hospital doctor punching a patient killing him instantly has irked the Russian authorities, who have ordered an investigation in the case on Saturday.

The shocking incident in the southern city of Belgorod raised questions over a cover-up culture in state medicine, with the investigation only opened days later after security camera footage was released on YouTube and aired on national television.

Belgorods Investigative Committee said in the statement released on Saturday that the incident took place on December 29. It gave no explanation for the apparent delay in investigating the crime.

It said the doctor was suspected of causing death through negligence, for which he could serve up to two years in jail.

In the video, the strongly-built doctor in medical clothing drags the barechested male patient from the examination table, asking him why did you touch the nurse? and pushes him out of the doorway.

When the patient returns, the doctor deals him a single blow to the face and a crash can be heard as the middle-aged man falls backwards onto the floor.

Meanwhile the doctor continues to scuffle with another man accompanying the patient, and it is only minutes later that the medics notice the patient lying motionless and attempt unsuccessfully to revive him.

The medics drag away the patients body and then an orderly mops up blood stains.

The doctor hit the patient in the face after he kicked a nurse during a procedure, the investigators said.

The cause of death of the victim was trauma to the skull and brain from hitting the back of the head on the hard surface of the floor.

Russian media named the doctor as a surgeon at the hospital, Ilya Zelendinov and the patient as 56-year-old Yevgeny Bakhtin.

Health minister Veronika Skvortsova has ordered the state health watchdog to carry out a check into the incident, state television reported on Saturday.

Russian medics have long operated in a culture of secrecy with patients having little recourse to compensation for medical errors.

Last year two Russians resorted to taking guns to hospitals and shooting dead doctors for perceived mistakes in their treatment. Both killed themselves at the scene.
Authorities in Chinas Henan province unexpectedly demolished part of a hospital and its adjoining morgue, sending doctors, nurses and patients fleeing and burying under rubble six bodies being processed at the morgue, reports said Friday.

The official Xinhua news agency reported that the hospital accused the local government of ordering the demolition work after failing to get the hospital to agree to it for a road expansion project.

The No. 4 Hospital of Zhengzhou University in Henan province said the unexpected demolition work Thursday morning buried six bodies stored in the morgue, caused nearly 20 million yuan worth of damage to medical equipment and injured several hospital staff, according to Xinhua.

Burying the remains of patients is enormously disrespectful to the dead, the hospitals deputy propaganda chief, Zhang Yuan, was quoted as saying. I never imagined anything like this would ever happen.

The Huiji district government information office said in an online statement on Thursday that they had asked the hospital in vain to demolish the CT room and morgue itself. It said workers had made sure there were no people inside the buildings before tearing them down, and there had been no casualties.

Calls to the mobile of an official at the construction bureau rang unanswered Friday, as did calls to numbers provided by the hospitals information service.

Forced demolitions are a common problem in China as local governments have looked to real estate and other development to fuel economic growth.
Adventurer Tracey Curtis-Taylor on Saturday completed her epic flight from Britain to Australia, landing her vintage, open-cockpit 1942 Boeing Stearman in Sydney.

I need a drink, she joked after finishing the final leg of the three-month journey which saw her contend with some treacherous weather in the air and logistical obstacles on the ground.

Modelled after pioneering aviator Amy Johnsons historic 1930 solo flight from England to Australia, Curtis-Taylor said her journey was a homage to female pilots of the past.

She said flying the open cockpit biplane had given her an insight into something of what she (Johnson) went through getting here.

Taylor taxies her 1942 Boeing Stearman Spirit of Artemis aircraft at Sydney Airport. (AP)

The flying has been sensational and thats why you do it, she told reporters at Sydney airport shortly after her arrival.

To fly something like this, low level, halfway around the world seeing all the the most iconic landscapes, geology, vegetation... its just the best view in the world. Its the best adventure in the world.

Curtis-Taylor, who flew from Cape Town to Goodwood, England in 2013, took off from Farnborough on October 1, with a flight path over Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

The route of nearly 21,000 kilometres (13,000 miles) saw her stop in places such as Vienna, Istanbul and Amman before she headed to Pakistan and India and on to Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. She crossed the Timor Sea to Australia this month.

Curtis-Taylor said she struck some bad weather, mostly in eastern Europe, as she flew the stick and rudder airplane with basic period instruments.

But as the journey involved frequent stops because of the planes short range, many of her obstacles were not related to flying.

Ive lost my rag several times dealing with people on the ground, she said, adding that she spent seven hours trying to get fuel at one airport.

In the end I just lay down on the tarmac and went to sleep with my head on my handbag.

Taylor pilots her biplane past Australia's Uluru rock formation during her historic England-to-Australia journey. (REUTERS)

She said that it was an experience to fly over Australia, where her stops included the outback towns of Tennant Creek and Alice Springs and flying over the monolithic rock Uluru.

Curtis-Taylor, 53, said she would love to continue the adventure and fly up north along Australias east coast.

But instead the plane, which the aviator said did not miss a beat during the epic journey, will be shipped to the United States.
Hours after Pakistan sought concrete evidence from India regarding the Pathankot attack, US Secretary of State John Kerry spoke to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Saturday in an apparent effort to nudge him to act against the perpetrators of the terrorist assault.

Sharif told Kerry during the telephone conversation late on Saturday that Pakistan is swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner and will bring out the truth, said a statement from the Pakistan Prime Ministers office.

The Prime Minister also reiterated Pakistans commitment to not allow anyone to use its soil to conduct terror operations abroad. Kerry extended full support and cooperation to Sharif to find out the truth in the Pathankot terror incident, the statement said.

Earlier, sources in Islamabad told Hindustan Times that Pakistani authorities had conveyed a request for concrete evidence to their Indian counterparts after Sharif chaired a meeting of top officials on Friday to discuss the assault on Pathankot airbase.

The move had raised apprehensions in New Delhi that Pakistans probe into the incident could be going the way of the 26/11 investigation.

The development came less than a week before a planned meeting of the foreign secretaries of the two sides in Islamabad on January 15 to frame the schedule and modalities for the new comprehensive dialogue process.

Read| Pakistan should act against Pathankot attack perpetrators: US

India has linked the talks to its demand for prompt and decisive action against the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack, which has been blamed on the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed.

The statement from Sharifs office quoted Kerry as saying that the US hoped the India-Pakistan dialogue will continue despite the fact that terrorists have tried to thwart it. Kerry added, Continuation of India-Pakistan talks are needed in the interest of regional stability and the leadership role by both PMs is required to ensure continuous dialogue.

Sharif told Kerry, (The) world will see our effectiveness and sincerity in this regard...All state institutions are fully committed to eliminate terrorism.

In the aftermath of the 2008 Mumbai attacks that was carried out by the Lashkar-e-Taiba, Pakistan repeatedly sought concrete evidence against the suspects, including LeT commander Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, even though India provided several dossiers. The Pakistani trial of the seven suspects in the 26/11 attack has made little headway.

Pakistans investigation of Pathankot certainly seems to be going in the same direction as the investigation into Mumbai. There will be pretensions of action but no serious moves, said G Parthasarathy, a former high commissioner to Pakistan.

Read: US Congress stalls sale of F-16 fighter jets to Pakistan

The JeM has a special relationship with the ISI because it shares a Deobandi affinity with the Afghan Taliban. It is important for the ISI in both Afghanistan and India. The Lashkar-e-Taiba will be the main group used against India but the JeM will also be kept in play, he said.

Indian officials have said Islamabad has been given intercepts of telephone calls made by the attackers to Pakistan-based handlers, the Pakistani phone numbers they called and the locations of these numbers. The external affairs ministry spokesperson described this information as actionable intelligence.

Soon after receiving the information from India, Pakistan had acknowledged it was investigating some leads. Sharif also telephoned his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi and assured him of prompt and decisive action.

The JeM has been banned by Pakistan but continues to be active in several parts of the country, including the southern part of Punjab province.

Sharifs government has traditionally been reluctant to act against terror groups based in Punjab, including the JeM and Lashkar-e-Taiba, because of fears of a blowback in the province that is the main base of the Prime Ministers PML-N party.

Read: PM Modi satisfied after visiting Pathankot airbase

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With his daring underground escapes and ability to sneak narcotics under the US-Mexico border, Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin El Chapo Guzman earned a new nickname: The Lord of Tunnels.

But Guzmans latest cat-and-mouse game with the authorities reached the end of the tunnel on Friday when President Enrique Pena Nieto announced his recapture on Twitter, declaring triumphantly: Mission accomplished.

Before that, the man whose old nickname means Shorty had used the money from a drug empire whose tentacles reach Europe and Asia to dig himself out of trouble.

The bathtub in one of his houses in Culiacan, capital of his northwestern home state of Sinaloa, opened into an escape route through drainage systems that he used to flee from troops in early 2014.

US and Mexican authorities have regularly discovered sophisticated tunnels with rails and electricity used to ship marijuana, cocaine and other drugs into the United States, with cash and weapons coming the other way.

Folk legend

The 58-year-old Sinaloa drug cartel leaders legend soared after he humiliated authorities by escaping prison in his most ambitious tunnel yet.

On July 11, 2015, after just 17 months at the Altiplano maximum-security prison in central Mexico, Guzman slipped through a hole in his cells shower, climbed on a motorcycle mounted on rails, and traveled 1.5 kilometers (one mile) through the tunnel.

T-shirts featuring fugitive Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman hang for sale inside the shrine of a faith healer in Mexico City. (AP)

US and Mexican law enforcement officials say Guzman then flew to his home turf at the Sinaloa-Durango state border because he is revered as a modern-day Robin Hood in the region. His octogenarian mother still lives in his village of La Tuna.

Marines nearly captured him in October 2015 in a remote mountain region between the two states. Authorities said Guzman injured his face and a leg while falling in the rough terrain, but special forces failed to nab him.

AFP journalists who visited the area weeks after the operation found bullet-riddled homes and cars. Residents said military helicopters fired on the community during the operation, prompting hundreds to flee.

Guzman had been previously captured on February 22, 2014, in the Sinaloa resort of Mazatlan. He was found in a condo with his wife and their young twin daughters.

He had been on the lam for 13 years after escaping a first time in 2001 from another prison, in western Jalisco state, by hiding in a laundry cart. He had spent eight years in prison following his 1993 capture in Guatemala.

Guzman became a legend of Mexicos underworld, with musicians singing his praises in folk ballads known as narcocorridos, tributes to drug capos.

He is said to have been brazen enough to walk into restaurants in his state of Sinaloa, ask diners to hand their cell phones to his bodyguards, eat calmly and pay everyones tabs before leaving.

Public Enemy Number One

Born on April 4, 1957, to a family of farmers in La Tuna, Guzman had humble beginnings in a region known as a bastion of drug trafficking.

He dropped out of primary school to work in marijuana and opium poppy fields as drug consumption rose in the neighbouring United States.

He was recruited by Guadalajara cartel boss Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo, the godfather of Mexicos modern drug cartels.

Guzmans job was to contact drug traffickers in Colombia.

Photograph of a notice published in newspapers offering 60 million Mexican pesos (3.8 USD approximately) reward to anyone with information leading to the recapture of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman Loera, in Mexico City. (AFP)

After Felix Gallardo was arrested in 1989, Guzmans Sinaloa drug cartel began its meteoric rise.

But he had enemies.

A gunfight in 1993 at the airport of Guadalajara killed the western citys archbishop, Cardinal Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo, allegedly because he was mistaken for Guzman.

His ability to sneak tons of cocaine, heroin and marijuana into the United States made him Public Enemy Number One in Chicago, a moniker that had been given to US prohibition-era mafia boss Al Capone.

Guzman easily surpassed the carnage and social destruction that was caused by Capone, the Chicago Crime Commission said in February 2013.

The mustachioed drug lord made Forbes magazines list of billionaires until he was left out in 2013 because he was believed to have spent much of his wealth on protection.

Guzman married an 18-year-old beauty queen, Emma Coronel, in 2007 and is believed to have 10 children with various women.

His family has paid dearly for his life of crime. One of his brothers was killed in a Mexican jail in December 2004 and a son was shot dead in a Culiacan shopping center parking lot in May 2008.
South Koreas loudspeaker broadcasts aimed at North Korea push the rivals to the brink of war, a top North Korean official has told a propaganda rally.

North Koreas fourth nuclear test on Wednesday angered both the United States and China, which was not given prior notice, although the US government and weapons experts doubt the Norths claim that the device it set off was a hydrogen bomb.

In retaliation for the test, South Korea on Friday unleashed a ear-splitting propaganda barrage over its border with the North. The last time South Korea deployed the loudspeakers, in August 2015, it triggered an exchange of artillery fire.

Jealous of the successful test of our first H-bomb, the US and its followers are driving the situation to the brink of war, by saying they have resumed psychological broadcasts and brought in strategic bombers, Kim Ki Nam, head of the ruling Workers Party propaganda department, said at Fridays rally.

State media published images of the rally which appeared to show thousands of people gathered in central Pyongyang, holding propaganda signs glorifying leader Kim Jong Un, whose birthday was also on Friday.

Kim Ki Nams comments, which are in line with routine propaganda rhetoric, were the Norths first official response to the Souths broadcasts, which it considers insulting.

The broadcasts, in rolling bursts from walls of loudspeakers at 11 locations along the heavily militarised border, blared rhetoric critical of the Pyongyang regime, as well as K-pop music. North Korea later responded with its own broadcasts.

A South Korean military official said Seoul and Washington had discussed the deployment of US strategic weapons on the Korean peninsula after the test, but declined to give details. Media said these could include B-2 and B-52 bombers, and a nuclear-powered submarine.

On Thursday, US secretary of state John Kerry said he had told Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi that Chinas approach to North Korea had not succeeded.

Chinas foreign ministry said Wang also held talks with his South Korean counterpart, Yun Byung-se. Yun pushed Wang to sternly punish North Korea over the test, the South Korean foreign ministry said in a statement.

China is North Koreas main economic and diplomatic backer, although relations between the Cold War allies have cooled in recent years.

South Koreas nuclear safety agency said it had found a minuscule amount of xenon gas in a sample from off its east coast but said more analysis and samples were needed to determine if it came from a nuclear test.

A joint factory park between the two Koreas was operating as normal on Saturday, South Koreas Yonhap news agency reported.
Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena marked his first year in office on Friday by pardoning a Tamil Tiger rebel convicted of plotting to murder him.

Sivarajah Jeneevan was sentenced last January to 10 years in jail for conspiring to murder Sirisena when he was irrigation minister in 2005.

The president welcomed Jeneevan onto the stage where he was making a speech to mark the anniversary, shaking hands with the former rebel and blessing him by touching him on his head.

Sirisena came to power promising compassionate rule and stable country, and has already released a number of hard core rebels from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), who fought for secession for more than 25 years until their defeat in 2009 under Sirisenas predecessor, Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Sirisenas opponents have, however, accused him of weakening national security with the releases.

Sirisena has also promised to end corruption, rebalance foreign policy by reducing Rajapaksas focus on China, and ensure the independence of the judiciary and civil service.

In line with UN recommendations, his government has pledged to establish a credible judicial process involving foreign judges to investigate allegations of war crimes during the bloody climax of the war against the LTTE.
Relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran took a turn for the worse last week after the execution of the Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr at the hands of the Saudi authorities along with 46 others. Since then, various countries in the Muslim world, already witnessing an unprecedented level of militant activity, have been taking sides and breaking off diplomatic contact depending on their allegiances, which have more or less neatly followed Sunni-Shia religious lines.

But to claim that the tense devolution of relations between Iran and its bitter rival stem wholly from a religious conflict that occurred 1,400 years ago is, at best, wholly fatuous, and at worst propagating an Orientalist discourse. The two Muslim nations are not in conflict because of their religious demarcations; rather, their differences have been utilised to further their geo-political agendas via the promotion of sectarian violence.

Read: Awakening not suppressible: Iran condemns Nimrs execution by Saudi

Origins of the split

The major schism in Islam occurred in the 7th century over a dispute over which caliphs to venerate, and in what order. The Shias, who approximately make up 10-15% of the total global Muslim population, were a movement - their current name is derived from their predecessors, the Shiat Ali (Party of Ali) referring to the caliph who was assassinated in 661 after a five-year-long civil war.

Despite being marked by civil discord and political instability, the Shias hold the belief that Alis successors were cheated out of their rightful legacy. Furthermore, they hold that Ali was the Prophets true successor, a claim that has lead many Sunni extremists to frequently denounce Shias as heretics.

The Sunnis, who comprise the majority of Muslims (approximately 80-85%) across the world, derive their name from the phrase Ahl al Sunnah, meaning people of the Tradition, hinting at their conservative practices.

But does a 1,400 year-old religious schism adequately explain the ongoing tensions in the Middle East?

1979: Saudi Arabia shifts uneasily as a Shah is toppled

As it turns out, no.

Religious differences have a political function, whether they are used against non-Muslims or even within the Muslim community, says AH Mohapatra, professor at the Centre for West Asian Studies in Delhis Jawarharlal Nehru University.

Islam is unique in that it is a political religion par excellence, meaning that it is more susceptible to abuse and misuse to the benefit of political actors than, say, Judaism or Christianity, he adds, emphasising the use of religious demarcations as a method for both Iran and Saudi Arabia to articulate their political desires.

Contemporary Sunni-Shia relations, which usually revolved around a clear hierarchy that favoured the former, changed almost completely in 1979, the year of the Iranian Revolution. The triumph of a revolutionary radical Shia Islamist agenda was seen as a challenge to the conservative Sunni countries; especially in the Gulf States, and especially in Saudi Arabia, which began assembling allies.

The Iranian Islamic Republic Army demonstrating in solidarity with people in the street during the Iranian revolution. The triumph of the Revolution changed the power dynamic between Sunnis and Shias; much to the discomfort of the Gulf States. (Getty Images)

That they along with future enemies would fall along the lines of the historical Sunni-Shia divide was certainly not a coincidence; but neither was it the driving force behind the instability in modern Iranian-Saudi Arabian relations.

As the political scientist Gilles Kepel noted, Irans revolution constituted a potent challenge to the existing Shia-Sunni status quo, and the political gambles that ensued after 1979 were articulated with that ancient schism in mind. This was further exacerbated by the particular school of Sunni thought that Saudi Arabia follows - Wahhabism - which strictly does not consider Shias to even be Islamic.

The sectarian violence that followed this political standoff was not a result of politics over a religious issue; rather it stemmed from political ambitions of two very different states who realised that they could use the schism to further their own goals. Religion, as is so often the case, became a tool to further the aims of the state.

Read: Shia clerics execution in Saudi exposes divisions in the Middle East

The rapid escalation of violence in the region along Sunni-Shia lines can perhaps be better understood by understanding the times in which they grew. According to the academic and Middle East scholar Vali Nusr, as the Muslim world became decolonised the ideology of Arab Nationalism began to lose its appeal. Fundamentalism blossomed as a consequence, with the harsh teachings of the Sunni scholar Ibn Taymiyyah being especially popular.

There are some caveats to this argument, of course. Sectarian violence did flare up before 1979, and Saudi Arabia and Iran are not the only groups to have used the division for political gain (Saddam Hussein did during his war with Iran in the 1980s, and the largely-Sunni Islamic State group has been exploiting the conflict successfully in its fight in Iraq and Syria). But the fact remains that sectarian violence has only become a defining issue for the Middle East relatively recently.

Future consequences

So what does the fallout between Iran and Saudi Arabia mean?

With relations between the two countries at their lowest since the 1980s (Saudi Arabia had backed Saddams invasion of Iran) it is clear that the ramifications of the execution of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr has caused a political fallout across the Muslim world.

The ongoing conflicts in the Middle East are already complex in nature because of the political machinations of both nations; in Yemen, Zaidi Shia-led Houthis launched a revolution with the backing of Iran, while in Syria Hezbollah and Iranian-backed Shia fighters are currently fighting on the side of the al-Assad regime against a largely Sunni-dominated opposition which includes the Islamic State.

Army soldiers hold up their weapons after taking over the main port of Yemen's southern city of Aden from gun men. The Hadi government forces are supported by a Saudi-led coalition, which remove the Iran-backed Houthi rebels from power last year. (REUTERS Photo)

So it is possible that the escalating tensions between the two rivals will hamper peace efforts in the region.

There are also questions about how India, home to the second-largest number of Shias in the world, should react. The MEA should think about acting in terms of dousing the flames before sectarian violence spills over from the Middle East, says Professor Aftar Kamal Pasha, another professor at the Centre for West Asian Studies.

It shouldnt result in a law-and-order problem, but it certainly will have an impact on our country - among the Kashmiri Shias for example, and may change what the minority groups expect from the local political parties like the Samajwadi Party and the Telugu Desam Party.

India faces a challenge because of the increasing bilateral alliance that has emerged during the Syrian Civil War, and that has been exacerbated by the Yemen revolution, agrees Mohapatra. We cant escape the situation because of our Shia population and the fact that we are dependent on Saudi Arabia for oil and Iran for gas - not to mention the historical and cultural ties we have with Iran.

Despite Maulani Wali Rehmani, the general secretary of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, in an interview with Indian Express saying that the fallout from the executions would not reflect here as there is no such inherent tensions here, the Centre may have to consider a suitable response to the escalating crisis.

Read More:

Iranian protesters storm Saudi embassy after Shia clerics execution

Shia clerics execution by Saudi Arabia sparks outrage in Iraq

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Two Austrian tourists and a Swede were wounded in an attack by suspected militants armed with knives and guns at a hotel in Egyptian Red Sea resort of Hurghada on Friday evening, the interior ministry said.

Security forces shot and killed at least one of the attackers after they stormed the beachside Bella Vista hotel, officials said, though there was no immediate information on the other, or on the condition of the tourists.

Security sources said the attackers had arrived by sea and also carried a gun and a suicide belt. Officials said officers had tightened checks across the area and shut off roads.

Norwegian Jon Torp told Norwarys VG newspaper that he heard at least 24 shots as the attackers moved around the hotel.

I was in my room when I heard someone shouting. I went out on the balcony and could see a man wave a black flag with white writings on it. He was yelling loudly, Torp told VG.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

But Egypt is fighting a wave of Islamist militancy and Islamic State, which has a black and white flag, claimed responsibility for the downing of a Russian passenger plane in October, killing all 224 people on board, most of them tourists returning home from the Red Sea resort of Sharm al-Sheikh, across the water from Hurghada.

Security sources had earlier said two tourists had been injured, one from Germany and one from Denmark.

But the Swedish foreign ministry confirmed that one Swede was injured and Expressen newspaper quoted the victims father as saying he was fine in hospital.

Armed men shot dead a police officer and a soldier on Saturday while they were in their car in the Giza area, on the outskirts of Cairo, the state news agency said.

Islamic State said on Friday it had carried out an attack on Israeli tourists in Cairo on Thursday, in response to a call by the groups leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, to target Jews everywhere.

Security sources said those tourists were Israeli Arabs.

Tourism is critical to the Egyptian economy as a source of hard currency, but has been ravaged by years of political turmoil since the revolution that ousted veteran president Hosni Mubarak in 2011.
The Obama administrations move to sell Pakistan eight new F-16 fighter jets has been stalled by US Congress, with lawmakers raising questions about the end use of the combat aircraft, and the relationship itself.

Several requests for clarification and information were made by members of the House of Representatives, effectively stalling the process, said a congressional source.

At least one member of the Senate, a Democrat, has put a hold on the sale, a legislative process of a request to delay floor action on a measure, a bill, nomination or sale.

In effect, the sale has been stalled, multiple congressional sources confirmed. They, however, clarified at the same time it does not mean the move is dead or it has been cancelled.

Read| Pakistan in negotiations with US to buy F-16 fighter jets: Air chief

Indians, who are closely following the proposal, preferred the word disrupted, which, once again, doesnt mean its been cancelled. Lets see where it goes now, an official said.

The move comes at a time when the US State Department has said it expects Pakistan to act against the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack without distinguishing between good and bad militants.

The Obama administration informally notified Congress of its proposal of a foreign military sale  of the jets  during Prime Minister Nawaz Sharifs visit to Washington last October.

It followed up with a formal notification of foreign military financing to fund the sale in early December. The next, and final, stage would have been a formal notification.

But that has been stalled by lawmakers requests  their number couldnt be ascertained  for clarifications or more information and the hold put by a senator.

There are several issues worrying lawmakers. One is the end use of the jets. Several members raised that at a hearing of the House foreign affairs committee last December. They wanted to know if the F-16s could, and would, be used against India.

Richard Olson, the US State Department official who deposed before the panel, had said the fighters had been used by the Pakistan Army for precision attacks in anti-terror operations.

Lawmakers seemed troubled also by the overall signal the sale would send. Im concerned about the messages were sending when we continue to provide Pakistan security assistance despite Pakistans ongoing relationships with the Haqqani Network and LeT, Eliot Engel, ranking member of the committee, had said.

Chairman Ed Royce used the phrase Pakistans double-dealing to question the continued flow of cash and arms  as he put it  despite Pakistans inadequate efforts against terrorism.

From here, there are two ways the proposed sale could proceed, sources said. One, the administration answers all the clarifications sought, and lawmakers let it go through.

Two, the lawmakers refuse to allow the use of foreign military financing, forcing the administration to look for alternative funding if it still wants to go ahead with the deal.

Read: US lawmakers strongly oppose weapon sales to snitch Pakistan
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True crime aficionados and armchair detectives have been talking nonstop about Netflix's latest docuseries "Making A Murderer," which documents the trial and conviction of Manitowoc County, Wis., resident Steven Avery for the rape and murder of Teresa Halbach - a crime Avery still denies having committed. Avery claimed that evidence was planted against him by Manitowoc County police because of a $36 million lawsuit Avery was involved with against them for the wrongful conviction and incarceration for the rape of a Manitowoc County resident in 1985, a crime he served 18 years for before being exonerated by DNA evidence.

Viewers decried Avery's conviction and expressed outrage over Avery's unjust trial on social media. But Wisconsin law enforcement officials have spoken out in various interviews to defend the trial and to call out the series' directors Moira Demos and Laura Ricciardi for leaving out key evidence from Avery's trial - evidence that led jurors to sentence Avery for life in prison for Halbach's murder, as previously reported by HNGN.

"It was a nearly six-week-long trial, and it would just be impossible for us to include all of the less significant evidence," Riccardi told the Wrap in defense of her documentary.

Here is a roundup of all the pieces of missing evidence law enforcement claimed was omitted from Netflix's "Making a Murderer."

DNA Evidence

Manitowoc County Sheriff Robert Hermann elaborated on the DNA evidence that linked Avery to the crime. In the documentary, law enforcement officials found the car key to Halbach's Rav4, which was discovered at Avery's Auto Salvage lot, owned by the Avery family. Officials said Avery's DNA was found on the key and the documentary didn't make it clear what type of DNA was found. "It was actually sweat, perspiration from Steven Avery," Hermann told the Hollywood Reporter. Hermann also said DNA evidence in the form of Avery's perspiration was found underneath the hood of Halbach's car, according to CNN.

Incriminating Evidence Found At Avery's Residence

Manitowoc County Police found leg shackles and irons in Avery's residence, according to the Huffington Post. They were allegedly purchased by Avery three weeks prior to Halbach's death, and they also matched the description of the restraints allegedly used to tied Halbach down to Avery's bed during her alleged rape, as per testimony from Avery's nephew Brendan Dassey. Halbach's belongings were also reportedly found in a burn barrel on the Avery property, Hermann told the Hollywood Reporter, which included her camera and her cell phone.

Avery Expressed Intent To Kill

While serving his 18-year sentence, Avery allegedly "told another inmate of his intent to build a 'torture chamber' so he could rape, torture and kill young women when he was released... even drew a diagram," Ken Kratz, the former District Attorney in neighboring Calumet County who presided over the Avery case, told People. "Another inmate was told by Avery that the way to get rid of a body is to 'burn it.'" Halbach's charred bones were discovered in a burn pit behind Avery's trailer on the auto salvage lot property, as seen in "Making a Murderer."

Phone Records

Halbach headed out to the Avery Auto Salvage lot Oct. 31, 2005, on assignment for Auto Trader magazine to take photos of a used van that Avery was selling, as seen on "Making a Murderer," and Avery was reportedly the last person to see her alive before she went missing. Her car and charred bones were discovered on the Avery property five days later. But the documentary didn't mention the phone records that reportedly proved Avery called Auto Trader magazine with his used car listing and asked specifically for Halbach on the morning of Oct. 31, since she had been to the auto lot once before on a similar assignment, Kratz told ABC News. Kratz also said Avery placed three phone calls to Halbach's cell phone on that same day, and used the *67 feature twice to block his phone number. He called a third time without using the *67 block feature.

Ballistics Evidence

A bullet found in Avery's garage tested positive with Halbach's DNA and the bullet was linked back to the gun that Avery kept above his bed in his trailer. "Ballistics said the bullet found in the garage was fired by Avery's rifle," Kratz told People.

Halbach Was 'Creeped Out' By Avery

When Halbach visited the Avery Auto Salvage lot on her first assignment, Avery reportedly greeted her wearing nothing but a towel, which "creeped her out," Kratz told People. "She [went to her employer and] said she would not go back because she was scared of him."

Dean Strang, one of the attorneys who represented Steven Avery during the 2005 trial, debunked a few of Kratz's and Hermann's missing evidence claims in an interview with Huffington Post. The claim that Halbach was afraid and didn't want to go back to the Avery Auto Salvage yard was blown out of proportion during the trial when two of her former Auto Trader co-workers testified. The Auto Trader witnesses said Halbach's reaction to Avery was more "ew" than fear, said Strang. "This is a good example of less significant prosecution evidence omitted and defense evidence omitted," he added.

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El Salvador's homicide rate has now surpassed that of last year's murder capital Honduras after 2015 saw a 70 percent increase in murders, making it the deadliest country in the world outside of a warzone, according to ABC News.

Recently released government data on officially registered homicides revealed that a total of 6,657 people were murdered in the small Central American nation in 2015, reported USA Today. With a population of only just over 6 million, the homicide rate for El Salvador is 104 people per 100,000.

The country with the next highest homicide rate is Venezuela, where the homicide rate is 90 people per 100,000, according to AFP. In comparison, the U.S.'s homicide rate is around four people per 100,000.

Local officials claim that the high homicide rates are largely due to gang activity. The end of a truce between two large rival gangs - the Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and the Barrio 18 - is thought to be responsible for the spike in homicides in the past two years.

The U.S. have pledged to give $750 million to Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras collectively this year in order to help improve security and stem violence in these nations, AFP noted. This is, in part, an attempt to curtail the overwhelming number of people who have fled from these countries to the U.S. in recent years. Almost 10 percent of residents from these three nations have left their countries, often for the U.S., including over 80,000 unaccompanied minors who ended up in the U.S. between late 2013 and mid 2015, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.

Five people were already murdered this year in El Salvador on New Year's Day at a gathering, including one child, as HNGN previously reported. The incident was believed to have been gang-related. A further five gang members were killed in a police shootout on the same day.

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A Swiss missionary based in the northwestern Malian town of Timbuktu was kidnapped by suspected Islamic militants on Friday. The woman, identified as Beatrice Stockly, was kidnapped for a second time in four years.

Malian security forces have confirmed that Beatrice was abducted by unidentified gunmen from her home in Timbuktu.

"I confirm that a European woman was kidnapped in Timbuktu at 3:30 a.m. (03:30 GMT). A neighbor alerted the security forces around 6 a.m.," Malian army spokesperson Souleymane Maiga said, according to DW.

"Armed men took Beatrice from Timbuktoo. They were armed. They tied her and left with her," a government official said, according to Africanews.

The Swiss foreign ministry confirmed the abuduction, saying that the woman was kidnapped second time.

"The Swiss citizen is the person who was once before kidnapped in Mali in the spring of 2012," the ministry said in a statement, according to swissinfo.

The ministry has formed a special taskforce to achieve the release of the kidnapped woman, the statement added. Read full statement here.

1/ I covered the abduction of Swiss missionary Beatrice Stockly from Timbuktu 4 yrs ago. Today she was taken again https://t.co/Vm1xD2TcbN  Rukmini Callimachi (@rcallimachi) January 8, 2016

No group has claimed responsibility for the kidnapping. However, involvement of Islamic militants, particularly on Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM)-linked Salafi leader Iyad Ag Ghali, has been suspected, according to EFE news agency.

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Three foreign tourists were injured in a commando-style suspected terror attack on a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort town of Hurghada Friday. The injured tourists are reportedly in a stable condition.

Two unidentified assailants stormed into the Bella Vista Hotel and stabbed three foreign tourists, two Austrians and one Swede. They reportedly entered the hotel through the outdoor restaurant located at the entrance of the hotel, The Guardian reported.

"The tourists -- two Austrians and a Swede - have suffered knife wounds but they are in stable condition," said Khaled Megahed, a spokesperson from the health ministry, according to AFP.

One of the attackers was killed by security forces, the interior ministry said in a statement. The ministry also identified the slain assailant as 21-year-old student Mohammed Hassan Mohammed Mahfouz, Al Jazeera reported.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack, which came a day after an ISIS-inspired attack on a hotel near the Giza Pyramids. A group of attackers reportedly fired birdshot at security forces outside the hotel.

"The first thing they fired was flares, and then they started firing at the bus. Later they started firing birdshot at the hotel and tried to throw Molotov cocktails at the bus," an eyewitness said, according to the Associated Press.

No one was wounded in the attack, which was claimed by an Egyptian affiliate of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
United Nations Secretary General Ban ki-moon has expressed concern over the use of cluster bombs in Yemen by the Saudi-led coalition of Arab nations.

"The Secretary-General (Ban Ki-moon) is particularly concerned about reports of intense airstrikes in residential areas and on civilian buildings in Sanaa, including the Chamber of Commerce, a wedding hall and a center for the blind," U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters on Friday, according to UNI news agency.

The U.N chief also warned that the use of prohibited cluster munitions could be war crime. The U.S. backed Saudi coalition has been fighting Iran-backed Shia Houthi rebels since March 2015.

"We have also received troubling reports of the use of cluster munitions in attacks on Sana'a on 6 January in several locations. The use of cluster munitions in populated areas may amount to a war crime due to their indiscriminate nature," Dujarric said, according to Cihan news agency.

Human Rights Watch, in a report, described the cluster bomb attacks by Saudi coalition as a "'war crime" and called for an international inquiry.

"The coalition's repeated use of cluster bombs in the middle of a crowded city suggests an intent to harm civilians, which is a war crime," HRW's arms director Steve Goose said in a statement.

"These outrageous attacks show that the coalition seems less concerned than ever about sparing civilians from war's horrors," he said.

A Saudi-led coalition of the Arab nations resumed airstrikes against Sanaa-based Houthi rebels last week after a two-week ceasefire. The ceasefire agreement between the two sides was announced on Dec. 15 after the resumption of U.N.-mediated Yemen peace talks in Switzerland, as HNGN previously reported.

Nearly 6,000 people - more than half of which were civilians - have been killed in the war-torn country since March 2015.

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Motorola COO Rick Osterloh announced during the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nev., that the brand name Motorola will slowly be phased out this year.

Motorola is a pioneer in the mobile industry, being the first brand to invent the hand-held Walkie-Talkie and the first cell phones, according to CNET.

The company was able to follow those pioneer products with different products, including smartphones, smart watches and Bluetooth headsets, but it was never able to come out strong against the rest of its competition in the market. It was bought by Google in 2012 and later sold to Lenovo in 2014.

While Lenovo has expressed the end of Motorola, it will retain the batwing-like "M" icon, which, from hereon, will be dubbed "Moto by Lenovo." It will also add its own blue logo to strengthen the connection between the two known brands, according to Fox 8.

Attaching Lenovo's name to Motorola products is a play that aims to make Lenovo a more familiar name for Android users, which are known to have a liking for Motorola products.

Lenovo has also decided to retain the production of Moto X and Moto G series, as these products fit the goal to use the Moto brand for the high-end smartphones, while the company's proprietary Vibe series will focus on the budget phones, The International Business Times reported.

Lenovo also shared during the CES that the name Motorola will still exist, but only within the company.

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A U.S. Hellfire Missile sent to Europe for a training exercise in 2014 was mistakenly sent to Cuba and has remained there ever since despite protests for its return, officials revealed Friday.

While no one knows why the Hellfire Captive Air Training Missile ultimately wound up in Cuba, the timeline suggests that the journey began when the CATM was sent to Spain by Lockheed Martin as part of a NATO training exercise, reported NPR. It was then supposed to be returned through a roundabout journey back to the U.S. via Germany. However, it inexplicably ended up in an Air France truck that took the cargo to Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, where it was put on a flight to Havana.

Now investigators are left to determine whether the mistake was the result of a shipping error or international espionage.

Officials do note that while the missile is inert (non-explosive), it still contains sensitive American weapons technology, including targeting and sensor information, which they fear could be shared with other world powers such as Russia, China or North Korea, according to BBC News.

"This is an issue that the administration takes very, very seriously. I think for quite obvious reasons," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Friday when asked about the issue, according to CNN.

In the meantime, officials have been trying to get Cuba to return the missile to the U.S. for more than a year now but have been unsuccesful. The delays could be possibly be the result of the focus given to the restoration of diplomatic ties between the two countries after more than 50 years of hostility. Relations were re-established last summer, and embassies are expected to open in Washington and Havana this summer.

Hellfire Missiles are laser-guided, air-to-surface missiles that weigh about 100 pounds each. Though initially designed as anti-tank missiles to be deployed from an attack helicopter like the Apache, modern-usage has seen the missile adapted so it could be fired from unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones like the Predator, in anti-terrorism operations.

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When Fetty Wap burst on to the scene, there was some talk of his vocal resemblance to Zach Farlow. While its entirely possible Fetty had never heard a Farlow song when he started writing music, its clear that the two had some similar ideas. Farlows 2014 tape, The Great Escape, helped him to build a loyal following of fans, and his new sequel to the tape, fittingly titled The Great Escape 2 should give him another push into prominence.



Across the projects 13 tracks, Farlow teams with Metro Boomin, Southside, DJ Spinz, Ricky Rackz, London On Da Track and TM88  essentially the best of the best that Atlanta has to offer. When it comes to star-making these producers dont tend to miss, so we suggest keeping an eye on Farlow this year.
Athens News Agency: Daily News Bulletin in English, 16-01-08 Athens News Agency: Daily News Bulletin in English Directory - Previous Article - Next Article From: The Athens News Agency at <http://www.ana.gr/> Friday, 8 January 2016 Issue No: 5097 CONTENTS [01] PM's office welcomes employer support for hike in social insurance contributions [02] PM Tsipras: It is our social responsibility to safeguard the sustainability of the social security system [03] Government's proposal on pension reform is final, Gerovassili says [04] Social partners' agreement for a reasonable increase in social security contributions is a strong negotiating tool, says Gerovassili [05] ESEE's Korkidis says rise in social insurance contributions is the best of bad options for pension reform [06] Employer groups support temporary hike in social insurance contributions after meeting with PM [07] Opposition parties need to participate in dialogue on pension reforms, says gov't spokeswoman Gerovassili [08] 'Difficult' bills will be helped to pass Parliament, ND's Meimarakis predicts in ANA-MPA interview [09] New pension system 'crushing' the middle class, Potami party says [10] FinMin Tsakalotos to have meetings with European counterparts [11] EU Commission cannot give an exact date on the institutions' arrival at Athens, says spokesperson [12] Justice ministry condemns 'racist' incident on board Aegean flight to Tel Aviv [13] Bank of Greece governor optimistic over 2016 [14] Greek enterprises see significant economic prospects in 2016 [15] Energean Oil & Gas doubles oil production in Prinos [16] Greek trade deficit down 1.8 pct in Jan-Nov [17] Greek unemployment rate eased to 24.6 pct in Sept [18] Greek unemployment rate eased to 24.5 pct in Oct [19] Greek state overdue debt to the private sector down in Nov [20] Greek stocks end sharply lower [21] ADEX closing report [22] Stage and screen actress Anna Synodinou dies, aged 89 [23] Domestic flights to be cancelled on Friday due to strike [24] Ferry services gradually being restored as winds weaken [25] Woman arrested in northern Greece for suspected links to ISIS [26] Blue Star Ferries installs pilot photovoltaic unit on the 'Blue Star Delos' [27] 1,094 refugees arrive at Piraeus port on Thursday [28] Clouds on Friday [29] The Thursday edition of Athens' dailies at a glance Politics [01] PM's office welcomes employer support for hike in social insurance contributions The government on Thursday welcomed the stance adopted by employer associations to the possibility of a hike in social insurance contributions in order to support the pension system, in an announcement issued by the prime minister's press office. It noted that a meeting between Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and the heads of the four largest employer groups had been held in a positive and constructive climate, with the employers will to discuss a modest increase in contributions to avoid pension cuts. After the meeting, the four organisations issued an announcement saying they were in favour of a small and temporary increase in contributions that was signed by the heads of the National Confederation of Commerce and Entrepreneurship (ESEE), the Hellenic Federation of Enterprises (SEV), the Greek Tourism Confederation (SETE) and the Hellenic Confederation of Professionals, Craftsmen & Merchants (GSEVEE). The government noted that this position would ensure the viability of the system without further horizontal cuts and also strengthen the country's negotiating position and laid the foundations for an economic and productive reorganisation, with social solidarity and protection of the weaker sections of society. [02] PM Tsipras: It is our social responsibility to safeguard the sustainability of the social security system It is our social responsibility to safeguard the sustainability of the social security system and we owe it to the next generations, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Thursday said in a meeting with the representatives of the labour unions. Tsipras is meeting with labour unions representatives within the framework of the debate on social security reforms. "Both the government and the representatives of the trade unions have the responsibility to make the right choices that will ensure the sustainability of the pension system and I think that this is something we owe it to the next generations," the prime minister underlined. He also noted that critical decisions are looming that will pave the way for the debate on debt reduction and the exit from the crisis. [03] Government's proposal on pension reform is final, Gerovassili says The government's proposal for reforming the pension system is final, government spokeswoman Olga Gerovassili said on Thursday in an interview with the radio station 'Parapolitika 90.1'. At the same time, she left open the possibility of small changes in the amount of social insurance contributions paid by the self-employed. Regarding an increase in employer contributions, Gerovassili pointed out that a exceptionally large reduction in the amount of social insurance contribution in recent years had done next to nothing to slow unemployment or black labour, while the small increase the government was discussing now will not create a problem. She said the government was still waiting for the institutions to express their views on the government's proposal, saying that there was currently conjecture or unconfirmed reports of a disagreement between the partners and the International Monetary Fund on the issue of employer contributions that she said were "not based on real facts". Gerovassili estimated that the pension reforms bill will be voted on in Parliament within the first 10 days of February, adding that the government's goal is to pass measures for non-performing loans and the Medium-Term Fiscal Programme by February 15. Asked whether she feared rebellion within the ranks of SYRIZA and ANEL over the pensions bill, the spokeswoman said that the government's proposal was a "national issue that must be approached in a different way," and that the dialogue on this issue must become stronger "even through disagreements". [04] Social partners' agreement for a reasonable increase in social security contributions is a strong negotiating tool, says Gerovassili The agreement of the social partners for a reasonable increase in social security contributions, so that pensions are not reduced, is a strong negotiating tool, government spokeswoman Olga Gerovassili posted on her Twitter account on Thursday. [05] ESEE's Korkidis says rise in social insurance contributions is the best of bad options for pension reform National Confederation of Commerce and Entrepreneurship (ESEE) President Vasilis Korkidis on Thursday said he agreed with a proposal for a 1 pct increase in social insurance contributions on wages, with the cost to be shared equally between employees and employers, as the "best of a bad lot" of available options. He also criticised the opposition parties' refusal to participate in dialogue on pension system reforms or present their own proposals in this discussion. "It really is a new pension system written on a blank piece of paper that changes the form of our pension system. There must, therefore, be very careful clarifications and interpretations so that it does not amount to a new tax on our businesses. More specifically, we agree with an increase by 1 pct (0.5 pct and 0.5 pct) of social insurance contributions. We consider that imposing a 1? tax on bank transactions will not help the effort to kickstart growth, end the consequences of capital controls and familiarise business people with the use of plastic money," he said. Korkidis made the statements after a meeting between employer groups and the prime minister to discuss issues relating to pension reforms. [06] Employer groups support temporary hike in social insurance contributions after meeting with PM Following earlier statements by National Confederation of Commerce and Entrepreneurship (ESEE) President Vasilis Korkidis, the four associations representing Greek employers on Thursday issued a joint announcement after their meeting with Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, saying they were not opposed to a small and temporary increase in social insurance contributions. The statement was signed by Korkidis, Hellenic Federation of Enterprises (SEV) President Theodoros Fessas, Greek Tourism Confederation (SETE) President Andreas Andreadis and Hellenic Confederation of Professionals, Craftsmen & Merchants (GSEVEE) President Giorgos Kavvathas. The announcement said that they had an extensive discussion with Tsipras on supporting the competitiveness of Greek businesses while supporting employment and social cohesion. "In this framework, it was decided that there should be close cooperation between the government and the social partners for the implementation of immediate measures to stabilise the economy and attract investments," they said, noting that the priorities will be a stable and gradually more attractive tax framework, a business-friendly environment and incentives for growth and investments. "On these terms and taking into account the proposals that will be tabled for sundry improvements to the government's proposal for pension system reform, the social partners do not adopt a negative position on a small, temporary increase in social insurance contributions," they concluded. [07] Opposition parties need to participate in dialogue on pension reforms, says gov't spokeswoman Gerovassili Government spokeswoman Olga Gerovassili on Thursday in statements to real.gr stressed the importance of the opposition's participation in a constructive and of national importance dialogue to decide upon the social security reforms. Gerovassili underlined that the participation of the opposition parties in such a dialogue would strengthen Greece's negotiating position. "The government is ready to listen to their positions. It's time to express their views," the government spokeswoman said adding that if they reject the government's position, they need to propose an alternative solution for the sustainability of the system and the end of injustices. She concluded that the Greek government has submitted a comprehensive framework of social security reforms to the social partners, the political parties and the EU institutions. [08] 'Difficult' bills will be helped to pass Parliament, ND's Meimarakis predicts in ANA-MPA interview The government will get help in passing difficult bills that it brings to Parliament, from those anxious to avoid a major political crisis, even though its policies were alienating its political base, main opposition New Democracy's leadership candidate Vangelis Meimarakis predicted in an interview with the ANA-MPA on Thursday. "From what I can see, there are several that are willing [from outside SYRIZA] that would not like a major political issue to arise," he said, noting that the tension with SYRIZA's social base would not greatly affect its Parliamentary majority. Asked about unity within ND, Meimarakis said that unity "is not an end in itself," and noted that to constantly talk about it as if it did not exist helped nothing. Regarding the party's secretary Andreas Papamimikos, Meimarakis insisted that Papamimikos was "unsuited to this position" but said that there was no provision for changing or challenging the secretary in the party's charter until the next party conference. On where he intends to lead the party if he is elected ND's president in Sunday's party election, Meimarakis noted that ND has always been a party of moderate views and national understanding and will remain so under his leadership. Replying to extremists, he noted that those not conforming with the collective decisions of party organs effectively place themselves outside the party through their own actions. [09] New pension system 'crushing' the middle class, Potami party says The opposition Potami party criticised the government's proposed pension system reform bill in an announcement on Thursday, saying that it revealed the government's inability to handle the crisis in the pension system. As a result, it added, "the need to link the contributions of the self-employed and thus their pensions with their real income has given birth to a monstrosity." Some people in the new government were turning a blind eye to, if not actually striving for, the crushing of the middle class, Potami said. It noted that a proposal to link contributions to income "was destroyed" by the fact that the state was requiring the self employed to pay a massive 38.5 pct of their income in social insurance contributions for pensions and health care, which along with other taxes and fees "makes the state the majority shareholder in all small and medium-sized businesses." The party also noted that the proposals once again "punished" honest business people and rewarded habitual cheats: "What sane person will pay that kind of contribution when at the end of their working life they will receive virtually the same pension as someone that has paid half? Who will declare an income of 100,000 euros when they will receive the same pension by declaring 20,000 euros and also dodge the tax," the party's announcement pointed out. [10] FinMin Tsakalotos to have meetings with European counterparts Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos will have a series of contacts with European counterparts, including German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, over the next few days. They will discuss the course of the Greek program in view of the first evaluation as well as the issue of Greek debt, the debate on which will begin after the conclusion of the evaluation by the institutions. The Minister's schedule is as follows: Friday, January 8, 2016 / Rome / Pier Carlo Padoan, Italy's Finance Minister. Saturday, January 9, 2016 / Lisbon / Mario Centeno, Finance Minister of Portugal. Sunday, January 10, 2016 / Paris / Michel Sapen, Finance Minister of France. Monday, January 11, 2016 / Helsinki / Alexander Stubb, Finland's Finance Minister. Tuesday, January 12, 2016 / Amsterdam / Jeroen Dijsselbloem, Dutch Finance Minister and President of the Eurogroup. Wednesday, January 13, 2016 / Berlin / Wolfgang Schaeuble, Germany's Finance Minister. [11] EU Commission cannot give an exact date on the institutions' arrival at Athens, says spokesperson BRUSSELS (ANA-MPA/ M. Aroni) The European Commission cannot give an exact date on the institutions' arrival at Athens, European Commission spokesperson Vanessa Mock said on Thursday. "We are not in a position to confirm the exact date of the first evaluation," Mock stated adding that the Commission will inform Athens when the date is fixed. Asked to comment on the planned social security reforms, Mock said that the plan, which was received last Monday, is being examined and the discussions with the Greek authorities will continue within the framework of the first evaluation. [12] Justice ministry condemns 'racist' incident on board Aegean flight to Tel Aviv The Greek justice ministry on Thursday condemned a racist incident on board an Aegean Airlines flight from Athens to Tel Aviv last Sunday and noted that the principle of equal treatment in the provision of goods and services must be strictly observed at all times and without exception. "All discriminatory treatment on grounds of racial or ethnic origin, religious or other beliefs, disability, age or sexual orientation is forbidden and to be condemned," the announcement said. The incident occurred last Sunday when a group of Israeli Jewish passengers protestly strongly when they realised that they would be travelling with two Israeli Arabs. The protesting passengers refused to sit in their seats and put on their seatbelts and the airline asked for the assistance of the police to again check the two Arab passengers. Eventually, the two Arabs agreed to get off the plane and be transferred to a hotel in order to depart on a flight the following day. The Israeli passengers then demanded an additional security check of all passengers and only backed down when the crew warned them that those continuing to protest would be escorted off the plane and lose the right to a refund. At this point, the aircraft departed after a delay of 1.5 hours. In an announcement on Tuesday, Aegean said that the additional security check conducted with the assistance of the Greek police, after concern and strong protests were voiced by a number of Israeli passengers, had not revealed any cause for concern. The airline called it an "isolated and unfortunate incident that ended quickly, thanks to the cooperation and the accommodating attitude of the two passengers," and expressed its sorrow for what it called an unpleasant incident, which does not express its views. Financial News [13] Bank of Greece governor optimistic over 2016 Bank of Greece governor Yannis Stournaras on Thursdsay sounded optimistic over the country's outlook. In a message to the central bank's workers, sent on the occasion of the New Year, Stournaras said that the Bank of Greece will continue fulfilling its role as treasurer of monetary and financial stability within the Eurosystem. Referring to 2015 developments, the central banker said that the strength of the financial system and of the economy were put into test in the first half of 2015, as intense uncertainty fuelled negative scenarios over the country's future. The banking system faced successive confidence crisis episodes, which threatened financial stability and led to the imposition of capital controls to safeguard deposits and the stability of the system. Stournaras underlined that the Bank of Greece successfully responded to these challenges and contributed catalytically in balancing the situation while at the same time it preserved its independence and its status. Stournaras said the Bank of Greece implemented a partial restructuring of its network and its operations and noted that a personnel renewal program will expand in 2016. [14] Greek enterprises see significant economic prospects in 2016 There are significant capabilities of supporting economic activity in 2016 through offering significant liquidity from the state to the private sector on the condition that the government strictly implemented its state budget, a privatisation programme and structural reforms included in a third memorandum, the Federation of Hellenic Enterprises (SEV) said in a weekly bulletin on economic developments in the country. SEV warned that in any other case, 2016 could be an "annus horribilis" for enterprises and workers as an over-taxation trend would further compress available incomes in the country. "The good news and the bet for 2016 is that if reforms were to be accelerated, as expected, the inflow of money from creditors could reach around 17-18 billion euros this year, instead of 13 billion euros," SEV said, adding that such a sum could allow the creation of cash reserves of around 5.0 billion euros and to repay almost all overdue debt to the private sector (currently around 7.0 billion). The bulletin noted that accumulating cash reserves of up to 8.0 billion euros by August 2018 was crucial to allow the Greek state to resort to capital markets for borrowing. SEB noted that funds from the bailout programme should help Greece towards an economic recovery through privatisations and boosting liquidity in the real economy. [15] Energean Oil & Gas doubles oil production in Prinos Oil production in the Prinos oilfield doubled following completion of the first from a total of 15 drillings scheduled for the period 2015-2017 in Kavala Bay, Energean Oil & Gas said on Thursday. The drilling added 1,500 barrels of oil to the daily production which totals around 3,000 barrels per day, up 60 pct from last year. Energean Oil & Gas said that verified oil reserves in Kavala Bay amounted to 30 million barrels and the company plans to exploit these reserves through a 200-million-US dollar investment program currently underway. Mathios Rigas, chairman and chief executive of Energean Oil & Gas, said that despite a collapse in international oil price and difficulties in a prevailing business environment, the company has managed to drill new oil from the Prinos oilfield. [16] Greek trade deficit down 1.8 pct in Jan-Nov Greek trade deficit shrank by 1.8 pct in November as imports fell more in value compared with a decline in exports, Hellenic Statistical Authority said on Thursday. The statistics service, in a report on the country's merchandise trade, said that the value of import-arrivals totaled 3.647 billion euros in November, from 3.904 billion in November 2014, for a decline of 6.6 pct (excluding oil products imports fell by 1.8 pct). The value of export-deliveries totaled 2.117 billion euros in November from 2.347 billion last year, for a decline of 9.8 pct (excluding oil products the value of exports fell 3.6 pct). The country's trade deficit eased to 1.53 billion euros from 1.557 billion in November last year, for a decline of 1.8 pct (excluding oil products the trade deficit grew by 0.5 pct). In the January-November period, exports totaled 39.863 billion euros, from 44.012 billion in 2014, a decline of 9.4 pct (excluding oil products exports grew by 1.1 pct). The value of imports amounted to 23.648 billion euros in January-November, from 25.035 billion last year, a decline of 5.5 pct (excluding oil products exports grew 8.4 pct). The country's trade deficit totaled 16.215 billion euros in the 11-month period, from 18.976 billion euros last year, a decline of 14.6 pct (excluding oil products the trade deficit fell by 6.9 pct). [17] Greek unemployment rate eased to 24.6 pct in Sept RUSSELS (ANA-MPA/Chr.Vassilaki) Greek unemployment rate eased to 24.6 pct of the workforce in September, slightly down compared with 24.7 pct in August but 1.5 percentage points down compared with September 2014 (26.1 pct), Eurostat said on Thursday. The EU executive's statistics arm, in a monthly report, said that the Greek unemployment rate remained the highest in the EU (including youth unemployment 49.5 pct), followed by Spain (21.4 pct and 47.5 pct respectively, November figures). Germany (4.5 pct) and the Czech Republic (4.6 pct) recorded the lowest unemployment rates. The unemployment rate in the Eurozone was 10.5 pct in November, from 10.6 pct in October and 11.5 pct in November 2014. In the EU, the unemployment rate was 9.1 pct in November from 9.2 pct in October and 10.0 pct in November last year. [18] Greek unemployment rate eased to 24.5 pct in Oct Greek unemployment rate eased to 24.5 pct of the workforce in October, from 26 pct in October 2014 and 24.6 pct in September, with the number of unemployed people amounting to 1,175,903, Hellenic Statistical Authority said on Thursday. The statistics service, in a monthly report, said that the number of unemployed people eased by 71,492 compared with October 2014 (a decline of 5.7 pct) and by 8,289 compared with September 2015 (a decline of 0.7 pct). The number of employed people totaled 3,630,449, up 86,295 compared with October 2014 (up 2.4 pct) but down by 2,191 compared with September (a decline of 0.1 pct). The unemployment rate among women was 28.7 pct in October, down from 29.6 pct in October 2014, while among men it fell to 21 pct from 23.2 pct over the same months respectively. The unemployment rate in the 15-24 age group fell to 48.6 pct in October, form 51.3 pct last year, in the 25-34 age group it fell to 30.9 pct from 34.2 pct, in the 35-44 age group it rose to 22.7 pct from 22.3 pct, in the 45-54 age group it fell to 19.6 pct from 20.8 pct, in the 55-64 age group it eased to 16.2 pct from 16.6 pct and in the 65-74 age group it fell to 10 pct from 12 pct. Epirus-Western Macedonia (27.4 pct in October form 25.8 pct in October 2014) recorded the highest unemployment rate among the country's regions, followed by Thessaly-Central Greece (27.3 pct, 26.2 pct), Attica (25.1 pct from 26.9 pct), Crete (24.9 pct from 22.4 pct), Macedonia-Thrace (24.8 pct from 27.4 pct), Peloponese-Western Greece-Ionian Islands (23.9 pct from 24.9 pct) and Aegean (14.7 pct from 21 pct). [19] Greek state overdue debt to the private sector down in Nov The Greek state's overdue debt to the private sector fell to 5.013 billion euros in November, from 5.144 billion in October, recording the first decline after several months of increases, the finance ministry said in a report released on Thursday. The ministry report noted that tax returns to the private sector eased to 715 million euros in November from 758 million in October. Social Insurance Organisations' debt (2.788 bln euros) accounted for the biggest part of overdue debt to the private sector in November (2.769 bln in October), followed by state hospitals (1.118 bln in November from 1.188 bln in October). [20] Greek stocks end sharply lower Greek stocks came under heavy selling pressure to end sharply lower in the Athens Stock Exchange on Thursday, amid sharp falls in international markets on concern about China and a collapse in international oil prices. The composite index of the market dropped 4.35 pct to end at 590.75 points, falling below the 600-point level for the first time since mid-December. The index ended off the day's lows of 582.86 points. The Large Cap index fell 4.58 pct and the Mid Cap index ended 3.60 pct lower. Turnover was a heavy 113.455 million euros in volume of 156,174,974. Ellaktor (0.71 pct) was the only blue chip stock to end higher, while Alpha Bank (8.70 pct), PPC (7.18 pct), Piraeus Bank (7.09 pct) and National Bank (6.65 pct) suffered the heaviest percentage losses of the day. National Bank and Piraeus Bank were the most heavily traded securities. Among market sectors, Insurance (3.65 pct) and Chemicals (0.73 pct) scored big gains, while Banks (7.25 pct), Commerce (6.23 pct) and Raw Materials (5.49 pct) suffered heavy losses. Broadly, decliners led advancers by 80 to 20 with another 16 issues unchanged. Akritas (19.90 pct), Sfakianakis (19.27 pct) and Sidma (17.86 pct) were top gainers, while Athina (19.44 pct), Dionic (18.52 pct) and AEGEK (15.71 pct) were top losers. [21] ADEX closing report The January contract on the FTSE/ASE Large Cap index was trading at a premium of 0.48 pct in the Athens Derivatives Exchange on Thursday. Volume on the Big Cap index totaled 2,958 contracts with 15,509 open positions in the market. Volume in futures contracts on equities totaled 34,621 contracts with investment interest focusing on National Bank's contracts (13,046), followed by Alpha Bank (7,274), Piraeus Bank (5,972), Eurobank (2,692), MIG (1,884), OTE (319), PPC (812), OPAP (556), Hellenic Exchanges (232), Mytilineos (690), Hellenic Petroleum (320), Motor Oil (122), GEK (214) and Jumbo (183). General News [22] Stage and screen actress Anna Synodinou dies, aged 89 Greek actress and politician Anna Synodinou, one of the foremost actresses of the stage in Greece and with a brief but notable career in film and television, died on Thursday at the age of 89. She was elected to the Greek Parliament in 1972 with the New Democracy party and served a term as deputy minister for social services. Her funeral will be held next Monday at the cemetery of the Athens district of Vyronas. President of the Hellenic Republic Prokopis Pavlopoulos contacted Synodinou's family on the telephone to express his condolences, while messages of condolence were sent by the prime minister and all the political party leaders. [23] Domestic flights to be cancelled on Friday due to strike A number of domestic flights are expected to be cancelled on Friday due to a 24-hour strike announced by the Federation of Civil Aviation Authority Unions (OSYPA). The strike was announced on the occasion of the hearing-debate by the Council of State of the action of OSYPA, regions, bar associations and other bodies and trade unions, against the Greek state airports privatization agreement. [24] Ferry services gradually being restored as winds weaken Ferry services are gradually being restored on Thursday as northerly winds are weakening. Earlier in the day, ferries remained docked in the ports of Piraeus, Rafina and Lavrio because of strong winds that reached 9 on the Beaufort scale. Hydroplanes from the Attica mainland to and from the Saronic Gulf, however, remain docked. [25] Woman arrested in northern Greece for suspected links to ISIS A woman of Swiss-Egyptian nationality was arrested and was being detained at the police headquarters in the northeastern Greek city of Alexandroupolis on Thursday, due to suspected links with jihadist militant group ISIS. The woman was arrested while trying to pass from the Greek border into Turkey with her four-year-old son. According to sources, she was detained on the basis of an outstanding warrant for her arrest issued by Interpol, after her husband in Egypt reported that she had kidnapped their child and left to join ISIS in the fighting in Syria. [26] Blue Star Ferries installs pilot photovoltaic unit on the 'Blue Star Delos' Blue Star Ferries on Thursday announced the pilot installation and operation of a specially-adapted photovoltaic unit on the ship "Blue Star Delos" for a trial period to test its performance. According to the company's technicians, the unit is not currently hooked up to the ship's electrical systems but is eventually expected to generate up to 100 kilowatts, covering a large part of the power needed for the electric lighting systems. The specific unit was tested for 12 months in tough weather conditions at sea, with promising results with respect to its durability. It has also won a Dutch award for its performance. Attica Group, which owns Blue Star Ferries, has already decided to go ahead with a system upgrade that will maximise the unit's output to 100 kilowatts and to extend installation to other ships in its fleet of 13, in order to benefit from the zero pollution, silent operation and small maintenance cost offered by the specific technology. Its use is expected to reduce use of the ships power generators and lower both fuel consumption and carbon emissions. Blue Star Ferries has been collaborating on with Eco Marine Power (EMP) and the Japanese firm Key System since October 2014 on the installation of the specific system. [27] 1,094 refugees arrive at Piraeus port on Thursday "Blue Star 1" and "Nisos Rhodos" with 1,094 refugees on board from Chios and Mytilene arrived at Piraeus port early on Thursday before the decision for all ferries to remain docked due to strong winds. Weather forecast [28] Clouds on Friday Clouds and northerly winds are forecast for Friday. Wind velocity will reach 5 on the Beaufort scale. Clouds in the northern and the western parts of the country with temperatures ranging from 04C-14C. Partly cloudy in the eastern parts and temperatures between 13C-19C. Scattered clouds over the Aegean islands and Crete, 14C-19C. Mostly fair in Athens, 08C-17C. Same weather in Thessaloniki, 07C-13C. [29] The Thursday edition of Athens' dailies at a glance DIMOKRATIA: Dark background EFIMERIDA TON SYNTAKTON: Employers say "yes" under conditions ELEFTHEROS TYPOS: A 20 percent cut in pensions ESTIA: A strategic solution for the social security system ETHNOS: Harsh negotiations inside and outside borders NAFTEMPORIKI: Shock for freelancers and farmers TA NEA: Vote all together 36, TSOCHA ST. ATHENS 115 21 GREECE * TEL: 210 64.00.560-63 * FAX: 210 64.00.581-2 INTERNET ADDRESS: http://www.ana.gr * e-mail: anabul@ana gr * GENERAL DIRECTOR: MICHALIS PSILOS Athens News Agency: Daily News Bulletin in English Directory - Previous Article - Next Article
Jay Spooner via Getty Images

As Calgary's vacancy rate continues to balloon, rental prices in the city are dropping rapidly.

Rental rates on RentFaster.ca are down between 11 and 18 per cent, website owner Mark Hawkins told CBC News.

The site reports that the current average monthly rental in the city is $1,581. Shared accommodation averages out to $679, while an apartment is around $1,281.

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Vacancy rate quadruples

Calgary's vacancy rate jumped to 5.3 per cent in October 2015, up from 1.4 per cent the same month last year, according Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC).

The country's national average for urban centres is 3.3 per cent.

It's a renter's market, which has some landlords struggling to find creative ways to rent out their properties.

A quick search of online rental sites turned up incentives such asreduced security deposits, free months of rent, free amenities like TV or Internet and even Visa gift cards, writes Emma McIntosh in the National Post.

High unemployment, too

Low oil prices is one reason behind the dropping rental prices and high vacancy rate, said Bob Dugan, chief economist at CMHC, said in a press release.

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In December, Alberta's unemployment rate rose to seven per cent  a rate not seen in the province since 2010. Alberta's unemployment rate was 4.7 in December 2014.

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With a hand-sculpted dragon over its fireplace, a tunnel to the bath house (yes, the bath house) and mural-covered ceilings  this $7.5-million estate is unlike anything you've ever seen before.

The Parkland County home located just west of Edmonton, is designed by owner developer Donald McCargar. He said it was his intention to build something with a lasting legacy.

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"I've always worked as a builder, a carpenter. I get bored of building boxes," McCargar told CBC News.

This 13,300 sq. ft. house is certainly more than just a box.

The five-bedroom, six-bathroom house boasts herringbone marble tile inlays and a Turkish walkway.

And its intricate ceiling murals and dragon sculpture were hand-built on site by Iranian artist Roxana Rastegar, according to the Edmonton Sun.

To top that off, its six-car garage features a car wash. There's a sauna and wet bar, too.

Also, nothing is a better fit for Edmonton's weather like travelling through a tunnel rather than venturing outside.

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I dont think youd find another one like this in Edmonton," McCargar told CTV news.

He's probably right.

Click through to see more photos from inside the house:

$7.5 Million Parkland County Home See Gallery

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An event organized by a Muslim centre to welcome Syrian refugees to Vancouver took an ugly turn when a cyclist rode by and attacked the group.

Vancouver police said a crowd of refugees was gathered outside the Muslim Association of Canada Centre on Friday night when a man biked past and pepper-sprayed the group, which included children.

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There were roughly 15 to 30 victims who had been waiting for the bus after the event, said CBC reporter Rafferty Baker.

Witnesses said several of those who were hit started coughing and complaining of burning eyes.

They were waiting for a bus outside the Muslim Association of Canada centre on Kingsway. Some very young children. pic.twitter.com/QcDPXpTLmX  Rafferty Baker (@raffertybaker) January 9, 2016

Paramedics and fire crews treated "a number of people" for exposure to the pepper spray, said Sgt. Randy Fincham in a news release.

"The motive for the pepper spraying is unknown at this time," he said.

UPDATE: Vancouver police investigators are treating this as a hate-motivated crime, until determined otherwise, said Fincham.

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Police are looking for the man on the bicycle, who was reported to be wearing a white hooded sweatshirt.

Syrian refugees were being welcomed at a special event inside the Muslim centre on Friday evening. (Photo: Melanie Mark/Facebook)

The Muslim centre on Kingsway was holding a special night for Syrian refugees on Friday to welcome the new families and help them connect to their new community, according to a Facebook listing.

B.C. NDP candidate Melanie Mark, who is running in a February byelection, posted photos of the event, which was attended by Vancouver MPs Don Davies and Jenny Kwan, as well as city councillor Geoff Meggs.

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Home is where the heart is. For Syrian families it's now Metro Vancouver. Welcome home @Muslim Association Canada. pic.twitter.com/a3YtLJnUn4  Melanie Mark (@melaniejmark) January 9, 2016

The politicians had already left the event when the attack happened, an aide told The Huffington Post B.C.

With files from The Canadian Press

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Lawsuit used to campaign against Trans-Pacific Partnership

Free-trade tribunals becoming a global controversy

Canada is most-sued country under NAFTA

TransCanadas decision to sue the Obama administration over the rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline has given new ammunition to opponents of free trade deals, who argue the NAFTA suit is proof these agreements undermine nations ability to set their own policies, and are a threat to climate initiatives.

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The lawsuit is going to remind Americans how much of our sovereignty these treaties give away, said Bill McKibben, co-founder of 350.org and a leading campaigner against the Keystone XL pipeline.

The oil industry is so used to always winning that I fear this kind of tantrum is predictable. Corporate power is truly out of control.

350.org co-founder Bill McKibben calls TransCanada's lawsuit over the Keystone XL pipeline a "tantrum." (Getty Images)

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Calgary-based TransCanada announced earlier this week it is suing the Obama administration for US$15 billion over the White Houses rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline. Thats roughly twice the estimated cost of the project.

Its filing the suit under chapter 11 of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which allows multinational corporations to sue governments if they feel they have not been treated as a domestic company would be treated.

A three-judge tribunal will issue a ruling, which cant be appealed to any national court. The panel cant force the U.S. to allow the pipeline, but it can award damages to TransCanada for lost investment.

Social activists and U.S. politicians, like Democratic presidential candidate Martin OMalley, are using the lawsuit to campaign against another trade deal  the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). It would create a 12-country free trade area  including Canada and the U.S.  that would encompass 40 per cent of the worlds economy.

Outrageous. An example of why I oppose #TPP. Trade deals shouldn't value corporate profits over national interests. https://t.co/zGueB1DFx3  Martin O'Malley (@MartinOMalley) January 6, 2016

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Like NAFTA, the TPP includes an investor-state dispute settlement mechanism, as these tribunals are called, or ISDS for short.

In a statement issued this week, the Sierra Club asserted the TPP would empower more foreign fossil fuel corporations to challenge U.S. environmental protections in unaccountable tribunals.

These destructive provisions ... show exactly why NAFTA was wrong and why the dangerous and far-reaching Trans-Pacific Partnership is worse and must be stopped in its tracks, executive director Michael Brune said.

The Obama administration now finds itself in a nuanced position defending itself against the TransCanada lawsuit while arguing that such lawsuits wont be a threat to U.S. policies under the TPP deal that its championing.

Here is exactly the attack on U.S. environmental policy that the president insisted could never happen under the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, said Lori Wallach, director of trade issues at Public Citizen, as quoted at the Washington Times.

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Supporters of the Keystone XL pipeline argue the pipeline would have little impact on emissions, as the oil moved through the pipeline can find other ways to market and would be burned anyway. But Keystone XL opponents have come to see the pipeline as a symbol of the U.S.s will, or lack thereof, to move away from a carbon economy.

More than 100.000 protesters gather to demonstrate against the TTIP and CETA trade accords on October 10, 2015 in Berlin, Germany. (Getty Images)

A Global Controversy

Free trade tribunals arent just an issue in the TPP. They have become a standard clause added to most free-trade agreements these days, including the proposed Canada-EU trade deal, known as CETA, and the proposed U.S.-EU trade deal, known as TTIP.

In Europe, these ISDS mechanisms are much more prominent in the political conversation, and have become the subject of mass protests against the U.S. and Canadian trade deals.

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In the face of vocal opposition to the ISDS tribunals and other aspects of the deals, the two trans-Atlantic trade pacts appear to have stalled, at least for the moment.

Canada Gets Sued The Most

For its part, the Obama administration says its confident its rejection of Keystone was entirely consistent with all of our international obligations, including our obligations under NAFTA."

Not all observers agree. TransCanada has a good shot at winning the lawsuit, Queens University law professor Nicolas Lamp said this week.

He pointed to the case of mining firm Bilcon, which earlier this year won the right to sue Canada and Nova Scotia under NAFTA after a joint governmental panel rejected the expansion of a quarry in Digby Neck, N.S.

"If the arbitration tribunal were to follow that precedent of the Bilcon case, I think it's quite likely that they will find against the U.S.," Lamp told the Canadian Press. However, NAFTA tribunals have no obligation to follow precedent.

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But others argue the case is a long-shot. They note that so far, the U.S. has never lost a NAFTA challenge.

Canada, on the other hand, has often been on the losing end. A study last year from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives found Canada has been the most-sued country under NAFTA, targeted in 70 per cent of all claims.

Thanks to NAFTA chapter 11, Canada has now been sued more times through investor-state dispute settlement than any other developed country in the world, said Scott Sinclair, who authored the study.
Former shadow minister Dan Jarvis is to fight for Labour to retain its pro-Trident policy after warning that it would be catastrophic for the party to go into the general election pledging to dump the nuclear deterrent.

The Barnsley Central MP, an ex-Paratrooper who served in Afghanistan, Iraq and Kosovo, told the Guardian that he would feel deeply uncomfortable as a Labour candidate in 2020 if the party under Jeremy Corbyn ditches its current policy.

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But Jarviss aides have told HuffPost UK that there is no question that he intends to stand at the next election - even if the defence review under Ken Livingstone and new Shadow Defence Secretary Emily Thornberry opts for unilateralism.

A spokesperson for the former shadow foreign minister told HuffPost: Dan has always been Labour and always will be. He firmly believes in strong defence and Britain's nuclear deterrent and will be arguing for that to remain as party policy.

As the current leadership demonstrates, it is perfectly possible to be a Labour MP and not always agree with the official position of the Party. We are a broad church.

Jarvis, now seen by many moderate Labour MPs as the future party leader who could most effectively take on the Tories, also hinted for the first time that he regretted not giving more thought to running for leader in the aftermath of the 2015 election defeat.

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in an interview with the Guardian on Saturday, he was asked if he would fight the next election for Labour if the party dumped Trident.

He replied: Thats a big question. To my core I have always been Labour and always will be, but I would feel deeply uncomfortable fighting as a Labour candidate on a manifesto that committed us to getting rid of our nuclear deterrent, not least because we would lose the election.

Its an issue of such strategic importance with the public that it would be catastrophic for us to go into an election with that as our policy.

I was much more comfortable with it being led by two people [Eagle and Livingstone] who had different views. That gave it balance. Weve lost that, which potentially weakens and undermines the process. For it to have any credibility, it needs to be seen to be open-minded.

Pressed further on what he would do, he replied: God knows. That is fortunately somewhere in the future. Therell be quite a lot of water under the bridge before we get to that point.

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But HuffPost understands Jarvis is set to follow the example of former deputy leader Denis Healey, who stayed in the party despite its shift to unilateralism in the early 1980s.

Kevan Jones, a supporter of Trident who resigned as shadow defence minister in protest at the appointment of Thornberry, also said today said he would still stand as a Labour candidate even if the party supported unilateralism. I would do what Denis Healey did in 1983 and what Jeremy Corybn did in 2015.

Jeremy Corbyn fired pro-Trident Maria Eagle as Shadow Defence Secretary in his reshuffle this week, replacing her with unilateralist Ms Thornberry.

Many Labour MPs are now gearing up for a battle royal over nuclear policy, with hints that the two-year defence review may now be accelerated and Jeremy Corbyn telling HuffPost that he wants another email consultation of party members on the policy.

HuffPost learned this week that many Shadow Cabinet ministers are poised to quit their posts if the policy was changed by the party conference.

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With unions like Unite and the GMB committed to defending Trident because of the defence jobs their members rely on, unilateralist MPs believe their best hope of changing policy is through an overwhelming vote by party members.

Despite being seen by many Tories as their worst possible Labour leader Mr Jarvis rarely speaks about his leadership ambitions. In the immediate aftermath of the May 2015 general election, Jarvis explained at the time that he wanted to put his young family first instead of running for leader.

He told HuffPost at party conference last year that I made absolutely the right decision and I stick by that decision.

He has now told the Guardian that he was so focused on the general election that he hadnt prepared any plans to run for leader, unlike other contenders.

Im not a great one for regretting anything. But what I do regret is that I didnt give it more thought beforehand.

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I had 24 hours to make a decision. There was overwhelming pressure from members of the public, members of the party, colleagues in parliament for me to stand. They were asking me, in some cases instructing me, to do it, but, for the reasons I set out at the time, I didnt.

He also suggested that things would have been different if Ed Miliband had stayed on to allow the party to make a more considered choice.

It would have been helpful, not just to me but to a lot of people, if there had been a period of reflection through to the party conference. It would have been better if he had let the dust settle.

In todays interview, he admits Jeremy and I are not on each others speed dials, but stresses that he does not expect the Labour leader to fall under the proverbial bus any time soon.

There might be a few rogue bus drivers out there, he says, but I think Jeremy is pretty canny on that bike.

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In a direct reference to a similar quote from sacked former shadow minister Michael Dugher, Jarvis told the Guardian today: We are in the votes business,
The propaganda broadcasts by South Korea directed over the border at their northern neighbours is driving the peninsula to the brink of war, according to a top North Korean official. Reported by Reuters, the grave warning was made at a rally in Pyongyang on Friday, marking the first response by the regime to the cross-border bombardment renewed in response to the Norths fourth nuclear test on Wednesday.

The North Korean regime claimed the blast was a hydrogen bomb, the first in the countrys history, however experts in Europe and the US, as well as the White House, have cast doubt on that claim. Regardless, the test was enough for Seoul to retaliate with the deafening propaganda, which were last used in August last year. That barrage so upset the North that it led to an exchange of artillery fire across the border.

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North Korean military personnel clap hands in a rally, after North Korea said Wednesday it had conducted a hydrogen bomb test, at the Kim Il Sung Square in Pyongyang, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016

The propaganda, which is broadcast from loudspeakers in 11 positions in the south, throws criticism at the sensitive Kim regime, which the North regards as insulting.

Addressing a crowd on Friday, Kim Ki Nam, head of the ruling Workers' Party propaganda department, said: Jealous of the successful test of our first H-bomb, the US and its followers are driving the situation to the brink of war, by saying they have resumed psychological broadcasts and brought in strategic bombers."

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Images of the rally, held in Pyongyang, were broadcast on North Korean state TV, with the crowd clapping and holding placards in tribute to the leader Kim Jong-un. One banner read: "We passionately celebrate the historic national event that is the success of the first hydrogen bomb test."

A South Korean soldier stands near the loudspeakers near the border area between South Korea and North Korea in Yeoncheon, South Korea, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016

Rising tensions following the nuclear test have led to discussions between Seoul and Washington about deploying US bombers in South Korea, as well as a nuclear-powered submarine off the coast of the peninsula.

Earlier on Friday, North Korea released footage of what the regime called a missile test, the film showing a submarine launch with Kim watching on from the deck of a nearby vessel. However, experts in South Korea dismissed the video as a montage of previous tests.

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Scott Barbour via Getty Images MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - JULY 23: Fuel nozzles rest in a fuel dispenser at a petrol station on July 23, 2013 in Melbourne, Australia. According to CommSec, fuel prices are expected to rise further as global demand increases and as the weak Australian dollar raises the costs of fuel imports. The average fuel price nationally is at 153.5 cents per litre, which is reportedly the fastest price increase accross the nation in four years. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images)

Australians are winning at the petrol pump right now, with the cost of fuel hitting its lowest level in 10 months.

But motorists are being urged to fill up fast as experts warn the price of petrol is likely to rise over the next few weeks.

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The national average price of unleaded petrol fell 2.4 cents per litre to 119.8 cents per litre last week, its lowest point since early 2015, according to the latest Australian Institute of Petroleum (AIP) figures.

The AIP data also showed prices have fallen further in the city than in the country, with the metro petrol price falling 3.1 cents to 117.9 cents per litre. The regional price fell by 0.9 cents to 123.8 cents per litre.

There are also big differences across capital cities.

In Sydney, unleaded petrol reached an average 113.4 cents a litre on Tuesday up from a low of 105.9 cents on Sunday, petrol price monitoring website MotorMouth said.

Melbourne residents are paying significantly more, with the latest average unleaded price recorded at 121.5 cents, according to Motormouth.

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The difference across major cities has led to speculation of price gouging by petrol retailers but the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has consistently found the retail petrol market is competitive.

Commsec's Craig James tipped the average price of petrol to remain depressed.

"The good news ... is that petrol prices continue to fall with pump prices in Sydney trading below cost price," he said. "Pump prices are set to remain low."

Mr James told Fairfax Media he expected the national petrol price to remain around 120 cents, but that it could go even lower, largely on the back of low global oil price.

COMMSEC: Low petrol prices in Australia are here to stay https://t.co/6YB2v2CKOlpic.twitter.com/aNEFTxaZIX a Business Insider AUS (@BIAUS) December 29, 2015

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"OPEC are determined to keep the market well supplied with oil and unless that policy was to change then it's likely motorists will continue to experience discount," he said.

There are a number of factors influencing moves in petrol prices at the bowser.

International Benchmark prices

To meet Australian demand, around 40 percent of fuel is imported, mostly from Asia. But it only makes commercial sense for Australian refiners to import fuel to Australia if the returns they're getting for it are on par with selling it in Asia.

For that reason the price of fuel in Australia is "benchmarked" against the price in Singapore, where most fuel is traded. That means when the price rises or falls in Singapore it has a knock-on effect in Australia.

The current benchmark price for Regular Unleaded Petrol is the Singapore Mogas 95 Unleaded

The relationship between Australian and Singapore prices can be seen here.

Currency fluctuations

As the ACCC points out , international benchmark prices for petrol, diesel and LPG are priced in US dollars, so the strength of the local currency can affect the price of petrol.

That means as the Aussie falls against the greenback it can be the case that the cost of fuel goes up.

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However, that's only the case if the benchmark price remains the same or falls and other local impacts dont push prices up.

Oil supply

Another key driver of Australian petrol prices are ebbs and flows in global oil supply and the related rise and fall in crude oil prices.

Currently, a big driver of low local prices is said to be the booming global supply of crude oil, the result of which has been a crash in its price.

Other factors

These include the profit margins of wholesalers and retailers, which are ultimately determined by the level of competition in the marketplace, as well as costs like wharfage, freight, insurance, transport and storage that can fluctuate.

In the short term, NRMA's Peter Khoury tipped the price of fuel to rise from its recent very low mark.

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He predicted average national prices to get back to around the 130 cent mark , but conceded it was difficult to pinpoint how fast that would happen given volatile overseas factors like oil prices.

"It's really difficult to forecast long term beyond the price cycle and that's what we tend to do," he told The Huffington Post Australia.

"In the short term there's no indication that prices are going to go through the roof."

Commsec's James said the average household was currently saving around $17 a month on filling up the car with petrol compared with three months ago.

That saved cash would help boost consumer spending on big-ticket household items, he said.

"Given that Aussie consumers believe that their finances are far better than they were a year ago, many believe it is a good time to buy a major household item like a television or refrigerator," James added.

He said the lower prices were also good for businesses, especially those in the retail, transport and aviation sectors.

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As Oscar Wilde once said: "Life imitates art far more than art imitates life." In fact, art as it is seen today can manifest in many forms and can represent the tangibility of our dreams or the conception and construction of something innovative and infinitely creative. A most profound example of this kind of artistic process is dialogue; a process of sharing and communication sometimes overlooked as a form of creativity, but perhaps the most prevalent and influential medium in existence. A testimony to the power of dialogue in art and innovation can be found at the intersection of art, social action and social justice; sectors that are working together across the globe and creating strategic alliances to impact change as understanding of these collaborations becomes more mainstream.

For activists, artists, and believers in the potential of dialogue as a mechanism for assisting world peace, understanding how this works on a global level is critical to impacting meaningful change. But how exactly does dialogue help us realize these promising directions and what examples can we study and learn from to go forward and build better models of human engagement and potential systems that embody and enable peace? That very question is important to me as an activist for NGO's which includes interfaith organization, Religions for Peace, and as a collaborator and supporter of activism in the arts. I was privileged to see this objective in process recently when I traveled to Baku, Azerbaijan.



As a panelist and participant in the 2015 Baku World Forum on Intercultural Dialogue, I joined a large international group of colleagues and leaders to disseminate how the qualities and characteristics of dialogue factor into the standards and health of multiculturalism and social harmony. I had heard contrasting opinions about Azerbaijan, but gladly accepted the invitation to attend for several reasons.

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First, I found it very interesting that Azerbaijan was the first secular democracy in the Muslim world established in 1918. Additionally, Azerbaijan chose to offer women the right to vote in 1919 despite being surrounded by conservative and in some cases, radical ideologies. This is a year before the United States delivered those essential rights which demonstrates a basic recognition of the vitalness of women in society and leadership.

The third reason of equal importance to the others is Azerbaijan's long history of friendship with Israel. The two countries have a shared vision for the world, and have strong values of diversity. I was privileged to visit the Jewish community and a synagogue with my colleague, Rabbi Cooper from the Simon Wiesenthal Center. The Jewish community for the most part lives peacefully with the Muslim majority in Baku. Interfaith marriages are accepted and the two communities share the common interest of working together to create a better nation. In addition to sharing these key values, Israel and Azerbaijan also share resources. Azerbaijan provides a large percentage of Israel's oil and Israel invests and shares technology and services with the government and people of Azerbaijan.



Our diverse delegation in Baku discussed how community and government leaders can play an important role in managing and optimizing strategic alliances and objectives in a world with continuous developing access and information and in a time when dialogue plays such a fundamental role in shaping our immediate future. Azerbaijan is geopolitically unique with its strengths and those that have protected the country from the triggers and factions of extremism ravaging the surrounding region. In this context, it is also relevant to address that the only ongoing conflict in Azerbaijan in the region of Karabakh near the Armenian border was initiated by the Soviets in 1992 and is over territory only and not over religious differences in contrast to other countries in the region. Before this dispute, intermarriage between Muslim Azeris and Armenian Christians was very common and despite the conflict, there are still more than 30,000 Armenians living peacefully in Azerbaijan.

Considering all of these factors, The Republic of Azerbaijan was an appropriate and very interesting location for this event which highlighted its commitment and success to interfaith and multicultural harmony, both domestically and internationally. It was inspiring to re-connect with colleagues and like minded leaders who all traveled to Baku to see how multiculturalism has been implemented in a secular and primarily Muslim country and how the Azerbaijani values of tolerance have been sustained in today's society. We recognized that by sharing what is positive in Azerbaijan, we can help share a new perspective on what many other nations hope to achieve.

We spoke definitively as a group about the need for the continuation of dialogue around the world and its impact and about how much work has yet to be done. Through the Azerbaijani narrative on interfaith peace, this unique society offers a powerful example for many other countries as a model for how diverse communities could live together in peace and mutual respect. The fact that Azerbaijan achieves this while bordering Iran speaks to the strength and solidarity of its principles.



Unlike other Muslim allies of Israel who,for the most part, have both unstable governments and populations that challenge their ability to achieve peace, Azerbaijan's success relies on the full-scale embrace of this openness and tolerance by both government and the society at large which has remained primarily stable for many decades. With a clear and shared agenda against extremism and intolerance firmly rooted throughout the nation, the threats from surrounding countries have no space or place to grow.

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Tara Geraghty observed a contemporary phenomenon while she watched her husband's health decline and doctors reject even looking into the possibility of her husband having Lyme and not ALS: "There's something about Lyme disease that no one wants to talk about it," she told The Valley Breeze.

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While some will argue that prolonged antibiotics and other treatment approaches simply have a placebo effect, it's interesting to note that the hyperthermia-induction treatment from which the woman described above claims to have benefited is effectively a modernized version of heat-induction treatment used (often successfully) to treat closely related neurosyphilis infections going as far back as 1857.

Another curiosity: The maps at the top of this article show the geographic distribution of (top) multiple sclerosis and (bottom) Lyme disease. It's impossible not to notice the overlap, which is strikingly similar, especially considering actual general geographic coverage and not the geo-political borders identified. (Note that despite many documented positive Lyme tests among Australian people, Australia is represented on the MS map but not the Lyme one, presumably because the Aussie government does not acknowledge endemic cases of Lyme disease despite positive tests among its people.)

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Migration from one geographic area to another seems to alter a person's risk of developing MS. Studies indicate that immigrants and their descendants tend to take on the risk level -- either higher or lower -- of the area to which they move. While underlining the complex relationship between environmental and genetic factors in determining who develops MS, these studies have also provided support for the opinion that MS is caused by early exposure to some environmental trigger in genetically susceptible individuals.

Some researchers as far back as 1988 have observed correlations between borrelia and MS, but as Tara Geraghty observed, "...no one wants to talk about it." The implication of genetic roles in determining who acquires multiple sclerosis would seem to rule out insect bites, but genetic factors in fact were implicated in this study examining the possibility that neuroborreliosis (neurological manifestation of Lyme) may cause Alzheimer's in some--not all--people, dependent on genetic predisposition.

Had Geraghty been diagnosed with Lyme and received treatment sooner, he may have recovered--or at least not died. But no one wanted to talk about it.

Medical professionals are obligated by virtue of their Hippocratic oath and general good practice to consider all potential causes of illness before rejecting certain possible causes--especially Lyme, which seems to be aggressively and inexplicably denied. The prevalence of physician neglect and insurance denial is so high that multiple members of U.S. Congress and state legislatures have introduced legislation to protect patients and support greater research.

Given such an obvious and glaring coincidence as the maps above, to offhandedly dismiss investigating whether there may be a correlation between these chronic illnesses that manifest similarly or identically seems to me to be shortsighted. Looking at these maps, isn't it natural for a person to ask about a relationship between these and other health conditions. Why are reasonable questions so often met with derision and condescension? Even if they turn out to be unfounded, are they not worth asking?

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Patients have to be our own advocates--no one else will do it for us. Lyme patients can be particularly annoying because we have to become our own investigators and--to the dismay and disapproval of doctors--diagnosticians when others give up on us.

I've learned the hard way that some doctors care, some don't, and some care, but are first and foremost small-business owners who must cycle their clientele in and out as quickly as possible. And some subscribe to a fundamentalist type of dogma approach to healthcare: what is known is all there is to be known, and certainly not to be questioned--no, not even by desperate patients who are trying to save their livelihoods or even their lives. The message such people send is clear: You are wrong, now go die off my watch.

So when someone makes an obvious observation--as with David and Tara Geraghty understanding Lyme disease well enough to know that David's so-called ALS symptoms are similar enough to warrant investigation into Lyme as a (potentially treatable) cause--about his or her own health and pleas with his or her healthcare provider to look into it, what is it that prevents the question from being considered?

The arrogance of a self-styled omniscient and omnipotent physician?

Strict adherence to prescribed regulations that don't take into consideration variable and nuanced real-world factors that don't always fit neatly into diagnostic criteria?

Or is there something about Lyme disease specifically, as Tara Geraghty said, that no one wants to talk about?

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A new book slated for release in Hong Kong next year is bringing China into yet another modern, Western tradition: arguing over the sexual orientation of its former leaders.

In The Secret Emotional Life of Zhou Enlai, Hong Kong author Tsoi Wing-mui reportedly posits that Zhou, mainland China's first Premier and a fellow revolutionary alongside Mao Zedong, was secretly gay. Zhou was born in 1898, "100 years early" to be an openly gay politician, Tsoi writes.

Zhou Enlai in 1917

Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Tsoi draws her conclusions from her analysis of Zhou's journals, particularly his recorded fondness for his junior schoolmate Li Fujing, without whom Zhou wrote he could not live, and who Zhou wrote could "turn sorrow into joy," a sharp contrast with Zhou's apparently lackluster feelings for his wife. Unsurprisingly, Tsoi's reading differs from that of the more traditional historians of mainland China, who have had decades to mull the same material. What Tsoi brings to the table as a former executive editor of the liberal Open Magazine and an apparent chronicler of gay issues is an understanding of queer reality and a willingness to remark upon it. In this way, she is like American agitators who have pointed out gay threads in their own past, often to the doubt and even derision of mainstream scholars in the West.

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America has had at least two arguably gay presidents: Abraham Lincoln and James Buchanan. There is ample historical evidence that both were, at the very least, bisexual. And in both cases, the historical mainstream has strongly resisted the call to examine themes that may seem obvious to modern readers. These experiences are likely to predict the path of Zhou's modern story in China, where the state of LGBT rights is similar to that of the U.S. several decades ago.

Abraham Lincoln in 1863

Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Starting in the mid-aughts, some scholars began seriously considering the possibility that Lincoln's adult relationships extended well beyond Mary Todd Lincoln, his wife of 17 years. Psychologist and writer C.A. Tripp's The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln, published in 2005, shortly after Tripp's death, examined several seemingly queer aspects of Lincoln's life. The most notable included a poem Lincoln wrote that described a same-sex marriage; his recorded history of sharing a bed with other men, a practice not unheard of in his time; and his relationship with two men, his roommate and bedmate of four years, Joshua Speed, and his bodyguard David Derickson, the latter of which inspired contemporary rumors. (Before their impending marriages, Lincoln and Speed exchanged fraught letters exposing surprising anxieties about each one's own nuptials.) A great-great niece of William Herndon, Lincoln's longtime friend and eventual biographer, has also reported that her family has passed from generation to generation the story that Herndon and Lincoln were lovers.

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A 2005 review of Tripp's work published in the New York Times accurately noted that modern notions of homosexuality don't apply to Lincoln's era. Other scholars were also quick to seize on that idea. Writing in Time magazine, essayist Joshua Wolf Shenk argued that "[r]ecent claims that Lincoln was gay -- based on a tortured misreading of conventional 19th century sleeping arrangements -- resemble the long-standing efforts to draft the famously nonsectarian man for one Christian denomination or another." Shenk railed against Tripp's "'epistemological hubris'" in assigning modern notions of sexuality to a time when "men could be openly affectionate with one another, physically and verbally, without having to stake their identity on it," and noted with seeming derision that Tripp's newfangled electronic search of Lincoln's records "yielded the delicious bit that Lincoln's New Salem, Ill., friend William Greene considered his thighs 'as perfect as a human being's could be.'"

Shenk was hardly alone in his views; much of the mainstream has viewed Tripp's take on Lincoln as ahistorical, suspicious and, apparently, immature. This is hardly a surprise; any time a gay historian claims a kinship with a historical figure, he or she is accused of inventing the connection in order to manufacture an affinity with that figure. Straight historians seem oblivious to the idea that this criticism could apply equally to them when they assume, without any supporting evidence, that a given historical figure was heterosexual.

Straight historians also seem to believe that if a comfortingly de-sexualized explanation for a historical fact exists, it necessarily negates the sexual possibilities. Take the example of Lincoln's practice of sharing a bed with another man, known as co-sleeping. While the practice may not be inherently gay, it's a necessary prerequisite for an awful lot of gay acts, knowledge of which is reflected in old, homophobic criminal laws. But Shenk argued that co-sleeping was merely akin to the modern sharing of houses and apartments by men, apparently oblivious to the fact that that's exactly what many gay couples do nowadays. (Do one hundred percent straight friends really sign letters to each other with the tagline "Yours forever," as Lincoln and Speed did?)

James Buchanan some time between 1850 and 1870

Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Buchanan should be an easier case, both because he was more obviously queer and is a less revered historical figure. But even he hasn't been allowed to simply be gay, and identity groups aren't exactly lining up to lay claim to the president who apparently approved of the Dred Scott debacle, described slavery in the territories in his inaugural address as "happily, a matter of but little practical importance" just before the South seceded, and went to war with Mormons in Utah. The only president to never marry, Buchanan was a lifelong bachelor who lived for 10 years with Democratic senator William Rufus King. Even at the time, others said they knew exactly what was going on: Andrew Jackson referred to Buchanan as "Aunt Nancy," while Alabamans called King "Aunt Fancy," and others considered King to be Buchanan's "better half" and "his wife." When King moved away to become an ambassador to France, Buchanan wrote that he was "now 'solitary and alone,' having no companion in the house with me. I have gone a wooing to several gentlemen, but have not succeeded with any one of them."

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Yet even with such seemingly overwhelming evidence of a male-male sexual and romantic relationship, there are still those who argue that labeling Buchanan as "gay" injects too much contemporary understanding into an alien historical context. A 2012 article in Time magazine noted that "[o]ther historians, however, believe that his relationship with King was in fact more complex than that, and that the book is far from closed on the matter of Buchanan's sexuality." One wonders what more Buchanan could have done to show that he was gay short of overtly committing the very acts that would have gotten him arrested in his time.

To be sure, the Zhou deniers in China will have not just mainstream culture on their side, but the force of a Communist Party unwilling to revisit a resolutely heteronormative founding narrative. The book, or its assertions on Zhou, will almost certainly be banned in the mainland, as Tsoi herself acknowledges. But observers rightly decrying the party-state's censorship should remember that much of the opposition Zhou, and Tsoi, are likely to face will parallel what Lincoln, Buchanan and their modern biographers have faced in the United States. Ostensibly straight mainstream historians will claim that Tsoi is a revisionist, that she is applying ahistorical labels, or even that she is sensationalizing normal, platonic male affection.
New year, new start. It's time to start living...

1. Ride a bike around Amsterdam

Image Credit - six-two

2. Sip coffee with a view of the Eiffel Tower

3. Swim in the crystal clear waters surrounding the Amalfi Coast

Image Credit - six-two

4. Take a selfie (from very far away) with the Mona Lisa

5. Stare out a member of the Queen's Guard (and lose, always lose) at Buckingham Palace

6. Make a snow angel on Jungfrau

7. Shop for treasures in the Grand Bazaar

Image Credit - six-two

8. Dance till dawn in Ibiza

9. Shake what your momma gave you at the Moulin Rouge

Image Credit - six-two

10. Visit two nations in a day as you cross the Bosphorus River in Istanbul

11. Celebrate Midsummer in Sweden

12. Party at Kings Day in Amsterdam

13. Run up all the steps to the top of the Duomo in Florence

Image Credit - six-two

14. Visit the smallest country in the world, the Vatican City

15. See in the half new year on Korcula Island, Croatia

16. Take a horse and carriage ride through Krakow's old town

17. Get your culture on at the opera in Vienna

18, Brave a black run on the slopes of Hopfgarten

19. Play chess with a local in the Szechenyi Baths in Budapest

Image Credit - six-two

20. Play out your Game of Thrones fantasies in Dubrovnik

Image Credit - six-two

21. Dance under the Northern Lights in Iceland

22. Explore the mystical fjords of Norway

Image Credit - six-two

23. Don a dirndl and chow down a bratwurst at Oktoberfest

24. Pay your respects at the Jewish Museum in Berlin

25 - Learn about one of the longest (and still unfinished) construction projects in history, the Sagrada Familia, in Barcelona

26. Feel all kinds of stylish soaking up the sun in Nice

Image Credit - six-two

27. Get snap happy on the picture perfect island of Santorini

Image Credit - six-two

28. Down pints of Guinness at Temple Bar in Dublin

29. Step back in time at the Acropolis in Athens

30. Fly (or fall, gracefully) like a bird as you skydive over the Swiss Alps

Also on HuffPost:
The $171 billion budget proposal released this week by California Gov. Jerry Brown shows how politics can work well in a state with the 8th largest economy in the world. It also offers a clear contrast to the political dysfunction in the budget process in Washington. Long derided for its "fruit-and-nuts" politics, California is leading the way in envisioning a political system that can actually get things done.

The key to Brown's budget is that it addresses the most pressing needs of California's citizens, from homelessness and education to needed infrastructure improvements, at the same time setting aside a substantial "rainy day fund" to prepare for future economic downturns. While not everybody is happy with the budget and it will clearly by tinkered with - Democrats want more social spending and Republicans don't like the tax proposals - it represents governance built on compromise and common sense.



Most importantly, it seeks to restore the trust of the public in the ability of government to set priorities and accomplish realistic goals. Unlike some state governments that are paralyzed by ideology and political polarization, blue-state California has found a more moderate, pragmatic path to governance. Social wedge issues have largely been put aside, with greater focus on the well-being of the citizenry and the health of the economy.

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While Gov. Brown's tough and experienced leadership is part of the successful equation, there have been important structural and strategic changes to the political system that laid the groundwork for success. In 2012, the state moved to an "open" primary process for elections. Instead of a handful of activist Democrats or Republicans choosing the nominees in their own primary elections in safe districts, any voter can now vote in the primary. The general election in November is then between the top two vote getters, even if they are from the same party.

In practical terms, these means that candidates must seek votes from all voters -- Democrats, Republicans and independents. So even in a safe Democratic district, for example, a candidate can win by getting more votes from Republicans and independents. Candidates with views that appeal only to the Democratic base may lose if they don't get some votes from non-Democratic voters. The same is true in Republican districts where a candidate appeals only to his or her base. The result is that more moderate candidates are elected on both sides of the aisle - candidates that more accurately reflect the views of the broader electorate.

Even though both the legislative and executive branches in California are controlled by Democrats, the government has avoided much of the ideological posturing that occurs in other states, particularly those dominated by Republicans. While this is in part due to the open primary system, it is also a result of a more moderate position taken by Republicans in the California legislature. For the most part, California Republicans steer clear of social issues and focus on fiscal responsibility and efficient government. In those areas, the Republicans have found occasional allies in both the governor and moderate Democratic legislators.

The Brown budget is also noteworthy in a couple of other respects. First, it sets clear priorities rather than being a jumble of allotments to special interests or political causes. It adds money for education and health services, but also for corrections and transportation, while it actually reduces spending for environmental protection, one of Brown's pet causes. It also extends a tax on health insurance companies, but sets aside $2 billion for the rainy-day fund. Democrats want more spending on social services instead of the fund set-aside, while Republicans are generally unhappy with the tax proposal. When everybody is a little unhappy, it's probably a sign of good government.

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ATHENS, Greece -- The clock strikes midnight on New Year's Eve, and the room on the ground floor of this former tax administration building is filled with people chatting and laughing. Persian dance music on YouTube blasts from the speakers of the laptop sitting on a table, surrounded by cookies and glasses.

Mehdi's* eyes are stuck on his mobile phone. He stands out in the crowd, hardly a smile on his face. He waits for news from his family. He hasn't spoken to them in four days.

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As Balkan border crossings closed for refugees not coming from Syria, Iraq or Afghanistan, many others found themselves stuck in Greece. They are the unwanted who got to spend the new year in Athens, and some found refuge in this building.

Mehdi is from Tehran. Back home he faces an eight-month jail time sentence for installing satellite dishes.

"I had two jobs. One was selling rice in the grand bazaar, the other one is illegal only in my country," Mehdi says.

After the intelligence services raided his home for the third time, he decided to take his family and leave Iran. From Greece they tried to cross the border to Macedonia with fake documents pretending they were Afghans. His wife, daughter and son managed to pass and are now in Germany. Mehdi was rejected and sent back to Athens. His fingers keep touching the screen of his mobile phone. The fingertips on his right hand are abnormally curbed. They were broken by Iranian police, Mehdi says.

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* * *

For more than 10 days now, Mehdi has been a regular at "Notara." That's the name the former administration building goes by these days. It comes from its address, 26 Notara Street, in Athens' graffiti-daubed neighborhood, Exarchia. Exarchia is somewhat of an independent republic within the Greek capital, home to anarchists and leftists. It is almost impossible to find a clean centimeter on its buildings' walls that does not carry a political slogan or drawing. Even more impossible is to see policemen patrolling the area. They would get beaten up and their cars would get torched, say locals.

It is here that some of the refugees found a home in a building squatted by anarchists on Notara Street. It hosts around 110 to 130 people, but newcomers arrive every day and now very few of them manage to move forward on their journey further West. Most of them are from Iran. There are also Syrian and Afghan refugees who either have problems with their documents or ran out of money and are waiting for a transfer from their relatives back home. Others still are Moroccans and Algerians.

Mohamed, 42, from Afghanistan and his daughter in their room at Notara solidarity center.

"I met a guy at a kiosk, I think it was one of the anarchists," Jalal, a 54-year-old man from Iran says. "He took pity on me, gave me some money for the cab and a piece of paper with the address to this place."

The guy at the kiosk wrote "Notara 6" on the note, so the taxi took Jalal there. Another man took the Iranian to the right address. That was 20 days ago. Jalal tried to cross into Macedonia two times since then. Each time he got sent back to Athens and ended up again in the squatted building. Now, he helps around Notara, doing some cleaning and helping with translation. Between 1976 and 1982 he lived in the United Kingdom. He left the country in the wake of immigration reformation. He would like to go back now.

"I left my spirit in England," Jalal says.

It is hard not to notice Jalal around Notara. Grey-haired, wearing his green lozenged sweater, he is always doing something. He's upstairs mopping the floor on one of the building's four stories, then he's downstairs at the entrance helping bring in supplies.

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The news about the existence of this place spread by word of mouth. Some of Notara's residents often go to Victoria Square, where refugees still sleep in the freezing winter air, to see if they can find relatives and friends and bring them here. Iman, 31, and his 6-year-old daughter Hadis, came to Notara one week ago.

Hadis, 6, brushing her father's hair on New Year's Eve in their bedroom in Notara.

"I found out about it in church. A friend from Iran who has been living in Greece for 15 years told me to come to Notara," Iman says.

The family left Iran because they are Christians and freedom of religious expression is just one of the human rights not granted in Iran. They arrived in Greece one month ago. The borders closing changed Iman's plans. He wanted to go to Finland where his sister lives. Now, he is going to apply for asylum in Greece. He wants his daughter to go to school, but he just doesn't know where or how.

Hadis is brushing her father's hair, this year's last rays of sun illuminating their improvised bedroom. They sleep on a large mattress on top of wooden pallets in one of the offices where taxes were previously collected. Plush toys and a plastic doll guard the window sill. An electric heater keeps them warm. In Iran, for Nowruz, marking the equinox and the beginning of the year in the Persian calendar, families go to visit other families. Iman wants to celebrate New Year's like Europeans now, so they are planning to go to Victoria or Syntagma Square at midnight.

* * *

Nina (center right) and other volunteers cooking for refugees on New Year's Eve.

Steam coming out the boiling pots fills the air in the little green-painted kitchen. Nina, a 34- year-old with long, dark hair, is cooking olive salad from an Iranian recipe. She and other volunteers came from across Europe to cook for refugees in Athens. Nina's parents were Iranian political refugees that moved to Sweden when she was 12. She went to London to study politics and stayed there. Nina, Max and Zaid, two other volunteers, all came from England by bus to get involved in the solidarity movement.

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The kitchen, established in a squatted house on one small alley leading to Exarchia Square, is run by EL CHEf, a food collective established by activists in 2008. Its original purpose was to feed the local homeless and the hungry, but with the growing number of refugees in Greece, the focus has shifted.

Nina and her friends borrow the kitchen from EL CHEf when they want to cook for refugees. The dish tonight is special -- it's New Year's -- and preparing it has its funny moments. Like when the British recipe for mayonnaise is in pints and the Greek measuring can is in liters.

"Convert it on Internet." Zaid finds the solution and pulls out his smartphone.

Small New Year's party for refugees in the Notara center in Athens.

Wall to wall with the kitchen is the migrants social center, Steki Metanaston. Steki in Greek means a place where you go often, where you feel safe. Nasim sits in his office on the first floor, smoking Marlboro Lights and drinking coffee from the cafe across the alley. Despite seven smoking ban laws, Exarchia is the place where you can smoke anywhere. The small office is crowded by a large filing cabinet and a desk with printers. Posters cover the walls. One belongs to the Boats4People organization and says "Freedom not Frontex."

Nasim is from Afghanistan. He came to Greece 15 years ago, long before the current refugee crisis. He crossed from Turkey by boat. Nasim did not want to stay in Greece, but he could not go anywhere else. Now, he loves it here.

"Greece does not have a heavy European culture. There's a little chaos and nothing is perfect. I love it," he says.

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He did not become a Greek citizen, did not care for that and having an Afghan passport still makes him miss a lot of flights due to security controls, he sourly jokes.

Banner welcoming refugees is hanging on the facade of the Notara center.

Nasim is part of Diktyo, the Network for Social Support to Immigrants and Refugees. It was created in March 1995, in a period when mass immigration towards Greece was starting, mainly from the Balkan countries.

"This initiative is not about charity," Nasim says. "It is about politicalizing the solidarity. We need to make demands. We have to put pressure on the government for better conditions for refugees, for better asylum for those who would want to stay."

In the network, a refugee or a migrant can find legal and general advice on social rights, help in cases of bureaucracy, illegal detentions or deportation, lessons of Greek language and computer skills. In the social center, they organize meetings that gather people from different countries and cultures. They can discuss and communicate.

"It's a sort of laboratory," Nasim says, "one that practices acceptance. Maybe we cannot change a law, but we can change the way we connect to people around us."

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After the summer, a lot of refugees did not have a place to stay. Many of them did not want to stay in the refugee camps and were sleeping on the streets of Athens. Victoria Square became a transit center for the refugees and an open market for smugglers. Activists came with the idea to squat some houses to give shelter to refugees. According to Nasim, there are over 4,000 empty buildings in Athens. That's how Notara solidarity center came to exist in September, and the former tax administration building, now boasting a huge banner stating "Refugees welcome," became a temporary home for refugees in Athens.

"The ministry came to cut the electricity in Notara," Nasim remembers. "But we [the activists] made some noise, so they came to reconnect."

* * *

The lights go out at 00:00 in Notara. People gathered at the ground floor of the solidarity center start applauding. It's 2016. They don't know what the new year has in store for them, but refugees, volunteers and activists hug, shake hands and wish each other "A Happy New Year." The atmosphere is close to festive. There's even some dancing for a short moment.

Children's drawings on the walls in Notara.

Children roam around the room riding plastic horses or playing ball. Their current happy times are in deep contrast with some of their drawings on the walls of Notara. Their crayons sketched beheadings, beatings and blood, a testimony to the terrible life they try to leave behind.

Mohamed's little daughter had color stains on her face the whole day. She is constantly looking for someone to play with. Mohamed, 42, and his family are from Afghanistan. They arrived in Greece 35 days ago and cannot move forward because they have no money left. Until Mohamed's brother back home manages to send them some money, they are living in Notara. But as soon as the money comes they plan to move on towards Germany, where they have other relatives. At least for now, they are together, in a safe place.

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Mehdi takes a folded piece of paper out of his jacket pocket. He keeps looking at it. It bears some text in Greek and a photo taken of him somewhere around Victoria Square. It is his fake Afghan document and probably the most expensive piece of paper he ever held. He just bought it this afternoon for 100 euros. It is the cheaper version one can buy. But if he doesn't get to cross, there's no refund. There are others that cost 200 euros. If they don't pass, refugees get 150 euros back. Mehdi plans to try again the first day of the new year. Once more, he will take the evening bus from Victoria Square, armed with a fake piece of paper and the little hope he has left to hold his family close again soon.

* Mehdi's name was changed to protect his identity.
As a former director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service who was responsible for the conservation and stewardship of the entire National Wildlife Refuge System, I am appalled by the illegal armed occupation of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in southeastern Oregon.

In a blatant attempt to steal public resources for themselves, these extremists are essentially telling the rest of the American public to keep out. These occupiers do not have the "rights" they claim to have over these lands. Rather, federal land management grants the American public privileges to use federal lands and resources. These extremists defy our Constitution and flout our national heritage.

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Conservation luminaries such as Theodore Roosevelt, Gifford Pinchot and others set aside federal lands for the American public to use and enjoy instead of ceding them to the country's wealthiest families and large mining, timbering, oil and railroad businesses -- controversial conservation decisions at the time they were made, but ones that have been validated and celebrated by American families ever since.

President Roosevelt eloquently defended his decision to reserve the public domain for the American people in his speech on "The New Nationalism":

Conservation is a great moral issue, for it involves the patriotic duty of insuring the safety and continuance of the nation. Let me add that the health and vitality of our people are at least as well worth conserving as their forests, waters, lands, and minerals, and in this great work the national government must bear a most important part.

The National Wildlife Refuge System was established through Roosevelt's landmark efforts to protect and conserve our nation's wildlife resources for the benefit, use and enjoyment of all. Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in particular, was established in 1908 by Roosevelt because of its critical importance for migratory birds. In addition to being an economic boon to local communities, national wildlife refuges are special places dedicated to the conservation of this country's rich fish and wildlife legacy. The system has grown since Roosevelt's time, to more than 560 refuges, covering over 150 million acres of land and waters in all 50 states, making it the largest network of its kind in the world. Millions of Americans visit national wildlife refuges every year for wildlife viewing and other wildlife dependent recreational activities. Thus, the system's conservation is crucial for us now and for future generations.

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Other federal land systems were also established, each with a mission of providing for the American public. The National Park System preserves some of our most cherished landscapes and historic monuments. The National Forest System protects important wildlife habitat, provides spectacular hiking and camping opportunities, and provides food, fiber and clean water to millions of Americans across the country. Similarly, public lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management are increasingly valued for the wildlife and recreational opportunities they offer in addition to economic uses.

Contrary to the virulent claims of the occupiers at Malheur, we are fortunate to share in the inestimable riches of this public domain set aside for all of us. Even where companies and individuals have secured permission to use public resources, they are required to apply through a public process for this privilege. Nobody is allowed to just grab our public lands and resources for themselves.

When public lands are in the midst of this sort of armed and illegal dispute, my first thoughts are for the safety of the dedicated men and women responsible for the management and conservation of those lands. In the case of Malheur, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has a dedicated professional wildlife refuge staff who work tirelessly for the benefit of the American public and the wildlife resources of that refuge. These exemplary public servants are the epitome of President Roosevelt's vision of American conservation and they deserve the respect of a thankful nation and not vitriolic abuse from armed anti-government extremists.
Typical restaurant scene in Paris with tables and chairs arranged on the street covered with an awning.

In the past few years, delivery has exploded with more restaurants aiming to provide the option to their customers - and for good reason. According to the National Restaurant Association's 2015 Restaurant Industry Forecast, 74% of millennials said they would order delivery from a table-service restaurant if available, while 56% of adults would. There's huge demand for delivery and restaurants are stepping up to provide it to their customers.

There are a variety of companies that have contributed to the growth of restaurant delivery. These delivery companies often offer a portal for people to find a restaurant, place an order, and then the company picks up the food and makes the delivery. As a result, many restaurants have benefited from these services, but others have not, as the drawbacks can be significant.

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The Benefits

More Options: Delivery services can provide benefits to both restaurants and customers, which is why delivery has become so popular. First, it gives a restaurant more options, especially if they didn't offer delivery before. Also, thanks to these delivery companies, restaurant customers have more options to eat their favorite meals, from their favorite restaurants.

Convenience: Providing delivery makes dining out more convenient for customers who would rather stay in than eat out at a restaurant. It just might be the reason a customer picks one restaurant over another that doesn't provide delivery. Referring back to the National Restaurant Association's 2015 survey, 61% of millennials stated the availability of takeout and delivery options are an important factor in choosing a table-service restaurant. Providing delivery could get a restaurant more customers. Obviously, a restaurant doesn't want the lack of a good delivery system and service to be the reason they lose customers to another restaurant.

The Weaknesses

Brand Erosion: Unfortunately, there can be significant drawbacks to some delivery services, including brand erosion. Some delivery and online ordering companies have posted menus online of restaurants that do not contract with them and without the restaurant's knowledge. With these types of companies, restaurants don't even have control over their own menu prices. To make extra profit on each sale, some companies mark-up menu prices without customers knowing. In the end, this can significantly hurt the relationship between restaurants and their customers if they feel they're being overcharged.

Reputation Risk: There's also the risk a company could perform terrible delivery service, such as delivering food cold and late. This can reflect poorly on a restaurant, when in fact it's not the restaurant's fault, but the fault of the delivery company. In fact, In-N-Out is suing DoorDash for delivering their food without permission, as the restaurant has expressed concerns about maintaining their brand image and the food not being handled properly or arriving cold.

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Loss of Customer Connection: Even if the restaurant has a working relationship with a delivery company, they may not have an actual relationship with their customers. Companies that handle every aspect of the order and delivery generally don't share any information. Because the customer never interacts with the restaurant directly, the delivery company essentially owns the customer. Restaurants don't receive access to any customer information, which puts the restaurant at a disadvantage. They have no way to connect with them later, to build a relationship, and keep them coming back.

Delayed Payment and High Fees: As if to add insult to injury after taking a restaurant's customer, another major disadvantage to using a portal-based delivery company are their high fees and delayed payment. Some delivery companies only pay restaurants once per month, after taking their service fees, which can be as high as 20%. This can put a significant strain on a restaurant by forcing them to wait to receive their money.

How To Make It Better

Online Ordering: Delivery should be integrated into a restaurant's online ordering system. An online ordering system for restaurants can provide huge benefits and allow them to easily control their delivery settings. The best online ordering systems give restaurants full control over their delivery business and can even link to local delivery companies to provide the actual delivery. NetWaiter, for instance, allows restaurants to receive each order and payment directly, meaning no third-party gets between the customer and the restaurant (or the restaurant's money). With NetWaiter, restaurants control the customer relationship and get paid directly.

On-Demand Delivery: It's okay if a restaurant doesn't have their own delivery team. The hassles and costs of directly employing delivery drivers can be prohibitive for many restaurants. Instead, restaurants should consider using a local "on-demand" delivery service that will show up when needed and make deliveries for the restaurant. These professional delivery teams can make deliveries quickly and efficiently. Restaurants should choose a courier that specializes in food delivery and uses insulated bags to protect the quality of their food.

Take Control: Restaurants don't have to deliver every hour they're open, especially if they have their own drivers making all of the deliveries. Delivering ever hour can cause a lot of stress on a restaurant. Instead, restaurants should only offer delivery during the hours they know they can provide great service, so customers get their food on-time and hot.

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Limit Options: Some foods just don't travel well, and restaurants should consider reviewing their menu to see what works for delivery and what doesn't. Customers don't want to place an order only to have their food arrive soggy or in a huge mess. Restaurants need to ensure customers get meals as close to what they would get if they were dining at the restaurant.
TO GO WITH AFP STORY BY SIMON VALMARY A photo taken on June 26, 2015 shows a police car parked behind metal barriers outside the Hypercacher kosher supermarket at Porte de Vincennes in Paris, six months after a bloody hostage drama at the supermarket during a jihadist attack on January 9 left four dead. AFP PHOTO / KENZO TRIBOUILLARD (Photo credit should read KENZO TRIBOUILLARD/AFP/Getty Images)

One year ago this week, an ISIS-affiliated Islamic extremist murdered four Jews at the Hyper Cacher kosher supermarket in Paris. That attack followed the shootings of the Charlie Hebdo journalists and police officers just two days earlier, a heinous act also committed by ISIS trained terrorists.

In 2012, a terrorist, who claimed affiliation with al-Qaeda, killed three soldiers in Montauban and days later murdered a rabbi and three children at a Jewish school in Toulouse. According to leaked documents in the ongoing investigation of the massive November 13 attacks in Paris, Jewish targets also were considered by the ISIS-affiliated terrorists.

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Anti-Semitism is a core tenet of Islamic extremism, so it should not come as a surprise that French Jews are attacked in tandem with representatives and symbols of the French Republic: soldiers, police, and those exercising freedom of the press. For too many years, though, the wave of anti-Semitism that began in 2000 was considered by French public opinion and French authorities as simply the import of the Arab-Israeli conflict and thus not the responsibility of France.

The Hyper Cacher murders marked a turning point toward an understanding that the French Jewish community and the French Republic share more than common enemies. They share a common destiny.

In a major speech to the French parliament just days after the attack, Prime Minister Manuel Valls admitted that French society had let down its Jewish compatriots by not reacting sufficiently. He vowed to implement a multi-pronged strategy against anti-Semitism and against radicalization in the Muslim community. That work is underway.

French authorities waged a similar battle against radicalization and anti-Semitism a century ago among mostly rural Christian communities. Public policies were implemented to emphasize critical thinking and secularism in educational institutions. Those efforts should be reinforced to address Islamic extremism in schools today.

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In 2015, almost 1,000 students were identified by their teachers as at risk of radicalization. In some schools in France -- fortunately a minority of them -- the anti-Semitism of the past 15 years presaged a rise of other illiberal tendencies: homophobia, sexism, conspiracy theories, and hatred of the French Republic.

Increasing Islamic extremism has contributed to the political gains of the far right, which also has a long history of anti-Semitism. The mutual reinforcement of these movements -- with the far right contributing to radicalization among French Muslims -- is not good for the Jews nor does it augur well for democratic values.

Today the situation in France is grave and very different from the conditions familiar to Jews living in the U.S. Comparing eight years of ADL's records for anti-Semitic assaults in the U.S. and data from SPCJ, the French Jewish security agency, we see that French Jews are nearly 40 times more at risk of being attacked than American Jews (after adjusting for the size of the two communities). While it is illegal in France to keep statistics based on ethnicity or religion, strong anecdotal evidence suggests that the overwhelming majority of the assailants are young men of North African descent.

According to a 2013 survey of European Jewish communities by the European Union, sixty percent of French Jews feared being the victim of an anti-Semitic assault. Half of French Jews always or usually avoid wearing anything that will identify them as Jewish. Fearing for their physical safety, a growing number of French Jews simply have left their native country. The number of French Jews who moved to Israel doubled in 2014 from the prior year to more than 7,000, and reached almost 8,000 in 2015. While no hard statistics are available, Jews also emigrated in large numbers to the UK, the US, and Canada. Moreover, most of these are core members of the community: families with children, identified Jews committed to their faith, people who feel that they have been forced to choose between their beliefs and their safety.

If the majority of French Jews lose confidence that their situation will improve, those numbers will continue to grow, leaving Europe's largest Jewish community much diminished and on the brink of collapse.

Our analysis and other polls have shown the French Muslim community to be one of the most moderate Muslim communities in Europe, but the terrorists who emerged from it have already deeply affected the Jewish community. Will Islamic extremists, with their intrinsic anti-Semitism, radicalize enough French Muslims to cause half a million French Jews to flee? Or, will the enduring French values of equality and fraternity prevail among the French Muslim community of eight million as an antidote to radicalism? Indeed, let us not forget, it was a young Muslim employee, Lassana Bathily, who saved six Jews at the Hyper Cacher market by hiding them in a walk-in freezer, an act which could have cost him his life

We all have roles to play. The government must ensure security for all French citizens, allow Jews to live openly as Jews, educate the public against anti-Semitism, and combat radicalization through a variety of means including better integration of French Muslims into French society. French Muslim leaders must encourage their communities to assist the authorities to identify those at risk of radicalization or already radicalized. Political parties committed to the values of the French Republic must prevail over parties who oppose those core ideas. Jewish leaders in France and around the world must continue to raise the alarm and make clear what is at stake: as goes the fight against anti-Semitism, so goes the French Republic.

In the words of President Francois Hollande, "it is not the Jews who should be leaving France, but the anti-Semites," and of Prime Minister Valls: because if French Jews leave, "France will no longer be France."
This Saturday, January 9, proves to be busy start for 2016 for the Los Angeles Art World. Some stand out exhibitions take place downtown, Santa Monica, Hollywood and in Culver City.

CB1 Gallery celebrates the art of Los Angeles based artist Paul Donald in a solo exhibition titled "Endymion Project." The New Zealand born and Australian trained artist is focused on his own alienation with the role of a white male in today's society.



image: Courtesy of CB1 Gallery, Endymion Project, 610 x 471



Inspired by Endymion from Classical mythology (who has been immortalized by European painter starting as early as the late eighteenth century), one senses the artist's identification with the vulnerability of his mythological counterpart.

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"Endymion Project" will feature a live performance along with a group of objects that are meant to celebrate and obscure the naked white male body. Both the performance and exhibition are simultaneously inspired by the artist's ambivalence to his own white masculinity. Donald works in a variety of media, including painting, sculpture, video and performance.

The opening reception takes place Saturday, January 9, from 3 - 6 pm. Two other solo shows also opening are "My Head is a Ghost," featuring the art of Chuck Agro, and "Chris Oatey's "Snowmelt Paintings." The exhibitions will remain on view from January 9 through February 20, 2016. CB1 Gallery is located at 1923 S Santa Fe Ave, LA, 90021; http://cb1gallery.com

At Bergamot Station, Leslie Sacks Contemporary hosts an artist reception for "Portability," featuring the square-format acrylic paintings of Los Angeles based artist, Charles Christopher Hill. The acrylic works on canvas range in size from 10 x 10 inches, 12 x 12 inches, 2 x 2 feet up to 5 x 5 feet.



image: Courtesy of Leslie Sacks Contemporary, Charles Christopher Hill, Daddy, I Want It!, 2015, Acrylic on paper mounted on canvas, 48 x 48 inches HILL144



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Hill's newspaper-collaged canvases offer an eclectic range of colors, such as a bright turquoise, luminous marigolds and shocking pinks.

The opening reception runs from 5-7pm at Leslie Sacks Contemporary (B6), Bergamot Station 2525 Michigan Ave., Santa Monica, 90404; "Portability" will remain on view through February 13, 2016. http://www.lscontemporary.com/

In Culver City...at the George Billis Gallery, artist Bonita Helmer will be featured in a solo exhibition titled "Observed" this Saturday from 5-7pm.The exhibition features Helmer's abstract paintings and will be her fifth exhibition at the gallery. Helmer combines her attraction to science and the universe with her first love and preferred medium...painting. She is currently a teacher at Otis College Art and Design where she has been teaching art since 1998.



Image: Courtesy of George Billis Gallery, Bonita Helmer, Glu-on II, 2015, Acrylic and spray paint on canvas, 36 x 36 inches



As a teacher, the artist recognizes the importance of learning, and has studied the origins of the universe via physics and astronomy at UCLA. In 2014 Exploration Institute invited Helmer (the sole visual artist) to be on the board. The Exploration Institute brings together astronauts, physicists, underwater researchers and more.

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Helmer's work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. Exhibitions include: MOCA, Beijing; a solo show at L'Espace Bateau Lavoir, L'Ecole des Arts Decoratifs in Paris; an official adjunct show as part of the MOCA Los Angeles, Whack retrospective of Women in Art; International Space Conference in Washington, DC.; Newport Harbor Art Museum (Orange County Museum of Art); Gallery Q, Tokyo; French Consulate/Alliance Francaise, Los Angeles; UCLA Dortort Center for the Arts, HUC Museum, NYU campus; Museum of Latin American Art (MOLAA). Helmer has also done paintings as set design for performance pieces, one co-produced by CalArts and the other in part by an NEA grant. Reception 5-8pm; George Billis Gallery, 2716 S. La Cienega Blvd., LA, 90029 http://www.georgebillis.com/

In Hollywood, Kohn Gallery exhibits a new body of work by established artist Lita Albuquerque. "Embodiment" features new pigment paintings and salt installations.

Albuquerque has traveled across the globe in search of a variety of materials. The art in "Embodiment" a form of rose madder (taken from lake roots), in addition to soft purple vesuvianite (originally found on Mt. Vesuvius) and pigments used in centuries-old Japanese painting technique called Enogu form the main gallery's palette.



Image: Courtesy of Kohn Gallery, Lita Albuquerque, Auric Field (February 2015), 2015, pigment on panel and white gold leaf on resin, 30 x 30 inches

Albuquerque is known for her performance art and recently gathered several hundred participants to create a "performative sculpture" titled Spine of the Earth 2012, for the Getty's Pacific Standard Time Performance. She received the Cairo Biennale Prize at the Sixth International Cairo Biennale. Her work is held in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Getty Trust, the Whitney Museum of American Art, LACMA, and MOCA, among others. Albuquerque's exhibition, "20/20: Accelerando," opens January 24, 2016 (through April10, 2016) at the USC Fisher Museum of Art with a performance from 4-6pm and will run concurrently with "Embodiment." Artist reception takes place Saturday, January 9, from 6-8pm. Kohn Gallery, 1227 North Highland Ave., LA, CA 90038; http://www.kohngallery.com/

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Homeless encampments are not an uncommon sight during my daily commute into work. Since 2013, Los Angeles' chronically homeless population - those who live on the street for one year or more - has increased by 55 percent. The city declared a "shelter crisis" in November, and began to establish temporary housing - a great first step - but to appropriately address the issue of homelessness, we must also recognize it as a public health crisis.

The stress and experiences of living on the streets, in a shelter or out of one's car, can significantly impact one's health. Homeless men and women are more likely to suffer from physical and mental illnesses and become dependent on illegal drugs or alcohol, all of which make it more difficult to move themselves out of poverty.

Three years ago, the Chicago School's Los Angeles Campus partnered with the Los Angeles Mission (LAM), a 75-year-old organization that addresses the needs of the city's homeless, to deliver on its commitment to make a transformational impact on the community. Graduate students from our Clinical Psychology, Forensic Psychology and Marital and Family Therapy Programs develop assessment and treatment plans for homeless men and women served by the Mission. Students provide comprehensive supports and services to those who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, bipolar disorder, and other mental health issues that may be exacerbated by an individual's experience with emotional, physical or sexual trauma while living on the streets. These services add capacity to the Los Angeles Mission to ultimately provide more people with the chance for permanent and sustainable positive life changes.

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Frank Miller, a former attorney who came to the LAM in April 2014, has a story that illustrates the impact of our work. Frank fell into a deep depression and began to abuse alcohol when his civil and criminal litigation business began to struggle. He lost his income, then his home, and found himself living on Skid Row, an area in downtown Los Angeles that is home to our country's largest concentration of homeless men and women. Frank was referred to the Los Angeles Mission and enrolled in its rehabilitation program, which now includes psychological counseling. Now, inspired by his experience working with our students, Frank is on a path to study psychology at the University of New Mexico, and to pursue a career in spiritual-based counseling to offer to others the kind of support he received at the Los Angeles Mission with The Chicago School. Each year, 120 individuals are enrolled in The Chicago School's 13-month counseling program, which boasts a graduation rate of nearly 75 percent.

Our students are also impacted by their work with the Los Angeles Mission. This real-world experience enriches our students as psychology practitioners by giving them an opportunity to gain a sophisticated understanding of the human experience and apply what they learn in the classroom to help people live more fulfilling and healthier lives.

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In a few days, The Chicago School in collaboration with the Los Angeles Mission and First Foundation Bank will bring together agencies that serve homeless women, service providers, psychologists, students and business and non-profit leaders for a conversation focused on how we can help create sustainable solutions that empower at-risk women and strengthen the health of their communities.

A woman whom I met in the lobby of the Los Angeles Mission was the catalyst of this one-day Women's Conference. This young woman struggled with homelessness and substance abuse for years, but after finding her way to the Los Angeles Mission, she succeeded in overcoming numerous challenges. She found quality housing, maintained her sobriety (she's now 16 years sober), and graduated from a regional occupational program for flower arrangements - a passion that she discovered during her time with the Los Angeles Mission that she now uses to mentor and inspire others through their journey to sustainable and positive life changes.

I have the pleasure of keynoting this event, which will serve as the beginning of an ongoing collaborative, that creates community, provides professional training and seminars, and places students in positions to collect data, perform research and work in more impactful ways in one of the most devastated homeless populations in the country.
green plants growth

By Stella Mikhailova, MSc in Sustainability and Management, University of Bath

The U.N. climate change conference (COP21), which ended recently in Paris, was billed as potentially the last chance to obtain a major global treaty on climate change, and as an event that could help set the direction the world's major economies will take over the coming decades.

At the heart of negotiations among developing nations was the concept of the "green economy." It's an idea that was introduced almost 30 years ago but only recently became a keystone in the climate change debate. Resource economist Anil Markandya is the father of this idea, and in the run-up to COP21, Pro Journo spoke with him.

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Anil Markandya

In 1989, Markandya, as co-author, published "Blueprint for a Green Economy," which would become his most important book. It was one of the first attempts to guide policymakers and academics in establishing tools for assessing the environment in economic terms and to include its value in economic decision-making.

Even 30 years ago, the green economy concept seemed to encapsulate most of the key principles and practices needed to make the world's economy sustainable. But as the debates at the COP21 conference demonstrated, there is still no agreement or substantial political commitment on how to make the transition to a green economy and what role it would play in the battle against climate change.

Originally, Markandya defined the concept as an economy "where the environment has its proper place." Because his book was published right after the Brundtland Commission, which defined global sustainable development, his green economy was quickly placed alongside the increasingly popular idea of sustainability. Since then, many similar concepts have appeared, such as green growth, low-carbon economy and bio-economy, to name a few.

"People like to think about new words," Markandya said when I met him. At 69, the Nobel Peace Prize winner rises at 7 a.m. He works until evening, with quick breaks for breakfast and lunch.

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"Basically, there is the same idea of bringing together the environment and the economy, and the society. And that all these important concepts are taking into account in the process of making decisions about our lives, our consumption, our production and the way we organize our activities," he said.

Markandya said all those ideas are varying names for essentially the same thing. But despite this glut of terms, it was the green economy that was chosen as the economic base for sustainable development at the United Nations' Rio+20 summit on sustainable development in 2012, and it remains a core concept for those combating climate change.

Though successful now, it took many years for Markandya to bring his idea to life. His own rise has largely followed that of the concept he created. Things were very different back in the 1960s when he started his research career in Britain, where he arrived after fleeing Pakistan with his family and a stint in Uganda. At the time, the U.K. was suffering from an economic slowdown--the emphasis was on living standards and much less about their impact on the environment. In the environmental economics field, there were few experts and little interest.

Like many others, Markandya studied economics as well as econometrics, which was popular at that time, but he felt he would contribute less in these fields than he would in environmental economics. So he persuaded his supervisor at the London School of Economics to accept an unusual topic where, among other things, he tried to put values on things that did not have a value before, like air and noise pollution. This was the beginning of his mission to achieve a global commitment to the incorporation of social and environmental targets into classical short-term economic thinking.

Eighteen years later, in 2007, Markandya shared the Nobel Peace Prize as a lead author of the Fourth Assessment Report by the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In it, he examined various scenarios and trends on how the world would develop, depending on different CO emissions levels. It was a recognition of Markandya's contribution to environmental policy, but also an illustration of how his own interests in the green economy had persistently moved toward climate change. He now runs a climate change research center at the invitation of the Basque government in Spain (it was named Best Climate Change Think Tank in Europe in 2012 by the International Center for Climate Governance).

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While the United Nations Environment Programme defines a green economy as one that results in improved human well-being and social equity, as well as significantly reduced environmental risks and damage, over time different countries have shaped their own conceptions of the idea differently. For example, Sergey Bobylev, a Russian expert in the green economy, says that for his country the most critical issues are natural resource depletion and energy intensity reduction, while most other developed countries are focused on building low-carbon economies.

But increasingly, climate change has become the central preoccupation of green economics, just as it has for Markandya. Climate change is now the main topic on the green economy agenda among developed countries, according to Bobylev.

Although many developed and developing countries are open to his ideas, Markandya acknowledges that they still face considerable resistance elsewhere, particularly in the U.S. The United States is the "society which is probably the most difficult to convince on sustainability issues," he said.

At COP21 in Paris, Markandya was to present a paper on how water can be used more efficiently in the future, in light of climate change. He also planned to continue his discussions with governments to reduce CO emissions by 2030. If the U.S. and China make a commitment at the conference to reduce their emissions, he said, it will be a huge impetus for development of low-carbon economies.

He said a cultural change is needed among people so they recognize that it is possible to have both good living standards and a cleaner environment.

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"But more than anything else, we now need a big political commitment," he said.
luminous blue icebergs floating ...

By Stella Mikhailova, MSc in Sustainability and Management, University of Bath

With the wave of media coverage surrounding the COP 21 climate summit in Paris, it might be hard to believe that climate change and other environmental issues suffer from a lack of coverage in the press. But, while major events like the COP can lead to brief peaks in reporting, media outlets continue often to struggle to engage both themselves and their readers in these issues. The former Guardian editor, Alan Rusbridger, shortly before stepping down, said he felt the media was failing to meet the challenge of covering the climate crisis; it's a view shared by many others in the press, even as seriousness of the danger posed by climate change is increasingly recognized.

At this year's World Resources Forum (WRF) 2015 in Davos, close to 500 environmental experts from more than 100 countries gathered in Switzerland, discussing ways to solve the world's most pressing environmental crises, including climate change. Pro Journo spoke to WRF participants to hear what problems they see with current media reporting of environmental issues and how it might be improved.

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Reduction in Climate Change Coverage?

"Environmental issues became less high on the agenda," said Thomas Gotting of the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment, a WRF participant. "Not because they are less interesting or concerning, but because other topics are covered more." For Gotting, issues like the refugee crisis, unemployment and the 2008 global financial crisis have received most of the media's attention.

Indeed, there is evidence that since the 2009 Copenhagen Climate Change Conference, media coverage of climate change and environmental issues has decreased. Since 2004, Max Boykoff, an assistant professor at the University of Colorado-Boulder, has collected data on global newspapers' coverage of climate change. His research shows that after two surges of interest in the subject, which happened after the 2007 publication of the IPCC's fourth Assessment report and the 2009 Copenhagen meeting, media coverage of climate change has dropped.

Jocelyn Bleriot of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation agrees that high-profile events create major sources of news concerning climate change. "There was no international event around these issues, and in 2009-2015 all focus was on the economic crisis," he said.

Yet a quick poll during WRF 2015 showed that 18 out of 25 participants polled actually noticed an increase in news coverage of climate change after 2010.

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One of the reasons for this may lie in the difficulty of defining what climate change news actually is. The Daily Climate, an independent media aggregator, showed an increase in news coverage in 2013, as it compiled a wider range of stories on climate change. As opposed to Boykoff, who counts articles featuring the phrases "global warming" or "climate change," the Daily Climate focuses on "fracking," "pipelines" and "oil sands," although these topics do not necessarily involve discussions about the implications for climate change. Both techniques have their pros and cons. But generally, the problem lies in the quality of the articles' content rather than in the quantity of news pieces on the subject.

Main Problems of News Coverage

"I regret the way it's being covered," said Mathis Wackernagel of the Global Footprint Network. Most WRF participants agreed that paying the same attention to scientific facts and the opinions of minorities who do not agree with the current climate change consensus are some of the biggest problems in news media coverage. This trend is not new. Back in 2014, the BBC was openly criticized by members of Britain's Parliament for giving the same weight to scientific facts and general opinions.

Many WRF participants see a decrease in the quality of news articles as a consequence of the media's existing business model. "Media is commercial," said Arthur ten Wolde, director of Circular Future. "So they have to make money in the short run, and you do it by creating a debate. So you want someone from one point of view and the climate skeptic with the opposite point of view. So both television and newspapers have 'the debates!,' which in itself suggests that there is no consensus [on climate change]. But there is consensus!"

According to WRF attendees, another problem is that current news about climate change is very impersonal and fails to reach readers. The media make it look as if global warming is happening somewhere far away from them. "What are we doing daily? We are eating, we are wearing clothes, we are living, housing. I think it [climate change coverage] has to be connected to daily life. I think it's rather important if media finds these links between daily life and professional life. They have to work on this," said Holger Rohn of the Factor 10 Institute.

The last major problem is insufficient coverage of concrete examples on how to tackle the problem. At a recent forum in New York attended by Bleriot, Ariana Huffington gave a talk on how the media should provide solutions and not focus on only the problems from climate change. "And she is right. It's all about the problems," said Bleriot. "The solutions don't get half the exposure they deserve."

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Claude Fussler of the CO Forum believes that negative news is the price we have to pay for a lack of action on climate change. He argues that as there is nothing good about the problem, it should not be covered in a positive way. However, most of the other experts present said that climate change's negative image makes the stories less interesting. As a result, people get bored and do not feel inclined to change their behavior.

Solutions

What does it take to change this situation and make the news more appealing? "It always takes creativity and imagination," said Wackernagel. For ten Wolde, the issue's complexity and journalists' lack of time to cover it properly are just an excuse. He shared a creative example from the Netherlands, where a local newspaper due to lack of resources used 10 students to write articles and produced "extremely thorough reports."

Covering more concrete stories about climate change is another important step. Colin Paul of Act on Climate suggested that newspapers have a positive impact when they try to report on situations where businesses and individuals are taking concrete steps to counter climate change, such as installing solar concentrators. He said that the role of newspapers is not to change people's beliefs but to show a business case for sustainability. Fussler agreed that emphasizing the human nature aspect of climate change and focusing on the necessity to act are both essential.

Collaboration with scientists and their research findings is another key solution to the problem. "Scientific journalism should be at the forefront," said Bleriot. "It's not a question of opinion." Using scientific results and limiting coverage of opinions not supported by facts are seen as the most important approaches that journalists should consider when covering climate change.

Data Journalism as Bridge Between Science and Media

While using research findings is a commonly recommended practice for journalists, researchers admitted that they experience difficulties communicating their results to the broader public.

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Florian Ramseger, a product specialist at Tableau, said that one of the problems in environmental coverage is finding a link between local events and large-scale issues. Journalists tend to cover one aspect--individual, narrow stories--while scientists look at the problems very broadly and globally.

For Ramseger, data journalism helps bridge these two extremes. "It can visualize how the story of an individual city, individual summer and individual event compares to the long-term development in a country," he said.

In this case, data journalism may help journalists see the broader picture while allowing scientists to find some local practical implications to their research.
By Waleria Schuele, Mercator Fellow

Living within planetary boundaries is imperative on a planet with finite resources. But in 2015 we seem far from meeting this imperative. If everybody led the lifestyle of an average American, we would need five earths to provide the natural resources needed, according to a calculation from the Global Footprint Network, a think tank that monitors countries' ecological footprint. So far, the consumption rates in industrialized countries have been balanced by countries like Bolivia or Angola, whose biological capacity far exceeds their present consumption rates.

But as more countries catch up in industrial development and adopt more consumption-driven lifestyles, the more we will overstretch the natural limits of our planet. Already, humanity now uses the equivalent of 1.6 planets in resources. This means that it takes the earth 1.6 years to regenerate the resources that we use in one year, a disproportionate phenomenon that is expected to grow as more countries industrialize.

There is a growing awareness among political decision-makers that we need to take action to accommodate the resource needs of a human population that is expected to exceed 9 billion by 2050. Yet that awareness still needs to translate into political action. "Excessive resource use is at the core of our most pressing problems today, including climate change and biodiversity loss. However, we do not have a single international convention regulating how we use natural resources," says Bas de Leeuw, managing director of the World Resources Forum (WRF), which took place Oct. 11-14 in Davos, Switzerland.

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To stimulate political momentum, the WRF has launched its flagship project, which aims to develop a Resource Efficiency Index to measure how efficiently nations use their resources. A first discussion paper was presented during this year's WRF.

"We measure the economic development of nations with the GDP and human development with the Human Development Index [HDI]. But we do not contrast these measurements with the resources that countries consume to get to their respective level of economic and human development," explains Arnold Tukker, director of the Institute for Environmental Sciences at Leiden University and lead scientist for the Resource Efficiency Index. That index could close this gap by spotlighting which nations are more resource-efficient in achieving a high gross domestic product and high human development. In short, good quality of life for their citizens.

The Resource Efficiency Index will aggregate three categories of resources: land, water and materials. The task is ambitious, considering that most products we consume are shipped across the globe before they reach us. The amount of water and land used at production sites in distant parts of the world is normally invisible when everyday products reach our shores. "That is what we want to make visible," says Tukker. "Simply put, we will look at a final product like a car and then count backwards, in terms of what resources have been used to create this product."

The data will be taken from large databases like Exiobase, one of the world's most ambitious databases, which was developed to analyze the environmental impacts of the globalized economy.

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The collection and selection of data is only one of the many challenges the index will need to overcome. Picking the right calculation matrix is another one. A number of different scientific schools passionately defend their own matrix as the most appropriate one. In anticipation of the debate, Tukker conducted test calculations with five alternative matrixes.

The outcome came as a surprise. Notwithstanding the underlying formula, the results proved to be very similar. Australia, Luxembourg, Canada and Finland always came out as the top four resource-inefficient countries, Tukker showed during his presentation at the WRF.

"In the end, we don't need to produce 100 percent exact results as long as the general direction is clear," says Friedrich Hinterberger, founding president of the Sustainable Europe Research Institute and a contributor to the paper.

The Resources Efficiency Index, like the GDP and HDI indexes, has to work with simplifications. It needs to deliberately exclude certain parameters to be functional. For example, it will leave out the impacts on human and ecosystem health from the resource extraction process.

"We do not think it is dangerous that we left out the human and environmental impacts of resource extraction in our calculations," says Hinterberger. "One could always include more elements. But this easily becomes a pretext for not doing anything at all. We think it is more important to get going with the resource efficiency debate. It is time to act."

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Others agree that it is more important to have some sort of index, even if it's imperfect.

"Even if one disagrees with the methodology, it remains a fact that resource use needs to be at the forefront of the political agenda," says Mathis Wackernagel, president of the Global Footprint Network, one of the most well-known think tanks in the field. "If the Resources Efficiency Index wants to succeed, it needs to communicate clearly which question it wants to answer. It needs to convey a simple message, and people need to understand how it can be used."

"The index could be applied in various ways. For example, it could reinforce arguments for higher taxes on resource use," suggests Hinterberger. "Tax resources, not labor" was a recurring suggestion during various panels at this year's WRF, an idea that suggests a tax system would incentivize the use of abundant and recycled materials instead of scarce ones.

At this point, the Resources Efficiency Index is still a work in progress. But Tukker's team seems to have shown that there could be a simple way to express nations' resource efficiency, a central question of the 21st century.
What started as a supposedly standard execution of (medieval-style) Saudi judicial system quickly morphed into a regional conflagration, when Riyadh decided to execute a prominent Shia cleric, Nimr al-Nimr. What (predictably) followed was massive protests by members of the Shia sect across the Middle East and beyond, with some protesters going so far as assailing Saudi embassy and consulate in Iran.

Soon, Iran and Saudi Arabia decided to completely sever their bilateral relations, with smaller Arab countries, in a show of solidarity with Riyadh, downgrading or severing their diplomatic ties with Tehran. Deeply worried about the ramifications of a potential full-scale showdown between the two regional heavyweights, world powers such as the United States, Russia and China advised restraint and/or offered to mediate between the two regional giants.

Without dialogue and cooperation between (Sunni) Saudi Arabia and (Shia) Iran, it is even harder to conceive a multilateral resolution of civil wars in places such as Yemen and Syria, and communal tensions in Lebanon and Iraq. The good news is: It is astronomically unlikely, as reiterated by an Eminence grise in Riyadh, for Saudi Arabia and Iran to engage in direct war. Significant American, British, and French military presence in the Persian Gulf will act as a buffer against any full-fledged war between Iran and its southern neighbors. And growing Saudi-Iranian spats will continue to undermine the ability of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) cartel to dictate oil prices in international markets.

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Nonetheless, there is a fear that proxy conflicts in the region will further intensify, while there is growing suspicion that Saudi Arabia, which is grappling with an economic crunch and a tenuous political transition, is bent on sabotaging -- hence executing a Shia dissident, knowing fully well the ensuing sectarian backlash -- the Iranian nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers, which is in its final implementation stage.

Yet, the mainstream global media tends to ignore the other international aspect of the Middle East conflagration: Millions of overseas workers, mostly from the developing world, who are anxiously worried about not only their employment, but also personal safety. The Philippines, which has as many as 2 million of its own citizens spread across the region, has a legitimate cause for concern. More than ever, it is time for countries like the Philippines to rethink their labor export policy, which is undergirded by deploying millions of vulnerable workers to one of the most dangerous and uncertain corners of earth.

Filipinos' Second Nations

All countries claim to be unique in their own ways. As far as the Philippines' uniqueness is concerned, one must note how its whole political economy is shaped by a decades-long phenomenon of manpower export. About 10 percent of the country's population resides outside its national territories, spread across more than 190 countries and mostly as overseas workers, who serve as the backbone of the national economy by contributing to more than 10 percent of the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Hard-earned remittances by Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) serves as both a cushion in period of crisis, as was the case during the immediate aftermath of the Great Recession, as well as an engine of robust growth, as has been the case in the past few years. Remittances fund the education, welfare, and investment and consumption behavior of the bulk of the Filipino population. Almost in every Filipino family, one can find a parent, sibling, and/or relative who is an OFW.

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Beyond a narrow economistic view, it is clear that the OFW phenomenon carries some significant costs. First and foremost, the feminization of Philippine labor export means that many children will be deprived of an important pillar in their family. In some families, both parents are working as OFWs, thus leaving their children behind for years if not decades with relatives or grandparents.

Then there is the culture of dependence. It isn't difficult to find (extended) families, who end up relying on the remittances of one of their kin for much of their lifetime. As Randy David, a leading Filipino sociologist reflected on some communities he closely observed: "The remittances doubled, but the family savings never increased. Only their needs multiplied. Families became addicted to a way of life where they traded the intangible values of family life for the nonessential acquisitions made possible by remittances."

Meanwhile, however, it is difficult to foster a sense of nationalism when a huge section of the society is always oriented towards relocating abroad in search of greener pastures -- thus, creating a lopsided sense of cosmopolitanism with tenuous attachment to the motherland. Moreover, since many OFWs tend to work in relatively low-skilled or dangerous professions, they are vulnerable to exploitation and abuse.

This is particularly the case when it comes to Filipino domestic helpers, who tend to lack legal protection in many (autocratic) countries. Not to mention, the worrying proliferation of illegal recruiters cruelly exploiting the desperation of would-be-OFWs, who end up in dangerous places with no employment certainty. The Middle East, where millions of Filipinos work whether legally or otherwise, is a particular area of concern. It is a region racked by conflict, political instability, and autocratic regimes with often medieval and non-transparent judicial systems.

Time to Rethink

While many Filipinos tend to (mistakenly) view the reign of Marcos as an era of supposed prosperity, they tend to overlook the fact that the OFW phenomenon actually started during the days of dictatorship. Overseeing a whimpering economy for much of his reign (Dohner & Intal 1989), the Marcos regime saw large-scale labor export as a convenient remedy to a collapsing job market at home.

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Simultaneously, the oil boom of the early-1970s also saw a major spike in Middle Eastern demand for foreign labor, especially in fields such as medicine, real estate and construction, and domestic work. Overtime, what started as a supposedly short-term response to domestic economic downturn gradually morphed into a pillar of Philippine foreign policy.

Though the Middle East is a top source of remittances, it is also where countless Filipinos have been a victim of all sorts of abuse and exploitation, mainly due to lack of proper legal protection for foreign workers, particularly low-to-semi-skilled. Opaque judicial proceedings, prejudice, and abusive practices such as confiscation of passports by employers have collectively contributed to a system of exploitation against OFWs.

Yet, one should recognize the fact that for many people, taking their chances abroad is always preferable to enduring unemployment and crushing poverty at home. Many have just given up on their country, with little hope of any significant uptick in the Philippine labor market.

The intensified sectarian conflict in the Middle East represents an added threat to the welfare of millions of OFWs in the region. Though low oil prices are good for the Philippine economy, it isn't necessary a good thing for the OFWs. Countries like Saudi Arabia, which ran a budget deficit of around $100 billion last year, is deeply affected by declining oil prices. Along with countries like Bahrain, it needs oil prices to be almost twice their current levels to balance its budget.

According to the International Monetary Fund, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, which enjoyed a budget surplus of $600 billion half a decade ago, are expected to run a $700 billion budget deficit by 2020. Due to lack of diversification, GCC economies are vulnerable to fluctuations in oil prices. And with post-sanctions Iran expected to flood the markets with boosted oil production, the petro-states are confronting the prospect of long-term oil glut. And growing regional geopolitical tensions isn't going to help efforts by petro-states to attract international investments to diversify their oil-dependent economies.

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The economic slump in the Persian Gulf means two things: First, fewer demand for overseas workers, and, more alarmingly, potential political backlash in countries where massive dole outs have precariously bought political passivity from restive populations. From both an employment and security perspective, this isn't the best news for the Philippines' labor export policy, which is deeply reliant on Persian Gulf Sheikdoms.
The president said he would sign the bill into law on the 50th anniversary of the original abortion rights decision if Democrats hold Congress in the 2022 midterm elections.
By Joni Blecher

Better housing for the world's refugees is coming from a surprising source: IKEA. Yes, that IKEA -- the flat-pack furniture kings of Sweden. The company has designed a metal housing structure that's much more durable than the tents that millions of refugees all over the globe currently inhabit. The temporary homes (which are shipped to camps in flat-pack boxes) are constructed by Better Shelter, a Swedish social enterprise owned by the Housing for All Foundation, a non-profit established by the Ikea Foundation.

Refugees from Syria and other conflict zones are migrating to Europe at an alarming rate. According to the UN Refugee Agency, from the beginning of 2015 through November, more than 876,000 people arrived on European shores. In November, more than half of those people were women and children. The standard tents where most refugees reside do provide shelter, but lack electricity, security and privacy. Once in a camp, refugees can expect to stay anywhere from a few months to a decade or more.

The new IKEA-designed shelters cost a little over a $1,000 each -- almost double the price of the existing tents -- but offer some things the tents don't, such as privacy, security, electricity and durability.

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"The refugee housing unit is an exciting new development in humanitarian shelter and represents a much needed addition to the palette of sheltering options mobilized to assist those in need. Its deployment will ensure dramatic improvement to the lives of many people affected by crises," says Shaun Scales, Chief of Shelter and Settlement, at UNHCR.

Units are about 60 square feet with four windows, two vents, and a door that locks. The inside of the structure is 6 feet high, making it easy for most people to stand and walk around. Since the design is completely modular, the structures can be easily repaired and assembled in a variety of dimensions to meet other camp needs (medical aid, schools, etc.).

Source: Better Shelter

The shelters arrive in two large cardboard boxes that can be lifted by four people. In typical IKEA "build-it-yourself" fashion, all tools are included (because honestly, who flees a war zone with a hex key) and a shelter can typically be constructed in four to eight hours. The frame, consisting of interchangeable parts, is made of durable, lightweight stainless steel that can withstand the changing environment.

Electricity is provided to each structure through a solar panel installed on the roof. During the day, it charges an LED light inside the shelter that can be used for four hours at night. The light also has a USB port that can be used to charge a mobile phone.

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In partnership with UNHCR, Better Shelter is deploying and installing these shelters in refugee camps around the world, including Iraq, Switzerland, Chad, Nepal and Greece. Over 4,700 units were delivered in the second half of 2015, and there are more on the way. UNHRC ordered 10,000 units in 2015 for use in their efforts to help refugees worldwide.

Visit XPRIZE at xprize.org; follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Google+; and get our newsletter to stay informed.
Larycia Hawkins, a Christian who is wearing a hijab over Advent in solidarity with Muslims, attends service at St. Martin Episcopal Church in Chicago on Sunday, Dec. 13, 2015. (Stacey Wescott/Chicago Tribune/TNS via Getty Images)

An act of interfaith outreach and human solidarity took place in the Chicago suburbs, by one Dr. Larycia Hawkins, a Professor at Wheaton College, a Evangelical Christian institution. This act of solidarity is now quite possibly costing Dr. Hawkins her job. At a time when Islamophobia is reaching an all-time high, resulting in hysteria and hate crimes, Dr. Hawkins donned a hijab in solidarity with the Muslim community. She also posted a statement on social media to this effect. It is part of her statement that resulted in her being put on administrative leave followed by a move to terminate her employment with Wheaton College.

The part of her statement the college seems to have a problem with is the following:



"I stand in religious solidarity with Muslims because they, like me, a Christian, are people of the book. And as Pope Francis stated last week, we worship the same God." ~Dr. Larycia Hawkins

I'm not going to tell an Evangelical Christian college what their Christian beliefs are, but I can say that this is the first time in my life that I have heard of a Christian stance so extreme - to resist this concept that we worship the same God. I grew up with a Catholic mother and Muslim father. My upbringing was based on respect for the two religions inside our household. Muslim men can marry Muslim women - or - women of the book. Muslim men can marry Christian or Jewish women because they believe in the same, One God. The God of Abraham (peace be upon him.) Jews, Christians and Muslims are cousins under Abraham. We are monotheists that worship the same God.

There are differences of course. Muslims see Jesus (peace be upon him) as a Prophet. Christians see Jesus as Lord, or part of a trinity representing the father, the son and the holy spirit. Jews do not recognize Jesus as a divine messenger, but recognize Christianity as similarly monotheist in nature.

The Christianity of my Christian family members and numerous Christian friends is one of tolerance and love for community and neighbor. In fact, I always describe my Christian friends and neighbors as people of "love." Christianity exudes love and dedication to community.

That is why this crazy event at Wheaton College is baffling to me.

From the Wheaton College website:

"The biblical foundation of Christian community is expressed in Jesus' two great commandments: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind," and, "Love your neighbor as yourself" (Matt. 22:37-40). Jesus himself perfectly demonstrated the pattern: love for God, acted out in love for others, in obedience to God's Word. Acknowledging our dependence on the power and grace of God, the members of the Wheaton College campus community humbly covenant to live according to this ideal."

Dr. Larycia Hawkins is loving her Muslim neighbors as herself at a time when I will admit - we can use some neighborly love. And Dr. Hawkins could be losing her job for it. Is it really necessary for Wheaton College to nitpick the nuances of the differences between Christianity and Islam? In my interfaith home, we focused on our similarities. If my Christian mother focused on our differences instead, would she have terminated me? Would she have aborted me? In Islam, "heaven lies beneath your mother's feet." If I were to disrespect my mother for our religious differences, would that be very Muslim of me?



with permission from CAIR-Chicago

I'm so incredibly proud of my Chicago community! Someone once said Chicago is spearheading the Renaissance of Islam - and that couldn't make me more proud. A Press Conference took place in downtown Chicago on January 6, 2015 at Chicago Temple attended by Christian, Muslim and Jewish faith leaders and community members surrounding Dr. Hawkins. In attendance were Reverend Jesse Jackson, CAIR Executive Director, Ahmed Rehab and Wheaton College staff and friends coming out in full force to show their support. Ahmed Rehab's speech was truly inspiring, like when he stated that Dr. Hawkins message "is one that is important because it goes against the currents and the waves of our time to say, 'I will stand even if alone!' but she is not going to be alone!"

with permission from CAIR-Chicago

Dr. Hawkins, I stand by you. #IAMDRHAWKINS



with permission from Community Activist, Eman Hassaballa Aly here supporting Dr. Larycia Hawkins #EmanSelfieTour

MyJihad, Inc. Board Member and Program Manager, Angie Emara, was in attendance and had this to say,

"It was truly amazing to witness a Christian woman standing up for the Muslim community, clearly stating that she will always stand for the oppressed because that is what Jesus did. That Christians and Muslims are even more alike than we knew."

Clearly, Dr. Hawkins chooses to focus on our similarities. Wheaton College chooses to focus on our differences. It is our differences that will always divide us. Hyper-focusing on our differences is what fuels extremism.
Kuni Takahashi via Getty Images JHARKHAND, INDIA - DECEMBER 06: Villagers carry illegally scavenged coal from an open-cast coal mine in Dhanbad, Jharkhand, India on December 6, 2014, trying to earn a few dollars a day. Indian government lead by Prime Minister Narendra Modi plans to double its coal production by 2019. (Photo by Kuni Takahashi/Getty Images)

NEW DELHI -- India is getting ready to open up commercial coal mining to private companies for the first time in four decades, with the aim of shifting the world's third-biggest coal importer towards energy self-sufficiency.

Anil Swarup, the country's top coal bureaucrat, told Reuters on Friday the government has identified mines it plans to auction, and is now finalising other terms such as eligibility criteria for companies to take part and whether and how to set up revenue sharing.

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He said a plan should be ready in the 2-3 months, setting a clear timeline on a plan that has previously only been vaguely marked out.

India has an ambitious plan to double its coal production to 1.5 billion tonnes a year by 2020, as part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's push to bring power to 300 million people who live without electricity, and give a boost to manufacturing.

It would also support the government's efforts to develop eastern parts of the country, which are resource-rich and hold most of India's coal reserves but have lagged the western states in development.

State-owned Coal India is on track to produce 1 billion tonnes a year by the end of this decade, and India is counting on private firms to produce the remaining 500 million tones - which may prove a tough target to achieve.

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As of now, only Coal India and a small government-owned company are allowed to mine and sell coal in India.

"It's imperative that India opens up the sector so that private companies can bring in new technologies and the efficiencies that we keep talking about," said Dipesh Dipu at energy-focused Jenissi Management Consultants. "But I don't think private companies will be able to produce more than 100 million tonnes this decade as the process has yet to start."

The move is likely to attract coal block bids from Indian conglomerates such as the Adani Group and GVK, but the government may find it harder to lure big multinational miners such as Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton, Anglo American and Peabody Energy. Rio Tinto did not respond to requests for comment.

Coal prices are at multi-year lows amid global oversupply, and foreign companies have faced obstacles to investing in India, such as problems in getting land and environmental approvals. Some private companies also worry that the best quality mines would be left for Coal India.

FINALISING TERMS

Swarup was handpicked by Modi to lead a turnaround in the coal sector soon after the prime minister came to power in 2014.

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Under Swarup's watch, Coal India has seen record production growth, and the government auctioned off a series of coal blocks successfully. Coal imports fell for a sixth straight month in December.

Until last year, India spent around $16 billion a year importing foreign coal, even though it sits on the world's fifth-biggest reserves of more than 300 billion tonnes.

Swarup said there were still some aspects of the plan to bring in private players that needed to be examined carefully.

The government, for example, has to make sure that companies do not under-report sales if a revenue-sharing model is adopted, he said.

Companies can do that by selling coal to their units at discounted rates, and by calculating the government's share based on that instead of the market price.

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Swarup declined to say where the identified mines were located. Most of India's coal is in the eastern states of Jharkhand, Odisha and Chhattisgarh.

Contact HuffPost India

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Why should Delhi not get full statehood? The main arguments we are given for this are, one, that Delhi cant be a state since it is the national capital, and two, that policing has to be with the central government since the national capital sees the coming and going of VIPs all the time, and has to manage the sensitive diplomatic enclave too.

As a result, the police in Delhi is not answerable to the people of Delhi. Since the central government has to ensure security for VIPs in central Delhi, people in Punjabi Bagh cant have a say in policing in Delhi. In Goa, whose population (15 lakhs) is less than Delhis (1.7 crore), people are able to use their vote to exFpress how they feel about the state of law and order.

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In Delhi, law and order  and much else  is run by the central government, elected by people across India. Why should all of India decide who the station house officer of Mehrauli police station be?

Arvind Kejriwal has rightly said that the central government can keep the New Delhi Municipal Corporation areas with it, and delegate the rest to the Delhi government.

Chief minister Arvind Kejriwal has rightly said that the central government can keep the New Delhi Municipal Corporation areas with it, and delegate the rest to the Delhi government. This seems like an eminently sensible suggestion. The New Delhi Municipal Corporation already reports to the central government, whereas the other municipal corporations dont.

But why would a BJP government give away powers to an AAP government, when even a Congress government in the centre for ten years didnt give full statehood to Delhi, which was then run by the Congress own Sheila Dikshit.

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Truth is, the Ministry of Home Affairs, like any other arm of the government, will not want to give away any powers it has. In charge of national security, the Home Ministry thinks it is very much its birthright to administer law and order in Shahdara, east Delhi.

Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal.

The argument we are given is that too much time and energy would be wasted in co-ordinating between the centre and the state government over issues pertaining to foreign diplomats in Delhi, should diplomats face or create any problems in areas governed by the Delhi government. By that logic, the police in Gurgaon should also be made to report directly to the central government. Remember the case recently involving a Saudi Arabian diplomat in Gurgaon? Foreign diplomats often travel across India, but the central government hasnt abrogated the powers of the state government over the police in the rest of India.

In UK, the City of London Police administers law and order in the 2.8 square kilometres of the City of London area. The rest of Greater London is protected by the Metropolitan Police Service. In Washington DC, the Metropolitan Police Department reports to the city's elected mayor. In Mexico City, only the Federal District's police is controlled by the central government, the rest of the citys police reports to the state government.

The Modi government doesnt even let Arvind Kejriwal appoint and transfer bureaucrats, leave alone let it have the Delhi Police.

The Modi government doesnt even let Arvind Kejriwal appoint and transfer bureaucrats, leave alone let it have the Delhi Police. The reason why Delhi deserves full statehood unlike other union territories is the size of it population. With 1.7 crore citizens, Delhi is larger than all other union territories combined. Chandigarh is merely ten lakh people.

It is important that citizens have a say in policing, and the local government is able to closely supervise policing in consultation with the public.

The Sixty-ninth Amendment Act, 1991, gave Delhi a special status amongst the Union Territories, changing its name from Union Territory of Delhi to National Capital Territory of Delhi. It is time to take the next logical step.

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Boo at the Zoo will take place from 2-5 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 29, throughout the grounds of the zoo, and is free to the public.
The owners of the Greylock Mill are planning an $18 million investment. They are asking for an exemption on property taxes during the renovation. The first phase of the renovation in taking place in the massive Shed on State Road. PreviousNext

North Adams Mill Owners Requesting Five-Year 'Increasing' Tax Exemption

NORTH ADAMS, Mass.  The owners of the Greylock Mill are asking for a tax break as they invest $18 million into the massive building over the next five years.



The City Council on Tuesday will decide on a special tax agreement that will raise the property tax on the more than 240,000 square foot building from zero to 100 percent over five years.



In his communication to the council, Mayor Richard Alcombright wrote that "the STA has been drafted in compliance with all state regulations and provides for tax benefit to Greylock for the significant investment and eventual job creation while fully protecting the City should certain milestones within the agreement not be met.



"Additionally, Greylock will be required under the agreement to provide reporting that demonstrates their compliance with the terms of the STA."



The mill, also known as the Cariddi mill, was purchased by Salvatore Perry and Karla Rothstein, principals of Latent Productions of New York City, an architectural design firm, last July. Latent, under the name Greylock Works, plans to transform the former textile mill into a multiuse space for artisanal foods, hospitality, residential and performances.



Work has already begun on what's being called "The Shed" portion, a long one-story building that is being renovated for food production and event use. The building is currently vacant, although a successful dinner and dance party was held New Year's Eve that attracted hundreds.



"This is a complex project that we believe can catalyze solution to some of the pivotal challenges of our time  intelligent adaptive re-use, environment and energy, and interweaving culture with business. The total estimated cost of this endeavor is anticipated to exceed ten [sic] million private dollars," according a letter submitted by Latent Production with its application for the Massachusetts Economic Development Program in North Adams.



Current taxes on the mill are $28,769.45, based on an assessment of $759,200. The STA formula as prescribed by state law sets year 1 at zero; year 2 at 25 percent; year 3 at 50 percent and year 4 at 75 percent, and year 5 (fiscal 2022) at 100 percent. The STA only exempts property tax, not personal property taxes as in a tax incremental financing agreement.



In granting the STA, the company would have to meet investment benchmarks, stay current on all other fees and taxes, and "use its best efforts to encourage tenants to hire City residents" and work with local schools, colleges and Regional Employment Board to provide opportunities for training and employment.



The agreement being set before the council states "The Project is expected to provide economic benefits to the City through significant investment in the building which will bring new businesses, and have a positive economic effect in the Route 2 commercial corridor in the City; and,



"The City strongly supports this increase in economic development to provide additional jobs for residents of the ETA, the City and surrounding area, increased commercial and industrial activity within the City leading to the further development of a healthy and diverse economy while growing the tax base ... "

Update: Edited headline to clarify content to encourage readers to read the full article.
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Imperial Valley News Center

FTC Approves Final Order In Craig Brittain Revenge Porn Case

Washington, DC - After a public comment period, the Federal Trade Commission has approved a final order resolving the Commissions complaint against Craig Brittain, alleging he used deception to acquire and post intimate images of women, then referred them to another website he controlled, where they were told they could have the pictures removed if they paid hundreds of dollars.

The settlement was first announced in 2015. In its complaint, the FTC alleged that Brittain acquired the images in a number of ways, such as by posing as a woman on the advertising site Craigslist, and offering nude photos purportedly of himself in exchange for photos provided by women. Brittain also allegedly solicited viewers of his site to anonymously submit nude photos of people to his site, according to the complaint, at times offering cash bounties for images of specific individuals.

Under the terms of the settlement, Brittain is required to permanently delete all of the images and other personal information he received during the time he operated the site. He will also be prohibited from publicly sharing intimate videos or photographs of people without their affirmative express consent, as well as being prohibited from misrepresenting how he will use any personal information he collects online.

The Commission vote to approve the final order and letters to commenters was 4-0
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Federal Jury Convicts Member of International Child Exploitation Conspiracy

Washington, DC - A Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, man was convicted today by a federal jury on child pornography charges relating to his participation in two websites that were operated for the purpose of coercing and enticing minors to engage in sexually explicit conduct on web camera.

Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell of the Justice Departments Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Dana J. Boente of the Eastern District of Virginia and Section Chief Calvin Shivers of the FBIs Violent Crimes Against Children Section (VCACS) made the announcement.

Brain K. Hendrix, 42, was charged by superseding indictment on July 23, 2015. Eight co-conspirators were charged in the Eastern District of Virginia and two co-conspirators have been charged in foreign countries. The investigation, Operation Subterfuge, identified more than 300 minor victims and an estimated 1,600 minors were lured to the websites. U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis of the Eastern District of Virginia presided over the trial.

According to court records and evidence at trial, co-conspirators created false profiles on social networking sites, such as YouTube, that portrayed them as young teenagers. They used these profiles to lure children to the websites they controlled. Once on the conspirators websites, the conspirators played pre-recorded videos of prior minor victims, often engaging in sexually explicit conduct, to make the new victims think that they were chatting with another minor. Using these videos, conspirators coerced and enticed children to engage in sexually explicit activity on their own web cameras which the website automatically recorded. Based on their contribution to the success of website objectives, conspirators earned points, which allowed them access to the sexually exploitative videos of children. Law enforcement agencies have disabled both websites.

In addition to Hendrix, the conspirators have been convicted and sentenced as follows:

Name, Age, Hometown Status Anthony Evans, 54, of Grahamstown, South Africa Pleaded guilty in South Africa and was sentenced to 10 years in prison on May 29, 2015. An extradition request remains pending. William J. Morgan, 36, of Essex, New York Pleaded guilty on June 26, 2015. Sentenced to 21 years in prison on Sept. 18, 2015. Milton Smith Jr., 34, of Lorton, Virginia Pleaded guilty on Aug. 14, 2015. Sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 22, 2016. James E. Hancock, 45, of Thomasville, Georgia Pleaded guilty on Dec. 29, 2015. Sentencing is scheduled for April 1, 2016. Christopher McNevin, 37, of Carlisle, Ohio Pleaded guilty on Aug. 21, 2015. Sentenced to 19 years in prison on Dec. 4, 2015 Carl Zwengel, 51, of Princeton, Illinois Pleaded guilty on July 10, 2015. Sentenced to 18 years in prison on Oct. 2, 2015. Karlo Hitosis, 32, of Bronx, New York Pleaded guilty on Oct. 30, 2015. Sentencing is scheduled for Feb. 5, 2016. Stephen Funk, 35, Milwaukee Pleaded guilty on Dec. 18, 2015. Sentencing is scheduled for March 25, 2016.

VCACS special agents led the investigation with the assistance of FBIs Operation Rescue Me, the FBIs Digital Analysis and Research Center and the Office of Victim Assistance. The South Africa Police Service, Family Violence, Child Protection, and Sexual Offenses, Gauteng; Royal Canadian Mounted Police, National Child Exploitation Coordination Centre; the Dutch Police Service Agency, KLPD, and the Australian Federal Police, Child Protection Operations, Sydney all worked closely with VCACS and were active partners in Operation Subterfuge, a multinational investigation coordinated by members of the FBIs Violent Crimes Against Children International Task Force. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, National Child Exploitation Coordination Centre, identified 43 victims as part of the operation. The U.S. Attorneys Offices and FBI offices in the Middle District of Georgia, Southern District of New York, Northern District of New York, Eastern District of Wisconsin, Middle District of Tennessee, Central District of Illinois and Southern District of Ohio, and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children also contributed to the investigation and prosecution. Trial Attorney Lauren Britsch of the Criminal Divisions Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS) and Assistant U.S. Attorney Tracy Doherty-McCormick prosecuted the case. CEOS Trial Attorney Ravi Sinha assisted with the prosecution. The Criminal Divisions Office of International Affairs also provided assistance.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys Offices and CEOS, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.
Governor Brown Announces Appointments

Sacramento, California - Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today announced the following appointments:

James Barthman, 81, of Castro Valley, has been reappointed to the California Building Standards Commission, where he has served since 2000. Barthman held several positions at Underwriters Laboratories Inc. from 1990 to 2000, including senior staff engineer, building and electrical code consultant and regional supervisor of codes and technical services. Barthman served in several positions for the City of Oakland from 1965 to 1990, including building official, chief electrical inspector and electrical inspector. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Barthman is a Democrat.

Raj Patel, 54, of Arcadia, has been reappointed to the California Building Standards Commission, where he has served since 2015. Patel has been assistant director of community development and city building official for the City of Beverly Hills since 2014. He served in several positions for Los Angeles County from 1985 to 2014, including assistant deputy director at the Consolidated Sewer Management District, superintendent of building, assistant superintendent of building and chief mechanical and plumbing engineer. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Patel is a Democrat.

Pedro Santillan, 45, of Downey, has been reappointed to the California Building Standards Commission, where he has served since 2015. Santillan has been business manager and secretary-treasurer for Laborers' International Union of North America, Local 1309 since 2014. He held several positions for Laborers' International Union of North America, Local 507 from 2010 to 2014, including business manager secretary-treasurer and business agent. Santillan was assistant executive director at the Construction Laborers Trust Funds for Southern California Administrative Company from 2008 to 2010 and trust funds administrator at Associated Third Party Administrators from 2001 to 2008. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Santillan is a Democrat.

Steven Barrow, 62, of Antelope, has been appointed to the California Commission on Emergency Medical Services. Barrow has been president and chief executive officer at Advocates for Health, Economics and Development and an independent consultant in strategic planning, organizational development and policy since 2013. He was policy director and executive director at the California State Rural Health Association from 2009 to 2013, a senior program officer at the Sierra Health Foundation from 1996 to 1999 and director of governmental affairs at the Center for Public Interest Law and the centers Childrens Advocacy Institute from 1985 to 1996. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Barrow is a Democrat.

Steve Drewniany, 54, of Sunnyvale, has been reappointed to the California Commission on Emergency Medical Services, where he has served since 2012. Drewniany has been a deputy chief at the City of Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety since 2011, where he has held several positions since 1989, including captain and lieutenant. He was a paramedic at American Medical Response West from 1985 to 1989 and at the Yacolt, Washington Fire Department, North Country Emergency Medical Services in 1985. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Drewniany is a Republican.

Aaron Francis Hamilton, 35, of Santa Ana, has been appointed to the California Commission on Emergency Medical Services, where he has served since 2011. Hamilton has been a managing member at Atlas Testing Laboratories LLC since 2012. He was chief technology officer at GPS Logic LLC from 2010 to 2015 and a systems engineer, emergency medical technician and dispatcher at the Care Ambulance Service from 2001 to 2010. Hamilton was a reserve firefighter and driver-operator at the Orange County Fire Authority from 1998 to 2005. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Hamilton is a Democrat.

Richard Owen Johnson, 69, of Mammoth Lakes, has been reappointed to the California Commission on Emergency Medical Services, where he has served since 2013. Johnson has been public health officer for Alpine County since 2014, for Inyo County since 2006 and for Mono County since 2002. He has been a clinical specialist at the Infant Botulism Treatment and Prevention Program since 2003 and an adjunct professor at Biola University since 1991. Johnson was a pediatrician at the Southern Mono Healthcare District from 1996 to 2014 and a managing partner and pediatrician at Pediatric Associates of Pasadena from 1979 to 1996. Johnson earned a Doctor of Medicine degree from the Albany Medical College of Union University and a Master of Public Health degree in maternal and child health from the University of California, Los Angeles School of Public Health. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Johnson is registered without party preference.

David Edward Rose, 51, of Livermore, has been reappointed to the California Commission on Emergency Medical Services, where he has served since 2013. Rose has served as battalion chief-paramedic at the City of Santa Clara Fire Department since 2013, where he was fire captain-paramedic from 1991 to 2013. He has been director of the Emergency Medical Technicians-Basic Training Program at Mission College since 2008. Rose served as a firefighter-paramedic at the South San Francisco Fire Department from 1986 to 1991. Rose is a member of the International Association of Fire Fighters, California Professional Firefighters and the National Association of Emergency Medical Services Educators. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Rose is a Democrat.

Eric M. Rudnick, 55, of Red Bluff, has been reappointed to the California Commission on Emergency Medical Services, where he has served since 2010. Rudnick has been a medical health operational area coordinator at the Glenn County Public Health Department since 2015 and medical director at Northern California Emergency Medical Services Inc. since 2005, where he was a regional disaster medical health specialist from 2004 to 2006. Rudnick was medical director at the Santa Clara County Emergency Medical Services Agency Division of Public Health from 2009 to 2015. Rudnick earned a Doctor of Medicine degree from the Medical College of Wisconsin. He is board certified in emergency medicine and emergency medical services. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Rudnick is a Democrat.

Susan Marie Webb, 58, of Foresthill, has been appointed to the California Commission on Emergency Medical Services. Webb has been a registered nurse and emergency preparedness coordinator at the Sutter Auburn Faith Hospital since 2010. She was an environmental risk coordinator at Sutter Health Support Services from 2007 to 2010 and a registered nurse and emergency preparedness coordinator at the Sutter Roseville Medical Center from 1994 to 2007. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Webb is a Republican.

Lynne Freeman, 54, of Sacramento, has been reappointed to the California Capitol Area Committee, where she has served since 2015. Freeman has been west coast regional director at the American Council for International Studies since 1992. She was a tour consultant at American Leadership Study Groups from 1989 to 1992, graduate assistant for communications studies at California State University, Sacramento from 1988 to 1990, public information officer at East Central University from 1984 to 1988 and news director and reporter at KTEN-TV from 1979 to 1984. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Freeman is a Democrat.

Steven Maviglio, 57, of Sacramento, has been reappointed to the California Capitol Area Committee, where he has served since 2014. Maviglio has been president at Forza Communications since 2008. He served as deputy chief of staff in the Office of California State Assembly Speaker Karen Bass from 2007 to 2008 and deputy chief of staff in the Office of California State Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez from 2005 to 2007. Maviglio was a member of the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board from 2003 to 2004 and served as press secretary in the Office of Governor Gray Davis from 2000 to 2003. He was office director and administrative assistant in the Office of Congressman Rush Holt from 1999 to 2000, deputy director of legislative and public affairs at the U.S. Department of Justice from 1998 to 1999, executive director for the U.S. House Democratic Caucus in the Office of Congressman Victor Fazio from 1997 to 1998, special assistant to the director at the U.S. Trade and Development Agency from 1995 to 1997 and served as a representative in the New Hampshire House of Representatives from 1990 to 1995. Maviglio is secretary of the Sacramento Natural Foods Co-op Board of Directors. He earned a Master of Public Administration degree from the University of New Hampshire. This position does not require Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Maviglio is a Democrat.

Adhitya Nagraj, 39, of Oakland, has been appointed to the California Housing Partnership Corporation Board. Nagraj has been director of development at BRIDGE Housing Corporation since 2013. He was project manager at the Mid- Peninsula Housing Corporation from 2010 to 2013 and at the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation from 2006 to 2010. Nagraj was an associate at Farella, Braun and Martel LLP from 2005 to 2006. He earned a Juris Doctor degree from Columbia Law School. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Nagraj is a Democrat.

Timothy Onderko, 38, of Loomis, has been reappointed to the California Housing Partnership Corporation Board, where he has served since 2012. Onderko has been a member of the Loomis Planning Commission since 2015 and vice president at the Money Brokers Inc. since 2006. He was a consultant for California State Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez from 2004 to 2006 and a staff member on the Ira Ruskin for Assembly campaign in 2004. Onderko was grant manager and consultant for the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California from 2002 to 2004 and a legislative aide in the Office of California State Assembly Speaker Robert Hertzberg from 2000 to 2002. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Onderko is registered without party preference.

Steve Beneto, 78, of Carmichael, has been reappointed to the California Horse Racing Board of Directors, where he has served since 2012. Beneto has been president at Beneto Inc. since 1979. He was a member of the California Exposition and State Fair Board of Directors from 2000 to 2004 and from 2005 to 2011, where he served as chair from 2001 to 2002. Beneto is a member of the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame Board of Directors and a founding member and chair of the University of California, Davis Medical Investigation of Neurodevelopmental Disorders Institute. He was a member of the Shriners Hospitals for Children Board of Directors from 2008 to 2010, inducted into the California State Fair Rodeo Hall of Fame in 2011 and awarded the California State Fair Golden Bear Award in 2004. This position requires Senate confirmation and the compensation is $100 per diem. Beneto is a Republican.
California Man Arrested for Making False Statements in a Terrorism Investigation

Sacramento, California - A Sacramento, California, resident was arrested Wednesday on a federal charge of making a false statement involving international terrorism. Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, 23, is charged in a complaint that was unsealed today in the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of California following his arrest. He had his initial appearance Thursday.

The arrest was announced by Assistant Attorney General for National Security John P. Carlin, U.S. Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner of the Eastern District of California and Special Agent in Charge Monica M. Miller of the FBIs Sacramento Division.

Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab allegedly traveled overseas to fight alongside terrorist organizations and lied to U.S. authorities about his activities, said Assistant Attorney General Carlin. The National Security Divisions highest priority is protecting the nation from terrorism, and we will continue to hold accountable those who seek to join or aid the cause of terrorism, whether at home or abroad.

According to the allegations in the complaint, the defendant traveled to Syria to take up arms with terrorist organizations and concealed that conduct from immigration authorities, said U.S. Attorney Wagner. While he represented a potential safety threat, there is no indication that he planned any acts of terrorism in this country. I commend the FBIs Joint Terrorism Task Force for their dedicated work on this matter.

In todays complex terrorism environment, our Joint Terrorism Task Force plays an important role in combating the threat of terrorism. The collaboration is stronger than ever and essential to protect our communities from harm, said Special Agent in Charge Miller. The public plays an equal, if not more important, role in protecting the community. We encourage those who encounter individuals who express an intent to do harm or claim allegiance to a terrorist group  whether in person or online  to voice their concerns to law enforcement.

According to the complaint, Al-Jayab is a Palestinian born in Iraq, who came to the United States as an Iraqi refugee in October 2012. Between October 2012 and November 2013, while living in Arizona and Wisconsin, he communicated over social media with numerous other individuals about his intent to return to Syria to fight for terrorist organizations. In those communications, according to the complaint, Al-Jayab discussed his previous experience with firearms and with fighting against the regime in Syria. On Nov. 9, 2013, he flew from Chicago to Turkey, and then traveled to Syria. Between November 2013 and January 2014, Al-Jayab allegedly reported on social media that he was in Syria fighting with various terrorist organizations, including Ansar al-Islam, a designated foreign terrorist organization since 2004. He returned to the United States on Jan. 23, 2014, and settled in Sacramento.

The complaint alleges that on Oct. 6, 2014, Al-Jayab was interviewed by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and responded in the negative to numerous questions, including whether he had ever been a member of any rebel group or militia; whether he had ever provided material support for any person or group engaged in terrorist activity; and whether he had ever been a member of a group, or assisted in a group, which used or threatened the use of weapons against others. Al-Jayab also allegedly stated during the interview that he had traveled to Turkey in late 2013 and early 2014 to visit his grandmother. The complaint alleges that all of those answers were materially false.

If convicted, Al-Jayab faces a maximum statutory penalty of eight years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Any potential sentence will be determined by the court after review of factors unique to this case, including the defendants prior criminal history, if any, the defendants role in the offense and the characteristics of the violation.

The charges are only allegations; the defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

The ongoing investigation is being conducted by the FBIs Joint Terrorism Task Force. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jill Thomas of the Eastern District of California and Trial Attorney Andrew Sigler of the National Security Divisions Counterterrorism Section.
Homeland Security Secretary Jeh C. Johnson On The Apprehension Of Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman Loera

Washington, DC - Statement By Secretary Jeh C. Johnson On The Apprehension Of Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman Loera:

As I said publicly when asked in Mexico last year, I was confident that the Government of Mexico would apprehend the fugitive drug lord Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman Loera. I commend President Pena Nieto, Secretary Miguel Angel Osorio Chong, the Mexican government, and all those involved in todays arrest. His recapture demonstrates the Mexican governments steadfast commitment to combating drug trafficking organizations and the violence they perpetuate. We will continue to work collaboratively with our Mexican partners to ensure that all of our citizens can live in peace and prosperity.
National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day

Washington, DC - Statement By Secretary Jeh C. Johnson On National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day:

"Today, on National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day, I would like to thank all law enforcement officers serving our communities. From the frontline officers across the Department of Homeland Security, to the federal, state and local officers we work with every day, your important efforts go unnoticed far too often.

"Just last month I had the privilege of delivering remarks at the New York Police Department Academy graduation ceremony. As I noted then, the terrorist threat today is very different than it was on 9/11. Given the events of recent months, local law enforcement is at a heightened state of awareness. Homeland security has become a matter of hometown security, and the local officer on the beat may be the first to detect a terrorist attack on the United States. I am confident that the men and women serving in law enforcement will continue to rise to the challenge posed by the evolving terrorist threat.

"To law enforcement personnel, both within DHS and across the country, thank you for your continued service to protect the public and preserve the peace, and for putting your life on the line every day." ~ Jeh C. Johnson
UK Delegates Deepen Cooperation, Partnerships Aboard Ronald Reagan

Yokosuka, Japan - The U.S. Navy's only forward-deployed aircraft carrier, USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76), hosted nine officials from the United Kingdom (U.K.).

Rear Adm. John Alexander, commander, Battle Force 7th Fleet, and Capt. Brett Crozier, Ronald Reagan's executive officer, welcomed aboard the Right Honourable (Rt. Hon.) Philip Hammond, Member of Parliament (MP), Secretary of Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the Rt. Hon. Michael Fallon MP, Secretary of State for Defence, and other delegates, and held a press conference on the ship's flight deck.



"I am very pleased to have our allies from the United Kingdom aboard the U.S. Navy's forward-deployed aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan," said Alexander. "It's my great honor to introduce the U.K. Foreign Secretary Minister Hammond and the U.K. Defence Secretary, Mr. Fallon."



British Ambassador to Japan Tim Hitchens, Director, Asia-Pacific Stephen Lillie, and Director, General Security, Ministry of Defence, United Kingdom Peter Watkins, were also among those who visited Ronald Reagan.



"We are delighted to be on board USS Ronald Reagan this morning," said Hammond. "We've been on the Izumo [Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force helicopter destroyer JS Izumo (DDH 183)] seeing how the Japanese and American forces work together to ensure our security and the interests of the international community in this region. It's very inspiring."



Hammond added the Asia-Pacific region is generating most of the world's economic growth and is increasingly becoming important to trade, prosperity and security.



"Our presence today demonstrates our commitment to the three-way alliance between Japan, the United States and the United Kingdom to helping preserve the stability in this particular region," said Fallon. "Japan is our closest security partner in this region and we work with the United States alongside the Japan Self-Defense Forces. Meeting, later today, our counterparts from Japan will enable us to develop that cooperation further in terms of joint exercises or exchanges, capacity building outside the United States in this region, and more industrial collaboration."



Fallon continued that he hopes to deepen the cooperation and progress made during the past year in technology, high-tech specialist equipment, sensors, radars, helicopters, submarine, and air-to-air capabilities.



During the conference, Hammond spoke about how the international community should respond to North Korea's nuclear tests.



"It is true that the efforts of the international community, so far, to contain and deter North Korea's nuclear ambitions was succeeding in slowing the program down, but we clearly haven't succeeded in halting it, as this week's test shows," said Hammond. "North Korea acted, totally, in an irresponsible and provocative way and I can entirely understand the pressure that the South Koreans feel to respond. But we have to be bigger than the North Koreans and I would urge South Korea, and other like-minded countries in the region, to exercise restraint. We know that responding in this way is simply rising to the bait North Korea is presenting to us. But if we are going to ask the South Koreans to act with restraint, we have to demonstrate to them that the international community is prepared to take action to address the challenge that North Korea represents. Continuing with words is not enough, we have to show that we are prepared to take the actions to make the sanctions against North Korea effective."



The U.K.'s secretary of state for foreign and commonwealth affairs and secretary of state for defence's visit to Ronald Reagan reflects the strong relationship between the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan and their partners in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region.
Assistant Secretary Frank A. Rose to Travel to Western, Nordic and Baltic European Countries

Washington, DC - Assistant Secretary for Arms Control, Verification and Compliance Frank A. Rose, will travel to France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Ukraine, Finland, Sweden, Estonia, and Lithuania from January 9-27.

From January 10-18, Assistant Secretary Rose will be in Paris, The Hague, Berlin, and Rome for bilateral discussions on arms control, nuclear security, ballistic missile defense, and outer space security. He will meet with senior officials from each countrys Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Defense. He will also travel to Brussels, where on January 12 he will participate in a press roundtable hosted by the U.S. Mission to NATO.

From January 18-20, Assistant Secretary Rose will visit Kyiv to hold discussions with officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the State Space Agency, and the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine on space security and other topics of mutual interest. Assistant Secretary Rose will also participate in a ceremony marking the update of the bilateral Nuclear Risk Reduction Center (NRRC) communications link at the Ministry of Defense.

On January 21, Assistant Secretary Rose will visit Helsinki for meetings with counterparts from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Defense, and with Members of Parliament on arms control, and other international security issues.

From January 22-24, Assistant Secretary Rose will visit Stockholm and meet with officials from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Defense on disarmament, strategic stability, and on the International Partnership for Nuclear Disarmament Verification (IPNDV).

From January 24-26, Assistant Secretary Rose will be in Tallinn and Vilnius, respectively, to conduct meetings with officials from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Defense. On January 25, A/S Rose will deliver public remarks at the International Center for Defense Studies (ICDS) in Estonia.
Watch: Viral Video Of Glass Octopus Leaves Internet In Wonder
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It was more than 10 years ago that Mary Lou Randour realised she couldnt answer what should have been a simple question: Was cruelty against animals on the rise or in decline?

Randour, a psychologist who switched careers to devote herself full time to animal rights advocacy, found there was no one keeping track of animal-abuse crimes. Even the most egregious cases, like dogfighting, fell under the category of other when local police agencies reported their statistics to the Federal Bureau of Investigation National Incident Based Reporting System.

She began a concerted push for the FBI to elevate animal cruelty to its own separate offense category. After a years-long lobbying effort, in 2014, the FBI agreed. And this year will be the first time it collects data on animal crimes the way it does for other serious crimes like homicide.

The FBI defines cruelty to animals as: Intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly taking an action that mistreats or kills any animal without just cause, such as torturing, tormenting, mutilation, maiming, poisoning, or abandonment.

There will be four categories of crimes: simple or gross neglect, intentional abuse and torture, organised abuse  like dog fighting and cock fighting  and animal sexual abuse.

These are creatures that suffer and we know their capacity to suffer, said Randour, now the senior adviser for animal cruelty programs and training at the nonprofit Animal Welfare Institute. In most societies its recognised that creatures that are dependent on others, whether the elderly or children or animals, need to be protected.

Over the weekend, a YouTube video of an abused dog in Romania reacting to his first time being petted was viewed more than 4 million times. The dog cowers and yelps at the sight of a womans hand. When he realises shes showing him affection, he nuzzles close and allows her to stroke him.

Its a devastating reminder of the realities of animal cruelty.

Like these distressing images, advocates hope the statistics on the volume and extent of crimes against animals will evoke similar emotions of outrage and heartbreak.

The FBI now counting animal abuse as a serious crime and backing it up with hard data is a huge policy shift and significant step forward, said Scott Heiser, an attorney with the Animal Defense League.

I think there is truth to the notion they will be a lot more interested when they recognize how much volume there really is, he said.

In 13 states and Washington, D.C., neglecting an animal is considered a felony. In all but two states, so-called affirmative acts of abuse are a felony on the first offense, though that can be subjective.

Vandhana Bala, an attorney for Mercy for Animals, which advocates for humane treatment of farmed animals, called the FBIs move a step in the right direction. But she said there is inequity in how cruelty to dogs and cats is punished compared to other animals, like pigs, cows, and chickens.

On Tuesday, the group scored a victory when a farm worker in North Carolina was convicted for kicking chickens and stomping them to death.

As practical matter, its heartening that the FBI is beginning to understand the seriousness of animal cruelty, Bala said, but added that she hopes the agency will crackdown on crimes against all animals.

The National Sheriffs Association was also a strong backer of the FBIs policy change. But the groups motivation wasnt animal welfare.

When Randour first brought the idea of tracking animal abuse data to the FBI a decade ago, John Thompson sat on the agencys policy advisory board. It was dismissed as trivial. But several years ago, Thompson, now deputy executive director of the National Sheriffs Association, was presented research that many serial killers, like Son of Sam, foreshadowed their penchant for violence at an early age through abusing animals.

Research has backed up that animal abuse can be a precursor to future violent crimes. In the popular Netflix true crime series, Making a Murderer, the principal character burned his cat alive.

Im on a mission because all these years Ive missed it and it was sitting right in front of me, Thompson said.

Some police agencies are already on it. Baltimore and Fairfax counties, for instance, have officers dedicated to investigating animal cruelty complaints.

The goal, he said, is that after several years of collecting the statistics other agencies will be able to see trends that will allow them to better allocate their resources to catching animal abusers.

For Randour the mission now is convincing local law enforcement to report the statistics, since the FBIs data collection is voluntary. Part of that is appealing both emotionally  animal abuse is inhumane  and pragmatically  it can help understand other crimes.

There is overwhelming evidence that [animal abuse] is linked to crimes against people, including violent crimes and domestic violence, she said. Its not about protecting people or animals, its protecting them both.

Copyright: Washington Post
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LOVE them or HATE them, knuckle tattoos have become something of a subversive trend. No longer the preserve of sailors and convicts, finger art is being popularised by Millennials, who are getting creative with eight characters. (And you thought Twitter's 140-character limit was a challenge.)

Photographer Edward Bishop began photographing knuckle tattoos back in 2009, visiting Brighton and London, as well as tattoo conventions across the UK, to shoot these tats in their natural habitats. He turned his collection into a self-published book in 2014.

Nicknamed "career killers" or "job stoppers", knuckle tattoos  which are famously difficult to hide  are often a last resort for body-art enthusiasts with no space left on their skin.

'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop Show all 25 1 /25 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop LOVE them or HATE them, knuckle tattoos have become something of a subversive trend  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop No longer the preserve of sailors and convicts, finger art is being popularised by Millennials, who are getting creative with eight characters  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop Photographer Edward Bishop began photographing knuckle tattoos back in 2009  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop Bishop visited Brighton and London, as well as tattoo conventions across the UK, to shoot these tats in their natural habitats.  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop Bishop turned his collection into a self-published book in 2014  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop Nicknamed "career killers" or "job stoppers", knuckle tattoos are famously difficult to hide  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop As with most body art, people tend to use knuckle tattoos as a way of expressing something about themselves  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop Knuckle tattoos are often a last resort for body-art enthusiasts with no space left on their skin  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop Choosing exactly what to say can be tricky. Should you opt for one long word or two short ones?  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop The archetypal knuckle tattoo is LOVE HATE. First seen on the fists of sociopathic preacher the Reverend Harry Powell in the 1955 thriller The Night of the Hunter, (as played by Robert Mitchum), this option is still one of the most common.  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop HOLD FAST is also widely used, traditionally by superstitious sailors who believed the words helped them hold on more tightly in a storm.  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop The knuckle tattoo has been dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century, with phrases such as BUFF TING, FOXY LADY, and BURRITOS finding their way on to elaborately decorated digits  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop 'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me  Edward Bishop

The archetypal knuckle tattoo is, of course, LOVE HATE. First seen on the fists of sociopathic preacher the Reverend Harry Powell in the 1955 thriller The Night of the Hunter, (as played by Robert Mitchum), this option is still one of the most common. HOLD FAST is also widely used, traditionally by superstitious sailors who believed the words helped them hold on more tightly in a storm.

Now, the knuckle tattoo has been dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century, with phrases such as BUFF TING, FOXY LADY, and BURRITOS finding their way on to elaborately decorated digits. But choosing exactly what to say can be tricky. Should you opt for one long word or two short ones? And is it OK to include thumbs? As with most body art, people tend to use knuckle tattoos as a way of expressing something about themselves. It could be that they're hard-working (SELF MADE), or high maintenance (LADY MUCK). What would I get? Probably SORRY MUM.

'Knuckles' by Edward Bishop; knuckletattoos.co.uk/the-book; edwardbishop.me
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The family of a mixed-raced student diagnosed with blood cancer have launched an international appeal for a rare donor.

Lara Casalotti, 24, has both Thai and Italian heritage. Since matching donors usually come from someone of the same ethnicity, the chances of finding the right donor for her tissue type are low.

Casalotti was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia a week before Christmas, when she suspected she had pulled a muscle in her back. Doctors said a stem cell transplant would be crucial, with her best chance of finding a match amongst people with both Asian and European heritage.

But of the donors registered with Anthony Nolan, a leading bone marrow charity, only 0.5 per cent are from East Asian backgrounds. In fact, Casalottis case reveals a troubling fact of the bone marrow register: a dearth of donors for ethnic minorities.

Patients of Asian, black and minority ethnic backgrounds have less than a 20 per cent chance of finding a suitable match.

Laras family have launched the Match4Lara appeal in order to find a match for Lara  but they also hope to raise awareness for other blood cancer patients from ethnic minorities who are desperate for a stem cell transplant. Sadly, Casalottis only brother is not a match.

The Match4Lara campaign has begun to gain traction, with the Facebook page garnering 6,000 likes, and Anthony Nolan confirming over 2,000 registrations overnight. Celebrities have offered their support, too, with Stephen Fry tweeting: Mixed race? You can do something with your unique identity  save a life.

Ms Casalotti is currently undergoing treatment at Londons University College Hospital. She was taken ill in Thailand, while working with an Oxford professor on conditions for migrant workers. She has previously worked with the UN and Human Rights Watch. "I really can't express how grateful and touched I am by everyone who has helped raise awareness and has signed up to bone marrow registries in response to the campaign, she said.

Potential donors can sign up by spitting in a kit pack and sending it by post. Anthony Nolan only accepts donations from donors under 30, but those older can sign up via the British Bone Marrow Registry or Delete Blood Cancer.

Visit the match4lara.com website for more details.
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Q. I read your answers to the questions about Extra Energy (see link below) with interest. In August I switched from Extra Energy to SSE and since then have been owed 106 by Extra Energy, as my direct debit payments were greater than the cost of the electricity used.

I phoned the company 15 times  and on the five occasions I got through, I was promised payment. I have also written three times to the company's managing director, who has not replied. MH, Oxfordshire

A. Extra Energy explained that "an internal issue" delayed your final bill. It said it advised you when you complained that it would take four to six weeks to issue a refund  a period that seems to us excessive. The refund was apparently processed in November and approved in December.

Extra Energy's managing director, Ben Jones, said: "In this case, we've fallen below the high standards we expect of ourselves, and a senior member of my team has called [the reader] to personally apologise for the delay in issuing her refund."

You tell us you have received the 106, plus a 50 goodwill payment. In addition, you received 125 to cover the cost of a small claims court action that you initiated at the same time you contacted us.

Although the company claims to offer "high standards", we have now had complaints from three Extra Energy customers who did not experience this.

Waiting for Anglian to reimburse my 200

Q. My house was fitted with a complete set of new windows and doors in August by Anglian Home Improvements. I overpaid my account by 200, and despite phone calls and two letters, I have not recovered my money. I would like to avoid having to go to the small claims court. IG, Kent

A. A spokeswoman for Anglian replied: "Having investigated the situation, we owe [the reader] an apology as he is absolutely correct and a 200 refund is due. Despite having sent us copies of the documentation, an administrative error at Anglian meant the refund was not recognised on our systems. I can confirm a cheque has been dispatched."

Charged as I couldn't move my broadband

Q. We moved house in September. We wanted to take our existing Virgin Media broadband service with us, but Virgin Media does not cover our new address.

It wants to charge us 145.50 for cancelling its service, but this seems unfair when it is unable to provide a service. JD, Hertfordshire

A. A spokeswoman for the company said: "Our contracts are very clear that if a service is ended early, a disconnection fee may be charged. We appreciate that not everyone lives in a Virgin Media cabled area, which is why we are investing 3bn to bring broadband to 4 million premises throughout the UK."

Nothing smart about my phone deal

Q. I was given a BlackBerry in May by a relative after her contract. The phone was no longer connected to a network, so I couldn't test it.

In June, my relative arranged to have the handset unlocked. I signed up with Vodafone for a SIM-only plan offering unlimited minutes and texts and 1GB of data.

I found that while I could make and receive phone calls, and texts, I could not use the internet facilities.

I went to the Vodafone shop, which added a full BlackBerry services package. Still the internet could not be accessed. I went back to the shop, where the assistant was unable to help; we concluded that the internet data allowance, a major part of the SIM-only package, could not be utilised.

I wrote to Vodafone seeking its agreement to cancel the contract. I received two letters from the company, one saying I had the right to cancel my direct debit at any time, another assuring me that I had the right to cancel my contract within 14 days of the letter's receipt. I emailed confirming my wish to do that. But I then received a letter requesting payment of 15.30.

However, Vodafone then agreed to waive the charge and told me to disregard the letter.

But in September I had a demand for 19.66 from a company called Debt & Revenue Services, which said that a default notice might be placed on my credit reference agency file. I wrote back saying the matter had been resolved with Vodafone.

DRS wrote again, saying it had left messages for me to which I had not responded  which was incorrect. I received another letter from DRS, so I wrote back saying it should discuss this with Vodafone. I have now been contacted yet again by DRS with a demand for payment; I have also had another demand from Vodafone. PL, Norfolk

A. Vodafone apologises. A spokeswoman said: "We've cleared the balance from the bill incorrectly issued to [the reader], removed any marks on his credit file and made sure he wasn't listed with any debt-collection agencies."

The company offered to reconnect your handset on a pay-as-you-go arrangement, along with a 30 credit. You refused this, saying you wanted nothing more to do with Vodafone, and requested a payment of 30 instead be made to a charity of your choice. Vodafone said it couldn't do this, but was willing to make the payment direct to you, for you to pass on to the charity. You restated your position. There the matter is concluded.
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A right-wing columnist offered the British jihadist suspected of being the voice in Isis latest propaganda video a "one way ticket to Syria".

Writing in the Spectator, journalist Douglas Murray recounted a heated exchange he had with Siddhartha Dhar - the Muslim convert who has been dubbed the new Jihadi John after his voice reportedly appeared in an Isis propaganda video - on the BBC where he told the extremist to leave the UK if he wanted to live under Sharia law.

Dhar - who is also known by his adopted name Abu Rumaysah - is believed to have left Britain to join Isis in September 2014 - not long after the debate on Sunday Morning Live.

Raised as a Hindu he converted to Islam in his late teens, he became known for his radical views and support for Sharia law.

The 32-year-old was a well known radical in London and was a member of the extremist organisation al-Muhajiroun - led by hate preacher Anjem Choudary - which was banned after Mr Murray was ambushed by its supporters at a debate on Sharia Law in London in 2009.

Dhar travelled to Syria in 2014 with his wife and children while on bail after being arrested for being a member of a proscribed group.

Speaking on the programme, Dhar praised the terror group and said the videos of journalists being beheaded by the group were lies and the massacres of Yazidis and Christians were exaggerations.

 New Jihadi John suspect's sister - 'I will kill him myself'

The former bouncy castle salesman said Sharia law was superior to British democracy: As a Muslim I would like to see the UK governed by the Sharia. It is far superior to democracy. I dont really identify myself with British values. I am Muslim first, second and last.

He also said of course he would go and fight for Isis in Syria.

In response Mr Murray said Well why dont you? and even joked the studio could have a whip-round to get him a ticket that evening.

But today Mr Murray does not regret what he said: For my part, I dont regret that I taunted Rumaysah to leave.

In pictures: The rise of Isis Show all 74 1 /74 In pictures: The rise of Isis In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters Fighters of the Islamic State wave the group's flag from a damaged display of a government fighter jet following the battle for the Tabqa air base, in Raqqa, Syria AP In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters Fighters from Islamic State group sit on their tank during a parade in Raqqa, Syria AP In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters Fighters from the Islamic State group pray at the Tabqa air base after capturing it from the Syrian government in Raqqa, Syria AP In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters Fighters from extremist Islamic State group parade in Raqqa, Syria AP In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis kidnapping A video uploaded to social networks shows men in underwear being marched barefoot along a desert road before being allegedly executed by Isis Getty Images In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis kidnapping Haruna Yukawa after his capture by Isis In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis kidnapping Khalinda Sharaf Ajour, a Yazidi, says two of her daughters were captured by Isis militants Washington Post In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters Spokesperson for Isis Vice News via Youtube In pictures: The rise of Isis A pro-Isis leaflet A pro-Isis leaflet handed out on Oxford Street In London Ghaffar Hussain In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters Isis Jihadists burn their passports In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis controls Syrian Aid A man collecting aid administered by Isis in Syria In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis controls Syrian Aid A woman collecting aid administered by Isis in Syria In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis controls Syrian Aid Local civilians queue for aid administered by Isis. Since it declared a caliphate the group has increasingly been delivering services such as healthcare, and distributing aid and free fuel In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Iraqi security forces detain men suspected of being militants of the Isis group in Diyala province In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Mourners carry the coffin of a Shi'ite volunteer from the brigades of peace, who joined the Iraqi army and was killed during clashes with militants of the Isis group in Samarra, during his funeral in Najaf In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraqi refugees An Iraqi Shiite Turkmen family fleeing the violence in the Iraqi city of Tal Afar, west of Mosul, arrives at a refugee camp on the outskirts of Arbil, in Iraq's Kurdistan region In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi A photograph made from a video by the jihadist affiliated group Furqan Media via their twitter account allegedly showing Isis leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi delivering a sermon during Friday prayers at a mosque in Mosul. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared an Islamist caliphate in the territory under the group's control in Iraq and Syria In pictures: The rise of Isis Islamic extremists destroying mosques in Iraq Shiite's Al-Qubba Husseiniya mosque explodes in Mosul In pictures: The rise of Isis Islamic extremists destroying mosques in Iraq Smoke and debris go up in the air as Shiite's Al-Qubba Husseiniya mosque explodes in Mosul. Images posted online show that Islamic extremists have destroyed at least 10 ancient shrines and Shiite mosques in territory - the city of Mosul and the town of Tal Afar - they have seized in northern Iraq in recent weeks In pictures: The rise of Isis Islamic extremists destroying mosques in Iraq A bulldozer destroys Sunni's Ahmed al-Rifai shrine and tomb in Mahlabiya district outside of Tal Afar In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Iraqi security forces celebrate after clashes with followers of Shiite cleric Mahmoud al-Sarkhi, in front of his home in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Baghdad In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Iraqi security forces arrest a follower of Shiite cleric Mahmoud al-Sarkhi after clashes with his followers in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Baghdad In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Iraqi security forces arrest a follower of Shiite cleric Mahmoud al-Sarkhi at his home after clashes with his followers in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Baghdad In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Iraqi security forces arrest a follower of Shiite cleric Mahmoud al-Sarkhi after clashes with his followers in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Baghdad In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis A vehicle burns in front of a home of a follower of Shiite cleric Mahmoud al-Sarkhi after clashes with his followers in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Baghdad In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraqi refugees An Iraqi woman holds her exhausted son as over 1000 Iraqis who have fled fighting in and around the city of Mosul and Tal Afar wait at a Kurdish checkpoint in the hopes of entering a temporary displacement camp in Khazair In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraqi refugees Displaced Iraqi women hold pots as they queue to receive food during the first day of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, at an encampment for displaced Iraqis who fled from Mosul and other towns, in the Khazer area outside Irbil, north Iraq In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria A militant Islamist fighter waving a flag, cheers as he takes part in a military parade along the streets of Syria's northern Raqqa. The fighters held the parade to celebrate their declaration of an Islamic "caliphate" after the group captured territory in neighbouring Iraq In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria Isis fighters wave flags as they take part in a military parade along the streets of Syria's northern Raqqa province Reuters In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria Isis fighters travel in a vehicle as they take part in a military parade along the streets of Syria's northern Raqqa province In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria Fighters from the Isis group during a parade with a missile in Raqqa, Syria. Militants from an al-Qaida splinter group held a military parade in their stronghold in northeastern Syria, displaying U.S.-made Humvees, heavy machine guns, and missiles captured from the Iraqi army for the first time since taking over large parts of the Iraq-Syria border In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria Isis fighters during a parade in Raqqa, Syria In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria Fighters from the Isis group during a parade in Raqqa, Syria. Militants from the splinter group held a military parade in their stronghold in northeastern Syria, displaying U.S.-made Humvees, heavy machine guns, and missiles captured from the Iraqi army for the first time since taking over large parts of the Iraq-Syria border In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria Isis fighters hold a military parade in their stronghold in northeastern Syria In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria Isis fighters during a parade in Raqqa, Syria In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Syria A member loyal to the Isis waves an Isis flag in Raqqa In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Iraqi anti-government gunmen from Sunni tribes in the western Anbar province march during a protest in Ramadi, west of Baghdad. The United Nations warned that Iraq is at a "crossroads" and appealed for restraint, as a bloody four-day wave of violence killed 195 people. The violence is the deadliest so far linked to demonstrations that broke out in Sunni areas of the Shiite-majority country more than four months ago, raising fears of a return to all-out sectarian conflict In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Iraqi security forces hold up a flag of the Isis group they captured during an operation to regain control of Dallah Abbas north of Baqouba, the capital of Iraq's Diyala province, 35 miles (60 kilometers) northeast of Baghdad In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Iraq Isis fighters parade in the northern city of Mosul In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Volunteers, who have joined the Iraqi army to fight against the predominantly Sunni militants from the radical Isis group, demonstrate their skills during a graduation ceremony after completing their field training in Najaf In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Kurdish Peshmerga troops fire a cannon during clashes with militants of the Isis group in Jalawla, Diyala province In pictures: The rise of Isis Lieutenant General Qassem Atta speaks during a press conference Iraqi Prime Minister's security spokesman, Lieutenant General Qassem Atta speaks during a press conference about the latest military development in Iraq, in the capital Baghdad. Iraqi forces pressed a campaign to retake militant-held Tikrit, clashing with jihadist-led Sunni militants nearby and pounding positions inside the city with air strikes in their biggest counter-offensive so far In pictures: The rise of Isis A police station building destroyed by Isis fighters An exterior view of a police station building destroyed by gunmen in Mosul city, northern Iraq. Iraq's new parliament is expected to convene to start the process of setting up a new government, despite deepening political rifts and an ongoing Islamist-led insurgency. Iraqi President Jalal Talabani issued a decree inviting the new House of Representatives to meet and form a new government In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Iraq Smoke billows from an area controlled by the Isis between the Iraqi towns of Naojul and Tuz Khurmatu, both located north of the capital Baghdad, as Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga forces take part in an operation to repel the Sunni militants In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraqi refugees An elderly Iraqi woman is helped into a temporary displacement camp for Iraqis caught-up in the fighting in and around the city of Mosul in Khazair In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraqi refugees An Iraqi Christian woman fleeing the violence in the village of Qaraqush, about 30 kms east of the northern province of Nineveh, cries upon her arrival at a community center in the Kurdish city of Arbil in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraqi refugees An Iraqi woman, who fled with her family from the northern city of Mosul, prays with a copy of the Quran AP In pictures: The rise of Isis Isis fighters in Iraq The body of an Isis militant killed during clashes with Iraqi security forces on the outskirts of the city of Samarra Reuters In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Iraqi civilians inspect the damage at a market after an air strike by the Iraqi army in central Mosul EPA In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Members of the Al-Abbas brigades, who volunteered to protect the Shiite Muslim holy sites in Karbala against Sunni militants fighting the Baghdad government, parade in the streets of the city AP In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis Shia tribesmen gather in Baghdad to take up arms against Sunni insurgents marching on the capital. Thousands have volunteered to bolster defences AFP/Getty In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq crisis A van carrying volunteers joining Iraqi security forces against Jihadist militants. Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki announced the Iraqi government would arm and equip civilians who volunteered to fight AFP/Getty In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Fighters of the Isis group parade in a commandeered Iraqi security forces armored vehicle down a main road at the northern city of Mosul In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq An Islamist fighter, identified as Abu Muthanna al-Yemeni from Britain (R), speaks in this still image taken undated video shot at an unknown location and uploaded to a social media website. Five Islamist fighters identified as Australian and British nationals have called on Muslims to join the wars in Syria and Iraq, in the new video released by the Isis In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Al-Qaida inspired militants stand with captured Iraqi Army Humvee at a checkpoint belonging to Iraqi Army outside Beiji refinery some 250 kilometers (155 miles) north of Baghdad. The fighting at Beiji comes as Iraq has asked the U.S. for airstrikes targeting the militants from the Isis group. While U.S. President Barack Obama has not fully ruled out the possibility of launching airstrikes, such action is not imminent in part because intelligence agencies have been unable to identify clear targets on the ground, officials said In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Militants attacked Iraq's main oil refinein Baiji as they pressed an offensive that has seen them capture swathes of territory, a manager and a refinery employee said In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Militants from the Isis group parading with their weapons in the northern city of Baiji in the in Salaheddin province In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq A smoke rises after an attack by Isis militants on the country's largest oil refinery in Beiji, some 250 kilometers (155 miles) north of the capital, Baghdad. Iraqi security forces battled insurgents targeting the country's main oil refinery and said they regained partial control of a city near the Syrian border, trying to blunt an offensive by Sunni militants who diplomats fear may have also seized some 100 foreign workers In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Militants of the Isis group stand next to captured vehicles left behind by Iraqi security forces at an unknown location in the Salaheddin province. For militant groups, the fight over public perception can be even more important than actual combat, turning military losses into propaganda victories and battlefield successes into powerful tools to build support for the cause In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq An injured fighter (C) from the Isis group after a battle with Iraqi soldiers at an undisclosed location near the border between Syria and Iraq In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Fighters from the Isis aiming at advancing Iraqi troops at an undisclosed location near the border between Syria and Iraq In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Fighters from the Isis group taking position at an undisclosed location near the border between Syria and Iraq In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Fighters from the Isis group inspecting vehicles of the Iraqi army after they were seized at an undisclosed location near the border between Syria and Iraq In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq One Iraqi captive, a corporal, is reluctant to say the slogan, and has to be shouted at repeatedly before he obeys Sky News In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Iraqi captives held by the extremists Sky News In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Iraqi captives held by the extremists Sky News In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Militants of the Isis group force captured Iraqi security forces members to the transport In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Militants of the Isis group transporting dozens of captured Iraqi security forces members to an unknown location in the Salaheddin province ahead of executing them In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq A major offensive spearheaded by Isis but also involving supporters of executed dictator Saddam Hussein has overrun all of one province and chunks of three others In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Militants of the Isis group executing dozens of captured Iraqi security forces members at an unknown location in the Salaheddin province In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Isis militants taking position at a Iraqi border post on the Syrian-Iraqi border between the Iraqi Nineveh province and the Syrian town of Al-Hasakah In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Isis rebels show their flag after seizing an army post AFP/Getty Images In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Isis militants waving an Islamist flag after the seizure of an Iraqi army checkpoint in Salahuddin Getty Images In pictures: The rise of Isis Iraq Demonstrators chant slogans as they carry al-Qaida flags in front of the provincial government headquarters in Mosul, 225 miles (360 kilometers) northwest of Baghdad. In the week since it captured Iraq's second-largest city, Mosul, a Muslim extremist group has tried to win over residents and has stopped short of widely enforcing its strict brand of Islamic law, residents say. Churches remain unharmed and street cleaners are back at work

People like him have benighted and burdened our country for years and it seems to me that neither our domestic government nor our societal defences are remotely up to the task of dealing with such people here.

Dhar is believed to take on the propaganda role that Mohammed Emwazi - a Kuwait born computer science graduate from west London - left absent following his death by an US drone strike in November last year.

In the video released last week, the masked figure - identified as Dhar by Sky News - speaking with an obvious British accent criticised the UK Government and Prime Minister David Cameron before shooting five hostages.
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The behaviour of a senior police officer who investigated a Westminster sex ring is to be examined by the Independent Police Complaints Commission over a claim of leaking information to the media.

The officer, believed to be DCI Paul Settle, who as the head of the Mets Operation Fairbank between November 2012 and May 2014 was charged with looking into claims of VIP sexual abuse at Dolphin Square, the Elm Guest House in Barnes and elsewhere, is the subject of a complaint by one of the alleged victims of abuse. It is believed that the complaint relates to "Darren", an alleged victim, whose anonymity should be assured under the law, and who has claimed that journalists arrived at his house asking questions of him, purportedly as a result of unauthorised briefings by the police. It has also been alleged in the media that an officer spoke to the BBCs Panorama for a programme broadcast last October and provided unauthorised material about the identity of a child abuse survivor. The name of the alleged Panorama source is not known.

The IPCC said last night: "The IPCC is investigating two complaints regarding the disclosure of information to the media. The investigation is at a very early stage and follows a referral from the Metropolitan Police Service."

The Independent on Sunday reported in October that police investigators had been told Settle could not have been the source of any leaks as he had been removed from his post by the time 'Darren' made his allegations. DCI Settle came to public prominence following his investigation into a rape claim against Conservative peer Lord Brittan. Settle found that there was no case to answer against Brittan, but his superiors, allegedly under pressure from Labour MP Tom Watson, sought to persist with the case. It was also claimed that Settle had not followed appropriate procedures for the examination of an allegation of rape.

Lord Brittan died some months after lawyers had concluded the case was too weak to warrant prosecution, but failed to inform the cancer-stricken peer. The Metropolitan Police subsequently apologised to the peers widow, and DCI Settle was commended for his approach to the case by the Home Affairs Select Committee. Notwithstanding assurances from the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, who told the Home Affairs Select Committee that the Met was working towards returning Settle to active service, Settle was recently reported to be doing "very little".


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The body of a young British backpacker has been recovered on the Thai island of Koh Tao.

Luke Miller, 27, of Newport, Isle of Wight, was discovered by hotel staff floating in a swimming pool.

His death comes just days after he posted a New Year's Eve message on Facebook in which he told how he was "living the dream."

The circumstances of his death are currently unclear, and local police are investigating. It is believed that Mr Miller travelled to the country on 22 December for a five-week holiday.

A fundraising page has been set up to raise money to bring Mr Miller's body back to the UK, which has so far raised over 5000.

Friends have paid tributes on social media, with one writing wrote on Facebook: "R.I.P big brother Luke Miller, I love you forever and always you April Fool."

Koh Tao is the same island on which Hannah Witheridge, 23 and David Miller, both from the UK, were murdered in 2014.

Bar workers Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo, also known as Win Zaw Htun, were found guilty of their murders.
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Diesel exhaust fumes are causing the biggest health catastrophe since the Black Death, a campaign group has claimed, as new figures show air pollution limits for the whole year have been breached in just eight days in London.

European Union limits demand that maximum hourly nitrogen dioxide (NO2) concentrations are not exceeded for more than 18 hours a year  yet Putney High Street, in west London, had recorded its 19th hour breaching the limits during Friday mornings rush hour, the London Air Quality Network said.

Oxford Street, where legal limits for the toxic gas for the whole of 2015 were breached in just two days, has almost certainly broken the limit again but the monitoring equipment is currently being repaired. Campaigners say that the Government must do more to tackle air pollution which has been linked to respiratory and heart problems.

Simon Birkett, founder and director of campaign group Clean Air in London, said it was breathtaking that toxic air pollution in the capital had breached the legal limit for the whole calendar year within the first few days of 2016. Mr Birkett also called on all the candidates in the mayoral elections to pledge to ban diesel exhausts from the most polluted areas by 2020.

He said: "Worse, several air pollution monitors have been vying for the dubious honour of recording the first officially monitored breach of the nitrogen dioxide (NO2) legal limit in the world in 2016."

High air pollution levels across the UK Show all 7 1 /7 High air pollution levels across the UK High air pollution levels across the UK pollution-5.jpg High air pollution levels across the UK pollution-3.jpg High air pollution levels across the UK pollution-2.png High air pollution levels across the UK pollution-1.jpg High air pollution levels across the UK pollution-4.jpg High air pollution levels across the UK pollution-7.jpg The Shard and St Paul's Cathedral from Hampstead Heath in London High air pollution levels across the UK pollution-6.jpg

He added that Oxford Street would have been first if it had not been offline, and warned that scientists said London would tend to have the highest nitrogen dioxide concentrations in the world because of its diesel pollution.

"This shocking start to the 60th anniversary year of the world's first Clean Air Act in 1956 illustrates the scale of Boris' [Johnson's] failure to reduce diesel fumes, which are the main source of NO2 at street level, and protect hundreds of thousands of people on our busiest shopping streets.

"Put simply, diesel exhaust is the biggest public health catastrophe since the Black Death.

Alan Andrews, lawyer for ClientEarth, which announced last month it would take the Government back to court over air quality, said: "Its failure to deal with illegal levels of air pollution, which causes thousands of early deaths in London every year, is a scandal."

Additional reporting by Press Association
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On a January morning in 2008 a young man from south London approached the edge of Waterloo Bridge and prepared to throw himself off.

Jonny Benjamin had just been admitted to hospital and diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, a combination of schizophrenia and depression. Struggling to come to terms with his diagnosis and battling to keep his sexuality under wraps  Mr Benjamin is gay  he felt he could no longer bear to be alive.

Mr Benjamin did not take his life that day; the kindness of a stranger who stopped to talk saved his life. After convincing him not to take his own life, the stranger continued on his way.

Six years later Mr Benjamin embarked on a campaign to track down the passer-by he believed was named Mike to thank him personally. The Finding Mike campaign became a global phenomenon and eventually led Mr Benjamin, now a filmmaker and mental health campaigner, to the man who saved his life, a former personal trainer called Neil Laybourn. Finding Mike: The Stranger on the Bridge, an award-winning documentary which aired on Channel 4 last year, captured the pairs emotional reunion.

Now, aged 28, Mr Benjamin is about to launch a new scheme to tackle the appalling suicide prevention strategy in the UK.

His initiative, ThinkWell, which is being launched on 11 January, is designed to educate young people about mental health and break down the stigma surrounding mental illness and suicide through school workshops. Each session will be delivered by a trained workshop leader and a qualified therapist.

Mr Benjamin, who developed the idea with Pixel Learning, which runs interactive workshops incorporating film and education, is determined to demystify mental illness and provide young people with the vital information and help which they are not being offered elsewhere.

My passion has always been young people, mainly because of what I went through when I was younger, said Mr Benjamin.

We developed the workshop and piloted it in a few schools. The reaction was really positive  the young people we spoke to really wanted to talk about this subject. There were a lot of young people that needed to talk. It was great to watch them engage, but it was worrying to see how much there was a need for it.

Parents and teachers had a really positive reaction to the workshops as well, Mr Benjamin added. Teachers need support, he pointed out. Theyre not trained in mental health and how to look after young peoples wellbeing. They want us to come in.

Parents realise it is an important subject that needs to be spoken about from a young age  it makes sense to go into schools.

He added: I get really frustrated, particularly around suicide prevention strategy in this country. Its just appalling.

We need to be tackling this now. I just see mental health provision getting worse.

The activist has the ear of key policymakers in the mental health sector and in the Government  hes held meetings with both Sam Gyimah, the education and childcare minister, and Alistair Burt, the social care minister  and is determined to push the issue up the agenda.

Mr Gyimah told i: We are at a turning point in how we tackle childrens mental health issues and I am determined to ensure we get it right  putting young people and children at the heart of this process is vital. Initiatives like Jonnys can play a huge role in helping schools find the right way to support good mental health.

Mr Benjamin said: Mental illness is so isolating. For so many years I struggled alone  to be able to talk about it is such a relief.

I find it really sad that people arent being given the help and support they need, he added. Things could be quite different.

For more information about ThinkWell visit pixellearning.org
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Firefighters, bakers and civil servants are planning to join junior doctors on the picket line when they strike over pay and conditions on 12 January.

Matt Wrack, general secretary at the Fire Brigades Union, said: Our people who have the day off work will go along to the pickets in support of junior doctors. Ian Hodson, president at the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union, said he will stand with our junior doctors.

The Public and Commercial Services Union, which represents civil servants, has long supported the junior doctors strike and previously vowed to join them on their picket of St Thomas hospital in central London last month. That strike was cancelled, but the action on 12 January looks set to go ahead after talks between the British Medical Association and the Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, collapsed last week.

About 26,000 junior doctors voted in favour of a walkout after Mr Hunt proposed reforms to create a seven-day NHS. Junior doctors are worried that the proposals will put more stress on the profession at the expense of patient safety.

Mr Hunt claimed last week that of the 16 areas of disagreement only one, involving pay and unsocial hours, had not been resolved.

Recommended NHS junior doctor strike could be called off in last minute deal

A BMA spokesperson said: It is simply not true that there remains only one area of contention. The Government has failed to fully address junior doctors concerns ... The Governments proposals do not go far enough to prevent junior doctors working unsafe hours and would leave those working the most unsocial hours worst off, affecting doctors in our A&Es and other areas of medicine that are already struggling to recruit and retain staff.

No junior doctor takes the decision to take industrial action lightly and we deeply regret the disruption that it will cause patients.

A Department of Health spokesman stated: The BMA said in December that significant ground had been made and there were only a couple of absolute areas of disagreement. Since then, the Government has put forward a substantive proposal in talks and also engaged Acas [the dispute resolution organisation]. Industrial action helps no one and risks harming patients, so we urge the BMA to suspend strikes and ... help broker a deal through dialogue with us.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 18 October 2022 Just Stop Oil protesters continue their protest for a second day on the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge, which links Kent and Essex and which remains closed for traffic, after it was scaled by two climbers from the group PA UK news in pictures 17 October 2022 Hundreds of students take part in the traditional Raisin Monday foam fight on St Salvator's Lower College Lawn at the University of St Andrews in Fife PA UK news in pictures 16 October 2022 A protester holds a placard during a march into central London at a demonstration by the climate change protest group Extinction Rebellion AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 15 October 2022 A member of the public drags an activist who is blocking the road during a "Just Stop Oil" protest, in London, Britain REUTERS UK news in pictures 14 October 2022 Germanys Womens double skulls during day one of the World Rowing Beach Sprint Finals at Saundersfoot beach, Pembrokeshire PA UK news in pictures 13 October 2022 Family and mourners arrive at St Michael's Church, in Creeslough, for the funeral mass of 49-year-old mother of four Martina Martin, who died following an explosion at the Applegreen service station in the village of Creeslough in Co Donegal on Friday PA UK news in pictures 12 October 2022 Motorists in Coventry pass trees showing autumnal colour PA UK news in pictures 11 October 2022 A woman and her dog in the the North Sea at Tynemouth Longsands beach before sunrise PA UK news in pictures 10 October 2022 Police officers remove a campaigner from a Just Stop Oil protest on The Mall, near Buckingham Palace, London PA UK news in pictures 9 October 2022 A drummer plays during the Diwali on the Square celebration, in Trafalgar Square, London PA UK news in pictures 8 October 2022 Timothee Chalamet attending the UK premiere of Bones and All during the BFI London Film Festival 2022 at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, London PA UK news in pictures 7 October 2022 Two young male fallow deer lock antlers in Dublins Phoenix park as rutting season begins PA UK news in pictures 6 October 2022 The Princess of Wales during a cocktail making competition during a visit to Trademarket, a new outdoor street-food and retail market situated in Belfast city centre, as part of the royal visit to Northern Ireland PA UK news in pictures 5 October 2022 Greenpeace protesters interrupt Prime Minister Liz Truss as she delivers her keynote speech to the Conservative Party annual conference PA UK news in pictures 4 October 2022 Prime Minister Liz Truss and Britains Chancellor of the Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng wearing hard hats and hi-vis jackets, visit a construction site for a medical innovation campus in Birmingham AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 3 October 2022 British artist Sam Cox, aka Mr Doodle, reveals the Doodle House, a twelve-room mansion at Tenterden, in Kent, which has been covered, inside and out in the artist's trademark monochrome, cartoonish hand-drawn doodles PA UK news in pictures 2 October 2022 Erling Haaland celebrates after scoring Manchester City's second goal against Manchester United at Etihad Stadium. Haaland went on to score a hattrick, his third of the season in the Premier League. City beat United 6-3. Manchester City FC/Getty UK news in pictures 1 October 2022 Protesters hold up flags and placards at a protest in London. A variety of protest groups including Enough is Enough, Don't Pay and Just Stop Oil all demonstrated on the day AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 30 September 2022 British Prime Minister Liz Truss, who has not been seen in days, leaves the back of Downing Street after a meeting with Office For Budget Responsibility following the release of her governments mini-budget Getty UK news in pictures 29 September 2022 The Virginia creeper foliage on the Tu Hwnt i'r Bont (Beyond the Bridge) Llanwrst, Conwy North Wales, has changed colour from green to red in at the start of Autumn. The building was built in 1480 as a residential dwelling but has been a tearoom for over 50 years PA UK news in pictures 28 September 2022 Criminal barristers from the Criminal Bar Association (CBA), demonstrates outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London, as part of their ongoing pay row with the Government PA UK news in pictures 27 September 2022 David White, Garter King of Arms, poses with an envelope franked with the new cypher of King Charles III 'CIIIR', after it was printed in the Court Post Office at Buckingham Palace in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 26 September 2022 A gallery staff member poses next to a painting by Lucian Freud - Self-portrait (Fragment), 1956 - on show at a photocall for the Credit Suisse exhibition - Lucian Freud: New Perspectives at the National Gallery in London PA UK news in pictures 25 September 2022 Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer is interviewed by Laura Kuenssberg in Liverpool before the start of the Labour Party annual Conference which he opened with a tribute to Queen Elizabeth II and sang the national anthem PA UK news in pictures 24 September 2022 Handout photo issued by Buckingham Palace of the ledger stone at the King George VI Memorial Chapel, St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle PA UK news in pictures 23 September 2022 A climate change activist protests against UK private jets while lighting his right arm on fire during the Laver Cup tennis tournament at the O2 Arena in London EPA UK news in pictures 22 September 2022 Woody Woodmansey, Lee Bennett, Kevin Armstrong, Nick Moran and Clifford Slapper attend the unveiling of a stone for David Bowie on the Music Walk of Fame at Camden, north London PA UK news in pictures 21 September 2022 A flock of birds in the sky as the sun rises over Dungeness in Kent PA UK news in pictures 20 September 2022 Flowers which were laid by members of the public in tribute to Queen Elizabeth II at Hillsborough Castle in Northern Ireland are collected by the Hillsborough Gardening Team and volunteers to be replanted for those that can be saved or composted PA UK news in pictures 19 September 2022 The ceremonial procession of the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II travels down the long walk as it arrives at Windsor Castle for the committal service at St Georges Chapel AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 18 September 2022 A man stands among campers on The Mall ahead of the Queens funeral Reuters UK news in pictures 17 September 2022 Wolverhampton Wanderers Nathan Collins fouls Manchester Citys Jack Grealish leading to a red card. 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Action Images/Reuters UK news in pictures 16 September 2022 Members of the public stand in the queue near Tower Bridge, and opposite the Tower of London, as they wait in line to pay their respects to the late Queen Elizabeth II, in London AFP via Getty Images UK news in pictures 15 September 2022 Members of the public in the queue on in Potters Fields Park, central London, as they wait to view Queen Elizabeth II lying in state ahead of her funeral on Monday PA UK news in pictures 14 September 2022 The first members of the public pay their respects as the vigil begins around the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II in Westminster Hall, London, where it will lie in state ahead of her funeral on Monday PA UK news in pictures 13 September 2022 Crowds cheer as King Charles III and Camilla, Queen Consort arrive for a visit to Hillsborough Castle Getty UK news in pictures 12 September 2022 Crowds line the Royal Mile, Edinburgh, as King Charles III joins a procession from the Palace of Holyroodhouse to St Giles Cathedral following the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II Katielee Arrowsmith/SWNS UK news in pictures 11 September 2022 Members of the Public pay their respects as the hearse carrying the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II, draped in the Royal Standard of Scotland, is driven through Ballater AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 10 September 2022 Britain's Prince William, Prince of Wales, Britain's Catherine, Princess of Wales, Britain's Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, Britain's Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, wave at well-wishers on the Long walk at Windsor Castle AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 9 September 2022 King Charles III and Camilla, Queen Consort wave after viewing floral tributes to the late Queen Elizabeth II outside Buckingham Palace Getty UK news in pictures 8 September 2022 A screen commemorating Britain's Queen Elizabeth II in Piccadilly Circus, London Britain EPA UK news in pictures 7 September 2022 Police officers stand guard after Animal Rebellion activists threw paint on the walls and road outside the Houses of Parliament in protest, in London, Britain Reuters UK news in pictures 6 September 2022 Queen Elizabeth II welcomes Liz Truss during an audience at Balmoral, Scotland, where she invited the newly elected leader of the Conservative party to become Prime Minister and form a new government PA UK news in pictures 5 September 2022 Visitors at the PoliNations garden in Victoria Square, Birmingham, which is made up of five 40ft high tree installations and over 6,000 plants. 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Strike plan

How will the strike by junior doctors affect health services?

During the first 24-hour strike, due to start on 12 January at 8am, junior doctors will provide emergency care only. This should mean minimal disruption to A&E departments and urgent surgery services.

The same level of care will be provided during the second walkout which, unless agreement is reached, begins at 8am on Tuesday 26 January and will last for 48 hours.

The brunt will be borne by those with appointments on the strike days. Most planned operations will be cancelled and reorganised.

Assuming no agreement has been reached by Wednesday 10 February, junior doctors will hold a full stoppage of all services for nine hours.

GP services will be unaffected throughout the strike, as will the non-emergency hotline 111

Lucy White
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Self-titled bird in a biplane Tracey Curtis-Taylor landed her 1942 Boeing Stearman at Sydneys international airport at 7.54am UK time on 9 January after a 13,000-mile solo trip from Britain to Australia.

Ms Curtis-Taylor, who told waiting reporters she needed a drink, left Farnborough in Hampshire on 1 October.

The three-month adventure was inspired by Amy Johnson, who became the first woman to fly solo between England and Australia in 1930.

Like her, Ms Curtis-Taylor made the trip in an open cockpit and navigated using basic instruments, which are now period pieces.

End of huge adventure, thank you everyone who supported me, the 53-year-old wrote on Facebook, marking the completion of a flight which crossed 23 countries and gave her the best view in the world from her biplane, Spirit of Artemis.

Many people took to social media to offer their congratulations, with one person saying that the sight of Ms Curtis-Taylor touching down in Sydney made them just well up with vicarious pride over what youve done. You are an amazing woman.

The route of Tracey Curtis-Taylor's solo trip from Britain to Australia

Ms Curtis-Taylor, who lives in London, admitted she had not yet managed to process the adventure. I would like to sit down with a large drink and rest and reflect on what I have gone through. Its been an astonishing experience  heaven and hell.

I just take my hat off to what [Johnson] pushed herself to, right on the limits of endurance. She was on the verge of nervous exhaustion when she finished. Its an astonishing survival story, all done by a slip of a girl at the age of 26 with little flying experience, said Ms Curtis-Taylor.

This generation needs to know what the pioneers achieved and how they resolved to break the records.

Ms Curtis-Taylors achievement is being seen as a source of inspiration for others. Kanchana Gamage, founder of the Aviatrix Project, an initiative which encourages women and girlsto fly, said: What she is showing is not necessarily [just] about aviation, its about perseverance. Its that sense of adventure, really.

Its showing that you can do exciting things. Tracey doesnt have a commercial licence; she doesnt have an instrument rating. Shes a private pilot  shes had a lot of challenges and difficulties to get to where she is, but shes managed it,

Jane Priston, founder of the Amy Johnson Herne Bay Project, said: I know Tracey feels very passionately that she wanted to promote aviation as a career for women and girls, which is interestingly the reason Amy took on the flight herself in 1930.

She has taken Amys legacy, built on it and inspired the whole world really.

Ms Curtis-Taylor, who flew from Cape Town to Goodwood, West Sussex, in 2013 inspired by Lady Mary Heaths flight in 1928, called flying addictive.

Her next trip? A solo flight across the US later this year.
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The Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond has been accused of coming dangerously close to condoning the wave of executions of alleged terrorists carried out by Saudi Arabia which have inflamed tensions across the Middle East.

The Government has faced fierce criticism for failing to condemn more forcefully the killing on a single day of 47 prisoners, including the prominent Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr.

To the anger of human rights groups, Mr Hammond yesterday described them as convicted terrorists.

Recommended Read more Fears of further unrest as Saudi prince defends execution of cleric

The execution of Sheikh Nimr, an outspoken critic of the Saudi regime who denied advocating violence, provoked a diplomatic crisis between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Mr Hammond said on BBC Radio 4 that it was sensible for Britain to relentlessly condemn the use of the death penalty but to accept that some countries would not abandon it. Asked if he would offer a tougher condemnation of the executions, he replied: Lets be clear that these people were convicted terrorists.

Pressed on whether the Government treated the Saudi regime with kid gloves because of its economic and security importance to the UK, he replied: It is much more complicated than that.

We are clear we condemn the use of the death penalty and we make that view very well known.

But we also understand that Sharia law calls for the use of the death penalty and the reality is however much we lobby countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran... they are not going to end the use of the death penalty.

So we are much more effective if we focus our lobbying on cases where we might make a difference.

He said he had urged his Saudi counterpart in talks last year to cancel mass executions and added: Just for the record, Iran of course executes far more people than Saudi Arabia does.

In response to The Independents disclosure that Saudi Arabia had been omitted from a Foreign Office list of priority countries where it would encourage the abolition of the death penalty, he said: This was a list, I understand from 2011. We were clear in our most recent human rights report in our condemnation of the use of the death penalty.

Saudi Arabias ambassador recently warned of potentially serious repercussions of a breakdown in relations with the UK and complained of a lack of respect for its strict system of Sharia.

Maya Foa, the head of the death penalty team at human rights group Repreive, said Mr Hammond appeared alarmingly misinformed.

10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Show all 10 1 /10 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses In October 2014, three lawyers, Dr Abdulrahman al-Subaihi, Bander al-Nogaithan and Abdulrahman al-Rumaih , were sentenced to up to eight years in prison for using Twitter to criticize the Ministry of Justice. AFP/Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses In March 2015, Yemens Sunni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi was forced into exile after a Shia-led insurgency. A Saudi Arabia-led coalition has responded with air strikes in order to reinstate Mr Hadi. It has since been accused of committing war crimes in the country. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Women who supported the Women2Drive campaign, launched in 2011 to challenge the ban on women driving vehicles, faced harassment and intimidation by the authorities. The government warned that women drivers would face arrest. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Members of the Kingdoms Shia minority, most of whom live in the oil-rich Eastern Province, continue to face discrimination that limits their access to government services and employment. Activists have received death sentences or long prison terms for their alleged participation in protests in 2011 and 2012. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses All public gatherings are prohibited under an order issued by the Interior Ministry in 2011. Those defy the ban face arrest, prosecution and imprisonment on charges such as inciting people against the authorities. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses In March 2014, the Interior Ministry stated that authorities had deported over 370,000 foreign migrants and that 18,000 others were in detention. Thousands of workers were returned to Somalia and other states where they were at risk of human rights abuses, with large numbers also returned to Yemen, in order to open more jobs to Saudi Arabians. Many migrants reported that prior to their deportation they had been packed into overcrowded makeshift detention facilities where they received little food and water and were abused by guards. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses The Saudi Arabian authorities continue to deny access to independent human rights organisations like Amnesty International, and they have been known to take punitive action, including through the courts, against activists and family members of victims who contact Amnesty. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Raif Badawi was sentenced to 1000 lashes and 10 years in prison for using his liberal blog to criticise Saudi Arabias clerics. He has already received 50 lashes, which have reportedly left him in poor health. Carsten Koall/Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Dawood al-Marhoon was arrested aged 17 for participating in an anti-government protest. After refusing to spy on his fellow protestors, he was tortured and forced to sign a blank document that would later contain his confession. At Dawoods trial, the prosecution requested death by crucifixion while refusing him a lawyer. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Ali Mohammed al-Nimr was arrested in 2012 aged either 16 or 17 for participating in protests during the Arab spring. His sentence includes beheading and crucifixion. The international community has spoken out against the punishment and has called on Saudi Arabia to stop. He is the nephew of a prominent government dissident. Getty

She said: Far from being terrorists, at least four of those killed were arrested after protests calling for reform and were convicted in shockingly unfair trials.

The Saudi government is clearly using the death penalty, alongside torture and secret courts, to punish political dissent. By refusing to condemn these executions and parroting the Saudis propaganda, labelling those killed as terrorists, Mr Hammond is coming dangerously close to condoning Saudi Arabias approach.

Amnesty UKs head of policy and government affairs Allan Hogarth said: Contrary to what Mr Hammond says, there is nothing complicated about this. The death penalty is wrong in all circumstances  no ifs or buts  and thats a universal principle to which the UK claims to subscribe.

Philip Hammond (left), with Defence Secretary Michael Fallon in Japan yesterday, called the executed men convicted terrorists EPA
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Ken Livingstone has dismissed allegations from a recently sacked Labour frontbencher that he is running the Labour leadership with a "bunch of far-left anti-war communists" in tow.

Speaking to The Independent, the former London mayor laughed off claims from the former shadow culture secretary Michael Dugher that he is pulling the strings of Labours high command from behind the scenes. Mr Dugher was removed from his post by Jeremy Corbyn earlier this week for "disloyalty" and "incompetence", according to reports.

Mr Livingstone added that since Mr Corbyn had won the Labour leadership race he has only had one official meeting  lasting half an hour, before the vote on Syria  and a phone call, requesting that he apologise for his comments to Labour MP Kevan Jones after saying he should "seek psychiatric help".

The former London mayor added: "Half an hour and one phone call, I think that would have to be mind control of alien nature." He said Mr Dughers comments in an interview with the Times showed "how right Jeremy was to sack this individual person", adding, "these people have got to come to terms with the fact that the Labour membership elected someone that they dont agree with."

Mr Dugher said to the Times that he was sacked from the frontbench for criticising Mr Livingstones "moral equivalence bulls**t" over the 2007 London bombings. "The idea that you can justify what the bombers did or somehow say they were martyrs to a cause ... is totally wrong," he said. "These were sick maniacs who murdered innocent people.

"If someone else had said what Livingstone had said about 7/7 ... theyd be kicked out. But Jeremy and his allies gave Livingstone a free pass, just as they have on other issues when hes said other outrageous things."

Mr Dugher went on to claim that the former London mayor was repeatedly given a free pass for remarks that would lead others to being expelled. He said: If you look at the people around Jeremy most of them have been in the employment of LivingstoneI think the truth is this leadership team is dancing on the strings of Ken Livingstone  and nobody elected Ken Livingstone to be leader of the Labour party last September.

One of Mr Livingstones controversial remarks included telling the Labour MP Kevan Jones, who is open about his history of depression, to "seek psychiatric help" after criticising the London mayors appointment to a defence policy group within the party.

Mr Livingstone, at the time, defended his comments by claiming his south London upbringing taught him to be rude to those who were rude to him. He added: "I didnt go to Eton and get all that smarmy charming education, Im afraid. [What Kevan Jones said] is a personal attack, hes questioning my competence to do the job."

In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Show all 11 1 /11 In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Jonathan Reynolds,Shadow Railways Minister: RESIGNED He resigned as shadow railways minister in protest at the reasons for sacking Pat McFadden In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Kevan Jones, Shadow Defence Minister: RESIGNED He resigned as a shadow defence minister who strongly supports renewal of Trident. Has spoken out against Jeremy Corbyns leadership before and was also the centre of a row with Ken Livingstone after he said Jones might need some psychiatric help (Jones has previously spoken about his struggle with depression) In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Stephen Doughty, Shadow Foreign Minister: RESIGNED He quit as a shadow foreign minister in protest at the sacking of his colleague Pat McFadden as shadow Europe minister. He said he had looked at his own conscience and decided to step down In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Pat McFadden, Shadow Europe Minister: SACKED He was sacked as shadow Europe minister for "disloyalty" to leader Jeremy Corbyn In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Pat Glass, Shadow Europe Minister: SAFE Former junior shadow education minister Pat Glass replaced Pat McFadden as shadow Europe minister In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Emily Thornberry, Shadow Defence Secretary: SAFE She was promoted to shadow defence secretary. She is anti-Trident and therefore more in tune with Corbyns stance and replaces Maria Eagle, who was pro-Trident Getty In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Emma Lewell-Buck, Shadow Minister for Devolution and Local Government: SAFE Emma Lewell-Buck was promoted to shadow minister for devolution and local government In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Michael Dugher, Shadow Culture Secretary: SACKED Outspoken critic of Jeremy Corbyns leadership, has been sacked as shadow culture secretary for his "incompetence and disloyalty" In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Hilary Benn, Shadow Foreign Secretary: SAFE Hilary Benn remains as shadow foreign secretary, but Corbyns team has insisted his role now comes with new conditions that he must agree with Corbyn over foreign policy. Benn insists there are no new conditions attached to his job and insisted: "I haven't been muzzled. I'm going to be carrying on doing my job exactly as before In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Maria Eagle, Shadow Culture Secretary: SAFE Maria Eagle, moved from shadow defence to shadow culture secretary as part of Corbyns move to make his defence team match his anti-Trident views In pictures: Jeremy Corbyn reshuffle Andy Burnham, Shadow Home Secretary: SAFE Reports linked him to foreign secretary brief, but Corbyn appears to have backed down on sacking Hilary Benn. He does not see eye-to-eye with Corbyn on home affairs such as the Snoopers charter, but removing your shadow home secretary so soon after starting would have been a dangerous move by Corbyn

According to reports, Mr Dugher lost his role as Labours culture spokesperson for a series of comments criticising the Labour leader. In September, shortly after Mr Corbyn was elected leader, he called for an end to Corbynite "punishment beatings" in an interview with the Sunday Times.

He said: "If you get into things like mandatory reselection you are heading down the Wacky Races road. Weve played this game before and it doesnt end well. Its time to stop our punishment beatings. Now is the time to be going after the Tories, not going after each other. It is totally destructive and its self-indulgent as well."

Then, in December the former culture secretary hit out at Momentum  the group set up to support Mr Corbyn inside the Labour party  in an interview with House magazine. "Personally, I cant see the point of Momentum," he said. "If its an extension of the leadership campaign, well, they won the leadership. The whole point is when youve had a leadership election, all the leadership campaigns have to pack up and come together in the Labour party  It occurred to me that their aggression is matched only by their stupidity."
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Jeremy Corbyns secret blueprint to seize control of Labours policy-making machine to fast-track a change in the partys position on Trident has been revealed in leaked documents drawn up by his allies in the trade unions.

Leading members of the Shadow Cabinet have been made aware of a paper which would strip them of the power to set policy between conferences. Instead, Labours National Executive Committee would explicitly be given the role of deciding policy.

One minister who has seen a copy of the proposal said that Mr Corbyns advisers were coordinating the move which would change the NECs aims and objectives to give it explicit power to set policy. The document is likely to be put before the NEC at its meeting this month.

Speaking to The Independent on Sunday, the shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said he had not seen the document but confirmed the NEC would decide fairly quickly on a process to change Labours position on Trident  and revealed it would happen before the summer.

He revealed that the review of the partys nuclear policy, which is being conducted by former London Mayor Ken Livingstone and the new shadow Defence Secretary Emily Thornberry  would come up with a range of options, including unilateral disarmament, rather than recommending just one policy. One option, that is to be considered, is for Britain to become a virtual nuclear state like Japan and Iran  free of nuclear weapons but with the possibility of re-arming in a short period of time.

The options will then be put to Labour members, before the NEC decides the process for making a final decision. Mr Corbyns office want this all to be completed before the Government calls a Commons vote  which could come as early as March or April.

The revelation comes despite a warning from the Labour MP Dan Jarvis, who is tipped as a future leadership contender, that he may not stand at the next election if Mr Corbyn changes the partys stance on Trident.

A spokesman for Mr Corbyn said the proposal to give sweeping new powers to the NEC would be considered once it was formally submitted. He added: The NEC is having a consultation about its policy and role. Members of the NEC, including the unions, are submitting documents which will be brought together and considered.

But a shadow cabinet minister who has seen the proposals said: The leaders office appears to have decided that the best way of changing the constitution of the party is to change the aims and objectives of the NEC. They are putting a paper to the NEC with some changes to the aims document.

The proposed change says the NEC should be given all power over policy. That is clearly with Trident in mind, the shadow minister said. Its quite a clever way to get what they want. Thats to go back to the 1970s control over policy - its outrageous. Its back to the future.

The shadow minister added: Its being coordinated by the leaders office. John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn say its the NEC which decides policy.

David Cameron could call a Commons vote as early as March or April (EPA)

I expect it will be put forward in January. Why would they be doing this otherwise?

The draft document states that frontbenchers should be able to respond to the Government in the Commons  in effect making policy at short notice  but only if they have run it past the NEC and the leaders office first.

Mr McDonnell, the shadow Chancellor, said: The National Executive Committee will determine the mechanism for consulting the party members [and] then the mechanism for the final decision.

The NEC, at the end of the day is the final determinant of policy.

Asked if a change of policy would happen before party conference in September  when policy changes are formally voted on  Mr McDonnell said: Its up to the NEC. The problem weve got is that the Government may bring forward a decision-making timetable which warrants a faster decision-making process by the party, so it will be up to the NEC to decide that.

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Haaland went on to score a hattrick, his third of the season in the Premier League. City beat United 6-3. Manchester City FC/Getty UK news in pictures 1 October 2022 Protesters hold up flags and placards at a protest in London. A variety of protest groups including Enough is Enough, Don't Pay and Just Stop Oil all demonstrated on the day AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 30 September 2022 British Prime Minister Liz Truss, who has not been seen in days, leaves the back of Downing Street after a meeting with Office For Budget Responsibility following the release of her governments mini-budget Getty UK news in pictures 29 September 2022 The Virginia creeper foliage on the Tu Hwnt i'r Bont (Beyond the Bridge) Llanwrst, Conwy North Wales, has changed colour from green to red in at the start of Autumn. The building was built in 1480 as a residential dwelling but has been a tearoom for over 50 years PA UK news in pictures 28 September 2022 Criminal barristers from the Criminal Bar Association (CBA), demonstrates outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London, as part of their ongoing pay row with the Government PA UK news in pictures 27 September 2022 David White, Garter King of Arms, poses with an envelope franked with the new cypher of King Charles III 'CIIIR', after it was printed in the Court Post Office at Buckingham Palace in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 26 September 2022 A gallery staff member poses next to a painting by Lucian Freud - Self-portrait (Fragment), 1956 - on show at a photocall for the Credit Suisse exhibition - Lucian Freud: New Perspectives at the National Gallery in London PA UK news in pictures 25 September 2022 Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer is interviewed by Laura Kuenssberg in Liverpool before the start of the Labour Party annual Conference which he opened with a tribute to Queen Elizabeth II and sang the national anthem PA UK news in pictures 24 September 2022 Handout photo issued by Buckingham Palace of the ledger stone at the King George VI Memorial Chapel, St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle PA UK news in pictures 23 September 2022 A climate change activist protests against UK private jets while lighting his right arm on fire during the Laver Cup tennis tournament at the O2 Arena in London EPA UK news in pictures 22 September 2022 Woody Woodmansey, Lee Bennett, Kevin Armstrong, Nick Moran and Clifford Slapper attend the unveiling of a stone for David Bowie on the Music Walk of Fame at Camden, north London PA UK news in pictures 21 September 2022 A flock of birds in the sky as the sun rises over Dungeness in Kent PA UK news in pictures 20 September 2022 Flowers which were laid by members of the public in tribute to Queen Elizabeth II at Hillsborough Castle in Northern Ireland are collected by the Hillsborough Gardening Team and volunteers to be replanted for those that can be saved or composted PA UK news in pictures 19 September 2022 The ceremonial procession of the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II travels down the long walk as it arrives at Windsor Castle for the committal service at St Georges Chapel AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 18 September 2022 A man stands among campers on The Mall ahead of the Queens funeral Reuters UK news in pictures 17 September 2022 Wolverhampton Wanderers Nathan Collins fouls Manchester Citys Jack Grealish leading to a red card. 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[The Government] is likely to do it before the summer, so it looks like the NEC will have to take that into account. They will have to timetable their process based on what is expected from Government.

He confirmed there would be a range of options for Britains future nuclear system. The NEC review will set out the options. Then there will be a consultation on that. The NEC will then determine the process by which the decision will be taken  that will be solely down to it. The NEC meets at the end of January. They are going to have to come up with a timetable quickly.

Mr McDonnell said his position was very straightforward... scrap the thing.

A close ally of Mr Corbyn confirmed that the NEC could make changes so that decision-making would become more straightforward. The ally said: If the NEC wants it and the party leader wants it, who is going to stop them? Its a matter of political will.

What it could do is change the way it operates to allow it to use its powers more efficiently and effectively. The source added: This is not a repeat of the unilateralist debate of the 1980s  it is whether the Governments proposals are value for money.

One friend of Mr Corbyn, who strongly supports the renewal of Trident, said there was no doubt Mr Corbyn would do all he could to change Labours policy. He said: Jeremy would not be able to forgive himself if he passed up an opportunity to get Labour to vote against Trident.

New figures suggest that the renewal of the Trident programme will cost an estimated 167bn (Getty)

Whos who on Labours NEC

* Jeremy Corbyn, Leader

* Tom Watson, Deputy Leader

* Diana Holland, Treasurer

* Three MPs nominated by the Shadow Cabinet: Angela Eagle, Jon Ashworth and Rebecca Long-Bailey.

* Glenis Willmott, leader of Labour MEPs

* Bex Bailey, Young Labour

* Twelve trade union representatives, one of whom, Paddy Lillis of Usdaw, is NEC chair

* Six Constituency Labour Party representatives, including Ken Livingstone

* Two Socialist Society representatives

* Two Labour Councillors

* Three Backbench MPs or MEPs elected by all Labour MPs and MEPs: Dennis Skinner, Steve Rotheram (Corbyns Parliamentary Private Secretary) and Margaret Beckett

Total 33

Corbyn has 11 firm supporters, but with some swing voters is close to a majority for opposing Trident.
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Two Egyptian police officers have been shot dead in Cairo as they made their way to work near the Pyramids of Giza.

The Interior Ministry published pictures of the two men on its Facebook page, saying they had been travelling through the district in their car.

Immediately after the incident several moving and fixed checkpoints were deployed in the Muneeb area in order to crack down on the attackers and catch them, a security source was quoted as saying by the state news agency.

(      ..          )   ... Posted by     on Saturday, 9 January 2016

The gunmen were not identified and there was no immediate claim of responsibility.

It is not the first time police have been targeted in Giza, which lies south-west of central Cairo and houses the world-famous Ancient Egyptian pyramids.

On 28 November, masked men riding a motorbike shot four police officers dead between the Giza and Saqqara pyramids.

Isis Egyptian affiliate claimed responsibility for that attack but not for a previous shooting that killed two police officer guarding tourists in Giza on 3 June last year.

Tourists leave the Bella Vista Hotel following the attack (EPA)

Saturdays shootings came after two men attacked a hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada, wounding two Austrians and a Swede before one was shot dead and the other detained.

Witnesses reported seeing the assailants waving an Isis flag but representatives of the Bella Vista resort called the rumours nonsense and blamed drugged young men for the incident.

Their injuries were not serious and all three victims were expected to be discharged from hospital by the end of today.

Hisham Zazou, Egypts tourism minister, was travelling to visit the affected tourists as he sought to play down the incident.

If someone wants to claim that this is part of a terrorist group, it is a bit amateurish for that, he was quoted as saying by AFP.

They used only knives. If someone wants to attempt really to create a terrible incident, he would not be using a knife.

Isis claimed responsibility for a separate attack on the Three Pyramids Hotel in Cairo on Thursday, where no one was injured.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has declared war on Islamist militants who have launched suicide bombings and shootings across the country.

Egypts most active terrorist group, Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, pledged allegiance to Isis in 2014 and started calling itself Wilayat Sinai.

Its jihadists are mainly active in the Sinai Peninsula, where they claimed to have bombed a Russian passenger plane with 224 people on board in October, and have also claimed responsibility for attacks in Cairo, the western desert and Nile delta.

Additional reporting by agencies
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Managers of the Egyptian hotel where three tourists were stabbed have claimed that drugged young men were responsible and called rumours of an Isis-inspired terror attack nonsense and c**p.

Two Austrians and a Swede were wounded by two men stormed the beachside Bella Vista resort on Friday in the second assault on hotels in Egypt in two days.

Unconfirmed witness reports claimed the men were bearing an Isis flag as they approached from the beach in Hurghada, reportedly armed with knives, a gun and explosives belt, and there was speculation they were attempting to kidnap tourists.

But a statement on the Bella Vista Resorts official Facebook page claimed to tell the true story of the ordeal, which said it was over in four minutes.

Two drugged young men attacked one of our hotel restaurants with fake gun (plastic) and small knives, the statement said.

One of the attackers used his knife trying to stab some of our guests (3 already injured), and then, our security and the hotel police man dealt immediately within seconds with the 2 attackers and shot them down, one was killed by police and the other was injured and captured.

Renata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both 72, and Sammie Olovsson, 27, were not seriously wounded.

One of the guests left hospital hours after the attack, while the remaining two were expected to be discharged this morning, the hotel said.

These are the injured guests (3) And they are OK nowGod bless themGod bless Egypt Posted by Bella Vista Resort Hurghada on Saturday, 9 January 2016

Any other rumours or news more than the above is nonsense and c**p, its statement continued.

Most probably is to make propaganda that will affect the tourism in Egypt badly, and that was the main aim.

The account was in line with statements from the Egyptian Interior Ministry, which reportedly recorded the attack as a criminal offence, rather than terror attack, and said the men carried only knives and a pellet gun.

But witnesses claimed the killed attacker was wearing an explosives belt, with retired military officer Mohammed Beram telling the Associated Press it could be seen when the man was stripped by security forces.

Jan-Eric Olovsson, 64, was sitting having dinner with his son Sammie when the attackers stormed in.

Everything went really fast, he told Swedens Expressen newspaper. I thought they came from outside. I myself had the gun pointed at me three times, and Sammie was stabbed with the knife.

A member of the Egyptian security stands guard in front of the entrance to Bella Vista Hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada, Egypt, January 9, 2016. (Reuters)

He described having to watch his son lie in a pool of his own blood until he could safely run outside to get an ambulance.

Sammie, from Gothenburg, wrote a Facebook status reassuring friends that although he had been stabbed four times, he was recovering and expected to leave hospital on Saturday.

I was lucky that I was able to ward off a deadly stab in the chest, he wrote. He tried to stab the knife in my neck a couple of times but it just cut muscle, no arteries or nerves. Im damn lucky.

A young Swedish woman who was also in the restaurant at the time, Zainab Feili, described the chaos.

Everybody just ran...we heard shooting. Everybody was crying. It was awful, she said.

Barbara Wolf, a German tourist who was also there for dinner, said she saw the killed attacker on the floor half naked as his shot accomplice screamed with pain before being detained.

(Getty)

The attack came hours after Isis claimed responsibility for an attack on a hotel near the Pyramids of Giza on Thursday, where no one was injured.

The Egyptian interior ministry again sought to reassure the public over the incident, claiming that security guards, rather than tourists, were the intended target and that at least one attacker was in custody.

Egypts tourist economy is struggling to recover from unrest triggered by the Arab Spring and military coup in 2013, and travel agencies were already reporting people cancelling trips to Hurghada today.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has declared war on Islamist militants who have launched suicide bombings and shootings across the country.

Egypts most active terrorist group, Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, pledged allegiance to Isis in 2014 and started calling itself Wilayat Sinai.

Its jihadists are mainly active in the Sinai Peninsula, where they claimed to have bombed a Russian passenger plane with 224 people on board in October, and have also claimed responsibility for attacks in Cairo, the western desert and Nile delta.

Additional reporting by AP
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Three tourists stabbed by suspected Isis terrorists at an Egyptian beach resort are being treated for their injuries after the second attack on hotels in the country in two days.

Two Austrians and a Swede were wounded by two men who stormed the beachside Bella Vista hotel in Hurghada on Friday night and raised an Isis flag, according to unconfirmed witness reports.

Renata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both 72, and Sammie Olovsson, 27, were not seriously wounded and are in a stable condition.

Security officials told the Reuters news agency that the assailants were also armed with a gun and explosives belt but were shot by police who repelled the assault.

Jon Torp, Norwegian tourist, told the Verdens Gang newspaper: I went out onto the balcony and could see a man waving a black flag with white lettering.

A hotel manager said the planned suicide bomber was dragging a female tourist into the hotels lobby, holding a knife to her neck, when he was shot.

Cleaners try to clean blood stains near the entrance to Bella Vista Hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada, Egypt, January 9, 2016 (Reuters)

He died at the scene but the second man was wounded and detained at the four-star Red Sea resort.

Sources told the BBC their aim was to kidnap tourists, while hotel staff said the attackers approached from the beach.

Initial reports said the men had opened fire and there were multiple accounts of hearing gunshots but the Egyptian interior ministry said they carried only knives and pellet guns.

A spokesperson named the dead attacker as 21-year-old Mohammed Hassan Mohammed Mahfouz, a student from Giza in Cairo.

The attack came hours after Isis claimed responsibility for an attack on a hotel near the Pyramids of Giza on Thursday.

 Shots fired at police guarding Cairo hotel

A statement said supporters targeted a tourist bus carrying Jews and caused casualties, but no one was injured in the assault, casting doubt on the claim.

A group of Arab Israeli tourists had been preparing to board a bus at the Three Pyramids Hotel when the attack started on Thursday morning.

Witness reports described Molotov cocktails being thrown at the building and gunmen firing live bullets but officials said only a homemade pellet gun and fireworks were used.

The Egyptian interior ministry again sought to reassure the public over the incident, claiming that security guards, rather than tourists, were the intended target and that at least one attacker was in custody.

Egypts tourist economy is struggling to recover from unrest triggered by the Arab Spring and military coup in 2013.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has declared an all-out war on Islamist militants who have launched suicide bombings and shootings across the country.

Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Show all 20 1 /20 Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Egyptian soldiers collect personal belongings of plane crash victims at the crash site of a passenger plane bound for St. Petersburg in Russia that crashed in Hassana, Egypt's Sinai Peninsula Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Egyptian soldiers collect personal belongings of plane crash victims at the crash site of a passenger plane bound for St. Petersburg in Russia that crashed in Hassana, Egypt's Sinai Peninsula Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt In this Russian Emergency Situations Ministry photo, made available on Monday, Nov. 2, 2015, showing Metrojet Airbus A321-200 flight 7K9268 flight recorder on display at an undisclosed location in Egypt Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Mourners lay flowers at Pulkovo International Airport outside St. Petersburg. Russia on 1 November mourned its biggest ever air disaster after a passenger jet full of Russian tourists crashed in Egypt's Sinai, killing all 224 people on board. Flags were at half mast on the parliament building, in the Kremlin, and on other official buildings in honour of the victims, most of whom were from Russia's second-largest city of Saint Petersburg Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt People pay their respects at the entrance of Pulkovo airport outside St. Petersburg, during a day of national mourning for the plane crash victims Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Debris from the plane crash in Egypt Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt A piece of an engine of Russian MetroJet Airbus A321 at the site of the crash in Sinai, Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt The crash site debris Flight 7K9268 crashed in the Sinai peninsula, in all probability killing every one of the 224 people on board AFP/Getty Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt The crash site debris Debris lies strewn across the sand at the crash site EPA Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Relatives in St Petersburg Relatives react after a Russian airliner with 217 passengers and seven crew aboard crashed, as people gather at the Kogalymaviais information desk at Pulkovo airport in St Petersburg on 31 October AP Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Relatives in St Petersburg A relative of a passenger of MetroJet Airbus A321 at Pulkovo II international airport in St Petersburg, Russia, 31 October 2015. EPA Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt The plane's journey The plane's last recorded radar position above the northern Sinai peninsula Flightradar24 Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Where it crashed A satellite view from Google Maps of the rough area where the plane crashed, in the mountainous Hassana region of the Sinai peninsula. Google Maps Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt The plane The Metrojet's Airbus A-321 with registration number EI-ETJ that crashed in Egypt's Sinai peninsula REUTERS/Kim Philipp Piskol Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt The plane The crashed Airbus A321 at Domodedovo international airport, outside Moscow,, on 20 October Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Relatives at in St Petersburg A relative of a passenger on MetroJet Airbus A321 at Pulkovo II international airport in St Petersburg EPA Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Relatives at in St Petersburg Relatives of passengers of MetroJet Airbus A321 at the Crown Plaza hotel in St Petersburg EPA Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Bodies being repatriated An Egyptian soldier prays as emergency workers prepare to unload bodies of victims from a police helicopter to ambulances at Kabrit military airport on 31 October. AP Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Bodies being repatriated Ambulances line up as emergency workers unload bodies at Kabrit military airport, 20 miles north of Suez, on Saturday AP Russian passenger plane crashes in Egypt Bodies being repatriated Egyptian paramedics load the corpses of victims into a military plane at Kabrit military air base by the Suez Canal on October 31, 2015 AFP/Getty Images

Egypts most active terrorist group, Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, pledged allegiance to Isis in 2014 and started calling itself Wilayat Sinai.

Its jihadists are mainly active in the Sinai Peninsula, where they claimed to have bombed a Russian passenger plane with 224 people on board in October, but have also claimed responsibility for attacks in Cairo, the western desert and Nile delta.

Following the attack in Hurghada, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office advised British nationals to stay in a safe location and follow the advice of local authorities.

Its travel advice warns of a high threat from terrorism in Egypt and warns UK citizens not to travel to the Sinai Peninsula or areas west of the Nile Valley and Nile Delta.

We believe that terrorists continue to plan attacks, it says. Attacks could be indiscriminate and occur without prior warning. Attacks targeting foreigners cant be ruled out.

Additional reporting by agencies
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A pamphlet was published in Philadelphia 240 years ago this weekend, with the rather unwieldy title of "Common sense; Addressed To The Inhabitants Of America On The Following Interesting Subjects". This document, anonymously signed but written by one Thomas Paine, would become the best-selling book in America and ultimately change the course of history.

Disquiet at British rule in the 13 American colonies was gathering some momentum in the early days of the American War of Independence, but public interest was fairly muted. Paine's 77-page pamphlet aimed to outline the reasons for rejecting British authority in the simplest, most straightforward terms, with self-evident arguments and a destiny written in the stars. "Common Sense" was the perfect title.

"There is something very absurd," wrote Paine, "in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island  The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind."

Within a few months, 150,000 copies had been sold across the colonies  the equivalent today, proportionally speaking, of well over 10 million. While some ridiculed the pamphlet (one loyalist warned of how America might "degenerate into democracy") Paine's words succeeded in swinging public opinion behind the revolutionary cause, and in doing so changed the language of political campaigning for ever. Even today we hear politicians use Paine's notion of "common sense" to try and appeal to popular wisdom.

Paine's own destiny was not a happy one. Having donated his share of the profits from "Common Sense" to George Washington's Continental Army, he left for Britain, and later France, where his written work would cause great controversy and legal tussles. His condemning of religion ("human inventions set up to terrify and enslave mankind") would see him ostracised by the Founding Fathers, whose cause he had done so much to help. He died in poverty in 1809.

@rhodri
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A Muslim woman was escorted from a Donald Trump rally after silently protesting the candidate's views on Islam and Syrian migrants.

Rose Hadid attended the rally in Rock Hill, South Carolina, wearing a hijab and a yellow star, reminiscent of those worn by Jews in Nazi Germany, with "Muslim" written on it.

The 56-year-old flight attendant was sitting in the stands behind Trump's podium and stood up when the Republican front-runner suggested Syrian refugees were affliated with Isis.

While she remained silent,Trump supporters surrounding her started chanting the candidate's name and pointing at her - as previously instructed by Trump campaign staff in the event of protests.

According to Ms Hadid, she was booed out of the event with one person shouting at her: "You have a bomb, you have a bomb."

She told CNN after being ejected: "The ugliness really came out fast and that's really scary.

"This demonstrates how when you start dehumanizing the other it can turn people into very hateful, ugly people, it needs to be known.

Rock Hill Police Department said Hamid was ejected from the event because the campaign had informed them "anybody who made any kind of disturbance" should be escorted out.

Ms Hadid had been joined a group of other protestors, some of whom were also escorted out by security.

Mr Trump commented on the disturbance: "There is hatred against us that is unbelievable.

"It's their hatred, it's not our hatred."

Before attending the campaign event, Ms Hadid had said: I figured that most Trump supporters probably never met a Muslim so I figured that I'd give them the opportunity to meet one.

"I really don't plan to say anything. I don't want to be disrespectful but if he says something that I feel needs answering I might  we'll just see what strikes me.

Mr Trump has caused global controversy by calling for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States and forcing all Muslims to carry special ID cards..
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It didnt take long for the man whose cartel is responsible for a quarter of the illegal drug trade in the US to disappear.

On 15 July, just 50 minutes after a security guard had given the drug lord his medicine, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman disappeared from the prison camera. He had climbed into a hole in the floor beneath his shower.

What officials discovered under the low dividing wall in his cell at the Altiplano prison was a highly sophisticated, well-lit and ventilated tunnel that stretched over one mile to a half-built outhouse.

The short, stocky 57-year-old, who has become as famous for his Houdini-esque feats as for his wealthy empire, has escaped from prison before.

In 2001, after eight years behind bars in one of the highest security prisons in Mexico, El Chapo was smuggled out of Puente Grande in a laundry cart.

In what could have been the second act of Houdini theatre, a prison guard reportedly dragged back a makeshift curtain from his cell and cried out: Hes escaped!"

But for a man who was desperate to get out of his cell, it cant be said he had a bad time in prison. He organised regular visits from sex workers, had a cell phone to conduct business and attended favoured inmate parties with drink and lobster bisque. According to the The New Yorker, Guzman consolidated his wealth and his empire from behind bars. He left when it suited him.

He then disappeared for 13 years.

Mr Guzman was like Houdini in more ways than one. His life was a rag to riches tale. Born into a poor family in the Mexican mountain village of La Tuna, Sinaloa, he had nine siblings. His father was a cattle rancher and suspected opium poppy farmer, who often beat his children.

Mr Guzman broke away in his 20s to join organized crime, and despite his illiteracy, worked his way up from so-called apprentice and air traffic controller to the godfather of the underworld.

Once at the top, he managed to keep his high status through trading information with the Drug Enforcement Administration. His Sinaloa cartel, meanwhile, continued to traffic cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamine all over the globe.

He was secretive - he used a BlackBerry, as he felt more comfortable owning a phone made by a Canadian company - but he liked to have a good time. After marrying teenager beauty queen Emma Coronel, he reportedly invited half the criminal underworld to the party. When American authorities arrived to arrest him, he had already received a warning and had fled.

Mr Guzman built a network of courier services, contacts and escape routes to dodge authorities. For a man who had made millions, he was reportedly living like a pauper in the mountains.

His wife gave birth to twins and insisted he spent time with them. But he still longed to party, and to dance. He continued to visit sex workers and ate Viagra like candy, spending almost as much time managing women than managing his empire.

It took just three minutes for marines to storm his house and capture him in 2014.

Now as we await further details on his capture this week, the public remain glued to his story and what his next Houdini moment will be.
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A man who claimed to be Jesus was foiled in his attempt to kidnap one of President Obamas dogs, Sunny and Bo, according to court documents.

Scott Stockert, who said he is the love child of John F Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe, was arrested at Hampton Inn, Washington DC with unregistered firearms and ammunition.

Recommended Read more FBI now tracking animal abuse like it tracks homicides

He told police he was in town to announce his candidacy for President and to advocate for $99-per-month health care - but he secretly had a plan to use the weapons to kidnap one of President Obamas two Portuguese Water Dogs.

Sunny and Bo are walked by a handler every morning on the South Lawn of the White House and are the Obamas family pets.

The man from North Dakota was arrested a week after making the plan when authorities discovered the weapons in his truck, which was parked near the Washington Convention Center.

Mr Stockert reportedly said: You picked the wrong person to mess with. I will **** your world up, as reported by NBC Washington.

The court documents did not reveal why Mr Stockert wanted to kidnap one of the President's dogs or which one he would choose.
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A Russian doctor faces criminal charges for punching a patient to death, after footage of the attack emerged on hospital CCTV.

The patient, identified as Belgorod resident Yevgeniy Bakhtin, 56, had allegedly been aggressive towards a nurse during a stomach examination on 29 December, according to Russian website Life News.

The video shows the doctor, identified as Ilya Zelendinov by Ren TV, interrupting the examination and punching Bakhtin in the head, causing him to fall to the floor. The doctor also repeatedly punches another man who tries to intervene.

Zelendinov and other staff tried unsuccessfully to resuscitate Bakhtin, who is seen in the video lying unconscious on the floor. He died of a brain haemorrhage following the attack, Bakhtins aunt Natalia Zaika told Life News.

Health Minister Veronika Skortsova ordered a probe into the incident afer the hospital CCTV spread virally online, state television reports. Zelendinov faces potential charges of causing death through negligence.

But a member of the Belogorod Investigations Committee, Yelena Kozyreva, said officials believed there was no malicious intent in the doctor's actions, according to the BBC.
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An Indian teenager was rushed to hospital with chronic stomach pains only to discover he had had 2.5kg parasitic twin living inside him.

18-year-old Narendra Kumar from the state of Uttar Pradesh in northern India is one of only 200 people in the world who have been diagnosed with foetus in fetu - a rare condition where one twin is absorbed by the other through the umbilical cord during early pregnancy but continues to live inside.

Mr Kumar had suffered from bouts of vomiting and weight loss for years but it wasnt until they operated on Monday they found the mass of skin, hair and teeth leaching off his blood supply.

Speaking to the Mail Online, Dr Rajeev Singh said: The boy's stomach grew, but his plight went undiscovered for years because neither his parents were of his medical condition nor the doctors could diagnose the condition at an early stage.

Technically the foetus was alive and was growing due to metabolic activity in his body.

He said they had removed a mass of hair, teeth, a poorly developed head, a bony structure of chest and spine with lots of yellowish amniotic like fluid in the sac.

Health news in pictures Show all 40 1 /40 Health news in pictures Health news in pictures Coronavirus outbreak The coronavirus Covid-19 has hit the UK leading to the deaths of two people so far and prompting warnings from the Department of Health AFP via Getty Health news in pictures Thousands of emergency patients told to take taxi to hospital Thousands of 999 patients in England are being told to get a taxi to hospital, figures have showed. The number of patients outside London who were refused an ambulance rose by 83 per cent in the past year as demand for services grows Getty Health news in pictures Vape related deaths spike A vaping-related lung disease has claimed the lives of 11 people in the US in recent weeks. The US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention has more than 100 officials investigating the cause of the mystery illness, and has warned citizens against smoking e-cigarette products until more is known, particularly if modified or bought off the street Getty Health news in pictures Baldness cure looks to be a step closer Researchers in the US claim to have overcome one of the major hurdles to cultivating human follicles from stem cells. The new system allows cells to grow in a structured tuft and emerge from the skin Sanford Burnham Preybs Health news in pictures Two hours a week spent in nature can improve health A study in the journal Scientific Reports suggests that a dose of nature of just two hours a week is associated with better health and psychological wellbeing Shutterstock Health news in pictures Air pollution linked to fertility issues in women Exposure to air from traffic-clogged streets could leave women with fewer years to have children, a study has found. Italian researchers found women living in the most polluted areas were three times more likely to show signs they were running low on eggs than those who lived in cleaner surroundings, potentially triggering an earlier menopause Getty/iStock Health news in pictures Junk food ads could be banned before watershed Junk food adverts on TV and online could be banned before 9pm as part of Government plans to fight the "epidemic" of childhood obesity. Plans for the new watershed have been put out for public consultation in a bid to combat the growing crisis, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said PA Health news in pictures Breeding with neanderthals helped humans fight diseases On migrating from Africa around 70,000 years ago, humans bumped into the neanderthals of Eurasia. 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The average 10 year old consumes the equivalent to 13 sugar cubes a day, 8 more than is recommended PA Health news in pictures Child health experts advise switching off screens an hour before bed While there is not enough evidence of harm to recommend UK-wide limits on screen use, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health have advised that children should avoid screens for an hour before bed time to avoid disrupting their sleep Getty Health news in pictures Daily aspirin is unnecessary for older people in good health, study finds A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine has found that many elderly people are taking daily aspirin to little or no avail Getty Health news in pictures Vaping could lead to cancer, US study finds A study by the University of Minnesota's Masonic Cancer Centre has found that the carcinogenic chemicals formaldehyde, acrolein, and methylglyoxal are present in the saliva of E-cigarette users Reuters Health news in pictures More children are obese and diabetic There has been a 41% increase in children with type 2 diabetes since 2014, the National Paediatric Diabetes Audit has found. Obesity is a leading cause Reuters Health news in pictures Most child antidepressants are ineffective and can lead to suicidal thoughts The majority of antidepressants are ineffective and may be unsafe, for children and teenager with major depression, experts have warned. In what is the most comprehensive comparison of 14 commonly prescribed antidepressant drugs to date, researchers found that only one brand was more effective at relieving symptoms of depression than a placebo. Another popular drug, venlafaxine, was shown increase the risk users engaging in suicidal thoughts and attempts at suicide Getty Health news in pictures Gay, lesbian and bisexual adults at higher risk of heart disease, study claims Researchers at the Baptist Health South Florida Clinic in Miami focused on seven areas of controllable heart health and found these minority groups were particularly likely to be smokers and to have poorly controlled blood sugar iStock Health news in pictures Breakfast cereals targeted at children contain 'steadily high' sugar levels since 1992 despite producer claims A major pressure group has issued a fresh warning about perilously high amounts of sugar in breakfast cereals, specifically those designed for children, and has said that levels have barely been cut at all in the last two and a half decades Getty Health news in pictures Potholes are making us fat, NHS watchdog warns New guidance by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), the body which determines what treatment the NHS should fund, said lax road repairs and car-dominated streets were contributing to the obesity epidemic by preventing members of the public from keeping active PA Health news in pictures New menopause drugs offer women relief from 'debilitating' hot flushes A new class of treatments for women going through the menopause is able to reduce numbers of debilitating hot flushes by as much as three quarters in a matter of days, a trial has found. The drug used in the trial belongs to a group known as NKB antagonists (blockers), which were developed as a treatment for schizophrenia but have been sitting on a shelf unused, according to Professor Waljit Dhillo, a professor of endocrinology and metabolism REX Health news in pictures Doctors should prescribe more antidepressants for people with mental health problems, study finds Research from Oxford University found that more than one million extra people suffering from mental health problems would benefit from being prescribed drugs and criticised ideological reasons doctors use to avoid doing so. Getty Health news in pictures Student dies of flu after NHS advice to stay at home and avoid A&E The family of a teenager who died from flu has urged people not to delay going to A&E if they are worried about their symptoms. Melissa Whiteley, an 18-year-old engineering student from Hanford in Stoke-on-Trent, fell ill at Christmas and died in hospital a month later. Just Giving Health news in pictures Government to review thousands of harmful vaginal mesh implants The Government has pledged to review tens of thousands of cases where women have been given harmful vaginal mesh implants. Getty Health news in pictures Jeremy Hunt announces 'zero suicides ambition' for the NHS The NHS will be asked to go further to prevent the deaths of patients in its care as part of a zero suicide ambition being launched today Getty Health news in pictures Human trials start with cancer treatment that primes immune system to kill off tumours Human trials have begun with a new cancer therapy that can prime the immune system to eradicate tumours. The treatment, that works similarly to a vaccine, is a combination of two existing drugs, of which tiny amounts are injected into the solid bulk of a tumour. 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Rex Health news in pictures Potential key to halting breast cancer's spread discovered by scientists Most breast cancer patients do not die from their initial tumour, but from secondary malignant growths (metastases), where cancer cells are able to enter the blood and survive to invade new sites. Asparagine, a molecule named after asparagus where it was first identified in high quantities, has now been shown to be an essential ingredient for tumour cells to gain these migratory properties. Getty Health news in pictures NHS nursing vacancies at record high with more than 34,000 roles advertised A record number of nursing and midwifery positions are currently being advertised by the NHS, with more than 34,000 positions currently vacant, according to the latest data. Demand for nurses was 19 per cent higher between July and September 2017 than the same period two years ago. REX Health news in pictures Cannabis extract could provide new class of treatment for psychosis CBD has a broadly opposite effect to delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the main active component in cannabis and the substance that causes paranoia and anxiety. Getty Health news in pictures Over 75,000 sign petition calling for Richard Branson's Virgin Care to hand settlement money back to NHS Mr Bransons company sued the NHS last year after it lost out on an 82m contract to provide childrens health services across Surrey, citing concerns over serious flaws in the way the contract was awarded PA Health news in pictures More than 700 fewer nurses training in England in first year after NHS bursary scrapped The numbers of people accepted to study nursing in England fell 3 per cent in 2017, while the numbers accepted in Wales and Scotland, where the bursaries were kept, increased 8.4 per cent and 8 per cent respectively Getty Health news in pictures Landmark study links Tory austerity to 120,000 deaths The paper found that there were 45,000 more deaths in the first four years of Tory-led efficiencies than would have been expected if funding had stayed at pre-election levels. On this trajectory that could rise to nearly 200,000 excess deaths by the end of 2020, even with the extra funding that has been earmarked for public sector services this year. Reuters Health news in pictures Long commutes carry health risks Hours of commuting may be mind-numbingly dull, but new research shows that it might also be having an adverse effect on both your health and performance at work. Longer commutes also appear to have a significant impact on mental wellbeing, with those commuting longer 33 per cent more likely to suffer from depression Shutterstock Health news in pictures You cannot be fit and fat It is not possible to be overweight and healthy, a major new study has concluded. The study of 3.5 million Britons found that even metabolically healthy obese people are still at a higher risk of heart disease or a stroke than those with a normal weight range Getty Health news in pictures Sleep deprivation When you feel particularly exhausted, it can definitely feel like you are also lacking in brain capacity. Now, a new study has suggested this could be because chronic sleep deprivation can actually cause the brain to eat itself Shutterstock Health news in pictures Exercise classes offering 45 minute naps launch David Lloyd Gyms have launched a new health and fitness class which is essentially a bunch of people taking a nap for 45 minutes. The fitness group was spurred to launch the napercise class after research revealed 86 per cent of parents said they were fatigued. The class is therefore predominantly aimed at parents but you actually do not have to have children to take part Getty Health news in pictures 'Fundamental right to health' to be axed after Brexit, lawyers warn Tobacco and alcohol companies could win more easily in court cases such as the recent battle over plain cigarette packaging if the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights is abandoned, a barrister and public health professor have said Getty Health news in pictures 'Thousands dying' due to fear over non-existent statin side-effects A major new study into the side effects of the cholesterol-lowering medicine suggests common symptoms such as muscle pain and weakness are not caused by the drugs themselves Getty Health news in pictures Babies born to fathers aged under 25 have higher risk of autism New research has found that babies born to fathers under the age of 25 or over 51 are at higher risk of developing autism and other social disorders. 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The teenagers father, Prem Chandra, expressed relief the evil was finally gone and his son could go back to living a healthy life. Doctors say the malformed foetus is found in the abdomen 80 per cent of the time but it has been known to occur in the brain or the cheek.
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Australians have always been known for their laid back nature and sense of humour. Now theyre putting it to use to speak out against the ongoing migration crisis  which is an issue in South East Asia, as well as Europe.

'Ourstralia' is an initiative which aims to alter the narrative around migrants and asylum seekers down under.

Their latest campaign videos use the very Aussie analogy of lifeguards at the beach making excuses to themselves to ignore a drowning man:

Im not gonna waste my time and energy helping some bloke thats got himself in trouble

Bruce, from this angle, hes not actually between the flags anymore

technically that is not our problem

Outta sight, outta mind.

Australia has a reputation for having a less than laid back attitude in regards migrants and asylum seekers.

While large numbers of migrants in boats has been a relatively new issue for Europe to deal with, large numbers have attempted to reach Australia by boat for many years.

The Australian government say that between 2012 and 2013, the number of illegal migrants arriving in the country by boat reached 18,119. It is believed that hundreds have died while trying.

Many are from war torn countries like Afghanistan and Iraq, Sri Lanka or Myanmar.

Controversial government measures to tackle this, such as towing boats away, meant that only one boat of migrants reportedly reached Australia in 2014. The number of asylum claims overall in the same yeardropped to 9,000 from 11,700 in 2013.

An even more controversial measure is the Pacific solution. This is the government policy of forcibly sending and detaining migrants in offshore processing centres on Pacific islands, such as Nauru and Papua New Guinea.

Media coverage of the situation and the conditions in which the migrants are housed in is scant. However, the migrant housing on the islands are routinely described as detention centres.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has condemned the practice of mandatory offshore migration, saying that it deprived [children] of their liberty.

The country itself remains divided on the issue of migration. Many wholeheartedly support the governments actions, and believe that tougher measures should be taken.

However, Ourstralia, backed by migrant advocacy group Balmain for Refugees, is not the only group of citizens which have spoken out in favour of migration. In December, a video and billboard campaign called I came by boat featured high profile migrants to Australia.

The practice of offshore migrant processing has also come under numerous legal challenges.
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Chancellor Angela Merkel proposed measures for the rapid expulsion of criminal asylum seekers in a desperate bid to repair the catastrophic damage to her open-door refugee policies caused by the New Years Eve sex attacks and robberies in Cologne and other German cities.

Her proposals came as Cologne riot police used a water canon to disperse an angry demonstration by what police said were about 1,700 members of the anti-immigration Pegida movement in the city on the afternoon of 9 January. The group has seized on the alleged involvement of some refugees and migrants in the attacks and stepped up its calls for a halt to the influx of people into the country.

In addition to the demonstration by Pegida, there were also protests by more than 1,000 people, mostly from German womens groups, waving placards demanding: No to violence and Leave our bodies alone.

The attacks in Cologne have shocked the country, with more than 100 women having filed complaints of sexual assault and robbery, allegedly carried out by groups of mainly young men. One demonstrator in the protest by womens groups said that the action was about making clear that we will not stop moving around freely here in Cologne.

Angela Merkel has rejected calls for the closure of Germanys borders with Berlin Wall-style defences (AFP)

With her once acclaimed welcome culture badly dented by the Cologne events, Ms Merkel told a meeting of her ruling Christian Democrats (CDU) in Mainz that anyone who committed crimes in Germany had to face the full force of the law irrespective of their ethnic background and if asylum seekers are involved, yes this can mean losing their right to asylum.

When crimes are committed and people place themselves outside the law, there must be consequences, she told journalists after the meeting. German law stipulates that asylum seekers can be sent home only if they have been sentenced to at least three years imprisonment, and providing their lives are not at risk in their own countries.

Under Ms Merkels proposals they could be denied asylum altogether if found guilty of committing crimes. Those on probation could also be deported. But so far Ms Merkel has categorically ruled out the idea of closing Germanys borders to refugee, despite a record intake of more than one million asylum seekers in 2015. Reports suggest that the influx will continue well into this year.

In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Show all 10 1 /10 In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany A police officer talks to a counterprotestor at the sidelines of right-wing movement 'Baergida' (Berlin Patriots against the islamization of the Occident), a Berlin version of Pegida (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the Occident), protest in Berlin In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany Participants of right-wing movement 'Baergida' (Berlin Patriots against the islamization of the Occident), a Berlin version of Pegida (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the Occident), protest in Berlin In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida with a sign reading 'Stop agitation against Islam' in Berlin In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany Participants of the 'Alliance against Racism' demonstrate against right-wing initiative Pegida (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the Occident) in Berlin. Counterdemonstrations against racism and xenophobia have been planned in Dresden, Berlin, Cologne and Stuttgart. The demonstrations staged by the anti-Islamic Pegida movement produce a series of slogans arguing that Germany is taking in too many foreigners, that the social structures are about to collapse due to the rising number of asylum-seekers, and that there is the threat of an 'Islamisation of the Occident' In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany German Justice Minister Heiko Maas takes part in a protest against the march of a grass-roots anti-Muslim movement in Berlin. The rise of the group, Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West (Pegida), has shaken Germany's political establishment In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany The lighting of the Brqandenburg Gate was switched off to make a statement against racism as People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida in Berlin In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany A left wing activist struggles with the riot police during a protest against a planed march of the Pegida movement in their first Berlin demonstration, which they have dubbed 'Baergida' In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida in Hamburg In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida in Munich In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida in Stuttgart

Ms Merkel said on 9 January that the proposals had been accepted by the CDU, but will be discussed with her coalition partners. Any changes in the law would also need parliamentary approval.

This is in the interests of the citizens of Germany, but also in the interests of the great majority of the refugees who are here, Merkel told party members in Mainz.

The Cologne attacks have dismayed grass-roots members of Ms Merkels party. Many have called for much tougher measures. The mood here has dropped into an abyss, Carsten Linnemann, a senior Christian Democrat in Mainz, was quoted as saying. Cologne has changed everything  people are now suspicious, insisted Volker Bouffier, the Christian Democrat Prime Minister of Hesse state.

Ms Merkel has rejected calls for the closure of Germanys borders with Berlin Wall-style defences. She argues that such measures are impractical and that the problem must be tackled through international diplomacy and by strengthening controls on the European Unions frontiers

But with Germany facing a series of key regional state elections this year, her party is concerned that the negative implications of the Cologne attacks will result in big gains for racist far-right parties such as the Alternative for Germany party and the neo-Nazi National Democrats.

Police in Cologne and the other cities where the New Years Eve attacks occurred said that more than 170 women had since brought charges against persons unknown. They said they had fallen victim to gangs of muggers and sex attackers on 31 December and during the early hours of New Years Day. Some female victims said they were forced to cope with crowds of attackers. One woman said she had her underwear torn off by a man who had his hands under her clothing.

Demonstration by a womens group on Saturday (AP)

Police say they have evidence that at least 31 people were involved in carrying out the attacks and that 18 of them were asylum seekers. The suspects comprised nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, five Iranians, four Syrians, one Iraqi, two Germans and a US citizen, although none of those was suspected of committing sexual assault. Separately, Cologne police said that they were investigating 21 people in connection with sexual assaults.

The police also said that more than 100 detectives are assigned to the case and are investigating 379 criminal complaints filed with them, about 40 per cent of which involve allegations of sexual offences.

However the strikingly low number of arrests  seven  and the small number of suspects positively identified are only two of the shortcomings levelled at Cologne police. Officers said that they had intervened early on New Years Eve and dispersed a rowdy crowd that was indiscriminately letting off fireworks in front of the main train station.

But they admitted having failed to take proper action later in the evening and during the early hours of New Years Day, when the majority of the muggings and sex attacks occurred. On 8 January, Cologne police chief Wolfgang Albers was suspended. There were similar sex attacks on women in Hamburg, Stuttgart and Bielefeld on New Years Eve.

On 9 January, Germanys mass circulation newspaper Bild said it had evidence that police had special instructions regarding refugee crimes. The paper quoted an unnamed high-ranking Frankfurt police official who said: We have strict instructions not to release information about crimes committed by refugees. We are only allowed to answer direct questions about such cases if they are posed by media representatives.
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Viennas chief of police has warned women against venturing into the streets alone, in the wake of highly-publicised sexual assaults in Austria and Germany.

However, police boss Gerhard Purstl is now being accused of putting the onus on women to protect themselves from assault, rather than targeting men who commit sexual crimes.

Mr Purstl said: "Women should in general not go out on the streets at night alone, they should avoid suspicious looking areas and also when in pubs and clubs should only accept drinks from people they know.

The controversial comments came in a statement made to Die Krone, Austrias largest newspaper. The newspaper has been censured by the Austrian press council for inflaming anti-immigrant sentiment with inaccurate reporting, and forced to apologise after being caught forging photos of Syrian refugees.

Mr Purstls comments follow a string of sexual assaults across Europe, including over a hundred allegedly committed in the German city of Cologne on New Years Eve. Three men have been arrested in connection with assaults committed in Salzburg, Austria, on the same evening.

However, Austrian politicians were quick to condemn Mr Purstl, speaking to Austrian media to decry his comments. They argued that his attitude showed he blamed the victims, rather than the perpetrators, of sexual violence.

Minister of the Interior Johanna Mikl-Leitner said: "The police will make sure that they tackle every sex assault case with zero tolerance. We women will not allow ourselves to see our freedom to go where we want, when we want, reduced by even a millimetre".

Sandra Frauenberger is the Womens Affairs spokesperson for the Social Democratic Party of Austria. She added: "The first reaction to incidents like this should not be to tell women to be more careful. The proper reaction is for us all to work together to fight problems like this."

Meanwhile, Mr Purstls counterpart in Cologne has been fired. Wolfgang Albers, 60, is taking compulsory early retirement amidst criticism of his handling of the incidents there.

Refugees settle in Germany Show all 12 1 /12 Refugees settle in Germany Refugees settle in Germany Germany Mohamed Zayat, a refugee from Syria, plays with his daughter Ranim, who is nearly 3, in the one room they and Mohamed's wife Laloosh call home at an asylum-seekers' shelter in Vossberg village on October 9, 2015 in Letschin, Germany. The Zayats arrived approximately two months ago after trekking through Turkey, Greece and the Balkans and are now waiting for local authorities to process their asylum application, after which they will be allowed to live independently and settle elsewhere in Germany. Approximately 60 asylum-seekers, mostly from Syria, Chechnya and Somalia, live at the Vossberg shelter, which is run by the Arbeiter-Samariter Bund (ASB) charity 2015 Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany A refugee child Amnat Musayeva points to a star with her photo and name that decorates the door to her classroom as teacher Martina Fischer looks on at the local kindergarten Amnat and her siblings attend on October 9, 2015 in Letschin, Germany. The children live with their family at an asylum-seekers' shelter in nearby Vossberg village and are waiting for local authorities to process their asylum applications. Approximately 60 asylum-seekers, mostly from Syria, Chechnya and Somalia, live at the Vossberg shelter, which is run by the Arbeiter-Samariter Bund (ASB) charity Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Kurdish Syrian asylum-applicant Mohamed Ali Hussein (R), 19, and fellow applicant Autur, from Latvia, load benches onto a truckbed while performing community service, for which they receive a small allowance, in Wilhelmsaue village on October 9, 2015 near Letschin, Germany. Mohamed and Autur live at an asylum-applicants' shelter in nearby Vossberg village. Approximately 60 asylum-seekers, mostly from Syria, Chechnya and Somalia, live at the Vossberg shelter, which is run by the Arbeiter-Samariter Bund (ASB) charity Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Mohamed Ali Hussein ((L), 19, and his cousin Sinjar Hussein, 34, sweep leaves at a cemetery in Gieshof village, for which they receive a small allowance, near Letschin Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Mohamed Zayat, a refugee from Syria, looks among donated clothing in the basement of the asylum-seekers' shelter that is home to Mohamed, his wife Laloosh and their daughter Ranim as residents' laundry dries behind in Vossberg village on October 9, 2015 in Letschin, Germany. The Zayats arrived approximately two months ago after trekking through Turkey, Greece and the Balkans and are now waiting for local authorities to process their asylum application, after which they will be allowed to live independently and settle elsewhere in Germany Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Asya Sugaipova (L), Mohza Mukayeva and Khadra Zhukova prepare food in the communal kitchen at the asylum-seekers' shelter that is their home in Vossberg village in Letschin Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Efrah Abdullahi Ahmed looks down from the communal kitchen window at her daughter Sumaya, 10, who had just returned from school, at the asylum-seekers' shelter that is their home in Vossberg Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Asylum-applicants, including Syrians Mohamed Ali Hussein (C-R, in black jacket) and Fadi Almasalmeh (C), return from grocery shopping with other refugees to the asylum-applicants' shelter that is their home in Vossberg village in Letschin Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Mohamed Zayat (2nd from L), a refugee from Syria, smokes a cigarette after shopping for groceries with his daughter Ranim, who is nearly 3, and fellow-Syrian refugees Mohamed Ali Hussein (C) and Fadi Almasalmeh (L) at a local supermarket on October 9, 2015 in Letschin, Germany. All of them live at an asylum-seekers' shelter in nearby Vossberg village and are waiting for local authorities to process their asylum applications, after which they will be allowed to live independently and settle elsewhere in Germany 2015 Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Kurdish Syrian refugees Leila, 9, carries her sister Avin, 1, in the backyard at the asylum-seekers' shelter that is home to them and their family in Vossberg village in Letschin Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany Somali refugees and husband and wife Said Ahmed Gure (R) and Ayaan Gure pose with their infant son Muzammili, who was born in Germany, in the room they share at an asylum-seekers' shelter in Vossberg village on October 9, 2015 in Letschin, Germany. Approximately 60 asylum-seekers, mostly from Syria, Chechnya and Somalia, live at the Vossberg shelter, which is run by the Arbeiter-Samariter Bund (ASB) charity, and are waiting for authorities to process their application for asylum 2015 Getty Images Refugees settle in Germany Germany German Chancellor Angela Merkel pauses for a selfie with a refugee after she visited the AWO Refugium Askanierring shelter for refugees in Berlin Getty Images

And similar allegations are being made about the Austrian police force, as it has emerged that there have been ten cases of sexual assault reported by women nationwide since the start of the New Year.

An Austrian police spokesperson said that it was standard practice not to publish information about sexual assault claims to protect the victims, and Mr Purstl added that his suggestions had been standard police policy for the general prevention of crime for many years.
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German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said she is considering changing the law to allow immigrants who commit crimes to be expelled from Germany faster, it has been reported.

The apparent policy U-turn comes following reports of mass sexual assault and a number of rapes allegedly undertaken by men from among a group of more than a thousand in Cologne on New Years Eve.

In light of claims that a large number of the attackers were of North African and Arab appearance, politicians in Germany have called for tighter rules on immigration.

Currently, asylum seekers are only deported if they have been sentenced to jail for at least three years and are deemed to not represent a threat to people in their home country. However, Deutsche Welle reports that Chancellor Merkel has said she is now open to changing the law to make expulsion considerably quicker.

She has reportedly told a party meeting in Mainz: The most important thing is that the facts about what happened are spoken about openly and bluntly. Terrible things happened, and we must respond to them.

When asked whether she believes it should be possible for criminal immigrants to have their right to remain in Germany revoked, she reportedly said: We should ask ourselves whether it might be necessary to take this away earlier and I have to say that for me, we must take it away sooner.

During 2015, Germany accepted more than a million refugees, many of whom were fleeing conflict in the Middle East.

The New Years Eve attacks have shocked the country. More than a hundred women are believed to have been attacked; molested sexually and beaten physically, as well as being intimidated and threatened.
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A couple lived with the rotting corpse of their seven-year-old son because they refused to believe he was dead, police have said.

Bruce and Shrell Hopkins had been living with the body of their dead son Caleb - who suffered from asthma - for as long as two months after his death in their apartment in Girona, north-eastern Spain.

Prosecutor Enrique Barata said the pair had "lost their sense of reality" after their sons death.

He said: "They would live normal home life around the dead body. They couldn't accept that the child was dead."

Police discovered Calebs body after the landlord raised the alarm following a visit to the apartment to collect unpaid rent.

Their defence lawyer Christian Salvador said they had now acknowledged their loss and were going through the mourning process.

The exact time and cause of the boys death will not be confirmed until the results of a postmortem are released but he was last seen alive on 15 November when he attended a family birthday.

The couple - originally from Detroit in the US - have been charged with negligent homicide after a judge heard they did not take their son to hospital because they do not believe in conventional medicine.

World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 30 September 2020 Pope Francis prays with priests at the end of a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 29 September 2020 A girl's silhouette is seen from behind a fabric in a tent along a beach by Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 September 2020 A Chinese woman takes a photo of herself in front of a flower display dedicated to frontline health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing, China. China will celebrate national day marking the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1st Getty World news in pictures 27 September 2020 The Glass Mountain Inn burns as the Glass Fire moves through the area in St. Helena, California. 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But Mr Salvador said Mr Hopkins had tried to resuscitate his son with cardiac massage and mouth to mouth breathing.

They could be released once the cause of death is determined if it can be proved the child was dead when they found him.

The couples other children - a boy and a girl aged 12 and 14 - have been taken into state care.

Additional reporting by AP
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Slovakias Prime Minister has warned that the country will fight against immigration from Muslim countries to prevent attacks such as the Paris shooting and Cologne sexual assaults, it has been reported.

Prime Minister Robert Fico made the comments while declaring that multi-culturalism is a fiction.

He told reporters that he would resist the European Commissions plan for mandatory quotas to share 120,000 asylum seekers among the EUs member states.

He said: Not only are we refusing mandatory quotas, we will never make a voluntary decision that would lead to formation of a united Muslim community in Slovakia.

Multi-culturalism is a fiction. Once you let migrants in, you can face such problems, he said referring to the Paris shootings in November and the recent allegations of mass sexual assaults in Cologne.

Slovakia is a socially conservative country with a largely Catholic population of 5.4 million people.

Last year, it received just 169 asylum requests. However this year it is being asked to accept 802 migrants under the European scheme.

World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 30 September 2020 Pope Francis prays with priests at the end of a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 29 September 2020 A girl's silhouette is seen from behind a fabric in a tent along a beach by Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 September 2020 A Chinese woman takes a photo of herself in front of a flower display dedicated to frontline health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing, China. China will celebrate national day marking the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1st Getty World news in pictures 27 September 2020 The Glass Mountain Inn burns as the Glass Fire moves through the area in St. Helena, California. The fast moving Glass fire has burned over 1,000 acres and has destroyed homes Getty World news in pictures 26 September 2020 A villager along with a child offers prayers next to a carcass of a wild elephant that officials say was electrocuted in Rani Reserve Forest on the outskirts of Guwahati, India AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 September 2020 The casket of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seen in Statuary Hall in the US Capitol to lie in state in Washington, DC AFP via Getty World news in pictures 24 September 2020 An anti-government protester holds up an image of a pro-democracy commemorative plaque at a rally outside Thailand's parliament in Bangkok, as activists gathered to demand a new constitution AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 September 2020 A whale stranded on a beach in Macquarie Harbour on the rugged west coast of Tasmania, as hundreds of pilot whales have died in a mass stranding in southern Australia despite efforts to save them, with rescuers racing to free a few dozen survivors The Mercury/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 22 September 2020 State civil employee candidates wearing face masks and shields take a test in Surabaya AFP via Getty World news in pictures 21 September 2020 A man sweeps at the Taj Mahal monument on the day of its reopening after being closed for more than six months due to the coronavirus pandemic AP World news in pictures 20 September 2020 A deer looks for food in a burnt area, caused by the Bobcat fire, in Pearblossom, California EPA World news in pictures 19 September 2020 Anti-government protesters hold their mobile phones aloft as they take part in a pro-democracy rally in Bangkok. Tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters massed close to Thailand's royal palace, in a huge rally calling for PM Prayut Chan-O-Cha to step down and demanding reforms to the monarchy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 September 2020 Supporters of Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr maintain social distancing as they attend Friday prayers after the coronavirus disease restrictions were eased, in Kufa mosque, near Najaf, Iraq Reuters World news in pictures 17 September 2020 A protester climbs on The Triumph of the Republic at 'the Place de la Nation' as thousands of protesters take part in a demonstration during a national day strike called by labor unions asking for better salary and against jobs cut in Paris, France EPA World news in pictures 16 September 2020 A fire raging near the Lazzaretto of Ancona in Italy. The huge blaze broke out overnight at the port of Ancona. Firefighters have brought the fire under control but they expected to keep working through the day EPA World news in pictures 15 September 2020 Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny posing for a selfie with his family at Berlin's Charite hospital. In an Instagram post he said he could now breathe independently following his suspected poisoning last month Alexei Navalny/Instagram/AFP World news in pictures 14 September 2020 Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida celebrate after Suga was elected as new head of the ruling party at the Liberal Democratic Party's leadership election in Tokyo Reuters World news in pictures 13 September 2020 A man stands behind a burning barricade during the fifth straight day of protests against police brutality in Bogota AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 September 2020 Police officers block and detain protesters during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus. Daily protests calling for the authoritarian president's resignation are now in their second month AP World news in pictures 11 September 2020 Members of 'Omnium Cultural' celebrate the 20th 'Festa per la llibertat' ('Fiesta for the freedom') to mark the Day of Catalonia in Barcelona. Omnion Cultural fights for the independence of Catalonia EPA World news in pictures 10 September 2020 The Moria refugee camp, two days after Greece's biggest migrant camp, was destroyed by fire. Thousands of asylum seekers on the island of Lesbos are now homeless AFP via Getty World news in pictures 9 September 2020 Pope Francis takes off his face mask as he arrives by car to hold a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 8 September 2020 A home is engulfed in flames during the "Creek Fire" in the Tollhouse area of California AFP via Getty World news in pictures 7 September 2020 A couple take photos along a sea wall of the waves brought by Typhoon Haishen in the eastern port city of Sokcho AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 September 2020 Novak Djokovic and a tournament official tends to a linesperson who was struck with a ball by Djokovic during his match against Pablo Carreno Busta at the US Open USA Today Sports/Reuters World news in pictures 5 September 2020 Protesters confront police at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia, during an anti-lockdown rally AFP via Getty World news in pictures 4 September 2020 A woman looks on from a rooftop as rescue workers dig through the rubble of a damaged building in Beirut. A search began for possible survivors after a scanner detected a pulse one month after the mega-blast at the adjacent port AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 September 2020 A full moon next to the Virgen del Panecillo statue in Quito, Ecuador EPA World news in pictures 2 September 2020 A Palestinian woman reacts as Israeli forces demolish her animal shed near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank Reuters World news in pictures 1 September 2020 Students protest against presidential elections results in Minsk TUT.BY/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 August 2020 The pack rides during the 3rd stage of the Tour de France between Nice and Sisteron AFP via Getty World news in pictures 30 August 2020 Law enforcement officers block a street during a rally of opposition supporters protesting against presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus Reuters World news in pictures 29 August 2020 A woman holding a placard reading "Stop Censorship - Yes to the Freedom of Expression" shouts in a megaphone during a protest against the mandatory wearing of face masks in Paris. Masks, which were already compulsory on public transport, in enclosed public spaces, and outdoors in Paris in certain high-congestion areas around tourist sites, were made mandatory outdoors citywide on August 28 to fight the rising coronavirus infections AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 August 2020 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bows to the national flag at the start of a press conference at the prime minister official residence in Tokyo. Abe announced he will resign over health problems, in a bombshell development that kicks off a leadership contest in the world's third-largest economy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 August 2020 Residents take cover behind a tree trunk from rubber bullets fired by South African Police Service (SAPS) in Eldorado Park, near Johannesburg, during a protest by community members after a 16-year old boy was reported dead AFP via Getty World news in pictures 26 August 2020 People scatter rose petals on a statue of Mother Teresa marking her 110th birth anniversary in Ahmedabad AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 August 2020 An aerial view shows beach-goers standing on salt formations in the Dead Sea near Ein Bokeq, Israel Reuters World news in pictures 24 August 2020 Health workers use a fingertip pulse oximeter and check the body temperature of a fisherwoman inside the Dharavi slum during a door-to-door Covid-19 coronavirus screening in Mumbai AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 August 2020 People carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesh, the deity of prosperity, to immerse it off the coast of the Arabian sea during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India Reuters World news in pictures 22 August 2020 Firefighters watch as flames from the LNU Lightning Complex fires approach a home in Napa County, California AP World news in pictures 21 August 2020 Members of the Israeli security forces arrest a Palestinian demonstrator during a rally to protest against Israel's plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank AFP via Getty World news in pictures 20 August 2020 A man pushes his bicycle through a deserted road after prohibitory orders were imposed by district officials for a week to contain the spread of the Covid-19 in Kathmandu AFP via Getty World news in pictures 19 August 2020 A car burns while parked at a residence in Vacaville, California. Dozens of fires are burning out of control throughout Northern California as fire resources are spread thin AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 August 2020 Students use their mobile phones as flashlights at an anti-government rally at Mahidol University in Nakhon Pathom. Thailand has seen near-daily protests in recent weeks by students demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha AFP via Getty World news in pictures 17 August 2020 Members of the Kayapo tribe block the BR163 highway during a protest outside Novo Progresso in Para state, Brazil. Indigenous protesters blocked a major transamazonian highway to protest against the lack of governmental support during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic and illegal deforestation in and around their territories AFP via Getty World news in pictures 16 August 2020 Lightning forks over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as a storm passes over Oakland AP World news in pictures 15 August 2020 Belarus opposition supporters gather near the Pushkinskaya metro station where Alexander Taraikovsky, a 34-year-old protester died on August 10, during their protest rally in central Minsk AFP via Getty World news in pictures 14 August 2020 AlphaTauri's driver Daniil Kvyat takes part in the second practice session at the Circuit de Catalunya in Montmelo near Barcelona ahead of the Spanish F1 Grand Prix AFP via Getty World news in pictures 13 August 2020 Soldiers of the Brazilian Armed Forces during a disinfection of the Christ The Redeemer statue at the Corcovado mountain prior to the opening of the touristic attraction in Rio AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 August 2020 Young elephant bulls tussle playfully on World Elephant Day at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya AFP via Getty

Late last year, the country accepted 149 Christians from Iraq. However, many locals objected to their presence and plans to lodge them with local volunteers had to be stopped following public protests.

Slovakia is set to go to the polls on 5 March for parliamentary elections. Mr Fico is standing for re-election. Immigration has been one of the primary topics debated on the campaign trail.

With additional reporting by Reuters
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More than 250 refugees who arrived at Beirut airport are in mortal danger after being forcibly returned to war-torn Syria by Lebanese authorities, Amnesty International has said.

The refugees, who arrived at Beiruts Rafic Hariri airport with the intention of travelling on to Turkey, were unable to board their connecting Turkish Airlines flights after new visa restrictions came into effect on Friday.

The new rules, imposed by Turkish authorities overnight, require Syrians arriving in the country by air and sea to have visas  for six years refugees have been allowed to enter visa-free for up to 90 days. Those who missed the deadline on Friday were forced to return to their Syrian homes, facing detention on arrival.

On Friday a group of 100 refugees were returned, then later in the day a further group of 150 who were stranded at the airport in Beirut were also flown to Syria, Amnesty told The Independent.

Speaking to AFP, Fadi al-Hassan, the head of Beirut international airport, said Syrian airline "Cham Wings is now returning 370 Syrian passengers to Damascus". He added: "A plane has already transported the first group, and we are waiting two more groups."

The decision by Lebanese authorities to deport the refugees back to Syria has been slammed by the leading human rights group Amnesty International which added that the country had stooped to a shocking new low and have placed the refugees in mortal danger.

From Kabul to Congo: Unique photography project captures day-to-day drama of the world's refugees Show all 6 1 /6 From Kabul to Congo: Unique photography project captures day-to-day drama of the world's refugees From Kabul to Congo: Unique photography project captures day-to-day drama of the world's refugees 603332.bin Espen Rasmussen/Panos Pictures From Kabul to Congo: Unique photography project captures day-to-day drama of the world's refugees 603333.bin Espen Rasmussen/Panos Pictures From Kabul to Congo: Unique photography project captures day-to-day drama of the world's refugees 603334.bin Espen Rasmussen/Panos Pictures From Kabul to Congo: Unique photography project captures day-to-day drama of the world's refugees 603335.bin Espen Rasmussen/Panos Pictures From Kabul to Congo: Unique photography project captures day-to-day drama of the world's refugees 603336.bin Espen Rasmussen/Panos Pictures From Kabul to Congo: Unique photography project captures day-to-day drama of the world's refugees 603337.bin Espen Rasmussen/Panos Pictures

This is an outrageous breach of Lebanons international obligations to protect all refugees fleeing bloodshed and persecution in Syria. The Lebanese government must halt all further deportations of Syrian refugees immediately, said Sherif Elsayed-Ali, head of refugees and migrants rights at Amnesty International.

He added: The new visa regulations in Turkey present yet another hurdle for Syrian desperate to seek sanctuary from the conflict and show what devastating consequences such restrictions can have for refugees.

Turkey and Lebanon host the highest numbers of Syrian refugees, with 2.2 million living in Turkish territories and just over one million in Lebanon.
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The Syrian government has confirmed for the first time that it is ready to attend peace talks with the opposition in Geneva later this month.

Syria is ready to take part in Geneva meetings at the appointed time, foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem said in a meeting in Damascus with UN envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura, according to state run Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA).

However, al-Moallems focus was still on fighting terrorism. The Assad government wants to review lists drawn up of participants distinguishing between terrorist organisations and those from the Syrian opposition sides who will partake in the talks.

In a reference to the prevalence of external powers exacerbating the conflict in Syria, al-Moallem also stated that the relevant resolutions are linked to the credibility of the efforts of fighting terrorism which require forcing the countries which support terrorism to stop backing it, according to SANA.

A statement Saturday from Mr De Mistura's office described his meeting with Mr al-Moallem as "useful" and said the UN envoy is "looking forward to the active participation of all relevant parties" in the upcoming talks.

Mr De Mistura has also been meeting with members of the Syrian opposition in Saudi Arabia, which has been a major supporter of some rebel groups aimed at removing Assad from power.

The Syrian opposition is demanding some gestures by the government ahead of the talks including lifting sieges imposed on rebel-held areas, releasing some detainees and ending airstrikes.

The Syrian opposition sees Bashar al Assad remaining in power as incompatible with their goals.

UN talks have been scheduled for 25th January to reboot efforts to end the Syrian civil war, following a resolution passed by the U.N. Security Council in December endorsing a transitional plan for Syria.

Attempted peace talks in 2014 failed to bring about meaningful change.

The Syrian conflict has so far killed over 250,000 and displaced millions, causing a refugee crisis in its border nations and reaching as far as Europe.
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His expression is rather cool, calm, and collected - its almost as if he knows what the future holds. Little did the other students in the photograph know who he was to become: a star in the legendary space film series that is Star Wars.

A new post on image-sharing site Imgur is beginning to do the rounds after a student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in the US spotted something different in a seemingly standard education poster featuring a row of smiling students - one of them is none other than a teenage John Boyega.

Boyega, who recently shot to super-fame after playing the character of as Finn in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, was, this week, named as one of the five faces lined up to be in the running for the Rising Star Award at the Bafta Film Awards next month.

It is unclear exactly when the image was uploaded onto the stock agency site Getty. However, titled Further education: school friends, the pictures accompanying caption reads: A group of 5 late-teenage school friends in a line with bright smiles and eye contact for the camera.

The student who uploaded the image probably had to look twice and rub his eyes when he spotted the actor, and wrote: I was a bit surprised to see Finn from Star Wars on a poster at my university.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Show all 24 1 /24 Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere John Boyega, left, and Oscar Isaac poses for photographers upon arrival at the European premiere of the film "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AP Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere British actress Daisy Ridley attends the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere British musician Noel Gallagher and family attend the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere British actor John Boyega attends the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" in central London AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Romeo and Brooklyn Beckham attend the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" at Leicester Square AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere US filmaker George Lucas and partner Mellody Hobson attend the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Mark Hamill gives a red carpet interview during the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Actress Carrie Fisher poses with stormtroopers - as her dog watches on AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere British actress Daisy Ridley attends the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere US actor Adam Driver attends the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Harrison Ford signs autographs for fans on the red carpet PA Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Writer-director J.J. Abrams attends the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen attends the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" in central London AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere British actor Peter Mayhew - who has played Chewbacca in all the Star Wars films - attends the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Warwick Davies poses for a selfie with Star Wars droid BB-8 AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Star Wars droid BB-8 attends the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Actor Warwick Davies and family attend the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Star Wars drones C-3PO and R2-DT attend the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" in central London AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Stormtroopers, Darth Vader and Chewbacca attend the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" at Leicester Square AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Star Wars characters attend the opening of the European Premiere of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" in central London AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Fans dressed up as Star Wars character pose ahead of the European Premiere of "Star Wars The Force Awakens" in central London AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Fans dressed up as Star Wars character pose ahead of the European Premiere of "Star Wars The Force Awakens" in central London AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Stormtroopers march through London's Leicesrer Square AFP/Getty Images Star Wars: The Force Awakens London premiere Star Wars London premiere Stormtroopers make their way down the red carpet ahead of the premiere AFP/Getty Images

Even the photographer, Chris Schmidt, was taken aback after the discovery came to light, and took to his Facebook to write: A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away... I did an education themed stock photo shoot with a bunch of teenage students; it turns out John Boyega did quite well afterwards.

 John Boyega surprises fans at Brixton's Ritzy

The force is strong with this one

That it is, Chris. That it is.

Prior to Star Wars, the 23-year-old from Peckham in London had only received one major film role as Moses in 2011s British sci-fi comedy Attack the Block, and also featured in the supernatural webisode series Becoming Human, a spin-off from BBC Threes Being Human.

Later this year, though, the young Brit looks set to move onto bigger things as he stars opposite Tom Hanks and Emma Watson in the film adaptation of The Circle, an adaptation of the Dave Eggers novel of the same name.
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Flights to Hurghada  the Egyptian resort where three foreign tourists were injured in an attack on the Bella Vista hotel  are continuing as normal, with EasyJet's 11.15am flight taking off from a murky Gatwick as planned.

The airline is telling passengers: "We are concerned to hear of the attacks in Hurghada." But it adds: "As the Foreign Office's advice on travel to Hurghada remains unchanged your flight will operate as planned."

What are the implications for British holidaymakers with plans to go to Egypt - and for the countrys tourist industry? Simon Calder, travel correspondent of The Independent, assesses the latest developments.

How does this latest atrocity aimed at tourists in Egypt compare with others?

The attack, extremely distressing though it was for those involved, barely registers. In 1997 the Luxor massacre killed 62 innocent people at an archaeological site beside the Nile. Then a series of attacks along the Sinai peninsula targeted Taba, Sharm el-Sheikh and Dahab in 2004, 2005 and 2006 respectively.

More recently Isis claimed to have placed a bomb aboard the Russian jet that crashed shortly after take-off from Sharm el-Sheikh airport in October, killing all 224 people on board  and leading to a ban on UK airlines flying to and from Egypts leading resort.

Cleaners try to clean blood stains near the entrance to Bella Vista Hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada, Egypt, January 9, 2016 (Reuters)

Given that ban, should there still be any flights to Egypt?

The Foreign Office advice is very specific and remains unchanged after the Hurghada attack. For many years the Government has warned that there is a high threat of terrorism in Egypt, but says the main resorts on the Red Sea, as well as the Nile Valley and the key cities including Cairo, are regarded as safe for British holidaymakers. The only ban that is in place is specifically about flights to and from Sharm el-Sheikh. So charter and scheduled flights to Hurghada, Cairo and Luxor will continue as normal.

Where does that leave British holidaymakers with bookings to Hurghada  can they switch or claim on their travel insurance?

They would have booked while the Foreign Office was warning of "a high threat of terrorism" to the country, and have no automatic rights to cancel without penalty. Unless the Foreign Office warns against travel to the main resorts  and experience suggests that such a change would take a very serious atrocity indeed  then flights and holidays will go ahead as planned. If you want to change then you are likely to lose some or all of your money. And "disinclination to travel" is not an insurable risk.

A member of the Egyptian security stands guard in front of the entrance to Bella Vista Hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada, Egypt, January 9, 2016. (Reuters)

What will the longer-term effect be?

To continue the destruction of tourism to Egypt, with the huge economic impact that will have. Just before Christmas I talked to the Egyptian tourist minister, Hisham Zazou, who told me: "The situation on the ground is under control. We are taking every step to protect tourists." Despite this assurance, terrorists were able to attack tourists in a holiday hotel in one of the top resorts.

The future for the millions of Egyptians who depend on tourism for their livelihood looks bleak. And it is likely to have a ripple effect on other parts of North Africa and possibly Turkey.

Click here to view the latest travel offers, with Independent Holidays.
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Being a flight attendant isn't like your typical 9-to-5 job.

According to Delta's careers page, flight attendants can expect 4 a.m. wake-up calls and sporadic hours, delays, and flight cancellations that will nix plans, and weekends and holidays spent working.

The tradeoff, though, is getting to see the world and not having to take your work home with you.

Flight attendants submit their monthly scheduling choices in a process called "bidding," and the more seniority they have, the more they're able to determine which routes they fly and days they get to take off.

Recommended Read more What flight attendants are really thinking about when they greet us

Every new flight attendant at Delta flies six monthly "A days," or days they are assigned to be on-call at or near the airport. For people who commute to work  many flight attendants live in cities other than where they are based  that can mean flying standby from home to base and then waiting to possibly be called to work a flight. For some, work commute means two four-hour flights across the country.

While the job is demanding at times, it does help to work for an airline employees seem to love.

On Glassdoor, employees rate Delta Air Lines four out of five stars, citing pros like great perks and benefits, a professional and friendly environment, and flexibility.

Danny Elkins, a 35-year veteran who's been a flight attendant with Delta since it acquired Pan American World Airways' North Atlantic routes in 1991, would agree.

During his tenure as a flight attendant, Elkins has held several titles, including Language of Destination flight attendant, International Coordinator, Code Share flight attendant, and flight-attendant recruiter.

We spoke to him to find out what it's really like to be a flight attendant. Here's what he said:

Current role

"Every interaction counts, so I make the most of it when I'm in the aisles."

Each workday really depends on the length of the flight and my rotation.

These days I generally fly from my base in Atlanta to the West Coast, including Los Angeles, Portland, San Francisco, Las Vegas, and other destinations. After meeting with my fellow flight attendants on board, we perform the required safety and security checks before helping passengers board.

We also prepare beverage carts and food carts for cabin service. If I'm working in the first-class cabin, I have meals to cook and work with pilots to discuss details of the flight.

I'm a people person, so after we finish our drink and snack service in the cabin I engage with customers and make sure I'm visible in the aisles to keep them well taken care of. We are there for our customers' safety and comfort, and every interaction counts, so I make the most of it when I'm in the aisles.

Hiring process

"I am told it's harder to get invited to the Delta Flight Attendant training center than to get into Harvard University."

I haven't been a flight-attendant candidate for 35 years, but I do help recruit our new hires, so I know a thing or two about the process.

Our culture at Delta is important to us, so we have to make sure those we hire can not only serve to keep our customers safe and comfortable on board, but also fit well within our organisation.

Recommended Read more Seven things that really annoy flight attendants

We implement an array of techniques, including video interviews, Q&A sessions, and in-person meetings to evaluate candidates to see if they'll be successful as a Delta flight attendant. It's a rigorous process, but we make sure it's fun and engaging for prospective crew members. And we often have an opportunity to select some amazing flight attendants.

Once the requisition is open for hire, it's not uncommon to receive more than 100,000 applications  I am told it's harder to get invited to the Delta Flight Attendant training center than to get into Harvard University.

Useful skills for a flight attendant to have

Being a good listener is a key skill to have.

It's important to have patience and be a good listener when you're a flight attendant.

Our passengers are as diverse as the places we fly, and their wants and needs vary greatly. But I have tools at my disposal to make sure they have a great experience on board the aircraft.

Flying can be tasking at times, so I do whatever I can to make their travel fun and easy. Listening to and being patient with my customers on board is paramount in making sure that happens.

Helpful education

Knowing another language gives you an advantage.

I studied Spanish in school and was ultimately hired to fill a language position. I've been based in New York, Miami, Los Angeles, and now Atlanta and have had the opportunity to speak Spanish on a daily basis both at home and at work on the plane.

Nearly all flights to Latin American destinations or to Spain have flight attendants on board who speak Spanish. Depending on the size of the plane, Delta often has several language-qualified flight attendants on board. Our customers value and appreciate having someone on board who can speak their native tongue and can act as a resource for them for any onboard translations.

Advice for breaking into the industry

Do a little research on the company and the industry. Familiarise yourself with important milestones and happenings, or learn about the airline's community involvement.

If you're given an opportunity to interview, come dressed for the part  usually business attire. We flight attendants take pride in our uniform and the way we look on board the aircraft and in the airports we serve, so it's important that you look the part.

Average pay for a flight attendant

Pay depends on how you schedule your flights.

I have the option to fly as few as 45 hours per month or as many hours as I want, provided I meet the required rest mandated by the Federal Aviation Administration, so it varies depending on how much flexibility I want in my schedule  that's part of why I love this career.

According to US Statistics, flight attendants earn on average $46,000 (31,679) a year, and the top 10% earn more than $70,000 (48,207) a year.

Perks and benefits

Flying virtually wherever you want on your days off is a unique perk.

Like all Delta employees, we can take advantage of our generous travel benefits and fly to places around the world. I love traveling when I work as a flight attendant, but I also get to travel for pleasure and that's a unique perk.

We also have a great medical, dental, and vision program as well as profit sharing, 401K matching, holiday pay, and other incentives. Last year the company shared $1.1 billion in profits with employees.

Choosing where to fly

There's a lot of flexibility as a flight attendant, but our seniority dictates where we can fly and on what days.

Our scheduling is computer-based, so I can give the computer up to 40 criteria, for example: start times, aircraft type, weekends off, international versus domestic destinations, long layovers, etc.

With those criteria the computer will attempt to build a schedule with as many of those choices satisfied as possible  dependent on my seniority.

Right now, I generally choose to work a one-day trip to Mexico and back on Mondays. On Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, I will work a three-day trip and spend the night in places like Chicago and then San Francisco, flying to a number of destinations in between.

Best part of the job

The best part is being able to have dinner in San Francisco one week and go to the beach in San Juan, Puerto Rico, in winter, the next  all while getting paid.

Worst part of the job

Delta is a global airline, and we fly to destinations halfway around the world. Changing time zones takes a toll on your body at times, but we have strategies to mitigate the effects, and long layovers in select destinations certainly help readjust your body clock.

Most surprising thing about being a flight attendant

Flight attendants are pros at handling difficult situations because of their extensive training.

The training we go through when we get hired and recurrent training we have to take and pass on a yearly basis  it is both intense and difficult. The classes refresh our memory on how to handle different types of fires, medical issues, evacuation drills, and security, to name a few.

Customers are often surprised to know the backgrounds of many of our flight attendants. I have flown with flight attendants who are also attorneys, real-estate agents, nurses, court translators, teachers, pilots, and many other professions that require advanced degrees.

Most memorable moment on the job

US and Canadian airspaces were closed to civilian travel for days following the September 11 attacks.

September 11, 2001 was the most memorable moment. We were leaving Caracas, Venezuela, for Atlanta and just about to make our takeoff roll. A Continental Airlines jet got off the ground in front of us, and I understand they were immediately diverted.

US airspace was closed for reasons unknown to our captain, and that was unprecedented. The tone in his voice put me on immediate alert. He told me we were going back to the gate and to get passengers off the aircraft as quickly as I could. The authorities knew there were threats to US airlines but obviously did not know to what extent.

By the time we got into the terminal the second World Trade Center tower had come down, and we watched it all on CNN. We stayed in Caracas for an additional four days (we had already been gone for three days), and we eventually ferried the aircraft home.

Favorite moment on the job

"I'll never forget little Lindsay, and it was absolutely a favorite moment of mine."

On an Atlanta to Orlando flight, a 6-year-old girl named Lindsay, in a wheelchair with Cerebral Palsy, was wheeled down the Jetway by her mom who had another child and luggage to bring on as well. While the mom was collecting her things I offered to carry Lindsay to her seat and was taken up on my offer immediately.

I didn't want to scare Lindsay and needed to establish a rapport with her, so I asked if she was going to see Mickey Mouse. Although nonverbal, her reaction told me she was beyond excited. She put her arms around my neck, and on the way to her seat I talked to her about what fun she would have.

When I carried her back to her wheelchair after landing in Orlando she didn't want to let go of my neck, and that gesture completely melted me. I'll never forget little Lindsay, and it was absolutely a favorite moment of mine.

Job security

Over the years, the airline industry has gone through some challenges, but we've seen a lot of very positive changes in the last several years. I have a lot of confidence in our leaders and in my 80,000 colleagues to continue making Delta a strong company and a great place to work.

Common misconceptions about the job

Flight attendants do more than serve you coffee.

We're commonly thought of as waiters and waitresses on a plane, but training and our real purpose for being on board goes far beyond service.

We are there for our customers' safety, security, and comfort, and that means we wear many hats. We are trained and can be called to address medical issues, unruly passengers, a fire, aircraft evacuation, and a number of other unforeseen circumstances.

Down time

Elkins enjoys spending time away from the airport on a lake in Georgia.

About 12 years ago I purchased a cabin on one of the large lakes in Georgia. It is so remote I have to bring all my supplies with me. I can relax on the deck or float on the lake and take some time away from the world's busiest airport.

The job's effect on enjoyment of traveling

After 35 years as a flight attendant, Elkins still loves to travel.

When it does affect my enjoyment of traveling it'll be time for me to cash in and retire.

Over the years I've taken some amazing vacations. Also my job gives me the opportunity to take friends and family with me at little or no charge to places that would not be available had I not been a flight attendant.

This job has given me a great life.

One word that describes being a flight attendant

Adventuresome.

Anybody who wants to take a job as a flight attendant is probably adventurous. Every day we leave our families, homes, and our comfort zone to travel to cities with different cultures, languages, and customs, all for the thrill of adventure.

I started this career at 22, left my home in North Carolina, and soon found myself living in NYC, flying around the world. Both my home life as well as my professional life became an instant adventure.
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When, a year ago, I was invited on to BBC Ones This Week to explain why I disliked Charlie Hebdo, Michael Portillo told me to remain silent. The former Conservative minister expressed outrage at my negativity towards the French magazine. Shrouding it with quasi-religious sanctity, he equated criticism of the publications badly drawn, embarrassingly unfunny material with a demonic defence of murderous terrorism.

As far as numerous Hebdo supporters are concerned, that reverential fantasy remains intact. The apologists have a dogmatic, preacher-like fervour about them as they cast their censorial stones. Their black-and-white argument is that al-Qaeda-affiliated gunmen who killed and maimed in and around the magazines offices represent all detractors. There is no subtlety: no acceptance that those of us left devastated by the massacre might also have a critical view of the publication.

In fact, as a Muslim born and brought up in Paris, I have every right to object to the excesses of Charlie Hebdo, while also feeling immense compassion for the victims of an abhorrent crime. Not only are the magazines crass, outdated stereotypes unpleasant in themselves (black people portrayed as monkeys and slaves, for example), but they spread racist and religious hatred in a manner that would be admonished instantly in every other sphere of public life.

Hebdo cartoonists and editorialists are part of Frances long tradition of anti-clericalism  they would be the first to admit that they despise religion and Islam in particular. In the words of former staff journalist Olivier Cyran, the magazines obsessive pounding of Muslims had powerfully contributed to popularising the idea that Islam is a major problem in French society.

In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Show all 25 1 /25 In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Police investigators search for evidence as an unidentified man is detained (L) during an operation in the eastern French city of Reims, after the shooting against the Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting A bullet impact is seen in a window of a building next to the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo's office, in Paris AP In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Police set up a piece of cloth at the back of a truck as they carry out a body from the offices of French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris Getty Images In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Police block the roads next to the 'Charly Hebdo' headquarter where a shoutout occurred in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting A truck tows the car used by armed gunmen who stormed the Paris offices of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo Getty Images In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting An injured person is evacuated outside the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo's office in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting French former Youth and Associations Junior minister Jeannette Bougrab (C) is comforted by an unidentified person outside of the headquarters of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting French Justice Minister Christiane Taubira reacts outside of the headquarters of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting French soldiers patrol in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris as the capital was placed under the highest alert status after heavily armed gunmen stormed French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and shot dead at least 12 people in the deadliest attack in France in four decades In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Firefighters carry an injured man on a stretcher in front of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting A victim is evacuated on a stretcher after armed gunmen stormed the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting A French Policeman is shot in the head in the street as two masked gunmen stormed the Charlie Hebdo headquarters, opening fire on staff In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting A bullet's impact on the window of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris, after armed gunmen stormed the offices leaving at least 10 people dead In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting A police car riddled with bullets during an attack on the offices of the newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting French President Francois Hollande (C) arrives after a shooting at the Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting France's interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve (C, L) and Paris' Mayor Anne Hidalgo (C, R) arrive at the headquarters of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Firefighters and police officers gather in front of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Firefighters and police officers gather in front of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Armed gunmen face police officers near the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting A police officer stands next to the bicycle of a police officer who was hit by a car near the shell of a bullet (bottom R) not far from the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Firefighters carry an injured man on a stretcher in front of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Police forces gather in street outside the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Firefighters carry an injured man on a stretcher in front of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Firefighters carry an injured man on a stretcher in front of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris In pictures: Charlie Hebdo shooting Charlie Hebdo shooting Police officers and firefighters gather in front of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris, after armed gunmen stormed the offices leaving "casualties", according to the publication's cartoonist, and "six seriously injured" police officers according to City Hall

In recent years Hebdos abiding prejudice has become a useful ally to those demonising brown-skinned communities living in neglected suburbs. What better way to torment unwanted Muslims from Frances former colonial empire than to ridicule them as puritanical savages who cannot take a bad joke?

Coco, one of the surviving Hebdo cartoonists, infamously depicted the Prophet Mohamed as a sexually deviant porn star, with his genitals and bare bottom exposed. It is all very well to say that you can simply ignore such obscenities, but her images were distributed online to a Muslim-hating global audience, from gun-toting American patriots to an increasingly jingoistic European electorate.

The cartoons continue to represent a bigots dream  a way to humiliate one of the most revered figures in Islam, along with his billion-and-a-half followers, all in the name of fun.

Cocos drawings first appeared when politicians such as former president Nicolas Sarkozy and Marine Le Pen, of the Front National, were doing all they could to stigmatise Muslims who  unfashionable as it may sound  actually find great comfort and hope in their Prophet. In turn, the power brokers suggest that Islam is better associated with an enemy within and a terrorist threat.

The Coco-style jokes are meanwhile mitigated by pompous claims about how you need to understand the French, or at least have an elite education, to get them. In fact, this is pure hypocrisy: numerous laws aimed at stopping discrimination against ethnic and religious minorities are simply ignored when it comes to the magazine.

It is not hyperbolic to compare Hebdos nastier material with that produced by the Nazi Der Sturmer magazine in the run-up to the Holocaust. The argument that only pens are used by Hebdo to depict Muslims as bearded cretins who spend their time on porn sites, as desert pigs, and women as sexual jihadists as they pray towards Mecca, their alleged pimp, could just as easily have been applied to Der Sturmers poisonous caricatures of Jews. While any hint of anti-Semitism immediately results in criminal prosecutions in France, Hebdo is given a free pass every single time. There is no need for a blasphemy bill: the legislation has always been in place to rein Hebdo in, but it never is. In this sense, the magazine is the spoilt, snarling brat of a Paris establishment that is otherwise as censorial as it is secretive.

After Hebdos offices were firebombed in 2011, the Socialist administration in Paris poured state funds into one of the worst security operations in history, providing a new top secret HQ that was anything but. Hebdos address was published in the telephone directory, and indeed in the magazine itself. A 24-hour police patrol car was initially posted outside the building but then  despite ongoing threats  was mysteriously stood down.

In other words, the authorities conceded that Hebdo was inflaming tensions to the point of violence, yet they wanted it to continue doing so, while not providing sufficient protection. Is this really what a society supposedly founded on tolerance and respect  on Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite  has come to? Is France all about testing the boundaries of extremism  how far one group is prepared to mock and humiliate, and how far another is prepared to react?

A commemorative plaque to pay tribute to the victims of 2015's attacks outside the former offices of French weekly satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo (EPA)

Never mind that Hebdo was pitifully amateur, its circulation was plummeting, and it faced bankruptcy (facts that the propagandists now conveniently overlook)  it had to be subsidised at any cost. Instead of controlling hateful expression, the French Republic bankrolled it.

Now we are back to square one: Hebdo is ensconced in another top secret Paris location, and is funded by millions more in state and charitable donations. This money mainly comes from entitled secularists and liberals propagating the fallacious right to offend mantra  one that only works if you are offending the right kind of people. Thus deceitful arguments for free-speech and against censorship are cynically used to spread hatred against devout immigrant communities, all in absolute contempt of the law.

Secularism and liberalism are not meant to subjugate religion. On the contrary, if they are applied properly they create a respectful society in which all expressions of faith can flourish, along with those who are atheists or agnostics.

What Mr Portillo failed to point out following those vile crimes a year ago was that the producers of This Week refused to broadcast Charlie Hebdos work. Thus I was being castigated for attacking a magazine considered too offensive to display. The entire Hebdo myth is built on such hypocritical absurdities  ones that make me object to its vicious excesses even more.
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During a conference in Berlin last month, I asked a young German woman how she felt about Angela Merkels decision to open the countrys borders to more than a million refugees. She said she supported her Chancellor but the policy had caused painful arguments among her friends, most of them recent graduates like her. The issue they disagreed upon was the potential impact on Germany of mass migration from countries where womens rights are barely acknowledged.

It would be easy to dismiss the anxieties she expressed as a covert expression of xenophobia, but I dont think that was her motivation. Many migrants come from countries where women have low status and little legal protection; it is only two years since Morocco repealed a law that allowed rapists of under-age girls to escape prosecution by marrying their victims. I keep hoping that one of the benefits of mass migration into Europe will be an opportunity to empower women and girls, giving them the confidence to demand rights I take for granted.

Recommended Read more Austrian police chief warns women not to leave home alone

A much more disturbing possibility  that some migrant men violently reject the idea of gender equality  is why the mass sexual assaults in Cologne on New Years Eve have caused such heart-searching. Other German cities, including Hamburg, reported sex attacks on a smaller scale, while a police chief in Finland made the startling claim that migrant gangs had similar plans to commit sex assaults in Helsinki. He said three asylum seekers had been arrested.

Colognes police chief stood down on Friday, after his force faced accusations of trying to conceal the fact that some of the men involved in the assaults were migrants. The slow police response is frustrating because, more than a week after the attacks, the job of identifying men who committed mass sexual assaults is increasingly difficult; I dont think theres much doubt that the police failed victims and made a bad situation worse by leaving the attackers identities in question. But I also dont think we should query the accounts of women who say their assailants appeared to be migrants and the attacks were organised. A leaked police report described victims being forced to run the gauntlet between ranks of extremely intoxicated men.

German far-right supporters demonstrate at Cologne`s train station (Reuters)

It is this aspect of the Cologne assaults which has caused the greatest outrage. Rape and sexual assaults are not unknown in European cities but organised sex attacks by gangs in public spaces are a new and terrifying phenomenon.

New to Europe, that is: there are striking parallels with what happened to women during mass demonstrations in Egypt during the Arab Spring. The CBS correspondent Lara Logan thought she was going to die after being seized and stripped by a mob, but most of the victims were Egyptian women who had rushed to join demonstrations against President Hosni Mubarak.

I was completely sexually assaulted by groups of men, pulling on me, grabbing every inch of my body, said one young woman who was attacked in Tahrir Square, Cairo in 2011. It was not an isolated incident: on a single day in 2013, more than 80 women were brutally assaulted by gangs of men during further demonstrations. In countries where women have few legal protections, some men behave as if they own the streets.

Even in Tunisia, which is widely regarded as having one of the best records in North Africa on gender equality, women describe sexual harassment as our everyday experience. In Egypt, where feminist organisations have existed since the 1920s, a recent UN report suggested that 99.3 per cent of Egyptian women have been sexually harassed. A study in 2008 by the Egyptian Centre for Womens Studies found that almost three-quarters of victims wore the veil, making a nonsense of Katie Hopkinss sarcastic proposal in the Daily Mail that she might now have to buy a burka and get it over with.

Hopkins is just as wrong when she suggests that some Islamic and Arabic men have no respect for white women. Men who commit such attacks have no respect for women, period, and are just as likely to be violent towards their wives, sisters and daughters. Its sometimes forgotten that many migrants are women and children, and even more likely to suffer from the effects of deeply entrenched sexist ideas than European women. In that 2008 study almost 63 per cent of the Egyptian men interviewed openly admitted they had harassed women.

In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Show all 10 1 /10 In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany A police officer talks to a counterprotestor at the sidelines of right-wing movement 'Baergida' (Berlin Patriots against the islamization of the Occident), a Berlin version of Pegida (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the Occident), protest in Berlin In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany Participants of right-wing movement 'Baergida' (Berlin Patriots against the islamization of the Occident), a Berlin version of Pegida (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the Occident), protest in Berlin In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida with a sign reading 'Stop agitation against Islam' in Berlin In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany Participants of the 'Alliance against Racism' demonstrate against right-wing initiative Pegida (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the Occident) in Berlin. Counterdemonstrations against racism and xenophobia have been planned in Dresden, Berlin, Cologne and Stuttgart. The demonstrations staged by the anti-Islamic Pegida movement produce a series of slogans arguing that Germany is taking in too many foreigners, that the social structures are about to collapse due to the rising number of asylum-seekers, and that there is the threat of an 'Islamisation of the Occident' In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany German Justice Minister Heiko Maas takes part in a protest against the march of a grass-roots anti-Muslim movement in Berlin. The rise of the group, Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West (Pegida), has shaken Germany's political establishment In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany The lighting of the Brqandenburg Gate was switched off to make a statement against racism as People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida in Berlin In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany A left wing activist struggles with the riot police during a protest against a planed march of the Pegida movement in their first Berlin demonstration, which they have dubbed 'Baergida' In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida in Hamburg In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida in Munich In pictures: Anti-Pegida protesters Germany People protest against right-wing initiative Pegida in Stuttgart

It would be naive to assume that men with unacceptable attitudes towards women will undergo an instant change of heart on arriving in countries with a commitment to gender equality. The problem hasnt been helped by a chaotic asylum system which has encouraged the survival of the fittest; some statistics suggest that a disproportionate number of asylum seekers are unaccompanied young men. But the problem can be managed through education and a direct challenge to views which are inherently sexist, or homophobic. If we can teach refugees English or German, we can also teach them about the importance of equality and human rights.

What happened in Cologne and other European cities is a wake-up call, but not the one claimed by far-right organisations such as Pegida, which held a rally in Cologne on Saturday. Even Merkel hasnt quite got it, talking last week about the feeling women had of being at peoples mercy. The one thing we know beyond doubt about the people who committed sex attacks in German cities is that they were men, a fact which should move womens rights to the top of the agenda.

A strong, confident Europe should be perfectly capable of doing two things: protecting people fleeing vile regimes while upholding the principle that every woman has a fundamental right to feel safe in public space.

Twitter.com/@polblonde; politicalblonde.com
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A Voices piece on Monday began: Sorry if this column makes some of you miserable or cross. Some of whom? Why, the readers of course, that community of people whom writers easily imagine themselves to be addressing. But just as Queen Victoria reputedly complained of Gladstone addressing her as if she were a public meeting, I confess that I, as a reader, object to writers addressing me as if the mere reading of an article has enrolled me in a club, some of whom may do this or that. The act of reading is solitary. There is just you and the newspaper. And it would be an odd club whose members had never met one another.

I hasten to assure you, dear reader, that in this column you will remain singular, as you deserve.

 A news story on Wednesday reported: Mr Corbyn has been urged by senior advisers to get a firmer grip on his front bench following public splits over bombing Isis in Syria and renewing the Trident nuclear deterrent.

The orthodoxy in Whitehall and Westminster is that while less enlightened nations have nuclear weapons, which are devices for incinerating thousands of people, Britain has a nuclear deterrent, which is of course nothing like that.

A newspaper should not allow such dishonest language to infiltrate its news pages, and should call Britains nuclear weapon a nuclear weapon.

 A feature article on Wednesday quoted and analysed Donald Trumps first campaign TV commercial: Donald Trump calls it radical Islamic terrorism. Thats why hes calling for a temporary shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until we can figure out whats going on. Righto.

No, that breezy exclamation of agreement (here employed ironically) is two words, spelt Right ho. I cite as authority the title of a 1934 novel by that great master of English prose, PG Wodehouse: Right Ho, Jeeves.

 In the journalese world everybody must have a label, as simple and vivid as possible. This is from a news story published on Thursday: Political correctness must not sanitise comedy and inhibit controversial material, Tracey Ullman has warned ahead of the veteran performers return to the BBC. So, Tracey Ullman is the veteran performer. Not untrue (though perhaps a little unkind at the age of 56), but the placing of the label is odd, just after a quotation of her opinions. It makes it sound as if she referred to herself as the veteran performer.

 A Voices piece on Monday referred to Greggs, McDonalds, Wrigley, Costa and KFC who, lets face it, should know a thing or two about litter and the despoilation of the nations high streets. There are two things wrong with despoilation. First, it is misspelt; the verb is despoil, but the noun is despoliation. Second, it is misapplied; it means spoiling in the sense of robbery or plunder.
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Something long overdue is happening here. The worm is turning against political correctness. For that, thank the excesses of self-appointed student thought police at some of the USs most venerable universities. But, though it pains me to say it, thank also Donald Trump and the wrecking ball he has taken to accepted norms of political campaigning.

Im no lover of Trump. Hes a narcissist, a bully and a bigot. Nonetheless he strikes a chord, and nowhere more so than in his railings against political correctness. The specifics may be odious: the ad feminam tirades; the callous disparagement of the war record of the Republican party grandee John McCain, who was captured and tortured by the North Vietnamese. But his broad theme is persuasive. The country, he says, is being suffocated by political correctness imposed by a cross-party elite. And Americans of every persuasion seem to agree.

Recommended Read more Two images that show just how disconcertingly popular Donald Trump is

In a fascinating poll last year by Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey, no less than 68 per cent said political correctness was a big problem in the US. Not just Republicans, but Democrats, independents and even minorities agreed. True, support dropped notably when Trumps name was attached. But other Republicans are following his example. They know a winning issue when they see one.

The PC controversy, turns on such practices as affirmative action, which ensures minority representation on college campuses and has, of course, been with us for decades. So too has PCs brother, the language of euphemism, in which America is a global leader. This is the land of Pentagon-speak, where mass civilian casualties are sanitised as collateral damage; the land where appropriate and inappropriate have supplanted those quaint and obsolete notions of right and wrong, and where you dont grow old but become a senior citizen.

But the latest campus goings-on have added a new dimension to the debate. A few weeks ago, I wrote in this space about the uproar among minority Yale students over offensive Halloween costumes, after a university official dared wonder in an email whether there was no longer any room for the young to be a little bit obnoxious and whether people could not simply ignore or reject things that bothered them.

Ignore? Not a bit of it. The official was castigated, and the clamour to make university a safe space merely intensified. So too did demands by many college student bodies for advance warning about courses that highlighted ideas that might be considered controversial or offensive. And so too did the fuss over so-called micro-aggressions  small, perceived slights, mostly sexist or racist, and often unintended.

Thus we slide into the related debate over Americas supposed culture of victimhood, first popularised by the late Australian art critic Robert Hughes in his 1993 book Culture of Complaint. Its thesis was that the country was turning into a nation of whiners and spoilt children, where racial and other minority groups claimed to be victim of some injustice or other.

Political correctness has been one way of coping with these grievances. But the airing of one groups complaints quickly inspired anothers: if this lot is being protected, ran the refrain, why cant we?. And so, it is argued, the PC blight spread, its most absurd manifestation perhaps the case of poor little rich boy Ethan Crouch, who killed four people in a drunken driving incident in 2013.

He was placed on probation after his lawyers argued that he suffered from affluenza, a supposed mental sickness caused by financial privilege. Now hes back in the news, having taken off for Mexico with his mother in breach of his probation terms, only to be arrested there just after Christmas. Currently, Crouch is fighting deportation back to the US, claiming that the Mexican authorities violated his human rights.

Donald Trump's most controversial quotes Show all 14 1 /14 Donald Trump's most controversial quotes Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On Isis: "Some of the candidates, they went in and didnt know the air conditioner didnt work and sweated like dogs, and they didnt know the room was too big because they didnt have anybody there. How are they going to beat ISIS?" Getty Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On immigration: "I will build a great wall  and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me and Ill build them very inexpensively. I will build a great, great wall on our southern border, and I will make Mexico pay for that wall. Mark my words." Reuters Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On Free Trade: "Free trade is terrible. Free trade can be wonderful if you have smart people. But we have stupid people." PAUL J. RICHARDS | AFP | Getty Images Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On Mexicans: "When Mexico sends its people, theyre not sending their best. Theyre sending people that have lots of problems. Theyre bringing drugs. Theyre bringing crime. Theyre rapists." Getty Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On China: "I just sold an apartment for $15 million to somebody from China. Am I supposed to dislike them?... I love China. The biggest bank in the world is from China. You know where their United States headquarters is located? In this building, in Trump Tower." Getty Images Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On work: "If you're interested in 'balancing' work and pleasure, stop trying to balance them. Instead make your work more pleasurable." AP Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On success: "What separates the winners from the losers is how a person reacts to each new twist of fate." Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On life: "Everything in life is luck." AFP Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On ambition: "You have to think anyway, so why not think big?" Getty Images Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On his opponents: "Bush is totally in favour of Common Core. I don't see how he can possibly get the nomination. He's weak on immigration. He's in favour of Common Core. How the hell can you vote for this guy? You just can't do it." Reuters Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On Obamacare: "You have to be hit by a tractor, literally, a tractor, to use it, because the deductibles are so high. It's virtually useless. And remember the $5 billion web site?... I have so many web sites, I have them all over the place. I hire people, they do a web site. It costs me $3." Getty Images Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On Barack Obama: "Obama is going to be out playing golf. He might be on one of my courses. I would invite him. I have the best courses in the world. I have one right next to the White House." PA Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On himself: "Love him or hate him, Trump is a man who is certain about what he wants and sets out to get it, no holds barred. Women find his power almost as much of a turn-on as his money." Getty Images Donald Trump's most controversial quotes On America: "The American Dream is dead. But if I get elected president I will bring it back bigger and better and stronger than ever before and we will make America great again." GETTY

However, none of this fully explains why Trumps anti-PC fulminations resonate so strongly. There was one group which felt it had missed out on the political correctness party, indeed, that it had been victim of it. Call them what you will: the old Nixonian silent majority, the disgruntled Reagan Democrats of the 1980s, or voters whom Barack Obama wooed in his first White House campaign, who had lost their jobs due to globalisation.

They tend to be white, without a college degree. They cant find work  or at least work that pays half-way decently and has the benefits they were used to. They consider themselves the salt of the American earth. Yet they have to listen to voicemail services that tell them to press 1 if they want a reply in English. They feel obliged to wish people Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas and feel they have been betrayed by a system in which they have no voice.

At which point, enter Donald Trump. He speaks his mind. He says things they wish they could, but which would normally be deemed politically incorrect. At last, someone is calling a spade a spade. His followers are Republicans, but also independents as well as blue-collar Democrats who never bought the Obama message.

Yes, I know the counter-argument. The US is a multicultural country where attacks on PC are often attacks on minorities and anyone else the speaker doesnt like. And what of the First Amendment, that unmatched constitutional guarantee of free speech? Unlike Britain, it is virtually impossible here to libel a public figure.

Donald Trump speaking in Rock Hill, South Carolina (AP)

However, without a measure of self-imposed restraint, free speech can turn into hate speech and mob incitement, and Trumps rants against immigrants, Mexicans and Muslims press right up against that fine line. Complaining  or PC, call it what you will  functions as a dam. The real menace to free speech is when people complain about the complaining.

That is the case for political correctness. The pendulum however has surely moved too far. A world stripped of PC would be blunter, harsher but more honest. And its a world Americans increasingly seem to want.
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The creative type with whom I felt the most sympathy in the first week of 2016 was a 36-year-old Glasgow resident named Ellie Harrison.

I will happily confess to not knowing anything about her activities until references to the controversy in which she is currently embroiled started to appear in the newspapers a few days ago, but that does not lessen the extent of my fellow feeling or the rush of craft solidarity that the case seemed instantly to inspire. For Ms Harrison, an artist who has just embarked on a year-long project in which she will not leave the confines of Scotlands largest city, barring ill-health or the death of a close relative or friend, has been accused of taking part in a poverty safari.

And why so? Well, news of this action research project/durational performance, booked to investigate the consequences of city-bound sequestration on career, social life, family ties and mental health, first appeared on a Facebook page accompanied by a somewhat stereotypical image of greasy chips.

Worse, the study has been named The Glasgow Effect thereby invoking a phrase often used to describe the poorer health and lower life expectancy of Glaswegians compared with those from other parts of the UK. Worse even than this, perhaps, is that Harrison has been given 15,000 of taxpayers money to finance the undertaking in the form of a grant from Creative Scotland.

Social media, naturally, found this irresistible. One of the more temperate comments was filed by Ellie Koepplinger, who observed: Ive lived here all my life, and Ive found that many of my peers have never left the Greater Glasgow area. Im not sure what this project attempts to achieve. Ms Koepplinger professed herself shocked that the first artefact that the artist associated with living in Greater Glasgow for a year was a plate of chips and added: Our culture is so much more than that. I dont believe you need 15k to see that.

Reporters and photographers who visit the Calais Jungle face the same controversy as Ellie Harrison (Rex)

A Creative Scotland spokeswoman described the object of its largesse as a recognised artist with a masters degree from Glasgow School of Art.

In Harrisons immediate defence, it should be pointed out that she has apparently lived and studied in Glasgow for nearly eight years, and can be presumed to know at least a little about the environment whose psycho-geography she now intends to map. And if, as Ms Koepplinger concedes, many people who live in Greater Glasgow have never left it, then surely this is a phenomenon worth investigating, even if the reason for this habit of staying put turns out to be poverty or straightforward inanition. The ordinary boys of the Morrissey song, who are happy going nowhere, are a sociologists dream merely because of their tethering to a landscape from which they wont or cant abscond.

As for the accusation that Harrison, by taking Government money and posting a picture of a plate of chips, is somehow launching herself on a poverty safari, then it is worth pointing out that this complaint has not only been levelled at artists for upwards of 200 years, but that the argument attached to its framing is, from the artists point of view, quite unwinnable. Choose not to study the effects of poverty and deprivation and you are ignoring the artists manifest duty of taking stock of the world outside the window. Go and have a look, and whatever the sincerity of your response, the length of your stay or the nature of your techniques, you will doubtless be accused of voyeurism or, worse, exploiting human misery.

However unfair this double assault, it is, at the same time, rare for an artist to emerge out of one of these engagements with his, or her, integrity entirely intact. Take, for example, the case of John Steinbecks celebrated Depression-era novel The Grapes of Wrath (1939), which tracks the flight of a family of ground-down Oklahoma sharecroppers to California  promoted to them as the American Dream in excelsis, but in reality a kind of charnel house of misery and exploitation. It is a work of something very near genius, which had the additional effect of alerting thousands of Americans to a tragedy being enacted on their own doorstep, and yet Steinbecks biographers have noted that the author, while certainly familiar with the deprivation he described, robbed much of the personal detail from research notes compiled by a US government employee and shared with him by her superior.

Culture news in pictures Show all 33 1 /33 Culture news in pictures Culture news in pictures 30 September 2016 An employee hangs works of art with "Grand Teatro" by Marino Marini (R) and bronze sculpture "Sfera N.3" by Arnaldo Pomodoro seen ahead of a Contemporary Art auction on 7 October, at Sotheby's in London REUTERS Culture news in pictures 29 September 2016 Street art by Portuguese artist Odeith is seen in Dresden, during an exhibition "Magic City - art of the streets" AFP/Getty Images Culture news in pictures 28 September 2016 Dancers attend a photocall for the new "THE ONE Grand Show" at Friedrichstadt-Palast in Berlin, Germany REUTERS Culture news in pictures 28 September 2016 With an array of thrift store china, humorous souvenirs and handmade tile adorning its walls and floors, the Mosaic Tile House in Venice stands as a monument to two decades of artistic collaboration between Cheri Pann and husband Gonzalo Duran REUTERS Culture news in pictures 27 September 2016 A gallery assistant poses amongst work by Anthea Hamilton from her nominated show "Lichen! Libido!(London!) Chastity!" at a preview of the Turner Prize in London REUTERS Culture news in pictures 27 September 2016 A technician wearing virtual reality glasses checks his installation in three British public telephone booths, set up outside the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague, Netherlands. The installation allows visitors a 3-D look into the museum which has twenty-two paintings belonging to the British Royal Collection, on loan for an exhibit from 29 September 2016 till 8 January 2017 AP Culture news in pictures 26 September 2016 An Indian artist dressed as Hindu god Shiva performs on a chariot as he participates in a religious procession 'Ravan ki Barat' held to mark the forthcoming Dussehra festival in Allahabad AFP/Getty Images Culture news in pictures 26 September 2016 Jean-Michel Basquiat's 'Air Power', 1984, is displayed at the Bowie/Collector media preview at Sotheby's in New York AFP/Getty Culture news in pictures 25 September 2016 A woman looks at an untitled painting by Albert Oehlen during the opening of an exhibition of works by German artists Georg Baselitz and Albert Oehlen in Reutlingen, Germany. The exhibition runs at the Kunstverein (art society) Reutlingen until 15 January 2017 EPA Culture news in pictures 24 September 2016 Fan BingBing (C) attends the closing ceremony of the 64th San Sebastian Film Festival at Kursaal in San Sebastian, Spain Getty Images Culture news in pictures 23 September 2016 A view of the artwork 'You Are Metamorphosing' (1964) as part of the exhibition 'Retrospektive' of Japanese artist Tetsumi Kudo at Fridericianum in Kassel, Germany. The exhibition runs from 25 September 2016 to 1 January 2017 EPA Culture news in pictures 22 September 2016 Jo Applin from the Courtauld Institute of Art looks at Green Tilework in Live Flesh by Adriana Vareja, which features in a new exhibition, Flesh, at York Art Gallery. The new exhibition features works by Degas, Chardin, Francis Bacon and Sarah Lucas, showing how flesh has been portrayed by artists over the last 600 years PA Culture news in pictures 21 September 2016 Performers Sean Atkins and Sally Miller standing in for the characters played by Asa Butterfield and Ella Purnell during a photocall for Tim Burton's "Miss Peregrines Home For Peculiar Children" at Potters Field Park in London Getty Images Culture news in pictures 20 September 2016 A detail from the blanket 'Alpine Cattle Drive' from 1926 by artist Ernst Ludwig Kirchner is displayed at the 'Hamburger Bahnhof - Museum for Contemporary Arts' in Berlin. The exhibition named 'Ernst Ludwig Kirchner - Hieroglyphen' showing the complete collection of Berlin's Nationalgallerie works of the German artist Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and will run from 23 September 2016 until 26 February 2017 AP Culture news in pictures 20 September 2016 A man looks at portrait photos by US photographer Bruce Gilden in the exhibition 'Masters of Photography' at the photokina in Cologne, Germany. The trade fair on photography, photokina, schowcases some 1,000 exhibitors from 40 countries and runs from 20 to 25 September. The event also features various photo exhibitions EPA Culture news in pictures 20 September 2016 A woman looks at 'Blue Poles', 1952 by Jackson Pollock during a photocall at the Royal Academy of Arts, London PA Culture news in pictures 19 September 2016 Art installation The Refusal of Time, a collaboration with Philip Miller, Catherine Meyburgh and Peter Galison, which features as part of the William Kentridge exhibition Thick Time, showing from 21 September to 15 January at the Whitechapel Gallery in London PA Culture news in pictures 18 September 2016 Artists creating one off designs at the Mm6 Maison Margiela presentation during London Fashion Week Spring/Summer collections 2017 in London Getty Images Culture news in pictures 18 September 2016 Bethenny Frankel attends the special screening of Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" to celebrate the 25th Anniversary Edition release on Blu-Ray and DVD in New York City Getty Images for Walt Disney Stu Culture news in pictures 17 September 2016 Visitors attend the 2016 Oktoberfest beer festival at Theresienwiese in Munich, Germany Getty Images Culture news in pictures 16 September 2016 Visitors looks at British artist Damien Hirst work of art 'The Incomplete Truth', during the 13th Yalta Annual Meeting entitled 'The World, Europe and Ukraine: storms of changes', organised by the Yalta European Strategy (YES) in partnership with the Victor Pinchuk Foundation at the Mystetsky Arsenal Art Center in Kiev AP Culture news in pictures 16 September 2016 Tracey Emin's "My Bed" is exhibited at the Tate Liverpool as part of the exhibition Tracey Emin And William Blake In Focus, which highlights surprising links between the two artists Getty Images Culture news in pictures 15 September 2016 Musician Dave Grohl (L) joins musician Tom Morello of Prophets of Rage onstage at the Forum in Inglewood, California Getty Images Culture news in pictures 14 September 2016 Model feebee poses as part of art installation "Narcissism : Dazzle room" made by artist Shigeki Matsuyama at rooms33 fashion and design exhibition in Tokyo. Matsuyama's installation features a strong contrast of black and white, which he learned from dazzle camouflage used mainly in World War I AP Culture news in pictures 13 September 2016 Visitors look at artworks by Chinese painter Cui Ruzhuo during the exhibition 'Glossiness of Uncarved Jade' held at the exhibition hall 'Manezh' in St. Petersburg, Russia. More than 200 paintings by the Chinese artist are presented until 25 September EPA Culture news in pictures 12 September 2016 A visitor looks at Raphael's painting 'Extase de Sainte Cecile', 1515, from the Uffizi Gallery in Florence during the opening of a Raphael exhibition at the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow, Russia. The first Russian exhibition of the works of the Italian Renaissance artist Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino includes eight paintings and three drawings which come from Italy. Th exhibit opens to the public from 13 September to 11 December EPA Culture news in pictures 11 September 2016 Steve Cropper and Eddie Floyd perform during Otis Redding 75th Birthday Celebration - Rehearsals at the Macon City Auditorium in Macon, Georgia Getty Images for Otis Redding 75 Culture news in pictures 10 September 2016 Sakari Oramo conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Symphony Chorus and the BBC Singers at the Last Night of the Proms 2016 at the Royal Albert Hall in London PA Culture news in pictures 9 September 2016 A visitor walks past a piece entitled "Fruitcake" by Joana Vasconcelo, during the Beyond Limits selling exhibition at Chatsworth House near Bakewell REUTERS Culture news in pictures 8 September 2016 A sculpture of a crescent standing on the 2,140 meters high mountain 'Freiheit' (German for 'freedom'), in the Alpstein region of the Appenzell alps, eastern Switzerland. The sculpture is lighted during the nights by means of solar panels. The 38-year-old Swiss artist and atheist Christian Meier set the crescent on the peak to start a debate on the meaning of religious symbols - as summit crosses - on mountains. 'Because so many peaks have crosses on them, it struck me as a great idea to put up an equally absurd contrast'. 'Naturally I wanted to provoke in a fun way. But it goes beyond that. The actions of an artist should be food for thought, both visually and in content' EPA Culture news in pictures Culture news in pictures Culture news in pictures

Does that make Steinbecks mid-1930s trips down Route 66 and his cruises around the Bakersfield area a poverty safari? Or does the impact of his reportage cancel out the great authorial crime of not acknowledging your sources?

The same dilemma hangs over Charles Dickenss pursuits of mid-19th-century London lowlife, which both drew attention to social evils, which the majority of Victorians were disposed to overlook, while offering a reliable source of material, and ultimately income, for the writer. And it will presumably have occurred to the photographer or essayist who turns up at a Calais refugee camp  that queer feeling that nearly every writer or painter experiences once in a while at the realisation that moral outrage is surprisingly easy to monetise.

Although there had been many an outlier  Jack Londons People of the Abyss (1903), say, or W H Daviess The Autobiography of a Super-Tramp (1908), the golden age of the British poverty safari  if that is what it was  came in the 1930s, when, as a critic once waggishly put it, you could scarcely throw a stone outside a pit-head without hitting a journalist engaged on a story about the plight of the unemployed miner. It was the age of J B Priestleys English Journey (1934), of George Orwells The Road to Wigan Pier (1937) or H W Massinghams I Took Off My Tie (1936), which follows its well-bred hero into the depths of the landlord-loathing East End.

The curious aspect of many of these investigations is the relative confusion of motive. To one or two scholars, Orwells tour of the poverty-stricken North of England was a significant milestone on his journey to socialism, but much of the evidence suggests that when he set out Orwell was merely a journalist in search of saleable copy and barely knew what the Labour Party was. There were other writers for whom the implications of the task that they had set themselves eventually became too uncomfortable to be borne.

Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath tracks the flight of a family of ground-down Oklahoma sharecroppers to California (Rex)

Beverley Nichols, for example, who announced in 1933 that he was to spend several weeks in Glasgow researching the conditions of the unemployed, lasted 10 days in his tenement lodgings before booking himself into a hotel, the reason being, his biographer tells us, that he found it impossible to articulate his anger and despair in a way that would result in action.

There are interesting parallels here with Harrison, for Nichols, too, was accused of being a poverty tourist and told by one Scottish newspaper that, for any good to come of them, his researches would need several years rather than several weeks.

What is the non-Glaswegian to feel about this action research project and its government funding? My own view is that, even in an age of austerity, so much public money is thrown away by the state that 15,000 to an artist is the smallest of small beer.

Meanwhile, its a fact that Harrison has managed to annoy many people. In an age where most art attracts only the most negligible response from its potential patrons, this can only be a good thing.
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Stephen Doughty, the Labour MP and shadow foreign affairs minister, resigned on 6 January, live on television, less than an hour before PMQs. It embarrassed Jeremy Corbyn at the Despatch Box, that is true. But the people who have complained that the on-air resignation on the Daily Politics was a stitch-up between BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg and the programmes producers dont understand journalism.

Doughty was resigning anyway, and had already written to Corbyn shortly beforehand. Kuenssberg, like any other journalist, wanted to get the scoop of his resignation. There was no bias: would it have been better if the BBC had urged the MP for Cardiff South to go on Sky News to resign instead? Or had got a Tory MP on to the programme to resign at the same time?

This was not news created, but news reported. Stories happen all the time, it is just a question of how to make sure it is your readers or viewers, and not those of your rivals, who get to see it first. Likewise, there are millions of puddles across this country, but only one enterprising company, Drummond, decided to livestream one on Periscope in a suburb of Newcastle that ended up being viewed by more than 50,000 people, becoming a news story on the same day as Doughtys resignation. A second puddle live on Periscope would be old news.

Doughty resigned for honourable reasons  he did not agree with the sacking of Pat McFadden as shadow Europe minister and Michael Dugher as shadow Culture Secretary. He could have tweeted his resignation, but instead took up the offer to do it on TV. Why shouldnt he? He feared that had he left his resignation to be announced by the leaders office, it would have been spun differently. (Given that Hilary Benn had to clarify that he had not been told not to speak his mind, after Corbyn Central had briefed the opposite, Doughty was right to be worried.)

Whether we like it or not, we live in an age in which public lives  and puddles  are played out on television, Twitter and Periscope. Barring a few notable exceptions, Parliament is no longer the dominant forum for debate or for a dramatic announcement. Doughty is not, if he will forgive me, the most recognisable or well-known of MPs. Why shouldnt he get the exposure? The public wants our politicians, like our celebrities, to share everything, to be something other than, if you like, as dull as puddlewater. MPs should be forgiven for playing along.

Some politicians are more adept than others at this new game. I will not get into the sleazy text scandal involving the Rochdale Labour MP Simon Danczuk, but before that story broke he courted the media like any minor celebrity. There is nothing wrong with this on face value: it is a more professional version of what his colleagues do less well, from putting out a press release about a constituency visit to doing a glossy interview with GQ. But did Danczuk cross the line when, as he admitted last week, he received 1,100 from a picture agency that sold pictures of him to red-top newspapers? Should public servants receive such publicity dividends simply for being an MP?

It seems wrong, but if we criticise Danczuk for taking the money  and it is from a private company, not public funds  then we should do the same to MPs who receive money for writing articles, after-dinner speeches and, like Corbyns ally Diane Abbott, TV appearances on the publicly funded broadcaster. While it may not be wrong, or gutter politics, it is unseemly, and, like a muddy puddle, rather murky.

Starving Syrians cannot wait

The pictures of emaciated and dying children and adults from the Syrian town of Madaya, which has been blockaded by the Assad government, should shame the world. So, why isnt there more urgency from the UK government?

In a letter to the Prime Minister on 8 January, Lord Ashdown and Labour MP Jo Cox, a former head of policy for Oxfam, said the UN was not being firm enough in trying to get aid into the town. Cox says that aid is still not getting through despite a deal between the UN and Damascus, and that the RAF, which has the capability and is in the region, could carry out emergency food drops.

The response from No 10 to this letter was that the images are heart-rending and that funding for more aid to Syrian refugees will be secured at a London conference next month. But for the starving and dying of Madaya, next month is too long to wait.

Those special phone calls

The newly released transcripts of phone calls between Tony Blair and Bill Clinton confirm many things about their relationship  the then US President was the joker, while Blair was all British seriousness, always trying to move the conversation on from banter.

But in two phone calls Clinton also reveals his admiration for the then Chancellor Gordon Brown. It was October 1998, when relations between Blair and Brown were more cordial than they later became. The President said Brown did a hell of a job talking to international finance ministers ahead of a G7 meeting, and also praised his suggestion of a new version of the post-war economic agreement at Bretton Woods, to prevent a worldwide financial crisis (although quite clearly it didnt work out as planned). Blair responded by saying that his No 11 rival was bloody bright, isnt he?.

The transcript does not show, of course, whether this was said through gritted teeth.

Talking to the animals

I have never been the most natural person with animals or birds  my only pet as a child was a goldfish  but last week I found myself talking to a baby robin that had got its head and feet stuck in the netting of one of my allotment neighbours.

Before running to get my secateurs to release it, I found myself involuntarily saying to the stricken bird: Dont worry, I will set you free. It couldnt have possibly understood, but I carried on talking to it as I cut the netting before it was finally released and could fly off.

Now we have my daughters class hamster to stay for the weekend, I might have re-deploy my inter-species linguistic skills to tell it to stop gnawing at its cage all night.

Twitter: @janemerrick23
The deputy president of the Irish Farmers' Association (IFA) has insisted he had not withdrawn his bid to get onto the election ballot paper.

Cork dairy farmer Tim O'Leary was vying with Carlow IFA chairman Derek Deane, who was the frontrunner in calling for transparency in pay in the association, for enough nominations to secure the final spot in the bid to become the next IFA president.

However, Mr Deane has stated that a technical difficulty halted his bid to enter the race and has called for his case to be put to the executive council to decide upon.

"I know that there is not a council member who will oppose my candidacy based on that I had the support by the required time but there was a technology failure on the email," Mr Deane said.

Mr Deane said he has informed the IFA that he received a message from the chair of Monaghan 15 minutes before the deadline pledging the final required nomination on the basis that Mr O'Leary had withdrawn his bid.

However, Mr O'Leary said he had not withdrawn from the bid to enter the election. "I was still waiting for someone to change their mind and support me but I did not withdraw," said Mr O'Leary.

"The last discussion I had through an intermediary was asking Mr Deane to withdraw and support me."

Mr Deane said he could not get a response from the IFA yesterday to his requests. Nominations are now being sought for the positions of deputy president and the four regional chairs.
Several insurance companies were instructed by the Central Bank to review their prices because they weren't charging enough to cover claims costs and expenses.

In a letter to Finance Minister Michael Noonan in August last year, then Central Bank Governor Professor Patrick Honohan said that, by failing to charge adequate premiums, the companies were burning through their reserves.

Prof Honohan urged the insurers to take a number of measures, including revising their prices and underwriting policies to plug losses.

"In effect, by failing to charge premiums sufficient to cover claims costs and expenses, several Irish general insurance companies have eroded their capital base," Prof Honohan wrote.

Consumers have been hit, in particular, with soaring premiums for motor insurance.

Official figures show the average premium has risen by 26pc in the past year, and the sector has warned of similar rises to come this year.

A survey by the AA, released just after Christmas, found more than one third of motorists saw the cost of their insurance rise by up to 50pc last year.

In the letter, the then governor argued that before the financial crisis, the insurance industry enjoyed premium growth and increasing employment. But a number of non-life insurance firms took an optimistic view of the economy, built up unsustainable costs, and followed an "imprudent pricing and underwriting approach." This resulted in companies' business plans becoming less resilient to risks, such as an increase in the frequency and severity of claims.

"These market conditions, combined with developments including changes in the Irish legal environment resulting in higher claims costs and the increasing frequency of exceptional weather events, have impacted the performance of the larger insurers."

Fianna Fail's finance spokesman Michael McGrath, who obtained the letter under Freedom of Information, said the documents reveal the extent of concern in the Central Bank at developments in the sector in recent years.

"Motorists are absolutely reeling from increases in motor insurance premiums.

"By the end of 2016, the cost of insuring an average-size family car is likely to have gone up in the region of 300. This is a massive hit to disposable income," he said.

"The benefits that were achieved from the work of the Motor Insurance Advisory Board to reduce premiums are now evaporating. I am reiterating my call for the re-establishment of MIAB".

Prof Honohan also suggested that legislation should be tightened to dissuade individuals in firms from lying in information they provide to the Central Bank. He said there have been instances where the Central Bank has been given false or misleading information.

Why this affects you

A rise in premiums will obviously put a dent in our pockets. And consumers are currently being hit with soaring premiums for motor insurance in particular, as drivers are paying the price, in part, for insurance executives' shocking mismanagement of their own companies.

Everyone with motor insurance is paying a 2pc levy on their policy for the management failures and the regulatory mistakes that saw Quinn Insurance having to be rescued.

The AA Motor Insurance survey of over 5,000 motorists revealed that 34pc saw their insurance premiums rise by between 20pc and 50pc when compared with 2014.

Fraudulent activity, high legal and claims costs, poorly resourced regulation, low levels of enforcement and a lack of industry transparency have cost motorists dearly, the AA said.
The Web Summit might be moving from Dublin to Lisbon, but its co-founder, Daire Hickey, has been singled out as one of the most talented young people in the world.

On Tuesday, Forbes released its annual "30 Under 30" list, which highlights the best and brightest young talent across a whole host of categories. Mr Hickey was on it.

He got the nod in the 'media' section - where he is praised for his work in establishing the Web Summit as well an invite-only company founders' conference called F.ounders.

His inclusion in the Forbes is a major coup for a man who in the last ten years has been president of the University Philosophy Society (The Phil) in Trinity, a researcher with RTE, a journalist with TheJournal.ie, and then went on to co-founded the two biggest tech conferences the country has ever seen.

Mr Hickey presided over The Phil from 2006 to 2007 - it might be literally a talking shop, but it's proud to boast Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde and Samuel Beckett among its past members.

The nod from Forbes means Hickey is now following those predecessors onto the world stage.

Its not something he has ever shied away from.

Writing in the Irish Independent in March 2014 Mr Hickey said that the one characteristic that was missing from Irish founders of start-ups was ambition.

"The typical Irish start-up may dream of a billion-dollar exit. But so many are all too happy to settle. They settle when it comes to advice. They settle when it comes to investment. They settle when it comes to product," Mr Hickey wrote.

Hickey, clearly, has never been happy to settle.

F.ounders was the brainchild of his partner, Paddy Cosgrave. Mr Cosgrave got in touch with the Trinity graduate six weeks prior to the first F.ounders event saying that he'd convinced the entrepreneuers behind Skype, YouTube and Twitter to come to Dublin.

All that left was to organise an actual programme. They might well have fallen on their faces, but the pair along with former asset manager David Kelly, managed to pull off an event that garnered rave reviews.

Exclusivity has helped F.ounders become one of the most sought after invites in the business world.

With just 150 attendees and the likes of Bono and The Edge joining the founders of the biggest tech companies in the world, the cache is unmatched - even the prestigious World Economic Forum at Davos counts attendees in the thousands rather than the hundreds.

Paddy Cosgrave was long the better known face, and curley mop, of the Web Summit. But Hickey hit headlines last year thanks to a tough interview with RTE's Sharon Ni Bheolain after details emerged about the list of demands made by the Web Summit organisers to the Irish Government before they decided to up-sticks to Portugal.

The Six One News split viewers. Hickey was forced to give an account of himself as Sharon Ni Bheolain repeatedly pressed him on whether the Web Summit should end a tit-for-tat feud that had broken out with the Government.

"Is it not rather pointless to engage in this kind of bitter, broadside at this point? Why not let bygones be bygones, the Government has wished you well," she asked?

Mr Hickey said that the "bitter" engagement with the Government was simply as a result of frustration from his co-founder Paddy Cosgrave.

Hickey stood behind claims that the event was moving away for factors that included poor public transport and exploitation by the hotel industry.

The dispute between the Government and the Web Summit probably climaxed at the point where Mr Hickey's co-founder described the funding offered by the Government as "hush money".

The row might have been unseemly, and ulimately pointless, but for a third year in a row it made the Web Summit the biggest story in town during much of November.

As former 'Phil' member Oscar Wilde pointed out, that kind of publicity is never bad.

Last year's controversies couldn't mask the success of the Web Summit, and its young team of entrepreneurs.

From a standing start five years ago - in the absolute pit of the recession - their event had already become iconic and un-ignorable.

That scale of achievement, ultimately, is is what gets the attention of people like Forbes. Last year Web Summit events attracted over 42,000 attendees. It and F.ounders are only two of the events in the Web Summit organisers' portfolio that also includes 'Rise' in Hong Kong.

Last week Hickey described his inclusion amongst 600 enterprising young people as 'awesome'.

Its actually pretty hard to argue with that.
At the Davy Equity Conference in New York were Brian McKiernan of Davy Group, Stan McCarthy of Kerry Group, Kyran McLaughlin of Davy, and David Rubenstein of The Carlyle Group.

Thirty three Irish and European corporates showcased their wares to 90 US and Canadian investment firms with a combined $13 trillion under management at Davy's Annual Equity Conference in New York this week.

American equity investors are a cornerstone of the Irish Stock Exchange, which dramatically outperformed many of its peers by closing up 30pc at the end of last year.

"US investors are increasingly looking to Europe for investment opportunities as the prospects for economic recovery improve. There is significant interest in the Irish equity market where earnings growth is likely to surpass that of the broader European market while continuing to trade at lower valuations," said Barry Dixon, head of Davy Research.

Corporate attendees at the Davy Equity Conference included executives from leading Irish aviation, transport, food and beverage, financials and industrials, as well as real estate, gaming and leisure, healthcare and media businesses.

Stock picks recommended by Davy to perform well in 2016 reflected a range of sectors and both domestic and international focused firms.

Picks for the year included CRH, Ryanair, Paddy Power, Betfair, and hotel group Dalata as well as Kerry Group, Independent News & Media, Total Produce, Cairn Homes and Premier Foods.
A health care assistant accused of assaulting a patient with the mental age of a toddler went from being a domestic worker to a nurse assistant without any proper training.

Kathleen King denies one charge of assault against Miss C, who has severe physical difficulties and the intellectual age of a two or three-year-old child,

Castlebar Distict Court saw footage of Ms King pushing Miss C back into a chair at Aras Attracta in Co Mayo and hitting her on the face with a piece of paper, saying: "Don't you dare come out of that chair."

Ms King said she was trying to keep Miss C, who has severe osteoporosis, from sliding out of her chair onto the floor and suffering an injury.

"All I wanted to do was keep this poor woman on the chair to keep her safe, that's what I was trying to do. If she broke a hip I'd be in trouble and my job would be on the line and I really didn't want that to happen," said Ms King, (56) Knockshanvally Straide, Foxford, Co Mayo.

She said she did not recall the incident and described hitting Miss C with the paper as a "spontaneous reaction". When pressed she said she would "probably agree" it was unacceptable but denied it was an assault.

Mandatory

Ms King said she had moved from a domestic assistant to a care assistant with no training, despite requesting such. A Fetac Level Five course on care and communicating was not mandatory at the time. When asked by the prosecution what course she needed to tell her her actions were wrong, Ms King replied: "I'm sure there is no course".

The court also saw footage of Joan Walsh (42) Carrowilkeen, Curry, Co Sligo, slapping a non-verbal resident who was seeking her attention, and lifting the same resident, Miss B, and dropping her into a chair.

Ms Walsh, the nurse in charge of Bungalow 3, said she had no recollection of the incident but regretted it, describing it as "poor practice and poor judgement". She said all staff had been very fond of Miss B, who had lived in care all her life.

Ms Walsh, who worked in Aras Attracta since 2000, said she had raised concerns about resources at the unit on the morning of the incident. She said she had found working conditions very stressful. It was claimed staff were "terrified for the safety" of undercover reporter Caoimhe Delaney, believing her to be a student nurse put in a dangerous position.

Five care staff deny one charge each of assault against residents. Judge Mary Devins is considering the case against Ms King, Ms Walsh and a Pat McLoughlin. She has excused herself from one case and is considering a similar application against the fifth.
Jury selection in the trial of former Anglo Irish Bank executive William McAteer and three co-accused has been adjourned until Monday after the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court ran out of potential jurors.

Over 270 prospective jurors were called yesterday for the selection of an enlarged 15 member jury for the trial, which is expected to last five months.

One man was excused after describing himself as "an adamant protester", another because he is getting married, whilst one woman - whom the court heard works for the Troika - was also excused. Others were excused due to personal and work commitments or because they knew some of the 100 witnesses or four defendants.

Judge Martin Nolan said the jury, once sworn, would likely not begin hearing evidence in the case until the week after next. Mr McAteer (65), who has an address at Greenrath, Tipperary town, Co Tipperary is accused with three other Anglo and Irish Life and Permanent officials.

They are: John Bowe (52), from Glasnevin in Dublin, who had been head of capital markets at Anglo Irish Bank; Denis Casey (56), from Raheny, Dublin, who was chief executive of Irish Life and Permanent (IL&P) until 2009 and Peter Fitzpatrick (63), from Malahide, Dublin, who had been IL&P's former director of finance.

They have all pleaded not guilty to conspiring together and with others to mislead investors through financial transactions to make the bank appear 7.2bn more valuable that it was between March 1 and September 30, 2008, in Dublin.
Lawyers for David Drumm have asked a Boston judge to release the fugitive banker from his "cruel and intolerable" conditions while he fights his extradition to Ireland.

Appealing a judge's decision last month to refuse him bail pending his extradition hearing, Mr Drumm's legal team outlined a number of reasons why he should be allowed to return to his family home.

The 49-year-old has been behind bars in the US for just under three months, since his arrest at his home in a Boston suburb on October 10.

His lawyer Edward McNally told District Court Judge Richard Stearns that a "complex white collar extradition hearing" can take many years.

Mr Drumm is being charged with crimes allegedly committed in 2008 but wasn't charged until 2015, he said.

"Even in the light most favourable to Irish state, it means Irish authorities sat on their hands for at least five years," he said, adding that there was no "reasonable explanation" for the delay. "Ireland itself has not placed a high premium on its case, or the return of Mr Drumm," he added.

Mr Drumm relies heavily on third parties for financial support, particularly his employer who is paying his legal fees and there was no reason for the court to believe that the former banker had substantial assets, the court heard.

Courtroom 22 in the John Moakley Courthouse was filled with supporters, including his wife Lorraine, her family from Dublin, their two daughters and dozens of friends.

Mr McNally said a series of events during Mr Drumm's incarceration had made him question whether it was designed to make it "so harsh, so indifferent, so cruel and intolerable" that Mr Drumm might waive his due process and return to Ireland.

Those included the release of his prison ID number and the refusal of prison authorities to let Mr Drumm's elderly mother visit on Christmas Eve.

Judge Stearns referenced Wall Street fraudster Bernie Madoff during the 90-minute hearing, raising the fact with the US Assistant United States Attorney that Madoff had been allowed out on "restrictive terms of release" to work on his defense. Adjourning the application, he said he would need at least the weekend to consider the request.
The Commission of Inquiry into IBRC will now not publish a report until after the General Election.

The High Court judge-led commission's deadline for reporting on certain IBRC transactions had been set for December 31.

However, the Irish Independent has learned this has now been extended until April.

The investigation was established last year to examine up to 40 IBRC transactions that resulted in a loss of 10m or more to taxpayers.

Last month, Taoiseach Enda Kenny met Opposition leaders to discuss how to progress the stalled investigation into a series of transactions at the former Anglo Irish Bank.

The meeting came after Judge Brian Cregan warned that he did not have the necessary powers to properly investigate IBRC transactions. He also raised serious concerns about confidentiality.

The Taoiseach pledged to circulate the draft heads of bill for the investigation before the Dail returns next week.

It is understood Mr Kenny still plans to meet this commitment.
An independent councillor at the centre of political corruption allegations says he may stand in the General Election, claiming an RTE probe has boosted his support.

Donegal county councillor John O'Donnell was filmed by the 'RTE Investigates' programme appearing to ask for money for political favours.

Fellow councillors on the local authority have called for him to resign his seat.

But in a wide-ranging interview yesterday, Mr O'Donnell said he was going to sue RTE over the programme and claimed its broadcast had boosted his popularity among supporters.

He said he was also now seriously considering a run for a seat in the Dail in the General Election.

"I'm ruling nothing out and I'll make a call shortly," he told the 'Donegal News'.

"I've a lot of supporters who are behind me, 100pc. If anything this (the RTE programme) will make me come back stronger than ever. My team is 110pc behind me."

The politician - whose late father was a leading member of Independent Fianna Fail - said his supporters knew he had been 'wronged' by the TV investigation. "I need to get my head down for a few days," he said.

"It has been a very tough month but if I do run (in the election) I will be one of the frontrunners.

"The support is there and if I do go, I'll give it a good rattle."

He again accused RTE of entrapment and claimed he had spent the past few days preparing a High Court action against the broadcaster.

"I'm taking them to the High Court. It was total entrapment on their part," he claimed.

In the broadcast documentary last month, Mr O'Donnell was seen to ask for payments for helping a fictitious wind farm company.

He winked at an undercover RTE journalist and asked for money to be paid to a third party.

Last night, fellow independent councillor and anti-corruption campaigner Frank McBrearty Jnr described the interview as an 'insult' to voters.

"This is a man who is at the centre of an investigation by Donegal County Council," said Mr McBrearty.

"It's an insult to the people of Donegal for him to think he has any support left after what he has done."

Mr McBrearty added: "There is still a great deal of anger over that (RTE) programme."
Police officers were called in to assist in removing the two Irish stepchildren of murder accused Molly Martens Corbett from her care.

The dramatic scenes were outlined in legal documents filed by lawyers for Ms Martens.

In the papers, Ms Martens (32) was said to be in "shock and despair" and was given no advance notice by a court of what was about to happen.

She brought the children to live at her brother's home, some 150km away from where they had been living, following the killing of their father, Jason Corbett, on August 2 last.

After his death, she applied for guardianship and adoption of the children, but this was opposed by Mr Corbett's family. They claim he had refused to allow her to adopt them due to concerns he had about her behaviour.

The Department of Social Services (DSS) in North Carolina picked up the children on August 17. They were later returned to Ireland and are now being cared for by Mr Corbett's sister, Tracey Lynch, and her husband David.

Records released in the aftermath of the guardianship dispute show Ms Martens complained bitterly about the manner in which the children were taken from her.

She claimed a judge who ordered DSS officials to retrieve the children instructed that she was not to be informed in advance.

The judge's order came just days after he heard testimony from Mrs Lynch alleging Ms Martens had been violent towards one of the children and was obsessed with them identifying her as "mom".

Mrs Lynch testified that the children needed to be protected from their stepmother due to alleged bouts of violent and erratic behaviour.

Lawyers for Ms Martens claimed that "without any notice" a department official accompanied by police officers arrived at the house. The youngest child Sarah (9) was riding her bicycle and the eldest Jack (11) was in the house with Ms Martens, they said.

The children were taken away in ten minutes or less.

It was claimed Ms Martens was still in her bathing suit while Jack Corbett "was not even given time to put on a pair of shoes".

After the children were returned to Ireland, a further dispute ensued over the return of their belongings and this was only resolved earlier this week.
Arron O'Leary is recovering well after his double lung transplant Credit: Cork University Hospital website

After a frenzied dash to the UK for a double lung transplant, little Arron O'Leary (11) is now well enough to complete a 'supermarket sweep' that Dale Winton would be proud of.

However the outlook wasn't so jolly in early December when he and his dad, Paul O'Leary, landed on English soil without a change of clothes or any Sterling in their pockets.

Paul had been at Cork University Hospital visiting his son when word filtered through that a set of donor lungs was available for Arron in the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle.

Mere hours later he and his young son, from Ballinhassig in Cork, arrived at the UK hospital.

"That evening, after arriving in the UK, I strolled over to Sainsbury's in South Gosforth, thinking I might be able to get some Sterling there, and I got talking to the manager Lee.

"I explained why I'd arrived with no money and he was very sympathetic.

"He said when Arron was well enough, to bring him over and he could do a trolley dash paid for by Sainsbury's," he told the Irish Examiner.

Arron was thrilled to take the supermarket up on its offer, but his good manners meant he only selected two bars of chocolate.

Staff intervened and threw plenty of goodies into his shopping trolley.

"They made his day.

"You wouldn't believe the transformation.

"Before the operation his breathing sounded like he was walking around with his lips closed, breathing through a straw.

"Now you can hear him breathing clearly.

"It's an awful weight off our shoulders - we were running out of time and we'll be forever grateful to the donor," Paul said.
Residents in a private nursing home continued to be served regular sausages, despite a warning by inspectors that they were at risk of choking on them, a new report has revealed.

The unannounced inspection of Ti Aire nursing home, in Tallaght, Belmullet, Mayo in early October found a previous instruction to only serve skinless sausages had not been followed.

The staffing skill mix did not adequately meet the assessed needs of residents as there was only one nurse on duty from 6pm to 8am, even though most of them were at maximum levels of dependency, according to the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa).

They inspectors also found fault with some of the restraint of residents even though the nursing home provider had worked towards improvements. Bedrails and lap belts were still in use.

Some residents used chairs that were in a reclined position with a lap belt in use and were too restrictive. Closed circuit television was also in place in the dining room.

In response, the owners agreed to review the issues highlighted by the inspectors.

A separate inspection of the Good Counsel Nursing Home in Kilmallock Rd in Limerick led to concerns about residents smoking in their bedrooms.

The inspectors found burn marks on one set of bed sheets.

It also found major non-compliance in relation to fire safety. Records showed that four staff had neither participated in a fire drill or received fire safety training.

A look at the staff roster found that untrained staff had been put on night duty.

The fire safety training programme did not include the need to ensure that staff knew what to do should the clothes of a resident catch fire.

They found that one of the residents was required to get fluids of moderate consistency.However, they were being given fluids of normal consistency.

This placed the resident at risk of choking or infection.

The owners agreed to comply with an action plan to address the issues. They agreed to put adequate arrangements in place within a certain timescale to comply with fires safety regulations.
Some 37 patients were on trolleys in the Beaumont Hospital emergency department yesterday. Photo: Collins

Talks aimed at averting industrial action by nurses in seven of the country's emergency departments have been adjourned for the evening.

Today's negotiations were described as 'positive' by all involved.

But nurses have stressed that management will have to keep their promises with visible action on working conditions in the emergency departments, or otherwise Thursday's strike will go ahead.

The Workplace Relations Commission said they hope to put forward working proposals tomorrow.

A spokesman for Health Minister Leo Varadkar said yesterday that he hoped there was a resolution in the interests of patients.

Some of the measures demanded by nurses to free up beds, however, involve increased cancellation of admissions by waiting list patients needing surgery.

This will drive up treatment delays in the coming weeks and months.

The end-of-year waiting list figures show 459 of those needing surgery are in the queue for more than 18 months.

And 5,262 are waiting more than 18 months to see a specialist.

Many patients have been outsourced for private appointments to try to make inroads into delays for the longest waiters.

Commenting on the figures, a spokesman for the Department of Health insisted the overall trend was positive.

He said: "It should be noted that a number of patients who had not yet had appointments have been scheduled for treatments or appointments in the coming weeks."

At the end of December no child who was suitable for spinal surgery to treat scoliosis was waiting more than 15 months in Our Lady's Hospital in Crumlin.

Some 39 children in need of spinal surgery on the Crumlin waiting list had now been transferred to either the Blackrock Clinic or the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital at Stanmore in the UK for treatment in the coming weeks, said the spokesman.

The department said that the overall numbers of patients on outpatient waiting lists had fallen to 375,000 at the end of December. This was at its lowest level in 2015 and amounts to a reduction of more than 10,000 on previous months.

Hospitals which have been worst hit by the trolley crisis also have the highest numbers of patients waiting the longest for surgery.

Some 179 are waiting longer than 15 months for an operation in Beaumont Hospital and 34 of these need neurosurgery.

Some 37 patients were on trolleys in Beaumont's emergency department yesterday morning and another seven in wards.

In Galway University Hospital, there are 421 patients on waiting lists for surgery for more than a year. The highest numbers are waiting for hip and knee surgery.

Temple St children's hospital in Dublin has 67 children waiting more than nine months for surgery after cancellations last month due to the rotavirus.
Luas drivers voted 221-2 in favour in action  which is likely to come in the form of one or two day stoppages.. Photo: Caroline Quinn

Luas drivers and other workers have voted emphatically for strike action in a move that could see widespread disruption commence early next month.

Drivers voted 221-2 in favour in action - which is likely to come in the form of one or two day stoppages.

Siptu organiser Owen Reidy told the Irish Independent the turnout was 99pc, which he says sends a "very strong message" to the company.

"The turnout was emphatic," he added.

The decision to strike centres around a row over pay, with Luas drivers seeking to be paid in line with their counterparts in Irish Rail.

But their demands, if met, would see the company operating the Luas pay drivers 20,000 extra each. These demands total 30m over five year.

Siptu's John Murphy, said all four grades of members working on the Luas network have voted for industrial action.

The members work as drivers, traffic supervisors, revenue protection officers and revenue protection supervisors.
Protesters are halting restoration works at the 1916 site on Dublins Moore Street, over fears the historical structures may be damaged. Photo: PA

Protesters occupying a building on Moore Street linked to the 1916 Rising are costing the taxpayer 30,000 each day restoration work is delayed.

About 15 people remained on scaffolding and in the building last night, vowing to step up their campaign if they do not receive assurances on the protection of the entire site.

On Thursday, a group of around 30 activists, calling themselves the 'Save Moore Street' group, gained access to the building currently being renovated.

A further 200 protesters gathered outside the site yesterday, which is owned by the Government, to protest against redevelopment plans for a number of dwellings on one of Dublin's most iconic streets.

The Government has already purchased some buildings, including the location of the last council of war held by the 1916 rebellion leaders.

Work began in November to restore numbers 14-17, which are subject to a State preservation order, to get them ready for this year's centenary celebrations. The dwellings are being converted into a new commemorative centre.

However, construction workers were forced to down tools yesterday after a small group of protesters refused to leave the site.

A spokesperson for the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, told the Irish Independent each day the work was delayed would cost the taxpayer in the region of 30,000.

He also warned the occupation could jeopardise plans to have the buildings ready for the centenary celebrations.

However, a spokesman for the 'Save Moore Street' group insisted the whole terrace was of historical significance and demanded that the entire area be protected.

Meanwhile, in a statement, the 'Save No 16 Moore Street' group said it was deeply concerned by the actions of the protesters. They also gave their full support for the establishment of a commemorative centre on the site.

Heritage Minister Heather Humphreys said any setback to the construction work could jeopardise having the buildings ready for the centenary celebrations.

The activists were supported by a number of politicians, including Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams and the party's deputy leader Mary Lou McDonald.
Justice Minister Frances Fitzgerald and Planning Minister Paudie Coffey have agreed the measure amid concerns about the "proliferation" of new licensed premises in certain urban areas. Photo: Damien Eagers

City and county councils are to be given new powers to regulate the opening of pubs, off-licences and nightclubs.

Local authorities will be able to include stricter rules surrounding licensed premises in their county and city development plans. Devising a local development plan is the responsibility of councillors.

Justice Minister Frances Fitzgerald and Planning Minister Paudie Coffey have agreed the measure amid concerns about the "proliferation" of new licensed premises in certain urban areas.

"Pubs, off-licences and nightclubs are a normal feature of any town or city in Ireland," Ms Fitzgerald said.

"However, in some towns and cities we are seeing an unsustainable proliferation of off- licenses along single streets or in historic or tourist areas. This is leading to concerns about the attractiveness and commercial vitality of these areas as well as prompting fears regarding drinking in public places and public order," the Dublin Mid-West TD added.
A Sinn Fein county councillor from Wexford is fighting for his life after he suffered a stroke and heart attack within the same week.

Councillor Anthony Kelly suffered a stroke earlier this week and was receiving treatment at Wexford General Hospital when he suffered a heart attack yesterday evening.

The politician has been moved to the Intensive Care Unit.

His condition has been described as critical.

Mr Kelly has been a local representative for 15 years and is described as a stalwart of the party in Co Wexford.

A spokesperson for Sinn Fein expressed his support for the councillor's family who are currently at his bedside.

The councillor is from Hill Street in the centre of Wexford town.

Mr Kelly is credited with leading active campaigns for increased social housing provision and improved community amenities.
There may be trouble ahead for established parties if European trends take hold. Above, Taoiseach Enda Kenny visits the home of Gertie Dunning in Carrickobreen, in Athlone, during the flooding. Photo: Steve Humphreys

ITs not the prospect of Dublin, London or another major city being submerged that will bring home the reality of how climate change and more frequent flood events will impact on us all.

Its the barn or family home left abandoned and isolated in a rural field.

Its the farmer left counting the cost of being forced to leave their land because it is almost permanently under water. Its the potholed roads ignored by local authorities because making repeated repairs simply doesnt make financial sense anymore.

Its been an horrendous five weeks for thousands of families as they have battled, sometimes in vain, to save their homes from rising flood waters. At least 400 homes and 388 businesses have been affected, and its testament to the response of local authorities and other agencies that no lives have been lost.

But many of those workers will continue to operate pumps over the coming weeks to prevent further destruction of property. Roads will remain under water across Galway and other counties for the foreseeable future, and not until the waters recede will authorities be in a position to definitively state how much this disaster will cost.

Depressingly, the science tells us we can expect more of the same as climate change takes hold. More extreme weather events means more storms, more rainfall and more misery. Rising sea levels wont help matters. We must begin planning now to adapt to the new reality. Waves lapping up OConnell Street means we have left it too late.

Part of the problem is that we have repeatedly failed to spend money on flood defences, and have ignored the ongoing maintenance of drains and culverts needed to drain water from the land.

We have deforested large parts of the country and allowed over-grazing to occur. We have built in the wrong places, and ignored engineers and planners who warned that erecting homes on flood plains would cause problems down the line. The last point isnt an historic issue, it remains a problem.

Since Flood Risk Management Guidelines took effect in 2009, three local authorities have been ordered to amend their development plans because they zoned land for development on areas at risk of flooding.

Limerick City and County Council was ordered as recently as last May to amend plans for lands in Adare; Cork County Council was told the same thing in April 2013, after lands in Midleton were earmarked for building; while Laois was ordered to change its development plan in December 2012 amid concern about lands in Mountmellick.

And while Taoiseach Enda Kenny may boast that the Governments capital plan allocates more money for defences than that set aside in the previous 20 years, its a case of too little too late. While some 430m will be spent out to 2021, delivery of schemes already promised is running behind schedule.

The River Shannon has been a focus for politicians this week, with the announcement that a coordination group  with powers yet to be announced  will be established to help better manage the countrys largest river.

This isnt a new concept. For 200 years there has been ongoing discussions about how to reduce flood risk, and OPW studies indicate late summer flooding in the last decade has been significantly greater than that experienced over the previous 40 years.

While farmers expect the river to flood during the winter, they are understandably concerned about flooding occurring during the summer months before crops are harvested.

The Shannon problem is complex and multi-faceted. It rises and falls slowly, meaning that homes and properties can remain under threat for weeks at a time.

And since you cannot tame nature, all the money in the world wont solve our flooding problem on this great watercourse. Rivers will always burst their banks at some point or other, and engineers must ensure that whatever defences are installed dont transfer the problem to another location.

Unfortunately, Irish Waters plans to abstract water from the Shannon at Parteen Weir to supply the midlands, east and Dublin wont save the day. The company plans to take some 330 million litres a day from Parteen, and while it seems a lot, its nothing compared with the flow currently being released by the ESB to prevent flooding downstream.

Some 470 cubic metres of water a second has been flowing through the weir in recent weeks  thats around 40 billion litres of water a day. No amount of concrete is going to stop that.

The focus to date has been on hard engineering solutions, but trees can play a vital role too.

Native species absorb and store water and provide flood protection, with experts suggesting that deep roots also provide channels to send the water deep underground, while the soil acts as a sponge. A national forestry campaign should be among the first measures taken by the Government to reduce risk.

Its a pretty poor state of affairs when groups like the Church of Ireland feel the need to launch a flood relief appeal because the government of a developed country has failed to protect its citizens. That must change. The focus for all politicians should be less posturing, and more engagement. Its only a matter of time before lives are lost due to flooding. More foresight and sustained investment is needed now.
Ibrahim Halawa's trial has been postponed for the twelfth time in Egypt today.

The young man spent his third Christmas in prison following after his trial was last postponed on the 19th of December.

Halawa (20) is scheduled to appear in court again on March 3rd.

Read More

The Dublin native has been in prison in Cairo without trial since 2013 after he was arrested during political protests in the Egyptian capital.

Under Egyptian law he is part of a mass trial which can not proceed until all 494 defendants and all witnesses are present in court.

Read More

Ibrahim was detained for participating in an anti-government protest in Cairo in the summer of 2013.
January is traditionally the peak month for travel bookings in Ireland, and this year's grim weather, improving economy and early booking offers mean 2016 is no exception.

"We saw enquiries take off at an unprecedented level last weekend," confirms Martin Skelly, President of the Irish Travel Agents' Association (ITAA) and Manager of Navan Travel.

Family enquiries are "multiples of what they were last year", Skelly adds, while sales of camping packages in France, Holland, Italy and Spain's Costa Brava signal "the fact that middle management Ireland is going back on holiday".

"Our bookings were up 50pc over the first four days of 2016," says Paul Hackett, CEO of Clickandgo.com. "We expect that trend to continue through January."

Sunway says its sales are up 20pc in comparison with 2015, a figure it expects to "grow considerably" in the coming weeks.

Don't expect the Canaries to be cheap and cheerful, however.

Recent terror attacks have pushed Egypt and Tunisia off the holiday brochures, Aer Lingus will stop flying direct to Morocco in March, and European holidaymakers searching for alternatives to North Africa have the archipelago firmly in their sights.

"There's been a rise on premium properties in all of the Canaries all over the winter period," says Martin Skelly. "Availability is still there, but we're definitely seeing customers going down a star level or stepping back from the beach to cope."

Operators such as Falcon Holidays and Clickandgo.com say competition should prevent summer prices being adversely affected, however.

"Some of the good, five-star properties are raising rates but that is down to demand from the German and Scandinavian markets," says Paul Hackett.

"The Scandinavians are winter travellers, so we dont see any problems with value in our favourite Canary Island destinations over summer."

If holidaymakers are flexible, Hackett adds, this year's sweet spot for holiday bargains looks like April - following three weeks of Easter school holidays.

Beyond Spain, Irish tour operators are reporting strong early interest in the Algarve and cruise holidays. Long-haul specialist Travelmood says its hottest properties are all-inclusive resorts in Mexico.

"We've been inundated since we opened after Christmas," says Lisa Byrne of SHG Ireland, whose brands include Travelmood and American Holidays.

Orlando is its bestselling US destination so far this year, she says.

Airline sales are also in full swing this week, with Aer Lingus, CityJet, Emirates and Ryanair among those running special offers - although keen demand for direct transatlantic flights means they are not offering the same savings as short-haul flights, or indeed as this time last year.

And this year's bolter? With new properties coming onstream from Sunway and the collapse of its Russian market, Turkey is already looking like one of the savvy traveller's bargains of 2016.

Going to press, Sunway had weeklong packages from 374pp in May.
Premium

John Downing Opinion Last time the Tories diced with economic disaster it took them another 18 years to win an election

I was listening to the young woman from the Daily Mail trying to recruit a gang of reporters to club together and hire an aeroplane to fly back to Brussels. She got an enthusiastic response from another British colleague who was celebrated for lavishly spending his employers funds.
Premium

Mary Kenny Opinion A male contraceptive jab is on the way, but will it truly equalise reproductive control?

It looks as though a male contraceptive vaccine will be available within the next year, according to Dr Amanda Wilson at De Montfort University in Leicester. The jab is called Risug, and it could obviate the demand for vasectomies  which is falling anyway. The vaccine, which has completed its final trials, would be reversible, so it is not as radical as vasectomy.
The clash between Saudi Arabia and Iran over the execution of a Saudi cleric of Shia Muslim faith, Nimr al-Nimr, and the occupation of the Saudi Embassy in Tehran in retaliation for that, is deeply worrying for many reasons.

The two countries are supporting opposite sides in the Syrian Civil War, and the participation of both countries would be vital to any chance of the brokering of a truce in that long-running and deeply destructive war.

If the two states now have no diplomatic relations with one another, it is hard to see how they can contribute to the talks in Vienna aimed at ending the war. That is tragic.

The two countries are also supporting opposite sides in another civil war, in Yemen, one of the poorest countries in the Arab world, which can least afford a regional power struggle being staged on its territory.

Many of the people executed in Saudi Arabia were on death row for a long time. The Shia cleric was condemned to death in 2014, so the timing of his and the other executions on the one day is significant. It may have been designed for domestic Saudi opinion, to send a message internationally, or both.

Some have suggested that the Saudis are raising the temperature in the region because they are worried about the Iran nuclear deal, and the fact that this may end Iran's economic isolation, which might change the balance of power in the region. Iran has the much bigger population, and greater unrealised economic potential.

Also executed on the same day as the Shia cleric, were a number of Sunni opponents of the Saudi government, who have been on death row for some time too. A sort of sectarian balance of pain may have been sought by the Saudi authorities, by having all the executions at the same time.

Given the chronic underdevelopment of the entire region, and the high levels of unemployment, the diversion of scarce resources to proxy wars is not in the interest of the people of the region.

Low oil prices are reducing the revenues of both countries, and one would think they could both ill afford the support they are giving to opposite sides in proxy wars in Syria and Yemen. Oil provides more than 70pc of Saudi government revenues, the country has a budget deficit, and is already having to cut back on subsidies to its own people.

If the increased friction between the two states prolongs, or intensifies, the Syrian Civil War, this will add to the refugee flow to Europe and to the suffering and the political instability flowing from that.

Sectarian

It will export to Europe the sectarian tensions now dividing the Middle East. But it is interesting to note that, in Athens last week, Shia and Sunni refugees demonstrated together against the Saudi executions, which, of course, affected both communities.

Europe has an obligation to take refugees, but so also have all the other countries of the world. So far there is little sign of help coming from any continent other than Europe.

Both Iran and Saudi Arabia practise the death penalty on a wide scale, which emphasises the large gap in values between both of them and the European Union, where the death penalty is banned.

European countries have strong common interests and values, but they are having increasing difficulty in giving effect to these values in a coordinated way.

Europe should avoid taking sides and instead seek to provide a neutral contact point between the two sides.

Europe's overwhelming interest is in de-escalating the Saudi-Iranian conflict as quickly as possible.
In Old Ireland, 'Brehon Law' offered the provision that a freeman might sit outside the house of his debtor and starve himself to death in order to shame his oppressor into recompense. An evolution of this was seen in the Hunger Strikes of the 1980s.

Self-imposed starvation has been with the Irish as a political tool that reaches back as far as our mythology. What defines this self-imposed abuse is the fact that there should be no other form of redress, and as such it is a last resort and the most potent appeal to one's oppressor.

If you brought your car to the mechanic to fix a puncture and instead he offered you a box of steak knives, you would reasonably consider him to be unhinged. Yet when we are presented with the ill-health of our health service in the guise of overcrowding at A&Es, we invariably seek to apply a solution that is in fact the cause of the malaise.

More money, more beds, study grants, promotions for nurses and longer tea breaks, etc, is not the solution to crammed A&Es, it is part of the problem. Perhaps the reason we apply the usual and utterly ineffectual 'solution' of 'more money' and 'more beds' is that we remain a nation of beggars and peasants, and apply the outstretched cap as the primary solution to almost all of our problems.

What I mean by this assertion is that perhaps we Irish have yet to take ownership of Ireland, and ownership of our problems. We remain entirely fixed within the colonial and post-colonial mindset of the 'big other'; London, the landlord or the Government/HSE will solve our problems by simply giving us more money.

As such it is our important job to scream loudly and beg for more and more of the same, and to starve ourselves until it is forthcoming.

Bizarrely, in Ireland most if not all doctors have worked or trained in A&E, and most if not all doctors are entirely aware that somewhere in the region of 70-80pc of those presenting to A&E could easily be managed in the community.

Some 30-40pc of emergency presentations are simply presenting with a medicalised form of anxiety, depression, or a dependence of some kind. Some 10-20pc of hospital beds are blocked by the elderly because they have nowhere to go. Some 70-80pc of casualty presentations are entirely inappropriate, and anyone working in a lab or scanning facility anywhere in the land will readily accept that 80-90pc of all scans, X-rays and blood tests yield entirely normal results.

The problem is not a shortage of medicine but rather too much medicine, too many doctors, too many beds and too many nurses with too many tea breaks.

The problem is not a shortage of medicine but rather a shortage, or complete absence of common sense.

Dr Marcus de Brun

Rush Family Practice,

Co Dublin

Are A&Es run by Basil Fawlty?

The response to the ongoing A&E crisis would almost be comical if it were not so serious. Asking the people to stay away from A&E departments brings to mind the legendary antics of Basil Fawlty, who would run a perfectly good hotel if it wasn't for the guests.

The current Government - who have had five years to address what has been termed a national emergency - should hang their heads in shame.

Gerard Reynolds

Churchtown,

Dublin 14

Benefits of working from home

As far back as 20 years ago, I listened to suggestions that people should be encouraged to work from home for all or part of their week but little has happened since.

Why not reactivate the concept which would :

(1) Free up the M50 and other congested routes;

(2) Alleviate motorists' stress;

(3) Improve family life;

(4) Decrease air pollution;

(5) Save on motoring costs.

Modern technology lends itself to teamwork without the members being physically present together in a room. The argument that employees would miss the contact/camaraderie which working together provides surely pales into insignificance when compared to leaving/returning home in darkness and driving bumper-to-bumper for an hour or more each way.

Sheila Ward

Carraig Mhachaire Rois, Co Mhuineachain

A daily dose of cynicism?

Your headline article on Wednesday, "Another talking shop: Coalition's response to the flooding crisis", written apparently by three reporters, derides the calling together of "the huge number of agencies involved in the River Shannon". To so consult is therefore ridiculous.

Farther on, this view is justified by asserting that the OPW already knows what to do and will be the ones to do it. This derision flies in the face of best management practice to achieve 'buy-in' of all those involved. Bringing all together is more trouble but absolutely laudable.

Then the page 2 headline is "State to pay 100m to avoid election backlash". Well, any government would have to pay out something and no doubt say 10m would be headlined, eg. "Miserly Coalition response to flooding".

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. The vast majority of TDs are well-intentioned, but is it any wonder that the composition of the Dail increasingly fails to reflect Ireland's modern educated population?

What person with ambition and talent will want to be subject to such daily cynicism?

Patrick Duffy

Blackrock, Co Dublin

Zero-tolerance for attackers

The reports that many women in Cologne and other German cities were assaulted by large crowds of men on New Year's Eve made depressive reading.

That many were "of North African or Arab appearance" does not bode well for others who seek asylum in Germany and the rest of the EU. Many of those who arrive from North Africa are economic migrants rather than genuine refugees. There should be a zero-tolerance policy towards this type of behaviour with a "one-strike-and-you-are-out" rule. Nothing less will do.

This behaviour should not reflect badly on genuine, law-abiding refugees who have fled in terror from war-torn countries.

John Bellew

Riverside House

Dunleer, Co Louth
Imagine the outrage and consequences had Britain bombed Dundalk in 1985.

The release of state papers this week under the 30 year rule revealed that British Prime Minister of the time, Margaret Thatcher had asked Taoiseach Garret Fitzgerald what the Irish state would do in response if the British bombed the town.

Thatcher was of the view that IRA terrorists took refuge in Dundalk having committed murder of RUC officers and British soldiers in Northern Ireland.

Fortunately Thatcher met her match in Garret Fitzgerald and he suggested if she had such proof she could give it to the Irish authorities through the available channels and the Gardai would pursue the matter.

There is no way of knowing the seriousness of Thatchers' comments, whether she was just sabre rattling or had any serious intent, however the comment was crass and showed a complete lack of understanding of the situation on the ground both in Northern Ireland and south of the border.

Had her comment turned to action the fallout would have been horrific, more innocent lives lost and a probable act of war.
Students Clara Lynch, Tara Duffy and Ciara Gregory present their project Factors that influence peoples opinions on the refugees at the BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition

Some of 2015's hottest topics were tackled by the socially conscious students of Bush Post Primary School as they prepared projects for the BT Young Scientist and Technology exhibition.

The north Louth school will have four projects competing in the exhibition when it opens tomorrow (Wednesday), some of which also reflect the school's rural roots.

Three students, Clara Lynch, Tara Duffy and Ciara Gregory looked at one of last year's most talked about topics - the influx of refugees on European shores, and the impending arrival of some refugees in Ireland.

Their project examines 'factors that influence people's opinion on the refugees' is an investigation into what the main factors are that influence people's opinions of the refugees, and them seeking refuge in Ireland.'

The students involved sent out over 400 surveys to schools in Leinster in order to find out what people's opinions on refugees are, along with where they obtain the opinions they hold.

They found that there were differences in general opinion between urban and rural areas. They also found that people who listed their main influence as family were generally more tolerant and welcoming than people who listed social media as their main influence.

Another topical project came from students Evan Cronin and Ryan Duffy as the investigated 'the impact of same sex marriage on the economy on both sides of the border.'

Science teacher Gary Galvin explained that the students investigated whether or not the south would benefit economically from the passing of same-sex marriage, given that it is not legal in the North.

'They found that bookings in local hospitality, florists, etc. increased in the south since the referendum was passed, with many customers coming from the north.

They also found that the rate of bookings from the north is increasing and is likely to double over the next year.'

Meanwhile, the project entitled 'Handbrake Alarm' was led by Mark Quinn, Paudi Ryan and Aaron Rehill.

There the students designed and constructed a working prototype of a system for agricultural vehicles whereby if the vehicle's handbrake is left unengaged and neutral gear is engaged, an alarm will sound in order to alert the driver and reduce the chance of an accident occurring.

The final project was led by students Sami Miled, Conor McEneaney and Jason Clarke who came up with the rather humorously entitled 'Muck Yeah!'

'The students involved designed and constructed a working a working prototype of a new tool for cleaning cattle sheds,' said Mr. Galvin.

'It incorporates a scraper, a water hose and a disinfectant pump and hose.'

'This cuts the work time needed in three as separate rinsing, scraping and disinfecting can now be completed in one quick step.'w
People intending to travel on the Cooley Parish Pilgrimage to Lourdes in May 2016 should hand in their names as soon as possible.

Applications are also being taken for Assisted Pilgrims (Sick) wishing to travel on the Pilgrimage.

Please phone the Parochial House at 042-9376105 as soon as possible as places are limited.

Parish Altar Societies volunteer appeal

The priests of Cooley Parish are very grateful to the many people who have cared for the Parish Churches over many years.

However there is now a need for new volunteers and an appeal has gone out for any adults, male or female, who can assist with the cleaning of the Churches, flower arranging and with the general upkeep of the Parish Churches.

A rota will be drawn up to ensure that the workload will not be too demanding. Anyone interested should get in touch with the sacristans.

Information sought on Mullaghbuoy Church

The Cooley Genealogical and Historical Society are looking for information on St. Mary's Church, Mullaghbuoy.

Anyone who can help are asked to get in contact with 0851833110.

Kickhams Membership Fees

Cooley Kickhams Club membership fees for 2016 are as follows: Adults, 50; Juveniles/Old age pensioners 30; Four children or more, 100.
Questions are being asked of the HSE after a man in his 70s who got into difficulty swimming off the Rush coast in north county Dublin, was left waiting for an ambulance just one kilometre from the Lourdes hospital following his rescue by the coastguard.

A helicopter was used to airlift the swimmer to Drogheda, but after an ambulance failed to arrive, he had to be loaded into a jeep and taken to hospital.

On Saturday, January 2, shortly before 10am, the National Maritime Operations Centre received reports of an adult swimmer possibly in difficulty off the Rush coast.

Concerned members of the public had spotted the man not far from the shoreline, and alerted the coastguard, who immediately launched a rescue operation tasking its Skerries team, the Skerries lifeboat and the coastguard's Sikorsky S-92 helicopter from its nearby base at Dublin airport.

Despite the challenging conditions, the swimmer managed to reach the shore and was then assisted on scene by medics. The helicopter successfully landed on the north beach in Rush and the casualty was taken on board for transfer to the Lourdes.

With no landing facilities at the hospital, the helicopter landed at the nearby O'Raghallaighs GAA ground, about one kilometre from the hospital, where the helicopter crew and their patient, waited for an ambulance.

The rescued man had a suspected case of hypothermia, but twenty-five minutes after the helicopter landed in Drogheda, there was no sign of an ambulance.

The coastguard then took action and loaded the man into one of the service's own jeeps, and transported him to the hospital.

In a statement on the issue, the HSE said that the coastguard notified the National Ambulance Services approximately 10 minutes prior to its estimated time of arrival in Drogheda.

'All ambulances in the region were at that time tasked with prior calls. The coastguard had a jeep ready to meet the helicopter on its arrival as is standard practice and decided to transport the patient to Our Lady Of Lourdes hospital.'

Vanessa Gaffney, officer in charge for Skerries coastguard, praised the public's vigilance.

'Fortunately, members of the public ashore were able to recognise that this person was in difficulty and raise the alarm, allowing the various rescue resources to be despatched to the scene.

'Crucially, they stayed on the beach and assisted in directing rescuers to the casualty.'

John Ryan, deputy officer in charge, added: 'The Skerries team have only just concluded an incredibly busy year and already 2016 appears to be following a similar trend with two call-outs completed in the first three days of the new year.

'As always, we would appeal to the general public to be vigilant and to watch out for those that might be in difficulty along the coast.'

The delay in the ambulance arriving to transport the patient to the Lourdes hospital has caused local concern and reacting to the incident, Drogheda's mayor, Paul Bell said: 'It is my understanding that the patient was airlifted from a beach in Rush having been swimming in the area and suspected to be suffering from severe hypothermia.

'The coastguard helicopter landed approximately one kilometre away from the hospital in the O'Raghallaighs GAA grounds.

'However, it is alleged that the HSE ambulance requested by the coastguard would not be available for twenty five minutes post the landing of the aircraft.'

Councillor Bell added: 'I am not for the first time ask why the HSE has not invested in developing a purpose-built heli-pad on the grounds of the hospital or on the roof of the building.'
Louth TD Gerry Adams says locals in Dundalk were already victims of British security policy in Ireland long before Conservative Party leader Margaret Thatcher asked the then Taoiseach Garret Fitzgerald: 'What would you say if we bombed Dundalk?'

Mr Adams was commenting in the wake of the release of State papers under the 30 year rule in which some of Thatcher's thoughts following the 1985 signing of the Anglo Ireland Agreement were revealed.

The Sinn Fein leader said: 'The threat of British forces bombing Dundalk was not some screwball idea from Thatcher.

'As British Prime Minister she knew intimately of the involvement of the RUC and its Special Branch, the UDR, and of British military and intelligence involvement in illegal and covert actions which killed Irish citizens.

'Collusion involving British state forces and unionist paramilitaries led to the deaths of hundreds of citizens on the island of Ireland.

'Eleven years prior to the meeting between Thatcher and Fitzgerald in Europe the British had already participated in the Dublin Monaghan bombings which killed 33. Almost exactly ten years before Thatcher's remark about bombing Dundalk, British state collusion had already led to the attack on Kay's Tavern in Crowe Street which killed Jack Rooney and Hugh Watters and wounded scores of others.

'Local man Seamus Ludlow was another victim of this British policy.

'Within two years of the meeting between Thatcher and Fitzgerald the British government helped unionist paramilitary groups bring in hundreds of rifles, handguns, hand grenades and some rocket propelled grenades which resulted in a significant escalation in the sectarian murder campaign of the UDA, UVF, Red Hand Commando and Ulster Resistance. Hundreds died, including members of Sinn Fein.

'The government papers make it clear that British government policy was primarily security driven. The Anglo Irish Agreement was essentially about securing greater Irish government support for this policy. The Irish government's short sighted policy helped sustain violence for years to come. It wasn't until the Hume/Adams negotiations and the emergence of the peace process that a new dynamic and opportunity were created to end violence.

'The British government's refusal to properly address the legacy of the past stems from its concern that the actions of its military, intelligence and political leadership will be exposed. The Cameron government's refusal to provide information the Kay's Tavern and other attacks is to protect those who killed on its behalf and with its sanction'.
A Louth father who revealed how the lack of a medical card for his baby son meant they ran out of specialist feeding tubes and had to travel to the North over Christmas to get them has thanked those who shared his Facebook post after he revealed the HSE had issued the card and scheduled surgery for tomorrow (Wednesday).

Adam Doyle, from Knockbridge, took to Facebook on December 30 to appeal directly to Health Minister Leo Varadkar for a medical card for his son, Noah, who was born 11 months ago with complex congenital heart disease, severe scoliosis, an underdeveloped skull, narrow air and food ways and a kidney defect.

Despite the seriousness of Noah's medical condition, Adam and his wife, Rosemarie, had been unable to get a medical card for their young son, even though they applied in July and again before Christmas.

The situation was so bad that nurses working with Noah said they were unable to provide specialist feeding tubes for the infant without the medical card and the couple were forced, on Christmas Day, to drive to Craigavon Hospital to get the equipment they needed.

The appalling circumstances of the delay in issuing the medical card prompted Adam to write a powerful and eloquent appeal to Minister Varadkar on his Facebook page on December 30, which was shared thousands of times.

His story also featured in national newspapers and thanks to Adam making the situation public, a medical card was issued within hours - five months after the family had initially applied for it.

A HSE statement said: 'There was an administrative delay in the processing of a medical card for baby Noah. A medical card was issued to him on December 30. The HSE has contacted baby Noah's father to apologise for the delay and for any distress the delay may have caused'.

And Adam revealed that Noah is to undergo surgery at Crumlin Hospital on Wednesday to remove the specialist nose tube and replace it with a PEG feed, meaning the baby will no longer need the syringes and tubes.

Writing on his page on January 2, Adam said: 'I just wanted to take a minute to thank all of the people who were very kind to us in the last few days, offering support, encouragement and of course helping to spread our story.

'Noah was given a medical card late on Wednesday and now has a surgery scheduled for next week to help ease some of his problems. He has a tough road ahead but we will work every second of our lives to help him through it.

'Caring for him is the greatest honour I could ever have.

'While we have made progress this week, I am mindful of the many other families in our country who did not; Other little babies with issues similar and worse than Noah with parents having to struggle and fight to get the help these special little people need.

'I don't know how something like this is fixed, I don't know what the solution is and accept that it may not be as straightforward as it seems.

'But I do know that it needs to be done and it needs to be done now. Our politicians need to step up, our civil servants need to face the issue head on, and we as the people of Ireland need to pressure them until they do'.
Former prime minister Margaret Thatcher asked what the reaction would be if the British bombed Dundalk in pursuit of IRA terrorists when she met Taoiseach Garret Fitzgerald shortly after the signing of the Anglo-Irish Agreement in 1985, newly released State papers reveal.

The agreement signed by the two leaders on November 15 1985, gave the government an advisory role in the North's government. It also confirmed there would be no change in the constitutional position of the North unless a majority of its people agreed to join the Republic in a vote.

Notes of the conversation between the leaders at a meeting in Luxembourg during an EU summit a little over two weeks after the agreement are contained in government files released under the 30-year rule.

Thatcher was her usual forthright self to Fitzgerald as they discussed the issue of border security. The notes reveal she told the Taoiseach: 'People in the South come to the North to commit criminal acts and then dash back.

'That is what I said to the Americans when the Israelis bombed Tunis. What would you say if Dundalk were bombed to stop this?'

The taoiseach responded: 'We have no evidence against people in Dundalk - if we had, we would arrest them. For example, the evidence I have is that escapers from the Maze are not in Ireland. I am told that some of them are in Scotland'.

'In the Irish community in Glasgow', said Thatcher.

Earlier in the conversation, Thatcher said she needed three things.

'One: political action. Can John Hume help here? Two: action on the Convention [for the extradition of terrorists]. Three: convictions of more IRA men'.

'Can you give me evidence on which to charge more of them?' replied Mr Fitzgerald. 'If there is evidence against anybody, there are channels through which it can be communicated and action will be taken'.

'If we have evidence, we will get it to you', responded Mrs Thatcher, who then made the reference to Dundalk.

Later in the conversation, Fitzgerald raised the possibility that the Northern secretary Tom King might indicate the possibility of early release for IRA prisoners if there was a sustained period of reduced violence after the agreement.

"That would be dynamite - no, not dynamite; nuclear. We could not think of relief for people guilty of bombing, of murder, of other atrocities," she responded.

The prime minister opened the conversation, which lasted for half an hour on December 3 1985, by expressing her concern at the scale of unionist opposition to the agreement.

She declared: 'I am very worried about developments. You have all the glory. We have all the problems'.
Fermoy has improved its standing on the final Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL) league table for 2015 by five places finishing 14th out of the 40 areas surveyed.

However the town, which finished in a disappointing 19th place on the final 2014 table, was unable to win back its coveted 'Cleaner Than European Norms' status, which was downgraded last year to merely 'Clean To European Norms'.

Despite this the secretary of the Fermoy Image Improvement Group, John Murphy, insisted the town was "moving in the right direction".

For a long time Fermoy had performed consistently well in the IBAL league finishing first in 2006, third in 2007 and second in 2008. However, the following year the town fell to 27th spot - it's lowest ever ranking on the end of year table.

By 2010 Fermoy had fought back increasing its standing by seven places. The upward trend continued with the town finishing 10th in 2011 and ninth in 2012 before slipping back slightly in 2013 to 11th place and dipping to 19th place for 2014.

Speaking on Monday at the unveiling of the final 2015 IBAL standings at Dublin's Buswell's Hotel, Mr Murphy said he believed there was no reason why Fermoy could not reclaim top spot again.

"We were delighted with the result. You have to be pleased anytime that your town improves its overall standing in the table, particularly given the strong competition and the strict standards adhered to by the IBAL judges," said Mr Murphy.

"Great credit must go to local community groups and Fas and Tus workers for their hard work. It would be remiss of me not to thank McCarthy Insurance who also sponsored the 2015 Tidy Towns competition," he added.

Mr Murphy said the five-year plan put in place following the completion of the town's multi-million euro flood relief works was already paying dividends. "As far as we are concerned it is onwards and upwards for Fermoy from here on," he said.

Fermoy: what the judges said

"All approach and link roads to Fermoy got the top litter grade - they were very well presented and maintained.

The Fermoy Community Centre/Theatre was in good order and the Fermoy Leisure Centre and Town Park were looking particularly well.

The Town Park is a wonderful amenity, which is clearly very well cared for and respected."

R639 Dublin route - Grade A:

"A clean and tidy route - all appeared in good order along this stretch of road".

R639 Cork route - Grade A:

"This was a very fresh and clean approach road creating a positive first impression of the town."

McCurtain Street - Grade A:

"This busy shopping street was spotless. The side of the street with 'Meals on Wheels' etc. had some attractive paving. There were quite a high number of vacant / disused premises but thankfully they didn't impact in any negative way on the litter situation".

Recycle Facility on Courthouse Road - Grade B:

"This recycle facility had somewhat of an abandoned air, sandwiched between a vacant building and a large vacant site. It wasn't so much a littered recycle facility but discarding of various items e.g. a large monitor and some filled black sacks".

Aldi - Grade B:

"A freshly presented car park which was let down by the very obvious litter in the low lying shrubbery area. A more thorough approach to cleaning is much needed to address this issue.

Lidl - Grade B:

"The main car park at Lidl was generally in good order but what brought down the litter grade was the litter near the ESB box to the rear of the car park and in the surrounding shrubbery".

Fermoy Leisure Centre and Town Park - Grade A:

"Fermoy Town Park was an excellent site - clearly it is a very well respected and maintained environment. The area directly outside the Leisure Centre was in good order".

Fermoy Community Centre/Theatre - Grade A:

"The area directly outside this building was spotless. It was freshly presented and maintained and a credit to the users of same.

County Council Car Park - Grade B:

"Much of the car park was clear of litter but the shrubbery around the perimeter of the car park harboured all of the litter - sweet papers, plastic bottles, fast-food wrappers and plastic bags. There have certainly been attempts at the maintenance of the shrubbery in the car park but it needs more attention to get the top litter grade".

M8 Fermoy/Cork Road- Grade A:

"This route was in exceptionally good condition - it was in much better order than in the last couple of IBAL Anti-Litter surveys. There was a virtual absence of litter along this road".
The first national survey undertaken of Ireland's local and regional road network confirms what the IFA describes as the unacceptable conditions farming families are living with.

IFA Deputy President and Countryside Chairman Tim O'Leary described as 'unacceptable' what, he said, many farm families have to endure in going about their business on a daily basis.

"The results of the first national survey of local and regional roads confirm the unacceptable road conditions that many farm families and rural dwellers have to endure each day," Mr O'Leary said in response to the results of the survey.

The survey, which was completed by the local authority oversight body, the National Oversight and Audit Commission, found that over 75 per cent of national roads are not in top condition and almost one-third of minor roads have some form of structural damage.

Mr. O'Leary added that of additional concern is the failure of at least five local authorities to complete the survey.

He said the IFA is calling on the Government to implement what the IFA considers to be two key measures set out in its Charter for Rural Ireland to tackle the issue:

1. A robust roads budget must be put in place, with funding from the Department of Transport ring-fenced for rural roads each year.

2. The Local Improvement Scheme must be restored and fully funded in each region.

The President of ICMSA John Comer said two things had emerged very clearly from the recent spate of widespread flooding damage.

He said that, firstly, it is now perfectly clear that the current ad-hoc system where multiple and overlapping agencies attempt to deal with these increasingly frequent floods is just wholly inadequate.

It was all very well, he observed, to hear Minister Kelly maintain that OPW will remain the lead agency in responding to these disasters but we are still left with the nub of the problem which is that we demonstrably have too many cooks in this particular kitchen.

"Though I don't doubt that all the agencies pull together when the floods occur my suspicion is that the real damage is done when there isn't an emergency and these agencies resume their normal business-as-usual attitude that has them guarding their own patches and working to a much more narrow agenda - that's the problem and that's what we need address by setting up a single authority specifically to deal with and prevent flooding," Mr Comer said.

He described the second point as being more 'fundamental', relating to concerns the new Paris Agreement on Climate Change could hamper the projected growth in food production in Ireland, if the terms of the deal impact farming in areas at risk of flooding.

Mr Comer said this would be particularly impactful in an area like Limerick as it accounts for roughly 8.5 per cent of the entire milk production of the State.

"The Paris Agreement on Climate Change is going to pose serious questions around Irish agriculture and while we note the statement contained in the text that the process will go forward 'in a manner that does not threaten food production' the devil here is very definitely going to be in the detail, with undoubted ramifications for Irish agriculture, generally, and milk production in our dairy heartlands, specifically," said Mr Comer.

"It would be illogical to impose restrictions on our food production if that production moves elsewhere to a location withhigher carbon emissions."
The provision of proper bus stops and shelters and how they are secured for certain areas got a lot clearer thanks to a recent meeting of the Laytown/Bettystown local council.

The councillors asked for Bus Eireann to attend the meeting to outline issues with the service and Joanne Duffy, Service Manager North East and Nicky McKeown represented the company.

Cllr Sharon Tolan explained that there was 'chaos' in Bettystown with the 'historical' stops outside the dry cleaners and Reddans and there were no shelters, especially at the Mosney junction and on the Julianstown/Laytown road.

'The bus stops at Colaiste na hInse where there is no stop and cars are overtaking on the narrow Coast Road,' she stated. She said the stop was necessary as otherwise children would be waiting for an hour to be picked up.

Ms Duffy said that there was permission granted for a shelter at Bettystown square.

Cllr Eimear Ferguson made the call for shelters at both ends of Duleek village. She also said she'd received representations about a stop at Piltown being moved closer to Moorehall Lodge.

Cllr Wayne Harding said Slane needed a shelter on the N2, both north and southbound.

Cllr Tom Kelly added that Donacarney school,amongst other places, needed a shelter while a stop and shelter was also required at Ozanam House.

'Where do the NTA come in to all this?,' Cllr Sharon Tolan remarked.

'I've been trying to get a stop in Duleek for 18 months but no-one from the NTA got back tol me. There is a private sponsor for it.'

Ms Duffy explained that in relation to shelters, she was the first port of call.

Cllr Sharon Keogan then made a case for a shelter at Rathdrinagh Cross and she asked why did the bus not go to Stamullen, via Gormanston. 'It's a long walk from the college into Stamullen,' she stated.

The Bus Eireann representative said it was 'floated' about 20 years ago about a service into Stamullen but nothing happened.

Shelters on the Slane to Collon road were also needed, as well as one at Hunterstown.

That report followed a similiar discussion at the Ardee area meeting two weeks ago.

Cllr Dolores Minogue wants to see a shelter on the link road of the town.

'This was asked for about 18 months ago and I hope it can be fast tracked,' she stated. 'People are waiting here in the morning for the bus to Dublin and getting soaked for the day.'

Engineer Gerry Kelly said they'd speak to infrastructure about it.

Cllr Jim Tenanty said former councillor Fintan Malone raised this in 2008 and 2010 and they were told the NRA were responsible for shelters and not the council.

'Bus Eireann said it was an NRA issue. Is it still?' he enquired.
A leading academic who writes about elections has predicted that Sinn Fein will have two seats in Louth after the general election, Fianna Fail will have one, while claiming that Labour will lose its only seat in this constituency.

Dr Adrian Kavanagh is a lecturer in Maynooth University's Department of Geography whose main research interests focus on the geography of elections and writes on the website adriankavanaghelections.org. He has analysed opinion polls, past results, current candidates and other factors and, according to his constituency level analysis of the latest Sunday Business Post/Red C poll, published on December 20, he puts support for the parties in Louth at 14% for Fianna Fail; 26% Fine Gael; 8% Labour; 35% Sinn Fein and 17% others. The Sinn Fein prediction is the third highest in the country, after Donegal at 44% and Dublin North West at 38%.

Dr Kavanagh runs two scenarios in his latest figures for Louth, which were revealed on his website on December 22.

In the first, based on the constituency estimates, revealed in the opinion polls, and using a 'D'Hondt' method to determine which party wins seats in an electoral area, Dr Kavanagh has estimated that Fianna Fail will have one seat, Fine Gael will lose one, Labour will lose one, Sinn Fein will gain one to two and an independent, or 'other' will take a seat.

In a second scenario, the numbers are slightly revised, with other factors, such as candidates and competition trends taken into account, Fine Gael will retain their two seats at the expense of the 'other' candidate. His estimates for the other parties remain the same with Fianna Fail (1), Labour (0) and Sinn Fein (2).

Dr Kavanagh believes Cllr. Imelda Munster will take a second seat for Sinn Fein, while current junior minister Ged Nash will lose his. The Fianna Fail vote in Louth, which has not been tested in a general election since the Brian Cowen-led coalition was defeated five years ago, is, according to the Maynooth lecturer, going to yield them a seat, while the Fine Gael candidates, and current TDs, Fergus O'Dowd and Peter Fitzpatrick, will be battling hardest to return to Leinster House.

There had been speculation that former ESB group of unions' general secretary, and founder of the Irish Locomotive Drivers' Association (ILDA), Marian Park man Brendan Ogle may contest the general election in his home county under the Right2Change banner, but he confirmed shortly before Christmas that he would not be a candidate in this election.

Drogheda looks set to be the battleground that will decide the final outcome of the general election in Louth, expected to take place in February. With five seats up for grabs, the retirement of veteran Fianna Fail TD and former Ceann Comhairle, Seamus Kirk, and the confirmation, so far, of 16 candidates on the ticket, Louth is shaping up to have one of the most hotly contested elections in years.

Will Fine Gael manage to hold onto two seats? Will Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams top the poll again and will the party secure an historic second seat in Louth? And what measure can be given to the Fianna Fail vote, which will be tested for the first time since the party was in power?

Labour is running two candidates, junior minister Ged Nash and senator Mary Moran, both of whom have high profiles in their respective areas, but with a collapse predicted in the Labour vote, how will that affect these candidates and where will their votes go instead?

To whom will the disaffected vote go? People Before Profit's Gareth Weldon? Direct Democracy Ireland's Pat Greene or Anthony Connor? Will independents, such as Cllr. Maeve Yore and Cllr. Kevin Callan, who are aligned to the Independent Alliance, poll well, and how will former Fine Gael councillor, Michael O'Dowd, fare with the untested party Renua?

Fine Gael will have to be at their best to hold on to the two seats they secured in 2011. Fergus O'Dowd, a former junior minister, is a strong candidate, among the very best performers in the current field, and particularly well-known in Drogheda where he has served as a public representative for many years.

However, he is in the unusual position of having to battle his brother, Michael, for votes in the town they once canvassed together and whether the draw of Lucinda Creighton's Renua, coupled with Michael's undoubted abilities as a former councillor, will be enough to tempt votes off his brother, remains to be seen.

The battle of Drogheda continues with the hopes for a second SF seat resting on the capable shoulders of poll-topping councillor Imelda Munster. Adams was the party's only general election candidate in 2011 and Sinn Fein is hoping that meticulous vote management, particularly in Mid Louth, will yield the desired result of an unprecedented two seats in Louth.

Minister Nash has enjoyed much success in his first five years in Leinster House, becoming a junior minister and growing in confidence as a politician. But he faces a battle in his hometown against a Labour vote that is predicted, nationally, to go into freefall. But will Drogheda want to let a politician of his calibre go?

Of course, Cllr. Callan, a former mayor and one of the town's most consistent performers on Louth County Council, is an 'known unknown' when it comes to a general election and is running as an independent, attached to Shane Ross's Independent Alliance. It is difficult enough to win elections with a party machine behind you, even harder when you're relying on yourself and a smaller team of canvassers. Since he left Fine Gael in 2014, Cllr. Callan has certainly upped his game and is a contender in Drogheda.

With three of the seats looking like they could go to Drogheda-based politicians, the power base in the county could shift from Dundalk. The only certainty, it seems, is that Gerry Adams will hold onto his seat, but whether he can hold onto his massive personal vote will be keenly watched by his critics, some of whom expressed surprise that he has decided to run again. Meanwhile, former Louth manager, Peter Fitzpatrick, surprised many in 2011 by taking a seat at the first time of asking. The first time politician has found in feet in Leinster House and has raised the issue of the Louth Hospital many times on the Oireachtas Health Committee. He has been working steadily in his constituency clinics but it's where the party splits Mid Louth between him and O'Dowd that will really decide whether they can hold on to what they have.

Another first timer who polled exceptionally well, in the local elections, was Maeve Yore. Her sensible, no nonsense attitude endeared her to voters but how will she fare on the bigger stage?

Other candidates in Louth include Emma Coffey FF, Gareth Weldon PBPA, Mark Dearey GP, Anthony Connor DDI-NCM, Pat Greene DDI-NCM and Jeff Rudd UP.
A student who used a forged utility bill as proof of residing at a particular address in order to get married at a Drogheda registry office has been given the benefit of the Probation Act.

Harprett Singh (25) and his partner went to the Marriage Registry office at Haymarket in Drogheda with the forged UPC bill in October 2014.

However, the registrar noticed a discrepancy on the bill as Tippex was used to alter the name on it.

Gardai and an Emigration officer were called and Singh admitted he got a friend to alter the bill.

Singh, of Kigscourt, Mungret Court in Limerick pleaded guilty at Drogheda District Court to forging the bill on October 8th, 2014 at Haymarket in Drogheda.

He has no previous convictions.

Defence solicitor Paul Moore said the 25-year-old Indian national, who is on a student visa, is studying for a degree in Business at Cork School of Business.

'He was in a relationship with a Portuguese woman and they sought to get married,' explained Mr Moore.

'They required proof of where they were residing, apart from the other required documents, and as he shares a house with other people, he doesn't have utility bills in his own name. A friend changed a bill for him using Tippex.'

'It was a foolish thing to do and if he had gone about it properly he could have satisfied the registrar.'

Judge Flann Brennan remarked 'There are times you have to pinch yourself about what you hear here. This is such a case.'

Mr Moore said the couple are no longer together and were only eight months into the relationship when this happened.

'I don't want to belittle his personal life or relationship but it is quite clearly a small storm of madness and he shouldn't have done it,' said Judge Brennan.

'Why anyone would want to make themselves the subject of someone else's bill I do not know,' he added, to which Mr Moore replied: 'Perhaps for love!'

Judge Brennan applied the Probation Act and told Singh to apply himself to his studies. 'Dishonesty just means no-one will trust you.
Questions are being asked of the HSE after a man in his 70s who got into difficulty swimming off the Rush coast, was left waiting for an ambulance just one kilometre from the Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda following his rescue by the Coast Guard.

A Coast Guard helicopter was used to airlift a swimmer who got into difficulty off the Rush coast, to a hospital in Drogheda but after an ambulance failed to arrive for the rescued man, he had to be loaded into a Coast Guard jeep and taken to hospital.

On Saturday, January 2, shortly before 10am, the Coast Guard's National Maritime Operations Centre received reports of an adult swimmer possibly in difficulty on the Rush coast. Concerned members of the public had spotted the swimmer not far from the shoreline and alerted the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard immediately launched a rescue operation tasking the Skerries Coast Guard team, the Skerries Lifeboat and also the Coast Guard's Sikorsky S-92 helicopter from its nearby base at Dublin Airport.

Despite the challenging conditions, the swimmer fortunately managed to reach the shore and was then assisted on scene by Skerries Coast Guard medics. The Coast Guard's Sikorsky helicopter successfully landed on at the north beach in Rush and the casualty was taken on board for transfer to the Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda.

With no landing facilities at the hospital, the helicopter landed at O'Raghallaighs GAA grounds in Drogheda, about 1km from the hospital where the helicopter crew and their patient, waited for an ambulance.

The rescued man was in his 70s and had a suspected case of hypothermia but 25 minutes after the helicopter landed in Drogheda, there was no sign of an ambulance. The Coast Guard took action and loaded the man in to one of the service's own jeeps, and carried him on to the Lourdes Hospital.

In a statement on the issue, the HSE said that the Coast Guard 'notified the National Ambulance Services approximately 10 minutes prior to its estimated time of arrival in Drogheda'.

The statement explained: 'All ambulances in the region were at that time tasked with prior calls. The Coast Guard had a jeep ready to meet the helicopter on its arrival as is standard practice and decided to transport the patient to Our Lady Of Lourdes hospital.'

Commenting on the initial successful rescue, Vanessa Gaffney, Officer in Charge for Skerries Coast Guard, praised the public's vigilance in spotting the swimmer in difficulty.

She said: 'Fortunately, members of the public ashore were able to recognise that this person was in difficulty and raise the alarm with the Coast Guard, allowing the various rescue resources to be despatched to the scene. Crucially, those members of the public that raised the alarm stayed on the beach and assisted in directing the Coast Guard to the casualty.'

John Ryan, Deputy Officer in Charge for Skerries Coast Guard said: 'The Skerries Coast Guard team have only just concluded an incredibly busy year and already 2016 appears to be following a similar trend with two call-outs completed in the first three days of the New Year. 'As always, we would appeal to the general public to be vigilant and to watch out for those that might be in difficulty along the coast.'

The delay in the ambulance arriving to transport the patient to the Lourdes Hospital has caused local concern and reacting to the incident, Drogheda's Mayor, Paul Bell said: 'It is my understanding that the patient was airlifted from a beach in Rush having been swimming in the area and suspected to be suffering from severe hypothermia.

'The Coast Guard helicopter landed approximately 1 kilometre away from the Hospital in the O'Raghallaighs GAA grounds.

'However it is alleged that the HSE Ambulance requested by the Coast Guard would not be available for twenty five minutes post the landing of the aircraft.'

The Drogheda Mayor added: 'I am not for the first time ask why the HSE has not invested in developing a purpose-built helipad on the grounds of the Hospital or on the roof of the building.'
Hollywood stars were among the guests at the glamorous wedding of Knockanure native film director Ger Barrett to Listowel's Grainne O'Sullivan.

Barrett, who shot to national attention with his acclaimed portrait of rural loneliness, Pilgrim Hill, found himself before the cameras and more than 300 guests on this happy occasion as he tied the knot with his stunning sweetheart.

As with many film industry events of note there were many familiar faces among the guest list - not least Transformers star Jack Rayner and his fiancee Madeleine Mulqueen; she of Rubberbandits Horse Outside video fame.

Jack was there to celebrate his pal's nuptials. It was Ger who directed the rising Hollywood talent in his recent feature Glassland, which also starred Toni Collette.

But Ger and Grainne were resolutely the stars of this big event with their families standing proudly by their side. Grainne, a daughter of Des and Bridie O'Sullivan from Bedford, and Ger, son of Joe and Peggy Barret, were married in St Mary's Church before their reception at the Listowel Arms Hotel. They were attended by bridesmaids Joanne Fitzmaurice, Leeann O'Sullivan and Lisa Healy and groomsmen John Herlihy, Tommy Barrett and Muiris Crowley. They will reside in LA.
Director JJ Abrams has admitted he was amazed that filmmakers were allowed film scenes for smash hit science fiction blockbuster Star Wars: The Force Awakens on Skellig Michael.

Abrams made the comments in a promotional behind-the-scenes video, made by Lucasfilm for Tourism Ireland, which is aimed at attracting fans of the beloved franchise to visit Kerry and the Skelligs.

In the short film, the crew revealed that the UNESCO World Heritage Site caught their eye when production designer Rick Carter stumbled across a picture of the area. He sent it to Abrams, who was looking for a location that looked suitably historic and realistic.

In the clip Abrams says he was amazed the filmmakers were allowed shot on the island.

"I can't believe they let us shoot there, it was so beautiful," Abrams says in the clip, which was made during the location shoot in 2014.

The shoot did prove controversial with An Taisce and several environmentalists strongly opposing it.
Any readers who have Prize Bonds tucked away in a folder or drawer somewhere in the house would be well advised to dig them out.

In the last week one Kerry Prize Bond holder has become a millionaire. On Wednesday December 30 the Prize Bond Company held its latest Millionaire Draw and the winning bond plucked from the box is held in the Kingdom.

The winner has yet to come forward and the Prize Bond Company is urging all bond holders in Kerry to check their bond's to see if they won the life changing prize.

A spokesperson for the Prize Bond Company said the number of the winning bond is DR 745397 and it was purchased back in 2002, meaning its owner may well have forgotten all about it.

The 1 million prize is awarded in the last draw of every second month (February, April, June, August, October and December) and replaces the normal weekly top prize of 50,000.

Other cash prizes awarded each week include 10 of 1,000, 250 of 100 and over 7,000 of 50 so there could well be more Kerry winners this week.

Bond holders can check draw results online at www.statesavings.ie. The main winning numbers are also available from most Post Offices.

"Congratulations to our new Prize Bond Millionaire from Kerry and to over 8,000 other winners in today's Prize Bond draw," said Chairman of the Prize Bond Company John Daly.

Prize Bonds are an Ireland State Savings product which, rather than paying interest, offers bond holders the chance to win cash prizes every week. All cash prizes are tax-free in Ireland, and Prize Bonds can be cashed in at any time after the minimum holding period of three months.
A Tralee family is this week celebrating the most amazing start to the new year as a 19-year old continues to recover from a successful kidney transplant - thanks to his dad.

Darren Burns from Kevin Barry's Villas owes his new lease of life to his beloved father Mike, who donated one of his kidneys to his son during a five-hour procedure at Beaumont Hospital on Monday afternoon.

Darren was diagnosed with Polycystic Kidney Disease when he was just nine years of age and had been on a strict medication regime ever since to keep the condition under control.

However, back in 2013 his condition began to deteriorate and four months ago he was referred to Beaumont Hospital having been told that he needed a life-saving kidney transplant.

Thankfully, both of Darren's parents Mike and Denise were deemed suitable donors and on Monday Darren underwent the life-saving operation, thanks to his father's incredible gift.

Speaking to The Kerryman the following day, an elated Denise said the pair were doing extremely well and that while both were understandably still quite sore, kidney recipient Darren was 'like a Spring chicken.'

A relieved Denise said that while it is still early days, doctors were very happy with their progress, with Darren's dangerously high Creatinine levels dropping by over 50 per cent in the first 24 hours after the operation.

Denise is staying at the Irish Kidney Association House beside the hospital with her younger son Devon until the men are fit enough to come home - hopefully next week.

"They are both doing absolutely fantastic, although they are obviously quite sore, but there's talk they might be home next Monday, which would be incredible," she said. "We are just so thrilled that everything went well and hopefully this will stress to others the importance of live organ donation. It's a gift we can't put a price on."

Denise also wanted to thank her friends and family for their ongoing support and kind messages of love this week, saying she was overwhelmed by people's kindness.

"I've been absolutely shocked at how amazing people can be when the chips are down."
The latest Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL) Litter League had disappointing news for Tralee and Killarney with both downs slipping down the rankings.

Having topped the league in August Killarney fell to sixth place on the league which ranks 40 Irish towns and cities on their cleanliness.

There was worse news for Tralee which fell from third in August to 17th on the latest league table.

Killarney was classed as 'cleaner than European norms' while Tralee was deemed to be 'clean to European norms."

An Taisce judges ranks the towns and there was some confusion in Killarney when the judges' report was published.

In their report on Killarney the judges made praised Domnick Street and highlighted a litter problem on Castle Street. Both of these streets are actually in Tralee.

When the error was pointed out to IBAL the body said the mistake was down to a misprint. According to IBAL in the Killarney report Castle Street actually refers to College Street while Domnick Street refers to Plunket Street.

Further clarification on the error is expected.

While judges praised most areas of Killarney the N22 Killarney to Tralee road came in for severe criticism with judges describing it as "heavily littered."

Unusually while the N22 road itself was criticised the "Tralee Approach Road" into Killarney (part of the N22) was highly praised, with judges describing it as "excellent."

Exactly where the judges delineated between the "N22" and the "Approach Road" is unclear.

In Tralee while most areas were praised judges said two "seriously littered" sites had brought down the towns ranking.

These were near the Clashlehane Roundabout and the car park adjacent to the Xtravision outlet. Judges said both sites need more attention.
A Tralee man left scarred after an assault outside a bar in the town two years ago says more needs to be done to support the victims of crime.

On Christmas Eve 2013 James 'Jim' Lyons, a trained professional security specialist who has lived Tralee all his life, had just left a Tralee town centre bar, after having a quiet Christmas drink, when the court heard he was set upon in an alleyway and attacked in a sustained 10 minute assault.

Last December his attacker appeared at Tralee District Court where he pleaded guilty to assault causing harm and agreed to pay compensation to Mr Lyons for the injuries he suffered in the attack.

Jim Lyons, who now has a scar over his lip and suffers flashbacks to the night of the attack, delivered a victim impact statement in court.

However Mr Lyon's, who has extensive experience in the security industry, said he found the experience in court almost as nerve racking as the attack itself.

Now he is calling for more to be done to support victims of violent crime.

"More needs to be done for victims. When I was in court I felt as though I was on trial," he said.

"In cases like these the victim seems to come away with the dirty end of the stick. From the victim's point of view the entire system seems to be stacked in favour of the criminals," said Jim

Mr Lyons said he was left "feeling like Frankenstein" after the attack and he is still extremely self conscious about the scarring he suffered.

"My self esteem has taken a battering, to put it mildly, and I am reluctant to go out at night alone in the town centre of Tralee which saddens me," he said.

"I often suffer flashbacks as well as ongoing nightmares reliving the attack," Jim said.
Members of the Kerry Mountain Rescue Team attend to the injured walker who broke his ankle while hiking on Carrauntoohil at the hight of Storm Desmond last Tuesday afternoon. Twenty members of the volunteer rescue team were called out in the storm to rescue the injured man

The Kerry Mountain Rescue Team are calling people to pay attention to weather warnings and not put themselves and others in danger.

The plea comes after 20 members of the voluntary rescue service were called out to rescue a walker who injured himself while walking on Carrauntoohil at the height of storm Desmond last Tuesday.

Rescuers had to brave high winds, floods and driving rain to reach and rescue the injured man.

The walker was among a group of four experienced walkers from Dublin who had been hiking in the area on Tuesday morning.

The fall occurred in the Hags Glen, between Lough Gouragh and the base of the Hags Tooth Ridge.

The walker's friends raised the alarm at 14.30 and Kerry Mountain Rescue Team were tasked to the incident.

The walker, a man aged 31 was treated at the scene for a broken ankle and was stretchered down the mountain before being brought to the nearest road, where he was transferred to an ambulance at approximately 5.30pm and brought to Kerry General Hospital. He has since returned to Dublin and is said to be recovering well.

Kerry Mountain Rescue Team Deputy PRO Colm Burke said the wet and windy conditions, and water logged lands, had made the rescue "much more difficult."

"The group were experienced hill walkers who would have been familiar with the area. They thought they'd be down off the mountain before the worst weather hit. Unfortunately they got caught out," he said.

"We would urge people to take serious heed of all weather warnings, and to avoid the mountains at this time. Extreme caution is also advised on low level walks and trails near watercourses, as the majority of rivers and lakes are currently in flood," said Mr Burke.

"They aren't issuing these warnings for no reason," Mr Burke said.
1 2 Become 1 Spice Girls

2 Un-break My Heart Toni Braxton

3 Knockin' On Heaven's Door/Throw These Guns Away Dunblane

4 One & One Robert Miles feat Maria Nayler

5 Don't Cry For Me Argentina Madonna

6 Beathe Prodigy

7 A Different Beat Boyzone

8 Horny Mark Morrison

9 All By Myself Celine Dion

10 Hillbilly Rock Hillbilly Roll Woolpackers

The Spice Girls were still at the top of the charts as 1997 dawned, having claimed the coveted Christmas No. 1 slot a week before. Only The Beatles (in 1963, 1964 and 1965) and the Spice Girls have managed three consecutive Christmas number one singles. '2 Become 1' was the first of the Girls' festive chart-toppers in the UK, followed by 'Too Much' in 1997 and 'Goodbye' in 1998. The song was the third Spice Girls single release - and their third number one. They would go on to score another six number ones in the UK over the next four years. A massive hit in Ireland, '2 Become 1' occupied the No. 1 spot here for six weeks over Christmas 1996 and into the New Year.
Do you remember where you were on Christmas Eve at 4pm? I know exactly where I was. I was standing beside my broken-down motorbike. Earlier on the drive it had given some trouble but eventually at a major junction in south Dublin it stopped dead.

It is a big bike, a Honda Deauville, 680cc. It is almost impossible to push it single-handedly and certainly dangerous in the extreme to try to negotiate it across a busy traffic light-controlled junction. I spotted a man walking on the footpath with his family and he kindly helped me get across to the other side of the road.

At least I now had it parked. It was cold and raining heavily. Fortunately I had the insurance company number on my phone and yes, my phone was in my pocket, charged too. I called the number, got through relatively quickly.

Those of you not familiar with a motorbike may not be aware but there is no place for an insurance disc. There is just one bracket or holder and that's for the tax disc. I did not have my insurance cert with me so I didn't know the policy number.

A woman answered the phone. I gave her the registration number and my location. She then asked: 'What's the make of the car?' I replied that it was a motorbike. She immediately told me that the company did not insure motorbikes. I insisted it was insured and that I had an insurance document for the bike. Alas, it was at home.

I went on to tell her the motorbike was insured as part of a fleet policy and gave her the name of the fleet. She then asked me for the policy number. I had to tell her I did not have it with me. She assured me she could do nothing for me and the call ended. It was raining, cold, and I was on the side of the road with a big machine.

I called a colleague and eventually got the insurance policy number. I phoned the insurance company again, gave all my details, including policy number. The man with whom I was speaking explained that within an hour assistance would arrive to help. I went on to tell him about my earlier experience and he explained that the company does not insure motorbikes for individual customers but it does for those who are insured on fleet policies.

Within an hour a white van arrives. The relief to see it. Mechanic gets out, introduces himself and after 20 minutes the engine ticks over and I am able to limp home. Was I glad to see my hall door and park up the bike. I called the insurance company and told them my story.

When the engine cut out at a major junction I was frazzled and nervous. I would not dare sit up on the bike without knowing that I had comprehensive insurance. In the event of anything happening I know I can call for assistance, anytime of the day or night. That's exactly what did not happen on this occasion.

Surely they should have a computer system that can recognise a fleet name. When people are under pressure they will always know the name but will most likely not know their policy number. Of course the policy number is written on the disc. Maybe the moral of this story is that motorbikes in Ireland be fitted with gadgets that can hold two discs.

So far I have not heard a word from the company, not a word of apology. I am not impressed.
Sligo Sport and Recreation Partnership has teamed up with the popular RTE programme Operation Transformation to host a national walk this Saturday January 9th at 10am on the Sligo Town Sli na Slainte route along Doorly Park.

The starting point for the 4k walk is JFK Parade Riverside and the route will follow along the Garavogue River through Doorly Park.

People of all ages and fitness levels are welcome and in particular, families. The event is ideal for beginners. The warm-up for the Operation Transformation Walk is at 9.50am.

For health and safety reasons organisers have asked people not to bring their dogs along.

For more information on the Operation Transformation walk in Sligo log onto www.sligosportandrecreation.ie or contact 071 91 61511.

And, for those who get the exercise bug in the New Year and want to continue after the Operation Transformation Walk, a new Sligo parkrun Operation Transformation training group is being facilitated by the local parkrun committee at Doorly/ Cleveragh Park on Saturday January 16th from 9.30am to 10.30am.

The training programme will run for five Saturday mornings and will culminate with a 5K parkrun on Saturday 20th February to coincide with the Operation Transformation national 5K in Dublin's Phoenix Park.

Instructors will lead the sessions which will include an element of walking and jogging with the aim of building up to a continuous 5K run.

Looking forward to the start of the training group, Jim Rushe Director of Sligo parkrun stated: "This programme is targeted at people who wish to get active by taking up running as a form of physical activity and is an ideal opportunity to get started in a supportive environment provided by the Sligo parkrun."

The programme, which is free to participants is being supported by Sligo Sport and Recreation Partnership.

Places on the programme are limited so participants are encouraged to book a place by contacting sligooffice@parkrun.com or 086 8389436.

Meanwhile, for those who wish to walk instead of run, Sligo Sport and Recreation Partnership is facilitating a Sligo East City Spring Walk Series.

The five week Spring Walk Series will commence on Thursday, January 21st at 10.30am and will run for five successive weeks.

Meeting place for the walks is the Riverside Hotel and each week the walk will take place in the local Doorly/Cleveragh Park area along flat terrain for approximately one hour.

A walking leader will be on hand to lead the group with a gentle warm up, followed by the walk along the dedicated and scenic walking paths in the local park culminating with a cup of tea back at the Riverside Hotel.

Diane Middleton SSRP said: "Walking is a great way to get active and is ideal for those who want to build up their fitness. A community walking group provides a support structure that is friendly and sociable and can be a great source of encouragement particularly for those new to exercise."

All ages and abilities are welcome to join this free walking programme. The initiative is being run in conjunction with the Riverside Hotel and Fitness Suite.

For further information contact SSRP at 071 9161511 or email diane@sligosportandrecreation.ie

RTE's Operation Transformation is one of the most programmes every January and is now in its ninth year.

The show is presented by Ray D'Arcy and Kathryn Thomas.
Parishioners must make protection of the unborn an election issue this year.

Bishop of Elphin Dr Kevin Doran made the call in his New Year's Day homily in Sligo Cathedral.

"There has been a lot of political posturing about repealing the eighth amendment, which is the only remaining protection unborn children have in our legal system," he said.

"That protection has already been significantly eroded in recent years.

"I believe that committed Christians must make this an election issue and that candidates must be questioned politely but firmly, not just on their future intentions but on their past record," he said.

"I know that people sometimes feel powerless in the face of the democratic process and I think that experience of powerlessness is shared by some of the politicians themselves.

"Be that as it may, but non-engagement would be an abdication of our responsibility," he added.

Bishop Kevin also made reference to a break-in at his home recently.

"In recent weeks, in the context of a break-in at home, I became "known to the Gardai" and, in a more personal way came to understand the significance of someone who comes when you need help," he told the congregation.

A spokesperson for the Bishop told this newspaper that "nothing serious" was stolen in the break-in.

"There is a tradition of inviting civic leaders to the New Year's Day Mass and in the context of expressing appreciation for the service of the Gardai to the Common Good, often at risk to themselves, Bishop Kevin referred to his own appreciation of their response," they said.

In his homily, Bishop Kevin also called on people to examine "very carefully" what the various political parties are proposing to do about Education - "Our Catholic schools have a very good track record of inclusiveness, but there are those who would like them to be less Catholic," he said.

"Does religion have a place in our schools?" he asked.
The Bishop of Elphin Kevin Doran has lead the wishes to members of the public as a new year begins.

Bishop Doran urged members of the Diocese of Elphin to use their democratic rights this year as the country prepares for an election in February.

"As we embrace this New Year, just beginning, with all its challenges, my prayer for you is in the words of our first reading.

"It is a blessing that comes to us, from almost three thousand years ago.

"One of the first tasks of 2016 will be the election of a new Oireachtas and the formation of a new government, which will serve the common good.

"I know that people sometimes feel powerless in the face of the democratic process.

!I think that experience of powerlessness is shared by some of the politicians themselves.

"Be that as it may, but non-engagement would be an abdication of our responsibility.

"What we need to do is to consider the quality of our participation.

"As Christians and as citizens, we need to engage with the candidates about the questions that really matter, not just to ourselves personally, but to our society as a whole.

"Looking back over 2015, two of the major challenges we have faced and which, to a large extent, still remain to be resolved, are the crisis of homelessness and the problem of flooding which has affected so many parts of our own diocese in recent weeks.

"On the international scene, the challenges are quite similar.

"We have the refugee crisis and the on-going challenge of protecting the future of the earth, which is our common home.

"There have always been refugees, of course but, at least in such large numbers, they have always been somewhere else.

"This time they are in Europe and it is not so easy to be indifferent.

"I would like to think that people are becoming more aware that, especially with the quality of information available to us from so many sources, we cannot remain indifferent to any of these challenges, simply because they don't touch us personally.

"I pray that in this coming year, the Spirit of Jesus, which is a Spirit of service and sacrifice, of healing and forgiveness, of justice and peace, will come upon our Church and upon our whole society."

The full transcript of Bishop Doran's homily which was read on New Year's Day can be found on the Facebook page - 'Elphin Diocese.'
Tanaiste Joan Burton was spotted strolling down O'Connell Street at lunchtime last Wednesday. She posed happily with her husband, Pat Carroll on their way to meet Sligo Senator Susan O'Keeffe for lunch in Hargadons.

"I like Sligo a lot, I used to come here on holidays to Mullaghmore years ago when our daughter was small. In recent years I just haven't had a chance to holiday so when we were coming somewhere after Christmas for a break we just said we'd go up to Sligo and walk. Famous last words!"she laughed.

"We're here on just a short three day break. Unfortunately yesterday (Tues Dec 29) it was broken by the Council of State so I had to go back up to Dublin but I'm back today and then we're going home tomorrow," she told The Sligo Champion.

The Tanaiste and her husband stayed in the Radisson Hotel in Ballincar: "It's got a pool which is great," she added. Deputy Burton got a dip of another kind the very next day when she fell out of a canoe into flood waters in Thomastown, Co. Kilkenny while inspecting flood damage from Storm Frank.
Avoca and surrounding roads were some of the mostly badly affected during Storm Frank last week.

Some years ago Wicklow County Council dredged gravel build-up along the bed of the Avoca River near Whitebridge which had vastly reduced, if not eradicated, the risk of flooding for a time.

However, the gravel has built up once more and on Wednesday the river burst its banks, requiring the Fire Service to attend and pump flood waters off the road.

A member of Whitebridge Residents' Association said that matters were 'very risky' at one stage with a very real risk of flooding to homes.

'The fire brigade attended and pumped water off the road but it was touch and go. The works carried out previously made a massive difference but the time has come to re-do it. The gravel was removed and placed up along the riverbank to help prevent flooding but it has washed away now.

' It was a very small job but a very important one for the local residents and we would appeal to the local councillors to lobby on our behalf,' the resident said.

'The residents are very concerned for the future if this is left. The waters came dangerously close to our homes this week and we don't want to risk damage in the future of more bad weather comes.'
Saoirse O'Reilly (left) and Rachael Milea with Lucy the German Mastiff. Dominican College Wicklow, "The Nose Knows," Young Scientist Project

Wicklow is poised to make an impression at this year's BT Young Scientist Exhibition which runs this week at the RDS.

Eight schools in County Wicklow are taking part in this year's show with 22 entries compiled by 40 students, with the support of their teachers.

One of the most unusual projects comes courtesy of Dominican College, Wicklow, entitled 'The nose knows... Biometric analysis of dog nose prints'.

Students Rachael Millea and Saoirse O'Reilly have spent time trying to prove whether or not each dog has a unique 'nose print' akin to a human fingerprint.

'Looking closely at a dog's nose it is possible to see lines forming patterns. This raises the question - could a dog be identified by its nose print? The answer is yes - dog nose prints have been used by the Canadian kennel club since 1938 to identify dogs and has also been used in America. Using nose prints is a very reliable way to identify dogs and is much better than other forms of dog identification which include the use of a microchip being implanted in the dog. Many pet owners feel this is an invasive and painful way of keeping track of their dogs. Microchips can also malfunction, and even become dislodged, rendering the chip useless,' explained Rachael and Saoirse.

Their project includes development of an App which can be used by dog owners to upload their dog nose print to add to a database.

'There are several important reasons for the research outlined. One being that it would help to return lost pets to their owners. Another important use for identification would be for forensics to determine the identity and ownership of an animal involved in property damage or personal injury. If extended to sheep and other animals, this method of identification would negate the need for tagging animals, which can be invasive to them,' they added

Dominican College students have submitted six of the 22 entries to this year's Young Scientist event, under the supervision of teacher John O'Brien.

Jade Duffy and Lauren Fahey hope 'to identify and observe exoplanet transits visible during October to January using the Watcher robotic telescope located in South Africa' while Water desalination by sapwood was the focus of Nicole Devitt and Aine Cahill's exhibit.

Eva Phelan and Molly Flood turned their attention on health and fitness by investigating if having and using a pedometer can cause people over 60 years to be more fitness aware.

Whether or not there is a correlation between pupil dilation and physical effort or perceived physical effort was examined by Rhian Drennan and Aoibhe Drennan while mental number sense in animals, namely chickens was assessed by Lauren Ryan and Lucy Phelan.

Six projects from Avondale Community College, mentored by teacher Aoife Sullivan have also made it through to the national final

'An Investigation into the Effects Weather has on Cereal Crop Yields in Ireland over a Ten Year Period' is the project of Mary Kate Condren who carried out her research project in conjunction with Teagasc and Met Eireann to investigate if a correlation exists between increasing spring barley yields and the weather it has been exposed to.

Sean Byrne focused on the exposure of workers to harmful chemicals for his exhibit and looked at levels in some motor factors and beauty salons.

An analysis of how worm concentration has a direct effect on the badger concentration which in turn affects the TB rates is the project of David Fleming and Conor Windsor entitled 'Tick Tack Tuberculosis.

Particularly important in County Wicklow, the exhibit looked at fertilisers which are added to land to increase crop yield also increase the worm concentration in the area.

'This increase in worm concentration then leads to an increase in badger concentration which feed on the worms. As badgers carry TB the number of positive cases of TB in cattle herds increases in these areas. This project will investigate the relationship between worm concentration and fertilizer type,' explained David and Conor.

A particularly important project in terms of society today was carried out by Aaron Lee, Jude George and Daniel Morley which investigates the effect of technology on teenagers' lives.

For 'Technology: Friend or Foe', the boys conducted their investigation through surveys with teenagers on the inpact of tehnology on their lives.

They will then compare and contrast the experience of teenagers with that of members of the public who grew up without the internet or social media.

East Glendalough School's entry by Donovan Webb examines how an automatic system can be used to control plant growth in a polytunnel or raised bed while at Colaiste Chill Mhantain students Lhamo Fitzsimons, Ashleigh de Vreede and Adelaide Kane set themselves the task of investigating the occurrence of Ehlers Danlos Syndrome Type 3, as is suspected of being underreported.

St Mary's College, Arklow, will have three exhibits at the show including comparing the effectiveness of different types of soap and drying methods by Shona Dillon and Doireann Kavanagh, examining egg quality by Sarah Shortall, Catherine Byrne and Lisa Hamilton and the effectiveness of spot creams by Helen Ryan.

Colaiste Raithin's exhibition entry comes from Luc de Barra who investigated the potential of pine needle oil as an alternative biodiesel source.

At St David's Secondary, Aoife Rainey, Niamh Daly and Sophie McDevitt looked at The feasibility of running anaerobic digester at a local level on waste materials only in an attempt to reduce our reliance on non-renewable energy sources while Harvey Brezina Cuniffe's project created the 'Family Minder' which allows families keep track on where younger or older family members are with danger zone proximity warnings.

At St Gerard's, Bray, Evelyn Clinton set about understanding the form of data input people gravitate towards and the implications it has on future technological evolutions.

Fellow St Gerard's pupil Joshua Dargan Hayes created a sunshade that charges any USB device (phones, tablets, fans, etc.) and includes an app that allows you to order items from your sun-lounger.

The BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition 2016 gets underway today, January 6 and runs until Saturday, January 9 and all of the Wicklow schools will have their exhibits on show for the public and adjudicators.

There are over 120 student, teachers and school awards to be won, including cash prizes, international trips and the overall title of BT Young Scientist & Technologist(s) of the Year.
The man behind the petition to name an element in the periodic table after Motorhead frontman Lemmy Kilmister said he hopes the tribute will make up for the lack of a knighthood during his life.

John Wright's change.org petition to ask the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) to consider the appellation "Lemmium" for one of the four newly-discovered heavy metallic elements has amassed over 113,000 signatures since Monday.

Speaking of why he started the petition, Wright said: "In terms of record sales impact, Lemmy should have been offered an honour but he didn't play that game. I don't think there was ever much chance of Sir Lemmy Kilmister so this feels like a tribute that has a permanence to it that acknowledges and represents his impact."

The petition comes as Lemmy, who died on December 28, is laid to rest in a service in Hollywood today that will be live streamed at 11pm GMT.

Lemmium, he claims, will be "a force for social good" by introducing both chemistry and heavy metal to a new generation.

Wright said: "Anything that makes it easier to stand up as a science teacher in front of a bunch of 12-13 years old that aren't interested in chemistry has to be a good thing.

"We're celebrating Lemmy but also getting the world's media to talk about the periodic table and what's a heavy metal."

Wright said he expected 200 signatures on the petition but, after being retweeted by Kerrang editor Phil Alexander then names like Guns N' Roses Duff McKagan, Professor Brian Cox and Motorhead's own Phil Campbell, it has gone viral.

He believes the petition caught on because it is like "an online condolence book" for Lemmy.

He admitted to doing a "back of a fag packet" level of research into the process of naming an element, but Wright revealed that "serendipitously" the process is under consultation until the end of February, meaning Lemmium does have a chance to become reality.

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"It just seems to be part of that natural synchronicity that makes this possible, serendipity, as if there's some forces at play here."

Now Wright's calling on the star supporters to help secure 20 minutes of the IUPAC's time to make a presentation, with a dream team of Cox and another Brian, ex-Queen guitarist and doctor of astrophysics May, who is yet to publicly support the petition but was a close friend of Lemmy.

He downplayed Lemmy's own protests in an interview with The Independent in 2010 that, "we were not heavy metal. We were a rock'n'roll band. Still are."

"Shall we not do it then because Lemmy said he's not heavy metal? It just doesn't seem worth turning down the opportunity to do something really special. Even if Motorhead weren't a metal band, Lemmy himself, almost a cartoon character, was certainly the very essence of metal," Wright said.

There is poignancy too in the option to pick a tribute in the world of science and not music.

"Science is often very rebellious. New ideas come from challenging the status quo. I think Lemmy would be very comfortable being seen within the landscape of people that aren't satisfied with the world as they pick it up but want to make an imprint on it," he said.

The music industry association, BPI, are also supporting the petition.

Spokesman Gennaro Castaldo said: "Lemmy was a true rock legend, who will be much missed. Although future generations will always be able to enjoy his iconic music, it would be wonderful to create an enduring legacy that will almost literally set Lemmy's name in stone for all time."
Police and security are ramped up outside the hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort city of Hurghada. Photo: Reuters

Two suspected militants stabbed and wounded three foreign tourists - two Austrians and a Swede - at a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort city of Hurghada yesterday, the Interior Ministry said.

Security forces opened fire at the two assailants, killing one and seriously wounding the other, according to a ministry statement.

The wounded attacker was arrested, according to security officials.

It is the second attack on a hotel frequented by foreign tourists in Egypt in as many days, an ominous development for the country's already battered tourism industry.

Knives

The Interior Ministry, which is in charge of police, said two men armed with knives had entered the restaurant at the front of the seaside, four-star Bella Vista Hotel and attacked the tourists.

The ministry identified the slain attacker as 21-year-old Mohammed Hassan Mohammed Mahfouz, a student from Cairo's neighbourhood of Giza. Both attackers, it said, carried knives and pellet guns.

All three wounded tourists were taken to hospital, where one was treated and discharged, the statement said.

There was no word in the statement on the condition of the other two, but Health Ministry spokesman Khaled Megahed described the condition of the three as "not serious."
Police and security are ramped up outside a hotel where two attackers opened fire in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada, Egypt, January 8, 2016. Two assailants armed with a gun, a knife and a suicide belt attacked a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada on Friday

Cleaners try to clean blood stains near the entrance to Bella Vista Hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada, Egypt, January 9, 2016. Two armed assailants attacked a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada on Friday, wounding three foreign tourists, Egyptian officials said

Three European tourists who were stabbed at a Red Sea resort in Egypt were only lightly wounded and are in stable condition, hospital officials said.

The victims - identified as Austrians Renata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both 72, and Swede Sammie Olovsson, 27 - suffered shallow wounds, a spokesman said.

Expand Close Police and security are ramped up outside a hotel where two attackers opened fire in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada, Egypt, January 8, 2016. Two assailants armed with a gun, a knife and a suicide belt attacked a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada on Friday / Facebook

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Whatsapp Police and security are ramped up outside a hotel where two attackers opened fire in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada, Egypt, January 8, 2016. Two assailants armed with a gun, a knife and a suicide belt attacked a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada on Friday

Two suspected militants attacked the three at a hotel in Hurghada late on Friday. Security forces shot both assailants, killing one and wounding the other before arresting him.

An Islamic State affiliate claimed another attack on Thursday at a hotel in Cairo, near the Pyramids, but no one was injured.

Egypt has been battling an insurgency based in the northern Sinai peninsula that grew following the 2013 military overthrow of Islamist president Mohammed Morsi.

The Interior Ministry said that in the Hurghada attack, two men armed with knives and pellet guns attacked the tourists in a restaurant at the front of the seaside, four-star Bella Vista Hotel.

Jan-Eric Olovsson, the 64-year-old father of the Swedish victim, told the Swedish Expressen newspaper they were having dinner in the restaurant when the attackers stormed in.

"Everything went really fast. We sat there and ate and then they showed up," he said. "I thought they came from outside. I myself had the gun pointed at me three times, and Sammie was stabbed with the knife."

He said his son was stabbed four times in the neck but "did well" because of his physical strength.

"I told him to lie still," he said, recalling how his son lay in a pool of blood. "I got up a few times and when I saw it was clear, I ran out on the street and tried to get hold of an ambulance."

He said another woman eating in the restaurant was also wounded.

Shortly after the attack, Sammie Olovsson updated his Facebook profile, saying he was "lucky" to have deflected the knife when the attacker tried to stab him in the chest. He said the knife cut some muscles in his neck but no arteries or nerves, and he would be able to leave the hospital on Saturday.

Egypt has been struggling to revive its tourism industry after years of unrest stemming from the 2011 uprising that toppled long-time autocrat Hosni Mubarak. The apparent bombing of a Russian passenger plane over Sinai last year, claimed by IS, led to widespread flight cancellations, dealing a major blow to the industry which is one of the country's main earners.

The other victims were also stable enough to be discharged on Saturday, Nile Hospital chairman Reda el-Naggar said.

The Olovssons' trip was organised by one of Sweden's largest tour operators, Apollo. The company's head Peter Browall said guests were given the option of relocating after the attack.

"Some have decided to do so. Not all have. This is done based on individual dialogues we have with them," he said.

Hurghada is "a small destination for Apollo Sweden", Mr Browall said. He could not provide any figures, but said interest in Egypt had dropped following recent attacks.

Zainab Feili, a young Swede who survived Friday's ordeal unharmed, described a scene of chaos. "Everybody just ran. We hear shoot. Everybody cries. It was awful," she said.

Mohammed Beram, a retired military officer living nearby who rushed to the scene to help, said the attacker who was killed was wearing an explosives vest.

Later on Saturday, gunmen killed two police officers in Cairo.

An Interior Ministry statement said the two were shot on their way to work in the Giza district. It said police were deployed to the scene to investigate the shooting and search for suspects.
Secret Service agents arrested a man who allegedly travelled to Washington to kidnap a dog belonging to President Barack Obama.

DC Superior Court documents say the agents interviewed Scott Stockert of Dickinson, North Dakota, at a Washington hotel after receiving information he was on his way to the capital to kidnap a "pet" owned by the first family.

The Obamas have two Portuguese water dogs, Bo and Sunny, and officials arrested Stockert after finding weapons in his car.

The documents say the agents interviewed Stockert on Wednesday after they received information from a Secret Service office in Minnesota that Stockert "was on his way to Washington, DC, to kidnap the pet that belongs to the first family".

During the interview, agents asked Stockert whether he had access to any weapons, and he acknowledged having two guns in his truck.

Agents found a shotgun and rifle as well as a machete, a billy club and ammunition. The court document says Stockert was not a registered gun owner and that he was charged with violating District of Columbia laws on carrying a rifle or shotgun outside a home or business.

According to the court documents, Stockert told agents he was "Jesus Christ" and his parents were President John F Kennedy and actress Marilyn Monroe, and that he came to Washington to announce he was running for president.

S tockert was released from custody on Friday but must wear an ankle monitor.

The first family's search for a dog to join them at the White House was widely publicised.

On election night in 2008, Mr Obama said that his daughters, Sasha and Malia, had "earned the new puppy that's coming with us to the White House".

Bo, a male Portuguese water dog, joined the family in 2009 and was a gift from then Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy. Sunny, a female Portuguese water dog, joined the family in 2013.

The dogs have been a regular presence at White House events. Late last year, they accompanied first lady Michelle Obama to receive the White House Christmas Tree. The decorations included larger than life replicas of Bo and Sunny.
Soldiers escort drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman into a helicopter during a presentation to the media in Mexico City, January 8, 2016

Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is escorted by soldiers during a presentation at the hangar belonging to the office of the Attorney General in Mexico City, Mexico January 8, 2016

Recaptured drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is escorted by soldiers during a presentation in Mexico City, January 8, 2016

The world's most-wanted drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was recaptured in a daring raid by Mexican marines after a shoot-out that left five people dead.

The dramatic raid came six months after Guzman fled through a tunnel from a maximum security prison in a made-for-Hollywood escape that deeply embarrassed the government and strained ties with the US.

Expand Close Soldiers escort drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman into a helicopter during a presentation to the media in Mexico City, January 8, 2016 / Facebook

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Whatsapp Soldiers escort drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman into a helicopter during a presentation to the media in Mexico City, January 8, 2016

Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto announced the capture using his Twitter account: "Mission accomplished: we have him."

Few had thought Guzman would be taken alive, and few now believe Mexico will want to try to hold him a third time in its prisons.

He escaped from maximum-security facilities in 2001 and on July 11 last year, the second breakout especially humiliating for the Pena Nieto administration, which held him for less than 18 months.

The capture had senior Mexican officials at a foreign ministry event gleefully embracing and breaking into a spontaneous rendition of the national anthem after interior secretary Miguel Osorio Chong delivered the news.

Guzman was held after a shoot-out between gunmen and Mexican marines at a home in an upmarket area of Los Mochis, a seaside city in his home state of Sinaloa.

The Mexican navy said that marines raided a home after receiving a tip about armed men there. They were fired on from inside the structure, it said. Five suspects were killed and six others arrested. The marine's injuries were not life threatening.

"You could hear intense gunfire and a helicopter - it was fierce," said a neighbour, adding that the battle raged for three hours.

Guzman may have been at the house and fled while his gunmen and bodyguards provided covering fire. The drug lord was later captured at the hotel Doux, a low-rise modern building on the outskirts of town.

Some reports said he tried to escape through storm drains. In 2014, Guzman evaded capture by fleeing through a network of interconnected tunnels in the drainage system under Culiacan, the Sinaloa state capital.

Marines seized two armoured vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher at the home in Los Mochis.
Armed police stand guard yesterday in front of the station where a man was killed Thursday after he showed up wearing fake explosives, in Paris. Photo: AP

A possible bomb factory where the Paris terrorist atrocity, was prepared has been discovered, Belgian prosecutors said today.

Three belts for use in suicide attacks, traces of explosives and a fingerprint of wanted suspect Salah Abdeslam were found in a Brussels flat.

They said Abdeslam, who has been on the run since the November 13 attacks, may have hidden there. But they were also investigating the theory that the flat was used to prepare the explosive suicide belts.

The discovery was made in December during a search of an apartment in the Schaerbeek area of the Belgian capital. It was rented by someone using a false name, possibly used by another suspect now in custody, they said.

"In the framework of the investigation opened after the Paris attacks, the federal prosecutor confirms that during a house search conducted on December 10 in an apartment on the third floor, Rue Bergi in Schaerbeek, material that can be used to fabricate explosives as well as traces of TATP were found," the prosecutor's office said.

"This apartment was rented under a false identity that might have been used by a person already in custody in this case," the statement added.

"Three handmade belts that might be used to transport explosives as well as a fingerprint of Salah Abdeslam were also discovered."

Police have been hunting for Belgian-born Abdeslam (26), since suicide bombers and gunmen firing automatic weapons killed 130 people and wounded many more in a wave of attacks across Paris on a Friday evening.

Investigators said friends drove Abdeslam from Paris back to the Belgian capital, slipping through three police checks, while one suspect has since said that he drove Abdeslam across Brussels to Schaerbeek on November 14.

Eric Van Der Sypt, federal prosecutors spokesman, said that it was not clear when Abdeslam visited the Brussels apartment.

"Maybe he went there to get his belt (before the attacks), and maybe he went back afterwards. I suppose it's a possibility of both," he added.

He said it was likely the flat was a bomb factory.

"We found material to make explosives, we found traces of explosives and we found three belts. So you don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to make the right deduction."

He would not comment on Belgian media reports that the flat had been cleaned and checked for fingerprints after the attacks, which would explain why only one of Abdeslam's prints was found.

After the attacks, French authorities said that telephone data had placed Abdeslam in the area where an explosives belt was found in a dustbin in the Paris suburb of Montrouge.

Isil claimed responsibility for the coordinated series of attacks on bars, restaurants, and a concert hall, in which the attackers were armed with guns and suicide belts. Seven died during the assault but the total number of those directly involved is still unclear.

One of them was Abdeslam's brother, Brahim.

In early December, Belgian prosecutors said they were looking for two "armed and dangerous" men who used false ID papers to help Abdeslam travel to Hungary in September where he was stopped - but then let go - by police.

Belgian authorities have arrested and charged a total of 10 people in connection with the attacks, including several with helping Abdeslam.

France has long said the attacks were prepared and organised in Belgium and that the mastermind was Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a Brussels resident who was killed in a police raid in Paris days after the massacre.

Paris was again jolted on Thursday when a man wearing a fake explosives vest and wielding a butcher's knife ran up to a police station and was shot dead by officers standing guard.

Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said investigators are still unsure of the man's true identity.
A shop assistant sets up a row of pepper spray in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

Air guns are seen in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

Police officers patrol in front of the main station of Cologne, Germany, on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016. More women have come forward alleging they were sexually assaulted and robbed during New Years celebrations in the German city of Cologne, as police faced mounting criticism for their handling of the incident

Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve.

Gun dealers and vendors of deterrent devices such as sprays and alarms say sales have taken off since August, when Chancellor Angela Merkel opened Germany's borders to people fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa.

Expand Close A shop assistant sets up a row of pepper spray in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke / Facebook

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Whatsapp A shop assistant sets up a row of pepper spray in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

Ingo Meinhard, director of the German association of gunsmiths and specialist gun dealers, said sales of scare devices had "at least doubled" in 2015, citing telephone surveys with his members.

He said demand spiked up after the militant attacks in Paris on Nov. 13 and again after about 120 women complained of being mugged, threatened or sexually assaulted by gangs of men on New Year's Eve in Cologne at New Year.

Expand Close Air guns are seen in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke / Facebook

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Whatsapp Air guns are seen in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

Similar but smaller-scale assaults on women have been reported in cities including Hamburg and Stuttgart.

A Cologne martial arts instructor, Josef Werner, said inquiries for women's self-defence courses have increased fivefold.

Since German laws put severe restrictions on the sale of firearms for private use, demand has risen for freely-available devices such as CS gas, pepper spray, body alarms and high performance flash-lights that can blind aggressors for up to three minutes.

Kai Prase, director of Frankfurt-based DEF-TEC Defense Technology GmbH, said sales of pepper spray rose seven-fold in the final three months of last year.

"Normally the first week of January is very quiet but this year it's been a strong week in terms of sales," Prase said, reporting high demand for sprays that fit inside a handbag.

Nine of the top 10 bestselling items in the "Sport & Leisure" section on Amazon's German website on Friday were either pepper or CS gas sprays. The seventh-most popular item was a pepper spray shaped like a pink lipstick.

On Friday, officials said asylum seekers were among those suspected of involvement in the Cologne violence.

Pavel Sverdlov, director of the Soldier of Fortune gun shop in Berlin, said the rise in demand since August has been "really quite exceptional, I've never sold so many repellent devices."

He said sales of blank guns had trebled and he had sold out of pepper spray.

"The most recent events have alarmed many people, especially women," he said.
A shop assistant sets up a row of pepper spray in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

Air guns are seen in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

Police officers patrol in front of the main station of Cologne, Germany, on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016. More women have come forward alleging they were sexually assaulted and robbed during New Years celebrations in the German city of Cologne, as police faced mounting criticism for their handling of the incident

Germanys law should be toughened to make it easier to deport migrants who commit serious crimes, Angela Merkel has said.

Responding to intense public anger after the sex attacks in Cologne  perpetrated mainly by men of African and Middle Eastern origin  the Chancellor said the law should be changed.

Expand Close German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Photo: Reuters / Facebook

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Whatsapp German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Photo: Reuters

At present, asylum seekers can only be deported if they are sentenced to at least three years in prison  and if their lives would not be at risk in their countries of origin.

"The question that arises after Cologne is when do you lose your right to stay with us?" said Mrs Merkel. "I have to say that, for me, we must take it away sooner. We must do this for us - and for the many refugees who were not part of the events in Cologne. I think there are indications that changes must happen.

Mrs Merkel added: The interior minister and the justice minister are discussing just what we could improve.

But Mrs Merkel refused to retreat from her open-door policy for refugees, which saw 1.1 million people arrive in Germany in 2015 alone. Whether it would be legally or practically possible to deport an offender back to Syria  where a civil war is raging  remains unclear.

Expand Close Air guns are seen in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke / Facebook

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Whatsapp Air guns are seen in a showcase of a gunsmith's shop in Berlin, Germany, January 8, 2016. Demand for pepper spray and blank-firing guns has surged in Germany, particularly after militant attacks in Paris in November and assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

Nor is it clear whether any reforms would apply retrospectively to those who committed offences in Cologne on New Years Eve.

Mrs Merkel maintained that Germany can integrate the huge influx of refugees in a way that will benefit the national economy in the long term. We can do it, she said.

However, senior members of her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) do not share the Chancellors sanguine view. The party leadership will hold a policy meeting in the city of Mainz on Saturday.

The far-right Pegida movement is due to hold a rally in Cologne on Saturday. Lutz Bachmann, the groups leader, is campaigning on the slogan "Rape Refugees not Welcome".

The crisis over the sex attacks by Middle Eastern and North African migrants threatened to divide Europe's east from west.

Political tensions caused by allowing more than one million migrants to enter the continent in 2015 boiled over on Friday, as leaders from central and eastern countries announced the death of liberal Europe and called for the continent to seal its borders.

The idea of multicultural Europe has failed, proclaimed Robert Fico, the prime minister of Slovakia, calling for an extraordinary summit of EU leaders next week to discuss fresh reports of migrant-led sex attacks emerging from Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Austria and Finland

There is also widespread anger over what many Germans see as a cover-up by the authorities. The day after the mass sex attacks in Cologne, the citys police said that New Year celebrations had been largely peaceful.

For several days, the media largely ignored the story  and the ethnic origins of the attackers were studiously overlooked. The police have now identified about 30 suspects, almost all of them migrants, including five Iranians and four Syrians.

Police have been accused of covering up crimes by the mass circulation Bild newspaper.

Under the headline Were the police forbidden to tell the truth? the paper said details of offences committed by migrants are only beginning to emerge iin cities in addtion to Cologne, where a number of sexual assaults took place on New Year's Eve.

The allegations in the tabloid will intensify the refugee crisis engulfing Germany.

In Cologne, the paper reported, the police initially said that there was no evidence that refugees were involved in the crime.

But the log from the riot police said that the majority of the 71 people arrested on New Years Eve were asylum seekers, the paper said.

Elsewhere, a high-ranking Frankfurt police officer told Bild, strict instructions had been given not to volunteer information about crimes committed by refugees.

Details should only be disclosed in response to direct questions from journalists.

Questioning from the press in recent days has revealed allegations that two women were raped by Syrians in Weil am Rhein.

A 20-year old Iraqi is accused of groping a number of women in Stuttgart during the New Years Eve celebrations.

A spokesman for the provincial government of Hesse, admitted that press officers had been advised to discreet rather than risk triggering a backlash from right-wing extremists.

Women have also complained of facing sexual harassment inside refugee camps, a spokesman for the Cologne refugee council told the Kolnische Rundschau, a local daily.

In Cologne, the citys police chief was sacked as condemnation continued over his handling of the wave of assaults.

Wolfgang Abers had faced a barrage of criticism over his forces failure to tackle the attacks on women by groups of men who police described as being of Arab and North African origin.
Supporters of HoGeSa (hooligans against Salafists) take part in a demonstration march with anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) in reaction to mass assaults on women on New Year's Eve, in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Ina Fassbender

Supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) take part in in demonstration march, in reaction to mass assaults on women on New Year's Eve, in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Ina Fassbender

Police use a water cannon during a protest march by supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Police use a water cannon during a protest march by supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Police use pepper spray against supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Police use pepper spray against supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) during a demonstration march REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Police use pepper spray against supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) during a demonstration march REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Police use pepper spray against supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) REUTERS/Ina Fassbender

Right-wing demonstrators carry a banner reading : Citizens get up, Protect our children and future, and \We are the People' as they march in Cologne, Germany Saturday Jan. 9, 2016. (AP Photo/Juergen Schwarz)

Participants of a women's flash mob wave flags and demonstrate against racism and sexism in front of the Cologne Cathedral in Cologne, Germany, Saturday, January 9, 2016. (AP Photo/Juergen Schwarz)

A police dog handler stands outside a sweet shop after a demonstration march by supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Police detain a supporter of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) during a protest march REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) take part in in demonstration rall REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

In Pictures: Demonstrations in Cologne in wake of New Year's Eve sex attacks Close

Women's rights activists, far-right demonstrators and left-wing counter-protesters took to the streets of Cologne on Saturday to voice their opinions in the debate that has followed a string of New Year's Eve sexual assaults and robberies blamed largely on foreigners.

Amid the heightened public pressure, Chancellor Angela Merkel's party proposed stricter laws regulating asylum-seekers in the country - some 1.1 million of whom arrived last year.

Police said that around 1,700 protesters from the anti-Islam Pegida movement were kept apart from 1,300 counter-demonstrators in simultaneous protests outside the city's main train station.

Pegida members held banners with slogans like "Rapefugees not welcome" and "Integrate barbarity?" while the counter-protesters pushed the message "refugees welcome".

Specifics of the New Year's Eve assaults and who were behind them are still being investigated. The attackers were among about 1,000 men gathered at Cologne's central train station, some of whom broke off into small groups and surrounded women, groping them and stealing their purses, cell phones and other belongings, according to authorities and witness reports. There are also two allegations of rape.

The Pegida demonstration on Saturday was shut down early by authorities using water cannons after protesters threw firecrackers and bottles at some of the 1,700 police on hand. Police said four people were taken into custody but no injuries were immediately reported.

Earlier, hundreds of women's rights activists gathered outside Cologne's landmark cathedral to rally against the New Year's Eve violence.

"It's about making clear that we will not stop moving around freely here in Cologne, and to protest against victim bashing and the abuse of women," said 50-year-old city resident Ina Wolf.

In response to the incidents, Ms Merkel said her CDU party on Saturday had approved a proposal seeking stricter laws regulating asylum seekers.

Ms Merkel said the proposal, which will be discussed with her coalition partners and would need parliamentary approval, would help Germany deport "serial offenders" convicted of lesser crimes.

Expand Close Supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) take part in in demonstration march, in reaction to mass assaults on women on New Year's Eve, in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Ina Fassbender / Facebook

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Whatsapp Supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) take part in in demonstration march, in reaction to mass assaults on women on New Year's Eve, in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Ina Fassbender

"This is in the interests of the citizens of Germany, but also in the interests of the great majority of the refugees who are here," Ms Merkel told party members in Mainz.

However, she also reiterated her mantra on the refugee issue, insisting again "we will manage it".

Expand Close Police use a water cannon during a protest march by supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay / Facebook

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Whatsapp Police use a water cannon during a protest march by supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Bonn University political scientist Tilman Mayer said he does not see the CDU proposal as either a change of course, nor one likely to dispel many Germans' concerns.

"This is just a building block in a chain of statements from the government and also the chancellor," he said on Phoenix television.

Expand Close Supporters of HoGeSa (hooligans against Salafists) take part in a demonstration march with anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) in reaction to mass assaults on women on New Year's Eve, in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Ina Fassbender / Facebook

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Whatsapp Supporters of HoGeSa (hooligans against Salafists) take part in a demonstration march with anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) in reaction to mass assaults on women on New Year's Eve, in Cologne, Germany, January 9, 2016. REUTERS/Ina Fassbender

Though Ms Merkel has decried the assaults as "repugnant criminal acts that ... Germany will not accept", they provide fodder for those who have opposed her open-door policy and refusal to set a cap on refugee numbers.

Influential Hamburg broadcaster NDR said in an opinion piece posted online Friday that such crimes threaten to push xenophobia toward the "middle of the population" - which could lead to a backlash against refugees.

Expand Close Police use pepper spray against supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay / Facebook

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Whatsapp Police use pepper spray against supporters of anti-immigration right-wing movement PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

"And who is to blame mainly?" the editorial asked. "These young, testosterone-driven time bombs with their image of women from the Middle Ages."

Despite the harsh rhetoric, the case is not yet that clear and the investigation is ongoing.

Of 31 suspects temporarily detained for questioning following the New Year's Eve attacks, there were 18 asylum seekers but also two Germans and an American among others, and none were accused of specifically committing sexual assaults.

Cologne police on Saturday said more than 100 detectives are assigned to the case and are investigating 379 criminal complaints filed with them, about 40% of which involve allegations of sexual offences.

"The people in the focus of the criminal investigation are primarily from North African countries," police said. "Most are asylum seekers or people living illegally in Germany. The investigation into if, and how widely, these people were involved in concrete criminal activity on New Year's Eve is ongoing."

Witness Lieli Shabani told the Guardian newspaper the attacks appeared coordinated, saying she watched from the steps of the city's cathedral as three men appeared to be giving instructions to others.

"One time a group of three or four males would come up to them, be given instructions and sent away into the crowd," the 35-year-old teacher was quoted as saying. "Then another group of four or five would come up, and they'd gesticulate in various directions and send them off again."

National broadcaster ARD called the attacks a "wake-up call" that illuminates the difficulty that lies ahead for Germany of integrating the newcomers.

"But we must not give in to our fears," ARD said. "If we now take all the refugees into custody, if we erect fences around our homes and country, if we join the swing to the right that some of our neighbors have, then we give up all we have achieved."

Cologne's police chief was dismissed on Friday amid mounting criticism of his force's handling of the incidents, and for being slow with releasing information.

Speaking in Mainz, Ms Merkel said local authorities must not be perceived to be withholding information and urged that the case be "fully clarified".

"Everything has to be put on the table," she said.

The proposal passed by her CDU party's leaders would strengthen the ability of police to conduct checks of identity papers, and also to exclude foreigners from being granted asylum if they have been convicted of crimes and sentenced to terms even as light as probation.

"Serial offenders who consistently, for example, return to theft or time and again insult women must count on the force of the law," Ms Merkel said.
The world's most-wanted drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was recaptured in a daring raid by Mexican marines after a shoot-out that left five people dead.

The dramatic raid came s ix months after Guzman fled through a tunnel from a maximum security prison in a made-for-Hollywood escape that deeply embarrassed the government and strained ties with the US.

Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto announced the capture using his Twitter account: "Mission accomplished: we have him."

Few had thought Guzman would be taken alive, and few now believe Mexico will want to try to hold him a third time in its prisons.

He escaped from maximum-security facilities in 2001 and on July 11 last year, the second breakout especially humiliating for the Pena Nieto administration, which held him for less than 18 months.

The capture had senior Mexican officials at a foreign ministry event gleefully embracing and breaking into a spontaneous rendition of the national anthem after interior secretary Miguel Osorio Chong delivered the news.

Guzman was held after a shoot-out between gunmen and Mexican marines at a home in an upmarket area of Los Mochis, a seaside city in his home state of Sinaloa.

The Mexican navy said that marines raided a home after receiving a tip about armed men there. They were fired on from inside the structure, it said. Five suspects were killed and six others arrested. The marine's injuries were not life threatening.

"You could hear intense gunfire and a helicopter - it was fierce," said a neighbour, adding that the battle raged for three hours.

Guzman may have been at the house and fled while his gunmen and bodyguards provided covering fire. The drug lord was l ater captured at the hotel Doux, a low-rise modern building on the outskirts of town.

Some reports said he tried to escape through storm drains. In 2014, Guzman evaded capture by fleeing through a network of interconnected tunnels in the drainage system under Culiacan, the Sinaloa state capital.

Marines seized two armoured vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher at the home in Los Mochis.
The Service Prosecuting Authority pledged no member of the Armed Forces would be prosecuted unless there was sufficient evidence to do so

Hundreds of British soldiers have received letters questioning their role in claims of torture and murder during the Iraq War, as prosecutors confirmed more than 50 deaths are set to be examined.

Around 280 veterans have been sent documents telling them they were involved in an incident under investigation by the Iraq Historical Allegations Team (Ihat), a spokeswoman for the unit said.

Unlawful death cases involving 35 alleged killings have already been referred to the Service Prosecuting Authority (SPA) - the military equivalent of the Crown Prosecution Service - along with 36 cases of alleged abuse and mistreatment with "multiple complainants".

The SPA said it was also preparing to advise on an additional 20 cases of unlawful killing and 71 cases of mistreatment in the near future.

Andrew Cayley QC, the director of the SPA, said it "will not flinch" in prosecuting British soldiers where there is evidence of wrongdoing.

The former war crimes prosecutor said: "I have spent the last 20 years of my professional life advising and prosecuting in cases involving genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

"I know very well what these crimes look like. Make no mistake we will give all these Ihat cases the thorough scrutiny the law requires and if prosecution is warranted we will not flinch from proceeding.

"Equally I want to make it absolutely clear that no member of the British Armed Forces will be prosecuted unless there is sufficient evidence to do so."

UK forces withdrew from Iraq in 2009 although lawyers are continuing to refer cases to the Ihat, the Government-established criminal investigation into murder, abuse and torture claims linked to the six-year military mission.

The multimillion-pound inquiry's workload reached 1,515 possible victims by September, of whom 280 are alleged to have been unlawfully killed. Ihat's budget is set at 57.2 million, which runs until the end of 2019 - 16 years after the 2003 invasion began.

An Ihat spokeswoman confirmed that some of the letters sent to veterans in the last two years had been hand delivered by detectives and that there was "no obligation to respond".

"It is standard police practice to send letters as a means of contacting potential witnesses," she said. "Sometimes the letters are delivered by hand and it may be that if a potential witness is at home then the investigator will take the opportunity to ask a few questions."

A Ministry of Defence spokeswoman said: "The vast majority of UK service personnel deployed on military operations conduct themselves professionally and in accordance with the law.

"The MoD takes all allegations of abuse or unlawful killing extremely seriously. That is why we are ensuring that they are investigated to establish the facts."

Retired Colonel Richard Kemp told the Daily Mail: "The idea that such a large number of soldiers should be accused of crime is a disgrace, and the Government should stop it.

"These soldiers did not sign up to go and put their lives on the line only to spend what could be the rest of their lives being hounded for their loyalty."

But Public Interest Lawyers, a firm that has acted in cases concerning Iraq, said Ihat and the SPA had to show they were "willing to prosecute culpable individuals".

"The Ihat was established in 2010 and some five years on there has not been a single prosecution as a result of its work," a spokesman said.

"This raises questions as to its effectiveness and its ability to deliver results for victims and relatives.

"It is important to note that the context of these allegations is the invasion and occupation of Iraq, not armed combat. The majority of the allegations of ill-treatment are in circumstances where individuals were being arrested or were in detention. There is a heavy responsibility to treat all detained persons humanely."
An Isil jihadist executed his own mother in public after she tried to persuade him to quit the militant group, according to reports.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the war in Syria from London, said that a number of reliable local sources told it of the killing, which took place on Wednesday.

Activist group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently (RBSS) also reported the incident.

It said that Ali Saqr al-Qasem, (20), shot his mother, Leena, in the head with an assault rifle in front of a large crowd.

It is believed that Leena (35), who lived in the town of Tabqa, near Isil's capital Raqqa, but was originally from the coast, told her son she wanted to leave and wanted him to come with her.

He reported her to the group. "She was executed under the pretext of 'inciting her son to leave the Islamic State and escaping together to the outside of Raqqa, and that the Coalition will kill all members of the organisation," the Observatory reported.

Her son executed her near the main post office building, where she worked.

Hundreds of people gathered to witness the killing, as is common with such events.

Isil have executed a number of women in recent weeks, including Ruqia Hassan, a "citizen journalist" from Raqqa who reported on life inside the town on her Facebook page. She disappeared in July, and her family were informed of her death on January 2.

At the weekend, the group also posted video online of five Isil "'executioners", led by a man with a British accent, killing five men for passing information to the activist group RBSS.

The killings may be connected to widespread reports that Isil is suffering a crisis of morale, with many foreign fighters trying to escape and return home.

Apostasy

The Observatory reported on December 29 that Isil had executed more than 2,000 Syrian civilians in the 18 months since it declared its 'caliphate' over the territory it controls in Syria and Iraq.

They included people killed on the grounds of homosexuality, practising magic and apostasy.

It was not possible to independently verify the latest report.
An Iranian woman in Tehran walks past a portrait of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, a prominent opposition Saudi Shiite cleric who was executed by Saudi Arabia last week. Photo: AP

It was an ominous start to the new year for an already deeply troubled Middle East. Last Saturday, Saudi Arabia announced it had executed 47 people in a single day. The mass executions were notable not just because of the high number killed, but the fact the dead included Saudi cleric Nimr al-Nimr, a prominent figure within the country's beleaguered Shia minority community.

While most likely related more to internal dynamics in Saudi Arabia than anything else, his execution caused outrage among Shia elsewhere in the Middle East and as far away as Pakistan, and proved a lightning rod in the ongoing and increasingly toxic regional power play between the kingdom and its arch nemesis, Iran.

Soon after news of Nimr's killing broke, protesters in Tehran ransacked the Saudi embassy there. The Iranian authorities moved quickly to name the street where the embassy stands after Nimr, just like they renamed the street where the British embassy is located after Bobby Sands in the 1980s.

The following day, Riyadh formally cut diplomatic relations with Iran and leaned on others - including Bahrain, the UAE, Kuwait and Sudan - to follow suit, while also threatening to sever commercial ties with Tehran. Iraq's prime minister, Haider al-Abadi, denounced Nimr's execution, warning of "repercussions" for regional security, while Iran's Revolutionary Guards said Riyadh could expect "harsh revenge".

By Thursday, Iran was accusing Saudi Arabia of launching airstrikes against its embassy in war-ravaged Yemen.

With the belligerent rhetoric continuing amid real fears of a serious escalation beyond the diplomatic, the repercussions will be felt not only in Syria and Yemen - where both countries back rival warring factions - but in the region more widely.

Riyadh and Tehran have long considered each other foes competing for influence in the Middle East, with both oil-rich states bidding to be the dominant power.

The rivalry plays out not just diplomatically or commercially but for real on the battlefields of Syria, and more recently Yemen, through the support of proxy forces, including militant groups.

Because Saudi Arabia claims to be the standard bearer for Sunni Islam and Iran the same for Shia Islam, the competition between the two powers has helped fuel sectarianism across the region.

While the schism between Sunni and Shia Islam dates back to the early years of the faith in the seventh century, the current regional violence manifesting itself along Sunni-Shia lines has less to do with a religious divide than how that historical rupture has been exploited as part of the Riyadh-Tehran struggle for power.

Amping sectarian sentiment for these purposes is not a new tactic for either Saudi Arabia or Iran.

After Iran's 1979 revolution, the Shia clerics who came to power there sought to "export" their revolutionary model, prompting Riyadh to promote a fundamentalist - and anti-Shia - interpretation of Sunni Islam in order to counter Iranian influence. The US invasion of Iraq in 2003 played to Iran's advantage, helping install its local allies there and bolstering its influence, but it also fanned Sunni extremism among those who lost out after Saddam Hussein was dislodged.

The seeds of what is now known as Isil, itself rabidly sectarian, were sown in bitter divides of post-invasion Iraq.

Today, the fault lines of the fighting in Syria and in Yemen have settled in many ways along Sunni and Shia lines, due in no small part to Riyadh and Tehran's patronage of key protagonists. The funding of extremist factions in Syria gave a more sectarian hue to what had initially been a largely non-sectarian uprising against the regime of Bashar al-Assad. There can be no peace in Syria or Yemen unless the two regional giants are prepared to roll back their support of favoured actors.

This week's escalation between Saudi Arabia and Iran could not have come at a worse time. There were tentative indications that both might have been heading for something approaching a mild rapprochement in 2016, perhaps even helping de-escalate the wars in Syria and Yemen.

Talks aimed at resolving the latter were scheduled for later this month. Efforts to address the Syria quagmire had been stepped up in recent months.

This week's events threaten to upend all that delicate diplomatic manoeuvring and raise Sunni-Shia tensions even further on the ground.
Women's rights activists, far-right demonstrators and left-wing counter-protesters all took to the streets of Cologne, Germany, in the aftermath of a string of sexual assaults and robberies blamed largely on foreigners (AP)

Women's rights activists, far-right demonstrators and left-wing counter-protesters took to the streets of Cologne on Saturday to voice their opinions in the debate that has followed a string of New Year's Eve sexual assaults and robberies blamed largely on foreigners.

Amid the heightened public pressure, Chancellor Angela Merkel's party proposed stricter laws regulating asylum-seekers in the country - some 1.1 million of whom arrived last year.

Police said that around 1,700 protesters from the anti-Islam Pegida movement were kept apart from 1,300 counter-demonstrators in simultaneous protests outside the city's main train station.

Pegida members held banners with slogans like "Rapefugees not welcome" and "Integrate barbarity?" while the counter-protesters pushed the message "refugees welcome".

Specifics of the New Year's Eve assaults and who were behind them are still being investigated. The attackers were among about 1,000 men gathered at Cologne's central train station, some of whom broke off into small groups and surrounded women, groping them and stealing their purses, cell phones and other belongings, according to authorities and witness reports. There are also two allegations of rape.

The Pegida demonstration on Saturday was shut down early by authorities using water cannons after protesters threw firecrackers and bottles at some of the 1,700 police on hand. Police said four people were taken into custody but no injuries were immediately reported.

Earlier, hundreds of women's rights activists gathered outside Cologne's landmark cathedral to rally against the New Year's Eve violence.

"It's about making clear that we will not stop moving around freely here in Cologne, and to protest against victim bashing and the abuse of women," said 50-year-old city resident Ina Wolf.

In response to the incidents, Ms Merkel said her CDU party on Saturday had approved a proposal seeking stricter laws regulating asylum seekers.

Ms Merkel said the proposal, which will be discussed with her coalition partners and would need parliamentary approval, would help Germany deport "serial offenders" convicted of lesser crimes.

"This is in the interests of the citizens of Germany, but also in the interests of the great majority of the refugees who are here," Ms Merkel told party members in Mainz.

However, she also reiterated her mantra on the refugee issue, insisting again "we will manage it".

Bonn University political scientist Tilman Mayer said he does not see the CDU proposal as either a change of course, nor one likely to dispel many Germans' concerns.

"This is just a building block in a chain of statements from the government and also the chancellor," he said on Phoenix television.

Though Ms Merkel has decried the assaults as "repugnant criminal acts that ... Germany will not accept", they provide fodder for those who have opposed her open-door policy and refusal to set a cap on refugee numbers.

Influential Hamburg broadcaster NDR said in an opinion piece posted online Friday that such crimes threaten to push xenophobia toward the "middle of the population" - which could lead to a backlash against refugees.

"And who is to blame mainly?" the editorial asked. "These young, testosterone-driven time bombs with their image of women from the Middle Ages."

Despite the harsh rhetoric, the case is not yet that clear and the investigation is ongoing.

Of 31 suspects temporarily detained for questioning following the New Year's Eve attacks, there were 18 asylum seekers but also two Germans and an American among others, and none were accused of specifically committing sexual assaults.

Cologne police on Saturday said more than 100 detectives are assigned to the case and are investigating 379 criminal complaints filed with them, about 40% of which involve allegations of sexual offences.

"The people in the focus of the criminal investigation are primarily from North African countries," police said. "Most are asylum seekers or people living illegally in Germany. The investigation into if, and how widely, these people were involved in concrete criminal activity on New Year's Eve is ongoing."

Witness Lieli Shabani told the Guardian newspaper the attacks appeared coordinated, saying she watched from the steps of the city's cathedral as three men appeared to be giving instructions to others.

"One time a group of three or four males would come up to them, be given instructions and sent away into the crowd," the 35-year-old teacher was quoted as saying. "Then another group of four or five would come up, and they'd gesticulate in various directions and send them off again."

National broadcaster ARD called the attacks a "wake-up call" that illuminates the difficulty that lies ahead for Germany of integrating the newcomers.

"But we must not give in to our fears," ARD said. "If we now take all the refugees into custody, if we erect fences around our homes and country, if we join the swing to the right that some of our neighbors have, then we give up all we have achieved."

Cologne's police chief was dismissed on Friday amid mounting criticism of his force's handling of the incidents, and for being slow with releasing information.

Speaking in Mainz, Ms Merkel said local authorities must not be perceived to be withholding information and urged that the case be "fully clarified".

"Everything has to be put on the table," she said.

The proposal passed by her CDU party's leaders would strengthen the ability of police to conduct checks of identity papers, and also to exclude foreigners from being granted asylum if they have been convicted of crimes and sentenced to terms even as light as probation.

"Serial offenders who consistently, for example, return to theft or time and again insult women must count on the force of the law," Ms Merkel said.
BANGKOK (AP)  A Thai cosmetics company quickly pulled a video in which an actress wears blackface and promotes a skin-whitener with the slogan: You just need to be white to win. The retraction did little, however, to stem a debate the ad ignited about the regularity of racist advertisements in the Southeast Asian country.

The online ad for the new product called Snowz featured porcelain-skinned Thai movie star Cris Horwang talking about being an aging actress in a competitive industry.

If I stopped looking after myself, everything that I have worked for  all the investment I have made to keep myself white  would disappear, says the 35-year-old actress. New stars would replace me, I would fade away.

As she speaks, a smiling, younger woman enters the picture and Cris own image darkens to charcoal black. A male voice says, You just need to be white to win.

A tirade of criticism erupted after the video was launched online Thursday. Online commentators labeled the ad as racist and ignorant, while some heaped criticism on the actress for accepting the job. Others called it a strategic way to attract wide attention and boost sales.

Ewwwwwww, was the reaction of 28-year-old Jutamas Tritaruyanon, one of many to post their disapproval on Facebook.

This ad is so obviously racist and another attempt to brainwash Thai women, Jutamas, a Bangkok-based office worker, told AP. Theyre saying that being dark is ugly. Its a narrow-minded and disgusting attitude.

The Thai cosmetics company Seoul Secret issued a heartfelt apology in a statement Friday saying it had pulled the video clip and related advertisements.

Our company did not have any intention to convey discriminatory or racist messages, the statement posted on its Facebook page said. What we intended to convey was that self-improvement in terms of personality, appearance, skills and professionalism is crucial.

The ad is hardly the first to use racial stereotypes in Thailand, where beauty is often characterized as fair and delicate. Darker skin is often associated with rural lower-class Thais, and the country has an enormous industry in skin-whitening products and cosmetic clinics to help customers emulate the porcelain complexions of the Bangkok elite.

TV commercials for skin-whitening products regularly promote the idea that white is beautiful.

In 2013, the Dunkin Donuts franchise in Thailand used a female model in blackface makeup to promote a chocolate doughnut. The companys CEO in Thailand initially dismissed complaints about racism, but the U.S. parent company quickly apologized and pulled the ad.

An herbal Thai toothpaste says its dark-colored product is black, but its good. A longtime Thai brand of household mops and dustpans called Black Man uses a logo with a smiling black man in a tuxedo and bow tie.
The Indian Army has urged civilians to avoid wearing clothes which have the 'Army-pattern' on them. In a set of guidelines issued to the public to prevent terror attacks, it also asked shopkeepers to refrain from selling combat clothes to the public.

The guidelines have been rolled out nearly a week after half a dozen terrorists managed to sneak their way through the border and attack the Air Force station in Pathankot. Seven lives of security personnel were lost in the attacks.

Wearing Army uniforms or using any other Army equipment is "illegal"

An official spokesperson said civilians should avoid wearing clothes with the Army pattern on it, as wearing Army uniforms or using any other Army equipment is "illegal". Additionally, the official asked private security agencies, police, and other central forces not to wear "combat-pattern" dresses as "it is not authorized and leads to false alarms". "All traders and shopkeepers interested in selling Army uniforms may approach the local military authority and request for shops in units/cantonments approved areas/shops," he said.

dailyworld.in

Defaulters will be checked

Police and civil administration have been asked to check on the defaulters. "The youth is exhorted to use social media to spread awareness and start a campaign to prevent misuse of Army uniform and equipment as fashion statement," the spokesperson said.

"The Army and the police keep getting information of suspicious activities of persons having been seen carrying rucksacks and wearing combat pattern dress associated with Armed Forces. While during incidents such as in Pathankot, it has resulted in the elimination of terrorists, in most cases these have turned out to be misleading and caused inconvenience to the people at large," the Army official said.

The Army appealed and requested the public to adhere to the guidelines in national as well as their own interest. "We deeply regret the inconvenience caused but then these operations are inescapable to ensure your safety and security," the official said.

With inputs from PTI.
The tourism ministry has come up with a noble initiative that will make life much easier and enjoyable for tourists visiting India.

PTI

Soon, all tourists landing in India with an e-tourist visa, will get a gift kit on entering the country.

"This will be a gift from tourism ministry...it will be handed over to the tourists arriving in India on e-tourist visa," a Tourism Ministry source said. The gift will consist of a SIM card which the tourists can use for making calls after they have recharged it.

PTI

Besides, it would also consist of maps, booklets and CDs with information about various tourists destinations, guidelines relating to dos and don'ts, details regarding whom to contact in case of any emergency, among other things.

Initially, it would cover the tourists arriving on e-visa and later to other categories.

E-visa facility for tourists was initiated to boost the tourism sector in India.

Reuters

In October 2015, a total of 56,477 e-Tourist Visa were issued compared to 2,705 during the month of October 2014, registering a growth of 1987.9% in an year.

Currently e-Tourist Visa facility is available for citizens from 113 countries in 16 international airports across India.

The airports are Bengaluru, Chennai, New Delhi, Goa, Kochi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Thiruvananthapuram, Varanasi, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Amritsar, Gaya, Lucknow and Trichy.
Two senior officials posted at Security Paper Mill (SPM) in Hoshangabad district of Madhya Pradesh were suspended on Friday over production of millions of defective Rs 500 and Rs 1000 banknotes.

Reuters/ Representative Image

Around 80,000 defective Rs 500 notes and 10,000 defective Rs 1,000 notes produced by the mill have already hit the market, triggering panic among citizens. Security threads are missing in these notes, said an official at Hoshangabad mill. The magnetic security thread with inscriptions 'Bharat' and 'RBI' is the most distinguishing feature in an Indian currency note and prevents counterfeiting.

A shocked RBI asked banks to replace such notes when customers approach them. The notes are genuine, but defective. A five-member team has been constituted by Union finance ministry to launch a high-level inquiry into the matter. The team reached SPM on Friday morning.

Mint

Manager H K Vajpayee and deputy manager Ravinder Singh, posted at SPM's new bank-note paper line (NBNPL) were suspended on recommendation of inquiry committee, said sources.

M S Rana, chairman and managing director (CMD) of Security Printing and Minting Corporation of India (SPMCI) refused to comment, citing ongoing probe.

NBNPL, also known as PM5, was recently inaugurated by finance minister Arun Jaitley. It has a capacity to produce 6000 MT paper for printing currency notes of Rs 10, Rs 20, Rs 50, Rs 100, Rs 500 and Rs 1000 denominations.

Establishment of NBNPL was considered a major step in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'Make In India' Initiative as it had capacity of producing currency note paper indigenously.

While officials have refused to comment, insiders said as many as 30,000 bank notes with a face value of Rs 1000 and 80000 notes of Rs 500 denomination were produced on currency note papers without security threads. SPM Hoshangabad produced the currency note paper and notes were printed at Nashik press.

The Hindu/ Representative Image

Introduced in year 2000, the 1000-rupee notes contain a readable, security thread alternately visible in front with inscriptions 'Bharat' (in Hindi), '1000' and 'RBI'. This thread was missing in those notes.

Earlier, Times of India had reported how Arabic inscriptions on magnetic security threads in currency notes manufactured at Hoshangabad paper printing unit in 2012 had triggered a furore over breach of national security. Nine months after an internal inquiry report by former CBI director indicted top officials of Hoshangabad unit for lapses, the thread supplier, Aristocrat International, was served with a showcause notice.

The company has been asked why it should not be 'banned' or 'blacklisted'. The government printing unit outsources magnetic threads from a Himachal Pradesh-based company.

Aristocrat International supplied security threads of 'Algerian Dinars' in place of threads used in Indian currencies. Company claims black-listing is contrary to 'Make in India' policy has already incurred loss of more than Rs 6 crore by importing magnetic threads at higher rates from Italy after its supply was barred.
A 21-year-old Syrian girl was brutally tortured to death by ISIS for violating the strict 'Islamic dress code' imposed by them in areas under their control.

Reuters/ Representative Image

The victim who was arrested from the northern city of Manbij, last week was tortured by a female jihadist, known as Oum Farouq, in the ISIS detention center. The family said they received their daughters dead body with marks of heavy torture all over her body.

They also allege that they cannot even complain against the crime as the only judicial system in the area is a Sharia Court, which supports such crimes.

Reuters/ Representative Image

All women living under the rule of ISIS are forced to wear a black veil and are not allowed to go anywhere without a male companion.

The latest incident of ISIS brutality toward women comes days after reports emerged that the notorious terror outfit executed a woman journalist.

ISIS is also accused of selling women captives as sex slaves.
Six months after he fled a maximum security prison in Mexico, dreaded drug lord, Joaquin El Chapo' Guzman was recaptured by police on Friday following a deadly raid.

Reuters

"Mission accomplished: we have him."Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto wrote on Twitter, confirming the arrest.

The drug-lord had escaped from by digging a tunnel from his shower in a maximum security prison in July, causing huge embarrassment to the government.

AFP

He slipped down a hole in his shower stall in plain view of guards into a mile-long tunnel dug from a property outside the prison. The tunnel had ventilation, lights and a motorbike on rails, illustrating the extent to which corruption was involved in covering up the elaborate operation. Noise of the final breakthrough from the tunnel was obvious inside the prison, according a video of Guzman in his cell just before he escaped.

Reuters

The notorious drug lord had a similar escape from jail in 2001 too. It took Mexican authorities 13 years to nab him again in 2014, only to see him escape in 2015.

Authorities first located Guzman several days ago, based on reports that he was in Los Mochis, said a Mexican law enforcement official.

Mexican marines raided a home after receiving a tip about armed men there. They were fired on from inside the structure, it said. Five suspects were killed and six others arrested.

Reuters

Guzman nicknamed Shorty for his short height is a legendary figure in Mexico who went from a farmer's son to the world's top drug lord and is estimated to be worth about $1 billion.

He is also wanted in the US for a number of drug-trafficking related cases. Following his arrest, calls started for his immediate extradition to the US, including from Republican presidential candidate, Florida Senator Marco Rubio.

U.S. had a $5 million reward for his capture, and the Mexican government was offering $4 million for him as well.
Africa is perhaps the least responsible continent as far as climate change is concerned. Yet, what some African nations have pledged to do is by far the most phenomenal arrangement one could think of in this hour of need. By 2030, African nations have promised to restore 100 million hectares, roughly about 386,000 square miles, of their forest area. The incredible initiative, called "AFR100", is an arrangement done in agreement with more than twelve African nations as an effort of reclaiming our Earth.

Although the number covers merely 7%, the tropical forests are responsible for protecting more than half the world's plant and creature species. Climate change is currently affecting Africa really badly. They are losing 10 million sections of land of backwoods each passing year. Not only is this a huge loss for Africa, it's also influencing climate change in the rest of the world. The Congo Basin is the biggest rainforest after Amazon - thus, securing it becomes essential for us. Ten specialised technical help suppliers and nine monetary accomplices have promised to AFR100, led by the New Partnership for Africas Development (NEPAD Agency), Germanys Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), and World Resources Institute (WRI).

greentech.news

President and CEO of the World Resources Institute recently released a press statement which said, "As the world forges a climate agreement in Paris, African countries  which bear the least historic responsibility for climate change  are showing leadership with ambitious pledges to restore the land. These African leaders are turning their words into action and making a real contribution to respond to the global threat of climate change."

Forests and trees across African landscapes will provide improved soil fertility, better availability and quality of water resources, increased biodiversity, reduced desertification, increased capacity for climate change mitigation, and of course, economic growth, among other things. Restoration of forest landscape also means improved livelihoods, more for women than men.

Restoring our landscapes brings prosperity, security and opportunity. With forest landscape restoration weve seen agricultural yields rise and farmers in our rural communities diversify their livelihoods and improve their well-being. Forest landscape restoration is not just an environmental strategy, it is an economic and social development strategy as well, said Dr. Vincent Biruta, Minister of Natural Resources in Rwanda.

hdwallpapercolections

The countries that have agreed to join the AFR100 initiative are-

 Democratic Republic of Congo (8 million hectares)

 Ethiopia (15 million hectares)

 Kenya (Committed, but finalizing hectare target)

 Liberia (1 million hectares)

 Madagascar (Committed, but finalizing hectare target)

 Malawi (Committed, but finalizing hectare target)

 Niger (3.2 million hectares)

 Rwanda (2 million hectares)

 Togo (Committed, but finalizing hectare target)

 Uganda (2.5 million hectares)

Just to give you an idea about why it is so important for all of us to care about Africa's forests, check out this video by Jane Goodall.
Follow us on city needs security more than me feels aamir khan on move by mumbai police

Mumbai: Actor-producer Aamir Khan on Friday welcomed the Mumbai Police's reported move to cut security for him as news emerged that a security review had been done for Bollywood personalities.

"I completely endorse the move by Mumbai Police to reduce the security around me," Aamir posted on Facebook.

"The police personnel can be put to better use in securing the city. If and when the Mumbai Police feel the need to increase my security, they will. I trust them completely," Aamir added.

His comments followed reported moves by police to slash security for top rated stars for him and his colleague Shah Rukh Khan.

A police spokesperson, while confirming the routine exercise of annual security audit on threat perceptions to various personalities, added that no actor's security has been downgraded or increased.

When contacted, Maharashtra's Minister of State for Home Ranjit Patil said he was not aware of the development.

Shah Rukh and Aamir, both 50, will be entitled to two armed constables in two shifts, down from the earlier round-the-clock security by four armed constables and an escort vehicle.

The two had been provided 24x7 security after controversies following their comments on "intolerance" increased threat perceptions to their lives, another official said.

Besides the Khans, police provides security to around 40 Bollywood personalities including directors Rajkumar Hirani, Farah Khan, Vidhu Vinod Chopra, brothers Ali and Karim Morani, and Mahesh and Mukesh Bhatt and actor Akshay Kumar.

Security cover is also accorded to icons like Lata Mangeshkar, Dilip Kumar and Amitabh Bachchan among some others.

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Follow us on cuddalore rape weary of court battles woman marries her rapist

Chennai: A woman in Cuddalore, Tamil Nadu, has been forced to marry to a man who is accused of raping and impregnating her when she was a minor. The move, as drastic as it may seem, has not been forced upon her. Yet, it does not appear to have come as a matter of choice for the victim.

On Decmber 29, 2015, the victim reached the Cuddalore Mahila Court along with her daughter born out of the rape and agreed to marry her rapist'. She informed the court that she had married the accused after a settlement and that the two were now living together.

As shocking as it may seem, the woman's decision to marry her rapist' came after a prolonged attempt and repeated failures to get justice.

Her first and unusual brush with the law came when, in a shocking incident in July last year, the Madras High Court referred her case for mediation with her alleged rapist citing religion and its capacity for reconciliation. The move led to a huge public outcry and stoked a major controversy.

The court's suggestion was fiercely contested by the victim. Did the judge ever think how I suffered all these years? He knew I had a baby from that rape. And now this single order of his wants me to go through that suffering again, The Indian Express quoted her as saying.

The case dates back to 2008 when the victim's age was all but 15. The cased reached the Cuddalore Mahila Court and the man was convicted and fined Rs 2 lakh in 2014. The conviction was based on evidences that included DNA samples.

What then led the woman to be so disheartened that she agreed to live with the very man who disgraced her? The victim's second brush with the law puts things in context.

In another bizarre move in October, Justice A Selvam of the Madras High Court set aside the man's conviction and the fine imposed on him on grounds that the trial court that convicted him had relied solely on the victim's oral submission regarding her age and had failed to examine documents.

Justice Selvam referred the case back to the lower court for verification of her age and also set aside the man's conviction. This was the man's second appeal in the High Court where he claimed that the girl was a major and that they had a consensual relationship.

An account narrated by the woman's brother to the daily cited above claims that his sister was helpless after the second High Court order that referred her case back to Cuddalore. The court proceedings to verify the authenticity of her birth certificate went on for days, which made her weary.

Also, her brother was struggling without a job, and she probably felt that she was being a burden. Her decision to marry the accused rapist came knowing fully well that he would marry her only to escape conviction.

And he did.

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Follow us on delhi police invites kung fu nuns to train school girls

New Delhi: A group of nuns, experts in Kung Fu, from the Drupka group in Ladakh may train schoolgirls in Delhi in self-defence on invitation from BS Bassi, the police commissioner of Delhi.

The Drukpa Lineage, also known as the Dragon Order, is a spiritual group in Ladakh.

"Even though society needs to change, we will also have to strengthen young girls and women so much that they can give befitting reply to those who try to harass them," the 59-year-old police chief said.

The nuns who are in Delhi, have cycled all the way from Kathmandu, led by the Gyalwang Drupka, the spiritual head of the 1,000-year-old group, to spread a message of peace.

Speaking at the culmination of the 2,500 km cycle journey by 250 nuns, Mr Bassi said, "These nuns are experts in self-defence and judo-karate. So, I request you all to stay in Delhi for one year as our guests and help us in giving self-defence training to the girls of the city."

The Drukpa Kung Fu nuns from various states, including Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and also from Bhutan participated in the cycle journey to carry the message of women empowerment and environment consciousness.

Speaking about the cycle journey, the Gyalwang Drukpa, said, "The journey points to the independent and collective willpower of women and their equivalence with men."

"At the same time, the use of cycle that is environment friendly sends a strong message of conservation and environment friendliness," Drukpa said.

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Follow us on jem celebrates pathankot attack mocks indian defence agencies

New Delhi: Pakistan-based terror outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) on Friday celebrated the deadly terror attack at Pathankot IAF base.

In an audio clip uploaded on www.alqalamionline.com, JeM founder Maulana Masood Azhar made startling revelations how terrorists infiltrated into India and attacked the crucial IAF base.

The 13-minute long clip described the terrorists as 'Mujahideens' who fought valiantly 'Indian tanks, helicopters and forces to reach their goal'. It also said that 'Indians who kill unarmed Muslims in Kashmir are now dragging their own dead'.

Mocking India's defence agencies over the confusion of number of attackers, he said, "Buri tarah mare gaye. First, they said there were six mujahideen, then they said five, then four. Such a big country is in tears. 48 hours later, India hasn't been able to figure out their numbers or their path."

The audio clip further described the site of the attack as 'heavenly scene'. "Mujahideens attacked India's Pathankot airbase at 3 am after Friday. We can only imagine the heavenly scene it would have been," a local Urdu magazine in Azhar's hometown, Bahawalpur, quoted him as saying.

"Who can ever imagine that someone could fight in this cold for 48 hours without sleep and food. But these men fought tanks and helicopters and kept killing Indian forces. Kya kafiyat hogi, kya jazbe honge, kya manzar honge," he added.

He further warned the Pakistani government not to accept Indian evidence.

"Why do Pakistan's leaders bow before India's allegations? Why do they shame us? Pakistan ke ilaam India ke ilzaam ke saamne kyon jhukte hein? Kyon sharmate hein?"

This was Ajhaz's second audio message against India in last two months. In his earlier audio clip, he had declared 'jihad against India'.

Azhar, the founder was banned terror group JeM, roams freely in Pakistan's Punjab province. He was released by Indian authorities in 1999 in exchange for the passengers of IC-814 aircraft.

India has named JeM chief Maulana Masood Azhar, his brother Abdul Rauf Asghar and two others (Ashfaq Ahmed and Kashim Jaan) as 'handlers' behind Pathankot IAF base terror attack. JeM goes by two other names in Pakistan, after it was banned in 2002.

According to evidences shared by NSA Ajit Doval with his Pakistani counterpart Nasir Janjua, Azhar oversaw the entire operations while his brother Asghar and two others were in constant touch with the terrorists who stormed the IAF base last Saturday.

Seven security personnel were killed in the attack by six terrorists who crossed over from Pakistan. All the six terrorists were killed by security forces later.

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Follow us on pakistan to arrest masood azhar for saving talks with india

New Delhi: Facing tremendous pressure from India to act against the perpetrators of Pathankot attack, Pakistan is reportedly considering the option of arresting Jaish-eMohammad chief Maulana Masood Azhar who is said to be the brain behind these attacks.

Reports emanating from Pakistan suggest that Pakistan wants India to go ahead with foreign Secretary-level talks slated to be held on Jan14-15 in Islamabad. But the Indian government has indicated that it won't be possible to send S Jaishankar to Islamabad if Pakistan fails to take action based on the inputs provided to them relating to Pathankot attack before the scheduled talks.

Pakistan believes that arresting Masood Azhar will assuage the hurt sentiments of India and that's why they are mulling over this possibility but the Indian security experts are of the opinion that if the arrest happens et al, it will be more symbolic rather than any concrete and reassuring action from Pakistani side.

The scepticism on Indian side is not without reasons. Pakistan is known to treat prisoners like Masood Azhar with kid-gloves. The example of Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhavi is there for all of us to learn from. Whenever Pakistan is forced to act against terror groups who are not anti-Pakistan, they arrest top leaders of these groups to placate the sentiments of the international community but treat them like political prisoners extending them all facilities inside the jail.

Will such a symbolic gesture be good enough for India to send its Foreign Secretary to visit Islamabad for talks with his Pakistani counterpart? Some media reports have also suggested that during meeting with Nawaz Sharif, Pakistani Army and ISI have clearly said that the leads provided by India are not concrete evidence of involvement of anybody from Pakistan in Pathankot attacks. If these reports are true then their intent is very clear and obvious. They would try every trick in the book to prove that Indian allegations are wrong.

But the Nawaz Sharif-led civilian government does not want the talks with India to get derailed because that will once again push them to the brink of being treated as a pariah in international circuits.

Latest India News
Follow us on chhota rajan has special relationship with indian government

New Delhi: Former Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar has claimed that the Indian government has a special relationship with underworld don Chhota Rajan, who was deported from Bali in November last year.

Kumar made the assertion during a session at the Delhi Literature Fest late last evening with journalist Avirook Sen. The short answer- yes there is, Kumar said to Sen's question.

Kumar reiterated his statement when session moderator Madhu Trehan asked him whether this was a fact or just hearsay. If I say it, it is true, he said.

The former top Delhi police officer in his tell-all memoir Dial D for Don had claimed that he had received a call from Dawood Ibrahim in June 2013.

Kumar had written that post the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts, he had telephonic conversations with the fugitive mob boss on three different occasions.

The book, which was released last year, also was in the news for its disclosure that that at one point in the 1990s Dawood wanted to surrender.

Responding to a question, Kumar said that all hopes must not be pinned on Chhota Rajan in order to get to Dawood.

There is hope in a manner of speaking, but let us not pin all our hopes on Chhota Rajan, Kumar said.

Chhota Rajan, a former aide of Dawood, is currently lodged in Tihar Jail.

The session also saw Kumar sharing some of his recollections from controversial cases over his long career, including the Ansal Plaza shootout and the Mandal Commission protests.

Latest India News
Follow us on 20 yr old isis militant publically executes his mother in syria

New Delhi: In a shocking incident, an Islamic State militant executed his own mother in front of a crowd in the Syrian city of Raqqa because she asked him to cut ties with the dreaded terror group.

According to media reports, ISIS had accused the victim of abandoning Islam and inciting her 20-year-old son to end all ties with the jihadi outfit.

The victim, believed to be in her 40s, wanted to escape with her son and reportedly told him that 'the coalition' will kill all members of the organization.

Confirming the news, the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights said that 45-year-old Leena Al-Qasem -- originally from the city of al-Tabaqa -- was killed by her son Ali Saqr publically for committing apostasy.

ISIS has carried out executions such as beheadings, mass shootings and burnings of foreign nationals on camera and posted videos of them on social media.

This week, reports surfaced that ISIS executed its first female citizen journalist for writing against the outfit and sharing her life experience under its rule in Raqqa.

The United States-led coalition is conducting airstrikes in Iraq and Syria targeting ISIS strongholds. Reports say that the coalition has so far killed more than 2600 militants in the two Islamic countries.

Latest reports also suggest that ISIS spokesperson Abu Muhammad al-Adnani has been wounded in an airstrike in Iraq's western province of Anbar.

Latest World News
Follow us on arrested gunman says he shot philadelphia cop in islam s name

Philadelphia: A man using a gun stolen from police said he was acting in the name of Islam when he ambushed an officer sitting in his marked cruiser at an intersection, firing more than a dozen shots at point-blank range, authorities said Friday. The officer and the man were wounded during the barrage of gunfire, they said.

The man, 30-year-old Edward Archer, also pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group when he was questioned after his arrest in the shooting late Thursday, police said. Archer's mother, Valerie Holliday, told The Philadelphia Inquirer he had been hearing voices recently and had felt targeted by police and the family asked him to get help.

Police Commissioner Richard Ross described the attack on Officer Jesse Hartnett, captured on a police surveillance camera, as an attempted assassination.

"He just came out of nowhere and started firing on him," Ross said. "He just started firing with one aim and one aim only, to kill him."

Investigators believe Archer traveled to Saudi Arabia in 2011 and to Egypt in 2012, FBI special agent Eric Ruona said, and the purpose of that travel was being investigated by the FBI. But police said there was no indication anyone else was involved in the officer's ambush.

Ross said Archer told police he believed the police department defends laws that are contrary to Islam. Though Archer "clearly gave us a motive," Ross said, it's up to police to see what the evidence shows.

"It wasn't like laying it out completely, chapter and verse for us," he said. "We're left to say, 'OK, he's leaving a trail for us. Where's it going to lead us, if anywhere?'"

Federal agents joined local police in searching two Philadelphia area properties associated with Archer, including the home where his mother lives in suburban Yeadon, authorities said.

Capt. James Clark said Archer told investigators: "I follow Allah. I pledge my allegiance to the Islamic State, and that's why I did what I did."

Archer's mother described him as a devout Muslim. Jacob Bender, the executive director of the Philadelphia chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, an advocacy group, said he contacted about five inner-city mosques and found no one who knew of Archer. He said the motive for the ambush still appears to be conjecture.

"I think the important point is not to lay the blame for this on the entire Islamic community," he said.

The gunman fired at least 13 shots toward Hartnett, getting up next to the car and reaching through the driver's-side window, investigators said.

Despite being seriously wounded, Hartnett got out of his car, chased the shooter and returned fire, wounding his attacker in the buttocks, police said. Other officers chased Archer and apprehended him.

Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in an arm and will require multiple surgeries; he was listed in stable condition. Archer was treated and released into police custody.

Ross called it "absolutely amazing" that Harnett survived.

"It's nothing short of miraculous, and we're thankful for that," he said.

Last March, Archer pleaded guilty to firearms and assault charges stemming from a 2012 case but was immediately released and placed on probation, court records show. Records also show he was scheduled to be sentenced Monday in suburban Philadelphia in a traffic and forgery case.

The attorney who represented him in the firearms case was unavailable to comment Friday because he was in court, his office said. A message for his lawyer in the forgery case was not immediately returned.

Surveillance footage of the attack showed the gunman dressed in a white, long-sleeved tunic. When asked if the robe was considered Muslim garb, Ross said he didn't know and didn't think it mattered.

The 9mm pistol used by Archer was recovered at the scene of the shooting, police said. It had been stolen from an officer's home in October 2013, investigators said. Officials said they were trying to figure out how Archer got the weapon and whether it passed through other people's hands after the theft.

Hartnett was in good spirits, said his father, Robert Hartnett.

"He's a tough guy," he said.

Hartnett served in the Coast Guard and has been on the Philadelphia force for four years. He always wanted to be a police officer, his father said.

When Hartnett called in to report shots fired, he shouted, "I'm bleeding heavily!" into his police radio.

Jim Kenney, in his first week as mayor of the nation's fifth-largest city, called Archer's actions "abhorrent" and "terrible" and said they have nothing to do with the teachings of Islam.

"This is a criminal with a stolen gun who tried to kill one of our officers," he said. "It has nothing to do with being a Muslim or following the Islamic faith."

In December 2014, a gunman announced online he was planning to shoot two "pigs" in retaliation for the chokehold death of Eric Garner and ambushed two New York police officers in a patrol car, fatally shooting them before running to a subway station and killing himself. Investigators said he had no connection to terrorism.

Latest World News
Follow us on islamic state launches new cyber war magazine for jihadists

New Delhi: Dreaded terrorist organisation Islamic State (IS) has launched a magazine- 'Kybernetiq', which is reportedly design to guide jihadist on how to take part in 'cyber war' against other countries.

Kybernetiq states that, it is very important to learn about the importance of technology and learn how to apply it correctly.

In its first article, 'Digital Brand,' stated, " as a brother in Islam, I feel obliged in this post-Snowden era to strongly discourage crypto-programs with a mujahid branding. This includes programs like Asrar al-Mujahideen, Amn al-Mujahid, Asrar al-Ghurabaa and various mobile applications.''

The author paid special attention to the GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG)-encryption program, which act as a "nightmare" against intelligence agencies.

The articles provide a clear description about the programmes and providing "step-by-step instructions" for installing and using it.

Articles in the Kybernetiq magazine include guidance on how to stay cautious and observant about the people while communicating with them.

"The enemy is reading you. Stay vigilant and don't underestimate them," states articles in Kybernetiq.

Readers are also offered for various internet alternatives like Whatsapp, Gmail and Hotmail and told not to share confidential information.

Under a section titled "Metadata can kill", author of the magazine clearly warns of surveillance which is undertaken by intelligence agencies like the US National Security Agency (NSA).

In one of its article, it tells its user to be attentive and make sure that the user is always one step ahead of their enemies.

Islamic State supporters are continuously attempting to launch their own social network which is becoming a challenge for the intelligence agencies to knock these sites offline.

Latest World News
Follow us on most wanted drug lord el chapo recaptured 7 key developments

Mexico City: In a daring raid on Friday, Mexican marines recaptured the world's most-wanted drug lord, six months after he fled through a tunnel from a maximum security prison. The development deeply embarrassed the government and strained ties with the United States.

Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, head of the powerful Sinaloa Cartel, apparently believed that his escape was worthy of Hollywood. According to Attorney General Arely Gomez, Guzman's people were communicating with actors and producers as he wanted to film a biopic. This communication was key to authorities tracking him down to a house in an upscale neighborhood in a coastal city.

The Attorney General further said he was being sent back to the maximum-security prison known as Altiplano, from where he escaped last July 11 through an elaborate tunnel that was dug to shower stall.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced the capture of Guzman using his Twitter account: "Mission accomplished: we have him."

No sooner than Guzman was apprehended, calls started for his immediate extradition to the U.S., including from a Republican presidential candidate, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

Mexican authorities said nothing about extraditing the drug boss to the United States.

Here, we bring you a timeline of the various pursuits, captures and escapes of Sinaloa cartel boss Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman:

* June 10, 1993: Guzman's first capture, in Guatemala, announced by Mexican authorities.

* 1995: Convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

* Jan 19, 2001: Escapes from one of Mexico's two top-security prisons, in Jalisco state, allegedly in a laundry cart.

* 2012: Nearly captured by Mexican federal police at a coastal mansion in Los Cabos, a day after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with dozens of other foreign ministers in the same resort town.

* Feb 22, 2014: Captured by Mexican marines at a condo in Mazatlan after he had escaped capture by fleeing through tunnels in Culiacan, the Sinaloa state capital.

* July 11, 2015: Escapes from country's Antiplano top-security prison in Mexico State using mile-long (1.5 kilometer) tunnel dug from site outside prison compound.

* Jan 8, 2016: Captured by Mexican marines during raid in Los Mochis, a seaside city in Sinaloa. Sent back to same prison he escaped from.

(With AP inputs)

Latest World News
Follow us on no terror group will be allowed to derail talks with india pak defence minister

Islamabad: Pakistan's Defence Minister Khwaja Muhammad Asif has said that no terrorist group will be allowed to derail the dialogue process with India.

Talking to a news channel, he said that strict action is being taken against elements involved in terror activities.

"No terrorist organisation will be allowed to derail the dialogue process between Pakistan and India," Asif was quoted as saying by the Radio Pakistan today.

The minister said Pakistan strongly condemns terrorism in every form as terrorists are enemy of humanity.

Earlier, Asif had said that "some elements" want to "sabotage" the Indo-Pak peace talks through terror acts but they will not succeed in their nefarious designs.

Heavily-armed terrorists last week attempted to storm the Air Force base in Pathankot. The attackers were believed to have infiltrated from Pakistan and there was speculation that they may belong to Jaish-e-Mohammad headed by Maulana Masood Azhar of the Kandahar hijack episode.

Asif said Pakistan has achieved immense success in elimination of terrorism through operation Zarb-e-Azb which is still going on.

"Some of the militant groups have already been destroyed and those still remaining will also be dealt with as the operation is still going on," he told Geo TV.

Asif also said there is no difference between military and civil government over the issue of fighting militancy.

"There is only one narrative and that is to eliminate the threat of militancy. I would request to highlight this aspect of our policy," he said.

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Follow us on pak citizen indicted for trying to smuggle drones for pak army

Washington: A Pakistani national was yesterday indicted by a US court for trying to smuggle high-end military -grade drones for the Pakistan Army by using a Lahore-based shell company.

The individual identified as Syed Vaqar Ashraf, charged on nine counts, transferred more than USD 62,000 to a US company in different money transfers from Pakistan between 2012 and 2014, according to court documents.

The 14-page superseding indictment was filed before a US court in Phoenix in December, but was unsealed only this week.

From court documents, it is not clear if Ashraf has been arrested or is still in Pakistan.

According to the indictment, Ashraf was CEO of Lahore -based I&E International.

Federal prosecutors alleged that this was a front company for the Pakistan Advanced Engineering Research Organisation (AERO), based in Lahore.

Ashraf placed orders to a Arizona-based drone company for high-end military-grade drones.

The Arizona company - not named in the indictment - specialised in the design, development and manufacturing of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) for the US military.

Federal prosecutors claim that Ashraf placed orders through emails for purchase of specific gyroscopes including eight VG34-0803 which is designed for medium size, multi- payload UAC designed for tactical long endurance missions, with a primary mission of reconnaissance, surveillance and communication relay.

He also placed orders for 10 Memsic VG800CA-200 Low Drift MEMS Vertical Gyros, which has a military and non-military applications and is used to increase stability inside a UAV.

Both the items come under export control of the US Government.

These models, in fact, were designed for Israel and is used for reconnaissance capable of flying more than 20 hours.

The total cost of these military hardware was nearly USD 3,45,000, for which he made an advancement payment of USD 62,000 in five wire transfers.

According to court documents, Ashraf concealed to the official of the US-based drone company - who was in fact an official of Department of Homeland Security - about the actual reason for his purchase of such equipment.

When the officials from the US drone company told Ashraf that this equipment could not be shipped directly to Pakistan, Ashraf gave them a Brussels address.

"Ashraf requested that Person A (from the US drone company) transship the modules to Pakistan, through Belgium," the indictment said.

Federal prosecutors alleged that Ashraf filled out fraudulent documents in the name of Innovative Links, a shell company used by him.

But he was purchasing these for AERO, which is in fact a wing of the Pakistan military, prosecutors said.

According to court documents, Ashraf in fact told the undercover agent that his client was the Pakistani military.

The trial is scheduled for February 7.

Latest World News
Follow us on pakistan india foreign secretaries to meet on january 15 sartaj aziz

Islamabad: Pakistani Premier Nawaz Sharif's advisor on foreign affairs, Sartaz Aziz, has confirmed that he will travel to New Delhi on January 15 to hold talks with his Indian counterpart.

This comes amid indications that next week's Foreign Secretary-level talks between India and Pakistan may be deferred in wake of the Pathankot attack,

India had linked the foreign secretary level talks to Pakistan's action against the militants.

Divulging the agenda of the meeting to the Parliament on Friday, Aziz said that 'Kashmir and all other outstanding issues will be on the agenda when Pakistan and India resume their comprehensive bilateral dialogue'.

The announcement came after Pakistan launched investigations into the Pathankot airbase attack, The Nation reported.

Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday chaired a meeting regarding Jaish-e-Muhammad organisation's involvement in the attack and Islamabad's response to New Delhi.

After the Pathankot air base attack, Sharif called Modi assuring him of "prompt and decisive" action against groups or individuals linked to the attack.

Seven security personnel were killed in the attack on the IAF base in Pathankot. Six terrorists, suspected to be from Pakistan, were killed during the gunfight that began on January 2.

Pakistan and India will remain in contact as Islamabad believes it needed solid evidence for a stern action.

Aziz told the house that the foreign secretaries of both the countries would discuss modalities of comprehensive bilateral dialogue and its timeframe during the meeting in Islamabad.

"As per the joint statement issued during the visit of Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to Pakistan, the comprehensive dialogue would include all outstanding issues including the Kashmir dispute," he said.

With IANS Inputs

Latest World News
Follow us on pathankot attack nawaz sharif asks intelligence agency to probe indian leads

Islamabad: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has asked the Intelligence Bureau to probe the leads provided by India on the alleged Pakistani links to the terror attack in Pathankot, a report said on Friday.

Sharif gave the directive to the Intelligence Bureau after chairing a high-level meeting here on Thursday, The Nation newspaper reported.

Among those who attended the meeting were Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, Adviser on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz, Special Assistant on Foreign Affairs Tariq Fatemi, National Security Adviser (NSA) Nasser Khan Janjua, Foreign Secretary Aizaz Ahmed Chaudhry and Intelligence Bureau chief Aftab Sultan.

"Officials said the prime minister and the aides agreed to launch investigations into the evidence provided by India," the report said.

Hours earlier, India linked the upcoming foreign secretary-level talks with Pakistan to Islamabad's action against suspected Pakistani terrorists who raided the Indian Air Force base in Pathankot on January 2.

The pre-dawn attack left seven Indian security personnel dead. Security forces killed all six attackers.

Sharif and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi spoke on the telephone after the terror attack. India said it had provided "actionable" inputs to Pakistan, and Sharif assured Modi of "prompt and decisive" action against groups and individuals who might be linked to the attack.

The Nation quoted an official as saying that the leads provided by India were handed over to IB chief Aftab Sultan for further action.

Addressing the meeting, Sharif said Pakistan was ready to boost cooperation with India as part of counter-terrorism efforts.

Sharif also directed NSA Nasser Khan Janjua to remain in contact with his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval in a bid to keep renewed dialogue on track.

Another official, however, said the information provided by India was "not enough" as it was just limited to telephone numbers. He said Pakistan might ask for additional information.

"We would like to have solid information to build a case for action. Otherwise courts intervene and the suspects will be bailed out," he added.

Latest World News
Follow us on nawaz sharif orders probe into leads provided by india

Islamabad: Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has ordered a probe into the leads provided by India about the Pathankot airbase attack, a media report said on Friday.

He chaired a high-level meeting on Thursday and discussed the attack on the Indian airbase, The Nation reported.

The prime minister and his aides agreed to launch investigations into the evidence provided by India, it said.

A senior official said the leads provided by India were handed over to Intelligence Bureau chief Aftab Sultan for further action.

Another official said the information provided by India was "not enough" as it was just limited to telephone numbers and Pakistan might ask for additional information.

"We would like to have solid information to build a case for action otherwise courts intervene and the suspects will be bailed out," he added.

He said the meeting agreed that strong action would be taken after probe against anyone found guilty of involvement in the attack.

The official said that the meeting also decided to speed up implementation of National Action Plan.

Latest World News
Follow us on bjp should not use varsities to spread communalism aap

New Delhi: Attacking the BJP over a seminar in Delhi University by party leader Subramanium Swamy on the Ram temple issue, the Aam Aadmi Party today said the saffron party should not use varsities to spread communalism and alleged that the move was aimed at the 2017 Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.

Terming it a "sensitive issue", senior AAP leader Ashutosh said that the case is pending before the Supreme Court and the decision on it should be by the judiciary and not outside.

The two-day seminar titled 'Shri Ram Janma Bhoomi Temple: Emerging Scenario' is being organised at DU's Arts Faculty by Arundhati Vashishtha Anusandhan Peeth (AVAP), a research organisation founded by late VHP leader Ashok Singhal.



Amid protests outside the Delhi University, senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy today went ahead with the seminar on the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya where he asserted that nothing will be done forcibly or against the law.

"We are not opposed to the move of discussion on Ram Mandir in the DU as we believe that the universities should be a place for healthy discussions of various issues. Our problem is using the seminar for communalising the atmosphere," Ashutosh said.

"There were riots in Muzaffarnagar before the Lok Sabha polls. Then there were communal riots in Delhi before the state polls. Ahead of Bihar polls, Dadri (where rumours of

beef consumption led to killing of man) was exploited. And before the Uttar Pradesh polls, you (BJP) have brought up Ram Mandir issue again," he said.

"...We want politics over Roti Kapda aur Makan and not religion," Ashutosh said.

AAP's Delhi unit convenor Dilip Pandey also questioned the move of renting out the venue for the seminar as the varsity in the past had denied permission to the party to

carry out party-related programmes in its premises.

He said the CYSS, party's student wing, is also agitating against the seminar in the campus.

He said that the BJP has not learnt from its mistakes and is "hell bent" on repeating them despite facing a drubbing in Delhi and Bihar.
Follow us on bjp mp manoj tiwari cries foul says did not call aamir khan traitor

New Delhi: BJP MP Manoj Tiwari has reportedly called Bollywood actor Aamir Khan a 'deshdrohi' (traitor) during a meet of parliamentary standing committee for tourism, culture and transport.

"It is good that Aamir Khan has been taken out of the (Incredible India) campaign. He is a traitor, he should be thrown out," the BJP MP from North East Delhi was quoted as saying in several media reports.

This morning he however denied making such remarks against the 'Mr Perfectionist' saying 'efforts were being made by opponents to tarnish his clean image'.

"Whatever I said in the standing committee is secret. And if the talks of the committee are coming out in public, then it is illegal. I have never used the word 'traitor' for Aamir Khan. I can never say a word like that for him in my entire life," Tiwari said.

Tiwari also said that he will give a notice to the newspapers who have published his false statement.

"I am a responsible citizen and I can never use a word like that. The newspapers are trying to tarnish my image by publishing false news," he said.

Tiwari's remark came amidst controversy over removal of Khan as the brand ambassador of Centre's Incredible India campaign. There are also reports that the Ministry of Tourism was considering appointing veteran actor Amitabh Bachchan as the new brand ambassador of this campaign.

Aamir was made the ambassador for Incredible India in 2009 when the Congress-led government was in power and had continued since the NDA government took power in May 2014.
Follow us on days after malda incident mamata claims there is no communal tension in bengal

Kolkata: Days after thousands of protestors, most of them Muslims, went on a rampage in Malda district raising concerns of communal tension in the area, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee has said that there is no communal violence in the state.

Mamata was addressing a gathering at the Bengal Global Business Summit in Kolkata. Mamata and the Trinamool Congress are hoping to bring in some big-ticket investments into the state which goes to polls later this year.

The state has suffered in terms of flight of capital in view of strong unionism and the alleged high-handedness of the chief minister. There is a vast majority of unemployed youth in the state and setting things in order will require roping in investors to set shop in the state.

Pushing a peaceful image of West Bengal will be crucial to draw such investments. Unity in diversity is the mantra of the TMC regime, Mamata said. She further claimed that Maoist violence has come down in West Bengal.

Even the people residing in the hills are smiling. There is no tension, she said.

The comments gain significance as they come barely four days after violent mobs ransacked a police station in Malda district of West Bengal. The violence began with a 1 lakh-strong crowd protesting against derogatory comments on Prophet Mohammed made by Bharat Hindu Mahasabha leader Kamlesh Tiwari. It soon spread from a rally organised by the Anjuman Ahle Sunnatul Jamat (ASJ).

However, an ASJ official later claimed that outsiders had masterminded the rampage.

According to a report in The Indian Express, violence erupted when a bus was trying to negotiate past the crowd on National Highway 34. As the passengers got off the bus, the protesters burnt it down.

A little later, another BSF vehicle coming from Malda was also set ablaze. The mob then turned towards the nearby Kaliachak Police Station. The protesters drove out the policemen and set a part of the police station on fire, including the barracks, eyewitnesses said.

A suo motu FIR lodged by the police a day later named 30 suspects responsible for causing the riot. 10 were arrested, six of who walked on bail soon after.

The area, in the north Bengal district of Malda bordering Bangladesh is known to be a hub of criminal activities including smuggling, running of counterfeit currency rackets, opium farming and human trafficking. No surprises then that the police station would have housed records of such organised crimes and their destruction would benefit criminals who may be internationally connected.

BJP has attacked the Trinamool Congress government in West Bengal over the "rampaging communalism" in Malda, alleging that the accused behind it are indulging in violence under its protection.

The BJP has also accused Banerjee's Trinamool Congress of protecting those behind Sunday's violence.

The Union Home Ministry has already sought a report from the West Bengal government on the Malda violence.

On 3 December, Tiwari called Prophet Mohammad the world's first homosexual. He is also reported to have allegedly circulated pamphlets against the Muslim community. He was arrested in Lucknow the same day.

On December 4, the Hindu Mahasabha stated that Tiwari was not a part of the outfit and that the controversy was an attempt by the BJP, the RSS and other groups to tarnish the image of the party.
Follow us on gst bill venkaiah naidu appeals parties to unite for nation building

Hyderabad: Union Minister M Venkaiah Naidu today hoped that the long-pending GST bill will be passed in Parliament at the earliest, and called on political parties to unite for building prosperous and stable India.

"I request all of you including political parties to unite to unleash the force of growth and make prosperous and stable India.

"I met the Congress President yesterday to seek support of Congress for the GST Bill, for the Real Estate Bill. We may be different political parties in elections and politics...When it comes to the question of nation building we are one party that is developmental party," he said addressing the All India Builders Convention here.

He also said his meeting with Sonia Gandhi is not a politically-motivated meeting but for the development of the country.

"Yesterday, I called on Sonia Gandhi because it is not a political issue. Politics of poverty has to be replaced by politics of development. Because need of the hour is development and good governance," the Parliamentary Affairs Minister added.

Referring to experts' opinion, Naidu said passage of the GST Bill may increase the GDP growth by 1.5 to 2 per cent.

"Experts say the passage of GST Bill will enhance GDP by 1.5 to 2 per cent. In that case I only hope that we join together to see that enough public opinion is created and GST Bill is also passed at the earliest opportunity."

He assured the Builders Association that he would take delegation of its representatives to the Prime Minister for voicing the industry's concerns.

Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao said builders and contractors also play vital role in nation building.
Follow us on j k bjp legislature party meeting today to decide on support to mehbooba mufti

Srinagar: The BJP legislature party will meet today to decide on the issue of extending support to PDP president Mehbooba Mufti as Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir following the death of incumbent Mufti Mohammad Sayeed.

"We are meeting today. A decision on this issue will be conveyed to you later today," BJP state president Sat Sharma told PTI.

The PDP, which is coalition partner of the BJP in the state government, yesterday wrote to Governor N N Vohra about its support to Mehbooba for becoming the next Chief Minister of the state.

The PDP move came following death of Sayeed at AIIMS in Delhi yesterday.

The PDP president can take oath only after the BJP informs the Governor about its support to Mehbooba for becoming the Chief Minister.

BJP, the junior coalition partner which has 25 members in the 87-member Assembly, yesterday made it clear it will go with the PDP's choice.

Senior BJP leader Ram Madhav, who played a pivotal role in stitching up the alliance with the PDP following the hung verdict in assembly elections in 2014, is expected to arrive here later in the day to put the process of new government formation in motion.

Meanwhile, official sources said preparations are being made at Sher-e-Kashmir International Convention Centre (SKICC) for the swearing-in ceremony likely to be held later today.

"We do not want to get caught off guard. We are just keeping the venue ready if the swearing in ceremony is taking place any time soon," an official said on the condition of anonymity.
Follow us on pak has to curb terror activities to continue talks with india

Kadapa (AP): Union Minister of Law and Justice D V Sadananda Gowda today said that if Pakistan wants to continue talks with India, it has to take steps to curb terrorist activities originating from its soil.

Now ball is in Pakistan's court. Pakistan has to respond positively to continue the bilateral talks. If Pakistan wants to continue talks, it has to take steps to curb the terrorist activities, which are harming our country, from its soil, Gowda said addressing a press conference here.

The Indian government and Prime Minister Narendra Modi are taking all necessary steps to maintain good relations with Pakistan and trying to ensure to take the bilateral talks forward to maintain peace in the sub-continent, he stressed.

Praising the soldiers, commandos and intelligence officials for efficiently handling the terror attack in Pathankot air base, he paid rich tributes to those who sacrificed their lives while fighting the terrorists.

Based on the information of intelligence department, all (security) forces were alerted who efficiently handled the Pathankot terror strike, otherwise it may have turned out to be worse than the Mumbai terror attack (of 2008), the minister said.

Gowda said the government is keen on maintaining harmony and good relations with the neighbouring countries and also to safeguard the nations's interests.

Six terrorists, who had sneaked into the country from Indo-Pak border in Pakistan, attacked the Indian Air Force base at Pathankot in Punjab during the intervening night of January 1 and 2.

They were killed during a counter-operation by Indian forces that lasted for about three days in which seven security personnel were killed.

Notably, putting the ball squarely in Pakistan's court, India yesterday linked the Foreign Secretary-level talks to Islamabad's prompt and decisive action in the Pathankot terror attack for which it has provided actionable intelligence.

Uncertainty prevails on talks scheduled for January 15 in Islamabad between Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar and his Pakistani counterpart Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry following the Pathakot terror attack which was originated from Pakistan. There is a widespread speculation that the talks may be put off to enable National Security Advisors to meet before that.
Follow us on pm modi may visit pathankot today nsa lauds punjab police

Chandigarh/Pathankot: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be visiting the Pathankot Air Base station on Saturday to take stock of the security situation after the terrorist attack that left seven security personnel dead and 20 others injured.

He is likely to arrive in Pathankot by 11am.

During his visit, which comes exactly one week after the pre-dawn attack on the frontline air base by the terrorists, Modi is likely to meet Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel at the base along with other troops in the area.

Police sources in Chandigarh said that tight security arrangements were being made for the prime minister's visit.

PM Modi's visit holds significance in the midst speculations that the Foreign Secretary-level talks between India and Pakistan could be called off by New Delhi in the wake of the attack.

The Government of India has put the ball in Pakistan's court, saying the future course of action would be decided after Islamabad's response to actionable intelligence provided with regard to the fidayeen strike.

Seven security personnel were killed in the attack early on January 2 morning on the Pathankot Indian Air Force station by six terrorists who, crossed over from Pakistan. All the six terrorists were killed by security forces later.

Ajit Doval lauds Punjab police role

National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval called up Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal on Friday and lauded the prompt role of the Punjab Police in providing timely inputs regarding the terrorist attack.

"The NSA lauded the most effective and commendable Punjab response to a most difficult challenge thrown at the country by terrorists at Pathankot," a Punjab government spokesman, quoting Doval's conversation with Badal, said here.

Sources said that Doval appreciated the response of the Punjab government, especially of the Punjab Police, "whose prompt inputs and zero-time coordination with the central forces" had helped in making counter arrangements and save critical assets of the air base, including fighter aircraft and attack helicopters.

Badal told Doval that the Pathankot, and the terrorist attack on Dinanagar town in Gurdaspur district in July last year, should be seen as "acts of disguised foreign aggression".

"In Punjab, we have been fighting the nation's war carried out by our enemies through proxy means. But we must regard it as acts of war and our response needs to be firm not in just words but in the form of better and professional preparedness and willing to take the enemy on," Badal said.

He emphasized on the need to strengthen the Border Security Force (BSF) strength in the Punjab sector to prevent any infiltration from Pakistan side.

Punjab shares a 553-km long international border with Pakistan.

With Agency Inputs
Follow us on pm reviews security at pathankot iaf base after terror attack

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi was on Saturday briefed by senior defence and security officers about the terrorist attack carried out by suspected Pakistani terrorists last week on the Pathankot IAF base.

Modi spent about 90 minutes at the air base during which he was briefed about the attack and security measures put in place at the facility in its wake. Air Force chief Air Marshal Arup Raha and National Security Guard officials briefed the Prime Minister about the attack and the counteroffensive launched against the perpetrators with the help of of maps, aerial pictures and operational photographs, defence sources said.

"Visited Pathankot air base today. Had a detailed briefing from senior leadership of Army, Air Force, NSG & BSF," PM Modi tweeted after his visit at the air base.

Modi reached Pathankot to take stock of the situation at the Indian Air Force base, seven days after it was attacked by terrorists on the night of January 2.

"Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response," the PM added.

The visit comes a day after security forces declared the air base sanitised after massive combing operations that spread over three days. During his visit, the Prime Minister is also likely to undertake an aerial survey of the Indo-Pak border areas, official sources said.

"Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride," the PMO said in another tweet.

Modi also went around the scene of the audacious attack that exposed the chinks in the armour of the Indian security establishment and was shown the huge cache of weapons and ammunition recovered from the six slain perpetrators.

The Prime Minister was taken around the Military Engineering Service Yard where the terrorists were first engaged by the security forces and the two-storey billet for airmen's accomodation where the last two terrorists were killed after the structure was blown up by the security forces, before undertaking an aerial survey of the forward positions along the Indo-Pakistan border.

Tight security arrangements were in place for the prime minister's visit. No one was allowed to enter the area near the Air Force Station (AFS), located 250 km from Chandigarh.

Defence minister Manohar Parrikar also visited the strategic facility on January 5. During his visit, Parrikar had admitted to "some gaps" that led to the attack. The perpetrators were believed to have infiltrated the Indian territory from a spot near Bamiyal village in Pathankot located close to the international border.

PM Modi's visit holds significance as it comes in the midst of speculations that the Foreign Secretary-level talks between India and Pakistan could be called off by New Delhi in the wake of the attack.

Modi is likely to fly to the border belt with Pakistan in Punjab in an IAF helicopter for a first-hand account of the security measures at the border.

The Government of India has put the ball in Pakistan's court, saying the future course of action would be decided after Islamabad's response to the actionable intelligence provided with regard to the fidayeen strike. Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had called up PM Modi and promised action against the perpetrators of the brazen attack.

Seven security personnel were killed in the attack early on January 2 on the Pathankot Indian Air Force station by six terrorists who are believed ti have crossed over from Pakistan. All the six terrorists were killed by security forces later.
Follow us on rajiv gandhi promised support in building ram temple subramanian swamy at du

New Delhi: Senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Subramanian Swamy today claimed that former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi had promised him of support for the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya and appealed to the Congress to come forward and support the cause.

"Rajiv Gandhi had promised me that he will extend full-hearted support for Ram Mandir. He helped us... he started the Ramayana television serial. He had said they will permit the foundation laying, too. He had also said in his campaign for 1989 elections that there should be Ram Rajya in the country. I hope Congress will also come forward and support as this is not just our demand but that of the country," he said while addressing a gathering on the first day of the two-day-long seminar on Ram Janmabhoomi in the Delhi University campus.

Expressing confidence that the Supreme Court verdict will be in the favour of Hindus, he said, "Nothing will be done forcibly and against the law. I am sure that we will win in the court."

The firebrand leader, however, noted that construction of the Ram temple is 'mandatory' and that he would not 'give up until it is made'.

Maintaining that the issue surrounding the construction of the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya should not be seen as a political stunt, he said, "Suppose we don't do it this year, the next year is the election and then we have to do it the following year which is 2018. Then you will say it is for the Lok Sabha elections. Every year there is an election. So, we can't stop our activities just because there is going to be an election."

Swamy further claimed that most people from the Muslim community were not opposed to the construction of the temple as Hindus are in favour of a Masjid across the Saryu river in Ayodhya.

"The public is quite sensible. They will know that it is an election stunt or not. The whole country wants... 99 per cent of the Hindus today want the Mandir to be built and most of the Christians and the Muslims are not opposed to it because we are not against building the Masjid across the Saryu river in Ayodhya," he said.

"Most of the Muslims in our country are converts," he added.

Swamy had earlier said that the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya would begin by the end of 2016 with the cooperation of the Muslim community.
Follow us on sakshi maharaj again temple in ayodhya before 2019

Etah: BJP MP Sakshi Maharaj on Friday said that Ram temple was in the party's agenda and it will be constructed before next Lok Sabha polls in 2019.

"The Ram temple will be built before next elections in 2019," the BJP leader said here. "Since the day of Pujan (worship) by Rajiv Gandhi, the work on the temple is continuous," the BJP leader claimed.

In 1985, Gandhi had ordered the removal of locks on the Ramjanmabhoomi-Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. The BJP leader said that the temple at the disputed site could be constructed through everyone's cooperation.

There are some other ways also like passing a bill in Lok Sabha, he said. The BJP leader said that the Ram temple was "in our agenda".

"We regard Quran, so Muslims should also respect Geeta, Ramayan and Lord Rama. We are not against mosque then Muslims should not have any sort of uneasiness with the construction of the temple," he said.

VHP today made a strong pitch for bringing a bill in Parliament to pave the way for construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya and expressed confidence of it becoming a reality during the tenure of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

VHP leader Surendra Jain also reached out to Congress president Sonia Gandhi urging her to support the bill inside Parliament.
A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

News Update : Bristol Indymedia Server Threatened by Police

by imc bristol

24th June 2005



Bristol Indymedia Server Threatened

News Release : Bristol Indymedia Server Threatened.by imc bristol24th June 2005Bristol Indymedia Server Threatened





Bristol Indymedia volunteers hid the post (originally posted late in the evening of 17th June) from their main newswire within 24 hours of it being posted - as it violated IMC Bristol editorial policy - and well before the police made initial contact.



When the solicitor contacted CID on the 21st to inform them that they could not have the server, or access to it, the police said that they could go through data protection and legal moves to get the logs or get a search warrant, and that they may arrest somebody for obstructing the course of justice.



At this point, an IMC Bristol volunteer informed IMC UK about the events. IMC Bristol then contacted Liberty, whose legal advisor contacted the police to press them on the issue that this server was considered an item of journalistic equipment and so subject to special provision under the law. The police have yet to confirm this. NUJ and Privacy International have also been contacted.



As of 24th June 2005, IMC Bristol remain in possession of their server. Communications with the police, and between various legal and civil rights organisations continue while technical and legal issues surrounding the case are clarified. Bristol Indymedia is an independent news service. As part of our policy, we will not make non-public information we hold publicly available. We do not permanently store IP addresses. We do not intend to voluntarily hand over information to the police as they have requested, and have informed them of this.



CONTACT: imc-bristol (at) lists.indymedia.org

http://bristol.indymedia.org



ADDITIONAL NOTES:

Link To Original Post

http://bristol.indymedia.org/newswire/display_any/23330/index.php?comment_view=1

This posting apparently triggered the police contacting IMC Bristol. On Mon 20th June, Bristol Indymedia (IMC Bristol) received an email from the police asking to contact them with reference to a posting on the IMC Bristol newswire. IMC Bristol volunteers appointed a solicitor and started briefing them to contact the police on their behalf. On Tue 21st June, the police contacted an IMC Bristol volunteer asking for IP logs. The subject of the police enquiry was a posting claiming that damage had been done to either some cars on a train transport, the transport itself, or the railway line.Bristol Indymedia volunteers hid the post (originally posted late in the evening of 17th June) from their main newswire within 24 hours of it being posted - as it violated IMC Bristol editorial policy - and well before the police made initial contact.When the solicitor contacted CID on the 21st to inform them that they could not have the server, or access to it, the police said that they could go through data protection and legal moves to get the logs or get a search warrant, and that they may arrest somebody for obstructing the course of justice.At this point, an IMC Bristol volunteer informed IMC UK about the events. IMC Bristol then contacted Liberty, whose legal advisor contacted the police to press them on the issue that this server was considered an item of journalistic equipment and so subject to special provision under the law. The police have yet to confirm this. NUJ and Privacy International have also been contacted.As of 24th June 2005, IMC Bristol remain in possession of their server. Communications with the police, and between various legal and civil rights organisations continue while technical and legal issues surrounding the case are clarified. Bristol Indymedia is an independent news service. As part of our policy, we will not make non-public information we hold publicly available. We do not permanently store IP addresses. We do not intend to voluntarily hand over information to the police as they have requested, and have informed them of this.CONTACT: imc-bristol (at) lists.indymedia.orgADDITIONAL NOTES:Link To Original PostThis posting apparently triggered the police contacting IMC Bristol. bristol update


This is included on the Oxford newswire because both Danny Chivers (the author) and New Internationalist are based in Oxford. I wish they'd bothered to mention that themselves when posting to the Oxford page, but people often forget.

oxIMCer


A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Abuse of women by undercover police must stop now! Women's blockade on Monday



In response, we call for women to come together for a blockade of Scotland Yard, in protest at political policing and in solidarity with all women who have been exploited by men they thought they could trust. Women in the UK should not have to worry about being sexually abused by policemen. It is as simple as that.In response, we call for women to come together for a blockade of Scotland Yard, in protest at political policing and in solidarity with all women who have been exploited by men they thought they could trust.



http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jan/19/wife-fourth-police-spy-children



Women in the UK should not have to worry about being sexually abused by policemen. It is as simple as that.



In response, we call for women to come together for a blockade of Scotland Yard, in protest at political policing and in solidarity with all women who have been exploited by men they thought they could trust.



Meet 8am outside Scotland Yard on Monday morning, January 24th



The blockade will be simple and dignified. Despite Scotland Yards best efforts we will not be broken.



This is a women led event but men are welcome to come in support.



We demand that the police make public the names and identities of all other undercover offices who have worked or are working to infiltrate movements for progressive social change, so women can know whether they have also been abused by the state, and can decide whether to join other women in considering legal action against the police.



It is likely that the police officers and their superiors have committed the criminal offence of misconduct in public office, which carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.



We demand a fully independent judge-led public inquiry into policy spying. We have no trust that the police can regulate or investigate themselves. Their actions show that they think that they are above the law. This is a dangerous situation that undermines democracy.



Please pass on to your friends, mums, colleagues and fellow activists...



Tweet it: #inquirynow



You can also follow:



www.facebook.com/nopolicespies



@NoPoliceSpies



Location: Outside Scotland Yard



8-10 Broadway, Westminster, SW1H 0BG



Nearest tube: St James' Park (or Victoria)



Buses 11, 24, 211, 148

The shocking revelations about police infiltration of protest movements get more extreme day by day. Reading Laura's story in the Guardian today about a 4th undercover cop has made us angry, sad, and upset... bringing home the true gravity of what the state does to political women in the UK.Women in the UK should not have to worry about being sexually abused by policemen. It is as simple as that.In response, we call for women to come together for a blockade of Scotland Yard, in protest at political policing and in solidarity with all women who have been exploited by men they thought they could trust.Meet 8am outside Scotland Yard on Monday morning, January 24thThe blockade will be simple and dignified. Despite Scotland Yards best efforts we will not be broken.This is a women led event but men are welcome to come in support.We demand that the police make public the names and identities of all other undercover offices who have worked or are working to infiltrate movements for progressive social change, so women can know whether they have also been abused by the state, and can decide whether to join other women in considering legal action against the police.It is likely that the police officers and their superiors have committed the criminal offence of misconduct in public office, which carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.We demand a fully independent judge-led public inquiry into policy spying. We have no trust that the police can regulate or investigate themselves. Their actions show that they think that they are above the law. This is a dangerous situation that undermines democracy.Please pass on to your friends, mums, colleagues and fellow activists...Tweet it: #inquirynowYou can also follow:www.facebook.com/nopolicespies@NoPoliceSpiesLocation: Outside Scotland Yard8-10 Broadway, Westminster, SW1H 0BGNearest tube: St James' Park (or Victoria)Buses 11, 24, 211, 148 angry woman


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Mike Weatheley MP Chased off Sussex Uni Campus - Statement Mike Weatherley MP, one of the architects of the ban on squatting in residential buildings, was invited to talk at Sussex University by members of the Conservative Society, and was forced off campus before that talk could take place.





Not a war that we chose, but a war that we are confronted with daily.



The time for debate is over, closing with the passing of Weatherley's Law. The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich and poor alike to sleep in empty properties, not to suffer the streets, and to steal warmth. This is a war for survival.



We are fucking angry.



An anger that is stoked when we find ourselves in damp houses extorted for rent, forced to live in secret or being violently evicted from our squats which otherwise remain empty and unused.



Our homes have seen no bailout; only bailiffs. The housing crisis grows at an unprecedented rate - a growth designed to animate the UK economy, to dance the corpse as if to imitate life. More than 900,000 houses lie empty while 50,000 lay their heads in hostels, on sofas, or on concrete.



Weatherley drove his law through Parliament not only to keep second homes empty but to forge a career from the suffering of others. Rather than dispossess the proprietor class to which he belongs, Weatherley can only dispatch human life. He jumps at the chance. The audacity of the destroyer coming to crow over that which he has destroyed makes us wretch. We will not amuse ourselves with trivial student debate while our friends freeze. Arguments cannot disprove the truth of homelessness; Debate with power can never be genuine.



This is why we fight the mere presence of this fucker on our campus. This is a fucking war.Not a war that we chose, but a war that we are confronted with daily.The time for debate is over, closing with the passing of Weatherley's Law. The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich and poor alike to sleep in empty properties, not to suffer the streets, and to steal warmth. This is a war for survival.We are fucking angry.An anger that is stoked when we find ourselves in damp houses extorted for rent, forced to live in secret or being violently evicted from our squats which otherwise remain empty and unused.Our homes have seen no bailout; only bailiffs. The housing crisis grows at an unprecedented rate - a growth designed to animate the UK economy, to dance the corpse as if to imitate life. More than 900,000 houses lie empty while 50,000 lay their heads in hostels, on sofas, or on concrete.Weatherley drove his law through Parliament not only to keep second homes empty but to forge a career from the suffering of others. Rather than dispossess the proprietor class to which he belongs, Weatherley can only dispatch human life. He jumps at the chance. The audacity of the destroyer coming to crow over that which he has destroyed makes us wretch. We will not amuse ourselves with trivial student debate while our friends freeze. Arguments cannot disprove the truth of homelessness; Debate with power can never be genuine.This is why we fight the mere presence of this fucker on our campus. Priam Collective


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Outrage as High Court permits secrecy over undercover policing Readers of Bristol Indymedia, and activists in the area, will be well aware of the exposures of undercover cops in recent years. Two of these cops, Mark Jacobs (undercover in Cardiff) & Mark Kennedy/Stone (undercover in Notts, but everywhere), were well known to activists in the south west and Wales, until they were exposed. What is perhaps less well known is that they and other undercovers coerced female activists into close relationships with them. Well for a while now some of these women have got together and are trying to sue the Metropolitan Police in a public court and hold them to account for the misbehavious of their undercovers, and gain some sense of justice for the abuse they suffered. As is so often the case when cops break their own rules, and their laws, the last thing the Met wants to do is face a public court case - the statement below shows that, for now at least, they are being successful in avoiding any public accountability.





The following statement was released by the support group for the women taking legal action against the undercover cops on 17/1/13:



OUTRAGE AS HIGH COURT PERMITS SECRECY OVER UNDERCOVER POLICING

The High Court has today granted an application by the Metropolitan Police for a secret hearing over the claims brought against them under the Human Rights Act, arising from undercover officers engaging in intimate long term relationships with women whilst undercover. The Claimants, who were involved in protest movements, were deceived into intimate sexual relationships by officers, including Mark Kennedy. One relationship lasted six years and all the Claimants suffered significant psychological damage as a consequence of those officers intruding deeply into their private lives. Lawyers for the women said that their clients are outraged at the High Courts decision today that the claims should be heard in the secret Investigatory Powers Tribunal.



The Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) is a little known tribunal set up under section 65 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA, 2000) to deal with claims brought under the Human Rights Act against the police and other security services.



Mr Justice Tugenhadt rejected the police submissions that the IPT was the appropriate tribunal for hearing common law claims also brought by the women (including for deceit and misfeasance in public office). However, the common law claims can be heard in the open jurisdiction of the High Court, but will be put on hold pending the verdict of the IPT.



In his judgment, Mr Justice Tugenhadt states that the actions of these officers must have been contemplated by legislators on the basis that:

James Bond is the most famous fictional example of a member of the intelligence services who used relationships with women fictional accounts (and there are others) lend credence to the view that the intelligence and police services have for many years deployed both men and women officers to form personal relationships of an intimate sexual nature (whether or not they were physical relationships) in order to obtain information or access.



He did, however, say that if the allegations are true they are very serious. He went on to say that physical sexual relationships, that are covertly maintained, may amount to inhumane and degrading treatment depending on the degree and nature of the concealment. This is an important concession because by implication, these relationships could not be authorised under RIPA and would be unlawful.



The rules of the IPT permit the case to proceed with the women denied access to and unable to challenge police evidence, and being powerless to appeal the tribunals decisions. Eight women, who are bringing a case together, were deceived into long term intimate relationships with undercover officers, who as part of the National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPIOU) and its predecessor the Special Demonstration Squad, seemingly had no other brief than to gather information on political groups. So far, this has meant that unlike a criminal investigation, the actions of the officers and their undercover command structure have never been subject to court scrutiny or public hearing, despite serious concerns over human rights violations.



Harriet Wistrich of Birnberg Peirce said: This decision prevents both the claimants and the public from seeing the extent of the violations of human rights and abuses of public office perpetrated by these undercover units. The claimants have already suffered a gross violation of their privacy and abuse of trust by the police, if the case is dealt with by the IPT they will be denied access to justice and may never discover why they were thus violated by the state.



She read a short statement on behalf of the claimants:

We brought this case because we want to see an end to sexual and psychological abuse of campaigners for social justice and others by undercover police officers. We are outraged that the High Court has allowed the police to use the IPT to preserve the secrecy of their abusive and manipulative operations in order to prevent public scrutiny and challenge. In comparison, the privacy of citizens spied on by secret police is being given no such protection, which is contrary to the principles we would expect in a democratic society. It is unacceptable that state agents can cultivate intimate and long lasting relationships with political activists in order to gain so called intelligence on political movements. We intend to continue this fight. (Ends)



There was also a report on the BBC website.

Solidarity to the sisters in their struggle for justice! Stop the institutionalised sexual abuse of women campaigners across the world!



Related Link: http://policespiesoutoflives.org.uk Recently the Bristol Bookfair collective contacted a London based activist, via a trusted intermediary, to ask if she'd be interested in talking about their case at the upcoming Bristol bookfair - but we were told that if even one wman involved in the case went public, all the women faced having their names & lives dragged through the gutter press. So for now the best we can do is offer them our solidarity & support, in this case by helping publicise the shameful & secretive misbehaviours of the Met Police and their undercovers.The following statement was released by the support group for the women taking legal action against the undercover cops on 17/1/13:OUTRAGE AS HIGH COURT PERMITS SECRECY OVER UNDERCOVER POLICINGThe High Court has today granted an application by the Metropolitan Police for a secret hearing over the claims brought against them under the Human Rights Act, arising from undercover officers engaging in intimate long term relationships with women whilst undercover. The Claimants, who were involved in protest movements, were deceived into intimate sexual relationships by officers, including Mark Kennedy. One relationship lasted six years and all the Claimants suffered significant psychological damage as a consequence of those officers intruding deeply into their private lives. Lawyers for the women said that their clients are outraged at the High Courts decision today that the claims should be heard in the secret Investigatory Powers Tribunal.The Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) is a little known tribunal set up under section 65 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA, 2000) to deal with claims brought under the Human Rights Act against the police and other security services.Mr Justice Tugenhadt rejected the police submissions that the IPT was the appropriate tribunal for hearing common law claims also brought by the women (including for deceit and misfeasance in public office). However, the common law claims can be heard in the open jurisdiction of the High Court, but will be put on hold pending the verdict of the IPT.In his judgment, Mr Justice Tugenhadt states that the actions of these officers must have been contemplated by legislators on the basis that:James Bond is the most famous fictional example of a member of the intelligence services who used relationships with women fictional accounts (and there are others) lend credence to the view that the intelligence and police services have for many years deployed both men and women officers to form personal relationships of an intimate sexual nature (whether or not they were physical relationships) in order to obtain information or access.He did, however, say that if the allegations are true they are very serious. He went on to say that physical sexual relationships, that are covertly maintained, may amount to inhumane and degrading treatment depending on the degree and nature of the concealment. This is an important concession because by implication, these relationships could not be authorised under RIPA and would be unlawful.The rules of the IPT permit the case to proceed with the women denied access to and unable to challenge police evidence, and being powerless to appeal the tribunals decisions. Eight women, who are bringing a case together, were deceived into long term intimate relationships with undercover officers, who as part of the National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPIOU) and its predecessor the Special Demonstration Squad, seemingly had no other brief than to gather information on political groups. So far, this has meant that unlike a criminal investigation, the actions of the officers and their undercover command structure have never been subject to court scrutiny or public hearing, despite serious concerns over human rights violations.Harriet Wistrich of Birnberg Peirce said: This decision prevents both the claimants and the public from seeing the extent of the violations of human rights and abuses of public office perpetrated by these undercover units. The claimants have already suffered a gross violation of their privacy and abuse of trust by the police, if the case is dealt with by the IPT they will be denied access to justice and may never discover why they were thus violated by the state.She read a short statement on behalf of the claimants:We brought this case because we want to see an end to sexual and psychological abuse of campaigners for social justice and others by undercover police officers. We are outraged that the High Court has allowed the police to use the IPT to preserve the secrecy of their abusive and manipulative operations in order to prevent public scrutiny and challenge. In comparison, the privacy of citizens spied on by secret police is being given no such protection, which is contrary to the principles we would expect in a democratic society. It is unacceptable that state agents can cultivate intimate and long lasting relationships with political activists in order to gain so called intelligence on political movements. We intend to continue this fight. (Ends)There was also a report on the BBC website.Solidarity to the sisters in their struggle for justice! Stop the institutionalised sexual abuse of women campaigners across the world!Related Link: BABC

Original article on IMC Bristol: http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/712513
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Catholic among the Pigeons Ciaron O Reilly, Assange and Anarcha-Feminism at yesterday's bookfair and beyond.





Strolling out of the bookfair yesterday in search of a Veggies burger I happened upon the tail end of a slanging match between Ciaron O'Reilly and a gang of what, semiotically at least, were anarcha-feminist and queer types.



Ciaron, it is fair to say, has confined himself to the fringes of a fringe movement by attempting to square the circle of being a practising Catholic and an anarchist. He's a long term peace activist and his main mission at the moment revolves around Assange, Manning and their persecution following the Wiki-leaks revelations. If one thing came across yesterday it's his frustration that anarchists as a whole have done little to support either Manning or Assange.



Currently of course Assange is living in the Ecuadorian embassy to avoid extradition to Sweden where two allegations of rape have been made. His supporters allege that that this is merely the first step towards an eventual extradition to the U.S where he will suffer the same fate as Manning. Given the nature of Realpolitik and the global reach of U.S power this seems likely.



Outside the bookfair however the consensus among the crowd haranguing Ciaron was that to stand up for Assange was tantamount to being a 'rape apologist'. (I actually intervened when one said We should just get up there and give him [Ciaron] a slap. When challenged on this threat of violence his immediate response was I've got mental health issues as if that was some kind of excuse). Certainly Ciaron was given no chance to speak and was unfairly abused  one woman was screaming Have you got any idea what enthuisastic consent is? I bet you've never experienced it in your life - a grotesque slur.



I managed to speak with a couple of the group shouting. Their position seemed to be that if Assange had been accused then he must be guilty and that he should be deported to Sweden a.s.a.p to face charges. This was based on the idea that a rape survivors narrative should be privileged above all. Obviously I was told that as a man I would have no understanding of the issues involved in any case 'cos of patriarchy. I was given assurances that there would be a fair trial and that Sweden would be in breach of its own laws were it to allow extradition to the U.S. I found this faith in fair-dealing at the level of international diplomacy to be breathtakingly naive. That's without the contradictions inherent in anarchists demanding that someone submit themselves to a judicial system.



There is actually a really good piece here by Women Against Rape that points out exactly why the rape charges against Assange are being pursued with such zeal by powerful nation states. The US military or the British Foreign Office do not care about rape victims unless it is strategically useful for them to do so. Many liberals have been coaxed into supporting wars of aggression (with their attendant murders and rapes), especially in Afghanistan, by an appeal to feminist principles. It is sad to watch anarchists marching into the same trap.



However if I'm honest it was really the manner in which the dispute was conducted that disturbed me. It seemed emblematic of a new dogma which is spreading through our movement, a dogma that does not tolerate debate and is almost entirely inwardly focused. It revolves around personal identity politics and the creation of safer spaces. What you do or don't 'identify' as has become more important than what you do. Feelings are absolutely paramount and must not be challenged. Anarchists don't think anymore  they feel.



I'm not the only one to have spotted this cultural shift. The anarchist movement I haphazardly joined twenty years ago was characterized by its rough and ready have a go nature. It was outwardly focused  we tried to effect change in the mainstream world. Some of it was no doubt crudely optimistic  ten crusties in a transit van were never going to throw down global capitalism- but it was vibrant and outward looking. It earned the nickname DIY culture and did, with Reclaim the Streets and J18, strike a chord with thousands if not tens of thousands.



A substantial section of today's anarchist prefer to sit around in their local social centre arguing about how to turn it into an even safer space. You've got to watch what you say or do as comments can readily be misconstrued and if someone 'feels' upset then there will be no gainsaying their 'survivors narrative'. Everyone's a victim, everyone has a handy psychiatric tag to excuse their behaviour. Needless to say this creates a space that is effectively unsafe for everyone not already schooled in the cutting edge language of trans-queer white privilege theory. Not an attractive shop window for an ideology that hopefully still aspires to become a mass movement.



The shouting down of Ciaron yesterday was an example of how inwardly focused some sections of our movement have become and if we are not careful we will suffer an even greater disconnect with the society we are trying to change.













Catholic among the Pigeons.Strolling out of the bookfair yesterday in search of a Veggies burger I happened upon the tail end of a slanging match between Ciaron O'Reilly and a gang of what, semiotically at least, were anarcha-feminist and queer types.Ciaron, it is fair to say, has confined himself to the fringes of a fringe movement by attempting to square the circle of being a practising Catholic and an anarchist. He's a long term peace activist and his main mission at the moment revolves around Assange, Manning and their persecution following the Wiki-leaks revelations. If one thing came across yesterday it's his frustration that anarchists as a whole have done little to support either Manning or Assange.Currently of course Assange is living in the Ecuadorian embassy to avoid extradition to Sweden where two allegations of rape have been made. His supporters allege that that this is merely the first step towards an eventual extradition to the U.S where he will suffer the same fate as Manning. Given the nature of Realpolitik and the global reach of U.S power this seems likely.Outside the bookfair however the consensus among the crowd haranguing Ciaron was that to stand up for Assange was tantamount to being a 'rape apologist'. (I actually intervened when one said We should just get up there and give him [Ciaron] a slap. When challenged on this threat of violence his immediate response was I've got mental health issues as if that was some kind of excuse). Certainly Ciaron was given no chance to speak and was unfairly abused  one woman was screaming Have you got any idea what enthuisastic consent is? I bet you've never experienced it in your life - a grotesque slur.I managed to speak with a couple of the group shouting. Their position seemed to be that if Assange had been accused then he must be guilty and that he should be deported to Sweden a.s.a.p to face charges. This was based on the idea that a rape survivors narrative should be privileged above all. Obviously I was told that as a man I would have no understanding of the issues involved in any case 'cos of patriarchy. I was given assurances that there would be a fair trial and that Sweden would be in breach of its own laws were it to allow extradition to the U.S. I found this faith in fair-dealing at the level of international diplomacy to be breathtakingly naive. That's without the contradictions inherent in anarchists demanding that someone submit themselves to a judicial system.There is actually a really good piece here by Women Against Rape that points out exactly why the rape charges against Assange are being pursued with such zeal by powerful nation states. The US military or the British Foreign Office do not care about rape victims unless it is strategically useful for them to do so. Many liberals have been coaxed into supporting wars of aggression (with their attendant murders and rapes), especially in Afghanistan, by an appeal to feminist principles. It is sad to watch anarchists marching into the same trap.However if I'm honest it was really the manner in which the dispute was conducted that disturbed me. It seemed emblematic of a new dogma which is spreading through our movement, a dogma that does not tolerate debate and is almost entirely inwardly focused. It revolves around personal identity politics and the creation of safer spaces. What you do or don't 'identify' as has become more important than what you do. Feelings are absolutely paramount and must not be challenged. Anarchists don't think anymore  they feel.I'm not the only one to have spotted this cultural shift. The anarchist movement I haphazardly joined twenty years ago was characterized by its rough and ready have a go nature. It was outwardly focused  we tried to effect change in the mainstream world. Some of it was no doubt crudely optimistic  ten crusties in a transit van were never going to throw down global capitalism- but it was vibrant and outward looking. It earned the nickname DIY culture and did, with Reclaim the Streets and J18, strike a chord with thousands if not tens of thousands.A substantial section of today's anarchist prefer to sit around in their local social centre arguing about how to turn it into an even safer space. You've got to watch what you say or do as comments can readily be misconstrued and if someone 'feels' upset then there will be no gainsaying their 'survivors narrative'. Everyone's a victim, everyone has a handy psychiatric tag to excuse their behaviour. Needless to say this creates a space that is effectively unsafe for everyone not already schooled in the cutting edge language of trans-queer white privilege theory. Not an attractive shop window for an ideology that hopefully still aspires to become a mass movement.The shouting down of Ciaron yesterday was an example of how inwardly focused some sections of our movement have become and if we are not careful we will suffer an even greater disconnect with the society we are trying to change. Grumpy Old Manarchist

Additions Link to Women Against Rape article

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/aug/23/women-against-rape-julian-assange%20 GOM


I attended the fundraising gig for Chelsea Manning in Liverpool at The Casa in Liverpool on Saturday 2nd November and witnessed the second physical attack that was launched against the event.

When I arrived workers were sweeping up broken glass from the first attack, which took place inside the venue. The event was a, not very well attended, gathering of peace activists, the kind of activists you generally come across at peace movement events.

Sometime later I was stood outside chatting to a woman who was having a smoke, a statement from her is reproduced below and I can verify that it is accurate, when I noticed a couple of women poking their heads around the corner of the building. They saw that I has seen them, I wandered over to them and they continued to poke their heads around the corner and then duck back, I wandered back to the entrance steps and waved at them. Then one of the peace activists at the event came out and I asked him if the women poking their heads around the corner were anything to do with the earlier attack, he went to have a look and as he returned a group of, I think, four men ran up shouting and one of them attacked him by jumping on his back.

I asked one of the attackers why they wanted a fight, the response is attached as a mp3 above, the attacker said he was only interested in having a fight with one of the peace activists at the fundraiser and it was nothing to do with Chelsea Manning.

The main attacker, the woman with dread locks in the photo above, tried to hit me when I asked her why she was attacking the event, but she was drunk and it was easy to dodge her swipes and she failed to touch me. The second audio clip above is her threatening to smash one of the peace activists face into the kerb as she left.

In all my years of activism the only incident that compares with this is when the EDL attacked a Sheffield Indymedia meeting, ironically the EDL were less violent and more reasonable than activists who attacked the Chelsea Manning fundraiser at The Casa.

Following is a statement from the woman I was chatting with outside the Casa before the attack started:
Tristan's supporters set up a protest about homelessness and squatting on the court forecourt, complete with cardboard, sleeping bag, visual statistics about empty homes, teddy bear and a friendly dog on a piece of string. Flyers were offered to everyone entering or leaving the court. The protest proved very timely as no fewer than ten repossession cases were being heard that day in the County Court in the same building, four of them brought by the local Flintshire County Council.

Yesterday, another case collapsed when the Crown Prosecution Service presented no evidence at Mold Crown Court against Tristan Dixon who was appealing his conviction under s.144.

Ten days ago, squatters occupied a residential council property in Southwark in protest at the sell-off of council houses and the criminalisation of squatting under s.144. Last week, a Brighton squatter was acquitted on appeal as the prosecution failed to prove he was living at the property. His two co-defendants had previously been acquitted on the same charge.

Resistance to s.144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act (LASPO) 2012 that outlaws squatting in residential buildings is growing. Ultimately, the law may prove unworkable and unenforceable.

Background to Tristan's case

PRESS RELEASE (from 31 October)

First ever Section 144 Squatting Appeal charade

I, Tristan Dixon, was arrested at around 5pm on 17th January 2013 in Moelfre, Powys for being in a formerly beautiful but completely derelict cottage by a lake, which the rich owner had unfortunately left abandoned to be condemned. It is common for property owners to build a larger holiday home once derelict status is given and so increase the value of the property.

I was illegally evicted by the police, who had not at that time even verified who the rightful owner of the house was, or had consent from the owner at that time(a legal requirement for eviction by police from a residential property), instead being notified by neighbours. The property in question was in a bad state of disrepair needing extensive repairs to the roof, floor and walls to the tune of 60,000-90,000. My intention had never been to live in the property but to use the land to grow trees and vegetables. I was bailed to the Magistrates Court in Welshpool for trial.

Squatting peoples homes when the owners have gone on holiday has been illegal since 1994. The Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 protects displaced residential occupiers, and therefore squatters had no right to occupy a used residence which has been temporarily vacated. Section 144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill introduced September 2012 made it a criminal offence to sleep in abandoned or even completely derelict residential buildings, therefore making a homeless person sheltering from the elements in a wreck a criminal. Therefore making second and third etc homes protected no matter the condition.

I was convicted in the Magistrates Court of Squatting (a new offence under section 144 Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill brought in September 2012), and appealed the squatting conviction to the crown court. This is the first time a squatting case has been appealed to the crown court.

When the appeal was later heard in the crown court the Barrister and Solicitor representing me were astonished at the level of incompetence across the board; of the police (having charged me with an unlawful charge), my previous solicitor Stephen Scully from Lanyon Bowdler (not having noticed or challenged the charge previously), and the magistrates court (not having noticed that the charge was defective). The appeal case has now been further adjourned to 6th NOVEMBER due to the confusion this caused.

In the interim I have recently received a letter from the CPS stating that; there is No Public Interest in contesting the appeal and that I should confirm so the matter can be dealt with administratively. This is because they want to avoid humiliation when the matter goes to court, and also to avoid setting a precedent for future court cases. It is in the public interest to have the case heard, in order that vulnerable homeless that take a nights shelter in a ruined building may stand a better chance of 'fair' treatment.

However I have decided to continue with the appeal in court and will be attending court on 6th of November, as it is my legal right to a fair trial in the court, and this trial in court will set a precedent for future cases as mentioned, so you see its importance.

This is the second time a squatting conviction has been appealed in the UK crown court.

Yesterday's developments

In court yesterday, Tristan - who was represented by independent barrister Alistair Mitchell - attempted to assert his right for his case to be heard so that the relevant issues would be properly considered. He'd filed a motion to have the initial charge quashed. The Judge at the previous Crown Court hearing was reported to have been sympathetic and interested in legal aspects of the case but Judge Rowlands was not of the same mind, threatening Tristan with the possibility of exorbitant legal costs if he insisted on the case being heard.

Some of the issues over the original conviction were that the charge was ill-founded, failing to address knowledge of trespassing and charging Tristan with 'living' or 'intending to live' in the property without specifying any period of time, as well as conflating these two alleged offences ('living' and 'intending to live') into one, creating what was in effect an uncertain charge.

In the end, Tristan settled for an acquittal rather than insist on a full hearing with its associated cost risks, then came outside with his barrister to join the protest on the court concourse for another hour or so.

How to resist

In order to achieve convictions under s.144, the prosecution will have to prove 'living' or 'intending to live' and merely being in a building isn't enough. So, the advice is:

Dont plead guilty. Presence in a building where someone is living is not enough, they have to prove with documentary evidence that you as an individual actually live there. So take our advice - give a 'no comment' interview and take it to trial.
Resistance to s.144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act (LASPO) 2012 that outlaws squatting in residential buildings is growing. Ultimately, the law may prove unworkable and unenforceable. There have been a number of successful prosecutions under the new law, including the widely publicised conviction and imprisonment of 21 year old Alex Haigh who came to London looking for work and stayed in an unoccupied housing association flat. He pleaded guilty, but it has since become clear that where a not guilty plea is entered by defendant, it may be difficult if not impossible for the prosecution to prove the charge. After some notable acquittals, we have a better idea about the obstacles facing hapless prosecutors and some of the ways in which well-informed residential squatters might go about successfully defending themselves in court. Read on.

Background to s.144

Section 144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act (LASPO) became law on September 1, 2012. In brief, it is now a criminal offence if a person is inside a residential building as a trespasser and living or intending to live there. Yet "living" is hard to prove, as the cases below demonstrate. Just as activist groups such as SQUASH were warning all along, the new law is now falling apart under legal scrutiny. This is fantastic; it should not be a crime to occupy unused or derelict space.

Some early prosecutions ended in conviction

Unfortunately, there have already been successful prosecutions and at least two people have been sent to prison. It is hard to track figures countrywide, but Alex Haigh is regarded to have been the first person to be convicted, after being arrested in a squat in Pimlico, London. He was sentenced to 12 weeks in jail. Henry from Bristol was also an early casualty of the new law.

A homeless Polish man was accosted by police who broke into a derelict house to tell him to leave. When he went back to sleep instead, they came back and arrested him.

Despite pubs specifically being excluded from section 144 in the Government's own guidance, two people were convicted in Romford last year of squatting a flat in a pub, although it is unclear whether they actually served time in the end.

There are no doubt other cases elsewhere, which groups such as the Squatters Legal Network are trying hard to follow.

Also for example, there was the case of the Spanish squatters in London who changed their plea from not guilty to guilty (they didn't get prison sentences, but it seems they received bad legal advice).

Of course, the new law is also being used a lot by police to intimidate people into leaving squats and it seems quite common for people to be arrested and not charged (by which time their house has been boarded up again). However, section 144 is now being challenged by people who are refusing to plead guilty...

Brighton Three go free

In Brighton, three squatters were arrested in a raid two days after the law changed. In what was seen as a test case for the police, they were charged with the new offence of squatting, as well as obstruction and abstraction (of electricity). Two squatters had all charges dropped, the other was convicted on the word of a copper. On appeal in October 2013, this conviction was also thrown out, since the Judge and two magistrates agreed that there was absolutely no proof that the squatters were actually living there. There is some analysis of the court case here.

The judge refused to comment on the second defence argument, namely that the building, despite being defined as residential by both the property management company and the police, had actually never been converted to residential.

Acquittal in Moelfre case

Tristan Dixon was accused of squatting a derelict house in Moelfre, Powys where he had planned to cultivate the abandoned land rather than reside. He was convicted under section 144 at Welshpool magistrates court with the help of a crap solicitor and subsequently appealed the conviction. Having filed a motion to have the initial charges quashed, he was then informed that the CPS would not be contesting the appeal, but Tristan wanted the case to be heard so that the legal issues could be aired in court and properly considered. At Mold Crown Court on 6 November, Judge Rowlands threatened Tristan with the possibility of exorbitant legal costs if he insisted on the case going ahead, so in the end he settled for an acquittal. A protest against homelessness and in support of squatting was held outside the Crown and County Court building where at least ten repossession cases were being heard that day.

Some of the issues over the original conviction were that the charge was ill-founded, failing to address knowledge of trespassing and charging Tristan with 'living' or 'intending to live' in the property without specifying any period of time, as well as conflating these two alleged offences ('living' and 'intending to live') into one, creating what was in effect an uncertain charge.

Southwark Protest Squat

The occupation of two Council houses in Southwark to prevent their sell-off for profit justifiably gathered a lot of media attention. But it also highlighted another way to attack s.144, which is to squat something as a protest rather than for living. This seems to have gone very well in this case so far, with the police not threatening to evict, despite the houses clearly being residential.

See also Housing Action Southwark & Lambeth

As the squatters say,

"we hope that our protest shows that the law to criminalise squatting in residential buildings (section 144) should not apply to protest occupations such as ours and that empty residential buildings should still be used for such acts."

Mike Weatherley is a coward case

As an amusing sidenote, the trial of the person charged under Section 4a of the Public Order Act (for calling Mike Weatherley a coward!) continued on November 11 at Brighton Magistrates Court. Weatherley and his cronies appear to want to scapegoat someone as revenge for getting chased off the University of Sussex campus by a large group of people last year.

Whilst they appear to be building a case of affray, the Crown must prove that the defendant caused alarm, distress or harassment to Weatherley and it seems unlikely they will be able to. At the hearing on 11 November, a submission to dismiss the case was made, but this was refused by the Judge and the case will continue on 12 November. Follow @housingwar on twitter for updates.

Practical advice for squatters

So it seems clear that people arrested under s.144 should not talk to the police except to give a no comment interview and should not plead guilty to the offence. The examples mentioned above show that it is difficult to prove that a squatter is "living or intending to live" in a squat without a major surveillance operation. This already makes the law unenforceable. Add to that arguments about the squat being a protest rather than residential, or perhaps a dispute over whether the specific building in question is even legally adapted as residential, and it seems clear that s.144 is unworkable in practice. On top of that, the huge expense that the police will have to go to, with forensic analysis of food and mattresses, door-to-door interviews with neighbours and observation of the squat, makes the law unaffordable! The "crime" of squatting residential buildings will continue!
To join in the resistance to the NATO summit, check out:
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Week of Action : Police Spies Out of Lives



Women resist police attempt to strike out undercover police abuse cases



Court Hearing has been confirmed as taking place on 18th  19th March 2014



This is the hearing which was postponed from last November, and involves a fresh fight against secrecy. THE BATTLE AGAINST SECRECY CONTINUESWomen resist police attempt to strike out undercover police abuse casesCourt Hearing has been confirmed as taking place on 18th  19th March 2014This is the hearing which was postponed from last November, and involves a fresh fight against secrecy.







These are the common law claims of deceit, assault, misfeasance in public office and negligence made by the women who were deceived into long-term intimate relationships with undercover officers.



WHAT CAN I DO? (see below for details of each action)



Picket outside Royal Courts of Justice

Gather with your friends in solidarity

Support us on social media

Sign up to the supporters email list

Add your name to the Where We Stand solidarity statement

If you are a journalist or blogger, write articles about the case and ask to be added to the press list



PICKET  LONDON

Picket outside Royal Courts of Justice, The Strand, London, WC2 (Holborn or Temple tube)

9am  10am, Tuesday 18th March.



GATHER WITH YOUR FRIENDS / COLLEAGUES

We are asking people to gather with your friends during the week of action, in public or at home, to send messages of support and as an act of resistance. Undercover policing is attack on the trust built within friendship groups. Therefore, by coming together in solidarity with the women challenging these destructive police tactics you can both demonstrate your support and resist within your own networks.



Consider coming together to:



Organise a mass letter / email writing to local and national papers  while sharing a meal.



Distribute PSOOL leaflets to raise awareness, on a busy high street or other appropriate location.



Discuss within your groups the possibility of giving official support to the Where We Stand support statement  showing collective resistance against the intimidation of campaigners for social and environmental justice.



SOCIAL MEDIA

Follow and share the resources we are producing on facebook.

and on Twitter: @out_of_lives use #policespiesoutoflives , #spycops and #wherewestand (to reference the solidarity statement we are asking everyone to sign)



SUPPORTERS EMAIL LIST

Sign up to the email list (in the right column on the website) to receive updates on news and actions.



WHERE WE STAND

Sign up, and ask your friends to sign up, to the Where We Stand solidarity statement.



PRESS LIST

To ask to be added to the list please email: contact#@#policespiesoutoflives.org.uk (removing hashtags which are there to prevent spam)



..



Further Information



The police will argue that the claims should be struck out because their asserted Neither Confirm Nor Deny policy prevents them from answering questions, disclosing any documents or giving evidence, and therefore they say they will be prevented from having a fair trial.



The police are also applying, in the alternative (i.e if the strike out application fails) for orders: 1. releasing them from standard disclosure obligations (so they dont have to provide any documents to the claimants or their lawyers), and 2. that the identities of each claimant and each police officer and each witness in the proceedings must not be disclosed.



This hearing comes after the three other women in this legal action had to battle for over a year against their human rights claims going to a secret court; to widespread dismay, the Court of Appeal found against them in November 2013, and their battle continues.



Police Spies Out Of Lives extends solidarity with everyone affected by the extreme intrusions perpetrated by undercover police officers. Five of the women will face an attempt by the police to have their common law claims struck out. The police claim as they can neither confirm, nor deny (NCND) anything about undercover policing, the trial should not proceed.These are the common law claims of deceit, assault, misfeasance in public office and negligence made by the women who were deceived into long-term intimate relationships with undercover officers.WHAT CAN I DO? (see below for details of each action)Picket outside Royal Courts of JusticeGather with your friends in solidaritySupport us on social mediaSign up to the supporters email listAdd your name to the Where We Stand solidarity statementIf you are a journalist or blogger, write articles about the case and ask to be added to the press listPICKET  LONDONPicket outside Royal Courts of Justice, The Strand, London, WC2 (Holborn or Temple tube)9am  10am, Tuesday 18th March.GATHER WITH YOUR FRIENDS / COLLEAGUESWe are asking people to gather with your friends during the week of action, in public or at home, to send messages of support and as an act of resistance. Undercover policing is attack on the trust built within friendship groups. Therefore, by coming together in solidarity with the women challenging these destructive police tactics you can both demonstrate your support and resist within your own networks.Consider coming together to:Organise a mass letter / email writing to local and national papers  while sharing a meal.Distribute PSOOL leaflets to raise awareness, on a busy high street or other appropriate location.Discuss within your groups the possibility of giving official support to the Where We Stand support statement  showing collective resistance against the intimidation of campaigners for social and environmental justice.SOCIAL MEDIAFollow and share the resources we are producing on facebook.and on Twitter: @out_of_lives use #policespiesoutoflives , #spycops and #wherewestand (to reference the solidarity statement we are asking everyone to sign)SUPPORTERS EMAIL LISTSign up to the email list (in the right column on the website) to receive updates on news and actions.WHERE WE STANDSign up, and ask your friends to sign up, to the Where We Stand solidarity statement.PRESS LISTTo ask to be added to the list please email: contact#@#policespiesoutoflives.org.uk (removing hashtags which are there to prevent spam)..Further InformationThe police will argue that the claims should be struck out because their asserted Neither Confirm Nor Deny policy prevents them from answering questions, disclosing any documents or giving evidence, and therefore they say they will be prevented from having a fair trial.The police are also applying, in the alternative (i.e if the strike out application fails) for orders: 1. releasing them from standard disclosure obligations (so they dont have to provide any documents to the claimants or their lawyers), and 2. that the identities of each claimant and each police officer and each witness in the proceedings must not be disclosed.This hearing comes after the three other women in this legal action had to battle for over a year against their human rights claims going to a secret court; to widespread dismay, the Court of Appeal found against them in November 2013, and their battle continues.Police Spies Out Of Lives extends solidarity with everyone affected by the extreme intrusions perpetrated by undercover police officers. Police Spies Out of Lives

e-mail: contact@policespiesoutoflives.org.uk

Homepage: http://policespiesoutoflives.org.uk/
Five of the eight women taking legal action against the Metropolitan Police, due to undercover police officers deceiving them into long term intimate relationships, will be opposing Scotland Yard's attempt to have their cases struck out on Tuesday 18th March. The women and their Police Spies Out of Lives support group have called for a solidarity picket outside the Royal Court of Justice, The Strand, at 9am on Tuesday 18th, as part of a week of action (17th - 21st March).

***STOP PRESS 13th March: The Metropolitan Police has withdrawn its application to strike out women's case as the legal battle continues. Solidarity picket on Tuesday 18th March will go ahead as planned.***

NCND: National Cover-up, No Democracy

The police are using the absurd argument that because they refuse to neither confirm nor deny their undercover activities, they will be denied a fair trial and therefore it should not go ahead. The Met. are claiming Neither Confirm, Nor Deny (NCND) is a policy regarding undercover operations. This is despite, to give just two of many examples, the police confirming to the media that Mark Kennedy and Jim Boyling were undercover officers. If this paradoxical nonsense fails to persuade the judge, the police will attempt to block the standard procedure of providing their documents to the claimants or their lawyers.

The five women are pursuing common law claims of "deceit, assault, misfeasance in public office and negligence" since their relationships occurred before the Human Rights Act (1998) was passed. This hearing comes after the three other women in this legal action had to battle for over a year against their human rights claims going to a secret court; to widespread dismay, the Court of Appeal found against them in November 2013, and their battle continues.

Unclear Inquiry

This ongoing legal battle continues despite Theresa May's announcement of a public inquiry into undercover policing. It is unclear what the scope of the inquiry will be and whether it will examine sexual and intimate relationships; it is also not scheduled to begin until 2016. This inquiry has also been called by the Home Secretary who has promised to scrap the Human Rights Act if the Conservatives win the next election.

Furthermore, any public inquiry must question the whole abuse of power within UK policing. The women taking legal action and their supporters have formed the Police Spies Out Of Lives (PSOOL) campaign to challenge the ongoing police abuses carried out against individuals as well as the disruption being caused by undercover policing to the whole social and environmental justice movement.

Undercover Cover-up

It is important to remember that all of the women were targeted by undercover officers precisely because they were effective activists struggling for change. They are not just victims, as largely portrayed in the mainstream media, but continue to fight for justice.

Also, this is not a historical issue; undercover officers continue to infiltrate and disrupt social justice and environmental groups. While the case being heard on the 18th March concerns officers employed by the Special Demonstration Squad (SDS, 1968 - 2008), their activities were continued by the National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPOIU, 1999 - 2011) and the National Extremism Tactical Co-ordination Unit (NETCU, 2004 - 2011). In 2011, these were merged into the current National Domestic Extremism and Disorder Intelligence Unit (NDEDIU) run by the Metropolitan Police's Counter Terrorism Command, known within the Met as SO15. The UK police force continues to obfuscate their undercover operations by re-branding them in even more Orwellian terms.

Undercover officers sought to undermine: the justice campaign for Stephen Lawrence and other Black justice groups, the Hillsborough Justice Campaign, Animal Rights, Anti-Capitalist, Peace and Environmental campaigns. The stated aim of undercover police units is to prevent 'disorder'; so any campaign that seeks a change to the status quo is a legitimate target. In response several groups affected and their lawyers have formed the recently launched Campaign Opposing Police Surveillance (COPS).

We must support the women who have suffered the most at the hands of undercover officers and who have the strength to take on the state in solidarity with the thousands of individuals and groups who have been targeted by undercover policing. Let them know that they don't fight alone: 9am, Tuesday 18th March, Royal Court of Justice, The Strand, WC2A 2LL.
A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Anti-militarist activists blockade NATO conference http://smashedo.org.uk/1676 View some pictures at





Protesters succeeded in blocking the front entrance for more than an hour, leading to chaotic scenes on the A283, as cars queued to get into the estate.



An event official told protesters: If you stop the event from happening, delegates wont be here to see you protesting so you wont get your message across to them!!



Activists also picketed the rear entrance, with police being forced to escort cars into the conference. One protester was arrested and roughly handcuffed by three large policemen for reasons which are unclear.



Leaflets were also handed out to locals in Steyning town centre, where the campaigners were followed by intelligence gathering police.



NATO is holding a Post 2014 Strategic Narrative Conference from Monday 17th to Wednesday 19th March. Its aim is to set the agenda and content for the 2014 NATO Summit, in Newport, Wales, in September.



Chloe Marsh of anti-arms trade campaign Smash EDO said: Senior NATO and member state officials, parliamentarians, and defence and security experts  responsible for untold death, illegal torture flights, and wars purely to protect Western interests  are gathering right now in Steyning. We are here to oppose them.



NATOs strategic narrative is essentially the lies with which it aims to hoodwink the public and justify its next imperialistic invasion. The conferences official website even admits that it is planning the elements of a proactive communications strategy to convey NATOs post 2014 strategic narrative and validation of the utility of military force to member state politicians and publics.



Michelle Tester of Smash EDO said: some of us have visited regions that have been targeted by NATO. We have seen buildings devastated by bombings and we have met local people who have lost friends and family. We oppose the demonisation by western governments and the media of people from countries that are the victims of NATOs invasions.



Activist group Stop NATO Cymru, part of the Anarchist Action Network will be mobilising against the NATO summit in Newport in September. See their website for the call-out. Anti-militarist activists today blockaded a NATO conference at a stately home in the Sussex countryside. Meanwhile, banners were hung off road bridges close to the venue to greet delegates as they arrived at Wiston House in Steyning.Protesters succeeded in blocking the front entrance for more than an hour, leading to chaotic scenes on the A283, as cars queued to get into the estate.An event official told protesters: If you stop the event from happening, delegates wont be here to see you protesting so you wont get your message across to them!!Activists also picketed the rear entrance, with police being forced to escort cars into the conference. One protester was arrested and roughly handcuffed by three large policemen for reasons which are unclear.Leaflets were also handed out to locals in Steyning town centre, where the campaigners were followed by intelligence gathering police.NATO is holding a Post 2014 Strategic Narrative Conference from Monday 17th to Wednesday 19th March. Its aim is to set the agenda and content for the 2014 NATO Summit, in Newport, Wales, in September.Chloe Marsh of anti-arms trade campaign Smash EDO said: Senior NATO and member state officials, parliamentarians, and defence and security experts  responsible for untold death, illegal torture flights, and wars purely to protect Western interests  are gathering right now in Steyning. We are here to oppose them.NATOs strategic narrative is essentially the lies with which it aims to hoodwink the public and justify its next imperialistic invasion. The conferences official website even admits that it is planning the elements of a proactive communications strategy to convey NATOs post 2014 strategic narrative and validation of the utility of military force to member state politicians and publics.Michelle Tester of Smash EDO said: some of us have visited regions that have been targeted by NATO. We have seen buildings devastated by bombings and we have met local people who have lost friends and family. We oppose the demonisation by western governments and the media of people from countries that are the victims of NATOs invasions.Activist group Stop NATO Cymru, part of the Anarchist Action Network will be mobilising against the NATO summit in Newport in September. See their website for the call-out. Smashy

e-mail: smashedo [at] riseup.net

Homepage: www.smashedo.org.uk
A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

The Anarchist Travelling Circus Presents: Newport Rising From the 26th May to the 1st June 2014 Anarchist Action Network is holding a week of Anarchist events dubbed the Anarchist Travelling Circus in Newport, South Wales. The week will include, workshops, discussions and skillshares and more. Emailo us to get involved!





If you would like to be involved in putting on an event email anarchistactionnetwork@riseup.net



Why Anarchism?



Anarchism is the philosophy that says we dont need governments and bosses, we can make communities based on mutual aid and solidarity. Anarchism means rejecting all forms of domination, oppression, and exploitation, and living as free as we can, right here right now. Anarchism is a living tradition of struggle and creation.



Anarchism is the most beautiful idea we know. We think we need to get the positive message out about what anarchism really means. What can we learn from more than 200 years of anarchist history? What can anarchism mean in the 21st century?



more info at http://www.anarchistaction.net/ideas/anarchism/



Why Newport?



On the 4/5 September another travelling circus is coming to Newport. This year NATO will have their next summit at Celtic Manor Resort, in Newport, south Wales. In early September 2014, world leaders  all directly responsible for untold death, illegal torture flights, and wars fought

purely to protect Western business interests and resource supply routes  will gather on the edge of this historic Welsh city. Many people from Newport, Cardiff, Bristol and beyond, will oppose the summit and use a diversity of tactics against it.



Newport has a history of radicalism. The Chartist rising, which celebrates its 175th anniversary this year, was the last large-scale armed insurrection in Wales, England and Scotland. A popular piece of public art celebrating the revolt was recently demolished ahead of schedule, as part

of a planned redevelopment of the centre, financed by a 90million loan which the Council have gifted to developers whilst slashing funds for frontline services. This naive gamble on reviving the fortunes of the town via the pumping of public funds into private companies, joins a long list that includes LG, The Ryder Cup, and now this NATO summit.



Newport Rising will be a chance to get to know each other and discuss ideas before the NATO summit.



What is the Anarchist Travelling Circus



Anarchist Action Network is planning to hold similar Travelling Circus events around the UK with the aim of raising public awareness of anarchism and building a movement with the strength to take renewed action.

From the 26th May to the 1st June 2014 Anarchist Action Network is holding a week of Anarchist events dubbed the Anarchist Travelling Circus in Newport, South Wales. The week will include, workshops, discussions and skillshares and more. We hope that these events will address some of the issues which most people are facing right now from problems with housing, to welfare cuts and the government austerity agenda, as well as increased poverty, environmental destruction, police repression, racism and the racist border system.If you would like to be involved in putting on an event emailWhy Anarchism?Anarchism is the philosophy that says we dont need governments and bosses, we can make communities based on mutual aid and solidarity. Anarchism means rejecting all forms of domination, oppression, and exploitation, and living as free as we can, right here right now. Anarchism is a living tradition of struggle and creation.Anarchism is the most beautiful idea we know. We think we need to get the positive message out about what anarchism really means. What can we learn from more than 200 years of anarchist history? What can anarchism mean in the 21st century?more info atWhy Newport?On the 4/5 September another travelling circus is coming to Newport. This year NATO will have their next summit at Celtic Manor Resort, in Newport, south Wales. In early September 2014, world leaders  all directly responsible for untold death, illegal torture flights, and wars foughtpurely to protect Western business interests and resource supply routes  will gather on the edge of this historic Welsh city. Many people from Newport, Cardiff, Bristol and beyond, will oppose the summit and use a diversity of tactics against it.Newport has a history of radicalism. The Chartist rising, which celebrates its 175th anniversary this year, was the last large-scale armed insurrection in Wales, England and Scotland. A popular piece of public art celebrating the revolt was recently demolished ahead of schedule, as partof a planned redevelopment of the centre, financed by a 90million loan which the Council have gifted to developers whilst slashing funds for frontline services. This naive gamble on reviving the fortunes of the town via the pumping of public funds into private companies, joins a long list that includes LG, The Ryder Cup, and now this NATO summit.Newport Rising will be a chance to get to know each other and discuss ideas before the NATO summit.What is the Anarchist Travelling CircusAnarchist Action Network is planning to hold similar Travelling Circus events around the UK with the aim of raising public awareness of anarchism and building a movement with the strength to take renewed action. Anarchist Action Network

e-mail: anarchistactionnetwork@riseup.net

Homepage: https://www.anarchistaction.net/
A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Banner drop in Newport today against EADS As part of Newport Rising, there was a banner drop today off the footbridge and at the top of the Kingsway car park against warmongering Newport company EADS.











The Celtic Manor, where the NATO Summit will be hosted, has held EADS events. EADS has helped to write the Newport City Council policy for the future of the city through Simon Gibson of WESLEY CLOVER, a sister company to The Celtic Manor. Both are owned by Terry Matthews. Gibson's report 'The ReNewport Report', proposes that Newport should become a 'Test Bed Laboratory' and a 'Safer City' like Singapore which has been a 'beneficiary' of EADS surveillance technology.



The NATO Summit is an opportunity for EADS to showcase its warmongering technology and increase its business through NATO procurement. EADS is a major player in the Arms Industry and makes huge profits from the death and mutilation of victims of war around the world. EADS is AIRBUS under another name, a major profiteer of war. The company manufactures the Eurofighter Typhoon Jet and 'drones' including some with nuclear warheads. EADS is also involved in the surveillance technology business. Under the name CASSIDIAN they have sponsored workshops at the Newport Council owned Riverfront Theatre and Arts Centre.The Celtic Manor, where the NATO Summit will be hosted, has held EADS events. EADS has helped to write the Newport City Council policy for the future of the city through Simon Gibson of WESLEY CLOVER, a sister company to The Celtic Manor. Both are owned by Terry Matthews. Gibson's report 'The ReNewport Report', proposes that Newport should become a 'Test Bed Laboratory' and a 'Safer City' like Singapore which has been a 'beneficiary' of EADS surveillance technology.The NATO Summit is an opportunity for EADS to showcase its warmongering technology and increase its business through NATO procurement. EADS is a major player in the Arms Industry and makes huge profits from the death and mutilation of victims of war around the world. newport rising


A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Police harassment in Merthyr On Wednesday, July 9th, the otherwise successful Day of Action against Nato in Merthyr Tydfil was marred by an intrusive police presence, the attempted intimidation of Stop Nato Cymru activists and the harassment of a public meeting that afternoon.

cops spotted in Merthyr





Later that day a meeting was called in a public community centre to plan local and national opposition to the Nato Summit, with a warm welcome to anyone who wished to attend - apart from cops, who couldn't seem to grasp the fact that it wasn't for them.



Two police (55608, plastic copper, and 4680, fully-grown porker) told staff at the community centre that they'd come to find a meeting - "something about NATO". They hung around in the adjacent cafe, peering in to the meeting room, realised that they'd been noticed and proceeded to take a walking tour of the outside of the building. When confronted by activists they admitted that "We'd heard there was a meeting", refused to disclose where they'd heard and walked off, ignoring requests for further details.



What's clear now is that Stop Nato Cymru and South Wales Anarchists are networks that are well and truly on the state's radar, with the likelihood that our websites, social media and possibly emails are being closely monitored in the run up to the NATO summit.



Making this so blatantly obvious was either an idiotic mistake by Merthyr's police or an attempt to intimidate activists before the summit, in which case they failed spectacularly. That anti-war and social justice campaigners can be targeted in this way, just for their attempts at social change, makes our reasons for targeting the state all the more justified. When 60 "world leaders" besiege Newport for two days in September and the heavy muscle of the state tries to keep their circus going by suppressing dissent, we will be ready and more determined than ever to make our feelings known.



Details of the police (pictured above) Beware, these individuals could be dangerous, intrusive and potentially violent. Stay away if spotted in public.



4680, left, real copper.

Grey hair, short-back-and-sides, balding, clean shaven, average build, between 5"7 and 6 foot, possibly late 40s.



55608, right, plastic cop.

Dark hair, clean shaven, average build, between 5"7 and 6 foot, possibly late 20s or early 30s. As soon as a stall was set up in the town centre the police made their presence known, with a mixture of "Community Support" officers and actual coppers surrounding the table - groups of two standing at either end of the street and four walking passed repeatedly, taking leaflets and demonstrating their cutting edge intelligence gathering techniques with questions such as "What you up to?", "Are you moving on?" and "Are you doing this anywhere else?".Later that day a meeting was called in a public community centre to plan local and national opposition to the Nato Summit, with a warm welcome to anyone who wished to attend - apart from cops, who couldn't seem to grasp the fact that it wasn't for them.Two police (55608, plastic copper, and 4680, fully-grown porker) told staff at the community centre that they'd come to find a meeting - "something about NATO". They hung around in the adjacent cafe, peering in to the meeting room, realised that they'd been noticed and proceeded to take a walking tour of the outside of the building. When confronted by activists they admitted that "We'd heard there was a meeting", refused to disclose where they'd heard and walked off, ignoring requests for further details.What's clear now is that Stop Nato Cymru and South Wales Anarchists are networks that are well and truly on the state's radar, with the likelihood that our websites, social media and possibly emails are being closely monitored in the run up to the NATO summit.Making this so blatantly obvious was either an idiotic mistake by Merthyr's police or an attempt to intimidate activists before the summit, in which case they failed spectacularly. That anti-war and social justice campaigners can be targeted in this way, just for their attempts at social change, makes our reasons for targeting the state all the more justified. When 60 "world leaders" besiege Newport for two days in September and the heavy muscle of the state tries to keep their circus going by suppressing dissent, we will be ready and more determined than ever to make our feelings known.Details of the police (pictured above) Beware, these individuals could be dangerous, intrusive and potentially violent. Stay away if spotted in public.4680, left, real copper.Grey hair, short-back-and-sides, balding, clean shaven, average build, between 5"7 and 6 foot, possibly late 40s.55608, right, plastic cop.Dark hair, clean shaven, average build, between 5"7 and 6 foot, possibly late 20s or early 30s. anonymous

Homepage: https://network23.org/stopnatocymru
A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Stop NATO Cymru launch #NatoCopWatch campaign against police harassment Online campaign: NATO Cop Watch







Communities in and surrounding Newport have already been threatened with up to 9,000 police being drafted in to the area for the Summit and it is expected that surveillance of locals will increase rapidly over this month.



Supporters of Stop NATO Cymru have already reported police harassment of street stalls and meetings across South Wales, individual email accounts being compromised and, on July 31st, Police Community Support Officers visiting rented flats in Cardiff, asking to take photos of the inside in connection with the Summit.



When activists can be treated this way just for our attempts at social change  harassed in the streets and at our homes  our reasons for challenging things as they are become clear. At no point is the states power over peoples lives more obvious than when it glaring at us through the lens of an evidence gatherers camera. The last year has seen huge revelations as to the extent of state surveillance, with a combination of corporate and state powers having access to virtually any aspect of our lives at their own discretion. This September those powers will be gathering in Newport, planning the maintenance and expansion of their influence through military strategy. We will be gathering to oppose them.



Until then we urge people  particularly those living in South Wales, who will bear the brunt of state surveillance in the oncoming weeks -to be aware of police intrusion into their lives and to film, photograph and upload images of the police to social media using the hashtag #NatoCopWatch, turning the cameras on those who seek to photograph us, keeping track of those who track our movements and exposing those who seek to suppress us. In the wake of anti-NATO campaigners facing unwarranted police presence at their events, the increase in surveillance expected in South Wales in the run-up to Septembers NATO Summit and police pestering activists in their own homes, Stop NATO Cymru have launched a campaign encouraging people to film and photograph police connected to the Summit and share the evidence on social media.Communities in and surrounding Newport have already been threatened with up to 9,000 police being drafted in to the area for the Summit and it is expected that surveillance of locals will increase rapidly over this month.Supporters of Stop NATO Cymru have already reported police harassment of street stalls and meetings across South Wales, individual email accounts being compromised and, on July 31st, Police Community Support Officers visiting rented flats in Cardiff, asking to take photos of the inside in connection with the Summit.When activists can be treated this way just for our attempts at social change  harassed in the streets and at our homes  our reasons for challenging things as they are become clear. At no point is the states power over peoples lives more obvious than when it glaring at us through the lens of an evidence gatherers camera. The last year has seen huge revelations as to the extent of state surveillance, with a combination of corporate and state powers having access to virtually any aspect of our lives at their own discretion. This September those powers will be gathering in Newport, planning the maintenance and expansion of their influence through military strategy. We will be gathering to oppose them.Until then we urge people  particularly those living in South Wales, who will bear the brunt of state surveillance in the oncoming weeks -to be aware of police intrusion into their lives and to film, photograph and upload images of the police to social media using the hashtag #NatoCopWatch, turning the cameras on those who seek to photograph us, keeping track of those who track our movements and exposing those who seek to suppress us. Anarchist Action Network & Stop NATO Cymru

e-mail: anarchistactionnetwork at riseup fullstop net

Homepage: https://www.anarchistaction.net/
Missing from the above are the actions and events organised by Stop NATO Cymru.More details of those are at:...but here's a summary:All week: action camp at Tredegar Park, Newport, with gigs, workshops, skillshares. Full details can be found on the camp website:Fri 29th Aug: Help set up the camp.Sat 30th Aug: Radical bloc will join demo against NATO in Newport.Sun 31st Aug: Day of action against drones, securitisation and policing, including action in Cardiff:Mon 1st Sep: Day of action against austerity, benefit cuts and evictions.Tue 2nd Sep: No Borders South Wales day of action, including noise demo at UKBA.Wed 3rd Sep: Day of skillshares and action training.Thu 4th Sep: Mass action to disrupt the summit. Further details near the time. Affinity group actions to help disrupt the summit also welcome!Fri 5th Sep: Affinity group actions against capitalism, the state and NATO; get together with your mates and organise your own action.Sat 6th Sep: Help pack up the camp.
A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Sun 31st August  Stop NATO action against securitisation and policing

Meet us at 3pm on Sunday 31st August at the security gates nearest to the Nye Bevan statue in Cardiff (west end of Queen Street, opposite the Castle) to make our feelings known.







http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/nato-summit-2014-cardiff-ring-7659971



Whilst they are in no way equivalent, we are mindful of the daily plight of the Palestinian people, hemmed in by giant walls that prevent them from accessing sufficient provisions, medical care or shelter from the prolific murderous Israeli attacks that have recently claimed thousands of lives. We stand against all those states and corporations which would seek to profit from human misery, division and securitisation.



Meet us at 3pm on Sunday 31st August at the security gates nearest to the Nye Bevan statue in Cardiff (west end of Queen Street, opposite the Castle) to make our feelings known.



Bring Palestinian flags and banners. In preparation for the NATO summit, the authorities have put a giant fucking wall around parts of Cardiff and Newport. Local people do not want this wall  it prevents access to public grounds and services, disrupts essential travel and is an ugly visible reminder of the increasingly militarised zone that Cardiff and Newport have become in advance of this Summit.Whilst they are in no way equivalent, we are mindful of the daily plight of the Palestinian people, hemmed in by giant walls that prevent them from accessing sufficient provisions, medical care or shelter from the prolific murderous Israeli attacks that have recently claimed thousands of lives. We stand against all those states and corporations which would seek to profit from human misery, division and securitisation.Meet us at 3pm on Sunday 31st August at the security gates nearest to the Nye Bevan statue in Cardiff (west end of Queen Street, opposite the Castle) to make our feelings known.Bring Palestinian flags and banners. Stop NATO Cymru and Anarchist Action Network

e-mail: anarchistactionnetwork@riseup.net


U.S. Intelligence Ought to Target Israel



By Paul Pillar January 08, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " National Interest "- An article in the Wall Street Journal about what the journalists describe as U.S. interception of communications of Israeli leaders has caused a stir, especially among those habitually quickest to leap to the defense of Israeli policies. We in the public do now know how much of the article's content is true; it represents one stream of reporting by one newspaper's correspondents. The administration and the intelligence agencies, quite understandably and appropriately, are not confirming or denying any of this. But worthy of comment are some of the reactions to the report, as well as what U.S. intelligence should be doing in this direction regardless of what it is or is not doing right now. U.S. intelligence agencies have responsibility to collect, within the limits of applicable laws and regulations, information on whatever is going on overseas, including whatever is going on inside foreign governments, that will help provide U.S. policymakers with the most complete and accurate picture of situations that they will have to deal with and that bear on important U.S. national interests. The policymakers in turn have responsibility for availing themselves of such information, for not impeding the proper collection and analysis of it, and for being as well-informed as they can be as they make decisions and conduct foreign relations. Unquestionably the activities of the Israeli government fall within the bucket of things going on overseas that bear on important U.S. interests and thus are important for U.S. policymakers to be fully informed about. Israel is a major player in the Middle East and has been at the center of wars, debilitating occupations, and much else that makes for instability and controversy and that unavoidably have been major policy preoccupations for Washington. The impact of Israeli actions on U.S. interests has been made all the greater because of the close association in the eyes of the world between the United States and Israel and thus the opprobrium that the former suffers because of actions of the latter. The impact of Israeli policies and actions on U.S. interests has included much that is damaging and destructive, which is the kind of impact that ought to be among the highest priorities for the collection of intelligence. Recently, in connection with negotiation of the multilateral agreement to restrict the Iranian nuclear program, the Israeli government did everything it could to sabotage and frustrate an important foreign policy initiative of the United States and its Western allies. The Journal story states that intelligence collection enabled U.S. policymakers to learn details of Israel's leaking of information about the negotiationinformation Israel had obtained in confidential briefings by the United States or through what the Journal has reported as Israel's own spying on the negotiations. This is certainly the kind of information it would be very useful for any policymaker to have in determining how to manage both a negotiation and any briefings of outside countries about the negotiation. One thing this whole story is not about is domestic spyingnot even to the same degree as the controversial matter of bulk collection of telephone metadata. It is common for intelligence collection aimed at foreign actors to involve conversations or other interactions with U.S. actors. This pattern is a natural consequence of the foreign actor being an important intelligence target precisely because of the impact or potential impact on important U.S. interests. This is true of a foreign terrorist group seeking collaborators for an armed attack inside the United States. It is true of a foreign government searching for entry points for a cyberattack against U.S. infrastructure. And it is true of a foreign government endeavoring to sabotage U.S. foreign policy. The rules and procedures that the National Security Agency observes in handling intercepted communications that involve any U.S. persons or organizations are longstanding, well established, and extremely strict. Basically those rules involve not disseminating anywhere, even as highly classified material and even to other members of the intelligence community, any identifying information about any U.S. persons or institutions, and no information at all beyond what could not be excised without rendering the intelligence about the foreign subject meaningless and useless. The rules also involve a clear understanding that information obtained about any U.S. persons can be picked up only as an unavoidable by-product of collecting against a foreign target, and can never itself be the objective of collection. One of those who was quick to comment on this story, Elliot Abrams, pays no attention at all to these aspects of how such intelligence reporting is handled, as he professes to be scandalized by the Journal's report. He thus tries to portray the matter as something else it is not, which is some kind of improper encroachment of the executive branch on the legislative branch. Abrams also declares that the United States should never monitor the communications of close allies. Setting aside the general question of why there should be such forbearance when even close allies have some interests that differ from those of the United States, this is another instance of the familiar practice of overlooking or excusing much that Israel does by simply applying to it the label ally. This practice involves mere labelingand rather arbitrary and questionable labeling at thattaking precedence over careful consideration of U.S. interests. Unlike all of the other countries that Abrams names as close allies (Britain, Germany, France, Japan, Australia, and Canada), Israel has no treaty of alliance with the United Stateswhich is a good thing, given the kind of scrapes that Israel gets into. And none of those true allies (in their current incarnations, not as a former Revolutionary War foe or a fascist empire) has caused the United States anything like the problems the current incarnation of Israel does. Although Abrams considers any intelligence collection by the United States aimed at Israel to be a scandal, he doesn't say anything about Israel's espionage against its close ally the United States. In addition to what the Journal reports to be recent such espionage regarding the Iran nuclear negotiations, there is the reminder we got earlier this year of the larger history involved when Jonathan Pollard was back in the news upon the occasion of his parole. The Pollard case still is one of the biggest episodes of espionage, in terms of the sheer volume of U.S. secrets stolen and the damage to U.S. security, that the United States has ever suffered. The damage is especially severe in light of what Israel has done with U.S. defense-related information, including what it has done recently, when it has gotten its hands on such information. The Israeli government initially lied to the United States by denying any involvement in Pollard, just as it is denying any involvement in leaking details of the negotiations with Iran. Whatever the United States has found out about these matters evidently has come from its own resources, not conversation with its Israeli ally. One additional issue raised by the Journal's story concerns the expectations habitually placed on U.S. intelligence, especially in hindsight after perceived failures. The Middle East, and especially untoward events such as wars there, have figured prominently in this record. The outbreak of the 1973 Arab-Israeli War, for example, is high on most lists of U.S. intelligence failures. Six years earlier was another warthe Israelis started this onethat is seen as a U.S. intelligence success. The Johnson administration was unable to prevent the 1967 war, but it had all the information it needed on what was about to happen, and it tried hard to prevent it. The 1967 war was especially damaging in that it marked the beginning of an occupation, now nearly half a century old, that has been a central issue in the Middle East and one of the most persistent problems there for the United States. Surprise attacks and warfare in the Middle East will continue to be major concerns for the United States, and it thus behooves the United States to use all available intelligence resources to find out as much as it can about such things, including whatever aspects of them involve Israeli intentions. Along this line, we should note how often has arisen the threat of Israel militarily attacking Iran, and of how this threat is related to the subject of the nuclear negotiations that have been the target of Israeli sabotage attempts and reported Israeli espionage. If the United States is surprised by a new war in the Middle East, if the surprise is due to the United States abstaining from collecting intelligence on Israel, and if that abstinence is due to political pressure not to spy on an ally, then we will know who ought to be blamed for the failureand it won't be U.S. intelligence agencies. Paul R. Pillar is a contributing editor to The National Interest . He is also a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a nonresident senior fellow at Georgetown Universitys Center for Security Studies. 2016 The National Interest. All rights reserved
The Deceptive Debate Over What Causes Terrorism Against the West





By Glenn Greenwald

January 09, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " The Intercept " - Ever since members of the U.K. Labour Party in September elected Jeremy Corbyn as party leader by a landslide, British political and media elites have acted as though their stately manors have been invaded by hordes of gauche, marauding serfs. They have waged a relentless and undisguised war to undermine Corbyn in every way possible, and that includes  first and foremost  the Blairite wing of his party, who have viciously maligned him in ways they would never dare for David Cameron and his Tory followers.

In one sense, thats all conventional politics: Establishment guardians never appreciate having their position and entitlements threatened by insurgents, and they are thus uniting  Tory and Labour mavens alike  to banish the lowly intruders from their Oxbridge court (class and caste loyalty often outweighs supposed ideological differences). Corbyns reaction to all of this is also conventional politics: He quite reasonably wants to replace his Blairite shadow ministers who have been vilifying him as a Terrorist-loving extremist with those who are supportive of his agenda, a perfectly rational response that the British media is treating as proof that hes a cultish Stalinist tyrant (even though Blairites, when they controlled the party, threatened to de-select left-wing MPs who failed to prove sufficient loyalty to Prime Minister Blair). In response to the dismissal of a couple of anti-Corbyn ministers yesterday, several other Labour MPs have announced their protest-resignations with the gestures of melodrama and martyrdom at which banal British politicians excel.

Rather than wallow in all that internal power jockeying of a former world power, I want to focus instead on one specific argument that has arisen as part of Corbyns cabinet re-shuffling because it has application far beyond Her Majestys realm. One of the shadow ministers replaced yesterday by Corbyn is a total mediocrity and non-entity named Pat McFadden. He claims (plausibly enough) that he was replaced by Corbyn because of remarks he made in the House of Commons after the Paris attack, which the British media and public widely viewed as disparaging Corbyn as a terrorist apologist for recognizing the role played by Western foreign policy in terror attacks. (Can you fathom the audacity of a Party leader not wanting ministers who malign him as an ISIS apologist?)

Other Labour MPs resigning from their positions today in protest of McFaddens dismissal have expressly defended the substance of McFaddens remarks about terrorism; one of them, Stephen Doughty, tweeted this today, with the key excerpt of McFaddens statement about terrorism:

This claim  like the two ousted shadow ministers themselves  is so commonplace as to be a cliche. One hears this all the time from self-defending jingoistic Westerners who insist that their tribe in no way plays any causal role in what it calls terrorist violence. They insist that those who posit a causal link between endless Western violence in the Muslim world and return violence aimed at the West are infantilizing the terrorists and treating them like children by suggesting that terrorists lack autonomy and the capacity for choice, and are forced by the West to engage in terrorism. They bizarrely claim  as McFadden did before being fired  that to recognize this causal link is to deny that terrorists have agency and to instead believe that their actions are controlled by the West. One hears this claim constantly.

The claim is absurd: a total reversal of reality and a deliberate distortion of the argument. That some Muslims attack the West in retaliation for Western violence (and external imposition of tyranny) aimed at Muslims is so well-established that its barely debatable. Even the 2004 task force report commissioned by the Rumsfeld Pentagon on the causes of terrorism decisively concluded this was the case:

Beyond such studies, those who have sought to bring violence to Western cities have made explicitly clear that they were doing so out of fury and a sense of helplessness over Western violence that continuously kills innocent Muslims. The drone hits in Afghanistan and Iraq, they dont see children, they dont see anybody. They kill women, children, they kill everybody, Faisal Shahzad, the attempted Times Square bomber, told his sentencing judge when she expressed bafflement over how he could try to kill innocent people. And then theres just common sense about human nature: If you spend years bombing, invading, occupying, and imposing tyranny on other people, some of them will want to bring violence back to you.

Theres a reason the U.S. and NATO countries are the targets of this type of violence but South Korea, Brazil, and Mexico are not. Terrorists dont place pieces of paper with the names of the worlds countries in a hat and then randomly pick one out and attack that one. Only pure self-delusion could lead one to assert that Spains and the U.K.s participation in the 2003 invasion of Iraq played no causal role in the 2004 train bombing in Madrid and 2005 bombing in London. Even British intelligence officials acknowledge that link. Gen. David Petraeus frequently described how U.S. policies  such as Guantanamo and torture  were key factors in how Muslims become radicalized against the U.S. In June, Tony Blairs former deputy prime minister, John Prescott, made this as clear as it can be made when he admitted the Iraq War was wrong:

When I hear people talking about how people are radicalized, young Muslims. Ill tell you how they are radicalized. Every time they watch the television where their families are worried, their kids are being killed or murdered and rockets, you know, firing on all these people, thats what radicalizes them.

Can that be any clearer?

Obviously, none of this is to say that Western interference in that part of the world is the only cause of anti-Western terrorism, nor is it to say that its the principal cause in every case, nor is to deny that religious extremism plays some role. Most people need some type of fervor to be willing to risk their lives and kill other people: It can be nationalism, xenophobia, societal pressures, hatred of religion, or religious convictions. But typically, such dogmatic fervor is necessary but not sufficient to commit such violence; one still needs a cause for the targets one selects.

In its statement claiming responsibility for the attack on Paris, ISIS invoked multiple ostensibly religious justifications for the violence but also said the targeting of the French was due to their war against Islam in France and their strikes against Muslims in the lands of the Caliphate with their jets (France had been bombing ISIS in Iraq since January 2015 and in Syria since September). In the same month, ISIS claimed responsibility for an attack on a Russian jet as retaliation for Russian airstrikes in Syria, as well as an attack on Lebanon as a response to Hezbollahs violence. Heres beloved-by-the-D.C.-establishment Will McCants of the Brookings Institution telling Vox why ISIS attacked Paris:

Even in those cases where religious extremism rather than anger over Western violence seems to be the primary cause  such as the Charlie Hebdo murders, done to avenge what the attackers regarded as blasphemous cartoons  the evidence is clear that the attackers were radicalized by indignation over U.S. atrocities in Iraq, including at Abu Ghraib. Pointing out that Western violence is a key causal factor in anti-Western terrorism is not to say it is the only cause.

But whatever ones views are on that causal question, its a total mischaracterization to claim that those who recognize a causal connection are denying that terrorists have autonomy or choice. To the contrary, the argument is that they are engaged in a decision-making process  a very expected and predictable one  whereby they conclude that violence against the West is justified as a result of Western violence against predominantly Muslim countries. To believe that is not to deny that terrorists possess agency; its to attribute agency to them.

The whole point of the argument is that they are not forced or compelled or acting out of reflex; the point is that they have decided that the only valid and effective response to Western attacks on and interference in Muslim societies is to attack back. When asked by a friend about the prospect of peaceful protest against U.S. violence and interference in Muslim countries, Shahzad, the would-be Times Square bomber, replied: Can you tell me a way to save the oppressed? And a way to fight back when rockets are fired at us and Muslim blood flows?

One can, needless to say, object to the validity of that reasoning. But one cannot deny that the decision to engage in this violence is the reasoning process in action.

By pointing out the causal connection between U.S. violence and the decision to bring violence to the West, one is not denying that the attackers lack agency, nor is one claiming they are forced by the West to do this, nor is one infantilizing them. To recognize this causation is to do exactly the opposite: to point out that some human beings will decide  using their rational and reasoning faculties and adult decision-making capabilities  that violence is justified and even necessary against those who continually impose violence and aggression on others (and, for the logically impaired, see the update here on explaining  yet again  that causation is not the same as justification).
Media Quiet as Saudi-led Coalition Bombs Center For The Blind In Yemen



You'd hardly know it from the media, but a U.S.-backed coalition is pummeling the poorest Middle Eastern country



By Ben Norton January 09, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " Salon " - Centers for the blind can now be added to the list of civilian areas bombed by the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen  along with wedding halls, hospitals, residential neighborhoods and humanitarian aid warehouses. The U.S.-backed coalition bombed the al-Noor Center for Care and Rehabilitation of the Blind in Yemens capital city Sanaa on Tuesday morning, U.N. officials confirmed to VICE News. The Saudi-led coalition also hit Yemens chamber of commerce and a wedding hall. Fighting broke out in Yemen, the poorest country in the Middle East, in March. A coalition of Middle Eastern nations and militants loyal to President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, led by Saudi Arabia and armed by the U.S., is combating Houthi rebels and militants loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh. Human rights organizations have accused the coalition of war crimes for targeting civilian areas. In March, the Western-supported coalition attacked a Yemeni refugee camp, killing roughly 40 people and injuring 200 more. The coalition then bombed an Oxfam warehouse full of life-saving humanitarian aid in April. In September, Saudi Arabia bombed a wedding in Yemen, killing 131 civilians, including 80 women. The next month, the coalition attacked another Yemeni wedding, killing at least 47 civilians and injuring 35 more. The coalition subsequently bombed a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Yemen in October, just weeks after the U.S. destroyed a hospital in Kunduz, Yemen. In December, the coalition bombed a second Doctors Without Borders medical facility in Yemen. Around 2,800 civilians have been killed in Yemen since the start of the war in March, according to the U.N. Another 5,300 have been wounded. At least 81 civilians were killed and 109 injured in Yemen in the month of December alone. The Saudi-led coalition is responsible for approximately two-thirds of civilian deaths, the U.N. says. Coalition airstrikes killed at least 62 civilians in December, whereas Houthi rebels reportedly killed 11. The U.N. has condemned the coalition for using widely banned cluster munitions in Yemen. These internationally banned weapons were provided to Saudi Arabia by the U.S. Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, blasted the coalition for using the indiscriminate weapons, saying Saudi Arabia is repeatedly using indiscriminate forms of warfare. A quiet, and misleading media Despite statements by rights groups, much of the U.S. media has been actively ignoring the ongoing war. And, even when outlets do report on it, coverage is often overtly biased. Reuters published a piece about the bombing of the center for the blind, euphemistically titled Yemen war intensifies amid mounting regional tension. The first line of the piece calls the Yemeni rebels Iran-allied Houthi forces, yet the extent to which they are backed by Iran is contested, and likely greatly exaggerated. Award-winning investigative reporter Gareth Porter has challenged media reports of Iran ties, arguing they are not based on evidence. Porter says false stories of Iran armed the Houthis were used to justify war in Yemen. Only in the third line of its article does Reuters report that the air raids hit a care center for the blind and Yemens chamber of commerce headquarters. Newsweek reprinted the Reuters article with the equally euphemistic headline Yemen War Heats Back Up After Relative Lull. The European press has devoted a little more attention to the U.K.-backed war, but even then its coverage also leaves a lot to be desired. Britains The Independent ran an article on Jan. 4 that calls the brutal Saudi-led, Western-backed war Yemens sectarian civil war, implying it is about sectarianism and religion, not empire. The piece claimed the war has largely escaped Western media attention, by which it actually meant the war has largely been ignored by Western media outlets. Most glaring of all, The Independent did not mention once in the piece that this is a Western-backed war, in which the Saudi-led coalition is being actively armed by the U.S. The article gave a heartwarming platform to a Yemeni artist, but, in the process, tried to humanize the war by depoliticizing it. Ben Norton is a politics staff writer at Salon. You can find him on Twitter at @BenjaminNorton. Copyright  2016 Salon Media Group, Inc
Fear And Loathing in the House of Saud



Desperation does not even begin to describe the current plight of the House of Saud.



By Pepe Escobar Riyadh was fully aware the beheading of respected Saudi Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr was a deliberate provocation bound to elicit a rash Iranian response. The Saudis calculated they could get away with it; after all they employ the best American PR machine petrodollars can buy, and are viscerally defended by the usual gaggle of nasty US neo-cons. In a post-Orwellian world "order" where war is peace and "moderate" jihadis get a free pass, a House of Saud oil hacienda cum beheading paradise  devoid of all civilized norms of political mediation and civil society participation  heads the UN Commission on Human Rights and fattens the US industrial-military complex to the tune of billions of dollars while merrily exporting demented Wahhabi/Salafi-jihadism from MENA (Middle East-Northern Africa) to Europe and from the Caucasus to East Asia. And yet major trouble looms. Erratic King Salman's move of appointing his son, the supremely arrogant and supremely ignorant Prince Mohammad bin Salman to number two in the line of succession has been contested even among Wahhabi hardliners. But don't count on petrodollar-controlled Arab media to tell the story. English-language TV network Al-Arabiyya, for instance, based in the Emirates, long financed by House of Saud members, and owned by the MBC conglomerate, was bought by none other than Prince Mohammad himself, who will also buy MBC. With oil at less than $40 a barrel, largely thanks to Saudi Arabia's oil war against both Iran and Russia, Riyadh's conventional wars are taking a terrible toll. The budget has collapsed and the House of Saud has been forced to raise taxes. The illegal war on Yemen, conducted with full US acquiescence, led by  who else  Prince Mohammad, and largely carried out by the proverbial band of mercenaries, has instead handsomely profited al-Qaeda in the Arabic Peninsula (AQAP), just as the war on Syria has profited mostly Jabhat al-Nusra, a.k.a. al-Qaeda in Syria. Three months ago, Saudi ulemas called for a jihad not only against Damascus but also Tehran and Moscow without the "civilized" West batting an eyelid; after all the ulemas were savvy enough to milk the "Russian aggression" bandwagon, comparing the Russian intervention in Syria, agreed with Damascus, with the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. US Think Tankland revels in spinning that the beheading provocation was a "signal" to Tehran that Riyadh will not tolerate Iranian influence among Shi'ites living in predominantly Sunni states. And yet Beltway cackle that Riyadh hoped to contain "domestic Shi'ite tensions" by beheading al-Nimr does not even qualify as a lousy propaganda script. To see why this is nonsense, let's take a quick tour of Saudi Arabia's Eastern province. All Eyes on Al Sharqiyya Saudi Arabia is essentially a huge desert island. Even though the oil hacienda is bordered by the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf, the Saudis don't control what matters: the key channels of communication/energy exporting bottlenecks  the Bab el-Mandeb and the Straits of Hormuz, not to mention the Suez canal. Enter US "protection" as structured in a Mafia-style "offer you can't refuse" arrangement; we guarantee safe passage for the oil export flow through our naval patrols and you buy from us, non-stop, a festival of weapons and host our naval bases alongside other GCC minions. The "protection" used to be provided by the former British empire. So Saudi Arabia  as well as the GCC  remains essentially an Anglo-American satrapy. Al Sharqiyya  the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia  holds only 4 million people, the overwhelming majority Shi'ites. And yet it produces no less than 80% of Saudi oil. The heart of the action is the provincial capital Al Qatif, where Nimr al-Nimr was born. We're talking about the largest oil hub on the planet, consisting of 12 crisscrossed pipelines that connect to massive Gulf oil terminals such as Dhahran and Ras Tanura. Enter the strategic importance of neighboring Bahrain. Historically, all the lands from Basra in southern Iraq to the peninsula of Musandam, in Oman  traditional trade posts between Europe and India  were known as Bahrain ("between two seas"). Tehran could easily use neighboring Bahrain to infiltrate Al Sharqiyya, detach it from Riyadh's control, and configure a "Greater Bahrain" allied with Iran. That's the crux of the narrative peddled by petrodollar-controlled media, the proverbial Western "experts", and incessantly parroted in the Beltway. There's no question Iranian hardliners cherish the possibility of a perpetual Bahraini thorn on Riyadh's side. That would imply weaponizing a popular revolution in Al Sharqiyya. But the fact is not even Nimr al-Nimr was in favor of a secession of Al Sharqiyya. And that's also the view of the Rouhani administration in Tehran. Whether disgruntled youth across Al Sharqiyya will finally have had enough with the beheading of al-Nimr it's another story; it may open a Pandora's box that will not exactly displease the IRGC in Tehran. But the heart of the matter is that Team Rouhani perfectly understands the developing Southwest Asia chapter of the New Great Game, featuring the re-emergence of Iran as a regional superpower; all of the House of Saud's moves, from hopelessly inept to major strategic blunder, betray utter desperation with the end of the old order. That spans everything from an unwinnable war (Yemen) to a blatant provocation (the beheading of al-Nimr) and a non sequitur such as the new Islamic 34-nation anti-terror coalition which most alleged members didn't even know they were a part of. The supreme House of Saud obsession rules, drenched in fear and loathing: the Iranian "threat". Riyadh, which is clueless on how to play geopolitical chess  or backgammon  will keep insisting on the oil war, as it cannot even contemplate a military confrontation with Tehran. And everything will be on hold, waiting for the next tenant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue; will he/she be tempted to pivot back to Southwest Asia, and cling to the old order (not likely, as Washington relies on becoming independent from Saudi oil)? Or will the House of Saud be left to its own  puny  devices among the shark-infested waters of hardcore geopolitics? Pepe Escobar is an analyst for RT and TomDispatch, and a frequent contributor to websites and radio shows ranging from the US to East Asia. Born in Brazil, he's been a foreign correspondent since 1985, and has lived in London, Paris, Milan, Los Angeles, Washington, Bangkok and Hong Kong.
Why the Feds Punk Out When Confronting White Rightwing Insurgents



When a criminal justice system born in Native American genocide and Black slave patrolling finds itself in conflict with conservative white Christian landowners, it short-circuits.



By Glen Ford



January 09, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " BAR " - The armed right-wing activists that seized control of a federal wildlife sanctuary compound in eastern Oregon have already committed  and conspired to commit  enough serious criminal violations of U.S. law to land each of them in federal prison for the rest of lives. Of course, as Wajahat Ali points out in The Guardian newspaper, if the gunmen were Muslim or Black, theyd already be dead. This is not a great revelation. Every Black child knows that white lives carry a premium value in the United States, while Blacks are casually killable. In a society where Walking While Black, Driving While Black or simply Breathing While Black is so often treated as a capital crime, the racial double standard is the norm. Thats why its insane to think that this society can be made worthy of Black habitation through tinkering with the system, piecemeal reforms, and appeals to the federal government for protection and relief. This is the same federal government that framed poor Black men from Miami and Newburgh, New York, on terrorist conspiracy charges, and that condones conspiracy indictments carrying life in prison for 100 Black youngsters from New York City housing projects based on their postings in Facebook. But the white, rightwing land grabbers who are in armed occupation of federal property cant seem to buy a confrontation with President Obamas FBI or any other armed federal agency. How is it, the people of the world must be wondering, that a country that runs by far the worlds biggest prison system, with the most heavily armed cops on the planet, equipped with the most advanced evidence gathering devices known to man  how is it that the Superpower of Policing and Prosecution seems to fear a confrontation with groups with names like the Oregon Bearded Bastards? The reason is really quite simple: the U.S. criminal justice system was not created to control white militias or greedy ranchers or gun-toting racists and Bible-thumpers. For most of U.S. history, these were prime stakeholders in the American project to build a White Mans Nation. The gunmen in Oregon have plenty of historical reasons to believe that land-grabbing is their birthright  and that a significant segment of white America empathizes with them. The federal government treads lightly, because white Christian lives do matter. For almost 50 years, the primary mission of the U.S. criminal justice system has been to control, contain and incarcerate Black Americans. It has spent half a century refining the tools to terrorize Black people on the streets, in their homes and in their schools. It is so efficient at what it does, that one out of every eight prison inmates on the planet is an African American. The Mass Black Incarceration State was designed to pre-empt any insurgency by Black people  not to deal with the Bundy family and the Bearded Bastards of Oregon. Thats why I think the Lords of Capital are much more afraid of Donald Trump than they are of Bernie Sanders. They think Trump might stir up more of those white bearded bastards, many of whom hate Wall Street almost as much as they do the federal government  which is a real problem for U.S. law enforcement. Back Agenda Report executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. Information Clearing House has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is Information ClearingHouse endorsed or sponsored by the originator.) Privacy Statement
Latin America Has to Fight and Win!





By Andre Vltchek





January 09, 2016 "

Information Clearing House

" - "

Counterpunch

" - For now, Argentina is lost and Venezuela is deeply wounded, divided and frustrated. Virtually everywhere in socialist Latin America, well-orchestrated and angry protests are taking place, accusing our left-wing governments of mismanagement and corruption.

What was gained during those years of hard work and sacrifices, is suddenly evaporating in front of our eyes. And there seems to be no way to stop the trend in the foreseeable future. Whatever magnificent work our governments have done have been smeared. Western propaganda and its local serfs belittle the achievements of our people. In several countries, revolutionary zeal has almost entirely vanished.

***

It is clear, even with an unarmed eye that great progress had been made. Those of us who knew Ecuador two decades ago, (then a depressing country, humiliated and torn by disparities and racism), are now impressed by its wonderful social services, free culture and modern infrastructure.

Indigenous people of Bolivia are proudly in possession of their own land.

Venezuela has been inspiring the entire Latin America and the world by its internationalism and determined struggle against Western imperialism.

Chile, step by small step, has been dismantling the grotesque legacy of Pinochets dictatorship, moving firmly towards socialism.

There are hundreds of great and inspiring examples, all over the continent.

In less than two decades, Latin America converted itself from one of the most depressing parts of the world, to the most progressive one.

A few years ago, it really seemed that the Empire had finally lost. There was no way that South Americans would want to go back to the days of darkness. The achievements of socialism were too obvious, too marvelous. Who would want to go back to the gloomy nihilism, depressing feudal structures and the fascist client-state arrangements?

Then the Empire re-grouped. It gathered its local lieutenants, its lackeys, and began striking back with deadly force.

All the means of imperialist propaganda were applied. The goal was to convince people that what they see is not actually real. Another objective was to subvert, to torpedo most of the achievements.

***

We lost elections? What nonsense!

It was clean economic and political terror unleashed against us, and it was the most vicious propaganda, which began forcing out the left wing governments of Latin America from power!

The world was watching, still demanding more Western-style democracy, more concessions. The West administered a Fifth Column that damaged Latin American revolutions, after infiltrating both media and brains in Caracas, Buenos Aires, even Quito. It consisted especially of the liberals and those so-called progressive forces; the same people who tried to burry the Cuban revolution after the Soviet Union had been destroyed by Western imperialism. The same people actually who were cheering the demolition of the Soviet Union itself.

They kept pushing for anarchism and for some formulae of participatory economy, in fact for their own concepts, for Western, white concepts, for something that most of Latin American people who fought and won their revolutions never asked for!

Jealous and petty, they hate the true powerhouses of resistance against Western imperialism: Russia, China, Iran or South Africa and in fact, even Latin America itself.

Latin American people have always been intuitively longing for big, strong governments, like those in Cuba and those that lately emerged in Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador. And their natural allies should have been those countries from other, non-Western parts of the world, with powerful people-oriented leadership, not some European and North American individuals representing grotesque and defunct movements and intellectual concepts.

In several countries, Latin America lost its way and again got derailed by Western demagoguery. Suddenly there was almost nothing left here of Chinese or Russian or Vietnamese ideas, nothing of internationalism, only Western soft liberal egotists and countless irrelevant marginal groups.

History was forgotten. It was simple, decisive and powerful action by China that single-handedly saved Cuba, when the island-nation was hit by the Gorbachev and Yeltsin disasters. I wrote about it a lot, and Fidel quoted me, agreeing in his Reflections.

It was the Soviet Union that stood in solidarity with almost all revolutionary movements of Latin America throughout the 20th century. And it was Russia that was backing Chavez during the countless Western attempts to overthrow his government.

***

Playing with anarchism, liberalism and Euro-socialist concepts brought several Latin American revolutions to the brink of absolute calamity.

South America is at the frontline. It is under attack. There is no time for the flowery theories.

I know Latin American revolutionaries. I have met many, from Eduardo Galeano to several Cuban and Sandinista leaders.

I also met many of the South American elites.

One day, not long after Evo Morales came to power in Bolivia, I spoke to a man, a member of one of the leading families, which has in its ranks Senators, owners of mass media outlets, as well as captains of local industry.

We will get rid of Morales, he told me, openly. Because he is a dirty Indian, and because we will not tolerate lefties in this part of the world.

He was not hiding his plans  he was extremely confident.

We dont care how much money we have to spend; we have plenty of money. And we have plenty of time. We will use our media and we will create food and consumer goods deficits. Once there is nothing to eat, once there are food lines in all the major cities, as well as great insecurity and violence, people will vote him out of power.

It was clearly the concept used by the Chilean fascist economic and political right wing thugs, before the 1973 US-backed coup against President Salvador Allende. Uncertainty, shortages, and if everything failed  then a brutal military coup.

In Bolivia the elites tried and tried, but they were not successful, because there was great solidarity with the government of Evo Morales, coming from socialist countries like Brazil and Venezuela. When the Right tried to break the country to pieces, pushing for the independence of the richest, white province of Santa Cruz, Brazilian President Lula declared that he was going to send the mightiest army in the South American continent and defend the integrity of the neighboring country.

It is beasts, and actually extremely powerful beasts, who are heading the opposition in South America.

And to be frank, we can hardly speak about an opposition. These are oligarchs, landowners, Christian (many from the Opus Dei) demagogues and military leaders. In many ways they are still the true rulers of the continent.

Nothing except brute force can stop them. They have unlimited financial resources, they have a propaganda machine at their disposal, and they can always count on the Empire to back them up. In fact it is the Empire that is encouraging, training and sustaining them.

***

Violations of democracy and human rights! the opposition yells, whenever our governments decide to hit back. It is not that we are lately hitting back really hard, but any retaliation is packaged as brutal.

What do we in fact do? We arrest just a few of the most outrageous terrorists  those who are openly trying to overthrow or destabilize the state.

But when they, the elites and their armies, came to power, they cut open peoples stomachs, and threw them from helicopters straight into the sea.

Their death squads violate children in front of their parents. Female prisoners are raped by specially trained German shepherds dogs, and tubes with starved rats are inserted into their vaginas.

Entire movements and parties are liquidated by fascist South American battalions of death (some of them trained in the United States), but we must use some nice and clean tactics and democratic means to prevent them from grabbing power again?

The white, racist, colonialist Christian implants from Europe have been forming so-called South American elites. They are actually some of the cruelest human beings on Earth. Thanks to them, before our latest wave of Revolutions, Latin America suffered from the greatest disparities on earth. Tens of millions of its people were murdered. It was racially divided. It was plundered. Its veins were, and to a great extent still are, open  to borrow from the terminology of the great storyteller Eduardo Galeano.

My friend Noam Chomsky wrote about it extensively. I wrote about it in several chapters of my two latest books: : Exposing Lies Of The Empire and Fighting Against Western Imperialism. Others have as well.

How can people still listen to those mass murderers, with a straight face?

***

One thing cannot be disputed: only a big and powerful government and its army could now defend its people. Latin American revolutionary leaders were given a mandate by the people, and they have no right to back up, to betray.

Indecisiveness could prove lethal.

Referendum after referendum, people expressed their support for the revolutionary Proceso, in Venezuela and elsewhere. Year after year the fascist opposition has been showing spite for the voices of the people, the same spite it has demonstrated for centuries.

Sabotage after sabotage was administered, one treasonous act after another committed. As was promised by the Bolivian elites, the Venezuelan capitalist bandits paralyzed their country by shortages. Even rolls of toilet paper became a deficit. All too familiar Like in Chile before 1973!

The message is clear: you want to be able to wipe your ass after shitting, then betray socialism! Or: You want to eat? Then down with the legacy of Chavez!

The will of the people is being humiliated. The elites are spitting straight into the faces of the majority.

Some citizens are now voting for the right, simply because they are exhausted, because they are scared, because they see no solution. They are voting against their own will (as they used to in Nicaragua during the reign of Aleman), because if they vote for their own candidates, they would be made to eat shit, literally.

But solutions are there! They are available.

Instead of listening to some Euro-centric gurus from Slovenia or New England, the Latin American governments should ask for help and lean on such countries as Russia and China, immediately joining alternative financial institutions, forging defense treaties, working on energy and other deals with those who are actually standing up against Western imperialism.

Latin America should never lose its independence. But with proven good friends and true powerful alliances, independence is never lost.

Our leaders should shed their dependency on the Western Left. Mainly because the Western Left does not exist anymore, with some tiny, miniscule exceptions that proves the rule. What remain are a huge army of liberals, and then a tremendous multitude of selfish beings defending their own interests and concepts. They are horrified of those who are truly fighting and winning; therefore they openly hate Russia, China and other non-Western nations. Frankly, they are racist. Such people cannot inspire or impress anybody, and so they are trying their luck at the distant shores, diluting determination and perverting the essence of the South American revolutions.

This is the time to be focused. South America should fight, with all its might. It is not easy, but its treasonous families, those who are destroying the precious lives of tens of millions of human beings, should be identified, arrested and tried. It should be done immediately! What many of them are actually doing is not being in opposition. They are interrupting the democratic process in their own countries, selling their homelands once again to foreign powers and international capital.

***

Mass media outlets that are spreading misinformation, lies and foreign propaganda should also be immediately identified. They should be exposed, confronted, and if their goal is to destroy the socialist fatherland, shut down. Again, this is no time for liberal niceties.

Freedom of expression has nothing to do with the freedom of using newspapers and television stations to spread fabrications, fear and uncertainty, or to call for the direct overthrow of democratically elected governments.

And in South America, entire huge international newspaper and television syndicates have been working for years and decades for one single and deadly goal  to smear and liquidate the Left, and to deliver the entire continent back to the racist, fascist foreign imperialist rulers.

It has all gone too far, and it has to stop.

A few months ago, I was riding on the impressive Sao Paulo metro system, together with my Cuban friend.

It is much better than any public transportation network that I have seen in Europe or in the United States, I exclaimed.

But people in Brazil think that it is total shit, commented my friend, laconically.

How come? I was shocked.

Because they are told so on the television, and because they read it in the newspapers.

Yes, thats how it is! Free art, including opera, given to the Brazilian public, is nothing more than crap, if one reads the mainstream Brazilian press. Free medical care, no matter how (still) imperfect it is, is not even worth praising. Free education in so many South American countries  New transportation networks, free or heavily subsidized books, brilliant parks with brand new libraries that are mushrooming in Chile and Ecuador Financial support for the poor, the fight to keep children in school, the fight to save the environment, countless programs to protect indigenous communities

Nothing, nothing, and absolutely nothing is positive in the eyes of the pro-Western South American propagandists!

This has become one huge counter-process, financed from foreign and local sources, aimed at discrediting all those great achievements.

***

Corruption!!! That is the new battle cry of the elites and their lackeys. Accusations of corruption are fabricated or inflated against all governments of the left: Dilma Rousseff in Brazil, Rafael Correa of Ecuador, Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela, Evo Morales of Bolivia, even Michelle Bachelet of Chile. Cristina Kirchners back was almost broken by constant corruption charges.

But how on earth could anyone take such accusations seriously, if they are coming from those who have been plundering, for over 500 years, their own continent on behalf of Europe and then the United States and multi-national corporations? Like locust, the right-wing families have been looting all the natural resources, while forcing people into near slave labor. Under horrendous feudal and fascist rulers, Latin America was converted into the pinnacle of corruption  moral and economic.

Nothing was left intact, and nothing remained pure. In order to survive in such a vile system, people had to bend, twist, and maneuver.

Now these same bandit clans that have been destroying the continent are smearing, pointing fingers at the governments that are, step by step, trying to reverse the trend and serve the people.

The same bastards that were bombing restaurants and hotels in their own countries, planting bombs on passenger airliners, and assassinating thousands of innocent people, are talking about morality.

Are our people, our governments, expected to reach, to achieve total purity in just one or two decades, after the entire continent had been functioning for over 500 years as a bordello of Western colonialism and imperialism?

Are we going to allow ourselves to be on the defensive when facing those who robbed and raped almost everything and everybody in Latin America?

***

Yes, the people of Latin America were brutalized for several long centuries. They went through unimaginable suffering. They lost everything. But they never gave up. Since the holocaust performed by Spanish, Portuguese and other European barbaric conquerors, they have been rising, rebelling and fighting for their scarred land.

Pablo Neruda wrote a tremendous poem Heights of Machu Picchu. Eduardo Galeano wrote Open Veins of Latin America. It is all there, in those two tremendous works.

The fight goes on, to this very moment.

Most of the power is now, finally, in the hands of those who are determined to fight for the interests of their people.

We have no right to be defeated. If we do, hundreds of millions will lose their future and their hope.

Such an opportunity would not come back. It is here, for the first time in 500 years! Millions died to bring it here. If the Revolution is crashed now, it may not return in full force for who knows how many years. In simple terms it means that several more generations would be lost!

We have to counterattack now. What are we waiting for? Of what are we afraid? That the biggest terrorist on Earth  the West  would brand us as undemocratic? That the same West that has, for centuries, overthrown our governments, murdered our leaders as well as simple men, women and children would not give us its stamp of approval? That we would be criticized by those countries, which are still looting, violating, lying and ruining?

Our friends, our allies are not in the West. We all know how lukewarm was the support given to Venezuela, Cuba or Ecuador in Europe and North America by those progressive forces, and how hostile was the mainstream. We have to wake up and join forces with those who are now standing proudly and with great determination against Western imperialism and market fundamentalism.

There is no time for experiments. This is the fight for our survival!

As I wrote earlier, in order for the Revolutions to continue, we need big governments, determined cadres, loyal armies and mighty allies. We also need huge Latin American solidarity, true unity and integration. One monolithic South American block in fraternal embrace with other truly independent countries.

This is an extremely serious moment, Comrades! This is damn serious.

Anarchism and the concepts of the factories administered by workers will not save us right now.

Argentina has fallen, but Venezuela is still standing. Each creek, each boulder has now to be defended, be it in Brazil, Uruguay, Ecuador, Bolivia, Chile, Venezuela, Nicaragua or Cuba.

We have to be tough, we have to be alert, and we cannot do it alone!
The Broader Design of the Anti-Syria Forces The Imperialist Violence in Syria, Part 2 of 7 - Part 1

By Kim Petersen and B. J. Sabri January 09, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - Previously, we asked , why is Russia concerned about US-promoted violence Syria? In a news dispatch, " Why Russia is standing by Syria's Assad ," BBC, the voice of British imperialism, answers our question with these words, "By standing up for Damascus, the Kremlin is telling the world that neither the UN, nor any other body or group of countries has the right to decide who should or should not govern a sovereign state." The writers agree with the expressed sentiment; however, Russia's position on the Syrian conflict should be looked at from a different perspective. A principled Russia appears to have concluded that the US-engineered violence in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Ukraine, and other parts of the world is a means to implement a longstanding agenda: global US imperialist domination. We, therefore, view Russia's intervention in Syria as a way to stop the United States from carrying out its plans for devouring the world, one country at a time. If the relentless US attempts to place world nations under its control or tutelage are allowed to go unchallenged, Russia and China will be left completely isolated to defend their own people, territory, history, culture, economy, aspirations, and way of life from American imperialist predation. Most notably, after Russian jets started hitting terrorist camps and infrastructures regardless of their "Islamic" or "secular" affiliations or the phony distinction between "extremist" and "moderate," many voices, especially American and those of her Arab and European vassals, clamored against its entry in Syria. Their objection is preposterous: that Russia's involvement is an aggravating factor leading to the prolongation of war. First, if that were so, why did the West and co-actors allow the carnage to continue before Russia called their bluff? Second, the US is not interested in ending the war on the Arabs even if Assad falls. There is no reason to doubt that after Assad, ISIS and sisters would take his place in the American agenda as evidenced by US officials repeatedly declaring that defeating ISIS would take 10 to 30 years . However, 30 years later and long after ISIS has disappeared from the news, it is expectedbased on the historical recordthat the United States would continue to create pretexts and persist in its interventionist policies. Emphatically, deciding how this conflict should end must never be allowed to rest in the hands of US imperialists and Zionist neoconsand this is what Russia is trying to do. In essence, starting with Syria, Russia is powerfully moving to end US hegemony. Second, the clamor seems to suggest that only the United States (and its European vassals) should enjoy the unrequested privilege to fly sorties against targets of its choosinglike hitting bare dunes or insignificant targets instead of encamped or convoyed armed groups. This can explain why after 14 months of American bombardment of Syria and Iraq, US-trained groups (like ISIS, al-Nusra, etc.) were still doing well and expanding. Curiously, did analysts ever point to the fact that western air campaigns, regardless of who carries them out, are destroying Syria's civilian and economic infrastructures? Consider this: While Russia is confining itself to hitting the military structures and transport logistics of ISIS and affiliated organizations, the West pursued an extremist agenda to bring about the dissolution of the current Syrian state: namely, the systematic destruction of its economic assets. When the Pentagon brags " Most of Islamic States oil refineries in Syria have been destroyed , when Britain's RAF bombs ISIS "oil fields , and when France joins in the wanton destruction, the fact remains: there is no "Islamic State" except in name. And there are no refineries belonging to itsnatching them is another issue. However, what the US, British, and French jetfightersand as of late even Russia, as reported by the Independent destroyed were expensive oil-refining structures, facilities, and oil trucks belonging to the Syrian people. Ample evidence suggests that the West created so-called ISIS as a pretext to attack Syria (and partition Iraq) without a declaration of war. As for the denomination of "Islamic State," we should mention that, besides how this terrorist organization likes to call itself, only the West emphasizes it is a "state" and capitalizes both noun and adjective. Most Arab media, on the other hand, correctly call it "the organization of the islamic state." (Notes: 1) there is no capitalization in the Arabic language, 2) the present writers call it islamist state without capitalization because this western creation has nothing to do with Islam, hence it should not share its adjective; in addition, it is not a state.) Based on our observations of the military developments just after the entry of Russia, we could say that the US was in a race with time to destroy Syria before Russia destroys the foreign-backed Islamist groups. Secretary of State John Kerry explained this design in a twisted way. He recently said, " US wants to avoid total destruction of Syria." What he essentially meant was this: the United States wants the destruction of Syria but not all the way to total. Besides, why did he say this just now and not immediately after becoming State Secretary? Recently, 55 Wahhabist and Muslim Brothers "scholars" in Saudi Arabia issued a so-called jihad fatwa against the "Russian Orthodox Crusaders." 1 Well, during the past 14 months of illegal US bombardment of Syria (and now of ground troops in the guise of advisors to their terrorist groups), we never heard these dubious characters releasing even a whisper against the "American multi-religion Crusaders." This episode can tell us just a little bit, as to who is directing Saudi Wahhabists and associates. Writing about violence in Syria without investigating first the forces that created and shaped it is similar to investigating ocean tides without mentioning the role of the moon in creating them. Accordingly, we must attempt to frame the issue of violence in Syria in exacting terms: who is turning Syria into a wasteland and theater of death similar to those the United States and Britain created in Iraq, to a slightly lesser extent in Libya, and now in Yemen via the fascist Wahhabi state of Saudi Arabia? Let us begin by citing the Syrian regime's harsh response (resulting in deaths) to the anti-regime protests in Daraa. First, that Daraa was the starting point of the protests is by itself very suspicious for one good reason. Daraa is a border city with Jordan. This means many foreign intelligence services in cooperation with the sold-to-imperialism Jordanian regime had easy access to foment protests under the guise of the so-called Arab Spring. Our question: who, just three weeks after that response, poured gasoline on the fire and began installing tent cities in Turkey and Jordan in expectation of refugees? This suggests that someone was expecting mass violence to erupt and refugees to start escaping to neighboring countries. Who then sent Saudi, European, Chechen, and others Islamists to Syria, armed them with heavy weapons, anti-tank missiles, gave them salaries, dressed them with Afghani garbs, made them carry black banners with religious themes taken from the Saudi flag, and topped all that with convoys of brand-new shimmering Toyota trucks? 2 What should be done if the anti-war front does not possess the material means to end the bloodshed? How to stop the tens of thousands of foreign groups paid for and armed mostly by Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and trained by the US and its regional clients Turkey and Jordan? Is it not ludicrous to watch killers coming to Syria from every corner of the world to overthrow the Syrian government under the banners of an Islam turned into a cult and re-defined and supported by the Wahhabis of the Gulf, by the United States, by the West, and of course by Israel? To emphasize our point: the unspeakable destruction of Syria is not a Syrian-made event. Those who are destroying Syria and killing its people are doing it following a precise imperialist design using tried-and-tested violence carried out before in many parts of the world. The pain of the Syrian people is undoubtedly real. While the present writers express our deepest sorrow for all those who have died and empathy with all those who are still alive but may still die senselessly pending a solution, we need to uncover more facts. For instance, we noticed that those who armed the domestic opponents of the Syrian regime such as so-called free Syrian army (composed of defectors and other unknown elements), as well as foreign islamist terrorists, and non-Muslim mercenariesnever tire from repeating that they are fighting in response to the Syrian regime's atrocities. Yet, they themselves are the direct cause of atrocities and terrorism. We also noticed that the US and its Arab and Turkish instruments are in the sleazy habit of saying they support freedom in Syria. We wonder, since when have the rulers of Americans, Turks, Saudis, Qataris, and Emiratis ever cared about freedom, democracy, human rights, and the prosperity of nations? Where is meaningful evidence for this? What is the broader design of the forces that organized international death legions and ordered them to destroy Syria under the pretext of fighting a bad regime? While we are on the subject, since the objective of US imperialism is known: global, unrestrained hegemony, why is Syria in the bullseye of countries like Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar? Have these countries, known for their dreadful suppression of freedom and political rights become overnight the standard-bearers of humanist values, personal freedoms, and political emancipation! From the Right, Left, and from everywhere, genuine and crocodile tears had been shed for the victims of violence in Syria; sincere but also fake grief had been heaped on the plight of refugees. Yet, with all exceptions considered, the near generalized destruction of Syria and its rich historical and human heritage is obliquely mentioned. And, we see images of cities destroyed, heads decapitated, people thrown from rooftops, captives burnt alive, women raped, and men and women (accused of illicit sex) stoned to death, the blame in western media and Arab news outlets (mostly owned by Saudi Arabia and Qatar) invariably goes to the Syrian regimebut never to terrorist groups and their backers. Is it not odd that the Qatari ruling family supports the Muslim Brothers in Syria with all means possible while its governing system, besides housing American military bases, is void of any sign of the Brothers' values? Saudi Arabia is another ridiculous story. It proselytizes Wahhabism, arms and trains the inductees, put them at the service of the United States to conduct terrorismespecially in the Arab states that oppose US hegemony, but then it boasts it is fighting a Syrian regime that kills its people! From our side, we shall never tire from repeatedly posing the same questions: who wants to see Syria destroyed and why? Unless one posits a pathological intolerance and hatred for Syria's government, it is hard to come up with an elucidating rationale for Saudi Arabia's violent animus. This leads us to consider an outside agent. What caused the Saudi rulers to assume a primary role in the destruction of Syria, and before it a role in the destruction of Iraq, then Libya, and now Yemen? Who is destroying the Arab lands with their marvelous cultural, ethnic, and religious mosaics? How could anyone understand anything about violence in Syria if the prevailing tendency to analyze it is focused on flash news and made-for-mass-media stories? Overlooking related factsby design, conformity, lack of specific knowledge, or just plain powerlessnesshas also become a trend. This has not only caused the roots of the conflict to be eventually oversimplified, but it has also diluted the long documented history behind the war's growth and expansion. In short, who wants to see Syria destroyed and why? Let us investigate. In a 2007 TV interview, Gen. Wesley Clark stated the following: About ten days after 9/11, I went through the Pentagon and I saw Secretary Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz. I went downstairs just to say hello to some of the people in the joint staff who used to work for me, and one of the Generals called me in. He said, Sir, youve got to come in and talk to me for a second. I said, Youre too busy. He said, No. We have made the decision were going to war with Iraq. I said, Were going to war with Iraq? Why? He said, I dont know, I guess they dont know what else to do. So I said, Well did they find some information connecting Saddam to Al-Qaeda? He said, No, theres nothing new that way, they just made the decision to go to war with Iraq. So I came back to see the same guy a few weeks later, and by that time we were bombing in Afghanistan. I said, Are we still going to war with Iraq? And he said, Oh its worse than that. And he reached over to his desk, picked up a piece of paper and he said, Ive just got this down from upstairs. (Meaning the Secretary of Defences [sic] office) and he said, This is a memo that describes how were going to take out seven countries in five years, starting with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Iran. I said, Is it classified? He said, Yes, sir. I said, Well dont show it to me. And I saw him a year or so later and I said, You remember that? He said, Sir, I didnt show you that memo. I didnt show it to you.3 In a TV interview that took place two years before large-scale violence exploded in Syria, Roland Dumas, former French Foreign Minister said the following: Im going to tell you something. I was in England, two years before the violence in Syria, on other business. I met with top British officials who confessed to me that they were preparing something in Syria. This was in Britain, not in America. Britain was organizing an invasion of rebels into Syria. They even asked me, although I was no longer Minister for Foreign Affairs, if I would like to participate. Responding to a question on the motive behind inciting violence in Syria, Dumas said, Very simple, with a very simple aim  to overthrow the Syrian government because in the region its important to understand that the Syrian regime makes anti-Israeli talk. And then the former Foreign Minister added that hed been told, by an Israeli Prime Minister a long time ago, that Tel Aviv would seek to destroy any country that did not get along with it in the region. It is not just about Israel, it is about the acquisition of country after country across the Middle and Near East, North Africa and then going deeper and deeper South into Africa. This has been planned for decades. 4 Next: Part 3 of 7 NOTES Al Monitor,  Saudi religious scholars enraged over Moscow's recent Syria strikes . For reading:  Obama Proposes $500 Million to Aid Syrian Rebels ;  The nations that sent arms and money to Syria ;  Where Does ISIS Get Those Wonderful Toys? ;  See other "ISIS" convoys . Reported at Humans Are Free website,  The Hidden Truth Behind Syria and the Arab Spring . Reported at Humans Are Free website,  The Hidden Truth Behind Syria and the Arab Spring . Kim Petersen is a former editor of the Dissident Voice newsletter. He can be reached at kimohp@inbox.com B. J. Sabri is an observer of the politics of modern colonialism, imperialism, Zionism, and of contemporary Arab issues. He can be reached at b.j.sabri@aol.com
Happy Birthday H-Bombs Marshall Kim By Eric Margolis January 09, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - Lets begin 2016with the thrilling explosion of our first hydrogen bomb, so that the whole world will look up to our socialist, nuclear-armed republic and the great Workers Party of Korea! - Kim Jong-un January 09, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - North Koreans may be happy, but the rest of the world certainly is not. Predictably, the US, Japan, China, Australia and South Korea seethed with fury at the explosive North Koreans. China scowled and muttered. This hypocrisy and hysteria made world equity markets, already reeling from new Chinese financial blundering, crazy as uninformed investors ran for the lifeboats. The UN shook its tiny fist at North Korea, ignoring that the US, Britain, France, Russia and China are all in violation of the 1963 Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. There was not a peep about nuclear scofflaws, Israel, Pakistan and India. Nor mention that todays outraged South Korea and Taiwan had been caught by CIA red-handed trying to make their own nuclear weapons. Is North Koreas claim of a hydrogen weapon true? The 6-7 kiloton underground nuclear blast  close to Chinas northern border was not indicative of a true thermonuclear weapon. It may, however, have been a test of the atomic trigger used to detonate a full hydrogen weapon. In any event, whether or not the device was an H-bomb or not, what really mattered was that Pyongyangs crowing that the device had been miniaturized. North Koreas foes have long feared that it would shrink and lighten a nuclear warhead sufficiently to be carried atop some of the Norths 1,000 medium-range missile arsenal. North Korea is believed to have about ten nuclear devices, but they are heavy and unsuited to high-stress ballistic flight. Still, there appears little doubt that North Korea is well on its way to deploy a respectable strategic nuclear force. North Koreans have been eating grass for decades to achieve just this goal. In Pyongyangs view, the US, Japan and South Korea all plan to invade North Korea, oust the Kim dynasty, and turn it into yet another western satrapy. Only North Koreas redoubtable if obsolescent million-man armed forces prevent this invasion, says Pyongyang. Annual, massive US-South Korean military exercises mimicking an invasion of North Korea do nothing to lessen Pyongyangs paranoia. There was also an important element of inter-Korean politics at play here. The North claims it is the only true, authentic Korea. South Korea, spits Pyongyang, is an American colony, garrisoned by US troops, and run by puppets. South Koreas armed forces are still commanded in wartime by a US four-start general. North Koreas nuclear progress stands in sharp contrast to the Souths, which was shut down by Washington. In spite of its blood-curdling threats against the US, North Korea is far from producing long-ranged missiles that can deliver nuclear warheads to North America. The real target for North Koreas missiles would be US bases in South Korea, Okinawa, Japan and Guam. But most likely only in the event of a full-scale US-led assault on the North. The US military does not like to fight opponents who have real armies. A US invasion of the north was estimated to produce upwards of 200,000 American military casualties. The most likely cause of US and South Korean military intervention in North Korea would be the collapse or overthrow of the Kim dynasty. China might sweep into North Korea to prevent it from falling under western and Japanese control. Japan is quietly content to see Korea remain divided. A united Korea would be a determined geopolitical and economic competitor with Japan. Koreans remains deeply hostile to Japan. South Korea sees its highest threat as unexpected reunification: a collapse of North Korea that sends millions of starving refugees south, forcing Seoul to feed and rebuild the north. The biggest concern in the US is that North Korean nuclear and missile technology will be sold to Israels Arab and Iranian foes. Pro-Israel neocons sabotaged a nuclear reduction deal with Pyongyang in 1994. Besides, the US likes keeping powerful, nuclear-armed forces in South Korea and around its highly strategic region. North Koreas Kim Jong-un may be zany and provocative, but he shows no desire to court nuclear suicide by attacking the US. So happy upcoming birthday, Marshall Kim. Revealing a supposed submarine-launched missile was his last years birthday surprise. Please try to calm down the West. Copyright Eric S. Margolis 2016
Nobel laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, has advised the government to be prepared for counter-attacks from corrupt Nigerians and their cohorts as it fights against the menace.

Speaking in Lagos, Professor Soyinka pointed out that it was the first time that the fight against corruption had been heightened and should not be treated lightly.

It is going to be a hard one. It has already started.

There is no question whatsoever that we are not where we were before this new administration took over, but we must all have to be very careful.

Corruption fights back and the hardest fighters are those already within the cesspit of corruption.

The fight is on two levels. One is directly against corruption and then you have to prepare for the counter-attack that is where we are at the moment, Professor Soyinka said.

He expressed worry at how funds meant for the purchase of military equipment to fight Boko Haram insurgency in the northeast was diverted without consideration for the helpless victims of the insurgent attacks and the soldiers at the forefront of the battle.

We havent had a situation where it is being alleged and increasingly proved that money supposed to be spent on defending ourselves, our nation and our neighbourhood has been shared.

I have not heard such expose within the military before and of cause because of that very reason, corruption has chosen to fight back. When people fight back, I like that, because when they fight back they energise you and you get ready for them, Soyinka said.
As the supplementary governorship election in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area and 101 other polling units across Bayelsa State is taking place, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has described the exercise as a mere formality as the All Progressives Congress, in conjunction with the security agencies and the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, have already written the result of the election.

The election is underway in Southern Ijaw and the other polling units to conclude the governorship election held on December 5, 2015, but was declared inconclusive by INEC.

The PDP candidate and incumbent governor, Seriake Dickson, was leading his challenger, Timipre Sylva of APC with over 30,000 votes in the seven out of the eight local governments of the state released before the postponement.

Southern Ijaw local government has over 120, 000 registered voters and will be the deciding factor in who emerges governor of the state.

In a statement Friday, the Acting National Chairman of the PDP, Uche Secondus, said that from intelligence report gathered by the party, Saturdays election is a mere formality because the APC, using federal might, has already written the results ahead of the election.

Southern Ijaw is the home local government of former governor of the state, Chief DSP Alamiseighga and a known Ijaw leader. The state is politically divided into Nembe, Ogbia and Southern Ijaw, that is the home LGA of Ijaws where the governor, Siarake Dickson is from.

This is the strongest home base of the PDP and our party has been winning elections in this core Ijaw LGA because it is the ancestral home of all Ijaws

Intelligence report at our disposal shows that the election is just a mere formality as results have been written with INEC standing as the main culprit, he said.

The PDP Chairman alleged that Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF, as well as the Minister of Defence and the Inspector General of Police have directed INEC to write the results in favour of APC.

He also said there is the use of Police and military personnel to intimidate voters and also scare them away as results are already written as directed.

Secondus noted that winning the Bayelsa governorship election is part of APCs plot of having a foothold in the South-south, saying, all ministers and government officials from the zone have been directed to ensure that Bayelsa is delivered to the APC at all cost.

He, therefore, called on the international community to be aware of the plot warning that this has the consequences of hurting Nigerias nascent democracy.

Mr. Secondus said Nigerians and the global community should hold the APC responsible should anything happen to democracy in the country because of the APCs quest to turn Nigeria into a one-party state.

The PDP chair recalled that it was this quest of winning at all cost that was responsible for the collapse of the Second Republic.
The Federal Government would introduce insurance package for soldiers fighting insurgency in the North-East, Minister of Defence, Brig.-Gen. Mansur Dan-Ali (retd.), said on Friday.

He made the disclosure while briefing newsmen shortly after a Special Jumaat Prayer to mark the 2016 Armed Forces Remembrance Day celebration in Abuja.

According to Dan-Ali, there were already numerous packages enjoyed by the military as a way of motivating them to ensure the success of the ongoing counter insurgency operation.

Normally we have package for the families of the fallen heroes but recently we are introducing the death insurance which has not been done before.

It is an additional package by President Muhammadu Buhari to motivate our gallant armed forces and to take care of the families of the fallen heroes, he said.

The minister solicited for prayers from all Nigerians to ensure the defeat of the Boko Haram terrorists.

Dan-Ali maintained that the military was getting it right in the ongoing fight against insurgency, and expressed optimism that Boko Haram would soon be a thing of the past in the country.

I believe Nigerians are fully aware of what the military has done so far and with their prayers everything will come to an end very soon, he said.

Earlier, the President of the Senate, Dr. Bukola Saraki, said that the prayer was part of recognition of the sacrifice made by men and women who laid down their lives to defend the territorial integrity of the country.

We must continue to do this not only to motivate their families that are left behind but to also encourage our men that are presently fighting insurgency, Saraki said.

He, therefore, called on all Nigerians to always remember the fallen heroes in their daily prayers and also pray for the unity and development of the country.

On his part, the Deputy Chief Imam of the National Mosque, Sheikh Ahmad Onilewura, prayed for the victory of the armed forces over the forces of evil in the country.

The prayer was attended by the Chief of Air Staff, Air Vice Marshal Sadique Abubakar, the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed and the Minister of State for Environment, Alhaji Usman Jibrin, among others. (NAN)
Accord Party has confirmed receiving N100 million from a former chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Tony Anenih, ahead of the 2015 general elections.

The party said it got the money through its national leader, Senator Rashidi Ladoja, who was the partys governorship candidate in Oyo State.

The party acknowledged the payment in a letter to the chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Ibrahim Magu.

The letter, dated January 8, 2016 was signed by the national secretary of the party, Nureni Adisa.

Mr. Anenih is one of several high profile Nigerians discovered to have received payments from a $2.1 billion slush fund, originally meant for the purchase of arms and munitions for the Nigerian Armed Forces to effectively combat the Boko Haram insurgency but which was diverted by the erstwhile National Security Adviser, NSA, Sambo Dasuki.

The former PDP BoT chairman reportedly explained to the EFCC in a letter late last year that he was not a beneficiary of the sum, but that he was instructed by former President Goodluck Jonathan to release the funds to some political groups for mobilisation and post-election peace advocacy.

He stated in a letter to the EFCC that N100 million was given to the leader of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Olu Falae, N100 million to the leader of Accord, Mr. Ladoja, and N63 million to a group headed by leader of the Northern Elders Council, Tanko Yakassai.

Confirming receipt of the funds, in the letter titled, Release of One Hundred Million by Chief Tony Anenih, Mr. Adisa said, Our attention has been drawn to a newspaper report that the sum of One Hundred Million Naira was released to the ACCORD leader, Senator Rashidi Ladoja by Chief Tony Anenih, the (former) Chairman BoT of the PDP.

We confirm that the sum of One Hundred Million Naira was given to the party through our leader after series of meetings between the leadership of ACCORD and Chief Tony Anenih in preparation for the 2015 general elections, said the letter.

Mr. Adisa highlighted three issues discussed at the said meetings, which according to him, led to the release of N100 million to Mr. Ladoja.

There was need to support the presidential candidate of the PDP since ACCORD had no presidential candidate.

The need to ensure that peace was maintained to enhance peaceful movement during periods of campaign, elections and after the elections.

The need for the PDP to support ACCORD campaign effort, said the letter.

Accordingly, the AP scribe said Mr. Anenih released N100 million for these purposes through our leader, Senator Rashidi Adewolu Ladoja.

The money released was accordingly used for the purposes as stated above, Mr. Adisa added.
Punch

$2.1bn arms deal: Ladoja received N100m from Anenih Accord Party

The Accord Party has confirmed that its leader, Senator Rashidi Ladoja, received N100m from the former Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Tony Anenih, ahead of the last general elections.

http://www.punchng.com/2-1bn-arms-deal-ladoja-received-n100m-from-anenih-accord-party/

Vanguard

How selfish leaders hinder Nigerias growth  Obasanjo

FORMER President,Olusegun Obasanjo, yestetrday, said selfish leaders have hindered the growth and progress of the country. Obasanjo, who advised that every leader to make the interest of the governed paramount in his policies, spoke when the leadership and members of the Scout Association of Nigeria paid him a courtesy visit and decorated him as Messenger of Peace Ambassador for Africa at his Presidential Hilltop mansion in Abeokuta.

The Sun

Buharis anti-graft war not selective  Ajomale Nigerians have been enjoined to support the ongoing war against corruption by President Muhammadu Buhari. http://sunnewsonline.com/new/buharis-anti-graft-war-not-selective-ajomale/ Thisday Lawmakers: Ambodes Demolition of Oshodi Market Necessary, Timely Some lawmakers, yesterday, defended the demolition of Owonifari Market within the notorious loop of Oshodi by the State Government, describing the development as necessary step towards the actualization of Oshodi transformation plan http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/lawmakers-ambode-s-demolition-of-oshodi-market-necessary-timely/229841/

Guardian

PDP demands immediate release of Metuh

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has called on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to immediately release its National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh.

http://www.ngrguardiannews.com/2016/01/pdp-demands-immediate-release-of-metuh/

Daily Times

Arms deal: Ladoja collected N100m from Anenih, Accord Party confirms

Accord Party, one of the political parties which did not sponsor a presidential candidate for the 2015 elections, has confirmed receiving N100 million from a former chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Peoples Democratic Party, Tony Anenih, ahead of the polls.

http://dailytimes.com.ng/continued-detention-metuh-unhealthy-democracy-ekweremadu/

Daily Trust

Arms deal: Metuh didnt receive N1.4bn or N4m monthly  PDP

The National Publicity unit of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has said that the partys National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh never received the sum of N1.4 billion from the Office of former National Security Adviser (ONSA) Colonel Sambo Dasuki (rtd).

National Mirror

Police in manhunt for mother who sold four-month-old baby

Policemen attached to the Lagos State Police Command are on the trail of a house wife who allegedly sold her four months old baby.

http://nationalmirroronline.net/new/police-in-manhunt-for-mother-who-sold-four-month-old-baby/

Leadership

Lassa Fever Kills 40, Spreads To Gombe, Plateau, Other States

The Lassa Fever re-emergence mortality rate has increased to 43.2% and has claimed the lives of five more people between Thursday and Friday, pegging the death toll to 40 as against 35 that was recorded on Thursday, thereby bringing the total number of reported cases to 86.

http://leadership.ng/news/490069/lassa-fever-kills-40-spreads-gombe-plateau-states

The Nation

The best of Buhari

By the time his tenure is over, will President Muhammadu Buhari be called great? Or will he be dismissed as just another has-been, or, worse, a mistake of the presidential kind? Well, it depends. For it will depend on how he applied himself to the weight and demands of his office, and whether he managed to crack the huge challenges facing his over 170m people, or the challenges cracked him.

http://thenationonlineng.net/the-best-of-buhari/

Tribune

Why Alamieyeseigha hasnt been buried

THE volatile political situation in Beyelsa State is responsible for the delay of a heroic burial of former governor of the state, Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, it has been learnt.

http://tribuneonlineng.com/%E2%80%98why-alamieyeseigha-hasn%E2%80%99t-been-buried%E2%80%99
Some federal and state lawmakers on Friday rose up in defence of the Lagos State Governments decision to demolish the Owonifari Market within the notorious loop of Oshodi, describing the development as a necessary step towards the actualization of Oshodi transformation plan.

The government had relocated traders at the Owonifari Market to the nearby newly built ultra-modern Isopakodowo Market before the demolition exercise Wednesday morning.

A lawmaker representing Agege Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives, Hon. Taofiq Adaranijo, in reaction to the development, said contrary to the criticisms trailing the action, what the administration of Governor Akinwunmi Ambode has done was a wonderful development aimed at restoring sanity to the area.

He said: When you go round other parts of the world, you will hardly see a market in such a place and constructing a bus terminal there will beautify the place and change that environment for good. It will add colour to the megacity that we are dreaming for Lagos and this is a bold step towards achieving the transformation plan.

Those are the things we want the Governor to continue to do. Although it is going to be hard and it will be a difficult decision to take, at the end of the day, people will appreciate it. They may not see it at the beginning but at the end of the day, they will appreciate it and that is a good step in the right direction, Adaranijo added.

Also speaking in an interview with journalists, a member representing Epe State Constituency 2 in the State House of Assembly, Segun Olulade, said the demolition was not done with any bad intention, but that same was in best interest of all residents of the State.

According to Olulade, Oshodi is gradually becoming a haven for criminals and what the government has done will no doubt check crime, enhance security around the area and aid free flow of traffic.

He said: Some people are claiming that the traders were not given enough notice to quit the market before the demolition exercise took place as required by law, but when situations like this arise, nobody will say they were adequately notified. There is no reason for anyone to be mischievous about the demolition. The Governor means well for the State and that was why the leadership of the market was severally engaged before the government went on to demolish the market.

Once again, the people should understand that the administration of Governor Ambode has good intentions. I believe that once government comes on board with its plans for the market, we will all commend government for a job well done and appreciate the action taken, Olulade said.

Another member of the Assembly representing Ifako/Ijaiye Constituency 1, Dayo Fafunmi said the plan of the State Government was to make Oshodi a place where everyone will be proud of.

He said: I am very much aware that the government gave the traders enough notice. The duty of regulating and maintaining the environment for the overriding public interest is paramount in the State.

I just want to implore our people to cooperate with the government because the administration of Ambode has good plans for the people, Fafunmi said.
The Yobe Government said it had taken additional measures to coordinate donors assistance to Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the state to guard against insurgents disguising as donors to infiltrate the camps.

The state Deputy Governor, Abubakar Aliyu disclosed this on Saturday in Damaturu in an interview with News Agency of Nigeria (NAN).

Abubakar, who is also the Chairman, Committee on Rehabilitation and Relocation of IDPs, said it had become necessary to adopt additional security measures for the safety of the IDPs.

We urge all donors ranging from government organisations to Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO) and philanthropists to liaise with the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) while providing assistance to the IDPs, he said.

He said the state government had been providing food, shelter, water, health and sanitation needs of the IDPs in both government and self- established camps.

The coordination between government and the donors has an advantage of avoiding duplication, improving synergy and intervening in areas where there are challenges and limitations, Abubakar said.

The deputy governor said the state had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) on specific areas of intervention.

The MoU signed between the state government and NEMA will check cases of duplication, waste and effective intervention to further improve the lives of the IDPs.

I urge other donor organisations and individuals to emulate NEMA to intervene through SEMA and work with the state government to provide assistance where they are most needed, he said.

Abubakar said government had worked out a three-month plan with the hope of relocating the displaced persons to their communities.

However, this depends on the assessment of the situation in the affected communities, government will liaise with security agencies for advice on the safety of returning back to the communities, he said. (NAN)
On Dec. 29, while many of you were off for the holidays, Microsoft released yet another Flash patch, KB 3132372, which covers IE and Edge in Windows 8, 8.1, and 10. The Win 10 version has been having problems.

Microsoft notes in the KB article that:

We are aware of limited application crashes that occur after this security update is installed on Windows 10. Microsoft is researching this problem with Adobe and will post more information in this article when the information becomes available.

That was a week ago. As of Jan. 4, there's been no additional information or update, and the patch hasn't been pulled. There has, however, been a loud scream of pain among Windows 10 users who have the misfortune to still be glued to Adobe Flash -- or Skype. Here are some of the reports I've seen:

Skype crashed on startup with an Exception code: 0x80000003. It looks like the folks at Skype weren't able to get Microsoft to fix KB 3132372, so they disabled the part of Skype that accesses the Flash player. Microsoft owns Skype. That should tell you something.

The HP Solution Center won't launch. Win10 customers with HP printers manufactured prior to 2011 (including many popular Scanjet and Officejet printers) won't be able to scan with their PCs. You may want to install the HP Scan and Capture app for Windows 10, available from the Windows Store. Or you may want to uninstall KB 3132372.

The Incredimail program won't start. It throws an "Exception: BREAKPOINT (80000003)."

Serif's Webplus won't start, and DrawPlus X4 crashes in some circumstances. The support people at Serif have come up with a couple of workarounds that involve adjusting settings inside Webplus. The official post also raises the possibility that this problem exists in Windows 8.1, 8, and 7 with IE10 and IE11 -- but I haven't seen any corroboration at this point.

GameMaker fails to start, with "External exception 80000003," although disconnecting from the Internet during GameMaker's boot seems to work, at least in some cases, as does disabling Startup news from File > Preferences. Lots of games got the shaft, including First Assault.

Microsoft really doesn't want you to uninstall the patch -- for good reason. As one of an ongoing string of Flash patches, KB 3132372 shores up holes in the Flash Player, which is integrated into IE10, IE11, and Edge. Those holes generally become well-known at some point after the patch is released and occasionally well-documented. Uninstalling the patch leaves your PC vulnerable to those Flash problems.

You may find hope by disabling Flash in your favorite browser and not using any browsers that allow Flash to run. (In Edge, click the ellipses in the upper-right corner, choose Settings > View Advanced Settings. Turn the Use Adobe Flash Player slider Off.) That won't completely protect you from Flash, but it's a good start.

At this point there are workarounds for the HP Solution Center, Webplus, and GameMaker issues. Skype has already thrown in the towel, so the bad patch won't keep you from Skyping.

If you want to buck Microsoft's specific instructions and uninstall the patch, here's how to do it in Windows 10 (which, as noted, appears to be the only version of Windows affected):

Step 1: Go to KB 307930 and download the wushowhide utility. (I talked about wushowhide last July.) Save the wushowhide.diagcab file someplace worthwhile -- you'll probably want to use it again, but don't run it yet.

Step 2: Click Start > Settings > Update & Security > Windows Update > Advanced Options > View your update history > Uninstall updates.

Step 3: Scroll down to the Windows updates, click on KB 3132372. At the top, click Uninstall. That'll get rid of the bad patch.

Step 4: This is a bit strange, but I found that I had to wait a few minutes before proceeding. Some people recommend that you reboot, but in my experience simply waiting for the patch to get flagged as uninstalled is sufficient.

Step 5: Double-click on wushowhide.diagcab. You will see a Hide Updates list like the one in the screenshot.

Step 6: Check the box next to this botched patch -- KB 3132372 -- and click Next. Click Next again, you'll see an odd notification message (this is, after all, a "troubleshooter") -- then you're done.

It's important to understand that this doesn't permanently hide the patch. It'll only be hidden until Microsoft issues an update for the patch, at which point Windows Update will automatically install the update.

Michael Horowitz at Computerworld reports that Adobe released yet another Flash patch on Jan. 1. According to Adobe's forum

The next version of Flash Player is available for immediate download. In today's release we've updated Flash Player ActiveX for Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 with a critical functional bug fix. We recommend all users update to the latest version.

The release notes go on to say:

January 1, 2016 - In today's release, we've updated Flash Player ActiveX for Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7. This release addresses a problem with Flash Player improperly loading in applications that have it embedded. We are working with Microsoft to provide this update to Windows 8 and Windows 10 users as soon as possible. Customers using Google Chrome or Windows 8.x/10 Internet Explorer or Microsoft Edge will receive the update through the Google and Microsoft update mechanisms.

It's customary for me to finish any discussion of Flash with a plea to get rid of the damn thing. Consider yourself re-plead.
AgMaster Report 10/19/2022 The PRICE Futures Group - 39 minutes ago DEC WHT The uncertainty surrounding the Ukraine Grain Export Corridor Deal  expiring on 11/19/22  has created roller-coaster price action for the Dec Wht! A week ago Monday, the mkt soared 60...

Russia evacuates occupied Ukrainian city, orders martial law AP - 1 hour ago KYIV, Ukraine (AP)  Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered martial law on Wednesday for four illegally annexed Ukrainian regions, doubling down on he described as very difficult. In a tacit... $SPX : 3,704.90 (-0.41%) $DOWI : 30,530.47 (+0.02%) $IUXX : 11,142.53 (-0.05%)

Gates Foundation donates $1B to prioritize math education AP - 1 hour ago The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced Wednesday that it is making grants of more than a $1 billion as part of a sweeping national plan to improve math education over the next four years. Its goal:... $SPX : 3,704.90 (-0.41%) $DOWI : 30,530.47 (+0.02%) $IUXX : 11,142.53 (-0.05%)

Grain is piling, not exporting Heartland Investor Services Inc. - 1 hour ago The grain is coming fast from the 2022 harvest, and it's piling up on the shores of the Mississippi, maintaining pressure on the grain complex.

Bears in Command Monica Kingsley - 1 hour ago S&P 500 had arguably made a local top  formed a black body candle with sizable lower knot, which Im looking to get follow through selling today, and on tomorrows set of (likely disappointing)...

UK inflation accelerates to 40-year high as food prices rise AP - 1 hour ago LONDON (AP)  British food prices rose at the fastest pace since 1980 last month, driving inflation back to a 40-year high and heaping pressure on the to balance the books without gutting help for the... $SPX : 3,704.90 (-0.41%) $DOWI : 30,530.47 (+0.02%) $IUXX : 11,142.53 (-0.05%)
Nel terzo trimestre del 2016 il prodotto interno lordo, espresso in valori concatenati con anno di riferimento 2010, corretto per gli effetti di calendario e destagionalizzato, e aumentato dello 0,3% rispetto al trimestre precedente e dello 0,9% nei confronti del terzo trimestre del 2015. Lo sostiene lIstat.

La crescita congiunturale e la sintesi di un aumento del valore aggiunto nei comparti dellindustria e dei servizi e di una diminuzione nellagricoltura. Dal lato della domanda, vi e un contributo ampiamente positivo della componente nazionale (al lordo delle scorte), in parte compensato da un apporto negativo della componente estera netta.

Nello stesso periodo il Pil e aumentato in termini congiunturali dello 0,7% negli Stati Uniti, dello 0,5% nel Regno Unito e dello 0,2% in Francia. In termini tendenziali, si e registrato un aumento del 2,3% nel Regno Unito, dell1,5% negli Stati Uniti, dell1,1% in Francia. Nel complesso, il Pil dei paesi dellarea Euro e cresciuto dello 0,3% rispetto al trimestre precedente ed dell1,6% nel confronto con lo stesso trimestre del 2015.

I dati Istat sul Pil sono in linea con le stime del governo ha commentato il ministro dellEconomia, Pier Carlo Padoan, arrivando alla Camera per lincontro con il gruppo Pd sulla legge di Bilancio. ll titolare di via XX Settembre in un tweet, poco prima, aveva sottolineato come i dati Istat confermano che leconomia e sulla strada giusta e le stime di crescita sono affidabili. Ma occorre spingere per accelerare
There is a glass of Merlot on the table, a sleeping little dog called Pepper at my feet, a gently crackling log of ash in the hearth, and a peaceful wraith of mist over Killaloe outside as I deploy my trusty rusty alphabet for the first time in yet another year. Good wishes to all of you as normality returns after the festive season.

I have a rattlebag of yarns this minute rather than a single story, so bear with me as I try to dispatch them all.

And I begin with a reality I perhaps mentioned here before about that phone on the wall of the Clare FM radio newsroom during the years I was news editor there, and its poignantly powerful connection with the rhythms of the currents of life.

It was a designated phone for the funeral directors of the county and region. Each time it jangled somebody had died and the funeral director was calling with the death notice.

And, incredibly, unbelievably almost, the pattern of the calls on that phone on the block wall from mid-December each year always touched me to the heart.

You see, except for accidents and tragedies, it stayed mute for the week before Christmas. It was clear the old ones near the end were hanging on to their lives so they would be able to be part of the welcome home for family members from England, the U.S., Europe, Australia and all the quarters of the world inhabited by the diaspora. And they did that.

And then, in the subsequent days, the Death Phone would begin to jangle again. It would often be incessant.

The old ones, having been part of the festive season, relaxed and breathed their last and headed off into the next eternal dimension to which we are all bound. I am four or five years out of the radio station now but I will never forget the tolling of that bell on the newsroom wall.

I daily peruse those death notices on the station's website, and that brings me to the next element of my rattlebag this week. I was shocked the other day to see the death of my friend John Campbell of Corofin's great Inchiquin Bar and Restaurant where I spent many happy hours during the years the Dutch Nation and I dwelt in Corofin on the edge of the Burren.

I last met energetic John last spring and he looked as spry and wry and witty as ever behind the counter on Main Street. He was only in his sixties and full of life and craic.

I always enjoyed his company and, moreover, he and his wife Anne were behind my coronation, 20 years ago, as life president of the All Ireland Stonethrowing Association. My greatest honor.

The idea had been mine, at a local community council meeting, and the event is still held every Whit weekend in the backyard of the Inchiquin Inn -- get there sometime if you can -- but I never thought I would be president of anything.

Contestants pay a few euros to throw stones across Campbell's backyard at empty bottles mounted on iron spikes. It is not as easy as it looks either!

I qualified once for the final but had to leave before the event to go to Ennis and read out the evening news. And I bore the brunt of John's wit many times thereafter for that.

A Scot in a kilt, a visitor, won the male title that year. There is also a lady champion and the competition is always fierce. Great fun.

John Campbell, a lovely gentleman, was a native of Strokestown in Co. Roscommon and they brought him back home there last weekend. RIP.

And, not being maudlin at all, I was hit quite hard earlier this very evening by another jangle of that phone. It revealed that my first cousin Bridie Clair of Lahinch had also gone away just after Christmas.

Bridie, the daughter of my father's only sister Mary Ellen, was colorful and flamboyant back in the gray forties and fifties in Fermanagh because she was the highly qualified nanny in London to a very wealthy Greek shipping family called Pateras.

She raised their kids and in return, when she was coming home, she showered the extended family with an amazing consignment of designer-label clothing of all shapes and sizes which the Greeks had given to her. Remember these were the postwar years of rationing and shortages, especially of clothing.

I got a pair of lederhosen once with a brass belt that was the pride of my boyhood. The clan womenfolk, however, in a conservative era, were unable to publicly wear many of the Greek gowns because if they were not slit up to the hipbone they had almost no tops at all in an era when even a hint of cleavage in our parish was a mortal sin.

Bridie eventually married happily in Lahinch, and I deeply regret not having seen her for years. My fault entirely.

Finally, maybe on a lighter note, I was at a New Year's party in Ballina where much of the chat was about the appalling flooding damage created upriver by the Shannon foaming past the front of the pub.

Boasting a little I said, truthfully, that I had jumped across the Shannon as a boy because the Shannon Pot, where it rises, was only a few miles away from home. (I was probably wearing those lederhosen at the time!)

I thought everyone in the group would be highly impressed until a well-traveled Dutchman at the other side of the table said, yes, he believed that because, under the same kind of circumstances, he had jumped across both the Rhine and the Rhone! That shut me up for a while!

But I will be back blethering away again next week unless that phone has cause to ring in the meantime
The results, published yesterday, came amid growing concerns about slowing shipments of Apples latest iPhone 6S models, which Hon Hai assembles.

Analysts said Hon Hais results could be an indicator of demand for Apples products in the first quarter of this year, but added that period was not normally a peak selling season and past iPhone cycles had followed a similar pattern, where an interim update on a model edition tends to see slower sales.

The first quarter is an off season, a high base from last year and the global situation is not stable, said Leon Chu, of Franklin Templeton SinoAm Securities Investment Management in Taipei.

Hon Hai, which goes by the trade name of Foxconn, reported December revenue of T$409.65bn (11.34bn), down just over 20% compared with both a year ago and November.

For 2015 as a whole, Hon Hais revenue totalled T$4.48tn, up 6.4%. Hon Hai said December sales were as expected.

Samsung Electronics said its fourth-quarter operating profit likely rose 15% from a year earlier, missing expectations and fuelling concerns the industry may be in for a year of slack gadget sales.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing, the worlds largest contract chip maker, said its December sales fell both on the month and on the year.

Reuters
They are still repaying the bill for the last upturn, according to Danske Bank, Denmarks biggest lender.

Reducing debt mountains might look like sound housekeeping. But weak exports mean Denmark has to rely on consumption to fuel growth, Danske Bank chief economist, Las Olsen, said.
Negotiations between the German car maker and the US Environmental Protection Agency are continuing and no decisions have been reached. Still, a buyback would be an extraordinary step that demonstrates the challenge of modifying vehicles that were rigged to pass emission tests.

VW has concluded it would be faster to repurchase some of the more than 500,000 vehicles than fix them, said the sources.

One source said the number of cars that might be bought back from their owners totals about 50,000, a figure that could change as talks continue.

Weve been having a large amount of technical discussion back and forth with Volkswagen, EPA administrator Gina McCarthy said on Thursday, when asked about the possibility of VW having to buy back some vehicles. We havent made any decisions on that, she said.

McCarthy told reporters after an event in Washington that VWs proposals to bring its cars into compliance with emissions standards have so far been inadequate.

We havent identified a satisfactory way forward, Ms McCarthy said. The EPA is anxious to find a way forward so that the company can get into compliance, she said.

VW is continuing talks with the US authorities and working toward a solution, said Eric Felber, a company spokesman. He declined to comment on details of the discussions.

The models in question are not the oldest ones, the so-called Generation 1 cars, the sources said. VWs US chief, Michael Horn, said in October that those models would be the most complicated to bring into compliance.

VW engineers have been working on adding an SCR catalytic converter to those cars, the people familiar with the process said.

This would mean installing a tank of urea-based solution that, when mixed with exhaust, binds with the smog-causing nitrogen oxides to reduce emissions.

McCarthy is scheduled to meet with Volkswagen chief executive Matthias Mueller at his request next Wednesday in Washington  the day before the California Air Resources Board is scheduled to publicly respond to VWs proposed repairs.

Mueller will be making his first visit to the US as VWs chief executive next week.

Two Democratic US senators urged Volkswagen to offer US consumers multiple options to compensate for damages and inconvenience of owning the diesel cars, including a speedy repair and money for lost resale value and any decrease in fuel economy.

Bloomberg
The inspection of the Good Counsel Nursing Home, on the Kilmallock Road, in Limerick, carried out by the Health Information and Quality Authority, was triggered by a pattern of concerns received by the authority and followed up on an earlier inspection.

Of the 10 headings checked, the centre was fully compliant in two, and majorly non-compliant in three.

According to the report, published yesterday: Inspectors identified that a number of actions had not been satisfactorily completed in relation to ongoing review of the quality and safety of care, healthcare, smoking arrangements, and restrictive practices.

An area of major non- compliance in the category of health and safety resulted in an immediate action being issued on the day of inspection in relation to inadequate fire safety training arrangements.

One concern that had been raised on a previous occasion was in relation to smoking practices at the centre.

According to the report: The providers explained that they actively discouraged smoking outside of the dedicated smoking area but this was not always successful and some residents were resistant to such suggestions.

Inspectors entered bedrooms on permission of residents and observed burn marks on one set of bed-sheets.

The inspection also found four staff had neither participated in a fire drill nor received fire safety training, while untrained staff had been rostered on night-duty, an arrangement described as not adequate to ensure the safe evacuation of all residents in the event of a fire from the designated centre.

Concerns were also raised about the administering of medicines, and there was also an issue regarding end-of-life wishes.

While inspectors found that care plans were in place for residents who were unwell to guide staff, a Do not attempt to resuscitate (DNAR) decision was made by one nurse in consultation with the residents family.

This was not in line with part four of the National Consent Policy, which states this duty rests with the most senior healthcare professional with responsibility for an individuals treatment and care.

In response, management at the centre said changes had been made and committed to addressing all concerns.
When his frazzled dad Paul arrived in Britain on December 7 for what turned out to be, literally, the trip of a lifetime, he did so with just the clothes on his back and no sterling in his pockets.

Hed been at Cork University Hospital visiting his son, who has cystic fibrosis, when the call came that a set of donor lungs was waiting for Arron at the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle.

That evening, after arriving in the UK, I strolled over to Sainsburys in South Gosforth, thinking I might be able to get some sterling there, and I got talking to the manager, Lee, said Paul.

I explained why Id arrived with no money and he was very sympathetic. He said when Arron was well enough, to bring him over and he could do a trolley dash paid for by Sainsburys.

Five weeks later, Arron was up and about and over in Sainsburys taking up their generous offer. Far from loading up with goodies though, he selected just two bars of chocolate. Staff got stuck in to add to his shopping cart, and in the end he had a generous basket of goodies, along with a pirate chest stuffed with more delights, including Star Wars paraphernalia. They made his day, Paul said.

Arron, from Ballinhassig, Cork, also made it to the Newcastle Museum of Natural History yesterday and Paul said they are hopeful of travelling home next week.

You wouldnt believe the transformation. Before the operation his breathing sounded like he was walking around with his lips closed, breathing through a straw. He could only shuffle about. Now you can hear him breathing clearly.

Paul said the transplant was in the nick of time.

Its an awful weight off our shoulders. We were running out of time and well be forever grateful to the donor.
It comes as disagreement brews between the Government and insurers, who say they would not sign up to a scheme to help flood-hit families and businesses until significant flood defences are built.

Gardai are also warning homeowners about bogus tradesmen calling to their doors seeking to fix any damage caused to their property by the stormy weather.

John Barry, chair of the national co-ordination group, yesterday confirmed at least 270 homes remain evacuated. However, the group is still awaiting figures from a number of local authorities, so this number is expected to rise.

A further 200 families who had to leave their flooded homes have now returned.

Mr Barry said: Other information has come forward on businesses. We have a figure of 388 businesses who have been affected by flooding.

The Dail has cleared time to let the Taoiseach, Tanaiste, and other deputies discuss the flooding crisis when it returns next week.

Although Met Eireann has forecast drier weather over the weekend, apart from some heavy showers along coastal areas, it will be many weeks before floods subside.

The Red Cross said it has already paid out around 450,000 to 166 flood-hit businesses that were unable to obtain insurance. This figure is also expected to increase as more applications are processed. Colette Morris of the Red Cross said: Next week assessors will be contacting people and they will be for applicants who are looking for claims that are in excess of 5,000.

Mr Barry warned there was still significant flooding on roads in many parts of the country, and motorists are advised to heed all diversions and not to follow their satnavs.

He also warned the public not to take unnecessary trips in boats across flood waters and said there had been some reports of flood tourism, with eager photographers putting themselves in danger to take pictures of waterlogged areas.

Gardai have also warned bogus outfits might seek to capitalise on damage caused by the adverse weather. Sgt Kelvin Courtney of the National Crime Prevention Office said: It tends to be February, into March, that the bogus tradesmen come out of the woodwork, with the spring cleaning.

But with the recent damage caused by high winds and driving rain to properties, not just those in flooded areas, the bogus tradesmen may start approaching homes sooner.

It is an opportunity for people now, if they want to be unscrupulous, to take advantage of people in these vulnerable situations, said Sgt Courtney.

He urged people who need to get urgent jobs done on their home, such as roof, boundary fencing or door repairs, to take the time to find a reputable tradesman.

People can be desperate to get a job done quick, but if you act in haste you might regret it, he said.

They might tell you its a few quid for the job, but then they come back down and say its a much bigger job and demand a lot more.

The flood barriers protecting the town in Mallow, Co Cork. Authorities there estimate defences protected the centre from flooding five times last month. Picture Dan Linehan

He advised people not to take on anyone they are suspicious of and to fit door chains, door limiters, or door viewers on their front door  and if concerned to ring local gardai.

Insurance Ireland, the representative body of Irelands insurers, yesterday said it would be unwilling to agree to any special scheme for flood-prone areas until significant flood defences are put in place by Government.

The Taoiseach is due to meet with insurers on Tuesday to discuss the issue.

However, Michael Horan of Insurance Ireland blamed flooding on inadequate investment by the Government and said it would not be logical to insure areas which are going to flood again.

The flood problem has been caused by inadequate investment in flood defences over the years combined with development on flood plains, he said.

Election dates

- Daniel McConnell
Film: The Revenant

Plot: The tale of legendary frontiersman Hugh Glass, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, who sustains injuries from a brutal bear attack in uncharted wilderness in the 1800s. His hunting team leaves him for dead, forcing Glass to fend for himself. Fuelled by a desire for vengeance, he resolves to track down his former confidant, played by Tom Hardy, who betrayed and abandoned him.

Why you should see it: While DiCaprio has managed to bag two Golden Globes so far, he has never won the Oscar for best actor . Many who have watched The Revenant believe this could be the performance to finally get DiCaprio his gong. So far it has four Golden Globe and eight Bafta nominations.

Film: The Hateful Eight

Plot: While racing toward the town of Red Rock in post-Civil War Wyoming, bounty hunter John The Hangman Ruth, played by Kurt Russell, and his fugitive prisoner, played by Jennifer Jason Leigh, run into another bounty hunter, played by Samuel L Jackson and a man who claims to be a sheriff. The group attempt to take shelter from a blizzard in a mountain pass but encounter four strangers who change everything.

Why you should see it: Its a quintessentially Tarantino film, complete with bounty hunters, Samuel L Jackson, lots of guns and gore, and probably a cameo from Quentin himself. The flick has three Golden Globe and three BAFTA nominations.

Film: Room

Plot: Held captive for years in an enclosed space, a woman, played by Brie Larson, and her five-year-old son, played by Jacob Tremblay, finally gain their freedom, allowing the boy to experience the outside world for the first time.

Why you should see it: Its based on a book written by Irish author Emma Donoghue, also titled Room. It has three Golden Globe nominations, including Best Motion Picture, and two Bafta nominations.

Film: Brooklyn

Plot: In 1950s New York, an Irish immigrant, played by Saoirse Ronan, falls for a tough Italian plumber, played by Emory Cohen, but faces temptation from another man, played by Domhnall Gleeson, when she returns home to Ireland for a visit.

Why you should see it: Brooklyn stars our own Saoirse Ronan, widely tipped for Oscars glory. The film has six Bafta noms and a Golden Globe nod.

Film: The Danish Girl

Plot: Set in Copenhagen in the 1920s, the film follows Danish artist Gerda Wegener, played by Alicia Vikander, and her husband, fellow artist Einar Wegener, played by Eddie Redmayne, as he prepares to undergo one of the first sex-change operations.

Why you should see it: Eddie Redmaynes performance has been lauded as potentially career-defining. He already has both a Golden Globe and an Oscar for last years The Theory of Everything, and has been widely tipped to scoop back-to-back Golden Globes and Oscar awards for The Danish Girl. The film has three Golden Globe and five Bafta nominations.

Film: The Big Short

Plot: The Big Short is the story of four outsiders who foresaw the global economic collapse.

The misfits subsequently decide to make a bold investment in an idea called The Big Short, leading them deep into the dark underbelly of modern banking.

Why you should see it: This movie may not sound terribly sexy, but it has a whole host of big names attached to it. Starring Christian Bale, Steve Carrell, Ryan Gosling, and Brad Pitt, this based-on-a-true-story flick is one of the most star-studded of the entire season.

The film has attracted four Golden Globe and five Bafta nods.

Film: Steve Jobs

Plot: This biopic follows the life of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, played by the always-on-form Michael Fassbender. It details the late tech gurus origins with the first Macintosh unveiling in 1984 and explores his relationship issues with his ex-girlfriend and their young daughter.

Why you should see it: Kerryman Michael Fassbender is reason enough to catch this flick but, if you need more persuading, you only have to look at the raft of award nominations it has received. It has picked up four Golden Globe and three Bafta nominations so far.
THE havoc created by winds and rain in Ireland in latter weeks is nothing new. The wind has always resulted in the unexpected in Ireland. In 1518, it blew the Habsburg Archduke Ferdinand and a royal retinue of about 400 people, en route from Spain to the Low Countries, into Kinsale.

One of the party, Laurent Vital, recorded the four-day visit in his diary.
Houses about here only infrequently come to market, and typically sell for well-above average prices. Latest case in point was the 1750s-built townhouse in the vertiginous village, Bow Hall on a half acre by Castletownshends Mall.

It made 1.2m late in 2014 when sold for its US owners the Vickerys, wrapped up by December, having only hit the market in July with local agents Charles P McCarthy.

The previous year, the same Skibbereen-based agents (acting with Savills), secured 1.85m for a contemporary version of a vernacular farmhouse cluster, Glasheenaulinn, one of West Corks best-finished contemporary private homes.

Glasheenaulinn and its guest cottage and studio, all in a cluster, stretched to 5,000 sq ft, on 38 acres, with spectacular views and two recently created lakes done by Ian Wright of Skibbereen to encourage wildlife, and it was one of the highest prices paid for any Cork property in 2014.

Gorgeous Glasheenaulinn  which featured heavily in these pages in the past  had been designed by German architects and was largely constructed by a German work crew who went bankrupt during that build process  the Irish contagion?

Its vendors had come from the UK, and had initially bought a run-down farmhouse on 140 acres to get the best chance of a planning grant, given this stretch of Castlehaven road from Castletownshend is a precious Golden Mile in a beauty parade not short of golden boreens.

They sold the house, lakes, and the 3,500 trees they had planted separate to 100 acres they had acquired across the road, and that land went back to a local farmer who has since started reclamation work on it.

All that price-crunching, background, and recall is relevant in the sale of this Castlehaven/Castletownshend farm cluster on 28 productive acres of good grazing, as its right next door to Glasheenaulinn.

It shares a long boundary along several fields with that 1.85m property, and has frontage to two roads, one the Coast Road from Castletownshend to Tragumna, the other a loop leading to Sandycove and Tracarta, back-to-back beaches on a promontory, getting morning/evening sun in their turn.

Selling agent Charles McCarthy describes this 28-acre offer as a traditional farmhouse property, totalling 3,000 sq ft in a most attractive location with superb views. It has, he notes, a favourable south-west aspect  pitch-perfect, is his judicious description  and whats offered is a long, four-bed, two-storey dwelling in excellent order, with an annex, along with a separate and well-built guest cottage.

The vendors were born in the US, but have family roots going back to this home, and the bulk of the land runs from the house towards the shoreline, yet giving enough distance to protect from salt, spray, and wave.

Whats certain is that not too many more homes will get to be built in these townlands, given the sensitivity of the landscape and the necessity not to spoil the scenic beauty, the Golden Goose of the Golden Mile. Having said that, there will be those who might see slim hopes for a site down at beach end of the farmland, but it may well be a long shot.

Mr McCarthy says the existing house and guest cottage here by Castlehaven Cross can be bought separately to the 28-acre bulk on which it stands. Going on the last sale of the 100 surplus acres at Glasheenaulinn, he knows theres proven local farmer demand, and even thats likely to be exacerbated given the more compact holding offered here, within the grasp of a wide buying cohort.

* Also nearby at Tracarta, the same agent has a smaller dwelling right by the shingle beach, with lots of direct water frontage, with 28 acres also on the go. For this similar amount of land, right by the sea, McCarthy guides at 1.25m and this quite sheltered cove is popular as a launch spot for small boats, dinghies, and kayaks, enabling a short, safe trip along the shoreline up to Castlehaven harbour, pier, pubs, and the legendary Mary Anns.

VERDICT: The 800,000-plus sought here for house, guest cottage, and great grazing land looks eminently achievable.

Castlehaven, West Cork

Price: 800,000-plus

Size: House plus annex plus guest cottage

Bedrooms: 4+1

Bathrooms: 3+1

BER: N/A
WHILE there is no doubting Philip Lanes independence as Central Bank governor, you could almost hear the collective sigh of relief from Government TDs yesterday morning when he promised to review the banks stringent mortgage-deposit rules this year.

Without committing to do very much about the requirement for prospective homeowners to have a deposit of up to 20% of the value of the house, Lane has given the Coalitions TDs cover on the issue, going into the general election.

Central Bank

Now when they are confronted by angry members of Generation Rent who have no hope of ever realising their dream of owning a home, they can refer to the upcoming review and how that will deliver them to Nirvana.

Its terrible the plight you are in, but the rules are being reviewed and we will ensure you will be looked after, is what they will say to appease their desperate constituents.

Under Lanes predecessor, the Central Bank introduced rules which saw first-time buyers typically need a deposit of 10% of the first 220,000 cost of a home, and 20% of the remainder of its value.

Mortgages are generally limited to 3.5 times gross income for all borrowers.

First-time buyers in Dublin, where property prices are much higher than in most other parts of the country, have found it impossible to meet the high threshold while also paying rent, which has also soared since 2013.

Last summer, Finance Minister Michael Noonan called for a review of mortgage caps for first-time homebuyers. He argued that the situation had changed since the bank introduced them to damp down the market. Noonans intervention came on foot of wails of unhappiness from backbench TDs who found themselves getting it in the neck from a generation of people who found themselves priced out of the market.

Just this week saw a very logical and credible solution put forward by Fianna Fails Michael McGrath which proposed banks taking account of rental income to offset the size of the deposit.

Michael McGrath

Of course, while a pledged review sounds promising now  and politically it is of help to the Coalition  in reality precious little will change.

As Lane laid out very clearly, from the Central Banks point of view, the new rules have worked. They have done what they were supposed to do. They calmed a market which was in runaway mode. The cooling-off has bought time for the under-supply of houses to be addressed.

The case for having rules is very robust and, again, if these rules had been in place in the mid-2000s, a lot of the problems would have been mitigated, Lane said.

Secondly, the review is only due to start in the summer and so it is likely to be well into the autumn or even later before any changes might be made. This means mortgage applications throughout the spring and early summer  the busiest time for house sales  will continue to be carried out under the current rules.

Furthermore, Lane included this word of warning in his comments. He stressed, that the rules could be tightened or loosened in either direction.

The rules, I think, could be adjusted upwards or downwards. Its not the case that the Central Bank picked the most severe rules. Those rules can be adjusted, recalibrated, but its not the case that wed expected to see [this reviewed] every quarter, he said.

Noonan and the Government have said they welcome the commitment to conduct the review and the 12-month timeframe is appropriate.

But not everyone is quite so sure.

Reacting to Lanes interview, Michael McGrath called for a planned Central Bank review of mortgage rules to begin immediately to avoid a prolonged period of disruption in the market.

He said: Potential first-time buyers and those looking to trade up will be disappointed that a review of the rules is not likely to commence for six months. There is a very real risk that this will result in the already sluggish mortgage market grinding to a halt as potential buyers and sellers wait to see the impact of any new regulations.

But such finer details about the actual plan will be forgotten as canvassing gets into full swing in the coming days and weeks.

And for those receiving politicians at the door: Dont allow yourselves to be fooled by promises that all will be much better the far side of an election.

The truth is, precious little will change. You have been warned.
What the hell is Ireland coming to if a vote-hungry, electioneering Government cant even buy its way out of an inconvenient health strike?

Who do these uppity nurses think they are? Dont they know they should just shut up about the appalling conditions in hospitals and swallow the belated promises of a better deal until the election is safely out of the way  then be abandoned again?

Health Minister Leo Varadkar attacks the nurses for putting patient safety at risk with the planned strike action, but has anyone put patients at risk more than this Government with its chaotic mismanagement of the health service?

Mr Varadkar sounded like a man ready to throw in the (bed bath) towel this week as the situation appeared to finally overwhelm him.

Leo Varadkar

It is hardly surprising the health service staff do not believe his promises when the minister was unable to say how much the proposed deal was supposed to cost when it was offered (despite claiming to know exactly how much a strike would), and having done so little to avert the annual trolley crisis.

Indeed, the only lesson Mr Varadkar seems to have learned from last years crisis is not to get caught out in sun-kissed Miami this time when the number of people languishing on trolleys heads for 600 a day.

But dont worry, here comes another failed health minister and would-be Taoiseach Micheal Martin to save the day  and the hospitals.

For you see, Mr Martin has come up with the extraordinary plan of taking power in a 158-seat Dail with just the 35 or so FFers he is likely to get over the line next month.

Just how is he going to achieve this? You might as well ask Leo how he is going to sort out the HSE, because neither man seems to have any idea whatsoever.

Mr Martin appears to think he is going to go into government with his imaginary friends.

Now, we all know Enda Kenny has an annoying habit of making up random people he has supposedly bumped into, who just so happen to provide him with an analogy to support whatever ill-judged and desperately unpopular policy he is trying to hold together that particular week, but even Enda does not expect us to believe these people are actually real.

But poor old Micheal seems to think he can populate an entire Cabinet with such non-existent supporters.

How else can we explain his rather curious collation?

Mr Martin believes he can become Taoiseach with his rump of, maybe, 35 TDs, plus the, maybe, 10 Labourites, and, maybe, a huge rag bag of independents.

Brushing aside the inconvenient matter of Labour insisting they have no interest in propping-up FF (but then Labour also promised they would be the moral guardians of Tory austerity junkies Fine Gael and look how that turned out). That just means Mr Martin needs 30 to 40 indies to get him to a Dail majority.

What a stable basis for government.

Especially as Mr Martin has woefully failed to install any kind of discipline on the meagre band of 20 colleagues he has at the moment, as they have openly defied him on everything from very modest X Case legislation to marriage equality.

Like Leo, Micheal gives off the hue of someone who is just going through the motions in their current role, as they know it is all going to end in disaster anyway and they just want to get out of it as quickly as possibly and get on with the rest of their lives.

How else can you explain the FF leaders cack-handed attack on Mr Kenny for not visiting more flood-ravaged sites across the country?

When asked why he, supposed Taoiseach-in-waiting (memo to Micheal: Its gonna be some wait, buddy) did not bother meeting victims outside Cork, he replied weakly: They are not my constituencies. And they never will be.

But what of the alliance of lefties and the anti-everythings, the AAA-PBP?

Despite sucking up all the letters they can get their hands on, it would seem they will lack the two most important ones  T and D  in sufficient numbers after the election to make much of an impact.

Though unweildy, the lefty alliance still has a way to go to keep up with the ever expanding umbrella tag for the gay community which now stretches to LGBTQQI.

The last three added letters stand for queer, questioning, and intersex, and add to this the MSMs, which is the an acronym for men who have sex with men, and there are not that many letters left.

The MSMs are an intriguing cohort as they do not self-identify as gay or bi, despite, as the name suggests, having sex with other men.

Maybe in their heads thats not gay at all, I mean, its not as if they are buying a sofa together in Ikea, or anything, is it?

Sounds like they might be in denial to me. Which brings us on to Labours curious little attack ad on an FF-Shinner hook-up after the next election which they deny leaking to the media to inflict damage without actually getting their hands dirty.

The rather crude image depicts Mr Martin tying the knot with the Sinn Fein leader as various independents look on joyously at the union.

Of course Gerry Army Council? What Army Council? Adams was never in the IRA (despite 89% of voters believing he is lying about that), so it would be unfair to describe the scene depicting the marriage between him and Mr Martin as a shotgun wedding.

Gerry Adams

They actually make quite a nice couple, despite Mr Martin failing to take his party with him down the aisle to marriage equality, and Adams doing very little for the cause at all.

Like Mr Martin, Mr Adams insists he will only go into government if he can be Taoiseach on his terms, though it is not clear if he means Taoiseach for life to match his seeming life presidency of Sinn Fein, a party where no TD is, apparently, allowed to ever voice a thought independent of the leaders.

Mr Adams pledges to sort everything out with his wonderful version of Disney- economics in which the magic wealth tax will solve all.

But will that wealth tax magically not apply to good republicans and convicted tax evaders like Thomas Slab Murphy?

And we have to choose between this lot in a matter of weeks?

Wouldnt it be good if we could follow the nurses, refuse to believe their garbage anymore and have nothing to do with any of them?
Salah Abdeslams fingerprint was found in the apartment on December 10, but prosecutors would not say why they waited a month to announce it. The search also turned up three suspected suicide belts, traces of the same explosive used in the November 13 attacks that killed 130 people, and other material that could be used to manufacture bombs, according to the Belgian Federal Prosecutors Office.

The third-floor apartment was probably used as a hideout, after Abdeslam fled the attacks, federal prosecutor, Eric Van der Sypt, said.

Abdeslam, who is still at large, called for two friends to pick him up, amid the bloodshed and chaos that night, which left 130 people dead and hundreds injured.

We found material to make explosives, we found traces of explosives and we found three belts. So you dont have to be Sherlock Holmes to make the right deduction, Van der Sypt told the Associated Press.

Abdeslam is believed to have played a key logistical role in the Paris attacks. A French gendarme stopped him and his two friends, in their car, near the border, but released them. The friends are among 10 people arrested in Belgium in connection with the attacks.

Authorities now believe Abdeslam returned to the apartment, was picked up by someone else and we lost trace, Van der Sypt said.

The apartment, at Rue Berge, in the Schaerbeek neighbourhood, had been rented under a false identity perhaps used by one of those now under arrest.

The three handmade belts could have been intended for the transport of explosives, the prosecutors office said. Traces of the highly volatile TATP, which was packed into the suicide vests in November, were also detected, as was other material that could be used to manufacture explosives.

Paris was again jolted on Thursday, when a man wearing a fake explosives vest and wielding a butchers knife ran up to a police station and was shot dead by officers standing guard.

Paris prosecutor, Francois Molins, said investigators are unsure of the mans true identity. He carried a paper marked with the Muslim declaration of faith, an emblem of the Islamic State group and his name, and gave his nationality as Tunisian.
Cologne police said Wolfgang Albers is being sent into early retirement by the state government.

They said North Rhine-Westphalias governing cabinet will formally discuss the decision on Tuesday but Albers will not return to his job.

Albers had faced mounting criticism for the polices handling of last weeks events and the fallout.

Cologne Mayor Henriette Reker suggested yesterday that police had held back information from her, and said in a statement that her trust in the Cologne police leadership is significantly shaken.

Police identified 18 asylum seekers among 31 suspects in connection with robberies and assaults committed in Cologne at New Year.

They were detained by police on suspicion of committing crimes ranging from theft to assault, and in one case verbal abuse of a sexual nature, interior ministry spokesman Tobias Plate told reporters in Berlin.

They were believed to be among a group of up to 1,000 people in front of Colognes main railway station on New Years Eve.

None of the 31 is currently suspected of committing sexual assaults of the kind that have prompted outrage in Germany over the past week.

Plate said the suspects were nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, five Iranians, four Syrians, two Germans and one person each from Iraq, Serbia and the United States.

Cologne police said they have received a total of 170 criminal complaints related to New Year, including 120 of a sexual nature.

In addition to the 31 suspects detained by federal officers, city police arrested two men from North Africa, aged 16 and 23.

The Daily Telegraph said police arrested two men of an immigrant background regarding the sex attacks.

One was carrying a note in German and Arabic with translations of phrases including Beautiful breasts, I want to have sex with you and Ill kill you, according to police.

Police said the attacks on women were committed by small groups of men who were among some 1,000 people described as being of Arab or North African origin that had mingled with revellers in front of Colognes main train station and Gothic cathedral.

The incident has triggered calls for tighter immigration laws, particularly from politicians opposed to Chancellor Angela Merkels open-door policy that allowed nearly 1.1m refugees to enter the country last year.

Government spokesman Georg Streiter said the chancellor wants the whole truth about the incidents in Cologne and nothing should be held back and nothing should be glossed over.

Swedish police said at least 15 young women reported being groped by groups of men on New Years Eve in the city of Kalmar.

Finnish police reported a high level of sexual harassment in Helsinki on New Years Eve and said they had been tipped off about plans by groups of asylum seekers to sexually harass women.

Helsinki deputy police chief Ilkka Koskimaki said : This is a completely new phenomenon in Helsinki.
The woman, in her 40s, had warned her son that a US-backed alliance would wipe out IS and had encouraged him to leave the city with her.

She was detained after he informed the group of her comments, according to the British-based Observatory, which monitors the war through a network of local sources.

The observatory said the 20-year-old man, named as Ali Saqr al-Qasem, shot his mother, Leena, in the head with an assault rifle, near the post-office building where she worked and in front of hundreds of people.

Raqqa city is a main base of operations for the group in Syria. IS, which controls wide areas of Syria and Iraq, has executed hundreds of people it has accused of working with its enemies or of breaching of its ultra-conservative interpretation of Islam.

The observatory said she was executed under the pretext of inciting her son to leave the Islamic state and escaping together to the outside of Raqqa, and that the coalition will kill all members of the organisation.

The observatory reported on December 29 that IS had executed 2,000 Syrian civilians in the 18 months since it had declared its caliphate over the territory it controls in Syria and Iraq.

They included people killed because of homosexuality, practising magic, and apostasy.

It was not possible to independently verify the latest report.

Meanwhile, foreign special forces have been carrying out raids on an IS stronghold in northern Iraq, ahead of an offensive planned for later this year to retake Mosul, the largest city under the groups control, Iraqs parliamentary speaker said.

Several attacks behind IS lines, around Hawija, 210km north of Baghdad, were carried out in recent weeks, Salim al-Jabouri said.

Both the US and Iraqi military have denied that US forces have carried out military operations on the ground, in Hawija, since October, when US special forces rescued 69 Iraqis in a raid that killed one US commando.

But Dubai-based al-Hadath TV and Iraqi media have reported at least half a dozen raids in and around Hawija, since late December, led by US special forces.

Washington said last month it was deploying a new force of 100 special-operations troops to Iraq to conduct raids against IS there, and in neighbouring Syria, but didnt provide details.
Police say a 25-year-old man proposed to a 20-year-old woman at a Bay City Wal-Mart store, in front of employees and other shoppers who congratulated them, on December 30.

But that same night, William Cornelius Jnr was accused of shoplifting at a nearby store and arrested. Court records show the items included an edible thong and a sex toy.

The Bay City Times, citing court records, reports that his fiancee admitted stolen jewellery was in her possession. Investigators confirmed Cornelius bought an engagement ring at Wal-Mart for $29.

Joke bombs

USA:

A grenade that led authorities to evacuate a county courthouse was a gag gift for the newly elected sheriff, authorities said.

Beaver County sheriff, Tony Guy, ordered the evacuation as a precaution, after the box addressed to him was X-rayed with other incoming mail.

The novelty gift included a disarmed World War II grenade mounted on a plaque, with a sign reading, Complaint department. Take a number.

A numbered, plastic ticket was attached to the grenades pin. The sheriff said he didnt recognise the senders name.

When I saw the name on the package, thats the first time Id seen the name or heard of the person, Guy said.

County detectives quickly tracked down the sender, who explained he was simply a fan of Guys and wanted to welcome Guy into office with a funny gift.

District attorney David Lozier said that the sender wont be charged with a crime, because his intentions were innocent.

But Lozier issued a warning to others.

Just because this is legal does not mean its smart, he said.

Undisputed champ

USA:

A man has won prizes worth $2,000 because he was the only person to enter a contest to celebrate a Michigan citys 150th anniversary.

Taylor Langstaff had to do 25 activities in the Bay City area and stamp them off on a passport to win the prizes, MLive.com reported.

He was the only person to submit a fully-stamped passport. The activities included seeing a show at The State Theatre, enjoying a beer at Tri-City Brewing, and going on a holiday tour of homes in Bay Citys Historic District.

Langstaffs prizes included restaurant gift certificates, a year-long membership to the Bay Area Family Y, Bay City-branded T-shirts and a four-person pass to sail aboard the Appledore IV tall ship.

Because Langstaff was the only entrant, he received all of the prizes for the top-ten places. Hes a native of the city and volunteers at the Bay County Historical Museum. I love Bay City so much that this was pretty easy, Langstaff said.

Better days

PORTUGAL:

Happy days are here again, in Portugal  four of them, at least.

The countrys new socialist government got parliaments approval to discard one of the most unpopular legacies of recent austerity by bringing back four public holidays that were cut two years ago.

The reinstated holidays are All Saints Day; Corpus Christi; October 5, commemorating the 1910 establishment of the Portuguese Republic; and December 1, marking Portugals 1640 return to independence, after 60 years of Spanish rule.

The holidays were cut by the previous, centre-right government to improve productivity, after Portugals 78bn bailout in 2011, amid Europes financial crisis.

But ridding Portugal of austerity is a badge of honour for the government, which took power in November.
Economy The Irrawaddy Business Roundup (Jan. 9, 2016)

A Thai trade delegation is due amid tensions; natural gas discovery reassures; Hong Kong carrier delays planned routes; and a Japanese firm offers car insurance.

Thai Trade Delegation Set to Visit Burma Amid Tensions

Amid widespread anger over the sentencing of two Burmese migrant workers to death in Thailand last month, the Thai commerce minister is set to lead a delegation to Naypyidaw that hopes to boost trade between the neighboring countries, according to Thai media reports.

Protests erupted across Burma after Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo were convicted of the murders of two British backpackers on the Thai island of Koh Tao, forcing Thailands embassy in Rangoon to close its consular section. Burmese officials have insisted that border trade has been unaffected by the protests, but army chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing has joined calls for a review of the evidence in the case, which is widely disbelieved in Burma.

The Buddhist monk-led nationalist movement known as Ma Ba Tha has also called for a boycott of Thai goods in Burma.

Media in Thailand reported this week that a high-level Thai government delegation would be visiting the Burmese capital next week with the aim of ramping up bilateral trade.

English-language newspapers the Bangkok Post and The Nation both reported comments by Commerce Minister Apiradi Tantraporn saying that the Thai military government wants to raise bilateral trade to about $10 to $12 billion in the next two years. Trade was worth $8.15 billion in 2014, according to Thai government figures cited by The Nation.

Apiradi will lead the Thai delegation in a meeting of the two countries Joint Trade Commission in Naypyidaw on Jan. 14-15, The Nation reported. The incumbent and likely outgoing Burmese commerce minister, Win Myint, is expected to lead Burmas delegation

Besides setting trade targets, the ministers will also seek further cooperation in banking and financing in a bid to use local exchange rates for trading between the two countries, The Nation reported.

They will also exchange information on trade rules and regulations, increase cooperation at cross-border checkpoints and discuss how to upgrade the checkpoints so that Thailand and Myanmar can achieve increased trade growth, Apiradi said.

Thailands government is also set to propose the formation of a new Thai-Burmese trade body to represent the private sector, according to the reports.

They will also discuss speeding up development of the Dawei deep-sea port and industrial economic zone along with other economic zone projects, the Bangkok Post reported.

As well as Thai companies leading the push to develop an economic hub in Dawei, in southern Burma, Thai conglomerate CP Group was also last week announced as a member of the winning, mostly Chinese, consortium set to build a port and industrial park in coastal Arakan State.

Discovery Hailed as Reassurance for Oil and Gas Investors

The discovery of natural gas in a deepwater offshore exploration block confirms that energy resources off the countrys coast are worth chasing, according to an analyst cited by Bloomberg.

A joint venture between Australias Woodside Petroleum and Burmese-run firm MPRLwhich is registered in the British Virgin Islandsannounced this week that it had found a gas column below the seabed in an exploration block off the Arakan State coast known as A-6. French firm Total E&P Myanmar also holds a stake as a non-operator in the project.

Further analysis will be undertaken to understand the full potential of the play, but this de-risks a number of leads which will now be matured, Woodside CEO Peter Coleman was quoted saying in a statement. This discovery is an encouraging outcome for future exploration and appraisal activity in the area.

Block A-6 was among 20 offshore areas awarded to international firms in a tender concluded in March 2014. Companies have now begun exploration after protracted contract agreement processes.

In the meantime, however, the price of energy has been driven down by a global oversupply, potentially denting Burmas hopes for a quick injection of cash into state coffers as exploration efforts lead to production.

The find reported by Woodside and MPRL is the first from the exploration projects underway offshore, which also involve majors Shell and Statoil.

In its report on the news, Bloomberg cited Adrian Prendergast, an analyst at Morgans Financial Ltd. in Melbourne, Australia, saying the find would be a boost to investors.

For a lot of the global players that rushed into the space, this confirms it is prospective and worth chasing, he was quoted saying. But theres still a long a way to go.

However, Prendergast reportedly cautioned over Burmas still-uncertain political situation, saying: Given the sovereign risk, youd need a lot more than that to get comfortable.

Hong Kong Carrier Delays New Rangoon, Mandalay Flights

A Hong Kong-based low-cost airline has been forced to delay its inaugural flight between Burmese cities and the Chinese Special Administrative Region due to regulatory approval issues, according to the website routesonline.com.

HK Express, which already operates flights between Hong Kong and a number of Southeast Asian tourist destinations, said in a November press release that it would begin flying regularly to both Rangoon and Mandalays airports beginning from mid-February.

The airline had already begun offering highly discounted rates for flights on the routes, touting the flights as an opportunity for travelers looking for an off-the-beaten path adventure.

But according to a post on routesonline.com, Due to regulatory approval issues, Hong Kong Express is delaying planned service launch to Myanmar by over 6 months.

The airline previously planned to begin 4-weekly Yangon service from [Feb. 17] and two-weekly to Mandalay beginning Feb. 21.

The routes launch dates have been revised to early September, the post said.

Japanese Firm Offers Car Insurance in Burma: Report

One of Japans largest insurers has begun offering car insurance in Burma, where the vast majority of drivers are uninsured, according to a report from Nikkei Asian Review.

The report, published Wednesday, said that Sompo Japan Nipponkoa Insurance had recently entered the Burmese market, operating out of the Thilawa Special Economic Zone close to Rangoon.

[Sompo Japan Nipponkoa] will mainly market vehicle insurance, as well as bodily injury and property damage liability coverage, to customers including businesses operating in the zone, the report said. With just 5 percent or so of drivers in Myanmar carrying insurance, the market is expected to enjoy significant growth.

According to the insurers website, it was licensed in Burma in May last year, after the government began opening up the insurance market, which was long monopolized by a state-run firm.
Economy Dateline Irrawaddy: Peace Cant Be Built by Ethnic Armed Groups and the NLD Alone

This week, the panel discusses what shape Burmas economic and political landscape might take in 2016, as well as the challenges to come for the NLD.

Kyaw Zwa Moe: Happy New Year, and welcome to Dateline Irrawaddy. This week, well discuss what Burmas political and economic landscape, particularly in regards to the countrys internal peace process, might look like in 2016. Well also talk about whether the muddling of politics and religion, which has tarnished Burmas image over the past five years, will continue into the new year. Ma Kyaw Hsu Mon, Ko Htet Naing Zaw, Ko Lawi Weng and Ko Thalun Zaung Htet, members of The Irrawaddys news crew, will join me for the discussion. Im Irrawaddy English editor Kyaw Zwa Moe.

Ko Thalun Zaung Htet, people are anticipating the swearing-in of a new government this year. Politically, there will be a lot of interesting things to see. However, questions remain. For one, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is constitutionally barred from the presidency, and people are wondering if she will somehow be able to assume Burmas highest office. What is your assessment?

Thalun Zaung Htet: The media have widely discussed if Daw Aung San Suu Kyi can become president, and who will be if she cant. But no one in the National League for Democracy or in the Parliament has been tipped as to an answer to this question. NLD sources say that theyre hopeful that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi will become president, and theres been communication between Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and President U Thein Sein and Senior General Min Aung Hlaing. At present, people have high hopes that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi will become president.

KZM: Though the constitution bars Daw Aung San Suu Kyi from being president, she may yet take the position, depending, in particular, on how her talks with military chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing play out. But whether she becomes president or not, shes bound to take the mantle in the countrys affairs. A lot of challenges await the next government.

TZH: Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, according to her speeches, is not forming a purely NLD government, but rather an inclusive, coalition-style one.

KZM: Thats what shes said. But I dont think she can appoint dozens of former government members to her cabinet. She will only be able to appoint a few, just a small percentage, to her cabinet because the people have given her the mandate to form the next government.

TZH: This is something to think about. If she is too keen to form a coalition government, the people who voted for her will become frustrated. Her government indeed has a lot of challenges to face in 2016. Though the leadership will change, the real question is if the governments administrative mechanisms will operate in the way that people expect.

KZM: People are concerned about these challenges, about how many political landmines U Thein Seins government will leave behind. These will be major hurdles for her.

Ma Kyaw Hsu Mon, the economy is the second most important issue in our country. For ages Burmese people have been in poverty. How will the economic landscape look in 2016?

Kyaw Hsu Mon: The new government must confront both the good and bad legacy of the former government. For instance, it will have to handle unfinished special economic zones. Detailed data on these projects will have to be given by the former government so that the new one will know how best to grapple with any challenges. Cronyism was very blatant under the former government. Ending this will be a huge challenge for the new government.

KZM: In its party manifesto, the NLD clearly said that it will establish a corruption-free government. But corruption is entrenched even in the lowest levels of government. How problematic will this be for the incoming government, given that the military owns cronies as well as businesses?

KHM: Yes, there are businesses owned by the military. Corruption has been entrenched in our society for ages, meaning that it will be a particularly tough one for the new government to break. The outgoing government created a committee to fight bribery, but it didnt have much success. If corruption cant be brought under control, it will only make it more difficult to tackle bigger problems.

KZM: Burma is a Southeast Asian country with great potential. But because it doesnt have clear economic policies and a stable economic environment, foreign investments havent really come into the country. How fast do you think the new government will be able to address this?

KSM: This is the question that every businessman has been asking, because they want advantageous trading policies and theyre hopeful that theyll see this under the new government. The government must create a favorable environment for businessmen, and businessmen, for their part, must support the governments initiatives, such as the Asean Free Trade Area (AFTA) and the Asean Economic Community (AEC), the latter of which has just come into operation. The new government will need to adopt good policies to handle such a huge task.

KZM: Ko Lawi Weng, over the past five years, U Thein Seins government has tried to bring about internal peace and an end to fighting, but there has only been little progress, and a ceasefire has not been properly enforced. Do you see greater prospects for this in the future, or will things be more of the same? What will be the deciding factors?

Lawi Weng: Ive talked to ethnic leaders of the United Nationalities Federal Council (UNFC). Theyve formed a committee to hold dialogue with an NLD-led government. They also said that theyre on the same side as the NLD regarding their views on federalism and other ethnic issues. They hope that theyll get along with the NLD, and theyve said that theyre ready and eager to meet with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, should they be invited to do so.

KZM: Its important to note here that peace cant be built by ethnic armed groups and the NLD alone. When it comes to peace, the military will arguably play the most important role.

LW: Indeed, the military will play a crucial role. And the NLD is concerned that its image may be marred if the army were to launch attacks at lower levels while the NLD is holding talks with UNFC. If the army does nothing, and doesnt launch any attacks during talks, then talks between the NLD and UNFC might be able to succeed.

KZM: Speaking of the ceasefire process and ethnic issues waiting for the new government, talks between Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and military chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing will likely play an important role as well. How smooth these talks are will be a deciding factor. What do you think should be the NLDs first move regarding the peace process and ceasefire after it comes to power on March 31, 2016?

LW: The media are talking about the Myanmar Peace Center (MPC) and the possibility of a reshuffling there. However, the MPC takes the same line as the [current] government, and its not a neutral institution. Ethnic groups therefore have little trust in the MPC, and honestly, they dont like it much. What should the NLD do when it assumes power? The MPC shouldnt be abolished, but I do think that the MPC should be reformed to include both current impartial members and new members who have considerable knowledge of ethnic issues, especially leaders of ethnic armed groups, and will cooperate with the new government in the peace process.

KZM: Finally, and most importantly, it can be said that misplaced nationalism has surged after U Thein Seins government came to power in 2011. And as a result, the country has seen lots of religious conflict that has led to heavy casualties and forced many people from their homes. Similarly, some political parties have attempted to win votes prior to the November election by abusing religion. If this continues in 2016, it will only further tarnish Burmas image.

Htet Naing Zaw: Looking back at 2015, there were some monks, such as U Wirathu and U Par Mauk Ka, who abused religion to wield political influence. But there were also virtuous, noble monks, such as U Thu Mingala and Dr. Nanda Marlar Bhivums. Indeed, these monks who preached objectively can be juxtaposed against U Wirathu, who labeled Yanghee Lee, the UNs special rapporteur to Burma, a whore, and against U Par Mauk Kha, who said regarding the Koh Tao murder verdict that he would disrobe and fight if need be. Even still, no monk committee or government has taken actions against them. Its probable that the government didnt do anything because it wanted to use U Wirathu and Ma Ba Tha to win votes.

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the NLD government must make establishing rule of law a priority in 2016, and they must approach Muslim and Rakhine religious leaders equally. If rule of law and co-existence can be obtained, many problems could, at least in part, be solved.

KZM: What other policies do you think the NLD should adopt? What do scholars think?

HNZ: If mutual trust and respect can be built gradually between two sides [despite religious and other differences], and if rule of law can be established, the problem of religious conflict could finally be resolved. Its important to note, however, that those who dont like the NLD and pessimists may try to exploit this problem to incite racial and religious instability.

KZM: How moderate leaders are will also play a key role. Di Dote U Ba Cho, who was assassinated along with General Aung San [in 1947], asked him to designate Buddhism as the States religion. And General Aung San told him not to say that again, for the sake of peace in Burma, a multi-ethnic and multi-faith country. If we can find such a leader once again, nationalists will find that they have no place in this country.

Though 2016 will hold many challenges for Burma and its people, we can also hope that it will be a time of exciting economic and political progress for the country.
New roofs, windows and classrooms are promised following the announcement of 5million Government funding for some Brent and Harrow schools.

Brent received more than 3million which will be used at four schools including replacing the gym at Alperton Community School and replacing temporary classrooms at WembleyIs Lyon Park School.
Night owls may be able to dine until the early hours under plans from a Stanmore cafe.

Canelles of Church Road has applied for a licence from Harrow Council to be allowed to stay open until 5am on Friday and Saturday nights.
If you have not seen the movie The Big Short yet, it is highly suggested you take the time to further understand the economic crisis of the United States which also caused unemployment at a major low point.

The movie has three separate but connected stories of the U.S mortgage housing collapse back in 2005. Michael Burry, played by Christian Bale, is an eccentric medical professional that eventually became a Scion Capital hedge fund manager. This was Bale's character and in the movie he really got into character.

As actors do, characterization is crucial to fulfill the role required and since his character, Michael Burry, doesn't wear the 4,000 dollar suit that most Wall Street professionals do, Bale was actually advised by the banker that inspired his character to trade in the traditional office attire for shorts, bare feet and a Supercuts haircut.

Bale explains that the conversation with him was very specific. For example, there were certain things in the script that Bale had to say for the character but they had to be corrected because he would never say things like that or would say it like that. He also told Bale that he never drinks coffee and would wear nothing else but certain t-shirts for certain reasons. As posted online, he would rather go barefoot in the office but if it was required to wear a suit, he'd wear it with Birkenstocks.

These things were Fedex'd to Christian Bale to help with his characterization. And in the movie, he really nailed it.

This is a twist in professional clothing where the mind is much more valued than the face (or in this case, the suit). However, solid suits are still preferred in the world of business and finance.

If you have not seen the movie yet, the film focuses on three parallel stories where Michael Burry believes that the US housing market is in a bubble that will burst in a few years time, so he decided to bet against the housing market with the banks, who are more than happy to accept his proposal for something that has never happened in American history. The banks think that Burry's crazy idea will never happen. Jared Vennett, played by Ryan Gosling, who works with Deutschebank also wants in on the Burry action and proposed the idea to Mark Baum, played by Steve Carrell.
On Tuesday one of China's regulators said that China is demanding answers with regard to Microsoft's business practices there.

The new scrutiny of Microsoft by the State Administration for Industry and Commerce has stanched from several antitrust investigations of major Western tech companies way back 2014.

It can be recalled that on July of 2014, more or less 100 SAIC officials showed up in four Microsoft offices in China, asking questions, copying confidential information such contracts and records, and downloading data such as emails and internal communication from the company's servers.

According to analysts, Microsoft's difficulties in the country began when the company decided to end support and security updates for Windows XP. This move has forced the country to rely on the American company. The end was made with the hopes that the Chinese Microsoft users would upgrade to newer versions.

This has resulted in Microsoft being criticized for ending support in favor of its newer software.

Xinhua released an article on Tuesday stating that "Microsoft was suspected in 2014 of causing computer compatibility problems by not fully disclosing information about its Windows operating system and Microsoft Office suite of applications." The article further cited that the Chinse law states that "incompatibility without advance warning to customers could be regarded" as being anticompetitive.

A Microsoft spokesman, whose named is not disclosed due to company policy, said that they are serious in terms of "complying with China's laws and committed to addressing SAIC's questions and concerns."

Meanwhile, Information Technology and Innovation Foundation's Mr. Atkinson predicted that the Chinese regulators could actually use a case against Microsoft to force concessions that could include requiring the company to bring back the support for Windows XP PCs.

On the other hand, Mr. Atkinson is positive that the Chinese leaders would like to see local alternatives to Windows to lead in the market. "I think the strategy is essentially what I term de-U.S.A.," he said.
The American stand-up comedian Amy Schumer recently made headlines. Love is in the air in the first few days of 2016 with Schumer's new boyfriend. How did the two meet? Reports indicated Schumer found him through an app that puts women in charge. She denies this pointedly.

Everyone is gushing over Amy Schumer's hottie new beau, Ben Hanisch, a 29 year old future designer in Chicago. Buzz around the internet explains that Schumer allegedly found Hanisch on an online dating app that puts women in control.

The app, which is unlike Tinder, is designed to remove the negative male factors involved in the dating world. The app is called Bumble and it does not allow men to send a private message to women unless she made the first contact. (P.S. If the connections are of the same gender, either one can make the first contact).

The app was created by Whitney Wolfe. Wolfe used to work at Tinder and describes the app like a Sadie Hawkins dance.

Schumer denies that she found her new hottie boyfriend on Bumble. On a Twitter post via her social media handle @amyschumer, she announced:

Please let the record show I have never in my life been on Bumble.

The same goes through her Instagram account @amyschumer. She posted a picture online and captioned it:

#tbt me and my date to the globes #roadmanager my bf will be there too and we did NOT meet on bumble. Great site just not how we met.

Her announcement came after the internet created gushing noises over their obsession with the new boyfriend, especially when Hanisch posted a picture with his Instagram handle @benhanisch and captioned it:

Sometimes in life you get extremely lucky, and the smartest, funniest, most beautiful woman comes along when you least expect it. Here's to what adventures 2016 brings!

That is not to mean that Schumer doesn't use a dating app and that statement does not mean that she does either, reports confirmed. Celebrities who do use dating apps, such as Lindsay Lohan, is not a strange thing since it is a widely socially acceptable way to meet new people. However, most of them do publicly acknowledge any type of connection, if they are willing to reveal private information.

This may seem like an attempt for either parties to gain publicity as rumors rose from multiple sources that indicate that Hanisch made an account in the app in early 2015. Whatever the case, everybody is happy for the new budding romance!
In previous news, China suffered losses in the global market shutting down its doors. Just recently, China has shut down its market - again.

China has halted trading quite suddenly for the second time this week. It does not like a good start for the first business week of 2016. The market closed its door after 30 minutes of opening after falling to 7%.

This meltdown happened within the first 15 minutes which triggered another "circuit breaker" like the last time as everone panicked about the Yuan. This second shut-down from China was necessary because of the new rules implemented to avoid panic selling of shares. Though this second instance, the circuit breaker lever was pulled faster than the first time.

Financial analysts and investors are anxious at the state of China's standing in the global market indicating an increasing slow growth.

Now, the Yuan is at its weakest. Chinese savers are losing confidence in the Yuan and have rejected the country's stocks after multiple devaluations by the Chinese central bank. The last recorded fall of the currency was back in March 2011.

That's just strike one for China. The second blow comes as China, being the world's largest oil importer, is under a lot of pressure which means oil prices are struggling world wide. This is not a welcome news since Saudi Arabia has cut its ties with Iran.

This rattled the Asian and European market. Clearly, this is hurting China's edge when its third strike has hit international markets. European markets are suffering from China's crisis pulling the FTSE100 down by 3%. Asian markets ended low with Hong Kong closing at 3% down and Japan's Nikkei at 3.2%, as reported online.

This is another hit for China to gain back economic confidence as the turmoil disrupted global markets. Investors may soon want to invest elsewhere.
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Atlanta-based Gourmet Foods International has chosen a building in the Business Park of Kenosha as the site for a new food distribution facility, the Kenosha Area Business Alliance said in a statement Friday.

"We are very excited to finally have a warehouse in Wisconsin, and Kenosha is the best spot in the state for our future plans," Doug Jay, president of Gourmet Foods International, said in the statement.

Gourmet Foods International is a specialty food and gourmet cheese supplier to retail and food service customers. It has distribution centers across the United States. The new site in Kenosha, Gourmet Foods International Midwest LLC, will be its seventh location nationwide.

"Southeast Wisconsin is one of the best locations in the nation for advanced food processors," Kenosha County Executive Jim Kreuser said in the statement. "Gourmet Foods is in good company and we look forward to helping them thrive here."

The 35,200-square-foot building will be GFI's first Midwest location and will allow the company to service the Milwaukee, Chicago and Minneapolis markets, according to the KABA statement.

The company plans to have up to 50 employees at the location, previously occupied by Process Retail Group, within the next two years.

The Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. awarded Gourmet Foods International $200,000 in Economic Development Tax Credits to support the investment.

The Kenosha Area Business Alliance provided $1.1 million in financing. This includes a $1 million low-interest loan and a $100,000 forgivable loan from the Kenosha County High Impact Fund, which was created and funded by Kenosha County to support high-quality economic development projects.

GFI purchased the building at 9629 59th Place in August 2015 and has been remodeling it to fit its specific needs. GFI plans to be operational by March. The site has an additional 3.3 acres for future expansion.
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By ,

The sixth annual edition of the Rep Lab  a night of short plays showcasing the emerging actors, designers and directors spending a year honing their craft at the Milwaukee Repertory Theater  begins with two plays that prominently feature doors.

Will they open, introducing us to people and places we didn't know? Or will they stay closed, locking us within the prison of the self? In both plays, these questions get framed in terms of romance, underscoring how our lives might be transformed if we're willing to allow others in.

I'll skip the second of these two  the regrettable "Ballad of 423 and 424"  which was the weakest piece on the night's eight-play bill.

The first  Kelly Younger's much more compelling "I Think You Think I Love You"  got the night started by introducing one of its core themes: How readily the stories we spin and personae we construct impede our ability to interact with others.

Most of this piece belongs to Hallie Peterson, credibly playing a young woman whose monologue morphs into a mordantly funny meltdown, as she tries and fails to cope with grief involving her mother's death. Her put-upon visitor (a nuanced Jared Davis) barely gets a word in edgewise, even as he persists in hoping a new story might emerge from the ashes of the old.

The two remaining pre-intermission pieces similarly foreground how the roles we play can get in our way, eroding our ability to learn new lines that might let love walk in.

The better of these  and best piece of the night  is Wayne Rawley's uproariously funny "Controlling Interest," directed by JC Clementz. Foregrounding the similarities between the boardroom and the playground, it demonstrates how hard it can be for us to shed comfortably familiar rituals and language that keep boys and girls  as well as men and women  apart.

The post-intermission plays build on these first four  suggesting that once we've allowed love into our private lives, we might cultivate empathy in the larger world for people different from ourselves.

The second half begins with the haunting "Airborne," directed by Leda Hoffmann. A young and lonely Army recruit (the consistently impressive Bridgid Abrams) falls to her death when her parachute won't open. Reflecting as she falls on how isolated she is, she hears the voice of her sorrowing commander (Arielle Leverett), suggesting she was loved in ways she never knew.

The night concludes with a moving devised piece, involving all eight emerging actors and helmed by emerging directors Ryan Holihan and Nabrashaa Nelson.

It honors everyday people these actors have met  many of them during their year here in Milwaukee. And it underscores how theater and artists like these serve as portals, enabling our travel to worlds undreamed of in our everyday lives.

IF YOU GO

"The Rep Lab" continues through Tuesday at the Stiemke Studio, 108 E. Wells St. Tickets remain for performances on Sunday and Tuesday night. Visit milwaukeerep.com. Read more about this production at TapMilwaukee.com.

TAKEAWAYS

The World Around Us: In the ensemble-devised piece featured in last year's Rep Lab, the focus was squarely on the emerging actors themselves: What their development during their year in Milwaukee might mean, for the sort of stories they'd bring to audiences in the years to come. Much as I liked it  and I really did  this year's piece was infinitely more moving.

Why? Because this year's devised piece looks outward rather than inward, rightly recognizing that the actors who learn to tell the best stories are those most attuned to the stories unfolding around them, in other lives involving other people, existing beyond the sometimes narrow and narcissistic enclaves that theater artists often inhabit.

I don't want to give these stories away. Suffice it to say that you'll likely remember stories like those shared by Martin Hanna and Kammeran Tyree. Collectively, these stories are true to Rep artistic director Mark Clements' passionately held view that theater shouldn't just interpret the world, but change it. Watching promising young artists like these convinces one that theater can do this and more.

Curse the Darkness: The audience gets an example of theater artists' occasional tunnel vision in Patrick Gabridge's "Curse the Darkness," featuring a quartet of actors playing stagehands for whom everything that could go wrong during a set change does. The darkness in Gabridge's title not only refers to the lighting, but also to this foursome's figurative blindness, narrowly focused as they are on petty trifles making clear they've lost all ability to understand the big picture.

Leda and JC: One of many reasons to love Rep Lab? It gives us a chance to see the ongoing emergence of Leda Hoffmann and JC Clementz as directors. Both themselves onetime emerging artists in the Rep's annual program, Hoffmann and Clementz now have established positions within the Rep itself  and growing, justly earned reputations as two of the best young directors in Milwaukee.

They also complement each other well, aesthetically and temperamentally. Hoffmann is more apt to go dark, in work that's both thorny and drunk on language. Clementz excels in comic and musical pieces, crisply executed and masterfully paced while nevertheless tapping into deeper, often overlooked emotional undercurrents.

Parachute Silk: "Airborne," the Hoffmann-directed piece, calls to mind one of the first pieces I ever saw Hoffmann direct, in Rep Lab 2 back in 2012: Carson Kreitzer's "Parachute Silk," which similarly featured two women and a parachute, brought together by a war and making common cause in a world haunted by death. "Airborne" also calls to mind the gorgeous visual images in the Hoffmann-directed "The Penelopiad" in 2013  also a tale involving solidarity among women under impossible circumstances.

One can't have too much of a good thing: Next up for Hoffmann as a director is the late Phylis Ravel's "Censored on Final Approach." Like "Parachute Silk," it's set during World War II; it features the intrepid pioneers who flew together as the Women Air Force Service Pilots, while battling harassment and sabotage on the ground. A collaboration between Renaissance Theaterworks and Marquette University, it comes our way in April, with a solid cast comprised of James Fletcher, Megan Kaminsky, Kat Wodtke and Greta Wohlrabe. You can order tickets at www.r-t-w.com/censored-on-final-approach.html

Hoffmann will also direct "Hamlet" this summer at the Illinois Shakespeare Festival, featuring Deborah Staples as the Danish prince. Yours truly will offer a full report, but book your tickets now; this is a not-to-be-missed event: thefestival.org/.

Ranking the Plays: Bearing in mind the inherently subjective nature of any such exercise, here's my ranking of the eight plays from Rep Lab 6, ordered by preference. I offer it as a conversation starter, for post-show dinners or drinks during which you might take a hand at devising a list of your own: (1) "Controlling Interest," by Wayne Rawley; (2) "Devised Piece," by the Emerging Professional Residents Ensemble; (3) "Airborne," by Laura Jacqmin; (4) "I Think You Think I Love You," by Kelly Younger; (5) "While the Auto Waits," adapted from an O. Henry story by Walter Wykes; (6) "Curse the Darkness," by Patrick Gabridge; (7) Eggnog Martinis and Cosmo-ho-hos," by Jami Brandli; and (8) "Ballad of 423 and 424," by Nicholas Pappas.
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A suspect in a domestic violence assault and abduction early Friday in Kenosha has been arrested in Arkansas, Kenosha Police Lt. Bradley Hetlet said Saturday.

Arkansas State Police arrested Jeremy Tyrone Shorter about 7:30 p.m. Friday during a traffic stop in Mississippi County, Hetlet said.

Shorter, 33, is being held on charges of kidnapping, reckless endangerment, intimidation of a victim and substantial battery.

A Kenosha resident called 911 about 4:30 a.m. Friday to report family trouble at a neighboring apartment in the 1600 block of Birch Road. When officers arrived, the apartment was vacant but there was evidence of a struggle.

Surveillance video showed Shorter forcefully removing a 31-year-old woman from the apartment. He then fled with her in a 2006 Dodge Charger with Illinois license plates.

Shorter is the father of two of the woman's children, according to Kenosha police.

The woman was found in Oshkosh later Friday morning and was being treated for facial and other injuries that are not believed to be life-threatening.
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Racine County deputies with the help of a canine unit apprehended an Illinois man wanted on multiple warrants after the man struck a deputy in the head and fled Saturday.

According to a news release from the Racine County Sheriff's Office, a citizen flagged down a deputy at Union Grove High School and reported a person trying to flag down cars in the area of Highway 45 and Spring St. The deputy saw a vehicle in a gas station parking lot at the intersection with its passenger side air bags deployed and missing its passenger side tires.

The driver, a 36 year old male from Illinois, was located in the restroom of the gas station and refused assistance. Upon running the driver for warrants he was found to have multiple warrants out of Racine and Kenosha Counties and from Illinois and was listed as armed and dangerous.

When the deputy was handcuffing the driver, he spun around and hit the deputy in the head. The deputy then attempted to Taser the driver who made it back to his car and took off westbound on Spring St.

The driver then stopped the vehicle about one mile west of Highway 45 and took off on foot north through a farm field. A perimeter was set up and a K-9 unit was called to the scene. The driver was located in the farm field, refused deputy commands and was then taken into custody with the assistance of the K-9 Nitro.

The driver was taken into custody on multiple warrants and fresh charges including OWI fourth, fleeing and eluding, and battery to a police officer.
SHARE Jennifer Garcia Milwaukee County Sheriff's Dept

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A Milwaukee woman who left her boyfriend's 3-year-old brain-damaged and crippled after two weeks of torture and abuse was sentenced Friday to 35 years in prison.

Jennifer L. Garcia, 33, was charged in 2014 with nine counts of child abuse and four counts of witness intimidation. In July 2015, a jury convicted her of all but two counts.

The victim, who spent months in the hospital and is now living with foster parents, was left in Garcia's care in June 2014 by his paternal grandmother; his birth parents were both in jail.

Milwaukee County Assistant District Attorney Matthew Torbenson said Garcia channeled her anger at her boyfriend onto his son, verbally and emotionally demeaning him in addition to beating him with a sandal, a belt and her fist.

Garcia once told a visitor, "Watch this," and for amusement ordered the boy into a corner to take off his shirt, revealing his back was covered with apparent cigarette burns. When Garcia told a 10-year-old girl in the house to get cigarettes and a lighter, the boy started to cry, in anticipation of burns like he may have suffered even before coming to Garcia's home in West Allis.

On the night of the final abuse, the girl testified, Garcia had hit the boy so hard he vomited. She sent the girl to get cleaning supplies and while in another room the girl heard a boom, then returned and saw the boy unconscious on the floor.

Torbenson said the girl tried to call 911 but Garcia took away the phone, then rejected others' advice to get help while bathing and trying to feed the boy grape soda to revive him. It wasn't until the next afternoon, when a neighbor came to the house and was shocked by the boy's condition, that 911 was called.

When rescue workers arrived, they found him on the floor, exhibiting a symptom of extreme brain injury called "decorticate posturing." He was stiff, with arms bent and fists clenched to his chest, with legs out straight. He was rushed to brain surgery at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin.

Hemorrhaging pushed his brain to one side of his skull. His body was covered with scrapes and bruises the complaint said were too numerous to count. His face appeared to have been burned. His liver was lacerated.

Garcia's attorney, Robert Haney, said his client "didn't just wake up one day and decide to be a monster," but was herself caught in generations of family violence. Garcia's mother had watched her mother kill her 5-year-old sister, he said, and later went to prison herself for severely abusing Garcia's siblings.

Despite her own trauma in foster care, and some criminal convictions and association with a gang, Garcia later became president of the Latino Student Association at Milwaukee Area Technical College, Haney said, and managed to provide for her own children. But she was also beaten by the boy's father when they were together, and got hooked on pain medication for a back injury. He said it had anesthetized not only her pain, but her emotions.

During Haney's presentation, deputies brought in the boy's mother in chains from jail. She briefly sat right behind Garcia and asked that she get the maximum penalty  which could have been over 100 years.

Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Rebecca Dallet told Garcia that even if she didn't love the boy, now 5, he deserved to be safe, to be respected as a human being.

"You could have said no to taking him in the first place, or called social services," Dallet said. Now, the judge said, the boy, who can't hold a conversation or even watch a movie, will likely need full-time care the rest of his life.
Jabari Parker (left) of the Milwaukee Bucks will join MPS Superintendent Darienne Driver (right) at a summit on attendance at 5:30 p.m. Monday at James Madison Academic Campus, 8135 W. Florist Ave. Credit: Journal Sentinel files

OK, Google, what's the famous quote from Woody Allen about showing up?

"Eighty percent of success is showing up."

But here's an additional quote, attributed to Thomas Edison: "Ninety percent of a man's success in business is perspiration." (In today's world, it would definitely be phrased as "a person's success" or something similar.)

I'm partial to both showing up and perspiring (so to speak) when it comes to education.

That's why I hope Milwaukee Public Schools' "summit on attendance" at 5:30 p.m. Monday at James Madison Academic Campus, 8135 W. Florist Ave., is a big success.

I'm not naive on this. I've covered a lot of attendance and truancy stories in the last couple decades, not focused only on MPS. Campaigns come and go. The net result is little or no improvement. But attendance is such a threshold issue in schooling  you've got to keep trying.

School attendance is among the problems that correlate strongly with income. Schools with a lot of kids from well-to-do homes don't have so much of an issue.

Many of the private or charter schools in Milwaukee have attendance issues, but they're not that startling. For one thing, kids with attendance problems aren't so likely to be enrolled in or to stay in a hard-charging school environment. But it's also true that staff members in some of those schools do great jobs of addressing attendance problems one-on-one. I've been in schools where the daily attendance is posted prominently and is a matter of pride (and accountability). Figures of 96% to 99% are not unusual.

There are also private and charter schools that do poorly on attendance, for reasons that include the school's own failings.

That brings us to MPS, which is the state's epicenter of attendance problems. That certainly has a lot to do with the home life issues of thousands of kids in MPS. At times, it has also had to do with procedures that are overly bureaucratic and ineffective and with a system that can't fully cope with the needs of it students.

Here's a lesson I've learned about fighting attendance problems: Success is a retail business. It's one-on-one, it's based on relationships between a child and someone in a school, it requires connecting a student with something that motivates them about school.

That's not a criticism of the Monday night rally  in fact, the opposite. Large-scale messaging about coming to school has its place. And, based on a conversation I had last week with Superintendent Darienne Driver, the event Monday is in large part aimed at boosting the "retail" efforts underway.

That includes the district's own work. In addition to school social workers, MPS now has 30 "attendance liaison" staffers who, as Driver put it, work in large part out of their cars, often going to the homes of kids who are frequently out of school. There were about 15 a year ago, she said.

Driver said the district is increasing its efforts to offer the kind of activities that build bonds between kids and schools  sports, arts, music, clubs  and to offer courses that challenge and interest them.

The "retail" work includes important efforts by community organizations such as the Violence Free Zone, which puts adults in schools with a goal of building rapport with kids and getting them on better tracks in (and out of) school.

An important effort comes from City Year, which places teams of young adults in a roster of MPS schools, where they spend a year helping. It's a common sight at those schools for kids to arrive at the door in the morning by walking between two-lines of red-jacketed City Year members cheering them on. The City Year members also often work one-on-one with low-attendance kids.

The Monday event will highlight the Milwaukee Bucks involvement in promoting school attendance and will include an appearance by player Jabari Parker. A new "incentive program," will be unveiled  Driver wouldn't hint what it will be.

MPS shows improvement

Overall, attendance in MPS is up seven-tenths of a percentage point over the same period last year, which is to say it is 91.1%. MPS provided a list of 24 schools where attendance is up at least two percentage points.

Attendance decreases as kids age. This year, MPS says, kindergarten through fifth-grade attendance is 94%. Fifth through eighth grade is 93.2%. But high school is 84.2%  in other words, one out of six is absent without an excuse on average. (In the past, high school attendance was often around 80%, so the current figure is an improvement.)

James Madison, site of the Monday event, is up 2.5 points this year  but that means it's now at 81.2%. The high-performing Rufus King High is up nine-tenths of a point, bringing it to 95.9%.

Attendance also varies by time of year  January is the worst month, Driver said. Add in the start of new semester and it's a good time to rev up interest in attendance.

Attendance, Driver said, is not just a school matter.

"It's a life skill," she said. You get into the workforce in a few years and employers are going to expect you "to be present, to be counted on, ready to work, ready to lead.... This is something we believe all of our students must develop."

Attendance isn't everything. I've heard from teachers who deal with students who think they're entitled to pass a course because they showed up  even if they didn't do their work. Some teachers feel under pressure from above to pass such students.

That's why I included the Edison quote above. You have to perspire  to learn things and do things  if school is really going to move you forward.

But showing up is a crucial starting point. I hope Monday's "summit" is a step toward getting more kids to that point.

Alan J. Borsuk is senior fellow in law and public policy at Marquette University Law School. Reach him at alan.borsuk@marquette.edu.
Steven Avery is escorted through the halls of the Manitowoc County Courthouse in 2007. A new Netflix documentary retells his story. Credit: Associated Press

By 1965, well-renowned American novelist Truman Capote had all but disappeared from public view. But in the fall of that year, The New Yorker magazine began publishing a true crime serial written by Capote that would hit the nation like a lightning bolt.

In February of 1966, "In Cold Blood" hit the shelves in book form; it is now credited with inventing a new "true crime" genre of "nonfiction novels." The book told the story of a wealthy Kansas farmer who, along with three other members of his family, was brutally shot to death by two drifters. Capote wrote it in a gripping tone, the author having meticulously researched the murders for five years.

Over the years, however, major discrepancieshave surfaced that call into question the veracity of the book. As early as 1966, Esquire writer Phillip K. Tompkins objected to Capote's characterization of the murders not as premeditated, but as crimes of passion while the two men were in fits of insanity. More recent documents have surfaced that show many of the episodes in the book couldn't have happened as described.

Nonetheless, "In Cold Blood" swept the nation, making Capote millions of dollars, launching him into America's literary elite and forming a new genre that Tom Wolfe would later deem the "New Journalism." And while everyone knows Truman Capote's name, few people can remember the names of the family members whose grisly deaths led to his worldwide fame.

Proving that what's old is new, America has spent the fast few weeks binge-watching the Netflix series "Making a Murderer," which once again serializes a grisly rural murder in America's heartland. This time the victim is 25-year-old photographer Teresa Halbach, who was last seen taking photos of a van on a property belonging to Steven Avery, a Manitowoc man who just two years before had been exonerated of a rape by DNA evidence after wrongfully spending 18 years in prison.

The 10-part Netflix series, told exclusively from the perspective of Avery's family and criminal defense team, speculates that Avery was framed for Halbach's murder by local law enforcement as retribution for a $36 million wrongful conviction suit Avery had filed against the local sheriff's office. Horizontal gumshoes watching from their couches across the world immediately decried the "unfair" trial Avery received, and hundreds of thousands have signed petitions demanding Avery's release.

But this isn't 1966, and viewers skeptical of the one-sided documentary were able to hit the Internet and discover important evidence left out of the series. For instance, a bullet covered with Halbach's DNA was matched to a gun Avery regularly kept in his house. Avery's DNA was found on the front hood latch of Halbach's car, exactly where Avery's nephew, Brendan Dassey, had led police to look.

But most distressing is the pain the Halbach family is now having to relive as a result of the series. Everyone involved in "Making a Murderer" is getting paid; Netflix's ratings are booming, the filmmakers are in high demand and Avery's defense attorneys are national celebrities (and to some,sex symbols.) Steven Avery defense funds are popping up on crowdfunding websites; If Avery decides to write a book while sitting in prison, expect it to fly off the shelves.

Yet lost in all the did-he-or-didn't-he-do-it drama is the fact that a young woman was brutally murdered and her body mutilated. Halbach was shot in the head and her body burned, all for the crime of being connected with Steven Avery. And yet she merely warrants a cameo in a 10-hour series about her own death.

Not only does the Halbach family now have to be reminded every hour of Teresa's death, they are forced to watch those involved in defending her killer being lionized for their efforts. In fact, the series even fingers her brother and an ex-boyfriend as potential killers themselves.

In 2012, Irish writer Colm Toibin noted that "As a novelist, you have many rights and no responsibilities." Certainly, the "Making of a Murderer" had every right to frame Avery's guilt in any way it chose; but as viewers, we have the responsibility to remember that Teresa Halbach is the real victim.

Christian Schneider is a Journal Sentinel columnist and blogger. Email cschneider@jrn.com. Twitter: @Schneider_CM
Indian burial mounds at Lizard Mounds County Park. A new bill would make it easier to develop similar mounds around the state. Credit: Journal Sentinel files

Wisconsin has an abundance of natural beauty and historical sites; so much and so many that I've hardly begun to scratch the surface of exploring it all in my 16 years in the state. I'm grateful to live in a place with such a rich tradition of environmental and historical stewardship that makes this true. Which is why I'm appalled by a proposed bit of legislation that would open the door to desecration of one of Wisconsin's unique features.

The effigy mounds that dot our landscape  Wisconsin has more of them than any state in the country  are links to an ancient past and people, some of whose descendants still live here. Some of these structures, which represent everything from bears to deer to geometric shapes in alignment with astronomical features, date back more than a millennium. They represent a connection to that ancient past, and are sacred places for many, especially since the majority of the mounds are also burial sites.

Yet two state representatives have introduced a bill that would open many burial mounds to excavation and destruction, all in the name of temporary profit. Reps. Chris Kapenga (R-Delafield) and Robert Brooks (R-Saukville) introduced AB 620 in December. The Legislative Reference Bureau assessment shows that, if enacted, the law would require that the Wisconsin Historical Society give property owners a permit that would allow them to "investigate" on their own whether a mound included burial remains. If none could be found, the landowners then would be allowed to use the property however they chose.

It's difficult not to see this as a law custom-designed to benefit one business interest in particular. Wingra Stone and Redi-Mix have been pushing in recent years to be allowed to destroy a mound in one of its limestone quarries in order to access the aggregate underneath.

Thousands of the mounds have long since been destroyed, plowed under for agricultural use and development by white settlers in the 18th and 19th centuries. Of the mounds that remain and are cataloged, some 90% are estimated to include burial remains. Beyond that, the mounds are a priceless cultural artifact. We have plenty in the way of resources. Arguing for the plunder of such a small but sacred feature of our state just smacks of callous thoughtlessness, especially toward Native American peoples for whom these sites have even greater significance.

There's also the problem of the process by which companies would go about "investigating" sites for remains. Ground radar technology is not foolproof, especially if remains are already very decomposed, and many such endeavors would necessitate digging. That in itself means destruction of the mound. The point shouldn't be whether or not physical remains exist. That these effigy mounds are considered sacred to a people still living in the area, and that they represent an irreplaceable and rare historical feature in our state, should be more than enough reason to continue to protect and preserve them.

Tailoring a law to benefit such a niche business or industry is also, in general, a pretty terrible way to govern. We ran into this same issue when lawmakers rammed through rule changes specifically to benefit Gogebic Taconite, the mining company that wanted to put in a large open pit iron mine in the Penokee Hills. Gogebic ended up pulling out of the state almost entirely (likely due to incredible community and federal pushback), but that law to weaken environmental regulations remains on the books.

Fortunately, there are a whole lot of folks in Wisconsin who not only oppose this current assault on protecting our cultural heritage from unnecessary destruction, but are working hard to ensure it doesn't happen. A rally led by representatives of the Ho-Chunk Nation is planned for noon Tuesday on the west side of the Capitol building in Madison. Already, representatives of the nation have been reaching out to the officials who introduced the bill to explain why it's a bad idea. Nearly 5,000 signatures have been collected for a petition against the law at savethemounds.com.

The Ho-Chunk Nation has played a large role in defending the cultural and environmental heritage of the state. Last year, it added explicit environmental protections to its constitution. It's part of a belief system that sees nature  air, water, wildlife  as having rights just as people do. Given that the well-being of any one of those things is inextricably tied up with all of the others, it makes perfect sense to see things that way. Whether you call them "rights" or not, acknowledging the interconnected web of life is crucial to the survival of our species.

By doing this, the Ho-Chunk also have more firmly positioned themselves to have legal standing in the fight to protect natural and cultural resources like the mounds.

The effigy mounds are part of the cultural legacy of everyone who calls Wisconsin home. They deserve the same level of reverence and protection that we'd afford any burial ground, spiritual sanctuary or other important historic site. After decades of unfettered development, we only have so much left. Let's act before it's too late.

Emily Mills is a freelance writer who lives in Madison. Twitter: @millbot; Email: emily.mills@outlook.com
President Barack Obama, right, listens to a question from Taya Kyle, left, widow of U.S. Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, during a CNN televised town hall meeting hosted by Anderson Cooper at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., Thursday. Credit: Associated Press

By

Just because a person is a gun owner does not mean that person understands the multitude of issues surrounding the Second Amendment, its creation, its intent and the various schemes proposed by other citizens who have a different view of America and wish to make this freedom impotent.

Here are the main reasons knowledgeable defenders of American gun rights oppose universal background checks:

Under current law, a background check to the FBI is not gun-specific; only the identity of the transferor and the transferee are entered into record. The application that the buyer completes at the licensed gun dealer's location includes not only the ID of the transferee but also contains a description of the firearm, including its unique serial number. That form is owned by the federal government and is treated as a tax return. Although prohibited by law, a new or possibly corrupt administration could just reinterpret existing law and seize all these forms and digitize the information to create a national registration list of most of the guns in America and who owns them.

Throughout history, once a government knew who owned what weapons, some form of disarming or confiscation soon followed.

Obama's faults

President Barack Obama closed his unprecedented  and perhaps unconstitutional  attempt to bypass the will of our country's elected lawmakers by invoking the tears and sadness felt by all people throughout the world in remembering the victims of mass shootings of children and adults, citing location after location.

He didn't mention that most of the murders occurred in "gun free zones." Nor did Obama mention our nation's 10-year war in the Mideast, Vietnam, Korea, World War II and the many hundreds of thousands of men and women who were killed protecting America's freedoms. The Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that the Second Amendment is an individual right and not a collective right, yet not an absolute right and subject to certain restrictions. What does that mean? Does it mean that perpetuating American freedoms has more to do with who is elected to office and less to do with the intentions of the Founding Fathers and the sacrifices of those who have died to protect our rights?

The only people who obey the laws are the people who are not a problem to society. Criminally minded individuals would find another way to get a gun. No person willing to violate the law would find it hard to acquire a "paperless" gun or a stolen gun.

Where it leads

The proposed law would not and could not be limited to just the sales of firearms. The law must include and prohibit the transfer of possession, no matter how temporary. Otherwise it would be lawful to simply loan a gun to a person without a mandated background check. If a man wanted to loan a rifle to his son-in-law for Wisconsin's deer hunting season, both of the men would have to pay for and pass a background check. Then after the hunt, when the rifle is returned to the father-in-law, both would again have to pay for and pass a background check. Although the call to the FBI for the background check possibly would be free of charge, the licensed gun dealer who is authorized to conduct that check would have to collect perhaps $50 from the men being checked for the time and trouble of having to enter the gun into his federal record books.

Obama pledged to close the imaginary gun show loophole, a campaign slogan created by those who believe Americans should be disarmed. Most of the sellers at gun shows are licensed dealers who must complete the same paperwork and background checks they do at their stores. The handful of unlicensed sellers of guns at gun shows frequently have attempted to obtain a federal license. The instructions provided by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives for filling out the application state that if a person's reason for applying for a license is to sell guns just at gun shows the application will be denied. After decades of abuse by the BATF following the passage of the gun control act of 1968, the president signed a law approved by both the Senate and the House that makes it lawful for Americans to buy and sell firearms as a hobby as long as the activity does not create a primary livelihood for the seller.

Most of the nation's gun rights organizations have supported the strict prosecution of those who attempt to buy firearms when they knowingly are prohibited from possessing firearms. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accurately stated that the National Rifle Association's mandatory background check in the Brady Act stopped a million people from buying guns from federally licensed gun dealers. Clinton omitted the fact that only a few dozen of those denied were ever prosecuted and only a few of those were ever convicted. A person would have to be naive not to realize that most gun buyers with criminal intent went to the black market or acquired firearms from friends and family.

A tax on guns?

Surely, most people would support investing in improving the treatment of those with mental illness, including easier access to that treatment. What was not disclosed is just where the $500 million will come from to increase this treatment. In past years, the nation's anti-gun leaders proposed similar schemes but then demanded that gun buyers pay an additional tax to fund the program. In years past, funding provided to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to research a variety of issues involving the misuse of guns was revoked when it was discovered that the CDC was using the money to demonize firearms, instruct family physicians to direct their patients to remove guns from their homes and a host of other actions clearly intended to encumber and confuse Americans about the lawful possession and use of guns.

With the NRA being the world's leading authority on gun safety, its programs have resulted in a downward decline in true firearms accidents in America for many decades.

The president accurately stated that traditionally 60% of suicides in America involve the use of guns. What the president didn't mention is that many other developed nations, Japan among them, have a higher suicide rate in their countries where citizens never have been allowed to possess firearms for any purpose.

Another Obama proposal is to outlaw new firearms that do not incorporate yet undeveloped technology that would allow only a specific user to be able to discharge a specific gun. But just how difficult would it be for today's preteens to defeat and disconnect such technology? And it would make guns more expensive and less available to some citizens.

Once Obama produces the documents explaining the details of his proposal, the early warnings of the NRA will be very clear. The NRA is funded by its 5 million-plus dues-paying members and many tens of millions of other Americans who vote and donate money to protect the Second Amendment.

The power attributed to the NRA comes from the collective power and concerns of gun-owning and, more and more, gun-toting Americans who refuse to become victims or subjects of the government.

Whatever a person's view is on the gun issue and the gun control laws of this nation, Obama's willingness to bypass the separation of powers and ignore the will of our country's elected Senate and House of Representatives is clearly similar to what dictators have done in the past. First, they enact a firearms registry and then they confiscate those guns, eliminating the ability of the people to resist.

James E. Fendry is a blogger at Purple Wisconsin, which is hosted at JS Online.
Sixteen staff members of Lincoln Hills School are on paid leave for a wide variety of misconduct and infraction, the state said Friday. State and federal authorities are investigating a range of potential crimes at the juvenile prison in Irma, including second-degree sexual assault, physical child abuse, child neglect, abuse of prisoners, and intimidation of victims and witnesses. Credit: Mark Hoffman

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By of the

Madison  Sixteen employees at the state's secure facility for young offenders have been put on paid leave while they face an investigation into excessive use of force, retaliation against accusers and other allegations, the state Department of Corrections disclosed Friday.

State and federal authorities are also investigating claims that the workers at Lincoln Hills School had improper relationships with inmates or failed to report infractions at the juvenile prison 30 miles north of Wausau.

The agency refused to name the Lincoln Hills employees who are on paid leave, how much they have been paid or how long they have been on leave, saying it couldn't release that information because the investigations are ongoing.

Two of the 16 employees have resigned, department spokeswoman Joy Staab said. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has previously reported that some employees have been on paid leave for nearly a year.

Sixteen employees would amount to 6.5% of the 246 positions that were filled at the prison as of mid-November, according to figures provided by the Department of Corrections to Rep. Mandela Barnes (D-Milwaukee).

The investigation became public in December amid a massive raid by state agents on Lincoln Hills but has been going on for a year, and Attorney General Brad Schimel has said it may continue for another year. A Lincoln County judge has found there is reason to believe crimes occurred there that include sexual assault, physical child abuse, intimidation of victims and witnesses, child neglect and abuse of prisoners.

The probe is focused on activities at Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake School, a secure facility for girls and young women that shares the same Northwoods campus.

The Department of Corrections began its investigation in late 2014 and brought in the state Department of Justice in January 2015 as well as the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is also involved in the case.

The probe intensified last month when about 50 state agents and attorneys descended on the prison and spent days there to conduct interviews with staff and inmates.

The raid came days after a Nov. 29 incident in which a teenage inmate was pushed partially into his room and his foot was caught in the door as it was slammed shut. The inmate had to have his toes amputated as a result, according to sources.

Frontline staff and their union representatives have contended managers and top officials have been slow to heed warnings and ignored concerns they raised. Chronic staffing shortages and a culture of not reporting serious problems have exacerbated the situation, they have said.

Gov. Scott Walker and his corrections secretary, Ed Wall, have said they took swift action to address problems at the school as they learned about them. They have said they have ordered a review of the agency's protocols and how use-of-force incidents are reported.

But the Journal Sentinel has also reported on concerns that have been raised about Lincoln Hills to Walker's office and DOC officials going back months before the raid.

Wall and his closest aides also visited Lincoln Hills with the local sheriff in August  giving him a chance to personally assess allegations of abuse and other problems at the troubled institution.

Three months after that visit, Wall praised the two top officials responsible for the school when the department announced they would both retire on Jan. 9.

Wall has given no explanation for why he had touted the performance of John Ourada, the school's superintendent at the time, and Paul Westerhaus, who was the administrator of the Division of Juvenile Corrections. Their departure from the agency came the same day as the first hearing was held in the so-called John Doe probe looking into the allegations of abuses at the school.
Walnut Way steps into We Energies rate case as voice of low-income gas, electric customers

Advocates say the pain of a large utility rate increase will fall hardest on low-income residents who are already struggling to make ends meet.
Firearms are lined up for sale Saturday at the Waukesha Expo Forum during a weekend gun show and sale. Credit: Calvin Mattheis

By of the

Waukesha It's become a truism among firearms dealers: Politicians call for more restrictions on gun sales, leading to a surge of people buying guns.

This weekend's gun show at the Waukesha Expo Forum is a case in point.

About 70 vendors selling guns, ammunition, knives and hunting gear saw a steady stream of buyers Saturday. It was part of the Bob and Rocco Gun Shows, named for founder Bob Pucci and his dog, Rocco, which typically draw about 1,500 people on a Saturday.

"I think it will be over that (number) today," show organizer Ron Martin said. He said the Friday night turnout was heavier than normal, with about 1,000 people.

Martin said the surge of buyers was tied to President Barack Obama's announcement Tuesday of new executive actions that Obama says will reduce gun violence.

"It does seem to create a frenzy of people who want to buy," Martin said.

The executive actions include requiring people who are determined to be in the business of dealing in firearms to get a federal firearms license. Once they're licensed, they are required to conduct background checks on all buyers.

Private sellers without a federal license don't have to conduct such checks.

Obama's executive action covers only those private sellers who are deemed to be active dealers, and doesn't apply to people who make occasional sales from their personal collection.

The Waukesha show is drawing a lot of first-time attendees seeking to buy handguns to help protect themselves, Martin said. Some might be concerned about the prospect of increased background checks by private sellers, he said.

But Martin said the federal government's approach to private gun sellers isn't a big change from current enforcement practices.

He knows of Wisconsin private sellers who have received cease and desist orders from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives for selling enough guns for the agency to consider them as being in the business of dealing in firearms.

Martin also doesn't believe expanded background checks will have much effect in reducing gun violence.

"All these laws are only for honest people," said Martin, a licensed firearms dealer for 30 years.

Marty Brunner, another longtime licensed dealer, agrees. He said guns used in several recent U.S. mass shootings were obtained legally.

Brunner, of Richmond, whose business cards refer to him as Machine Gun Marty, and Martin, of Somerset, both said Obama's actions are limited.

For private sellers, a new requirement to obtain a federal firearms license isn't a huge burden, Brunner said.

Also, buyers who are concerned the background checks will create a paper trail linking their gun ownership to the federal government are misinformed, Martin said.

He said the form filled out by a buyer for the background check isn't turned over to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which conducts the check.

Instead, the law requires the firearms dealer to keep that information on file for 20 years. Law enforcement doesn't contact the dealer for that information unless that gun is connected to a criminal investigation, he said.

The paper trail, Martin said, "doesn't really exist, unless you do something wrong."
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By of the

A woman killed in a head-on crash in the Town of Cross Plains was identified by the Dane County medical examiner's office Friday as Leah R. Harris, 30, of Mazomanie.

The crash was reported shortly after 9:30 a.m. Thursday on U.S. Highway 14 at Rocky Dell Road, according to a news release from the Dane County Sheriff's Office.

According to the release, the car Harris was driving was westbound on the highway when she crossed the centerline and struck an SUV driven by a 33-year-old Black Earth woman.

Harris was pronounced dead at the scene and the driver of the SUV and several passengers in that vehicle were taken to hospitals with minor injuries, according to the release.

The crash remained under investigation.
Steven Avery is escorted through the halls of the Manitowoc County Courthouse in 2007. A new Netflix documentary retells his story. Credit: Associated Press

By of the

An Illinois law firm announced Friday that it will represent convicted killer Steven Avery and that it hopes to add him to its "list of wrongful conviction exonerations."

Kathleen T. Zellner & Associates of Downers Grove assumes representation of Avery as a the Netflix documentary series "Making a Murderer" continues to cast doubt on his guilt in the killing of 25-year-old photographer Teresa Halbach in 2005 in Manitowoc County.

Avery, now 53, was sentenced to life in prison for Halbach's death.

He had previously been released from prison after 18 years for a rape that DNA evidence showed was committed by another man.

According to a news release from the Zellner law firm, it will be assisted with Avery's representation by Tricia Bushnell, legal director for the Midwest Innocence Project.
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Town of Geneva police Friday are investigating an officer-involved shooting in Walworth County, WITI-TV in Milwaukee reported.

The shooting occurred shortly after 5 p.m. near Lincoln Drive and Gooseberry Road, according to a post on the station's website.

No officers were injured in the incident, according to the station.

The website WalworthCountyToday reported that police responded to a report of someone smashing windows at a house near lake Como before police radio traffic indicated that shots had been fired.

No further information on the shooting was available late Friday.
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By of the

Two Town of Geneva police officers fatally shot a 26-year-old man Friday evening after the suspect charged at them with a large knife, town Police Chief Steven R. Hurley said Saturday.

Hurley identified the deceased man as Geneva resident Eric C. Olsen.

The two officers were dispatched about 5:10 p.m. to a complaint of a man breaking a window with an axe at a residence at W3836 Lincoln Drive, near Olsen's own residence, Hurley said.

When the officers arrived and made contact with the suspect, the man charged at them with a knife and they shot him, according to Hurley.

Both the Walworth County Sheriff's Office and the state Department of Justice are investigating the officer-involved shooting. The two officers have been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation.

No officer was injured in the incident, Hurley said. The department employs 12 officers.

Nearby residents told news reporters that they heard multiple gunshots at the time.
Sarah Schuh (left) and her sister Katherine Daniels look at a picture of their mother, Colleen Daniels, who died in 2011 after a doctor refused to remove a breathing tube from here esophagus at Calumet Medical Center in Chilton. Her estate recently reached a settlment with the physicians insurer. Credit: Rick Wood

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The estate of a woman who died after a doctor stuffed a breathing tube in her esophagus  and refused to remove it  and a man who lost a leg to medical negligence just collected payments to settle their medical malpractice lawsuits.

Successful medical malpractice claims are rare in Wisconsin because of a series of laws and court rulings that limit who can sue and how much they can collect. In addition, the defense of all claims over $1 million is backed by a state-managed $1.24 billion insurance fund. Those factors often make it impossible for people with legitimate claims to find a lawyer to take their case.

In one of the handful of malpractice cases to win at trial last year, attorneys for Deshawn Gray said their 28-year-old client just collected $2.1 million from Wheaton Franciscan-St. Joseph hospital. The payment was about $800,000 less than the jury awarded after agreeing that medical negligence caused him to have a leg amputated after he fractured his knee in a 2012 motorcycle accident.

"When you go into the hospital with a broken leg... you should not come out with no leg at all," said James Pitts, Gray's lawyer.

Gray's lawsuit centered around his claim that soon after his knee was surgically repaired at St. Joseph he developed acute compartment syndrome, a condition in which the muscle and tissue swell, cutting off blood supply to the muscle and causing nerves to die off, said Gregory Pitts, who also represented Gray.

"The guy could not feel his leg or wiggle his toes," Gregory Pitts said, noting that the nurses documented the condition but were negligent because they failed to contact doctors who could have taken actions that would have saved Gray's leg.

"If you don't call the doctor, how is the doctor going to know," James Pitts said.

A spokeswoman for Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare declined to comment.

Before the trial, attorneys agreed that if Gray won his case, he would be entitled to $1.3 million in economic damages to cover past and future medical bills and lost wages.

On top that, the jury awarded Gray $1.5 million for noneconomic damages  Gray's pain and suffering and his 7-year-old son's loss of companionship with his father. Gray, however, agreed to cut that figure in half so that it would be in line with the state's $750,000 cap on awards for pain and suffering and other noneconomic damages.

James Pitts said his client agreed not to challenge the cap to avoid putting the entire award at risk, since the defense would scour the trial record in search of reversible error.

"These medical malpractice defense lawyers are not weak," Pitts said.

The $750,000 cap is being challenged by attorney Daniel Rottier, who in 2014 won a $25 million verdict on behalf of a Milwaukee woman who lost all four limbs after a Strep A infection  the kind that causes strep throat  went undetected by doctors at Columbia St. Mary's Hospital in Milwaukee. The award included $16.5 million for pain and suffering and loss of companionship.

Colleen Daniels lawsuit

In the second malpractice case that was recently settled, attorneys had to follow an unusual legal road to get around a unique Wisconsin law that allows only minor children or spouses to sue for medical malpractice in a death case  meaning adult children or the parents of adult children cannot sue.

Colleen Daniels, 56, died in 2011 after a doctor refused to remove a breathing tube from her esophagus despite pleas by a paramedic and other medical personnel in the emergency room at Calumet Medical Center in Chilton. Daniels, of Kiel, was brought to the hospital following a car accident.

Daniels' case was profiled in a 2014 Journal Sentinel series about the difficulty of bringing medical malpractice lawsuits in Wisconsin.

Since Daniels was a divorced mother of three adult children  including a daughter who was an 18-year-old high school student living at home when her mother died  state law prevented anybody from suing for medical malpractice.

So, Michael End, the attorney for the Daniels estate, filed a pain and suffering suit on behalf of the estate, arguing the woman was in pain and was aware that her medical procedure had gone horribly wrong.

"It was a scary and painful time," End said.

The case was settled out of court, with the bulk of the settlement coming from the insurance company for physician Zulfiqar Ali. End declined to disclose the amount of the settlement that was paid this week, except to say it was in the "low six figures."

Ali, who contends he inserted the breathing tube in the proper pipe, said Daniels should have received a larger settlement.

"Dammit, she was killed," Ali said. "It was a reckless and wrongful death."

Ali, who did not cooperate with his medical malpractice insurance company, has repeatedly said there were wrongdoing and coverups at the hospital.

Ali's medical license was suspended in 2014 for his treatment of Daniels, and it was revoked last year after he posted confidential medical information about Daniels on several Internet sites and on Facebook.

Attorneys for the hospital and the insurance company representing Ali did not return phone calls.

End said that even though he collected a modest settlement for Daniels' estate, the law should allow for a malpractice suit to be filed by Daniels' children.

"It's unfortunate that the law in Wisconsin prevents the children from recovering compensation after their mother was suffocated by the tube going into her stomach instead of her lungs," End said.

Lawmakers have repeatedly rejected attempts to allow adult children or parents of adult children to sue for medical malpractice in death cases. Each attempt has failed and a bill pending in the state Senate that would allow parents of adult children to sue in medical malpractice death cases is seen as having little chance of passing.
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By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) |  

Dorit Rabinyans novel Borderlife treats a love affair in New York between an Israeli woman and a Palestinian man, which ends when they return to their respective homes. The novel began being assigned by those inveterate social radicals, the High School Teachers, in Israel. But then senior officials of the ministry of education banned the book. Later they said it wasnt banned and could be taught, but would not form part of any examination. (In education systems with year-end examinations, elective material that cannot appear on the exam is usually not much taught).

Ms. Rabinyan explains the block here.

In the United States, the rate of out-marriage among American Jews is about 50%; many Israelis, whether Jews, Christians or Muslims, do not approve of of mixed marriages. Taboos on intermarriage in the US collapsed in the mid-1960s, apparently as a result of the influence on young people of the Civil Rights movement. 39% of American marriages in the past five years were interfaith. Of course, many Americans have ceased marrying at all, and those informal unions are also often interfaith. 45% of American Muslims also marry outside their faith.

The high-handed intervention of the ministry of education has been met with protests. Some 5,000 readers went out and bought the novel in just 1 week.

Then TimeOut Tel Aviv, the lifestyle site, made a video of Jews and Arabs kissing, which has gone viral:

The Israeli Ministry of Education decided to ban from the school program a book describing an affair between a Jewish woman and an Arab man. So TimeOut Tel Aviv have decided to ask Jews and Arabs to meet and to kiss. Six couples of Jews and Arabs  male and female, gay and straight  have decided to do the forbidden deed and express love infront of our camera.

Some of them were couples, some just friends, some have never met prior to the shoot. Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies.

Time Out Tel Aviv:    | Jews & Arabs Kiss |    

In August of 2014, the far right wing Lehava movement shouted death to Arabs outside a mixed wedding, where a Jewish woman had actually converted so as to marry her beloved. I wrote at that time:
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By Walden Bello | ( Foreign Policy in Focus ) |  

How the CIA, bad trade deals, and wanton military intervention caused the social crises that gave us the Donald. (Really.)

When the late Chalmers Johnson introduced the word blowback to describe the adverse consequences of Washingtons actions in the world, he wasnt referring simply to the victims of U.S. imperial interventions striking back on American soil. More importantly, he saw the resulting destabilization of the American democratic process as the most dangerous blowback of all.

Seen in this light, Donald Trumps M&Ms campaign  which relies heavily on broadsides against Mexicans and Muslims  is unquestionably a disturbing blowback from Washingtons policies abroad.

Trump launched his campaign with a plan to build a wall along the nearly 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border while summarily deporting undocumented migrants and their families. After the San Bernardino shootings on December 2, in which a Muslim couple killed 14 people, Trump has pushed for the U.S. to stop accepting Muslim migrants and visitors to the United States.

These two proposals run directly against the U.S. self-image as a country of migrants, threatening to unleash a tide of hatred against Mexican-Americans and Muslims, and putting them on notice that their rights are fragile. Yet Trumps calls have resonated with large sectors of the Republican base, with extremist rhetoric now a staple not only of Trumps campaign but of his rivals as well.

The Blowback from Iraq

The U.S. foreign policy blunders that created ISIS  popular fear of which now drives U.S. domestic and foreign policy alike  are relatively well documented.

The U.S. invasion of Iraq blew the lid off Iraqi society, which had been a pressure cooker of sectarian rivalries contained by the regime of Saddam Hussein. As a Shia-dominated regime took over in Baghdad, an extremist Sunni movement  al-Qaeda in Iraq, headed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi  rose to fight the government and its American sponsors.

Zarqawi found many receptive recruits among the hundreds of thousands of Sunni soldiers in Saddams army, which had been disbanded by the Americans shortly after their takeover. Adherents were also nurtured in U.S. prison camps, among them future ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. After Zarqawi was killed by a U.S. airstrike, Baghdadi emerged as the leader of the group, which broke from al-Qaeda during the Syrian civil war and began calling itself the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS  later shortened to just the Islamic State.

At first, ISIS was seen by western intelligence as focused mainly on establishing a caliphate in the Middle East, for which it undertook a sophisticated international recruitment campaign online. Then concern developed that ISIS was not simply recruiting young people from Europe and the U.S. to fight in Iraq or Syria, but training them to be sent back to perform terrorist acts in their home countries.

The Paris massacre in mid-November, which saw a handful of shooters and bombers kill some 130 people in a sophisticated coordinated operation, was seen as the ultimate blowback. That is, until the San Bernardino shooting two weeks later, which U.S. authorities saw as the scariest blowback of all: shooters carrying out uncoordinated individual actions inspired by ISIS propaganda disseminated online.

The Mexican Blowback 1: The CIA Connection

The blowback process from Mexico is less well known but equally well documented. One trigger, as in Iraq, was political intervention.

The Mexican drug syndicates were relatively small-time affairs until the 1980s. It was the Central Intelligence Agency that made them big-time during

the Reagan administrations efforts to overthrow the Sandinista government in Nicaragua, where it engaged in unconventional fundraising operations to evade congressional scrutiny.

One was the so-called Iran-Contra deal, where top Reagan administration officials facilitated the sale of weapons to Iran  then the object of a U.S. arms embargo  and then diverted part of the proceeds to fund the anti-Sandinista guerrillas known as the Contras.

Another method was to use Mexican drug syndicates.

In her brave expose on the rise of Mexican drug cartels, Narcoland: The Mexican Drug Lords and Their Godfathers, the celebrated Mexican investigative journalist Anabel Hernandez writes that when the U.S. Congress prohibited the use of government money to fund the overthrow of the Sandinistas, the CIA made a deal with the cartels to allow large-scale cocaine sales into the United States, but on condition that part of the proceeds would be diverted to support the Contras.

Indeed, the CIAs complicity in fostering the rise of the Mexican cartels, which eventually displaced the Colombian cartels as the main transporters of cocaine to the United States, has also been documented by a number of U.S. journalists. Among the key beneficiaries of the CIA connection was the Sinaloa Cartel, which eventually produced the lord of drug lords: El Chapo Guzman.

The Mexican Blowback II: NAFTA

The other source of the Mexican blowback was economic.

Following the Third World debt crisis in the early 1980s, the United States  via the International Monetary Fund and World Bank  began an ambitious effort to restructure the Mexican economy along free-market lines. The cutting back of government support for many agricultural services, along with a program of privatization designed to reverse communal ownership of land institutionalized by the Mexican Revolution, resulted in widespread suffering in the countryside, with many peasants thrown off their lands.

But even more devastating was Mexicos integration into the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, which quickly became a program for dumping subsidized U.S. corn and other agricultural products into Mexico. According to a 2003 report of the Carnegie Endowment, imports of U.S. agricultural products under NAFTA threw 1.3 million farmers out of work.

For these peasants, the choice became either the shantytowns of Mexico City or El Norte, with vast numbers opting for the latter. By 2006, roughly 10 percent of Mexicos population was living in the United States, 15 percent of its workforce was working there, and one in every seven Mexicans was migrating to the U.S. There was a strong element of truth in the sardonic comment that, owing to NAFTAs savage impact on peasant agriculture, Mexicos peasantry simply moved to the United States.

U.S. policies in Mexico and Central America thus had a dramatic dual blowback effect. On one side, the CIA godfathered a powerful cartel whose massive exports of cocaine devastated inner cities from Los Angeles to Washington, DC  and whose violence has now killed or displaced tens of thousands of Mexicans. On the other side, U.S.-sponsored structural adjustment and NAFTA ruined Mexican peasant agriculture, leading to the migration of millions to the north, where theyve become scapegoats for U.S. economic troubles.

Study after study has refuted claims that migrants take jobs away from non-migrant workers, or that they dont pay their taxes. Yet Mexican migrants are continually blamed by opportunistic politicians on the make, like Trump and his Republican colleagues.

The Ultimate Blowback

Its unfortunate that this opportunistic, demagogic game of playing on physical fear (Muslim terrorists out to take your life) and economic fear (Mexican workers out to steal your jobs) has resonated among so much of the countrys white population. Trump, whose anti-Muslim and anti-Mexican rhetoric is most brazen, leads his opponents in the Republican presidential race by a wide margin in the surveys.

Instead of aggressively challenging the Republican candidates inflamed rhetoric and pointing to U.S. political and economic programs as the cause of the blowback, most liberal leaders are on the defensive. Only Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent, is pointing to the real roots of Americas foreign policy and domestic crises. In the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, his opponent, Hillary Clinton, continues to push for more military intervention in the Middle East and is reluctant to finger Wall Street as the source of the countrys economic troubles.

The country seems headed towards an even less liberal democratic order than now exists  one marked by more religious intolerance, more restrictions on civil liberties, and more immigration rules designed to keep out migrants. And that, as Chalmers Johnson so presciently warned, was really the ultimate blowback.

FPIF columnist Walden Bello is Adjunct Professor of Sociology at the State University of New York at Binghamton. An earlier version of this commentary was published by Telesur.

Via Foreign Policy in Focus



Related video added by Juan Cole:

A+: Donald Trump In Mexico: We Asked Mexicans What They Thought About Trump
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Human Rights Watch |  

(Beirut)  Saudi Arabia-led coalition forces airdropped cluster bombs on residential neighborhoods in Yemens capital, Sanaa, early on January 6, 2016. It is not yet clear whether the attacks caused civilian casualties, but the inherently indiscriminate nature of cluster munitions makes such attacks serious violations of the laws of war. The deliberate or reckless use of cluster munitions in populated areas amounts to a war crime.

Markings on a remnant of a CBU-58 cluster bomb found near al-Zira`a Street in Sanaa on January 6, 2016 indicating that it was manufactured in 1978 at the Milan Army Ammunition Plant in the US state of Tennessee.

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Markings on a remnant of a CBU-58 cluster bomb found near al-Zira`a Street in Sanaa on January 6, 2016 indicating that it was manufactured in 1978 at the Milan Army Ammunition Plant in the US state of Tennessee.

 2016 Private

The coalitions repeated use of cluster bombs in the middle of a crowded city suggests an intent to harm civilians, which is a war crime, said Steve Goose, arms director at Human Rights Watch. These outrageous attacks show that the coalition seems less concerned than ever about sparing civilians from wars horrors.

Residents of two Sanaa neighborhoods described aerial attacks consistent with cluster bomb use. A resident of al-Zira`a Street told Human Rights Watch that his family was awakened at 5:30 a.m. on January 6 by dozens of small explosions. He said that he had been at work, but that his wife told him that when the family fled they saw many homes and a local kindergarten with newly pockmarked walls and broken windows.

The coalitions repeated use of cluster bombs in the middle of a crowded city suggests an intent to harm civilians, which is a war crime. These outrageous attacks show that the coalition seems less concerned than ever about sparing civilians from wars horrors. Steve Goose, arms director.

A resident of Hayal Sayeed, another residential neighborhood, described hearing small explosions at around 6 a.m. He went out on the street, he said, and saw more than 20 vehicles covered in pockmarks, including his own, as well as dozens of pockmarks in the road. He said that at least three houses in the area had pockmarked walls and broken windows. He found a fragment in his car, he said.

The al-Zira`a Street resident said that neither neighborhood had been hit by airstrikes before January 6. The nearest military installations, a small office, and a garage used by military guards, were about 600 to 800 meters from the al-Zira`a Street neighborhood. Even if the attacks were directed at the military targets, the use of cluster munitions meant they were still unlawful, Human Rights Watch said.

The al-Zira`a Street resident said that at the time of the attack he had been at his office, about 2 or 3 kilometers from Hayal Sayeed and 5 kilometers from al-Zira`a Street. Every 10 to 15 minutes he heard small explosions, until about 1:30 p.m. These did not sound like regular gunfire, he said. I asked my colleagues if they could hear them too  they said yes.

A third cluster bomb attack on January 6 was reported on social media by residents of Sanaas al-Thiaba neighborhood, although Human Rights Watch could not confirm this.

Human Rights Watch viewed photographs taken on January 6 in Sanaa that showed unmistakable remnants of cluster munitions, including unexploded submunitions, spherical fragmentation liners from submunitions that broke apart on impact, and parts of the bomb that carried the payload.

Human Rights Watch identified the munitions as from US-made BLU-63 antipersonnel/anti-materiel submunitions and components of a CBU-58 cluster bomb. Markings on the bomb remnants indicate that it was manufactured in 1978 at the Milan Army Ammunition Plant in the state of Tennessee in the United States.

Each air-dropped CBU-58 cluster bomb contains 650 submunitions. The United States transferred 1,000 CBU-58 bombs to Saudi Arabia sometime between 1970 and 1995, according to US export records obtained by Human Rights Watch. The US is a party to the armed conflict in Yemen, playing a direct role in coordinating military operations, and as such, is obligated to investigate alleged violations of the laws of war in which its forces took part.

The CBU-58 cluster bomb and BLU-63 submunition were developed by the US during the Vietnam War and are designed to attack personnel and lightly protected materiel. The submunitions also contain 5-gram titanium pellets that produce an incendiary effect on flammable targets.

In 2015, Human Rights Watch documented the use by coalition forces of three types of cluster munitions in Yemen. Amnesty International documented the coalitions use of a fourth type. A fifth type of cluster munition has been used, but the users identity is unclear. A US Defense Department official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told U.S. News and World Report in August that the U.S. is aware that Saudi Arabia has used cluster munitions in Yemen.

BLU-63 submunitions that broke apart on impact after being dispersed by CBU-58 cluster bombs in the Hayal Sayeed neighborhood of Sanaa on January 6, 2016.

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BLU-63 submunitions that broke apart on impact after being dispersed by CBU-58 cluster bombs in the Hayal Sayeed neighborhood of Sanaa on January 6, 2016.

 2016 Private

Neither Yemen, Saudi Arabia, nor any of the other coalition countries are party to the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions, the international treaty banning cluster munitions. A total of 118 countries have signed and 98 have ratified the treaty. Human Rights Watch is a co-founder of the Cluster Munition Coalition and serves as its chair.

On November 17, the US Defense Department announced that the State Department had approved a sale of US$1.29 billion worth of air-to-ground munitions, such as laser-guided bombs and general purpose bombs with guidance systems  none of which are cluster munitions. The US should not sell aerial bombs to Saudi Arabia in the absence of serious investigations into alleged laws-of-war violations in Yemen, Human Rights Watch said.

The UN Human Rights Council should create an independent, international inquiry into alleged violations of the laws of war by all sides.

It may have been 20 years since the US last provided these cluster munitions to the Saudis, but they are being used to kill civilians now, Goose said. The US, as a party to the conflict, should be demanding that the coalition immediately stop using these weapons or risk becoming complicit in their use.

Via Human Rights Watch



Related video added by Juan Cole:

CCTV: Coalition Airstrikes Intensify in Yemen
The server hosting this blog will be going offline this Friday (the 14th) at roughly 10pm. If all goes well, it will come back up on Saturday morning at 7-...

1 week ago
SHARE A red light camera on the corner of Sylvan way and Wheaton Way in Bremerton. LARRY STEAGALL / KITSAP SUN

By Josh Farley of the Kitsap Sun

BREMERTON  Wesley Weaver has a front-row seat to Bremerton's red light cameras.

He lives near the corner of 11th Street and Warren Avenue, where one of the cameras is installed. He sometimes hears screeching tires as vehicles attempt to stop, and wonders what is coming next.

"We'll listen for the crash noise," said Weaver, who has seen collisions occur due to such brake slamming.

He's no fan of Bremerton's red light cameras, which have been busy as ever.

In 2015, the program's nine cameras produced 8,842 citations through November, and will surely eclipse 9,000 when year-end statistics become available. That's roughly 2,400 more than were written in 2014.

Less than two years ago, Mayor Patty Lent was contemplating canceling the program because ticket revenue was failing to cover expenses. The program's $558,942 in revenues in 2014 were largely eaten by the annual $432,000 fee to the camera's provider, Redflex Traffic Systems. But 2015 revenues calculated so far were $693,880, with more expected to come in as people pay their tickets.

City leaders are uncertain why the camera program is on an upswing.

"Assuming the practice at (the Bremerton Police Department) has been consistent, the only variable I can think of is the carelessness or apathy of drivers," said Bremerton Municipal Court Judge James Docter. "Or, maybe there is more traffic."

The latter was the best guess of Bremerton Police Chief Steve Strachan.

"It is noticeable how much more traffic there is," he said. "With more traffic, you get more violations."

State and city traffic data, though, have not yet reflected an increase. But there is some evidence to back up Strachan's theory. At least 2,650 jobs have been added at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard since 2013. And the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier arrived in Bremerton in January 2015, relocating around 3,000 sailors and their families here.

Lent agreed with the chief that traffic, particularly during rush hour, may have something to do with it.

"They're anxious to get from point A to point B," she said of motorists.

Red light camera snapshot

Citations issued and fines collected through Bremertons red-light camera program:

Year Citations issued Revenue collected

2010 8,613 $687,095

2011 8,362 $688,144

2012 8,839 $733,937

2013 6,337 $570,775

2014 6,609 $533,751

2015* 8,842 $693,880

Total 47,602 $3,907,582

* 2015 total does not include December; data is not yet available for that month.
The Premier of Taiwan writes:

I extend sincere congratulations to New Zealand for its role in the complex 12-nation negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement concluded in October.

I would also like to take this occasion to reiterate Taiwans interest in joining the trade bloc. 

The two countries already have strong foundations in merchandise and services trade.

New Zealands fruit and nut products are popular with Taiwanese consumers and its butter, dairy, meat and fruit command large market shares here.

Meanwhile, demand for services continues to grow here.

By supporting Taiwans inclusion in the TPP, New Zealand would not only create business opportunities for itself but also support the two countries common desire for peace and prosperity in the Asia-Pacific.
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By Emily Choate

In the closing essay of "Walk Till the Dogs Get Mean," a new anthology edited by Adrian Blevins and Karen Sayler McElmurray, West Virginia native Jayne Anne Phillips contemplates the hidden nature of the writing life: "Writers focus perpetually on the half seen, and we live in the dim or glorious shadows of partially apprehended shapes. We could bill ourselves as perceptually challenged  given that we live two lives at once, segueing from one to the other with some distress  but we accept, long before we publish, the outlaw's mantle. We occupy a kind of border country, focused on the details that speak to us."

The Appalachian writers gathered in this anthology share a doubled understanding of such borderlands, hailing as they do from tucked-away Southern communities that prize the act of concealment. "Walk Till the Dogs Get Mean" delves deeply into this secretive aspect of Appalachian lineage and into the personal costs of exposing the forbidden.

These writers invite us well beyond cliched portraits of old-time religion and backwoods contrariness. Some bring us inside their most intimate, even dangerous, experiences of the forbidden. Chris Offutt narrates a heartbreaking series of abusive childhood encounters with an older man and then considers the consequences of the abuse. In the title essay, Jessie Van Eerden draws a vivid comparison between the half-wild dogs she encounters on her walks  their wounded "meanness" and hunger  with the internal upheaval caused by her own divorce. Jacinda Townsend reveals an intense moment when the severity of her childhood training  that women must not travel solo  comes flooding back, decades later and halfway around the world. Dorothy Allison owns up to patterns of self-destruction that dogged her as she struggled to escape her shame-drenched origins.

Other essayists examine their Mountain South backgrounds with a longer lens, noting cultural patterns that influenced many generations before them. The forbears of Kentuckian bell hooks believed "that above all else one must be self-determining," a crucial influence on hooks's life of activism and her ability to "survive whole in a postmodern world." Pinckney Benedict tackles the bigger picture in an entirely different way, a comic featuring mythologized characters like Orgo The Hillbilly King, "lean and cruel, crowned with kudzu." Joyce Dyer uses the second-person voice, which glides into and out of the idiosyncratic lives in an "outmigrant" company town.

Time and again these writers prove that to understand the Mountain South we must learn to see beyond its kitsch. In "Outsider Appalachian," East Tennessee native Melissa Range asks: "Am I an Appalachian writer if I question the stereotypes and nostalgia I see in the books I've loved, and try to do something other than perpetuate them?" As someone who left a South that constrained her true sensibilities, Range has come to redefine this lineage for her own vision: "What makes my writing Appalachian, to me, is its musical language, its underdog eye, its anger at injustice, its violence, its investment in the natural world, its terrifying God. But I don't know if that's enough for the insiders to claim me as one of their own, or if they should."

The shadow of Appalachian inheritance looms large, and in each of these essays we are allowed an unguarded glimpse into the making of that writer's voice, no matter how far from home he or she may have roamed. The essays create a cumulative effect of startling honesty.

For more local book coverage, visit chapter16.org, an online publication of Humanities Tennessee.
Wayne Bledsoe Columnist SHARE Jimmy King/Special to Go Knoxville David Bowie returns to experimental sounds on Blackstar. Monica Frisell/Special to the News Sentinel Bill Frisell, center, explores soundtrack music with friends on his new album When You Wish Upon a Star.

"Blackstar," David Bowie (Columbia)

During the 1970s, David Bowie was known as rock's chameleon. His different personas were almost as entertaining as his music. From the "Ziggy Stardust" bi-sexual alien rock star to his emaciated cocaine-fueled guise as the "Thin White Duke," Bowie always seemed to be a few musical steps ahead of everyone else in rock. Trace today's electronic music backwards and you'll find Bowie, who was hanging out in Berlin with producer Brian Eno and electronica's pioneers, as one of the first mainstream artists to pick up on the genre.

In the 1980s and '90s, though, Bowie sounded like an artist who was distracted. Suddenly, he was following the pack rather than leading. Even albums that tried for something different sounded uninspired.

In the bleak and pretentious "Outside," Bowie reunited with Eno, collaborated with Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor and began to get a little of his mojo back. Then with 2013's "The Next Day," Bowie seemed to be reinvigorated. The songs were punchy and visceral. It was a rock album so good that it might've come from the late '70s era referenced on the album cover  the photo from Bowie's 1977 disc "Heroes" with his face covered with a white square.

Bowie's new album, "Blackstar," though, returns to Bowie stretching his limits. On "Blackstar" Bowie incorporated modern jazz. He's flirted with it before. "Black Tie White Noise" (1993) featured trumpet great Lester Bowie, but it was a more awkward. Saxophonist Danny McCaslin, drummer Mark Guiliana, bassist Tim Lefebvre, keyboardist Jason Lindner and guitarist Ben Monder often make the magic in the tracks.

That's especially true on "Tis a Pity She Was a Whore." While the song references a notorious play from the 1600s involving a tragic brother/sister romance, the lyrics aren't particularly important. It's the groove these guys get going, with just enough chaos to keep it interesting.

Let's be clear. This is not easy listening Bowie. Electronic effects, odd time signatures and minor keys can make it jarring at times. Bowie, who just turned 69, is still happy to put his listeners on edge. But he also knows how to give you something lush and pretty, such as on the songs "Lazarus" and "I Can't Give Everything Away."

Like Bob Dylan and nearly every great artist who has survived into senior citizen-hood, Bowie has had plenty of ups and downs, artistically, through the years. While this doesn't rank with his very best albums, it's nice to have him back sounding like he has something to prove.

"When You Wish Upon a Star," Bill Frisell (Okeh)

Guitarist Bill Frisell is one of instrumental music's coolest and quirkiest players emerging from the New York jazz scene in the 1980s. His understated style, terrific technical chops and intuition made him a sought-out player. One of Frisell's greatest strengths, though, was the breadth of his interests. In the late 1990s, he began collaborating with all manner of artists. He released "Nashville," which featured Americana greats and teamed up drum ace Jim Keltner (a favorite rock session man) and bassist Viktor Krauss (who'd started in the bluegrass world with sister Alison Krauss) and guests for a series of albums that were simply gorgeous. Frisell's "Good Dog, Happy Man" and "Gone, Just Like a Train" are modern masterworks.

From that point on, Frisell has simply seemed to go wherever his muse led him. His latest effort is a peculiar collection of renditions of movie soundtrack music  from Elmer Bernstein's classic music for "To Kill a Mockingbird" to Bernard Hermann's theme to "Psycho" to the theme from television's "Bonanza."

Frisell's collaborators are viola player Eyvand Kang, bassist Thomas Morgan and drummer Rudy Royston. Petra Haden (daughter of jazz bass great Charlie Haden) contributes vocals on "You Only Live Twice," "The Shadow of Your Smile," "Moon River," "Happy Trails" and the title cut  as well as adding some wordless vocals.

Frisell always seems to be most connected to his drummer. On this release, Royston may not quite have that almost supernatural feel of when Frisell teamed with Keltner, but he and the guitarist mesh beautifully.

While the "Mockingbird" theme is delivered with some dreamy left turns, "Bonanza" is served fairly faithfully, lasting only a minute and a half. The most expansive excursion is three tracks dedicated to Ennio Morricone's music for the epic "Once Upon a Time In the West," the last of which begins with a reggae beat, and a nine-minute exploration of the theme from "The Godfather."

Frisell's own "Tales From the Far Side," his creepy theme for the little-seen TV special based on Gary Larson's cartoons, provides one of the highlights of the album.

"Moon River" (a song that still may be the peak of composer Henry Mancini and lyricist Johnny Mercer) gives Haden her best moment while Frisell and Morgan provide a sweet and uncluttered accompaniment.

While it's another interesting turn in Frisell's quirky career, "When You Wish Upon a Star" is not Frisell's most listenable album. It sounds more like a project than something born of real inspiration.

Still, his followers will want to hear what Frisell found on this detour.
It wasn't until the 1970s, when Supreme Court decisions recognized birth fathers, that they earned the right to have a say in the adoption process.

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By Leslie Mann

You don't venture far into the world of adoption before you hear the word "triad." Picture a triangle with the adoptee at one corner, adoptive parents at another and the biological, or birth, mother at the third. But, wait  someone's missing 

The birth father.

Too often, the birth father dangles from the birth mother's corner. Sometimes he doesn't even know she's pregnant.

Adoption has evolved from the pre-WWI "taking in" of the orphan next door, to closed adoptions, to open, which became the norm in the early 1980s. "Open" ranges from exchanging annual letters to co-parenting. (We're talking domestic adoptions here; international adoptions are usually closed.) All along, though, the biological father has been second fiddle to the birth mom.

"Until the 1970s, unmarried birth dads were not necessarily parents, legally, and their names were often left off of birth certificates or labeled 'unknown,'" said Susan Appleton, a law professor at Washington University Law School in St. Louis. "The birth mom made the adoption decisions." Several Supreme Court decisions in the '70s recognized birth dads. Since then, state laws have elevated their status further.

Research says "open" is healthier for everyone in the triad, but a major study, the long-term, ongoing Minnesota/Texas Adoption Research Project doesn't even mention birth dads in its "key findings." Fiction and films continuously portray them as an afterthought, too. (You may recall the birth mom, her parents and the adoptive parents in the movie "Juno." But, do you remember the birth dad?)

More often, today's birth dad can parent the child or participate in the adoption decision, but the burden is still on him to prove paternity. And, the calendar works against him, said Adam Pertman, president of the National Center on Adoption & Permanency.

"The court takes so long to adjudicate the decision, the child is no longer an infant when a birth dad wins custody or visitation," Pertman said. "Removing him at an older age is heart-rending, as we see in cases like Baby Richard." (He refers to the highly publicized custody battle over Danny Kirchner, a young child whose adoption was revoked when his biological father, Otakar Kirchner, won custody in a case decided in 1995 by the Illinois Supreme Court. His adoptive parents had named him Richard.)

Complicating the matter is the advent of states' putative (alleged) father registries, which vary widely. They appear pro-birth parent, giving the birth father a chance to register his paternity and contest adoption. In fact, their tight deadlines squeeze him out, say experts. And, because few people know the registries exist, the registration rate is low.

"Men say, 'What am I supposed to do, register every time I have sex?'" said Kris Faasse, vice president of Bethany Christian Services, an adoption agency with offices in 36 states. "I say, 'Ideally, yes.' But that won't happen."

Now, several trends are working in the favor of biological fathers. Ninety-five percent of adoptions are open now, according to the 2012 "Openness in Adoption" report from the Donaldson Adoption Institute, based in New York. Closed-adoption triad members can find each other when the adoptee is an adult, thanks to social media, DNA-linking websites and "open records laws" that allow access to birth certificates.

One baby step at a time, the birth dad's fate improves. Agencies such as Bethany have male social workers to talk to the dads. Advocacy groups ask school administrators to include birth father responsibilities in their sex-ed classes. Watchdog groups push for pro-birth dad laws.

"Finally, the birth dad is evolving from an obstacle (in an adoption) to a partner," Faasse said. "More often, we see him involved in the child's life. In the end, we all want the same thing  what's best for the child."

ADVICE FOR ALL INVOLVED

"Get a lawyer," echoed adoption experts. Visit the American Academy of Adoption Attorneys to find one who knows adoption law. In addition, follow these tips from the trenches:

FOR THE BIRTH DAD

 Young birth dads need to tell their parents about the pregnancy. "We regret hiding it," said Darrick Rizzo, 37, a birth dad living in Pennsylvania and author of "The Open Adoption: A Birth Father's Journey," speaking of his own experience. "We should have had their guidance."

 "Avoid conflict (put three exclamation marks here) with the birth mom," advised Joseph Cordell, a Creve Coeur, Mo.-based family law attorney. "She can make this difficult for you by saying you're not the father. When there's a conflict, the birth mom wins."

 If the birth mom is married to another man, many courts consider him the father.

 Yes, DNA tests can prove paternity. No, results are not immediate like on TV.

 "Join birth parent groups for help and support," said Jon Klaren, 45, of San Diego, a birth dad and member of Concerned United Birthparents.

 If you lose contact with the child, join the father registries in your state and in nearby states, and on the one maintained by the ALMA Society (Adoptees' Liberty Movement Association).

 You have the right to know about the birth of the child, but not necessarily the right to be part of his or her upbringing. If the pregnancy is the result of rape, or if you have a history of abuse or violence, the courts can exclude you from the child's life. The laws vary from state to state, but judges rule on the basis of what's best for the child.

FOR THE BIRTH MOM

 "Don't shut out the birth dad," Faasse said. "The child has a right to have a relationship with him."

 Before you decide to parent the child yourself, be realistic about your capabilities. Can you provide your child with food, shelter, love and guidance?

 Don't use the child to hurt the birth dad you no longer like.

FOR THE ADOPTIVE PARENTS

 Beware of a birth mom who is unwilling to name the birth dad. It may be because he wants paternity rights or visitation. "Sometimes the birth mother says the pregnancy resulted from rape to cover her indiscretions," said Marie Anderson, an ALMA coordinator. Enlist an experienced social worker, who can talk to the birth mom; if it is discovered that the birth mom was not raped, he or she also can help convince her to come clean so the word "rape" is not on your child's paperwork forever.

 "Don't buy into the myth that birth parents want to snatch your baby," Faasse said. "They made an adoption plan because they cannot parent the child."

 "Don't promise the birth parents what you can't deliver," Rizzo said. "You want that baby, so you say 'yes' to their requests. But if you don't want them at your holiday dinner, say so."

FOR ADULT ADOPTEES

 Recognize the possibility that your birth dad may not want to be found because he hasn't told his wife or other kids about you.

 To find your birth parents' families, register your DNA with 23andme.com, ancestry.com and/or familytreedna.com . "I found my birth dad's family on ancestry.com, although he had died," said Pam Kroskie, 47, a Bloomington, Ind., adoptee and president of Hoosiers for Equal Access to Records (HEAR). "As I met them, everything fell into place. I felt like I was filling in the blanks in my life."

 Don't expect your birth dad search to have a fairy tale ending. "If everything were hunky-dory with birth mom and dad, there wouldn't have been an adoption," Pertman said.
Former U.S. Rep. Zach Wamp, left, joins with other local leaders to show support for Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, at Volunteer Landing. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)

Former U.S. Rep. Zach Wamp will represent GOP presidential hopeful Marco Rubio in New Hampshire at campaign events on Tuesday while the Florida senator is in Washington for President Barack Obama's final State of the Union address.

Wamp said he will shadow another GOP presidential candidate, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, in the Granite State, appearing at grassroots events and doing radio interviews as a counter to Cruz.

"I effectively am going to be a replacement for him that day," Wamp said.

Wamp, a business consultant in Chattanooga who leads Rubio's effort in Tennessee, was in Knoxville at a Wednesday news conference for Rubio and was interviewed afterward and on Friday. He said he spends about 20 percent of his time on the Rubio campaign

Wamp said he believes Rubio will do well enough in the Feb. 1 Iowa caucus and Feb. 9 New Hampshire primary to continue in the race. In that case, Rubio will return to Tennessee  he's already been to Chattanooga  and come to Knoxville prior to the March 1 state presidential primary, he said.

"Iowa and New Hampshire will shrink the field. Mike Huckabee has already said if he isn't in the top third," he'll end his campaign, Wamp said.

In a national poll released Tuesday by NBC News/SurveyMonkey, Rubio holds the third-most votes among candidates for the Republican Party's nomination. Businessman Donald Trump is frontrunner with Cruz running second.

Another poll released Wednesday done by the Democratic-leaning Public Policy Polling showed Rubio is second in New Hampshire at 11 percent among 515 likely Republican voters, with Trump leading at 29 percent.

During the news conference, Wamp and others talked about Rubio's "electability," particularly against the presumed Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton. Wamp also said it was critical to the Republican Party to reach out to Cuban Americans like Rubio and young people.

Wamp represented the 3rd District in Congress from 1995-2011, when he ran for governor against Bill Haslam, who won and is now in his second term.

Others at the news conference at Volunteer Landing along Fort Loudoun Lake included state Sen. Becky Duncan Massey, state Rep. Eddie Smith, former Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale, Knox County Trustee Ed Shouse, Sevier County Mayor Larry Waters and former Knoxville Mayor Victor Ashe.

Michael Hensley, a University of Tennessee student and staff assistant to U.S. Rep. John J. Duncan Jr., also attended, representing students.
By Don Jacobs of the Knoxville News Sentinel

The former treasurer of St. George Greek Orthodox Church will serve the first portion of a 10-year split sentence in a Knox County jail this month after his guilty plea Friday to stealing more than $400,000 from church coffers.

Constantine D. Christodoulou, 48, of Knoxville is slated to report Jan. 22 to begin serving one year in jail, with nine years on probation, according to Knox County District Attorney General Charme Allen.

Christodoulou is entitled to whatever jail credits he can accumulate to shorten the sentence, said Assistant District Attorney General Sean McDermott.

Knox County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Martha Dooley said jail officials were unable to say how much time could be shaved off Christoldoulou's one-year sentence. She said jail officials did not have Christoldoulou's paperwork, so they couldn't determine which sentence-shrinking credits might apply to his case.

Credits can be awarded for good behavior, educational courses, substance abuse classes and working around the jail.

Christodoulou's sentencing concludes a story that began Feb. 26, when the Rev. Anthony Stratis informed church members through a letter that the former treasurer had been stealing from them for years. Church officials did not report the theft to police until two months after the News Sentinel published a story on the embezzlement. Stratis had initially written in the letter that the church would not seek prosecution.

Christodoulou between Dec. 30, 2010, and Feb. 21, 2015, "wrote checks to himself from church accounts that were not authorized by church officials," Allen stated in a news release. He placed the money into "business and personal accounts," she said.

Allen placed the total theft at $415,950. Christodoulou has repaid $145,000 of the pilfered money, Allen said, and the church's insurance company paid $50,000 on the claim.

Allen said the church spent $3,725 internally investigating the theft.

Christodoulou has agreed to pay another $224,675 in restitution, Allen said.

"Under the terms of this agreement, we made sure Christodoulou will serve time in custody for his crime and will be supervised upon his release," Allen said. "Most importantly, we have retained jurisdiction over the case to make sure Christodoulou pays his restitution and the church is made whole."

Christodoulou appeared Friday morning with his attorney, Mike Whalen, before Criminal Court Judge Bob McGee and agreed to be charged through a bill of information. Through that agreement, Christodoulou waived his right to a grand jury review or to a trial.

Christodoulou's probation means officials will have legal control over him to be sure he repays the embezzled money.

Christodoulou did not respond to calls for comment.

"It's a lot of money," Whalen said Friday.

He would not address what the money was spent on.

"Once it became apparent, he admitted to it," Whalen said.

Whalen said Christodoulou sold his travel business and a house to raise the $145,000 already repaid and plans to sell other properties to reimburse the church. He said the Christodoulou family had been active in the church for decades, but Constantine Christodoulou apparently no longer participates in church services.

"This is a community he has been a part of all his life, so it's not been easy on him," Whalen said.

McDermott said he didn't know what Christodoulou had done with the pilfered money.

The theft left the church with less than $2,000 in its bank accounts, prompting church leaders to approve obtaining a $150,000 loan to stabilize finances.

The low cash balance also delayed a decision to install a fire alarm system that had been reviewed and approved by the church, Stratis said.

At 6:50 a.m. April 12  the Eastern Orthodox Easter  a passerby reported flames in the sanctuary. By then, flames already had damaged the ornate dome in the sanctuary and raced through the structure.

Knoxville fire investigators eventually settled upon candles used in the night service that ended early in the morning April 12 as the probable cause of the fire. Someone had tossed a candle in a trash can and didn't douse it in the tray of sand at the rear of the sanctuary, investigators said.
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By News Sentinel Staff

KNOXVILLE  A Knox County man has been convicted of a combined 24 sexual assaults against two children.

Brian Derick Hickey, 53, will serve a 15-year prison sentence. Hickey pleaded guilty Jan. 8 before Criminal Court Judge Scott Green to 13 counts of aggravated sexual battery, two counts of attempted rape of a child, three counts of rape, one count of attempted rape and five counts of incest.

Police began investigating Hickey on Jan. 2, 2014, after a complaint he had sexually assaulted a 12-year-old. Knoxville Police Department Investigator Patty Tipton conducted interviews, collected DNA swabs and obtained a search warrant for Hickey's DNA; forensic analysis by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation supported the victim's account of the assault.

During that investigation, KPD Investigator Keith Johnson received a separate complaint about a 16-year-old, who said Hickey assaulted her from 2006-2014.

Hickey will be placed on the state Sex Offender Registry and is subject to community supervision for life.
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By News Sentinel Staff

KNOXVILLE  Police have released the name of a man who was shot Thursday in the Fort Sanders community near the University of Tennessee.

Paul Allen Riley, 24, was shot one time in the upper back and treated at the University of Tennessee Medical Center, police said.

Riley told Knoxville Police Department officers, who responded to a disturbance call at 1402 Highland Ave. at 5:46 p.m. Thursday, that three men entered his apartment and demanded money, then an with a video-game system, a cell phone and other items.

Police have made no arrests so far.

More details as they develop online and in Saturday's News Sentinel.
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By News Sentinel Staff

Editors note: This story has been updated to reflect new information.

SEVIERVILLE  A Sevierville businessman has been indicted on charges of sales tax evasion and theft.

Eric Eugene Gibby, 39, surrendered Friday to Tennessee Department of Revenue agents at the Sevier County jail.

Gibby had been the subject of an investigation by the department. On Tuesday, a Sevier County grand jury indicted him on one felony count of sales tax evasion and one felony count of theft of property over $60,000. The indictments charge that Gibby failed to remit $185,890.91 in state sales tax due for the U-Drive Auto used-vehicle dealer, 732 Parkway.

Bond was set at $25,000.

The department pursued the criminal case in cooperation with 4th Judicial District Attorney General Jimmy Dunn and his staff. Anyone who suspects violations of Tennessees revenue laws can call the toll-free tax fraud hot line, 1-800-FRAUDTX (372-8389).

The Department of Revenue is responsible for the administration of state tax laws and motor vehicle title and registration laws and for the collection of taxes and fees associated with those laws. The department collects about 87 percent of total state revenue. During the 2015 fiscal year, it collected $12.6 billion in state taxes and fees and more than $2.4 billion in taxes and fees for local governments.
photos by MICHAEL PATRICK/NEWS SENTINEL Hobart Akin, center, with the Tennessee State Parks World War I living history group, explains military items to students from West Haven Elementary and L&N STEM Academy on Friday at the Krutch Park extension. The re-enactment group portrays soldiers who served in the American Expeditionary Force during the first World War.

SHARE Re-enactor John Ball explains the gas mask Josh Waggener is putting on during the a World War I living history day at the Krutch Park Extension on Friday. The group portrays soldiers who served in the American Expeditionary Force during the First World War. (MICHAEL PATRICK/NEWS SENTINEL) Darrin Haas, a Ph.D. public history student at Middle Tennessee State University, following his lecture at the East Tennessee History Center about an Allied plot to kidnap Germanys deposed Kaiser Wilhelm II on Friday. (MICHAEL PATRICK/NEWS SENTINEL) Hobart Akin with the Tennessee State Parks World War I living history group explains military items to students from West Haven Elementary and L&N STEM Academy at the Krutch Park Extension on Friday. The group portrays soldiers who served in the American Expeditionary Force during the first World War. (MICHAEL PATRICK/NEWS SENTINEL)

By Mike Blackerby of the Knoxville News Sentinel

Almost 100 years ago, a group of Tennessee soldiers hatched a plot to kidnap the Kaiser.

Historian Darrin Haas painted a humorous account on Friday of the ill-advised 1919 scheme by American officers, including Tennessee National Guardsmen, to kidnap the deposed German ruler, Kaiser Wilhelm II.

But instead of a thrilling story of post-World War I espionage, Haas' narrative sounded more like a script from 'Hogan's Heroes.'

About 150 people attended the lecture at the East Tennessee History Center auditorium in downtown Knoxville. The lecture, held in conjunction with a living history encampment by re-enactors in nearby Krutch Park, was part of the East Tennessee Historical Society's commemoration of World War I.

"It (the plot to kidnap the Kaiser) is not highly well-known. It's more of a strange footnote in history," Haas said.

In late 1918, a group of American officers and enlisted men from the Army's 114th Field Artillery Regiment concocted a plan to extract the Kaiser from a Dutch castle. Their leader? Col. Luke Lea, a Tennessee native who had founded the Tennessean newspaper in Nashville and served in the U.S. Senate.

"In December 1918, Wilhelm abdicated his throne and exiled himself to Holland, which was a haven for political refugees," Haas said. "Lea was concerned that the Kaiser may escape punishment. He personally felt that he needed to be treated as a war criminal. Americans were very pro, 'We want to hang the Kaiser.' "

Haas recounted two comical attempts over several days by Lea and his band of seven soldiers to snag the Kaiser.

One of Lea's men was Cpl. Marmaduke Clokey, a 21-year-old from Knoxville.

"Lea's first attempt ended when he couldn't cross into Holland because he didn't have the proper passport," Haas said.

The second kidnapping attempt was a five-day odyssey of drinking, partying and car trouble.

"It was just a bunch of guys having a good time," Haas said. "Their car was continually breaking down. It broke down about eight times. They hit a bicyclist and ran out of gas."

Lea and his men finally gained access to the castle where the Kaiser was staying, but the Dutch military arrived and forced the group to leave.

"After failed attempts to see the Kaiser, Dutch guards started to surround their car. Lea said, 'We're out of here.' They jumped in their car, headed back to Luxembourg and thought that was where it was going to end."

An investigation was held by American officials, but newspapers hailed Lea and his men as heroes.

"He basically gets off scot-free with a little reprimand," Haas said.

The tale of the plot to kidnap the Kaiser has undergone many revisions and embellishments over the years, according to Haas.

"It blossomed into this crazy story," he said. "It's referred to as a 'caper' a lot of times."
NEWS SENTINEL ARCHIVE Former News Sentinel Managing Editor Harold Harlow, right, and Ralph Frost, executive committee chairman of Billy Grahams East Tennessee Crusade, look over a souvenir edition printed for the crusade on July 2, 1970.

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By News Sentinel Staff

Harold Harlow loved his family  but the newspaper had his heart.

Mr. Harlow, 90, a former News Sentinel managing editor, died Wednesday.

The News Sentinel "was his life," said daughter Carol Bailey. "He was a good dad, and he provided for us, but he was a journalist through and through."

Mr. Harlow was bitten by the news bug early, working part-time at the Daily News in his hometown of Bowling Green, Ky., while attending Western Kentucky State University. After three years in the Army Air Corps during World War II, he moved to Knoxville to attend the University of Tennessee and began working at the News Sentinel his senior year in 1949.

As a copy boy, he started a four-hour shift at 2 a.m., then went to class. He returned at 3 p.m. for another four hours. For that, he was paid $25 per week.

But the grueling schedule and low pay didn't deter Mr. Harlow from a career in journalism. After graduation, he began as a copy editor, working his way up to news editor, managing editor and associate editor. When he retired in 1990, he had been at the paper nearly 42 years.

"He accepted nothing less than top effort," said retired reporter Jim Balloch. "He could be gruff, or encouraging, or a mix of both, whichever was necessary. We all knew that he had a big heart."

Reporter Frank Munger credits Mr. Harlow with allowing him in the early 1980s to create his beat, U.S. Department of Energy operations in Oak Ridge. The paper had covered it only sporadically.

"He understood the importance of the federal facilities and also grasped the news value of activities there," Munger said.

Mr. Harlow's funeral will be at 4 p.m. Sunday at Rose Mortuary's Broadway Chapel.
Patient Bill Nobbe, center, has his teeth cleaned by dentist Nathan Chesney, left, and dental coordinator Paula Mays, right, at Interfaith Health Clinic. The clinic, which serves the working poor, has one dentist and one hygienist on staff and relies on volunteers to help treat more. (ADAM LAU/NEWS SENTINEL)

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By Kristi L. Nelson of the Knoxville News Sentinel

For six years, Melody Lee dealt with abscessed and infected teeth, going to the hospital emergency room when the pain became too great to bear.

Lee, 42, subcontracts for a painting company and last had dental insurance in 2005, when she had a basic care policy through Florida Medicaid. She hadn't seen a dentist since, but she knew the cost of the extractions and fillings she needed would top $4,000.

PDF: Community Health Assessment on oral health

"That is well out of my price range, and I'd went so long without dental care, it was just too much to be done," said Lee, who has three children. "I barely keep the regular bills paid."

When she saw information about a Remote Area Medical clinic in Clinton last winter, she and a friend spent the night in a parking lot to get a spot. There she had four teeth pulled. At a second clinic in Bristol in April, she got three fillings and a cleaning. She'll have two more teeth filled at a future RAM clinic.

"The volunteers were so friendly, they made us feel totally welcome and at ease  not the usual getting frowned upon and judged for needing help," Lee said. "Frankly, it was embarrassing to show my teeth, in the shape they were in, to a dentist."

RAM founder Stan Brock said he estimates close to 100 percent of people who come to RAM's events  which provide medical, dental and vision care at no cost  need dental work. Given a choice between that and vision, he said, about 70 percent choose dental.

"Infections from bad teeth lead to all kinds of ominous problems, such as diabetes and heart disease," Brock said. "It's one of the most serious health-care issues."

Yet it's a problem almost half the population doesn't have the resources to address. Health Department statistics indicate 62 percent of Knox County residents visited a dentist last year, a gradual decline over the past 10 years. In the surrounding rural counties, where dentists are scarce, the numbers are lower. And they're significantly lower among poorer people: 34 percent of those whose annual household income is less than $15,000 a year saw a dentist last year. Yet most Medicaid programs  including TennCare and Gov. Bill Haslam's proposed Insure Tennessee plan  don't include dental benefits.

In Knox County last year, 8 percent of all adults  and 21 percent of all adults older than 65  reported having all their teeth pulled because of infection, tooth decay or gum disease. Black senior citizens were nearly twice as likely as whites  36 percent, compared to 19 percent  to have had all their teeth pulled. And 43 percent of Knox County residents of all ages have had at least one tooth pulled because of infection. In most rural counties, the percentage is higher.

"We've been going to Wise County, Va., every year for 15 years," Brock said. "Every year there we will extract right around 4,000 teeth in two days and two hours, (plus 1,900 fillings). Which absolutely amazes me, since the patient count is around 3,000  and it's the same people coming (each year). That is an example of just how desperate the situation is for dental care for the poor and not-so-poor people of this country."

Interfaith Health Clinic has provided dental care since 1991, said director Melissa Knight. Knight said most patients either had dental insurance and lost their jobs or dropped their policies because they couldn't afford them, or have gone years without care and are now having dental emergencies.

The clinic has one paid dentist and one paid hygienist, who see patients two days a week, said dental coordinator Paula Mays. She schedules as many other appointments as possible, depending on how many volunteer shifts she can fill. Most months, the clinic serves 80-110 uninsured dental patients, who pay on a sliding scale.

"The majority of our patients need several things  more than just a filling," Mays said, and dental problems can exacerbate other health issues.

She has a periodontist who's agreed to see two patients a year on the sliding scale, an orthodontist who will treat two children annually with serious problems, and an endodontist who takes referrals. But more volunteers, or money to hire more dental staff, rank at the top of Mays' wish list. While the waiting list currently sits at three weeks, sometimes it's long enough that only emergencies are taken.

"We've got four chairs that we wish we could fill every single day," Knight said. "And we're open at night  we'd love to have it staffed then, too."

HOWS OUR HEALTH?

Over the next several weeks, the News Sentinel will run a series of articles on Saturdays. Each will focus on a specific health topic outlined in the 2015 Community Health Assessment. Wed like our readers to see where Knox County is doing well and where its lacking when it comes to issues that affect everyones health.

Previous stories in the series:

Assessment looks at Knox County's top health concerns

Income tied to health-services access; 15 percent in Knox delay care because of cost

Cancer disparities rooted in 'health inequity'

Knox County makes smoking cessation for youth, pregnant women a public health priority

Diabetes still increasing problem in Knox despite attempts to raise awareness

As obesity rate balloons, so does rate of other health problems

Growing healthy habits for Knox County students

Tenn. teen drug abuse declines

Heart disease still a huge killer in Knox County
Anderson County Commissioner Robert McKamey, center, beams shortly after the sign, in background, dedicating the new Anderson County Senior Center to him was unveiled Friday. Center volunteers Cora Webb, left, and Robert Phillips flank McKamey. (BOB FOWLER/NEWS SENTINEL)

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By Bob Fowler

CLINTON  It's been a long time coming, supporters say, but Anderson County's new senior center is finally, officially open.

"It's a necessary and valuable investment in the county," County Commissioner Myron Iwanski said.

Ceremonies dedicating the new facility on Edgewood Avenue near downtown Clinton were held Friday, and both its parking lot and the center were filled to overflowing.

It marks the end of an effort that began nearly a year ago with a protest by elderly residents in front of the courthouse drawing attention to the lack of such a center.

Meetings followed, then talks on how to make it happen, then a search for a site, then negotiations.

The center includes a relocated Anderson County Office on Aging, originally housed in a small office on the courthouse square that seniors said was difficult to access.

Federal funds for the office  which provides a variety of services for the elderly  were originally administered by East Tennessee Human Resource Agency.

That oversight has been transferred to the county, which now controls the center's $52,000 annual budget.

Office director Cherie Phillips said county commissioners during the upcoming budget cycle will be asked to provide additional funding.

She said the office provides a variety of services to some 6,500 elderly residents, and there are about 28,000 seniors in the county.

Phillips said all of the center's furnishings were donated, and the facility is open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekends.

As part of Friday's celebration, Anderson County Commission Robert McKamey tore away silver foil covering the building's new sign, which dedicates the structure in his name. He's credited with keeping the effort to obtain a center rolling.

"I'm glad we finally got something for the seniors in Anderson County," said McKamey. He said he was first elected to County Commission in the early 1980s when he was 32 years old.

Now he's 66  eligible as a center member  "and I never thought one of my biggest accomplishments would be getting a senior center."
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Do you know where your elected representatives stand on issues important to you?

Find out, and get a barbecue lunch buffet in the process.

The East Tennessee Society of Professional Journalists will hold its annual Legislative Preview Luncheon on Saturday at Bearden Banquet Hall, 5806 Kingston Pike, next to Buddy's BBQ.

The doors will open at 11:30 a.m., with the buffet beginning at 11:45 a.m. and the program starting by noon.

Journalists and the public can submit questions to a panel of legislators. WBIR-TV's John Becker will moderate the discussion.

So far, legislators confirmed as attending are representatives Harry Brooks, Martin Daniel, Bill Dunn, Roger Kane, Jimmy Matlock, Bob Ramsey, Eddie Smith and Jason Zachary, and senators Richard Briggs, Becky Massey and Randy McNally.

Cost for lunch is $18 in advance for SPJ members, $20 in advance for non-SPJ members and $22 at the door. There is no cost to attend the event if you're not eating. Register online by Wednesday at www.etspj.org.

Last year's discussion was dominated by questions on open records and abortion. This year, open records and open meetings are again expected to be hot topics, along with charter schools and other education-related issues, and Gov. Bill Haslam's proposed Insure Tennessee program to replace the federal government's Medicaid expansion plan under the Affordable Care Act.

The ETSPJ is a nonpartisan organization dedicated to encouraging the free practice of journalism, high standards of ethical behavior and protection of First Amendment guarantees of freedom of speech and press. Learn more at www.etspj.org.
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A look at recent events in the news that pleased us ...

Expanding conservation: A local land conservancy chalked up another banner year in 2015 by extending its coverage to include five Southeastern states and seven Tennessee counties.

The Foothills Land Conservancy completed 24 land projects last year totaling 7,215 acres  a record for the Maryville-based nonprofit that got its start 30 years ago protecting scenic tracts in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

The Foothill Land Conservancy works with private landowners to develop conservation easements as a means of protecting their property from unwanted development.

Gorilla bump: A record number of people visited the Knoxville Zoo in 2015, and zoo officials attribute the rise partly to the births of the park's first endangered Western lowland gorillas.

The zoo's annual attendance in 2015 was 440,115. That's the most ever in the 67-year history of the park, and 53 percent were tourists from outside a 50-mile radius of the park.

The gorilla tots  Obi, a female, and Ubuntu, a male  were born at the park's Gorilla Valley in late May and early June. They, along with mothers Hope and Machi and father Bantu, are part of the zoo's first gorilla family.

Digital dynamo: Oak Ridge High senior Melissa Yuan has become only the third Tennessee girl to win a national Aspirations in Computing Award from the National Center for Women and Information Technology.

Melissa was among 35 winners for 2016 chosen from over 3,100 nationwide applicants for the award.

Her winnings include $1,000, a new laptop and an all-expense-paid trip to the National Award weekend March 4-6 in Charlotte, N.C.

Melissa is currently working on a data visualization project at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Supporting scofflaws: A Tennessee legislator used social media to find out how to join the cause of armed anti-government protesters who took over a remote national wildlife refuge in Oregon.

In a post on his Twitter account Monday, state Rep. Andy Holt, R-Dresden, asked the protesters where he could send support for them. According to The Associated Press, Holt later deleted the post.

Holt later told the AP he disagreed with the group's tactics but supported their goal of getting the federal government to turn over public land in the West.
By Choi Sung-jin



In Korea, unlike most other industrial countries, the more children that families have and the lower their income, the heavier their tax burdens become, a recent OECD report showed.



For instance, the tax burden of a single-member, high-income household is half of OECD's average while that of a four-member, low-income household is similar to the average of the club of rich countries, it said.



That means, unlike most other countries where families with many children receive generous tax credits, larger and poorer Korean households have to pay relatively high taxes, which runs squarely counter to the government's policy to encourage childbirth, analysts said.



According to the "2015 Taxing Wages" report, a single-member, unmarried Korean household who earns 167 percent of the average income pays 23.2 percent in taxes, 17.2 percentage points lower than the average tax burden of 40.4 percent for members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Only three countries  Chile, Mexico and New Zealand  pay less in taxes than Korea.



The tax gap with the OECD average narrows as income levels go down. The tax burden of Korea's single-member, unmarried household earning average income was 21.5 percent, 14.5 percentage points lower than the OECD average. But the gap was reduced to 13.4 percentage points for unmarried households that earn 67 percent of average income.



This means that in Korea, correlations between wages and taxes are relatively low, unlike in other countries where the smaller the wages, the smaller the tax rate.



As a result, the tax burden of four-member households  two parents and two children  that earn 67 percent of average income was 16.9 percent, only 1 percentage point lower than the OECD average of 17.9 percent, the report showed.



"In Korea, high-income households pay relatively smaller taxes because of various tax cuts and exemptions," Professor Ahn Chang-nam of Gangnam University said to Newsis, a wire agency. "The government should gradually increase the highest tax rate and reduce tax exemption benefits."



The government's policy to encourage childbirth can hardly ring hollower under this tax system, either, other analysts said.




By Choi Sung-jin

Will the slump gripping the shipping industry for the past seven years come to an end in 2016? Industry experts, who have been hesitant to make optimistic forecasts, are cautiously saying "yes."

Such rosy predictions were also prevalent at a workshop at the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry on Friday.

"As the global trade recovers, container cargo movements will also likely increase this year," said Kim Wu-ho, a researcher at Korea Maritime Institute. "The increase of cargo volume along with the implementation of mega-free trade deals, such as TPP and RCEP, will also prove to be a boon for the industry."

According to Clarksons, a British agency analyzing shipping and the shipbuilding industry, container cargo transport is expected to increase by 5.4 percent this year, compared with the 3.5-percent rise in the 2014-2015 period. It is the highest growth rate since 2010 when the volume surged 13.1 percent after it plunged 9.2 percent the previous year in the aftermath of the global financial crisis.












By Choi Sung-jin



The Four Seasons Hotel in Seoul, which opened in Gwanghwamun last October, is sticking to its high room rates, which are nearly double those of other luxury hotels, industry sources said.



Its deluxe room fetches 445,000 won, or $370 (for two people, exclusive of taxes), per night. The rate for a suite is twice that at 800,000-900,000 won, according to sources. The comparable room rates for similar hotels in Seoul -- Lotte, Shilla and Westin Chosun -- are 225,000 won, 280,000 won and 246,500 won, respectively.



The Four Seasons in Seoul was built by Mirae Asset Management through forming a real estate fund of 340 billion won, and is being run by its Canadian operators.



"Deluxe hotels in Seoul are charging rates relatively lower than their counterparts in major foreign cities," said a hotelier. "Even considering this, the Four Seasons' rates are exceptionally high."



There is also the issue of fair competition. "It's completely up to Mirae Asset and Four Seasons to decide their room rates," another hotelier said. "Yet their policy can provide excuses for other hotels that are offering services of similar quality to raise their room charges."



The newly-opened hotel appears set to stick to its current rates, however. "In view of the equity with other customers who have paid the fixed price, we are not planning any discounts for promotion," said one Four Seasons executive. "And this principle applies not only to Korea but to all our hotels throughout the world."




South Korea's military said on Saturday that it will continue loudspeaker broadcasts aimed toward North Korea, adding that the North has not yet made any detectible moves of a possible provocation.

South Korea restarted its cross-border loudspeaker broadcasts carrying anti-North Korea messages on Friday after stopping them for about four months. The South is resuming the broadcasts in retaliation against the hydrogen bomb test North Korea claimed it detonated on Wednesday.

"We are continuing the broadcasts at 10 spots along the border on Saturday," a military official was quoted as saying. "We have not yet detected any unusual activity by the North Korean army."

South Korea said it will continue the broadcasts irregularly around the clock.

Pyongyang has bolstered its monitoring at the border and also started its own broadcasts to disturb Seoul's loudspeakers, but has yet to make other significant moves, military sources said.

Seoul believes that North Korea violated the two Koreas' rare Aug. 25 deal to defuse military tension. Landmines planted in the South's patrol zone detonated and maimed two South Korean soldiers in early August, sharply escalating military tensions between the two Koreas.

In the wake of the landmine incident and subsequent exchanges of fire, the two Koreas reached a set of agreements in August to ease tensions and make efforts to improve their ties.

North Korea made its first official reaction against the broadcasts on Friday, saying that South Korea's moves could provoke a war. Pyongyang added the hydrogen bomb test has "displayed the dignity" of the country.
North Korea may have attracted global concern this week after producing a big bang in a blast that the country's leadership claimed was a hydrogen bomb test (a claim widely disputed by the international community based on lighter than expected seismic activity, according to the New York Times).

But come Friday, South Korea had unleashed their own Big Bang, blasting the K-pop boy band's summer smash "Bang Bang Bang" at the border through a mammoth speaker system as retaliation for Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un's apparent attempt at a display of power in his country's northeast coast on the week of his 33rd birthday.

Other Hallyu hits on the South Korean military's playlist included Gfriend's single "Me Gustas Tu," and Apink's 2012 track "Let Us Just Love" written for the South Korean television comedy series "Protect The Boss," the UK publication the Guardian reports. Viral singing sensation Lee Ae Ran is also included in the sonic assault, along with news reports and panel discussions on human rights, the AP stated on Thursday.

"We have selected a diverse range of the most recent popular hits to make it interesting," a South Korean defense ministry official said at a local press briefing.

The 48-speaker setup was originally installed at 11 locations in the demilitarized zone separating the two Koreas back in 2010, after naval soldiers from the North torpedoed the South's Cheonan warship, killing 46 servicemen. After a tentative agreement was reached, the speakers had fallen silent before being fired up back in August following the first artillery exchange between the two warring nations in five years.

Big Bang's "Bang Bang Bang," released on June 1, was also the musical weapon of choice for the South Korean government back then, according to the website Koreaboo. The Washington Post reported the 2009 Girls' Generation release "Tell Me Your Wish" and Noh Sa Yeon's 1989 hit "Meeting" were also played at the border.

And though South Korea's pop-fueled propaganda campaign this week has received Western media coverage featuring reporters' tongues planted firmly in their cheeks, this is no laughing matter for the supreme leader, according to senior research fellow Park Chang Kwon at Seoul's state-funded Korea Institute for Defense Analyses.

"Kim Jong Un isn't your typical dictator," Park told Australian newspaper the Sydney Morning Herald on Friday.

"He's a god in North Korea and propaganda broadcasts raise questions among North Koreans about that. Broadcasts from South Korea can reach deep and far into North Korea's society, imbuing the minds of its people with the images of a free nation and hurting the oppressive personality cult."

According to a statement made from a South Korean defense ministry official to the government-funded media outlet Yonhap earlier this week, the weaponized K-pop strategy is not something that nation is taking lightly either.

"If North Korea attacks the loudspeakers, we will immediately retaliate," he said.
The SLFP does not condone the continuation of the Emergency Regulations (The Public Security Ordinance) more than a day necessary

Read more
Burbank Boulevard in Sepulveda Dam flood basin during this week's storms. LAFD/Jeremy Oberstein.

Next in Porter Ranch: Burning off some of the methane gas, screening an oily spew and upping the political pressure on SoCal Gas. Daily News, LA Times, KCRW/Which Way, LA?, KPCC News

Year 30 of LA's homeless crisis: new plans from the city and the county and, again, calls for patience while money is raised to build more affordable housing. KPCC, LA Times

City Councilman Felipe Fuentes said Friday that he will not run for reelection next year, ending his time as a city elected official after a single four-year term. He says it has nothing to do with a federal grand jury subpoena of his district director, Yolanda Fuentes Miranda, last month. LAT/Zahniser

"While all sorts of wild comparisons have been made regarding Trump (is he Hitler or Mussolini?), a better analogy is to former Los Angeles Mayor Sam Yorty," writes Raphael Sonenshein. Jewish Journal: "2016 election will be a game-changer"

San Francisco politically connected gangster Raymond "Shrimp Boy" Chow was convicted of 162 charges in the massive corruption case that previously claimed former state Sen. Leland Yee. LAT

LA Times consumer columnist David Lazarus cuts the Time Warner Cable cord.

Mexico's president announced via tweet that the government had re-captured drug kingpin Joaquin Guzman Loera, also known as El Chapo. NYT

Los Angeles-born playwright David Henry Hwang writes first-person in the New York Times: The Time I Got Stabbed in the Neck

The prop shark from "Jaws" that has been at the now-closed Aadlen Brothers junkyard in Sun Valley is headed to the film academy museum that will open at Wilshire and Fairfax. City News Service

Welcome, say some scientists, to the dawning of the Age of Anthropocene. LAT Opinion/Scott Martelle

There's no good news in the reversal of the often-reported decade of down-trending crime stats, but journalist Sam Quinones found some anyway. KCRW/Which Way, LA?

First look at the huge mixed-use complex set for Olympic and Bundy in West LA. Curbed LA

A busy first week of 2016 for the Los Angeles Fire Department. Medium.com

The Dodgers' dilemma with Alex Guerrero: "Over his next 66 games, he was a different player at the plate, and alas, the same one on the field." LAT/Steve Dilbeck
This article appears in the January 8, 2016 tssue of Executive Intelligence Review.

The Law, the Citizenry and the Government

Immediately below are selected excerpts taken from two live dialogues with Lyndon LaRouche: his discussion with the LaRouche PAC Policy Committee on Dec. 28, 2015, and his national Fireside Chat on Dec. 30, 2015.

[PDF version of thses excerpts]

From the Policy Committee Discussion

Lyndon LaRouche: All right,we have one of the most crucial moments in history for the whole planet. That is, whats happening through the international system, the United States, the British system, and so forth, Europe in general, is terrible. China is less affected directly, but is indirectly affected. So as of this time, we have entered a period in which the intention is to reduce the populations resources to effect virtual mass murder.

That is what is in process, unless the Obama Administration is ordered to prevent this thing from happening. So the existence of Obama as President of the United States is, in part, the major issue for life of all human beings on this planet. But! In particular, the United States is responsible.

Now, in other parts of the planet, certain parts of Asia, for example,Europe is in a mess. Europe is in a terrible mess. Its a terrible threat. The threat against the people of Europe is monstrous, right now! And I know this material directly, so lets not debate it in detail. The point also is that China and India and so forth, and Asian nations, are also implicitly threatened by this thing. But the main thing is that the major threat is in the trans-Atlantic region, right now! And were looking at a threat of massive death of human beings over the first days, and into the next days. And thats what is happening right now.

The question is, can we get Obama thrown out of the Presidency now, in time to avoid an absolute disaster?....

Diane Sare: ... Part of the challenge we face is the very deep pessimism and despair of the population. And partly that is challenging to overcome, because in the last 50 years, the culture has so degraded that people look within themselves, and they have a hard time locating a certain quality of emotional strength, and emotional determination, to persevere whatever the obstacles. And I think in that regard, what we saw with the incredible response to the [[performances of Handels Messiah in Manhattan and Brooklyn]], [[http://www.schillerinstitute.org/highlite/ 2015/1219-nyc-messiah/main.html]] is people grappling for something greater, something which they havent known about themselves for some time, that will give the strength necessary to actually persevere and to resist the incredible degradation of tolerating and going along with this.

The Wrong Laws

LaRouche: We have a whole century after the Renaissance; the collapse of the Renaissance and that whole century and beyond, has been the kind of destruction which has occurred. We have had over a century of this kind of thing over much of the planet. Its mass murder. So whats the law? The law is, mass murder is illegal....

... And this is again the same British animal. The British animal has been the dominant factor, and the British animal is Obama! Obama is a creation of the British system; that was the way it was done.

And what was before then, the Bush family,well, the Bushes should have been burned.

But were at this kind of point: this is reality. And everything that we can do that is right in nature, should be done. Law is not supreme when it violates the principle of law.

Ben Deniston: And I think that can go to what youre saying on natural law. That the effect of policies that go against the natural necessity of the existence of a growing economy, ends with this result.

LaRouche: I think your point on natural law is the crucial point to emphasize.

Bill Roberts: ... As Michael raised earlier, this crisis is the will of Obama, when he intervened to impose Dodd-Frank and block Glass-Steagall. That was an intervention on behalf of creating this crisis. So its not just a financial crisis that Congress finds itself admitting to, but that this was created by the cultural norm that they accepted, the degraded state. And so that has to be taken on, top down.

LaRouche: Well, theres another, deeper issue here in terms of history. The problem is, that we take laws and we use laws which are wrong laws, and we dont understand what the real law is. They say, well, human beings have made a choice; that is, ordinary societys human beings have made a choice, and this, therefore, is law.

Now, that is not true! It never was true. Particularly when you look at the appeasers of evil in relatively modern history, that is, since the Renaissance. And what happened with the Renaissance was the introduction immediately afterward,they shut it down, and they created degeneration. They created mass murder! Thats what happened.

Now, whats the point? The idea of the law is not the true law; thats the problem. That was the problem then, after the closing-down of the Renaissance, and we had a big struggle to get something in Europe and elsewhere, which was not evil. And we fought evil repeatedly. And we dont say that the law,the letter of the law as provided by some people because they happen to be in power,that that defines the principle of law for the human species! In other words, the other law is a responsibility of mankinds security and development, and progress: that is the law! And if that law is defied, if that is defied, then the crime has been committed!

Matthew Ogden: You know, I think Putin addressed that very clearly in his speech to the United Nations a few months ago, and then also more recently, where hes taken the question of what is the standard of international law, and how thats been violated repeatedly by, for example, the Bush and Obama administrations, with the overthrowing of sovereign governments and the imposing of the will of one nation on another nation, which is a definition of aggressive warfare.

Thats the kind of thing that the United Nations was set up in order to prevent in the aftermath of World War II, which was really a major reason why Franklin Roosevelt mobilized the entire American people, in alliance with the Russians at that time, to defeat what was coming out as fascism in Europe in the 1930s. There is a standard of international law, and theres a standard which the United Nations is intended to represent, and thats exactly what Putin and Xi Jinping and others have been addressing very clearly in their recent interventions on that question.

What Real Law Is

LaRouche: But theres a higher question here, which Ive raised occasionally, which is not raised usually; when it comes to technicalities, its not raised; its not treated. The problem is that mankind cannot really make the law! That is, mankind does not, by mankinds own authority as such,by terms of individual members of societies,does not really make the law. Because the law is the principle of the progress of the human species, and if the human species is not progressing in its development and its fruition, then the law has been violated! And thats where the problem lies.

You look at the terrible things that have happened, under which various Renaissances have been crushed; look at what the mass murder was of that. Now were talking about a mass murder problem right now. What were talking about is the policy of the United States government right now, at least under the current President and the preceding two Presidential terms: Mass murder!

So therefore, there is no law which justifies the existence of the people who do that thing! And therefore, you dont say, theres a technical law, theres a law on the books. That is not the law! Because the worst, the most Satanic forces on the planet, have been the law! Thats how it worked!

And the point is that mankind is answerable to a higher law, because mankind is not an Earthling! Mankind is based on a principle which is not that of Earthlings. It is the responsibility of mankind to develop future populations which are more fitting. The assumption is that every generation should be moving progressively, in terms of its natural law, and the natural law is the improvement, the self-improvement of the human species. And only mankind has the power to do that.

So when somebody comes in, in government, and says Were government, we have a law. Who made the law? Who says its the law? Whats the law?

Well, you had in Christianity, for example,under Christianity what happened was the idea of law governing mankind per se, and thats the higher law. The higher law is that mankind must produce next generations which are superior, for the purpose of mankind, for the progress of mankind. And mankind must rise to higher levels of achievement: Thats Gods law! And we call it Gods law, not this petty law that people gossip about.

But thats what it is. Mankind has to make progress, and the obligation of law, among nations, is progress for mankinds condition; better intellectual development; newer, higher levels of knowledge; higher levels of achievement; higher meanings of the existence of mankind, of successive generations of mankind.

And thats the law, thats the real law. The technical law, the book law,that is not the law. The law is that mankind must progress in its nature. That, you know, people die; all right, fine. Whats the law? Well, did they get better people produced in their families? Were their families able to be progressive in going to a higher levels of achievement for mankind? Are we not responsible to take care of the Galaxy, for example? We are responsible!

So whos going to shut that law down? The law is that mankind must progress, that mankinds achievement must progress, by that higher standard. You know, weve even got other cases on that thing.

Ogden: Well, one thing that comes to mind is Alexander Hamilton, absolutely. That was absolutely the discussion of Alexander Hamilton and his associates in the Federalist Papers and elsewhere, the question of natural law. That was the birth of our nation, based on that idea.

LaRouche: But the point is, what about the Galaxy? Mankind is responsible to improve upon the Galaxy; thats implicit. Who could take that away? Who has the right to take that away? Who has the authority to take that away?

Deniston: I think this message needs to go to the Pope, pretty quickly.

LaRouche: I think the Pope should probably be put into suspension. His existence should be in some kind of suspension. He should not be Pope-ular.

Deniston: Well, the precedent of Cusa really sticks out in my mind. Because you see his work on science, also his work on the nation-state, the idea of a government of a republic,it flows from the discovery he made, a higher conception about mankinds creative mission and existence in the universe. And that was the basis then, for him to develop and take further conceptions about how must society organize itself to facilitate this progress.

The Principle of Law

LaRouche: You have to look at Brunelleschi, too. Brunelleschi was very important in this; the Renaissance would not have occurred without Brunelleschi. It was going to be one of the old, usual kinds of systems of government. And Brunelleschi forced it, and what happened was that the Renaissance as such was continued.

But then that got crushed! It got crushed in the beginning of the next century, which became an evil thing, just like what were talking about now! Thats what happened after that, after the end of that century: it came down. And that is what happened in the various stages of Renaissance efforts after that point.

No, there is a higher law, and we have to really specify there is a higher law for mankind. And mankind is not limited to being an Earthling; thats also the case. Mankind goes out to higher levels of achievement, beyond what we call nature, natural nature. And the development of mankind is through the progress of the development of mankinds ability to create, and that is the directly pertinent precedent for law. Are you creating a level of achievement for subsequent generations? Thats the issue!

And this thing is Satanic! And thats the only way to say it: This is entirely Satanic, directly Satanic. That Obama and everything he represents is a Satanic personality, and therefore should not be considered human.

Because the right to have rights depends upon your humanity. And humanity is something which is dependent upon the reconstruction of the birth of new generations of human birth and development and progress. And thats the principle of law, and thats the only law that mankind has ever been able to define. Does mankind become a better, more powerful force for good, in the history of mankind? Thats the issue!

And this is Satanic! And we have to use the word Satanic, to describe those who are making these orders. You say, Well this is the law;well, you are operating under Satanic law. We are under the order of anti-Satanic law.

And we have to do it that way. If you dont do it, if you dont go to this question of whats a higher principle, and you say, Well, assume we have a human order of principle.... But thats not the principle; the existence of mankind does not depend upon these kinds of caprices! It depends entirely upon the progress of mankind as a species! And mankind has the only power that has a willful capability of improvement in species.

From the Fireside Chat

Lyndon LaRouche: But the crucial thing here, of course, is that we have to understand that were working under a threat of extinction. By that I mean the fact that the typical American can have his job, his life rights, all kinds of things taken away from him in the course of even weeks and months. Thats whats on now. Thats whats coming from Obama, its coming from his program. Its coming from the British Empire, the British Empire as such.

It means also some Satanic elements, like 9/11, the 9/11 crisis: Here we had a number of citizens, especially concentrated in Manhattan And they were subjected to mass killing, especially in the southern part of Manhattan; one spot in Washington, mass murder. The mass murder has never been uncovered. The Congress of the United States, the institutions that go with the Congress of the United States, have always suppressed as much as possible the fact of what happened in 9/11.

What was 9/11? Ill tell you what 9/11 is, and its what youre going to think about. What happened was that the British Empire, which was working with the Saudis, Saudi agents as well as the British agents,and they ran an operation which invaded the United States, in their own operation, and they created a mass murder operation in that time, during the attacks on particularly Manhattan.

Now, this thing was going on already, it had been. It was run by the British and the British Monarchy in cohesion with the Saudis. These are our mortal enemies. And that has to be remembered. There has never been justice delivered to the victims, to the memory of the victims, of those who died in Manhattan by Saudi agents and British agents. Never!

What Is the United States?

But since that time, theres always been a moot argument that we must not offend the Saudis and the British, the ones who murdered our citizens. And it means all the terrorist screwballs and so forth, which have come up under the Bush family and Obama. And the name of Bush, and of Obama, is the most hateful thought which any honest American can experience. And therefore, the important thing we have to say: The members of Congress who sanctified the suppression of the 9/11 information are treasonous agents working against the United States, in effect, now.

And you want to digest that a little bit, because here we are: We were attacked by the British. It was a British-Saudi oil business, and this is the thing that led to 9/11. And the Presidency of the United States, the majority of the forces of the Congress, and other people involved in this sort of thing, along with the British all along,they committed warfare, in effect, against the United States. And those members of Congress who still cover up for what the Saudis did and what the British did in 9/11,these people are not members of our government; theyre only traitors.

And the time has come, weve got to clean this thing up. The first step we have to take: we have to force the Congress, in its shame, to lift the 9/11 ban. Until that time, the United States has not been honored by its Presidents, by its leading representatives in the Congress, and other agents. It has to be done now.

And now were facing a great danger to the people of the United States, a great danger; one greater than anything most of them have ever thought of. And therefore, we have to,as people,we have to force our government to do the right thing, and stop covering up the intrinsic criminality, intrinsic to the British system and to the British systems golliwog, Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia and the British Monarchy are one piece, two parts of the same piece. Theyre both evil. And those who are acting to support 9/11, are complicit with evil, not only against the United States and the people of the United States but against humanity in general.

Weve got to clean the mess up. And some people will enjoy doing that, especially some people whose families came from the southern quarter of Manhattan.

Question: [Describes how an employee of a Congressmans office became fascinated with the Manhattan choral process, after discussion with a young LaRouche organizer.] But I just wanted to fill you in on this, and hear what you have to respond, because it seems to me they need this just as much as the rest of the citizenry does,to hear what were doing, and to see it uplift them, and we should invite them along as well.

LaRouche: I think youve got a very good beginning there, a keystone effort. Because what needs to be understood, is avoided; that people will try to limit their discussions to things that they think are acceptable, or in some way they have a special attitude about them. When the problem is that we have to have a population mobilized, by itself in a sense, and by whatever we can contribute to make that happen; for the people of the United States to take charge of the United States, of the people of the United States.

In other words, the problem is that the typical reaction is the idea of, were only amateurs, and we have to listen to the higher authority of higher elected people or elected officials of that type. And the problem is that people do not have the psychology, in themselves, to realize that they cannot just simply ask funny questions of admirable people. We have to realize that we have to get our citizens in like soldiers. It doesnt mean theyre taking guns or something,they are like soldiers, they are part of an army; an army of citizens, and as an army of citizens whose power is to chastise and inspire the citizenry in general, and especially so-called authorities in high places.

That has to be the principle. This idea, This guys a bigshot, hes around all the world and so forth, that doesnt really sell anything, really, to anyone who understands reality. Yes, there is a reason to appreciate the achievements of some people in the discoveries theyve made, and the fact that they may also be teachers, as well as leaders in a Congress or something like that, or officials in general.

But the point is, there has to be a reciprocal relationship between the ordinary citizens and the medium-level citizen and so forth, and the leadership. There has to be a process which is not a your taste; my taste; his flavor; her flavor, this sort of thing. Thats not the way. You have to bring people together, and bring them as groups from all walks of life, so to speak, to digest among themselves, in their discussion, and in the cross-discussion with other groups and similar groups; there has to be a commonality of development, of determining what kind of ideas should be promoted, and what role these ideas should contribute.

And that issue is where weve lost it in the United States in general. Very few people in the United States, as citizens or potential citizens, have ever been able to understand what the principle of Congress must be; what the United States is. Most people will talk about the United States, but they dont know what it is, and they never knew what it was. And thats what we have to fix.

What is Citizenship?

Q: Now, I have a question from a gentleman who hopefully heard what you just said, but its along similar lines, communicated through the internet. He asks: Why has Obama been allowed to stay in office this long and has destroyed America without question? The spineless Congress and Senate hadnt gone against him nor denied his executive orders; why are they all afraid of that weasel?

LaRouche: Okay, hes absolutely correct in placing the problem exactly there. The problem essentially is that the idea of freedom of the citizen is the right of the citizen to participate in election, the process of election, to participate in the discussion of policy; not someone who comes out like a beggar, saying Please, Mr. Wiseguy, tell me what the news is? Well, thats not very good influence.

You have to bring the people together. Now admittedly, during the first seven Presidential terms of the United States after George Washington, this principle was not really understood well. And we had one good President after that, a great President. Then he was kicked out office after this crucial one term. And after that, there was a run-down up to Abraham Lincolns role, there was a rundown of mostly fakers, in the name of Presidents. And we had big trouble with this, of course, with the Southerners, because that was an extension of that problem.

We never had a unified United States since that time, since the beginning,for instance, the death of Alexander Hamilton, Washingtons service in particular, as President; then there were a few good things, plus terrible mistakes. You cannot say that at that time, there was much of anything of solidarity among citizens. There were a few times, you know, people wouldwell, the Civil War was an important struggle. The losers were still losers, for the most part, and their progeny were generally also losers, like the others.

But the United States has not been a clean operation. It has not been a united nation, not since just the beginning: Alexander Hamilton and President Washington, that was the beginning of only a Presidency. But, since that time, ups and downs, ups and downs.

And the United States has had British influence coming in, other kinds of foreign influence coming in, foreign influences from France; foreign influence from Britain, and from other quarters.

So the United States has never really been, except in momentary cases, like in fighting the Civil War..., theres not really been much solidarity. And we had some under Franklin Roosevelt, but look what happened. Once the Republican Party was able to win an election against the President of the United States [in 1944], that he took a back seat, a low back seat, and the orders were given by the Republican Party and the Republican Party was, in other words, the FBI. The Federal Bureau of Investigation became the government of the United States, pushing out Franklin Roosevelt, who, while still President, was pushed out of that role, and his people were pushed out of that role.

And since that time, more or less, there has been no such thing as solidarity among American citizens. And therefore, we have to take the crises that we have to deal with, and we have to make sure that those crises actually mobilize us to a system of solidarity, real solidarity, where citizens are enabled to participate in what citizens and leaders of government at the same time, must deal with. And we dont have that. We havent had that for a long, long time.

Q: I wonder if we all should remove our life savings, and close our accounts. Much is in 401ks and life insurance policies. Those with regular savings, will they be affected? 401ks? Insurance policies? I am prepared for chaos, no matter what comes. What do you think we should do?

We Dont Depend on Money

LaRouche: I think, first of all, you have to recognize what the nature of the problem is. Now, on the surface of what youre describing, I can understand that immediately; I dont have any problem with that. The problem is, whats the follow-up? Whats the consequence of your trying to do something to deal with that problem, that misuse of economy? And thats where the problem lies.

You have to understand that what is being done to us now, is that through Wall Street and things like Wall Street in the United States in particular, what were doing is were jeopardizing the very existing life, personal life, of most people in the United States itself. And unless we interject action, to prevent that consequence from occurring....

We have to throw out President Obama, throw him out of office immediately; get rid of people in the government agencies, of government function, who do the same thing: who cheat; who steal and cheat. And yet they walk around day-to-day, place to place, and they are treated as authorities, authorities of the seats of government; or the members of Congress, and the institutions associated with those members of Congress. And these guys are committing murder, theyre committing crimes against the people of the United States. The Wall Street gang should be cleaned out.

You have to go look at one thing: What did Franklin Roosevelt do when he became President? What did he do to deal with what had happened under Hoover and Hoovers associates? What did Franklin Roosevelt do? He was merciless. He put them in jail for great fraud. And he took the people who had been robbed,all their access to wealth, even accumulation of savings and so forth, were being taken away from them: And Franklin Roosevelt intervened to deal with that. And what did he do? He acted to wipe out everything that was criminal about Wall Street and similar institutions. This is applied not only to the United States itself, but Franklin Roosevelt also understood that we had to deal with other nations, foreign nations on the same standard of judgment.

Now, we didnt always get our way on that thing from the United States, but were in a time now, where you want to throw Wall Street out of existence, put em someplace where they beg, go beg, go beg for something. Because theyve got nothing coming to them! They have robbed the people of the United States, theyve cheated them to the bottom of everything.

What we need to do is mobilize the people, the citizens, to look at the problem,look at the problem the way Franklin Roosevelt looked at this problem, the way he dealt with them. His action was correct. Now, what did he do? The United States was bankrupt; under Franklin Roosevelt, through the Hoover system the United States was bankrupt. How did Franklin Roosevelt save the United States from continuing to be bankrupt? By using the powers of government, the powers that lie in government, through the people, and to make sure that we provide credit, credit for people who have no employment but need it; who suffer from want.

What we did is, we changed the character of the United States, from Franklin Roosevelts assumption of the Presidency to the point of the damned election of the Republicans which took the real power of Franklin Roosevelt out of his hands, and put it into the hands of really the same people within the Hoover circles.

And therefore, what we have to do, is we operate on the basis that the government of the United States will use its potential credit to assist in providing the opportunities of work and of necessity, as well, in order to build up the per-capita capabilities of the citizens within the United States, all kinds of citizens; and to do this by aid of making investments in creating construction. One of the greatest things was the so-called Hoover Dam, same thing.

So the idea is that we do not depend on counterfeit money; we do not depend upon money per se. We depend upon a system of credit, which has a valid base for advancing the productive powers of labor, of mankind in general. In other words, you take a person off the streets; theyre absolutely hopeless in terms of their financial situation. Franklin Roosevelts administration gave provision to save people from dying on the streets! Like the streets of Manhattan!

And what we did, is we built up an economic growth inside the United States, within the term of Franklin Roosevelt prior to the new election, Wall Street election. And we created the most powerful improvement in human life that mankind has ever experienced, heretofore. And thats the principle. We are responsible for the people; we who lead the nation, we are responsible for the care of the people. And when the care of the people is poor, because its been stripped of its assets, its the duty of government to promote the advancement of the skills and achievements of every citizen and every person. And thats our job.

What Is our Government Now?

We do not depend upon other peoples money! We depend upon what the United States represents in its characteristics of its institution, and we are determined to provide growth and advancement in the condition of life of the parts of the nation and the individuals of the nation. And thats what Franklin Roosevelt did! And that is the only thing that is worthwhile considering as a policy for planning for the condition of the United States right now, and for many other parts of the world also.

We just have to get back to that principle which Franklin Roosevelt, while in power, understood and demonstrated very clearly. We dont have to invent something new. We simply have to do what Franklin Roosevelts Administration did, by putting Wall Street in jail, with serious jail time, among other things; and the loss of their money. And weve got to do the same thing again, which means, also, that the Federal government must act not to promote wealth as such, but to promote the growth of productivity of the citizens, and the results of that growth in terms of the benefits realized by human beings who are the citizens.

Q: My really big question is, does LaRouche PAC have Congressional support for the current effort? All I see thus far is I cant see Congress taking action until after a big event of financial crisis or total executive misconduct. What do you think?

LaRouche: Well, hes right. The point is the present government, under the Bushes, in particular, the Bush succession,and Obama, is the worst of all possible Presidents to be considered so far. Hes actually of a character of a Satanic characteristic. That is, his morality, or substitute for morality, is Satanic intrinsically. Every Tuesday, Obama has on the record so far,has ordered people to be killed, with no valid protest of this, on this account. And they died; and Obama does that generally on Tuesdays. So you have a President who kills innocent citizens on his own impulses, and does it regularly.

Now you have a Congress, Congress in general; the Congress is fully aware of this! And what do they do about it? Nothing.

So what kind of a government do we have? We have a government. on the one hand, of professional Satanists; on the other hand, cowards. And that fact has to be rubbed in without remorse; rub it in!

Youve got many members of Congress who are gutless wonders, and yet they call themselves the policymakers of nations. I dont think we need gutless wonders as members of Congress.

Q: Will the recent Seymour Hersh revelations of U.S. military giving Obama the middle finger and sharing intelligence with the Russians on the Daesh [ISIS], inspire Americans to take back their country?

LaRouche: I think I would read that a little bit differently. First of all, the entirety of the government of the United States today, pretty much all the officials and so forth, and especially Obama; Obamas among the worst mis-representatives of the United States: hes evil. Obama is an evil person. He should not have been President, ever! Hes evil!

Now, the question of whether hes a President or not has come into doubt; of how Hillary lost the nomination for President to Obama. Now, thats a very strange thing, but in any case at a certain point I still thought that she was a valid person, and I spoke to her, and she asked my advice and I gave her my advice. But then she got under pressure from Obama. And from that standpoint on, things began to get pretty bad.

Now Hillary is not exactly a genius, not when it comes to science, nor when it comes to the profession of science; she never was. She was a lawyer, and she worked as a lawyer. And you have lawyers sometimes who are disenchanted by anything except the law profession.

The Legal Profession

Now, the law profession in the United States is filled with a lot of corruption. The courts are filled with corruption, because they treat legal matters, of law, they treat them in a certain way which is contrary to morality. They get by with doing things which a decent person would never allow to happen. And so, thats where the problem comes in: we dont really have checks and balances in any real sense, in terms of how the U.S. government is composed and how it is to operate,we dont have it. Nor do we have it in our practice in general. The United States is dominated by Bertrand Russells legacy, a kind of corruption, inherent corruption.

So the problem is, how can we get a system of government inside the United States which is fit for the use of the government of the United States? We have a few individuals who have a conscience in these matters, but those who have consciences have two problems, of two varieties: One variety is, theyre very concerned; their conscience is stricken by what they did not do that they should have done. And the other is like Hillary, who doesnt give a damn what the truth is, when shes working for Obama, as she is now!

And she has no moral conscience in that sense. She may have a conscience of her daughter, a conscience of members of her family, this sort of thing; its all personal stuff. But when it comes to the interaction among members of government, or bodies of government, these standards are corruption. And shes corrupt! Shes inherently corrupt, morally corrupt! Theres no doubt of it.

And so, there are a lot of people in the Congress and in the courts, who are corrupt in that way: they outnumber the people who are not corrupt, not necessarily in numbers, but in terms of influence. Some of the most powerful people in legislation, law generally, in government in general, are the worst, absolute worst, among the members of government of the United States.

That has to be changed, and it must be changed.
The White House raised the pressure on the tech industry Friday to help rein in terrorism, dispatching top national security officials to Silicon Valley and announcing the creation of a task force to help prevent extremist groups from using social media to radicalize and mobilize recruits.

The moves come a month after President Obama addressed the nation in the wake of the San Bernardino terrorist attack, when he urged high-tech and law enforcement leaders to make it harder for terrorists to use technology to escape from justice.

Although the tech industry says it wants to help, its reluctant to give away private information and data to government agencies, arguing that doing so fosters user distrust and raises the risk of hacker attacks.

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The newly created Countering Violent Extremism task force will be led by the departments of Homeland Security and Justice but will include staff from the FBI, the National Counterterrorism Center and other federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies.

In addition, the State Department will establish a unit called the Global Engagement Center to work with allies to deter terrorists from carrying out attacks overseas.

Given the way the technology works these days, there surely are ways that we can disrupt paths to radicalization, to identify recruitment patterns and to provide metrics that allow us to measure the success of our counter-radicalization efforts, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told reporters Friday.

The initiative will require a level of cooperation that historically has not existed between the White House and Silicon Valley, which have long been at odds over government surveillance  especially since the 2013 Edward Snowden leaks sparked a panic over privacy. The former security contractor revealed widespread snooping by the National Security Agency that the tech industry says its still paying for.

American cloud computing firms, for example, say theyve lost sales and opportunities overseas over fears the U.S. government will gain access to sensitive information. Forrester Research estimates the U.S. information technology sector could lose as much as $180 billion in business by the end of this year.

Tech firms have also been adamant about the need to protect consumer data, much of it shielded with increasingly sophisticated encryption tools.

The tech community has been pretty clear its not going to give the government a free pass on these things, said Tanya Forsheit, a partner at the law firm BakerHostetler who specializes in privacy and data protection. I dont think that most tech companies are inclined to just give in.

Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook has repeatedly said that the iPhone maker has never worked with any government agency in any country to create a back door in any of our products or services.

NEWSLETTER: Get the days top headlines from Times Editor Davan Maharaj >>

As it is now, Google, Facebook and other companies say they turn over user data when law enforcement, courts or government agencies send in a legal request, usually in the form of a subpoena, wiretap or search warrant.

But not all types of requests require consent of a judge or court. The tech industry has been lobbying nationwide to elevate standards, so law enforcement would have to go through more hurdles unless theres an imminent danger.

Last year, Gov. Jerry Brown approved a law requiring a search warrant, and thus court approval, for law enforcement to gather private emails, text messages and GPS data.

But with each deadly terrorist attack and growing fears over Islamic State, the pressure on tech companies to compromise will only grow  especially if access to private social media communications could have thwarted an attack.

San Bernardino shooter Tashfeen Malik, for example, sent at least two private messages on Facebook to a group of Pakistani friends in 2012 and 2014, stating her support for Islamic jihad and pledging to join the fight, law enforcement officials said.

As situations like that arise, security experts said it will be increasingly hard for tech firms to defend profits over lives.

Chenxi Wang, chief security officer at cloud securities company Twistlock and former vice president of strategy at Intel Security, urged the White House to consider alternative forms of intelligence gathering now that encryption technology has become so common.

The thing civil liberties activists are concerned about is not the capability to do surveillance but rather the abuse of surveillance powers, Wang said. Washington needs to augment this process so they could have encryption surveillance to some degree but still have civil liberties enforced.

The task force announcement comes as Obamas top national security officials  including Atty. Gen. Loretta Lynch, FBI Director James Comey, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and others  tried to enlist support from technology and social media companies at a meeting in San Jose.

Representatives from Apple, Google and Facebook attended the meeting, which sought to find common ground on an issue that has become increasingly complex.

Afterward, a Facebook spokesperson said the two sides were united in our goal to keep terrorists and terror-promoting material off the Internet.

Facebook does not tolerate terrorists or terror propaganda and we work aggressively to remove it as soon as we become aware of it, the company said. This is an ever-evolving landscape.

Earnest conceded there were complicated 1st Amendment issues to discuss regarding freedom of speech, but he said the tech companies in the meeting were run by patriotic Americans.

They certainly dont have any interest or desire in seeing their tools and their technology being used to aid and abet terrorists, Earnest said.

The White House said the flurry of activity signifies a renewed push to prevent further terrorist attacks at home and abroad.

The horrific attacks in Paris and San Bernardino this winter underscored the need for the United States and our partners in the international community and the private sector to deny violent extremists like ISIL fertile recruitment ground, Ned Price, spokesman for the National Security Council, said in a statement. Islamic State is sometimes known as ISIL or ISIS.

The Obama administration has sought to counter the militants propaganda for more than a year, but officials did not believe enough was being done.

The new task force will bring together the best resources and personnel from across the executive branch to ensure that we face the challenge of violent extremism in a unified and coordinated way, Jeh Johnson, secretary of Homeland Security, said in a statement.

william.hennigan@latimes.com

paresh.dave@latimes.com

tracey.lien@latimes.com

Hennigan reported from Washington, D.C., and Dave and Lien from Los Angeles.

Times staff writers David Pierson and Michael A. Memoli contributed to this report.

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The Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. takes its share of guff  some of it justified, some not  for choosing Golden Globes nominees based as much on red-carpet reasons as aesthetic ones.

But when Hollywoods first major awards ceremony gets to the two biggest prizes of the night Sunday  best motion picture in the drama and comedy/musical categories  youd be hard-pressed to quibble with its choices.

Some are better than others, and a few will endure longer than the rest. But all 10 films make a compelling case for inclusion on the years most esteemed (American) movies of the year. (Yes, including Spy. Mostly.) More important, all of them offer something we hadnt seen before, or at least in a very long time. Theyre not landing on Mars, but theyre finding new ways to depict landing on Mars (or getting off it).

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Heres a highly subjective but totally inarguable breakdown of the elements that make each movie stand out from its forebears.

Mad Max: Fury Road. Forget the style, the mythology-extension, the sheer swagger of Imperator Furiosa. Theres a simple formal conceit at the heart of George Millers sequel that seems impossible to execute: Can an action movie be made containing veritably nothing but action? Sure can. The idea of reducing exposition and back story has been on Hollywoods mind for a while. This is its natural end point  and, possibly, its future.

Carol. The very fact of migrating a story of midcentury gay suppression among women  where the story hadnt previously been  from men, where it had (including in director Todd Haynes own Far From Heaven), was novel enough. But that romance and tension could bloom amid so much restraint and wordlessness is what truly distinguishes this film. Who else can mine so much emotion while so little is spoken  Kaurismaki? Ozu? Whos done it recently? And in America?

Spotlight. This ones easy. Sex abuse on screen is usually sensational; journalistic investigations inaccurate. In Tom McCarthys tale about the Boston Globes Catholic Church scandals of the early 2000s, both axioms prove untrue. The molestation is disturbing in a way that raises the stakes, but never in a way that feels like its trying to raise the stakes. And the journalism comes off as it does in real life  long slogs punctuated by thrilling breakthroughs.

The Revenant. Bears, military ambushes, horse beds  lots to choose from here. Lets go macro. The idea of suffering for ones art has been around since the beginning of art, and suffering. In recent years around Hollywood, the notion has been devalued. Badly. Every director who takes on dramatic subject matter is brave; every actor who loses weight for a role is devoted or Method. Its moviemaking. These things are supposed to happen. Thats why its refreshing to see instances of people actually being brave (and OK, even suffering), to put their vision on screen. Sure, it might have made everyone around the production a little crazy. And not all crew members made it out. But the idea of enduring cold, hardship and months of uncertainty has rarely been put to such good effect. If youre going to make people hurt a little on a movie set, it should be for a cause like this.

Room. Yes, of course, Brie Larson is good. But when have you ever seen a child given an arc of this complexity? When have you seen a child actor pull off an arc of this complexity? Jacob Tremblays work should make every stage parent shudder--your kid will never be as good as this.

Spy. The Melissa McCarthy-Paul Feig magic had seemed to run its course sometime after the first half hour of The Heat. And a spy spoof? Didnt the last Austin Powers close the book on that years ago, as any spy spoof with Fred Savage will? Youd think. Turns out both propositions werent true. Spy brought a freshness to what previously had been moribund. Not technically an innovation, but still a surprise. And coming a few weeks after Hot Pursuit, practically a Citizen Kane.

The Martian. So much of the talk has been about the science, rare for a movie of this big-budget kind. And of course the spectacle, which really did draw from, and look, like, Mars. All well and good. But that wasnt the greatest innovation. The greatest innovation was to make a movie this grand out of stakes so low. One person  one botanist  is whats on the line throughout this movie. At least Gravity had two people. Every Marvel movie seems to have a planet or two in peril. Yet the more lives at stake, the less we seem to care about what happens to them. And The Martian, about one guy we got to know really well, made us care a lot.

Joy. Bag all you want, but when else has a dysfunctional-family story felt this inspirational? Maybe you welled up a little at the end when Joy, having pulled off a coup and built an empire, pays it forward; maybe you didnt. Then again, maybe you cry when looking into the eyes of lost puppies; maybe you have a heart of stone. Also, Jennifer Lawrence playing it heroically without the need of a bow and arrow? It isnt an innovation. But it is something the world could use a lot more of; its been a while since Winters Bone.

Trainwreck. I loved this movie less than most .The main character was fresh and interesting; the third act of contrived-breakup-followed-by-dramatic-conciliatory-gesture wasnt. But the thing it did that hadnt been done in a studio comedy before  more than just simple ribaldry, which had been done plenty, if by the other gender  was take someone genuinely flawed and have her struggle with how to deal with that. Yes, Bill Hader could have had more depth. But Amy Schumer had enough for both of them.

The Big Short. Volumes can be written about the tonal shift at the end of this movie, when director Adam McKay, having spent 90 minutes begging our identification with outcasts, shakes us awake and asks us to question just what weve been rooting for. Its not easy to make a movie thats both a stand-up-and-cheer crowd-pleaser and a stand-up-and-throw-shoes-at-elected-leaders cri de coeur; its even harder when it involves pulling the rug out from under the audience. The New Yorkers Anthony Lane recently noted that by taking this final turn, the move bets on our indignation, and loses. But how many movies would even make the gamble?

Twitter: @ZeitchikLAT

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J.J. Abrams admiration of Stephen King is palpable.

As he sat in front of a room of assembled journalists at the Television Critics Assn. press tour in Pasadena to discuss Hulus upcoming limited-series thriller 11.22.63, based on the hugely popular King novel of the same name, Abrams shared a story of meeting the fabled author while working on Lost.

I was lucky enough to go with Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse to Maine, where my wife is from, to sit with Stephen and go to a horror movie with him afterward, Abrams said, going on to detail the encounter and their viewing of The Descent. Every time someone died horribly on screen, he would cheer, and I just fell in love with him.

Kings novel is a meaty thriller that follows the tale of a time traveler attempting to stop the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Executive producers Abrams and Bridget Carpenter maintain that what changes theyve made from the source material were necessary and judicious.

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According to Abrams, King agrees with them.

I was unsure he was going to embrace some of these significant adjustments, but they were necessary and he saw that, Abrams said.

Beyond matters of adaptation, Carpenter has been fixated throughout the process on ensuring an accurate representation of the entire era surrounding the Kennedy assassination.

That era of Kennedy, was probably up until that time, the most photographed presidency. Were talking about the most beautiful couple that ever walked into the White House, Carpenter explained, going on to say, You dont need to know much about Kennedy or the events to know those images. As American people, theyre emblazoned on us.

Its these unshakable images that drive the series to be so meticulous in its representation of events  whether its designers going through the Zapruder film frame by frame to recreate costumes or the shooting in Dallas  and that emotion carries through to the actors experiences as well.

The cast was awed by their time in Dallas.

James Franco, who plays time traveler Jake Epping, said the process was like revisiting the past, but also doing something new.

Co-stars Daniel Webber and T.R. Knight had similar things to say about the process.

There was such an excitement going in there and attempting to recreate the film and the images, Webber said.

Knight said the time spent in Dallas was like going to a wake, adding that your skin feels different.

Hulus 11.22.63 airs the first of its eight episodes Feb. 15.

Follow me on Twitter at @midwestspitfire.
How can an almost 80-year-old broadcasting building steeped in Hollywood history relate to how we work and live now?

The design of NeueHouse, a hybrid coworking facility and social club aimed at enterprising creative professionals, reveals many connections between past and present within the former West Coast headquarters of CBS.

Were all broadcasters today, said Joshua Abram, NeueHouses co-founder, in what originally was the general managers office. Legendary network head William S. Paley would work from the upper floor suite when he came to Los Angeles to check in on his networks big names, such as Orson Welles, and attend to the growing CBS media empire.

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In a sly reference to modern architecture pioneer Le Corbusiers notion of the home as a machine for living, Paley described the building he commissioned Swiss architect William Lescaze to design in 1937 on Sunset Boulevard near North Gower Street as a machine for broadcasting.

Abram explained that Paley wanted Lescaze to turn the guts of the machine and display it on the outside, making all of the parts  including the stars  totally visible. The Hollywood studio-as-fortress paradigm was rejected to turn work into something you share, Abram added, which is obviously a theme that we find here.

The shared-work concept  where the workplace is reimagined as a place with public, interactive, and collaborative qualities  was one of the many concepts that guided the design team throughout the process of rehabilitating the six-story Streamline Moderne landmark. Rockwell Group architects collaborated with Cristina Azario, design principal of NeueHouse Studio, to revamp the building that opened in 1938.

The Gallery at the NeueHouse. (Ricardo DeAratanha / Los Angeles Times)

Lescazes structure has been transformed and updated, with its historic integrity protected. In addition to shared and private offices, NeueHouse holds a 100-seat theater (a full-time staff member oversees cultural programming), group meeting spaces, plus specially engineered rooms for recording and top-of-the-line audio listening. Members-only and public restaurants will open this year too.

The buildings seductive exterior and interior curves merge with the mission and aesthetic of the New York City-based group, which opened its first location in Manhattan in 2013. The building also significantly figures into the makeover and heavy investment thats sweeping Sunset east of Vine Street.

In addition to NeueHouse, developer Kilroy Realtys Columbia Square location features several restaurants  Sugarfish, Sweetgreen and Rubies+Diamonds are already open, with more to come. Viacom is among the tenants moving into an adjacent office building thats under construction. Artist Dustin Yellin completed a series of panels in the outdoor plaza leading to NeueHouses main entrance, which links the other in-progress buildings.

Third-floor center living group at the NeueHouse. (Ricardo DeAratanha / Los Angeles Times)

Inside NeueHouse, Azario focused on a contrast of hard and soft surfaces. You need to live your life, you need a certain comfort, you need to find nooks to retreat to, she said. There is a way to marry that with the Modernist building and create a sense of discovery and journey.

This approach is evident starting with the lobby, cafe and shared work tables located at the ground gallery floor, up through the more private spaces and dramatic outdoor terraces. Azario mixed Moroccan and South African-made rugs, textiles from designers in New York and L.A., and primarily custom-made furnishings throughout that pay homage to the sleek, machine-inspired International Style legacy, along with vintage pieces and American classics such as Cherner armchairs. She and Abram selected original artwork from the Artist Pension Trusts collection.

Living group 1, lobby and reception at the NeueHouse. (Ricardo DeAratanha / Los Angeles Times)

The result builds layers of warmth and texture, and blurs distinctions between private and public experiences.

Theres a great attention to design, Azario noted, but in a way, its a backdrop to life happening.

home@latimes.com

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Good morning. It is Saturday, Jan. 9. Heres what you dont want to miss this weekend:

TOP STORIES

Guilty verdict: Raymond Shrimp Boy Chow was convicted on 162 counts Friday, including racketeering and murder, following two days of jury deliberations. Chow was arrested after federal agents conducted a lengthy undercover investigation that also touched then-state Sen. Leland Yee, who later pleaded guilty to racketeering. Attorneys for Chow maintained their clients innocence. Los Angeles Times

Clean up efforts: As part of an agreement intended to reduce emissions and odors from the gas leak in Aliso Canyon, Southern California Gas Co. will capture and incinerate some of the natural gas as soon as next week. The effort should help mitigate to some extent the foul odors and also will destroy the methane, but theyre not going to be able to capture all the gas thats leaking, said Sam Atwood, a spokesman with the South Coast Air Quality Management District. Los Angeles Times

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Guests of honor: San Bernardino Police Chief Jarrod Burguan and San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon will be guests at President Obamas State of the Union address Tuesday. The two were at the forefront of the investigation into the Dec. 2 shooting at the Inland Regional Center. They have made us all so proud, and I look forward to seeing them in Washington and to continue working together to help our community rebuild and recover, said Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-San Bernardino), who is bringing the two as his guests. San Bernardino Sun

One term: L.A. City Councilman Felipe Fuentes will not run for reelection when his first term is up. The decision to leave the city council is an unusual one  hes the first politician in at least 20 years to step down after a single term of office. I know that I will be 46 years old when I finish this term, and I want to write a new chapter, try a new career, Fuentes said. His term will end in 2017. Los Angeles Times

Rec and parks: Take 360-degree tours of the smallest parks in the city of Los Angeles. One is just 706 square feet. Los Angeles Times

THIS WEEKS MOST POPULAR STORIES IN ESSENTIAL CALIFORNIA

1. El Nino showed up this week and brought with it heavy rains and flooding. Here are the 13 craziest images from the storms. Curbed LA

2. This is what El Nino storms do: They arrive back-to-back-to-back. El Nino storms: its steady, not spectacular. But its relentless, said Bill Patzert, climatologist at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Canada Flintridge. Los Angeles Times

3. The Los Angeles River came back to life this week. Los Angeles Times

4. What was this guy thinking, driving his Lamborghini through a flooded intersection? CityLab

5. One drivers frightening crash off the Angeles Crest Highway was captured by his dashboard camera. YouTube

ICYMI, HERE ARE THIS WEEKS GREAT READS

Endangered species: In Mongolia, officials with the World Wildlife Fund want to protect the elusive snow leopard from an encroaching population. An explosion in the number of horses, cattle, sheep and goats has set off a war between nomads and wildlife. To herders, snow leopard attacks on their animals are common and can cost them thousands of dollars. Los Angeles Times

LOOKING AHEAD

Sunday: The Golden Globe Awards will be held in Beverly Hills.

Tuesday: The Orange County Board of Supervisors will select a new president of the board.

Saturday: The fourth annual Pelican Days Festival will be held at the Salton Sea.

Please let us know what we can do to make this newsletter more useful to you. Send comments, complaints and ideas to Alice Walton or Shelby Grad.
A report released by city analysts this week set the cost of confronting Los Angeles surging homelessness over the next decade at nearly $2 billion, a stark acknowledgment of the money and work required to help the nations largest unsheltered population.

Almost as remarkable as that sum is the method of raising it that the report suggests could be necessary: A ballot initiative that would probably require supermajority approval from city voters.

------------

FOR THE RECORD:

Homeless funding: In the Jan. 9 California section, an article about providing funding to help Los Angeles homeless was accompanied by a photo of a homeless woman that identified her location as beneath the 405 Freeway in Venice. She was beneath the 405 on Venice Boulevard in Palms. 

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Such a measure  which could take the form either of a bond or a tax increase  could reshape the citys political landscape next year, forcing elected leaders to take sides in a campaign with scant local precedent. They would do so in an atmosphere of greater than usual uncertainty, as voters weigh whether to open their wallets for a humanitarian issue very different from the infrastructure projects that typically occupy the ballot.

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This is kind of new territory, said Raphael Sonenshein, executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at Cal State L.A. Usually the selling point for a bond or a tax is that youre going to get something from it, not that youre doing the right thing for someone who is not you.

That assessment was echoed by former L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, who campaigned for one of the few human-service measures to succeed on the ballot in recent years: Measure B, which taxed some forms of construction to help fund emergency medical care at public hospitals and passed with more than 73% approval in 2002.

The elected officials are going to have to appeal to the better angels of the middle-class voters who tend to be the swing voters on these issues, Yaroslavsky said. Its not going to be easy.

The political challenges of selling the public on a large outlay of government funds for the homeless were evident in the mixed and sometimes cautious responses to the report that city leaders offered on Friday, a day after its release.

Mayor Eric Garcetti and City Council members praised the reports thoroughness and appeared to agree with its cost estimates and policy prescriptions. Yet among those who spoke to The Times, only a few on the council expressed unqualified support for a bond or tax increase.

Theres nothing thats off the table, whether its possibly going to voters, whether its looking at the growth of our budgets or shifting some priorities from some things that we fund today that while important may not have the same urgency as homelessness, Garcetti said, adding that a specific funding mechanism for addressing homelessness could be debated in the months ahead.

The citys 233-page report, prepared by City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana and Chief Legislative Analyst Sharon Tso, comes as the plight of the more than 26,000 people who live on L.A.'s streets is preoccupying City Hall as it rarely has before. Makeshift encampments have sprung up across the city, prompting a flood of complaints to council offices.

The report lays out a broad array of strategies for reducing the number of homeless over the next decade, centered on the building and leasing of long-term housing where the homeless can live with access to social services.

Paying for such housing could be done in a variety of ways, the report concluded. The city could cut funding to other services and departments, or seek state and federal aid. Nevertheless, given the size of the necessary investment, the report suggested city officials also consider options including a bond or tax hike. The report increases hikes to the sales tax, hotel tax, billboard tax and others as possible sources of revenue.

Councilman Mitch OFarrell, whose district spans Hollywood to Echo Park, said he was open to a voter-approved bond or tax hike but that city officials should also try to identify other ways to build housing for the homeless  such as creating mandates that such housing be created as part of new developments  before asking city residents for money.

Voters are going to demand that we are also doing our part and were not just saying, Oh, well just take it to the voters, OFarrell said. If we do some of these policy initiatives that Im talking about and we follow through on them, voters are going to have a lot more confidence. And perhaps if we do think of some sort of ballot initiative, it will be more reasonable, and it will be more palatable and more affordable.

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Minimizing the amount of money asked of voters could be all the more important if a measure to raise money for the homeless jostles for attention on the ballot with other tax initiatives. L.A. County transportation officials are widely expected to seek a sales tax increase in 2016 to raise as much as $120 billion for roads and public transportation.

Nevertheless, some city leaders said that with an energetic campaign, the ballot measure envisioned in the report could pass.

Im willing to go to the voters to ask for this. This is the No. 1 issue I hear about from all over my district, said Councilman Mike Bonin, whose Westside district has one of the largest concentrations of homeless encampments. I think if we can show that we have an actual strategy, theyd be willing to invest in it.

Councilman Marqueece Harris-Dawson, who represents parts of South Los Angeles and co-chairs the Homelessness and Poverty Committee, said the road map laid out in the report requires an investment of the voters and that he would support a ballot initiative to generate new revenue.

I think if something is put before the voters that actually can solve the problem and has transparency and accountability, I think voters will support it, Harris-Dawson said. I think the electorate in Los Angeles  has shown a willingness to invest in building the kind of society that we all want to live in.

peter.jamison@latimes.com

Twitter: @petejamison

emily.alpert@latimes.com

Twitter: @LATimesemily
The school districts cost for dealing with a gas leak in Aliso Canyon has surpassed $5 million, according to officials with Los Angeles Unified, which has relocated two campuses.

The total of expenses could rise much higher and is still being tallied, said district General Counsel David Holmquist.

The gas leak, from a storage well operated by the Southern California Gas Co., has prompted more than 4,500 families to apply for relocation assistance from the energy company since late October. Two schools also were affected, with teachers and students reporting an increase in health problems, as attendance and enrollment dipped.

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The gas company has covered moving and related living costs for residents, but has not come to terms with L.A. Unified. Not wanting to wait any longer, the Board of Education in December approved the shutdown of Porter Ranch Community School, which enrolls students in kindergarten through eighth grade, and Castlebay Lane Charter Elementary.

The district acted so that new facilities could be prepared over winter break. Porter Ranch students will resume classes on Tuesday at Northridge Middle School. Students and staff at Castlebay Lane will relocate to Sunny Brae Avenue Elementary in Winnetka.

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For the Record

8:22 a.m.: An earlier version of this article said the relocated Porter Ranch students will resume school Monday. They will return Tuesday.

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See the most-read stories this hour >>

Construction crews have spent the last three weeks building annexes at the two host campuses.

Besides the moving costs, the district has rented and installed portable buildings; extended water, sewer and electrical connections; and laid down concrete and asphalt. The district said it made the changes in compliance with rules and inspection guidelines from the Division of the State Architect, which oversees school construction.

There also have been expenses at the now-closed campuses, including environmental testing, the installation of air-filtration equipment and added nursing staff.

The Board of Education has authorized its attorneys to sue Southern California Gas, if necessary, for reimbursement, but so far, talks have been amicable although inconclusive, Holmquist said.

Scott Schmerelson, the L.A. Unified board member who represents Porter Ranch, said he is confident that the gas company will have to pay the tab, although no commitment has been made. I have no idea what the cost is, but it will all be reimbursed by SoCal Gas, he said.

Twitter: @howardblume and @Joy_Resmovits

Join the conversation on Facebook >>

MORE ON PORTER RANCH

Everything you need to know about the Porter Ranch school relocation

Officials and gas company agree on plan to burn off some methane afflicting Porter Ranch

Two weeks after a court order, the pace of Porter Ranch relocations hasnt improved
When the Laguna Beach City Council adopted a controversial new view ordinance in 2014, many predicted that the city would be deluged with claims from residents seeking to restore sightlines of the ocean or surrounding hillsides lost to overgrown trees and other vegetation on a neighbors property.

Statistics obtained recently from the city tell a different story.

Since the revised ordinance took effect in January 2015, the city has received 25 applications from residents seeking to restore their views, far fewer than anticipated. The legislation requires property owners to attempt a solution on their own, or with help from a mediator, before the city-appointed View Restoration Committee considers the matter at a public hearing.

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The updated ordinance allows residents to use the date they purchased the home or Nov. 4, 2003  the date used in the prior law  whichever is earlier, to establish a record of a view, usually through photographic evidence. Offending vegetation must be within 500 feet of the claimants property line and at least 6 feet tall to be subject to a claim.

Community Development Director Greg Pfost listened to residents fears of an onslaught of claims before the new ordinance became law.

I heard, Be prepared to have a line out the door, Pfost said in an interview. There has not been a line. People are interested to see how the ordinance will play out. Ive heard property owners who have attended [view committee meetings] to see how things play out, so that may delay [filing a claim].

Under the current ordinance, a property owner alleging a blocked view must try to work out a solution with his or her neighbor harboring the trees or vegetation before the city becomes involved. If the parties cant reach consensus, then the property owner pays $500 for a city-hired mediator to step in.

Of the 25 restoration applications, a mediator resolved five cases while parties in two other cases worked out issues by themselves. Other cases are pending.

If mediation doesnt work, the aggrieved landowner may file a view-restoration claim with a $630 price tag. Once a resident files a claim, city staff visits the site, interviews the property and vegetation owners and schedules a public hearing where the restoration committee considers the evidence.

Since June, the committee has deliberated four claims.

The hearings have helped some neighbors reach a compromise. During a hearing in July, for example, a resident agreed to remove a 50-foot-tall ash tree that a neighbor said blocked views of the ocean and Catalina Island.

At other times, neighbors have failed to agree, such as a recent hearing when a property owner seeking to restore a view rejected a neighbors proposed planting plan in fear the trees would eventually obstruct sightlines.

There is also disagreement over who should bear the brunt of costs for filing claims and trimming.

Councilman Kelly Boyd said the overall process is an improvement.

Most people arent going past a mediator, which is good, Boyd said. There was a worry that 50 to 60 people would go crazy. In the past, someone could say, Hell with you, and the view would be blocked. Now people are working it out, which is a great thing.

The City Council this month is scheduled to consider adopting a separate ordinance related to city-maintained trees and vegetation that will outline a process for residents wishing to restore lost views due to trees planted on public property.

bryce.alderton@latimes.com

Alderton writes for Times Community News.
The U.S. refugee program came under fresh criticism Friday after federal authorities revealed that two Iraqi-born men arrested on terrorism-related charges had come to America as refugees.

While there was no evidence the men intended or planned attacks in the United States, Republican lawmakers already concerned about the federal governments ability to properly vet Syrian refugees said the cases highlight weaknesses in the program that put Americans safety at risk.

How many ticking time bombs are we going to bring in in this refugee program without a proper vetting system in place? Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas and chairman of House Homeland Security Committee, said at a news conference.

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He and other GOP lawmakers urged the Senate to pass legislation to block refugees from Iraq and Syria until screening is improved. The House passed a bill in November.

The uproar comes after weeks of fervent debate in Washington and on the presidential campaign trail about tighter security screens in the wake of attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California.

Immigrant advocates said they have full confidence in the vetting process and that tens of thousands of Iraqi refugees have been successfully resettled under the program.

On Thursday, federal authorities in California accused 23-year-old Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab of Sacramento of traveling to Syria to fight and lying to U.S. officials about it. Al-Jayab had come to the United States as a refugee in October 2012, and discussed on social media how he fought against the regime in Syria as a teen, authorities said.

In Texas, 24-year-old Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan of Houston was indicted on charges that he tried to provide material support to the extremists. Both suspects are Palestinians born in Iraq, authorities said.

The U.S. annually accepts 70,000 refugees from around the world, including people fleeing violence, religious persecution and war, and has announced plans to increase the number to 85,000 this year.

Since the 2001 terrorist attacks, about 785,000 refugees have arrived in the country, and fewer than 20 have been arrested or removed over terrorism-related concerns, according to the State Department.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Friday the screening of refugees is rigorous and thorough. He repeated the administrations opposition to proposals that would impose a religious test or bar individuals from the U.S. based on their ethnicity.

That doesnt represent who we are as a country and, most importantly, its not going to keep us safe, Earnest said.

More than 127,000 Iraqi refugees have arrived in the United States since October 2006, with the largest numbers headed toward California, Michigan and Texas, according to State Department statistics. Some Iraqis go through the U.N. refugee agency, while some can apply directly to the refugee program in Jordan, Egypt and Iraq.

Melanie Nezer, vice president for policy and advocacy at the Jewish refugee agency HIAS, said she worries the recent backlash might place law-abiding refugees under suspicion. She said she has confidence in the governments screening measures and that these are continually updated by federal intelligence officials.

The vast majority of refugees, including Iraqi refugees, have not caused any harm to our country and will not cause any harm to our country, she said.

Federal authorities said Al-Jayab promised to provide weapons training to Al Hardan and advised him on how he would be assigned to the battlefield once he arrived in Syria. While authorities say Al Jayab fought twice in Syria, including with a group eventually linked to Islamic State, there is no indication that Al Hardan actually traveled there.

Al Hardan became a legal permanent resident of the United States in 2011 and applied in 2014 to become a U.S. citizen, authorities said. Al-Jayab was interviewed by immigration officials in 2014 for his green card and did not disclose his recent travel to Syria, authorities said.

Security screenings for immigrants and travelers have come under increased scrutiny because of recent attacks. Rules have been tightened for visa-free travel to the United States and lawmakers have vowed to look into the fiance visa program, which was used by the husband-and-wife attackers in San Bernardino who killed 14 people last month.

On Friday, senior White House officials and members of the presidents national security team traveled to Silicon Valley to seek tech industry help to stop the Islamic State and other groups from radicalizing people online.

Associated Press
For more than two decades, conservation groups have argued that a wolf and the rainforest in southeast Alaska where it lives are at risk.

While the groups have won strong restrictions on logging of the Tongass National Forest, the nations largest, they have been denied in their efforts to win federal protection for the wolf.

This week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service denied them again: The agency determined that the wolf, known as the Alexander Archipelago wolf, should not be listed as an endangered or threatened species.

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While the government agreed with conservationists that the wolf is declining in parts of its range and that loss of its habitat from logging is playing a role in that decline, it said the overall population of the wolf appears to be healthy.

Although the Alexander Archipelago wolf faces several stressors throughout its range related to wolf harvest, timber harvest, road development, and climate-related events in southeast Alaska and coastal British Columbia, the best available information indicates that populations of the wolf in most of its range are likely stable, the Fish and Wildlife Service announced Tuesday.

Named for a collection of remote islands, the wolf actually ranges across much of heavily forested mainland southeast Alaska and the coast of British Columbia in Canada. Conservationists pressing for its protection have focused on wolves in the archipelago, which includes on Prince of Wales Island, an expanse of nearly 2,600 square miles with about 6,000 people.

Part of Prince of Wales is being logged under one of the largest timber sales in the Tongass in two decades, and estimates say the island could now have as few as 50 wolves, down from about 300 two decades ago. Logging can also reduce habitat for deer, a critical food source for the wolves.

Conservationists built part of their argument on scientific evidence showing that wolves on the islands  an area the government calls GMU 2, for Game Management Unit 2  are genetically distinct from those roaming the mainland. The government agreed there are differences but said they were not strong enough to warrant listing the island wolves as a distinct species.

The best available genetic data do not indicate that the GMU 2 population harbors significant adaptive variation, which is supported further by the fact that the GMU 2 population is not persisting in an unusual or unique ecological setting, the government concluded.

Bruce Dale, the director of the division of wildlife within the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, which argued against a listing, said the state was committed to protecting the wolf through improved forest management and hunting practices and other means. Despite the declines, he said wolves and deer on the islands remain abundant relative to other parts of the range.

That doesnt mean they werent more abundant before, he said.

The decision was a victory for the regions remaining timber industry. Only one large sawmill remains on Prince of Wales Island.

The Fish and Wildlife Service said it expects wolves on the island to decline further in the next 30 years from the cumulative effect of stressors.

However, wolves here constitute only 4% of the range of the Alexander Archipelago wolf and 6% of its current estimated total population. Therefore, negative population impacts on these islands will likely not affect the rangewide population in a significant way, the agency said.

@yardleyLAT
After mulling over a proposal to impose sweeping gun control by executive order, President Obama this week instead shelved the idea and settled for a few memos warning firearms sellers to run more background checks.

But after months of anticipation that Obama was poised to take strong action, gun control opponents in Washington were cranked up for a furious fight over what they considered impending tyranny.

Obama wants your guns, declared Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruzs website in a headline over a picture of the president dressed as a SWAT commando. It also featured a button to direct readers to donate to the Cruz campaign.

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The hue and cry was notable given the relatively minor amount of federal government power that Obama exercised. But it was only the latest example of how Washingtons chief product these days isnt laws, its outrage.

Rolling out any new initiative is now a three-dimensional chess game involving social media and targeted audiences. The old playbooks from the 20th century dont work.  Mike McCurry, a former White House press secretary

The ever-deepening partisan divide has for years fueled fundraising for both sides: Dont like what the opposition is doing? Donate to us, and well stop them!

No event is too small anymore to gear up the hype machine, particularly in an election year and with such an emotionally fraught policy issue as guns.

Obama is no bystander in all of this, of course. The White House generated its own buzz for the presidents new gun control program, leaking word that he was looking at issuing an executive order and doing little to tamp down the rising tide of concern over the last three months.

In the end, he didnt issue an order, but instead had his administration write a few letters and promised to crack down on people selling multiple guns, regardless of where sales occur, including flea markets, gun shows and the Internet. Even if vendors claim to be hobbyists exempt from licensure, Obama said, if they are acting like gun dealers, they will have to apply for licenses and start conducting background checks on buyers.

Still, the response has been so hyperpartisan that even the hyperpartisans were shocked.

Im a professional hyperbolist. I enjoy and encourage ridiculous overstatement and participate in it every day, said Paul Begala, a Democratic strategist and commentator. Even for me, this is beyond the pale.

Republicans attribute the response to long-standing frustration over what they see as Obamas failure to work in a collaborative way.

The president took office promising to unify the country, but unfortunately his administration has spent the past seven years stirring up their base and avoiding anything that looks like common ground, said John Ashbrook, a Republican strategist and former aide to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

In years past, there appeared to be more patience for a diversity of opinions. During his time in office, President George W. Bush said he believed in background checks at gun shows or, for that matter, anywhere. His brother Jeb Bush and fellow Republican John McCain, the Arizona senator, also voiced concerns about the gun-show loophole.

But the issue has become increasingly partisan. If Obamas for something, Republicans are almost always opposed. Likewise, Democrats rarely embrace GOP priorities.

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When the handgun control measure known as the Brady bill came up for consideration 20 years ago, it passed with the support of former President Reagan, Begala recalled. Obama could never hope for such a backing today, he said, because of the way the partisan lines have hardened.

The media landscape has also changed during that time, with social media and niche outlets widening the partisan divide.

Rolling out any new initiative is now a three-dimensional chess game involving social media and targeted audiences, said Mike McCurry, a former White House press secretary who introduced many initiatives for President Clinton. The old playbooks from the 20th century dont work.

In this case, the Obama administration managed to excite interest in the subject of gun violence in the traditional and new media alike. The president announced in October that he had ordered his staff to scrub existing laws for any possible executive action he could take.

As part of the policy announcement, Obama participated Thursday in a prime-time, nationally televised town hall on the subject.

He came ready to engage with some tough talk of his own. He denounced the National Rifle Assn. for being unwilling to join the discussion at George Mason University in Virginia hosted by CNN, noting it was taking place just down the street from its national headquarters.

We have invited them repeatedly, Obama said. But if you listen to the rhetoric, it is so over the top and so overheated.

NRA officials declined to comment. Christopher Cox, the groups executive director, told Fox News Channel immediately after Obamas appearance that the president was engaging in political theatrics.

The president is creating an illusion that he is doing something to keep people safe. He needs to do that because his policies failed miserably, Cox said. This president didnt use it as an opportunity to unite this country. Didnt use it as an opportunity to lay out a plan to defeat terrorism. He used it as an opportunity to impose more gun control on law-abiding Americans.

Also Thursday the president announced he would not support any candidate, even from his own party, who did not support the same kind of common sense gun laws he did. On Friday he was set to discuss the issue with Organizing for Action, which evolved out of his former campaign organizing committee.

michael.memoli@latimes.com

christi.parsons@latimes.com

ALSO

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The global digital assembly line has arrived. Its workers labor at computer keyboards, performing the behind-the-scenes tasks that make the Internet appear intelligent and functional. They assign labels like family or theme park to photos, check that Web URLs work, verify addresses on Yelp, review social media posts flagged as adult.

Corporations, from the smallest start-ups to the largest firms, can now taskify everything from scheduling meetings and debugging websites, to finding sales leads and managing fulltime employees HR files. Instead of hiring help, firms just post their needs to the Web.

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FOR THE RECORD

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Taskified Work: An article on Jan. 10 misstated the age of Riyaz Khan. He is 35, not 32.

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This online piecework, or crowdwork, represents a radical shift in how we define employment itself.

The individuals performing this work are of course not traditional employees, but neither are they freelancers. They are, instead, users or customers of Web-based platforms that deliver pre-priced tasks like so many DIY kits ready for assembly. Transactions are bound not by employee-employer relationships but by user agreements and Terms of Service that resemble software licenses more than any employment contract.

Researchers at Oxford Universitys Martin Programme on Technology and Employment estimate that nearly 30% of jobs in the U.S. could be organized like this within 20 years. Forget the rise of robots and the distant threat of automation. The immediate issue is the Uber-izing of human labor, fragmenting of jobs into outsourced tasks and dismantling of wages into micropayments.

In the U.S. and overseas, crowdwork payments can mean the difference between scraping by and saving for a home or working toward a degree. But as Riyaz Khan, a 32-year-old from a small town in the coastal state of Andhra Pradesh in India, discovered, doing work on spec posted by someone youll never meet and who has no legal obligations to you has serious disadvantages.

My team at Microsoft Research spent two years studying the lives of hundreds of American and Indian crowdworkers like Khan to learn how they manage this nascent form of employment and the capriciousness that comes with it. Khan, when we met him, had spent three years finding work on Amazon Mechanical Turk. AMT is one of the largest online marketplaces that connect providers from around the world like Khan with requesters, typically U.S. or European businesses or individuals. He did tasks for companies as big as Google and as small as neighborhood print shops.

On good days, he made $40 in 10 hours  more than 100 times what neighboring farmers earned. He soon found more tasks than he could complete himself. So he hired locals to work with him out of his living room. In exchange for a cut of their pay, Khan helped his crew create their own accounts, taught them how to complete tasks efficiently, and ferreted out tasks that best matched his workers skillsets. He also handled any final queries after the completed task was submitted. They called themselves Team Genius.

Three years in, now dependent on this income to support family and friends, Khan heard worrying tales of Indian workers AMT accounts being shut down. One by one, members of Team Genius lost their accounts.

Then it happened to him. An email from Amazons Customer Service Team offered no explanation beyond: I am sorry but your Amazon Mechanical Turk account was closed due to a violation of our Participation Agreement and cannot be reopened. Any funds that were remaining on the account are forfeited, and we will not be able to provide any additional insight or action. You may review the Participation Agreement/Conditions of Use at this URL: https://www.mturk.com/mturk/conditionsofuse. Thank you for trying Amazon Mechanical Turk. Best regards, Laverne P. We value your feedback, please rate my response using the link below.'

Using a Contact Us link, Khan sent several messages pleading his case. He received auto-replies thanking him for his patience, but no information about how to appeal or retrieve the funds hed banked with AMT for completed tasks over the last two months. Instead, he was referred to the agreements Restrictions and Limitations clause, which grants AMT the right to terminate or suspend any Payment Account for any reason in our sole discretion.

Forget the rise of robots and the distant threat of automation. The immediate issue is the Uber-izing of human labor, fragmenting of jobs ... and dismantling of wages.

Such policies are not unique to AMT. Using Terms of Service and Participation Agreements as guidance for when  or whether  to pay people for work they have satisfactorily completed is standard practice in the crowdworking sphere. In the absence of any legal definition of the rights and responsibilities of parties involved, these account and service agreements are the default labor laws.

Six months later, without explanation, Khan received his final paycheck. Other members of Team Genius, unsure how to pursue resolution, got stiffed. None ever found out exactly why AMT suspended their accounts, although I suspect they know what parts of the Participation Agreement they broke. Practices such as automating the acceptance of tasks, or transferring an account to another person violate AMTs rules but are widespread among those in the United States and India alike who are trying to cobble together a full-time living.

Khans experience should be a warning to us all. Crowdwork may seem like a small eddy of employment, contained to those who work on computer code and Web development. But it looms like a tsunami of change for anyone whose routine work  filing forms, drafting standardized reports, coordinating events  can be broken into bits and farmed out online.

We must recognize that crowdwork sites are not just technologies that deliver convenient services. They are sites of employment that encompass the globe. Yet there are no clear rules for how this new form of employment should operate. As Team Genius case demonstrates, the right to be paid for ones labor is no longer guaranteed. Centuries of global labor activism, from child labor laws to workplace safety guidelines, are left vulnerable.

The Amazons, GrubHubs, Upworks, and Ubers that profit from brokering this new work relationship certainly bear some responsibility. More broadly, state and national governments need to reset their labor rules and reweave social safety nets. This is not a simple matter of re-classifying crowdworkers as employees; rather we need to move beyond the fulltime-freelance divide. Businesses (and their customers) demand an all-hours, at-the-ready workforce. But to get that, workers need portable healthcare, a basic income, paid leave and retirement plans.

Corporations and governments would be wise to underwrite portable benefits plans; after all, companies stand to profit the most from a flexible, on-demand workforce. With comprehensive universal benefits, more individuals could absorb the risks of letting their 9-to-5 jobs go. Governments and corporations could stabilize on-demand work, boosting productivity and global economic growth. Without such benefits, on the other hand, we have a recipe for further financial insecurity, underemployment and social unrest.

As the nation with the greatest number of tech companies dependent upon and profiting from the global digital assembly line, its up to the United States to set the bar for what gainful employment looks like in 21st century. We must do so with our own children in mind, as well as children in Andhra Pradesh, for their futures are intertwined. And neither deserves an emailed pink slip that makes collecting a paycheck a customer service nightmare.

Mary L. Gray is a researcher at Microsoft Research, a fellow at Harvards Berkman Center for Internet and Society, and an associate professor at Indiana University. She is co-writing a book about on-demand economies and the future of work with computer scientist Siddharth Suri.

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook
Homelessness, bad water management and a concrete channel that scars our urban landscape: If theres a chronic problem in Los Angeles, the El Nino deluges seem to be highlighting it.

Some of the perennial issues that plague L.A. go unaddressed precisely because of this areas usual lack of rain. Our dry, typically comfortable weather makes postponing meaningful action on homelessness easier, and the semi-arid climate of Southern California and surrounding mountain ranges conspire to produce flash flooding when the rains do come, necessitating the use of flood-control channels to shunt the fresh water safely to sea.

But with a multi-year drought still underway and more El Nino storms on the horizon, some of our letter writers have started asking: Why dont we keep this water? Shouldnt we get homeless people out of the rain? And can we finally we do something about our unsightly river?

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Venice resident Joel Shapiro, the coproducer of a documentary about the L.A. River called Rock the Boat, says we should use the water flowing into the Pacific Ocean:

The title and focus of The Times article on Thursday on the now-raging L.A. River should have been headlined, Opportunity Missed.

The missed opportunity is the 440,000 acre feet of water we are throwing away annually into Long Beach Harbor while Los Angeles imports 660,000 acre feet from the already overtaxed Colorado River and the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.

This is a critical mismanagement issue. With climate change, we are heading into a new normal of long-term drought, and we toss away the equivalent of much of what we import into Los Angeles.

By the way, this also means we are using vast amounts of energy (and associated carbon pollution) to import all this water.

Anne Cook of Venice similarly laments a waste of resources and compares L.A.'s river to those of other large cities:

Thanks for the article about the L.A. River, a beautiful, evocative, poetic, fact-packed piece of reporting. My compliments to the writer Joe Mozingo; hes a keeper.

How sad, too, that unlike other cities on world-class rivers like the Danube and the Seine, we havent preserved our waterway as a resource. And considering the immense volume of water thats running past, why the heck arent we capturing it? When will we ever learn?

Alison Rood of Folsom takes issue with those who regard El Nino only as a burden:

Regarding Steve Lopezs column on Wednesday about the homeless man drastically affected by heavy rainfall, isnt cursed a bit heavy-handed when describing El Nino?

Its not a good situation for many people, thats true, but with our forests dying, our reservoirs empty and our ecosystems in jeopardy, surely the rainfall we desperately need is not a curse. At some point the health of our natural world should be more worthy of our concern.

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook
To the editor: My heart fell reading Tamar Jacobys article about newly arrived immigrants who struggle to learn English. Of course immigrants need to be proficient in English to achieve the American dream. But proficiency for adults takes years of everyday study with qualified teachers. (Beyond survival English, Opinion, Jan. 5)

For more than 100 years, the Los Angeles Unified School District had an extremely respected and efficient Adult Education Program. Hundreds of thousands of students from more than 100 different countries studied English as a second language (which I taught in the district), participated in vocational training programs and worked toward obtaining their high school diplomas. Classes were held day and night to meet these students needs.

In 2012, then-Supt. John Deasy canceled that marvelous program. I still dont understand why. Now, a small portion of the adult education program is running, but on a very restricted scale.

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Yes, our immigrants need to be given easy access to American English classes if we are to all succeed in our society. LAUSD has a lot to answer for.

Planaria Price, Los Angeles

..

To the editor: By failing to put the issue into proper historical perspective, Jacoby creates unrealistic expectations about what public schools can do.

In 1905, New York City was inundated with far more non-English speaking immigrants than now live in Los Angeles. As Irving Howe wrote in World of Our Fathers, the New York system did rather well in helping immigrant children who wanted help, fairly well in helping those who needed help, and quite badly in helping those who resisted help.

Instead of persisting in the fiction that all newcomers to these shores have the same motivation to become proficient in English, its important to remember the lessons from the past.

Walt Gardner, Los Angeles

The writer is the author of Education Weeks Reality Check blog.

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook
To the editor: Everyone is talking about how to control guns to prevent gun violence that is, how to restrict access to guns and prevent bad guys and mentally ill people from getting weapons. All these efforts do is restrict access to legal guns for law-abiding people who seek only to protect themselves and their families. (With gun epidemic raging, Obama finally bypasses Congress, editorial, Jan. 5)

All of this emphasis is on the implement  the guns. What is rarely mentioned by people advocating policies like the ones supported by President Obama is the control of violence with guns. They do not discuss the behavior of the persons carrying out this violence or of the consequences that society should demand from people who commit crimes using guns.

When Cook County, Ill., (where the largest city is Chicago) sends a gun offender to prison for an average of about six months and returns them to the streets, are our priorities in order? With theft of a gun and unlawful possession of a firearm both misdemeanors in California, what are we saying about our priorities?

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Do we care more about lawful purchase of a gun by law-abiding citizens or holding violent people responsible for their behavior?

Robert Braley, Bakersfield

..

To the editor: Even in the framework of previous unconstitutional positions that The Times has taken, this one is astounding.

The Times is advocating that Obama bypass the Constitution and bypass Congress to make and expand laws because Congress isnt doing what he says he wants. Maybe some hope that The Times is closed without due process of law. After all, some people sure regard its headlines as occasionally akin to yelling fire in a crowded theater.

The Times blames the National Rifle Assn. for having lawmakers in its iron grip. Can 5 million members have such a grip? Of course not. But the many millions more who are not members but support the NRA have Congress in their grip, as well they should.

Which freedom that you might not support is next?

Steve Hawes, Sunland

..

To the editor: Americans have a variety of solutions for every social problem they face that are based on everyones personal values. At the top of their value scale is human life.

However, for some there are good humans but also bad humans. Therefore we need guns to defend ourselves. Yet the evidence shows we are killing too many good humans.

Obama has proposed a few modest controls for gun ownership, and House Speaker Paul Ryans (R-Wis.) response was, His words and actions amount to a form of intimidation that undermines liberty.

Preserving human life versus preserving gun liberty: Those are incredible value differences.

David N. Hartman, Santa Ana

..

To the editor: Obama stated that he wants an increase in funding for research into gun use and gun deaths.

An important part of this research should be an investigation into the psychology of why many Americans are so desperate to own a device with which to kill other Americans.

Zena Thorpe, Chatsworth

..

To the editor: Even in the face of murdered children, moviegoers and shoppers, Congress chooses to placate its NRA overlords. Our president has the courage and compassion to say, Enough.

Thank you, President Obama.

Suzanna Bortz, Laguna Niguel

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook
Despite family members pleas to a judge for mercy, an Irvine man was sentenced Friday to 25 years to life in prison for strangling his wife to death after he discovered she was having an affair.

Shalabh Rastogi, 42, attacked his 40-year-old wife, Jalina George, in their home while they were arguing about marital troubles the night of May 21, 2012, according to a grand jury indictment.

A month earlier, Rastogi found birth control medication, even though hed had a vasectomy years earlier, leading him to suspect that George was cheating on him, prosecutors said.

George at first denied having an affair, but she later admitted it after Rastogi followed her and watched her meet with another man, according to the indictment.

The night of the killing, Rastogi snapped and grabbed Georges throat, court documents state. Later that night, he called police to say he had killed his wife, prosecutors said.

In November, a jury convicted Rastogi of first-degree murder.

Before Fridays sentencing hearing, the couples three children and Georges family members wrote a stack of letters asking Orange County Superior Court Judge Michael Cassidy to spare Rastogi the lengthy prison term, according to public defender Melani Bartholomew.

My client is a meek, soft-spoken person who has never done anything in his whole life that would indicate that he would be at this table ever, Bartholomew said.

She asked Cassidy to place Rastogi on probation instead of behind bars. He loves his children. Hes devoted his life to his children, she said.

Rastogi sat mostly motionless during the hearing, staring at the table in front of him. He spoke to Cassidy only once, quietly indicating that he understood what was happening.

Bartholomew argued that Rastogis wife dominated their relationship and irreparably damaged it when she had an affair.

Its devastating to a marriage, Bartholomew said. Its devastating to a person, and I dont know if she ever really realized the impact that selfish decision would have on her kids, her family, her husband.

Prosecutor Cynthia Herrera said Rastogi alone was responsible for his actions.

This court did not make those children orphans. The victim didnt. He did, she said, pointing at Rastogi. It was his jealously, his suspicion, his anger as he stewed for a month.
Where in the world did Etta go?

You remember Etta, the life-sized cow that once inhabited the front yard on Larkspur in Corona del Mar. Corona del Mar Today wrote about her a few years ago. We also wrote about a neighbors birthday surprise that featured 40 mini cows on the next-store lawn.

Then, however, Etta was gone.

The mystery has been solved, according to Ettas owner, Melinda Morgan, who moved last December to Sea Island. Morgan purchased a large condo with a big wrap-around yard, and thats where Etta now resides.

I do miss not having the people in Corona del Mar, and the kids that would ring the bell to ask if they could climb on Etta, Morgan said.

Etta now has a view of the Back Bay and Jamboree Road. And Morgans dog has an enclosed yard, and its also a better location for her son who now lives there.

So far the neighbors have welcomed Etta and said that they liked her, and the homeowners association doesnt have a problem with the new resident.

One of my neighbors said that if the HOA had a problem with the cow, they would write a letter saying how much they like it in the neighborhood, Morgan said. Others just say you have a cow in your yard!!?.

*Quiet Woman restaurant celebrates big 5-0

The Quiet Woman is a perfect place, said owner-chef Lynne Campbell. We will never have a Michelin star but Michelin stars dont matter much in everyday life.

The restaurant, located at 3224 East Coast Highway, opened its doors on Dec. 15, 1965 and has been a local hangout ever since, from business lunches to live music at night.

Generations of customers have enjoyed the Quiet Woman, she said, and will continue to do so.

Shannon Beador, a star of Bravos Real Housewives of Orange County, said she and her husband, David, had their first blind date at the Quiet Woman.

We announced our engagement there also, she said. Back in the day you could walk to the back and we were always able to avoid the long line in front because we knew all the bouncers. When Lynn stared to issue Quiet Woman VIP cards, I felt pretty cool that I had one.

Her three daughters now join them, calling it Q Dub, Beador said.

Its old school and a classic, she said. We never get tired of it.

Its not going anywhere, Campbell said.

In 2009, the restaurant underwent a major remodel. At the time, co-owner Sean Campbell said that first meal in Orange County  shortly after landing from Florida at John Wayne Airport  was at The Quiet Woman. A year later, he and his now wife, Lynne Campbell, were dating, and they eventually bought the restaurant in 1989.

*

Mayor to give state of the city address

Newport Beach Mayor Diane Dixon will give a State of the City address at a Jan. 19 Corona del Mar Chamber of Commerce networking luncheon.

The luncheon will take place at Fig & Olive at 151 Newport Center Drive, and the lunch costs $30 for members and $40 for guests. Check-in and networking will begin at 11:30 a.m., followed by lunch and the program from noon to 1:15 p.m.

The event is expected to sell out, and organizers ask that you reserve a spot by calling (949) 673-4050. No payments will be accepted at the door.

Dixon will be the featured speaker and will discuss the state of Newport Beach in what traditionally is a preview of the Mayors Dinner speech, which will take place in February. The event also will feature the installation of the 2016 chamber board of directors.

*

This the final installment of Corona del Mar Today, which appeared Sundays in the Daily Pilot.
Germanys acceptance of more than a million refugees fleeing Syria and other troubled spots last year is undergoing intense scrutiny after an outburst of reported assaults on women in at least five cities on New Years Eve.

By Friday, nearly 300 women in Cologne, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Duesseldorf and Frankfurt had filed complaints with police saying they were groped, molested or robbed by unruly mobs of up to 1,000 young men when New Years Eve street-party celebrations turned into wanton violence, officials said.

A spokesman for the interior ministry in Berlin said officials have questioned 31 men in their investigation of the assaults, including 18 refugees registered as seeking asylum. Among those identified were nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, five Iranians, four Syrians, one Iraqi, one Serb and one American as well as two German citizens. Two have been arrested in Cologne, where 170 complaints have been filed, according to media reports.

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The assaults  and a slow trickle of information from authorities in Cologne, Hamburg and Stuttgart acknowledging that the suspects included newly arrived refugees  unsettled some Germans and appeared to at least temporarily damage public support for giving shelter to so many refugees. For many Germans, there has been a growing sense that the country of 82 million is losing control of its borders and city centers after 1.1 million people from the Middle East, Africa and Asia arrived in the last 12 months.

Even German Chancellor Angela Merkel, a supporter of an open policy toward refugees, said in a speech late Friday that some of the assailants in Cologne deserved to be kicked out of the country and that she is now open to changing laws to make it easier to send people who commit crimes elsewhere to serve their prison time.

Weve got to think about what it takes for someone to forfeit their right to be guests in Germany, she said to applause from a meeting of her conservative party in Rhineland-Palatinate. If it turns out that the incidents in Cologne and elsewhere dont lead to convictions that are long enough [to allow for deportations], then we have to ask ourselves if their rights should be forfeited. And I would have to say, yes, one forfeits his right to stay with that. Weve got a new situation now. Weve got to think about how to deal with this new reality.

The intense media coverage of the assaults has included interviews with a number of young women looking straight into the cameras as they described their ordeals. Some of the reported assaults occurred despite a small police presence at a popular public square between Colognes central rail station and the iconic Cologne Cathedral. The attacks revived accounts of the countrys wartime history, when an estimated two million German women were raped by Soviet troops.

In Cologne, some women reported their breasts, crotches and rear ends were groped so hard by their attackers that they had bruises, and some had their clothing ripped off.

The Cologne police chief was fired Friday following reports that authorities in Germanys fourth largest city may have covered up information that refugees had been connected to the assaults. Wolfgang Albers, head of the police department, was sent into early retirement by the North-Rhine Westphalia state government.

State Interior Minister Ralf Jaegers move came after Cologne Mayor Henriette Reker complained that Albers had not given her all relevant information about what happened Dec. 31.

People rightly want to know what happened on New Years Eve, they want to know who the assailants were, and they want to know how such attacks can be prevented in the future, Jaeger said.

Merkel, whose catchphrase Wir schaffen das (We can do it) has become a symbol of tolerance describing her open-door policy on refugees fleeing the war in Syria, had already been under increasing pressure to close the gates to more refugees after 1.1 million arrived in 2015. She has staunchly refused all demands from her conservative party allies in the southern state of Bavaria to set a cap of 200,000 refugees per year because, she argues, there is no upper limit in the countrys liberal postwar constitution.

But the New Years Eve violence and the media coverage have sent the pendulum swinging back in the other direction, just four months after citizens at rail stations cheered new arrivals who made it to Germany, with calls for closing down the borders and deporting refugees convicted of crimes. Merkel and Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel said that criminals can and should be deported regardless of whether they are seeking asylum.

See the most-read stories this hour >>

Theres been a complete change in sentiment in the wake of the attacks in Cologne, said Thomas Jaeger, a political scientist at Cologne University. There are a lot of cosmopolitan people in Germany who are otherwise open to the world but theyre now thinking: Whoa! What have we got ourselves into here with this? Have we been working so hard to help these people for this to happen?

Germany is considered one of the most open and tolerant countries in Europe and the world. With strict gun control, little drug abuse and a high reputation for safe streets, German city centers are usually filled with life and revelers on weekend and holiday nights. Because of that high degree of public safety, there is nothing extraordinary about women walking around alone or in small groups even after midnight in most towns and cities. That openness might have been grossly misunderstood by the new arrivals to Germany on New Years Eve, when cities are especially alive with people ringing in the new year by shooting off their own private fireworks, Jaeger said.

Jaeger said that opinion might have been evenly divided in Germany before the attacks in Cologne came to light earlier this week, with many Germans already leery about or outright opposed to the surging numbers of refugees arriving. Before it was about 50-50 for and against allowing in more refugees, but thats changing very fast now, he said.

Far-right parties and anti-immigrant groups, such as the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West, latched onto the assaults as proof of their warnings the country was losing control of its borders and culture. They accused the media and authorities of trying to sweep under the carpet the fact that refugees were among those involved.

If someone has immigrated to Germany or came here as a refugee and is implicated, that cant be swept under the carpet, said Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere in a newspaper interview to be published Saturday in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, dismissing those accusations. That would only be grist to the mill for those who accuse political leaders and the media of distortions.

Kirschbaum is a special correspondent.

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Drug lord El Chapo Guzman captured in deadly shootout after six months on the lam
His house was nothing special, a single-story, tree-shrouded home in a middle-class neighborhood in this seaside city. And there the worlds most sought-after drug kingpin hid for months until his capture in a deadly shootout.

Neighbors noticed his comings and goings, but without special attention. And then suddenly, the Mexican naval special forces descended Friday.

It was like an action movie, said Javier Torres, an 18-year-old student and neighbor. The gunfire ... the helicopters woke us. There were lots of shouts.

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And with that, Sinaloa cartel commander Joaquin El Chapo Guzman was captured, in a shootout that killed six of his associates. It was six months after he escaped from Mexicos maximum-security prison through a tunnel he dug under his cell.

His ability to elude authorities was due in large part to the support he has among rank-and-file Mexicans. He was also able to pay off local government and military authorities and spread largesse.

It makes us sad because he is a good guy and gives us security, said Los Mochis resident Mariana Ocampo, 21.

In the end, it wasnt exhaustive Mexican detective work, nor sophisticated U.S. intelligence, that exposed Guzmans whereabouts. It was ego and a chance at Hollywood.

Mexican Atty. Gen. Arely Gomez said Guzman had been in talks to produce a movie about his life.

He established communication with actors and producers, which has formed a new line of investigation, she said in a late-night news conference as Guzman was being transported from Los Mochis.

One of those contacts was apparently actor Sean Penn, who revealed in an article he wrote for Rolling Stone, published Saturday, that he had held a secret interview with Guzman in October at his jungle hide-out in Mexico.

Surrounded by the drug lords armed security troops, Guzman told Penn of his daring prison escape, in an interview translated by Kate del Castillo, an actress who had famously played a drug trafficker in a Mexican soap opera.

I supply more heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana than anybody else in the world, he boasted. I dont want to be portrayed as a nun.

Gomez said authorities were able to track Guzmans meetings with lawyers and other associates and were close to capturing him in October, apparently after his meeting with Penn. He had been spied by helicopter, she said, but was accompanied by two women and a child, and so security forces decided not to engage.

Gomez also gave new details about Guzmans summer escape, saying his brother-in-law, two pilots and tunnel engineers were involved. Once he made it through the tunnel, on a motorcycle speeding over specially built rails, he was whisked to an airfield where his airplane and a decoy took off in the night.

In a statement Saturday afternoon, the Mexican government announced the beginning of extradition proceedings that would set the stage for Guzman to face trial in the United States.

The proceedings are in response to two formal extradition requests from the U.S. government for crimes including murder, money laundering and arms possession, according to the statement.

Guzman ... and his lawyers now have three days to file objections and 20 more days to prove them, the Mexican government statement said.

If a judge decides to approve the extradition, the request will be sent to Mexicos Ministry of Foreign Relations, which can approve or deny it.

Guzmans attorney, Juan Pablo Badillo, told the Milenio newspaper that the defense already has filed six motions to challenge extradition requests.

Mexican media reported Saturday that Guzman, upon being captured, exclaimed: Damn federales! They got us.

Follow @TracyKWilkinson on Twitter

Sanchez and Bonello are special correspondents. Times staff writer Tracy Wilkinson reported from Washington.

MORE ON EL CHAPO

Inside El Chapo Guzmans cell: a fortress, but not secure enough

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Who is El Chapo and how did he become a dark legend in Mexico?

It probably cost millions to build tunnel believed to be tailor-made for El Chapo
In another blow to Egypts ailing tourism industry, two men armed with knives attacked foreign tourists at a hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada on Friday, injuring three of them, authorities said.

The men sneaked into a restaurant belonging to the Bella Vista hotel and started randomly stabbing tourists, Egypts Interior Ministry said in a statement.

Police opened fire on the assailants, killing one and seriously injuring the other, the Health Ministry said. The ministry identified the stabbing victims as two Swedes and an Austrian, but the Interior Ministry said they were two Austrians and a Swede.

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Tourism is an important source of jobs and foreign currency revenue in Egypt. But the sector has been struggling because of recurrent instability in the country since the 2011 uprising that toppled former President Hosni Mubarak.

Attacks by Islamist militants have intensified since the ouster of Mubaraks elected successor, Islamist President Mohamed Morsi, in a military takeover in 2013.

Fridays attack came just hours after the local Islamic State affiliate claimed responsibility for a shooting attack on a tourist bus outside a hotel near Egypts famous Giza pyramids the previous day. No casualties were reported in Thursdays attack.

The extremist group also claimed responsibility for a plane crash in the Sinai Peninsula that killed 224 people in October, saying a security breach at Sharm el Sheik airport enabled it to plant a bomb on the Russian passenger jet.

Russias Federal Security Service, the main successor agency to the Soviet KGB, announced that an improvised bomb had caused the crash. But Egyptian authorities said there was no evidence pointing to terrorism.

See the most-read stories this hour >>

The crash lead Britain and other European countries to suspend flights to Sharm el Sheik. Russia barred all flights to Egypt.

Hurghada, however, has continued to attract some tourists.

The German Foreign Ministry advised its citizens Friday to avoid leaving their hotels in the city, which is located about 55 miles southwest of Sharm el Sheik.

Hassan is a special correspondent.

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The Syrian government declared Saturday it is ready to attend peace talks scheduled in Geneva later this month, but said it would insist on receiving the names of opposition figures who will be part of the negotiations.

Walid Moallem, Syrias foreign minister, told a United Nations envoy during a meeting in Damascus that the government needs to know in advance whether terrorist groups will be participating in the meetings, according to the Syrian news agency SANA.

The Geneva negotiations are the first step in a road map laid out last year by the international community to end the Syrian civil war. The nearly five-year conflict has killed an estimated 250,000 people and created a massive refugee crisis in the region as well as in Europe.

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The road map, which was adopted unanimously by the U.N. Security Council in December, calls for a nationwide ceasefire between the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad and the armed rebels pitted against him.

It is to culminate in credible, inclusive and non-sectarian governance, constitutional reform and U.N.-supervised elections within 18 months. The fate of Assad remains unclear.

But the road map also seeks to determine which of the many opposition parties will participate in the conference, while excluding those deemed as terrorist organizations  a difficult task in light of the Syrian governments dismissal of the opposition as terrorists and mercenaries, as well as the sectarian nature of many rebel factions on the ground.

It also outlines several confidence-building measures, including the cessation of the indiscriminate use of shelling and aerial bombardment against civilians, safe and voluntary refugee transfer, and unfettered access for humanitarian agencies to besieged areas of Syria.

See the most-read stories this hour >>

Previous attempts at jump-starting peace talks have failed because of what was viewed as the governments intransigence regarding rebel participation.

The government, according to regional analyst Mouin Rabbani, speaking in a phone interview from the Jordanian capital Amman, has given conditions that were very extremely difficult for the U.N. to meet.

From the governments point of view, theyre not keen on negotiations anyway, Rabbani said.

The most effective rebel groups, mostly hard-line Islamist groups, have advocated an Islamist system of governance in Syria and have displayed little interest in negotiations unless Assads departure is guaranteed.

The talks face another stumbling block in soaring tensions between regional rivals Iran and Saudi Arabia, both of which have been instrumental in exacerbating the sectarian element of the conflict.

Irans Shiite leadership has backed Assad, a member of the Alawite sect that is related to Shia Islam.

Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, has funneled money and materiel to the Sunni-dominated insurgency arrayed against Assad.

Last week, Saudi Arabia executed an influential Shiite cleric, enraging Iran and leading to a cutoff of diplomatic ties between the two countries.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Jubeir, however, has insisted that the row will not affect the Syrian peace talks.

Iran has similarly called for calm, while diplomatic efforts from Iraq and Oman continue to encourage a reconciliation between the two countries.

U.N. Special Envoy Staffan de Mistura, after his meeting with the Syrian foreign minister in Damascus, said through a spokesmans statement that the meeting was useful and that he is looking forward to the active participation of relevant parties in the Geneva talks.

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Opposition leaders have expressed doubts that the negotiations will be held this month.

I dont at all see that the proposed date is a realistic one, especially since on the ground there were no confidence-building measures, opposition member George Sabra said in a phone interview Saturday.

He cited the situation in Madaya, a town with an estimated population of 40,000 located 25 miles northwest of Damascus that has been besieged by pro-government forces since July. Aid organizations said at least 23 people have died in the town as a result of starvation. Others put the death toll at much higher.

The issue of Madaya has become a key point. The Syrian cannot go to negotiations while Syrians are dying of hunger and cold, Sabra said.

If the U.N. cannot deliver a food basket to Madaya, then how can we believe that the U.N. will lead a political solution? he said.

On Thursday, the Syrian government said it would allow aid to enter Madaya in the coming week. Pawel Krzysiek, spokesman for the International Community of the Red Cross in Damascus, said in a tweet Saturday that the operation would not start before Monday.

In recent days, Madaya has become a media battleground for the warring parties in Syria. Opposition activists have uploaded horrific pictures and videos depicting cadaverous children subsisting on water and spices. The furor also has affected the Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah, an ally of the Assad government, which is accused of perpetrating what Madaya residents have described as a nightmare.

But Syrian pro-government media and Hezbollah supporters say much of the images are fake and part of an orchestrated plan to turn what is a military situation into a fabricated humanitarian crisis, according to Amin Hateet, a political analyst who was designated to discuss the matter by Hezbollahs media office in Beirut.

Hateet also accused rebel fighters bunkered inside Madaya of holding civilians hostage, barring their exit from the town.

There is exaggeration in this matter, so as to blackmail and slander Hezbollah, he said.

Bulos is a special correspondent.

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Transplant Recipients at a Higher Risk of Death from Cancer: Study

media@latinoshealth.com By Julio Cachila Jan 09, 2016 05:52 AM EST

While it is known that organ transplants help prolong the lives of recipients, a new study has found that solid organ transplant recipients (SOTRs) are at a higher risk for dying from cancer.

It is clear that those who received lung, liver and other solid organs already had a higher risks for cancer, reports CBC. However, what remains unclear is whether they will die from the said disease.

The researchers think that transplant patients are unable to receive the most potent of cancer treatments because their immune systems are suppressed to prevent the rejection of an organ being transplanted into them. However, evidence of this hypothesis was not presented in their study.

"Despite the fact that SOTRs have shorter life expectancies and a higher risk of dying of non-cancer-related causes, these patients have an elevated risk of cancer death as compared with the general population, the researchers wrote in the study, published in JAMA Oncology.

Addressing the cancer burden in SOTRs is critical to improving the survival of these patients."

For the study, the researchers looked into more than 11,000 transplant patients in Ontario, Canada between 1991 and 2010, following them for 20 years. These patients received either kidney, liver, lung and heart transplants. There were 3,608 patient deaths recorded, 20 percent or 603 of which were cancer-related. This number is significantly higher than those of the general population's.

It was found that the overall risk of cancer-related death remained high regardless of the organ the patients received. It was also found that the risk was higher for children who received transplants but lower in patients older than 60, reports the United Press International.

Skin cancer was the most common cause of cancer-related death among the patients who participated in the study, reports CBC. Cancer was the second-leading cause of death for patients, following only after heart-related causes.

Study author Dr. Nancy Baxter, a colorectal surgeon at St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto, said that transplant patients should be aware of their higher risk for cancer. Health-care providers, on the other hand, should focus on prevention and screening.

"I think that we've done a really great job in getting people to live longer and live well with their transplants," Baxter said. "It's time to shift the focus."

A journal commentary notes that the study was able to establish the association between organ transplants and cancer-related death. However, commentary author Dr. Marianne Schmid of the University Medical Center in Hamburg, Germany, said that it doesn't establish what needs to be done for the patients.

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6 Helpful Kitchen Hacks That You Should Know

media@latinoshealth.com By Julio Cachila Jan 09, 2016 05:55 AM EST

While eating seems to be something many people find easy (unless its about stopping), working wonders in the kitchen is something that not all people find easy to do. To make it easier to prepare food wonders, here are some kitchen hacks that might help you.

Making Food Less Sweet

Having a barbecue or pasta lunch but having trouble with the overly-sweet taste of store-bought sauces? Redbook suggests adding a splash of vinegar. However, add it slowly, a little at a time because vinegar is a powerful ingredient that might overpower other flavors.

Does the cake, chocolate mousse or any other dessert taste too sweet for you? Try adding an acid, such as lemon or lime juice, or some whipped cream. These simple additions help lessen the overall sweetness of the dessert while boosting flavor. Keep in mind, though, that the sugar count won't go down.

Washing a Bunch of Potatoes

It feels good to eat that baked potato or a serving of french fries, but washing a load of potatoes doesn't feel that good. To help you wash a bunch of potatoes quickly (and with less effort), put them in the dishwasher for a quick rinse cycle. Just remember not to add soap, says Redbook (via MSN).

Making a Fancy Pie Crust

Looking for ways to make that pie crust look more appealing or fancy while not failing to seal the edges? Instead of using your fingers to plainly press or pinch the pie dough into the pie pan's edge, try using a variety of simple kitchen utensils such as a fork, spoon, or tong to effortlessly create neat designs while successfully closing edges.

One Ingredient Ice Cream

Run out of ice cream to go with your pie? Redbook (via MSN) suggests that instead of running to the store to buy a tub, just throw in some ripe bananas into the blender, then freeze for a few hours to make your own. You can also put in some more ingredients of your choice, such as chocolate chips or chocolate syrup.

Cookie Bowls

Looking for a neat bowl where you can put that homemade ice cream in? Make your own cookie bowls!

Get some cookie dough, assemble them on the bottom side of a muffin tray to make small bowls, bake as usual, and enjoy sweet bowls that you can eat with or without that ice cream anyway.

Healthy Homemade Wendy's Frosty Alternative

Here's a skinny shake that tastes like Wendy's Frosty as seen in this website. Get a three-fourths cup of almond milk, about 15 ice cubes, half a teaspoon vanilla, one to two tablespoons of cocoa powder, and a third of a banana. Mix them in a blender, and enjoy your self-made sweet treat.

Have fun!

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Cancer Death Rates in the US Declining due to Smoking Cessation, Improved Treatment & Screening

media@latinoshealth.com By Staff Reporter Jan 09, 2016 06:40 AM EST

Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the U.S. today. And in 21 states, it has overtaken heart disease as the number one killer. On the bright side of things, the number of cancer deaths has steadily dropped in recent years, according to the American Cancer Society.

On the average, the cancer mortality rates dropped by 1.8 percent per year in men and 1.4 percent per year in women in the last 10 years. Since 1991, a 23 percent decline in cancer deaths was recorded, which means 1.7 million few Americans died of cancer through 2012, according to a report from Reuters.

"Part of the decline in cancer mortality rates is because of smoking cessation and some of our successes in battling tobacco," said Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society. "Part of the decline is because of improvements in our ability to treat many of these cancers. And part of the decline is from the success of what I'll call 'wise screening.'"

The decline in the death from the four major forms of cancer, namely breast, colon, rectal and prostate cancers, has contributed to the decrease in cancer mortality rate, WCVB reported. There are also fewer lung cancer deaths as more people quit smoking.

According to Brawley, the number could get even better if the number of people having access to adequate health care is improved. He also pointed out the need to encourage people to undergo the good screening tests that we have today.

"I would point out that 55 percent to 60 percent of Americans over the age of 50 are up to date on colorectal cancer screening. We could save a lot of lives if we could just get to 80 percent by 2018," he said. "If you look at women over the age of 45, about a third to 40 percent are not up to date on mammography. Many have never actually even had a mammogram, and we need to work on that."

Rebecca Siegel of the American Cancer Society also cited another area of improvement, which is the gap between races in terms of the rates of new cancer diagnoses and deaths. She said that while there is an improvement in cancer prevention and early detection and treatment, it is not equally disseminated among the population.

For instance, black men have higher diagnosis and death rates than non-Hispanic white men for every malignancy other than kidney cancer. "A lot of progress has been made, but there is more work to do," she said.

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The first tweet came from Mexico president Enrique Pena Nieto.

It was short and stoic, telling the world that Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the Sinaloa drug lord wanted by both the Mexican and U.S. government, had been captured. "Mission accomplished: we have him," Nieto's tweet read upon translation. "I want to inform the Mexican people that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested."

The Associated Press, among other news outlets, would fill in details of Guzman's arrest soon after. An anonymous source confirmed that the long-sought fugitive was involved in a shootout with the Mexican Navy in Los Mochis, a coastal city in Guzman's home state of Sinaloa. Five people were killed, six arrested, and a marine suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

Images of Guzman - disheveled and wearing a dirtied, sleeves undershirt - surfaced on social media following his arrest, one taken as he sat unhandcuffed in a jet. The next step is in deciding where Guzman goes next.

"El Chapo" escaped a maximum-security prison last July by exposing a blind spot in his bathroom. His freedom cost a reported $50 million in bribes and led to a worldwide manhunt commandeered by Mexican law enforcement and DEA officials. Now comes the not-so-easy decision on where Guzman is sentenced.

He's wanted on numerous organized crime and drug trafficking charges in Mexico. The U.S. wants him extradited on similar charges, in addition to counts of homicide and conspiracy to commit murder.

The gravity of "El Chapo's" arrest goes beyond federal courtrooms. The court of public opinion has a say and they've taken to Twitter to express it.

Some believe Guzman is Mexico's problem. Others whimsically say he's escape prison a third time, regardless of where he ends up.

But one group of Twitter users, some who believe "El Chapo" is a positive influence in Mexico, opine his arrest will have detrimental consequences on the Mexican people.

Well there goes the only law and order in Mexico. As well as the only person that will help the poor. El Chapo was more good than bad  Ivan A. (@Ivannn_A) January 8, 2016

El Chapo isn't even a bad person. He actually helps a lot of poor people. He's like Robin Hood.  x o; (@paolaaa_xoxo) January 8, 2016

The thing is that El Chapo does more for the poor people of Mexico than the government!  JESS (@XO_JESSICA96) January 8, 2016

el gobierno mexicano debe de estar agradecido con el Chapo, ayuda mas a la gente el, que ellos.   (@rebleal17) January 8, 2016

Dice mi companera que para que lo agarran, si el Chapo ayuda a la gente pobre del pais. Pues nada. Ya no digo nada.  Mir (@MirthaGzz) January 8, 2016

Ojala se vuelva a escapar el chapo, ayuda mas a los mexicanos que el propio presidente.  Melo. (@InsaneInaBrain_) January 8, 2016

All the drug trafficking charges he's tied to, and the countless murders Mexican official believe he coerced, there are people who believe Guzman is a modern day Robin Hood; a Godfather-like figure who uses organized crime to help the needy.

In the past, Guzman supporters have cited his impoverished upbringing. He was a roadside orange seller before joining the Sinaloa Cartel in the early 1990s. Other point to a lack of trust in government and 63 million - 52.3 percent of Mexico's population - that lives in poverty.

"At the heart of narcocultura is the figure of the mafia godfather," Ioan Grillo wrote in his 2011 book "El Narco: Inside Mexico's Criminal Insurgency," as found by Business Insider.

Grille added, "The personage is celebrated in mythological terms as the ragged peasant who rose to riches; the great outlaw who defies the Mexican army and the DEA; the benefactor who hands out dollar bills to hungry mothers; the scarlet pimpernel who disappears in a puff of smoke."

The Twitter hashtag #FreeElChapo, prevalent around the time of his Feb. 2014 escape, began trending on Friday.

Mexico love's El Chapo he's a drug lord and shot caller but he doesn't forget where he came from he helps people eat and live #FreeElChapo  zues (@trvple666) January 8, 2016

I Guess The Mexican Government Wants Mexico To Get Ugly Again. #FreeElChapo  Victor Jimenez (@Victor_SSF) January 8, 2016

Some users quipped that he would free himself.

Based on his last two escapes, that may not be far from the truth.

 2015 Latinos Post. All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Mexican authorities are in the midst of preparing Pope Francis' February visit to the country, where the head of the Roman Catholic Church is expected to draw huge crowds and where thousands of police officers will be assigned to protect the 79-year-old pontiff.

Up to 2.3 million spectators are expected to attend the trip's main event on the outskirts of Mexico City, and Mexico State Gov. Eruviel Avila told The Associated Press on Jan. 7 that medical and aid facilities needed to be set up for the encounter in the city of Ecatepec.

Beyond Ecatepec, Francis is also set to visit the Mexican capital, as well as the states of Chiapas, Michoacan and Chihuahua. In Mexico State alone, 10,000 state police officers will be assigned to keep the peace at a 5.5.-mile motorcade and rally on Feb. 14.

But Alberto Suarez Inda, the archbishop of Morelia, told reporters at a news conference on Jan. 5 that the Argentine-born head of the world's Catholics asked for the security measures to be limited, Notivideo reported.

"The pope has called for no extraordinary measures. On the contrary, (he intends) to be near the people," Suarez said. "He would not come if he did not have his confidence in God, in the goodness of the people. We're all mortals, but as far as I know there has been no change in politics to necessitate more protection."

During his trip, Francis plans to first visit the Michoacan capital of Morelia, where he will meet with young people and give a speech at a stadium there after visiting the city's cathedral, The Guardian reported. A day later, on Feb. 17, he will head to Ciudad Juarez, the largest municipality in Chihuahua, which had been plagued by heavy violence during the last decade.

Francis is also scheduled to visit the basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City, one of the most visited pilgrimage sites in the Americas.
Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the notorious escaped leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel, was caught by Mexican authorities on Jan. 8.

As previously reported, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced the arrest on social media.

"Mission accomplished, he tweeted around noon. "We have him."

As the Associated Press reports, an anonymous official revealed that Guzman was captured at a motel on the outskirts of Los Mochis in his home state of Sinaloa.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration expressed their happiness at the capture on Twitter. "DEA is extremely pleased at the capture of Chapo Guzman," they wrote.

Guzman was arrested after a shootout with Mexican marines in the city of Los Mochis.

DEA is extremely pleased at the capture of Chapo Guzman. We congratulate the MX Government and salute the bravery involved in his capture  DEA News (@DEANEWS) January 8, 2016

CNN reports that several individuals tied to Guzman died in Fridays raid.

Guzman started his cartel career in 2009 and is considered the living symbol of how common people in Mexico can attain power though criminal activities.

Malcolm Beith, an expert on Mexican cartels, calls him the epitome of the drug problem in Mexico.

"He's a poor kid who had some family connections in the drug trade, no options, no real education ... (and) becomes a big-time drug lord," says Beith.
Democratic presidential candidate Martin O'Malley may not make the cut to participate in the next Democratic primary debate in South Carolina on Jan. 17.

According to the criteria released by NBC News on Friday, each candidate must maintain an average of at least 5 percent in either recent national polls or in polls in conduct in Iowa, New Hampshire or South Carolina. Plus, the news outlet will only consider the five most recent polls published before Jan. 14, 2016 and recognized by the debate's host. This puts O'Malley in jeopardy of being excluded from the debate since he has an average of less than 5 percent in national polls, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

Although Real Clear Politics finds that the former Maryland governor is currently at exactly 5 percent in Iowa, he still won't qualify for the debate if his numbers drop in The Hawkeye State and if he fails to gain traction elsewhere.

However, an unnamed NBC executive said the network expects all three candidates to qualify and will likely round up from a 4.5 percent, reports CNN. Still, that might not help O'Malley much since he averaged just 4.3 percent in the three most recent Iowa polls under NBC News' consideration and has a 3.5 national average.

Following NBC's announcement, the other two Democratic challengers called for O'Malley to be included in the debate on Twitter. Brian Fallon, the press secretary for Clinton's campaign, tweeted:

We believe all three candidates should participate in the South Carolina debate, and oppose any criteria that might leave someone excluded  Brian Fallon (@brianefallon) January 8, 2016

Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz also chimed in, tweeting support for O'Malley.

Because of our three great candidates, each #DemDebate has shown our party at its best. I expect to see all of them in Charleston next week  D Wasserman Schultz (@DWStweets) January 8, 2016

Spokespeople for the O'Malley campaign have yet to comment on the network's criteria.

The NBC News debate will be moderated by "NBC Nightly News" anchor Lester Holt in Charleston. It will be co-hosted by the Congressional Black Caucus Institute.
Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio raised alarm about the threat of terrorists illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexican border and called for a tougher U.S. immigration system during a campaign event in New Hampshire on Thursday.

'ISIS Exploiting Loopholes'

While speaking at a packed rally in Bedford, the Florida senator stated that Islamic State terrorists are exploiting loopholes in the U.S. immigration system and sending jihadists into the country to kill Americans.

"As someone who has access to very sensitive information, I can tell you for a fact that ISIS understands our legal immigration system and is seeking to exploit it," said Rubio, who is a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, according to Bloomberg Politics.

The 2016 hopeful also used the recent ISIS-inspired terrorist attacks in San Bernardino and Paris as reasons why to strengthen the nation's immigration laws.

"We now have radical jihadist groups that are using our immigration system against us. They are trying to get people into this country as doctors, as students, as investors, as tourists. They've already gotten someone into this country as a fiancee," he said referring to San Bernardino shooters.

"They understand that our southern border is weak, and they're trying to exploit that as well. They are radical jihadist groups. The same people who inspired the attacks in Paris, who inspired the attacks in California are trying to use our immigration system against us," he added.

More Secure Border, Tighter Visa Requirements

In addition to calling for more border security, Rubio also talked about the need to tighten a visa waiver program.

About an hour later, he presented the same message while delivering a speech at Nashua Community College.

"When I am president, our immigration system is going to be guided by a very simple principle. If we don't know 100 percent for sure who you are, and 100 percent for sure why you are coming, you will not be allowed to enter the United States of America," he said. "We're not going to have amnesty."

Although his message appeared to be widely received by attendees, pro-immigration advocates bashed Rubio over his new hardline stance towards immigration. Frank Sharry, the executive director of America's Voice, pointed out that the Cuban American candidate was once a champion of comprehensive reform measures that would have provided undocumented residents with a pathway to citizenship.

"His fall from grace is complete," said Sharry. "In 2013, he became a courageous champion of immigration reform and now he's lurching to the right almost as fast as Ted Cruz. Once hailed as the guy who would save the GOP from its extremist wing, he's now pandering to it."
A New York City police sergeant was served with departmental disciplinary charges on Friday for her role in the 2014 chokehold death of Eric Garner.

NYPD Sgt. Kizzy Adonis was one of two Police Department supervisors that were on the scene when Garner, a 43-year-old unarmed man, was choked to death during a confrontational arrest in Staten Island on July 17, 2014. Footage of the arrest, which was captured by a bystander, sparked protests against police brutality across the nation.

On Friday, Adonis was charged with four counts of "failure to supervise" and was stripped of her gun and shield, reports The New York Times. She was also placed on modified duty, making her the first officer involved in the case to face official accusations of misconduct. The officer responsible for choking Garner, however, was cleared of all charges by a grand jury in late 2014.

According to an internal report by the NYPD, Adonis told investigators "the perpetrator's condition did not seem serious and that he did not appear to get worse," reports The New York Daily News. The 14-year NYPD veteran also said that she "believed she heard the perpetrator state that he was having difficulty breathing."

In spite of the long-delayed discipline taken against Adonis, Garner's widow said she is not satisfied with how the case has been handled.

"When I get an indictment or a prosecution, then I'll be happy," Esaw Garner told The Daily News.

On the other hand, Sergeants Benevolent Association President Ed Mullins slammed NYPD Commissioner William Bratton for the charge against Adonis.

"It's a bulls--t political charge, and Commissioner Bratton is pandering," said Mullins. "That's exactly what that is ... Although he is the commissioner, I believe he has overstepped his bounds in this case."

"This is a total surprise," said Mullins. "Based on my knowledge, in my 35 years, she did her job. We may not like the outcome, but she did her job."

The Rev. Al Sharpton, however, applauded the charges against Adonis as progress.

"This is a good sign, but it's certainly not all we want," said Sharpton. "I think all the officers that were there need to be brought up on charges once the federal investigation is over. She and everyone involved had a responsibility to stop it," he added.
Social media are currently running abuzz with reports, reactions and memes about the recapture of the world's most dangerous drug cartel boss Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. The news came after Mexican President Pena Nieto took to Twitter on Friday, Jan. 8, and announced El Chapo's recapture, six months after his controversial jailbreak from Altiplano maximum prison.

In July, the whole world was stunned after reports emerged that Mexico's most powerful and deadly drug trafficking operations kingpin El Chapo had escaped from a maximum-security prison, which was located west of Mexico City. Based on previous reports, the Sinaloa cartel boss crawled through a hole and disappeared through a mile-long tunnel, which was allegedly built just for him.

Dubbed as the "jailbreak of the millennium," the Mexican government offered a $3.8 million reward as El Chapo's bounty on his head. The said reward will be awarded to whoever has information that will lead to the world's biggest mafia boss' recapture. But today, Pena Nieto proudly announced El Chapo's recapture, NBC News noted.

"Mision cumplida: lo tenemos," the Mexican president tweeted. "Quiero informar a los mexicanos que Joaquin Guzman Loera ha sido detenido." (In English: "Mission accomplished: we have him. I want to inform Mexicans Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested.")

Following the announcement, several social media platforms were flooded by reactions, which were a combination of humor and cynicism about the Mexican government's role in his recapture as well as his effortless and elaborate escape in 2015. Some Twitter users also questioned the authenticity of the news, tweeting phrases, "No photos, no proof" and "lies like always." Netizens also posted interesting feedbacks on Twitter and Instagram with hashtag #ElChapo.

Despite the doubts circulating El Chapo's recapture, Pena Nieto emphasized that the arrest of Mexico's most-wanted drug lord was a "victory for the rule of law." The president also added that Mexicans could still have confidence in the nation's capability to fight crime. According to BBC News, Guzman was captured after a shoot-out with Mexican marines in his hometown, Sinaloa's coastal city of Los Mochis, situated in northwest Mexico. Five of El Chapo's bodyguards were reportedly killed in the raid. While one marine was wounded in the bloody confrontation.

"There is no group that it is impossible to confront," Pena Nieto said.

Meanwhile, at least three jurisdictions in the United States have indicted El Chapo on murder, drug smuggling and related charges, New York Post has learned. In Brooklyn, he was indicted in 2014 for reportedly laundering $14 million and ordering multiple killings, kidnappings and torture assaults. Apart from Brooklyn, the Department of Justice's Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section, the federal prosecutors in Florida also want him.

For various social media reactions and memes, see below.

So I guess they "caught" #ElChapo, I give it a good 2 or 3 months before he escapes  Vanessa Macias (@Nessa_TheBoss) January 9, 2016

I won't believe El Chapo is in captivity until he's in an American prison. #ElChapo  Alfonso Garcia (@FonziGarcia) January 9, 2016

#elchapo is Mexico's answer to the #Kardashians. Just can't get enough bullshit, can you Raza?? #NoOneCares  Ricardo Luis Canez (@Ricky_M44) January 9, 2016

Mexican Government is all about the show with showing #elchapo . Seriously you stopped the novelas for this? He is going to escape MX again.  Avina82 (@angel24909304) January 9, 2016

#elchapo #hewillescapeagain A photo posted by @crazy.bruh on Jan 8, 2016 at 7:31pm PST

#NoChill #ElChapo A photo posted by Lyrical.Vangogh (@el_jefexnochill) on Jan 8, 2016 at 7:31pm PST
The love triangle between Amina Buddafly, Peter Gunz and Tara Wallace has definitely intensified on "Love & Hip Hop: New York" season 6. While the VH1 series and its cast are no strangers to infidelity and adultery issues, it still affect the relationship with conflicts. Thus, making the show more dramatic and controversial.

Prior to "Love & Hip Hop: New York" season 6, episode 5; the previous episodes have already shown the messy relationships of Gunz to his baby mamas, Cardi B and Yorma's major conflict, BBOD's looming breakup and Papoose's aversion towards Remy Ma's pal, Rah Ali. The upcoming episode will concentrate more on Buddafly's pregnancy and her pursuit for new alliances from very unlikely sources.

So, as Buddafly seeks out advice as well as some support and encouragement, here are the 3 latest scoops on "LHHNY" season 6, episode 5 titled "Endings and Beginnings."

1. Amina Buddafly Seeks Out Advice from Peter Gunz' Oldest Daughter, Whitney

Buddafly's life has been quite dramatic lately. After she discovered that her husband was still sleeping with his ex, she also found out that she's pregnant with her second child by her cheating husband. And to make matters worse, she felt alone and confused over what she should do next since her twin sister Jazz, who has been there to support and encourage her, decided to move back to Germany, Fashion & Style reported.

"Finding out that I was pregnant was supposed to be a happy occasion, but it turned out to be a nightmare when my biggest fear -- Peter and Tara sleeping together -- was confirmed," Buddafly admitted in the sneak peek for "LHHNY" season 6, episode 5. "Honestly, I just feel like I've been stabbed in my heart. And now that my sister's moving to Germany I really don't have anybody to talk to."

Now, Buddafly is seeking her husband's oldest daughter for some advice. And though Whitney was unfazed with her dad's lifestyle, she gave Amina some serious advice.

"I mean it's my dad," Whitney told Amina. "He's not telling me, but I know my dad. My dad has a good heart, but when it comes to women my dad has a problem. And that has affected me in watching him and the way he treats my mom, or the way he treats women around me. He would say to me, 'I don't want you with somebody like me.' But you're supposed to show me. You know what I'm saying? Do you want that for Cori? Do you want her to see her dad come home sometimes?"

2. Mariah Lynn Releases New Video

Despite being at the center of the drama between Cisco Rosado and Miss Moe Money on the latest "LHHNY" season 6 episode, the rapper won't let the issues affect her career. In fact, she recently released a new music video for her song "Once Upon a Time (Not long ago, I was a hoe)," which was first heard during her visit at DJ Self's radio show on "LHH," another Fashion & Style report noted. Unfortunately, she is bound to receive a "devastating news."

3. The Fate of Amina Buddafly's Pregnancy Revealed

The upcoming "Love & Hip Hop: New York" season 6, episode 5 will also reveal the fate of Buddafly's pregnancy. And with Gunz's lifestyle and behavior, adding another child seemed to be a bad idea. But will she terminate her pregnancy?

"Despite everything that Peter has put me through I love him," Amina said. "But I know that loving him is hurting me. And Whitney's right. It's also hurting Cori, and that's a lot to bear as a mother. I never want my child to suffer from my mistakes, so I'm trying to pick up the pieces and make the right decision moving forward."

Elsewhere, Yandy will learn some details regarding Mendeecees' legal case, Cardi B and Biance will take up etiquette classes and Lexxy is threatening to leave BBOD for good. For "Love & Hip Hop: New York" season 6, episode 5 synopsis, click here.

"Love & Hip Hop: New York" season 6, episode 5 will air on VH1 on Monday, Jan. 11 at 8 p.m. For free online stream link, click here.
Texas Senator Ted Cruz continues to cling to a slight lead over overall Republican front-runner Donald Trump in the critical, early voting state of Iowa.

A new Fox News poll now shows Cruz registering 27 percent support from likely GOP caucus-goers, good enough for a four-point lead over Trump at 23 percent. Florida Senator Marco Rubio remains in striking distance and third place at 15 percent.

Those numbers represent little change from a month ago, when the same poll found Cruz at 28 percent, compared to 26 and 13 percent for Trump and Rubio, respectively.

Cruz Favorite Among Conservatives

The most recent poll also reveals Cruz's lead grows among would-be voters who describe themselves as "very" conservative. Among that demographic, he bags 40 percent of the vote, nearly doubling Trump who stands at 22 percent.

White evangelical Christians also prefer Cruz to Trump, 33 to 19 percent, and Cruz also leads among likely GOP voters with a college degree, 25 to 18 percent.

In yet another encouraging sign for Cruz, data also reveals Trump may find it difficult to expand his base in Iowa, as roughly one in three voters insist they could "never" see themselves backing the bombastic real estate mogul. That's more than four times as many as say the same thing about Cruz at seven percent.

Overall, 57 percent of Republican caucus-goers in the state insist they feel "betrayed" by party representatives with 66 percent of voters identifying as Cruz supporters expressing such feelings.

GOP Voters Rank "National Security" Top Issue

In all, 36 percent of Iowan GOP voters say national security will be the determining issue in who ultimately gets their vote, compared to 32 percent who say the economy and 12 percent immigration.

Still, even with all the aforementioned variables going in his favor, only 26 percent of caucus-goers believe Cruz will emerge as the party's official nominee, compared to 37 percent for Trump.

Ben Carson (nine percent), Jeb Bush (seven) and Rand Paul (five) are the only other GOP candidates registering at least five percent support in the state. Carson was once polling as many as 14 points ahead of Trump in the state.
Now that Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is back behind bars debate has turned to if he should be extradited to U.S. to answer for at least part of his crimes.

Following Friday's daring Marine-led recapture of one of the world's most wanted men, Mexican officials have strategically avoided all talk of whether he will be shipped to the states. If that proves to be the move, experts warn it could be a lengthy process.

Back to the Same Prison He Escaped

For now, the Chicago Tribune reports Guzman is slated to be sent back to the same Altiplano maximum-security prison from where he escaped custody earlier this summer by building an elaborate underground tunnel running from his jail cell.

The escape from custody was the second over the last 14-years for the head of the powerful international Sinaloa Cartel.

U.S. senator and Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio is among those frantically calling for Guzman's extradition.

"Given that 'El Chapo' has already escaped from Mexican prison twice, this third opportunity to bring him to justice cannot be squandered," he said.

What Led to His Capture

Several media outlets have reported Guzman was apprehended on Friday following a shootout with Marines where at least five of his henchmen were killed.

A legendary figure across much of Mexico, it's rumored part of how authorities were able to track him down stemmed from his active plan to produce a biopic about his life and times.

"For that he established communication with actresses and producers, which became a new line of investigation," said Mexican Attorney General Arely Gomez.

Friday's raid was the culmination of a six-month investigation where authorities tracked Guzman from Durango to the Los Mochis region where he moved last month.

The Intense Shootout

"You could hear intense gunfire and a helicopter; it was fierce," said a neighbor, adding that the battle raged for three hours, starting at 4 a.m.

Gomez said Guzman and his security chief, "El Cholo" Ivan Gastelum, were able to flee the scene via storm drains and escape through a manhole cover to the street. There they quickly commandeered getaway cars, with a fleet of Marine shot on their heels. Authorities were eventually able to locate the two after receiving reports of stolen vehicles and they were arrested on the highway.

Guzman's cartel is reputed for smuggling tons of cocaine, marijuana, methamphetamines and heroin into the U.S. He now faces federal indictments in Chicago, New York, San Diego, Texas and Florida.

In the days leading up to his most recent capture, El Capo's son Alfredo Guzman is reported to have tweeted out a post that may have inadvertently tipped authorities to his father's whereabouts.

"Satisfied here, you already know with whom," CNN reports the post read, showing off a location believed to be Costa Rica.
The man who Easton police say robbed a Downtown dollar store now has a name.

And it's not the one he gave at the hospital where he's being treated for injuries related to his two hours on the lam Friday night in Easton and his violent response to police as they tried to take him into custody.

Jonny Sanders, 44, last of Philadelphia, has violent tendencies, should be considered armed and dangerous and is an escape risk, according to a warrant related to a recent Philadelphia armed robbery, police Lt. Matthew Gerould said early Saturday afternoon.

Sanders did not tell Easton police who he was; police turned to "investigative techniques" to deduce his identity, Gerould said.

Sanders was arraigned late Saturday afternoon before on-call District Judge Richard Yetter III in the hospital. Bail was set at $500,000. Police aren't confirming what hospital is treating Sanders, but it is St. Luke's University Hospital in Fountain Hill.

Charges

From Friday's events -- including the 9:18 p.m. robbery at the Family Dollar, 301 Northampton St., and his attacks on police officers as the tried to arrest him just before midnight -- Sanders is charged with robbery, two counts of aggravated assault, resisting arrest and terroristic threats, police said. Sanders allegedly tried to flee in the rugged terrain of a steep slope that leads from Bushkill Drive to College Avenue.

He is facing an additional charge of being a felon not to possess a hand gun, now that police know who he is, Gerould said.

A gray Hyundai that carried Sanders, co-defendant Rachyeed Hollenbach -- who was arraigned Saturday morning on a robbery charge and sent to Northampton County Prison in lieu of $85,000 bail -- and a third man to Riverside Drive near Bushkill and North Delaware drives was processed after a search warrant was obtained, Gerould said.

Items related to the robbery were found as well as other items of interest, Gerould said. He wouldn't go into detail.

The third man in the car was not charged with a crime, police said.

Prior record

Online court papers don't show any county-level charges against Sanders since 1998 in Pennsylvania, a year he faced several different criminal court actions in Philadelphia.

In 1998, Sanders was sentenced to 6 to 12 years on separate robbery charges, court papers say.

Sanders was paroled from the Pennsylvania state prison system June 6, online records show. Those records do not say what case was involved.

It wasn't immediately clear if he faced any federal cases in the past 20 years.

He has several aliases and they are trying to determine why Sanders was in Easton, Gerould said.

Tony Rhodin may be reached at arhodin@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyRhodin. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.
UPDATE: Robbery suspect gets name, is violent and an escape risk, cops say

An armed robbery suspect who eluded Easton police for more than two hours Friday night before fighting it out with them in a yard in the first block of North Delaware Drive still refuses to give his name, Lt. Matthew Gerould said Saturday morning.

The man was taken to St. Luke's University Hospital in Fountain Hill -- although police will not confirm that location -- and has yet to be arraigned on charges of robbery, two counts of aggravated assault, resisting arrest and terroristic threats.

Police have "investigative techniques" that could reveal the man's identity, Gerould said. The man has not aided police in the investigation.

Charges related to two handguns -- which the man allegedly dumped near steps just north of Bushkill Drive and Riverside Drive -- may also be filed, police said in an overnight news release.

At this point neither gun the suspect allegedly displayed about 9:18 p.m. Friday during a robbery at the Family Dollar at 301 Northampton St. has come back as reported stolen, Gerould said.

Police will follow up with Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in an effort to determine where the guns -- a semiautomatic and a revolver -- came from, Gerould said. That tends to be a longer process, he added.

Police believe the unnamed man and Rachyeed Hollenbach -- who was arraigned Saturday morning on a robbery charge and sent to Northampton County Prison in lieu of $85,000 bail -- were the only two people involved in the robbery, Gerould said. That doesn't mean something won't change as the investigation develops, but there are no indicators of that as of Saturday morning, he said.

A third man in what police say is the getaway car -- a gray Hyundai -- apparently was not involved and likely encountered the two men after the robbery, Gerould said. That man, who said he didn't do anything, was detained for more than two hours Friday night before being released. The car was impounded early Saturday morning and police are seeking a warrant to search it, Gerould said.

Tony Rhodin may be reached at arhodin@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyRhodin. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.
When a suspect in a Downtown Easton armed robbery began to climb the tree-lined hill about 9:45 p.m. Friday above Bushkill and North Delaware drives, he moved ever more closer to Lafayette College's campus.

Lafayette College President Alison Byerly says the campus locked down for more than two hours Friday night while campus security personnel joined the search for a man who allegedly committed an armed robbery Downtown and tried to escape up a hill near the Easton campus. (lehighvalleylive.com file photo)

At the top of the tough terrain is College Avenue and just beyond that, the campus itself.

College officials weren't taking any chances, President Alison Byerly said Saturday morning in an email.

"A Public Safety alert was sent at 9:59, with the heading Campus Lockdown, stating that EPD was in pursuit of an individual on foot, possibly armed, near Feather House" close to where College Avenue becomes Cattell Street, Byerly wrote. "Students were advised to shelter in place."

Easton, Forks Township and Lafayette police, with the assistance of a New Jersey State Police helicopter, scoured the steep slope from above and below searching for the second of two men who will be charged in the robbery of the Family Dollar at 301 Northampton St. The other man was quickly captured lower on the hill.

The man being sought displayed two handguns in the store and dumped both weapons while he was on the hill trying to escape, city police said.

Students took to social media to share the information that was available.

Sirens and alarms going off tonight at Lafayette College. Easton currently on lockdown due to armed robbers at large. #shelterinplace  Nicole Diomedo (@NDiomedo) January 9, 2016

As midnight neared, the suspect was found under a classic Plymouth Fury in a parking lot off North Delaware Drive and after a tense fight with police -- which involved fists, Tasers and injuries to officers -- the man was taken into custody.

"Another alert was sent at 12:17, headed All Clear, noting that the suspect was in custody and the lockdown was lifted," Byerly wrote.

High-ranking Easton police pointed out the excellent teamwork among all the officers who responded.

Byerly added to thought.

"I am pleased that Lafayette's Public Safety officers were able to assist in the search, and grateful to EPD for their hard work," Byerly wrote. "We were all very relieved to learn that the suspect had been apprehended."

Tony Rhodin may be reached at arhodin@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyRhodin. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.
Police departments in Warren County warned of a variety of scam phone calls in the last week.

A Greenwich Township resident on Wednesday reported a caller impersonating the IRS and demanding immediate payment of $1,800 under threat of arrest, township police said.

Scammers can sometimes mask their number on caller ID to appear as an official agency. (AP File Photo)

The resident pressed the caller for information on their credentials, agitating him and eventually getting him to hang up, police said. The number reportedly showed up as from the Washington, D.C., area on caller ID.

The IRS will never call to demand immediate payment, require a certain form of payment, threaten to bring in other agencies or ask for credit or debit numbers over the phone.

The same day, Mansfield Township police said they got a report about a caller seeking donations for an association benefiting fallen police officers.

On 1/6/16 Mansfield Police received a report from a local resident advising they received a phone call from an... Posted by Mansfield Township Police Department on Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Police in the township are represented by Hackettstown-Mansfield Policemen's Benevolent Association Local 369 and only solicits donations through an annual letter, not over the phone, police said.

Also in the last week, Hackettstown police on Facebook issued a warning about Publishers Clearing House scams. While police did not indicate the posting was in reference to a specific complaint, someone from the area responded on the social media site that they had recently gotten a call asking for credit card information.

****FRAUD ALERT - Publishers Clearing House Scams**** Click the link below for more information:https://info.pch.com/consumer-information/tips-a-warning-signs Posted by Hackettstown Police Department on Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Publishers Clearing House on its website offers tips to identify scams. Chief among them: Any calls, mailings or emails asking "winners" to send money or credit card information to claim a prize are false.

Steve Novak may be reached at snovak@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @type2supernovak. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.
Alex Salmond got a few headlines this week when Iain Dale announced that he would be hosting a weekly half hour phone in with the SNPs foreign affairs spokesperson Alex Salmond. The first one is at 4pm next Wednesday.

So, Salmond gets the chance to wind up Middle England,in advance of the EU Referendum. No doubt the Leave campaign, just like the Tories during the election, will be listening carefully to his comments. The SNP, and Salmond, are very much pro EU but there is the inescapable fact that it would suit them fine if England voted to leave and Scotland voted to stay in. That would give them the excuse for a second referendum on independence. Ive often said that that would be my tipping point to voting yes, but having seen the price of oil plummet to barely a third of the SNPs estimates, I worry about whether we would be able to create the sort of fair, compassionate society that we want to see.

You do have to wonder why LBC invited Salmond to do it. After all, its usually been party leaders who have participated in these things, Nick Clegg being the first with his two years of Call Clegg. The argument that Nicola is in Edinburgh and Salmond in London doesnt wash as Clegg was quite often around the country when he took part. They could easily have had Nicola take part from Edinburgh.

To celebrate the new show, LBC got Alex Salmond to read some mean tweets about himself but how did he do compared to others?

There was a certain smugness and condescension about how he did it, but it was certainly funny. The tweets were mild compared to the stuff the cybernats produce, though.

Nick Clegg did the same thing for the Sun just before the election and probably enjoyed it a bit too much:

But neither of these could possibly live up to the coolest of them all.

Is this the sort of thing that politicians should be encouraged to be doing, though, to convince us that they are just like us? If it was a break from usually rational, calm and sensible political debate about issues rather than personalities, it would be fine. Its also interesting that there dont seem to be many female politicians who are asked to do it. That might be because of the nature of the stuff sent to women or it might be because nobody has thought of asking them. Theres also the possibility that they may have been approached had the good sense to say no.

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
A bit of intrigue never goes amiss on a Saturday afternoon.

Last night, Alex Salmond missed Any Questions because, according to Jonathan Dimbleby at 1 minute 50 in: apparently been held up in Scotland by the floods. Certainly his Gordon constituency has been badly affected by some awful flooding in the north east of Scotland. In fact, Lib Dem MSP for North East Scotland Alison McInnes has been scathing about the SNP Governments slow response, saying:

Here in the north-east local agencies have faced a prolonged battle against the rising water and staff and residents are exhausted. I do worry we havent seen the last of the bad weather but everyone has rallied together to support one another and the examples of community spirit have been heartening to see at such a difficult time. Lessons need to be learnt on whats happened in Scotland since the start of 2016 because I still think this response took place at a snails pace. The Scottish Government cannot keep forgetting that its responsibility is to the whole of Scotland, not just the central belt.

Salmonds reason for missing Any Questions is kind of interesting. Especially seeing as he was in Westminster, outside Portcullis House at 1pm yesterday. How do we know this? Because he was spotted by our Party President:

Puzzled by Alex Salmond's apols for @BBCAnyQuestions last night (stuck in floods in constit), as he walked past me in Westminster at 1pm.  SalBrinton (@SalBrinton) January 9, 2016

He certainly was back in the constituency later on that evening, tweeting just before 3:

I will be visiting local residents in #Inverurie and #Ellon later tonight, assessing the damage and discussing future defences. 4/4  Alex Salmond (@AlexSalmond) January 8, 2016

But why not just tell that to Any Questions? Everyone would have understood that he needed to be back home. Maybe he did and they got it wrong, but it certainly looks odd. Maybe someone should ask him. Is he on the radio any time soon.?

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
Evidence for a new geologic epoch continues to accumulate, like layers of sediment that over time harden into strata. Although those who study the branch of geology known as stratigraphythe study of those strata and their resolution into Earth's vast geologic time scalewill continue to debate the idea of the Anthropocene for what may seem like eons, the record in the rock continues to pile up.

"This Anthropocene signal is global, it is sharp and all the signs are big," argues geologist Jan Zalasiewicz of Leicester University, chair of the group tasked with making a formal recommendation on the potential for a human-made, future-looking epoch. Twenty-four members of that working group, including Zalasiewicz, have just published their compilation of the gathering evidence in the January 8 Science. "A real geological phenomenon is taking place, it is still going on. In many respects, it's accelerating even as we speak."

The present geologic epoch is known as the Holocene, or "entirely recent," stretching back 11,700 years before 1950 to when the last ice age began to melt and raised sea levels by roughly 120 meters over a few millennia. During that transition, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere increased by roughly one part per million per century. More recently, however, CO2 levels have been increasing by two ppm per year, and rather than slowly returning to an ice age the world has become ever warmer, melting more ice. The rapid increase in excess CO2 comes from the fossil fuel burning and land use of one species that first appeared approximately 200,000 years ago: Homo sapiens.

In fact, rapid development of technology, swelling population and growing consumption of resources from crops to metals have expanded humanity's impacts, particularly after 1950 or so, an inflection point some have dubbed the "Great Acceleration." People have created long-lasting new materials, ranging from copper alloys to plastics that will form long-lived, so-called "technofossils." Enough concrete has been made by now to cover every square meter of the world in a kilogram of the building material. Sufficient plastic is currently manufactured each year to weigh as much as all seven billionplus humans on the planet. People move nearly three times as much rock and dirt via mining than the amount that travels with water through all the world's rivers. Modern chemistry has even liberated civilization from the natural nitrogen cycle that has prevailed for the last 2.5 billion years. And tiny soot particles left over after burning coal, oil and natural gas now can be found in sediments from tropical lakes to the middle of the Pacific Ocean, a permanent smudge on the geologic record.

As a result, the study authors argue, Earth has entered a new epoch that is "functionally and stratigraphically distinct from the Holocene," in the words of the paper laying out the case. Humanity has even reconfigured the course of future evolution by shifting plants and animals around the globe or eliminating certain speciesthe same biological markers known as index fossils and used to define most of the time intervals that divide the last 540 million years, an eon known as the Phanerozoic.

Key questions remain, however, such as when specifically this new epoch beganwhether it is old and pegged to the advent of farming or widespread burning of landscapes by ancient ancestors or is very new. In fact, some, including Zalasiewicz, have proposed a very precise start date for the Anthropocene: July 16, 1945, the date of the first test of an atomic bomb at Alamogordo, N.M., and the beginning of the spread of rare radioactive elements like plutonium around the globe. The roots of the Anthropocene may reach back into the Pleistocene but the most evident signs point to a new epoch that began around 1950 when human population and many other signals like bomb testing really took off, leaving manufactured radionuclides that will be detectable for at least 100,000 years.

The real hard work of Anthropocene stratigraphy has yet to be conducted or even attempted. For example, examining the strata forming off the California coast to look for plutonium and soot. "That is science that will need some organization and some money," Zalasiewicz notes, adding that one could also look for the shells of microscopic animals waxing and waning in the most recent strata or when rat teeth begin to appear on different islands. "Yes, the signal is pretty big but correlating Anthropocene deposits between Florida and Pennsylvania, let alone the coast of Papua New Guinea and Patagonia, using fossils requires detailed successions," he adds. "Generations of geologists sweated over that for Jurassic ammonites and Silurian graptolites."

And there is not even agreement within the working group itself on whether to propose formalizing the epoch, let alone its beginning, several participants note. "Many find it difficult to accept that an epoch that is so short in duration can be adequately recognized in geological successions, let alone the utility of it being formalized," says stratigrapher Colin Waters of the British Geological Survey, lead author of the new analysis.

The Anthropocene may be a new name but it is not a new idea, and has been called everything from the upper Holocene to the Poubellian (from the French for garbage can). Not everyone in the geologic community or the wider world is convinced the new epoch is a good idea. Some note hubris or a tendency to overestimate human influence, others think the big changes like mass extinctions or climate change have yet to happen, still others wonder whether geologists should learn more from archaeologists to determine whether the Anthropocene might supersede much of the Holocene, given large-scale human impacts that stretch back thousands of years.

At base, however, the core argument is whether and how the historical and geologic records might merge. At some point in time, whether it is the beginning of the Anthropocene, the end of the Holocene or some other arbitrary date, the record in the rock and in human history match up. To record geologic events going forward it seems sensible to switch over to the human timescale tied to some crossover point that can be found in recent rocks of "radical change to the entire Earth system," in Waters's words. On the other hand, the Anthropocene may exist, but what is it good for in terms of geology?

"The Anthropocene is a young science and we are working on this like a cottage industry, in bits of time in the evening," Zalasiewicz adds. "We are putting together ideas and then hoping to gather responses from people who can give us some sensible feedback from which we can eventually develop our formal recommendation."

This article was first published at ScientificAmerican.com.  ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.

Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs. Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
Tech & Science, Local News, Travel & Local Attractions, Press Releases

By Long Island News & PR Published: January 09 2016

Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today unveiled the eighth signature proposal of his 2016 agenda: modernize and fundamentally transform the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, dramatically improving the travel experience for millions of New Yorkers and visitors to ...

Albany, NY - January 8, 2016 - Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today unveiled the eighth signature proposal of his 2016 agenda: modernize and fundamentally transform the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, dramatically improving the travel experience for millions of New Yorkers and visitors to the metropolitan region.



The Governors proposal includes a new approach to rapidly redesign and renew 30 existing subway stations across the system. It also includes a number of technology initiatives to bring the system into the 21st century, including expanding Wi-Fi hotspots, accelerating mobile payments and ticketing to replace the MetroCard, and providing USB ports on subway trains, buses and in stations to allow customers to charge their mobile devices. The Governor detailed this proposal at an event earlier today at the New York Transit Museum in Brooklyn, where he was joined by MTA Chairman and CEO Tom Prendergast.



The MTA is absolutely vital to the daily functioning of New York City, but for too long it has failed to meet the regions growing size and strength, Governor Cuomo said. This is about doing more than just repair and maintain  this is thinking bigger and better and building the 21st century transit system New Yorkers deserve. We are modernizing the MTA like never before and improving it for years to come.

The MTA is committed to meeting Governor Cuomos challenge head-on, eliminating every possible inefficiency to deliver these improvements faster, better and at a lower cost, MTA Chairman and CEO Thomas F. Prendergast said. Well accomplish this by incorporating the Governors suggestions to use alternative delivery methods such as design-build, leveraging private-sector expertise through public-private partnerships, and streamlining our procurement processes to ensure the entire MTA is focused on delivering improvements to the people who rely on us every day.



"Once again Gov. Cuomo is stepping up on behalf of transit riders and transit workers," Transport Workers Union Local 100 President John Samuelsen said. "These projects will greatly improve the commutes for scores of riders and we're proud to be doing our part."



More than six million people ride the New York City subway on its busiest days, and the Governors proposal is designed to bring rapid improvements to their daily experience while enhancing a system that is more than a century old. The Governors proposal introduces new customer-friendly initiatives and accelerates existing projects to bring meaningful improvements to the transit system that New York relies on.



Transformative approach to station redevelopments



The MTA will revamp the design guidelines for subway stations to improve their look and feel, then put them in place at 30 stations across the entire system which will be completely renewed. These cleaner, brighter stations will be easier to navigate, with better and more intuitive wayfinding, as well as a modernized look and feel. A list of those 30 stations is available here.



The MTA will use design-build procurement to deliver the projects more quickly, at a lower cost and with better quality, as a single contractor will be held accountable for cost, schedule and performance. Stations will be closed to give contractors unfettered access with a singular focus  get in, get done and get out.



Similar improvements will come to the Richmond Valley station on the Staten Island Railway, and the entirely new Arthur Kill station opening later this year will also feature many of these elements. These new processes and innovations will inform future improvements to stations on the Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North Railroad as well.



Work on the majority of these 30 stations will be completed by 2018, and all will be finished by 2020, with timeframe for redevelopments from start to finish being reduced by more than 50 percent. On average, station redevelopments are expected to take between six and 12 months. Comparatively, under the previous piecemeal approach, station redevelopments relying on night and weekend closures could take two to three years or more to be completed.



Embracing the digital future



The Governors proposal also embraces innovation and accelerates the deployment of modern technology throughout the MTA system.



Wi-Fi and cellphone service: More than 140 underground subway stations already have cellphone, data and Wi-Fi service, and the deployment of this enormously popular amenity will now be accelerated. All 277 underground subway stations will have Wi-Fi service by the end of 2016, and cellphone service will be available in all of them early in the following year.



Mobile payment and ticketing methods: The Governors proposal also accelerates the process of bringing mobile payment methods to subways and buses, allowing riders to pay their fares by waving a cellphone, a bank card or another payment device over contactless readers. This will modernize the payment process, so customers can board buses and pass through turnstiles more quickly, as well as manage the value in their accounts online instead of on physical cards that can be lost or damaged. Subways and buses will start using contactless payment methods in 2018.



The MTA will begin offering mobile ticketing on the Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North Railroad within six months and fully introduce it by the end of the year, giving railroad customers the same ability to buy tickets on their mobile devices. Railroad customers who also ride subways and buses will be able to pay their fares using a single app and a single transit account starting the following year.



Countdown clocks and real-time data: Other technological improvements included in the Governors proposal will install more countdown clocks and deliver real-time arrival data on all subway lines. Countdown clocks have proven popular on the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and L subway lines as well as the 42nd Street shuttle, and the MTA will begin installing them this year on the 7 line as well as the lettered subway lines. The MTA will also accelerate delivering real-time arrival data for all 469 subway stations, which will be available on the MTAs SubwayTime app and will be streamed as an open data feed for any developer to use.



Additional Technology Initiatives: The Governors proposal will also improve the customer experience aboard subway cars and buses with digital information screens, Wi-Fi hotspots and USB charging ports for mobile devices. Charging ports will be installed on 200 subway cars this year and 400 next year, while all new buses delivered starting later this year will have Wi-Fi hotspots. By 2018, some 1,500 buses will have Wi-Fi hotspots and USB charging ports, bringing a new level of connectivity and convenience to customers. A pilot program to install digital information screens on 200 buses will also launch this year, displaying information about upcoming stops and service alerts.



The MTA this year will more than double the number of On The Go Travel Stations, the interactive digital touchscreen kiosks that provide real-time service information, maps, travel planning and elevator and escalator status within subway stations. There are 169 On The Go Travel Stations in 31 subway stations today, and another 190 will be added in more than 20 additional stations by the end of 2016. The MTA is also deploying Help Points, instant communication devices which provide direct lines to emergency assistance as well as service information, and are topped with a distinctive blue beacon light. Help Points are already installed in 250 subway stations and will be added to at least 130 more stations this year, with all 469 stations featuring them by 2017.



To ensure a safe environment for MTA customers, deter inappropriate behavior and help prosecute criminals, more surveillance cameras are coming to the MTAs fleet. All new buses will be delivered with cameras installed, and existing buses will continue being retrofitted. By the end of this Capital Program, 85 percent of the bus fleet will have surveillance cameras installed. The MTA will also test installing surveillance cameras in subway cars for the first time later this year.



Continuing to build and improve



The initiatives announced today build on the states significant efforts to transform the MTA and its infrastructure, such as the Governors recent proposals to transform Penn Station and the Farley Post Office building into one, interconnected world-class transportation hub, and to move forward with a long-overdue extension of the LIRR. Additionally, the state is contributing $8.3 billion to help fund the MTAs $26.1 Capital Program, which when combined with existing efforts will add more than 3,100 buses and 1,400 subway cars to the system, add four new Metro-North stations in underserved areas of the Bronx, begin construction on extending the Second Avenue Subway to East Harlem, and continue building the East Side Access project so the LIRR will be able to bring travelers into Grand Central Terminal.
Local News, Press Releases

By Long Island News & PR Published: January 09 2016

Suffolk County Police Third Squad detectives are investigating a tractor trailer crash that seriously injured two people in Bay Shore early this morning.

A tractor trailer was struck by a car in Bay Shore. The driver and passenger of the car had to be extricated.

Bay Shore, NY - January 8, 2016 - Suffolk County Police Third Squad detectives are investigating a tractor trailer crash that seriously injured two people in Bay Shore early this morning.

Billy David Goodman was operating a 2007 International tractor trailer eastbound on Sweeneydale Avenue and attempted to turn left onto northbound Fifth Avenue when his vehicle was struck by a southbound 2016 Lexus at 4:15 a.m. Officers from Emergency Service Section responded and extricated the two occupants of the Lexus, which was pinned underneath the tractor trailer.

The driver and passenger of the Lexus, who have not yet been identified, were transported to Southside Hospital in Bay Shore for serious injuries. Goodman, 57, of Arkansas, was not injured.

Motor Carrier Safety Section inspected the tractor trailer, which is owned by Be Good Trucking, and the Lexus was impounded for a safety check. The investigation is continuing. Detectives are asking anyone with information on the crash to contact the Third Squad at 631-852-8352.
Looking to stay up to date about all of the news stories and local headlines that are important to Long Islanders? We've rounded up the top coverage for all of the important topics from multiple sources around Long Island, so you can be sure you've got the most recent update on the top stories for Long Island. Have an idea for a news story? Email us at news@longisland.com

Columnists Press Releases
Click the image to view the slideshow of the suicide truck bombing at Combat Outpost Inman in western Mosul that was carried out by former Kuwaiti Guantanamo Bay detainee Abdullah Salih al Ajmi on March 23, 208. The photographs were taken by Bill Roggio for The Long War Journal.

In Tom Joscelyns report on the transfer of former Guantanamo detainee Fayez al Kandari to his home country of Kuwait, he reported that the Periodic Review Board recommended against Kandaris transfer less than two years ago. In July 2014, the board noted a lack of history regarding the efficacy of the rehabilitation program Kuwait will implement for a detainee with [Kandaris] particular mindset. Yet, in September 2015, the PRB recommended Kandari for transfer and the Defense Department followed through yesterday.

We know of at least one Guantanamo detainee who was transferred to Kuwait and quickly returned to the battlefield: Abdullah Salih al Ajmi. The US captured Ajmi at the Battle of Tora Bora in Afghanistan in 2002, and sent him to Guantanamo. He was transferred to Kuwaiti custody in November 2005, acquitted by a Kuwaiti court in March 2006, and subsequently released. Shortly after he was freed he joined al Qaedas branch in Iraq, which at the time was known as the Islamic State of Iraq.

Ajmi subsequently carried out a suicide attack at Combat Outpost Inman in Mosul, Iraq. Thirteen Iraqi soldiers were killed and 42 were wounded after Ajmi drove a makeshift armored truck packed with an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 pounds of explosives through the gate of the outpost and detonated it in a spot between the main buildings of the compound. The blast destroyed the facades of the three buildings, including the structure housing the battalion headquarters.

At the time, I was embedded with a US military training team in Mosul and was at COP Inman just three days prior to the attack. I also arrived at COP Inman within an hour after the bombing and documented the carnage. The result of the massive blast was reminiscent of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

We were only able to confirm Ajmis role in the COP Inman suicide attack after al Qaeda released a propaganda video praising his operation. Some of the photographs I took at the devastated base were included in the video. You can view the photographs above.

It is likely that the Periodic Review Board was initially skeptical of Kuwaits ability to deal with a detainee such as Kandari in part because of Ajmis suicide bombing. At least this was the case in 2014.

As Tom reported, Joint Task Force  Guantanamo (JTF-GTMO) had previously deemed Kandari a high risk who is likely to pose a threat to the US, its interests and allies. It is unclear why the PRB changed its tune in just over one year.

Bill Roggio is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Editor of FDD's Long War Journal.

Are you a dedicated reader of FDD's Long War Journal? Has our research benefitted you or your team over the years? Support our independent reporting and analysis today by considering a one-time or monthly donation. Thanks for reading! You can make a tax-deductible donation here.
Luton is a large town, borough and unitary authority area of Bedfordshire. Luton and its near neighbours, Dunstable and Houghton Regis, form the Luton/Dunstable Urban Area with a population of about 258,000. Luton is home to Championship team Luton Town Football Club, London Luton Airport and The University of Bedfordshire. You can find us on Facebook and Twitter. For all the latest news from Luton sign up to our newsletter here.
Chef Philip Hillenbrand of Bottega Cucina in West Springfield is presenting a Beer and Game Dinner on Jan. 31.

Co-hosted by Lefty's Brewing Company of Greenfield, the dinner will feature some of that microbrewery's special "barrel-aged" malt beverages.

The eight-course menu starts with a 5 p.m. social hour; the first course of smoked duck that follows will be paired with Lefty's barrel-aged porter.

Sheep sausage and Vietnamese lamb pops will be next up, as will presentations of rabbit confit and pheasant au poivre.

Bison goulash will serve as the sixth course; it will be followed by a quail egg savory and venison pot roast.

Seats are $85 and must be reserved in advance with a $25 deposit.

Contact Bottega Cucina at (413) 732-2500 for more detail.



The Munich Haus in Chicopee will be kicking off their Game Feast season on January 23 with a "hunter's harvest" evening.

The dinner, which starts at 6 p.m., will feature a carving station serving llama, venison, bison, and kangaroo. A game-themed buffet will also be part of the experience.

Tickets, which must be reserved in advance, are $49.50.

Contact the Munich Haus at (413) 594-8788 or go to munichhaus.com to find out more about this event.


Over the last 30 years, Providence has emerged as one of New England's dining out meccas, thanks in part its hometown Johnson and Wales University, whose culinary school is among the nation's most highly regarded.



Providence's Winter Restaurant Weeks, Jan. 10-23, make Rhode Island's capital city a worthwhile day-trip or weekend-away destination.



Nearly 80 restaurants are participating in the event. You can find the full list at goprovidence.com/restaurants/rw/

The pricing for Restaurant Weeks is $14.95 for three-course lunch menus; participating restaurant have a choice of offering three-course dinners at either $29.95 or $34.95.



Go to goprovidence.com for links to restaurant menus.

Providence Restaurant Week is coordinated by the Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau, which answers at (401) 456-0200.
chicopee city hall photo.JPG

(DAVE ROBACK|REPUBLICAN FILE)

CHICOPEE - Unrolling a huge paper map, Michelle Santerre explained the document and 700 like it have been the city's official zoning maps since the 1940s.

If a change is made in the city, such as a new street being added or a zone switched, Planning Department staff use a ruler and pencil in the change to make it official, said James Dawson, development manager for the department.

The only way realtors, developers and others could get data about zoning or other property information was to visit City Hall and ask to look at the paper maps.

But recently the city joined most communities its size by putting the entire city's zoning information on a comprehensive electronic GIS map which is now available on the city's website, Mayor Richard J. Kos announced this week.

"A GIS system allows users to visualize, question, analyze and interpret data to better understand the environmental conditions of property. GIS also provides an opportunity for cost savings from increased efficiency, better record keeping, improved communications and more efficient decision making," Kos said in a statement announcing the upgrade.

Kos, with the support of the City Council, last year created and funded the job of GIS coordinator. Santerre was hired as the coordinator at the end of 2014 and she and the rest of the Planning Department spent most of the year compiling and entering data to create the map.

People can now view the map on the city's website at http://www.chicopeema.gov/566/Geographic-Information-Systems-GIS. Residents can search for property by address, owner name or parcel number. A PDF of the overall city zoning map can also be downloaded.

The Planning Department is working towards releasing additional GIS information as it becomes available, Kos said.
cottagestreet_medeiros.jpg

The Cottage Street Cultural District boasts an eclectic array of shops, galleries, and nightlife.

(Matt Madeiros)

EASTHAMPTON -- Easthampton City Arts+, under the leadership of director Burns Maxey, continues to find innovative sources of funding to support arts and culture in this small city, especially within its Cottage Street Cultural District.

The group announced two new grants this week -- one from the Massachusetts Cultural Council and another from the National Association of Realtors(r) through its local branch.

The "placemaking micro-grant" was made through the Realtor(r) Association of the Pioneer Valley. It will fund $2,200 for a new public art project at the Promenade Park at Nashawannuck Pond. The arts organization will release a request for proposals in February for an interactive art project.

A $5,000 matching grant from the state will boost projects within the Cottage Street Cultural District, including the third annual Winterfest (Feb. 13), public art, and other programs. The grant is part of $150,000 awarded statewide for designated cultural districts.

Easthampton's Cottage Street Cultural District was one of the first cultural districts to be recognized by the state. It's billed as place where visitors can find "down-to-earth funkiness" and an eclectic array of shops, galleries, and nightlife.

Easthampton City Arts+ was formed in 2005, and works to integrate arts, culture and community while revitalizing and protecting the city's cultural assets.



Mary Serreze can be reached at mserreze@gmail.com
Hartford man charged with kidnapping, human trafficking

Dwayne Hairston has been charged with trafficking of a human, kidnapping, unlawful restraint and promoting prostitution. (Hartford Police Department)

(Hartford Police Department)

HARTFORD, CONN.  A 31-year-old Windsor man has been arrested and charged for allegedly holding and sexually trafficking an 18-year-old Enfield woman for almost a month.

According to an arrest affidavit, the woman reportedly met Dwayne Hairston, who went by "Crash," at a store on Westland and Main streets in September and was invited to his apartment to smoke marijuana and hang out, the Hartford Courant reported this week.

According to the newspaper, the woman told investigators that while she and Hairston had consensual sex, sex with four men who came into the bedroom afterward was not consensual. The woman also told police that she was not allowed the leave the room for the next week as men came in to have sex.

Hairston, who reportedly made about $800 from men who had sex with the woman, also allegedly forced her to snort and inject what's believed to be heroin and attempted to sell her to another man, the newspaper reported.

Police found the woman in an apartment at 2572 Main St. in Hartford on Sept. 29, but did not apprehend Hairston until earlier this week, according to the Courant. He faces charges of trafficking of a human, kidnapping, unlawful restraint and promoting prostitution, police told the newspaper.

Hairston was held on $800,000 bail following a Thursday court appearance, the Courant reported.

James Eric "Nut" Williams, 25, of Hartford, was also arrested and charged with first-degree sexual assault this week after being identified by the victim as one of the men who reportedly sexually assaulted her. He was held on $500,000 bail after appearing in court Thursday, according to the newspaper.

Police said more arrests were expected.
To Jeff Sayer, former director of the Idaho Department of Commerce, news that Illinois human-resources services provider Paylocity had chosen Boise as home for its new office was proof that Idahos new business incentive program was expanding the states economy.

Paylocity promised in September to create 551 jobs paying an average annual wage of $46,200, beating the Ada County average of $43,000. Statewide, Idahos average wage of $38,300 ranks lower than every state except Mississippi, according the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

"Not only does Paylocity get my tax dollars, now I have to compete with them for employees, since they do much of the same kind of work I do," Gersema said. "Well, gee whiz, thank you, Legislature of the state of Idaho. Thank you very much."

By Zach Kyle

[email protected]

Read more here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/business/government-and-business/article53844595.html#storylink=cpy
by Philip Rosenstein , Staff Writer, January 8, 2016

For a country that by and large has a two-party political system, we have an abundance of third-party and independent candidates running for president.



Curiously, among the 38 citizens registered as third-party candidates in 2016: Chris Keniston, an aircraft maintenance professional, Daniel Zutler, an insurance manager, Joy Waymire, a veteran and spiritual visionary, Brian Briggs, music lover, and Perry Morcom, a self-proclaimed middle-class working person.

Talk of independent or third-party runs started early in the cycle.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, a longtime independent, is running for nomination as a Democrat, in large part to benefit from the unmatched power and organizing prowess of the Democratic National Committee. He is not actually registered as a Democrat, due to Vermont not having registration opportunities.

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Former Democratic candidate Jim Webb has said that he is considering a third-party run.

On the Republican side, there is Donald Trump.

Earlier in the year, he finally agreed to sign a pledge that he would support whomever receives the Republican party nomination. In late November, however, his plans seemed to change. Other GOP candidates had been gearing up to spend on negative ads against him, in response to which Trump tweeted: That wasnt the deal!

A third-party Trump candidacy would surely give the Democrats an edge on whoever eventually wins the Republican nomination.

Electoral history is rife with examples of third-party candidates derailing one party or the other, prying away just enough votes from one side.

The most recent example is Ralph Nader, running as a Green Party candidate in 2000. Many believe that had he not run, many of his voters would have sided with then-Vice President Al Gore. Gore lost by 537 votes in Florida, when the Supreme Court halted the vote count. Nader received 97,421 votes in that state.

Examples of third-party efforts go back to the beginning of the 20th century, with President Theodore Roosevelt creating his own party when he wasnt nominated by the Republicans. More recently, Ross Perots candidacy damaged President George H. W. Bushs chances for reelection in 1992; Bill Clinton won by a plurality.

This country is deeply in need of additional political parties, given the lack of cooperation between the two major parties and the extreme conservatism of the Republican Party. The Republicans could be divided up in a few ways on policy positions, as could the Democrats.

While it seems like a pipe dream to have a successful candidacy outside the traditional party system, there is a cast of characters willing to mount a challenge.
by Larissa Faw , January 8, 2016

Dentsu Aegis Network continues its acquisition spree with the purchase of Navegg, a data strategy shop based in Brazil. Founded in 2009, Navegg specializes in the collection, analysis and multichannel activation of audience data, particularly for programmatic buys.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Navegg has a database of over 250 million Internet users on more than 100,000 Web sites, blogs, price search engines and ecommerce.

Navegg will continue to operate under its own name and remain headquartered in Curitiba, Brazil. Luciano Juvinski, Naveggs current CEO and chief technology officer, will continue to lead Navegg and will assume the position of managing director.

He reports directly to Abel Reis, CEO of Dentsu Aegis Network Brazil, and to Ashwini Karandikar, global president, Amnet, Dentsu's programmatic unit.

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"The acquisition of Navegg reflects our view on the power of data and significantly strengthens our ability to deliver real-time audiences at scale for brand and performance advertising. Additionally, the acquisition brings market leading innovation, skills and talent," stated Karandikar.

For Navegg, the deal provides access to Denstu's additional resources and reach.

This is Dentsu's second acquisition in 2016. Earlier this week the network purchased full-service agency Grip.
by Erik Sass , Staff Writer @eriksass1, January 8, 2016

The editorial convulsions at Maxim magazine have taken a new and unexpected direction this week, as owner and publisher Sardar Biglari assumes the role of editor-in-chief.

Biglari, who also owns the Steak 'n' Shake restaurant chain, fills the spot left empty by former EIC Kate Lanphear, previously the style director for T: The New York Times Style Magazine. She was hired by Biglari to lead an makeover of Maxim as an upscale mens lifestyle magazine in February 2015, but left in October after readers rejected the new look.

Among other things, Lanphear had tried to introduce more artistic photography of female models in place of the familiar cheesecake shots. The magazines highbrow reincarnation was well received by critics, but newsstand sales plunged, indicating that Maxim readers still like their cheesecake the old-fashioned away.

While steering back toward more nubile flesh, Biglari retained some of the artsy cachet by bringing on famed fashion photographer Gilles Bensimon, the creative force behind the magazines December cover. It featured Victorias Secret supermodel Alessandra Ambrosio in a state of total undress, save for an artfully positioned newspaper.

The December issue, which also had a larger trim size and more luxurious stock, proved the most popular in years, selling 100,000 copies at newsstands.

As both publisher and editor-in-chief of the magazine, Biglari also feels entitled to put his name on the cover: his signature is now visible beneath the first M in Maxim. Its not quite clear what this is supposed to mean to readers, since Biglari is not exactly a household name.

That Biglari announcement marks yet another phase in the ongoing reinvention of the mens magazine as a sort of different mens magazine. The news was first reported by Politico.
by Jonathan Haber , January 8, 2016

LAS VEGAS -- This is the refrain of agency grunts as we take our hungover strolls among the pleated pant masses and endless aisles of tech on display here. We tend to be an egocentric bunch in advertising and are sometimes surprised when we realize that CES is not actually built for us. Believe it or not, people are mostly here to sell technology products to retailers and suppliers.

Yet we dutifully learn everything there is to know about autonomous cars, as if it is central to our jobs as advertisers. When we chat at parties, we say things like, that new Faraday electric car is amazing, really tipping the industry on its head with a modular design concept and a subscription-based business model and can you believe the processing capacity of that new Nvidia supercomputer? 24 trillion operations per second!

That said, it is our job to know everything about culture. Its up to us to figure out how to harness it and how to create engagement with our audiences by weaving our messages into the ever-changing fabric of culture. To that point, technology is a fundamental pillar of this culture that we must consider our business, partly because tech inherently disrupts content distribution, which in turn disrupts advertising distribution. Perhaps more importantly, however, because it is a passion point no different than music, sports, or fashion.

For almost all of us at some point during CES, there comes the moment of clarity, the sudden realization during Lady GaGas rendition of the classics at the big MediaLink executive dinner, that autonomous cars ARE connected to advertising. Gaga belts out Start spreading the news and our inner monologues drift as we wonder to ourselves, Why is Google in the self-driving car game? Maybe it is because the millions of hours we spend driving, we arent using search engines or watching video? They must be lobbying Congress now to make it legal to look at your phone while in the driver's seat of a self-driving car. Then Gaga croons: I get no kicks from champagne!

On day two, groggier and more bewildered than ever, we stand listlessly in another taxi line, pondering autonomous selfie drones and refrigerators that promise to order our groceries for us. Sure, Uber and Lyft are operating in Vegas but if we try and call either, wed better be prepared for an aggressive newbie driver to call us relentlessly and demand that we run around the parking garage like maniacs so he can beat the traffic. But, while we wait in line and contemplate whether or not ads on smart TVs are worth the effort, the guy in front of us shows his colleague an Instagram post about a new free floating hologram. HOLOGRAM, we exclaim in our own mind, I heart holograms. There is definitely an experiential idea where we can use this new hologram tech, we think. But is this find worth the trek to Sin City, the infamous transportation nightmares and the slogs through packed showrooms, especially since we technically found out about holograms on Instagram anyway? Probably not.

However, we are here for more than just the tech that can be read about anyway on Mashable, Techcrunch, PSFK, Adweek, Adage, Mediapost (wink!), Wired, the New York Times, USA Today, The Verge, Buzzfeed, Uproxx, Reddit, Venturebeat, and Variety. OK Ill stop. We get it. We are also here for the meetings, meetings, meetings.

For the ad world, Vegas is the Cannes of the US, however instead of coastal French sophistication and elegance, we get the worlds highest grossing Fatburger franchise and Wheel of Fortune slots. But like Cannes, this is a three day window where we can break bread with our clients, sit down with the biggest media companies in the world, chat with up-and-coming media companies, poach talent from other agencies, try to stop our own talent from being poached, meet new clients, and spread the good word about how we are reinventing the agency business.

This part of the CES journey happens nowhere near the conference center but at nightclubs and restaurants all over the city. We RSVPd to the iHeart party, the Twitter party, the Roku party, the CNET party, the Wired Cafe, the MediaLink parties, the Vox party, the PopSugar feminism party. (For some reason this has become the ultimate combination of the listicle and the article here.)

So CES is a lot of things to the advertising community. I am not sure we can quantify what we get out of it but we seem to have mutually agreed upon its status as a cant miss event. In the interest of ending on a utilitarian note, here are some of the things ad folks are talking about between stuffing hor d'oeuvres into our faces and sipping drinks:

Did you hear twitter invested in a headphone company? I guess they are making another play at music.

Nikons launching a consumer camera that films 360 degree VR content in 4K. Looks like the 2016 VR explosion is also going to include UGC.

SyFy is making props and collectibles from their shows available in schematic form for 3D printing. Should we make 3D printed preroll so they have to print our branded product before the thing they actually want?

Did you see the selfie drone? Throw it in the air and it will aim the camera back at you and take a selfie. I think I prefer the drones that shoot missiles.

The newest thing in wearable is tracking your mental health instead of your physical health. I think I might be too neurotic for that. But maybe thats the point!

So if you didnt make it to CES this year, sure, you can read all about it everywhere, but there is something to be said about being here in the middle of it all. For all the speculation about 1,000 horsepower self-driving supercars (that might also double as submarines, Im honestly not sure), and all the discussion about which reality will happen first, virtual or augmented, and all the sincere wondering about whether or not were comfortable with the idea that our fridge can talk to our toaster and remind our autonomous vacuum cleaner to shut off its HD camera, there is something about being surrounded by people who are constantly innovating and trying to redefine what is possible. Sure, we might not know whether that super microchip actually has the computing power of 150 macbook pros, but its in the spirit of the event that we can draw inspiration. Our business is constantly changing, and one of the driving forces behind those changes are these tech innovations, so perhaps we can derive some inspiration and some creative spark to bring back to our own shops. And it is just good business.

Besides, regardless of whether or not well ever be able to place an ad on an autonomous laser-mounted 3D 4K UHD helicopter, I got to see Lady GaGa sing the classics. See you next year! Maybe your taxi will purposefully side swipe my Uber, which is also apparently a thing here in Vegas.
by Erik Sass @eriksass1, January 8, 2016

Lamar Advertising has acquired Clear Channel Outdoors out-of-home assets in five midsized U.S. markets for $458.5 million, the outdoor advertising companies revealed Friday. The transaction covers over 5,500 billboards and posters, including 132 digital displays, in Seattle and Tacoma, Washington; Cleveland, Ohio; Des Moines, Iowa; Memphis, Tennessee; and Reno, Nevada.

The deal will bring Lamars total sign holdings to around 320,000 displays across the U.S., Canada, and Puerto Rico, including around 2,000 digital displays, and is forecast to add around $79 million to the companys total revenues this year.

Lamar CEO Sean Reilly said he hopes to achieve earnings of $44 million a year from these properties in the near future, the previous peak of Clear Channels earnings in the same markets.

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Lamar funded the acquisition with $460 million in short and long-term loans. Clear Channel is said to be contemplating divesting billboard assets worth up to $400 million in other markets, with possible buyers including Total Outdoor and Reagan Outdoor.

This is the latest in a series of moves to consolidation in the U.S. outdoor advertising business.

Back in 2014, CBS Outdoor, now known as Outfront Media, acquired most of the outdoor advertising assets of Van Wagner Communications for $690 million, creating the country's second-largest outdoor advertising company in terms of billboard assets, after Clear Channel.

Also in 2014, Lamar made a number of acquisitions targeting regional outdoor advertising companies, including Marco Outdoor Advertising in New Orleans.

Overseas, CCO was considering the sale of its European assets for as much as $2.5 billion, but put the plan on hold, given the weakening euro. The company then separated its U.S. and international operations, fueling speculation it is planning to convert is domestic operations into a real estate investment trust.
As neuroscience races headlong into the future, no question is too esoteric to be tackled. A recent study, investigating whether free will is an illusion, garners some fascinating results. Share on Pinterest A recent study into the neuroscience of free will reopens an ancient debate. Free will and its arch nemesis, determinism, have been battling since philosophys ancient conception. Do we, as humans, choose our actions, or are we simply drifting along a predetermined path at the mercy of the fates? On the surface, to a modern mind, free will seems like it should have the upper hand. After all, it was you who decided to order large fries, and you know only too well that you can blame no one else for opening that second beer. But, historically, neuroscientific enquiry did not find the evidence for free will as forthcoming as one might imagine. The earliest neurophysiological research into free will began in the 1980s with the work of Benjamin Libet. He constructed a number of experiments that seemed to fall in favor of a more deterministic state of affairs. For Libets landmark study, he asked participants to flick their wrist at random points in time while he measured their brain waves. Libet found that he could measure a build up of neurological activity before the wrist was flicked. It seemed that the neurological activity preceded the participants conscious decision to move. This brain activity was dubbed the readiness potential.

The death of free will? At the time, other scientists considered that this readiness potential might, in fact, be the cause of the movement. Therefore, Libets next challenge was to see if the readiness potential could be detected before the conscious intention to move was registered. In other words, did the brain know what the participant was going to do before the participant knew they were going to do it? To this end, Libet asked participants to watch a clock, and, after having made the random wrist movement, he asked them at what exact time they had decided to make the action. Libet found that the unconscious readiness potential began roughly half a second before the individual reported having decided to move. From these experiments, and others in the same vein, many were eager to be rid of free will altogether. But, as with most neuroscientific endeavors, the truth is a lot more complicated than it might first appear.

The rebirth of free will A recent study, carried out at the Charites Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience in Berlin, Germany, has reopened this age-old debate. Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the results are fascinating. The team, led by Prof. John-Dylan Haynes, wanted to find out whether the readiness potential could be vetoed by the brain. In other words, once the unconscious brain had decided on a course of action, could the conscious brain override it? Prof. Haynes explains: The aim of our research was to find out whether the presence of early brain waves means that further decision-making is automatic and not under conscious control, or whether the person can still cancel the decision, i.e., use a veto.' To this end, they came up with an ingenious experiment. Participants were pitted in a duel with a computer while their brain waves were monitored using electroencephalography (EEG). The computer was trained to effectively read the human players mind. When the program detected the EEG readiness potential associated with the participants next move, the computer would preempt it, making its move before the human was even conscious that they were about to make that move.
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Last year there were 22 cases in just four nations across Africa, compared to 3.5 million in 20 countries in 1986 when The Carter Centre began its massive push began to stop the water-borne parasite.If the campaign succeeds, guinea worm will become the first parasitic disease to be eradicated and only the second human disease to wiped out worldwide after smallpox in 1979."Eradication of this painful and debilitating disease is within our reach," Kok said of the progress which occurred despite a civil war which has gripped South Sudan for the past two years.Aside from South Sudan, guinea worms exist only in Chad, Ethiopia and Mali. In 2015, Chad recorded nine cases, Mali had five and Ethiopia just three, the Center said."As we get closer to zero, each case takes on increasing importance," said Jimmy Carter. "Full surveillance must continue in the few remaining endemic nations and neighboring countries until no cases remain."Also known as dracunculiasis, from the Latin for "little dragons", the long white worms dig through the body towards the skin, releasing chemicals to burn the flesh and then spewing thousands of larvae as they exit.The breeding cycle can be broken by making sure people do not wash in sources of drinking water while the worm is emerging from the skin.They must be teased out by wrapping the wriggling worm around a stick -- the reported origin for the medical symbol of a snake coiled around a staff.Source: AFP
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In a new paper in the, U-M genetic researchers show that a molecule called Xist RNA is insufficient to silence the X chromosome. The gene for that molecule, Xist, has been seen as the key factor in silencing one of the two X chromosomes in every female cell.The findings come from the same team that recently showed how a fragment of genetic material made from reading Xist backward, called an antisense RNA, leads to the production of Xist RNA.Team leader Sundeep Kalantry said, "Xist is widely believed to be both necessary and sufficient for X silencing. We for the first time show that it's not sufficient, that there have to be other factors, on the X-chromosome itself, that activate Xist and then cooperate with Xist RNA to silence the X-chromosome."Kalantry further added, "In the future it may be possible to change the level of these other factors in cells and turn on the healthy, silenced copy of a gene that lies on the inactive X-chromosome." The Xist gene, short for X-inactive specific transcript, is found on each X chromosome. It doesn't tell cells to produce a protein, like most genes do. Instead, it produces Xist RNA that physically coats the entire X-chromosome, and thereby is thought to seal most of it off from the rest of the cellular world.Now, the U-M group has shown that Xist has to have accomplices. Though they are close to identifying these accomplices, they do know that they reside in a very interesting place: the X chromosome that's destined to get silenced. Although most genes on the inactive X chromosome are fully silenced, a handful of the genes on the inactive X are in fact active.It is this set of X-inactivation 'escapees' that the research team focused on. Since the 'escapee' genes are expressed from both the active and the inactive X-chromosomes in females, they produce more gene product in female cells than in male cells, which only have a single X.The Kalantry lab's study predicts that it's this higher 'dose' in females that triggers X-inactivation selectively in females; the lower dose in males is insufficient.That means that if researchers can determine exactly which factors cause X-inactivation to occur, they could find ways to affect the activity of genes on the X chromosomes - specifically, genes involved in certain diseases."In females, we could envision 'reawakening' a healthy copy of an X-linked gene on the inactive X chromosome, by modulating the dose of these so-called escapee genes and ameliorating the effects of the unhealthy copy," says Kalantry.Unfortunately, this approach probably won't help males with X-linked diseases, because they only have a single X chromosome in each cell and inactivating it would be harmful.But that's exactly what made the new research possible: The team attempted to silence the sole X chromosome in male stem cells from mice by turning Xist on artificially. As it turns out, they could only silence the X-chromosome genes somewhat - because the male cells had no 'twin sister' X chromosome to contribute the genes needed to finish the silencing job.When the researchers used female cells that had one X that was already inactivated - and therefore had the same number of active X-chromosome as in males - they were still able to silence the active X when they artificially turned Xist on from that chromosome.The difference was that the female cells had higher levels of products made by 'escapee' genes.Now, Kalantry says, the team is zeroing in on the specific X-inactivation escapee genes that first allow for Xist RNA to be expressed and then work with Xist to make silencing possible.Source: Eurekalert
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The research team published their work online inCo-senior author Robert L. Mauck, an associate professor of Orthopedic Surgery and Bioengineering at Penn, said, "To be able to probe natural tissue structure-function relationships, we developed micro-engineered models to advance our understanding of tissue development, homeostasis, degeneration, and regeneration in a more controlled manner. Our tissue-engineered constructs match the structural, mechanical, and biological properties of native tissue during the process of tissue formation and degeneration. Essentially, we are working to engineer tissues not just to provide healthy replacements, but also to better understand what is happening to cause degeneration in the first place."The team describes that the meniscus tissues of knees are comprised of fibrous regions consisting of long, aligned fibers that give the tissue strength and stiffness. However, within this fibrous region are small non-fibrous regions called microdomains that have a different composition, with concomitant different mechanical properties. While the aligned fibrous regions transmit mechanical deformation signals directly to surrounding cells, the proteoglycan-rich microdomains do not deform at all."Our first question when we saw these microdomains was 'Are they normal, or are they associated with pathology?'," asked co senior author Dawn Elliott, professor and chair of Delaware's department of Biomedical Engineering.Studies performed in the Elliott lab using cow and donated human tissue showed that microdomains are present in very young healthy tissue, but these microdomains grew larger with age, injury, and such disorders as osteoarthritis, suggesting that increased microdomain size is related to disease onset and loss of tissue function.The team surmised that cells in the fibrous regions and proteoglycan rich microdomains were not receiving the same mechanical signals. In fact, the cells within the microdomains did not respond to mechanical inputs, while cells in the fibrous regions switched calcium signals on and off in response to mechanical loading. These cells likely sensed the physical inputs when stretched - similar to stresses on muscles when exercising - and converted the mechanical input into a biochemical message, in this case calcium flow through the cell membrane.Mauck next developed a tissue engineered model to better control variables compared to natural tissue. His lab devised a micro-scaled culture platform to generate engineered tissue with both normal and abnormal features and looked at differences in physical structure and cell signaling in response to mechanical loading. These engineered microtissues replicated the key features of degenerating native tissue and can now serve as a platform for testing new treatment strategies, whether physical in nature - such as physical therapy - or drug-based."This engineered disease model will enable the development of new treatments for degenerative disease in numerous types of connective tissues," Mauck said.Source: Eurekalert
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"WHO has approved South Korean biopharmaceutical firm EUBiologics to make the vaccine, implying a potential doubling of the available vaccine for 2016, to six million doses," said Stephen Martin of WHO's epidemic diseases unit.In 2015, the sole contributor to the WHO stockpile, Indian firm Shantha Biotechnics, produced just three million doses - enough to protect 1.5 million people with the necessary two-dose treatment."Swedish firm Crucell also makes a WHO-approved cholera vaccine, but does not contribute to the stockpile. The addition of the third producer was 'very welcome', as in 2015 the demand was greater than supply," Martin explained.Both Sudan and Haiti made requests in 2015 for WHO cholera vaccine supplies for pre-emptive immunization campaigns, but were turned down due to the global shortage, the UN agency said in a statement.Martin said the addition of a new producer would not only increase access to the vaccine, but was also expected to lower the cost per dose from $1.80 to $1.45.He further added, "We expect to bring more producers to the market and to lower the price further."WHO first created its cholera vaccine stockpile in 2013, and since then more of the vaccines have been distributed and used than in the previous 15 years, it said.A large portion of the vaccines used in 2015 went into a massive immunization campaign in Iraq, where more than 2,800 cases of cholera were detected.That campaign, which ended in December, 2015, focused especially on camps for refugees and internally displaced people, amid fears the disease would spread to war-ravaged Syria.WHO said that the outbreak was considered to be over, and they had no indication Syria had been affected.Source: AFP
BAD AXE  A wind energy developer updated county planners on its preliminary results to show the wind farm is working in compliance with the countys wind energy ordinance.

Traverse City-based Heritage Energy currently has 10 turbines operating in its Big Turtle Wind Farm in Rubicon Township and they plan to add 15 turbines as part of the second phase of the project.

Huron Countys wind energy ordinance requires developers to submit post-construction reports.

Heritage Energy Project Manager Xiomara Cordoba briefed county planners of its recent report during its meeting Wednesday.

I think the certification report we submitted last month should speak for itself, she said.  We submitted a compliance report Dec. 23, 2015. The wind farm was built and installed exactly as approved by planning commission.

Cordoba noted Heritage Energy provided as-built survey maps that show all the infrastructure of substations, turbine locations, access roads and electrical collection systems  all in compliance with the ordinance.

In terms of the avian analysis, we did do one year of post-construction surveys, Cordoba explained. We had biologists out there from the spring through the fall (Nov. 15, 2015) and they did daily searches of the wind turbines trying to get a count of what kind of impact the wind farm is having.

While the final reports still arent in, Cordoba said the preliminary results show its a low impact as expected in an agricultural area.

Were expecting in the next month or two, well have a report and we would be happy to provide a summary to the planning commission if thats of interest, she added.

In other news, Cordoba said a complaint resolution is in place as approved by the planning commission.

We havent had any formal complaints, she said. Every now and then there will be a call from a landowner and a site manager usually handles that, but its nothing really serious.

Jeff Smith, director of building and zoning, said his office did not receive any complaints regarding the project.

During a noise compliance study, the turbines met sound requirements at the four locations tested.
HURON COUNTY  Helicopters flying over Bad Axe three weeks ago taking photos are linked to federal special agents arrests of three locals Friday morning they say were involved in criminal activities involving illegal immigrants  and the arrests could possibly lead to further investigation beyond the boundaries of our county, according to Huron County Sheriff Kelly J. Hanson.

Special agents of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested two adult females and one adult male at about 6:30 a.m. Friday, according to the sheriffs office. They were taken to the Bay City federal courthouse to be arraigned on federal charges Friday afternoon, an ICE public affairs officer told the Tribune in an email.

Hanson says the investigation leading to the arrests started with his office and Bad Axe police. He told the Tribune he could not say what prompted the investigation, but theres more than likely more to come.

We turned our information over to ICE, and this may have possibilities to go beyond the boundaries of our county, Hanson said.

Hanson said he wasnt told whether Fridays arrests are connected to the Sanilac couple, Yolanda and Ralph Stewart, who federal prosecutors charged with conspiring to supply Huron, Tuscola and Sanilac dairy farms with illegal U.S. workers. The charges came the week after helicopters hovered overhead in Bad Axe on Dec. 18, but were later dropped because prosecutors said they needed more time to put together a case.

ICE isnt giving a play-by-play of what theyre doing, Hanson said, adding the agency isnt obligated to and he doesnt expect it. Asked if Fridays arrests were a success in the investigation, the sheriff said he couldnt comment other than to say its more than accusations.

Hanson said residents called his office asking about helicopters flying in the area Friday. One call came in from a Verona Township resident who lived east of M-19 and reported seeing the helicopter at about 7 a.m. and was concerned, he said.

The call came a half hour after the arrests, and Hanson says he told the resident it was part of an ICE investigation, theres no reason to be alarmed and theres no safety issue.

Helicopters and other federal aircraft are no stranger to the shoreline, Hanson said.

Youre apt to see them go through the area, theres no doubt about that, he said.

However, changes in federal immigration policies have brought confusion when it comes to local enforcement.

Hanson, in his eighth year as sheriff, said the Obama Administration has changed immigration policies three times.

It does cause confusion, he said.

Currently, unless an illegal immigrant has committed a crime, feds are not interested in picking them up, Hanson said.

Five years ago, in Huron County, Hanson says there were more than 200 illegal immigrants.

Were not running into the amount we once did, he said. (But) we know theyre still there.

When local authorities did find illegal immigrants, Hanson says it usually involved a call for domestic violence or traffic stop.

It wasnt us going to farms looking for them, he said.

As for risks to residents due to the helicopters, investigations, arrests or any other worries, Hanson says there are none that he is aware of.

The Tribune requested a copy of the criminal complaint from ICE filed at the Bay City federal court, but did not receive the document Friday. A message seeking whether ICE will continue to monitor Huron County by helicopter, or any other means, or neighboring counties in relation to the arrests or for any other reasons, was also left with ICE.
It was the second time this year that restrictions have been placed on the use of amphibious combat vehicles.
The Angels have avoided arbitration by agreeing to a one-year deal with lefty Hector Santiago, the club announced. Hell receive a $5MM salary, per Mike DiGiovanna of the Los Angeles Times (via Twitter).

Santiago was projected by MLBTR to earn $5.1MM in his second season of arbitration eligibility after taking home $2.29MM last year. Obviously, hell land right in the range of that projection.

The 28-year-old southpaw has had some hiccups at times, but its hard to argue with his overall results. Since being acquired by the Halos as part of the pre-2014 Mark Trumbo deal, Santiago owns a 3.65 ERA over 308 innings with 7.9 K/9 against 3.6 BB/9.

On the other hand, metrics are not big fans of Santiagos work thus far in Los Angeles. Hes never been a darling of ERA estimators, but he reached a new low last year with a 4.77 FIP, 5.00 xFIP, and 4.50 SIERA mix going onto his resume.
Ow don't we just love Ntoma fabrics! I absolutely love their patterns, the vibrancy of the colors, and most of all the symbolism and story behind them. I remember always being flabbergasted when I would join my mam into a fabric store and she would know exactly what most of the patters are and what they would mean. I thought to myself... I wanna know all these too. I want myself and all of you readers to know the different patterns that are out there (the most timeless ones) so you may be able to choose the appropriate one for yourself or as a gift for someone else. So by all means, sit back and relax. Because I will be discussing all these gorgeous pieces you see in the picture below (some were double but just in another color). Oh and by the way... all pictures were taken by yours truly. Let's go.

AHWENE PA N'KASA

"Ahwene Pa N'kasa" or translated means good beads don't talk. It's a proverb that basically means that one's actions will speak for you. So in other words, if you do good then people will notice all the good virtues without you intentionally trying to express it.

SIKA WO NTABAN

"Sika Wo Ntaban" or also translated as "Money has Wings" means that money has a very good talent for disappearing on you. You may think you have it one moment and before you know it's gone or no longer available. Love this pattern a lot.

DI3 NYAME AY3 AMAME

"Di3 Nyame Ay3 Amame" means what God has done for me. I actually bought this piece after my research just because I felt I had a whole lot to be grateful for. I could relate to it.

Love the vibrant colors on this one.



ANANSE NTONTAN

"Ananse Ntontan" means spider web. Just about every Ghanaian knows about the famous Ananse stories. Ananse symbolizes wisdom, creativity and all the complexities that comes with life.

Oh I love the colors on this one too.



OBAAPA

"Obaapa" means good woman. I really like this particular patter for myself (wink wink), but it's also a beautiful statement piece to give away to a woman. It gives acknowledgement to the good virtues a woman possesses and that are appreciated and valued.

AKYEKYEDE AKYI

"Akyekyede Akyi" means the back of a tortoise. Now if you look carefully at the pattern, you'll see just that.

This pattern was actually created based on the following proverb: "Huriee si akyekyede akyi a, osi ho kwa". Which basically means that there is absolutely no point in doing things or engaging yourself in activities that will be of no benefit to you and that will get you nowhere. Love these colors too!

ABANKABAN

"Abankaba" means handcuffs, and it actually comes from the saying "Efie ye a anka abankaba nna me nsa" This basically means that all is not well else I would not be in handcuffs. This piece has a bit of a political tint to it. It sort of reflects the injustice and loss of faith in the government.

SENKYE BRIDGE (ADOMI BRIDGE)

This pattern was created to honor the only suspension bridge that was built under President Nkrumah's time and this is located at Adomi in the Eastern Region.

AMA SERWAAH

This cloth was named after a very popular Ashanti queen called Ama Serwaah, so much so that parents even wanted to name their daughters after her. She was the 6th Asantehemaa that ruled during the reigns of Osei Tutu Kwame Asiba in the early 1800's.

FELICIA

This pattern was also named after a lady named Felicia but not much information was found about her nor of the pattern symbolism. Do love the colors of it.

EFIE ABOSEAA

"Efie Aboseaa" means courtyard pebbles. This pattern was actually derived from the saying "Se ofie aboseaa twa wo a eye ya sen abonten so dee" Which actually means that when you get hurt by the people you are closest to, it hurts more than someone who is not close to you. Which is so true. Colors are fab!

AKONFEM

"Akonfem" means Guinee fowls, the only thing I could find about this pattern is that these animals usually move in groups, so if you should find one by itself, do not mistake it being alone for loneliness for its group may be nearby.

TWA BENKUM (FA BENKUM)

"Fa Benkum" is derived from the Akan proverb saying : "Y3n fa benkum nkyire y3 fie kwan" which means, we don't use our left to show the direction to our house. In Ghana it's a general knowledge that using your left hand in giving something or in expressing or showing something is frowned upon, and even disrespectful. Simply because we use the left hand for things that are considered "not nice" such as wiping your behind. Intense proverb I would say, but are we loving the pattern and colors on this piece or what :-) !

KOFI ANNAN ADWEN

This pattern was created in honor of Mr. Kofi Annan. The seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations, I think this man deserves his own pattern, yes we are very proud!

Well, we got through the first part of the "Ntoma Patterns and their Proverbial Symbolism" edition. I hope this was quite helpful and informative to you as it has been for me. I'm pretty sure there will be a continuation of this first edition published soon, so until then just let me know which one you like best. xoxo

(Source: African Traditional and Oral Literature As Pedagogical Tools in Content Area, authors : Mr.Lewis Asimeng-Boahene and Mr.Michael Baffoe, click "here" to read more in-depth information.)

Originating at www.eclectickyeiessa.com
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Badu Evans, the leader of the Amamere Folk Music & Dance Ensemble, one of the leading cultural dance groups in Ghana, says that this year, his group will embark on educational campaign tour to educate Ghanaians on the country's culture.

He said Amamere Folk Music & Dance Ensemble, which is among a few cultural groups that have lifted high the image of Ghana on international platforms is also set to stage a series of live cultural musical performances in the country this year to entertain cultural music fans.

According to him, the group which was formed two decades ago to promote Ghanaian and African cultural values, both at home and abroad has had tremendous success in terms of international engagements.

In an interview with Beatwaves yesterday, Badu Evans disclosed that the group will from March this year organise intensive training programmes on African cultures through the visual and performing arts for students in both second cycle and tertiary institutions throughout the country.

He noted that the group was still negotiating with some selected institutions in the country where it would train and help develop talents in the youth.

The group leader hinted that very soon the group would stage live musical performances and drama in some of the second cycle institutions to encourage the young ones to develop interest in traditional music and dance.

He noted that for the past years, the group had been involved in the promotion and development of traditional Ghanaian music and dance, and based on its outstanding performances, the group had last year, participated in a number of cultural festivals in Ghana and abroad.

Badu Evans stressed that the ultimate mission of the group is to promote African culture through dances and music to showcase the richness of African traditional values, adding that it will continue to inspire the youth and assist young Ghanaian artistes to expose their talents.

The Amamere Folk Music and Dance Ensemble is a member of the Centre for Arts and Culture, National Commission on Culture, Ghana Export Promotion Council and Ghana Monument Board. It affiliates internationally with Cioff, IOV, CID (international festival organizers) Austria, and is the only West African representative of Leading University of Dance, Theatre and Show Organisation  Mandova, Italy.

By George Clifford Owusu ([email protected])
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Kenstep Group of companies last week Wednesday hosted end of the year party for its staff and friends at the company's premises near Nima Frankies in Accra.

The objective for the end of the year party was to create quality funtime for the staff, to hang out, network and socialize with the guests. Good food and drinks were in abundance in an ambience of melodious music.

The excited staff at the party danced to gospel tunes, participated in dancing competitions and a variety of cultural dances and interacted with the invited guests.

Addressing the staff, the board chairman of Kenstep Group, Kenneth Kwame Asare thanked the staff for their hard work throughout the year and their contribution toward the success of Kenstep.

Kwame Asare who stressed that Christmas and New Year is about forgiveness and giving, urged his staff to go and reconcile with anybody they need to reconcile with and share 'Christ' with them.

He urged all the staff to continue to work hard and help the company achieve its target in 2016. He advised the staff to forgive each other quickly in order to promote unity at the workplace and also aim high in their day to day activities.

He disclosed that Ghana Base Management, Alpha Lotto and Kenstep Micro Finance, all members of Kenstep Group, will in 2016 host a number of events to promote the activities of the company.
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Cairo (AFP) - Egypt's tourism minister was expected Saturday to visit the victims of an attack at a Red Sea resort hotel by knife-wielding assailants, the latest blow to the country's beleaguered tourism industry.

The interior ministry said two men who attacked the Bella Vista hotel where foreign tourists were staying in Hurghada on Friday were armed with knives, but not an explosive belt as reported earlier.

One of the assailants was killed on the scene and the other badly wounded, police said, after they injured two Austrians and a Swede.

A video published by Egyptian news websites appeared to show the wounded assailant receiving CPR and being questioned on his identity.

He appears to have been shot in both legs.

Tourism Minister Hisham Zazou was due to arrive in the resort Saturday morning "to check on the wounded tourists," the ministry said.

The incident further threatened efforts to repair the country's damaged tourism industry, coming a day after a hotel in Cairo hosting Israeli tourists came under attack by a group of men.

The Islamic State group claimed credit for that attack, which they said targeted "Jewish" tourists. Police said they were Arab-Israeli tourists.

The extremist group's Egypt affiliate is waging an insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula, and dealt a body blow to the country's tourism industry by claiming to have downed a Russian airliner in October, killing all the holidaymakers on board.

The attack prompted Russia to suspend flights to and from Egypt, while Britain restricted flights to the Sharm el-Sheikh resort from where the doomed plane had departed.
08.01.2016 LISTEN

On Wednesday, January 6, 2016, a few news outlets especially, Fox News mentioned in passing that two Guantanamo Bay Detainees have been sent to Ghana. Many of the major news outlets did not cover this information. Why was this news not publicized in all the news media? It was not publicized because it would be shameful to the Obama administration. They knew that the White House spokesperson would be inundated with questions from the media and journalists. Furthermore, they wanted to keep it hidden from the American public.

However, the gist of my write up is not more concerned about the Obama administration than Mahama and his cronies. I would like to ask some relevant and pertinent questions about this covert deal. First, I would like to know if members of parliament knew about this deal. Second, was the information disseminated to the Ghanaian public? Third, why were these detainees not sent to any peace loving Arab nation? Third, how far is the distance from Guantanamo Bay (Cuba) to Ghana? Why were the detainees sent to Ghana? Fourth, who were directly involved in this covert deal? Fifth, how much money changed hands? What did President Obama promise to the Mahama government? Sixth, if parliament knew it why have the opposition parties remained mute? Seventh, if this deal was legitimate why did president Obama keep it secret from the United States Congress? Eighth, did Mahama ask that question when the transaction was being made? Finally, what does Mahama and his cronies stand to gain in this deal? Does Ghana provide better prison environment than Guantanamo Bay or any maximum prison in the United States?

Now I begin the gist of my piece. When Obama took the helm of the presidency of the United States, his first promise to those who voted him to power was to close the Guantanamo Bay Prison because it is blight to the pride and reputation of the United States. The United States used the Guantanamo Bay as prison to house global terrorists. The reason is that the US did not want these savages to influence the prison communities of the United States. Obama has faced stiff opposition in his efforts to close the Guantanamo Bay since the inception of his presidency. Therefore, he is arranging with and performing these covert deals to prove to his supporters and voters that he has accomplished all his promises before he leaves office. He wants to score a political point.

However, Mahama and his cronies have put the peaceful nation of Ghana in jeopardy. The reason is simple. These two detainees are a threat to the United States that no other country wants them. What security and safe apparatus have Mahama and his incompetent leaders put in place that they think Ghana can house them? Have they thought about the indoctrination that these two terrorists can provide to the vulnerable young people in Ghanaian prison systems?

A simple but appropriate question ought to be asked. What tangible project, infrastructure, and educational assistance did Obama provide for Ghana since he became the President of the United States in 2008? Why then do Mahama and his inept leaders put the peace loving country of Ghana in such great peril? Ghana is closer to Nigeria that is under siege by Boko Haram. What assistance has Mahama provided to Nigeria to fight and defeat these terrorists? Furthermore, Ghana is also within the range of the terrorist networks of Libya, which is now the second headquarters of global terrorism.

I suggest that the opposition parties and their leaders demand answers from Mahama and the NDC government. In addition, the people of Ghana should protest and demonstrate on the streets and the residence of President Mahama and the headquarters of the NDC in Accra. They should do this consistently and persistently until this duo global terrorists are removed from Ghana. Ghana does not stand to gain anything from the ire of global terrorism. For the most part, God has blessed and protected Ghana from wars. Ghana has not even tasted any civil war since the dawn of her independence. Why then should Ghana invite the savagery of global terrorism in this peaceful nation? Ghanaians should take action now if the nation were to continue its peaceful existence.
Madrid (AFP) - Migrants trying to enter the tiny Spanish territory of Ceuta in North Africa from Morocco have faced beatings and other abuses from police, a migrants' rights group said Friday.

The Moroccan Association for the Integration of Immigrants, which is based in Malaga in southern Spain, said six migrants had been killed since December 25 trying to make the dangerous crossing.

Three migrants drowned and 19 others were hospitalised on Christmas Day attempting to enter the territory by swimming from Morocco or scaling a barbed-wire fence, the rights group said in a statement.

Those hurt and killed were part of a group of over 300 migrants who were trying to reach Ceuta, which is located across the Strait of Gibraltar from mainland Spain.

A total of 185 migrants managed to enter the Spanish territory but a "large group" was arrested by Moroccan authorities and released in cities in southern Morocco, the statement said.

Another three migrants drowned on Monday and about 20 were hospitalised when hundreds of migrants once again tried to cross into Ceuta from Morocco, the association said.

Two men and a woman are in critical condition and will need surgery to repair fractured bones in their legs and hands, it added.

"Two of the victims said the fractures they suffered were due to the violence and abuse exercised on the part of security forces against them," the statement said.

About 250 migrants who tried to enter Ceuta at this attempt were arrested by Moroccan authorities and taken to cities in southern Morocco, including several who were in critical condition, it added.

The association said it was "extremely worried" by the rise in the "acts of violence against migrants in border areas of Ceuta" and called for an investigation into the actions of security forces in the region.

Ceuta, along with Melilla to the east, are Spanish territories on the northern coast of Morocco that together form the European Union's only land borders with Africa.

Spain fortified fences in the two territories last year in response to a rise in the number of migrants trying to jump over the barriers from Morocco.

In February 2014, 15 migrants drowned in the Mediterranean after dozens tried to enter Ceuta by swimming from a nearby beach.

Human rights groups and migrants said the Spanish police tried to keep them from crossing into Spanish territory by firing rubber bullets and spraying them with tear gas.

Madrid has since said that its guards are now banned from using rubber bullets to repel migrants.
08.01.2016 LISTEN

Accra, Jan. 8, GNA - The Public Services Workers Union (PSWU) of the Trade Union Congress, after extensive deliberations at its 9th Quadrennial Delegates conference has resolved on eight considerations to government.

They are public sector base pay, privatisation of the power sector, resourcing and retooling of centres for national culture, Tema Oil Refinery and Ghana Railway, Housing, labour unrest, post-retirement health and medical endowment fund and political tolerance.

The conference noted that considering the fact that every election year government over spends; 'we are watching with keen interest and will act appropriately should government come out to review budget numbers upward during the mid-year review'.

It said much as we do not oppose Public Private Partnership in principle, yet we would not fold our arms unconcerned and allow the power sector to be unbundled and privatised.

'We therefore call on government to stop all the processes to give Electricity Corporation of Ghana to a concessioner. We also want to put on record that we shall resist fiercely any attempt by government to separate Thermal Power from Hydro Power with the ultimate aim of privatising the former.'

The conference said in the era of Sustainable Development Goals as the new universal development agenda, 'we call on government to adequately resource and retool the centres for national culture to unearth our national heritage through our culture for tourism and preservation.'

On the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) and the Ghana Railway, it said: 'We want to direct government attention to finding private partners for the resuscitation of TOR Ghana Railway Company.

The conference observed that there is acute shortage of housing in the country, particularly in the urban centres and considering the huge rent advances of two to three years running into thousands of cedis, being demanded by landlords from workers before they could secure accommodation; 'we urge government as a matter of urgency to partner private investors for the provision of housing units for workers'.

It noted the fact that there has been numerous labour agitations in recent times, and acknowledging that high productivity strives under peaceful working environment, the PSWU urged government to make sure all outstanding labour grievances are resolved for a harmonious working environment.

Recognising that most retirees/pensioners are unable to deal with and manage chronic cases of kidney, liver, heart malfunction and various cancers, which are not covered under the National Health Insurance Scheme, 'we call for the urgent establishment of a post-retirement healthcare scheme and medical endowment fund through a partnership by government, labour, all employers and the public, for pensioners/retirees'.

The conference said considering the fact that there have been unguarded statements made by some politicians across the political divide and watching the alacrity by which some media houses take advantage of such statements to whip up sentiments, 'we in conference do hereby call on all stakeholders to be circumspect in their utterances and dealings as we move closer to our national general election'.

The workers said the challenges that confront workers in the public service and their families are numerous and daunting, 'nevertheless, our hopes and aspirations for fair and equitable incomes and improved conditions of service remain very high and alive'.

'The Public Sector Workers Union is committed to the principles of fairness, equity and social justice, and will continue to work assiduously in various ways including Collective Bargaining processes to secure better working conditions and improved social standard of living for her members.'

GNA
08.01.2016 LISTEN

Accra, Jan. 8, GNA - Two victims of a mob attack at Bortianor in the Greater Accra Region, have appealed to the Inspector General of Police (IGP) for justice.

Joseph Tetteh Amui, 38 and Peter Adama Armah, 29, who carried their injured pictures to Ghana News Agency in Accra, said they were attacked on December 29, 2015 in their home by a mob numbering about 50 who inflicted cutlass wounds on them and molested their family members.

They said they reported the matter to Kokrobite Police but no arrest have been carried out and so they have no option but to call on the IGP to order an investigation into the case to apprehend the culprits for prosecution.

They said their offence was to report to the police about a mob attack on the Bortianor Chief's palace, who vandalised property.

GNA
08.01.2016 LISTEN

Koforidua, Jan 8, GNA - The Council for Technical Vocational Education and Training in collaboration with the Skills Development Fund, has organised a four day programme for members of the National Poultry Farmers Association in the Eastern Region.

The programme on the theme: 'Bio-security and management for increased productivity and competitiveness,' was to enlighten poultry farmers on how to feed and manage their birds properly to increase productivity.

Dr Michael Boateng, Project Coordinator, told the Ghana News Agency in Koforidua, that the programme is to train poultry farmers in bio-security, feeding, managing of birds and to prevent the spread of diseases from one farm to the other.

The resource persons are from the Department of Animal Sciences of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology.

Dr Boateng explained that, the training involved a practical training on the farms of the members to ensure that, what they are taught is put into practice.

He said inspections would be carried out on the farms of participants to ensure that members put what they have learned into practice

Dr Boateng said the training would be replicated in the other regions to ensure that, poultry farmers in the country acquire the requisite knowledge to help them maintain their birds properly to increase productivity.

He called on the youth to invest in agriculture to employ themselves and create employment avenues for others to help reduce the unemployment rate in the country.

GNA
The threats coming after Ghanas Electoral Commissions declaration that it will clean the electoral register rather than procure a fresh one for Election 2016 are needless; the NPP and the Let My Vote Count Alliance (LMVCA) should be more democratic for the very democracy they are seeking to administer. Firstly those in favor of the cleaning of the voters register are far more than those seeking a fresh one, and also by the very core principle of democracy majority has carried the day even though they as minority have been given the chance to have their say.

Much as they seek to punch holes in the responses and decisions of the Electoral Commission, just a couple of the latters explanation need re-echoing for the benefit of all Ghanaians. Firstly the Supreme Courts ruling that NHIS card should no longer be used for electoral registration went with the caveat that an already-registered voter cannot be disenfranchised without further proof of their citizenship. Now if it is insisted that fresh registration be done, what proof of citizenship would such people produce if they have neither a drivers license nor a passport, since their voters card from 2012 would be invalid!

As for a birth certificate, it is common knowledge that its acquisition has been corrupted over the years such that non-Ghanaians have got it to secure Ghanaian passports which in turn makes the passport suspect as a genuine identification material! So maybe the most reliable proof will be the testimony of two witnesses! Well, can we all adopt this method to cut down on the high cost of the biometric registration/voting whose operations at times disappoint.

The bit about Togolese electoral authority not giving their electoral register to Ghanas EC has to be understood in respect of the security the former is officially has to accord the bio data of the Togolese voter. When cleaning the register is the decision now, it would be in the interest of all Ghanaians if NPP or any other concerned person could help in the deletion of names that do not qualify to remain in the register for any reason at all.

As for the issue of foreigners in the register, it has been the common knowledge that cross-border residence is a common thing. It is double/dual citizenship at play with the commoners in society. The usual and civilized system would show a dual citizen document for this, but we all know the position of the illiterate with documents. It is joked but almost true that the border could even pass through the compound of a house, one part in say Togo and the other in Ghana. It is common for a youth to have one parent from one country while the other is from the other country or living in one country and attending school in the other. Since a dual citizen Ghanaian can vote both in Ghana and in their second country, these border residents case should not be taken this seriously while effort are made to clean those names like the dead etc if they do not deserve to be in there. Note that the complaint for a registration status has been operative all along.

Also, taking the cost and voter apathy into consideration, it would be better to consider the national coffers as well as the convenience of the average voter if a fresh voter is proposed by any entity. With my earlier article on my worry with the over-expenditure on elections at the expense of other processes of democratic governance, I dare advise that the NPP and the LMVCA should coolly accept the choice of the majority, which is cleaning the voters register and also accept the statutory independence of the Electoral Commission for a smooth fair and free Election 2016. Last but not least, let us not forget that an election is just the beginning of democracy; the bigger involvement is after it. We therefore need not destroy any life or property, or even create fear and panic in the country as is happening now, because of it.
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Festus Mogae served as president of the southern African country of Botswana from 1998 to 2008. He is the recipient of several international awards, including the 2008 Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership. In this interview held recently in New York with Tefo Pheage for Africa Renewal, the former president shared his thoughts on gay rights, the reform of the UN Security Council, the right to protect civilians in humanitarian crises and the fight against HIV/AIDS. These are excerpts from the interview.

Africa Renewal: Let us start with the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people. Some African leaders are of the view that gay rights are un-African. They applauded Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe when he declared at the UN 70th General Assembly that Africans were not gay. As an advocate for LGBT rights, what is your view on Africa and human rights?

Fetus Mogae: Its not surprising that we appear to be speaking from different corners of the mouth. Differences in opinion are welcome. While I admit that the West often push their agendas on Africa, which we must be wary of, I also believe that we must, as Africans, admit that the world is changing and we must move with the times. This means often abandoning some of our long-held convictions about life, if the need arises. In my long interaction with LGBT groups and extensive research, I have come to the realisation that we are limited in our knowledge and must be open to new discoveries. I have been converted; I used to hold the same beliefs as my counterparts. President Mugabe has said that he hates homosexuals and is on record as saying they are worse than pigs and dogs. That is still his position. Leadership is not always about you, it is about people and often circumstances. I call upon African leaders to open up to second generation rights.

You have on several occasions clashed with Botswanas current leadership and religious organisations due to your persistent advocacy to decriminalise LGBT practices in Botswana. How has it been?

Obviously not easy, but when you believe in something, nothing should stop you. Botswana inherited a law that outlaws is against homosexuality. We have not repealed it, but generally we have not harassed or arrested these groups (gays and lesbians). But the international community would say it is not enough to say you havent made any arrests because if you have such a law, you or another leader may wake up the next day and apply its provisions. Our argument as a country has always been that we havent imprisoned any member of these specific groups.

Are you hopeful that LGBT rights will be respected in the near future in Africa?

Yes, some countries like South Africa have already paved the way and others are following slowly. Change takes time and often meets resistance in some quarters. One of the challenges we have in Africa is that even the traditional leaders or chiefs are against LGBT groups. I once participated in a debate organised by the BBC. Traditional leaders argued that they didnt like homosexuals because young people will follow their ways. They said they wanted their children to get married, give birth and keep family names alive and bring bride prices, amongst many other benefits. I found this to be selfish and a wrong mentality towards LGBT rights.

The UN has been heavily criticised of late by some member states for being ineffective and undemocratic. Do you think the UN has lived up to expectations?

Just like any other organisation, the UN has its own problems and limitations. I think the problem is with the Security Council and its veto power. The UN would be better off and more democratic without veto powers. Even we as Africans have to advocate for total abolition of the veto, but not permanent Security Council membership. In that case, states will be more equal. It is without a doubt that at the UN, some member states are more equal than others. The concept of vetoes is outdated and is tarnishing the good name of the UN.

The African Union has been pushing for a seat on the Security Council but it seems to be unable to agree on which country would occupy such a seat. Whats your comment on this?

I support Africas demand for an AU permanent seat on the Security Council. The question, however, is whether we are capable of nominating one of our own to represent us. You will recall that there is Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, Egypt and others who want to join the Council. We should be advocating for a permanent seat for an African country that will take its mandate from all the AU heads of states.

How do we balance a countrys sovereignty with the right of outsiders to intervene particularly in times of economic failure, humanitarian crisis or internal conflicts?

As with everything else, it is always the difficulties at the margins. Even if a country is well governed, it could still face unprecedented levels of unemployment as we have here in Botswana. But that should not justify outside intervention. However, if a country starts to experience inter-ethnic conflicts, the international community could feel they cannot sit on the sidelines and watch people being butchered willy-nilly by those who once vowed to protect them. Sovereignty has limits like any other right. A leader cannot kill and harass his people and hide behind sovereignty. A true leader does not kill but protects his people. We still have leaders in Africa who think they are indispensable, larger than life and more important than their countries. That must stop. If a leader loses control, the world will and should intervene to save the people.

You are regarded globally as a champion in the fight against HIV/AIDS. In your travels throughout Africa, how do you assess this fight?

We have fought a good battle but we are still experiencing new infections. I think our worst enemy is complacency. You will recall that after the virus was first discovered in the 1980s in Africa, people were dying on a massive scale. We entered into a state of panic and too much stigma and discrimination was attached to the deadly virus. All that has since changed. But the biggest mistake will be to think we have won the war. In Botswana, we declared the virus an emergency. I took the HIV/AIDS fight from the Ministry of Health to the presidency for close and more authoritative monitoring, and it paid off. The situation has greatly stabilised, according to statistics, and I have learnt that the same has been happening in other countries.

Africa Renewal
09.01.2016 LISTEN

According to Hamilton Fish, the 16th Governor of New York; "If our country is worth-dying for in time of war, let us resolve that it is truly worth-living for in time of peace. Although, Ghana has not engaged in war with any country, all cannot be said to be right due to the mismanagement of the economy by president Mahama and his NDC government. Unfortunately, the Ghanaian electorates have refused to give the opportunity to those whose expertise could help turn the country's economy around, something which is difficult to comprehend. One of such personalities is Hon. Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, a man described by no mean a person than former president Kufuor as "a man of many parts and great pedigree".

Born into a "political family", the contribution of Nana Akufo-Addo to Ghana's socio-economic and political development cannot be over-emphasized. A three-time Member of Parliament, and human rights activist, Nana Addo has distinguished himself as a Minister of Justice and Attorney-General, as well as, Foreign Affairs. His exemplary work at those two portfolios, if nothing at all, resulted in the abolition of the criminal libel law, the establishment of Fast Track High Courts, and the inflow of $547m from the Millennium Challenge Account during the Kufuor-led NPP administration.

Even though most politicians are perceived to be corrupt, I am yet to hear any such accusation leveled against the man under discussion. Surprisingly, inasmuch as Nana Addo's political opponents had deliberately subjected the man into the worst form of personal and political attacks, none of them had dared Nana Addo's credibility and integrity as far as corrupt practices are concerned. Based on this positive trait, Nana Addo once remarked; "I am not corrupt; I have never been corrupt; and I'll never be corrupt". The above statement clearly shows how committed he is to fighting this social canker when given the opportunity to lead this country.

Personally, my admiration for Nana Addo is not actually based on his good communication skills or track record. Mine is rather based on the level of tolerance, political maturity, and his vision for the country. For, in spite of the "violent cloth" put on Nana Addo's neck by the NDC propaganda machinery, the man continues to prove his critics wrong. Nana Addo has developed such a big heart and stomach to swallow all forms of 'political nonsenses' since he led the NPP in 2007. Whilst many politicians such as president Mahama had reacted angrily to certain non-personal and personal issues, Nana Addo has tolerated all shades of opinions - both internal and external, a political test which he has passed with distinction.

Again, as a tried and tested politician, Nana Addo has consistently made his vision clear for this beloved country of ours since 2008. He goes; "I am not in politics for personal gains; I have a genuine commitment toward the welfare of the Ghanaian people". Nana Addo's promise of providing free secondary education for the Ghanaian child and putting the teacher at the centre of his educational policy makes him stand tall among his compatriots, especially those who have scrapped teacher trainee allowance in their country.

It is thus imperative for the electorates to think beyond political parties and consider Nana Addo for the presidency in Election 2016. This is non-negotiable in view of the level of incompetence, corruption, and untold hardship that have befallen Ghanaians under president Mahama's misrule. One cannot therefore dispute the fact that, a Nana Addo-led NPP government is the next best alternative to the current corrupt NDC government. Indeed, Ghanaians love peace, and for that matter, want to be assured of their personal safety and that of their businesses under any government. Therefore, their dithering in voting for Nana Addo on two occasions - 2008 and 2012 cannot be said to be wrong considering the enormity of the allegations poured on him by his opponents. However, thankfully today, many Ghanaians have seen the true Nana Addo. His acceptance of the Supreme Court verdict to save precious lives and property has gone a long way in killing any negative perception about him.

In conclusion, I would only plead with the Ghanaian electorate to reconsider their voting decision on this patriot, come November 7, 2016. The electorates should bear in mind that, Ghana is currently in a monumental crisis, and therefore requires very serious, honest, and high calibre visionary leadership to take us out from this quagmire. Nana Akufo-Addo's rich political experience and wisdom must therefore not be allowed to go waste, but rather, be tapped for the benefit of all Ghanaians. Let's not miss this great opportunity by wasting our vote on the NDC for the third consecutive time.

God bless Ghana! God bless Nana Akufo-Addo!! God bless Kufuor!!!

Katakyie Kwame Opoku Agyemang, Asante Bekwai-Asakyiri

([email protected])

0202471070 // 0547851100 // 0264931361

"Vision, coupled with persistency, results in true success"
09.01.2016 LISTEN

INTRODUCTION

It is important that Ghanaians prudently put together the coordinates of their development needs and expectations in the political worksheet of national development priorities as the November election (2016) draws nigh. These valuation coordinates should take due cognizance of the suite of accomplishments, unaccomplished and yet-to-be-accomplished policy objectives, and policy failures of incumbency against what a potential Opposition could have done strategically and tactically better, including an impartial assessment of Opposition potential policy weaknesses and strengths in the likely event of assuming the highest office in the body politic.

Obviously these existential policy interrogations entail the praxis of dialectics, the logic of political economy, the sociology of knowledge, and the critique of moral epistemology. It therefore means that the ordinary Ghanaian should undertake an embracive qualitative valuation of the political and economic landscape, under the management and oversight of incumbency from the standpoint of sound statistical and visual validation, not under any restraining potentiality of partisan politics, political ethnocentrism, and ideological autarchy.

Such a painstaking undertaking requires a strict methodology of inclusive knowledge in an attempt to bring together, all measureable indices of economic, social, and political variables into a harmonizing posture of qualitative and quantitative reasonableness, backed by the moral imperative of individual and collective choices as well as by a commanding jurisdiction of statistical and visual conviction, transparency, accountability, and probity.

We shall not, however, provide templates of statistical data in support of our serial discourses. It is our submission that the inventory of these data are easy to locate for private and public digestion. Rather, we expect our discerning readership and the larger Ghanaian public to holistically assess members of the political class and political parties on the basis of the seemingly disparate but interconnected topical discourses we are initiating in this new series.

EDUCATION

Education constitutes one of the most indispensable building blocks of the edifice of civilization. Therefore, a society that neglects the education of its citizens does so at its own risk. We are not talking about education merely for its own sake. Rather, we are interested in a typology of education that is technologically, industrially, and scientifically advanced and versatile enough to meet the crushing challenges and demands of the complexity of human psychology, modernity, development economics and development sociology, and globalization. In this context, Ghana has a long way to go in terms of the radical modernization of its educational system in response to the material and spiritual exigencies of the modern dispensation, in which vigorous pursuit of technological and industrial advancement defines policy strategies and tactics and even more so, feeds the superior psychology of progressive nationalism and the hegemonizing tendencies of radical nativist nationalism.

Some commentators, policy analysts, educationists, and sociologists have concluded that Ghanas educational system is behind the times as indicated and measured by international standards in the contexts of poor technological and industrial facilitation of its educational institutions, poor showing and sequent peripheral placements in the conduct of internationally administered tests. There is, however, no escaping the fact that the frozen institutionalization of ideological cacophony in Ghanas body politic from the imposing stratosphere of partisan politics drowns out any meaningful discourse on the etiology of the virtual failure of Ghanaian education. Many candidates associated with the negative causation of potential problems plaguing Ghanas educational system have, nonetheless, been proposed against the din of partisan politics.

Poor, bad, or substandard teaching methodologies may be just one of the many causes of falling standards in education. Yet, the general interlocking causes of falling standards in education is a complex one, somewhat beyond the scope of our reductionist simplicity. We all know what the problems are. And we also know what the solutions are. Politics and corruption are, perhaps, the greatest obstacles to implementing sound policy reforms of the educational system. Regardless, we should not ignore the relationship between quality mass education on the one hand and on the other, improved standard of living, quality of life, personal and collective advancement, and development. We believe democracy is stronger and sustainable when quality mass literacy and critical, analytic thinking and reading skills join hands in the political psychology of citizenship and collective agency.

What we can suggest now by way of potential remedies is, if we can find an effective way to demystify science, engineering, and mathematics for popular patronage and consumption in both formal and non-formal settings. In this way we remove the spectral halo of problematization from the domain of public psychology and allow it to assume policy emphasis in pedagogy and didactic methodology. This is not to say we should shun abstraction and defamiliarization in formal instruction, which are useful in the conversational methodology of formal pedagogy. Both tools are relevant for psychological and character development, individual, collective, and national. What we also need to do is to strengthen the liberal arts/the humanities/science sciences and the natural sciences via modern pedagogical methodologies.

Our schools need to teach students scientific advances in environmental awareness and the Afrocentric method. We should not leave out andragogy (adult education). On top of it all we should strive to move away from our entrenched policy overemphasis on excessive credentializing of students, to a more usable, practical, and technical education deeply rooted in the didactics of the liberal arts, Afrocentric theory and critical pedagogy, in the methodology of critical, analytic thinking and psychologizing, and in the acquisition of critical reading skills. STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education can aid this compass of methodological emphasis of critical pedagogy.

Teaching technology entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial science, management science, public speaking, and operations research to students are equally, if not more, important. This is exactly what the Accra-based Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology has done producing a Ghanaian trio, namely Philips Effah, David Osei, and Kamil Nabong, whose web-based company, Dropifi, occupies a place among tech giants in the California-based Silicon Valley. But we should be careful not to pack all our tactical and strategic eggs into one convenient basket of formal education. The inventions of the Kantanka Group of Companies, even if their inventions are based on remodel templates, speak to the danger of totally neglecting the private and non-formal educational sectors.

All of these require intense implementable research and instructional capital if we want to build that reservoir of human capital with an intrinsic capacity for technological, industrial, and scientific transformation of society.

ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS

Pollution of our prized national topography of rivers, flora (forests) and fauna, and ordinary habitations due to galamsey may not have received wider criticism from the Ghanaian media, think tanks, parliament, and the general public. Criticism of the practice from certain sectors of the Ghanaian political establishment has been ideologically cosmetic at best, lacking the caustic imprimatur of statutory enforcement in defense of public health, environmentalism, public safety, and national security concerns. It is as if we do not care mortgaging the present and future of public health to corruption, profit, and official dereliction of constitutional mandates to safeguard the environment and citizens.

It is our opinion that if the current rate of pollution of certain regional enclaves due to galamsey is not effectively checked it is going to negatively impact Ghanas GDP in a way we never anticipated. Our convenient nonchalance may cost us dearly in terms of unforeseeable and unforeseen rising disease burden and the health of posterity. Even so, pollution is already impacting Ghanas GDP in many subtle and explicit ways. However, it is the potential long-term implications of pollution costs gnawing away at Ghanas GDP and what the implications hold out for regional and national development priorities that capture our imagination. We do not want to see dangerous chemicals getting into the genetic constitution of our food chain and making their impact felt in rising disease burden and emerging diseases.

Our worry is that at present Ghana does not seem to have cutting-edge technologies and expertise to deal with the complex epidemiology of an emerging disease. Ebola comes to mind. The problem is, however, compounded by corporate greed. There is no question that corporate irresponsibility has usurped corporate social responsibility. Unfortunately some of these environmental crimes have the active support of officialdom. Traditional leadership is at the heart of the wanton rape and pollution of natural capital, as well, to the detriment of regional public health and development.

Distortions in ecological balance do not bode well for a practical homeostasis of flora and fauna co-existence. Such corrupt and greedy traditional leadership has no regard for collective agency in the management of common-pool resources (CPR). They may have forgotten that caring for the environment is not only a political responsibility but a moral one as well. Disaffected and well-meaning citizens need to drive the burning spear of collective agency via the frigid heart of traditional and corporate greed, dismantling the self-aggrandizing marriage of convenience among the grinding greed of traditional anachronism, public corruption, and vampiric corporatism, local and foreign.

Finally, while the earth may not have eschatological expectations as mortals, we may still want to believe that it is a living system with all the biologic accoutrements of livability and powers of transferable longevity to terrestrial living systems, plants and animals alike. The earth is more welcoming of mortal death than mortal finiteness is of itself. After all, the earth is what we submit to when mortal finiteness succumbs to the uncompromising dictates of the immortal coldness of death. Of course, the biologic personality of tellurian ontology is beyond the limiting grasp of mortal psychology, the psychology of secular politics, the moral oversight of mathematical psychology, and the ever-expanding mandate of land economy due to population explosion.

We shall return
09.01.2016 LISTEN

The Asamankese District Magistrate Court has sentenced a 35-year-old electrician to two years' imprisonment for defrauding by false pretences.

The convict, Ofosu Agyei, pleaded guilty when charged on five counts and the court, presided over by Charles Wiafe, convicted him on his own plea. He was ordered to pay back an amount of GH1,650 to the victims.

Chief Inspector Samuel Tetteh, presenting the facts to the court, said in December 2015, Ofosu Agyei introduced himself as a staff of the Asamankese branch of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) to some residents of Osenase namely, Oduro Moses, Emmanuel Gyan, Seth Pobi, Joseph Asiamah and Saviour Ametepe and collected a total amount of GH1,650.00 (ie: GH570.00, GH260.00, GH250.00, GH430.00 and GH140.00) respectively under the pretext of supplying them with electricity meters; but it turned out to be scam.

The prosecutor added that several attempts by the complainants to contact the convict proved futile after which a report was lodged to the Asamankese ECG and the Osenase police for investigation.

Upon further probing, the police retrieved two electricity meters from Ofosu Agyei and confessed committing the crime. He was arrested and sent to court after investigations had been completed.

BY Daniel Bampoe


09.01.2016 LISTEN

Samia Nkrumah, presidential hopeful of the Convention People's Party (CPP), has stated that her political party will break the domination of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and National Democratic Congress (NDC) during this year's elections.

She said the ruling NDC and NPP, the largest opposition political party, have all won elections held under the 4th Republic.

Samia Nkrumah stressed that the CPP would not play second fiddle to the NPP and NDC during the upcoming general elections, noting that her party would launch a thorough campaign to win the elections.

According to her, the CPP is stronger now, especially at the grassroot levels across the various constituencies in the country, indicating that the CPP would be a force to reckon with during the polls.

She stated that people who think the CPP would just add up to the numbers during the presidential and parliamentary elections would experience the shock of the lives later this year.

.

Samia Nkrumah told the media that the party had learnt from its past mistakes, and that the CPP is now battle ready to shake the political landscape of the country when Ghanaians go to the polls to elect the next president.

The confident daughter of Ghana's first president said the CPP has antidotes to the problems confronting the country, urging the electorate to rally behind the CPP to save the country from its current decline.

Reacting to Dr. Abu Sakara's decision to contest the presidential elections as an independent candidate, Samia Nkrumah said it is his personal decision and I wish him well.

According to her, Ghana is practicing democracy which gives Dr. Sakara the right to take any legal action of his choice, including contesting for the presidential slot as an independent candidate.

Samia Nkrumah said Dr. Sakara's exit from the CPP would not affect the electoral fortunes of the CPP, this year, noting that the CPP is strong and ready to win the general elections.

From I.F. Joe Awuah Jnr., Kumasi


09.01.2016 LISTEN

When the news first flipped past my ears, as I lay half-awake in the early hours of the morning, I couldnt take it in.

Ghana mentioned in the same breath as Guantanamo? How possible?

But in the next news broadcast, the two words were juxtaposed again! This time, I paid attention.

And I got the full story: Ghana was accepting, at the request of the USA, two ex-Guantanamo detainees whom the US had released from the notorious prison.

They were originally from Yemen (the report said) but they werent being allowed to return there. Ghana had agreed to let them stay in the country for two years.

My first reaction was sheer, unadulterated FEAR!

Are they mad? I asked of our Government.

If you have been following world affairs seriously, then you must pray never to have anything to do with jihadists.

By whatever name they choose to be called  Al Qaeda, AQUIM, Al Shabab, Boko Haram, ISIS, Ansah-al- Din, Ansar-al-Sharia  you just steer clear of them.

For these are not just simple political movements as we know them. They are organisations whose politics is firmly rooted in faith  and you cannot negotiate someone elses faith away.

If a person believes strongly that his faith demands x or y action, and that if, whilst accomplishing that action, he or she is killed or martyred, he/she will be rewarded by the Almighty in a pre-determined manner, then that person is, of course, , out of this world.

A fanatic of any sort is, of course, dangerous to everyone else. But a fanatic who thinks that his or her thoughts and actions are inspired, nay, dictated, by Almighty God, is altogether feral.

For you cannot REASON or argue with such a person.

Jihadists dont mind if they commit atrocities that end in the deaths of fellow Muslims of a different sect, or who are adherents of a more moderate set of beliefs.

They will tell you that it was unfortunate that fellow Muslims had to be killed or maimed during any action they took in the course of their holy war. But it was the will of God who controls everything!

.

It is because of their unbending attitude towards the beliefs of fellow humans that jihadists are held in such fear. For if they happen to miscast your position with regard to any action you take, they might retaliate by inflicting serious harm on you and your people.

Let us now look at the implications of what the Ghana Government has done. The government seems to believe that the two men sent to Ghana by the Americans  Saudi-born Yemenis Khalid al-Dhuby, 34, and Mahmoud Omar Bin Atef, 36,  are currently harmless (because the Americans have determined that they are!) and so need not be feared if they are allowed to live in Ghana.

But that is the easy part of the equation. A more important segment is this: what do the organisations they were allegedly working for when they were captured, now think of them?

If Al Qaeda thinks that someone who claimed to be working for it has been turned by the Americans during interrogation (and the Americans use torture, especially water-boarding, in their search for sensitive information from their terrorist captives) it is not likely that Al Qaeda would ever regard such a person as a hero. Would Al Qaeda come for such a person in his new abode if it regarded him as someone who eventually turned traitor? If it did, its vengeance against him could be fearsome. And that vengeance could take place anywhere on earth, because Al Qaeda is in possession of a long and well-oiled killing machine that knows no boundaries. Events in Kenya bear testimony to this Al Qaeda mindset.

But thats not all  a second scenario, equally unwelcome to Ghana, beckons. Suppose Al Qaeda regards our two guests as heroes and wants to deprive us of the honour of hosting them? Would we be able to resist an attempt to free them?

Yet a third scenario exist, namely: Suppose Al Qaeda does not care about the two men at all, but is rather more interested in drawing up a roll-call of countries upon which the USA can count, in its world-wide search for collaborators against jihadism? The US is waging this war with drones, guns and bombs world-wide, including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen and Somalia. Why does Ghana want to be put on a list of countries who have self-defined themselves as those who tacitly approve of such US actions?

It is in ignoring the possibility of being classified by Al Qaeda and its affiliates as their enemy because Ghana has been patently identified as the friend of Al Qaedas main enemy, the USA, that the Ghana Government has compromised the security of Ghana as a nation.

A risk to national security must not be contemplated by our Government under any circumstances.

The USA would not put its national interests at risk for Ghana, and the Government of Ghana should have enough sense to appreciate and realise this fact and do the same as the US would do. By the way, declining to compromise ones national security is not an unfriendly act  in case our government is concerned over how the US would react to a refusal.

One other thing: the Pentagon treats the national security of the US as being of such prime importance that it apprised the US Congress  presumably on a bi-partisan basis  before sending the two ex-Guantanamo detainees to Ghana. .

The US, which was ridding itself of persons who might constitute a security risk, sought the acquiescence of its legislators before ridding itself of that menace.

Yet the government of tiny, feeble Ghana, which was taking on a national security problem jettisoned by the mighty USA, apparently did NOT inform the elected representatives of its own people, i.e. Parliament, before embracing such a sensitive burden.

Do the Americans breathe air that is different from what Ghanaians breathe? Or what?
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Some firefighter putting out the inferno

Some prostitutes operating at Tutulane in Ashaiman have been rendered homeless following an inferno that gutted some of their structures on Thursday.

The fire, which began at about 11:30 am, razed down over 40 cubicles, which were being occupied by the sex workers, some with their children.

Condoms were seen all over the place after the fire destroyed electrical appliances, furniture, cooking utensils, among others.

The cause of the fire was not immediately known but some eyewitness, who spoke to DAILY GUIDE, said the fire was caused by a prostitute who was smoking.

Others also mentioned that the fire was caused by a welder, who was working on a container which caused a spark.

Some prostitutes, whose lost properties worth thousands of Ghana cedis, were seen wailing at the scene with their friends consoling them. No casualty was recorded.

Two suspects were also arrested by the Ashaiman Police for allegedly looting cloths and property of the affected persons. They were detained at the Ashaiman District Police Headquarters.

.

Personnel from the Ghana National Fire Service (GNFS), who responded to the distress call, took over two hours to bring the fire under total control.

Divisional Fire Officer (DFO) III, Anthony Mawuko Semey, District Fire Service Commander in Ashaiman, said two fire engines from Ashaiman Main Fire and Tema Regional Fire Services and a water tanker were used to put out the fire.

According to him, it is too early to determine the cause of the fire but investigations would be launched into the incident.

He noted that the fire could have spread to other structures if not for the swift respond.

For his part, Chief Superintendent F.S. Adikah told DAILY GUIDE that the two suspects were arrested at the scene while his personnel were providing security.

According to him, the two suspects would be arraigned before court after investigations, adding that the items had been retrieved and would be used as exhibits during the prosecution.

Some residents also appealed to government to ensure complete eviction of the said prostitutes from the area, which is noted for harbouring hardened criminals in the municipality.

They were of the view that the female sex workers, mostly foreigners and some criminals have turned the area into their hideout.

From Vincent Kubi, Ashaiman


09.01.2016 LISTEN

Ghana's President, John Dramani Mahama, and his ministers yesterday relocated to Ho, the Volta Regional Capital, to cool off and prepare adequately for the year, ahead of the November general elections.

The team, spending Friday and Saturday (January 8-9, 2016) at a retreat at the newly-opened Volta Serene Hotel, would be evaluating their activities over the last three years and preparing for the heavy schedule ahead of the presidential election which President Mahama said he would win 'one touch'.

DAILY GUIDE learnt the ministers travelled in buses to save cost, but some of the official vehicles were also seen around the programme venue, making the place very busy.

A statement released from the Media Office of the Flagstaff House, Office of the President, said the retreat was being attended by Vice President Kwesi Amissah-Arthur as well as Presidential Advisers and Staffers.

According to sources, the President would inform the team about the impending ministerial reshuffle.

They would have the opportunity to review strategies for the implementation of key policies outlined in the 2016 Budget and other initiatives in the State of the Nation Address to be delivered by the President in February.

The Ho retreat would end with a health walk on Saturday.

The Volta Regional Police Commander, DCOP Peterkin Yentumi Gyinae, told DAILY GUIDE that security in the regional capital was water-tight and that his men were collaborating with the National Security and other sister agencies to ensure an incident-free weekend.

Victory

.

President Mahama assured the ministers of a resounding victory for the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the elections.

According to him, government's efforts at improving the lives of the people would place them at an advantage over the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP).

We have done sufficient There are things that we have delivered. I feel very proud; sometimes I don't know we did it. You go to a community and the chief is praising you to high heaven for some school or some clinic I didn't even know had been put there. But everywhere you go they say 'we see the development, we have a good road, we have enough water'.

There is a track record. There is a strong performance when it comes to development and infrastructure that we can defend. We will win this election. I'm confident that we will win this election, he told his team even though Vice President Amissah-Arthur had said recently in Cape Coast that it would be a tough race.

The President also charged his appointees to prepare for the heavy schedule ahead in the last year of his first term and also emphasised the need for a carefully considered SWOT analysis to determine the way forward.

What we must do and what I am thinking must come out of here is to have an analysis of what our strengths are and what our weaknesses are and to also look at what our opportunities and what the threats are; and once we do that, we come up with a road map on how we can all work together to ensure that we win 2016.

President Mahama rubbished claims that his administration had saddled the country with huge debts running into over GH100 billion from the GH9.5 billion he inherited, saying Kwame Nkrumah's government was given the same tag.

Nkrumah had done so phenomenally when it comes to infrastructure. He had just finished the Akosombo Dam. It was months after he had switched on Akosombo and the same opposition at the time said he had run Ghana into debt and that he had borrowed so much. Exactly the same accusations we are facing now 

From Fred Duodu, Ho ( [email protected] )
09.01.2016 LISTEN

The Ashanti Regional Police Command, led by DCOP Kofi Boakye, has denied comments by a member of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) that the police support a diabolic plan of the ruling party to stockpile machetes to cause mayhem during the upcoming polls.

The police categorically distanced themselves from the irresponsible remarks made by one Robert Owusu, an NDC Communicator on Boss FM in Kumasi, stressing that the police would ensure that he faces the law.

With regard to Robert Owusu's irresponsible comments in relation to amassing and sharpening of machetes, the police, particularly DCOP Kofi Boakye, categorically disassociate themselves from such irresponsible utterances, the police stressed.

In a release, authored by the Ashanti Regional Police PRO, ASP Mohammed Yussif Tanko, the police lambasted the NDC man for inflaming passions on radio and trying to link the police to it.

He said the police would vigorously deal with the dicey matter, which poses a threat to the peace of the Ashanti region, noting that Robert Owusu would face the consequences of his action per the law.

.

Assist. Supt. Tanko said the regional police command and the National CID Headquarters, (Political Desk), have requested for copies of the said tape for the necessary action to be taken against the NDC man.

The police, he stated, would not condone and connive with any political groupings to destabilize the peace of the region, noting that the police would always discharge their professional mandate of ensuring law and order and protection of life and property devoid of political interference.

The Police PRO sternly cautioned all political parties and their commentators to be mindful of their comments on radio, noting that any person that would pass comments that have the potential of causing political tension would be arrested and prosecuted.

Meanwhile, DAILY GUIDE's checks revealed that Robert Owusu was part of NDC supporters in Kumasi, who some time last year called for an immediate transfer of DCOP Kofi Boakye from the Ashanti region.

They claimed DCOP Kofi Boakye's reputation and credibility might not augur well for the NDC in terms of the accumulation of votes because the police chief would not allow anybody to rig the 2016 polls.

FROM I.F. Joe Awuah Jnr., Kumasi


09.01.2016 LISTEN

There seems to be no turning back as regards the Electoral Commission's (EC's) decision not to compile a new voters' register for the 2016 elections and beyond, despite overwhelming evidence that the electoral roll is bloated.

The largest opposition party, the New Patriotic Party (NPP), had raised concerns about the existing electoral roll, which was used for the 2012 elections and generally believed to be flawed.

The NPP claimed the register was not only replete with foreign nationals, but also full of minors and all manner of persons who did not deserve to be on the list, compelling the EC to set up a five-member committee to investigate their grievances.

The committee in turn came out with a report which shot down the NPP's claim, saying there was no need for a new register.

The EC therefore indicated its readiness to clean the register.

Even though it was not clear what method it intended to use in cleaning the register, some including the United States of America (USA) branch of the NPP insisted there was still the need for a new voters register since the existing one was flawed.

That was what compelled the EC Boss, Charlotte Osei, to reiterate her resolve not to allow any political party to stampede the Commission.

Speaking at a press briefing in Accra, Mrs Osei said she would not allow the independence of her outfit to be toyed with.

An electoral management body should never be stampeded into taking a decision by a political party. That is why the Constitution gives you independence. People may try to stampede but you have to stand your ground and do what is right, she said.

She explained that there was inclusiveness in what they did in the sense that you need to listen to the views of all the stakeholders and examine their views and take it on board when you can. But you must always do what is right and what is legal.

She dispelled claims by the NPP that the EC had failed to contact the Togolese electoral body over claims that over 76, 000 Togolese nationals have their names and pictures in Ghana's electoral roll.

She said the main opposition party could always come to her office to verify.

You can come to our office and we'll give you copies of our letters to the Togolese electoral commission and we can also show you copies of their response on their letterhead and that should settle the matter, Mrs Osei stated.

Togolese opposition had defended the NPP saying that the register presented by Ghana's main opposition was the same register used by the French-speaking country.

Some interest groups, including the NPP and Let My Vote Count Alliance (LMVCA), had asked what the nation stands to lose in compiling a new voters' register to safeguard the credibility and integrity of the country's upcoming election, but the EC boss said the right and legal thing must always be done in accordance with the law.

She however indicated her willingness to listen and examine views from various quarters.

The NPP and the LMVCA were however yet to give their official view on the EC's position and the committee's report, even though it was clear they were all against the outcome.

By Charles Takyi-Boadu
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Uncontrollable fire on Friday swept through a large portion of the Achimota Forest, destroying a major part of the reserve.

When DAILY GUIDE visited the scene, major parts of the forest had been razed down with smoke still emanating from some tree stumps.

A vast area of the forest close to the Abelemkpe roundabout, towards the Greater Accra Regional Forestry Commission office, had been lost to the fire which according to an eyewitness started around 11:45am.

Another eyewitness told the paper that attempts by some workers of the Forestry Commission, together with the police and other volunteers, to bring the fire under control while they awaited the Fire Service team to get to the scene proved futile due to the high harmattan winds.

The Fire Service personnel from the Abelemkpe fire station were said to have fought the raging fire for close to an hour before extinguishing it.

Though the cause of the fire was not immediately known, Edith Ansah, the Greater Accra Regional Manager of the Forestry Commission, said she suspected that the fire was ignited by wee smokers who were smoking in the forest.

I suspect that the wee smokers went in there to do their own thing but failed to completely put out their flames. Last year around this time, the same thing happened and we had parts of the forest burnt as well, Madam Ansah told DAILY GUIDE in an interview.

My reason is that from what we saw, the fire started right in the middle of the forest or let's say right within the forest. But if it started outside, I would have said a passer-by had thrown away a cigarette stump which had caused it, she added.

Though we patrol the forest a lot, these smokers lurk around till my patrol team go for lunch or break and as soon as they leave, the boys go in there to do their own thing, she said.

She urged Ghanaians to be very careful in handling fire close to bushes or forest areas in this dry season to avert fire destroying the country's forest and game reserves.

Within the past 62 hours, Ghana has recorded several fire outbreaks and it is feared that more incidents could occur during this severe harmattan period if precautionary measures are not put in place.

By Nii Ogbamey Tetteh

[email protected]
09.01.2016 LISTEN

A police officer and fiancee of Anthony Anyomi, a 34-year-old student who posed as a lawyer, on Thursday broke down and wept bitterly, pleading with her senior colleague police officers to temper justice with mercy and not prosecute her fiance, whom she was scheduled to wed today.

The lady, who was reportedly shocked upon hearing that the suspect had been grabbed for claiming to be a lawyer, went and pleaded with the authorities not to go ahead and put the suspect on trial yesterday so that their wedding could come off today.

However the prosecuting team, led by Chief Superintendent Duuti Tuaruka, yesterday hauled the suspect before an Accra Circuit Court presided over by Mrs Patricia Quansah.

He was charged with impersonation but denied the offence and was remanded in police custody while the prosecuting team was ordered to furnish the court with a list of cases the suspect was handling before his arrest.

The case was then adjourned to January 14, 2016. With the decision of the court, it means that the suspect will be in detention instead of spending time with his wife.

The order came fresh off the heels of a submission by the prosecuting officer that the suspect had acted as counsel in a number of cases currently before the Circuit Courts in Accra and Ada.

Facts

The facts of the case, as presented by Prosecuting Officer Chief Supt Tuaruka, are that upon information that Anyomi was posing as a lawyer and was handling cases within Accra, the police mounted intelligence on him.

According to him, the suspect was arrested on January 5, 2016 while he was representing some unsuspecting persons at an Accra Circuit Court.

.

He said after the arrest of the accused person, a number of police prosecutors came forward and identified Anyomi as someone who had posed as a lawyer in a number of cases, some of which were still pending at the Circuit Courts in Accra and Ada.

He stated that during interrogation, the suspect admitted that he was not a lawyer and noted that the police were still conducting investigations.

Messrs Sylvester Nyamekye, John Bernard Otto and Seidu Nasigri, counsel for the accused person, had said the suspect was a student whose fiancee was a police officer, adding that they were about to wed in less than 24 hours.

They said the offence was bailable and noted that the suspect would not desert his wife because of the case and would assist police in investigations.

According to them, the fiancee of the suspect was also pregnant and was likely to suffer psychological discomfort and emotional trauma if the wedding did not come off and prayed the court to allow the suspect to have the wedding as plans were far advanced for the occasion and invitation cards had been sent out.

Supt Tuaruka however said the matter was still under investigation and that the suspect would interfere with investigations if granted bail.

The trial judge consequently said even though the defence team sounded convincing in their submission, the suspect would be remanded for the court to be furnished with a list of all his cases.

The suspect, who once served time in prison for stealing a police officer's uniform and released in 2014, was nabbed by police officers around the court premises after suspicion was raised about his conduct in court.

Anyomi, when asked by police prosecutors as to when he was called to the bar, mentioned 2014 but kept changing the date when he could not mention any classmate of his or any lawyer he was called to the bar with.

By Fidelia Achama


09.01.2016 LISTEN

The Akan have a saying that whenever you point your accusatory index-finger at your neighbor, you ought to recognize the fact of your three other fingers pointing directly and squarely at the accuser. This was the first feeling and thought that rushed through my mind when I read the article captioned Media Mustnt Plunge Ghana into Violence 2016  Rev. AsanteStarrfmonline.com / Ghanaweb.com 12/14/15).

There is absolutely no evidence, whatsoever, in Ghanas entire postcolonial history of the medias having plunged the country into any form of chaos and confusion. Rather, it has been leaders from Kwame Nkrumah to Jerry John Rawlings who have plunged our country into turmoil and on the verge of civil strife. And so the Most-Rev. Emmanuel Asante, the current Chairman of the so-called Ghana Peace Council (GPC), would make himself more relevant by addressing most of his quite laudable cautionary notes to our politicians and leaders, in particular the so-called opinion leaders, including himself.

You know, the pontifical stance of the former Presiding Bishop of the Methodist Church of Ghana reminds me of a St. Peters (PERSCO) classmate and friend of mine called Michael Thomford. I probably have his first name incorrectly given; and who can blame me for the quite significant impact of mnemonic corrosion of these past 34-odd years? Anyway, what brought up the name of Michael Thomfordwith which I wanted to regale my dear reader, is the colonial history behind my old friend and classmates surname. Or perhaps, more appropriately, my old classmate and good friend. For we were first schoolmates and classmates before we became friends.

Well, family legend has it that Michaels grandfather, AgyaTuwohofo (Advise Yourself), traveled to the Sekondi-Takoradi Location or Railroad Terminal looking for a menial job to enable him take care of himself and his family sometime during the late 1920s or 30s, perhaps in the searing wake of the Great Depression. AgyaTuwohofo had lined up with quite a remarkable number of job applicants all of who came up, by turns, to have their names written down by the European clerk at the employment office. Then after what seemed like a whole lifetime, AgyaTuwohofo  he must have been a young man in his late 20s or early 30s, came up to the front of the queue.

What is your name? the white clerk looked intently into his eyes. My name is Tuwohofo, the job applicant shyly cooed, we are told. What? Come again, young man, what is your name? My name is Tuwohofo. Oh, how could I have missed this!? Pardon me, young man, but we also have the exact same name in England where I grew up. Thomford. Your name is Thomford.

That, in essence, was how the Thomford Family got its badly corrupted Anglicized name. I suppose the Tuwohofo family hails from the Elmina-Cape Coast littoral. What I am saying in no mistakable terms here is that the Rev.-Prof. Asante did not need to have reminded our media reporters, producers and talk-show hosts and newscasters that they have great power beyond the imagination of the average Ghanaian citizen, whatever the meaning of average may be vis-a-vis the concept of Ghanaian citizenship. The most progressive and qualified Ghanaian journalists  both of the print and the electronic media  already know this. And besides, we are blessed with a National Media Commission (NMC) that already does quite a good job bringing our errant journalists and other media operatives to book, that is, those who do not get physically roughed up by such presidential human bulldogs as Mr. Stanislav Dogbe.

I was also quite intrigued to hear Prof. Asante bitterly decry the fact of him having come under malicious media attacks in recent months. I was in no small way intrigued, quite obviously because oftentimes Rev. Asante appears to be preaching to a congregation of adolescent Ghanaians rather than full-fledged mature adult media practitioners, irrespective of how relatively wet-eared a sizeable majority of these journalists and reporters may be. Then also, Rev. Asante could make himself and the Peace Council he heads more relevant and effective, if he and his group focus a bit more of their energies on the real culprits on our national political landscape, that is, the terrorist-hosting cynical politicians at the Flagstaff House, Parliament and their main rivals and opponents waiting in the wings, poised to fiercely pounce at the drop of a pin.

*Visit my blog at: kwameokoampaahoofe.wordpress.com Ghanaffairs
09.01.2016 LISTEN

The New Patriotic Party UK calls on Hanna SerwaaTetteh,Ghanas Minister of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, to resign immediately. Madam Tettehhas misled Ghanaians about why terrorists previously imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay have been brought to Ghana, thereby placing the whole of Ghana and all Ghanaians at risk ofterrorist attack.

In an official statement, Madam Tetteh told Ghanaiansthat two detainees from Guantanamo Bay who have just been expatriated to Ghana had been cleared by the US security authorities and were not a threat to national security. She was being economical with the truth.

This is not the first time MadamTettehhas made conflicting statements. In November 2014, asGhanas Minister of Foreign Affairs, she sat on Radio Gold and said that the jailed socialite NayeleAmetefe (aka Ruby AduGyamfi), now serving eight years and eight months in the UKfor drug smuggling offences, had thought she was carrying gold dust in luggage she took to London. British police and customs officials later certified that the gold dust was narcotics: 12.5 kilograms of cocaine, worth nearly 2 million. The same NayeleAmetefe, arriving at KotokaInternational Airport to board the plane to London on which she was arrested on 10 November 2014,was given VVIP access by Ghana national security officials through the airport in Accra.

In Madam Tettehs statement, the Foreign Minister failed to tell Ghanaians that these two terrorists, Mahmoud Omar Bin Atif and Khalid SalihAl Dhuby, were already in the country. This created the impression that the former detainees were about to arrive and Ghanaians had nothing to fear.

It has also emerged that she did not inform Parliament because Deputy Ranking spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Mr IssacOsei MP for Subin has stated in an interview with the press that parliament had not been informed .This to us is gross abuse of power .

However, it has emerged that bothmen, whether proven terrorists or not, received training in Afghanistan with the Taliban. The Talibanare still waging a war against the democratically elected Afghan government, in tandem with the work ofal-Qaeda, which has links to Islamic State and other terrorist groups operating in the Middle East and Africa. In fact, one of the two men now in Ghana was an aide of Osama Bin Laden.

The government of Sudan took some of these ex-Guantanamo Bay inmatessome years ago. Of two prisoners transferred in December 2013, at least one escaped to Yemen tocommit atrocities.Another one who transferred to Sudanin 2012 is now a terror chief in Yemen. The leopard does not change its spots!

The United States government thought it fit to detainboth of these men for years.In a Fox Television news report as well as on ABC News, the men were described as high security risk: in other words, they are dangerous and prone to engage in terrorism.

We in NPP UK believe that common sense rather than financial benefit and personal gain should guide our leaders. Thesecurity, welfare and well-being of the people of Ghana are more important than the interests of our selfish leaders. Our rights cannot be horse-traded for money, or to curry favour with the US government for its support in helping to win elections!

We respect the United States and admire its democratic values and freedoms. The United States is the most powerful country in the world. It has military bases everywhere from Europe to the Pacific.If these men are a danger to US citizens, does that mean Ghanaians are second-class beings, and soterrorists should be dumped on us, endangeringordinaryGhanaians lives?

Former Ghanaian President John AgyekumKufuor together with Nigeria and Algeria refused the request of the United States government in 2007 to set up a US Africa Command (AFRICOM) with military bases in their countries.

Mr. Kufuor flatly rejected the idea of AFRICOM in Ghana. He put the welfare, security and wellbeing of Ghanaians first, something President Mahama and Hannah Tetteh have failed to do!

The Ghana Government under President Mahamais incapable ofbringing an end to the current long trail of power cuts, armed robberies and financial crimes which are collapsing business in our country, putting people out of work, depriving our people of food, decent education and healthcare, and causing daily misery for our people. Recently a million bullets were discovered, brought into Ghana fromTogo to cause mayhem;up to date no one has been arrested. According to news reports in the last few days, Arthur Simpson Kent, who is being sought by the Metropolitan Police in connection with the murder of a reputable Britishtelevision actress and her two young children, has been able to fleeto Ghana.Interpol has had to intervene to assist the Ghana Government to find this man, because Ghanas forces of law and order dont have the ability or resources to track him down. It is into this environment that Madam Hanna Tetteh has decided to bring two men with a track record of training in terrorist activities.

HannaTetteh is unfit to be a Minister of Foreign Affairs. Shehas been untruthful and dishonest. She must go now!

8 January 2016

Nana Yaw Sarpong

Communications Officer

NPP UK

07983302369
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Over the weekend, Ghananewsmedia.com got in touch with the Director of Operations of the Concerned Ghanaians  USA, Kwame Agyemang-Budu to seek the reaction of hisgroup on the response of the EC to the clarion call for a new voters register of which they have been actively involved.

Without mincing words, the dynamic demo organizer stated that he and his group are very disappointed in the response of the EC in the face of all the evidence that have been put before them. He said stance of the EC does not promote consensus building which is key in ensuring peace in our country during 2016 elections. He was quick to add that they are least surprise at the ECs conduct; appearing adamant to all calls from political parties (other than the NDC) civil societies, and pressure groups such as Let My Vote Count (LMVC) Alliance. He said such reckless posture by the EC boss, Charlotte Oseishows the lines of dictate of the Mahama government to the EC which in his opinion is tantamount to political unrest in the country.

Kwame Budu told Ghananewsmedia.comthat the group followed keenly the discussion of the forum organized by the EC to examine the concerns raised about the existing voter register and came to the conclusion that, but for the rascality of the EC, there is no way the existing voters register should be used for the impending 2016 elections. It is just unacceptable, he fumed.

The operations director hinted that Concerned Ghanaians USA are not perturbed by the actions and inactions of the EC in their response to LMVC Alliance. He said his group will continue to demonstrate fervently against the presence of John Mahama and his cronies at any international platform in the USA. He added that they will continue to protest to the international community about the dangers lurking in the political atmosphere for Ghana should the existing voters register be used for the impending 2016 elections. He stated that they will let investors and donor agencies know the volatile situation that Ghana finds herself.

Concerned Ghanaians  USA through their operations director indicated to Ghananewsmedia.com that the group is in full support of the position taken by the LMVC Alliance to further seek legal redress of the concerns they have raised over the discredited voters register. Kwame Buduencouraged members of the LMVC Alliance and others civil societies in the fight for electoral decency and fairness to continuously be resolute and firm in their fight for the love our country. Hehowever appealed to the conscience of the EC boss, Charlotte Osei to put the love of country above serving her appointers and other parochial interests. He said it is better for the EC to listen and act in accordance with the will of the majority of Ghanaians than reduce our beloved country into a state of pandemonium in the not too distant future.

Next Monday, the Operations Director of Concerned Ghanaians-USA, Kwame Agyemang-Budu will be travelling to Ghana to meet with the leaders of LMVC Alliance and render the unwavering support of his group to the alliance as they take the next step to seek legal remedy about the existing bloated and foreigners-infiltrated voters register of Ghana.

It must be noted that ConcernedGhanaians  USA have been part of the clarion call for the demand of a new voters register ahead of 2016 elections. They have been behind most demonstrations that have rocked John Mahama and his government atall times that they have visited the USA. Concerned Ghanaians  USA is an anti-corruption group that seeks social, political and economic justice for all Ghanaians!

God Bless Our Homeland, Ghana!

Amponsah Stonash

Ghananewsmedia.com
09.01.2016 LISTEN

WHEN the news first flipped past my ears, as I lay half-awake in the early hours of the morning, I couldn't take it in.

Ghana mentioned in the same breath as Guantanamo? How possible?

But in the next news broadcast, the two words were juxtaposed again! This time, I paid attention.

And I got the full story: Ghana was accepting, at the request of the USA, two ex-Guanatanamo detainees whom the US had released from the notorious prison. They were originally from Yemen (the report said) but they weren't being allowed to return there. Ghana had agreed to let them stay in the country for two years.

My first reaction was sheer, unadulterated FEAR! Horror -- pure and simple.

Are they mad? I asked of our Government.

If you have been following world affairs seriously, then you must pray never to have anything to do with jihadists. By whatever name they choose to be called  Al Qaeda, AQUIM, Al Shabab, Boko Haram, Isis, Ansar-al- Din, Ansar-al-Sharia  you just steer clear of them.

For these are not just simple political movements as we know them. They are organisations whose politics is firmly rooted in faith  and you cannot negotiate someone else's faith away.

If a person believes strongly that his faith demands x or y action, and that if, whilst accomplishing that action, he or she is killed or martyred, he/she will be rewarded by the Almighty in a pre-determined manner, then that person is, of course, , out of this world.

A fanatic of any sort is, of course, dangerous to everyone else. But a fanatic who thinks that his or her thoughts and actions are inspired, nay, dictated, by Almighty God, is altogether feral.

For you cannot REASON or argue with such a person.

Jihadists don't mind if they commit atrocities that end in the deaths of fellow Muslims of a different sect, or who are adherents of a more moderate set of beliefs. They will tell you that it was unfortunate that fellow Muslims had to be killed or maimed during any action they took in the course of their holy war. But it was the will of God who controls everything!

It is because of their unbending attitude towards the beliefs of fellow humans that jihadists are held in such fear. For if they happen to miscast your position with regard to any action you take, which they think goes against their interests, they might retaliate by inflicting serious harm on you and your people.

Let us now look at the implications of what the Ghana Government has done. The Government seems to believe that the two men sent to Ghana by the Americans  Saudi-born Yemenis Khalid al-Dhuby, 34, and Mahmoud Omar Bin Atef, 36,  are currently harmless (because the Americans have determined that they are!) and so need not be feared if they are allowed to live in Ghana.

But that is the easy part of the equation. A more important aspect is this: what do the organisations they were allegedly working for when they were captured, now think of them?

If Al Qaeda thinks that someone who claimed to be working for it has beenturned by the Americans during interrogation (and the Americans do use torture, especially water-boarding, in their search for sensitive information from their terrorist captives) it is not likely that Al Qaeda would ever regard such a person as a hero. Would Al Qaeda come for such a person in his new abode if it regarded him as as someone who eventually turned traitor? If it did, its vengeance against him could be fearsome. And that vengeance could take place anywhere on earth, because Al Qaeda is in possession of a long and well-oiled killing machine that knows no boundaries. Events in Kenya bear testimony to this Al Qaeda mindset and capability.

But that's not all  a second scenario, equally unwelcome to Ghana, beckons. Suppose Al Qaeda regards our two guests as heroes and wants to deprive us of the honour of hosting them? Would we be able to resist an attempt to free them?

Yet a third scenario exists, namely: Suppose Al Qaeda does not care about the two men at all, but is rather more interested in drawingupa roll-call of countries upon which the USA can count, in its world-wide search for collaborators against jihadism? The US is ruthlessly deploying drones, guns and bombs to wage this War against targets world-wide, including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen and Somalia. Why does Ghana want to be put on a list of countries who have self-defined themselves as those who tacitly approve of such US actions that often cause the deaths of innocent people, including women and children?

By ignoring the possibility of being classified by Al Qaeda and its affiliates as their enemy because Ghana has been patently identified as the collaborator of Al Qaeda's main enemy, the USA, the Ghana Government has iexplicably compromised the security of Ghana as a nation.

It has also negated Ghana's traditional policy of resisting the attempts of foreign powers to recruit it to their side in international conflicts. Ghana adopted a policy of non-alignment from 1957 because it was in its enlightened self-interst not to make itself a target in conflicts that had nothing to do with it.

A risk to national security must not be contemplated by our Government under any circumstances. The USA would not put its national interests at risk for Ghana, and the Government of Ghana should have enough sense to appreciate this fact and do the same as the US would do. By the way, declining to compromise one's national security is not an unfriendly act -- in case our Government is concerned over how the US would react to a refusal.

One other thing: the Pentagon regards the national security of the US as being of such prime importance that it apprised the US Congress  presumably on a bi-partisan basis of its decision to send the detainees to Ghana before sending them. The US, which wasridding itselfof persons who might constitute a security risk, sought the acquiescence of its legislators before ridding itself of that menace.

Yet the Government of tiny, feeble Ghana, which was taking on a national security problem jettisoned by the mighty USA, apparently did NOT inform the elected representatives of its own people, i.e. Parliament, before saddling itself with such a dangerous burden.

Do the Americans breathe an air that is different from what Ghanaians breathe? Or what?

www.cameronduodu.com
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Something just doesn't add up. Two Guantanamo detainees being transferred to Ghana. Why?

The news said : Two Yemeni detainees Mahmoud Omar Bin Atefand Khalid al-Dhuby- held at the controversial US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have been transferred to Ghana.

Both have been held for more than a decade and have never been charged.

Ghana has given permission for the men to stay for two years subject to security clearances, Foreign Minister Hanna Tetteh said.

The West African nation has not previously taken any Guantanamo prisoners.My first question iswhy now ?Then again it may well be that its the first time weve been asked. And being the hospitable people were said to be, we obliged.

Some of us want an explanation on how high-risk and medium-risk changed tono risk. Or is it low risk? Those in authority owe some urgent explanations. And quite frankly itll helpful if the explanations are well thought-out. What Ive heard so far is not compelling. Itsunconvincing and certainly not reassuring.

Over a decade in captivity and some people think the detaineeshabour no ill-feelings against their captors and society. Hmmmm...Mandela traits ..not sure its a common trait. Try caging an animal for a period, free it after a while and observe its reaction. Its likely to go for anything in sight.

Its not likely to offer a thank yougesture for freeing it. And in this case were dealing with people who have gone through years of ideological indoctrination before their captivity.

Human as I am, I may be wrong. But thisis not something that we ought to risk willingly, unless of course there are compelling reasons!Maybe and just maybe theres something we the(citizenry) dont know and may never know in the interest of global diplomacy. Easy way to take cover.Hmmmm... So whats in this for mother Ghana? Certainly, not just brownie points!

Try as I have I still cant get my head round it. Perhaps Parliament will succeed.

Thankfully, Major DerekOduro (rtd), Ranking Member of Parliaments Defence and Interior Committee,has indicated that they will push for an early reconvening of the House to enable the legislators quiz Foreign Affairs Minister, Hanna Tetteh, over this matter.

Isaac Osei,Deputy ranking member on the Parliamentary Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, has also questioned the decision; an indication that hell support any effort to examine the matter.

Parliament of Ghana, were watching you with bated breath. How many days did you spend on Professor Alex Dodoo and Black Rasta regarding the Ebola Trial matter? Three or so.

Well, for some of us, this detainee transfer matteris priority and thusdeserves total attention. Given the urgency,Parliament ought to reconvene ASAP to put this matter to rest.

We wish the Parliamentarians Gods guidance.
Folks, sometimes one is compelled to ask, do we have sensible leaders in Ghana? Some of the decisions that President Mahama and his government have taken are difficult to believe.

First, while the oil price in the world market continues to fall and consumers in countries around the world are enjoying cheaper and cheaper fuel price at the browser, the consumer price of fuelin Ghanahas gone in the opposite direction because the insensitive government has imposed up to 28% tax on the prices of oil products. Meanwhile President Mahama and his appointees will not bear the hardship that the increase in the fuel price will cause because they draw free oil from the tax payers for their V8 motorcade that burns fuel at a very high rate.

Less than a month ago, this same insensitive government spent huge amount of money to inscribe the portraits of the President on buses at an alarming cost to the tax payers, with Ms Selassie Ibrahim, a NDC activist being the main beneficiary of the inflated cost. As readers may know, the then transport minister resigned as a result, after justifying the cost for the inscription.

Now, the mother of allstupid decisions by the Mahama Government has come as a shock to all Ghanaians and even NDC core members, when the Government had secretly negotiated with the US Government to have two notoriousGuantanamo detainees to be transferred to Ghana. Why is Mr Mahama inviting problem for Ghana when we cannot even deal with our own problems.The Akans say asem ne fie, na wako fa asem abe fie in other words, you invite trouble when there is no need for it.

The US Government itself from all that they have said still consider these people to posse some risks, so why should the Government accept these obviously dangerous people into Ghana. Of course, the Government can continue to deny that they receive financial benefit for this reckless decision, but no sensible person is going to believe that.

It seems that so far this government does not make sensible decisions at allfrom STX project to SADA, GYEEDA, fraudulent payment to Wayome and its retrieval, they have all proved fiasco and at high costs to Ghanaians. It appears a spell has been cast upon President Mahama that is why he is getting all his major decisions so wrong. Clearly, only one word can describe the President and his GovernmentINCOMPETENCE.

I hope Ghanaians will not forget these reckless decisions that have caused hardship in the country and vote incompetent Mahama out in November, otherwise he will completely destroy Ghana. Obviously, he was not even a presidential material, he only got there by an accident caused by the mysterious death of President Atta Mills.

Author: Joseph Annor
Since President John Dramani Mahama announced Mrs. Charlotte Osei as the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission, I have heard a lot of people raise concerns about her capabilities. Not many doubt her competence as a person. Their beef is her gender.

This position is not for a woman, they say. This is a mans job.

What is the main difference between a man and a woman? Or what does a man have which a woman does not have? In my opinion, it is the penis. Yes, that troublesome mini-cobra which eventually ruins those who are not able to tame it, is the main difference between a man and woman.

In my opinion, Charlotte Osei does not need a penis to succeed. In other words, one does not need to be a man to succeed as the head of the Electoral Commission. I admit that job is a very tough one. But it is not a job that needs physical strength. It is not a job that requires masculine strength at all.

If that were the case, Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan would not have been a candidate at all. It only needs someone with mental toughness to succeed. And nothing shows that a woman cannot be mentally tough.

You cannot doubt the mental strength of the species who endure excruciating menstrual cramps and still write exams and beat their male counterparts. You cannot doubt the mental strengths of the people who are able withstand labour pains. And you certainly cannot underestimate the mental strength of those who carry pregnancy for nine months and still live their lives and work like anyone else. Men would need extra-mental strength to go through one week of flow every month. Man, do you still think this woman has no mental strength?

To succeed as the EC boss, one needs good conscience. One has to be incorruptible. One has to be credible. There are many corrupt men who have run down many state institutions. A few women have messed up, too, but we have not heard anything of that sort about Mrs. Charlotte Osei.

Some have said she will be biased because she has affiliation with the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC). I think that point is invalid. Who in this country does not have a soft spot for any political party? Do we know of a Ghanaian of good standing who does not vote and who should be made the EC boss because of their supposed neutrality?

Can we even say that such people are neutral just because they do not vote? Whether the appointment is done by President Mahama or any independent institution (as some people are suggesting but are without the faintest idea the planet from which that institution will fall) the EC boss will have some sort of affiliation or soft spot for one political party.

Mrs. Charlotte Osei, like any normal human being in our republic, cannot be neutral. She can only be fair and impartial in her dealing with the political parties involved. She can be true to her conscience and put Ghana beyond her personal or party interests.

Whether Charlotte Osei will succeed or not is a choice. If she wants to succeed, there are a few things I think she should do:

She should thank President Mahama for appointing her to that enviable office, but she should know she doesnt owe allegiance to the President or his political party. She should know that like, Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, Presidents and political parties will come and go but she will be there. Only her integrity can keep her afloat the turbulent waters of our immature democracy.

Mrs. Charlotte Osei should know that she is carrying the hopes and aspirations of millions of women in our republic. There are people who still believe that women are not fit for the position she is occupying. How she performs will either put them to shame or vindicate them. She must not fail.

Finally, she has to psyche herself to the reality that will confront her. She is now like a ripe mango tree by the roadside and she should prepare for a lot of stones. Our elders say a person who does not like greetings must not farm by the main village path. She has taken a tough job. Like Kofi Anann was once told when he was appointed Secretary General of the United Nations, she has accepted a job from hell. It is an important job that must be done. And the lots have fallen on her.

Her position will attract a lot of attention, for the good and bad reasons. She will be insulted and abused. She will be vilified and accused. Even if she is fairer than an angel, she will be accused of bias. But she should learn from Dr. Afari-Gyan. He was named Ghanas apostle of Integrity by the Royal House Chapel, and many Ghanaians agreed with that citation.

But both the NDC and NPP have taken turns to praise or vilify him, depending on whose favour the pendulum of election victory or defeat swung. As a piece of advice, she should not listen to some radio talk shows and guard against wanting to please anybody.

The spotlight is on you, Madam Referee. Welcome to our turbulent political pitch. The battle has begun for you. We mere mortals are only spectators. We will praise you if our team wins. We hiss and curse at you on the touchline if our team is losing.

But your true judges are far better and fairer than those of us with vested interests in this game. And who these true judges of yours?

Your conscience.

Posterity.

And the ageless Old Man beyond the azure skies.

The boy from Albert Abongos Bongo Constituency of the Upper East Region can only wish you the best of luck.

May you succeed.

May our democracy grow under your watch.

And may Ghana succeed.
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - A 34-year old student, who was nabbed at the court premises parading as a lawyer, has been remanded into lawful custody by an Accra Circuit Court.

Anthony Anyomi, charged with impersonation, pleaded not guilty.

He is expected to reappear on January 14 before the Court presided over by Ms Patricia Quansah.

His remand followed prosecution submission that the Police were investigating the matter.

Chief Superintendent of Police Mr Duuti Tuaruka said the Police were yet to compile the number of cases he had been defending in the various courts as well as retrieve his gown and wig which he had been using in his operations.

A team of four lawyers led by Mr Seidu Nasigri prayed the Court to admit their client to bail as he was scheduled to get married the next day to a pregnant Police officer.

Mr Nasigri said Anyomi would not interfere with police investigations as alleged by the Police.

He said the Police had completed their investigation and they had nothing to add to that.

Mr Sylvester Lamptey, second Counsel, contended that the charges leveled against his client were bailable as he had a fixed place of abode and would appear anytime to stand trial.

Mr Lamptey said denying him bail would be of great disservice as he was set to get married the next day.

The Court, however, ruled that the accused should have thought of the consequence of his actions although he was to presumed innocent until proven otherwise.

According to the Court the prosecution was also going to compile the list of cases and assess the status of those cases.

It, therefore, denied him bail.

Prosecution's case was that the Police received information that accused was parading as a lawyer at the court premises.

The prosecutor said the Police therefore mounted surveillance and on January 6, when he appeared at Circuit Court Three, he was nabbed.

According to the prosecutor a number of Court Warrant Officers, Registrars had stated that Anyomi has been representing people in cases before the court.

'When Anyomi was questioned by the Police, he admitted that he was not a lawyer,' the prosecutor said.

GNA
Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - Professor Sylvester Achio, Rector of the Accra Polytechnic, has called for more investment into tertiary education and research as they are the main engine through which Ghana could achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.

'At no point in history has it been more important to invest in higher education, as a major force in the eradication of poverty and the attainment of sustainable development than at this time', he said.

Speaking during the 23rd matriculation of 4,791 students at the Polytechnic on Friday, Prof Achio, said the current economic crisis that had hit many countries, including Ghana had affected the fortunes of the educational institutions as funding for its GETFund projects had delayed.

The admitted students were made up of Bachelor of Technology students and Higher National Diploma students on both full and part time basis.

In all, the School of Business and Management Studies admitted 2,740 applicants, while the School of Applied Sciences and Arts also admitted 1,155 students, with the School of Engineering admitting 896 applicants.

Prof Achio said the net freeze on public sector employment in the country had also constrained the school's expansion drive as the Polytechnic had not been able to employ lecturers and other auxiliary staff to augment its staff strength.

He said as part of the Polytechnic's objective to increase access to quality education, it has revised the content of some of its HND programmes and introduced more Bachelor of Technology degree programmes to help solve societal problems.

'The institution is also joining forces with the alumni association to serve as a vehicle for marketing the polytechnic to the job market, providing opportunities for staff development, as well as offering job satisfaction and motivation to staff to develop a high human resource capacity'', he said.

He said schemes available for students with financial difficulties include: the Disability Bursary Scheme for disabled students, the Government Scholarship Scheme for brilliant science and mathematics students as well as the Council for Technical and Vocational Education Training (COTVET) Scholarship also for brilliant but needy students.

The Rector appealed to the newly admitted students to make maximum use of the opportunity offered them by the Polytechnic.

He called on the students to eschew violence and channel all their grievances through the Office of the Dean of Students for redress.

GNA
Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - Air Commodore Maxwell Mantsebi-Tei Nagai, the new Chief of Air Staff of the Ghana Armed Forces, has reiterated his commitment and dedication to ensure that the Air Force operates efficiently.

The new Chief of Air Staff said this during the handing over ceremony and to bid farewell to Air Vice Marshal Michael Samson-Oje.

Air Commodore Mantsebi-Tei Nagai promised to continue from where his predecessor left off, adding that he would work assiduously to lift the flag to a higher pedestal.

'I have always told Air Vice Marshal Samson-Oje that, taking over from him is like collecting a 4 x 100 metre relay baton from Usain Bolt to finish the last quarter of a race', he said.

He promised to consult his predecessor to tap on his enormous experience and commended Air Vice Marshal Samson-Oje for making the service vibrant and robust.

Air Vice Marshal Samson-Oje said his tenure of seven years saw a vigorous revamping of the Service in terms of acquisition of new platforms and associated ground support equipment, infrastructural developments and manpower enhancements.

He commended the new Chief of Air Staff for his loyalty, professionalism and dedication to duty, urging him not to lose sight of these values.

He also commended all personnel for the roles played leading to the success of the service and urged them to give equal support to his successor.

GNA
Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - The National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE), with support from the European Union, has stepped up a nationwide civic education campaign on the Local Government System.

The move is to help enhance public awareness on the concept of the local governance with emphasis on the structures, roles of the Unit Committee and District Assembly members.

Speaking at a meeting held atat Kadjebi in the Volta Region, Mr Kenneth Kponor, the Volta Regional Director of the NCCE, said the programme sought to rekindle community participation in the activities of local government units at the grassroots level.

He said the country was not reaping the full benefit of the local government system due to apathy by the citizenry, adding that the high level of disinterest has implications for effective grassroots participation and inclusive development.

He said there was the need for a holistic assessment to understand and find solutions to the reasons for low patronage of citizens at the local level.

Mr Daniel Agbesi Latsu, the Kadjebi District Director of the NCCE, called on Ghanaians to demonstrate patriotism and to be fully committed to their civic duties, by getting involved in the decision-making process of the state at all levels.

He said the participatory democracy occurs when the citizenry realise the need to contribute to the decision-making process and did not sit on the fence only to engage in the 'blame game' if things went wrong.

Mr Latsu said the stated aim of the Local Government Law, 1988 (PNDC Law 207) which introduced the District Assembly Concept was 'to promote popular participation and ownership of the machinery of government by devolving power, competence and resources/means at the district level'.

Mr Joseph Kwadwo Ofori, the Member of Parliament for Akan Constituency, said it was obvious that the lower structures of the local government system were not working.

He urged the assembly members not to lose sight of the fact that development was inclusive hence the need to bring all on board in the fight against poverty, hunger, and diseases.

Mr Jimah Yakubu, the Kadjebi District Coordinating Director, called on all stakeholders to enhance the district assembly concept by making the sub-structures of the assembly functional.

Mr Yakubu, who spoke on the topic: 'the inter- relationship between the Unit Committee, Area /Town/ Urban Councils and the Assembly member', said the relationship between the Assembly members, the councils and unit committees should not be a master-servant one but rather they should assist and mutually benefit from each other.

He said the councils and unit committees formed important structures through which various communities have opportunities to relate to the assemblies.

Similar programmes have been held at Ho, Kpando, Jasikan, Nkwanta, Keta, Kete-Krachi and Hohoe.

GNA
Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - The Association of Magistrates and Judges and the International Association of Women Judges, Ghana branch on Friday donated assorted items to the Ghana Prisons Service Council.

The items, which are to be given to inmates of the country's prisons, include 28 cartons of Keysoap, 10 cartons of Sunlight soap, 37 cartons of Carbolic soap and a carton of Pepsodent.

Presenting the items, Sir Justice Denis Adjei, President of the Association of Magistrates and Judges, said the donation was part of their social responsibility cause of giving to inmates and others in need.

Sir Justice Adjei, who is a Court of Appeal Judge, said it behoves on judges to show care and support to inmates and this is besides their constitutional duties.

'In the bible Jesus declared that 'when I was in prison, you did not care for me'. We are here showing our care to the inmates because we do not only discharge our constitutional duties,' he said.

Reverend Dr Stephen Y. Wengam, Chairman of the Council, said the donation was going to bring healing to the inmates.

He said it would also make the inmates appreciate the functions of judges who are not only interested in their incarceration.

He appealed to other state institutions, religious groups and benevolent organisations to support the Ghana Prison Service.

GNA
Accra, Jan. 8, GNA - Mr Thomas Svanikier, Executive Chairman of Svani Group, has donated GH 50,000 in aid of an endowment fund for the Winneba Youth Choir (WYC), in line with his increasing support towards the education of young people.

The amount serves as seed money for the fund, which aims at supporting the education and welfare needs of the members of the choir and needy children.

In addition to the financial support, the Svani Group has donated a saloon car to the Choir Master to help him to effectively manage the music group made up of talented youngsters.

The support package, announced by Mr Svanikier at the Choir's end-of-year 'Peace on Earth' choral concert in Accra to crown a year-long charity activity by the company in commemoration of its silver jubilee.

Last year, the Svani Group, a leading automobile and logistics services firm, donated a 35-seater bus to the choir to addressing transportation challenge facing the nation's leading youth choir.

The donations are to express the company's commitment to its corporate social responsibility in the areas of education, youth development and employment creation.

Mr. Svanikier, together with his wife, Johanna, who is Ghana's Ambassador to France and Portugal, addressing the concert, commended the management of the WYC for effectively helping to nurture the talents of the youth.

Describing the choir as 'ambassadors of joy,' he thanked God for using it to spread the gospel through music.

Mr Godfred Adusei Derkyi, Chairman of the Winneba Youth Choir, who launched the endowment fund, thanked the Svani Group, with subsidiaries in the energy, oil and gas and real estate sectors, for the immense assistance towards the choir.

Paa John Arthur Yamoah, the Choir Master, expressed gratitude to the company.

The concert, which was held under the auspices of Mr and Mrs Svanikier, was attended by high profile personalities including Mrs Matilda Amissah-Arthur, Wife of the Vice-President former Chief of Staff, Mr John Henry Martey-Newman, and former Second Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Professor Mike Oquaye.

GNA
09.01.2016 LISTEN

The Chairman of the Legal and Constitutional Affairs of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Prof. Mike Oquaye, has given the General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Johnson Asiedu Nketia a 24-hour ultimatum to validate allegations that the NPP forged pink sheets in the election petition case. According to Mike Oquaye, Asiedu Nketia's comments brings the Supreme Court into disrepute and for that matter must be charged with contempt because he is putting words into the mouth of the Supreme Court and then hanging the Supreme Court over something that did not happen.

Mr Asiedu Nketia, on Wednesday, called for the arrest of the NPP's vice presidential candidate, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, for allegedly fabricating falsehood in relation to allegations of names of foreign nationals on Ghana's voters' register. The NDC scribe also described as fake pink sheets presented by the NPP at the Supreme Court as evidence in the 2012 election petition case in a bid to portray the election as flawed.

They printed fake pink sheets and tendered them in, in the Supreme Court. All that was done, was that the Supreme Court just rejected them. Nothing has happened up till today and they come to deceive the Electoral Commission again by printing fake Togolese register, pick peoples pictures on the register and presented them as Togolese and presented some documentation and writing French on those things and claiming it is Togolese register, added Asiedu Nketia. But speaking on Eyewintess News on Friday, Mr. Oquaye accused Asiedu Nketia of mischief and said Asiedu Nketia should be punished if he fails to validate his claims. If he is not able to prove that immediately, then he is the author of falsehood and he must be dealt with according to law, he said. Mike Oquaye held fast to his ultimatum saying, I am telling him me to meet me and Dr Bawumia at the Police headquarters and the moment he gets there within the next 24 hours then Interpol will be contacted and we shall see who will go home.

 citifmonline
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Nsuta (Ash) Jan - 9 (Kwaku Amofah Dwomoh), a native of Bosomkyekye near Asante Mampong and a driver appeared before Nsuta Circuit Court on Thursday charged for negligently killing 10 cows valued GH 7,750.00 and some properties of thecattle owners.

He pleaded not guilty to all the charges including careless driving, negligence, causing harm, causing damage and driving without road worthy certificate.

The court presided over by her Honour Ellen Vivian Amoah granted him GH 800.00 bail to reappear in court on Monday, February 8, 2016.

Prosecuting Chief Inspector Simon Boavo told the court that on November 27, 2015, the accused was driving Tipper Truck vehicle with registration number AS 5083- 09 loaded with sand from Afamaso near Agona to Asante Mampong.

He said when the driver reached part of the road just after Nimark Hotel at Agona where there is a sign post indicating cattle crossing zone at 4:00pm, he ran into some cows crossing the road and killed 10 of them even though the Fulani signaled him to stop.

The prosecutor said, complaint was made to the police and the accused was arrested.

He said on December 10, 2015 the truck was carefully examined and tested by the Agona District Manager of DVLA and based on his findings, the accused was charged and arranged before court
Koku Anyidoho

09.01.2016 LISTEN

He has spent most of the past three years claiming to have been speaking on a nightly basis with the late President John Evans Atta-Mills, the man whose Communications Director he zealously served until he was rudely booted out of the Flagstaff House by President John Dramani Mahama who, word has it, had been utterly disrespected and ignored by this Arch-Trokosi Nationalist.

What I am simply saying here is that Mr. Anyidoho has absolutely no credibility whatsoever. Like the man who succeeded President Mills under the murkiest of circumstances, Mr. Anyidoho has yet to tell the world precisely how his late boss met his death.

And so it is ineffably revolting to hear the Deputy General-Secretary of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) accuse Team Bawumia of having criminally fabricated their copy of Togos National Voters Register (NVR) from which the leaders of the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) claims the names of some 76,000 foreign nationals to have been illegally migrated onto Ghanas NVR. Rather than be allowed to wax so farcically self-righteous, Mr. Anyidohos executive associates at the NDC party headquarters would do themselves a great favor by quickly rushing their pathological dreamer to the nearest psychiatric hospital

Indeed, he may not like to hear this, but the Chief Advisor to Togos main opposition leader, Mr. Jean-Pierre Fabre, by the name of Mr. Messeme Esse, has just publicly confirmed to Atinka-FM Radio that, indeed, the forensic copy of Togos NVR that Team Bawumia used to uncover the names of the 76,000 foreigners packed onto Ghanas NVR is the same register that was used in that countrys most recent general election.

Ghanas Electoral Commissioner, Mrs. Charlotte Kesson-Smith Osei, has scandalously chosen the facile method of blaming Team Bawumia for her own gross administrative incompetence, by lamely claiming that all attempts to procure a copy of Togos NVR in order to ascertain the authenticity of the forensic copy used by Team Bawumia to assemble its incontrovertible evidence of ballot-rigging by the erstwhile Afari-Gyan-chaired Electoral Commission (EC) had been roundly and summarily rebuffed.

The Charlotte Osei-led EC, it is significant to note, now shamelessly admits that, indeed, the names of more than 2,000 (Two-Thousand) multiple registrants remain on Ghanas NVR, months after the EC boss had informed the nation that the current voters register had been thoroughly cleansed of any multiple registrants, and that the current Biometric Voters Registration (BVR) system was equipped with a multi-layered auditing system that made it virtually impossible not to detect and promptly eliminate the multiple registration of eligible voters.

We shall deal with the EC chairs scandalously porous argument in due course; for now, suffice it to note, at least in passing, that the 2,000-plus names of multiple registrants were specifically brought to her attention by Team Bawumia, rather than this discoverys being the result of any due diligence having been conducted by the EC Chair and her staff.

In all the foregoing, however, what was outrageously disappointing was the annoyingly languid expression of the same by Nana Akomea, the New Patriotic Partys Communications Director. To be certain, I felt the wistful urge of yanking out my waist-leather belt and meting the Akyem-Nsutam native quite a bit of sound spanking (See ECs Decision on Voters Register Disappointing  NPP Citifmonline.com / Ghanaweb.com 1/4/16).

Were he a savvy communicator, Mr. Akomea would have promptly issued a strongly worded statement calling the EC Chairs decision to reject the nationwide call for the establishment of a new NVR what it veritably was: An act of insufferable criminality only surpassed by President Mahamas unconscionable decision to allow the United States to dump two of the worlds most dangerous Al-Qaeda and Taliban Islamist terrorists on the Ghanaian people.

*Visit my blog at: kwameokoampaahoofe.wordpress.com Ghanaffairs
Hannah Tetteh

09.01.2016 LISTEN

The New Patriotic Party, UK, calls on Hanna Serwaa Tetteh, Ghanas Minister of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, to resign immediately. Madam Tetteh has misled Ghanaians about why terrorists previously imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay have been brought to Ghana, thereby placing the whole of Ghana and all Ghanaians at risk of terrorist attack.

In an official statement, Madam Tetteh told Ghanaians that two detainees from Guantanamo Bay who have just been expatriated to Ghana had been cleared by the US security authorities and were not a threat to national security. She was being economical with the truth.

This is not the first time Madam Tetteh has made conflicting statements. In November 2014, as Ghanas Minister of Foreign Affairs, she sat on Radio Gold and said that the jailed socialite Nayele Ametefe (aka Ruby Adu Gyamfi), now serving eight years and eight months in the UK for drug smuggling offences, had thought she was carrying gold dust in luggage she took to London. British police and customs officials later certified that the gold dust was narcotics: 12.5 kilograms of cocaine, worth nearly 2 million. The same Nayele Ametefe, arriving at Kotoka International Airport to board the plane to London on which she was arrested on 10 November 2014, was given VVIP access by Ghana national security officials through the airport in Accra.

In Madam Tettehs statement, the Foreign Minister failed to tell Ghanaians that these two terrorists, Mahmoud Omar Bin Atif and Khalid Salih Al Dhuby, were already in the country. This created the impression that the former detainees were about to arrive and Ghanaians had nothing to fear.

It has also emerged that she did not inform Parliament because Deputy Ranking spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Mr Issac Osei MP for Subin has stated in an interview with the press that parliament had not been informed .This to us is gross abuse of power .

However, it has emerged that both men, whether proven terrorists or not, received training in Afghanistan with the Taliban. The Taliban are still waging a war against the democratically elected Afghan government, in tandem with the work of al-Qaeda, which has links to Islamic State and other terrorist groups operating in the Middle East and Africa. In fact, one of the two men now in Ghana was an aide of Osama Bin Laden.

The government of Sudan took some of these ex-Guantanamo Bay inmates some years ago. Of two prisoners transferred in December 2013, at least one escaped to Yemen to commit atrocities. Another one who transferred to Sudan in 2012 is now a terror chief in Yemen. The leopard does not change its spots!

The United States government thought it fit to detain both of these men for years. In a Fox Television news report as well as on ABC News, the men were described as high security risk: in other words, they are dangerous and prone to engage in terrorism.

We in NPP UK believe that common sense rather than financial benefit and personal gain should guide our leaders. The security, welfare and well-being of the people of Ghana are more important than the interests of our selfish leaders. Our rights cannot be horse-traded for money, or to curry favour with the US government for its support in helping to win elections!

We respect the United States and admire its democratic values and freedoms. The United States is the most powerful country in the world. It has military bases everywhere from Europe to the Pacific. If these men are a danger to US citizens, does that mean Ghanaians are second-class beings, and so terrorists should be dumped on us, endangering ordinary Ghanaians lives?

Former Ghanaian President John Agyekum Kufuor together with Nigeria and Algeria refused the request of the United States government in 2007 to set up a US Africa Command (AFRICOM) with military bases in their countries.

Mr. Kufuor flatly rejected the idea of AFRICOM in Ghana. He put the welfare, security and wellbeing of Ghanaians first, something President Mahama and Hannah Tetteh have failed to do!

The Ghana Government under President Mahama is incapable of bringing an end to the current long trail of power cuts, armed robberies and financial crimes which are collapsing business in our country, putting people out of work, depriving our people of food, decent education and healthcare, and causing daily misery for our people. Recently a million bullets were discovered, brought into Ghana from Togo to cause mayhem; up to date no one has been arrested. According to news reports in the last few days, Arthur Simpson Kent, who is being sought by the Metropolitan Police in connection with the murder of a reputable British television actress and her two young children, has been able to flee to Ghana.

Interpol has had to intervene to assist the Ghana Government to find this man, because Ghanas forces of law and order dont have the ability or resources to track him down. It is into this environment that Madam Hanna Tetteh has decided to bring two men with a track record of training in terrorist activities.

Hanna Tetteh is unfit to be a Minister of Foreign Affairs. She has been untruthful and dishonest. She must go now!

8 January 2016

Nana Yaw Sarpong

Communications Officer

NPP UK

07983 302 369
09.01.2016 LISTEN

The grandeur of social media in this 21st Century being globalisation-bound cannot be overemphasised. Social media, referring to websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking, has practically become a near necessity in the life of the average person. In fact, social media has enslaved a chunk of technology savvy youths.

And social media, directly and indirectly, dominates every facet of our lives and even the fabric of our society. Personally, a quick calculation I just did revealed that, on average, I spend 8 hours or one-third of a day on social media daily, as a young blogger. "A survey by a digital marketing firm found that the average person with a smartphone uses it more than 200 times a day," according to patrickfynn.blogspot.com. Look! The advent of social media in today's world has undoubtedly helped transform the world into a global village, where distance is no more a sickening barrier to communication.

Also, per statistics from Ghana's National Communications Authority (NCA), "Ghana's mobile internet penetration stands at 54.09%, as at the end of April, 2014, compared to the country's population of 26,354,769," according to spynewsagency.com. And it is no gainsaying that the vast majority of internet users in our country Ghana are literally engrossed in social media - be it WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter or Instagram - even to the detriment of other sides of their everyday lives.

No wonder there are a staggering number of Ghanaian folks on the aforementioned social media platforms in total. Indeed, the avid internet user in Ghana prioritises social media over and above other personal stuff which are equally or even more essential though. For the teeming youths in every nook and cranny of our nation capitalise on social media to boost their social dignity.

So I now question the general public in the court of public opinion for pragmatic adjudication on the delicate matter in hand! Is social media in Ghana more of an economic tool or just a fun-filled adventure? To be frank, I can proclaim with vim and vigour that social media in Ghana is a 65% fun-filled adventure and a 35% economic tool. Yes, the business community in Ghana is yet to completely leverage social media to stimulate its general economic activity.

Oh have they overlooked the stern commercial caution issued by the richest man in the world? Bill Gates strongly declared that, "If your business is not on the internet, then your business will be out of business." However, our creative arts fraternity has maximised its use of social media in epic proportions. And this has made it possible for our stars or celebrities to magnify their brands, augment their initiatives and expand their international careers.

Moreover, lots of social media firms keep springing up and their chief preoccupation is to provide tailor-made services for industry players in our creative arts arena. One of such promising firms is Hyperactive Ghana, a social media oriented enterprise which builds corporate brands. It recently engineered "#SpriteBall" which peaked at #1 as a Twitter trend in Ghana.

Thus incredibly uplifting the brand image of the underrated Sprite Ball games through an exquisite brand evangelism it did. Again, social media, regardless of its zero censorship, has facilitated the enjoyment of our constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech. On social media, the masses acting as social media freaks hold our political leaders accountable for their public actions and inactions, and they also champion a myriad of social agendas. Need I say more?

Now to the issue of social media being more of a fun-filled adventure in Ghana. The spate of evil deeds on social media in Ghana is simply appreciable. Folks gleefully abuse each other and even public figures among others on social media. Many social media addicts propagate falsified fabrications in various forms which obviously cause fear and panic among people.

Young people spend all their time chatting and having mere fun on social media platforms. Social media in Ghana has also become a virtual platform which breeds lustful relationships. For Albert Einstein, the great German theoretical physicist, once said that, "I fear the day that technology will surpass our human interaction. The world will have a generation of idiots." Gosh, this is gradually culminating in a real phenomenon in our Ghanaian society through the prevailing social media craze!

Source: sirarticle.blogspot.com
An unidentified young man suspected to be a thief was set alight in the early hours of Saturday January 9, 2015 and dumped in a drain at Agric Kromoase, a suburb of Kumasi in the Ashanti Region.

Some residents who spoke to Class News Ashanti regional correspondent, Frank Jackson, said they had been recording theft cases in the community in the last few months.

According to Frank Jackson, scores of residents had gathered on the morning to catch a glimpse of the man.

The suspected thief was lying in a gutter dead and burnt beyond recognition.

Beside his body was a locally manufactured gun.

It was not clear what was used to burn him as there were no car tyres - normally used by mobs to burn suspects - at the scene.

A few metres away from the body were pieces of concrete blocks and torn,blood-soaked clothes .

The police were not at the scene at the time of filing this report.
09.01.2016 LISTEN

Dear KA, thank you for your letter commenting on my article of the above caption which was published on the Modern Ghana internet site not long ago! Thank you for your comments, and for trusting that my response to them could be a blessing to you and others too! For this reason, I publish my reply in the very medium you read the article so that, as is your desire, other readers may be blessed by my response.

Let me begin my response by quoting for you your own words: In reference to the quotes you stated in your articleRomans 13:1-7, First Timothy 2:1-3, First Peter 2:13-17I believe these were not commandments but the personal views of the apostle. For example in the bible an apostle states ... I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper... This is a personal comment not a commandment. And so, concerning your quotes, I believe they border on morality and not necessarily commandments.

Well, according to the scriptures, anyone who gets to be genuinely born anewthat is, born of mayim (water) and of Ruwakh HaKodesh (Holy Spirit?) in the true manner of [the Ivri] tevilah in a mikveh mayim of running natural waters (baptism?)gets to live inside the person of Yahushua (the only true name of the Savior) and, at the same time, has Yahushua and his Abba (Father), Yahuwah Elohiym, also coming to indwell himcf. Hisgalus (Revelation) 3:20, YahuKhanan (John) 14:20, 21, 23, 15:5, 17:23, Galatians 2:20, Ephesians 3:17-19, Colossians 1:27, YahuKhanan Alef (First John) 3:24!! So then, the born anew experience is such a weighty and glorious issue no one should take lightly.

Anyone who is blessed in the manner that these verses teach can be said to be fully possessed by Yahushua and Yahuwah Elohiym, for they live and are very active in that person; and, in fact, no one can behave differently from anyone who lives in and possesses him!

So then, the life that a born anew person lives, he no longer lives by his own strength as he did before becoming born anew, but by the strength of Yahuwah who now inhabits him just as Galatians 2:20 reveals!!

And so, when the writers of Romans 13:1-7, First Timothy 2:1-3, and First Peter 2:13-17, say what they say by these verses, they are speaking as to reveal the WILL of Yahushua and his Abbawho are living in these very writersfor them and their readers to comply with, since the WILL of Yahushua and his Abba are, in fact, their COMMANDMENTS to these writers, and to all other truth seekers, to obey.

That is why I said in my article that the clergymen who did not live in compliance with these verses broke the commandments of their constitution [their English Bible!]. Not that they were just harsh in their words, they had no right to do what they did.

We must learn to obey anything that holy men of the past obeyed and instructed us in their writings to obey or emulate, for that is what Yahushua himself meant for all his genuine followers to do in his Give unto Caesar what is Caesars . . . teaching of MattitYahu (Matthew?) 22:21; just as he himself did in order to meet the WILL [or COMMAND] of his Abba, and also to set an example for his followers!!

Moving forward let me again quote your own words: . . . on the names Jesus Christ (Yahushua) and God (Elohiym), you may have the original transcript of the bible and not necessarily believing in History and Culture of his "assumed family otherwise, your claim may not hold. Also, God is a spirit and per the attributes we give him which are all true, he works with us on individual basis and not group hence if I called upon him by using "Jesus Christ" he knows exactly where I am coming from and will therefore not hesitate in coming to my aid. A major problem of present day teachers in the faith is that we are being too much into knowledge seeking or centered as against the practicality of the faith. The early leaders of the faith like Paul were practical and not necessarily quoting the scriptures all the time.emphasis mine.

Dear KA, no one should live in isolation today and so, it is very easy to look for and find the true names of the Savior and the Most High One which were revealed at Creation from other seekers of truth.

The Most High One revealed Himself and everything about the mission of His son to earth, long before it happened, to only Ivriim (Hebrew people) among all kindred of mankind. Every name He gave of Himself and of His son was in Ivrit (Hebrew language), so that the people He spoke to would know what these names stand for.

I must say that, historically and anthropologically, no person who was native to Yisroel was ever called by any of the English names, Jesus, Christ, John, Matthew, Simon, etc, from the time of Avraham to the date of birth of the Savior, simply because the English race and the crudest form of their language came seven good centuries after the ascension of the Savior.

The English language was never in any human mind for it to be used to name anybody until the seventh century. So the one who died for your salvation was never called or known as JESUS CHRIST, until some liars after the seventh century began to deceive mankind with this fake name!

The question to ask is: do men have the right to rename the Savior, even more weirdly so, posthumously, by giving him an English name, and thus nullifying the value of the Ivrit name by which his parents were commanded by Elohiym through a holy malak (angel) that he be so named at birth?? You see, the name JESUS is simply out of place in Yisroel, just as the names Osei and Fofie of the Akan people of Ghana are out of place in the culture of Zulu people!

If you get the copy of The Orthodox Jewish Bible (OJB), edited by Dr. Phillip E. Goble, you will get to know some 139 indigenous Ivrit names given by Elohiym to holy men who, down the ages, had roles to play in the execution of the salvation plan of Elohiym that are either prefixed or suffixed with Yahu; Yahu being the short construct for Yahuwah, the name of the Most High One.

Some of these are YeshaYahu (not Isaiah), YirmeYahu (not Jeremiah), YahuKhanan (not John), ZakharYahu (not Zechariah) and, therefore, you will not doubt where todays Binyamin NatanYahu descends from! These names are so unique and sacred that hardly did more than one person bear anye.g. Avraham, Moshe, ElYahu, YeshaYahu and top of the pack, Yahushua!!

As the Most High One Yahuwah begot a son and named him Yahushua (so that His Yahuwah nature, power, glory, etc, would permanently dwell in His Yahushua-named son), which mortal humans dared to change this Ivrit Yahushua to the Greek IZEUS or Iesous (meaning the son of Zeus), and thence to the Latin IESUS, and then, to the English JESUS?? Since the root of JESUS is in ZEUS, a Greek deity, are Christians not worshipping ZEUS through a back door? Just think about this!!

So then, because you have no right to dictate to Elohiym, dont suppose that He must respond to you when you mention the name of deception and evil roots [JESUS]! You see, the deceiver who took the name Yahushua from you and gave you his JESUS is he who responds to your cries in the name of JESUS. Dont you get it?? And as you know, tares look like wheat but, unlike wheat, they are only fit to be burned at the end of timeMattitYahu (Matthew?) 13:24-30!

Let me also say this: Faith only comes by hearing the word of Elohiymcf. Romans 10:14and not that of translators or yours! How and why would you have faith in JESUS which Elohiym never uttered and disregard the YAHUSHUA He has given as the name of His son?? Elohiym rewards no such ignorant persons who speak into the air asking for salvation without knowing the only one true name recognized in Heaven by which everyone must be savedActs 4:10-12. Where, then, would be His justice and fairness when all YAHUSHUA and JESUS believers are rewarded in same way??

Yes, at times, teachers of the way of salvation may have to quote copiously from Scripture to bring people to the TRUTH; maybe unlike Shaul (never refer to him as Paul) and others did. Dont forget these great men did not have the Beyrit Khadasha (New Testament?) written out for them to quote from! They are those people who the Most High One used to write them (the Beyrit Khadasha) for our benefit.

Dear KA, I pray you will write to me again soon, and to comment on what I said in my article are fatal errors that Christian clergymen lead their followers to commit.

Do you not see it to be a problem that Christian clergymen are misleading their followers by turning the Lords Supper memorial into a daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly Sunday Breakfast at their whims; what about the impossibility of counting three days and three nights between a Friday evening-hour burial and a supposed Sunday dawn resurrection, in reference to the Saviors death, burial, and resurrection accounts; and of renaming the Ivri-born Savior with a Gentile name that only evolved seven centuries after the Savior was named by his Ivri parents under the instructions of the Most High One, thereby hiding the Saviors true identity?? Please let me hear you speak to these issues of grave importance!

Dear KA, I hope you find my responses to your comments useful; and please, do let us continue the conversation. Shalom aleikhem.

PS: Should readers of this and any of my articles have serious questions or suggestions, they may contact me via e-mail by clicking on Contact on the Home Page of my website, http://sbprabooks.com/BongleBapuohyele . You may also purchase a copy of my bookBeware of This False Doctrine: Of Reciting the Sinners' Prayer for Salvationvia the same web address so, together, we walk the narrow way to the presence of Elohiym. Shalom.
Niamey (AFP) - Niger's constitutional court has approved 15 candidates for next month's presidential election, the interior ministry announced Saturday, including imprisoned opposition figure Hama Amadou.

Incumbent Mahamadou Issoufou, elected in 2011, is seeking another term and will also be up against chief opposition leader Seini Oumarou, former president Mahamane Ousmane and ex-planning minister Amadou Boubacar Cisse, among others.

At the start of the week the interior ministry put forward 16 names of potential candidates to contest the February 21 election.

Of these only Abdoul-Karim Bakasso, the leader of a minor party, was deemed "ineligible" by the court, Interior Minister Hassoumi Massaoudou told reporters.

His bid was rejected due to "the lack of a medical certificate," said opposition spokesman Ousseini Salatou.

Amadou, seen as one of Issoufou's strongest opponents, has been in prison since November 14, 2015 over allegations he was involved in baby trafficking.

The former prime minister and national assembly president fled the county in August 2014 to escape charges in the matter but was arrested after he returned.

Amadou has proclaimed his innocence and considers the legal process against him to be "political".

A legal decision on his latest demand to be freed provisionally is expected Monday.

Former agriculture minister Abdou Labo, who was also implicated in the affair and is currently out on bail, is also on the approved presidential candidates list.

- 'Deteriorating political climate' -

The political climate in the arid Sahel state has been tense since Amadou joined the opposition in 2013.

Oumarou, 65, served as prime minister from 2007 to 2009. This is his second time running for president.

The election commission late last month announced that the first round of voting would be held on February 21, followed by a run-off on March 20 if necessary.

The opposition has rejected the timeline, saying there had been no consensus on the dates.

An opposition march is planned for Sunday to denounce "arbitrary arrests" of militants and to call for "transparent elections", spokesman Salatou said.

Niger's influential tribal chiefs on Friday expressed their concern at the "deteriorating political climate".

Last month President Issoufou said the government had foiled a coup plot, a claim rubbished by Boubacar Cisse.

Politicking aside, whoever wins the presidential race will have to tackle the pressing issue of Boko Haram attacks from neighbouring Nigeria.

Boko Haram, which has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, has stepped up attacks on areas of Niger, Chad and Cameroon that border Nigeria while also continuing a devastating campaign of suicide and shooting attacks on home soil.

Electoral campaigning will get underway on January 30 for both presidential and legislative ballots.
Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - Mr Horst Schulze, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Capella Hotel Group, has said the greatest secret of customer service delivery was to be nice to clients.

He said there was the need for companies to keep and create customer loyalty to enable them promote their business operations.

Mrs Schulze was speaking at an even organized by the Chartered Institute of Marketing, Ghana (CIMG) on the theme: 'Creating a world class customer service' in Accra.

The CIMG in pursuit of its advocacy and training objectives organised the event to provide professional development for its members.

He said management of companies should create efficiency in the way they deal with customer service delivery issues.

Mr Schulze said customers become loyal when organizations do according to their desires and obey the 'the customer is always right' saying.

Mr Kojo Mattah, the National President, CIMG, urged members to input some of the tutorials into their daily business operation to improve on their outputs.

GNA
Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - The management of the Ghana National Fire Service has cautioned the general public to adhere to basic fire safety practices to avoid incidents of fires during this dry season.

In a statement signed by Mr Prince Billy Anaglate, Deputy Public Relations Officer of the Ghana National Fire Service, said within the last few days the harmattan has intensified making the weather very fertile for fires to spread.

It said the public is advised to be extra careful with the way naked fires are handled.

It said smokers are to ensure that cigarettes butts are properly extinguished before they are disposed off.

The statement said some safety measures that must be adhered to in order to avoid fires include: when leaving the home ensure that all electrical equipment, except fridges are switched off and unplugged, close all doors and windows tight, avoid the use of charcoal for cooking and for heating in the market, do not accumulate sawdust in the timber market as this is a potential source of fire outbreak, improper electrical connection must be avoided and proper use of candles must be adhered to by placing the candle in a ceramic bowl or an enamel bowl.

The statement said as per the Prevention of Bushfires Law, PNDC Law 226, it is an offence not to report a bushfire adding that all such bushfire must be reported to the Fire Service for the appropriate action.

It said all fire and fire related incidents can be reported to the Fire Service through emergency number 192.

GNA
Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - The fourth Ghana Economic Outlook and Business Strategy (EOBS) conference has been launched in Accra.

The conference is on the theme: 'Industrialization: The impetus for Ghana's economic growth'.

The EOBS, which is being organized by the Africa Business Media (ABM), would be held on 20th January 2016 to create a conducive forum where key policy and decision makers would address issues confronting the industrial sector.

Mr Kwadwo Asumaning, Chairman of ABM, said the forum would seek answers from decision makers on the inability of government to implement the initiatives in the industrial policy.

'Through the forum, local manufacturers will get the opportunity to interact with visiting foreign investors and explore opportunities for investments and partnerships,' he said.

Mr Asumaning said officials expected to attend the forum would include those from government, the business community and the diplomatic community.

In a speech read on his behalf, Dr Ekow Spio Gabrah, the Minister of Trade and Industry, commended the organisers of the conference for using such forums to help promote investment in the country.

He said government has started the implementation of the industrial policy, including the formulation of an export strategy to increase export earnings and sensitization of people to buy made in Ghana products.

Mr Moses Agyemang, a representative of the Private Enterprises Federation, urged organisers of the conference to use the forum to set the tone for what the politicians need to discuss regarding development of the industrial sector in their political campaigns.

GNA
Accra, Jan. 9, GNA - The Civil and Local Government Staff Association, (CLOSAG) has called on its members to continue their normal duties while the Association finds ways of engaging the Government to re-negotiate their conditions of service.

In a statement signed by Mr Issac Bampoe Addo, Executive Secretary of CLOSAG, said the (2015) increases in the salaries and allowances were done without considering increases in utility and petroleum prices.

It said transportation fares are expected to rise with the resultant increase in food prices and other products.

''The repetitive appeals from our members, through direct contacts and telephone calls asking ''what Government is going to do to reduce the plight of the staff within the Civil and Local Government Services'' have been overwhelming'', it said.

The statement said, under the current circumstances, the Association is calling on the Minister for Employment and Labour Relations to consider the Re-negotiation of the base pay on the Single Spine Salary Structure (SSSS).

It said it is the hope of the Association that their request would be heeded to by Government and treated as a matter of urgency.

GNA
you are here:
Midland County opened 2016 with one new rig, but the Permian Basin as a whole idled eight.

The Permian is still the most-active basin the U.S.; however, it ended a three-week run of gains to finish at 209, according to the weekly rotary rig count report released Friday by Houston-based oilfield services company Baker Hughes.

Midland County, which boasts more rigs than any other county in the U.S., closed the year's opening week with 30 rigs.

For areas with active rigs in the Permian Basin, there were three rigs in District 7B, up one; 29 in District 7C, up three; 133 in District 8, down six; 12 in District 8A, down two; and 32 in New Mexico, down four. The Texas total was 177, down four.

At this time last year, there were 502 rigs in the Permian Basin.

TEXAS & NEW MEXICO

Texas' rig count finished negative this week after 13 rigs were idled, lowering the statewide total to 308.

The Eagle Ford sank to 71 rigs after five were taken offline. The Haynesville fell two to 23, while the Granite Wash was down three to 12. One rig was idled in the Barnett, dropping the North Texas basin's rig count to six.

Texas recorded three rigs offshore.

New Mexico closed the week at 34 rigs, down four. Its two rigs not in the Permian Basin were in San Juan and Rio Arriba counties, located in the northwest part of the state.

A year ago this week, there were 810 rigs in Texas and 95 in New Mexico.

UNITED STATES

The nationwide rig count tumbled to 664 after 34 rigs were idled. All drops in activity occurred on land, where there were 635 rigs counted after 37 were idled. The number of rigs in inland waters rose to two after one rig went online. There were 27 rigs offshore, up two and all of which were in the Gulf of Mexico.

The number of rigs searching for oil fell 20 to 516. The natural gas rigs tally fell 14 to 148.

By drilling trajectory, there were 81 vertical rigs, down eight; 519 horizontal rigs, down 30; and 64 directional rigs, up four.

The U.S. had 1,750 rigs a year ago this week.

TOP 5s

The top five counties by rig count in District 8 this week were Midland; Reeves with 22, up one; Loving with 17, down four; Martin with 16, down two; and Culberson with nine, unchanged.

The top five counties in the Permian Basin were Midland; Reeves; Lea (New Mexico) with 20, down three; Loving; and Martin.

The top five basins nationwide were the Permian; the Eagle Ford; the Williston with 49, down four; the Marcellus with 37, down four; and the Cana Woodford with 36, down two.

The top five states were Texas; Oklahoma with 83, down four; Louisiana with 59, up one; North Dakota with 34, down four; and New Mexico.

CANADA AND NORTH AMERICA

After several weeks of steep declines, Canada's rig count finished sharply positive, adding 83 rigs for a nationwide total of 166. The number of rigs searching for oil rose to 71 after 59 rigs went online. There were 95 natural gas rigs, up 24. Canada had 366 rigs at this time last year.

The total number of rigs in the North America region rose 49 this week to 830. A year ago this week, there were 2,116 rigs in North America.

INTERNATIONAL

On Friday, Baker Hughes released its international rig counts for December 2015. The worldwide rig count was 1,969, down 78. The U.S. closed December with 714 rigs, down 46, and accounted for 36.26 rigs worldwide.

The following are international rig counts by region, with the top three nations in parentheses:

 Africa: 91 (Algeria, 49; Angola, 11; Kenya, 11)

 Asia-Pacific: 198 (India, 100; China offshore, 25; Indonesia, 25)

 Europe: 114 (Turkey, 30; Norway, 17; Poland, 12)

 Latin America: 270 (Argentina, 91; Venezuela, 68; Mexico, 42)

 Middle East: 422 (Saudi Arabia, 129; Oman, 73; Iraq, 51)

MORE ENERGY NEWS

Don't miss this week's Oil Report in Sunday's Reporter-Telegram. This week's big six stories:

 The Permian Basin is single-handedly sustaining domestic oil activity.

 Questions surround inventory of drilled, uncompleted wells.

 Upstream mergers and acquisitions activity plunged amid low oil prices.

 API says 2016 elections offer choice between pro- and anti-energy development.

 TransCanada goes to court of the Keystone XL pipeline's rejection.

 Raymond James says 2016 will be a roller-coaster ride for oilfield services companies.

More energy news is also available online at mrt.com/business/oil. For more information about this week's rig counts, visit the Baker Hughes website at bakerhughes.com.

Follow Trevor on Twitter at @HowdyHawes.

***

The following are Permian Basin rig counts by county for the week ending Dec. 31, with changes in parentheses:

District 7B

Fisher 2 (+1)

Nolan 1

Total 3 (+1)

District 7C

Crockett 0 (-1)

Irion 4 (+2)

Menard 1

Reagan 10 (+1)

Terrell 1

Upton 13 (+1)

Total 29 (+3)

District 8

Andrews 7

Crane 1 (+1)

Culberson 9

Ector 2

Glasscock 4 (-5)

Howard 8

Loving 17 (-4)

Martin 16 (-2)

Midland 30 (+1)

Mitchell 1

Pecos 5

Reeves 22 (+1)

Sterling 1

Ward 6 (+2)

Winkler 4

Total 133 (-6)

District 8A

Borden 1

Dickens 0 (-1)

Garza 1

Hockley 1

Scurry 3 (-1)

Terry 1

Yoakum 5

Total 12 (-2)

New Mexico

Eddy 12 (-1)

Lea 20 (-3)

Total 32 (-4)

Source: Baker Hughes

Compiled by Trevor Hawes
Early morning on Christmas Day, a car pulls up outside the Midland County Detention Center and a deputy gets out. He hefts his backpack onto his shoulder and shakes himself as he walks toward the jail employee entrance on West Industrial Avenue.

In the booking room, the clerks, jailers and a corporal shoot the breeze and sip steaming Styrofoam cups of coffee. The overnight crew clocks out. Then its time for roll call for the newest intakes: mostly young and middle-aged men recovering in the drunk tank from the night before. One man, who had threatened to commit suicide and was combative in a substance-fueled rage earlier that morning, is in a padded cell.

This is how the day shift at Midland County jail begins: a couple of laughs, maybe more than a few cups of coffee and roll call.

Cpl. Rebecca Patterson, often called Miss P. by inmates, has worked at the Midland County jail for the past 21 years. Shes often asked how shes done it that long.

What I like about my job is I deal with the people, said Patterson, sitting in the pod, a small room with darkened windows that overlooks both sides of D block -- one of the two all-female blocks. The five other blocks, A and B, and E through G house males, as does the tent, an open dormitory-style space for minimum-security inmates.

I dont judge them, Patterson said. Ive learned that even though people make mistakes, that doesnt mean theyre bad people. ... Our job is not saying they did or didnt do this or that. The only one that can say that is the judge.

Patterson spends most of her day in the C and D block pods, inputting her daily logs into the computer and responding to inmate requests -- such as for pencils that were missing in their intake kits. She passes the TV remote from one side of D block to the other. One woman asks her for temporary child custody papers.

Christmas was a particularly quiet day, but most days are fairly mild, Patterson said. The week of Christmas was the first week in months that the jail had under 450 inmates, she said. The jail has a 500-inmate capacity; on Christmas there were 411.

With the oil boom down its been really busy, but [in November] its only been about three or four intakes a day, said Cpl. Shelly Jones. Normally we get 15 to 20 every day.

Most of the female inmates Patterson oversees have been there before, usually for unpaid traffic tickets, probation violations, possession charges or robbery. Occasionally theres a woman with a family-violence charge, she said.

Many of the women have family members who had been incarcerated and most of the inmates have children of their own.

Weve had inmates ... (who) had kids and sometimes the kids follow in the parents footsteps whether theyre male or female, Patterson said. Working here as long as I have, you pretty much get to know the whole family.

Patterson said that problems of crime are more than just situational, but rather are generational.

I think a lot of it really has to do with our society -- with people not getting an education, Patterson said. I see inmates that were here when I started in 94, and now their kids are coming in. Most of them are coming from higher poverty; they dont have a decent job or something to at least make ends meet from payday to payday. Even if youre pretty much in the middle class and you work every day sometimes you cant get the help you need.

Patterson understands this at a personal level.

When I first started working here my husband had cancer and he couldnt work so we were having to pay all the medical bills, food, rent, etc. on my paycheck, Patterson said. Well, we couldnt get food stamps to go buy groceries because I was making $100 too much to qualify and we had five of us in the family. So I think that has a lot to do with some of these people who go steal. They need to make ends meet for their families.

With three kids of her own, Patterson also knows the challenges young men and women face during their teen years, regardless of home life.

With our school systems, the fact you gotta take this test or you wont graduate, I think that has a lot to do with it, too, because kids get frustrated, she said. I have a son and hes not a test-taker. He sits down to take a test and hes so nervous that he cant even take the test.

The younger generation -- some of them dropped out of school, and its not helping their situation because nowadays you have to have a high school diploma to get any job.

The jail offers GED courses, but Patterson wishes there could be more services.

I wish we could find some way to better the person thats been in trouble and give them a better life so hopefully their kids would have a better life, Patterson said. Dont get me wrong, people make mistakes all day long. But if our inmates that are constantly coming back to jail had something to look forward to when they leave -- some kind of training for a job -- then that might help.

And maybe if they had somebody to sit down with them and just talk to them and say, Hey lets try to do things different this time.... A lot just didnt have a person that was there to pull them this way rather than that way. So the cycle just keeps going, she said.

Lunch is served at 11 a.m., and the inmates line up. Most of them had been sleeping or lying in their bunks; a few were watching TV. Theres not much to do in jail. Inmates get up to three hours of recreation a week. Theres visitation twice a week for 30 minutes and theres a church service on Sundays. They can use the phone if they can afford $20 call cards. Other than that its sleep eat, and repeat. Many just sleep all day, Patterson said.

As the lunch trays are passed out, a young woman with long horizontal scars on her right arm and a delicate cross tattoo on the side of her forearm makes a face at the spread: a slice of chocolate cake, some soggy-looking greens, bread and what looks like meat covered in a lumpy gravy.

It is another world in here, Patterson said, adjusting her hair net as another inmate grabs her lunch tray. Its one a lot of people dont really know about.

More than half of the inmates in Texas county jails have not been convicted of the crime for which they are accused, according to the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition. A large percentage of the men and women in the Midland County jail are in pretrial detention for non-violent crimes and cannot afford the bond that would allow them to be released before trial. Each inmate, either pretrial or post conviction, costs county taxpayers about $59 a day, according to the coalition.

The Midland County jail is still overcrowded and understaffed, but in this line of work theres job security.

My job, its always gonna be there, Patterson said. Theres always gonna be somebody who gets in trouble and weve gotta have some place to put them and someone to watch them. The pays not bad. I couldnt leave here today and make what Im making now. So Im not complaining. I have a job.

But to Patterson its more than a job.

Some people come in here, do their job, get their paycheck and go home, she said. I have to be here at 6:30 every morning. I leave at 2:45, 3. Sometimes I dont leave till 3:30.

Patterson often spends time talking with her officers and the inmates during her daily rounds.

Working here you got some inmates that come in and theyve been beat, in a family-violence situation. It might not be physical abuse but theyve had mental abuse and its bad, yknow. Growing up, my dad used to get drunk and wanna fight. He never went to jail, but Ive had family members that have been in prison. So Ive seen both sides.

After 21 years of seeing repeat offenders -- some who have committed heinous crimes, others who are stuck in an unending cycle -- one might think Patterson would have become jaded.

I just think they need to be treated with respect even though I dont approve of everything theyve done, Patterson said as she inputs logs. With some better parenting, somebody in there couldve done a little bit better. I understand people have bad days. We get to go home every day, but theyre in here day in and day out. Sometimes you just gotta listen because everybody has some kind of issue that they have to get through. And if somebody leaves and they dont come back -- that gives me fulfillment.
One of hip-hop's most iconic duos is teaming back up this month for a major launch. Ja Rule and Ashanti will be hitting the stage Thursday January 14th at New York City's Stage 48 to celebrate the official launch of Add Ventures Music. Founded by former Murder Inc VP Chris "Gotti" Lorenzo, the New York affair will be rounded out by Bronx MC Fat Joe, who is also joining them as one of the evening's performers.

Lorenzo founded Add Ventures Music back in April of 2015 with the goal of helping independent artist take control over their music and take their careers to the next level. With a track record of collaborators like Jay Z, Jennifer Lopez, Ja Rule and Ashanti, Lorenzo has learned a thing or two about working with superstars and is looking to help the next generation of aspiring acts.

Lorenzo's camp said via press release, "Add Ventures Music aims to be at the cutting edge of the new business of music - emancipating artists and allowing them the true and complete freedom over their musical careers." They went on to say "The goal is to build a strong community of recording artists that will define a new era in the music community, taking control back from those who have traditionally not had the best interests of the artist."

The evening will not only celebrate Add Ventures Official Launch but also the newly added Latin Music division, with performances from Latin artists Don Dinero and Alex Fatt.

"It's been a long time coming and I'm just really excited to start with my new venture in music and show the world what Add Ventures Music brings to the table," said an excited Chris Gotti.

As for the evening's other headliners; Ashanti has remained busy since the release of her last album 2014's Braveheart, while Ja Rule has been enjoying some reality TV spotlight with his family on their MTV series Follow The Rules. He hinted at potential new music from the duo last year, telling Hollywoodlife.com, "Everybody wants me and Ashanti to do a record. You know, we will. We're going to put something together-but I can't promise that's it's going to sound like our old stuff!"

 2015 MusicTimes.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Former Love & Hip Hop: New York star Erica Mena has made some New Year resolutions and adjustments. It seems the reality star decided to be done with all things "worthless and old" in her life and her breast implants were on that list. She recently had them removed. But, she's still feuding with her ex, Bow Wow, and it's all on social media.

The 28-year-old reality star took to Instagram to share a photo she had taken with her doctor--a man she credits for "guiding her every step of the way" in her journey to remove her implants.

According to Rolling Out, Mena revealed the photo to the world on Thursday night, Jan. 7, with a bit of back story. It seems she may have new opportunities and career endeavors she's working on and to move forward with them, she had to let go of a few things -- two things to be exact. In her caption she wrote, "I literally got rid of everything that was worthless & old. Ready for MY NEW Life! Ready for My Own Show & Movie role which called for my breast to be all natural."

Another part of Mena's life that she "got rid of" was her relationship to rapper Bow Wow (Shad Moss), which over time, became very public and nasty. The pair was engaged and at one point lived together but that relationship has since ended with the public jabs at one another still going strong. According to New York radio station Hot 97, the two have been bashing one another on social media. The Shade Room captured a video of Bow Wow giving a toast at a New Year's Eve gathering where he instructed those in attendence from the media site to not ask him about "that crazy b*tch" and continued his rant by saying "we done with these reality b*tches."

WARNING: Posted Video Contains Offensive Language





Pt. 2 #ShadMoss throwing shade at #EricaMena A video posted by The Shade Room (@theshaderoominc) on Jan 1, 2016 at 1:28am PST

#ShadMoss throwing shade at #EricaMena #NewYears #2016 A video posted by The Shade Room (@theshaderoominc) on Jan 1, 2016 at 1:20am PST

Mena didn't hesitate to respond with her own jabs back at Bow Wow in a series of tweets that were later deleted but, not before thacelebritea captured an image of the tweets and shared them on Instagram.

#EricaMena vs #BowWow A photo posted by News With A Side of Tea (@thacelebritea) on Jan 5, 2016 at 9:05am PST

Very messy.

Nevertheless, congratulations to Erica Mena on embracing her natural self.



 2015 MusicTimes.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Last night proved to be probably the most entertaining and fierce competition that viewers of Lip Sync Battle on SpikeTV have seen. Past shows have displayed the talents of celebs such as Anne Hathaway, Queen Latifah, Terrance Howard and Justin Bieber. This week, it got real when Magic Mike star Channing Tatum and wife Jenna Dewan-Tatum (Step Up) duked out in a way that we've never seen before. Tatum even brought out a special someone to help him clinch the title and beat out his dancer wife.

This was the first episode of the second season and they kicked things off with a bang, literally, as Dewan-Tatum did a sexy version of Tatum's routine to Ginuwine's "Pony" from Magic Mike XXL filled with plenty of thrusting, pumping and gyrating-incorporating many of the moves that had women lusting after her husband when Magic Mike was steaming up theaters. Hosts LL Cool J and Chrissy Teigen were in shock as they jammed along to Dewan-Tatum's routine, which ended with the actress giving her awed hubby a lap dance (lots of crotch involved!), ripping off her white tank and blowing money into the crowd a la exotic dancer.

Those who remember Dewan-Tatum from Step Up know that the actress has a dancing background. In fact, she and Tatum connected over their love of dance during the filming of the movie. Now, several years of marriage and a baby later, the talented Dewan-Tatum seems to still have the moves that caught Tatum's eye from the start. And don't get us started on that six-pack. Impressive.

But don't count Tatum out yet.

The dancer-actor came out swinging to Beyonce's "Who Runs the World (Girls)," complete with mini skirt and blond wig. He had the chest popping and twerking down to a science, including a floor routine and lots of hair tossing. Dewan-Tatum seemed to enjoy her husband's out-of-the-box routine, but her laughs quickly turned to utter shock when Beyonce herself marched onstage to complete Tatum's routine alongside the actor. Two heads of blond hair swung back and forth as Tatum whipped his way into the winner's circle. We've gotta say we agree; Dewan-Tatum was great, but her husband and his co-star stole the show. Watch both performances below and you be the judge!

 2015 MusicTimes.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
WE tv's brand new reality show Growing Up Hip Hop made its debut on Thursday (Jan. 7), showcasing the lives of children born into famous music industry families. Before the series premiere, we spoke with executive producer and cast member, Angela Simmons, for an exclusive interview about the show. She revealed her true feelings toward Dame Dash's comments about stress, the troubles of having a famous last name, the many business that keep her occupied, and so much more.

Growing Up Hip Hop follows Simmons (Rev. Run's daughter), Romeo Miller (Master P's son), Damon "Boogie" Dash (Dame Dash's son), Kristinia DeBarge (James DeBarge's daughter), TJ Mizell (Jam Master Jay's son), and Egypt Criss (Pepa and Treach's daughter). Miller and Master P also act as executive producers on the show.

Placing a spotlight on their unique family dynamics and the steps they're taking to achieve independent success, viewers will learn how the celebrity offspring balance romance and surprising life challenges, all while working their way to the top.

So who is Angela Simmons? You might remember her from MTV's Run's House, but a lot has changed since then. Read the full interview below to discover how the hardworking 28-year-old came up with the idea for the show, what it's like to have her life documented on camera, and the best advice she received from her dad.

Morgan Murrell: What made you want to create a show surrounding the children of hip hop icons?

Angela Simmons: You know, I had been working on a show for a couple of years and my partners, Datari Turner, Tara Long, and I just started brainstorming and came up with this wonderful idea. We thought about the people that I kind of already had around me and so I sat down with Romeo, because he's one of the first people I thought about for the show. He thought it was a wonderful idea. So then we just figured out the rest of the cast and from there it was history. I just think there's something amazing behind all these incredible iconic families, because we all have stories to share. A lot of the times, children get lost in the shadows and I feel like we have a story to tell.

How would you describe the show in three words?

There's comedy, love, and a lot of ambition.

Was there anyone you had in mind for the initial cast, who wasn't able to participate in the show?

No, I mean not really. I'm really great friends with a lot of different people, like Aaron Reid (son of L.A. Reid & Pebbles) and so forth. He's a really busy individual, so he had stuff going on. I did have conversations with other individuals that may be on future seasons hopefully, if all goes well. There are other amazing friends that I have in the industry that I think would be incredible for the show as well.

A photo posted by wetv (@wetv) on Jan 6, 2016 at 8:00am PST

What are you hoping viewers learn about you from the series?

You know, I think there's so much to learn. I grew up on television as a young woman and now I've grown into a woman and a lot of people don't know exactly what I have going on. So I just want them to know me better as a person, learn about my business, and all of the things that I'm taking on. My philanthropy side is not really shown this season, but I am very big on that, and working on building an orphanage in Haiti. I just want people to get to know me better.

Will we see you engaging in your various business ventures?

You will! On the show you'll definitely see a lot of my Foofi & Bella faux-fur line and so much more has developed since I began filming. I'm partners with Sanya Richards-Ross and she's on board with that. She and I work together and she's really an incredible individual. So you will definitely see a lot on the show surrounding that.

I also have a few other things I'm working on at the moment. This year I'm kicking off the VIPE activewear line with founder Marlies Korijn. It's based out of Europe. I'm really into fitness, so it made sense for me to step into that. I keep myself pretty busy. I have an extension line with Dhair Boutique called the SEA collection and we'll be dropping some new stuff in February. I have an online boutique as well and we're supposed to be putting a store up soon, so there's tons of things in the fashion industry that I'm currently working on.

There's no resting for you is there?

No [laughs], there's definitely no rest. Why not do it all while you're young right? I love what I do, so it doesn't really seem like work.

There was a lot of drama included in the official trailer for the show, including a scene where Dame Dash accusing you of not knowing what real stress is. Can viewers expect to see any drama or romance pop off between the actual cast members? I feel like the show is pretty honest.

It's a positive show, but there is drama here and there. I'm dealing with stalker issues and there's possible romances, but I think you guys definitely need to tune in to see what happens with that. Dame Dash and I did have a little moment, but I wouldn't call it an argument. I just let him talk, while I listened to what he had to say. Did I agree? No. I don't think he heard me out and fully understood what I was saying, but I don't like to get into confrontation with my elders. I listen. I was never raised to do such a thing, so I just listened to him, heard what he had to say, and called it a day.

Is filming a reality show harder now that you're an adult or are you comfortable with the cameras due to your history of being on TV?

I would say it's completely different. As far as me being in front of a camera, that's pretty simple because I'm used to it. Doing it without your family is a different ball game, you know? Your family is someone that you're used to, someone you wake up to, and someone in the same household. These are individuals who are friends, who become like family, but at the same time it's completely different than working with your real family.

Being an executive producer on the show really helps, because you're a part of the creative process and you know what's going on after it's all been shot. I'm overall excited about it. It was a different experience, but at the same time, it was a wonderful experience. WE tv's been incredible and I'm so happy we're on that network. I'm excited about the show. I haven't seen anything like it. We really have something to offer here that isn't available anywhere else.

Did you get any say in the editing process?

Yes! I mean we have a great team at eOne. When they're done chipping away at it and editing, I get to see it. If I don't like something, of course I have a say on whether I think it's a go or not. It's definitely a team effort.

Growing up in the spotlight can have its perks, but there can be downsides as well. Have you ever experienced bullying solely based on your last name?

You can say in the industry, sometimes your name gets you in certain doors. People aren't really sure about your talent. They think, perhaps just because you come from something that everything you have was handed to you. Sometimes they think you don't have talent at all in their eyes. It is a little more challenging with and without the name. It's blessings overall, but you still have to realize that people aren't so sure. They think, "oh you're your father's child or Russell Simmons is your uncle, so what do you really have to offer?" It's kind of like I have to prove myself over and over again.

My sister and I did the Pastry line together and it did well over $56 million, but at the same time people were like, "well that was given to you." Yeah, in a way we were walking through the door, but my sister and I designed them and thought of names for the various shoes. We're the reason the company went where it went. I would definitely say It stems back to having true talent and having true passion about what you do.

What's the best advice you received from your dad?

My dad gives me tons of advice, because we talk on the regular. He's so full of knowledge. Since I was younger he's always told me to "do your best and forget the rest" and I've applied to everything in my life. When I know I've given my all, then there's nothing I can do. I just let it go, leave it in God's hands, and let whatever happens happen. I know that if I study hard, I get the good grades and if I don't put in the work, then I won't get what I want out of it. I apply that to relationships, to work...to everything.

 2015 MusicTimes.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
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Assemblyman Jim Patterson View Photos

Fresno, CA  A early challenger has revealed firm intentions to run for the seat of Mother Lode state senator, Republican Tom Berryhill, when he terms out in 2018.

On Friday, Clarke Broadcasting spoke with Republican Fresno Assemblyman Jim Patterson about his just-announced plans to seek the 8th Senate District seat.

Sharing reasons for stating his intentions early on, Patterson explains, I have had the opportunity of working with some people from the Senate from our area, and have really gotten to appreciate the opportunity that the Senate provides for a strong and vigorous voicealso people have been asking repeatedly what my plans would be after my election, and so I thought it would be important for me toannounce my interestand that would give me the kind of time necessaryto know the district in a much better way. Plus, he says, matter-of-factly, It also gives other people the opportunity to say, well, if Jim is going to vacate the Assembly seat, well, we may want to run for thatit gives everybody an opportunity to make some decisions.

A former Fresno mayor, Patterson, nearly 68, is now serving his second Assembly term. He notes similar common concerns within his 23rd Assembly District to those in the Mother Lode due to geography. Among them, he says, are issues with government, water, fire, forest health, public safety and park areas.

As to his thoughts about a possible run by Republican Assemblymember Kristin Olsen, who, before redistricting, represented the Mother Lode, Patterson replies, Open seats are an invitation for people to earn the votesmy guess is that there will be a number of people who will be seeking the seat.

As previously reported, Olsen, who was also as Assembly minority leader these past two years, recently decided to sit out this election for family reasons. However, she signaled generic near future plans to return to public service in a newsletter sent to supporters from a Paid For By Olsen for Senate 2018 email account. Clarke Broadcasting reported that, along with other lawmakers who quietly filed last September with the Secretary of State, Olsen submitted a Statement of Intention to run for Berryhills seat in 2018.
Calaveras County Seal View Photos

San Andreas, CA  As part of next weeks robust agenda, the Calaveras supervisors anticipate spending at least an hour pondering how to fill the sheriffs vacancy.

According to the meeting documents, Board Chair Cliff Edson directed that the discussion be slated so that the board can decide whether it is ready to proceed, as required by law, in making a formal appointment pending the next general election, or calling for a special election.

As previously reported, following last falls sudden, tragic loss of Sheriff Gary Kuntz, 63, due to a heart attack (his life remembered, here), the board chose to take no action for 90 days. Since then, Bureau of Operations Capt. Jim Macedo, the chief deputy next in line of authority has discharged the sheriffs duties. This arrangement will remain in place until the supervisors either appoint someone else or an election process is completed.

Among other regular agenda items, the board will consider accepting as complete all road improvements for the Olive Orchard Estates subdivision in Rancho Calaveras, effectively waiving certain offsite improvements such as the building of left turn lanes on Highway 26 at the intersection of Olive Orchard Road and Garner Place. As previously reported, a residents appeal took exception to the planning boards decision to approve the move. The board will also hear and receive the countys Fish & Game Commission annual report.

On its consent agenda, the supervisors will adopt a resolution supporting the Calaveras Public Utility Districts (CPUD) efforts to lift the building moratorium imposed back in October of 2014 by the State Water Resources Control Board (WRCB), after WRCB deemed that the water supply source was not reliable. On Dec. 15, WRCB amended its compliance order, requiring CPUD to make 36-month, temporary service available to 55 connections serving FEMA modular housing units for Butte Fire survivors.

Other consent items include continuing local states of emergency relating to the Butte Fire and pervasive tree mortality issues.

Following an 8:30 a.m. closed session, the meeting will begin a 9 on Tuesday in the supervisors chambers at the government center (891 Mountain Ranch Road).
Jacksonville Bridge over Lake Don Pedro View Photos

Tuolumne County, CA  The Tuolumne County Sheriffs Department has found a way to get rid of some of the derelict vessels that are eyesores on waterways and properties for free.

The California Division of Boating and Waterways has awarded the department a Surrendered and Abandoned Vessel Exchange (SAVE) grant. The $29,500 allocation will fund the removal and disposal of broken-down, abandoned vessels that create hazards on the water and ground. Sheriffs spokesperson Sgt. Andrea Benson explains, Even if you have lost the title or if the vessel has been abandoned on your property the Tuolumne County Sheriffs vehicle abatement office can still assist with the removal.

The grant runs two years or until the money runs out. Sgt. Benson outlines the guidelines, stating, There is no official deadline to submit a removal request. There is not a size limitation for the boat or an amount of vessels that you can dispose of, as well as, no cost limit.

This is the first awarding of a SAVE grant to the sheriffs office and Sgt. Benson indicates that if all goes well, they plan to apply for the grant again. To inquire about disposing of a vessel, contact the Sheriffs Vehicle Abatement Office at 209-533-5866.
Florida Fish and Wildlife has launched an investigation after three dogs were found dead in the Ocala National Forest.

The three animals were found by a man who was riding in the trail area on Sunday.

Brittany Iverson, the man's girlfriend, said the dogs were mostly white and appeared to be hunting dogs. Each dog had a tattoo on their ears.

"If something happened to them where they got sick or they got hurt or something, then you had to do what you had to do," Iverson said. "But why wouldn't you bury them in the ground? Like that's just the respect you should give your animal."

Animal Control picked up the dogs and will be performing a necropsy to determine the cause of death, according to a report from the Marion County Sheriffs Office.
Texas A&M AgriLife Extension will offer a Profitability Workshop at the Hale County Extension Office from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 19.

The workshop will help producers compare the profitability of relevant crops with the use of a spreadsheet with separate budgets for over 20 different crops. The crop spreadsheet budgets that will be used in the workshop can be downloaded from the Profitability Website: SouthPlainsProfit.tamu.edu

The Profitability tool is a set of crop spreadsheet budgets tied together in one file to allow quick and easy comparison of different crops. The objective of the workshop will include introducing participants to the budget spreadsheet to compare various alternative crops and help them prepare to enter their own yields and cost information.

Each participant will receive a jump drive with the budget spreadsheet on it. Participants are encouraged to bring their computer if they would like to follow along on computer. Instructors will make sure everyone knows how to get the spreadsheet on their computer, either from the website or the jump drive.

Participants should leave the workshop ready to enter their own costs and with a tool to compare the potential profitability of various crops with their expectations of yields and costs.

Among topics to be covered are:

 Market Outlook -- Dr. John Robinson, Cotton Marketing Specialist

 Update on STAX, SCO and other crop insurance issues -- Shawn Wade, Plains Cotton Growers

 Overview of Expected Input Prices -- Jeff Pate, Risk Management Specialist, High Plains Water Project

 Overview of the Farm Assist Program -- Will Keeling, Risk Management Specialist-Farm Assist Program

 Introduction to the Basic Crop Spreadsheet Budget -- Jackie Smith

 How to enter your data, save files, print, getting comfortable with all the tools in the spreadsheet

 Go through a dryland example comparing two crops.

 Go through an irrigated example comparing two crops.

 Overview of the breakeven tools.

The goal is for everywhere to leave the workshop with a good understanding of the tool and feel comfortable entering data, according to Jason Miller, county Extension agent-agriculture.
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Two popular authors of Christian fiction, Tracie Peterson and Kimberley Woodhouse, will have a joint appearance at Unger Memorial Library, 825 Austin St., beginning at 4:30 p.m. Friday, Jan. 15.

Unger Librarian John Sigwald said the pair were be there for a book discussion and signing of their joint novel, Beyond The Silence. Library patrons as well as the general public are invited.

We are really fortunate to have these two outstanding writers visit our community, and to come to the library, Sigwald said. Im sure everyone who has a chance to attend will go away glad that they were present. This should be a really enjoyable program.

Peterson writes many historical novels with romantic threads in them, as well as collaborating with other Christian authors on joint novels. Many of her books are published by Bethany House. Several of her book series feature Harvey Girls, who were historically part of the Fred Harvey Company.

She and her husband, Jim, live in Montana with their three children, Jennifer, Julie and Erick.

Peterson originally used the pen name Janelle Jamison.

Writing Christian fiction has been a ministry and a joy for me, she explains on her website. My goal is that ever book I write - whether its a historical novel for a series, a standalone contemporary novel, a novella or a nonfiction book - would entertain, educate and encourage each reader in whatever way God sees fit. This is my mission field and passion.

She, her husband Jim, daughter Jennifer, and a friend, Charity Kauffman, own Peterson Ink, Inc. Barbour Publishing uses that company to handle its entire production of the Heartsong Presents book line. Heartsong Presents publishes 52 Christian romance books each year. Half are contemporary stories and half are historical.

Woodhouse, who lives in Colorado with her husband and two children, has been writing seriously for the past 15 years, including songs, plays, short stories, novels, picture books, articles and newsletters. Only after a friend challenged her to do something with it did Woodhouse began pursuing publication. Since then she has multiple books to her credit, with more on the way.

A devoted wife and mother, and third-generation Liszt student, she has passed on her love of the arts on to hundreds of students, recorded three albums and appeared at more than 700 venues.

Her familys story has been featured in newspapers, magazines, articles, medical journals and most recently on ABCs Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. They also have been asked to share their story on The Montel Williams Show and Discovery Health Channels Mystery ER.

That story involves her daughter, 13-year-old Kayla Woodhouse, who also is an author and has written books individually and with her mother.

Kayla was born with HAS, Hereditary Sensory Autonomic Neuropathy, which is an extremely rare nerve disorder that leaves her body unable to sweat or feel anything less than particularly intense pain. Her condition forces her to wear a heavy cooling vest whenever shes out of the house.

In 2006, Kayla was diagnosed with another rare problem unrelated to HSAN. That condition, Chiari Malformation of the brain, ultimately required brain decompression surgery.

Woodhouse says her familys deep abiding Christian faith continues to help them face their ongoing challenges, and both she and her daughter use their many talents to share their faith.
Adopting new rules to govern the concealed and open carrying of firearms by licensed individuals in county-owned buildings, County Judge Bill Coleman admits, has created a big headache.

County commissioners brought up the issue at Fridays work session, and its on the agenda for Mondays regular session. Specifically, they are being asked to adopt guidelines on where in the courthouse and other county buildings will be off limits to non-law enforcement gun carriers, and to post appropriate signage to convey that information.

Coleman noted that state statutes specifying the exact wording, size and dimensions for signs and labels prohibiting the open carrying and concealed carrying of firearms are aptly designated by Texas Penal Code numbers 30.06 and 30.07.

The statutes are fairly straightforward, but the recommendations are vague, Coleman said Friday. And if we dont get it right, theres a good chance the county could be penalized financially.

State District Court Judges Rob Kinkaid and Kregg Hukill have taken some of the burden away from the commissioners, Coleman reports, by already adopting a miscellaneous order prohibiting both the open carrying and concealed carrying of firearms within the courtrooms at the Justice Center as well as all rooms and offices used by the court, court coordinators, officers, bailiffs, court reporters, jurors and prospective jurors, along with adjacent hallways. The order includes the district clerks office and jury assembly room as well as the adult probation offices in the Courthouse Annex at Sixth and Broadway and the juvenile probation offices on the northeast corner of the courthouse square.

Referring to the district judges order as a template for them to use at the courthouse, Coleman on Friday suggested that firearms be prohibited in the Justice of the Peace courtroom and offices in the basement as well as areas used for early voting; the county clerks offices along with commissioners courtroom and work rooms on the first floor, when used for public meetings; all except the special projects coordinators office on the second floor; and the courtroom and selected areas on the third floor.

We cant do a blanket order for the entire courthouse, Coleman noted. Commissioners also are expected to adopt guidelines for other county facilities, including the Ollie Liner Center.

County Attorney Jim Tirey at Fridays session agreed to work with Coleman in drafting recommendations for commissioners to consider before taking formal action on posting firearm restrictions. We really need some written direction before we move forward, Coleman said.

In other action Monday, commissioners are scheduled to:

--Approve the new maximum state mileage reimbursement rate of 54 cents per mile, down from 57.5 cents.

--Approve accounts payable of $211,417.21 through Dec. 31, and $265,290.37 for 2016.

--Consider a request from the American Cancer Society to hold its Relay For Life activities on the courthouse grounds from noon to 8 p.m. April 16.

--Review a certificate of compliance with tax abatement agreements from Golden Spread Cooperative on Phase I and Phase II construction at the Elk Power Station north of Abernathy.

--Renew service agreements with Ameripride Linen and Apparel Services for county precinct barns, Ollie Liner Center, courthouse and sheriffs office, and with Lexis/Nexis for the county attorneys office.

--Consider a request from Lubbock Stock Show board to use the Ollie Liner Center for its upcoming swine show since facilities they normally use in Lubbock were damaged by the Goliath Blizzard.

--Approve the Halfway Volunteer Fire Departments 2015 activity report, showing 11 runs, and release its 2016 stipend.

Commissioners are scheduled to consider the countys jail contract with Hutchinson County, the sheriffs office maintenance agreement with Mentalix, a request for a credit card for use by County Extension Agent Cassidy Peek, and discuss filing an annual report on the countys eminent domain authority.
In an apparent case of a good deed gone wrong, a 19-year-old man was arrested Friday in the beating of a teenager who let him use his cell phone last month.

On Dec. 3, Christopher Serenil asked to borrow a 16-year-old males phone while at Golden Park in the 7000 block of Somerset Road, according to a San Antonio Police arrest warrant affidavit. The teenager agreed.
If youre going to engage in a foreign policy capitulation, might as well do it when everyone is getting tanked and otherwise occupied. Say, New Years Eve.

Heres the story. In October, Iran test-fires a nuclear-capable ballistic missile in brazen violation of Security Council resolutions prohibiting such launches. President Barack Obama does nothing. One month later, Iran does it again. The administration makes a few gestures at the U.N. Then nothing. Then finally, on Dec. 30, the White House announces a few sanctions.

They are weak, aimed mostly at individuals and designed essentially for show. Amazingly, even that proves too much. By 10 p.m. that night, the administration caves. The White House sends out an email saying that sanctions are off  and the Iranian president orders the military to expedite the missile program.

Is there any red line left? First, the Syrian chemical weapons. Then the administration insistence that there would be no nuclear deal unless Iran accounted for its past nuclear activities. (It didnt.) And unless Iran permitted inspection of its Parchin nuclear testing facility. (It was allowed self-inspection and declared itself clean.) And now, illegal ballistic missiles.

The premise of the nuclear deal was that it would constrain Iranian actions. Its had precisely the opposite effect. It has deterred us from offering even the mildest pushback to any Iranian violations lest Iran walk away and leave Obama legacy-less.

Just two weeks ago, Irans Revolutionary Guards conducted live-fire exercises near the Strait of Hormuz. It gave nearby U.S. vessels exactly 23 seconds of warning. One rocket was launched 1,500 yards from the USS Harry S. Truman.

Obamas response? None.

The Gulf Arabs  rich, weak and, since FDR, dependent on America for security  are bewildered. Theyre still reeling from the nuclear deal, which Obama declared would be unaffected by Iranian misbehavior elsewhere. The result was to assure Tehran that it would pay no price for its aggression in Syria and Yemen, subversion in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, and support for terrorism.

Obama seems not to understand that disconnecting the nuclear issue gave the mullahs license to hunt in the region. For the Saudis, however, its not just blundering but betrayal. From the very beginning, theyve seen Obama tilting toward Tehran as he fancies himself Nixon in China, turning Iran into a strategic partner in managing the Middle East.

This is even scarier because it is delusional. If anything, Obamas openhanded appeasement has encouraged Irans regional adventurism and intense anti-Americanism.

The Saudis, sensing abandonment, are near panic. Hence the reckless execution of the firebrand Shiite insurrectionist, Sheikh Nimr Baqr al-Nimr, that has brought the region to a boil. Iranians torched the Saudi Embassy. The Saudis led other Sunni states in breaking relations with Tehran.

The Saudis feel surrounded, and its not paranoia. To their north, Iran dominates a Shiite crescent stretching from Iraq, Syria and Lebanon to the Mediterranean. To the Saudi south, Iran has been arming Yemens Houthi rebels since at least 2009.

The danger is rising. For years, Iran has been supporting anti-regime agitation among Saudi Arabias minority Shiites. The Persian Gulf is Irans ultimate prize. The fall of the House of Saud would make Iran the undisputed regional hegemon and an emerging global power.

For the United States, that would be the greatest geopolitical setback since China fell to communism in 1949. Yet Obama seems oblivious. Worse, he appears inert in the face of the three great challenges to the post-Cold War American order. Iran is only the most glaring. China is challenging the status quo in the South China Sea, just last week landing its first aircraft on an artificial island hundreds of miles beyond the Chinese coast. We deny Chinas claim and declare these to be international waters, yet last month we meekly apologized when a B-52 overflew one of the islands. We said it was inadvertent.

The world sees and takes note. As it does our response to the other great U.S. adversary  Russia. Whats happened to Obamas vaunted isolation of Russia for its annexation of Crimea and assault on the post-Cold War European settlement? Gone. Evaporated. Kerry plays lapdog to Sergei Lavrov. Obama meets openly with Vladimir Putin in Turkey, then in Paris. And is now practically begging him to join our side in Syria.

There is no price for defying Pax Americana  not even trivial sanctions on Iranian missile-enablers. Our enemies know it. Our allies see it  and sense theyre on their own and may not survive.

letters@charleskrauthammer.com
Weeks before Ammon Bundy and his pals showed up at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge to protest five-year federal prison sentences imposed on two Oregon ranchers, a friend alerted me to the ranchers story. Thanks to federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws, the government was sending Dwight and Steven Hammond, who had served earlier sentences, back to prison for the same crime. The draconian sentencing that warped the drug war had bled into home on the range.

I have no love for the Bundy bunch. In 2014, when Nevada cattle rancher Cliven Bundy (Ammons father) began an armed standoff with the federal government over seized cattle, I wrote, He was willing to start a range war and risk the lives of his supporters in order to retrieve some cows. He doesnt feel he has to recognize a government elected by his fellow citizens.

The Oregon Farm Bureau has another beef with the Malheur Refuge occupiers: They have diverted public attention and scrutiny away from the injustice that the federal government perpetrated on the Hammonds.

In 2012, a jury found rancher Dwight Hammond guilty of setting a 2001 arson fire that spread from his ranch and burned 139 acres of public land. Jurors also found his son Steven guilty of the 2001 arson and a 2006 fire that burned an acre of public land. A U.S. District judge sentenced Dwight to three months and Steven to one year and one day. Both Hammonds went to prison, served their time and were released.

That should be the end of the story. Except government lawyers had prosecuted the Hammonds under the Anti-terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 that set a five-year minimum sentence for arson on federal property. They wanted to throw the book at the Hammonds. The presiding judge found the five-year minimum disproportionate to the crime. (I think the judge was right at heart, but wrong on the law.)

Alas, Department of Justice lawyers appealed the reduced sentences and won. In 2015, a different judge ordered both Hammonds to prison to complete their five-year sentences. It doesnt seem fair  or a smart use of tax dollars  to throw Dwight Hammond, 73, behind bars for four years, nine months more.

The law is an ass. Kevin Ring of Families Against Mandatory Minimums noted that Congress passed the 1996 law in response to the Oklahoma City bombing to punish terrorism aimed at public buildings. Ring sees the issue as one of local control versus D.C. control. The judge, a local, knew the facts of the case  that the fires werent terrorism. The community seemed satisfied with the outcome. But the federal one-size-fits-all model is merciless.

Theyre not really mandatory minimums, Ring told me. Theyre not mandatory because the prosecution can make deals and theyre not bare minimums because Washington pols idea of minimum is any reasonable persons idea of severe.

What should good people do? Write your senators and congressional representative. Tell them to purge the books of minimum terms that are doomed to spawn injustice.

Debra J. Saunders is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist.

dsaunders@sfchronicle.com

@DebraJSaunders
A stroke of a pen amending the constitution of the Dominican Republic in 2013 rendered an estimated 200,000 to 250,000 Haitians in the country a stateless people. Haitians in the Dominican Republic born as early as 1929 to undocumented parents became persons without a country.

There was a sliver of opportunity for regularization status for those who could successfully navigate the labyrinthine system and who could produce proper documentation. This is complicated as many persons of Haitian ancestry born in the Dominican Republic were never issued birth certificates. The regularization process was cumbersome even for those who had one parent who was Dominican.

The deadline for applying for the naturalization program ended six months ago, when only a handful of individuals who registered had actually received residence permits. Many applicants continue to live in limbo having no access to documents that they submitted along with their application fees.

Over the past several months, many Haitians have been forced to leave for Haiti, a country many do not know. Wide estimates suggest that tens of thousands of Haitians have either been deported or have voluntarily left for Haiti.

Those deliberately leaving the Dominican Republic have done so in response to threats from native Dominicans, a large majority of whom favor the constitutional amendment ridding the country of Haitians.

Approximately 3,000 Haitians are living in makeshift squalid camps located along Haitis border with the Dominican Republic, where they reside in the midst of an outbreak of cholera, little food, and the lack of potable water, sanitary sewage and medical care.

The history of Dominican-Haitian relations has been tainted by massive hate and racism, intensified by the Dominican Republic gaining its independence not from Spain, like many other countries in Latin America, but from Haiti in 1844.

One of the ugliest stains in Dominican-Haitian relations is the massacre of Haitians  estimates ranging from 9,000 to 20,000  in the Dominican Republic in 1937 at the behest of Rafael Trujillo, the countrys tyrant who brutally reigned over the Dominican Republic for over three decades.

Racism against Haitians in the country persists today. Racial lines are clearly drawn. Many Dominicans recognize their Spanish and indigenous roots but not the African ancestry that many possess. Dominicans tend to not see themselves as black, even if their skin color belies this perception; it is Haitians who are black.

Haitians are segregated with a large number living in bateyes, sugarcane plantations, where they live in horrendous slave-like conditions. The life of Haitians in the bateyes in the Dominican Republic is depicted in the 2007 documentary The Price of Sugar featuring the Spanish priest Christopher Hartley and narrated by Paul Newman.

Over the past year, the issue of immigration has been in the news in the United States. The press has been focused on the more than one million refugees and migrants who have arrived in Europe in 2015 from the Middle East and Afghanistan.

In Texas much of the focus has been on the resurgence of Central American children making their way to South Texas, as well as Gov. Greg Abbotts protest against the settling of Syrian refugees in the state.

The Haitian migrant crisis in the Dominican Republic has received far less attention. Despite pressure from political activists within the country as well as from abroad, the Dominican Republic government denies the statelessness status and the violation of basic human rights of Haitian migrants.

The statelessness of Haitians is the latest setback for the poorest people in Latin America. A brighter light needs to be cast on the plight of Haitians without a country.

Dr. Rogelio Saenz is dean of the College of Public Policy and Peter Flawn Professor of Demography at the University of Texas at San Antonio.
The House voted Wednesday to repeal the Affordable Care Act. And this is different from the dozens of other such votes only because its a bill that actually got to the presidents desk. It got there because the GOP-controlled Senate, using filibuster-proof reconciliation rules, passed its repeal earlier.

All of which does not change the ultimate outcome. President Barack Obama vetoed the bill on Friday, which means, just as with the other efforts, it will not stop a program that has resulted in some 11.7 million Americans obtaining health coverage and a drop to 11.4 percent of Americans who remain uninsured. This is down from nearly 16 percent before the ACA was enacted.
San Antonio will have plenty of challenges in 2016 if the city is serious about its slogan of being on the rise.

The Express-News Editorial Board will focus on three of these challenges this year, not because the metro areas problems can be distilled to that number, but because we view these as key to improving the quality of life here.

The three issues we will emphasize in a series of Agenda 2016 editorials are education, transportation and the Alamo  not just broadly but with particular focus. Back to what type of focus in a minute.

We arrive at these three because of our own observations, because we want to sustain some momentum that occurred in 2015, and because when we asked, readers were not bashful about sharing their concerns. We listened.

This doesnt mean we will ignore the regions other issues. There is, for instance, the nagging matter of health  much of the populace is obese, and that translates into distressing rates of diabetes, a killer. Sugar-sweetened beverages are a major culprit. Count on it; well return to this topic.

Theres a lack of civic engagement, most noticeable in paltry voter turnout, particularly in municipal elections. Well be urging specific action on this, even if a presidential election year likely means more robust turnout than usual. But even in that, weve noticed, Texas still lags other states.

Downtown development remains a major issue for the city and the region. Simply, the city will not thrive without a vibrant center, and this must involve more than tourist attractions.

Mental health. Income inequality. Gentrification and displacement. So many issues, and well visit as many as we can. But heres why weve picked these three issues  with a particular emphasis  for our Agenda 2016 focus.

Education

There is no other topic that influences so many of the other issues confronting San Antonio. Failure here means challenges in:

Economic development: Good schools mean a workforce skilled enough to make the region competitive and attracting companies that need skilled workers.

Poverty: No education? Low-paying jobs follow, indeed if employment follows at all. And then other dominoes fall, including increased reliance on social welfare programs.

Crime: Its no coincidence that our jails and prisons are full of people who have not finished high school, much less gone to college. Low educational attainment is not a guarantee of a life of crime, but there is a correlation.

Voting: The link between voting and educational attainment is clear. And theres one between high incomes and voting, too. And those incomes dont come without education these days.

Thats why well be focusing on education broadly. But heres why well be focusing mostly on the San Antonio Independent School District.

Simply, its a linchpin. If it lags, so does the region. And it is lagging in significant ways.

No, SAISD is not the largest school district in Bexar County. Its the third largest. The top two in student enrollment are Northside ISD and North East ISD, respectively. But of the three, SAISD underachieves and, because of its size, this has repercussions for the entire area, including a reluctance for people with children to move downtown.

We like what new Superintendent Pedro Martinez has laid out in his five-year plan for the district and what he plans to say in his state of the district address this week. He gave the Editorial Board a preview on Thursday.

In his five-year plan, he wants 70 percent of SAISD schools achieving A and B grades by 2020 in a rating system the state will start using in 2017, though we will have to see the worthiness of this system. He wants 25 percent of students in advanced placement and international baccalaureate courses, up from 13 percent.

But heres what is the most telling about SAISD, in our view. Though it boasts a nearly 81 percent graduation rate, only 3 percent of its students score at college ready in SAT exams.

Yes, the district says 52 percent of its graduates nonetheless continue to college, but only 25 percent go to four-year institutions and 2 percent to Tier One universities.

And remediation for unprepared students takes up a lot of resources in community colleges.

This lack of college readiness indicates that too many of the students who graduate from SAISD are not ready to take their places in an increasingly competitive economy. It indicates that their schools have failed them. And that bodes ill for the region generally, particularly when it comes to economic development.

Its true that SAISD faces distinct challenges  93 percent of its students are on free and reduced lunch, most of these qualifying for free. This points to a stubborn strain of economic disadvantage. Nearly 79 percent of students are deemed at risk because of a variety of factors.

And in this SAISD can be said to be a microcosm of many Texas schools, including in its predominately Latino school population.

So, one way of looking at this: If SAISD can achieve, it will be showing the way for many of the states schools.

That said, we see some advantages at SAISD that we dont see in other area districts. Its board of trustees is clearly functional, and its members obviously have their heads and hearts in the right places. Sadly, we cant say that about other districts. Their dysfunctional boards will continue to get attention from us.

And Martinez strikes us as ambitious on behalf of his students, clearly not buying into the notion that being a low-income student means he or she cant learn.

His goals include long-term efforts to increase the level of teacher proficiency, steps to tackle a nagging teacher shortage, plans for  eventually  all students being enrolled in what amount to advanced programs, all English language learners literate by third grade, all third graders reading at grade level and advanced math learning in the early grades as well.

Martinez clearly understands the districts linchpin role for San Antonio, ackowledging also an array of other factors that, he says, are creating a city of haves and have nots. The status quo in the district, he adds, means a continuing bleeding of families to the citys northern neighborhoods and this ultimately does not further the citys ability to thrive.

We agree. So, our goal will be to help Martinez and the board achieve their goals  including adequate funding from the state. This will be key.

Transportation

Overwhelmingly, readers who responded to our request for their thoughts on what the top three policy items for the city should be named transportation. They were talking about the quality of our roads, but also the quality and availability of public transportation.

We agree. Thats why we will focus on mass transit in our Agenda 2016 series of editorials, also paying attention to roads and highway quality as well.

In San Antonio, you cant talk about mass transit without tackling what we have and what we dont. We have VIA and its fleet of buses. But we dont have a 21st century transit system because we lack light rail.

We view VIA as a relatively well-functioning entity, all the more remarkable because it is underfunded, underresourced and underappreciated despite serving a vital role for the community.

Well try to change that.

Like education, transportation is an issue that touches so many others. People getting to and from jobs, and goods getting to where they need to go  this is vital for a thriving economy.

But transportation is also about linking disparate communities.

We see public buses as helping in this regard. Needed: more of them and with routes that make it more likely that San Antonians will get out of their cars.

But we see a particularly crucial role for light rail.

After the bruising the city and VIA took over the downtown streetcar proposal, tackling this issue might seem to be a matter of tilting at windmills. But the question really is whether San Antonio will have a complete and modern system or will simply look to more road asphalt as the solution.

This alone will not ease congestion in the city. Getting San Antonians out of their cars will help more, and thats important for any number of additional reasons, from air quality to global warming.

Simply, many San Antonians wont step out of their cars to get into a bus. They will in higher numbers, we believe, for light rail.

And theres the issue of bridging the communitys divides. Light rail can help. It can mean more incentive to venture back and forth across Loop 410 and Loop 1604 to live and work. Its not a panacea, but it can help this community better integrate.

Wed like to see the city engage on light rail  with full citizen input  sooner rather than later.

The Alamo

This has been a focus of ours for a few years now, and weve seen progress as many have shared the vision and pushed the issue forward.

That vision is for an Alamo that lives up to its potential.

In 2015, the Legislature gave nearly $32 million for the effort. The city, which owns Alamo Plaza, plans to pitch in with another $17 million or so.

Also in 2015, the state completed its purchase of three buildings across from Alamo Plaza. The potential is dizzying.

The city formed an Alamo Plaza Advisory Committee, which crafted the parameters of what a reimagined Alamo might look like, with an eye toward a better and more accurate telling of the history  before, during and after 1836, and linking all that with San Antonios other missions, which together won a World Heritage Site designation in 2015.

A master plan, crafted jointly by the city and state, offers the hope for coordination as weve never seen before. This master plan will have to be ready in 2016 in time for planning for the citys 2017 bond election and before the Legislature reconvenes in 2017. More state support will be needed.

This master plan will need to be bold if the Alamo Endowment, formed by the state to raise funds and to participate in the master plan process, is to be successful in bringing in the money needed for proper renovation. People will not contribute to perpetuate the status quo.

Is that all there is? A bold master plan will make sure this would no longer be such a common refrain.

We envision a restoration of the site to its 1836 footprint as much as possible, a world-class Alamo museum and visitors center, and surrounding businesses that dont disrespect the history attached to the Cradle of Texas Independence.

Our Agenda 2016 editorials will be urging bold action. Well be watching what comes out of this master plan.

Last year contained many ups and downs. Our hope is for a 2016 in which the city and the region can claim many wins in education, transportation and at the Alamo.
Re: We the people should end gerrymandering, Mike Collier, Another View, Dec. 28:

Mike Collier gets it exactly right in his commentary. Gerrymandering is the very embodiment of nonrepresentative government. End it now.

Mickey Gayler

Elections controlled

Re: We the people should end gerrymandering, Mike Collier, Another View, Dec. 28:

Most of your readers with good judgment and political acumen will agree with this column. It is completely accurate that ending gerrymandering is the sole and essential means of ending gridlock in Washington.

As long as the extremes of both major parties control the primary elections, normal people who are willing to work out solutions to problems, just as they do in free enterprise business, will not succeed in the Washington political world and increasingly are not even willing to subject themselves to an election effort.

This constitutional amendment effort must be the primary American political focus for the coming years. We are too great a nation to allow ourselves to be subjected to a failed Congress, whose overwhelming concern is their own re-election.

David DeWall

Living planet

Re: Seek the truth, Your Turn, Dec. 29:

There can be no doubting the accuracy of the letter regarding global warming. For millions of years, the Earth has gone through glacial and interglacial periods, or times of both warming and cooling. Ours is not a stagnant but a living planet, as we ourselves are living proof.

Though many scientists will attest to the fact that we are in an interglacial period, those and many others will simultaneously admit that mans contribution of fossil fuel exhaust is exacerbating a natural phenomenon.

Greenland was indeed once green, but it was given that moniker, as the story goes, when early settlers sought to encourage gullible settlers to inhabit a land that was mostly frozen tundra.

Jamie Blount
I had spent almost 1 week on this crazy island. For real, this was my 2nd time in here and it is still awesome place to chill. Forget about those crazy party, let us focused on the HALAL food. Finding HALAL food in Koh Pangan is not that easy like Krabi or Hat Yai or Surat Thani town itself. This is because the Muslim in this island is really minority.



To get HALAL food easily, first you must have your own transport. You can spent around 150baht to 200baht per day for motorcycle rental. All the motorcycle is auto. But to rent a motorcycle, most probably you need to submit your passport and they will hold your passport until you return the vehicle. But be extra careful, there are some case that the company will claim the motorcycle was damaged by you and they will ask you compensation, if you not pay the damage you will not get your passport. My recommendation, rent the bike through your hotel/hostel



If you think to get HALAL food around the mosque, you are wrong. I had been there to the mosque. 1st, I am quite shocked with the mosque condition. 2nd, there were no HALAL food shop around the perimeter of the mosque.



Bhan Tai area Map, you can see there showing "Mosque"





At this junction, you can find Koh Pangan map showing Mosque and where you are now, took the right road less than 1 minute, the mosque is in your left





Where you can find the mosque? Actually, I had passed by the mosque few times without I realize that is the mosque I was looking about. It is situated next to the road of Ban Thaai to Had Rin. Assume you start from the Big C, go straight until you passed 2 units of 7 eleven (1 at the petrol station, and 1 more near the Jungle Party junction), then straight more there will 2 roads (on the left, to the Sramanora Waterfall Party, and you can find Map signboard, then right road will go to Ban Thai). Choose the Ban Thai road, and around 30 second on your left, there is a Mosque!



The mosque in Koh Pangan









Back to the main topic, where can you get Halal Restaurant in this Full Moon Party Island, Koh Pangan?



1. MAKANAN HALAL  Makanan Halal is actually Malay translation for Halal Food. I called this shop this name because it is the only sign I understand. Location in Ban Tai, to find this shop, assume you drive from Makro to the Big C, after 30 second you passed by Big C, on your left is where this restaurant located. They also provided prayer room. Last time, I just came back from party then went to this shop, and this time also they played the Al-Quran reading voice, can you imagine how guilty I am? Their price is affordable, most of the menu around 50baht.





At MAKANAN HALAL, Shrimp Paste Fried Rice, 50 baht





At MAKANAN HALAL





At MAKANAN HALAL, Chicken Pad Thai, 50 baht





Chicken Ginger with Rice, 50 baht



2. FRIED CHICKEN SHOP BAN TAI  No, this is not this shop called, the name is in Thai which I cant read. Its selling fried chicken, like wings and boneless chicken. Yummy!! I had passed-by this shop few times before I found the HALAL symbol. I was very excited and bought a few chicken for my picnic at the beach. Situated also in Ban Tai, it is between MAKRO and BIG C, on your left. Just carefully observed each shop you might missed it.

Fried Chicken Shop Baan Thai, between Makro and Big C



3. MATEO Restaurant  This restaurant called Mateo, and its situated at the beach front and the wind here is so refreshing. The price at this shop a little bit higher. The restaurants actually a wooden house. To find this restaurant a little bit tricky. This restaurant is situated at the kite surfing area. I assumed you already found the mosque (read above introduction), the mosque on your left, keep driving straight. Less than 5 minutes, on your left you see signboard of SARONG CAFE & Guesthouse, Bar & Restaurant, then 2 second from there, stop, look at your right, there will be a sign MUSLIM RESTURANT or Kite surfing. Turn to that road, at the end of the road, park your vehicle, the restaurant is the 1st shop you will encounter.

5 minutes from Mosque, on your left, you will passed Sarong & Cafe

Less than 10 second after Sarong & Cafe, at your right, there will be junction with a lot of signboard. Turn right into this junction.





MATEO Restaurant, at the beachfront

White Tom Yam, popular dishes in Thai





4. THONG SALA area  At Thong Sala, you can go to the PANTIP market every night. There are various foods you can find over there. There 1 HALAL fried chicken shop there, how to recognize, look up at their stall roof, the Muslim shop they have Al-Quran written around their stall, and no, they not wearing Hijab. Others, there are HALAL KEBAB, actually 2 of it. There is also Vegetarian Food Stall. I love the sushi stall which all sushi is only 10baht. Only seafood sushi are here, no meat involved. I also asked them about is there any mix of alcohol, they said no. So, if you confident, you can try the sushi if not no need. 1 more thing you can eat is a Mango Sticky Rice. Yummy!





Sticky Mango Rice, do not choose the blue, the taste is weird

Halal Kebab

Pantip Market, at Thong Sala

10 baht each sushi

Fried Chicken, this one is not HALAL. HALAL fried chicken shop is in front of this stall.





5. THAI PANCAKE  Who doesn't love these pancake?? Where the bananas and nutella mixed together as the topping. 1 word: Heaven! .You can get Thai Pancake in front of BIG C in Ban Thai. There are 2 Muslims shop over there, 1 for pancake and 1 for the juices.



6. 7 Eleven  At some shop, you can find Halal Instant noodle. Just check carefully and 1 by 1, the HALAL sign at each product is really obvious.




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By Harriet Howard Heithaus of the Naples Daily News

First, Ginny Dickinson departed from the usual denouement of her beachcombing finds  handmade mirror and picture frames  by encrusting an entire 6-foot fiberglass sea horse with shells to benefit the Golisano Children's Hospital.

Next, she festooned another creature, one of the nearly 6-foot-square loggerhead turtles displayed around Collier County to benefit a trio of local organizations.

Then she quit her job.

After 31 years as a CPA, Dickinson's life has undergone a sea of change in the last year.

"It's probably more joy I've ever known, and it's so far outside my black-and-white box," the Fort Myers woman conceded of her intense work on the Mer Princess, the elegant amphibious presence in the lobby of the Naples Grande Beach Resort.

This joy has to be in the heart of the creator: Few other people envy the work Dickinson, 53, did assessing, bleaching and patterning row after row, thousands of shells in perfect or near-perfect symmetry. She also had to press many of those shells onto vertical surfaces, holding them in place while their glue dried to the music of her favorite blues artists, the Tedeschi Trucks Band. It was  conservatively  200 hours of work, not counting the shelling.

Curious kids and moving accidents mean the piece occasionally needs some cosmetic glue. Visitors to the Naples Grande Beach Resort have walked by, bemused, as Dickinson, who looks as much like a yoga teacher as an artist, plants herself in various positions to reseat a shell on Mer Princess.

The giant turtle is one of 50 embellished fiberglass reptiles paddling around prominent places in Collier County for Turtles on the Town, which benefits The Conservancy of Southwest Florida, the United Arts Council of Collier County and the Community Foundation. (See more information in the box accompanying this story.) Its name indicates its artistic lineage from the sea horse, titled the Mer Queen. That work now sits in the lobby of the Golisano Children's Hospital in Fort Myers, thanks to Dickinson herself. She felt so strongly the piece should be there she solicited money from family and friends to bid on her own sea horse and donate it.

Dickinson won't say the gravitational pull of art wrested her from an accounting career. It was time, she said, for a change. In fact, she may do some consulting in that arena.

"I want to go from success to significance," she declared. It's a good bet art will be in the mix.

Dickinson said she loved her work, especially a segment that sent her to various companies to reorganize their accounting: "I'd come in and have to learn all about an industry in six months while I was working on their books."

Similarly, she had to learn the physiognomy of the turtle she was working on.

"She's anatomically correct," Dickinson said with a sly grin.

That anatomy included small claws on its flippers and a five-sectioned back with family-friendly representations of its spiny scutes.

Of course there's royal jewelry: a pendant and a coronet of crab claws, augers, fighting conchs, calico scallops, glassy orange jingle shells and fins. Only the crab claws ("They were delicious!") didn't come directly from a nearby beach.

"And she's female, so she's got purple eye shadow," Dickinson added, pointing out arcs of dusky 1/2-inch tagulus. For mascara, black shark's teeth set Mer's moon shell eyes in permanent flirtation. Facial details and jewelry weren't difficult to create; mapping out the turtle's giant back  probably 10 square feet of real estate  was, she said.

"I was using these heart cockles, and they were heavy (to glue on). And I always have to be thinking, where should it start? Should the shells overlap or not?" she recalled.

Color-matching was its own challenge. Heart cockles alone come in shades from pure white to striped or mottled brown or with a faint gold or violet shading. Dickinson had to go back to the beach to find turkey wing shells that held similar densities and shades of color, and zigzagging never seen on a Burberry jacket.

Beachcombing isn't work for Dickinson, a third-generation Floridian whose grandfather settled in Fort Myers after arriving here from Bartow on horseback. The beach is in her family's blood, and when Dickinson's husband went on a business trip, she was at the beach every evening, she said.

"It's my form of meditation," she said. "I need to go shelling. If I walk across a driveway and see a shell, I'll pick it up. There's always a shell in my pocket."

Those shells, in a sense, are her brush strokes in a pointillist painting.

"I like to see a lot of little things that make a large thing," Dickinson said. She doesn't view herself as an artist, at least not yet, although the idea of someone commissioning her to create something like this in shells delights her.

"From a hoarder to an artist  that's a good change," she mused.

Still, she asked, "Is it really the beauty of the way I arranged the shells or the beauty of the shells themselves? I have to give credit to The Guy who created them."

She's also in awe of her fellow artists who produced everything from photo collages to murals to tie-dye to intricate life cycle chains over the fiberglass models.

"It was a 'wow' for me just to be in the room with all those people," she said of the Turtles on the Town opening reception in November.

Her husband carefully documented her hundreds of hours of work on a time-lapse video (see the video at naplesnews.com). Dickinson loves that people have responded to her fanciful sea creature: "I've seen photos of her people have put on Instagram and it just blows me away."

Did using so many thousands of her stock deplete the boxed inventory of coral, shells, fins and fossils in the family garage? A grin flashes across Dickinson's face again.

"I could do another one of these tomorrow," she said.
<p>Brain Balance of Naples Program Director Gabriel Dennis screens 6-year-old Matthew Smith, of Naples, for the company's program on Thursday, Dec. 4, 2014, in North Naples. (David Albers/Staff)</p>

SHARE Ron Nall, co-owner of Brain Balance of Naples. (David Albers/Staff) A series of scent pots awaits the screen process for participants of Brain Balance of Naples' program on Thursday, Dec. 4, 2014, in North Naples. (David Albers/Staff) Six-year-old Matthew Smith, of Naples, completes a screening process for Brain Balance of Naples on Thursday, Dec. 4, 2014, in North Naples. (David Albers/Staff) Ron Nall, co-owner of Brain Balance of Naples, hangs informational posters along the hallway at the business on Thursday, Dec. 4, 2014, in North Naples. (David Albers/Staff)

By Liz Freeman

Ronnie Nall spent 15 years and a small fortune on various therapies for his sons developmental disorder until his wife drove by a Brain Balance Center in North Carolina one day.

It was life changing, Gayle Nall said.

That was two years ago when they enrolled Hunter, then 17, in the 12-week program at the center in Cary, North Carolina.

The program targets the imbalance and disconnect between the two sides of the brain to address faulty communications that result in developmental and behavioral delays, Ronnie Nall said.

Their sons remarkable transformation made the Nalls such believers they are opening the Brain Balance Center of Naples this week in the Galleria Shoppes of Vanderbilt, in North Naples. There are 51 other franchise centers around the United States.

The Naples center already has 37 assessments of children scheduled, with a program capacity of 60 children, he said.

This community has been starving for help and that is not a reflection of anyone else in the community, Nall said.

Serving children ages 4 to 23, the program was founded by childhood neurobehavioral expert, Dr. Robert Melillo, who wrote Disconnected Kids. Melillo is in Naples Friday and Saturday for the grand opening and will give a one-hour lecture each day.

The program is based on research that shows disorders like attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and Asperger syndrome are a result of a right or left-brain deficit, and symptoms depend on which side and area of the brain is affected. The program involves sensory exercises, cognitive training and healthy nutrition to strengthen the side of the brain that is weaker and slow down the dominant side, Nall said.

Ninety percent of the kids have right-brain weakness, Nall said.

An assessment takes 3-1/2 hours. Children will do 72 half-hour sessions, but they do two sessions at each appointment three times a week. And parents must commit to do physical therapy-like exercises with their child at home.

The nutritional component involves eliminating foods that cause sensitivities and impact the immune system, according to program literature.

It is a 12-week rescue mission, so all hands are on deck, he said, of the intense program.

Not all children are accepted in the program and parents have to be realistic about their expectations, he said. Children at the extreme of the autism spectrum disorder, who are nonverbal autistic children and incontinent will not be college bound, he said.

In March, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released new data that one in 68 children has autism spectrum disorder. It is more prevalent in boys, at a rate of one in every 42 boys and one in every 189 girls, according to CDC data.

The Brain Balance program has met with skepticism from some medical professionals.

This past January, a committee of autism professionals at the Wisconsin Department of Health looked at the evidence available about the program and concluded there is limited experimental research to document either its use or effectiveness.

There are insufficient data available to draw meaningful conclusions about its efficacy, the committee report said.

The $7,000 cost for a 12-week program is not covered by medical insurance, but financing is available from two outside companies, Ronnie Nall said.

Their sons journey

When Hunter Nall was diagnosed 17 years ago with pervasive developmental delay  not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS), medical and mental health professionals offered his parents little direction.

I remember it was a kick in the gut, Ronnie Nall said. My son just received a life sentence.

Hunter did not start speaking until he was 3-1/2. He spent three years in a Head Start program and none of his records were sent to his kindergarten teacher.

That was a wake-up call to me, Nall said. These parents have to be advocates for their children. That was a stunner to me.

Nall refused to believe there was nothing that could help his son. For 15 years, Hunter saw mental health professionals and went to physical and occupational therapy, along with socialization therapy.

At age 17, he was reading at a third grade (level), Nall said. Its not the industrys fault. They are absolutely doing what they are trained to do.

One day his wife drove by the Brain Balance Center in Cary and went for an appointment on her own. She came home and told her husband they had to enroll Hunter.

I did go meet the doctor who owned it, Ronnie Nall said. I liked her and I listened to her but I didnt believe her. I wanted to find something for my son that was measurable and specific.

Gayle Nall said they were given the names of five parents to talk with about the program.

It sounded too good to be true, Gayle Nall said.

Nonetheless, they enrolled Hunter and started seeing changes after three weeks. He started coming out of his room. He would start making eye contact, she said.

They soon realized their daughter, Kayla, then 21, has autism spectrum disorder and she was enrolled.

I had missed it when she was young. Girls present differently, he said. (Today) she is graduating with a degree in special education.

Hunter is 19 today and a senior at First Baptist Academy. He is an ambassador for the Naples center so others can learn how much the program can help, she said.

Ronnie Nall declined to comment about what interaction he has had with the Collier County School District.

Until moving full time to Naples last year, the Nalls held stress-inducing jobs; he taught orthopedic surgeons how to use new surgical devices and his wife did marketing for insurance companies.

They left their corporate jobs to pursue a franchise in Naples for a Brain Balance center, she said. They got approved in April.

Ronnie Nall said he wanted to be located someplace that is easily accessible from Interstate 75 for families coming from Lee County, and be in a health-oriented commercial area. The Galleria Shoppes fits the bill with health-focused restaurants and fitness businesses nearby.

Word spread quickly about the brain center coming, especially after they put a rainproof brochure box out front  which emptied quickly  and an 8-foot banner sign.
SHARE Steven Richards Wendelyn Nall

By Daily News Staff

A Naples Park couple face a slew of drug charges after a search warrant was executed at their home Friday morning.

Around 6 a.m., Collier County sheriff's deputies searched the couple's home at 761 97th Ave. N., where they found 15 types of narcotic pills and about five pounds of marijuana. Deputies said they also found marijuana wax and a torch and butane gas used to make it.

Neither of the residents, 27-year-old Steven Michael Richards and 26-year-old Wendelyn May Nall, wished to speak with deputies, according to an arrest report. Both Richards and Nall face seven drug-related charges, including trafficking in opium or a derivative and possession of a place for the manufacturing of a controlled substance.
By Maryann Batlle of the Naples Daily News

The developer of the proposed Corkscrew Farms residential community defended his project Friday before an Estero group that filed a lawsuit against it.

At an Estero Council of Community Leaders meeting, Cameratta Companies founder Joe Cameratta and his consultants handed out inch-thick booklets of information and waited until the nearly two-hour meeting ended to make a presentation.

Cameratta commanded the podium at the Koreshan State Historic Site Art Hall, where the meeting was held, as he confronted points made by previous speakers who oppose development of the Corkscrew Farms site.

"You have to judge this for yourself people. But know your facts," said Cameratta. "What I'm telling you is the truth and the facts.

County commissioners in November gave Corkscrew Farms permission to rezone 1,360 acres the developer owns that are about six miles east of the Corkscrew Road and Interstate 75 interchange, within a density restricted groundwater resource area in southeast Lee known as the DRGR. Corkscrew Farms is outside of the village of Estero's borders, which means Lee County has final say on the project.

Last month, the Estero Council of Community Leaders and the Responsible Growth Management Coalition filed a circuit court lawsuit that argues county commissioners wrongly granted Cameratta Companies permission to build 1,325 houses on what is supposed to be protected land.

The lawsuit seeks a court review to determine if the Corkscrew project complies with Lee's comprehensive development plan, said Ralf Brookes, the lawyer who filed the complaint on behalf of the ECCL and RGMC.

"If not, (the court) overturns it and denies it," said Brookes.

Cameratta said he has followed the county's rules and has made substantial compromises, such as a promise to install 700 acres of uplands and wetlands, that would benefit the groundwater resource area.

"Millions of plants will be planted where you see sod farming taking place today," he said. "I'm not happy about the lawsuit. I'm trying to be calm about all of this."

Corkscrew Farms would add 12,000 vehicle trips per day onto Corkscrew Road, which two-lanes east of Interstate 75 and is already overburdened with traffic, the ECCL contends.

More drivers on Corkscrew Road would also endanger the lives of Florida Panthers, according to the complaint.

Lee County has failed to complete a comprehensive traffic analysis, one that would consider all Corkscrew Road, wildlife and groundwater resource area impacts as a whole instead of in a piecemeal manner, according to the lawsuit.

ECCL Chairman Don Eslick said the lawsuit challenges the way Lee County handles community development, and is not to impugn Cameratta's efforts or reputation.

"One of the problems we have always had with (county) development approvals is they're (done) project by project," Eslick said. "They don't have a broader vision."

Lee County, not Cameratta Companies, is to blame for leading developers to believe their projects conform with county planning rules, Eslick said.

"I don't think any of us in examining this proposal doesn't agree that Joe (Cameratta) has done everything possible on the site," Eslick said. "Our concern is what happens off the site and to the entire area."

Neale Montgomery, a private land use lawyer who has worked with Cameratta Companies, said the ECCL lawsuit has a direct impact on Cameratta and Corkscrew Farms.

"So, while you may not have intended it to be personal, it is personal," Montgomery said.

Pete Cangialosi, environmental director for the ECCL, said the environmental restoration offered by Corkscrew Farms is admirable, but the ECCL wants Lee County to study the entire groundwater resource area.

"There could be a domino effect where other properties start going one right after the other," Cangialosi said.
Park Royal Hospital in Fort Myers, a 103-bed psychiatric facility, is pictured shortly before its completion in 2012. The hospital, which already had a sexual abuse scandal involving one of its employees, is now subject to a lawsuit involving the suicide of a patient in November 2014. (Naples Daily News file photo)

SHARE

By Jacob Carpenter of the Naples Daily News

The employee might have lied, but the video did not.

In November 2014, it fell to James Landers, a staff member at Park Royal Hospital in Fort Myers, to check every 15 minutes on psychiatric patient Theodore Ousback Jr. In hospital documents, Landers wrote that he checked on Ousback three times during a one-hour span, noting each time that Ousback was asleep, his chest rising and falling.

Except surveillance video showed Landers never did those checks. And Ousback was, in fact, awake. Sometime during that hour, the 51-year-old Massachusetts native, who'd hinted at suicide in recent days, went into his bathroom, closed the door and hanged himself with a tied-up hospital gown.

The troubling details of Ousback's death are the subject of a recently filed lawsuit in Lee County against Park Royal Hospital and Landers. They also represent another black eye for the four-year-old hospital, which has already seen one employee sent to prison for sexually assaulting several patients and has had documented issues with failing to check on patients.

In the lawsuit, filed last month by Ousback's father, it's alleged that Landers abused Ousback by "failing to timely check on the safety of the decedent so as to protect him from injury to himself," and that the hospital is liable for the abuse.

Ousback's father declined to comment Friday, and his Fort Myers-based lawyer, Dennis Webb, could not be reached for comment last week.

Click here to read Park Royal Hospital statement of deficiencies

Officials from Park Royal Hospital and its parent company, Tennessee-based Acadia Healthcare, didn't return multiple calls and emails for comment last week. Efforts to reach Landers were unsuccessful. Neither the hospital nor Landers have filed responses to the lawsuit in court.

With 103 beds, Park Royal Hospital is the region's largest psychiatric inpatient facility. At the time of its opening, it was heralded as filling a major gap in mental health treatment in Southwest Florida, which had gone more than a decade without a psychiatric hospital.

Lapse in oversight

Although the Ousback court case is in its infancy, government inspectors and the hospital's own staff have found significant oversights that might have contributed to Ousback's death.

Investigators said Ousback was admitted to Park Royal Hospital on Oct. 28, 2014, under the Baker Act, a state law that allows for the involuntary commitment and evaluation of mentally unstable individuals. Ousback reported that he'd been feeling depressed, paranoid and hopeless, and that he'd been having suicidal thoughts, according to a Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services report.

While at the hospital, Ousback was quiet and didn't participate in therapy sessions, employees said. Then, on Nov. 2, two days before his death, Ousback made a request to a social worker: He wanted forms to complete a living will. The social worker said he didn't ask Ousback the reason for the request, and he didn't report the request to anyone. Ousback filled out his will and wrote that he was not to be resuscitated, the CMS report said.

Two days later, on Nov. 4, Ousback's doctor ordered him to remain at the hospital. Ousback "continued to be disorganized, confused and preoccupied with discharge," according to the doctor. Ousback wasn't placed on suicide watch, but he was to be monitored every 15 minutes.

"If I had been made aware of the living will dated 11/3/2014, I would have placed the patient on suicide watch and one-to-one supervision immediately," the doctor told hospital investigators. The names of hospital employees are redacted from the CMS report.

That night, at 8:45 p.m., surveillance video showed Ousback carrying a patient gown and entering his room. A hospital check sheet, which is used to document 15-minute checks of patients, showed that Landers wrote that he peeked in on Ousback at 9 p.m., 9:15 p.m., and 9:30 p.m.

But those checks never happened.

It wasn't until 9:45 p.m. that Landers finally looked in on Ousback, discovering his body in the bathroom. And it wasn't until Ousback's doctor was writing up a discharge summary that he learned of the living will request.

"I was surprised to see the paper for the first time the day after my patient had expired," the doctor told hospital investigators.

Troubled history

The hospital inspection records suggest that Park Royal Hospital employees should have been on heightened alert when it came to checking on patients.

Six weeks before Ousback's death, a patient followed a staff member out through a locked door. The patient's absence wasn't discovered for 2 hours and 20 minutes.

But during that stretch, hospital staff wrote that they checked on the patient three times. Each time, they wrote the patient was sleeping, according to the CMS report.

An "action plan" was developed in response, and hospital management pledged to monitor the documentation of 15-minute checks. But in an interview two weeks after Ousback's death, the hospital's risk and quality manager said he "had not analyzed the data, and he is not sure what the supervisors were monitoring," the CMS report said.

Ousback's death also came about one year after the arrest of Benjamin Bland, a nonmedical staff member who pleaded guilty to sexual assault charges and received five years in prison.

In Bland's case, hospital administrators missed several red flags during Bland's interview process, including that he lied on his resume and had admitted to choking a woman three years earlier.

In addition, the hospital's internal investigator gave false information to a sheriff's detective about whether Bland entered a victim's room during a specified time. (It wasn't clear whether the omission was intentional.) That information, which was provided early in the investigation, might have helped to validate the victim's account and prevent subsequent assaults.

The hospital's human resources director also testified at a civil deposition that he checked during the interview process with two hospital employees who had worked with Bland in the past. But both employees testified that was not true.

Eleven women eventually sued Park Royal Hospital. Webb, who also represented the women, said in November that a settlement had been reached in their cases. He declined to disclose the terms, and they aren't available in court records.

Webb also filed another lawsuit against the hospital on Dec. 30, on behalf of a former patient who said she was sexually abused on two occasions by an employee in 2013. That employee was never arrested, and it wasn't immediately clear when she first reported the abuse.

RELATED STORIES:
Artis-Naples CEO and President Kathleen van Bergen addresses the audience at Artis-Naples Friday night, January 8, 2016.

SHARE From left, music Director Andrey Boreyko, CEO and President Kathleen van Bergen and Board Chairman Ned Lautenbach at Artis-Naples Friday night, January 8, 2016. Members of the professional and youth ensembles perform at Artis-Naples Friday night, January 8, 2016.

By Harriet Howard Heithaus of the Naples Daily News

ArtisNaples has announced a $50 million New Year's fitness resolution, and has a breathtaking pair of running shoes to start it: a seed gift of $15 million.

ArtisNaples board member Kimberly K. Querrey and her husband, Louis A. Simpson, made the $15 million donation, labeled by the group as the largest gift in the organization's history. CEO and President Kathleen van Bergen, along with board chairman Ned Lautenbach, made the announcement at a private event for major supporters Friday. At the same time, they announced plans for a $50 million campaign with four goals:

 To increase the institution's endowment from its current $60 million to $100 million. The goal is "so we can ensure the stability of everything we bring to this community and our audiences in perpetuity," van Bergen said. That has been a longtime hope for van Bergen, who has said the venue's endowment fund is undersized.

- To create "artistic and community initiatives" under Andrey Boreyko, its music director. "We have committed to him. We feel like we're soaring with him and we are excited about fully embracing some of those initiatives." In November, the music director's post was endowed in perpetuity by a $10 million gift from Sharon and Timothy Ubben of Naples.

van Bergen would not be specific, but said these were "artistic, mission-driven initiatives. This doesn't change our programming  only goes into it more fully and deeply." They would be developed in "conversations around fundraising (that) will be very intimate and specific."

- To rethink the ArtisNaples venue for the future. "We have 8 beautiful acres, five buildings, multiple performance spaces and gathering places," van Bergen said. "We would like to launch a master plan that will imagine what this space and 8 acres can be for generations to come."

- To increase the permanent collection of the Baker Museum and "steward the visual arts for all audiences," as van Bergen said. The November gift of Paul and Charlotte Corddry's extensive contemporary art collection "was a part of that and has inspired more interest around permanent growth in our collections." Art, however, will not be valued as part of the $50 million campaign because it is tracked differently financially, she said.

Some ideas for changing the ArtisNaples venue, she added, may help the most immediate needs.

"This is not on the 'very sexy' or 'beautiful' list, but I regularly hear about bathrooms as something that needs attention," she said. The women's restrooms have long been recognized as undersized; lines form out into the halls at intermission at both downstairs bathrooms.

"And when we think about the variety of needs we have for a cultural institution, I like to remind people that in 1989 when campus, these buildings, were first erected, having Wi-Fi in every space was not a thought in anyone's mind," she said.

Simpson and Querrey are known as philanthropists primarily in medical research. They previously made two gifts totaling $115 million to Northwestern University in support of the University's biomedical research programs at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and to endow the Louis A. Simpson and Kimberly K. Querrey Institute for BioNanotechnology in Medicine.

Simpson is an alumnus of the university and chairman of SQ Advisors, LLC, an investment advisory firm in Naples. He previously served as president and CEO of capital operations at GEICO Corp.

Querrey is president of SQ Advisors. According to Bloomberg Business Reports, she has served as independent consultant on operational management, served in manufacturing positions and has adjunct university teaching experience in operational management, engineering and chemistry.

In recognition of the $15 million gift, ArtisNaples has named its 8.5-acre, five-building property at 5833 Pelican Bay Blvd., North Naples, the Kimberly K. Querrey and Louis A. Simpson Cultural Campus.

The couple declined to be interviewed, but offered prepared statements.

"Thanks to the leadership of Kathleen and her team, the future of ArtisNaples is extremely bright," said Querrey, a board member since 2012. "This gift will help her continue to realize the vision we all have for this vital community asset and to build upon our endowment."

"The ultimate value of endowment is financial stability for generations," Simpson's statement reads. "This foundation will be there for ArtisNaples today and in perpetuity."
Librado Aguilar stands with his dog outside of his home, which is in need of repair, in Immokalee on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2015. Farm Worker Village is expected to undergo rehabilitation by the Collier County Housing Authority through a USDA grant. The rehabilitation was supposed to have started seven years ago. (Dorothy Edwards/Staff)

SHARE A tree is shown growing from underneath an empty home in Immokalee on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2015. Farm Worker Village is expected to undergo rehabilitation by the Collier County Housing Authority through a USDA grant. The rehabilitation was supposed to have started seven years ago. (Dorothy Edwards/Staff) Victor Arenas, a farmworker, sits in front of his home, which he shares with six others, in Immokalee on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2015. Farm Worker Village is expected to undergo rehabilitation by the Collier County Housing Authority through a USDA grant. The rehabilitation was supposed to have started seven years ago. (Dorothy Edwards/Staff) Erica Ramirez and her daughter Aaliyah, 18, sit on the porch of their home in Immokalee on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2015. Farm Worker Village is expected to undergo rehabilitation by the Collier County Housing Authority through a USDA grant. The rehabilitation was supposed to have started seven years ago. Could it be better? Yes, Ramirez says of her home in Farm Worker Village, where she raises four children. I am just thankful we have a home. (Dorothy Edwards/Staff) Maria Olvera and Eduardo Juarez sit in the living room of their home in Farm Worker Village in Immokalee on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2015. Farm Worker Village is expected to undergo rehabilitation by the Collier County Housing Authority through a USDA grant. The rehabilitation was supposed to have started seven years ago. (Dorothy Edwards/Staff) Related Coverage Renovation of Immokalee rental housing units begins Related Photos Photos: The Farm Workers Village

By Maria Perez of the Naples Daily News

Some areas of Immokalee's largest affordable housing rental community have been a ghost town for years.

Vacant houses with broken windows. Erosion exposing footer slabs of buildings. Trees sprouting through the foundation of two homes.

Things have deteriorated so much at Farm Worker Village that the federal agency that paid to build the homes declared some of the occupied units unfit to rent. Eighty units cannot be rented because the electrical system is outdated, considered a potential fire hazard.

"There are some that are in very bad condition," Librado Aguilar, a tenant in Farm Worker Village, says, speaking in Spanish. "All those that are vacant, people who lived there went away and didn't come back."

Aguilar, 62, has been living at Farm Worker Village for 18 years. He said the inside of the house he rents is in good condition, but a chunk of the soffit between the roof and the siding on the house's exterior fell down more than a year ago. Despite reporting it to management, it still isn't fixed.

The 611-home community, built with federal grants and loans, is managed by the Collier County Housing Authority, a public entity created to help provide affordable housing in the county. Made of concrete block exteriors, the homes built without air conditioning were envisioned to provide decent, safe and sanitary housing for farmworkers who flocked to Immokalee to work in low-paying jobs. Most of the houses were built in the 1970s and 1980s, although some went up in the 1990s.

Decades later, many homes are in disrepair and vacant, despite the great demand in Immokalee, where substandard trailer parks and other similar housing still have plenty of tenants. Despite several local and federal property inspections that uncovered unsafe and unlivable conditions in many of the homes, the poor conditions remained unresolved, in some cases for years, records show.

The public agency admitted earlier this year to misusing federal money to pay for maintenance of some of its high-vacancy properties not covered under the federal program. Esmeralda Serrata, the agency's executive director since 2002, was fired in May.

Now things are changing, said Oscar Hentschel, who took over as the agency's executive director in September. The housing authority's staff is working hard to make Farm Worker Village a much better community. More tenants are moving in, and there is a waiting list to rent properties once they are repaired. About 380 units in Farm Worker Village and 30 in Collier Village are currently occupied, he said, up from 342 in December 2014.

Last month, the housing authority finalized a long-awaited agreement for nearly $9.3 million to pay for a rehabilitation project with U.S. Department of Agriculture money. The project covers repairs of 315 homes in Farm Worker Village and Collier Village, Hentschel said.

The funding  nearly $5.3 million in grants and $4 million as a 1 percent interest loan  will be used to add air conditioning and heating to the Farm Worker Village homes, make some units handicap accessible and, depending on the home, refurbish bathrooms, update appliances, cabinets, counter tops, windows and doors.

The project, the largest rehabilitation development funded by the USDA Rural Development in Florida, was announced more than eight years ago, when the funds were obligated. But as homes kept deteriorating, the project also kept getting postponed, partly because of disagreements between the housing authority and USDA.

Hentschel said the project will be very positive for the community.

"You are going to have better and safer houses," Hentschel said.

***

The federal funding, originally intended to rehab the oldest homes in the community, will be spent in the newest housing. While 335 of the newest units in the community, built in the 1980s and 1990s, remain part of the federal program, another 276 of the oldest were removed in March 2013 after the housing authority paid off all remaining loans. That means federal money cannot be used on those oldest units.

USDA had advocated demolishing the 150 oldest units before moving forward with paying for the rehabilitation program, due to the high vacancy rates, records show. The housing authority opposed demolishing solid houses, arguing it was contrary to the mission of providing affordable housing in a community with such need.

Removing the older housing from the properties eligible for federal money was a double-edged sword, though. Many of those who live in Immokalee trailers don't qualify to rent homes within the USDA program because they are undocumented immigrants or they don't work in the fields. The oldest units can now be rented to low-income residents who don't work in the fields, and the authority doesn't need to check prospective tenants' immigration status. But the USDA money cannot be used to upgrade the property.

Hentschel said their other priority now is to repair the older houses that aren't in condition to be rented.

"The houses were abandoned for so long. When houses are empty, they are vandalized," he said.

The agency plans to repair the outdated electrical system of 80 vacant homes considered a potential fire hazard so they can rent them.

"We are making the homes habitable," Hentschel said.

***

At Aguilar's home, it's not only the soffit that needs repair. A windowsill is broken, just as it is in the house next to his.

"There is a problem here," he said. "You go and tell them, and they don't do anything."

He says he usually cleans grass from a nearby drain that's left unattended, even burning the grass to avoid floods. Another nearby drain, he shows, is blocked.

At the former home of Basilio Ahmed in the newest section of Farm Worker Village, Collier County Code Enforcement inspectors found walls rotting and deteriorating in February, possibly due to mold. The bathroom floor was buckling.

"While inside the unit, observed holes in the wall in the kitchen area, the door frames were peeling and there were cockroaches running around all over the place," the inspector wrote in his report. "Also in the bathroom there is a hole in the wall, the bathtub needs chalking and the tile around the tub in (sic) falling off the wall."

The report said repairs were ordered about four months before the inspection. After a code enforcement officer contacted the manager, the housing authority completed the repairs.

Another tenant, Ruben Anzualda, said when his family was away, working in Georgia, his brother discovered that someone broke into his home though a window that remained broken for about six months, taking a TV set.

"This incident was reported to Farm Worker Village management. In the meantime, about 2-3 days later someone entered into the house and took his air conditioner, a free standing fan, fishing rods and several of men's pants," the Collier County Sheriff's Office report says.

Maintenance staff repaired the window before the family returned home.

***

A 2010 USDA inspection found numerous health and safety violations in the housing community, according to a letter signed by Michael Botelho, USDA Rural Development's area director.

Parking and drive areas were deemed in dire need of repaving. Several roofs were missing shingles, which could result in water inside the home. The washers in the laundry facility had mechanical parts and electrical wires exposed, and there was water on the floor from leaking washers. Tree roots caused trip hazards. Insects infested many units.

"The deteriorated, oil-covered, unlevel and pitted parking areas are causing a trip and fall hazard," the report stated. "Erosion around and under sidewalks could cause collapse."

It also found issues inside the homes inspected in the newer section. Four units had termite damage and had been unrentable for five or six years.

Several homes had mold on the exterior walls and suffered erosion around the building, even exposing the foundation in some cases. They found eroded doors, damaged soffit, and damaged interior walls and ceilings, among other issues.

"The borrower (the housing authority) has allowed units to be occupied that are not ready for occupancy due to the physical condition of unit," the USDA letter said.

The report mentions standing water in multiple areas around the complex, poor lawn maintenance with many holes and depressions that need to be filled, and floor covering, interior and exterior doors, refrigerators, sinks, toilets, bathtubs, cabinets and counter tops in poor condition, among other problems.

"Maintenance crew is way too small to handle the workload," the report says.

The housing authority responded by fixing some of the problems, and saying others would be solved with the rehabilitation project, and that there were procedures in place to take care of other issues.

The initial rehabilitation proposal was to demolish and rebuild some of the oldest homes and renovate the rest. But the nearly $9.3 million in federal money was not enough to pay for Collier County Land Development Code requirements tied to the rebuilding of homes, according to the authority and USDA records.

A revised project was submitted in 2009 for USDA approval. But by then, the community's vacancy rate had grown to 25 percent, up from 2 percent in 2006. The vacancy rate later would reach 50 percent in 2011 and later years.

With federal money now available for Farm Worker Village, the rehabilitation project is expected to be completed in mid- 2017.

The retrofitting, especially the addition of central air conditioning, is expected to attract more tenants, said Angela Edison, Director of Housing at the authority.
News / Africa

by Staff Reporter

Police at Kamuzu International Airport (KIA) in Malawi on Thursday intercepted cannabis "cakes" weighing 4kg posted from Harare, Zimbabwe, and heading to the United Kingdom on Kenyan Airways.Spokesperson for KIA Police, Sgt. Sapulain Chitonde, told Mana that the cannabis was disguised as cakes and wrapped in carbon papers, which were covered with hot pepper apparently in an attempt to kill the smell."The parcel was en route to UK with a London address as its destination, and a Harare address as where it was posted from," explained Chitonde.He said the authorities were yet to chart the next step regarding the parcel which had since been seized.This is the first cannabis (Cannabis sativa) interception at KIA in the year but more similar cases were reported at the airport between August and November in 2015.During the period, police in Blantyre arrested a Nigerian known as Mzee Chidiebere on allegations that he was behind the posting of some such parcels from Blantyre to Europe via KIA.Importation, exportation, possession or consumption of cannabis is illegal in Malawi under Sec. 11 (A) of the Penal Code as read with Regulation 19 of Dangerous Drug Act, according to Chitonde.
Corey Perrine/Staff Private jets overflow into the commercial area of the runway as Naples Municipal Airport endures heavy holiday traffic Dec. 28.

SHARE Private jets are shown Monday, Dec. 28, 2015 at the Naples Municipal Airport in Naples, Fla. Elite Airlines is waiting on the TSA to start commercial flights out of Naples. (Corey Perrine/Staff) Ski Kordeski, Air Traffic Manager, directs from the tower Monday, Dec. 28, 2015 at the Naples Municipal Airport in Naples, Fla. Elite Airlines is waiting on the TSA to start commercial flights out of Naples. (Corey Perrine/Staff) Private jets overflow into the commercial area of the runway as heavy holiday traffic is shown at Monday, Dec. 28, 2015 at the Naples Municipal Airport in Naples, Fla. Elite Airlines is waiting on the TSA to start commercial flights out of Naples. (Corey Perrine/Staff) The control tower is shown Monday, Dec. 28, 2015 at the Naples Municipal Airport in Naples, Fla. Elite Airlines is waiting on the TSA to start commercial flights out of Naples. (Corey Perrine/Staff)

By Joseph Cranney of the Naples Daily News

Jets lined up by the dozens at the Naples Municipal Airport during New Year's Weekend, causing delays in traffic and setting a near-record total in fuel sales. The airport sold more than 68,500 gallons of fuel on Sunday, the second-highest single-day total on record, said Sheila Dugan, the airport's deputy executive director.

The uptick in fuel sales was hailed as a promising sign of a recovering economy. The amount of takeoffs and landings in the last three months of 2015 increased 4.4 percent from the same period last year, according to the airport's numbers.

The increases coincide with tourism numbers that show the area is continuing its post-recession boom. The county collected more than $1.3 million in tourism taxes in November, according to the most recent data compiled by the Naples, Marco Island, Everglades Convention & Visitors Bureau. Tourism tax totals from 2015, even excluding December, are more than $2 million more than what was projected.

Mayor John Sorey said the economy is allowing private jet travel for those who can afford to avoid the hassles of a commercial hub. During his trip to Europe on the holiday break, Sorey said he went a week with a lost bag after a layover in New York.

"Air travel is no longer fun," Sorey said.

Overnight at the airport Sunday, Dugan said, there were roughly 100 aircraft. Many of them took off Sunday and Monday. Dugan said about 30 jets were lined up to take off at one point, which caused delays.

Dugan said it's difficult for the airport to monitor the makeup of the travelers, but Jack Wert, executive director of the CVB, said most of the county's tourists fly into Fort Myers.

Dugan likened the increase of airport traffic to the rest of the traffic increases the city sees during its tourism season.

"We're seasonal just like all the other service industries," Dugan said.

The last time the airport sold so much fuel in a single day was in February 2007, the same year commercial flights were indefinitely halted. In October, Executive Director Ted Soliday signed a commercial service contract with Elite Airways, but the flights are held up as the airport waits for the Transportation Security Administration to set up its services.

The airport had roughly 8,200 takeoffs and landings in December, down about 3 percent from last year. But there were more than 25,000 operations from October through the end of 2015.

The airport expects the heavy flight load to continue. In its 2015-16 budget, it projects a 3 percent increase in takeoffs and landings and a 4 percent increase in net revenue from fuel sales.
SHARE An American flag waves in the wind mounted on a car at the Third Annual Southwest Florida Nationals Car Show on Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016, at JetBlue Park in Fort Myers. The annual car show raises money for the Salvation Army of Lee, Hendry, and Glades counties. (David Albers/Staff) Attendees circulate among the cars on display at the Third Annual Southwest Florida Nationals Car Show on Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016, at JetBlue Park in Fort Myers. The annual car show raises money for the Salvation Army of Lee, Hendry, and Glades counties. (David Albers/Staff) Related Photos 3rd annual Southwest Florida Nationals Car Show

By Jessica Lipscomb of the Naples Daily News

Thousands of people turned out Saturday for the third annual Southwest Florida Nationals car show at JetBlue Park in Fort Myers.

The show began at 9, and as the morning grew later, the clouds broke and the sun came out, much to the relief of event organizers. This year, the goal was to raise $10,000 for the Salvation Army and increase last year's attendance of 5,000 people, said Ron Maglothin of Roadhouse Promotions, which organized the event.

"Mustang Sally" played over the sound system and the air smelled like cigars and barbecue as people milled around looking at the estimated 800 cars.

Mark Henry said he was visiting his friend Robert Hamill in Fort Myers Beach from upstate New York.

"I've been to a lot of car shows, but I don't know if I've ever seen one this big," Henry said.

Hamill said it was his third time at the event and thought it would be fun to bring his guest.

"We're car guys," Hamill said.

Sean Dever, of Cape Coral, who brought a customized 2007 Ford Mustang, said he travels to dozens of car shows throughout the year. Dever explained that an award can mean much more to the winner than just the bragging rights.

"For a show like this, if you get best of show, you could probably add 15 to 20 grand to the value of a car," he said.

For a car to win, he said it has to be very clean, from the interior under the floor mats to the engine.

"A lot of these, you could look under these cars and eat off of it," Dever said.

Among the cars was a pale yellow '67 Corvette belonging to Rick Fox, of Bonita Springs, who said people know him as Doc Fox. At one time, it was the third fastest street legal car in the country, according to Fox, who said it reached 161 mph in 8.57 seconds.

Arnette Albany and her husband, Vincent, live in Cape Coral and came to show their red '66 Chevrolet Nova. Albany said she has always loved cars and loves everything about car shows.

"Just the cars themselves, the engines, the noise, the look of 'em, the paint," she said.
Heather King.

By Jessica Lipscomb of the Naples Daily News

Neither a seven-month investigation by the Collier County Sheriff's Office nor an autopsy by the medical examiner's office was able to determine what happened to a woman whose body was found in East Naples last May.

Deputy Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Manfred Borges Jr. said he could not determine either the cause or manner of death of Heather King, 21. King's remains were found on May 26 by her father, Troy King, a short distance away from the Days Inn where she was last seen on May 21.

The autopsy did not find any trauma to King's remains, according to a Sheriff's Office report released Friday. A toxicology report showed the presence of several drugs in King's system, including "a very high level of morphine in combination with ethylone, a designer drug." Borges said the drugs were a likely cause of death but couldn't definitively rule it as such.

"There are no witness statements, evidence or surveillance footage to indicate there was foul play," the Sheriff's Office said in a statement.

On the afternoon King went missing, she was with friends at a birthday party at the Days Inn at 3387 Tollgate Blvd. Those who were with her told detectives she had taken some "molly"  a drug said to be a pure form of MDMA, or ecstasy  that she said made her feel strange. Everyone else avoided taking the rest of her supply, according to Sheriff's Office investigative reports. (Ethylone is a drug with similar properties to molly.)

Surveillance footage shows King's mother dropping her off at the hotel around 2 p.m. that Thursday. At 3:38 p.m., King is seen walking in the hallway looking impaired. At 3:52 p.m., King and another friend walked outside the hotel, then went back inside upon seeing a patrol car. Three minutes later, she is seen alone in the hallway, running.

After the patrol car left at 3:56 p.m., King is seen for the last time on the hotel's cameras, climbing over a wall by the pool and walking alone out of the camera's range.

That night, a Days Inn employee said he confronted two men who looked like they were throwing away a purse. The two said they were only throwing away Taco Bell wrappers, but the employee recovered King's purse and cellphone from the garbage and called King's mother to give them to her.

After King's mother, Pamela Truax, picked up the items, she ran into the two men, both her daughter's friends, at a nearby Shell station. The two men, Chris Gill and Jake Verrot, told her that King had seen the cop car, "freaked out" and ran off. They said they hadn't seen her since, according to a Sheriff's Office report.

Deputies were able to speak with two other people who were with King at the hotel but said both Gill and Verrot retained criminal defense attorneys and declined to provide statements about what happened that day.

Troy King said Friday he finds it suspicious that the two men threw away his daughter's belongings.

"They knew she wasn't going to be coming back for it," he said.

His daughter's body was so decomposed that Troy King says the medical examiner wasn't even able to determine the day she died.

"I would like to know what happened to my daughter. It's tough not knowing anything," he said. "If anyone knows anything, I would want them to come forward to the sheriff's department."

Alicia Clouse, a friend of Heather King, said she isn't quite sure what happened but doesn't believe an overdose was the cause of death.

"It's no secret to anyone that knew Heather that she was a partyer, and I'm not going to defend the fact that she relapsed. But I don't believe that's how things happened," Clouse said.

Because of the condition of King's remains, Clouse said, "a lot of our evidence is gone."

Anyone with information that could help investigators is asked to call Southwest Florida Crime Stoppers at 1-800-780-TIPS (8477). All callers will remain anonymous and are eligible for a cash reward of up to $1,000. Tips may also be made online at www.swflcrimestoppers.org or by texting a tip to CRIMES (274637) with the keyword "REWARD."

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Update: Officials ID body found in East Naples as missing woman Heather King

Friends, family mourn woman found in East Naples
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Kudos

Habitat for Humanity of Collier County continues to amaze, arranging closings on 20 homes in December so families could enjoy the holidays in their new residences.

That the local Habitat chapter builds 100 houses a year is impressive; that it was able to coordinate the work of employees, volunteers and the new homeowners to get a fifth of that workload to come to fruition for the holidays warrants special recognition.

Families of modest means struggle mightily to find places they can afford to live in high-priced Collier County. It's hard to imagine where the community would be if not for the work of Habitat Collier, a top-producing chapter in the nation. The nonprofit has built more than 1,800 homes since its first one in Immokalee in 1978.

Homeowners contribute "sweat equity" in the construction. Businesses, congregations and organizations across the region unite to provide employee and volunteer labor to help build. The homeowner receives an interest-free mortgage based on their financial ability to pay. That translates to $650 to $725 monthly for the mortgage payment, property tax escrow and homeowners insurance. Those selected go through classes to teach them how to be successful at owning a home.

Last year, Habitat Collier completed 184 homes in Regal Acres, a subdivision east of Naples, and set to work on 23 homes in Golden Gate Estates and the 55-home Legacy Lakes subdivision east of Collier Boulevard. It continued working on homes at Faith Landing in Immokalee.

Habitat wants to do more to meet the great demand. It receives 15 applications for every one it can approve. Importantly, it needs land for more homes.

To find out more, there is information on its website about a Jan. 16 dedication ceremony; a Jan. 26 meeting for congregations to find out how to partner in the faith-based mission and a community tour of Habitat projects on Feb. 9.

More information: 239-775-0036 or www.habitatcollier.org

Kicks

We just don't get the whole Chinese lantern thing in an area that professes to be law-abiding and care about its environment.

What good can possibly come out of celebrating by releasing a fire-carrying paper lantern into the sky, where it can land in a vegetated area and risk starting a fire  or drop into a body of water where it can harm marine life.

Prior to the New Year's Eve fireworks, Naples police reminded folks (kudos for doing this) that the sky lanterns are illegal. After the event, members of Collier County Waterkeeper, a local chapter of the international Waterkeeper Alliance, took to the beach area to pick up trash (kudos for that effort, too).

Yet, among the items the volunteers found? About 20 of the Chinese lanterns that people brought along anyway, despite the admonitions.

To those who see this as a novel way to celebrate, we have an alternate suggestion. Go fly a kite.

Kudos

Not only did the League of Women Voters of Florida push for the constitutional amendments to make sure the state's political districts are drawn fairly rather than for political gratification, the organization went to court when lawmakers missed the mark.

Now, the nonpartisan League also did the line drawing for legislators.

A Florida Senate redistricting plan created by Senate Republican leadership didn't satisfy the judge who was assigned to review whether the maps outlining 40 Senate districts were drawn without regard to politics. But the judge found acceptable a map submitted by the League and Common Cause Florida.

The map that gives Democrats and Republicans an equal shot at controlling the Florida Senate won't thrill GOP- dominated Southwest Florida. But state data shows Florida voter registration is 38 percent Democratic and 35 percent Republican, with the rest of minor party or no party affiliation.

Pamela S. Goodman, president of the League of Women Voters of Florida, said the court's decision supported standards put in place by voters in the constitution in 2010 "ending incumbent protection. 2016 will be a year of fair districts, better discourse, and better elections because of the voters."

And because of the League of Women Voters, we'd add.
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Al Whiffen, Naples

Breaching our border

Letter writer Louis Erickson criticizes two men of the cloth for their comments concerning the fears of most Americans today. He states "How about acknowledging reality. This is not a time Americans need to be living in fear."

He finds it depressing that "religious leaders do not acknowledge the absurdity of Americans living in fear during an age when we have survived the Great Recession and ended our fruitless ground wars..."

He says religious leaders, like politicians and the media, thrive on discontent and fear.

Apparently, Mr. Erickson is unaware of the recent happenings in Boston, San Bernardino and Paris, and likewise, unaware that we have unknowns by the thousands breaching our borders on a regular basis.

The savages wreaking havoc in the Middle East have vowed death to America. In response, our fearless leader tells us of a non-existent 60-nation coalition to fight the threat and then jets off to Hawaii for another vacation.

The vast majority of Americans are living in fear today. And that fear is not being stoked by clergy, but by the action, (or inaction) of our indecisive and totally inept president who is either unable or, as I believe, unwilling to confront the enemy at our doorstep.
News / Local

by Fungai Lupande

NewsDay deputy editor Nqaba Matshazi and reporter Xolisani Ncube's story alleging members of the Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) were secretly paid their annual bonuses last year sparked the Chitungwiza demonstrations, the court heard yesterday.Matshazi and Ncube appeared in court jointly charged with their employer, Alpha Media Holdings (Private) Limited, which was represented by its company secretary, Sifikile Thabeta.Harare magistrate Mr Elijah Makomo granted Matshazi and Ncube $200 bail each. As part of their bail conditions, Mr Makomo ordered the pair to surrender their passports and report every Friday at CID Law and Order.They were also ordered to reside at their given addresses and not to interfere with State witnesses.The trio's lawyer, Mr Taona Nyamakura, gave notice to court that he intends to apply for referral of the matter to the Constitutional Court.Mr Makomo postponed the matter to January 27.The three face charges of communicating or publishing falsehoods prejudicial to the State in contravention of Section 31 (a) (ii) of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act Chapter 9:23, alternatively Section 31 (b) (ii) (B) of the same Act.Prosecuting, Ms Sharon Mashavira alleged that the trio connived and published a false story in the NewsDay newspaper on Wednesday headlined, "CIOs secretly get bonuses".The story read in part: "The Government last year quietly paid Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) operatives their annual bonuses, yet postponed, several times, paying the salaries of civil servants . . . While most civil servants were penniless during the festive season, members of the CIO received their December salaries on December 21 and their bonuses 10 days later . . . "The trio, well knowing in truth and fact that Government did not pay the 2015 bonuses to the CIO staff or members, allegedly published the false article without verification.The court heard that as a result of the story, the message was communicated nationally, causing an outcry from other Government employees.This resulted in Chitungwiza demonstrations on the same day, it is alleged.Some of the placards displayed by the demonstrators were written, "Together united, pay all civil servants their dues now, bonus are crumbs that fall from the masters table," among others.
News / Local

by Lloyd Gumbo

Government has ordered an audit of deals approved by former chairperson of the State Procurement Board (SPB) Mr Charles Kuwaza in the past four years in preparation for takeover by a new board chaired by Mr Buzwani Mothobi.The move is in line with the Office of the President and Cabinet's drive to reform the SPB which hogged the limelight for the wrong reasons during Mr Kuwaza's tenure. Sources said the OPC tasked the Auditor-General's Office to carry out a full audit of deals handled by Mr Kuwaza between 2012 and December last year.Deputy Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet Dr Ray Ndhlukula confirmed the audit yesterday. "There are auditors who are going to see what was happening," he said. "But you should understand that auditors always come when there is a hand-over, take-over."Sources said there were high chances the audit would expose the shortcomings that characterised Mr Kuwaza's reign, particularly since the introduction of the multi-currency regime in 2009. Mr Kuwaza was at the helm of the SPB from the early 2000s, with his contract being renewed on several occasions.He left the SPB at the end of November last year. But his tenure was tainted with reports of underhand dealings when handling tenders which Mr Kuwaza always dismissed as unfounded."After the OPC requested for an urgent audit of the board ahead of the hand-over, take-over, the Auditor-General's Office immediately asked the SPB to submit financial statements from 2012 to the end of Kuwaza's tenure at the end of November 2015," said a source."However, there are indications the Auditor-General's Office has also asked that an internal audit be carried out immediately to have an appreciation of the board's assets and liabilities." Added another source: "There are a number of issues that are obviously going to be picked up by the audit."For instance, the issue of Kuwaza's tax evasion that has seen the board's bank accounts being garnished. "So, when Zimra garnished the board's accounts, they took all the money that was there. There is also the issue of renovation of the company house where Kuwaza stayed that continued to chew a lot of money."There are also a number of things that were happening under his nose which the media has been reporting on over the years." The Herald in 2014 published Mr Kuwaza's mega perks, excluding salary, which gobbled about $210 000 that year alone.Zimra has been demanding that Mr Kuwaza settle his tax arrears, but his reluctance led to the garnishing of the SPB account with an outstanding bill of $1 million. Sources said there was about $230 000 in the SPB's two accounts which Zimra took.
A civil war erupted within the Democratic Party [in December] after news that Bernie Sanders' campaign took advantage of a technological glitch to access, search and save one of Hillary Clinton's most valuable campaign assets  her voter files.



Tension rapidly escalated throughout the day as the Democratic National Committee cut off Sanders' access to his own voter files, effectively crippling his field operation, and the senator retaliated by suing the party and accusing its leaders of plotting to hand the presidential nomination to the Democratic frontrunner.



Charges the DNC already favors Clinton

Too few debates

(NaturalNews) Supporters of top GOP presidential contender Donald Trump have watched angrily as the mainstream political and media establishment have spared no effort to disrupt and destroy his candidacy from the outset. His anti-politically-correct speech, his direct manner and his steadfast refusal to back down or apologize for his brash style have left the political-media establishment apoplectic, to be sure, but also clueless as how to stop his freight train of a campaign.Now that Democrat presidential contender Sen. Bernie Sanders, D-Vt. (formerly Independent), is gaining in support and out-polling (in some states) the mainstream-preferred Democrat presidential contender, Hillary Clinton, that party's political-media establishment has turned their sights on "The Bern," and appears set to stop at nothing to destroy and derail him.As reported by, there is emerging "chaos" when it comes to the Democrat presidential primaries, with the Clinton campaign accusing the Sanders campaign of stealing voter data and the latter accusing the former of sabotage:Within hours, however, after consultations between Sanders' campaign, the DNC and a federal judge, an agreement was reached to give the Sanders campaign back its access.Still, the DNC tactic goes to show how far the Democrat establishment is willing to go in order to ensure a Clinton coronation."The Sanders campaign has now complied with the DNC's request to provide the information that we have requested of them," DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz said in a statement. "Based on this information, we are restoring the Sanders campaign's access to the voter file, but will continue to investigate to ensure that the data that was inappropriately accessed has been deleted and is no longer in possession of the Sanders campaign . The Sanders campaign has agreed to fully cooperate with the continuing DNC investigation of this breach."Clinton campaign press secretary Brian Fallon added, "We are pleased that the Sanders campaign has agreed to submit to an independent audit to determine the full extent of the intrusion its staff carried out earlier this week, and also to ensure that Sanders' voter file no longer contains any of the proprietary data that was taken from us. We believe this audit should proceed immediately, and, pending its findings, we expect further disciplinary action to be taken as appropriate."Still, the Sanders campaign accused the DNC and Clinton of attempted sabotage."The leadership of the Democratic National Committee is now actively attempting to undermine our campaign. This is unacceptable," Jeff Weaver, Sanders' campaign manager, said before the dispute was settled. "Individual leaders of the DNC can support Hillary Clinton in any way they want, but they are not going to sabotage our campaign  one of the strongest grassroots campaigns in modern history."This isn't the first time that Sanders has complained that the DNC is tilting mightily toward Clinton. In fact, the other Democrat in the race, former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who is barely registering in the polls, has also accused the DNC of outsized support for Clinton.For instance, both have voiced opposition to the DNC's scant debate schedule, citing the six debates as too few."The Democratic Party should not limit debates or close off debates," he said at a press conference in New York in mid-December. "Look when the Republicans scheduled theirs: On a weeknight when the greatest number of people see it and talk about it the next day. Look when our party schedules the debates: the same time as [the movie] on a Saturday."Both men rebuffed the DNC leadership during a summer meeting in which debate schedules, and other matters, were discussed,reported.
Dixie isn't racist  unless you want it to be

Dixie is cultural

(NaturalNews) The lionization of Barack Obama has begun already, and the man still has a year left in his presidency. Oh, and the lionization is coming at the expense of southern culture, which is appropriate, of course, if you're a Left-wing hater who takes great pride in memory-holing ideas, concepts and societal norms with which you disagree.As reported by thein Fort Lauderdale, Fla., the nearby city of Riviera Beach renamed a local thoroughfare, Old Dixie Highway, in honor of the 44th president in recent days. Now, to the delight of city officials at least, it is known as Barack Obama Highway The change, say city officials, "will help move the community past its segregated history," the paper reported. Um, more on that in a moment. In fact, more on aof things in a moment.The change marks the second time uber-liberal Palm Beach County changed the name of a road to Barack Obama. A couple of years ago  with Obama barely into his second term  officials in Pahokee, Fla., apparently couldn't wait anymore, so they renamed East First Street (nothing racist about that, right?) to Barack Obama Boulevard.Thefurther noted:"A crowd cheered as a crew lowered the Old Dixie Highway street sign in Riviera Beach and raised one bearing the sitting president's name: President Barack Obama Highway."[Seriously, have youattended an "official highway renaming ceremony" before? Or do you have a life?]"We are stepping up to a new day, a new era, and replacing Old Dixie with Barack Obama , who represents change," Riviera Beach Mayor Thomas Masters toldnews partner-Ch. 12.The city council voted last August for the name change inside the city limits. Now, the first intersection of roads are named after Obama and another favorite name from the civil rights holdovers, Martin Luther King Jr.Some who came to speak at the August city council meeting just didn't think the name "Old Dixie" put the Florida community in a good ( meaning politically correct ) light."The name Old Dixie does not align in any way with the goal of racial and social equality," Kendra Williams, a Riviera Beach resident, said during the meeting, the Sentinel reported. "Let's just move forward and move on, because it's time."In 1998, the Florida Legislature designated the Florida Turnpike the Ronald Reagan Turnpike, but that was a decade after Reagan left office.Now, the impetus for this change  that "Old Dixie" is somehow racist, because that's what this is about  is just ludicrous, plain and simple.Dixie and, in particular,, is not about race  or racism  it's about heritage. It's about culture. It's a, a lifestyle, not a political ideology or movement. And the fact that all things "Southern" have been hijacked by Left-wing kooks seeking to rewrite history does not change any of this.What's even more interesting  and ironic  is that the name Dixie, and the "Old South" it came to represent, was partially devised in theAccording to(1951), by Mitford M. Mathews:------The South still contains many references to, and vestiges of, the Antebellum Era, with which the "Dixieland" moniker is mostly associated. That's not "racist," that's just a cultural segment of our country, much like the Northeast, Midwest, West and Southwest all have different cultural flavors.
The only way back to our founding is via an Art. V convention

Fear of a convention is unfounded and, frankly, silly

(NaturalNews) Frustrated with the massive accumulation of power in Washington, D.C., liberty-minded Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has become the latest high-profile politician to call for an Article V convention of the states in order to propose amendments to the U.S. Constitution, amendments he and others say would return power to states and the people.As reported by, Abbott  elected in 2014 to succeed Rick Perry who opted instead to pursue another run at the White House  issued his call earlier today, identifying nine new amendments he would like to see considered at a future convention organized by states.Among them are amendments that would require a balanced federal budget, something long sought by fiscal conservatives worried about the spiraling national debt which has more than doubled on President Obama's watch and a prohibition on Congress from regulating any activity "that occurs wholly within one state," the latter an amendment which conservatives say eyes gun rights and marriage.Additional amendments include giving states the authority to override federal laws and Supreme Court decisions by two-thirds majority and a requirement for a seven-justice supermajority for high court decisions aimed at invalidating any laws passed by states or Congress.Texas lawmakers are again scheduled to meet in 2017, and Abbott said he plans to ask them to approve a measure calling for a state convention."When measured by how far we have strayed from the Constitution we originally agreed to, the government's flagrant and repeated violations of the rule of law amount to a wholesale abdication of the Constitution's design," Abbott wrote in his 90-page proposal, which he announced in a 1 p.m. speech before the conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation.Abbott noted that the administration of President Obama had particularly encroached on states' rights, mentioning specifically the new executive gun control actions the president issued earlier this week (which prompted this tweet from Abbott)."The president took action that threatens Second Amendment rights, even though the entire point of the Bill of Rights was to protect Americans from invasions of their liberties," Abbott said in his prepared remarks.But of course, the Obama Administration is far from the only one that has usurped the Constitution and imposed a federal solution on many an unwilling state. The U.S. Supreme Court has twice upheld the Affordable Care Act in recent years, despite its clear constitutional shortfalls , and the high court has imposed gay marriage on all states, in violation of states' traditional role in defining marriage and despite the fact that several had passed their own marriage-defining legislation.Also in this century: the Bush Administration's use of the NSA to blatantly spy on Americans without a court order , in clear violation of the Fourth Amendment, and the Republican-led Congress greatly expanded Medicare, which added to the national debt.Then there are the myriad of federal regulations that have increasingly been imposed on states and the American people by faceless, nameless bureaucrats  regulations that have the force of law, with real penalties and consequences if they are not honored. Per the Constitution, onlycan make law, and that's only if a president agrees and signs them.For those who are not familiar with Article V, it is the section of the Constitution explaining the two ways in which it can be amended . Since the Bill of Rights was ratified, the additional 17 amendments have all been proposed and passed by Congress and then sent to the states, three-fourths of whose state legislatures must then approve it before it can be added to the Constitution.The second way amendments can be proposed is a process that has never been attempted: Two-thirds of states petitioning Congress to call for a convention for the purposes of proposing new constitutional amendments. Were that to happen, states would agree to terms, such as how many delegates to send, and any amendments that were passed would again have to be approved by three-fourths of the states.Opponents  many of whom simply do not understand the process and are thus fearful of it  say any new "constitutional convention" would amount to a "runaway convention," whereby existing constitutional protections are put at risk of repeal.Konni Burton, a Republican state senator from Colleyville, Texas, is one typical of most opponents, saying in 2011 that a new convention will allow "anyone to offer up any number of amendments... based on their own ideology and interests, which could ultimately radically change our Constitution."That's irrational and incorrect. As the history of the first Constitutional Convention reveals to anyone willing to spend the time to read the debates and inform themselves of the processes employed by our founders when hashing out our original governing document, state legislatures would provide guidance on what to propose. Also  and this is key  any new amendment, regardless of how it is proposed,. Do Burton and other critics seriously believe that three-quarters of state legislatures would approve an amendment overturning the Second Amendment? Eliminating free speech? Privacy protections? The right to worship freely?That's just not a sensible, coherent argument.By the way, a full listing of Abbott's amendment proposals is here Learn all about the Art. V convention of the states project convention of the states Two GOP presidential contenders  Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas  have also previously voiced support for holding a convention of the states.The most authoritative voice on an Article V convention is constitutional scholar and radio talk host Mark Levin, the so-called "father" of this movement which was launched with his powerful 2014 book,, which you can purchase or review here
How household and industrial pollution damage the developing brain

Regulatory overhaul needed

(NaturalNews) Scientists are increasingly uncovering the ways in which ubiquitous industrial chemicals are damaging children's brain development, condemning a generation of children to neurobehavioral disorders from hyperactivity to autism.According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were 1.8 million more children diagnosed with developmental disabilities from 2006 to 2008 than there were a decade before. Over that same time period, there was a 33 percent increase in cases of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and a shocking 300 percent increase in cases of autism. Between 10 to 15 percent of all U.S. children will eventually be diagnosed with some neurobehavioral disorder; the real prevalence is believed to be even higher.The problem appears to be worldwide, and is so severe that prominent researchers Philippe Grandjean of theand Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Philip Landrigan of thein New York have called it a "pandemic."Increased diagnosis cannot fully explain the increase, say many researchers, including Irva Hertz-Piccioto of the. The rates are actually increasing, and many scientists believe that environmental contaminants are largely to blame.Brain damage begins in the womb, when mothers are exposed to toxic chemicals - many of which pass through the placenta and straight to the fetus. Because the brain is still developing at this early stage, it is actually especially vulnerable to long-term disruption."The brain is so extremely sensitive to external stimulation," Grandjean said.Many chemicals and metals have been long known to pose risks to children's brains, yet even these - such as lead, mercury, or organophosphate pesticides - are still widespread in the environment. Pesticide residues are found on foods or in the air and soil in agricultural areas; lead is still found in paint or even children's toys; and mercury is found in fish and in air pollution from coal-fired power plants.But science is now uncovering entire new families of problematic chemicals in everything from plastics to furniture to indoor and outdoor air. Many of these are chemicals previously identified as endocrine (hormone) disruptors, which researchers are only now realizing can also damage the brain. This is because hormones such as thyroid or sex hormones play important roles in brain developments.Endocrine disruptors believed to damage the brain include flame retardants (found in furniture, electronics and infant sleep products), PCBs, plastics chemicals such as BPA and phthalates, and perfluorinated compounds such as Teflon.Recent research has also shown that many widespread air pollutants can also damage children's brains - such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, a byproduct of burning fossil fuels, which has been linked to ADHD.Realizing how dangerous these toxic substances are, we naturally want to reduce our children's exposure to them. But it can be hard to identify which chemicals are dangerous, and many of those already identified are now so prevalent that it is nearly impossible to avoid them. In addition, many toxic substances are used in products where they do not need to be labeled or identified.Grandjean and Landrigan place much of the blame for this situation on the U.S. regulatory system, which does not require manufacturers to prove chemicals safe before they are permitted for use."Untested chemicals should not be presumed to be safe to brain development , and chemicals in existing use and all new chemicals must therefore be tested for developmental neurotoxicity," they wrote in an article in the prestigious journal"To me it is very clear we have to set up a different system to better protect the brains of the future," Grandjean said.
Special privileges for spoiled rich twit



Affluenza teen flees country with mom after violating probation

(NaturalNews) In June 2013, a spoiled teen with millionaire parents was given special privileges after he killed four people driving drunk in his mom's pickup truck. Instead of facing real consequences, the teen was given sympathy and told he had "affluenza"  a made-up condition that basically says the teen had no concept of responsibility because his rich parents coddled him his whole life.That summer night, 16-year-old Ethan Couch took off intoxicated in his mom's pickup truck. With two friends in the bed of the truck, Couch hit the gas pedal and sped out of control on a two lane road. With a blood alcohol level of 0.24, Couch swerved and struck a broken-down SUV, killing four people on the scene. His friends were severely injured as they were hurled from the bed of the truck.Couch was convicted on four counts of DUI vehicular manslaughter and two counts of intoxication assault causing serious bodily injury.The case was highly controversial because Ethan only got a slap on the wrist for killing four people. Instead of going to jail, he was put on 10 years probation and allowed to go to rehabilitation as if he were the victim of the circumstances.The defense claimed that Ethan Couch suffered from a condition called "affluenza." They claimed that Ethan Couch suffered as a child because he lived under wealthy parents who never instilled a sense of responsibility in the teen. The defense said that all the coddling took away the boy's ability to determine right from wrong. So the court's answer was to just slap him on the wrist and continue the cycle of never knowing right from wrong.The defense described Ethan as a kid who faced extreme parental neglect, and they got the judge to go along with it, even though the teen was a spoiled, rich kid who had never been told NO nor ever learned any kind of boundaries.Just two years later, the "affluenza teen" broke his probation when he was allegedly caught on camera playing beer pong. When authorities pursued him for not showing up for a probation appointment and violating court orders, they found out that he and his mom had fled.But it didn't take long to find the rotten duo. According to a Texas district attorney's office, Mexican authorities had caught up to the " affluenza teen " and his mother Tonya Couch after they made a phone call for pizza at a Mexican hotel. Both were taken into custody in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.After being captured, Ethan Couch was held at the Agujas immigration detention center where he was confined to a cot in a room with two or three other detainees. His mother returned to the US where she faces up to 10 years in prison for obstructing the capture of a felon.Ethan's millionaire father hired Fernando Benitez, a decorated criminal defense lawyer who has already filed for an "amparo" on Ethan's behalf. An amparo is similar to an injunction. It has bought Ethan at least two months before he is deported back to the US to face consequences.Will the affluenza teen face consequences at all? That is the question. Or will his millionaire father pay off the court system, allowing the now 18-year-old Ethan Couch to run around doing whatever he wants in society, never facing real consequences and never learning NO?
News / Local

by Auxilia Katongomara

BULAWAYO war veterans' leaders have threatened to demonstrate against the Minister of Welfare Services for the War Veterans, War Collaborators, Former Political Detainees and Restrictees Christopher Mutsvangwa if he goes ahead with his planned visit to the city today.The freedom fighters described Mutsvangwa as "a chairman for hire" who was being used by other forces to push their agenda.They said Mutsvangwa must first go back to his home province, Mashonaland West, to be cleared after the province passed a vote of no confidence in him, before he comes to Bulawayo.Mashonaland West province recently recommended Mutsvangwa's expulsion from Zanu PF following his utterances in the private media that were deemed as insulting to the First Family and undermining the authority of the President.He is alleged to have said: "We will respect the institution of marriage and (Saviour Kasukuwere) is confused and conflating the institution of marriage."War veterans in the city said the Minister, who is also the chairperson of the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans' Association was scheduled to address a meeting at the war veterans' provincial offices in Entumbane suburb today but he said last night that he will not attend.Bulawayo War Veterans' vice chairman Naison Mashasha said they were bona fide ex-combatants who were loyal to the President and followed the resolutions held at the war veterans Masvingo Congress last year."We hear Mutsvangwa is coming here but our message to him is very clear. We don't want to see him, he has to sort out things from his home province where they want to chase him away before coming here," said Mashasha.He accused Mutsvangwa of fanning divisions in the association by appointing an executive which they alleged worked with ousted leader Jabulani Sibanda."He came here and endorsed an illegal executive which used to work with Jabulani Sibanda. He is not following the association's resolutions made in Masvingo. Last time he was here, he hired thugs whom he appointed to beat us up, we are the bonafide war vets who fought for this country and are 100 percent behind the Presidium and Amai (the First Lady Grace Mugabe)," he said.Mashasha said they would stage demonstrations once Mutsvangwa sets foot in Bulawayo to express their opposition to him and the alleged illegal executive he endorsed in the province.The Cephas Ncube-led executive is accused of having people loyal to the ousted Sibanda, dividing members in the province. "We're not speaking in polite terms, we will demonstrate peacefully telling him what we want. Asimfuni lapha ko (we don't want him here in) Bulawayo u Mutsvangwa, he has no place here," said Mashasha.He said as genuine war veterans they were well versed in how structures worked emanating from their experiences during the liberation struggle, hence they only take orders from the party and not vice versa."We gave Mutsvangwa a letter telling him our grievances but what we got were assaults from his thugs most of whom are widows, war collaborators and children who were not part of the armed struggle. He must go to other provinces first," said Mashasha.War veterans' provincial secretary, Mitsho Ndlovu, said Bulawayo would not endorse Mutsvangwa."Mutsvangwa is playing nicodemous, he is coming to Bulawayo knowing very well that his province has passed a vote of no confidence. He is seeking favours from the so-called war veterans to endorse him so that he gains favour from them," he said.Mutsvangwa said in an interview last night that he is not coming to the Bulawayo meeting as he was just returning from the holiday, but other war veterans leaders would attend."I'm aware of the meeting but I just came back from the holiday. I will not be able to attend, my vice-chair and secretary general as well as the party leadership will address that meeting," he said.He said the planned demonstrations were led by people who were "woefully ignorant" of party structures."Zanu-PF is led by President Mugabe and he has the prerogative to appoint Cabinet and Politburo not some errant junior members in Mash West.How does a junior in Mash West question the President's decision to appoint the Cabinet and Politburo? These people are tendentious and woefully ignorant of the structures of Zanu PF," said Mutsvangwa.He said the planned demonstrations were illegal and organised by people with dubious liberation war records.He said he would not be distracted by the threats in conducting his duty which is to improve the welfare of war veterans"On whose authority will they demonstrate, as of now the Acting President is Mphoko and they want to abuse his office? It's sad that they are abusing that office to do things that are unstructured. They have no respect for that office," said Mutsvangwa."As the chairman I will not do anything not known by the patron of the war veterans who is President Mugabe who is war veteran number one. If they are demonstrating ask them where they got that authority from as the President is out of the country."
'You're making us less safe'

What's to 'resolve'?

There are always questions as to whether or not having a firearm in the home protects you from that kind of violence. And I'm not sure we can resolve that  people argue it both sides. What is true is that you have to be pretty well-trained in order to fire a weapon against someone who is assaulting you and catches you by surprise. What is also true is always that possibility that firearm in the home leads to a tragic accident.



(NaturalNews) When it comes to the use of force and violence to make a political statement, nobody holds a candle to Left-wing "progressives." Though they love to portray conservatives as "right-wing, gun-toting, violent racist bigots," political Lefties are the true purveyors of hate, mayhem and destruction. Oh, and they're pretty hypocritical too.As reported by the, Trent Brooks, the owner of Brook's Place, a restaurant specializing in barbecued cuisine, is an outspoken supporter of Texas' open-carry law. So much so, in fact, that he even gives customers who walk in either openly carrying a firearm or carrying a gun concealed a discount.Since he made his announcement, the local media has reported on his business, so he's gotten quite a bit of free publicity. And as you might imagine, his stance has also garnered quite a bit of attention and commentary on social media.But in recent days, it all turned ugly, when a staunch opponent of the open-carry law threatened to attack his business, according to a post on Brooks' Facebook page "I'll shoot up the place on Saturday. Let's see how your gun-toting patrons will stop me," the threatening post said.Like any responsible citizen Brooks, who is African American, contacted the authorities. On the day mentioned in the threat  Saturday, Jan. 9  Brooks said police officers would be on the scene to help out if necessary."We'll be open on Saturday," Brooks said, "but we are not taking [the threat] lightly. Not with all the crazy stuff that is going on in the world today."The restaurant has been on Alison Cook's Top 100 Houston Restaurants list for the past three years. That's quite a feat, considering Houston is the fourth-largest city in the country, with a population just over 2 million, according to the 2010 census.On Jan. 1, the first day the state's new open-carry law took effect, about 45 gun owners earned themselves a nice discount when they visited the BBQ eatery."I support the Second Amendment," Brooks told the. "It creates a safer environment for someone dining here - if there was ever someone trying to rob us - or rob our patrons - they'd walk in here, see people with guns. That should be a deterrent."You know who doesn't think so? President Obama , that's who.In attempting to justify his recent executive gun control actions during a "town hall" broadcast on the always-politically-friendly CNN Jan. 7, the POTUS actually told a rape survivor that guns in her home made her and her children"As a survivor of rape and now a mother to two small children, you know it seems like being able to purchase a firearm of my choosing and being able to carry that where me and my family are  it seems like my basic responsibility as a parent at this point," Kimberly Corban, who survived a 2006 rape while studying at a Colorado college, told Obama. "I have been unspeakably victimized once already and I refuse to let that happen again to myself or my kids."So why can't your administration see that these restrictions that you're putting to make it harder for me to own a gun or harder for me to take that where I need to be is actually just making my kids and I less safe?" she asked.Initially, Obama issued the standard platitudes about how "horrific" her story and how "brave" she was to bring it up (both of which are true, by the way). He then denied that his gun control orders would restrict anyone's ability to get a gun (not true, by the way). Then he said this:Watch the exchange here The only way to fully test Obama's theory is to remove all "gun-free zones" across the U.S. Also, what is there to "resolve" about Americans having a gun in their homes? Isn't that a personal decision?
In the Alaskan Arctic in 1871, 33 ships were caught in pack ice near shore. They were mostly whaling ships and their captains had assumed that the wind would turn from the east, pushing the ice out to sea as had happened in the past.

After the ships were battered and destroyed over a few weeks, a monumental thing happened. About 1,200 whalers were left without transportation near the top of the globe. Eventually they were rescued by seven ships that had been waiting about 80 miles farther south, in open water near what has been called Icy Cape since Capt. James Cook named it in 1778. While all the mariners lived, the incident was called one of the top causes for commercial whaling to founder and end in the United States.

Recently, archaeologists found what they think are two hulls of the ships left marooned in the ice in 1871.

These days, as ice melts in the Arctic, more shipwreck sites are showing up for archaeologists. The two hulls were located after researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Maritime Heritage Program searched a 30-mile section of coast near Wainwright, Alaska on the Chukchi Sea, according to a release from NOAA. (Scroll down to read further...)

The search team used state-of-the-art sonar and technology for sensing in order to picture the flattened hulls' outlines and other part of the wrecks' "magnetic signature." They also found fasteners, anchors, ballast and pots lined with brick that had been used to render whale blubber to oil, the release confirmed.

"Earlier research by a number of scholars suggested that some of the ships that were crushed and sunk might still be on the seabed," Brad Barr, NOAA archaeologist and co-director of the project, said in the release. "But until now, no one had found definitive proof of any of the lost fleet beneath the water. This exploration provides an opportunity to write the last chapter of this important story of American maritime heritage and also bear witness to some of the impacts of a warming climate on the region's environmental and cultural landscape, including diminishing sea ice and melting permafrost."

For more great nature science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).

-Follow Catherine on Twitter @TreesWhales
After a rash of burglaries in the community of Danville last weekend, police said earlier this week they are bolstering efforts that they hope will curb these crimes.

Danville police said extra patrols have been added during certain times, officers have been reallocated to focus on property crimes and other solutions, such as license plate recognition cameras, are being explored.

Police said this comes after five burglaries and one attempted burglary occurred throughout the unincorporated town of Danville this past weekend. Property crimes in general rose in 2015, police said.

Robert Rawlinson's neighbor in the Greenbrook area recently got hit by burglars.

"They kicked the door to try and go to the front door, but couldn't get in with the front door so they broke the glass with a cement duck they had on their front porch," Rawlinson said.

In less than five minutes, thieves made out with jewelry and other family heirlooms.

Police are working to put an end to the spike in crime.

"This level of property crime will not be tolerated," Chief Steve Simpkins said in a statement. "We will be doing everything we can to catch these criminals and bring this situation to an end."

Besides its own efforts, police are asking residents of Danville to be aware of the tactics often used in local burglaries. Police said suspects sometimes knock on the door of a home, and end up requesting something innocuous, such as directions, when a resident answers.

But if there's no answer, police said, the suspects kick in the door and take valuables from the home. Police said the best course of action for residents who witness potentially suspicious activity is to report it to police without hesitation.

"We would rather you call," Simpkins said. "We would rather get the call and check it out than take the chance of letting the bad guys get away."

NBC Bay Area's Elyce Kirchner reports.
Hillary Clinton is kicking off the election year with a trip to the Bay Area.

Former Secretary of State Clinton had two appearances scheduled in San Francisco on Friday. She was also expected to attend an evening fundraiser in Palo Alto at the home of a venture capitalist.

Presidential Hopeful @HillaryClinton answers questions from kids at Childrens Town Hall", campaign fundraiser in SF pic.twitter.com/Gk2uNKlFUL  Jodi Hernandez (@JodiHernandezTV) January 9, 2016

Hundreds of supporters and their children showed up to meet Clinton at San Francisco's Palace of Fine Arts. Every one of them paid $2,700 to meet, greet and take a photo with the presidential hopeful.

The Democratic presidential candidate was in Southern California on Thursday. She spoke to a group of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Clinton criticized Republicans who she says characterized immigrants as drug dealers.

A Field Poll released earlier this week shows Clinton maintains an 11-point lead over Bernie Sanders among likely voters in Californias Democratic presidential primary. Another Field Poll, focusing on the Republican candidates, shows Ted Cruz and Donald Trump atop the GOP presidential field in California. But, other poll data show Trump to be in a much weaker position among this state's Republicans, as well as its overall electorate.

Early Friday morning, the State Department released another 3,000 pages of emails from the former Secretarys private email account, missing a court-ordered goal for their production by a week. The department said the documents include 65 that contain information that has subsequently been deemed "confidential," the lowest classification.
Aniya Williams (@operaqueenie) and Marco Rogers (@polotek) didnt really plan to have their baby at home.

But as their tweets show, thats exactly what happened. And the only people to chronicle the whole thing were the two of them and Williams' dad. And there was an app that helped measure the contractions (both Williams and Rogers work in tech: Williams is the CEO and founder of Tinsel, a wearables startup, and Rogers is a web developer).

Baby "Noe"  short for Noemi  and mom are both doing fine.

Twitter even made a Moment out of the whole storytelling.

h/t SFGate.


Infamous drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman has been captured, Mexicos president said Friday.

"Mission accomplished," Enrique Pena Nieto said on Twitter. "We have him."

The operation was carried out by the Mexican Navy, according to Mexican newspaper El Universal. The navy said in a statement that marines acted on a tip and stormed into a home in the town of Los Mochis before dawn. They fired on the building from the inside, killing five suspects and arresting six others.

Michael Braun, the former DEA chief of operations, confirmed the details to NBC News. Braun said authorities told him they were planning on moving El Chapo to Mexico City for security reasons.

Guzman had previously escaped from prison in 2001, and was only recaptured in 2014. His second escape was humiliating to Nieto's administration.
The Broward Sheriff's Office is looking for a man who's accused of politely robbing a Little Caesars in Deerfield Beach, Florida.

BSO said the incident happened at the restaurant at 1462 South Federal Highway on Dec. 9.

According to witnesses, the man was holding a black handgun and described the robber's tone as very polite. The man allegedly asked a restaurant employee to open the safe and please give him the money.

The man went on to say he was sorry for doing this, but his kids need Christmas, according to detectives.

"All of his apologies and politeness are one thing, but it doesn't change the fact that he put these people in a terrifying situation," said Gina Carter with BSO.

The suspect is described as a black male in his early 20s with a light complexion and medium frame. He is about 5'8" and had a gold grill on his teeth and a mustache.

"This man may have felt bad about what he was doing, but he clearly knew what he was doing was very wrong," Carter said.

Anyone with information is asked to contact Broward Crime Stoppers at (954) 493-TIPS.
The city of New Haven is installing new lights to help remind residents when a parking ban is in effect during snow emergencies. The flashing blue lights can be seen above traffic signals at some busy intersections. City officials hope they solve the towing problem they face every winter.



One of our biggest challenges is communication, Director of Transportation Doug Hausladen said. We have 60,000 cars on the street so how do you tell them when theres a parking ban?



The 22 new lights ended up being the perfect solution. The system is the first of its kind in Connecticut, but was copied from a similar system in Vermont and Massachusetts.



Turns out its a really simple and good idea a way to let people know theres a parking ban, Hausladen said. It gives us the chance to be a little more proactive and fair with our residents.



Hausladen said it comes down to space because plows need more of it and the tow yards run out of it. They are hoping the lights help prevent it from happening this winter.



Ive had friends that have been towed before and its just a frustrating experience, so I think this will help, Emily Cable of New Haven said.



The lights have been installed at 22 different locations, including intersections and highway exits and entrances. City leaders are in the process of installing signs underneath the lights so drivers do not get confused the next time the snow falls.



Their goal is to install even more lights next year and eventually cover all of the snow routes.
News / Local

by Patient Sibanda

AN 80-year-old granny from Bulawayo's Old Luveve suburb in Bulawayo survived an inferno when her six roomed house caught fire as she was home alone.Elizabeth Mavolwane was hospitalised for heat exhaustion and smoke inhalation following the incident that occurred on Tuesday at around 6PM.She told The Chronicle that the fire started in her sitting room and spread to other rooms. She said the fire started when power supplies were restored after a period of load shedding."I was alone when the incident happened. I only saw smoke emanating from my sitting room. I then realised that it was fire as I felt too much heat.My neighbours jumped over my pre-cast wall to help. My neighbour took me out of the house. All my property that was in the sitting room, kitchen and spare bedroom was damaged," she said.Mavolwane said she was ferried to Mpilo Central Hospital for treatment."I was given medicine. I'm now feeling better and I hope I will be fine. I nearly died," she said.On the neighbour who saved her life she said: "He saved my life. I really thank him. I could've died in fire."Bulawayo Chief Fire officer Richard Peterson said the fire was caused by an electrical fault."The value of the property that was lost was estimated at $5,000."We received a call at 18:10PM and we arrived at 18:15PM. We managed to stop the fire before it engulfed all rooms."An 80-year-old granny suffered from smoke inhalation and she sustained minor injuries. She was ferried to Mpilo Central Hospital for treatment," said Peterson.Another house in Bulawayo's Mzilikazi suburb was gutted by fire on Wednesday at around 10PM and property worth about $3,000 was damaged.Peterson said the owner of the house delayed to call the fire brigade as they were busy removing their property out of the house."The fire was caused by a stove which was left switched on by its user," he said.
Two Austrians and a Swede who were stabbed in an attack on a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort of Hurghada were only lightly wounded and in stable condition on Saturday, an Egyptian hospital official said.

The official, who requested anonymity in line with regulations, identified the victims as Renata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both 72, and Sammie Olovsson, 27. The official said they suffered shallow wounds.

Two suspected militants attacked the three at a hotel in Hurghada late Friday. Security forces shot both attackers, killing one and wounding the other before arresting him.

It was the second hotel attack in as many days. An Islamic State affiliate claimed an attack Thursday on a hotel in Cairo near the Pyramids that did not wound anyone. Egypt has been battling an insurgency based in the northern Sinai Peninsula that grew following the 2013 military overthrow of Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.

The Interior Ministry said that in the Hurghada attack, two men armed with knives and pellet guns attacked the tourists in the restaurant at the front of the seaside, four-star Bella Vista Hotel.

No one has so far claimed responsibility for the attack in Hurghada.

Jan-Eric Olovsson, the 64-year-old father of the Swedish victim, told the Swedish Expressen newspaper that they were having dinner in the restaurant when the attackers stormed in.

"Everything went really fast. We sat there and ate and then they showed up," he said. "I thought they came from outside. I myself had the gun pointed at me three times, and Sammie was stabbed with the knife."

He said his son was stabbed four times in the neck but "did well" because of his physical strength. "I told him to lie still," he said, recalling how his son lay in a pool of blood. "I got up a few times and when I saw it was clear, I ran out on the street and tried to get hold of an ambulance."

He said another woman who was eating in the restaurant was also wounded.

Shortly after the attack, Sammie updated his Facebook profile, saying he was "lucky" to have deflected the knife when the attacker tried to stab him in the chest. He said the knife cut some muscles in his neck but no arteries or nerves, and that he would be able to leave the hospital Saturday.

The other victims were also stable enough to be discharged on Saturday, Nile Hospital Chairman Reda el-Naggar told The Associated Press.

Bella Vista Hotel, however, dismissed in a Facebook statement reports saying the victims were still hospitalized, arguing that they are motivated by a desire to "make propaganda to affect the tourism in Egypt badly." They described Friday's assailants as "drugged," without elaborating. Egypt has a track record of blaming some attacks on drug use or mentally disabled individuals, in an apparent bid to head off an image of unrest or instability.

Egypt has been struggling to revive its tourism industry after years of unrest stemming from the 2011 uprising that toppled longtime autocrat Hosni Mubarak. The apparent bombing of a Russian passenger plane over Sinai last year, claimed by the IS group, led to widespread flight cancellations, dealing a major blow to the industry, which is one of the country's main earners.

The Olovssons' trip was organized by one of Sweden's largest tour operators, Apollo. The company's head Peter Browall said guests were given the option of relocating after the attack.

"Some have decided to do so. Not all have. This is done based on individual dialogues we have with them," he told the Associated Press.

Hurghada is "a small destination for Apollo Sweden," Browall said. He wasn't able to provide any figures, but said interest in Egypt had dropped following recent attacks.

Police carrying walkie-talkies stood outside the hotel on Saturday as journalists set up cameras on the sidewalk.

Zainab Feili, a young Swede who survived Friday's ordeal unharmed, described a scene of chaos. "Everybody just ran... We hear shoot (shots). Everybody cries. It was awful," she said.

"We saw a dead man on the floor. He was half naked... The other man next to him screamed of pains but nobody did anything. We have been so shocked," said German tourist Barbara Wolf, who was dining in the restaurant at the time of the assault.

"They took their clothes off to make sure they were not hiding explosive belts underneath them," said Mohammed Beram, a retired military officer living nearby, who rushed to the scene to offer help. He said the attacker who was killed was wearing an explosive vest.

Meanwhile in Cairo's twin city of Giza, gunmen killed two policemen, the country's Interior Ministry said. The ministry, which is in charge of the police, said they deployed police to the scene to investigate the shooting and search for suspects. No one claimed responsibility for the Giza attack, but it was identical to past such attacks claimed by the Islamic State or other militants.
A San Francisco jury on Friday came back with a guilty verdict in the murder and racketeering case of Chinatown gang leader Raymond "Shrimp Boy" Chow, following a two-month trial.

Chow shook his head in disbelief when the verdict was read, and his high-profile and colorful defense attorney, J. Tony Serra vowed to appeal.

We have been stabbed in the back by the jury," Serra said. "The decision was predicated on five snitches that no one should believe in. The prosecution's main witness against Chow was an undercover FBI agent who posed as a foul-mouthed East Coast businessman with mafia ties while infiltrating Chow's organization.

Then Serra added: There will be a second stage. Chow was noble in defeat and we will prevail in the second round.

Chow was convicted in all of 162 counts. The murder charge alone carries a mandatory life prison sentence. Judge Charles Breyer scheduled Chow's scheduled for March 23.

In addition to murder, Chow was also convicted in the aid of racketeering for ordering the killing, racketeering conspiracy, conspiracy to murder another rival, conspiracy to traffic in stolen liquor and cigarettes, and money laundering. The jurors began deliberating on Tuesday.

Federal investigators said Chow took over the Chinese fraternal group, the Ghee Kung Tong, in 2006 after having its previous leader, Allen Leung, murdered. He then ran a racketeering enterprise that engaged in drug trafficking, money laundering and the sale of stolen cigarettes and alcohol, investigators said. Chow was also convicted of soliciting the murder of Jim Tat Kong, a suspected organized crime figure.

The Chinatown probe also ensnared former California state Sen. Leland Yee, who has pleaded guilty to a racketeering count involving bribes. Yee is scheduled to be sentenced Feb. 10.



The trial follows on the heels of Chow's other legal troubles more than 15 years ago.



In 2000, Chow pleaded guilty to racketeering for crimes including heroin and cocaine trafficking, attempted murder and robbery, according to an FBI affidavit in Chow's current case. He was sentenced to more than 13 years in prison, but served a much shorter sentence after agreeing to testify in another prosecution.



Chow has acknowledged his criminal past, but maintained he went straight in 2003 after completing his federal prison sentence. His defense attorneys had hammered that point home to the jury.

But during her closing argument, federal prosecutor Susan Badger urged jurors to disregard claims that Chow was a changed man, saying deception was part of his nature.

The notorious, self-described sun of the underworld goes by many names: Kwok Cheung Chow, Raymond Chow, Ha Jai or "Shrimp Boy. Chows arrest during a FBI raid in March 2014 has drawn attention to the gangs that operate out of San Franciscos Chinatown.

After Chow's arrest, his Facebook and Twitter accounts came under intense scrutiny by the media, with some saying that the case of now-resigned senator and former street gang leader resembled a real-life version of the The Wire, American Hustle and House of Cards all rolled into one.

A History Channel documentary about Chinatown gang wars has resurfaced, in which Chow opens up about his childhood, his violent past and his path to reform.

I run this city. Who can tell me something I cannot do? Nobody, Chow says, matter-of-factly, in the opening scene of the documentary, admitting that at one point he controlled the majority of Chinatowns gangs.

The world is under my feet. I have my own security. I have everything, he tells the filmmakers. You make so much money you dont even want to count it. Im not thinking Im God, but in this city, Im the man that calls the shots.

NBC Bay Area's Chuck Coppola, the Associated Press and Bay City News contributed to this report.
A Boston police officer identified as Kurt Stokinger, father of two young children, is reportedly "doing well" after being shot in the leg Friday by a suspected drug dealer, and the suspected gunman is in custody, authorities said.

"Our officer is doing well as he continues to recover from his injuries," Boston Police said in a statement released Saturday morning.

The call came in around 10:25 a.m. Friday reporting an officer-involved shooting on Mount Bowdoin Terrace in the city's Dorchester neighborhood, according to Boston police.

Police Officer Shot in Boston

"I heard the police screaming, I heard five shots, look out the window seen the guy running, police right behind him telling him to stop, he kept on going," said Gary Bell, who looked out his window and saw the injured officer bleeding. "He seemed to be OK, he was standing up on the car and I seen blood coming from his leg."

The officer was shot in the leg and the injuries are not life threatening, police said.

Boston Police Commissioner William Evans said the drug unit officer stopped a suspect who was believed to be dealing drugs, and a shooting ensued. The suspect began to run when approached by the officer and then turned around, pulled a gun from his waistband and fired at the officer.

After being shot, the officer began to lose blood, so he took out a tourniquet and attempted to apply it to stop the bleeding. Another officer assisted him. Boston police have been issuing tourniquets to officers over the past several weeks as part of a new initiative.

Police said the suspect was captured shortly thereafter and the gun - an automatic Glock 40mm - was recovered.

Evans said the suspect's name is Grant Headley, 27, of Dorchester. Evans said Headley is well-known to police and was locked up in 2012 on firearms and drug charges. He was released on probation in April. He is expected to be arraigned next week in the officer's shooting.

"For me, it's like, mind-boggling," said Eric Gilbert, who lives nearby.

Tania Guity lives down the street.

"You could never get used to anything like this no, any violence anything, we're all still in awe if it happens at any given time, we still want to protect our children."

On Geneva, the Head Start daycare went into lockdown mode as the police chase ended nearby.

Mom Christine Clark watched it all unfold from the window as her 4-year-old daughter and her classmates were playing inside.

"There was, like, the guy running down the street, then the police tackled him down to the ground and got him, handcuffed him," she said.

The officer who was shot was a 9-year veteran of the drug unit. Evans said his name is not being released at this time.

"It's unfortunate," Evans said. "I'm just glad the officer's OK."

Boston Mayor Marty Walsh spoke sternly, saying there are "too many guns on the street," and adding that "We're not going to tolerate anyone going after the Boston Police Department."

Pat Rose, president of the Boston Police Patrolmen's Association, echoed those comments, saying "We are the targets, and that's wrong... the public should not stand for this."

The injured officer is awake and conscious and talking to medical staff at Boston Medical Center. He is expected to recover.

"In our minds, he's a hero," Evans said.
Denzel Washington has been selected as the recipient of the 2016 Cecil B. DeMille Award, to be presented at 73rd Annual Golden Globe Awards on Jan. 10 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.

The honorary award is presented by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (the organization behind the Globes) for "outstanding contributions to the world of entertainment."

Washington, 61, has been nominated for seven Golden Globes and won for "Glory" and "The Hurricane." He won Academy Awards for "Glory" and "Training Day," and has received two Emmy nominations, one Tony Award ("Fences"), one NAACP Image Award and a Grammy Award for his narration of "John Henry."

"Washington's long and storied career is earmarked by his countless roles in front and behind the camera," said Hollywood Foreign Press Association president Lorenzo Soria in a statement. [[361321371,C]]

Washington most recently appeared in "The Equalizer," directed by Antoine Fuqua ("Training Day"). Next up he re-teams with Fuqua for "The Magnificent Seven," also starring Chris Pratt and Ethan Hawke.

"In any craft or artistic endeavor you want to do different things. You want to go to different places, you want to find different ways to go about it," Washington said in 1998 of his profession, per IMDB. "So that's how it is for me as an actor. I couldn't play the same guy eight times and I don't have to. I think I've said all of my career, I'm not a celebrity. I'm not a movie star. I'm just an actor who is more popular right now. I don't even know what a movie star is. And one of the reasons why I keep on going back to make movies that don't have such huge budgets is that it's not as much pressure. You feel like you can take more chances."

After graduating Fordham University in 1977, the Mount Vernon, N.Y. native moved to San Francisco where he began his theater career. National recognition came in 1982 when he joined the cast of the long-running NBC TV series "St. Elsewhere."

Previous recipients of the Cecil B. DeMille award include George Clooney (2015), Woody Allen (2014), Jodie Foster (2013), Morgan Freeman (2012), Robert De Niro (2011), Martin Scorsese (2010), Steven Spielberg (2009), Robin Williams (2005), Harrison Ford (2002) and Barbra Streisand (2000).

Here, five of Washington's most notable and lauded roles:

"Glory" (1989)

Based on the writings of Col. Robert Gould Shaw, the Civil War-era officer who led the US's first all-black regiment, "Glory" solidified Washington's place on the cinematic map and earned him his first Academy Award. Washington played one of Shaw's troops alongside Morgan Freeman and Andre Braugher, with Matthew Broderick in the role of Shaw. [[362650701,C]]

"Malcolm X" (1992)

Taking the title role in the biopic of the of the controversial and influential Black Nationalist leader, Washington earned his third Oscar nomination. Directed and co-written by Spike Lee, the film also stars Angela Bassett, Albert Hall, Al Freeman, Jr., and Delroy Lindo. The role earned Washington a best actor Oscar nomination. Of his Academy Award loss to Al Pacino ("Scent of a Woman"), Lee said, "I'm not the only one who thinks Denzel was robbed on that one." [[362650811,C]]

"Philadelphia" (1993)

Inspired by a real-life court case, "Philadelphia" stars Tom Hanks as Andrew Beckett, an attorney who files a wrongful termination suit against his former firm claiming it was due to his AIDS diagnosis. In the film, Hanks' character enlists personal injury lawyer Joe Miller (Washington) to represent him. While Hanks garnered most of the praise for the film, Washington's subtle turn as a man struggling with his personal beliefs and his respect for the law cemented his place as one of the best dramatic actors working in the 1990s. [[362650951,C]]

"Training Day" (2001)

Known for playing noble, often heroic characters, Washington surprised and dazzles in the role of crooked LAPD detective Alonzo Harris, who is tasked with evaluating straight-shooting new partner (Ethan Hawke). The gritty role earned Washington a best actor Academy Award and a supporting actor nomination for Hawke. [[362651291,C]]

"Flight" (2012)

In the opening scenes of "Flight" Washington's character, respected pilot Whip Whitaker, saves hundreds of lives when he makes a daring landing after his plane malfunctions. But that's just the beginning of the drama when the story shifts to the post-crash investigation where it is revealed Whitaker is an alcoholic who was legally drunk at the time of the crash. [[362651341,C]]
A Tarrant County judge has ordered Tonya Couch to get a mental exam, saying in a court order filed Friday there's "reasonable cause" to believe she has a mental illness or is "a person with a mental retardation."

Couch, 48, made an initial court appearance Friday in Fort Worth on a charge of hindering the apprehension of a felon. She did not enter a plea because her attorney was not present for the arraignment.

The order for Mental Health Mental Retardation of Tarrant County (MHMRTC) to examine Couch's mental health came from a magistrate court, not Tarrant County Judge Wayne Salvant, who is the judge in Couch's criminal case.

Couch is jailed on a $1 million bond. Meanwhile, her son, 18-year-old Ethan Couch, remains in custody of Mexican authorities.

The mother of a fugitive teen who used an affluenza defense after killing four people in a drunken crash has been arraigned in Tarrant County Friday morning on a charge of hindering the apprehension of a felon.

In an arrest affidavit released Friday, investigators said Tonya Couch withdrew $30,000 from a personal bank account on Dec. 3, and neither she nor Ethan used their cell phones from that day forward.

The mother and son were suspected of fleeing Texas together in early December as prosecutors investigated whether the teenager had violated probation. They were arrested at an apartment complex in Puerto Vallarta late last month.

Ethan Couch was driving drunk and speeding near Fort Worth in June 2013 when he crashed into a disabled SUV, killing four people and injuring several others, including passengers in his pickup truck. He pleaded guilty in juvenile court to four counts of intoxication manslaughter and two counts of intoxication assault causing serious bodily injury and was sentenced to 10 years' probation.

The next hearing is set for Monday afternoon, during which time Tonya Couch's attorneys will ask for Ethan Couch's probation records.

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It's difficult to quibble over the fact that Los Angeles had a major moment, film-wise, in the 1980s.

There was dystopian, rainy-night LA, courtesy of "Blade Runner," there was I'll-be-backian LA, thanks to "The Terminator," there was time-travel-y San Dimas, due to "Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure," and there was yippee-ki-yay LA, in none other but "Die Hard."

But many a film goer might count "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" as nearest to their own kooky life experiences, in many ways. The mall, school, hanging out, the always desired "tasty waves," and the curling-iron'd, Van-tastic high jinks of Los Angeles youth rang true with many a fan then and now.

And many a fan will be out at The Wiltern Theatre to pay homage to one of the seminal Southern California teen flicks on Saturday, Jan. 23 when the "Fast Times Fest" hangs ten for the Wilshire Boulevard landmark.

Yeah, like, for sure, The Wiltern's a few miles from the beach, but count on a screening of the 1982 movie as well as attendees to be in their favorite food court-ready wear or board shorts and Spicoli-style ponchos.

But how tubular is your local's knowledge of the location? Yep, Sherman Oaks Galleria was immortalized in "Fast Times," as was Santa Monica Place. Van Nuys High School, and Canoga Park High School, too, cameo as Ridgemont High, while the Encino Little League Fields pop along the way.

It's extravagantly '80s in vibe and tone, thanks in large part to writer Cameron Crowe and director Amy Heckerling, who both possessed a knack for reading the current cultural weather. And it's so SoCal in its lingo and dress code and attitude, or at least it served up a singular slice of SoCal that existed for many locals back in '82.

Speaking of slices, who is dressing up as Jeff Spicoli's classroom-ordered pizza? For sure, some fan'll go the cheesy distance.
Hundreds of protesters and Porter Ranch residents rallied at Granada Hills Charter High School Saturday, calling for the permanent closure of a gas storage facility ahead of a hearing held by air quality regulators.

The protesters packed a meeting at the school held by the South Coast Air Quality Management District Hearing Board to address concerns over a massive gas leak in the Southern California Gas Co.'s Aliso Canyon storage complex.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District Hearing Board made no decision Saturday.

The leak, which began in October, has prompted the relocation of thousands of households from the area and has led to complaints of headaches, nausea and other ailments.

According to one estimate, more than 78,000 metric tons of methane have leaked from the storage well. That's equivalent to roughly 745 million gallons of gasoline burned, according to the Environmental Defense Fund.

At Saturday's hearing, the South Coast Air Quality Management District Hearing Board considered a proposed order, which would require the gas company to minimize natural gas leaking from the well, and capture and dispose of leaking gas.

Frustrated residents gathered outside the meeting, holding signs that read, "Shut it down!" and requesting immediate action from local officials.

"It's a danger. It's been affecting our health," said one attendant. "We've had to be relocated. We've basically been chased out of our community because the air has become toxic."

Under the order, SoCal gas would begin installing equipment to capture and incinerate natural gas leaking from its well in the Porter Ranch area.

"The captured odorized natural gas will be combusted by thermal oxidizers that will safely burn the gas in an enclosed, ceramic-insulated chamber," Kristine Lloyd, a project manager with the Gas Co., said. It is still unknown when the process will begin.

Lloyd said the system is being designed to be installed in two phases, and could ultimately incinerate up to 20 million standard cubic feet per day or filter odorant out of 14 million cubic feet per day.

The proposed abatement order would also require SoCalGas to continuously monitor the well, submit to the AQMD a plan for an enhanced leak-detection and well-inspection program, and commit to funding a health study on the impacts of exposure to the leaking gas.

SoCalGas is in the process of digging relief wells that are expected to allow the company to cap the leak. That process, however, is not expected to be completed until February or March.

AQMD officials noted that the proposed abatement order does require the extraction of gas from the well, and a ban on injecting any more into the well.

Gov. Jerry Brown on Wednesday declared a state of emergency in the Porter Ranch area due to the continuing leak. The order came two days after Brown met with a handful of residents in the Porter Ranch area and toured the storage facility and a relief well.

Air quality officials said the hearing could take all day, or several days.

City News Service contributed to this report.
The Chicago Crime Commission has called for Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman  the city's "Public Enemy No. 1"  to be extradited to the U.S. immediately following his capture Friday.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced on Twitter Friday that the fugitive drug kingpin had been recaptured seven months after he escaped from a maximum-security prison.

"Mission accomplished: we have him," Nieto wrote. He said in a follow-up tweet that capturing the leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel is an "important achievement for the rule of law in Mexico." A law enforcement source confirmed the arrest to NBC News.

"The Chicago Crime Commission demands that Guzman is immediately turned over to American authorities," J.R. Davis, President and Chairman of the Chicago Crime Commission, said in a statement Friday. "The two escapes by Guzman demonstrate that even the most 'high security' Mexican prisons are not equipped to hold Guzman."

Guzman was renamed Chicagos "Public Enemy No. 1" following his most recent escape. The Crime Commission said Guzman was originally given the title in 2013, but it was suspended when he was captured in 2014.

Officials with the crime-fighting group called Guzman "one of the most dangerous criminals in the world."

The drug lord was indicted in Chicago in 2009 and pleaded guilty to drug trafficking in 2013. Federal officials pushed for Guzman to stand trial in Chicago, but he was sent to Mexico for his trial instead.

Guzman was only the second person to be named Public Enemy No. 1 in Chicago, following Al Capone, who received the title in 1930.


An Indiana high school has been drawing attention for serving what some have called "sandwiches of shame" to students who have debts on their lunch accounts.

A student posted a photo of a cheese-and-bread sandwich served to a classmate in front of her in the cafeteria line.

"The lunch lady said, 'You owe $25.60. You have to have this alternative lunch,'" Kokomo High School senior Sierra Feitl told TODAY.

The effort is part of a policy enacted to encourage families to pay off their debt. The school notified families about the change at the end of last year but only recently began to enforce it.

The district says total credit on lunch accounts have put the school in $50,000 in debt, putting it at risk for losing federal funding.
News / National

by Lovemore Meya

Sixteen commuter omnibus drivers were on Tuesday fined up to $300 by a Chitungwiza magistrate after they pleaded guilty to charges of contravening Section 4 (a) of the Road Traffic Act.The offences include driving without a defensive driving certificate, lack of five years' experience and no medical certificate endorsement.They appeared in separate courts with some being fined $200 on two counts and $300 for three offences.Samuel Diringa (34) of 15A Ashburton Road, Chadcombe, Harare, was charged together with Jonathan Jenje.They each faced three counts.Aggripa Nyangumbe (40) was charged on two counts, with each offence attracting a fine of $100. Failure to pay the fine will attract a month-long prison term.Diringa and Jenje pleaded guilty before Chitungwiza magistrate Mr Lazarus Murendo and were each fined $300 for the three offences.Nyangumbe and others appeared in separate courts.The prosecutor, Mr Tatenda Mukatera, told the court that all the accused were holders of Zimbabwe driver's licences issued in respect of classes 2, 3 and 5.However, they were arrested on January 4 after being stopped by Inspector Karonga and his team at a police checkpoint.They were driving Toyota Hiaces ferrying commuters.When they were requested to produce their particulars, it was noted that some had no medical certificates, five years' experience and did not have defensive driving certificates.
An alleged recruiter for the al-Qaida terrorist organization has been released from the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and sent home to Kuwait, part an ongoing effort to winnow down the number of men held at the detention center and eventually close it.

Faez Mohammed al-Kandari was sent back to his homeland after a review by six U.S. government departments and agencies concluded it was no longer necessary to continue holding him after nearly 14 years at Guantanamo, the Pentagon said Friday in announcing the release.

A profile of al-Kandari released by the Pentagon last year identified al-Kandari as an al-Qaida recruiter and propagandist. It said he also "probably" served as Osama bin Laden's spiritual adviser. He denied committing any terrorist acts or having any extremist affiliations and was never charged.

His attorney, Eric Lewis, said al-Kandari would undergo a medical examination and then be placed in rehabilitation program set up by the Kuwaiti government to hold former Guantanamo prisoners re-integrate into society in the Persian Gulf nation.

"Mr. al-Kandari is delighted to be going home and reuniting with his beloved parents and family after all these years away," Lewis said. The lawyer said the former prisoner "looks forward to resuming a peaceful life and to putting Guantanamo behind him."

It was the third release this week, following the resettlement of two Yemenis in the West African nation of Ghana, and reduces the Guantanamo prisoner population to 104. The military is expected to free a total of 17 from Guantanamo this month. President Barack Obama has said he wants to reduce the number of low-level detainees and move the remainder to the U.S., a policy that is opposed by many in Congress.

Al-Kandari was the last of 12 Kuwaiti citizens held in Guantanamo since it opened in January 2002 to hold prisoners suspected of links to al-Qaida and the Taliban. Khalid Shaikh Mohammad, a prisoner at the base who has claimed responsibility for orchestrating the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack, grew up in Kuwait but is a Pakistani national. He is facing trial by military commission with four co-defendants at the base.

The government of Kuwait had supported the release of its citizens and the 12 prisoners, who unlike a majority of those held at Guantanamo, have high-profile Washington lawyers and public relations firms working to secure their freedom.

That effort suffered a setback in 2008 when one of the released prisoners carried out a suicide car bombing in Iraq targeting Iraqi security forces in the northern city of Mosul.
Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi says she was wrong to urge Medicare to pay for high-priced and unnecessary drug screening tests from a company being investigated for defrauding Florida Medicaid of millions.

Bondi told The Palm Beach Post in an email Friday that she never should have issued a 2014 letter to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services supporting the tests performed by Millennium Laboratories. Bondi explained in her email that she believed the letter, drafted by her staff, only supported the general concept of drug testing, not a company that was under federal investigation.

Florida's Agency for Healthcare Administration, which oversees Medicaid, wrote both Millennium and Bondi's office in 2012, stating that company was probably running a kickback scheme.

Millennium agreed to pay $256 million in October to resolve federal kickback and civil fraud charges.
Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the United States will hold talks in Islamabad on Monday aimed at reviving the Afghan peace process.

Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman Ahmad Shekib Mostaghni said Saturday that the representatives will discuss a "roadmap for peace talks." Kabul's delegation to the one-day meeting is to be led by Deputy Foreign Minister Hekmat Karzai, he said.

The talks were agreed upon during a visit to Kabul last month by Pakistan's army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif.

Monday's talks do not include the Taliban, who have been battling the U.S.-backed government for nearly 15 years and have recently stepped up their attacks.

Talks with the Taliban have been on hold since July, when they collapsed after just one meeting following Afghanistan's announcement that longtime Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar had been dead for more than two years. The Taliban called off its participation and a second meeting was cancelled.

A subsequent power struggle within the Taliban has raised questions about who would represent the insurgents if and when the talks with Kabul are revived.

Pakistan is believed to have influence over the Taliban, but relations with Kabul have been tense in recent months. The two countries have long accused each other of backing the Taliban and other insurgents operating along their porous border.

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani took part in a regional conference last month in Islamabad, which called for the resumption of the Afghan-Taliban peace negotiations. Ghani was given a warm welcome at the meeting, which was also attended by U.S. and Chinese representatives.

Analysts have cautioned that despite the rapprochement between Kabul and Islamabad, any substantive peace talks are still months off.
Gov. Chris Christie is taking sides in a nasty Democratic dispute over expanding casinos to northern New Jersey.

The Republican governor and presidential candidate intervened Friday in a standoff between Democratic leaders of the state Legislature, supporting Senate President Steve Sweeney's contention that an Assembly proposal for a statewide referendum lacks enough support to pass.

The Senate and Assembly bills differ on who could own the two new casinos and how much of their gambling tax revenue would go to compensate Atlantic City.

"It is disturbing that infighting within the Democratic Party over competing gaming bills may deprive the voters of the ability to consider this question in November," Christie said. "Inaction should not be an option. ... Delay puts the expansion of gaming in peril. That is not in the interests of anyone in New Jersey, north or south."

Assembly Speaker Vincent Prieto fired back at the governor, who has been out of the state much of the year while seeking the GOP presidential nomination.

"If Gov. Christie had spent time in New Jersey, he would understand the facts and that the Assembly bill is the best one for the entire state," Prieto said. "Gov. Christie is failing to support the free market system and competitive capitalism. That's somewhat surprising, considering his current focus."

The governor weighed in a few hours after Sweeney said the possibility of north Jersey casinos would be "dead" if a referendum bill did not pass Monday, on the final day of the Legislative session. Sweeney said there will not be enough votes in the next session to pass a north Jersey casino referendum bill because more votes will be needed  a three-fifths majority that he said has "no chance" of happening due to opposition from southern New Jersey lawmakers.

"I think it's done; I think it's over," Sweeney said. "The opportunity to have casinos in north Jersey will be lost. It's a shame."

Meadowlands Racetrack operator Jeff Gural, who has offered to pay a 55 percent tax rate on winnings at a casino at his track, said he doesn't think Sweeney's bill can pass because gambling companies will campaign against it if they can't bid for complete ownership of one of the casinos.

Gural said a survey commissioned for his company and Hard Rock International, which would run the casino, found 83 percent of respondents oppose limiting the licenses to existing Atlantic City casino operators.

"I could make a deal with one of them, but Wynn and Sands and all the others will spend tons of money to defeat this if they can't bid," he told The Associated Press. "What a mess."

Sweeney's bill would require that both casinos be owned by existing Atlantic City casino operators, though he softened that stance to permit outside companies to partner with Atlantic City operators and own up to 49 percent of a new casino. The Assembly bill would only require one of the two to be owned by an existing Atlantic City operator.

Sweeney said backers of the Assembly bill want to clear the way for casino magnate Steve Wynn to get one of the two licenses. A spokesman for Wynn Las Vegas said he would be interested "If the right opportunity were created by the Legislature."

"It seems shortsighted to limit the options available for future development of the industry, given that some of the top tier resort companies, such as Wynn, are not operating in Atlantic City," said Wynn spokesman Michael Weaver.

Prieto accused Sweeney of "preening," and vowed that the Assembly will not pass the Senate bill on Monday.

Pressed on why the proposal could not be revived in ensuring years, Sweeney conceded that it could, but cautioned that New York plans to authorize additional casinos in New York City in a few years.

"I can't say it won't ever happen, but by 2018, New York will have approved a casino in Staten Island," Sweeney said. "It needs to be now because we have the opportunity now."
A fundraising page has been created to support a Philadelphia Police officer who was wounded during a targeted ambush shooting while he was sitting in his police cruiser.

A GoFundMe page for has been set up to aid Officer Jesse Hartnett during his expected long road to recovery.

Officer Hartnett suffered a broken arm and nerve damage. He underwent surgery shortly after the shooting. His injuries are considered very serious and will require multiple surgeries.

A statement on the GoFundMe page reads: Jesse will need all the help that he can get. Please help support Jesse on his road to recovery by making a donation. Donations will be used to help cover any additional expenses during his recovery.

Hartnett was driving in a marked cruiser through the intersection of 60th and Spruce streets in West Philadelphia when police say Edward Archer, 30, walked up to the car and opened fire around 11:45 p.m. Thursday.

The suspect fired about a dozen times, emptying the 9mm handgun in his hand, Philadelphia Police Commissioner Richard Ross said.

Despite being shot three times in his left arm, Hartnett was able to jump out of his car and return fire. Archer was struck in the buttocks as he ran from the scene. He was apprehended a short distance away.

Investigators say Archer confessed to shooting Hartnett "in the name of Islam" and pledged allegiance to ISIS. Ross said Archer used a stolen police gun during the shooting.

"This guy tried to execute the officer," Ross said. "I don't know how this officer survived."

Philadelphia Fraternal Order of Police John McNesby said Hartnett is expected to undergo another surgery either Monday or Tuesday.

McNesby told NBC10 Hartnett is in good spirts, but the impact of what happened is starting to set in.

Hartnett is a five-year veteran of the Philadelphia Police force and a graduate of Monsignor Bonner High School in Drexel Hill. He previously worked for the East Lansdowne Police Department.

To donate, simply visit the GoFundMe page.
San Diego firefighters and lifeguards began using a new guide to help protect communities prone to flooding during the first of potentially many El Nino-fueled storms.

San Diego Fire-Rescue Department (SDFD) firefighters and Lifeguards created the guide in preparation for El Nino.

"The idea is to have a common plan on how to deal with these areas, especially when we know these are the areas that usually do flood," says Lt. John Sandmeyer, a lifeguard with San Diego Fire Rescue. "Rather than restarting from scratch each time. We have a history of being down here (Mission Valley), some of the same areas getting closed, some of the same streets being inundated."

Lifeguards identified 5 areas that have the highest risk of floods and rescues:

Mission Valley East (of Interstate 805)

Mission Valley West (of Interstate 805)

Sorrento Valley

Chollas Creek

San Ysidro/Tijuana River Valley

The water rescue guide is a combination of tactical maps, flood gauge readings, and forecast data from the National Weather Service.

It uses templates from the regional wildland pre-fire plan.

Lifeguards say a big part of the plan is initiating staging areas for evacuees and knowing when to bring in additional assets, such heavy equipment.

This week, first responders used the new plan in another high risk area, Sorrento Valley, to evacuate Roselle Street.

"The San Diego Police Department is our partner in the evacuation part of the plan," says San Diego Fire Rescue Battalion Chief Craig Newell. "Using the National Weather Service forecast data, knowing how deep and how high a river is going to go, we can tell how wide it's going to spread and what businesses and residents will be affected by the flooding."



Firefighters say it's very important people heed the safety warnings from emergency responders.

"If people don't evacuate, it exposes them to complications of contaminated flood waters. Also, if we have to go back and rescue someone, it's a drain on necessary resources," says Newell.

Chollas Creek is considered another high risk area because it's a flood control channel that runs through Southeast San Diego.

"One of the concerns we have with Chollas Creek is the flood channels were designed to move as much water as possible to prevent the flooding. But in doing so, the slick walls of the channel are a hazard to anyone who falls into a flood control channel and a hazard to the firefighters or lifeguards who rescue them," says Newell. "It's very difficult to rescue anyone because there is never a stop or a break in the water flow."

The new water rescue plan identifies 41 places along Chollas Creek where it's safe to rescue someone.

Under California's mutual aid agreement, all first responders can be called out to help in other areas.



The plan makes it much easier for first responders in other agencies to jump in and help.

First responders can access the plan through their electronic devices, so they can prepare, even as they head to an emergency.

"They see the hazards that are present. They know the conditions of the flooding. They know the access points. They know the points for the staging areas. They know the command post locations," says Newell. "Information to us is power. People in the field have to make critical decisions so they can use that information to make good tactical decisions because so many variations and so many variables come with a river rescue event... if the person is trapped in moving water, if they're trapped in stillwater, if they're trapped in a flood control channel. We can't predict all of those events, but we can give them a good format to give them an understanding of the resources available to them."

Another important element of the new guide is getting the word out to the public through mainstream media and social media, and also making sure there's a common message on safety alerts, such as what areas to avoid.

"We're trying to get to the point of being organized, and well coordinated. At this point, we can start at square 6 instead of square 1 and have everybody on the same page," says Lt. Sandmeyer.

"We're open to sharing this template with any other fire agency that wants to use it for their plan. We want to make sure that anyone who wants to, can use it for their department as well," says Newell.

First responders also want to everyone to know where to find the resources they need in an emergency.

For more information about El Nino and what resources are available to you, go to the City of San Diego's website by clicking here.
A Northern Virginia man who previously pleaded guilty to squirting semen from a bottle onto women in stores is free after he pleaded no contest on Friday to several sex offenses and then changed his mind.

Michael Wayne Edwards was arrested in September on charges he tried to take photos up the skirts of female shoppers at a Safeway store on South Lakes Drive in Reston, Virginia. He also was charged with exposing himself to one victim.

Friday in Fairfax County General District Court, Edwards pleaded no contest to two counts of unlawful filming and one count of indecent exposure. But when the judge sentenced him to 18 months in jail, Edwards reversed course and opted to appeal the case to Circuit Court. The judge accepted Edwards' request to remain free on an appeal bond.

As he left court, Edwards refused to answer questions.

His attorney said the allegations have cost the former fitness trainer his job, his friends and made him the subject of persecution.

"Mr. Edwards has suffered some social consequences in his personal life. They are personal in nature and we will not be commenting on his case at all," said Jennifer Raimo, his defense attorney.

This is not the first time Edwards has been accused of bizarre attacks on women. He pleaded guilty in 2011 to squirting semen on one woman in a Giant grocery store and another woman at a Michael's craft store, both in Gaithersburg, Maryland in 2010.

He was sentenced with three years in prison but received a suspended sentence and was placed on probation.

At the time, his lawyer said he was a church-goer who would see a therapist.

Then, in August 2015, Edwards became a suspect again in Fairfax County. At the time, he was working as a personal trainer at Fusion 360, a gym near the Safeway.

Prosecutors told the judge Edwards could be seen on surveillance video trailing female shoppers through the grocery store's aisles, using his cellphone to take "upskirt" photos.

He followed one victim into the parking lot, asked her "Have you seen this?" and then exposed himself, she told police.

The two Safeway victims appeared in court Friday as Edwards entered the no-contest plea and then reversed course. The prosecutor said they wished to stay anonymous.

A search warrant affidavit reveals Edwards also is a suspect in an attack Sept. 8 in which he also is accused of using his bodily fluids.

A 44-year-old woman told police she got off a bus at the Stone Road Park and Ride and began to walk home. She felt something touch her back and then felt something wet. When she turned around, a man was holding his hands over his genital area, court documents say. Edwards lives just blocks from the Park & Ride. He has not been charged with that crime.
News / National

by Elita Chikwati

Farmers are complaining that private abattoirs are offering farmers in drought-stricken areas non-viable prices for their livestock. Most farmers have heeded Government's call to reduce their herds by selling unproductive livestock.But farmers can only sell the livestock in their own areas owing to veterinary restrictions following the recent foot and mouth disease (FMD) and anthrax outbreaks after the Department of Veterinary Services banned the movement of cattle from one area to another to reduce the spread of the disease.Some private buyers have taken advantage of this inability to move cattle to areas where better prices are available by offering the desperate farmers low prices for the cattle.Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers Union president Mr Wonder Chabikwa yesterday said de-stocking was delayed and now farmers were facing challenges in selling their cattle.He said the situation could have been better had the cattle been sold earlier before the outbreak of the diseases."We were supposed to have moved the cattle to areas with pastures," said Mr Chabikwa."Now farmers are selling their cattle at give-away prices because they are desperate and cannot watch their livestock succumb to drought."It is better for farmers to sell than leave the cattle to die."It is better to get the little money and buy food than watch the cattle dying."Mr Chabikwa advised farmers to seek advice from the DVS before selling their cattle.DVS director Dr Josphat Nyika encouraged farmers to approach their provincial veterinary offices for guidance."Anthrax and FMD are now under control, but the quarantine remains. Farmers cannot move cattle out of their zones and can only sell in their areas," he said.
A lawyer for a man convicted of killing Washington intern Chandra Levy said former California Congressman Gary Condit, who was romantically linked to Levy, misled the jury when he testified during the man's trial.

Ingmar Guandique's attorney Eugene Ohm made the allegation during a court hearing ahead of Guandique's scheduled March re-trial. Notes of an interview authorities did with Condit after Levy's disappearance show Condit, a Democrat who served in Congress from 1989 to 2003, misled the jury when he testified in 2010, Ohm said. He did not elaborate.

Condit testified during Guandique's trial he had nothing to do with Levy's disappearance but evaded questions about whether he had an intimate relationship with her. His lawyer, Abbe Lowell, did not immediately return a message requesting comment.

The 24-year-old Levy went missing from her Washington apartment in 2001, and her disappearance became a sensation after she was romantically linked with Condit, who was ultimately ruled out as a suspect. Her remains were found in Washington's Rock Creek Park in 2002. Prosecutors argued that her death fit a pattern of attacks Guandique committed on female joggers. A jury convicted him, and he was sentenced to 60 years in prison, though he has maintained he is innocent.

At Friday's hearing, prosecutors also announced they intend to call a key witness from the first trial, Guandique's one-time cellmate Armando Morales, during the upcoming trial. Morales was a star witness at the first trial because he testified that Guandique had confided in him that he was responsible for Levy's death. Defense lawyers have argued, however, that Morales gave false or misleading testimony during the trial and that prosecutors knew or should have known the testimony was problematic and investigated further. Last year, prosecutors dropped their opposition to a new trial.

Lawyers are scheduled to return to court Jan. 20.
Two poachers who picked on the wrong deer had their hunting licenses suspended and their gear seized Thursday by a district judge in St. Marys County.

David James Few, 21 of Taneytown, and Brian Kelley Stitely, 24, of Fairfield, Pa., were caught by Maryland Natural Resources police on a stakeout on Oct. 23, as they spotlighted and shot the agencys robotic decoy deer from a road in Leonardtown.

Officers moved in and stopped their truck shortly after 10:30 p.m. as Stitley was reloading his crossbow. Inside the vehicle, they found two crossbows, two flashlights, 4.2 grams of marijuana and a glass pipe.

"Robo-Deer" suffered minor injuries.

In court, both men pleaded guilty to casting rays with an implement (spotlighting). The judge dismissed charges of having a loaded weapon in a vehicle, hunting from a vehicle and shooting from a roadway. Fews civil citation for marijuana possession also was dismissed.

Few received a 30-day suspended sentence, two years of unsupervised probation and had his hunting privileges suspended for two years.

Stitely was the subject of a joint 2013 investigation with Pennsylvania Game Commission officers that resulted in his arrest on deer poaching charges in both states. He also was convicted in Pennsylvania of spotlighting deer.

The judge sentenced Stitely to a 30-day suspended sentence and three years of unsupervised probation. His hunting privileges, already suspended in Maryland through 2018 and in 44 other states as part of the Interstate Wildlife Violators Compact, were further suspended until 2023.
Metropolitan police detectives are investigating a shooting death in northeast Washington on Friday night.

Police said they received a call shortly before 9:30 p.m. about a shooting in the 3700 block of Hayes Street, Northeast. When they arrived, they found Joseph Andre Robinson, 31, of southeast Washington, suffering from an apparent gunshot wound.

Robinson was transported to a hospital, where he died.

Police have no information on a suspect and are asking for the publics help in providing information to solve this crime. They said this is first homicide for the city in 2016.
A container removed from the site of an explosion that injured five people Thursday in North Andover, Massachusetts, was blown up Friday.

"This is such a volatile material - extremely volatile - that every step and everything you do has to be checked and cross-checked before you can move onto the next step," said North Andover Fire Chief Andrew Melnikas.

Hazmat teams spent more than 24 hours securing the building so investigators could go inside safely.

After about two hours, the state fire marshal's team had completed their forensic investigation of the scene and are now waiting to speak with the four male victims who were injured in Thursday's explosion.

Dow says those victims, who remained hospitalized Friday, have a lot of experience.

"There's nothing that is leading us to think that this is something other than a very tragic industrial accident," said Massachusetts Fire Marshal Stephen Coan.

"The proper investigations will proceed with our full cooperation and participation," Dow said in a statement. "The cause of the incident is not known at this time. We remain in close contact with the families of the impacted workers, and our thoughts and prayers continue to be with them."

Back in 2013, one man died in an explosion at this same plant... Authorities say that explosion involved a different chemical.
The father of a man accused of shooting a Boston Police officer says he is sorry for the victim and his family, and that he did not raise his son to be like this.

"I'm pretty saddened about this," said Grantley Headley.

His 27-year-old son, Grant Headley, allegedly shot a Boston Police Officer Friday.

"He's my son, I can't say anything negative about him," the elder Headley told necn. "He had some trouble, but he wasn't a bad person."

Asked why his son allegedly did what he did, Grantley Headley replied, "I don't know. I'm shocked."

Grantley Headley is now also apologizing to the officer.

"I feel bad for the police. I hope everything works out fine, I hope he recovers," he said. "If he did it, he's wrong to do it. It's pretty sad."

The suspect was on probation at the time of the shooting and is well-known to police. Officials say he did a five-year state prison stint after being convicted of dealing cocaine and having a firearm back in 2009.

His dad says the family has lived in Dorchester home for decades.

"I respect the Boston police, they do good work, and the last thing you expect is a family member to be shooting at police," he said.

Grantley Headley says he plans at some point to see his son, but he will not Friday. He's angry, but also feels bad for his son.
Cisco has disrupted another exploit kit that was emanating from Russian service providers. The companys Talos security operation said it blacklisted several Class C subnets from provider Eurobyte that were serving the RIG exploit kit or scored negatively in web reputation.

RIG is an exploit kit that delivers malicious payloads to unsuspecting users. It redirects users to a landing page and the delivers the exploit payload  in this case, spambot variants -- via a GET request, according to this Talos blog post.

During its RIG investigation, Talos discovered that of 44 IP addresses delivering RIG, 43 belonged to the same autonomous system number associated with WebZilla, a Russian service provider. All of the addresses were leased to Eurobyte, a leaf provider of WebZilla.

When notified by Talos of the RIG activity, WebZilla blocked the hosts. Eurobyte never responded nor acknowledged Talos queries, so the Cisco security operation blacklisted the offending subnets.

From the Talos post:

Despite multiple emails to Eurobyte RIG activity continued as new addresses get stood up after being reported to WebZilla. This underscores one of the major problems we face today, leaf providers. As providers could have multiple downstream leaf providers we find that we routinely have success in dealing with larger providers. These providers help get systems shut down, but without the cooperation of the smaller downstream providers the adversaries just stand up new servers and move on. We were able to inflict some damage to RIG during our investigation, but were unable to actually get the actors behind the activity stopped.

Last October, Cisco Talos thwarted a $60 million Angler ransomware exploit kit. But its hard to monetize and quantify the financial impact of the RIG exploit Cisco disrupted because the payloads were spambots, and the victims were just generating spam, says Nick Biasini, threat researcher in the Talos Security Intelligence and Research Group.

More from Cisco Subnet:

Cisco shifting to a software model

Cisco adds programmability to Internet routers

Cisco CEO not big on spin-ins

Ex-Juniper sibs look to soften up the WAN

What's Juniper Networks to do?

Cisco, Ericsson team as industry consolidates

Users prepare for a software-driven world

Juniper disaggregates even further

PC storage waning, Cisco study finds

Cisco SDN user says just pick what you need

Follow Jim Duffy on Twitter
If you are a computer scientist and have any thoughts on developing human brain-like functions into a new wave of computers, the researchers at the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity want to hear from you.

IARPA, the radical research arm of the of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence this week said it was looking at two groups to help develop this new generation of computers: computer scientists with experience in designing or building computing systems that rely on the same or similar principles as those employed by the brain and neuroscientists who have credible ideas for how neural computing can offer practical benefits for next-generation computers.

+More on Network World: +

From the IARPA request for information: the principles of computing underlying today's state of the art digital systems deviate substantially from the principles that govern computing in the brain. In particular, whereas mainstream computers rely on synchronous operations, high precision, and clear physical and conceptual separations between storage, data, and logic; the brain relies on asynchronous messaging, low precision storage that is co-localized with processing, and dynamic memory structures that change on both short and long time scales.

The group breaks out a number of questions on specific topics it wants computer scientists in particular to offer answers to including:

Spike-based representations: Brains operate using spike-based codes that often appear sparse in time and across populations of neurons. In many systems, these codes appear noisy or imprecise, suggesting a plausible role for approximate computation in brain function.

What is the current state of research in the use of spike-based representations, sparse coding, and/or approximate computations for digital or analog computing systems?

Are there existing hardware systems that utilize representations similar to spikes? If so, in which application areas and use cases have these been deployed, and what are their performance characteristics?

Asynchronous computation: Brains do not employ a global clock signal to synchronously update all computing elements at once. Instead, neurons function independently by default, and only transiently coordinate their activity (e.g. when participating in a coherent cell assembly).

What is the current state of research in the use of asynchronous computation and/or transient coordination for digital or analog computing systems?

Are there existing hardware systems that utilize asynchronous computation and/or transient coordination? If so, in which application areas and use cases have these been deployed, and what are their performance characteristics?

Learning: Brains employ plasticity mechanisms that operate continuously and over multiple time scales to support online learning. Remarkably, brains continue to operate stably during ongoing plasticity.

What is the current state of research in the use of online learning over short and long time scales for digital or analog systems?

Are there existing hardware systems that utilize online learning over short and long time scales? If so, in which application areas and use cases have these been deployed, and what are their performance characteristics?

Co-local memory storage and computation: Brains do not strictly segregate memory and computing elements, as in the traditional von Neumann architecture (John von Neumann found inspiration for the design of the Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer (EDVAC) in what was then known about the design of the brain  70 years ago, IARPA wrote). Rather, the synaptic inputs to a neuron can serve the dual role of storing memories and supporting computation.

What is the current state of research in the use of co-local memory storage and computation for digital or analog computing systems?

Are there existing hardware systems that utilize co-local memory storage and computation? If so, in which application areas and use cases have these been deployed, and what are their performance characteristics?

There is a similar set of questions for the neuroscientist world as well. You can read them all here.

This current RFI isnt IARPAs first dance with human brain research. Last year it announced a five-year program called Machine Intelligence from Cortical Networks (MICrONS) that offered participants a unique opportunity to pose biological questions with the greatest potential to advance theories of neural computation and obtain answers through carefully planned experimentation and data analysis.

Over the course of the program, participants will use their improving understanding of the representations, transformations, and learning rules employed by the brain to create ever more capable neurally-derived machine learning algorithms. Ultimate computational goals for MICrONS include the ability to perform complex information processing tasks such as one-shot learning, unsupervised clustering, and scene parsing. Ultimately, as performers incorporate these insights into successive versions of the machine learning algorithms, they will devise solutions that can perform complex information processing tasks aiming towards human-like proficiency, IARPA stated.

IARPA said that despite significant progress in machine learning over the past few years, todays state of the art algorithms are brittle and do not generalize well. In contrast, the brain is able to robustly separate and categorize signals in the presence of significant noise and non-linear transformations, and can extrapolate from single examples to entire classes of stimuli.

IARPA said that the rate of effective knowledge transfer between neuroscience and machine learning has been slow because of differing scientific priorities, funding sources, knowledge repositories, and lexicons. As a result, very few of the ideas about neural computing that have emerged over the past few decades have been incorporated into modern machine learning algorithms.

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Ex-US State Dept. worker pleads guilty to extensive sextortion, hacking and cyberstalking acts

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IBM tapped by US intelligence agency to grow complex quantum computing technology

DARPA scheme would let high-tech systems see as never before
News / National

by Lovemore Meya

Forty people, including two juveniles of school-going age, who allegedly took part in skirmishes that led to the destruction of property worth thousands of dollars in Chitungwiza, appeared in court on Thursday charged with public violence.The 40 also allegedly barricaded roads with large stones and stoned the police.Pardon Mashayamombe (35) of St Mary's is jointly charged with 33 others including the two minors aged 15 and 16 respectively.Michael Charamba (34) of Zengeza 4 and five others also appeared in court on separate charges.The accused's ages vary from 15 to 50 and most of them are from Chitungwiza while a few came from Waterfalls and Westlea in Harare.Appearing before Chitungwiza resident magistrate Mrs Renika Dzikiti, they were not asked to plead to charges of public violence and participating in a gathering with intent to promote public violence, breaching of peace or bigotry.The 38 adults were remanded to January 21 on $50 bail, while the two minors were freed into the custody of their parents.Prosecutor Mr Donald Mudadirwa told the court that on January 5 and at around 7:30 am at Chigovanyika Shopping Centre in Chitungwiza, the accused persons barricaded the road.They allegedly blocked the road with stone boulders and threw stones towards the police who were dispersing the riotous mob. It is further alleged that the mob was demonstrating against Chitungwiza Municipality for hiking annual commuter operating fees.Charamba and his accomplices, acting in concert on the same day at around 11.30 am allegedly teamed up with the purpose of protesting against council decision. They allegedly went to Zengeza 4 Pagomba Shopping Centre and barricaded the road using boulders, forcing all commuters to disembark from commuter omnibuses despite warning by the police to desist from such acts.
News / National

by Elita Chikwati

Information, Media and Broadcasting Services Minister Dr Christopher Mushohwe says the electronic media should meet listeners' expectations to remain competitive in the face of challenges brought about by digitisation.Speaking during a tour of the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation's studios in Mbare and Pockets Hill in Harare yesterday, Dr Mushohwe said ZBC radio stations could easily lose the market to private players if they did not disseminate relevant information."I think the reason why you are losing is because you are giving people what you want instead of giving them what they want. ZBC is still using programmes that were programmed 10 years ago. You should be concerned with what the consumer will benefit from the programmes," said the minister."We need to make sure we have the requisite content that benefits our people."People will not subscribe to ZBC if their product is inferior. ZBC is not operating in isolation and after digitisation, Government will not protect inefficiency."We want to see people competing and surviving through our interventions as they produce and sell to the people. We should learn from other countries such as Nigeria, India, Philippines and Ghana."Addressing journalists after the tour, Dr Mushohwe said digitisation was progressing well and that he was impressed by the new state-of-the-art equipment at Mbare and Pockets Hill."Digitisation is progressing very well. The perception that I had and what I have seen are different. ZBC has done well from Mbare to Pockets Hill studios. Hopefully, soon ZBC will use the studios under digital environment," he said."The studios I have seen have first class equipment, state-of-the-art machinery. I hope the nation appreciates that we are moving from analogue to digital. I think when we finish, the studios should be open to the public so they can appreciate the transition," he said.Minister Mushohwe said after digitisation, ZBC would have a different outlook."We have 24 stations being worked on and I am happy that we are adding 24 more to cover the entire country. There are areas like Mwenezi, Binga and Rutenga, among others, that have not been enjoying good reception of both radio and television. I hope digitisation will cover all those grey areas," he said.He said there were still areas that were not accessing radio and television, but ZBC was working on gap filling such areas to ensure 100 percent quality radio and television transmission."We are unleashing a technology revolution and Zimbabwe will be a new place with regard to electronic broadcasting. We are grateful to China for assisting with digitisation and the 33 local trainee engineers who are working towards this exercise," said Minister Mushohwe."I am glad that the trainees are young and have just graduated from universities. We are very excited. We want to see our own young people taking over the technology revolution. We are happy that the engineers are spread from all parts of the country and every area is represented. We do not want to depend on expatriates when we have skilled people," he said."I hope the co-operation of BAZ, Transmedia, ZBC and other parastatals is solid and compact," he said.His deputy Thokozile Mathuthu said ZTV should improve on its timing of programmes.She said some movies were played after 10pm when most people had retired to bed."Timing of programmes is important. For instance, playing the movie Hotel Rwanda on Christmas Day is not appropriate," she said.ZBC acting chief executive officer, Mr Patrick Mavhura, said ZBC was working towards ensuring that they had a distinct content from foreign content to ensure relevance."We have content creators. We once experienced challenges of paying them, but Government has promised to help us kick-start the project. This will go a long way in reviving the industry," he said.
News / National

by Elizabeth Tsuro

A 14-year-old Gweru boy who allegedly murdered a 41-year-old family maid over a memory card, and stayed with the body for about 20 hours has been remanded in custody.The boy (name withheld) of Mkoba Village 20, Gweru, appeared for initial remand before Gweru Magistrate Judith Taruvinga facing one count of murder.He appeared in the company of his uncle and was remanded to the juvenile section of Whawha prison, just outside Gweru. His uncle stood in the witness stand listening to proceedings.The boy was not asked to plead and was remanded to January 22.Clad in a clean light blue t-shirt and a dark blue short, he looked remorseful and confused at the same time."Today it's just initial remand and you will be in custody at the young offenders section at Whawha Prison. The offence you committed is a serious one hence it shall be tried at the High Court," said Taruvinga.Prosecutor, Daniel Tafuma, told the court that on January 3, the accused, a Form Two pupil at a local school in Gweru, allegedly killed Nyarai Mandonzva, a family maid at around 11PM.The boy allegedly hit Mandonzva's head several times with a hoe handle and stabbed her eyes with a knife before dragging the body into the toilet.The court heard that the maid's body was found on Monday evening by neighbours who decided to check on the house who then called the police.He said while the police were attempting to open the door, the boy drank some cleaning detergent and was found vomiting while lying on his bed.Tapfuma said the boy was arrested and taken to Gweru General Hospital for treatment.
News / National

by Nqobile Tshili

AIR Zimbabwe yesterday cancelled its flight from Bulawayo to Johannesburg, South Africa, leaving scores of passengers stranded. It was supposed to leave Bulawayo at 12noon but by 7PM it had not left. Some of the passengers told The Chronicle that the airline had promised to book them into hotels in Harare last night.They claimed that Air Zimbabwe flew a smaller plane which could not accommodate all the passengers, hence some were left from the Johannesburg flight. Disgruntled passengers complained that Air Zimbabwe had greatly inconvenienced them as some had connecting flights after reaching South Africa, while others had cancelled business meetings in the neighbouring country.Air Zimbabwe spokesperson Shingai Dhliwayo said she was on leave so could not shed light on the cancellation of the flight. When a Chronicle news crew arrived at the airport at about 5PM, scores of passengers were waiting to be picked up for Harare and said Air Zimbabwe should improve its communication with its clients."They never officially communicated the problem. We could only eavesdrop as other passengers were saying our flight had been cancelled. This prompted me to go and find out for myself what had transpired. That's when we were told that the captain of the bigger air bus wasn't feeling well so they could only fly a smaller one which couldn't accommodate all the passengers," said Bongiwe Zililo.Another passenger who declined to be named said most passengers got agitated after learning that their flight had been cancelled. "People got mad after learning that their flight had been delayed. Initially they seemed shocked, confused and frustration started creeping in before they became very angry but eventually they calmed as it was clear that nothing was happening," said the passenger.She said those who had connecting flights were the worst affected as they had to buy emergency tickets from Air Link. "Some people were travelling to America and the United Kingdom so they couldn't miss their flights so they were forced to buy tickets from Air Link costing over $430."Others went back home and there was a woman who was travelling with her nurse who was also forced to abort the flight because of delays" she said. Another Air Zimbabwe client Frederick Mitchell said the airline had forced some of them to cancel their business meetings."The point of flying is that we get to our desired destinations in time. If we wanted to spend the whole day travelling we could have easily bought bus tickets. This is grossly inappropriate. We deserve an apology and proper explanation of today's events," said Mitchell.
News / National

by Sukulwenkosi Dube

A BULILIMA girl who was allegedly raped by her father has been granted permission to abort the pregnancy by a Plumtree magistrate for her not to interrupt her studies.The 16-year-old girl was impregnated by her 55-year-old father in late October while her mother was away in South Africa, where she works. The mother applied to the court for her daughter to abort the pregnancy and Plumtree magistrate, Livard Philemon granted the order.The father and daughter who cannot be named to protect the girl lived alone in Dombodema area in Bulilima District. The man took advantage of his wife's absence to forcibly engaged in sex with the then Form Three pupil in October last year and then warned her against reporting the matter.The matter came to light after the juvenile's mother discovered that her daughter was two months pregnant when she visited home in December for the holidays.In her application, the woman told the court that the juvenile had been impregnated by her father and that she was not prepared to keep the pregnancy as she was still in school. The juvenile's father appeared on initial remand before the same magistrate facing rape charges. He was remanded in custody to January 20.Prosecuting, Elisha Mazorodze said the elderly man raped his daughter on October 29. "On October 29 the man called his 16-year-old daughter into his bedroom in the middle of the night. He was alone with the juvenile and he started fondling her breasts and ordered her to remove her clothes," he said."The juvenile protested and her father threatened to assault her with a knobkerrie if she didn't comply. He forcibly removed her clothes and raped her once. The man went on to warn the girl against reporting the matter to anyone."Mazorodze said the juvenile remained silent about the matter and when her mother returned home in December she discovered that her daughter was two months pregnant. He said when questioned, the juvenile revealed that her father had raped her. The matter was reported to the police leading to his arrest.
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News / National

by Staff reporter

PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe has instructed that Zimbabwe hold a period of national prayer as the severest drought looms and the country teeters on the brink of a socio-economic and political crisis.A group of clerics from across denominations known as the Zimbabwe Heads of Christian Denominations (ZHOCD) yesterday told journalists in Harare that churches will also begin a process of mobilising resources to avert famine.ZHOCD spokesperson Shingi Munyeza said Zimbabweans needed to "turn from our wicked ways"."Following discussions with the Acting President Phelekezela Mphoko who said he had authority from the President, we have agreed to call the nation and all Christian denominations to prayer from the 9th of January to the 17th."It was a spiritual request and as the prophetic voice of God we must respond responsibly. We as the body of Christ have chosen to respond to this request with responsibility as required of us rather than be irresponsible or reckless," Munyeza said."This is a kairos moment that we, as a people, reflect on our ways and errors, recognise we have sinned against God, repent and seek the face of the Lord for the revival and restoration of our nation and land."Munyeza, who chose to be diplomatic, said Zimbabweans had collectively sinned against God, but would not be drawn into commenting on whether the "poisoned political environment" was to blame for "God's anger"."The Church has sinned against God, and State actors have not acted in the manner God would have expected, so we need to walk away from sin."We must repent from our wicked ways and repent from our sins. In some way we have not been good stewards of what God has given us. Zimbabweans need to walk away from our sins," the businessman-turned-clergyman said.Zimbabwe has particularly in the last decade and a half experienced frequent droughts and food shortages.Asked if Mphoko had revealed the extent of hunger Zimbabwe was facing and the number of people likely to require food aid, Munyeza said this was currently being figured out."We will work with provincial administrators to find out the extent of hunger. We did not want to have figures thrown at us so we will begin the process of finding out and ascertaining the help that is required," he said.
Reporter

Mary Schenk is a reporter covering police, courts and breaking news at The News-Gazette. Her email is mschenk@news-gazette.com, and you can follow her on Twitter (@schenk).
'It is a Big Game to Start With But..': India Captain Rohit Sharma Reveals How India Are Gearing up For The Pakistan Clash
News / National

by Staff reporter

A 40-YEAR-OLD Burnside man, Garikai Mushambavanhu, recently saw red when his sisters and brothers-in-law pounced on him and pulled his privates accusing him of not giving his wife enough money and failing to satisfy her in bed.Mushambavanhu's alleged assailants Una Mapondera, her husband Tatenda Mapondera, Virginia Chanazi Washaya and Bernard Drums yesterday appeared before Bulawayo magistrate Sheunesu Matova charged with assault and were remanded out of custody to February 1 on $50 bail each.All the suspects were not asked to plead to the charge and were represented by Innocent Mafirakureva.Prosecutor Nkathazo Dlodlo told the court that on November 8 last year, at 1pm, the four arrived at Mushambavanhu's house and asked him to get into his office as they had something to discuss with him.They allegedly accused him of not giving their sister money and failing to satisfy her in bed.Sensing danger, Mushambavanhu is said to have refused to get in and the four allegedly became violent.The court heard, Mushambavanhu tried to escape, but they caught him and assaulted him all over the body with fists.Una allegedly slapped him once on the cheek and pulled his private parts.The State alleges, Drums used a knobkerrie and hit him three times on the right hand, while Tatenda also assaulted him all over the body.Mushambavanhu sustained deep cuts on the right hand and a medical report produced indicated the injuries were serious.Drums is alleged to have damaged four window panes and doors with his knobkerrie destroying property worth $300.
News / National

by Staff Reporter

The Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing has ordered 680 vehicles and spare parts worth $50 million from a firm in India.On Saturday ET Auto reported that the Indian automobile manufacturing company, Ashok Leyland had "bagged an order for 680 vehicles and spare parts worth $50 million (over Rs 330 crore) from Zimbabwe."According to the publication, the order is from the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing, Government of Republic of Zimbabwe. Last year the Zimbabwean government bought vehicles mostly used by the military and police bought from Ashok Leyland, under a $50-million loan facility from the Export-Import Bank of India.
Its the first time ever, so much Edna Andrade art in one place.

And the last time in a while, so many Florentine masterworks so close to home.

Its looking deep into the sea, and deep into collections far and wide for hidden gems, and deep into the life of a painter you might have forgotten to learn about in the first place.

Thats art, Virginia-style.

The state, and the District of Columbia, which well claim because its so close and home to so much, has some of the most incredible art in the world. Some of it is here forever more, and some it is just passing through.

I dont think theres ever been an Andrade show like this, Richard Waller, the executive director of the Harnett Museum at the University of Richmond, said as he toured the galleries last fall and looked at more than 50 op art images from one of the masters of the movement.

Waller, a serious man who spent 19 years at the Brooklyn Museum of Art before moving to UR in 1990, was almost giddy as he showed off the retrospective of the Portsmouth-born artist.

The Harnett is occasionally lost in Richmonds vibrant museum scene, but the exhibitions staged by Waller and his staff demand attention.

The works there arent alone in commanding notice.

There are more than 100 museums in Virginia and Washington. From those, seven exhibitions currently on display captured our attention:

The Likeness of Labor

(photography; through April 10)

Virginia Museum of Fine Art, 200 N. Boulevard, Richmond

Open 10 a.m. daily; closes at 5 p.m., Saturday-Wednesday; 9 p.m., Thursday-Friday

Admission free

More information: vmfa.museum or (804) 340-1400

Occasionally lost in the grandeur of the VMFAs marquee galleries and world-class traveling shows is the fact that the museums collection is as deep as it wide.

It was one of the first museums to take photography seriously, and through the years, it has acquired a vast collection. The images are displayed in themed groups in a small gallery on the third floor near the west elevator. The current rotation includes work by Lewis Hine, Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange and Margaret Bourke-White that documents the life of working Americans.

Unlike formal portraits of the rich, whose patronage of the arts guaranteed their place in its history, these images are of anonymous men, women and children. The work stems from Hine, who embarked on a decades-long mission to document the abject working conditions of the nations child laborers with the hope of provoking change before he died in 1940, according to the museum.

The Serial Impulse at Gemini G.E.L.

(paintings, lithographs, others; through Feb. 7)

The National Gallery, Sixth Street and Constitution Avenue NW, Washington

Open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday-Saturday; 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., Sunday

Admission free

More information: www.nga.gov or (202) 737-4215

Artistic impulse can be a peculiar thing. For some, a single image will suffice, a feeling or mood conveyed once capturing a moment.

For others, a single image breeds a whole series of work. This became particularly true in the pop art world of the 1960s when Roy Lichtenstein, Frank Stella and Robert Rauschenberg began testing the limits of what was possible in contemporary art, then repeating what theyd found until theyd created a catalog of like images.

For 50 years, the Los Angeles workshop and studio Gemini G.E.L. has encouraged, and sponsored, cutting edge work from artists willing to take chances.

In this show, the fourth collaboration between the studio and the National Gallery, entire series from 17 artists  127 pieces in all  are on display.

Seascapes by William Trost Richards

(sketches, paintings and personal effects, Jan. 9-May 1)

Chrysler Museum of Art

1 Memorial Place, Norfolk

Open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesday-Saturday; noon to 5 p.m. Sunday; closed Monday

Admission free

More information: www.chrysler.org or (757) 664-6200

Richards (1833-1905) worked at the time of, and occasionally with, the Hudson River School of painters, but his work evolved from romantic interpretations of his world into more scientifically detailed renderings. He spent years studying the coast, from his clifftop home in Newport, R.I., and while on frequent trips to the southwestern coast of England.

This show is more than a typical retrospective, though. In 1994, Richards granddaughter, Edith Ballinger Price of Virginia Beach, gave the museum paintings and related artifacts that are still being examined.

Here, you can see the painters paint box and palette and a number of works never before seen in a gallery, including an unstretched, unvarnished oil painting of rocky cliffs.

Jacob Lawrence: Struggle  From the History of the American People

(paintings, through June 6)

The Fralin Museum of Art at the University of Virginia

155 Rugby Road, Charlottesville

Museum closed until Jan. 21, then open noon to 5 p.m., Tuesday-Sunday

Admission free

More information: www.virginia.edu/artmuseum/exhibition or (434) 924-3592

Jacob Lawrence (1917-2000) was an aberration in the mid-20th century American art scene. In an era of intense segregation, Lawrence was the rare black painter whose work was taken seriously.

His use of vivid, flat colors and his approach to storytelling helped define a life few other painters even acknowledged. But then, just as the Supreme Court was defining the future of the Civil Rights movement with its Brown vs. Board of Education decision, Lawrence set aside his interest in contemporary life so he could create a series of paintings about early American history.

He intended to finish 80 paintings about the history of the United States and offer the collection in a book. In two years, he painted 30 panels, reaching through Revolutionary War and the early years of the United States. But then he stopped.

A private collector bought all 30 pieces and spent a decade selling them off. Today, five pieces are unaccounted for, and the others are dispersed in a number of collections. This show includes a dozen panels from the Harvey and Harvey-Ann Ross collection.

Edna Andrade: An Overview

(paintings; through Feb. 8)

Joel and Lila Harnett Museum of Art, University of Richmond

28 Westhampton Way, Richmond

Museum closed until Jan. 12, then open 1 to 5 p.m., Sunday-Friday; closed Saturdays

Admission free

More information: museums.richmond.edu/exhibitions or (804) 289-8276

Edna Andrade (1917-2008) was an early, if somewhat unappreciated, practitioner in the Op Art movement. She used a keen sense of color and a geometric formality to create canvases that still immediately catch the eye and keep it because theres so much to see.

Credit the folks at UR for putting together whats likely the first career-spanning retrospective of Andrades work. The bulk of the show is made up of her large canvases, but the show covers her entire career, and other styles and approaches are on display, too, including figurative pieces and abstract studies of the Atlantic Coast.

Like your art with a Virginia connection? This is for you. Andrade is known for her Philadelphia roots  she lived there for more than 60 years  but she was born in Portsmouth and began her career teaching art in a Norfolk elementary school.

Liquid Light: Photography Beneath the Sea

(photography; through Jan. 31)

Mariners Museum

100 Museum Drive, Newport News

Open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday-Saturday; 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sunday

Admission $8.95 for children (4-12), $13.95 for adults

More information: www.marinersmueseum.org/liquid-light/ or (757) 596-2222

The creative genius in art is often the ability of artists to interpret things we all know and see in ways wed never before considered. We can relate to Picassos people because we know people, even if their eyes line up maybe a little more evenly in our minds. But occasionally, art takes us somewhere we havent been.

In Liquid Light, nine California photographers take us into the ocean and show us worlds that dont exist anywhere else. They captured images that play off the light as the light plays off the water, showing what the museum calls a stunningly beautiful, meditative and exceptional world.

Twilight of a Golden Age: Florentine Painting after the Renaissance, Masterworks from the Haukohl Family Collection

(paintings, through Jan. 17)

Muscarelle Museum of Art at the College of William & Mary

603 Jamestown Road, Williamsburg

Open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, noon to 4 p.m. Saturday-Sunday; closed Monday

Admission $10

More information: Muscarelle.org/exhibitions/current or (757) 221-2700

The museum claims the collection includes some of the finest examples of paintings and objects from the Florentine Baroque period, and its hard to argue the point.

It might be a narrow niche in the history of art, but that doesnt diminish its importance, or the opportunity for intellectual enhancement before the show closes.

The show is also further proof that the Muscarelle has become a major player in Renaissance exhibitions. It has featured the works of Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Carvaggio in recent years.
Who are the 13? DC just retconned new Golden Age characters into continuity

Meet the 13 characters retroactively added to DC's Golden Age era in Flashpoint Beyond #6
News / National

by Stephen Jakes

A social and political commentator Josepher Madlanduna has said most of the power hungry political leaders are busy concentrating in preparing for the 2018 elections and ignoring to mention anything about the hunger that is already rocking the nation He said only the MDC senior official David Coltart has raised concerns over the drought situation affecting the country at the moment."Only David Coltart is raising the hunger shrill. The scale is Africa,bSouthern Africa and not only Zimbabwe ironically, all the big boys in Zimbabwean political leadership are still and only enmeshed in outweighing each other for 2018 only," he said."Hunger is approaching hungry Zimbabweans already!bWhat's the strategy orphans of Nehanda and Lobengula? I'm scared ordinary citizens might face this scary scenario ahead, left for their devices only and alone!"
Junior Calypso turns 40

Speaking at the launch of the TUCO/First Citizens Junior Calypso competition held last Thursday at the First Citizens Corporate Centre, Queens Park East, he said: Forty years of competition is no small achievement.

And the fact that it has survived for so long is because of the dedication and commitment involved. Recalling the likes of Lance Heath and Roy Augustus who championed the cause of Junior Calypso in TT over the years, he also saluted the teachers, parents, school supervisors and ministry officials who he said have come together at this very important occasion.

Garcia then spoke of his ministrys emphasis on the teaching of TT s history, stating that the teaching of calypso and its origins must form an integral part in the history of TT . And I look forward to more discussions where that is concerned and I invite the chairperson to the national consultation on education who Im sure should be able to make a sterling contribution where especially, as it refers to the history of calypso in TT , Garcia said. Deviating from his prepared text since as he said coyly, a couple of the previous speakers may have peaked at it, Garcia spoke of the cleverly crafted Steelband Clash by Lord Blakie (Carlton Joseph), Explainers (Winston Henry) Lorraine and Bombers (Clifton Ryan) Joan and James, which he stated all put him in those places at those times, and urged the youngsters to follow in the footsteps of the masters of the art form.

He once again thanked the organisers and members of the committee for their very hard work and for their commitment, adding: And I noticed that many members of the committee are either practising teachers or former teachers, and it tells me that teachers really need an increase in salary. Applause followed that statement.

Garcia then gave the assurance that his commitment, support and the financial assistance remains for the youngsters in the art form.

Earlier Lutalo Massimba (Brother Resistance), president of TUCO stated that the financial cuts to Carnival was not on his mind. He said: Forty years among young people is a moment to celebrate. We as a nation must be proud. Calypso is a spirit and vibration of our soul and it has nothing to do with cuts. He then went into a bit of history of calypso that he said brought us through plantation slavery to independence and republicanism in TT .

He then made a pitch to have full degree programmes in calypso done at UTT and UWI, though there is a MOU with the former for calypso studies and its history.

He told Garcia and Minister in the Education Ministry, Dr Lovell Francis who was also present that they got to treat with the matter with the importance it deserves.

Massimba closed saying: Whether the price of oil and gas go up or down, it shouldnt matter. By calypsos our stories are told. Jason Julien, deputy CEO at First Citizens stated that though we have challenging times ahead, the spirit, soul and strength of the people rise. He said: We have to tap into every creativity and spirit of the people to bring fruit and benefits in years to come. This raw talent can be developed and exported. Julien ended his contribution quoting for David Rudders Calypso. A symbolic handing over of sponsorship documents from Julien to Massimba followed.

Stefan Camejo and Aaron Duncan performed live at the event.
I sued to prove wrongful death

In the end, the court ordered in an assesment that Ramsumair be awarded $300,000 from the SWRHA instead of the $2 million that was initially offered by the authority two- years ago.

The 42-year-old father of three has filed an unconditional Notice of Discontinuance in the High Court, stating he would not pursue any further court action for the death of his wife Chrystal, 29, on March 4, 2011. He initially filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the SWRHA and three doctors of San Fernando General Hospital (SFGH).

Just why Ramsumair did not accept the SWRHAs $2 million offer in 2014, he declined to say except that his lawsuit against SWRHA and the doctors, was not about money but to prove there was negligence. The request, by Ramsumairs lawyers to the Ministry of Health for $3.5 million to settle the matter, is ongoing.

That you will have to speak to my attorneys about, Ramsumair said yesterday at his home in Couva.

Ramsumair told Newsday yesterday he has actually gotten not one black cent, when compared to the $3.6 milion his attorney had initially claimed from the State for Chrystals death. I have gotten not one cent but as a single parent, I am taking care of my children as best as I can, Ramsumair said. His daughter Danielle, four, survived the Caesarean section (c-section) surgery on her mother, which subsequently led to her (the mother) bleeding to death. He also has a son Christian and another daughter Sarah.

The wrongful death lawsuit against the SWRHA and four doctors of the San Fernando General Hospital (SFGH) who oversaw the C-section surgery was ended after Ramsumair failed to bring expert testimony from a doctor to prove negligence in the death of his wife.

Not one doctor was willing to testify for me against the SWRHA and those three doctors. And so, I had a very slim chance to prove negligence. It was never about money, which I have not gotten a cent. It was about my quest to prove negligence led to my wifes death, Ramsumair said. With the negligence case falling apart, Ramsumair filed private charges against the four doctors, but this too had to be quashed as, once again, no doctor in this country was willing to give expert testimony on Ramsumairs behalf.

A post mortem conducted by Professor Hubert Daisley revealed two arteries were not ligated (tied). However, this finding was challenged by the SWRHA and the three doctors whom Ramsumair sued, when they filed expert testimonies of Dr Rajendra Persad, former head of the Department of Pathology and forensic pathologist Dr Valery Alexandrov. An assessment of damages for the lawsuit against SWRHA, came up in December 12, before High Court Master Marrissa Robertson and an Order was made for the SWRHA to pay Ramsumair $300,000 and in turn he would file a notice of discontinuance.
Chaguanas Carnival launches today

He said the National Carnival Commission (NCC) is expected to contribute $500,000 while the rest would have to come from the private sector. He said that last year, the NCC promised extra but nothing was forthcoming.

He continued that the little extra came from Xtra Foods Supermarket. Nagessar said all celebrations would take place on Ramsaran Street with the exception of the premier event the 2016 Chaguanas Carnival Queen Pageant.

He said that it may either come off at Ramsaran Street or at the Chaguanas Market Car Park. Meanwhile, Chaguanas Mayor Gopaul Boodhan said more Jouvert bands and schools have indicated they would participate in this years celebrations. Boodhan said he wants to encourage Carnival as a healthy annual family activity and would be going all out to ensure that safety of masqueraders and spectators remains a high priority.

Mayor Boodhan said safety was the main agenda of the CCC which held a media conference on Tuesday at the Chaguanas Borough Corporation to announce security measures and plans at the launch today.
Sex assault victim to donate award

Perhaps it is the first time in our jurisdiction compensation has been accepted by a victim of indecent assault, as a part of a sentence imposed on an accused found guilty.

The accused, Nigel Xavier, 45, of Pleasantville, was found guilty of committing an indecent assault on a woman some ten years ago in San Fernando, at a place where both accused and victim were employed. Xavier went on trial before Justice Carla Brown-Antoine in the San Fernando High Court.

The State led evidence from the woman through State Attorney Shabaana Shah, that on May 2, 2005, both she and Xavier were working at a businessplace.

Xavier touched her on the shoulder, but she responded by hitting him on the back. She testified that he then grabbed her hand, spun her around and holding both her hands, touched her between the legs. Xavier, she testified, then said, I will rape you today. Xavier was charged with the offence of committing an indecent assault on the fellow-employee.

Xavier testified in his defence, but the jury returned a unanimous verdict of guilty as charged. The issue of compensation arose when his attorney put forward the proposal, that compensation be considered as an option.

The judge asked prosecuting attorney Shah to enquire from the victim if that was an option, and she obliged, however, the woman expressed the view that the money, if offered, is not what she would want to keep for herself. She went on to tell the State attorney what she would like to do with the money.

Shah then told Justice Brown-Antoine that after consulting with the victim, she was told that she would accept the compensation but would like to donate to charity where women aggrieved like her, could be counselled. MLady, the victim has agreed, but indicate that she would prefer the money be donated to some form of charity, to help persons who are affected by these sort of offences, Shah said.

Justice Brown-Antoine then passed sentence on Xavier in which she ordered him to pay a fine of $20,000, or serve 12 months hard labour.

He has two months to pay.
US Military Really Didn't Want

You to Know What's in New

Washington Post Investigation
News / National

by Stephden Jakes

Chitungwiza Magistrate Rekina Dzikiti on Thursday 07 January 2016 set free three juveniles who were apprehended during a dragnet arrest by police on Tuesday 05 January 2016 and charged with committing public violence.This was after the intervention by the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights to defend the juveniles.ZLHR Communications officer Kumbirai Mafunda posted that police on Tuesday 05 January 2016 apprehended Lizbert Saruchera aged 15 and is a Form 2 student at Mutero High School in Masvingo, Takudzwa Chirwadzimba aged 16, a Form Four student at Zengeza 2 High School and Simbarashe Nkwezaramba aged 19 during a dragnet arrest effected by Zimbabwe Republic Police officers after they cracked down on commuter omnibus crews who stormed council offices over exorbitant commuter operating fees."The juveniles spent two nights in police detention together with 31 other accused persons and were only freed on Thursday 07 January 2016 after their lawyer Kennedy Masiye of Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights successfully applied for bail before Magistrate Dzikiti," he said."Police charged the juveniles and the other 31 accused persons with contravening Section 36 of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act Chapter 9:23 for committing public violence, a charge which they denied."He said the State prosecutors claimed that the juveniles together with their co-accused persons barricaded roads with stone boulders at Chigovanyika Shopping Centre in Chitungwiza and threw stones at some police officers who were dispersing a "riotous mob" which was demonstrating against Chitungwiza Municipality for hiking annual commuter operating fees."Lizbert and Takudzwa were granted free bail while Simbarashe was ordered to pay $50 bail. The other 31 accused persons were also freed on $50 because of the dissection of the Form 242 done by Masiye on the State's reasons for opposing bail for the accused persons," Mafunda said."Masiye argued that the reasons advanced by the State in opposing bail such as the fear that the accused persons could incite other people to demonstrate against Chitungwiza Municipality and that they could abscond because of the "gravity of the offence" were not convincing as insinuated by the Constitution that an accused person can only be denied bail if there are compelling reasons to do so."The 34 accused persons will return to court Thursday 21 January 2016.
(Newser)  Walter Cavanagh of Santa Clara, Calif., holds the Guinness Book of World Records title of "Mr. Plastic Fantastic," and Money revisited his story earlier this week. As it recounts, Cavanagh has 1,497 valid credit cards, adding up to $1.7 million in available credit. The wild stats don't end there: His custom wallet, the world's longest, stretches 250 feet, weighs 38 pounds, and can hold only 800 of his many cards, not that he carries them around: The Los Angeles Times reported in a 2004 profile that all but one (which he uses and pays off in full in each month, giving him nearly perfect credit) are kept in a safe-deposit box. Cavanagh's card collection started as "silly bet" with a friend nearly half a century ago. Whoever collected the most cards by the end of the year would win a dinner. The final score: 143-138 in Cavanagh's favor.

With credit cards from gas stations, airlines, and an ice cream store, Cavanagh says he's only been denied credit once, by the now-defunct JJ Newberry Co., which said he had too much credit already. To maintain his title (which he's held since 1971, per ABC News), Cavanagh has to keep amassing cards. If a card isn't valid any more, he doesn't count it as part of his collection. Cavanagh isn't the only collector of plastic. The American Credit Card Collectors Society was formed in 1994 and holds regular conventions. But 29% of Americans actually have no plastic, per an April 2014 Gallup survey cited by MarketWatch. A third of us have one or two, and only 7% have seven or more. (Here's why you should freeze your credit reports.)
(Newser)  A tech company has built "a reverse Iron Man" suit, in the words of the Wall Street Journal's Geoffrey Fowler. The R70i Age Suit is designed to make the wearer feel what it's like to be decades older. Fowler, who tried on the suit during the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week, describes the experience as "unforgettable" and "distressing." Or as Quartz's Mike Murphy, who also tried on the suit, puts it: "I now fear getting old." The R70i's virtual-reality visor simulates the effects of everything from cataracts to glaucoma, while headphones increase background noise and add tinnitus, the Journal reports. Murphy writes that the simulated hearing problems made it difficult to even recite the lyrics to a children's song.

Fowler says he was most surprised by what the suit did to his mobility. The R70i "puts the brakes" on eight joints in the arms, legs, and hips to simulate arthritis and muscle deterioration, the Journal reports. "Ordinary tasks like walking around and lifting my arms became extremely difficult," Fowler writes. "I was sweating enough that my Age Suit needed a good wash after I was done with it." According to Murphy, walking with the "legs of a 100-year-old" felt like "walking through waist-high mud," and a simulated damaged hip made it hard to stay on a treadmill. An insurance company plans to use the suit to help people better understand aging, the Journal reports. You can intellectualize these things all day long, but when it becomes an emotional first-person experience, it is very different," says the co-founder of Applied Minds, which made the suit. (Read more aging stories.)
(Newser)  While other candidates have made Iowa their home away from home, spending the night in hotels and motels before America's first caucus, Donald Trump has taken a different approach. Trump flies home to Manhattan in one of his private planes or copters so he can snooze in his own bed in Trump Tower every night, reports Reuters. For instance, Trump attended eight campaign events in Iowa in November and December, and he hightailed it back to NYC afterward each time. "It works very well for me," he tells Reuters, mentioning he uses a Boeing 757 with a larger bed when he's flying into bigger airports, and a smaller Cessna for tinier destinations. But Reuters talks to political analysts and others who think the strategy could end up costing him votes.

"Not everything in a presidential campaign can be accomplished with a speech or a rally," the chairman of the American Conservative Union says. "You attend a family event of a supporter in a key state ... these have an important psychological impact." Ted Cruz has been able to go to about 12 town halls and about two dozen smaller schmooze sessions in part because he holes up in local accommodations after his work is doneand while his numbers can't necessarily be pegged to his lodgings, he's now leading Trump in Iowa polls. Still, as one blogger notes, you can bet Trump isn't worrying about his travel habits. He "not only defies political conventional wisdom on just about every score, but he's proving to other candidates that they don't need to follow them either," writes Dan Calabrese at caintv.com. (Two women who say Bill Clinton targeted them are fans of Trump.)
(Newser)  The Democratic Party's official third wheelMartin O'Malleymay not qualify for the next Democratic presidential debate on Jan. 17, the New York Times reports. And CNN says he's "dangerously close" to watching the debate on NBC with the rest of us. Which is ironic, as O'Malley has been the candidate most persistent in his demands for more debates, the Times reports. To qualify, candidates must reach an average of 5% either nationally or in Iowa, New Hampshire, or South Carolina in the five most recent polls recognized by NBC News," the Times quotes NBC's rules. O'Malley is right at 5% in Iowa, but in the three most recent polls he's only averaging 4.3%, CNN reports. He's well below the cutoff everywhere else.

An O'Malley staffer recently accused the media of wanting to focus only on Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton, Yahoo reports. And the Times notes it would probably be better for NBC's ratings if they could bill the debate as a head-to-head between Sanders and Clinton. But O'Malley is getting plenty of supportincluding from NBC itself, which said it may round up his poll numbersto be on stage Jan. 17 in South Carolina. A representative from the DNC expects O'Malley to make the cut. And representatives from both the Clinton and Sanders campaigns tell CNN they want O'Malley to take part in the debate. If O'Malley somehow fails to qualify, it would be a "huge blow" to his campaign with only days to go before the Iowa caucuses, the Times reports. (Read more Martin O'Malley stories.)
(Newser)  Being on the run as the world's most wanted drug lord apparently wasn't enough fame for Joaquin Guzman: Authorities in Mexico, where "El Chapo" was recaptured on Friday, say they were able to track him down because he wanted to make a biopic about his life and his people had contacted actors and producers about the project, the Guardian reports. Attorney General Arely Gomez says Guzmanwhose daring prison break six months ago would presumably have been a big part of the biopicwas captured in the town of Los Mochis in his native Sinaloa state with the help of investigators who had been watching his lawyers. In other developments:

Gomez says that for now, Guzman is being returned to the Altiplano maximum-security prison that he escaped from in July, the AP reports. He escaped from another prison in 2001.

Authorities say Guzman was recaptured in the coastal town early Friday after a firefight with Mexican Navy marines that killed five of his bodyguards and injured one marine, CNN reports. He escaped through tunnelsas he has done many times beforeand managed to steal a car before he was stopped on a highway outside of town, authorities say.

In the US, the Drug Enforcement Administration praised the capture, which many thought would never happen, as a "victory for the rule of law" and a "significant achievement" in the shared fight against drug trafficking, the Los Angeles Times reports. The DEA and Mexico will "continue to work together to respond to the evolving threats posed by transnational criminal organizations," the agency said in a statement.

The US does, however, want to see Guzman in an American prison instead of a Mexican one this time and there have been calls for immediate extradition, the AP reports. "Given that 'El Chapo' has already escaped from Mexican prison twice, this third opportunity to bring him to justice cannot be squandered," said Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto called the recapture a sign that Mexicans can trust national institutions and the rule of law, though experts tell NBC that the president will probably sign off on extradition to avoid the potential humiliation of having Guzman escape once again.

(Read more Joaquin Guzman stories.)
(Newser)  Maine Gov. Paul LePage says he is being labeled a racist because of a "one word slip-up" during remarks on the state's drug problem. He insists that he hadn't intended for there to be a racial element to his claim that out-of-state drug dealers called "D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty" are coming to Maine to sell heroin and impregnate "young white girls," the Portland Press-Herald reports. "Instead of saying Maine women, I said white women," LePage told reporters at a Friday press conference. "I'm not going to apologize to the Maine women for that because if you go to Maine, you will see we are 95% white." He went on to slam the media, accusing them of being in the "back pocket of Maine bloggers," CNN reports.

The Republican governor said he probably could have used many other words in a better way, the New York Times reports. "That's who I am. You can take the kid off the street, but you cant take the street out of the kid." The Times notes that LePage often uses his life story to defend himself, and it's certainly a doozy: LePage, the oldest of 18 children, ran away from his abusive father at 11 and lived on the streets before eventually making it into college and having a successful business career. After the Friday conference, the chairman of the Maine Republican Party said the governor was right to "apologize for his ill-chosen words," the Press-Herald reportsthough critics said it didn't seem like much of an apology. (Read more Maine stories.)
(Newser)  Two suspected militants stabbed and wounded three foreign touriststwo Austrians and a Swedeat a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort city of Hurghada on Friday, the Interior Ministry said. Security forces opened fire at the two assailants, killing one and seriously wounding the other, according to a ministry statement. The wounded attacker was arrested, according to security officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. Officials tell the BBC that the attackers, who raised the ISIS flag, were trying to kidnap tourists.

Hospital officials say the victimsRenata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both 72, and Sammie Olovsson, 27are in stable condition and only suffered shallow wounds. The Hurghada attack was the second attack on a hotel frequented by foreign tourists in Egypt in as many days, an ominous development for the country's already battered tourism industry. The attack came just hours after the local affiliate of ISIS claimed responsibility for an attack a day earlier on a hotel in Cairo near the Giza Pyramids. No one was hurt in the Thursday attack, in which a group of over a dozen men fired flares and birdshot at a security post outside the hotel where Arab Israeli tourists were staying. (Read more ISIS stories.)
News / Regional

by Patient Sibanda

A 45-YEAR-OLD man from Mazwi village on the outskirts of Bulawayo has been arrested for allegedly fondling the breasts and buttocks of his two orphaned nieces who had visited him during the holiday from a children's home where they live.Dumisani Masango was arrested on Tuesday for allegedly indecently assaulting his nieces aged 16 and 13 who cannot be named for legal reasons.The man's victims live at a children's home and the incident occurred when the suspect's wife was away.Bulawayo metropolitan province police spokesperson Inspector Precious Simango said Masango was arrested for indecent assault."I confirm that we've arrested a 45-year-old man for fondling breasts and buttocks of his two nieces. He will soon appear in court," said Insp Simango.A member of Mazwi village neighbourhood watch committee, Dumisani Mlalazi, claimed that the man had also raped his wife's younger sister, but the matter was being swept under the carpet.Police said they had only received a complaint in connection with the indecent assault.Mlalazi said the family had not wanted the matter to be reported to the police, but he apprehended the suspect."His nieces told me that he fondled their breasts and buttocks after raping her wife's young sister. His nieces cried as they narrated the story to me and they requested to go back to the children's home where they stay. The family wanted to keep this issue under the carpet as they have sent away his wife's young sister who was raped by him," said Mlalazi.He said Masango told him that he was playing with his nieces when he fondled their breasts and buttocks.A neighbour, Ncedisani Mpofu, said the children came to her home at night crying and they told her that their uncle was fondling their buttocks and breasts.
(Newser)  A city that's made headlines for having too little water is preparing to spend $3.1 million to deal with a potential excess of it, NBC Los Angeles reports. LA officials are worried that this year's El Nino will force the Los Angeles River to do something highly unusual: spill its banks. "We're preparing for a worst-case scenario," says Col. Kirk Griggs with the Army Corps of Engineers, as quoted in the Los Angeles Times. "We feel we need to do that, and we owe it to the residents." To prevent potential flooding, the Army Corps of Engineers is installing temporary barriers to increase capacity along a 3-mile stretch of the river next to Interstate 5, NBC reports.

The temporary barriers, which are being paid for with federal emergency money, are similar to "giant sandbags," Phys.org reports. They'll add an extra 4 feet of clearance to the river's banks, according to NBC. The river was lined with concrete decades ago, and plants growing along the bottom of that stretch of the Los Angeles River have cut its capacity nearly in half. The temporary barriers will give some of that capacity back. Officials think it's unlikely the river will flood, but they'd rather be safe than sorry. "If [the river] floods, there is risk of significant damage, not to mention real and immediate danger to Angelenos," says Mayor Eric Garcetti. Frequent flooding before the river was paved killed many people and caused millions in damage in the early 1900s, Phys.org reports. (This year's El Nino could rival the scary one of 1997.)
The Secret Service has arrested a man in Washington D.C. on Wednesday for threatening to kidnap at least one of President Barack Obama's family dogs.

According to the Secret Service, the man, Scott D. Stockert, 49, had traveled from Dickinson, North Dakota to the Capitol with the intention of stealing Bo, the seven-year-old dog.

Stockert was found at a Hampton Inn at 901 6th Street NW, which is near the Washington Convention Center, the court document revealed. The document did not explain why Stockert wanted the dog.

When asked if he had any weapons, Stockert informed the officers that he had two guns as well as ammunition in his car. The officers found a 12-gauge pump shotgun and a bolt-action .22-caliber rifle with more than 350 rounds of ammunition. The firearms were both unloaded. There was also a billy club and a machete in the vehicle.

In D.C., it is illegal to carry weapons that have not been registered.

When he was arrested, he allegedly said to the officers, reported by NBC Washington, "You picked the wrong person to mess with. I will [expletive] your world up."

After the arrest, Stockert had told officers that he was Jesus Christ and had come to Washington to run for president. He also claimed to be the son of former president, John F. Kennedy and movie star, Marilyn Monroe.

Secret Service Officers from the Minnesota filed office, who were the first ones to learn about Stockert's plans, had tipped off the agents in D.C.

During a hearing Friday morning, the judge allowed Stockert to be released under a supervision program until a court date is scheduled. Stockert will not be allowed to carry real or fake weapons. He is also not allowed to be near the White House or the Capitol.
Activists are claiming that a militant with the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, has publicly executed his own mother in Raqqa, Syria.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) as well as the group, Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently, reported on the execution, citing eyewitnesses who said that 20-year-old Ali Saqr fatally shot Lena al-Qasem in front of hundreds of people outside of a post office where she worked. Al-Qasem was believed to be in her 40s.

According to the reports, al-Qasem had asked her son to leave the city with her out of fear that Raqqa and ISIS will be wiped out by the U.S.-led military coalition. Saqr then reportedly told ISIS about his mother's statements and since ISIS does not tolerate any kind of opposition, they found her guilty of apostasy and demanded that he kill her.

This is not the first time that an ISIS fighter has been told to kill his family.

Raqqa has been the de facto capital for the terrorist group. Ever since ISIS took control of areas in Syria and Iraq, they have killed many people for a wide range of offenses, such as homosexuality or witchcraft.

The group has also taped executions of people from around the world. In one of their latest video, ISIS militants shot five men, who they claimed were British spies.
A hijab-clad Muslim woman was escorted out of a Donald Trump rally on Friday for silently protesting the event.

Rose Hamid, 56, had stood up when Trump started to address the topic of Syrian refugees. The Republican frontrunner in the 2016 presidential campaign, who has previously called for a temporary ban on all Muslims from entering the United States, said that the refugees "probably are ISIS." ISIS is another term for the terrorist group, the Islamic State, which is also known as ISIL.

Once Hamid, who was sitting behind Trump, stood up, Trump supporters started to chant "Trump" repeatedly. They were reportedly instructed by the campaign staff to do so if they see someone protesting.

Although Hamid remained quiet, the security still came to escort her and a fellow man, who also stood up, out of the arena. Hamid was wearing a shirt that read, "Salam, I come in peace."

Other silent protesters, who were wearing yellow eight-pointed stars, which referred to the six-pointed stars that Jewish people were forced to wear during the Holocaust, were also told to leave. On the stars was a message that read, "Stop Islamophobia."

While Hamid was leaving, Trump supporters began booing her and telling her to "get out." CNN reported that Hamid, who is a flight attendant, said that one person had shouted, "You have a bomb, you have a bomb."

She added in a phone interview with CNN, "The ugliness really came out fast and that's really scary."

While the protesters were leaving, Trump said, "There is hatred against us that is unbelievable. It's their hatred, it's not our hatred."

Trump and his campaign have not commented on the situation. The Council on American-Islamic Relations has asked Trump to publicly apologize to Hamid.

"The image of a Muslim woman being abused and ejected from a political rally sends a chilling message to American Muslims and to all those who value our nation's traditions of religious diversity and civic participation," said Nihad Awad, the council's national executive director, the Washington Post. "Donald Trump should issue a public apology to the Muslim woman kicked out of his rally and make a clear statement that American Muslims are welcome as fellow citizens and as participants in the nation's political process."

Prior to the start of the rally, the crowd was told that protesting was not allowed.
New Delhi:

Showing audacity, Pakistan based terrorist outfit Jaish E Mohammad, which orchestrated the Pathankot Attack, have issued an audio clip condemning Indias combat operation during the attack.

The clip uploaded to www.alqalamionline.com, reveals about the operation (from militants side) and how the terrorists ceased Pathankot Air Base for more than three days.

In its major highlight, the clip ridicules Indias efforts to counter the attack. The clip in its address says that Indian agencies opted a fitful policy to tackle the situation.

It ridicules how Indian defence agencies could not tackle the six mujaheedin. He also demeans martyrdom of Lt Col Niranjan Kumar and ace shooter Fateh Singh and talks about the confusion over the number of attackers. Buri tarah mare gaye. First, they said there were six mujahideen, then they said five, then four. Such a big country is in tears. They are pointing an accusing finger like cowards.

Hailing the efforts and courage shown by the terrorist, he says that the attack at Pathankot airbase was a fidayeen operation. He also added that terrorist fought Indian soldiers at night.

Four mujahideen attacked Indias Pathankot airbase. It was the night after Friday at around 3 am, a time when the sly is closest to earth they entered into the Indian airbase. Kya kafiyat hogi, kya jazbe honge, kya manzar honge.

The speaker warns the Pakistan government not to accept Indian evidence and ridiculed why they bow down every time in front of India. Pakistan ke ilaam India ke ilzaam ke saamne kyon jhukte hein? Kyon sharmate hein? (Why do Pakistans leaders bow before Indias allegations? Why do they shame us?), he asks.

He also adds who would believe that jihadis can fight for 48 hours in such freezing temperatures, harsh weather conditions, without sleeping, without eating.

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London:

Mick Jagger suggested the producers of his new 1970s rock-themed TV series to take a look at his son when they were looking for someone to play the frontman of fictitious punk act The Nasty Bits.

The Rolling Stones star dug deep into his own recollections of the music business for Vinyl, the hard-hitting new drama hes co-producing with Martin Scorsese, but he didnt go into the project thinking hed be working with his kid, James, reported Contactmusic.

When I saw the role was being created, I thought, Well, wait a minute, theyre looking for a guy who likes this kind of music, can play it and can act as well, Mick said.

He (James) loves that kind of music, that kind of screaming racket. Not that Ive got any objections to it, but I mean, hes really into that. So I thought Id put James into the mix. Im very pleased with him.

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New Delhi:

Top officials of the Obama administration have met leading Internet companies in Silicon Valley in an effort to build cooperation with them in combating online radicalisation and recruitment by terror groups.

This meeting is the latest in the administrations continuing dialogue with technology providers and others to ensure we are bringing our best private and public sector thinking to combating terrorism, a senior administration official said after the meeting was over in San Jose yesterday.

The meeting was attended by the White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough, Assistant to the President for Counter Terrorism and Homeland Security Lisa Monaco, US Chief Technology Officer Megan Smith, among other senior administration officials.

Representatives of a number of leading Silicon Valley companies including Google, Facebook, Yahoo and Microsoft attended the meeting.

The meeting comes after Obamas call in his address on December 6 for government and technology community to work together to combat terrorism and counter violent extremism online.

This engagement is a result of that call. The administration is committed to taking every action possible to confront and interdict terrorist activities wherever they may occur, including in cyberspace, the official said.

Earlier in the day, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest, said the goal of the engagement was to find additional ways to work together to make it even harder for terrorists or criminals to find refuge in cyberspace.

Earnest said this was an opportunity to be a robust discussion about ways they can make it harder for terrorists to leverage internet to recruit, radicalise, and mobilise supporters to carry out acts of violence.

Earnest said there was precedent for this kind of cooperation with tech companies, when they had worked together to combat child pornography and hoped to find common ground with them Many of these technology companies that are participating in the meeting today are run by patriotic Americans who dont have any desire in seeing their technology being used to aid terrorists, or make it easier for terror organisations to recruit followers and incite them to carry out acts of violence, he said.

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Cairo:

Two foreign tourists were on Friday stabbed by militants at a hotel in Egypts Red Sea resort city of Hurghada, police said, adding one of the attackers was killed and the other injured in retaliatory fire.



The injured persons were Danish and German tourists, Ministry of Interior said in a statement.



The attackers were armed with knives and both of them were wearing an explosive belt, police said.



They stabbed the tourists at Bella Vista Hotel in the busy downtown area of the city. The injured tourists are currently being treated in the towns Nile Hospital.



Police opened fire at the attackers, killing one and wounding the other.



Security forces have cordoned off the area and are currently investigating the incident.



The incident comes a day after unknown gunmen opened fire on a tourist bus and a hotel in Al-Haram Street in Giza yesterday.



A local affiliate of the Islamic State terror group has claimed responsibility for yesterdays attack.

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New Delhi:

Mumbai police have summoned director Karan Johar for making vulgar comment during AIB roast show which staged in Mumbai last year.

Johar, who was pivotal part of the show, anchored the programme which contained obscene gestures.

The event was inspired by US celebrity roasts  an event where a celebrity is mocked  and it featured Johar as the Roastmaster or host.

We have summoned Karan Johar, which essentially means he will have to come to the Tardeo police station to give his statement. His statement will be an important part of the charge sheet that is yet to be submitted to the court, said an officer from the Tardeo police station.

The police will also summon actors Arjun Kapoor, Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone.

As per a report, the accused will also be booked under section 295 of the IPC (punishment for hurting religious sentiments), but the police need the permission of the states chief secretary before submitting the charge sheet in court.

Karan Johar is currently in London for his upcoming flick Ae Dil Hai Mushkil. Tardeo police are in touch with his advocate and are coordinating with him. They plan to record Johar's statement in a few days.



After Karan Johar, actors Arjun Kapoor, Ranveer Singh, and Deepika Padukone are likely to be summoned to record individual statements.





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Opinion / Columnist

In the beginning the Nazis burnt all the books consider subversive to the narrow Aryan Race Nazi ideology and then they tried to fill the gap with trash chained out by Propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels, dim-witted philosophers, etc. History has the habit of repeating itself!Soon after independence President Mugabe has institute a ruthless control of the Zimbabwe's media turning the country's public print media and the country's only licensed radio and tv stations into some of the most tightly controlled media in the world into total disregard to the people's right to a free media and freedom of expression. The regime has haunted the country's small independent print media arresting the journalists and shutting down the paper at the drop of a hat.The public media has been there to air Zanu PF's point of view and no other; for all intent and purpose, Zimbabwe's public media is nothing but Zanu PF's publicity department in all but name. Having eliminated everyone else with an opposing point of view to Mugabe is a great leader ethos there thousands of square metres of newspaper column space and thousands of hours of radio and TV air time to be filled. In stepped Zanu PF apologists, propagandists and all manner characters with all manner of idiotic ideas, chief amongst them was Nathaniel Manheru cum George Charamba, to fill the columns and air time.Nathaniel Manheru has had a column in the Herald and Sunday Mail for donkey years; he is President Mugabe's spokesman, who would dare deny him all the column space he wants to say whatever! And that is exactly what he has done too subjected the reading public to column after column, week in week out, of trash!"2016 arrived nine days ago," wrote Manheru in his latest article. "Or so we allege. As before, and before, on New Year the sun still rose from the east, still set in the west. The clock - not time - ticked as before, giving us an illusion of recording reality, of time past, time present, time future. Arguably, there is no time past, no time future. Only a continual, eternal present in which we inhere for a little while, and, when our life is spent, then decay or depart to . . . we don't know where. And not to know where is not quite the same as not to believe where. The priest  or is it pastor nowadays  tells us we head heaven-or hell-wards, depending on our goodness or its deficit. Gentle reader, I hope you notice I slipped. Nowadays? How nowadays when I have repudiated a past-present-future continuum? How nowadays when I have repudiated time and periodisation?"The article was entitled "Zimbabwe: New Year, Old Thinking!""What is the nincompoop wittering about?" you may well ask. Like the Nazi, Zanu PF has stifled all meaningful debate, free media and freedom of expression and so the regime has to file the empty columns with nonsense from the modern day Josef Goebbels, Nathaniel Manheru!
New Delhi:

Karnataka State governor Vaju Bhai Vala has landed up in a controversy by saying that studious girls should give up make up completely in order to achieve excellence in their goals.

Vaju Bhai vala said that - give up on fancy clothes and lipstick because college is not a platform for a beauty contest!

Both girls and boys are intelligent...To achieve something in life you need to sacrifice something. Boys have to give up their specific addictions. Girls need to give up their fashion. You (girls) come to college for studies and not to participate in any beauty competition. You (girls) dont need to get your eyebrows done, apply lipstick or trim your hair... he said while delivering the valedictory address of the 103rd Indian Science Congress in Mysuru on Thursday.

However, the comments were not very harsh in nature and were made with a touch of humour. At the time comments were made, they were even welcomed with a loud applause by the audience, including girls, at the Crawford Hall in Mysore University.

However, a section of scientists, who were present there, were left bewildered by the governors statement.

What does beauty or fashion have to do with studies? It is something personal. It is an individuals choice to present herself in a specific way. Who said that a fashionable girl is not academic or intelligent? The governor was addressing the valedictory of a Science Congress. Instead of speaking about promoting science, his comments on girls were unnecessary, said Pallavi, a student, who was present there.

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Mexico City:

Mexican authorities have recaptured fugitive drug kingpin Joaquin El Chapo Guzman, six months after his prison break, President Enrique Pena Nieto said on Friday.

Mission accomplished: We got him. I want to inform Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested, Pena Nieto wrote on Twitter.

A presidential spokesman confirmed the authenticity of the tweet to AFP, but declined to give more details, saying that a press conference would be held later today.

Mexican marines have conducted extensive operations in the northwestern states of Sinaloa and Durango in search of Guzman since the 58-year-old drug lords spectacular July 11 escape.

News of his arrest came shortly after the navy reported that five suspects were killed and a troop wounded in a clash with marines in the Sinaloa city of Los Mochis, but it did not indicate whether it was related to Guzman.

Six people were detained after the shootout, which broke out when marines were tipped off about the presence of armed men in a home, the navy said in a statement.

A suspected gang leader identified as Orso Ivan Gastelum Cruz, was in the house but managed to escape, the navy said.

On July 11, after 17 months at the Altiplano maximum-security prison in central Mexico, Guzman slipped through a hole in his cells shower, climbed on a motorcycle mounted on rails, and traveled 1.5 kilometers (one mile) through a tunnel.

US and Mexican law enforcement officials say Guzman then flew to his home turf at the Sinaloa-Durango state border because he is revered as a modern-day Robin Hood in the region.

Marines nearly captured him in October in a remote mountain region straddling the two states. Authorities said Guzman injured his face and a leg while falling in the rough terrain, but special forces failed to nab him.

Guzman had been previously captured on February 22, 2014, in the Sinaloa resort of Mazatlan. He was found in a condo with his wife and their young twin daughters.

He had been on the lam for 13 years after escaping a first time in 2001 from another prison, in western Jalisco state, by hiding in a laundry cart. He had spent eight years in prison following his 1993 capture in Guatemala.

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New Delhi:

Members of the National Students Union of India (NSUI) on Saturday demonstrated outside the venue of a seminar which was to be addressed by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Subramanian Swamy.

Holding placards, the protestors raised slogans in protest against Swamy's seminar on the construction of Ram temple.

According to reports, clashes were also reported between members of NSUI and Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).

Reacting to it, Swamy said, "Everyone has the right to protest in a democracy, but you should ask them why they have resorted to intolerance despite speaking against it."

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New Delhi:

Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan today attacked Nitish Kumar government over the murder of an assistant sub-inspector of police in Hajipur, claiming a string of such killings showed that jungle raj is back and the Chief Minister is helpless.

There are three ministers from Vaishali region in Nitish government including two sons of RJD chief Lalu Prasad of whom one is also Deputy Chief Minister.

Still, all this is happening in Vaishali. What will happen to the security of people when the police are not safe in Bihar. Why the Chief Minister is so helpless and silent on all this, Paswan, who is an MP from Hajipur, told PTI.

Paswan will be visiting his constituency tomorrow to take stock of the situation.

Training his guns at the ruling coalition in the state, the LJP chief claimed that this is the third such incident in Hajipur alone.

He (Nitish) used to take pride in being called Sushashan Babu. After engineers, doctors and traders, now even police men are not safe. There is no government in Bihar. Extortion is being done openly.

The situation in the state has become worse than what it was in 1990 when RJD ruled the state. When we used to say that jungle raj will be back if Lalu Nitish combine came to power, they used to react strongly. See the jungleraj is back in such a short span of rule, Paswan said.

ASI Ashok Kumar Yadav was shot dead by unidentified assailants and his body was found today in Manua village of Vaishali district.

Two engineers of a construction company, Brajesh Kumar and Mukesh Kumar, were gunned in daylight on December 26 in Darbhanga. Soon after, Ankit Kumar Jha, a Quality Engineer of Reliance IT, was found dead with injury marks on his body in Vaishali district.

In another incident, a foodgrain trader was shot dead by unidentified assailants in a locality under Yahiyapur police station in Bihars Muzaffarpur district.

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New Delhi:

The Centre is considering to put in place a policy on naming of new airports in the country, under which they will known after the citys name and not certain personalities or icons amid the on-going controversy over naming of the new Chandigarh airport.



The Civil Aviation Ministry keeps getting requests from different political parties to name/rechristen airports after certain icons and personalities, more particularly after the change of regime at the Centre or in states and a firm and long-term policy in this regard is needed to put an end to the practice, sources said.



The Government is discussing the issue of naming of new airports and may put in place a policy soon in this regard, Civil Aviation Ministry sources said today.



Under the proposed policy, airports will be known by the name of the city and not individuals, they said adding, whatever mechanism will be put in this regard will be for long-term.



The developments come in the backdrop of Haryana and Punjab Government locking horns over the naming of Chandigarh International airport, which was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi last year.



While Haryanas BJP government reportedly wants the airport to be named after one of the RSS pracharak Mangal Sein, the Badal Government wants it to be named after martyr Bhagat Singh.



At the same time, Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy has recently said that his government was considering naming the International Airport at Nedumbassry in Kochi after K Karunakaran, who was a Congress leader and former Chief Minister.



The Civil Aviation Ministry had last year, received request from various quarters to change the names of airports such as Delhi, Udaipur, Chennai and Srinagar, among others.



One of the proposals from a BJP office-bearer was to rename the IGIA after Mahatma Gandhi.



At that time Minister of State for Civil Aviation Mahesh Sharma had said that Government was not considering changing the name of any of the airports in the country including the Indira Gandhi International Airport while acknowledging that it (the ministry) had received some proposals in this regard.



It (changing names of some of the airports in the country) is not under our consideration, he had said.

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London:

A British website, set up to catalogue the last days of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, has released what it claims are eyewitness accounts of the day he was reportedly killed in a plane crash in Taiwan on August 18, 1945.

The latest set of documents quote several people who were reportedly involved in the matter related to the accident as well as two British intelligence reports that revisited the crash site to establish the facts.

The website also sheds light on what may have been the freedom fighters dying words, which reflected his devotion to the cause of Indias freedom.

For 70 years, there have been doubts in certain circles whether such a tragedy at all took place. Four separate reports each corroborating the other constitute irresistible evidence to the contrary, says a statement issued by www.bosefiles.info.

The documents say that early in the morning on 18 August 1945, a Japanese Air Force bomber took off from Tourane in Vietnam with Bose and 12 or 13 other passengers and crew. Also on board was Lt Gen Tsunamasa Shidei of the Japanese Army and the planned flight path was Heito-Taipei-Dairen-Tokyo.

The three-member Netaji Inquiry Committee, instituted by the government of India in 1956 and headed by Major General Shah Nawaz Khan of Boses Indian National Army (INA), was told that since the weather was perfect and the engines (of the aircraft) worked smoothly the pilot decided to overfly Heito and proceed straight to Taipei, arriving there late morning or early afternoon.

Major Taro Kono, a Japanese Air Staff Officer and one of the passengers, told the committee: I noticed that the engine on the left side of the plane was not functioning properly. I, therefore, went inside the plane and after examining the engine inside, I found it to be working all right.

He added the accompanying engineer also tested the engine and certified its air-worthiness.

Captain Nakamura alias Yamamoto, the ground engineer in charge of maintenance at the airport, concurred with Major Kono that the engine of the left side was defective.

He said the pilot told him it was a brand new engine.

He went on to say: After slowing down the engine, he (the pilot) adjusted it for about five minutes. The engine was tested twice by Major Takizawa (the pilot). After being adjusted, I satisfied myself that the condition of the engine was all right. Major Takizawa also agreed with me that there was nothing wrong with the engine.

However, soon after the aircraft was airborne there was, according to Colonel Habib ur Rahman - Boses ADC and a co-passenger, a loud explosion.

He described it as a noise like a cannon shot. Nakamura, who was watching from the ground, said:

Immediately on taking off, the plane tilted to its left side and I saw something fall down from the plane, which I later found was the propeller.

He estimated the plane crashed about 100 metres beyond the concrete runway and immediately caught fire in the front portion.

Colonel Rahman recounted: Netaji turned towards me. I said Aagey Say Nikaleay, Pichey Say Rasta Nahin Hai. (Please get out through the front; there is no way in the rear.)

We could not get through the entrance door as it was all blocked and jammed by packages and other things. So Netaji got out through the fire; actually he rushed through the fire. I followed him through the same flames.

The moment I got out, I saw him about 10 yards ahead of me, standing, looking in the opposite direction to mine towards the west. His clothes were on fire. I rushed and I experienced great difficulty in unfastening his bush-shirt belt. His trousers were not so much on fire and it was not necessary to take them off.

Rahman was in woollen uniform, whereas Bose was in cotton khakis, which, it was assessed, caught fire more easily.

Rahman added: I laid him down on the ground and noticed a very deep cut on his head, probably on the left side. His face had been scorched by heat and his hair had also caught fire and singed.

Netaji enquired from me in Hindustani: Aap Ko Ziada To Nahin Lagi? (Hope you have not been hurt badly). I replied, I feel that I will be all right. About himself he said that he felt that he would not survive.

Bose added: Jab Apney Mulk Wapis Jayen To Mulki Bhaiyon Ko Batana Ki Mein Akhri Dam Tak Mulk Ki Azadi Ke Liyay Larta Raha Hoon; Woh Jangi Azadi Ko Jari Rakhen. Hindustan Zaroor Azad Hoga, Oos Ko Koi Gulam Nahin Rakh Sakta. (When you go back to the country, tell the people that up to the last I have been fighting for the liberation of my country; they should continue to struggle, and I am sure India will be free before long. Nobody can keep India in bondage now.)

Lieutenent Col Shiro Nonogaki, who was on the flight, said: When I first saw Netaji after the plane crash, he was standing somewhere near the left tip of the left wing of the plane. His clothes were on fire and his assistant (Col Rahman) was trying to take off his coat.

There were variations in the details provided by Rahman, Nonogaki, Kono, Takahashi and Nakamura. They were giving evidence 11 years after the accident.

But in essence there was no disagreement between their testimonies on the fact of the crash and Bose suffering severe burns and injuries as a consequence, the website notes.

Netaji was rushed to the nearby Nanmon Military Hospital in a critical condition. In September 1945, British authorities in India sent intelligence teams comprising of Messrs Finney and Davies, H K Roy and K P De to Bangkok, Saigon and Taipei to enquire about the whereabouts of Bose and, if possible, to arrest him. They, instead, returned with the story of the crash.

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Srinagar:

Congress president Sonia Gandhi is expected to visit Kashmir today to offer condolences to PDP president Mehbooba Mufti on the demise of her father Mufti Mohammad Sayeed.

Sonia ji is scheduled to visit Srinagar tomorrow to offer condolence to Mehbooba ji, Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee president Ghulam Ahmad Mir told PTI.

Mir said the Congress president would visit the Gupkar residence of the Muftis in the afternoon and meet Mehbooba.

However, she will not go to Bijbehara, Sayeeds ancestral town where he was buried on Thursday, he said.

However, Jammu and Kashmir was tonight placed under Governors rule with the process of new government formation following the death of Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed taking some time.

Governors rule has been imposed in the state of Jammu and Kashmir, a Home Ministry spokesperson said in Delhi.

The President cleared the recommendation of the Union Home Ministry for imposing Governors rule on the basis of a recommendation from J-K Governor N N Vohra.

The state had to be put under Governors rule in view of the reluctance of Muftis daughter Mehbooba to take oath during the mourning period though her party has already conveyed to the Governor that 28 MLAs of the PDP legislature party backed her for the Chief Ministers post.

79-year-old Sayeed died on Thursday after a brief illness and since then there is a Constitutional vacuum.

PDPs coalition ally BJP has also indicated that it would take a decision on new government formation once the four-day morning period is over tomorrow.

"There are certainly no conditions from our side and there was no meeting of our leaders on government formation.

"We respect the right of the bereaved family of Mufti Sahib to mourn his death," BJP state president Sat Paul Sharma told PTI.

Sharma said he had received a letter from the Governor on government formation but the party will take a decision on it only after Sayeed's fourth day ceremony is observed tomorrow.

"There is no hurry on this issue. We will definitely be meeting after tomorrow's ceremony for Mufti Sahib and take a decision," he said.

Sharma said it was a "historic" coalition between the BJP and the PDP in the state and "we would like it continue".

"We are interested in peace and development in the state and we want this coalition to continue on this path shown by Mufti Mohammd Sayeed," he added.

Senior PDP leader and former Education Minister Naeem Akhtar also dismissed suggestions about any conditions set by either his party or the BJP for forming the new government.

"Mehboobaji is still mourning the great loss... Mufti sahib was not only her father but guide, mentor and inspiration.

"We are not in any condition to discuss government formation at this moment so how can there be any talk of conditions," Akhtar said.

He said the party leadership including the president will discuss and decide on government formation at an "appropriate time".

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Islamabad:

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today said Pakistan is swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner into the terror attck on the air base in Pathankot and will soon bring out the truth.

This was conveyed by Sharif to US Secretary of State John Kerry who telephoned the Prime Minister.

Kerry extended full support to the Prime Minister to find out the truth in the Pathankot terror incident, a statement issued by the Pakistan PMO said.

It said Sharif told Secretary Kerry that we are swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner and will bring out the truth. The world will see our effectiveness and sincerity in this regard, the Prime Minister added, according to the statement.

Kerrys call to Sharif came amid Indian intelligence reports suggesting that groups and people in Pakistan planned and executed the strike on the Pathankot airbase.

Kerry said the US hopes that talks between India and Pakistan will continue despite the fact that terrorists have tried to thwart it because continuation of India-Pakistan talks is needed in the interest of regional stability and the leadership role by both the Prime Ministers is required to ensure continuous dialogue, said the Pakistan PMO statement.

Sharif said Pakistan would not allow anyone to use its soil to carry out terror operations abroad, it added.

The statement said Kerry lauded the Prime Ministers leadership role in such difficult environment, which was the exact the leadership needed in this situation.

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Opinion / Columnist

The reason why political parties have failed to dislodge Mugabe is because of our attitude Zimbabweans as a people. We sit in our offices and plot and counter plot how to bring other people.Mujuru is not a saint but she has at least acknowledged her dirty past and apologised.Political analysts should take time and study all countries which suffered under a dictatorship.It takes someone from within that system to say NO! this road we are walking is not good. Some get maimed some get killed before they achieve this personal political transformation.I have read a lot of articles of analysts ridiculing Gumbo Mujuru and Mutasa. I want to bring to attention to people that even a thief or murderer has family friends and relatives they come from societyWen they get arrested for their crimes why are the parents , relatives and friends not arrested as well? Being a minister under Zanu is not a crime because believe me most of these Mps cant wait to see the back of Zanu pf and its policies.Before we pick our pens and scribe lets think about how clean ourselves are before we point fingers at others we are crying for democracy and Mujuru Gumbo and Mutasa are exercising that democracy by shunning dictatorship for democracy.If the analysts and political commentators are true believers of democracy they shouldn't be wasting time on trying to bring these guys down.What I have noticed of these scribes they offer nothing but critic only. If the trio mentioned above are dirty Tsvangirai is dirty Biti; Mangoma and Ncube are greedy Bakare is seeking relevance so who is it we should vote for?Can't u see you legitimising Zanu Pf? And from most of the articles I doubt I will be wrong if I conclude most of these pple their articles are written in a way not to offend Zanu Pf?Aren't your articles state sponsored?Why I say so Musewe Magaisa and others are ignoring the fact that for these people to be sacked they were trying to bring change from within?Rugare was arrested before for challenging Mugabe and he has been branded a traitor openly by your president (yours because - me - I have never voted for him).The late Zvinavashe Zvobgo, Mujuru, Gunda Mleya all these people lost their lives trying to rescue Zimbabwe from within Zanu pf.Why are you not telling people about this? Zimbabweans for Zim to be fully democratic, for Zim to have a president with no military background we need moderate war veterans to be in poor first people who can accept criticism, people who have a human heart.If you think you can vote these radicals out of office just like buying ice cream think again.Zim is North Korea of Africa shout and bang your heads on steel pipes but Zimbabwean democracy can be brought about by moderates within Zanu-PF and thats were the Mujuru's PF comes into play.Tsvangirai will never achieve this because Robert has his file now. With Mujuru and the Gumbos a chance is there because they also have a file on Mugabe and company.Zanu-PF itself is crying for change but their past deeds are forcing them through they will only leave office by death or war.They have radicalised Zhuwawo and Kasukuwere so be rest assured their legacy of terror violence rigging corruption murder etc is in capable hands.So gentlemen lets support those who have decided to change for with them our future as a democracy is.
Mexican Officials: El Chapo Has Been Captured

Trending News: Notorious Drug Lord El Chapo Captured!

Why Is This Important?

Because El Chapo is the closest thing we have to a criminal of Pablo Escobar's stature these days.

Long Story Short

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced that notorious fugitive Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman has been captured.

Long Story

It wasn't that long ago that no one had ever heard of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the notorious Mexican drug lord. That is, until he famously escaped from prison in elaborate fashion, sparking a manhunt that continued until today. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto just announced via twitter that authorities have El Chapo in custody.

Mision cumplida: lo tenemos. Quiero informar a los mexicanos que Joaquin Guzman Loera ha sido detenido.  Enrique Pena Nieto (@EPN) January 8, 2016

Translated, the text reads in part "Mission accomplished: We have him." Right now, that's all we know. Stay tuned for further updates.

Update: Per the Mexican newspaper El Universal, it was Mexico's navy that carried out the operation. Marines descended upon a home in Los Mochis in the predawn hours, and were met with gunfire. Five suspects are dead, with an additional six (including El Chapo) arrested.

Own The Conversation

Ask The Big Question: Will they be able to hold him this time?

Disrupt Your Feed: I'm glad this dangerous guy is off the streets, but his escape was admittedly a little inspiring.

Drop This Fact: Contrary to popular belief, El Chapo did NOT in fact threaten to wage war on ISIS.
Peach Is An Easy-To-Use New Messaging App From The Founder Of Vine

Trending News: The Cool Features On This New Messaging App Are Worth Switching Over For

Page 1 of 3

Why Is This Important?



Long Story Short



Long Story

Because when I type gif, I want a .gif right freaking now!A new messaging app from the founder of Vine is gaining in popularity  so much so that it was experiencing issues last night from all the downloads and traffic.Social networking gone super literal is here with Peach . You want a gif, type gif and search what kind of .gif you want and itll it appear (ie. snowing). Type shout and youll be able to write something with big words and colors and emojis  you can just picture your friends go :O:O:O (smiley cat)(smiley cat)(smiley cat).





Peach is a social media messaging app from the founder of Vine, Dom Hoffman, which allows you to chat with friends, like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Snapchat, etc. It also lets you post little tidbit status updates to your followers, like Twitter, and as demonstrated above, you can type in commands, called magic words to get super literal. More examples: move tells your friends how many steps youve walked today, song sends what youre listening to right now and rate lets you rate anything, ANYTHING, with a 1-5 star rating. More magic words will be coming soon.

The other big advantage for the iOS app (sadly only iOS for now) is that it looks prettay slick.

Since yesterday when Tech Crunch and Product Hunt picked up on the app, so many people wanted to try it, the system crashed. Whoops! Peach tweeted that theyre working things through and the app should be more stable now.

Thanks to everyone for downloading Peach! Still experiencing issues. We're working hard to resolve ASAP.  Peach (@peachdotcool) January 8, 2016

Still working through things, but the app should be a little more stable now.  Peach (@peachdotcool) January 9, 2016



Own The Conversation

Will this be the next Vine and do extremely well, or will it be the next Circle , remember that? Me neither.Why didn't Peach come out on Android at the same time as iOS, they're losing a huge chunk of the public without being on both.

Disrupt Your Feed: Nobody is going to switch to anything like this unless literally all of their friends switch over.

Drop This Fact: Deciding whether to share personal info on yet another social media app? If you're like nearly half of Americans, you're not confident in what will be done with your data after you sign up for any particular social media site.
The History Of Male Sex Toys

Let's Look At Men's Favorite Bedroom Toy Throughout History... You Know You Want To Click

Male sex toys are seemingly taboo in our society. We can talk about dildos and vibrators as casually as we talk about our coffee orders, yet we seem to shy away from the idea of a man pleasuring himself with anything other than his hand. The reality is that fake vaginas have been around as long as masturbation  weve just been afraid to talk about them.

If you actually take the time to seek them out, our sex toy options seem limitless. We have Fleshlights molded to our favorite porn stars vaginas. We have contraptions like the Autoblow that are specifically designed to simulate the feeling of someone sucking you off. On the horizon, sex dolls have already begun to buzz around our minds, offering society a new smorgasbord of sexual satisfaction.

Despite the conservative knee-jerk reaction to blame porn on our desire to f*ck things other than other people, this is nothing new. Men have been sticking their dicks into weird shit since they figured out they could.

Humble Beginnings

From the beginning of time, men were figuring out weird ways to get off. In Ancient Greece, men who liked a little pickle with their ham would use stale bread as a dildo, with olive oil as lube. As the centuries passed, men began filling warm towels with jelly and other lube-like substances and going to town  because they freaking could. Eventually, however, the Christian church rebelled against masturbation, particularly citing that it was evil for young men to do it, which left young guys having nothing to hump but their pillows for years.

In 1904, alchemist Rene Schwaeble recorded meeting a Dr. P. in Paris, where he was working on inflatable dolls for randy gentlemens pleasure. Four years later, inflatable dolls were being mass produced with multiple orifices for men to shove themselves into.

It was the first time artificial vaginas were produced, despite how simple they would seem to us now. The creepiest part of the first blow-up dolls? The manufacturers offered consumers the option to create a custom doll that could look like any live or dead person.

As previously mentioned, despite the fact that inflatable dolls were being produced, it was still taboo for men to possess fake vaginas. It wouldnt be until 1960 that the Supreme Court would rule sex shops to be legal in the United States, meaning that men could finally enter shops and purchase porn and fake vaginas legally. Coupled with the virginal mindset of the '50s and '60s, men were still left with few artificial things to bang, so they began inventing their own.

Digital Awakenings

The internet was invented in 1990, and with it saw the ultimate shift in how men fake-f*ck. The worldwide web opened men to a whole new world of blow-up dolls that could be delivered to your door, and porn that could be consumed from the comfort of your own office.

This radical shift is how culture consumed sex changed the way men began to see fake vaginas. Men began to post on message boards on the easiest ways to get off using couch cushions, condoms, and generous amounts of petroleum jelly. Men came together online to cum together using homemade fake vaginas. Even today, there are a slew of websites dedicated to the practice of coming up with the most realistic fake vaginas.

Because people could now order sex toys from their home, the fake vagina market also began to boom. The term pocket pussy became common in the adult industry, with manufacturers investing large sums of money into the creation of silicon-based devices that were small enough for men to carry around. From there, the variations continued. Men were soon able to purchase pocket pussies with assholes included; there were some that had fake pubic hair, not to mention every skin tone. Pretty soon men were banging fake vaginas like it was their job.

Seeing The Fleshlight

Then, in 1995, a man decided to make the world of fake-f*cking more realistic. Using a think tank that containing his own sons and a primary investment of $50,000, Steve Shubin set out to create what we now know as the Fleshlight. Shubin knew there was a market for a pocket pussy, but none that he had seen felt realistic enough. He told Vice, As a man, you know this: If something doesn't feel real, we're not going to be excited about the physical contact with it. So that was a first priority."

Shubin and his team worked hard to de-stigmatize male masturbation, and their solution was to place their fake vagina in something that would look normal sitting out in a living room. Add one perfectly innocent flashlight, and the Fleshlight was born. From there, Fleshlight has boomed to becoming one of the largest providers of male sex-toys. They've even expanded their brand to include FleshJack, a line catered to gay men who want to bang an artificial asshole instead of an artificial pussy.

Porn stars have come forward and have allowed Fleshlight to mold their vaginas and asses so that men can feel like theyre getting it on with their favorite adult film star. Since the Fleshlight came into being, the conversation surrounding male sex toys has shifted. Everyone wants to buy one, or at least try one. No longer are men microwaving banana peels to bang or taking cues from American Pie.

RELATED READING: The Weird-Ass Male Sex Toy You Want To Try (But Shouldn't)

No one is suggesting these artificial vaginas replace women. Even creators and manufacturers understand how it would seem this way, however. The solution, they say, is to educate both sexes as to why men want to get intimate with fake vaginas. If variety is the spice of life, male sex toys can be the perfect spice to any healthy sexual relationship.

Looking into the future, manufacturers are likely going to blend these sex toys with virtual reality headsets to craft virtual sexual experiences unlike any other. Will it replace real sex? Never. Will it allow men to explore new sexual experiences other than simply getting it on with another person? Hell yeah. Men have been sticking their dicks into weird things for centuries  we've just have been too shy to talk openly about it.
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Connecticut hospitals have taken the first step toward a legal battle with the state over a tax they assert is unconstitutional and has cost them tens of millions of dollars in recent years.

The Connecticut Hospital Association and 24 hospitals, including Danbury, Bridgeport, Norwalk, Stamford and Greenwich, have filed documents with the state departments of revenue and social services claiming the hospital tax violates state and federal laws, as well as the state and federal constitutions.

The filings request that the two agencies issue declaratory rulings that the tax is invalid and unenforceable.

Our goal is fairly simple, said Stephen Frayne, senior vice president of health policy at the Connecticut Hospital Association. Wed prefer to be taking care of patients rather than have to fight this out in the court system, but we are left with no choice because were being taxed into oblivion.

The States hospital tax is preventing us from doing the work we know our community expects and deserves, wrote Dr. John Murphy, the president and CEO of the Western Connecticut Health Network, in a statement. We have no choice but to fight for what we know is right.

The state began collecting the hospital tax in 2012, intending to redistribute the proceeds to the hospitals as a way of drawing down matching federal grants. That year the hospitals paid about $350 million in taxes, Frayne said, and received about $400 million in state and federal funds.

But when the state began experiencing severe budget pressures, it started returning less and less to the hospitals. This year, hospitals are projected to owe $556.1 million in taxes but are slated to receive only the $164.3 million provided in Decembers budget deal.

The state agencies have 60 days to respond to the two filings, which were dated Nov. 30. If they uphold the tax, the way is open for the association and the hospitals to file suit.

Hospital and CHA officials say they hope not to take that step. But if they do so, they wont be the first in the region; their counterparts in New Hampshire fought a similar fight and were able to force a settlement that restored the flow of revenue to the hospitals.

The New Hampshire hospital tax had been collected for decades, with the money being returned to hospitals to help care for uninsured patients.

In 2011, ten of the states largest hospitals, including Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, filed a federal suit against the state over the way the money was being redistributed. Some hospitals were getting nothing at all.

It was an untenable situation that endangered our ability to provide care for our patients, said Frank McDougall Jr., vice president of government relations at Dartmouth-Hitchcock. We gathered as a group and talked about this and saw no other alternative than to bring the federal suit.

Separately, a rehabilitation hospital and three acute-care medical hospitals sued the state, claiming the tax was illegal because it didnt apply to other health care providers offering similar services.

In both cases, state judges ruled that the tax was unconstitutional.

In 2014, the state reached a settlement with 25 hospitals. Under the agreement, larger hospitals will get about half what they pay for uncompensated care over the next two two-year budget cycles, and smaller hospitals about 75 percent, in exchange for dropping the lawsuits. The state also agreed to put all money raised from the tax in a trust fund for use only to support Medicaid.

The years of discord and disagreement between the state and hospitals seems to be in the past.

We feel like weve made tremendous strides in those relationships, said Steve Ahnen, president of the New Hampshire Hospital Association.

But Ahnen said the work isnt over.

Ensuring that this agreement stays in place is absolutely essential, he said. When the the legislature was considering the current two-year budget, there was an attempt to undo the settlement, to pull some money away. We had to fight quickly to make sure that didnt happen.

In Connecticut, feuding over the hospital tax has intensified in recent months.

In September, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy slashed the state budget, cutting the $255.9 million originally budgeted for hospitals to $64 million. In response, the Connecticut Hospital Association started an aggressive multimedia online campaign to reverse the cuts.

The governor countered by shaming health care executives over their multi-million-dollar salaries and the hospitals supposedly high profit margins.

In response to the Nov. 30 filing, Department of Social Services spokesman David Dearborn cited figures suggesting that state hospitals had more than $900 million in profits last year  although the CHA disputes those figures as grossly misleading.

Dearborn also contended that Medicaid payments to hospitals have increased over the last decade, and that hospitals are seeing fewer patients without coverage because of Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act.

Even in an industry that made $916 million last year alone - and one in which there is exorbitant CEO pay - the hospital association is asking Connecticut taxpayers to foot more of the bill, said Dearborn in a statement.

Perhaps signaling where the dispute is heading, the CHA has hired the New Hampshire law firm involved in the hospital cases against that state to advise it in its proceedings against Connecticut.

We had hoped common sense would prevail in resolving this matter, but the process has taken too long and yielded too little, said Danbury CEO Murphy. After several years of refusing to consider our appeals, negotiations and proposed solutions, the Governor has forced us to pursue legal action to repeal a tax that is unfortunate, unfair and unconscionable.
OTTAWA, Jan. 9, 2016 /CNW/ - The Honourable John McCallum, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, today issued the following statement:

"I was appalled when I heard of last night's incident outside the Muslim Association of Canada Centre in Vancouver, in which an unknown assailant pepper sprayed a group of Syrian refugees. Paramedics treated more than two dozen men, women and children for exposure to the noxious substance.



"That the group was there to attend an event welcoming them to Canada only makes this attack even more infuriating and reprehensible.

"Canadians know that this incident is an affront to our values as a nation, and is at odds with the overwhelmingly positive welcome that Syrian refugees have received in communities across our country.

"I am sure that welcoming community spirit will endure, and will grow even stronger in the wake of this disturbing crime. I would also like to assure recently arrived Syrian refugees that those who gathered last night to support and welcome them embody the Canadian spirit. This attack in no way represents their new home.

"As Minister of Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship, I wish all of the victims of last night's attack a quick recovery, and I look forward to our police and legal system bringing the perpetrator to justice."

Building a stronger Canada: Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada strengthens Canada's economic, social and cultural prosperity, helping ensure the safety and security of Canadians, while managing one of the largest and most generous immigration programs in the world.

SOURCE Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada

For further information: For further information (media only), please contact: Minister's Office, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, 613-954-1064; Media Relations, Communications Branch, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, 613-952-1650, [email protected]
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, the newly-crowned African Player of the Year, received a heros homecoming on Friday where he was hailed by ...

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, the newly-crowned African Player of the Year, received a heros homecoming on Friday where he was hailed by thousands of fans as the pride of Gabon.The 26-year-old Borussia Dortmund star pipped four-time winner Yaya Toure of Manchester City and Ivory Coast to win the prestigious award, an achievement which had fans dreaming of Africa Cup of Nations success on home soil in 2017.He has risen through the ranks and this is a just reward, said Brice Ignegue, the president of the Panthers (the national teams nickname) fan club.Sabrina, a young fan who came out to greet Aubameyang, said the player was a national hero.Aubameyang represents Gabon, he is the national panther. He is the pride of Gabon and Africa, she said.Gabon president Ali Bongo Ondimba posted photos of the players arrival on his Twitter account as he welcomed his compatriot to the presidential palace.The president immediately conferred upon Aubameyang one of the countrys leading civil honours, Commander of the National Order of Merit.I am happy and proud with this honour that I dedicate to the people of Gabon, my family and you, Mr President, said the Dortmund star.Aubameyang then was feted by thousands of fans who packed the Nzeng Ayong stadium where he showed off the player of the year trophy.Long live Aubameyang, long live Gabon!, they shouted.Now we expect him to win the Africa Cup of Nations for us in 2017 just like Yaya Toure did with Ivory Coast, said Achilles, a local student.
Governor Kashim Shettima has received with utter shock and sadness information concerning the murder of an Internally Displaced Person (...

Governor Kashim Shettima has received with utter shock and sadness information concerning the murder of an Internally Displaced Person (IDP), name withheld, whose body was found at the Shettima Ali Monguno Teachers Village camp on Thursday.Initial report, though unconfirmed indicated that the victim was beheaded inside the camp after misunderstanding that erupted between him and some aggrieved youth over a girlfriend who is among the fleeing refugees.It was also observed that there would be a serious problem in the nearest future when IDPs return to their communities following illegal marriages that occurred amongst IDPs while in the camps, as some of the marriages were contracted among those who had already gotten married with their former spouses, but due to the sacking and displacement of their communities by insurgents, some fled to neighbouring Cameroon, Niger and Chad Republic, while their wives fled into Nigeria who later got married to another men they met in camps.The fully fenced camp, located at Pompamari, near the headquarters of the Garrison Commander 7 Division, Nigerian Army hosts 13,000 displaced persons from Ngala and Kukawa local government areas while two Divisional Police Officers (DPOs) of Ngala and Kukawa alongside policemen under their formations live at the camp as part of security measures long adopted by government.According to a close government source, the male victims body was not found beheaded. Contrary to media reports, the victim was found tied with bruises on his head apparently resulting from hits.Governor Kashim Shettima who is very much disturbed has since ordered immediate investigations by the police and demanded arrest of any person connected to the incident.The Governor also directed officials to comb the camp throughout the night of Thursday to search within and around the camp to ensure no displaced person has any object that can cause injury.The police has recovered the body of the victim and his identity will be revealed to members of the public after his family is contacted.Meanwhile, the Executive Chairman of the Borno State Emergency Management Agency, Engineer Garba Satomi informed Governor Shettima on Thursday that the police has arrested a displaced person in connection with the the attack and that more suspects where being trailed.Satomi also said the investigation has so far pointed at a disagreement between a group of youths who later conspired an attacked the murdered victim.As at 8pm of Thursday, camp officials were already complying with Governor Shettimas orders as meetings were being held between officials and chairmen of the two local government areas at the camp with participation of members of the civilian JTF while the camp was combed with searches being conducted.However, Shettima said Government will never accept threats in any IDP camp where citizens already suffer the trauma of being displaced as a result of insurgency attacks.
Image via YouTube)

Matti Friedman is the author of The Aleppo Codex. His new book, Pumpkinflowers: A Soldiers Story, will be published in May.





Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh. blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work as well as a big vote to follow our good friend Kay Wilson on Twitter.

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..Tabletmag.com..05 January '16..This fall and winter have seen many of us here in Israel consuming a miserable kind of reality TV: blurry clips of young Palestinian Muslims with knives seeking release in murder and martyrdom, lunging, stabbing, falling stricken to the ground, the action captured by cellphones or security cameras; an imam in Gaza waving a knife and calling on the faithful to render us into body parts; a fighter from the Islamic State, our new neighbor, warning us of the violence he and his comrades will inflict when they arrive. The effect was so disturbing that it triggered psychological stress akin to that of a real war, though the fatalities barely added up to a skirmish. No land was conquered or lost, no concessions demanded. With our computers and cellphones, as the director of military intelligence put it, Were all brainwashing ourselves. The battlefield had moved almost entirely inside our own minds.In the past month or two it has been more apparent than ever that the confluence of unfiltered information, dramatic images of bloodshed, and fanatical interpretations of Islam have converged to become one of the key forces shaping our lives. That makes it worth looking for the moment this force began to make itself felt in earnest. My selection, a subjective one based on my personal experience, can be found on the front page of the Israeli dailyof Oct. 31, 1994.Two possible futures appear on this page in the form of two stories. The days main headline tells us that Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin is in Morocco, where he met with King Hassan. Israels peace treaty with Jordan is a few days old. The photo shows a warm handshake between the prime minister and the king, two men of similar age, and the headline quotes the Israeli leader: Peace is a house, and the economy will furnish it. This was what was known at the time as the new Middle East, the title of an optimistic book published by Shimon Peres a year earlier, which envisioned a peaceful region where new highways moved citizens of Palestine to shop in Israel and Israeli tourists to the souks of Damascus, past old tanks rusting at the side of the road. Next to the photo of the handshake is an analysis piece titled, A Bank, Not a Tank.Below the fold is a smaller headline. It reads, Shock in the army: Soldiers flee at outpost during Hezbollah attack. The story appears on page 2 with a blurred frame from a video in which an armed man is seen driving a flag into the ground.***The latter story, obscure at the time and forgotten now, bears some explanation.Two days earlier, a Saturday, at an Israeli army position on a hilltop in southern Lebanon, shelling commenced just after 8:30 a.m. This base, Outpost Pumpkin, was part of a string of grim Israeli army positions with trenches, machine guns, and bed-and-breakfast names; nearby were Outposts Cypress, Citrus, Red Pepper, and Basil. In those days the army controlled a buffer zone inside Lebanon to protect Israels northern border, waging a guerrilla war in this zone throughout the 1990s with the Shia fighters of Hezbollah, the Party of God. Hezbollah wasnt the powerful force we now see dominating Lebanon and fighting in Syria, with 150,000 missiles pointed at Israel. At the time the group wasnt taken particularly seriously. Yet this little war, about which nearly nothing has been written, is key to understanding the present-day Middle East.A lieutenant moving between guard posts on the perimeter had his back riddled with shrapnel and was helped to a bunker where medics were busy with someone else, a soldier who had lost some of his fingers. Shooting seemed to be coming from every direction, and the soldiers couldnt see the attackers. Several sentries and lookouts guarding the approaches from the west abandoned their positions under fire, and then the guerrillas arrived with their cameraman.Were used to this kind of footage by now, but in the fall of 1994 it was fresh and gripping : shouting in Arabic, gunfire, martial music. At first the cameras lens is at the height of dry thistles on the hillside, below the peak where the Israeli emplacements loom. Hezbollah shells hitting the embankments send up plumes of dust. Someone not visible in the frame shouts, Just a minute. After another shell hits on target we hear, Good, good! A fighter shoulders a launcher and fires a rocket.When four guerrillas leave cover and move uphill, closing the distance to the outpost, the cameraman follows them. They run until the steep climb slows them to a walk. There is no response from the Israelis. When the fighters reach the top one pulls out a Hezbollah flag and plants it triumphantly with both hands as the camera rolls. It is the jihadi moon landing, the Iwo Jima of militant Islam. Cut.***The newly rapid and unchecked flow of electronic information across borders gave the Hezbollah propagandists of 1994 immediate access to millions of TV viewers throughout the Islamic world, where the video was greeted with applause and admiration. Viewers in Israel were horrified. The Hezbollah man drove his little flag into the ground on Israeli TV sets over and over again. Headlines called the incident the disgrace, and Outpost Pumpkin became briefly infamous as a symbol of rot in the military. Hezbollah claimed to have captured the hill and to have purified it of Zionists, in the words of one official account. In fact, though one soldier had been killed the garrison was intact, and the guerrillas never set foot in the base. After planting the flag they ran away, but you didnt see that on the video. What you saw looked like a victory, and so in Israel the incident gained the dimensions of a major military defeat.Terrorist drama isnt new, as the bomb-throwing nihilists of tsarist Russia would remind us, and neither is the use of mass media to amplify military successeven if you dont know what happened on Iwo Jima, you know the photo of those Marines and their flag. But this video represented the seed of a new idea, or perhaps a distillation of the old one. It was no longer necessary to do anything as difficult as kill the tsar or capture the island, or even hijack an airplane before the eyes of the world media, as the PLO did in the 1970s. The camera wasnt a way to amplify success, but a replacement for success. It managed to separate the public display of prowess from the achievement of any tangible goal.Some in the army protested that the incident was just an attack repulsed. But they were stuck in the 20th century, while Hezbollah had progressed to the 21st. The flag was an enactment of bravery and defiance staged for the organizations own camera, which was the only really important weapon in the assault force. The Hezbollah fighter wasnt engaged in an actual attack, but in a religious play. He was saying to his audience: Look at me, at my bravery, at the strength of my faith, fear me or follow me. It was a kind of selfie.What the fighters were up to on Oct. 29, 1994, is interesting and important because it helps explain what their heirs and imitators are up to today. Hezbollahs Deputy Secretary-General Naim Qassem explained in a book that his organization is not merely an armed group that wishes to liberate a piece of land, nor is it a circumstantial tool whose role will end when the pretext for using it comes to an end. It is rather a vision and an approach. The idea is not to use war as a continuation of politics by other means, but to form what Qassem calls a resistance society, a community of faith where people are raised to believe that death in battle is not an unfortunate necessity but the attainment of a religious ideal. Hezbollahs men werent radicals. They were not, that is, members of a society who have used reason to conclude that extreme action will accomplish the dramatic change they desire. They were fanatics: people with an entirely different idea of whats going on, what life is, and where the future lies. The Iranians who shaped, funded, and trained Hezbollah beginning in the 1980s understood the untapped power of people like that, even if few others did at the time.When confronted with this type of thinking Western observers tend to dismiss it as strange rhetoric masking the kind of goals Westerners can understand. Journalists expend a great deal of energy trying to discern those goals, if not inventing them outright. (This is why, for example, youll encounter so many reportorial gymnastics to the effect that Hamas war against Israel has to do with a Gaza blockade imposed years after Hamas war against Israel began.) In the 1990s we in Israel misunderstood Hezbollah as a kind of Viet Cong, an ideological group interested in a piece of land. Many observers shared the same misunderstanding. Despite its rhetoric, journalist Hala Jaber assured readers in a book about Hezbollah from 1997, Hezbollah knows that its military resistance would be terminated once Israel withdraws from South Lebanon.But Hezbollahs war was never solely about forcing Israel off territory, and Qassem brags in his book of rejecting an Israeli offer for a negotiated withdrawal. It wasnt primarily about land, and the battle on the hill in October 1994 wasnt for the hill. The attack was meant to provide an image and an example that would mobilize support for a holy war that wouldnt end because it was an end in itself. The language of the military is less helpful here than that of the stage: The outpost wasnt an objective, but a set.Powerful new ideas often pop up in a few places more or less simultaneously, so its not surprising that at the same time al-Qaida was in incubation and Hamas was stirring, along with other ideological cousins around the region. The World Trade Center had been bombed the year before in a botched attack largely deemed a curiosity. The vision and approach was spreading across the Middle East in different versions beneath the outwardly stagnant surface of the regions dictatorships.The Hezbollah fighter was saying to his audience: Look at me, at my bravery, at the strength of my faith, fear me or follow me. It was a kind of selfie.None of this was clear that day in 1994. When the editors at Maariv sat down to lay out their front page on Oct. 31, the talks in Morocco that weekend were the main headline and Outpost Pumpkin went under the fold. From there the flag incident migrated deeper inside the paper over the next few weeks before being forgottenexcept by the soldiers who were there and by the new soldiers who rotated in and out of Outpost Pumpkin afterward. Before I arrived on the hill with my infantry company three years later, our commanders made sure to tell us the story. The image of the holy warrior with the flag was imprinted on our impressionable brains and kept us awake in the guard posts. The following year, when I was responsible for my own soldiers on the hill as a platoon sergeant, I made sure they knew it too. (Ive spent the past few years interviewing former soldiers and unearthing documents for a book about Outpost Pumpkin that will be published this spring.)The guerrillas grew stronger and savvier in the years that followed. Israelis were not actually losing the war in Lebanonthe forces werent remotely comparablebut they were worn down. After a disastrous commando raid inside Lebanon in 1997, Hezbollah displayed Israeli body parts that had been left behind (and later erected a sign facing Israel showing a fighter holding a soldiers severed head). Israelis began to perceive themselves to be losing, and support for a withdrawal grew. One night in May, 2000, five-and-a-half years after the video, soldiers from my company finally blew up Outpost Pumpkin when the army pulled out of south Lebanon.***The withdrawal gave Hezbollah what it wanted and ended the waror so we thought, because we still didnt understand Hezbollah or the war. In fact, the footage of Israeli vehicles retreating showed Hezbollahs audience that the groups vision and approach worked and could be replicated. A few months after the withdrawal, in the fall of 2000, the Palestinians launched the onslaught that became known as the Second Intifada. On Palestinian TV I saw footage of mass protests in Gaza spliced with shots of Israeli tanks leaving Lebanon earlier that year. The aging Guevaras of the old PLO guard receded and Hamas came to the fore. Hezbollahs success, wrote Naim Qassem, was a light at the end of the Palestinian tunnel, a hope that liberation might be achieved by treading the path of resistance and martyrdom. You didnt have to win a battle or cede anything in humiliating negotiations. Instead, you could mobilize support and wear down the enemy with dramatic performancesof bravery, cruelty, sacrifice, and, above all, faith. If your idea of victory is perpetual war, you are sure to win.In its varying and often competing forms, this vision and approach has appeared to fill nearly every vacuum in the Middle East since thensouth Lebanon, Gaza, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Sinai, and elsewhere. The different incarnations disagree about much but tend to share a taste for theatrical violence: gleaming knives, a pilot burning in a cage, a jet crashing into an office building. As we saw this fall in Paris, one of the latest stages selected for this performance, things have progressed so far that the original practitioners now seem tame.Just as the Hezbollah fighters knew they wouldnt take the outpost that day, the suicide stabbers on Israels streets right now know they wont make a dent in Israeli control, create an independent state for Palestinians, or change anyones life for the better. Like the shooters in Paris or San Bernadino, they move in a world beyond such mundane goals. They arent soldiers but storytellers. Along with many others across this region, they have escaped despair into a fevered movie set where they are the directors and stars and everyone else is a disposable prop. We all need to understand this movie, because were all in it.On that day in 1994, nearly everyone watching the Middle East thought the story that mattered was the one about leaders of states talking to each other. But the nameless men with the camera at Outpost Pumpkin mattered more.
A former minister of information, and governor of the old Anambra State, Chief Jim Nwobodo, on Friday defected to the All Progressive Con...

A former minister of information, and governor of the old Anambra State, Chief Jim Nwobodo, on Friday defected to the All Progressive Congress.Nwobodo, a former Senator and presidential aspirant on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, attended an APC meeting, reportedly convened by Foreign Affairs minister, Dr. Jeffrey Onyeama, in Enugu.He declared his membership of the party at the meeting, to the surprise of most of the APC members present at the event.A former PDP senator from Enugu State, Chief Fidelis Okoro, also defected to the APC at the meeting.Okoro was in the Senate between 1999 and 2007.There were indications that the former PDP bigwigs defection did not go down well with the some APC members, who openly voiced their dissatisfaction with the development at the meeting.The party faithful could not hide their surprise, and shock, when Nwobodo arrived at the venue of the meeting in company with Okoro.Some APC members, who apparently understood the duos mission at the meeting, voiced their disapproval.Chairman of the party in Enugu State, Dr. Ben Nwoye, who appeared to have prior knowledge of the defection, got the aggrieved party members to calm down before Nwobodo made his declaration speech.In his declaration speech, Nwobodo had harsh words for his old party, PDP.Nwobodo condemned the PDP, and blamed the partys leadership for allowing five governors to leave for the APC in the build up to the 2015 general elections.According to him, he is joining the APC to move the people of Enugu State into the mainstream at the federal level.Drawing from his experience as a governor, he said it was not good being in the opposition.He said members of the APC in Enugu State should not to be discouraged by the electoral losses they suffered in the state in the past.You must always lose, what matters is the ability to rise again.I must condemn our former party, PDP  I know we had problems.I told our former chairman, how come did we allow five governors to leave the party?I am not looking for a job, I am talking because I want peace.I want our people to be part of the Federal Government at the centre.I had a problem being an opposition governor.I am not coming into APC because I want anything.I want our people to be reintegrated and have our own share of the Federal Government resources, Nwobodo said.Nwobodo recalled that while he was in PDP, his wife had always been an active member of the APC.He pointed out that the slogan change did not start now with the APC.According to him, it started in 1983, when he was an opposition governor.
A former Senior Special Assistant on Public Affairs to ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, Doyin Okupe, has accused President Muhammadu Buhar...

According to Okupe, recent developments including the arrest of the National Publicity Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party, Olisa Metuh, is making the President to lose respect.Buhari is respected but with the hounding of opposition members, he is losing respect in the eyes of the international community. This selective probe is eroding his integrity, He told newsmen yesterday.Okupe condemned Metuhs detention, insisting that the PDP sourced and utilised its campaign funds the same way the All Progressives Congress did.He said, The Federal Government should not try to dabble into or control the finances of the PDP. The way and manner the ruling party is undertaking its selective probe by hounding opposition leaders is unbecoming and very disheartening.Party finances are not the business of the government. The former National Publicity Secretary of the APC, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, cannot deny that he didnt collect money for campaigns during the last elections.Why is the Federal Government not asking questions on the sources of the APCs campaign funds? The way the PDP spent billions of naira to fund its campaigns in the media was the same way the APC did theirs? Where did the APC get its campaign funds from? The opposition must be given the liberty to thrive.Reacting to an allegation that a former Minister of Aviation, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, benefited from the $2.1bn arms funds, Okupe said the former minister merely provided a service to the PDP during the electioneering and should not be questioned.Okupe urged the President to be tolerant of criticism even as he condemned a statement credited to the National Chairman of the APC, John Odigie-Oyegun, in which the APC chair asked Nigerians not to abuse Buhari.He advised Buhari to emulate Jonathan who he said was insulted by many leaders of the opposition but never retaliated.Fani-Kayode had said on Wednesday that the All Progressives Congress spent more than the Peoples Democratic Party which was in power during the last general elections.Fani-Kayode, who was the spokesperson for the Peoples Democratic Party Presidential Campaign Organisation, made the claim while reacting to the probe of some key officials of the PDP by the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration.He said, No election campaign anywhere in the world, including that of President Buhari was run with just words, goodwill, grass and pebbles and neither were we given free campaign adverts or airtime. All these things were run and paid for with large sums of money.This is especially so with publicity and media because that was the lifeblood of the various campaigns. I repeat, there is nothing that we did in the campaign organisation or that my directorate did that Lai Mohammed, Buhari and the APC did not do in theirs.As a matter of fact, they spent far more than we did but I have no idea where they got their money and whether they were private or public funds.The ex-minister also denied reports that he collected N1.7bn from the embattled former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki.
The Minister of Defence, retired Brig.-Gen. Mansur Dan-Ali, said on Friday that the Federal Government would introduce insurance package ...

Dan-Ali made the disclosure while briefing newsmen shortly after a Special Jumaat Prayer to mark the 2016 Armed Forces Remembrance Day celebration in Abuja.He said that already there were numerous packages enjoyed by the military as a way of motivating them to ensure the success of the ongoing counter insurgency operation.Normally we have package for the families of the fallen heroes but recently we are introducing the death insurance which has not been done before.It is an additional package by President Muhammadu Buhari to motivate our gallant armed forces and to take care of the families of the fallen heroes,he said.The minister solicited for prayers from all Nigerians to ensure the defeat of the Boko Haram terrorists.He said that the military was getting it right in the ongoing fight against insurgency, and expressed optimism that Boko Haram would soon be a thing of the past in the country.I believe Nigerians are fully aware of what the military has done so far and with their prayers everything will come to an end very soon,  he said.Earlier, the President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, said that the prayer was part of recognition of the sacrifice made by men and women who laid down their lives to defend the country.We must continue to do this not only to motivate their families that are left behind but to also encourage our men that are presently fighting insurgency,  Saraki said.He called on all Nigerians to always remember the fallen heroes in their daily prayers and also pray for the unity and development of the country.On his part, the Deputy Chief Imam of the National Mosque, Sheikh Ahmad Onilewura, prayed for the victory of the armed forces over the forces of evil in the country.The prayer was attended by the Chief of Air Staff, Air Vice Marshal Sadique Abubakar, The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed and the Minister of state for Environment, Alhaji Usman Jibrin, among others. (NAN)
The Federal Government on Friday confirmed the death of 40 people out of 86 reported cases of Lassa fever outbreak in 10 states. Prof. I...

The Federal Government on Friday confirmed the death of 40 people out of 86 reported cases of Lassa fever outbreak in 10 states. Prof. Isaac Adewole, Minister of Health, said this in Abuja while briefing newsmen on the outbreak of the haemorrhagic fever. Adewole advised communities to improve on their hygiene, including food hygiene and food protection practices.He also urged the public to avoid contact with rodents and rats as well as food contaminated with rats secretions and excretions. Avoid drying food in the open and along roadsides, it is also important to cover all foods to prevent rodents contamination, he said. The minister said affected states have been advised to intensify awareness creation on the signs and symptoms of the disease.According to him, the affected states are Bauchi, Nasarawa, Niger, Taraba, Kano, Rivers, Edo, Plateau, Gombe and Oyo. The public is hereby assured that government and its partners and other stakeholders are working tirelessly to address the outbreak and bring it to timely end, said the minister.He said the ministry had ordered for the immediate release of adequate quantities of ribavirin, the specific antiviral drug for Lassa fever, to the affected states for prompt treatment of cases. Adewole added that the ministry deployed rapid response teams to all affected states to assist in investigating and verifying the cases as well as tracing of contacts.He said also clinicians and relevant health care workers had been sensitised and mobilised in areas of patient management and care in the affected states.Besides, he advised family members and health care workers to always be careful and avoid contact with blood and body fluids while caring for sick persons infected by the disease.He also directed health facilities in the country to emphasise routine infection prevention and control measures and ensure that all Lassa fever patients are treated free.Adewole said Nigeria has the capability to diagnose Lassa fever, adding that all the cases reported so far were confirmed by our laboratories.The ministry would not impose travel restrictions as a form of control measure from and to the areas currently affected by the outbreak, Adewole said. The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) recalls that the first case of the current outbreak was reported from Bauchi in November.
Mexican authorities recaptured worlds most-wanted drug lord Joaquin El Chapo Guzman on Friday, six months after his spectacular priso...

The AFP reported that Mexican marines conducted extensive operations in the northwestern states of Sinaloa and Durango in search of Guzman since the 58-year-old drug lords July 11 escape from a high-security prison.Guzmans arrest will be a major sigh of relief for the president, whose administration was humiliated by Guzmans prison break.Mission accomplished: We got him. I want to inform Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested, Pena Nieto wrote on Twitter, without elaborating. He was scheduled to address the nation later Friday.A presidential spokesman confirmed the authenticity of the tweet to AFP but officials declined to say more about the arrest. The government website said the capture occurred Friday.The US Drug Enforcement Administration, which played a key role in Guzmans previous arrest in 2014 by providing intelligence, praised Mexican authorities.DEA is extremely pleased at the capture of Chapo Guzman. We congratulate the MX Government and salute the bravery involved in his capture, the DEA wrote on Twitter.News of his arrest came shortly after the navy reported that five suspects were killed in a clash with marines in the Sinaloa city of Los Mochis, but it did not indicate whether it was related to Guzman.Six people were detained after the shootout, which broke out when marines were tipped off about the presence of armed men in a home, the navy said in a statement.A suspected gang leader identified as Orso Ivan Gastelum Cruz was in the house but managed to escape, the navy said, adding that a dozen weapons, including a rocket-grenade launcher, were seized.On July 11, after 17 months at the Altiplano maximum-security prison in central Mexico, Guzman slipped through a hole in his cells shower, climbed on a motorcycle mounted on rails, and traveled 1.5 kilometers (one mile) through a tunnel to freedom.US and Mexican law enforcement officials say Guzman then flew to his home turf at the Sinaloa-Durango state border, where he is revered as a modern-day Robin Hood.More than a dozen prison and federal police officials have been arrested on charges of helping Guzman flee, along with several associates of the drug lord who worked from the outside on building the tunnel.Marines nearly recaptured him in October in a remote mountain region straddling the two states. Authorities said Guzman injured his face and a leg while falling in the rough terrain, but special forces failed to nab him.Guzman had been captured on February 22, 2014 in the Sinaloa resort of Mazatlan. He was found in a condo with his wife and their young twin daughters.He had been on the lam for 13 years after escaping a first time in 2001 from another prison, in western Jalisco state, by hiding in a laundry cart. He had spent eight years in prison following his 1993 capture in Guatemala.Questions will now likely turn on whether Mexico will extradite Guzman to the United States.Pena Nieto had refused to hand Guzman over to the United States before his escape, but the authorities have since then secured an arrest warrant to extradite him.The man whose nickname means Shorty had used the money from a drug empire whose tentacles reach Europe and Asia to dig himself out of trouble.He is a legend of Mexicos underworld, with musicians singing his praise in folk ballads known as narcocorridos, tributes to drug capos.With his daring underground escapes and ability to sneak narcotics under the US-Mexico border, he also earned the nickname Lord of the Tunnels.The bathtub in one of his houses in Culiacan, capital of Sinaloa, opened into an escape route into drainage systems that he used to flee from troops in early 2014.US and Mexican authorities have regularly discovered sophisticated tunnels with rails and electricity to ship marijuana, cocaine and other drugs into the United States, with cash and weapons coming the other way.Born on April 4, 1957, to a family of farmers, Guzman had humble beginnings in a region known as a bastion of drug trafficking.He dropped out of primary school to work in marijuana and opium poppy fields.He was recruited by Guadalajara cartel boss Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo, the godfather of Mexicos modern drug cartels.After Felix Gallardo was arrested in 1989, Guzmans Sinaloa drug cartel began its meteoric rise.The mustachioed drug lord married an 18-year-old beauty queen, Emma Coronel, in 2007 and is believed to have 10 children with various women.Guzmans family has paid dearly for his life of crime. One of his brothers was killed in a Mexican jail in December 2004 and a son was shot dead in a shopping center parking lot in May 2008.AFP
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission might not release the spokesperson for the Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Olisa Metuh, and...

It was gathered that the anti-graft agency might not release the detainees until after charges had been prepared.It was further learnt that operatives were still grilling the suspects as of the time of filing this report by 10.30 pm on Friday.A top operative, who confided in our correspondent, wondered why the people were talking of granting bail to the suspects when the commission was still at the stage of interrogation with them.The operative said, Those people you are talking about are still being detained, they are facing interrogation.Nobody can tell you when they are going to be released, may be, that could come up after their charges have been prepared.This gives a strong indication that the Spokesman of the PDP, Olisah Metuh, will spend the weekend at the EFCC detention facility.Apart from Metuh, the commission is still detaining the former military assistant to the former National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki. The assistant, who is a serving colonel, is believed to have spent two weeks in detention.Also, a German believed to have been engaged to facilitate the training of 750 Special Forces in Belarus who was picked up on December 28, 2015, is still waiting to face charges being prepared against him in court.On Wednesday night, the EFCC arrested a former military administrator of Kaduna State, Jafaru Isah, also in relation to the ongoing investigation into the $2.1 Billion arms procurement probe.Isah is a close associate of President Muhammadu Buhari. He was the governorship candidate of the defunct Congress for Progressive Change in Kano State, which Buhari founded in 2011 to actualise his presidential ambition
The immediate past Special Adviser on Media and Publicity to the Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, Opunabo Inko-Tariah, yesterday in P...

The immediate past Special Adviser on Media and Publicity to the Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, Opunabo Inko-Tariah, yesterday in Port Harcourt stated that he decided to defect to the All Progressives Congress (APC) from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on account of the love shown him by APC leaders when he recently escaped assassins bullets in the state and took ill afterwards.Inko-Tariah, who is publisher of the Port Harcourt-based Hard Truth newspaper, disclosed that former Rivers governor and now Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi; Rivers APCs governorship candidate, Dr Dakuku Peterside; and an ex-Sole Administrator of the Rivers State Environmental Sanitation Authority, Ade Adeogun, all APC leaders, cared for and assisted him in his trying period, when Wike, of the PDP, abandoned him.In defecting to the APC, he noted that it was natural for him to reciprocate the kind gesture of leaders of the party, thereby supporting Peterside to emerge as Rivers next governor in 2016.The former media adviser stressed that although he criticised Amaechi in the past, it was reinvigorating to note that the transportation minister called to sympathise with him and gave his widows mite.Inko-Tariah declared that to reciprocate Amaechis gesture, he would do his best to ensure that Peterside emerge as governor of the state in the event of a rerun.He said: It was surprising that a man I censured, His Excellency, Rt. Hon. Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi, CON, the Hon. Minister of Transportation, was the same person who showed unsolicited love and care.It was reinvigorating when he called to sympathise and also gave his widows mite, while I was already in the United States for medical treatment, after reading my resignation letter. How compassionate can a man be!On my support for Hon. (Dr.) Dakuku Peterside, it is only natural that one reciprocates gestures. Therefore, I state my support for Rt. Hon. Amaechi and Dr Peterside for the love they have shown.Moreso, Dr Peterside is a man whose refreshing initiatives and articulated policy options will help refuel the ethos of good governance in Rivers State.Inko-Tariah, while giving further insight into his reason for resigning from Wikes government, noted that he sustained head injuries from falling in a bathroom, after earlier escaping assassination, declaring that the Rivers governor did not show concern for his plight.
Seven corps members returning from the recent holidays were among the 16 passengers attacked by robbers at a spot on the Kaduna-Abuja hi...

Seven corps members returning from the recent holidays were among the 16 passengers attacked by robbers at a spot on the Kaduna-Abuja highway on Sunday.The females among the corps members serving in Enugu and Ebonyi states were reportedly raped by the hoodlums who blocked the highway to stop vehicles.A victim of the attack told the News Agency of Nigeria in Enugu on Friday that the 16-seater bus carrying them was attacked by the robbers who disguised as policemen.She said that the bus left Television Garage in Kaduna around 8:30pm and was attacked a few kilometres away from the garage.The victim further said the robbers mounted a road block to give the impression that they were policemen on duty.As we approached the road block, the driver noticed that they were not policemen and tried to retreat but it was late.The robbers sensing what our driver wanted to do, left other cars and descended on us, she said.The victim said that the robbers forcefully raped all the female corps members in the bus and took all their belongings which included laptops, jewelries, handsets, foodstuffs and money.The corps member appealed to the government to ensure adequate security on the highways.
WOODBURY -- A Sicklerville man pleaded guilty Friday in connection with a 2013 armed robbery of a Wendy's restaurant in Woodbury Heights, according to the Gloucester County Prosecutor's Office.

Marvis O. Jones, 29, pleaded guilty to first-degree robbery by threat, admitting in court that he threatened employees with bodily harm and carried a firearm during the crime.

Jones testified that he agreed with co-defendant Erica Albert, 29, of Clayton, a shift manager at the Wendy's, to rob the establishment, according to prosecutors. Albert was not aware that Jones had a gun until the robbery began, Jones admitted.

Investigators quickly determined the case wasn't a simple robbery.

After the restaurant had closed for the evening on Nov. 24, 2013, Jones shot out a window and entered the business, according to previous accounts from the prosecutor's office.

Once inside, he told "terrified" employees, "I know you've got four (cash) tills," prosecutors said, noting that Jones also knew there were several panic buttons that could be pressed for emergencies.

Albert also aroused suspicions, authorities said, when she allegedly claimed the robber had thrown her on a just-washed floor. The floor was still wet, but Albert's clothing was not, investigators observed.

"It was an inside job," Assistant Prosecutor Joseph Enos told a judge in 2014.

Jones was arrested in Virginia in March 2014 and extradited to New Jersey.

As part of a negotiated plea deal, Assistant Prosecutor Tiffany Degrandmaison will recommend eight years in prison with a requirement that Jones serve 85 percent of his term before he is eligible for parole.

Jones remains jailed on $200,000 bail pending sentencing.

Albert was arrested in February 2014 following an investigation by the prosecutor's office and Woodbury Heights police. She is charged with conspiracy to commit robbery, robbery and theft. She is free on $50,000 bail.

Matt Gray may be reached at mgray@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @MattGraySJT. Find the South Jersey Times on Facebook.
By Steve Anderson, Contributing Writer

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The first full week of 2016 has been a big one in terms of weather, but it's also been huge for call center services. A host of new developments stepped in to lead off 2016, and now that we've got a weekend on hand, it's a great time to take a step back and look at things in the wider view. So put on another cup of coffee and settle in, because it's time to run down the biggest in call center services with our Week in Review coverage.





First, we had a look at the Convergys call center, whose New York operation rose to over 900 staff total. That's a record for the company, and there's no sign it will slow its growth. Convergys (News - Alert) started 2015 with 400 employees in its customer service, and means to clear 1,100 before much longer. Increased demand and boosted investment are said to be two of the biggest reasons behind the change.

Next came a look at a new call center in Qatar, this one particularly noteworthy for its use. It's part of the Primary Health Care Corporation, and it's being used mainly to provide callers with more information about breast and bowel cancer screenings. Part of a larger effort that includes a website and other tools, the call center will not only be staffed by medical professionals, but those who can handle both Arabic and English-speaking callers for maximum impact.

Customer service in general came up next, as a new report from VoiceSage's chief product officer Paul Sweeney offered insight into customer service in 2016. Sweeney's report noted that contact centers would largely be driven by social media and application programming interfaces (APIs), as more operations went mobile and increased channel operations, moving toward a true omnichannel experience. Apps, however, were likely to be on the decline as such were considered niche.

Then Zendesk stepped in with its line of tools specifically useful for the midsized operation. The company landed a Strong Performer ranking from Forrester (News - Alert), gaining a listing in its recent offering of The Forrester Wave. Zendesk's strong market presence and product strategy, along with business intelligence and total number of live users, gave it high marks on nearly every front, earning it high ratings. Throw in its strong showing with multi-hundred agent environments, and Zendesk proves a great fit with midsize firms.

Finally, word from Wilmac emerged, as the company started selling VPI EMPOWER systems. VPI EMPOWER is a workforce optimization tool that allows organizations a better means to not only gather business intelligence, but also act on it within the contact center and with customers in general. That gives Wilmac a great new tool to offer its customer base, and since VPI approves of Wilmac's history of personalized service and after-sales support, gives VPI a great reason to offer it up through Wilmac.

That was the week that was in call center services, and it was quite a week indeed. Our global online community was right in the thick of it all, bringing back the best in news for us to consider. So be sure to keep it right here for all the latest, and every weekend as well for our Week in Review coverage!
The Newlin Township Board of Supervisors plans to meet with the Pennsylvania State Attorney General regarding its ordinance regulating commercial horse facilities.

The controversial ordinance was adopted in late 2014 despite strong opposition from local horsemen. Newlin Township is in Chester County, a horse-laden area and not far from New Bolton Center and home to many prominent equestrians.

In November the Attorney General sent a letter to the township saying the ordinance violated the Agriculture, Communities and Rural Environment Act (ACRE). The state argues that many parts of the ordinance seek to regulate issues that are already addressed by the state rules such as nutrient management and the protection of waterways.

Among other things, the ordinance requires that for commercial horse operations there must be three acres for the first horse and two acres for each horse thereafter. One farm had to board five horses elsewhere because it was over the limit base on that rule, but recently received an exception so those horses could return home.

A recent letter sent to area media by the township Board of Supervisors said its ordinance is similar and even less restrictive than those of other Chester County municipalities.

"The Township sought the expert advice on appropriate zoning amendments that allowed the boarding of horses in the Township as an incidental and secondary use to a residential dwelling, as well as a separate principle commercial use of land. The amendment was designed to allow the boarding of horses and other equestrian activities with reasonable regulations that are aimed at protecting neighboring property owners and preserving environmentally sensitive natural resources. The Board sought input from its Planning Commission, five Newlin residents, who unanimously recommended that the Ordinance be adopted," the letter said.

The letter noted that after the ordinance was adopted, eight applications were filed with the Zoning Hearing Board and all eight applicants have been granted the necessary zoning permit to continue business.

A meeting was to be scheduled in early January although no date has been publicized.

After the ordinance was proposed, the Concerned Citizens of Newlin Township was formed to oppose the legislation. The group has said the changes were inconsistent with how horse farms have been regulated in the Township for the past 30 years; threatens open space preservation and would adversely impact the local economy.

If the state still finds that the ordinance violate state rules, there could be legal action taken against the township.

For current equestrian news see Horse News or check out the online version of the print edition.

Horse News covers everything equestrian in the mid-Atlantic area and can be reached at horsenews@hcdemocrat.com

To subscribe to the print edition call 908-948-1309.

For advertising e-mail mchapman@njadvancemedia.com. Find Horse News on Facebook
sfulop09.JPG

Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop will appear on two weekend news programs to discuss the effects gaming legislation could have on Northern New Jersey.

(Reena Rose Sibayan | The Jersey Journal)

Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop will appear on two New Jersey political shows this weekend to discuss the impact North Jersey gaming legislation will have on New Jersey residents.

He will appear on "On The Record" with Michael Aron on NJTV tomorrow at 6:30 p.m. and Sunday at 10:30 a.m.

Fulop also will appear on "Power & Politics" on News 12 New Jersey on Saturday and Sunday at 10 a.m., 12:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m.

"I'm interested and hopeful that legislative leaders further compromise to find a solution that works for everyone," Fulop said in a statement. "Both sides feel they have compromised, but it remains clear this legislative matter has not reached resolution. It is unproductive to force legislation on the legislature or the public. It breaks with democracy."

Viewers can find News12 on Channel 12 on Cablevision and Channel 62 on Comcast. Viewers can find out where to watch NJTV here.
A group of government employees were shouting, "Overworked, underpaid, pay us what you should," during a protest march yesterday where they were demanding higher wages.

About 20 workers for the Hudson County Department of Family Services met on the corner of Baldwin Avenue and Academy Street in Jersey City at about 4:30 p.m. to protest and raise awareness for what they consider to be unfair wages.

Later in the evening, the protest group presented their issues to the Hudson County Board of Chosen Freeholders in a scheduled meeting. The protesters were hoping for an executive decision, but left without a resolution.

Jackie Robinson, one of the protesters, said she has worked as a clerk for the department for 16 years, and she's still barely making enough to get by.

"I can't pay my rent, I can't eat, and I can't get food stamps because I don't have any kids," said Robinson, as she stood on the corner near the Hudson County Sheriff's Office. "We are so overworked and underpaid over here. It's just not fair anymore, and I'm tired of it."

"We're not asking for something that we don't deserve," she added. "We work our butts off because we have the highest clientele out of all the counties, and we're underpaid. How do I work for the government and I can't eat and pay my rent? How is that even possible?"

Robinson and other protesters said they make near or below $30,000 a year, and the majority of them have to work second jobs to get by.

The protesters compared their wages to government employees with similar titles in other counties like Essex and Bergen. Terrell McDonald, the organizer of the protest who works as a social worker for the department, said that an Essex County employee with the same title as Robinson starts out with a salary of $60,000 starting. McDonald added that the Essex County employee makes more the she herself does, even though McDonald's job requires a degree.

"This is a government job, and most of us have to have a second job in order to pay our bills," McDonald said. "You have people in a McDonald's in New York making the same amount as the clerks that have been here for 14, 15 years. We work for the government, and we are the working poor."

The demonstrators marched down Baldwin Avenue and stopped in front of the Hudson County Counsel on 567 Pavonia Ave. The group protested outside the building before taking part in the Hudson County Freeholder's meeting inside.

The protester's presented reports and testimonies to the freeholders, hoping an executive decision would be made, but the board did not take action.

Hudson County spokesman Jim Kennelly said the board told the protesters that they need to take their issue to their union representatives. He added that the workers are currently in a five year labor contract, which ends on June 30 2019.

"It would be considered unfair labor practices for either the administration or the freeholders board to reopen contracts and change wage rates," Kennelly said. "Those things are fairly carefully described by federal regulations regarding bargaining agreements....and government entities."

McDonald said that the group will look toward other avenues to reach their goal.

"The fight isn't over," said McDonald. "I'm going to continue to fight for what we deserve, I'm just not going to use that same method."

In addition to the county employees seeking a salary hike, the number of officers from the Hudson County Sheriff's Office who responded to the protesters led to a shouting match among several of the freeholders and the county undersheriff at the meeting.

Freeholder Bill O'Dea asked why so many offers were deployed for a protest that had a rather low turnout.

"They (the sheriff's office) knew at 4:30 p.m. there were 15-20 people," O'Dea said in a video posted on the Hudson County View website. "I don't know if there was a single bullhorn. I don't believe there was a single television station or camera there. That they decided to wait until 6:20 to send the officers home...I don't fault these officers. God bless them. They put their life on the line every day, and I respect them, and I respect the job they do."

The decision to deploy so many officers was defended by Freeholder Anthony Vainieri.

"I don't understand why we're knocking the Sheriff's Office from doing their job," he said. "They had information that this meeting was going to be chaotic and jammed. They did what they did to take precautions."

Hudson County Undersheriff Andrew Conti explained his office's decision.

"If any of you know anything about protests or demonstrations, sometimes you have a small group in one place, so you let your guard down, and then in another place, a large group shows up."
An Abraham Lincoln High School senior wants to do something about radioactive gas she suspects is lurking in some Iowa schools.

Alyson Sorensen is the primary supporter of one of six legislative positions adopted by the State of Iowa Youth Advisory Council, which plans to lobby members of the General Assembly to support causes important to young people across the state.

Sorensen, along with A.L. senior Harrison Jones, serves on SIYACs health committee, and she proposed requiring radon testing in all public schools in Iowa. Two bills in the Legislature  one proposed by Rep. Art Staed, D-Cedar Rapids, and another from the Committee on Local Government following a House study bill  make similar proposals to require radon testing.

The plan encapsulated in House File 584 drew lobbyist support from the American Cancer Society and Iowa Medical Society as well as mixed reaction from school advocacy groups.

The Iowa Association of School Boards opposed it, while the groups backing school administrators and educators supported it and those groups representing rural and urban schools were undecided, according to the Legislatures bill tracking website.

For Sorensen, though, the issue is simple and boils down to safety. She spends a lot of time at school, she said, enough that it can feel like shes living her life more there than at home.

I would really like to not be living in a massive building full of cancer right now, Sorensen said. As we learn more about the long term effects of radon, its important we protect who we can at this point.

Radon doesnt top the list of concerns for the Council Bluffs Community School District, but Staci Pettit, its facilities director, said it would be worthwhile to test for radon. For now, though, the district is waiting to see what requirements might come from the legislative process, so it doesnt have to go back and test again and waste taxpayer money.

Were really waiting from guidance from the state on how they want to proceed with this, Pettit said. If we had major concerns, we would definitely be checking into it.

Two elementary schools, Bloomer and Lewis and Clark, were tested in spring 2014, she said.

Bloomer was in good condition for its learning spaces, with some radon detected in crawl space and lower-level storage spaces, which might occasionally be used for tornado drills or other brief occupation. At Lewis and Clark, two classrooms were mitigated at a cost of several thousand dollars.

The position paper Sorensen advanced through SIYAC calls on schools to test for radon every 10 years. A test resulting in excess levels being detected would be repeated in 90 days, and a second positive finding would put the school attendance center on a one-year shot clock to mitigate the radon, test again and develop monitoring procedures.

Every county in Iowa is considered at high risk for radon, Sorensen said. The radioactive gas is the second leading cause of lung cancer, after tobacco smoking, and the leading environmental cause of cancer deaths in the U.S., according to a study by the University of Iowa.

Sorensen said three out of every five Iowans will come into contact with radon, and shes worried schools are one place where the states youth could be exposed. She said the cost of addressing the radioactive gas would be relatively low, because many schools could use a tube in the basement to pump air instead of residential-style mitigation that vacuums the gas. Addressing radon in an elementary school, she said, might only cost a few thousand dollars.

Paying for radon testing and mitigation is the most controversial part of the proposal, the A.L. senior said. Her proposal, similar to the bill in the Iowa House, would allow schools to use infrastructure dollars from their physical plant and equipment levies and state sales tax revenue provided to schools for mitigation, and the House bill would also let school districts request additional spending authority to use property tax dollars to pay for the unfunded mandate.

There are options built in so that way were not putting any district in the place where the government is on their heels and they would have no money to do it, Sorensen said. The idea of this bill is not to put a school district in a position that they cant handle. Im just trying to make sure that our kids are safe.

Spending money up front on reducing radon exposure will save society health care costs down the road, she said.

Pettit said she would hope any new state requirements would provide a few years, perhaps five, to conduct the initial radon testing, so any mitigation could be phased into budgets. She said she would prefer to start with elementary buildings where students spend more time in specific rooms and spend more time on or near the floor.

Its unclear how much radon might be found in the Council Bluffs schools, or in other districts that dont conduct regular testing. Nothing has come up to prompt a sense that testing needs to be conducted immediately.

A majority of our facilities have been renovated, Pettit said, adding as a caveat: Until you actually go out and test, youre not going to know.

Among the questions holding up testing, she said, is whether they have to be done by an external provider, what are the expectations and what protocol should be followed. Pettit said, Its just a matter of how do we proceed.
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Gelinas: Rising jobless rate proof of Liberal's failure

Nickel Belt MPP France Gelinas said Friday that the job numbers for December 2015 show that the provincial government has failed Sudbury families. Unemployment has risen 2.4 per cent compared to the same time last year and now stands at 8.

Nickel Belt MPP France Gelinas is trying to get the province to create a French-language university. A rally in support of the project takes place in Toronto today. File photo.

Nickel Belt MPP France Gelinas said Friday that the job numbers for December 2015 show that the provincial government has failed Sudbury families.



Unemployment has risen 2.4 per cent compared to the same time last year and now stands at 8.4 per cent, Statistics Canada reported Friday.



The Liberal governments record for Sudbury in 2015 was a record of failure, Gelinas said in a news release. The Wynne Liberals sat and watched as Sudbury mines closed and jobs that families and communities depended on were lost.



Instead of helping families and businesses by investing in job creation, the Wynne Liberals pressed ahead with its fire sale of Hydro One, despite the concerns of mining companies and local businesses about increasing hydro costs.



She also said the governing Liberals have failed to move on the promised projects for the city, such as four-laning Highway 69, Maley Drive and the development of the Ring of Fire.



This year, the Wynne Liberals need to begin moving on their promises of job creation for Sudbury, Gelinas said. They need to stop their selloff of Hydro One, which will hurt families and business with increased hydro rates during a time of high unemployment.



Sudburys unemployment rate is now the second highest in the province among major cities. Only Windsor, at 9.7 per cent, is higher. This time last year, the rate was six per cent.
Syrian family to be reunited with grandfather

The first family of Syrians to arrive in Sudbury received good news on Friday: the grandfather they had to leave behind in a refugee camp in Lebanon is on his way to Canada.

One Syrian family arrived in Greater Sudbury just in time to ring in the New Year on Dec. 31 and another three families are confirmed to arrive in Greater Sudbury by March of this year. File photo.

The first family of Syrians to arrive in Sudbury received good news on Friday: the grandfather they had to leave behind in a refugee camp in Lebanon is on his way to Canada.



"We found out just a couple of hours ago -- I got an email from Immigration Canada," said Joanne Ross, of Lifeline Sudbury and St. Andrew's United Church, which sponsored the family.



"They confirmed they located him, issued him his papers and he is on his way."



When the Qarqoz family arrived in Sudbury on New Year's Eve they expressed a mix of happiness to be here, and sadness that they had to leave the 80-year-old grandfather behind. The father told reporters it was the family's most pressing concern.



"The first thing he wants is his dad to come here," said Abdul Hak Dabliz, Imam of the Sudbury Mosque, who acted as the translator for the family's first media interview.



The Canadian government issued the family  mother, father, and three sons  the equivalent of temporary passports so they could leave Lebanon for Canada.



But for some reason, one wasn't provided for the grandfather. But Ross said Friday the issue has been worked out and he's on his way.



"Mr. Qarqoz will be in Toronto tomorrow and likely on a flight to Sudbury on Monday," she said.



"This is literally the answer to (the family's) biggest prayer. They've been very worried about him and so they're very happy that they'll be reunited soon. And we're sure happy, too.



"The whole community is happy, too. This story has really resonated in our community."



Qarqoz will join his family, bringing the total number of refugees from Syria that have moved to Sudbury to 15.



On Thursday, a family of nine arrived, sponsored by the Capreol-Valley Refugee Sponsorship group. They will live in a Catholic Church in that community that has been readied for their use.
Strike avoided - OPSEU and province reach agreement

The OPSEU bargaining team for frontline correctional services workers has reached an agreement to settle all outstanding issues in contract talks with the Government of Ontario.

The OPSEU bargaining team for frontline correctional services workers has reached an agreement to settle all outstanding issues in contract talks with the Government of Ontario. File photo.

The OPSEU bargaining team for frontline correctional services workers has reached an agreement to settle all outstanding issues in contract talks with the Government of Ontario.



The announcement comes after negotiations that began Friday and went through to the early hours of Saturday morning.



Our members spoke with a strong and united voice, said OPSEU President Warren Thomas.



We listened and we acted upon that voice. History is being written today, and Im proud of the resolve that our courageous Corrections members have shown in making it happen.



Tom ONeill, Chair of the OPSEU Correctional Bargaining Team, said the agreement achieved enhancements over an earlier deal rejected by correctional workers in December.



All improvements in the Nov. 23 agreement are in this deal, plus other improvements, most notably, transition to binding arbitration to settle bargaining disputes, said O'Neill.



This deal satisfies the strong desire of our members to have their wages set at arbitration. Frontline correctional staff are first responders who deal with violence, trauma and tragedy in the normal course of our work, and we intend to be recognized for the vital service we provide in keeping Ontarians safe.



Thomas warned the government that much more has to be done.



This is a first step to stabilizing a correctional system that's in crisis. But it cant be the last. Our jails are bursting at the seams and our probation officers have the highest caseloads in Canada, he said.



We're facing a severe staffing shortage. Violence continues to escalate. We want to be part of a constructive dialogue with the government on ways to ease this crisis and ensure the safety of the public, correctional staff, and inmates.



Thomas also expressed his appreciation for the tireless efforts of union members and staff over more than a year of very difficult negotiations.



My sincere thanks go out to the bargaining team for all their hard work," he said. I also want to recognize the OPSEU Executive Board, our local leaders, and everyone who helped bring these talks to a successful conclusion.



Some 6,000 Correctional workers, who have been without a contract since Dec. 31, 2014, would have been in a legal strike or lockout position as of 12:01 on Sunday morning.
8:47 p.m. UPDATE: Fire Chief Bernie Kanger said firefighters are concerned that the building could potentially collapse or that the fire could spread to another building to the west. At 8:40 p.m., flames were still roaring up through the roof.

Firefighters and bystanders have been moved to near the corners of the building because, if the structure were to collapse, it's expected that the front of the building would fall onto 11th Street.

The fire was first reported at 2:51 p.m., and had grown to three alarms by 7:30 p.m. Additional alarms bring additional manpower to the scene. By nightfall, firefighters from across the city had responded to the Old Market.

No firefighters have been injured, but the extreme cold was creating mechanical problems with the equipment, Kanger said. The chief said one person had been injured and was taken in serious condition to the Nebraska Medical Center.

He said he could confirm only that there was a report of a possible explosion that preceded the fire. He also couldn't identify the origin of the fire, saying that was under investigation.

The first floor of M's Pub has partially collapsed. He said a lot of the interior is wood and highly combustible. That led firefighters to adopt a "defensive position," withdrawing from the building and fighting the fire from outside the structure.

Kanger said there are a lot of open spaces in the building, allowing the fire to spread quickly to the second and third floors.

As water poured off the front of the building, long icicles formed off the awning at the building's entrance.

5:06 p.m. UPDATE: The gas is off and flames are no longer shooting out of Ms Pub, according to witnesses.

However, the place is filled with smoke, including the corner boutique on the corner known as Nouvelle Eve, and firefighters are continued to aggressively work the scene that filled downtown Omaha with smoke and sorrow.

It is too early to tell the exact level of damage to the historic restaurant that was one of Omahas most beloved institutions, but it appears to be extensive.

No one, however, was seriously hurt.

And, everyone in the restaurants and the surrounding buildings were safely evacuated.

One of those was Marilyn Turtellot, who lived in the adjacent building next to Ms Pub. She was upstairs when she heard the explosion, and looked out the window.

It almost knocked me out of the chair. And, I went right to the front window and saw all the people running out of Ms, and all the workers running across the street, said Turtellot who has lived in the Old Market for more than a decade.

Shortly before the explosion, several people called 911 to report the smell of natural gas. The Fire Department said there was a leak in the basement. A person who lives above Ms Pub said she has seen crews working on pipes in and around the building for about a week.

Metropolitan Utilities District employees were at the scene.

Three people with injuries that were not serious but that needed medical attention were taken to a hospital. Three ambulances were called to the scene.

When Turtellot and others got out of the building, they saw flames shooting from the front of the building. Acrid smoke and fine debris filled the air.

Police and firefighters were on the scene in minutes.

Street construction crews had been working in the area for several days, with heavy equipment.. They scrambled to move their trucks and equipment away from the burning building.

Buildings next to Ms were also evacuated, including Old Chicago and Jams.

Seth McMillan lives in building above Ms and owns McLovin mens clothing store a little east on Howard. Hes told that all apartment residents got out safely. His shop has closed.

McMillan helped Turtello leave the building. The two took shelter in an art gallery across the street.

Keith Tracey, who lives on third floor of a building in the same block but facing Howard Street, said he was not allowed in his building  it has been evacuated by authorities  but learned from other residents that everyone got out OK.

He said people in the area reported feeling a concussion.

It is so sad. It is so iconic, Gena Dushan said of the damage to Ms.

Ron Samuelson, longtime co-owner of the restaurant, was not in town and learned about the fire via Twitter.

I feel horrible, helpless, Samuelson said.

He said he has been told that no one in restaurant at the time  it was open for business - was hurt but that one person elsewhere in the building was injured.

He added that he has been told that all the glass in the front of building was blown out.

Its a tragedy no matter who it happens to, Samuelson said when asked about the impact on this Omaha icon. Its the people who live there that Im really worried about.

One person, he said, has been there 30 years.

World-Herald staff writers Emerson Clarridge, Janice Podsada, and Sarah Baker-Hansen contributed to this report.
SCOTTSBLUFF  After graduating from Scottsbluff High School in 2006, Nik Ingersoll used the marketing skills he learned there and at San Diego State University to co-found Candy Lab, an interactive marketing firm. While working at Candy Lab, he designed and created several brands, including the Barnana brand from scratch. He met his business partner Caue Suplicy, who told him about a special banana snack he ate as a child growing up in Brazil. Two years later, they created Barnana. Now, Ingersoll has been named to Forbes 30 Under 30 list.

In an email, Ingersoll said being named to the list was an great honor.

This is definitely something that you hope to achieve being a young entrepreneur, he said. The overall feeling is certainly surreal.

The snacks are made from organic bananas that have been rejected for export because they are imperfect, have scuffs, are a little too ripe or arent the perfect size. Barnanas are made from these imperfect organic bananas that used to be wasted.

Growing up in western Nebraska was a benefit for Ingersoll.

It taught me how to work hard from a young age and have a deep appreciation for nature and food, he said. I grew up in the country so I got to roam around a lot, create art and music, farm and hunt  all of which developed in me both the innate desire to hustle and the unquenchable thirst to create new and different things.

Ingersoll credits his Papa Wilber, who used to own the Skyport Restaurant, and Scottsbluff High School teacher Derek Deaver with helping to foster his entrepreneurial journey in creating new things. Ingersoll described the marketing program at Scottsbluff High School as truly unique.

Most high school students never get to experience business, marketing and entrepreneurship until they get to college, he said. For me, Deaver and DECA helped solidify my path both heading into college and creating new businesses for a living.

In the past year, Ingersolls business has more than doubled. They have expanded into Costco, Canada, Japan and Australia and have introduced new snack-size products. The Barnana line will soon see a new set of products hit the shelves in Target and Kroger and expand at Costco.

Ingersoll plans to raise additional capital to fund the rapid growth rate of the company. They have new investors, including Mark Rampolla, the founder of Zico Coconut Water, who recently sold his company to The Coca-Cola Company.

While he has been busy expanding his business, Ingersoll is trying to stay grounded.

Im just focused on keeping my head to the earth and hustling as hard as possible, he said. Im also pumped to head back to western Nebraska to go bow hunting next season.
Ive been thinking lately about where ideas come from. They often seem to blip into your head out of nowhere. And that feels very random. Do you just hav...

3 weeks ago
A growing number of Northwest Indiana entrepreneurs have been turning to crowdfunding websites instead of talking to loan officers when launching their business, though it's not for everyone.

The Grindhouse Cafe in Griffith used a Kickstarter campaign to launch a new food truck. Critically acclaimed 18th Street Brewery, one of Northwest Indiana's biggest and most successful craft breweries, got its start on Kickstarter. Real Food Blends, which Julie Bombacino founded in Chesterton in 2012, has scaled up into a national business after using a crowdfunding campaign to help get the word out.

Loopy Cases, a Schererville-based enterprise that makes a smartphone case that prevents drops, recently persuaded 3,194 backers on Kickstarter to chip in $139,229, about 460 percent more than expected. That crowdfunding campaign also helped Loopy Cases get national press, including from Inc. Magazine.

Crowdfunding is a relatively new phenomenon, and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission recently approved new rules, which include limits on how much of your net worth you can donate to crowdfunding campaigns.

Donors typically get awards that can vary from a T-shirt to a behind-the-scenes tour, depending on how much they pledge. Not every attempt to raise funds on Kickstarter, GoFundMe, IndieGoGo, Patrean and Crowdrise is successful, though. The Region is littered with failed crowdfunding projects, including an effort to buy a digital projector for Hammond's historic Kennedy Theatre, which has since stopped showing first-run films and is now a special events venue.

Crowdfunding more than just money

But crowdfunding, which is also used to bankroll artistic endeavors and assist people in times of need, is growing rapidly. Experts project that online crowdfunding will grow to $34 billion by the end of 2016, when it will eclipse more traditional venture capital investing, according to the Crowdfunding Industry Report.

"People who talked to me about a Kickstarter campaign coined it 40 days of chaos," said JT Wangercyn, the chief executive officer and co-founder of Loopy Cases. "But it's cool to get the product out in front of people who are early adopters."

The Kickstarter campaign was useful because it sold phone cases to many new customers and generated feedback that was used to tweak the design, which Wangercyn said was more efficient than prototyping every new design and then getting customer reaction. Instead, continuous online feedback was used to repeatedly adjust the phone case, such as by making it easier to plug in charging cords and earbuds.

"A lot of research went into it," he said. "We made sure whatever we chose doubled and tripled and had enough subscribers to ensure whatever we brought to the market worked."

Selling the idea, closing the deal

Bombacino also had angel investors who funded her company, which blends real, wholesome food for people needing tube feeding. But she wanted a Kickstarter campaign to drum up early interest.

"It was mostly for the marketing, since I had raised the money from investors," she said. "The viral nature of crowdfunding lets you test the waters and get the word out before you launch a company. You can engage customers and get feedback."

She felt since it was such a new concept it was important to see how people would react. They provided valuable input, such as what ingredients to use.

What's important for entrepreneurs to know is they can't just post a campaign on Kickstarter and sit back and wait for the money to trickle in, Bombacino said. They need to be prepared and dedicated.

"Always, always, always do the homework," she said. "Treat this like a product launch. Don't just slap it up and wait for people to come to you."

She spent a lot of time emailing influential people who might endorse her product, responding to backers, and promoting it in different online venues.

Crowdfunding campaigns need to be run by someone with a flair for salesmanship and they also aren't for every type of business, said Lori Feldt, regional director of the Northwest Indiana Small Business Development Center. They typically work best if it's something like a craft brewery that can potentially generate a lot of buzz among enthusiasts.

"It's a great way to promote the business," she said. "You can establish a marketing list and have fans awaiting your opening."

Crowdfunding campaigns work when there's a built-in audience of people with a deep interest in the product and if the business owner gets out there and advocates for the product online. They can generate cash flow, demonstrate the level of interest and advertise the forthcoming product.

"It's all about marketing, getting your message out there," Feldt said. "It's worthwhile getting some advice from someone who's done it. You don't want to jump out there on the crowdfunding platform without planning and strategy."
Michael Hall's love for music has taken him from the stage at Portage High School to some of the largest concert halls in the United States, Italy and Austria.

Now the 47-year-old 1987 PHS graduate is taking his love of music to Indonesia, where he and two others are creating that country's first philharmonic orchestra.

"There is nothing greater than sharing the love of music," said Hall, who now lives in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood with his wife and two daughters. "What I want more than anything is to take the wisdom I've gained and help them start out right."

That love for music, said Hall, started as a child in his South Haven home where his parents, Lawrence and Rose Mary "Bebe" Hall always played music and encouraged him to pursue his dream.

It led him from Portage to earning degrees at Ball State University, University of Cincinnati and University of North Carolina Greensboro.

His involvement in founding the Bandung Philharmonic in a city of nearly 9 million is almost by accident.

Airin Efferin, an Indonesian musician, studied her craft in the United States. One of her professors at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich., was Robert Nording.

When Efferin completed college and returned to Indonesia, she again sought out Nording about founding an orchestra in her country. Indonesian musicians travel hundreds of miles out of their country to perform.

While Nording and Hall are musicians, they met by happenstance a couple of years ago when Nording moved in across the hall from Hall and his family.

After Efferin contacted Nording, Nording contacted Hall.

Hall, a concert violist who has played from Austria to Italy to Thailand and also teaches at VanderCook School of Music in Chicago, said he jumped at the chance to help.

"There are a great deal of classically trained musicians in Indonesia," he said.

The trio began a social media campaign seeking Indonesian musicians who would like to audition. Hall said they received about 150 applications.

He and Nording, neither of whom have been to Indonesia, leave today for the country. They will spend an intense 10 days auditioning musicians to pare down applicants to between 80 and 85; then rehearse and host their first performance on Jan. 18.

Hall also will launch a music education program while there, teaching orchestra participants how to take their love of music into the local schools.

The long-term goal is to make the Bandung Philharmonic successful and independent.

While the adventure started out as a way to spread his love of music by helping other musicians, Hall said it struck him that this also would be a cultural exchange of sorts.

Indonesia is a predominantly Muslim country with issues of its own.

"At first that didn't enter my mind," he said about the divide between cultures and religions. "The further I got into the process, the more I got it. The idea of sharing cultures became bigger. The idea of getting all of us together to do something became exciting."

Hall and he and Nording have been learning the intricacies of the Indonesian culture and customs. They want to be ambassadors for the United States as well as musicians.

In addition to foster the love of music and a new orchestra, said Hall, they also hope to foster an understanding of America and help bring the cultures together.
GARY  Parents of students at Wirt-Emerson Visual and Performing Arts school are concerned students are wearing their coats in the classroom.

Students in the Gary Community School Corp. returned to school Jan. 4 after the two-week Christmas holiday to find chilly temperatures in some classrooms but not chilly enough to dismiss school.

Wirt-Emerson Principal Adrian Richie said the building is old and has three boilers, one of which is being repaired.

"Hopefully, they will get fired up for next week," he said.

"The students just came back to school and it took a couple of days for the boilers to warm the school. It was a little chilly on Monday and Tuesday. Some of the classrooms, some parts of the building, were not as warm as others. We told the students they could wear a jacket or coat if needed."

Richie said there were other classrooms where it was hot and teachers wanted to open windows. "It's an old, old building. You just never know. We tell the students and teaches to play it by ear and use their professional judgment," he said.

Gary schools Superintendent Cheryl Pruitt said one of the things financial consultant Jack Martin is doing is to evaluate every facility within the school corporation.

Martin is the financial adviser the district was instructed to hire by the Indiana Distressed Unit Appeals Board to help eliminate a nearly $40 million deficit, and turn the district around financially.

"He is doing a complete review of the facilities and the maintenance operation, so we can get more efficient and make certain our costs are within reason and we can upgrade some of our buildings," Pruitt said.

"It is our intent that if any building is below the required temperature of 68 degrees, we would notify parents. There are several boilers in the high school buildings and each is responsible for warming a different part of the building. Wirt-Emerson is not at capacity so we can move students to warmer classrooms. Sending them home would be our last resort," Pruitt said. The building is not at capacity with 650 students in grades five through 12.

Over the years, there have been heating problems at other Gary schools.

In January 2014, Gary Roosevelt College & Career Academy, which is operated by private management company EdisonLearning Inc., had heating failures. A number of pipes in the building burst causing the hallways near the gym to flood with up to 2 inches of water.

At that time, EdisonLearning leaders said temperatures in many of the classrooms registered between 47 and 58 degrees, and temperatures in the hallways ranged from 51 to 61 degrees. The school was closed for several days.

In February 2015, there was only one boiler operable at Gary Roosevelt, causing students to be relocated to warmer rooms or forcing the school to close at times.

The financially struggling Gary Community School Corp. was responsible for repairs to the boiler; once made, Roosevelt students returned to the classroom.
INDIANAPOLIS  The Republican and Democratic leaders of the Indiana House are pledging to conduct the state's legislative business this year with civility as a top priority.

House Speaker Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis, and Democratic Leader Scott Pelath, D-Michigan City, both declared last week that debate over controversial issues likely to come before the House through March 14 will not devolve into name-calling or personal attacks.

"We will do everything in our power to be certain that no matter how difficult the discussions might get on any issue, that we're respectful of each other, that we talk about ideas and not personalities and that we work together to do what we believe is best for the state of Indiana," Bosma said.

He emphasized that civility is so important to the 71 House Republicans that Bosma decided to include preserving civility on the caucus legislative agenda, alongside infrastructure funding, student testing reform and cracking down on drug dealers.

The goal, he said, is to execute legislative responsibilities effectively while promoting efficient and ethical governance.

Pelath said he absolutely agrees with Bosma that civility is essential for good government generally, and is what Hoosiers deserve from their elected representatives.

"Hurt feelings, unfair accusations, they don't do anything to make government work better," Pelath said.

At the same time, Pelath insisted the 29 Democratic House members don't intend to remain mute as lawmakers hash out the details of controversial issues, including whether to extend civil rights protections to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Hoosiers.

Pelath believes it is possible to negotiate and haggle, even over the most contentious legislative proposals, while remaining committed to civility.

"I enjoy tough debate over issues. I enjoy pointed criticism. Those are good things; the people need to hear them," Pelath said.

"But once it starts to impinge on personalities or trying to make assumptions about what's really in somebody's heart, then I think we have to draw a line."

Across the Statehouse rotunda, the Senate soon is expected to honor a successful civility campaign, led by the Gary Chamber of Commerce and The Times Media Co., that's been embraced by numerous units of local government in the Region.

State Sen. Lonnie Randolph, D-East Chicago, is sponsor of Senate Resolution 6 commending the Community Civility Counts initiative.

The resolution praises the CCC goal of transforming "our communities through positive programs and relationships," because "in order to better understand opposing points of view, we must first hear and understand these points of view."

"Governmental entities must also adhere to the principles of civility," the resolution says. "The way government reaches a decision can be as important as the actual decision."

Senate approval of Randolph's Civility Counts resolution is expected in the next few weeks.
SPRINGFIELD, Ill.  Gov. Bruce Rauner's office ended a monthslong fight over details about his workday Friday, releasing more complete appointment calendars in response to an attorney general's decree that he was withholding more information than allowed under state records-access law.

A lawyer for the first-term Illinois Republican disclosed fresh versions of his calendar from early 2015, nearly four months after the state public access counselor's ruling. The new versions revealed little new information.

The issue over what Rauner is doing, when and with whom has been contested by The Associated Press, the Chicago Reader and the Illinois Times, whose staff writer, Bruce Rushton, filed a lawsuit over the matter, an action Rauner lawyer Don Tracy of Springfield blamed for the delay in disclosure.

Rushton told the AP he's satisfied with Rauner's response and remaining redactions. But he said he will oppose the government's motion to dismiss the lawsuit and he will ask a judge to force the government to pick up his legal fees under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act. In a letter released Friday, Tracy called Rushton's lawsuit "flawed" and ill-timed.

"We have no heartburn whatsoever in their redacting personal cellphone numbers and that sort of thing. We don't want to know anyone's pants size," Rushton said. "But when it comes to, it's my fault? No. He could have released these records at any time along this process."

Rauner's office declined further comment.

An AP comparison of the new versions  from January, February, April and May of 2015  to those originally supplied to the AP last year reveals few changes.

Dates on which job applicants, later tabbed for administration posts, were interviewed were blacked out until Friday. The new calendar versions repeatedly show that "budget briefings" were the previously redacted subjects of governor's office meetings. Previously, the governor's calls to staffer Ed Murphy were redacted; the fresh version reveals they dealt with "appointments," presumably to government boards and commissions.

And the fact that "BVR/DMR"  Rauner and his wife, Diana  shopped at a Springfield grocery on Feb. 14 was disclosed originally, but only on Friday was it revealed that they later had dinner at a popular Springfield bar and grill and that night attended the Illinois Symphony Orchestra.

The governor's office, in response to AP Freedom of Information Act requests, similarly redacted calendars for the rest of 2015. The public access counselor issued an opinion last week in favor of the AP's objection, but new versions of latter-year datebooks were not forthcoming.

The ruling on the AP case found that Rauner's schedules are public because they pertain to public business and were prepared for or by a public body for use by government officials. It rejected administration arguments that redactions were proper under FOIA exceptions allowing private and free-flowing policy discussion, safeguarding personal security and ensuring confidential attorney-client communications.

The AP pointed out in its appeal that one redaction apparently made to keep a policy debate secret appeared to be 68 characters long  about half the amount allowed in a Twitter post.
FOX LAKE, Ill.  The village of Fox Lake has appointed a veteran of three police departments to serve as its interim police chief.

Russell B. Laine served as the chief of police in the Chicago suburb of Algonquin from 1985 through 2014. He also served as chief in Edgerton, Wis. and in Bartlett, Ill.

The village in August launched a search for a replacement for Police Chief Michael Behan, who retired before the death of Lt. Charles Joseph Gliniewicz. Authorities say Gliniewicz staged his suicide to look like a homicide before discovery of his embezzlement from a youth program.

Village Administrator Anne Marrin says it was determined interim leadership is needed to deliver needed reforms ranging from updating policies and training to modernizing information technology.

Officials say Laine and village officials agreed to a one-year contract.
CEDAR LAKE  When police searched a Cedar Lake home last month, the odor of urine and feces was so strong that officers could only stand to be inside for a short period before going outside for fresh air.

The Lake County police officers found feces outside and throughout the home located in the 13000 block of Edison Street in Cedar Lake, according to the affidavit.

Clothes, toys, remnants of food and garbage were found throughout the house, according to court records. Officers also observed a brown liquid rising from the carpet along with fleas.

Nicole L. De La Cruz, 29, and Chad E. De La Cruz, 30, were each charged Friday with five counts of neglect of a dependent and one count of cruelty to an animal.

Warrants were issued for their arrest, but they were not in custody as of Friday afternoon.

As a result of the investigation, the couple's five children were temporarily placed in the state's custody.

The Lake County sheriff's department began investigating the couple on Dec. 12 after Patches, a black mixed-breed dog, for two days was seen eating out of garbage cans at a gas station near the intersection of 133rd Avenue and Whitcomb Street in Cedar Lake.

An examination of Patches later revealed it had broken teeth, was about 20 pounds underweight, had sarcoptic mange and appeared to be depressed, according to court records.

The couple contacted the sheriff's department in attempts to get Patches back. The sheriff's department gave the couple's attorney a list of conditions that had to be met before the dog could be returned to their custody.

Those conditions included allowing an investigator to see where Patches would be living.

On Dec. 16, an investigator for the Lake County sheriff's department animal control visited the couple's home and reported that the living conditions were deplorable for humans and animals. That prompted police to search the home the next day.

Police removed two dogs from the home and three rabbits, according to the affidavit. There were also two cats in the home, but they evaded capture.

There were no lights in the bedrooms, and there were gates at the entrance of each bedroom, according to the affidavit. There was also a space heater in the living room, which police suspected was a fire hazard because of the conditions of the home.

The Indiana Department of Child Services was called on the scene to take custody of the couple's five children, according to the affidavit.
CROWN POINT  A 23-year-old man already convicted in a murder will spend 15 additional years in prison after he admitted to his role in a home invasion.

Lake County Criminal Judge Diane Boswell sentenced Akeem S. Carpenter to 15 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to burglary while armed with a deadly weapon.

The sentence is in addition to the 50-year term he was sentenced to in September after a jury found him guilty in the March 12, 2014, shooting death of Yueh Ju Wu, of Hammond.

A Lake County jury acquitted him of murder, but he was found guilty of murder in the perpetration of a robbery or attempted robbery.

The homicide in Hammond happened about a week after he posted bail in the case stemming from the Merrillville home invasion, which is the case he pleaded guilty to on Friday.

In that case, Carpenter and others were accused of on May 26, 2013, robbing at gunpoint a Merrillville family in their home, according to court records.

One of the residents, Roger Lane, said he, his wife and sister were held at gunpoint for about two hours that day. Lane said he was told he would be killed if he didn't comply with the suspects' demands.

As the suspects ordered him to write out a check, Lane said the suspects told him that is how they made their money.

According to court records, Carpenter was identified as a person seen on video using the victim's debit card while withdrawing money.

While arguing for a 20-year sentence, Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Judith Massa described Carpenter as a domestic terrorist.

That prompted defense attorney Michael Lambert to stand up and object. Boswell noted his objection and told Massa to continue.

Massa described her frustrations at seeing the same defendants going through the system. Pointing out that Carpenter has been an alleged gang member since he was 12 years old, Massa said a message needs to be sent to the community.

Lambert argued for a 10-year sentence while referencing his client's young age.

Carpenter said it was outrageous that the state called him a terrorist for mistakes he made when he was younger.

He told Boswell he didn't have a mother or a father, and the environment he grew up in was all he knew. Still, he managed to graduate from high school and enrolled in college.

Like he told Boswell during the sentencing in the murder case, Carpenter told her, "God is not done with me."

Boswell told Carpenter he had some good qualities, but she couldn't overlook the severity of the crime.

"I want to see better from you, because I know it's in you," she said.

After imposing the 15-year sentence, Boswell asked Carpenter if he wanted to appeal her decision.

"No, ma'am," Carpenter said. "I believe it's fair."
SCHERERVILLE  An open parcel on U.S. 41 has attracted a local developer whose initial ideas about the site's use received a positive reaction from town officials last week.

Plan Commission members said they liked developer Guy Costanza's proposal to use the parcel, south of the intersection of U.S. 41 and 77th Avenue for a limited number of retail and service businesses.

The parcel, at 7771 U.S. 41, is on the east side of U.S. 41 between Drenth's Highway Garage and Stan's Auto Salvage. It has about 400 feet of frontage, Costanza told the commission.

Costanza said his current plan calls for two buildings at most, likely with one or two tenants in each.

Commission members said a limited number of tenants fit their desires.

"We're trying to stay away from strip malls," commission member William Jarvis said.

Costanza said he plans to build based on a tenant's needs, and that has led so far away from the idea of a strip mall. "I surely wouldn't speculate," he said.

Costanza said he viewed the land similarly to property he's developed in Dyer at U.S. 30 and Northwinds Drive. The highway frontage is now home to an Oil Express oil change business and an Aqua Express car wash business.

The town recently rezoned the back part of the Dyer property, on Northwinds, to allow for a public storage business.

Development of the U.S. 41 property in Schererville has been discussed in the past, and has included consideration of residential development.

"I like this better than some other things that have been presented," Commission President Tom Anderson said of Costanza's early plans.

Among the concerns is traffic problems a residential subdivision might have created for the U.S. 41 and 77th Avenue area.

Commission members mentioned the possibility of the Indiana Department of Transportation creating a middle left-turn lane on U.S. 41, and also the possibility of right-turn only ingress to and egress from Costanza's proposed development.

Last week's discussion was during a study session. Costanza will need to return to the commission when he's prepared to move forward with the project.

Also last week, the Plan Commission gave final approval to a project to remodel the BMW of Schererville dealership at 1400 U.S. 41.

Dealer Principal Kirk Cordill said the remodeling was prompted by BMW's "corporate identity standards."

It will include a new front facade, and will add showroom space and update the vehicle service center.
Lake County Sheriff's officers are seeking information in regard to the robbery of a Cedar Lake John Deere dealership early Friday morning.

Video surveillance showed two unidentified males wearing hooded sweatshirts walk into the business in the 17900 block of Wicker Avenue and later flee the scene before officers arrived.

Officers with the sheriff's department responded to the scene at 3:33 a.m. Friday after the business owner called and said a surveillance camera and alarm indicated someone had entered the building. Along with members of the Indiana State Police, officers surrounded the building and began searching the surrounding area, according to Mark Back, a spokesman for the sheriff's department. Officers saw a window on the side of the building open and some paperwork scattered on the ground near the window.

After the business owner arrived, officers with K-9s searched the scene and did not find anyone inside the business. Several areas inside had been ransacked and disturbed and $700 was missing, according to the sheriff's department. Anyone with information about the incident can call anonymously to the Report-A-Crime Hotline at 1-800-750-2746.
Our Focus

By the end of this century many of the worlds islands and coast lines will have changed or disappeared altogether, placing the lives of millions of people at risk.



These are people that live and depend on the ocean for their livelihood. Whilst changes in sea level have occurred over the long geological history of the planet, recent global observations indicate that rising sea-levels will dramatically transform many Small Island Developing States (SIDS) Arctic Communities, Island Nations and Coastal States.

One of our missions is to bring together countries, scientists, policy-makers, the civil society, the media and other stakeholders to share know-how; provide a platform for public-private partnerships and mainstream sea-level rise adaptation within country-level institutions.
GARY  Lake County Commissioner Roosevelt Allen Jr. died in his sleep at his Gary home, officials said.

Lake County Coroner Merrilee Frey said she was told about 11:50 a.m. Saturday that Allen died from natural causes while he was sleeping at his home. He was 68 years old.

The sudden death came as a surprise to many Lake County politicians who described Allen as a gentleman who made decisions based on the best interest of his constituents.

Lake County Sheriff John Buncich, who is also the chairman of the county's Democratic Party, said he was in shock after learning about Allen's death. Since news began spreading about the death, Buncich said he had been fielding calls from people throughout the state.

"It's indicative of how well respected he was," Buncich said. "He was a true gentleman, a true friend to everyone."

Frey also described Allen as a distinguished gentleman.

"He always carried himself in a professional way," Frey said. "It was always imperative to him that he did what was the right thing for the good of our community."

My heart goes out to the Allen family and to all those whose lives have been enriched because Roosevelt Allen walked amongst us and served us all. We will all miss his selfless dedication to making the world better than he found it, U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-Merrillville, said.

Allen, D-Gary, was a 1965 graduate of Roosevelt High School in Gary. He went on to study at Indiana University and DePaul University. He worked as a funeral director at Guy & Allen Funeral Directors in Gary.

In 2006, Allen was elected as 1st District county commissioner, and he was serving his third term. The district includes residents in Gary, Merrillville, New Chicago, Hobart, Lake Station and part of Crown Point.

He replaced the late Rudy Clay who had resigned in 2006 as commissioner to become the mayor of Gary. Allen had previously been a member of the Calumet Township Advisory Board.

Gary Mayor Karen Freeman-Wilson said in a prepared statement that the city was devastated by Allen's death.

"He was a exemplary government leader, an astute businessman and a great philanthropist in this community," Freeman-Wilson stated. "His heart for the citizens and city of Gary were demonstrated daily and will serve as a lasting memory of who he was."

Lake County Commissioner Gerry Scheub, D-Crown Point, said Allen didn't just care about north Lake County. Scheub said he could always count on Allen to stand for what was in the best interests of residents in the southern part of the county.

"When we talk about Lake County as a region, he truly lived that and preached it," Scheub said.

Dan Dernulc, the chairman of the county's Republican Party, said he and Allen didn't always agree on issues, but he said the two personally got along well.

He recalled joking with Allen, who was known for dressing well, about wanting to look as good as he did when he was older.

Dernulc last saw Allen Thursday for a meeting.

"He looked great," Dernulc said. "That's why I'm just totally shocked."

Lake County Commissioner Mike Repay, D-Hammond, described Allen as intelligent and passionate. Repay said Allen provided him with so much advice and input that he nicknamed him, "The Professor."

Repay said Allen had a lighter side who liked to joke around. He recalled that on Friday they had all been joking around in their office.

Like Dernulc, Repay said Allen appeared in good health. He recalled Allen gave him tips about how to stay healthy.

Repay said he thinks Allen will most be remembered for his demeanor while in office.

"His constituents knew they had a calm, cool, intelligent and thoughtful person working on their behalf," he said. "That was something that was set in stone."

Information about Allen's funeral services was not immediately available.
MERRILLVILLE | Several felony charges have been filed against a person police said is in custody in connection with a Sunday home invasion on Merrillville's west side.

Akeem S. Carpenter, 20, of Hammond, was charged with burglary, burglary while armed with a deadly weapon, armed robbery and three counts of criminal confinement.

Carpenter allegedly is one of five men who were carrying guns and wearing ski masks Sunday night when they entered a home in the 7400 block of Bigger Street, ordered three occupants into a bathroom and demanded their valuables.

During the home invasion, three of the masked men left the home and used a victim's debit card to withdraw $200 from a bank, police said. The two other men stood guard over the victims.

After the three returned, the five men ordered the victims to stay in the bathroom for 10 minutes while they fled the area with jewelry, coins, a victim's drivers license and a $3,000 check in which one of the victims endorsed at gunpoint, police said.

Video surveillance from a local People's Bank branch shows a man using a victim's debit card on Sunday to withdraw $200.

Merrillville police Sgt. Bob Morgan recognized the person in the video as Carpenter. Court records show Morgan had previous contacts with Carpenter.

Morgan also reported Carpenter drove to a Harris Bank branch in Hammond on Tuesday with a passenger in his vehicle. The passenger allegedly attempted to cash the $3,000 check taken during the home invasion. That person presented the drivers license reported stolen from the Bigger Street home, Morgan said.

Morgan believes the passenger wasn't involved in the home invasion, but the person could face charges in connection to attempting to cash the stolen check.

Morgan said he continues to collect more information about the home invasion.

"It's still a very active investigation," he said of the case.

Anyone with information about the home invasion is asked to contact Morgan at (219) 769-3531.
MUNSTER  Learning to help others less fortunate is an integral part of the education process for St. Thomas More School students, and December was a busy month for giving back to the community. Students participated in a number of activities and collections to help bring some joy to others at Christmas. Students in grades 7 and 8 participated in a collection and sorting of baby items for Catholic Charities. Approximately 200 items were sent to Catholic Charities for distribution to those served by the organization. Each year students at St. Thomas More School also contribute to the annual St. Vincent de Paul Toy Drive which serves other children in the community, ages 3 to 14.
Laughing. Was it the very last thing Abraham Lincoln did while conscious? I wondered about this as I sat in a space that is the preliminary stop in the Life Review at the Lincoln Heritage Museum in Lincoln, Ill.

The museum guest is welcomed into the state box at Fords Theatre and is seated behind Lincoln, his wife, Mary, and their guests. One sees the shadowy John Wilkes Booth approach the president, hears the roars of laughter, and anticipates the terrifying shot.

While physicians attended the fatally wounded president, while people carried his limp body across a street dense with revelers celebrating peace, while wife, son, and colleagues oscillated between shock and grief at the Petersen House, what was Lincoln  the man, the mind, the soul  experiencing?

What happened during those nine hours and nine minutes of twilight when Lincoln was held between life and death? This question gets at some of the ultimate mysteries of the human mind and the intersections of time and space and life and death.

The Lincoln Heritage Museum uses this question as a means to provide a creative approach to the familiar telling of Lincolns life. After the sound of a gunshot rings through the state box, a door slowly opens and a swooshing sound beckons the guest to walk through it. And one does. The life review begins.

Sound and light move the guest through the different periods of Lincolns 56 years, which are represented by various voices and objects. Illumination and darkness, swaying shadowy trees and eerie sounds, the soft and constant ticking of a clock, and even silence create an ambience that helps one feel as though they are traveling through this mysterious space of time that Lincoln inhabited as his life waned.

The life review at the Lincoln Heritage Museum is a thought-provoking way to take guests through the life and times of our 16th president. The journey through the scenes of Lincolns life while it hangs in the balance takes place on the second floor of the museum while the first floor is more traditional with its display of 19th century artifacts, including many items owned by Lincoln.

About a three hour drive from the Region, a trip to the museum and the life review experience can also include a visit to portions of historic Route 66, which ran through the city of Lincoln, as well as to take in additional Abraham Lincoln sites, such as the location where on Aug. 27, 1853, Lincoln the lawyer christened the town named in his honor with watermelon juice. A sculpture of a watermelon marks the spot!

The small museum on the campus of Lincoln College is an attractive destination for a one-day round trip visit or as a part of a longer visit centered on historic sites in central Illinois, including Lincolns New Salem State Historic Site, the Lincoln Tomb and War Memorials State Historic Site, and the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum and Library.
We've all felt the duality of such moments in the pits of our stomachs. You know, the jubilant butterflies of a fantastic experience coupled with a rumbling disappointment, realizing the joy must end.

Crown Point nurse and Wheatfield mom Jill Terborg felt it in spades last weekend when she had to put 7-year-old Bobo, a boy she hosted in December from a Chinese orphanage, back on a plane to his homeland.

The joy of her family's experience with Bobo is now the rocket fuel of an effort to find the little Lego-loving boy a home in the United States  perhaps even the Region.

And Terborg could use all of our help.

I wrote about Bobo in my column last Sunday, detailing his visit and ties to Terborg's family.

Jill Terborg adopted her two daughters from China, 9-year-old Ella and 7-year-old Lexie. When Lexie became Jill's daughter in 2012, she left behind her best friend, Bobo, in a Chinese orphanage housing about 300 children.

Terborg kept tabs on Bobo's whereabouts and seized the chance to host him over the holidays through Pennsylvania-based Living Hope Adoption Agency.

Bobo and Lexie reunited, the little boy experienced his first Christmas season, and now Terborg and Living Hope are on a mission to find him a forever family.

Living Hope's Adoption Director Sarah Hansen said her office has received a number of phone calls since last Sunday's column published, with folks inquiring about Bobo and looking for ways to help.

Part of the perceived challenge for people hoping to build their families through adoption is the expense, which can run about $30,000 for an international adoption from China. The cost is much the same for domestic adoptions of children here in Indiana.

But many prospective adoptive parents aren't aware of several avenues of financial help.

Living Hope is offering a $2,000 grant to help offset Bobo's adoption expenses.

Beyond that, Bobo's advocates have established an adoption aid account through the nonprofit agency Reece's Rainbow, which helps children find forever homes.

Anyone can donate to the secure account online, and the proceeds will go to the family that adopts Bobo, helping offset the expenses. As of late last week, the account was up to more than $1,200 and is expected to grow.

Adoptive parents also can claim tax credits of about $13,000 in adoption expenses on their federal tax returns, and Indiana now offers a $1,000 state income tax credit per family.

Combine those factors with some agencies that offer other grants or low-interest adoption loans, and the adoption price tag is far less intimidating.

"This all means adoption isn't so far out of reach for the middle class," Hansen said.

Now Terborg and Hansen are just waiting to see what help flows in and who may step forward to provide Bobo with a loving home.

Terborg shared again with me last week the possibility that she may adopt Bobo. But as a single mom of two daughters, she wants to see if anyone else comes forward.

The little boy, who was enamored with Lego sets and a plastic "Minions" watch he received during his Region visit, worked his way permanently into Jill Terborg's heart.

Bobo forgot to strap that "Minions" watch to his wrist last weekend before boarding a China-bound plane in Fort Wayne.

Terborg hopes to return it to him when the dream of a forever family in the United States becomes a reality.
INDIANAPOLIS  Advocates are praising Congress' recent softening of a longtime ban on federal dollars going to needle exchanges amid growing intravenous drug abuse that's spreading hepatitis and HIV in many states.

The new rules, which were in the spending bill signed last month by President Barack Obama, say that federal money still can't go to buying clean needles but can be used for other program costs in communities deemed "at risk" for significant increases in hepatitis C or an HIV outbreak.

Advocates say exchanges, which provide IV drug users with clean needles and collect used ones to reduce needle-sharing that spreads diseases among users, also help get some users into drug-treatment programs.

The change is significant, because it was backed by several Republicans who previously opposed federal funding. U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, a Kentucky Republican who heads the House Appropriations Committee, spearheaded the change because he and others realized something needed to be done to address the growing outbreaks and mounting medical costs, Rogers' spokeswoman Danielle Smoot said.

"We can't ignore the growing crisis. It's happening and we've got to make changes, and hopefully this will help save lives," she said.

Rogers' state is experiencing hepatitis C outbreaks and has the nation's highest rate of acute hepatitis C. To the north of Kentucky's biggest city, Louisville, southeast Indiana saw a record HIV outbreak fueled largely by people abusing a prescription painkiller.

There were about 200 needle-exchange programs in place in 33 U.S. states in 2014, according to The Foundation for AIDS Research.

The softened federal ban should help many of those exchanges pay employees' salaries, purchase vans to deliver clean needles to users and rent office space, said Daniel Raymond, policy director for the New York-based Harm Reduction Coalition, which provides training and technical assistance for needle exchanges across the nation.

"It's definitely a victory and I think it's a workable compromise," he said.

While the change will eventually bring millions of federal dollars into the needle exchanges, the exact amount and the number of programs won't be known for a year or more, said William McColl, director of health policy with the Washington-based advocacy group AIDS United.

The move is especially important for cash-strapped rural areas of states like Kentucky, Indiana, West Virginia and Ohio  all of which are dealing with outbreaks tied to heroin addiction and abuse of other opioids.

"They're the ones who have been struggling and the federal ban has been a huge barrier," Raymond said.

Four Appalachian states  Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia and Virginia  saw the rate of hepatitis C more than tripled between 2006 and 2012, the Centers for Disease Control said in a report released last year, and researchers have warned an HIV epidemic would likely follow if nothing is done.

That type of epidemic came to rural southeastern Indiana, where more than 180 people have tested positive for HIV. Nearly all of those cases have been in Scott County about 30 miles north of Louisville, Kentucky, in an outbreak driven largely by needle-sharing among people injecting a liquefied form of the prescription painkiller Opana.

Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, a conservative Republican who had long opposed needle exchanges as part of drug-control efforts, signed a new law last spring that gave Indiana's health commissioner authority to approve local needle exchange programs.

To date, exchanges have been approved for four Indiana counties. More than 20 other Indiana counties are planning to seek state approval for exchanges of their own and Congress' move could give some of Indiana's exchanges a boost, said Beth Meyerson, co-director of the Rural Center for AIDS/STD Prevention at Indiana University.

"For us in Indiana, and likely everywhere else, this is huge news because it allows our programs to apply for funding once it becomes available," she said.

In Kentucky, the Legislature passed a law last year that allowed local communities to set up needle exchange programs, but only the state's two largest cities, Louisville and Lexington, have so far.

Smaller counties in eastern Kentucky, which has been devastated by prescription drug abuse, have hesitated because of funding barriers and moral objections; conservatives have long believed that needle exchanges enable drug abuse.

Russ Read, founder of the Kentucky Harm Reduction Coalition, hopes Congress' shift might send a message to local politicians and health officials.

"There's just so much fear in some of these counties," he said. "Now that the feds are on board, I think that'll maybe loosen up the purse strings, and loosen up the attitudes."
The world's most-wanted drug lord was captured in a raid by Mexican Marines.

The Mexican Navy says Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was taken into custody Friday along with six other people after a raid and shootout in the seaside town of Los Mochis.

Guzman had been on the run since he escaped from a maximum security prison in July last year.

He has now been returned to that same prison.

Two armored vehicles and a cache of weapons were seized in the raid, including a loaded rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

Five other suspects were killed and six others were arrested.
A state lawmaker says damage in his district, from Hurricane Sandy has been left lingering for far too long, and he's calling on the federal government to take action. NY1's Shannan Ferry filed the following report.

The Bath House at Jacob Riis Park has seen better days. From the outside, visitors can see boarded up doors and deteriorating bricks.

Residents in the area tell NY1 that the facility has been underutilized for years. However, they say the condition has progressively gotten worse since Hurricane Sandy.

"We know that the storm hit with five feet of water and damaged all the interior," said Daniel Mundy, vice president of the Jamaica Bay Ecowatchers. "The building looks sort of derelict, quite honestly."

Now, State Assemblyman Phil Goldfeder is calling on the federal government to fund a full restoration of the bath house and the surrounding area.

The National Park Service recently started a rehabilitation project at the site to repair damage from Hurricane Sandy. They say they are also they're making the area more resilient so it can withstand future storms.

Still, Goldfeder says with more people visiting Rockaway each year, a larger-scale reconstruction is needed.

"They're trying to make the area safe, which is great, but we want them to invest real money to ensure that it's not just safe, but it's beautiful, and we owe it to the people who live here and the people who visit," Goldfeder said.

Goldfeder is also calling for a full restoration of West Pond at the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge. During Sandy, a path circling the pond was breached by storm surges.

"The breach has been in effect for three years now, and the pond, if you are a birder, it's one of the premier birding sites in the world," said Barbara Toborg, a member of the American Littoral Society.

Parks officials say they expect work to fill the breach and repair other damages at the pond to begin sometime during the fall. The agency tells us once that's underway, they'll seek funding for additional amenities like boardwalks and educational signs, which Goldfeder is also calling for.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of the Interior tells NY1 they're reviewing the assemblyman's concerns.
Welcome to the KTIC Agriculture Information blog!!! Check back here for the latest in ag news and information, from local events to international happenings and government reports that affect your operation. Please email with suggestions! -Chad Moyer, Farm Director, KTIC Radio
In 1988, something went terribly wrong with Jonathan Stanleys brain. A college junior, he was visiting a friend in New York when he suddenly suspected that secret agents were pursuing him. For three days, he raced through the citys streets and subways without food or water until the police found him penniless in a deli perched naked on a plastic milk crate.

Later, at a hospital, the diagnosis was bipolar disorder.

Well call it the epiphany, from my dads standpoint at least, Mr. Stanley recalled in a 2014 interview with NPR, the public radio network. My dad came to visit and got to see his beloved son in a straitjacket.

His father was Ted Stanley, who had made a fortune selling collectibles, and who died on Jan. 3 at 84 at his home in New Canaan, Conn. When he learned of Jonathans diagnosis, Mr. Stanley was inspired to begin giving large amounts of money to related medical and pharmaceutical research  philanthropy that led to a donation of more than $825 million, including a record single gift of $650 million, to the Broad Institute, an unconventional biomedical research collaborative in Cambridge, Mass.

Under Broads auspices, scientists from Harvard, M.I.T. and other institutions have sought the genetic and molecular causes of psychiatric disorders and the means of addressing them.
10. Maines governor denied that he was being racist when he said this week that out-of-state drug dealers come to sell heroin and half the time, they impregnate a young white girl before they leave. Paul LePage held a news conference to say that he meant to say Maine women instead of white girl. I may have had a slip of the tongue, but my heart is to protect the Maine people, he said.

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Steven H. Davis, the former chairman of Dewey & LeBoeuf, will not face another criminal trial over allegations of accounting fraud at the once mighty New York law firm, but he will remain in legal limbo for the next five years.

In a deal with Manhattan prosecutors that was formally approved on Friday, Mr. Davis agreed not to practice law in New York for five years as part of a deferred-prosecution agreement.

The signing of the agreement, which was confirmed during an appearance in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan, had been in the works for several weeks and was discussed in open court last month. Negotiations began soon after a six-month trial of Mr. Davis and two co-defendants ended in a hung jury in October after the panel deadlocked on dozens of charges.

The length of the prohibition against Mr. Daviss practicing law in New York was something of a surprise, given that he has largely been out of work since Dewey crumbled and declared bankruptcy in spring 2010.
Hyundai is recalling 155,000 2011-12 Elantra models because the electronic stability control may malfunction, suddenly reducing engine power while trying to alter the direction of the vehicle, according to a report posted in December on the website of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Hyundai blamed a malfunctioning sensor on the electronic stability control system, which is supposed to detect if the vehicle is sliding in a direction at odds with how the steering wheel is turned. The recall is necessary because the sensor may activate the electronic stability control when it is not needed, increasing the risk of a crash, the automaker told regulators. Hyundai said it was not aware of any accidents or injuries related to the defect. Some owners began complaining to regulators as early as 2013. It feels as if the auto is driving on flat wheels or on ice, a New Jersey owner wrote in 2013.
On Sept. 11, 2001, seven members of Ladder Company 20 on Lafayette Street in the NoLIta neighborhood of Manhattan were killed in the collapse of the World Trade Center, about a mile and a half away, along with seven members of Squad 18, which shared the firehouse at the time with the ladder company.

A few weeks later, during the period of mourning that followed, a purebred Dalmatian puppy showed up at the companys doorstep.

The dog, a gift from two deputies with the Monroe County sheriffs department in upstate New York, was given the name Twenty, after the ladder company.

Twenty immediately loved the fire truck, a classic Seagrave hook-and-ladder, and began accompanying the firefighters on all their calls, from raging blazes to false alarms.
Late one night in 2014, Tynneal Grant faced the kind of subterranean dilemma that often confronts New Yorkers: an absent-minded swipe of a MetroCard onto the wrong subway platform, followed by vague instructions from a ticket booth clerk about how to cross to the right one without spending another $2.50 on fare.

Ms. Grant, 33, a home designer, accidentally paid to get onto the Manhattan-bound platform of the Nostrand Avenue subway station, on the A and C lines, in Brooklyn just before midnight on June 2. A clerk sent her back to street level and toward the Far Rockaway-bound platform with the promise that someone there would help her get through without having to pay again.

But no transit worker appeared. By the end of the night Ms. Grant was in a holding cell for hopping a turnstile and, according to her testimony, being made to undress in front of a female police officer as part of a search.

The lawfulness of that search was the subject of heated questioning on Friday in an administrative trial on the fourth floor of Police Headquarters in Manhattan, where the officer, Shaquanna White, faced a departmental charge of abusing her authority by conducting an unlawful strip-search.
The death of her mother in 2011 left Tanya Nickolan inconsolable.

I still cry for her every night, said Ms. Nickolan, 44, who described her mother as her best friend and staunchest supporter. I never knew it would hurt this much.

Overwhelmed by the loss, Ms. Nickolan stayed in bed, getting up only to feed herself and her cats, and to pay bills.

After the benefits from her mothers life insurance policy ran out, Ms. Nickolan, who has bipolar disorder, could not afford the rent. She was evicted from her apartment in Rego Park, Queens, on July 30, 2014, her mothers birthday. Ms. Nickolan also put her beloved cats, her sole companions, up for adoption.

Feeling utterly alone, Ms. Nickolan attempted suicide, slicing her arms with a razor blade. She was hospitalized for two weeks and then entered New York Citys shelter system.
Berlin  ON New Years Eve, hundreds of men gathered in the plaza at the main train station in Cologne, Germany, groping and robbing scores of women as they passed by. By the end of this week the police had received 170 complaints, including 120 related to sexual assault.

Despite the fact that the attacks occurred in the center of Germanys fourth-largest city, it took days for the news to surface in the national media. Even stranger, the police seemed to know little about the attacks. No arrests were made, and authorities claimed that nearby surveillance cameras offered little help in identifying suspects. The Cologne police chief was forced from his job on Friday.

The police have since identified 31 suspects. They are a multinational lot, including Germans, a Serb and even one American. But 18 of them are asylum seekers from the Middle East and North Africa.

This latest news is merely fuel for what many Germans already suspected, and witness accounts had already indicated: that the crowd was composed largely of men of North African and Middle Eastern descent, and that they were among the one million refugees that Germany has accepted over the last year.
Just when President Obama was attempting a reasoned debate on gun control this week, Donald Trump was engaged in his latest pandering to the gun rights crowd  vowing as president to strike down laws that bar firearms from schools. My first day, it gets signed, O.K.? Mr. Trump told a campaign rally in Vermont on Thursday. My first day. Theres no more gun-free zones.

Even by Mr. Trumps standards for uninformed bombast, the vow was remarkable for its ignorance of the fact that gun-free zones have been thoughtfully approved by numerous local governments concerned about the gun violence afflicting the nation; remarkable also for the imperiousness with which he would wipe away with the stroke of a pen safety measures enacted after 20 schoolchildren and six educators were murdered three years ago in the Sandy Hook assault-rifle massacre.

It was remarkable, too, for its contrast with Mr. Obamas televised defense of his own modest gun proposals, for which he asked full and fair attention by this years presidential candidates so that all of them might rationally address genuine public concerns with the grim reality of 30,000 gun deaths every year.
Americans, who grew up watching action shows in which everybody is a good shot, tend to underestimate how much skill it takes to handle a gun. Hitting a moving target is hard. Shooting in a crisis is very hard. Hitting a moving target in a crisis is so hard we would need a word way better than very.

Police on average, for every 10 rounds fired, I think, actually strike something once or twice, and they are highly trained, Bill Bratton, New Yorks current police commissioner, once told me.

There have been armed good guys present at a number of Americas horrific mass shootings. Sometimes they fired and missed, like a security officer at Columbine High School in 1999. More often they simply froze, which was probably all to the good. During the Arizona shopping center mass shooting that wounded Representative Gabby Giffords, an armed bystander tried to help and almost accidentally shot an innocent man.

If I actually pulled a gun out, I doubt wed be safer for it, said Zach Stone.

Demanding that people know how to shoot before they get a gun is a triple winner.

The nation could find a rare moment of gun consensus by supporting safety training. Take an idea currently being proposed by an Indiana state legislator, Jim Lucas, to provide a tax credit for people who take firearms instruction. We could all get together in the middle! I am sorry to say that Mr. Lucas wont be personally joining us, since he is also sponsoring a bill to get rid of licensing requirements entirely. But nobody said this was going to be easy.

And since were awash in firearms anyway, wed be better off if people knew how to use them without hitting anything other than their target. Even Jeb Bush, in his assault on the presidents itsy-bitsy loophole-closing initiative, talked about how law-abiding citizens that are trained to be able to protect themselves creates a safer America.
glyph 559: B. F. Johnson, editor . reports on contributions to the emergence of liberty . stories of insight, courage, and action . a growing collection of evidence that a network is forming that can make a free world

Freedom Glow, as introduced by its creator and editor, B. F. Johnson, December 2015  a venture traced in patterns of light (sparks from this forge will travel)

Freedom is a state of mind. Freedoms tools are knowledge translated into action so others might know and act. Each time such an action occurs a packet of light complete with the unique frequency of an individual is emitted and each time an individual picks up a freedom tool and works it in their own life a unique packet of light with a unique wavelength is emitted. This then is Freedom Glow. We see twinkling of Freedom Glow in New Delhi and New York, in Amsterdam and Tajikistan, in Tehran and Jerusalem, in Accra and Mogadishu, in Denver and Austin around the globe and into space. Freedom Glow can be seen in art, and economics, and politics, and philosophers musings, and medicine, and scienceanywhere we care to look. Freedom Glow are the stories of one person at a time lighting a darkened world for all to see.

http://freedomglow.com

http://explorersfoundation.org/glyphery/559.html

a list of all glyphs
In the midst of death we are in life, thinks the wonderfully human Leopold Bloom, contemplating the prospect of sex among the tombstones, as he stands in a churchyard in James Joyces Ulysses.

Bloom was quoting  or rather, misquoting  from The Book of Common Prayer. But his observation was much on my mind the other night as I watched a performance based on a seemingly very different and far older religious text, The Egyptian Book of the Dead, parts of which were written 4,000 years ago.

Go Forth, which opened on Thursday night, is an elegant and energetic memorial of sorts to the African father of the woman who directed it, Kaneza Schaal, best known for her work as a performer with Elevator Repair Service. Staged in the bowels of the Westbeth Artists Community near the Hudson River, a fine place to consider existence beneath and beyond the earth, Go Forth finds an immediate and visceral strength in ancient codes of mourning.

This production, part of P.S. 122s Coil festival, was inspired by Ms. Schaals visit to Burundi for her fathers burial in 2010, an experience that led her to reassess the role of ritual in grieving. The resulting seven-scene, four-performer work she has created throbs with the anguished effort of letting go  both for those who die and those who stay behind.
WASHINGTON  Wearing a black hijab and a Pakistani ankle-length gown, Saba Ahmed lined up one morning inside the Rayburn House Office Building here, waiting to lobby members of the Armed Services Committee.

But then came a cellphone call with a request from Fox News to be interviewed about the sexual assaults in Germany, which have been ascribed to Muslim refugees. While driving to a nearby studio, Ms. Ahmed strategized with a fellow passenger and frequent ally, the Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, an evangelical minister with strong ties to the conservative establishment.

Their conversation ranged from a speaking opportunity for Ms. Ahmed at an anti-abortion rally to the possibility of her appearing before the annual convention of the Conservative Political Action Committee, provided she would not be heckled in front of cameras. The two of them also prepared for an afternoon call to Donald J. Trumps campaign manager to propose that Mr. Trump, the Republican front-runner, meet with an interfaith delegation that included imams.

The days hurly-burly typified Ms. Ahmeds intriguing, improbable and perhaps ill-fated mission of attracting Muslim voters to the Republican Party. A relative newcomer to Washington with a mercurial political past, Ms. Ahmed is the founder and leader of the Republican Muslim Coalition, a lobbying and advocacy group that has run straight into a wind tunnel of anti-Muslim invective from many Republican presidential candidates.
The authorities have deported General Jose Guillermo Garcia, who was minister of defense in El Salvador in the 1980s, after an immigration judge found that he had a role in human rights violations in that period, including in the 1980 slaying of Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero while the prelate was saying Mass in San Salvador. In a decision in February 2014, the judge found that General Garcia, a close ally of the United States during the Salvadoran civil war, should be deported for assisting numerous acts of torture and extrajudicial killing while he was command, a Department of Homeland Security news release said. An appeal by General Garcia, 82, of the lower court ruling was denied on Dec. 8. He was arrested on Dec. 17 at his home in Florida, where he had been living for many years, and was flown to San Salvador on Friday.
Antigovernment groups have occasionally clashed with state and federal officials over the use of public lands, religious rights or the regulation of firearms. Violent clashes with the government, such as in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992, and near Waco, Tex., in 1993, have at times ended in bloodshed and became rallying cries for antigovernment militants. A survey of law enforcement agencies last year, conducted by the Police Executive Forum, found that 74 percent of the 382 agencies polled cited antigovernment extremism as one of the top three terrorist threats.

Heidi Beirich, who oversees the poverty centers tracking of extremist groups, said the militia groups actions in Oregon were predictable, considering the governments response to a confrontation with Cliven Bundy, a Nevada rancher, last year. At the time, the Bundy family refused to pay the Bureau of Land Management more than $1 million in cattle-grazing fees. The government relented when an armed militia gathered on the familys ranch and a standoff ensued. Mr. Bundys son, Ammon Bundy, is among the leaders of the continuing occupation of federal land in eastern Oregon.

We believe that they were emboldened by their ability to run federal officials off at the point of a gun, Ms. Beirich said. Now, a year and a half later, there have been no prosecutions whatsoever. Pointing a gun at a federal officer is a crime.

Many Republicans who had expressed support for Mr. Bundy have condemned the takeover of the federal building.

The radicalization office was meant to monitor domestic threats, with a major focus on militia groups, particularly because Homeland Security analysts worried that these groups might be able to recruit returning military veterans. The reference to veterans, in addition to claims that the report was targeting Tea Party activists, prompted the backlash that led to the closing of the office.

Former Speaker John A. Boehner, Republican of Ohio, who was then House minority leader, criticized Ms. Napolitano for the departments failure to use the term terrorist to describe groups such as Al Qaeda, while using the same term to describe American citizens who disagree with the direction Washington Democrats are taking our nation.

After the criticism, the Homeland Security Department reduced the number of analysts who studied domestic terrorism that was unconnected to foreign threats. Last September, Jeh Johnson, the Homeland Security secretary, created the Office for Community Partnerships in order to counter violent extremism. The office works with local communities and focuses on both domestic and foreign threats, the department said.
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa  Scott Schneidermann, one of Senator Marco Rubios supporters from northwest Iowa, saw all the hallmarks of a campaign on the upswing: a rapt audience of 200, nowhere left to sit, a crush of out-of-town reporters.

The problem? The people packed into a pub in tiny Rock Rapids, five hours from here, were all there to see Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, making stop No. 9 on his six-day, 28-town bus tour across Iowa. Mr. Schneidermann, a councilman and member of Mr. Rubios local leadership team, would love to have seen the Florida senator instead. But he has not actually laid eyes on Mr. Rubio since the end of October.

Hes spent a lot of time in Des Moines and Cedar Rapids and the bigger media markets, Mr. Schneidermann said by phone, adding that he had pressed to bring Mr. Rubio back to his area to try to make the personal connections that voters in a caucus state like Iowa crave. Hes playing it like its a primary state. And thats a mistake.
A Swiss woman who was briefly abducted in 2012 was kidnapped again by suspected jihadists who scaled the walls of her home in northern Mali, the Malian authorities said Friday. The woman, Beatrice Stockly, lived in Timbuktu. No group has claimed responsibility for the kidnapping. Switzerlands Foreign Ministry said it was aware of reports of a kidnapping. Ms. Stockly was abducted in April 2012 and ended up in the hands of the extremist group Ansar Dine. She was freed about 10 days later and returned to Timbuktu. Islamists accused her of proselytizing for Christianity and warned her that she would be executed if she returned to Timbuktu.
Stephen W. Bosworth, a former American ambassador who pulled off a diplomatic coup in 1986 by persuading the Philippine dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos to allow free elections, and then personally delivered Washingtons pink slip to him when he refused to accept defeat, died on Jan. 4 at his home in Boston. He was 76.

The cause was pancreatic cancer, according to Tufts University, where Mr. Bosworth had been dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.

Mr. Bosworth served as United States ambassador to Tunisia, the Philippines and South Korea under Presidents Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. As President Obamas special representative for North Korea policy, he sought to persuade the Pyongyang government to enter into nuclear disarmament negotiations.

But his most celebrated act of diplomacy came in Manila, where the kleptocratic Mr. Marcos was ruling by martial law in the face of a communist insurgency, mounting political opposition and an eroding economy, all of which threatened not only the Marcos government but also the survival of American military bases in the Philippines.
Although some of the most reviled Mubarak-era figures were barred from running in the elections, which took place over several rounds from October to December, several other former officials, or their close relatives, have seen their political fortunes restored. Osama Heikel, a former information minister, has a seat, as does the son of Kamal al-Shazli, a former ruling party power broker. So does the sister of Hisham Talaat Moustafa, a real estate tycoon who became one of the countrys richest men under Mr. Mubarak, and who is in prison for murdering his girlfriend, a Suzanne Tamim, a Lebanese pop star.

President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi says this is part of Egypts democratic blossom, reversing the effects of the military takeover that brought him to power in 2013. With 596 seats, the Parliament is the largest in Egypts history; at least 19 parties are represented in the chamber including more women and Coptic Christians than ever before.

To critics, though, the Parliament is no more than window-dressing for his authoritarian rule  a fractured and toothless institution that marks the culmination of five years of sometimes bloody political tumult, and that represents the dashed hopes of a truly representative democracy. Were seeing the social reproduction of the old system in the worst ways, and the emergence of a new kind of establishment, said Rabab al-Mahdi, a political science lecturer at the American University in Cairo.

Certainly, the prospects for a vigorous legislature that has the authority to actually address the serious economic, social and security challenges facing Egypt are, at best, weak. The election was characterized by candidates competing to express their support for Mr. Sisi. The largest party  the Free Egyptians party, led by Naguib Sawiris, a telecommunications tycoon  holds just 11 percent of seats; more than half of the new legislators do not belong to any party.

Businessmen, former military officials and pro-government media personalities are expected to predominate.
WASHINGTON  Executives from 25 news organizations sent a letter on Friday to Secretary of State John Kerry urging him to press Iran to release the jailed Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian.

The letter said Iran should recognize that independent journalism is a fundamental human right and free Mr. Rezaian. The United States has considerable leverage with Iran right now to press that point, and we urge you to continue to do so, the executives wrote.

Mr. Rezaian, 39, was born in California and holds dual citizenship in Iran and the United States. He was convicted last year after being charged with espionage and other hostile acts. The length of his sentence has not been publicly disclosed.

Iran has never offered any evidence that even makes a pretense of justifying this imprisonment, the news executives wrote.
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Police in Shenzhen have arrested another five executives of the company responsible for the construction waste pile that collapsed and buried 77 people in the southern Chinese city last month.

The Bao'an district people's procuratorate confirmed the arrests Friday, following the earlier arrests of 11 others from the company, including a legal representative.

All 16 have been charged with negligence.

The waste pile collapsed on Dec. 20, destroying 33 buildings in the Hengtaiyu industrial zone. Fifty-eight bodies had been recovered by Wednesday, 18 days after the landslide.

A State Council investigation found the disaster was a result of work safety mismanagement rather than geological causes.
UNITED NATIONS  The government of Yemen on Friday reversed its decision to expel a United Nations representative from the country, and its envoy to the United Nations said that he hoped for better relations with the world body.

The decision to bar the United Nations human rights official from the country came as the United Nations sharply intensified its criticism of Yemens government and its most powerful backer, Saudi Arabia.

On Thursday, after Yemens announcement, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon of the United Nations said he condemned the move and said Yemen had run afoul of its international obligation to let United Nations representatives do their work. On Friday morning, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Zeid Raad al-Hussein, called on the government to allow his representative to continue his work, calling its order unwarranted, counter-productive and damaging to the reputation of the Government and its coalition partners.

Then, on Friday, Mr. Ban, through a spokesman, issued an unusually stinging statement against the military coalition led by Saudi Arabia that is seeking to rout rebels from inside Yemen, saying that its reported use of cluster bombs in heavily populated areas may amount to a war crime.
Whats the point of a literary magazine today? Thats a question I heard a lot five years ago, when my colleagues and I decided to relaunch The Paris Review.

At the time print quarterlies didnt exactly look like a going concern. The journals wed grown up on had folded or seemed to be on life support. Every month brought word that another bookstore had closed. Social media was held up as the new literary community, and the Kindle was king. Print, we heard again and again, was dead.

Worse, if you talked to editors, writers and teachers off the record, you encountered a consensus  or at least a prevalent view  that American literature itself was in decline. Short stories especially: Nobody actually wanted to read them. Nobody was learning how to write them. The savviest M.F.A. students were pouring their energies into fat historical novels  and their Facebook pages. When I told my sister I was quitting my job as a book editor to edit a magazine of stories and poems, she looked as if Id said I was running away to join the circus: a tiny, doomed, irrelevant circus.

Five years later I wont say all that has changed. But things look slightly different. We spend more time than ever on our devices, but it seems fair to say we like them less, especially when it comes to reading. E-book sales have plateaued. Bookstores have staged a modest resurgence. Turning off your phone has become a prized luxury. Over these last few years all of us, readers and writers alike, have developed a growing appreciation for what the Internet wants to take away: our time alone with the written word.
I learned about my friends sleep problems by accident. We were having a cookout with three families not long ago, and the children were off playing by themselves. The couples sat down for an adult conversation that might otherwise have turned to Hollywood, parenting or Donald Trump, when suddenly one of the women announced she had a confession: She never got to see her husband.

She said she collapsed into bed soon after the children went to sleep, then woke up wired at 4:30 a.m., anxious about work deadlines. He came home late from his job, played with the children for a time, then went to bed after 11 p.m.

Instead of finding this situation unusual, every other person at the table had a similar story. One spouse liked to meditate in the morning, another liked to binge-watch television at night; one liked reading when the house quieted down after midnight, another liked making coffee before the house got chaotic at dawn.

One thing they all had in common is that they had radically incompatible sleep schedules with their spouses. Another is that they werent sure whether this was good or bad for their relationship.
Yes, you can have dinner theater without the dinner. The Westchester Broadway Theater is now offering show-only tickets for selected performances, allowing patrons to skip the included meals at a substantial savings.

And who needs food when the stage is cooking with a well-sung Show Boat, one of the American musical theaters signal achievements? A classic since it opened on Broadway in 1927, Show Boat is one of the first grown-up musicals, a happy marriage of soaring songs by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II and gripping drama lifted from the pages of Edna Ferbers best-selling novel.

Aboard the showboat, the Cotton Blossom, are the entertainers and backstage folk who keep it running. As it turns out, their interconnected lives have quite as much romance, villainy, joy and suffering as the ones in the stock melodramas they perform as they stop at the river towns along their route. Captain Andy, the genial proprietor played by Jamie Ross, calls his showboat crew one big happy family.

But the musical doesnt spare us the river rats, country rubes and intolerant lawmen who can so easily make trouble for that family. Nor does it shy away from the appalling realities of the Cotton Blossoms time and place, 1887 to 1927 in the American South.
Oh, no, shes a predator, Ms. Pistell said. Retreat! Retreat!

Ms. Pistell was leading a lesson on organisms, and the students, who at the beginning of class had answered stomach and heart when asked what an organism was, now knew, with hints from her, that an organism is any living thing.

Ms. Pistell is among 140 visiting artists who lead arts lessons as part of Hartford Performs, a nonprofit partnership with a three-pronged focus in the school system:

 to use dance, theater, visual arts and music to teach academic subjects,

 to provide training for teachers to learn how to integrate arts into their academic lessons,

 and to fund student visits to museums, concert halls and theaters.

The initiative began six years ago, in just a few Hartford schools. After a 2014 study by Public Consulting Group concluded that students participating in the programs scored better in reading and writing than their peers, the initiative was greatly expanded. It is now serving 13,600 students from prekindergarten through eighth grade. And the partnerships board and school officials are discussing how to best increase arts integration into the citys high schools. The programs are financed by the school system and through foundation grants.

While it is valuable to have proof that integrating the arts into academic lessons improves student learning, the superintendent of Hartfords school district, Beth Schiavino-Narvaez, said the arts in and of themselves are essential to education.

When we learn things in the real world, subjects arent compartmentalized, Dr. Schiavino-Narvaez said. Hartford is so rich in arts resources. It is the first and most important thing about this partnership. It gives our children access to these critical resources that exist in the community.
It was around 2 a.m. on Saturday when police officers from the 40th Precincts anticrime unit arrived at the scene of a large brawl in the South Bronx that officials said involved dozens of people, some armed with bats, knives and guns.

Officer Sherrod Stuart and his partner, both dressed in plain clothes, plunged into the melee in an effort to break it up, but soon came under fire from a man armed with a handgun, officials said. Officer Stuart, 25, was shot in the ankle, but was able to return fire, hitting the gunman four times.

It was not immediately clear what started the violence, which broke out at what officials described as an illegal jump up party held in a rented hall at 2505 Third Avenue in the Mott Haven neighborhood. The fighting then spilled out into the street.

By the time it was over, at least five people had been stabbed. The suspected gunman and Officer Stuart were taken to Lincoln Medical and Mental Health Center. Officer Stuart, whose four-year anniversary with the New York Police Department was Saturday, is expected to recover. The suspected gunman, who was in critical condition, was identified by the police as Christopher Rice, 19. The police said Mr. Rice, who had not been charged as of Saturday afternoon, had a long criminal history that included arrests for assaulting a police officer and resisting arrest. He had appeared in court and had been allowed to leave hours before the shooting after being arrested on Friday for subway fare evasion, said William J. Bratton, the police commissioner.
You might get confused if youre looking for the Butchers Bar & Grill, a steakhouse in Williston Park that opened in November. The restaurant is more commonly known as the BBG, which is the name on the sign youll see over the door as you enter.

Once inside, youll find a backlit display of wine taps and a room of white: white walls, white tables and chairs, a whitewashed raftered ceiling and white benches with thick light brown cushions.

If the decor looks a lot like that of Kyma, the excellent Greek seafood restaurant in Roslyn, there is a reason. Two of the investing partners at BBG are co-owners of Kyma. The Roslyn restaurant is large and features bottles of white wine and a display of fresh fish on ice, while BBG, a storefront, presents diners with a centerpiece of prime beef under glass and bottles of red wine. There is also a playful display of cleavers and butchers knives on one wall and a large illustration of a steer showing the various cuts of meat on another.
Emily and Hakan Basaran enjoyed some success with Carpe Diem, their Italian restaurant in New Canaan, but the building that housed it was going to be taken over by a post office, so they looked for a new location.

They decided on a centrally located spot in neighboring Wilton and a new name, Cielo, which means sky in Italian. But they remain focused on northern Italian food, Carpe Diems specialty, and were able to keep the same chef, Victor Pastuizaca.

Cielo, now in a building formerly occupied by Luca, opened in August. The restaurant is in a small, sunny, white-walled space accented by colorful abstract photographs. As serenely pretty as Cielos tiny dining room is, its the food that commands attention, beginning with the eggplant that comes in a tomato-basil sauce with soft, crusty bread before the meal begins.
One day, when Ms. Pulinario was 7, her mother did not show up to get her from school.

Even when she was taking me to different homes, she would always pick me up, she said.

When the authorities could not find her mother, Ms. Pulinario entered foster care. She spent the next seven years in a few different homes. It was a period of growing self-hatred during which she twice tried to end her life by overdosing on sleeping pills. Things improved when she was 14. Ms. Pulinario came under the custody of Maria Rios and her son, Nelson Torres-Rios.

It was a lot of structure, which is what I needed, Ms. Pulinario said. Everything just felt right. It was a big change. I finally felt like I could set down some roots.

She grew very close to her guardians. Ms. Pulinario refers to them as her grandmother and uncle.

But in 2014, Ms. Pulinario had a breakdown that she said was brought on by overwhelming anxiety about what life would be like as she aged out of foster care. Once again, she swallowed a number of sleeping pills.

Just let me go to sleep and be at peace, she recalled of her mind-set.

Now, she looks back at that moment with regret.
Aside from the barbarism and injustice of Saudi Arabias execution of 47 men on Jan. 2, the state-sponsored killings  some by beheading  bucked a strong trend against capital punishment in most of the world. According to the annual report of Amnesty International, executions were carried out in 22 countries in 2014, the year covered; there were 25 in 2004. The total number of people known to have been executed also fell. To its disgrace, the United States was still among the five countries that most often used capital punishment  alongside China, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Iraq  but the number of executions in America continued to decline.

Amnestys report said an alarming number of countries that carried out the death penalty in 2014 were responding to perceived threats to state security, the major factor in most of the Saudi executions. Pakistan resumed the execution of civilians after an attack by the Taliban on a Peshawar school, and China  which is thought to have the most executions of any country but keeps the number secret  used the death penalty in response to ethnic violence in the Xinjiang region. In Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia and in Shiite-ruled Iran, death sentences often derive from a stern interpretation of Islamic law.

Image Iranians protested the execution of Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr in Tehran, Iran. Credit... Abedin Taherkenareh/European Pressphoto Agency

But there is no compelling evidence that the death penalty deters crime, whether murder or terrorism. And absent deterrence, what remains is just vengeance.
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Chinese Vice Premier Liu Yandong met with foreign scientists winning this year's International Cooperation Award in Science and Technology Friday.

The seven recipients were Jan-Christer Janson from Sweden, Kazuki Okimura from Japan, Evgeny Velikhov from Russia, Peter J. Stang and Walter Ian Lipkin from the United States, Carlo Rubbia from Italy and Joannes E. Frencken from the Netherlands.

Liu presented certificates and thanked them for their contributions.

"The world is facing climate change, grain security, public health and other global challenges and risks that demand cooperation and joint tackling between countries," she said.

Stressing that "science has no borders," Liu urged Chinese and foreign scientists to cooperate more so as to benefit the whole human race.

She vowed that the Chinese government will create more opportunities for cooperation in science and technology, import high-caliber overseas talent and create a better environment for their career development here.

Since 1995, China has given the International Cooperation Award in Science and Technology to 101 foreign scientists and two international organizations.
A case the Supreme Court will hear on Monday morning threatens to undermine a four-decade-old ruling that upheld a key source of funding for public-sector unions, the last major bastion of unionized workers in America.

In the 1977 decision Abood v. Detroit Board of Education, the justices ruled that public unions may charge all employees  members and nonmembers alike  for the costs of collective bargaining related to their employment. For nonmembers, these are known as fair-share fees. But nonmembers may not be compelled to pay for the unions political or ideological activities.

The Abood ruling was a sensible compromise between the states interest in labor peace and productivity and the individual workers interest in his or her freedom of speech and association. Before the decision, strikes and labor unrest in the public sector were far more common, as workers struggled to have their voices heard in the absence of meaningful organized representation.

Stronger unions have not only helped ensure that essential public services are more efficient and effective; they have also led to higher wages and better benefits for workers. According to a report by the Economic Policy Institute, public employees in states with fair-share fees enjoy nearly the same compensation as their private-sector counterparts, while those in states that have banned such fees get 9 percent less.
ON New Years Eve, in the shadow of Colognes cathedral, crowds of North African and Middle Eastern men accosted women out for the nights festivities. They surrounded them, groped them, robbed them. Two women were reportedly raped.

Though there were similar incidents from Hamburg to Helsinki, the authorities at first played down the assaults, lest they prove inconvenient for Angela Merkels policy of mass asylum for refugees.

That delay has now cost Colognes police chief his job. But the German government still seems more concerned about policing restless natives  most recently through a deal with Facebook and Google to restrict anti-immigrant postings  than with policing migration. Just last week Merkel rejected a proposal to cap refugee admissions (which topped one million last year) at 200,000 in 2016.

The underlying controversy here is not a new one. For decades conservatives on both sides of the Atlantic have warned that Europes generous immigration policies, often pursued in defiance of ordinary Europeans wishes, threaten to destabilize the continent.
After he got sick, the local medical assistants and the on-and-off clinic couldnt help him. Finally his mother got special permission for him to leave the camp to be hospitalized, but by then it was too late. After two days, he came back as a corpse, his mother said.

A hundred feet from his hut, another family is also mourning. Bildar Begum, a 20-year-old woman, contracted hepatitis A, according to neighbors. Hepatitis A is normally not life-threatening, but she, too, couldnt get the medical help she needed, and so she died late last year, leaving a 2-year-old son, Hirol.

If she was not Rohingya, she would surely still be alive, I can say that 100 percent, said Enus Monir, a community leader.

And now Hirol is starving: At 28 months, he weighs just 19 pounds. On the World Health Organization weight-to-age sheets, he is off the charts. The minimum on the charts is the third percentile, and Hirol is far below that.

Some of the families in the camp have substantial savings in the banks in Sittwe a few miles away. But because they have been locked up since 2012, they cant access their own bank accounts to feed their families.

The global response has been pathetic. Partly thats because Myanmar makes it difficult for aid groups and journalists to see the Rohingya, so that they are largely invisible.
IN a typical presidential campaign, the most successful candidates lay claim to leadership with their high-mindedness. They reach for poetry. They focus on lifting people up, not tearing them down. They beseech voters to be their biggest, best selves.

Not the two front-runners in this freaky Republican primary. Theyre unreservedly smug. Theyre unabashedly mean.

If youre not with them, youre a loser (Donald Trumps declaration) or youre godless (Ted Cruzs decree, more or less). They market name-calling as truth-telling, pettiness as boldness, vanity as conviction. And their tandem success suggests a dynamic peculiar to the 2016 election, a special rule for this road:

Obnoxiousness is the new charisma.

Sure, weve had contenders like them before. But two on top at the same time? And two with this degree of stridency, this deficit of dignity?

Cruz just finished up a dominant week, besting Trump in a poll of California Republicans, drawing swarms of reporters to his bus tour through Iowa, prompting ever surer predictions of triumph in that state.
Avila, Spain  I made the mistake of falling for a man who wants a wife. I should clarify that I do not mean he wants me to be his wife. Men dont look at me and think Id make good wife material. Maybe because of how much I swear. But I go to Berlin to see him, he tells me his future plans for marriage and family, and I understand that I am not compatible with those plans. Then I flee, to huddle in the backs of cathedrals, an impulse that I do not fully understand.

I am not Catholic, and yet I find myself drawn to the women saints. There is something about them that I admire. Maybe it is simply the lengths to which they went to avoid marrying. When St. Catherines mother said her hair would surely attract a good suitor, she cut all of it off. When St. Lucias pursuer said she had lovely eyes, she cut them out and presented them to him. (What, I imagine her asking him as he screamed. I thought you said you liked them.) Then theres St. Olga of Kiev, whose feast day is my birthday. Emissaries came to her and suggested she marry their prince. She had them all buried alive.

After another disastrous visit with the man in Berlin, I got on a plane and came to Avila, Spain, on a pilgrimage to St. Teresa, the 16th-century mystic nun and philosopher. The town was celebrating her 500th birthday with banners of her poetry and a whole year of events. She did not have to remove any body parts to stay unmarried, nor murder scores of men. She did have to defy her family, though. As well as what she thought she wanted out of life, which was love. But she had watched her mother slowly die through pregnancy after pregnancy, her body weakening with each child, and she saw that this was her wifely duty.

Teresa did not want to be reduced to merely a body, bred and sacrificed for the sake of her husband and children. If she had to choose between being a body and a brain, she would choose to be a brain. So she entered the church  the only way a woman could become a philosopher.
When an international team of researchers asked some 2,300 people in 58 countries to respond to a single question  How can you tell when people are lying?  one sign stood out: In two-thirds of responses, people listed gaze aversion. A liar doesnt look you in the eye. Twenty-eight percent reported that liars seemed nervous, a quarter reported incoherence, and another quarter that liars exhibited certain little giveaway motions.

It just so happens that the common wisdom is false  and we need psychologists in order to make that determination. What researchers who study ways of detecting deception, like Leanne ten Brinke, a psychologist at the University of California, Berkeley, will tell you is that the signs people associate with liars often have little empirical evidence to support them. Therein lies the psychologists distinct role and her necessity. As a writer, you look in order to describe, but you remain free to use that description however you see fit. As a psychologist, you look to describe, yes, but also to verify.

Without verification, we cant always trust what we see  or rather, what we think we see. Whether were psychologists or writers (or anything else), our eyes are never the impartial eyes of Chekhovs chemist. Our expectations, our wants and shoulds, get in the way. Take, once again, lying. Why do we think we know how liars behave? Liars should divert their eyes. They should feel ashamed and guilty and show the signs of discomfort that such feelings engender. And because they should, we think they do.

The desire for the world to be what it ought to be and not what it is permeates experimental psychology as much as writing, though. Theres experimental bias and the problem known in the field as demand characteristics  when researchers end up finding what they want to find by cuing participants to act a certain way. Its also visible when psychologists choose to study one thing rather than another, dismiss evidence that doesnt mesh with their worldview while embracing that which does. The subjectivity we tend to associate with the writerly way of looking may simply be more visible in that realm rather than exclusive to it.

IN 1932, when he was in his 70s, Freud gave a series of lectures on psychoanalysis. In his final talk, A Philosophy of Life, he focused on clarifying an important caveat to his research: His followers should not be confused by the seemingly internal, and thus possibly subjective, nature of his work. There is no other source of knowledge of the universe but the intellectual manipulation of carefully verified observations, he said.

Intuition and inspiration, he went on, can safely be counted as illusions, as fulfillments of wishes. They are not to be relied on as evidence of any sort. Science takes account of the fact that the mind of man creates such demands and is ready to trace their source, but it has not the slightest ground for thinking them justified. Freud may have looked as a writer, but as a psychologist he had learned to distrust what he saw.
Rick Cluchey had never been in a theater  not even to rob one, as he was fond of saying  before he was convicted of armed robbery when he was 21 and sentenced to life in prison.

But his life began to change for the better when the San Francisco Actors Workshop performed Waiting for Godot, directed by Herbert Blau, at San Quentin State Prison in November 1957. Thus began the unlikely redemptive arc of Mr. Clucheys adulthood, one that led him out of jail and toward a career as an actor and playwright, most notably as a protege of Samuel Beckett and an interpreter of his cryptic work.

He died at 82 on Dec. 28 in Santa Monica, Calif. His wife, Nora Masterson, said the cause was complications of congestive heart failure, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and emphysema.

Stirred by an intuitive appreciation of the comically grim appraisal of life in Godot, Mr. Cluchey (pronounced CLOO-shee) became something of a Beckett savant. He began acting, performed in several Beckett plays while still in prison, and eventually met the playwright in the mid-1970s in Paris.
FLINT, Mich.  A caravan of Genesee County sheriffs office cruisers snaked its way through the streets here on Thursday, doling out water filters and jugs of water to frustrated and terrified residents who have been trying to cope for more than a year with the public health crisis that has been flowing out of their taps.

Shortly after officials switched the source of their drinking water to the Flint River from Lake Huron in April 2014 to save money, residents started complaining that their tap water looked strange, tasted bad and caused rashes. But not until the fall of 2015, when the water was found to have elevated levels of lead that were reflected in childrens blood, did state officials swing into action.

Now they are scrambling to address a situation that has endangered the health of Flints children and generated untold costs and anxiety.

Its ridiculous we have to live in such a way, said Colette Brown, a Flint native who months ago stopped drinking tap water. She said the filter at her home needed a replacement cartridge.
The chickens have come home to roost, Mr. Buchanan said. Putting the party back together again will be very hard after this nomination race. I think the party is going to shift against trade and interventionism, and become more nationalist and tribal and more about protecting the border.

Anger and alienation have been simmering in Republican ranks since the end of the George W. Bush administration, at first over policy and then more acutely over how the party should respond to the countrys changing demography.

While party leaders like Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina say Republicans are in a demographic death spiral and will not survive unless they start appealing to Hispanics and young people, many voters see such statements as a capitulation. They hunger for an unapologetic brand of conservatism that would confront rather than acquiesce to the political establishment  sentiments that have been amplified by conservative talk radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh and commentators like Ann Coulter, whose verbal broadsides influence the partys agenda.

All the things the voters want have been shoved off to sidelines by Republican leaders, said Laura Ingraham, a talk-show host who was a force behind the primary election defeat of Eric Cantor, then the House majority leader, in 2014. And the voters finally have a couple of people here who are saying this table has to be turned over.

The splits within the party would be difficult to heal no matter the nominee. If an establishment candidate wins the nomination, the highly energized voters backing Mr. Trump and Mr. Cruz may revolt; about two-thirds of Trump supporters would vote for him as a third-party candidate, according to a Suffolk University/USA Today poll last month  a possibility that could help the Democratic nominee. If Mr. Cruz is nominated, he will have to win over party leaders while not appearing to be selling out to his anti-establishment supporters. A Fox News poll released on Friday found that 66 percent of Cruz supporters in Iowa felt betrayed by politicians in their party.

If party leaders backed Mr. Trump, they would have to conduct campaigns in parallel universes, supporting a candidate who has said he wants to deport illegal immigrants en masse and temporarily bar Muslims from the country, while simultaneously trying to diversify their predominantly white male base.
MEXICO CITY  After long resisting requests from Washington, the Mexican government is moving toward extraditing Joaquin Guzman Loera, the Mexican drug lord known as El Chapo, to the United States to face drug and murder charges there, Mexican officials said on Saturday.

The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, said the process could take months as it goes through the judicial system. On Saturday, the attorney general of Mexico, Arely Gomez Gonzalez, said for the first time that the government took preliminary steps to proceed with Mr. Guzmans extradition as far back as July, shortly after his escape from prison.

Mr. Guzmans lawyers are expected to fight extradition to the United States, where he faces at least seven indictments in federal courts on charges of drug trafficking and murder.

Mr. Guzman, who escaped from prison last year, was captured on Friday after a gun battle near the coast in his home state, Sinaloa. His capture was the culmination of a monthslong manhunt in the mountains of the so-called Golden Triangle, a rugged area in the northwest of the country. After an intense gunfight in the coastal city of Los Mochis, Mr. Guzman was captured attempting to flee in a vehicle with one of his top lieutenants. By late Friday he was en route to the same prison he escaped from in July.
Women hold up placards that read "Mrs. Merkel: Where are you? What are you saying? This worries us!" during a protest in front of the Cologne Cathedral, Germany, January 5, 2016. [Photo/Agencies]

During a jittery new year's eve in Europe, as everyone had their midnight glass of wine while the Brussels police had an orgy and Munich was shut down due to terror threats which thankfully never materialized, I had a mundane discussion in a classified simulation board, regarding threat analysis and the future of the EU in thecoming year. The European Union, the greatest achievement of borderless human movement in the modern history of mankind and a new world order, bereft of national conflict for a quarter of century, is crumbling in a slow march to death. Among the other serious hotspots of the world, including the Middle East, the Latin America and the African continent, Europe remained an oasis of peace, even with its stagnated growth. All that shockingly changed last year with the Ukrainian war, the largest human migration since the Second World War, the Greek debacle, and the inevitable ultra-right backlash.

The biggest discussion was about the dynamics between Germany and Russia. Recently, German banks were accused of being a front for Russian money laundering, even after the EU imposed sanctions on Russia following the Crimean annexation, a move that sent shockwaves to German allies across Europe.

Germany, since the end of the Second World War, was instrumental in building an image of tolerance, moral high ground and benevolent global citizenship, and this skullduggery was not expected from the Germans, not least with Russia. Similarly, Germany recently was accused of a corrupt Gas pipeline deal with Russia's state owned Gazprom, and that is not going down well with anyone in the EU. Germany is trying to portray the Nordstream 2 project as a project strictly in the market sense, which, according to Germans, doesn't reflect the societal revulsion to Vladimir Putin's latest geopolitical maneuvers.

This argument doesn't make sense, and many people have called the bluff. According to Anders Aslund, Swedish economist from the Atlantic Council, this is an outright lie, as Putin is very clear about his motivations to use Gazprom as a means of bypassing the sanctions, and using the oil revenues to shore up Russia's slugging economy. Consumption in the EU has fallen over 21 percent, according to the WSJ and it doesn't even make practical sense.

While that is true, one needs to understand the German motivation for this act, and the European situation broadly. Europe now has a Damocles sword hanging over its head. The Central and Eastern European countries are almost on open revolt regarding the European policies on accepting millions of migrants from Arab countries as well as Africa where there are literally no wars going on. Hungary and Poland are ruled by ultra conservative, xenophobic, Euro skeptic populist parties. Even in countries where right wingers are not in power yet, there is backlash against migration. The causes of these are due to the insular cocooned nature of Central and Eastern European societies, and it underscores the irony of migration in which the Europeans themselves have undertaken. However, this is beyond the point.

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COLOGNE, Germany  As Chancellor Angela Merkel proposed tougher laws regulating asylum seekers in the wake of the New Years Eve assaults on scores of women in Cologne, the city again bristled with violent tension on Saturday.

The scene near the square where the assaults occurred was a tableau of the doubts and perils coursing through Germany with the arrival of more than a million migrants in the past year.

In the afternoon, the police clashed with right-wing protesters opposed to Islam while leftists rallied against sexism and nationalism.

Earlier, Ms. Merkel met leaders of her Christian Democratic Union in the southwestern city of Mainz and sounded the more stringent tone she has adopted since word of the New Years Eve assaults spread last week.
Some of the collectors willing to buy black-market artifacts are believed to be in Persian Gulf countries. But many others, experts say, are in the West.

There appears to be an interesting geographic divide: Pre-Islamic objects go to Europe and North America, while Islamic art goes to countries of the gulf, said Markus Hilgert, director of the Museum of the Ancient Near East in Berlin, who is coordinating a research project on the illicit trade.

A recent report by the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies observed of customers in the West, The main buyers are, ironically, history enthusiasts and art aficionados in the United States and Europe  representatives of the Western societies which I.S. has pledged to destroy.

Some objects have been shown fleetingly by middlemen in photographs on cellphones, using applications like WhatsApp. Andreas Schmidt-Colinet, an emeritus professor at the Institute of Classical Archaeology at Vienna University, said he had seen images online purporting to be of funeral reliefs from Palmyra, the ancient city in Syria now controlled by the Islamic State. Images of other similar artifacts have also surfaced in catalogs offered by antiquities dealers, he said, but so far there is no evidence of their authenticity.

Since 2011, the authorities in Turkey have seized 6,800 objects, a majority of them coins, and are holding them in regional museums until their origins can be determined, according to Necati Anaz, the deputy manager of the International Center for Terrorism and Transnational Crime in Ankara. Dr. Anaz said the challenge was that many of the smallest objects could easily be carried in bags or in clothes.

In the United States, there has not yet been a documented case of a looted object linked to the Islamic State, according to officials from several agencies. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau of the Department of Homeland Security repatriated more than 80 objects in March 2015 in a ceremony at the Iraqi Consulate in Washington, but they had been taken during the American-led war in Iraq.
MADRID  The Catalan separatist parties on Saturday reached an 11th-hour agreement to replace the leader of the region, Artur Mas, and avoid new elections that risked derailing Catalonias push to secede from the rest of Spain.

Under the accord, Mr. Mas will step aside and be replaced by Carles Puigdemont, who is the mayor of the Catalan city of Girona. The agreement ends more than three months of feuding among separatist parties over who should lead the next regional government.

Mr. Mas on Saturday described his decision as painful and emphasized that he planned to remain in politics, even if he was no longer in charge of the regional government and its secessionist movement. At a news conference, he also offered words of praise for his party colleague, Mr. Puigdemont, saying, He understands very clearly the country project, knows that Catalonia is a nation and has the right to decide and that its appropriate for Catalonia to use the right to self-determination in order to have its own state.

Mr. Mas had failed to convince the far-left Popular Unity Candidacy party  known by its Catalan acronym, CUP  to allow him to stay in office after regional parliamentary elections on Sept. 27 in which a separatist coalition of parties won, but not with enough seats to form a government without support from the CUP.
It is inconceivable that the thinking that we hold most sacred should cause the entire Islamic world to be a source of anxiety, danger, killing and destruction for the rest of the world, Mr. Sisi warned.

But Mr. Beherys ideas offended the scholars at Al Azhar, who accused him of violating the foundations of Islam and, with others, brought a slew of court cases against him. One of those cases resulted in a criminal prosecution, and on Dec. 28 Mr. Behery began serving a one-year sentence.

Egypt is the country of injustice, Mr. Behery wrote in a Facebook post before he was imprisoned.

The prosecution appeared to signal the limits of Mr. Sisis approach to modernizing Islam. Al Azhar, which is state-funded, has hewed closely to Egypts rulers for the past six decades, yet at the same time jealously defended its position as Egypts premier authority on Islam.

Some clerics appeared to take Mr. Sisis speech last year as an attack on the integrity of Al Azhar itself, said Nathan J. Brown, a professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University who specializes in the Middle East.

For people within Al Azhar, there was something remarkable and distasteful about a president and a general lecturing them about religion, he said. You saw some pushback, in the form of a proxy struggle. Then there was the episode with Islam Behery.

Still, the relationship between the different arms of the Egyptian state is notoriously hard to read, and some experts see the court prosecution as an example of Al Azhar flexing its institutional muscle. In public, Al Azhar has always been loudly supportive of Mr. Sisi.

Shortly after the takeover, the grand imam of Al Azhar, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, sat by the generals side at his inaugural news conference.
 Flash

An Arab-Israeli perpetrator of a deadly shooting spree in Tel Aviv was shot and killed by police in northern Israel on Friday, following a week-long manhunt, security officials said.

The police has confirmed that Nashat Melhem, 31, "was located and killed" near a mosque in the town of Arara, his northern hometown.

Police surrounded the building, calling him to surrender himself. Melhem shot towards the police while stepping out of the building and then was shot dead.

Channel 2 TV news said Melhem was caught thanks to neighbors who informed the security forces of his presence.

Earlier on Friday, police deployed large forces in Tel Aviv and Wadi Ara, a region of many Arab towns, including Arara.

Minister of Interior Security Gilad Erdan said forces with the police, army, border police, and the Shin Bet security service took part in the manhunt.

Melhem's shooting spree took place on Dizengoff street, an area of pubs and restaurants, on a busy noon hour last Friday. He opened fire with a submachine gun, killing two men and wounding eight others. He escaped the scene before police arrived.

On Wednesday, police said he is also suspected of killing an Arab-Israeli taxi driver. He apparently killed the driver as the taxi approached a police barricade, less than an hour after the attack at the pub.

The incident came amid three months of Israeli-Palestinian violence, which has claimed the lives of at least 139 Palestinians and 23 Israelis.
SACRAMENTO  Gov. Jerry Browns proposed $122.6 billion California budget plan would seem to please Democratic interests by pumping billions of tax dollars generated by the booming state economy into public schools and universities, health care for the poor and public infrastructure.

Instead, Democratic legislative leaders and advocacy groups saw what was left out.

A laundry list of critical needs remains, said Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins, D-San Diego.

For state lawmakers from both parties and the groups that lobby them, the general fund spending the Democratic governor outlined Thursday is merely a starting point in a months-long tug-of-war over funding.

Sen. Holly Mitchell, D-Los Angeles, was upset the plan did not increase maximum payouts to families in the welfare-to-work program, which she called impossibly tiny.

Chris Hoene, executive director of the California Budget & Policy Center, which advocates for low-income families, said Browns budget is a missed opportunity to use the states strong revenues to boost key public investments that help individuals and families advance, such as child care and preschool, welfare-to-work services, affordable housing, and higher education.

Union leaders also blasted the plan in an email with a subject line of Caregivers, Seniors, and People With Disabilities Deserve Better.

Shamus Roller, executive director of Housing California, a group that backs affordable housing, said, Governor Brown proposed a budget that provides no new help for the many people struggling to stay in their homes.

And the Childrens Defense Fund-California accused the governor of using the threat of future recession to justify not making critical investments of our most vulnerable children today.

Under Browns proposal for 2016-17, Californias general fund would climb to a record high. Combined with special funds and bond money, overall spending would climb to $170.7 billion  a staggering figure bolstered by Californias capital gains windfall as Silicon Valley booms.

But Brown warned that the economic boom will not last.

The state faced a $26 billion budget deficit when Brown took office in 2011, forcing deep cuts to social welfare programs, schools and universities.

At his budget briefing Thursday, he held up charts, one saying balanced budgets have been quickly followed by huge deficits and another that more permanent spending combined with recession would be devastating.

Everybody thinks when theyre up here, its all wonderful, he said, pointing to a soaring revenue peak. Thats what they thought before the dot-com (bust), and thats what they thought before the mortgage meltdown.

Brown called for the state to put $3.5 billion into its voter-approved rainy day fund  $2 billion more than the law requires.

Brown also touted his income tax credit for the poor, a cost-of-living increase for elderly, blind and disabled people who receive supplemental income from the state, and more funding for universities and colleges but said the state cant meet every demand.

Its not a candy store where you can pick out whatever you want, he said.

His proposal also includes a $1.1 billion compromise on a new tax on health insurers to ensure continued federal funding for Medi-Cal, which Republicans said was unnecessary thanks to the burgeoning tax revenues.

Medi-Cal is projected to cover 13.5 million people by 2017, nearly a third of the states population. Supporters were disappointed the governor once again opted not to raise reimbursement for providers in the program, which were cut by 10 percent during the recession, leading to a shortage of doctors in the program.

Additional funding for the University of California and California State University systems in Browns budget plan would keep tuition flat for another year, while K-12 schools and community colleges see the largest share of revenues by far: $71 billion, which would push per-pupil spending to $10,591.

The California Chamber of Commerce, which has often found an ally in the Brown administration, thanked Brown for leadership and vision.

We are pleased that the governor underscored his commitment to long-term budget stability and protecting the states solvency, president Allan Zaremberg said in a statement. His call for budget restraint should comfort Californians from the threat of new taxes.

Still, Republicans have ideas as well for the budget surplus.

The backbone of Californias economic engine, agriculture and reliable energy, is suffering, Senate Minority Leader Jean Fuller, R-Bakersfield, said in a statement. Furthermore, we cant take our roads and water delivery system for granted and must address these fundamental needs that are in distress.
Nearly three decades after Santa Ana transient Kenneth Clair landed on Californias death row, the convicted killer quietly has received a reprieve and no longer faces execution.

Clair, the subject of a viral social media campaign that has attracted 152,000 supporters, now will serve a sentence of life without parole because of errors made by his defense attorney during his trial, according to court documents obtained by The Orange County Register.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals secretly overturned Clairs death sentence in March and sealed the records. The three-judge panel, however, upheld Clairs conviction for the 1984 murder of a Santa Ana nanny and noted conflicting DNA evidence uncovered since his trial.

Orange County prosecutors said Friday they wont retry the trials penalty phase or challenge the appellate ruling, which the court sealed because of concerns Clair might be attacked in prison because of his history.

We made this decision months ago in consultation with the state Attorney Generals Office, said Senior Deputy District Attorney Scott Simmons. He cited the age of the case, as well as the difficulty in locating witnesses.

Prosecutors are trying to determine whether Clair, currently at San Quentin Prison, needs to come back to Orange County to be resentenced.

Clair was 25 and living in an abandoned house next door to the victim when police arrested him in the strangulation death. He had been out of prison for a year after serving six years for purse snatching. Clair was sentenced to death in 1987.

For more than a decade, private investigator C.J. Ford has championed Clairs cause, arguing his innocence to mostly deaf ears.

Since November, Fords efforts gained attention online amid Orange Countys nationally watched informant controversy and allegations that prosecutors and police misused jailhouse snitches and withheld evidence.

Although Clairs case does not involve jailhouse informants, his supporters contend his conviction is an example of the Orange County District Attorneys Offices win-at-all-costs mentality.

Ford launched his petition to free Clair on Change.org. He struck a chord.

People from across the nation have signed the online document  more than the signatures collected on another petition supporting two prison inmates featured on Netflixs Making a Murderer.

Ford said Friday he plans to take the signatures supporting Clairs release to Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas next week.

Ford was unaware, until contacted Friday by a Register reporter, that Clairs death sentence had been overturned in March.

The reason: During his trial, Clairs defense attorney failed to present evidence that he was repeatedly raped behind bars as a teenager during his previous prison stint for purse snatching. Such evidence may have swayed the jury toward compassion, the appellate court found.

Julian Bailey, Clairs attorney at the time and now an Orange County Superior Court judge, conceded in court documents he could have done a better job on what was his first death penalty case.

I did not adequately prepare for a penalty phase in this case because of a combination of inexperience and overconfidence, Bailey said, according to the appellate ruling. I did not ask the right questions of [Clair], his family, myself or my investigator to obtain an adequate understanding of my client and his case.

Bailey could not be reached for comment Friday.

The appeals court called Baileys performance during the trials penalty phase subpar, virtually without value and woefully incompetent. Justices noted that Bailey barely looked at Clairs prison history and interviewed him only once.

Clairs life is no longer on the line. But supporters insist he is innocent. They contend he deserves to be exonerated in the killing of 25-year-old Linda Faye Rodgers because of DNA evidence found at the crime scene that belongs to someone other than Clair.

He didnt commit the crime, so he shouldnt be in jail for life, Ford said. The D.A. doesnt have a case. Period. They dont want to go back to court and lose.

For more than seven years, Rackauckas has known that DNA evidence taken from Rodgers body does not belong to Clair. Prosecutors maintain there is ample evidence of his guilt.

They have declined to discuss the nature of the disputed evidence and, backed by a Superior Court judge, declined to release to the defense the identity of the person tied to the DNA evidence. Prosecutors on Friday said they could not talk further about the case because of a gag order by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The refusal to exonerate Clair has triggered a storm of protests on social media since November.

Im signing in this matter because DNA evidence should not in any case be held back, wrote Robert Harol of Tustin at change.org. There are too many people in jail because of this type of corruption in the justice system.

The desire of prosecutors to win rather than serve justice is destroying our legal system, wrote Efrem Lipkin of Berkeley. Evidence is hidden, plea bargains driven by threats of long sentences, destroy(ing) innocent lives.

For 28 years, Clair has been imprisoned on a case filled with contradictory evidence.

Rodgers was strangled with her own clothing, stabbed and bashed on the head in the Santa Ana house where she worked. She died from strangulation.

Her 5-year-old daughter and four other children were in an adjacent room when the killer struck, splattering blood on the walls and floor with a knife taken from the kitchen.

One of the children, age 5, told police the culprit was a white man and had been in the house earlier, demanding money. Clair is black. The child, years later, recanted at the behest of his mothers husband, who was a member of a white motorcycle gang, according to appeals court records and news reports.

The appeals court opinion noted the victim had threatened to call police on her employer for allegedly selling drugs from the house.

About a week before the killing, the house was burglarized, with $450 stolen from a coffee can.

Clair, a transient, had been living next door to the victim in an abandoned house. He had been arrested on suspicion of the burglary and released a few hours before the killing.

Prosecutors based the murder case, in part, on the testimony of Clairs ex-girlfriend, who said he showed her items taken from the house during the killing. She also wore a wire, which recorded Clair equivocating when asked why he killed Rodgers. He didnt deny the murder but falls short of confessing, according to the recording.

They can run hair fibers until the cows come home; theyre not going to walk away from that tape, former prosecutor Mike Jacobs said in a 2008 interview.

Clair can be heard on the recording saying: They cant prove a  thing, not unless you open your  mouth.

When the woman said she saw blood on him the night of the killing, he replied, Aint on me no more. The girlfriend later recanted some of her statements.

Contact the writer: tsaavedra@ocregister.com
SANTA ANA  An Arizona mother who promised her two children a relaxing beach vacation but instead smothered them to death in a Santa Ana motel room was sentenced Friday to life in prison without parole.

The sentence against 44-year-old Marilyn Kay Edge was handed down in Orange County Superior Court.

Im sorry for failing my children as their mother  and believing this was the only choice I had to protect them, Edge said during the sentencing. I pray they (the victims family members) get peace.

In what prosecutors called a horrific and tragic case, Edge subdued 10-year-old Faith and 13-year-old Jaelen, using cough syrup and then killed them on Sept. 13, 2013, at the Hampton Inn and Suites in Santa Ana.

While Edge was eligible for the death penalty, the Orange County District Attorneys Office instead opted for a life sentence.

Edge pleaded guilty to the murders in December.

Three days before the murders, prosecutors said Edge lost custody of Faith and Jaelen at a family court hearing in Georgia, where her ex-husband lives.

Edge was ordered to hand over custody of the children on Sept. 15, but instead she drove with her children to Arizona and then California under the false pretense that they were going on a family vacation, prosecutors said.

Hours after she killed her son and daughter, Edge attempted to commit suicide by driving into an electrical box outside a hardware store in Costa Mesa, prosecutors said. She instead crashed into a protective pole and was arrested by Costa Mesa police.

While officers tried to get her out of the car, they said Edge attempted to strangle herself with an electrical cord. Officers eventually broke a window and forcibly removed her from the vehicle, according to grand jury testimony.

Edge told the police officers that Jaelen and Faith were dead at the Hampton Inn.

Dr. Yong-Son Kim, a forensic pathologist, testified to the grand jury that an autopsy revealed Faith died from smothering but also had an elevated level of a drug called diphenhydramine in her system, consistent with an over-the-counter sleep aid.

Jaelen, who also suffered from severe autism, died from a combination of drowning and smothering, Kim said. Police found the children in a bathtub in the hotel room.

Senior Deputy District Attorney Larry Yellin told the grand jurors that Edge had planned the murders and took the children to California for a good time for their last day.

She decided that rather than do what the court had ordered, she was going to kill her children and herself, he said.

Staff Writer Kelly Puente and City News Service contributed to this report.

Contact the writer: 714-796-7767 sschwebke@ocregister.com Twitter: @thechalkoutline
MUNICH  At a time when nationalist and far-right politics are again ascendant in Europe, a team of German historians presented a new, annotated edition of a symbolic text of that movement on Friday: Mein Kampf, by Adolf Hitler.

The Nazi leaders manifesto, which first appeared as two volumes in 1925 and 1927, was banned in Germany by the Allies in 1945 and has not been officially published in the country since then. A team of scholars and historians spent three years preparing a nearly 2,000-page edition with about 3,500 annotations in anticipation of the expiration on Dec. 31 of a 70-year copyright held by the state of Bavaria.

The effort by the Institute of Contemporary History in Munich to publish the new, critical edition was the subject of debate almost as soon as it was announced, with some seeing it as an important step toward illuminating an unsavory era in Germany, never to be repeated, while others argued that a scholarly edition would legitimize the rantings of a sociopath who led the country down the path of evil.

Andreas Wirsching, the director of the institute, acknowledged that debate at a news conference on Friday in Munich, where Hitler staged the unsuccessful Beer Hall Putsch in 1923, landing him in jail, where he passed the time working on the book.

Nevertheless, there is widespread agreement on a decisive point, Wirsching said. It would be completely irresponsible to allow this jumble of inhumanity to be released into the public domain without commentary, without countering it through critical references that put the text and its author in their place.

The republication, even with critical annotations, of a work that advocated an Aryan master race comes as Germany finds itself at a crossroads after 1 million migrants, many fleeing conflicts in Syria and Afghanistan, crossed its borders over the past year. Chancellor Angela Merkel has found herself struggling to maintain popular support for her migrant policy amid concerns about the social and economic costs of accepting the new arrivals, as well as over religious extremism and national security.

Those tensions were brought to the surface this week after reports that women were sexually assaulted and robbed on New Years Eve in Cologne by groups of men described as having a North African or Arabic appearance.

Elsewhere in Europe, voters are increasingly turning to far-right and other populist parties after years of economic stagnation, dissatisfaction with mainstream parties and questions about national identity in the face of open borders for much of the Continent and an influx of migrants from outside it. Some far-right parties have appropriated Nazi imagery and texts.

Some historians and education experts welcomed the new Mein Kampf edition as part of modern Germanys pledge to never forget, never repeat the atrocities Germany committed under Hitler, through education and critical examination.

We concern ourselves with clarification, said Winfried Nerdinger, the director of the Documentation Center for the History of National Socialism in Munich, which opened last year. Our understanding of the critical publication is that it will do the same. Critics argue that issuing a new edition, even one that contains thousands of painstaking historical notes, is but a further step in a process to defang Hitler and lessen the crimes for which he bears responsibility.

Its probably inevitable  the process of normalizing Hitler into just another tyrant, whose words are to be parsed and contextualized, said Ron Rosenbaum, the author of Explaining Hitler, considered one of the definitive examinations of the Nazi dictators mind. Nonetheless, it feels deeply disturbing, especially when Hitlers image has returned in hate rallies around the world.

Jewish groups in Germany have been split over the publication. The Central Council of Jews in Germany, which has long warned against further publication of the original work, welcomed the critical edition on Friday as an effort to counter anti-Semitism by placing Hitlers ideas in historical context. But the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany called for an absolute ban on any new editions.

For many survivors, a new publication is a fresh slap in the face that damages Germanys international reputation, said Rudiger Mahlo, the German representative of the claims conference. Such irrational racist slogans should not be spread anywhere, least of all in Germany.

The introduction to the new edition describes Hitlers writing as half-baked, incoherent and difficult to read, partly because of the many grammatical errors. It goes on to examine how the work laid out the four ideas on which Hitler based his worldview and that later formed the basis of Nazi ideology: race, space, violence and dictatorship.

Christian Hartmann, the leader of a team of five historians at the Institute of Contemporary History, described the annotation process as a painstaking and difficult metamorphosis from the original to the critical edition. Each historian was assigned a chapter, he said, but the final notations were discussed and agreed on by the group.

Of course there were differences of opinion, but these were mostly productive, Hartmann said, crediting the assistance of dozens of international experts.

Despite the new editions heft  the two volumes together weigh more than 10 pounds  and an announced price of 59 euros, or about $64, sales have already far exceeded expectations. The Institute of Contemporary History had to increase its initial run of 4,000 copies after receiving about 15,000 pre-orders before Fridays release, Wirsching said.

Even so, the book sold out within hours on Amazons German site, where it was listed as not available, due to limited publication.

Ian Kershaw, a British historian who has written about Hitler, noted the importance of finally having an annotated version of the work for German and historical studies, but cautioned against expecting too much from the new edition of Mein Kampf, calling the interest surrounding its publication a nine-day wonder, he said it would not have a lasting impact on the myth surrounding the original in many parts of the world.

Of course the attention is very high at the moment, but I think it will subside after a very short while, Kershaw said.

The countries that abuse Mein Kampf will continue to do so, Kershaw added. I dont think this edition will discourage or prevent that.
Hi, its me, Marla Jo, your columnist and deals maven. Check out my Cheapo Travel column in the Sunday Travel section. If you know a great deal, let me know at mfisher@ocregister.com. You can also find me at Deals Diva on Facebook and Twitter. And dont forget to read my humor columns, now on Wednesdays, in the Register.

FREE BREAKFAST

The Chick-fil-A in Yorba Linda invites you to celebrate their anniversary with a free breakfast item each day from Jan. 11-16. One per person, per day from 6 to 10 a.m. Note: This is valid at this location only: 22450 Old Canal Road. Learn more: 714-685-9400

DRINK DEAL

Like Dunkin Donuts? Join their DD Perks loyalty club and get a free beverage upon joining, another free one on your birthday and another every time you earn 200 points. Create an account and enroll a DD Card online at DDperks.com or on the Dunkin mobile app, and youre ready to earn rewards. You can get DD Cards in store, online, or via the app. You can also get a card automatically sent to your Dunkin app when you enroll at ddperks.com directly. Learn more: dunkindonuts.com.

SHOWTIME PREVIEW

Numerous TV providers including AT&T U-verse, Cable One, Century Link, Comcast, DirecTV, Dish Network, Hulu, Mediacom, RCN and Verizon FIOS will be offering a free preview of Showtime channels this upcoming weekend. Most of the previews will be offered Jan. 15-18, but some carriers are offering Jan. 16-18. Some viewers can only get Showtime, others will also get Showtime on Demand. I saw this on FreePreview.TV; sign up if you want to get these alerts.

MAMMOTH DEAL

Fly to Mammoth on Alaska Airlines and get a free lift ticket to ski the day you arrive. Sweet, right? Just show your boarding pass and theyll give you a free full-day lift ticket. This is good in January only. Call 800-MAMMOTH to learn more. Note: Lifts operate only from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. so make sure you take an early flight.

WAREHOUSE SALE

Jan. 10 is the final day of a two-day sale at ICONICloset, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Its cash only and all sales are final. Look for ready-to-wear and evening gowns; apparel from BCBG, Herve Leger, Jovani, Sherri Hill and other brands. Location: 3621 W. MacArthur Blvd, Suite 110, Santa Ana.

READER TIP

From Kim Bayron: Ebates.com is fantastic because when you want to buy anything from Living Social, Groupon, and a lot of other companies, you can log into this site first, then go to, say, Living Social and make your purchase. Ebates will give you additional discounts toward your purchase. When you accumulate the extra money, you can request to get a check or however you want. They will send it directly to your house. Not only do I get discount prices from the Living Social site, I also get additional discounts from Ebates. I have been getting it for almost six months now.

FREE CAMPING

You can camp for free at Picacho State Recreation Area next Friday through Sunday if youre willing to help improve the campground and campfire center from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Jan. 16 and 17. Theres free tent and RV group camping, but no hookups. Kids over 13 are welcome with a guardian. This is part of the Park Champions program run by the California State Parks Foundation. Learn more and sign up here: Calparks.org/help/park-champions.

SHARK LAGOON

Dont want to pay to enter the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach? On many winter Fridays  including this week  they offer free Shark Lagoon Nights, 6 to 9 p.m., where the public can come into the outdoor shark area, watch sharks and rays swim, and touch bamboo sharks in the touch tank. Coffee, hot cocoa, beer, wine, desserts, and snacks are available for purchase. Rain cancels. Note: This isnt a pass to the entire aquarium, just the shark tank. Learn more here: Aquariumofpacific.org/events/info/shark_lagoon_nights or call 562-590-3100, ext. 0. Location: 100 Aquarium Way.

Contact the writer: 714-796-7994 or mfisher@ocregister.com
What exciting opportunities, and yet what dreadful prospects, loom for 2016. The coming 12 months could be the best of times. Or the worst of times. For example, Ted Cruz could be elected president. Or Hillary Clinton.

With perhaps more at stake than ever, civilization, freedom and prosperity approach a pivotal junction in this coming year. Never before has mankind been more highly developed, freer to pursue lofty goals or more rolling in the dough, to use a dated idiom.

Yet as we embark on the new year, our blessings are more than tempered with curses aplenty. Terrorism knows no national boundaries, and worse yet, many nations foolishly have abandoned the idea of borders as barriers in misguided efforts to boost commerce, foster multiculturalism and establish regional identities to replace communities developed over centuries.

Which trends will accelerate? Which will dissipate? Will Europe become the transnational paradise its EU overlords hoped to create? Or will its member states recoil and retreat within their own borders, as heavily hinted by the British and shouted by the Swedes, who have said enough already to accommodating Syrian refugees?

Domestically, we in the United States resemble the crumbling Roman Empire, where, according to historian Philip Matysak, nepotism, back-scratching and the exchange of favors did not corrupt the system, they actually were the system.  If a man had done a senator a favor, such as giving him an interest-free loan, not only would that senator support that man in politics, but he would freely admit the reason.

The U.S., to its credit, advanced the concept of government by law, rather than government by men. But over the past half century that noble principle eroded under a burgeoning bureaucratic state where lawmaking is assumed by faceless technocrats who assure us they know best. The dictate-to approach is also trending among elected representatives, who are supposed to serve, rather than dictate.

President Barack Obamas pen and phone are the last logical step in a cancerous administrative transformation that needs no legislative guidance and ignores it when its provided. Congressional leaders whimper in protest, but inevitably kowtow to diktats from on high, valuing their posh jobs more than their oaths of office.

Across the land, similar let-the-people-be-damned attitudes have crept into statehouses and governors mansions until hardly anyone blinks when places like California adopt unconstitutional laws that authorize temporarily seizing privately owned guns based, essentially, on someone elses complaint. There once was a day when a person had to break a law and be convicted at trial to have his constitutionally protected freedoms revoked.

But thats how despotism works. It never lets a crisis go to waste, as the president once was advised. We face a terrorism threat that requires government to do something. But when already unaccountable government cant be trusted to do the right thing in routine matters, such threats only result in government doing something it shouldnt, using the crisis as an excuse.

Thats how a no-fly list based on secretive criteria is fashioned from the whims of unaccountable bureaucrats, as if drawing inspiration from a Kafka novel. Thats how elected representatives can dictate how many bullets is too many in a law-abiding citizens gun kept for self-protection.

Despotic logic defaults to the counterintuitive. When the Washington, D.C., handgun ban and trigger-lock law was in effect from 1976-2008, the D.C. murder rate averaged 73 percent higher than it was at the outset of the law, while the U.S. murder rate averaged 11 percent lower. Somehow it eluded the gun-control-minded that disarming the innocent emboldens the guilty.

Another round of counterintuitive and harmful diktats from the controlling class threatens to worsen our lot in 2016, and to make the coming year a genuine candidate for the worst of times.

But Americans also have the exciting possibility of shedding the harmful ways of the past and laying a foundation for the best of times. It will come down to the American people recognizing what constitutes good alternatives, then American voters making good choices.

Good choices should be obvious. If someone wanted to destroy the United States, what would he do? He would betray our friends, embolden our enemies and make more Americans dependent on government for everything. Does that sound like anyone you recognize?

The American people are tired of liars and people who pretend to be something they are not, proclaimed one candidate for president. Hillary Clinton got that much right. But if Americans havent learned from the mess she and her cohorts in the Obama administration have gotten us into, its likely 2016 will be one giant leap toward the worst of times.

It shouldnt take brain surgeons to figure this out, to use a contemporary idiom. Another candidate, Ted Cruz, captures it concisely: Secure the border. Restore the rule of law. Protect Americans.
COSTA MESA  A new program at a Newport Beach high school will connect homeless students with a single mentor, who will continue to contact and help them into young adulthood.

The Promotor Pathway program, a partnership between Costa Mesa nonprofit Project Hope Alliance and Newport-Mesa Unified School District, will provide support to as many as 50 local homeless youth until they reach age 24.

The district, which approved the partnership in December, will be the first in California to adopt the long-term assistance, according to Newport-Mesa officials. The program will operate out of Newport Harbor High School.

The goal, as the students age, will be to get them a high school diploma, a college or post-secondary education, and a job with long-term career potential.

The students at Newport Harbor High facing poverty as youth are increasingly likely to drop out of school and to face challenges of poverty as theyre entering adulthood, said Susi Diaz, a development manager at Project Hope Alliance, which aims to break cycles of generational homelessness by helping homeless children.

Young people experiencing homelessness are essentially in crisis mode, she said, A lot of basics life skills  planning over the long term, coming at concrete steps to achieving goals, budgeting, getting school work done, filling out applications  those can be a luxury for homeless children.

The Orange County Department of Education reported last year that there were 32,510 homeless children in the county during the 2013-14 school year, with 1,730 living out of shelters, 1,239 in motels, 241 outdoors, and the vast majority doubled- and tripled-up in single-family residences due to economic hardship.

While most programs and services for homeless high school students stop once the child leaves school, Promotor Pathway was developed by the Latin American Youth Center, a Washington, D.C. nonprofit that found continued long-term support by a single advocate can build trust and provide the stability lacking from the life of a homeless, disenfranchised or traumatized child.

After Project Hope Alliance CEO Jennifer Friend learned about the method during an East Coast conference, she approached Newport-Mesa about developing a partnership, saying her nonprofit would fund the entire program.

This is the first time Newport-Mesa has brought an outside organization onto a school campus full-time to help homeless children. That proximity solves the problem of getting homeless children to seek out and find transportation to service providers, which Diaz said is often a significant barrier.

Contact the writer: jgraham@ocregister.com or 714-796-7960
Proposition 19, the California marijuana legalization initiative that lost by seven points in 2010, was about 3,000 words long. The Adult Use of Marijuana Act, the legalization initiative that seems to have the best shot at qualifying for the 2016 ballot, runs more than 30,000 words. That does not necessarily mean the AUMA is 10 times as good as Prop. 19, but its backers seem to be betting that specificity will allay voters concerns.

Recent elections do not provide much evidence to support that expectation, and there is something to be said for keeping things vague. Leaving details such as tax rates and warning labels to legislators and regulators avoids potentially contentious issues while making room for the considered judgment of people with more public policy expertise than the average voter. While legislators do not necessarily read the bills they pass, it seems even less likely that voters will wade through all 62 pages of the AUMA. Those who do, even if they are inclined to support legalization, are apt to be troubled by some of the initiatives provisions.

It is hard to say whether size matters to voters. Washingtons Initiative 502, at more than 20,000 words, won by 11 points in 2012. But so did Colorados Amendment 64, a svelte contender at 3,700 words. Oregons Measure 91, which won by 12 points in 2014, was 15,000 words long. In that same election, Alaskas Measure 2, a mere 4,100 words, won by seven points. But the District of Columbias Initiative 71, which was one-third as long as Oregons ballot measure, had the biggest margin of victory by far: an astonishing 40 points.

Then again, Ohios Issue 3, a relatively slim 6,600 words, went down in flames last year, losing by 27 points.

AUMA, which has the support of Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Facebook president Sean Parker and activists who originally backed a rival effort known as Reform CA, is longer than any of those initiatives. It is much longer than the four other legalization initiatives that are expected to be on U.S. ballots this year, the heftiest of which, Maines, contains less than half as many words. Thats because AUMA, which incorporates the recommendations of Newsoms Blue Ribbon Commission on Marijuana Policy, is packed with prescriptions that will thrill technocratic meddlers but repel fans of free markets.

Ohios 2015 initiative failed spectacularly, largely because of a provision that alienated legalizers as well as prohibitionists: a cannabis cultivation cartel that would have limited commercial production to 10 preselected sites controlled by the measures financial backers. The AUMA includes a different sort of protectionist scheme: a five-year ban on growers cultivating more than 22,000 square feet indoors or more than an acre outdoors. That ceiling is aimed at allowing smaller growers to establish themselves in the market.

AUMA, which also bars large cultivation licensees from holding distribution licenses, says regulators should strive to avoid the creation or maintenance of unlawful monopoly power. It is not clear what that goal, which is supposed to guide licensing decisions, will mean in practice. But it is not hard to imagine how a policy officially aimed at promoting competition might be used as a cover for protecting entrenched interests.

AUMAs limits on marijuana advertising are also anti-competitive. It prohibits signs on highways that cross state lines or within 1,000 feet of various locations where children gather, ads intended to encourage persons under the age of 21 years to consume marijuana, and symbols, language, music, gestures, cartoon characters or other content elements known to appeal primarily to persons below the legal age of consumption. Although marijuanas continued federal prohibition complicates the question, the constitutionality of those speech restrictions is doubtful.

The Adult Use of Marijuana Act improves on earlier efforts in some ways  for example, by allowing deliveries of marijuana to consumers and cannabis consumption in settings outside of private residences. But it is also inappropriately harsh, prescribing a $500 fine and up to six months in jail for possessing more than an ounce in public or growing more than six plants at home.

It should go without saying that even the most picayune regulatory system is preferable to prohibition. But that is a pretty low bar.

Jacob Sullum is a senior editor at Reason magazine and Reason.com and author of the book Saying Yes: In Defense of Drug Use.
The vast field of presidential candidates doesnt agree on much else, but on this there is broad consensus: The news media has done them wrong.

Democrat or Republican, front-runner or also-ran, almost every candidate has had something critical to say about the media during this campaign. In particular, Donald Trump, whose candidacy owes much to his pervasive news coverage, has repeatedly bitten the hands that have fed him.

Beating on the press is as old as Spiro Agnews political career, so theres nothing new about candidates dishing out an occasional head slap to the media. Whats new in this cycle is the number and kind of attacks  complaints about biased coverage, about hostile coverage, about inaccurate or superficial coverage. Or just not enough coverage.

Everyone seems to be playing:

 Ted Cruz (at the Republican debate, Oct. 28): The questions asked in this debate illustrate why the American people dont trust the media. Everyone home tonight knows that the moderators have no intention of voting in a Republican primary.

 Bernie Sanders (to CNN, Dec. 24): You explain to me how a major network on the evening news has 81 minutes of Trump, 20 seconds of Bernie Sanders. Does that make sense to anybody?

 Ben Carson (to CBS, Nov. 8): Theres no question Im getting special scrutiny from the news media. Every single day or every other day or every week, theyre going to come out with, Well, you said this when you were 13  and the whole point is to distract. Distract the populace, distract me.

 Carly Fiorina (to Fox News, Nov. 11): News flash: The media is biased. This isnt anything new. And we just have to deal with it, unfortunately. So, its not going to rattle me.

 Marco Rubio (at the Oct. 28 debate): The Democrats have the ultimate Super PAC. Its called the mainstream media.

Trumps press-bashing citations are too numerous to list. And while Hillary Clinton has been relatively quiet about the media during this campaign, her husband hasnt been. In defending his wife against criticism of her use of a private email server while she was secretary of state, the former president went after both Republicans and the media  a two-fer. He told CNN, I have never seen so much expended on so little.

Criticizing the news media is a hallowed chapter in the presidential candidates playbook, especially among Republicans, said Terence Smith, a veteran journalist (New York Times, CBS News) and press analyst (PBS) who now writes a newspaper column. Even so, he said, it seems to be a banner year for press-bashing among the candidates.  Its more blatant and frequent this time around.

A well-honed blast at the media can be an attention-getting device, Smith said, and strikes a chord with a candidates most devoted followers, especially during a debate. But hes not sure its anything more than an applause line: Does it resonate equally with the viewing audience and the public at large? Not so much, I suspect.

On the other hand, the current round of press bashing reflects a genuine anger on the part of a number of Americans toward the media, said Jane Hall, a professor of journalism at American University in Washington.

Issue No. 1, according to Hall: If I were a Republican candidate, Id be outraged about all the (media) attention Trump is getting. Theres genuine frustration that Trump has taken over the coverage.

Of course, the irony of Trumps widespread coverage  a recent survey found that he garnered more than twice as many minutes of airtime on the three evening news broadcasts than the rest of the Republican field combined  is that Trump has been, by far, the most critical of the media. In perhaps a first for a leading candidate, he has called out reporters by name at his rallies and on his Twitter account.

A short list of the media figures Trump has insulted since he announced his candidacy in June includes: CNN pundit S.E. Cupp; Fox News hosts Megyn Kelly and Chris Wallace; New York Times reporter Serge Kovaleski; HuffingtonPost founder Arianna Huffington; Washington Post blogger Chris Cillizza; Post columnists Jennifer Rubin, George Will and Charles Krauthammer; MSNBC host Lawrence ODonnell; columnist/Fox News pundit Bill Kristol; columnist/TV host Errol Louis; conservative columnists Erick Erickson and Jonah Goldberg; Associated Press political reporter Jill Colvin; and NBC News Katy Tur and Chuck Todd.

He speaks about the media with absolute contempt, said Hall, and yet the media cant get enough of him. It feels like sadomasochism.

In an era when trust in the press remains at historic lows, the media may be a safe rhetorical devil figure for both parties, said Richard Vatz, a professor of rhetoric at Towson University. While Vatz believes that the news media generally favors Democrats, the press can be attacked for its selective agenda from any angle, such as Sanderss recent complaint that excessive attention on Clintons emails was a distraction from a discussion about poverty in the United States.

No politician ever lost an election by attacking bias in the media, said Vatz. Still, such attacks are beginning to have diminishing returns, he said, particularly when the complaints are repeated. Carson and his supporters, for example, complained about media bias, but his lack of foreign policy expertise has been his undoing, Vatz said.

About the only candidate who hasnt complained about his press clippings of late is former Maryland governor Martin OMalley, who remains far behind Clinton and Sanders in Democratic polls. Asked about her candidates attitude, OMalley spokeswoman Haley Morris offered an explanation likely to win him a few friends in the press: Everyone has a job to do, and Gov. OMalley respects that, she said.

Besides, she added, Perhaps there are worthier demons.
Last year was a rewarding one for art in Orange County, and more broadly, in Southern California. Engaging exhibits at the Orange County Museum of Art that highlighted a new generation of Chinese artists, or the Quran illustrated like a graphic novel, gave us a view on a wider cultural landscape. Others, like the Canyon Project at Laguna Art Museum and the glittery replicas from King Tuts tomb at Muzeo, told us about history both local and not so local.

Fortunately for art fans, this year has some pretty exciting things coming up, from mummies at the Bowers Museum to a new addition to Orange Countys arts scene. Here are some of our highlights.

Irvine Museum Shows at this museum for California art from the Impressionist period are pretty straightforward. The themes are clear, not abstract or academic. The upcoming The Nature of Water: Our Most Precious Resource is an example, with the simple motif of water in all its forms  oceans, snow, rivers, clouds  tying together 60 paintings. The best thing about the Irvine Museum is that its a place to enjoy some beautiful paintings, in a quiet sanctuary-like space, for free. Jan. 30-June 16.

Begovich Gallery We love exhibits, like this one, that give us a new side of Orange Countys history. This show at the gallery at Cal State Fullerton will look at the connection between the Beat movement in art and poetry and the modern surf art it helped engender, art that bubbled up in coffeehouses and cafes around Orange County in the 1950s and 1960s. The exhibit aims to re-create the atmosphere of those cafes along Orange Countys coast, like Cafe Frankenstein and Sids Blue Beat. Feb. 6-March 12.

Laguna Art Museum The museum that specializes in California art will host a retrospective of work by Helen Lundeberg, who, with her artist husband, Lorser Feitelson, is credited with creating the post-surrealist movement. Its hard to sum up Lundebergs work, which ranged from classically rendered and recognizable objects suffused with symbolic meaning to imaginary landscapes meant to evoke certain moods. Her career spanned most of the 20th century, and this show looks as though its going to be a stunner. Feb. 21-May 30.

New museum coming Last fall, Los Angeles got a new museum with the opening of The Broad. Now its Orange Countys turn. As with The Broad, the Hilbert Museum of California Art is drawn from the collection of wealthy philanthropists, and its free. Mark and Janet Hilbert gave more than 200 works of art, plus $3 million, to Chapman University to build a museum dedicated to California scene art, an overlooked style depicting everyday life in mid-1900s California. The plan is to move the museum to a larger space later on, but in the meantime, the collection will be on display at 167 N. Atchison St. in Orange. Grand opening Feb. 26-27.

Mapplethorpe For the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the J. Paul Getty Museum, 2016 will be the year of Robert Mapplethorpe, the photographer who drew both admiration and controversy. He photographed flowers and celebrities, but also provocative nudes and New Yorks underground sadomasochism scene. Between the two museums will be five exhibits related to Mapplethorpe and themes of sexuality and photography. Feb. 13-Sept. 5 for Catherine Opie: O at LACMA. The other four exhibits open March 15 at the Getty Museum and March 20 at LACMA and close July 31.

Bowers Museum The main show here will be something very old  mummified, in fact. Mummies of the World includes mummified remains dating back thousands of years from Egypt, South America and Europe. Youll see everything from intentionally mummified animals to people who were naturally preserved, such as one found in a peat bog in the Netherlands. Keep in mind that some of the mummies are pretty intact, with faces and hair very visible, so parents may want to think about that before taking little ones. March 19-Sept. 5.

Los Angeles County Museum of Art While womens fashion has morphed from petticoats to miniskirts over centuries, mens fashion hasnt varied as much. But consider that the frilly, powdered-wig-topped outfit worn by an 18th-century European aristocrat  while still technically a three-piece suit  is a far cry from the mod styles that came along 300 years later. Those who view fashion as art shouldnt miss LACMAs Reigning Men: Fashion in Menswear, 1715-2015. April 10-Aug. 21.

J. Paul Getty Museum Not so interested in Mapplethorpe? The Gettys exhibit on the fascinating Mogao caves in the Gobi Desert of China may be more your style. The caves, a UNESCO World Heritage Site along Chinas Silk Road, are filled with decorated Buddhist temples and paintings created over the course of 1,000 years. This exhibit will feature objects from the caves, including some that have never traveled to the United States. Whats more, the Getty Museum promises three full-size cave replicas as part of the exhibition. May 7-Sept. 4.

Muzeo The Anaheim museum will display sculptures, drawings and prints from perhaps the most famous surrealist artist of all, Salvador Dali. Thats a good way to follow up its terrific exhibit of glittery replicas from King Tutankhamuns tomb. You can still catch that show  it ends Jan. 30. Tentative dates for the Dali exhibit are July 15-Sept. 30.

Orange County Museum of Art This museum usually focuses on modern and contemporary art, but it will take a step back with a look at the art that gave rise to later movements. A selection of 65 works from the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., will cover art from the 1860s to the 1960s and include pieces by Alexander Calder, Richard Diebenkorn, Thomas Eakins, Edward Hopper and Georgia OKeeffe. Aug. 6-Nov. 6.

The Broad The frenzy of visitors following The Broads September opening hasnt slowed. But that doesnt mean you cant get in, with some time and patience. To see the collection that includes works by Jeff Koons, Andy Warhol, Cindy Sherman, Roy Lichtenstein, Ed Ruscha and other greats of contemporary art, go early, especially on the weekends. Expect to wait up to 90 minutes on the weekends, according to The Broads website. Ongoing.

Contact the writer: aboessenkool@ocregister.com
Wesley Landers appears in court during his arraignment, Friday in Cincinnati. Landers, of Trinity, Ala., was arrested on charges of possession of drugs, carrying a concealed weapon, having weapons while under disability and possessing drug abuse instruments, after he was found unresponsive the day before in the bathroom of his 7-month-old daughter's hospital room with a heroin syringe in his arm, The Cincinnati Enquirer reported. His wife, Mary Landers, 31, also of Trinity, was found dead of an apparent overdose in the same hospital room.
A good column by Mark Landsbaum [Americans not who Obama wants us to be, Opinion, Jan. 2]. Obama told America seven years ago that he intended to fundamentally transform America, and few listened. America had always tried to be careful about who it lets in the country, but Obama has thrown out that idea.

Obamas quote, Thats not who we are, makes one wonder who is we? The man is not deaf. He knows full well that Americans do not want hundreds of thousands of unvetted Syrians waltzing into America. Who is going to do background checks on them? The Syrian State Department? Syria does not know who these people are and doesnt care.

Europe is full of refugees who have no intention of assimilating into European society and we are beginning to have our own problems here. We have millions of illegals from south of the border who have no intention of assimilating either. Obama and the Democrats now want to flood us with thousands upon thousands who also will not assimilate. The religious beliefs of Muslims do not mix with anything America stands for, and Obamas administration has no way of knowing how many radicals are among those refugees.

I dont like everything that Donald Trump stands for, but I do agree with him that we must not allow that many Muslim refugees into America until we have thoroughly vetted them or found a place in the Middle East to put them. The wealthy Muslim countries dont seem to want them, so why should America just allow them to waltz in unchecked?

Americans need to contact their representatives in Congress and voice their concern over this president thumbing his nose at the concerns of citizens and pressing on with his agenda to do what he wants, when he wants and how he wants. If citizens dont start demanding action from their elected representative, 2016 could be very dangerous for America.

Ed Bjork

Fountain Valley

  

Im in total agreement with Mark Landsbaums column relative to President Obamas statements in recent press and global media outlets. Obama, in my view, is a child of his father and has inherited the traits and honed them to a fault. Obamas father was a fraud, con artist, thief and polygamist, among other things. Read the sons book. He envisions a new immigration policy without proper vetting from the Middle East. My grandmother came through Ellis Island.

American politics in this age of great global challenges need someone to step up and say to the world, Enough. It may well take a multitude of international powers, meaning multinational forces, to eradicate the terrorist element. Education and tolerance are the answer. Perhaps Jesus and Muhammad could get together.

William Lewis

Irvine

  

Re: Americans not who Obama wants us to be [Opinion, Jan. 2]: Why We Fight was a World War II propaganda film series to persuade Americans to fight the Axis powers.

Today, does anyone know why we fight in the Middle East?

Saudi Arabia, birthplace of 15 of the 19 al-Qaida terrorists responsible for 9/11, just created an anti-terrorist organization composed of 34 Sunni Muslim nations.

Unsurprisingly, Shia-led Muslim nations, like Iran, Iraq and Syria, were not included, continuing a Sunni-Shia feud started nearly 1,400 years ago.

Iraq is perhaps 65 percent Shia, but they are splintered into ethnic factions, and Kurds spread among Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey hope for a resurrection of Kurdistan.

In Pakistan and Afghanistan, Pashtun tribes, sources of Taliban fighters, hope for a restoration of their homeland.

I oppose putting our troops in harms way until President Obama explains why we fight terrorism.

Joe Boyett

Riverside

  

Once again, Mark Landsbaum has spoken for the majority of Americans by castigating the president for wanting to allow thousands of unvetted Syrians into our country. The president claims that refusing admission is not who we are. There is a way this could be tested. Let the first 100 refugees occupy the presidents home for one year. If nothing else, it would show everybody who he is.

Jack Bowden

Buena Park

Pricing people out

Re: New year, more money, fewer jobs [Opinion, Dec. 31]: The headline on the editorial states a simple economic principle  raise the price of something, and demand for it will go down. Yet, raising the minimum wage continues to be popular, despite examples all around us  self-serve gas, self-checkout at markets, ATMs, online shopping, etc. There used to be people doing those jobs. Not anymore. The economics is irrefutable, and our elected officials know that.

If they were genuinely dedicated to creating more jobs, they would never enact such laws. But thats not how they think. Whether something is good or bad for the economy or society as a whole isnt really what drives them; what does is whether something gets them more votes. Since they have proven they dont have a clue about how to create jobs, except in government, the next-best thing is promising more pay for the ones who already have jobs, which theyve learned is a winner at the polls.

M.J. Knudsen

Trabuco Canyon

Self-deporting coyotes

While reading about our coyote problem here in Huntington Beach, I began to entertain the idea of our fair city hiring a coyote czar. Then, it hit me! Why not simply declare Huntington Beach a coyote-free zone? End of problem. Be careful not to get run over by the rush of coyotes leaving town.

Don Keeley

Huntington Beach
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates  Iranian Princess Ashraf Pahlavi, the twin sister of the countrys deposed shah whose glamorous life epitomized the excesses of her brothers rule, has died after decades in exile. She was 96.

Many in Iran before the countrys 1979 Islamic Revolution believed Princess Ashraf served as the true power behind her brother, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and pushed him into taking power in a 1953 coup engineered by the U.S.

Immortalized in her royal prime by an Andy Warhol portrait with bright red lips and raven-black hair, Princess Ashrafs years out of power more resembled a Shakespearean tragedy. Assassins killed her son on a Paris street just after the Islamic Revolution, her twin brother died of cancer shortly after, while a niece died of a 2001 drug overdose in London and a nephew killed himself in Boston 10 years later.

Still, she always defended her brothers rule and held onto her royal past.

At night, when I go into my room, thats when all the thoughts come flooding in, the princess told The Associated Press in a 1983 interview in Paris. I stay up until 5 or 6 in the morning. I read, I watch a cassette, I try not to think. But the memories wont leave you.

Reza Pahlavi, a son of the shah, announced his aunts death in a Facebook post on Thursday night. Her personal website said she died Thursday, without elaborating.

Robert F. Armao, a longtime adviser to Princess Ashraf in New York, said the princess died in Europe on Thursday, declining to elaborate on the cause of her death. He said there were no immediate plans for a funeral.

In Iran, local media reported her death relying on international reports. State television reported she died in Monte Carlo and described her as being famous for being corrupt, something Armao criticized.

Her Highness did an awful lot for her country, whatever her human faults, he said.

Born Oct. 26, 1919, Princess Ashraf was the daughter of the monarch Reza Shah, who came to power in a 1921 coup engineered by Britain and later was forced to abdicate the throne after a 1941 invasion by Britain and Russia. By 1953, America helped orchestrate the coup that overthrew Irans popularly elected prime minister, Mohammad Mossadegh, over fears he was tilting toward the Soviet Union. That brought her brother to power and set the stage for decades of mistrust between the countries.

But the shah was a man of indecision, according to a long-classified CIA account of the coup first published by The New York Times in 2000. To push the coup along, the plotters reached out to the shahs dynamic and forceful twin sister who already had been in touch with U.S. and British agents, according to the account. After considerable pressure by her and a U.S. general, the shah reportedly agreed.

As her brothers government ruled in opulence and its secret police tortured political activists, Princess Ashraf focused on womens rights in an appointment to the United Nations. She and her sister, Shams, also were among the first Iranian women to go in public with their hair uncovered, breaking traditional norms in the Shiite country. She also worked on other diplomatic missions for Iran.

She traveled widely and became known for gambling on the French Riviera, the French press dubbing her La Panthere Noire, or the Black Panther. She survived a 1977 apparent assassination attempt in Cannes that killed her aide and wounded her chauffeur.

The political opposition during the shahs era criticized Princess Ashraf over allegations of corruption, as well as her highly publicized love affairs with Iranian actors and public figures.

After her brothers 1979 overthrow in Irans Islamic Revolution, Princess Ashraf shuttled between homes in Paris, New York and Monte Carlo. She published a memoir and remained outspoken immediately after the overthrow.

After the death of my brother, if we had had the $65 billion some people said we had we would have retaken Iran just like that, she told the AP in 1983.

Princess Ashraf married and divorced three times in her life and had three children. She gradually faded from public view in later years, though she attended U.S. President Richard Nixons funeral in 1994. And she always maintained she regretted nothing.

I would want to do the same thing. Its passed, now, only memories. But there were 50 years of grandeur, of glory, she once said.
LOS ANGELES  The U.S. refugee program came under fresh criticism Friday after federal authorities revealed that two Iraqi-born men arrested on terrorism-related charges had come to America as refugees.

While there was no evidence the men intended or planned attacks in the United States, Republican lawmakers already concerned about the federal governments ability to properly vet Syrian refugees said the cases highlight weaknesses in the program that put Americans safety at risk.

How many ticking time bombs are we going to bring in in this refugee program without a proper vetting system in place? Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas and chairman of House Homeland Security Committee, said at a news conference.

He and other GOP lawmakers urged the Senate to pass legislation to block refugees from Iraq and Syria until screening is improved. The House passed a bill in November.

The uproar comes after weeks of fervent debate in Washington and on the presidential campaign trail about tighter security screens in the wake of attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California.

Immigrant advocates said they have full confidence in the vetting process and that tens of thousands of Iraqi refugees have been successfully resettled under the program.

On Thursday, federal authorities in California accused 23-year-old Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab of Sacramento of traveling to Syria to fight and lying to U.S. officials about it. Al-Jayab had come to the United States as a refugee in October 2012, and discussed on social media how he fought against the regime in Syria as a teen, authorities said.

In Texas, 24-year-old Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan of Houston was indicted on charges that he tried to provide material support to the extremists. Both suspects are Palestinians born in Iraq, authorities said.

The U.S. annually accepts 70,000 refugees from around the world, including people fleeing violence, religious persecution and war, and has announced plans to increase the number to 85,000 this year.

Since the 2001 terrorist attacks, about 785,000 refugees have arrived in the country, and fewer than 20 have been arrested or removed over terrorism-related concerns, according to the State Department.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Friday the screening of refugees is rigorous and thorough. He repeated the administrations opposition to proposals that would impose a religious test or bar individuals from the U.S. based on their ethnicity.

That doesnt represent who we are as a country and, most importantly, its not going to keep us safe, Earnest said.

More than 127,000 Iraqi refugees have arrived in the United States since October 2006, with the largest numbers headed toward California, Michigan and Texas, according to State Department statistics. Some Iraqis go through the U.N. refugee agency, while some can apply directly to the refugee program in Jordan, Egypt and Iraq.

Melanie Nezer, vice president for policy and advocacy at the Jewish refugee agency HIAS, said she worries the recent backlash might place law-abiding refugees under suspicion. She said she has confidence in the governments screening measures and that these are continually updated by federal intelligence officials.

The vast majority of refugees, including Iraqi refugees, have not caused any harm to our country and will not cause any harm to our country, she said.

Federal authorities said Al-Jayab promised to provide weapons training to Al Hardan and advised him on how he would be assigned to the battlefield once he arrived in Syria. While authorities say Al Jayab fought twice in Syria, including with a group eventually linked to Islamic State, there is no indication that Al Hardan actually traveled there.

Al Hardan became a legal permanent resident of the United States in 2011 and applied in 2014 to become a U.S. citizen, authorities said. Al-Jayab was interviewed by immigration officials in 2014 for his green card and did not disclose his recent travel to Syria, authorities said.

Security screenings for immigrants and travelers have come under increased scrutiny because of recent attacks. Rules have been tightened for visa-free travel to the United States and lawmakers have vowed to look into the fianc visa program, which was used by the husband-and-wife attackers in San Bernardino who killed 14 people last month.

On Friday, senior White House officials and members of the presidents national security team traveled to Silicon Valley to seek tech industry help to stop the Islamic State and other groups from radicalizing people online.
VISTA  A member of a sadomasochistic sex triangle has been sentenced for killing a Marine wife who was kidnapped near a Southern California base.

The San Diego Union-Tribune reported that 28-year-old Jessica Lopez was given two consecutive life terms Friday.

Shes the last of three defendants who were convicted of kidnapping, torturing and killing Brittany Killgore in 2012.

Prosecutors say Killgore had innocently befriended the three while her husband was in Afghanistan.

Authorities say the trio lured her from her apartment near Camp Pendleton, then abducted and killed her while fulfilling a sadistic fantasy.

Her nude body was found near a rural lake.

The other defendants, Louis Perez and Dorothy Maraglino, were sentenced in November to life in prison without parole.
WASHINGTON  Reports of sexual assaults at the three major military academies surged in the 2014-15 school year, led by the Air Force Academy, where the number nearly doubled, the Defense Department said Friday.

Complaints of sexual harassment also spiked, the department said.

Pentagon officials said the sharp increases were due largely to students growing confidence in the reporting system and expanded awareness programs, but the announcement raised nagging questions about whether sexual misconduct is rising at the schools.

I think its appropriate for people to feel frustrated about hearing this in the news. Bottom line is that if this were an easy problem, we would have solved it years ago, said Nate Galbreath, the senior executive adviser for the Pentagons sexual assault prevention office. Unfortunately, this is a very hard problem to solve.

The Army, Navy and Air Force academies received a total of 91 sexual assault reports in 2014-15, up from 59 in the previous school year, an increase of 54 percent.

The Air Force Academy accounted for 49 of the sexual assault reports, compared with 25 the previous year. Officials at the school outside Colorado Springs, Colorado, declined to be interviewed but issued a written statement saying the 25 reported in the 2013-14 school year was unusually low compared with previous years. The school had 51 reports in 2011-12 and 44 in 2012-13.

The Air Force Academy statement said victims are the schools main concern.

In order to provide them the care they need, we must encourage them to come forward and report these crimes. In doing so, cadets demonstrate their trust and confidence in our program, the academy said.

The U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York, reported 17 assaults in 2014-15, up from 11 the previous year. The Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, reported 25, compared with 23 a year earlier.

Senior Pentagon leaders have argued for years that increased reporting is a good thing because it suggests victims are more willing to come forward. Sexual assault in civilian and military society has historically been a vastly underreported crime because victims often fear reprisals or stigma, or they worry that they wont be believed or dont want to go through the emotional turmoil of a court case.

Eight of the 91 assaults reported in the 2014-15 year occurred before the student entered military service, the Pentagon said.

Also, sexual harassment complaints rose by 40 percent to a total of 28 during the last school year. The Naval Academy had 13, Air Force eight and West Point seven. School-by-school totals for the previous year werent released.

Galbreath said a key recommendation this year is for the academies to put more emphasis on sexual harassment prevention and training because often harassment leads to assault. Discussions with focus groups and other studies found that while students know how to report sexual assaults and how to treat victims, they didnt know as much about what makes up sexual harassment and what to do about it.

One problem is that sexual harassment is handled by various military Equal Opportunity offices, while sexual assault issues are handled by the Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Offices.

That improved emphasis on sexual harassment will likely lead to prevention of sexual assault, Galbreath said. We are smarter now and we know that a lot of other factors are beginning to play into prevention work.

The military held 10 focus group sessions in March and April 2015 with academy students, faculty and staff, and the discussions revealed progress in attitudes about harassment, officials said. An increasing number of students spoke about becoming more active in preventing or objecting to harassing comments, including online.

Seven of the focus groups were with students and three with faculty and staff.

Almost 200 students and nearly 100 faculty and staff took part.
ANAHEIM  Mayor Tom Tait is crying foul that the City Council will not be able vote Tuesday on a district map that he supports.

City staffers said that the mayors request was denied based on a technicality.

This is unprecedented, and I think its a violation of the law for them to exclude this, Tait said Friday afternoon.

During the Dec. 15 council meeting, Tait called for reconsidering a map with six voting districts, one of which had a clear majority of Latinos who are registered to vote.

Latinos made up a plurality in two other districts in that map, which supporters called the peoples map.

However, Tait made the request during a debate over whether to allow a panel of retired Superior Court judges to recommend which voting districts should be placed on the November ballot. That idea, also raised by Tait, failed.

Even though the topic was about Anaheims move toward district elections, city staffers said that Taits request to reconsider the peoples map was not directly connected to the discussion about the judges.

If Tait had wanted the item placed on the agenda for Tuesdays meeting, then the mayor would needed to reiterate the request during the council communications portion of the agenda, per a council policy established in 2012, said city spokesman Mike Lyster.

That didnt happen because Tait shut down the Dec. 15 meeting early amid loud chanting and protesting by others who supported the peoples map.

Given the constraints presented by the council policy manual, this was the best way to allow for consideration of any and all maps, Lyster said in a statement.

Tait called it a tortured interpretation of the rule and the first time this has happened in Anaheim. In the past, Tait said that other council members were able to add agenda items that were not mentioned during council communications.

In October 2013, the council voted 4-1 to strip Tait of the ability to place items onto City Council meeting agendas whenever he wants  one of the few powers, beyond those of regular council members, he once wielded as the elected head of Orange Countys largest city.

The council is re-examining roughly 30 maps that were presented earlier this year to the panel of retired judges.

If the mayor asks during Tuesdays council meeting, his item could be heard as soon as Jan. 26.

Contact the writer: 714-704-3769 or amarroquin@ocregister.com
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On Jan. 11, the Supreme Court hears what may well be the most important case of the term. In Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, 10 teachers have challenged a state requirement that they support political causes with which they disagree and that hurt their students.

At issue is a kind of law that exists in 25 states which forces public-sector workers either to join a union or pay an amount that covers the cost of the unions collective bargaining. For California teachers, that means annual dues of about $1,000 or agency fees of about two-thirds that amount.

Nonmembers dues arent supposed to fund union political activities like lobbying and election campaigns. As the Supreme Court ruled in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education (1977), states cant force workers to contribute to the support of an ideological cause [they] may oppose as a condition of holding a job.

But in the public-sector context, collective bargaining is an inherently political activity, meant to influence government policies in various ways that go beyond the mundane terms-of-employment issues at play in the private sector. Should teachers be paid based on seniority or merit? Should education budgets expand even if that means higher taxes? How many teachers should the city hire?

These are all questions that naturally come up during the negotiation of teachers contracts, but they also obviously implicate serious matters of public policy. As the Supreme Court put it in Harris v. Quinn (2014)  which rejected the forced unionization of publicly funded home health care aides  core issues such as wages, pensions and benefits are important political issues.

Moreover, even if collective bargaining werent inherently political, its easy to see how workers could object to the supposed benefits negotiated on their behalf. For example, a teacher might prefer higher pay to tenure protections, or a defined-contribution pension plan  such as a 401(k)  to one that has defined benefits.

Collective bargaining also can come at the expense of students. When schools lack high-quality math teachers because the union contract requires they be paid the same amount as gym teachers, kids lose out. And when that contract has last in, first out (LIFO) rules that force a district to lay off a talented young teacher before a low-performing teacher with seniority, students suffer.

Last year, a judge in California struck down such tenure and LIFO rules after finding compelling evidence that making it hard to fire low-performing teachers had a negative impact on students, especially low-income and minority students. The judge pointed to research by Harvard professor Thomas Kane showing that Los Angeles Unified School District students who were taught by an English teacher in the bottom 5 percent of competence lose the equivalent of 9.5 months of learning in a single year relative to students with average teachers.

Indeed, the judge concluded, it shocks the conscience.

Sadly, the deleterious effects of collectively bargained tenure rules can be serious and long-lasting. In a 2012 study of more than 2.5 million students, Harvard professors Raj Chetty and John Friedman and Columbia professor Jonah Rockoff found that students who had just a single year in a classroom with a teacher in the bottom 5 percent of effectiveness lose approximately $50,000 in potential lifetime earnings relative to students assigned to average teachers.

And in a just released study, professor Michael F. Lovenheim and doctoral student Alexander Willen of Cornell found that laws forcing school districts to negotiate with unions had a modest but statistically significant negative impact on students future employment and earnings. Adults who had been subject to duty-to-bargain laws while attending grade school worked a half-hour less per week and earned $795 less per year. The aggregate national effect is an annual loss of about $196 billion.

Collective bargaining can be an important means of protecting workers, but in the public sector, union power shouldnt trump the public interest. President Franklin D. Roosevelt understood these dynamics, which is why he opposed the formation of public-sector unions in the first place. All government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service, he wrote in 1937 to the president of the National Federation of Federal Employees.

And so, when the justices take their seats for their first hearing of 2016, they should consider whether agency-shop rules really merit an exemption from the First Amendment protections for speech and association. A decision to stop states from forcing their employees to fund policies they oppose would benefit teachers and students alike.

Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow in constitutional studies at the Cato Institute. Jason Bedrick is an education policy analyst. Cato filed a brief supporting the plaintiffs in the Friedrichs case.
California has a message for teachers or anyone who has dreamed of a career in the classroom: We need you.

In a big shift from just a few years ago  when school districts were handing out pink slips to teachers in the wake of budget cuts  the scramble is on. School districts are snapping up every new teacher they can find, and theyre going to new lengths to fill high-demand teaching positions in math, science, special education and bilingual education.

Those who run teacher-preparation programs in Orange County say many students are getting job offers on the spot during interviews, and more are getting hired to train on the job through internship programs that put them into their own classrooms, even though they are still studying for their teaching credentials.

At a Cal State Fullerton spring job fair for education, more school districts than ever came with jobs to offer. Meanwhile, Los Angeles Unified sent out recruiters to make a pitch to UC Irvines bilingual education students  at their welcome orientation during the first week of school.

I get the sense right now that districts are just short of teachers, period, said Kathryn Theuer, associate dean of the School of Education at Irvines Brandman University, which trains teachers at 17 campuses statewide.

For the current school year, school districts need to fill 21,500 teaching slots, according to the California Department of Education, but the state is issuing fewer than 15,000 new teaching credentials a year.

California issued 14,810 teaching credentials in 2013-14, the most recent data year available, according to the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing. That number has been falling since 2008-09, when it issued 44,694 credentials.

BIGGER CLASSES?

So why does the number of teachers have school officials sounding the alarm?

If a severe teacher shortage comes to pass, thats going to force California to use larger class sizes again, said Joshua Speaks, spokesman for the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing.

It could also lead to an increase in the number of less-prepared teachers being hired to teach in schools, especially in subjects they might not be fully qualified to teach, educators say.

Already, school districts increasingly want prospective teachers to train on the job. In 2013-14, for example, almost one-fourth of all new teaching credentials issued in California were for internships that enabled candidates to work full-time as teachers while simultaneously enrolling in training courses at night or on weekends.

(California teachers are required to complete a teacher-preparation program after they receive a bachelors or higher degree from an accredited university. The programs vary but take one to two years and include student teaching along with academic coursework.)

Penelope Collins, interim associate dean for undergraduate and teacher education programs at UCIs School of Education, says one problem with a teacher shortage is it may cause Californias most vulnerable students to suffer. Affluent school districts will have the means to raise salaries or offer other incentives to hire the best teachers who have completed credential programs and have benefited from hands-on experience, supervision and mentoring, she said.

Research shows that kids who have greater needs, whether because of socioeconomics or learning disabilities, etc., theyre the ones who really are dependent on a high-quality teacher. Kids who come from privileged backgrounds, theyre much more resilient. If they have a weaker teacher, they still learn, she said. The kids who are in the greatest need might not get the quality instruction that they need.

In times of great need, the state has historically done things like issue emergency permits to get literally anyone in the classroom, said Aimee Nelson, interim director for the Center for Careers in Teaching at Cal State Fullerton. Those are teachers who have not necessarily had the education or experience teaching, and thats just creating a pathway of problems for years.

The good news, Nelson said, is that Cal State Fullerton has seen an uptick in enrollments in its teaching credential program (about 500 students this fall, up from about 460 in 2013-14), with a candidate pool with equal or even better academic qualifications than in earlier years.

Today, new teachers are not just recent college graduates, but also older professionals, said Maria Grant, who directs Cal State Foullertons intern credentialing program.

Were seeing retired engineers, moms who have raised their kids, and more traditional students who have just completed their bachelors degrees, Grant said. The people who are going into teaching really think of teaching as one of the most important professions around. They know the challenge is great, and they come to our program enthusiastic and ready to learn.

CAREER IN FLUX

The last recession was hard on teachers, especially in California. According to Labor Department statistics, California lost 82,000 jobs in schools from 2008 to 2012. Given the steady drum of negative news stories about job losses, fewer people entered teaching-preparation programs.

Teaching has definitely gotten some bad PR. The profession has been bashed recently, and theres been an outpouring of negativity, Theuer said. New teachers also earn lower salaries than those in many other professions that require similar skills and education levels.

But today, thanks to the improving economy, spending on public schools has begun to recover, spurring some new hiring. Meanwhile, about one-third of the current teaching workforce is near retirement age, according to the California Teachers Association, meaning a teacher shortage might grow even worse.

The needs are only going to increase, Theuer said, adding that she just sent a note to a young relative who is thinking of becoming a teacher. I told her shes in the right field. She will get the right job. Theres no reason to shy away from teaching.

David Monge, 27, once dreamed of becoming a doctor until he worked in the medical field and realized it wasnt his passion. This fall, he landed his first teaching job in the science department at Northwood High School in Irvine.

As a student in UC Irvines teacher-credentialing program, he was a student-teacher at Northwood last year. (You could call it a yearlong interview, he joked.) This year, Monge is teaching chemistry and integrated science.

I remember hearing negative things about teaching during college, like professors saying, If you cant do, teach. But when I was working, I started doing some tutoring on the side and fell in love with helping students and kids, Monge said.

Teaching is hard. You give a lot of yourself. I didnt expect it to be as hard as it is, but also to be as rewarding as it is.
The ability of public employee unions to collect dues and fees from government workers has huge implications for the public sector workplace, and for the political process. Next week, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear a case that might end public employee unions ability to collect funds through deductions from government paychecks, leaving only voluntary contributions from its members to fund the union. This is the most important event for labors role in American politics that has happened since 1935, when labor unions were first granted rights by federal law.

Of the 131 million American wage and salary workers, only 14.6 million now belong to unions. The private unionized sector is languishing  less than 7 percent of those employees are in unions, and their number has been dropping steadily since 1979. But for the public sector  where unionization stands at 35.7 percent  organized labor would already be a historic relic in the U.S.

State laws created exclusive collective bargaining rights for state and local government employee unions. (Federal labor laws do not cover them, as a matter of respect for state sovereignty.) These unions rely on dues and fees from their members, collected by the public employer. These dues go for more than negotiating contracts. Public employee unions are actively involved in the political process. Indeed, they help select the government officials with whom they bargain on behalf of government employees. The Center for Responsive Politics reports that, in the 2014 federal election cycle, four of the top eight political donors were labor unions  three of them public employee unions. (The top eight groups all gave overwhelmingly to Democrats; Nos. 9 and 10 on the Center for Responsive Politics list, however, gave to Republicans more than Democrats.) Over 99 percent of the unions money went to Democrats.

Therefore, if public employee unions atrophy, the effect disproportionately will be felt by Democratic candidates, especially in primaries, where public employee unions dominate the process.

The right of unions to charge a fee to employees they represent, even if employees chose not to join the union, has long been settled in the private sector. The issue for public employees, however, has not been so clearly settled. First, federal law does not apply to them. Second, the First Amendment applies to government employers, but not private employers. A private sector employer could hire only Democrats, for example, if she or he wished. A public employer cant.

If a private employer agrees with a union to deduct union fees from employees paychecks, no First Amendment issue is involved. When the employer is the state, county or city, however, it becomes an issue of the government compelling individuals to pay money to an organization they may not support  that might violate employees right of association (or not to associate) under the First Amendment.

In 1977, the Supreme Court set in place a general rule that even a public employee who was not a union member could be compelled to pay the union the cost of bargaining for the employee. This was roughly the same rule that applied in the private sector. The rationale was that, to preserve workplace tranquility, it was important that all who benefited from a unions representational effort helped pay for it. That was important enough a concern to override the First Amendment rights of the public employees who did not support the union.

Recently, the Supreme Court has narrowed its 1977 decision. In 2014, the court considered the case of home health care workers, whom the state of Illinois had deemed to be state employees. There was no common workplace; hence, the dampening down of inter-employee strife was not a compelling state interest. The court held that the First Amendments guarantee of a right to associate also meant a right for a government employee not to be compelled to associate with a union.

Mondays case will decide whether the court will overrule the 1977 opinion outright and say that government cannot compel its employees to associate (by dues or otherwise) with a union. For nonunion members, this would mean the end of payroll deductions for any union purpose, and, depending on how broadly the court rules, even union members payments might have to be collected outside of the paycheck deduction process, to the extent used for political purposes.

That would decimate the financial base of public employee unions, matching the practical extinction that has already happened with private sector unions.

Tom Campbell is the dean of the Fowler School of Law at Chapman University. He has published in the field of labor law and is a former congressman, California state senator and state finance director.

These views are his own.
FLINT, Mich.  Shortly after officials switched the source of their drinking water to the Flint River from Lake Huron in April 2014 to save money, residents started complaining that their tap water looked strange, tasted bad and caused rashes. But not until the fall of 2015, when the water was found to have elevated levels of lead that were reflected in childrens blood, did state officials swing into action.

Now they are scrambling to address a situation that has endangered the health of Flints children and generated untold costs and anxiety.

State and city leaders had largely dismissed residents complaints for months, assuring them that the water was safe and being tested regularly. With the emergence of the blood level data, officials began advising residents not to drink unfiltered tap water  a recommendation that remains in effect.

In October, Gov. Rick Snyder helped orchestrate a switch back to Lake Huron water. Though Mayor Karen Weaver called that a positive step, she said the change did not undo corrosion damage from the river water that caused pipes to leach lead.

As of last month, the state had identified 43 people with elevated lead levels in their blood. Lead is toxic, and can cause stunted development in children.

Last month, the governor apologized to residents. On Tuesday he declared the city to be in a state of emergency  the same day that federal officials said they had opened an investigation into the water contamination. And in October, Snyder announced a state plan to distribute free water filters and provide water testing to residents. But many residents remain unsatisfied.

On Thursday, Snyder told reporters that he would work to provide a broad-based suite of services to address the water issues and other problems in Flint. Among the services could be more water testing, more filters, and health care and education support for those affected. Many residents have called for state money to replace the citys old pipe infrastructure  which the mayor has said could cost up to $1.5 billion  and a fund to address any developmental impact on children.

You have to earn trust, Snyder said. This will be a process by showing the steps were taking to be proactive.
A 42-year-old man who strangled his wife in their Irvine home, then took his children to a Jack in the Box restaurant for dinner, was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison Friday.

Shalabh Rastogis family members wrote letters pleading with Orange County Superior Court Judge Michael Cassidy to show some leniency in sentencing. The state-mandated sentence for Rastogi, who was convicted Nov. 17 of first-degree murder in the death of his 40-year-old wife, Jalina George, was 25 years to life.

Cassidy had the discretion to deviate from that sentence if there were unusual circumstances, but he said there were none.

Rastogis attorney, Melani Bartholomew, argued for probation based on the familys wishes for a lesser sentence.

My client takes complete and total responsibility for this, she said. He has shown great remorse and great insight into what happened.

She said her client is a meek, soft-spoken person who snapped on May 21, 2012, when he killed his wife, who was having an affair.

Bartholomew argued that Rastogi was the primary caregiver to the couples children and that they would be orphaned because of the sentence.

Senior Deputy District Attorney Cynthia Herrera countered, This court did not make those children orphans, and neither did the victim. He orphaned those children.

The judge said, This is a tragic case, not only for the loss of the mom, but the kids are now without parents.

The couple had two daughters and a son and were living in Irvine after a 2011 move from Boston. Rastogi grew suspicious of his wife when he came across a medical bill indicating she was taking birth control measures.

He started using a locator tool on his wifes cellphone to track her movements and at one point downloaded a chat session she had with her boyfriend, Herrera said.

The couple quarreled about their marriage until they signed a document May 17, 2012, finalizing terms of their breakup, the prosecutor said.

It came to a head May 21 after Rastogi dropped off the children at a class and he and his wife quarreled again in their home. When she tried to leave, he wouldnt let her, the prosecutor said.

She says to him, Im going to take the kids, Herrera said in her opening statement of the trial.

Rastogi then choked her, saying, Youve ruined my life. Ive done everything for you and you cheat on me, and now youre going to take my kids away from me, Herrera said.

After his wife fell unconscious, he bought plane tickets for himself and their children to India and then went to pick them up from their class, Herrera said.

They stopped at a Jack in the Box for dinner on the way home and were eating at their residence when the children started asking about their mothers whereabouts, the prosecutor said.

The couple was an odd pairing, Bartholomew said. He was from a well-to-do family from the north of India, and her family was less wealthy and from the south part of the country.

She was Roman Catholic, and he was Hindu, the attorney said. They met when she got into trouble at their university and faced expulsion, but he used his status to lobby on her behalf, and they fell in love, Bartholomew said.

Rastogi was content to remain in India working for his uncles firm, but she dreamed of emigrating to the U.S.

They bought a big house with a pool in Boston in 2009 but sold it at a loss because she wanted to chase Hollywood dreams in California, Bartholomew said.

Rastogi converted to Catholicism for his wife and became a devoted member of the religion, his attorney said.

The two argued about all the auditions she was dragging the children to that sometimes led her to take them out of school, Bartholomew said.
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The president of the United States wept on Tuesday. He wept when he came to the part of his speech about the first-graders.

First-graders! he said. Every time I think about those kids, it gets me mad.

Barack Obama, purportedly an emotionless man, has been passionate about gun control ever since the 2012 school massacre in Newtown, Conn., when 20 children and six adults were killed. Aides say his meetings with the Newtown parents included tears, too.

But Obamas most powerful emotion on this issue isnt empathy; as he said, its anger. Hes angry that Republicans in Congress blocked new gun control laws even after Newtown. Hes frustrated that he hasnt been able to rally political pressure in favor of new regulations. And hes disappointed that his legacy may be nothing more than the mild executive actions he unveiled this week.

The measures Obama described on Tuesday are sensible but modest, limited by what his lawyers said he could do without the approval of Congress.

He expanded an existing regulation to ensure that more gun buyers receive background checks, and created a new rule to require that dealers report when guns are lost or stolen.

Most significant, Obama broadened the definition of a gun dealer to make it clear that anyone who sells firearms as a regular course of trade or business must conduct background checks on customers. Until now, people who sold guns over the Internet, or informally at gun shows, could claim that they were merely engaging in a hobby  which meant no checks were needed.

The governments new clarification means federal law enforcement can more easily go after anyone who frequently sells guns to strangers for profit. If the sellers fail to conduct background checks, they could be fined as much as $250,000.

Thousands of gray-area gun dealers are on notice, Attorney General Loretta Lynch said.

Thats not an infringement of their right to keep and bear arms; theres no limit on how many guns they can own. Instead, its a regulation of their freedom to conduct business  the same regulation that gun stores already endure.

Of course, that didnt stop the National Rifle Association and its allies from claiming that Obamas action was dangerous. The proposed executive actions are ripe for abuse, the NRA warned. House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., issued a statement charging that Obama was targeting the most law-abiding of citizens instead of terrorists.

Despite that heated rhetoric, the real-world impact is likely to be small  mostly because the agency thats charged with enforcing Obamas orders doesnt have the staff to do the job.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is the federal agency that oversees gun dealers, and Congress has deliberately starved its budget for years.

ATF is massively underfunded and overworked, said Matt Bennett of Third Way, a centrist group that has worked for gun control legislation. As it is, theyre able to inspect federally licensed dealers, on average, only once every seven years.

Obama on Tuesday promised to include funding for 200 more ATF agents in his budget this year  but that merely amounts to a request that Congress is certain to reject.

The odds that Congress will go along are roughly zero, Bennett said. There is, alas, no way around that.

Still, Obamas actions did include some useful improvements, he said, including a shift of money within the Federal Bureau of Investigation to strengthen the background check system. And there are two ways Obamas actions could have broader political effects.

One is that the president has injected gun control directly into the presidential election. If his successor is a Republican, these executive orders will be overturned (on day one, some GOP candidates have already promised). If his successor is a Democrat, they will remain in place  even if Congress remains under Republican control, as expected.

More broadly, Obama seemed to signal that he plans to make the most of his last year in office through unilateral action.

Some of the measures the president unveiled this week were proposed by administration officials last fall, but the White House hesitated then  in part because it still needed Congress to pass a spending bill for 2016.

That bill is now in place, and Obama appears to believe he no longer needs to bargain with Republican leaders, who are focused on winning Novembers election.

Indeed, White House officials say they are considering more executive actions in areas from climate change (including new emissions standards for heavy trucks) to the U.S. military detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (which Obama vowed to close in 2009).

This weeks gun control measures were only the first act in a final year that promises even sharper partisan combat than before.
BJP backs Jallikattu in TN: Sorry Mr Bull, you are not a cow

Feature

oi-Oneindia

By Oneindia Staff Writer

The NDA government has issued a notification to permit Jallikattu, Tamil Nadu's traditional bull-taming sport which has been making the headlines for controversial reasons, ahead of the Pongal festival.

The latest notification, which overturns the one of 2011 that had prohibited the exhibition or training of bulls and other animals as performing ones. The Supreme Court had in 2014 upheld the order of 2011.

The Centre's move came after Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa made a request to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to lift the ban on the sport and celebrations were seen across the southern state once the Centre responded. A grateful Jayalalithaa thanked the PM after the Centre's notification came.

Will BJP gain anything in TN by sacrificing the bull?

For the AIADMK leadership, the reason for backing Jallikattu so urgently is still understandable but how much the BJP will gain in the poll-bound state by making this move?

At a time when the right-wing brigade in the country is displaying its desperate concern for the well-being of the cow, the BJP showed little care for the bull's lot just because it wants to align itself with the popular opinion in favour of the age-old game which the animal rights groups have denounced.

Jayalalithaa's fast course to regain popularity after floods

Political observers felt the Tamil Nadu CM's demand for an ordinance (!) to allow Jallikattu was aimed at bagging the votes of the Thevar community, a sizeable backward class group which is involved in the sport in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu. This could also be a ploy to divert attention from the slow recovery that the state has been found to be making from the devastating floods in some of its northern parts, including capital Chennai.

The BJP is perhaps also seeing an opportunity in this. Just like fight for development or against pollution, the bull-taming sport is also a safe election issue for supporting it would not meet much resistance, except from the animal groups. Hence, the BJP leadership promptly responded to Jayalalithaa's request to keep the unpredictable leader content, something that could help the saffron party after the Tamil Nadu polls get over.

For a party which has received back-to-back election setbacks in 2015 and also not in a position to deliver in the next set of Assembly polls, some opportunity somewhere is always welcome. Jayalalithaa, too, would look to regain her popularity in the wake of the floods before the state goes to the polls and hence took up the Jallikattu on an urgent basis. The stakes are similar for the AIADMK and BJP as far as Jallikattu's resumption is concerned.

If an ordinance is promulgated before January 14, the animal rights groups are likely to move the court and seek a stay on Jallikattu. But yet that wouldn't hurt the AIADMK and BJP for they would claim before the electorate that they had at least tried.

The Congress would be left exasperated as Jayalalithaa also blamed the former UPA government for its 2011 notification whereby bulls couldn't be exhibited or treated as a performing animal. The DMK also criticised the AIADMK government over its handling of the matter but all that is least likely to give the Opposition any opportunity to meet the stiff challenge that the populist CM of Tamil Nadu has already thrown at it.

National parties now running after local issues to become relevant?

It is seen as a pattern now that the national parties try to emulate the regional parties to focus on local issues to gain a foothold in those states where they are weak. The BJP, for example, changed its focus more on issues like development in West Bengal from directly attacking Mamata Banerjee in issues like Saradha chit fund scam.

The ruling Trinamool Congress, which has quite a lead over the saffron party, is also talking about development and it would be futile for the BJP to attack its top leadership if it wants to increase its vote share there. Now, the same is happening in Tamil Nadu where the BJP has shown an inclination to align itself with the powerful Jayalalithaa in a local issue to keep the electorate happy.

Sorry Mr Bull, you are not quite a cow

But does scoring a political brownie point the most important objective for the BJP, which is leading the national government now, than take due care of an important issue like animals' rights? If a cow commands so much respect in this country today, why doesn't a bull?
'Chhota Rajan has special relationship with Indian government'

India

oi-PTI

New Delhi, Jan 9: Former Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar has claimed that the Indian government has a special relationship with underworld don Chhota Rajan, who was deported from Bali in November last year. Kumar made the assertion during a session at the Delhi Literature Fest late last evening with journalist Avirook Sen.

"The short answer- yes there is," Kumar said to Sen's question. Kumar reiterated his statement when session moderator Madhu Trehan asked him whether this was a fact or just hearsay.

"If I say it, it is true," he said. The former top Delhi police officer in his tell-all memoir "Dial D for Don" had claimed that he had received a call from Dawood Ibrahim in June 2013. Kumar had written that post the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts, he had telephonic conversations with the fugitive mob boss on three different occasions.

The book, which was released last year, also was in the news for its disclosure that that at one point in the 1990s Dawood wanted to surrender. Responding to a question, Kumar said that all hopes must not be pinned on Chhota Rajan in order to get to Dawood.

"There is hope in a manner of speaking, but let us not pin all our hopes on Chhota Rajan," Kumar said. Chhota Rajan, a former aide of Dawood, is currently lodged in Tihar Jail. The session also saw Kumar sharing some of his recollections from controversial cases over his long career, including the Ansal Plaza shootout and the Mandal Commission protests.

PTI
Former US state secy John Kerry trying to save Iran deal by himself: Report

Trump thumps Kerry once again over Iran Deal activism, this time on Twitter

News executives urge Kerry to push Iran to release reporter

India

oi-PTI

Washington, Jan 9: Executives from 25 news organisations, including The Associated Press, have sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry urging him to press Iran to release jailed Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian.

The letter said Iran should recognise that independent journalism is "a fundamental human right" and free Rezaian.

"The United States has considerable leverage with Iran right now to press that point, and we urge you to continue to do so," the executives wrote yesterday. Rezaian, 39, was born in California and holds both US and Iranian citizenships.

He was convicted in closed proceedings last year after being charged with espionage and related allegations. The length of his sentence has not been disclosed publicly.

"Iran has never offered any evidence that even makes a pretense of justifying this imprisonment," the news executives wrote. They noted: "Many of our organisations employ journalists who, like Jason, operate in countries, like Iran, that do not always hold a high regard for the free flow of information. We understand the risks involved."

Still, the letter continued, "we depend on the United States and other democratic countries to stand behind the values that Jason represents." Media organisations represented in the letter included the AP, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN.

The Post has vigorously denied the accusations against Rezaian. Post Publisher Frederick J Ryan Jr said in December that the United States, other governments and businesses should keep Rezaian in mind when considering improved relations with Iran.

"If the callous regime in Tehran imprisons and abuses a fully accredited and innocent journalist, what might they do to a visiting delegation?" Ryan said.

PTI
FTII Mahabharata: It's not over yet

India

oi-Oneindia

By Oneindia Staff Writer

Bengaluru, Jan 9: There was an uncanny lull at the prestigious Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, after the long-drawn protests by students came to an end some time ago.

The calm, however, was broken once again on Thursday (January 7) when the students and the police clashed.

This happened after the aspiring filmmakers had left their classrooms to express their displeasure in a non-violent manner against Gajendra Chauhan, who finally took charge as the FTII chairman on Thursday.

Violence used on non-violent protestors

Some of the video footages gathered from the spot clearly show the students staging non-violent protests. It was the police which used canes to disperse the slogan-shouting protestors, alleged a few students.

Gajendra Chauhan takes charge as FTII chairman; 40 protesters held

Even female students were not spared. Several women students were allegedly manhandled by the police. Around 25 students were forcibly packed in a police van and detained till evening.

Heavy deployment of security personnel - riot control team and State Reserve Police Force (SRPF)-at the campus gave a fair indication that the government was in no mood to handle the students' protests with kid gloves.

The protesting students were seen shouting slogans like 'Go back Chauhan' and 'Chauhan Murdabad'.

"We were lathi-charged for trying to enter our own campus gate," student leader Reema Kaur told media. While police claimed the students' protest was violent, students insisted it was not so.

A seven-month-long battle

Chauhan's appointment as the FTII chairman in June 2015 triggered unprecedented protests by students.

Several celebrated alumni questioned his stature and vision to head the reputed film school that has produced some of the finest talents. Chauhan's claim to fame was the role of Yudhishthira, which he portrayed in India's most-popular television series, Mahabharata.

The critics of the BJP leader say he was given the prestigious post as a gift for campaigning for Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the 2014 General Elections.

The students launched an indefinite strike on June 12 last year against Chauhan, but withdrew it in October after 139 days.

Chauhan holds out olive branch to protesting students

On his first day on the campus, Chauhan attended meetings with members of the FTII Society and the Governing Council. Chauhan told the media that he was willing to address the demands of the protesting students.

"I really wanted to meet the students of the institute. I am willing to talk to protesting students any time and listen to their grievances," Chauhan told.

Regarding protesting students, Chauhan said, "Staging a protest is a democratic right. Taking action on them is not under our jurisdictions, it is for police to look into the matter."

"I came here to fulfil my responsibilities and the meeting has been very fruitful and it has been conducted with lot of positive attitude," he said.

Why Chauhan never meets the students?

Last year, when the protests were at its peak, we saw how Chauhan used television channels to pass on his message to the students.

However, on the ground no such effort was made by him or by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry to have a healthy dialogue. Now, also he spoke to media, but did not make the effort to address the students directly, even when he was on the campus.

Unless the students are addressed directly by the decision-makers (government), the epic battle seems far from over.

OneIndia News
Every Republican of the type concerned with winning in November has been asking the question (at least internally), What if the worst happens?

The worst does not mean the nomination of Ted Cruz, in spite of justified fears of political disaster. Cruz is an ideologue with a message perfectly tuned for a relatively small minority of the electorate. Uniquely in American politics, he has made his reputation by being roundly hated by his colleagues  apparently a prerequisite for a certain kind of anti-establishment conservative, but unpromising for an image makeover at his convention.

Cruzs nomination would represent the victory of the hard right  religious right and tea party factions  within the Republican coalition. After he loses, the ideological struggles within the GOP would go on.

No, the worst outcome for the party would be the nomination of Donald Trump. It is impossible to predict where the political contest between Trump and Hillary Clinton would end up. Clinton has manifestly poor political skills and Trump possesses a serious talent for the low blow. But Trumps nomination would not be the temporary victory of one of the GOPs ideological factions. It would involve the replacement of the humane ideal at the center of the party and its history. If Trump were the nominee, the GOP would cease to be.

Whatever your view of Republican politicians, the aspiration, the self-conception, of the party was set by Abraham Lincoln: human dignity, honored by human freedom and undergirded by certain moral commitments, including compassion and tolerance. Lincoln described the promise that in due time the weights should be lifted from the shoulders of all men, and that all should have an equal chance.

It is this universality that Trump attacks. All of his angry resentment against invading Hispanics and Muslims adds up to a kind of ethno-nationalism  an assertion that America is being weakened and adulterated by the other. This is consistent with European, right-wing, anti-immigrant populism. It is not consistent with conservatism, which, at the very least, involves respect for institutions and a commitment to reasoned, incremental change. And Trumpism is certainly not consistent with the Republicanism of Lincoln, who admitted no exceptions to the promises of the Declaration of Independence and was nominated, in part, because he could appeal to anti-slavery German immigrants.

Liberals who claim that Trumpism is the natural outgrowth, or logical conclusion, of conservatism or Republicanism are simply wrong. Edmund Burke is not the grandfather of Nigel Farage. Lincoln is not even the distant relative of Trump.

Trump, in some ways, is an odd carrier of ethno-nationalist beliefs. He held few of them, as far as I can tell, just four years ago. But as a demagogue, he has followed some of Americas worst instincts wherever they have led, and fed ethnic and religious prejudice in the process. All presidential nominees, to some extent, shape their parties into their own image. Trump would deface the GOP beyond recognition.

Trump is disqualified for the presidency by his erratic temperament, his ignorance about public affairs and his scary sympathy for authoritarianism. But for me, and I suspect for many, the largest problem is that Trump would make the GOP the party of racial and religious exclusion.

American political parties are durable constructions. But they have been broken before by powerful, roiling issues such as immigration and racial prejudice. Many Republicans could not vote for Trump, but would have a horribly difficult time voting for Clinton. The humane values of Republicanism would need to find a temporary home, which would necessitate the creation of a third party. This might help elect Clinton, but it would preserve something of conservatism, held in trust, in the hope of better days.

Ultimately, these political matters are quite personal. I have spent 25 years in the company of compassionate conservatives, reform conservatives, Sams Club conservatives, or whatever they want to call themselves, trying to advance an agenda of social justice in Americas center-right party. We have shared a belief that sound public policy  promoting opportunity, along with the skills and values necessary to grasp it  can improve the lives of our fellow citizens, and thus make politics an honorable adventure.

The nomination of Trump would reduce Republican politics  at the presidential level  to an enterprise of squalid prejudice. And many Republicans could not follow, precisely because they are Republicans. By seizing the GOP, Trump would break it to pieces.
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News Flash: 2012 Army troops movement story was true: Manish Tewari

India

oi-Oneindia

By Oneindia Staff Writer

New Delhi, Jan 9: Get all news updates in brief from India and other countries here on Saturday, Jan 9, 2016.

9:15 pm: GST is not being passed because BJP & PM Modi do not want it. BJP is deceiving people: Jairam Ramesh, Congress.

9:00 pm: I also did this to make other citizens aware, please come up where are these issues: Vijay Hingorani who sued BMC after falling into manhole.

8:40 pm: Fire in 'agarbatti' factory in Ghaziabad, 1 dead.

8:10 pm: Mumbai: Man sues BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation(BMC) for Rs 1.5cr after he broke his leg by falling into manhole.

7:50 pm: We strongly condemn such terrorist attacks, wherever it takes place: Le Yucheng,Chinese ambassador to India on Pathankot Attack.

China is also a victim of terrorist act. We share the feeling and anger of Indian people: Le Yucheng pic.twitter.com/hEEhhPIvSm  ANI (@ANI_news) January 9, 2016

7:40 pm: For now Governor's rule has been imposed in J&K: Jitendra Singh, MoS PMO on Mehbooba Mufti's swearing in as CM.

7:30 pm: Around 7 persons injured in a grenade blast in Meghalaya's Williamnagar.

7:25 pm: India beat Western Australia XI by 64 runs in a 50-over warm-up match in Perth.

7:10 pm: I was in the standing committee of Defence then & unfortunate but the story (Army troop moving towards Delhi in 2012) was true: Manish Tewari,Former I&B Minister, when asked on veracity of 2012 Indian Express Army troops movement story.

Indian express troop movement story was true says Manish Tewari(Former member of parl standing committee on defence) pic.twitter.com/t5D9gelFK1  ANI (@ANI_news) January 9, 2016

6:50 pm: Sania Mirza-Martina Hingis beat Angelique Kerber-Andrea Petkovic 7-5, 6-1 to clinch Brisbane International Women's Double title.

6:30 pm: People take out candle march to pay tribute to jawans who lost their lives in Pathankot Attack.

5:23 pm: Was briefed in great detail on how our forces neutralised such a serious terrorist attack: PM Narendra Modi after visiting Pathankot

5:33: Terror alert in Punjab's Batala town in Gurdaspur district. Police and security agencies activated.

5:19 pm: Samajwadi Party hits out at BJP for raking up Ram temple issue. The matter is in court, says SP leader

4:49 pm: Jharkhand police bust a naxal hideout in Khunti village, recovers 3 rifles, cylinder bombs and more than 600 bullets.

4:10 pm: To please few political leaders of South, govt has allowed this barbaric tradition: Jairam Ramesh,Cong on jallikattu

4:02 pm: UAE arrests 2 men for posting selfie in front of hotel fire on New Year's Eve

3.13 pm: Sanjiv Ranjan appointed as the next Ambassador of India to Republic of Argentina.

3: 02 pm: No decision to extend trial period of Odd-even, will examine the 15-day data & then decide the future course of action: Gopal Rai

2.20 pm: Allies PDP and BJP today dismissed speculation about any differences or new conditions between them over formation of new government in Jammu and Kashmir.

1.53 pm: At least four persons injured in a grenade blast in Meghalaya's Williamnagar: DGP Rajiv Mehta.

1.45 pm: A bullet-riddled body of an Assistant Sub-Inspector has been found in Vasihali district of Bihar on Saturday.

1.23 pm: Clash reported between ABVP and NSUI students over Ram Janmabhoomi seminar in DU today.

1.10 pm: Bihar: 10-phase Panchayat elections to begin from 24th of April.

1.05 pm: Illegal arms factory busted in West Bengal

1.00 pm: IIT topper from Hyderabad found dead at US University, suicide suspected

12.35 pm: Ghulam Ali to perform at Netaji Indoor Stadium in Kolkata on January 12.

12.10 pm: A girl & a boy went missing in Mumbai. Girl fell in the water while clicking a selfie & the boy had jumped in to rescue her.

11.59 am: German Chancellor Angela Merkel says she will consider changes in law to make it easier to deport migrants who commit crimes.

11.48 am: PM Modi arrives in Pathankot.

11.45 am: Mehbooba Mufti to take oath as J&K CM next week.

11.10 am: BJP MP Manoj Tiwari has rubbished reports which said he called actor Aamir Khan a traitor.

11.05 am: Delhi University students protest against Subramanian Swamy's seminar on building Ram temple.

10.59 am: Dadri lynching: Victim Akhlaq's kin get four flats in Greater Noida

10.35 am: Reaction of Nawaz Sharif now is similar to Yusuf Gilani after 26/11.He also phoned Dr.Manmohan Singh and promised action-Mani Shankar Aiyar.

10.30 am: John Kerry blames China for 'failed' soft approach to N. Korea

10.15 am: AAP govt vs Centre: Delhi home secretary's powers curtailed, kept in charge of only 3 home subjects

10.10 am: NSUI protests over Ram Janmabhoomi Seminar in DU

9.55 am: Jammu and Kashmir is likely to undergo a spell of Governor's rule this weekend.

9.45 am: FBI hacks world's largest child porn site, 1,300 arrested

9.30 am: Head of PACL Nirmal Singh Bhangoo arrested by CBI over alleged $6.8 billion investment scam.

9.25 am: Turkey claims to have foiled ISIS raid on training camp, Iraq denies any battle.

9.15 am: Mumbai's kaali-peeli taxis to get an app this month.

9.12 am: DRDO successfully conducted test firing of new tank ammunition Penetration-Cum Blast & Thermobaric Ammunition in Odisha on 6th Jan 2016.

9.05 am: Govt to measure success of Swachh Bharat Mission, rank 75 cities on performance.

8.56 am: We met Mehbooba ji to express our condolences, & there was a little talk about the immediate constitutional requirement: Ram Madhav

8.52 am: Airports won't be named after netas, proposal being considered by the civil aviation ministry: Reports

8.50 am: Delhi out of Unesco's heritage city tag race; eyes on Nalanda in 2016

8.45 am: Kamal Haasan to speak at Harvard during India Conference 2016

8.35 am: Security tightened at Pathankot airbase ahead of PM Modi's visit today.

8.30 am: Terror outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad mocks Indian defence agencies

8.20 am: Delhi Metro sets new travel time limits for commuters, new rules to come into effect from Monday. Decision has been taken to decongest stations.

8.15 am: Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to visit the Pathankot air base station on Saturday to take stock of the security situation after the terrorist attack.
Scorpio car swept by flash floods in AP even as driver tried to steer it away | WATCH

In Andhra, power staff to not use mobiles during work hours from Oct 1

Kakinada set to fly high: Naidu

India

oi-PTI

Kakinada, Jan 9: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has said that Kakinada was poised for fast growth next to Visakhapatnam and Tirupati, after receiving the smart city tag.

Addressing the Janmaboomi-Maavuru programme at Parlovapeta Kakinada limits here yesterday, he said the port city was set to become a hub of economic activity after its inclusion in the smart city list.

Kakinada would soon be declared as a clean city, free from open defecation. Another Rs 36 crore project was being implemented to supply water connections to the poor. About 3600 and more houses would be constructed under Centre government sponsored scheme, Naidu said.

Also, the salt creek between the NTR Bridge and the Indrapalem junction would be developed as a tourist spot, spending Rs 90 crore, he added. Despite heavy deficit in the budget, the CM said the government was determined to go ahead with the development and welfare scheme as scheduled by mobilising resources.

On criticism by Opposition for not fulfilling election promises especially those to the Kapu community, Naidu said he was commited to include Kapus in backward class list. Already, a finance corporation has been constituted for the Kapu community with Rs 100 crore corpus fund to look after their requirements.

A Commission is also being constituted to go into the demands of Kapus and a decision would be taken soon after receiving its report, he said. The government's aim was to include Kapus in the BC list without affecting the existing quota.

Hence the Kapus (predominantly concentrated in the coastal districts) need not have any apprehension, he said. Later, Naidu inaugurated the three-day long beach festival at NTR beach in Vakalapudi village here.

Deputy Chief Minister Nimmakayala Chinarajappa, Finance Minister Yanamala Ramakrishna, in-charge minister Devineni Uma, Kakinada MP Thota Narasimham, District Collector H Arunkumar, SP Ravi Prakash and several MLAS were among those who attended the event.

PTI
AAP vs LG fight again and this is time it is on Gandhi Jayanti

Lal Bahadur Shastri was confident of India-Pakistan peace: Kuldip Nayar

India

oi-IANS

By Ians English

New Delhi, Jan 9: Lal Bahadur Shastri, India's second prime minister, was confident of subcontinental peace, which is why he signed the Tashkent Accord with Pakistan on January 10, exactly 50 years ago. But this collapsed due to his death hours later early January 11, an event that should be probed even though half a century has elapsed, veteran journalist Kuldip Nayar, a long-serving aide of the Indian leader, said.

"Shastri was very sagacious. He firmly believed India could make peace with Pakistan but not with China," Nayar, who was Shastri's media advisor, reminisced in an interview with IANS, adding that it was the prime minister, who got then Pakistani president Field Marshal Ayub Khan to pencil in the words "without resorting to arms" in the first draft of the Tashkent Agreement.

Under the agreement, the two countries agreed that their armies would return to the positions they held on August 5, 1965, the day they went to war for the second time after the partition of the subcontinent in 1947.

"Ayub Khan was inclined but (Pakistani foreign minister Zulfikar Ali) Bhutto stormed out of the negotiations, saying he would denounce the president (back) home. After Shastri died (in circumstances that are still suspect), and thanks to Bhutto, whatever had been achieved at Tashkent collapsed in Rawalpindi (then the Pakistani capital), Nayar, still sharp as a razor in spite of his 93 years and possibly the only survivor of Tashkent, noted.

Reinforcing this view, Nayar recalled Ayub Khan saying on the morning of Shastri's death: "Here lies the man who could have brought Pakistan and India close."

Pathankot terror attack: Here are the proofs which nail Pakistan

Ayub Khan, in fact was one of the two front pall-bearers (on the left) who carried Shastri's coffin to the aircraft that transported it to New Delhi.

Elaborating on Shastri's sagacity, Nayar pointed to a letter the then Shah of Iran, Mohammad Raza Pahlavi, wrote to Ayub Khan in the wake of the Chinese invasion of India in 1962, asking him to send Pakistani troops to beat back the invaders.

"A copy was marked to (India's first prime minister) Jawaharlal Nehru, who sought (home minister) Shastri's comments. Don't accept it, Shastri said because it tomorrow, if Pakistan asks for Kashmir (still a sticking point between the two nations on which they have fought four wars), we'll be in a difficult situation," Nayar contended.

Shastri had assumed office after soon after India's first prime minister died on May 24, 1964 in spite of the fact that it was widely felt that Nehru wanted his daughter, Indira Gandhi to succeed him.

So how did Tashkent, now the capital of Uzbekistan but at that time part of the undivided Soviet Union, come to be chosen as the venue of the peace negotiations?

"The Americans stepped in (after the 1965 war ended) but Shastri said 'No. They have given them (Pakistan) arms. We can't trust them. The Soviets stepped in; they said come to Tashkent, known for its kababs and good food. Shastri was a strict vegetarian, but he said, let's go."

Though military cooperation between India and the Soviet Union had begun soon after the 1962 war with China, this took a quantum leap soon after the Tashkent Accord and today, India imports almost 70 percent of its armaments from Russia, the successor state after the collapse of the Cold War superpower.

Read More: Pakistani, Indian foreign secretaries to meet on January 15: Aziz

Nayar also said there was much bonhomie between the Indian and Pakstani delegations, as also between the journalists of the two countries who were reporting on the talks.

"We (the journalists) were staying in the same hotel. Bahut milna julna tha. Saath khate peete the (There was much camadaraderia. We used to eat at drink together. After Shastri's death, all of them cam to sympathise with us). The next morning, even people on the street came to sympathise with us," Nayar recalled.

As for the circumstances of Shastri's death hours after the Tashkent Accord was signed, Nayar said: "There is a general perception that he was poisoned, there should be an enquiry, even though a long time has elapsed.

The government says there are certain papers whatever papers there are, make them public."

Speaking about the future of India-Pakistan ties, Nayar saw great hope. "There are fringe elements (as evidenced in the attack on the Pathankot IAF air base soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dramatic visit to Lahore via Kaul after a state visit to Moscow), but everyone realises that peace must prevail," he said.

"Had people like Lal Bahadur Shastri been around, all this would not have happened," Nayar concluded.

IANS
Pathankot attack: Foot prints of terrorists at Bamihal village will ascertain route taken

India

oi-Vicky

New Delhi, Dec 9: The foot prints of the terrorists who staged the Pathankot terror attack have been collected from the Bamihal village and the air force station and sent for forensic examination.

Need to see Pathankot attack as act of 'foreign aggression'

If the samples match then the National Investigation Agency will be able to clearly ascertain that the terrorists slipped into India through the Bamihal village. It may be recalled that there was denial by the Border Security Force that the terrorists may have slipped in through the Bamihal village.

The NIA which has formed four teams is camping in Pathankot. A team in Delhi is also part of the probe and will question the Gurdaspur, Superintendent of Police, Salwinder Singh on Monday, January 11th. He has been summoned to Delhi by the NIA for questioning.

DNA samples preserved:

NIA officials tell OneIndia that post mortem examinations of the bodies of the terrorists killed have been conducted at Pathankot Civil hospital on January 7th. Body tissues of the terrorists have been preserved for DNA sampling.

During investigations DNA samples have been collected from the vehicles used by the terrorists and the same are being sent for forensic examination. Footprints suspected to be of the terrorists, have been lifted by forensic experts from Bamihal village in the border area and from within the Air force station and have been sent to CFSL for examination.

All the arms and ammunitions used by the terrorists in the attack have been seized. These include AK series rifles, pistols, grenades and assorted ammunition. Other articles found on the bodies of the terrorists and from the crime scene and suspected to belong to the terrorists have been seized.

These include food articles and medicines carried by the terrorists. Search of the Air force station campus is being conducted to recover any trace evidence left behind by the terrorists.

Oneindia News

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Saturday, January 9, 2016, 10:58 [IST]
Pathankot attack: NIA focuses on 10 points to unravel plot

India

oi-IANS

By Ians English

New Delhi, Jan 9: Ten key points top the NIA's agenda as it probes the audacious terrorist attack on the IAF base at Pathankot in Punjab that has caused fresh strains in India-Pakistan relations.

Read more: Need to see Pathankot attack as act of 'foreign aggression'

The National Investigation Agency, which took over the case on January 4 from Punjab Police, is to uncover the sequence of events from the time the terrorists, believed to be Pakistanis, sneaked into India to the attack.

Some 36 hours of fighting at the base left seven security personnel dead. All six terrorists were also killed.

The key points the NIA is investigating include mobile phone conversations between the terrorists and their suspected handlers in Pakistan, a Jaish-e-Muhammad letter, DNA samples of the terrorists, and their voice record samples.

Other issues being focussed on include ammunition the terrorists carried, their strategy, suspected involvement of locals, the route the terrorists took from the India-Pakistan border, the accounts given by a Punjab Police officer, his friend and cook after their abduction by the terrorists just before the attack, and a Pathankot map found from the police officer's car, an NIA officer told IANS.

"A 20-member team of NIA, led by an inspector general, has been camping in Pathankot to supervise the investigation. Our focus is on the key points," the officer told IANS.

An officer of the rank of superintendent of police has been appointed the chief investigating officer of the case, he said.

The NIA took over the case by filing three separate First Information Reports (FIRs).

These were filed in connection with the abduction of Gurdaspur Superintendent of Police Salwinder Singh, along with his jeweller friend and cook, the earlier killing of taxi driver Ikagar Singh, and the terrorist strike at the Indian Air Force station.

Another NIA officer told IANS that the lapses by the Border Security Force (BSF) in preventing the infiltration from Pakistan into Bamiyal sector adjoining Gurdaspur in Punjab and Kathua in Jammu and Kashmir were being investigated at the highest level.

The failure of Punjab Police, which looks after the security of areas near the border, was also under the scanner, the NIA source said.

The NIA is also trying to establish the identity of local residents who provided army fatigues and a walkie-talkie to the six terrorists after they infiltrated into Punjab, possibly on December 30.

The NIA officer said the DNA samples of the terrorists have been sent to Pakistan for establishing their identity. Voice samples of the terrorists have also been sought from Pakistan.

The statements of the police officer, his friend Rajesh Verma and cook Madan Gopal were being thoroughly analysed, the officer told IANS. All of them will soon face lie detector tests.

The statement of the officer's personal security officer, Kulwinder Singh, has also been taken.

The officer said the calls made from the mobile phone of the abducted victims were being analysed along with the number belonging to the dead Innova driver, Ikagar Singh.

The NIA team on Wednesday took police officer Salwinder Singh to the place near Kolian village, 25 km from Pathankot, from where he was allegedly abducted in his car along with the two others. The NIA team also took the officer to the place where he was dumped by the terrorists and to the spot where his car was found abandoned.

The NIA team is looking at what the officer did for nearly three hours after he and the others allegedly left a shrine in Kathua district at 9.30 pm on December 31 -- till they were allegedly abducted on the midnight of January 1.

The superintendent, who was transferred from Gurdaspur last week, had claimed that he, along with Verma and the cook, were stopped and abducted by four or five heavily armed terrorists near Kolia village.

He claimed that his senior officers did not initially take his information on the presence of terrorists seriously.

IANS
After the verdict in Kathua rape case chief investigator regrets Vishal's release

Aerial Assassin: How AH-64 E Apache became the world's best Attack helicopter?

Police checkpoints along Jammu-Pathankot highway alerted after carjacking in Punjab

Grenade blast near Pathankot, all check-posts put on high alert

PM briefed on terror attack at Pathankot air base

India

oi-IANS

By Ians English

Pathankot (Punjab), Jan 9: Prime Minister Narendra Modi was on Saturday briefed by senior defence and security officers about the terrorist attack, carried out by suspected Pakistani terrorists last week, on the Pathankot IAF base.

The prime minister arrived here on Saturday morning for an assessment of the attack.

Soon after landing at the air base, targetted exactly a week ago in a pre-dawn attack, Modi met senior Indian Air Force (IAF) and army officers.

Tight security arrangements were in place for the prime minister's visit. No one was allowed to enter the area near the Air Force Station (AFS), located 250 km from Chandigarh.

The prime minister was taken around the air base by the defence and security officers.

Modi is likely to fly to the border belt with Pakistan in Punjab in an IAF helicopter for a first-hand account of the security measures at the border.

The terrorists are believed to have infiltrated into India from Pakistan side by taking advantage of broken border fencing.

Six terrorists and seven security personnel were killed in the attack.

Security forces repulsed the attack and the terrorists were unable to harm any of the IAF's critical assets, including fighter aircraft and attack helicopters.

IANS
Punjab's Gurdaspur on high alert

India

oi-Vicky

New Delhi, Jan 9: A high alert has been issued in Punjab following an intelligence alert of possible terrorists strikes and infiltration. The alert had been issued specific to the Batala town in Gurdaspur district.

Need to see Pathankot attack as act of 'foreign aggression'

All security agencies in the state have been put on high alert. There is a high alert at Batala an intelligence bureau official confirmed.

The security agencies in Punjab are taking no chances especially after the Pathankot attack that took place last week. Moreover it was only sox months back that Gurdaspur too had been hit by a terror strike.

Pathankot attack: Foot prints of terrorists at Bamihal village will ascertain route taken

There has also been search operations for two terrorists in Punjab. Some villagers had claimed spotting two terrorists in army fatigues. Security personnel have been undertaking an operation to nab these two men who are believed to have infiltrated along with the 6 others who undertook the Pathankot attack.

OneIndia News

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Saturday, January 9, 2016, 17:51 [IST]
Aryan Khan gets clean chit in drug case: Here is the timeline

Relief for SRK as SC upholds quashing of case against him for Vadodara stampede

Shah Rukh, Aamir enjoy same security cover as before: police

India

oi-PTI

Mumbai, Jan 8: Bollywood actors like Shah Rukh Khan and Aamir Khan coninue to enjoy the same level of security as before after a review of the protection cover, the police said here today.

"Review of security is a routine exercise. Security of any specific actor has not been downgraded or increased," said DCP (detection) Dhananjay Kulkarni.

Aamir meanwhile welcomed any move to scale down his security saying "the police personnel can be put to better use in securing the city." Shah Rukh and Aamir were provided additional security in the wake of their comments on perceived intolerance in the country.

According to police, Shah Rukh started getting threats after the release of his film "My Name is Khan". In January 2013, some groups had made statements after the Pakistan-based terrorist Hafiz Saeed's offer of asylum for the actor in Pakistan if he felt insecure in India.

An article written by Shah Rukh where he spoke of being a soft target for the right wing, and the need for him to always prove his patriotism, also led to hostile comments and some threats.

Aamir Khan's security was extended after the release of his movie "PK" last year. The actor had allegedly got extortion calls from a gangster last year.

Aamir Khan, in a Facebook post, said "I completely endorse the move by the Mumbai Police to reduce the security around me.

The police personnel can be put to better use in securing the city. If and when the Mumbai Police feel the need to increase my security, they will. I trust them completely."

PTI
Pak citizen indicted for trying to smuggle drones for Pak Army

International

oi-PTI

Washington, Jan 8: A Pakistani national has been indicted by a US court for trying to smuggle high-end military -grade drones for the Pakistan Army by using a Lahore-based shell company.

The individual identified as Syed Vaqar Ashraf, charged on nine counts, transferred more than USD 62,000 to a US company in different money transfers from Pakistan between 2012 and 2014, towards the purchase of a series of high-end drones with an estimated cost of more than USD 340,000, according to court documents.

While the court case has been going on for more than a year now, a US court in Phoenix unsealed the documents including federal complaint and indictment on January 6 The 14-page superseding indictment was filed before the court in December last year.

Court officials said Ashraf has been arrested in Brussels about a year ago and extradited to the United States some four months ago. His last court appearance was on December 23, during which he pleaded not guilty. There was no immediate response from the Pakistan Embassy here. According to the indictment, Ashraf was the CEO of Lahore-based I&E International.

Federal prosecutors alleged that this was a front company for the Pakistan Advanced Engineering Research Organisation (AERO), based in Lahore. Ashraf placed orders to a Arizona-based drone company for high-end military-grade drones.

The Arizona company  not named in the indictment  specialised in the design, development and manufacturing of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) for the US military. Federal prosecutors claim that Ashraf placed orders through emails for purchase of specific gyroscopes including eight VG34-0803 which is designed for medium size, multi- payload UAC designed for tactical long endurance missions, with a primary mission of reconnaissance, surveillance and communication relay. He also placed orders for 10 Memsic VG800CA-200 Low Drift MEMS Vertical Gyros, which has a military and non-military applications and is used to increase stability inside a UAV.

Both the items come under export control of the US Government. These models, capable of flying more than 20 hours, were designed for Israel and is used for reconnaissance . The total cost of these military hardware was nearly USD 3,45,000, for which he made an advancement payment of USD 62,000 in five wire transfers. According to court documents, Ashraf concealed to the representative of the US-based drone company  who was in fact an official of Homeland Security department about the actual reason for his purchase of such equipment.

When the officials from the US drone company told Ashraf that this equipment could not be shipped directly to Pakistan, Ashraf gave them a Brussels address. "Ashraf requested that Person A (from the US drone company) transship the modules to Pakistan, through Belgium," the indictment said.

Federal prosecutors alleged that Ashraf filled out fraudulent documents in the name of Innovative Links, a shell company used by him. But he was purchasing these for AERO, which is in fact a wing of the Pakistan military, prosecutors said. According to court documents, Ashraf told the undercover agent that his client was in fact the Pakistani military. The trial is scheduled for February 7.

PTI
What does the US actually want in Syria?

Two refugees arrested in the US on terror related charges

International

oi-PTI

Houston, Jan 9: The US Federal authorities have arrested two Iraqi-born refugees on terror-related charges for providing material support to the Islamic State terror group, officials said today.

Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan, 24, was arrested in Houston, Texas, and charged with attempting to provide material support to ISIS, while Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, 23, was arrested from California and charged with traveling to Syria to fight with ISIS and making a false statement to investigators.

The arrests, coming just over a month after the San Bernardino attack in California in which a Pakistani-origin couple killed 14 people, has renewed the debate in the US that authorities are not doing enough to screen the migrants coming from strife-torn countries in the Middle East.

Both suspects were Palestinians born in Iraq and both were living as refugees in the US, according to the US Justice Department. Citing social media communications, the criminal complaint against Jayab said he spoke with an unnamed Texas resident about weapons and training in Syria.

That unnamed individual is Hardan, who was indicted on Wednesday on three charges of providing material support to ISIS, according to the law enforcement officials.

Over 1 million refugees arrived in Europe by sea: UNHCR

"I need to learn from your weapon expertise," the individual wrote to Jayab, according to the complaint. In reply, Jayab wrote, "We will make your abilities very strong," according to authorities.

"Our concern now is only to arrive there," Jayab went on. "When you arrive to al-Sham [Syria] you will be trained."

It was not immediately clear whether Hardan or Jayab had retained legal representation. They are both scheduled to appear in court later today. If convicted, Hardan faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a USD 250,000 fine.

Jayab entered the US as an Iraqi refugee in October 2012, the Justice Department said. According to a criminal complaint filed in federal court, Jayab exchanged messages on social media in 2012 and 2013, saying he planned to go to Syria to fight.

In November 2013, the complaint alleges, he flew from Chicago to Turkey, and then traveled to Syria. He "allegedly reported on social media that he was in Syria fighting with various terror organisations, including Ansar al-Islam," officials said.

Meanwhile, the US Attorney Benjamin Wagner said there were no signs that Jayab was involved in any US terror plots. "While he represented a potential safety threat, there is no indication that he planned any acts of terrorism in this country," Wagner said. If convicted, he faces a maximum penalty of eight years in prison and a USD 250,000 fine.

PTI
India vs Pakistan Asia Cup 2022: Date, time, where and when to watch it LIVE and more

UAE arrests 2 men for posting selfie in front of hotel fire

International

oi-PTI

Dubai, Jan 9: Two young men were arrested in the UAE over their selfie in front of a New Year's Eve hotel fire and have been subsequently released after investigators found "no criminal intent".

The duo arrested for posting a selfie on social media with the Address Downtown fire in the background have been released, Attorney General of Dubai Essam Al Humaidan was quoted as saying by the state-run WAM news agency.

The news of the arrest and release of the two men comes after a couple were similarly criticised on the night of the fire for taking what was deemed to be the "most inappropriate selfie ever" smiling together with the burning hotel in the background.

The Attorney General said that the Public Prosecution in Dubai has decided to release the two young men following a thorough investigation and review of the posted picture and case file and after listening to all witnesses.

The case against them has been closed since "no evidence of criminal intent was established". The Attorney General called on individuals to exercise caution and discretion when posting any material on social media and refrain from spreading rumours, defaming others or violating other people's freedom.

Huge fire erupts at Dubai's the Address hotel, site of New Year celebrations

A huge fire ripped through the luxury Dubai hotel near the world's tallest tower Burj Khalifa, injuring 16 people, just a few hours before the emirate celebrated the new year with a spectacular fireworks display.

PTI
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Antigua to Resolve Longstanding Online Gambling Dispute with US

Published January 9, 2016 by Elana K

The Antigua Foreign Affairs Minister announced on Christmas Eve 2015 that Anigua is ready to accept the United States' offer, thus resolving the longstanding dispute between the two nations.

On Christmas Eve, the Antigua Foreign Affairs Minister, Charles Fernandez, announced that Antiguas government is ready to resolve the longstanding gambling trade dispute between itself and the United States government. In fact, Antigua is ready to accept the United States offer as early as January 2016 (yes, now!), and resolve the issue once and for all.

Antiguas beef with the United States goes back 13 years, when Antigua and Barbuda filed a complaint to the World Trade Organization accusing America of unfairly discriminating against Antigua's licensed online gambling sites that target the US.

On the other hand, the United States claimed that it had a responsibility to block international sites from its citizens in order to reduce problematic gambling behavior. The WTO accepted Antiguas complaint, not the United States' defense, calling US policy hypocritical, in that it allowed domestic sites to offer gambling services but not foreign sites.

In siding with Antigua, the WTO demanded that the US pay an annual $21 million to Antigua to counter the losses incurred by the ban, but the US has to date not paid one cent to Antigua. While the previous administration of Antigua took a hard-line stance against the US, the current Prime Minister of Antigua, Gaston Browne, who was elected in 2014, has made good-faith offers to the US, offering to cut their debt in half. It seems that Brownes more conciliatory approach has paved the way for Antigua to be ready to accept the United States latest offer. Hopefully, the former ruling party, the United Progressive Party, will not attempt to thwart the deal from going through.

What that deal is, however, has not yet been disclosed.

About the World Trade Organization

The WTO is an international organization that deals with the rules of trade between nations. Its goal is to help producers of goods and services, exporters, and importers conduct their businesses.
Congress Switchboard: 202-224-3121

"Rob Kall's book is amazing. He's created a real breakthrough, visionary how-to for a sustainable, quality future. Like Saul Alinski's Rules for Radicals, this book is destined to become a classic must-read for all those concerned with social, economic, and environmental justice in today's interconnected world. Story shapes the world and our world needs new stories if we are to survive and thrive. The story of the bottom-up evolution and revolution is one that can change individuals, groups, businesses, religions, and governments for the positive as it shows how bottom-up inclusiveness, connectedness, collaboration, empathy, innovation, and freeform creativity can help unleash the great potentials for good inherent in our very nature. If you want to improve things in your world and the world, first read this book, then apply the suggestions. Change is sure to come."



Pamela Jaye Smith, mythologist and author of InnerDrives, Power of the Dark Side, Symbols* Images* Codes* and award-winning writer-producer-director
Wherever modern war exists, governments are indebted to bankers. This is what prompted a cash-strapped Napoleon to observe: When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain. It is hardly coincidental that the first bank in North America was chartered to supply arms for the American Revolution, and the first central bank of the United States was chartered specifically to fund Revolutionary War debt. Although no banks had existed in British North America during the 174 years preceding the Declaration of Independence, Americas first commercial bank sprang forth in 1781.
Why else would the GOP presidential candidate oppose US intelligence keeping an eye on Israel?



Marco Rubio - Thirsty for Power

(Image by DonkeyHotey) Details DMCA



This week, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) released a television ad that slammed President Barack Obama on several fronts: guns, abortion, climate change (it's not a true threat), and the war on terrorism. In the ad, the almost-top-tier GOP presidential candidate proclaims, "America needs a real commander in chief and a president that will keep us safe." And, as part of his indictment of Obama, Rubio huffs, "He spies on Israel."

Rubio's message seems to be that a strong and effective US leader would not spy on Israel, and that Rubio would not green-light espionage operations that keep an eye on that nation. No doubt, that would delight Israel and its spies, who have long targeted Washington with aggressive espionage operations.

As the Wall Street Journal reported last month, the US intelligence establishment does snoop on Israeli officials. This has outraged conservative supporters of Israel within the United States. But what has such spying unearthed? That Israel spies on the United States.


'Trump-Hitler' gets 11.4m hits on Google

(Image by Democratic Underground) Details DMCA



It's almost as if he's running his campaign as a send-up of the other hopefuls, beholden to lobbyists and the mainstream media. The only one with name recognition is Jeb Bush, and that, only because his brother was president (disastrously) eight years ago. Think of Trump as The Joker in the film "The Dark Knight" (2008): "I'm not a schemer. I try to show the schemers how pathetic their attempts to control things really are."

He electrifies audiences, much as fascist scalawags Hitler or Mussolini did when Germans and Italians felt hopeless in the face of economic disaster. But where Nazism is defined as "a form of socialism featuring racism and expansionism", Trump is no Nazi. It is precisely because he is not a Nazi (and hence easy game for the mainstream) that the US imperial elite are so incensed by him and his sudden, immense popularity. He is neither a socialist nor an expansionist. In as much as he has a coherent philosophy, it is libertarian and isolationist. He wants good relations with Russia, and cooperation on fighting al-Qaeda's latest incarnation. "Russia wants to get rid of ISIS. We want to get rid of ISIS. Maybe let Russia do it. Let them get rid of ISIS. What the hell do we care?"



Alternative to the Bush-Obama project





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The Republicans and American gun nutz have become unhinged because the greatest President in their lifetime is making an executive order to reinforce gun laws that are already on the books. Thirty-thousand people are killed each year by guns, and President Obama's sensible gun legislation is met with irrational Republican vitriolic ire.

Congressmen Steven Palazzo of Mississippi is asking his colleagues in Congress to censure President Obama for his executive actions on gun "control" sales. Congress wants to censure the first Black President like they actually censured the first Black Attorney General, Eric Holder. It is no coincident that censure is being pushed by one of the old slave-state representatives for a resolution against another Black official. Calling President Obama the "N-word" is being masked by a Congressional censure resolution.

Our children are dying every day, and these racist wars against reasoned governance is disgraceful and deferential to a more perfect and safe union. It is time for the American people to get angry and loud. If the Congress has "censure resolution fever" why don't they censor the 47 Senators who have violated the Constitution and betrayed the American people by sending a letter to the Ayatollah of Iran?

Another example that should be censured is Senator Tom Cotton (R) of Arkansas, another former slave-state, who accepted more than a "few pieces of silver" to sell out his country. Cotton collected $2.1 million in campaign support from the pro-Israel lobby. He has also taken almost $2 million from the gun lobby to block sensible gun laws to save our children's lives.
The guy who has branded himself as the wonkish, "serious" Republican presidential candidate has unveiled a plan to make millions of Americans go hungry. That would be Jeb! Bush, of course, and:

"He would eliminate the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, formerly called food stamps, housing assistance programs and a cash program called Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. "He would use the money to give so-called 'right to rise' grants to the states to let state governments fund programs they develop as the best way to address poverty."

Oh, the states. Like Missouri, where Republicans wanted to ban food stamp recipients from buying all forms of seafood, including canned tuna? Or Wisconsin, where Republicans were okay with the poors getting light tuna but not white tuna? Or the slew of states that have passed unconstitutional drug testing requirements or worked hard to get around that pesky Constitution and find a constitutional drug testing policy -- even as state after state finds seriously low levels of drug use?

Bush's plan is premised on the claim that these programs don't work. Even though we have study after study showing that the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, for instance, leads to better health and education outcomes for the children who benefit, and reduces healthcare costs for things like diabetes. And when benefits run short at the end of the month, food stamp recipients are more likely to go to the hospital with hypoglycemia, because as it turns out, SNAP works well until people run out of benefits, which they usually do. We also know from experience that instituting block grants leads to decreased funding over time.

And this is the wonkish, supposedly non-extreme side of Republican policy. Making people hungry, sick, and homeless.
Plu-toc-ra-cy

1. Government by the wealthy.

2. A country or society governed in this way.

1. Christmastime for Plutocrats

Political scientists need a new subspecialty to describe the end-of-year extravaganzas that influence peddlers and special interests have combined to make a Capital Christmas tradition: the racket of wholesale plundering of the government's treasury. Paraphrasing Willie Sutton, that's where the (tax-farmed and public-debt) money is.

On Friday, December 18, 2015, Obama and Congress processed the plutocracy's 2015 Christmas gift order at lightning speed. These rented politicians jump right to attention when the owners are being served. Who said government is broken? Under Obama it purrs right along smoothly, delivering on time annual gifts for plutocrats worth, this year, the whole discretionary civilian budget.

Bernie Sanders' supporters already understand this. But if there are Americans in need of more evidence that they live in a plutocracy, where governing is just another racket run by what Sanders calls "the billionaire class," then the Influence Peddlers Protection Act of 2015 should provide it. Technically known as the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2016, this law piles-on the already sufficiently probative evidence of systemic corruption provided by last year's similar year-end Bonanza for Plutocrats Act of 2014 (known as "CRomnibus").

To place this year's plunder described in Part B in context, last year's episode is first recapped in Part A of this chapter.

A) CRomnibus I

My extensive piece last year on what can now be called "CRomnibus I" described how Obama and a majority of Senate Democrats similarly connived to bypass ordinary legislative procedures to expedite the Omnibus appropriations bill of 2014. The 2014 "CRomnibus Act" ranks as one of the most deeply corrupt laws in United States history. It increased the amount of money that plutocrats can legally give to political parties by a factor of ten. (This enables plutocrats to finance, while their propaganda machine supports, the DNC effort to stop Bernie Sanders , for example).

Enabling of large 2014 kickbacks from plutocrats to political parties was a quid for the Chrismas quo to Wall Street of drafting taxpayers as insurers of gambling losses at their Capitalist Casino. The punters are poised to drop trillions when the roullette pill lands on the next too-big-to-fail banking crisis. I wrote : "The CRomnibus repeal of this ' swaps push-out rule ' to withdraw federal insurance from this particular [swaps] gambling table is the most blatant of second Gilded Age economic recklessness, exceeding even such Clinton-era corruption as the repeal of Glass-Steagall."

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Reprinted from The Greanville Post

But then, second of all, when confronted with real issues and real differences between Democrats and Republicans, particularly on national security and foreign affairs, the Democratic candidates (well at least Clinton and Sanders, dunno much about O'Malley) the Duopoly-in-action was clearly demonstrated. For example, Clinton was asked if she could guarantee that "San Bernardino" could never happen again. That is, could a slaughter perpetrated by a U.S. citizen, obtaining on the open market with the help of a friend perfectly legal (!) assault rifles, assisted by his wife who entered the U.S. under a "fiancee" visa program of long-standing, be absolutely prevented? (Of course nothing was said at all about a U.S. citizen who got his guns because of a background-check flaw and then went out and slaughtered other U.S. citizens of a different skin color. Which event is, of course, not characterized as "terrorism.")

Holding up the Democratic Party establishment's end of the Duopoly bargain, that of course plays right into the hands of the Republicans. For while the Democratic candidates actually debate substantive matters, at least to some extent, the Republicans don't. But then, there is no prime time opportunity for the Democrats to get a head start on next year's campaign, by showing up all of the Republicans as empty, but very loud and nasty (or soft and very nasty, like Carly Fiorina) suits. And then there was Debbie making a fuss about a "data breach" (the type of which apparently happens all the time) that allowed much of whatever airtime the Democrats got after the debate (when most of it, in the mainstream media plus Fox "News" of course goes to Trump) to be caught up in a molehill-like mountain instead of again, being on the real issues.

If you wanted to see the Democratic/Republican political Duopoly at work, outside of the Congress and the Administration, you needed to have looked no further than the Democratic Party debate on television on Saturday evening, Dec. 19. First of all, these debates were carefully arranged by the Clinton Campaign's de facto chairwoman, Cong. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, otherwise known as the Chairwoman (sic) of the Democratic National Committee, to be at a time when the fewest people could possibly be watching. My-oh-my, we would not want anything -- like Bernie Sanders' candidacy, for example -- to get in the way of the coronation of Hillary Rodham Clinton as the Democratic Party's nominee, would we?



So Clinton goes into her three-part "national security plan" and of course doesn't say anything like, "well, you know, each Administration does absolutely the best it can. But after all, let's remember that with the best of intentions, after warnings were coming all the summer before, 9/11 did happen on President Bush's watch." You can just imagine the reaction to THAT one, but those are the facts, Ma'am! And oh yes, she might have added that no terrorist attacks of anything remotely close to that magnitude have happened on President Obama's watch, and that on her husband's, two that could each have been larger than 9/11 were prevented: the 1998 "25 airliners plot" and the 2000 "LAX Millennium Bomb plot."



Turning to Trump (since everyone else does and for me too he's such an inviting target), the New York Times noted that "Clinton's Focus in Third Debate is on Trump." Well, yes, if you can call what she did focusing. She did note that Trump's "plan" (if you can call it that) is sending the wrong message here and around the world about the U.S. attitude towards Muslims, and that the U.S. is not, I repeat NOT, in a "clash of civilizations with Islam." Well, that's good to know. But how about Trump's call to have every U.S. Muslim be issued a religion-based identity card (to be followed by being required to wear a Yellow Crescent, perhaps?) (Even Trump did not get into the administrative problems the Nazis faced when doing the same to the German Jews, like identifying them first-off, dealing with the problems of the "Mischlings" [you could look it up] and so forth.)

Whether or not Daesh actually made Trump-insulting-Muslims videos, there is plenty of Trump stuff on You Tube that Daesh could make use of, directly or indirectly, and according to Arab newspapers, the material is circulated widely (an important point that she did make). But, Clinton did not go on to challenging Trump on his proposal to halt all Muslim immigration to the United States, on which she could have given the example of the Republican-sponsored Chinese Exclusion Act of 1885 or the Republican-sponsored Immigration Law of 1924 which severely limited the immigration of Southern and Eastern Europeans and Jews to the U.S. (And Bernie didn't do any of this sort of thing either.)

In attacking Trump -- described by the Times reporters as "setting herself above the intra-party fray, while looking ahead to the General Election, she didn't, to my knowledge, get into Constitutional issues, to demonstrate that whether or not Trump understands it (or has even read it), it certainly easily lays it aside. For example, in accepting the endorsement of some police organization he casually mentioned that if elected President, on his first day in office he would issue an executive order mandating the death penalty for killers of police. The Constitutional/legislative niceties not to be observed here would make up a fairly long list, but this is Trump's approach to governing. About which she could have made a very important point, but it was not, to my knowledge, mentioned.

Nor did she trouble herself with Trump's proposal to bring back water-boarding (which not only doesn't work for intelligence gathering, but also violates Article VI of the Constitution). Nor did she note that he wants to do it not only for intelligence-gathering but also because "those guys deserve it" (to great roars from the crowd). The niceties of such items ranging from probable cause to trial by jury to "cruel and unusual" punishment clearly escape Trump. But heaven help any of the Democrats up there to call sharp attention to the Republican approach to the Constitution and or governing, by fiat (and that approach to governing was originally established in the country that makes Fiats). And, yes one can say "the Republicans" because very few of them dare to fault Trump on very many of his recommendations.

And so, one could go on about the Far Rightist positions of virtually all of the Republican candidates on a variety of issues, should one want to launch the general election campaign now. Let's see. Dominionist Ted Cruz has attended meetings run by one of the foremost Islamphobes in the United States, Frank ("let's make up some poll numbers") Gaffney (also attended by Rick Santorum and Carly Fiorina). He also attended a meeting addressed by a leader of the religious far-right who calls openly for the execution of gays -- for being gay (also attended by the Dominionists Mike Huckabee and Bobby Jindal).

Then the "trying-hard-to-be-an-'establishment'-candidate" Marco ("if I were to tell the truth, which I try hard not to, my 'refugee Cuban parents' actually fled from Batista, not Castro [as did Cruz' father, by the way]") Rubio has called for criminalizing abortion with no exceptions. As for the "moderates" JEB Bush, in commenting on Trump's "ban the Muslims" proposal, said that the U.S. should let in the Christian ones (all Christians, JEB, or just ones of whom you approve?), while John Kasich has called for the establishment of a governmental office for spreading "Judeo-Christian values." Forget about the Constitutionality of that one. Forget even about bringing the Christians -- from the Dominionists to the Catholics to the Unitarians -- into it. Just think about putting a Hasid, a modern Orthodox, a Conservative, a Reform, a Reconstructionist, and a Secular Humanist (like me) Jew in a room to figure out just what is meant by the "Judeo" part of "Judeo-Christian" values. OY Veh!

Anyway, no, these issues and many more like them (to the best of my knowledge) did not come up. Nor are they very likely to. This is the (there's a bunch of issues Democrats don't touch) Duopoly at work, whether it is led at this point by Hillary Clinton, Bernie (the New Deal on steroids) Sanders, or Barack Obama. And it is going to stay that way for quite some time.
Kim Davis to Attend Family Research Council's 'State of the Family' Address Texas Pastors, High School Principal, and University President also to Attend Monday Evening Address by Tony Perkins



Contact: J.P. Duffy or Alice Chao, 866-FRC-NEWS, 866-372-6397



WASHINGTON, Jan. 8, 2016 /Christian Newswire/ -- On Monday, January 11 at 7:00 p.m. EST, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins will deliver his second annual an address on the "State of the Family." This report to the nation will highlight key issues of concern to families and our broader culture and offer policy proposals to strengthen protections of human life, marriage, and religious liberty.



The speech will be given at FRC's headquarters one day before President Obama delivers his annual State of the Union address. Kentucky County Clerk Kim Davis will attend the speech. Also in attendance will be Dr. Everett Piper, President of Oklahoma Wesleyan University, which filed suit against Obamacare in 2013 for violating its conscience rights.



Also in the audience will be Jason Rowland, principal of Airline High School in Bossier, Louisiana, which has been threatened with a lawsuit by secularists, and Texas Pastors Hernan Castano and Charles Flowers, who have led successful efforts to defend religious liberty and protect their cities against the advent of transgendered bathrooms.



WHO: Tony Perkins, President, Family Research Council Kim Davis, Kentucky County Clerk Dr. Everett Piper, President, Oklahoma Wesleyan University Jason Rowland, Principal, Airline High School Pastor Hernan Castano, Houston, Texas Pastor Charles Flower, San Antonio, Texas WHAT: State of the Family Address WHERE: FRC Headquarters 801 G Street NW Washington, D.C. 20001 Webcast: www.frc.org/stateofthefamily WHEN: Monday, January 11, 2016 7:00 p.m. ET ** Contact FRC's press office at media@frc.org to request media credentials.***

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PASADENA, California -- It's not unprecedented for real-world events to intrude on the show-business focus of the biannual Television Critics Association press tours. Last year, for example, the terrorist killings in France at the offices of the satirical publication, Charlie Hebdo, coincided with the two weeks-plus tour.

This winter, the news of armed militants occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon has surfaced at unexpected moments in the first couple days of the two-week tour, adding a note of gravity to days filled with good-looking celebrities and cocktail-party receptions.

On Thursday, Samantha Bee, late of "The Daily Show," was here at the Langham Huntington hotel in Pasadena to talk about her upcoming PBS comedy show, "Full Frontal with Samantha Bee."

Bee and her showrunner, Jo Miller, only had clips to share with TV critics and reporters in attendance. But they've been busy.

After Bee said she wasn't going to be doing a lady-behind-a-desk sort of show on the weekly "Full Frontal," she added, "We have a bunch of stories in the works."

Miller added, "Right now, we don't have a show. So we are just doing things in our social media feeds. We just did a thing on the Oregon freedom fighters who have taken over a bird sanctuary..."

Bee interjected, they did something "from the point of view of the animals."

Miller elaborated: "From the point of view of the animals at the sanctuary...

who have very considered opinions about freedom and public responsibility."

On a much more serious note, the Oregon standoff came up during a press conference for the new Investigation Discovery series, "Hate in America." The documentary series features host Tony Harris, who works for Al Jazeera America, exploring cases from the files of the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups and extremist behavior in America.

Harris was joined at the press conference by Morris Dees, co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, and Heidi Beirich, director of the center's Intelligence Project, which follows the activities of anti-government and hate groups.

Toward the end of their session, Harris asked Beirich about activities in Northwest Montana.

"It's an area of radicalization," Beirich said. "A lot of antigovernment groups, many extremists have relocated there. Everybody's been watching what happened in Burns, Oregon, this week. That's reflective of what we're seeing in the Northwest. It's the same thing."

In an interview after the press conference, Beirich and Dees again said the events in Oregon are reflective of the growth of anti-government, self-styled militias in the U.S.

"Hate in America" premieres on Investigation Discovery on Feb. 23.

And on Friday, the Oregon standoff came up again, during a press conference for "Outsiders," an upcoming drama on WGN America. The series, whose stars include David Morse, is about a family determined to stop anyone or any force, that interferes with their off-the-grid life on a mountain in rural Kentucky.

When asked whether "Outsiders" has parallels to what's happening in Oregon, series creator Peter Mattei drew a distinction. The family in "Outsiders" want to stay on their land, Mattei said, not take anyone else's, and they don't have a major beef with the government.

Executive producer Peter Tolan ("Rescue Me") also brushed off suggestions that the do-anything-to-keep-their-land family in "Outsiders" might inspire others to take actions similar to those of the militants gathered in Oregon at the wildlife refuge. He also noted the fictional family in "Outsiders" aren't heavily armed.

After the press conference, Tolan said he was surprised at the questions raising possible similarities between the fictional story of "Outsiders" and the real-life drama playing out in Oregon. The "Outsiders" story is "coming from a different place," said Tolan.

"Outsiders" premieres Jan. 26, on WGN America.

Stay tuned for more reports from the TV Winter 2016 Press Tour.

-- Kristi Turnquist

kturnquist@oregonian.com

503-221-8227

@Kristiturnquist
A former Washington County sheriff's sergeant who pleaded no contest to official misconduct on Thursday had sexual contact with female coworkers while he was on duty several times, including inside his patrol car, according to a prosecutor.

Daniel Cardinal, 41, was sentenced to two years of probation after pleading to the misdemeanor charge in Washington County Circuit Court as part of a plea agreement, which also required him to voluntarily relinquish his police certification with the state. The charge stemmed from sexual conduct that occurred across several months in 2014.

Cardinal was on duty during the sexual encounters, but his coworkers were not, said Multnomah County Deputy District Attorney Chris Ramras, and all of the sexual contact was consensual.

"But given that he was on duty, and this was something that occurred a number of times, we felt it was appropriate that he was charged this way," Ramras said during a telephone interview Friday.

Ramras declined to identify how many women were involved in the case but said they all supported the outcome.

"I have talked to each and every one of them, and they all approve of this resolution," Ramras told the court Thursday, according to a recording of the hearing released Friday to The Oregonian/OregonLive.

Cardinal's attorney, William Aring Meyer, declined to comment when reached by phone Friday afternoon. In court, Meyer told Presiding Judge Charles Bailey that he and his client believed taking the plea deal was the right move.

"We believe this is a fair resolution, your honor," Meyer said. "Actually, I would say that although my urging was to fight this, my client feels like it's in his interest and in the interest of anyone involved that he take this plea."

Though the sheriff's office had a spokesman in the room during Cardinal's hearing, the agency did not release any information about his scheduled court appearance. The hearing also did not appear on the public court docket.

"We don't know why it wasn't on the docket," said Richard Moellmer, Washington County's trial court administrator.

Cardinal was charged, pleaded and sentenced at one hearing that lasted about five minutes. Moellmer said it's unusual for that to happen in Washington County.

Cardinal was not arrested before his plea. He was booked into the jail afterward.

Most defendants don't have attorneys before they are arrested and charged, Ramras said, but when they do, it's not that unusual for a deal to be struck before a defendant is charged.

The investigation into Cardinal began after an anonymous writer sent a letter to the sheriff's office and The Oregonian/OregonLive alleging widespread sexual misconduct in the agency. The letter claimed that some deputies had sex on the job and coerced coworkers into sexual relationships.

Cardinal was named in the letter and accused of repeatedly having sex on duty. He resigned from the agency May 1, soon after the investigation began. He had spent more than 15 years at the sheriff's office.

After receiving the letter, the sheriff's office asked the Portland Police Bureau to investigate the allegations. Ramras said that investigation is continuing.

Clackamas County prosecutors have also said they are reviewing a case involving the sheriff's office. It likely involves a Washington County union party held last winter in Clackamas County, but officials have declined comment on any details except to say it's part of a broader investigation of the sheriff's office.

Jonathan Christensen, a 38-year-old sheriff's corporal who was fired in August, was arrested in December on accusations of first-degree official misconduct, fourth-degree assault, coercion and strangulation. He was fired after the sheriff found during an internal review that he likely showed up at a female coworker's home while he was in uniform, choked her and demanded that she continue a sexual relationship with him. Christensen also was named in the anonymous email. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges against him.

Cardinal, Christensen and a third deputy were placed on administrative leave soon after the sheriff's office received the letter. Sheriff's officials have declined to name the third deputy, who remains on leave, but sources have identified him as Deputy Dave Bergquist. Bergquist wasn't named in the letter.

Emily E. Smith and Everton Bailey Jr. of The Oregonian/OregonLive contributed to this report.

-- Rebecca Woolington

503-294-4049; @rwoolington
As wintery weather slowed much of Portland to a crawl early this week, the Portland Bureau of Transportation ramped up its operations to combat the freeze.

The bureau said Friday its staffers worked more than 3,600 "storm-related" hours, round the clock, to combat Portland's first major weather event of 2016.

The bureau also compiled the following statistics about its response to the storm. Each statistic, including the one above, pertains to the timeframe of Sunday, Jan. 3 to 6 a.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 6.

Aerial photographer Rhianna Lakin captured the snow-covered waterfront using a drone Jan. 3, 2015. She posts images to her Instagram account @AerialRhianna.

Deicer used: More than 24,000 gallons

Sand used: 1,100 cubic yards, or about 90 large dump trucks

Roads closed: 16, eight of which were reopened within seven hours

Miles of deiced roads: 1,700 "lane-miles" -- driven at least four times each -- adding up to 6,800 miles overall. For context, that's more than a round trip between Portland and Miami.

Portland Aerial Tram rides on Sunday: 300

Portland Aerial Tram rides from midnight Sunday through midnight Monday: 4,830

The tram is usually closed on winter Sundays, the bureau said, but opened Sunday and continued to provide overnight rides during a closure on Southwest Sam Jackson Park Road.

The bureau previously released similar statistics regarding its activity Dec. 6 to Dec. 9, 2015.

-- Jim Ryan

503-221-8005; @Jimryan015
DAEGU, SOUTH KOREA -- If there is one thing the great city of Seoul envies of Gotham City, it would be a superhero saving its citizens. On an early December morning, Seoul didn't need Batman, Staff Sgt. James G. Mckeehan, Platoon Sergeant for 1st platoon, 142nd Military Police Company, 94th MP Battalion filled in to save the day.

On cold and early December morning, Mckeehan began his commute to formation when he drove past a crowd gathered around a scooter laying on its side. He got out of his car and approached the scene. Mckeehan saw a foot and hand protruding from underneath the scooter. There were more than 50 terrified spectators, idly watching critically wounded victim.

"There were like 50 people just watching. They were super quiet, taking pictures and whispering to each other." Mckeehan recalls.

Mckeehan and another brave volunteer pushed the scooter off the unresponsive and breathless victim. McKeehan immediately used his medical skills, acquired through military combat lifesaver training, to perform a head-tilt chin-lift to open the victim's airway.

Following McKeehan's rescue attempts, the victim began coughing and breathing again. Mckeehan secured the victim's body tightly to prevent further damage to the victim's contorted legs. Moments later, an ambulance safely transferred the victim to the hospital.

Capt. Christina D. Boschert, the commander of the 142nd Military Police Company, proudly praised Mckeehan's heroic actions.

"I think what Staff Sgt. McKeehan did was brave and I'm proud of him for stepping up." said Boschert.

A few days after the incident 94th MP battalion commander, Lt. Col. Jimmy Carlson recognized Mckeehan. Command Sgt. Maj. Michael L. Jeanes of the 94th MP Battalion gave him a coin in front of his peers.

Mckeehan's actions greatly reflected the values of the U.S. Army, especially selfless service and personal courage. He encouraged his fellow Soldiers to be proactive in situations they can render their assistance.

"I think service members need to be prepared to act in extreme situations when others wouldn't," said McKeehan.
JOINT BASE PEARL HARBOR-HICKAM, Hawaii -- The U.S. and five ally and partner nations in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region are scheduled to participate in exercise Cope North 2016 at Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, Feb. 10 through 26.

Exercise CN16 is a long-standing exercise designed to enhance multilateral air operations between the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy, Japan Air Self-Defense Force and Royal Australian Air Force. As part of CN16, additional participants from the Philippines Air Force, Republic of Korea Air Force and Royal New Zealand Air Force will participate in humanitarian assistance and disaster relief training.

More than 930 U.S. Airmen and Sailors will train alongside approximately 490 JASDF, 375 RAAF, 5 PAF, 20 ROKAF and 35 RNZAF service members. Additionally, more than 100 aircraft, comprised of 23 flying units from the U.S. and Indo-Asia-Pacific region, will participate in CN16.

The exercise will begin with a two-day table-top Humanitarian Assistance Disaster Relief exercise to enhance command and control prior to the week-long HA/DR training. This will be the first time a table-top HA/DR exercise has been completed prior to executing the training. During the second part of the exercise, the focus will shift to large-force employment training, fighter-versus-fighter air combat tactics training, and air-to-ground strike mission training over the Farallon de Medinilla range 160 nautical miles north of Guam. The U.S. Air Force's 353rd Combat Training Squadron from Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska, will participate in the exercise and conduct multilateral survival training for the first time this year.

Additionally during CN16, Andersen AFB will open its doors to the general public to attend an open house featuring static displays and flyovers.

Beginning in 1978 as a quarterly bilateral exercise held at Misawa Air Base, Japan, Cope North was moved to Andersen AFB in 1999. Today, the annual exercise serves as a keystone event to promote stability and security throughout the Indo-Asia-Pacific region by enabling regional forces to hone vital readiness skills critical to maintaining regional stability.
WASHINGTON  Defense Secretary Ash Carter today called Japanese Defense Minister Gen Nakatani to discuss the recent North Korean nuclear test, according to a statement provided by Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook.

Carter and Nakatani agreed that the nuclear test by North Korea is an unacceptable and irresponsible act that undermines regional security and stability, he said.

Nakatani stated that the test was a clear violation of the United Nation's Security Council resolutions and condemned the act, Cooks statement said.

Carter agreed with this view, Cook said, noting the secretary commended the high level of coordination between the United States and Japan after the test. Carter also noted that utilizing the Alliance Coordination Mechanism under the 2015 Guidelines for U.S.-Japan Defense Cooperation exemplifies this close cooperation, according to Cooks statement.

Carter reaffirmed steadfast U.S. defense commitments to Japan and allies in the region, Cooks statement said. Carter and Nakatani agreed that trilateral cooperation with the Republic of Korea is critical to deterrence and maintaining peace and security in Northeast Asia and beyond, Cook said.

The two leaders reiterated their commitment to continue close trilateral cooperation and information sharing, according to Cooks statement.
YOKOSUKA, Japan  The U.S. Navys only forward-deployed aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76) hosted nine officials from the United Kingdom, Jan. 8.

Rear Adm. John Alexander, commander, Battle Force 7th Fleet, and Capt. Brett Crozier, Ronald Reagans executive officer, welcomed aboard the Rt Honorable Philip Hammond MP, Secretary of Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, and the Rt Honorable Michael Fallon MP, Secretary of State for Defense, and other delegates and held a press conference on the ships flight deck.

I am very pleased to have our allies from the United Kingdom aboard the U.S. Navys forward-deployed aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan, said Alexander. Its my great honor to introduce the U.K. Foreign Secretary Minister Hammond and the U.K. Defense Secretary Mr. Fallon.

British Ambassador to Japan Tim Hitchens; Mr. Stephen Lillie, Director Asia Pacific; and Mr. Peter Watkins, Director General Security, Ministry of Defense, United Kingdom, were also among those who visited Ronald Reagan.

We are delighted to be on board USS Ronald Reagan this morning, said Hammond. Weve been on the Izumo [Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force helicopter destroyer JS Izumo (DDH 183)] seeing how the Japanese and American forces work together to ensure our security and the interests of the international community in this region. Its very inspiring.

Hammond added that the Asia-Pacific region is generating most of the worlds economic growth and is increasingly becoming important to trade, prosperity and security.

Our presence today demonstrates our commitment to the three-way alliance between Japan, the United States and the United Kingdom to helping preserve the stability in this particular region, said Fallon.

Japan is our closest security partner in this region and we work with the United States alongside the Japan Self-Defense Forces. Meeting, later today, our counterparts from Japan will enable us to develop that cooperation further in terms of joint exercises or exchanges, capacity building outside the United States in this region and more industrial collaboration.

Fallon continued that he hopes to deepen the cooperation and progress made during the past year in technology, high-tech specialist equipment, sensors, radars, and helicopter, submarine and air-to-air capabilities.

During the conference, Hammond spoke about how the international community should respond to North Koreas nuclear tests.

It is true that the efforts of the international community, so far, to contain and deter North Koreas nuclear ambitions was succeeding in slowing the program down, but we clearly havent succeeded in halting it as this weeks test shows, said Hammond. North Korea acted, totally, in an irresponsible and provocative way and I can entirely understand the pressure that the South Koreans feel to respond. But we have to be bigger than the North Koreans and I would urge South Korea, and other like-minded countries in the region, to exercise restraint. We know that responding in this way is simply rising to the bait North Korea is presenting to us. But if we are going to ask the South Koreans to act with restraint, we have to demonstrate to them that the international community is prepared to take action to address the challenge that North Korea represents. Continuing with words is not enough, we have to show that we are prepared to take the actions to make the sanctions against North Korea effective.

The United Kingdom's Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Secretary of State for Defense's visit to Ronald Reagan reflects the strong relationship between the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan and their partners in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region.
My husband and I are 'retired' but travel all over the third world developing clean water projects funded by our church. We get paid only in blessings. Life is a joy when it has meaning, and life is truly interesting for us! We have been to Indonesia, Kenya, Tanzania, Peru, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nepal, Haiti, Mongolia, the Pacific Islands and Ghana. We come home to hugs from our children and many grandchildren.
Ever think you might want to be a judge? Pretty cushy job, most people would observe. Good pay. Set your own hours. Job security. Nice pension. Community respect  heck, people even stand up when you enter the courtroom.

But every once in a while, up pops a judicial matter so thorny that it makes me believe Id never want to wear the black judicial robe. Most often it involves sentencing, when a judge must consider a pack of issues, including the crimes seriousness; public protection; the offenders background, including prior arrests; whether the penalty can deter others from committing the same offense; chances of rehabilitation; overall fairness; and, if incarceration is an option, maybe even whether a jail or prison has enough room for still another inmate.

An example, you demand?

Pretend for a moment that youre the judge who must sentence a young woman convicted of being drunk when she drove her car off the road, leaving her 18-year-old passenger a quadriplegic after 361 days in six hospitals. The record shows the driver had a prior arrest for DUI, that this was no post-midnight, post-party incident. This was a 90 mph crash that occurred just after a lunch supplemented by a margarita and several shots of liquor.

Then, just days before you plan to impose a sentence that could range from probation to 12 years in prison, the young woman is involved in another car crash  two of them, in fact. This time shes the passenger. The car is driven by her boyfriend.

The first crash is a fender bender. But then the boyfriend speeds away, a minute later hitting a second car. Its driver is dead at the scene. The boyfriend dies later at the hospital. And the young woman, instead of being in your courtroom for sentencing as scheduled, lies in a hospital in critical condition.

A new sentencing date is set for a couple months later. The young woman doesnt show. Too medically fragile to appear, her lawyer says. Prosecutors want her arrested.

These essentially are the facts surrounding the case of 23-year-old Ashley Trenholm. Shes the one who ran her car off I-74 after a booze-soaked lunch more than two years ago. The suburban Chicago womans sentencing on the DUI conviction is overdue. The matter is before McLean County Judge Casey Costigan. Itll be his tough call. Better his than mine.

Should he consider that Trenholm has a 3-year-old son whose father is in prison? That if she were spared prison time, she might be able to earn some income and help pay her paralyzed passengers continuing medical bills? That, in an ironic twist, she herself has been seriously injured in a car crash? That taxpayers likely will be stuck with some or all of her medical bills if shes an inmate? That a tough sentence might deter other drunks from driving?

Judge Costigan has ordered Trenholm to be in his courtroom next Friday, or have her lawyer provide medical proof as to why thats impossible. If she shows up, Costigan could decide he needs to know more about her changed circumstance before he imposes the sentence.

Its a tragic, complicated situation that would weigh on any judge, but perhaps more so on Costigan. When he was 7 years old, his brother and two sisters died in a car accident.
The world's most famous royal couple, Prince William and Kate Middleton, is rumored to be expecting a new addition to their ever growing family. According to reports, the Duchess of Cambridge is expecting a third child just almost a year after daughter Charlotte was just born.

Reports of the 33-year-old Kate expecting their third child came after photos of eldest child Prince George attending nursery school were released. An insider said that both William and Kate announced the pregnancy during Christmas to family and that William's younger brother Prince Harry was ecstatic about the news.

Kate is said to be two months along now and that the young Duchess is quiet nervous having three children all under the age of three but is very happy.

While on other news, Prince George, eldest son of the Dutch and Duchess of Cambridge started nursery school last Tuesday, attending Westacre Montessori School, a school chosen by his parents. Prince George's nursery school is located just 10 miles away from Prince William and Kate Middleton's Norfolk estate but reports say that the royal couple doesn't have plans of residing in Norfolk permanently instead they plan to live in Anmer Hall.

Prince George's nursery classes will be attended by the young prince three times a week starting with a few hours of school and going to a half day of school. The young prince looked impeccably adorable in the official photos released.

Other rumors surrounding William and Kate, it is said that they are the newest reigning monarchs of Britain. Reports claimed that Queen Elizabeth II, the current reigning monarch, forces her son, Prince Charles, who is the father of Prince William, to give up the throne to his eldest son.

Whatever it might be, the royal couple is exuberantly happy about their family, with two kids and one already starting school, this year will be exciting for Prince William and Kate Middleton.

Do you think Prince William and Kate Middleton are now ready for their third baby? Share to us your thoughts in the comment section below.
Ebola Treatment Unit health care workers in Port Loko, Sierra Leone have recently conducted a study on the most effective procedure to treat children with Ebola. With the primary purpose of initially launching a prescript for treating children with Ebola, these health care personnel and practitioners are mostly concerned with the speeding up of the recovery process of such condition as well as increasing their patient's chance of survival.

The first aid for the patient diagnosed with Ebola is to advise them to increase water or fluid intakes. This will help them counteract diarrhea and get rid of vomiting that may cause dehydration. Likewise, this also includes treating possible infections, increases their bedside care and gives them highly nutritious food. The said protocol were published last Friday, Jan 8, 2016.

Indi Trehan, MD, an assistant professor of pediatrics at Washington University School of Medicine is St. Louis believes that Ebola is coming back. Trehan and his co-authors treated Ebola patients at a 106-bed while also handling cases of with 'intensive care'.

Shawn D'Andrea, MD, an instructor of emergency medicine at Harvard Medical School said that two IVs per patient are needed to recover body fluids. They keep on monitoring young patients' electrolytes and continuously provide drugs to reduce vomiting and diarrhea.

The authors also said that future ETUs have pressure bags that allow IV fluids to be handled faster. Hence through this endeavor, they are able to appreciate the importance of good nutrition in its ability to recover from solid infections -- enhancing the usage of ready-to-use therapeutic foods.

Furthermore, Sierra Leone and Cuban Medical Brigade ensured that there were workers assigned in the unit 24/7. Trehan also added that they would like to give them the same level of care they seem to receive if they were in the U.S.

Trehan and his team encouraged the other medical teams in different parts of the country that fighting Ebola through the use of the said protocol seems possible and attainable especially when administered accordingly. After all, this rule can fight Ebola, an 'illness of health unfairness' and fortunately, save lives.
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Simultaneous Assertion of Realism and Symbolism

[

[public domain]

(2-17-11)

The great Church father (who lived from 354-430) made many statements about the Eucharist that have been traditionally seized upon as evidence of his adoption of either a purely symbolic (Zwinglian) or Calvinistic notion of the Lords Supper.

These are often unfortunately interpreted within the framework of what has been called the dichotomous tendency in Protestantism, whereby things are set against each other and opposed, when they need not be. Catholic theologian Ludwig Ott explains:

The Eucharistic doctrine expounded by St. Augustine is interpreted in a purely spiritual way by most Protestant writers on the history of dogmas. Despite his insistence on the symbolical explanation he does not exclude the Real Presence. In association with the words of institution he concurs with the older Church tradition in expressing belief in the Real Presence . . . When in the Fathers writings, especially those of St. Augustine, side by side with the clear attestations of the Real Presence, many obscure symbolically-sounding utterances are found also, the following points must be noted for the proper understanding of such passages: (1) The Early Fathers were bound by the discipline of the secret, which referred above all to the Eucharist (cf. Origen, In Lev. hom. 9, 10); (2) The absence of any heretical counter-proposition often resulted in a certain carelessness of expression, to which must be added the lack of a developed terminology to distinguish the sacramental mode of existence of Christs body from its natural mode of existence once on earth; (3) The Fathers were concerned to resist a grossly sensual conception of the Eucharistic Banquet and to stress the necessity of the spiritual reception in Faith and in Charity (in contradistinction to the external, merely sacramental reception); passages often refer to the symbolical character of the Eucharist as the sign of unity (St. Augustine); this in no wise excludes the Real Presence. (Ott, 377-378)

Other patristic scholars (including Protestant ones) concur:

His thought [on the sacraments] has been widely studied but has not always been expounded in an unequivocal manner. Here as in other instances, it is necessary to keep in mind the various aspects of the dogma which he illustrates and defends. Thus . . . his insistence on the ecclesiological symbolism of the Eucharist does not obscure his explicit affirmations of the real presence (the bread is the Body of Christ and the wine is the Blood of Christ: Serm. 227; 272; In ps. 98, 9; 33, 1, 10) and of the sacrificial nature of the Eucharist (De civ. Dei 10, 19-20; Conf. 9, 12, 32; 13-36). (Johannes Quasten, vol. 4; St. Augustine chapter (VI) written by Agostino Trape, 449-450)

There are certainly passages in his writings which give a superficial justification to all these interpretations, but a balanced verdict must agree that he accepted the current realism . . . One could multiply texts . . . which show Augustine taking for granted the traditional identification of the elements with the sacred body and blood. There can be no doubt that he shared the realism held by almost all his contemporaries and predecessors. (J. N. D. Kelly, 446-447) [Augustine] at the same time holds fast the real presence of Christ in the Supper . . . He was also inclined, with the Oriental fathers, to ascribe a saving virtue to the consecrated elements. (Philip Schaff, History of the Church, vol. 3, chapter 7)

Schaff (the renowned Protestant historian, who was certainly no partisan of transubstantiation!) had in the previous two pages just shown how St. Augustine referred to symbolism in the Eucharist as well, but he honestly admits that the great father accepted the Real Presence at the same time.

This is precisely what Catholics maintain. Facts about Christian doctrinal history, and who believed what, are facts, whether we agree with them or not. Schaff (as always) is honest enough to present them, even when he (as a Protestant) disagrees on a doctrinal level.

Kelly also noted that this state of affairs was generally true of the Church fathers (not just Augustine):

It must not be supposed, of course, that this symbolical language implied that the bread and wine were regarded as mere pointers to, or tokens of, absent realities. Rather were they accepted as signs of realities which were somehow actually present though apprehended by faith alone.

(Kelly, 442)

St. Augustines symbolic language can be synthesized with his realistic language, because realism can co-exist with symbol while retaining its realism. The symbolic language can also (and indeed often does in Augustine) refer to other, more communal aspects of the Eucharist that complement (but are not contrary to) the Real Presence aspect of it. So there are at least two ways in which this can be explained as consistent with Catholic theology.

The simple fact of the matter is that Augustine speaks in both ways. But we can harmonize them as complementary, not contradictory, because Catholics, like Augustine himself, think in terms of both/and rather than the either/or outlook so prevalent in Protestantism. Thus, when some Augustinian symbolic Eucharistic utterance is found, it is seized upon as proof that he thereby denied the Real Presence.

This is neither logically compelling, nor scholarly, since there are also a great many of his statements that clearly indicate his belief in the literal, real physical presence of Christ in the Eucharist, and the Sacrifice of the Mass, and the priesthood: all of which makes no sense without sacrifice, and the efficacy of the Mass (as well as other prayers) for the aid of the dead in purgatory, etc.

Either St. Augustine contradicted himself, changed his mind, or else the Catholic take on the situation is correct. The communal (symbolic if you will) aspects of the Sacrifice of the Mass, to which Augustine refers, are totally consonant with Catholic theology, and are discussed in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (#1359-61, #1372, #2643).

The Bible takes the same approach. For example, Jesus refers to the sign of Jonah, comparing Jonahs time in the belly of the fish to His own burial (Matthew 12:38-40; Lk 11:29-30). In other words, both events, although described as signs, were literally real events. Jesus also uses the same terminology in connection with His Second Coming (Matthew 24:30-31): a thing that is believed by all Christians to be a literal, not a symbolic occurrence.

Moreover, Jesus language of sign is very literalistic when He describes terrors and great signs from heaven (Lk 21:11), in the context of earthquakes and famines and pestilences, and when He refers to signs in sun and moon and stars (Lk 21:25).

In the Jewish and biblical understanding signs are not merely symbolic and abstract; they are concretely real (e.g., Jn 2:23: they saw the signs) and visible (Jn 4:48: Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe; Lk 17:20: signs to be observed). They are usually something that one does (Mk 13:22; Lk 23:8; Jn 2:11, 23; 3:2; 4:54; 6:2, 14; 9:16; 11:47; 12:18, 37, etc.).

Likewise, this holds true in St. Augustines eucharistic thinking. The language of sign and symbol does not nullify his eucharistic realism.

St. Augustine also believed in adoration of the host and the Sacrifice of the Mass, causing further conundrums for the Calvinist who seeks to claim his as a forerunner:

Commenting on the Psalmists bidding that we should adore the footstool of His feet, he pointed out that this must be the earth. But since to adore the earth would be blasphemous, he concluded that the word must mysteriously signify the flesh which Christ took from the earth and which He gave us to eat. Thus it was the eucharistic body which demanded adoration. (Kelly, 447) As to the adoration of the consecrated elements: This follows with logical necessity from the doctrine of transubstantiation, and is the sure touchstone of it. . . . Ambrose speaks of the flesh of Christ which we to-day adore in the mysteries, [Ps 98,9] and Augustine, of an adoration preceding the participation of the flesh of Christ. (Schaff, History of the Church, Vol. 3, Chapter 7) The self-same Christ Who was slain there is in a real sense slaughtered daily by the faithful, so that the sacrifice which was offered once for all in bloody form is sacramentally renewed upon our altars with the oblation of His body and blood. (Kelly, 454; further sources: Ep. 98:9; cf. C. Faust, 20,18; 20:21)

John Calvin, in his 1537 treatise, On Shunning the Unlawful Rites of the Ungodly, and Preserving the Purity of the Christian Religion (in Beveridge and Bonnet, vol. 3, 383, 386-387, 393), thought eucharistic adoration was abominable Idolatry, where bread is pretended to assume Divinity, and raised aloft as God, atrocious and insulting, all prostrate themselves in stupid amazement, like worship of the Statue at Babylon, a sink of pollution and sacrilege, and an example of being enchanted by a kind of dull and magical murmur! He offered equally scathing criticisms of the Sacrifice of the Mass:

[T]he mere name of Sacrifice (as the priests of the Mass understand it) both utterly abolishes the cross of Christ, and overturns his sacred Supper which he consecrated as a memorial of his death. For both, as we know, is the death of Christ utterly despoiled of its glory, unless it is held to be the one only and eternal Sacrifice; and if any other Sacrifice still remains, the Supper of Christ falls at once, and is completely torn up by the roots . . . Will it still be denied to me that he who listens to the Mass with a semblance of Religion, every time these acts are perpetrated, professes before men to be a partner in sacrilege, whatever his mind may inwardly declare to God? . . . Taking the single expression which gives the essence of all the invectives which the Apostle had uttered against Idolatry  that we could not at once be partakers at the table of Christ and the table of demons  who can deny its applicability to the Mass? Its altar is erected by overthrowing the Table of Christ . . . In the Mass Christ is traduced, his death is mocked, an execrable idol is substituted for God  shall we hesitate, then, to call it the table of demons? Or shall we not rather, in order justly to designate its monstrous impiety, try, if possible, to devise some new term still more expressive of detestation? Indeed, I exceedingly wonder how men, not utterly blind, can hesitate for a moment to apply the name Table of Demons to the Mass, seeing they plainly behold in the erection and arrangement of it the tricks, engines, and troops of devils all combined . . . I have long been maintaining on the strongest grounds that Christian men ought not even to be present at it! . . . will you represent the Supper under the image of a diabolical Mass? Will you persuade us that in an act in which you ignominiously travesty the death of the Lord, you observe his Supper, in which he distinctly exhorts us to shew forth his death? (Ibid., 383, 386-388)

Since St. Augustine believed in these things, these accusations all to apply to him as well. Yet Calvin and many of his followers maintain the pretense that it is not the case. Calvin always wants to lambast the Catholic Church. He refrains from scolding and condemning all the Church fathers who believe basically the same. All we can do is document the actual state of affairs.

Adoration is precisely directed towards the consecrated Host; otherwise it can be directed towards the non-physical Father in heaven at any time. Eucharistic adoration is specifically that directed towards the Incarnate Christ substantially present in the consecrated elements: the eucharistically substantiated Christ.

By definition it involves, then, a host that was bread and wine that was wine, but which are both transubstantiated into the Body and Blood of Christ. St. Augustine makes this crystal-clear (downright undeniable). Here is the key passage, from his Exposition on Psalm 99:8 (NPNF 1, vol. 8):

O magnify the Lord our God (ver. 5). Magnify Him truly, magnify Him well. Let us praise Him, let us magnify Him who has wrought the very righteousness which we have; who wrought it in us, Himself. For who but He who justified us, wrought righteousness in us? For of Christ it is said, who justifies the ungodly. Romans 4:5 . . . And fall down before His footstool: for He is holy. What are we to fall down before? His footstool. What is under the feet is called a footstool, . . . in Latin Scabellum or Suppedaneum. But consider, brethren, what he commands us to fall down before. In another passage of the Scriptures it is said, The heaven is My throne, and the earth is My footstool. Isaiah 66:1 Doth he then bid us worship the earth, since in another passage it is said, that it is Gods footstool? How then shall we worship the earth, when the Scripture says openly, You shall worship the Lord your God? Deuteronomy 6:13 Yet here it says, fall down before His footstool: and, explaining to us what His footstool is, it says, The earth is My footstool. I am in doubt; I fear to worship the earth, lest He who made the heaven and the earth condemn me; again, I fear not to worship the footstool of my Lord, because the Psalm bids me, fall down before His footstool. I ask, what is His footstool? and the Scripture tells me, the earth is My footstool. In hesitation I turn unto Christ, since I am herein seeking Himself: and I discover how the earth may be worshipped without impiety, how His footstool may be worshipped without impiety. For He took upon Him earth from earth; because flesh is from earth, and He received flesh from the flesh of Mary. And because He walked here in very flesh, and gave that very flesh to us to eat for our salvation; and no one eats that flesh, unless he has first worshipped: we have found out in what sense such a footstool of our Lords may be worshipped, and not only that we sin not in worshipping it, but that we sin in not worshipping.

The entire thrust of his argument has to do with what is the footstool that God says we can worship? It is clearly something physical, having to do with the earth. But Augustine notes that we are not to worship the earth. So Augustine brilliantly connects God to the earth by noting the incarnation: For He took upon Him earth from earth; because flesh is from earth, and He received flesh from the flesh of Mary.

Then he says that Jesus gave us that very flesh to us to eat for our salvation and concludes that the footstool is the eucharistic elements that become Christs body and blood; therefore can be worshiped as God, even though they have an earthly connection, precisely because of the incarnation.

Then he denies that it is a sin to so worship and adore, and goes further and says it is a sin if we do not. Therefore, it is unarguable that this is unmistakably eucharistic adoration: the very thing that Calvin detested as an idolatrous abomination.

There can be no middle ground on this matter: St. Augustine must be accepted as a full-fledged Catholic or not at all. But Protestants (particularly Calvinists) want to ignore or overlook these outrageous Catholic elements in Augustines doctrine and make out that he was almost like a Calvin in the 4th century, with regard to the Eucharist. Its not true; it is manifestly, plainly untrue.

Catholics, too, think that the Eucharist is a sign, just as Augustine did (Catechism of the Catholic Church: #1333-1336, 1412), and a memorial (CCC #1099, 1362-1366), even, indeed, a foretaste or sign of the Resurrection (CCC #1000) and an analogy to the Paschal meal of the risen Jesus (CCC #1347). Obviously, then, the notion of sign is not, for us, as for Augustine, intrinsically contrary to substantive presence, as if it wipes it out, like the relationship of water to fire, etc., or a zero-sum game.

We can explain Augustines language of both signs and his more literal language, as a harmonious package. Calvinists (who want to claim him as one of their own in this regard) cannot. They must deny or spiritualize away his more literal, substantive, Catholic-sounding statements. And so on and on the debate goes, with this sort of dynamic almost always present.

Calvinists may disagree with St. Augustine because of these Catholic beliefs and admit that Calvin wrongly includes him among the non-idolater real Christians  or else continue to futilely maintain that Augustine was more like Calvin in this regard than like St. Thomas Aquinas. If it is contended that Augustine had a mystical / spiritual-only view of the Eucharist, his views on adoration and sacrifice must still be faced.

Eucharistic adoration has no place in the Calvinist system. If Augustine believed in that, then he should be rejected as any sort of precursor to Calvin at all. But Calvin nevertheless believed that Augustine did not accept either the Sacrifice of the Mass or adoration of the consecrated Host, or some sort of close precursor to transubstantiation. He claimed that St. Augustine was completely on his side:

Since the advocates of this spurious dogma are not ashamed to honour it with the suffrages of the ancients, and especially of Augustine, how perverse they are in the attempt I will briefly explain. Pious and learned men have collected the passages, and therefore I am unwilling to plead a concluded cause: any one who wishes may consult their writings. I will not even collect from Augustine what might be pertinent to the matter, but will be contented to show briefly, that without all controversy he is wholly ours. The pretence of our opponents, when they would wrest him from us, that throughout his works the flesh and blood of Christ are said to be dispensed in the Suppernamely, the victim once offered on the cross, is frivolous, seeing he, at the same time, calls it either the eucharist or sacrament of the body. . . . For by interposing the expression, in a manner, he declares that he was not really or truly included under the bread. . . . in comparing the presence of the flesh to the sign of the cross, he sufficiently shows that he has no idea of a twofold body of Christ, one lurking concealed under the bread, and another sitting visible in heaven. (Institutes, IV, 17, 28) [I]f the question relates to the approval of the fiction of sacrifice, as imagined by Papists in the mass, there is nothing in the Fathers to countenance the sacrilege. They indeed use the term sacrifice, but they, at the same time, explain that they mean nothing more than the commemoration of that one true sacrifice which Christ, our only sacrifice (as they themselves everywhere proclaim), performed on the cross. . . . Hence Augustine himself, in several passages (Ep. 120, ad Honorat. Cont. Advers. Legis.), explains, that it is nothing else than a sacrifice of praise. In short, you will find in his writings, passim, that the only reason for which the Lords Supper is called a sacrifice is, because it is a commemoration, an image, a testimonial of that singular, true, and only sacrifice by which Christ expiated our guilt. (Institutes, IV, 18, 10)

Its an uphill battle to try to maintain such a view, as it was for Martin Luther and Philip Melanchthon, who eventually ceased co-opting St. Augustine for their purposes because they realized that their views differed from his.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Beveridge, Henry and Jules Bonnet, editors, Selected Works of John Calvin: Tracts and Letters, Vol. 3: Tracts, Part 3, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1983.

Calvin, John, Institutes of the Christian Religion, translated by Henry Beveridge for the Calvin Translation Society in 1845, from the 1559 Latin edition; reprinted by William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company (Grand Rapids, Michigan), 1995; available online.

Kelly, J. N. D., Early Christian Doctrines, San Francisco: Harper, revised edition of 1978.

Ott, Ludwig, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, edited in English by James Canon Bastible; 4th edition, translated by Patrick Lynch, Rockford, Illinois: TAN Books and Publishers, 1974; originally 1952 in German.

Quasten, Johannes, Patrology, four volumes; fourth volume edited by Angelo di Berardino and translated by Placid Solari; Allen, Texas: Christian Classics, 1950.

Schaff, Philip, editor, Early Church Fathers: Nicene & Post-Nicene Fathers Series 1 (NPNF 1), 14 volumes, originally published in Edinburgh, 1889, available online.

Schaff, Philip, History of the Christian Church, New York: Charles Scribners sons, 1910, eight volumes; available online.
First, the updates:

Despite the seeming impossibility of the task, the Cologne police have had more success in identifying attackers than at least I had expected would be the case. Theyve got a list of 31 suspects so far. Countries of origin, according to Der Spiegel:

Algerien (9)

Marokko (8)

Iran (5)

Syrien (4)

Deutschland (2)

Irak (1)

Serbien (1)

USA (1)

(The U.S.? A true American tourist, or someone with dual citizenship?)

It seems to be the case that these sex-mobs (as they seem to now be labelled even in German) were coordinated (this Spiegel article speaks of a three-digit number of men having planned, well, something  the article is vague as to whether the police dont know or are unwilling to say more. But these attacks follow the same pattern and method as in Tahir Square in Cairo, for example.

A recent article in The Guardian describes coordination, based on an eyewitness account:

I watched for some time as three men who were smartly dressed gave out instructions. One time a group of three or four males would come up to them, be given instructions and sent away into the crowd. Then another group of four or five would come up, and theyd gesticulate in various directions and send them off again.

According to Deutsche Welle (in English), a total of 379 women have now come forward to report attacks, 40% of which involved sexual crimes. (UPDATE: as of Der Spiegels Sunday reporting, its now 516.) And its not just Cologne. Hamburgs count is now up to 108. Instances were also reported in Dortmund and Dusseldorf; in the former city only two complaints have been reported so far, but police presume there are more and are asking women to come forward; in the latter city, there are 11 cases so far  in both cities the attacks were of the same sex-mob nature. Cases have been reported in Berlin as well, though only of two attacks, in each case with a single perpetrator, each of whom was a registered refugee, one from Iraq and one from Pakistan, not mob attacks.

Perhaps the most extensive description of the situation Ive seen so far is an English-language article in Der Spiegel, Chaos and Violence: How New Years Eve in Cologne Has Changed Germany, which places the attacks in Cologne in the context of ongoing crime in the area:

The search for the perpetrators initially led the Cologne investigators to a criminal milieu, one that has plagued Cologne for years, especially in nightlife districts or around the train station. Its typically groups of young pickpockets who use perfidious tricks to snatch wallets, phones and other valuables off unsuspecting pedestrians. The perpetrators dance up to their victims in a pretend celebratory mood, rub up against them and rob them. Those who try to defend themselves are insulted, threatened or even hurt. In Cologne alone, more than 11,000 people have been robbed in this way in the last three years. According to police, all of the perpetrators have been male and in the majority of cases, they have come from North African countries such as Morocco and Algeria. The authorities are also investigating groups of men from central Africa and Kosovo. One person involved in these investigations has said most of the men have been in Germany for quite some time but only have a tolerated immigrant status*, meaning officials could not confirm their country of origin due to missing travel documents. This milieu has little to do with the refugees who have arrived in Germany recently after fleeing places like Syria, Iraq or Afghanistan. The perpetrators  among whom are also some Germans  tend to be between 16 and 25 years old and they usually operate in small groups. On any given day in Cologne, there are about 20 of them on the streets. Conviction rates are low, and when they are made, the result is usually just a fine. Thus far, such penalties have not had a deterrent effect. But all that may now change  now that the criminals have moved on from mere thefts and threats. New Years Eve may have marked a dramatic turning point. Sexual assaults were perpetrated en masse in several cities, as if coordinated by some invisible hand. Two of the alleged attacks in Cologne ended in rape. These are serious offenses that can hardly be mentioned in the same sentence as the tricks of the pickpockets. In one rather explosive development, however, authorities in Cologne were able to locate some of the mobile phones that were stolen on New Years Eve. In a number of cases, the trail has led to refugee shelters or their immediate neighborhood.

The tolerated status, by the way, means that the individuals claim for refugee status has been rejected, but for whatever reason, they are not eligible for deportation. According to Deutsche Welle,

Very few refugees are granted full asylum status, which means that their personal persecution by the authorities back home is recognized by the state. Most are offered only tolerated status in Germany. These are people whose asylum application has been rejected, but who have not yet been sent home by the immigration authorities. This may be because they are too sick to travel, or because the situation in their home country is too dangerous. In some states, tolerated refugees dont get money to live on, but only vouchers which they can exchange for food and hygiene products like shampoo. In addition, they must apply every six months to extend their status. In any case, they are expected to leave Germany as soon as possible. This makes their integration almost impossible.

Another DW article describes the difficulty these individuals have in finding work, even though (it seems) they are legally allowed to work. This seems to be a status similar to the Temporary Protected Status in the U.S. Hence, its technically correct that these people are not refugees, but neither are they individuals who immigrated as guest workers, or with some other status.

Political repercussions continue. Deutsche Welle reports

The most important thing is that the facts about what happened [in Cologne] are spoken about openly and bluntly. Terrible things happened, and we must respond to them, Merkel told an audience of fellow members of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) at a meeting in Mainz. Under Germanys current laws, asylum seekers are only sent back if the government sentences them to three-year jail terms and deems they will not be in danger if theyre sent back to their countries. We should ask ourselves whether it might be necessary to take this away earlier [than is currently the case], and I have to say that for me, we must take it away sooner, Merkel said, the first time she has explicitly called for a change to the law, according to AFP news agency.

Here in the U.S., theres a lot of I told you so, as sites such as the National Review place this into a context of a Muslim/Arab culture which accepts or even encourages this sort of action. For instance, Europeans Studiously Ignore Muslim Mobs by John OSullivan, says that underlying these attacks is a sense of superiority on the part of Muslim men, whcih originated from a set of rules

includ[ing] capital punishment for leaving Islam (a.k.a. apostasy), which is presumably a disincentive to doing so; strict rules for regular public prayer, which strengthen group solidarity; a privileged position for men over women, amounting in practice to ownership of them as either wives or concubines; a hierarchical structure within Islamic society that places Muslims in a position above non-Muslims in law, government, and social life; and a religious orthodoxy that endows Muslims with a general superiority (and sense of superiority) over others in non-Islamic societies. Taken together, these rules help to shape a Muslim community that is cohesive, conscious of its separation from the rest of society, resistant to influences likely to undermine its cohesion, self-policing through its male members, and  because its sense of superiority is not reflected in its actual status either locally or globally  prey to resentment and hostility toward those whom it blames for its unjust subordination.

And Andrew McCarthy takes this a step further, with When Worlds Collide: Unassimilable Muslim Migrants Crash Europes Fantasy Islam, which he begins with the (rhetorical) question:

What happens when the Wests fantasy Islam collides with the reality of an imported critical mass of unassimilated  and defiantly unassimilable  Muslims? Cologne happens.

and he asserts that these men are not just a worryingly-large number of bad apples but actually acting strategically as a part of a larger action to conquer Europe for Islam, citing Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the Muslim Brotherhoods renowned sharia jurist who lived in Britain for a time despite his support for terrorism, and now lives in Qatar.

Qaradawi is the most influential Muslim intellectual behind the strategy of, as he puts it, conquering Europe and America by dawa  the aggressive proselytism of Islamic mores. The plan calls for flooding the West with Muslim migrants, directing them to resist assimilation, establishing Islamic enclaves, and pressuring the host country to concede the enclaves right to govern itself in accordance with sharia  Islams societal framework and legal code. As Ive previously explained, when Muslims are seeking conquest, Islamic scripture endorses sexual assault as a weapon to establish their dominance. . . . Just as in the Middle East, women and girls in the West are the spoils of jihad, the vehicle for intimidating non-Muslims into surrendering sovereignty over the streets. If they want to be safe, Sheikh Qaradawi warns, they must submit to Islams sartorial suffocation. If not, well, they have it coming.

Are these criminals really acting strategically? Unlikely. But do they believe that their status as Muslim men gives them the right to commit these crimes? Almost certainly. Is this a religious conviction in the sense of having been taught by religious leaders that God gives them the right to abuse women? Unlikely. Is this a result of a corrupt culture, stretching across countries, across, indeed, the whole of the former Ottoman Empire, nurtured by a resentment that Germans are wealthier than they, with a religion that adapts itself nicely to this resentment, and produces a commonality among immigrants from many countries who would otherwise see each other as competitors? Again, yes, surely, and you cant simply split out Islam, as practiced by these groups, from their culture.

But  in the U.S. and in Europe  political leaders have been all too willing to accept claims of moderation from Islamic leaders who do not fit any reasonable definition of moderate, and too fearful of appearing intolerant to actually acknowledge and reject those who arent. There is no reason why Islam cant fit perfectly well into German life, if its the sort of Islam that I described as core principles Islam not long ago: a belief that the Quran is fundamentally about treating other people justly, and anything within the Quran or other Islamic religious traditions that appears to oppose this, is explained away in some manner or another.

Whats more, the desire to believe that people are, fundamentally, all well-intentioned, has short-circuited honest discussion. I wont even say that its fear of being accused of being Islamophobic or of stoking right-wing furor. But what do you do when in your midst are large number of people who arent willing to play by the rules?

The great advantage of a uni-cultural country is that there is no us and them  everyones an us and the pressure in ones community to conform keeps criminality down. (Consider Norway, and the reports that come out of there about light penalties for crime.) But look at the statement about the petty theft in Cologne: its been an ongoing problem, and the fines are insufficient to deter the criminals. One can guess that these penalties were established for a prior generation of criminals, who were assumed to be able to be turned to the right path far more easily.

Germany has to adapt  and quickly. That means processing asylum applications quickly, and being willing to expel those who are ineligible  right now they have a large population who were found ineligible for asylum, but likewise ineligible for deportation due to issues in their home countries. And Germany will have to become much more heavy-handed with its criminals.

This is a very tall order. It takes a lot of work, and requires an entirely new mindset.

Is Germany up to the task? Time will tell.
Patna: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator from Bankipur Nitin Navin is not a happy camper these days because noted film-maker Prakash Jha, in his latest movie 'Jai Gangajal', has introduced a character, who is not only a don of his area but is also an elected legislator from, you guessed it, Bankipur.

Speaking at a press conference in Patna on Friday, the BJP leader expressed his frustration and anger with Jha saying he has asked the film-maker to change the character's constituency from Bankipur to some other constituency as it could potentially hurt his political career in future.

"The character in question is a criminal who has been repeatedly elected from Bankipur seat. While I am not a criminal, the fact that this character is an MLA from the same constituency where I am from could be detrimental to my future," Navin, who was made the MLA following his father Navin Kishore Prasad Sinha's sudden and premature death on January 1, 2006.

Navin, who was re-elected from his father's seat first in 2010 and then again in 2015, threatened to sue the film-maker if he did not make the necessary change in the character in Jai Gangajal.

The legislator said that he has also sent letters to the Union Information and Broadcasting Ministry and Censor Board seeking their intervention in settling this matter.

The film also stars Priyanka Chopra in the character of Superintendent of Police (SP) Abha Thakur.

Jha, the maker of critically-acclaimed films like Gangajal, Apharan, Aarakshan, and Satyagraha, is yet to respond to Navin's request.
Young Poet Hila Sedighi Arrested at Airport in Tehran, Latest in String of Arrests

01/09/16

Source: International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran

Freedom of Artistic Expression Under Assault in Iran



Hila Sedighi



January 8, 2016-The poet and civil activist Hila Sedighi was arrested at Imam Khomeini International Airport on January 7, 2016, as she and her husband returned from a trip to the United Arab Emirates, the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran has learned.

Sedighis arrest appears to be in connection with a sentence issued against her in absentia by the Culture and Media Court, a court established by the Iranian Judiciary to try media and culture-related crimes. There has been no comment as of yet from government or judicial officials on the reasons for her arrest or where she is being detained.

Artistic expression is under unprecedented assault in Iran, said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. The Iranian Judiciary is incapable of tolerating the peaceful expression of its own citizens, seeking instead to intimidate and silence them with arrests and imprisonment.

Sedighi, 30, co-recipient of the 2012 Hellman/Hammett prize for free expression, was a campaign worker for reformist presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi in 2009 and she recited poems in public gatherings in support of the Green Movement.





Hila Sedighi

(photo by Reza Baharinejad from facebook page)





The Green Movement arose in opposition to the outcome of Irans 2009 presidential election, which resulted in the widely disputed victory of the hardline Ahmadinejad presidency. The peaceful protests that swept Iran after the election were violently put down by the state.

On December 9, 2010, Intelligence Ministry agents searched Sedighis home and took away a number of her personal belongings. She was then summoned and interrogated numerous times by the Intelligence Ministry. On August 16, 2011, Branch 26 of the Revolutionary Court condemned Sedighi to four months in prison, and the sentence was suspended for five years.

In recent months there has been a surge in the crackdown on members of the artistic community. In October 2015, poet Fatemeh Ekhtesari was sentenced to nine years and six months in prison and another poet, Mehdi Mousavi, was sentenced to 11 years in prison by a Revolutionary Court. In addition, both were sentenced to 99 lashes.

The documentary filmmaker Keywan Karimi was sentenced to six years in prison and 233 lashes for insulting the sacred and illegitimate relations while three music producers, Mehdi Rajabian, Hossein Rajabian and Yousef Emadi, were sentenced to six years in prison for propaganda against the state.

In addition, the poet and lyricist Yaghma Golrouee was arrested at his home on November 30, 2015, and later released on bail, and the poet Mohamadreza Haj Rostambegloo was arrested on December 16, 2015, and bailed out two days later.

The crackdown, which has also targeted journalists and individuals associated with reformist groups in Iran, has intensified as the country approaches critical Parliamentary elections in February 2016. Hardliners are anxious to maintain their dominance in the domestic sphere and beat back any potential political gains of the Rouhani administration and more moderate factions.

The mounting arrests of young artists in Iran is yet another indication of the suffocating domination of security and intelligence agencies over the Judiciary, said Ghaemi. These young artists are national treasures; now they are behind bars.





Hila Sedighi - Poem (English Subtitle) for oppressed students of Iran



Hila Sedighis latest poem:

The Wind Blew Your House Away

The wind blew away your house

And, you still worry about the wind blowing in my hair?!

The myth of which caves sleepers has you intoxicated so?

Why are you sleeping?

A hundred tribes go to ruins while you sleep

The scandal about the kingdoms thieves is everywhere

But, with your two hands, you still hold on to the two ends of my shawl

You are asleep behind this worn out curtain, and I,

with this same forbidden hair of mine

will weave a ladder as tall as the sunrise

to bring out the sun

And you are asleep and water passes over you

And you never saw

how in the forest, pine trees were cut down, night after night,

in place of poplar trees

And there were no tigers when

mythological Damavand Mountain

was hanged from the loin

And for every grain of rice that had come to our table through hard labor,

in the rice paddies,

they planted iron, bricks, and walls

And you are sleeping,

and water thirsted for Hamoon Lake,

blood of Zayandeh River clotted,

and the breath of Hoor Wetlands humid nights

were buried under mud



The wind blew away your house

The scandal about the lootings has broken out

With your claws, you grab on to my nights hair

Lest the famine-stricken nights of our dinner spread

reveals the emptiness of your fists

Lest anyone sees your temper

I am veiled

but not veiled according to volition of my own free body

I am veiled because of your spoiled body and mind

You are asleep behind this worn out curtain, and I,

with this same forbidden hair of mine

will weave a ladder as tall as the sunrise

to bring out the sun
U.S. Urged To Secure Release Of Reporter Jailed In Tehran

01/09/16

Source: RFE/RL

Executives from 25 news organizations urged U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to press for the release of a Washington Post reporter jailed in Tehran.





Detained Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian

Free Jason



"Journalism is not a crime. Yet...Jason Rezaian has been imprisoned by Iran since July 2014 for doing his job. Iran has never offered any evidence that even makes a pretense of justifying this imprisonment," the executives said in a January 8 letter to Kerry.

"The United States has considerable leverage with Iran right now to press that point, and we urge you to continue to do so," they wrote.

Kerry has frequently raised Rezaian's case with Tehran, but he has refused to link the release of Rezaian or other U.S. prisoners with the lifting of U.S. sanctions on Iran, which is expected this year as Tehran rushes to carry out its part of a landmark nuclear agreement with global powers.

Rezaian, 39, was convicted in closed proceedings last year after being charged with espionage. The length of his sentence has not been disclosed publicly.

Media organizations represented in the letter included the Associated Press, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN.

Based on reporting by AP, PBS, and Politico

Copyright (c) 2016 RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. www.rferl.org
Gulf Air suspends flights to Iran

01/09/16

Source: Press TV

Iran said on Saturday that Bahrain's national carrier Gulf Air has announced that it will no longer make flights to Iran as of 14 January 2016.

Mohammad Khodakarami, the deputy for aviation and international affairs of Iran's Civil Aviation Organization (CAO), has been quoted by the media as saying that Gulf Air made the announcement through a letter to CAO.

Khodakarami said that the airline's flights will remain suspended until a further notice.

Gulf Air's move follows an earlier decision by Manama to cut all diplomatic ties with Iran. The decision came after Riyadh severed its relations with Tehran in reaction to protests in Iran against the recent execution of top Shia cleric Nirm al-Nirm by the Saudi government. Several other countries have also cut relations with Iran. They include Sudan, Somalia, and Djibouti.







Khodakarami added that Gulf Air in its letter has also requested that all flights by Iranian airlines to Bahrain be suspended from 14 January. Nevertheless, he said that Bahrain's state aviation organization is yet to officially inform CAO about the suspension of flights to Iran.

The official emphasized that Gulf Air currently operates 14 flights to Iran in a week. The flights are made to Tehran, Mashhad and Shiraz.

He emphasized that the suspension of Iran flights will harm Gulf Air more than the Iranian airlines. This, Khodakarami said, is because the airline's flight routes to Iran are among its most crowded ones.

Gulf Air had once suspended flights in Iran in 2008 as political rifts with Iran grew over allegations by Manama that Tehran was supporting anti-government protests in the tiny Persian Gulf state. The airline resumed its flights to the Islamic Republic later in 2011.








UPDATE: Paul Chabot, the Republican congressional candidate challenging Aguilar, sent a mass email blasting Aguilars floor speech.

Today, Obamas lapdog, Congressman Aguilar went on the House floor and had the audacity to lump the insidious radical Islamic terrorist attack in San Bernardino with Aurora, Newtown and Charleston, while calling for gun control, Chabot wrote.

The absolute insult he laid before the House floor today is the last straw. San Bernardino deserves better.





ORIGINAL POST: Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Redlands, used the floor of the House of Representatives on Friday, Jan. 8 to call for gun control.

A little over a month ago, my hometown of San Bernardino fell victim to gun violence and was added to a list that no community wants to join. Aurora. Newtown. Chattanooga. Charleston. And the list goes on, said Aguilar, who represents the site of the Dec. 2 terror attack that killed 14 and injured 22.

And thats the problem  the list goes on. The only action Congress has taken to address the epidemic of gun violence has been to hold moments of silence in honor of their memory.

As a father of two young boys and as San Bernardinos voice in Congress, I cannot be silent. We owe it our communities from San Bernardino to Newtown to do something. As one of the family members mentioned earlier in the week, Congress has offered their thoughts and prayers, but thoughts and prayers are cheap when you have the power they have. While one single law could not have prevented the horrific events in San Bernardino, that doesnt justify a refusal to take action or to make our communities safer.
The American Red Cross Inland Empire Chapter is offering services to Forest Falls-area residents in need of shelter during a prolonged power outage that may last over the weekend.

Snow, ice and cracked tree branches have knocked out power to customers in the San Bernardino Mountains communities of Forest Falls, Barton Flats and Jenks Lake, beginning Thursday, Jan. 7, during the winter storms.

About 780 customers in Forest Falls, Jenks Lake and Bear Valley are without power, according to Paul Griffo, Southern California Edison spokesman. It may take until Monday or later to restore power in some remote areas due to accessibility to make repairs, he said.

A phone message was sent out to the area and Community Emergency Response Team volunteers began making door-to-door contacts Friday, Jan. 8, to check on people, according to Tracey Martinez, San Bernardino County Fire Department spokeswoman. The countys Office of Emergency Services operates through the department.

The Red Cross is waiting to hear whether residents need alternate shelter before deciding whether to open a shelter in the Yucaipa area, said Georgia Duncan, Red Cross public affairs spokeswoman for the San Bernardino office.

The mountain communities are very resourceful, very self sufficient, Duncan said.

With the clearing storm, We have beautiful sunny weather and no power, Duncan said. Residents who may need assistance may contact the Red Cross at 909-380-7230.

Griffo reminded customers if they see downed power lines or dangling wires to stay away from the lines and call 911 to report the problem.

Customers may check the utilitys outage map, here, for updates on when power may be restored.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)  The U.S. Navy on Saturday released footage it said showed Iranian Revolutionary Guard vessels firing rockets near warships and commercial traffic in the strategic Strait of Hormuz late last month, a move raising tensions between the two nations despite the recent nuclear deal.

The Navy said it released the footage in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, though it also comes as U.S. ally Saudi Arabia has cut ties to the Islamic Republic following attacks on diplomatic posts there after the kingdoms execution of a Shiite cleric.

The 45 seconds of black-and-white Dec. 26 footage, which the Navy said was shot from a Seahawk helicopter, shows what appears to be an oil tanker passing by. A flash appears on the left side of the video and after zooming in, it shows small boats the Navy said were Iranian firing rockets.

The Navy has said the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier, the USS Bulkeley destroyer and a French frigate were nearby at the time, as well as commercial vessels.

There was no immediate reaction in Tehran to the videos release. Previously, Gen. Ramezan Sharif, a Revolutionary Guard spokesman, said his forces didnt carry out any drills there at that time and called the American comments psychological warfare.

Military vessels taking part in the war against the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria also pass through the strait, a narrow waterway between Iran and Oman. The U.S. Navy previously said Iran gave 23-minutes warning over maritime radio before opening fire with unguided rockets.

The Strait of Hormuz is only about 33 kilometers (21 miles) wide at its narrowest point. Ships traversing the chokepoint have even less room to maneuver. The shipping lane in either direction is only 2 miles (3.22 kilometers) wide, with a 2-mile (3.2-kilometer) buffer zone between them.

The U.S. Navys 5th Fleet is based in nearby Bahrain, on the southern coast of the Gulf. It conducts anti-piracy patrols in the greater Gulf and serves as a regional counterbalance to Iran.

U.S. and Iranian forces clashed in the Strait of Hormuz in the 1980s, during the Iran-Iraq war. On April 18, 1988, the U.S. attacked two Iranian oil rigs and sank or damaged six Iranian vessels, including two naval frigates, in Operation Praying Mantis. That came after the near-sinking of the missile frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts by an Iranian mine.

A few months later, in July 1988, the USS Vincennes in the strait mistook an Iran Air flight heading to Dubai for an attacking fighter jet, shooting down the plane and killing all 290 passengers and crew onboard. The shoot-down of the jet came shortly after the U.S. vessel reported coming under fire from Iranian speedboats.

Tensions have persisted in the strait even into this year. Iran sank a replica of a U.S. aircraft carrier in February near the strait and it earlier tested out so-called suicide drones it said could crash into naval vessels.

Iran seized a Marshall Islands-flagged cargo ship and later released it in May after its forces had earlier surrounded a U.S.-flagged cargo ship transiting the strait. That caused the 5th Fleet to escort commercial ships traveling in the Gulf for a short time.

Iran and world powers led by the U.S. agreed to a landmark nuclear deal earlier this year to limit Tehrans enrichment of uranium in exchange for lifting economic sanctions. Iran has always denied seeking nuclear arms.

The deal reached with moderate President Hassan Rouhanis administration has been panned by Iranian hard-liners, and in the months since, Iran has conducted missile tests criticized by the U.S., as well as aired footage on state television of an underground missile base.

In recent days, regional tensions have been escalated even higher as Iran and Saudi Arabia face off after the execution of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr and the storming of the kingdoms diplomatic posts in Iran.
When it came time to plan this years Flags for the Fallen ceremony, it seemed natural to include tributes to the 14 people killed in the Dec. 2 terrorist attack in San Bernardino.

Something of that magnitude has never happened in the Inland area, said Dani Medrano, president of the Eastvale-based Wives of Law Enforcement and Firefighters, which sponsored Fridays event. It was horrific.

We need to support those families, Medrano said. And we need to honor the victims who were Inland Empire residents.

And so it was that, in addition to the 131 American flags honoring law enforcement officers and 86 flags honoring firefighters who died in 2015, 14 flags with small black ribbons and bearing the names of the San Bernardino victims were placed on the front lawn of Eastvale Fire Station 27.

RELATED: All the latest developments related to the San Bernardino shooting

Flags also memorialized four Eastvale residents: Pat Libertone, a Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department lieutenant who died in 2014; Al Rivera, a Los Angeles County Sheriffs investigator who died in 2014; Gilbert Cortez, a California Department of Corrections sergeant killed in a 2013 traffic accident along with his K-9 partner, Mattie; and Nora Perez, a Los Angeles County Probation Department officer who died last month from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrigs disease.

The flags honoring law officers had blue ribbons. Those honoring firefighters had red ribbons.

Fridays ceremony came on the eve of National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day, organized by Concerns of Police Survivors along with other law enforcement organizations, including the Fraternal Order of Police.

It was the second flag ceremony in Eastvale, and Medrano said it would be an annual event.

The ceremony drew more than 100 people, including state Sen. Richard Roth, D-Riverside, to the sidewalk in front of the Hamner Avenue fire station.

I just wanted to show my support and respect for these fine folks who protect us and keep us out of harms way, Roth said as he stood in line, waiting to get a flag. This is the least I can do.

Eastvale resident Brian Smith, a vice investigator with the Los Angeles Police Department, and his wife, Tonya, a member of the wives group, came with their 1-year-old son, Bentley.

The Smiths said they came to support officers and firefighters and those who died Dec. 2.

What happened was a tragedy, Brian Smith said.

Vivian Rivera, daughters Debra and Angela, and 6-year-old grandson Raiden placed a flag honoring Al Rivera.

Vivian Rivera said her husband served 30 years with the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department before his death.

Im proud of his contributions, she said.

The event began with a welcome by Medrano and Eastvale Mayor Ike Bootsma. Eastvale Police Chief Jason Horton, Corona Fire Department Chief David Duffy and Downey police Officer Ralph Diaz also spoke.

Then, as bagpipes played mournfully, guests quietly filed past Fire Station 27 and placed American flags on the front lawn.

Contact the writer: 951-368-9647 or sstokley@pressenterprise.com
Inland Southern California cities are scrambling to pass new rules governing medical marijuana to beat a March 1 deadline, after which they would lose control to the state.

It turns out they may not have had to rush. A bill to remove the deadline has already begun moving through state Assembly committees.

Nonetheless, the rules some cities have created suggest entrenched opposition to marijuana may be starting to weaken a bit. After spending seven years and more than $800,000 to shut down dispensaries, Riverside officials on Tuesday, Jan. 5, opted to allow medical marijuana patients to grow a handful of plants for their own use.

With the citys ban on dispensaries and delivery services, Every avenue of access has been cut off, Riverside Councilman John Burnard said. I think (to allow) growing as an individual for personal use and on a limited basis is very compassionate.

But decisions by Riverside, Jurupa Valley and Riverside County to permit a few pot plants by no means herald a seismic shift. Most Inland communities already forbid dispensaries, and cities including Canyon Lake, Corona, Hemet, Menifee, Norco and San Jacinto recently extended the prohibition to cultivation of any amount of marijuana.

Menifee banned storefront dispensaries in 2011 and mobile delivery services in 2013, Mayor Scott Mann said, and We felt the best thing to do for Menifee right now was to follow suit with our two previous bans.

Mann and other city officials say the goal of their new rules was to maintain local control. But with a statewide marijuana legalization measure predicted for the November ballot, theyre not sure how long that control will last.

BEATING THE DEADLINE

California voters approved marijuana for medical use in 1996, but until now the state lacked a detailed system of regulation. The drug remains illegal under federal law.

Inland cities new marijuana rules were a reaction to a package of three state bills that create a regulatory scheme to license the growing, testing, processing and sale of the drug. One of the bills included a March 1 deadline by which cities must either pass their own rules for medical marijuana or cede regulatory authority to the state.

Legislators meant to remove the deadline, but a clerical error left it in the final bill, said Paul Ramey, spokesman for Assemblyman Jim Wood, D-Healdsburg. Wood wrote the bill that set the deadline.

Wood realized cities and counties would have very little time to craft their own rules, so hes pushing a bill to eliminate the deadline, Ramey said.

Under the three bills, which were signed into law in October, if a city has no regulations on medical marijuana, someone wanting to grow or sell it could get a license from the state to do so. But a state license wouldnt supersede a local pot ban.

Thats why Menifee, Corona and other cities added marijuana cultivation to their list of prohibitions, officials said.

Its really just a continuation of what weve already had, Corona Councilmna Eugene Montanez said.

He and Mann, the Menifee mayor, said their cities may revisit the rules in the future. And, they added, while medical marijuana patients wont be allowed to grow pot at home, they dont have to go far to find it.

There are ways for people to get their prescriptions filled. (Dispensaries are) all over the place, Mann said. Theyre just not in Menifee.

SORT OF VICTORY

But a few other local governments felt differently.

Riverside County passed rules in May 2015 mainly intended to end the nuisance of large-scale pot farms, but they created a de facto exemption for patients with a state medical marijuana card to grow small amounts at home.

We were getting so many complaints from (residents) that they couldnt open their windows because there were literally a hundred plants, two hundred plants growing in the backyard next to them, people armed (for security) at all hours, Riverside County Supervisor Kevin Jeffries said.

But when writing the rules, he and then-Supervisor Jeff Stone wanted to differentiate between someone growing pot commercially and someone with a medical need growing it for personal use. So they eliminated the penalty for patients or their caregivers who grow no more than 12 plants per person or 24 total on their own property.

The government cracking down their gates to come in and nail them because theyve got a couple of plants for ther own personal medical needs,  thats not a priority of county government, Jeffries said.

Riversides City Council voted Tuesday to allow people with a medical marijuana card and a city license to grow up to eight plants on a single family parcel, though they could lose the license if the city gets complaints about odor or other problems. The rules also ban large commercial pot grows.

Burnard, the Riverside councilman, said when his father had Stage 4 lung cancer, a doctor recommended marijuana to ease nausea and help him gain weight. He just had no energy, no motivation to go outside to do things, Burnard said, adding that it might be therapeutic for an ill person to tend marijuana plants.

Medical marijuana activist Lanny Swerdlow, who in 2009 helped open a dispensary in defiance of Riversides ban and later lost a court battle to keep it open, said he was surprised by the councils vote and called it sort of, kind of a victory.

Swerdlow and other activists hoped the city would allow more plants per patient, but he was glad they allowed any, he said.

This shows that when patients get out and make the effort to contact their elected officials, it changes opinions, Swerdlow said. It wasnt that long ago when nobody was receptive.

CONVERSATION WILL CONTINUE

On Thursday, Jurupa Valley officals banned large-scale cultivation of medical marijuana but opted to allow patients with a card to grow up to 12 plants on their property for their own use.

The ordinance also prohibits deliveries of medical marijuana even if the dispensary is located outside of the city limits.

Councilman Brian Berkson, who supported the measure, said he was troubled that the citys rigid stance was robbing seniors and disabled veterans of the right to get medical marijuana to treat their ailments.

We need to regulate (marijuana businesses) so its done right, he said. This conversation will continue.

But officials in several cities, regardless of their stance, said the prospect of statewide legalization, a question that may face voters this fall, makes the future of their pot rules uncertain.

Just because theres a current ban doesnt mean there will always be a ban, said Montanez, the Corona councilman. I think most people realize theres a strong likelihood that total legalization will happen later this year whether we like it or not.

Contact the writer: Staff writers Patrick ONeill, Tom Sheridan, Craig Shultz, Sandra Stokley and Michael Williams contributed to this report.951-368-9461 or arobinson@pressenterprise.com
MEXICO CITY  After long resisting requests from Washington, Mexicos government is now actively considering extraditing Joaquin Guzman Loera, the Mexican drug lord known as El Chapo, to the United States to face drug charges there, a Mexican official said on Saturday.

The Mexican official, who confirmed media reports on the Mexican governments new stance, said the process could take months as it goes through the judicial system. Guzmans lawyers are expected to fight the extradition.

Guzman, who escaped from prison earlier this year, was captured Friday after a gunbattle near the coast in his home state, Sinaloa.
Venezuelas free-market oriented Democratic Union took control of Congress on Tuesday for the first time in 16 years, ousting the Socialist Party of Hugo Chavez, who died in 2013. Mr. Chavezs successor, President Nicolas Maduro, has continued policies of strong government control of the economy bordering on dictatorship.

The Associated Press reported that the new leader of Congress, Henry Ramos Allup, said in his inaugural remarks that a six-month deadline to remove Maduro by constitutional means is not negotiable.

That was just the latest in a string of victories for freedom-oriented political parties in Latin America. On Nov. 22, Businessman Mauricio Macrio was elected president of Argentina, defeating Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, who, along with her late husband, Nestor Kirchner, ruled Argentina since 2003.

Next out could be Brazils President Dilma Rousseff and her socialist Workers Party. The country  scheduled to host the Summer Olympics in August  is suffering the deepest recession since at least 1901, according to Bloomberg. Latin Americas largest economy will shrink 2.95 percent this year [and] contracted 3.71 percent last year.

Ms. Rousseff faces impeachment in Brazils Congress, where she is accused of illegally manipulating the numbers in the national budget, and has said her administration did nothing wrong, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The shift to the right is not universal. AP reported, Other leftist stalwarts in South America remain on solid footing, including Ecuadors Rafael Correa, who enjoys a 52 percent approval rating even as his oil-dependent economy struggles to fight off recession.

As in most countries, including the United States, political fortunes largely depend on economic fortunes. Yet market-oriented politicians often forget that connection, as witnessed by the large spending increases leading to massive deficits by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and President George W. Bush, both Republicans who favored market rhetoric.

Another example was Fernando Henrique Cardoso, president of Brazil from 1995-2003. He carried out the Real Plan of 1994 established under his predecessor, Itamar Franco. Both were oriented toward market reforms. But, according to a 2004 study by the International Monetary Fund, while the authorities rhetoric favored fiscal austerity, unrelenting pressures to increase expenditures more than offset increases in revenue or cuts in other expenditures, bringing massive deficits.

Voters replaced Cardoso with Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of the Workers Party, whose surprising austerity, combined with rising global commodity prices, helped Brazil produce budget surpluses and weather the 2008 global economic crisis. His caution was not adopted by Rousseff.

An important player in all this is Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto and his 1989 book, The Other Path: The Invisible Revolution in the Third World. It has sparked numerous free-market reforms in his native country and throughout Latin America.

One of his main points was that high taxes and a ridiculous number of regulations made it nearly impossible for the poor and middle class to start small businesses. Its a lesson all countries need to keep learning.
When it comes to the for-profit college industry, many federal lawmakers seem willing to squander billions of taxpayer dollars (about $30 billion annually) to prop up institutions whose practices often border on  and frequently wander into  fraudulent behavior.

And many elected representatives fight to keep the industry free from meaningful regulation.

This is an industry that by Congress own assessment, survives on government grants and loans. Student loans, that is.

Legally, these trade and technical schools must receive at least 10 percent of their revenues from sources other than the Department of Education.

But that doesnt mean they cant backfill with other federal money. A 2012 Senate report found there was a push to recruit greater numbers of veterans into for-profit colleges, thus using G.I. Bill funds to make up much of that 10 percent.

So, some for-profit colleges are almost entirely federally funded.

The same study found that among a sampling of 30 companies, more was being spent on recruitment and marketing (22.4 percent) than on instruction (17.7 percent). The schools had an average profit of 19.4 percent. The average CEO salary among the companies was $7.3 million.

By contrast, Janet Napolitano, president of the University of California system, makes just a shade under $700,000.

What are taxpayers getting for the million-dollar salaries they are helping to fund?

In 2013, the National Center for Education Statistics reported that just 32 percent of for-profit college students graduate, compared with 58 percent in public universities and 65 percent at private nonprofit schools.

In the past year, three companies running schools in the Inland Empire have closed, one because of declining enrollment, and two others that were in trouble with regulators for deceptive practices.

For-profit colleges have a reputation for overselling programs, preying on lower-income and lower-educated students, and turning out graduates with credentials that dont necessarily lead to employment.

Such students  who are often encouraged to pay for their education with student loans  are often left with tens of thousands of dollars in debt, which they have little chance of repaying. For-profit college students accounted for 47 percent of student loan defaults in 2012, even though they make up only 13 percent of the total college student population.

But efforts by lawmakers to make for-profit colleges more accountable have been hard-fought battles. The Obama administration issued gainful employment regulations in 2015, requiring colleges to reach certain thresholds of income-to-debt ratios for their graduates, or risk losing their ability to issue federal student loans.

Legislators in favor of greater oversight said the reforms didnt go far enough. The for-profit college industry and its congressional supporters called the rules unfair.

The industry has contributed generously to politicians campaign coffers. In 2014, according to OpenSecrets.org, for-profit schools funneled nearly $3 million into political campaigns.

Surely there are some good actors among the for-profit institutions. But even industry giant University of Phoenix came under investigation in the past year by the Federal Trade Commission for unfair business practices.

If for-profit schools were supporting themselves, perhaps one could argue they have a right to free rein. But theyre not.

On the other hand, people left holding the bag, those students with mounds of debt and, all too often, poor job prospects? They dont really have much political clout. Perhaps theyll learn something from that.

Contact the writer: mmuckenfuss@pressenterprise.com or 951-368-9595
Here are new DVD releases scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 12:

The Martian (Rated PG-13 for some strong language, injury images, and brief nudity, 144 minutes): Hey, look, a good movie! The Martian, at first glance, is a Hollywood fairy tale: good science fiction, excellent cast, amazing special effects, funny script and one great adventure. Matt Damon stars as an astronaut stranded on Mars. While trying to survive, NASA tries to come up with a plan to save him. How funny is it? Its nominated for Best Picture  Musical or Comedy at the Golden Globes. Yes, Im being serious about that.

The Blu-ray includes interesting extras including gag reel, a look at the true story, interviews with the cast and crew and production gallery.

Verdict: Buy it.

Paranormal Activity 5: The Ghost Dimension (Rated R for language and some horror violence, 88 minutes): Think of the Paranormal Activity films as the drunk friend that wont leave: they used to be fun and you enjoyed their company years ago. But, now it seems they have overstayed their welcome. Can you believe the films have been leading to one story this entire time? Its like taking five films to just seeing what Freddy Krueger looks like.

Verdict: Pass, go rent the first one.

Sinister 2 (Rated R for strong violence, bloody and disturbing images, and language, 97 minutes): Evil children; is there anything creepier? Maybe evil children dressed as clowns wearing Beats headphones. Sinister 2 continues the tale of the evil demon Bhughul, who loves tearing families apart. While the film is rated R, expect more jump scares than anything. For the fear that comes from renting a sub-par film.

Verdict: Pass. Want to be scared? Rent Fantastic Four.

Hotel Transylvania 2 (Rated PG for some scary images, action and rude humor, 89 minutes): When the first film came out, all I could think was Adam Sandler as Dracula? Are you kidding me? Turns out, its a pretty good childrens movie. Plus, Steve Buscemi plays a werewolf. Come on, that is comedic gold right there. More cool points are added in the sequel by having Mel Brooks play Draculas father.

Verdict: Why arent you watching this already?

Contact the writer: 951-368-9342, tguy@pressenterprise.com or on Twitter: @timwguy
Casino dealer program open house

TEMECULA Mt. San Jacinto College will host an open house Tuesday, Jan. 12, for the public to learn about its casino dealer training program. Guests can visit the Casino Dealer School and speak with instructors.

The program runs year-round with open enrollment and costs $1,000. It prepares students for their dealer audition, according to MSJC.

The open house is from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at MSJCs Temecula Education Complex, 27447 Enterprise Circle West, Room 106.

Information: 951-506-6595.

 Staff report

Paleontologist to speak

HEMET SAGE Society of Hemet will host Eric Scott, associate curator of paleontology at the Dr. John D. Cooper Archaeological and Paleontological Center, on Tuesday, Jan. 12.

Scott is past curator of paleontology at the San Bernardino County Museum. He studies the evolution and extinction of large ice age mammals in western North America, with an emphasis on extinct horses and bison.

The meeting will be in the Ramona Room behind Miller Jones Mortuary, 1501 W. Florida Ave. There will be a social at 1:30 p.m., followed by Scotts talk at 2 p.m.

Information: 951-926-2143 or 951-929-1630.

 Staff report

Member of Torres Martinez Tribe to speak

HEMET Derek Duro, a member of the Torres Martinez Tribe, will be the featured speaker at the Hemet Heritage Foundation meeting at 7 p.m. Monday, Jan. 11, at the Diamond Valley Middle School Library, Room 117.

Duro is knowledgeable about local Native American history and aims to raise awareness of Native American cultural activities.

The school is located at 291 W. Chambers St. Parking is available adjacent to the library.

 Staff report

Classes for older adults available

RIVERSIDE The U.S.-Saudi Arabia relationship, African American actresses and modern painters are among the titles of classes coming up at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute.

The institute offers college-level courses designed for older adults. Winter session classes are offered from 10 a.m. to noon and 1 to 3 p.m. weekdays at the UCR Extension Center, 1200 University Ave., Riverside.

Oshers annual membership fee is $35, which allows members to attend individual classes January through June for $20.

Information: 951-827-4105 or extension.ucr.edu.

 Staff report

New breastfeeding program to start

SAN BERNARDINO San Bernardino County Department of Public Health will help kick off a new breastfeeding support program on Wednesday, Jan. 13.

The rally is from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. at the Archdiocese of San Bernardino, 1201 E. Highland Ave., in San Bernardino.

The program is titled Babys Optimal Nutrition with Ultimate Support, or BONUS. The main goal of the program, according to a news release from the county, is to increase the number of San Bernardino County babies that breastfeed exclusively, and the amount of time they breastfeed, by providing a 24-hour support helpline via 211.

 Staff report

Play With Your Food to open new season

HEMET Play With Your Food Productions will kick off its 2016 season with the play I Hate Hamlet.

Performances will begin at 6:30 p.m. on Jan. 15, 16, 22 and 23 and at 1:30 p.m. on Jan. 17 and 24 at 140 N. Buena Vista. Tickets are $40 and pay for dinner.

The play is about a terrible actor who has been cast as the title role in Hamlet.

Information: 951-663-8491 or playwithyourfoodhemet.com.

 Anne Marie Walker

Fundraiser for homeless veterans

SAN BERNARDINO On Saturday, Jan. 16, the Frazee Community Center will host a Texas Hold Em charity event to raise money for the citys homeless veterans.

The fundraiser is from 4 to 10 p.m. at the Arrowhead Country Club at 3433 Parkside Drive.

The goal of the fundraiser is to raise $30,000 to renovate veteran housing and other facilities. Frazee Community Center has been aiding the homeless and military veterans since 1965 by providing hot meals, clothes and transitional housing.

Information: 909-980-1194.

 Anne Marie Walker

Send items for possible inclusion in Community Notes to community@pressenterprise.com.
The widow of San Bernardino terror victim Damian Meins has been invited by Rep. Mark Takano, D-Riverside, to attend Tuesdays State of the Union address in Washington, D.C., according to Meins daughter.

Trenna Meins will attend the speech, according to an email from Tina Meins. Tina and her sister Tawnya will accompany their mother to Washington.

Damian Meins, 58, of Riverside, was one of 14 killed during a Dec. 2 gathering of San Bernardino County employees at the Inland Regional Center. He also worked for Riverside County for 26 years before retiring.
A San Bernardino County Sheriffs Department canine died following a training exercise Wednesday, Dec. 6.

Jojo served the department for three years, and specialized in bomb sniffing and arson tracking, spokeswoman Cindy Bachman said.

The cause of death is not yet clear, she said. Jojos handler, a detective in the department, could not be reached for comment. More information is expected to be released early next week.

The San Bernardino Police Department offered their condolences in a Facebook post after JoJos death.
Two long-awaited infrastructure projects that will transform traffic patterns in the cities of Murrieta and Menifee and the rapidly expanding community of French Valley could begin construction this year.

Jeff Hitch, Murrietas public works construction manager, said his city is wrapping up right-of-way negotiations that will allow for the start of work on the final Whitewood Road segment, a one-mile stretch in the northeastern corner of the city that will allow traffic to flow from Murrieta to Menifee, where Whitewood turns into Menifee Road.

That particular segment is important because Whitewood and Menifee roads form a north-south corridor that allows motorists to bypass Interstate 215 when it is congested.

We believe it will be open in 2016, Hitch said.

The other big project in the area that could start construction this year is the four-mile extension of Clinton Keith Road from Whitewood Road to Trois Valley Street, a new route that will give people a straight shot into French Valley from the 215.

The county, which is spearheading that project, awarded the $23 million bid to a Santa Ana construction company in December.

Work is scheduled to start in February if everything comes together as planned.

We are in the process of obtaining all the permits, said Dennis Green, a consultant on the project.

Green said a meeting scheduled for Jan. 28 that should provide more clarity on the details.

The project, which will feature two lanes in each direction, is expected to take about 18 months, which would put the grand opening in the summer/fall of 2017.

The ultimate plan for the corridor is three lanes in each direction and the project will be graded for that width when it is built, which will allow for a relatively quick upgrade when traffic levels merit the increase.

Both projects have taken longer than normal to get off the ground because of their proximity to a county wildlife corridor, which has necessitated the completion of additional environmental reviews.

In the case of the Whitewood segment, there will be a special culvert that allows for animals to cross back and forth.

There also will be a special crossing built under the Clinton Keith Road extension, which will feature a total of three bridges.

The negotiations with the property owners who will be providing the land for the Whitewood Road segment are confidential, Hitch said, but they are following the normal process.

The city gets an appraisal of the land and then the owners of the property can get an appraisal of their own that is paid for by the city. With those numbers in hand, the two parties then hash out a price for the land.

Once a deal is reached that information will become public record and it will be formally considered by the Murrieta City Council.

The city hoping to start construction as early as May but a delay could push the start time to July or August.

Contact the writer: aclaverie@pressenterprise.com, 951-368-9698, @PE_Claverie
In case you missed it, reactions to the Federal Governments plan to effectively cut the Medicare rebates available to the public on some v. important tests and procedures has ranged from uh, dont you think that seems a bit excessive? to excuse me, but what the flying fuck are you doing?

The cuts, which look to take $650m from the current system, have been called into question for possibly discouraging Australians  particularly women  from getting some really important tests done. The subsidies available for pap smears are likely to be reduced, and you can expect blood, urine, and STI tests to have a price hike too.

Recently, the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia even went as far to say that if people opt out of pathology testing because they are worried about how much it is going to cost, there will be a resurgence in late diagnosis of cancer, and there will be adverse outcomes.

The thing is, pathology for possible cancer patients is only one area expected to face cuts, and medical imagery professionals have said that tests that are vital in diagnosing cancer are up for some sizeable price-hikes too. Now, the Guardian reports the Australian Diagnostic Imaging Association said some patients could even face out-of-pocket charges of over $1,000  just on the preliminaries.

Thats before treatment. Before diagnosis, even.

Chief Executive of the Association, Pattie Beerens, said the upcoming out-of-pocket charges are significant amounts for patients to forego. Patients awaiting a melanoma diagnoses  melanomas already in the top five most commonly diagnosed cancers in in Australia, BTW  could cop the worst of it, but breast- and thyroid cancer patients may also see charges upwards of $300 on procedures that were previously covered. Significant amounts for sure, especially if they were bulk billed beforehand.

Again, thats just on testing; while vital, bringing out-of-pocket expenses into the picture could, unfortunately, deter a slew of at-risk Aussies from getting the attention they need. The eventual costs of treating those illnesses in later stages would well outweigh the cost of the tests, too.

While a spokesperson for Federal Health Minister Sussan Ley said those charges wont have to be passed on to the patient, Beerens says, on the real, they most likely will.

More evidence that this sorta thing affects the lot of us, not just those who need access to pap smears. A viral change.org petition aimed at stifling the cuts entirely is already nearing 200,000 signatures.

Story: Guardian.

Photo: Media For Medical / Getty.
teds_bar_and_grill.jpg

This glass has the old Ted's Bar and Grill address, before its recent move.

Food: Broad menu has standout homemade specialties mixed with lackluster items.

Service: Slower than expected for being well-staffed

Ambiance: An austere bar room and monochromatic, compact dining rooms.

When one Ted's Bar & Grill closes its doors at 6197 Allentown Blvd. another Ted's Bar & Grill opens at 7300 Allentown Blvd ... within 3 miles. The local fan base has stayed constant and the neighborhood bar scene is as lively as ever at this new venue, which is twice the size but not as warm and inviting.

Ted's Bar & Grill is a characterless wonder. The rectangular, flat-roofed building sits propped on top of a hill of dirt until surrounding bulldozers finish the landscaping, reseeding and patio area on the east side of the parking lot. The restaurant distinguishes itself from a warehouse by a faux rock facade that outlines the lower quarter of the building.

Far from cozy, the interior is cold and austere with cement flooring and ceiling duct work sandwiching the big main bar area. Glancing around the room, customers were seated at high-top tables still wearing winter coats and thick, hooded sweatshirts. Chrome legged bar stools are two heights depending on the size of the cushions. I switched seats to look down rather than across at my burger.

Two separate monochromatic and unadorned dining rooms are set apart from this main bar room furnished by booths and matching banquet chairs around thin tabletops. Unobtrusive flat-screen TVs are high and scattered around every room. On Saturday nights, there is usually a band playing on the tiny stage at the corner of the bar room. Karaoke is scheduled to begin every Thursday at 9 p.m.

The ambiance may not be comforting and appealing, but good house specials and plenty of assorted beers on tap are crowd pleasing. Although we had requested the Phillips crab-topped soft pretzel ($10.99), they were out of this house specialty. Instead we split an order of duck poppers ($7.99). Invented by the chef, Joel LeMarco, owner Romeo LeMarco's son, this is the duck version of a jalapeno popper. We expected these two thick knobs to be heavily breaded and deep-fried. However, bacon wraps around these twin portions of duck meat covered by a thin layer of spicy barbecue sauce. Juicy duck meat wraps around jalapeno peppers and cream cheese ($7.99).

Wings (6 pieces $4.99 and 40 cents each Monday through Friday, minimum order of 6) are practically at every table. They are mouth-watering, crispy on the outside and very tender and meaty. Garlic BBQ is a good choice of sauce; rich, thick and studded with lots of garlic bits.

"We sell out of our homemade soups every week.," says LeMarco, who co-owns the restaurant with business partner John Saad. Other homemade items that have kept customers coming back for more are slow roasted prime rib ($15.99 for a 13-to 15-ounce portion), hand-cut chargrilled steaks ($9.99 to $16.99) and their signature, very lumpy broiled crab cake entree ($15.99).

With such a broad menu, some things are just better tasting than others. Chargrilled, hand patted 6-ounce burgers ($7.50 to $8.99) drip with flavorful juices where as buffalo chicken wrap ($7.99) has faint whisper of heated wing sauce and dry strips of meat. Bacon cheese fries ($3.50) are nondescript highlighted by ballpark nacho cheese coating and crispy bacon bits. Premade pizza crusts are chewy rather than puffy and crispy, however, Greek pizza ($7.99) has a wonderful, garlicky mozzarella cheese layer studded with big chunks of feta, red onion, chopped tomatoes and kalamata olive pieces.

Right now all of their desserts come from Sweet Treats Bakery of Hanover.

We split a fudgy frosted square of tiger cake ($5.59) resembling a birthday cake with its alternating thick, moist vanilla and chocolate layers. It was luscious and decadent. At some point in the near future, desserts will be made in house.

Convivial atmosphere is intact but coziness is nonexistent at this larger, bare version of Ted's Bar & Grill.

7300 Allentown Blvd., corner of Oak Grove and Allentown Blvd., Harrisburg, 717-652-3832

Hours: 11 a.m to 2 a.m, daily (Sundays, the place sometimes closes at midnight depending on crowd).

Menu: American pub fare

Entrees: $9.99 to $17.99

Notes: Major credit cards, reservations accepted, full service bar, handicapped accessible, children's menu, Super Bowl takeout wings special, karaoke Thursdays at 9 p.m., live music on Saturday nights.
Building Collapse

In this June 5, 2013, file photo, rescue personnel work the scene of a building collapse on Market Street in downtown Philadelphia that left six people dead. Two demolition contractors are schedule to be sentenced on Friday, Jan. 8, 2016 for the collapse. (AP Photo/Jacqueline Larma, File)

(Jacqueline Larma)

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- As he drank coffee at his job site in the mornings, demolition subcontractor Sean Benschop often talked with Borbor Davis, who worked at the adjacent Salvation Army in downtown Philadelphia.

The men, both immigrants, asked where the other was from.

"I say, 'I'm from Guyana.' He say, 'I'm from Liberia,'" Benschop testified Friday before he was sentenced for his role in a 2013 building collapse that killed the 68-year-old Davis and five others. "When I learned ... he was dead, I couldn't believe it."

Benschop, who was operating heavy machinery the day of the collapse despite taking Percocet and marijuana for medical problems, was sentenced to 7 1/2 to 15 years in prison.

Co-defendant Griffin Campbell was the cut-rate contractor who gutted the building from the inside, destabilizing it, rather than take it down floor by floor. He was sentenced to 15 to 30 years.

Judge Glenn Bronson deemed Campbell a danger to the community, ignoring warnings the building was at risk of imminent collapse. And he said the collapse "shook this city to its core."

The men were convicted of similar crimes, including involuntary manslaughter, aggravated assault and causing a catastrophe, although a jury last year acquitted Campbell of third-degree murder. Benschop pleaded guilty and testified against Campbell.

Prosecutors said Campbell ignored standard demolition practices in order to salvage joists and other materials. The joints were resold for $6 apiece.

Campbell, 51, denied any profit motive, and said he had a long history of generosity in his North Philadelphia neighborhood.

He said he had been thrilled to get the $112,000 contract and hoped it would be his big break after years running a lunch truck.

"This job meant a lot to me -- a lot. I was going to be out of debt, and life was going to be good," said Campbell, 51, a married father of four.

City Treasurer Nancy Winkler called it "disturbing and distressing" that her family will have to go through a second trial in civil court to seek justice for others involved in the building demolition that killed her 24-year-old daughter, Anne Bryan.

Many families are suing building owner Richard Basciano, who was redeveloping the long-vacant strip of stores after owning them for about 20 years, along with the Salvation Army and other entities.

A city inspector who had visited the site committed suicide days later, although officials found no evidence of any wrongdoing.

The four others killed were Kimberly Finnegan, 34, a newly engaged woman working her first day at the thrift store; Bryan's close friend, Mary Simpson; Juanita Harmin, 75, a retired University of Pennsylvania secretary; and Roseline Conteh, 52, a mother of nine looking for bargains to send to her native Sierra Leone.

"They suffered a terrible death, buried alive, suffocating," the judge said.

Myra Plekan, a widow from the Ukraine shopping at the thrift store's weekly sale, lost both legs after spending 13 hours trapped in the rubble. She was not in court Friday as she recuperates from her 31st surgery. Her medical bills have topped $10 million, her lawyer said.

"The doctors tell me I will live to a normal age, but my life will be anything but normal," Plekan, who now lives in a nursing home, wrote in a letter to the judge. "I do look forward to when all people responsible for what happened when the Salvation Army store collapsed will be brought to justice."

Davis died in the store basement after switching posts with a younger clerk called away to hang a picture, the surviving co-worker testified last year, fighting back tears.

Benschop, 44, asked the judge Friday if he could write to the victim's families. The judge found his remorse sincere.

"Mr. Benschop advised others of the proper way to do things," defense lawyer William Davis said. "Then, faced with a decision to keep working to provide for his family or to walk away ... he made a mistake."
Several farmers gathered outdoors Saturday at the Pennsylvania Farm Show to send an anti-fracking message.

More than 75 people stood near the complex's Cameron Street entrance to urge Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf to stop fracking. The group was comprised of not only farmers but state-wide groups who are opposed to fracking.

The protesters carried signs reading "Organic Farms are Under a Frack Attack." Nearby, visitors exited off of shuttle buses to enter the 100th Farm Show.

"We're here to say farms, not fracking," shouted Tracy Carluccio of Riverkeeper Network.

"Can we tolerate this," she shouted to the crowd who responded with a rousing, "No."

The group of farmers brought along a letter signed by about 150 Pennsylvania farmers to give to Wolf at the Farm Show. Member Maria Kretchmann, whose family farm has been impacted by fracking, attempted to hand the letter to the governor but was directed to an aid, said Sam Bernhardt of Food & Water Watch.

"Governor Wolf has the power to stop fracking and we're here to send that message strongly to him," Bernhardt said. "The Farm Show is a celebration of our agricultural tradition and fracking is destroying that tradition," he added.

During the protest, farmers and other supporters shared stories about how fracking has destroyed their life from sick animals to health concerns and contaminated farmland.

This story has been updated to clarify messages on the signs.
HARRISBURG- After a fight with Harrisburg Mayor Eric Papenfuse over a $50,000 grant, the NRA announced Friday that it planned to give the grant in part to the National Civil War Museum in Harrisburg.

Papenfuse has been a frequent critic of the museum, so the award of $25,000 to pay for a special gun exhibit could be seen by some as a thumb in the mayor's eye.

The National Civil War Museum

But Lars Dalseide, an NRA spokesman, said the museum won the award on the merits of its application.

The mayor pulled his city police officers from working inside the NRA's annual Great American Outdoor Show this year after the tiff over the grant. Papenfuse and Police Chief Thomas Carter had expected the city, as the host municipality, to benefit from the annual $50,000 grant from the NRA.

The event is at the Farm Show Complex off Cameron Street. When seeking to take over the outdoor show in 2013, the NRA promised to build community ties and be a good partner with local agencies.

But NRA officials said this year that they didn't intend to restrict their foundation's annual grant to the city of Harrisburg. Dave Black, president of the local chamber, said he thought the NRA had fulfilled its obligations. The foundation last year awarded the grant to buy a fully outfitted police car for Harrisburg, but they said annual awards would be decided through a grant application process.

NRA officials said the foundation's bylaws don't allow them to commit to annual payments to any single entity.

When Papenfuse found out the grant this year would not go to the city, he tried to negotiate for the money. NRA officials said they had already committed to giving $25,000 to three shooting sport groups, but that they could consider awarding the city the remaining $25,000.

Papenfuse refused, saying he wanted an ongoing commitment for the five-year contract that the NRA had to run the outdoor show.

The $25,000 grant then went to the struggling museum. Papenfuse has been calling on the museum to pay fair market rent to the city since last year. The museum operates out of a city-owned building with mostly city-purchased artifacts and pays the city $1 in annual rent.

Museum officials were glad to get the NRA's grant, according to an NRA news release issued late Friday afternoon.

"The Civil War was one of the most turbulent eras in our nation's history and we pride ourselves in our museum's unbiased look at its people, events, and technology," said Board Chairman Michael Love. "Thanks to this generous donation by the NRA, we look forward to enhancing a number of our exhibits."

The museum was selected for its "educational contributions," according to the news release.

"The National Civil War Museum will be using funds from The NRA Foundation to construct a new exhibit recognizing firearm manufacturers of the Civil War era that are still in operation today as well as highlighting gun safety programs and firearm education and training offered through the NRA," the news release said.

When Papenfuse found out about the museum's grant Friday, he said the planned gun exhibit in a city besieged by gun violence "shows once again just how out of touch the National Civil War Museum is with Harrisburg residents."

The other recipients that will split $25,000 are:
Parking meter downtown Harrisburg.JPG

Street parking rates for 2016 remain unchanged, but hourly garage rates have increased.

(Christine Vendel, PennLive.com)

HARRISBURG- Reduced happy hour parking rates and free hours on Saturday will continue in Harrisburg into the new year, Mayor Eric Papenfuse announced Friday.

Papenfuse last year negotiated an agreement with SP Plus, the operator of the city's parking system, to cut the rate from 5 to 7 p.m. to $2 per hour for street meters and to offer four free hours of parking on Saturdays through the mobile phone application Pango. He had to backstop the agreement by pledging $285,000 in city money, in case the discounts ended up causing the parking system to lose money in 2015.

As it turned out, more people parked on the city streets, so the city didn't have to dip into the $285,000 at all.

The experimental program carried an end date of Dec. 31, 2015. But the program was deemed a success and parking officials indicated last year they would like to continue the program in 2016. On Friday, Papenfuse confirmed that parking officials "have no plan to end its parking discounts."

Parking officials on Friday also confirmed to PennLive that transient garage rates, that's the rate that drivers pay to park in garages when they don't have a monthly pass, have increased this year.

The rate last year was $8 for the first two hours. It was lifted to $9 starting Jan. 1. The rate for up to four hours was increased to $12.

The rates for street meters remain untouched for this year at $3 per hour downtown (except for the happy hour discount described above) and $1.50 hourly in midtown.

Another parking discount still in effect this year is the $3 River Street Lunch and Brunch special. Patrons who park at the River Street Garage can pay a flat fee of $3 Monday through Friday between 11:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. The same special applies on Saturday and Sunday, 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Meanwhile, city officials are still fighting for their promised payments from the parking system. The city is owed about $1 million and it's unclear if they will get the money this year under the parking system's recently approved 2016 budget.

The budget shows bonuses for the parking operator, SP Plus, and parking manager, Trimont, but a smaller payment than originally anticipated for the city of Harrisburg based on reduced revenue projections.

John Gass, of Trimont, said he could not comment on the parking budget because details were still being negotiated.

"These matters are under discussion at the moment and I will provide an update when appropriate," Gass said.

Papenfuse told reporters at a briefing Friday that he planned to fight for changes to the parking system to reduce the burden on local businesses and ensure the city gets the money it was promised.

The mayor said he was working with the Downtown Improvement District on plans to provide easier, cheaper parking for customers of downtown businesses. He said he was also talking with parking officials about millions that were promised to the city through so-called waterfall payments when the city sold its parking assets to help get out from crushing debt.

"It is my opinion that we would not have transferred that asset. We would not have a Strong Plan at all if not for the fact that we were promised a revenue stream which hasn't yet materialized," he said. "I would not underestimate the city's ability to change the dynamic of that conversation."
Coimbatore Corporation has won a Central Government award for tapping solar power to use in its establishments, the civic body was the only one in Tamil Nadu and one among the few in the country to win the award  a prize of Rs. 10 lakh and a shield Government of India - Ministry of New and Renewable Energy Resources will give the award soon in New Delhi, as told by the Corporation Commissioner K. Vijayakarthikeyan told monday.





The Corporation has installed solar power plants at its main office in Town Hall in 2014-15, and at other places in 2015-16. Five zonal offices, a few schools and maternity centres.





The installed capacity of solar panels in the five zonal offices was 37.5 kw, six maternity centres was 45 kw, the main office was 50 kw, 15 schools was 112.5 kw and other establishments was another 12 kw, the civic body met most of its requirements.





Consequent to the award, the Corporation has asked the Central Government for Rs. 2 crore to install more solar panels.




Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan, left, is escorted by a U.S. Marshal into the Bob Casey Federal Courthouse on Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Houston. He was indicted Wednesday on three charges that he tried to provide material support to extremists. (AP Photo/Bob Levey)
Thousands still without power following Monday, Tuesday winds

Great Lakes Energy said less than 3,300 members are still without power as of 9 a.m. on Wednesday following stormy and windy conditions this week.
Producers and others that want to learn more about the use of cover crops and or no-till crop production should consider attending this seminar in Columbus on Jan. 29. Gabe Brown from Bismarck, North Dakota, is one of the most sought after speakers for no-till, cover crops, livestock grazing, and soil health presentations in the United States.

Gabe is coming to Platte County Agricultural Park to present his information about utilizing cover crops, establishing no-till and his thoughts on soil health.

The day-long event is free. However, you are asked to register by Jan. 27 by calling the Extension Office at 402-563-4901. On the 29th, the registration/rolls/coffee starts at 9 a.m., and the program starts at 9:30 a.m. Lunch will be provided. The program will end about 3 p.m.

Gabe Brown is featured in several YouTube videos, and there are several of his presentations available on the Web. You can learn more about him at http://brownsranch.us/.

The Browns strive to solve problems in a natural and sustainable way. Improving soil health is a priority, and no-till farming has been practiced since 1993. A diverse cropping strategy, which includes cover and companion crops are used. They have now eliminated the use of synthetic fertilizers, fungicides, and pesticides.

Groups cooperating to support having Gabe Brown come to the area include Nebraska Extension, Platte County; Natural Resources/Conservation Service Office in Columbus; Lower Platte North NRD; Lower Loup NRD; Lower Elkhorn NRD, Prairieland RC&D; and the Shell Creek Watershed Improvement Group. Several local banks and businesses are providing the resources needed to support the lunch for this event.

Announcements: The Extension Office will be closed on Monday for the Martin Luther King Holiday. Private pesticide training will start in Platte County at the Farm Show, Ag Park, Feb. 3-4. On Feb. 3, the training will be at 1:30 p.m.; on Feb. 4, the training will be at 9:30 a.m. The training serves as initial or recertification training for those that need to obtain the private applicator certification to apply restricted use pesticides.

For more information or assistance, please contact Allan Vyhnalek, Extension educator, Nebraska Extension in Platte County. Phone: 402-563-4901 or e-mail avyhnalek2@unl.edu.
LINCOLN -- If Nebraskans must submit to background checks to purchase firearms, should they also submit to checks to purchase tactical gear and military-type equipment?

Omaha Sen. Ernie Chambers thinks so, although maybe not for the reasons most people might presume.

He's not thinking about terrorists from foreign countries. He's considering the possible harm from people born and raised in America.

The bill (LB839) would cover gear typically used by police special weapons and tactics teams, military-grade helmets, body armor, night-vision eyewear or scopes and high-capacity ammunition clips.

Purchasers would have to be 21 and pass the same federal background check as if purchasing a firearm. If a person would not be allowed to purchase or possess a firearm under the federal law, he or she would not be allowed to purchase the gear.

Chambers, who is serving his 42nd year in the Nebraska Legislature, most of that time as the only black senator, said he is looking at conduct, and not who is committing it.

"The driving principle is not what white Americans think of when they hear the term terrorism," he said. "They're thinking about someone from another country."

But no so-called terrorist has created as much havoc, taken as many lives of men, women and little children as white, Christian Americans, he said. But none of those acts were labeled terrorism, nor were the perpetrators called terrorists.

What's happening in Oregon with people occupying headquarters of a federal wildlife refuge is subversive, a direct, armed challenge against the authority of the United States, Chambers said.

"But since white men are doing it," he said, "it's treated in almost a ho-hum fashion: This is what white men do."

It's an example, Chambers said, of what so-called law-abiding Americans do when they get these guns and they don't like what is going on.

If Muslims did they same thing, he said, authorities would kill as many as they could, and then brand every other Muslim as a threat and round them up.

If they were black people, they'd be shot down right now, he said.

When black people have demonstrated across the country against police violence -- unarmed, and not threatening direct violence -- there were military vehicles and military weaponry standing by, Chambers said, even though nobody was taking armed control of anything.

People can be arrested if they articulate a desire or intent to go to Syria or Iraq or Iran, he said.

If the mere expression of an opinion is sufficient to be arrested and charged with a serious offense that can carry years in prison, he said, then it's not unreasonable to bring a bill to deal with the kind of equipment and garb that would bespeak illegal violence.
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Out and About Audio Article Atascosa County Anti-Bullying Rally Oct. 19 Poteet Strawberry Festival grounds, main pavilion, 6-8 p.m. Guest speaker Batman & Co. and...

JISD Supt. McAllister announces retirement Audio Article The retirement of Jourdanton ISD Superintendent Theresa McAllister was announced at the meeting of the school board held on Oct....
The Online Railbird Report: "TILTMENOT" & David "Deldar182" Eldar Off to Hot Start

January 08, 2016 Chad Holloway Executive Editor U.S.

Welcome to the first Online Railbird Report of the New Year! The start of 2016 marks a new start to the yearly online race, but before we take a look at the first week of high-stakes cash game action on PokerStars', we should probably let you know the final results for 2015.

It comes as no surprise that Viktor "Isildur1" Blom finished as 2015's biggest online winner, which you can read about by clicking here. Blom held a massive lead most of the year, and unlike previous years, there wasn't much of a race in the latter half of the year.

Likewise, Phil "RaiseOnce" Ivey was far and away the year's biggest loser, something we wrote about in the last edition of the Online Railbird Report. Between PokerStars and Full Tilt, Ivey lost a staggering $3.7 million.

As for 2016, no one is off to a better start than "TILTMENOT," who was this week's biggest winner after winning $162,141 in 1,562 hands over nine sessions. Likewise, it was a good week for David "Deldar182" Eldar, who won $127,093 in 1,256 hands over 13 sessions.

On the flip side, Alexander "joiso" Kostritsyn was the biggest loser of the week after dropping $138,624 in 588 hands over nine sessions, while Blom was the only other six-figure loser down $115,592 in 380 hands over six sessions.

Sion the 2015's Last Big Winner

On Thursday December 31, Elior "Crazy Elior" Sion became the first daily winner of 2016 when he finished atop the leaderboard with a $106,900 win. The UK pro played a mix of games, but his biggest win of $32,800 came in 105 hands of heads-up $300/$600 2-7 triple draw against "kkhoghy."

Elior "Crazy Elior" Sion

According to HighStakesDB, Sion also won $22,900 in two hours of $300/$600 fixed-limit Omaha hi/low against Alex "BiatchPeople" Luneau, and then notched five-figure scores playing both $400/$800 8-Game and $100/$200 no-limit hold'em.

Meanwhile, Ronny "1-ronnyr3" Kaiser finished as the day's second-biggest winner after profiting $91,500 off "TILTMENOT" at the $50/$100 pot-limit Omaha tables. Surprisingly, he did not win what ended up being the biggest pot of the day, Kaiser (433,925.80) opened for $300 from the button and was met by a three-bet to $900 by "TILTMENOT" ($29,709.39). Kaiser four-bet to $2,700, "TILTMENOT" called, and the flop came down .

"TILTMENOT" led out for $4,150, Kaiser raised to $17,848, and "TILTMENOT" moved all in for $27,009.39, which Kaiser called.

"TILTMENOT":

Kaiser:

"TILTMENOT" got it in good with a set, but Kaiser was drawing to a flush and overpair. The turn gave Kaiser the flush, but it was a moot point as it also gave "TILTMENOT" a full house. Kaiser needed an ace on the river, but it wasn't in the cards as the bricked. Ship the $59,418.78 to "TILTMENOT."

"TILTMENOT" Gets Revenge in 2016

On the first day of the New Year, "TILTMENOT" returned for revenge and got it when he won $83,400 off Kaiser at the $50/$100 PLO table. According to HighStakesDB, the duo played two sessions and "TILTMENOT" won roughly $40,000 in each, which included winning the biggest pot of the day.

It happened when Kaiser ($28,376.15) opened for $300 from the button and "TILTMENOT" called from the big blind to see the flop. "TILTMENOT" check-called a bet of $598, and then checked for a second time on the turn. Kaiser bet $1,794, "TILTMENOT" check-raised to $6,650, and Kaiser called to see the river.

"TILTMENOT" fired out $13,600, and Kaiser made the call. "TILTMENOT" tabled the for the nuts, and Kaiser mucked before watching the $42,196 pot pushed to his opponent.

Eldar Cleans Up Playing PLO

On Thursday, January 7, Eldar, who has opted out of long term tracking, finished as the day's biggest winner after winning $103,000 playing "jumper17" heads up at three tables of $50/$100 PLO. Here's a look at three notable hands from that match.

David "Deldar182" Eldar

Hand #1: Eldar ($45,112.88) limped and then called when "jumper17" ($18,788) raised to $300. The flop saw "jumper17" lead out for $1,700 and then call when Eldar raised to $1,700. "jumper17" then checked the river and min-raised when Eldar bet $3,500. Eldar called the additional $3,500 and then called when "jumper17" shoved all in for $9,788 on the river to create a $37,526 pot.

"jumper17" showed the for queens and fives, but it was no good as Eldar held a full house with the .

Hand #2: "jumper17" ($93,830.30) opened for $300 only to have Eldar ($15,273) three-bet to $900. Not to be outdone, "jumper17" made it $2,700, Eldar called, and the flop came down . "jumper17" check-called a bet of $5,398, and then moved all in for his last $7,175 on the turn. Eldar made the call and the cards were turned up.

"jumper17":

Eldar:

"jumper17" held a pair with a wrap, but Eldar was technically ahead with tens. The river was run twice, but neither the turn nor river helped "jumper17." With that, Eldar scooped the $30,546 pot.

Hand #3: Eldar ($25,650.71) raised to $300, "jumper17" ($50,541.85) called, and the flop came down . "jumper17" checked, Eldar bet $450, and "jumper17" check-raised to $1,500. Eldar made the call and then called a bet of $2,800 on the turn.

When the completed the board on the river, "jumper17" checked but still called when Eldar bet $9,198. Eldar tabled the for two pair, and it was good enough to win the $27,496 pot as "jumper17" sent his cards to the muck.

Biggest Winners/Losers from Jan. 1-7

Winners Profit Losers Loss "TILTMENOT" $162,141 Alexander "joiso" Kostritsyn $138,624 David "Deldar182" Eldar $127,093 Viktor "Isildur1" Blom $115,592 "Colisea" $124,504 Brian "tsarrast" Rast $93,987 Alex "BiatchPeople" Luneau $102,515 "fjutekk" $83,807 "BERRI SWEET" $65,830 "candela2005" $82,585 Jean-Robert "Jaqueline" Bellande $58,924 "jumper17" $64,492

Data and hands obtained from HighStakesDB.com

Want to stay atop all the latest in the poker world? If so, make sure to get PokerNews updates on your social media outlets. Follow us on Twitter and find us on both Facebook and Google+!

Sharelines Online Railbird Report: "TILTMENOT" & David "Deldar182" Eldar top weekly online winners leaderboard.
Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto said the capture of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman culminates "days and nights" of collaborative work among Mexican intelligence and police agencies.

Guzman's capture confirms Mexican institutions' ability to "restore tranquility to Mexican families."

Mexican authorities snared drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman in a bloody raid Friday aimed at capturing one of the world's most notorious and slippery criminals.

"Mission Accomplished," President Enrique Pena Nieto announced via Twitter. "We have him."

Members of Mexico's navy caught Guzman in an operation at about 4:30 a.m. (6:30 a.m. ET) in the coastal city of Los Mochis in Sinaloa state, a senior law enforcement official in Mexico told CNN. Several people aligned with Guzman died in the raid.

U.S. officials were aware of the operation to capture Guzman, according to a law enforcement official.

The Americans provided assistance in the search, but his capture was the Mexican government's operation, the official said.
Grant Headley is accused of shooting and injuring a Boston officer. (screen capture: WCVB)

A Boston police officer was rushed to a local hospital after being shot in the leg in the city's Dorchester neighborhood Friday morning, reports WCVB.

The plainclothes officer was seriously injured but is expected to recover. He used a department-issued tourniquet to help stanch the blood flow from his wound. The nine-year veteran of the force is a member of the Mattapan Drug Control Unit.

The shooting suspect, identified as Grant Headley, 27, of Dorchester, was in custody and the firearm, a 40 mm handgun, was recovered, Boston Police Commissioner William Evans said.
A judge is urging the Calgary Police Service in Canada to consider creating a policy for foot pursuits after a police chase ended with an officer fatallyl shooting a man brandishing a screwdriver in 2011, reports the Calgary Herald.

The fatal confrontation on Aug. 11, 2011 happened after friends led police on an hours-long dangerous driving spree around north Calgary in stolen pickup trucks. Jonathan Rawlings, 36, and a woman eventually abandoned one of the stolen vehicles and ran into a residential area in Whitehorn.

Rawlings was pursed on foot by an officer  a 10-year- veteran  and followed to a backyard where he held an edged instrument (later determined to be a screwdriver) and shouted he had a knife. Rawlings was shot four times by the lone police officer and died as a result of his injuries.

A public fatality inquiry report, released Tuesday, into the fatal shooting more than four years ago concluded the incident was "tragic and difficult" for both the victim, the victim's loved ones and the police officers involved "who were doing what they were trained to do."

In the report, the judge stated while it is difficult to formulate recommendations that could prevent similar deaths, it is apparent that police foot pursuits are dangerous for the pursued subject, police officers and innocent bystanders.

The only recommendation urged by the judge in the 19-page report is that the Calgary Police Service "give consideration to formulating a policy on police foot pursuits, including a consideration of holding reviews of those pursuits in serious incidents directly involving foot pursuits."

Calgary Police Association president Howard Burns called the suggestion fair.

"It wouldn't hurt to examine and look at a policy in relation to foot pursuits," he said.

The service has policies relating to vehicle chases but lacks a similar formal policy respecting foot pursuits.
Marvin Louis Guy is charged with capital murder. (jail photo)

A district judge has set a new trial date for a Killeen, TX, man who is accused of killing a police officer during a raid on a local house, reports KWTX.

Judge John Gauntt, in 27th District Court, set Marvin Louis Guy for trial on his capital murder charge on September 26.

Guy is charged with capital murder in connection with the May 9, 2014 fatal shooting of Killeen police Officer Charles Dinwiddie and two counts of attempted capital murder in connection with the wounding of two other officers during the same event.

Dinwiddie was killed when he was shot in the face during the execution of a "no knock" drug search warrant at a house.

Bell County District Attorney Henry Garza has said he'll seek the death penalty for Guy at trial.
Photo: Facebook

The mayor will appoint an independent civilian to monitor the New York Police Department's counterterrorism activities, lawyers said in court documents on Thursday as they moved to settle a pair of lawsuits over surveillance targeting Muslims in the decade after the Sept. 11 attacks, reports the New York Times.

The agreement would restore some of the outside oversight that was eliminated after the attacks, when city leaders said they needed more flexibility in conducting investigations. In the years that followed, the Police Department secretly built files on Muslim neighborhoods, recorded sermons at mosques, collected license plates of worshipers and documented the views of everyday people on topics such as drone strikes, politics and foreign policy.

The settlement does not explicitly prohibit any methods that are currently allowed, and the city does not admit any wrongdoing. Police officials said many of the provisions of the agreement  such as barring investigations based solely on religion, race and ethnicity  simply codified changes already in place. But civil rights lawyers said some tactics that investigators used over the past decade violated the Constitution and would probably not have been allowed if anyone outside the Police Department had been reviewing the investigative files.




1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.

2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.

3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament of the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.

4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.

5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.

6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.

7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.

8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.

9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.

10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.

11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)

12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.

13. Do away with all loyalty oaths.

14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.

15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.

16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.

17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks.

18. Gain control of all student newspapers.

19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.

20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policymaking positions.

21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.

22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms."

23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."

24. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.

25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and TV.

26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy."

27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity which does not need a "religious crutch."

28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state."

29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.

30. Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."

31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the "big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.

32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture--education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.

33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.

34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.

35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.

36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.

37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.

38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand.

39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.

40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.

41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.

42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use united force to solve economic, political or social problems.

43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.

44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.

45. Repeal the Connally reservation so the United States cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction over nations and individuals alike.
RALEIGH, N.C.  The company that lets you compare airfares and translate foreign languages online wants to make it easier to weigh the costs and benefits of installing solar panels on household rooftops.

Google is rolling out a new online service that quickly tallies up considerations of going solar and whether homeowners should consider buying or leasing photovoltaic panels costing thousands of dollars. Google's Project Sunroof combines the eye-in-the-sky images behind Google Earth with calculations on how much shade trees cast over a rooftop, data on local weather patterns, industry pricing and available subsidies to arrive at its bottom line.

The service expanded in December to analyze properties in the Raleigh area, as well as 15 other metro areas in Arizona, Nevada, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Colorado.

Interested potential customers are referred to solar-panel installers for further follow-up, cutting their marketing costs, said Carl Elkin, the senior software engineer behind the service.

"We at Google believe in solar energy. The solar industry needs our help," he said.

ADVERTISEMENT

Google has invested more than $1 billion in recent years into solar energy, including $300 million earlier this year into a fund that finances residential rooftop projects installed by SolarCity Corp. Google invested $280 million in the publicly traded company in 2011.

Project Sunroof launched this summer in San Francisco and Fresno, Calif., and Boston, where Elkin works. The metro areas were picked based on several criteria, including Google's available satellite imagery and local market conditions including government incentives, Elkin said.

Google's proposition is a faster, simpler way of sizing up possible pros and cons of solar than calling out someone for a site evaluation or using the more complex calculator offered by the U.S. Energy Department.

An Associated Press reporter who plugged in his Raleigh home address was informed that installing solar panels likely would be a money-loser based on the amount of usable annual rooftop sunlight, shading from surrounding pine trees, and current household power use. But if the reporter chose to pursue the idea further, buying rather than leasing or a loan would be the better deal.

Google's increased involvement in solar comes as some states begin to re-evaluate policies that have helped stimulate the rapid growth in turning the sun into electricity.

All but a handful of states have laws allowing what's called "net metering" for homes or businesses  basically selling power from rooftop cells they don't use themselves, usually to the local electric utility, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. In December, Mississippi became the 46th state to adopt broad rules promoting solar power.

In Texas and some of the remaining states, individual utilities may offer similar solar-purchase options, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association, a national trade group.

Solar accounts for about 1 percent of the country's total reported electricity generation, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. About two-thirds of that is from utility-scale solar arrays that are often spread across rural tracts.

ADVERTISEMENT

But as many as two dozen states are considering changes that would reduce the incentives for solar customers under the theory they too should pay for the broader power grid.

Nevada utilities regulators last week adopted a policy to reduce by 75 percent over five years the amount Las Vegas-area electric company NV Energy pays customers for extra power their solar panels produce. The change means rooftop solar customers will pay more of the costs now shifted to nonsolar customers to maintain the utility's transmission lines and power generation.
Philadelphia Police Officer Jesse Hartnett was shot some three times in an attempted assassination by one Edward Archer late last night. Archer got off approximately 12 shots from close range. Thankfully, most missed. Officer Hartnett was shot three times in the arm. He was apparently bleeding profusely when he radioed for assistance.

Archer is a self-professed Muslim who sought to kill Officer Hartnett in the name of Islam with another officers stolen Glock. According to Philadelphia officials, Archer had pledged his allegiance to ISIS. His record includes previous arrests for aggravated assaulted and firearms violations.

Lest there be any misunderstanding, Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney begs to disagree with Archer. He has declared that the shooting had nothing to do with Archers being a Muslim or the Islamic faith. Perhaps Mayor Kenney can clear that up with Archer himself somewhere down the road.

Officer Hartnett not only survived the shooting, he chased Archer and got off a shot that must have slowed him down. Other officers apprehended him. The video below comes from Philadelphias 6ABC Action News and is posted here. CBSPhilly has more here.
Frankly, Donald Trump says a lot of dumb stuff. And yetit often isnt quite as dumb as it seems. This is a good example: in the wake of President Obamas tearful soliloquy about gunsnever mind that Obama cares little about enforcing the countless gun laws already on the booksTrump spoke to an audience about gun control, taking a conservative position, as he should. He is right about the stupidity of gun-free zones.

But note how he vows to do two things: he is going to get rid of gun-free zones in schools and on military bases. He goes on to promise to get rid of such zones by executive order on his first day on the job:

I think most normal listeners would understand that Trump pledges to do away with gun-free zones in schools. But he cant possibly do that. The federal government has nothing to do with such policies, which are often mandated by state law. I dont see how Congress could change such policies, and, in any event, the president certainly cant override state law by executive order. (He could, however, change the policy on military bases by executive order.) Is Trump such a dunce that he doesnt understand this?

Perhaps. But if you parse his words very carefully, you may conclude that he is opposed to gun-free zones in schools, but only promises to make a change with respect to the idiocy of disarming our military personnel on their bases. That would be a sensible position, but I think most people in the audience who applauded Trump thought he could do something about school no-gun zones, too.

This is classic Trump. You think he is saying something really dumbI will issue an executive order to eliminate gun-free schools!but if you parse his language carefully enough, he may have left himself an out. Is this due to incredibly shrewd calculation on his part, or dumb luck? Beats me. If you are thinking about voting for Trump, I guess that is something you will have to decide.
Britains Daily Mail must be one of the worlds oddest news sources, but occasionally it does some good original reporting. That is the case with respect to its coverage of the epidemic of sexual assault that has erupted across Germany:

[Michelle] is just one of 120 women who were abused that horrific night in the [cathedral] square, which is dotted with bars, nightclubs and coffee shops, and is where Cologne locals have seen in the New Year for centuries. The men, speaking Arabic and seemingly either drunk or high on drugs, moved around in large groups among a gathering of around 1,000 male migrants and deliberately targeted women. The men easily outnumbered the 190 police officers on duty, who were quickly overwhelmed.

It wasnt just Cologne:

In other cities across Germany, including Stuttgart, Dusseldorf, Hamburg, Munich and Berlin, where a tourist was sexually assaulted by five men right in front of the famous Brandenburg Gate, it was the same disturbing story. Nearly 50 women in Hamburg complained to police about sexual harassment by North African men, who called them bitches, shouted Fikki, fikki to indicate they wanted to rape them, and chased them like cattle around the streets.  In Stuttgart, women complained of sexual attacks by trouble-makers with an immigrant background and 15 other Mediterranean men of Arabic appearance. When one group of young girls refused these mens advances, their boyfriends were beaten up. One girl who fought off an attacker ended up in hospital with a broken nose and deep cuts to her face.

The common denominator, of course, is that the attackers were recent Islamic immigrants, most of them apparently refugees.

The attacks have sounded the alarm bell in Germany over the consequences of mass migration.

One would hope so! But its a little late, and DM notes that around 3,200 Islamic migrants are still entering Germany every day.

What is most remarkable about this story is the coverup, which is now being freely acknowledged:

Many Germans, including some of the victims themselves, have accused authorities of a conspiracy of silence over the assaults to stop criticism of the mass immigration policy pursued by Mrs Merkel and her politically-correct supporters. The mainstream media in Germany has, until recently, toed the Government line; a top public broadcaster, ZDF, recently refused to run a segment about a rape case on its prime-time crime-watch show because the dark-skinned suspect was a migrant. The programmes editor defended her decision, saying: We dont want to inflame the situation and spread a bad mood. The migrants dont deserve it.

American news outlets also censor the news to advance a political agenda, but they are not quite so brazen about it.

Cracks only began to show just before New Year. Bild, Germanys largest daily newspaper, broke ranks

Contemplate that for a moment: broke ranks.

by accusing officials of conducting a campaign of deception on a massive scale by burying bad news on migration. It reported that drug gangs involved in organised crime were actively recruiting newly-arrived migrants from the vast temporary camps where they live. The Cologne police force has also been accused of deliberately hushing up the New Year scandal. It issued an official press release the following day describing the celebrations as exuberant, but mostly peaceful. The release has since been retracted, and last night it emerged that police chief Wolfgang Albers is to resign.

Mostly peaceful: interestingly, the same locution that is conventionally used to describe violent Black Lives Matter protests in the American press.

Broadcaster ZDF had to apologise for a cover up after it failed to report the Cologne story for three days, even though it knew about it. And until Thursday, a week after the attacks, there had been silence from Mrs Merkels ministers about the backgrounds of the perpetrators. Initially, they insisted there was no evidence that new migrants were involved in the violence.

In fact, contemporaneous police reports indicated that all or virtually all of the attackers were recently-arrived Muslims.

Europes leftists are clinging bitterly to their illusions, in some instances actually trying to excuse the sex criminals. Some city officials have issued recommendations for how young women should act to avoid provoking rapists from other cultures. Will non-elite Europeans put up with such nonsense? I doubt it. In Europe, even more than in the U.S., fundamental transformation through mass immigration is a policy that the elites just cant sell.
Perhaps the most biggest whopper President Obama retailed at CNNs town hall forum on gun violence this past Thursday was his support for Second Amendment rights. He obviously detests the Second Amendment and obviously believes Americans should not have the right to own guns. He therefore bashes the foremost organizational advocate of Second Amendment rights in the United States at every opportunity.

John Lott has testified to Obamas opposition to gun ownership as expressed to him personally by Obama at the University of Chicago Law School. And so on.

Obama bashed the NRA for declining to appear at the forum staged by CNN. The NRA protests that it would have been restricted to one prescreened question. They would in any event have reasonably shied away from serving as a foil for Obama at such an event. Aaron Goldstein adds a few appropriately cynical notes on point.

Obama disparages his political opponents on this point as advocates of a conspiracy theory because they dont take his protestations at face value. This from the guy who promised if you like your health insurance you can keep it and if you like your doctor you can keep him. Oh, yeah, and Obamacare would lower health insurance premiums on average by $2500. You would have to be a fool to take anything he says at face value. He will say anything to advance the causes he believes in, and he believes in the restriction of Second Amendment rights.

In response to unusually critical questions Obama hems and haws and makes it up as he goes along. The transcript of the CNN forum is here.

At one point Obama blamed Indianas less restrictive laws for Chicagos epidemic of murder. The problem is, is that about 30 percent, 40 percent of those guns are coming from Indiana across the border, where there are much laxer laws, Obama said. Folks will go to a gun show and purchase a whole bunch of firearms, put them in a van, drive up into [the execrable Father] Mike Pflegers neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago where his parish is, open up the trunk, and those things are for sale.

Now with Mike Pfleger the clock strikes thirteen. What is this Marxist clown doing here? You might say that Obamas citation of his old Chicago buddy is another clue to his true Second Amendment views. But I digress.

Some of us think the problem is Chicagos gangbangers. Why arent those Indiana guns creating the mayhem in Indiana? Is it something in the water in Chicago?

But where did the the mysterious van from Indiana come from? Make that a van with a trunk.

Putting the van and the trunk to one side, Obama may have been referring to the case of David Big Dave Lewisbey. USA Today seems to think Obama was talking about the Lewisbey case.

Lewisbey bought large quantities of firearms at Indiana gun shows and sold them with a confederate on the streets of Chicago. In September 2013 Lewisbey was convicted of dealing firearms without a federal license, two counts of illegally transporting firearms across state lines, and two counts interstate travel to sell guns without a license. In 2014 he was sentenced to 17 years in prison. The FBI press release adds that Lewisbey had no criminal record that disqualified him from buying firearms.

I may be missing something. So far as I can tell, however, the case of David Lewisbey appears to be another sidebar illustrating the irrelevance of Obamas proposals to their purported object.
Popular Nigerian actor, Ali Nuhu, has suspended all business of film making in Nigeria to return to school.

Ali Nuhu will undergo a six-week course in film production and cinematic arts at the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts, USA.

Nuhu has made a name in the Hausa film industry, Kannywood, and in Nollywood.

He has since resumed classes at the prestigious film and media communications institute in the United States.

He wrote on his twitter page saying

 I am already missing everyone in the Kannywood. 

Nuhu Abdullahi, an actor and film producer in the Kannywood, said, We are proud of Ali Nuhu, he always set the pace in the Kannywood.

He was first to be verified on twitter among us, he has the first video on demand channel on the internet among us and he is the first now to have taken such a professional programme to enhance his career and that is a lead for us to copy. We are really proud of him,he said.
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Raising electricity tariff was the last major decision of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission,NERC, in 2015. The immediate past Chairman of the Commission, Sam Amadi, in the concluding part of his interview with PREMIUM TIMES Business/Economy Editor, BASSEY UDO, says the hike was in the interest of energy consumers.

PT: On the day your tenure ended, you gave Nigerians an unexpected parting gift, a new tariff regime that abolished fixed charge on one hand, yet raised electricity charge, on the other. Nigerians describe this as a Greek gift. Why did NERC leave the decision till you were at the door and on the eve of Christmas?

AMADI: Well, the timing, to me, was good. We are all aware of the process. Nigerians have been asking for a new tariff for months. The tariffs have been out about two months ago. But, we needed to appraise government on the policy implications of the tariff on fiscal and monetary policies, economy, investment, consumption, household income and livelihood as well as agencies and institutions with responsibility for the power sector and the market.

Those consultations kept going back and forth, before we went back to the DISCOs. The participatory processes in decision making are what make NERC an effective regulator. We are benchmarked by transparency, credibility and participation.

The new tariff could have been announced a week earlier, but another meeting was called to sort out an issue with the DISCOs. Everything was ready a day before the end of our tenure. As the chairman of NERC, I still had the mandate and powers till the last day to sign off the tariff.

It would have been irresponsible to have left that to the new commissioners, because nobody knows how long it would take them to come.

For me, the announcement of the new tariff was timely. Tariff is an important tool the market uses in investment decisions. We also needed to bring a new tariff for the good of the consumer who needs quick improvement in the level of electricity supply, which depends on a credible tariff regime.

PT: How was tariff hike for the good of the consumer?

AMADI: Yes, we gave everything to the consumer. Unfortunately, the price increase was not like increment in gas, water or electricity price. Increase in tariff flows from benchmark of investments and their costs. That means there will be more investments coming to the sector in terms of metering, generation and transmission.

If the tariff is to help TCN deliver better services, by building capacity to wheel the power and ensure adequacy and reliability, it is the consumer that would benefit.

Fixed charge has now been removed. So, the consumer will win in a double way. If the GENCOs and DISCOs do not provide the service, consumers will not pay, unlike the past when they would have to pay fixed charge, whether electricity was generated and supplied or not. The price increase is to benchmark improvement in services to consumers.

PT: But, it appears this is putting the cart before the horse, since more investments and improvement in services is supposed to come before the hike in tariffs?

AMADI: Sure! Today that we have increased the tariff, it is not all the costs that the consumer is paying. In that tariff, there are prices for 2017 till 2024.

When we say tariff is to cover investment, it means the investor is bringing the money, maybe through bank loans, because he has seen a recovery plan that spans 10 years. But, NERC is putting the horse before the cart, because if the banks provide the money, they would want to see a plan for the recovery of their investment.

That means they would not put in their money if they do not see the prospects and plan for the recovery of their investment. And a tariff is not what the consumer is paying, but what he should pay.

PT: That explanation sounds like a confirmation of the accusation by Nigerians that NERC always tilts more to the DISCOs and GENCOs than the consumers it is supposed to protect?

AMADI: Since the tariff was announced, I have received several text messages, both from consumers and operators. Consumers are thanking NERC for removing fixed charge from the pricing template. No operator is saying the same thing for the tariff increase.

Rather, they accuse NERC of all sorts of things, including their business plan were ruined. But, it is an accusation that is not completely senseless. The responsibility of a consumer is to pay for a service. But, except the consumer has adequate service through stable supply, they cannot accept they have full value for what they are paying for.

But, the truth is that NERC is working hard to give the consumers a fair deal. That is what we are committed to do.

PT: But, the tariff hike appears to be against a directive by the National Assembly for NERC not to go ahead?

AMADI: I dont know about any directive. If there was any, the National Assembly has a way to communicate such resolutions to NERC. I dont want to go into any controversy. I will rather leave that to political leaders, including the Vice President. The National Assembly gave NERC the mandate to do what it did.

That mandate did not include that tariff reviews should be stopped by any other arm of government. If anybody has any problem with the tariff, the person can go to court and challenge its legality and reasonableness of the decision. Otherwise, by law NERC, and NERC alone, can carry out that function.

PT: Looking back now, is there any decision you think you would have handled differently given another chance?

AMADI: Many! But, I have taken time to reflect on what I call: Road not taken: Pitfalls in electricity reform project.

There are many things we should have done better, like what we are doing now  benchmarking tariffs against investment; removing fixed charge in the pricing template, which could have been done earlier; removal of collection loses by operators, which was wrongly timed. We could have done it earlier before elections, so that people would not read political meanings to the exercise that have degenerated into political blackmail.

What we did was to incentivize production. We felt that it was wrong for DISCOs to totally transfer their inefficiencies to consumers by saying their collection losses was as a result of consumers not paying their bills.

But, latest decision is a mid-way out that would discount public and government debts from private debts.

Again, we believe there should have been a lot more communication to avoid political blackmail. Maybe when we look back, we can see poor timing, poor communication and in some cases, wrong-headed strategies.

Thats perhaps why countries with long leadership do better. People know they can learn from their mistakes in office. I made my mistakes and I have learnt from them. If I have the opportunity of coming back there, with hindsight, I will do a better job from my experience.

PT: So, what kind of electricity industry are you bequeathing?

AMADI: We are leaving behind a credible, strong and effective industry. For instance, early this week, we gave out eight more licenses worth 1,000 MW. Thats a massive vote of confidence that despite the ones we have given earlier, more players are still willing to come in.

Also, a few days ago we received a report of a strong technical team of the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria, MAN outlining very lucid framework for micro-grid.

So, without a doubt, the industry is strong. NERC as an institution is strong, although not as we would have wished. But, credibility is very high. We are very good; better than the best. But, we are not where we want to be.

PT: How would posterity remember you and the service you rendered to Nigerians and the industry?

AMADI: It was Winston Churchill that said: History will be kind to me, because I intend to write it. So, I will like to be part of writing that history of Nigerias electricity industry regulation.

But, I will like posterity to remember me as a guy who meant very well; had the right kind of intentions, without any iota of deceit to leverage public decisions for private gains; as a person who likes to apply intelligence in solving public problems. But, I like to leave the final judgment to posterity itself.

PT: But, where are you going from here? What next?

AMADI: Well, I have no business to retire to, neither a farm to return to. I am here hoping to be re-engaged in public service. I am a private sector lawyer. At my private level, Ill go back to do what I know how to do best  think, write, advocate, and in between that, ensure that there is commercial value.

PT: Thank you for your time. Congratulations again.

AMADI: Thank you.
Investors cummulative returns on investment at the Nigerian bourse dipped by 5.6 per cent, an all time low in 2016, as first week trading closed on Friday.

At the end of trading, the Nigerian Stock Exchanges All-Share Index fell by 1,613.86 points.

The market capitalization or the cumulative net worth of listed securities also dipped by N555 billion to close at N9.296 trillion.

In the same vein, all other sectoral indices finished lower in the week ending January 8, 2016, with the exception of the NSE Industrial Goods Index that rose by 0.45 per cent to close at 2,176.44 points.

Nigerian Breweries led the price losers, shedding N26.50 to close at N109.50 per share.

GlaxoSmithkline share price depreciated by N4.20 to close at N30 while Union Bank lost 90k to close at N6 per share.

Earlier, Larfage Africa price gained, chalking up N8.20 to close at N105 per share.

Okomu Oil share price appreciated by N5.95 to close at N36.2 while Cement Company of Northern Nigeria gained 75k to close at N10.10 per share.

An analysis of the weekly trading showed that the Financial Services Industry (measured by volume) attracted the highest attention with 764.790 million shares valued at N4.86 billion traded in 8,904 deals.

The financial services industry also accounted for 85.01 per cent and 63.34 per cent to the total equity turnover volume and value respectively.

A further breakdown activities in the financial services industry indicated that Access Bank Plc, Guaranty Trust Bank Plc and United Bank for Africa Plc (measured by volume) accounted for 37.69 per cent and 36.51 per cent to the total equity turnover volume and value respectively.

The Conglomerates Industry followed with 40.164 million shares worth N100.471 million in 626 deals while the Consumer Goods Industry accounted for 40.006 million shares worth N1.707 billion traded in 2,116 deals.

Also traded in the period were 12,016 units of Exchange Traded Products (ETPs) valued at N2.050 million executed in 25deals.

Overall, 899.604 million shares worth N7.669 billion were traded in the week under review by investors in 14,164 deals on the NSE compared with 2.965 billion shares valued at N9.364 billion that exchanged hands the perious week in 7,174 deals.

Meanwhile, some dealers told PREMIUM TIMES that the sharp decline in returns on investments in the first week of transactions stemmed from a potpourri of events internationally and locally.

Steve Idia, an investment adviser said that the sustained free fall of crude oil price and the in ability of OPEC to arrest the trend were sipping dangerously into the emerging economies.

Mr. Idia said Nigerias portfolio investment terrain was worst affected because most of the quoted companies which recorded double digit losses were yet to locate their bearing under the new government economic blue print.

So the pressure on the NSE is both foreign and domestic and it will continue like that until the federal Government float a peculiar policy to amerlorate financial and economic challenges facing the real sector, Mr. Idia said.
As the organised private sector mulls how to overcome the challenges imposed on businesses by the Nigerias economic environment, John Holt Plc has been handed a damning report questioning its capacity and those of its subsidiary companies to continue in business.

John Holt Plc is one of Nigerias legacy companies transformed from trading in primary commodities during the colonial era into a manufacturing and trading conglomerate.

But, a report of an audit of its business operations by BDO Professional Services, a firm of Chartered Accountants, on Friday raised serious doubts about the capacity of the Group to remain in business.

The report, which followed a comprehensive audit of John Holt Plc consolidated and separate financial statements for the year ended on September 30, 2015, said that the basis of their opinion followed the huge losses incurred by the company and the group.

The auditors noted in the report that their fears were predicated on the massive erosion of the companys shareholders fund and the fact that John Holts current liabilities far outstrip current assets.

The auditors however noted that while the groups current liabilities exceeded current assets, the shareholders fund remained very strong.

Specifically, the auditor stated that John Holt Plc audited annual account signed off by Ebenezer Olabisi, with FRC/2012/ICAN/00000000104 registration number, and dated December 30, 2015, made the revelations under Emphasis of Matter.

A close review of the financial statement revealed that the company incurred a loss before taxation of N311 million.

Overall, the Group lost a total of N171milion as at September 30, 2015, compared with a profit of N266 million and N427 million earned by the company and group respectively in 2014.

In the period under review, the companys current liabilities exceeded the assets by N4.2 million, with N3.6 billion as shareholders funds.

In the same period, the groups current liabilities exceeded current assets by N1.2 billion, while the group also had positive shareholders funds of N3.2 billion.

In spite of the groups positive shareholders funds, the auditors said that the financial conditions in the group were worrisome.

These conditions indicated the existence of a material uncertainty, which may cast significant doubt about the companys ability to continue as a going concern, the auditors stated in the report.
The Peoples Democratic Party has stated that Saturdays governorship election in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area, in Bayelsa state is a mere formality as the All Progressives Congress, in conjunction with the military, police and the Independent National Electoral Commission, have already written the result of the election.

The election is underway in Southern Ijaw to conclude the governorship election held on December 5, 2015, but was declared inconclusive by INEC.

The PDP candidate and incumbent governor, Seriake Dickson, was leading with over 30,000 votes in the seven out of the eight local governments of the state released before the postponement.

Southern Ijaw local government has over 120, 000 voters.

In a statement Friday, the Acting National Chairman of the PDP, Uche Secondus, said that from intelligence report gathered by party, Saturdays election is a mere formality because, the APC, using federal might, has already written the results ahead of the election.



Southern Ijaw is the home local government of former governor of the state, Chief DSP Alamiseighga and a known Ijaw leader. The state is politically divided into Nembe, Ogbia and Southern Ijaw, that is the home LGA of Ijaws where the governor, Siarake Dickson is from.

This is the strongest home base of the PDP and our party has been winning elections in this core Ijaw LGA because it is the ancestral home of all Ijaws

Intelligence report at our disposal shows that the election is just a mere formality as results have been written with INEC standing as the main culprit, he said.

The PDP Chairman said the Secretary to the Government of Federation, SGF, as well as the Minister of Defence and the Inspector General of Police have directed INEC to write the results in favour of APC.

He also said there is the use of Police and military personnel to intimidate voters and also scare them away as results are already written as directed.

He said that winning the Bayelsa governorship election is part of APCs plot of having a foothold in the South-south, saying, all ministers and government officials from the zone have been directed to ensure that Bayelsa is delivered to the APC at all cost.

He called on the international community to be aware of the plot warning that this has the consequences of hurting Nigerias nascent democracy.

Mr. Secondus said Nigerians and the global community should hold the APC responsible should any thing happen to democracy in the country because of the APCs quest to turn Nigeria into a one-party state.



He further warned that it was this quest of winning at all cost that was responsible for the collapse of the Second Republic.
The Deputy Governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress in the November 21, 2015 Governorship election in Kogi State, James Faleke, and Mohammed, the eldest son of Abubakar Audu, the late APC governorship candidate, Abubakar Audu, were on Saturday invited by the State Security Services for undisclosed reason, and then detained.

The Director, Media and Publicity of Audu/Faleke Campaign Organisation, Duro Meseko, said in a statement on Saturday that the duo arrived the SSS headquarters in Abuja at exactly 10.00am and were kept in an office with assurances that an officer would attend to them only to keep them indefinitely.

Mr. Meseko said the two politicians were kept in an isolated office till 4p.m on Saturday evening.

He said, Im surprised my Principal and the eldest son of our political leader, Mohammed are still being kept as I speak with you which is 4pm. What could be responsible for this ill treatment by the SSS?

Or could they be acting the intimidation script? Trying to arms-twist them into abandoning the sacred mandate freely given to the Audu/Faleke team by the generality of Kogi people?

Let me make it abundantly clear that our mandate is sacred and no amount of of technical detention, intimidation and harassment would shake our resolve to get justice through the judiciary.

I refuse to believe that the presidency has hands in the arrest! But we may not rule out the fact that the power that be must have wielded their influence in the arrest, but we are not not pertubed over the development, because we believe that God ultimately vindicate us.

The SSS has had no official spokesperson since Marilyn Ogar was removed, and could therefore not be reached for comments.

Mr. Faleke was running mate to the late Mr. Audu in the November 21, 2015 gubernatorial election, that was declared inconclusive by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

He is insisting that the election had been won and lost before Mr. Audu died and that INEC was wrong in failing to declare him governor-elect.

He said he would not present himself for swearing-in with Yahaya Bello, the governorship candidate who was drafted in after the death of Audu.

Mr. Faleke is billed to be sworn in on January 27, 2016, alongside Mr. Bello.

He said his stance was in furtherance of his earlier letter to the national leadership of the party not to work with Mr. Bello, the governor-elect.

Mr. Faleke, has now approached the state governorship election petition tribunal to seeking to be declared the authentic elected governor of the state.
The African Network for Environmental Sustainability (ANFES) aims to ensure that environmental sustainability research agenda and commercial exploitation of local communities natural resources benefit local communities by responding to their needs and aspirations and by improving their livelihoods opportunities.
A few years ago when gasoline was $4 a gallon, few thought they'd ever see $2 a gallon again. Now the question is whether it will hit $1.50 a gallon. Likewise, the notion that the U.S. would again become a leading producer of natural gas and oil seemed remote just several years ago.

Unpredictable energy markets and the progress of science and technology might also someday favor the nuclear energy industry, which is in retreat in the face of all that cheap natural gas. If so, nuclear power could become a bigger part of South Jersey's economy.

The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission recently gave safety and environmental site approval for adding two nuclear plants to the existing three in Salem County. The companies that own the Salem and Hope Creek generating stations have no intention of proceeding with a new plant, not when the U.S. cost of nuclear power is much higher than that of natural gas and is expected to remain so for years.

Events of the past year, however, suggest the feasibility of such plants could change in the decade ahead. University researchers petitioned the NRC last year to reconsider basing its rules on the unproven theory that there is no safe level of radiation. Low levels of radiation are part of the natural world in which humans evolved, so presumably such levels should be acceptable.

Evidence that the danger of radiation has been overestimated has been building for years, as predicted high numbers of fatalities from such nuclear accidents as Russia's Chernobyl in 1986 and Japan's Fukushima in 2011 have failed to appear. The U.N. radiation committee in 2008 quit trying to predict Chernobyl's harm using the no-safe-threshold model.

The NRC historically has promulgated and enforced rules on reactor design and operation based on the premise there is no safe radiation level, even though in 2014 it said, "Studies of occupational workers who are chronically exposed to low levels of radiation above normal background have shown no adverse biological effects."

The NRC in June started accepting public comment on whether to revise safety standards to reflect the experience with low levels of radiation.

If that happens some day, the cost of building nuclear plants could fall dramatically. And if Americans in the future want to significantly reduce climate-related carbon emissions in a cost-effective way, nuclear power could play a big role.

France, where the global climate conference wrapped up last month, produces 75 percent of its electricity with nuclear power. According to The Wall Street Journal, it has the world's 20th highest per capita income, but is 50th in greenhouse emissions.

So maybe those two South Jersey nuclear plants will be built someday, not only adding lots of good-paying jobs to the region but helping solve the energy and climate challenges of the future.

Our view:
Julian in Jackson Square

Creole or Cajun?

Carnival Parade Costumes Based on Historical Tribal Wear

Touring

Classic French Quarter Design

Jackson Square

Julian and Louis Armstrong

Tourist Cruise on the Mississippi

Hotel, Dining and Nightlife

Brennan's Egg Sardou

My husband, Kevin, at Cafe Du Monde

Cafe Du Mond's Cafe au Lait and Beignets

Drago's Charbroiled Oysters

Kevin at Lagasse Foundation Fundraiser

Crawfish Boil

My husband and I had the opportunity to travel to New Orleans recently, having not been there since prior to hurricane Katrina. I'm pleased to report that the city is better than ever. There has been significant construction and investment in infrastructure since my last visit in 2005. Many entrepreneurs have moved to the area and great chefs have flocked to the city, which has always been rich in food history.New Orleans is unique in America. It doesn't feel so much like a Southern city, but perhaps more of a Caribbean city. The area once populated by the Choctaw, Houmas, and other Indians, was strongly influenced by the French, French-Canadians and Spanish during colonial periods and the introduction of African slaves in the 18th century. Here all these cultures intermingled and yet survived together.Cajuns were the French colonists who settled the Canadian maritime provinces (Nova Scotia and New Brunswick) in the 1600s. The settlers named their region "Acadia," and were known as Acadians. The name "Acadian" eventually became known as "Cajun." They developed their own distinct lifestyle in the swamps and surrounding areas of South Louisiana.Creoles as an ethnic group are harder to define than Cajuns. "Creole" can mean anything from individuals born in New Orleans with French and Spanish ancestry to those who descended from African/Caribbean/French/Spanish heritage.Both groups have contributed greatly to the local cuisine. A simplified way to describe the two cuisines is to deem Creole cuisine as fancier city food while Cajun cuisine is often referred to as rural country food. While many of the ingredients in Cajun and Creole dishes are similar, the real difference between the two styles is the people behind these famous cuisines and their preparation and presentation techniques.There are many things to see and do in New Orleans, and I'll just give you a few highlights. Get a good tour book before you go and review all of your options.Of course you can't miss the French Quarter. Travel down Royal Street on foot and enjoy the many shops, most all of them local. Parallel to Royal is the famous Bourbon Street, home to the city's night life. There isn't too much going on here during the day, but some shops are interspersed and it's a good time to take photos or enjoy an buggy ride with guide, which you can catch in nearby Jackson Square.The square faces the Mississippi River and is surrounded by historic buildings, including the St. Louis Cathedral, the Presbytere and Cabildo (Louisiana State Museums), and the Lower and Upper Pontalba Apartments, the oldest apartment buildings in the United States. The Pontalba Apartments offer retail shops, museums, galleries and restaurants on the ground level; their second and third floors still house a selection of prestigious apartments.For well over a half-century, there has been an open-air artist colony around Jackson Square. Local artists paint, draw, create portraits and caricatures, and display their work on the square's iron fence.The French Quarter borders North Rampart and Louis Armstrong Park, and is adjacent to America's oldest black neighborhood called Treme . As the area is the site of significant economic, cultural, political, social, and legal events that shaped the course of events in Black America for the past two centuries, I suggest you get a local guide to walk you through the neighborhood and park. The guide will describe all of the significant events, buildings and architecture in the area, making your foot tour more meaningful.If you have the time, walk from the French Quarter's Jackson Square along the river until you reach the aquarium and entrance to the riverfront outlet mall. On the river you'll see everything from classic river paddle boats (now for tourist tours and dinner cruises... take one if you have time) to colossal container ships. The Mississippi is a working river and the amount of traffic and cargo making their way up and down the river is impressive. If you have children, stop into the aquarium which is also popular. And if you enjoy outlet shopping, work your way through the outlet shopping mall, which provides for duty free shopping (rebate desk) if you are not from the USA.If you'd like to take a break from local culture, visit the National WWII Museum, formerly known as the D-Day Museum, which is a military history museum located in the Central Business District of New Orleans. Founded in 2000, it was later designated by the U.S. Congress as America's official National World War II Museum in 2003. The Museum is affiliated with the Smithsonian Institution and is an excellent way to spend at least half of a day.Like touring, there really is too much to enjoy on the food and nightlife front to do all in one trip. So again, I'll give you my favorite highlights, but do your research before you go and plan accordingly.At least once during your visit, start your day with breakfast (or brunch if you've had a late night Brennan's in the French Quarter. Make a reservation in advance as it can be busy, especially on Sunday mornings. The restaurant opened in 1946 where bananas foster became the signature dessert. Originally located in the Old Absinthe House, after ten years it moved to the present location at 417 Royal Street. Brennan's classic breakfast includes a baked apple or turtle soup, followed by eggs sardou, a Creole dish made with poached eggs, artichoke bottoms, creamed spinach and Hollandaise sauce. Many other options are available, most of which are unique and intriguing. Be adventurous!A coffee shop on Decatur Street across from Jackson Square in the French Quarter is known for its cafe au lait and its French-style beignets, a local pastry akin to a freshly fried doughnut (without the hole) and coated in powdered sugar. There is always a long line. Riverside is the line for take out, and street side is the line for seating. Both move pretty quickly due to the limited menu. If you don't feel like waiting, there is another new location in the outlet mall at the end of the riverwalk. It has a better view (you can actually see the river) but of course it is not the original.If you are looking to stay in the heart of the tourist area (French Quarter) then the best choice is the Royal Sonesta , which combines timeless elegance, southern refinement and modern facilities. It is also home towhich takes a modern approach to Cajun and Creole cuisine, and comes highly recommended. We had a superb dinner here followed by an evening at, also located in the hotel. Even if you don't stay at the Royal Sonesta, do enjoy her restaurant and jazz. Superb!There are at least a dozen restaurants famous for grilled oysters in New Orleans, and you should sample as many as possible. Some call them charbroiled and others chargrilled, but they are basically the same technique. Cooking oysters in their shells over a grill's fire, topped with some mixture of butter and garlic, seasoning and sometimes cheese, yields meat that is firmer but just as juicy as raw.If you can get a seat with a view, the grilling itself is dramatic, becoming part of the show at places like Drago's and Neyow's Creole Cafe, where the grills sit in plain view of diners. If you're near the outlet shopping mall which connects to the Hilton hotel, Drago's is located inside the lobby. You can even have cocktails in the hotel lounge and order a platter of Drago's oysters mid-day, should you need a little refreshment. Highly recommended!New Orleans is brimming with celebrity chefs. Many have made national fame while others are known only to locals and foodies. Of course, the most famous of these is Emeril Lagasse. As much a celebrity and entrepreneur, as an actual chef, Emeril has built an empire and uses his celebrity and corporate operations to support charities in New Orleans.We were there for his fundraiser called Boudin, Bourbon & Beer, which was a sold-out event. His restaurants include. All three are well established and the food is good. The crowds can be large and the restaurants noisy, but if you haven't ever been to one it's worth the visit. It's unlikely you'll see Emeril onsite, but if you do he'll gladly autograph your purchased cookbook. Otherwise, check out some of the other options I've mentioned above.Of course do make sure you have enough time to take in the many other local favorite foods. I don't know of any city in America with so many local specialties. Of course you must have the seafood and andouille sausage gumbo, blackened alligator, and a low-country crawfish boil. Fried chicken and jambalaya should also be on your menu.Enjoy the crawfish etouffee (gumbo's spiced-up cousin), shrimp creole, a muffaletta (Italian sandwich on French bread usually with salami, ham, provolone and olive spread) , a PoBoy (sandwich piled high with meat such as roast beef, turkey or sausage, with gravy or sometimes seafood), red beans and rice, bread pudding, and bananas foster. And for a local candy, you must have the Creole pralines (pecans in a caramel base).As I said, there is much to sample in New Orleans. And while you're at it, there is live music of all kinds everywhere you turn. What could make the city more perfect!
For the New World Order, a world government is just the beginning. Once in place they can engage their plan to exterminate 80% of the world's population, while enabling the "elites" to live forever with the aid of advanced technology. For the first time, crusading filmmaker ALEX JONES reveals their secret plan for humanity's extermination: Operation ENDGAME.

Jones chronicles the history of the global elite's bloody rise to power and reveals how they have funded dictators and financed the bloodiest warscreating order out of chaos to pave the way for the first true world empire.

Watch as Jones and his team track the elusive Bilderberg Group to Ottawa and Istanbul to document their secret summits, allowing you to witness global kingpins setting the world's agenda and instigating World War III.





to Ottawa and Istanbul to document their secret summits, allowing you to witness global kingpins setting the world's agenda and instigating World War III. Learn about the formation of the North America transportation control grid, which will end U.S. sovereignty forever.





Discover how the practitioners of the pseudo-science eugenics have taken control of governments worldwide as a means to carry out depopulation.





View the progress of the coming collapse of the United States and the formation of the North American Union.

Never before has a documentary assembled all the pieces of the globalists' dark agenda. Endgame's compelling look at past atrocities committed by those attempting to steer the future delivers information that the controlling media has meticulously censored for over 60 years. It fully reveals the elite's program to dominate the earth and carry out the wicked plan in all of human history.

Endgame is not conspiracy theory, it is documented fact in the elite's own words.




Join Us Monday, January 11, at 5:30PM at Lifetime Montessori School: Renowned Montessori Educator Maura Joyce, M.Ed., to Speak!

Contact

Bob Gavin

***@digitalmarketingnp.com Bob Gavin

End

-- Join us at LMS this Monday, January 11, from 5:30-6:30PM to discuss your childs skill sets going forward at Parent Education Night.Learn how together we can improve your childs academic, social and spiritual journey via Montessori education.Our children are given an environment to discover knowledge through concepts, lessons and materials, Kristin Edwards M.Ed., co-founder of Lifetime Montessori School, said.We give our children freedom and our teachers guide their journey. Still, many parents have asked me, Where does this exploration and discovery lead my child? To answer this question, well be discussing the topic at the Parents Education Night event.Maura Joyce, Head of School at the acclaimed Montessori in Redlands (MIR) School, will lead the discussion. At MIR, teachers guide children aged 18 months through Sixth Grade. The school is celebrating is 40th anniversary and is considered one of Southern Californias best.Well discuss outcomes you should expect your children to acquire during the Montessori toddler and Montessori preschool yearsand how all of us can help your child achieve them, Joyce said.These skills and outcomes include education, character development, sensorial and practical life skills. Within one hour, parents will have an excellent handle on how to continue at home the learning their children receive during the day.This Monday night event will reinforce how parents can help foster the private school Montessori Method of self-realization, self-motivation and self-discovery amid a curriculum that promotes the childs physical, intellectual and emotional growth.Childcare will be provided for this one-hour discussion at the school.Lifetime Montessori School (LMS) serves the Poway, Scripps Ranch and 4S communities along the I-15 corridor in mid San Diego County. Over 150 studentsaged eighteen months to eight yearsattend and also live in the neighboring communities of Carmel Valley, Rancho Bernardo, Rancho Penasquitos and Rancho Santa Fe.LMS is an American Montessori Internationale (AMI) school. This is a key difference between the Lifetime Montessori preschool and a traditional preschoolwe employ teachers rather than caretakers while following a time tested teaching method to foster independence and self-confidence. Teaching adheres to the philosophies and methods of teaching as stated by Dr. Maria Montessori a century ago.Visit Lifetime Montessori school for more information. The school is located at 14727 Camino De La Luna. www.lifetimemontessorischool.com
Non-profit serving immigrant families kicks off crowdfunding

Bethzaida C. McGuire - President MiMadre Corporation

Contact

Bethzaida C. McGuire - President

Phone: (202) 617-7019

***@mimadre.org

2026177019 Bethzaida C. McGuire - PresidentPhone: (202) 617-70192026177019

End

-- January 8, 2016- Damascus, MD- Today MiMadre Corporation began its initial crowdfunding campaign.According to President Bethzaida Cordero McGuire, We chose GoFundMe as our platform based on their track record of success.The campaign description says:You can make an immediately impact on the lives of immigrant families!My name is Russell McGuire. As the husband of almost 40 years, of Bethzaida (Betsy) Cordero McGuire, you may feel am the last person to give an objective review of Betsys non-profit,. But, hear me out.In 2012 Betsy quit the job of a lifetime (for most of us) in the intelligence community to work full time in her passion of helping others.Being Puerto Rican, and fluent in both English and Spanish, she carved out a role for herself in the immigrant community here in Montgomery County Maryland, befriending, working with and praying with the new Americans. Regardless of their immigration status, and sometimes because of it, Betsy reached out to make a difference in peoples lives.Working closely with immigrant families, she was able to understand the process and the robust services available in Montgomery County, MD. Combining this knowledge, with a great group of advisors from around the state, an idea became a reality. Betsy has built up a fantastic program which lends to the effectiveness and reputation of the organization.is about extending the reach of one person to positively impact the lives of many. The more people she can affect, she believes, the better our community.If there was food in our pantry and not theirs, it was put in a box or shopping bag and delivered personally to the homes of those who needed it.When the husband and primary wage earner in a poor Honduran family was dragged to Immigration prison for being a passenger in the car of someone stopped for a routine traffic violation, she went to work. She fought to protect the family from cold and starvation and, to get the husband representation to seek his freedom. After six months, he was reunited with his two children and his wife.When a couple were mercilessly run down as pedestrians in a crosswalk, and left brutally and permanently injured, she helped. Betsy translated for them in medical visits. She consulted with them as they made difficult choices about the treatment and care. She helped them think through their options for care and redress. More importantly they kept their dignity and knew someone cared.Betsy has learned, time and again, that when a birth record in a local hospital insensitively ends a male Hispanic childs name in an a instead of an o, like Alejandra instead of Alejandro, he can face withering humiliation later in grade school. She has, on her own, without ever taking a nickel from anyone, intervened on behalf of such families to get a new, corrected birth certificate.Showing over and over again, more commitment and courage than most of us could muster, she has been there for folks who are often afraid to rock the boat because their status may be problematic, or they dont have the resources and hence assume they dont have any right to fair play or equal treatment under the Law.She reached out to a gentleman, new to the U.S. from Chile, who was tricked out of $30,000 by a cynical predatory employer who saw him as a ripe target for fraud. She helped him get an attorney. But most importantly, she taught him he shouldnt be marginalized and abused.I have left out the many church activities for kids, the parties at our home with the big inflatable bounce houses, the visits to the museums and the National Mall, the picnics, the school visits, the innumerable doctors visits, the overnights at a hospital at the side of an anxious mom with a sick childonly because I dont want to lose your attention.Heres the message as noted in the GoFundMe campaign- Betsy has formed a non-profit that will become an umbrella under which she can broaden and expand her work. It is called MiMadre.Here is the link: https://www.gofundme.com/ 79c6bj38 Here is a link to MiMadres website on the internet: http://www.mimadre.org . Here is McGuires Twitter Account: https://twitter.com/MiMadreOrg.The campaign notes:got the okay from the IRS on the 501(c) 3 in 2015. As she says on the website, MiMadre is committed to building positive futures for Marylands families by working collaboratively with families, schools and communities in order to improve opportunities for excellence in education and success for families in school and community life. Our special focus is women and families.MiMadre is an expression of Betsys belief in human potential. As Betsy says, eachdream is built by the love and hard work of families, together. MiMadre wants to be there to open doors of opportunity for all new families who are navigating their way through often unfamiliar and sometimes hostile pathways in search of that dream.The Campaign asks: Wont you join me in supporting Betsy and her dream of a better world? A world where a WELCOME sign is posted on the door; instead of a DO NOT ENTER sign?Russell McGuire says, Our family has been called to a better place by Betsy, a place of sacrifice and love. As I say again and again, Betsy has a calling andis callingall to love one another, to take time to listen to one another and to make a positive difference in each others lives.She needs to rent a small space in Gaithersburg as the footprint forin Montgomery County, MD. To do that she needs $25,000 for one years rent, facility improvements and the move.The campaign ends: Will you help? And enjoy a 2016 tax deduction at the same time? If so, give today. Go fund Betsy!!!
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Waterville Valley Resort has announced their list of new and returning sponsors for the 2015/16 winter season. The biggest of those names is BMW, who is kicking off a new series of interactive driving events with the first being at Waterville Valley Resort. These dynamic, educational events will take place at mountain resorts throughout New England and will help raise money for local programs at Waterville Valley Resort..

BMW is a world class brand that is looking to create a new experience to drivers in areas like the White Mountains, said Marketing Director Matt Hesser. This new partnership is exciting for us as I think it will add another dimension to the type of events we do here, not just in the winter, but in the spring, summer, and fall as well.

One of the unique aspects of BMWs sponsorship with the resort is a premier driving event called The BMW Winter xDrive Experience that will take place from Friday, January 16th to Monday, January 18th. Its an interactive, educational event that with sites at the mountain, in Town Square, and at the Golden Eagle Lodge. BMW will have professional drivers providing education and doing demonstrations for guests as they teach safety tips and techniques for driving in winter conditions. For each participant at Waterville Valley Resort, BMW will donate $1 to the Waterville Valley Adaptive Program.

In addition to BMW, Waterville Valley Resort has announced their partnership with GoPro, the new mobile application Adored, communications service provider APXnet, as well as continued partnerships with 603 Brewery, Burton, Coca-Cola, Harpoon Brewery, Nesquick, Red Bull, and Snapple.

###

Waterville Valley Resort was designed and planned specifically as a self-contained four season resort. Known as New Hampshires Family Resort, it features 220 skiable acres with an altitude of 4,004 feet and vertical drop of 2,020 feet, 50 trails, and 11 lifts. Lodging options include country inns, condominiums and all-suite hotels. For more information, call 1-800-GO-VALLEY or visit http://www.waterville.com.
We are very pleased to add Skyn ICELAND to our growing family of premier brands...

Skyn ICELAND, LLC (http://www.skyniceland.com), a leading retailer of specialized skin care products, has launched a performance-based Affiliate marketing program to increase its online sales and website traffic. BroadBase Media, LLC, (http://www.broadbasemedia.com) with offices in Los Angeles, CA and Carson City, NV, will be the exclusive manager of the program, including Affiliate recruitment, sales tracking and monitoring.

Skyn ICELAND was born from a life-changing mission to treat and alleviate the effects of stress on skin while promoting a stress-free life full of balance, health and wellness. Their products are 100% vegan, free of parabens, petroleum, mineral oil, chemical sulfates, phthaletes, synthetic fragrance and dye. They are also proud to be a part of PETAs Beauty Without Bunnies as their products are produced without testing on animals.

BroadBase Media is a leading provider of managed marketing services to clients such as Ergobaby.com and Orbitbaby.com. BroadBase uses a state of the art tracking platform, Sage Track (http://www.sagetrack.com) to recruit, track and pay Affiliates who drive sales, as well as provide various analytics to determine traffic sources and patterns.

Were really excited to be launching this new affiliate program with BroadBase in an effort to expand our online presence, said Sarah Kugelman, Skyn ICELAND Founder and President. Reaching a broader audience through network partners and influencers is a big part of our overall business strategy in 2016 and beyond

We are very pleased to add Skyn ICELAND to our growing family of premier brands, and to work with Sarah and her team, says Marc Allen Rona, a Managing Partner at BBM. Their stellar line of products is a perfect fit with our growing Network of Affiliates, which includes some of the top websites, networks, bloggers, and Social Media influencers.

This is Skyn ICELANDs first entry into performance-based marketing and is part of their overall strategy to grow their online sales channel.

About Skyn ICELAND

Skyn ICELAND offers skincare solutions to combat and treat the damage caused by stress  starting with the eye area, where signs show up first. Its high performance skincare system of products brings instant relief, immediate results and long term benefits addressing the five symptoms of stressed skin: accelerated aging, adult acne, irritation, dryness, and dullness. Its inspiration comes from nature, in the pure unspoiled natural resources of Iceland  with its mineral rich waters, antioxidant powered berries, soothing algaes, replenishing mosses and immunity boosting Angelica Archangelica. With these potent naturals, products soothe, stabilize, fortify and nourish skin, bringing it back into balance and returning it to a glowing, youthful state. All skyn ICELAND products are certified cruelty free by PETA, 100% healthy and vegan. For more information, visit skynICELAND.com.

Contact:

Marilee Clark

Marileec(at)skyniceland(dot)com

Phone: 212-588-1555

For PR Inquiries:

48 Communications, Inc.: 646-893-4561

Email: skyniceland(at)48communications(dot)com

Vijay Lalwani: vijay(at)48communications(dot)com

About BroadBase Media

Broadbase Media, LLC is a leading provider of multi-channel marketing services with offices in Los Angeles, CA and Carson City, NV. Created in 2011 by a group of digital media experts with over forty years of combined success in the world of marketing, BroadBase Media has one simple goal; help companies grow their online business. BBM has emerged as a premier boutique digital media company unsurpassed in integrity, knowledge and technology.

Contact:

Marc Allen Rona

marc(at)broadbasemedia(dot)com

Phone: 323-951-9110
Screening for cervical cancer using the pap test has decreased the number of new cases of cervical cancer and the number of deaths due to cervical cancer since 1950. More than 90 percent of women can survive cervical cancer when it's localized and caught early," says Dr. Catherine Staropoli," chief of Women's Health for the VA Maryland Health Care System.

A Cervical Cancer Screening Month Resolution

Attention all women! You may want to consider scheduling a pap smear as part of your New Years resolutions! January is Cervical Cancer Screening Month. A pap smear can find abnormal cells that may indicate cervical cancer. Screening for cervical cancer using the pap test has decreased the number of new cases of cervical cancer and the number of deaths due to cervical cancer since 1950.

The VA Maryland Health Care System encourages all women veterans enrolled for VA health care to get tested for cervical cancer. Women aged 21 to 65, as well as those at high risk, are candidates for pap smear screening. Detecting cervical cancer in its earliest stages greatly improves survival rates. More than 90 percent of women can survive cervical cancer when it is localized and caught early. Human papillomavirus (HPV) infection is the major risk factor for development of cervical cancer.

Other risk factors for cervical cancer include:



Chronic Human Papilloma Virus infection

Having many sexual partners

Having first sexual intercourse at a young age

Smoking cigarettes

Having a weakened immune system

Here are some ways to reduce cervical cancer risk:

Limit the number of sexual partners and use condoms or diaphragms every time you have sex.

Dont smoke.

Get regular pap smears to detect any precancerous cells.

If you are under 26, consider the HPV vaccination.

The good news:

It is the easiest gynecological cancer to prevent with regular screening tests and follow up.

It is highly treatable when found early.

Early detection can be lifesaving. For more information on cervical cancer or to schedule a pap smear, veterans should contact the Women Veterans Clinic at 1-800-463-6295, extension 4981. At the VA Maryland Health Care Systems Womens Clinic, comprehensive primary, mental health and specialty care services are available.

Editors Note: Dr. Catherine A. Staropoli, FACP, chief of Womens Health for the VA Maryland Health Care System, is available as a subject matter expert on cervical cancer. Zelda McCormick, the Womens Health program manager, can speak about issues pertaining to the Women Veterans Health Program. For more information or to speak with either Dr. Staropoli or Ms. McCormick, please contact Rosalia Scalia, Public & Community Relations, VA Maryland Health Care System, at (410) 605-7464, or via e-mail at rosalia.scalia(at)va.gov.
A blog about societal, cultural, and civilizational collapse, and how to stave it off or survive it. Named after the legendary character "Crazy Eddie" in Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's "The Mote in God's Eye." Expect news and views about culture, politics, economics, technology, and science fiction.
Goldsboroughs 11th pastiche, Stop the Presses! A Nero Wolfe Mystery, brings to life Rex Stouts beloved sleuths, Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin.

What appeals to you about Nero and Archie?

With other master detectives, like Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot, the sidekick seems sometimes dim. Not so here. Stout created two very smart guys, one cerebral and sedentary, the other brash and quick-witted. They play off each other beautifully, each one supplementing the others shortcomings. I took to these stories from the first. I liked the byplay between Nero and Archie, and also all the details about the brownstone and Neros idiosyncrasies and rigid schedule.

When did you first read the books?

Probably in the late 1940s or very early 1950s. My mother was a great fan of these stories, which she read as serializations in the old American Magazine and in the Saturday Evening Post. She recommended them to me in part because they contained very little overt violence, swearing, or sex.

How did you come to write your own?

When Rex Stout died in 1975, I showed his newspaper obituary to my mother, who said, Now there arent going to be any more Nero Wolfe books. I thought, maybe there could be one more, and I began writing a Wolfe story for her. I finished Murder in E Minor in time for Christmas, dedicated it to my mother, and gave it to her as a leather-bound typescript. She was delighted, and for eight years, well beyond her death, it remained a book written for only one person. The Stout estate liked the way I handled the characters and story in Murder in E Minor, and theyalong with publisher Bantam Booksfelt the publication of a new Nero Wolfe book would revitalize the backlist of Stout stories, which it did. The hardest part has always been developing a whodunit plot that makes all of the suspects seem more or less equal as potential murderers.

How did you get the nerve to write how Archie and Nero met?

Rex Stout never gave readers much of a backstory, and doing a book about their meeting had always fascinated me. In writing my prequel, Archie Meets Nero Wolfe, I used every reference, however brief, throughout the long series as to how Archie happened to come to New York and what some of their early cases were. I set the book in 1930, which would be roughly consistent with the timeline in the Stout books. The first Wolfe mystery, Fer-de-Lance, came out in 1934. I pitched the prequel through my agent, and Otto Penzler jumped on the idea.
What do you do when your child dies? Thats the anguishing question behind Rosalie Lightning: A Graphic Memoir (St. Martins, Jan. 2016), the extraordinary new graphic novel by Tom Hart. Its heartrending pages recount the sudden death of Rosalie, Harts two-year-old daughter in 2011 and the grieving process for him and his wife, acclaimed cartoonist Leela Corman (Unterzakhn). Its an unsparing, brutally painful memoir that conveys the tragedy as well as the spirit of a young child cut off so quickly. Rosalies singular quirksa love of acorns, her special vocabulary, her enjoyment of a comic by the European duo Metaphrogare beautifully captured, making her an individual in addition to a symbol of love and loss.

When he isnt making comics, Hart runs the Sequential Arts Workshop (SAW) comics school in Gainesville, Fla. But when I spoke with him via Skype, he was in Sydney, after teaching an intensive two-week course on cartooning on a small island off the coast of Tasmania. It was a hot morning in Australia, and Hart was at a friends house; a dog had just stolen a stuffed monkey from Molly Rose, his second daughter, and life, he said, was good and normal. Rosalie Lightning is a reminder of a different time.

By his own admission, Hart has spent three years retelling the worst two months of his life, a period that began in November 2011. Hart and Corman found Rosalie unresponsive one morning, after what had seemed a typical night. She was taken to the hospital, where her parents made the decision to take her off a ventilator. There was no warning, and no obvious cause, which made her death all the more shocking and painful.

Hart immediately began making notes, not even certain why. As soon as she died, I wrote constantly, he recalls. The work helped him keep track of his emotions. Youre not capable of sorting anything out so soon after, so mostly it was to occupy myself.

The book moves back and forth in time to show Rosalies birth and life, and the emotional devastation that Hart and Corman experienced. Friends reached out to them, leading to trips to Hawaii and New Mexico and a grief counseling workshop. The book ends on New Years Day, 2012, when a particular interaction with a child allows Hart to find some acceptance. Life will go on, he realizes, but it will never be the same.

Not surprisingly, Hart has created a book with no easy answers. His scrappy, brisk comics have consistently confronted social systems and the quest for happiness. He emerged from the Seattle comics scene of the early 1990s along with Ed Brubaker (Criminal), Megan Kelso (Watergate Sue), Jon Lewis (True Swamp), and Jason Lutes (Berlin). Almost all of them won Xeric grants (a grant established by Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cocreator Peter Laird to help young cartoonists print and distribute independent work). Hart won for Hutch Owens, the first of many books that would explore the conflict between corporate consumerism and free will, as embodied by the character Hutch Owen, an often angry but eloquent homeless man who spouts truths and frequently clashes with various corporate foils. Imagine a comic about a smarter Homer Simpson vs. Mr. Burns, drawn by a punk Charles Shultz.

Although not yet a household name, Hart may become one with Rosalie Lightning. He is a cartoonists cartoonist. Tom is a genius, Brubaker wrote in an email recalling their Seattle days. Toms work had this daring emotional honesty to it. And so did Tom. He was always a true artist, never worried about being cool or following trends.

Hart recalls that our scene in Seattle in the 90s had literary aspirations for comics. He adds: Our heroes were Chester Brown and Dan Clowes, but even they were mostly surrealists first. Our influences were more literary, cinematic, and musical. I loved Calvino and Werner Herzog and the dramatist Peter Brook. We all believed comics could and should tackle the themes that literature, theater, and movies had been tackling.

Harts love of literary comics informs Rosalie Lightnings powerful scenes. As he and Corman traveled and dealt with the reality of life, he kept writing. In all that time, I was just trying to stay present, Hart says. While in Hawaii, he began thinking that his notes should be a book, although he says, I [already] knew it would be one, because thats what Ive always done all my lifeturn things, especially emotional experiences, into books.

When the incident that ends the book happened, Hart realized he had come to a natural endpoint and started taking everything Id gathered into this huge binder of thoughts and emotions, not knowing how long it would take to create the book. It took three years. Harts devotion to telling Rosalies story became something like a mission, but it was also crucial to his healing. The writing contained a lot of intellectual things, like how to move on and what this new space in the world is, he says. But I think to get to a point where I could be in the world in a better way, I had to go through the process of drawing and sculpting it very slowly.

This writing process may sound grueling, but Hart has no regrets. I had to do it, he says, with no hesitation. Often, it was pretty much all I wanted to. Over the next year and a half Hart would establish SAW and become a father again, but working on Rosalie Lightning became a strange sort of private time. It was hard but it was really necessary.

Hart started a Tumblr to track the process of making Rosalie Lightning, including bits that got lost or were especially hard to write; the first few chapters were published as mini comics. (Corman wrote her own comic about Rosalies death, published online in Tablet Magazine.)

The positive response to the minis helped Hart keep working, and early reviews are raves. But now a new part of the process has begun with the books January launch. Even in the best of times, the repetitive questions that come with promoting a book can be tiring, but the questions people will ask about this book go into painful territory. He admits to some anxiety about the process, but says, Im proud of the book, and I think it did something to honor her spirit.

Although Hart and Cormans decision to have another child is described in the graphic novel, the birth of Molly Rose isnta deliberate choice that avoids the appearance of a happy ending. It was really important, because the book is not about that. If you lose a child and are lucky enough to be able to have another one at some point, that may go a long way to healing, but I dont think thats the story I needed to tell. If there was a plan to it or if theres a purpose to what happened, it had to be about bringing us to a new understanding. I think trying to understand what these messages werewhat was sort of cosmically required of uswas what was really important.

After several years at the School of Visual Arts in New York, Hart and Corman moved to Gainesville in 2011 to open SAW, where they both teach. The class is smallabout 14 studentsand diverse, including people from New York, Boston, and Mumbai. Its one of only three standalone comics schools in the U.S. (along with the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction, Vt., and the Joe Kubert School in Dover, N.J.), and it has an intensive one-year curriculum that immerses students in the emotional experience of making comics.

Teaching has given Hart a view of the evolution of making graphic novels. When his generation started making comics, there was much less attention on the form, whereas todays students often get contracts for their own books a few years out of school. There were less eyes on you, and the disdain from the rest of the world was more palpable, he says of his early days. But now people have a lot of reference points for what a graphic novel is, and much more encouragement.

SAW is run on a small budget, like many key comics institutions, by a hardscrabble, dedicated base of people making less money than they should. Comparing its first few years to a one-room schoolhouse, Hart values the closeness and the DIY aspect. I think its part of the whole learning experience.

For Hart, 2016 will be a busy year. His earliest minicomics were recently reprinted as Shes Not into Poetry, and The Odyssey of Sergeant Jack Brennana retelling of Homers epic written for Iraq war vets that Hart editedcomes out from Pantheon in April. Finally, he has an instructional book publishing later in the yearThe Sequential Artists Workshop Guide to Creating Professional Comic Strips, revealing techniques he learned from tight deadlines. I learned many strategies for surprising yourself as a creator and keeping yourself engaged, Hart says. The books thesis is that we dont need to know what we want to say before we start, that we can start and learn what we want to say as we create.

Hart is also putting together notes for a new project that hes been chipping away at since 2003. Though eager to pick up that project, dealing with the Rosalie book has helped him understand some things about his own work, even though finding the language to describe it evades him. I want to keep mining somethingI dont want to do something trite, Hart says. I actually think I need to keep working with this loss a little bit more. I dont know whats next, but I dont think Im done with the story of losing Rosalie.
In 2015, an unusual event occurred in the world of bestsellers: a new category dominated the charts. For the first time, adult coloring books were the most successful players on the trade paperback lists. Four are among the longest-running bestsellers of the year, and 21 adult coloring books landed on the trade list in the course of 2015. The 21 coloring books spent a combined total of 175 weeks on the bestsellers lists; that accounts for 13.5% of the total positions on the trade paper bestseller lists for the year.

Adult coloring books are a long way from the subject matter of previous years bestsellerserotic romance was hot in 2012 thanks to the 50 Shades trilogy, the Duck Dynasty titles by members of the Robertson clan loudly quacked their way onto the charts in 2013, and movie tie-in sales in 2014 were big winners. The latter continued to do well in 2015. Three of the five longest-running mass market top sellersAmerican Sniper, The Longest Ride, and The Martianwere movie tie-ins, spending a total of 63 weeks on the charts. American Sniper and The Martian also made impressive showings on the 2015 trade paper longest-running chart. The movie tie-in editions of Unbroken, Still Alice, and Wild were also on that trade list, along with the regular editions of Unbroken and The Martian. That group added up to 238 weeks on the trade paper list. If any publisher can figure out how to do a movie tie-in adult coloring book, it would be a surefire winner.

Conglomerates Rock

The number of publishing conglomerates keeps shrinking, and that is a direct result of consolidation. While conglomerate clout on the bestseller charts continues to be powerful, the group keeps getting smaller. Three years ago, in 2013, we calculated the Bestsellers by Corporation chart for nine companies; in 2014, it was seven companies, and the latest chart only has five. It is also the first year that we combined the bestsellers from all the divisions and imprints of HarperCollins and Harlequin, and that had a significant boost on HCs paperback numbers. Adding the 2014 paperback totals for the two amounted to 126 titles and 549 weeks; the 2015 totals are 152 books and 543 weeks (the additional titles are due to the Harelquin acquisition).

In 2015, the Big Five owned 87.8% of all the hardcover bestseller positions available, and 80.1% in paperback. The groups leader, Penguin Random House, controlled 40.1% of the hardcover slots and 34.2% of paperbacks in 2015. It is unlikely that PRH will lose its first-place standing in the coming years. As separate publishers, Penguin and Random House were generally the top two players on these charts. As we point out each year, the bestsellers that make the weekly and annual charts represent less than 1% of total annual title output. And despite the conglomerates dominance, there are 37 other hardcover publishers and 46 trade paperback houses that had titles on PWs weekly bestseller lists. However, most of the titles on the mass market lists belong to the Big Five. Only 41 of the 291 books that landed on the mass market list in 2015 were from publishers that were not part of the Big Five, and Kensington published 39 of those titles. The only two other publishers to crack the mass market list were Merriam-Webster with The Merriam-Webster Official Scrabble Players Dictionary and Sourcebooks with Ill Stand by You by Sharon Sala.

Tenure, Tenure, Tenure

The key to financial success is not just getting on the charts, but staying there. For example, Hachette had 61 hardcover bestsellers in 2015, much less than the 78 from HarperCollinsbut Hachettes titles stayed on the lists for a combined total of 308 weeks, while HC had a total of 269. The result was a higher percentage of bestseller positions for Hachette. In another example, PRH had 150 paperback bestsellers in 2015, two books fewer than the HC total of 152, but PRHs titles racked up 889 weeks on the years charts, compared to 543 for HC. That resulted in a 34.2% market share for PRH versus a 21% share for HC. An explanation of the significant difference is tenure. A total of 48 book titles in the HC group were on the weekly charts for only one or two weeks (mostly Harlequin romances). PRH had only 22 titles with one- or two-week runs. PRH also enjoyed nine of 21 titles that stayed on the charts for a double-digit number of weeks, and HC had only three.

Trade paperbacks tended to stay on the bestseller lists longer than mass market titles in 2015. Forty-one trade paperbacks stayed on the trade paperback lists for at least 10 weeks, and another 77 bestsellers had runs of five or more weeks, totaling 38% of the 240 on the list. There were still plenty of trade paperbacks that hit the lists for only a few weeks last year, with 93 books on the list for one week and another 34 for two weeks.

Multiple Hits

Veteran authors of fiction continue to be abundant on these annual charts, but there were some lucky debut writers. Debut holdovers from 2014 included Andy Weirs The Martian and Celeste Ng for Everything I Never Told You. Other debut novelists who arrived on the lists last year were David Duchovny with Holy Cow (FS&G), Stephanie Clifford with Everybody Rise (St. Martins), and Garth Risk Hallberg with City of Fire (Knopf).

There were 20 authors that scored four or more mass market bestsellers during 2015. They included William W. Johnstone (18), Debbie Macomber (16), Nora Roberts/J.D. Robb (15), and James Patterson and his cowriters (11). Collectively books by those 20 writers occupied a total of 473 positions on the mass market charts, an impressive 36.4% of that list.

Eclectic is a good word to describe the assortment of nonfiction high rollers, including the leader of the pack, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, a book on decluttering and organizingvery important while New Year resolutions are still on the to-do list. Finance, health and fitness, and religion and spirituality continue to be strong nonfiction topics, as are books by Bill OReilly. Religion writers are again blessed on these charts, including Joel Osteen, Joyce Meyer, T.D. Jakes, Max Lucado, and Billy Graham. And with the 2016 elections looming and the presidential candidates causing a stir, there is no surprise to find many political books on the charts, including Ted Cruzs A Time for Truth, Ben Carsons A More Perfect Union, and Donald Trumps Crippled America.

Gold Goal Getters

Its hard to get to the top of the charts, and its even harder to stay there. Only four of the 82 books that had double-digit runs on the 2015 weekly charts stayed at #1 for more than 10 weeks. In hardcover fiction, The Girl on the Train stayed at #1 for 14 weeks. In hardcover nonfiction, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up was at the top of the charts for 12 weeks. And in trade paperback, the movie tie-in of America Sniper remained at #1 for 14 weeks, and Grey was there for 11 weeks. There were a total of 70 books with runs of one, two, or three weeks at #1. But even one week lets the author and publisher declare the book a chart topper.

Bestsellers by Corporation

How the Big Five fared on PWs 2015 charts

Hardcover Paperback Company Books Weeks Share* Chg from 2014 Books Weeks Share* Chg from 2014 Penguin Random House 239 1,042 40.1% +0.3% 150 889 34.2% -3.6% HarperCollins** 78 269 10.4% -0.1% 152 545 21.0% -0.1% Simon & Schuster 75 379 14.6% +3.1% 42 218 8.4% +0.1% Macmillan 65 280 10.8% +0.8% 21 58 2.2% -0.4% Hachette Book Group USA 61 308 11.9% +5.1% 56 373 14.4% -1.7%

*This figure represents the publishers share of the 2,600 hardcover and 2,600 paperback bestseller positions during 2015 (there are 25 positions on each of our four weekly bestseller lists).

**This is the first year that we combined Harlequins numbers with HarperCollins.

Bestsellers by Format

2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 Hardcover Fiction 203 202 251 273 268 Hardcover Nonfiction 199 222 269 267 288 Mass Market 200 196 290 264 291 Trade Paperback 84 122 187 226 218

The above table indicates the number of titles that appeared on the bestseller lists in each format during the given year.

2013 was the first time that the numbers reflected the top 25 books for each list; previous calculations were based on the top 15.

PWs 2015 Longest-running Bestsellers

Hardcover

Weeks on the

2015 top-25 lists Fiction 49 *The Girl on the Train

Paula Hawkins.

Riverhead 43 The Nightingale

Kristin Hannah.

St. Martins 23 *Go Set a Watchman

Lee Harper.

Harper 22 All the Light We Cannot See

Anthony Doerr.

Scribner (33) 18 Gray Mountain

John Grisham.

Doubleday (9) 17 Luckiest Girl Alive

Jessica Knoll.

Simon & Schuster 16 *Girl in the Spiders Web

David Lagercrantz.

Knopf

Weeks on the

2015 top-25 lists Nonfiction 45 *The Life-Changing Magic of

Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of

Decluttering and Organizing

Marie Kondo.

Ten Speed (3) 41 Being Mortal: Medicine and What

Matters Most in the End

Atul Gawande.

Metropolitan (11) 32 Thug Kitchen Party Grub

Thug Kitchen.

Rodale (10) 28 *Dead Wake:

The Last Crossing of the Lusitania

Erik Larson.

Crown 25 Get Whats Yours: The Secret of

Maxing Out Your Social Security

Laurence Kotlikoff, Philip Moeller,

and Paul Solman.

Simon & Schuster 25 *The Wright Brothers

David McCullough.

Simon & Schuster 24 The Whole 30: The 30-Day Guide to

Total Health and Food Freedom

Melissa and Dallas Harting.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 22 Yes Please

Amy Poehler.

Morrow/Dey Street (8) 22 Between the World and Me

Ta-Nehisi Coates.

Random/Spiegel & Grau 21 *Killing Patton:

The Strange Death of World

War IIs Most Audacious

General

Bill OReilly and Martin Dugard.

Holt 20 The Road to Character

David Brooks.

Random House 19 *The 20/20 Diet: Turn Your

Weight Loss Vision into Reality

Phil McGraw.

Bird Street 18 What If? Serious Scientific Answers to

Absurd Hypothetical Questions

Randall Munroe.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (16) 17 *Bill OReillys Legends and Lies:

The Real West

Bill OReilly and David Fisher.

Holt 16 Money Master the Game:

Simple Steps to Financial

Freedom

Tony Robbins.

Simon & Schuster (5) 16 Guinness World Records 2016

Guinness World Records.

Guinness World Publishing 15 You Can, You Will

Joel Osteen.

Faithwords (12)

Paperback

Weeks on the

2015 top-25 lists Mass Market 27 *American Sniper (movie tie-in)

Chris Kyle.

Harper 18 *Gray Mountain

John Grisham.

Dell 18 The Longest Ride (movie tie-in)

Nicholas Sparks.

Grand Central 18 *The Martian (movie tie-in)

Andy Weir.

Broadway 15 The Escape

David Baldacci.

Vision

Weeks on the

2015 top-25 lists Trade 48 The 5 Love Languages:

The Secret to Love that Lasts

Gary Chapman.

Northfield 44 *The Martian

Andy Weir.

Broadway (8) 32 *American Sniper (movie tie-in)

Chris Kyle.

Morrow (9) 32 Creative Cats Coloring Book

Marjorie Sarnat.

Dover 29 I Am Malala:

The Girl Who Stood Up for Education

and Was Shot by the Taliban

Malala Yousafzai.

LB/Back Bay 29 Adult Coloring Book:

Stress Relieving Patterns

Blue Star Editors.

Blue Star 28 *Unbroken:

A World War II Story of Survival,

Resilience, and Redemption

Lauren Hillenbrand.

Random House (21) 27 *Grey: Fifty Shades of Grey as Told

by Christian

E.L. James.

Vintage 24 The Husbands Secret

Diane Moriarty.

Berkley 24 Owls Coloring Book

Marjorie Sarnat.

Dover 23 The Boys in the Boat:

Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest

for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics

Daniel James Brown.

Penguin (30) 22 10-Day Green Smoothie Cleanse

JJ Smith.

Atria (27) 21 *The Goldfinch

Donna Tartt.

LB/Back Bay 20 Unbroken (movie tie-in)

Lauren Hillenbrand.

Random House (7) 18 Still Alice (movie tie-in)

Lisa Genova.

S&S/Gallery 18 The Martian (movie tie-in)

Andy Weir.

Broadway 17 *Leaving Time

Jodi Picoult.

Ballantine 16 Everything I Never Told You

Celeste Ng.

Penguin 15 Wild: From Lost to Found on the

Pacific Crest Trail (movie tie-in)

Cheryl Strayed.

Vintage (5) 15 Euphoria

Lily King.

Grove 15 *A Work in Progress: A Memoir

Connor Franta.

Atria/Keywords 15 Color Me Calm

Lucky Mucklow and Angela Porter.

Race Point

*These titles achieved the #1 spot at least once on PWs weekly top-25 lists in 2015.

The number in parentheses indicates how many weeks the title spent on PWs top-25 lists prior to 2015.

Ranking the Houses: How the Divisions and Imprints Competed in 2015

Publisher Books Weeks Adult Hardcover Putnam 35 157 Simon & Schuster 32 177 St. Martins 31 125 Little, Brown 23 150 Morrow 21 81 Knopf 20 98 HarperCollins 20 75 Grand Central 19 68 Ballantine 15 77 Random House 14 63 Dutton 12 38 Gallery 11 58 Bantam 11 56 Delacorte 11 50 Doubleday 11 45 HMH 9 53 Viking 9 22 Thomas Nelson 9 20 Scribner 8 68 Holt 8 62 Clarkson Potter 8 35 Crown 8 59 Atria 8 26 Spiegel & Grau 7 58 Dey Street 6 45 Faithwords 6 44 Threshold 5 27 Penguin Press 5 23 Twelve 5 19 Howard 5 14 Farrar, Straus & Giroux 5 13 LucasBooks 5 12 Flatiron 5 12 Harmony 5 10 Prima Games 5 6 Ten Speed 4 51 Crown Archetype 4 18 Regnery 4 17 Minotaur 4 13 Norton 4 11 Hay House 4 9 Avery 4 5 DC Comics 4 4 Del Rey 4 4 Portfolio 4 4 Wizards of the Coast 4 4 Sentinel 3 15 Broadside 3 14 Tyndale 3 12 Blue Rider 3 9 Riverhead 3 9 Artisan 3 8 Ecco 3 8 Crown Business 3 7 NAL 3 6 Berkley 3 6 Ace 3 4 Pantheon 3 4 Penguin 3 4 Guinness 2 8 Emily Bestler 2 18 Regan Arts 2 10 Broadman & Holman 2 9 Ripley 2 9 Celebra 2 5 HarperBusiness 2 5 Roc 2 4 Running Press 2 3 St. Martins Griffin 2 2 Thomas Dunne 2 2 Orbit 2 2 Metropolitan 1 41 Bird Street 1 19 Triumph 1 9 Center Street 1 9 Marion Wood 1 8 Bloomsbury 1 3 Golden Books 1 3 37 Ink 1 2 Kingswell 1 2 Crown Forum 1 2 Greenleaf 1 2 Free Press 1 2 Prime Test Kitchen 1 2 Quirk 1 2 Mass Market Harlequin 47 114 Mira 37 174 Zebra 21 94 Pocket 20 66 Jove 18 74 Pinnacle 18 57 Berkley 16 74 Signet 16 67 Vision 14 101 St. Martins 13 41 Grand Central 12 74 Silhouette 11 42 Avon 11 31 Love Inspired 10 15 Dell 9 75 Bantam 9 45 Ballantine 9 43 Harper 7 51 Broadway 3 34 Minotaur 2 3 Little, Brown 1 4 Kensington 1 3 Anchor 1 1 Merriam-Webster 1 1 Penguin 1 1 Trade Paper Grand Central 19 117 Berkley 13 78 Broadway 7 101 Vintage 7 69 Back Bay 6 73 Penguin 6 69 Gallery 6 38 Bantam 6 23 Thomas Nelson 6 7 Random House 5 56 Americas Test Kitchen 5 9 Image Comics 5 10 Viz 5 5 Dover 4 58 Harmony 4 7 Morrow 3 34 Atria 3 24 Mira 3 13 St. Martins Griffin 3 11 Plume 3 10 Triumph 3 10 Tyndale 3 8 Bethany 3 5 Harlequin 3 5 Kodansha 3 3 Blue Star 2 42 Dey Street 2 19 B&H 2 24 Lark 2 17 Fox Chapel 2 12 Touchstone 2 11 Ballantine 2 9 Mariner 2 9 World Almanac 2 5 Zondervan 2 5 Barbour 2 3 Clarkson Potter 2 3 Avon 2 3 Cogin 2 3 Flatiron 2 2 Oxmoor House 2 2 Abingdon 2 2 Forever 2 2 Grove 1 15 Riverhead 1 10 Howard 1 6 Simon & Schuster 1 6 Spiegel & Grau 1 6 Worthy 1 5 Revell 1 5 Anchor 1 4 Scribner 1 3 Center Street 1 3 Weinstein 1 3 HMH 1 3 Christian Art Center 1 2 Chronicle 1 2 American Diabetes Assn. 1 2 Andrews McMeel 1 2 Baker 1 2 Dunham 1 2 HarperOne 1 2 Love Inspired 1 2 Harper Thorsson 1 2 NAL 1 2 Zebra 1 2

Note: Publishers of hardcovers and trade paperbacks that had a single title hit the lists for just one week are not included in the ranking.

Correction: The "Ranking the Houses" chart has been updated with data for Simon & Schuster imprints Atria, Emily Bestler, and 37 Ink.
At the Movies

The top science fiction title in December was Andy Weirs The Martian. In fact, the book took the top three spots on our monthly list, with two movie tie-in editions and a conventional trade paper edition. (The hardcover is #10).) SF continues to ride high this month, not only with Star Wars: The Force Awakens (and its associated publishing machine), but also with the film adaptation of The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey, in theaters January 22. The tie-in edition is the #6 book overall, and the conventional trade paper is at #10, with 18.9K and 16K print units respectively. The second book in the series pubbed in November and is at #6 in childrens frontlist fiction.

The Revenant was optioned for film before its 2002 publication and finally hit theaters on Christmas. The buzz around the Leonardo DiCaprio vehicle stirred up plenty of enthusiasm for Michael Punkes historical novel: the books review was the most-read one on our site in 2015, and the conventional trade paper sold more than 39K print units this year. The movie tie-in edition debuts this week on our trade paper list this week at #6, with almost 10K print units sold.

Other movies to watch for include The Choice, based on the 2007 novel by Nicholas Sparks, opening February 5. Two tie-in editions are in their second week on our lists. The mass market tie-in debuted last week at #2, and this week takes the top spot, with 22K print units sold; its the #5 book overall. The trade paper tie-in moves up six notches this week to #2, with 16K print units sold.

The film 13 Hours, based on Mitchell Zuckoffs 2014 account of the attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, opens January 15; the movie tie-in edition debuts this week at #23 in trade paper.

In all, nine tie-in editions of seven movies appear on our mass market and trade paper lists, and another two are on the childrens fiction list. If Netflix and chill was the euphemism of 2015, perhaps 2016 will be the year of read the book and chill.

(See all of this week's bestselling books.)

Best Intentions

The new year brings a raft of releases aimed at the resolution-making crowd. Ann Cuddys Presence, which offers readers confidence-building techniques, moves up in its second week on our list, from #11 to #6 with 9,874 print units sold. Debuting at #8 with 7,705 print units sold, Joel Osteens Fresh Start, an evangelical title, promises readers that the new you begins today.

Selfie-concious makeovers are found in The Shred Power Cleanse by Ian K. Smith, landing at #14 with 6,412 print units sold, and Become a Fat-Burning Machine by Mike Berland, at #24 with 4,395 print units sold. And at least one older title had a big week: The Whole 30, which pubbed in April 2015, is up 66% over last week, returning to our hardcover nonfiction list (at #5, 10K print units sold) for the first time in months.

Of Note

Engagement season, which is said to last from Thanksgiving to Valentines Day, is in full swing, as a quick glance at your Facebook and Instagram feeds will confirm. At least one book is reaping the benefits: The Knot Ultimate Wedding Planner & Organizer by Carley Roney, which is up 22% this week compared to last week. With sales of 4,113 print units, the nuptial binder had its best week since its 2013 release.

Top 10 Overall

Rank Title Author Imprint Units 1 The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up Marie Kondo Ten Speed 32,576 2 Old School (Wimpy Kid #10) Jeff Kinney Abrams/Amulet 32,058 3 Lost Ocean Johanna Basford Penguin 27,033 4 Enchanted Forest Johanna Basford Laurence King 23,252 5 The Choice (movie tie-in) Nicholas Sparks Grand Central 22,123 6 The 5th Wave (movie tie-in) Rick Yancey Penguin/Speak 18,900 7 Last One Home Debbie Macomber Ballantine 18,692 8 Secret Garden Johanna Basford Laurence King 17,914 9 Star Wars: The Force Awakens Visual Dictionary Pablo Hidalgo DK 16,687 10 The 5th Wave Rick Yancey Penguin/Speak 16,250

All unit sales per Nielsen BookScan except where noted.
To accommodate increased demand, the American Booksellers Association is growing its annual postholiday gathering, which this year takes place in Denver from January 23 to 26. Attendance had previously been capped at 500 booksellers to maintain an intimate atmosphere, but the number will increase at Winter Institute 11.

Much of this years programming is centered on best practices for booksellers, with several programs directed specifically at childrens booksellers, including Partnering for Diversity and Getting the Most Out of Your ARCs. Other sessions look at such topics as inventory management, returns, and human resources. There will also be plenty of opportunities to meet authors. Both the general authors reception and the one with small and university press authors are back. Authors will also give morning keynote addresses and appear on the panel Authors, Agents, and BooksellersUnited for a Fair Marketplace, featuring Authors Guild president Roxana Robinson and council member Douglas Preston, who founded Authors United.

This years conference is also going mobile for the first time. A new app from CrowdCompass by Cvent is available for iOS and Android devices, as well as for desktop computers. It includes a complete schedule of events, updated frequently, and maps of Denver and WI 11related hotels. Users can post to Twitter and LinkedIn from the app and complete event evaluations.

ABA CEO Oren Teicher sums up what is important about this years institute and where bookselling is heading in the following letter, which he sent out at the end of last year.

A Letter from ABA CEO Oren Teicher on the Eve of WI 11

I am pleased to be able to report that the state of indie bookselling remains strong. For the first three quarters of 2015, sales across the indie channel were up over 2014, and, whats more, a number of stores have reported increases in profitability. This tells us that indie stores are continuing to innovate and to adaptand, as a result, are running their stores more efficiently and profitably.

That commitment to innovation is what fuels the Winter Institute, and it has undoubtedly become one of the highlights of the annual bookselling calendar. This year more booksellers than ever will be joining us in January in Denver, and, while weve grown the event to accommodate increased demand from both booksellers and publishers, we are determined not to lose the institutes overall intimacy and its ability to maximize one-on-one interaction among attendees.

WI 11 will present the broadest program yet, including advanced learning opportunities, and we could not be more delighted with our roster of plenary speakers, featured talks, and educational sessions. We are very excited about the new Backlist Book Swap, as well as the opportunity for attendees to be able to visit some wonderful bookstores in the Denver area the day before WI 11 opens. With help and guidance from ABAs Education Task Force, Booksellers Advisory Council, and board of directors, the ABA staff have been hard at work in planning for this years institute. We can hardly wait for it to begin! And were extremely grateful for the participation of all the booksellers who taking part in WI 11s panels and sessions, and for the institutes many sponsors, especially our lead sponsor, Ingram.

Looking ahead to 2016, indie booksellers face a number of significant challenges everything from intensifying competition from online retailers to changes in minimum wage to significant increases in the cost of real estatebut its clear that, now more than ever, independent bookstores are the prime venue for the discovery of new titles and new authors, not to mention the sustained sales of backlist. Putting the right book in the hands of readers and book buyers continues to be the central mission of indie booksellers, and Im confident that they will continue to discover new and exciting ways to do just that.

Below, more on WI 11

Denver is a real boomtown right now, says Len Vlahos, who with his wife, Kristen Gilligan, is the new owner of Tattered Cover Book Store, which has four branches in the greater Denver metropolitan area and three at Denver International Airport.

Last years inaugural national Independent Bookstore Day, which coincided with Free Comic Book Day on May 2, was a huge success.

Over the past year, Peter Hildick-Smith, founder and CEO of the Codex Group, and Kristen McLean, director of new business development for Nielsen Book, have been following several industry developments that could well shape book sales going forward.

As part of his Sunday morning presentation, consumer expert Martin Lindstrom, author of the soon-to-be-published Small Data: The Tiny Clues That Uncover Huge Trends, selected five booksellers for an onstage business review.

A selection of adult and childrens authors to meet at this years Winter Instituteand what makes their books notable.
This story was edited Jan. 12, 2016 to correct the length of the sentence handed Brandon McNeal.

A Moline man has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for being a felon in possession of a firearm.

Brandon McNeal, 24, also was ordered by Chief U.S. District Judge James E. Shadid to serve a three-year term of supervised release after his prison term.

Mr. McNeal pleaded guilty to the charge on Sept. 11. He was sentenced Friday in the Rock Island Division of the U.S. District Court.

In a separate case, Chief Judge Shadid sentenced to Hasan Stoner, 23, of Country Club Hills, Ill., to 37 months in federal prison, followed by two years of supervised release, for being a felon in possession of a firearm.

Mr. Stoner entered a guilty plea to the charge on Sept. 11, 2015.

Both cases were prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney John Mehochko. The charges were the result of investigations by the Moline Police Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigations Quad Cities Federal Gang Task Force, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
The Illinois State Board of Elections on Thursday rejected nominating petitions from Elizabeth Pahlke of Arlington Heights. A hearing officer found Pahlke didn't file proper paperwork and signatures. Some of her petitions contained what Pahlke described as mud, grass and "bird signatures."

Kirk now faces one opponent on March 15: James Marter, a businessman from Oswego who says he's more conservative than Kirk.

The winner of the GOP primary will face Democratic U.S. Rep. Tammy Duckworth, state Sen. Napoleon Harris or former Chicago Urban League CEO Andrea Zopp in the November general election.
DAVENPORT -- Kentucky Senator and Republican presidential nominee hopeful Rand Paul had 1,019 reasons to celebrate Friday evening at a birthday party held in his honor at the River Music Experience, 129 N. Main St.

Sen. Paul, who turned 53 on Thursday, announced to the decidedly young crowd of about 150 that he had 1,019 precinct captains in the state of Iowa.

"That's almost, or maybe a little bit more than, two-thirds of all the precincts, which means we will have people there to organize on caucus night, people to speak in favor of my candidacy," Sen. Paul said. "It's a significant milestone because I don't think there's any other presidential candidate that has announced any kind of extensive precinct captain list."

During his short three-minute speech, Sen. Paul asked if there was anyone there who believed in the right to be left alone, which drew thunderous applause and cheers.

"One of the most cherished of rights among civilized men and women is the right to be left alone," Sen. Paul said. "I want a government that is so small you can barely see it. I want a government that leaves us alone in our economic lives, leaves us alone in our personal lives, and I want a budget that balances every year."

In an interview before the event, Sen. Paul said he thinks they are doing "really well" with getting his father Ron Paul's supporters to support him. He said two of his father's co-chairs are now serving in the same role for him.

"We think well over 95 percent of the people who supported my dad are sticking with us," Sen. Paul said.

Sen. Paul told the media that he has an advantage this election cycle because the college students are back in school and ready to support him. He also said that he believes older people will support him as well because he is a fiscal conservative.

"I think most people, particularly retired folks, don't like the idea of the government borrowing so much money and going into debt," Sen. Paul said. "They came up from a generation where they knew they had to balance their own family books, and so I think that they are with me on the idea of being fiscally conservative."

In the lobby before the event, guests were invited to sign an over-sized birthday card, which was presented to him prior to his speech. Afterwards guests lined up to meet the senator and have pictures taken with him.

Matt Hotvedt, 19, of Maquoketa, said he made the 40-minute trip to Davenport to hear Sen. Paul speak and hopefully get to talk to him.

"I really like his sincerity," Mr. Hotvedt said. "I appreciate his values. I am Lutheran, and his religiousness appeals to me."

Dale Boege, 85, of Eldridge, said he thought he might be the oldest person at the event. He said he believes Sen. Paul has a chance because polls are "inclusive but not conclusive."

"I always liked the attitude he and his dad conveyed for years, and I just wanted to see what kind of a following he was developing," Mr. Boege said. "I just wanted to see it for myself.

Sen. Paul is tied for seventh in Iowa with support from 2.6 percent of Republican voters, according to a composite of five major polls by Real Clear Politics. The numbers are an average from Dec. 7 through Jan. 7.
Via the Jamaica Observer: Barbados monitors 8 suspected cases of Zika virus - News. Excerpt:

The Ministry of Health says it is monitoring eight suspected cases of the Zika virus.

At a press conference on Friday, Minister of Health John Boyce said samples will be sent to the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) in Trinidad and Tobago for confirmatory testing and the results will be shared with the public as soon as the ministry receives word from the agency.

In the wake of this, Boyce has warned the public to be on alert and use simple measures to prevent mosquito breeding around our homes, business places and communities.

The fact that the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which transmits the Zika virus, is the same mosquito that spreads dengue fever and chikungunya, we are all very familiar with the prevention and control measures which we need to undertake Inspect your surroundings to search out and remove mosquito-breeding places on your properties. The Ministry of Health recommends that this should be done once per week.
Ford is going all-in on bringing Apple CarPlay and Android Auto to the auto dashboard:

Ford is making Apple CarPlay and Android Auto available on all 2017 vehicles equipped with Sync 3 in North America, starting with the all-new Ford Escape. Owners of 2016 vehicles equipped with Sync 3 will get an opportunity to upgrade later in the year, the company said without providing details.

What this means is that, beginning with 2017 auto models, the new car will essentially become a smartphone with wheels.

You need to wrap your head around this in order to appreciate what it does and doesnt mean for folks in the radio business. So let me rephrase: CarPlay and Android Auto are not about simply substituting one type of audio content (radio) for another, they are about literally installing wheels on that most precious and personal of electronic devices, the smartphone.

From CIO.com:

The car company is adding these capabilities in line with its strategy to provide higher integration between car functions and smartphone apps. It aims for example to use its Sync Connect technology to let users remotely lock and unlock cars, check fuel levels, and locate and start a vehicle using a smartphone.

When you can start a car with your phone, the wheels belong to the phone, not the car.

This means (at least) three things for folks in the radio business:

First, it means that content itself must get more magnetic, more special, more unique, more expensive, more valuable  or else.

Ford claims there are more than 15 million Sync-equipped vehicles on roads around the world currently, with 43 million expected by 2020, a scant four years from now. The days where we could rely on habit and convenience and ease-of-use as the driving forces (pun intended) for radio usage in cars  those days are winding down or, as it were, running out of gas. Were moving to an era where folks will act according to their deepest desires in a space where anything is possible.

Second, it means that radio needs to rethink its business models especially when so much of its business comes from folks sitting in traffic. If youre not planning for a much larger fraction of your business to come from non-spot revenue, then youre not planning at all.

ts interesting to see this play out in the podcasting space, where there is no legacy advertising model for even the leading podcasters to lean on.

Take Welcome to Night Vale, a very popular podcast that had its best year ever in 2015. Consider the monetization portfolio of this podcast and note that nowhere do I list traditional interruptive ads:

Finally, it means that radio needs to ask much bigger questions about what it means to bring your content to the kind of mobile platform with four wheels, now powered by the smartphone. Do you think it will be enough to simply simulcast your over-the-air stream? Well, unless your content is more magnetic, more special, more unique, more expensive, and more valuable, then youre wrong.

Its interesting to see this play out in the podcasting space, where there is no legacy advertising model for even the leading podcasters to lean on.

Mark Ramsey is a veteran media strategist, researcher, and trend-maker who has worked with numerous media, publishing, and digital brands.

You can contact Mark Ramsey by heading to his website markramseymedia.com
The Killid Group, January 9, 2016

Going to school is fraught with danger in provinces like Takhar, Sar-e Pol, Baghlan, Parwan, Nangarhar, Kunduz, Helmand and Badakhshan. Schools have been targeted and buildings blown up by Taleban and other armed anti-government fighters.

Nearly 10 million students  a little less than half girls  are affected. While Killids research points to roughly 780 closed schools in 34 provinces, the Ministry of Education, claims a third of the number.

Helmand: Sardar Mohammad is an assistant teacher in the Helmand education department. He says some 170 schools are closed in the province. Most of them in Marja, Sangeen, Musa Kala, Kajaki, Greshk, Nadali, Nawzad and Markaz Babaji areas. One hundred and four of the Helmands 454 schools have been closed for the past three or four years. Sixty nine shut recently because of security threats. The number of enrolled students in the province is 192,500 including 51,867 girls.

Zabul: Some 150 schools have been closed for 10 years in Zabul province. Rahimullah Ludin is the head of education department in Zabul province. He says 60 percent of children are unable to go to school. The worst affected are districts like Shahjoy, Daichopan, Arghandab, Shamelzi and Shinkai. Some 9,800 of the 46,035 children enrolled in schools are girls.



A school in Badakshan. Low standards of schools are a big problem in Afghanistan, not given any importance. (Photo: RAWA.org)

More Photos A school in Badakshan. Low standards of schools are a big problem in Afghanistan, not given any importance. (Photo: RAWA.org)

Kandahar: The number of schools closed due to conflict in the province is 140. Nazar Mohammad Samimi, information officer in the provincial education department says schools have been closed for the last 13 years in Registan and Shorbak. There are some 318 functioning schools. The total number of school-going students in Kandahar is 263,000 students (70,000 girls).

Uruzgan: Among the worst affected, 60 schools are closed in Choora, Dehrawad, Gizab, Nesh and Khas Ruzgan. Allah Dad, the assistant teacher in the education department, says the schools have been shut since 2012. Of the 292 registered schools in Uruzgan, 232 are active and enrolled some 71,000 students including 3,000 girls.

Farah: Some 54 of the 367 schools are closed in the province. Mohammad Sarwar who is administrative assistant in the Farah education department says schools are shut in Khak Safed, Bakwah, Posht Road, Shebkoh and Balabolook. The number of enrolled students is 125,300. A little more than half are female.

Nangarhar: There are 40 closed schools located mostly in Chin, Koot, Batikoot and Chaparhar districts. Mohammad Asef Shinwarai, information officer, Nangarhar education department says the schools were closed because of threats of violence from Daesh (Islamic State) fighters. Previously 59 schools were closed but because of the efforts of village elders, 19 have reopened. These are in areas where military operations have taken place against Daesh. Some 820,000 students are enrolled in schools in the province. There are 475,000 boys and 345,000 girls.

Schools in Paktika, Paktia, Ghazni and Nimroz are among those less affected.

Paktika: Kochai who heads the education department says six schools have been closed for three years. Twenty seven shut two months ago as violence flared. Some 158,983 students are studying in 361 schools in the province. Only 29,500 are female.

Ghazni: There are 32 closed schools. Unfortunately not a single school is open in Nawa district. Mohammad Abed Abed, head of the provincial education department told Killid the situation in Zanakhan district was previously the same as in Nawa. Now the schools are open once again. The worst affected are the districts of Khogiani, Dehyak, Ajrestan and Andar. In Ghazni, 380,000 students are studying in 635 schools. There are 171,000 females.

Paktia: Some 28 out of 353 schools are closed. The affected districts are mainly Sayed Karam, Dandpatan, Zadran and Chamkani. Luqman Hakim, head of education in Paktia, says schools were shut because of security concerns or personal differences. According to Luqman, 203,000 students are studying in the 325 schools. There are 60893 girls and 143,017 boys.

Nimroz: Twenty three schools are shut in districts such as Char Borjak, Chakhansoor and Khashroad because of security threats, says Abdul Wahed Hekmat in the education department. The remaining 135 schools in the province have admitted 85,000 students  40,000 are girls.

The situation is uncertain in many other provinces. Schools have been closed for the last three weeks in Kunduz.

Destroyed schools

The Ministry of Education says it has no statistics for the number of schools blown up or set on fire by Taleban and anti-government forces. Kabir Haqmal, head of publication department in the ministry says some 100 schools were partly destroyed in 2014.

Killids research reveals 22 schools were razed to the ground. The break-up is 12 schools in Logar, 4 in Parwan, 2 in Ghazni and one school each in Farah, Faryab, Ghor and Kunar.

There are thousands of schools running out of tents and in the open including in Kabul. Eighty one of the 273 schools in the Afghan capital function out of make-shift premises. The state of schools is equally dismal in the provinces. Half the schools in Kunduz do not have buildings; the ratio is more than half in Takhar. Out of 458 schools in Kandahar, 274 have no building. Schoolchildren in only 97 of Sar-e Pols 388 schools have a roof over their heads.

Originally published on Dec. 28, 2015
Think the Middle East is complicated? Need a scorecard to identify the players on the field? Confused about who's doing what to whom and why? Join the club.

But if you want a handy road map to help guide you through 2016, keep your eye focused on the following four realities. Pay attention to the day-to-day headlines, but don't lose sight of the trends. These four in particular will continue to define the landscape of this broken, angry, and dysfunctional region.

The Saudi-Iranian rivalry: No relationship between any two Middle East countries can purport to represent the region as whole. But the intensifying rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran may come close. Embodied in this competition are broader political, religious and sectarian tensions between Sunnis and Shia, and a struggle for regional influence and power between a rising Iran and a defensive and uncharacteristically risk-ready Saudi Arabia. These two also represent increasingly formalized alliances. Indeed, the struggle for Syria reflects a clash between a Sunni axis that includes Saudi Arabia; the United Arab Emirates; Kuwait and Egypt on some issues; and a variety of Sunnis militias. This grouping faces up against a Shiite bloc, led by Iran, including Hezbollah; what's left of the Assad regime; and pro-Iraq Shia militias.

Two important outside powers have aligned with each bloc - Turkey with its fellow Sunnis, and Russia with the Iran-led Shiite axis. This Saudi-Iranian cold war will likely remain a proxy struggle, but it could turn hot. Remember that regardless of its intensity at any given moment, this rivalry is not going away. Hardliners on both sides will continue to stir up trouble, and clashing regional interests will do the rest.

The meltdown of the Arab State: The Middle East isn't disintegrating, but the concept of the Arab state is under severe duress. Three kinds of situations present themselves: failed or failing states (Yemen, Libya, and Syria); dysfunctional polities that will continue to wrestle with huge, chronic political and economic challenges (Iraq, Egypt); and the functional states, largely in the Gulf, that have survived the Arab Spring intact. Most intriguing is the case of Saudi Arabia, where falling oil prices, rising deficits, cutbacks in social welfare benefits, and concern about internal opposition contrast with a preternatural stability and capacity to survive - and recently even to project power. Yet it is stunning to observe that the most functional and capable states in the region are the three non-Arab states: Turkey, Iran, and Israel. With all their problems, these states still manage to wield substantial economic and military power and influence. While Arab states such as Jordan, Tunisia, and Morocco continue to hold their own, the trend for the major states in the Arab world is likely to be continued dysfunction, lack of effective reform, and in some cases, near-fragmentation.

Transnational actors: The vacuum created by the absence of state authority has allowed a number of transnational actors to exert power. This isn't just a case of a sensational headline or two about the rise of the Islamic State. It's a regional phenomenon that is here to stay.

Just look around the region. In Lebanon, Hezbollah has emerged as the most important actor, using and defying state authority. Hamas has staked out a separate fiefdom in Gaza and challenges the Palestinian Authority and Israel. In Libya, ISIS has carved out its own territory, as have several al-Qaeda affiliates. In Yemen, the Houthis and al-Qaeda have made a mockery of state authority. And despite the success of the Iraqi military in Ramadi, the Kurds and pro-Iranian Shiite militias dominate in certain areas of the country. Indeed, empty spaces, bad or no governance, sectarian tensions between Sunnis and Shia, and just plain mistrust of centralized authority will ensure that local actors consolidate their control while transnational groups spread their influence.

The role of the United States: Even if we weren't in the eighth year of the Obama Administration, with the President running out of time and influence to address the challenges of the region, the situation for the United States in the Middle East would be pretty grim. There isn't a single problem -- from Iran's putative quest for a nuclear weapon, to stabilizing Syria or Iraq, to the unresolved Israeli-Palestinian problem, to defeating ISIS - that has an American or even a regional solution. There's no real leadership in the Middle East, nor does Washington have reliable partners. The recent Iranian-Saudi rivalry has left the United States somewhere in the middle - mistrusted and disliked from Tehran to Riyadh - without the clout to do much about the rising Sunni-Shiite sectarian and political struggle.

Ousting ISIS from Ramadi was indeed a milestone, but hardly a turning point in a near-futile effort to rebuild a unified Iraqi polity. Though weakened in Iraq and Syria, ISIS has jumped its borders, and the group now spreads its influence by inspiring rather than directing its jihadist terror. Important international players such as Russia and Turkey have overlapping goals with the United States in certain respects, but a fundamentally different agenda in others, such as their stance toward the Kurds or visions for a political transition in Syria. The Iranian nuclear deal is being implemented even while Tehran continues to play an unhelpful role in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen.

As we move into 2016, the Middle East is going to continue to be a broken, angry, and dysfunctional place. Indeed, the four trends discussed above all but guarantee it. There is scant room for dramatic improvement, and a great deal more space for further deterioration. As for the United States, amid all the region's uncertainties, one thing is clear. Whether it's an R or a D, a he or a she, in the White House in 2017, the next president will confront a Middle East filled with missions impossible, long shots, and lost causes. Count on it.

(AP photo)
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Via CIDRAP, Lisa Schnirring writes: New MCR-1 reports warn of untreatable infection threat. Excerpt:

The newly identified MCR-1 resistance gene has been detected in six more countries, along with worrisome signs that it can appear alongside other resistance genes, which would make some infections untreatable, according to reports yesterday from several research groups.

At least 17 countries have now reported the MCR-1 gene, which disables the last-line antibiotic colistin, an older drug that isn't often used in humans but is commonly used for raising food animals.

The newest reportsbased on studies of existing bacteria collectionsplace the gene in Germany, Vietnam, Cambodia, Japan, Switzerland, and Belgium.

The MCR-1 gene was first reported by Chinese researchers in the middle of November. Since then, scientists in other countries have been looking in lab sample archives to gather more clues about its spread. The new findings appear in eight separate reports in The Lancet Infectious Diseases and follow a similar gush of new findings published in the same journal on Dec 17.

Most of today's reports detail findings in livestock or their environments, but three detections involve humans: a German patient, a Cambodian child who was hospitalized in 2012, and an elderly Swiss man who had no history of travel abroad.

Multi-country findings in farm animals

In one of the reports, German researchers looked for the gene in a database of 577 whole-genome sequences collected from people, animals, and the environment in Germany since 2009. They found the MCR-1 gene in four Escherichia coli samplesthree from swine and one from the wound of an infected human. One was from 2010, which the authors said shows that transmission of colistin resistance in Germany's animal population isn't a recent occurrence.

An alarming finding was that all of the colistin-resistant isolates they found were also resistant to either third-generation cephalosporins or carbapenems. "Our data suggest that the advent of untreatable infections has already arrived," the team wrote.
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The technical school bigwig launched Google Compare for mortgages on Monday, which may permit potential home consumers to search out and compare home loans.

People everywhere in the globe use Google Earth to zoom in on their childhood homes, show friends their backyards, or scrutinize the roads of a house they may wish to shop for. However, that's previous news.

When wanting to shop for a home, consultants advocate looking around to search out the simplest mortgage terms. With Google Compare, users are able to enter personal data, together with property worth, payment size and approximate credit score, to urge tailored results. The results also will show lenders' ratings and reviews.

Homeowners can even use the tool to finance their mortgages. The product is presently solely accessible in California, however the corporation plans to expand into different states.

Note that Google proscribed its services thereto of a broker, not a loaner. So as for the service to be liberated to customers, Google says it's "compensated by mortgage loaners" while not endorsing any lender especially. Google has partnered with Zillow and Lending Tree, together with different disposition partners, to power a lot of the disposition information the Compare tool uses.

Google's newest tool follows its different Compare options, together with the Google Compare Machine Insurance and Compare Credit Cards. The corporation has not declared when it plans to expand the Compare Mortgage feature to the remainder of the country, however they have already tested the tool on a bigger scale within the U.K.

Google recognized that lender cooperation is dependent on a more adaptable cost per lead model, which features the firm is hired by mortgage lenders. The said tools add on Google Compare, which let users purchase for credit card offers and insurance quotes. Let us know what you think about this news, by leaving your comments below.
Via a very interesting blog called Epi Response, Dr. Rebecca Christofferson of Lousiana State University writes a Zika Rant. Excerpt and then a comment:

I want Zika to be sexy just like anybody else looking to get funded. But this and the media reports supported by "experts" and the blog posts associated with journals from scientists who are touting this as a done deal are irresponsible. Notice, this has only happened in Brazil. Of all the 10s of countries to have Zika in the past decade, only Brazil.

Here's why: What if it isn't Zika? What if it is an environmental toxin? Media and health officials perpetuating this "We know what it is!" myth are encouraging further risk. Behavior, control, FUNDING, etc. will be biased to this assumption. And what if it isn't Zika? Then the investigation for the actual casual mechanism will suffer.

I've had the same feeling for weeks. It may be that it's actually psychologically comforting to attribute a new outbreak of microcephaly with the arrival of a new and relatively unknown disease.

After all, what's the alternative? Do the Brazilians have to start doing surveillance for a host of known and unknown other diseases, plus environmental toxins? The sheer scale of such an effort would be dauntingat least if it's Zika, mosquito control is more or less feasible.

Still, Zika remains unproven as the causal agent of the microcephaly outbreak in Brazil and the post-Zika neurological problems reported in French Polynesia.

I'm adding Epi Response to the Bloggers list, and I look forward to more posts (and rants) from Dr. Christofferson.
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News last week that the Redding Rancheria Economic Development Corp. has a new president, Arthur Smithson, got us wondering what became of its former head, Joe Murphy.

Turns out Murphy, the son of tribal chairwoman Barbara Murphy, quietly has become the new owner of WaterWorks Park in Redding.

Murphy paid $2.9 million for the 8.9-acre park on Lake Boulevard, according to county records.

Sellers were longtime owners David and Barbara Enns of Vancouver, British Columbia.

The buyer was Yanaco Inc. Murphy's listed as Yanaco's president. The firm's name is an apparent reference to the north state band of American Indians. The deal closed in May. When we interviewed WaterWorks manager Shawn Patterson in August for an "It's Your Business" profile on the park, he declined to name the new owner.

Murphy couldn't be reached for comment.

The 20-year-old park is one of Redding's major summer fun sites, attracting about 100,000 visitors during its roughly 100-day season, which stretches from Memorial Day to Labor Day. In season, it has 140 employees.

Construction's under way on a new attraction, an enclosed flume ride. Keeping the park exciting is expensive. The Avalanche, the most popular ride in recent years, is a 34-foot-high half-pipe built at a 59 degree angle that generates 3 "G"s and lots of screams. When built in 2000, it cost $313,000 -- cheap by today's standards, Patterson said.

And there are other big bills -- liability insurance ($80,000 this year), workers' compensation ($54,000) and utilities ($10,000 a month for electricity in season).



President speaks

Last week's lead "Buzz" on contractors' concerns with Shasta College's approach to building its Health Sciences and University Center in downtown Redding raised the ire of school President Mary Retterer.

In a letter to the paper, Retterer insists the college will save money and be able to include more local contractors by dividing the $15 million project into 21 jobs.

Retterer said breaking up the project is a common practice for educational institutions and pointed out that the construction manager for the building, 3D International, has billions of dollars in public works project experience and currently is managing several community college projects.

Ron Owens, a spokesman for the California Community Colleges Chancellors office, said there are a number of projects in the community college system using this bidding structure.

"Yes, this is a common practice, but we don't keep any statistical data on how common it is," Owens said.

The college's former vice president in charge of construction projects, Al Erdman, joined 3D International last year, said Sue Vanderwerf, college spokeswoman and Retterer's assistant. But she said she had no contact information for Erdman.

The "Buzz" item also got a response from Joe Cerami of Cerami & Browning Construction Inc. The Redding firm built a $726,000 warehouse for Shasta College in December 2002. It's also done $25 million worth of public works projects since 1986, including Mountain View Middle School in east Redding.

Cerami can't fathom how Shasta will save taxpayer dollars by breaking up the project. He also questions whether the strategy will bring more local builders to the job.

"You will exclude the majority of local subcontractors from submitting bids because they don't carry a bond," Cerami said.

Cerami fears the college could be left with out-of-town builders on the job who don't have a stake in the community.

For the record, sealed bids for the Health Sciences and University Center are scheduled to be opened and announced Thursday.

We'll keep you posted.



Grouchy over Chico

Does anybody at City Hall have a sense of humor?

Deputy City Manager Randy Bachman apparently was not amused by last week's "Buzz" item on Chico

landing sought-after retailers like Trader Joe's before Redding. He responded with a stat-filled e-mail demonstrating that Redding hauls in more retail sales tax revenue than Chico, $1.87 billion to $1.4 billion in fiscal 2002-2003 (the latest numbers available from the state controller), and more taxes per capita -- $218.20 per resident, versus $204.11 for Chico.

Our first thought was that we're not sure bragging about taxes is a smart strategy in this red-state county.

But on reflection, we see Bachman's point. Chico -- which legendary Chronicle columnist Herb Caen once dismissed as "the kind of town where you'd find Velveeta in the gourmet section of the supermarket" -- can take those stats and shove em in a Trader Joe's shopping cart.

By the way, a reader informed us that In-N-Out Burger came to Redding first.



It's showtime

Robbie Cooper, caterer extraordinaire and the hardworking owner of the Sausage Factory, is the new concessionaire for the Cascade Theatre, taking over for the late Rene-Joule Patisserie.

Cooper plans to upgrade wine and food selections, adding fare like gourmet cookies, white chocolate popcorn and honey-mustard pretzels. For the Valentine's Day screening of "Amelie," the offbeat French romance, she's going to serve champagne and petit fours.

Cooper, who is the granddaughter of legendary Redding restaurateur Harry "Doc" Clearie, also will be trying to meet the needs of picky performers whose contract requirements could include pasta, tofu or even a particular brand of bottled water. "That part's pretty entertaining," she told us while serving orders at the popular Hartnell Avenue lunch spot she's owned for the past five years.

Got a "Buzz"-worthy item? Reporter David Benda can be reached at 225-8219 or at dbenda@redding.com; reporter Marc Beauchamp can be reached at 225-8221 or at mbeauchamp@redding.com.

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'The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.' Former RA&W official Jayadeva Ranade explains what China's military reforms mean for the world.

Crucial portions of the major military reforms -- described as 'far reaching and unprecedented' -- that were publicly announced on September 3, 2015, by Xi Jinping, who is concurrently the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, president of China and chairman of the Central Military Commission, have begun to be implemented.

On December 31, 2015, on the occasion of conferring flags on the newly created People's Liberation Army general command of army, PLA Rocket Force and PLA Strategic Support Force, Xi outlined the direction of the PLA in an official speech known as Xun Ci -- literally translated as 'admonishing words.'

Xi is only the second person to give a Xun Ci since the founding of the People's Republic of China. The other leader to have delivered a Xun Ci to the military in China's 67-year history was Mao Zedong, who did so in 1952 and 1953. Xi's decision to deliver the Xun Ci is a sign of his confidence and that he is consolidating authority to implement the plans for major military reform.

The substantive contours of these reforms are fast becoming clearly visible. On January 1, 2016, the Central Military Commission headed by Xi issued the full text of the 4,993-character Guideline on Deepening National Defence and Military Reform.

The 'guideline' clearly emphasises the political nature of the PLA and its subordinate relationship to the Chinese Communist Party. The central features of these are clearly: Strengthened 'political and ideological education'; expansion of the Chinese Communist Party organisation in the military; thoroughly implementing the resolutions of the Party's 18th Congress and the Third, Fourth and Fifth Plenum, Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the important thought of 'Three Represents', the guidance of scientific development concept and the teachings of the chairman's series of important speeches.

The Guideline asserts that the main objective of the reforms is to equip the PLA for 'Theatre battles' -- in other words to replace the existing military regions with theatre commands, establish a joint operational command system and promote the development of military and civilian integration.

It stated that these would be achieved by 2020 along with the capability of 'winning' the information war and effectively carrying out 'mandated missions by a military system with Chinese characteristics.'

The Guideline also disclose that while in 2015 the focus was on organising implementation of the leadership and management system and reforming the joint operational command system, in 2016 the reforms will focus on downsizing the PLA and its organisation, reforming the 'military combat force structure' and institutions, and basically completing the reforms.

The period between 2017 and 2020 is to be devoted to making further adjustments to specific areas of reform and optimising and improving the reforms that have been implemented. Attention will be paid to the development of military and civilian integration.

On January 2, 2016, the state-run Global Times summarised the contents of the 'guideline on deepening national defence and military reform' released by the Central Military Commission on New Year's Day.

It noted that a day earlier, the CMC had announced establishment of the General Command of the Army, the People's Liberation Army Rocket Force and the PLA Strategic Support Force. Justifying the reforms the Global Times observed, briefly: (i) 'China's national interests and current international situation are constantly changing, so is the task of the Chinese army.'

'Hence, the PLA and relevant mechanisms have to be adjusted accordingly to keep up with the pace of China's rise';

(ii) 'the task that confronts China's armed forces is arduous and more than just safeguarding the nation's maritime and land territories.'

'As China's international cooperation grows, more Chinese enterprises go global and the country embraces greater responsibility to maintain regional and world peace, a strong Chinese army is needed';

(iii) 'China must have a strong military... China doesn't need to worry about military aggression.'

'But there is more about national security....During China's rise, friction with the US has gone beyond broad geopolitics. If China has a big gap with the US in terms of military prowess, this will affect its international position and other countries' attitude toward China';

(iv) 'with a strong army, China can be more politically appealing, influential and persuasive, and will make it easier to network.'

'As we gain more trust from other countries, many of them will no longer be dependent on the US for security and on China for economic benefits';

(v) 'moreover, our military strength has to be demonstrated to the world.'

'The army needs to be able to fight battles and provide real deterrence. The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting';

On December 31, 2015, at a ceremony in Beijing attended by the entire CMC, Xi conferred military flags to the three new organisations -- the PLA's General Command of the Army, the PLA Rocket Force and the PLA Strategic Support Force.

Xi also announced the names of the commanders and political commissars of the new organisations indicating that they are formal, separate entities.

Generals Li Zuocheng and Liu Lei were appointed commander and political commissar of the PLA's general command of the army, the commander and political commissar of the PLA Rocket Force are General Wei Fenghe and General Wang Jiasheng respectively and General Gao Jin has been appointed commander of the new PLA Strategic Support Force and General Liu Fulian as its political commissar.

Establishment of these organisations, it was stressed, was 'to realise the Chinese dream and the dream of a strong military, and a strategic initiative to build a modern military power system with Chinese characteristics.'

Xi described the PLA Rocket Force as 'China's core strategic deterrence power' and as strengthening nuclear deterrence and nuclear counter-attack capabilities, intensifying the construction of medium and long range precision strike power, and reinforcing the strategic check-and-balance capability.'

He emphasised that the 'PLA Strategic Support Force is a new-type combat force to maintain national security and an important growth point of the PLA's combat capabilities', thus suggesting that its responsibilities would include innovation and missile R&D.

The PLA's general command of the army appears to effectively be the headquarters of the ground forces -- in the last couple of years described in official Chinese documents as the PLA Army, PLAA -- and likely to absorb some of the functions of the erstwhile general political department, general logistics department and the general armaments department.

While the substantive parts of this crucial stage of the military reforms are being implemented fairly rapidly, there is, however, unease in the middle and lower ranks of PLA officers. Indicative are the publication of at least twenty articles relating to the military reforms from September 3, 2015, until now by the official PLA Daily.

Earlier in September, both the vice-chairmen of the CMC travelled to all seven military regions to explain the reforms to the middle and lower ranking PLA officers.

Jayadeva Ranade is a former additional secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India, and president of the Centre for China Analysis and Strategy.

IMAGE: China's President Xi Jinping at a military ceremony in Beijing. Photograph: Jason Lee/Reuters
'Just a whiff of a live operation, and he is back in the field, at least in his mind. That is why the immediate decision to send the NSG to Pathankot.'

'But there is a difference between classical intelligence or counter-terror operation and dealing with a larger threat to a place as sensitive and sprawling as an air force base. This is what led to confusion and mix-ups,' says Shekhar Gupta.

IMAGE: National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, right, after the signing of the accord with the NSCN-IM.

That Ajit Doval has had an outstanding career in the Intelligence Bureau is widely accepted. I did write a few years ago that our careers, in our respective professions, have run, sort of in parallel, as I have mostly ended up covering the situations he was tackling at different junctures. He has stayed a couple of steps ahead, because of seniority and years -- he will turn 71 on January 20.

But if I got to a story even shortly after Mr Doval had been there, he had left enough of a reputation to still be a talking point.

In January 1981, as the new Northeast correspondent of The Indian Express, when I made my first visit to Mizoram, the chief minister, Thenphunga Sailo, gave me a long lecture on the past and the future.

One key point he made was, how things would have been so much better if 'we had a few more officers like that A K Doval.' Mr Doval had headed the Mizoram unit of the IB (called Subsidiary Intelligence Bureau) as assistant director until fairly recently then.

Almost exactly a year later, when I arrived in Gangtok to cover the funeral of Palden Thondup Namgyal, the Chogyal (or rather former Chogyal as Indira Gandhi had abolished the title after the merger in 1975), the name of Mr Doval was mentioned often enough -- in adulation or awe -- for you to know he had recently been there and had left his mark.

My next big story took me often to Punjab. Mr Doval wasn't there yet, but he was across the border, quite legitimately and legally, in the Indian mission in Islamabad. He was undercover only to the extent that his posting, if I recall correctly, was as head of commercial section. I do not believe there was so much commerce between India and Pakistan.

Mr Doval was busy, however, keeping a close eye, among other things, on the subversion and separatist propaganda to which Sikh pilgrims visiting their holy places in Pakistan were exposed. In an ugly and unfortunate incident, fully instigated and orchestrated by Pakistan intelligence, he was once attacked by a jatha at one of these pilgrimages.

Ajit Doval is an IPS officer from the 1968 batch, but like many others of his ilk who came to the IB early -- including, notably, the equally legendary M K Narayanan -- he became an IB citizen for life. Messrs Doval and Narayanan, incidentally, are from the same Kerala cadre.

From the moment Mr Doval returned to India, he walked straight into the Punjab/Sikh crisis and that kept him busy for nearly a decade, until that insurgency ended as K P S Gill's Punjab Police, with quiet help from a rejuvenated IB, destroyed what is often described as the third, and longest, phase in that decade of terror.

I am grateful to Mr Gill for the access he gave me, not just to himself and his key officers, but also to a large group of former top (A and B category, as they were classified) militants who were now detained in the Punjab Armed Police Centre in Jalandhar.

Their capitulation had been spectacular as just until a few months back they held sway over much of the western districts of Punjab. Most of them were very barely in their mid-20s and spoke with a degree of innocence. One, a self-styled 'major general', in fact, told me he had already killed 87 Hindus to attain that rank. If only he had killed 13 more, or three policemen (one cop equalled five Hindus), he would have automatically become 'lieutenant general', but that was not to be.

Their stories made it clear to me that the success in Punjab was of the local police, as well as the IB. I have often said, somewhat half-facetiously, that each A or B category Punjab militant killed or captured in the Operation Black Thunder phase (1989 to 1990) should be marked 'caught Doval, bowled Gill.'

In the last phase, Mr Doval was more involved tracking Khalistan terrorists across the country, and did that with his usual panache.

Terror ended in Punjab, but another full-fledged crisis had meanwhile grown in Kashmir. Mr Doval was back to what he so loves: Operations. You would find his calling card in many key operations, from Kashmir to Dawood. Some of his more 'proper' seniors did not approve of his methods. But he was widely respected for his ability to deliver and it was the UPA government that appointed him Director, Intelligence Bureau, in July 2004.

Mr Doval's subsequent career is relatively better known. He was the prime mover behind the Vivekananda Foundation, which filled the vacuum for a right-of-centre think-tank. He was a key mind behind the spectacular anti-corruption campaign, including Anna Hazare's.

The Foundation became a key source of talent for Narendra Modi's government. His principal secretary, Nripendra Mishra, was there too. Mr Doval, with his hardline image, and the legend built around him, was a natural for NSA.

The essential truth about him, that his mentors, peers and proteges would tell you, is that he is still compulsively an operations man. Just a whiff of a live operation, and he is back in the field, at least in his mind.

That is why the immediate decision to send the NSG to Pathankot. But there is a difference between classical intelligence or counter-terror operation and dealing with a larger threat to a place as sensitive and sprawling as an air force base.

This is what led to confusion and mix-ups. This left Mr Doval no deniability as he was widely seen to be controlling the operation. Frankly, I do not even know for sure whether he was. But folklore is often stronger than reality.

Mr Doval's admirers from the eighties and the nineties know him to be a brilliant, 'khurafati' intelligence mind. This was a tactical military operation in a very sensitive military environment.

Mr Doval is our fifth NSA. In some ways, on the security side, he is our most powerful yet. The first, Brajesh Mishra, combined the job of principal secretary, but had his focus on running the PMO and foreign policy.

The UPA then split the job between J N Dixit (foreign policy) and security (M K Narayanan) until the former passed away. Mr Narayanan controlled intelligence and key levers of foreign policy, but left governance alone as that was the remit of T K A Nair.

Shiv Shankar Menon, as you would expect, was more focused on foreign policy though he did focus on the military, filling the gap left by A K Antony's uncommunicative indecision.

Mr Doval, now, brings a compulsive operational mind to the job -- and to that extent, makes the NSA's position much newsier.
'This is social reform, which has to be conducted from within society and by its institutions, like religious bodies, not by public officials and ministers.'

'That is why I think the big change Modi seeks is actually not in his power to bring about,' says Aakar Patel.

The prime minister has asked his top bureaucrats for breakthrough ideas that will help citizens get better service and help India progress. The officers are to think about this for a couple of weeks and then report to him.

I think that if by breakthrough ideas something entirely fresh is being thought of, that will be difficult to come by. Modern democracy is 250 years old (and its essential concepts go back to Athens of the 5th century before Christ).

The modern civic government is probably 500 years old. So it is unlikely that something totally new is still waiting to be discovered.

However, it is true that there is the scope for innovations. The prime minister himself introduced one of these in Gujarat. He split the supply of electricity to rural homes and rural farms so that homes would continue to get power while farm pumps would get it only for a few hours of the day.

This simple innovation made a big difference in a part of the world where unusual problems like line losses (meaning theft) and consumer refusal to pay mean that electricity is always in short supply.

Writing about the subject of the PM's instructions in Business Standard, T N Ninan said that it would not be easy for the bureaucrats to come up with good fresh ideas for another reason. He said bureaucrats 'are trained to follow rules and precedents; most of them are administrators, not problem-solving managers. That is why new ideas usually come from politicians, technocrats and civil society activists.'

He listed the subsidised rice scheme, the mid-day meal and the right to information as among the innovations that came in from the outside. I think that the big things have all been done in terms of legislation. One could argue that a unified tax scheme or a more efficient land acquisition law would dramatically improve India's economic performance, but I disagree.

These are small things and address efficiency rather than dramatic change.

There is only one major thing left to do in India. It is now down to implementation, what Modi calls governance. Here I should repeat what I have written about before. That it is not the domain of government to bring about a change in the individual's behaviour and morality.

For example, let us take the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, which Modi has promoted by himself sweeping the streets. It is noble to get Indians to be more clean, but is it the job of government? I do not think so.

This is social reform, which has to be conducted from within society and by its institutions, like religious bodies, not by public officials and ministers. That is why I think the big change Modi seeks is actually not in his power to bring about.

Ninan writes that one of the books Modi should read is Poor Economics by two MIT professors who have worked on India.

In one of their tests, the two academics (Esther Duflo and Abhijeet Banerjee) sent actors to government doctors with classic symptoms of five major diseases. The doctors did not diagnose the patients correctly an astonishing 97% of the time because they weren't bothered. They did not spend more than 60 seconds with patients on average.

If you are going to be diagnosed by government doctors correctly only three per cent of the time, you may as well stay home and not be treated.

A Harvard academic who also works on India, Lant Pritchett uses two more examples to show the problems of government in India.

First, that in a test group it was learnt that unless you paid a tout, you would likely fail your driver's test in Delhi. But if you paid, you didn't have to take the test at all and were given a license. Meaning that if you chose to follow the law, you would be penalised. And you would be free to drive even if you couldn't, if you paid up.

So organised was this bribery that none of the Road Transport Office's staff were paid directly. So efficient was it, that almost without exception potential drivers were compelled to submit.

Pritchett's other example was about research that found Rajasthan's nurses don't turn up for work. Half of them collected salaries for staying at home or doing something else.

A well meaning NGO tried to change this through a system of attendance monitoring. It failed. Nurses continued to stay away from their work, but this time they were equipped, each time they were checked, with an official excuse for their absence.

None of this surprises those who are familiar with things in India. The State has collapsed or it is dysfunctional. And this is true whether you observe the police station or the finish of the footpath.

The only question is: Should we see this as a problem of government, where New Delhi will offer genius solutions? Or should we see it as a problem of society? I would say the latter, and that is why it is not possible for the government, however well meaning, and its bureaucrats, to change it.

IMAGE: Prime Minister Narendra Modi launches the cleanliness drive for the Swacch Bharat Mission from Valmiki Basti in New Delhi. Photograph: Press Information Bureau

Aakar Patel is Executive Director, Amnesty International India. The views expressed here are personal.
'If this were to happen, it won't exactly be a game changer because Pakistan is known for treating arrested terrorists as 'political prisoners', who are generally given VIP treatment,' says Rajeev Sharma.

Is Pakistan going to act, and act big, to satisfy India and keep the talks momentum going?

Will Pakistan arrest the prime movers and shakers of the Pathankot terror attack to keep India engaged and continue the talks-for-the-sake of-talks business with Pakistan?

Well, the indications emanating from Pakistan to India are rather positive.

Pakistan is believed to be seriously considering detaining or arresting several people, including Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Maulana Masood Azhar, to save the foreign secretary-level talks between India and Pakistan.

The talks are scheduled to be held in Islamabad on January 14-15 and there is no official word from India yet if Foreign Secretary Dr S Jaishankar will travel to Pakistan for kickstarting the stalled peace process.

India has linked the future of these talks to Pakistan first taking concrete steps to assuage Indian feelings in wake of the Pathankot attack.

Chances are that Masood Azhar may well be arrested or detained by the Pakistani authorities to keep India interested in talks.

It will definitely be a big moment for India if Pakistan were to put Masood Azhar behind bars. If this were to happen, as indeed it is likely to happen, it will keep the bilateral dialogue process alive.

However, India also knows in its hearts-of-heart that such a scenario would only be window dressing even if the move were to come true in the first place. But this window dressing should be enough for India to keep the dialogue process alive and settle down to a working deal kind of a scenario with Pakistan.

The Modi government is expecting such a move from Pakistan -- arresting Masood Azhar -- in the next 48 hours. Should this happen, India may agree to play ball with Pakistan and send Dr Jaishankar to Islamabad either on the scheduled date or a slightly deferred date.

But if this were to happen, it won't exactly be a game changer because Pakistan is known for treating arrested terrorists as 'political prisoners', who are generally given VIP treatment.

Besides, such a move will make India vulnerable for yet another high profile terror attack.

The Pakistan government is under tremendous pressure to do something tangible and do it fast on the Pathankot incident as the international community is watching it closely.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has invested huge political capital in improving relations with Pakistan as evident from his surprise visit to Lahore on Christmas Day.

Having come this far and letting things go back to square one will be a personal loss of face for Modi. His Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif is in the same boat.

It is quite obvious that the political clearance for arresting Azhar would have to come from Rawalpindi, where the Pakistan army headquarters is located.

The Pakistan government will find it hard to let the resumed dialogue process fall through. This may make Islamabad take some hard decisions, like arresting Masood Azhar.

The ball is in Pakistan's court. The next big move has to come from Pakistan. It is for Islamabad to decide how to respond -- by arresting Azhar or by choreographing yet another terror attack on India.

Ironically, this scenario is rather conducive to India and presents New Delhi with the 'Tails I win, heads you lose' kind of situation. After all, it is India, which currently enjoys an upper hand diplomatically with Pakistan.

The international community won't exactly be hauling India over the coals should it cancel the foreign secretary-level talks. The fact that India hasn't done so thus far adds to the diplomatic pressure on Pakistan.

It is Pakistan, not India, which is set to pay a diplomatic price this way or that post Pathankot. Pakistan runs a serious risk of losing out heavily to India if it were to drag its feet on ordering a crackdown on its own terror apparatus.

Rajeev Sharma is a New Delhi-based independent journalist and strategic analyst who tweets @Kishkindha.
IMAGE: Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Velapally Natesan during a visit to Kerala.

'Unlike in other states, minorities form a significant number in Kerala. They have money and political power.'

'In such a society, the emergence of a new communal power is not a healthy thing.'

B R P Bhaskar, 83, is one of the most respected journalists in Kerala. He started his career at The Hindu and went on work with The Statesman, Patriot, Deccan Herald, before he became the consultant editor of the Asianet television channel when it was launched in 1994.

Bhaskar, below, left, discussed with Shobha Warrier/Rediff.com the political changes expected in Kerala, which will go to the polls in a few months' time.

When I spoke to Vellapally Natesan, he said the kind of influence Christians and Muslims have in decision-making in Kerala was the reason behind him trying for Hindu unity.

That's his opinion. His slogan was to unite all Hindus from the Namboothiris to the Nayadis. But with the Nairs staying out, there is a big dent in his idea of Hindu consolidation.

The Namboothiris may be small in number, but certainly they have social clout because of their past domination. There was division among the Namboothiris too about joining hands with Vellapally.

The Ezhavas and Nairs form the major chunk of Hindus in Kerala.

And if you look at the total population of Kerala, Hindus will come only just above 50 per cent.

The problem the Hindus have is the political clout the Christians and Muslims have in Kerala through the Muslim League, the Kerala Congress and even the Congress itself.

There is a feeling that Christians are able to wield more political influence even in the Congress. This feeling is not new.

A K Antony himself said there was a feeling among the Hindus that the minorities were ruling the roost.

Prominent personalities from the Nair community like former ISRO chairman Madhavan Nair, actor Suresh Gopi, etc openly said they were all for Hindu unity.

But the Nair Service Society president is adamant about not being part of such a unified Hindu community. Will he get the support of the Nairs of Kerala?

There is a group within the NSS that is opposing the NSS president and there is a group in the SNDP (the Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana Yogam) that is opposing Vellapally.

But political parties fear Vellapally as they think he will take away votes.

R Sankar was a much greater leader and a powerful person in politics than Vellapally, but in the old Travancore state, a stronghold of the SNDP, Sankar, who was president of the Congress and secretary of the SNDP, could not win in any of the constituencies he contested.

Finally, he went to Kannur to get elected to the assembly and became the chief minister.

Do you think Vellapally can garner the support of the majority of Ezhavas?

Certainly not. The capacity of the SNDP to influence Ezhava voters is extremely limited.

If you take the (2015) local body elections, the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) got more votes, and who has suffered? It's not the LDF (Left Democratic Front) that had the support of the majority of Ezhavas that suffered, but the UDF.

If you look at Yogendra Yadav's study of the last assembly elections in Kerala, it says 65 per cent of the Ezhavas voted for the Left. It is a fact that a majority of the community have been voting for the Left for several years.

You are saying only the UDF will get affected and not the Left.

If the efforts of Vellapally have borne some fruit and the BJP achieved some acceptance in Kerala in the local body elections, it has happened at the expense of the Congress.

The Ezhava elements who are with the Congress may be more vulnerable and get influenced by Vellapally and the BJP than the Ezhavas who are with the Left.

Vellapally is talking about a Third Front with the BJP. Is there space for a Third Front in Kerala?

From 1980, political parties other than the BJP have been fighting either as part of the UDF or LDF and never alone. In the assembly also, only the UDF or LDF has won. There was no third party or front coming into the assembly.

Today, the BJP's voting strength has increased. With the present voting strength, it is possible for a third party or a front to come to the assembly. They need not have a very big number.

In the last assembly election, the difference between the UDF and LDF was marginal. There was no BJP or any third element then. Now that the third element has grown, they are in a position to win two or three seats.

In the 140-member assembly, imagine three are from the BJP. Suppose the number is equally divided between the UDF and the LEDF, even with 2 or 3 members, the BJP may be able to hold the balance between the two fronts.

These three fellows can decide who will rule Kerala. That will be Vellapally's real game!

So, you feel Vellapally is going to be the kingmaker.

He himself says so. He said he would decide who would rule Kerala next.

Do you think both the UDF and LDF have failed Kerala and that was why the BJP could influence voters?

That is the general impression. That is why both the fronts are in a very bad shape. I would say both the fronts are on the verge of collapse and people have a feeling that there is not much difference between the two.

They are losing ground and they are not able to understand this situation.

Now parties have become election machineries. In five years, three are election years; assembly, Lok Sabha and local body elections. It means they are constantly in election mode.

The highly commented programmes of Kerala are welfare-oriented programmes and they are all election programmes.

Do you feel youngsters are moving towards the BJP as the two fronts have not been able to do anything for the young?

There is no such indication so far, but one thing is clear: Kerala is getting urbanised at a very fast pace. So the thinking changes.

Why did youngsters move to other places for jobs? Because there were no jobs available here. They may be sending money, Rs 1 lakh crore a year, but they are all effectively social or economic refugees.

Then, people want to go with the winning side and with the BJP having won at the Centre, its ability to attract votes is much greater.

The BJP and Vellapally are talking about development. Will it work with the young?

Other than creating some slogans, what development has taken place in the last two years?

For the last few years, both the fronts in Kerala are also using the development slogan, but the development that is taking place in Kerala is the wrong kind of development.

When the Gadgil Committee gave a report on the Western Ghats, all the political parries united to destroy it. In the name of development, the environment is being destroyed.

Assembly elections are a few months away. What kind of changes do you see happening in Kerala?

I am of the view that both the fronts may suffer. But I am concerned that what is taking its place is not an improvement.

The BJP-led Third Front can be the kingmakers and they will demand a price for that. What that price is, what impact will it have is a worrying factor.

Unlike in other states, minorities form a significant number here in Kerala. They have money power and political power.

In such a society, the emergence of a new communal power is not a healthy thing.

As a political observer, how do you look at Vellapally Natesan's efforts to unite the Hindus of Kerala as a political force?

This is not the first time that such an effort is being made to consolidate the Hindu political wing.

Mannath Padmanabhan and R Sankar, the two leaders of the prominent caste organisations, the Nair Service Society and the SNDP Yogam that speaks on behalf of the Ezhava community, made an effort way back in the 1950s and 1960s to bring all together under the Hindu Maha Mandalam.

The motivating factor was the general feeling among the political class that the Congress was getting controlled by the Christians. But the effort did not succeed.

Why didn't it succeed?

There are inherent contradictions between the position of the Nair community and the Ezhava community. The Nairs enjoyed certain benefits under the old caste system. Naturally they wanted to preserve that.

So whatever efforts they made were short lived. Later, when K Karunakaran was chief minister, the NSS and SNDP started sponsoring their own political parties because as caste organisations, they could not be on the political scene.

In fact, in 1947 at the time of Independence, the NSS and SNDP Yogam declared that they were withdrawing from the political field.

So, during Karunakaran's time, the NSS created the National Democratic Party and the SNDP Yogam created the Social Republican Party. Both became allies of the UDF (United Democratic Front) at one time. They were in the Karunakaran ministry also. But this also didn't last too long.

Has the political atmosphere changed in anyway today?

The inherent contradictions remain. A few years ago, when Vellapally became the SNDP leader, he and the NSS secretary made an attempt, but that too did not bear fruit. Vellapally could not bring all under a Hindu umbrella.

I don't think Hindu consolidation is going to work in Kerala. It is very difficult to create a common Hindu identity because of the differences between the so-called upper castes and the lower castes.
Rediff.com regrets to inform you that our dear colleague Arthur J Pais passed away in New Jersey on Friday.

Arthur, an Editor at Rediff.com and India Abroad -- the Indian-American newsweekly owned by Rediff.com -- was 66.

After a distinguished career in Indian journalism, Arthur and his wife Betty moved to the United States in the early 1980s.

He was a prolific writer and no subject -- films, literature, social trends, news -- escaped his attention. His insatiable curiosity and diligence enlivened every feature he wrote and his loss is an irreplaceable loss to all of us at Rediff.com

When informed about Arthur's passing, Salman Rushdie replied: 'This is sad news indeed. My condolences to his family and to all of you, his colleagues. Thanks for letting me know.'

Actress and cook book writer Madhur Jaffrey wrote: 'Very sad to hear the news.'

Tributes to Arthur from colleagues and friends in the US and India were posted on Facebook:

Aseem Chhabra, Rediff.com columnist and contributor:

Today I lost a man who was my first real friend in America. Arthur Pais was a real support to me during my early days as a journalist in New York. He loved films and we bonded on classics, filmy gossip and old Bollywood songs.

Later, at a time when I had given up journalism, Arthur again opened up my world to writing and reporting, and gave me the opportunity to become a better journalist.

I went for my first film interview with Arthur Pais. Well, he was going to interview Pagli Ji (aka Mira Nair) and I begged him to let me tag along with him. I told him I would pretend I was his photographer.

It was 1983 and I had just finished Columbia J School. The interview was about Mira's documentary So Far From India. I had seen the film at MoMA and had loved it.

We went to Mira's apartment on the UWS -- I think it was on 118th and Amsterdam. Three of us ended up having such fun conversations. And I loved the idea of talking to a filmmaker soon after I had seen her film.

And that's how I started writing about films. Arthur opened up this world for me.

I will miss him!

Pagli Ji (director Mira Nair):

Arthur Pais was wonderful warm and memorable...

Arun Venugopal, Correspondent PBS:

Arthur J Pais, a dear friend and my first journalism mentor died today.

I received the news from a former coworker at India Abroad/Rediff, where I worked with Arthur, years ago. A lot of you would've seen his byline, and maybe were even interviewed by him for the first time in your life, when your book had just been published or your film was about to be released -- he was an insanely prolific and passionate writer who took great pleasure in exposing new voices to the world.

He was also kind of a nut -- a character like no one I've ever met, who knew the most obscure and salacious details about Bollywood screen legends, about writers and editors, and New York itself, the city as it once was, unvarnished and vulgar and ripe with possibility.

We could be dirty around each other, and took great delight in each other's inappropriate thoughts, and when I left for public radio it made me sad to think I was leaving that behind, and him.

He believed in our craft and, most importantly, in those of us who were entering into it.

Sree Sreenivasan, Chief Digital Officer, Metropolitan Museum of Art:

RIP, ARTHUR PAIS, journalist, friend and mentor to so many in the NYC and SAJA worlds.

He had been ill for a long time and is in a better place now.

My prayers for his soul and his soulmate, Betty.

He was so quiet, so kind, so generous. Anytime I needed help or SAJA needed help, he would jump at the opportunity. But he was often keen that he not be acknowledged in any way.

A fun, wonderful man who loved writing, cooking, eating and listening to music, both Western and Indian. And he knew more about all of those than almost anyone I know.

During the dot-com boom, I was approached by a VC to help create a smart web publication for Indian Americans. The VC wanted a veteran editor to run things and I recommended Arthur and he launched the publication. Unfortunately, it died soon after because of the dot-com bust. Arthur never complained about it to or expressed anger about the situation he took it all in stride, just like everything else.

In 1999, he, along with our friends, Aseem Chhabra, Megha Bhouraskar and others, helped me launch the Old Filmi Music Club (an occasional gathering of lovers of old Bollywood -- filmi, in Hinglish -- music where we sing songs and eat a potluck dinner). Hundreds of folks have attended these in NYC over the years and I reckon we need to gather again in Arthur's honor soon!

We all get busy and lose touch with people we should not -- am sorry to say that I wasn't in touch these last couple of years, only seeing him and Betty at the India Abroad annual gala. If there's someone in your life you haven't called or connected with in a while, please use this as a reminder to do so.

Two words for you, Arthur: THANK YOU.

Lavina Melwani, Journalist:

Today the New York community lost one of its strongest voices -- journalist Arthur J Pais of India Abroad. Very sad to hear this unexpected news.

Arthur was the story-teller of our community. He had looked increasingly frail in recent years, but his writing was always strong, top-notch, be it on any subject.

My thoughts and prayers are with Betty and the family. I wish them peace and strength at this time.

Deepa Iyer, Social Activist:

I have such fond memories of Arthur. He used to call us at SAALT often for the "other side" of the story as he would often say. He traveled to many of our events to cover them.

I remember having a conversation with him outside the gurdwara in Oak Creek a week after the massacre there. He was always on the ground, quite literally -- he didn't want to just report via phone or remotely. He cared deeply about our communities.

Sandip Roy, Author:

Ohhh how sad to hear this. I met him many times and he was always so fun. He also did some of the first stories on LGBT South Asians when noone else touched that issue.

He helped define Indian-American journalism for many of us. He mentored many. And he gave coverage with compassion to issues many in the Indian community shied away from like LGBT issues.

Years ago Trikone honoured him with an award for that which he received with such humility and warmth. I am glad we got to thank him.

Anurag Harsh, Musician:

Rest in Peace Arthur. I can never forget that cold January evening in New York, 9 years ago when you took the trouble to talk to me and conduct that beautiful interview a couple months before my first ever Carnegie Hall concert, and the subsequent lovely two column spread that you had written -- one of the finest articles every penned about me in media. Thank you Arthur and May Your Soul Rest in Peace.

Toby Chaudhuri, Vice-President, PBS:

A gap in the world and great loss.

Vijay Iyer, Jazz musician:

Sad news. Rest in peace.

Suparn Verma, director:

The first time I read @StephenKing I was 13, it was a world without the Internet. Took me a year and one day an article appeared in the Sunday Observer. I saw the byline. It read Arthur Pais. I visualised an exotic white man writing for an Indian paper.

Many years later I was working @Rediff.com and I met the man in person. This lovely, kindhearted and helpful soul. It was my fanboy moment. I still have the paper cutting.

We interacted over the years on work and despite being sick last year he helped me during my trip to Los Angeles. Today he is no more.

Dear Arthur, I will always be your fanboy. Love, Suparn

Chidu Rajghatta, The Times of India's Editor in Washington, DC:

Legend -- of our times, in our community. Thoughts with his family at this time for strength and a celebration of his memories.
A Border Security Force Jawan has been arrested for allegedly helping smugglers in cross-border smuggling of drugs and ammunitions, Punjab police said in Mohali on Saturday.

The accused has been identified as Anil Kumar, a jawan with 52 Battalion, posted in Rajasthan, a senior Punjab Police official said.

"Anil Kumar, 29, has been arrested from Rai Singh Nagar in Sriganganagar in Rajasthan," said Mohali SSP Gurpreet Singh Bhullar.

Kumar, who joined BSF in 2008, allegedly used to help smugglers in smuggling of drugs like heroin and arms and ammunitions from Pakistan in lieu of money, he said.

The police also found transfer of "ill-gotten" money in his bank accounts. "BSF jawan was made first payment of Rs 50,000 and then Rs 39,000 which was transferred into his wife's bank account in lieu of cross-border smuggling," SSP said.

The alleged involvement of BSF Jawan came to light following questioning of a drug smuggler, Gurjant Singh alias Bholu who along with his two associates was arrested on January 4 from Kharar in Mohali.

Bholu was in contact with Kumar through social networking site 'Facebook' and messaging service 'WhatsApp' for taking his help in cross-border smuggling of weapons and drugs from Pakistan, SSP said.

Bholu was also already in contact with Pakistan based smuggler identified as Imtiaz, who used to send delivery of drugs and arms and ammunitions, police said.

Last week, Punjab police had claimed to have busted a drug smuggling syndicate and arrested three persons from near Mohali, and recovered Pakistani SIM card, mobiles, weapons and ammunition from their possession.

Besides, Bholu, two others who were arrested were Sandip Singh and Jatinder Singh alias Jindi.

Police have recovered one stengun of .9 mm, two pistols, two pistols .30 bore, one airgun, 190 live cartridges, 31 mobile phones, one Pakistani mobile sim card and one car from them.

Meanwhile, police also arrested one person identified as Deepak Kumar, resident of Ludhiana, who was allegedly involved in making fake driving licenses of Gurjant Singh and his associates.
Nudging Pakistan to act against the perpetrators of the Pathankot terror attack, United States Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday asked Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to find out the truth and underlined the need to stay focused on the pressing challenge of terrorism in the region.

"We can confirm Secretary Kerry spoke (over phone) today with Prime Minister Sharif. They discussed a range of bilateral issues of importance to our relationship and the need to stay focused on the pressing challenge of terrorism in the region," State Department spokesman John Kirby said.

He was responding to questions on the telephonic conversation between Kerry and Sharif. This is the highest level talk between the leaders of the two countries in the aftermath of the terrorist attack at the Pathankot air force base on January 2 by six Pakistani terrorists.

A statement issued by the Pakistan Prime Ministers Office in Islamabad said that Kerry extended full support to the prime minister to find out the truth in the Pathankot terror incident.

Sharif told Kerry that we are swiftly carrying out investigations in a transparent manner and will bring out the truth. The world will see our effectiveness and sincerity in this regard, the Prime Minister added, the statement said.

Kerrys call to Sharif came amid Indian intelligence reports suggesting that groups and people in Pakistan planned and executed the strike on the Pathankot air force base.

India has provided specific and actionable information in this regard to Pakistan.

However, Pakistan has said it needed concrete evidence from India for acting against the terrorists suspected of being involved in the Pathankot strike instead of leads suggesting the attack was planned and directed from its soil.

"The Secretary also reiterated our belief that it remains vital for India and Pakistan to continue working together for a more secure and prosperous region," Kirby said.

Kerry said the US hopes that talks between India and Pakistan will continue despite the fact that terrorists have tried to thwart it because continuation of India-Pakistan talks is needed in the interest of regional stability and the leadership role by both the prime ministers is required to ensure continuous dialogue, said the statement.

Sharif said Pakistan would not allow anyone to use its soil to carry out terror operations abroad, it added.
Pakistan's Defence Minister Khwaja Muhammad Asif has said that no terrorist group will be allowed to derail the dialogue process with India.

Talking to a news channel, he said that strict action is being taken against elements involved in terror activities.

"No terrorist organisation will be allowed to derail the dialogue process between Pakistan and India," Asif was quoted as saying by the Radio Pakistan on Saturday.

The minister said Pakistan strongly condemns terrorism in every form as terrorists are enemy of humanity.

Earlier, Asif had said that "some elements" want to "sabotage" the Indo-Pak peace talks through terror acts but they will not succeed in their nefarious designs.

Heavily-armed terrorists last week attempted to storm the Air Force base in Pathankot. The attackers were believed to have infiltrated from Pakistan and there was speculation that they may belong to Jaish-e-Mohammad headed by Maulana Masood Azhar of the Kandahar hijack episode.

Asif said Pakistan has achieved immense success in elimination of terrorism through operation Zarb-e-Azb which is still going on.

"Some of the militant groups have already been destroyed and those still remaining will also be dealt with as the operation is still going on," he told Geo TV.

Asif also said there is no difference between military and civil government over the issue of fighting militancy.

"There is only one narrative and that is to eliminate the threat of militancy. I would request to highlight this aspect of our policy," he said.
A Pakistani national has been indicted by a US court for trying to smuggle high-end military-grade drones for the Pakistan Army by using a Lahore-based shell company.

The individual identified as Syed Vaqar Ashraf, charged on nine counts, transferred more than $62,000 (Rs 41.4 lakh) to a US company in different money transfers from Pakistan between 2012 and 2014, towards the purchase of a series of high-end drones -- with an estimated cost of more than $340,000, according to court documents.

While the court case has been going on for more than a year now, a US court in Phoenix unsealed the documents including federal complaint and indictment on January 6.

The 14-page superseding indictment was filed before the court in December last year.

Court officials said Ashraf has been arrested in Brussels about a year ago and extradited to the United States some four months ago. His last court appearance was on December 23, during which he pleaded not guilty.

There was no immediate response from the Pakistan Embassy in Washington.

According to the indictment, Ashraf was the CEO of Lahore-based I&E International. Federal prosecutors alleged that this was a front company for the Pakistan Advanced Engineering Research Organisation, based in Lahore.

Ashraf placed orders with an Arizona-based drone company for high-end military-grade drones.

The Arizona company -- not named in the indictment -- specialised in the design, development and manufacturing of unmanned aerial vehicles for the US military.

Federal prosecutors claim that Ashraf placed orders through emails for purchase of specific gyroscopes including eight VG34-0803s, which is designed for medium size, multi-payload UAC designed for tactical long endurance missions, with a primary mission of reconnaissance, surveillance and communication relay.

He also placed orders for 10 Memsic VG800CA-200 Low Drift MEMS Vertical Gyros, which has military and non-military applications and is used to increase stability inside a UAV. Both the items come under export control of the US government.

These models, capable of flying more than 20 hours, were designed for Israel and is used for reconnaissance.

The total cost of these military hardware was nearly $3,45,000 (Rs 2.3 crore), for which he made an advancement payment of $62,000 (Rs 41.4 lakh) in five wire transfers.

According to court documents, Ashraf concealed to the representative of the US-based drone company -- who was in fact an official of Homeland Security department -- about the actual reason for his purchase of such equipment.

When the officials from the US drone company told Ashraf that this equipment could not be shipped directly to Pakistan, Ashraf gave them a Brussels address.

"Ashraf requested that Person A (from the US drone company) trans-ship the modules to Pakistan, through Belgium," the indictment said.

Federal prosecutors alleged that Ashraf filled out fraudulent documents in the name of Innovative Links, a shell company used by him.

But he was purchasing these for AERO, which is in fact a wing of the Pakistan military, prosecutors said.

According to court documents, Ashraf told the undercover agent that his client was in fact the Pakistani military. The trial is scheduled for February 7.

Representational Image Courtesy Reuters
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday visited the strategically important IAF base in Pathankot and reviewed the situation with the Air Force chief and other top officials in the aftermath of last Saturday's brazen attack by suspected Pakistani terrorists.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi being given a presentation on counter-terrorist and combing operation by the Defence Forces, at Pathankot Airbase. The Chief of Army Staff, General Dalbir Singh is also seen. Photograph: PIB

Modi spent about 90 minutes at the air base during which he was briefed about the attack and security measures put in place at the facility in its wake.

Air Force chief Air Marshal Arup Raha and National Security Guard officials briefed the Prime Minister about the attack and the counteroffensive launched against the perpetrators with the help of of maps, aerial pictures and operational photographs, defence sources said.

"Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response," PMO tweeted after his visit to the airbase.

"Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride," it said in another tweet.

Modi also went around the scene of the audacious attack that exposed the chinks in the armour of the Indian security establishment and was shown the huge cache of weapons and ammunition recovered from the six slain perpetrators. Seven Indian security personnel were also killed during the assault.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi being received by the Chief of Army Staff General Dalbir Singh and the Chief of the Air Staff Air Chief Marshal Arup Raha on his arrival, at Pathankot Airbase. Photograph: PIB

The prime minister was taken around the Military Engineering Service Yard where the terrorists were first engaged by the security forces and the two-storey billet for airmen's accomodation where the last two terrorists were killed after the structure was blown up by the security forces, before undertaking an aerial survey of the forward positions along the Indo-Pakistan border.

The base was kept out of bounds for the media.

An official press release said in Delhi that National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, Army chief Dalbir Singh and chiefs of NSG and BSF were present during the visit.

Officials of the NIA, which has taken over the probe into the attack, also briefed the Prime Minister on the progress of the investigation.

Security forces had on Friday declared the sprawling Air Force station fully sanitised after a massive combing operation spanning over three days.

"The combing operation at the Air Force station is over," a senior IAF official said, adding the entire area has been sanitised.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi being given a presentation on counter-terrorist and combing operation by the Defence Forces, at Pathankot Airbase. Photograph: PIB

Six terrorists, believed to owe allegiance to Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed were gunned down by the security forces after a four-day gun battle.

The operation to ensure that no terrorist was hiding was carried out jointly by Army, NSG and IAF's Garud commandos.

Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar had also visited the base on January five and admitted to "some gaps" that made the attack possible.

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had called up Modi and promised action against the perpetrators of the brazen attack. India has said it has handed over specific and actionable information regarding Pathankot attack to Pakistan.
Why does she want to kill herself? M I Khan reports from Patna.

A rape victim in Bihar has asked President Pranab Mukherjee's permission to kill herself, saying she has been denied justice for nearly three months, the police said on Saturday, January 9.

Mamta (name changed) in her early 20s, a resident of Arwal district, has sent letters to President Mukherjee, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar in this connection. She has also sent letters to the Chief Justice of India and Bihar Governor Ram Nath Kovind.

The victim also met Arwal District Magistrate Alok Ranjan Ghose in this regard.

"She has sought the President's permission to kill herself as she was denied justice despite knocking at the doors of all concerned officials," a relative said.

In her petition to the President, Mamta said the local police has delayed taking action against the accused or arresting him.

According to the police, a First Information Report was lodged against the main accused at an all-woman police station in Arwal on October 23, a day after she was raped by an uncle.

A medical test on the woman confirmed rape, police said.

Mamta said the accused has not been arrested so far and his family members have repeatedly threatened her to withdraw the case or face dire consequences.

Kumari Babita, the officer in charge of the Arwal woman police station, says investigations are on, but no arrest has been made.
Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, world's most-wanted drug lord who fled through a tunnel from a maximum security prison in a made-for-Hollywood escape that deeply embarrassed the Mexican government and strained the country's ties with the United States six months ago, has been recaptured.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced on Twitter: "Mission accomplished: we have him."

Also Read: How 'Shorty' executed his stunning jailbreak

The head of the powerful Sinaloa Cartel was captured at a roadside motel after an operation that killed five at a safe house in the city of Los Mochis, in the drug baron's native northwestern state of Sinaloa.

The Mexican Navy says they found two armoured vehicles, eight rifles, a handgun, and a rocket launcher at El Chapo's Sinaloa home.

Guzman now faces the prospect of being tried in the United States. But the process could take months, although US Republican party presidential hopeful Marco Rubio called for Barack Obama administration to immediately pursue extradition, Reuters reported.

Once featured in the Forbes list of billionaires, Guzman has led a cartel that smuggled billions of dollars worth of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamines into the United States and fought vicious turf wars with other Mexican gangs.

He started his own cartel in 1980, expanding it into other states and even poaching some of his mentor's territory.

That creation -- the Sinaloa cartel -- soon became Mexico's most powerful and richest, a multibillion empire. US indictments claim the organization used assassins and hit squads to show its muscle.

The rivalry with other drug cartels has spurred an ongoing drug war that's left thousands of Mexicans dead.

After his first capture in Guatemala in June 1993, Guzman was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

He reportedly made his 2001 escape from the maximum security prison in a laundry cart, though some have discounted that version.

His second escape last July was even more audacious. He slipped down a hole in his shower stall in plain view of guards into a mile-long tunnel dug from a property outside the prison.

The tunnel had ventilation, lights and a motorbike on rails, illustrating the extent to which corruption was involved in covering up the elaborate operation. Noise of the final breakthrough from the tunnel was obvious inside the prison, according a video of Guzman in his cell just before he escaped.

Mexico launched a huge manhunt and a couple of months later tracked him to the mountains of his home state, arresting a pilot who allegedly flew Guzman to the region hours after his escape. Guzman was said to have narrowly escaped an earlier capture and injured a leg and his face while fleeing marines in the rugged terrain.

Images: Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is escorted by soldiers during a presentation in Mexico City before being taken away in a helicopter. Photographs: Tomas Bravo/Reuters
Since astronomers first stared up at the wandering stars they eventually recognized as planets, they have mostly used our home solar system as the basis for how such celestial families form. And then, twenty years ago, astronomers started finding the first planetary systems other than our own. And all understanding went out the window.Our solar system has no Jupiter-size world orbiting close to our star. And while rare relative to other kinds of planets, we see hot Jupiters in abundance around others stars. The Sun also hosts no planets between the sizes of Earth and Neptune. Yet these appear to be overwhelmingly common in other systems. And we have no giant planets orbiting past Pluto. Yet direct imaging observations reveal multiple examples of these as well.Perhaps most perplexing is that astronomers have found no true solar system analog in their searches. They know of no system other than our own that has neatly arrayed rocky small planets, followed by gas giants, then slightly smaller ice giants, and then small rocks again.So, we are clearly not a typical example. But could we be common in the galaxy? Astronomer Ruth Murray-Clay closed a fantastic 227th meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Kissimee, Florida, addressing just this question.Exoplanet searches are still not fully sensitive to Earth-sized planets on Earth-length orbits around Sun-like stars. Or Jupiter-sized planets on Jupiter-length orbits. And so on down the line. So, despite not seeing any systems like ours, we could still be common. But the wealth and diversity of other types of systems means that any models or understanding of how planets form must answer for all kinds of planet families. And that is quite the challenge.Astronomers are sure of some basics: Stars form in clouds of dust and gas called a nebula, and as they gather mass and collapse down into a massive ball of gas, they also form a disk of gas and dust that eventually becomes planets.But what causes the diversity of worlds? Why do some nascent disks yield solar systems like ours, and others the alien systems we observe? And, because astronomers have to tie their questions into observations, the only solid answers they can obtain, how can researchers use the large, easy-to-spy worlds to tell them about the existence of Earth-sized planets?One of the key factors that determines how big a planet can get is essentially how much material a budding planetesimal can crash into before the disk disappears. This is how astronomers explain the small planets in our solar system: They form in the hot part of the disk near the star where it is harder for material to clump together and impossible for some icy materials to exist at all. Farther out, material is cooler and more sticky, and planets form more readily.But this is highly dependent on the mass of the disk. Disks with less material form different planets at different distances from their stars. So Murray-Clay developed a system to predict what kinds of planets should form depending on the total mass of the disk and how far the developing planets are from their star. Among other things, her work suggests that if a system includes mini-Neptunes, it should not also include giant planets. And if it includes super-Earths, giants are also likely.Many observed extrasolar systems fit into Murray-Clays framework. But more importantly, her work creates more predictions, and she encouraged future observers to test these.One or two systems are not enough to validate or dismiss her work. But astronomy is already entering the age where researchers have dozens, sometimes hundreds of systems for comparison. And we will only learn more as future exoplanet hunting telescopes come online.
County stock shows will be beginning soon. Children from elementary school through high school will be trying for trophies, ribbons or belt buckles as a rewards for the work they have put in feeding, exercising and training their animals.

Most of the area county shows will be held over the next two weekends.

Even those who don't go home with prizes may win something, said Allison Schaefer, a senior at Ballinger High School who has been showing swine or rabbits since third grade.

'You don't always win, so you have to have that mindset that you can be better if you keep working at it,' she said. 'It teaches you a lot about character.'

Schaefer has experienced her share of success. She has won something at the county level each year, she said. She has also attended major state shows, and has her eye on the San Angelo and Houston shows this year and may also consider going to Austin or San Antonio.

She is preparing four swine for this year, two crossbred, a Hampshire and a gilt.

In some counties, high schools will hold their own shows to give competitors a practice run before the county or state shows. But for most, the county show is the big event.

Judges examine the animal for good tone, muscle development and how the animal moves as the owner walks it around the pen. The owners are also judged on their abilities to show off the animals best qualities. Animals compete in a specific class, with an overall grand champion and reserve champion (first runner-up) declared for each type of animal.

A lot of work is involved in getting the animals ready to show. They must be fed properly, exercised regularly and trained to follow the owner's direction in the show without becoming skittish.

Schaefer wants to win, but that isn't her overwhelming passion as she is preparing her animals.

'I never look at it as how I'm going to do. I look at it as a day-to-day thing. If they continue to do what they're doing right now, they should be very competitive,' she said.

For a novice competitor, she suggests going to the county Extension agent for advice on caring for their animal. For herself, she wants her pig to get used to her, so she spends time with it. She seeks to build stamina in the animal by walking it, with a goal of 30 minutes of nonstop walking.

After all that work, how can a student handle walking away without winning?

'You just have to don't get discouraged, you don't know what's going to happen,' she said. 'I just go with the flow, do what you can with the animal.'

SCHEDULE OF AREA STOCK SHOWS

Jan. 7-9: Junior Livestock Show of Erath County

Jan. 7-9: Stephens County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 8-9: Winters, Miles and Ballinger high schools

Jan. 9: Eula and Baird high schools

Jan. 9: Throckmorton County Junior Livestock Assn. Show

Jan. 9: Wylie, Trent and Abilene/Cooper high schools shows

Jan. 9-11: Comanche County Junior Livestock Show

Jan 13-16: Brown County Youth Fair

Jan. 13-16: Eastland County Livestock Show

Jan. 13-16: Howard County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 13-16: Nolan County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 13-16: Scurry County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 14-15: Jones County Junior Livestock Show, Anson

Jan. 14-16: Callahan County Junior Livestock show

Jan. 14-16: Haskell County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 14-16: Mills County Youth Fair

Jan. 14-16: Mitchell County Livestock Show

Jan. 15-16: Kent County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 15-16: Knox County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 15-16: Runnels County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 16: Merkel, Jim Ned, Roby and Rotan high schools

Jan. 16-19: Coleman County Livestock Show

Jan. 20-22 (sale Jan. 23): Taylor County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 21-23: Fisher County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 22: Stonewall County Junior Livestock Show

Jan. 28-30: Shackelford County Youth and Livestock Show
Temple services

Temple Mizpah, 849 Chestnut St., will have Shabbat services at 7 p.m. Jan. 15 led by Dr. Marc Orner. The Women's Auxiliary will host an Oneg Shabbat following services. For information, call 325-672-8225.

Christian Women's Connection

The next Abilene Christian Women's Connection Fall Fest and Silent Auction is set for 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Thursday at the Abilene Country Club, 4039 S. Treadaway Blvd.

Jeri Hawkins of Hillsboro will present "Putting Perfect First  Phooey!"

Callt Sharlyn Garoutte at 325-370-6567 or AbileneCWC@aol.com to make reservations or for cancellations. Cost to attend is $16.

Chamber Music Concert Series

A concert of the 2016 season Chamber Music Concert Series at Episcopal Church of the Heavenly Rest, 602 Meander St., will be held at 5 p.m. Sunday. The Key City Winds (Artists-In-Residence) will perform.

Youth fundraiser

The youth of Southwest Park Baptist Church, 2901 S. 20th St., will have a baked potato luncheon after morning services Sunday.

Faith & Finance$

The next Faith & Finance$ session has been scheduled for 6 to 8 p.m. beginning Thursday and ending April 7. Each weekly class will be held at the Christian Ministries of Abilene Food Pantry Building, 701 Walnut St.

Faith and Finance$ provides encouragement and accountability to people with low to moderate incomes as they seek to manage money wisely. Join the learning community in exploring how to overcome financial obstacles, get free from debt and save for the future.

Teachers include Sue Thomesen, Diane Rose, Phyllis Bolin and Jen Rogers.

There is a $10 per person, book fee and the class must have a minimum of 10 -15 students. Class size is limited. Free child care is provided.

Call Becky at325-673-5295 (please leave a voicemail) or email beckyhighland3@gmail.com if you have questions or would like to register.

Unitarian Universalists

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Abilene, 1541 Sayles Blvd., welcomes people of all religions, non-religions and all ages. Sunday's service continues with The Great Courses DVD 'How Jesus Became God'. Bart D. Ehrman, professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, delivers the 20th lecture, "The Birth of the Trinity," at 11 a.m. For information on the fellowship, visit www.uuabilene.

Send news of your religious organization or group to Religion Editor, Abilene Reporter-News, P.O. Box 30, Abilene, TX 79604; fax it to 325-670-5242; or email it to jan.woodward@reporternews.com. Deadline is noon Monday.
No one knows when, or if, President Obama's executive order on gun control will go into effect, or even what the order will entail, but vendors at the Texas Gun & Knife Association gun show at the Abilene Civic Center were fairly certain about one thing.

It would be good for business.

"I fully expect it to be a good weekend," said Ray Allen, a gun dealer from Belton. "Our president is the best gun salesman there is."

Don Hill, who runs the show along with his wife Janice, said that when sentiment is high that the federal government is trying to pass gun legislation, sales go up.

"I don't know of anyone who has in faith in the government, or any trust," said Hill, who lives in Kerrville.

The show runs Saturday from 9 a.m.-5 p.m. and from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. on Sunday. However, Friday afternoon was busy inside the exhibition hall as vendors set up for the show. The overwhelming consensus was the executive order was an illegal power grab by the president.

"I call him the Idiot-in-chief," said David Andrews of Merkel, who sells ammunition that he manufactures.

Allen said the order was a move by the president to see what kind of support he has.

"He's stirring the pot," he said. "He's testing the water to see who's going to support him."

Hill, who has been running gun shows for 38 years, said several times that the order was a long way from becoming law. Even if it becomes enacted, he doesn't think it will have much impact on gun shows.

"I forget what state it is, Pennsylvania or Massachusetts, but they've had strict laws and their shows are still doing well," he said. Hill said that while some vendors may get out of the business because they anticipate the order being too restrictive, they'll probably return "when they realize it's not the monster they think it is."

Part of the order calls for dealers who sell at shows to conduct background checks, which Allen said he's already doing.

"That won't affect me," he said, adding that the check is usually done in about 15 minutes.

"It takes the customer longer to fill out the form and for me to type it in than it does to get an answer," he said.

Hill said if dealers at shows are required to perform background checks, they'll probably use someone, like Allen, who is already doing background checks.

More of a concern to the vendors was that the president, who said at a town hall meeting Thursday night that he had no intention of taking guns from sportsmen or law-abiding citizens, would move further on restricting the rights of gun owners.

"It will be challenged," said Andrews of the executive order. "Liberals don't understand (the term) 'may not be infringed.'"

Allen said it was impossible to tell how the order would impact guns being passed down to family members.

"It all depends on the wording," he said.

Andrews found it incomprehensible that the government could impede on those transactions.

"Are they going to tell me that I can't give a gun to my wife of 41 years?" he asked.
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The map shows Vietnam and disputed territories in the South China Sea.

As we enter a new year, the South China Sea appears to remain the biggest potential flash point in East Asia.

Chinas announcement on Jan. 2 that it had landed an aircraft for the first time on an airstrip in a disputed chain of islets and its confirmation that Beijing is building its second aircraft carrier have created new regional worries.

Vietnam quickly issued a strong protest to Beijing concerning the aircraft landing on an islet in the Spratly Island chain, known to the Vietnamese as the Truong Sa Islands.

Two more planes landed at the same location on Jan. 6 on a runway long enough to accommodate bombers. Beijing said, however, after the first landing that it was used to test whether the newly built airfield met civil aviation standards.

But less visible forces, such as growing nationalistic sentiments on all sides and Chinas buildup of fishing vessel militias may prove more dangerous in the end than dramatic moves by ships and planes.

More immediately threatening to Vietnam may be the more than 20 attacks on its fishing boats that took place in 2015, with the latest occurring on New Years Day this year.

The attacks were conducted by vessels that are believed to have been controlled by the Chinese military.

In the Jan. 1 attack, a Chinese vessel repeatedly rammed a Vietnamese fishing boat in disputed territory near the Paracel Islands. According to the boats captain, five Chinese men carrying knives jumped on board the boat and confiscated its catch, communications devices, and fishing equipment.

When the boat sank, the crew were rescued by nearby Vietnamese fishing vessels.

Oil rig triggered crisis

Chinas decision in May 2014 to deploy an oil rig in waters off Vietnams coast then set off an intensifying round of confrontation that included deadly anti-Chinese rioting in Vietnam.

China claims most of the South China Sea, which harbors large oil and gas deposits. And ships passing through this area carry more than $5 trillion in cargo to and from the growing economies of East Asia.

China eventually withdrew the oil rig, apparently recognizing that its move had been overly provocative.

Chinese President Xi Jinpings visit to Vietnam two months agothe first by a Chinese president in 10 yearsraised some hopes that calm could be restored in the region.

But nationalistic, anti-Chinese sentiment in Vietnam, which reached a peak after the oil rig incident, is still running high.

At the end of Xis visit, Vietnam agreed to build a truly trustworthy relationship with China. But at the same time, Japanese officials told the Kyodo News Agency that Vietnam had invited Japan for a port visit and coastal military exercises in 2016.

This was a reminder of the stakes that several other nations have in the South China Sea.

High stakes region

In addition to China and Vietnam, claimants to disputed territory in the South China Sea include Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Taiwan.

China, Taiwan, and Vietnam each claim all of the Spratly Island chain.

As the region continues to grow in influence and power, says the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, the handling of the competing claims will set the tone for relations within East Asia for years.

Even a momentary failure to manage tensions could pose a significant threat to one of the worlds great collaborative economic success stories, the group adds.

The United States takes no position on the various sovereignty claims. But it may now be walking a tightrope by trying on the one hand to avoid a military conflict in the South China Sea while on the other providing military assistance to friends and allies resisting Chinese encroachments.

In late October last year, the U.S. sent the USS Lassen, a guided-missile destroyer, on a passage within 12 nautical miles off an artificial island built by China on Subi Reef in the Spratly Island chain.

China then summoned U.S. ambassador to China Max Baucus to its Foreign Ministry to make a serious representation of protest over the incident.

But the U.S. Navy described the Lassens passage as a nonthreatening effort to underscore the right guaranteed to all nations under international law to freely use vital sea lanes.

U.S. officials have indicated that more such freedom of navigation operations will take place on a regular basis.

Unpredictable future

Chinas assertive approach to the South China Seaand to the East China Sea, near Japanhas created some apparently unintended consequences, such as an increase in U.S. military aid to the Philippines and a buildup of naval forces in several Southeast Asian countries.

This includes Vietnamese purchases of submarines from Russia.

India has begun training Vietnamese submarine crews, and the Philippines has been negotiating the acquisition of defense equipment from Japan, Chinas World War II enemy and modern geopolitical rival.

Japanese ships and planes would also get access to Philippine bases, according to Renato Cruz de Castro in a report for the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

Chinas long-term intentions are not transparent, which makes planning countermoves difficult. This is partly because China takes a long view of strategy, dating back to concepts developed in the ancient Warring States period.

These include the use of deception, misinformation, and intimidation to win battles without firing a shot.

Escalation possible

Chinas use of its coast guard and fishing vessels to gain access to fishing grounds of rival claimants or to harass other nations ships and fishermen makes the escalation of small incidents into larger conflicts much more possible.

Growing nationalistic sentiment in China, encouraged in part by the countrys state-controlled media, might also be a force that the Chinese leadership has to take into account before reaching any settlement of disputes.

Meanwhile, long-term factors bolstering anti-U.S. sentiment might be pressures from hawkish, well-placed Chinese military officers and the demonization of the United States both by the Chinese media and the countrys education system.

Future clashes in the South China Sea may well involve Chinas even greater use of its maritime militia, which includes civilian fishing vessels that can lay mines, jam enemy equipment, carry supplies for the military based on artificial islands, run reconnaissance patrols, and maintain a Chinese presence in disputed archipelagos.

Andrew S. Erickson, an associate professor at the U.S. Naval Warfare College in Newport, Rhode Island, who has studied this issue extensively, says that the maritime militia receive training from various Chinese military departments. They also work closely with the Chinese coast guard.

China is trying to use these government-controlled fishermen below the radar to get the bonus without the onus to support its South China Sea claims, Erickson told Defense News, based in Springfield, Virginia.
A hotel in northwestern Chinas Qinghai province has rescinded a rule that Tibetan staff may speak only Chinese while at work, backing down and apologizing after the local Tibetan community launched a storm of protest online, Tibetan sources say.



The Shang Yon hotel in Rebgong (in Chinese, Tongren) county in the Malho (Huangnan) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture had initially forbidden Tibetan workers from speaking their own language on the job, threatening a fine of 500 yuan (U.S. $76 approx.) for noncompliance, according to social media accounts.



But the rule, issued on Jan. 7, was quickly reversed when local authorities ordered the hotel temporarily closed after area Tibetans furiously complained in social media postings at this intrusion on their rights, sources on the popular social media platform WeChat said.



On Friday, the hotel released a public apology to the Tibetan community, saying that its actions had breached cultural privileges guaranteed by Chinas policy on so-called minority nationality groups, sources said.



Call for equal rights



In an unusual move, support for the Shang Yon workers was also voiced online by members of Chinas Han majority, with one netizen saying Tibetans should have the right to speak their own language, and this right should be protected.



Whoever promoted this policy of using only Chinese should be held accountable for violating human rights and damaging ethnic unity, the netizen, calling himself shanshen pelyun, wrote.



It is not too much to ask for ethnic groups to have equal rights and the freedom to use their own languages, agreed Liu Benqi, a Han Chinese living in Qinghai.



I dont support the policy of promoting Mandarin Chinese [in ethnic minority areas], he said.



Eroding traditions



Tibetans have long complained about eroding religious, cultural, and linguistic traditions in Tibetan-populated regions of China, and language rights have become a particular focus for Tibetan efforts to reassert national identity in recent years, sources say.



On Nov. 9, 2012, several thousand students in Rebgong took to the streets to demand greater rights, including the right to use Tibetan, instead of Mandarin Chinese, as their language of instruction in the schools.



Groups formed to promote the study and speaking of Tibetan have been banned as illegal associations in Rebgong, though, due to Chinese concerns that these may pose a threat to Beijings rule.



Reported by RFAs Tibetan Service and by Xin Lin for the Mandarin Service. Translated by Rigdhen Dolma and Feng Xiaoming. Written in English by Richard Finney.




Activists say Russian air strikes on a prison complex run by Al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate in Syria have killed nearly 60 people.

The January 9 strikes hit an Al-Nusra Front building, located near a popular market in Maarat al-Numan in the northwestern province of Idlib, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The British-based monitoring group said the raids killed 57 people, including civilians, militants, and detainees, while 30 others were wounded.

It said the strikes were carried out by Russian warplanes.

Russia has been conducting air strikes in Syria since September 30 to support the embattled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a Kremlin ally.

More than 250,000 Syrians have been killed in almost five years of conflict, which began with antigovernment protests.

Based on reporting by AFP, AP, and the BBC
Tajik authorities have accused Kyrgyzstan of violating cease-fire agreements near disputed segments of their shared border after dozens of people were killed from both sides during clashes last month.

Tajikistan's Border Guard Service stated on October 19 that Kyrgyz authorities are implementing "premeditated actions aimed at escalating the situation in districts close to the state border."

"The provocative actions of some Kyrgyz citizens to destabilize the situation, preparation of assault points, digging of trenches, continuation of concentration of military equipment, and regular violations of the air space of the Republic of Tajikistan clearly confirm the Kyrgyz side's malign plans," the statement said.

Kyrgyz authorities rejected the Tajik statement, saying it "absolutely does not correspond to the real situation."

In a statement, the Kyrgyz State Border Guard Service accused the Tajiks of using a photo of Kyrgyz military trucks taken last month as they were withdrawing from the border area, and falsely portraying it as a new photo to make it look as though Kyrgyzstan was concentrating its military equipment in the border area.

The statement said it was the Tajik authorities who are violating cease-fire agreements by leaving deadly mines on the disputed territories and digging trenches there.

Earlier in the day, Kyrgyz Defense Minister Baktybek Bekbolotov told reporters that Bishkek had asked the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) to provide a limited contingent of troops at disputed segments of the Kyrgyz-Tajik border.

"An independent mediator must stay between us, such as a limited group of CSTO troops, with the goal of maintaining a cease-fire and the withdrawal of heavy weaponry from the border. If they solve these two issues, then the political goals on the delimitation and demarcation of the Kyrgyz-Tajik border can start being discussed," Bekbolotov said.

Both Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, along with Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Armenia, are CSTO members.

Bekbolotov's statement comes two days after Kyrgyz Security Council Secretary Marat Imankulov said that Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed to provide Bishkek with archived Soviet-era maps to help solve the ongoing border dispute between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

Putin has said that there is more "true" information about borders between the former Soviet republics available in the archives in Moscow than in the republics themselves.

Putin and the Kyrgyz and Tajik presidents, Sadyr Japarov and Emomali Rahmon, discussed border problems between the two Central Asian nations on October 13 in the Kazakh capital, Astana.

In September, Kyrgyz and Tajik authorities accused each other of aggression after the two sides used heavy artillery and mortars in clashes near a disputed part of border.

Kyrgyz officials said 63 of its citizens died in the violence, and more than 200 others were injured. Tajikistan has put its death toll at 41, but correspondents from RFE/RL's Tajik Service reported a higher number after talking to relatives and friends of the people killed during the clashes. They concluded that 81 people, about half of whom were civilians, lost their lives.

Many border areas in Central Asia have been disputed since the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991.

The situation is particularly complicated near the numerous exclaves in the volatile Ferghana Valley, where the borders of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan meet.

Almost half of the 970-kilometer Kyrgyz-Tajik border has yet to be demarcated, leading to repeated tensions since the two countries gained independence more than three decades ago.
The Sunni Arab monarchies of the Persian Gulf have expressed support for Saudi Arabia in its diplomatic row with Iran, condemning what they described as Iranian interference in Riyadh's internal affairs.

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia accused Iran of sponsoring terrorism and warned that the kingdom was considering new steps against Tehran.

The six foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) held an extraordinary meeting in Riyadh on January 9 to discuss growing tensions between Saudi Arabia and predominantly Shiite Iran.

The GCC groups Bahrain, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.), Qatar, Oman, and Saudi Arabia.

In a statement, the six countries strongly denounced the sacking of the Saudi diplomatic missions in Tehran by demonstrators angered over its execution of prominent Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr.

They also stated that Tehran carries the responsibility for these terrorist acts."

The statement criticized "Iranian interference in Saudi Arabias affairs over its denunciation of Nimr's execution a week ago, adding that Tehran's criticism had "directly incited the aggressions targeting Saudi diplomatic missions."

The GCC "totally supports decisions taken by Saudi Arabia to combat terrorism and has total confidence in the independence and integrity of Saudi justice," the statement added.

Also on January 9, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said the kingdom was considering additional measures if its regional rival, Iran, continues with its aggression.

"Iran is used to interfering in affairs of its neighbors and sponsoring terrorism," Jubeir told a press conference.

He did not elaborate on what the new measures against Tehran could be.

Saudi Arabia executed Nimr on January 2 for terrorism, triggering outrage among Shi'a across the Middle East and elsewhere.

Nimr, a highly respected cleric in Saudi Arabia's Shiite community, was behind demonstrations calling for better treatment of the minority.

Iranian officials fiery criticized the kingdom's authorities for the execution, and an Iranian mob stormed and ransacked the Saudi Embassy and consulate in Tehran in protest.

Countermeasures

In response to the Iran incidents, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain severed diplomatic relations with Tehran.

Kuwait and Qatar recalled their ambassadors, and the U.A.E. downgraded its ties.

Meanwhile, Tehran cut all commercial ties with Riyadh.

Iran has said Saudi Arabia is to blame for the diplomatic crisis and accused the kingdom of "sectarian hate-mongering."

In a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on January 8, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Saudi Arabia must choose between promoting extremism and fostering good relations in the Middle East.

Zarif insisted Tehran has "no desire or interest in escalation of tension in our neighborhood" and hopes Saudi Arabia will "heed the cause of reason."

Arab League foreign ministers are due to meet in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, on January 10 to discuss the crisis.

Jubeir, the Saudi foreign minister, said his country had asked the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, of which Iran is a member, to convene an extraordinary meeting.

With reporting by Reuters, AFP, and dpa
Iran accused Saudi Arabia of "sectarian hate-mongering" and said the kingdom must choose between promoting extremism and fostering good relations in the Middle East.

In a letter to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on January 8, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif insisted Tehran has "no desire or interest in escalation of tension in our neighborhood" and hopes Saudi Arabia will "heed the cause of reason."

But the Saudis have been "spreading delusional hype about Iran" and engaging in "numerous direct and at times lethal provocations against Iran" after failing to derail the nuclear deal reached with world powers in July, Zarif said.

He accused the Saudis of mistreating Iraqi pilgrims, which fuels "public outrage in Iran," and appointing preachers who have made "a routine practice of hate speech not only against Iran but against all Shi'ite Muslims."

Zarif offered as evidence of Iran's preference for peace, stability and "Islamic unity" Tehran's decision not to move like Riyadh to sever diplomatic relations after the split between the two regional powers erupted over the Saudis' execution of Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr.

Based on reporting by AP and AFP


A group of German-speaking jihadists has released the first issue of an online magazine that provides information on encrypted communications and Internet security.

The magazine's release highlights the growing awareness of, and interest in, security and encryption among Islamist militants as a tool to help them operate and spread propaganda undetected.

The jihadists' apparent effort to wring opportunity from the greater availability of encrypted communications platforms could enable them to better evade monitoring by government security services.

The magazine, Kybernetiq, is in German and was released on social media on December 28 by a group that claims on its Twitter account to be "not ISIS," an acronym referring to the Islamic State (IS) group. The group told RFE/RL in a direct message exchange on Twitter that "it is enough for you to know that we aren't from ISIS" but would not say if they had an affiliation with any other militant group.

According to the SITE Intelligence group, which translated extracts from the magazine, Kybernetiq includes an article on how jihadists can protect their identities online. One piece of advice tells would-be militants to avoid applications that have "a mujahid branding," -- i.e., a distinct jihadist identity that would identify them as militants to law enforcement.

According to SITE, Kybernetiq also recommended that jihadists use Tor or Tails, free software that enables users to surf the Internet anonymously.

Kybernetiq also advised would-be militants to use the Whatsapp or Telegram messaging apps, which have built-in encryption, and praised the GNU Privacy Guard cryptographic software as a "nightmare for intelligence agencies," according to a translation by SITE.

'Security-Aware' Militants

Encrypted platforms like Tor and popular messaging apps like WhatsApp have many desirable uses for the privacy-conscious. They keep user data safe and can allow those living in repressive regimes to communicate without being snooped on, for instance.

But intelligence and law-enforcement agencies have warned that such technologies are also increasingly used by extremists, including IS.

Those tracking jihadists' usage of encrypted technology also say the problem is growing.

In recent months, there has been a visible shift by IS militants toward using some of these secure platforms, particularly Telegram, to spread propaganda messages over the web.

A source in the anti-IS Anonymous subgroup GhostSec said that in the past five days alone there has been a surge in the creation of new jihadist chat rooms in Telegram and the hacktivist group is now tracking nearly 300 chat rooms in various languages.

"I feel that their Telegram usage is being overlooked and is a lot more powerful than anyone realizes," the source told RFE/RL.

'Long Tradition'

According to Alex Krasodomski from the Center for the Analysis of Social Media at the London-based think tank Demos, the use of encryption technology by militant groups is not a new phenomenon but part of a "long tradition."

Al-Qaeda released its own encryption software in 2007. (Notably, Kybernetiq advises would-be militants not to use it because it is jihadist-affiliated.)

What is new is the increase in number and availability of apps that use encryption software, many of which -- like messaging apps Telegram and WhatsApp -- can be downloaded for free from the Internet.

So it's not surprising that "wannabe jihadis are early adopters" of such technology, says Krasodomski.

The boom in availability of encrypted communications platforms has raised fears that militants' use of these technologies could pose a serious threat by allowing them to evade monitoring by security services.

In the immediate wake of the November 13 Paris attacks, for which IS claimed responsibility and which killed 130 people, there was speculation that the attackers had used encrypted communications in order to plot and direct the attacks.

But does the increasing use of encrypted communications by jihadists really pose a threat?

Krasodomski points out that, despite the initial fears, signs show the IS networks involved in plotting the Paris attacks used unencrypted technologies -- old-fashioned text messaging -- to communicate.

So laying the blame for the attacks "at the door of cryptography is not the answer," Krasodomski says.

Nevertheless, "encryption is a fact and security services have to have the capability and tools under law to deal with it, that reflect this new reality," says Krasodomski. "But I don't think that [encryption] will paralyze the security services."

It's worth noting that even the authors of Kybernetiq magazine are not convinced that encryption software will make them invulnerable to the security services.

Jihadists should write really important messages down on paper, and these must be "quickly burned," they wrote.
Opposition supporters and police have clashed during an antigovernment protest in Kosovos capital, Pristina.

Following a peaceful start of the January 9 demonstration, some opposition supporters threw firebombs and stones at the government's headquarters, which caught fire before firefighters quickly doused the flames.

Police responded with tear gas to disperse the crowd.

Police said 14 people were hurt in the unrest, including 10 police officers and two journalists, while 24 protesters were arrested.

Several thousand people gathered for the protest, calling for early elections and the resignation of Prime Minister Isa Mustafa.

The opposition wants to block an EU-brokered agreement with Serbia designed to give greater autonomy to Serb-majority municipalities in Kosovo and the possibility of financing from Belgrade.

The agreement has not been ratified by either of the countries' parliaments.

Kosovo, which is overwhelmingly ethnic Albanian, declared independence from Serbia in 2008.

With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters
The arrest on terror charges this week of two Iraqis who entered the United States as refugees is fueling sentiment in Congress against the program for resettling refugees from the Middle East.

Legislation to prevent any further resettlement of refugees was considered in Congress last year after the terrorist attacks in Paris, but was set aside when the White House agreed to more limited curbs on visas for people who traveled to Syria, Iraq, Iran, or Sudan.

But on January 8, after two Iraqi refugees were charged with planning terrorist attacks, some legislators called for a revival of the more punitive legislation.

"How many ticking time bombs are we going to bring in in this refugee program without a proper vetting system in place?" Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of House Homeland Security Committee, asked.

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy urged the Senate to vote on legislation that passed the House in November that would require new FBI background checks and other steps before any refugee could come to the United States from Iraq or Syria, where the Islamic State group is based.

Based on reporting by AP and AFP


There is an effort under way in Kyrgyzstan to place some regulations on marriages performed by mullahs to hold the religious figures responsible for marriages that should not have been allowed under the law.

It is a sensitive issue given that the line between mosque and state is being crossed and the ceremony in question has existed as long as Islam has been in the region.



The ceremony is called nikah (nike in Kyrgyz), and two members of Kyrgyzstan's parliament have introduced legislation that would give the local mullahs, or others (well get to that soon), regulations to follow before they pronounce a couple man and wife.



Underage marriage is a problem in Central Asia despite legislation that sets a minimum age to be eligible for matrimony and requires the official registration of the union with the authorities. All the same, in the tight-knit communities of the region many marriages are still arranged by parents and performed by the local mullah. Often there is no documentation of such a marriage.



One of the parliamentarians raising the issue is Elmira Zhumalieva (from the Kyrgyzstan Party). She is a co-author of a bill that would require all marriages to be registered first with authorities. Any couple appearing before a mullah with a request for a religious wedding ceremony would have to have the appropriate forms documenting their civil union.



Zhumalieva spokes with RFE/RLs Kyrgyz Service, known locally as Azattyk.

There are instances when girls 15 or 16 years old are married off [by] going through the nikah ceremony. Girls at this age are not mature enough for marriage, Zhumalieva explained, adding that "every now and again the girls cannot resist the will of parents and after getting married they commit suicide.

Zhumalieva and her co-author, Aida Salyanova (from the Ata-Meken Party), propose that The mullah who performs the nikah ceremony must be held accountable. According to their draft bill, that means the mullah must first have proof the couple -- any couple regardless of age -- coming to him have already registered their marriage at a state agency. If not, the mullah faces three to five years in jail.



Azattyk interviewed a woman named Adalat from the southern Nookat region who has been married three times, never once registering the marriages with the authorities.



The first time I was married I was 14. At that time the parents arranged it. Father ignored my arguments, that I was too young, and my husband was much older than me, Adalat recalled. After two years we got divorced.



Her father died and Adalat married a second time of my own desire, to a man with three children, a marriage that also was not officially registered.



After Adalat gave birth to a daughter, her husband went back to his first wife. The third time I married and had two children, after that my husband told me I was ugly and left, despite my pleading not to leave me, that I had no way of feeding the children and my pensioner mother.



Since none of Adalats marriages was ever officially registered she had no legal basis to claim anything from any of her three ex-husbands.



Azattyk contacted Chinara Yrysbaeva, the legal representative at the Nookat mayors office. Yrysbaeva said there were many cases like Adalats in the district. Yrysbaeva said when these divorced wives come to officials seeking alimony or child support there is nothing officials can do since their marriages were never officially registered.



These are problems that go beyond just the marriage of underage girls, as Adalats experience shows.



But Baktiyar Toktagaziev from the Spiritual Department of Kyrgyzstans Muslims told Azattyk the legislation Zhumalieva and Salyanova are proposing needs to be carefully reviewed and studied.



What kind of responsibility can a mullah have in this matter? Toktagaziev asked. If young women ask for him to perform the nikah ceremony, how can [the mullah] be held responsible?



Toktagaziev said: A mullah performs nikah, fulfilling his duties, and with that his part ends.



Toktagaziev said his department was not against the legislation and pointed out that mullahs are supposed to ask the ages of the people getting married and inquire if they consented to the marriage. He said in order to make mullahs responsible under the law, the status of a mullah would have to be raised to that of a state official.



Azattyk also spoke with Jamal Frontbek kyzy, the head of the Muslim womens organization Mutakallim. Frontbek kyzy said she believes the proposed legislation is a good idea, though she questioned whether the authors of the bill understand the depths of the problem.



Frontbek kyzy did object to holding only the mullah responsible. She said one of the biggest problems with focusing on the mullah is that any person can perform a nikah just by reading namaz and no one has the power to prevent this.



According to Azattyk, this is true. Preferably someone reading the relevant holy passages for nikah has at least made the hajj, but this is not essential.



Nikah is actually becoming more popular in Kyrgyzstan and there are solid reasons for that.



The first is simply that young people in Kyrgyzstan are becoming more religious and wish to have a religious ceremony that formalizes their wedding.

For people far from the cities, where the marriage registration bureaus are located, the trips back-and-forth to complete all the paperwork needed for a marriage can be daunting. Many therefore choose to simply have the nikah ceremony performed in their town or village.

For people in the cities, the long process of registering the marriage, which involves much waiting in line, is also inconvenient.

And it goes without saying that those who marry a second, third, or even fourth wife can only get married through nikah.

But as Azattyk has reported, the consequences for women without official marriage documents can be devastating if one day their husband abandons them.

And obtaining official documents provides protection for underage girls.

It is a contest between state and religion and, as Frontbek kyzy noted, this idea of forcing responsibilities on mullahs has come up before but in the end not been instituted.

Azattyks Gulaiym Ashakeeva contributed to this report, which was based on material from Ashakeeva, Kanymgul Elkeeva, and Eleonora Beyshenbek kyzy
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey needs to keep troops in northern Iraq after they thwarted a planned attack on its military training camp there this week by Islamic State militants.

The assertion on January 8, which Iraq denied, renews a dispute with Baghdad that erupted last month after Turkey deployed a force protection unit of around 150 troops to an area hear Bashiqa where its soldiers have been training Iraqi militia to fight IS.

Erdogan told reporters in Istanbul that Turkey killed 18 IS fighters who were planning to inflitrate Bashiqa and attack the camp, in a pre-emptive strike against the IS forces.

"None of our soldiers were wounded," he said, but "this incident shows what a correct step it was" to station additional troops in Bashiqa. "They are doing what needs to be done at the right time, and will continue to do so," he said.

Baghdad has insisted that the troops weren't authorized, violate international law, and must be removed. It has taken its case to the United States, the United Nations, and other forums to try to force an immediate withdrawal.

But after pulling out some troops under pressure from the United States, Erdogan has ruled out a total withdrawal.

In response to Erdogan's remarks January 8, Iraq's Joint Operations Command in Baghdad issued a statement asserting there was no IS assault on Turkish forces "in Bashiqa or any other areas."

While that conflicted with Erdogan's account, media reports coming out of northern Iraq confirmed that 18 IS fighters were killed there this week. Some reports said they were killed by coalition air strikes, however, rather than Turkish or Iraqi troops.

Erdogan said he believes Russia is behind Iraq's sudden objection to Turkish troops in the last month. Relations between Ankara and Moscow took a nosedive at the end of November after Turkey shot down a Russian plane that it says strayed over its border with Syria.

"They [Iraq] asked us to train their soldiers and showed us this base as the venue. But as we see, afterwards, once there were problems between Russia and Turkey...these negative developments began," Erdogan said.

Turkey has pointed out that Baghdad can't protect its military trainers because Iraqi security forces have had no presence in the northern Nineveh province since they collapsed in June 2014 in the face of a sweeping advance by IS.

With reporting by Reuters, AP, and AFP
Executives from 25 news organizations urged U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to press for the release of a Washington Post reporter jailed in Tehran.

"Journalism is not a crime. Yet...Jason Rezaian has been imprisoned by Iran since July 2014 for doing his job. Iran has never offered any evidence that even makes a pretense of justifying this imprisonment," the executives said in a January 8 letter to Kerry.

"The United States has considerable leverage with Iran right now to press that point, and we urge you to continue to do so," they wrote.

Kerry has frequently raised Rezaian's case with Tehran, but he has refused to link the release of Rezaian or other U.S. prisoners with the lifting of U.S. sanctions on Iran, which is expected this year as Tehran rushes to carry out its part of a landmark nuclear agreement with global powers.

Rezaian, 39, was convicted in closed proceedings last year after being charged with espionage. The length of his sentence has not been disclosed publicly.

Media organizations represented in the letter included the Associated Press, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN.

Based on reporting by AP, PBS, and Politico


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Changes might be coming to the Hotel Carlisle.

The hotel, which is currently owned by Sweet Dreams LLC, is alleged to be shutting down as current management plans to pursue renovation efforts. The hotel closed its doors to new rentals last week.

The hotel has reportedly been dealing with financial debt, allegedly lingering from past ownership; it currently owes money to both utility companies and several vendors.

There are talks of another company coming in and taking over and us being able to move forward the way we previously wanted to, said Hotel Manager Sam Price.

Subsequently, several resident employees and long-term tenants, who have continued to live in the hotel, have been advised to vacate by Jan. 11, according to hotel employee Jason Shearer. Now, they are uncertain of what to do.

Right now, none of us have a place to go, Shearer said.

Shearer, who has been living at the hotel himself, said that tenants and employees were told last week that they would have to leavetime that they felt was insufficient.

I have two kids and I dont know what to do or where Im going to go, said Housekeeping Supervisor Jasmine Johnson. The people here really dont know where they are going. You need more than a few days to figure that out.

According to Shearer, hotel employees have also not been paid in over five weeks, one of several financial shortcomings allegedly stemming from a $3.7 million civil suit in 2014 in which the hotel, under different ownership, had not made loan payments and subsequently defaulted. The suit was later dismissed by the loan company.

Price, who has been with the hotel since Feb. 2015, said that tenants and resident employees would be given extra time to find somewhere else to go if need be, but that most utilities, including electricity, would be terminated on Jan. 11. Shearer said that the buildings heat has already been off for several weeks.

We feel that we have given (current tenants and resident employees) ample time (to find somewhere to go), Price said. Management staff has given them as much help as we can to find places to go. Unfortunately, we are asking them to leave (because) we dont want to take the risk of new management not coming through (for them).

Price said that, depending on the hotels management status, plans might be in place to begin a renovation process with a tentative target completion date of March 2016.

Obviously we are looking to renovate the property; it had really been let go by past owners, Price said. The goal is to take the main building that houses the pool, sauna and about 119 rooms and renovate it and make it worthy of at least a three-star quality to start with. (Completion) is really dependent on the weather and the money coming in.

Price said that the hope would be to restore the hotel to its once thriving nature. The hotel dates back to the mid-1960s.

It would be a process of multimillion-dollar renovations and a loan for us to upgrade the property and bring it back to what it used to be, Price said.

(The hotel) was a big place with me growing up, Shearer said. There used to be all kinds of people here. This used to be a nice place; it was basically suit and tie.
Lawyers for a University of Virginia dean who has filed a defamation lawsuit against Rolling Stone say the magazines shocking story of a campus rape is based on a series of lies by its main subject, according to new court filings.

In documents filed this week, lawyers for U.Va. Associate Dean Nicole Eramo say Jackie, the female student whose account of a 2012 gang rape at a fraternity house served as the main narrative of the Rolling Stone article, should not be protected from having to reveal her text messages in the case because theres no evidence a sexual assault ever took place.

What Jackie is refusing to produce is not evidence of a sexual assault, but evidence that she lied, Eramos lawyers wrote in a filing submitted Wednesday in federal court.

The new filings underscore the potential for the events that led up to the article to be aired in court in ugly fashion as details of Jackies conduct become fodder for legal arguments. The article, later retracted by Rolling Stone, has spawned three defamation lawsuits, none of which names Jackie as a defendant.

The documents have prompted a leading feminist group to pen an open letter to U.Va. President Teresa A. Sullivan crying foul about the court proceedings and asking the university to intervene.

Eramo, whose duties include handling allegations of sexual misconduct, filed a lawsuit against Rolling Stone last May seeking more than $7.5 million in damages. Eramo argued that the story, published in late 2014, falsely portrayed her as dismissive of the rape allegation outlined by Jackie in the article. Major discrepancies emerged in Jackies account, and after an investigation, Charlottesville police found no evidence to substantiate the story.

Two other defamation suits against the magazine have been filed by Phi Kappa Psi, the fraternity named in the story. One suit was filed by the chapter, and another was from a smaller group of fraternity members.

The new filing from Eramos legal team says having Jackie turn over her communications for the lawsuit would require Jackie to admit that her concern is not being outed as a victim of sexual assault, but rather being exposed as a serial liar who invented people, events and text messages.

Jackies attorneys have argued that, as the victim of an alleged assault who is entitled to legal protections and is not a party to the lawsuit, she should not be forced to divulge private information. In a sharply worded response, Jackies attorneys said Eramos court filings are the best example to date of exactly the calloused behavior that she was accused of by Rolling Stone.

Above all else, Dean Eramos recent filing continues her troubling treatment of (Jackie) and should be of concern to sexual assault survivors everywhere, Jackies attorneys, a team consisting of attorneys from Washington-based Stein Mitchell Cipollone Beato & Missner LLP and several Charlottesville lawyers, wrote in a response filed Thursday.

Jackies lawyers also pointed to a letter addressed to Sullivan this week from the National Organization for Women, which said the very troubling pattern of abuse in Eramos court filings should not be allowed to continue.

Your deans demands recite nearly every false argument made to undermine victims of sexual assault, read a letter signed by NOW President Terry ONeill, Virginia NOW President Diana Egozcue and Charlottesville NOWs Tannis Fuller. It is exactly this kind of victim blaming and shaming that fosters rape culture, revictimizes those brave enough to have come forward and silences countless other victims.

U.Va. officials declined to comment.

Eramos lawyers have sought documents related to Haven Monahan, a person Jackie told friends was her date on the night of the alleged rape in 2012. Eramos lawyers have suggested Monahan was a fake suitor created by Jackie in a strange bid to earn the affections of another student, Ryan Duffin.

Eramo, represented by the Alexandria-based law firm Clare Locke LLP, is seeking to compel the production of Jackies communication with Rolling Stone writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely (the articles author whos also named as a defendant in Eramos suit) and any other magazine personnel; communications with Eramo and other U.Va. officials; any messages Jackie wrote under the Monahan name or referencing Monahan; communications with any others about the article; and any online postings by Jackie about the alleged assault.

An earlier motion sought a broader range of documents, but Eramos attorneys reduced the scope.

Jackies attorneys wrote that Eramos defamation case does not center on Jackie, but instead requires her to disprove the articles suggestion of a systemic failure to protect victims.

What is tragic about this case is that Dean Eramo apparently believes she can rehabilitate her reputation by attacking a student she herself counseled and whom she referred to support groups and additional counseling following her report of sexual assault, Jackies attorneys wrote.

Eramos attorneys said theyve attempted to be reasonable and accommodating to Jackie, including by agreeing to identify her in court documents only by the pseudonym used in the article.
It was democracy in action in salute of a legend buried in the Old Graveyard in Carlisle.

One hundred years ago this January, local residents announced plans for a special celebration to accompany the scheduled June 28, 1916 unveiling of the monument to Molly Pitcher.

Delegates from as far away as Camp Hill and Shippensburg met on Jan. 6, 1916 to discuss the steps to organize a parade, sponsor a pageant and arrange for extra train service to handle the expected crowds. The men had in common membership in the Patriotic Order of the Sons of America.

Grassroots Diversity

They were only the vanguard of a broader movement of supporters who led the charge in 1915 to have a million Pennsylvanians petition state lawmakers to release $10,000 from the Treasury to develop a monument to a Carlisle woman some say was no heroine of the Revolutionary War. In 1915, $10,000 was the equivalent of about $230,606 in todays money.

The sense of the meeting seemed to be that now that the monument had been produced  everybody should be asked to cooperate in making the day one long to be remembered, The Carlisle Evening Herald reported on Jan. 7, 1916.

The newspaper mentioned how the delegates had formed a temporary committee tasked with drumming up support and funding for a June commemoration to honor not only the memory of Molly Pitcher, but also the contribution the Cumberland Valley made to the American Revolution. Part of the mission was to reach out to all the organizations that had lobbied for the monument.

Those organizations included such diverse groups as the Knights of Malta, Daughters of the American Revolution, Sons and Daughters of Liberty and the Senior Order of the United American Mechanics. Together they formed legislative committees to push their agenda.

R.W. Woods of Carlisle was among the lawmakers who assisted these committees in their successful petition drive that resulted in the money being allocated. Gov. Martin Brumbaugh then appointed William A. Rupp of Carlisle to a commission whose job was to coordinate the design and development of the monument.

A contract was let to the Van Amringe Granite Company of Boston, Massachusetts, for $9,750, leaving $250 to pay for part of the expenses of the commission, The Evening Herald reported in January 1916. Work has been going on since last August by the sculptor called in to collaborate with the contractors J. Otto Schweitzer of Philadelphia.

The result was the monument that stands to this day in the Old Graveyard in Carlisle. A 6-foot-tall figure of Molly Pitcher holding a cannon swab stands atop a granite pedestal overlooking a replica of a Revolutionary War cannon.

The legend

As the story goes, Molly Pitcher was a camp follower who accompanied her sweetheart to the Battle of Monmouth on June 22, 1778. Amid the fighting, she tended the wounded and carried cool spring water to refresh thirsty soldiers suffering in the oppressive heat. She had earned her nickname from the container she used in her mercy mission.

When Molly saw her lover killed or wounded by enemy fire, she promptly took his place at the cannon and helped to load the weapon as soldiers held the line. The troops which had started to retreat, rallied to her support and the battle was won, The Herald reported in January 1916. It is believed that Gen. George Washington gave Molly the honorary rank of sergeant in recognition for her bravery.

A woman named Molly McCauley died in Carlisle in 1832 and was buried in the Old Graveyard. Over time, the legend grew that she was the Molly Pitcher of lore and thus deserving of a series of upgraded memorials to mark her burial site.

The first upgrade took place in 1876 when a citizens committee was formed to raise money for a marble headstone to honor Molly during the Centennial of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

Almost 30 years later, in 1905, an effort was launched to lobby state lawmakers to budget $5,000 toward the installation of a cannon and a flagpole at her gravesite.

But not everyone was supportive of this measure.

Deserving or not?

Jeremiah Zeamer, editor of the American Volunteer newspaper, sought to debunk the Molly Pitcher legend, but was largely ignored by the majority of local residents. Zeamer felt her grave was already appropriately marked.

Considering the small and doubtful service Molly McCauley tendered the country, this is about all the respect that can be awarded to her memory in justice to history, Zeamer wrote in an April 4, 1905 editorial. She is neither an historical or moral character to hold up to young Americans for emulation.

At times, he was downright insulting of McCauley calling her a vulgar, profane old woman, uncouth of appearance and notoriously fond of grog.

Molly herself made no mention of helping to load artillery during the Revolution, Zeamer added. Had anything so remarkable occurred, she certainly would have felt sufficient pride in it to remember and sometimes speak of it. There was no mention of the Battle of Monmouth incident in any of the obituaries published at the time of her death when the story of her exploits would have been relatively fresh and easy to collaborate.

In a paper published by the Cumberland County Historical Society, local historians D.W. Thompson and Merri Lou Schaumann mentioned how there is no record of any woman manning artillery at Monmouth. They believe the story of Molly Pitcher became such an accepted part of Revolutionary War history that no one disputed the 1876 claim that Molly McCauley was the legend.

There is evidence to suggest that the Molly McCauley of Carlisle may have done something distinctive during the war. In 1822, she applied for and received a pension from the state for her military service. The Evening Herald reported that a formation of soldiers from the Carlisle Barracks escorted her remains to the Old Graveyard at the time of her death.

After 1905, efforts were underway to develop a monument for Molly. A bill looking to this end was repeatedly presented to the legislature and twice passed but both times vetoed by the governor for lack of funds, The Herald reported. The newspapers did not mention when the bills were passed.

The last veto led to the grassroots effort that saw a million Pennsylvanians sign a petition backing a monument for Molly. The 1910 census reported the population of Pennsylvania was 7.6 million.

The parade that June drew thousands of people to downtown Carlisle to celebrate the legacy of Molly Pitcher. Judge Edward Biddle was among those who spoke during the unveiling ceremony at the Old Graveyard.

The monument which Carlisle receives today from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a splendid and lasting recognition of that lofty virtue which we call heroism, Biddle said. Molly Pitcher has come to be accepted as Americas foremost conspicuous exponent of feminine valor, notwithstanding that the unique position accorded her has been frequently and vigorously assailed.
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Sen. Tom Garrett said his charge into the 5th Congressional District nomination contest wont hinder his performance in the 60-day General Assembly session that begins Wednesday.

Garrett, R-Buckingham County, entered the race at the starting line, announcing the same day Republican Rep. Robert Hurt confirmed he would not seek a fourth term representing the 5th. Physically it is the largest congressional district in Virginia, sprawling from the North Carolina border to the Northern Virginia suburbs. Locally it includes all of Franklin County and part of Henry and Bedford counties.

I just increased my work day from 12 hours a day to 18 and from five days a week to six, Garrett said .

When asked whether he was concerned about fatigue setting in during the 60-day endurance challenge featuring negotiations on Democrat Gov. Terry McAuliffes proposed two-year budget, Garrett said no.

I think it comes from my time in the military, Garrett said, referring to his five-year U.S. Army service that included combat deployment in the Balkans. Sometimes you have to get stuff done. You get it done and you sleep when its over. One-seventh of a week is enough time for me to recharge and go back to the next week.

So far, Garrett is the only current elected official to have announced candidacy for the 5th District seat.

Although Virginia law states General Assembly representatives and statewide officials, as well as their campaigns, are prohibited from fundraising during the sessions, an opinion issued by then-Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, a Republican, said the prohibition does not extend to congressional races. The 2010 opinion responded to a request from Hurt, then a state representative. It opened up his congressional campaign to fundraising during the General Assembly.

Garrett said he has not planned fundraisers during the General Assembly and he is focused on the session.

Garrett faces off against at least two Republican challengers, Bedford County developer Jim McKelvey and Michael Del Rosso, a technology executive.
A national feminist organization is calling on University of Virginia President Teresa Sullivan to quell the actions of a university administrator embroiled in a defamation lawsuit against Rolling Stone magazine.

The National Organization for Women published an open letter to Sullivan on Jan. 6 calling out the deeply disturbing actions of Nicole Eramo, an associate dean of students at UVa who filed a $7.5-million federal lawsuit last May against Rolling Stone in relation to a now-retracted article about sexual assault on UVas campus. A former chairwoman of the universitys sexual misconduct board, Eramo claims in her suit that the article portrays her as ineffective and uncaring in helping victims of sexual assault.

In recent weeks, Eramo has asked the court to compel the cooperation of Jackie, the UVa student whose account of her alleged gang rape at a prominent fraternity house served as the articles centerpiece. An investigation by Charlottesville police turned over no evidence that Jackies alleged assault ever occurred, and the magazine has since retracted the story that the Columbia Journalism Review dubbed a journalistic failure that was avoidable.

Counsel for Eramo has asked that Jackie turn over any communications with the magazine, friends, family and a campus support organization related to the alleged assault, but Jackies lawyers have countered that their client is immune from doing so, as she is not a party to the lawsuit and should be given immunity as a victim of sexual assault.

In Wednesdays letter, the National Organization for Women said Eramos effort is going too far.

Your deans demands recite nearly every false argument made to undermine victims of sexual assault, the letter reads. It is exactly this kind of victim blaming and shaming that fosters rape culture, re-victimizes those brave enough to have come forward, and silences countless other victims.

The letter states that by implicating Jackie in the lawsuit, Eramo has publicly attacked a victim whom she formerly counseled and that doing so could damage the ability of students to trust university officials tasked with protecting them. Further, the letter indicts the university for condoning Eramos actions and demands that it take steps to put a stop to these actions, make clear that the university does not support them and to continue to foster a more positive environment where all students can feel safe and protected.

A spokesman for the university said Friday that Sullivan declined to comment on the matter.

When reached Friday, one of Eramos attorneys said it was unfortunate that Jackie and her cadre of lawyers have taken the unreasonable and legally untenable position that she is immune from routine civil discovery.

And it is even more unfortunate that an organization that is supposed to advocate on behalf of women is supporting a woman who has set the cause for survivor support back so far, said Libby Locke, a member of Eramos counsel.

In her most recent filing in the case, Eramo called Jackie a serial liar who invented people, events and text messages to corroborate her story, and that she is not immune from participating in the lawsuits discovery phase.

Jackie was the primary source for Rolling Stones false and defamatory article that included her story about being the victim of a violent sexual assault. But there is no evidence whatsoever that the story Jackie told her friends, or the very story she told Rolling Stone, actually transpired, Locke said in an email. Instead, it appears that Jackie fabricated her perpetrator and the details of the alleged assault.  Having freely discussed her supposed sexual assault with numerous media outlets, there is no basis in law or logic for Jackie to refuse to produce documents related to her participation in the Rolling Stone article.

Terry ONeill, president of the National Organization for Women, disagreed with the notion that Jackie had fabricated her story, saying that I have always believed Jackie and that Jackies trauma could have affected her memory of the alleged assault. She further censured the university and Sullivan for condoning Jackies re-victimization through Eramos court filings.

They are ratcheting up the promotion of rape culture and slut-shaming with these filings, ONeill said Friday. I am beyond shocked that an institution as well regarded as the University of Virginia would actually engage in this kind of behavior.

ONeill said her organization had not sent any messages to Eramo directly, and that while UVa is not named as a party to the lawsuit, the organization view[s] this as an action of the administration of the university.

What we see is the message that is unmistakably being communicated to women at UVa  if you get raped at UVa and you file a report on it, you are fair game to be viciously attacked years after the attack if the administration feels it is in their best interest, ONeill said. President Sullivan is responsible for those kinds of messages, period, end of discussion.

Rolling Stone is facing two more lawsuits in relation to the retracted story. In 2015, members and alumni of the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity filed lawsuits claiming they were unduly harmed by the allegations in the debunked article.
I identify as a conservative but I have many friends who are more conservative than me, so most of the content I see on Facebook generally leans more to the right than my personal views.

There are many issues, mostly fiscal, but a couple of social issues as well where my views dont align with President Obamas.

That said, I dont hate or even dislike our President. He seems to me to be a good father and husband, and genuinely believes his policies will lead to a better America.

Our Wednesday paper ran a front page photo of the President as he had just announced the signing of an executive order to enact new gun regulations. A subscriber left a message on my voice mail questioning our use of the photo and called the President the N word.

If you spend any time at all on social media sites you will see that many Americans have very strong feelings about the President and hatred is not too strong a descriptor for their feelings.

Interestingly, many of my friends who express these strong feelings are Christians.

A more moderate friend sent me a link that I think sums up the proper Christian response.

I Peter 2:17 says, Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.

That was quite a statement to make when the king at that time was Nero.

Nero was notorious for his mistreatment of Christians, including dipping them in oil, putting them on spikes and setting them on fire to light his garden at night.

Many historians say Nero was responsible for crucifying the apostles Paul and Peter.

The key to understanding this teaching, to honor the King, is to realize that it was not about Nero, it was about the Christians he was writing to. His point was that as Christians, our attitude and actions toward others is always on display and to say or do anything uncharitable or ungracious to another would be noticed and possibly lead the observer to conclude that Christian are no different than anyone else.

Furthermore, Peter taught that even if the king was a tyrant, Christians should recognize that God placed him in his position and the position deserved to be honored.

I think we can all agree that no matter how much you may dislike our Presidents policies, he is no Nero and it is our Christian obligation to honor the position.

I dont see many Christians following Peters instruction, and it is both disappointing and damaging, both to Christianity and civil engagement.

If it isnt too late to add a resolution to the list, lets all resolve to be better communicators and begin by honoring one another. If not because you believe the other person deserves it, then because you are a better person than that.
Albert Lane Boyd, 89, of Ferrum, departed this life on Thursday, January 7, 2016. He was the only child of the late, George Cleveland Boyd and Myrtle Boyd Thomas.Lane is survived by his wife, Diamond Bowling Boyd whom he married on December 7, 1944. They had many happy years together. He is also survived by two brothers-in-law, Herbert Bowling and Hosea Bowling; and one sister-in-law, Eva B. Pyron. Lane served two years in the United States Navy, World War II, in the South Pacific. He was a member of the American Legion Post #6, Franklin County. He received a machinist degree from DCC, Danville, Va. He worked as a Research Technician at Dan River Mills, Inc. He also worked for Ferrum College many years and retired from Aerospace Testing in Roanoke, Va. Lane was a charter member of the Crossroads Ruritan Club and later a member of the Waidsboro Ruritan Club. Lane actively served the Lord at Maple Grove United Methodist Church. He was a loving, caring person and will always be remembered for jokes, and tall tales leading to a contagious laugh.Funeral services will be conducted at 2 p.m. Sunday, January 10, 2016 from Flora Funeral Chapel with the Rev. Baesik Peter Choi officiating. Interment will be private in St. John's Cemetery, Endicott. In lieu of flowers contributions will be welcomed for the Maple Grove United Methodist Church Fellowship Hall, 452 Henry Road, Ferrum, Virginia 24088. A heartfelt gratitude is expressed to Maple Grove UMC congregation; to Peggy Hale for home caregiving; Helen, his hospice nurse; and to Dr. Unwin. His family will receive friends 5 to 7 p.m. Saturday, January 9, 2016 at Flora Funeral Service & Cremation Center, Rocky Mount.
An affinity for the environment is a self-serving and important asset. We have but one. We either keep it clean and livable, or poison it and threaten our health and our lives. We have no spare. When this one is uninhabitable, we are done.

Affinity is a function of experience and closeness. You like your family and friends (most of them, anyway) more than you care for a stranger living in the farthest western provinces of China. You care what happens in your town more than you care what happens in a town in the Idaho panhandle. To be fair, they feel the same way in Cocolalla, Idaho, about us.

Affinity for me started many years back as conservation taught by a father who loved to hunt and fish and maintained by over four decades of chasing trout with a fly rod. Trout, especially Pennsylvanias state fish, the brook trout (technically a char), tend to live in wild and lovely places. However, those places are disappearing.

A recent report by Trout Unlimited shows the erosion of habitat for the nations native fish. For the mid-Atlantic region, this is brook trout. Forty-five percent of the historical range for these jewels has been lost in this region, and a look at the TU map shows that a great portion of that loss occurred right here, across southern Pennsylvania.

These streams that can no longer hold fish that require clean and cold water flow into the rivers that supply drinking water to millions of Pennsylvanians. The loss of forested buffers along these streams leads to more silt and pollution entering the water and more costs to taxpayers treating that water so it is safe to drink. The loss of these riparian buffers also means more flooding  also an increased cost for people living downstream.

We can do ourselves and our children and grandchildren a favor by increasing interest in keeping these streams viable for trout and thereby cheaper, cleaner and safer for us. Fly fishing is one way to build the affinity necessary for that to happen.

Trout Unlimited runs fly-fishing camps for teenagers around the country. The first, Rivers Camp, started here 20 years ago, sponsored by the Cumberland Valley chapter of TU. Each year the camp welcomes up to 32 young adults, ages 14 to 17. The camp provides a unique experience in both fly fishing and fly tying instruction coupled with conservation lessons and experiences that support the long-held TU maxim: take care of the trout, and the fishing will take care of itself.

The camp does more, however. It also creates a lasting, formative experience for the participants. Clark Hall, CVTUs camp organizer says, Every year after camp, we hear from several campers that the camp changed my life.

While parents wonder about kids screen time and worry if they see enough of the world around them, an alternative is nearby. Registration for Rivers Camp began Nov. 1. See riverscamp.com for details. Someday your tap water will thank you.

Alan Howe lives in Carlisle. He is an Air Force veteran with two decades of overseas experience, and a life-long student of history, governance and the Letort. He is a member of the Carlisle Area Dog Park Association board; chair of the CADPA Site Committee; a newly elected Carlisle area leader for the Democratic Party. He also serves on the CVTU board and as South-Central VP for the Pennsylvania Council of TU.
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A PRIVATE company chosen to run probation services and manage violent offenders in South Yorkshire has failed an audit.

Sodexo, a French catering company, was chosen to run South Yorkshire Community Rehabilitation Company (CRC) in December 2014.

But within six months of taking over, it had failed an audit by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) who found that offenders were not being properly monitored and there were systematic failures with the management of offenders.

John Healey, MP for Wentworth and Dearne, called for the company to be stripped of its contract, branding the failings a scandal and a disgrace.

He added: Conservative ministers were determined to press ahead with privatisation and, within just a few months, theres proof its putting the public at risk.

Before this contract Sodexo had no experience in dealing with offenders \_ they served food in our schools.

Theyre just not up to the job and should be stripped of the contract.

Mr Healey (pictured) said he had asked justice secretary Michael Gove for a copy of the MoJ audit and an explanation from the government.

He also said he had received a number of reports from probation officers in South Yorkshire about high workloads, low morale, failed promises, IT problems and other issues.

Mr Healey said: There are extremely worrying findings in this audit, but exactly the sort of problems I and other MPs predicted and feared before the government pushed through its reckless and ideological reorganisation.

Company managers seem to be paying little care or attention to the service, offenders and safety of the public, and this is why I have, and will continue to, challenge the government over the privatisation of a perfectly good service.

Ministers were determined to press on with privatising probation, despite serious concerns about the risk to public safety.

There was no justification or evidence it would make the probation service better, the public safer or reduce re-offending.

A spokesman for Sodexo Justice Services said: We are disappointed with the results of the recent audit at South Yorkshire Community Rehabilitation Company.

We take this very seriously and have implemented an action plan to address the concerns raised.

A Ministry of Justice spokesman said it was currently reviewing the CRCs corrective action plan and that if it was found to not be meeting the requirements of the plan, the MoJ had the right to take further action.

He said: We hold providers rigorously to account for their performance and take action wherever they are falling short.

Following an audit by the Ministry of Justice, South Yorkshire CRC has now developed an improvement plan. We will continue to monitor the CRCs performance closely.

Our probation reforms are designed to make sure almost all offenders receive support on release, including, for the first time, those sentenced to less than 12 months.
Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. (TMO) said late Friday that it has agreed to acquire Affymetrix Inc. (AFFX) for $14 per share cash, or $1.3 billion, which represents a premium of about 52 percent to Affymetrix's closing price Friday. Subject to approval from Affymetrix shareholders, Thermo Fisher expects the deal to close at the end of the second quarter. Thermo Fisher intends to use cash on hand and short-term debt to finance the transaction.

Shares of Affymetrix, which had been halted at $9.21 prior to the announcement, surged $4.59 or 49.84% to $13.80 in after hours.

Both companies boards of directors have unanimously approved the transaction. Affymetrix's eBioscience offering for cellular analysis will enhance Thermo Fisher's leading biosciences capabilities. Specifically, the company specializes in a range of antibodies, multiplex RNA, and protein and single-cell assays.

The transaction is expected to be immediately accretive to Thermo Fisher's adjusted EPS, adding $0.10 of accretion in the first full year of ownership. Thermo Fisher expects to realize total synergies of about $70 million by year three following the close, consisting of about $55 million of cost synergies and about $15 million of adjusted operating income benefit from revenue-related synergies.

For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com

Business News
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Four Ethiopians arrested for wearing women's clothes





DHAMAR, Jan. 09 (Saba) - The security services in cooperation with the popular committees arrested on Saturday in Dhamar province four Ethiopians wearing Woman clothes.



The Ethiopians were seized in a checkpoint at the entrance of Dhamar city while on their way to Sana'a coming from Aden, a security official said.



Investigations are underway, he added.



It is worth to mention that the security services in Dhamar province arrested in August 2015 a terrorist cell of five people and a woman, who were all Ethiopians.



HA/AF

Saba

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[09/January/2016]
UN concerned deeply by coalition's intensified air strikes in Yemen





New York, Jan. 09 (Saba) - The United Nations (UN) expressed on Saturday deep concerns over escalation of the Saudi-led Coalition's air strikes in Yemen.



"The Secretary-General is deeply concerned about the intensification of Coalition air strikes and ground fighting and shelling in Yemen," said the Spokesman for UN Secretary-General. "The Secretary-General is particularly concerned about reports of intense air strikes in residential areas and on civilian buildings in Sana'a, including the Chamber of Commerce, a wedding hall and a centre for the blind."



The UN has received troubling reports of the use of cluster munitions in attacks on Sana'a on 6 January in several locations, Stephane Dujarric said. "The use of cluster munitions in populated areas may amount to a war crime due to their indiscriminate nature.



He said the Secretary-General reminded all parties of the utmost necessity to respect their obligations under international human rights law and international humanitarian law, which prohibits attacks directed against civilians and civilian infrastructure.



The Secretary-General called on all parties to the conflict in Yemen to engage in good faith with his Special Envoy for Yemen in order to convene a new round of peace talks as soon as possible, Dujarric said.



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[09/January/2016]
SEOUL, South Korea  North Korea warned of war as South Korea on Saturday continued blasting anti-Pyongyang propaganda across the rivals tense border in retaliation for the Norths purported fourth nuclear test.

North Korean propaganda is filled with warnings of war, but the country is also extremely sensitive to criticism of its authoritarian leadership, which Seoul resumed in its cross-border broadcasts on Friday for the first time in nearly five months. Pyongyang says the broadcasts are tantamount to an act of war. When South Korea briefly resumed propaganda broadcasts in August after an 11-year break, Seoul says the two Koreas exchanged artillery fire.

Speaking to a massive crowd at Pyongyangs Kim Il Sung Square, a top ruling party official said the broadcasts, along with talks between Washington and Seoul on the possibility of deploying in the South advanced warplanes capable of delivering nuclear bombs, have pushed the Korean Peninsula toward the brink of war.

Pyongyangs rivals are jealous of the Norths successful hydrogen bomb test, Workers Party Secretary Kim Ki Nam said in comments broadcast on state TV late Friday.

South Koreas Yonhap news agency reported that frontline South Korean troops, near 11 sites where loudspeakers started blaring propaganda Friday, were on highest alert. Yonhap said Seoul had deployed missiles, artillery and other weapons systems near the border to swiftly deal with any possible North Korean provocation. South Koreas Defense Ministry did not confirm the reports.

While the Souths broadcasts also include news and pop music, much of the programming challenges North Koreas government more directly.

We hope that our fellow Koreans in the North will be able to live in (a) society that doesnt invade individual lives as soon as possible, a female presenter said in parts of the broadcast that officials revealed to South Korean media. Countries run by dictatorships even try to control human instincts.

The broadcasts came as world powers sought to find other ways to punish the North for conducting what it said was its first hydrogen bomb test Wednesday.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry urged China, the Norths only major ally and its biggest aid provider, to end business as usual with North Korea.
A first-of-its-kind journey along India and Pakistan border

What binds the two most talked about nations - India and Pakistan together? What makes the
Philippines launches worlds first national human rights investigation into 50 big polluters

By GREENPEACE

December 4, 2015

MANILA  The Philippines Commission on Human Rights (CHR) announced that it will launch an investigation on December 10 (International Human rights Day) which could hold fossil fuel companies responsible for the impacts of climate change, such as extreme weather events. This will be the world's first national human rights investigation into big polluters.

The 50 companies that will be investigated include Chevron, ExxonMobil, BP, Royal Dutch Shell, ConocoPhillips. They are a part of the 90 legal entities that are responsible for the majority of global CO2 and methane emissions in the earths atmosphere, as identified by peer-reviewed research into so-called Carbon Majors published in 2014.

The response of the Philippines Human Rights Commission to the petition signals a turning point in the struggle to avoid catastrophic climate change. It opens a critical new avenue of struggle against the fossil fuel companies driving destructive climate change, said Kumi Naidoo, the International Executive Director at Greenpeace International.

This should hopefully inspire other human rights commissions around the world to take similar action. If I were a CEO of fossil fuel company, I would be running scared. This is yet another indication that we are seeing the end of the fossil fuel era.

The CHR disclosed in a press conference on 4 December in Paris that its investigation will involve all stakeholders including the 50 corporations, and include consultations and studies. As triggered by the petition, it will organize an investigation committee devoted to climate change and human rights.

This investigation is not just about how fossil fuel companies do business, but that they do business at all in the future. Its time we held, those to account who are most responsible for the devastating effects of climate change, said Zelda Soriano, legal and political advisor at Greenpeace Southeast Asia.

Were absolutely behind the Commission on Human Rights in seeking the opinion and cooperation of UN human rights experts and scientists, and its courageous investigation into these distant and faceless companies, adds Zelda Soriano, legal and political advisor at Greenpeace Southeast Asia.

Greenpeace Southeast Asia together with 14 organizations, 20 individuals, filed the petition on 22 September calling for this investigation to take place. Over 100,000 signatures have been gathered in support of the initiative online from Change.org, SumOfUs and Greenpeace Southeast Asia, and eight international NGOs provided advice and support. Among other requests, the complaint asks for the CHR:

- to officially put these companies on notice;

- to request plans from these companies on how they intend to eliminate, remedy and prevent damages (or threatened damages) resulting from the impacts of climate change, and;
Pearl Harbor remembered

By ROSE SAN DIEGO

December 8, 2015

CHICAGO  Remembering the day, December 7th, 1941, a reason why we volunteered to save our country, our families.

Not only did the Japanese unload its arsenal from the air on the Island of Hawaii, but also on the Philippines Islands as well that day. The surprise air bombardment annihilated the Navy's entire Pacific Seventh Fleet at Pearl Harbor within hours. Across the ocean the Japanese Zeros were also creating havoc destroying US bases in the Philippines, Guam and Midway.

These aging Filipino WWII veterans continue to gather regularly to share their daily life struggles but most importantly to share in a bond of camaraderie with one another. After each gathering they have a merienda style of refreshments and then depart in all directions on their way home, hoping to meet for another community mission.

Continuing on their agenda is the hopeful return of at least one of the three church bells removed from the Town of Balangiga, Eastern Samar in 1901 and is still a priority in their lifetime. Another great observance is Bataan Day, commemorated annually on April 9th when US Forces first surrendered the Town of Bataan and its soldiers in 1942 to the enemy, the Imperial Japanese Army.
 -    ,    :             
SEMO

Kayla Carrington of Bismarck has received the Governor's Scholarship to attend Southeast Missouri State University for the 2016-2017 academic year. Carrington is the daughter of Paul Carrington of Bismarck, and will be a 2016 graduate of Bismarck High School.

Bayle Kennon of Fredericktown has received the Residence Life Leadership Award to attend Southeast Missouri State University for the 2016-2017 academic year. Kennon is the daughter of Robert Kennon of Farmington, and Pam Kennon of Fredericktown, and will be a 2016 graduate of Fredericktown High School.

Olivia Simpson of Park Hills has received the University Scholarship and Residence Life Leadership Award to attend Southeast Missouri State University for the 2016-2017 academic year. Simpson is the daughter of James Simpson of Fredericktown, and Candace Hart of Park Hills, and will be a 2016 graduate of Central High School.

Harding University

Farmington resident Taylor Friend, a mathematics major at Harding University, was among more than 1,300 University students included on the dean's list for grades achieved during the fall 2015 semester.

Union University

Tia Jordan has been named to the Union University President's List for the fall 2015 semester. The President's List includes full-time students who achieve a 4.0 grade point average on a four-point scale.

Columbia College

Christopher A. Martin, of Farmington and Cody W. Allen of Park Hills were named to the Columbia College dean's list for the August-October and October-December 2015 sessions. To be named to the dean's list a student must have completed 12 semester hours in a 16-week period and achieved a minimum GPA of 3.5 on a four-point scale.

Maryville University

Maryville University has named Devyn Kennon of Farmington and Susan Cowsert of Park Hills to the Honors List for the Fall 2015 semester. Part-time, undergraduate students are eligible for the Academic Honors List when carrying a minimum of six (6) credit hours in the fall, spring or summer semester and maintaining a minimum grade point average of 3.5 and no single grade below a B-.

Maryville University has named Cameron Harvey of Bonne Terre; Breanna Henson of Irondale; Autumn King of Park Hills; Carly Hampton of Farmington; Emily Camillo of Mineral Point to the Deans' List for the Fall 2015 semester. Maryville undergraduate students are eligible for the Deans' List when they complete at least 12 Maryville University credit hours in a semester with a minimum of a 3.5 grade-point average on a 4.0 (perfect) scale.
A University of Southampton-led study has found that blocking a receptor in the brain responsible for regulating immune cells could protect against the memory and behaviour changes seen in the progression of Alzheimer's disease.

The research, published in the journal Brain, was jointly funded by the MRC (Medical Research Council) and Alzheimer's Research UK.

It was originally thought that Alzheimer's disease disturbs the brain's immune response, but this latest study adds to evidence that inflammation in the brain can in fact drive the development of the disease. The findings suggest that by reducing this inflammation, progression of the disease could be halted.

The team hope the discovery will lead to an effective new treatment for the disease, for which there is currently no cure.

The researchers at the University of Southampton used tissue samples from healthy brains and those with Alzheimer's, both of the same age. The researchers counted the numbers of a particular type of immune cell, known as microglia, in the samples and found that these were more numerous in the brains with Alzheimer's disease. In addition, the activity of the molecules regulating the numbers of microglia correlated with the severity of the disease.

The researchers then studied these same immune cells in mice which had been bred to develop features of Alzheimer's. They wanted to find out whether blocking the receptor responsible for regulating microglia, known as CSF1R, could improve cognitive skills. They gave the mice oral doses of an inhibitor that blocks CSF1R and found that it could prevent the rise in microglia numbers seen in untreated mice as the disease progressed. In addition, the inhibitor prevented the loss of communication points between the nerve cells in the brain associated with Alzheimer's, and the treated mice demonstrated fewer memory and behavioural problems compared with the untreated mice.

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Importantly, the team found the healthy number of microglia needed to maintain normal immune function in the brain was maintained, suggesting the blocking of CSF1R only reduces excess microglia.

What the study did not find is a correlated reduction of the number of amyloid plaques in the brain, a characteristic feature of Alzheimer's disease. This supports previous studies that argue other factors may play more of role in cognitive decline.

Dr Diego Gomez-Nicola, lead author of the study and an MRC New Investigator Research Grant (NIRG) fellow at the University of Southampton, said: "These findings are as close to evidence as we can get to show that this particular pathway is active in the development of Alzheimer's disease.

"The next step is to work closely with our partners in industry to find a safe and suitable drug that can be tested to see if it works in humans."

Dr Rob Buckle, director of science programmes at the MRC, added: "It is increasingly clear that inflammation is a key player in a number of neurodegenerative conditions and this study is beginning to unravel the biological processes behind this link.

"The study is an excellent example of how basic research can lead to promising partnerships with industry that could be of real benefit for those with dementia."

Dr Simon Ridley, Director of Research at Alzheimer's Research UK, said: "This work, looking at the role of the immune system in Alzheimer's disease, suggests that blocking the action of the CSF1R protein in mice could help limit the damaging effects of inflammation and protect against symptoms like memory loss. In the last few years, scientists in Southampton have been at the forefront of research into the role of the immune system in Alzheimer's, so it is encouraging to see this study taking these ideas forward by identifying a specific mechanism that could be a target for future treatments.

"Alzheimer's Research UK is delighted to be supporting the next phase of this work as the researchers seek to build on these findings and develop drugs that could block the action of CSF1R in people. Research like this is vital as there are currently no treatments that can stop or slow the progression of Alzheimer's in the brain. We desperately need to see greater investment in research, if we are to find new ways to help the tens of thousands of people who develop Alzheimer's in this country every year."

Dr Gomez-Nicola and his colleagues at the University of Southampton will continue their work with funding from the Dementia Consortium -- a collaboration between Alzheimer's Research UK, MRC Technology and pharmaceutical companies, Eisai and Lilly.
Two Texas A&M University scientists highlighted the conservation benefits of ecotourism worldwide and said a recent research review citing the dangers of ecotourism to wildlife is premature and problematic.

Dr. Lee Fitzgerald, a conservation biologist, and Dr. Amanda Stronza, an anthropologist, published a critique of a recent review in the scientific journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution that proposed tourism may increase the vulnerability of wildlife to predators.

Ecotourists in the Peruvian Amazon are allowed to watch endangered Giant Otters from a distance in this non-motorized small catamaran. More than half the lake is off-limits to tourism, but the entire lake and surrounding rainforest is protected from overfishing and hunting. Ecotourism at this site and many others worldwide is an incentive for conservation and protection of wildlife. (Photo courtesy Dr. Lee Fitzgerald, Texas A&M University) Ecotourists in the Peruvian Amazon are allowed to watch endangered giant otters from a distance. "There have been some claims that have drawn media attention, saying that nature tourism and ecotourism can hurt wildlife and can even make wildlife more vulnerable to predators and poaching," Fitzgerald said.

"Dr. Stronza and I think it's important to qualify those statements," Fitzgerald said. "The idea picked up by the media that nature tourism is bad for animals sends a very mixed message to the public and to all sorts of conservation stakeholders that doesn't help conservation.

"We do research that advances theories in conservation science and our understanding of management practices that work for the benefit of biodiversity conservation. We felt if the idea is being promoted that tourism is bad for animals and can make animals more vulnerable to predators, then that idea should be researched before making sweeping statements that tourism is able to drive negative changes in entire populations.

"We wrote to clarify that the opposite is well-known and supported with much research; that tourism can and often does protect large landscapes and the wildlife within those landscapes."

They pointed out the world's very first national parks in the U.S. were created with tourism in mind and thousands of protected areas around the planet are at least partially justified by tourism.

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They added it's difficult to imagine wild animals becoming so tame from their interaction with people they lose their fear of being eaten.

"The risk of predation is like a big sledgehammer in nature that drives the persistence of antipredator behaviors in species," Fitzgerald said.

"Tourists tend to interact with a small portion of the wildlife population, so it's practically impossible that the characteristics of tameness or boldness would become prevalent throughout an entire population. It's hard to imagine natural selection in that instance would overcome the ever present pressures of predators in nature."

Fitzgerald cited examples of tame domestic species such as cattle, dogs, goats, pigs and even guppies, that when released into the wild, quickly become feral and regain their wild antipredator behaviors.

There are instances of poorly managed interactions between people and wildlife, Fitzgerald noted, but a basic management policy worldwide is to ensure bad interactions and habituation are avoided as much as possible.

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Fitzgerald and Stronza said in many parts of the world tourism protects wildlife from poaching, which is arguably the much greater threat to wildlife.

Stronza said in Botswana, tour operators are bringing rhinos from South Africa for release into the wild to restore populations. She said many of the animals may never see a tourist. And on the Mara Conservancy along the border of Kenya and Tanzania, ecotourism dollars directly fund anti-poaching measures.

Fitzgerald and Stronza explained that strong ecotourism programs keep poachers at bay. If the shield of ecotourism goes away, animals are not poached because they are tame, it's because large areas can then be infiltrated by poachers.

"We wanted to clarify this crucial point because there is no evidence to support the claim that ecotourism and nature tourism make animals vulnerable to poachers. Implying that they do sends a message that could undermine the benefits of ecotourism.

"In other words, it may be more helpful to appreciate the conservation benefits of nature tourism and ecotourism for wildlife, landscapes, people and communities than to pose untested scenarios that tourism hurts wildlife," Fitzgerald said.
Members of the Transfiguration of Our Savior Greek Orthodox Church invite the residents of Florence to The Blessing of Florence in honor of the Feast of Epiphany at 10 a.m. today at Oakdale Lake. During the special blessing service, the Holy Spirit will be called down to bless the waters and those who partake of them or are sprinkled by them. This ancient custom of blessing water is celebrated throughout the world as part of the Orthodox Christian celebration of Epiphany, the celebration of the Baptism of Jesus Christ who blessed all of creation when He entered the Jordan River.

So why do Orthodox Christians bless water, and other material things? How can water be holy? How can the grace of God be contained in some material object? The word holy has a double meaning in the ancient Christian Church, which means not earthly or set aside for a special purpose. God commanded His people to Be holy as I am holy, (Leviticus 11.44-5) and Saint Peter affirmed the call to holiness in the New Testament. If God commanded people to be holy, it would mean that material things can become holy. There are dozens of references in the Old Testament to material objects being holy. If we understand the word as set aside for a special purpose, then it becomes clear.

When Orthodox Christians bless material things, such as the water at the Blessing of Florence, we are asking God to use those material things for a special purpose. Especially in the case of water, which is the single most important physical requirement for life, blessing water means blessing life itself. For Orthodox Christians, the created world has been given to us by God for a special purpose  to find God. Throughout history, the physical world has assisted humanity to understand God. Both the Old and New Testament are filled with references to the earth being a sign for Gods love and power. Earthquakes, stars, floods, clouds, refreshing rain, harsh droughts and even solar eclipses have been used by God to reveal Himself to humanity. To prove His point Jesus said, I tell you that if these should keep silent, the stones would immediately cry out. (Luke 19.40)

If the material world should not be used for God to bless humanity, then He would have remained a distant God and called down from His throne, Ok, I forgive you. You may now go about your business as usual. But God did in fact use creation as way for us to find Him. It is humanity that abuses creation and uses it for selfish purposes. It is humanity that assigns monetary value to life, not God. If by asking God to bless material things, we (thing by thing) set aside the material world to the original purpose God had intended, we are partners with God, not enemies. Just try to reach out to God without using any material thing  no building, no mountain top, no peaceful valley, not even the voice that flows from our lips  it just cannot be done. Thats why Orthodox Christians bless material things.

Athanasios C. Haros, the pastor of Transfiguration of Our Savior Greek Orthodox Church, is a member of the Morning News Faith & Values Advisory Board. Contact him and other board members at fvboard@florencenews.com.
Representatives of FEMA were out visiting parts of St. Francois County on Friday to assess damage to areas that were affected by the flood.

St. Francois County Joint Communications Director and St. Francois County Emergency Management Deputy Director Alan Wells said they are progressing rather well and most of the damage that was sustained primarily to residents affected by the rise in the water table and water getting into lower levels of the homes.

We do have FEMA coming in to do some review of some of those residences to see if we qualify for public assistance, said Wells. We have not had a whole lot of flood victims come forward, but we know that there are many more that we do not know of.

Wells said that from what information he does have there about 15 homes that he is aware of that were affected by flood waters.

There are many that wasnt living space, but I know that there are many more homes that are affected, said Wells. We just dont have the information at this time. People havent been coming forward with that. If we can get the public's assistance, and if FEMA sets up an office, Im sure they will be advertising and putting up information, then we will have people coming forward.

Wells said the county fared better than those counties along the Meramec and Mississippi Rivers. He added that so far the flooding that has been reported to them has been water table flooding.

As far as we know we didnt have severe flooding, we had some low-lying areas flooded and rapid water and some crossings and bridges, but as far as I know we didnt have any recorded flooding in the homes that was river or waterway flooding, said Wells.

Anyone who wants to report flooding that has affected them can call the county commissioner's office at 573-756-3623 or they can contact Wells and leave a message for him at 573-431-7842.
Press Release

January 8, 2016 Duterte-Cayetano launch platform and nationwide listening tour Presidential contender Davao City Mayor Rodrigo "Rody" Duterte and his running mate Senate Majority leader Alan Peter Cayetano officially unveiled their platform of government to the public at the formal launch of their nationwide listening tour in Cebu City today. Speaking in front of 5,000 attendees belonging to different sectors in the province, Duterte and Cayetano promised to wage a war against crime and corruption, especially on illegal drugs, realize an inclusive economy through regional development and equality under law. 24/7 war against crime, corruption and drugs Duterte boldly declared that they will wage a 24/7 war against crime, corruption and illegal drugs and reduce the crime rate to half. "Utilizing the military and the police, and exercising the extraordinary powers of the president, we will half the country's national crime rate and the number of big-time drug lords operating in the country," Duterte said. Duterte said they will also increase the salaries of police personnel to P75,000-P 100,000 and reimpose the death penalty for drug trafficking and other heinous crimes. "I will not allow criminals and the corrupt to further abuse and oppress our people. The Filipino people deserve more than candidates who promise only continuity, and not swift solutions, who promise more of the same, when the same is clearly not enough," the tough-talking mayor said. Federalism and regional development For his part, Cayetano said his partnership with Duterte will ensure that all regions in the country, not just the national capital region (NCR), will benefit from economic development. "Through federalism, Mayor Duterte and I will allocate at least P800 billion worth of guaranteed funds for 10 years to harness the potentials of various sectors in the region, including education, health, agriculture, livelihood, housing, tourism, infrastructure, and transportation." Cayetano explained. Department of Tourism in Cebu, more tourism estates The duo said they want to transfer the Department of Tourism to Cebu and create more tourism estates such as Mactan. "We will create better opportunities by creating more tourism estates in the province. We want to have more Mactans in the province, which is known for its successful industrial ventures and high-class tourism industry," Cayetano said. Heart and lung centers in the Visayas The tandem also want to construct specialty hospitals in Visayas and Mindanao, similar to the Heart Center, Lung Center, Kidney Center, Orthopedic Center, Children's Hospital, and Cancer Research and Treatment Center, which are all based in Metro Manila. "If Manila has a lung or heart center, I don't see why Cebu can't have the same specialty hospitals. There should be no second-class citizens with regard to health care," Cayetano said. The duo's platform also pledged to phase out contractualization, double the salaries of public school teachers and provide a living wage to workers. It also proposed to expand scholarship grants to the youth through the Iskolar ng Bayan program. "Haharapin natin ang hamon ng pagbabago, at sisiguruhin na ang bawat mamamayan ay makikinabang sa gobyernong may matapang na solusyon at mabilis na aksyon," Cayetano ended. The nationwide tour dubbed as "Hamon ng Pagbabago" will cover major cities, provinces, and different sectors in the country. It will be in form of town hall meetings where Duterte and Cayetano can personally listen to the people's concerns and present their solutions to their problems.
QC PTA Federation Signs Manifesto Of Support

For The Vice Presidential Bid Of Sen. Marcos

The Federation of Quezon City PTA (Parents-Teachers Association) has endorsed the Vice Presidential candidacy of Senator Ferdinand "Bongbong" R. Marcos Jr. in a manifesto "Wall of Support".

The "Manifesto Wall" , entitled, "MANIFESTO OF SUPPORT TO THE CANDIDACY OF SENATOR FERDINAND "BONGBONG" R. MARCOS JR. FOR VICE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES THIS COMING MAY, 2016 NATIONAL ELECTIONS," was signed last Thursday at the Asamba Compound, Baesa, Quezon City.

The group cited the major role Marcos played in the passage of key measures like the SK Reform bill, or Senate Bill 2401, entitled, "An Act Establishing Enabling Mechanisms for Meaningful Youth Participation in Nation Building, Strengthening the Sangguniang Kabataan, Creating the Municipal, City and Provincial Youth Development Council, and for Other Purposes," which he authored and sponsored as Chairman of the Senate Committee on Local Government.

Marcos is also the author and sponsor of Senate Bill No 12, entitled, "An Act Providing Barangay Officials, Including Barangay Tanods, Members of the Lupon ng Tagapamayapa, Barangay Health Workers and Day Care Workers Retirement Benefits," which was already passed on third reading in the Senate.

Section 1 of the measure states: "There is hereby established a retirement benefit for Punong Barangays in the amount of One Hundred Thousand Pesos (Php100,000); a Sangguniang Barangay Member in the amount of Eighty Thousand Pesos (Php80,000); a Barangay Treasurer and Secretary, a Barangay Tanod, a Member of the Lupon ng Tagapamayapa, Barangay Health Workers and Barangay Day Care Workers in the amount of Fifty Thousand Pesos (Php50,000).

"RESOLVED, THAT THE QUEZON City PTA FEDERATION AND THE QC PTA FED-DISTRICT- 1 TO 6 HEREBY ENDORSES AND FULLY SUPPORTS THE CANDIDACY OF SENATOR FERDINAND "BONGBONG" R. MARCOS JR. FOR VICE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES THIS COMING MAY, 2016 ELECTIONS," the manifesto said.

The manifesto was signed by officials of the Federation and representatives from other organizations.

Marcos also signed the manifesto, saying: "With humility, I accept."
Despite widespread vocal and written opposition to an ASARCO settlement project proposal to purchase the 2,463-acre Frederick Creek Ranch in Oregon County for the development of a new state park, the Missouri Trustee Council announced Friday it intends to move forward with the plan.

The council is comprised of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, and, for some projects, the U.S. Forest Service.

Along with the Oregon County land purchase, the council also said it will be funding five additional restoration activities in the southeast Missouri counties of Dent, Iron and Reynolds that fall within the Southeast Missouri Lead Mining District (SMLMD), one of the largest lead-producing regions of the world. The district spans multiple counties located anywhere from 40 to 90 miles southwest of St. Louis and located in the Big River, Black River and St. Francois River Watershed.

The total cost for the six approved restoration projects is estimated at $10.98 million. Funding for the selected projects will come from legal settlements with ASARCO, LLC and Freeport McMoRan for natural resources harmed by releases of lead and zinc from mining and smelting at sites in the SMLMD.

Council trustees discussed proposals for the selected and approved projects at a public meeting held Sept. 2 at Johnsons Shut-Ins State Park. The September meeting turned out to be a major bone of contention for counties making up the SMLMD who said they hadnt received any prior notice about it.

At a public meeting held Oct. 13 in Park Hills, members of county commissions and city councils representing areas affected by the lead and zinc contamination complained to representatives of the Missouri Department of Natural Resources that the Johnsons Shut-Ins meeting had not been publicized until two days prior to it occurring, and then only on the DNR website.

Despite DNRs insistence that an email list of nearly 500 people were given prior notice of the public meeting at Johnsons Shut-Ins, no one attending the Park Hills meeting, including state representatives and members of the media, said theyd received it.

The presentation was followed by a 40-day public comment period allowing the public to review the proposed projects and provide feedback. Despite receiving major opposition to the plan from the public, state elected officials, county commissions  and even the Oregon County Commission who feared a further dip in county tax revenue  the council said that after reviewing the comments made, it had elected to fund and implement a suite of six restoration projects involving acquisition of over 5,400 acres and restoration of upland, wetland and bottomland habitats which will benefit migratory birds and other species, as well as improve water quality.

In a statement released Friday, the council said, The purchase and restoration of high-quality habitats enable the trustees to compensate the public for the loss of natural resources as a result of lead and zinc contamination. Natural resources injured by the releases of mining-related contaminants include surface water, stream sediments, fish, aquatic invertebrates, and migratory birds, and their supporting habitats, such as streams, riparian corridors, forests and savannas.

The property purchases will include additional lands for the U.S. Forest Service in the Black River watershed and will add to the Bell Mountain Wilderness area in Iron County and will infill other areas within their proclamation boundaries in Dent County. The property purchases in Iron, Oregon and Reynolds counties will be owned and managed by Missouri Department of Natural Resources.

Habitat restoration projects such as eradication of non-native invasive plant species will be conducted on some of the newly acquired properties in addition to other areas already owned by the Forest Service in Washington, Crawford and Shannon counties. Additionally, the Forest Service will conduct wetland restoration on the Mark Twain National Forest property on the upper West Fork of the Black River in Reynolds County.

State Rep. Linda Black, R-Park Hills  a vocal opponent of using ASARCO settlement funds to fund projects outside the SMLMD  said, "It's unfortunate that the process by which citizens are allowed an opportunity to speak has fallen on deaf ears with the trustees of the ASARCO settlement. All levels of government have shown disapproval of using settlement money to purchase compensatory land. Proceeding forward at this point makes the whole process of accepting public comment seemingly void. I will continue to advocate for local projects that seeks to restore damages."

State Rep. Kevin Engler, R-Farmington, responded to the councils announcement, saying, We know they are purchasing land in several places and they continue to fund projects, but [State Representative] Jay Barnes has introduced a bill to sell the property once we put it in our inventories. It will be an interesting fight and I would hope that they would start funding some of these other projects to show what all theyre going to get done. Well wait and see.

Senator Gary Romine, R-3rd District, didnt wait long to respond to the councils decision, stating Friday afternoon his continued opposition to the decision by the governors office to move forward with the purchase of the Frederick Creek Ranch in Oregon County with monies from the ASARCO settlement."

It is my understanding that the purchase has been made and is waiting to be recorded, Romine said. I am disappointed and dismayed that the governor would ignore the will of the people most affected by the legacy of mining in my district and the will of the citizens of Oregon County to purchase land with the money from the ASARCO settlement in an area never affected by mining activities.

The citizens of my district deserve better. There are worthy projects in the vicinity of the damaged area that could have used this money. Now, we must work toward a solution to curb this blatant abuse of executive power.

Romine said he intends to file legislation to address the issue in the coming weeks, and he plans to use the Lead Industry Task Force, which he chairs, to bring the decision-making process of the Missouri Trustee Council to light.

We must not let this abuse of power continue, Romine said. Money set aside for a certain area should be spent in that area, and the only way that will occur is to ensure that the process is transparent throughout the whole process.
Press Release

January 8, 2016 GRANDSTANDING NOT ALLOWED IN

MAMASAPANO HEARING - POE Sen. Grace Poe allayed fears that the reopening of the Senate investigation into the Mamasapano clash that killed 66 people will be used by the senators and possible resource speakers to advance their political agenda in this year's elections. Poe, who will preside over the inquiry as chair of the Senate Committee on Public Order, assured the public that the committee will not allow grandstanding and will immediately examine the supposed new information on the incident. "Hindi ko po papabayaan na gamitin lamang ito sa pulitika. Kailangan constructive ang mga tanong at kung magpe-personalan sila doon at magsusumbatan sila, hindi natin papayagan kung wala naman konstraktibong kahihinatnan," she said. "Ayokong mag-away ang PNP or AFP dahil dito; kailangan lang sagutin ang katotohanan ukol sa iba pang tanong at kung ano na ang benepisyong naiparating talaga sa mga naulila ng ating mga bayaning SAF 44," Poe said. Four senators are running for vice-president while others are pursuing reelection. Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, who was in detention on plunder charges when the hearings were conducted last year, moved for the re-opening of the investigation, citing new personal information on the incident. Upon the approval of Sen. Alan Cayetano, who heads the Committee on Rules, Poe scheduled the hearing on January 25, exactly one year after the incident, which killed 44 members of the Special Action Force (SAF), 18 Moro rebels and some civilians. Enrile is a member of the opposition; administration presidential candidate Mar Roxas was Secretary of the Department of the Interior and Local Government during the Mamasapano incident. "Oposisyon man o administrasyon, kung merong mga tamang impormasyon na ilalabas, bakit hindi naman natin diringgin? Sabi ni Senator Enrile, marami pa raw siyang katanungan na hindi niya nagawa dahil nga wala siya noon," Poe said. The senator, however, said she herself was not aware of any new information on the Mamasapano case, citing executive sessions with former Philippine National Police-SAF chief Gen. Getulio Napenas Jr., one of the key resource persons in last year's Senate inquiry. But she said she was open to any new evidence that would come to light. Poe, the frontrunner in the presidential race, also said that she will only be there to moderate and will not use the proceedings to put political rivals, especially Roxas, in a bad light. "'Yung iba ay nagsasabi na baka naman ginagamit ito sa kampanya na grandstanding. Uulitin ko po, hindi po tayo ang nagpatawag ng hearing na ito. At kung sakali naman na nangangamba ang iba na ang aking katunggali ay matanong dito, si Secretary Mar, hindi po kayo dapat mangamb sapagkat ako po ay hindi magtatanong sa kanya. Ako lang po ay magmo-moderate nitong hearing na ito," she said. Aside from Enrile's personal information, which could be potential evidence, Poe said it is also important to hear from the families of the fallen SAF members if they have received assistance from the government. Poe reiterated that the re-opening of the investigation will not affect or void the earlier committee report signed by 21 senators.
Press Release

January 8, 2016 Trillanes calls on DFA, DOE to prepare for Saudi-Iran Crisis Senator Antonio "Sonny" F. Trillanes IV on Thursday calls on the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and the Department of Energy (DOE) to prepare contingency plans that could be immediately implemented should the brewing tension in the Middle East, particularly between Iran and Saudi Arabia, continue to escalate. Trillanes said, "The rapid deterioration of the situation in the Middle East, particularly between Iran and Saudi Arabia is quite alarming. The DFA and DOE should start preparing contingency plans to ensure the safety of the more than two million OFWs in the region, and to anticipate the crisis' impact on our energy needs." Trillanes, chairman of the Senate Committee on National Defense and Security, proposed "It is high time that we appoint a Cabinet-level crisis manager for the Middle East to make sure that somebody is on top of the situation on both strategic and operational levels." Earlier this week, Saudi Arabia has announced that it is cutting its diplomatic ties with Iran, following a massive and destructive rally by Iranians in front of the Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Iran. This came after Saudi's execution of Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr last January 2. According to some analysts, an escalation of the tension between these two countries can be a potential threat to global oil prices. "As early as now, the Department of Foreign Affairs should map out emergency response/repatriation measures in case the situation worsens and we need to evacuate or at least ensure the safety of our OFWs in the region. Also, the Department of Energy should look for alternative sources of oil and formulate energy reduction policies to mitigate the impact of this crisis," Trillanes further noted. The country has been importing oil from Saudi Arabia since 1993 and the crisis could greatly aggravate the volatile energy situation in the country. Trillanes added, "Our government should have a proactive mindset and should anticipate all possible scenarios, so that we won't be caught flat-footed again."
Press Release

January 9, 2016 CHIZ URGES VITANGCOL TO TELL ALL Sen. Francis "Chiz" Escudero is urging former Metro Rail Transit 3 (MRT-3) general manager Al Vitangcol to reveal the details of the $1.5-million contract awarded for the commuter train's maintenance in October 2012, which became the basis of the graft case filed against him. Barely a month after the Sandiganbayan affirmed his indictment for graft, Vitangcol broke his silence last Wednesday to lament what he regarded as apparent haste in resolving the case against him. He insisted it was actually the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) that awarded the contract. It was earlier reported that the controversial MRT maintenance deal with Philippine Trams Rail Management Service Corp. (PH Trams) was "perfected" at a time when the DOTC was headed by Liberal Party presidential candidate Mar Roxas. The Office of the Ombudsman had also cleared incumbent DOTC chief Joseph Emilio Abaya of any liability in connection with the deal because he was appointed just two days earlier when he signed the contract. Escudero said the former MRT chief should reveal the "extent of the culpability of other DOTC officials in the anomalous contract that they have left Vitangcol high and dry to claim responsibility for deal." "Mr. Vitangcol should not be afraid to speak up. Why sacrifice yourself, your career, your life, your family name when you know that there were others behind this questionable deal? He should come clean and reveal everything he knows," Escudero said. Vitangcol had earlier said that he was being made a "sacrificial lamb" and was being made to answer for the anomalies in the 10-month MRT 3 maintenance contract that was awarded to PH Trams, whose directors included Vitangcol's uncle-in-law. The Ombudsman had originally named 20 DOTC officials involved in the deal but eventually charged only Vitangcol for the anomaly, exonerating, among others, Abaya. Vitangcol cried foul and said that he was just being singled out. He also said that an "emissary" had promised to help him with the graft case but he has now been "dropped like a hot potato." The emissary, he said, had gone to his lawyer and gave the assurance that he would be getting help from the latter's principals. "If you wanted help, we're just here. Don't worry because the case would eventually be dismissed in a matter of time," Vitangcol's lawyer quoted the emissary as saying. According to Escudero, "there could be no one else who could wield such power and influence above Vitangcol with possible links to the maintenance contract than Roxas and Abaya." Vitangcol's revelation came on the same day that President Aquino renewed his confidence on Abaya whom he said will stay on as DOTC Secretary till the end of his term in June. "Whoever his benefactors were, they're now long gone. And the longer that Mr. Vitangcol decides that he should pin them down, the longer the time and chance he gives them to cover their tracks. Mr. Vitangcol should blow the whistle on them now," Escudero said. He also reminded Vitangcol how whistle-blowers were effective in "uncovering ugly truths about the previous administration and even led to the impeachment of a Supreme Court Chief Justice." "That's why Vitangcol has nothing to worry about or fear for. The whistle-blower system is now well-entrenched, recognized and protected so he can be assured of his and his family's well- being," Escudero pointed out.
Press Release

January 9, 2016 Sen. Marcos Twits Palace For Casting Doubt

On Re-Opening Of Mamasapano Probe Senator Ferdinand "Bongbong" R. Marcos, Jr. today lamented Malacanang's effort to discredit the re-opening of the Senate probe of the Mamasapano incident even before it started. Earlier, the President said he sees politics behind the re-opening of the investigation into the Mamasapano incident, which resulted to the death of 44 members of the police's Special Action Force. "It is unfortunate that instead of awaiting the outcome of the investigation Malacanang insinuates bad faith in the re-opening of the Mamasapano probe," Marcos said. He noted that the President did admit it could be the opportunity to provide answers to the lingering questions on what really happened in Mamasapano on January 25, 2015. "So if Malacanang really has nothing to hide it should welcome the re-opening of the investigation. I believe majority of the Filipino people sincerely want answers and would be discerning enough to recognize any attempt at grandstanding merely to score political points," Marcos opined. Marcos backed moves to re-open the Mamasapano investigation initiated by Senate Minority Leader Juan Ponce Enrile who claimed to have new information on the incident. The Senate will re-open the investigation on January 25, the first anniversary of the tragic police operation. Among others, Marcos said he wants to find out why almost a year after the incident no criminal charges in court has been filed against those responsible despite the government's promise that justice will be served. "The families of the policemen slain in the Mamasapano massacre do not ask for anything from the government save for justice," Marcos concluded.
Hadjibou Soumare, president de la Commission de l'UEMOA

Cheikh Hadjibou Soumare a pris avec philosophie la decision prise de confier la Presidence de la Commission de lUemoa au Niger a partir du mois de juin.

 De ce qui mest revenu, il est question que la rotation au niveau de la Commission de lUemoa se fasse alternativement entre le Senegal et le Niger et qualternativement aussi le poste detenu par le Niger au niveau de la Banque centrale, le poste de vice-gouverneur, puisse alternativement revenir au Senegal. Dans ce cadre, il y a un consensus qui permet quand meme dapaiser les preoccupations des uns et des autres. Et je pense que les Chefs dEtat ont pris les bonnes decisions pour la bonne marche de notre institution. Aucune prerogative, aucun interet dun pays ne doivent primer linteret general parce quil sagit de travailler pour linteret de nos jeunes des 8 pays , reagit-il. Des propos rapportes par  Le Quotidien .

 Il faut se feliciter davoir ces chefs dEtat, moi je men glorifie. Jai ete Premier ministre dans mon pays. Je sais ce que cest une decision de chef dEtat. Je sais ce quils ont du endurer eux-memes a huis clos pour trouver la bonne decision. Ce qui est important, cest la vie de notre institution , dit-il.
Colere a Senegal Airlines : Le chomage technique des agents prolonge de 6 mois

La rencontre organisee hier a loccasion de la celebration des 5 ans dexistence de la compagnie Senegal airlines, a ete loccasion pour le personnel de lister les maux qui plombent les ailes de la compagnie senegalaise de transport aerien. Le college des delegues de relever une perte de 61 milliards en 5 ans dexploitation.

A Senegal airlines, les agents qui sont a un an de chomage technique et a 4 mois darrieres de salaire, nen peuvent plus. Ils ont ainsi prevu de saisir la commission des lois de lAssemblee nationale, a fait savoir leur coordonnateur, Moustapha Diakahte.

 A quoi sert un aeroport tout neuf, si on na pas de flotte?? Nous voulons un Senegal airlines debout , avait tonne le Premier ministre Mohamed Dionne, devant les deputes, evoquant le redressement de la compagnie.

Le chomage technique prolonge de six mois, jusquen juin 2016, les agents de Senegal airlines de denoncer  une absence de volonte politique du gouvernement .
Le mouvement Y en a marre

Fadel Barro, le coordonnateur du Mouvement  Y en a marre , reconnait que le President Lamine Diack Diack les a soutenus, en un moment donne, dans leurs activites.

 En 2013, le forum des esprits de Y en a marre dEurope, a voulu organiser un debat intergenerationnel. Tous les esprits dEurope devaient se reunir a Paris. Ce debat intergenerationnel devait opposer quelquun qui a passe tous les ages, de lindependance a maintenant, a un jeune engage de la nouvelle ere. Nous avions sollicite, a lepoque, Amadou Makhtar Mbow. Mais malheureusement, son calendrier ne lui permettait pas de faire le deplacement sur Paris. Ensuite, lesprit de Paris a choisi le President Lamine Diack. Nous (y en a marre) avons aussi choisi le President Lamine Diack, parce que nous estimons quil est non seulement un modele, mais aussi cest quelquun qui est la depuis Senghor, a vecu sous Diouf et sous Abdoulaye Wade. Pour nous, cest un modele. Cest comme ca quil a ete choisi comme parrain de ce forum. Cest ainsi quil nous a achete nos billets davion. Et dailleurs, pour plus de transparence, Y en a marre, aussitot apres le forum, lors des differentes sorties dans la presse, a remercie le President Diack pour avoir facilite notre deplacement a cette rencontre de Paris , dit) il dans un entretien avec  Enquete .

 Nous reconnaissons quil nous a soutenus durant ce forum. Nous reconnaissons meme quil a ete un soutien moral. Quelquun qui etait dans la meme mouvance que nous. Cest a dire qui sopposait a la candidature de Wade. De la a dire que cest lui qui a finance tout ce que nous avons fait, cest une exageration , fait-il remarquer.
As someone who lived through the Joplin tornado of 2011, I have more than a passing familiarity with and interest in violent storms. The Joplin twister was the worst in U.S. history in terms of property damage, but it was only the seventh deadliest. However, southern Missouri can also claim the dubious honor of being the site of the worst tornado in American history in terms of lives lost, or at least the storm started here.

More people lost their lives during the Tri-State Tornado of 1925 than during any other. The twister was first sighted in Shannon County, Missouri, about 12:40 p.m. on March 18, 1925, and the first fatality occurred about twenty minutes later north-northwest of Ellington, where several buildings were also destroyed. The storm virtually annihilated the town of Annapolis in Iron County, killing two people there and doing a half million dollars in property damage. Two more people were killed at the small community of Leadanna, also in Iron County. The twister then crossed Bollinger County, where thirty-two children were injured when two schools were damaged. Multiple homes were completely destroyed. Next the storm entered Perry County and struck the towns of Altenburg, Biehle, and Perryville. At Biehle, it destroyed many homes and killed four people. At least eleven people altogether were killed in Missouri before the tornado continued its deadly path through Illinois, which was the hardest hit state, and into Indiana.

The storm cut a swath 235 miles long and about 1,200 yards wide on average. It stayed on the ground about three hours and produced hail as much as 4.5 inches in diameter. Altogether it killed 695 people, making it by far the deadliest single tornado in U.S. history. Although not officially rated at the time, it is considered an EF5 tornado.

Initial reports placed estimates of the number of dead and injured in the Tri-State Tornado even higher. It was first thought as many as a thousand people had perished and over three thousand injured before those figures were revised downward. For instance, one of the early news reports said twenty-seven people, not eleven, were killed in Missouri. At Biehle alone, eleven people, not four, were killed, according to this report. The same report also said six were killed at Perryville, one at Altenburg, and seven at Cape Girardeau, in addition to the two deaths at Annapolis. As many as 150 people were reportedly injured at Annapolis and fifty each at Biehle, Cape Girardeau, and Perryville. Other Missouri communities that reportedly paid their toll to the Black Monster of the Sky included Cornwall in Madison County and Frohna in Perry County.

The Tri State tornado was part of a whole series of tornadoes that broke out on the same day, and the total number of deaths for all the storms that day was 747. If, in fact, Cape Girardeau was hit by a tornado on this day, as the report cited above said, the town was probably not hit by the main tornado but by one of these lesser twisters, because the line of the Tri-State Tornado did not go near Cape Girardeau.

The worst hit town of all was Murphysboro, Illinois, where 234 people perished. Another hard-hit town in Illinois was De Soto, where sixty-nine people were killed, including thirty-three at a school.
The body of a 33-year-old woman was found washed ashore near Fort Bragg on Thursday, police said.

Anne Shapiro, of Little River, was reported missing to the Willits Police Department around 8 a.m. Thursday, said Captain Greg L. Van Patten, a Mendocino County Sheriffs Office spokesman.
They came to Daly City wearing camouflage clothes and holsters on their hips, dragging baskets and cases to carry their purchases home. Both newcomers and veteran buyers shopped the gun show with a sense of urgency, worried that new federal rules could choke the future sale of firearms.

The Crossroads of the West gun show  held Saturday and Sunday at the Cow Palace in Daly City  has long been a magnet for Second Amendment aficionados, attracting thousands of people to one of Northern Californias biggest gun shows.

Vendors sold handguns, rifles, bulletproof vests, ammunition, fancy pistol grips and camouflage T-shirts, pants and hats. Land of the Free! one bumper sticker read, alongside a gun symbol. Concealed weapons handbags bejeweled with the Texas flag and baggies of bullets were neatly arranged on a folding table next to a stack of Donald Trump T-shirts for sale. Signs cautioned shoppers, If you are buying a firearm, you will need a firearm safety certificate with testing and certification issued immediately and a background check!

New rules ahead

The event took place just days after President Obama announced new rules on gun sales and sellers, sending the stock of gun manufacturers soaring. People rushed to buy guns and ammunition before the market tightened up. Under the executive order, even occasional gun sellers would be required to get a federal license and conduct background checks on all buyers.

Tighter California restrictions could also follow later this year if a November ballot initiative pushed by Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom succeeds. The proposal would ban large-capacity magazines and require background checks for anyone buying ammunition.

Its not the first time California politicians have tried to crack down on guns and gun sales. In recent years, supervisors in both San Mateo County and San Francisco have repeatedly  and unsuccessfully  called for a ban on gun shows at the state-owned Cow Palace.

Everardo Lopez, 18, of Modesto said he understands why there need to be some regulations on guns, but added that it feels like the government is cracking down on buyers. He was shopping for a stun gun to keep in his home for protection.

These are rights we have had since the United States has been one country, he said. One way or another, people will find a way to get their own protection instead of just relying on the government. Its cool to see a bunch of people getting together for an event that is getting pushed to the side by the government. We are out here having a good time.

I hate the attitude

Others complained of what they saw as continuing government attacks on gun buyers. Ana Anaya, 30, of Oakland brought her daughter to shop for ammunition. Anaya is teaching the elementary-school-aged girl, as well as her son, how to shoot on the range.

Its upsetting that politicians are trying to pull all of these state laws against gun control, she said. Its already hard. Theyre making us feel like criminals. Im fine with the background check and all of that, but I hate the attitude toward guns in this country.

Andy Krandall of San Mateo stopped to examine a tray of rifles, a plastic bag of ammunition swinging from his wrist. It was his first time at the gun show, and he said he doesnt think the new regulations will have much effect on gun sales and buyers.

People who dont really know guns are making a big deal out of this, but I dont think it will change anything that much, Krandall said. They arent trying to take away the Second Amendment. We should just better educate people on how to use them. I think people would think twice about committing a crime with a gun if they knew the system was much more rigorous.

No need to freak out

Krandall stopped to look at the crush of people making their way down the aisles, many stocking up on guns and ammunition as if they were on sale for the last time.

I do get it, he said. But I dont think theres a reason to freak out like this. We should wait and see what happens.

Lizzie Johnson is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: ljohnson@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LizzieJohnsonnn
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SACRAMENTO  Shackled and silent, a Sacramento college student and Iraqi refugee facing terrorism charges after allegedly fighting alongside insurgents in war-torn Syria, made his first appearance in federal court Friday, with his lawyer maintaining the case against him had been grossly mischaracterized.

Aws Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, 23, is charged with making false statements to immigration officials when he returned to the U.S. in 2014 after traveling to Syria. Prosecutors say he fought with militant groups including Ansar al-Islam, which the U.S. has designated a terrorist organization.

Al-Jayab surrendered to FBI agents Thursday, and his brief hearing before U.S. Magistrate Judge Carolyn Delaney was mainly held to assign an attorney and set a time to discuss possible bail.

His attorney, Ben Galloway of the federal public defenders office, asked that he be released from the Sacramento County Jail, noting that his client is not charged with planning any attacks in the United States. But the judge refused, citing investigators accusations that he left America to fight overseas and the gravity of the charge against Al-Jayab.

Theres nothing to suggest Mr. Al-Jayab intended to harm anyone in this country ... no indication that Mr. Al-Jayab intended any acts of terrorism in this country, Galloway said.

Dapper on Facebook

Al-Jayab  a Palestinian by ancestry who was born in Iraq and emigrated from Syria to the U.S. in 2012  said nothing during his hearing and was led away in an orange jumpsuit.

The image of a gun-toting fighter conflicted sharply with Al-Jayabs Facebook page, where in his home page photo the computer science student at American River College in Sacramento strikes a dapper pose in stylishly coiffed hair and beard, standing with the Golden Gate Bridge as a backdrop.

His interests on the page are dominated by flashy cars and good times with family  and the last entry is a video posted on Wednesday of his brother arriving in California for a visit.

That brother, 19-year-old Samer Mohammed Younis Al-Jayab, was brought before the same judge Friday on a less serious matter. He was charged with receiving stolen property in connection with what investigators say was a fencing operation for stolen iPhones and other electronics in Milwaukee.

The operation, investigators said, was run with a third brother, Younis Mohammad Al-Jayab, and a cousin, Ahmed Waleed Mahmood. The stolen-property suspects all live in Milwaukee  where Aws Al-Jayab lived once  and the charges have nothing to do with terrorism, officials said.

I want to make clear that they are not a terrorist cell by any indication, said Lauren Horwood, a spokeswoman for federal prosecutors.

The federal complaint unsealed Thursday against Al-Jayab said he traveled overseas to fight alongside terrorist organizations and lied to U.S. authorities about his activities.

Eager to see blood

In 2013, the FBI said, he wrote to a friend in communications recovered by the agency that he was eager to go back to Syria, where he had fought earlier. O god, grant us martyrdom for your sake while engaged in fighting and not retreating, he wrote, according to the complaint.

I am eager to see blood, he allegedly wrote three days later.

Also appearing in federal court Friday  but in Texas  was a Houston man accused this week of communicating with Al-Jayab about plans to return to the Middle East and fight. Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan, 24, also an Iraqi-born refugee, made a brief appearance and did not enter a plea to a charge of attempting to support terrorism  specifically the Islamic State, known as ISIS.

Theres no indication in court documents that the FBI believes Al Hardan actually left the U.S. to fight in the Middle East.

Al-Jayab, in intercepted communications filed in court, repeatedly said he did not like the Islamic State.

Federal documents outlining the case against Al-Jayab refer to frequent contacts with a man in Texas who told Al-Jayab, I need to learn from your weapon expertise. Al-Jayab allegedly discussed various weapons with him, including the M16 assault rifle and Glock handguns, and promised, I will train you. Authorities would not say if that man was Al Hardan.

The arrests of Al-Jayab and Al Hardan fueled a growing call by conservatives to block refugees from Syria  or to go even further, as in Republican presidential candidate Donald Trumps proposal to block any Muslims from immigrating to America.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, among several Republican governors who oppose allowing Syrian refugees in their states, said the two cases illustrate their point. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, another GOP presidential candidate, called for a new review of all refugees who have come to the U.S.

Refugees from Syria

The United States has accepted 2,500 Syrian refugees since spring 2011, and President Obama has said he wants to increase that number to 10,000 this year.

A terrorism expert and author at the Rand Corp. think tank said those with fears of refugees sneaking into America as terrorists would be well served by taking a deep breath.

Brian Jenkins said he testified before Congress in December that he estimates there are only about 250 people in America who want to go abroad to fight with terror-linked groups. Roughly 80 percent of the 134 people arrested in connection with alleged terror plots since Sept. 11, 2001, were U.S. citizens, he said, and most were born in the country.

Its about people who already live here being turned, he said.

Chronicle staff writers Hamed Aleaziz and Steve Rubenstein contributed to this report.

Michael Cabanatuan and Kevin Fagan are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. E-mail: mcabanatuan@sfchronicle.com, kfagan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ctuan @KevinChron
Stacey Schuett and Lesly Taboada-Hall had been partners for nearly 30 years, registered domestic partners since 2000, and the parents of two children when they got married in their Sebastopol home in June 2013. The next day, Taboada-Hall died of lung cancer at age 56.

Three months later, a Sonoma County judge issued Schuett a certificate that validated their marriage, even though it had taken place a week before the U.S. Supreme Courts ruling that ended Californias ban on same-sex marriages. That didnt stop FedEx Corp., Toboada-Halls longtime employer, from denying widows pension benefits to Schuett.

Now, Schuett has gained a legal victory that may be significant to other same-sex couples: A federal judge has ruled that she can sue FedEx for the benefits.

Although Proposition 8 had prevented California from recognizing gays and lesbians nuptials since 2008, the two women had done everything in their power to wed legally, and their marriage was validated by the state through its courts, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton of Oakland said last week in a ruling that denied the companys attempt to dismiss Schuetts suit.

Hamilton noted that another federal judge had declared Prop. 8 unconstitutional in 2010. There would be no question then that Schuett and Taboada-Hall had been married, Hamilton said, were it not for Californias application of the unconstitutional law until the Supreme Court ruling.

Maybe itll make things better for somebody else, Schuette, 55, said of the ruling. But she said shes still shocked that FedEx told the couple shortly before Taboada-Halls death that Schuette would be ineligible for survivors benefits because their marriage would not be legally recognized, and refuses to retreat from that position.

FedEx touts gay rights

The companys website promotes its inclusive culture and support of gay rights, and describes diversity as both a smart business practice and simply the right thing to do.

My wife earned her benefits during her decades of service to the company, Schuett said. No employer should be permitted to ignore our families.

FedEx said it was reviewing the ruling, which it could appeal to higher courts.

The two women met at college, worked together at a local feminist publication called Womens Voices, and found that they shared the same birthday, Oct. 9  a good sign for a relationship, Schuette said. While Taboada-Hall worked as a FedEx delivery driver for 26 years, Schuette stayed home with their daughter, now 20, and their son, 16, and worked as an illustrator of childrens books. She now grows food for upscale San Francisco restaurants.

Taboada-Hall was diagnosed with cancer in 2010. She took a medical leave in November 2012 when her condition worsened. On June 3, 2013, her doctor told her she was dying.

Schuette said they had planned to marry years earlier, and then Prop. 8 came along. Thoughts of traveling to a state that allowed same-sex marriage faded as Taboada-Hall grew weaker. As she neared death, their daughter, Clare, and her friends frantically summoned friends and relatives to their home to watch them be wed by a county supervisor on June 19.

She was able to die knowing we were married, which was important to her and to me, Schuette said.

Until then, she said, FedEx had treated us well. They had domestic partner benefits. They seemed to be on board.

But the company said its pension benefits did not cover a survivor whose marriage to an employee was not legal when it was performed. FedExs pension plan tracked federal law, which then defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman.

Law struck down

In its historic decision one week after the couples wedding, the Supreme Court struck down that law and granted federal benefits to same-sex couples. On the same day, the court dismissed an appeal by Prop. 8s sponsors challenging lower-court rulings that declared the 2008 measure unconstitutional,

In Mondays ruling, Hamilton said the couples marriage must be considered legal in light of the Sonoma County judges decision to validate the ceremony retroactively.

She also said the Supreme Courts decision granting federal benefits for same-sex couples was retroactive  that is, it applied to couples who had been validly married, under their states law, before June 26, 2013. Since FedExs federally regulated pension plan was based on that law, Hamilton said, Schuett can sue the company for allegedly violating her rights under the law.

Attorney Amy Whelan of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, one of Schuetts lawyers, said because the facts of the case are not in dispute, the next step will be to ask Hamilton to find Schuett eligible for a pension without the need for a trial.

Whelan said the ruling should also be helpful for couples elsewhere who are seeking recognition of weddings performed before the high court legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @egelko
Dear Editor,

Over the past few town hall meetings Shelby Lawson has brought up the problem of empty houses surrounded by trash in the City of Leadwood. For the most part her complaints have gone unanswered, or met with Charlie Lewis pat answer of It takes time to fix the problem. Recently Charlie has come up with a new answer for the problem. Even though the City of Leadwood has ordinances to deal with the trash in front of empty houses or the destruction of dangerous, derelict buildings; Charlie has chosen not to enforce these ordinances. Rather, his new mantra is Its up to the neighbors of the trashed property to complain. We cant do anything until they complain.

I disagree. There are ordinances on the books that deal with both trash and dangerous structures. When I was mayor I spent a whole day riding around town taking pictures of properties that were old, abandoned and/or dangerous  not to mention the properties that were surrounded by trash. I turned in all these pictures when I left office after the Beckett property fiasco. I assume these pictures and descriptions were burnt in the mysterious fire that consumed the records of city hall.

These ordinances need to be enforced  without neighbors first having to complain. The onus is not on the neighbors to complain endlessly to a deaf city government, but rather the primary responsibility to clean up these houses and trash dumps rests with the City of Leadwoods government.

Since the current board and mayor pro tempore are more concerned with buying trucks and building lavish new city halls than enforcing ordinances that are already on the books, I am complaining.

At the north end of my block on the west side of the street is an empty rental house. It was resided and refurbished in June of 2015. It was subsequently not rented and squatters moved in and lived there for three months. ALL the trash from the renovation plus the trash from the squatters was thrown in the front, back and side yards. It has sat there ever since. Not only is it an eyesore, it is a health hazard, as it is a breeding ground for rats, mice, cockroaches, etc Stray dogs also make a point of coming down the street to explore the trash and scatter it everywhere.

It also appears that animals are not the only ones active at the trash dump. The people in the rental house across the street (who own the pit bull that bit me), are also taking their trash over to the pile and throwing it in. As a result the pile is growing ever and ever larger.

It seems silly to me that the current Leadwood City government is more concerned with buying a new police truck and constructing a lavish new city hall  while the trash piles up on the streets and the number of derelict properties increase. Why build a shiny new city hall and patrol the city with a shiny new police truck when there are mountains of trash setting on the side of the road in front of abandoned houses? Who in their right mind would want to come to such a city  even if the city hall was new and the police department had a new four wheel drive truck.

Bottom line: I want the City of Leadwood to pick up the trash at the end of my street. I want it gone. I want the slumlord who owns the property held accountable. And, I want it done now. This trash has been sitting there since June of 2015. Its time for the city government to enforce ordinances that are already on the books  and stop answering worried citizens complaints about the trash and derelict properties with condescending comments such as It takes time to fix the problem. Speaking for myself, youve had since June of 2015 to correct the problem at the end of my street and done nothing.

David Henry

Leadwood
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The annual consumer electronics show in Las Vegas didnt produce one life-changing new gadget that set the world abuzz, but automobile and wearables technology dominated the conversation this week.

Meanwhile, the latest in TV tech  usually a big topic at the 2016 CES that wraps up on Saturday  had to share the spotlight with a wider variety of topics, from smart home devices to virtual reality.

Still, the entire five-day convention, which draws more than 170,000 analysts, journalists and electronics industry executives, has become such a melange of technologies that its harder than ever to discern which ones will become consumer hits and which will disappear.

There was still some great eye candy, but there wasnt a dominant theme as there once was, said analyst Dale Ford of the research firm IHS. It was a more diversified experience.

Two research firms, Zignal Labs of San Francisco and Synthesio of New York, analyzed data culled from social media posts, blogs, mainstream news stories and even forums like Reddit to try to discern what people around the world were most excited about.

CES is the worlds biggest annual technology showcase and an event thats supposed to indicate tech trends to watch for the year and beyond.

In research supplied to The Chronicle, data analytics firm Zignal Labs found that wearables and gadgets were the most popular of five general CES topics during the week, followed by television, the Internet of Things, car tech, and virtual and augmented reality. Zignal says it pulls data from tens of millions of sources.

Earlier in the week, car talk ranked higher, probably boosted by news generated by the sporty Faraday Future concept electric car, a.k.a. the Batmobile.

By the end of the week, talk of Faraday had faded compared with more well-known companies such as Intel, Apple, Samsung, Oculus and Huawei.

But according to Synthesio, a social media intelligence platform that measures sentiments from about 600 million online sources, car tech continued to generate the most buzz through the week.

News from automakers, who showed off a range of tech, including video cameras to replace rear- and side-view mirrors to self-starting cars that sync with smart home devices, sparked about 21 percent of the online discussions, Synthesio said.

Talk about TVs fell to 14.6 percent, compared with last year when ultra-high-definition monitors generated more than 35 percent of the buzz and car tech talk didnt even register, said Adam Dalezman, Synthesio communications manager.

With car tech, people are very excited about it, with 28.5 percent of all mentions of car technology being positive, Dalezman said.

Analysts who attended CES said auto tech stole the show.

Tim Bajarin, who has attended 55 of the shows (including 18 held when there was a summer edition) said the auto industrys presence this year was bigger than ever.

While traditional auto shows in Detroit and Los Angeles remain the place where the industry unveils the mechanics of its latest model vehicles, theyre using CES to showcase the electronics, said Bajarin, president of Creative Strategies of San Jose.

IHS Vice President Dale Ford noted that a BMW exhibit exemplified how carmakers are trying to integrate vehicles with smart devices.

In the exhibit, an Internet-connected home mirror displayed traffic along a route while the car started its own engine, backed out of a garage and parked, waiting for the driver. Once at work, the car parked itself.

To be sure, Ford said, that scenario is still a long drive from reality. Youre not going to see it this year, but I think in the future, its realistic, he said.

Faraday Future, however, may not be so realistic, Bajarin said. The company created the biggest public relations buzz at CES, but without a more specific design and a manufacturing plant, we consider it the equivalent of what we used to call vaporware, he said, meaning the product is announced but never materializes.

For the long haul, Bajarin said Santa Claras Nvidia set itself up for success with a product aimed at becoming the brains of all self-driving vehicles.

Theyre making money on it already, he said. If it gets into millions of cars, thats a big win for Nvidia.

Despite TV makers taking a back seat to the auto industry, there were impressive advances in HDR screen technology on display from Samsung and LG, Ford said. HDR, which stands for high dynamic range, provides better brightness contrasts and color accuracy than existing high-definition or 4K TVs.

Consumers may start seeing more HDR screens this year, but Ford said it may be another year before the technology starts to take off.

Benny Evangelista is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: bevangelista@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ChronicleBenny

Top CES topics

Car Tech: 21 percent

Televisions: 14.6 percent

Phones: 10.9 percent

Wearable technology: 10.3 percent

Virtual reality: 9.4 percent

Internet of Things: 9.2 percent

Connected home: 7.9 percent

Drones: 7.8 percent

Tablets: 6.5 percent

Robots: 1.6 percent

Hoverboards: .0.9 percent
Number of the day

$19.98

That was Fridays record low closing stock price for San Franciscos Twitter, which has continued to struggle despite co-founder Jack Dorsey taking over as CEO. Since its 2013 initial public offering, the company has disappointed investors with slowing user growth and sales, and shares fell as low as $19.60 Friday. The stock fell 35 percent in 2015.

Hear here

We made it as close to the cost of the hardware as possible. The margin is razor-thin.

Brendan Iribe, chief executive of Oculus, explaining the $599 price announced this week for the companys Rift virtual reality headset. Although orders were brisk, many potential buyers complained about the price. Earlier, co-founder Palmer Luckey had indicated the Rifts price would be in the ballpark of $350, the price of the kits the company was sending to developers. He apologized for his miscalculation.

Goodbye

A famous name in mobile phones is going away. Motorola is widely credited as the first company to produce a mobile phone, and it was a leading brand a decade ago. But now Lenovo, which bought the Motorola phone business from Google in 2014, is phasing out the brand. A Motorola representative confirmed that Lenovo will still use the name Motorola Mobility for the phone division, but it will shift the branding of its phones and wearable devices to Moto and Vibe.

The Daily Briefing is compiled from San Francisco Chronicle staff and news services. See more items and links at www.sfgate.com. Twitter: @techchronicle
At a time of heightened tensions between Washington and Silicon Valley, top tech companies met Friday with high-ranking federal officials to discuss a potential collaboration in the fight against terrorism.

Representatives from Google, Facebook, Twitter, Apple and other firms gathered in San Jose to meet a Washington cadre that included White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough, FBI Director James Comey and National Intelligence Director James Clapper, according to reports.

Leaked government documents and agendas for a meeting hinted that the discussion would include encryption  a hot-button issue that has pitted privacy-seekers against lawmakers  among other less controversial measures to thwart terror groups.

We are interested in exploring all options with you for how to deal with the growing threat of terrorists and other malicious actors using technology, including encrypted technology, to threaten our national security and public safety, read a White House briefing reportedly passed out to participants and provided to the Intercept.

Reuters broke news of the meeting Thursday evening. An agenda leaked to the Guardian outlined talking points.

Among them: making it more difficult for terrorists to recruit; promoting alternative content that would undercut ISIL; making it harder for terrorists to coordinate attacks using the Internet; and dreaming up ways to possibly measure counterterror efforts.

Such meetings between federal officials and tech firms arent unheard of, but this one comes as recent incidents have stoked fear about the use of technology in attacks.

The U.S. intelligence community has used that fear as ammunition in its long-standing push to weaken the built-in methods that safeguard digital communication from eavesdroppers.

In the memo obtained by the Intercept, federal officials recognize that there is no one-size-fits-all solution. It asks tech executives in attendance to seek a framework on which everyone can agree.

Despite that openness, privacy advocates say they have been left out of the loop.

I acknowledge that we have a terrorist problem, said Pam Dixon, executive director of the World Privacy Forum in San Diego. I acknowledge we need solutions, but lets have a democratic conversation about it.

The debate, she argued, should be happening in a public forum, not in private.

Sean Sposito is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: ssposito@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @seansposito
Citing German privacy laws, Volkswagen has refused to provide e-mails or other communications among its executives to attorneys general in the United States, impeding U.S. investigations into the companys emissions-cheating scandal, according to officials in several states.

The revelation signals a turning point in the now openly fractious relations between Volkswagen and U.S. investigators, after claims by the Justice Department, in its own inquiry this week, that the company had recently impeded and obstructed regulators and provided misleading information.

Significantly, investigators say, Volkswagens actions limit their ability to identify which employees knew about or sanctioned the deceptions. Finding the people responsible for the cheating is important to the lawsuits: Penalties would be greater if the states and others pursuing Volkswagen in court could prove that top executives were aware of or directed the activity.

Our patience with Volkswagen is wearing thin, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said. Volkswagens cooperation with the states investigation has been spotty  and frankly, more of the kind one expects from a company in denial than one seeking to leave behind a culture of admitted deception. He was one of several attorneys general to express dissatisfaction in response to inquiries from the New York Times.

I find it frustrating that, despite public statements professing cooperation and an expressed desire to resolve the various investigations that it faces following its calculated deception, Volkswagen is, in fact, resisting cooperation by citing German law, said Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen. We will seek to use any means available to us to conduct a thorough investigation.

Volkswagen admitted in September that it had installed software created to cheat on emissions tests in 11 million of its diesel vehicles worldwide. A 48-state civil investigation is being led by a half-dozen states, including New York and Connecticut. Attorneys general in California and Texas are conducting their own inquiries of the company, which includes the Audi and Porsche brands.

When he was named CEO shortly after the scandal broke, Matthias Muller said My most urgent task is to win back trust and promised maximum transparency. But opening up a company known for its particularly insular culture has been a tall order.

Volkswagen said it could not comment on continuing proceedings.

Germany, a close ally of America, is known for strict privacy laws like its Federal Data Protection Act, which limits access to data, particularly outside the European Union. Strains over data-sharing between the countries emerged after the spying revelations linked to Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor.

Germany also has a history of refusing to extradite its citizens to the United States. But U.S. investigators have dealt with German corporations for many years and often reach amicable settlements.

The United States, where the scandal originated, is seen as potentially conducting tougher investigations of Volkswagen than Germany, where the carmaker is one of the nations largest employers. Prosecutors in Braunschweig initially said they would conduct a formal investigation of Martin Winterkorn, Volkswagens former chief executive, but quickly backtracked.

The Justice Department, which filed a civil suit against Volkswagen this week, has not ruled out filing a criminal charge or going after specific executives. A spokesman declined to say whether it was facing obstacles in its inquiry.

Lacking access to officials at Volkswagen headquarters makes it more difficult to determine who was responsible for the wrongdoing, William Sorrell, the Vermont attorney general, said in a recent interview. One of the things thats important to the state and others in terms of looking at the egregiousness or seriousness of the conduct is who at Volkswagen knew what and when, Sorrell said.
Bill Hutchinson

A kidnapping scare prompted BART officials to halt trains in both directions at the Montgomery Street station in San Francisco Friday afternoon when an angry father bolted with a baby after arguing with the childs mother.

Authorities shut down trains in both directions to look for the infant before police tracked down the father and the child in the 600 block of Market Street, said Officer Grace Gatpandan, a police spokeswoman.
A San Francisco man who masqueraded as a doctor was sentenced to 20 years in prison Friday for performing illegal plastic surgery procedures and sexually abusing women at a phony clinic in the Mission District, prosecutors said.

Carlos Guzmangarza, 53, was sentenced by Judge Michael Begert at the San Francisco Hall of Justice for impersonating a physician to perform illegal operations on at least nine women, some of whom he sexually assaulted.

District Attorney George Gascon noted the patients he deceived all came from Central America.

This individual was preying on immigrants and taking advantage of the doctor-patient relationship, he said. He will have a lot of time to reflect on his reprehensible conduct."

Guzmangarzas patients accused him of blatant medical malpractice, including claims he smoked a cigar during a 2010 liposuction, then went to the womans home to flush 6 pounds of removed fat down the toilet.

The patient said he made her hold the IV bag during the $3,000 procedure, and she later needed corrective surgery when her abdomen became infected.

In another case, a woman took her daughter to Guzmangarza for acne treatments, but he injected her face with an unknown substance that made it worse, prosecutors said.

Guzmangarza, who was practicing medicine without a license, was convicted of 33 felonies in October, along with eight misdemeanors connected to Derma Clinic, an office in the 2500 block of Mission Street that he used under the identity of a Central Valley physician assistant who had a similar name.

Guzmangarza has been in police custody since he was arrested for the crimes in December 2011.

The patients alleged Guzmangarza told them he ran the operation with another Bay Area doctor. In reality, that physician was not associated with the fake clinic.

Three sexual assault victims said he used his capacity as a doctor to take advantage of them. One woman said he gave her pills then attacked her while she was incapacitated. He told another victim the sexual assault was a part of her skin treatment, prosecutors said.

Guzmangarza was found guilty of sexual battery and sexual penetration in relation to two victims. He was found not guilty of assaulting one of the women.

Jenna Lyons is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: jlyons@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JennaJourno
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Thousands of the worlds top health executives and investors from pharmaceutical companies to national insurers will convene Monday for a four-day J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco, the industrys oldest and largest health investment conference.

But much of the deal-making happens among small companies not invited to the event.

About 100 health care startups plan to turn a nearby co-working space and coffeehouse into the site of the StartUp Health Festival, a two-day event where entrepreneurs hope to connect with investors, potential business partners and customers.

Youve got thousands of investors coming into San Francisco for this J.P. Morgan conference, the biggest concentration of money in health care, said Unity Stoakes, co-founder of StartUp Health, a long-term accelerator program from New York that supports digital health companies and is hosting the festival. Weve never even been invited to the J.P. Morgan conference, so we decided to create our own festival at the gates of the conference.

The 34th annual conference, which ends Thursday and is expected to attract more than 9,000 people, features some of the biggest names in health care. Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson will be attending, along with representatives from major hospitals, insurers, biotechnology firms and health care services companies such as Anthem and McKesson. The exclusive conference takes place primarily at the Westin St. Francis in Union Square.

Small events grow

For years, smaller companies have networked outside the conference and even started their own events. But longtime observers say these smaller events are growing and becoming conferences in their own right.

For example, biotechnology companies have been meeting at the Biotech Showcase for the past seven years. The event has expanded to draw more than 300 companies and 2,000 participants Monday through Wednesday at the Parc 55 hotel.

Smaller companies are always left out in the cold when it comes to the J.P. Morgan conference, said Janet Vasquez, a New York publicist who describes them as the uninvited guests who have to create their own party. But I think the action is outside.

StartUp Health has been holding space for entrepreneurs for the past three years to give them an opportunity to present 59-second demos to potential investors or partners, but this year the effort involves a full two days of presentations, and the number of startups invited to attend has doubled. The event will feature leaders in technology and digital health such as angel investor Esther Dyson and Vinod Khosla, founder of Khosla Ventures, who will speak at fireside chats.

Health festival

The StartUp Health Festival will take place on the ground floor of 180 Montgomery St.

While the environment for finding outside funding remains tough, digital health companies have been attracting interest. Investors poured more than $4.3 billion into digital health last year, according to Rock Health, a San Francisco venture fund that backs digital health firms. The total is a significant jump from 2011, when investment funding amounted to $1.1 billion.

StartUp Healths Stoakes said new companies in medical and digital health operate on a much longer time cycle than many other tech startups due to heavy federal and state regulation, privacy concerns and other complications associated with making health products.

In the tech world, you can have these 12-week accelerator programs, he said. In health care, you cant even get a meeting in 12 months in a hospital.

Many of the small Bay Area health firms planning to participate in the StartUp Health Festival know that first-hand.

Nirinjan Yee started BreathResearch in Walnut Creek in 2008, before words like digital health or wearables became part of the mainstream lexicon.

I think its going to be a wonderful opportunity to meet a lot of investors and people in health care all in one place, Yee said. For an entrepreneur, thats a really great thing because, for us, its not that easy to get a meeting with people youd like to meet with.

BreathResearch is developing a wireless headset that can detect subtle changes in breathing patterns that could be the first sign of cardiovascular problems, and assess overall health. While the prototype is still in development, Yee and her team have raised $1.1 million and have established relationships with health organizations like the Mayo Clinic, which is collaborating with the startup to create applications to monitor heart and lung disease.

Jonathon Feit, CEO of Beyond Lucid Technologies in Concord, co-founded his company in 2009, but didnt start selling his product until 2014.

The company developed a platform that connects ambulances and medical transport vehicles with hospitals so they can receive patient information before arrival. The companys technology allows emergency responders to create a medical record that can be handed off to any hospital, saving time and hopefully lives.

Growing use

The technology is now being used in two dozen locations in 18 states, including the city of Alamedas Fire Department, a private ambulance service in Stockton and, most recently, Dallas Fire Rescue in Texas.

Beyond Lucid has already raised $955,000 and hopes to raise much more to expand. Networking with the power brokers like those attending the J.P. Morgan conference is vital to Feits survival because being visionary doesnt pay the bills, he said.

As a startup, one of our most important mandates is to survive, Feit said. You have to survive until what you have to offer is what people are finally asking for.

The founders of HelloMD, which has offices in San Francisco and San Rafael, are pretty sure theyll be the only medical marijuana startup within a whiff of the conference.

HelloMD, which securely connects patients over live video to doctors who can authorize medicinal marijuana licenses, operates only in California, but plans a national expansion to all cannabis states. Since HelloMD shifted its focus to concentrate exclusively on the cannabis industry eight months ago, the company has garnered more than 20,000 customers and works with 15 delivery services and 40 dispensaries.

So far, HelloMD has raised $350,000, but its founders want to soon raise $2 million more. And they hope to attract some of those funds from investors and other potential partners at the conference.

J.P. Morgan has always been a very mainstream health care event, so were not sure whats going to come out of this for us, said Mark Hadfield, co-founder and CEO of the company. But theres a growing interest in medical cannabis among traditional health care institutions. This is a growing part of what is becoming mainstream health care.

Victoria Colliver is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: vcolliver@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @vcolliver
As it has for months, Ben Carson's campaign is raising a lot of money. The Republican presidential candidate raised $23 million in the last quarter of 2015 -- ahead of red-hot Ted Cruz and, likely, all other rivals in the Republican field.

At the same time, Carson is plunging in the polls. On Nov. 5, he was in first place in the national GOP race, with 24.8 percent in the RealClearPolitics average of polls. Today he is in fourth place, with 9.3 percent.

In Iowa, on Nov. 1, Carson was in first place with 29.2 percent of the RealClearPolitics average. Today he is in fourth place with 9.6 percent.

In New Hampshire, on Nov. 14, Carson was in second place with 14.7 percent of the average. Today he is in seventh place with 5.5 percent.

Finally, in South Carolina (where there are fewer polls to count), Carson was in second place with 22.7 percent of the average on Dec. 3. Today he is in fourth place with 11.3 percent.

It's been common for a while now to refer to the Republican first tier as Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and Carson. But Carson is hanging on to the lowest rung of the top tier by his fingernails, and seems sure to fall soon.

Talk to people in Carsonland, and they'll concede some self-inflicted wounds. Whose idea was it to allow Duane Clarridge, Carson's foreign-policy tutor, to belittle the candidate's knowledge in an interview with the New York Times?

Who let Carson talk to the Washington Post's Sally Quinn on the subject of religion? In that interview, Carson said he does not believe in the Rapture, or in the reality of Hell. The campaign had some cleaning up to do with evangelicals after that one.

Beyond that, Carson's campaign recently underwent an open civil war, with campaign manager Barry Bennett resigning after a protracted conflict with longtime Carson friend and manager Armstrong Williams. Before Bennett left, the feud created an embarrassing scene in which Carson invited some reporters to his home without Bennett's knowledge, and told them he was going to shake up his campaign -- a clear signal he was going to sack Bennett. Then Carson semi-backtracked when it blew up in the press. A series of confusing "clarifications" followed until Bennett finally took off.

Now, Carson says he will run a sharper operation. "One thing I want to do is have a much more robust response to attacks, particularly when they are false," he told CBS recently. "We've kind of taken a nonchalant attitude toward that. I think it's the wrong thing to do. So you'll see much more aggressiveness in that region."

Carson's analysis should alarm anyone who cares about his campaign. It suggests that whichever warring faction has the candidate's ear at the moment is telling him the problem is messaging. That's what campaigns in trouble like to tell themselves.

A candidate who appears utterly unprepared for the policy challenges of a campaign, much less the White House? Failing campaigns prefer to blame things on a messaging problem, when in fact they almost always have a candidate problem. And so it is with Carson.

In questions about Carson's depth on both foreign and national policy issues, people in his circle consistently declare him to be one of the smartest people, if not the smartest, they've ever known. That, of course, misses the point. Everyone recognizes Carson's medical achievements. But there are lots of smart people who don't have the type of knowledge required for the presidency. Carson appears to be one of them.

Meanwhile, Team Carson firmly believes -- or says it firmly believes -- that he will win the Iowa caucuses. Like every other trailing campaign, they point to the fact that eventual caucus winner Rick Santorum was far behind at this date (and even much later) in the 2012 campaign. Santorum shot to the top to win, so why can't Carson?

The answer, in part, is because Santorum, a former senator fluent in national and foreign policy issues, was not a one-time leader who plunged in the polls.

Whatever Carson's difficulties, there's still all that money. The problem is, Carson appears to be spending even more than the prodigious amounts he is raising. Citing internal campaign documents, the Wall Street Journal recently reported that Carson raised $8.8 million in October and spent $9.5 million. A huge amount of that money is being pushed back into more fundraising.

Any outsider's first reaction to such news would be: Somebody is getting rich off this. People in Carsonland deny it. But chances are, somebody is getting rich off this.

All the while, Carson's slide continues. If past campaigns are any guide, there will be a shakeup, followed by cutbacks, followed by a deeper dip in the polls. Despite his many admirable qualities, Ben Carson's extraordinary venture into presidential politics is not likely to end well.
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Russian River Brewing in Santa Rosa is gearing up once again for the annual release of its coveted Pliny the Younger triple IPA beer.

Its finite release  only two weeks out of every year  lends to its notoriety, and leads many to believe it as one of the rarest beers in the world.
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Tony Lane, an art director at Rolling Stone magazine in the 1970s who also designed some of the most iconic album covers of the rock n roll era for artists like Michael Jackson, Simon and Garfunkel, and Miles Davis, died on New Years Day at his home in Oakland. He was 71.

The cause was complications from brain cancer, said his longtime partner, Anita Malnig.

Joining Rolling Stone in 1974 as its third full-time art director, Mr. Lane streamlined the San Francisco magazines cover design by emphasizing strong images over clunky copy blocks. He was instrumental in recruiting photographer Annie Leibovitz and giving the front of the book what Publisher Jann S. Wenner described as a sparer, poster-type look.

He brought East Coast sophistication to the magazine, said Wenner, calling from Rolling Stones current headquarters in New York. He was the first professional art director Annie Leibovitz worked with. He had a fine eye for design and helped the magazine become its modern self.

After his tenure at the magazine  he recruited Roger Black as his replacement in 1976  Mr. Lane served as art director at several major labels, including Columbia, Fantasy Records and Elektra Asylum. He commissioned more than 300 album covers for artists as diverse as Dexter Gordon, Bob Dylan, Barbra Streisand, Ravi Shankar and Duke Ellington.

Among Mr. Lanes best-known album designs are the sleeves for Jacksons Bad, Simon and Garfunkels Bridge Over Troubled Water and Totos Turn Back. In 1979, his work on Carly Simons Boys in the Trees earned a Grammy Award.

Tonys approach was to meet with the artists, have them share their music and in that process extract the essential truth of the artist, which he then translated into a complete brand and identity, Malnig said.

Born Anthony Samuel Lane on May 2, 1944, in New York City, he was the son of Seymour Lane and Leona Jaffa. Mr. Lane attended the High School for Art and Design in Manhattan and graduated from the Philadelphia College of Art.

His first job out of college was as assistant art director at Harpers Bazaar, which led to a position as lead art director at Holiday magazine.

After his run in the music industry, he became executive vice president and creative director at the Design Co., where he came up with identity for brands such as Pacific Telesis, LaCroix Sparkling Water and Wrangler. As an independent designer, he also created logos for Kia, Global Pacific Records and HarperCollins Publishing.

Mr. Lane was predeceased by his parents and his brother, Jonathan Lane. He is survived by his daughter, Siiri Lane; son, Sebastian Lane; and five grandchildren.

Aidin Vaziri is the San Francisco Chronicle's pop music critic. E-mail: avaziri@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @MusicSF
PHILADELPHIA  A contractor hired at a cut-rate price to take down a building was sentenced Friday to 15 to 30 years in prison for its collapse, which killed six people and injured 13 others and led Philadelphia to adopt new rules for demolitions.

Judge Glenn Bronson told Griffin Campbell the victims suffered slow, agonizing deaths in a crime that shook the city.

Prosecutors had sought a 25- to 50-year prison term for Campbell for involuntary manslaughter, aggravated assault and other charges, according to a sentencing memo. A jury cleared him of third-degree murder at a trial.

Sean Benschop, whom Campbell hired, was sentenced to 71/2 to 15 years in prison for recklessly operating heavy equipment at the site when a towering brick wall collapsed onto a neighboring thrift store.

Campbell had been thrilled to get the $112,000 contract and hoped it would be his big break after years running a lunch truck.

This job meant a lot to me  a lot. I was going to be out of debt, and life was going to be good, said Campbell, 51, a married father of four who did not have insurance for his demolition work.

During his trial, Campbell described himself as a scapegoat for the architect overseeing the demolition of a seedy downtown block. He was being paid a fraction of the going rate for the job.

Prosecutors said he cut corners  gutting the building inside instead of taking it down floor by floor  and ignored repeated warnings before the wall collapsed, trapping 19 people inside the store.

City Treasurer Nancy Winkler called it distressing that her family will have to go through a second trial in civil court to seek justice for others involved in the demolition, which killed her 24-year-old daughter. Many families are suing building owner Richard Basciano, the Salvation Army and others.

Benschop, who pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and testified against Campbell, told the judge hed made a mistake in an effort to feed his family. He said he was using heavy equipment nearby when the wall crashed onto a Salvation Army store, instead of doing the delicate job by hand.

When I saw the building like that, I should have walked away, Benschop testified. I had my family to feed and I had bills to pay.

One survivor lost both legs after spending 13 hours trapped in the rubble. A dozen others were injured.
After years of trying to motivate Congress to act on improving gun safety laws, President Obama has decided to go it alone. I fully understand his motivation to proceed cautiously.

We have arrived at a point where we will sell guns to a terrorist or a criminal in the false claim of protecting ourselves, even though Americans hold half of all guns owned by civilians in the entire world.

The handgun statistics are as cold as death. Four million American citizens were assaulted, robbed or otherwise harmed by handgun violence during the last 10 years. In the same time period, 2,000 American children were slain yearly by bullets.

Last year, 30,000 people died by guns. More than 18,000 ill souls used guns to commit suicide. More than 12,000 citizens were cut down on public streets by gun violence.

Throughout his presidency, Mr. Obama has consoled grieving families multiple times -- from Aurora to Charleston to Newtown to San Bernardino and beyond. The hardest times were when children were victims.

Joshua Dubois, an ordained Pentecostal minister who worked at the White House, accompanied the president on his trip to Newtown, where Obama met with and consoled the parents of the 20 murdered children and the families of slain staff members.

Dubois said his White House staff reserved eight classrooms just to hold two to three of the families of those killed, and that Obama spent hours with them individually, grieving with over 100 family members. It's important we know this, because the president met with each family on our behalf, on behalf of the nation, as well as himself.

He consoled 20 sets of parents of 6- and 7-year-olds who had been brutally slaughtered. Kim Parker, director of social trends research at the nonpartisan Pew Research Center, just this week tweeted that "31 percent of U.S. parents worry their child might be shot at some point; concern is much higher among lower-income parents."

These tragedies must stop. When opponents of gun checks focus on mental health, I say, "I agree. That's why everyone needs a background check. How do we stop people with mental health issues from getting a gun if we don't conduct a check?"

When foes of any gun regulation mention gun deaths in Chicago, which has some of the most stringent laws in the country, I point out that a majority of the guns confiscated in Chicago came from out-of-state gun shops without tough background checks.

Two Milwaukee police officers brought suit against a gun shop that sold 537 guns recovered from crimes in one year, including the guns used to shoot both officers in the face.

When someone quotes NRA officials as saying none of the background checks that Obama is proposing would have stopped any mass shooting, I say, "Does that mean we shouldn't stop killings where we have the power to do it?"

Even post-Paris terror attack polls show 85 to 90 percent public support for universal background checks. Frankly, the kinds of things that Obama has been pushing have been so common-sense that people don't even consider them controversial.

Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush endorsed the kind of background reviews the president proposes -- reviews that would guarantee gun ownership for mentally balanced, non-violent citizens. President Obama said that "background checks make a difference." In Connecticut, gun deaths decreased by 40 percent after they chose background checks. But when Missouri repealed background checks, gun deaths there increased to "almost 50 percent higher than the national average."

Everybody knows that the NRA owns the Republican Congress along with a handful of Democrats -- so literally absolutely nothing will come out of them to curb gun violence. If families care as much about doing something to help stop mass killings as they say they do, then Obama acting on his own is literally the only path forward.

President Obama included in his actions many of the GOP's solutions -- increased help for mental health, enforcing existing laws -- and they still oppose and dismiss it. When Republicans oppose even their own suggestions, it shows why Obama was left no choice but to act on his own.

Opposing Obama on these simple, modest revisions is the same as advocating doing nothing. And while we do nothing, the mentally ill, and those with evil in their souls will be doing something that we will read and weep about ... again.

Bottom line: President Obama will work to keep guns out of the wrong hands. This is not a lame-duck president. This is a transformational president who is willing use every bit of his authority, however modest, to make life safer for Americans.
BRIDGEPORT  Can you put a price on public safety?

Thats what Mayor Joe Ganim has to decide.

As a candidate last year, then ex-mayor Ganim traversed the city, showing up at crime scenes, organizing vigils for victims, opening unofficial police substations, all to portray opponent Mayor Bill Finch and Police Chief Joseph Gaudett as culpable for the rise in homicides and nonfatal shootings.

But even as Ganim pledges to crack down on violent crime now that voters returned him to office, he faces the competing pressure of a bloated cop overtime bill.

More Information See More Collapse

Halfway through the fiscal year, the department has blown through its entire $4.3 million overtime budget.

Theyre spending at a 143 percent rate (over) last year, said Nestor Nkwo, Ganims budget chief.

By the time the fiscal year ends on June 30, members of Bridgeports Finest are projected to have earned $10.5 million in overtime  higher than the prior five years  and double 2014s bill.

We have five months to really slow this trend down, Nkwo said.

Cannot be done  says Sgt. Chuck Paris.

Paris is president of the police union, which threw its support behind Ganim when the former mayor challenged Finch last year for his old job.

It takes a lot of manpower to help slow down the issues were having now with the shootings, crime and drug sales, Paris said. And officers are continuing to retire.

The force, as anyone who followed the mayoral race knows, has been greatly depleted by retirements and other departures. There are 359 men and women working for the department, down from 447.

Thats 88 fewer cops.

Public safety should be the No. 1 priority, Paris said.

As of Friday, it appeared that argument had won out. Ganim ordered a reorganization of the departments handful of top cops to improve functionality, operational and economic efficiency.

The four deputy chiefs will be more focused on crime reduction and have to be on the scene at major incidents.

And Assistant Chief James Nardozzi? Hired three years ago by Finch, Nardozzi had initially been tasked with cutting overtime before the loss of officers.

And some in the Ganim administration had wanted Nardozzi to take another crack at cost-cutting.

Then on Friday, Ganim eliminated his job.

Man for the job

Wilbur Chapman, a former city police chief who is serving as Ganims public safety adviser, said, When our grandchildren are senior citizens, people will still be complaining about police overtime.

Everybody complains about overtime, Chapman said. The workers dont get enough. Management says its too much. When I was chief (under Ganim from 2000 to 2005), that was the main bone of contention.

In 2010, the department overspent its $6.8 million budget by just $18,327. A year later the budget had been increased to $7.3 million, and wound up $47,476 in the red.

Then in 2012 the Finch administration reduced the overtime budget to $5.8 million. It was wishful thinking. The department spent $8.6 million.

Finch in late 2012 hired Nardozzi, a veteran of the Waterbury police force and more recently dean of Post College, to help curb expenses.

At a March 2013 meeting of the City Councils budget committee, Chief Gaudett told members: Theres no overtime unless its preapproved by myself or the assistant chief, with very few exceptions. The message to the department is there is no money left in the checkbook.

Still, when that fiscal year ended, the overtime tab was $8 million  $2.1 million over budget.

But Nardozzi eventually met his mandate. The 2014 overtime budget was reduced to $4.3 million, and the department went $902,227 over budget.

Jump to this past December. Sworn in on Dec. 1, Ganim, mayor from 1991 to 2003, announced his team inherited an estimated budget deficit of $20 million from Finch, including cop overtime.

Ganim also inherited Gaudett. The chiefs contract was supposed to expire in December, but Finch extended it five years. So Ganim has been redistributing police powers to allies within the department, like Capt. A.J. Perez, the head of detectives. Ganim also brought Chapman back.

The order came down from Ganims office to cut that projected $10.5 million overtime bill by $2 million.

Chapman turned to Nardozzi.

Whos in charge?

While the lack of manpower, coupled with increased violent crime, is one reason for the ballooning overtime budget, there are other theories, like politics.

Ex-City Councilman Bob Walsh said the campaign between Finch and Ganim was in high gear when the fiscal year started in July.

It may have just been Finchs knee jerk reaction when violent crimes were spiking  I dont care what it takes, just get more cops more visible,  Walsh speculated.

Chapman in an interview early last week said Nardozzi was told to look at those areas where there can be a reduction in spending, without compromising service delivery or safety. If we have six people on a traffic detail, could we still function with four?

Hes energetic, focused and a tremendous asset for accomplishing what city government wants, Chapman added.

Paris, early last week, said he and his members were not pleased with the renewed focus on overtime.

I dont want too much information out there because you dont want the bad guys to know this, Paris said. Theyve taken some of the extra cars off the road. Theres other (patrol) details weve had out there that theyve either eliminated or reduced.

This is not what we expected at this time, Paris said. Ive sat down with the mayor and everyone on his staff ten times in the last two weeks, trying to talk to them regarding some of the issues we have here in the police department.

By Friday, Nardozzi was out and Chapman in an interview said with homicides up 73 percent over the previous year and shootings up 14 percent, reduction in overtime was secondary to improving police operations.

But, Chapman added, cost cutting efforts will continue.

You have to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time, he said. Chapman said the city is also moving forward with training new recruits, but admitted not much could be done to overcome the fact the citys police academy can only handle one class of 32 at a time.

Chapman sounded like someone unhappy to see Nardozzi go.

I thought he was an asset, Chapman said, but added: Normally the responsibility for overtime monitoring falls on the chief of police.

And, according to Chapman, Gaudett will resume that responsibility.

Except that the changes at the top Ganim ordered Friday included giving his friend, Perez, overall authority for strategic appointment and overtime allocation.

I dont really know whats going on, Walsh said. I dont think he (Ganim) has a firm footing on the whole situation. ... But at some point, youre going to have to cut the overtime if thats the only place you really have the money to cut.
Out here on the edge of the national forest, in the cattle-ranching, timber-cutting, deer-hunting Arkansas county where I live, this Ammon Bundy guy looks like the Al Sharpton of cows. His publicity seeking has created a media pseudo-event of a particularly modern kind.

Can anybody doubt that the feds could more efficiently resolve the standoff at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge by confiscating TV cameras rather than guns?

Actually, there's no real "standoff," since law enforcement is nowhere in sight. Blocking the roads, cutting the power and waiting them out looks like the wisest policy, although there appear to be almost as many tribal ideologues on the left hankering for a shootout as anti-government militia types.

The Washington Monthly's normally sensible David Atkins is breathing smoke and fire: "I feel that if Bundy's little crew wants to occupy a federal building and assert that they'll use deadly violence against any police who try to extract them," he wrote, "then they should get what they're asking for just as surely as Islamist terrorists would if they did likewise ... "

"What's good for one type of terrorist must also be good for another," Atkins continued.

Sounds downright Trump-like to me. Elsewhere, racialized insults and cries for vengeance have become common. "Y'all-qaeda," "yee-hawdists," "yokel haram," tweeted New Yorker satirist Andy Borowitz. Less witty ridicule is everywhere.

At Salon, Bundy's cowboy patriots are denounced as a "strident example of unapologetic white privilege in action."

Salon proclaims "They'd be killed if they were black: The racial double standard at the heart of the new Bundy family standoff."

"Armed white men seize a federal building. The government stands down carefully. But a 12-year-old with a toy gun?" reads the sub-headline.

Even the Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson couldn't resist making the tempting, but specious comparison between Bundy and Tamir Rice, the Cleveland child killed by cops in a city park. Think harder. Everybody acknowledges the boy's death was a pointless tragedy. Nobody wanted him to die.

It's also clearly false that armed white crackpots are always given a pass. Heard of Ruby Ridge? Waco? But hold that thought.

Robinson does acknowledge the single most salient fact: that Bundy's posse is holed up deep in the Oregon wilderness, 30 miles from a town of 2,800, a threat to nobody but each other. The last thing the U.S. government needs to do is give them the martyrdom a few of the crazier ones crave.

Then too, as a political matter, Bundy appears to have made an almost comical miscalculation. Hardly anybody in remote Harney County appears to support his cause. Even the father-son team of ranchers whose five-year prison terms Bundy's group is allegedly protesting have renounced his support.

Dwight and Steve Hammond did plead guilty to arson, you know.

In a press conference, county Sheriff David Ward addressed the anti-government vigilantes directly: "To the people at the wildlife refuge: You said you were here to help the citizens of Harney County. That help ended when a peaceful protest became an armed occupation. The Hammonds have turned themselves in. It's time for you to leave our community, go home to your families and end this peacefully."

Which is not to say those sentences are either just or equitable. Even among their neighbors, opinions differ. Five years seems like an awfully long time for torching 139 acres of sagebrush and juniper -- particularly given Dwight Hammond's age, 73.

The sentencing judge thought so too, refusing to enforce the mandatory minimum as unconstitutionally severe. After prosecutors objected, the Ninth Circuit Court in San Francisco imposed the statutory penalty. Indeed, the Hammonds' legal appeals are not complete, making the timing of Bundy's insurrection inconvenient at best.

Detailed accounts in local media make the entire affair sound like a high desert version of "Sometimes a Great Notion," Ken Kesey's manic epic about a western Oregon logging clan. Some stress the Hammond family's business success and generous support of local charities.

Trial records, however, also make it appear that as wealthy ranchers are prone to do, the Hammonds had taken to acting dictatorially. No doubt the Bureau of Land Management bureaucracy can be maddening, but renting grazing rights on government land doesn't convey the freedom of action a rancher has on his own property.

For the past 20 years, the Hammonds have taken to confronting hunters killing "their" deer on federal land, and threatening U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agents over water and fencing disputes. According to a 2010 grand jury indictment, "Hammond family members have been responsible for multiple fires" for more than 20 years. The indictment also alleged that one fire was set to destroy evidence of deer poaching -- animals killed not for meat but because they competed with cattle for forage.

If true, the wonder is that they got away with it so long.
NEWTOWN  School officials left a Saturday morning retreat still considering how best to tackle declining school enrollment, a trend that has re-opened discussions about closing an elementary school.

Much of Saturdays meeting focused on whether Superintendent Joe Erardi should further study shuttering a school and idea heavily debated and ultimately tabled last summer  or if reconfiguring the districts facilities could open space for municipal use, an early childhood education center or other options.

The focus is always on closing a school, but Im not sure thats where we should start, Board of Education Chairman Keith Alexander said.

Alexander asked other board members to send him their views before the boards next meeting on Jan. 19, when he said he would offer school administrators direction on the matter.

Newtowns school population, like many districts in western Connecticut and across the state, has dropped steadily in recent years. An enrollment analysis from Milone and MacBroom shows a continued decline of about 200 students per year over the next five years.

But the study also showed that elementary enrollment could rebound starting in 2021-22.

Vice Chairman Michelle Ku said because of the possible uptick, the district could be forced to reopen a school, reducing anticipated cost savings from closing one in the near term.

Personally I dont think we should be closing a school, Ku said. If we close a school for only seven or eight years, how much would we really be saving? How much would it cost to reopen?

Even if a school is not closed, some board members said space vacated because of dwindling enrollment could be repurposed to house an early child education center. Another option could be to move the districts central offices into unused space in one of the schools.

While no members said they favor a school closure, Alexander and Erardi were skeptical about the long-term accuracy of the study, which considers economic outlook, birthrates and other factors in its predictions.

I just cant wrap my brain around how someone can predict how many births there will be 10 years from now, Erardi said.

Similar problems have been felt in nearby towns such as New Milford, which closed John Pettibone Elementary School, and Ridgefield, where officials have talked about redistricting or a school closure.

Last summers debate in Newtown over closing Hawley School resulted in contentious protests. But there was also concern about trauma associated with closing a school just as the new Sandy Hook Elementary School is set to open this fall.

The entire time it was in committee, we knew it would be absolutely awkward to open and close at the same time, Erardi said.

awolff@newstimes.com; 203-731-3333; @awolffster
Once emblematic of technology and innovation, Gilt Groupe will be acquired by Hudsons Bay Co. for a quarter of its earlier private valuation.

Hudsons Bay, the department store retailer that owns Lord & Taylor and Saks Fifth Avenue, plans to purchase Gilt for $250 million in cash, the companies said this week. That compares with Gilts $1 billion valuation in 2011.

Soon after Gilt was founded in 2007, it was hailed for revolutionizing fashion e-commerce through its flash sales, which give shoppers a limited window of time to capture discounts on clothing and accessories. The model attracted scores of users, some of whom became less enthused by the deals over time, analysts say.

Hudsons Bay is betting that the acquisition will revive Gilt through a partnership with its Saks Off Fifth. After the deal is completed, Gilt customers will be able to return merchandise at Saks Off Fifth.

The companies would also set up Gilt shops in Saks Off Fifth stores, giving Gilts 9 million members access to brick and mortar stores.

Hudsons Bay CEO Jerry Storch said the two brands are a close match because both Gilt and Saks Off Fifth offer luxury items at a steeply discounted price.

The two most rapidly growing areas in retail today are Internet and off-price, Storch said. We think this is a marriage made in heaven.

The deal was modeled after Nordstroms 2011 acquisition of flash site HauteLook, a deal that paved the way for traditional retailers purchases of sites for private sales.

Retailers including Hudsons Bay have been experiencing challenges, partially related to slower traffic in their stores as more customers shop online.

By bringing in Gilt, the Canadian department-store owner is looking to take advantage of the sites digital presence. About 50 percent of Gilts orders are conducted through its mobile platform, and Hudsons Bay wants to tap into those capabilities for the rest of its brands.

We are a huge believer of an all-channel retail model, said Storch. Gilt is a very cool brand. This opens up a whole new world.

Storch said that he is using as a model Nordstroms acquisition in HauteLook. Nordstroms discount division Nordstrom Rack learned from Haute Looks customers.

Nordstrom said in November that since its purchase of HauteLook, online sales now represent more than 10 percent of its overall off-price business. In contrast, it took the company more than 10 years for Nordstrom.com to reach that level of online sales.

The deal is expected to close Feb. 1. The addition of Gilt Group is expected to contribute $500 million to Hudsons Bay revenue in fiscal 2016.

The companies said that after combining they would be able to reduce shipping costs and share inventory, as well as increase purchasing power.

Chronicle News Services contributed to this report.
In this image released by Mexico's Attorney General's Office, Saturday, Feb. 22, 2014, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is photographed against a wall after his arrest in the Pacific resort city of Mazatlan, Mexico. Eduardo Verdugo/AP

U.S. federal prosecutors in New York plan to seek the extradition of Mexico's most wanted man, drug cartel kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, to the United States, the U.S. Attorney's office said on Sunday.

Guzman, captured on Saturday in Mexico with help from U.S. agencies, had long run Mexico's infamous Sinaloa Cartel. Robert Nardoza, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's office in Brooklyn, said his office plans to seek Guzman's extradition to face a variety of charges.

The U.S. had placed a $5 million bounty on Guzman. His cartel has smuggled billions of dollars worth of cocaine, marijuana and methamphetamines into the United States, and fought vicious turf wars with other Mexican gangs.

Guzman, whose nickname "El Chapo" means "Shorty," pioneered the use of sophisticated underground tunnels to smuggle drug shipments across the border and also became a major narcotics exporter to Europe and Asia in recent years.

Reuters
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At a national gathering of astronomers on Wednesday, a Harvard University scientist pinpointed where interstellar civilizations could be thriving in the Milky Way.

Rosanne DiStefano of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics told a meeting of the American Astronomical Society that "a globular cluster might be the first place in which intelligent life is identified in our galaxy."

The clustersdense bunches of solar systemswould afford the best opportunity for life to evolve and establish relations with nearby planets.

It comes a half-century after the kick-off of American academics' official Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI), and months after NASA's head of science told a congressional hearing that humanity was "on the cusp" of learning if alien intelligence exists.

RELATED: NASA's head of science says humans 'are on the cusp' of answering the ultimate question

Globular star clusters hold millions of stars in spaces that average about 100 light years acrossextremely dense by galactic standards. Our Milky Way galaxy hosts about 150 such clusters.

Scholarly debate questions whether the clusters even bear planets. In fact only one has ever been found. But spotting distant planets from the Earth is like noting specks of dust drifting on the other side of town; not easy. DiStefano and her colleague, Alak Ray of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai, argued that there could be planets in the clusters, and that those planets would be well suited to host life.

As scientists understand, temperature is key for the evolution of life. Liquid water seems necessary for the most basic biological processes, and the precious compound exists in its rare liquid state through a tiny temperature range before it is frozen or vaporized. DiStefano's research stipulated that the "just right" range could be most easily found inside globular clusters.

RELATED: Texas researcher finds burping black hole, discovers secrets of the universe

By the nature of their formation, the clusters are old, about 10 billion years old, more than twice the age of Earth's sun. Bright, hot stars die young, and dim warm ones live long. A heavy concentration of low-burning stars could create a warm cosmic ambience nicely suited to liquid H2O.

The clusters' old age also would afford more time for the evolution of advanced organisms.

And the density of old star systems could facilitate interstellar communication between planetary societies, raising the possibility of the long-imagined galactic civilization somewhere in the sky.

"We call it the 'globular cluster opportunity," DiStefano said. "Sending a broadcast between the stars wouldn't take any longer than a letter from the U.S. to Europe in the 18th Century."

RELATED: NASA funds research to recycle human waste for deep-space travel

Looking for those plausible civilizations won't be easy. SETI methods haven't changed much since 1960, when Frank Drake at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory made humanity's first attempt to detect extraterrestrial technology, turning a massive radio telescope towards targeted worlds in hopes of picking up intelligent communication. But he found only static and cosmic noise.

Later scientists began sending their own targeted radio pings out into the sky with hopes of a response, but none has yet come. DiStefano recommended reaching out to the globular clusters, just to see if anyone is home.
My fellow Californians, the state of our state is nuttier than ever.

I know you will hear more conventional assessments of the state of things in the coming weeks. January is the high season for elected officials to offer addresses on how our state is faring  overviews of California and its local governments. And, to be clear, I am not judging the sanity of Californians (we have lower rates of mental illness than the U.S. as a whole). Nor am I referring merely to the growth in our almond and walnut production.

I offer my assessment of our essential nuttiness as a starting point for a year in which we will debate and cast votes on our taxes, drug laws, schools, roads, our rails and water. As we figure things out, let us not lean too heavily on reason, or appeal too often to common sense. After all, this state  with its peculiar history of rapid change  has never been a particularly reasonable or sensible place.

So when things make no sense in the coming year, take comfort in the words of the writer Edward Abbey: There is science, logic, reason; there is thought verified by experience. And then there is California.

Obsessed with singularity

We have been so singular for so long that California has become obsessed with singularity  and even afraid of the singularity, the idea that artificial intelligences will eventually surpass our own, dooming humanity. When Gov. Jerry Brown gives his own State of the State address, there likely will be a predictable list of California singular-status boasts: as a leader in renewable energy, high-speed rail, protecting undocumented immigrants and fighting climate change.

Such policies are to be celebrated. They also are the fruits of our perceived nuttiness  other states have rejected high-speed rail and cap and trade for greenhouse gas emissions as irretrievably wacky ideas.

You wont hear this months official speech-makers talk about the other half of the nut  the way our nuttiness can turn on itself.

Ours is a state of creative communities and people that is ruled from Sacramento via the most centralized regime of regulation and taxation in the United States.

California has the highest percentage of its population living in poverty of any state in the country, and yet our leaders pursue policies that give us some of the most expensive electricity, gas and housing in America. We embrace freedom and restrict it in the same breath. Californians are on our way to legalizing marijuana  but good luck finding a place in the state where you can smoke it, or anything else. The state is pioneering self-driving cars  even as we let our roads deteriorate into impassable messes.

Weve led the way in expanding health insurance for poor people  roughly half of our children are now on Medi-Cal, Californias version of Medicaid  but at the same time, weve made it harder for people to see a doctor and get treatment. California desperately needs more college graduates  well be short a million skilled workers by the middle of the next decade  so, naturally, weve been underfunding public higher education and limiting enrollment in our colleges.

We Californians also have a nutty weakness for empty and extravagant promises. We spend years on Elon Musks waiting lists for Teslas he can never seem to deliver in the promised numbers. We invest billions in the trivial  how many online coupon companies and photo-sharing apps does one state need? And we overdo it. The California Public Employees Retirement System wants to lower its expected rate of investment return to 6.5 percent (just a year after it said it could guarantee 7.5 percent). Our governments are still offering billions in retiree health care  without setting aside money to fund it  even in an age when Medicare and Obamacare should cover all.

Simpler rules needed

This year, youll hear lots of big talk about how well reform our crazily complicated criminal justice and tax systems. We should reform, though we probably wont. A place as nutty as this needs simpler rules, not 5,000 separate criminal provisions and more than 400 penalty enhancements.

I could go on  take note that Ive gone this far in a column about California nuttiness without once mentioning San Francisco  but whats the point? While our nuttiness has its costs, California will survive. And well cope, as we always do, by celebrating how crazily creative we are.

As Comptons Kendrick Lamar will rap at this new years Grammys when he wins a boatload of awards, We gon be alright. Do you hear me, do you feel me? We gon be alright.

Joe Mathews writes the Connecting California column for Zocalo Public Square. To comment, submit your letter to the editor at www.sfgate.com/submissions
Regarding John Diazs Against the waves of big money (Insight, Jan. 3): What a sad day it is for American democracy when there are no limits on federal campaign contributions, nor any effective disclosure of whos buying Congress. Here in California, we have the same problems with ballot propositions, but we could soon have the power to mandate real disclosure with the Voters Right to Know Initiative. This initiative, backed by Silicon Valley entrepreneur Jim Heerwagen and the nonpartisan California Clean Money Campaign, would make political ads clearly show their top three funders. This would be a giant step toward ending the unfair dominance of big money in California elections. This isnt just another special interest ballot petition. Its in everyones interest to know whos really paying for political ads. Please sign the petition to put it on the November ballot.

David Schmidt, San Francisco

Trumbos principles

Dalton Trumbo was indeed a hero  not for the Communist beliefs he held for periods of time, but for his very American belief that no government has the right to ask a person what his beliefs are. This was the principle he went to jail for.

Robert Davis, San Francisco

Leave Odysseo alone

Am I to assume that the new, half-page feature, My Arts Column, (Datebook, Jan. 3) is meant to be taken seriously? It very rudely attacks the beautiful Canadian horse show Odysseo. This show, a guest in our city, displays exquisite synergy between finely trained horses and their skilled handlers. It gives a message of harmony and respect for life. Can you tell me the intent?

Please dont embarrass us with any more such low-minded tirades. For shame, Chronicle.

Marisa Schaer, El Granada

Day care programs

When I read Emily Greens Growing day care squeeze (Jan. 3) regarding the challenges of finding child care in San Francisco for young children, I was very surprised that there was absolutely no mention of the high-quality, no-cost to low-cost Early Education program of the San Francisco Unified School District. This program, in existence for over 70 years, provides child care and early childhood education opportunities, including an infant and toddler program, for thousands of children at schools all over San Francisco. The teachers are licensed educators, and the 600 teachers and paraprofessionals (classroom assistants) are all highly trained in developmentally appropriate practices for our youngest students. San Francisco has good reason to be proud of being home to a school district that has included addressing the needs of young children and working parents for so many years, and United Educators of San Francisco is proud to represent the fine educators in our Early Education Schools. I encourage all parents who are interested in an excellent early education experience for their children to contact the San Francisco Unified School District.

Susan Solomon, executive vice president,

United Educators of San Francisco,

San Francisco

When to move

I read Moving into Oldies Asylum  carrying a lighter load (Insight, Jan. 3) by Roberta Alexander. If Alexander had given her age the whole piece would have been more helpful to those of us considering such a decision. Do we make the move at 80 years old? Earlier? Later? This subject has been dinner party conversation for years, and her discussion of the topic is interesting. But more information next time, please.

Susan Burns, San Mateo

Guns arent the issue

President Obama and the Democrats would make it seem that closing some loopholes in buying guns so there are more background checks is the answer to gun violence. I do not own a gun and have no issue expanding background checks, but it is law abiding citizens who submit to them when buying a gun. Not someone with a criminal background, drug dealer or gang banger. These groups will get their guns illegally and are the ones to use them. In 2013, there were over 33,000 deaths from guns and over 20,000 were related to suicide by gun. That is a mental health crisis and not a gun issue. Plus, guns kill thousands each year as a result of an accidental firing of the gun. That is the result of poor ownership of guns. Yet, we have never heard from President Obama on dealing with the gun violence in the cities. Chicago is the murder capital of the U.S. and Baltimore is not far behind. Why hasnt the president addressed this issue, which takes the lives of so many African American men primarily and a huge toll on the families of those who were murdered by a gun? New York City dealt with the gun violence to make that city very safe, but its method is no longer considered valid. The massacre of Sandy Hook in 2012 was a mental health tragedy as the mother of Adam Lanza legally bought the guns and kept them at her home. She refused to acknowledge that her son with mental health issues could use the guns on others and she ultimately paid the price as victim No. 1.

Andrew Smith, Santa Rosa

Inspiring stories

Company van pool riders like a second family to me (Insight, Jan. 3) by Susan Sommercamp of Roseville was an enjoyable read. She found a group of terrific, diverse people. I think we all need to be riding in van pools. Richard Rapaports Stricken with the disease that devastated Williams (Insight, Jan. 3) was inspiring and courageous  my best wishes to both correspondents, and thanks for publishing these articles.

Joan Wakefield, San Francisco
The verdict is in. On Friday, jurors found 56-year-old Raymond Shrimp Boy Chow guilty on all 162 charges against him, including murder, conspiracy to murder, racketeering, trafficking in stolen goods and 154 counts of money laundering. While the FBI and U.S. attorneys office may feel vindicated by the verdict, the guilty verdict also serves as an indictment of the federal criminal justice systems standard operating procedure. It was the feds, after all, who chose to let Chow out of prison despite his long criminal career.

In 2003, the feds freed Chow, who was serving a 160-month sentence on racketeering charges involving murder for hire, conspiracy to distribute heroin and arson, after he testified against a fellow gang leader who had fled to Hong Kong. It was an odd decision for a bizarre deal  free a violent offender in order to jail another violent offender who had left the United States and had no reason to come back. Chow also had previous state felony firearms convictions  yet federal prosecutors released him from prison, despite the risk that he might reoffend.
Republicans fulfilled a popular campaign pledge Wednesday when, by a 240-181 vote, the House passed a bill repealing the Affordable Care Act and defunding Planned Parenthood. The bill, already passed by the Senate, went to the desk of President Obama where it was vetoed on Friday.

Just when, I have to ask, did my Grand Old Partys idea of victory become passing bills that wont become law? Whats so glorious about fecklessness? The GOP House put an awful lot of work  it voted to repeal Obamacare 62 times  into passing something that cannot become law while Obama is president when there are not enough Republicans to override a veto. And yet, I see progress.

This is the first time the Senate passed a repeal bill  thanks to a budget reconciliation rule that allows leadership to bypass cloture rules that require 60 votes. Every single member of our conference campaigned on repeal of this disastrous law, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnells spokesman Don Stewart told me. They delivered.

Republicans did not deliver a bill with an alternative health care plan  to the glee of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, whose office posted a blog about the many times House Republicans have promised an alternative, without wrapping the package. It seems there is not a lot of pressure for Republicans to support an alternative bill  the heavy pressure lines up behind gimmicks.

Republicans tactic backfires

Or maybe thats changing. Last year, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, argued it was the right thing for the GOP Congress to risk shutting down the government by passing a spending spending bill that defunded Planned Parenthood. Cruz didnt care how that same tactic backfired in 2013. Or that National Right to Life President Carol Tobias opposed his shutdown gambit. She told supporters, given how congressional rules work, the only way to defund Planned Parenthood is to elect a president who opposes abortion. For once, the lemming caucus didnt herd the whole GOP caucus toward the cliff.

Tobias told me that the newly passed measure shows the Senate can pass a bill to defund Planned Parenthood with a simple majority vote. Thats a win. And: There were a lot of conservatives and Republicans who didnt think Mitt Romney was good enough. So they didnt vote. Obama won re-election. Now many of these same people are now upset that Republicans in Congress arent doing what they consider to be enough. Im sorry, elections have consequences.

Heres what bugs me: The House Freedom Caucus withholds votes  which sends House Speaker Paul Ryan into Pelosis loving arms. Then the Freedom Caucus complains that Ryan worked with Democrats. As the House passed the Obamacare repeal, Freedom Caucus head Rep. Raul Labrador of Idaho announced that Speaker Ryans honeymoon is over  and Ryan needs to start putting up real conservative reform to show that he is different from former Speaker John Boehner.

By the way, Pelosis blog also asserted Ryan is no different than John Boehner. Great minds ...

Actually, Ryan and McConnell have done something that could not be accomplished without their majorities. With a bill on his desk, Obama was forced to veto the measure  and in so doing, he reminded the public why the Affordable Care Act is so unpopular. But wait, theres more: They sent the Oval Office a spending bill, signed in December, that included a two-year hiatus on the Affordable Care Acts tax on Cadillac health plans and the 2.3 percent excise tax on medical devices. The impure GOP establishment actually passed measures that peeled back Obamacare.

Critics on the far right want to rub away the shine of accomplishment. Talk to Republican voters and many seem unaware of GOP victories. The think-tank establishment and radio talk-show hosts tell the base that the GOP leadership is good for nothing, when the eggheads are good for getting nothing done.

The notion that the GOP-led Congress doesnt do anything feeds Democrats claims that this is a do-nothing Congress. To the contrary, under Republican control the Senate passed the first multiyear highway bill since 2005. Obama signed it in December. Since 1997, Congress regularly has had to pass doc fixes to avert huge scheduled cuts in payments to physicians that would have chased physicians out of Medicare. This Congress repealed the formula that made those fixes necessary. In April, Obama signed the bill. In November, the president signed a defense bill that raised military pay and impedes his promise to close Guantanamo Bay.

Steps in the right direction

Yes, to their discredit, Republicans didnt pay for these reforms. But these measures represent steps in the right direction. They are improvements. People elect candidates to Congress to improve the country, not fall on their swords.

As he was leaving the speakership, Boehner sagely advised, Have the courage to do what you can do. Its easy to have the courage to do what you cant do.

I have my own saying: Its hard to dance with a knife in your back.

Debra J. Saunders is a San

Francisco Chronicle columnist.

E-mail: dsaunders@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @DebraJSaunders

What is conservative?

As the House voted to repeal Obamacare, the conservative Heritage Foundations Daily Signal ran this headline: House Conservatives Warn Paul Ryan: Honeymoon Is Over. That headline suggests Ryan is not really conservative. Ryan has an 84 percent lifetime rating with the conservative Americans for Prosperity. Hes conservative, and also is strategic. The two should not be mutually exclusive.
The most luminous and massive system of stars within 10,000 light-years of Earth, known as Eta Carinae, is surrounded by a veil of gas and dust that makes it unique in the Milky Way. Now Eta Carinae is no longer a lonely anomaly  astronomers have for the first time detected five twins of the system in other galaxies. This finding could shed light on the violent ends of massive stars and the way they can shape their galaxies, scientists added.

Located about 7,500 light-years away from Earth in the southern constellation Carina the Keel, Eta Carinae is 5 million times brighter than the sun. The binary system is made up of two massive stars  the larger star is estimated to be 100 to 150 times more massive than the sun, while its smaller companion, detected in 2005, is 30 times the sun's mass.

In a rare celestial outburst later dubbed the "Great Eruption," the larger of Eta Carinae's stars blasted out at least 10 times the mass of the sun into space in 1838, an explosion that made it the second-brightest star in the sky for a decade. This eruption left behind an expanding veil of gas and dust known as the Homunculus Nebula that still envelops Eta Carinae, the only shroud of its kind known in the Milky Way.

One possible explanation for the Great Eruption is that when massive stars age, they start burning the heavier elements inside them, leading to dramatic spikes of energy that make the stars unstable. "These instabilities can result in thick stellar winds, or even ejection of the outermost portion of the star," said study lead author Rubab Khan, an astrophysicist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

"An alternative idea is that the less massive star in the Eta Carinae binary got too close to the more massive star, and it literally ripped off a portion of the higher mass star," Khan added. "Very recently, one group even proposed that Eta Carinae originally consisted of three stars, and two of those merged, causing the eruption."

Still, while Eta Carinae is probably the best-studied massive star in the sky, "a working model for how this star erupted still eludes us," said astronomer Nathan Smith at the University of Arizona at Tucson. "Its eruption is not something that fits into the standard picture we have from models of stellar evolution."

Solving the mystery of why Eta Carinae erupted could help scientists better understand the lives and deaths of massive stars, where elements heavier than helium are forged. "By better understanding massive star evolution, we can learn about the process of making all the elements and the dust that then made the world we now live in," Khan said.

To find out why the Great Eruption happened and how common such explosions are in the evolution of massive stars, astronomers need more examples of such events. However, such massive stars are rare because their size makes them unstable and relatively short-lived, and the aftermath of such explosions are similarly brief, making the discovery of such eruptions needle-in-a-haystack levels of difficult. "It is a rare phase in the lives of the rarest stars," Khan said.

Now, for the first time, astronomers have detected potential matches for Eta Carinae dubbed "Eta twins."

"Eta Carinae is not a one-off freak of nature  rather, its present state represents a condition that occurs in nature possibly for most or even all very high-mass stars," Khan said.

The researchers analyzed visible and infrared light from Eta Carinae. Its shroud absorbs ultraviolet and visible light and reemits it as mid-infrared rays. The researchers then combed through data from the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes to find similar patterns of dimming and brightening.

The scientists focused on four nearby galaxies  M83, NGC 6946, M101 and M51, located 15 million 18.6 million, 21 million and 26 million light-years away from Earth, respectively. These galaxies display high rates of star formation, suggesting they might possess a lot of massive stars.

While an initial search of seven galaxies from 2012 to 2014 failed to find any Eta twins, highlighting their rarity, a follow-up 2015 hunt discovered five candidate Eta twins in four different galaxies  two in M83, and one each in NGC 6946, M101 and M51. These likely each contain high-mass stars hidden behind five to 10 solar masses of gas and dust.

"We expected to first find just one, and then another after some time, and so on," Khan said. "So when we found five in one sweep, after so many years and so many galaxies of not finding any, we were quite startled. In fact we spent quite some time checking, double-checking, and double-double-checking to make sure that everything was in order."

"Khan's recognition of some possibly similar analogs in other galaxies may shed some light on the question of how rare Eta Carinae-like events are," said Smith, who did not take part in this research.

By comparing what researchers know about Eta Carinae and will learn about Eta twins, they can begin solving a number of mysteries surrounding massive stars. "Do all very high mass stars lose a significant portion of their material as they age?" Khan said. "Do all of them lose that mass through a single giant eruption, or through many small eruptions, or through a heavy wind? How long do they live after these eruptions?"

"The next step is to further study the Eta twins with present generation telescopes, and then with the James Webb Space Telescope when it is launched in 2018," Khan said. "We would also like to find more Eta twins, especially in galaxies that are unlike the ones in which we have found them now, to figure out if it takes special physical conditions to produce these objects."

Khan and his colleagues detailed their findings in the Dec. 20 issue of Astrophysical Journal Letters and on Jan. 6 at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Kissimmee, Florida.

Charles Q. Choi is a freelance science writer based in New York City who has written for The New York Times, Scientific American, Wired, Science, Nature, and many other news outlets. He tweets at @cqchoi.

Reprinted with permission from Inside Science, an editorially independent news product of the American Institute of Physics, a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing, promoting and serving the physical sciences.


Zachary Bookman, one of The Chronicles Visionary of the Year nominees last spring, wants to help governments meet the demands of the 21st century. In a world where transparency has become an increasingly important standard, Bookmans goal was simple: to revolutionize the way governments analyze and allocate money.

Bookman founded his company, mOpenGov.com, with Nate Levine and Joe Lonsdale in 2012. In the past year, OpenGov has made the kind of progress many startups can only dream of and with over 700 governments in 45 states using the platform, a new executive team and the backing of investor Marc Andreessen, OpenGov is poised for even more success.

We have built an incredible team to tackle some very difficult problems, Bookman said, reflecting on some of 2015s most poignant success stories.

OpenGov helps to create custom budget reports that keep everyone informed -- from administrators and legislators to everyday citizens. Once those reports are created in OpenGov, they provide insight for management during the budget planning process and internal audits. OpenGov also allows governments to publish interactive reports in a searchable format, fostering transparency and giving taxpayers access to more information about how their money is being spent.

One of OpenGovs latest feats is in the City of Stanton in Orange County, California. In 2011, Stanton lost $4 million in funding from the State of California once earmarked for various city improvements. In an effort to bring some of the lost revenue back to the town, residents voted and approved a one-cent sales tax, Measure GG, in November 2014.

Stanton acquired the OpenGov platform in September 2015 -- soon after the sales tax went into effect -- with the goal of keeping residents closely informed about how their sales tax money was being spent. Initial confusion about how the taxpayer money was being spent was troublesome  with some residents concerned that the sales tax money was going toward the building of a new park. However, with the help of a bookmark budget report feature by OpenGov, Stanton officials were able to clear up the misconception and showcase that 82 percent of the sales tax revenue was being used to improve public safety. With the help of the sales tax revenue, two new deputies were put on the street to protect the public.

Our goal is to help governments with how they work -- and at the same time, help them truly connect to their communities, Bookman said.

OpenGov has also partnered with 114 governments in the state of Ohio to create the OhioCheckbook.com platform, a statewide project that will compress and organize financial data into a no-frills, searchable format. With the click of a button, officials and citizens alike can search by keyword, date, department, vendor or a plethora of other options. The information discovered on OhioCheckbook can also be downloaded and even shared on social media.

But the success of OpenGov is all the more possible, Bookman explains, because of his nine-member executive team -- now backed by $25 million in investments from an all-star lineup that includes Tim Cook and Ashton Kutcher. New to the Board of Directors is investor Marc Andreesson, the Silicon Valley titan whose investing feats include LinkedIn and Zynga. Andreesson is no stranger to innovation, as he also sits on the Board of Directors at Ebay, Facebook and Hewlett Packard.

Its very exciting to be surrounded by such incredible people, Bookman said.

To read more about VisionSF & the Visionary of the Year Awards, go to www.sfgate.com/visionsf
Why Evan Marwell?

"Evan was the winner of our 2015 Visionary of the Year award, and with good reason. He not only is embarking on a very challenging and important task  helping wire all the nation's schools to the Internet  he is doing it in a very original way, by bringing the culture and energy that made him so successful in the startup world to the nonprofit sector."

- John Diaz
OSAN AIR BASE, South Korea  A powerful U.S. B-52 bomber flew over South Korea on Sunday, a clear show of force from the United States as a Cold War-style standoff deepened between its ally Seoul and North Korea following Pyongyangs fourth nuclear test.

North Korea will read the fly-over of a bomber capable of delivering nuclear weapons  seen by an Associated Press photographer at Osan Air Base near Seoul  as a threat. Any hint of Americas nuclear power enrages Pyongyang, which links its own pursuit of atomic weapons to what it sees as past nuclear-backed moves by the United States to topple its authoritarian government.

The B-52 flight follows a victory tour by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to celebrate the countrys widely disputed claim of a hydrogen bomb test. Kim is seeking to rally pride in an explosion viewed with outrage by much of the world and to boost his domestic political goals.

Kims first public comments about last weeks test came in a visit to the countrys military headquarters, where he called the explosion a self-defensive step meant to protect the region from the danger of nuclear war caused by the U.S.-led imperialists, according to a dispatch Sunday from state-run Korean Central News Agency.

It is the legitimate right of a sovereign state and a fair action that nobody can criticize, Kim was reported as saying during his tour of the Peoples Armed Forces Ministry.

The tone of Kims comments, which sought to glorify him and justify the test, is typical of state media propaganda. But they also provide insight into North Koreas long-running argument that it is the presence of tens of thousands of U.S. troops in South Korea and Japan, and a hostile U.S. policy that seeks to topple the government in Pyongyang, that make North Koreas pursuit of nuclear weapons absolutely necessary.

During his tour, Kim posed for photos with leading military officials in front of statues of the two members of his family who led the country previously  Kim Jong Il and Kim Il Sung. He also sought to link the purported success of the nuclear test to a ruling Workers Party convention in May, the partys first since 1980. Hes expected to use the congress to announce major state policies and shake up the countrys political elite to further consolidate his power.

World powers are looking for ways to punish the North over a nuclear test that, even if not of a hydrogen bomb, still likely pushes Pyongyang closer to its goal of a nuclear-armed missile that can reach the U.S. mainland.
1 Guantanamo prisoner released: A Kuwaiti jet departed from the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Friday with a freed captive once suspected of being Osama bin Ladens adviser, leaving 104 war-on-terror prisoners in the remote detention center President Obama wants closed. Fayez al-Kandari, 38, was held since 2002 and never formally charged with a crime. Al-Kandari was the last of a dozen citizens of the U.S-allied emirate taken to Guantanamo. With his departure, just 16 nations are represented in the prison, with the majority of remaining captives being Yemenis.

2 New Years assaults: German authorities on Friday tied asylum seekers for the first time to the wave of violent assaults on women in Cologne on New Years Eve as debate intensified over whether the country had made a mistake in opening its doors last year to more than a million migrants. The Interior Ministry said 18 of the 31 people identified so far as suspects in the violence in Cologne had applied for asylum in Germany. Most of the crimes they were accused of involved theft and violence, but at least three acts were considered sexual assaults.
KABUL  Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the United States will hold talks in Islamabad on Monday aimed at reviving the Afghan peace process.

Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman Ahmad Shekib Mostaghni said Saturday that the representatives will discuss a road map for peace talks. The talks were agreed upon during a visit to Kabul last month by Pakistans army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif.

Mondays talks do not include the Taliban, who have been battling the U.S.-backed government for nearly 15 years and have recently stepped up their attacks.

Talks with the Taliban have been on hold since July, when they collapsed after just one meeting following Afghanistans announcement that longtime Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar had been dead for more than two years. The Taliban called off its participation and a second meeting was canceled.

A subsequent power struggle within the Taliban has raised questions about who would represent the insurgents if the talks with Kabul are revived.

Pakistan is believed to have influence over the Taliban, but relations with Kabul have been tense in recent months. The two countries have long accused each other of backing the Taliban and other insurgents operating along their porous border. Taliban leaders are widely believed to be based in Pakistani cities near the Afghan border, including Quetta and Peshawar.

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani took part in a regional Heart of Asia conference last month in Islamabad, which called for the resumption of the Afghan-Taliban peace negotiations. Ghani was given a warm welcome at the meeting, which was also attended by U.S. and Chinese representatives.

Analysts have cautioned that despite the rapprochement between Kabul and Islamabad, any substantive peace talks are still months off. Taliban demands have consistently focused on the end to an international military presence in the country. The U.S. and NATO have 13,000 troops stationed in Afghanistan, mostly in a training capacity. They include 9,800 Americans.

The Taliban have intensified attacks in recent weeks and come close to taking over strategically important districts in southern Helmand province, the worlds premier poppy-producing region. Almost all the worlds heroin is made from opium grown in southern Afghanistan.
HURGHADA, Egypt  Two Austrians and a Swede who were stabbed in an attack on a hotel in Egypts Red Sea resort of Hurghada were only lightly wounded and in stable condition Saturday, an Egyptian hospital official said.

The official, who requested anonymity in line with regulations, identified the victims as Renata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both 72, and Sammie Olovsson, 27. The official said they suffered shallow wounds.
STATEN ISLAND N.Y. -- The legalization of medical marijuana in New York is bringing hope to people like Mary Reilly, one of countless New Yorkers living with debilitating illnesses.

Mrs. Reilly, who is fighting a battle with rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia, will still have to wait for her illnesses to make it on the list of afflictions for the state-approved version of marijuana, but she said it seems like a safer alternative than the drugs she currently takes.

"I was on prednisone for a long time, probably 10 years ... long-term use of prednisone could affect your bones, and if you have [rheumatoid arthritis], that's not good."

"If they approve [rheumatoid arthritis], it would be something I would definitely try with the hopes that I would get some relief," she said.

New York has limited medical marijuana to non-smokeable extracts delivered in forms such as capsules, vaporizers and liquids taken orally.

The first medical marijuana dispensary is now operating in Manhattan and 19 more will be opening in the state by the end of January.

The fight to make medical marijuana a law in New York was no easy task, but it's something that state Sen. Diane Savino says will make a huge impact for people suffering from AIDS, cancer and other illnesses.

Savino, a co-sponsor of the original bill, took over from a colleague, state Sen. Tom Duane, who introduced it but then left the Senate.

It was written at a time when the marijuana industry was non-existent, but Savino took an extensive look at the recent boom in places like California and Colorado to look at "the good, the bad and the ugly."

"It took me about two years to re-draft the bill and create what is now the Compassionate Care Act of New York State, a bill that Gov. Cuomo would sign," Savino said.

"In its previous form, it would have never happened."

According to Savino, statewide polling showed that the issue polled well across the aisle - Democrats, Republicans, independents and Conservatives - to offer patients access to a drug that provided relief for their medical conditions.

So much so, that Assembly member Nicole Malliotakis switched her stance and came out in favor of Savino's re-written legislation.

"I did meet a family from Willowbrook, who had a 3-year-old boy who suffered from very bad seizures," she explained.

"The family came to me and pleaded with me about medical marijuana, they were learning that children in other states with similar conditions were seeing their conditions minimized ... they really helped me evolve in my opinion."

The Assembly member also credits Savino with playing a big role in making her comfortable with throwing full support behind the re-written drafts, which she says is a "responsible, safe bill for the people of New York."

"It was limited to certain diseases, not just anyone can get it ... We are taking a responsible approach to this, not like the state of California."

Costs may continue to be a burden for people like Reilly, who's co-payments with conventional pain management drugs drain the wallet.

"Some of these medications cost so much," said Reilly. "I don't know how much [medical marijuana] will be, but if it helps people, it might alleviate some of the burden of the co-pays."

However, it may be advantageous for those replacing expensive drug co-pays with medical marijuana flat rates, but insurance for New York patients has yet to be a reality.

Currently, the federal government classifies marijuana as a schedule one substance - meaning it's not for medicinal purposes and is highly addictive - so patients seeking medical marijuana will have to dole out cash for the time being.

"No insurance company will cover it right now," said Savino. "Hopefully, at some point in the future, we can begin to talk about insurance coverage, but we're not there yet."
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.-- The Linden Police Department was deficient in disciplining Pedro Abad, the wrong-way driver involved in the fatal crash on the West Shore Expressway last March, after he was charged with two DUI's before the incident, according to a report by NJ.com.

Acting Union County Prosecutor Grace Parks also announced that her office will oversee the Linden Police Department's internal affairs department, the report says.

Abad, 28, was behind the wheel of a Honda Civic that crashed head-on into a tractor-trailer on March 20, prosecutors allege.

Two of his passengers, Linden Police Officer Frank Viggiano, and civilian Joseph Rodriguez, both 28, died of their injuries. Abad and another passenger, Linden Police Officer Patrik Kudlac, 23, were badly hurt.

The group had just left Curves, a strip club at 2945 Arthur Kill Rd. in Charleston, police said.

Abad faces charges of aggravated vehicular homicide and manslaughter.
Terror Suspect

FILE - In this Sept. 18, 2014 photo, Mufid Elfgeeh is taken out of Federal Court in Rochester, N.Y. Elfgeeh, a naturalized U.S. citizen, helped arrange travel and funding and put one recruit in touch with an English-speaking Islamic State contact in Iraq via Facebook, authorities said on Thursday, Dec. 17, 2015. Elfgeeh pleaded guilty in federal court to two counts of attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization under a plea agreement that recommends a sentence of just under 22 1/2 years in prison. (Carlos Ortiz/Democrat & Chronicle via AP) MAGS OUT; NO SALES; MANDATORY CREDIT

(Carlos Ortiz)

NEW YORK -- A Vietnamese man pleaded guilty to terrorism charges Friday, just weeks before a scheduled trial, agreeing not to challenge any prison sentence between 30 and 50 years.

Minh Quang Pham pleaded guilty in federal court to providing material support to a terror group, conspiracy and a weapons offense. Judge Allison Nathan set sentencing for April 14, when Pham faces a minimum of 30 years and a maximum of life.

Wearing a prison uniform, Pham spoke in English as he described the crimes to which he pleaded guilty, saying he provided material support in 2011 to al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula while he was in Yemen. He said he knew then that he was participating in terrorism directed at the United States.

He said he assisted in the preparation of the group's English propaganda publication, Inspire magazine. Reading from a statement he prepared with his defense attorneys, Pham said he also agreed in 2011 to receive military training from the organization, and he carried and used an automatic assault rifle.

Pham, who had faced a trial in Manhattan scheduled to start in early February, said he knew when he joined the conspiracy that al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula "was an organization engaged in terrorist activity and terrorism."

Prosecutors said Pham went from the United Kingdom to Yemen in 2010 to pledge allegiance to the group.

Pham was arrested at Heathrow International Airport when he returned in July 2011 from his six-month Yemen trip.

"Minh Quang Pham sought and received military-style training from an al-Qaida affiliate with the intent to martyr himself and inflict harm on behalf of the group," FBI Assistant Director Paul M. Abbate said in a release.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Buckley told the judge Friday that the government would have proven at trial that Anwar Al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born al-Qaida leader who was killed in a drone strike in Yemen in September 2011, had directed Pham to detonate explosives made with household chemicals in the arrivals area of London's Heathrow Airport where U.S. citizens and Israelis arrive. Such an attack never occurred.

When the judge asked Pham if that and other allegations described by Buckley were true, Pham was stopped by his lawyer, Bobbi Sternheim, who said Pham was only admitting to the charges outlined in the plea deal he struck with prosecutors.

The U.S. State Department designated al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula as a terrorist organization in January 2010 after it claimed responsibility for attempted terrorist attacks against the U.S., authorities said.

They said the group claimed responsibility in 2009 for an attempted Christmas Day bombing of a Detroit-bound passenger plane from Europe and later claimed responsibility for an October 2010 plot to send bomb-laden packages on U.S.-bound cargo planes.

Prosecutors say al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula has called on followers to attack civilians and has taken credit for coordinating attacks overseas, including the January 2015 Paris attack on the French publication Charlie Hebdo, which killed a dozen people.
Erica Garner blasts the Rev. Al Sharpton and National Action Network

Erica Garner, left, daughter of chokehold death victim Eric Garner, and his mother Gwen Carr, talk to the press after attending a court hearing, in the Staten Island borough of New York, Thursday, Feb. 5, 2015. Civil liberties lawyers urged a state judge on Thursday to reveal secret grand jury testimony concerning the police chokehold death of Eric Garner, an unarmed man, saying the public needs to reconcile a video of the arrest with the decision not to indict the officer involved. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- After an NYPD sergeant was placed on modified duty Friday and hit with disciplinary charges in connection with the Eric Garner incident, his daughter, Erica Garner, said that after a year and half, this is the only answer the family has received.

"Not one of the eight killer cops that was on my dad's back was charged with anything," she said in a two-minute video posted on her website officialericagarner.com. "This underscores the fundamental problem in this country. This is why we can't reform our way out of it. This is why we can't train our way out of it."

Probationary Sgt. Kizzy Adonis of the 120th Precinct was placed on modified assignment and served with disciplinary charges in the NYPD's internal review of Eric Garner's death in police custody July 17, 2014 in Tompkinsville, police said in a statement Friday.

NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo, the man seen in the video bringing down Garner, was stripped of his gun and badge and placed on desk duty following the incident.

A grand jury declined to indict Pantaleo in connection with Garner's death.

"For the life of me, I still can't wrap my head around how the police department can get this woman on charges, but can't indict Daniel Panataleo for anything," Garner says in the video.

Police Commissioner William Bratton has previously told the media that the NYPD administrative case against Pantaleo won't be pursued until after the Justice Department rules.

The federal government is still investigating the incident to determine if any of the officers involved violated Garner's civil rights.

Time was running out for the NYPD to take action against Adonis due to an 18-month statute of limitations under the labor contract between the sergeants' union and the city, according to NY1.

On Monday, Garner is planning a rally on Staten Island in support of Ramsey Orta, the man who filmed the Garner video. The rally is 10 a.m. at 26 Central Ave.

"The only man charged in my dad's death," she said in the video.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- An New Brighton man, accused of shooting another man last year in a drug-related beef inside a bodega in his community, was sentenced Friday to 30 months in prison.

The episode, involving Rayshawn Lawrence, unfolded on Jan. 29, 2014, outside the store at 402 Jersey St., said prosecutors.

Lawrence, 33, and the victim began fighting outside the store, according to court papers and a law enforcement source with knowledge of the case.

The battle spilled inside the bodega, where Lawrence allegedly shot the man, the source said.

The defendant then went into hiding.

In his bid to lay low, Lawrence abandoned his pit bull "Daisy," the source said.

Lawrence was ultimately arrested on April 10, 2014, said the source. Officers executing a search warrant recovered a .45-calilber handgun from the defendant's home, the source said.

Authorities found Daisy two days later, emaciated and injured, at another location, the source said. A microchip implanted in the dog's skin connected Lawrence as the owner, said the source.

Three weeks ago, Lawrence pleaded in state Supreme Court, St. George, to second-degree assault and criminal possession of a firearm to satisfy all charges against him, including those related to animal cruelty, officials said.

Besides prison time, Lawrence was sentenced to two years' post-release supervision.

Eric Nelson represented Lawrence.
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Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. Trace begun at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Exceptions.pm line 125 HTML::Mason::Exceptions::rethrow_exception('Can\'t call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25.^J') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 157 HTML::Mason::Component::run_dynamic_sub('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x5612efe2e850)', 'main') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 948 HTML::Mason::Request::call_dynamic('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612efe81730)', 'main') called at /var/cache/mason/obj/2011159162/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj line 17 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 135 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x5612efe2e850)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1302 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1292 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 955 HTML::Mason::Request::call_next('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612efe81730)') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html line 149 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 135 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x5612efe2f1f8)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1300 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1292 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 481 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 481 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 433 HTML::Mason::Request::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612efe81730)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 165 HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612efe81730)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 831 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handle_request('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612ebbd2778)', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x5612eff8f6a0)') called at (eval 592) line 8 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handler('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x5612eff8f6a0)') called at -e line 0 eval {...} at -e line 0
System error

error: Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25.

context: ... 21: </%method> 22: 23: % foreach my $c (@categories) { 24: <%perl> 25: my $category_id = $c->get_id(); 26: my @stories = Bric::Biz::Asset::Business::Story->list ( { element_type_id=>1148, category_id=>$category_id , Order=> 'cover_date', publish_status => 't' , OrderDirection=> 'DESC' , Limit=>10 } ); 27: </%perl> 28: <table width="90%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"> 29: <tr> ... code stack: /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html:25

/usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm:948

/var/cache/mason/obj/2011159162/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj:17

/usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html:149



Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. Trace begun at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Exceptions.pm line 125 HTML::Mason::Exceptions::rethrow_exception('Can\'t call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25.^J') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 157 HTML::Mason::Component::run_dynamic_sub('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x5612efe4f6e0)', 'main') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 948 HTML::Mason::Request::call_dynamic('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612f05de880)', 'main') called at /var/cache/mason/obj/2011159162/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj line 17 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 135 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x5612efe4f6e0)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1302 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1292 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 955 HTML::Mason::Request::call_next('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612f05de880)') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html line 149 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 135 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x5612efe95310)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1300 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1292 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 481 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 481 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 433 HTML::Mason::Request::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612f05de880)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 165 HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612f05de880)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 831 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handle_request('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x5612ebbd2730)', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x5612f05f2888)') called at (eval 592) line 8 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handler('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x5612f05f2888)') called at -e line 0 eval {...} at -e line 0
Heathrow to Hong Kong. Hong Kong to Sydney. You can do it in 19 hours with Cathay with a glass of wine to hand, a meal on its way and the choice of scores of movies.

Not for Tracey Curtis-Taylor who arrived from Britain in her veteran biplane, The Spirit of Artemis, at Mascot on Saturday just after midday.

She did it the hard way. Or perhaps it's the romantic way. An open cockpit with Biggles-style leather helmet and goggles with one eye on the horizon and the other on the fuel gauge.

Her flight spanning 23 countries and 21,000 kilometres over three months was modelled after British aviator Amy Johnson, the first woman to fly solo from Britain to Australia in 1930 in what is considered one of the greatest flight achievements in history.
A Jamboree Scout leader has been granted conditional bail after he was charged with aggravated indecent assault at Cataract National Park, south-west of Sydney.

Mark Gaynor appeared at Parramatta Local Court via audio visual link on Saturday.

A Western Australian Jamboree Scout leader has been charged with aggravated indecent assault.

A Scouts Australia spokeswoman confirmed Mr Gaynor was a registered leader and his membership and registration in scouts was immediately terminated after the arrest.

The Western Australian man on January 4 allegedly aggressively groped the victim's buttocks with both hands, court documents stated.
Washington: Five Hong Kong booksellers critical of China's leaders have disappeared, sparking concerns they have been abducted by mainland agents.

Lee Bo, 65, a shareholder of Causeway Bay Books and a British passport holder, went missing from Hong Kong last week, though his wife has said he voluntarily travelled to China and has withdrawn a missing person report.

A protester holds a photo of missing bookseller Lee Bo during a protest in Hong Kong. Credit:AP

Four other associates of the publisher that specialises in selling gossipy political books on China's Communist Party leaders have been unaccounted for since late last year.

The disappearances, and China's silence, have stoked concerns that they were abducted by mainland agents in shadowy tactics that erode the "one-country, two-systems" formula under which Hong Kong has been governed since its 1997 return to China.
A wombat in a bathroom, a blue-tongue lizard beneath the floorboards and a possum stuck in the zip of a camper trailer.

Wildcare wildlife rescue organisation attracts almost 2000 calls a year but some are more unusual than others.

Of the 2000 calls Wildcare receives in a year, a small number are to extract native animals from unusual places. This possum was found under the bonnet of a car but hid in the air filter when rescuers tried to extract him.

Wildcare species co-ordinator Helen Stevens said in 2015 volunteers were called out to a variety of wildlife related incidents. Most commonly, she said, were dog and cat attacks on native animals, motor vehicle collisions and wildlife caught in netting and fencing.

"There are also those calls that are a little bit more unusual," Ms Stevens said.
The disturbing footage released this week of an alleged one-punch attack on a man in Civic on New Year's Eve is a reminder that Canberra is not immune to such horrifying crime.

All violence is inexcusable but there is something particularly insidious about the delivery of a surprise attack against an unsuspecting victim.

In this case the victim, who has spoken of his surprise at being alive after the alleged punch, has fortunately escaped the fate of Brisbane teen Cole Miller, who died this week.

The young water polo player suffered massive brain injuries after an alleged one-punch attack in Brisbane last Sunday morning.
Their conduct is a timely jolt to those of us who might have hoped that sexism and misogyny in politics were relics of the recent past and that the end of the Abbott era has signalled the arrival of a more inclusive and female-friendly time. Not so. Neither the numbers nor the default language of so many in the government supports any conclusion other than that the exclusion of women remains core business for the coalition. Malcolm Turnbull might have increased the numbers of women in his cabinet to five (from Abbott's insulting two) but women still make up only 19.4 per cent of his ministry. Women were 31 per cent of Kevin Rudd's final ministry while they comprised 33 per cent of Gillard's. All are a far cry from Canada where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, on assuming office last November, announced that his cabinet would be 50 per cent women.

Turnbull responded to this news by saying: "In an ideal world you would have 50-50 but we don't have 50-50 men and women in the Parliament." Neither does Justin Trudeau. Women make up just 27 per cent of his party room yet he opted for over-representation  "because it's 2015". Women make up only 20.6 per cent of the Coalition party room (compared with 45 per cent for both Labor and the Greens) so Turnbull's degree of difficulty in achieving equality is arguably greater but there is no sign that he is actively working within the Liberal Party to ensure that number increases at the next election. An opportunity exists in Victoria where there are two Senate vacancies to give a leg-up to women. Victorian MP and former minister in the Howard government, Dr Sharman Stone is campaigning for an all-female ticket (the number two spot which automatically goes to the Nationals is already held by Bridget McKenzie). "We have to have a long-term affirmative action strategy until we reach our agreed upon proportion of women," she told me this week.

She would like to see the goal as 50 per cent  which is now Labor's policy  but would settle for 45 per cent. With women's representation in the Liberal Party in Canberra currently at 21.8 per cent, neither goal is remotely achievable without concerted intervention by the leadership. Since the Coalition returned to power in 2013, the proportion of women sitting on government boards has declined from 41.7 per cent to 39.1. The numbers chairing boards has declined, as has the number of women heading up federal government departments. This is the context, then, in which we should be appraising the language used by Peter Dutton to comment on his colleague's misconduct in Hong Kong. It is now than five years since Tony Abbott stood at a rally in Canberra in front of signs that described Prime Minister Julia Gillard as "Bob Brown's bitch" and enjoined Australia to "Ditch the witch". If we thought those days were mercifully behind us, Peter Dutton's words were an ugly wake-up call to the fact that they are not gone and, as far as some people are concerned, nor should they be.

The language used to castigate women is telling. They are either "bitches" or "witches" or, possibly, both since the terms are not interchangeable. A bitch, the dictionary tells us, is of course a female dog but it also means a woman who is "belligerent, unreasonable, malicious, a control freak, rudely intrusive or aggressive". These are all terms that are often applied to ambitious women in politics or employment. Uppity women, in other words, pushing their way into worlds that once were closed to them. (Tellingly, if a man is referred to as a bitch it means he is a subordinate, such as a sexual slave in prison.) Witches, on the other hand, are seen as using their terrifying female powers to alter the natural order of things.

Witchcraft served an eminently useful purpose in 17th century New England, Stacy Schiff concludes. "The aggravating, the confounding, the humiliating all dissolved in its cauldron. It made sense of the unfortunate and the eerie, the sick child and the rancid butter along with the killer cat. What else, shrugged one husband, could have caused the black and blue marks on his wife's arm?" Messrs Briggs, Dutton, Joyce and their ilk have been accused this week of "not getting it". I disagree. They get it all right. They just don't like it and will do all they can to stop those bitches and witches from ruining their smug comfortable little world. @SummersAnne
"The show is a real discovery, a gem," Bertels says. "It's really very moving because it tells a story that's little known, even in Japan. I asked people sitting around me if they knew about these stories, and they didn't."

Lieven Bertels, artistic director of the Sydney Festival, saw +51 Aviacion, San Borja in Yokohama and immediately snapped it up for the Festival's edgy About an Hour program.

Lit by fluorescent tubes, the actors of +51 Aviacion, San Borja (Peru's international calling code and the name of an upscale suburb in the capital, Lima) perform on rainbow-coloured yoga mats. The set is littered with suitcases. It's a story of travel, cultural displacement and assimilation.

Three young actors in a tiny room beneath an ageing Yokohama shopping mall face the audience. One wears a mask. Another holds a green parrot. Together they are telling the story of a little-known phenomenon in Japan's 20th century history, the migration of thousands of people from the island of Okinawa to far-off Peru, in search of farmland, a tropical paradise and, perhaps, gold.

In making the show, director and writer Yudai Kamisato followed in the footsteps of his great-grandfather, who emigrated from Okinawa to Peru in the 1920s. The Japanese government of the time encouraged poor workers to look for work overseas, Kamisato explains.

"Men like my grandfather were convinced they were coming back to Japan, but a lot didn't for all sorts of reasons," he says. "They were promised many things before they got on board, but once they arrived in the new land, what was waiting for them was almost like slave labour. They never got what they were promised."

Kamisato also researched the life of Seki Sano, an actor in Tokyo in the 1930s who was exiled to Mexico and later became known as the "father of Mexican Theatre".

"I linked these two men's lives, also the political background of the time, and contemporary theatre activities, to show how people's minds and ideas change as they journey from one place to another," Kamisato says. "The show is something between fiction and non-fiction."

Kamisato, 33, is one of the most talked-about contemporary theatre makers in Japan. Born in Peru and raised in the industrial city of Kawasaki, he lived in Paraguay and the United States before returning to study literature at Tokyo's Waseda University. In 2003, he established his own small company, Okazaki Art Theatre. Its stated mission is "to examine people's attitudes to politics and society, and portray the coexistence of people who cannot understand one another".
Controversy has erupted over the Baird government's decision to allow a trial of the popular US-style hunting activity known as bow fishing in an effort to curb the population of the noxious carp fish.

Academics, environmental groups and politicians have voiced their opposition to the trial, sending submissions to the government warning that native and threatened species including the platypus could end up as "collateral damage".

The Department of Primary Industries announced last November it would allow the trial in inland waters to target the overpopulation of carp which are a well-known pest because of their destructive bottom-feeding habits.

A government fact sheet described the trial as an activity targeting carp using archery from river banks or a boat. It said that it was legal in South Australia and carp bow fishing tournaments were regularly staged in North America, attracting hundreds of competitors.
Findlay, 34, was born with a rare and painful skin condition, ichthyosis, which causes red scaly skin and has no cure. She gets infections easily and sometimes has to be hospitalised, with her whole body bandaged. As she knows all too well, in a society uncomfortable with difference and obsessed with perfection, people with disabilities  particularly visible ones  are invariably viewed either as sentimental symbols of heroism or tragic figures in need of rescuing. In the worst cases they are met with revulsion. Two years ago Findlay's picture went viral when it was uploaded without her consent to the social networking site Reddit under the headline "What The F---?" Among the countless comments were those saying she looked like a "lobster", a "glazed donut" and "something that was partially digested by my dog". One user suggested she should be killed with fire. Others offered cures and prayers, saying she couldn't possibly be happy. Reddit did little to address her complaints.

In the past two months, Findlay, who is in touch with people around the world with ichthyosis, complained to Facebook when the images of two children she knows with the condition were stolen and posted with requests for prayers for likes. She and the families who reported it were told the posts did not violate community standards. Carly Findlay does not want your pity or prayers on Facebook. Credit:Justin McManus It is a fate that many people with visible disabilities dread. El Gibbs, a Sydney-based blogger and disability activist who has severe psoriasis, rarely posts pictures of herself online. "People have a strong reaction to how I look. It's on my face and all over my body. I also walk with a stick. Carly's experience is something that I fear," she said.

"It's frustrating that the range of acceptable bodies is so small and that how I look is seen as unusual or weird or disgusting in some people's eyes rather than just a normal variation of the human body." The bigger picture, say those in the disability sector, is the low benchmark society sets for their community. Stella Young, the Melbourne activist who died in December 2014, railed against "inspiration porn"  an online phenomenon in which people with disabilities are objectified and applauded for the most basic achievements as a means to inspire the masses to greatness. The famous meme of Paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius running alongside a young girl with Down syndrome with the caption "The only disability is a bad attitude" prompted Young to point out in a TED talk that went viral that "No amount of smiling at a flight of stairs has ever made it turn into a ramp". Stella Young. 'No amount of smiling at a flight of stairs has ever made it turn into a ramp.' Credit:ABC

Craig Wallace, president of People with Disability Australia, said for many people the real challenge was not their condition but the external environment. "If we want to portray things on social media we should be showcasing the restaurant toilets that are inaccessible, or the spaces that aren't made well, we should be talking about the lack of support and employment opportunities," he said. "These kind of posts that ask people to share pictures of people with disabilities without their permission and also prayers for likes don't do anything to improve the lives of people with disabilities they only improve for a brief moment the self esteem of the people who are viewing them on social media." Disability and queer rights activist Jax Jacki Brown, said society needs to shift its medical view of disability as a tragedy that needs to be corrected. She urged allies to take action rather than view the disabled as objects of pity.

"It would be good if more non-disabled people would actually do access audits of their local restaurants, buildings, places of employment and actually start engaging with the people in those spaces to demand better access," Brown said. Disability activist Jax Jacki Brown urges people not to buy into online "inspiration porn" but to take real action. "Go out into the world, take a look around and see the barriers that people with disability face, both in terms of physical access to space but also in terms of examining your prejudices or your views of what disability means so that you become truly accepting and understanding." Advocates argue that part of the cultural shift around our view of people with disabilities must be an end to deifying them for leading ordinary lives. When Michelle Payne last year became the first female jockey to win the Melbourne Cup her brother Stevie also shot to fame, being lauded as a "joyous beacon for the life those afflicted with Down syndrome can lead."
The 13-year international manhunt for the world's most wanted criminal came to an anticlimactic end on Saturday when Mexican marines, with the help of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, arrested Joaquin Guzman Loera in Mazatlan in his home state of Sinaloa. No shots were fired.

No one stands to benefit from the arrest of "El Chapo," the leader of the Sinaloa cartel, more than Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto. With the capture he has succeeded where his two predecessors failed  despite his pledge to steer resources away from the militarized battle against crime syndicates and lessen security cooperation with the United States. As Mexican media point out, Guzman is Pena Nieto's Osama bin Laden.

But the effect of Guzman's arrest on organized crime in Mexico remains uncertain. His detention, analysts say, does nothing to combat corruption, the deeply ingrained vestige of Mexico's authoritarian past. That corruption  fueled by multibillion-dollar drug profits  continues to influence local police, judges and politicians. And it remains a pillar of drug traffickers' ability to operate.

"Guzman's detention has huge political significance for (Pena Nieto). It prolongs his honeymoon with Europe and the United States," said Edgardo Buscaglia, a crime expert at Columbia University and president of the Citizen Action Institute in Mexico. "But his arrest will have little effect in the absence of judicial controls, within a judicial system that produces one sentence for every 100 crimes."

"Mexican governments have not dismantled the production and distribution systems of legal businesses that form part of the Sinaloa network," Buscaglia said. "These still exist despite El Chapo's arrest."

It's a sentiment echoed by the opposition Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) upon Guzman's arrest on Saturday: Before Mexico can right itself, the political elite must reach consensus and agree to tackle organized crime.

Guzman's arrest will be "an oblivious victory, a media coup," if Mexico continues to take isolated action in absence of an integrated strategy, the party said in a statement. "The PRD demands the arrest of other criminal leaders, the dismantling of the criminal syndicates' financial networks and a battle against impunity."

"El Chapo" bought that impunity during a storied career that is legend in Mexico. Under the stewardship of Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo  Mexico's biggest cocaine dealer during the 1980s  Guzman came to dominate the global cocaine market. In the process, he amassed well over $1 billion and made the list of Forbes world billionaires for four consecutive years.

Under his leadership, the Sinaloa cartel bolstered its drug trafficking dominance by branching out into the heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana markets. The cartel's criminal portfolio also includes kidnapping and human trafficking. Today Sinaloa operates in 17 Mexican states and in as many as 50 countries, including the U.S., where it is blamed for 80 percent of the drug trade in certain cities.

Some Mexican crime analysts say the cartel was able to amass so much power in the last decade partly because of its powerful contacts in the National Action Party (PAN), which led the two administrations before Pena Nieto and his Institutional Revolutionary Party regained power in December 2012.

Under Pena Nieto's immediate predecessor, Felipe Calderon, the Mexican government launched a high-profile militarized attack against Sinaloa's major enemies, including the Zetas and the Gulf cartel. That drive is blamed for fueling a wave of cartel violence that left more than 70,000 dead in the last seven years. Throughout, Guzman and his major lieutenants remained unscathed.

But federal authorities began to close in on Guzman after nabbing associates of Ismael Zambada, one of Guzman's principal partners and his potential successor. In early February federal police swept through Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa state, and arrested several top Zambada officials. But a U.S. law enforcement official told The Associated Press that some of Zambada's associates were Guzman's security personnel and that they provided information that led to Guzman's arrest.

That the DEA and U.S. marshals were heavily involved in Guzman's arrest seems to contradict Pena Nieto. Shortly after taking office, the Mexican president vowed to reduce cooperation with U.S. authorities in the search for drug kingpins, unlike Calderon.

Hours after the arrest, Jeh Johnson, head of the Department of Homeland Security, said Guzman's capture "is a significant victory and milestone in our common interest of combating drug trafficking, violence and illicit activity along our shared border."

Now the question remains whether Mexico will extradite Guzman to the U.S., where he faces drug trafficking and organized crime charges in eight districts. On Sunday the U.S. Attorney's office said federal prosecutors in New York plan to ask Mexico for his extradition.

"The only way the arrest of this man (Guzman) results in the dismantling of the Sinaloa cartel, at least partially, including his arms, human and drug trafficking operations," Buscaglia said, "is if he is extradited to the United States and if investigations are generated from there."
A coral reef bursts into sexual reproduction on just a couple of nights of the year depending on moonlight, water temperature and a few other important variables.

Transport that same coral from the Great Barrier Reef halfway around the world and immerse it in London tap water and you might reasonably assume it would no longer be in the mood to produce the spores necessary to generate baby coral.

But a London museum says it has done just that by accurately replicating the amount of light shining into tanks to emulate the conditions on the Queensland reef.

Fertilisation using IVF mixing eggs and sperm then took place to reproduce Acropora tenuis, usually coloured blue, and Acropora millepora which is pink-coloured. The researchers used techniques which scientists hope may encourage the coral to reproduce a bit more frequently than once a year. The research is part of the move to save reefs increasingly at risk from pollution and climate change.
A man accused of deliberately lighting fires in bushland in Sydney's south was arrested after his would-be getaway vehicle got stuck on a rock.

Firefighters with the Rural Fire Service heard shouting as they battled a number of fires on Heathcote Road at Sandy Point about 8.40pm on Saturday.

An accused arsonist was arrested after his car became stuck on a rock.

They alerted police and, with the help of the police helicopter, officers located their suspect trying to manoeuvre a Suzuki Vitara which had become wedged on a rock.

There were chemical containers outside the SUV and a petrol container inside, police allege.
In early 1993, Pickering "retired" from his Melbourne parish and fled to England in the face of mounting allegations of sexual abuse.

Suspected paedophile priest Ronald Pickering received $200,000 from the Archdiocese of Melbourne after he evaded authorities and went on the run.

Father Ronald Pickering, who is known to have abused at least 16 children, successfully evaded justice in Australia and died in Britain in 2009.

The archdiocese of Melbourne funnelled nearly $200,000 to a suspected paedophile after he fled overseas, funding his "retirement" for nearly a decade while he was hiding from authorities.

Despite being personally aware of complaints as early as 1986, then Melbourne Archbishop Frank Little ordered Pickering's retirement entitlements be boosted in the wake of his impromptu departure.

"At this time the Archbishop does not intend appointing Father Pickering as Pastor Emeritus. However, he would appreciate your regarding Father Pickering, in this exceptional case, as qualifying for receipt of those monies which would normally be granted to PEs," the Priests Retirement Foundation was instructed.

The prestigious honour entitled a retired priest to additional remuneration and allowances because of its prestige.

Documents tendered to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse show that a Pastor Emeritus received a pension and housing stipend worth $21,000 a year (circa 1998).

But church leadership in Melbourne, including then Bishop George Pell, soon faced a new problem when they were notified by a bishop in Britain that Pickering was seeking work as a priest in a local parish.
A man jailed for 15 years for setting his pregnant partner on fire has had his sentence slashed by a third by Victoria's highest court.

Yavaz Kilic, 22, doused his partner in petrol and set her ablaze when she tried to leave him. The victim received burns to 20 per cent of her body and the pregnancy was terminated after the attack.

"You want to make my heart burn, now you can burn, bitch," he said at the time.

Kilic, who was on bail and a community corrections order at the time of the attack, received the second-longest sentence ever imposed in Victoria for the crime of "intentionally causing serious injury".
Police in the state's east are hunting for a hit-and-run driver who escaped the scene of a crash by reversing along the wrong side of the road.

Moe officers are seeking information following the collision in Newborough around 8.55am Saturday morning.

The car police believe was involved in a hit-and-run.

Investigators have been told that a yellow Holden sedan crashed into the rear of a white Holden Commodore as the driver was waiting to turn right into Narracan Drive from John Field Drive.
A United Airlines flight bound for Denver was diverted to Vancouver early Saturday morning after a threatening message was received.

United Flight 1104 from Anchorage, Alaska, landed safely in Canada's third-biggest city at 4:16am local time, the Vancouver Airport Authority said in a statement posted on its website.

A United Airlines flight to Denver was diverted after a threat and a suspect is in custody. Credit:Andrew De La Rue

"The crew elected to divert the flight after they discovered a threatening message from one of the passengers," United spokesman Charlie Hobart told CNN.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police took a suspect into custody, according to a Twitter message from the RCMP in Richmond, British Columbia. A spokesman for the RCMP, Corporal Dennis Hwang, didn't immediately return a voicemail message seeking comment on Saturday.
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Walk, if was pill like that I could tolerate I would take it. I applauds you.



Sleepies, I also has damage brain and broken spirit, and while I has some creature comforts, I not has ever feel safe inside. I actual envy you that you not alone, even though I know you feel you partner not sensitive lot of time. It get harder and harder for me to be alone with self.



Anyways, this downfall, I think, was cuz people, including therapist, suggest for me not to give up caffeine. Just have little bit. I understand, cuz I was reporting suicidal ideations and depressions. But I has also say repeatedly that any stimulant will lead to alcohol.



Reality is, is multi-head serpent: Depression-stimulant-alcohol. So chopping off alcohol and then caffeine sent depression fangs into wild frenzy. To depths I never experience before.



Was untenable. So once I get "permission" from others to have the caffeine, and even though I know was total mistake which I already try thousand time, I do it.



Got to find way out of this Daisy Chain of Satan. Got to find way to endure the unendurable. And I think I got to do it on my own. ... ...I mean, you know, while whole time bitch and moaning to my belove crazy peanut gallery here on SR.
Suburban schools grow slightly, or lose less than state average

Numbers from the state Department of Public Instruction show that in suburban Milwaukee, about 27 school districts grew last year, or lost fewer students than average.
This artist's illustration depicts how the foamy structure of space-time may appear, showing tiny bubbles quadrillions of times smaller than the nucleus of an atom that are constantly fluctuating and last for only infinitesimal fractions of a second. For more, see this <a href="chandra.si.edu/press/15_releases/press_052815.html" target="_blank">NASA press release</a>.

Alan Brown, writer and blogger for The Kavli Foundation, contributed this article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

What kind of universe do we live in? Dutch physicist Ronald Hanson has provided perhaps the best answer to date  and Albert Einstein wouldn't like it.

The question revolves around a phenomenon called quantum entanglement, which predicts that changing one particle instantaneously changes the other  even if they are on opposite sides of the galaxy, 100,000 light-years apart.

Einstein called this idea "spooky action at a distance." And he dismissed it, arguing that nothing could move faster than light, so entanglement couldn't be real. Instead, he proposed that unknown "local factors" must determine the strange properties of these so-called entangled particles.

So how has Hanson proven him wrong? He separated a pair of entangled particles far enough apart that local forces could not act on both at the same time, measured their properties, and found that the particle properties correlated.

It is the strongest proof of quantum theory to date, and raises all sorts of questions about the nature of the universe. The Kavli Foundation put some of those questions to Ronald Hanson and Renato Renner, a theoretical physicist who studies quantum cryptography, in a Google+ Hangout. (Watch the original video.) The following is an edited transcript of their conversation.

About the participants:

Ronald Hanson is the a professor in the department of Quantum Nanoscience at Delft University of Science and Technology and a member of the school's Kavli Institute of Nanoscience. He has conducted the strongest test of quantum entanglement yet.

Renato Renner heads the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Zurich's Institute for Theoretical Physics and the Quantum Information Theory (QIT) Group. He is a leader in applying quantum physics to data security.

The Kavli Foundation: Let me start with an obvious question. What do we mean when we say a particle is entangled? When I weave my fingers together, are they entangled? Is this what we're talking about?

Ronald Hanson: Entanglement and the theory of quantum physics is really different than that. If particles get entangled, they lose their identity. So before they are entangled, you can assign them certain properties. They can have definite values. But once they are entangled, they now have only an identity together as a whole. The weird thing is that this entanglement bond stays there even if you pull the particles apart. So even when you place those particles on opposite sides of the galaxy, they will behave as if they are actually one particle.

TKF: Renato, is that pretty much what you see?

Renato Renner: That's a very nice explanation, and it includes certain things that we learned after Einstein made his remarks about faster-than-light communication. He argued that nothing moved faster than light, and so separate particles couldn't possibly communicate with each another.

One thing we've learned is that entangled particles lose their identity. Indeed, they even lose their properties. You can no longer say that an entangled particle has a certain, specific property. For example, before it was entangled, a particle might have been spinning up or down. Once entangled, it loses this property. [Einstein's Unfinished Dream: Marrying Relativity to the Quantum World ]

That's something you don't find in the classical world. It's a special property of the quantum world, and something that we have to learn to accept in some way.

TKF: How does entanglement actually happen? Is there a physical mechanism linking these particles together? I mean what would it look like? Do we have any idea?

R.H.: Entanglement doesn't happen automatically. It requires interaction between particles. So two particles must either be close together, or they have to interact with some third or fourth particle, a technique we used in our experiments. But we have to establish some link by the usual physical laws that we know.

The peculiar thing is that once this entanglement has been established, it will stay there. So then  without any interaction, without any rope connecting the two particles, without anything  you can move them apart and the entanglement will persist. It's really the state of the particle. It has nothing to do with physical laws or dynamics.

TKF: And yet they're connected.

R.H.: Yes, when we do experiments, they seem connected. But maybe we should qualify that. They are connected in the sense that if we take a measurement of one, it correlates with a measurement on the other, even though the measurements can be done so fast that there's no time for communication between the particles.

TKF: This suggests we could communicate at faster-than-light speeds, right? The galaxy is 100 thousand light years wide but this happens instantaneously. So, is something moving faster than light?

R.R.: No. Nothing is moving faster than light. Of course, the first explanation we would come up with is that it takes something moving faster than light to explain that behavior. But then when you think more deeply, you realize that there may be other explanations.

For example, we just said that entangled particles lose their individual properties. But let's momentarily assume they still have their properties. Then the only explanation would indeed be that something is moving faster than light.

But let's think of it in a different way, and say they simply don't have these properties. These properties only come into existence when we observe them. Then there is no reason to think of a physical mechanism that communicates information about one particle's property to the other particle, because neither particle has that property to communicate. The property appears only at the time we observe it.

TKF: So if this is not a matter of communication, does it suggest something about the structure of the universe? In other words, what makes this behavior possible? Do we have any clue? Do we even know where to look?

R.H.: This is a very good and deep question, I think. It boils down to what Einstein was trying to do, find a theory underneath quantum mechanics that is more intuitive in our world.

I think it's fair to say that people are still debating about the implications of Bell's inequality, the equations that define whether the behavior of entangled particles reflects quantum or classical physics. That is what we were testing in our experiment. But there are different ways of arriving at Bell's inequality, and different premises that go into it. You can come at it from different angles.

Einstein's angle was that there are "local" factors that act on both entangled particles, and that these particles have "real" properties even before we observe them. If we see a blue marble, for example, we believe intuitively that the marble was already blue before we looked at it.

If you start with Einstein's concepts of locality (local forces) and realism (real properties) you end up at Bell's inequality. And Bell's inequality was violated in our experiment. So we have to drop either locality or realism to make it work.

TKF: If I understand you properly, researchers use Bell's inequality to test whether Einstein was right or wrong about local factors and realism. Bell's inequality says what? Is there a simple way to explain it?

R.R.: Building on what Ronald said, I would explain it in the following way: You make certain assumptions. One assumption is that particles have real properties. Another assumption is that nothing travels faster than light. These are your two starting assumptions.

Now if you combine them and do the mathematics, you arrive at Bell's inequality, which tells you that certain things that you can measure are smaller than a certain number.

What Ronald did is that he measured these things, and he found out that they are not smaller than this particular number. They are actually larger. So we conclude that one of the two assumptions has to be wrong.

Both of these assumptions are things that we would naturally think are clearly true. Ronald's experiment proves one of them has to be wrong. We still have a choice as to which one we think is wrong, but one of them has to be wrong.

TKF: While we've been talking, several listeners have sent in questions. One wants to know whether higher dimensions could account for the linkage that connects entangled objects. Is this a possibility? Is this something we even know?

R.R.: People often ask about higher dimensions when they try to find a mechanism to explain entanglement. However, as I said before and what Ronald's experiment essentially shows, is that we have to give up one of our assumptions about local forces or realism. If we give up the assumption of realism  that things have properties  then higher dimensions is a valid explanation.

We could also explain Ronald's experiment if we give up the assumption that there is nothing faster than light. If we do that, however, and this is an important point I try to stress all the time, then we are in trouble with our assumption that we have free choice.

For example, in Ronald's experiment, he has to choose what he measures. He has to choose between different measurements. Now, if you give up the assumption that nothing is faster than light and you assume there is some higher dimension in which things can propagate much faster, then we can no longer hold onto our belief that we have free choices. But that's something we probably don't want to give up.

TKF: This goes to the heart of what Einstein meant when he said, "God doesn't play dice," right? He thought particles had properties, even if we didn't know how to figure out what they were. You're saying this experiment shows that they do not have a property until we measure them, and then they both have the same property at the same time. Am I getting that right?

R.H.: Yes. There's still two options open: Either God plays dice, in which case reality as we've just defined it does not exist, or signals do go faster than the speed of light and can actually talk to each other by some unknown force. So these are two possible explanations of the experiment. Or as Renato said, we don't have free will. Everything we are doing now, the people that are watching this, they're just running like a clock in a fully deterministic way without any free will.

TKF: So God playing dice is essentially what gives us free will. There's a certain amount of not knowing what's going to happen next.

R.R.: Yes. One needs to carry out an experiment in such a way that what you are going to measure is not predictable. That way, the outcomes of the experiment are also not predictable. One way to achieve that randomness is through the free choice of what we do. This is an assumption, but then, we get things that are not predictable from the experiment. So we invest in some free choice and we get some randomness back. This is, as we may discuss later, something that is extremely important for cryptography and data security.

TKF: Well, I was just about to ask you about security. That's your interest and you've suggested we could use entanglement to protect privacy. How?

R.R.: As Ronald said, when particles are entangled they lose their properties. They only get properties once we measure them. So, for example, entangled particles can be polarized either up or down. Because these properties are not there before they're measured, no one can see them. So, in some way, you can encrypt or hide data because, for a certain time, that information simply doesn't exist.

To be a bit more specific, we start by entangling two remote particles, Alice and Bob. When we measure them, the results will be correlated. Two observers will both see, for example, either a zero or a one. But because this random bit did not exist until we measured Alice and Bob, no one could have possibly stolen or even predicted it.

They not only get a correlated random bit, they get a random bit which is fundamentally unpredictable by anyone. This is exactly what you need in cryptography: a way to make sure that you and I have certain random bits that we both know but no one else knows. Entanglement achieves exactly that.

TKF: Those random bits would be how I know who you are?

R.R.: Yes. We could use that common knowledge to authenticate each other or to hide messages so only the two of us could see them. We could use it as a cryptographic key to encrypt messages. For example, you might ask me an important question where the answer is either yes or no. So I tell you that when our random bit is "zero," I give you a plain answer, but when it is "one," I give you an answer that is the opposite of what I mean.

Now, if I answer, "no," someone who does not know the value of our random bit cannot know whether the answer was actually "no" because our random bit was a zero, or "yes" because our random bit was one and I flipped it.

If we share a common random bit that no one else knows, I could answer you in such a way that only you can decrypt it. No one else would ever be able to guess what this answer was. That's essentially the idea of it.

TKF: But you would need more than one bit to do this, right?

R.R.: Yes. That's what makes quantum cryptography so strong. Quantum cryptography, and in particular the type of experiments that Ronald carried out, gives us a way to constantly produce new random bits from entangled particles. We can use them to create keys to encrypt information.

In conventional cryptography, I get the password once. Maybe my bank sends it to me. It's like passing me an envelope. But whenever I use it, an adversary could try to guess what it is. The more messages I send, the more information my adversary learns about it. At some point, it's used up. But in quantum cryptography, we can constantly produce new secret keys without having to meet and exchange that secret envelope.

TKF: That sounds difficult to hack, but today's security codes are pretty good too, aren't they? I've heard they generate 340 undecillion  a number so big, I've never even heard anybody say it  340 undecillion possible keys. It would take 800 million times longer than the age of the universe for our computers to crack them. What kind of threats are you envisioning here?

R.R.: I've never heard this number either.

TKF: It's 10 to the 36nd power [1036]. Which is pretty high. So isn't quantum security overkill?

R.R.: There are at least two answers to this. First, quantum technology will produce something else which we did not talk about, namely quantum computers. We don't know when the day will arrive, but there is a possibility that 20 years from now, we will have a quantum computer. It's known that most known public-key cryptography systems, the type we use every day on the Internet, can be broken in very short time using a quantum computer. In fact, a quantum computer could decrypt a message as quickly as an honest user could do it. So once quantum computers exist, the public key systems we use to communicate with banks and stores will be completely insecure. They can be broken in no time.

The second way to answer this question is that it takes so much time to crack today's security codes because we are referring to classical computers. Classical computers essentially go through every possibility and check all possible keys. If there are too many, the computer needs a very long time to do it. But quantum computers use a completely different approach. There are very clever algorithms that are known today and which I will not describe that can break this type of key within seconds.

TKF: Ronald, I know some of your work involves quantum computing. Are you building the type of computer that Renato needs to protect us against?

R.H.: That is indeed one of the goals of my research. We have a fairly new institute here in Delft called QuTech. One of our primary goals is to build a large-scale quantum computer. You could indeed use it to break cryptographic codes.

I'd also like to add two things to what Renato said. We may not have a quantum computer tomorrow or even in 10 years. But you have to realize that whatever we communicate now can be stored and deciphered 10 or 20 years from now, when we do have a quantum computer. So when thinking about information security, you already have to take into account that quantum computing may arrive in the future.

What is so nice about quantum cryptography is that you don't have to know what happens inside your device. It's really a black box approach to cryptography. As long as the box at the sender and the receiver violate Bell's inequality, then you know for sure that the key you are generating is secure. That's really powerful. It doesn't rely on other people not having enough computational power or enough access to your system. It relies on the fundamental laws of nature.

TKF: I've got a terrific question from a listener. Ronald, your experiment separated quantum particles by about one mile. Is it possible that there are local forces that might extend one mile, or 100 or 1,000 miles, or even several light years? Is that a possibility?

R.H.: The question asks if there is some length scale involved in quantum entanglement, and once we go beyond a certain distance it breaks down. So I think this is a good time to mention that in the experiment, it's not so much the distance between the entangled particles that matters, but the distance combined with the time it takes us to measure the particles. We do our measurements so fast, there's not enough time, even at the speed of light, for the signal to go from one particle and influence the measurement of the other. So the mile is important because we are dealing with a time scale of a few millionths of a second. That's the time that it actually takes us to do the measuring.

The other answer is that we don't really know. If we believe quantum physics, there should be no length scale involved in entanglement. It should also work if the two particles are separated basically by the size of the universe. Of course, such experiments have never been done. So the real answer is that, experimentally, we don't know.

TKF: One of our listeners has asked whether we could use quantum entanglement for communication.

R.H.: Yes. Actually, quantum entanglement allows you to teleport information, what we call quantum information. You can teleport quantum states over distance. Teleportation here really means that the information disappears on one side and at the same time reappears on the other side.

This sounds like faster-than-light communication, but one caveat here: Besides teleporting the quantum signal, you also have to send a classical signal to decipher what you have teleported. It's actually a very useful concept for a future quantum version of the Internet that we're trying to build, but it does not allow faster-than-light communication.

TKF: So we would be unable to, say, get our pictures of Pluto back to Earth instantaneously.

R.H.: Right. With all that we know of nature and all the experiments that have been done so far, this seems to be impossible.

TKF: One of our listeners asks about relativity. Imagine we have one entangled particle here on Earth and another one in a craft that's moving at almost light speed, fast enough that time dilates. Will both particles change instantaneously?

R.H.: That's a good question for Renato to answer.

TKF: Give it to the theorist.

R.R.: Yes. Let's say I measure a particle in one lab. One would imagine that the change happens immediately to the sister particle in the second lab as well.

However, the only thing that we actually know is that when you take a measurement in one lab, you will see a correlated outcome in the other lab.

So you shouldn't think of it as a change that happens and spreads. It's more that if you take a measurement at the same time, which is now relative to the reference frame of the observer doing the measuring, then you see this correlation. From the particle's point of view, the speed of the particle or time dilatation is not relevant. What is relevant is that you're sitting in a lab, someone is sitting in another lab, and we take a measurement at the same time in our reference frame.

That said, there was recently an experiment carried out by Nicolas Gisin's group at University of Geneva that tried to look at this problem. He moved one observer relative to the other in a very clever way, so that each observer, from his point of view, appeared to take the measurement first. The experiment showed that despite the fact that they both seem to make the measurement first, they both see the correlation between the particles.

If we were to interpret this experiment in a way that assumes some sort of signaling between the particles, we would have to assume that the signal would have had to travel into the past. This is a strange explanation. It's much better to assume that there's no signaling, and try to come up with other explanations.

TKF: Speaking of strange explanations, let me ask you a question that's interested me: We entangle photons. We entangle electrons. We entangle atoms. Is there any reason we could not entangle  watch out, Starbucks  a cup of coffee?

R.H.: That's a very interesting question, and one that is on many physicists' minds. For example, my colleague, Gary Steele at Delft's Kavli Institute is trying to create quantum superpositions with very small objects, and many other people around the world are actually exploring this. They want to see what happens if we make things bigger, more massive.

Who knows? Maybe we will have to rethink the laws of physics that we know up to now. Quantum physics has very good laws for describing what happens in the world of small particles. But if we look at our everyday lives, we never see such things. Your cup of coffee from Starbucks is always in one place. It's not in two places at the same time, and it does not appear to be entangled with something else.

So where is the transition in scaling up from the quantum world of small particles to the classical world we perceive, where things have well-defined properties and seem to be in the right places? Quantum theory defines these two domains and gives them different laws, but we do not fully understand how to connect these two worlds. Some people call this the measurement problem or the measurement paradox. But it really has to do with what happens when we go from a quantum mechanical picture up to some measurement result that we see on the screen. Maybe there is some clue when we scale up to bigger particles. Who knows?

R.R.: Whether the laws of quantum physics also apply to large objects is one of the most important questions we should answer in physics. We could go even further, and ask, "What happens if humans are entangled? What happens if I'm entangled with a particle?" To add to Ronald's reply, one possibility indeed is that there is a transition point. Once we get to large enough objects, they become more classical and behave the way we think and perceive them.

If you're a topical expert  researcher, business leader, author or innovator  and would like to contribute an op-ed piece, email us here (Image credit: SPACE.com)

There are also other explanations. One explanation is that everything is actually entangled. If I just look at an object, I become entangled with it. But because I am now part of this entangled thing, I don't perceive it as entanglement. It would only look entangled from the outside. To me, the object looks as if it has a well-defined property.

We don't know which of these explanations is the case. So we have at least two consistent explanations. One says everything is quantum, things are entangled, and we are entangled with one another. The other, maybe less adventurous, says that when things get larger, they become classical and all these strange behaviors disappear. Deciding between these two possibilities is something I think we should do in the future. Trying to do experiments with larger and larger objects is a nice way to achieve that.

TKF: That would be an interesting set of experiments. We're going to wrap this up since we're already a few minutes over, but I do have one final question. If Einstein could join us today, how do you think he would react to this experiment? What avenues of research do you think it might suggest to him?

R.H.: If you look at Einstein's life, he started out overthrowing the physics of his time. Relativity theory was a complete break with everything that was known before. But by the time quantum physics really matured, he seemed to have grown more conservative. When he analyzed quantum entanglement, he didn't say, "Let's take this quantum entanglement and see what the properties are and what it can tell me about the world." Instead, he said, "I think the world should be local and obeying realism and therefore quantum theory is incomplete"' So on this point, he seems quite a bit stubborn.

My guess is that even after seeing the results of our experiment, he would not be convinced. He would still say, "My theory is still there." But we don't really know, because he did not get to see Bell's inequality, and maybe that would have convinced him. I'm not so sure.

R.R.: I would assume, obviously, that Einstein is an intelligent, rational person. He would look at the possibilities. As we discussed, there are not many possibilities left. All the options require us to give up a certain view we had of the world. As Ronald said, Einstein was actually very good giving up certain intuitions people had about the world at that time. Ronald's experiment closes the possibilities that Einstein thought were true. I would assume that he would give up those possibilities, and try to find the theory that explains things in accordance with this experiment. This would probably be a very unconventional theory, and I would expect Einstein would be able to do that.

Follow all of the Expert Voices issues and debates  and become part of the discussion  on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher. This version of the article was originally published on Space.com.
Colored dots over an artist's rendition of the Milky Way reveal the location and ages of stars in the galaxy. Red dots show the older stars, which formed early in the life of the galaxy, while blue dots show the younger generations that have formed since.

The first complete age map of the Milky Way shows that the galaxy grew from the inside out.

To construct the map, scientists measured the composition and masses of red giant stars to determine their ages. Using a revolutionary technique, the researchers found that older Milky Way stars tend to lie near the center of the spiral galaxy, whereas subsequent generations formed around the spreading edges of the disk.

"This is key to understanding galaxy formation," Melissa Ness, a postdoctoral student at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Germany, said at a press conference today (Jan. 8) at the 227th Meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Kissimmee, Florida. Ness lead a group that used the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) to study the light, or spectra, from red giant stars to produce the first global age map of the Milky Way. [Stunning Photos of Our Milky Way Galaxy (Gallery)]

"Measuring the individual ages of stars from their spectra and combining them with chemical information offers the most powerful constraints in the galaxy," she said.

Up and out

The familiar spiral arms of the Milky Way lie in a flattened disk of dust and stars. Sorting the stars in this disk by age can help scientists to better understand how the galaxy as a whole evolved. To do that, Ness and her team studied red giant stars, bright stars for which there is a known relationship between age and mass.

That relationship depends on the life course of some stars. While some stars end their lives in violent supernova explosions, others don't have enough mass to produce such fireworks. Instead, in the penultimate stage of their lifetimes, stars like the sun swell up and become red giants, which have large radii but low mass.

Using the SDSS' Apache Point Observatory Galaxy Evolution Experiment (APOGEE), the team targeted 70,000 red giants to determine their ages and locations. But determining the mass of such a star, and thus its age, has been a long-standing challenge for astronomers. To solve the mystery, the team turned to NASA's Kepler space telescope. Although most famous for the more than 1,000 exoplanets it has discovered, Kepler has also revealed a wealth of information about stars since the observatory's March 2009 launch.

In an independent study, Marie Martig of the Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, Australia, looked at 2,000 stars whose masses and ages had been previously determined by Kepler. By comparing those values to the measurements of the stars' carbon and nitrogen obtained by APOGEE, she was able to calculate the relationship among red giants' mass, age and carbon and nitrogen abundances. Ness and her team, which included Martig, then used that relationship to determine the mass of the 70,000 red giant stars APOGEE had studied in the disk of the Milky Way.

"This is somewhat revolutionary, because ages have previously been considered very hard to get," Ness said.

With this age map, the scientists were able to chart how the Milky Way has grown throughout its lifetime. They found that the more-ancient, 13-billion-year-old stars were the first to form early in the lifetime of the universe. As the young galaxy collected gas and dust in a growing disk around its edges, the material became the site of the next generation of star formation.

"Our galaxy grew, and it grew up by growing out," Ness said.

Follow Nola Taylor Redd on Twitter @NolaTRedd or Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com.
Board of Education members have agreed to withdraw a placeholder application before the Planning and Zoning Commission for a new building for New Lebanon School.

The withdrawal of the application is a formality. The P&Z has taken no action on the Scheme D proposal for a new building on New Lebanons property on Mead Avenue.

Last June, the Board of Selectmen referred the Scheme D application to the P&Z for municipal improvement land-use approval. That plan was superseded in the late fall after the New Lebanon building committee and the school board instead endorsed an Option 1 plan for a new building in the ravine next to New Lebanons existing site.

The selectmen rejected the new plan.

At their own meeting Wednesday, building committee members recommended the school board take the application off the table to expedite the review process as the committee prepares to review new designs. The committee, the school board and the selectmen need to agree on another plan after the selectmen last month voted against Option 1.

Board member Jennifer Dayton said at Thursdays school board meeting that she was concerned that withdrawing the application would not give the Representative Town Meeting the opportunity to review it after former RTM member Bob Brady last month referred the D plan to the RTM for its members opinions.

While I understand its cleaner, it would be really nice for the RTM to have their discussion before we make this bait and switch, Dayton said.

Peter Bernstein, the school boards representative on the building committee, objected to Daytons use of the term bait and switch, saying that the D application was a placeholder and never supposed to get P&Z approval.

Its not a complete application, Bernstein said. While I respect the fact that RTM would like to have a discussion about their process under the town charter and Planning and Zoning, this is not the project for that discussion. They need to have the discussion in the context of a charter revision.

Architects are scheduled to present two new plans to the New Lebanon building committee at a meeting set for 8 a.m. Wednesday at the school districts Greenwich Avenue headquarters. The school board will likely vote on a new plan at its Jan. 21 meeting at Central Middle School.

pschott@scni.com; 203-625-4439; twitter: @paulschott
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In New York, you cant smoke them if youve got them.

And that might prevent the nations newest medical-marijuana program from getting off the ground.

New Yorks medical-marijuana system that opened on Thursday is sharply different from Connecticuts program. Smokable forms of the drug are prohibited. Doctors are required to take a four-hour, $250 course on cannabis therapy.

Observers say this can create major obstacles for patients who have watched Connecticuts pharmacy model from across the border with envy.

Its a unique program in a lot of ways, but its basically an experiment, said Chris Walsh, managing editor of Marijuana Business Daily, the Rhode Island-based trade journal for the industry.

He said that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomos prohibitions on smokable forms of the drug are hindering the program from the start.

More Information Different states New York: Population 19.75 million Patients in program: 51. Age requirements: none Dispensaries: 20, owned by five companies that also grow the marijuana. Eligible ailments: cancer, HIV/AIDS, ALS, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injury with spasticity, epilepsy, inflammatory bowel disease, neuropathy that causes pain and weakness, Huntington's disease, cachexia or wasting syndrome. All patients must have severe or chronic pain, severe nausea, seizures, or severe or persistent muscle spasms. Connecticut: Population 3.5 million Patients in program: 8,205 Age requirements: At least 18 years of age. Dispensaries: 6. Growers: 4 Eligible ailments: Cancer, glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord spasticity, epilepsy, cachexia, or wasting syndrome, Crohn's disease, post-traumatic stress disorder. Seven new ailments, including ALS, have been recommended for inclusion in the program but have not yet been adopted by the General Assembly's Regulation Review Committee. See More Collapse

It creates a completely different market, Walsh said in a phone interview. Only oils, tinctures, solutions and capsule forms of marijuana are sold in New Yorks dispensaries, although the oil can be inhaled as a vapor. It really changes the market dynamics. And since more patients may prefer to smoke marijuana, therefore, they may stay in the black market.

He described New York City, in particular, as an easy place for people to purchase unregulated marijuana.

The doctor certification is certainly a big difference, too, and could hamper access if your doctor doesnt want to deal with the extra step, Walsh said. One doctor might take the time to meet the requirements, but another might not be willing to jump through the hoops to do it.

Unlike Connecticut, where the four companies that grow medical cannabis are not affiliated with the six dispensaries, each of New Yorks five producers also own four dispensaries, which are located throughout the state.

The program started on time, but Walsh noted that at least one dispensary in New York had no patients on the first day.

Its a tremendous occasion for all involved, and congratulations are in order for the hardworking teams rushing to meet a tight deadline, Lisa Rough said on the Leafly marijuana-rating website. It will be an interesting experiment to watch medical cannabis rollout in the Big Apple, as there will likely be a few bumps in the road. But its encouraging that the program is on track and dispensaries are ready to serve patients.

A request for comment from the New York Department of Health was not returned last week, but the New York Times reported that only 51 patients were registered.

Walsh, the industry analyst, said after millions of dollars in investments, having no business must have been frightening.

Youd expect giant lines out the door and dispensaries packed, Walsh said. Id much rather operate a business in Connecticut than New York.

Karen O'Keefe, director of state policies for the Marijuana Policy Project, a nonprofit advocacy group, said that New York and Connecticut are among the most restrictive programs in the nation.

She said that both states exclude many patients with chronic pain who may benefit from using the drug. Connecticut, she said, has the only medical-cannabis program in the nation that prohibits use for patients under 18. Connecticut also has high annual fees that can discourage patients.

While Connecticut has one dispensary for every 600,000 people, New Yorks 20 sales locations amount to one for every million people.

Its not uncommon for states to take time to ramp up, but given the restrictions in New York, per capita use will not be that great, she said.

David Lipton, managing partner for Advanced Grow Labs of West Haven, one of the four Connecticut cannabis producers, which also applied for a New York State license, said last week that the states are very different.

Its like night and day, said Lipton, who thinks Connecticuts program is doing well.

The program here started slowly, too, until the product was online, so thats not a surprise, said Jonathan Harris, commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Consumer Protection, which oversees the states medical-cannabis program. Weve been experiencing steady growth.

Harris plans to announce licenses for three more dispensaries with a desire to address the more than 1,800 residents of Fairfield County, whose closest dispensary is in Bethel.

Harris recalled that when the dispensaries first opened in September 2014, there were 1,681 patients and 81 participating doctors.

Now, there are more than 8,200 patients and 406 physicians.

The stigma is lessening, Harris said. Theres a higher acceptance by the public.

kdixon@ctpost.com; 860-549-4670; Twitter: @KenDixonCT
The Army is not properly monitoring the prescribing of medications to treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in active-duty soldiers to ensure that antipsychotics and sedatives are not being used, a new government report says.

The report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) recommends that the Secretary of Defense direct the Army to monitor prescribing practices in order to detect medications that are discouraged under PTSD treatment guidelines. Those guidelines caution against the use of antipsychotics and benzodiazepines, a class of sedatives, because of their ineffectiveness and potential risk.

The Army does not monitor the prescribing of medications to treat PTSD on an ongoing basis, says the report, led by the GAOs director of health care, Debra Draper. Without such monitoring, the Army may be unable to identify and address practices that are inconsistent with the guideline.

The Department of Defense did not dispute the GAO recommendations, but argued that it has worked to reduce antipsychotic prescribing. Army officials cited an analysis showing that the proportion of service members with PTSD who were prescribed such drugs fell from 19 percent in 2010 to 10 percent in 2014. The Army issued a policy in 2012 that required military hospitals to review their prescribing practices for atypical antipsychotics, but the policy expired in 2014 and did not apply to benzodiazepines, the report says.

The GAO noted that the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) actively tracks the prescribing of benzodiazepines and antipsychotics for veterans with PTSD, and requires VA facilities with higher-than-average prescribing to develop and implement plans to reduce those rates.

In a separate recommendation, the GAO urged that the VHA clarify a 2015 policy instructing its health providers not to discontinue mental health medications when active-duty service members shift into VA care. VA providers had varying interpretations of which medications are covered by this policy, the GAO found, posing a danger that some providers might be inappropriately discontinuing mental health medications . . . which could increase the risk of adverse health effects for transitioning service members.

In a response to the report, Robert L. Nabors, chief of staff to VA Secretary Robert McDonald, said the agency would issue written guidance to its providers clarifying the types of medications covered by the 2015 policy.

The GAO report found that the defense department, which is responsible for the care of active-duty troops, has a wider variety of psychiatric, pain and sleep medications in its formulary than the VHA does. VHA officials told the GAO that safety, efficacy, and cost were factors in determining which medicines to include in their formulary. For example, they said, the VHA formulary includes only two sleep medications because of concerns about the appropriateness of some drugs for the treatment of insomnia.

A breakdown of psychiatric drugs used by the defense department shows that the highest percentage of prescriptions filled for active-duty service members in 2014 were for the antidepressant Trazodone (8.5 percent of all psychiatric prescriptions), followed by the stimulants Amphetamine/dextroamphetamine (8.2 percent) and the antidepressant Bupropion (7.1 percent).

This story was reported under a partnership with the Connecticut Health I-Team (www.c-hit.org).
On Jan. 12, Connecticuts school funding trial, Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding (CCJEF) v. Rell, will finally begin. The plaintiffs include a statewide coalition of parents, municipalities, local boards of education, and organizations, and individual parents in districts across the state. They began the case in 2005. Since then, the state has waged a costly, failed crusade to keep the plaintiffs from having their day in court.

The plaintiffs claim that the states flawed school funding system provides inadequate resources to schools, thereby depriving Connecticuts public school children of their rights under the Education Article of Connecticuts constitution.

Under Connecticuts Constitution, the state is responsible for providing children with a suitable public education. In 2010, when Connecticuts Supreme Court denied the states first attempt to dismiss the case, it defined a suitable education as one that enables graduates to participate in democratic institutions, attain productive employment, or progress to higher education. The court ruled that the state must provide sufficient resources to enable students to obtain this level of education.

The CCJEF plaintiffs contend that for children to have a constitutionally suitable education, schools must have certain essential resources:

high quality preschool;

appropriate class size;

programs and services for at-risk students;

high quality administrators and teachers;

modern and adequate library facilities;

modern technology and appropriate instruction;

an adequate number of hours of instruction;

a rigorous curriculum with a wide breadth of courses;

modern and appropriate textbooks;

a healthy, safe, well-maintained school environment conducive to learning;

adequate special needs services;

appropriate career and academic counseling; and

suitably run extra-curricular activities

This list of essential resources is consistent with what courts across the nation deem necessary for a constitutionally adequate education.

In the states last attempt to dismiss the case, in 2013, Gov. Dannel P. Malloys administration claimed that its 2012 reforms, including yearly common core standardized testing of students, evaluating teachers by students standardized test scores and a system of ranking, shaming and punishing districts with low test scores, would solve all the states education woes.

This failed tactic was attempted by states in other school funding cases, such as Kansas. The Kansas court declared that relying on similar unproven reforms rather than adequate funding was experimenting with our children (who) have no recourse from a failure of the experiment.

The CCJEF court ruled that there is no evidence that Malloys reforms would redress the constitutional inadequacies and ordered that the state prove it at trial.

That the state has known all along that the plaintiffs are right  that schools need the essential resources the CCJEF plaintiffs demand. In 2005, Connecticuts top education official, Commissioner Betty Sternberg, wrote to then-Education Secretary Margaret Spellings and told her so.

In the letter, Commissioner Sternberg requested permission to continue testing children only in grades 4,6, 8 and 10. She stated that adding standardized tests in the other grades will cost millions of dollars and will tell us nothing that we do not already know about our students achievement and what we must do to improve it.

Sternberg maintained that high-needs schools needed support to improve and set forth proven strategies to improve education, including:

High quality preschool;

School based health centers/family resource centers;

Small class size;

Adequate support staff, such as nurses, social workers, psychologists, reading specialists and guidance counselors;

Incentives to retain experienced teachers;

Adequate technology, curriculum, supplies and professional development;

Adequate learning time;

Adequate space for learning.

In 2005, Connecticuts top education official enumerated almost the exact same list of resources that the CCJEF plaintiffs seek. Moreover, Commissioner Sternberg maintained that these resources are not a buffet, but rather a full-course meal. If we want to see significant improvement in student achievement, all of these areas should move ahead in concert, she wrote.

Despite this admission by the state that schools need these essential resources, the state did nothing over the past 10 years to try to ensure every Connecticut school be properly equipped. Rather, the state chose to waste millions of taxpayer dollars in a futile attempt to keep the facts about its failure to fund schools from coming out in court. During that time, a generation of Connecticut children passed through the educational system deprived of basic educational resources they needed to succeed in school and life.

The governor, legislature and state education officials knowingly and repeatedly disregarded their duty to our children. One hopes that when the facts finally emerge, the court will grant our children the justice Connecticut politicians consistently denied them.

Wendy Lecker is a columnist for the Hearst Connecticut Media Group and is senior attorney at the Education Law Center.
R are Andy Warhol drawings are among the top ticket items at the Mayfair Antiques & Fine Art Fair, which got underway this week in Grosvenor Square.

This years exhibits also include distinctive silver gelatine prints of celebrities and 120-million-year-old Russian ammonites.

Antiques dealer William Cook said it's become such a popular fixture because there is a demand for different, interesting objects.

Ingrid Nelson, director of the antiques dealers fair, said: Its a real Aladdins cave of treasures.

We get a lot of members of the public who love antiques or who find the event for the first time and are just surprised by the variety here.

People even fly in from abroad. We've been running this fair for the last three years and we've had people every year coming from Monaco, France and even the Unites States."

Launched in 2013, the event boasts the Westminster Ballroom as its backdrop.

The fair runs until Sunday.
A Chinese doctor who raped a female patient and sexually assaulted two others has been jailed for seven years.

Hongbin Liu, 53, of Vauxhall Bridge Road, Westminster, pleaded guilty to rape, assault by penetration and two counts of sexual assault at Wood Green Crown Court on Friday.

He was sentenced on the same day.

In February last year, Liu raped and assaulted a woman who attended the Chinese Traditional Medical Centre on Haverstock Hill in Camden.

The victims usual therapist was not there so she agreed to see Liu instead.

The woman was raped and assaulted during treatment and reported the attack at a police station immediately after she left the centre.

Two women reported they were sexually assaulted at the Shu Jun Healthcare Centre in Westminster / Google Street View

Liu denied the offences when he was arrested by police and was bailed.

Weeks later, two more women reported offences to police after they visited the Shu Jun Healthcare Centre in Wells Street, Westminster.

In both cases the women were sexually assaulted.

One victim said she thought Liu took a picture of her while she received a massage but no photographs were recovered.

Detective Constable Jane Tunnicliff, from the Met's Sexual Offences, Exploitation and Child Abuse Command, said: "This is a man who betrayed the patient-doctor relationship.

Dr Liu prayed on the vulnerabilities of his patients. It is important that each and every one of us feel safe to seek treatment when we are ill or in pain.

As police officers we strive to make our community safer for everyone - even behind closed doors."

Detective Inspector Lee Davison, added: "People who abuse their position of trust damage the fabric of our society and the impact of their actions on their victims can be great.

We will pursue all such offenders to bring them to justice.

I would encourage anyone who has suffered at the hand of another to report the matter to the police in the knowledge that they will be believed and supported."
A drug dealer has been jailed for more than ten years after heroin, cocaine and cash were discovered in a flat in east London.

In October Shipu Miah, 23, of Ford Road, Bow, pleaded guilty at Snaresbrook Crown Court to possession with intent to supply heroin and cocaine.

He also admitted a charge of possession of criminal property after more than 170,000 in cash was also seized.

He was arrested in June in last year when police raided a flat in Prince Meridian Walk, Poplar, which Miah used as a safe house to mix and store class A drugs.

Officers recovered 2kg of heroin, 1kg of cocaine, 54kg of cutting agent and 171,195 cash.

On Friday, he was sentenced to 10-and-a-half years in prison.

DC Matthew Foy of the Met's Organised Crime Command said: "I am delighted with the sentence handed down in this case, it sends out a clear message to those that think supplying Class A drugs is a way to earn a living.

The impact on the people of London is severe and this has been reflected in this sentence."
A n asylum seeker and his London-based brother-in-law have been jailed for a total of more than 14 years for their part in a 25 million internet fraud involving victims from 55 countries.

Emmanuel Adanemhen, 50, and Eduwu Obasuyi, 40, pleaded guilty at Maidstone Crown Court to their part in sophisticated fraud and money laundering scams, which in some cases targeted the elderly and vulnerable.

A Kent Police spokesman said that Adanemhen arrived in the UK as an asylum seeker in 1998 and had assumed the identity of a deceased Portuguese man by changing his name by deed poll and on driving licences.

The fraudster then used the fake identity to open bank accounts to launder funds from bogus schemes, which included dating website scams, false inheritance scams, overseas lottery wins and shipping frauds.

Police were led to Adanemhen after they apprehended Obasuyi, of Friern Road, East Dulwich, who was arrested as he was about to board a plane from London to Lagos, Nigeria.

Detectives found that the two defendants had moved more than 4 million through their various accounts, which had come from victims in countries around the globe, including Germany, Norway, Switzerland, New Zealand, Canada, United Arab Emirates and across the USA.

One elderly victim from Florida was conned out of $2.9 million, while police estimate the total victims have been conned out of to be more than 25 million.

Adanemhen admitted to conspiracy to defraud, conspiracy to enter into a money laundering agreement and three counts of fraud against the Home Office and the DVLA, which related to his fake documents.

He was ordered to serve seven and a half years in jail.

Obasuyi pleaded guilty to conspiracy to enter into a money laundering agreement, and was sentenced to seven years in prison.

Detective Constable Paul Walker, from the Kent and Essex serious crime directorate, said: "This was a highly sophisticated criminal enterprise with Emmanuel Adanemhen and Eduwu Obasuyi at the heart of operations.

"They were undoubtedly highly placed and trusted individuals, handling and moving millions of pounds obtained through devastating and cruel frauds played out on sometimes very elderly and vulnerable people."

Proceeds Of Crime Act proceedings have been launched, and will seek to strip the fraudsters of their illegal gains.
A shopkeeper told how his sister was seconds away from suffering serious injuries after a bus crashed into a supermarket in north London.

Police and paramedics were called to Pratt Street in Camden at 10.47am on Saturday after a Transport for London 274 bus mounted the pavement before hitting Ozdiller Food Centre.

Owner Huseyil Ozdil said his 32-year-old sister Feleknaz was helping a customer at the time of the crash and has been left traumatised.

He told the Standard his sister could have been seriously hurt after the bus hit the store near the counter where she usually sits.

But Ms Ozdil was helping a customer elsewhere in the store at the time.

He said: Thankfully we are ok. There are no injuries but my sister has been badly shaken up by what has happened.

The bus collided with the front of the shop where the counter is and that is normally where she sits.

If she wasnt helping a customer at the time then its possible she would have been seriously injured. Ten seconds could have been the difference.

Everyone is trying to calm her down but she might need to go to hospital.

I wasnt here at the time but this wasnt just a bump. Luckily no pedestrians were outside on the pavement at the time.

Police confirmed no injuries have been reported and road closures are in place following the collision.

Tony Akers, TfLs Head of Bus Operations, said: At 11am today (9 January), a route 274 single deck bus, operated by Metroline, was involved in a collision with a shop front along Pratt Street NW1.

No one was seriously injured in the incident. Police attended the scene. There will be a full investigation into the incident.
A 24-year-old student and charity campaigner from Hampstead is appealing for a bone marrow donor to come forward to save her life.

Lara Casalotti has been diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia and needs a lifesaving bone marrow transplant.

Miss Casalotti found out she had the condition in early December, when she thought shed pulled a muscle in her back, and was becoming out of breath on short runs.

Not realising anything was seriously wrong, she flew out to Thailand where she was working with a professor from Oxford on conditions for domestic migrant workers.

While she was away, her condition started to deteriorate, and she visited a doctor, who diagnosed her with the serious illness.

Her brother, Seb Casalotti said: While she was there the pain shed been having down one side of her body suddenly switched to the other side. Thats when she started to get worried.

Our aunt, who lives in Thailand, insisted Lara saw a doctor. She was given a blood test and, to everyones immense shock, discovered she had leukaemia.

We flew out to see her straight away and then all came home together a few days later. We spent Christmas in hospital as a family.

Miss Casalotti, who is being treated at Londons University College Hospital, was put on a combination of three chemotherapies and told she needed a stem cell transplant.

However, due to her mixed Thai and Italian heritage, the search for a bone marrow donor is extremely difficult, and her only brother was told last week that he is not a match.

Only 0.5 per cent of people on the Anthony Nolan bone marrow register in the UK are from East Asian backgrounds and 1.5 per cent are from European backgrounds, and the shortage of ethnic minority donors is mirrored across the worldwide registers.

This means that only 20 per cent of people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds who need a stem cell transplant will find a perfect match.

As a result, Miss Casalotti's family, who are spread across four continents, have launched the global #Match4Lara appeal to help find the donor she desperately needs.

Miss Casalotti, who speaks five languages, is a keen advocate for a fairer world, and studies global migration, volunteers with at-risk youth and marginalised groups, and has worked at the UN and Human Rights Watch.

She and her family hope that as a result of the international campaign, they will not only find a match for Lara, but will make the world a fairer place for other mixed race, Asian or black blood cancer patients in desperate need of a donor.

Mr Casalotti said: Strangely, Id joined the Anthony Nolan register just a few months before at a donor recruitment drive at my college. At the time, it just felt like a no-brainer; I spat into a tube and that was that, not realising that a few months later my sisters life would depend on other people doing the same thing.

We have a big bunch of 11 cousins, living all over the world, from America to Thailand and Tanzania, and were all very close  but its Lara who is the glue that keeps everyone together, making sure we all stay in touch regularly.

Now all the cousins are springing into action to start a global campaign for Lara. Were all pitching in, wherever we are in the world - from building a website to contacting universities.

Were doing big pushes in America and Thailand, as well as the UK, to bust the myth that donation is painful and get more people signing up.

Its all a bit embarrassing for Lara as shes very humble and hates being the centre of attention; she hardly even uses social media apart from posting about refugee issues.

"But she knows how important this is, and what a difference it could make for anyone who is mixed race and looking for a donor.

He added: "Anyone joining the register is obviously great at any time. It takes time for the labs to test your tissue type and add you to the register.

"Theres no time to put this off or think Ill do it next week. That could be too late for Lara. Please do it today."

To join the register, visit the Anthony Nolan website.
T housands of protesters have gathered in London against Government proposals to scrap bursaries for nurses and midwives.

Demonstrators met at St Thomas's Hospital on Westminster Bridge at 12pm on Saturday before starting their journey to Downing Street.

Organised by the student nurses of Kings College London, opponents say scrapping the bursary from 2017 will mean young care professionals could face over 50,000 debt to train on a three-year degree course.

A statement on the groups Facebook page said: This started as a student protest but we stand in solidarity with the wider movement defending our NHS.

We work in hospital as part of our training: we bath, feed, administer medication, tend wounds, manage extreme emotions, visit people in their homes, wear our heart on our sleeves, with a smile on our face every day that we go to work.

We care: bringing hope to the most troubled and in support of those most in need.

We need to learn in hospital, under supervision of good, efficient nurses and midwives but we also need to learn from research, from best practice. The government funds research, it needs to start using it.

George Osborne announced plans to replace bursaries for nursing students and other professionals with loans during the November spending review.

More than 150,000 people have signed a Government petition calling for the bursaries to be kept triggering a debate in Parliament on Monday.

The Government has argued the changes will provide a more sustainable financial model to deliver nurses and midwives for the NHS.
A n adventurer has touched down in Australia after a 13,000-mile solo-flight from Britain in a vintage biplane.

Tracey Curtis-Taylor, 53, who lives in London, said she was euphoric after reaching Sydney Airport on Saturday three months after leaving Hampshire.

Over the course of her journey, she flew across 23 countries and made 50 refuelling stops to rejuvenate her 1942 Boeing Stearman Spirit of Artemis aircraft.

She posted on Facebook: Finished Sydney Airport! End of huge adventure, thank you everyone who supported me."

Historic: Tracey Curtis-Taylor pilots her biplane past Australia's Uluru rock formation during her incredible achievement / Reuters

Ms Curtis-Taylor follows in the slipstream of Amy Johnson, the pioneering aviator who became the first woman to fly solo from Britain to Australia in 1930.

She paid tribute to Johnson after she finished the feat.

She told the Press Association: I'm tired, it's been a pretty intense week with all the build-up to the final arrival, I'm relieved, euphoric, it's great to be here."

You can't do this without a great sense of empathy and sympathy for what she went through, what she achieved is so brilliant.

"I just take my hat off to what she pushed herself to, right on the limits of endurance. She was on the verge of nervous exhaustion when she finished, it's an astonishing survival story, all done by a slip of a girl at the age of 26 with little flying experience.

"This generation needs to know what the pioneers achieved and how they resolved to break the records."

Ms Curtis-Taylor said her future plans included celebrating her mothers 80th birthday in New Zealand before joining up with Artemis for a coast to coast expedition in America.

She added she was still seeking further adventures.

She said: Why not keep going, life should be about big projects."
U S Secret Service agents have uncovered a bizarre alleged plot to kidnap a dog belonging to Barack Obama.

Court documents in Washington show officials arrested Scott Stockert, of North Dakota after they received intelligence that he was on his way to the White House to steal a pet owned by the President.

The Obamas have two Portuguese water dogs, called Bo and Sunny. Mr Obama announced his family would be getting a new puppy on election night in 2008 when he was voted in as President.

Stockert was arrested after weapons were found in his car and told agents he had two guns in his truck when questioned about them.

Popular presence: Bo and Sunny have become a regular sight at White House events / PA

Officials found a shotgun and rifle as well as a machete, truncheon and ammunition, according to the documents.

Papers also revealed Stockert was not a registered gun owner and that he was charged with breaching District of Columbia gun laws on carrying a rifle or shotgun outside a home or business.

Stockert told agents he was Jesus Christ and that his parents were President John Kennedy and actress Marilyn Monroe and that he came to Washington to run for the presidency, the court documents said.

He was released from custody on Friday but must wear an ankle monitor.

Bo, a male Portuguese water dog, joined the family in 2009 as a gift from then Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy. Sunny, a female Portuguese water dog, joined the family in 2013.

The dogs are a regular presence at White House events.
T he three tourists who were stabbed in an attack on a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort of Hurghada were not seriously wounded, an Egyptian hospital official said.

The official, who wished to remain anonymous, said the victims were Austrian couple Renata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both 72, and Swedish man Sammie Olovsson, 27.

Two suspected Islamic State militants attacked the three after they stormed the beachside Bella Vista hotel late on Friday.

No group has immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

Security forces shot both attackers, killing one and wounding the other before arresting him.

Security sources said the attackers had arrived by sea and also carried a gun and a suicide belt.

Officials said officers had tightened checks across the area and shut off roads in the area.

Injured: Sammie Olovsson, 27, was stabbed in the attack on the hotel Friday / AP Photo/Mohsen Nabil

Egyptian tourism minister Hisham Zaazou visited the three injured tourists and vowed to beef up security at the resort in the wake of the attack.

He said: "I have just visited the three victims involved in the incident and am relieved they were not seriously hurt and will be released from hospital today. I conveyed my deepest regrets for what they went through last night.

"Unfortunately there is an active global challenge with many incidents in recent days and months throughout the world. The authorities in Hurghada acted very quickly and very effectively to deal with the local agitators whose goal was to further harm the tourism sector which is so important to Egypt's economy.

"Over the coming days we will announce even greater security measures to safeguard all tourists visiting Egypt. This follows the recent important announcement concerning the appointment of the international risk and security company Control Risks to assist us further to enhance airport security.

"The welfare of the tourists visiting Egypt is of the greatest importance to us and will continue to be so. No stone will be left unturned to ensure their security despite the global challenges we have witnessed in cities throughout the world."

Injured: Ahmed Abdullah, Governor of Egypt's Red Sea Governorate visits Renata Weisslein / AP Photos/APTN

Following the incident, an expert has warned British tourism in Egypt could suffer a slump.

About 1,500 British tourists are currently estimated to be in Hurghada, which is one of the most popular Red Sea resorts with British tourists after Sharm el Sheikh.

The incident is the latest in a series of terror attacks in Egypt and comes less than three months after a Russian jet flying from Sharm el Sheikh exploded, killing all 224 people aboard.

Germany updated its travel advice after the hotel attack, advising tourists in Hurghada not to go on any day trips from the resort for now and recommending they stay vigilant.

Sean Tipton of Abta, the association of travel agents and tour operators, said Egypt has already suffered a "significant drop-off" in tourism in the wake of terror attacks, and warned that the stabbings could further damage the industry.

He told the Press Association: "We have already seen quite a big drop-off in business to Egypt. We saw that after the Arab Spring, not because people were being attacked but because people had a general worry about demonstrations etc.

"Bookings started to pick up again a couple of years after the Arab Spring. But with what has happened in Sharm el Sheikh Airport and yesterday's attack it doesn't encourage people to travel to that destination.

"But I will say that British holidaymakers are very resilient. In other countries it takes very little for them to stop travelling to a destination."

The Foreign Office has not changed its travel advice and tour operators are still travelling to the area.

Mr Tipton said tourism is important to the Egyptian economy and the country has high levels of security to protect holidaymakers.

He said: "One of the reasons why the British Foreign Office has not advised against travel to the Red Sea resorts is because of the fact that Egyptians do have very high levels of security.

"They have advised against travel through the airport at Sharm el Sheik but they haven't advised against travel to the resort itself.

"Egyptians do take security incredibly seriously, but I think incidents like this show how important that is."
A young British tourist has died on the same Thai holiday island where two British backpackers were murdered.

Friends have paid tribute to Luke Miller, who died on the island of Koh Tao on Friday.

The body of the 27-year-old, from Newport in the Isle of Wight, was found floating in a hotel swimming pool.

Thai authorities are looking into how the young tourist died, and have said the circumstances of his death are as yet unclear.

Mr Miller and a friend flew out to Thailand from Heathrow Airport on December 22 for a five week "holiday of lifetime."

His death comes just days after he posted a New Year's Eve message on Facebook saying "living the dream."

He wrote: "Can honestly say this new year I am living the dream of to the full moon party on a speed boat drink cocktails strawberry daiquiris living life to the full yolo so let's do this."

David Miller, 24, from Jersey, and 23-year-old Hannah Witheridge, from Norfolk, were murdered on the island in 2014.

Two Burmese migrant workers were sentenced to death for the killings on Christmas Eve.

About 80 Britons a year die in Thailand, mainly in tourist areas.

Friends of Mr Miller have paid tribute to him on Facebook.

Joanne Doe wrote: "To think we were enjoying your photos seeing you live the holiday of a lifetime. This is such a shock. Will never forget that mental Christmas party at ours! At least you were living life to the full. Thoughts are with your family right now and Erin Laird xxxx RIP Luke Miller."

A Foreign Office spokesman said: "We are providing assistance to the family of a British national who has died in Koh Tao, Thailand. Local authorities are investigating the death and we will remain in contact with them."

Appeal: more than 5,000 has already been raised in donations / GoFundMe

A fundraising page set up to bring Mr Miller's body home has already raised more than 5,000.

Thanking those who had donated, his sister Maria Miller wrote: "Thankyou for doing this. I just want my baby brother home, where he belongs.

"This is so devastating and heartbreaking. He should be here, being the cheeky little shit everyone knows and loves.

"Not a day will pass that I won't think of you Luke. Love you so much."
Trot Insider has learned that the full on-scene investigation into the tragic barn fire at Classy Lane Training Centre concluded on Thursday.

"They have concluded the investigation on scene, that's phase 1 of the investigation," Steven Goode, Fire Chief for the Township of Puslinch told Trot Insider on Thursday. "They've done evidence collection, forensics from the Ontario Fire Marshal's office was on scene, they've collected their information...they've x-rayed wires and looked at other potential sources of ignition."

Goode noted that the Fire Marshal's office has yet to confirm a cause or pinpoint a starting location for the fire, and the process is still ongoing.

"We're concentrating our efforts into one area -- potentially electrical. That's what we're really looking at here at this point: the electrical and some of the small appliances that existed there in one particular office area on the north-east corner of the building," stated Goode. "We've based it on witness accounts, and we've x-rayed the wires and based on x-raying the wires we can determine what had power and what didn't have power. So if the building had power and one section was burning, it would disconnect power to the other portion of the building. So the area of origin has pretty much been determined."

The next phase of the investigation still involves a number of agencies, including the Ontario Racing Commission, Technical Standards & Safety Authority, the Puslinch Fire Dept., the Ontario Fire Marshal's office and the Wellington County OPP.

"So jointly we concluded as far as the evidence goes," continued Goode. "We've sent one horse for testing at the University of Guelph for many reasons...first being fire-investigative and insurance-related."

According to Goode, the complete investigative report should be released in a couple of months. That report will be released to the owners of Classy Lane, with Goode indicating a possibility that all the information in the report may not be made public.

"In speaking with the lead at the Ontario Fire Marshal's office, they're suggesting it's going to take a couple of months to complete."

The Fire Services crew on site at Classy Lane on Thursday made a short speech to horsemen upon conclusion of this investigation phase.

"What we expressed was that it wasn't their fault by any means, we don't suspect anything suspicious and this was an accident...and accidents do happen. It's really sad, and we share that and hope they're able to rebound and we're sure that they will.

"By the time the first person recognized there was a fire, it was too late. The fire was well involved and there was really nothing that could be done, other than protect the adjacent property, the building and the animals as well."

Many of the firefighters from Puslinch that were on-call on Monday night were thankfully familiar with that barn at Classy Lane, having performed some large animal rescue in that exact location about three months ago.

"When we first got the call, and we knew the barn and the valuables within the barn -- the horses -- we summoned four other fire departments immediately. So we had 55 firefighters on scene with well over a dozen trucks. Not once did they run out of water and they had some big streams going on this building," stated Goode. "If it wasn't for that, there wouldn't be much of an investigation because we were able to salvage an awful lot within the actual structure, and able to protect the [propane] tanks that were right adjacent to it."

Details revealed the barn did not have a sprinkler system installed or some sort of smoke detection alert system. Goode is not convinced that a conventional system with traditional detection capabilities would have necessarily saved the day.

"We can't say that if sprinklers has existed or if there was an alarm detection system if that would have changed anything. Because it is a barn," said Goode. "If you talk to some of these operations at Woodbine and Mohawk, some of them do have it and they've had some devastating history relating to fire. In saying that, it comes with some issues...sprinklers freezing up, horses hitting sprinklers, the alarms going off and scaring the horses and causing a lot of harm.

"So a traditional system, to me, will not work. It would have to be a system that we would build and revise to accommodate such a business."

Goode stated that the Fire Dept. will return to the training centre in a few weeks to work with those stabled at Classy Lane and provide additional grief support if needed. His team will also be working with Classy Lane and its horsemen to develop an action plan promoting proper emergency response and avoiding potential hazards.

"If you can't act appropriately on scene -- and I'm not saying they didn't, because I believe they did -- the actions of those that first witness a fire are the ones that are going to determine the outcome of the situation. And that's the case with any fire."
LINCOLN  The Nebraska Supreme Court has overturned the convictions of a Custer County man serving life in prison for kidnapping and raping his former wife because prosecutors saw his confidential trial strategy.

The Supreme Court ruled Friday that Tyler Bains Sixth Amendment right to effective representation and right to confidential communications with his attorney was violated. Bains attorney, James Martin Davis of Omaha, was able to show that at least five prosecutors saw documents related to his trial strategy.

James Smith, solicitor general with the Nebraska Attorney Generals Office, argued the series of prosecutors either stumbled across or were sent the confidential information that had been left in the document files provided to them when they were appointed to the case. And the prosecutor in charge when Bain was convicted by a jury never saw the defense documents.

The high court struck down the convictions, which were overseen by Custer County District Judge Karin Noakes. It was unclear Friday whether Bain, 33, could be prosecuted a second time for the crimes.

Bain was convicted in 2014 of kidnapping, first-degree sexual assault, second-degree assault and terroristic threats.
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WASHINGTON  The Federal Highway Administration on Friday granted Missouri's request for $1 million to help repair damaged roads from the recent flooding.

Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., who had urged rapid approval of the funding, said it was "just the beginning of the federal aid Missouri will need to repair flood-damaged roads."

McCaskill had written Federal Highway Administrator Gregory G. Nadeau that at the peak of flooding, which resulted in a federal emergency designation for 73 counties and the city of St. Louis, more than 285 roads were closed, including parts of Interstates 44, 55 and 70.

Earler this week McCaskill wrote the Internal Revenue Service asking that people affected by the floods get tax-filing deadline extensions and help in declaring disaster losses on this year's taxes.

A McCaskill spokesman said an answer on that will have to wait until whether President Obama issues a federal disaster declaration for the region.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency's "emergency" declaration opens up possible immediate aid for areas affected by storms or other events. "Disaster" takes longer, and requires deeper investigation. President Obama has granted the former, but a "disaster" designation is a longer process and requires more investigation to determine areas affected. It also potentially opens up more federal assistance.
How St. Louis-area members of Congress voted in the week of Jan. 4-8. The Senate was not in session during the week.

House

Affordable Care Act Repeal  The House voted, 240-181, to repeal key parts of the Affordable Care Act while defunding Planned Parenthood for one year. The bill would effectively kill the health law by repealing its individual and employer mandates and taxes on medical devices and high-priced health insurance benefits. A yes vote was to send HR 3762 to President Barack Obama, who vetoed the bill. Republicans do not appear to have the votes necessary to override it.

Yes  Blaine Luetkemeyer, R-St. Elizabeth, Mo.; John Shimkus, R-Collinsville; Ann Wagner, R-Ballwin; Mike Bost, R-Murphysboro, Ill.; Rodney Davis, R-Taylorville, Ill.

No  William Lacy Clay, D-St. Louis.

Repeal of Regulations  The House voted, 245-174, to establish a commission with a $6 million annual budget and subpoena power to review federal regulations and target for repeal those it judges to be outdated and overly costly to the economy. The bill also bars agencies from issuing new regulations without repealing existing ones to offset the cost. A yes vote was to send the GOP bill (HR 1155) to the Senate.

Yes  Wagner, Davis, Luetkemeyer, Shimkus, Bost.

No  Clay.

FDA Food-Safety Rules The House defeated, 173-245, an amendment sponsored by Democrats that sought to prohibit HR 1155 (above) from authorizing the repeal of any Food and Drug Administration regulation designed to protect food safety in the U.S. A yes vote was to exempt FDA food regulations from the scope of the bill.

Yes  Clay.

No  Shimkus, Wagner, Davis, Luetkemeyer, Bost.

Class-Action Suits, Asbestos Claims  The House voted, 211-188, to tighten rules for federal class-action suits in order to bar unqualified claimants from collecting payments. The GOP bill also would have the effect of delaying compensation payments to some disease victims in suits based on workplace exposure to asbestos. A yes vote was to send HR 1927 to the Senate.

Yes  Luetkemeyer, Shimkus, Bost, Wagner, Davis.

No  Clay.

Week Ahead  This week, the House will debate the Clean Water Act and economic sanctions against North Korea, while the Senate will take up a bill to launch a congressional audit of the Federal Reserve.

The votes and descriptions are compiled by Voterama in Congress, a legislative tracking organization.
U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Kansas City, gave the opening address Saturday evening kicking off the states official events to honor civil rights leader the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Harris-Stowe State University, where Cleaver spoke Saturday, has hosted the opening celebrations of the annual King events for the last 30 years.

Cleaver delivered a rousing speech at Harris-Stowe State University that generated laughs and applause, including a standing ovation at the end. He urged attendees to wake up from what he called apathy.

His speech, more closely resembling a sermon, delivered a lesson about the perils of injustice that can happen while the electorate sleeps.

He did not dream his life. He lived his dream, Cleaver said of King.

Cleaver condemned talk of black-on-black killing. He said the nation should be more concerned with people killing people.

Were more anti-Muslim than we are anti-murder, Cleaver, said referring to Donald Trump and his presidential campaign.

The people who are not of good will, they want us to sleep.

After serving as a City Council member for 12 years, Cleaver was elected the first black mayor of Kansas City in 1991. He was elected to Congress in 2004.

Several elected officials, including St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay and Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster, addressed the gathering.

Many of those politicians talked about the need for real change  not talk  to improve race relations and policing in communities such as Ferguson.

On Tuesday, St. Louis University, in partnership with the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis, will host its fifth-annual tribute to King, at the Busch Student Center. The program begins at 9:30 a.m., with a breakfast an hour earlier.

Diane Nash, a longtime civil rights activist, will be the keynote speaker.

Nash, a Chicago native, became involved in the nonviolent movement in 1959 while a student at Fisk University.

She led a student sit-in movement in Nashville, Tenn., the first southern city to desegregate its lunch counters.

She and others established the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee.

In 1961, Nash coordinated the Freedom Ride bus trip from Birmingham, Ala., to Jackson, Miss.

She was appointed by President John F. Kennedy to serve on the committee that promoted passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

The event is free, but reservations are required; call 314-977-4585.

The largest annual event comes on Jan. 18, when the country officially marks Kings birthday this year.

Under the dome of the Old Courthouse, music and speeches begin at 10 a.m.

The courthouse is where slaves were sold on the outside steps, and where Dred Scott, with his wife, Harriet, sued for their freedom in a case that hastened the start of the Civil War.

A large number of elected officials and clergy are expected to attend the ceremony, which will be followed by a march to Washington Tabernacle Baptist Church, 3200 Washington Avenue, for an interfaith service.

The church is one of the places in St. Louis where King spoke.

In a related observance, Christ Church Cathedral, at 13th and Locust streets, will have a daylong reading of writings and speeches of King. The come-and-go event runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Let his words resound and wash over you, is how the Rev. Michael Kinman describes the annual readings of King.

At Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, the annual King lunch, on Jan. 20, will be preceded by a conference on the Black Lives Matter movement.

Venessa A. Brown, associate chancellor for Institutional Diversity and Inclusion, said it makes sense to pair the new Black Lives Matter conference with the annual King event, putting in perspective what happened during the Civil Rights Movement with race-related conflicts today, including Ferguson.

This is a great opportunity, given whats going on in the world, in the nation, in the region, to really make this an educational experience, Brown said.

A complete list of events compiled by Gov. Jay Nixons Martin Luther King Jr. State Celebration Commission is available online at hssu.edu.
The federal governments tempered response to the occupation of a U.S. national wildlife refuge in Oregon by an armed group of white ranchers and their supporters have critics crying foul. Citing white privilege, some observers of the weeklong standoff have accused authorities of taking a less-forceful approach to the situation than they would have if the occupiers were black or Muslim.

Curious what the armed men think about that criticism, Dena Takruri of AJ+ went to the occupied wildlife refuge to ask them herself.
WASHINGTON  The U.S. Education Department is urging the nations colleges and K-12 schools to guard against harassment and discrimination based on race, religion or national origin, a response to anti-Muslim and anti-refugee sentiments that appear to be on the rise.

A focus on these protections, while always essential, is particularly important amid international and domestic events that create an urgent need for safe spaces for students, reads the Dec. 31 open letter to school leaders, which was signed both by Arne Duncan, who stepped down as U.S. education secretary that day, and John King, who is now serving as acting secretary.

The letter described the kind of behavior that schools should look out for, from name-calling to physical attacks, and singled out students who are most likely to need protection: Those who are, or are perceived to be, Syrian, Muslim, Middle Eastern, or Arab, as well as those who are Sikh, Jewish, or students of color.

The guidance to schools comes after terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., fueled a backlash against Muslims and a vigorous public debate about whether to welcome refugees fleeing violence in Syria. More than two dozen Republican governors have said they dont want refugees in their states, and GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump has called for rejecting all Muslim refugees seeking to enter the U.S.

Such public discussion can result in the dissemination of misinformation into schools, leading to bullying that can jeopardize students ability to learn, undermine their physical and emotional well-being, provoke retaliatory acts, and exacerbate community conflicts, federal officials wrote in their letter.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations has reported an increase in reports of bullying and discrimination against Muslim students in the past year. CAIRs 2014 survey of Muslim youths ages 11-18 in California found that a majority of them  55 percent  had been bullied at school because of their religion. And not all of the offensive behavior came from other students: One in five Muslim youths, or 20 percent, reported discrimination by a teacher, administrator or other staff member.

Last year, for example, a teacher in Florida was suspended for five days without pay after allegedly calling a Muslim student, 14, a raghead Taliban when he walked into class wearing a hoodie, according to the Miami Herald. And the Justice Department is investigating whether the arrest of Ahmed Mohamed, 14, who was taken into custody after bringing a homemade clock to his school in suburban Dallas, was the result of discrimination. Officials there said they were worried the clock might be a bomb.

The Education Departments letter to schools highlighted the role teachers play in creating a welcoming culture: Because parents and students look to you for leadership, their hearing from you that such conduct is unconditionally wrong and will not be tolerated in our schools will make a real difference, the letter said.
He comes to the commission following the departure of two of its most high-profile members last month
Wellesbourne Airfield

He was first elected to the council in 1963 and held office continuously for over 50 years. In 1988, he was elected chairman and led the council for the next 25 years.

During his time on the council, Tony has seen its duties under constant change, become more complex and demand more and more of his time, which he always gave without hesitation.

Tonys unstinting service on behalf of us all has been exceptional and exemplary. The effect Tony has had on Ilmington can be seen across the village.

He has left his mark on the village landscape by instigating the planting of many trees and shrubs. Most notably were the planting of 100 Oak trees throughout the parish at the time of the turn of the millennium.

These lovely specimens are now of some size and stand as a wonderful legacy of Tonys stewardship. His steering of Ilmingtons Parish Plan helped ensure the building of the houses on the Armscote Road  appropriately named Wilkins Way. T

hey are a permanent testament to his contribution to our community. Thank you Tony for all the time, energy and dedication you have given to Ilmington over the years. We are forever grateful and wish you well in your retirement from the parish council.

The 83-year-old retired farmer, a lifelong resident of the village, told the Herald this week he felt he had done his bit  even cleaning up leaves, and sweeping gullies and footpaths when necessary. But he admitted it was a disagreement over the councils desire to cut down two remaining Leylandii trees he had planted many years ago that has led to him retire. It was the final straw for me, I do not want them to be cut down. S

peaking about his years on the council, he added: I was hands-on and it took up quite a bit of my time. I suffer from macular degeneration, so its become difficult for me to read the council documents. I cant do e-mails either because I can see the print on screen, so its time for someone else.

Of the road named after him, Tony, who seems to be rather outspoken, added: It was sprung on me at a council meeting. My first reaction was: no way.

Its not that I dont like the development, its a good one, but I didnt agree with the way the houses were allocated.

But its a great village to live in, unique is some sense because of the road going all the way around it, with little lanes running off it.
Founder of NantWorks and NantHealth to discuss the strategic fit of NantHealths acquisition of NaviNet

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- NantHealth, today announced that their CEO and Founder Patrick Soon-Shiong, MD, will be presenting at the 34th Annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference at the Westin St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco on Monday, January 11, 2016 at 8 a.m. Pacific Time.

Under the leadership of Dr. Soon-Shiong and a seasoned management team, NantHealth is transforming health care by providing high-speed, secure, cloud-based information technology that uniquely combines genomic science and big data. Over the past decade, his vision has been to revolutionize the treatment of cancer and other disease states by connecting a patient's health data and individual genetic information at the point of care to precisely guide clinician decision making.

"The acquisition of NaviNet fits the vision, mission and strategic goals of NantHealth, said Dr. Soon-Shiong. This transaction completes our 10-year journey to introduce a new category of information technology into our complex healthcare ecosystem with a single sign-on, seamless, cloud-based, secure adaptive learning system for patients, payers, and providers.

The reason we've acquired NaviNet is not only for its current capabilities, which are substantial. NaviNet has an enormous footprint of 450,000 active providers with access to more than 450 commercial and government health plans, strong payer relationships, and product pipeline of payer-provider solutions that help NantHealth cover almost 100 million lives. While what NaviNet has accomplished is truly impressive, this acquisition brings NantHealth an opportunity to build a truly bidirectional communication tool for our genomic and clinical information technology solutions, and transform the way healthcare is provided today.

About NantHealthNantHealth, a member of the NantWorks ecosystem of companies, is a transformational healthcare IT company converging science and technology through a single integrated clinical platform, to provide actionable health information at the point of care, in the time of need, anywhere, anytime. NantHealth works to transform clinical delivery with actionable clinical intelligence at the moment of decision, enabling clinical discovery through real-time machine learning systems. The companys technology empowers physicians, patients, payers and researchers to transcend genomics into the world of proteomics and the traditional barriers of todays healthcare system. By converging molecular science, computer science and big data technology the Nant Service Oriented Operating System (NantOS) platform empowers physicians, patients, and payers to coordinate best care, monitor outcomes and control cost in real time. This is the first operating system of its kind in healthcare that is based on supply chain principles and grid service oriented architecture and integrates the knowledge base with the delivery system and the payment system, enabling 21st century coordinated care at a lower cost. For more information please visit www.nanthealth.com and follow Dr. Soon-Shiong on Twitter @solvehealthcare.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160109005009/en/

NantWorks

Jen Hodson, 562-397-3639

[email protected]

Source: NantHealth
KINSHASA (Reuters) - Rwandan Hutu rebels killed 14 civilians from a rival ethnic group in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo early on Thursday morning and wounded nine, the army said, in a sign of the ethnic tensions that persist in the conflict-torn region.

Fighters from the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) attacked the ethnic Nande civilians in the town of Lubero in North Kivu province at around 2 a.m. (7 p.m. ET), said Mak Hazukay, a local spokesman for Congo's army.

Hazukay said the killings appeared to be revenge for a series of attacks launched by Nande Mai Mai militias against the FDLR. The Nande, who dominate commerce in North Kivu, are historic rivals of the local Hutu.

"For some time now, the FDLR and Mai Mai have fought over the zone and that has provoked high tensions between the two communities," Hazukay said.

The Centre of Study for the Promotion of Peace, Democracy and Human Rights (CEPADHO), an activist group that documents violence in North Kivu, confirmed the death toll of 14 and said the victims had been shot or hacked to death.

The FDLR's spokesman could not be immediately reached for comment.

Ethnic rivalries, foreign invasions and competition for land and rich mineral deposits among in eastern Congo's dozens of rebel groups have fueled persistent conflict that has cost millions of lives over the last two decades.

The FDLR, a Hutu militia founded by some of the perpetrators of Rwanda's 1994 genocide who fled into neighboring Congo, is the largest rebel group, estimated by analysts to have more than 1,000 members.

Congo's army attacked the FDLR last February. The FDLR accuses Congolese forces of collaborating with local rebel groups to attack Hutu civilians, a charge the government denies.

(Reporting By Aaron Ross; Editing by Edward McAllister and Kevin Liffey)
Asimov said: If he was God, why did people have to make up stories about him after he died



This is the unsupported, undocumented statement--your own opinion--that I am challenging. Not whether you accept the Creation or Flood account. You can't prove to me that the the writers of the New Testament made up anything after Christ died. You can only say what you think. That's all I was pointing out. Click to expand...

Think about this, nearly every atheist believed in God, they came to atheism by reason.Very few go the other way.The only evidence of the stories of the New Testament, is the stories of the New Testament, and they appear in a collection which includes magical fiction.That is quite a difference from appearing in a collection that is God Inspired and every word is true.Biblical inerrancy only works if every word IS true.Once you start pealing off stories as magical fiction, you turn God's Word into a collection of myths.Those aren't my rules, that's from the nuns.
Tokyo businessmen toast with mugs of Asahi Breweries' beer after their office hours at a beer garden at the rooftop of Nihonbashi-Mitsukoshi department store in Tokyo July 30, 2013. REUTERS/Issei Kato

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japanese beverage maker Asahi Group Holdings Ltd <2502.T> will submit a bid as early as next week to buy SABMiller PLC's (NYSE: SAB) Grolsch and Peroni beer brands for as much as 400 billion yen ($3.41 billion), the daily Yomiuri reported.

If accepted, it would be the biggest overseas beverage acquisition ever by a Japanese company, topping Kirin Holdings Co Ltd's <2503.T> $3.3 billion takeover of Australia's Lion Nathan in 2009, the paper said.

Asahi Holdings officials could not be reached for comment.

Anheuser Busch InBev SA (NYSE: ABI), which agreed to buy SABMiller for $100 billion plus, has been seeking potential bidders to buy Grolsch and Peroni, sources close to the process told Reuters last month.

Peroni and Grolsch are small, premium brands and AB InBev wants to avoid getting bogged down in regulatory scrutiny over a European portfolio that already includes Corona and Stella Artois, the sources said.

Indicative offers are due in mid-January, with a tight schedule for due diligence in order to clinch a deal by early March, the sources said.

The sources had estimated a potential combined value for Peroni and Grolsch of about 1.8 billion euros ($2 billion), based on earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of 120 million to 150 million euros and a possible multiple of around 12 times EBITDA.

(Reporting by Tim Kelly; Editing by Edmund Klamann)
Poland's President Andrzej Duda speaks during his announcement at Presidential Palace in Warsaw, Poland December 28, 2015. Poland's president signed into law an amendment to how its constitutional court makes rulings, a move critics say will erode checks

By Marcin Goettig

WARSAW (Reuters) - Poland dismissed European Commission concern on Friday that a new law on state-run media threatened media freedom, warning Brussels not to interfere in its affairs on the basis of "biased and politically-engaged" reports.

Simultaneously, the government, run by the euroskeptic Law and Justice (PiS) party, gave teeth to the new law by naming a former PiS member of parliament to head state television.

The European Union's executive has written to Poland asking how the new law tallies with EU rules on media freedoms - a sign of disquiet in Brussels that PiS policies could undermine democracy.

The PiS has long aimed to overhaul rules on public broadcasters to ensure they defend what it defines as national interests. The party has signaled earlier plans to "depoliticize" the state media.

Replying to the letter, the foreign ministry said Poland fully recognized media freedom and the Commission may have been provided with misleading information with a bias against the Polish government.

"Exposing the Polish Government to interventions inspired by unjust, biased and politically engaged enunciations might have an undesirable effect, which is to be carefully avoided," the Polish foreign ministry said.

The Commission is to discuss the issue in Brussels on Jan. 13.

NEW LAW

Under the new law, approved on Thursday by President Andrzej Duda, the treasury minister has the right to appoint heads of state-run broadcasters - a prerogative he used on Friday to name Jacek Kurski, a former PiS member of parliament, to head state television.

The heads of state media were until now appointed through public contest organized by the National Broadcasting Council, a constitutional body set up to protect the freedom of speech.

"Competences of the National Broadcasting Council, including competences the aim of which is to ensure media pluralism, stay untouched," the Polish foreign ministry said in the letter.

"There is no EU law that would require a media market regulatory body to have the power to determine the composition of management boards of public media companies," the ministry said.

The law drew criticism from within the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

In a statement, Isabel Santos, who heads the human rights committee of the OSCE parliamentary assembly, expressed alarm at "measures that undermine the independence and impartiality of media" in Poland called on its leaders to repeal it.

PiS, which ousted the governing centrist party by a wide margin in the October election, rejects such criticism. It says it has a broad mandate to redesign the country to reflect its Catholic values and independence from the EU in Brussels.

In December, the EU executive expressed concern over an overhaul of the rules governing Poland's constitutional court, demanding their introduction be postponed.

European lawmakers returned to work on Friday after the holiday break to find their mailboxes overflowing with letters from supporters of the Polish government and dismissing charges that Warsaw is eating away at democratic freedoms.

The Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) group in the European Parliament said its lawmakers had received "hundreds of spam e-mails over the past days ... assuring us that democracy in Poland is doing fine and that now the situation is finally much better than under the previous government."

Members of the parliament's Greens group received "hundreds, probably at this point thousands of these e-mails", said a spokesman, Richard More O'Ferrall.

"PiS is using good old-fashioned propaganda that Poland remembers from the past. However, a lie told often will not become the truth," said ALDE leader Guy Verhofstadt.

(Additional reporting by Gabriela Baczynska in Brussels; Editing by Richard Balmforth)
A 20-year-old is in custody after an Auckland man was taken to hospital with a deep stab wound to the neck.

The attack in Motutara Rd, Muriwai, northwest of Auckland City was reported about 3.30am on Saturday, police said.

The attacker left the scene before police arrived. Since then a 20-year-old man had been taken into custody and was being spoken to about the attack.

He was likely to appear in Waitakere District Court on Monday, charged with wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, Detective Carl Fowlie of Henderson CIB said.

The injured man was recovering in Auckland City Hospital. His injury was not thought to be life-threatening.
Record numbers of Chinese visitors will come to New Zealand this year, with February being the peak month.

Nearly 50,000 Chinese holidaymakers will shortly land in New Zealand as experts forecast the biggest "golden week" for Chinese tourists in our history.

January and February are traditionally New Zealand's busiest and most lucrative tourism months but it is the growth in Chinese holiday visitors that is pushing the industry to new peaks.

The so-called "golden week" starting February 7 coincides with the Chinese Lunar New Year holiday week and China's middle class goes on the move particularly to destinations like Thailand and Japan, but also further afield to places such as New Zealand.

Increased air capacity to New Zealand from China is also helping.

READ MORE:

* The American girl who is the future of New Zealand tourism

* Bungy-jumping, jetboating tourists buoy NZ's economy

* Tourism set to overtake dairy as NZ's top export

* Is tourism's success masking growing pains?

* Opinion: The most dangerous month for foreign drivers is coming



Last February, the country hosted about 46,000 holidaymakers from China, a jump of about 40 per cent on the previous February. The usual February now brings some 20,000 more Chinese holiday makers than a typical January.

Tourism Industry Association (TIA) chief executive Chris Roberts said the increase in Chinese tourism was beyond all expectations. In 2013, a 20 per cent annual growth rate seemed an optimistic prediction but it had been far exceeded and showed little sign of slowing.

Roberts said the industry was growing across the board with international tourism growing by 17 per cent.

The Chinese influx will test South Island tourism operators from rental car suppliers to hotel operators but no one is complaining.

President of Hospitality NZ Canterbury Peter Morrison, who owns The Classic Villa boutique hotel in Christchurch, said the year was already very busy and most accommodation would be pretty full but rooms were still available.

"It's certainly pushing us. The Chinese seem to leave booking to the last minute so I've had to turn a number of independent Chinese travellers away."

Trish May, a marketing consultant for the 104-room, 4 Star Edgewater Hotel in Wanaka, said the hotel was booked out for the Golden Week and had been for some months.

Chinese visitors were the hotel's second biggest international market besides Australia, she said.

The Chinese Golden Week certainly showed up in his bookings, Real Journeys (which runs Milford Sound tours, among others) chief executive Richard Lauder said.

"The underlying growth from China is probably the more significant story ... in the quarter up to the end of the December we have experienced 30 per cent growth from China compared to the previous quarter to December and we expect that to flow on to January, February, March like it did last year."

Extra sailings and extra tours were used to handle the peaks but plenty of capacity was available, he said.

"February is the peak for Chinese visitors but the Chinese market is spreading right throughout the year."

Independent travellers from China were starting to form a bigger part of the market, he said.

Barry Kidd, chief executive of the NZ Rental Vehicle Association, said the industry would be at peak levels in February but he was confident enough vehicles were available.

"It may well be the busiest time ever but a lot of the growth has been anticipated and planned for," he said.

With February also the most dangerous time on South Island roads for tourist driver crashes, the association was encouraging operators "to continue to do the things we have put in place in the last 12 months".

Education and messages about NZ driving were brought home to Chinese drivers from the time they applied for a NZ visa to the time they picked up their vehicles, he said.

Police has made some special arrangements for the week but he would let the police talk about them, he said.

Southern District Police were unable to provide any comment before next week.

Christchurch Chinese Consul-General Jin Zhijian said the education campaign appeared to be making some progress. Despite the increase in Chinese drivers last year, accident numbers had not risen in proportion.
The alleged assault happened on the corner of Nile and South streets soon after the New Year countdown at the Church Steps in Nelson.

A Nelson teenager was knocked out by an unprovoked "coward punch" and rushed to hospital with a brain bleed after celebrating the New Year in the city.

The 17-year-old building apprentice, who asked not to be named, said he didn't see the punch coming when he was struck from behind and knocked to the ground in the early hours of January 1.

"I don't actually remember it, but I know what happened," he said.

He had seen in the New Year with friends at the countdown at the Church Steps in Nelson.

"I was having a good night, nothing was really going wrong."

He said he was walking home with his girlfriend when he saw a friend surrounded by a "large group of guys" near the corner of Nile and South streets, about 200 metres from the concert.

He said this was the last thing he remembered before waking up in the back of an ambulance. His girlfriend has helped him to fill in the blanks.

"My girlfriend went to walk away from the situation because it was getting a bit heated and apparently as I was turning around he clocked me one and I fell over - that was the problem - and I split my head open," he said.

"There was quite a bit of blood, apparently."

He was unconscious for close to two minutes and the trauma caused a small brain bleed.

He was taken by ambulance to Nelson Hospital where he received two staples to close the split in his head and remained under observation for two days.

He said he knew the person who punched him and had passed the information on to police.

Sergeant Brett Currie of Nelson police, who confirmed officers were investigating the incident, said there was "zero tolerance" for "mindless violence".

"This kind of wanton thuggery can and regularly does kill the victim."

The alleged offender was associated with a group of youths that was known for violence, the victim said.

"It's just something these guys do for fun. He just probably thought it was a cool thing to do," he said.

"I would have rather if he had a problem with me, come and tell me about it rather than just bloody being a coward."

The incident is disturbingly similar to an unprovoked attack in Brisbane, Australia, two days later.

Cole Miller, 18, died in hospital after being punched in the side of the head and falling to the pavement on January 3.

New Zealanders Armstrong Renata and Daniel Maxwell, both aged 21, have been charged with unlawful striking causing death in connection with the incident.

The Nelson teen said unprovoked "king hits" or "coward punches" were a serious problem, as highlighted by Miller's death.

"A little place like Nelson, things like that shouldn't happen, especially on New Year's. Everyone should just be having a good night."

He said he had recovered well and was back at work this week.

Currie said the enquiry was still in the early stages with officers speaking to witnesses to get a complete picture of what occurred. Police are appealing for any witnesses to the alleged assault to make contact via the Nelson police station on (03) 546 3840.
The conditions were calm as 11 people set out on a tragic kayaking trip on Lake Tekapo in September.

More than three months have passed but for Ricky Hartnett, returning kayaks to the waters of Lake Tekapo would still be too raw.

Hartnett and Kylee Smith, who run kayak hire company AquaNorts, are still making up their minds about what to do with their business after the deaths of two people who hired their kayaks for a group paddle on September 25.

Overseas students James Murphy, 20, of London, and Daniel Hollnsteiner, 21, of New York, died after they were tipped from their boats in deteriorating conditions on the South Canterbury lake.

Murphy reached the remote Motuariki Island, but went back into the icy water to try to save a friend after hearing some of the kayaks had capsized in the high winds. He never made it back to shore.

READ MORE:

* Two dead on Lake Tekapo

* Kayakers went beyond recommended area

* Students farewell kayaking victim

* James Murphy returned to water to save friend

A rescue helicopter plucked nine survivors, who attended Melbourne's Monash University with the pair, from remote parts of the lake, including Motuariki island. Murphy and Hollnsteiner's bodies were retrieved from the lake.

"At this stage we are just in a break at the moment, we don't really know where we are at," Hartnett said.

"It's all still very raw for us and we're still trying to get our heads around it all."

AquaNorts' website was taken down in early December, but Hartnett said that was to prevent people who had not heard the news from ringing to make a summer booking.

"It also wasn't worth paying the costs of keeping up the website at this stage so we took it down," Hartnett said.

Murphy and Hollnsteiner were part of a group of exchange students at Monash University in Melbourne, travelling in New Zealand.

The group of 11 people kayaked uninstructed under a freedom hire purchase. Smith said in September that they had paddled outside of AquaNorts' recommended zone.Hartnett said he and Smith had since left Tekapo, but a return to operating on the lake was not impossible.

"At this stage this break is a temporary thing. We're still trying to figure everything out."

Mid-South Canterbury area commander Inspector Dave Gaskin said the police-led investigation into the tragedy was ongoing.
Reason One: A study in the Journal of the American Medical Association says that SSRI's like Paxil and Prozac are no more effective in treating depression than a placebo pill. Click to expand...

Reason Two: doctors routinely prescribe not one but two or three SSRI's and other psychopharmological drugs in combination with few if any serious studies to back up the multiple usage Click to expand...

Reason Three: More and more psychiatric disorders are appearing that might be called "lifestyle" diseases. What was called shyness, sadness, restlessness, shopping too much, high sex drive, low sex drive, and so on have increasingly been seen as diseases Click to expand...

Reason Four: We're an over-medicated society Click to expand...

Reason Five: The whole serotonin hypothesis is challenged. don't ever let anyone say "I've got a chemical imbalance" without asking them what they actually mean and where is the science to prove that statement Click to expand...

This is untrue. There are dozens of studies into the effectiveness of SSRIs and nearly all of them show a benefit over placebo. The few studies that dont find a benefit are often touted by the antimedication crowd, while ignoring all the positive trials. This is the same in any area of medicine; there are many trials done and most show positive results, with a couple of outliers that the doubters cling toThis is true, and its a disgrace to the medical profession. I will say though, this is more prevalent in American than elsewhere, if I ever prescribe 2 similar medications to anyone my colleagues ask questions and I am asked to justify my actions.Yes, another disgrace for the profession and again something much more prevalent in America. Personally I think its because psychiatrists need to get paid, in America this is usually from an HMO. The HMO will only pay if the patient had a diagnosis, so the psychiatrist has to produce a diagnosis. If the problem the patient has is hoarding, dieting, shyness, shopping, then that has to be a diagnosis or the doctor doesnt get paid. To make it official, these things are now in the DSM. Basically, the American psychiatric association has re-written psychiatric text books in order to satisfy the needs of accountants.But dont blame this all on big pharma, they are responding to demand. The drive to prescribe away the problem often comes from patients. It started with antibiotics, now its spread to anxiety and depression. Its also spread to quitting smoking and losing weight, your smoking and obesity is now a disease for your doctor to fix with pills.I have this kind of conversation now and then with patients and colleages. It does miss the point a bit, we know that these drugs work (the right drug for the right problem in the right patient at the right time). Like any medical treatment they have their potential problems but they do help. we dont know how or why, but we know they do.
None of us Christians believe for one second that there are any gay people in Alabama. Weve even talked about this in our church and our Pastor says that the gay people are being planted here by the gay pride people and that they are being flown and bussed in from places like San Francisco, Seattle, NYC and Austin. My Pastor also says the gay people are running out of other gay people so they are going to the places where normal people live where they drug, trick and convert us into gay.



We are not dumb, we know there are no gay people who are from or who would live in Alabama. Alabama is in the south and is full of us Christians who dont like the gay people. We do not agree with what they do to each other at night with the kissing, hugging, touching and loving. Its not natural and its not what God ever intended.



We are not impressed if they can use more words than us or that most of them went to college. They are not smart because its dumb and dirty when two men get turned on by each other and end up going into the bedroom where one man empties his range into the other.



All Christians fully agree with fellow Christian Chief Justice Roy Moor "Sodomy has never been and never will be an act by which a marriage can be consummated. When men put themselves inside of another man rear end its nothing but sin and filth.



God Bless the Holy Bible and God Bless the way America used to be.
Two girls playing near their Albany home are safe after having the street smarts to refuse to get into a car with a suspicious person Wednesday night. Albany police are seeking the suspect, and ask community members to remain alert.

The incident happened around 5:30 p.m. Wednesday. According to a citizens report, a vehicle had stopped across from where the citizen's daughter and a friend were playing in the area of 20th Avenue and S.E. Breakwood Circle.

Asked what he was doing, the driver allegedly told a neighbor he was there to pick up the two girls. The children did not recognize the vehicle and did not get into the car.

The vehicle later drove away, and officers did not receive a consistent description of the subject, except that he was male, possibly 30 to 40 years old, and that the vehicle was described as a dark-colored 1990s Honda or Saturn with black wheels.

In light of the incident, the Albany Police Department recommends children in the community remain aware of their surroundings, and that they use the buddy system: always walk with a friend and never leave that friend alone. Parents are also asked to designate a safe adult who is allowed to drive and pick up their children. Also, parents are asked to give their children confidence to say "no" if they feel uncomfortable or are asked to do something they feel is wrong.

Encourage your children to tell you or a trusted adult about any interaction with children or adults that make them feel uncomfortable, sad or mad, said Albany Police Capt. Eric Carter.

Police officials ask citizens to report all suspicious circumstances, vehicles and people to the Albany Police Department at 541-917-7680. Police also ask citizens to always be prepared to give specifics of the circumstances, provide your name and answer additional questions.
Monkees boutique sells designer clothing, shoes and accessories and carries brands including Amanda Uprichard, Joie, Tyler Boe, Susana Monaco and BCBG.

By Kelly Tyko of TCPalm

STUART  "You might need a bigger closet" after visiting downtown Stuart's newest boutique.

That's the slogan of Monkee's, which celebrates its grand opening this weekend with free gifts with purchase, raffle drawings and trunk shows.

Stuart native Natalia Meredith, 29, and her mother Dierdre Lucido are the owners of the small, upscale boutique located at 9 S.E. Osceola St.

"It feels real now," Meredith said. "Everybody is really excited about it, very curious."

Meredith said the store's inventory of designer clothing, shoes and accessories will be constantly changing. Amanda Uprichard, Joie, Tyler Boe, Susana Monaco and BCBG are among the brands the store carries.

Andrea Rice, vice president of sales and operations for Monkee's corporate, said the Stuart location is the 25th Monkee's.

The original Monkee's opened in Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1995 and other stores are traditionally located in historic downtowns.

"The response that we've gotten so far has been amazing," Rice said. "I think just the Lucido family in general is so well respected in the area that people are going to want to come out not only to shop but to shop with them."

Rice said the company has been looking for a long time for the right owners to open up a store in Florida.

"As soon as I met them I knew this was the one," she said. "(And) when we came down here and found this location, we knew this was exactly where we wanted to be."

The boutique is located on Haney Circle and is next to Sada International Salon and across from LouRonzo's Italian Fusion restaurant.

"I think it's going to be a fun, new addition to the downtown area," Lucido said. "It's just going to bring new faces to this end of the street."

MONKEE'S OF STUART

Address: 9 S.E. Osceola St., Stuart

Hours: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday; noon to 5 p.m. Sunday*

Grand opening: Jan. 9-10. There will be gifts with purchases, raffles and trunk shows.

Phone: 772-266-9879

Website: www.monkeesofstuart.com

Social media: Facebook.com/monkeesofstuart; Instagram.com/monkeesofstuart



*Hours are expected to change in May
Linn-Benton Community College centers in Lebanon and Sweet Home are offering a variety of community education personal enrichment and fitness classes over winter term.

For more information, see the LBCC online schedule at www.linnbenton.edu, email at Lebanon@linnbenton.edu or sweethome@linnbenton.edu, or call the Lebanon Center at 541-259-5801 or the Sweet Home Center at 541-367-6901.

A sampling:

Personal Computer Essentials: A class for those who have never touched a computer before and want hands-on, step-by-step instruction. Designed to go at an easy pace. Introduces working with Windows 7 and a brief introduction to email and the internet. Important to attend first class.

Class will start Jan. 13 and meet from 1 to 2:50 p.m. Wednesdays at the Lebanon Center, 44 Industrial Way. Cost is $59.

Buying and Selling Online: Explore popular marketplace services while learning to create ads to attract buyers and other strategies to get results and protect yourself as both buyer and seller. Basic computer skills are necessary. Class will start Jan. 13 and meet from 6 to 7:50 p.m. Wednesdays at the Lebanon Center. Cost is $59.

Introduction to Facebook: For beginners seeking to learn the basics of connecting with family and friends online. Learn to establish an account, set up your profile and set security parameters. Basic computer and web browsing skills are necessary. Bring your smartphone or tablet if available. Class will start on Jan. 14 and will meet from 6 to 7:50 p.m. Thursdays at the Sweet Home Center, 1661 Long St. Cost is $59.

Line Dance: Learn to dance to a variety of music including Country/Western, '50s and Latin. No partner needed. Dancers must wear shoes with smooth soles. Class will start on Jan. 12, and will meet from 1:30 to 2:50 p.m. Tuesdays at the Lebanon Center. Cost is $65.

Complete Country Dance: Learn a variety of couples pattern dances and line dances in this combination class that requires no partner. Wear smooth soled shoes for easy foot movement. Class will start on Jan. 12, and will meet from 6:30 to 7:50 p.m. Tuesdays at the Lebanon Center. Cost is $65.

Prose Writing Workshop: Be inspired, gain tips and tricks to improve your writing style. Workshop writings in a supportive critique group guided by the instructor. Perfect for all skill levels interested in producing works of all genres, any length. Class will start Jan. 13 and will meet from 3 to 4:20 p.m. Tuesdays at the Sweet Home Center. Cost is $69.

Life Stories: Preserve your own life stories and those of family members. Recall family history in your narrative style with enhancement of detail, description and dialogue. Class starts on Jan. 13 and will meet from 2 to 3:50 p.m. Wednesdays at the Lebanon Center. Cost is $69.

Retooling Your Retirement: You are finally retired! So, now what? Being physically and emotionally ready for retirement is as important as financial readiness. Class will start Jan. 14 and will meet from 6 to 7:50 p.m. Thursdays at the Sweet Home Center. Cost is $29.

Lunch & Learn Series: Listen to medical professionals from our community share about the latest in medical advancements, healthcare and wellness. Class starts Jan. 11 and will meet from 12:30 to 1:50 p.m. Mondays at the Lebanon Senior Center. Class is free.

General Woodworking: If youre interested in learning to do it yourself," this is the class for you. Complete two simple class projects with materials provided. An in-class safety orientation is required prior to tool use. Bring ear and eye protection. Fee includes some supplies. Class starts Jan. 14 and will meet from 6:30 to 8:20 p.m. Thursdays at East Linn Christian Academy. Cost is $99.

POUND: This workout fuses cardio, Pilates, isometric movements, plyometrics, and isometric poses to strengthen and sculpt infrequently-used muscles. Drum your way to a leaner, slimmer physique. Class starts Jan. 13 and meets from 5:30 to 6:20 p.m. Wednesdays. Cost is $39.
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By Staff Report

Three Tampa men were sentenced to prison this week for attempts to have banned chemicals used to make synthetic marijuana shipped to Indian River County, the U.S. attorney's office said.

The three men were part of a conspiracy to have the chemicals, which they would have used to make Spice, shipped from China to mailbox service centers in Indian River and Palm Beach counties, federal officials said. Customs agents in New York intercepted the packages, however.

Saiful Hossain, 28, was sentenced in federal court in West Palm Beach to 10 years in prison. Co-defendants Ahmed Yehia Khalifa, 28, and Ahmed Maher Elhelw, 25, were sentenced to eight years each.
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By Lamaur Stancil of TCPalm

STUART  An attorney who has a criminal record was charged Thursday with attempting to buy cocaine, police said.

Nathaniel Bundy Burke, 52, of the 500 block of Southeast Prescott Place, Stuart, was taken into custody after he paid $75 for a bag of fake cocaine from an informant outside a deli in the 1800 block of Southeast Palm Beach Road, according to his affidavit. A Stuart police officer provided the bag after learning that Burke was wanting to buy cocaine, the affidavit states.

Burke posted $5,000 bail at the Martin County Jail.

In 2007, Burke had his law license suspended for three years by the Florida Bar after he pleaded guilty to firearm and driving under the influence charges. Burke was arrested in May 2006 for firing a gun into the air to break up a fight outside the Wild Coyote Bar in Stuart. Two weeks later, Burke was charged with driving under the influence and possession of cocaine. A judge withheld adjudication of guilt for the drug charge, which spared Burke a felony conviction.
Jonathan Peavy

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By Staff Report

FORT PIERCE  A jury Friday convicted a Fort Pierce man for firearm charges stemming from when he was a teen, the St. Lucie County Sheriff's Office said.

Jonathon Deon Peavy, 19, was convicted of possession of a firearm by a felon, tampering with evidence and resisting arrest without violence. He faces up to 21 years in prison.

In June 2014, Peavy was wanted by the Fort Pierce Police Department for aggravated assault with a firearm, possession of a firearm by felon and resisting an officer without violence. He was 17 years old at the time.

One month later, the Sheriff's Office teamed up with Fort Pierce police to apprehend Peavy following a foot chase during which he carried a loaded AK-47 rifle, the Sheriff's Office said. Peavy was found in the 3600 block of Avenue by Officer Oscar Trinidad and his K-9 partner Tobago.
Julius Belle

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By Laurie K. Blandford of TCPalm

FORT PIERCE  The 21-year-old Fort Pierce man suspected of shooting another man Thursday was arrested after police officers followed up on a tip about a stolen vehicle, said police officials.

Julius Belle was arrested Friday and charged with attempted first-degree murder in connection with a shooting that occurred in the 2200 block of Avenue E in Fort Pierce just before noon Thursday, said police Sgt. Cassandra Davis. Detectives had issued a warrant for his arrest.

Belle is accused of shooting 22-year-old Deshone Stacy of Fort Pierce in his right leg, Davis said. Stacy was taken to Lawnwood Regional Medical Center & Heart Institute with non-life-threatening injuries and released Friday.

On Friday, an officer was following up on a stolen vehicle tip about 11:15 a.m. when he saw a vehicle matching the description traveling west on Avenue Q from North 29th Street, Davis said.

The vehicle's driver, later identified as 18-year-old Robert Burnadette of Fort Pierce, saw the officer and stopped, Davis said. The vehicle's passenger, later identified as Belle, ran from the vehicle.

Burnadette then drove away in the stolen vehicle, and officers set up a perimeter in the area, Davis said. Burnadette drove a short distance before he abandoned the vehicle and ran.

Officers found Burnadette nearby in a wooded area about two minutes later and then found Belle in the 3300 block of Avenue Q about two minutes after that, Davis said.

Burnadette was charged with grand theft of a motor vehicle, fleeing and eluding, resisting without violence and driving with a suspended license, Davis said.

Belle remained Saturday in the St. Lucie County Jail with a $750,000 bail, according to a jail official, and Burnadette was released Saturday from the jail on $24,875 bond.
ST. LUCIE COUNTY  The man accused of being a serial smash-and-grab car burglar has been caught, according to sheriff's and Port St. Lucie police officials.

William Edward Harmon Jr., 29, of the 900 block of Southwest Haleyberry Avenue in Port St. Lucie, was arrested at 11:30 a.m. Friday and charged with two counts of burglary to a conveyance, according to officials. Harmon also is suspected of committing 13 other recent burglaries across the city and the county.

Between Dec. 27, and Wednesday, officials from the Sheriff's Office and Police Department responded to a combined 13 parking lot vehicle burglaries in which windows were smashed and purses, backpacks, identifications, wallets, jewelry and other items of value were taken.

On Thursday, police officers went to the Fortis School at 9022 S. U.S. 1 at 11:05 a.m. in response to another smash-and-grab car burglary, officials said.

On Friday, police detectives followed up on that burglary and found a credit card stolen from the car was used at a 7-Eleven gas station in Fort Pierce, officials said.

At the same time, they heard on their radios another smash-and-grab burglary just happened at Planet Fitness at 3225 S.W. Port St. Lucie Blvd., officials said. Sheriff's crime analysts, who were monitoring the radios, recognized the calls might be related to the string of car burglaries and passed that information along to officials at the scene.

Police detectives saw a vehicle matching the description of the one seen driving away from the Planet Fitness burglary and other burglaries driving north on Northwest Peacock Boulevard, officials said. They followed it into the Five Guys parking lot at 1707 N.W. St. Lucie West Blvd. and found Harmon was the driver.

During the traffic stop, police detectives discovered Harmon had the driver's license and purse from the car that was broken into at Planet Fitness, officials said.

Harmon remained at the Port St. Lucie Police Department late Friday being questioned by detectives before he would be taken to the St. Lucie County Jail, officials said.
PORT ST. LUCIE  It's costing taxpayers money each day the city's lawsuit against the Vaccine & Gene Therapy Institute of Florida is stalled.

Yet despite Circuit Judge Janet C. Croom's mid-December order that the city and VGTI appoint a receiver for the defunct biotech research center, the city wants a delay on that move until Feb. 1, according to court documents.

Croom said she ordered the receiver be in place by the new year to spare taxpayers dollars wasted on lengthy litigation.

Both parties previously agreed to name the city's New York-based crisis-management firm, Alvarez & Marsal, the receiver, but the agreement hit a snag over billing. That kink was to be ironed out by Jan. 1, but the wrinkle remained. In court filings Dec. 31, the city said it chose a different receiver: Jim Rizzi of WorkingBuildings, who is maintaining the vacant Tradition laboratory.

But there was another hiccup.

After both sides agreed on Rizzi, he demanded a provision in the contract for $175,000 if the court orders the city and VGTI stick with Alvarez & Marsal, court documents show. Furthermore, WorkingBuildings threatened to stop managing and operating the vacant building if a contract wasn't signed by Jan. 1, lawyers for the city wrote in its request for an extension.

WorkingBuildings has agreed to operate the building through Jan. 15, rather than abandon it, court documents show.

The receiver will be tasked with combing through VGTI's financial documents and ensuring city-bought and state-bought equipment is preserved.

The complications are part of a lawsuit the city filed against VGTI on May 8, asking a judge to ban the biotech-research institute from moving out of the city and to force it to make good on a $2.6 million mortgage payment that was due May 1. That legal action came nearly two weeks after VGTI asked the city for a $21 million bailout. Once VGTI formally announced its closure, the city amended the lawsuit, asking the judge to appoint a receiver to supervise the biotech's departure.

City administrators declined to comment about concerns of mounting legal bills stemming from the stalled suit.

Mayor Greg Oravec, however, expressed disappointment at the pace of the case.

"I am deeply dismayed by our lack of progress on the VGTI case and, more importantly, of getting to the end game  selling or leasing the building to an entity which provides the biggest return, as measured in money and job creation, on our taxpayers' investment of approximately $60 million," Oravec said in an email Friday. "There has been much more interest in this building from credible parties than for Digital Domain, and we can't miss the opportunity to find the silver lining."

In addition to its own legal costs, TD Bank now is demanding the city pay its legal fees.

TD Bank  a plaintiff in the case and VGTI's mortgage holder  claims it incurred more than $112,000 in legal fees through November, according to court documents.

It's the city's responsibility to cover those costs if VGTI can't, bank attorneys said in a Jan. 5 court filing.

VGTI shut down Oct. 1, and Port St. Lucie paid $1 million on Nov. 1  the biannual mortgage payment VGTI was unable to make.

The city in 2010 borrowed $64 million for an incentive package to build and furnish VGTI's facility. VGTI was required to repay the money over 30 years with interest. In the event it couldn't cover the cost, the city was responsible. With interest, the total owed is $130 million.

Another hearing in the case regarding the receivership is set for Jan. 21.
Lawyers from Indian River Shores lawyers and Vero Beach to meet to discuss electric power impasse.

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By Colleen Wixon of TCPalm

INDIAN RIVER SHORES  Town Council wasted no time Friday agreeing to let its lawyers discuss the $64 million question with lawyers representing Vero Beach.

Vero Beach estimates its electric customers would face a $64.5 million impact if Florida Power & Light Co. buys the Shores' portion of the Vero electric system. Indian River Shores officials want a better understanding of how Vero arrived at that figure.

FPL has offered Vero Beach $13 million for the 3,500-customer base in Indian River Shores, but Vero said that amount is too low.

Vero Beach City Council agreed Tuesday to let its lawyers meet with the Shores lawyers. In a 6-minute special meeting Friday, the Shores council also unanimously agreed to a discussion in Tallahassee, where both legal teams are based. No date has been set for the discussion.

"It's an opportunity for us to learn how the city came up with this estimate of $64 million, which is nearly five times what FPL offered," Shores Mayor Brian Barefoot said. "To this point, no detailed explanation has been provided, but our rate consultant shared publicly his doubts about that figure."

The meeting also shows a "good-faith" effort on the part of two communities to work out their disagreements and seek a solution, he said.

"I continue to believe a partial sale of the electric system can offer such a solution, eliminating the need for further litigation," Barefoot said.

The Town Council approved the meeting without comment. Barefoot said the meeting would involve only discussion. Lawyers would not be authorized to take any action on behalf of the town.

The two governments have been at odds for years over Vero's electric rates. Indian River Shores has sued Vero Beach, claiming the city has no legal right to force town residents to be on its electric grid after the franchise agreement ends in November. Vero claims the state Public Service Commission has given it authority to set its service area boundaries.

Talk of a partial sale to FPL began about a year ago, but was dropped when Vero Beach and FPL realized they were more than $50 million apart in the value of the Shores portion of Vero's electric system. The city's impact analysis considered fixed costs, general expenses, electric fund debt, general fund and how much more the city would have to charge its remaining electric customers.
Fort Pierce Police Department (FILE)

Another day, another sexual discrimination lawsuit filed against the city of Fort Pierce.

On Dec. 16, former police officer Nicole Patsalides filed suit in federal court alleging sexual discrimination, retaliation and a hostile work environment in the police department.

Patsalides alleges a pattern of sexual harassment and retaliatory punishment after she complained repeatedly about a senior male officer's behavior. It's reminiscent of the treatment endured by another female officer, Kristin Anderson, who won a federal sexual discrimination suit against the city in 2015.

Yet, according to her suit, Patsalides endured far more than the verbal taunts Anderson experienced.

Patsalides alleges frequent sexual harassment by fellow officer Fred Pate, who is referred to in the lawsuit as "a notorious, hands-on sexual harasser" throughout his 22-year career in the police department.

The alleged abuse began on Patsalides' very first day on road patrol with Pate.

Patsalides accused Pate of "grabbing her arm or shoulder on the very first day, putting his hand on her breast under the guise of adjusting her name tag and, later, of reaching through her patrol car window to grab her inner thigh."

She filed a complaint in October 2013 and was told by the department's internal affairs lieutenant, "I already know he did it ... this is not the first time," according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit says that although then-Chief Sean Baldwin was aware of the alleged harassment, Pate eventually was allowed to retire without any charges being filed against him.

In the meantime, Pate's male squad mates, Patsalides alleges, began taunting her that "you don't snitch on other cops," "this is a brotherhood," and "if you can't handle that (i.e. Pate's behavior), you can't handle being a cop," according to the lawsuit.

She filed an internal affairs complaint with the department's internal affairs. Then things began to get really weird.

Internal affairs turned its attention to what the lawsuit calls "unfounded allegations by Kathleen Pate, Mr. Pate's wife and a supervisor at the St. Lucie County central dispatch facility" on the grounds that Patsalides had cheated to get through the police academy, and that she had stolen money from others while in the academy.

Patsalides' request to transfer to other shifts to get away from the reported taunting and heckling was refused.

Finally on April 15, 2014, Patsalides was informed internal affairs officers had sustained charges against Pate for her sexual harassment complaint, conduct unbecoming to an officer and insubordination.

The suit says Pate was never charged for these offenses but instead was allowed to retire in good standing.

Then Patsalides alleges retaliation began against her. Within a week of Pate's retirement, according to the lawsuit, she was issued a counseling action notice for failing to attend a training class and for taking six sick days to care for her ailing grandfather. After being hospitalized for stress, the suit says, she returned to work only to be informed she was being relieved of duty pending a hearing about her proposed termination.

The lawsuit paints another ugly picture of life inside the Fort Pierce Police Department, where fellow officers verbally abused a female officer and supervisors did little to remedy a climate of discrimination.

Patsalides, like Anderson, finally was fired, apparently because she was considered a nuisance and a troublemaker.

Since all this happened, there have been big changes within the department. Several officers, including former chief Baldwin, have either retired or moved on. Yet many of the same rank-and-file officers are still there.

We have a new female police chief, Diane Hobley-Burney, who one would think might be more sympathetic to female officers. Yet Hobley-Burney filed a declaration in federal court in November explaining why Kristin Anderson would not be reinstated.

It's the chief's prerogative, of course, to have whomever she wants in her department. I can't fathom why Anderson would even want her old job back in such a poisonous atmosphere.

It's high time to break down "the brotherhood" attitude depicted here. Male cops may not want females working alongside them  or even issuing orders to them  but these days they have no choice.

Anthony Westbury is a columnist for Treasure Coast Newspapers. This column reflects his opinion. Contact him at 772-221-4220, anthony.westbury@tcpalm.com, or follow him at TCPalmWestbury on Twitter.
Juniper Networks on Sunday informed customers that recent security threats to its ScreenOS were not as widespread as initially believed.

The company last week issued an alert following its discovery in ScreenOS of unauthorized code that could allow an attacker to gain administrative control of devices using Netscreen (Administrative Access) or to decrypt a virtual private network (VPN Decryption).

The two issues are unrelated to each other, according to the company.

Juniper originally advised all customers that the Administrative Access code affected ScreenOS 6.30r12 through 6.30r20, and that the VPN Decryption code affected ScreenOS 6.20r15 through 6.20r18, and it advised users to patch their systems.

Once we identified these vulnerabilities, we launched an investigation into the matter and worked to develop and issue patched releases for the latest versions of ScreenOS, noted Bob Worrall, senior vice president and chief information officer.

That investigation led Juniper to narrow the list of affected versions.

Administrative Access  only affects ScreenOS 6.3.0r17 through 6.3.0r20, Worrall wrote in Sundays update. VPN Decryption  only affects ScreenOS 6.2.0r15 through 6.2.0r18 and 6.3.0r12 through 6.3.0r20.

We strongly recommend that all customers update their systems and apply these patched releases with the highest priority, he added.

Juniper had not received any notifications of exploitation of the vulnerabilities when it issued its original alert last week, and as of Monday, it had nothing further to share on the security issues, spokesperson Danielle Hamel told TechNewsWorld.

NSA Suspicions

Because the vulnerabilities are reminiscent of the disclosures whistleblower Ed Snowden made about NSA techniques to gain unauthorized access to various networking systems, questions have surfaced about whether the unauthorized code could be connected to backdoor government surveillance.

The NSA ANT catalogue has detailed capabilities on penetrating Juniper firewalls and they have spent considerable time and effort building customized capabilities for several enterprise firewall vendors, LogicNow Security Lead Ian Trump told TechNewsWorld.

Juniper declined to respond to TechNewsWorlds specific questions about the timing of its discovery of the latest vulnerabilities, but the company vehemently denied working with government officials to install code that could exploit its own systems.

As weve stated previously, Juniper Networks [takes] allegations of this nature seriously, said spokesperson Hamel. To be clear, we do not work with governments or anyone else to purposefully introduce weaknesses or vulnerabilities into our products.

The company consistently operates with the highest of ethical standards and is committed to maintaining the integrity, security and assurance of its products, she said.

Juniper previously investigated reports published in Germanys Der Spiegel, which suggested that the NSA might be using software implants to exploit vulnerabilities in its BIOS.

Release notes from the company appear to show the affected ScreenOS flaws date back to at least 2012.

Open Source Solution?

We dont know whether the culprit in this instance is the NSA or some other state-based actor, but it is clear that the network equipment providers are targets  sometimes willingly, sometimes not, said Eli Dourado, research fellow and director of the Technology Policy Program at George Mason Universitys Mercatus Center.

Moving more of the code that runs the guts of the network to an open source model could prevent this type of intrusion, he said  and in fact, he made that proposal in a 2013 New York Times essay, following Snowdens revelations about NSA surveillance practices.

With more eyeballs on the code, we may be able to discourage some of these hacking attempts and better detect the ones that are not deterred, Dourado explained.

The potential impact on Junipers customer base likely will be short term, said Avivah Litan, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner.

I think its safe to assume every network technology company has had its technology compromised by some government, and I think most CIOs realize that, she told TechNewsWorld. Juniper is no different than others in that regard.
New Delhi, India, January 09, 2016: In this information-driven world, for millions of people, language continues to be a barrier to the effective use of technology and while the Internet may be everywhere, even today many people are unable to benefit from it. In India, we have 22 major languages, written in 13 different scripts, with over 720 dialects; thats a high level of linguistic diversity. Moreover, a large number of Indians use their local language in their work and personal life. Well versed with this behavioral pattern of Indians, Microsoft looks at things differently and believes that the language diversity of Indians needs to be embraced.

On the occasion of January 10, World Hindi Day, Microsoft salutes the official language of the worlds largest democracy  Hindi  and revisits the key breakthroughs that have helped create economic opportunities, build IT skills, enhance education outcomes, and sustain our local language and culture. Microsoft has been dedicated to this cause for over 15 years. The company announced Native Unicode support for Hindi in the year 2000. Unicode is also supported as a part of Microsofts server operating systems, Exchange, SharePoint & SQL  entrenching the Hindi use case across most Microsoft products and services. Hindi is also core to these services running from Microsofts India datacenters.

Here are 8 things that Microsoft has done to enable technology to help people use Hindi across devices and services:

Product localization

Microsoft has localized Windows and Office (provided Language Accessory Packs) in 14 Indian languages including Hindi. Microsoft also provides Indian languages support throughout the platform and across the range of products. Its Office suite of apps offers Hindi language support across iOS and Android as well and offer features like proofing tools for the Hindi language to make the consumer experience seamless.

Hindi language support on Windows Phone

With the launch of Windows 10 Mobile, Microsoft has built new phonetic keyboards for 10 Indian languages including Hindi that allow users to type on a familiar QWERTY keyboard layout and the IME converts what they type into their native script. Basis ones learning curve and comfort with Hindi, Microsoft offers four keyboards that can help consumers perform everyday tasks like email, text, social networking, search on their phone in Hindi.

Bing Support for Indian Languages

Indian language experience is available on Bing.com both on Desktop and Mobile devices. Users can not only use Bing to enter their search queries in Hindi but also use Bing as a translation tool. A virtual onscreen keyboard helps users in typing their preferred language without requiring additional keyboard installations.

Skype Translator Messenger

Provides endless possibilities for people around the world to communicate. Skype Translator messenger breaks down the language barrier by instantly translating conversation in IM from English to Hindi. Skype Translator is also supported by Microsoft Translator for IM communication in more than 50 languages.

Microsoft Language Interface Packs

Microsoft has localized its Windows and Office products into more than 40 languages and dialects globally. In India, the company has localized Windows and Office (provided Language Accessory Packs) in 14 Indian languages including Hindi. Microsoft also provides Indian languages support throughout the platform and across its range of products. Microsoft Language Interface Packs (LIP) can be downloaded free of charge. A LIP language has translations for up to 300,000 words in Windows and for 600,000 Office.

The Indic Language Input Tool

The tool facilitates users to input localized text easily and quickly. This tool is available in two versions; the desktop version enables the user to input localized text directly into any application running on Windows, such as Microsoft Word or Outlook. The web version allows the user to enter text on any web page  such as Outlook.com  without requiring software download. The tool is available for free download and currently supports ten languages including Hindi.

Microsoft Translator App

Microsoft has also introduced a translator app that works across smartphones, tablets, Apple Watch and Android Wear devices. Microsoft Translator supports up to 50 different languages including Hindi.

Project Bhasha

A cohesive program that brought together the governments, the academia and the research institutions, the local ISVs and developers and the industry associations on a common ground for promoting local language computing. Microsofts website www.bhashaindia.com is a one stop shop for consumers to download and get access to Hindi software, tools, content and code.Through the initiative, Microsoft aims to involve everyone who is, in anyway related to, and interested in developing for and learning Indian language computing. The Bhasha Online Community portal is Indias leading community for Indian language computing.

 Technuter.com News Service
Storybook Land named as beneficiary

For the third consecutive year, Christmas Storybook Land was chosen as the Spring Hill Womens Association nonprofit organization as the association's Christmas luncheon charity.

On Dec. 2, more than 180 Spring Hill Womens Association members and their guests gathered for their annual Christmas social and luncheon at the Linn County Fair & Expo Center. As the audience joined their voices in Christmas carols, Santas Elfie scurried around tables, collecting bags of donations. A tally of all donations revealed an extraordinary $4,735.76!

In addition, for the second year in a row, Gregory Krpalek, owner of Krpalek Financial Services, a wealth management firm in Albany since 1976, stepped up and offered to match monies collected up to $3,000!

The Christmas Storybook Land Board wishes to extend a huge, heartfelt thank-you to all the members of the Spring Hill Womens Association, and especially to Krpalek Financial Services for its overwhelming matching-fund donation.

Sincere thanks go to the executive board of the Spring Hill Womens Association, particularly Judy Scott, who championed Storybook Lands cause, and all the generous women who donated to make this goal a reality.

These funds will be used to support this free, unique holiday experience which warmed the hearts of 41,112 children and adults in the 2015 season, and collected more than 30,655 food items from visitors for distribution by the Fish of Albany food pantry. See our website, ChristmasStorybookLand.org, or follow us on Facebook.

Joyce Moreira

Christmas Storybook Land board

Thanks to person who found purse

I just wanted to send a big thank-you to the person who turned in my purse at Walmart the morning of Dec. 31.

I had a major airhead moment and forgot my purse in my shopping cart after putting my groceries in my car. It wasnt until I got home and reached for it that I noticed I didnt have it. I went back to the store without much hope, but it had been turned in.

I wanted to thank you in person, but the store staff members werent able to give me your name. So I just hope you see this and know that I am so grateful. With so many bad things in the news these days, you are a light. Thank you again.

Donna Thwing

Albany

Century Link crews restored service

A very heartfelt thank-you to the Century Link crews and support personnel who braved the elements to restore service following the recent outage.

The frosting on the cake was the immediate adjustment to our account. Wishing yall a happy new year.

Dan Lais

Albany

Thanks for donations to baby basket

The staff at Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital would like to thank the following people and businesses for their generous contributions toward a gift basket for the first baby born in 2016:

Bi-Mart (gift card); Wells Fargo (stuffed pony); Schmizza Public House (gift certificate); Mane Event hair salon (gift basket with shampoo and conditioner); Quality Director Nancy Bond, Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital (lactation supplies); individual staff members at the hospitals Girod Birth Center (various baby items and gifts).

We and our patients appreciate our communitys generosity. This support is what makes our community and hospital so special.

Anne Simmons

Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital

Furniture Share thanks donors

Furniture Share would like to send our most sincere appreciation to the individuals and local businesses who helped provide a Giving Tree at their location for customers to choose A Bed for Kids or toy tags, and to those who shopped for these children.

Furniture Share was able to provide 455 kids with beds, and 816 children were provided with Christmas gifts.

We would not have been able to make a dent in this years holiday giving needs if it wasnt for the generous monetary Beds for Kids donations from NW Mechanical, Lee Eckroth of Town & Country Realty, Buzz Wheeler, Coastal Farm & Ranch, Kiefer Nissan and Volvo of Corvallis, and Clayton Homes/Golden West Homes; and for the Heritage Mall's supporting our main giving tree location as a pick-up and drop-off site.

There are too many to list individually; however, you all know who you are, and we truly appreciate each and every one of you. Hope you all have a healthy and safe new year!

Michelle Robinson

Furniture Share
Apple has made its first acquisition of 2016, and it's another company specializing in artificial intelligence. The Cupertino-based firm has bought San Deigo startup Emotient Inc. for an undisclosed sum, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal.

Emotient's AI technology is used to determine a person's emotions just by analyzing their facial expressions. It's primarily sold to advertisers and marketers who use it to assess consumers reactions to ads and products. The tech has also been tested by doctors to interpret signs of pain in patients who are unable to express themselves.

Emotient had previously been tested on Google Glass as a way to find out what emotions people around you were feeling by analyzing their faces. The camera on the device was used to identify and process facial expressions and provide an emotional read-out on the small screen.

It's not clear what plans Apple has for Emotient's technology. It could be used on its own iAds platform, photo apps, or even implemented into FaceTime. The company rolled out its usual generic statement after the acquisition: " [Apple] buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans."

Apple has acquired a series of companies over the last 12 months that have a focus on AI systems. In October last year, the iPhone maker bought Perceptio, a small startup company specializing in technology that lets companies run artificial intelligence systems on smartphones without needing to share much user data.

Apple has also bought VocallQ - a firm that specializes in natural language processing as it applies to automobiles - and mapping data analytics startup Mapsense. In November 2015, the company confirmed it had bought Faceshift, a Swiss startup that uses real-time motion capture technology to captures a person's facial expressions in order to create CGI avatars and other figures.

Assuming this isn't all part of a plan to build Skynet, these acquisitions suggest that AI will play an even bigger role in Apple's future products.
Microsoft is preparing to launch its own wireless data service, presumably to make it easier to get Windows 10 devices online.

A listing in Microsoft's Store for a Cellular Data app says it allows users to connect to a trusted nationwide mobile data network using only your Microsoft account. The service won't tie uses to a long-term contract with a wireless provider, instead offering plans directly from Microsoft.

The description adds that the app is designed to work only with specific Windows 10 devices and requires a Microsoft SIM card (something that currently doesn't exist).

As Engadget points out, an international mobile virtual network operator by the name of Transatel said earlier this week that Microsoft selected its SIM 901 solution to support its upcoming paid cellular data service for Windows 10. Transatel said consumers will be able to purchase pre-paid 3G/4G LTE data service and use it with a Microsoft SIM card while on the go.

At present, Transatel offers service in 38 countries with plans to expand to 50 countries including the US, UK, Mexico, India and several European counties on January 15. If I had to guess, I'd say Microsoft is holding off on its launch until at least that date.
Apple has acquired Emotient, a startup that employs artificial intelligence technology to assess emotions by reading peoples facial expressions, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The Cupertino-based company, though, did not specifically reveal what it plans to do with the startups technology. An Apple representative only verified that the company buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans. Furthermore, she declined to go into details regarding the terms of the acquisition.

Emotient boss Ken Denman also declined to comment on the matter.

By looking at what Emotient does, though, we could have an idea as to what Apple has in mind for the startup's technology.

Lets do the rundown.

 Emotients technology is used to help advertisers in assessing the reactions of viewers to their advertisements.

 Doctors use the startups technology to interpret the pain of patients who cannot express themselves.

 The company said one of its clients, a retailer, used the AI technology to check the reactions of buyers on the products in its stores.

"The insights gained from Emotient give businesses the ability to make better decisions and accelerate their revenue growth," says Emotient on its website.

This week, the San Diego startup already tweaked its website, wiping out details with regard to the services it previously offered.

How The Startup Describes Itself

"Emotient is the leader in emotion detection and sentiment analysis. The company is at the vanguard of a new wave of emotion analysis that will lead to a quantum leap in customer understanding and emotion-aware computing," says the company description on its website. "Emotient's cloud-based services deliver direct measurement of a customer's unfiltered emotional response to ads, content, products and customer service or sales interactions."

Other Acquisitions

Apple has also made other recent acquisitions, which could give a clue regarding its real plan.

In October 2015, Apple acquired Perceptio, a company that developed a deep-learning image recognition technology specifically built for mobile processors. Another AI company, VocalIQ, also moved under Apple's umbrella. The startup focuses on beefing up a computer's capacity to understand natural speech.

The following month, we reported that Apple bought Faceshift, a motion picture startup with a focus on facial analysis.

Apple's Patent Application

In 2014, Apple applied for a patent describing a software system that has the capacity to assess and recognize people's moods based on different clues, including facial expression.

Back in May 2015, Emotient revealed that its patent had been approved for its method of gathering and labeling up to 100,000 facial images every day so computers can better distinguish various expressions.

Facebook And Google's Facial Recognition Technology

It should already be no secret by now: Facebook and Google are also working on a similar facial recognition technology.

Facebook, however, decided not to roll out its Moments photo app in Europe because of the region's existing privacy regulations. Google likewise released its facial recognition feature for Google Photos only in the United States.

While Apple has yet to disclose its plans on how to incorporate Emotient, rumor has it, however, that it could be developing a smarter Siri, which would have the ability to recognize the user's emotion.

 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Tackling the issue of obesity and malnutrition has become a national priority in the United Kingdom.

Rising numbers of people who are obese and overweight threaten to trigger an overwhelming surge in cases of cancer within the next 20 years, as revealed in a report by several health groups.

If the trend continues, the UK will be seeing at least 670,000 additional cases of cancer in the country, and almost three in every four adults could be obese or overweight by 2035, the report said.

Previous studies have revealed that being overweight or obese increases the chances of a person to develop any of the 10 types of cancer.

Experts from Cancer Research UK and the UK Health Forum also predicted millions of new cases of heart diseases, stroke, and Type 2 diabetes will turn out due to the increasing cases of obesity. Both groups call on the government to create a national strategy to fight obesity.

The Impact On Social Care And Health Services

According to the report, rising cases of obesity-related diseases will cost the National Health Service more than 2.5 billion or about $3.6 billion annually.

The report said high obesity rates will contribute to 4.6 million new cases of Type 2 diabetes and 1.6 million extra cases of cardiovascular diseases in the country.

In 2013 alone, about 440,000 cases of new diseases were accounted to obesity. Of this number, 257,000 were cases of Type 2 diabetes.

In terms of gender differences, obesity will affect 76 percent of men, while it will affect 69 percent of women in the country.

How The Government Should Deal With The Problem

The country's Chief Medical Officer, Professor Dame Sally Davies, said in December that obesity is a threat that carries the same dangers to the nation as terrorism and natural disasters.

"Action is required across all of society to prevent obesity and its associated problems for shortening women's lives and affecting their quality of life," she said.

The current Cancer UK report suggested that small changes in lifestyle would bring meaningful improvements in public health and finances.

The report said reducing the cases of obesity and malnutrition by just 1 percent every year below estimated trends would save the NHS 300 million or about $438 million in 2035. Experts listed down several solutions to reduce obesity rates:

 Limiting online marketing of junk foods and unhealthy drinks

 Implementing a sugar tax of 20p a liter on sugar-sweetened drinks

 Placing a 6:00 a.m to 9:00 p.m. ban on TV advertisements that market unhealthy drinks and food and target children

 Making food with high levels of salt, sugar and fat more expensive while increasing the affordability of healthy alternatives

 Improving people's access to recreational facilities

 Encouraging people to walk and cycle more often

 Enhancing the labels on food products by extending nutritional color coding to the front of the pack

Chef and healthy food advocate Jamie Oliver said today's generation of children live in a society where junk food is cheap, accessible, widely advertised and full of sugar, making it difficult to teach them to make better choices for their health.

"If governments take children's health more seriously and use education to inspire them, we could have a huge impact on their health and well-being," said Oliver.

How To Lose Weight Naturally

Luckily, there are several ways to help you lose weight. You know the usual: exercise regularly, eat healthy, have enough sleep, etc., but to truly make your weight loss count and avoid the complications that come with obesity, here are several things you can do:

1. List down all the food you eat during the week. Keeping a food journal will help you become mindful of what you eat. You should also watch out for the food you eat during weekends. A past study conducted by the University of North Carolina found that people eat 115 extra calories during Saturdays and Sundays.

Solution: Cut down on calories from sauces, dressings, drinks, and snacks. This could spell the difference between your weight loss and weight gain.

2. Find an online weight loss buddy. Having someone to support you in your weight loss goals could definitely motivate you. A University of Vermont research found that those with online buddies and are enrolled in Internet weight loss programs sustained their weight loss better than those who met face-to-face.

3. Stick to water. Throughout the day, drinking water will help you reduce your calories. Drinking sugary drinks accounts to an added 245 calories per day. That's an estimated 90,000 calories or 25 pounds per year.

4. Walk five minutes for every two hours. If you're stuck sitting behind a desk all day, walking for at least five minutes every two hours will definitely help you. You could also extend your walking time to 30 to 45 minutes. Brisk walking every day could help you lose 30 pounds in a year.

5. Find a mantra. Pessimism will only hinder you from achieving your goals. Experts said focusing on positive thoughts such as "I can lose weight," or "I will get out for a walk today," will help you believe that you can do it and achieve your weight loss goals.

Photo : Robert Anthony Provost | Flickr

 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
When Google unveiled the Cardboard during the "Google I/O 2014," it was simply presented as an inexpensive way to experience Virtual Reality (VR) using one's smartphone. No one probably ever thought that the roughly $20 toy would end up saving the life of an infant who was deemed inoperable. Take that, critics!

Teegan Lexcen was born with only one lung and half a heart, and an operation to manage the fatal condition would likely cut short her already limited lifespan. That is, until Dr. Redmond Burke tapped the VR toy and found a way to save the baby's life.

Not only is a heart surgery difficult to perform, doctors also consider it to be risky as a very vital organ is involved. That's why Teegan was sent home from the Minnesota Hospital where she and her twin sister Riley were born with the grave news to expect the worst. Teegan refused and after two months of fighting, her parents brought her case to Nicklaus Children's Hospital in Miami where Dr. Burke worked as the chief of cardiovascular surgery.

"Teegan had the worst set of defects you can imagine... I've been doing surgery for 30 years. This is the first time I've seen a case like hers," Burke said in an interview. Still, Burke saw that Teegan had a strong will to live and he didn't want to give up on her without doing anything. In order to determine the possibilities though, he needed a three dimensional (3D) model of Teegan's heart but the 3D printer in the hospital was broken at the time.

Dr. Juan Carlos Muniz, a pediatric cardiologist specializing in imaging, bore the bad news to Burke. However, Muniz also wouldn't give up. Recalling a discussion about the possibilities of VR for children's hearts, he quickly purchased a Google Cardboard, uploaded the images of Teegan's heart in his phone and ran it through the free application called Sketchfab.

It proved to be a huge advantage not only for Burke but for Teegan as well because a typical 3D printed heart would have only given Burke an image of the baby's heart. Using the Google Cardboard, he saw that Teegan's heart wasn't only in bad shape, it was also located farther to the left of her chest and that would have forced him to perform a clamshell incision on her.

"It's massive trauma to a baby -- it's just horrendous," he commented.

Using what he saw through the VR imaging, Burke was able to perform the incision on the proper area and spare the already weakened infant the trauma.

"It was the first time I've ever touched Google Cardboard... [it] gave a whole new perspective to this baby's heart," he said. Since he also saw Teegan's heart in detail, Muniz was able to determine what he could do by looking at every angle. By the time Teegan made it to the operating table on Dec.10, he was well-prepared and there was no longer an element of surprise. "Sometimes that's what makes the difference between life and death," he concluded.

The operation was precise and the doctors didn't waste even a single minute during the seven-hour surgery. They also wanted to do their best for the baby whose willpower to live never waned.

As for Teegan, she is continuing on the path to recovery and is expected to leave the hospital by mid-January.

"It was mind-blowing... To see this little cardboard box and a phone, and to think this is what saved our daughter's life," Cassidy Lexcen, Teegan's mother, said.

"Experience virtual reality in a simple, fun, and affordable way," Google said of its cardboard viewer. Now they can add "save lives" in the description. You can check out the range of Google Cardboard certified viewers from the Google Cardboard website. You can also choose among different VR applications from Google Play.

 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Scientists have created a new state of hydrogen. Meet what is likely a completely new phase of matter: phase V hydrogen, which researchers revealed through crushing Earths lightest element with so much pressure that it assumed a never-before-seen solid crystalline form.

This phase may just be a step closer to metallic hydrogen, which in the 1930s was first proposed and believed to lead to ultra-efficient computer devices and other breakthroughs.

University of Edinburgh doctoral student Philip Dalladay-Simpson and his colleagues Ross T. Howie and Eugene Gregoryanz conducted the study and detailed their findings in the journal Nature published on Jan. 7.

Hydrogen, typically in gas form on Earth, can turn solid when cooled to certain low temperatures, but turns into a metal once it solidifies. Jupiter is believed to be largely made of this, such that this hydrogen crushed at extremely high pressures is considered a peek into the inner atmosphere of the giant planet.

Creation Of Phase V Hydrogen

"This paper does not claim a metallic state, but claims that it is a precursor to the metallic state, clarified co-author Howie, citing the similarities between what they saw in their experiment and what is forecasted theoretically for a solid metallic hydrogen state.

The team used a two-diamond anvil setup, where the gems were placed opposite each other and a small amount of hydrogen was placed between them for compression. They then pumped up the pressure to 384 gigapascals or 55 million pounds per square inch (psi).

To illustrate this extremely high pressure, Earths atmosphere is 100 kilopascals (15 psi) at sea level, while on Jupiter the atmosphere weighs 29 million psi at around 10,000 miles below tops of the clouds. This is where hydrogen is suggested to be in a liquid metal state.

In the experiment, when the pressure reached 325 gigapascals (47 million psi), the hydrogen turned solid and for the first time the elemental form was nearly at room temperature, according to the researchers. So, in the process of trying to create metallic hydrogen, they were able to come up with a new phase of the element.

Dalladay-Simpson said the hydrogen state was created at much higher pressures and temperatures than previous research. "When we use pressure we force the molecules to interact," he explained, adding that this pressure then leads H2 bonds to begin breaking.

A Step Away From Metallic Hydrogen?

The team tested the phase V hydrogen by firing a laser at it, observing the changes in the light's wavelength.

This signaled the new structure of the material, which the researchers could not confirm as a metal just yet. They could not test the conductivity because the space between the diamond anvils was so tiny that electrodes for testing would hardly fit, the authors explained.

To make sure the element took on a metallic state without testing conductivity, the researchers would have to increase the pressure even more, at 450 gigapascals at most, but such might shatter the diamond anvils.

The researchers hope to raise the pressures and test the limits of the anvils in future studies.

Paving The Way For Next-Gen Computers, Super Fuel

Movement in the fluid state of metallic hydrogen in Jupiter is considered the likely source of the planets massive magnetic field, and NASA's Juno probe will be exploring that possibility when it arrives at the planet this year. The spacecraft is expected to arrive in Jupiter on July 4 after a five-year journey.

Fascination surrounds metallic hydrogen not only because it may account for a majority of the internal composition of Jupiter and other planets, but also because this state of hydrogen could herald a new kind of zero-resistance conduction. A material that can offer infinite electrical conductivity will certainly boost the performance of next-generation computers.

"It's been predicted that metallic hydrogen could be a room-temperature superconductor, which is still yet to be achieved with any material," Howie said in a different interview.

Metallic hydrogen is also predicted to lead to the creation of a super fuel, which can generate significantly greater thrust than the standard hydrogen used in rockets today.

Howie said, however, that the practical applications may not be clear at this point because they are working with small quantities.

Back in 2011, scientists at Germanys Max Planck Institute for Chemistry claimed to have created metallic hydrogen, but never really confirmed it and they received scrutiny and criticism from other scientists.

 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
With agriculture in developed nations predicted to be hit harder by droughts due to climate change, is it time for Western farmers to borrow a technique or two from their counterparts in poorer nations?

New research of a team from the University of British Columbia (UBC) and McGill University assessed the link between weather-related disasters and food production and warned that nations with sophisticated farming methods were more prone to droughts and heat waves than nations that are less advanced. Farming systems in the former are highly uniform across massive lands and can be hit by a domino effect, while those in the latter are composed of small fields with diverse crops.

If a drought hits, some of those crops may be damaged, but others may survive, explained study first author Corey Lesk from McGill University.

Think Differently, Western Farmers Told

Senior author Navin Ramankutty, global food security and sustainability professor at UBC, noted a big surprise in their findings: a glaring gap in farm yields between developed and developing nations.

Droughts in affluent Europe, North America and Australia slash yields by 20 percent on average. In contrast, the weather event did the same in Asia by over 12 percent and in Africa by about 9 percent.

The data showed an 8 to 11 percent more damage from drought to crops in countries that are well-off.

Then what do Western farmers need to do? Experts urge them to start thinking differently.

One way is to avoid intensively cultivated areas farmed for a single crop. Ramankutty said that while such model works well in stable climates, it will not fare well in extreme weather situations.

Maybe their yields are lower but theyre not as susceptible to weather shocks, Ramankutty advised.

He recommended tending smaller fields with a diverse number of crops, particularly during dry spells and climate-related contexts when industrial-scale farming wont be the best option.

In non-drought seasons, however, Western farmers may return to farming for profit by strategizing more toward maximum yields than minimal risks.

Serious Implications

Wheat, maize and rice, the main cereal crops, are about half of the worlds calorie sources. When drought hits parts of the Western hemisphere, catastrophic events such as supply shortages and various instabilities are predicted to occur.

In the last eight years, drought in the United States, Australia and Russia have led to major price hikes in wheat, rice and corn.

Ramankutty cited the 2008 food crisis. [T]here were simultaneous production losses in the former Soviet Union, Argentina and Australia, and there were major price shocks, he recalled.

Rising food prices in countries such as Egypt and Haiti resulted in riots and political turmoil, while rice shortages and ballooning prices prompted export bans in countries such as Japan, India and Brazil.

According to the United Nations, there will likely be a 30 percent population rise before 2050, which will bring in 10 billion more people to be fed.

Nevertheless, there is time for adaptation. The researchers assured that there are agricultural priorities and strategies that can better protect farming systems and their dependent populations.

Photo: Matthias Ripp | Flickr

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In one of the first operations of its kind in Europe, Romanian police have taken down an ATM gang suspected of using the Tyupkin ATM malware to harvest cash from ATMs.

The suspects allegedly used the Tyupkin ATM malware to trick machines into shelling out their cash. We first reported on the Tyupkin malware back in October 2015, when it was spreading across Asia, Latin America and Europe.

At the time, Kaspersky reported that cyberattacks have greatly increased in frequency in recent years, especially when it comes to ATM attacks. Kaspersky advised banks to upgrade the locks the manufacturer provided on the ATMs, as well as change the default password in the basic input-output systems within the machine, install alarms and update their antivirus protection.

The ATM malware scheme has now come to a turning point in Europe, following a successful European joint effort.

In a rare EU-wide operation, Romanian cops raided multiple houses across their own turf and the neighboring Republic of Moldova, resulting in the arrest of eight individuals. According to police, the culprits used the Tyupkin ATM malware to hack ATMs in Europe and steal cash.

EU-wide law enforcement agencies such as Europol and Eurojust assisted Romanian police in the disruptive cybercrime operation. It remains unclear at this point just how much the cyber-robbers were able to steal with this complex fraud scheme.

Europol said this "Jackpotting" scheme, conducted by a criminal gang of Moldovan and Romanian citizens, caused "substantial losses" to the ATM industry in Europe.

"ATM 'Jackpotting' refers to the use of a Trojan horse, physically launched via an executable file in order to target an ATM, thus allowing the attackers to empty the ATM cash cassettes via direct manipulation, using the ATM PIN pad to submit commands to the Trojan," explains Europol.

Malware ATM attacks have been steadily gaining ground since 2010 and are now beginning to spread globally, with Western European banks facing serious threats.

Wil van Gemert, deputy director of operations at Europol's European Cybercrime Centre (EC3), points out that ATM attacks that rely on malicious software have seen an alarming increase over the past few years.

Such carefully orchestrated schemes have a complex cybercrime aspect, according to Gemert, perfectly illustrating how criminals are always finding new means of evolving their methods and committing more sophisticated crimes.

Europol's EC3 hosted several international operational meetings to assist European police forces and analyzed intelligence to further help with the investigation. The entire operation was a collaborative international effort, marking an important milestone in countering this dangerous malware.

"To match these new technologically savvy criminals, it is essential, as it was done in this case, that law enforcement agencies cooperate with their counterparts via Europol to share information and collaborate on transnational investigations," Gemert adds.

ATM malware and logical attacks pose a severe threat, and Europol's EC3 has outlined new security guidelines to handle this new type of ATM cyber threat. This document is the first of its kind, made in collaboration with the European ATM Security Team (EAST).

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While devices are becoming more connected, because of that connectivity, they're also getting a lot smarter.

A new device called Prizm has been announced that plays music based on not only the user's music habits, but also on for whom it is playing.

The device basically uses signals from phones to determine who's in the room, then uses the music services that person plays most often to create a playlist for its audience.

The device is pretty compact and stylish, and it won't look too out of place sitting near a set of speakers. It has a few buttons, including a play/pause button and volume buttons, alongside a "like" and "next" button.

The "like" and "next" (or basically "dislike") buttons are what power the device's intelligence, and that information will educate the device as it tries to get to know your music tastes. It can also be linked to services like Spotify, Deezer or SoundCloud through the Prizm app, which will let the device tap into the user's existing library.

The device will need to be placed in a location in the room where it can detect Wi-Fi signals, but also where the user can easily access it for when they need to press the buttons.

Once the device connects to your smartphone, it will seek out the kinds of music you listen to on services like Spotify. If it's just you in the room, then most of the music will be music that you would have listened to anyway, but if a friend walks in, for example, music that he or she would listen to is put into the mix.

So, how is it able to tell who's in the room? Well, the device is able to detect Wi-Fi signals and matches them up with signals that were previously detected.

The Prizm will be sold on an invite-only basis for 149 euros, or around $162. The first patch is set to be sent out in "early 2016," according to the Prizm website.

Via: Slashgear

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A new year signifies new beginnings. People usually keep up with their resolutions at least until the year's first half until it starts to naturally and slowly dwindle. For London, its aim to combat air pollution officially abated eight days into the new year as it breached the European Union's annual air pollution limit.

On Friday, Jan.8, London's main air quality control showed that Putney High Street in West London surpassed its annual limits for nitrogen dioxide (NO2), which is a toxic substance produced by diesel-powered vehicles.

London's NO2 Situation

According to EU, each location is only allowed to have an hourly limit of 200 micrograms of NO2 per cubic meter of air 18 times a year. Putney reached its 19th on 7 a.m., Friday.

"It is breathtaking that toxic air pollution in London has breached the legal limit for a whole year within a few days," says Clean Air's director Simon Birkett.

For Andrew Grieve, an air quality analyst from King's College London, the early breach was not extraordinary. Compared to data from previous years, the discrepancies are not that wide.

"It's just [that] central London, and London as a whole, have a really huge problem with NO2.," says Grieve. He added that the recent breach is a testament of how huge the problem is.

Government To Blame

ClientEarth's lawyer Alan Andrews calls the government's failure to deal with illegal levels of air a "scandal."

Five years have passed since the country has breached EU's pollution limits, and ClientEarth filed a lawsuit against the government for this. In November 2014, EU's top court ordered Britain to hasten their actions against air pollution.

The supreme court has ordered the government to create an action plan that will address the issue. While the plan was published in December 2015, certain cities like London, Leeds, Birmingham, Liverpool, Edinburgh and Cardiff are still expected to breach the limits for another five years.

The lawyers dub the government's response to the issue as "arrogant," particularly after it has released the air quality control plan. They also think that the plans fall short and that London residents still have to suffer another 10 years of choking hazards if the government will not implement big actions.

In December 2015, Andrews said his group would take the issue back to court. For the time being, they will await the response of the mayoral candidates and see how they will handle the situation.

"Warm words and empty rhetoric won't save lives," he says.

The recent report could have gotten worse as some other roads also have similar situations, but those areas do not have monitoring apparatuses.

Oxford Street also breached the limit in 2015 after just two days. The area may have reached the limit too but incidentally, the monitoring system had malfunctioned.

Photo: Louise Ireland | Flickr

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A new study found that blocking the brain's formation of new immune cells can decrease memory problems which are seen in patients with Alzheimer's disease. The findings strengthen growing evidence that brain inflammation is the main driver of Alzheimer's disease, and can lead to novel treatments.

Researchers from the University of Southampton stopped the brain's production of microglia cells (immune cells) in test mice. The current drugs used in dementia treatment attack the amyloid plaques, which are the protein build-ups in the brain and one of the Alzheimer's disease hallmarks.

The current study proved that attacking the build-up of microglia cells could also stop the disease's progression. The study was published in the Brain journal on Jan. 8.

The research team led by Dr. Diego Gomez-Nicola found an increased rate in the accumulation of microglia cells in the autopsied brains of Alzheimer's patients. In the lab tests, the mice were given a drug that stop the function of the CSF1R, the brain receptor responsible for the surge of microglia cells.

The mice given the drug had less behavioral and memory issues. Communication between nerve cells is compromised in the brains of Alzheimer's patients. The drug used in the study was able to prevent the communication loss in the brains of test mice.

University of Reading's Dr. Mark Dallas commented on the "exciting discovery" and said it could explain why Alzheimer's disease drugs have been unsuccessful so far.

"While this basic science research provides strong evidence, the challenge will now be to develop medicines for people with dementia, so we await the development of clinical treatments with interest," said Dallas, Reading's cellular and molecular neuroscience lecturer who was not involved in the study.

Notably, Alzheimer's Society director Dr. Doug Brown found the findings "encouraging." Brown added that there has been no new dementia drug in over 10 years. The population is fast aging, making the need for a new treatment to prevent and stop the disease's progress more crucial.

Systems Immunity University Research Institute director Paul Morgan from Cardiff University also praised the new research. The results showed a real possibility in targeting the CSFR1 function to halt dementia among patients with early signs of Alzheimer's disease.

At present, there are already drugs capable of targeting CSFR1 function but are used for other medical applications. A new Alzheimer's drug could be achieved far quicker compared to developing an entirely new drug from scratch.

Photo: Vince Alongi | Flickr

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Apple Buys Artificial-Intelligence Startup Emotient That Reads Peoples Emotions

According to a report from the Wall Street Journal, Apple has acquired Emotient, a San Diego artificial intelligence (AI) technology startup that reads peoples emotions by interpreting their facial expressions.

Basically, the AI technology used by Emotient read the emotions on the faces of people, mainly for advertising and marketing purposes, such as measuring a customers response to ads and products. It adds to a growing string of artificial intelligence technology purchases Apple has made over the years.

A spokesperson for the Cupertino-based tech giant confirmed the acquisition with the standard statement that Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we do not discuss our purpose or plans. The spokesperson declined to provide further information regarding the transaction.

Apple is interested in the field of artificial intelligence. In September, it was reported that the tech giant increased its efforts in hiring AI experts, mainly in machine learning to help develop smarter phones.

In October, Apple confirmed that it had acquired another artificial-intelligence startup, VocalIQ Ltd., a company working on voice-recognition tech that can interpret dialogue and natural language. It was purchased for a sum of between $50 million and $100 million dollars, according to Britains Business Weekly.

In a 2014 patent application, it described a software system that would analyse and identify peoples moods based on a variety of clues, including facial expression.

With fewer than 50 employees according to its LinkedIn profile, Emotient had raised about $8m from investors including Intel Capital. Its early customers included marketers and retailers that wanted to understand how consumers were responding to their products. However, according to people familiar with the situation said that the startup was trying to look for a new round of financing from venture capital firms but failed to secure favourable terms. Last year, it released a Google Glass app that could be worn by salespeople, for training and to analyse customer reaction in real time.

In May, Emotient announced that it had been granted a patent for a method of collecting and labelling as many as 100,000 facial images a day. The process allows computers to identify different facial expressions better.

In its website, Emotion claims to a leader in emotion detection and sentiment analysis based on facial expressions. Its cloud-based services provide a direct measurement of a customers unfiltered response to ads, content, products, customer service or sales interactions.

Emotient had also suggested its technology might be useful in education or even medical diagnosis. However, Apple often makes technology-focused acquisitions that end up being used in entirely different applications to when the company was independent.

Where there is no clarity as to why Apple acquired Emotient, which mostly sold its software to advertisers, the company has made some other recent acquisitions that are likely complementary. Faceshift, a Swiss company that develops real-time facial motion capture technology, and Perceptio, a company with deep-learning image recognition technology designed for mobile processors, are now also under Apples umbrella.
Riot police broke up far-right protesters in Cologne on Saturday as they marched against Germany's open-door migration policy after asylum seekers were identified as suspects in mass assaults on women on New Year's Eve.

The attacks, ranging from sexual molestation to theft, shocked Germany, which took in 1.1 million migrants and refugees in 2015 under asylum laws championed by Chancellor Angela Merkel, despite fervent opposition.

Shortly before Saturday's protest began, Merkel hardened her stance toward refugees, promising expulsion for criminals and a longer-term reduction in refugee numbers to Germany.

Police said around 1,700 people attended the rally organized by the far-right anti-Islam PEGIDA movement, which has seized on the alleged involvement of refugees in the New Year attacks in Cologne as proof Merkel's policy is flawed.

Demonstrators, some of whom bore tattoos with far-right symbols such as a skull in a German soldier's helmet, had chanted "Merkel must go" and "this is the march of the national resistance". "Rapefugees not welcome," one banner read.

A police spokesman said roughly half of those at the PEGIDA protest were from the 'hooligan scene'. Some in the crowd threw bottles and firecrackers at officers, and riot police used water cannons to disperse the protesters.

Two people were injured in the clash, and police detained a number of demonstrators.

PEGIDA, or Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West, almost fizzled out last year when its leader resigned after a photo was published of him posing as Adolf Hitler.

But its ranks have swelled as resentment spread of Merkel's welcoming stance to refugees.

In all, about 1,700 police officers were on the streets of Cologne, dwarfing the number on duty during the chaotic scenes of New Year's Eve when at least 120 women were robbed or sexually molested.

"The events on New Year's Eve led to a lot of emotion," said a police spokesman. "We had feared that emotions would boil over."

About 1,300 people attended a rival left-wing protest in Cologne, according to police.

"No means no. Keep away from our bodies," read one sign held by one of the demonstrators, most of them women.

Chancellor Merkel's remarks on Saturday were in stark contrast to her earlier optimism about the influx to Germany, which has taken in far more refugees than any other European country.

Her 'we can do it' slogan irritated many Germans, uneasy about the mass arrivals.

"The right to asylum can be lost if someone is convicted, on probation or jailed," Merkel said after a meeting of the leadership of her Christian Democrats party that was overshadowed by the attacks in Cologne and other cities.

"Serial offenders who repeatedly rob or repeatedly affront women must feel the full force of the law," Merkel told journalists in Mainz.

Under German law, asylum seekers are now typically only deported if they have been sentenced to at least three years in prison, and providing their lives are not at risk at home.

Merkel's conservative party said it wanted to reduce and control migration to Germany, and send those who had been refused asylum home promptly. Such a move would require a change to German law.

"Cologne changed everything," Volker Bouffier, one of the conservative party's most senior members, told the meeting, according to people present.

Earlier in the week, German federal police said they had identified 32 people who were suspected of playing a role in the attacks on women on Cologne, 22 of whom were in the process of seeking asylum in Germany.

They documented 76 criminal acts, most of them involving some form of theft, and seven linked to sexual molestation.

Of the suspects, nine were Algerian, eight Moroccan, five Iranian and four Syrian. Three German citizens, an Iraqi, a Serb and a U.S. citizen were also identified.

Similar assaults happened in other cities such as Frankfurt.

Reuters
Why dont these phone scams ever go away? Why do new variations consistently emerge to bedevil honest people, with tempting get-rich-quick schemes or ploys designed to scare us into submission?

Heres the reason why: Because they work.

For example, consider the Internal Revenue Service phone scam, currently making the rounds in Albany and Linn County. Dozens, if not hundreds, of people in the county have received this call over the last week or so; we know this because many of them have done the correct thing and reported the calls to the Albany Police Department or the Linn County Sheriffs Office.

Heres how this particular scam works (and this is worth paying attention to, because this general framework also is used in a variety of related scams): You get a phone call or text message on your smartphone. Its a recorded message that says the IRS has filed a lawsuit against you and has issued a warrant for your arrest.

Thats bad news, of course, and it gets worse: Agents are on their way to your house and expect to arrive within 20 minutes.

It seems that the only way you can avoid incarceration is to send the callers some money right now, preferably through a pre-paid debit card that can be purchased at a local store.

In the cold black-and-white of print, of course, this seems ludicrous: You know thats not the way the IRS works. You know its always a bad idea to send money to someone whos calling you out of the blue.

But, over the telephone, this scam can have a scary intensity, and many times, the scammer has the technological wherewithal to make it appear on your caller ID as if the call is coming from the IRS or some other official agency.

And the bottom line is that this scam is effective at prying money out of unsuspecting marks: In 2014, according to the Oregon Department of Justice, the IRS con cost state residents more than $77,000; the biggest single loss was $15,000. Thats a lot of hard-earned cash. Your hard-earned cash.

While the IRS scam is a favorite of these despicable con artists, they have other tools in their arsenal. Some of them  such as the startlingly effective scam in which a grandchild calls an elderly residents to report that theyre in trouble and need cash now play off our deepest desires to help. Some of these scams, of course, play off our fears  and who isnt going to pay extra attention when someone who says theyre with the IRS is on the phone? Some of them appeal to our desires: Who doesnt want to get something for nothing?

The best defense against all of them is a healthy dose of skepticism. If something doesnt seem right, hang up right then and there. Your very next call should be to your local law enforcement agency, or the Oregon Department of Justice, which has devoted a division to battling exactly this sort of scam.

These scam artists wont go away until their schemes stop paying off. The first line of defense is you. (mm)
Forceps helped bring Cristin Taylor's first child into the world, a joy that outweighed the pain of the fourth-degree tear Taylor suffered in her perineum during the birth. The wounds closed, but Taylor still struggled with urinary incontinence. She'd leak when she ran, coughed or brushed her teeth.

A decade-long battle with her bladder raged through Kegel exercises, the birth of another daughter and physical therapy (not with a pelvic floor specialist). Taylor resorted to surgery to insert mesh support, in hopes of correcting what had been diagnosed as a tilt in her bladder neck. After six weeks of recovery, the incontinence continued  now accompanied by numbness that dulled her sex life. "It was like a foot that had fallen asleep."

In 2011 Taylor and a friend tried a new fitness class at a gym near her home in Satellite Beach, Fla. Called Fluidity, the class uses an adjustable-height barre to strengthen all muscle groups but particularly the lowest and innermost structures of the core, what Fluidity founder Michelle Austin calls "the inner unit."

"Michelle talked a lot about the pelvic floor and alignment awareness," Taylor said. "They had three classes a week, and I came every time I could. Within six months, I was noticing huge changes in my life, including a wonderful, more connected sex life with my husband."

Women like Taylor were the original target for Austin's Fluidity regimen, which has been taught at gyms and rehabilitation centers around the country for over a decade. But in the last year Fluidity has been noticed and recommended by Microgate USA, a company that specializes in movement analytics to help everyone from professional athletes to the elderly and Parkinson's patients.

Anyone can benefit from the regimen, Austin said, which revolves around a barre with a backboard that rises from the floor. The ability to adjust the Fluidity barre to hip height is key, Austin said, because it reduces the tendency to perform exercises in a posterior tilt, which compromises alignment and effectiveness of some barre workouts.

Fluidity's goal: to correct pelvic instability that can contribute to chronic complaints such as incontinence, back pain, sexual dysfunction and loss of balance as we age.

The concept emerged from Austin's resolve to rehabilitate herself after cancer and a full hysterectomy at age 42, combined with her training in the Lotte Berk barre method, which Austin taught in the 1990s in New York City.

"In hysterectomies, they're taking out an organ, if not several, and there's no rehab," Austin said. "It's ridiculous."

Fluidity classes now are held at rehabilitation centers and gyms around the country. An at-home counterpart includes a collapsible barre, DVDs, mat, ball and bands.

Silent suffering

The pelvic-floor muscles often become dysfunctional after childbirth, gynecological surgery, illness such as urinary tract infections, or just from disuse, says Cindy Neville, a physical therapist specializing in women's health who is on clinical faculty at the University of Northern Florida.

That dysfunction can contribute to pelvic organ prolapse, where the vaginal walls or cervix drop, as well as incontinence, estimated to affect 30 to 40 percent of middle-aged women and 30 to 50 percent of elderly women.

Many women suffer in silence. If they seek treatment, doctors sometimes recommend a surgery like Taylor's. Of the 400,000 pelvic floor surgeries annually in the U.S., 120,000 of those are repeats, Neville said, suggesting that surgery isn't solving the problem.

"But people are afraid to talk about the pelvic floor muscles; it's like breast cancer 20 years ago; to say the word breast was almost pornographic in our culture," she said.

Neville recommends Fluidity to some of her patients.

"In Fluidity there's not an emphasis on bending forward or rounding forward, it's more balanced with the front and back of the body, versus always being the front of the body, which so many things focus on," Neville said. "The neutral pelvis and engaging the deep core, including the pelvic floor, are very effective."

Peter Gorman, the president of Microgate USA, who holds several patents on heart rate monitors, met Austin at a deli counter in Florida over Thanksgiving in 2014.

"I didn't know what Fluidity was, but she and I were speaking the same language," he said. "As you lose integrity in your core, especially your inner core, things happen; you can get physiological changes from anatomical deficiency."

He was curious enough about her method to observe her Fluidity class, where Austin guided participants into what she calls the "neutral pelvis" position: Wrap thumb and index finger around the right hip and around the left hip and tilt the pelvis all the way forward and all the way back. When you find the position where the wrist feels relaxed between those two places, that's neutral pelvis.

In that position, the muscles can contract and relax more effectively to not just tone the body but re-establish the stability of the inner core and pelvic floor.

Gorman thinks the Fluidity regimen has applications beyond fixing incontinence, which he views as an early warning sign for problems that become life-threatening as we age.

"As we march through life, we lose our balance control," Gorman said. "The average 53-year-old should be able to stand on one leg with eyes closed for 15 seconds. If she can't, she's at a higher risk (of deadly falls). So, what if we put her in a program where besides just feeling good and losing some pounds  hey, let's all go to Ipanema together!  but also, her balance, timing and coordination improved? By doing that she's basically learned to grow younger."

A year after starting Fluidity, Taylor visited a cranial sacral therapist who evaluated her muscle control.

"She reported I have 360 degrees of strength in my pelvic floor, which to her was phenomenal, regardless of what I recovered from," Taylor said.

Fluidity isn't a cheap or instant cure, she noted. When she is busy and goes on hiatus from her Fluidity workouts, she notices her bladder control starts to lapse. It's one reason she invested in the barre system for her home.

"I feel like I have this tool," Taylor said, "and I can always heal myself."
Argentina also wishes to join the BRICS since this international forum offers a cooperation alternative that benefits all its members. | Read More
In the later part of last week, we got several bits of information that indicated that INFLATION PANIC seems overblown. The first item I want to notice is ...

1 day ago
Shabbir Ali asks KCR to disclose donors' names for Yagnam

Hyderabad, Jan 9 (INN): Leader of Opposition in Telangana State Legislative Council Mohammed Ali Shabbir on Saturday asked Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao to disclose the names of people who donated money for Ayutha Maha Chandi Yagnam and recent publicity drive for Telangana Rashtra Samithi.



Addressing a press conference at Gandhi Bhavan, Shabbir Ali said that the Chief Minister himself claimed that he was in receipt of nearly Rs. 7.5 crore donations for the Yagnam. He must reveal the entire list of donors. Further, KCR should also reveal the list of people who provided funds for massive publicity campaign in Greater Hyderabad by engaging thousands of hoardings and flexis. "KCR must clarify whether he accepted those donations in the capacity of Chief Minister or the TRS President. Who is donating so much of funds to KCR and Why?" he asked while adding that TRS party's revenues have increased manifold compared to Telangana Government's revenues.



Shabbir Ali said KCR should disclose the details before the GHMC elections. "He can also furnish those details before the Income Tax Department. We will get a copy by filing an RTI application," he said while demanding that the Chief Minister learn to act in a transparent manner. He alleged that the Chief Minister was hit with publicity-mania. "He wants his hoardings and pictures everywhere. Even public toilets were not spared," he said.



The Congress leader also slammed MIM president Asaduddin Owaisi and asked him to reveal the sources of income that enabled his party to take up publicity campaign. "MIM leaders collect donations to organise public meeting Jalsa-e-Rahmatul Lil Aalameen on the occasion of birth anniversary of Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) every year. They have no money to spend in the name of Prophet Mohammed (PBUH). But they have crores of rupees to spend on publicity campaigns. Asaduddin Owaisi must reveal how he organised funds to hire so many hoardings across the city," he demanded.



KCR, Asaduddin Owaisi had hurt Muslim community



Shabbir Ali accused KCR and Asaduddin Owaisi of hurting the sentiments of Muslims through one of their hoardings. Showing the pictures of a hoarding at Lakdi-ka-pul, he said that TRS and MIM hoardings have been installed in such a manner that KCR's feet is on the head of Asaduddin Owaisi. "Through this hoarding, KCR is apparently trying to convey that the entire Muslim community was beneath his feet. Asaduddin Owaisi has a beard and wears a topi. Therefore, this hoarding was installed only to hurt the community's sentiment. Both KCR and Asaduddin Owaisi should apologise with the entire community for this act," he demanded.









News Posted: 9 January, 2016








GNR officer asked.

"I flew into Paris. They didn't stamp my passport." I replied.

"That's impossible! They must stamp your passport!"

"No, they really don't stamp my passport. In fact, I've never had my passport stamped when I've entered France."

"That's strange because we do. You're coming with us. We have to check."

The Portuguese men who had picked me up were free to go but I had to go to the station. To their credit, they didn't assault me nor did they even use handcuffs. I got into the backseat and we drove back to Vila Nova de Milfontes. Observing the two officers I realized that they were Portuguese and that this was not going to be a very difficult situation. Moreoever, I was certain that a provincial police outpost in Portugal would be unable to get in touch with Paris and verify when I had arrived or not. More importantly, it was true that the Immigration police at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris did not stamp USA passports. I knew this fact personally. As much as the electronic concentration camp has been erected, it's not complete and there are plenty of loopholes to take advantage of, if you know of them and are quick enough to exploit them.

Still, Portugal was for nearly 50 years a fascist dictatorship. Old habits are hard to break. Still compared to my encounters with the Spanish police, the Portuguese police were more laid back. At the station went the following scene.

"OK. Tell me how you got here. Where did you come from? Where did you land? How did you get here?"

"I arrived in Paris May. I then flew to Vienna...."

"Why did you go to Vienna. What did you do in Vienna?"

"I had a Spoken Word performance. I am a poet and performed it in Vienna."

"OK, ok. From Vienna how did you get here?"

"From Vienna I went to Bratislava. From Bratislava I flew to Malaga, Spain. I then went along the coast of Andalusia. I then took the ferry from Ayamonte to Vila Real."

"When was that?"

"In late June. I still have the Ferry receipt. That has the date on it.

"Ferry ticket is not a valid proof of entry."

They then made me wait. Instinctively I knew that they were going to let me go. A year prior I had overcome my fear of the police in Austria. I took the book Moby Dick and quietly led. To my astonishment they even went to the FBI website to see if I was wanted. My reading pleasure was rudely interrupted by the following nonsense.

"Oh!" The same officer exclaimed. "You're wanted by the FBI!"

I looked up from my book and glared at him with an expression of bored contempt. "No I'm not. I'm not wanted by the FBI." I answered with an air of certainty the way a cruel adult smashes the creative fancy of a child with a large imagination.

"Oh yes you are. You're wanted by the FBI! Come and look!"

I stood up and looked at the screen. There was a mugshot of a random Black man who simply had a similar skin complexion to mine. I couldn't hide my disgust. I sucked my teeth, gave a dismissive gesture of my hand and then sat back down. The two officers chuckled and giggled to each other. It was clear that these cops were bored out of their mind and I was their object of amusement to help make the clock move faster in the tropical summer heat.

The other officer was searching for me on Facebook. He was disappointed that there wasn't a trace of me on it. This vindicated my refusal to go on Faceless Book and to generally avoid Soulless Media. It also made me realize how the masses have been suckered to give up their privacy. The authorities have access to whatever people place on the web.

I noticed that both officers had cigarettes. I had a craving for nicotine and asked if they could give me a cigarette.

"Do you like Portuguese or American cigarettes?"

"I like Portuguese." I replied

"In that case, I will give you American cigarettes". He offered me Marlboro. "You have to step just outside this office door in the courtyard."

"I'll keep in sight. Don't worry, I won't run away." I replied facetiously.

"If you do...", he rapped his knuckles on the window to this office door to a sticker which read:

WARNING

Trespassers will be shot.

Survivors will be shot again.

I definitely got the message. The officers announced that they had contacted the FBI in Washington, DC and were waiting for a reply to see if I was clear for release. I was shaken that the authorities in Portugal would actually run a background check on me with the FBI. Naturally the check came up empty. I was released. By the next day I had managed to make it to Lagos instead of Sagres.

The three case studies written above are simply a drop in the bucket that I've had in the entirety of my world adventures.





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By Der Kosmonaut9 January 2016Over the past decade I have been to 18 countries. Within that decade I have lived in 5 countries. Within those travels I have trekked to opposite extremes. The two opposite extremes were Seattle and Serbia as each are incomprehensible to one another in extremis. The countless impressions obtained over the past 10 years are intensely vivid and graphically emotional. All this IS underscored By the fact that I was a stranger through most of it. I was the quintessential outsider both observing and participating. Each new destination, be it a country, city, state, town or village manifested into an unknown and mostly unexpected experience. I have two travel tales from Europe to share. The first was during an attempt to hitchhike from Budapest to Vienna. The second was when I attempted to hitchhike south along the west coast of Portugal.The first intense experience was when I attempted to hitchhike from Budapest to Vienna after an 8 hour overnight train from Belgrade. Though I began my attempt at the crack of dawn, it would take 8 hours before anyone would give me a lift. I did get a lift taking me no further 25 kilometers outside of Budapest. I was dropped off at a truck rest lot next a travelers hotel, which as I observed on this particular day, was mostly used by couples to have sex. For another 3 hours I was stuck in the middle of Hungary. Truckers refused to pick me up. Sunset was underway and soon night would fall. It was January. I knew that I was doomed. A Czech van driver who had parked to talk on his cell phone noticed that I needed help. He was headed to Brno via Slovakia. He gave me a lift to Bratislava, Slovakia. I took a public bus to the rail station. I inquired about train tickets to Vienna. That cost 10 Euro. I then asked about the price to Marchegg on the Austrian side of the border. That was 5 Euro. I didn't have one Euro on me but exhausted and determined to reach my bed in Vienna, I manufactured 5 Euro by playing the lost American tourist who needed help getting to Vienna, where my plane back to America was waiting for me. The train conductor inspected all tickets as the rush hour train was packed before we reached the Austrian border. The train stopped at Marchegg. I stayed on. Just as I had suspected, there were no further ticket inspections. I stayed on through Vienna getting off at Stadlau which had a U-Bahn connection straight to my place.There were my long distance hikes in Andalusia, Spain and in Portugal . In the latter country, I had a serious encounter with the Republican National Guard (GNR), which is that country's national military police for domestic repression. A couple of days before I had attended the World Music Festival in Sines. At that festival I got to see Shangaan Electro for the first time. It was one of four concerts which I have seen which made my jaw drop. (The others include Nitzer Ebb (1990), Laibach (1992), Kraftwerk (1998). After the festival I decided to head back south to Algarve. My only choice was to hitch from Sines down to Sagres.I was able to get a lift from Sines to Vila Nova de Milfontes. I spent the night on the sand dunes of that town. The next morning I attempted to hitch and for 6 hours had no luck. At one point a car pulled up and some men stepped out. One of them recognized me from the festival in Sines. He told me that he and his friends were heading to another festival in Porto das Barcas and that I was invited to join them. I readily agreed as I was fed up of waiting 6 hours for a lift and I was feeling a bit lonely and was keen to meet new people. I got into the backseat and we were off. We went about 75 meters crossing the bridge over the Rio Mira when a wailing siren and flashing blue lights came from behind. The driver of our vehicle pulled over. Two plainclothes men came to the car. Each of them went to both sides. They violently opened the doors and snatched the driver and front seat passenger out of the car. They were slammed against the car and were roughly searched. They the officers yanked both passengers sitting on each of me out of the car and searched them. Finally I was snatched out, thrown against the car and searched. They went through my backpack and found a recently expired passport."Are you from New York?", one asked.I replied in the affirmative."Where's your passport?"I handed them my passport. They searched through it and noticed that there weren't any entry stamps. The reason for that was that two months earlier I had obtained a new passport in Austria. However since it was new, it didn't have any entry or exit stamps. I was aware that this could be a problem. For a new stamp I would need to leave the European Union and then return for a new entry stamp. I thought about going to Serbia which is not in the EU. However, after my last adventure traveling from Serbia to Austria via Hungary, I decided it was worth the risk. Besides, if the authorities questioned the lack of an entry stamp, I had a lock solid alibi."How come your passport doesn't have a stamp?", the
Spin doctors, market researchers and advertising gurus are cleaning up from taxpayer-funded government advertising, reaping tens of millions of dollars before an ad even appears on televisions or in newspapers.

In some cases, three-quarters of the total bill for "public information campaigns" has gone towards the creative process.

But Labor's attempt to capitalise on the Turnbull government's latest wave of big-budget advertising has taken a hit after it was revealed the party spent more on ads during its time in power.
Pristina: Demonstrators in Kosovo fought running battles with police and briefly set fire to government headquarters on Saturday in the latest violence in the young Balkan country over an accord with its former ruler Serbia.

The seat of government in the capital Pristina caught fire after it came under a hail of petrol bombs. Firefighters quickly doused the blaze and police used tear gas to drive back several thousand opposition demonstrators.

Lawmakers move after opposition lawmakers in Kosovo threw a tear gas canister disrupting parliament's session, in the capital Pristina, last year. Credit:Visar Kryeziu

They were rallying against a deal brokered by the European Union to give Kosovo's ethnic Serb minority greater local powers and the possibility of financing from Belgrade.

Police pursued the protesters, who threw petrol bombs, stones and bottles and set light to an armoured police car.
The Ben & Jerry's Openair Cinemas kick off again in Canberra from January 14, with five weeks of screenings including new releases, classics, singalong sessions and even free icecream.

The event has again set up shop on the Patrick White Lawns, outside the National Library of Australia, where you can watch the sun set over Lake Burley Griffin.

The latest season of Ben & Jerry's Openair Cinemas in Canberra begins on January 14 at the Patrick White Lawns.

The films kick off on Thursday January 14 with recent blockbuster In The Heart of the Sea, which tells the true story that Moby Dick was based on.
Picture this. You're walking along a quiet road in the countryside at night, torch in hand, enjoying the serenity. You spy some tissues on the ground, so go to pick them up. Then you see a pair of undies. They are crawling with ants and, on closer inspection, it's clear that that's because they are covered in shit. Down the phone line from his home in West Sussex, David Sedaris tells me this is what he encountered on his walk earlier in the day. And it's not the first time this has happened  remarkably, this is his third such experience. "But the last time, the underpants belonged to a very, very fat man; these looked more like they would be worn by a teenager," Sedaris says.

It's what he calls "a headline story", which he will work on next morning. That means it's the most interesting snippet he's happened upon that day and will form the basis of one of his essays.

David Sedaris. Credit:Robert Banks

Sedaris is the master of turning an isolated event into an incredibly funny yarn; he has a remarkable talent for observation and humour. A regular contributor to The New Yorker and to National Public Radio in the US, he has published seven books, including five New York Times bestsellers.


"This is the fear, this is the dread, these are the contents of my head," Alan Cumming sings in Why by Annie Lennox, the opening number of his stripped back cabaret show. The title, Alan Cumming Sings Sappy Songs!, appears to be false advertising. Sure, the second song is Keane's Somewhere Only We Know, but somehow anything sung in a Scottish burr is disqualified from sappiness.

What is more striking about the songs is their strength of character, from Billy Joel's scarred veteran in Goodnight Saigon, to Stephen Sondheim's perfectly acerbic The Ladies Who Lunch, immortalised by Broadway great Elaine Stritch.

Cumming, who first made a name for himself as the MC in the musical Cabaret, has described his voice as "nice" rather than incredible, but he also knows that's not why people are here. What he has in spades is charm, talent, humour and a gobsmacking story, told in his book Not My Father's Son. It's currently at the top of The New York Times bestseller list after a pre-Christmas push from his publishers: as he gleefully notes, Americans apparently think a book about a violent father-son relationship makes the perfect gift. In this show, he only has time to tell a little of what he discovered a few years ago about his grandfather, and his father's toxic influence on his life. He also reveals his favourite Australian phrases with a perfect accent, does a snippet of Eli, his character from TV's The Good Wife, and talks up Lismore. "At least the theatre there had four walls and indoor plumbing!"

Cumming is accompanied by drums, cello and his musical director Lance Horne on piano and backing vocals. Late afternoon in the Spiegeltent at Hyde Park, long before the sun goes down, it's hard to create the kind of intimate space that best suits cabaret, as sirens blare, St Mary's bells dong and an improbably loud car stereo doofs. At one point, deciding the mood has dipped, Cumming promises he's going to pep things up with a hilarious showbiz anecdote. It's about condoms, it is indeed hilarious, and demonstrates his abilities and experience as a performer, not just to entertain, but to adjust on the turn of a heel and make sure we all enjoy ourselves, whether he's singing a French love song to a prostitute (sorry, still not sappy) or talking tattoos in private places.
Rebels outlaw motorcycle gang members are patching out of the bikie fraternity at a rate never seen before, police say, with claims Australia's biggest bikie club is in disarray.

The membership shake-up has been triggered by a combination of a leadership vacuum, tough anti-bikie laws and strict police enforcement.

A patched Rebels member who was among riders protesting bikie laws at Parliament House in Canberra in December 2014. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

In the Macarthur region alone, an area south of Sydney home to the group's national clubhouse, police believe up to 20 members have either handed in their club colours, or are about to do so.

Police expect the number of chapters in the area, a Rebels stronghold, will reduce with some chapters to completely dismantle.
Plucked straight out of the 1930s, the plush red seating and gold trimmings on the candy bar will provide the perfect backdrop for the old-fashioned film format used by Quentin Tarantino in his latest blockbuster.

The director's passion for shooting and screening bloody westerns using 70mm film will come to life at the premiere of his latest movie, The Hateful Eight, in cinemas across Australia this week.

A team of projectionists have been brought in to the Hayden Orpheum Picture Palace in Cremorne for the premiere week and they will fire up the seldom-used film projector for screenings of thepicture about gun-slinging fugitives starring Samuel L. Jackson and Kurt Russell.

The last time the art-deco theatre showed 70mm was in 2012 for Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master, but for theatre supervisor Samuel Hanson, The Hateful Eight will be his first time running a movie using the vintage method.
Just the other day, I was saying that I don't really know where the summer went. It seems like it is already over, and I haven't done anything. My photo ...

5 weeks ago
A leaking gas bottle has been blamed for a fire that destroyed one home and severely damaged another in Melbourne's north-east overnight.

Nineteen CFA and MFB fire crews took two hours to control the fire which broke out in a two-storey complex of town houses on

Henley Bridge Road in Chirnside Park around 10pm Friday.

A firefighter was treated for minor smoke inhalation but all occupants were evacuated unharmed.

Chirnside Park CFA captain Neil Thompson said it was an intense and challenging fire.

"It was a difficult firefight and the crews from CFA and MFB did a fantastic job working together to stop the fire spreading to neighbouring properties," he said.
Toxic chemical waste has been washed into the Yarra River at Warrandyte by Parks Victoria staff, killing trees and creating a "public health risk" near a popular Melbourne swimming spot.

According to a confidential internal report on Parks Victoria operations, a toxic cocktail of chemicals and herbicides has flowed into the Yarra from a "wash-down facility" near Pound Bend, which is a popular spot for swimming, fishing and canoeing inside Warrandyte State Park.

Siblings Oscar, 7, Sophie, 11 and Harry, 9, enjoying a swim at the Pound Bend Reserve in Warrandyte. Credit:Luis Ascui

An incident and hazard summary report, dated October 29, reveals the concrete site is used to "pressure-wash vehicles, triple rinse chemical containers and mix herbicides for use in the park".

But the area drains directly into the Yarra, and the report states that chemical waste from the depot's wash-down area has already killed a number of trees before entering the river.
Zhushigang, China: Days after photographs of a giant, golden statue of Mao spread across the internet, drawing ridicule for its grandiosity amid the bare fields of rural Henan Province, the statue has been quickly torn down.

Demolition teams arrived on Thursday morning, villagers said, and by Friday morning only a pile of rubble remained.

According to Chinese state media, businessmen and local villagers contributed nearly 3 million yuan ($650,000) to build the cement statue. Credit:AP

The 36.6-metre-tall statue, erected at a cost of $US465,000 ($660,000), according to local news media, had been under construction for months and was nearing completion when it began to attract attention.

Some commenters on social media denounced the extravagance of the colossus in a poor, rural part of China, where the money might have been better spent on education or healthcare. Several quoted Shelley's sonnet, Ozymandias, a meditation on the ruins of a monument to a long-forgotten autocrat ("Two vast and trunkless legs of stone stand in the desert.").
Washington: The US government has announced the formation of a taskforce to counter online propaganda by the Islamic State and other militant groups as it tries to crack down on the unprecedented use of the internet by jihadists.

A new group known as the Countering Violent Extremism Task Force will "integrate and harmonise" government efforts to prevent violent extremism in the United States, White House national security spokesman Ned Price said.

A propaganda image for Islamic State shows its fighters in a convoy of vehicles bearing the group's flag. Credit:AP

Some of the changes appear largely bureaucratic, however, and reflect the government's ongoing struggles to address the Islamic State's presence online.

US President Barack Obama has been trying to reassure the public that his administration is succeeding against Islamic State in the wake of recent attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California.
The weather in the Northeast this holiday season caught a lot of folks off guard with balmy temperatures and a conspicuous absence of snow. But around this time of year at Greenwich Village's Minetta Lane Theatre, snowflakes never stand a chance anyway with all the steamy warmth emanating from the stage. I'm speaking of course about the latest incarnation of Company XIV's Nutcracker Rouge, which, happily, is establishing itself as a wintertime, adults-only tradition of song, dance, and incomparable burlesque that warms the cockles of your heart better than a hot toddy.

Austin McCormick, who created Company XIV in 2006, uses Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker as a springboard for his innocent heroine, Marie-Claire (played with smiling energy by Laura Careless), to swan dive into a deliciously seductive dreamscape of sexual awakening. (Leave the kids at home for this one.) After Marie-Claire loses her nutcracker, Madame Drosselmeyer (played by the brassily captivating Shelly Watson) serves as the young woman's guide through a naughty world of fleshy pleasure.

And there's a lot of flesh on display as Marie-Claire is "educated" by a series of tempters and temptresses, such as the alluring Cherry Girl dancers (Hilly Bodin, Lea Helle, and Nicole von Arx), a sassy posse of Turkish Delight boys (Nicholas Katen, Ross Katen, and Brett Umlauf), and dozens of other purveyors of carnal pleasure. When Marie-Claire finally finds her nutcracker, which magically transforms into the strapping Steven Trumon Gray, the two are ready to get their dance on in the show's romantic (and unabashedly sexy) balletic tour-de-force finale.

Tchaikovsky's music plays through much of this libidinous, often comical journey, but McCormick enjoys, and is in fact known for, blending the old with the new. Besides the classical score, we hear Madonna standards belted in a Euro vein ("Je suis a Material Girl") as well as an unforgettable rendition of Sia's "Chandelier," sung in French by the extraordinary soprano Marcy Richardson as she performs her own graceful ring ballet high above the stage. To witness Richardson's intensely physical performance as she flexes her operatic muscle without missing a note is worth the price of admission alone.

McCormick, with dance captain Allison Ulrich, creates a scrumptious melange of graceful and provocative dance numbers, with moves inspired by the likes of Balanchine and Fosse. Zane Pihlstrom's confectionary costumes  from licorice-like leather that hides very little, to bouncy cotton-candy gowns  all look good enough to lick.

Though the general narrative may stay the same, Nutcracker Rouge offers a new twist each season, so theatergoers who have attended before will discover a couple new acts this time around. Those who thought they might have outgrown the Nutcracker they knew as kids will want to make this adult version their new holiday tradition.
SHANGHAI -- January 8, 2015: Lincoln, an iconic luxury automotive brand with a heritage linked to presidents, royalty and movie stars, sold 11,630 vehicles in China during 2015, the first full year for the brand in China.

MORE INFO Lincoln Research and Buyer's Guide Guide

Lincoln offers customers a full SUV line-up in China - the medium-size premium utility Lincoln MKC, the medium-large-size premium utility Lincoln MKX and the full-size luxury SUV Lincoln Navigator, as well as its popular mid-size premium sedan, the Lincoln MKZ.

Lincoln exceeded its dealership expansion plan by opening 33 Lincoln Stores, eight more than planned. Sales performance of these first stores has been strong and three of Lincolns top 10 dealerships globally in terms of sales in 2015 are located in China.

We are very encouraged by the consumer response to Lincoln in China, said Robert Parker, president of Lincoln China. Our sales growth and rapid network development are proof that consumers are looking for a new way to shop for luxury products and they are finding it with Lincolns one-size-fits-one approach.

The personalized experience of The Lincoln Way is a mainstay of all Lincoln dealerships, while The Virtual Lincoln Way is bringing the experience online to reach more customers, even those with no immediate access to Lincoln Stores. Launched in September, The Virtual Lincoln Way allows customers to tour a Lincoln Store, video chat with a Lincoln Host and make an appointment for an at home test drive.

Lincoln will continue its expansion in China, with 60 dealerships in 50 cities by the end of 2016. Lincoln also plans to launch the legendary full-size luxury sedan Lincoln Continental  further rounding out Lincolns product offering in China.

Note: Lincoln reports retail figures.
SAUDI-PERSIAN RIVALRY: WHAT CAN BE DONE ABOUT IT? "Saudi Arabia cut diplomatic ties with Iran on Sunday and gave Iranian diplomats 48 hours to leave the kingdom, marking a swift escalation in a strategic and sectarian rivalry that underpins conflicts across the Middle East. The surprise move, announced in a news conference by Adel al-Jubeir, the Saudi foreign minister, followed harsh criticism by Iranian leaders of the Saudis execution of an outspoken Shiite cleric, Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, and the storming of the Saudi Embassy in Tehran by protesters in response. The cutting of diplomatic ties came at a time when the United States and others had hoped that even limited cooperation between the two powers could help end the crushing civil wars in Syria and Yemen while easing tensions in Iraq, Bahrain, Lebanon and elsewhere. Instead, analysts feared it would increase sectarian divisions and investment in proxy wars. This is a very disturbing escalation, said Michael Stephens, an analyst at the Royal United Services Institute, a research center based in London. It has enormous consequences for the people of the region, and the tensions between the two sides are going to mean that instability across the region will continue." Ben Hubbard, "Saudi Arabia Cuts Ties With Iran Amid Fallout From Clerics Execution". The New York Times. 3 January 2016, in "For all the sectarian differences between Saudi Arabia and Iran, what divides the two countries most may be the thing they have in common. Both regimes have predicated their legitimacy on a transnational mission of exporting religion and safeguarding Islam. Following the Arab awakenings and the collapse of the regional state system that followed, their competition for power has only become more urgent. For months, the Islamic republic had been warning the Saudis not to harm the dissident Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr. The kingdoms rash decision to kill him probably stems from a sense of vulnerability. Weakening oil prices are sapping the Sauds petroleum wealth just as the jihadis of Isis challenge the Islamic orthodoxy that underpins their claim to power. The US, for decades the guarantor of Saudi security, has lately seemed not just flat-footed but indifferent. It is not lost on Riyadh that the Obama administration transacted a deficient nuclear agreement with Tehran, which offers ample financial rewards in return for transitory checks on an Iranian bomb. The US has stood aside as Iran directed the battle against Isis in Iraq, and looked askance as the Syrian civil war produced the worst humanitarian catastrophe of the modern Middle East. But while insecurity may explain why the Saudis lashed out, the principal victim will be House of Saud itself. The execution is bound to polarise politics further in Saudi Arabia and beyond, helping Tehran to kindle an affinity with the Arab Shia community". Ray Takeyh, "Middle East Pays the Price for a Poorer, Weaker House of Saud". The Financial Times. 5 January 2016, in The true answer to the above referenced question is: very little. Why pray tell one might well ask? Simply put the impetus for current Saudi policy (and make no mistake, it is Saudi Arabia which has been more aggressive as of late both vis-a-vis Persia and in the region generally), is primarily domestic in origins. Id est., very much a case of primat der Innenpolitik. With the accession of the new King Salman and the two Crown Princes, especially the young (and it would appear very impetuous and no doubt ambitious Deputy Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman) 1. For a mixture of reasons including a 'changing of the guard', as well as a felt need to bolster its domestic popularity given the recent financial pressures on the Kingdom due to the seventy-five percent decline in the price of oil in the past eighteen months, the Saudi ruling elite sees an aggressive foreign policy as one which pays dividends. Whether Riyadh is as fearful of Persia and its policies in the region is an unknowable query. However, I for one would be very surprised if the ruling trio (King, Crown Prince and Deputy Crown Prince) are as fearful of Teheran as they claim to be. What might perhaps (and I do mean 'perhaps') calm Saudi fears (real or imagined) would be a more forceful and competent American policy in the Near and Middle East. Something which has been unfortunately almost completely lacking in the past few years. As the Kenneth Pollack formerly of the American National Security Council staff and the Central Intelligence Agency recently noted at his lecture to members of the Lotos Club here in Manhattan (see my post of the 5th of December Anno Domini 2015) 2. Judging from the comments above coming from the State Department and the White House, I do not anticipate anything changing in that regard until perhaps the next American President arrives in the White House and perhaps not even then. In short: do not expect any changes in Saudi-Persian rivalry in the Near and Middle East any time soon. 1. For one example of the Deputy Crown Prince's new policy initiatives, see: Simeon Kerr, "Proposed Aramco sale breaks with Saudis past". The Financial Times. 8 January 2016, in 2. See: "BARACK OBAMA MAKES NO SENSE TO ANYONE": OR KENNETH POLLACK AT THE LOTOS CLUB". Diplomat of the Future. 5 December 2015, in Ben Hubbard, "Saudi Arabia Cuts Ties With Iran Amid Fallout From Clerics Execution".. 3 January 2016, in www.nytimes.com Ray Takeyh, "Middle East Pays the Price for a Poorer, Weaker House of Saud".. 5 January 2016, in www.ft.com The true answer to the above referenced question is:. Why pray tell one might well ask? Simply put the impetus for current Saudi policy (and make no mistake, it is Saudi Arabia which has been more aggressive as of late both vis-a-vis Persia and in the region generally), is primarily domestic in origins. Id est., very much a case of. With the accession of the new King Salman and the two Crown Princes, especially the young (and it would appear very impetuous and no doubt ambitious Deputy Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman) 1. For a mixture of reasons including a 'changing of the guard', as well as a felt need to bolster its domestic popularity given the recent financial pressures on the Kingdom due to the seventy-five percent decline in the price of oil in the past eighteen months, the Saudi ruling elite sees an aggressive foreign policy as one which pays dividends. Whether Riyadh is as fearful of Persia and its policies in the region is an unknowable query. However, I for one would be very surprised if the ruling trio (King, Crown Prince and Deputy Crown Prince) are as fearful of Teheran as they claim to be. What might perhaps (and I do mean 'perhaps') calm Saudi fears (real or imagined) would be a more forceful and competent American policy in the Near and Middle East. Something which has been unfortunately almost completely lacking in the past few years. As theformerly of the American National Security Council staff and the Central Intelligence Agency recently noted at his lecture to members of the Lotos Club here in Manhattan (see my post of the 5th of December2015) 2. Judging from the comments above coming from the State Department and the White House, I do not anticipate anything changing in that regard until perhaps the next American President arrives in the White House and perhaps not even then. In short: do not expect any changes in Saudi-Persian rivalry in the Near and Middle East any time soon.1. For one example of the Deputy Crown Prince's new policy initiatives, see: Simeon Kerr, "Proposed Aramco sale breaks with Saudis past".. 8 January 2016, in www.ft.com 2. See: "BARACK OBAMA MAKES NO SENSE TO ANYONE": OR KENNETH POLLACK AT THE LOTOS CLUB".5 December 2015, in www.diplomatofthefuture.blogspot.com
PUERTO VALLARTA, MexicoEver since Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the worlds most wanted drug lord, escaped from a Mexican federal prison six months ago, special forces troops attached to the Mexican Navy have pursued the kingpin with a scorched earth policy that forced him out of his stronghold in the high mountains of his native state of Sinaloa.

The heart of Guzmans Sinaloa Cartel, the largest supplier of drugs to the United States, is in the mountains and forests that blanket the Pacific Northwest of Mexico, an area of the Sierra Madre Occidental known to drug-enforcement as the Golden Triangle. The portion of farmers who cultivate illicit cash crops like marijuana or opium-poppy in the Triangle23,000 square miles spread across the states of Sinaloa, Durango, and Chihuahuacan exceed 80 percent.

Guzmans escape from prison on July 11, 2015, was a major source of embarrassment to the government of Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto. The drug lord escaped through a mile-long tunnel under his cell in a maximum-security prison. At a press conference Friday night, Mexican Attorney General Arely Gomez announced that El Chapo will be sent back to Altiplano, the prison he escaped from in July. His chief of security will likewise be sent to Altiplano. There has been no word yet on whether he will be extradited to the US.

With a fortune large enough to land him on the Forbes list of billionaires, he presumably could have fled to anywhere in the world. But from the start, the manhunt to recapture him focused on the protective terrain and loyal campesinos of the Golden Triangle. The Daily Mail reported that Marines tracked Guzman to the Sierra Madre mountains after U.S. drug agents intercepted data from his phone.

The chase for Guzman was not always smooth. As The Daily Beast reported, on October 6 three naval helicopters were observed hovering low in the sky over the municipality of Tamazula, in the state of Durango. Marta Marbella, 32, watched them from her home in the tiny mountain village of El Verano. Marbella expected the choppers to land, but instead said she had to run for cover as bullets from the helicopters tore through her modest dwelling. I could see the helicopter stop and shoot directly at the house, Marbella told AFP. I was scared, screamed and cried, although I knew it was useless.

The Mexican Navy later denied that its marines fired on a civilian population. In a joint statement, Mexicos security forces said the operation was conducted with the utmost respect for human rights.

Marbella was one of as many as 700 inhabitants of villages in the mountains around Tamazula who fled that part of the sierra for the safety of Cosala, a town 80 miles away in the neighboring state of Sinaloa. Three days later, on October 9, Mexican Marines spotted the Sinaloa cartel chief near Cosala. In the confusion of the firefight that ensued, Guzman reportedly fell off a cliff and broke his leg, yet somehow managed to escape.

The Marines pursued Guzman further into Sinaloa. For months, Navy helicopters were observed flying over the mountains near Badiraguato, the municipality where Guzman was born and a bastion of his Sinaloa Cartel.

On Nov. 21, three men linked to Guzmans cartel were killed in Badiraguato. News reports said only that the killers were part of an armed commando. Four more of Guzmans men were assassinated soon thereafter while returning from the wake of their three fallen comrades.

Last month, the head of security for Aureliano Guzman, El Chapos brother, was ambushed and assassinated along with seven of his men in the tiny mountain hamlet of San Jose del Barranco. Again, news reports said only that the ambush was carried out by an armed commando. Among the seven killed were men from La Tuna, the village where El Chapo was born.

Following the ambush, the Marines deployed to La Tuna in the expectation that El Chapo would attend the funeral of his fallen henchmen. According to local news reports, the Marines made an additional incursion into the nearby village of Surutato. R i odoce reports that the naval team commandeered as their base a ranch in the area that reportedly belongs to Aureliano Guzman. Since mid-December, the Marines have used the base to stage incursions in the heart of the Sinaloa cartels empire.

The intensity of the conflict in the erstwhile stronghold of the cartel perhaps explains why, when the Marines finally caught up to El Chapo yesterday, the culminating firefight was not in the high sierra of the Golden Triangle but in Los Mochis, a city a half-hours drive from the Gulf of California on the northwestern coast of Mexico.

The recapture of Guzman was a joint operation between U.S. and Mexican authorities. In a tweet from its official account, the US Drug Enforcement Agency credited bilateral cooperation for the successful recapture of the fugitive drug-trafficker. During his previous capture on February 22, 2014, agents from the DEA and U.S. Marshals Service donned the uniforms and balaclavas of Mexican marines and made the arrest themselves, with supervision from an elite group of Mexican Marines.
For some, its definitely not the most wonderful time of the year.

The holidays can be particularly challenging for people who suffer from depression. And during this most recent holiday season, Christmas Eve may have been the most depressing day of all. Thats according to Iodine, a health care information website which offers an iOS application called Start that helps users track the effects of their antidepressants.

From December 18th of last year to January 3rd, over 3,000 people took a PHQ-9 surveyan instrument that measures the severity of depressive symptoms on a scale from 0 to 27either through Iodines online Depression Test or through Start. The information they recorded is by no means nationally representative but its still an indication that, for people with depression, Christmas Eve can be more of a hurdle than it is a holiday. Iodine found that average PHQ-9 scores fluctuated significantly over the holidays with a spike of 15.2 on Christmas Eve and a dip of 13.6 on New Years Day. Iodine has only been running the Depression Test since early last December but, so far, Christmas Eve is the most depressed day they have on record.

The PHQ-9 survey is a standard clinical instrument asking respondents to reflect on the past two weeks and rate, on a scale from 0 to 3, how frequently theyve experienced nine symptoms of depression including: taking little interest or pleasure in doing things, experiencing trouble concentrating on things, or having thoughts that you would be better off dead or hurting yourself in some way. These scores are then tallied to produce a total PHQ-9 score. Below 10, depression is considered mild or minimal. From 10 to 14, it is moderate. Between 15 and 19the range in which Iodines average fell last December 24thdepression is moderately severe. Over 20, it is considered severe. Physicians use this scale to determine the best course of treatment and to decide if and when to prescribe antidepressants.

Why might Christmastime be one of the least cheery times for people with depression? Perhaps because there is so much cultural pressure to experience the holiday as a holly jolly fun fest, says one physician. A lot of people feel like theyre supposed to be happy during the holidays, psychiatrist Dr. Steve Koh told CBS News on the day before Christmas Eve 2015. Everyone around them is telling them theyre supposed to be happy, and yet inside they dont [feel happy.] So theres this friction between whats happening inside versus what everybody else is telling you to feel and that can increase depressive symptoms and anxiety. Contrary to popular belief and many inaccurate newspaper stories, the suicide rate does not rise during the holiday season and there are no reliable population-level statistics to suggest that rates of depression increase in late December. As the CDC notes, the suicide rate is actually lowest in December, peaking during the spring and the fall. But Iodines users, as the company told The Daily Beast, do not reflect the general public, in that they either have been diagnosed with depression and are being treated for it, or they likely believe they are depressed. In other words, the overall rate of depression might not go up during the holidays, but if you already struggle with the condition and observe the holiday, theres a strong chance Christmas Eve could be your most difficult day.

More not-so-fun facts from the services data set: Iodine users in Utah were the most depressed over the holidays, with an average score of 17, followed by Nebraska, Oregon, and Louisiana. Part of this finding, at least, seems consistent with several studies that have found alarmingly high rates of depression and suicide in Utah, often described as the most depressed state. Users in West Virginia were the least depressed through the year-end celebrations, followed closely by New Mexico, Nevada, and Kentucky.
Accounts of the American Revolution often sound like tales from the Legion of Nerdy Superheroes with Wigs. Thomas Jefferson writes the Declaration. John Hancock signs it. John Adams grumbles. Then, James Madison theorizes about the Constitution, Alexander Hamilton implements the ideas, and George Washington presides beatifically over it all.

Today, remembering the acerbic first lady Abigail Adams and the martyred African-American from the Boston Massacre, Crispus Attucks, injects multicultural touches into the white boys club. A fuller story would also include the Wonder Woman of the Revolution, Catharine Macaulay. Hailed as the Amazon leading charge after charge on behalf of a Great New Cause, this bold British thinker helped shape the Anglo-American love of liberty that freed us from England and launched our democratic era.

Catharine Macaulay released her eight-volume, 3,500-page A History of England from 1763 through 1783critical years in American life. Her version of British history, along with her other writings, celebrated liberty and mocked monarchy. Her works reflect the broader blossoming of republican thought in the 1700s. This democratic ideology triggered the American Revolution, valuing the consent of the governed over the brute force of those who govern.
Gay men arent having nearly as much sex as you might think theyre having.

In a 2012 survey of its users, the popular dating website OkCupid (which is owned by IAC, The Daily Beasts parent company) found that its gay male users had enjoyed roughly the same number of sexual partners as everyone else. If just 1 percent of heterosexual males self-reported that theyd engaged in intercourse with 20 or more partners in their lifetime, the share of gays was just a hair higherat 2 percent. (Thats hardly enough to be statistically significant.)

A later study actually found that gay men reported having fewer partners than their straight counterparts. Whereas the average heterosexual male claimed to have had sex with five partners, gays had just four.

But despite these statistics, myths about the scourge of promiscuous gay men keep going strongunfettered by a thing like reality. Last week, I wrote a piece about the high rate of open marriages in the gay community, and rather than coming to terms with the fact that same-sex and heterosexual relationships might have their own separate boundaries and expectations, many readers saw it as a confirmation of the oldest canard to ever canard: Gays just cannot keep it in their pants.

The comments arent worth repeatingbecause if youre a queer man, youve likely heard them all your life.

These ideas have long been at the center of conservative opposition to marriage equality: If gay men cant behave themselves, why should they have the same rights as everyone else?

Troy Madera Republican representative for Wyomings House of Representativesonce even suggested that promiscuity was a leading cause of gay suicide. While its important to assert that these right-wing notions of what it means to be queer are pernicious and harmful, we shouldnt run from the question of sex itself: Some folks do engage in many types of sexual activity with many different people. When we pretend that gay promiscuity doesnt exist, we continue to weaponize sex for a community that for too long has read that three-letter word as a death sentence.

In 1997, Dossie Easton and Catherine A. Liszt published The Ethical Slutwhich has, in the two decades since, become the seminal polyamory bible. But the greater message of Easton and Liszts book is to destigmatize mutually consenting, healthy play between good, giving, and game partners (a phrase later coined by sex writer and columnist Dan Savage).

During an interview with Salons Tracy Clark-Flory in 2012, Easton posited gays an ideal community when it came to sex: In the wondrously explorative 70s, I learned that gay men use the word slut as a term of admiration and approval, as in What did you do at that party? Oh, you slut!

But gay men have their own complicated relationship with promiscuity and slut shamingone born of the AIDS panic of the 1980s. As Peter Conrad writes in The Sociology of Health and Illness, populations disproportionately at risk for illness have always been subjected to stigmafrom cholera to the bubonic plague.

However, because HIV is spread through sexual contact, the target is as much behavior as it is homosexuality, particularly within the community itself. When Truvadaa potentially life-saving blue pill that reduces the transmission of HIV up to 90 percentdebuted on the market, those who took it were branded as Truvada whores. AIDS Healthcare Foundation president Michael Weinstein referred to the pill as a party drug.

Even while there are more options for safer sex and preventative treatment than ever before, HIV rates have continued to rise among millennial gay men, according to a 2014 report from the Centers for Disease Control. Research shows this is particularly true for black and Latino MSMS (men who have sex with men). At a time when New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has declared the end of the AIDS epidemic is in sight (PDF)vowing to eradicate HIV in his state by 2020how could this be possible? At face value, it seems like a frustrating paradox.

But its hardly a mystery why that would be the case. The lingering shame around gay sexualityincluding a lack of education around healthy sexkeeps many from seeking these crucial resources, or even wearing a condom.

In an earlier study from 2011, the CDC found that LGB teenagers were more likely than their heterosexual peers to be partaking in risky, unprotected sex. The organization argued that these phenomena are due to a dearth of safe, supportive environments for queer youthwho might not have affirming communities or parents willing to have the sex talk with them. Theyre often forced to figure it out on their own.

That lack of sex positivityor education geared specifically toward queer bodieswill continue to be a problem when young people leave the home and attempt to find themselves in a community that struggles with acknowledging the realities of sex.

Last August, Noah Michelson, executive editor of Gay Voices, wrote a piece about the simple fact that hes a queer man who loves sex (an acknowledgment that shouldnt be all that controversial) but the response from other gays was often quite negative. [P]eople are saying that Im a pervert, and that Im ruining it for all of us, he said in an interview with the site. And its immature to act that way, and thats how a teenager would act.

His article acknowledged what we rarely recognize: Sure, gays are having about as much intercourse as everyone else but how we form community around sex is quite different. Public sex spacesincluding underground bars and porn theatersare deeply ingrained into the history of the community, an important meeting ground for men to explore themselves and others bodies.

Today, those spaces are disappearing across the country, replaced by the privacy of technology; surveys show that 80 percent of queer men meet their partners on hookup apps like Grindr and Scruff. But that doesnt mean our need for sexual liberation has decreased. If stigma is continuing to kill people at high rates, its arguably more important than ever.

If gays have long been taught that our desires are predatory or the reason we cant have nice things, its natural that we would have internalized a great deal of what Freud termed schwanzangstour own fear of penises. But the simplest way to eradicate that very angst is to embrace the promiscuity weve been running from for so long.

As long as youre being safe, whats so wrong with being a slutor even the belle of the ball at the local orgy? Last night, I visited a gay bathhouse for the first time while on vacation, and when I woke up this morning, I was the same person I was beforejust as worthy of love, respect, and human rights.

For decades, the gay community has championed the notion of pride, throwing yearly parades to remind America that 30 years after HIV seemed like the end of a community, were still here. But fighting for pride in complicated, beautiful sexualities is just as important.
MUNICH  Who hasnt heard of Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitlers infamous Nazi screed? The book laid the foundation for his Nazi ideology and the roadmap to the Third Reich. Mein Kampf (My Struggle) was Hitlers preamble to war; its where he preached what he would later practice.

But few alive today have actually read it, especially in its original language. Because in Germany, Hitlers book was banned from the end of the Second World War until January 1 this year. Now Germanys Institute of Contemporary History is republishing it, and while this scholarly version is the first edition to go back on sale in modern Germany, it may not be the last.

But will it sell? Market forces may have a part to play in this, and right now the market is, to say the least uncertain.

Nobody read Mein Kampf when Hitler was in power. says Niklas Frank, and he should know. His father was Hans Frank, confidante of Hitler and the high profile Nazi Governor of Poland, responsible for the death of millions.

As the child of a major war criminal, Niklas Frank has few good words for Hitlers Nazi manifesto. When you were married you got a copy of this bloody book, but nobody, really, was interested in it.

The new German edition of Mein Kampf is hitting the stores just now, 90 years after the first printing in 1926. The Munich-based Institute of Contemporary History has pulled together an annotated version of Hitlers megalomanic diatribe, adding no less than 1200 pages to the already very bulky 800-page read. If the original was boring, this one may be very heavy going indeed.

That this new edition, like the first one, is printed in Munich, is no coincidence. The German state of Bavaria, of which Munich is the capital, has held the copyright to Hitlers book ever since the war ended.

Munich, youll recall, is the place where Nazism was born and flourished. In this city, young Austrian-born Adolph Schicklgruber settled in 1913 when he was 24, and recast himself with the punchier surname of Hitler. After their foiled 1923 coup, the so-called Bierstube (beer hall) Putsch, the Nazis proclaimed Munich the capital of the movement. Because Hitler only left Munich to take his parliamentary seat in Berlin as Chancellor in 1933, his official residency remained here. That is how Bavaria managed to get the rights to the book and prevent any German copies from being published until January the 1st of 2016. Copyright in Germany expires after 70 years.

Niklas Frank told The Daily Beast he first read Mein Kampf when he picked up a German-language copy as a journalist in Namibia, many years ago. There you can buy it in every bookshop, he said.

As for this reprint, he sees no danger in it. Brilliant idea, it should have been done years ago. A big part of Mein Kampf is boring, sometimes its even a little funny, Frank sniggers. When he [Hitler] describes how he started the National Socialist party for instance. As the name of the book suggests, my struggle, he is always pretending to do or fulfill something or other.

Munich is wealthy and beautiful and many of its people today fit that description. Men are attired in smart casual wear and women dress in coats with fur trimmings. They slowly parade the quaint little squares and shiny boulevards that make up the center of town. It looks like a classic childrens picture book; nothing is out of place. In the shop windows dirndl dresses and lederhosen are sold next door to specialized stores selling only tea or herbs. The Bavarian capital has always been affluent, even between the two world wars. Its always crowded at the local Bierstube Hofbrauhaus, a place where tourists can mingle with locals and taste the regional beers. The brass band plays traditional folkloric music in its domed basement as people sit down at its long tables. Before the war, the Munich Bierstube was the place where Nazis held their meetings. Hitler himself passed by. But on the eve of the Mein Kampf republication, Buck, Preston, Kevin and Lena are at a table here near the brass band. The trumpet player is a member of their own band, in fact. The group meets here twice a year. Buck: My grandfather was fighting as a GI and Kevins grandfather was in the SS, they were mortal enemies, and here we are!

The personal stories of this gathering give the impression everyones family here is linked somehow to the war. Most of them grew up in Munich, or around it. Buck is from Dachau. So every time someone looks at my passport they react. But because Ive got dark skin nobody bothers me about it.

Buck and Prestons family histories are entwined with the war, because their grandfathers were American GIs. Prestons grandfather married a German girl and only separated years after.

Preston: My grandfather married a German girl, I was born in the US but raised as a true German, so I get a perspective from both sides, thats great. Buck still wants to look for his American relatives at some point. His father never met his grandfather, the GI Frank Wootz, who impregnated his grandmother then went back to the family he had already in the States.

At the press conference launching the book, Mein Kampfs new edition was introduced by Dr. Andreas Wirsching, director of the Institute of Contemporary History. It would be irresponsible to let this convoluted version of inhumanity roam free without critical reference, he said, explaining the purpose of the voluminous annotations. By contextualizing and deconstructing the original work, the Institute hopes to inoculate its readers against Nazism. We published the book ourselves, without commercial intentions, said Wirsching. The purpose is to add to the demystification, to present the deadly racism in a critical way.

But, at the same time, the Institute insists the book was not made for the classroom. Nazional Socialismus is not to be reduced to Hitler alone, said Wirsching. I wouldnt propagate a school version of our edition. The problem with Mein Kampf is that it is not just a book, its a symbol.

I any case, there is not much chance of this printed beast roaming free. The expiration of copyright means Mein Kampf can be reprinted, yes, but only with commentary. Versions without it remain banned because of Germanys hate speech laws. At the Institute, a team of historians from the center and outside worked on the new format for three years. We have a scientific approach, said Wirsching. Our library holds 200.000 books. Our archive is five kilometers long.

The selling of Mein Kampf is not a strictly German but an international problem, said Wirsching. He showed a photo from New Delhi where US President Barack Obamas book cover is featured next to Hitlers. They look shockingly similar. We have to avoid the book becoming an article for export. We will come up with a strategy to prevent that from happening. But that strategy may become a matter of urgency, now that the initial edition was already upped from 4000 to 15,000 copies because of the demand.

Niklas Frank is not worried: Everybody should read this crap, he says. We all know what came of it: completely industrialized mass murder. You dont believe what you read, because you know Hitler was a mass murderer and people like my father helped him do it.

That may be so, but at the beer hall there is still something that bothers Buck about the reprint: Its is the idea that the book is sold again, and people are making money because of it that I dont like. Anyway, whats being taught in school is different from what you learn at home. My mothers father told me he cried when Hitler died, it was all he knew.

Some people believe the toxic proclamation is still too dangerous to read. After all, it was once used to propagate Nazism in preparation for the brave new world called the Third Reich. What if an educational scheme fails to demystify Nazism and in fact, inadvertently, finds a new audience for its racist ideals? Niklas Frank says he doesnt believe thats possible: Mein Kampf is only of interest to people who want to know more about history, or people like me who were born into a family of a big shot Nazi criminal. But its not an issue for a great debate or for people in the street to have conversations about. In an official statement Dr. Josef Schuster, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, hesitantly embraced the scientific edition. He started by saying the council is convinced that the book must remain prohibited. But, he went on, Unfortunately, it can already be purchased via the Internet and abroad, and knowledge of Mein Kampf continues to be important in order to explain National Socialism and the Shoah. Therefore we do not object to a critical edition, contrasting Hitlers racial theories with scientific findings, to be at the disposal of research and teaching. When books are banned and gatherings are outlawed, ideology does not lose its appeal. The forbidden offers its own attractions, especially to the young.

At the Hofbrauhaus table of friends, Kevin said his grandfather, who served in the SS, always had strange ideas about the war. When Hitler came to power he was only 13 and he was 25 when it ended. My grandfather owned a copy of Mein Kampf with gold inlay and a personal signature of Hitler. That book is now worth a fortune on the black market because Neo-Nazis love that rubbish. For them its like a Bible signed by Jesus.

Angela Merkels ruling Christian Democratic Union government argues that giving Nazism a context and bringing it into the classroom would be a productive effort to nip the lure of Neo- Nazism in the bud.

Alexandra Senfft, an author and Middle East expert, became acutely aware of her own family history only later in life. My family didnt talk about the war. I knew my grandfather was the Third Reich envoy in Slovakia, so he was in an upper level of Nazi leadership. I later found out he was co-responsible for the deportation of 65.000 Slovakian Jews, most of whom died in the camps. In her book, Silence Hurts, she says, I investigate the trans-generational consequences of guilt and the Holocaust and war though my grandmother, mother and me.

Where does Hitlers tome fit into that picture. By all means look at Mein Kampf and contextualize it, says Senfft. It is part of our history. What I am kind of hesitant about is identifying Hitler as Nazism as such. I find it much more important to not only focus on leaders but on how people on an every day level, ordinary people, latch on to the ideology. One must ask, she says, why the majority of ordinary Germans became perpetrators. But, she adds, It helps to understand how words, publications and how youre educated can actually prepare you.

Giving Mein Kampf a well-founded historical context may be a well intentioned plan. But what happens if you lose that battle for the hearts and minds? What if, by introducing the book, you inadvertently introduce the seed of evil, and even help it to grow?

In the US, Adolf Hitlers 800-page rant has been freely available since 1998. That hasnt made Nazism more prevalent in America. OK. But according to the 2014 figures of the German Security Services, Germany harbors around 21.000 right wing extremists of whom 5,600 are Neo-Nazis. Will there be more now? How will reaction to the refugee crisis mix with Hitlers bible of hate? Nobody has the answer yet.

And, in the meantime, how does one promote a book like that? You dont, says the information clerk at a branch of the major German bookstore chain Hugendubel. In the shop there are no indications that the book is being sold at all. We only sell them by pre-order, he says. theyve had quite a few requests so far, he says. But you never know how long that will last. It was in the news yesterday, today people come asking, who knows what will happen tomorrow?
In the photo of him slouched in a grimy wifebeater after his capture, Joaquin El Chapo Guzman has the forlorn look of someone who has reached an end.

His face is the face of fucked.

And we have the Mexican Marines to thank.

As we in America continued to buy the fugitive El Chapos drugs and sell him guns, it had once again fallen to the Marines to catch him.

The Marines had captured him in 2014 only for him to escape this past July via a tunnel that included a motorcycle on rails to zoom him to freedom.

The Marines went right back on the hunt, for month after month.

A convoy of Marines was attacked on Christmas Day, but fortunately nobody was seriously hurt.

Their luck ran out three days later, when two Marines were killed.

The gunman was identified as Jose Maria Penuelas Rubio, allegedly an El Chapo minion in the Sinaloa Cartel. The names of the two Marines were not released.

That is likely because of what happened just before Christmas in 2009, after a Marine who had been killed by a grenade tossed by a cartel gunman was lauded by name as a national hero.

At the funeral, full military honors were accorded Ensign Melquisedet Angelo Cordova. His mother spoke to reporters afterward.

Thinking as a mother, I used to feel very sad and hurt for the families of soldiers and police who had been killed she said. It would make me cry. And now, now it is my turn.

After she returned home from the cemetery, cartel gunmen burst in and killed her along with her other son, her daughter, and her sister.

Lest some variation of that be repeated, the two Marines killed just after this Christmas were mourned privately.

The bravery of their comrades remained on public display as the Marines pressed on into the New Year.

At 5 a.m. Thursday, the Marines acted on a tip that armed men had been seen in the vicinity of the Motel Doux in the Sinaloa town of Los Mochis.

Until then, the Doux had been known for luxury accommodations on a beer budget, offering spotless rooms with a great shower for $50 a night.

Had the famously risk averse army been acting on the tip, somebody might very well have made a phone call and a search would have only produced suddenly vacated rooms.

The integrity of the Marines was proven anew as they approached the motel and encountered gunfire.

A two-hour firefight ensued in which five gunmen were killed. One Marine was wounded, but is expected to recover.

When it was over, the Marines recaptured El Chapo.

As before, they restrained themselves from killing or even beating him.

A photograph shows him without a significant mark as he sits on a bed amidst beer budget luxury, a pin-up tacked to the wall. His hands were cuffed in front of him. His dirty shirt suggested he may have made some desperate, last-minute effort to hide, perhaps once again through a tunnel.

He now sat as dejected as a mole without a hole.

Also present was Gastelum Orso Ivan Cruz, aka El Cholo Ivan. He is said to be one of El Chapos righthand men. He is known to have kept with a longtime tradition among cartel bosses of squiring beauty queens and he had once dated Miss Sinaloa of 2012, Susana Maria Flores Gamez. He is said to have abandoned her during a gun battle with the army the same year as her crowning, telling her just to tell the soldiers that she had been kidnapped. She was shot to death.

At the time of that gun battle, El Cholo Ivan had been a fugitive, having escaped prison in 2008. He had been arrested last March only to regain his freedom under circumstances that remain unclear.

On Thursday, El Cholo Ivan was initially reported to have eluded capture. But the Marines reported otherwise and a photo appears to show him in custody with El Chapo.

Both El Chapo and El Cholo Ivan no doubt hope they will be able to escape as they each have at least twice before.

But El Chapos more recent prison break was an international embarrassment for the Mexican government. An obviously elated President Enrique Pena Nieto tweeted last week, Mission accomplished. Weve got him.

Nieto surely does not want to join George Bush as another president who prematurely declared Mission accomplished. El Chapo will likely have considerable more difficulty in escaping this time.

And there is a chance he might be extradited to the United States. Some Mexican politicians are already calling for it. Others are saying that turning him over to the Americans would be admitting that Mexico is incapable of holding him.

If El Chapo does stay in Mexico, those who spoke out against extradition would have continuing cause to prove they were right by keeping him behind bars.

He seems to understand all this in the photo of him sitting in an unmarked vehicle that would whisk him off to a nearby airstrip, where a white towel would be draped over his head and he would be trundled aboard a small jet bound for Mexico City.

El Chapo remains a billionaire and, if he is not extradited, maybe he will someday have cause to lose the face of fucked.

But should he by some wild chance manage to escape again, the Marines are sure to set out hunting for him once more.

And they are just as sure not to stop until they get him.

Meanwhile, we should at least offer a prayer for the latest Mexican Marines to die, even if we do not know their names.

Of course, if we really want to honor them we should stop buying the drugs and selling the guns.
The master perfumer lowered his voice as he described the days, weeks, and months spent thinking about one man, the inspiration for his new fragranceRussias President Vladimir Putin.

Vladislav Rikunovs new warm, woody scent is the result of six months of creative observation and inspiration, the Belarusian perfumer told The Daily Beast. Rekunovs creation, Leader Number One eau de toilette, was designed in Belarus, made in France, and approved by Putin himself, according to the perfumes distributors. The fragrance is on sale in only one place: in the heart of Moscow, on Red Square.

On a recent Tuesday, crowds buzzed around a brightly illuminated skating rink on Red Square, where music played and lights reflected on the ice, on colorful glass balls, and on the enormous toys hanging off the capitals large Christmas tree. More colorful toys, huge candies, and oranges almost as big as the clock on the Kremlins tower, decorated the interior of the Upper Trading Rows, GUM, a historic 19th century department store known for presenting luxurious brands with biting prices, as some shoppers put it.

The Putin-inspired eau de toilette was presented on a stand on GUMs ground floor. The displays conservative design stood out: black boxes with Putins silver profile, which looked almost too dramatic in the colorful mishmash of the stores overwhelming New Years decorations. Inside the boxes were 100 milliliter bottles of eau de toilette. In the black frame under the glass, the Russian Empires crown, and a crowned eagles head, part of the state main symbol, were seen as the background of Putins black and white photograph. Next to the presidents face was a list of the perfumes fragrances: lemon, bergamot, black currants, balsam fir, cedar, musk, and tonka beans.

The perfumer said he once recognized his perfume on the street in Moscow. I was in the underground pedestrian passage and sensed my scentsee, I deliberately made it noticeable and sustainable, Rekunov told The Daily Beast.

Rekunov believes in aromatherapy: Fragrance changes the human organism. By being absorbed through the blood, it changes the hormone state at the molecular level, the perfumer insisted. Rekunov said he suggested that men wear his perfume at business and political events, and of course they should put some on for important meetings. Not many people discover their sentimental feelings, in politics it could be seen as weakness; but this perfume, soft and round, can show a softer side of character.

Last year, a Moscow based media holding called Leaders chose the Belarusian perfumer to create the Leader Number One perfume. To prepare his scent, Rekunov watched videos of Putins interviews, his gestures, his mimics, and looks, the perfumer recalled. We all know that he came out of the special services, where they teach people not to unveil their real emotions, but I am very observant.

It was not the first time that Russians could buy Putins smell in a bottle. Individual fragrances of politicians and other celebrities became popular over a decade ago. Putins former wife, Lyudmila Putina, was famous for ordering a mens perfume from Zhanna Gladkova, a Moscow perfumer. Zhanna and I are friends but I did not listen to her fragranceI know only know that it had more metal, a steel scent, and mine on the contrary [is] soft, round for a man who wants to be liked by a woman, Rekunov said.

Back at the department store, a young, tall shop assistant dressed in a black uniform jacket was enticing GUM visitors to smell Rekinovs perfume. Not many in the overcrowded department store stopped to pay attention to the unknown fragrance. It was not cheap. The price said 6,500 rubles, which was a bit more than $88. The shop assistant told The Daily Beast that distributers had managed to sell 1,000 bottles of the perfume in just in few days, nearly a half of what they had available.

But not all shoppers were so enthusiastic. My boyfriend might get a kick out of it but, no, too expensive, a young shopper, Maria, told The Daily Beast. Another shopper wrinkled his nose and sniffed, I prefer Dior.
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This editorial originally appeared in the Kentucky New Era:

A new poll about attitudes toward smoke-free legislation in Kentucky confirms what has been clear for at least a few years now. Most adults  66 percent, according to the Kentucky Health Impact Poll released Monday  support a statewide ban on smoking for indoor public places.

Unfortunately, some state lawmakers have stubbornly resisted public opinion, along with overwhelming health and financial considerations, in the debate over passing legislation to protect Kentuckians from secondhand smoke in restaurants, stores and offices.

As the General Assembly convenes in Frankfort, there ought to be some hope that 2016 will be the year Kentucky breaks this deadlock.

The key to winning passage could start with a recognition of the economic toll smoking takes on state governmentand Kentucky businesses. Medical costs related to tobacco use exceed $1.9 billion annually, and nearly $500 million of that is covered by Medicaid, according to Smoke-Free Kentucky.

Reducing these expenses would make a great deal of sense as Gov. Matt Bevin formulates plans for changing his predecessor's Medicaid expansion under Obamacare. Given the poll results about support for a statewide smoking ban, Bevin wouldn't risk any political capital with Kentuckians if he encourages the Republican Senate to pass the legislation. His support would be grounded in fiscal responsibility.

The Republican Senate has been the last obstacle for a smoke-free bill. A year ago, the House narrowly passed a statewide ban but the Senate failed to advance the bill out of committee.

For two straight years, Republican leaders have assigned the legislation to a committee chaired by a lawmaker they knew would let the bill die in committee. In 2014, it was the Judiciary Committee chaired by Sen. Whitney Westerfield, R-Hopkinsville. Last year, it was assigned to the Veterans, Military Affairs and Public Protection Committee, headed by Sen. Albert Robinson, R-London.

The proper assignment would be the Senate Health and Welfare Committee, chaired by Sen. Julie Raque Adams, R-Louisville. She supports the measure and would ensure it gets a fair hearing.

Although 24 communities have passed comprehensive bans, Smoke-Free Kentucky estimates 67 percent of the state's residents live in an area without protection from secondhand smoke in public indoor places.

It's time to provide protection to the entire state and to reduce the cost of treating tobacco-related illnesses. Kentucky can no longer afford this burden.
HAVANA  One year ago, the Cuban government began releasing 53 political prisoners whom President Barack Obama wanted freed as part of a historic deal to re-establish diplomatic relations between the former Cold War foes.

U.S. government information and an Associated Press assessment of the dissidents lives 12 months after their release shows that at least 35 have asked for refugee status allowing them to move permanently to the U.S., reducing the ranks of an already weak and divided opposition movement.

Many applications have been delayed by vetting of the dissidents criminal records, some of which have little to do with political activity. Seven have either left Cuba or are preparing to leave this month.

Among those who remain, at least six men are back in Cuban prison on what their allies say are politically related charges. Others have abandoned activism altogether.

About 20 of the freed dissidents have decided not to leave, some because theyve abandoned political activism. But others say they want to stay and work to change the government.

Our commitment is here, said Jose Daniel Ferrer, leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba, a group based in the countrys east. We do a lot to make our members aware of that, so that they dont leave.

Many Cuban exiles view the countrys dissidents as brave freedom fighters against the single-party state founded by Fidel Castro and run by his brother, Raul. Exiles support some political activists here with money and lobbying of politicians and the press in the U.S. and other countries.

The Cuban government historically has characterized internal dissidents as unpatriotic mercenaries acting on behalf of the U.S. government and violent exile groups who want to retake control of Cuba.

Whatever the reason, many ordinary Cubans today question the dissidents credentials, saying they suspect the activists are motivated mostly by money from abroad and the chance of visa to the U.S. or Europe.

Obamas new policy moves away from a decades-long U.S. focus on the dissidents and toward a broader diplomatic and economic engagement with the Cuban government. He argues that will bring better conditions for the Cuban people in the long run, and says he may travel to Cuba as early as this spring if he feels the rights situation here is improving and a presidential trip will help.

In a statement Thursday night, the State Department said: We have publicly called for the release of political prisoners and others jailed for exercising their internationally recognized freedoms in Cuba, and will continue to do so. It added that the U.S. Embassy has been in contact with many of those freed last year.

International advocacy groups such as Amnesty International say that regardless of U.S. policy, its up to Cuba to improve the islands human rights situation.

The reforms that have to be made in terms of restrictions of liberty must come from the Cuban government, not from the government of the United States, said Marselha Goncalves Margerin, Amnesty Internationals advocacy director for the Americas.

Cuban officials did not respond to requests for comment on how the freed dissidents are faring.

Among those back behind bars is Wilberto Parada, who was arrested for public disorder in October when he protested in front of a prosecutors office in Havana. Vladimir Morera, from the central province of Villa Clara, has been jailed since May on charges of assault. Fellow dissidents said he held a weekslong hunger strike that ended last month.

Another freed government opponent, Carlos Manuel Figueroa Alvarez, was charged with jumping the fence protecting the U.S. Embassy to claim refugee status after he said he was denied a refugee visa in September. Figueroa is now held on Cuban charges of violating a diplomatic site.

Angel Yunier Remon, a rapper from the eastern province of Granma, said he also was denied refugee status despite being named by the State Department several times as a victim of political repression before he was freed in January 2015.

Id never opted for refugee status, but government aggression made me feel like an enemy in my own land, Remon said by telephone.

Remon said the U.S. Embassy gave him a document that recognized him as worthy of refugee status, but said he was non-admissible to the United States. He said an embassy employee told him that was because of a robbery conviction he had before becoming a political activist.

U.S. officials says that most of the 53 political prisoners who have applied for refugee status are likely to receive it and that those who complain about delays may be misinterpreting normal processing times as problems with their applications. They remain eligible for refugee status, the officials said.

Several of the freed dissidents nonetheless complain they have waited for months to hear from U.S. consular officials, saying they are at risk of harassment while still in Cuba.

I was very grateful for Obamas effort to free me in January, but now Im upset about the wait, said Sandalio Mejias, who said he recently was notified of his second appointment, next month, to present documents supporting an a request for refugee status filed nearly a year ago.
NORWALK -- After a New Jersey man was charged with narcotics possession and sale on Friday evening in South Norwalk, he reportedly gave officers a colorful admission of guilt.

According to police, as Norwalk Police Special Services Team officers were responding to the area of Sheridan Street following reports of a shooting there, they observed a man wearing a hood and ski mask walking briskly in the area of Henry and Chestnut Streets.

Officers pulled their vehicle alongside and asked to speak with him, but he moved away toward the fence in front of Side by Side School before stopping to speak with them, according to police.

The officers reportedly told him that there had been a shooting in the area, and asked if he was in possession of any weapons. He said no, and officers asked him if he would consent to a search, to which the man reportedly agreed.

According to police, Dwayne Harper, 22, of of 22 Maple Terrace, East Orange, New Jersey, had in his possession a large stack of small bills split in multiple stacks by denomination, which police said was consistent with the way a drug dealer would carry money. The bills totaled $330.

Police also said that that Harper's pockets contained grains of rice, which they said are a "natural dessicant" that removes moisture from packaged heroin.

After the search of Harper, officers searched the area of the fence where the suspect had allegedly moved away from them, and said that they recovered a black bag in that location which contained 15 bags of suspected heroin. The bags were stamped with the word "Delicious," police said.

Harper was walked to police headquarters by officers where testing of the bagged substance allegedly yielded positive for heroin.

As the suspect was being held in the holding facility, he reportedly said to police, "Hey, yo. I'm going to be a man about this. (Expletive), it's mine, all the money and the dope, it's mine. You caught me fair and square."

Harper was charged with possession of narcotics, possession of narcotics with intent to sell, sale or possession of narcotics within 1,500 feet of a school, He was also charged with failure to respond to an infraction from a prior case. He was issued a $10,200 bond and given a court date of Jan. 15.
Saudi Arabia's feud with Iran over the beheading of a prominent Shiite cleric led to a lot of overwrought speculation about Sunni-Shiite tensions rising to tear up the Middle East. Those more steeped in regional affairs point to the other 46 men beheaded, almost all of whom were Sunnis charged with terrorism.

The theory here is that the execution of the preacher, Nimr al-Nimr, was less about provoking Shiites than pre-empting domestic outrage over the deaths of so many Sunnis, who make up 85 percent of the country's population. The kingdom has rarely been concerned with domestic opinion in its 90 years of statehood. Does Saudi Arabia now fear unrest among the masses? Should it?

Outside of North Korea and the New England Patriots, few institutions are more opaque than the Saudi royal court. But over the last year, the first in the reign of 80-year-old King Salman, the famously hidebound monarchy has undergone a shocking and risky makeover.

Salman, who took over last Jan. 23 on the death of his half-brother King Abdullah, was widely expected to be just a caretaker. Instead, he took care of business. Within months, he replaced the anointed crown prince with his nephew Mohammed bin Nayef, the longtime interior minister. Yet he also watered down this new heir's influence by dismantling the crown prince's previously independent court.

The real winner was the king's young son, Defense Minister Mohammed bin Salman, who became deputy crown prince and gatekeeper to those seeking the king's attention. The prince was named head of the new Council of Economic and Development Affairs, which took over many powers of the finance ministry, and was given control over Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil monopoly. (On Thursday, he suggested that the kingdom may consider selling a stake in the oil giant.)

Many questioned whether the untested Mohammed bin Salman, who is thought to be in his early 30s, was up to all that responsibility. Open letters printed in the Guardian attributed to a "senior Saudi prince" accused King Salman of being "completely reliant on his son's rule" and hinted that the oldest generation of royals should choose a replacement for Salman.

Mohammed bin Salman's tenure has not put those doubts to rest. He was the prime agitator for the Saudi intervention in neighboring Yemen, where Iran-backed Houthi rebels had overturned the Saudi-backed government. A nine-month bombing campaign has reduced much of the impoverished country to rubble and killed hundreds of civilians, but the military quagmire just grows deeper. It certainly does not demonstrate a mastery of geopolitics.

There were also reports, unverified but widely believed in the Arab world, that road closings for the deputy crown prince's motorcade were partially responsible for the stampede among Muslim pilgrims near Mecca in September, in which more than 2,000 died. Even if the prince was blameless, and even if road closings were not a factor, the rumors cut deeply into one of the family's greatest sources of legitimacy: as dependable custodians of the Islam's most revered sites.

The Saudi reaction to 2015's collapse in oil prices is also under scrutiny. Saudi Aramco has refused to cut back production -- no doubt wary of the huge losses in market share it suffered by following that path in the 1980s -- leading to huge deficits and staggeringly high unemployment rates among younger citizens. As Bloomberg's David Fickling points out, the Saudi economy is now more exposed to cratering oil prices than archrival Iran's.

Facing this budget crunch, the young prince did what you might expect from a modern monarch: He called in the consultants. With advice from McKinsey & Co., Mohammed bin Salman has outlined a plan that will impose taxes and cut billions in electricity, gasoline and water subsidies, particularly among the wealthiest. The government has begun issuing sovereign bonds, its first since 2007, rather than further draw down its $635 billion in reserves. Some state- controlled functions, such as airports, will be privatized.

Above all, the plan calls for diversifying the economy away from oil, which provides 80 percent of budget revenue. The imported number crunchers say a "productivity- and investment- led transformation" could add 6 million jobs by 2030. Sure. Mohammed bin Salman wasn't alive to see all of them, but there have been at least 10 previous official development plans for the kingdom since 1970, and each has put economic diversification at the top of the agenda.

Perhaps the 11th time will be the charm. Maybe the Saudis and their Gulf allies can forge a truce in Yemen that lasts more than a couple of days. Perhaps rising Sunni rivals such as Qatar, which notably did not break off diplomatic relations with Iran this week, can be brought into line at the emergency meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council scheduled for Saturday.

But none of this will ease the royal family's existential fears, or its horror over the Arab Spring of 2011. Particularly chilling was fall of Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak, abandoned by his longtime U.S. allies.

The House of Saud has long kept the populace in line by spreading out oil riches, what the scholar Toby Craig Jones calls "the very social contract that informally binds ruler and ruled." Now, a population of which a large majority is under 30 will be the first in memory to face economic privation. It may want a greater say in its future.

"Part of the leverage the regime has had on their people is that they don't impose taxes and therefore people don't expect representation," said Robert Jordan, a former U.S. ambassador to Riyadh. "But once they pay taxes, you're likely to see an increase in political unrest."

The kingdom is taking no chances. It has initiated a new security law that lists "disrupting public order," "risking national unity" and "harming the reputation" of the royal family as terrorist acts. Human rights lawyer Waleed al-Khair was given 10 years in prison for "inflaming public opinion," and a pro- democracy blogger, Raif Badawi, was given the same term as well as 1,000 lashes.

While this week's mass execution was the largest since the 1980s, use of the death penalty overall has been on the rise. In recent years, drug offenses have been far and away the top reason for capital punishment. The first-place ranking for 2016 changed on Saturday, when each of the 47 beheaded had been convicted on terrorism charges. (Adultery, apostasy and "sorcery" also all remain punishable by death. )

If those executions were meant to stifle dissent, it wasn't entirely successful. Since Saturday, there have been a series of protests in the Shiite-majority Qatif region, near the kingdom's vital oil fields, with reports of shots fired and a Saudi Aramco bus torched. The bombing of two mosques there last May, for which Islamic State took credit, was a warning that the region's Sunni-Shiite conflict, which the Saudis have done nothing to assuage, could do great damage inside the kingdom.

Domestic worries also provide an explanation for continuing the fruitless campaign in Yemen. The border between the two nations exists more in theory than practice, and the last thing the Saudis want is for the Houthi rebellion to spread among the Sunni tribes that straddle the line. We saw a similar dynamic during the Arab Spring, when unrest among the Shiite majority in neighboring Bahrain during became such a threat that Saudi tanks rolled across the causeway to prop up the island nation's Sunni leaders.

Saudi Arabia is hardly fertile ground for revolution, even now. It remains among the most oppressive nations on Earth. Even under straitened circumstances, its citizens remain among the wealthiest in the world, with a per capita gross domestic product 12 times that of Yemen. Fewer than a million of the nation's 28 million citizens turned out to vote in last month's municipal elections, even though women were on the ballot for the first time.

That said, there is little doubt that the new king and his son face challenges at home that were of little concern to their predecessors. Iran makes a useful bogeyman, but at the moment Sunni extremism in the form of Islamic State is a far more potent threat to Mideast stability than Persian/Shiite ambitions. And while the al-Sauds can blame the American perfidy and Muslim Brotherhood treachery for the collapse of Mubarak's Egypt, they are surely aware that the prime cause of the Arab Spring was economic frustration among a youthful populace with little faith that aging dictatorships would look to the future.
An affiliate of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Egypt has claimed responsibility for an attack that killed two policemen in the Giza neighborhood in the southern outskirts of the country's capital city.

Police officers Ali Ahmed Fahmy and Ramadan al-Burhami were killed as they made their way to work in Giza's Shabramant district, the Egyptian Ministry of Interior said in a statement on Saturday.

Officials said police shot two attackers, killing one and wounding another. The ministry identified the slain attacker as 21-year-old Mohammed Hassan Mohammed Mahfouz, a student from Giza.

The attack was claimed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group in a statement posted on messaging service Telegram, the Reuters news agency reported.

The killing of the two officers comes a day after two knife-wielding attackers stabbed three tourists at a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea city of Hurghada. The interior ministry said two men armed with knives had entered the outdoor restaurant at the front of the seaside, four-star Bella Vista Hotel and attacked the tourists.

Saturday's attack also comes two days after a man opened fire on a bus carrying Arab citizens of Israel outside a Cairo hotel.

No one was hurt in the attack, which was also claimed by ISIL in a statement published on social media.

Al Jazeera and wire services
http://donpolson.blogspot.com/ Bringing you the very best information, analysis and opinion from around the web. NOTE: For videos that don't start--go to article link to view.
Ambassador Asoke K Mukerji has been the Permanent Representative of India at the United Nations from early 2013 to December 31, 2015. Ambassador Mukerji who has served with distinction the MEA for almost 38 years []
DHAKA (TIP): Bangladeshs top court on Wednesday upheld the death sentence on the leader of the largest Islamist party for crimes during the countrys 1971 independence struggle, paving the way for his execution within months. []
KATHMANDU (TIP): Nepals agitating Madhesi Front and the three major parties on Janyary 5 formed a task force to find a common ground and narrow their differences over the new Constitution in a bid to []
Building upon Prime Minister Narendra Modis initiative of inviting all SAARC leaders to his swearing-in ceremony in May 2014, the neighbourhood continued to be the primary focus of Indias foreign policy in 2015. While relations with []
January is National Radon Action Month and Madison County Health Department (MCHD) is emphasizing the importance of having your home tested for radon. For the month of January, MCHD by offering radon test kits for $5 each for residents to check the radon level in their home. Radon is a significant environmental cancer risk. Radon is the leading cause of lung cancer among non-smokers and the second leading cause of lung cancer among smokers. Over 20,000 lung cancer deaths each year in the U.S. are caused by radon exposure.

Radon is a colorless, odorless, tasteless, and invisible gas that occurs naturally in the soil. It is produced by the natural breakdown of uranium and radium in rock formations. Radon typically enters a home by moving up from the soil and through cracks and holes in the foundation. Things such as sump pits, foundation cracks, gaps in suspended floors, construction joints and exposed soil in crawl spaces are areas where Radon may find a route into a home. Although a much smaller risk, radon can also enter a home through water that is obtained from the ground, such as from water wells. Once inside a home, radon gas can build up and create a hazard.
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Linkedin Marguerite Afra Sapiie (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

The Indonesian Army will further strengthen military posts in the Indonesian regions bordering other countries with the objective of developing infrastructure and human resources, Army spokesperson Brig. Gen. Muhammad Sabrar Fadhilah said on Friday.

He also said the Indonesian Military would mull over establishing new Military Commands in Papua and Sulawesi.

According to Fadhilah, military posts in border regions now lacked military personnel and infrastructure that supported their mobility, such as roads, transportation and weapons systems, making the bases unable to effectively be at the forefront of safeguarding the country.

"We will improve the infrastructure and place more personnel, since they are the ones who will directly face threats of invasion or smuggling over the sea," Fadhilah told journalists. He gave as an example that currently only two military personnel were placed in a military post on Liran Island, the westernmost island of the Maluku province.

Border regions susceptible to attacks have become a priority, according to Fadhilah, particularly regions such as Maluku, Papua, the Kalimantan borders, Aceh (North Sumatra) and small islands that are mostly located in eastern Indonesia.

The form of development could not be standardized for all military posts in Indonesia, Fadhilah said, since the distinct conditions shaped what needed to be improved in each region.

"For example, speedboats for military personnel placed on islands will bring greater benefits for mobility than motorcycles," Fadhilah said.

Meanwhile, the Army would also aim to form Military Command (Kodam) 13 in Manado, North Sulawesi, to further intensify control of the border regions and to further enhance the security there.

Kodam 13 would oversee three regional commands (Korem) in Manado, Gorontalo province and Palu in Central Sulawesi. The Army would also establish more military district commands (Kodim), the creation of which would be based on necessity.

"This [the formation of new military commands] is for the sake of the national interest, particularly to safeguard Indonesia's sovereignty because the Indonesian Military is responsible to protect outer border regions," said Fadhilah.

The Army was also eyeing the formation of a new Kodam in West Papua to cover sensitive areas, but it was still in the assessment stage and would be developed in the future, Fadhilah added. (bbn)
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Linkedin Corry Elyda (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

Following a deadly incident involving a chiropractic practice in South Jakarta, the Jakarta administration has urged all stakeholders, including government officials and residents, to help monitor health clinics and treatment facilities such as beauty salons, spas and massage parlors.



Jakarta Health Agency head Kusmedi Priharto said each of his agency's offices in the municipalities had a unit tasked with monitoring and controlling such businesses, but added that the units did not have enough resources.



'We need active participation of other parties, including residents and other administration institutions to monitor and control these businesses,' he said.



He said that he even did not have data on the licensed businesses.



Kusmedi said such businesses, especially medical practices, such as traditional methods, should have licenses. 'They need licenses both for their employees and the place,' he said.



Kusmedi added they should also have permits from their local administration.



According to Health Ministry Decree No. 1076/2003, chiropractic is categorized as a form of traditional medicine. Each traditional medical practice is obliged to have permit.



Kusmedi admitted that it was hard to monitor all related activities. 'They usually play hide and seek with us when we want to inspect them,' he said.



He gave an example of a sudden inspection he conducted yesterday. 'I had to disguise myself as a patient first to be able to enter the clinic,' he said.



Kusmedi also called on patients to be more critical in trying new treatment. 'They should ask about the permit and search for information about the treatment offered,' he said.



The victim of alleged chiropractic malpractice, 32-year-old Allya Siska Nadia, reportedly went to the Chiropractic First clinic in Pondok Indah Mall (PIM), South Jakarta on Aug. 5 last year for a consultation as she had suffered from neck pain for a year. She died in Pondok Indah Hospital on Aug. 7 at 6:15 a.m., a day after her treatment and several hours after experiencing agonizing pain in her neck.



Suspecting malpractice, Allya's family filed a report against the chiropractor who had treated Allya, US-national Randall Cafferty, on Aug. 12. Her family, however, refused to grant their permission for a police autopsy.



Allya's father Alfian Helmy said at a press conference that the family would not allow the police to carry out the procedure as it would be 'useless'.



'It has been five months since we buried Allya. The body comprises only bones right now. They will get nothing,' Alfian said on Friday, adding that his family members also disagreed with the procedure, because their spiritual belief forbade it.



Alfian suggested the police use other ways, such as testimony of orthopedics experts, to investigate the case.



Didik Librianto, an expert from Orthopedics Spine Indonesia who attended the conference, said that the orthopedics branch of medicine, as well as medical science, did not acknowledge chiropractic or 'spine manipulation'. According to him, chiropractic is classified as a traditional medical treatment.



He went on to suggest that people opt for clinical measures such as X-ray scans and physiotherapy to heal orthopedic abnormalities.



Meanwhile, Jakarta Police chief detective Sr. Comr. Krishna Murti explained that based on past experience, the police could determine the cause of death on bodies that had been buried for months. Thus, according to Krishna, the police hoped that Allya's family would cooperate in the investigation by allowing the autopsy.



Krishna went on to say that the police had teamed up with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) to search for Cafferty.



Separately, Merry Hotma, a member of the City Council's Commission E overseeing education and welfare, said that due to the incident, the council would discuss permit issues with the Heath Agency.



'We need to coordinate to ensure that these kind of clinics have permits,' she said.



She said she also suggested that the city administration form an institution to handle matters of consumer protection not only on food, medication and cosmetics. (agn)

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Linkedin Corry Elyda (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

Although the contract termination with Bekasi's Bantar Gebang landfill operator PT Godang Tua Jaya (GTJ) has not yet been finalized, the Jakarta administration is gearing up to independently manage the capital's garbage.



Jakarta Sanitation Agency head Isnawa Adji said during a discussion on low-carbon waste management recently that his agency would try to tackle the garbage of the city efficiently to lessen its dependency on Bantar Gebang.



Isnawa said the city administration would soon announce the winner of the bidding process for the intermediate treatment facility (ITF) in Sunter, North Jakarta.



'We plan to hold the groundbreaking ceremony for the ITF in Sunter next month or in March,' he said.



ITF Sunter was initiated by former Jakarta governor Fauzi Bowo, but the sluggish bidding process saw the project halted for years.



He added that city-owned property developer PT Jakarta Propertindo (Jakpro) would also build another ITF in Cakung Cilincing, North Jakarta. 'If we have two or three ITFs with a capacity of 1,000 tons, we can cut by 50 percent the garbage amount transferred to Bantar Gebang,' he said.



Isnawa said the agency would also intensify efforts to treat garbage upstream. 'We have the garbage bank information system dubbed 'Sibas,' where residents can submit the trash they collect to any garbage bank in Jakarta,' he said.



According to Isnawa, the city of 10 million people produces 6,700 to 7,000 tons of garbage a day. 'We need large [funds] just to transfer the garbage to Bantar Gebang,' he said.



The city administration spends at least Rp 400 billion in annual fees to GTJ to handle city trash in Bekasi.



Past experience showed that Jakarta's garbage treatment system was very fragile, he said. 'We could not send our garbage to Bantar Gebang for just three days, and the city was in a mess. It took a week to normalize conditions.'



The Bekasi administration previously banned dump trucks from Jakarta to enter their area after the Bekasi Transportation Agency seized six Jakarta garbage trucks for traveling to Bantar Gebang outside their designated operating hours.



Jakarta is about to terminate the contract with GTJ after a report from the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) found the company failed to comply with all the clauses in the contract.



Agus P. Sari, who chairs the working group on funding instruments at the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) task force, said ITFs using incinerators had been abandoned by many countries as they were not safe for the environment.



'If the city administration still wants to use incinerators, it must ensure that the combustion is above 1,000 degrees Celsius,' he said, adding that otherwise the process would produce hazardous gas.



According to Agus, the safest waste treatment is carbonization and gasification.
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post  Sat, January 9, 2016

Jan. 7, 2016



RM Wijoseno Hario Bimo aka Kanjeng Gusti Pangeran Haryo (KGPH) Suryodilogo was officially crowned Pakualaman leader with a reigning title of Kanjeng Gusti Pangeran Adipati Arya (KGPAA) Paku Alam X in a coronation ceremony held at Sewatama meeting hall at the Pakualaman complex in Yogyakarta on Thursday.



He replaced his father, KGPAA Paku Alam IX, who passed away on Nov. 22.



In the coronation ceremony, KGPH Suryodilogo was installed as the highest ruler of Pakualaman after the Kyai Bontit, an heirloom kris (dagger), was pinned to him.



In the ceremony, the 53-year-old stood before his throne, which is located at the northern tip of the Sewatama hall, before sitting upon it, surrounded by various heirloom weapons.



Your comments



How many minor principalities does Indonesia actually still have ' I mean areas in which those regents automatically assume public offices usually meant to be occupied by democratically elected people?



GF



To be honest, it's a ridiculous practice to allow those with no qualifications whatsoever to rule. And the public accepts it, that's something even more amusing. It's a principality within a republic.



SIM



No, it's not ridiculous. The sultans rule with dignity and honesty rarely seen anywhere else in Indonesia. They take care of the province well, and even the Special Province of Yogyakarta scored highest in terms of provincial performance in 2015.



I was born in West Java, yet I went to college in Yogya. At first I also thought the practice was outdated, yet the sultans took care of the citizens much better than the celebrities and corrupted people elected to the House of Representatives, enabled by votes of mostly uneducated people of Indonesia in this democracy system.



Lala Indischa



Yet the people of Yogya and Surakarta widely accept the idea of having someone not elected in a democratic way, not sure if rulers actually care about their citizens anyhow. I've been to Yogya a couple of times, and not so much has developed, same as other regions across this country.



If they functioned as a symbol like the Queen of England, then it would be okay. But they still wield power; such an outdated system is not only weird, but non-functional as well.



Simba1991
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

As online commerce grows exponentially, customer complaints are rising accordingly, with the sector recording the fourth-highest number of complaints in Jakarta in 2015, according to the Indonesian Consumers Foundation (YLKI).



'This is the first time ever that the sector has been in the top 10 most-complained-about sectors, and it's shot straight to number 4,' said YLKI complaints and law division head Sularsi in South Jakarta on Friday.



Of 1,030 reports received by the foundation, 77, or around 8 percent, were related to online shops. Seventy percent of cases originated in Jakarta, with the remainder from regions across the country.



The increase in complaints, Sularsi said, was in line with the sector's stratospheric rise in recent years; business statistics portal Statista notes that the number of digital buyers in Indonesia in 2011 was 2 million, but had leapt 55 percent to 3.1 million by 2013.



The portal furthermore expects the number of online shoppers to have continued increasing since 2013 and to continue increasing in the future, projecting 7.4 million and 8.7 million buyers in 2015 and 2016, respectively.



YLKI data show that the 77 complaints were related to issues such as refunds, late deliveries, undelivered items and one-party cancelations.



Most online shopping portals provide space for individual online sellers to sell their goods; selling and buying transaction quality can vary widely depending on the respective portal's policy.



Responding to the report, Lazada Indonesia CEO Magnus Ekbom said that the number of complaints reported to the YLKI reflected the size of his firm's e-commerce business.



'The number of complaints reflects the relative size of our business. The most important thing for Lazada is keeping our customer promise to provide an effortless shopping experience and ensuring no customers are left unhappy,' he wrote in an email.



Lazada had 500 customer service agents on standby 24 hours a day and provided a 100 percent money and satisfaction guarantee, Ekbom said.



The site, which houses at least 11,000 tenants, sold 1.7 million items during Online Shopping National Day (Harbolnas) from Dec. 10 to 12.



Similarly, Bukalapak CEO Achmad Zaky said that his company's sales had been more than doubling yearly and that over Harbolnas, his site had been the venue for more than 10 million transactions.



'As the business grows, we always strive to settle disputes between our tenants and their buyers. However, satisfaction parameters vary from one customer to another. Nevertheless, we always educate our tenants that the buyers remain the first priority,' Achmad said.



To safeguard its reputation, he added, Bukalapak had already severed ties with hundreds of tenants that had failed to comply with the site's service benchmarks. The site is now used as a selling space by more than 500,000 vendors.



To minimize customer complaints, YLKI's Sularsi said, the government should look into issuing regulations to protect both buyers and sellers.



Meanwhile, most online buyers interviewed said that while they rarely encountered problems with virtual shopping, one bad experience was enough to upset them and color their opinion of the site in question.



'I once bought a T-shirt from Zalora for my boss' birthday, but it had a defect and I had to return it. It's good that Zalora paid me the small delivery cost in voucher form, but the fact that the supposedly timely present came late annoyed me,' said 28-year-old Sherlly.



Private-sector employee Astrid also had a bad experience. 'In November, I bought an item from Lazada as it was still displayed 'in-stock'. After a week, I still hadn't received it, so I contacted the reseller [Lazada's tenant], who told me the item was actually out of stock. She said that I needed to contact Lazada myself to get my money back. But I was very busy at the time, so I never bothered contacting the site,' she explained. (rbk)

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Linkedin Eduardo Castillo and Mark Stevenson (The Jakarta Post) Mexico City  Sat, January 9, 2016

The world's most-wanted drug lord was recaptured in a daring raid by Mexican marines Friday, six months after he fled through a tunnel from a maximum security prison in a made-for-Hollywood escape that deeply embarrassed the government and strained ties with the United States.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced the capture of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman using his Twitter account: "Mission accomplished: we have him."

Few had thought Guzman would be taken alive, and few now believe Mexico will want to try to hold him a third time in Mexican prisons. He escaped from maximum-security facilities in 2001 and on July 11, 2015, the second breakout especially humiliating for the Pena Nieto administration, which only held him for less than 18 months.

The capture had top Mexican officials at a Foreign Ministry event gleefully embracing and breaking into a spontaneous rendition of the national anthem after Interior Secretary Miguel Osorio Chong delivered the news.

No sooner than Guzman was apprehended, calls started for his immediate extradition to the US, including from a Republican presidential candidate, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

"Given that 'El Chapo' has already escaped from Mexican prison twice, this third opportunity to bring him to justice cannot be squandered," Rubio said.

The United States filed requests for extradition for Guzman on June 25, before he escaped from prison. In September, a judge issued a second provisional arrest warrant on US charges of organized crime, money laundering drug trafficking, homicide and others. But Guzman's lawyers already filed appeals and received injunctions that could substantially delay the process.

Mexico said after the 2014 capture of the cartel boss that he would be tried in his home country first, with officials promising they would hang on to him. After his escape in July, the talk on Friday about keeping and trying Guzman almost as a matter of national pride wasn't so overt.

"It would be better for the Americans to take him away," said Mexican security analysis Raul Benitez.

Pena Nieto said he personally issued the order to recapture Guzman and heaped praise on Mexican agencies for their coordinated effort. "Careful and intensive intelligence work was carried out for months" leading up to the arrest, he said.

Pena Nieto gave a brief live message Friday afternoon that focused heavily on touting the competency of his administration, which has suffered a series of embarrassments and scandals in the first half of his presidency.

"The arrest of today is very important for the government of Mexico. It shows that the public can have confidence in its institutions," Pena Nieto said. "Mexicans can count on a government decided and determined to build a better country."

Guzman, a legendary figure in Mexico who went from a farmer's son to the world's top drug lord, was apprehended after a shootout between gunmen and Mexican marines at a home in an upscale neighborhood in Los Mochis, a seaside city in Guzman's home state of Sinaloa.

Authorities first located Guzman several days ago, based on reports that he was in Los Mochis, said a Mexican law enforcement official who was not authorized to be quoted by name said.

The Mexican Navy said in a statement that marines raided a home after receiving a tip about armed men there. They were fired on from inside the structure, it said. Five suspects were killed and six others arrested. The marine's injuries were not life threatening.

"You could hear intense gunfire and a helicopter; it was fierce," said a neighbor, adding that the battle raged for three hours, starting at 4 a.m. She refused to be quoted by name in fear for her own safety.

Guzman may have been at the house and fled while his gunmen and bodyguards provided covering fire from the house, said a second federal law enforcement official, who also agreed to discuss the operation on condition of anonymity. Guzman was later captured at the hotel Doux, a low-rise modern building on the outskirts of town.

Some reports said he tried to escape through storm drains. In 2014, Guzman evaded capture by fleeing through a network of interconnected tunnels in the drainage system under Culiacan, the Sinaloa state capital.

Marines seized two armored vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher at the home in Los Mochis, the navy's statement added.

Photos of the arms seized showed that two of the rifles were .50-caliber sniper guns, capable of penetrating most bullet-proof vests and cars. The grenade launcher was found loaded, with an extra round nearby. An assault rifle had a 40-mm grenade launcher and at least one grenade.

"The arrest is a significant achievement in our shared fight against transnational organized crime, violence, and drug trafficking," the Drug Enforcement Administration said in a statement.

The US Justice Department commended the Mexicans for their work as well. "I salute the Mexican law enforcement and military personnel who have worked tirelessly in recent months to bring Guzman to justice," Attorney General Loretta Lynch said.

After his first capture in Guatemala in June 1993, Guzman was sentenced to 20 years in prison. He reportedly made his 2001 escape from the maximum security prison in a laundry cart, though some have discounted that version.

His second escape last July was even more audacious. He slipped down a hole in his shower stall in plain view of guards into a mile-long tunnel dug from a property outside the prison. The tunnel had ventilation, lights and a motorbike on rails, illustrating the extent to which corruption was involved in covering up the elaborate operation. Noise of the final breakthrough from the tunnel was obvious inside the prison, according a video of Guzman in his cell just before he escaped. (bbn)

Associated Press writers Christopher Sherman in Mexico City and Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report.
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

The Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH Jakarta) has encouraged individuals who occupy strategic posts at the city administration to be brave in petitioning against 'baseless' decisions made by their superiors to remove them from their posts.



LBH Jakarta's Muhammad Isnur and Handika Febrian made the statement at the Jakarta State Administrative Court (PTUN) after the court ruled in favor of their client Retno Listyarti, who was removed from her post as the principal of state high school SMA 3 in South Jakarta.



'Hopefully the verdict today will motivate other high-ranking employees in the administration to follow suit in petitioning any baseless decisions to remove them from their posts,' Handika said.



He cited Jakarta Governor Basuki 'Ahok' Tjahaja Purnama as an example of an individual who often removed subordinates from particular posts.



'Bu Retno was removed by the Jakarta Education Agency's head [Arie Budhiman]. But, more specifically, this practice [of removing individuals] has been popular at the city administration recently,' he said, referring to Ahok.



'Hopefully the governor will no longer sanction individuals as he likes,' he added.



In May last year, Retno, who was also an education activist with the Federation for Indonesian Teachers Associations (FSGI), was demoted to the position of a teacher at a different school after she left SMA 3 for around an hour during a national examination to attend an interview at a private TV station.



She has defended her actions, saying she attended the interview to talk about leaked exam sheets.



The Thursday verdict noted that Retno was wrong to leave the school during a national exam.



'Attending an interview to express her opinion is her right, which is protected by the law. Her rights are, however, limited by her obligation to show up at school. She should have prioritized her obligations over her rights,' presiding judge Tri Cahya Indra Permana said when reading the verdict at the court in East Jakarta.



However, the verdict stated that punishing Retno by removing her from her post was also wrong because her mistake was considered minor and therefore she should have faced a lighter penalty.



'The mistake she made was a light one. The examination, after all, continued until the end though without her presence,' the verdict noted. 'She should have been punished with a lighter sentence.'



The court added that punishing Retno with a sentence considered weightier than her mistake would cause fear among other employees.



Retno said after the trial that she was happy with the verdict, adding that challenging the agency's decision by continuing to work as a principal was not her goal.



'My goal is to show that the punishment is not comparable with my small mistake. The agency's head should have given me notice first before removing me from my post,' she said.



Previously on Wednesday, Momon Muliana, another lawyer from the administration, also said they would appeal at a higher court.



'[Being a] principal is not a person's right but rather an additional responsibility that can be removed. An analogy, for example, is if I lent you my phone and then saw you were not looking after it, could I take it back? Of course I could if you might damage it. The same thing applies to a post. If I assign you to a post but you show no integrity, can I remove you?' he said after the trial. (saf)
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Linkedin Ina Parlina (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

National Encryption Agency (Lemsaneg) head Maj. Gen. (ret) Djoko Setiadi, recently re-appointed for a second term, has pledged to ensure the security of communication between government officials and President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo.



Djoko said that one of his priorities would be improving data security systems.



'Lemsaneg is improving the security system. We have managed to build a strong algorithm,' Djoko said after his inauguration at the State Palace on Friday.



He also called on government agencies to prevent the use of foreign applications. 'The nation has now managed to build a far more secure system,' Djoko said, adding that foreign-made applications were more vulnerable to attacks launched by other countries.



After President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo's call for the implementation of e-governance across the country to support a more efficient bureaucracy, hackers launched attacks on a number of government websites last year, with the latest target being the website of the Cabinet secretary.



Djoko has previously announced that 20 to 50 government websites using the go.id domain get attacked by hackers on a daily basis.



Despite being in operation since 1952, Lemsaneg, which is tasked with helping the government to secure its classified data and information, remains an obscure state institution.



Djoko assumed his position in 2011 when he was still an active military official.



The Friday inauguration marked not only Djoko's second tenure, after he retired from military service in December last year, but also a change in the encryption body, which is now under the President.



In 1972, Lemsaneg was transferred from the President's authority to the Defense Ministry's.



'That is why it was the President himself who inaugurated him,' Cabinet Secretary Pramono Anung said after Djoko's inauguration. 'It's function has been restored [to the initial 1952 arrangement] and it now answers directly to the President.'



The encryption agency has been helping the Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) to improve the data protection and security of BKPM's one-stop investment licensing services across the country, which was launched last year.



At the BKPM, Lemsaneg aims to ensure the security of all data submitted by investors.



Lemsaneg has also been providing data security for law enforcement agencies.



Djoko, however, claimed to have no knowledge as to why he was reassigned to the position, a decision made by Jokowi after his administration unveiled plans to establish a new body called the national cyber agency, which would lead a campaign against cyber attacks, including those threatening financial institutions and basic infrastructure, such as cellular services and electricity.



Djoko said the plan was still being discussed, adding that his office would be ready to help the government realize it.



Maj. Gen. (ret) Nachrowi Ramli, former Lemsaneg chief from 2002 to 2008, said Lemsaneg would face more complex challenges in the future and that it must prepare itself for an all-out attack on government data.



'He [Djoko] must be ready in terms of [preparing better] human resources, equipment, systems and strategies,' said Nachrowi, who was in charge of the implementation of the National Encryption System launched in 2004, which forms the backbone of the country's platform for exchanging secret information between state institutions.



Under the system, all ministries and state-owned companies are required to install standardized encryption devices in certain phone and data transmission lines to prevent potential leaks during transfers of secret information.



'The human resources must be able to work professionally and must consist of people with various backgrounds and experience,' Nachrowi added.

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Linkedin Ruslan Sangadji (The Jakarta Post) Palu  Sat, January 9, 2016

The management of Lore Lindu National Park (TNLL) in Central Sulawesi say its regular observations over the past few years have found that the populations of at least four animal species endemic to the region are in decline as a result of reproduction difficulties and poaching.



Speaking to The Jakarta Post on Thursday, TNLL head Sudayatna said numbers of mountain anoa, low-plain anoa, babirusa and tarsius within the park area had substantially dropped.



'Several years ago, our field officers could easily spot anoa or babirusa gathered in herds of 15 to 20. Over the past year, however, they could only find a single herd of no more than 11 anoa and babirusa,' Sudayatna said.



Another species that his men noticed have been declining in number is the tarsius.



'Unlike the maleo bird, the populations of anoa, babirusa and tarsius continue to decline as we currently have no breeding program for them,' Sudyatna said.



According to him, babirusa and anoa could not be bred like the maleo, which has been bred successfully in captivity.



The center is only able to build watering holes for the anoa and babirusa to help them survive the threat of extinction.



Sudayatna described the babirusa and anoa as very wild animal species surviving in vast areas, so when his center had sufficient funds, it would build watering holes and provide food to both animal species so they would feel at home there. 'It's the only thing we can do to save them and help them multiply,' he said.



The 189,000-square-kilometer TNLL is located around 60 kilometers south of the provincial capital of Palu.



It is home to endemic Sulawesi flora and fauna as well as beautiful natural panorama, as it sits along the Wallace Line and part of the Asian and Australian continental shelves. The TNLL is the biggest mammal habitat in Sulawesi.



The anoa, babirusa, deer, monkey ghost, kakaktonkea monkey, kuskus marsupial, tarsius and Sulawesi musang civet, the biggest meat-eating mammal, live in the park.



TNLL is also home to at least five squirrel species and 31 of 38 rat species, including endemic species.



It also includes at least 55 bat species and more than 230 bird species, including the maleo, two Senggang, julang and kengkareng bird species endemic to Sulawesi.



Thousands of exotic and beautiful insect species can also be found around TNLL. The brightly colored butterflies flying around the park or along footpaths and streams regularly attract visitors.



Biology researcher Mohammad Yasin, who has been studying the region's endemic species, said that his research over the past three years had confirmed that babirusa and anoa also inhabited the neighboring Togean National Park in Tojo Una-Una regency.



Yasin estimated that there were currently 200 babirusa in Togean. The size of the babirusa population in Togean, he added, remained stable compared to that in TNLL as people in the Muslim-majority region were not allowed by their religious teachings to consume meat from babirusa, a type of pig.



'This is different compared to TNLL, whose most residents living near the park are Christians who are allowed to consume the meat,' he said.



Sudyatna emphasized the role of the local community in protecting the forest and its endemic species.



'They have to stop poaching the protected animals. This is important as the TNLL is not just a state or provincial asset, but also the lungs of the world,' he said.
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

Vice President Jusuf Kalla has said that the planned redrilling of a gas well near the center of a mudflow in Porong, Sidoarjo, East Java, by oil and gas company PT Lapindo Branta ' which is controlled by the family of businessman and Golkar Party chairman Aburizal Bakrie ' could generate money that the company could use to pay off its debts to the government.



'That's how things should work. [Lapindo] could pay its debts ' the government has been giving it funds long enough. How can they pay if they don't start drilling?' Kalla asked as quoted by Antara on Friday.



Fresh drilling, he said, would be environmentally sound, with clearance having been issued by the Upstream Oil and Gas Regulatory Special Task Force (SKK Migas).



'If SKKMigas has given the nod and it's safe, they can go ahead, no problem,' Kalla said.



Workers from the company began their drilling operation on Wednesday at the Tanggulangin 1 well in Kedungbanteng subdistrict, Tanggulangin district, Sidoarjo, some 5 kilometers from the center of the mudflow in Porong.



Company spokesman Arief Setya Widodo said the drilling at Tanggulangin 1 would be for gas rather than for oil, as had been the case with the Banjar Panji-1 well, which is believed by many to have caused the 2006 flow of hot mud that inundated thousands of houses in Porong.



The company expects drilling at Tanngulangin to be over in a matter of weeks.



SKKMigas has encouraged the company to increase production to meet demand for gas in East Java.



Lapindo's gas production at the Tanggulangin 1 well is predicted to reach 5 million cubic meters per day. If combined with the production of some 30 wells already in operation in Sidoarjo, production would reach 8 million cubic meters daily.



The new drilling operation kicked off while many victims of the Porong mudflow remained uncompensated more than nine years after the disaster struck.



Of the 3,331 compensation claims filed, 86 remain unresolved because of issues surrounding verification of land ownership.



The government earlier agreed to bail out the powerful Bakrie family to settle the remaining compensation for victims of the mudflow disaster, providing a Rp 781 billion (US$62 million) loan to PT Minarak Lapindo Jaya.



The company claims it has so far spent Rp 6.1 trillion on dealing with social and physical issues arising from the mudflow.



Green groups, meanwhile, have spoken out against the government's decision to allow Lapindo to resume drilling so close to where the disaster occurred.



The Indonesian Forum for the Environment (WALHI) said that the new drilling activity could result in a repeat of the mudflow disaster.



Walhi executive director for East Java Ony Mahardika said the new well Lapindo plans to drill was located only 2 kilometers from areas currently still buried under the mud.



Coupled with what he called Lapindo's 'poor drilling standards', taking up drilling in the area could increase the risk of another disaster, Ony said as quoted by Bisnis Indonesia daily.



The government, he stressed, should protect the local people from the possibility of another disaster that could occur in the area.



'The government should come up with a mechanism to protect the lives of people living in densely inhabited industrial areas. That is why Lapindo's plan to conduct drilling activities must be rejected,' Ony said.

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I don't know how it is with you, but for me the shocker of the week was this . Now, look at the photo. Who would be the man hanging on ...
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Linkedin Grace D. Amianti and Tassia Sipahutar (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

Foreign exchange (FX) reserves finally increased in December, but economists say that they risk falling again in light of unpredictable market movement.



In a statement published on Friday, Bank Indonesia (BI) announced that FX reserves had climbed to US$105.9 billion in December from a previous position of $100.2 billion in November.



The figure is sufficient to finance 7.7 months of imports or 7.4 months of imports and repayment of the government's external debts. It is, moreover, above the international benchmark of three-month imports.



The December result is the first increase recorded after the reserves posted persistent decline between February and November.



The rupiah exchange rate underwent sharp fluctuations during the period, prompting the central bank to continuously enter the market and use the reserves to calm volatility.



While the $5.7 billion rise represents good news, the increase was mainly supported by the government's efforts to source external financing, rather than improvements in exports.



The government sold $3.5 billion-worth of global bonds in December and withdrew at least $850 million in loans from several institutions, such as the Agence FranAaise de DAveloppement (AFD), KfW Development Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB).



As reported previously, the debt paper issuances and loan withdrawals were part of the government's attempt to plug the 2015 state budget deficit and generate early funding for the 2016 state budget.



The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) will only issue data on the December exports in mid-January, but the figure has been on a downward trend so far.



Commenting on the reserves result, BI Governor Agus Martowardojo said that the central bank was still on the lookout for risks that might impact the reserves, citing falling oil prices, which could further hit commodity prices and exports.



Agus also highlighted the findings of a recent World Bank report on global prospects. The report forecasts continued economic slowdown in China and Japan, two of Indonesia's largest export destinations.



Meanwhile, Bank Danamon economist Anton Hendranata said that it would be difficult to bring FX reserves back to the levels recorded in previous years.



'They're actually more likely to fall again, because the rupiah will continue to fluctuate this year. Of course, maintaining exchange rate stability is a priority for the central bank and it will spend the reserves again for that purpose,' Anton said.



Bank Mandiri economist Andry Asmoro said that Indonesia could not rely on exports for FX reserves, adding that additional funds would be generated from the government's upcoming global bond issuances.



Andry said that capital inflows would still stream into the portfolio market and direct investment, but presumably at a lower amount than before.



'BI may not want to use the reserves too aggressively because we're only entering the second week of 2016 and look at what's already happening in China,' he said, adding that 'more awaits in the coming months'.



Both economists agreed that the FX earnings held by exporters could help increase the reserves, but called for more efforts to persuade them to 'let go' of the FX and convert the reserves into rupiah.

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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

JAKARTA: In a bid to improve the performance of his administration, Jakarta Governor Basuki 'Ahok' Tjahaja Purnama inaugurated 1,042 new city administration officials of various echelons at City Hall on Friday.



Ahok said during the inauguration ceremony that he hoped the officials would work with integrity.



'All officials should report any rent seeking in their offices,' he said.



He said he hoped those who became district and subdistrict heads would familiarize themselves with their areas. 'You have to ensure that there are no more illegal buildings, for example,' he said.



Among the new appointees were six new Echelon II officials, the heads of agencies and working units.



Yurianto, the former Jakarta Development Planing Board (Bappeda) deputy head, was appointed the new Investment and Promotion Office (BPMP) head, while the previous BPMP head Catur Laswanto has taken over at the Tourism Agency.



Former deputy head of the Education Agency, Sopan Adrianto, was appointed the new head of the agency, replacing Arie Budhiman who has moved to the central government, while Sopan's position has been filled by Bowo Irianto, the agency's former secretary.



Meanwhile, Yayan Yuhana, former official at the Tax Agency, has become the Legal Bureau chief, replacing Sri Rahayu who has retired.



Ahok switched, demoted or appointed more than 8,000 officials last year.
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

JAKARTA: In a bid to ease the capital city's traffic congestion, the Jakarta administration is considering whether to extend Transjakarta bus routes to Greater Jakarta, including Tangerang in Banten, Bekasi and Depok, both in West Java.



Jakarta Governor Basuki 'Ahok' Tjahaja Purnama said at City Hall on Friday that the Jakarta administration and the local governments would cooperate to extend the service of Transjakarta buses.



'We will prioritize Tangerang, Bekasi and Depok, ' he said, adding that the city would also consider Bogor and Cianjur, both in West Java.



Ahok said he hoped that commuters who traveled daily from the satellite cities to the capital would leave their private vehicles and opt for Transjakarta.



'Therefore, the fares should be cheaper and the buses should be safer and more comfortable,' he said.



Ahok said at least 3 million private vehicles, both cars and motorcycles, entered the capital city every morning. 'We have to decrease that number,' he said.



Ahok added that he also wanted a flat fare of Rp 3,500 (25 US cents) on all Transjakarta and feeder routes.
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

JAKARTA: Two houses and a rice stall on Jl. Swadaya Raya in Tanjung Duren, West Jakarta, were burned down on Friday following a gas explosion in the stall, according to the police.



Tanjung Duren Police chief Comr. Rokhmad Hari Purnomo said the fire, which started at 5:30 a.m., immediately took hold of the rice stall before spreading to two adjoining houses.



'The fire originated in the rice stall. We believe the fire was ignited by a gas leakage inside the stall,' he said as quoted by wartakotalive.com.



He added that an employee of the stall was cooking food at the time of the explosion.



No casualties were reported in the incident and the police have not yet estimated the losses suffered by the householders and stall owner.



The Jakarta Fire Agency deployed 13 fire trucks to extinguish the blaze, which they brought under control at 7 a.m.
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Linkedin Ina Parlina (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

Russia and Indonesia have expressed their intention to boost economic ties, with Moscow proposing investments in various infrastructure projects and smelting facilities in Southeast Asia's biggest economy.



The remarks were made during a meeting between President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo and Russian Industry and Trade Minister Denis Manturov on Friday at the State Palace.



'During the meeting, Indonesia [...] asked Russia to remove its non-tariff barrier for Indonesia's CPO [crude palm oil] and fisheries commodities,' Foreign Minister Retno LP Marsudi told reporters after the meeting.



Jakarta reportedly also asked Russia to exempt Indonesians visiting Russia from visa requirements, following Indonesia's implementation of a visa-free facility for Russian tourists, who represent one of the biggest groups of foreign arrivals to the country.



According to Coordinating Economic Minister Darmin Nasution, Manturov said Moscow would discuss Indonesia's request on CPO.



Russia is the 27th-largest foreign spender in Indonesia, with the bulk of investment going to hotels and restaurants, according to data from the Foreign Ministry.



Meanwhile, bilateral trade has surged in recent years, up by 45.1 percent on average to US$3.52 billion last year from 2009, according to statistics from the Trade Ministry.



During the meeting, Manturov asked Indonesia to address a number of challenges hampering his country's investment in Indonesia.



'Russia asked for our attention in terms of the ease of doing business related to their ongoing investment and that being planned, including a railway construction project in Central Kalimantan and East Kalimantan,' Darmin said, adding that Russia also mentioned problems related to tax.



Manturov expressed Russia's intention to invest in West Kalimantan to build an alumina smelting facility in the region amid ongoing bidding for the project, and another smelting facility for ferronickel.



'We told them to fight for the tender,' Darmin said.



Russian proposals for investment arose following Indonesia's move to ban shipments of unprocessed mineral ores in a bid to spur growth in the country's downstream mining industry and add value to its exports. Miners are now required to build local refineries and smelters in order to be able to export, as stipulated in the 2009 Mining Law.



Growing interest from foreign companies indicates that Indonesia remains one of the world's major investment destinations despite the economic slowdown.



During a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of the APEC Summit in Beijing in late 2014, Jokowi sought Russian investment in energy, power plants and railway construction, as well as irrigation, food and manufacturing facilities. Putin has expressed optimism that there could be more room for future economic cooperation with Indonesia.



Russia also proposed cooperation in the civil aviation sector and shipyards during the Friday meeting.



The country is a cooperative partner for Indonesia in the fields of aviation, air transportation and nuclear energy, with plans to maintain and increase its aircraft exports to Indonesia.



The Yaroslav Mudry frigate visited Indonesia in 2014 as part of the Indo Defense Expo.



Retno said, meanwhile, that the meeting did not touch on global politics amid ongoing tensions in the Middle East, but merely highlighted the good ties between Indonesia and Russia.



'We [Indonesia and Russia] want to improve economic cooperation,' Retno added.

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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Batam  Sat, January 9, 2016

BATAM: Some 2,000 workers from PT Amtek Engineering Batam in Riau Islands province are planning to strike from Jan. 11 to Jan. 30 to demand clarity on their status following the company's decision to change its name.



The Federation of Indonesian Metal Workers Union's (FSPMI) Batam chapter official, Suprapto, said the workers were restless because the name change was made without informing them and they feared it would affect their positions in the company.



He said some workers had been with the company for over 10 years and they wanted to know whether the change would put their service period back to zero. 'The company could not explain this,' he said.



Amtek became a subcontractor of cell phone producer Apple after the latter bought US-based company Interplex. The Singaporean company has been in operation in Batam since 1996, working in metal stamping and forming.
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Denpasar  Sat, January 9, 2016

DENPASAR: An Australian man living in Bali was found dead on Friday morning at his residence on Jl. Tungak Bingin Blok H No. 2 in Sanur, Denpasar. The body of the 64-year-old man, identified as Alistair Robert Hugh Frowde, was found floating in his swimming pool. South Denpasar Police chief Comr. Nanang Prihasmoko said Frowde's body was found by his wife at around 5 a.m. on Friday.



'His wife realized that he was not in bed when she woke up. The man was apparently found floating in his swimming pool,' Nanang said.



Nanang said the police's preliminary investigation showed no signs of violence prior to Frowde's death. He said the victim had likely experienced cramps or a heart attack, which led to his death. Frowde's body was taken to the Sanglah Hospital morgue for an autopsy.
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post  Sat, January 9, 2016

Jan. 7, 2016



State electricity company PLN recorded a 2.2 percent growth in electricity sales to end-users in 2015, the weakest sales growth for the company in the last decade due to the sluggish economy.



PLN marketing division head Benny Marbun said electricity consumption slowed throughout 2015 on lower demand from businesses such as factories, plants and mills.



'The achievement is far from the 2015 target, which was set at 5.6 percent. It is the lowest growth in the last 10 years, mainly because industry growth was quite small,' said Benny in Jakarta on Thursday.



Your comments:



The sluggish economy has nothing to do with PLN's sales figures. As long as houses continue to be built and PLN's security remains non-existent, people will continue to enjoy 'free' electricity at the expense of those who do pay. PLN is its own worst enemy.



Angela006



It's more about red tape and corruption to be fair. PLN has failed to provide essential services to the public. With no clear reform plan, there'll be no change.



Simba1991



The reality is that PLN does not deliver. Electricity is still in demand, however, PLN cannot provide the basic need to its customers. Considering the alleged 'slow' growth, I really wonder if PLN's outages have more to do with profit-making.



Every excuse has been used and there are more outages than ever. PLN makes promises but doesn't deliver, charges more for less service, and then has the nerve to blame the sluggish economy.



It is typical of the government to blame someone or something else for its failures to save face.



Willo1246



The keyword is 'sales' here, as it prefers to sell unsubsidized kilowatts to industries, rather than provide an essential service to the public.



Kelapa



Maybe it should also be noted by PLN that consumers need to pay some 'grease' to actually get an upgrade within an acceptable time period, while doing so of course does not guarantee that electricity will be delivered 24 hours a day, seven days a week.



Gordon Freeman



To see growth it needs to provide service. Everyone knows PLN fails in service and management.



Simaging



We know perfectly that with PLN we can pay a worker to give us a good price, especially with the new meter system.



Phil France
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Linkedin Ayomi Amindoni (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo has expressed a commitment to resolve a number of past human rights violations by the end of this year.

In a dinner with journalists on Friday night, the President said he had ordered the coordinating politics, legal and security affairs minister, the attorney general, the National Police chief and the head of the National Intelligence Agency (BIN) to seek comprehensive resolutions to unresolved cases of human rights violations.

The President himself did not mention which human rights violations in particular would be addressed.

In a move to show that he is different from his predecessors, Jokowi has repeatedly reiterated his commitment to settling past rights abuses. Nevertheless, he has been criticized for his poor performance on human rights, which is far from his election campaign promise to improve their protection in Indonesia.

Several human rights violations occurred in 2015: Christian-Muslim strife in Tolikara, the burning and demolition of Christian churches in Aceh Singkil, the fatal beating of an anti-mining activist in Lumajang, the creation of internal Shia and Ahmadiyah refugees because of intra-Muslim religious intolerance and the criminalization of freedom of speech and expression are among the cases.

Meanwhile, older unresolved rights cases include a 1989 massacre in Talangsari, Lampung, the forced disappearance of anti-Soeharto activists in 1997 and 1998, the 1998 Trisakti University shootings, the Semanggi I and Semanggi II student shootings in 1998 and 1999, the mysterious killings of alleged criminals in the 1980s, the communist purges of 1965 and various abuses that took place in Wasior and Wamena in Papua in 2001 and 2003, respectively. (bbn)
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Linkedin Marguerite Afra Sapiie (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo will undertake an official state visit to Russia in an effort to strengthen economic cooperation between the two countries, Russian Trade and Industry Minister Denis Manturov said.

The visit will be made in late May when President Jokowi attends the ASEAN-Russia Summit, Foreign Minister Retno L.P. Marsudi confirmed.

"President Jokowi has accepted the invitation from our president. We really look forward to his visit to Russia," Manturov told journalists on Friday.

The Russian government would prepare some documents to be signed during Jokowi's visit, possibly a memorandum of understanding to follow up on the bilateral cooperation agreements reached by the two countries, Manturov said.

Manturov delivered the invitation from Russian President Vladimir Putin during his visit to Jakarta on Friday, when the Russian delegation met with Indonesian ministers to discuss economic cooperation, investment in particular.

In the spotlight was the US$2.5 billion Russia has invested in railway construction in Kalimantan, a long-awaited plan that has been in the works since 2011.

Manturov confirmed that the Russian government had already divided the five-year project, named Borneo Railways, into four construction phases and had set up subsidiaries to handle them.

According to Manturov, Russia also wished to establish industrial cooperation with state-owned aircraft manufacturer PT Dirgantara Indonesia (DI) to produce several MC-21 plane parts in Indonesia, which in the long run was aimed at producing 20 to 100 planes in 10 years.

"It's a win-win solution. This will give motivation to Indonesia and guarantee alternative supplies to Russia, which today is still buying from Western companies," said Manturov.

He added that Russia would be ready to cooperate with Indonesia in other areas, such as in nuclear energy plants and gas turbine energy, as well as by supplying oil from Russian oil companies to Indonesia, adding that Russia was also looking for reliable Indonesian partners to participate in Russian projects.

"We are absolutely open. It depends on the Indonesia partners and this relies on the [Indonesian] government, too," Manturov said. (bbn)
December 17 was the day we first wrote about the drinking water disaster in Flint, Michigan by contrasting the arrest of multimillionaire Martin Shkreli with the hands-off policy of law enforcement agencies towards Rick Snyder, responsible for poisoning the city of Flint, Michigan. Maddow was on the case very quickly and has stayed on the case... very doggedly.

As you'll recall, Snyder's administration keep reassuring Flint residents that the water was perfectly safe and that nay-sayers were crackpots and troublemakers for months and months before they finally admitted something was wrong with the city's drinking water late in December. It now turns out that Snyder was aware of the gravity of the situation for half a year. So for months his administration was telling residents to drink poisoned water. This is mind-boggling. I've never heard of anything like this in my life. He hasn't been arrested. I don't know if there's been a Grand Jury empaneled to investigate. NBC News reported that "Six months before Michigan's governor declared a state of emergency over high lead levels in the water in Flint, his top aide wrote in an email that worried residents were 'basically getting blown off by us.'" This was something that started in April when Snyder's anti-democracy plenipotentiary, Darnell Earley, ordered that Flint stop using water from Detroit to save some money. It didn't take long before the salty water from the Flint River to start corroding pipes and leaching out lead and causing illnesses among children.

"These folks are scared and worried about the health impacts and they are basically getting blown off by us (as a state we're just not sympathizing with their plight)."

"I really don't think people are getting the benefit of the doubt. Now they are concerned and rightfully so about the lead level studies they are receiving," Muchmore said.

Half a year later-- this week-- Snyder declared a state of emergency. It seems pretty clear that Snyder, frantically trying to duck responsibility and cover his ass, is to blame. Lonnie Scott, executive director of Progress Michigan, wrote that "The source of the Flint Water Crisis leads directly to Gov. Rick Snyder and the fiscal austerity policies that he and his Republican colleagues have been pushing for years on Michigan residents. Families in Flint were forced to drink lead-tainted water while the administration scoffed at their concerns and cries for help. An entire generation of Michiganders now face an uncertain future because of Republican cuts to essential and life-giving services."

In his rush to save money while poisoning a city's children, Snyder's austerity agenda will cost Michigan taxpayers upwards of a billion dollars . Thursday Chuck Todd interviewed Michael Moore, film-maker and Flint resident, who told him Snyder should be arrested and that his weak apology was like that of a drunk driver saying, hey, he wasntto kill that kid on that sidewalk. "It really was absolute insanity. The governor refused to listen. He mocked the critics. He mocked the doctors doing the studies at a local hospital. He ridiculed them. He wouldnt listen to anybody." And he was covering up what he already knew to be true and getting worse.

Dear Governor Snyder:





Thanks to you, sir, and the premeditated actions of your administrators, you have effectively poisoned, not just some, but apparently ALL of the children in my hometown of Flint, Michigan.





And for that, you have to go to jail.





To poison all the children in an historic American city is no small feat. Even international terrorist organizations haven't figured out yet how to do something on a magnitude like this.





you did. Your staff and others knew that the water in the Flint River was poison-- but you decided that taking over the city and "cutting costs" to "balance the budget" was more important than the people's health (not to mention their democratic rights to elect their own leaders). So you cut off the clean, fresh glacial lake water of Lake Huron that the citizens of Flint (including myself) had been drinking for decades and, instead, made them drink water from the industrial cesspool we call the Flint River -- a body of "water" where toxins from a dozen General Motors and DuPont factories have been dumped for over a hundred years. And then you decided to put a chemical in this water to "clean" it-- which only ended up stripping the lead off of Flint's aging water pipes, placing that lead in the water and sending it straight into people's taps. Your callous-- and reckless (btw, "reckless" doesn't get you a pass; a reckless driver who kills a child, still goes to jail)-- decision to do this has now, as revealed by the city's top medical facility, caused "irreversible brain damage" in Flint's children, not to mention other bodily damage to all of Flint's adults. Here's how bad it is: Even GM won't let the auto parts they use in building cars touch the Flint water because that water "corrodes" them ( Butdid. Your staff and others knew that the water in the Flint River was poison-- but you decided that taking over the city and "cutting costs" to "balance the budget" was more important than the people's health (not to mention their democratic rights to elect their own leaders). So you cut off the clean, fresh glacial lake water of Lake Huron that the citizens of Flint (including myself) had been drinking for decades and, instead, made them drink water from the industrial cesspool we call the Flint River -- a body of "water" where toxins from a dozen General Motors and DuPont factories have been dumped for over a hundred years. And then you decided to put a chemical in this water to "clean" it-- which only ended up stripping the lead off of Flint's aging water pipes, placing that lead in the water and sending it straight into people's taps. Your callous-- and reckless (btw, "reckless" doesn't get you a pass; a reckless driver who kills a child, still goes to jail)-- decision to do this has now, as revealed by the city's top medical facility, caused "irreversible brain damage" in Flint's children, not to mention other bodily damage to all of Flint's adults. Here's how bad it is: Even GM won't let the auto parts they use in building cars touch the Flint water because that water "corrodes" them ( link ). This is a company that won't even fix an ignition switch after they've discovered it's already killed dozens of people. THAT's how bad the situation is. Even GM thinks you're the devil.





Maybe you don't understand the science behind this. Lead, in water-- now, bear with me, this involves a science lesson and you belong to the anti-science party, the one that believes there's not a climate problem and that Adam and Eve rode on dinosaurs 6,000 years ago. Lead is toxic to the human body. There's no way to fully eliminate it once it's in your system, and children are the most damaged by it.





By taking away the city's clean drinking water in order to "cut costs," and then switching the city's water supply to Flint River water, you have allowed massively unsafe levels of pollutants and lead into the water that travels in to everyone's home. Every Flint resident is trapped by this environmental nightmare which you, Governor, have created.





Like any real criminal, when you were confronted with the truth (by the EPA and other leading water experts across America), you denied what you did. Even worse, you decided to mock your accusers and their findings. As I said, I know you don't like to believe in a lot of science (after all, you used to run Gateway Computers, and that, really, is all anyone needs to know about you), but this time the science has caught up with you-- and this time, I hope, it's going to convict you.





The facts are all there, Mr. Snyder. Every agency involved in this scheme reported directly to you. The children of Flint didn't have a choice as to whether or not they were going to get to drink clean water. But soon it will be your turn to not have that choice about which water you'll be drinking. Because by this time next year, if there is an ounce of justice left in this land, the water you'll be drinking will be served to you from a tap inside Jackson Prison.





I am calling upon my fellow Michiganders-- and seekers of justice everywhere-- to petition U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, asking her to arrest you for corruption and assault (i.e., the physical assault you committed against the children of Flint when you knowingly poisoned them).





Yesterday, the federal prosecutor in Flint, after many of us had called for months for this action, finally opened up an investigation into the matter ( link ). Now we need your arrest, prosecution and conviction.





And who will be cheering on that day when you are fitted with a bright orange jumpsuit? The poor and minority communities of Michigan who've endured your dictatorial firing of their mayors and school boards so you could place your business friends in charge of their mostly-black cities. They know you never would have done this to a wealthy white suburb.





I welcome all to look at the appalling facts of this case, which have been reported brilliantly here here , and especially here by the great Rachel Maddow. Thank you, Rachel, for caring so deeply when the rest of the national television media didn't.





I'm asking everyone who agrees with me to sign on to this petition and call for your arrest, Governor Snyder. You are not allowed to run amok in my hometown like you have done. The children whom you have poisoned have to endure a life of pain and lower IQ's from your actions. You have destroyed a generation of children-- and for that, you must pay.





It is time for you to go to prison. Out of mercy, I'll ask that you have in your cell your own personal Gateway computer.





Sincerely,

Michael Moore

Flint native

Michigan resident and voter
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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

JAKARTA: Attorney General M Prasetyo has defended a move taken by state prosecutors to freeze bank accounts belonging to the Soeharto family-owned Supersemar Foundation.



Prasetyo said that his office had moved to freeze the bank accounts after receiving a tip-off that people from the foundation were attempting to transfer money out of the accounts.



'We received information from certain banks that money in the accounts would be withdrawn. We then moved to freeze the accounts,' he said as quoted by tribunnews.com.



In early December last year, the Supersemar Foundation filed a lawsuit against the Attorney General's Office (AGO) for what it deemed an illegal move to freeze the foundation's bank accounts.



The foundation's lawyer Denny Kailimang said that due to the unwarranted freezing of accounts, the Supersemar Foundation had not been able to pay their employees or distribute scholarships it had promised to students.



The AGO moved to block the foundation's bank accounts following a Supreme Court ruling ordering the foundation to pay a Rp 4.4 trillion (US$316 million) fine for misusing scholarship funds.
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Linkedin Slamet Susanto, Suherdjoko and Agus Maryono (The Jakarta Post) Yogyakarta/Semarang/Banyumas  Sat, January 9, 2016

Law enforcement personnel in Yogyakarta and Central Java have reassured the public that they will launch an investigation into the disappearance of more than a dozen residents from neighboring provinces over the past several months.



Their investigation will aim to address widespread public speculation that the missing people had joined radical organizations, including the Islamic State (IS) movement.



In Yogyakarta, Rica Tri Handayani, a civil servant general practitioner at the Sardjito General Hospital's physiotherapy division, and her son have been missing since November last year.



According to the hospital's employee attendance list, Rica should have been back at work in November, but she never showed up.



Her house in Mlati, Sleman regency, is also reportedly empty.



The hospital's spokesperson Trisno Heru Nugroho said there was suspicion that Rica had joined IS as National Intelligence Agency (BIN) officers had visited the hospital asking Rica's coworkers about Rica's personal background and her husband, Aditya.



'The couple sent their child, who is still a toddler, to study at Ngruki Islamic boarding school in Surakarta [Central Java]. His whereabouts are also still unknown,' Trisno said.



Yogyakarta Police chief Brig. Gen. Erwin Triwanto said Rica's family were no longer in Yogyakarta but the police were still trying to determine their exact location.



'Our men have been investigating. Be patient. We will most surely locate them,' Erwin said, without commenting on speculation about Rica's connections with IS.



Among others reported missing in Yogyakarta were Diah Ayu Yulianingsih and her daughter Raina Ayranica Salyaputri, whose home has reportedly been empty since Dec. 11.



Meanwhile, 14 other people from a number of regions across Central Java were also reported missing by family members between February and December last year.



The Central Java Police said there was no solid evidence to suggest that the missing persons had joined radical organizations.



'If such an organization exists, the government would not allow them [to join] as it would not be an official institution,' Central Java Police deputy chief Brig. Gen. Musyafak told reporters in Semarang.



Among the reported missing persons were two civil servants from Purbalingga regency, namely Praptono Adi, secretary of Kembaran Kulon subdistrict administration in Purbalingga district, and Widodo Panca Nugraha of the Purbalingga regency administration.



A week before going missing, Widodo tendered his resignation as a civil servant. It turned out later that both Widodo and Praptono had been frequently communicating with each other via phone calls and direct meetings. Both left their respective families without notice.



The issue of radicalization and the growing influence of militant groups has increasingly attracted attention and criticism in Indonesia, especially in light of the more than 500 Indonesians reported to have joined the IS movement in Iraq and Syria.



In November last year, the National Counterterrorism Agency (BNPT) confirmed that a civil servant in Batam, Riau Islands, who had been reported missing along with his family several months earlier, had left the country and joined IS.



In the same month, the police managed to foil an attempt by eight residents of South Sulawesi to leave Indonesia for Syria, allegedly to join the IS movement.

------------------

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Linkedin Fedina S. Sundaryani, Ina Parlina and Nurul Fitri Ramadhani (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

The National Police say that they will not launch a criminal investigation into former House of Representatives speaker Setya Novanto over his alleged attempt to broker a back room deal with PT Freeport Indonesia.



National Police chief Gen. Badrodin Haiti told reporters on Friday that investigators had already consulted with experts and concluded that there was no legal justification for launching a general crimes investigation as the conversation between Setya, Freeport Indonesia president director Maroef Sjamsoeddin and business tycoon Muhammad Reza Chalid did not violate any articles of the Criminal Code.



'We can't charge them with slander against the President as the Constitutional Court abolished that article. We can't pursue a case of slander against the President because the recording was not made public by Setya, but by the House ethics council hearings,' he said at the National Police headquarters in South Jakarta.



Badrodin added that it was also impossible for the police to investigate allegations that Maroef had committed fraud because he did not do anything that could be considered a violation of the Criminal Code.



'This definitely has more indications of being a special crime, which is already being probed by the Attorney General's Office [AGO],' he said.



Late last year, Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Sudirman Said reported Setya to the House ethics council for allegedly claiming to have won the approval of President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo and Vice President Jusuf Kalla to secure shares and projects from Freeport in exchange for helping the company to extend its contract and continue operations at its gold mine in Papua, one of the world's largest.



The report included a transcript and copy of a conversation between Setya, Maroef and Reza.



Following the report, the ethics council held a series of hearings, with testimony from Maroef, Sudirman and Setya himself, to determine whether he had committed a breach of ethics



However, Setya resigned from his post as House speaker before a decision could be made and will become Golkar Party faction leader pending approval.



The AGO has since launched an investigation into the case and claims that the parties involved in the conversation could be charged with conspiracy to commit corruption. Both Maroef and Sudirman have already been questioned while Setya is scheduled to be summoned next week. However, Reza has failed to answer two summons as he left the country days after the AGO announced its investigation.



Setya has also filed a police report against both Sudirman and Maroef for alleged defamation and a violation of the Electronic Information and Transactions (ITE) Law by recording the conversation without his consent.



However, he did not show up to give his testimony against Sudirman and Maroef on Friday, with his lawyer Firman Wijaya saying that Setya had clearly stated his case.



'Our police report is clear enough. It concerns slander, defamation and violation of the ITE Law. It may even come under the Intelligence Law as recording without notice is illegal unless conducted by a law enforcement body,' Firman said on Friday.



Meanwhile, after weeks of insisting that special permission from President Jokowi was required to summon Setya, Attorney General M. Prasetyo finally said on Friday that his office would press ahead with summoning Setya without such permission.



'I have ordered [prosecutors] to immediately summon him. [The questioning] will probably be conducted next week,' Prasetyo said on Friday. 'I'd like to underline that we need no special permission from the President.'

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Linkedin Fedina S. Sundaryani (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

The National Police are considering whether to continue with Camar Maleo, the operation to hunt down and neutralize a terror group operating in Poso, Central Sulawesi, after its fourth stage concludes on Saturday.



National Police chief Gen. Badrodin Haiti said the police were currently reviewing past Camar Maleo operations, adding that the police's counterterrorism unit Densus 88 had arrested 28 terrorist suspects in the past year.



'We had a meeting about this recently and have produced several alternatives but we are still figuring out whether [a renewed operation] should focus on just that region [or expand it further]; the most important part is that it must be effective,' he told reporters on Friday at the National Police headquarters in South Jakarta.



The gang in Poso is allegedly run by the Santoso-led East Indonesian Mujahidin (MIT) group, which has been affiliated with the Islamic State (IS) movement in Syria and Iraq since 2013.



Currently, at least 1,000 personnel from the police's Mobile Brigade (Brimob) and Densus 88 have been deployed in the regency, and the Indonesian Military (TNI) has also assisted in the manhunt.



The operation has led to recent arrests of Chinese Uighurs and several women suspected of being part of the MIT, but Santoso himself has continued to lead and take part in terrorist activities.



Badrodin said that although Santoso remained one of their targets, there was a possibility that others would rise to take his place if the most-wanted terrorist was arrested or killed, meaning that it was unlikely that his surrender would result in a reduction in militant activity in the region.



'Yes, Santoso is our main target, but if he is caught [the terrorist activities] will not simply come to an end. If Santoso is killed then others will rise; this is what typically happens in such organizations,'

he said.



'This is why we are not making our decisions based [solely on capturing Santoso] but on how effective our actions in the region are. In our evaluation, we see that we have managed to catch 28 [terrorist suspects] in a year, including two leaders.'



From the late 1990s to the mid-2000s, Poso was home to sectarian conflict between Muslims and Christians. Although the conflict officially ended with the signing of the Malino Accords in 2001 and 2002, the region remains a hotbed of terrorist activity.



Terrorism expert Al Chaidar recently said that greater involvement by the TNI was essential in the effort to apprehend Santoso as they 'know how to fight against guerrilla strategy' adopted by the MIT.



Although Al Chaidar said he did not believe that radical groups, such as the MIT, currently had the ability to engage in large-scale attacks, the government should take precautions and distribute an official list of radical groups to avoid and report on.



Indonesia ranked 31st among 162 countries surveyed in the Institute for Economics and Peace's 2014 Global Terrorism Index, scoring 4.67 on a scale of 1 to 10.

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Linkedin Nurul Fitri Ramadhani (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

After a decision earlier this week that could throw the Golkar Party into chaos, the Law and Human Rights Ministry has made another controversial move, creating confusion within the United Development Party (PPP).



On Thursday, the ministry revoked a decree it issued last March recognizing the leadership of the PPP's Muhammad Romahurmuziy, effectively invalidating his control over the Muslim-based party.



However, the ministry's latest decree carried no stipulation about handing over control to the party's rival camp led by politician Djan Faridz.



In response to the confusion, Romahurmuziy and his secretary-general Arsul Sani visited the ministry's office in South Jakarta on Friday, seeking the details of the decree.



'The revocation means that the central board lineup elected in Surabaya has been officially dissolved,' Romahurmuziy said, referring to a national congress held in 2014 that awarded him the party leadership.



Given the lack of detail in the decree, Romahurmuziy concluded that the party leadership must therefore be given to a central board lineup selected during a congress in Bandung, West Java, in 2011.



At the congress, party members reelected former religious affairs minister Suryadharma Ali as their chairman, current Religious Affairs Minister Lukman Hakim Saifuddin as deputy chairman and Romahurmuziy as secretary-general.



'The minister's decision to dissolve our lineup is only a follow-up to the Supreme Court's decision. So we have to respect this. This is legal certainty of our status,' Romahurmuziy said, adding that the next step would be to hold a national congress to vote for permanent party leaders.



Following a decision by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) to name Suryadharma Ali a graft suspect in May 2014, making him unfit to serve as PPP leader, party elites have locked horns over who should be in charge of the party. The camps of both Romahurmuziy and Djan have filed lawsuits challenging each others leadership.



In October 2015, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Djan, granting him the party leadership. The verdict overturned a State Administrative High Court (PTTUN) decision from March 2015 that granted the position to Romahurmuziy.



Following the ministry's Thursday decision, Romahurmuziy's camp nominated Lukman as interim leader given Suryadharma's status as a suspect in several graft cases.



Suryadharma is currently undergoing trial for his alleged role in multiple graft cases including allegations he abused his power in running the government's haj program from 2010 to 2013, causing Rp 27.28 billion (US$1.95 million) and 17.97 million Saudi riyals in state losses.



He was also accused of appointing people deemed incompetent as Saudi Arabia-based haj organizing committee (PPIH) officials, giving unused haj quota seats to people not included on the official list and accommodating requests from House of Representatives Commission VIII to enable certain people to complete the haj for free.



'All responsibility as the party's leader will be given to Lukman for a while,' Romahurmuziy said, adding that he would hold internal discussions with the party's senior politicians about the temporary solution.



Meanwhile, Lukman said his new position in the PPP would not interfere with his job as minister, arguing that the PPP had many officials who could help if he became too busy with his ministerial tasks.



Lukman added that he would immediately hold a coordination meeting and also called on both camps to attend a national congress in the near future in an attempt to unite the party.



'I hope that Djan's camp and other relevant parties agree [to the congress]. This is the right moment to unite our vision and mission and end this internal conflict,' he said.



The party's secretary-general from Djan's camp, Dimyati Natakusuma, applauded Law and Human Rights Minister Yasonna Laoly's move to invalidate the leadership of Djan's rival, saying Yasonna had properly implemented the relevant rules and regulations. Dimyati also insisted that the party's leadership be given to Djan.



'If they say that the chairmanship automatically goes to the lineup from the 2011 Bandung congress and keep insisting on holding a national congress soon, it means they don't understand the law,' Dimyati said.



Yasonna earlier issued a decree that annulled the leadership of Golkar's Agung Laksono, without detailing whether his rival Aburizal Bakrie could take over the party.



Critics of Aburizal are now calling for the party to hold a national congress to elect new leaders.

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Linkedin The Jakarta Post  Sat, January 9, 2016





Members of the Anti Forestry Mafia Coalition (left) submit their complaint to the head of the Judicial Commission Public Complaints Agency, Indra Syamsu (right), in Jakarta on Friday. The coalition is protesting against Palembang district court's recent judgment in a forest fire case. They suspect a Palembang district court judge may have violated ethics in rejecting the case filed by the Forestry and Environment Ministry against PT BMH for allegedly burning forests for land clearance. (JP/DON)
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Linkedin Abdillah Toha (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

Animosity between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran is nothing new. Interrupted by one or two scenes of reconciliation, the relationship between the two countries since the successful Islamic revolution in Iran led by Ayatollah Khomeini has developed from bad to worse.



Saudis have always seen Iran as a potential and actual source of revolution in the Middle East. They find this particularly worrying because of the recent uprises of people against their authoritarian rulers in some Middle Eastern countries, known as the Arab Spring. Iran's open support for Hezbollah in Lebanon, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Syria and the suppressed majority of Bahrainis, as well as its alleged covert military assistance to the Houthi rebels in Yemen, further hardens the attitude of the Saudis toward it.



More than 3 million Saudis, mainly in the eastern province of the country, are followers of Shia who demand an end to discrimination and to the absolute power of the monarch. Led by their revered leader Sheikh Nimr Baqr al-Nimr, the Saudi Shiite opposition recently held demonstrations and revolts that were suppressed with gun shots and led to the arrest of Al-Nimr.



When Iran allegedly embarked on the production of nuclear arsenals and the containment policy by the West in the form of economic sanctions did not seem to ease tension in the region, the US initiated a change of attitude in the hope that the new regime in Iran, that is generally considered moderate by the West, would see efforts to ease tensions in the region work better.



This, however, created big disappointment on the part of the Saudis who feel that they are being abandoned by the US. As the nuclear agreement was later signed and easing of sanctions follows, Saudi Arabia's disappointment toward America is turning into more aggressive policy in the region as they no longer trust the US' policing of the region. Thus, the attack and bombing of Yemen were conducted with the pretext of reinstalling the legitimate ruler and restoring democracy in Yemen, which is ironic and laughable as the Saudi system of government is far from democratic.



In the meantime, the failure of Saudi, Qatar, American and Turkish financial and military support to the Syrian opposition groups to overthrow Al-Assad on the one hand, and the speedy advancement of the Russian coalition with Iran, Hezbollah and Al-Assad troops in rooting out Islamic State (IS) strongholds in Syria on the other hand, have multiplied Saudi Arabia's frustration with the seemingly unending debacles on its side.



A new strategy will have to be introduced to put Iran on the defensive. First, an informal alliance with the arc enemy of Arabs, Israel, is unavoidable. This would involve exchanging intelligence and possibly joint attack and defense missions in future military confrontation with Iran. This suits the well-known Arab saying, 'aduwwu 'aduwwik shahibuk' (the enemy of your enemy is your friend).



Second, the Saudi regime initiated a military coalition of 'Muslim' nations, inviting 30 countries to join in what they call a fight against terrorism. The coalition ended up being a Sunni-Wahabi coalition as countries like Iran and Iraq were not invited and its whole purpose was to isolate Iran.



Indonesia was invited but declined for obvious constitutional and foreign policy reasons.



Third, to show the Shiite population of Saudi that the Kingdom is in charge and no attempt to rebel against the authorities will be tolerated, the government decided to sentence the outspoken Al-Nimr to death and execute him.



The execution, condemned around the world, was also designed to provoke an irrational and violent response from Iran, which the Saudis hoped would jeopardize Iran's recent rapprochement with the West.



Apart from the ransacking of the Saudi Embassy in Tehran, the Iranian reaction has so far been limited to words of condemnation.



The rising tension seems to be under control and Iran has not reacted foolishly.



The first casualty will probably be the planned UN-led conference in Vienna to negotiate a political settlement between the warring parties in Syria, which is not wholeheartedly supported by Saudi Arabia anyway.



US President Barack Obama, nearing the end of his term, will likely be uninterested in adding a last-minute entanglement to his legacy and IS may take advantage of the major powers' attention being temporarily shifted toward the Saudi-Iran conflict.



The young prince Muhammad bin Salman, the King's son and the second Crown Prince, who effectively holds the real power in Saudi Arabia, may have miscalculated. The uproar about the execution of Al-Nimr may temporarily divert attention from the numerous problems faced by the Kingdom including the war in Yemen, a budget deficit and an oil-price fall, but it certainly will not be taken lightly by the 3 million supporters of the Sheikh. New revolts may be in the making with unknown repercussions.



Within the palace itself voices of other princes, critical and dissatisfied with the 30-year-old prince who is in charge of defense, oil and the economy, continue to cast a shadow on the throne held by the sickly King.



The ability of America to continually increase the production of shale oil and lower production costs for exports and domestic reserves has substantially reduced the strategic importance of Saudi oil.



Thus, the US, whose people are increasingly critical of the many violations of human rights in Saudi Arabia, is no longer a reliable partner or protector for the kingdom. Whether all this is a sign of a looming end to the Al-Saud dynasty, time will tell.



For Indonesia, the Sunni-Shia sectarian conflict to a certain extent has had a bad influence on radicals here that might endanger our unity as a nation. The Saudi regime is spending billions of dollars to promote their brand of conservative Wahhabism here and elsewhere that could drag us into taking sides in the conflict, which has nothing to do with our national interests. To ensure that our nation remains safe from foreign meddling and sectarian rifts, the Indonesian government should not take this development lightly.



We should instead strive to offer our assistance, if requested, to ease the tension in conflict areas in the Middle East between the two Muslim countries without necessarily involving ourselves in the religious aspect of the conflict. Although Indonesia is the largest Muslim-majority country in the world, it is doubtful that our offer of mediation will be seriously welcomed as the Arab world has always regarded Indonesia's non-Arabic-speaking Muslims as second-rate Muslims.



As I finish this article, a report has just come in on the bombing of the Iranian embassy in Yemen by Saudi air power. It seems the Saudis have taken revenge for the attack earlier by students on their embassy in Tehran.



This is a dangerous development in the conflict and should not be allowed by to develop further.



Open war between Saudi Arabia and Iran could drag major powers into opposing sides and, God forbid, lead to a third world war with unimaginable consequences.

___________________



The writer is a columnist and former member of the Foreign Commission of the Indonesian House of Representatives.
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Linkedin Ayomi Amindoni (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sat, January 9, 2016

The World Bank has warned that a continuing economic slowdown in emerging markets will cause substantial spillovers into developing economies and eventually hold back the recovery in advanced economies.

As a result, the bank cut its forecast for global economic growth in 2016 to 2.9 percent from its initial projection of 3.3 percent, but the growth projection is still better than global growth in 2015, which was at 2.4 percent.

The economic growth projection for Indonesia was also slashed to 5.3 percent from an initial projection of 5.5 percent.

Bank Indonesia Governor Agus Martowardojo said the central bank would remain cautious over the development of the global economy, in particular the Chinese economy. Recently, China's capital market experienced tremors and even suspended trading twice in the past week.

Besides, China's move to devalue its currency in August created a risk-off period, when all funds tend to flee to safe assets, according to the BI chief. "The global economy and the situation in China needs to be continuously watched. This is not the end; just the beginning," said Agus in Jakarta on Friday.

In addition, the central bank is also watching the downward trend of crude oil prices and the possibility of another increase in the US Federal Reserve funds rate. "These are the things that we need to continuously follow," he told journalists.

Agus explained that despite the pressure, the rupiah depreciation in 2015 was in the range of 11 percent, better than the Brazilian currency, which depreciated 49 percent, Turkey's, which dropped 33 percent, and that of other countries that depreciated more than 20 percent.

"But Indonesia can maintain above 11 percent. What we need to watch is the rupiah's volatility. If we can maintain its stability, we will be able to create a good business climate and boost our economy," he said.

Agus added that the foreign exchange reserves were enough to provide resistance against external factors and maintain the sustainability of economic growth in 2016.

"We will support the government's efforts to achieve 5.2 to 5.6 percent in growth. We also welcome the World Bank's projection that the Indonesian economy will grow 5.3 percent, as it is in line with the government's target in the state budget," he said.

Indonesia's reserves recorded a US$5 billion month-to-month increase in December 2015 to $105.9 billion. The increased reserves came from the government's foreign debt withdrawal, oil and gas exports and the global bonds issued to cover foreign exchange needs.

Acceleration of budget spending, according to Agus, will have a major impact on economic growth in 2016. "We certainly expect the private sector's role could be better. On the other hand, we know the world commodity prices are still depressed and we appreciate if there are initiatives to search for new export markets and to export more value-added product," he said.

According to the World Bank's January 2016 Global Economic Prospects, a modest recovery in advanced economies continues this year and activity is stable among major commodity exporters.

According to the report, falling commodity prices, flagging trade and capital flows and episodes of financial volatility sapped economic activity and made global economic growth was less than expected in 2015, while firmer growth in 2016 will depend on the stabilization of commodity prices and China's gradual transition towards a more consumption-based growth model.

However, growth is projected to slow further in China, while Russia and Brazil are expected to remain in recession in 2016. Meanwhile, developing economies are forecast to expand 4.8 percent in 2016, less than expected earlier, but up from the 4.3 percent growth in 2015. (bbn)
(front page)

Cuban workers and farmers

mark 57 years of revolution

On Jan. 1, 1959, U.S.-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista fled Cuba as the Rebel Army of workers and peasants, led by Fidel Castro, was advancing across the island. Seven days later the victorious revolutionaries entered Havana to the cheers of hundreds of thousands who filled the streets.

On Dec. 17, 2014, in another victory, the last of the Cuban Five revolutionaries imprisoned in the U.S. since 1998  framed up by the FBI for working to prevent violent attacks by paramilitary groups based in Florida  returned home, a precondition for an agreement with Washington to re-establish diplomatic relations. Since their return the Five have traveled around the island  and the world  sharing their experiences on the front lines of the U.S. class struggle as part of the sizable section of U.S. workers who are in prison.

Even in the worst of times [in prison], we felt that freedom, that joy, that feeling of usefulness of being there denouncing every day the double standard of the empires policy in its much vaunted fight against terrorism, Antonio Guerrero, one of the Five, recently told the Cuban paper Granma.

For the last 57 years the U.S. government has done everything within its power to overturn the revolution. It has armed counterrevolutionaries, organized assassination attempts against revolutionary leaders, launched the failed Bay of Pigs invasion, and imposed a draconian economic embargo that continues to cause severe hardships for the Cuban people.

But the Cuban Revolution and its leadership remains a bone in the throat of U.S. imperialism and a beacon for class-conscious workers across the globe, living proof that it is possible to stand up against seemingly impossible odds and win.

On the one-year anniversary of the announcement of the re-establishment of diplomatic relations with the U.S., Cuban President Raul Castro said, Despite Cubas repeated claim for the return of the territory illegally occupied by the Guantanamo Naval Base, the government of the United States has stated that it has no intention of changing the status of that enclave.

Washington continues to enforce its brutal embargo and finances the so-called dissidents and illegal radio and television broadcasts to Cuba in violation of Cuban sovereignty.

U.S. capitalists fear example of Cuba

U.S. capitalists hated the revolution from the start, not just because they feared losing their superprofits  dominating everything from sugar and cattle lands to oil refineries, mineral rights and casinos  but because working people in Cuba were gaining confidence in their ability to stand up to U.S. imperialism and to be the masters of their own destiny, setting an example for Latin America and the world.

To Washington and Batista, the revolutions advance was incomprehensible. On Jan. 1, 1959, the rebels had at the most 3,000 armed men and women, yet they defeated more than 80,000 of Batistas soldiers and cops.

Washington provided planes so Batista and his closest henchmen could flee the island, leaving power in the hands of a military junta. The Rebel Army called a general strike, which swept the island. The junta was swept aside and a revolutionary government put in place.

A survey before the revolution found some 60 percent of rural families lived in huts with dirt floors and no running water; 70 percent of them used kerosene lamps for lighting and the rest had no source of lighting at all. Hundreds of thousands were unemployed.

Workers control

The revolutionary leadership organized working people in Cuba to take control of the factories, mines, mills and farms to improve their lives and reverse these miserable conditions.

In March 1959, the revolutionary government took over the Cuban Telephone Company and reduced the rates. It ordered the lowering of rents by 30 to 50 percent. In May it enacted an agrarian reform law that encouraged the formation of cooperatives, and distributed land to landless peasants. Popular militias were organized to defend and advance these gains arms in hands.

In late October 1959 President Dwight Eisenhower authorized the State Department and the CIA to create armed Cuban counterrevolutionary groups in preparation for moves to overthrow the revolution.

In June 1960, when U.S.-based Esso and Texaco and British-Dutch Shell refused to refine oil Cuba bought from the Soviet Union, the revolutionary government organized working people to take the refineries over. In August, Fidel Castro announced the expropriation of 26 U.S.-owned companies. In October, Eisenhower imposed a sweeping trade embargo prohibiting the vast majority of U.S. trade with Cuba.

Stepped up U.S.-sponsored attacks

In late December bombs and arson attacks by counterrevolutionaries destroyed businesses in Havana. On Dec. 31 the revolutionary government warned that Washington was preparing to invade. Three days later Eisenhower broke all diplomatic relations.

Cuban working people organized a massive literacy campaign, mobilizing more than 100,000 student volunteers and over 150,000 others to go into the countryside, teaching 707,212 people to read and write in less than a year.

And in April 1961 Cuban toilers decisively defeated the U.S.-organized Bay of Pigs invasion.

From the outset the revolution has extended the hand of solidarity to toilers worldwide  from medical and military assistance to Algeria where a workers and farmers government came to power in 1962, to sending 425,000 volunteer combatants to Angola to help defeat invasions by apartheid South Africa, to leading the fight against Ebola in Africa last year. Today there are thousands of Cuban medical workers volunteering to provide health care all over the world.

Defending socialist revolution today

Washington hopes to accomplish its long-standing goal  destroying the socialist revolution and destruction of workers and farmers power there  by the workings of capitalist economic pressures.

At the same time, Cuba faces the effects of the worldwide capitalist economic crisis  exacerbated by the continuing U.S. economic embargo. The Cuban government has taken necessary measures and retreats to attract more foreign investment, streamline bloated workforces at state-owned companies, and increase productivity, including steps to make it easier to set up small businesses and be self-employed.

The Cuban press is giving broad coverage to government-led discussions on how to face these challenges, and reviewing how the revolution mobilized workers and farmers to meet challenges they confronted at key turning points in the past.

The history of our revolution is full of glorious pages in the face of difficulties, risks and threats, Raul Castro told the National Assembly of Peoples Power Dec. 29.

The return of the Cuban Five  Gerardo Hernandez, Ramon Labanino, Guerrero, Fernando Gonzalez and Rene Gonzalez  has reinforced the fight to maintain the values and course of the revolution. Since their return they have spent a large part of their time visiting factories, farms and campuses, speaking with working people and students.

The Dec. 17 issue of Granma published interviews with each of the Five to mark one year since they all were back in Cuba.

We have received feedback and learned more about the Cuban reality every day, Guerrero said. I believe this is also important for any other tasks that will no doubt come our way.

The situation Cuba is experiencing today with regard to the re-establishment of relations with the U.S. and the process of social-economic transformations underway demands better preparation, consistency, study, updating, something to which we feel extremely committed, Ramon Labanino said, because we are part of this project and Cuban society, and this is what we have been immersed in this year.





Related articles:

Defend, emulate Cuban Revolution!







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Theis from the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz:A New Jersey high school student  reportedly a is facing possible bullying charges stemming from Twitter posts that school administrators called anti-Israel.An assistant principal at Fair Lawn High told, 16, on Wednesday that she could be formally charged under New Jerseys Anti-Bullying Bill of Rights Act, which could lead to suspension or expulsion from school, the Gothamist reported. The matter has been referred to the superintendent of schools.In tweets about the 2014 Gaza war and the Israeli-Palestinian situation, Koval called Israel a  and said . Another post on the social media site expressed happiness that a pro-Israel classmate had followed her. Koval did not identify the student, but told a friend she would provide the name in a private message.In a tweet, Koval said she does not believe that to be bullying.Her name was never mentioned. I never degraded her. They use bullying as a guise to cover their pro-Israel, pro-censorship agenda, she wrote.Koval surreptitiously recorded parts of a meeting she had with a school administrator over the bullying accusations in which she called her tweets about Israel controversial, but not problematic.Well, thats your interpretation, the administrator responded. Theres a state law that might interpret it differently.Koval, who goes by the nickname Benny, was identified by The New York Times as a Jewish-Israeli. The Gothamist, which first reported the controversy, said she grew up in Fair Lawn, a New York City suburb, and has family in Israel.The teen has received a great deal of support on Twitter, where she has nearly 6,000 followers, many of whom now using the hashtag #IStandWithBenny. The international hacking group Anonymous also has backed Koval.
(front page)

Obama administration launches

raids to deport Central Americans

CASA de Maryland

The Barack Obama administration is conducting highly publicized immigration raids to rapidly deport adults and children who have come to the U.S. from Central America over the past couple of years. The operation began in Georgia, North Carolina and Texas with immigration cops taking 121 people into custody over the Jan. 2-3 weekend.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are targeting thousands of people whose requests for asylum have been denied. Many missed court dates to fight their deportation because they lacked an attorney or knowledge about complicated court procedures. The vast majority will be sent back to El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala with no right to further court hearings or judicial review.

We had a mother and her three children taken by ICE, pretending to be looking for a criminal and asked to enter the house to check whether he was there, Charles Kuck, an immigration attorney in Atlanta told the Wall Street Journal Jan. 3.

Some 100 people, including mothers of children threatened with deportation, rallied against the roundup in an action organized by CASA de Maryland outside the White House Dec. 30.

Rev. Alison Harrington, pastor of Southside Presbyterian Church in Tucson, Arizona, is offering sanctuary to those facing deportation and encouraging other churches to do the same.

More than 100,000 families have entered the U.S. through its southwest border seeking asylum since 2014, as well as tens of thousands of unaccompanied children.

The plan to begin the raids was announced on the front page of the Washington Post Dec. 24. They are the first nationwide operations directed specifically against Central Americans.

The raids could be the largest since April 2012 when immigration agents swept up more than 3,100 people who ICE claimed were criminal aliens.

While the overall number of deportations has been declining since 2004, the number of immigrants deported under judicial orders and who therefore face felony charges if they try to re-enter the United States increased fourfold from 1997 to 2013, but have since declined substantially.

The number of cops patrolling the U.S. border has doubled over the past decade to more than 18,000 today, ramped up under both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations, making it much more difficult to enter without papers.

The initiation of these raids comes amid a lot of media attention to Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trumps call for the mass deportation of undocumented immigrants and for extending the wall on Mexicos border.

The Presidents actions are far more harmful than Trumps demagoguery, said Pablo Alvarado, executive director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, in a Jan. 3 statement. While Trumps dangerous rhetoric stigmatizes our loved ones, President Obama actually deports them.

An average of 34,000 people are held in detention at any one time in the U.S. on immigration charges. With the recent surge of Central Americans crossing the border the Department of Homeland Security opened family detention centers, two in Texas and one in Pennsylvania, that now hold more than 1,700 people.

Many women and their children have been held for months. In August a federal judge in California ordered the Obama administration to begin releasing them from these centers starting in October. The administration said its complying, but also appealing.

From California to Colorado and Alabama to Texas, detained immigrants have held hunger strikes over the last three months to protest the abysmal conditions. Supporters of 10 men from Bangladesh who had been on a hunger strike for nearly a month rallied outside the Krome immigration prison near Miami Dec. 27 to protest a judges order to force-feed the men.

In recent months the flow of families crossing the border has shot up. More than 12,000 individuals were apprehended at the border in October and November, compared to 4,500 in the same months the previous year. The number of unaccompanied minors caught by border cops during those two months doubled to more than 10,000.





Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home




(front page)

UK govt moves to arm more

cops, let them shoot to kill

LONDON  Prime Minister David Cameron has announced plans to give greater leeway for police to shoot to kill. Using the recent terrorist attacks in Paris as a pretext, the extension will cover all cases, not just those defined as counterterrorism. This takes place amid protests against the police shooting of 28-year-old Jermaine Baker here in December.

Senior police officers, including London Metropolitan Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe, have been pressing for the changes, claiming that current regulations make it hard to carry through government plans to recruit significantly more armed cops after the attacks in Paris. Of 130,000 officers in England and Wales, 6,000 are trained to use guns.

The Home Office announced Dec. 17 an extra $50 million for firearms officers, and a police taskforce is examining how to increase the number of armed response vehicles and specialist counterterrorism teams, and whether to equip riot police with firearms. Authorities are also planning to increase the number of cops armed with Tasers.

On Dec. 11, Baker was shot dead by a plainclothes officer while sitting in a car outside Wood Green Crown Court in north London. Police allege that Baker was part of a plot to spring two men who were being sentenced that day, and that a fake handgun that fires plastic pellets was recovered at the scene. Authorities say there is no recording of the incident, either from surveillance video or police body cameras.

Residents of Tottenham, where Baker lived, voiced their anger at a Dec. 17 public meeting of some 150 people, addressed by officials of the governments Independent Police Complaints Commission and the Metropolitan Police. There was applause when IPCC representative Cindy Butts said an officer had been arrested an unusual move  as part of an IPCC criminal homicide investigation. The officer, who hasnt been named, has been suspended from duty. Butts made clear, however, that he has not been charged.

Ive been told that he was sleeping in his car. Police officers had information that was not 100% that he was going to do it  you took an innocent man away, a friend of Baker told the meeting, according to the Daily Mail. The IPCC now says they are investigating the claim that Baker was asleep when he was shot.

Its another case of shoot first and ask questions later, Rupert Sylvester, a long-time fighter against police brutality, told the Militant. Sylvesters son, Roger, was killed by police in 1999.

The arrest of the cop sends a very bad message, said former Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair. These are men and women who go to work to do an incredibly dangerous job for which they volunteer and if they do their duty and shoot somebody because they have to, he told Sky News, they should not be treated as criminals.

As commissioner, Blair was a vocal defender of the shoot-to-kill policy following the notorious counterterrorism operation in which police executed Jean Charles de Menezes in 2005. They later admitted the Brazilian-born electrician was completely innocent.

No firearms cop has ever been convicted of unlawful killing. Under the current law they are allowed to open fire if they have an honest and instinctive belief that it is reasonable. Last July former officer Anthony Long was cleared of murdering Azelle Rodney 10 years after shooting him dead, including with four bullets to the head. Long argued self-defense, saying he feared Rodney was reaching for a gun.

That same month, Home Secretary Theresa May announced a review of deaths in police custody, saying they have the potential to undermine dramatically the relationship between the public and the police. By official figures, 17 people had died at the hands of police in the previous 12 months, a five-year high.

Working people are wary of the governments moves. Its alright for police to use weapons if there is danger, but you need to have some measures to check them, said Nadeem Butt, who works at the McVities cookie factory. Some people think they have power when they have a gun.
(Books of the Month column)

Vietnamese people, US anti-war

fight stopped Washingtons war

BY FRED HALSTEAD

The Second Indochina War was the first in the epoch of American imperialism in which the United States went down to defeat. After emerging victorious from the Spanish-American War and two world wars, then encountering a stalemate in Korea, the Pentagons military machine was ignominiously evicted from Vietnam, thanks to the persevering struggle of the Indochinese plus the antiwar resistance of the American people. This was the most sustained and, except for Russia in 1905 and 1917, the most effective antiwar movement within any big power while the shooting was going on.

The official propagandists cooked up various formulas to justify their military intervention. It was depicted as a crusade for democracy and freedom against the threat of communist totalitarianism and for the defense of the independence of the South against invasion from the North. The U.S. was there, it was said, to fulfill treaty obligations to the client Saigon regime and thwart the expansionism of China and the Soviet Union. Toward the end the excuses became exceedingly thin: to assure the return of the POWs; to prevent a bloodbath in the South if the NLF should take over completely; to protect U.S. troops as they were withdrawn. All this was demagogy.

In reality, U.S. intervention had a thoroughly imperialistic character. The colossus of world capitalism hurled its military might without provocation against a small and divided colonial nation thousands of miles away struggling for self-determination and unification. A series of American presidents sought to do what King George IIIs empire failed to do against the rebel patriots of 1776.

On one side was a state armed to the teeth promoting the strategic aims and material interests of the corporate rich on the global arena; on the other was a worker and peasant uprising heading toward the overthrow of capitalist power and property, despite the limited political program of its leadership.

These underlying anticapitalist and antilandlord tendencies were eventually clearly expressed in the reunification of Vietnam in 1976 and the process of eliminating capitalist property relations in the South. The prolonged civil war in South Vietnam thereby proved to be an integral part of the international confrontation between the upholders of capitalism and the forces moving in a socialist direction that has been unfolding since the October 1917 Bolshevik revolution. 

The antiwar movement began with people who were already radicalized: pacifists, socialists, communists, rebellious students, and a scattering of morally outraged individuals. At the start these were a small minority, convinced of the justness of their cause and ready to face unpopularity for their stand. The energy, resoluteness, and fortitude of this vanguard brought the movement into being and remained its prime mover.

The most paradoxical aspect of this profound and unforgettable chapter of American history was the central and decisive role played by the left-wing elements, which included the radical pacifists. When it began, it was almost unthinkable that they could set in motion and head a movement of such vast scope. They themselves did not really expect such a development. They just felt obliged to do whatever they could.

At the beginning of the sixties the American left  old and new  was looked upon as an esoteric fringe with virtually negligible influence. So far as numbers in radical organizations were concerned, this was close to the truth. The cold war and the witch-hunting atmosphere, in conjunction with the prolonged prosperity of the 1950s, had decimated their ranks. Even after their numbers increased manyfold during the sixties and early seventies, the tens of thousands directly supporting the various radical groupings were not very large compared to the entire population.

Yet this unrespectable, irrelevant, and by no means homogeneous band became the saving remnant as it moved into the vacancy left by the established educational, religious, labor union, journalistic, and political institutions. These were tied in with the two-party system and went along with the generals and the State Department, supporting a perfectly obviously illegal and unjust war to one extent or another. 

Insofar as the Democratic and Republican doves contributed to the spread of antiwar sentiment  and some of them did by lending their authority occasionally to antiwar activities, publicizing certain facts about the war, and so on  their activities were contradicted by their steering people toward the two parties that supported the war and by their effective votes in Congress.

The issue was not resolved, or even ameliorated, through the two-party electoral process. On the contrary, the election periods were used to precisely the opposite effect. They served to hoodwink the antiwar feelings, defuse antiwar protests, and give the war-makers some extra maneuverability in their pernicious and ill-fated plans. That happened with every congressional and presidential election from 1964, when Johnson ran as a peace candidate, to 1972, when the Nixon administration announced that peace is at hand and then, after the election, went ahead with another brutalization of the Vietnamese population.

Those who retain or preach faith in the reformability of the capitalist two-party system must reckon with the fact that the American movement against the Vietnam War  the greatest moral resurgence in the U.S. since the struggle to abolish slavery  had to arise and maintain itself apart from and in defiance of both parties.
(feature article)

Alameda, Calif., meeting protests attack on mosque

ALAMEDA, Calif.  Over 150 people turned out for a Standing Against Hate Crime meeting here Dec. 27 to protest a Dec. 11 attack and threats against the Islamic Center of Alameda. Held at the Elks Lodge, the gathering was sponsored by the center and chaired by Imam Musa Balde.

Balde welcomed everyone, explaining that a large plate glass window at the centers building where Muslim women pray, across the street from the main mosque, was broken after the center received threatening phone calls. Go back home, callers said. Youre not welcome here.

This is our home, Balde said, referring to the establishment nearly 20 years ago of the Islamic center and mosque in Alameda, an island city in the bay next to Oakland.

We are here in peace and love, Balde said, and against terrorism by anyone, whether they be Muslim, Christian, Jewish or atheists.

We are also concerned because our sisters wearing the hijab have found some people are not as congenial as before on buses or other public places, he said.

Many of those attending were from churches, synagogues and community organizations in Alameda. People in the community around the center have brought flowers and volunteered to help repair the damage.

The program was kicked off by three speakers, followed by an open forum, where many expressed their readiness to defend the center if any more attacks are threatened.

We have to learn from history, said Michael Yoshii, pastor of the United Methodist Church in Alameda. During World War II, many in our congregation were immigrants from Japan, taken away to concentration camps under the Roosevelt administration. Yoshii cited war hysteria, racism and lack of leadership as being the reason why the mass incarceration of Japanese took place.

That is why Japanese-Americans are coming out in support of Muslims today, he said.

In the workers movement we say an injury to one is any injury to all, Joel Britton said, speaking for the Socialist Workers Party.

Attacks like the assault on the center not only harm Muslims, they are an attack on the rights and political space of all working people to organize and fight for our interests.

The attacks on Muslims go hand in hand with the war drive, military interventions in the Middle East and elsewhere, Britton said. So we say: End U.S. bombings and other attacks in the Middle East now. And stop the attacks on Muslims and refugees from the Middle East and elsewhere.

Rabbi Allen Bennett, who came with over a dozen members of the nearby Temple Israel Synagogue, also spoke.

During the open forum, Dina Ezzeddine, a young woman from Oakland, took the floor and pointed to the history of aggression by the U.S. and other imperialist powers against peoples in the Middle East, from Iraq to Libya.

You cant understand anything thats going on if you dont understand this, she said.





Related articles:

Washington war plans unravel as conflicts surge in Middle East

SWP campaigns against Washingtons war drive

Vietnamese people, US anti-war fight stopped Washingtons war







Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home




SWP campaigns against Washingtons war drive

From joining protests against attacks on Muslims and mosques to discussions on workers doorsteps, the Socialist Workers Party is campaigning against Washingtons war drive in the Middle East and the attacks on the working class at home that go along with it. As they do so, SWP members are using the partys paper, the, and books on revolutionary politics published by Pathfinder Press to put forward an independent working-class political course. They explain why working people need to break from the Democrats, Republicans and other capitalist parties, and build our own party, based on the unions, that can help mobilize to fight in our class interests.

We participated in a forum against anti-Muslim attacks in Alameda Dec. 27, wrote Eric Simpson from Oakland, California (see article above). We learned about the event a couple days earlier when we visited the mosque to express solidarity after it had been vandalized.

We got a warm response to a small table at the door of the speakout featuring Pathfinder books in English and Arabic and the Militant, Simpson said. More than two dozen participants purchased copies of the paper, and several bought books in Arabic including Is Biology Womans Destiny? Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to Workers Power, The First and Second Declarations of Havana and Voices From Prison.

One high school student was seriously interested in the literature. What is the difference between communism and socialism? he asked. He got a copy of the paper, learned how to read it on the web, and made sure to leave his contact information. Another participant picked up a subscription, said Simpson.

Party members from Oakland also took part in a Dec. 18 rally of 200 people outside San Francisco City Hall to speak out against attacks on Arabs and Muslims. One of the speakers was Rasheed Albeshari, who was physically attacked by California Department of Corrections employee Denise Slader Dec. 6. Slader shouted abuse at him and others, disrupting a Muslim prayer service at a park in Castro Valley. Albeshari began recording her rant, at which point Slader slapped him and threw coffee on him.

Sixteen people at the protest bought copies of the Militant, and we sold several pamphlets, wrote Carole Lesnick.

SWP members and supporters from Oakland and Colorado are organizing a second team to Fort Morgan, Colorado, where nearly 200 Muslim packinghouse workers were fired in a dispute over the right to prayer breaks. They will talk with workers at the plant and in the surrounding area.

Deborah Liatos from Los Angeles sent a note about discussions going door to door Jan. 3 in San Bernardino, where supporters of Islamic State had killed 14 people a month earlier.

Natisha Robinson, a 19-year-old worker at an Amazon distribution center, told Liatos she disagreed with anti-Muslim statements made by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. How can you blame all people who come from Pakistan because thats where the attackers in San Bernadino originally came from, she said. Trump said Mexican immigrants are rapists. How can you run for President and be down on people like that?

The Obama government and all the candidates  Democrats and Republicans alike  are using the attacks in France and San Bernardino to scapegoat Muslims and Arabs, Liatos said, and this is used against the working class as a whole.

Natisha agreed when we explained the importance of workers fighting back, like the movements to fight for $15 and a union and against police brutality, she said. We discussed why the working class needs to take power in the U.S. and around the world, and pointed to the example of the Cuban Revolution  what is possible when workers make a revolution.

A young auto body mechanic got a subscription to the Militant. He said since the attack in San Bernardino he is more hesitant to go out into crowds. He also said the police are scrutinizing people more, mostly if they are young and a lot of people in a car or together, Liatos said. A restaurant worker also signed up.

To join in this campaign, contact the Socialist Workers Party in your area, listed on page 8.





Related articles:

Washington war plans unravel as conflicts surge in Middle East

Alameda, Calif., meeting protests attack on mosque

Vietnamese people, US anti-war fight stopped Washingtons war







Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home




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Nuclear bombs require enriched uranium or weapons-grade plutonium above 90% enrichment.

does not have and never had sufficient amount of the weapon

s-

grade uranium

and/or plutonium

Iran

John Kerry

Iran

Mr. Kerry, in a statement, said the ship, which Russian officials said was the Mikhail Dudin, carried 25,000 pounds of nuclear material, which included the fuel that had been enriched to 20 percent purity for a specialty reactor to make medical isotopes. As per the deal signed last year, Iran is permitted to hold 300 kilograms, or about 660 pounds, of low-enriched uranium; but that is not enough to produce a single weapon. In a telephone interview with NY Times, the Rosatom spokesman, Sergei Novikov, said the shipment fulfilled the requirement between Iran , the United States and five other world powers, including

Russia

, to remove Iran s stockpile of uranium enriched to this level.
In the 1920s and 1930s, a worldwide economic depression caused many people to lose faith in democracy and capitalism. Extreme ideals arose. Communists celebrated what they saw as the failure of capitalism. Strong leaders arose who supported intense nationalism, militarism, and a return to authoritarian rule. Fascism emerged in Germany and Italy.

As can be seen, fascisms rise to power had much to do with the First World War. Italy fought on the side of the Allies as a defense mechanism against Austro-Hungarian aggression; the war left Italy devastated. The country had little money left and the Liberal Party that had been head of the country could no longer hold control. When the Fascist party promised freedom from the current poverty and chaos, they were met with great enthusiasm from the Italian people. The same was the case with Germany. The Treaty of Versailles (1919) had effectually destroyed the country - politically and socially. It humiliated the once mighty powerful Germany putting a tremendous burden on her to pay off the winners of the war. Soon the country became poor and its economy was ruined, thus, breeding only anger, hopelessness and impotency.

Fascism varied in the different countries that it spread to. There were notable Fascist parties in Hungary, Spain, Portugal, Britain, France, and Romania. France had two significant Fascist movements, the Action Francaise and the Juenesse Patriotes. Fascism in Romania took the face of a National-Christian movement (Payne 379). Although Fascism itself has no religious affiliation, various Fascist leaders in Europe all came from Christian background and exploited religious ideologies in an effort to gain the confidence of their people.





Fascists states were characterized by: 1. Blind loyalty to a leader 2. Use of violence and terror 3. Strong military 4. Censorship and government control of news 5. Extreme nationalism 6. State control of the economy 7. Strict discipline 8. Rule by dictator.

In 1922 the Fascists used force to gain control of Italy. They ended free elections, free speech, and the free press. They killed or jailed their enemies. Grasping desperately for order, Italians put the goals of the state above their individual rights.

In 1920, Adolf Hitler headed the National Socialist German Workers, or Nazi, Party. His Party grew. In 1933, Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany. Hitlers Germany, called the Third Reich, was a totalitarian state. He built a one-party government, ended civil rights, silenced his enemies with force, put businesses under government control, and employed many people in large works programs. Germanys standard of living rose. Hitler rearmed Germany and built its military which violated the Treaty of Versailles. Hitler used the Jews as a scapegoat for Germanys problems. He instituted anti-Semitic policies. He used education and the arts as propaganda tools to push these policies. At first, Nazis organized boycotts of Jewish businesses, but by 1938 they were seizing the property and businesses of Jews and selling them to non-Jews. The Nuremberg Laws of 1935 took away the political rights and German citizenship of Jews. Few German citizens worried about Hitlers policies. Most were pleased at the growth of German pride and Germanys increased military and economic power.

After the end of World War II, a lthough fascist parties were forbidden in many counties fascism wasnt completely dead.

Neo-fascist groups continued to emerge throughout the world. In India, RSS - precursor to today's BJP, was highly influenced by fascism since the days of Hitler and Mussolini. Today's fascist members have different views of the values of society.

They want strict anti-immigration laws . Foreigners should leave the country. (In the USA and some European countries, some politicians through their hatred and bigotry of Muslims and Islam are showing their fascistic mindset.)

The police should have more rights. There should be more law and order in a country.

Neo-fascist movements perform acts of violence and are sometimes involved in terrorist attacks but they are too small to start a wide -scale rebellion in a state.

Some 70 years after the death of Nazism and Fascism, Europe is vibrant with resurgent fascist forces today.
Education Ministry threatens to take over Abac University if internal conflict not settled in seven days

BANGKOK: The two opposing factions of the council of Assumption University of Thailand  commonly referred to by its old name of ABAC (Assumption Business Administration College)  were today given a 7-day deadline to settle their ongoing dispute or the Education Ministry will step in to take control of the management of the university.

politics

By Thailand PBS

Saturday 9 January 2016, 11:09AM

The ultimatum was issued by Education Minister Dapong Rattanasuwan to the two rival factions at a meeting today mediated by the university committee at the order of the minister. An informed source said after the meeting that the university committee proposed the two factions to resign en masse so the management of the university would fall under the jurisdiction of St Gabriel Foundation which will handpick a new university council for Abac. However, the source said that one of the two factions disagreed with the proposal. The two sides are to meet again on January 5 at the order of the education minister and, if the conflict cannot be resolved, the source said that the education minister would invoke Section 86 of the Private University Act to take over the management of Abac and to appoint a working committee to act on behalf of the university council.
Hong Kongs much loved dolphins dwindle in numbers

HONG KONG: As Hong Kong seeks to expand its international airport and with a major new bridge project under way, campaigners warn that the dwindling number of much-loved pink dolphins in surrounding waters may disappear altogether.

animalsenvironmentconstruction

By AFP

Saturday 9 January 2016, 10:00AM

A pink dolphin playing in the waters off Lantau, Hong Kong. Photo: AFP

Conservationists say their repeated concerns have fallen on deaf ears, with what they describe as a rapid decline of the mammal in the past few decades.

The Chinese white dolphin  popularly known as the pink dolphin due to its pale pink colouring  draws scores of tourists daily to the waters north of Hong Kongs Lantau island.

It also became Hong Kongs official mascot for the handover ceremony in 1997, when Britain returned the territory to China.

But despite the affection felt towards the dolphin, campaigners say there may soon be none left.

The proposed construction of a third runway at Hong Kongs busy Chek Lap Kok airport could be the nail in the coffin, they say.

We think that if that project goes ahead, then it will probably drive the dolphin away from Hong Kong waters, said Samuel Hung, chairman of the Hong Kong Dolphin Conservation Society, who has been going out to sea at least twice a week to monitor dolphin activity for almost 20 years.

In some ways it seems like we are pushing them closer and closer to the edge of the cliff and if were making that final push, they will be gone forever. I think now is the time to get our act together.

Mr Hung says there are only around 60 dolphins left in Hong Kong waters  a drop from 158 in 2003.

The dolphin decline is caused by a number of factors, including overfishing and environmental pollution... but I think the major contribution is coming from the increase of high-speed ferry traffic, he said.

The dolphins have either gone to neighbouring Chinese waters or may have died off, says Hung.

Dolphin habitats have also been affected by the ongoing construction of a 50-kilometre bridge connecting Hong Kong to the gambling enclave of Macau.

The bridge looms on the horizon behind the village of Tai O, on the western tip of Lantau island, from where dozens of dolphin tours go out daily.

Since the construction of the bridge in 2012 the situation has worsened, says Mr Hung, who blames land reclamation encroaching on dolphin habitats and continuing construction creating disturbance.

The WWF recently placed volunteers on the dolphin-spotting boats to tell tourists about the problems the animals are facing.

Pollution is quite serious in the air and water... We worry about the marine life being affected, said Hong Kong bank worker Yeung Ka-yan, 30, after taking a short boat trip.

We were a little disappointed, added her boyfriend, a 26-year-old chef from Taiwan, after failing to spot any dolphins  a scenario that could become all too common in the years ahead if conservationists fears are realised.

Tourist boat operator Wong Yung-kan, who was born in Tai O and has lived most of his life there, said residents used to dislike the dolphins because they ate catch from fishermen's nets, when fishing was the villages most important trade.

Now the fishing industry has reduced in size, we have had to change our line of work from fishing to taking tourists out on boats to see dolphins, said Mr Wong, 67.

Dolphin-watching accounts for 10 per cent of Tai Os tourism business.

Of course we want them to remain here... the tourists will be happier and well be happier as well, Mr Wong added.

Unlike conservationists, he says he is optimistic for the dolphins future  but if the worst happens, villagers will adapt as they did before.

These natural things wont disappear... if you are not actively eliminating them, then they wont go away, said Mr Wong.

[But] if this species has to go extinct, theres nothing we can do about it. We can find another way to make a living. People know how to cope with change.

The government refused to be interviewed but said in an email that potential impacts the proposed third-runway could have on the pink dolphins had been properly assessed and addressed.

To compensate for the permanent loss of Chinese white dolphin habitats arising from the land formation works, the designation of a new marine park of approximately 24 square kilometres in the waters north of the third-runway project has been proposed, the statement from the agriculture, fisheries and conservation department said.

But campaigners criticised the plan, saying the marine park would not be established until at least 2023, when reclamation work for the third runway is expected to finish.

We dont even know whether the dolphin can hang on and survive and wait, Mr Hung said.

We have been following some of them for nearly 20 years so those are our old friends.

They dont realise that there is more disaster waiting for them.
In conjunction with Japan Pacific Resource Network, we have established the Japan Multicultural Relief Fund to support the victims and survivors of this escalating tragedy. Our goal is to provide aid to those who can be neglected and underrepresented in receiving disaster aids from the Japanese government or mainstream NPOs.

Your charitable contribution is tax-deductible.
By Dave Graham

LOS MOCHIS, Mexico (Reuters) - Mexico recaptured the world's top drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman in a pre-dawn shootout and chase through drains on Friday, returning him to the same prison he escaped from six months ago, in a boost for the beleaguered government.

The head of the powerful Sinaloa Cartel was captured in a car wearing a filthy vest after fleeing through tunnels and drains from a raid on a safe house in the city of Los Mochis, in his native northwestern state of Sinaloa.

"Mission accomplished: We have him," President Enrique Pena Nieto said on his Twitter account. "I want to inform all Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested."

For Pena Nieto, the capture of a trafficker who twice slipped out of Mexican prisons is a sorely-needed victory after his presidency was tarnished by graft and human rights scandals and the shame of the kingpin's flight from the maximum security Altiplano prison in July.

It also provides relief to U.S.-Mexico relations, strained by suspicion of high-level collusion given the apparent ease with which Guzman gave Mexican authorities the slip after the United States requested his extradition.

Guzman now faces possible extradition to face trial in the United States. That process could take months, although U.S. Republican party presidential hopeful Marco Rubio was among those calling for Washington to immediately pursue extradition.

Once featured in the Forbes list of billionaires, Guzman led a cartel that has smuggled billions of dollars worth of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamines into the United States and fought vicious turf wars with other Mexican gangs.

He was caught early on Friday after Mexican marines raided his safe house, killing five and capturing six of Guzman's henchman. They pursued the drug lord through the northern city's drains and caught him after a car chase through the outskirts, Attorney General Arely Gomez said.

He was flown to Mexico City and later transferred in a naval helicopter back to the Altiplano.

Guzman, whose nickname means "Shorty", first escaped prison in 2001 by bribing prison officials, and went on to dominate the world of Mexican drug trafficking.

He was recaptured by Pena Nieto's government in 2014 but escaped in July by capitalizing on the drug-tunneling skills his cartel honed on the U.S. border. A mile-long tunnel equipped with electric lights, rails and a motorbike came out directly into the shower of his prison cell and he simply slipped away.

The escape heaped embarrassment on Pena Nieto, who had resisted a U.S. request to extradite Guzman and had said previously that an escape would be "unforgivable."

Dozens of people were arrested over the jailbreak, though details of who Guzman bribed and how his accomplices knew exactly where to dig into the prison remain scarce.

His recapture on Friday involved Mexican marines, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and U.S. Marshals, a senior Mexican police source and a U.S. source said.

STORM DRAINS

After stopping his getaway car, the Marines took Guzman and waited for reinforcements at Hotel Doux, a love motel on the outskirts of town that rents out rooms by the hour.

Los Mochis residents described gunfire and explosions from about 3:30 a.m. (0930 GMT).

Schools were closed as helicopters clattered overhead.

"The teachers were coming out terrified because they had heard the rumours that he was fleeing in the city's drains," said Ana Bertotti, 30, a housewife who crossed town to find her child's kindergarten closed.

One photograph widely circulated on social media, but that could not be independently verified by Reuters, appeared to show Guzman sitting handcuffed on a hotel bed, in a room that resembled those shown on the Hotel Doux website.

He was wearing a filthy vest and a poster of a scantily clad woman was pinned on the wall behind him.

Another photo appeared to show Guzman without handcuffs and wearing the same vest in the back of a vehicle next to one of his top assassins.

U.S. officials and the DEA, which has had a bumpy relationship with its Mexican counterparts since traffickers tortured a U.S. agent to death in 1985, took no credit and congratulated Mexico on the capture.

"This notorious criminal is ? and will remain ? behind bars, until he faces justice in a court of law," said DEA Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg.

EXTRADITION WILL 'TAKE TIME'

After coming under fire for failing to send Guzman to the United States before he escaped the last time, Mexico said in July it had approved an order to extradite him north of the border.

On Friday, the U.S. Justice department said its previous request to extradite Guzman to the United States still stands.

A senior Mexican official said the attorney general's office would quickly move to determine how Guzman could be extradited, but that it could be months before he was sent out of the country.

Guzman's lawyer in October appealed against possible extradition in case his client was captured.

Guzman is wanted by U.S. authorities for various criminal charges including cocaine smuggling and money laundering

In 2013, Chicago dubbed him its first Public Enemy No.1 since Al Capone, the gangster who won notoriety in the 1920s.

Believed to be 58 years old, Guzman was born in La Tuna, a village in the Sierra Madre mountains in Sinaloa state where smugglers have been growing opium and marijuana since the early 20th century.

After Guzman's first prison break, violence began to creep up in Mexico. The situation deteriorated during the 2006-2012 presidency of Pena Nieto's conservative predecessor Felipe Calderon, when nearly 70,000 people lost their lives in gang-related mayhem.

After he managed to outmanoeuvre, outfight or out-bribe his rivals to stay at the top of the business for over a decade, some security experts see in Guzman's capture new hope for Mexico.

"This gives important credibility to the Mexican government. And the fact is, they're starting to move forward in implementing the rule of law," said Mike Vigil, former head of global operations for the DEA.

(With reporting by Gabriel Stargardter, Christine Murray, Cyntia Barrera and Alexandra Alper; Writing by Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Simon Gardner and Kieran Murray)
Fee for repeat offenders who don't mow grass could be increased

Those who fail to keep their lawns cut are charged a $100 fee per incident for the city to cut their lawns. The council looks to increase this fee.
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syria's government told a U.N. envoy on Saturday it was ready to participate in Geneva peace talks later this month but said officials wanted to know who would take part from the opposition.

Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem, who met U.N. envoy Staffan de Mistura in Damascus, also demanded a list of groups that would be classified as terrorist, state media reported.

The Geneva talks scheduled for Jan. 25 are part of an international bid to end the five-year conflict that has killed an estimated 250,000 people. The plan for a hoped-for ceasefire envisages defining "terrorist groups" in Syria, one of many tough issues facing diplomats.

The Syrian government views all the groups fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad as terrorists, including rebels represented in a recently formed opposition council tasked with overseeing the negotiations.

Syrian rebels and opposition politicians have expressed doubts over whether the peace talks will begin as planned. Earlier this week, they told de Mistura that before negotiations the Syrian government must stop bombing civilian areas, release detainees and lift blockades imposed on opposition-held areas.

The outlook for the talks has been further clouded by increased tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran, which back opposing sides in the conflict. Tensions have risen since Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr.

Moualem told de Mistura "Syria is ready to take part in the Geneva meetings at the proposed time, confirming the necessity of obtaining the list of terrorist organisations and the list of names of the Syrian opposition groups that will take part", state media reported.

A statement from de Mistura's office described Saturday's meeting as useful and said the envoy had outlined preparations.

"The Special Envoy is looking forward to the active participation of relevant parties in the Geneva talks. He will be continuing his consultations in the region," it added.

Opposition leaders are voicing misgivings over the new effort endorsed by the U.N. Security Council, not least because it does not address Assad's future, a point of contention between states on either side of the war.

Syrian rebels said on Friday there was global pressure on the opposition to make concessions that would prolong the war, adding to their doubts about the U.N.-led drive.

One opposition official said the negotiating team would not be named before the Syrian government did so. Monzer Mahkous, representative of the opposition in Paris, said it was not certain the talks would go ahead as planned due to numerous unresolved issues.

(Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Helen Popper)
Once upon a time, a poverty-stricken Jamaican mother of seven held on to a sliver of hope that her future might be brighter.

Two of Opal Austins children had escaped the dirt floor, one-room hovel that had housed them since birth in a Kingston ghetto. Dwayne, 12, her crackerjack of a son intent on pop music stardom; and Melonie, 13, her quiet daughter dreaming to be a nurse  had landed in Toronto, the Promised Land.

Almost 25 years later, aspiration has turned to ashes  literally. All that remains of Opals dreams for Dwayne and Melonie are two urns filled with their ashes.

This is the story of how Toronto teenagers were tortured, abused, and died right under our noses in a Parkdale apartment  in abject anonymity. More than one of us saw the signs and didnt report it. Theres blood on our hands as it could happen again.

Do we have the checks in place? I dont think so. Whos making sure a child goes to school? asks Det. Sgt. Steve Ryan, a veteran of 150 homicide investigations over 13 years, but particularly haunted by the suitcase murder victim, Melonie Biddersingh.

Melonie? I think about her every day, Ryan tells the Star. Just the nature of the case; it breaks my heart. We cant let this happen again.

The story in all its brutish, macabre detail closed another chapter on Thursday inside a University Ave. courtroom. A jury found Everton Biddersingh guilty of first-degree murder of his daughter Melonie in 1994. He faces a mandatory life sentence, with no chance of parole for 25 years.

Tell them to throw away the key, advised Melonies sister, Racquel Ellis, on hearing that Biddersingh was headed to the pen.

Biddersingh, 60, fathered at least seven children with four women. His wife, Elaine, is co-accused and her murder trial is scheduled for April.

The details in this story come from Evertons trial and preliminary hearing. Details from Elaines preliminary hearing are under a publication ban.

Melonie, Dwayne and their half-brother Cleon (Beverly Scott is his mom), arrived in Canada together, Jan. 25, 1991. Only Cleon survived to tell the tale.

Since birthing her first of seven children at age 16, Opal had housed them all in a shack  first with leaky roof, dirt floor, flapping tarp walls for fleeting privacy; then concrete where the dirt was; and now, finally, indoor plumbing. In her own words to the jury:

I provide the little I have; they satisfy with it. They not hungry. I love to boil porridge, soup, fry dumpling . . . they never out of something to eat. I did domestic work, do a little selling (box drinks, candy, biscuits, cigarettes) so they never hungry. Sometimes, I go to school and say, Teacher, I dont have any lunch money today, and they would take care of it. They know me. Im on the PTA . . . 

Opals testimony  simple, pure and powerful  only ached more hearts in the courtroom. Jurors, reporters and court officers had already been reduced to tears when assistant Crown attorney Anna Tenhouse read out the atrocities endured in the abominable apartment.

Discombobulated and put off by all the hairsplitting legal wrangling that defines the justice system, Opal returned to Jamaica on Christmas night certain of one thing: shed tried her best. She did what refugee families are doing today. Shed tossed her children a lifeline; their father and stepmother failed to haul them ashore.

And whatever help came from the rest of us  police, Childrens Aid Societies, schools, neighbours, churches, Jamaican community, governments  was not nearly enough to compensate.

When Melonie was recovered from the burning suitcase in Vaughan she was grotesquely thin  the size of an 8-year-old. She wasnt reported missing. Nobody knows how she died: starvation or by some dastardly deed from her caregivers.

Melonie was often kicked, punched about her body, dragged by her hair and stomped upon.

At trial, her older brother Cleon testified that as punishment  failing to meet the exacting demands of her stepmom to care for her infant sister  Melonie was deprived of food, locked in a closet for hours, placed in a barrel on the balcony and interrogated, and forced to sleep on a piece of cardboard in the living room, not on the sofa bed.

Considered dirty and devil-possessed by a fanatical stepmom, Melonie was told to shower on the balcony of the apartment in the summer, Cleon testified.

As she weakened, crawled about and lost control of her bowels, the once lovely girl was forced to use pails on the balcony to relieve herself. Cleon, a year older, had to wash her down. To extract information, her father placed her head in the toilet and flushed.

When death brought relief, an autopsy revealed 21 fractures, at different stages of healing, hinting at a timeline of over six months.

There was one final, inexplicable indignity: She had a piece of pepper inserted inside her vagina.

Nobody saw nothing. And those who did, were blind witnesses.

There was no prying superintendent. Neighbours didnt report her screams; neither did they recognize her whimpering as her father cowed her into submission  lest she get another cuff or kick for daring to cry so loud that someone might overhear.

Visitors were at a minimum. Another of Evertons children, Suan, born to Yvonne Hamilton, the woman who sponsored him to Canada, was nearly Melonies age and nagged her father to let her visit the apartment. She couldnt comprehend why contact with Melonie was suddenly cut off. Her dad skilfully put her off. She was just 15. She gave up trying.

When Pedro (Clifton Allison), Biddersinghs friend  the one outsider to visit occasionally  came over Everton hid Melonie in the closet to conceal her injuries. Pedro didnt seem to notice anything unusual in the house of horrors.

And in the apartment itself, the immediate family members were either willing accomplices or terrified abettors; scared conformists or incapable of confronting the evil unleashed on the Jamaican kids.

As Cleon testified  dissolving into sobs of regret and self-blame in the witness box last November  he was no match for his fathers evil designs. We were in fear. We did anything he said. We were scared for our lives.

He himself had been dehumanized, subjected to a DNA test to prove he was his fathers child, turned into a drug runner for Evertons crack dealing, beaten, abused and essentially a slave.

Everton made it clear hed send his goons to shoot up Cleons mom and his two siblings in Kingston, if he snitched or ran away. They know how to squeeze a rat, father told the son.

Me and Melonie, we were scared . . . We had no future. We were like zombies, just living, scared for our lives, Cleon, now 41, told the court.

He didnt know where to go, who to turn to, a safe number to call, without endangering his other family. So he tried to endure the nightmare.

I know she understands . . . she is here right now, looking down on me, Cleon testified, slowly losing it in the courtroom. It was not me doing it, I was forced to, he sobbed. I feel guilty I could not help my sister . . . I couldnt do anything. People judge me, ask why I couldnt help my sister. I couldnt help her . . . 

Elaine? Judgment Day for her comes shortly after her April trial for first-degree murder. Could she live in the tiny apartment and be so engrossed in reading her Bible that she did not hear every stiff kick and horrified scream?

Maybe a smarter, more connected Opal Austin would not have accepted the lie that Melonie had run away with friends to New York. But considering her circumstances, a world away, Opals effort was Herculean.

Had the Jamaican Foreign Ministry, which told Opal in 1993 that Melonie seems to be quite happy, been a bit more diligent and skeptical, they might not have pacified Opals concerns for Melonies safety.

It takes a village, sometimes. And this family needed one badly for a long, long time.

Councillor Michael Thompson got city council to approve an effort to establish a registry that would require immigrant children to report stages of settlement such as school enrolment.

Two years later, everyone is waiting for the federal government to leap the jurisdictional hurdles. While bureaucrats shuffle paper, other Melonies are at risk.

There is an emptiness with the verdict, Thompson told the Star Thursday. This could happen again tomorrow.

Editors note:

Since the trial started Columnist Royson James has hosted Opal Austin and Racquel Ellis, the mother and sister of Melonie Biddersingh. Austin was the first witness at the trial in the cold case slaying her daughter in 1994. James first reported the story from Jamaica when police first identified Melonie in 2012. He's maintained contact with the family and assisted the women in navigating the city during the trial. They left for Kingston on Christmas Day, having been away from family since Oct. 29.

Steps to end secret abuse of immigrant children

Require all immigrant children register at a school or with the Education Ministry, within 30 days of arrival. Its a no-brainer. It has to be done, says Det. Steve Ryan.

On arrival at Pearson, and ports of entry, and at visa issuing offices, give all newcomer children a card and info on where to call, if threatened or abused.

Launch a visible, wide-ranging education campaign  not easily filtered by abusers  that empowers minors and vulnerable individuals to seek help.

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Nearly five million Americans woke up on New Years Day with champagne headaches and a new resolve to renounce drinking. Traditionally, that would involve pouring out the content of ones liquor cabinet and heading to a doctors office or an AA meeting.

But in the wilds of Reddit  of all imaginable places  more than 30,000 recovering problem drinkers have found that there might be another way. Its called r/StopDrinking, and it is, in a nutshell, the Internets unlikely answer to traditional addiction therapy.

I tried everything, said one member of the forum, who goes by the username Cake_Or_Radish and has been sober for more than 560 days. The support I saw in (StopDrinking) on day one felt like nothing I had experienced in hundreds of AA or SMART meetings.

r/StopDrinking is a fascinating case study, both as a thriving online community and as a possible new vector for addiction treatment. Its run entirely by volunteers, most of whom are themselves former alcoholics. It includes an astounding 31,339 subscribing members, as of this writing, plus untold thousands who view the forum but dont subscribe or comment.

Of those subscribers, one-in-five say r/StopDrinking is their sole support group, and most say they visit multiple times a month. A majority of subscribers call it their most helpful tool in their fight against alcohol, more so even than counselling, rehab, or more formal peer-recovery groups. Similar self-help forums on Reddit, like r/loseit, have recorded similar successes.

Experts dont doubt it: While StopDrinking lacks a Big Book, a step program, or even a coherent philosophy on addiction and recovery, it includes all the hallmarks of an effective peer-support program.

Its the fellowship factor thats effective, said John Kelly, an addiction researcher at Harvard Medical School. Theres accountability and monitoring over time. Theres 24/7 support. Theres cheerleading. Its incredibly valuable, especially early on.

In many respects, in fact, StopDrinking functions much like a conventional peer support-group. Theres a daily check-in, where members affirm theyre sobriety. (Its been 30 days. Im in! Sober weekends are where its at!)

There are badges  each personally bestowed, along with a congratulatory note, by one of the forums six moderators  that celebrate the days or weeks since each users last drink.

Theres a 24-7 chat room, where users can nip in for conversation or emergency help. A virtual book club and movie night once helped members adjust to sober social schedules. In the main forum, where dozens of people post every day, members share their revelations (Im happy again!), struggles (a post to help me get through my cravings) and questions (does controlled drinking ever work?).

During the holidays  a particularly trying time for many recovering alcoholics  the forum lit up with tips for surviving a sober Christmas with the in-laws and suggested replacements for the usual holiday drinks. (Pomegranate juice and sparkling cider are, far and away, the favourites.) On New Years Eve, hundreds of members signed a pledge not to imbibe. In another life, they may have cherished the evenings bar crawls and midnight toasts; now they settled into their couches early, nursing a soda water, laptops open.

I remember once saying that if I needed to I was going to check in (to StopDrinking) via my phone underneath the table at Thanksgiving dinner, said Cakes, the D.C. Redditor. I totally meant it.

Cakes recalls logging into StopDrinking frequently during the holidays or while travelling; its when she most feared a relapse. A single woman with a high-powered K Street job, shed gone out of her way to hide her drinking as it escalated in her mid-30s  reassuring herself, like many female alcoholics, that she was still high-functioning.

Few of her friends and family knew how much she drank; she certainly didnt share with them every time she relapsed or celebrated another sober month. But in StopDrinking, thousands watched her progress daily as she reset her badge, the little icon next to each users name that celebrates how long theyve been sober: Seven days. Fourteen days. Zero days. Seven days. Two months. Zero again.

In the very beginning, /SD was so integral to my sobriety, she said, because I felt like it made me accountable, not only to myself but to thousands of strangers.

Its fitting, and not entirely coincidental, that r/StopDrinking came of age just as researchers and clinicians began to rethink exactly how alcoholism treatment works. In a brochure released last year, the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, a division of the National Institutes of Health, began pushing treatments like medication and cognitive-behavioural therapy, right next to 12-step programs and traditional rehab. Meanwhile, a series of breakthrough studies have finally demystified the efficacy of Alcoholics Anonymous, particularly over the long-term.

Surprisingly, Kelly and others have found, its the peer solidarity that really works  not the ritual introductions, the religious overtones or the much-revered Big Book.

That means that any good addiction-recovery therapy should essentially do three things, Kelly said. One: Teach cognitive-behavioural coping skills, like the ability to deal with bouts of depression and anger, and confidence in the face of stress or temptation. Two: Change the addicts social network, so that she changes her lifestyle and gets fewer cues to drink. Three: Motivate people to recover, largely by reminding them how they lived and felt before.

Twelve-step programs accomplish all three, through their particular blend of sponsorship and peer-group therapy. But they still dont work for everyone: particularly people in rural areas, people who feel uncomfortable in group settings, or people afraid to discuss alcohol abuse under their real-life identities. According to the NIAAA, 14 per cent of all American adults are currently problem drinkers  but fewer people than ever are seeking treatment for it.

Addiction is still seen as a moral or a motivational problem, and that makes people very afraid to admit it, said George Koob, the NIAAAs director. Particularly to a man in a white coat, whos an authority figure.

Communities like StopDrinking override that stigma, the thinking goes, by letting people connect in complete anonymity, direct from their computers and smartphones.

Despite that potential, groups like Alcoholics Anonymous have been reluctant to do much in the way of online outreach, and an AA spokesman declined to discuss the new wave of Internet efforts. AA members convened their first workshop on the Internet and the fellowship just last year; their official guidelines on Internet use still stress extreme caution around subjects like social networking.

That doesnt make much sense to Victoria Purdy, a long-time moderator of StopDrinking and an addictions counsellor in Oshawa, Ontario, who thinks treatment needs to meet people where they are. She personally attended AA for two years and has taken other women to meetings in her former hometown, Ottawa. But when newcomers flock to the forum, as they do each January, Purdy reassures them that they have options far beyond the traditional recovery methods that they may be accustomed to.

Everyone thinks you need to go to AA, and AA has pushed that attitude, she said. But in reality, there are other ways to get sober. And for me, Reddit has been a powerful tool.

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Re: Saudi Arabia cuts off ties with Iran, Jan. 4

Re: Saudi-Iran crisis rooted in ancient religious struggle, Jan. 6

Re: Answering Trumps question, Letter Jan. 1

Saudi Arabia cuts off ties with Iran, Jan. 4

It is too bad for the spectacle-seeking news media that the Saudi autocracy does not execute its myriad victims in public. The media are left no choice but to focus on peripheral but spectacular sequels such as the attack by angry protesters on the unoccupied Saudi embassy in Tehran, which caused some minor damage before being halted by police.

The sensationalism helps to sideline any discussion of vital issues of far-reaching consequence, such as the nature of the ludicrous monstrosity that is called a criminal justice system in Saudi Arabia, the political character of the trials that led to the executions, and the role of Washingtons green light to the carnage, in the form of massive armaments sales to the Saudi regime and tacit patronage of its criminal conduct within and outside the country.

Meanwhile, the misguided protesters in Tehran helped divert the worlds attention to marginal issues such as the potential impact on Irans already-moribund relations with Saudi Arabia, as well as the larger but still marginal issue of the supposed root-cause of it all, namely, the Shia-Sunni rivalry.

Relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia have never been what one would call cordial, and there has been intense Shia-Sunni rivalry for at least four centuries. The new element in the picture is the Arab Spring and its aftermath, including Washingtons worried reaction and its backing of Saudi and Egyptian dictatorships.

The turmoil in the Middle East will persist and intensify, until Washington abandons its project of imposing fake democracy on the region, and leaves the regions peoples to envision and build their future on the basis of their own needs and aspirations.

Al Eslami, North York

How difficult is it to imagine a scenario in which Iran and Saudi Arabia attack each others oil fields? What about if the Shia minority of Saudi Arabia managed to wrest away one of the oil-rich eastern provinces? The devolution of Islam into warring factions, and into breakdown products of the Iraq war, such as the IS and Al Qaeda, adds further complexity to the region.

Ever since the U.S. undermined the free and fair election of the Mossadegh socialist government in Iran, and heavily armed its puppet, the Shah, the region has organized itself into either dictatorships or fledgling, internally feuding representatives of warlords and other vested interests trying to present themselves as democracies.

Its clear that neither the rulers of Iran nor the Saudi kingdom are much interested in sunny ways, let alone gender-parity governmental institutions.

Ron Charach, Toronto

Saudis execution of Al Qaeda militants is a self-inflicted consequence of the regimes own advocacy of extremist Wahhabism. The same hateful teachings exported abroad with matching funding serves as both inspiration and capability for ISIS, Al Qaeda, Boko Haram, and other groups to carry out their cold-blooded acts of terror in a growing number of nations including Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Nigeria and France.

The execution of Sheikh Nimr Al-Nimr is a different matter. His only crime was to stand up, through peaceful protests, for the downtrodden and oppressed Shia minority in the eastern provinces of Saudi Arabia.

Canada needs to repudiate the Saudi regime and terminate the $15 billion military contract signed in secrecy with the Stephen Harper government.

Ali Manji, Thornhill

Would someone please explain why we are selling armoured cars to Saudi Arabia? Would we sell armoured cars to the Islamic State? Of course not. In that case, tell me the difference between those two entities.

Both ISIS and the House of Saud, in the name of their various twisted interpretations of Islam, turn their guns on innocent civilians and demonstrate a particular interest in decapitation. At least 4 of the 47 people beheaded by Saudi Arabia on Jan. 1 were guilty, it seems, of peacefully protesting against that countrys repressive regime. Thats all.

I therefore ask again, why are we sending war material to the likes of the Saudis? Ah, why am I so naive as to believe that money shouldnt trump morality?

Richard Griffith, Ravenna

The minute I heard of the executions in Saudi Arabia I thought that the delivery of light armored vehicles to that country would be halted. I was shocked to hear that nothing was to be done. We have a moral obligation to prevent arms going to a country that will not hesitate to use them on its own people.

Even if contracts have been signed and money transacted, it does not mean that Canada must honour this agreement. If we have to compensate the company concerned, so be it. We are aiding, abetting and condoning the atrocious acts of last Saturday if we do not cancel this sale.

Carol Duffy, Richmond Hill

I was shocked to hear the statement of Stephane Dion who is enthusiastic to sell arms to a country that is the source of terrorism in Middle East and the world. Recent execution of political prisoners is a living example of the brutalities of this state. What is the assurance that these weapons will not be passed on to Saudi sponsored terrorist organizations?

It looks like we are playing the same double game like Turkey, which has been accused of supporting ISIS as well as being part of the coalition forces. At one side we are accepting thousands of Syrian refugees showing our positive role. At the same time we are selling weapons to extremist countries to promote more war resulting in more refugees.

Nice game!

Abbas Raza, Ajax

In its Jan. 6 editorial, the Star says that the sale of $15 billion worth of Canadian-made arms to Saudi Arabia bears close watching. What we will be watching is people being run down and otherwise scared into submission by ruthless Saudi rulers using our armoured vehicles.

This deal, begun under the abolished Harper regime, should be cancelled at once. Our new governments talk about new ways should not be undermined by the same old greedy hypocrisy.

Jean Gower, Kingston

As North Korea and the Islamic state dominate headlines this week, an equally important issue has been nonchalantly swept under the rug by Western media. News outlets have been hesitant to shed light on the horrific human rights violations currently taking place in the middle eastern nation of Yemen.

This week, the Saudi Arabian air coalition against Yemen enters its tenth month. As the civilian death toll now exceeds 8,000  with roughly 1,900 of them being children  its about time to start asking questions regarding Canadian and American involvement.

Saudi plans to receive $14.8 billon worth of Canadian made light-armour military vehicles that will begin production within the next year. The vehicles will be added to Saudis stockpile of American-made ammunition, as it continues to beat down on a country too poverty stricken to afford adequate air defence systems.

Saudi Arabian actions display a flagrant disregard for human life by striking a maternity hospital less than a week ago, and destroying a help centre for the blind a few days later.

As Saudis list of human rights violations seems to be extending by the day, its time to ask ourselves as Canadians: Is money really all it takes for us to sell out our morals?

Alex Kennedy, St. Catharines

Saudi-Iran crisis rooted in ancient religious struggle, Jan. 6

At the beginning of Olivia Wards article this question is raised, Is the current Saudi-Iran conflict rooted in religion? Liyakat Takim goes on to say that there are more political issues than religious at play, but the rest of the article is almost all about religion. I think its safe to say that religious manipulation is the main cause of problems in the Middle East. That and Western interference in a part of the world where it seems like many would prefer to live in the past. And thats not just fantasy.

Richard Kadziewicz, Scarborough

The Saudi official proclaimed the 47 executions and beheadings as mercy to the prisoners. How could any sane person describe the incident as such casually as if a life does not matter? We did them a favour by executing them sort of reasoning.

Saudi Wahhabis have executed more people than ISIS has done in the last two years and yet the U.S., Britain and their allies will not utter a word. They only condemn if it is not their friend or ally.

These Saudi butchers live in an age they do not deserve. Perhaps they were better off living in an Age of Darkness in the middle of desert, riding camels and fighting among themselves.

Canada should take the lead to ensure that these Saudis never hold a prestigious post ever at the UN.

I hope the Saudis learn from history that as you sow, so shall you reap.

Shafic Kara, Markham

ISIS beheads people under their control who disagree with them. So do the Saudis. ISIS invades sovereign territories and kills civilians who dwell there. The Saudis do it by air in Yemen. ISIS practices an absolute dictatorship form of goverment. So do the Saudis.

Why is it that we vilify ISIS, but provide military hardware to the Saudis? Why are the Saudis our valiant allies in the soi-disant War on Terror?

Patrick McDonald, Toronto

Answering Trumps question, Letter Jan. 1

The letter writer has made a historically incorrect statement unsupported by the facts when he states a century of humiliation for Muslims followed as Britain, France and the U.S. ignored local history and culture to devise countries . . . He was referring to the Allies at the end of World War I and I assume the negotiations with the defeated Ottoman empire.

Including the U.S. as taking part in the devising of countries and ignoring local history and culture is in error. There were several agreements and treaties between the Allies and the Ottoman empire at the end of the war, none of which the U.S. was ever a participant or signatory.

To be brief. The Armistice of Mudros of Oct. 30, 1918, which set the partition of the Ottoman empire, was between Britain and the Ottoman government. No U.S. involvement.

The Treaty of Serves of May 10, 1920, included this partition agreement as well as creating the British Mandate of Palestine and Iraq, and the French Mandate of Syria and Lebanon. This treaty excluded the U.S.

Then there was the secret Sykes-Picot agreement between Britain and France with Russian assent defining their spheres of influence in the Middle East. The U.S. was not a party to this agreement.

In addition there was the Balfour Declaration of 1917 by Britain and the Zionist Federation of England and Ireland establishing Palestine as a Jewish homeland. This declaration was incorporated into the Treaty of Serves from which the U.S. was as previously noted excluded.

In summary to state that the U.S. was involved in the establishing of the current mess in the Middle East dating back to the first world war is incorrect and totally unsupported by any historical facts or documents.

William E. Goss, Markham

You joke, right? Distinguished Kazakh journalist and documentary filmmaker Borat Sagdiyev would have a field day covering this latest Middle East Smackdown event between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

There appears to be a bidding war of words between these two combatants for bragging rights over who is better at supporting and exporting terrorism. Could there be a reality show in the making starring Irans Revolutionary Guard and Saudi Arabias Foreign Ministry?

So far, there have been some memorable quotes that will no doubt go on to become historical gems, such as Iran calling the executions by Saudi Arabia a medieval act of savagery. Hey wait a minute, doesnt Iran hang gays, jail and/or execute journalists, etc.?

But the best so far  a real keeper (and most noteworthy)  is by Saudi Arabias Foreign Ministry, which fundamentally refers to the Lebanese Hezbollah group as terrorists supported by Iran.

David Honigsberg, Toronto

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By Tom Perry and Mariam Karouny

BEIRUT (Reuters) - An air strike reportedly killed dozens of people in a rebel-held town in Syria on Saturday as a U.N. envoy visited Damascus to advance preparations for peace talks planned this month despite opposition misgivings.

Agreement was also reached for aid to be delivered on Monday to an opposition-held town besieged by pro-government forces where United Nations says there have been credible reports of people dying of starvation, sources said. Aid will be sent simultaneously to two villages blockaded by rebels.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 39 people were killed in the air strike, which hit a court house and adjoining prison in the town of Maarat al-Numan in Idlib province. It did not say whether the air strike was carried out by Syrian or Russian jets, which have both bombed the area.

Russia has been staging air strikes in Syria in support of President Bashar al-Assad since September. The building was struck with four missiles and the number of dead could increase due to the large number of wounded, the Observatory said. Syrian officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

The war has raged on since last month when the Security Council endorsed a plan for peace talks, a rare case of U.S.-Russian agreement over a conflict that has killed 250,000 people. The talks are due to begin on January 25 in Geneva.

The Syrian government told U.N. envoy Staffan de Mistura on Saturday it was ready to participate but wants to know who would take part from the opposition, Syrian state media reported.

Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem also said it was important to see a list of groups that would be classified as terrorists as part of the new diplomatic process, flagging another potential complication.

Damascus views all the groups fighting to topple Assad as terrorists, including rebels who support a political solution and are represented in a recently formed opposition council tasked with overseeing the negotiations.

A statement from de Mistura's office described Saturday's meeting as useful and said the envoy had outlined preparations.

"The Special Envoy is looking forward to the active participation of relevant parties in the Geneva talks. He will be continuing his consultations in the region," it added.

Syrian rebels and opposition politicians have expressed doubts over whether the peace talks will begin as planned. Their concerns over the diplomatic bid include the absence of any mention of Assad's fate.

Earlier this week, they told de Mistura that before negotiations the Syrian government must stop bombing civilian areas, release detainees and lift blockades imposed on opposition-held areas.

AID DELIVERY AGREED FOR MONDAY

"Can the international community achieve the implementation of this pre-negotiation stage in the few remaining days? If it can, there is no problem. But I doubt they can," Riyad Naasan Agha, a member of the opposition council, told Reuters.

Another opposition official said on Friday the opposition would not name its negotiating team until the government did so.

The outlook for the talks has been further clouded by increased tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran, which back opposing sides in the conflict. Tensions have risen since Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr.

The aid deal agreed on Saturday will result in humanitarian supplies being sent to the opposition-held town of Madaya at the Lebanese border, and to two villages in the northwestern province of Idlib that are blockade by rebels.

Aid agencies have warned of widespread starvation in Madaya, where some 40,000 people are at risk. The United Nations said on Thursday that Damascus had agreed to allow access to all three areas, but did not say when the delivery would take place.

"Both date and time have been set. Aid will go to three towns on Monday morning, all at the same time," said a source familiar with the matter. A second, pro-Syrian government source confirmed the details.

(Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Gareth Jones)
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - A manhunt is still on in Argentina for two of three fugitive murderers convicted of drug-related killings, the federal police chief said on Saturday, hours after the president and prosecutor's office said the escaped prisoners had been caught.

Police seized Martin Lanatta, one of the country's most wanted men, on Saturday morning and police and government officials later said his brother Cristian Lanatta and a third man, Victor Schillaci, had also been detained.

"We're still looking for the other fugitives," acknowledged Roman Di Santo, head of the Argentine Federal Police force.

The 13-day search operation for the men who escaped from a maximum security prison on Dec. 27 has gripped the Argentine nation and the surprise turn of events will be a major embarrassment for President Mauricio Macri.

(Reporting by Richard Lough and Jorge Otaola; Editing by James Dalgleish)
The United States congratulates the people of Venezuela on the seating of their new democratically-elected National Assembly. It was a historic day as Venezuelas opposition took majority control of the National Assembly for the first time in 17 years. The press was allowed access to the legislature for the first time in many years and state TV broadcast interviews with opposition leaders.

State Department Spokesperson John Kirby called the seating of the legislature an important and necessary step towards fulfilling the will of Venezuelan voters as reflected in last months elections.

However, the Venezuelan Supreme Court barred four lawmakers from taking their seats while it probed allegations of electoral fraud. As a result, only 163 of the 167 lawmakers were sworn in on January 5. The next day, three opposition deputies were sworn in over protests by members from the legislatures minority who announced their intention to challenge the move. Consistent with the spirit of the Inter-American Democratic Charter, which both the United States and Venezuela have committed to uphold, the United States calls on all parties to respect the independence, authority, and constitutional prerogatives of the National Assembly. In recognition of the installation of the National Assembly and in support of inclusive and meaningful political dialogue, said Spokesperson Kirby, the U.S. again call[s] for the release of all [Venezuelans] imprisoned for their political beliefs and activities.The United States believes the new National Assembly can serve an important function in advancing and promoting national dialogue focused on addressing the social and economic challenges facing the Venezuelan people.

As President Barack Obama has said, Democracy depends not only on elections, but also strong and accountable institutions, and respect for the rights of minorities.
NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) stock is decreasing 1.38% to $75.18 in afternoon trading on Friday as lower oil prices persist despite a drop in the U.S. oil rig count.

U.S. oil companies took 20 rigs out of production this week, bringing the total count to 516, according to Baker Hughes (BHI) data.

WTI crude is down 0.42% to $33.13 per barrel, while Brent crude is falling 0.71% to $33.51 per barrel this afternoon, according to the CNBC.com index.

Crude oil prices have fallen 10% this week because of global oversupply and weak demand, Reuters reports.

"It is extremely difficult to forecast the exact bottom," ABN Amro senior energy economist Hans van Cleef, told the Reuters Global Oil Forum. "The sentiment is still extremely negative and short positions are still at excessive levels. So, downside risks still remain. That makes it also hard to pinpoint the timing of the expected recovery."

Irving, TX-based Exxon Mobil is an energy company that produces and refines crude oil.

Recently, TheStreet Ratings objectively rated this stock according to its "risk-adjusted" total return prospect over a 12-month investment horizon. Not based on the news in any given day, the rating may differ from Jim Cramer's view or that of this articles's author. TheStreet Ratings has this to say about the recommendation:

We rate EXXON MOBIL CORP as a Hold with a ratings score of C. The primary factors that have impacted our rating are mixed - some indicating strength, some showing weaknesses, with little evidence to justify the expectation of either a positive or negative performance for this stock relative to most other stocks. The company's strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its reasonable valuation levels and largely solid financial position with reasonable debt levels by most measures. However, as a counter to these strengths, we also find weaknesses including a generally disappointing performance in the stock itself, disappointing return on equity and weak operating cash flow.

Highlights from the analysis by TheStreet Ratings Team goes as follows:
The first thing that strikes you when you come to a rural village in India is the people. People that look so different, that dress so dif...
An investigator takes a box from one of the residences where suspect Edward Archer has lived Friday, Jan. 8, 2016, in Yeadon, Pa. Archer accused of ambushing a police officer and firing shots at point-blank range said he was acting in the name of Islam and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, Philadelphia authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
Men walk in the Rue Henri Berge in the Schaerbeek neighborhood of Brussels on Friday, Jan. 8, 2016. A Brussels apartment in the Rue Henri Berge was likely used to make bombs for the Paris attacks, and one of the plotters also hid out there after escaping a police dragnet, Belgian prosecutors said Friday. Prosecutors said they found Salah Abdeslams fingerprint in a search of the apartment on Dec. 10, but the international fugitives whereabouts remain unknown. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)
Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is made to face the press as he is escorted to a helicopter in handcuffs by Mexican soldiers and marines at a federal hangar in Mexico City, Mexico, Friday, Jan. 8, 2016. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced that Guzman had been recaptured six months after escaping from a maximum security prison. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)


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On Thursday, the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of American, the nations largest Orthodox Jewish umbrella organization, praised the introduction of the bipartisan Zero Tolerance for Terror Act into Congress by U.S. Representatives Joe Kennedy III (D-MA) and Ted Deutch (D-FL).

The bill, which has five Democrat and Republican co-sponsors, would allow Congress to quickly impose sanctions on Iran if the Iranian government commits an act of terror, provides support for terrorist organizations or violates international law by acquiring ballistic missile technology.

The Zero Tolerance for Terror Act was introduced in response to Iran illegally launching two ballistic missiles in October and November 2015. While the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) found that the October launch violated UNSC Resolution 1929, it did not take any action against Iran.

Nathan Diament, Executive Director of OU Advocacy, the nonpartisan public policy arm of the Orthodox Union, issued the following statement:

Last month, the long-awaited International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report confirmed what we have suspected for years about the military dimensions of Irans nuclear program: Iran previously lied about its ambitions, and, until 2009, actively sought to develop the technology for nuclear weapons. Since the signing of the Iran nuclear agreement, Iran has illegally tested two missiles capable of delivering a nuclear weapon. Unfortunately, the Obama Administration has yet to respond to these provocative actions, as it promised it would.

The Zero Tolerance for Terror Act will give Congress the ability to respond to Iranian violations of international law and all Iranian acts of terror or sponsorship of terror. We applaud U.S. Representatives Kennedy and Deutch for sponsoring the bill and the bipartisan group of Representatives for co-sponsoring it. We urge all members of the U.S. House to co-sponsor this bill and move it forward quickly to become law.

(YWN World Headquarters  NYC)
When traveling to any other country, may it be the Philippines or Holland or Zimbabwe, youre sure to come across all kinds of hassles and obstacles that could give you a pressing headache and make you wish that youre back at home sweet home. But its really not necessary to go all through that with the right amount of preparation and research. When traveling to another country, you should always expect the unexpected and make sure you have a contingency plan for each situation you might find yourself in. And in your trip to the Philippines, here are a few suggestions you could take to make your trip to the Philippines hassle free.Philippine Travel Tip #1  Weather This, Weather ThatWhen youre in Dubai, youre sure to expect extreme heat during the day and extreme cold during the night. In the Philippines, however, there are no extremities in temperature to watch out for. If youre going to travel to the Philippines between the months of March till May, be sure to bring lots of light clothes because its the hot and dry season. During the months of June till October, its the rainy season that would greet you on your Philippine travel. Lastly, the months of November till February are possibly the best times of the year to travel in the Philippines because its cool but dry. But to be more specific, if you want your trip to the Philippines unmarred by the occasional typhoon, set your travel date between the middle of December till mid-May.Philippine Travel Tip #2  Everythings Within A Call Away?Manila, the capital city of the Philippines, is also dubbed as the texting capital of the world because everyone, and I do mean everyone, has got a cellphone  or two!  in their name. Thats why if youre lost, you need not worry about looking for the nearest public phone because cellphones are able to work in almost all places in the Philippines. Quite a convenient thing for anyone traveling, isnt it?Philippine Travel Tip #3  Party Time!One of the most unique and enjoyable experiences you could have when you travel to the Philippines is being part of the fiesta season. The whole town or city usually participates in a fiesta and each and every house is open to all, natives and foreigners alike. Filipino delicacies are prepared in each household and colorful banners are hung everywhere so that youd know when theres a fiesta going on. You could also try participating in one of the native games thats usually played like climbing a tree slick with oil or being blindfolded and try hitting the palayok or pot filled with candies and coins for children.
Experts are warning parents they must ensure their children are not running up big bills by playing games on family iPads or computers.

Ewan Taylor-Gibson, telecoms expert at comparison website uSwitch, says that the older children become, the easier they find it to outsmart usage restrictions that parents put in place.

He says: No parental control software can ever be up to date.

His comments come after Faisal Shugaa, from Crawley, West Sussex, spent more than 3,900 upgrading his dinosaurs on computer game Jurassic World. The seven-year-old had memorised both his fathers iPad password and Apple ID.

Costly dinosaurs: Faisal Shugaa spent more than 3,900 upgrading his dinosaurs on Jurassic World

While Apple agreed to refund the charges, there are no guarantees this will happen every time a child runs up a bill, especially if a password is used. You can appeal to Google or Apple if your child runs up an unexpected bill on a device, but you have no automatic right to have the money refunded.

While most tablets and other internet-enabled gadgets have parental control settings, they are not pre-set. With hundreds of thousands of tablets, games systems and other wi-fi-enabled presents received for Christmas, the fear is that parents will not have put controls in place, leaving them exposed to big bills.

Figures compiled by uSwitch show that only 60 per cent of parents have installed controls on their childrens devices. Aisha Tilstone is a director of Engage Media Solutions which educates parents and children about the potential dangers of going online. She says checking devices before giving them to children is key to making them safe.

She explains: Check the devices settings and choose which apps and add-ons you want your child to have access to. When you hand over the device, the facility for in-app purchasing, or buying items with an associated credit card while you are playing, should be password-protected.

These settings should be available in the user guide for your device, but if you are unsure, the UKs Safer Internet Centre, which is part funded by the European Commission, offers guides to settings on most popular devices, including the Nintendo 3DS and iPad at saferinternet.org.uk.

Restrictions: On an iPad or iPhone you can switch off in-app purchasing

On an iPad or iPhone, you can turn off in-app purchasing by going to settings, then scroll down to restrictions and enable restrictions. You can then switch off in-app purchasing.

On Android phones and tablets you can hide in-app purchasing behind a PIN code using the Google Play store app. Select settings, down to set or change PIN, enter a code, then select use PIN for purchases.

The popular Kindle Fire has parental controls under the quick settings tab. Tap more, then parental controls and then tap on. This will prompt you to set a password and you can choose to restrict web browsing, purchases or specific content types.

You can also change the settings on your home broadband to help keep children safe online. Your broadband provider should be able to ensure that while your children are using their device at home, they cannot see adult content.

Research shows that even young children are getting round controls. A fifth of parents with children aged between one and six claim their children have bypassed parental settings to view content or buy items. Changing your PIN regularly is one security measure you can take, while you should also monitor your childrens use of out of the home networks, perhaps disabling 3G or 4G altogether.

Ewan Taylor-Gibson warns that children can get round home broadband controls by using 3G or 4G networks, and that savvy teenagers may even use a VPN (virtual private network) that disguises where they are surfing from when using home broadband.

Website internetmatters.org provides information on how to keep children safe. The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children provides a helpline on 0808 8005002.

HOW JOSHUA'S MINECRAFT PASSION PROVED A MINEFIELD Screen test: Linsey with Joshua, who is a fan of Minecraft Linsey Bailey-Rowles thought she had put all the necessary restrictions in place when she allowed her son, Joshua, to use an iPad Mini to look up his favourite Minecraft videos on YouTube. But Linsey, 38, was horrified to find the ten-year-old watching an inappropriate video that suggested, Its good to do drugs. She says: I thought I was savvy and had everything locked down. Joshua, above with Linsey, is now banned from YouTube, and although he received a Nintendo 3DS for Christmas, she has changed the settings so that he cannot chat with other people online, or pay extra for new levels or points within games. Linsey, who is married to Mick, 43, an engineer, and lives in Burnley, Lancashire, also has a two-year-old daughter Elise. She already enjoys playing on an iPad. Its scary for parents because technology is changing all the time, Linsey adds. The experience with YouTube showed me how important it is to keep up to date with changes. Computer game Minecraft




Heating engineer: 'It is not a rip-off but it is usually a waste of money'

The prospect of the central heating breaking down over the winter months scares many homeowners into taking out expensive  and often unnecessary  boiler insurance.

Ten million homeowners a year spend a combined 1billion on such cover to fix broken boilers, repair burst water pipes and kick-start the central heating back into life.

But the vast majority of these people  who typically pay 20 a month for cover  would be better off burning the pound notes they spend on insurance in staying warm.

Boiler insurance: Ten million homeowners a year spend a combined 1bn on such cover to fix broken boilers

This is because most never have to claim  and those that do can spend more on the cover than they would have done if they just called a plumber to fix the problem when it arose, research has found.

Boiler insurance covers the cost of a plumber to come out and fix any problem with your boiler, at any time of day or night. It includes the cost of replacing broken or worn out parts.

Some also include replacing the boiler if it cannot be repaired  and an annual inspection.

The insurance is sold as standalone boiler breakdown cover or offered as part of a more comprehensive package that covers other central heating problems, for example broken radiators or leaky pipes.

It is separate from home insurance that will not include the cost of your central heating boiler system as standard.

TO AVOID GETTING INTO HOT WATER WITH COWBOYS There are no guarantees when it comes to finding someone to do a good job. But there are ways you can lower the risk of being duped by a cowboy. Ask family and friends for a personal recommendation. Take a look at the work they have completed and the price paid. Separately, ask to see customer references. The Government-backed TrustMark scheme is a not-for-profit organisation where tradespeople sign up to a strict code of conduct. There are also commercial websites aimed at helping people find quality tradesmen, including Which? Trusted Traders and Rated People.

Energy providers British Gas and EDF as well as specialists such as HomeServe offer boiler breakdown cover. Premiums are based on boiler type and age.

Research by consumer group Which? reveals that two thirds of boiler insurance policyholders never make a claim.

Those that do claim would invariably have been better off saving the money used to fund premiums and calling out a skilled local plumber to fix their problem.

Which? says the typical cost of an annual boiler service is 70 while insurance that includes an annual inspection is 245. The average cost of repair is 210.

Heating engineer Billy Wilgar, of AC Wilgar, based in Orpington, Kent, says: Scare stories are often used to push the merits of emergency boiler insurance cover. It is not a rip-off but it is usually a waste of money.

It makes better sense to ensure your boiler is well looked after with an annual service from a local professional that you can trust. This should not only stop problems occurring but savings made from not taking out insurance can be put aside for the rare occasions you have a genuine emergency.

He adds: Insurance does not guarantee that your heating gets fixed any quicker. There is also small print in these insurance policies that enables companies to weasel out of fixing faults  for example, if a policyholder has not had their boiler inspected on a regular basis.

The Financial Ombudsman Service received 1,300 complaints about home emergency cover in 2014  on everything from delays in repairing burst water pipes to disputes over whether the insurer should have replaced a boiler or not. In the first six months of last year it received 1,200 complaints.

Many heating systems are already covered under a manufacturers warranty, a tradesman guarantee or a home insurance policy. So if you are tempted to sign up to an emergency boiler insurance policy check with your home insurance provider first to see if it already covers repairs to your boiler.

Even if it does not, it is often possible to extend the insurance cover to include the boiler for an additional 50 a year. This will not include the cost of an annual inspection.

Boiler insurance prices vary depending on the system you have installed and the level of cover you want.

A spokesperson for the Financial Ombudsman Service says: Boiler insurance has a bad reputation. We are working closely with the industry and expect claimants to be treated fairly.

How I found a decent plumber to fit a new boiler

Prepared: Michelle Kowalcyzk made sure her plumber was Gas Safe registered

Price comparison website uSwitch says one of the best value for money emergency insurance offers is from HomeServe. It includes an annual service and free call-outs and comes with an initial 12-month special price of 162 (discounted from 258).

Michelle Kowalcyzk, 28, from Beckenham in Kent, spent 3,000 installing a new boiler and having old water pipes flushed out last month after suffering years of frustration with an unreliable heating system.

The married secondary school teacher says: Some days the water was scalding hot while on other occasions it would suddenly go cold on me  just at that awkward moment when I was washing my hair in a rush. I have spent hundreds of pounds trying to get engineers to fix the problem but when the heating recently packed up downstairs I decided enough was enough.

Michelle found a reputable engineer using the Government-backed TrustMark scheme where members sign up to a strict code of conduct.

She also made sure the plumber was Gas Safe registered  something all gas boiler fitters must be signed up to.

The new boiler came with a seven-year guarantee against any fault as long as an annual service was conducted. In addition, there was a ten-year guarantee from the plumber against faults.

Michelle adds: I was not tempted by adverts scaring me into buying unnecessary boiler cover  I can think of more fun ways to waste money.


Tony Hetherington is Financial Mail on Sunday's ace investigator, fighting readers corners, revealing the truth that lies behind closed doors and winning victories for those who have been left out-of-pocket. Find out how to contact him below.

D.W. writes: I had the unpleasant experience of dealing with Wayne Montgomery. I did not know of your articles about him prior to buying a Rolex watch from his firm Capital Fine Watches in Tamworth, Staffordshire. The watch was losing time. It was sent back to him but a replacement also lost time so I returned that as well. Since then he has not supplied another watch or refunded my money, so I have lost more than 3,000.

Wayne's world: Montgomery has been duping people for two decades

I reported last October that a reader had handed over her Rolex to dealer Wayne Montgomery to sell on her behalf. He told her to expect between 4,000 and 4,500, but she got nothing except a long series of excuses.

According to Montgomery, he was the victim of an armed robbery. On top of this, he had passed watches on to another dealer, who had in turn handed them to a third dealer who had then gone bust with debts of 9million.

The reader did not get back her watch and Montgomery made excuse after excuse about selling property to allow him to make a repayment, though it now seems the property sale may just be fiction.

When I asked him about your watch, Montgomery described you as a very unpleasant man. He added: Like you, he doesnt seem to accept that I was robbed and have had business difficulties, which is obvious.

Montgomery also said: I am semi- retired now, as when I ceased trading last year I decided to turn a hobby, trading the exchanges, into a lucrative source of income.

He would not tell me whether the watches he held for customers were insured, but with a property sale just around the corner, plus his lucrative stock market deals, perhaps there is hope after all that he will repay people who had trusted him.

But in Waynes World nothing is quite what it seems. You see, he is actually an undischarged bankrupt. One of his customers, Carole Humphreys from Cardiff, finally lost patience with him and took him to court in Coventry. So how can he be selling property and trading in the City? Wayne failed to offer any explanation.

Problems: A Rolex from Montgomery's firms website

Carole told me: I purchased a watch from him. The last [wristband] link that was put on was too big, hence the watch coming off my wrist and breaking. I sent it back to him for repair.

Some time later, she explained, Montgomery said he could not return the watch because, he told her: I had a break-in at my house and the watch was stolen.

When Carole went to see him in Tamworth, Montgomery tried unsuccessfully to get her to back down. He said: How far do you want to take this? I hope youve got enough money.

She replied: Youve just said the wrong thing, because Ill take it as far as I need to go.

The loss of the watch, and the legal costs of making him bankrupt, have come to more than 10,000. Montgomery is a serial dodgy dealer. My first warning against him was published in The Mail on Sunday as long ago as 1996.

For years he ran gambling syndicates, advertising huge successes, but hiding behind offshore companies and maildrop addresses.

After punters invested, they would receive a letter saying the syndicate had suffered an extraordinary run of bad luck and the money was gone.

Here we are, two decades on, and Wayne is still a professional wallet-thinner. Why should he stop? Nothing too bad ever happens to him.

He seems to slip past every consumer or investor protection organisation there is. No doubt he will be back. Rolex or not, it is only a matter of time.

Pension money

Mrs K.C.M. writes: I reached 60 last April but am still waiting for my company pension money. I worked for a hotel firm, but the pension plan is with Friends Life.

Friends Life is part of the large Aviva group, so I asked staff at Avivas head office what had gone wrong.

They told me that the trustees of the hotel firms pension scheme gave instructions last June on how to deal with employees who  like you  wanted to use the new pension freedom rules to take benefits as cash.

They explained: Due to an error, we did not act on this instruction, and this resulted in a delay in dealing with Mrs Ms case.

By the time you read this, Friends Life will have paid you, and you will find an extra amount to make up for the delay and upset.

Lottery of parking at Aldi

Parking fees: Aldi does not have a standard time limit for its stores in the UK

T.P. writes: I went shopping with two friends to the Aldi store in Sutton-in-Ashfield, Nottinghamshire. Aldi restricts customers to one hour of parking time at this store.

We were not aware of this and overstayed by 11 minutes. My friend, whose car we were in, has now been fined 70. Aldi says there are notices about the time limit, but as we are all in our 70s or 80s and it was raining at the time, the notices, of which we were not aware, were the last thing on our minds.

I did wonder whether this particular store might have a problem, perhaps with commuters parking all day, or people leaving their car but shopping elsewhere. I asked about this, but the company only replied: Aldi does not have a standard time limit for its stores in the UK.

Time limits vary, depending on how busy the individual store is, and are in place to ensure that spaces are available for all our customers.

So, if you are used to shopping at one Aldi branch, dont assume you get the same parking time at a different branch.

And the good news is that your friends fine will be scrapped. Aldi said: On this occasion we have cancelled the charge as a gesture of goodwill, and this is currently being processed.
James Henderson has fund management coursing through his veins. But it does not mean that the great-grandson of Lord Faringdon, the founder of investment giant Henderson Global Investors, is infallible when it comes to maximising returns for investors.

I often buy companies too early and I then sell them too quickly, he admits, rather coyly.

It sometimes infuriates the boards of the investment trusts I manage, who say I should time my decisions slightly better, but its a contrarian approach embedded in my investment DNA.

'Contrarian': James Henderson, right, and Lord Faringdon, his great-grandfather

Though it may sometimes be frustrating to people such as Peter Troughton, the demanding chairman of investment trust Lowland which James Henderson has managed since 1990, it is an idiosyncratic style that has not disappointed shareholders.

Over the past five years, all four funds he manages have comfortably generated more returns than the FTSE All-Share Index  no mean achievement.

Im obviously doing something right, he says, somewhat modestly. Investment trusts Law Debenture and Henderson Opportunities and investment fund Henderson UK Equity Income & Growth make up the quartet.

Also, analysis by fund scrutineer Financial Express Trustnet shows that in terms of 12-month performance, Henderson has beaten his immediate peers seven times in the past ten years. Again, few managers have such a consistent track record.

Hendersons approach of buy early, sell early means he has been busy buying out-of-favour mining stocks such as Glencore and Anglo American for Lowland, even though both companies have recently suspended dividend payments in response to collapsing commodity prices.

I know the two companies will not pay dividends for another two to three years, he says, but they are great businesses that will come good again. Its just a matter of when, not if. Yes, some may say I have bought too early, but my philosophy is that it is better too early than too late.

Lowland, launched 53 years ago, invests almost 100 per cent of its assets in the UK stock market, with the aim of delivering a mix of income and capital growth.

Lowland, launched 53 years ago, invests almost 100 per cent of its assets in the UK stock market

Over the past 40 years, it has increased its dividend every year bar 2008, when it maintained payments against the backdrop of a global financial crisis. Dividends are paid quarterly. Unlike most other investment trusts with a UK stock market mandate, Henderson is as happy investing in AIM-listed shares as he is in FTSE 100 giants such as BP, HSBC and Vodafone.

The result is a diverse trust with 110 holdings  more than the norm. He says: I like long lists because it means the trusts income flow is not too disrupted if one of my FTSE 100 holdings cuts its dividend.

It also allows me to buy the Glencores of this world in anticipation of dividend fruits further down the line.

Currently, the trust has enough income in reserves to pay the equivalent of 75 per cent of last years dividend. The UK stock markets difficult start to the year, triggered by further sharp falls in Chinese equity prices and unrest in the Middle East, does not seem to have ruffled Hendersons feathers. Its certainly a different start to the new year, he says, but there will be opportunities and I will buy where there is value.
The debate about the pros and cons of renewable energy has been raging for years and shows no sign of abating. But whatever people think about wind turbines and solar panels, they are likely to produce an increasing amount of the worlds energy over the coming years.

Among the many concerns this trend provokes, there are two very practical issues. Wind turbines only work when it is windy, so production is intermittent. And solar panels only produce power during the day, while the greatest demand for power is at night.

Some UK energy suppliers have even stopped accepting consumer-generated solar-powered energy between 10am and 4pm because they do not need it at that time. Similar difficulties occur on many parts of the Continent and they are even more acute in sunny US states such as California and Hawaii.

Bright future: Scott McGregors giant battery units, developed from spaceflight technology, can store solar-generated power for use at night

REDT Energy aims to solve this problem and many others involving energy production. The company has created a pioneering method of storing energy, using large storage facilities that are long-lasting, effective and could transform the way energy is distributed to homes and businesses.

REDT shares are 7p and should increase materially over the next three years as the group ramps up production of its units in the UK and overseas.

Energy storage is not a new phenomenon, but most of the available options have clear disadvantages. Lithium batteries, for example, are expensive, degrade within a few years and work best in short, sharp bursts. Hydro-electric power is an excellent source of renewable energy and can be stored.

However, it only works in areas where there is plenty of water and the creation of suitable sites can incur considerable environmental opposition.

REDTs units work with batteries based on liquid vanadium, an element once used to strengthen swords and still employed today to reinforce steel. Conventional batteries used in the home store energy only for short periods before either needing to be recharged or replaced. REDTs vanadium-based storage units last for decades, so they can store energy almost permanently.

Technology: REDT Energy chief executive Scott McGregor

The technology was invented by US space agency Nasa for use on missions and REDT spent 12 years, from 2000 to 2012, perfecting a version for commercial energy storage. Since then the group, led by Scott McGregor, has been turning the concept into an affordable, reliable reality.

Working with New York-listed manufacturer Jabil, the technology has been rigorously tested, costs have been brought down and the first units are now on trial.

One large facility is being used on a wind farm in Scotland, another has been sold to a German industrial company and another to a large utility group in Europe. Several others have been distributed to customers here and on the Continent, while one has been sent to an eco-resort in South Africa.

This highlights another use for REDTs technology. In the developed world, its units will largely be deployed to store energy created by wind and solar power so it can be used when it is needed, rather than when it is generated. That energy will then be distributed by national grids on a timely basis.

Many emerging markets do not have national grids, so businesses rely on diesel generators for electricity, which are expensive and inefficient. REDTs units would allow these businesses to take greater advantage of solar power, storing it during daylight hours and using it when necessary.

Clean energy: In the developed world, REDTs units will largely be deployed to store energy created by wind and solar power so it can be used when it is needed, rather than when it is generated

Prices for REDTs units start at about 13,500 for a model the size of a US-style fridge, which is hardly cheap, but they can be leased over five, seven or ten years and the cost is expected to come down considerably by 2017.

Utilities and industrial groups have already been approaching McGregor directly for new units, so demand is expected to be high. However, he and his team have deliberately adopted a slow and steady approach to manufacturing so they can be sure the product works and is cost-effective before rolling it out on a large-scale basis.

REDT was formed out of another business, Camco Clean Energy  a rag-tag of renewable energy businesses, virtually all of which have now been sold. McGregor has retained an African operation, focused on managing funds for renewable energy projects, as this division provides REDT with contacts and a distribution network for its storage units.

Analysts expect modest sales of just 4.6million (3.4million) this year, as the group slowly starts to sell its storage units. But sales are expected to soar to 23.9million in 2017, with the group moving into profit shortly afterwards.

The company reports in euros today, but is likely to switch to sterling, as its engineering facility is based in Livingston, near Edinburgh, and its development plant is in Wokingham, Berkshire.

Midas verdict: Reliable energy storage is in demand here and abroad and REDT is a pioneer in the field. The shares are not without risk but McGregor has adopted a sensible approach towards business expansion and the rewards could be substantial. A good punt for adventurous investors.

> Midas share tips update: Hold your nerve at Cineworld

SHOULD INVESTORS BE WORRIED BY STOCK MARKET TURMOIL: LISTEN TO THE THIS IS MONEY PODCAST
Shell's 36billion offer for rival BG Group has received a boost after shareholder advisory group Glass Lewis is understood to have come out in favour ahead of the investors vote later this month.

Glass Lewis is the leading adviser for US shareholders and nearly a third of Shells investors and a quarter of BGs are US-based. The deal has also won the backing of the other leading shareholder advisory group ISS last week.

But some investors are concerned over the plunging oil price and late last week Standard Life Investmenst said it would be voting against the deal. Announced in April last year, it saw Shell offer a 50 per cent premium to BG shares at 1350p a share, made up of 383p in cash and 0.44 of a Shell share for each BG share.

Tank half full: Shell boss Ben van Beurden is optimistic

Both BG and Shells shares have tumbled since the announcement, after the price of oil fell from more than $65 a barrel to $33.30.

News that Saudi Arabia is considering floating Aramco, the worlds biggest oil firm, is also seen as a sign that the future of oil businesses may be in doubt in the long term, with suggestions that the kingdom was cashing in while it could.

Since the offer was made, Shells share price has fallen from 2208p to 1391p, meaning it must pay a bigger proportion in cash, leading to fears that its investors may baulk at the deal. Shell must get the backing of the majority of its investors and 75 per cent of BGs.

BG shares are trading at 942p a share.

Shareholders backing the deal cite the long-term benefit to Shell in acquiring a business strong in gas production, amid expectations that the price of fossil fuel will rise eventually.

We think its okay in the long term, said one top ten investor, and its difficult to see how they can reduce the price. If Shell did try to alter the terms, under City rules the present deal would lapse, allowing a rival bid to emerge.
The oil industry, which spurred Aberdeens boom in the 1980s, faces tough times, but the city is leading the regions for investment in business property.

Research shows it to be the city outside London that has attracted the greatest spend by buyers of office, industrial and retail space per head of population over the past ten years.

The study, by real estate firm CBRE, revealed that regions beyond the South East accounted for 60 per cent of the UKs commercial property transactions.

Of the 44.4billion invested in the 12 cities looked at from 2006 to 2015, Aberdeens share was 2.67billion or 11,800 per head. Manchester saw the highest investment overall at 8.3billion.
Almost half of people accessing their retirement savings since the introduction of pension freedom rules last April are cashing in the whole amount, official data has revealed.

Statistics from the Financial Conduct Authority, crunched by This is Money, show 46.5 per cent of people accessing their pots between April and September 2015 withdrew their entire fund - and many did so without advice.

This is just the latest revelation to cause concern for industry experts since pensions freedoms were launched in April 2015, allowing over-55s more flexible access to their retirement savings.

Withdrawals: Almost half have accessed their retirement savings, but without advice they could be missing out on growth and end up paying too much tax

Retirees can still take out 25 per cent tax-free but as well as being able to access the rest of the pot through an annuity or stay invested while taking an income through drawdown, for the first time they can withdraw the rest of their fund as cash.

All options have various tax consequences and could mean missing out on extra investment growth or other benefits.

With more than 2billion accessed under pension freedoms so far, we run through some of the statistics raised by the FCAs latest findings.

More than two-thirds are cashing out their whole pension

In the quarter July to September 2015, 178,990 pensions were accessed to take an income or fully withdraw cash, according to the FCA.

Of these, 68 per cent (120,969 pensions) were fully cashed out, with the retiree having to pay tax at their marginal rate on the portion in excess of the 25 per cent tax-free lump sum. That portion is officially known as the uncrystallised fund pension lump sum.

Of the funds that were completely raided, 88 per cent were small pot pensions - defined as 30,000 or less.

The remaining 32 per cent, or 58,021 pensions, were used to take an income after the tax-free cash had been withdrawn through drawdown or to buy an annuity.

Earlier FCA data from April to June 2015 shows 204,581 pots were accessed, and 57,568 of those were fully cashed-in.

When you put both figures together, 383,571 people have accessed their pensions between April and September, and of those 178,537 have fully cashed in their pots, amounting to 46.5 per cent.

It is not known whether some of the money cashed out was put into other investments such as Isas or property.

Gareth James, head of technical resources at AJ Bell, said: 'It is surprising that 68 per cent of people accessing their pensions during this period fully cashed in their fund.

'Pensions are designed to provide a long-term income in retirement so these figures suggest the pension freedoms might be encouraging the wrong sort of behaviour.

'Most of those full withdrawals are small pots of less than 30,000 so hopefully those people have other pension savings they are using for the long term but, if they dont, they will potentially be left relying on the inadequate state pension alone.'

Cashing out: The FCA found that 88 per cent of cashed out pensions were small pots below 30,000, which make up 54 per cent of the value of pensions that were fully withdrawn

More than two-thirds arent shopping around for an annuity

The pensions industry has gone to a lot of effort to encourage retirees to shop around when buying an annuity.

Providers are supposed to promote the open market option, which tells retirees to shop around before choosing their retirement product.

But the FCA data shows 64 per cent of customers who purchased an annuity in the quarter stayed with their existing provider.

More than half, 58 per cent, of drawdown customers stayed with their existing provider.

This doesnt necessarily mean people are worse off, but with annuity rates at record lows, it is important to shop around to check you are getting the best deal.

Slightly more worryingly, 68 per cent of customers accessing pensions through guaranteed annuity rates did not take them up.

This could mean they miss out on high rates and benefits, although this was more common in small pots of 30,000 or less.

The figures show 59 per cent of customers with policies 30,000 or above took up their GARs.

Dean Mirfin, of Key Retirement, said: In its thematic review of annuities in February 2014, the FCA found that 80 per cent of consumers who purchase an annuity from their existing provider would have ensured a better deal by shopping around.

Much more needs to be done to raise awareness around the benefits of seeking out the best deal as well for seeking advice to ensure the best outcome for those at retirement.

Consumer choice: The FCA stats show how regularly retirees have sought advice or guidance. By the way, UFPLS stands for uncrystallised fund pension lump sum - in plain English, the taxable lump sum you can take

Retirees are ignoring Pension Wise and financial advice

Taking money out of your pension is a big decision with huge financial and tax implications.

The wrong decision could mean a big tax bill or running out of money sooner than expected.

The government set up a guidance service last year called Pension Wise to help people make decisions.

Retirees can also take financial advice. According to advisory website Unbiased, UK savers who take advice save on average 98 more every month and receive an additional income of 3,654 every year of their retirement, based upon a pension pot of 100,000.

Despite this, the FCA shows many are not seeking support.

In total, around 30 per cent of customers used neither an adviser or Pension Wise when taking cash out of their pension
Investment bank Shawbrook has spent millions on a firm specialising in proton beam therapy the form of radiotherapy that made headlines in the case of Ashya King.

Shawbrook Asset Finance has agreed a 30million loan facility with Proton Partners International, which is building the first dedicated proton beam therapy centres in the UK.

Ashyas case came to light when his parents  Brett and Naghmeh  took him from Southampton General Hospital in 2014 against the wishes of his doctors in order to seek the proton beam therapy abroad for his brain cancer. This sparked a police search and the controversial arrest of his parents near Malaga in Spain.

Therapy: Ashya King with his father

A High Court judge later backed the parents right to take Ashya to the Czech Republic for the treatment. The six-year-old is now clear of cancer and went back to school last week.

The clinics, which will also offer traditional radiotherapy, will be open to NHS patients from England, Scotland and Wales, as well as medically-insured private patients and self-paying patients.

The first centre will be in Newport and is expected to treat traditional radiotherapy patients this year and proton beam therapy patients next year. Centres in London and Northumberland are due to open in 2017.

Mike Moran, chief executive officer of PPI, said the project would transform cancer treatment in the UK. He said: The equity funding has provided a very solid foundation on which the company can progress its plans for building the centres.

The facility from Shawbrook is welcome as it underpins the financial strength of the company.
The Government should focus more on building up or scaling companies than creating them, according to Jonathan Quin, founder and chief executive of currency transfer business World First, which increased its revenue by 71 per cent in 2015.

This time two years ago the firm, based in Westminster, had 200 employees. Now it has more than 400 and last years revenue growth was its highest since 2007.

Quin, who launched the company in 2004 after working for Royal Bank of Scotland and Citigroup, said of 2015: Weve transacted over 7billion.

Support: World First boss Jonathan Quin backs the plan

He said: Were strongly supportive of the idea of a scale-up Minister. Big business gets lots of coverage and start-ups have had some great exposure over the years. I think there are lots of great mid-sized businesses that no one has heard of. They have a lower risk of failure than start-ups but are much more able to grow quickly than huge businesses.

In 2014, Canadian angel investor and non-executive director of the London Stock Exchange, Sherry Coutu, produced an independent report into scale-ups.

She offered 12 recommendations  including a Minister supported by an industry taskforce responsible for reversing the scale-up gap facing the UK  saying they could add 1trillion to the economy by 2034.

Coutu, who is based in the UK and who invested in DVD rental service LoveFilm and property website Zoopla, has said: Britain is very, very good at getting start-ups going, but the real prize comes getting further down the road. Thats how you get the next Google or Apple.

More than a year later a scale-up Minister has not been announced. Quin said: As Coutu states in the report, competitive advantage doesnt go to nations that focus on creating companies, it goes to those that focus on scaling companies.

Quin also said he believed all businesses have the potential to grow.

He explained: If someone wants to grow their business but doesnt feel that they can grow what theyre currently doing, I think they should diversify their product, their geography or their product group.

Quin, who is in the Supper Club, a membership organisation for fast-growth founders, added: Its interesting to get an outsider in and to listen undefensively to what they have to say. Sometimes people cant see the wood for the trees.

He also said: Its essential that employees believe in what the business does. I think this has become noticeably more important to people since the crash. Its not just about the money.

As a business we already had a high growth target, but two years ago we set an even higher target and really interestingly it changed the way people worked. They were driven to do more, to act more quickly, to think further ahead, and to fix the things which wouldnt scale.

It was almost self-perpetuating that by aiming higher, we grew quicker.

He added: Since then weve exceeded our 38 per cent year-on-year growth target. Lots of businesses or people thinking about starting businesses are too afraid of taking risks and try to get themselves to being 100 per cent confident about an idea.
Paypal Working Capital, the business lending arm of the online payments giant, has provided 690million to small firms since launching in 2013.

In a sign of just how rapidly small company finance is changing, demand for PayPal Working Capital has tripled in the past year. It provides 2million a day. So far 60,000 small firms globally have secured funding.

Among them is Active Hound, a Plymouth-based supplier of products for dogs, including Chuckit! toys. Zak Taylor, who owns the firm, said: Initially I borrowed 8,000 as a test run.

Fetch!: Zak Taylor raised money for his firm, Active Hound, through PayPal Working Capital

It meant we could advertise more aggressively and buy more stock. It worked out a dream. He later borrowed another 19,000.

Norah Coelho, director at PayPal Working Capital, said: It launched in the UK about a year after it was developed in the US and grew tremendously fast. The size of the portfolio now exceeds 690 million, about 15 per cent of which is outside the US.

It is still early days in the UK. Fourteen months ago firms could borrow up to 20,000, now its 50,000.
Outside the Belle Vista Hotel

Hurghada "Reuters"

9:45 PM Cairo Local time

           8        ( ...

Posted by     on Friday, January 8, 2016

The media center spokesperson stated that on 8 January Friday even , unidentified people sneaked and entered the "Bella Vista" Hotel in Hurghada through the restaurant on the street and threatened the hotel guests using knives.

The security forces assigned to secure the Hotel dealt with them. In reaction , the two men tried to escape but in their attempt , one of them was killed and he is called : Mohamed Hassan Mahmoud Mahfouz , born in 1994 and lived in Giza while the other suspect was injured badly. They were carrying a sound gun "Starting gun" and knives.

Three tourists "2 Austrians and 1 Swede" were injured during the attempt of the preparators. The injured were transferred to the hospital to recieve medical treatment.

The Prosecution started its investigation.

at 9.58 PM

by anonymous security sources.

Anybody hearing on the TV that an attack has taken place where I am in Egypt, be assured I am fine. It was 3 men arguing...

Posted by Peter Kwapisz on Friday, January 8, 2016

The true story of what happened in Bella Vista Resort HurghadaThe whole situation didnt take more than 4 minutes...

Posted by Bella Vista Resort Hurghada on Saturday, January 9, 2016

Updated @ 07:42 PM CLT 9/1/2016

Hurghada: The inside story is a crazy story !! A man who wanted money from the hotel owner told him he will spoil his...

Posted by Mayar Abdel Aziz on Saturday, January 9, 2016

From few hours ago, the city of Hurghada in Red Sea governorate was the center of attention of the world with shocking news about an attack in a hotel there Friday evening.According to the early information spread in Egyptian media from news websites and TV channels, unknown militants stormed "Belle Vista" hotel attacking the tourists at the Hotel Lobby there and that the security forces were handling the situation there.Within few minutes, news reports based on anonymous security sources started to show up in popular news websites like Youm 7 and Al-Masry Al-Youm claiming that those militants were carrying the Daesh/ISIS flag and that one of them was wearing an explosive belt.The sources began to call those militants as terrorists.Sooner, we read that two tourists were injured and at least, two terrorists were killed on the spot.Then, even more alleged details began to spread online like how those alleged terrorists came from Sinai through the Red Sea and more ignorance revealed in itself in a famous Arabic news channel that do not know that Hurghada is not located in Sinai.The reports went viral internationally online.We are still recovering from the Russian airliner crash and yesterday we had another bizarre incident involving tourists which Daesh claimed its responsibility despite it failed. As soon as I read the news alert about the attack in Hurghada, I thought about Tunisia and the terrorist attack in its resort city.I wondered if it was some sort of lone wolves style attack especially with all the reports in the media.At, Egypt's ministry of interior issued its first statement about the attack and it had another version of the story.Now interestingly the official statement of the Egyptian ministry of interior did not mention or include the following words in ArabicThe MOI was speaking about two suspects only.What is even stranger are the statements of the minister of tourism Hisham ZazaouIn statements to Youm 7 news website, the minister said that according to the information he received on the phone from the Red Sea governor, the attack was actually an attempted robbery by two unidentified suspects. All the news reports in Egypt speaking about the ISIS Flag and the explosive ballet are based on quotesAt the same time online, alleged photos showing the ISIS flag and allegedly explosives vest as 3 men "2 dead and one alive" in the alleged crime scene went viral online.They were not released by the interior ministry but they found their way online till they landed to the Daily Mail Front Page for hours.Then the MOI official spokesperson Abu Bakr Abdel Karim spoke on Al-Mehwar TV channel on air declaring that that no explosive vests nor belts were found in the scene !!!!!!!!!!!!!He also added that the investigations were still undergoing to determine if it was a criminal or terrorist act.On Twitter, people began to share the tweets of a young man who knows somebody in Hurghada near the Hotel who told him that it was a terrorist attack but rather a fight between unfortunate youth that used firearms outside the hotel and the security thought that they were terrorists and things erupted !! Strangely, that version of the story is confirmed by a tourist who is in Hurghada who spoke about a fight between three young men.And We have got also the statement from Belle Vista Hotel itself saying the attackers were two drugged men.I found another version of the story from a lady who works in tourism.So technically, we got 4 versions of the story "a terrorist attack", "Just an attack that is being investigated according to MOI officially", "Robbery according to the minister of tourism and Red Sea governor" and a "fight between youth that turned ugly according to eye-witnesses".Seriously, I do not know what to believe.Shockingly, Youm 7 published a video showing the interrogation of the suspected injured attacker while he was in semi-coma and asked about his name.I am quite surprised to find that video is published online and has gone viral.Aside it is unacceptable to publish such interrogation in that way even for an alleged suspected terrorist who still got rights according to the laws whether locally or internationally, I do not know if it is legal to publish interrogations publicly in the media like that when the General prosecution has not finished its investigation.Now whether it is a terrorist attack or a robbery or just a fight that gone mad and sadly, there is one fact: It is another blow to the tourism industry in Egypt.
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By Philip Newman

A Queens County grand jury has indicted a 27-year-old Jamaica man on charges of murder and arson in the death of a 25-year-old woman whose charred remains were found in the bathtub of an apartment the two shared, the district attorney said.

This was a heinous crime, said Queens DA Richard Brown. A young woman was killed and her remains burned from head to toe in her own bathtub. The defendant fled the scene but was found in Florida and extradited back to Queens to face charges. If convicted the defendant will likely spend the rest of his life behind bars.

Brown identified the defendant as Carlos Pineda (aka Carlos Leon) of 90th Avenue in Jamaica. He was arraigned Tuesday before Supreme Court Justice Gregory Lasak on an eight-count indictment, charging him with second-degree murder, arson, reckless endangerment and tampering with physical evidence. He is being held without bail and will return to court March 10.

If convicted, Pendeda could get up to 25 years in prison, the DA said.

Brown said that according to the charges, between Oct. 16, 2015 and Oct.17, 2005, Pineda allegedly killed his live-in girlfriend, Miriam Lucrecia Samayoa Veliz, by choking her.

Pineda was observed on video survelliance leaving the apartment building just after 3 a.m. Oct. 17 and seen returning to the location with a red container commonly used to hold gasoline some 20 minutes later. Pineda is alleged to have been seen on surveillance video leaving the building again around 3:53 a.m., just before a 911 call reporting a fire at the occupied location, Brown said, First responders discovered the burned remains of Veliz in the bathtub.
Beaver County's homes rose in price

How did Beaver County's housing market do in July? The median price for a house in 2022 was higher than 2021.
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Beverly Drive United Methodist Church, 813 N. Beverly: The United Methodist Women will meet at 6 p.m. Jan. 12. The Friendly Kettle free lunch will be served at 11 a.m. Jan. 13. Church members will conduct services at Faith Mission at 7:30 p.m. Jan. 18. Committee meetings Jan. 19 include education at 6:30 p.m. and worship at 7 p.m.

Church of the Good Shepherd Anglican, 1007 Burnett St.: The church's new rector, the Rev. Brian Chase, of Canton, Ohio, will celebrate his first service Jan. 10.

Church of the Living God Pillar and Ground of the Truth, 1218 Gladiolus: The church fish fry dinner will be served 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Jan. 16. A donation of $10 is requested. The Brotherhood Program will be presented at 3:30 p.m. Jan. 17. Deacon Charles Gurley, of Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church, will be the speaker.

Fain Presbyterian Church, 2201 Speedway: A congregational meeting will be held Jan. 10 after the 10:45 a.m. service. The session will meet at 7 p.m. Jan. 11.

First Baptist Church, 1200 Ninth St.: Barbara Miller will lead a gathering at 6 p.m. Jan. 13 at her home, 4818 Wyoming Ave., to pray for revival and forgiveness of sins. Reservations are requested, but all are welcome. Call 692-1872 or 613-4165.

First Baptist Church of Lakeside City, 3384 Texas 79 South: Daniel McCoy has been selected as the church's new pastor, after serving as interim pastor since November. McCoy is a recent graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary. His wife, Marca, is a pharmacist.

First Christian Church, 3701 Taft Blvd.: On Jan. 10, the ordination of elders will be conducted during the 10:45 a.m. service, with congregational and church board meetings to follow. The Christian Women's Fellowship will meet Jan. 11, with a board meeting at 10:30 a.m. and a membership luncheon at 11:45 a.m. Rita Gauthier, with Workforce Solutions, will present the program. Cost for the lunch is $5. The property ministry will meet at 7 p.m. Jan. 12. Ministry meetings on Jan. 19 will include education, evangelism, membership, stewardship and world outreach at 6 p.m. and worship at 7 p.m.

First Christian Church of Iowa Park, 210 E. Cash St.: The church board will meet at 9:30 a.m. Jan. 10 to elect new officers.

First United Methodist Church, 909 10th: Fifth- and sixth-grade children who would like to learn to make small talk at parties and improve their table manners can sign up for the Manners Matter class starting Jan. 14. The five-week class will be taught by Dee King and will end with a dinner-dance party Feb. 11. Registration is $65 and is due by Jan. 10. Sign up on the church website.

Floral Heights United Methodist Church, 2214 10th: On Jan. 11, the senior adult council will meet at noon and the family ministry team will gather at 6 p.m. The evangelism group will meet at noon Jan. 12. Later that day, the senior adults will sponsor a dinner and program at 6 p.m.

Friberg-Cooper United Methodist Church, 5511 Old Friberg Church Road: Members will meet at 9:30 a.m. Jan. 9 to take down Christmas decorations. A planning meeting will be at 9 a.m. Jan. 16.

Our Redeemer Lutheran Church, 4605 Cypress: Pairs & Spares will take a trip to Rockin'M Ranch for a distillery tour Jan. 9. Participants will meet at 3:45 p.m. at the Catholic church in Scotland to caravan to Rockin'M, then eat dinner at Thad and Paisley's after the tour. The GLOW women's Bible study will meet at 4 p.m. Jan. 10.

Sacred Heart Catholic Church, 1501 Ninth St.: The youth ministry is collecting canned food for the annual SouperBowl of Caring Drive ending Feb. 1. Donated cans, wrapped with dollar bills, can be dropped off at the pastoral center during the week or at the table in the church atrium before Masses. Food is also needed for sack lunches given out three times per week. Single-serving food items like peanut butter and cheese crackers, fiber bars and vienna sausages are requested.

St. Mark's United Methodist Church, 4319 McNiel: A fellowship meal will be served at noon Jan. 10.

St. Paul Lutheran Church, 11th and Holliday: The Tabitha Joy Lutheran Women's Missionary League will meet at 9:15 a.m. Jan. 9. On Jan. 10, a collection will be taken for Rathgeber House and a church un-decorating event will be at 3 p.m. On Jan. 11, the men's Bible class will meet at 9 a.m. and the board of evangelism will meet at 6 p.m. The church council will meet at 6:30 p.m. Jan. 14. Jan. 15 is the deadline for February newsletter and calendar items.

Trinity United Methodist Church, 5800 Southwest Parkway: The Growing Center board will meet at 1 p.m. Jan. 11. The Tuesday morning Bible study will begin a study of "War Room" at 9:30 a.m. Jan. 12. The Wednesday evening adult Bible study will start a study of Psalms at 6:40 p.m. Jan. 13. The prayer shawl ministry will resume meetings at 10 a.m. Jan. 14.

University United Methodist Church, 3405 Taft: Volunteers will take down the Christmas decorations starting at 9 a.m. Jan. 9.

The deadline for submitting items for church briefs is 4 p.m. Wednesday. To have an item listed, mail the information to Bridget Knight, Times Record News, P.O. Box 120, Wichita Falls, Texas 76307. Please limit announcements to special events, meetings or guests. Limited space does not allow listings for regular weekly events. Items may be faxed to 940-720-3444 or emailed to bridget.knight@timesrecordnews.com. We are sorry, but church brief items cannot be taken over the phone.
Contributed photos Nancy Howell sits with her sons, A.J. (left) and Ben (right). Howell lost her husband, Mark, in July 2011 after a routine surgery. She will share her story of heartbreak and resilience at the Spirit Day for Women event Jan. 23 at Floral Heights United Methodist Church, 2214 10th St. Tickets to the event are $15 and include lunch.

SHARE Nancy Howell and her son, A.J., prepare to hunt pheasants on family land in central Kansas. After her husband Marks death, Howell pledged to continue to instill his love of nature and the outdoors in her two sons. She also took over his outdoor column in the Times Record News, renaming it The Adventures of an Unexpected Outdoor Woman. Contributed photo Ben Howell kayaks on Lake Murray near Ardmore, Okla., while on a family camping trip.

By Sarah Johnson

Mark Howell was a healthy man with an intense love for the outdoors. As his wife, Nancy, describes him, he was 55, looked 35 and acted like he was 25.

"We went into the hospital expecting routine surgery, a two- or three-day hospital stay, and a six-week recovery period once back at home," Howell remembers. "That's not what we got."

It was July 2011.

"The day he died, I had gone home from ICU to sleep for two hours, only to be called by his nurse to hurry back," Howell said. "He had slipped into a coma, his body was shutting down. Doctors gave me no hope. I sat by his bedside. I prayed, I begged God to heal him, I sang to him, I told him stories. I basically spent 16 hours wrapping my head around the reality that, short of a miracle, he was going to slip on up to heaven ahead of me. As the day waned, I saw the handwriting on the wall. His heart was so strong, but I had to let him go. I whispered in his ear that it was OK to go. I promised him that I would do my best to raise our sons in the way he had planned. I told him that it would be a long time before the boys and I would be 'fine,' but we would be OK. I kissed him on his cheek and sat down beside him. The nurse leaned over to check his pulse, and he coded."

That was the day Nancy Howell's life was forever changed. It was the day she started sailing into uncharted territory. It was the day she gave it all up to God.

Howell will share her heart-rending story at the Spirit Day for Women event Jan. 23 at Floral Heights United Methodist Church. The day begins at 8:30 a.m. with registration. Guests will enjoy special music and lunch. Tickets are on sale now through Jan. 19 for $15.

"The week Mark was in the hospital, I grabbed God's hand and pulled him in close," Howell said. "It's like being in a dress rehearsal for a big performance. I'd never actually been on stage, just on the sidelines. I was content to let Mark lead, to be his wife, the mother of his boys. But when he died, I had to fully and completely rely on God. I had to trust his plan, even when I hated it. Even when it wasn't fair. Even when it made no sense to any of us."

Howell knows there are people who forge their way through tragedies without God. She just can't fathom how they do it.

"I've been a Christian since I was 11 years old," Howell said. "God is an integral part of who I am, what my family is built on. So, I have no grasp of what this road would have been like had I not believed in God."

Leaning on God, Howell was able to pick herself up out of the depths of despair, if only for two important reasons  her sons, A.J. and Ben. Although her life was uncertain and shifting, one thing she knew for sure. She was determined to continue to instill Mark's love of nature in her boys. He had written an outdoor column in the Times Record News for a few years in addition to his job at Texas Parks & Wildlife Department.

"Weeks after his death, I would open the Thursday section to see if they had found a replacement," Howell said. "I waited a month before reaching out to Deanna Watson and Nick Gholson, sending them a sample column. I tell people I really didn't have a choice. I knew that it was what Mark would want me to do. The worse thing they could say was 'no.' Thankfully, they didn't. I just started my fifth year. It helped (and continues to help) the boys and me on many levels. It forces me out of my comfort zone. It gives me opportunity to explore the outdoors. It keeps me on the path I know in my heart Mark wanted not only for his sons, but also for me."

The column was renamed "The Adventures of an Unexpected Outdoor Woman." Howell smiles when she remembers tackling the outdoors on her own.

"A woodpile up against our house was a bone of contention between Mark and me, but in marriage you choose your battles," she said. "I feared rats would get into the house and he always laughed at me. Roof rats ate out the electrical insides of his riding lawn mower and bellied up to his bird dog's food dish on a daily basis. I started setting rat traps. I caught a rat every night for two weeks. The trap would 'clean kill' them and I would squeamishly  and girlishly  dispose of them with gloves and a shovel. Until one night, whenever the trap disappeared from the back porch before bedtime. Somewhere in my backyard, a rat was running around with its head caught in a trap. I waited until morning, where I found it nearby. But the rat wasn't dead. With an 8- and 9-year-old boy encouraging me, I put the poor rodent out of its misery. It was Mark's birthday. I still remember the boys cheering for me as we took the rat out to the garbage. They told me that 'dad was proud of me for whacking the rat.'"

Along with the column, Howell also founded "A Widow's Might," a faith-based blog/website and online community for widows, and its umbrella ministry "aNew Season."

Howell admits she hasn't done things exactly like Mark would've, but together, his family has come pretty close.

"I tell folks that while Mark is absent from us physically, I know exactly what I am supposed to do in the rearing of his sons," Howell said. "He lived, breathed and loved nature and the outdoors. He was one of the few people I've ever known that got paid to do something that he truly loved. It was his essence, in his genetic makeup. I certainly haven't done things precisely like he would have  there's no way. But I've adapted his dreams for AJ and Ben into something doable by a left-handed girl from Western Kentucky  his term for me."

Guests at Spirit Day for Women will be treated to tears, laughter and gutsiness when Nancy Howell takes the microphone to share her story. As for Anita Beeks, chairman for the Spirit Day for Women committee at Floral Heights, she is excited about the opportunity for women to renew and refresh their faith.

"I rejoice because God has given us the opportunity to share his love to the women of Texoma," Beeks said. "I could tell you that this day is about fellowship, food and fun. And it is  but it is so much more than that. This event is an opportunity to renew and strengthen our relationship with Jesus, our Savior. It is a time to see how God equips us for the life journey we are on. We can find strength, peace, comfort and joy in Nancy's message because it shows us that God will never leave us nor forsake us. He walks beside us each day no matter what that day brings."

For more information about Spirit Day for Women, call Floral Heights at 723-7151 or log on to fhumcwf.org.
Bowie graduate wins CMA broadcast award

Bowie graduate Cory Fitzner was named the winner of the 2022 CMA Broadcast Personality of the Year, weekly national for his radio show.
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By Christopher Collins of the Times Record News

No characters from the Walt Disney pantheon have ever been booked into the Wichita County Jail.

Times Record News editors say they're acutely aware of that fact, and unless some notable arrests have occurred under their news-sniffing noses, it still held true on Friday.

Regardless, the newspaper was made famous  or infamous, depending on how you look at it  on a statewide level when it was named the winner of a Texas Monthly Bum Steer award. Awards generally are given to people and organizations who commit public blunders, such as Blue Bell's listeria contamination and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick's Twitter post that appeared to condone mass shootings.

In the Times Record News' case, the Wichita Falls Police Department issued a report in October indicating a suspect named Mickey Mouse had been booked into the local jail on a burglary charge. The police report was in error, the department told the newspaper, but only after a tongue-in-cheek article about the jail booking was posted on the newspaper's website.

Clearly not everyone got the joke  other news agencies picked up on what the Times Record News says was supposed to be a humorous aside, in one instance reporting that local media in Wichita Falls had been "duped."

Newspaper staff place blame for the Bum Steer award squarely on the shoulders of city editor Lynn Walker, author of the article in question and owner of what one reporter described as "a very dry sense of humor."

"When we saw Mickey Mouse was a suspect on the daily crime report, we doubted it was THE Mickey Mouse," Walker said. "My first thought was some smart alec scofflaw had given a fake name. After our blurb appeared online, we discovered that police had used 'Mickey Mouse' in a training test."

Walker, a baby boomer newsman with a staid affect and a penchant for deadpan joke delivery, said he was only trying to tickle the funny bones of readers. And while his story did bring lots of traffic to the TRN website, it also riled up police officials and won the newspaper's first Bum Steer.

"I thought it was kind of funny. The police chief did not," Walker said. "After we understood what happened, we removed the blurb from the web. When I worked in Amarillo once, I interviewed an insurance agent whose real name was Donald Duck. So, you never know."

After learning of the Bum Steer designation, Times Record News editor Deanna Watson said she didn't want to scurry mouse-like from the story, but that the newspaper should approach the matter directly.

Even if the whole mess is a little Goofy.
Native Americans make up a greater number of the U.S. armed services proportionally than any other ethnic group, according to the Department of Defense.

But any Native American veterans who after military service fall into homelessness would find few federal programs directly aimed to help.

This week U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julian Castro took a step to change that, announcing a $5.9 million program to provide housing to homeless Native American veterans. The funding will be divided among 26 tribal communities in 12 states.

This groundbreaking new effort is going to help 500 military heroes to get back on their feet, Castro said.

The goal of providing housing to 500 veterans around the country may seem relatively modest for a national initiative.

But activists on the ground say the need is urgent.

Poverty remains a critical problem for Native Americans in general. More than one out of four, 26 percent, are poor, according to the Pew Research Center, compared to an 11 percent poverty rate for white Americans.

But residents of Native American reservations dont necessarily qualify for subsidized housing available in other parts of the U.S., said Gary Cooper, executive director of the housing authority for the Cherokee Nation.

He said the share of funding from the new initiative going to the Cherokee Nation would provide housing for 20 veterans and their families. Perhaps just as importantly, the federal program will put a new emphasis on the issue of Native American veteran homelessness.

This program is going to allow us to identify exactly how big a problem it is, Cooper said.

Castro tied the announcement to President Obamas larger goal of reducing veteran homelessness nationwide. Native American advocates said it is the first time that the federal government has made a focused effort to address veteran homelessness in tribal communities.

Money will be allocated to each tribe, but the Department of Veterans Affairs will take the lead to determine who is eligible for the program.

Along with housing, the program will cover the costs of other social services that veterans might need.

Raymond Vann is a member of the Cherokee Nation, and a veteran. He works at the veterans center in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, and said he often sees veterans with housing issues, including about three or four a month who are homeless.

Most have mental health issues, suffer from alcoholism or have trouble managing their money, Vann said. Some of them cant get organized to get back on their feet.

The Cherokee Nation Veterans Center currently refers its homeless clients to third parties, a spokeswoman for the Cherokee Nation said. This new federal money means that they will be able to subsidize housing directly.

Tribes participating in the program also include the Navajo and Ogala Sioux. Different tribes received different amounts of money between roughly $120,000 and $400,000.

Federal officials were clear that the program is intended to provide subsidized housing for a couple of years, not permanently free housing.

Continuation of the program beyond next fiscal year will depend on future congressional approval.

This is the first step for us  to identify the overall need, Cooper of the Cherokee Nation said. Then, advocates can go back to Congress and say Hey, this has been a big deal.
If you're going to open an Italian restaurant, it stands to reason you'll be armed with your Nonna's to-die-for recipes or ready to share your delicious take on regional Italian classics. Not so for Il Faro, a new Italian restaurant on North Pearl Street, where gaffe after gaffe makes for a baffling ride.

Every restaurant critic loves to learn of a new place to eat, a scoop to serve on a silver platter. Il Faro's opening in a former neighborhood breakfast-and-lunch joint where North Albany becomes Menands, a mile from the not-long shuttered Sciortino's, sounded so promising I soon sought out the back story: Chef-owner Chris Lofaro and co-owner Jessica Lamoreaux, Manhattan transplants, had scoured upstate for just the right place. Il Faro, a riff on Lofaro's last name, is Italian for ''lighthouse,'' and the new website waxes lyrical about being "a beacon in the neighborhood" and promising "a memorable meal you will crave."

Right off the bat, you're walloped with the smell of fresh paint, an unfortunate background for dining since it takes over your nasal cavity and never quite lets go. You'd think three months is sufficient time for paint fumes to dissipate but if not, take action with fans, litter, charcoal or burnt toast.

While your brain is processing paint fumes and the full-length unfinished cinderblock wall that gives more of a prison vibe than anything Italian or lighthousey, Lamoreaux, a former attorney, lays down the law. This includes an explanation of her menu and her wine list. (There's a lot of first person here.) They're printed without any descriptions whatsoever to ensure "a dialogue between diner and server." Fortunately, the menu is straight-up Italian  fine if you know your pollo from your vitello and your saltimbocco from your fra diavolo. If not, you'll be dependent on your server not just for the specials but for everything else.

More Information Il Faro 698 North Pearl St. Menands Phone: 463-2208 Web: www.ilfaroitalian.com Reservations: Suggested, but open tables suggest plenty of availability. Credit cards: All major. Hours: 11 a.m. to midnight Tuesday to Friday, 5 p.m. to midnight Saturday, 5 to 10 p.m. Sunday; closed Monday. Parking: Large side parking lot. Disabled access: Yes. Attire: Casual. Prices: Soup, salads, antipasti, $7 to $12; starters, $12 to $16; entrees $12 to $27; desserts, $5 to $9. Food: (*1/2) Italian standards, many of them massacred. Beverage: (**) Full-service bar and house cocktails built around kitchen herbs ($10). I can't speak knowledgeably about the wine since it's shrouded in mystery and changes on a whim, but all bottles are listed for $34, a rather remarkable price. Wines are also listed as $9 by the glass, but we were offered 5- or 7-ounce pours and charged $10 for each 5-ounce glass. Service: (**) Oh, how desperately willing is the staff and how hamstrung they are in their lack of knowledge. Staff must run circles to find out information or take desperate stabs at guessing out of sheer embarrassment. They get an extra half star for sheer tenacity. Bless their cotton socks. Ambiance: (*1/2) The dining room makes an attempt at interpreting reclaimed modern with glossy dark tables and dim lighting, but the open room, hanging filament bulbs and bare cinderblock wall have the unwitting feel of an unfinished basement. The bar is a cozier nook. An outdoor front porch should be pleasant in warm weather. Personality: (*1/2) Despite the radical interior makeover, the spot retains some sort of neighborhood feel. Locals pop into the bar and a handful of tables make up the scant dinner crowd. Overall Rating: *1/2 See More Collapse

It gets more problematic with a wine list left deliberately vague because Lamoreaux likes to rotate wines. Fair enough. But making your server the crucible of knowledge  instead of printing a weekly list  means servers must be brimming with information.

Instead, there is a special torture reserved for Il Faro diners forced to inquire line-by-line about each wine's origin or year  aka the usual ways in which one chooses  while the server repeatedly runs off to ask. It's bloody hard work with a perverse side of owner-designed control. I get the owners' vision, but eating out isn't about them or forced communication.

Granted, it was an odd start, but I remained bright-eyed and expectant even when my fennel Negroni ($10) had no sign of fennel, visual or infused. And then came the food. No one can ruin a Caprese salad ($9) unless they serve up ragged slabs of tasteless, pale orange supermarket tomatoes, which Il Faro does, with a hairy caterpillar of feverishly pulverized garlic-cilantro spread reluctantly resting on top. Seafood salad antipasta ($12)  an attractive, bouncy plate of squid rings, chilled shrimp and conch over arugula  turned out to be flavorless rubber, as if all were washed and rinsed squeaky clean. Giving it another whirl on our next visit, the platter arrived with a whiffy pong of blocked drains and was sent back to the kitchen. Conch was the culprit, though the squid, which we accidently tasted when we thought the smell really was coming from the bathrooms, had a much lovelier touch of lemon.

Plates coming out of the kitchen were skewed like an interpretive dancer attempting "Swan Lake." A craftsman doesn't blame his tools, but someone should send a strainer to Il Faro. Spicy brine from tinned hot cherry peppers swamped the chunky chicken Murphy ($17), a starch-thickened, slightly slimy white wine throwback to the 1970s. Sole meuniere with capers ($22)  regrettably mislabeled as sole "menure"  is no French classic but a breaded limp biscuit waterlogged in enough unstrained briny caper juice and lemon to rid a castaway of scurvy. Worst of all, eggplant rollatini ($13) held us in appalled fascination: folded in halves like bee-stung tacos, these six breaded and thickly sliced sponges were so swollen with oil my companion could stomach only one before throwing in the towel.

There are more quirks. The menu promises "your choice of pasta or daily vegetable," but it lies, lies. It's not your choice of pasta, only ziti with sauce or Brussels sprouts. Having now eaten four portions with seasonal goodwill, I can only hope for a monthly change. Nonna's special sauce (I'm making that part up) is one of the saddest Italian gravies ever spooned over pasta: largely bland with an overriding high note of canned tomato paste. And then there was the unexpected jaw-breaking thrill of almost raw diced carrots bopping about a warm, creamy orzo side, as fun to eat as gobstoppers in porridge, and Russian roulette of crunchy, barely roasted Brussels sprouts rolling around in an oil slick with their other halves softened to a subtle mush.

Plates to brighten our meals were desserts: crisp cannoli shells freshly filled with sugary cream ($5) and an enormous rectangle of espresso-soaked tiramisu ($9), both produced by Rispoli's Pastry Shop in New Jersey, so alarm bells rang when our waitress tried to convince us they're by the local Cheesecake Machismo. Um, no: Ask your manager. Beyond that, we found hope in a pretty charcuterie platter headed to another table and in our crunchy bread with dipping oil. Beyond that, it's a desperately flawed affair.

It's hard to say what's going on at Il Faro. Given all the front-of-house chatter at the start of the meal, I wonder if the pair haven't overthought the concept and forgotten to bone up on the cooking. A few locals seem willing to prop up the bar and, over two nights, five tables of mostly older families put up with the friendly servers' constant search for answers. Lafaro and Lamoreaux both profess restaurant industry experience. Collectively, however, the plates are so disastrous it's hard to believe neighborhood Italian is really their calling. Dinner for two  including two appetizers, two entrees, one dessert and a bottle of wine  came to $125, with tax and tip. A second visit, unusual for a Times Union review but undertaken to determine if the initial meal was unusually bad or a fair representation of the restaurant, came to $149.50 for two.

Susie Davidson Powell is a freelance writer from East Greenbush. Follow her on Twitter, @SusieDP. To comment on this review, visit the Table Hopping blog, blog.timesunion.com/tablehopping.
Troy

A Rensselaer County grand jury indicted a Brunswick man on 21 felony child pornography counts Friday.

John Toomajian was indicted on 20 counts of possessing a sexual performance by a child, which has a maximum sentence of four years in prison if convicted, and one count of promoting a sexual performance by a child, which has a maximum sentence of seven years in prison if convicted.

Each count related to pornography involving boys or girls younger than 16-years old. The crimes allegedly occurred in May 2014 in Brunswick.

Indictments were handed up to Rensselaer County Judge Debra Young. Two other men were indicted in unrelated cases.

Johnathan Sutliff of Nassau was indicted on three felony counts and three misdemeanor counts for allegedly attacking a 2-year-old on July 10, 2015 in a Church Street residence in Nassau.

The felony charges are second-degree assault, attempted second-degree felony assault and third-degree strangulation. The three misdemeanor counts are endangering the welfare of a child.

Dale Murray was indicted on three felony counts for a July 16, 2015 incident on Ingalls Avenue in Troy for allegedly having heroin.

Murray was indicted for third-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, fourth-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance and fifth-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance.
CLIFTON PARK  A Cohoes man who spent two years on the lam and ended up in Colorado after allegedly sending indecent material to minors, surrendered on Tuesday to authorities, State Police said.

A warrant was issued in November, 2013 for Avree J. Larkin, 24, of Cohoes, who allegedly sent indecent material and had an inappropriate conversation with an underage girl on social media two years ago, troopers said.
AMSTERDAM  A city man was arrested after pointing a gun at a car during a dispute over a school parking spot, Montgomery County sheriff's officials said.

George Shuttleworth, 68 of Guy Park Avenue and another driver pulled into the same parking spot outside the Tecler Magnet School on Northern Boulevard Friday, and an argument followed, deputies said. According to the other driver, Shuttleworth aimed a gun toward her car. After the incident was reported, the school was placed in lockdown.
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Mexico City

The world's most-wanted drug lord was captured for a third time Friday, as Mexican marines staged heavily-armed raids that caught drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman six months after he escaped from a maximum security prison.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced the capture Friday, writing in his Twitter account: "mission accomplished: we have him."

Few had thought Guzman would be taken alive, and few now believe Mexico will want to try to hold him a third time in Mexican prisons, from which he escaped in 2001 and 2015. The U.S. has sought his extradition, though Mexico in the past has said he would serve sentences here first.

A federal official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to be quoted by name said Guzman was apprehended after a shootout with Mexican marines in the city of Los Mochis, in Guzman's home state of Sinaloa. He said Guzman was taken alive and was not wounded.

Five people were killed and one Mexican marine wounded in the clash. It was unclear if Guzman was at the house or nearby when the raid was under way. Another law enforcement official confirmed that Guzman had been captured at a motel on the outskirts of Los Mochis.

But given Guzman's penchant for escaping through tunnels, the details of his capture, once they are released by Mexican officials, are sure to be startling.

Responding to what was seen as one of the biggest embarrassments of his administration  Guzman's July 11 escape through a tunnel from Mexico's highest-security prison  Pena Nieto wrote "I would like to inform Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been detained."

In the United States, the Drug Enforcement Administration wrote in a tweet that it was "extremely pleased at the capture of Chapo Guzman. We congratulate the MX Government and salute the bravery involved in his capture."

The U.S. Justice Department had no immediate comment on whether it would push to extradite Guzman to the United States, where he faces charges in multiple different jurisdictions across the country.

Another Mexican law enforcement official said authorities located Guzman several days ago, based on reports he was in Los Mochis.

The official, who was not authorized to be quoted by name, said authorities had even searched storm drains in the area. In 2014, Guzman escaped arrest by fleeing through a network of interconnected tunnels in the city's drainage system in the Sinaloa state capital of Culiacan.

The Mexican navy said in a statement that marines acting on a tip raided a home in the town of Los Mochis before dawn. They were fired on from inside the structure. Five suspects were killed and six others arrested. The marine's injuries were not life threatening.

At the home marines seized two armored vehicles, eight rifles, one handgun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

Photos of the arms seized in the raid suggested Guzman and his associates had a fearsome arsenal at the non-descript white house.
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Colonie

A 70-acre parcel near the Mohawk River will be kept forever wild, thanks to a donation of the land from a local doctor.

Dr. Patricia Fox, a plastic surgeon, donated the land to the Mohawk-Hudson Land Conservancy to give neighbors a respite from the commercial development that surrounds her property. She'd planned to donate the land since she bought it in 1983.

"There is not a lot of undeveloped land around," Fox said. "It's full of wildlife. I'm a softy for animals, and I think they deserve a piece of property too."

The property sits across River Road from the Mohawk-Hudson Bikeway and Shaker Creek partly runs through it. It has views of the Mohawk River, though some trees and brush will be cleared to make that scenery easier to see.

"It's a little bit of a look back at what Colonie used to look like," said Mark King, executive director of the conservancy. "Our plans on this one are ultimately we will open it as a public preserve."

Paths lead now through the hilly property, but they will be made into more formal walking paths. The organization is evaluating how to provide parking for people to use it. As a result, it won't open to the public until 2017.

Fox will remain living in her home and retains ownership of the land where her home sits.

"Ultimately I think we have to change the way we live and the amount of space we each take up," she said. "Now instead of owning the property, I live in the middle of a park."

The site is located a short distance from the Northway and less than a mile from Albany International Airport, making it an easily available natural preserve in an area rapidly being filled by commercial development.

"It's a really great location, and it's one of the few large open spaces left in the town," King said.

The property's inhabitants include deer, raccoons, weasels and foxes. It's also home to a variety of trees.

"We haven't done any thorough inventory of the plants and animals," King said. "We don't know of anything rare or unique on the property."

Founded in 1992, the conservancy has been steadily setting aside properties for preservation, with two new preserves opened in 2015 for a total of 16. It has preserved almost 3,700 acres including more than 1,300 that are available for public use.

"The concept for all our preserves is to give people a chance to connect to nature," King said.

In October, the conservancy opened the Bozen Kill Preserve including about one mile of trails in the town of Knox. The Van Dyke Spinney Preserve in the town of Bethlehem was opened in November.

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It also is working on preserving two properties in the Pine Bush and hopes to finalize those acquisitions soon.

While the conservancy has six paid staff, it also relies on volunteers to keep an eye on the lands it oversees.

"Each of the preserves have volunteers who oversee the properties," King said.

Lea Montalto-Rook, the conservancy's development director, credits King for increasing the pace of their work since he took charge in 2013.

"We've grown exponentially in the past few years," she said. "He's been working in conservation for years. He's brought a lot of property to us. It's had this snowball effect. In our 23 years, we did maybe a project or two a year and were able to preserve 3,700 acres. Currently we have about 2,000 acres in place to possibly preserve. It's a real testament to the reception by the community and the interest and the desire to see this land preserved."

King downplayed his own role, saying he is fortunate to be at the helm at a time when there is renewed interest in preserving greenery.

"We are in a period where people are really receptive to the work we do," he said.

tobrien@timesunion.com  518-454-5092  @timobrientu
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Ballston

Chris Torre was living in a tiny efficiency in Scotia 13 years ago, when he spotted an ad for a rent-subsidized, two-bedroom home at Bridgewater Apartments, just outside Ballston Spa village.

Excited by the opportunity, he and his wife, Diane, pulled up stakes and moved to Saratoga County.

Built on 22 tidy acres where Brookline Road meets Route 50, the apartment complex contains 192 rental units in 17 buildings, a community building and in-ground swimming pool. The owners, Brookline Housing Associates LLC, renovated and added apartments at the site in 1996 with state loans and the federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program, which is designed to create affordable housing and determines residents' rent based on their income. Chris Torre signed a lease for $575 a month.

"Everything was fine," he recently recalled. He's a former butcher with pancreatic disease. His wife's health problems prevent her from working as well.

A lot has changed in Saratoga County since 2003. GlobalFoundries built a $15 billion computer-chip factory in the neighboring town of Malta, and the health care and hotel industries are booming in Clifton Park and Saratoga Springs.

"What we have experienced is GlobalFoundries is part of the region, and that whole area has done fabulously well," said Robert Wilder, chairman of Wilder Balter Partners, managing member of Brookline Housing Associates. "We were finding about half the people who walked in were making too much money to live here."

In September, his company told Bridgewater tenants that it had terminated participation in the federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program, which provides lucrative tax breaks, generally for 10 years.

The LLC is continuing to honor tax-credit rental limits for existing tenants until September 2018, but new tenants are not eligible for rent limits.

Internal Revenue Service law allows certain projects to drop the low-income program after 15 years, and Bridgewater applied to the state to exercise that option.

It has remodeled about 20 low-income apartments into market-rate dwellings and will upgrade the remaining units as they become available, Wilder said.

The change has shocked some residents who rely on the housing assistance. While the Torres were given three years to prepare for the switch, they and other tenants say there is tension between staff and some residents, and families moved out while others feel pressure from property managers.

Under the guidelines of the tax-credit leases, rent can increase up to eight percent, depending on how much the region's median income rises.

Last summer, Bridgewater raised the Torres' rent by $25 a month to $760 in a lease extension through Aug. 31, 2016, according to documents. Then three days after Christmas, a property manager sent Chris Torre a letter, telling him that rising incomes in the area meant his rent would jump again by eight percent, or $61 a month, to $821 on Feb. 1.

The improved, market-rate models were renting for $1,039 to $1,359 a month, according to the property's Facebook page.

"The median income increased in March 2015," the letter said. Management offered him the option of leaving the apartment without penalty by Feb. 29.

The Torres say the double whammy on rent and their inability to have needed repairs done in their apartment while other buildings are being renovated with granite counter tops and new appliances are the owners' way of telling them to leave.

"It feels like they are nitpicking the people that are here," Diane Torre said, sitting at her dining room table.

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Across the hall from the Torres lives Paul Zostant, 56, his wife, Holly, and two children, ages 7 and 13. They've lived there two years, and have also seen their rent increase under the tax-credit program.

Paul Zostant sees surging development and housing communities popping up across Saratoga County, and wonders if his family will be able to keep up with the rising tide. He builds kitchen sets for Home Depot, and she recently started working nights at Wal-Mart so they can afford to stay at Bridgewater.

"They are forcing out low-income families to make more money," Zostant said. "These are peoples' lives."

Wilder said no tenants who pay their rent were forced out, and he's had several lease renewals since announcing the site's status change. He said the LLC could charge up to $979 for a two-bedroom under the tax-credit leases.

Brookline Housing Associates LLC of Westchester County purchased the property in 1996 for $3.1 million, according to Saratoga County records. It financed the improvements at Bridgewater Apartments through a $4.8 million mortgage and a $900,000 loan from the New York State Housing Trust Fund, and with Low-Income Housing Tax Credits. For investors, it provides a dollar-for-dollar reduction in federal income tax liability. The property is now assessed at $4.6 million.

The state Homes and Community Renewal Asset Management Unit has a phone number tenants can call if they believe they are being harassed 212-872-0490.

The Torres get by on disability payments and Chris' small pension. They'll cover their higher rent by dipping into their food budget, he said.

"We are going to stick it out here, at least until our lease is up," he said. "We can't really afford to move anywhere."

dyusko@timesunion.com  518-454-5353  @DAYusko
When the state Legislature loses a Senate majority leader and an Assembly speaker in one year to corruption, ethics is clearly the elephant in the chamber this session, and the donkey, too.

The convictions of former Majority Leader Dean Skelos, a Republican, and ex-Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a Democrat, should embarrass both major parties. They should be shamed into undertaking a bipartisan effort to clean up this mess.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo and lawmakers should start with the ethics watchdog that failed to sniff out so much corruption. They should either overhaul the Joint Commission on Public Ethics to make it more transparent, independent and effective, or replace it.

The Legislature and Mr. Cuomo took some stabs at strengthening requirements on lawmakers for reporting outside income, but they left more wiggle room that they should have. They need to tighten this.

More Information Capital to-do list Ethics Campaign finance Public school funding Higher education funding Minimum wage Public defense Albany's deficit To comment: tuletters@timesunion.com or at http://blog.timesunion.com/opinion See More Collapse

Technically, lawmakers will start fully reporting all their outside clients this year. But given the reporting schedule, it will be more than a year before the public will see all the information. Even then, legislators can seek exemptions to shield disclosure. And they can shop around a bit for those exemptions, choosing either JCOPE or the Office of Court Administration.

All this points to the need for a limit on outside income, as we have in Congress. After all, most lawmakers seem to get along now without another source of income; a recent analysis by Common Cause New York found that about 60 percent of lawmakers elected before 2014 rely solely on their legislative salary.

Restrictions on outside income could be coupled with a modest increase in the $79,500 base pay, at least for seats in high-cost parts of the state. It should also come with an end to the stipends known as lulus  which have come to serve as a tool for legislative leaders to hand out favors in exchange for loyalty.

The Legislature needs, too, to tackle campaign finance, another source of influence and corruption. It needs to lower the contribution limits for donors  now as high as $65,000 for statewide races. It needs to close the loophole through which wealthy individuals can exceed even those high limits by funneling contributions to politicians through separate limited liability companies.

The state needs a real system of public financing of campaigns, and a limited campaign season to end the constant chasing of money and rich donors. If there's money left in politicians' coffers after an election, it should go back to donors, or to charity, or toward state debt, or to help replenish a public campaign finance fund.

We've said all this before, as have many watchdog groups. And to their credit, Democrats in the Assembly have taken up some of these issues, such as campaign finance reform. They were blocked by Senate Republicans. We'd think that having their leader convicted of corruption would give Senate Republicans a change of heart. The taint is on every legislator.

Addressing corruption, though, is just the essential starting point. There are other key issues lawmakers must pay attention to.

Increased school funding

We've watched in recent days as Mr. Cuomo rolled out tens of billions of dollars in proposals for economic development and infrastructure, yet when it comes to public schools, the state remains, if not miserly, then tight-fisted. This frugality might have been appropriate during the Great Recession, but with the state obviously in much better financial shape, the lingering austerity mentality that guides education funding is inexcusable.

In particular, it's time to eliminate the Gap Elimination Adjustment, a budgeting device that's diverted school aid to close the state's own deficit, and to fulfill the promises the state made years ago to adequately fund schools, particularly in needier areas.

Fair funding of higher education

New York is considering whether to renew its "rational tuition plan," which allows annual tuition hikes at State University of New York campuses. While the state promised to maintain its own commitment, state support has been fairly flat. The result is that students are paying more and more of SUNY's budget. Tuition uncertainty is bad, but balancing SUNY's books on the backs of students and parents is inexcusable.

A more livable minimum wage

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The governor has been using what power he has to raise minimum wages in the state workforce and the fast food industry, but what's needed is for the legislature to act broadly on a $15 minimum wage. Yes, this should be done nationally, but it's pressure from states like New York that will make that happen.

Real public defense

In 2014, the state settled a lawsuit brought in five counties over the inadequate funding of assigned counsel to indigent defendants. We've yet to see this addressed statewide. This is both a matter of social justice and a constitutional obligation the state simply can't ignore.

Don't forget the capital city

The city of Albany goes into 2016 with a $12.5 million deficit, Mayor Kathy Sheehan's way of forcing the hand of a state that gives the city far less aid per-capita than other big upstate cities. It's time to end this persistent inequity. If nothing else, the governor and lawmakers should consider what it would say about their management of New York state if its capital city goes bankrupt.
For all those who have despaired that the current presidential race foreshadows the demise of American democracy  that is, for you who are worrying that the epidemic of meanness and callousness among candidates suggests we can never come together as a people  I offer here some reason for hope.

Two caveats: My optimism arises not from what we're hearing from the candidates, but rather from a collection of hardworking private citizens. And the issue they're confronting isn't one that grabs attention on cable news channels, though it should.

Where we have a chance to make bipartisan progress, perhaps, is in the effort to end hunger in America.

If you think of hunger only in the context of famines on another continent, consider a fact about the globe's richest big nation, the USA, which holds $118 trillion in wealth, according to the United Nations' last estimate: Almost 7 million American households experienced hunger at some time in 2014.

More Information Rex Smith is editor of the Times Union. Share your thoughts at http://blog.timesunion.com/editors. See More Collapse

That number hasn't declined during the recovery from the Great Recession. Hunger affects people of all ages, and its impact is felt everywhere. It reduces workplace productivity. It leaves people unhealthy, forcing up health care spending. It consigns hungry children to a future as bleak as their parents'.

By hunger, I mean what experts call "very low food security," which means somebody in a household misses meals or doesn't have enough to eat because the household doesn't have money for food. If you think that's not worth worrying about  nobody's starving, you know  please refer back to the figure above: $118 trillion. If you stacked up 118 trillion one-dollar bills, I'm told, the pile would be 7 miles high.

Somewhere in that stack, surely, we can find enough bills to make sure no American kid goes to bed hungry at night, and no mom has to give up lunch so her kid can have one.

For the past 18 months, a nine-member bipartisan National Commission on Hunger has been probing how to fix the problem of food insecurity. Its charge from Congress was limited to using only the existing programs and funds of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, meaning no pie-in-the-sky conclusions, if you'll pardon the expression. We already spend about $104 billion annually on federal food programs.

The commission conducted hearings around the country, including one in Albany last summer, and visited sites where pilot programs were being tried. It gathered mountains of data. Then its members got together to argue, which is what happens when you put liberals and conservatives together in a room.

"We had a lot of painful discussions," said Russell Sykes, a commission member who lives south of Albany, and who used to run public assistance programs for New York state. He was an appointee of U.S. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell. "I think there's a lesson for others in how we got to our conclusions, particularly perhaps people in Congress."

The final report, issued this week, showed evidence of people thinking outside their political biases. Even in assessing the causes of hunger, the report had something for left and right.

A Republican might especially like the commission's argument that "marriage has a significant impact on whether or not a household will experience hunger," and that assuming personal responsibility is key to reducing food insecurity.

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A Democrat might more comfortably note the report's attention to the history of racial or ethnic discrimination as a cause, and low-wage jobs that don't offer family leave.

It is in its policy recommendations that the report could "be castigated by both sides," in Sykes' view. Most controversially, it recommends that federal SNAP benefits  what we used to call food stamps, the major food aid program  not be allowed to buy sugary soft drinks.

That's not to say poor people shouldn't be able to buy all the soda they want. But it's saying because we know those drinks lead to obesity and related illnesses, including diabetes, taxpayers shouldn't be subsidizing the soda industry with SNAP benefits, not to mention the Medicaid dollars that are swallowed up with every Big Gulp.

Sykes, a lobbyist for progressive causes in his youth who has moved to the right, says it was "something of a miracle" that the politically divided group yielded such a report.

"But, then," he acknowledged, "none of us are trying to get elected and worrying about every word we say."

Maybe, though, the people we elect will notice the way this expert panel they set up reached beyond typical biases. Maybe, this once, they'll worry less about getting elected, and more about kids going to bed hungry.
[January 08, 2016] The Ravens Group, Inc. Announces Professional Services Contract Award

The U.S. Army Contracting Command awarded The Ravens Group, Inc. a five-year $49M Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract on October 20, 2015 for the United States Army Rapid Equipping Force (REF). Under this contract, The Ravens Group will deliver professional staffing to support the REF's mission to harness current and emerging technologies to provide immediate solutions to the urgent challenges of U.S. Army forces deployed globally. "We are pleased to be a part of the rapid-response capability of the REF to meet the equipment needs of Army units deployed around the world," stated LTG (Ret) Joe N. Ballard, Founder, President and CEO of The Ravens Group. "As a Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business, our focus continues to be on championing our military through reducing operational risk and addressing capability gaps. This contract is an exciting win for us, and we look forward to supporting this critical operation."



The Ravens Group will deliver services in the areas of: strategic planning and liaison; business and resource management; administration, intelligence and security; operations; training; information technology; management and process improvement; requirements analysis; project management; research and analytical support; logistics; and assessments. The Ravens Group began working on this contract on January 4, 2016. The Ravens Group's contract runs through December 31, 2020. About The Ravens Group

Headquartered in Lanham, Maryland, The Ravens Group is a Center for Verification and Evaluation (CVE) verified Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business. LTG (Ret) Joe N. Ballard founded The Ravens Group after retiring from the United States Army; his last military assignment was as the 49th Chief of Engineers and Commander, United States Army Corps of Engineers. Since 2001, The Ravens Group has been supporting the Federal Government in the areas of professional services, intelligence, training, cyber security, information technology, health and human services and business process improvement. Website www.theravensgroup.com View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160108005871/en/

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[January 08, 2016]

Kay Family Foundation and Living in Digital Times Award Two Young App Developers, Brandon Boynton and Shalin Shah for Novel App Creation

LAS VEGAS, Jan. 8, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The Kay Family Foundation, a grant-making foundation located in Orange County, CA, and Living in Digital Times have awarded the third annual Appreneur Scholar Award to Brandon Boynton and Shalin Shah for their innovative app creations.

In addition to each receiving a $5,000 scholarship funded by The Kay Family Foundation, Boynton and Shah will be recognized at CES 2016 at the TransformingEDU Summit and have the opportunity to demo their apps to an audience of tech influencers during the annual Mobile Apps Showdown, also produced by Living in Digital Times on Thursday, January 8 at 1:30 PM in the Las Vegas Convention and World Trade Center (LVCC), North Hall, Room N257.

"These young individuals have demonstrated vision, drive and tenacity in their pursuit of tackling real-life problems with technology," said Robin Raskin, founder and president, Living in Digital Times. "The Appreneur Scholar Awards enables us to showcase remarkably outstanding and bold individuals who bring their passions to life while making a meaningful impact on society."

"The Appreneur Scholar Award program reflects our commitment to recognizing young tech innovators and championing their role in building a better society," said Elim Kay, president of the Kay Family Foundation. "Both winners have created apps that solve real-world problems and enrich our communities."

"The Appreneur Scholar winners are remarkable examples of young innovators that we need more of who show a true desire to disrupt the status quo, understand how people and societies work and design solutions that improve lives," Nithin Jilla, director of programs for the Kay Family Foundation.

More on our winners:

The creator of The BullyBox is Brandon Boynton. He is a senior at Pendleton Heights High School in Pendleton, Indiana. He embarked upon a journey as a social entrepreneur during his sophomore year of high school. He combined his passion for anti-bullying efforts with a fervent desire to hone his programming skills, and travelled the country attending tech conferences. The BullyBox is a mobile application that facilitates safe and anonymous student reporting of bullying and other school-related safety issues.

While in 9th grade, Shalin Shah's World History teacher showed the class a documentary in which a man named Sanduk Ruit went to North Korea and used his small-incision cataract surgery to cure thousands of poor North Koreans, enabling them to see again. This was Shah's "aha moment" as he knew he wanted to do something that could also help. He combined his passion for computer science and his desire to help blind people to build Voice, an app that lets the user take a picture of anything that has words on it, and then reads it aloud. Shah is now in 11th grade at Tesoro High School in Orange County, California.







Boynton and Shah were selected from a pool of high school, undergraduate and graduate students from around the world. This year's panel of judges represents the education and technology sectors. Judges include:

Stephen Ibaraki is an IDG IT World ( Canada ) writer/blogger, past multiple award-winning educator/professor/program research head, multiple award-winning serial entrepreneur and executive chairman.

is an IDG IT World ( ) writer/blogger, past multiple award-winning educator/professor/program research head, multiple award-winning serial entrepreneur and executive chairman. Nithin Jilla , director of programs at The Kay Family Foundation, a private philanthropic foundation and the co-project manager of AppJam+, a STEM education program that is recognized by the Clinton Global Initiative and teaches underserved and low-income middle school kids how to make mobile apps while exposing them to STEM careers.

, director of programs at The Kay Family Foundation, a private philanthropic foundation and the co-project manager of AppJam+, a STEM education program that is recognized by the Clinton Global Initiative and teaches underserved and low-income middle school kids how to make mobile apps while exposing them to STEM careers. Elim Kay , president of The Kay Family Foundation, sponsor of the Appreneur Scholar competition. As an entrepreneur and active angel investor, Elim is also currently serving as co-founder and COO of Zaka, Inc., a mobile software early-stage venture, and managing member of Insepin, LLC, a private holding company for technology investments.

, president of The Kay Family Foundation, sponsor of the Appreneur Scholar competition. As an entrepreneur and active angel investor, Elim is also currently serving as co-founder and COO of Zaka, Inc., a mobile software early-stage venture, and managing member of Insepin, LLC, a private holding company for technology investments. Robin Raskin , president and founder, Living in Digital Times. She has spent the past 30 years exploring what it means to be living in digital times. She is an author, editor, magazine publisher, blogger, and TV and radio personality.

, president and founder, Living in Digital Times. She has spent the past 30 years exploring what it means to be living in digital times. She is an author, editor, magazine publisher, blogger, and TV and radio personality. Jay Rosner , executive Director of The Princeton Review Foundation, an admissions test expert based in the San Francisco bay area.

Tweet this: Kay Family Foundation & @LIDTEvents grant @TheBullyBox & Voice 2016 #AppScholars Award for innovative app development http://bit.ly/1RExCNv

About Kay Family Foundation

Kay Family Foundation is a U.S. private grant-making foundation. The Foundation's mission is to promote new models and systems that produce 21st century global leaders primarily across four thematic pillars: faith, education, medical and the arts. For more information, visit The Kay Family Foundation.

About Living in Digital Times:

Founded by veteran technology journalist Robin Raskin, Living in Digital Times brings together the most knowledgeable leaders and the latest innovations impacting both technology and lifestyle. It helps companies identify and act on emerging trends, create compelling company narratives, and do better business through strong network connections. Living in Digital Times produces technology conferences, exhibits and events at CES and other locations throughout the year by lifestyle verticals. Core brands include Digital Health Summit, Digital Money Forum, FitnessTech, Baby Tech, [email protected], Family Tech Summit, TransformingEDU, MommyTech TV, Beauty Tech, Wearables and FashionWare runway show, Mobile Apps Showdown, Last Gadget Standing, Robots on the Runway and the KAPi Awards. The company also works with various foundations and manages the Appreneur Scholar awards program for budding mobile entrepreneurs, as well as the 10 Under 20: Young Innovators to Watch awards recognizing student STEAM innovations in New York City. For more information, visit www.LivinginDigitalTimes.com and keep up with our latest news on Twitter, Linkedin and Facebook.

About CES:

CES is the world's gathering place for all who thrive on the business of consumer technologies. It has served as the proving ground for innovators and breakthrough technologies for almost 50 yearsthe global stage where next-generation innovations are introduced to the marketplace. As the largest hands-on event of its kind, CES features all aspects of the industry. And because it is owned and produced by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA)TM  formerly the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA)  the technology trade association representing the $285 billion U.S. consumer technology industry, it attracts the world's business leaders and pioneering thinkers to a forum where the industry's most relevant issues are addressed. Check out CES video highlights. Follow CES online at www.CESweb.org and on social.

Media Contact:

Linda Krebs

LKPR, Inc. for Living in Digital Times

[email protected]

646-484-4539

646-824-5186 (mobile)

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20150923/269999LOGO

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20140918/147059

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/kay-family-foundation-and-living-in-digital-times-award-two-young-app-developers-brandon-boynton-and-shalin-shah-for-novel-app-creation-300198489.html

SOURCE Living in Digital Times
City Council discuss owner occupied home rehabilitation program

The $250,000 grant would be would be split between 15-20 city homeowners, who would be afforded up to $15,000 each for repairs to their homes.
ELKO -- Four outstanding attorneys and law firms and two community partners were recognized and celebrated for their extraordinary work at the Nevada Legal Services Inaugural Elko Champions of Justice Luncheon on Dec. 10, 2015.

The event was held at the Western Folklife Center in Elko, and was chaired by Anna Marie Johnson, executive director, Nevada Legal Services.

Nevada Legal Services created the Champions of Justice Award to give recognition to those who significantly support the cause of access to justice for all Nevadans by providing or promoting pro bono assistance, Johnson said. As the needs of our rural communities have increased we have reached out to our rural community volunteers and community agencies for support and assistance in addressing the increased need for legal aid.

The award recipients represent a broad cross-section of Elko and rural Nevadas legal community and share a commitment to advancing access to justice.

RURAL PRO BONO ATTORNEY OF THE YEAR 2015

Rendal Miller, Esq. has committed over 200 hours of pro bono time over the past year. He has covered every Winnemucca self-help legal clinic since 2012. Miller frequently accepts cases directly from the clinics and often refers pro bono clients to Nevada Legal Services.

RURAL PRO BONO FIRM OF THE YEAR 2015

The Gerber Law Firm has historically been a faithful law firm provider of pro bono services. Whether teaching a class or clinic, accepting a case placement or providing assistance to Nevada Legal Services attorneys, the firm is a supporter of assisting in the expansion of pro bono services to the community.

RURAL PRO BONO CLINIC ATTORNEY OF THE YEAR 2015

Kriston Hill, Esq. has been a dedicated legal clinic volunteer throughout this past year. She has assisted at 11 clinics, answered the questions of numerous clients, has assisted clients in completing paperwork, and has been known to fill in when NLS is unable to find a substitute attorney.

ANDREW J. PUCCINELLI SPECIAL RECOGNITION OF THE YEAR 2015

Julie Cavanaugh-Bill, Esq. is being given this award in recognition of her ongoing commitment to pro bono service and support to community members throughout rural Nevada. Cavanaugh-Bill regularly provides services to tribal members, as well as many rural community members. Whether giving advice on the phone, meeting with clients to provide consultation advice, or full representation, she is a true example of what the Puccinelli Award epitomizes.

RURAL PRO BONO COLLABORATION PARTNERS OF THE YEAR 2015

Nevada Legal Services is recognizing the Elko County Library as its Rural Pro Bono Collaboration Partner for 2015. Throughout the past year the library has provided meeting space for clinics, advertising of our clinics and classes and services. The library has been a staunch and steady supporter of our efforts to provide access to legal services in the rural areas of Nevada.

RURAL PRO BONO COMMUNITY PARTNERS OF THE YEAR 2015

With the expansion of the Nevada Legal Services Elko office and the addition of two staff attorneys, its presence in the local community has increased and the Elko Office of Aging and Disability Services Division has proven to be a valuable community partner.
What can the Elko Area Chamber staff do for your business?

There are many benefits of being a member of the Elko Area Chamber, but the biggest is the Chamber staff. As a member of the Chamber you have access to their assistance in marketing, budgeting event planning and so much more.

Start with event planning. Billie Crapo is the sales and events director with more than 10 years of event planning experience. She can assist with an event plan to help ensure success.

Next move to marketing for your business with the Chamber. Emily Anderson is your key to get the word out about your company to the other members. She can help you with designing flyers, your TCS page with the Chamber website and much more.

If its benefit-use you need assistance with, its Stacey DeFord you want to contact. She can help you see the value of your membership and how to fully use your benefits. Maybe its budgeting or QuickBooks questions you have to help your business grow this year, then its Mary Kelly you want to call.

As the CEO of the Elko Area Chamber there are many areas I can also assist our members. With strategic planning, budgeting for a small business, and how to work with other members to help your business grow, to name a few.

The Elko Area Chamber staff are here to assist our members and our community, please give us a call today at 738-7135.

The Elko Area Chamber is the Business Behind Your Business.
SPRING CREEK  Local author Aubrey Moore released her first book last month, and plans to release the next installment in her Red Butterfly Series in February.

Growing up, Moore always had a pen and paper in her handseven as a 10-year-old child, shed find herself sitting on the back steps of her grandparents house writing stories of youth and the struggles young girls go through in a judgmental society.

Her stories developed later into a love for portraying young girls as heroines whose faith and trust in people is constantly being tested. She often appeared onstage in several plays, studying the lines of the writers words, developing her own writing form in the process.

In a writing course at Foothill College in Los Altos, California, she wrote a short screenplay, Inheritance, which the colleges acting class chose to perform live. Moore took an interest in screenplay writing in her early teens but quickly advanced into writing novels. With binders and journals full of story ideas, the Red Butterfly series emerged.

In 2015, she started her own Publishing Company, RipplEffect Books, in which she hopes to encourage and help young writers through the writing process. Moore, 27, currently resides in Spring Creek with her husband and daughter.

Butterfly Red Sky, the first book in Moores six-book series, describes the world of 17-year-old Maya Colebrook, who is haunted by dreams of the man who took her best friends life. The character must find this shadow man before he finds her, while also battling personal demons.

Moore plans to have book signings in the future. Her website is AubreyMoore.com.
Best VPN free trial in 2022

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Dr. Ernest Evans: The Crime Situation in Kansas City

: This morning one of thein the study of crime offers his insight and analysis into the current increase in Kansas City homicide, robbery, rape and property theft. We've included a few illustrations to break up the text and help draw attention to some of the most important points in this analysis but the words ofhave been proven correct over time and offer an objective look at a deadly local trend. Checkit:Crime trends in Kansas City, Missouri have generally followed national crime patterns in 2014-2015, so it is appropriate to note these national trends first. According to the FBI's Uniform Crime Report, a yearly compilation of the nation's crime statistics, homicides declined six percent in the first six months of 2014, and then rose five percent in the last six months of 2014. And, while we do not have the final national crime figures for 2015, surveys of the annual crime reports of cities around the nation show that most cities in 2015 registered an increase in homicides.This pattern held up in KCMO: In the first eight months of 2014 there were 41 homicides in the city--a significant decline from the numbers in 2013. But in the last four months of 2014 there were 40 homicides in KCMO--a significant increase from the totals in that time period in 2013. And, in 2015 homicides in KCMO increased sharply from their totals in 2014: There were 109 homicides in 2015, compared to 81 in 2014.When we look at the crime patterns in Saint Louis in 2014-2015 we see a similar pattern: In the first seven months of 2014 there were 70 homicides in STL--in the past five months there were 89. In 2014 there were 159 homicides in STL--in 2015 there were 188. (In 2013 there were 120 homicides in STL.)A striking aspect about the homicide increases in both cities is that the increase in 2015 over 2014 was entirely due to an increase in the number of black murder victims. In both KCMO and STL the combined total for white/Asian/Hispanic homicides was the same in both 2014 and 2015: 44 murder victims. In contrast, in 2014 the combined total for black homicides was 196 victims, in 2015 it was 253 victims.I realize that the argument that I am about to make is controversial, and many people may even find it offensive, but it is my best, professional guess as to why both locally and nationally we have seen a major surge in black homicides victims in the past eighteen months while homicide totals for other races have remained level. There is a term in crime studies called "de-policing." "De-policing" takes place when a local police department feels that if accused of racist misconduct that they will get neither due process nor fair media coverage. In response, out of sheer self-survival the cops abandon their duties in the black neighborhoods and the gangs and the criminal elements take over and unleash a crime wave. In recent decades there have been a number of cases of "de-policing" on the local level, what I feel happened with the tragic death of Michael Brown in Ferguson on August 9, 2014 is that "de-policing" became a national problem.Now, personally, I find it pointless right now to engage in a "blame game" over our city's and our nation's crime surge in the past eighteen months. The issue we must address now is how to stop this crime surge. To do so, we as a nation and as a community must undertake a difficult assignment: We must make it clear to police forces that while the nation will not tolerate unnecessary brutality and killings, the nation will also uphold the ideals of due process and fair media coverage.In conclusion, I do want to note that there is a lot going right on the crime scene in KCMO. I particularly commend Chief Forte of the KCPD: The Chief has walked, successfully, the fine line of assuring the community that police misconduct will not be tolerated while also assuring his officers that he will not allow them to be unfairly attacked. Also, while I realize that NOVA and AIM4Peace are controversial programs, on balance they have made a contribution to fighting crime in our city. But a lot more needs to be done by the city's journalists, politicians and community leaders if we are able to get the city's crime problem under control.#########
CHECK THE LATEST STATEMENT FROM ORGANIZERS OF A PETITION TO BLOCK THE BNIM TIF IN THE CROSSROADS!!! THEY REJECT RECENT OVERTURES FROM THE COUNCIL AND DEMAND REFORM IN THE PROCESS OVERALL!!!

Statement from Petition Committee RE W 17th St. TIF

The struggle over a controversial taxpayer subsidized project in the Crossroads doesn't look any closer to a compromise.To wit . . .Here's the wordon this blog . . .Members of the referendum petition committee met today to review ordinances presented at the recent City Council Legislative Session. As previously stated, the committee does not believe the 1640 Baltimore project warrants incentives due to its location in the Crossroads and feels the ordinance should be repealed or placed on the April 2016 ballot.With respect to the use of public incentives, the committee encourages the council to adopt an ordinance that not only enacts policies that address the amount, duration, definition of blight, financial analysis (both but-for and cost-basis), but also targets the utilization of tax incentives to truly blighted, and underdeveloped areas.It's also important that taxing jurisdictions have a meaningful role in the process. Under the current system, they are outnumbered by Mayoral appointees and even when a city representative supports the taxing jurisdictions, he/she is subject to removal by the Mayor, as evidenced by the recent removal of Commissioner Phil Glynn.Members of this committee will continue to advocate on behalf of our community and children.###############Developing . . .
ELKO  A home-based computer business that began about a year ago, now has an official store front.

Nevada Integrity Technologies hosted its grand opening Friday at 2715 Argent Ave. Suite 4 in the Gateway Center in Elko. It is across from the Verizon Wireless store near Wal-Mart.

The owner, Donald Harwart, said he and his family moved to Elko because of the mines. He left his mining job because he felt a lot of people in Elko wanted more from IT services in the area.

The business, which can be found on Facebook as Nevada I.T., does on-site visits, drop-offs and remote services.

As long as you have Internet, we can get to you, said Harwart.

We offer high quality computer support to meet everyones individual needs, said April Harwart, his wife and the business marketing manager.

Donald Harwart is the primary technician, but the business has added another tech, Austin Pruessing.

The Harwarts said they work on all types of technology from desktops and laptops to tablets, smartphones and gaming systems. The technicians also will audit the systems in a home or business to make sure customers are receiving the Internet speeds they pay for and to help set up networks.

We dont do anything without the customer being totally informed, Donald Harwart said. I dont like surprises and Im sure my customers dont, either.

Nevada I.T. does basic maintenance for business or residential customers. The business also can install a remote monitoring system on a computer.

Well know theres a problem on your computer before you do, April Harwart said. We can be your eyes and ears.

Nevada I.T. is also the only Apple Service Provider in town with Apple technicians. People with Apple products had to send their devices out of Elko to have them fixed before Nevada I.T. received its certification.

People who have old or broken computers also can take their units to Nevada I.T. to recycle them or get them fixed. Donald Harwart said he will always tell the customer if the unit is worth fixing or just cheaper to buy new.

If customers want to recycle their computers, the business will wipe the hard drive according to federal standards, and then turn around and donate it to a nonprofit organization. If the customer wants to transfer his or her data before the computer is recycled, Nevada I.T. will transfer all the data to another hard drive for a reduced rate. The transfer of data is done for free when the business builds a new computer for the customer.

If the computer is too expensive to fix or parts cant be found, Nevada I.T. wont just put it in the trash.

Theres precious metals in these, Donald Harwart said. They have gold, silver and copper. All computers are disposed of properly so theyre not filling up landfills.

Nevada I.T. is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday. The companys website is www.nevadait.services and its phone number is 391-6257.
UK anti-terror squad rushed into an office block in Liverpool along with negotiators after a man possessing suspect package locked himself into the building.



Staff at one of the firms at the 14-storey Silkhouse Court in Liverpool evacuated themselves and called police after they spotted a man acting suspiciously.



Police and a bomb disposal team arrived at the scene in Tithebarn Street at about 10.30am on Friday after they were also told he had a suspect package.



Police negotiators made contact with the man while he was still inside the building and armed police were seen leading a man into a police van at around 2pm.



A police spokesman was quoted by Express: "Merseyside Police can confirm that a man has been detained following an incident at a business premises in Silkhouse Court, Tithebarn Street, Liverpool, on Friday.



"He will be taken to a police station on Merseyside where he will be questioned.



"No one has been injured during the incident and the site will remain cordoned off until a search of the premises has been completed.



"Thanks to residents, businesses and motorists for their continued patience."-Reuters
Saudi Arabia may take further measures against Iran after cutting ties with its regional rival this week, the Saudi foreign minister said on Saturday, in a major row over the kingdom's execution of a Shi'ite Muslim cleric.



Adel Al Jubeir's comments came in a press conference after an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), convened to discuss tensions with Iran after attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions there.



"We are looking at additional measures to be taken if it (Iran) continues with its current policies," Jubeir said, without elaborating on what these measures could be.



The crisis between conservative Sunni kingdom and Shi'ite power Iran, both major oil exporters, started when Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr on January 2, triggering outrage among Shi'ites across the Middle East.



In Iran, protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations. Tehran cut all commercial ties with Riyadh, and banned pilgrims from travelling to Makkah.



"The escalation is coming from Iran, not from Saudi Arabia or the GCC .... We are evaluating Iran's moves and taking steps to counter them..things will be clearer in the near future," Jubeir said.



After the meeting the GCC, which comprises Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and the UAE, condemned what they said was Iranian interference in the internal affairs of Saudi Arabia and the region.



Jubeir also said his country had asked the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, of which Iran is a member, to convene an extraordinary meeting to discuss the aggression against its embassy.



Iran has said the kingdom is to blame for the diplomatic crisis.



In a letter to the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies earlier on Saturday, Iran's foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif complained about Saudi Arabia's "provocations" towards Tehran.-Reuters
Italian state lender CDP is considering whether to merge Italy's two top gas distributors with joint assets of roughly 8 billion ($8.7 billion) as the sector gears up for major reform, four people familiar with the matter said.



CDP (Cassa Depositi e Prestiti) controls Italy's biggest gas distributor Italgas through gas grid operator Snam. CDP is also a shareholder of infrastructure fund F2i which bought into No. 2 player 2i Rete Gas in 2009 and now holds 72 per cent.



"These are early stage discussions but the idea is on the table," said one source, cautioning that no deal was certain and talks could still fall apart.



CDP and F2i declined to comment.



A second source said the merger of Italgas and 2i Rete Gas was CDP's favourite plan but other options, including a stock market listing of Italgas, were being considered because of the risk a merger might not be approved on antitrust grounds.



A combination of Italgas and 2i Rete Gas, which together had revenues of about 1.8 billion in 2014, would hold some 50 per cent of the Italian gas market.



CDP revamped its top management in July to get more closely involved in government projects to boost growth and upgrade infrastructure.



Claudio Costamagna, a former senior Goldman Sachs banker, was appointed CDP's chairman while Fabio Gallia, previously head of BNP Paribas in Italy, became CDP's chief executive.



But CDP is in no rush to finalise a merger of Italgas and 2i Rete Gas since the board of Italgas parent Snam, including long-standing CEO Carlo Malacarne, is up for renewal, two sources said, adding that advisers for a deal have yet to be appointed.



Snam, which is controlled by CDP through a vehicle that also includes State Grid Corporation of China, is due to nominate a board in April.



On Friday, Snam strengthened its managerial structure by appointing Marco Alvera as its first Chief Operating Officer effective January 15.



Alvera, a former gas manager at Eni, will report to Malacarne and will oversee the company's growth on the international and domestic natural gas market.



Italy's gas distribution sector is highly fragmented with more than 200 companies working across almost 7,000 concession areas serving more than 20 million clients.



But new rules cutting concession areas to just 177 are expected to streamline the industry to make it more efficient and cut bills.



Crucially, bidders who win a tender in a new area where they do not have full control of the distribution assets will need to compensate other grid owners and operators, a condition that will favour companies with strong balance sheets.



"A tie-up makes sense since the business is going to need big investments in coming years and Rome needs to create national champions in what is a strategic sector," a third source said.



Snam, which also runs nearly all of Italy's gas storage operations, is investing heavily in expanding its European footprint in its core business of gas transmission. Bankers said it could benefit from reducing its distribution commitments.



A banker familiar with the matter said in the past CDP had tried to get partners on board to help fund Italgas.



"Infrastructure and pension funds have been interested in the asset and could well be interested in the future," the banker said.-Reuters
INTERCOURSE, Pa. (AP)  With the explosion of online shopping, few can deny the power of the Internet.

Not even the Amish and Mennonites, known for being devout to their faith and for shunning technology, electricity and modern advances that run counter to those beliefs.

It raises an intriguing question: Can the Amish and online co-exist?

It is interesting that commerce is forcing even the Amish to adapt to the online retail world, said Barbara Khan, director of the Jay H. Baker Retailing Center at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. It isnt social pressure that is forcing the cultural change, but, rather, economic necessity.

The next generation of Amish who have grown up in business admit as much, while the numbers affirm what many know: Online retailing is growing at the expense of traditional stores.

Sam Riehl, 26, wants to boost online orders by next year at L. Halteman Family Country Foods in downtown Philadelphia.

Riehl works behind the counter Monday through Saturday. Like all Amish, he rests on Sunday.

But he represents the progressive, tech savvy side of the Plain People. Riehl is aiming to grow the family business and offer online delivery of the familys key products, ranging from ground beef and pork to homemade jams and jellies, within a year.

My generation is more advanced, Riehl said recently while working the busy lunch crowd. We feel the Internet is really important to grow a business, and we have to do more on the Internet.

Meanwhile, about an hours drive away, it seems as if youre in another world as soon as you arrive in Gap, Lancaster County. For miles, you travel through picturesque rolling hills. A few horse-drawn buggies putter by on the side of the road.

Then you get to the heart of Amish Country, the tourist hub, in a town called Intercourse.

A visitor comes across a well-lit store decorated with pieces of furniture at the front entrance. This is Snyders Furniture, a 30-year-old shop that is on the online superhighway despite its simple surroundings.

Snyders specializes in handcrafted Amish furniture. It has had its own website, snydersfurniture.com.

For the most part, Amish craftsmen and retailers are adapting to the challenges of 21st-century businesses and looking for ways around their beliefs to adapt to changing technology, said Keith Horst, the stores 29-year-old general manager. They find a way.

They wont fly, but they will go on trains, he said. They dont drive, but will hire drivers. They wont have computers, but have very advanced word processors. They will have a fax machine, but a separate phone in their work shack and not in their house.

They wont have machines run by electricity, but by air compressors and generators as a way around their belief of being unconnected to the world, said Horst, who himself grew up Mennonite, but is no longer active in the church. He graduated from Temple University in pre-law and drives a BMW.

Americus Reed, a marketing professor who focuses on brand identity at Wharton, said the Amish  like many other business owners and operators nowadays  are being compelled to expand their reach through the Internet.

If the core customer goes to online, and that is where they are getting their information, and that is where they are going to actually purchase, then the mantra will be change or die, Reed said.

Horst said the Amish in Lancaster County are adapting, and many who run businesses now have websites.

They realize they need it to stay in business, he said.

Snyders store recently made three straight days of holiday furniture deliveries to the Philadelphia suburbs.

They were big-ticket items, ranging from $5,000 to $10,000 and included dining room pieces, bedroom sets, and kitchen tables.

Snyders uses its own trucks to make deliveries in Pennsylvania. For out-of-state deliveries, it hires an outside firm. The store grosses about $2 million in annual sales.

Horst is focused on clicks-to-bricks strategies to get more people to view the stores website, and following up with emails to encourage them to visit the store.

He is busy these days, figuring out how to charge for shipping furniture, especially to the West Coast.

We can have the cost built into the price of the product itself or charge a flat fee, Horst said. Many people got used to free shipping from Amazon, and we just cant do that.

Standing in the store a few feet from Horst was his cousin, Andrea Groff, 26, wearing traditional Mennonite dress. She was wiping down furniture with water from a spray bottle and a cloth  her version of dusting, because Mennonites dont use silicone-based products.

As the office and sales manager at Snyders, Groff regularly updates and freshens the companys website.

They totally understand, she said of the shifting attitude among Amish and Mennonite businesses over the Internet. Before, they were more closed off. In the last five to seven years, more are open to getting their products out there online. They are adapting.
COLOGNE, Germany (AP)  Members of Colognes large Muslim community have joined the chorus condemning a string of assaults on women on New Years Eve that have shocked Germany. But some are also voicing concern that pointing the finger of blame at Muslims in general  and North African immigrants in particular  is unfair when most migrants are law-abiding and the full facts of what happened on the night remain unclear.

In Ehrenfeld, a multi-ethnic neighborhood where streets are lined with colorful Turkish grocery stores and halal butchers, few can believe that those who allegedly carried out the assaults amid the crowds ringing in the New Year may share their religion.

Police said Wednesday that 121 women have filed criminal complaints for robbery and sexual assault  including two allegations of rape. They said the attackers were among a group of some 1,000 men described as being of Arab or North African origin who gathered in front of the Colognes main train station and gothic cathedral that night.

Although there is little solid information so far on who committed the assaults, the incident has put a spotlight on Chancellor Angela Merkels welcoming stance toward those fleeing conflict, and has been seized on by Germanys far right, which opposes most forms of immigration.

Its really sad what happened, said one woman wearing a Muslim headscarf, who only gave her last name, Ozap. She rejected the suggestion by some German politicians that the Muslim attitudes toward women might have played a role in the attacks.

Everywhere it says that this has something to do with Muslims. What I read and learned in the Quran is completely different.

Ive been here for 30 years myself and Ive never seen anything like this, she added.

Hassan Akdogdu, a 34-year-old businessman and a second-generation Turkish immigrant, agreed. He accused police of not doing enough to prevent the attacks.

Its nothing to do with religion, he said. Lack of respect for women isnt a religious problem, as a Muslim I can say that.

Akdogdu also questioned whether the issue might have triggered greater outrage because of an ongoing debate in Germany over how to integrate the nearly 1.1 million refugees who came to the country last year, many of them Muslims from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.
Members of self-styled militia groups met on Friday with armed protesters occupying a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon, pledging support for their cause, if not their methods, and offering to act as a peacekeeping force in the weeklong standoff over land rights.

During the 30-minute meeting at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, a leader of the occupation, Ammon Bundy, told about a dozen representatives of such groups as Pacific Patriots Network, Oath Keepers and III% that he had no immediate plans to abandon the siege.

"I was asked to do this by the Lord," said Bundy, a Mormon, as some of the militia members nodded in understanding. "I did it how he told me to do it."

Earlier on Friday the Pacific Patriots Network called on its members to establish a safety perimeter around the refuge in remote southeastern Oregon to prevent a "Waco-style situation" from unfolding.

In 1993, federal agents laid siege to a compound in Waco, Texas, being held by the Branch Davidians religious sect for 51 days before the standoff ended in a gun battle and fire. Four federal agents and more than 80 members of the group died, including 23 children.

The Pacific Patriots Network has previously said that while it agrees with Bundy's land rights grievances, it does not support the occupation, a position leader Brandon Rapolla reiterated during the meeting.

Bundy thanked Rapolla and handed him a small roll of bills, which he said came from donations.

"We're friends, but we're operating separately," Rapolla, a former Marine who helped defend the Bundys in 2014 in their standoff with the U.S. government at their Nevada ranch, told Reuters in an earlier interview.

The militia members are not joining the occupation, but are sleeping in their vehicles or in hotels in Burns, he said.

Rapolla said he had also taken sausage McMuffins to FBI agents who are stationed at nearby Burns Municipal Airport to monitor the occupation and had coffee with deputies from the county sheriff's office on Thursday.

The meetings were friendly, he said, and he told them that they were there to make neither side escalates the dispute.

"That's really the point of militias: it's community involvement," Rapolla said. "If something happens in your community, that's what militias are for."

Some two dozen armed protesters have occupied the headquarters of the refuge since last Saturday, marking the latest incident in the so-called Sagebrush Rebellion, a decades-old conflict over federal control of land and resources in the U.S. West.

The move followed a demonstration in support of two local ranchers, Dwight Hammond Jr. and his son Steven, who were returned to prison earlier this week for setting fires that spread to federal land.

A lawyer for Hammond family has said that the occupiers do not speak for the family.

Ammon Bundy met briefly with Harney County Sheriff David Ward on Thursday but rejected the lawman's offer of safe passage out of the state to end the standoff.

During a press conference on Friday morning, Bundy seemed to soften his position, saying: "We will take that offer but not yet, and we will go out of this county and out of this state as free men."

Following Bundy's press conference on Friday morning, a lands right activist opposed to the occupation spoke to the media.

"This is about furthering an extremist right-wing agenda," Barrett Kaiser, a Montana resident and a representative of the Center for Western Priorities said, as supporters of Bundy tried to interrupt him and argue with him. "They need to be charged and prosecuted."

Local residents have expressed a mixture of sympathy for the Hammond family, suspicion of the federal government's motives and frustration with the occupation.

Federal law enforcement agents and local police have so far kept away from the occupied site, maintaining no visible presence outside the park in a bid to avoid a violent confrontation.

Reuters
The winter is off to a good start providing plenty of snow for Eastern Nevada. Many of the basins in northeastern Nevada range from 120 percent to almost 200 percent of the average for the snow pack. This is good news for our streams and reservoirs.

Just remember that it is early in the winter and this could change at any time. Just keep your fingers crossed and continue to do those snow dances.

For those fly rodders wondering what spey casting is all about, the Ruby Mountain Fly Fishers will be having a program introducing the history, terminology and basics of spey casting at their monthly meeting this Wednesday.

Their meeting is in the Nevada Department of Wildlife conference room at 6:30 pm. The address is 60 Youth Center Road in Elko. Call 934-4565 for more information. Their website is www.rmffs.org or check out their blog site for lots of good local fly fishing information at www.flyfishelko.blogspot.com.

WILD HORSE

Wild Horse is covered with an average of about 12-14 inches of good ice covered with about 6 inches of snow. With the colder temperatures forecast for this weekend, conditions should continue improve. ATVs should be careful of pockets of slush. Expect fishing to be slow for larger fish and slow to fair for 10- to 14- inch fish. So there are a few holdovers still waiting to be caught. Wild Horse was stocked with 10,000 fish in October and this lake has received very little fishing pressure since then.

SOUTH FORK RESERVOIR

South Fork ice is averaging around 5 inches thick with a crust of snow on top, though with this weeks precipitation, there may be a bit more snow. Trout have been cruising the shallows with most being caught in less than 10 feet of water. One angler caught a limit of trout less than 10 feet from shore along Jet Ski Beach this week. The usual PowerBait and worms seem to be working.

WILSON RESERVOIR

No recent report on road conditions but this part of the county received a lot of moisture, so expect four-wheel drive conditions. Travel will be difficult. Generally water conditions here mirror South Forks, so the lake probably has around 5 inches of ice.

RUBY LAKE NWR

Harrison Pass is closed due to snow and anglers should plan on accessing the Refuge through Secret Pass. Secret Pass does experience drifting near the top, so take care here as well. As a general rule anglers can almost always find some open water here due to flows and the numerous springs even during very cold weather. Last weekend, the collection ditch was about 85 percent ice covered with some open spots where the springs are. The Ruby Mountain Fly Fishers had their annual New Years Day fishing party here with plenty of smaller fish being caught behind the hatchery. One large 24- to 25- inch fish over 5 pounds was caught. Egg patterns and light colored wooly buggers were catching the little ones while the large one was caught with a hares ear. Be careful on the Ruby Valley Road as you cant tell where the road ends and the borrow ditch begins. Lots of vehicles having to be pulled out of the borrow ditch last weekend.

JAKES CREEK/BOIES RESERVOIR

Approximately 10 inches of ice and fishing is fair to good for trout. Anglers are using PowerBait or worms with success.

COLD CREEK RESERVOIR

There is lots of snow and the lake is 100 percent ice covered. You cant drive to the lake, but you can walk down from the main road. However, no word on the thickness, so drill a test hole close to shore before venturing upon it.

CAVE LAKE

Cave Lake is covered with 10 to 12 inches of ice with about 6 inches of slush and snow on top at last report. However Ely received a lot of snow on Thursday, so expect more snow on top. The ice does start to thin out near the inlet. The snow on top will slow down ice growth, but it should continue to improve. Expect fishing to be good using the usual assortment of spinners, worms, mealworms or PowerBait.

ILLIPAH

This lake is covered approximately 10 inches of ice with 2 to 3 inches of slush and snow at last report. Expect good fishing using the usual assortment of jigs, worms and PowerBait. Local anglers like to use a black marabou jig tipped with a worm.

ANGEL LAKE

The road to Angel Lake is closed.

ALPINE LAKES

Due to the snow at higher elevations, travel in the high country is not recommended at this time except for experienced backcountry travelers. Lakes are iced over.

STREAMS

Stream flows are about normal for this time of year, many of the streams that hold trout have ice on them and the shorelines are covered with ice and snow. Expect stream fishing to be slow.
Jan. 7

Miguel Aboytes, 36, of Spring Creek was arrested at 501 Parkchester Drive for failure to appear after bail for a misdemeanor crime. Bail: $1,169



Michael W. Anderson Jr., 23, of Spring Creek was arrested at 1335 Pickering Ave. for failure to appear after bail for a misdemeanor crime. Bail: $1,155



Alexus K. Carlson, 19, of Chandler, Arizona, was arrested at 895 W. Silver St. for failure to appear after bail for a felony crime. No bail listed.



Mark O. Ferrier, 23, of Aztec, New Mexico, was arrested on Interstate 80 for DUI, possession of less than one ounce of marijuana, possession of a controlled substance and operating a vehicle with expired registration or plates. Bail: $6,982



Tina L. Finley, 54, of Minneapolis, Minnesota, was arrested at the Humboldt County Jail for failure to appear after bail for a misdemeanor crime. Bail: $3,452



Robert C. Garland, 33, of Elko was arrested at 340 Commercial St. for giving false statement to or obstructing a public official, disturbing the peace, possession of less than one ounce of marijuana and failure to appear after bail for a misdemeanor crime. Bail: $2,235



Steven R. Johnson, 56, of Spring Creek was arrested at 2134 Pershing Ave. for assault with a deadly weapon. Bail: $20,000



Nicole L. McKay, 34, of San Francisco, California, was arrested at the Washoe County Jail on a warrant for possession of a stolen motor vehicle, 13 counts of forgery of a credit card, four counts of possession of a document or personal ID, possession of an incomplete credit or debit card or machine to produce credit or debit card and the personal ID of another. Bail: $140,000



Jordan M. Miller, 22, of Aztec, New Mexico, was arrested on Interstate 80 for possession of less than one ounce of marijuana and possession of a controlled substance. Bail: $5,737



Kira L. Negrete, 33, of Spring Creek was arrested on Interstate 80 on a warrant. Bail: $640



Tasha M. Salinas, 45, of Wells was arrested at 157 South U.S. Highway 93 for failure to appear on a traffic citation. Bail: $415



Jacob C. Schneider, 23, of Lodi, California, was arrested at the Elko County Jail for failure to appear after bail for a felony crime. No bail listed.
ELKO  The Nevada Department of Veterans Services is hoping to reach out to every veteran in the state through its advocate program, helping veterans understand the benefits they are entitled to such as tax, education and disability.

Veterans advocates are trained volunteers who link veterans to services and educate them about benefits they may be eligible for. The state has a goal of training 5,000 veterans advocates.

Its an ambitious program, said Department of Veterans Services Community Outreach Director Liz Watson in an interview Thursday with the Free Press.

Advocates can complete a free course online to become certified. The online course at nvapps.state.nv.us includes 20 modules, said Veterans Service Officer II Supervisor Mike Mader.

A workshop is also offered once a year in Northern Nevada. The workshop counts toward 10 of those modules. Scholarships to help cover travel costs to the workshop are available.

We want to touch every veteran, said Veteran Advocacy Support Team Director Stephen Sitton.

There are currently three state veterans advocates in the Elko area, as well as one state veterans service officer, Deborah Gentry. Service officers assist veterans in filing claims with a service-connected disability, pension or other benefit programs.

Advocates serve the role of finding veterans and providing the link to the service officers. This is especially helpful in rural areas, Watson said. It is estimated that 8-10 percent of Nevadas population are veterans. The state has 380 certified advocates.

Many veterans have not registered to receive benefits, said Watson, who explained they see a continuing stigma in women who have served. Until the Defense Department lifted gender based restrictions in 2015, combat roles were limited. Therefore, many women do not consider themselves veterans, Watson and Mader speculated.

Weve always had this idea in our heads, as old people, that if you didnt go into combat you werent a veteran, Mader said. Thats just not true.

Many male veterans havent served in direct combat positions, either.

Only one in 10 veterans has served in the field of combat, Watson said. Everyone else is support.

Some medical benefits are available only to veterans who have been diagnosed with a condition related to their time in the service, Mader said. There may be other criteria that vary, such as the length of service. Those who have served and believe they have a serious related condition should sit down with a veterans service officer, he said.

Were basically pseudo medical attorneys, Mader said.

Other state benefits to veterans include free hunting and fishing licenses to disabled veterans, the Nevada Women Veterans Program, veteran tax exemptions, educational programs and state veteran cemeteries. Those on reserve duty may also qualify for benefits, Mader said.

The local Nevada Department of Veterans Services office is located at 762 14th St. To schedule an appointment with a veterans service officer, call, 777-1000.
Artur Mas during his press conference. G. Battista

After months of negotiations, the pro-independence Junts pel Si bloc and the anticapitalist Candidatura dUnitat Popular (CUP) have reached a final-hour deal to invest a new premier in Catalonia and avoid fresh regional elections.

Under the terms of the pact, which was reached on Saturday just 30 hours before the deadline to choose a leader was due to expire, the mayor of Girona, Carles Puigdemont, will become the new Catalan premier with current acting regional chief Artur Mas stepping down. The CUP will also hand over two of its deputies to work within the Junts pel Si coalition.

The decision represents a U-turn for Mas, who since his Junts pel Si bloc won the September regional election had always insisted that he would not step aside

The decision represents a full U-turn for Mas, who in the three months since Junts pel Si  which comprises his own Democratic Convergence (CDC) party, the Catalan Republican Left (ERC) and other pro-sovereignty groups  won the regional election had always insisted that he would not step aside in favor of a consensus candidate, as the CUP had demanded.

The small pro-independence, anticapitalist partys 10 elected deputies held the key to power in the region after Mass separatist coalition failed to attract enough votes for an absolute majority at the September 27 election.

The agreement allows us to work, Mas said in reference to the independence process as he appeared before reporters to explain the deal on Saturday afternoon.

In his address Mas admitted that the decision was painful but that he was convinced that his resignation was positive for pushing ahead with the independence process, and for Catalonia. The country is the first thing, he said.

He underscored that he would not be taking on another role in exchange for stepping down, but that he would remain at the disposal of the Catalan parliament and the future premier and regional government.

The plan is that Puigdemont, also of Mass CDC party, will on Sunday be elected premier in the first round of voting by an absolute majority. That implies that he would receive the votes of the 62 Junts pel Si deputies in the Catalan parliament and two of the 10 CUP members.

Although Mas had already announced on Monday that he was resigned to there being new elections in Catalonia, negotiations between the two forces had continued throughout the week. But it was only on Saturday that the deadlock finally broke and the possibility of Mas stepping down was placed on the table.

What happened to make Mas change his mind? The CDC leader responded to the question by explaining that time and events have progressed and something that could hardly be foreseen occurred, and that is that there is a stable agreement on everything by everyone.

What also changed is that the CUP admitted its own mistakes, he added. No new concessions have been given to the CUP. I have taken a political decision that I did not have to take. The election was an option, but not a good option.

English version by Nick Funnell.
  

  

    ,                          .
An airstrike killed at least 39 people in a Syrian rebel-held town in the northwest on Saturday when it struck a courthouse and an adjacent prison, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported.

The Observatory said that the prison was run by Al-Qaeda's affiliate in Syria, the Nusra Front, and that many of those killed were Nusra fighters and their detainees in the northwestern town of Maaret al-Numan in Idlib province.

The airstrike also wounded a large number of people, many of whom were in critical condition, the Observatory said.

The Local Coordination Committees, another activist group, said the airstrike killed 51. Conflicting figures are common in the aftermath of airstrikes in Syria.

Wire services
Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, January 9

The role of the Municipal Corporation (MC) and the contractor concerned came under scanner today when a huge water tank collapsed on the newly built Sanjh Kendra at Dada Colony here today, completely rendering the just-constructed building to rubble.

The tank fell inside a huge park. The contractor, meanwhile, said that he was aiming to demolish the tank so that it fell away from the Kendra, but due to it being very old, the tank fell right on the Kendra.

Fortunately, the workers working on the Kendra building and children playing in the park escaped unhurt, with one of the workers having walked out of the building seconds before the collapse.

Residents of the area blamed the contractor for carelessness and destruction of the Sanjh Kendra built at Rs 20 lakh, the work on which was on for the past three to four months. Residents also claimed compensation for some minor losses to sheds and structures near the park. They were pacified after MLA KD Bhandari spoke to them and assured them that he shall ensure the rebuilding of the Sanjh Kendra and residents shall also be duly compensated.

ACP Amneet Kondal reaches spot

The contractor had reportedly received directions to pull down the water tank, following which the work on the same had started this morning. The tank was being felled as a hospital was proposed to be built on the land where it was situated.

Interestingly, the demolition of the tank was also ordered three to four months ago  around the same time as the Sanjh Kendra construction was started. Right next to the Kendra, a fire station also narrowly escaped from getting damaged.

Contractor Harbans Lal said, The work on the cutting of the tank base began this morning. Ideally, it should have fallen on the side on which it was cut. But a displacement of 10 feet in the fall caused it to collapse on the Kendra. We had also been asked to complete the work soon. Due to the tank being very old, its fall was displaced. We had followed the right procedure.

Rohit Sharma, the contractor for the Sanjh Kendra, said, The centre collapsed due to the negligence of the demolition contractor. The building was fully constructed and only a board remained to be put up. It was built at Rs 20 lakh. The entire centre is reduced to rubble. One of our men just walked out of it seconds before the collapse.

While it would take at least some time to remove the rubble of the huge tank from the spot, residents questioned why the tanks demolition was ordered after the Sanjh Kendra was built.
Srinagar, January 9

The National Conference (NC) today expressed serious concern over continued political and constitutional uncertainty in the state following the demise of Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed.

In a joint statement issued by the opposition partys provincial presidents Nasir Aslam Wani and Devender Singh Rana, the party said, A sensitive state like J&K cannot afford a constitutional crisis or prolonged political uncertainty.

While we understand the grief and sorrow that the family and Mehbooba ji must be going through, we are also seriously concerned over the prolonged constitutional crisis in the state as a result of the demise of a sitting Chief Minister. For a sensitive state like J&K, this raises a lot of apprehensions and concerns, the NC leaders said.  TNS
Hyderabad, January 9

An IIT topper from Hyderabad studying in North Carolina University in the US committed suicide after scoring low marks in exams, according to information reaching his family here.

Shiva Kiran (23) ended his life by hanging from the ceiling fan in his room in the university hostel on Thursday. The authorities in the US informed the distraught family on Friday.

He had taken admission in the university six months ago and was scheduled to come to Hyderabad. The family lives at Indira Nagar in the Ramanthapur area.

Shiva Kiran, who did mechanical engineering from a college here, was apparently depressed after he failed to secure better grade in the recent exam.

The family has appealed to the state and Central governments to help bring his body home.  IANS
Tribune News Service

Guwahati, January 9

Nine people were injured when Garo tribe militants set off explosives in Williamnagars market in East Garo Hills district of Meghalayas Garo hills on Saturday.

A woman was among the nine injured.

Inspector General of Police GHP Raju said the outlawed Garo National Liberation Army (Jimi), a tribal militant outfit, blew up a wine shop in William Nagars main market at around 12.40 pm in a low intensity explosion. The wine shop was completely destroyed in the blast, which sources claimed the explosion could be in retaliation to the recent surrender of some GNLA cadres.

Police cleared the area and conducted searches for other hidden explosives.

The area is on the Indo-Bangladesh border.
Anirudh Gupta

Ferozepur, January 8

After a long wait of almost seven decades since Independence, the state government has finally issued a notification to accord heritage status to the old double-storeyed building, which is believed to be a secret hideout of Krantikari Party led by legendary revolutionary Shaheed Bhagat Singh and his accomplices.

Though the state government took several years to grant this building protected monument status, local residents, who had launched an agitation for the same last year, are now contented with the move.

Deputy Commissioner DPS Kharbanda said though he had not received a copy of the notification, the officials concerned in Chandigarh have confirmed the same.

Kharbanda said a notice would be soon served to the occupants to preserve the structure as they would not be allowed to make any changes in the building henceforth.

We will try to rehabilitate the families occupying this structure by offering them alternative accommodation so that the building can be renovated and preserved as per the status it deserves, he added.

Earlier, after a prolonged battle fought by the local residents, the Department of Cultural Affairs, Heritage and Museums had issued a preliminary notification on December 19, 2014, under the Punjab Ancient and Historical Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1964, to seek any objections to grant heritage status to this building.

Though no objection was received by the Department, there was an inordinate delay following which the Punjab and Haryana High Court had issued a notice to the state government on a contempt petition filed by Advocate HC Arora in December 2015, alleging non-compliance of the order for declaring this building a protected monument.

For me this building is no less than a pilgrimage as I have grown up on stories around this hideout which was taken on rent by my father Dr Gaya Prashad under fake name of Dr BS Nigam to run a pharmacy here, said Kranti Kumar Katiyar, who had visited this building in June last year.

My father had told me so many stories about the secret activities during the revolutionary movement for which this building was used, he said, expressing happiness over the move.

While Dr Gaya Prasad used to run the pharmacy from the ground floor, the first floor was used by the revolutionaries to make bombs and evolve strategy against the oppressive British rule, said Rakesh Kumar, who has played an instrumental role in the agitation to grant heritage status to the building.

Rakesh, who has authored several books on this monument, said the state government should establish a museum and library in this building.
Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, January 9

Chain Singh Chain, the Communist leader who is considered to have played a crucial role in Netaji Subhas Chandra Boses escape from India in 1941, is no more. He passed away here today at the age of 98.

Chain was the last of the generation who laid the foundation of the Communist movement in Punjab. He started his political career in the early 1930s with the Kirti Kisan Party, which was founded in 1928 and considered an extension of Ghadar movement.

He was a close associate of prominent Communist leader Teja Singh Swatantar. Later, Chain also became a central committee member of the Lal Party, which had waged an armed peasant struggle in the erstwhile PEPSU in the late 1940s. It is known as PEPSU Mujhara movement.

Gurmeet Singh, trustee of Desh Bhagat Yadgar Hall in Jalandhar, said that Chain played an important role in Indias freedom struggle. It was Kirti Partys responsibility to help Bose from India. And in Kirti Party, it was comrade Chain who was assigned the job, said Gurmeet Singh.

However, the account has recently been countered in Sugata Boses book His Majestys Opponent, that it was All India Forward Bloc that was instrumental in doing so. Chain Singh Chain will also be remembered for his work on the history of Kirti Kisan Party.

In 1942, he was arrested and was tortured at the British-run torture centre in Lahore Fort, said Kesar Singh of Desh Bhagat Yadgar Hall, Jalandhar.

Another popular tale about Chain is that when the Telangana peasants struggle was at its peak, he was instrumental in procuring weapons from Punjab and supplying these to the struggling peasants.

He also founded the Punjab Freedom Fighters Association and served as its general secretary for long. Even his wife Sushila Chain was a full-time member of the Communist Party of India. He was born in Danduwal village in Phillaur on August 25, 1917.
Ravi Dhaliwal

Tribune News Service

Gurdaspur, January 8

The massive search operation launched by the Army, BSF and Punjab Police to locate suspected terrorists in the area was called off today with senior officers claiming that the three-hour delay in informing the police had proved costly.

The incident, which came in the aftermath of the Pathankot air base attack, kept the city and its suburbs on tenterhooks for nearly 72 hours. By 4 pm, the last of the Armymen left the spot, indicating how the colossal exercise involving the usage of high-tech equipment, including drone cameras, had proved futile.

Officers had no answer as to how the drone picked up movements in the 15-acre sugarcane fields on the basis of which the operation lingered on for three days.

Unlike the July 27 (2015) Dinanagar attack, a clear chain of command was followed this time. The final orders were executed by the Army, though senior police officers and the BSF too were kept in the loop.

At the break of dawn, decks had been cleared for a SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) team to launch an assault. But the attack never materialised and the SWAT team entered the fields in two armoured vehicles and mowed down nearly 20 acres of standing crop.

After two hours, a five-minute meeting of Army and BSF commanders and the police officers was held wherein the decision to exit the operation was taken.

Officials are now claiming that the delay made by Satnam Singh, a resident of Pandher village near Tibri military area, to inform the police on January 6 evening about some suspicious movement proved costly.

The terrorists might have exited the cane fields in those three hours and could have moved to another location, said a police officer.

Questions are also being raised about the statement made by Lovepreet Singh (18), another resident who claimed that two men had beaten him up with a rifle butt last night when he was returning home from Tibri Cantonment.

With injury marks visible on his neck, he had maintained that he was riding a motorcycle when the men stepped out of the fields and attacked him. He was taken to the Army cantonment yesterday as well as today for questioning.

As nothing emerged, all check posts on the 22-km Gurdaspur-Mukerian stretch were removed by the evening.
Ruchika M Khanna

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 9

The Punjab Government will give a written assurance to the Portugal government that suspected terrorist Paramjit Singh Pamma will neither be awarded death penalty nor incarcerated in a prison for more than 25 years, if found guilty of spreading terror in Punjab.

Sources said the assurance was mandatory as Indias extradition treaty with Portugal specifies that those extradited would not be awarded the death sentence. The assurance will be given by the states Home Department, after the file is approved by the state Home Minister and Deputy CM Sukhbir Badal.

Pamma was arrested by the Portugal police last month after an Interpol red-corner notice was issued against him. Pamma, residing in the UK on political asylum, was on a visit to Portugal with his family when he was detained there. He is accused of plotting the killing of Rashtriya Sikh Sangh (a RSS offshoot) leader Rulda Singh. Also, he is a key conspirator in the Patiala and Ambala bomb blasts.

Ever since his arrest, hardline Sikh activists have stepped up efforts to block his extradition. Pammas parents in Punjab have appealed to the Portuguese court against his extradition, claiming there was a threat to his life in India.
Kanwalpreet

The Konark Temple in Odisha is a marvel made in stone. This story revolves around the temple which was built on the orders of King Narasimha Deva. The plot keeps the reader engrossed for it deals with the sacrifices made by 1,200 artists who worked for years to create an architectural wonder. It became a symbol of kings devotion to Lord Jagannath and also a tangible demonstration of the craft and skill of artists of that time. The plot does full justice to the magnificence of the Konark Temple just as it does to the characters in the book.

Charles, a researcher, travels from Washington DC to Bhubaneshwar to study the architecture of the Konark. He is accompanied by his fiancee, the latter being more interested in the erotic images carved on the Konark Temple. As Charles studies each image minutely, he falls deeper in love with the history behind Konark. While his fiancee loses interest in the study and leaves Charles for the beaches of Goa, Charles continues with the mission. Soon, he is joined by a companion, Prachiparva, a research scholar who is on an assignment to learn more about Konark.

Together, they embark on a journey that binds them to the temple and to each other in a strange way. Kushabhadra, known as Kushi Mausi and Vishnu Maharana become the sources of the researchers. They are a living history of the temple. The gifting of manuscripts by Kushi Mausi to Charles, a complete stranger, on her death bed, lends a new perspective to the whole story. Charles is in awe of the love showered on him by the people of the land. Kushi Mausis unconditional love works like a balm on his battered soul, which suffered for the lack of love from his own parents. As Vishnu Maharana reads the palm-leaf manuscripts, the protagonists as well as the readers are transported to the time when the temple was being built. So vivid is the description that one can actually imagine the artists working with dedication. The use of words is so deft that the reader can hear the artists chisel the stone.

The story of Chitra, a flower girl who sells flowers to arrange for her dowry, touches heart. Dharmanada, a young boy, who earns his livelihood selling erotic pictures of the Konark to foreigners, is in a hurry to get rich. In contrast to Chitra, Charles and Prachis perception, Konark for him holds no heritage value, rather it is a gateway to wealth. Where does it lead him to? What happens to other characters? Are they able to dig into the rich history of Konark? Are they able to capture the pain, the sufferings and the joys of the artists, who gave up their youth to construct a temple that would pull tourists? Does Charles and Prachis love reach an end or it transcends the limits of time?

Pratibha Ray, the author, is a winner of the Odisha Sahitya Akademi Award. Rightly so, for she weaves the story in a manner that she is able to narrate the inspiration behind each figure carved in stone on the Konark. Reading the novel makes one not only realise the effort behind the temple but inspires one to visit the temple. Each word, each character is a testimony of the authors love for the masterpiece called Konark.
Steve Connor

Forest fires in tinder-dry Indonesia, a disappointing monsoon in India and even the recent unusually warm, wet and windy weather in Britain are all being blamed on a record El Nino developing in the South Pacific, which meteorologists believe could become the biggest in living memory.

El Nino is a temporary natural warming of the surface sea in the tropical East Pacific as it spreads across the equatorial Pacific, causing fluctuations and reversals to the normal trade winds. It triggers major changes to the weather patterns across the world, from Australia and India to Africa and Central America.

The event appears once every few years at variable intensity. It gets its name from the Spanish for boy-child, a seasonal reference to Christmas. But this winter it shaped up to be as large, or even larger, than the notorious El Nino of 1997-98, the biggest since accurate records began, according to the Met Office.

El Nino has continued to strengthen and its already about on a par with the largest event in living memory, which occurred in 1997-98. However, its still too early to say whether its going to be the biggest ever, says Jeff Knight, a climate modeller at the Met Offices Hadley Centre, near Exeter.

The heat index measured over the surface of a vast tract of ocean in the equatorial Pacific already suggests that El Nino is as big as anything seen before, and computer models are forecasting that it will only get stronger over the coming weeks and months, Mr Knight said. A strong El Nino, combined with increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, also means that the world became the warmest last year on record, breaking the previous years record to become the hottest since 1880, when the instrumental record began.

However, when El Nino develops to such intensity, it has a major impact around the world. The exceptionally dry weather in Indonesia, which has fanned the flames of the forest fires in the region last year, is set to continue as El Nino delays the onset of the rainy season, says Mr Knight. India declared an official drought year after a 14 per cent decline in the monsoon rains  although food shortages had been largely averted thanks to government planning and stockpiling.

Globally, however, food prices are set to rise further, according to the UNs Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). The cost of food last year rose largely because of the expectation that El Nino and bad weather will curb food output in 2016. Sugar prices are expected to rise after late rains delayed harvesting in Brazil, while the extended dry season in South-east Asia and Indonesia is causing concern over the production of vegetable oil, according to the FAO.

A strong El Nino is also known to disturb the westerly jet stream, a ribbon of fast-moving air circumnavigating the northern hemisphere. This could increase the chances of the kind of weather patterns seen recently in Britain, which are caused by a southerly kink in the jet stream over the North Atlantic, sending the a south-westerly stream of warm, wet and windy weather across the UK. In Britain, the impact of El Nino is nowhere near as marked as in other parts of the world. But it does tip the balance a little bit more in favour of wet and windy weather. It makes it more probable, Mr Knight said.

A strong El Nino can also cause wetter weather in Central America, the southern United States and East Africa, increasing the risk of malaria as the mosquito population rises. But its not all bad news: after a five-year drought, California could actually benefit from increased rainfall.  The Independent
Sunit Dhawan in Rohtak

November, 2014: Rohtak-based Janki went to stay at her parents place in Nepal for a few days. On her return to Rohtak in December, she brought along her younger sister Meena alias Sarita, who was undergoing treatment for depression. I felt the change of place and environment would do her some good, Janki recalled.

February 1, 2015: Meena, 28, was reported missing from her sisters home in Chinyot Colony at Rohtak. The family lodged a complaint with the police and a search operation ensued.

February 4: Her mutilated body was found from an agricultural field in Bahu Akbarpur village on the outskirts of Rohtak. A post-mortem revealed brutal rape and inhuman torture. There were no witnesses.

December 21, 2015: A local court dismissed the arguments and awarded the death penalty to all seven accused.

All the witnesses who volunteered to help the police as well as lawyers will be honoured at a Republic Day function in recognition of their services.

The local police have decided to send the case to the Haryana Police Academy, Madhuban, as well as the Bureau of Police Research and Development, Delhi, for study as the conviction and death penalty came without any eyewitness on the basis of scientific investigation and circumstantial evidence.

I have never seen such brutality in my career-experience, said Dr SK Dhattarwal, head of the Forensic Medicine Department at the Rohtak PGIMS, where the autopsy was conducted.

The autopsy report revealed the woman suffered multiple injuries on the head, chest, thighs and private parts. The gangrape-cum-murder case shook the conscience of the Rohtak residents as well as Nepalese nationals, who took out candle-light processions and staged protests to press for the arrest of the culprits.

A Special Investigation Team (SIT) led by DSP Amit Bhatia probed the matter. The investigators identified nine suspects. Eight of them were arrested on February 9, while the ninth allegedly committed suicide reportedly due to fear of arrest. The accused were: Rajesh alias Ghuchru, Sunil alias Shilla, Sarwar alias Billu, Manbir, Sunil alias Maddha, Pawan and Parmod alias Padam, all residents of Gaddi Kheri village in the district. The eighth, who hailed from Nepal, was found to be juvenile. The suspect who allegedly committed suicide was identified as Sombir, , also a resident of Gaddi Kheri village.

After the arrests came the big challenge: how to prove the charges against the accused, as the victim was found dead and there was no eyewitness. We ruled out a watertight case, given circumstances. So we appealed to the people to come forward, recalls Rohtak SP Shashank Anand.

Four citizen-volunteers offered help to the police. They are: Ajay Kumar Nijhawan, Tushar, Rajesh Loomba alias Teenu and Gulshan Nijhawan. They were involved in each aspect of the investigation, including the interrogation of the accused and collection of evidence. The entire process was videographed. Despite considerable social pressure, they testified before the local court, thus playing a crucial role in ensuring the conviction of the accused and the death penalty to them.

Prime witnesses turning hostile and eye-witnesses not volunteering to come forward to depose before a court of law are generally responsible for the low conviction rate. In the given scenario, the initiative taken by these Good Samaritans is commendable as well as inspirational for others, the SP said.

He revealed that as many as 360 exhibits were produced before the court and DNA analyses of the biological samples were carried out to reach definite conclusions. Scientific forensic analysis and technical support, like tracking of mobile phones of the accused, also helped in guiding the investigation and ascertaining the location of all accused at the scene of crime, he added.

Rohtak lawyers also set a precedent by pleading the case for the victims family members without charging any fee. The lawyers worked tirelessly and presented the case in such a strong manner that the court of Additional District and Sessions Judge Seema Singhal dismissed the arguments of the defence side and awarded the death penalty to all seven accused.

Apart from handing over the death penalty to the accused for the offence under Section 302 of the IPC (murder), the Judge also awarded them life imprisonment for the remaining period of their lives under Section 376-D (gang-rape), 10-year imprisonment under Section 366 (kidnapping), and seven-year imprisonment under Section 201 (destruction of evidence). She also awarded life imprisonment to one of the accused, Rajesh, under Section 377 (unnatural sex). The court has specifically maintained that all of the said sentences would run consecutively without any remission, concession, parole or furlough.

One of the lawyers, Pradeep Malik, said he was approached by the family-members of some of the accused, who wanted to engage him. They reportedly offered him a hefty fee to defend the accused. Malik said he not only refused to plead the case on their behalf, but voluntarily offered to stand on behalf of the victims family. He did not charge any fee. I strongly wanted to get justice for the girl. I am satisfied with the courts judgment, he said.

Triveni Verma, who had been deputed by the District Legal Services Authority (DLSA) to assist the public prosecutor, also declined to accept the honorarium which she was supposed to get for her services.

On the other hand, a counsel for the accused, Deepak Bhardwaj, maintained that the court had delivered the judgment, but not justice. We will now approach the High Court, he added.

(The real name of the gangrape-cum-murder victim has been given as the family-members of the deceased have maintained before the court that they had no objection against revealing her identity and the court has mentioned her name in the judgment.)

Demand for tougher law against juveniles in heinous cases

Janki, victims sister

The crime committed to my sister was unpardonable. The court has rightly awarded the death penalty to the convictss, though even the capital punishment seems to be inadequate for the perpetrators of such inhuman crimes.

Amar, victims brother

The law should be stricter about punishment to the juveniles, at least in cases of such heinous crimes.

Ajay Kumar Nijhawan

The sheer brutality of crime forced me to step forward for help. The judgment will instil hope among women and strengthen their faith in the judicial system.
Tribune News Service

Dehradun, January 8

Chief Minister Harish Rawat today said he would quit politics if the BJP proves that over Rs 1,509 crore released by the Centre for disaster relief in Uttarakhand was siphoned off. I will quit politics, if the BJP proves the charge. The allegation is a white lie and the party is painting a wrong picture on the basis of funds recommended and not on the basis of funds actually released by the Central government to the state, said Harish Rawat while speaking with mediapersons today.

The Chief Minister said the BJP had ignored the revised estimates and made a false impression of the whole issue. They are trying to say that the Chief Minister has no knowledge of budgetary provisions and officers concerned are useless as they allowed the money to vanish. The BJP should apologize for trying to hurt the confidence of the people in the state government, said Rawat.

He added the Central government had recommended Rs 7980.13 crore for the state under various heads. Out of this, the state government had only received Rs 2,367.74 crore. The fund assistance was for three years (till 2016-2017).

Significantly, based on an RTI information provided to a lawyer close to the BJP, state BJP president Ajay Bhatt had alleged that the state did not account for Rs 1,509 crore given by the Centre after the 2013 natural disaster.
Cairo, January 9

An Egyptian court on Saturday upheld a three-year jail sentence for former president Hosni Mubarak and his sons for embezzling millions of dollars' worth of state funds that were intended for the maintenance of official residences.

Mubarak, 87, and his sons  Gamal and Alaa  were charged of acquiring almost 126 million Egyptian pounds (USD 16 million) from the presidential palace budget and using the money for the construction and development of family-owned assets.

They are also charged with forging official documents and damaging public property.

In May 2014, Mubarak and his sons were sentenced to three years each in a maximum- security prison on embezzlement charges.

Collectively, they were fined 125 million Egyptian Pounds and are required to repay 21 million Egyptian Pounds.

Mubarak and seven former security commanders, including his former interior minister Habib al-Adly, were cleared in 2014 of charges of killing anti-government protesters during the 2011 revolution.

The judge in the case said that Mubarak should never be tried for these charges.

The three-year jail sentences have already been served during the trio's time in pre-trial detention. Gamal and Alaa Mubarak walked free in May 2015 and Mubarak returned to Maadi Military Hospital where he currently resides.

According to Egyptian law, pre-trial detention is counted as time served towards any possible sentence.

Mubarak has spent most of his time in a military hospital since his arrest in 2011 after his ouster in popular uprising.  PTI
Damascus

Syria's foreign minister says it is ready to attend peace talks later this month in Geneva but that the government wants to see lists of the opposition groups who will attend and the terrorist groups that will not. The Syrian government refers to all those battling to overthrow President Assad as terrorists. AP

Beirut

Raids on Syrian prison kill 39

Russian strikes on Saturday on a prison complex run by Al-Qaidas Syrian affiliate in the countrys northwest killed at least 39 persons, including five civilians. The strikes hit an Al-Nusra Front building, which houses the groups religious court and a jail. AFP

Cologne

Merkel on expulsion rules

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday backed a toughening of expulsion rules for convicted refugees, as protesters took to the streets against a shocking rash of sexual assaults blamed on migrants during New Year festivities. Afp
Tulsa police arrested a Nebraska man who reportedly crashed into a chain-link fence during a vehicle pursuit before exiting the car and running across Interstate 244.

An officer attempted to pull over Anthony McCauley, 32, for a broken tag light as McCauley drove north on North Utica Avenue just after midnight Saturday, according to McCauleys arrest and booking report.

The officer turned on the emergency lights to stop the vehicle, which slowed as if to stop but continued down an alley north of East Archer Street, police said.

The driver then drove through a stop sign at North Trenton Avenue and East Admiral Boulevard and attempted to turn onto the Interstate 244 service road, according to the report.

During the turn, The vehicle drove over a curb and crashed into a chain-link fence, according to the report.

The officer pursuing the vehicle crashed into the back of the suspect vehicle but was uninjured, police said.

After the crash, McCauley exited the vehicle and ran south across Interstate 244 to the 200 block of South Trenton Avenue, police said.

the officer followed McCauley on foot and eventually Tasered him when he didnt comply with the officers demands to stop, according to the report.Police later discovered the vehicle was reported stolen. McCauley also has a federal warrant out for his arrest for a probation violation, police said.

McCauley was booked into jail on complaints of eluding after a felony conviction, failure to stop for a stop sign, obstructing justice, possession of a stolen vehicle after a felony conviction, defective lights other than headlights, no drivers license, hit and run and three previous warrants, according to jail records.
The states top budget officer called the Tulsa Regional Chambers new chairman disingenuous, out of touch and arrogant in two Facebook posts Thursday night.

Finance Secretary Preston Doerflinger, a Tulsa resident, was responding to Chairman Jeff Dunns blunt criticism of a senior Cabinet official for defending the 0.25 percent reduction in the state income-tax rate that went into effect last week, even as state agencies were told to trim spending by 3 percent because of a general revenue failure.

Although Dunn did not name the official when he made the comments during a speech to the chamber Thursday, it was understood to be Doerflinger because of recent comments he has made.

The two Facebook posts  one on Doerflingers own page and one on Dunns  used the hashtags really?, outoftouch, ohthearrogance and disingenious, apparently to describe Dunn.

Neither Dunn nor the chamber responded to requests for comment Friday.

As state revenue has flattened and fallen in recent years, Doerflinger and other members of Gov. Mary Fallins administration, as well as the Republican legislative leadership, have found themselves defending the income-tax cuts they championed.

Declining revenue, they maintain, is the result of plummeting energy prices, not tax reductions. But they have acknowledged that other incursions on the tax base, such as tax credits, need to be reassessed.

On Thursday, Dunn said, Many elected officials, to some degree, have their judgment clouded by that omnipresent intoxicant  re-election.

Doerflinger is an appointed, not elected official.

On his own Facebook page, Doerflinger wrote:

In light of Jeff Dunns comments at the Tulsa Chamber meeting  let there be no doubt I am always going to be in favor of the hardworking, tax paying citizens of this state being able to keep more of THEIR money. Modest, incremental tax reductions are not the problem and it is disingenuous to suggest otherwise. The arrogance of those who would suggest to YOU, the tax paying citizens of this state that you should not be able to keep more of your hard earned dollar astounds me.

Critics of the income tax cut say the most recent reduction amounts to less than $100 a year for most Oklahomans but will cost the state more than $150 million a year when fully implemented. General revenue, meanwhile, is expected to fall more than $900 million in the fiscal year beginning July 1.

Some, including Doerflinger, have suggested that the revenue decline is an opportunity to reduce and streamline state government.
South Australian TV veteran Lionel Williams, who co-hosted Adelaide Tonight with Kevin Crease during the 1960s, has died, aged 87.

He passed away on Thursday after a brief illness at Flinders Private Hospital.

He joined Nine in 1959, co-hosting Adelaide Tonight with Crease for eight years, winning a Logie in 1963.

He hosted his own daytime show, Its A Womans World in 1976, which eventually became The Lionel Williams Show. It ran for 12 years, while he also presented Sevens The Golden Years of Hollywood and co-hosted daytime quiz show, Concentration, with Joan McInnes.

Williams also tried his hand at acting, with appearances in Matlock, Homicide and Division Four.
 Bertrand Escolin,  Bordeaux agglomeration, restructuration majeure pour la station depuration , Le Moniteur, no 5579, 29 octobre 2010, p. On peut notamment mentionner la communaute de Recife au Bresil (premiere communaute en Amerique latine), celle dAmsterdam, ou lon peut visiter la synagogue portugaise dAmsterdam, celle de Bordeaux (cimetiere des juifs portugais), celle de Rhode Island (premiere synagogue dAmerique du Nord  Synagogue Touro, a Newport), celle de Montreal avec la plus ancienne synagogue du Canada, Shearith Israel, mais egalement celle de Londres (synagogue de Bevis Marks) egalement connue sous le nom de : Congregation of Spanish and Portuguese Jews (plus ancienne synagogue du Royaume-Uni), Hambourg, Livourne (Granas), Curacao, etc. Golf : Championnat Kraft Nabisco : lAmericaine Morgan Pressel devient la plus jeune joueuse a avoir remporte un titre majeur. Il prend part au mouvement artistique La Jeune Peinture et recoit en 1963 le prix Othon Friez pour ses gravures executees en France.

Lio, chanteuse et actrice (Belgique et France). A cet Euro 1992, le Danemark a ainsi elimine les trois grands favoris de la competition (Allemagne, France et Pays-Bas) qui en etaient egalement les trois derniers vainqueurs. Les pays ayant la plus grande communaute portugaise, dans lordre decroissant dimportance demographique, sont le Bresil, les Etats-Unis et la France. En plus des 10 720 000 Portugais vivant au Portugal, on en compte environ 72 millions de plus dans le monde, de premiere generation ou luso-descendants, faisant un total de plus de 82 millions de portugais dans le monde entier. Dapres le recensement de 2001, la paroisse civile compte 476 habitants. Dapres les historiens, cest dans un palais de Moledo, quInes de Castro aurait vecu. La diaspora portugaise est la population portugaise et de descendance portugaise dans le monde. Chaque ile est gouvernee comme une entite distincte jusquen 1753. En 1951, les iles deviennent provinces doutre-mer du Portugal. Cet article est une ebauche concernant le Portugal et les sciences humaines et sociales. Elle est evaluee a plus de 82 millions dont 10 720 000 residents au Portugal. Generalement, ils ont pour point commun davoir une forme de blason bleu, barre parfois dune ligne jaune, sur lequel est ecrit le nom du club ( CA BOCA JUNIORS , ou plus recemment  CABJ ).

A ce jour, seul Otto Rehhagel a plus entraine que lui dans le championnat allemand. Grujic simpose comme un titulaire regulier durant la saison 2015-2016, qui le voit prendre part a 29 rencontres en championnat, dont 27 comme titulaire, pour six buts marques et sept passes decisives delivrees, contribuant activement a la victoire du club en championnat au terme de lexercice. Cyclisme, Amstel Gold Race : victoire de lAllemand Stefan Schumacher. Parmi les regions concernees, on peut notamment citer : Goa et Diu en Inde, Sri Lanka, Malacca en Malaisie, Phuket en Thailande, Macao en Chine. Le gouverneur de Macao etait responsable du controle interne de la colonie. Le Grand Prix a ete cree principalement pour promouvoir les voyages internationaux dans le cadre des competitions de Diplomatie et a ce titre tous les tournois ont le meme poids du point de vue du classement general independamment du nombre de participants. 15/08/09 : Gabriel Campillo (19-2, 6 KO), champion WBA poids mi lourds, conserve son titre en battant aux points Beibut Shumenov (8-1, 6 KO).

Resultat de lectures des uvres geographiques ou cosmographiques, tres en vogue en son temps, classiques (Ptolemee, Strabon, Pline, Pomponius Mela  dou il tire une partie de son titre (De Situ Orbis)-), et modernes (Alfraganus, Sacrobosco, Vincent de Beauvais), ce livre est tonifie, rehausse, par une meditation personnelle, et par une connaissance directe, qui a chaque pas permet a Pacheco de critiquer ou rejeter des affirmations danciens auteurs :  Chez  Duarte Pacheco  ecrit Joaquim Bensaude, dans Lastronomie nautique au Portugal a lepoque des grandes decouvertes, maillot flamengo 2022 p. Puerto Pizarro est la porte dentree du sanctuaire national des mangroves. Composee que dune localite unique, la paroisse a donc Moledo pour chef-lieu et est represente par le president de la paroisse, Alexandre Manuel de Jesus Mauricio (PS). Corner concede par Andrew Weber. Corner concede par Bill Hamid. Dans la meme periode, il y eut un processus dexpansion imperiale et de colonisation, au peuplement des iles de lAtlantique, par la colonisation du Bresil (ou la plupart de la population a des ancetres portugais) et la propagation dans dautres parties de lEmpire qui faisait partie des communautes dorigine portugaise, culturels et academiques.

Pour plus de details sur survetement bordeaux visitez notre page daccueil.
The Economic Development and Trade Ministry of Ukraine has signed with the European Commission four programs that will help bring to Ukraine 30 million euros.

It has been reported by the press service of the Economic Development and Trade Ministry of Ukraine.

"Ukraine will receive 30 million euros of grant aid from the EU due to continuation of four cross-border programs, which Economic Development and Trade Ministry recently signed with the European Commission," the statement said.

ish
On January 7, 2016, the Council of the European Union appointed Mr Kestutis Lancinskas, a senior Lithuanian police official, as head of the European Union Advisory Mission Ukraine.

It has been said in a statement of the EU Advisory Mission.

Mr Lancinskas will replace Mr Kalman Mizsei and is expected to take up his duties in Kyiv on February 1, 2016.

The European Union Advisory Mission for Civilian Security Sector Reform Ukraine, EUAM Ukraine, was formally launched on December 1, 2014, with a mandate to support Ukrainian state agencies in the reform of the civilian security sector. The mission is one the central elements of the EUs enhanced support to the Ukrainian authorities after events of Euromaidan in November 2013. It follows the signing of an Association Agreement between Ukraine and the EU in 2014, which includes the establishment of a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area (DCFTA). The DCFTA came into effect on January 1, 2016.

ish
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance Frank A. Rose will visit Kyiv on January 18-20 as a part of the January visit to European and Baltic States.

"From January 18-20, Assistant Secretary Rose will visit Kyiv to hold discussions with officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the State Space Agency, and the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine on space security and other topics of mutual interest," reads a post on U.S. Department of State's website, Interfax informed.

Besides, Secretary Rose will participate in a ceremony marking the update of the bilateral Nuclear Risk Reduction Center (NRRC) communications link at the Ministry of Defense.
The EU foreign ministers will consider the issue of granting Ukraine a visa-free regime in March or June, depending on the progress in implementation of necessary reforms.

Ukraine's Deputy Foreign Minister on European Integration issues Olena Zerkal said this in an interview with TV Channel 5.

"It depends on how quickly we will convince justice and home affairs ministers of the European Union that we have fulfilled all the requirements and continue improving [the legislation]," Zerkal said.
"Whenever I go into a restaurant, I order both a chicken and an egg to see which comes first"


Researchers say that the newly discovered theropod dinosaur footprints indicate that the dinosaurs indulged in a frenzied Cretaceous courtship dance, Christian Monitor reports.

Scientists say the scratch marks left behind in Colorado could be direct evidence of the animals' mating behavior. The markings could be the traces of a courtship dance, similar to the one employed by ground nesting birds.

The paper was published on Thursday in the journal Scientific Reports.

"We now have proof that carnivorous dinosaurs engaged in extremely active courtship displays," study lead author paleontologist Martin Lockley told The Christian Science Monitor in an interview.

Some of the scratch marks discovered are around six feet long. The most prominent marks are made up of two long parallel furrows with a ridge in the middle, with clear scratch marks appearing across the furrows.

The scrape marks were discovered at four sites in Colorado by a team led by Martin Lockley, a paleontologist at the University of Colorado, Denver. Three of the sites are in western Colorado, and one is in the east of the state.

The largest of the four sites, in western Colorado, features some 60 scrapes on a sandstone surface measuring about 50 meters long and 15 meters wide, according to Sciencemag.

The researchers ruled out the explanations that the dinosaurs could be digging for water, for food or for leaving a scent to mark their territory.

"Could they be digging for water? That seems very unlikely," Lockley said..

"These trace fossils of dinosaurs repeatedly scratching the ground are very likely from courtship behavior," Emory University paleontologist Anthony Martin, who was not involved in the study, told the Monitor in an email.

"Some modern birds do similar scratching when displaying or otherwise trying to attract a mate. Considering that modern birds are descended from Mesozoic theropod dinosaurs, it shouldn't be surprising that birds' ancient relatives would have done this, too."

Peter Falkingham, a paleontologist with Liverpool John Moores University who was not associated with the study, suggested that a direct comparison between the scrapes that modern birds make during mating dances and these dinosaur marks would strengthen the paper.

According to The Guardian, the exact species of dinosaur that may have danced is unknown, but researchers feel that it could be Acrocanthosaurus, a gigantic, ridged-back theropod that lived in the wetlands of western North America in the Cretaceous.
Vietnam accused China for threatening peace in South China Sea after China landed two civilian aircraft in Spratly Islands in South China Sea. The area has been a dispute between China, Vietnam, Philippines and Malaysia.

Channel News Asia reported that Vietnam has issued its second rebuke in a week to Beijing, after more Chinese aircraft landed on a contested reef in the South China Sea. China landed two civilian planes on one of the lands in the Fiery Cross reef in the disputed Spratly Islands, which are claimed by Hanoi but controlled by Beijing.

On Thursday, Vietnam Foreign Ministry make an official announcement regarding Chinese action. Le Hai Binh, the ministry spokesman said in the statement, "The landings are a serious violation of Vietnam's sovereignty and threaten peace and stability in the region."

China News Agency, Xinhua argued that the artifical island with a newly-built airfield is aimed to serve the needs of the great many vessels and seafarers in South China Sea, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. China called the artificial island as Yongshu Jiao and the plane landing was to test its airfield. Both airplane took off from the Meilan Airport of Haikou, capital of Hainan Province.

China also claimed that its sovereignty over the island in Spratly is undisputed and self-evident. Within more than three years, China has built three reclamation islands on the islands for its airbase. The new runway in Yongshu Jiao is a 3,000 meters (10,000 feet) long, which is able to support large aircraft operation.

China insist that its airfield its artificial island is for the safety of vesels traveling South China Sea, and to facilitate search and rescue, disaster prevention and reduction, and research and conservation from a Chinese land base. However many foreign officials and analyst doubted that. Taipei Times reported that the airfield will increase Chinese military presence in the disputed sea and could effectively lead to a Beijing-controlled air defense zone.

Following official complaint from Vietnam, Phillipines is planning to do the same as both countries also have claims on the disputed islands. Philippines Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Charles Jose said, "That's the fear, that China will be able take control of the South China Sea and it will affect the freedom of navigation and freedom of overflight,"

Spratly Islands is called Nansha in Chinese, Philippine called it as Kapuluan ng Kalayaan in Tagalog, or Qua'n da'o Tru'ong Sa in Vietnamese. It covers an archipelago over 425,000 km2 (164,000 sq mi) off-coast Philippine, Malaysia and Vietnam.
Astonished Delhi residents have experienced dense fog on Friday morning with minimum temperature settling at 11.5 degrees Celsius. First fog during the ongoing winter has reportedly fumbled flight operations at Delhi Airport with delays, diversions and flight disruptions across the domestic network.

More than 130 trains have been cancelled and 60 early morning flights have been forced to commence delay because of the fog. A fall of two or three degrees Celsius in minimum temperatures has been predicted to appear over the region from January 9, Thursday. Shallow to moderate fog may occur at isolated places over Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi and west Uttar Pradesh.

The meteorological department has forecast a partly cloudy sky and moderate to dense fog early on Friday morning in Delhi. Very light, isolated drizzles have also been expected in the city today. On January 13, the met office is expecting partly cloudy sky with thundery development reports The Times of India.

The Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA), countrie's busiest one, handles around 900 flights a day and is the lone equipped with CAT IIIB Instrument Landing System. However, between 4 am to 10 am visibility has been recorded around 75 meters and no plane could take off during that period.

The Airport Authority of India (AAI), responsible for controlling air traffic movement at all civil Indian airports has promised to bring the situation under control soon. Facilities in dense fog witnessing airports like Lucknow and Amritsar have been upgraded to CAT II from CAT I Instrument Landing System (ILS).

CAT I ILS guides pilots in landing aircraft in visibility up to 550 meters, while CAT II can afford landing in visibility of up to 350 meters. The Delhi airport is equipped with CAT III- B ILS, which is capable of functioning in visibility up to 50 meters.

The calibration of the ILS has been completed and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation initiated certification for operations. However, visibility at Lucknow, Amritsar, Varanasi and Gaya has reportedly gone below 50 meters due to dense fog, reports The Hindu quoting Dr. R.K. Jenamani, Head of the IGIA Met office.

Up gradation to CAT IIIC instrument landing facility has been demanded by Amber Dubey, Head of Aerospace and Defense Practice at KPMG said. Some operational factors have been cited as the logical reasons for up gradation to CAT IIIC which allows pilot to land in complete blindness, reports Business Standard.

Refreshments have been reportedly served on board and guests kept updated on the status of the flights. Guests have also been offered refunds as per policy and DGCA civil aviation regulations or accommodated on subsequent flights.

The Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) has been compelled pausing air traffic movement for around six hours. Authority's move for upgrading ILS up to CAT IIIB (allows to take of in visibility up to 75 meters) has gone in vein. Met office predicted thundery developments may cease flight operations even for a longer period.
Scientists confirmed that the 125-year-old bottle of Alexander Keith's, an amateur treasure hunter found at the bottom of the Halifax Harbour last year, is in fact beer.

CTV News reported that scuba diver Jon Crouse, who is a worker at a Halifax-area warehouse, found the green glass bottle in a three-meter deep water with its cork still intact. He wondered if the beer is still drinkable, which is why he sought the help of Dalhousie University scientist to test it. Fermentation research specialist Professor Andrew Macintosh found that the contents of the bottle is in fact an Indian pale ale beer.

National Post interviewed MacIntosh, who said that the beer has an odd, meaty flavor. He said the beer smelt like burnt barrel and a bit of sulfur. It had hints of lighter tree fruit taste, as well as a distinct bitterness of a strong ale.

According to Phys Org, Dr. MacIntosh hopes for a science discovery coming from testing the century-old bottle.

He said, "All of the chemicals that make up the beer, whether it's skunky or buttery, all of those have a peculiar chemical that contributes to that flavor. We can identify those, quantify those and it will give us some clues about the raw materials that were used in the production of that beer. They are set up to do that in Scotland with Dr. Spears, so we've taken a sample that we'll be sending to him that's leaving tomorrow [Friday] and between our two analyses we'll be able to paint a complete picture of that beer which we plan to publish."

The scientist said the beer had the same characteristics with the present Alexander Keith's, with a 4.3 acidity on the pH scale. This is notable since beers are usually ranges from four to five. Using the International Bitterness Units scale, the beer registered 15, which is higher than most industrial. Mass-produced lagers.
Oracle billionaire Larry Ellison sold a controlling interest of his Hawaiian budget airline Island Air.

Business Insider reported that Island Air offers affordable flights for people traveling the Islands of Oahu, Maui, and Lanai. Ellison bought Lanai in 2012 with the plan to turn it into an archetype of sustainable living, vacationing, and agriculture. Since then, he has renovated hotels and resorts in the island. He bought the second best inter-island carrier to bring more visitors into the island.

Reports of the sale was first reported in Hawaii News Now last week. It reported that Ellison rejected bids from Hawaiian CEOs Bruce Nobles and Paul Casey. Airline industry historian Peter Forman said, "I'm not surprised that Larry Ellison's people would be considering selling Island Air because their strategy did not work."

According to the report the carrier lost some $40 million since its 2013 acquisition by Ellison.

Meanwhile Biz Journals wrote that Ellison's Ohana Airline Holdings LLC will sell a controlling interest of Island Air to investment funds PaCap Aviation Finance LLC and Malama Investments LLC, which are both run by venture capital investment company PacifiCap. The US Department of Transportation is yet to give regulatory approval to the sale.

"We are thrilled with the opportunity to partner with Mr. Ellison and his team to create a strong second airline for Hawaii," said PacifiCap founder and managing director Jeffrey Au. "Like Hawaii itself, we may not be big, but we can be great. We believe that having local owners and managers will allow us to provide the kind of reliability, seat availability and service that our fellow kamaaina deserve."

Ohana Airline Holdings will still have a non-controlling interest in the airline and will work with the new owners for future expansions. Island Air will have a transition team that consists of CEO Dave Pflieger, its executive Les Murashige, and Au.
The U.S. Transportation Department fined the United Airlines $2.75 million for violating rules that protect disabled passengers and rules governing tarmac delays.

According to the International Business Times, the second largest US carrier acknowledged the fine and promised to enhance infrastructure for passengers with disability. The Department of Transportation (DOT) received a lot of complaints last year on mistreatment of passengers with disability.

One of the major incidents that caught the public's eye involves a passenger suffering cerebral palsy who was forced to crawl out of the flight in October, since the crew didn't provide a wheelchair for the person.

"It is our duty to ensure that travelers with disabilities have access to the services they need, and that when significant tarmac delays happen, travelers are not left on the plane. We will make sure that airlines comply with our rules and treat their passengers fairly," said US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx.

Daily News reported that the airline also violated a rule that should let passengers deplane due to a tarmac delay of not less than three hours on domestic flights in the US.

This happened during December 2013 and May 2015 when the airline faced severe weather. A United Continental Holdings Inc spokesman said, "We remain committed to fully meeting all (Transportation department) rules - particularly during difficult operating conditions."

USA Today reported that United gets a million requests for wheelchair assistance every year. According to the airlines, it strives to provide the best service possible, but passengers are now asking for better treatment.

The airline said in a blog post, "We want you to know that providing convenient, comfortable and flyer-friendly service to all of our customers is one of our top priorities."

United isn't the only airline that committed such violations. Rival Southwest Airlines Co was also fined with $1.6 million back in 2015 for violating the tarmac-delay rule. US Airways, which is now part of the American Airlines Group Inc, was also fined with $1.2 million in 2013 for providing inadequate wheelchairs.
It's the new year and McDonald's is adapting a new look, giving its packaging a colorful makeover and letting go of the familiar gold, red and white colors with Passionate Purple, Optimistic Orange and Magical Magenta to name a few.

AD Age reported that the giant food chain updated its iconic Golden Arches with overhauled takeout bags, boxes and cups that have bright letterings.

This bright new face has a long list of people to thank for since the company has hired seven creative people from seven agencies, who were then sent to London Shoreditch to brainstorm for a week. The objective was to come up with packaging designs that will work with McDonald's updated designs.

Matt Biespiel, McDonald's Global Marketing senior director, said in a statement that McDonald's cater to 69 million visitors a day and that this new packaging "will be a noticeable change." He also added "It was fun to join these ideas together and create playful pieces that connect our customers to the Brand."

According to ABC News, the new look will now be distributed to the 36,000 branches all over the world throughout 2016. "McDonald's is a fun and modern brand and this was a progressive way to turn our packaging into art and support a community where fashion is an expression," Biespiel said.

The Business Insider writes that McDonald's packaging has been white since 2013, but with the new design the packaging finally looks busy. These new packages will also come from certified or recycled sources as McDonald's has a goal of sourcing 100% of it from them by 2020. By the end of 2014, the company already reached 27% of that goal.

To add hype to the launching, the company has asked two students from the University of Miami to create a "couture collection" out of the new packaging. The collection produced within 48 hours included one sun hat, four handbags, a pair of straw-spiked shoes, and one backpack.
UK government issued new alcohol consumption guidelines further lowering recommended drinking levels as it found that there is no safe level of drinking.

BBC News reported that UK's chief medical officers found out that any amount of alcohol can lead to increase in cancer risk. For health reasons, the new guidelines cut alcohol consumption limit to no more than only 14 units per week for both men and women. That is equivalent to seven glasses of wine or six pints of beer.

Meanwhile, pregnant women are advised not to take any alcohol consumption at all. The guideline also states that people should drink moderately, leaving certain days alcohol-free. It is also not recommended for people to save up their units and consume them in just one session, since heavy drinking leads to accidents and injuries.

The Irish Times wrote that the previous guideline, which was issued in 1995, states that alcohol consumption for men should be 21, while women could only have 14. England Chief Medical Officer Sally Davies said, "Drinking any level of alcohol regularly carries a health risk for anyone, but if men and women limit their intake to no more than 14 units a week it keeps the risk of illness like cancer and liver disease low."

According to The Independent, the Committee on Carcinogenicity (COC) stretches further with evidence revealing that drinking a glass of red wine has no significant medical benefits. COC said that people who don't drink significantly lower their risk for cancer, compared to those who do. Meanwhile, those who quit drinking will take years before their risk for cancer gets to a significantly low level.

This is the first full review on alcohol consumption guidelines since 20 years ago. This is a subtle shift from the past guidelines among men and women in England and Wales, as well as Northern Ireland.
Y Combinator, Silicon Valley's largest startup factory, is going through rearrangement of responsibilities at the executive level due to absorption of larger manpower. In a major reshuffle, Gmail creator, Paul Buchheit replaces Sam Altman as managing partner of Y Combinator's main accelerator program.

The acceleration program has reportedly helped launching companies like Airbnb, Dropbox, Reddit and Stripe. Y Combinator has grown a lot under the leadership of Sam Altman, appointed president around two years back.

Paul Buchheit, Gmail creator and founder of FriendFeed has joined Y Combinator a little more than five years ago. He replaces Altman as managing partner of the core YC program, which admits hundreds of startups every year and whips them into shape for other investors, reports Tech Crunch.

Through the inception of new managing partner, Y Combinator starts rolling through Alphabet moments. Google has reshaped its corporate structure to represent image of something more than search engine during last August. Without changing Google, other side projects like life sciences and cars have spun out into their own sections under its parent company, Alphabet.

Alongside, Altman has been reported to expand Y Combinator's scope. The acknowledged accelerator has announced inauguration of a venture capital fund, naming YC Continuity Fund, to continue funding startups. Outside of the main accelerator program, it also created a new YC Fellowship slot for smaller teams with even earlier stage startups, according to a report published in the Business Insider.

Y Combinator, expanded beyond its core program, has now been spread out into five major groups. Altman will run the research lab himself until they find someone new. But otherwise each new managing partner representing each major hub is a deputy of Altman who will continue to oversee the entire program.

Gmail innovator Paul Buchheit will now run the core accelerator with Altman still advising the startups. Kevin Hale, creator of one Y Combinator's earliest funded startups Wufuu, now will lead the fellowship program. For the full list of assigned and related assignments, has been furnished in Altman's post.

The accelerator has backed more than 800 companies that have a combined valuation of $30 billion since its inception in 2005. The accelerator program invests about $120,000 in each of the 85 or so startups it accepts twice a year. Although the accelerator's membership is comprised mostly of software companies, Y Combinator has begun formally wooing hardware and biotech startups last year, reports Bloomberg magazine, also a Y Combinator startup investor.

Y Combinator, Silicon Valley's largest known accelerator for business start ups has been spitted into five hubs followed by its unbelievable growth recorded during the last 2 years. During this period, under the leadership of the sworn in President Sam Altman, the accelerator has backed a huge number of enterprises. Gmail innovator Paul Buchheit is all set to flagship voyages under advisory supervisions from his predecessor.
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CAMARILLO

Harassment seminar planned

Employment law firm LightGabler LLP will present a seminar on "Sexual Harassment Prevention Training for Supervisors" from 7:30-9:30 a.m. Jan. 19.

The seminar will take place at LightGabler, 760 Paseo Camarillo, Suite 300.

California law requires companies with 50 or more employees provide their supervisors with at least two hours of interactive sexual harassment prevention training every two years. New supervisors must be trained within six months of starting their supervisory position.

LightGabler employment attorney Ryan Haws will conduct the training program. Attendees will receive a training acknowledgment form to sign and return to their employers acknowledging they have completed the program. The training program is also open to supervisors at companies with less than 50 employees.

The cost is $50 per person and is limited to four attendees per company. For larger groups, contact Jody Kirschbrown at 248-7033 to schedule an in-house session.

Reservations for the seminar are required and can be made by contacting Kristine Chatari at 248-7089.

SANTA BARBARA

Yardi Systems story to be told

Executives with Yardi Systems will tell the story of the global real estate software firm at the California Lutheran University Corporate Leaders Breakfast slated for Jan. 21 at Fess Parker's Doubletree Resort in Santa Barbara.

Founder and President Anant Yardi and Executive Vice President Gordon Morrell will present "Innovation, Progress, Stability: The Yardi Story" from 8-9 a.m. Networking and breakfast will begin at 7:30 a.m.

In 1982, Yardi recognized the need for an integrated accounting and property management software for the residential market. In 1984, Yardi created Basic Property Management for the Apple II computer and sold it to the company's first customer, Sabaco Realtors. Since that time, Yardi has directed his Santa Barbara-based company through more than 30 years of steady growth as it became a leader in real estate asset and property management solutions.

Morrell joined Yardi Systems in 1990. As executive vice president, he protects the company's corporate and fiscal interests and oversees day-to-day operations. Yardi Systems has more than 4,000 employees and 35 offices worldwide.

The Corporate Leaders Breakfast Series brings members of the business and civic communities together to share ideas and hear from prominent leaders in the region. The 2015-2016 series will continue with a report by Gold Coast Veterans Foundation President Ronald Greenwood on March 4 at the Ventura Beach Marriott and a panel discussion on cybersecurity on May 3 at Cal Lutheran's Lundring Events Center in Thousand Oaks.

Reservations are requested by Friday. To RSVP, contact Sharon Nelson at smnelso@callutheran.edu or 493-3150. For more information, go to http://CalLutheran.edu/clb.

THOUSAND OAKS

Senior Concerns to present seminar

Senior Concerns will present a seminar on UberASSIST and UberWAV, two new on-demand transportation services offered by Uber Technologies Inc. to help meet the need for private, door-to-door transportation options for seniors and family caregivers in Ventura County.

The seminar will take place at 5:30 p.m. Jan. 19 at Senior Concerns, 401 Hodencamp Road.

UberASSIST is designed to provide additional assistance to seniors and people with disabilities. Driver-partners with UberASSIST are trained by Open Doors Organization to assist riders into vehicles and can accommodate folding wheelchairs, walkers and scooters. UberWAV connects riders with vehicles that are equipped with ramps or lifts. Both services are available to riders in Ventura County through the Uber app, which can be downloaded for free via iTunes store or Google Play.

Light refreshments will be served. Reservations are requested and can be made by calling 497-0189.

VENTURA

Law update seminar set

Myers, Widders, Gibson, Jones & Feingold LLP will present the 2016 annual Employment Law Update seminar on Jan. 19 at the Wedgewood Banquet Center, 5800 Olivas Park Drive.

Check-in will be from 7:45-8 a.m., program from 8-9 a.m. and question-and-answer session from 9-9:30 a.m.

The presenters will be Steven Lee and James Perero.

The seminar will focus on several important topics in employment law and human resources management, including: paid sick leave law amendments, Fair Pay Act, disability and religious accommodations, GPS monitoring of employees, whistleblower protections and more.

There is no charge. Continental breakfast and handouts are included.

Reservations are required. Call Samantha Balchum at 644-7188 or email sbalchum@mwgjlaw.com to reserve your spot.

VENTURA COUNTY

Employment firm to offer seminar

Employment law firm LightGabler LLP will present a free employment law seminar, "Still Crazy After All These Years  The 2016 Employment Law Update!"

The seminar will be held twice: Tuesday in Oxnard and Jan. 26 in Simi Valley.

Attorney Karen Gabler will discuss how new 2016 employment laws will impact businesses and will provide key employment tips arising out of cases and administrative matters decided in 2015.

Topics include revised regulations under the California Family Rights Act, the AB 304 sick leave bill, Private Attorneys General Act limitations on curing pay stub deficiencies, expansion of gender wage equality rules and other new laws and legislation for 2016.

The Oxnard seminar will be held at Oxnard Courtyard Marriott, 600 East Esplanade Drive and the Simi Valley seminar will take place at Best Western Posada Royale Hotel, 1775 Madera Road. Both seminars are from 7:30-9 a.m. A continental breakfast will be served.

Reservations are required at least 24 hours in advance. To make a reservation, call 248-7089 or email seminars@lightgablerlaw.com. Indicate which seminar you will attend.

To share news about your company or business-related organization, email dajustesen@VCStar.com. If there is an event involved, please email the information at least three weeks in advance of the event.
Sandra Sunken

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Grab your fluorescent highlighters and pick a color that you like. It's time to mark important tax due dates on your 2016 calendar.

Jan. 15: Due date for the fourth and final installment of 2015 estimated tax for individuals (unless you file your 2015 return and pay any balance due by February 1).

Feb. 1: Employers must furnish 2015 W-2 statements to employees. Payers must furnish 1099 information statements to payees. (The deadline for Form 1099-B and consolidated statements is Feb. 16.)

Feb. 1: Employers must generally file 2015 federal unemployment tax returns and pay any tax due.

Feb. 29: Payers must file information returns (except Forms 1095-B and 1095-C) with the IRS. (March 31 is the deadline if filing electronically.)

Feb. 29: Employers must send W-2 copies to the Social Security Administration. (March 31 is the deadline if filing electronically.)

March 15: 2015 calendar-year corporation income tax returns are due.

March 15: Deadline for calendar-year corporations to elect S corporation status for 2016.

March 31: Large employers must furnish Form 1095-C to employees.

April 18*: Individual federal income tax returns and annual gift tax returns for 2015 are due unless you file for an automatic extension. Taxes are due regardless of extension.

April 18*: 2015 federal partnership returns are due.

April 18: First installment of 2016 individual estimated tax is due.

May 31: Payers must file Forms 1095-B and 1095-C with the IRS. (June 30 is the deadline if filing electronically.)

June 15: Second installment of 2016 individual estimated tax is due.

Sept. 15: Third installment of 2016 individual estimated tax is due.

Oct. 17: Deadline for filing your 2015 individual tax return if you filed for an extension of the April 18 deadline.

*April 19 for taxpayers in Maine and Massachusetts.

Sandra Sunken is principal of Sunken Accountancy Corp. in Ventura.
Andreas Scheuer, the secretary-general of the Christian Social Union in Bavaria (the Christian Democrats sister party), tweeted , It is unbearable that in major German cities, women are sexually assaulted and robbed in the street by young migrants  as if attacks by old Germans were somehow more bearable. For U.S. presidential hopeful Donald Trump, the attacks provided racist fodder for his Twitter refrains .

Chancellor Angela Merkels Christian Democrats are directing energies to expand social control and harden asylum policies  a very rare moment of mainstream political activation around sexual assault. Meanwhile, right-wing voices  not known for their concern for rape victims  are gurgling with putrid anti-refugee sentiment in Germany and beyond.

Its predictable statement reveals the ill-thought debate around the Cologne attacks, which has little to do with protecting women and more to do with scapegoating the Middle Eastern or North African other entering Germany. The response should instead focus on tackling the patriarchal context from which such violations against womens bodies systematically spring, as well as caring for victims.

The response, the party contends, should take a specific shape. According to the draft proposal, refugees convicted of a crime would immediately lose their claim to asylum, it would be easier for police to take allegedly suspicious individuals into custody, dragnet spying would expand, and more surveillance cameras would be installed.

In Colognes city center, scores of women were sexually assaulted and mugged as crowds gathered to ring in the new year. Thirty-one suspects have since been identified by police, at least 18 of whom are asylum seekers , and a draft announcement from Germanys governing Christian Democratic Union, to be released Sunday, stated that the attacks demand a strong response from the authorities.

This week German magazine Focus ran a cover story on the attacks with a darkly metonymic image: A white naked woman stands alluringly in monochrome, her pale skin stamped  literally besmirched  with handprints of black paint. But it was the German magazine, not a random refugee, who stripped the woman of her clothes. Germans responses the terrible events of New Years Eve should not collapse into racist machinations as archaic as the tale of Shakespeares Othello.

It bears mentioning, however obvious, that to stigmatize all refugees on the basis of the actions of a few is pernicious. Its an extrapolation that is the very definition of racism. One million refugees entered Germany last year, in Europes largest movement of refugees since World War II, and to suggest that this entire group is a threat to women in Germany reproduces the worst stereotype of the invading, barbarous moor  a centuries-old trope that has long fostered discrimination without providing any traceable safety for the women it purports to protect.

We should be suspicious of any people keen to point out the links between Islam and misogyny if they are not equally concerned with the prevailing violent misogynies in the cultural West.

Treating rape as a problem imported from the Middle East and North Africa that can be deported along with refugees grossly ignores and normalizes an already ubiquitous rape culture. Swiss newspaper Neue Zuercher Zeitung warned this week of an imported macho culture arriving on German soil with the refugees. The insinuation that Europe does not already have a well-worn macho culture or macho cultures of its own is nothing short of an offense to feminism. Most assaults, after all, take place in German homes: Marital rape was still legal in Germany until 1997.

This is not to say the attacks on New Years Eve are not deadly serious. A large number of contemporaneous assaults demand an investigation into whether and how each attack is connected; if there is a connection rooted in certain cultural or societal mores, it should not be dismissed. Currently, details about the attacks remain scarce. We know that at least 18 asylum seekers are suspects and that victims described the perpetrators as looking North African or Arabic  which are broad strokes. And needless to say, most people in Germany of that description are not seeking asylum.

In opposing the rights racism, we must be able to countenance that a group of refugees could be responsible for the assaults and that these individuals should not be defended. We engage in our own subtle racism if, in defending the rights of refugees in general, we collapse them all into a homogeneous category, because all racism is predicated on treated an entire group of people as an undifferentiated mass. The key is to take these assaults seriously on their own terms and as part of a generalized scourge of sexual harassment and assault, which is not fought by picking out specific ethnic groups. Whats more, we should be suspicious of any people so keen to point out the links between Islamic culture and misogyny if they are not equally concerned with the prevailing violent misogynies in the cultural West.

The key challenge, according Spiegel columnist Sascha Lobo, is differentiation. To be civilized means to meet nine people in a row with black hair who all turn out to be assholes and then to meet a tenth black-haired person and not punch that one in the face, he wrote. Thankfully, a number of groups are championing that approach. Kristina Erichsen-Kruse of Weisser Ring, a support organization for victims of crime (not only sexual assault), said, We worry that after these events, refugees will be unjustly in focus. These generalizations shouldnt happen.

On Saturday, numerous organizations are calling for a protest under the banner No to sexual violence, no to racism and explicitly rallying against right-wing nationalist political parties such as PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West). Maja Wegener of Terre de Femmes, a womens rights nonprofit, told us that sexism and sexual assaults existed before New Years Eve, especially at events like Oktoberfest and other festivals. But theres no public debate.

Some European nations have taken a specific approach to educate newly arrived male refugees. Norway offers new classes in which sexual norms and related laws are taught to men more accustomed to conservative values. They teach that types of violence perhaps considered honorable in certain spaces are illegal and disrespectful in Norway. Similar classes are being proposed in Denmark. It is, prima facie, preferable to educate in an effort toward integration, as opposed to scapegoating and rejecting. It would be far better still if these anti-rape, respect for women classes were standardized across Europe, offered not just to new and feared brown-skinned arrivals. Men everywhere are in desperate need of such lessons.
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO/MENDOCINO FARMS Inspired by Elvis Presley, the PB3 sandwich available Jan. 8-15 at Mendocino Farms in Thousand Oaks and beyond is made with peanut butter, caramelized bananas, applewood-smoked bacon, honey-roasted almonds and green apples.

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By Lisa McKinnon

Eat like The King in Thousand Oaks. Toast the impending departure of Peirano's in Ventura. Grab a free slice of pizza in Simi Valley. Yep, there's plenty to do, see and taste in and around Ventura County this weekend.

1). EAT LIKE THE KING

Celebrate what would have been Elvis Presley's 81st birthday Friday by chowing down on the hunka hunka sandwich that is the PB3, available for a limited time at Mendocino Farms in Thousand Oaks.

Billed as a "modern take" on Presley's beloved peanut butter, banana and bacon sandwich, the PB3 adds honey-roasted almonds and sliced green apples to the mix. The bananas are caramelized, the bacon is applewood smoked and the bread is ciabatta, all pressed together on a panini grill.

Don't get all shook up: the PB3 ($8.95) will stay on the restaurant's menu Friday through Jan. 15. (966 S. Westlake Blvd., Thousand Oaks, 805-379-9055, http://mendocinofarms.com).

2). GET IT WHILE YOU CAN



Roughly four years after changing hands, Peirano's Restaurant in downtown Ventura has announced plans to close on Jan. 24 -- which means you're running out of time to try its Mediterranean-inspired menu in general and its "lamburger" in particular. The latter features ground lamb and feta in a pita with cucumbers, sumac, onions and yogurt. Lunch, dinner and cocktail service will continue from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays. (204 E. Main St., 805-648-4853, http://www.peiranos.com).

3). LOOK SHARP

Take your kitchen routine up a notch by attending "Knife Skills 101," the first cooking class offered by VACE  aka Ventura Adult and Continuing Education  in the New Year.

The by-reservation-only class led by culinary arts coordinator Pat Doler will take place from 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday in the culinary arts kitchens at Ventura High School. Can't make it (or didn't register in time)? Consider signing up for one of these upcoming sessions taught by Amy Tyrrell: "Healthy Eating," Jan. 16; "Mexican Cuisine," Jan. 23; "Love Me Tender," Jan. 30 and "Sweetheart's Dinner," Feb. 6.

Classes are $85 each, or $225 for three. (805-289-7925, ext. 1014, http://www.adultedventura.edu/programs)

4). CHILL

Known for its grab-and-go or stay-and-enjoy pastries, sandwiches and cups of Stumptown Coffee Roasters coffee, Stir is one of the more casual dining spots at the Four Seasons Hotel Westlake Village.

Did we mention that it also has gelato?

And did we mention that, during Gelato Happy Hour from 4 to 5 p.m. every Saturday and Sunday, a buy-one, get-one-free offer is in place? Bring a friend. Or not. (2 Dole Drive, 818-575-3000, http://www.fourseasons.com/westlakevillage)

5). EAT FREE PIZZA

The East Coast Pizza Company in Simi Valley will celebrate its sixth anniversary with gifts for the restaurant's patrons: free slices of cheese pizza from 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday. Owners Neil and Ashley Felder also plan to give away prizes ranging from T-shirts to a big screen TV to pizza for a year.

"The support from not only Simi Valley but also Moorpark, Thousand Oaks and even the San Fernando Valley has been great and continues to expand every year," Neil Felder said in a media release. (2667 Tapo Canyon Road, 805-520-3500, http://theeastcoastpizzacompany.com).

Lisa McKinnon is a staff writer for The Star. Her Cafe Society column appears in the Sunday Life section and Fridays in the Time Out section. For between-column updates, follow 805foodie on Twitter and Instagram and "like" the Facebook page VCS Eats. Please send email to lisa.mckinnon@vcstar.com.
RICHARD QUINN/SPECIAL TO THE STAR John Wheir dumps coffee out of his roaster at Beacon Coffee in Ventura. Wheir and his wife, Jennifer Wheir, are opening a second location in Ojai.

Lisa McKinnon Columnist SHARE RICHARD QUINN/SPECIAL TO THE STAR Jennifer and John Wheir are the owners of Beacon Coffee in Ventura. Fresh from a re-branding effort that includes a new logo and redesigned bags, the Wheirs are focusing on opening a second location this spring in Ojai. RICHARD QUINN/SPECIAL TO THE STAR Freshly roasted coffee beans are seen at Beacon Coffee in Ventura. RICHARD QUINN/SPECIAL TO THE STAR Jennifer Wheir, co-owner of Beacon Coffee in Ventura with husband John Wheir, weighs out different coffee beans to make Beacons espresso blend. The Wheirs are preparing to open a second location this spring in Ojai. LISA MCKINNON/THE STAR Vacant since April, Carrows in Ojai will reopen this spring with a second Beacon Coffee site as one of its two tenants.

Nine months after four of the six existing Carrows and Coco's Bakery & Restaurant sites in Ventura County closed in a sudden, pre-Easter massacre caused by a change of corporate ownership, here's what's happening at three of them:

Not much.

The weeds were mowed recently at the former Coco's in Ventura. Three pies and a partial cheesecake abandoned in the display case at the old Carrows in Oxnard have long since been removed (thank goodness!). And the parking lot at the vacant Coco's in Camarillo has been fenced off for temporary use as overflow space for a neighboring car dealership.

But it's a different story at the Carrows building in Ojai (211 W. Ojai Ave.), where pull-down shades in the windows conceal but can't quite hide the activity percolating inside: John and Jennifer Wheir of Beacon Coffee in Ventura are turning the building  or most of it  into a second location.

"We've been looking to put a cafe in Ojai for a long time. We want to do business in the town where we live and have the community involvement that comes from that," said John. "And, of course, it's an honor to be in the same neighborhood as (Ojai Vineyard winemaker) Adam Tolmach."

Slated to open this spring, the Ojai version of Beacon Coffee will serve the same menu of espressos, lavender mochas and cold-brew-on-tap beverages (along with bags of whole-bean coffees) available at the original site in a business park at Bunsen Avenue and Olivas Park Drive.

The Ventura site will remain open as both a coffeehouse and Beacon's roasting plant.

But at more than twice the size, and with a commercial kitchen on the premises, the Ojai location will also offer house-made nut milks, tropical juices made with locally grown fruit, and sweet and savory pastries and other baked goods produced on the premises by a baker to be named at a later date.

"We won't be scrambling eggs and flipping pancakes; the flat-top grills are gone. But we do plan to bring back our coffee-pairing dinners," said Jennifer.

Part of the kitchen will be portioned off and designated gluten-free for use by Alexis Davis, whose gluten-free and vegan baked goods already appear at Farmer and the Cook in Meiners Oaks and Lazy Acres Market in Santa Barbara.

When Beacon opened at the Ventura business park in 2010, the intention was to focus on wholesale accounts, John said. Instead, the Wheirs found themselves falling in love again with face-to-face interactions with retail customers, a side of the hospitality business with which they both have experience in Ventura County and New England.

They were approached about the Carrows building by its new owner, restaurateur Warner Ebbink, who with business and creative partner chef Brandon Boudet also owns Little Dom's, 101 Coffee Shop and MiniBar in Los Angeles. Both men have homes in Ojai, where opening a restaurant in a building that includes a newly vacant ceramics studio is just one item on their culinary to-do list.

Ebbink envisioned dividing Carrows into two spaces, and initially suggested that the Wheirs consider a roughly 1,200-square-foot section that includes the former restaurant's banquet room.

But with visions of pop-up dinners and expanded cold-brew production dancing in their heads, the Wheirs opted instead for the 3,800-square-foot section to the right of the vestibule just inside the front door.

They will furnish it with benches, shelves and one long community table created from salvaged wood by Ojai craftsman Josh Mariani. Floor lamps and comfy chairs will help create conversation nooks, Jennifer said.

A retail area will be stocked with hand-thrown ceramic mugs, coffee-brewing equipment, and bags of coffees roasted by the Wheirs using single-estate beans sourced during their travels to Guatemala and Costa Rica.

The banquet room space to the left of the front door is expected to be occupied by a high-end crafts store operated by a couple with ties to the fashion and graphic design industries, the Wheirs said. On the first Sunday of the New Year, construction workers could be seen  and heard  installing drywall at the future shop.

This Sunday, the Wheirs plan to make some noise of their own with the arrival of a volunteer demolition crew. The plan is to peel away the carpet and floor tiles to reveal the cement underneath.

"All our friends are looking forward to blowing off some post-holiday steam," said Jennifer. "Everyone wants to be part of this next step for us."

A restaurant-supply company already has hauled away the old banquettes, but not before Jennifer unearthed something hidden in the upholstery: a credit card that expired in 1986.

"Who knows what other treasures we'll find?" she said with a laugh.

In the meantime: Hours at the Ventura location are 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Mondays through Fridays and 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays (5777 Olivas Park Drive, Suite R, 805-248-7054, http://www.beaconcoffee.com).

CLOSING NUMBERS

A gala New Year's Eve party with music by Abri van Straten marked the final day of business for Limon Latin Grill at its original location in the Simi Valley Town Center  but the restaurant isn't down for the count.

"We came to the end of our lease, and someone else is coming to that space," said Shabby Tavakoli, whose brother, Ron Tavakoli, opened the restaurant at Suite 695 in 2006.

"We love Simi Valley and hope to be in the mall in the future," she added, noting that, while Limon has been offered a prime spot near the movie theaters, financing the creation of a new restaurant at that location is a work in progress.

"My goal is to open a tapas bar-and-grill version of Limon there," Tavakoli said. "I remain optimistic."

But the Whale's Tail Restaurant appears to have come to the end of its run at 3950 Bluefin Circle Oxnard's Channel Islands Harbor. Opened under that name in the early 1980s by Michael Koutnik, the waterside restaurant fell on hard times in recent years and in 2015 was taken over by the Ventura County Harbor Department.

EB Restaurant Consultants of Los Angeles was brought in to manage the Whale's Tail, but the company's current role with the property is unclear.

The permit to operate an "independently operated food area" at the restaurant was briefly suspended in December by the Ventura County Environmental Health Division, which cited the location for having an inoperable hand-wash sink and unsanitary conditions. Signs reading "We are temporarily closed for repairs" were posted on the restaurant's doors before New Year's Eve. Its phone was still in service as of Jan. 8, but calls during the business hours listed on its website go unanswered.

Ken Simons of NAI Capital, the real estate firm hired by the harbor department to lease the property, said last week that it had not changed hands or been leased. Calls to the harbor department for comment were not returned.

COMING ATTRACTIONS

Applebee's Neighborhood Bar & Grill is returning to Simi Valley and Ventura, seven years after a previous franchisee closed both locations within days of each other. A new franchisee, Apple American Group LLC, is remodeling the former Seahorse Buffet in Simi Valley (2022 First St.) and has filed plans with the city of Ventura that call for demolishing the vacant Iron Horse Bar & Grill to clear the way for a new building (4722 Telephone Road). Both restaurants are slated to open in late 2016.

CONGRATULATIONS ARE IN ORDER

The January edition of the Rancho Ventavo Cellars newsletter contained some happy but surprising news when it popped up in email in boxes on New Year's Day.

"Well, after 40 years of being partners, we tied the knot on Nov. 30," wrote winery co-founder Faye Hawes, slipping news of her marriage to winemaker George Gilpatrick into the ninth paragraph.

Inspired by the 40th anniversary of the day the couple met, the ceremony took place at the Ventura County Government Center with "kids and grandkids" in attendance," Hawes said.

She and Gilpatrick launched Rancho Ventavo Cellars 11 years ago.

Visitors to the label's tasting room in Oxnard's Heritage Square can choose between two flights ($10 each). A collection of five different red varietals is always available; the second option alternates between a library flight of older vintages or a vertical flight of the same wine over five years.

Tasting room hours are noon to 5 p.m. Fridays through Sundays (741 South A St., 805-483-8084, http://www.rvcellars.com).

Lisa McKinnon is a staff writer for The Star. Her Cafe Society column also appears Fridays in the Time Out section. For between-column updates, follow 805foodie on Twitter and Instagram and "like" the Facebook page VCS Eats. Please send email to lisa.mckinnon@vcstar.com.
Star File Ojai City Hall

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Ojai residents will have the chance to weigh in Saturday on efforts to define how different neighborhoods in the city should look.

City officials and consultants with Sargent Town Planning will be at the meeting to present ideas and answer questions from the public about the neighborhood planning process, which launched last year.

The meeting will be held from 9 a.m. to noon in the Boyd Center at Sarzotti Park, 510 Park Road, Ojai. It's the second in a series of three public meetings on the issue.

The Ojai City Council hired Sargent Town Planning in November 2014 for $50,000 to assess Ojai's neighborhood planning needs. The goal is come up with standards for streets and front yards that reflect the distinct character of each Ojai neighborhood. These standards would guide future development, public works projects and rules related to screening elements, such as walls, fences and hedges.

"Like a lot of cities we kind of have one-size-fits-all zoning," said City Manager Robert Clark. "The reality is the character of each neighborhood is a little bit different and sometimes its zoning isn't really a very good fit for a particular neighborhood, maybe because it's been built in the past and modern zoning standards don't quite fit it so well."

Clark said he expects the final guidelines to reach the City Council within the next six months.
STAR FILE PHOTO

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By Staff Reports

A lane of southbound Oxnard Boulevard remained closed from Citrus Grove Lane to West Gonzales Road Friday due to a sinkhole, Oxnard police said.

All southbound lanes were initially closed about 6 p.m. after a semi truck drove through the far right lane, sunk and became stuck, officials said. An underground pipe broke, causing a small sinkhole, police said.

The far right lane remained closed about 10:45 p.m. but the other lanes have reopened, authorities said. City maintenance crews were working to repair the damage, police said.
A man shot dead in front of a police station is searched by an anti-explosive robot on Jan 7, 2016 in Paris. (Photo: AFP/New York Times/Anna Polonyi)

PARIS: The man shot dead by police after trying to storm a Paris police station brandishing a meat cleaver appears to have been identified by his family, a source close to the investigation said Friday (Jan 8).

The man, who attacked the police station on Thursday wearing a fake suicide vest, was said to be a Tunisian named Tarek Belgacem.

He was killed by officers as he ran towards the entrance of the police station shouting "Allahu Akbar" ("God is greatest"), exactly a year to the day since the massacre of journalists at the Charlie Hebdo newspaper.

Based on his fingerprints, police initially identified him as Sallah Ali, born in 1995 in Casablanca, a homeless man who was arrested for theft in 2013.

But Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said Friday that the identity he gave was "not at all certain" since he was carrying no documents at the time of his arrest.

"This identity (he gave in 2013) is contradicted by a hand-written note that we found in his clothes," Molins told France Inter radio. "He is not known to the intelligence services under this name."

Investigation sources told AFP that individuals claiming to be the parents and cousin of Belgacem have identified him from his photo.

"There is therefore a very strong indication that it is him, but it is still to early to speak of a formal identification," the source said.

Molins said the man was carrying a mobile phone with a German SIM card, with French media saying it contained several messages in Arabic, some of which were sent from Germany.

His note was written in Arabic with a hand-drawn flag of the Islamic State group (IS).

The police station is in the 18th district of Paris, an area with a mainly North African population close to the tourist hotspot of Montmartre.

Describing the attack, an investigation source said the man pulled the cleaver from his inside coat pocket as he ran towards the officers. He "did not heed the warnings, and police opened fire".

The attacker was also wearing a pouch under his coat with a wire hanging from it, but the device "contained no explosives," the source told AFP.

A remote-controlled robot was also used to inspect the body for explosives.

MILITANTS SENTENCED

A source close to the investigation said Thursday's attacker had pledged allegiance to IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in the documents found on his body, and justified the attack as revenge for French bombings in Syria.

Justice Minister Christiane Taubira confirmed the suspect was not on the radar of counter-terrorism police.

"From what is known of this person, there was no link to violent radicalisation whatsoever," Taubira said on Thursday.

More than 1,000 French citizens have left to fight with militants, and the government has tried to deter more from leaving with stiff prison sentences.

On Friday, a French court handed two men six and 10 years in prison prison for travelling to join IS in Syria, one of whom was sentenced in absentia.

The ruling came a day after a Paris court handed a 15-year sentence - also in absentia - to key French IS member Salim Benghalem, who had ties to the Charlie Hebdo attackers.

Thursday's drama unfolded just moments after President Francois Hollande concluded a sombre speech at police headquarters to mark the anniversary of the attack on the Paris office of satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo on January 7, 2015.

Rocker Johnny Hallyday will perform at a concert in Paris on Sunday to mark a year since 1.6 million people gathered in the capital in support of freedom of expression following the deaths of Charlie Hebdo's best-known cartoonists.

With France still grieving after the massacre of 130 people by militants in Paris in November - also claiming vengeance for France's role in Syria - Hollande used his speech to call for greater cooperation between the security services.

Since the attack on Charlie Hebdo, nearly 200 people in France had been placed under travel restrictions to prevent them joining up with IS in Syria or Iraq, Hollande said.
Cologne's police chief Wolfgang Albers. (Photo: AFP/Henning Kaiser)

BERLIN: The police chief of the German city of Cologne was suspended on Friday (Jan 8) for failing to stop mob violence at New Year's Eve celebrations, as authorities said many suspects were asylum seekers.

Unsettled by a record refugee influx, Germany has reacted with shock to news that women had to run a gauntlet of groping, lewd insults and thefts in an aggressive and drunken crush of around 1,000 men, described by witnesses as mostly of Arab and North African appearance.

Cologne's police chief Wolfgang Albers, 60, was suspended from active duty in order to "restore public confidence" in the police force, said Ralf Jaeger, interior minister of North Rhine-Westphalia state.

Albers had come under intense pressure - both for failing to stop the attacks, and for downplaying the true extent of the chaos, which only hit national headlines four days later.

Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere had fumed that "police cannot work this way".

Having initially reported a "peaceful" night, Cologne police were slow to unveil the true extent of the carnage, as well as the politically charged fact that the hostile crowd was made up mostly of migrants.

By Friday, with more women coming forward, city police had received over 200 criminal complaints, mostly over sexual offences from groping to two alleged rapes, Spiegel Online reported.

As the furore grew, Chancellor Angela Merkel said she backed legal changes to make it easier to deport migrants who commit crimes, saying it was time to ask: "When do you lose your right to stay with us?"

POPULAR ANGER

A week after the assaults outside Cologne railway station and iconic Gothic cathedral, federal police said they had identified 31 suspects over offences from theft to physical attacks, though not sexual assaults.

Eighteen of them were asylum seekers, the interior ministry said.

Among the suspects were nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, five Iranians, four Syrians, one Iraqi and one Serb, as well as two Germans and one US national, ministry spokesman Tobias Plate said.

Outrage resonated beyond Germany, with Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, a hardliner on the migrant issue, calling for an extraordinary EU summit on the historic refugee wave.

Politicians were continuing "to trivialise - even after the attacks in Cologne and other European cities - the security risks associated with unregulated and uncontrolled migration within the EU," he said.

In Germany, assaults have inflamed a heated public debate about how to integrate the nearly 1.1 million asylum seekers the country took in last year.

Right-wing populists have charged that Merkel's liberal migration policy has fuelled crime and destabilised society.

The anti-migrant and Islamophobic PEGIDA movement has announced a rally in Cologne at 1300 GMT on Saturday.

Police expect around 1,000 backers of PEGIDA and the local far-right group Pro NRW, while counter-demonstrators have also vowed to take to the streets.

On Friday, Swiss artist Milo Moire threw off her clothes in front of Cologne's cathedral in protest against the sexual assaults, carrying a sign that read "Respect us! We are no fair game even when we are naked!!!"

TOUGHER DEPORTATION LAW?

Merkel's spokesman George Streiter said it was "important that the whole truth comes out", but also warned that migrants must not be put under general suspicion or collectively blamed.

"Primarily, this is not about refugees but about criminality," he said, noting that most asylum seekers in Germany have come seeking protection.

Still, the assaults have fuelled popular doubts about the biggest influx of asylum seekers to any EU nation and led German leaders to promise to better enforce law and order.

"We must do everything to prevent such incidents from happening again," de Maiziere told the Rheinische Post daily, pledging "more CCTV cameras in places where many people gather, a heightened (police) presence on the streets and harsher penalties".

Merkel's conservative party plans to discuss tougher policies this weekend, including the deportation of all migrants handed jail sentences by German courts.

Under current laws, asylum seekers are only forcibly sent back if they have been sentenced to jail terms of at least three years, and if their lives are not at risk in their countries of origin.

"We should ask ourselves whether it might be necessary to take (the right to remain in Germany) away earlier - and I have to say that for me, we must take it away sooner," Merkel said.
Kosovos worst political crisis since declaring independence from Serbia in 2008 deepened Saturday, with thousands of opposition protesters taking to the streets of the capital, Pristina, to denounce the countrys elected officials and set fire to the governments headquarters.

The crowd, which repeatedly chanted, Down with the government, was angered by a European Union-brokered deal with Serbia that allows Serbian-majority municipalities within the predominantly ethnic Albanian state to establish an association and have more autonomy.

They also object to a separate border demarcation deal with Montenegro that cedes a small portion of Kosovo to its Balkan neighbor.

They are taking away our country, said Genc, 21, a student who attended Saturdays demonstration. The people here are fed up.

Speaking on stage in a main square adjacent to the parliament building, opposition leaders denounced the Serbia and Montenegro agreements as unconstitutional violations of Kosovos sovereignty and demanded fresh elections.

Building catches fire

Before the speeches concluded, some demonstrators began throwing rocks, glass objects and Molotov cocktails at police stationed outside government offices. The clashes intensified as soon as the speeches finished, leading to the main government building catching fire.

We waited and waited, but when they set fire to the building we had to act, Major Baki Kelani of the Kosovo police told VOA.

Police used tear gas to disperse the crowd, estimated to be at 8,000; however, many hard-liners ran down side streets and continued to hurl rocks and Molotov cocktails at officers, who proceeded slowly down a main boulevard.

A 26-year-old woman, who wished to be identified only by her initials, E.K., was in a group throwing rocks at police when officers started to pursue them. She and two female friends were eventually forced to hide behind garbage bins in a cul-de-sac.

Im not really scared, she said. Kosovo is a big mess right now, and we want to make a change.

E.K. said her grievances had less to do with territorial loss and more to do with the everyday lives of Kosovars. Theres corruption, the economy [is bad], unemployment  there are many reasons to protest.

By late afternoon, police had arrested 24 people. Fourteen people were injured, among them 10 police officers, two protesters and two journalists.

Saturdays unrest was the latest in a string of altercations in Kosovo, which has seen a surge of nationalist sentiment in recent months. Since October, opposition members of parliament have attacked the chamber with tear gas nearly half a dozen times, resulting in the arrests of 13 lawmakers.

Speaking in Kosovo last month during his first trip to the Balkans as U.S. secretary of state, John Kerry condemned the oppositions tactics, saying parliament should be treated as a shrine to democracy, a place of reverence, of respect. That is not the place for tear gas and is not the place for intimidation.

Slow progress

Analysts said Kerrys visit highlighted growing concerns by the West about the slow pace of progress in Kosovo 16 years after a U.S.-led NATO air war helped pave the way to independence from Serbia. Saturdays events, they said, will do little to ease those concerns.

This is not the way that one would have hoped to see Kosovos development, said James Ker-Lindsay, a senior research fellow at the London School of Economics. I think that there will be a lot of people in the United States and the European Union who are desperately nervous at the moment about the way things are going because, of course, there is that danger that nationalist sentiment, which is currently directed at the government, could overspill  and be directed at minorities.

Regional leaders are also concerned. Speaking to the Vienna-based Die Presse newspaper in August, Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic said he was very afraid of regional instability. A single spark can set fire to the entire Balkans, he said.

Ker-Lindsay said that for a relatively small region, the Balkans have a number of potential flashpoints. What were seeing in Kosovo is one of them. I think there has been a tendency for us to take our eye off the ball, so to speak, on the western Balkans. It hasnt got as much attention as other regions in the news for quite some time, and I think there are people who want to highlight that there are very serious problems that still exist.
After years of unrest, the Central African Republic recently observed peaceful elections. Now, two candidates and former prime ministers, Anicet Dologuele and Faustin Touadera, head to a runoff at the end of the month.

The National Electoral Commission said nearly 80 percent of voters turned out for the elections last month. That included some living outside the country, like residents of a refugee camp near Garoua Boulai in Cameroon.

"Everybody is excited because we need change in our country," said Abdoul Karim Carvalho, a refugee voter.

"Because there is disorder in my country, we are here to find a unique president who'll be able to reconcile our country and bring peace. That's all we want," said Sidick Aboubakar, another refugee voter.

While thousands of Central African refugees at the camp were able to cast their ballots in the presidential election, others in other parts of the world couldnt.

Reason for hope

But regardless of who becomes the next leader after a runoff ballot later this month, Central Africans around the world said they were excited and couldn't wait for their country to emerge from its crisis.

Gabino Guerengomba lives in the United States; he is chief executive officer of Integrated Solar Technologies and a leader of the Central African community in Washington. He didnt get to vote but said the high turnout sent a message to the world.

"They really want to get past this really sad episode of our history and move on to greener pastures," he said.

Sectarian violence between Christians and Muslims in the past several years has caused nearly 1 million people to flee their homes.

Guerengomba said the election was an opportunity for us to realize that we Central Africans are the only people that could be responsible for what our country would become."

'The best plan'

When asked to name his favorite candidate, he smiled and said he wasnt supporting anyone in particular.

Right now, its not even about preference, nor affiliation," he said. "Its about who has the best plan, who can reconcile the Central African people, who can bring about a societal framework.

The winner of the runoff will replace the transitional government of Catherine Samba-Panza that came to power in 2014 after a rebel leader stepped aside less than a year after overthrowing President Francois Bozize.

Dologuele won 23.78 percent of the vote in the first round of voting on December 30. Touadera trailed at 19.42 percent, according to unofficial results.

Dologuele, 58, a former central banker, came to be known as "Mr. Clean" after his attempts to clean up murky public finances during his spell as prime minister from 1998 to 2001.

Touadera, also 58, is a former math professor who served as prime minister under Bozize. He was considered an outsider among the 30 candidates running for the top job.



In a statement released Friday, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry commended the vote and said there were "clear signs that Central Africans seek a new beginning for their country, and a future based on democratic governance and free from the violence and instability that have plagued the country for far too long.
Chinese officials are investigating the bulldozing of a hospital with patients and doctors still inside, in an incident that left bodies from the hospital morgue buried under a pile of rubble.

Thursday's incident in central Henan province has sparked outrage and confusion over how the razing could take place without notification of hospital personnel. Three hospital workers were reported injured in the incident.

A local newspaper also said six bodies from the morgue were buried in the wreckage and $600,000 worth of medical equipment was damaged.

Images published by Chinese reporters show hospital rooms with collapsed ceilings, shattered brick walls, and heaps of debris and cable scattered across the floors.

Local authorities told the French News Agency (AFP) that investigators are trying to find out how the accident happened, but are not expected to announced any findings until Monday.
The presidential campaign team of Ugandas former Prime Minister Patrick Amama Mbabazi says the electoral commission has violated its own directive that called on all presidential candidates to strictly adhere to its approved harmonized campaign programs to prevent interparty clashes.

Mbabazi petitioned the electoral commission about concerns that incumbent President Yoweri Museveni was scheduled to campaign in Mbale, in eastern Uganda, the same place for which the electoral commission had approved a campaign appearance by the former prime minister on Saturday.

Jotham Taremwa, spokesman for the electoral commission, recently told VOA that the eight presidential candidates must follow the harmonized campaign programs in a bid to ensure peace ahead of the February 18 general election. The electoral body and the parties signed a memorandum of understanding, which, Taremwa said, forms part of the process to ensure an equal playing field in the run-up to the presidential vote.

We have harmonized the campaign program for the eight candidates in the race, and we signed a memorandum of understanding with all those eight candidates," Taremwa said. "We expect everybody to keep to the harmonized and approved campaign program by the electoral commission.

Should there be any change on the part of the candidate schedule, that must be communicated to the electoral commission before the candidates effect it. These campaigns should be ending at 6 p.m. Uganda time every day, including the current president, who is also in the race. So we expect that legal requirement to be observed and complied with.

Road project

Also, Taremwa said on a local television program that Museveni was still the president and had duties to undertake despite being an incumbent candidate.

But Josephine Mayanja-Nkangi, spokeswoman for the former prime ministers campaign team, said the electoral commission appeared to be biased by failing to stop Museveni from commissioning a new road in the area, which forms part of his campaign.

We are not very happy with it," she said. "We are being told we have to accept the fact [Museveni] is the president, so he has presidential duties that supersede the electoral schedule. ... So if he does have duties that are being considered not campaigning, then there was no conflict.

Meanwhile, the Ugandan police have warned Mbabazis campaign team not to create tension. The campaign team accused police and other security agents of intimidating, harassing and making arbitrary arrests with no warrants. Mayanja-Nkangi said the election should be about ideas rather than prospective voters being forced to back Museveni and his ruling party.

The police [are] being disingenuous," she said. "However, if they think that we are the ones not telling the truth, the onus is on them to prove it. Because we called out the cases, now its on them to prove exactly what happened. ... If the IGP [inspector general of police] says he will take us to court because of this, I think he does need to do that, because all that we want is for the truth to be heard and to be treated fairly and justly."

Pretext for rejection

Supporters of the government say the accusations by members of the opposition are a pretext for them to reject the results of the elections by claiming intimidation and harassment of opponents. They contend that the former prime ministers campaign has lost momentum, and that is why his team is pointing accusing fingers at the government.

We have no need to mudsling the president. We have said this election should be about ideas, and we have kept it about ideas from the very beginning, Mayanja-Nkangi said. The fact that our people are being taken  are disappearing  thats a fact. And if anyone wants to disprove it, they are welcome. We would be more than happy to have these people with us. That would be our joy for us to have our people.
Pakistan is set to host four-way talks Monday on reviving the Afghan peace process. The talks will include Afghanistan, China and the United States.

Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman Ahmad Shekib Mostaghni said Saturday the representatives meeting in Islamabad will discuss a roadmap for peace talks. The discussions were agreed to during a visit to Kabul by Pakistan's army chief, General Raheel Sharif, in December.

Pakistan is believed to have influence over the Taliban, but relations with Afghanistan have been tense in recent months. The two countries have long accused each other of backing the Taliban and other insurgents operating along their porous border. Taliban leaders are widely believed to be based in Pakistani cities near the Afghan border, including Quetta and Peshawar.

Some regional analysts say Pakistan could be important in the Afghan peace process.



Pakistan has a vital role in these talks and it [Pakistan] must play its role now as the Afghan government doesnt have the capacity to bring the Afghan Taliban to the table for talks, Pakistan-based defense analyst Saad M. Khan told VOA Deewa Radio.

Monday's talks do not include the Taliban, but Javid Faisal, a spokesman for Afghanistan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, said the Pakistani government will provide a list of Taliban representatives who are willing to participate in the peace process.

The Reuters news agency reports some factions within the Afghan Taliban are considering taking part in the peace process.



On hold since July



Talks with the Taliban have been on hold since July, when they collapsed after just one meeting following Pakistan's announcement that longtime Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar had been dead for more than two years. The Taliban called off its participation and a second meeting was canceled.



A subsequent power struggle within the Taliban has raised questions about who would represent the insurgents if the talks with Kabul are revived.



Analysts have cautioned that, despite the rapprochement between Kabul and Islamabad, any substantive peace talks are still months off. Taliban demands have consistently focused on an end to the international military presence in the country. The U.S. and NATO have 13,000 troops stationed in Afghanistan, mostly in a training capacity. They include 9,800 Americans.
The Ghana Bar Association (GBA) has called on lawyers in the country to help explain the electoral laws to prospective voters in a bid to ensure Novembers presidential, legislative and local elections are transparent and credible.



Some civil society organizations had expressed concern that a lot of people are not aware of their rights and responsibilities during elections as required by law. They also called for intensified voter education campaigns across the country.



In his New Year message, Nene Amegatcher, president of the GBA, called on members of the group to volunteer to educate Ghanaians ahead of the election. This after it was reported that some electoral officials were not entirely conversant with the electoral laws governing elections.



Tony Forson, spokesman for the GBA, says the organization is ready to partner with the electoral commission in the electoral bodys quest to administer credible elections.



Call for help



Everyone is expectant that this years election would be credible because of what happened in the 2012 election that went to court and the recommendations, which were made by the Supreme Court, said Forson.



The call is for the individual lawyers to help. Those who are politically aligned could help their own political party in the training of their polling agents [and] members could help the electoral commission. But the view is towards having a credible election That was the mindset of the president in making the call that lawyers should avail themselves of this opportunity to help make the 2016 election credible.



Some critics say it appears members of the GBA have demonstrated their political bias over the years, which they said, could undermine the call of the groups president to educate Ghanaians. They argued that it is the duty of the electoral commission and the National Commission for Civic Education to educate prospective Ghanaian voters ahead of the election.



Forson disagreed that GBAs help is not needed in the education campaign ahead of the poll.



I dont believe that helping is not needed. I believe that every little thing helps... So, we believe that, in view of the kind of criticisms that were leveled against the electoral officers, we thought that that is one area in terms of personnel that the GBA, with the expertise that it has, would help, said Forson. I believe that everybody can help towards making Ghana become a beacon of Africa ...That is my belief.



His comments came after former president Jerry Rawlings called on former military personnel to help with their experience to ensure the November vote is peaceful and credible.



Education campaign



Forson says the GBA plans to take its education campaign to all media organizations including on social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. He also called on the political parties to encourage their supporters not to engage in acts of violence in the run up to the elections.



Some of these basic concepts are not understood by a majority of the people, even people who are educated, because these are issues which border on law. And education is the only way to go. So, yes on Twitter and Facebook, anything that would help so that people would understand and appreciate; one, the problem, and two, how to go about solving the problem, said Forson.



The most important message would be that of political tolerance and understanding, because it is a competition of idea. The GBA would want to believe that everyone should have that heart to listen to the other side of every political debate so that, together, we build a happy and prosperous nation.
Foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council have expressed their support for Saudi Arabia in its diplomatic dispute with predominantly Shi'ite Iran.

The council, which comprises Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, in a statement criticized what it described as Iranian interference in the internal affairs of Saudi Arabia and the region.

"The Ministerial Council discussed the repercussions of the attack on the Saudi Embassy in Tehran and the Saudi consulate in the Iranian city of Mashhad. It strongly condemned these acts and stated that Iran carries the responsibility for these terrorist acts," said GCC Secretary General Abdullatif al-Zayani following a meeting in Riyadh of the foreign ministers.

Saudi Arabia has also asked the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the Arab League to convene a meeting to discuss the situation.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said his country, which cut ties with Iran this past week, would considering taking further measures.

"We are looking at additional measures to be taken if it [Iran] continues with its current policies," he said.

The heightened tensions came in the aftermath of Sunni Saudi Arabia's recent execution of a leading Shi'ite cleric, Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr. After Riyadh announced his execution, along with 46 others, angry Iranian protesters smashed furniture and set fires at the Saudi Embassy in Tehran, with demonstrators also attacking the country's consulate in Mashhad.

In response, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, which has a Shi'ite majority, severed diplomatic relations with Iran. Kuwait recalled its ambassador, the United Arab Emirates downgraded its ties, and Oman and Qatar condemned the attacks.
International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde urged central African states Friday to diversify their economies, which have been hit by plummeting petroleum prices and terrorism. The IMF managing director's three-day visit to Cameroon comes at a time when the war against terrorism and the crisis in the Central African Republic have negatively impacted the region's economies.

Christine Lagarde says although all six central African states counted on their petroleum resources to improve their economies, Gabon, Chad and Equatorial Guinea have suffered most as a result of reducing world prices. She says they did not diversify their economies like Cameroon did.

Lagarde says Cameroon's economy has also been affected by the war against the terrorist group Boko Haram, while the crisis in the Central African Republic made its economy decline sharply. And the Republic of Congo has suffered the effects of the economic slowdown.

Impact of drop in oil prices



Lagarde says drastically reducing petroleum prices have had negative consequences on the economies of the six central African States. She says it is now imperative to drastically reduce ambitious development plans and invest wisely in projects that will improve the living conditions of grassroots populations.

She says central African member states need to diversify their economies, promote regional integration and the free movement of people and goods, and work together to find solutions to their common problems because unity is strength.

The IMF estimates that performance in 2014 and 2015 deteriorated as a result of stagnating revenues and increasing expenditures. It says lots of infrastructural projects are being financed by foreign borrowing thereby raising debt levels. Overall, fiscal deficit worsened from 4.1 percent of GDP in 2013 to about 6 percent in 2015.

Cameroon diversifies



Alamine Ousman Mey, Cameroon's minister of finance, says in spite of the challenges, his country's economy has shown some resiliency because of the diversification that developed value chains in agriculture, the construction sector and energy supply.

He says his country has been resilient to economic and security shocks because it has diversified its economy.

International oil prices have more than halved between 2014 and 2015 making it very difficult for the region where five out of its six member nations are oil producers. Additionally, terrorist threats that spilled over from Nigeria to Cameroon and Chad disturbed economic activity and generated additional budgetary spending.

Regional integration



Lucas Abaga Nchama, governor of the Bank of Central African States (BEAC), blames the adverse effects on the international economic downturn and difficulties promoting integration in the region. He says inspite of the challenges, the central African currency, CFA, used in the region remains strong.

He says it is imperative for central African states to promote regional integration and preserve its monetary union. He says it is in difficult moments that the strength of a currency is measured and that the CFA Franc has always been solid in times of crisis. He says the central bank will maintain monetary stability as one of the main conditions to achieve growth and that they are not thinking of changing the regions currency.

Christine Lagarde said her main call is for central African countries to implement reforms that will promote stronger and more inclusive growth and reduce social inequalities.
The Islamic State has a new front: an established foothold in Libya.

And Libya gives IS a new opportunity: a place from which to expand into Africa and Europe.

"Libya is one of the top two or three provinces claimed by IS, and the most dangerous," said Tom Joscelyn, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

While IS has had a presence in the chaos of post-Gadhafi Libya since late 2014, it has recently solidified its control of the coastal city of Sirte.

Analysts estimate the extremist group has several thousand fighters in place in Libya, a large number of them veterans of the war in Syria and Iraq.

The core is believed to be made up of Libyans, Tunisians and, some suspect, Europeans.

"They are able to control real territory, and control much of Sirte and surrounding towns. They have something they can latch onto even if they are overblowing how much a province it is," Joscelyn told VOA.

IS-claimed "provinces" include pockets in Afghanistan, Egypt and Yemen.

Rowboat ride to Italy

Libya's Sirte is between the main cities of Tripoli and Benghazi, and across the Mediterranean from Italy.

"Libya to Italy, you can do by a rowboat," noted Cyril Widdershoven, a Netherlands-based security analyst.

Having a foothold in Libya could prove a significant boost to IS, both as a propaganda tool and in operational terms.

"It says, we can have a presence wherever we choose, Widdershoven told VOA. It is not up to NATO, Washington, or London or Brussels. If you want us out of Iraq, we will go to Libya, and if you come to Libya, we can move to Egypt or back to Iraq."

The closeness to Europe adds to the group's claims of an expanding caliphate.

"Libya provides them a launching-off point to Rome, the symbol of Christendom. This becomes a very powerful talking point for them," Joscelyn said.

Operationally, Libya also provides a number of advantages.

IS in Syria and Iraq are already suggesting that European fighters can go there by boat, said Jacob Zenn, an African affairs fellow at the Jamestown Foundation. Or, you can go to Europe by boat.

Theyre already beginning to explore those opportunities, Zenn told VOA on the phone from Nigeria.

African base

The Islamic State is also looking to expand inside Africa.

Libya could open up "a new market of consumers  young Africans who may be interested in the idea of the caliphate and the very action-oriented methodology of ISIS and its social media outreach," Zenn said.

A permanent base in Libya would make the extremist group more flexible and versatile. From Libya, "they can work harder to expand in Mali" and recruit more in countries such as Chad and Nigeria, Zenn said.

It would allow IS to expand its Middle Eastern character and add an African profile, he said.

In 2014, the Nigeria-based extremist group Boko Haram  one of the most prolific jihadist organizations in the world in terms of attacks and casualties  pledged allegiance to IS.

Joscelyn said IS has been supplying Boko Haram through its base in Libya, showing Boko Haram they could form a united network all the way through Nigeria.

"These networks are much more cohesive than people realize," Joscelyn noted.

From a propaganda standpoint, being able to say that IS exists in West Africa through Boko Haram has also been a significant coup for the terrorist group, which is in stiff competition for jihadi supremacy in the region.

Al-Qaida and other jihadist groups, tribal gangs and criminal networks are rife in Libya, a country run by rival governments that have little control beyond their own power bases.

Although Joscelyn cautioned that IS has exaggerated its actions in Libya, he said in some areas of Libya it has become the strongest jihadist group present.

IS recently claimed a number of suicide bomb attacks in Libya, including at a police training center Thursday in Zliten that killed more than 50 people.

Libyan oil

Similar to its expansion in Iraq and Syria where IS captured cities and then expanded to seize territory and economic resources such as oil, grain and water, the group is aiming at oil targets in Libya.

This week, Islamic State militants were fighting Libyan forces for control of crucial eastern oil terminals.

"The bigger issue for IS now is consolidating, to settle in Libya, to establish governance in Libya and really make their presence in Libya permanent," Zenn said.

Analysts do not see an easy fix to Libya.

"Libya is part of a bigger problem, and no one knows how to turn it back and stop it," Joscelyn said.
The Israeli military says two Palestinians were shot dead after trying to stab soldiers at a checkpoint in the West Bank.

A spokeswoman said the attack occurred in the north of the Jordan Valley.

It was the latest in a series of attacks over the past three months that include stabbings, gunfire and car rammings by Palestinians targeting Israeli forces.

Also Saturday, Israel razed the former home of a Palestinian who was shot dead October 3 after killing an Israeli rabbi in Jerusalem.

Gush Etzion settlement

On Thursday, Israeli soldiers killed three Palestinians who tried to stab them outside a Jewish settlement near Jerusalem.

The Gush Etzion settlement has been one of the focal points of Palestinian anger in the latest wave of Israeli-Palestinian violence, which began in early October.

The ongoing violence was set off by rumors Israel was planning to take over an East Jerusalem holy site sacred to Jews and Muslims.

The conflict has killed 22 Israelis, along with an American and an Eritrean. At least 138 Palestinians have died in clashes with Israeli forces or shot to death while trying to stab police, soldiers and civilians.

Also Thursday, Israeli security forces announced that last month, they arrested six Hamas terrorists who were planning to kidnap and murder an Israeli citizen.

Officials say the Hamas terror cell was planning to use the Israeli hostage as a bargaining chip for freedom for Palestinian prisoners.
As the armed occupation of U.S. federal buildings in rural Oregon drags on, some blame the U.S. government for failing to arrest anti-government lawbreakers in the western United States after the last big standoff in 2014.

Some former federal officials and lawmakers say they believe anti-government lawbreakers have been emboldened by the Justice Department's failure to prosecute rancher Cliven Bundy, whose 2014 standoff with the government over Nevada grazing rights ended with federal agents backing down in the face of about 1,000 armed militiamen.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been building a case against participants in that dispute, according to federal and local officials. But prosecutors have yet to bring charges, and no arrests of Bundy, his family or others have been made.

Bundy's sons, Ammon and Ryan Bundy, are now leading a small group of armed protesters in rural Oregon who seized a federal wildlife center Saturday to try to win greater local control over federal land. Cliven Bundy is advising his sons by telephone from Nevada, according to Reuters reporters on the scene.

"If people feel like there's no repercussions for their actions, especially if they're acting illegally, it does embolden them," said Bob Abbey, who led the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from 2009 to 2012. "Two years should be sufficient time for bringing people to justice."

Rallying point

Cliven Bundy's long-running dispute with the BLM over grazing fees turned into a rallying point for the far right in 2014, when hundreds of heavily armed paramilitary activists flocked to his Nevada ranch to prevent federal agents from seizing his cattle. Bundy's sons were also photographed participating in the dispute.

Bundy's perceived victory energized a far-right citizens militia movement that has waxed and waned in the United States over several decades. The Department of Homeland Security predicted in an intelligence report that it would inspire other acts of violence.

The BLM said it was still pursuing the Bundy case through the legal system. "Our primary goal remains to resolve this matter safely and according to the rule of the law," spokesman Tom Gorey said. The FBI, the Department of Justice and the U.S. attorney's office in Nevada declined to comment.

Former federal officials say the Justice Department, on the whole, is quick to handle criminal cases involving public lands. But many BLM agents have expressed frustration that the government has not yet brought any charges related to the 2014 standoff, said Ed Shepard, a former BLM Oregon state director who stays in touch with current employees at the agency.

"It's a violation of law and they should be held accountable for it," said Shepard, who as president of the Public Lands Foundation represents retired BLM workers.

Waco siege

In recent years, federal officials have taken a cautious approach when dealing with armed extremists to avoid a repeat of the 1993 siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, that left more than 80 people dead.

The hands-off strategy averts bloodshed but has enabled participants in the 2014 standoff to scatter across the country.

Two people involved in the standoff went on to kill two police officers and one civilian in Las Vegas in June 2014, less than two months after the Nevada standoff at the Bundy ranch ended. Others have discussed plans to seize land and attack federal convoys and helicopters, according to the Homeland Security report, which was released in July of that year.

One man involved in the standoff, Washington state resident Schuyler Barbeau, was arrested in a separate incident in December on charges of attempting to sell an unregistered firearm. He told an informant that it was his duty to "lynch" public servants he deemed to be unworthy, according to the charges.

Armed members of the Oath Keepers, a paramilitary group involved in the standoff, gathered at mines in Montana and Oregon last year at the request of owners who said they worried the government was going to seize their properties. Both disputes are pending in court.

Threats to employees

The April 2014 standoff also led to an increase in threats and security risks for the federal employees who police rangeland, deter trespassers and round up stray livestock on public land in the western United States, former officials say.

In the weeks after federal agents backed down, two BLM rangers were menaced at gunpoint on a Utah highway, said Juan Palma, the agency's state director at the time.

Archaeologists, biologists and others who often work alone far out in the wilderness were required to travel in pairs for safety, and the agency carefully tracked who was in and out of the office, said Palma, now retired.

"Some of our employees didn't feel comfortable wearing the uniform to be identified in a restaurant," he said.
U.S. actor Sean Penn met with legendary Mexican drug trafficker Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman in Mexico, months before his capture, for an interview posted on Rolling Stone magazine's website late Saturday, a day after Guzman was captured by Mexican authorities.

Guzman "proudly" volunteers to Penn "I supply more heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana than anybody else in the world. I have a fleet of submarines, airplanes, trucks and boats." Penn described Guzman as "entirely unapologetic."

"If there was not consumption, there would be no sales," Guzman says about his drug trafficking. "It is true that consumption, day after day, becomes bigger and bigger. So it sells and sells."

Daring prison escape

Guzman's July 11 prison escape  his second in the past 14 years  was accomplished through a 1.5-kilometer underground tunnel, dug in secret from his cell to a nearby village.

It was a major embarrassment for the administration of President Enrique Pena Nieto, which had been praised for its aggressive push against Mexico's top drug traffickers.

Penn says Guzman sent his engineers to Germany last year "for three months of extensive additional training necessary to deal with the low-lying water table beneath the prison." He says once Guzman descended into the tunnel he was able to drive off in "a pipe-track-guided motorcycle with an engine modified to function in the minimally oxygenized space."

Penn made plans for the interview at the same time he was staying in the same New York hotel as Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto. Penn says one person from the Mexican president's detail asked him for a selfie as the actor walked down a street "lined with the armored SUVs that will transport the president of Mexico to the General Assembly."

Willing to extradite 'El Chapo'

In an earlier development Saturday, unidentified Mexican officials told multiple media outlets the Mexican government is willing to extradite Guzman to the United States.

That is a sharp reversal from the government's position after his last capture in 2014.

Guzmans escape in July from a maximum-security prison was a point of friction between Mexico and the U.S., which had requested his extradition.

The extradition process could take months, and Guzman's lawyers are expected to fight it.

Guzman was returned to the Altiplano prison after being recaptured Friday in the city of Los Mochis, which is in Guzmans home state of Sinaloa.

Hours later, he was shown to reporters, dressed in a blue shirt and track pants, being transferred from an armored van to a helicopter that was to take him and at least one accomplice back to prison.

Mexican Attorney General Arely Gomez Gonzalez said Guzman's recapture was the product of a huge surveillance operation that involved a film crew that had been working on a biography of the drug trafficker.

The Mexican marines, acting on a tip, raided a home in Los Mochis just before dawn on Friday.

A gunbattle ensued that left five suspects dead and one marine injured. During the fighting, El Chapo and one of his top lieutenants escaped through the sewers, but marines captured them later.

Six others were arrested during the operation.

Mexican federal authorities had been focusing their manhunt since October on a mountainous region of Sinaloa, in northwestern Mexico. Tracking teams reported it appeared that Guzman had been injured while fleeing marines in rugged terrain near the borders of Sinaloa and Durango states.



2001 escape



Guzman was first captured in 1993, but he escaped in 2001 with the help of prison guards. After more than a decade on the loose, he was recaptured early in 2014, with the help of intelligence that U.S. authorities provided to Mexico.

Mexico has issued arrest warrants for more than 20 former officials, guards and police officers for their alleged participation in Guzman's escape last year. Ten civilians are also in detention.

Guzman escaped through a rectangular hole found underneath a shower of his prison cell, moving through a fully ventilated tunnel equipped with electric lighting. Authorities also found a motorcycle modified to run on rails; the vehicle apparently was used to haul tools and dirt away from the subterranean site during construction.

WATCH: Related video clip
A Muslim woman wearing a hijab was forced to leave a Donald Trump presidential campaign rally Friday after she staged a silent protest against the Republican front-runner, who in December called for a ban on Muslims entering the United States.

Police escorted Rose Hamid, 56, from the rally in Rock Hill, South Carolina, after she and another person stood in silence when Trump spoke about Syrian refugees entering the United States. According to CNN, Hamid was sitting in the stands directly behind Trump and stood up when he suggested that Syrians fleeing the war in their country were affiliated with the Islamic State terror group.

Televised images showed Hamid wearing the Muslim head covering along with a shirt that read, "Salam. I come in peace." Stitched to the garment was a yellow Star of David that evoked memories of badges that Jews were forced to wear during the Holocaust. The word "Muslim" was printed on the star.

The video also showed Hamid being escorted from the rally while Trump supporters waved signs bearing his name and, in some cases, heckled her.

Hamid later told CNN one man shouted, "Get out. Do you have a bomb? Do you have a bomb?" Hamid, however, also said that as she was being led out, one woman reached over to shake her hand and told her, "I'm so sorry this is happening to you."

Hamid told the network she sincerely believed that if people got to know each other one on one, they'd stop being afraid of each other. She said the incident was a vivid example of what happens when "you start using this hateful rhetoric and how it can incite a crowd."

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Muslim advocacy group, denounced the incident and called on Trump to apologize, saying, "The image of a Muslim woman being abused and ejected from a political rally sends a chilling message to American Muslims."

There was no immediate comment from the Trump campaign, although the candidate, in comments about the fracas, was quoted as saying, "There is hatred against us that is unbelievable. It's their hatred, it's not our hatred."

Last month, Trump called for a "total and complete shutdown" of Muslims entering the United States, saying such a ban should remain in place until the government "can figure out" Muslim attitudes toward the U.S. in the wake of deadly shootings in California. In announcing the plan, Trump alleged that polling data showed "great hatred toward Americans by large segments of the Muslim population."

Virulent statements against Muslims are nothing new for Trump, who has called on the government to monitor mosques and has refused to rule out his earlier proposal to enter the names of Muslims in America into a database.
Muslim activists in the United States say they are caught up in two simultaneous battles: fighting the Islamic State group and other extremists in their efforts to recruit Americans as terrorists, while also struggling against Islamophobia  prejudice and discrimination aimed at Muslims  in the United States.

Highly charged politics in this U.S. presidential election year and the intensity of radical Islamists have forced Muslim community leaders to reorganize themselves to try to counter these sentiments.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) reported that there were 75 attacks on mosques in the United States last year, the highest number ever recorded. The council said property damage and physical intimidation were involved in roughly equal amounts in those hate crimes.

Nearly half of the anti-Muslim outbursts occurred after attacks that Muslim gunmen carried out in Paris on November 13 and in San Bernardino, California, on December 2.

Muslim leaders said mosques were targeted in some areas where no previous attacks had been recorded against Muslim houses of worship, even after the devastating September 11 attacks in 2001.

Mosque desecrated

One of these was in Philadelphia, the fifth-largest U.S. city, where a pigs head was thrown at the Al-Aqsa Mosque on December 7.

Marwan Kreidie, director of the Arab-American Development Corporation in Philadelphia, has an office in the mosque. The pig's-head incident  a gesture particularly insulting to devout Muslims, who are forbidden to eat pork  was an "extremely isolated" case, he said, "something completely unexpected.

Mosque leaders immediately cleaned the scene and filed a police report, but no one has been arrested in the past month.

The incident was a real potent example of Islamophobia  anti-Arab, anti-Muslim feelings  and it really hurt people, Kreidie said.

Out of prejudice, unity

However, he added, desecration of the mosque may have boomeranged on those responsible, because instead of inflaming hatred against Muslims, members of all religious faiths in that Philadelphia community were united in condemning the attack, and they came together in a ceremony where they exchanged wishes for peace and shared food.

The same day that the mosque was attacked, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump delivered his first speech demanding a total and complete shutdown of U.S. borders to all Muslims trying to enter the country.

Trump said his decision to call for a ban on all Muslim visitors was triggered by the mass shootings in Southern California five days earlier, where American-born Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, a Pakistani national, shot 14 people to death at a Christmas party attended by Farook's co-workers.

Hate travels cross-country

The morning after Trumps speech in South Carolina, police in Grand Forks, North Dakota, informed Ilham and Omar Hassan that their restaurant had been set afire overnight. The attack on Juba Restaurant and Coffee was recorded as a hate crime.

Ilham Hassan and her family, refugees from Somalia, had been operating the restaurant, and an adjacent halal butcher's shop selling meat prepared according to Islamic standards, for about year. Sales had been increasing, and they were expanding the business.

The Hasans were already acquainted with anti-Muslim feelings. On the day after the killings in San Bernardino, graffiti featuring the Nazi swastika symbol and the words "go home!" were sprayed on their window.

A 25-year-old white American, Matthew Gust, has been arrested and charged in connection with the arson attack, but authorities said it wasn't clear whether the graffiti incident was related to the firebombing of the restaurant.

Hassan said it was clear to her that both incidents were carried out by someone with hatred.

Damage to the restaurant was estimated at $90,000, possibly more. But Hassan insisted that the family was not going anywhere and would stay in North Dakota.

Unreported incidents

Jaylani Mohamed Hussein, head of CAIR's chapter in the northern U.S. state of Minnesota, said, "We believe there are many incidents that have not been reported. In Minnesota, we have noticed a great deal of bullying taking place in schools" after the controversial comments by Trump. Muslim parents and their children have reported that other students have been "taking advantage" of the stormy public comments about Muslims to spread similar sentiments in schools.

But Trump's anti-Muslim speech has had an effect beyond U.S. schools, restaurants and mosques.

Late in December, the Islamic extremist group al-Shabab, based in Africa, released a video featuring Trump, evidently intended to help recruit American Muslims to their cause. The video included images of U.S. police beating or shooting black males, suggesting that American blacks could find solace in Islam.

The video shocked the U.S. Muslim community. In Minneapolis, for instance, activists hastily arranged a meeting and urged their members to counter the messages it carried.

Abdirisak Bihi, one of the organizers, said: "Its a very desperate situation that they have to use a long and highly dramatized violent video to make recruitment, but I dont think there is appetite for that among young people in our community anymore."

Bihis nephew, Burhan Hassan, accepted an earlier recruitment pitch and joined al-Shabab in Somalia, where he later died. He also was featured in the propaganda video.

Heightened fears

Bihi worries about the effect al-Shabab's message may have on the community of Somali Muslims in the United States. What Im really concerned about is that they might scare our mainstream community again," he said, and make the older generation "more fearful of our young people."

Divisions with the Somali community in the U.S. could result in "more unemployment and more anger in our young people, and that is how they [al-Shabab] recruit, he said.

Trump shrugged off criticism of his comments, as well as the use of his remarks in al-Shabab's propaganda message. I have to say what I have to say, he told questioners.

Marwan Kreidie said words and negative tones have consequences: These politicians should be more mature. They should understand that words have consequences. We need people in leadership positions to make sure they dont accept any form of anti-anything  Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, anti-black, whatever.
The U.S. response to the rift in relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran may be influenced, in part, by a U.S. desire to see the Iran nuclear deal implemented, according to analysts studying the crisis.

"What is paramount is for [U.S. President Barack] Obama to protect the Iran deal," said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran analyst with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

In a Friday forum, Sadjadpour said there is currently not a clear U.S. "siding" with Saudi Arabia, whereas in the past, the U.S. had been in "lock step" with the Gulf kingdom against Iran. That change has angered Saudi officials.

If [the Iran nuclear deal] is at the top of your agenda," Sadjadpour said, "that means that the administration's perspective is that they are going to try to do everything they can to de-escalate tension with Iran."

Secretary of State John Kerry said Thursday that nuclear negotiators could be "days away" from implementing the agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. Launching the agreement would be the culmination of nearly two years of intense negotiations among Iran, the U.S. and other world powers.

Sadjadpour said a U.S. goal is to hold back on penalties against Tehran that could potentially trigger a response that would unravel the deal.

Regional resolutions

On Monday, State Department spokesman John Kirby said the U.S. had "expressed particular concerns" over Saudi Arabia's execution of Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr. He also said the U.S. condemned the attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran that were launched in response to the execution.

"Ultimately, solutions to problems in this region must come from leaders in this region," Kirby added.

Analyst J. Matthew McInnis of the American Enterprise Institute said the Saudis are concerned about what they view as a U.S. shift that began with the Iran nuclear talks  "not so much to fully pull away from Arab states," McInnis said, "but to rebalance in Iran's favor."

He added that the U.S. is now trying to allow regional states more room to work out issues for themselves.

Similar sentiments were echoed by Frederic Wehrey, a senior associate in the Middle East program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

"One of Obama's visions for this region, at least in the Gulf, is equilibrium," Wehrey said.

Fear of empowered Iran

Analysts say there are ongoing concerns among U.S. Gulf allies that Iran would be empowered by the sanctions relief it would receive as a result of compliance with provisions in the nuclear deal. They fear an empowered Iran could be destabilizing for the region.

The Saudis, and to a lesser extent the other Gulf Cooperation Council countries, are "paranoid" when it comes to Iran, said analyst Simon Henderson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

"Saudi Arabia is the most important country on its side of the Gulf, and Iran is the most important on its side," Henderson said.

Saudi Arabia severed ties with Iran after protesters stormed the Saudi missions in Tehran. In Iran, mass protests over the cleric's execution have continued.

There are signs, however, that the tension may be starting to abate.

Kerry said he had spoken to his counterparts in Iran and Saudi Arabia and received assurances that they would not allow their rift over the Shi'ite cleric to affect their willingness to work cooperatively to help resolve Syria's crisis.

Saudi Arabia, Iran and the United States are part of the International Syria Support Group. The group was instrumental in crafting a plan for a U.N.-mediated political transition in Syria. The U.N. intends to launch an initial meeting on the plan with the Syrian government and opposition this month.

Also, in an interview with The Economist, Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman said a direct war with Iran was something that Saudis "do not foresee at all."

He said Iranian escalation had "already reached very high levels" and Saudis would try hard "not to escalate anything further."
Just under the surface of land situated along the Illinois River Valley in the Midwest state of Illinois is a widely used, naturally occurring mineral, which has brought a flurry of interest in property near the home of Utica resident Mary Whipple.

"Silica sand right now is the new white gold," Whipple said.

And more common than one might think.

"Silica sand is in so many things that are used in everyday life that people don't think about," said Nick Fetig, plant manager for Unimin Corporation's silica sand processing facility in Utica. "It's used in coatings and paints and ceramics and things that we touch and handle every day."

Fetig says the fine, white silica sand found beneath the banks of the Illinois River is also ideal for use in the hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," oil industry.

During the hydraulic fracturing process, which collects oil from shale formations deep below the surface, silica sand is injected into the fractures created in the those formations. The tiny beads of silica sand help keep the fractures open to allow release of the oil.

Growing demand

It is the most reliable material available for this function, which created red-hot demand for silica sand when the fracking business was booming.

"It's been a hot commodity, and we have the best darn sand in the world," said Price Futures Group Senior Market Analyst Phil Flynn. "Saudi Arabia comes to us for the sand. You would think they would have their own sand. But they like our sand better so it's a very, very high-quality sand for what the industry needs."

That need drove up demand, and with it came new silica sand mines in Utica.

"It was like a frenzy. All of a sudden everyone needed silica sand to boost their fracking industry," said farmer Monty Whipple, Mary's husband.

The Whipples live near several new silica sand mines, which are not owned by Unimin  a company that has operated in Utica for several decades.

The Whipples are upset that once-prime farmland has become full of sprawling, open holes in the ground.

"For those of us who have lived in the area our whole life, we want to maintain what we had," Monty Whipple said. "You can't take away that type of natural beauty easily to me."

Falling prices

But the need for silica sand  and with it, new mines  is directly tied to the price of oil, which has plunged in recent weeks. Many parts of the U.S. are now paying 60 cents a liter for fuel.

"The price of oil became too cheap," Mary Whipple explained. "You need a good, strong price per barrel of oil to bring up U.S. shale oil. It's not like the wells in Saudi Arabia."

Phil Flynn agrees.

"Low prices are good for the consumer but not so good for the U.S. producers," he said.

The low cost of fuel makes the high cost of extracting oil by the fracking method financially unfeasible, which has dramatically reduced the amount of new fracking wells being drilled.

"A lot of the banks that lend money to the frackers are a little bit tighter with their wallet right now because they are concerned about the long-term viability of this industry," Flynn said.

Ripple effect

That concern has a ripple effect through many industries, including silica sand. Several mines in the U.S. have already closed or suspended operations because of decreased demand.

"They're producing more oil with less rigs," Flynn said, "but if you stop drilling for rigs, or stop drilling in the shale, or slow that process down, you're not going to have as much demand for the sand."

The nation's largest silica sand provider  U.S. Silica  projects a 15 percent drop in demand.

Its competitor, Unimin, stopped construction on a planned expansion at its Utica facility last year. But plant manager Nick Fetig says there is still demand for silica sand outside the fracking business.

"Unimin is set up to handle the ebbs and flow of the markets," Fetig said.

Unimin's operation in Utica employs about 100 workers.

The company says there have been no permanent reductions in its workforce there as a result of the industry downturn, but there is no date on when the planned expansion of its facility will resume.

Analyst Flynn sees the downturn as a temporary drop.

"The demand for oil is not going away," he said. "We are going through a leveling of the playing field. I think fracking is here to stay, but for the next year or two, it might be rough going."

"From a purely selfish point of view, the lower the oil price, the less fracking interest will be," said Monty Whipple, who adds that while he and his wife are hopeful slowing demand for silica sand will curb the loss of nearby farmland to silica sand mining, they are concerned about what will be left if the current mines shut down permanently.

"Every sand mine that is left in its wake is just an empty hole that collects water from rainfall and so on and turns a nasty color," he said, adding that the one thing the land most likely won't return to, at least in the foreseeable future, is the prime farmland he grew up with.
A top U.S. general is concerned that a small number of motivated Islamic State fighters could commit acts of terror in Caribbean nations.

General John Kelly, commander of the U.S. Southern Command, told reporters Friday at the Pentagon that about 150 Islamic extremists left the Caribbean region to join Islamic State fighters in the Middle East last year, about 50 more than in the previous year.

However, he said, the biggest threat might not be the extremists who leave to train and fight with the Islamic State, but the ones who stay behind.

Kelly said Islamic extremist groups seem to have a new message for would-be jihadists.

"And that [message] is, 'Rather than coming here to Syria, why don't you just stay at home and do San Bernardino or do Boston or do Fort Hood?  the general said, referring to attacks in the U.S. perpetrated by Muslims sympathetic to extremist groups. As recently as Thursday, a gunman claiming allegiance to the Islamic State ambushed a police officer as he sat in his car in Philadelphia.

They [Caribbean nations] don't have an FBI, they don't have law enforcement like we do," Kelly said, adding that the U.S. military provides as much information as it can to agencies in those countries.

Iraq, Afghanistan

When asked about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Kelly praised recent comments made to USA Today by General John Campbell, commander of the NATO-led Resolute Support Mission, that the president should delay the drawdown of U.S. troops and maintain the current force of 9,800 because of the volatile security situation in Afghanistan.

He also appeared to pointedly disagree with the U.S. decision to withdraw all troops in Iraq by the end of 2011, telling a reporter there were other ways to have done it.

I believe this war stuff is hard, and it's not for the untrained and the unadvised," he said.

Kelly, who served in Iraqs Anbar province, said the removal of U.S. troops took away vital mentors the Iraqi army needed as it continued to develop.

"The equipment is important, but it doesn't come close to having people who are just with them, he said.

Kelly, a Marine, said there would eventually be pressure to lower standards for women so more of them could advance in combat roles, such as the Marine infantry and the Army Rangers.

Last year, the Marine Corps asked that certain combat jobs remain closed to women, but Defense Secretary Ash Carter overruled the request.

Pentagon officials have vowed that standards for those jobs will not be lowered.
Sixteen Tunisian lawmakers from President Beji Caid Essebsi's Nidaa Tounes party resigned on Friday over a dispute involving his son in a move that may allow Islamist rivals to become the main parliamentary power.

The resignations deepened a split between two wings in Nidaa Tounes just days after its secretary-general, Mohsen Marzouk, announced he would break away and form a new political movement over accusations Essebsi's son was trying to control the party.

The rift in Nidaa Tounes, formed after Tunisia's 2011 revolt against Zine Abidine Ben Ali, comes at a delicate time as the North African state struggles to contain jihadist violence and encourage economic growth.

"The son of the president and his group took control of party and carried out a coup," Walid Jalled, one of the lawmakers told Reuters. "We will not accept being like a flock of sheep."

Another lawmaker, Abada El Kefi, said three more Nidaa Tounes parliament members would resign when they returned from travel overseas.

After this week's resignations, Nidaa Tounes will have 70 lawmakers in the 217-member congress while Islamist party Ennahda has 69 seats. If more Nidaa Tounes legislators left, Ennahda could become the main party in parliament.

The resignations may complicate attempts to push through sensitive reforms that Tunisia's international lenders are demanding to curb public spending and kickstart an economy hit by three major Islamist militant attacks this year.

Nidaa Tounes emerged as a political force in 2013 to lead protests against a government formed by the Islamist party Ennahda. It beat Ennahda in elections in 2014 and went on to form a coalition with its rival.

Divisions have been growing inside Nidaa Tounes - which means Call of Tunisia - since last year after a dispute emerged between a wing of the party led by Hafedh Caid Essebi the president's son and another by Marzouk, one of its founders.

Essebsi's backers dismiss claims they wanted to put his son in a position of power through a dynastic handover of control of the party. Critics say Essebsi's camp had ridden roughshod over party regulations.

With a new constitution and free elections, Tunisia has been praised as a model of democratic transition since the ouster of Ben Ali. It has mostly escaped the violent upheaval of other states in the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings.

But after three major attacks by militants last year, Tunisia is struggling with security challenges. It needs reforms to help ease public spending and create economic opportunities that many Tunisians still see as a priority.
An Egyptian affiliate of the extremist Islamic State group says it carried out an armed attack Saturday that killed two members of security forces on their way to work on the outskirts of Cairo. The gunmen targeted a car carrying a police officer and a soldier in Egypt's Giza province. In a separate attack earlier, on Friday evening, knife-wielding militants stabbed three tourists dining at a hotel in a Red Sea resort.

International news media said Islamic State supporters posted notices on social media claiming responsibility for the shooting incident on Saturday. Those claims could not be independently verified, but the notes seen online resembled previous messages from Islamic State affiliates in Egypt.

There was no claim of responsibility for the earlier stabbing attack in the resort town of Hurghada. Three European tourists were wounded but have since been reported in stable condition.

Video from the scene showed police and medics giving first aid to one of the two assailants who burst into a hotel dining room and began slashing tourists.

Authorities said the second attacker was shot dead by police.

Scene of chaos



There were many policemen around and we saw a dead man on the floor. ... He only had his bathing trousers on. The other man next to him screamed in pain, but nobody did anything," German tourist Barbara Wolf told a reporter.

Another tourist, a Swede, said there was "chaos" inside the hotel when the attackers burst in, with hotel guests fleeing in terror.

The wounded man appeared to be in his teens or late 20s, and was clean-shaven. He appeared to have been shot in both legs, and most of his clothing had been removed  probably to determine whether he might have been wearing a suicide belt filled with explosives.

Security sources said the attackers had arrived in Hurghada by sea, but no other information about them was released.

One of the three people wounded, Swedish tourist Sammie Olovsson, wrote on his Facebook page that he had been stabbed four times, but that he was recovering.

New security measures



Roadblocks were set up near the hotel and other security measures were put in place. Egypt's tourism minister said later that the government would soon be announcing further security measures to protect foreign tourists at Red Sea resorts and other tourist centers.

Two days earlier, attackers fired at a tourist hotel and several empty tourist buses near Egypt's iconic Giza pyramids. A group of Israeli Arab tourists were staying at the hotel outside Cairo at the time of the attack. The same Islamic State group that said it killed the policeman and soldier early Saturday claimed responsibility for the incident on Thursday.

Income from tourism is a critical source of revenue for Egypt, but tourist business has declined sharply during the past few years of political turmoil and a growing wave of violent attacks by Islamic militants. Islamic State extremists say they planted a bomb aboard of plane that crashed over Sinai in October, carrying 224 people  most of them Russian tourists  to their deaths.
With his calls this week for tighter gun laws in the U.S., President Barack Obama brought gun control to the forefront of America's 2016 presidential election campaign  and made headlines across the globe.

Obama announced plans to tighten and clarify rules about who can sell guns to whom, whether in shops, gun shows or online.

But Obama's tears as he recalled victims of gun attacks received as much attention as the proposals themselves.

"Obama's tears were every bit as memorable as his words," wrote Khaled A. Beydoun for Al Jazeera English. "In the U.S., guns are far more than weapons. They are ideological talismans."



Nick Curtis of New Zealand's Herald Online notes with irony that when Hillary Clinton and Margaret Thatcher wept in public, their critics dismissed them as weak.

The publicly weeping female is seen as irrational, out of control, dangerous. By contrast, a bloke who blubs in public is today thought brave, noble, in touch with his feelings," he said.

"Barack Obama's tears for America's murdered children as he called for more gun control have been claimed by supporters as a sign of his deep emotional response to a national tragedy, and by Republican foes as an act of 'fascist' fakery involving the deployment of an onion, or some other lachrymal enhancement."

Britain's Telegraph ran a poll asking readers whether the presidential tears were real or fake.

Meanwhile, a number of tweeps from the Middle East have questioned why the U.S. leader wasn't weeping for those killed in conflicts abroad.

Obama gun action: too little too late?

Across traditional and social media, observers questioned why the U.S. President waited so long - his eighth and last year in the White House -- to tackle the issue of gun violence in America.

"By his own estimate, in the seven years Barack Obama has been in the White House more than 200,000 American men, women and children have died in his countrys epidemic of gun violence. In the final months of his presidency, Mr Obamas response, long overdue, is to use his executive powers to order a series of modest gun control measures," reads a Jan. 7 editorial in the Australian.

"His presidential orders tinker at the edges of existing lax controls...the measures fail to address the huge number of weapons already in private hands."

Assessing blame

And some analysts blame not the politicians, but the U.S. public itself, for the rising number of violent deaths in America.

The number of people who are shot in the U.S. - a figure that is more appropriate in a country involved in a civil war than an allegedly civilized western industrialized nation - will not considerably decline as a result of these executive orders," reads a recent editorial in Germany's Sueddeutsche newspaper.

"When the issue is U.S. gun madness, we can always point to die-hard Republicans, conservative constitutional judges and nasty gun lobbyists..They all have...blood on their hands. But, fundamentally, this is a social, not a political or legal problem. The majority of Americans do not want to touch the right to carry a gun, and they do not care about the victims.

India's Urdu-language daily Hindustan Express asks why the U.S. has no official figures on the actual number of guns circulating in the nation:

"The United States is an extremely organized country and the intelligence agencies and all the institutions ensuring enforcement of law and order are quite organized," it notes.

Losing battle?

Many international editorials stress the strong Republican opposition to gun control in America and express doubt that real reform will take place.

"It would be too upbeat to call a televised town hall meeting on Thursday night between President Barack Obama and gun-rights advocates a dialogue of the deaf," Britain's Economist newspaper noted Friday.

"The difference between opponents and supporters is that the latter believe Mr Obama when he says he has no plan, ability or time left in office to reduce Americas uniquely large private arsenal. And judging by the weary, almost despairing expression on Mr Obamas face during his CNN town hall meeting, the supporters are right," the Economist concluded.

US reaction ranges from cynicism to gratitude

It's no surprise, given the polarization around the issue in the U.S., that reaction here was strong on both sides of the debate.

The National Rifle Association - which was called out by Obama during the townhall for declining an invitation to participate - liveblogged the event, and took their own jabs at the President, calling the gun control effort "a distraction" and a "PR stunt."

The conservative Washington Times opined that, since the president can't figure out how to confiscate the guns Americans already own, "he has set out to make life as miserable as he can for everyone who wants to exercise his constitutional right to own a gun, a right fundamental to the republic for as long as there has been an America."

Former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who five years ago survived a mass shooting at an event in her Arizona Congressional district and now advocates for stricter gun regulation, thanked President Obama for taking action.

The New York Times editorial board used what they called the President's "televised defense of his own modest gun proposals" to take Republicans to task for peddling "hallucinatory fictions" about Obama confiscating guns  which in turn, according to the Times, has helped boost gun sales and drive up stock prices of gun manufacturers.
A Vietnamese man who prosecutors said traveled to Yemen to join an al-Qaida affiliate and was instructed there to detonate an explosive at London's Heathrow Airport pleaded guilty to U.S. terrorism charges Friday.

Minh Quang Pham, 33, pleaded guilty in Manhattan federal court to three counts  including that he provided material support to al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula  three weeks before he was set to face trial.

Speaking in a quiet voice, Pham admitted to providing support to the Islamic militant group.

Prosecutors have said that Pham, who had attended a university in South London, while in Yemen also directly trained with Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born radical Islamic cleric who was killed in a 2011 U.S. drone attack.

In court, Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Buckley said that after his arrest, Pham admitted that al-Awlaki instructed him in how to make an explosive device out of household materials.

Buckley said al-Awlaki "directed Pham to return to the United Kingdom, where he was to construct and detonate the device at the arrival area of Heathrow." Buckley added that al-Awlaki gave Pham $10,000 for the plot.

Oath, training

Bobbi Sternheim, Pham's lawyer, said her client accepted "full responsibility" for the charges to which he pleaded. But she said there was "no proof" Pham did anything to follow through with causing any harm at Heathrow.

Pham faces a mandatory minimum of 30 years in prison and a maximum term of life. He is scheduled to be sentenced April 14.

Prosecutors said Pham traveled from the United Kingdom to Yemen in December 2010 and took an oath of allegiance to the militant group, which the United States lists as a terrorist organization. He spent a year in Yemen, where he received "military-type" training and helped prepare the group's magazine, Inspire, working directly with Samir Khan, a U.S. citizen who served as its editor and died in a U.S. drone strike in 2011.

Pham returned to the United Kingdom in July 2011, where he was detained at Heathrow. Authorities discovered various items, including a live round of .762 caliber armor-piercing ammunition.

He was subsequently arrested in the United Kingdom in June 2012 at the request of U.S. authorities and extradited to the United States in February 2015.
North Korea has often blamed the "hostile policy" of the United States for its development of nuclear weapons.

When the communist country announced a purported test of a hydrogen bomb Wednesday, it said the test was a "measure of defense" against the U.S.

Analysts, however, say the test might be a show of Pyongyang's dissatisfaction with Beijing, a reflection of deteriorating ties between the two allies.

In a rare move, China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs publicly criticized the North Korean action, saying Beijing "firmly opposes" Pyongyang's suspected nuclear test. Spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters her country had not been given warning of the test.

Beijing snub

Bilateral ties between the neighboring countries have cooled since late 2011, when Kim Jong Un took power. Relations deteriorated further in 2013, when Pyongyang proceeded with its third nuclear test despite Beijing's repeated warnings.

Analysts say the latest test has angered Chinese leaders and could lead to Beijing's participation in international efforts to impose fresh sanctions on Pyongyang. Beijing's participation is viewed as a key component of international sanctions on Pyongyang.

Richard Bush, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, said Beijing might take a tougher stance on Pyongyang this time.

"My guess is that China will intensify its support for what the international community has already done," Bush said.

He said there is still room for additional financial sanctions on Pyongyang, adding that Beijing "could do more" in tightening the penalties.

Douglas Paal, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, said the test came as Beijing was trying to mend ties with Pyongyang and the Chinese would take the North Korean action as counterproductive.

"Judging from what I have heard from the Chinese over the last few months, this would be surprising and irritating to them," Paal said.

He also said Beijing could take stronger actions to send a message to Pyongyang.

The test site was close to the Chinese border and the Chinese must have realized the potential danger, said Bruce Bennett, a senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation.

"If North Korea really were to explode an H-bomb at the Punggye-ri nuclear facility, that is so close to the Chinese border that it would cause serious damages more than likely in China," Bennett said.

Beijing's dilemma

Robert Manning, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, said he expects that Beijing's actions would be limited, despite the current troubled relationship between Beijing and Pyongyang. China appears to be afraid of the destabilization of the North Korean regime, which could slide into chaos on the Chinese border.

"They are trying to find a path that sends a message to North Korea, but doesn't push them to the point where they have to worry about a collapse of their regime," Manning said.

Manning added that over the past few years, the Chinese appeared to be leaning toward a sense that their ally is more of a liability than an asset.

Gordon Chang, an author and columnist who writes extensively on China, said there appears to be little consensus in the Chinese leadership about whether it should change its policy on North Korea at this point.

"In Beijing, there are a lot of people who do want to change the Chinese foreign policy with regard to North Korea to take a tougher stance against Kim Jong Un, but there is no consensus to do so," Chang said.

On Friday, Beijing rejected Washington's criticism that its policies toward Pyongyang had failed.

"The origin and crux of the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula has never been China," Hua said, in an apparent reference to comments by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.

On Thursday, Kerry told reporters that Beijing's approach to Pyongyang "has not worked, and we cannot continue business as usual."
Civil servants have reacted angrily to suggestions by Higher Education Minister Professor Jonathan Moyo that bonuses for state workers should not be taken as a form of entitlement as some of them are allegedly lazy.

In one of his latest tweets, Professor Moyo noted that some civil servants normally leave their jackets in offices and then expect bonuses at the end of the year.

David Dzatsunga, chairperson of the College Lecturers Association of Zimbabwe, said though they cannot dispute the fact that there are workers who may be drinking beer at work, the government must still honour its promise of paying them their 13th cheque.

Professor Moyos tweet came at a time when some civil servants are threatening to down tools if they are not paid bonuses by the end of this month.

Dzatsunga told VOA Studio 7 that if the minister feels some employees do not deserve bonuses the government has mechanisms and means to deal with them.

Professor Moyo was not reachable for comment.
Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto says authorities have captured fugitive drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, who brazenly escaped from prison through a secret underground tunnel seven months ago.

The president announced Guzman's capture in a brief announcement in Spanish Friday on Twitter: "Mission accomplished. We have him."

A Mexican official told The Associated Press that Guzman was arrested after a shootout with Mexican marines in the city of Los Mochis in Sinaloa, Guzman's home state.

Acting on a tip, authorities said a squad of Mexican marines raided a house in Los Mochis at dawn Friday, and gunfire broke out immediately.

Mexican officials said five suspects were killed and six others arrested. One of the marines was slightly wounded.

Mexican federal authorities had been focusing their manhunt since October on a mountainous region of Sinaloa, in northwestern Mexico.

Tracking teams had reported it appeared that Guzman had been injured while fleeing marines in rugged terrain near the borders of Sinaloa and Durango states.

Guzman's July 11 prison escape - his second in the past 14 years - was accomplished through a 1.5-kilometer-long underground tunnel, dig in secret from his cell to a nearby village. It was a major embarrassment to the administration of President Pena Nieto, which had been praised for its aggressive push against Mexico's top drug lords.

Guzman was first captured in 1993, but escaped in 2001 with the help of prison guards. After more than a decade on the loose, he was recaptured early in 2014, with the help of intelligence that U.S. authorities provided to Mexico.

Mexico has issued arrest warrants for more than 20 former officials, guards and police officers for their alleged participation in Guzman's escape last year. Ten civilians are also in detention.

Guzman escaped through a rectangular hole found underneath a shower of his prison cell, moving through a fully ventillated tunnel equipped with electric lighting.Authorities also found a motorcycle modified to run on rails; the vehicle apprently was used to haul tools and dirt away from the subterranean site during construction.
Police have released Newsday newspaper deputy editor Nqaba Matshazi, journalist Xolisani Ncube and Sifikile Thabethe, a representative of their company, Alpha Media Holdings, who were arrested for allegedly writing falsehoods.

The three staffers, who are represented by lawyer Taona Nyamakura, are facing allegations of communicating or publishing false statements prejudicial to the state after running a story in the newspapers Wednesdays edition titled CIO secretly gets bonuses.

Matshazi thanked those people who supported them while they were in police custody.

Hi guys thanks for the support, been a hectic 30 or so hours but at least we aren't in custody anymore, read his tweet posted soon after he left police cells.

His attorney Nyamakura said police handled the case in a professional manner as they did not torture three staffers.

Matshazi and Ncube were each asked to pay $200 bail. Thabethe was released on free bail.

Nyamakura said they will challenge the constitutionality of some sections of the law they are being accused of violating.

They are facing charges of contravening Section 31 (1) (ii) of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act.

Government has been struggling to pay salaries and bonuses for its 550,000-strong workforce but it is known to prioritize the security sector.
Despite complaints from many Zimbabweans about the state of the countrys economy, which most people blame on the ruling Zanu-PF party, director Pedzisai Ruhanya of the Zimbabwe Democracy Institute, said they would still likely vote for the party in an election than any of the opposition parties because of their state of disunity and disarray.

Speaking in a recent panel discussion with chairman of the United Kingdom Zanu-PF branch, Nick Mangwana, Dr. Ruhanya, said its not that the ruling party itself is any better, but it holds up better than the opposition.

I dont think that the failures of Zanu [PF] necessarily mean that the opposition will gain, said Dr. Ruhanya.

Zanu can be torn apart, they can run into factions, but I can say that a faction in Zanu [PF] given the complexity between party and state, and how they hold the state through the military, they can still win the election because the opposition is not organized. The opposition is in disarray.

Dr. Ruhanya said as long as the opposition remains this way, splintering like the once united Movement for Democratic Change, there can be no hope of a strong opposition to Zanu-PF which could force the ruling party into any kind of compromise, for the benefit of the people.

Look at Zanu [PF] and Zapu [Zimbabwe African Peoples Union]. There was a time when they formed the Patriotic Front, to confront a common enemy in Rhodesia, and they won independence, and these guys [opposition] to be frank, if they continue in their disorganizing manner and their mediocrity state as it is, Zanu [PF] can be torn apart, they can differ, but they can still win the elections because of the problems of the opposition.

Mangwana agreed that there is more his Zanu-PF party can do to improve the standard of living in the country. He also noted his partys objectives this year.

We have to deliver good outcomes for our people, we have to focus not on power gains, we actually have to focus on delivering good economics to our people. That as a party is a running call that any well-meaning Zimbabwean should make.

Stressing his partys various policies to improve peoples livelihoods, such as the Zimbabwe Agenda for Socio-Economic Transformation (Zimasset), Mangwana said though its progress may be slow, it is yielding results.

He said there are more stringent needs that as a country every citizen should be concerned about and help the party address, rather than fighting it.

This year there is going to be very devastating drought. We need everybody focused on making sure that not even a single person would starve, and not even a single person would go hungry. We have to make sure that the jobs that are there are retained, and more are created, Mangwana said.

If people have got a single-mindedness of focusing on those particular goals, well achieve everything we need, and 2016 can be better.

But with the World Food Program reporting that close to 2 million Zimbabweans are in need of food aid, and the appeal that it has put out for assistance, Dr. Ruhanya said Mangwana and his Zanu-PF partys concerns are late.

I dont know why he [Mangwana] is saying that we will not have anyone starving, people are starving, people have no food, we already have a drought. I think that theyve told him [Mangwana] from Harare, that the country has a huge food deficit, said Dr. Ruhanya.

To adequately address the problem, Dr. Ruhanya said Zanu-PF and all the parties in the country should prioritize people rather than their own person needs.

The problem we have as a country is that we have a problem of the will to power, versus the will to transformation. Everything that is happening here is about grabbing, its about capturing power, but transforming our institutions, transforming our economy, transforming our democratic culture, is not part of the discourse, not only in Zanu [PF] but also in the opposition, Dr. Ruhanya said.

But aside from that Dr. Ruhanya continued, change in the country is a long stretch given the age of President Robert Mugabe, whom he said is not inspiring confidence in investors wanting to invest in the country, and not showing the leadership needed to steer the country out of its current abyss.

President Mugabe is turning 92 in 7 weeks time, he stressed. Surely you cannot have international or domestic economic confidence in a 92-year-old, to do deals with a 92-year-old, Dr. Ruhanya concluded with a laugh.

But Mangwana said he and his party have confidence in President Mugabe, whom they recently endorsed as the candidate for the 2018 elections, in which he will contest for the countrys presidency, at the age of 94.
Jeffrey Tambor in Transparent and Arrested Development. Photo: Amazon, Netflix

Its taking a while for Mitch Hurwitz to get Arrested Developments fifth season off the ground, not just because of scheduling issues but also because, as Hurwitz told Deadline, real life keeps stealing his ideas. Take, for instance, one idea for Jeffrey Tambors George Sr.: What if the Bluth family patriarch revealed that she was trans, throwing her relationships with her immature adult children into disarray? Then came Transparent, with literally the exact same actor in the exact same premise and, hell, even the exact same setting. George will remain cis in season five, but other plotlines are already locked in: Lindsays plan to build a giant wall on the U.S.-Mexico border was a humorous satire of anti-immigration rhetoric when it was introduced in season four; now its the most important plank in the platform of the Republican presidential front-runner. Likewise, Busters arrest for the murder of Lucille Austero came years before the current true-crime frenzy, but in the wake of the genres massive buzz, Hurwitz says season five will be heavily influenced by Making a Murderer. Tony Hale had better start growing that beard.
Photo: Getty Images

Writers each have their own creative processes, but some might be better suited for the pace of the internet. Diana Gabaldon, the author of the Outlander series, was at the Television Critics Association winter press tour when she was asked when readers might expect the ninth installment of her series. One audience member asked Gabaldon if she would meet her deadline for her book, pointing out that fellow fantasy writer George R.R. Martin has had trouble finishing the sixth book of his Song of Ice and Fire series, The Winds of Winter, confessing to blowing multiple deadlines. Unlike George, I write no matter where I am or what else Im doing, she said to murmurs from the audience. He admits it himself, he likes to travel and he cant write when he travels. Thats just the way he works. While Gabaldon concedes that everybodys got their own writing mechanisms, she describes herself as someone who is constantly compelled to write:

[Even with] two full-time jobs and three small children, I wrote in any spare minutes that I had, so Ive kept that work ethic, so to speak. I do have a couple of hours in the middle of night that I can count on when things are quiet, and thats my main writing time. I will write at intervals during the day. I write when I travel, and so forth.

Gabaldon is nothing if not prolific, writing an entire spinoff series of stories about a minor Outlander character as well as an episode of the second season of the Starz adaptation. She says that while negotiating deadlines with her publisher can be tricky, she operates by her own internal deadline. Eventually we get down to my deadline, which is when the book is talking to me so strongly Im not doing anything else, she said. Stuff just goes through me, Im not doing anything else. Luckily this only lasts two or three months or else I would die.
Local artist Pat Blackwell will give a demonstration of creating stained-glass art at a meeting of the Art Guild of Central Texas at 2 p.m. Sunday in the Garden Room at Central Presbyterian Church, 9191 Woodway Drive.

Blackwell has produced stained-glass works for many locations in Waco and also has taught the craft.

The meeting will be preceded by a reception at 1:30 p.m. and is free to the public.

For more information, visit www.artguildct.org.

Pro-Life Waco

Pro-Life Waco will meet from 1 to 2 p.m. Sunday in the Parish Hall at St. Marys Church, 1424 Columbus Ave.

In addition to action planning, the program will include a viewing of two short videos, one an animation of pre-born life created by Alexander Tsiaras, the author From Conception to Birth: A Life Unfolds.

An Italian buffet lunch will precede the meeting from noon to 1 p.m. Cost for the meal is $3 for adults.

For more information, email prolifewaco@gmail.com or call John Pisciotta at 644-0407.

Free health screenings

Sams Club, 2301 E. Waco Drive, will offer free health screenings from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday.

Two of the free tests being offered, blood pressure and blood glucose, are key markers for determining overall health status.

The screenings are free, confidential and open to the public.

Low-cost pet clinic

Animal Birth Control Clinic, 3238 Clay Ave., will conduct a pet preventive health and microchip clinic from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday.

Services to be offered will include microchips, distempter/parvo vaccinations, feline vaccinations, heartworm testing, Rabies vaccinations, flea treatment and heartworm prevention.

For pricing information, visit www.animal birthcontrol.org or call 776-7303.

Square dance class

The Waco Star Square Dance Club will hold classes for new dancers from 7 to 9 p.m. Monday at Allemande Hall, 106 Westlake Drive in Speegleville.

The weekly classes will continue for 12 weeks.

For more information, email wendellmr662@gmail.com or call or text 715-2749 or 722-6395.

Happy Sew Year

Heart of Texas One Stop Shop Hop will have a Happy Sew Year event from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday at the Waco Convention Center, 100 Washington Ave.

The event will feature 42 brick-and-mortar quilt shops in one location, with fabric, notions and more available to purchase.

Admission costs $6 for ages 12 and older.

For more information, call 741-6988.

Blood drive on Sunday

Peace Lutheran Church, 9301 Panther Way, will host a blood drive from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Sunday.

The Carter BloodCare bus will be on site in the churchs parking lot.

For more information or to schedule an appointment, call Terri Schmidt at 420-4729.

January donors will receive a Coca-Cola waterproof cellphone pouch, while supplies last.
The area around New Road and Valley Mills Drive is quickly becoming LED headquarters for Waco.

LEDs have become the rage because of their lower energy consumption, longer lifetime, smaller size and faster switching capabilities compared with other forms of lighting.

At 530 N. New Road, Amir Surani opened Smart LED in December and said he offers LED products for residential and commercial use.

We not only sell LED lighting but offer other energy saving solutions, Surani said.

Nearby, at Westview Village, Lux LED has signed a lease on about 3,750 square feet of space next to WiseGuys restaurant.

Lux reportedly will offer an array of LED products in a showroom setting. LED is short for light-emitting diode.

Therapy center grows

Focus Behavioral Associates moved into a new clinic at 620 N. Robinson Drive, across from Bushs Chicken, during the Christmas holidays.

The opening of a new facility reflects the organizations continued growth. Focus reportedly is the only privately owned, clinical-based therapy center in Central Texas that is focused on so-called applied behavior analysis techniques. Applied behavior analysis enables children and adults diagnosed with illnesses including autism spectrum disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and oppositional defiant disorder to improve their communication, motor and reasoning skills.

Focus provides customized therapy options to help treat people with this type of disorder.

The organizations new building has a daily life room with features found in an apartment, such as a laundry center, a kitchen and bedroom. This setting will help Focus clients learn skills that could allow them to live independently in the future. The new clinic also has five classrooms, two conference rooms and five therapy rooms.

Brazos Funeral Home

The Brazos Funeral Home at 1124 Washington Ave. has closed, and the two-story building has been placed on the market priced at $356,000.

For most of 90 years, that location operated as Wilkirson-Hatch Funeral Home, one of the most prominent and respected mortuaries in the community. It later became Wilkirson-Hatch-Bailey under the leadership of Hatch Bailey, a member of the historic family whose corporation owned the funeral home.

Wilkirson-Hatch-Bailey relocated to Valley Mills Drive and Bosque Boulevard in 2000, which represented a more central location in Waco. Three years later, a newly formed corporation made up of most of the family members who also owned Wilkirson-Hatch-Bailey created Brazos Funeral Home in the downtown location.

Hatch Bailey said the downtown location was a low-cost funeral home.

But the prices were so low that it did not generate much revenue at all, and it just didnt make sense to keep it open, Hatch Bailey said. It did experience some water damage during heavy rains and storms, and the facility will need repairs.

Bailey said the building is being listed by Mike Meadows with Kelly Realtors, adding that Meadows already has received inquiries.

It would be a great church, or somebody may like to have just the land due to its proximity to Baylor and downtown, Bailey said.

He said family members who have pre-pay funeral plans with Brazos Funeral Home will have their contracts honored by Wilkirson-Hatch-Bailey.

About 80 funerals a year were held at Brazos Funeral Home, Bailey said, adding that Wilkirson-Hatch-Bailey averages one service per day.

Common Grounds

Common Grounds, located on the Baylor University campus at 1123 S. Eighth St., has earned a reputation for serving a nice cup of coffee.

But Trey Lumley, who serves as catering manager, has let it be known the shop welcomes catering orders.

We began catering in 2012 for just a few people who requested our signature Cowboy Coffee and Arnold Palmer Tea for special, personal events, Lumley said in a news release. Three years later, weve expanded to consistently execute between 100 and 130 orders per year over the past two years.

Dropping a famous name, Lumley said Chip Gaines of Magnolia Market and Fixer Upper fame asked Common Grounds to serve coffee at a birthday party thrown for his wife and co-star, Joanna Gaines. Lumley said the shop also has a good relationship with Baylor, hosting events such as Line Camp, Welcome Week, Invitation to Excellence and Christmas on Fifth Street.

He said Common Grounds also has taken part in Waco Wonderland and the Texas Food Truck Showdown.

Weve determined what it takes to make bulk, high-quality coffee beverages and equipped ourselves to expand this niche market throughout Waco, Lumley said.

He said Common Grounds also partners with restaurants such as Lula Janes, El Crucero Tacos & Burritos, Heritage Creamery and Fuego Tortilla Grill to add food options to catered events.

Catering services include:

Making beverages at Common Grounds and placing them in insulated beverage dispensers for delivery or pickup.

Brew Bar, which involves setting up tents and selling three or four popular drinks brewed on-site.

Barista Rental, which is the hiring of Common Grounds baristas to make high-quality coffee and espresso drinks at weddings or other events.

Backyard Brew Bar, a concept in the works for serving two or three types of drinks in the Common Grounds backyard.
A judge declined to throw out an indictment Friday against a biker who saw his stepfather killed May 17 at Twin Peaks and claims to be a crime victim rather than a criminal defendant.

Houston attorney Paul Looney, who represents Cody Ledbetter, a member of the Cossacks group from Waco, also failed in his attempt Friday to have a trial date set for Ledbetter after asserting for the third time his clients demand for a speedy trial.

Looney alleged that Ledbetters case should catapult to the top of Judge Ralph Strothers 19th State District Court felony docket because Ledbetter is seeking a trial as soon as possible while no other defendants are making similar requests.

Michael Jarrett, McLennan County first assistant district attorney, argued that the local courts have systems and procedures in place and Ledbetter has no right to buck that system, putting his case ahead of others.

Jarrett also told the court that the investigation of the complex case by the DAs office and state, federal and local authorities is still in its infancy stage as far as being ready to go to trial.

Jarrett said prosecutors have produced thousands of pages of discovery to defense attorneys but are still waiting for analysis of cellphone and ballistics evidence and the examination of thousands of biker Facebook posts, including ones by Ledbetter.

The delay in setting Ledbetters trial is causing him serious and long-standing harm, Looney told Strother. Looney characterized Ledbetter as a crime victim and said his indictment and wait for trial are preventing him from applying for state crime victim compensation because he saw his stepfather, Daniel Diesel Boyett, killed in the shootout at Twin Peaks.

Jarrett countered that it flies in the face of justice for Looney to refer to Ledbetter as a victim instead of a defendant.

Boiler-plate indictment

In his argument to quash the indictment, Looney told the judge that the completely wide-open and boiler-plate indictment is not specific enough to inform his client what he is being charged with.

This is the first time in my career where the indictment or discovery documents dont tell me what my client did that he is on trial for, Looney said. I dont know what conduct he is being charged with.

Jarrett argued that the indictments, which charge 106 bikers with first-degree felony engaging in organized criminal activity, with underlying offenses of murder and aggravated assault, track the language of the statute and are legally sufficient to allege an offense.

Jarrett said the bikers are being charged with being members of a criminal street gang and attending the meeting of a biker coalition as a show of force.

Strother denied the motion to quash the indictment, saying that the cases represent the aftermath of a unique, complicated and complex series of events. The judge also conceded that the identical 106 indictments were not crafted as a matter of literary art, but are legally sufficient.

The term of the McLennan County grand jury that returned the 106 indictments Nov. 10 was extended by 90 days on Dec. 17 to conclude its investigation into the deadly shootout.

No date has been set for the grand jury to return.
The McLennan County sheriffs race will heat up Monday night in a forum for the three candidates to address voters.

Incumbent McLennan County Sheriff Parnell McNamara, Waco police Sgt. W. Patrick Swanton and Willie Tompkins each confirmed they will attend the 7 p.m. event at Brazos Plaza on 715 Elm Ave.

McLennan County Republican Chairman Jeb Leutwyler said he will introduce the candidates, who are all running as Republicans.

Each candidate will speak for 15 minutes after drawing names to determine the order. Then each candidate will have a designated area where citizens can ask individual questions.

The primary election will be March 1, with a May 24 runoff if needed. The general election will be Nov. 8.

Swanton has been with the Waco Police Department for 35 years and has said his experience includes 10 years of real law enforcement on the streets.

The forum is a great way to meet the candidates, visit with the citizens and tell them why Mr. McNamara is doing a poor job running the sheriffs office, Swanton said.

He is willing to show his experience by bringing his record from the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement, which tracks all training records of Texas peace officers.

I publicly challenge both candidates to produce theirs and share them with the public, Swanton said. And I would like to compare training records with the other candidates. They dont want you to see theirs.

Tompkins is a former Waco police officer who ran for the same position in 2012 as a Democrat. He is a pastor at New Generation Church in Bellmead and a substitute teacher at Waco High School. He got 29 percent of the vote against McNamara in his first run.

One of my priorities is to drive down taxes in the county, because the incidents that have happened will cost the county millions of dollars, Tompkins said. Twin Peaks, people dying in jail  a lot of these will be put on the taxpayers. I want to be able to stabilize especially the extra, extra spending thats been going on. I dont see how the budget is not broken already.

McNamara has held the office since 2012 and aims to inform attendees of his own record.

I think they will see me as a front-line lawman and a good administrator, McNamara said. Ive got an unbelievable command staff of captains, lieutenants and sergeants, and were doing a tremendous job of protecting the county with everything we possibly can.

Once again, we have a very, very good record, and Im going to keep coming down hard on the criminals.
The family of an Alzheimers patient who died at Regent Care Center in September 2012 alleges that negligent care by the nursing home staff caused his death.

Tabitha Schuerg, granddaughter of Lawrence Buice; Buices wife, Barbara Buice; and his two sons, Donald Buice and Ronald Buice, are seeking unspecified monetary damages in their wrongful death lawsuit, filed in 414th State District Court against Regent Care Center of Woodway.

Lawrence Buices family admitted the 81-year-old to Regent Care, 7801 Woodway Drive, in December 2011 after he fell and required 24-hour medical care.

Buice suffered from Alzheimers disease and Parkinsons disease, which left him largely dependent on others, according to the lawsuit.

He died Sept. 29, 2012, after months of severe and agonizing pain and suffering from pressure ulcers he developed at the nursing home, the suit alleges.

Galveston attorney Janet Rushing, who represents Regent Care, declined comment on the lawsuit.

Houston attorney John Brothers, who represents the Buice family, also declined comment.

When this case is tried, the evidence will show that with proper care, most pressure ulcers are avoidable, the lawsuit says. The evidence will also show that there was nothing about Mr. Buices condition that made pressure ulcers unavoidable, evidenced by the fact that prior to his admission to Regent Care Center, he had never developed a pressure ulcer.

The nursing home staff knew Buice was at risk of pressure ulcers, so a plan was developed that required a pressure-reducing device on his bed and frequent turning and repositioning, according to the lawsuit.

By April 4, 2012, Buice had developed a pressure ulcer on his backside, and within two weeks, he developed another one on his right hip, the suit alleges.

Despite that, the suit claims, a pressure-relieving mattress was not placed on his bed until April 30, 2012.

Sadly, but not surprisingly, Mr. Buices pressure ulcers progressed and new wounds developed, the suit says. Mr. Buices condition deteriorated and, ultimately, the decision was made to place him on hospice.

The lawsuit says an autopsy would confirm that pressure ulcers were a cause of his death.

The suit alleges that the staff at Regent Care breached the standard of care and was negligent by failing to prevent the pressure ulcers, by failing to treat them and by failing to provide sufficient staff that was adequately well-trained and supervised.
The Robinson City Council agreed this week to send a letter demanding a sitting councilman remove obstructions he placed across a road, as they argued whether the road is private or public.

Councilman Doye Baker said hes pretty sure the only way the issue over where city property ends and his property begins will be resolved is to go to court  especially, Baker said, after a presentation given at a city council meeting this week.

Mike Dixon, a Waco attorney who represents the city, said the city contracted out an engineering survey to determine the property lines along Shamrock Drive.

The survey confirmed that the city owns the road, which provides access to a city shop and an old city sewer plant. Dixon said the process was not done haphazardly, because the city has been in a state of flux for so many years regarding that area.

On one side of the street sits city property, while on the other side is about 13 acres owned by Baker.

Despite the fresh survey, the city and the councilman disagree on where the line between the two properties sits.

Dixon said the disputes generally arise out of Bakers often-successful attempts to block the citys access to its properties, including a locked gate and fence he installed across Shamrock Drive.

Dixon said the engineering survey states that Shamrock Drive is in fact a public street and that Baker has fenced in land owned by the city.

Parked tractor

Dixon said Baker has gone as far as parking his tractor in the middle of the street, preventing the citys access to its property.

But Baker says Shamrock Drive isnt a public street and is on his property. Therefore, parking the tractor on the street overnight with plans to mow his property in the morning should have concerned no one but himself, Baker said.

He said if the city is interested in buying some land from him, hes willing to entertain an offer but hes not giving any of it away. Baker said the engineering survey was made up by the city and therefore is not reliable.

The other members of the council agreed to authorize city staff to send a letter demanding Baker remove any obstructions hes placed in the street right-of-way and to move his fence to the boundary line located by the recent survey.

But the action wasnt taken before some back-and-forth.

Dixon said Baker was called twice the morning of the tractor incident about moving the equipment. When he didnt show, they had the tractor towed, he said. Dixon said Baker wasnt happy about it and reported it to the police.

This is just harassment on their part, Baker said.

He told the council they could have just driven the tractor out of the way. He also wanted to know how his 15-foot mower attached to the tractor blocked a 50-foot entrance.

How can you block a 50-foot easement with a 15-foot piece of equipment? You can if youve already obstructed the street all the way over to that point, Dixon said, pointing to a picture showing the fence Baker built and his tractor blocking an opening.

Councilman Jimmy Rogers asked Baker to point out on the picture exactly how the city staff was supposed to drive around the tractor to get down Shamrock Drive and to the city facilities. Rogers also added that someone cant get in a private vehicle and drive off with it.

Baker then asked why the city has the vehicle impounded and then accused the chief of police of trying to steal the mower.

Police Chief Rusty Smith said it is standard to tow a vehicle blocking a public roadway so that an emergency vehicle cannot pass it.

Councilman Jeremy Stivener asked Baker what made him chose that location, on that street, to park his mower versus anywhere else on the other 13 acres of land.

Baker said that issue could be solved in court.

Dixon said Friday the property line issue has been a problem for years. The matter would go dormant for a while until there was another flare-up because Baker had blocked the entrance again, he said.

It was after that farm equipment stuff, there started being more and more questions about what are our rights out there, Dixon said, adding thats when the city committed to having an engineering firm survey the property.

Baker said Friday hes owned those 13 acres for 20 years. He said hes being targeted because in April 2015 the city was cited for unauthorized dumping of municipal waste at the end of Shamrock Drive. Baker, who began his term on the council in January 2015, filed a complaint with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, charging that the city had created an illegal dump site.

They were crossing my property and dumping trash, Baker said Friday.

Addressing Bakers comments that hes being harassed by the city manager, police chief and Dixon, Dixon said, We enforce the regulations to the city and the laws of the state equally no matter who it is.

Baker said the city has room on the other side of its property to build a street to access its buildings if it so desires.

Ive got the deed

But Shamrock Drive is on his property, he said.

Ive got the deed to it, Baker said. It goes back probably 100 years.

Councilman Jimmy Rogers said Baker is entitled as a private citizen to his opinion.

As I told him, he needs to take those issues up through the proper channels, Rogers said.

Rogers said Baker is well within his rights to have a dispute over property lines, but its not proper to block access to city property.

Mayor Bert Echterling said it wasnt the city council that pursued the study of the boundary lines.

He said he guessed that decision came from management. When asked who he meant, he said, either the city manger or the citys attorney.

Echterling said now that the city has agreed to send the letters, they will see if Baker removes his fence.

Unless Mr. Baker disputes the information that the city has, and then Im assuming it would become a court decision, he said.
Jan. 1 marked the third anniversary of the Affordable Care Acts implementation in Texas. So it makes sense for Texans to ask: How is the law playing out in your state?

Not well. Roughly 1,040,200 people purchased 2016 health insurance on the states Affordable Care Acts online exchange, where they likely found an unpleasant surprise. Monthly premiums for their plans will be 14.09 percent higher, on average, than they were in 2015. Adding to that, 36,000 even had to scramble for new providers after the ACA-sanctioned Community Health Alliance had no choice but to leave the exchange altogether.

Deductibles and out-of-pocket costs are also on the rise, and health-care provider networks are narrowing. The combination of these factors helps explain why the federal government recently halved the number of people it expects to sign up for the laws health insurance.

Yet while the outlook for the Affordable Care Act is already bleak, the data show it will likely become even worse. Thats the result of an analysis I conducted in recent weeks. Using the latest health-insurance-exchange enrollment data and a model funded in part by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, I estimated how the Affordable Care Act will affect the health insurance market over the next decade.

In brief: Costs will continue to rise and coverage will continue to underwhelm. In fact, coverage will likely begin declining in the next few years, leaving millions more Americans uninsured than today.

The looming premium increases in Texas show 2016 will be a particularly rough year, but subsequent years will also be costly. I project premium increases for 2017 health insurance will average at 7.4 percent for individual plans. Family policy holders will likely pay 6.2 percent more. That trend will hold for years to come; the Affordable Care Acts tax-dollar assistance programs for insurers, known as risk corridors and re-insurance, will expire at the end of this year, leading to further growth in premiums.

Over the next decade, I estimate individual and family policy holders will see their rates increase more than 61 percent by 2025. That comes to $5,500 a year for an individual policy and $23,500 for family coverage on average.

Even federal subsidies will not be enough to cover these costs. Just between 2016 and 2017, policy holders should expect to pay $600 more in premiums, even after subsidies are factored in. As premiums continue to increase in subsequent years, that out-of-pocket cost will rise correspondingly. Texans with individual and family plans, respectively, can expect to pay $2,000 and $8,000 more a year by 2025.

This leads to the second component of my study  decreases in overall coverage. As costs continue to rise, they will discourage people in Texas and across the country from purchasing any health insurance at all.

This is happening already. Data show the IRS fines approximately 7.5 million Americans for choosing to forgo health insurance entirely, even though the Affordable Care Act penalizes them for doing so. The reason is often simple: Consumers forced to choose between an expensive penalty and an even more expensive health-insurance plan will often choose the cheaper option. It may be a financial necessity. The number of people making this choice will rise as insurance becomes ever more expensive.

This will undermine the Affordable Care Acts central goal of universal coverage. I estimate the total number of uninsured in 2025 will be roughly 40 million  roughly as many uninsured Americans as there were before the law was passed.

Such is the Affordable Care Acts likely future. This puts in context the claims of presidential candidates like Hillary Clinton, who says the Affordable Care Act is working. That may make for a good sound bite on the campaign trail, but it doesnt match with the experiences of many Texans dealing with the law firsthand. Theyre paying more and getting less with every passing year  a trend that shows no signs of changing any time soon.

Stephen T. Parente is a professor of health finance and associate dean of the Carlson School of Management and the director of the Medical Industry Leadership Institute at the University of Minnesota.
This is the kind of fundamentally irrational argument that is beloved of the pro-gun lobby. The bad guys have guns, they argue, and always will have guns (because they're bad guys), so it is extremely important that all the good guys also have guns. Sometimes the next bit of the schtick says that this is so the good guys can defend themselves and their loved ones against these bad dudes, and sometimes it posits a kind of dodgy balance-of-terror in which the crims won't shoot if they know the saints will shoot back.

The really dumb and insulting thing about this line of argument is that it makes the bitterly simplistic assumption that good guys and bad guys are fundamentally different. It rests on a revived theory of eugenics (look it up, Senator) that asserts a detectable genetic difference between good and bad.

The problem, of course, is that such an argument is complete and utter frogshit. Those kids who shoot up schools, those loners who shoot up cinemas and abortion clinics, those gang-members who blast their rivals  even, over here, those spree killers whose potential copiers Howard's gun laws prevented  all started life innocent, as kids.

Somewhere along the line, sooner or later, environment, abuse, horror, addiction, religious fervour , or mental illness corroded their moral compass and led them to move along the spectrum from "good" to "bad". And "bad" in this scenario is evidenced solely by the willingness to pick up a gun and use it.

So where does this leave the good ol' boys of the Oregon militia? They claimed last week that they were expressing their inherent goodness by conducting the armed occupation of a government building, defending folks' rights to set torch to publicly owned woodland, demanding the overturn of a court judgment, and threatening to put a bullet into any government employee who came near them.
Tarantino owns the New Beverly cinema, just south of Hollywood. A year ago, he took over as its program director, mostly showing prints from his private collection, always in double bills. He hopes it can be to a new generation of enthusiasts what the Carson Twin Cinema in Scottsdale was to him in his youth, presenting martial arts and blaxploitation flicks, thrillers, comedies and horror movies; Five Fingers of Death and Enter the Dragon, to a live soundtrack of hooting and yelling and kung fu fighting in the aisles. Thankfully, by the time I see The Hateful Eight at the Crest on December 4, the problem has been fixed. The projectionist's body has been disposed of. Blood has been scrubbed from the carpet. And when legendary screen composer Ennio Morricone's overture is finished, and the screen fades from red to snow white, the whirring of the projector is the only sound. The Colorado wilderness, presented in an extra wide aspect ratio of 2.76 to 1, flickering at 24 frames a second, looks absolutely magnificent. Jennifer Jason Leigh plays a fugitive in The Hateful Eight. The Hateful Eight is set shortly after the end of the US Civil War. Bounty hunter John "the Hangman" Ruth (Kurt Russell) is bringing fugitive Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh) to face justice in the town of Red Rock. They encounter Union officer-turned-bounty hunter Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson) and Confederate soldier Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins). A blizzard forces them to take shelter at Minnie's Haberdashery, an inn in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, where they are greeted by four strangers with bad intentions. "I think of this movie as a western Reservoir Dogs," Tarantino tells me, when we meet at the Four Seasons hotel the day after the screening. "A bunch of characters in one space. No one can really trust anybody else. The paranoia is so thick that it bounces off the walls until it has nowhere to go but the fourth wall into the audience."

How has he changed as a director in the two decades since Reservoir Dogs? "I think, um " There's a long pause. Tarantino's words generally tumble out in flurries, forming sentences that break down and veer off on tangents, as if he's constantly trying to express two related thoughts at once. "I think my methods are the same. You can ask Tim Roth and Michael Madsen about that and they'll tell you. Hopefully I'm a lot better. That was my very first movie. I was kind of a boy when I did that." Well, I tell him, I watched Reservoir Dogs for the first time in 10 years yesterday and was knocked out by it, but you can see when the titles come up that it was made on a budget. "Yeah, exactly. I guess the difference is if I did Reservoir Dogs now it would be three hours long." He laughs  a throwaway line, for sure, but not one that holds up. The lean, propulsive script, in which events unfold in real time, is one of the main reasons it's such a great film. We've got into a polarised, lines-drawn camp that we haven't experienced since the Civil War. "A friend of mine had a really profound take on [The Hateful Eight]," Tarantino continues. "He said 'I feel like this could be your first post-apocalyptic movie'. As opposed to the Australian outback in the Mad Max movies, it's this brutal winter wasteland, and the survivors of the apocalypse have found shelter. They're sitting there arguing about who caused the apocalypse, and the apocalypse is the Civil War." In Django Unchained (2012), with its brutal depictions of slaves torn apart by dogs and forced to fight to the death for the amusement of white plantation owners, Tarantino obliged movie-goers to confront the horrors of slavery. His new film is a sequel, of sorts, set in a country recovering from an unprecedentedly brutal war, in which more than 600,000 men perished and atrocities were committed by both sides.

He has a theory that westerns, more than any other genre, reflect the values and conflicts of the American decade in which they were made  he cites the "noir" westerns made after World War II, the self-confident, morally certain films produced under Eisenhower in the 1950s and the counter-cultural mythic westerns of the '70s as evidence  and says that, although it wasn't his intention, The Hateful Eight fits the pattern. "I didn't know that it was going to be such a serious meditation on the post-Civil War era," he says. "And I had no idea that events in the news would be corresponding with the themes we were dealing with  You've got institutional racism running rampant in this country. We've got into a polarised, lines-drawn camp that we haven't experienced since the Civil War." Bounty hunters Kurt Russell and Samuel L. Jackson face off in The Hateful Eight. In November, he marched through New York to draw attention to police violence against unarmed African-American men, telling demonstrators: "I have to call the murdered the murdered and I have to call the murderers the murderers." Police unions responded with a threat to boycott his movies. Django Unchained was heavily criticised for its unrestrained use of the word "nigger"  a charge fellow director Spike Lee has levelled at Tarantino since 1997's Jackie Brown  and The Hateful Eight doubles down on this. The southern characters use the word with real spite, savouring the hatred of its original meaning.

"If I was doing a romantic comedy, maybe they don't use the N-word so much," says Tarantino, with a forced, rather nervous laugh, like the host of a dinner party trying to prevent an argument. "I'm not making a romantic comedy; I'm dealing with post-Civil War times, black and white struggle, ripped apart and laid bare. I think dealing with racial issues in America is something I have to offer the western." Samuel L. Jackson, Tarantino's leading man and greatest defender, tells me "I always feel like the characters are speaking honestly. I never feel like he's just throwing it in people's faces." Django also won the blessing of several prominent African-American intellectuals, including Henry Louis Gates, Harvard professor and founder of The Root news site. Watching The Hateful Eight, though, I felt that the criticism had brought out the little boy in Tarantino, stubbornly refusing to do as he's told. He's not buying this. "It is my job as an artist to ignore social critics," he says. "I can't let them in the rooms in my head. I believe 100 per cent in what I'm doing and I'm doing it with all my passion and I'm coming from a wonderful tradition of provocateurs in cinema." The film is Tarantino's first western, or fourth. There's Django, set in the antebellum South. He has often described Inglourious Basterds (2009) as a western taking place during World War II. Kill Bill (2003) is studded with references to Once Upon a Time in the West, The Searchers, Navajo Joe and Death Rides a Horse. He showed Uma Thurman The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and suggested she model the Bride on Clint Eastwood's Man With No Name. Once a week on set, Tarantino hosts a movie night, to show the cast and crew films that have inspired him. For The Hateful Eight, he had them watch The Thing, John Carpenter's 1982 shocker about a dozen men trapped on an Antarctic research station with an alien organism, not knowing which of them has been infected.

In the five years he spent behind the counter at Video Archives in Manhattan Beach, before his breakthrough with Reservoir Dogs, Tarantino watched literally thousands of movies. He studied the old masters and the French new wave, and devoured the good, the bad, and the indifferent, with the same hunger to improve his own art that led William Burroughs to pencil GETS  Good Enough To Steal  in the margins of the books he read. When asked if he did much research into World War II before writing Inglourious Basterds, he replied that he studied propaganda films by Jean Renoir and Fritz Lang. The biblical verse that Samuel L. Jackson's hitman declaims in Pulp Fiction, Ezekiel 25:17, is something remembered not from Sunday school, but from a Sonny Chiba martial arts movie. All directors have a mental library of images and sequences to draw on. Tarantino is just more willing to cop to his influences, and artful enough to get away with it, employing genre conventions in a fresh context and turning his films into a game to be played by his most cine-literate fans. In Kill Bill, the Bride fights her way through the history of exploitation cinema, with each character on her death list representing a different genre  the climax is an homage to Shogun Assassin, with a dash of Ichi the Killer. Tarantino didn't attend the screening at the Crest because he was at the New Beverly that night, watching Carwash, in a double bill with Thank God It's Friday. "I hadn't seen it since I was a kid," he says. "And it was wonderful in the theatre. Everyone was laughing  Not to get too sappy about it, but it brings me a lot of joy. There are regulars and fans coming out, and a whole lot of young people and film students, and they're making the pilgrimage again and again and again." The opening credits of The Hateful Eight announce that it is "the eighth film by Quentin Tarantino". He says that once he's made 10, he'll retire, to write novels and film criticism and run the cinema. And although artists often say they'll stop, and rarely do, there's reason to believe him. He has never been a director for hire, and it seems as if he really would be happy to spend the rest of his life watching films, and talking about films, and writing about films, and sitting in the back row, waiting for the lights to go down.
Beef cheek with horseradish foam. Credit:Pat Scala "We have got to serve news audiences however they choose to consume their news," he says. "This idea that's floated from time to time that the ABC shouldn't be on digital platforms is crazy  it's like saying we're taxpayer funded but only to a certain segment of the audience that chooses to consume the news in this way [on television and radio]. We shouldn't choose who gets our service and who doesn't: they should choose." This pursuit of audience shouldn't be confused with the chase for ratings, says Morris. "If nobody wanted to watch us that would obviously be a disaster, but we're not here to be popular or populist," he says. "We're here to ensure we're as relevant to someone in their 20s, 30s or 40s as we are to someone in their 50s, 60s or 70s." Receipt for lunch with Gavan Morris at Pure South. The risk of not being relevant isn't merely abstract for Morris. Growing up on a hobby farm outside Canberra with his mother (she and his father, a former soldier turned fireman, divorced when he was a child), the ABC was rarely on. "Mum watched Lateline, but I think that was about it. The ABC didn't provide a service that my family found particularly useful."

We're lunching at Pure South, the excellent Southbank restaurant devoted entirely to produce from Tasmania. It's an apt choice, since Morris has family in Tassie  he pulls out his phone to show me a photo of Morris's General Store in Swansea, which has been in the family since the 1860s. "If I could choose a different life," he says wistfully, "living there would be fantastic." If nobody wanted to watch us that would obviously be a disaster, but we're not here to be popular or populist. Especially if the food was this good: the Bass Strait scallops and stripey trumpeter fish I order are magnificent, and Morris makes short work of his octopus entree and beef cheek main, too. Morris studied journalism at university, working part time in the Fairfax bureau in Parliament House as a copy boy. It was the perfect blooding for a budding newshound. "I was invisible," he recalls. "I could go into any room where stuff was going on, because people didn't care who I was. Keating would wander into the room at the Fin Review or the SMH and he'd have a conversation with a journalist and the next day you'd read the paper and it was, 'Off-the-record sources ...' And I'm like, 'Oh my god, that off-the-record source was Paul Keating! I heard it!' "

No wonder you became addicted to it. "Completely." His first job was at The Canberra Times, but when he saw a position advertised for reporters for a new youth-oriented current affairs show at the ABC called Attitude he decided to apply. Hell, there was a flight to Melbourne  a city he had never before visited  so why not? In the waiting room at Ripponlea, Morris saw his competition and his heart sank. "There was the beautiful Jessica Rowe, and it's a television job, and I thought I had no hope." But it was Morris who got the job, not Rowe ("She clearly didn't suffer from not getting that one," he quips), because, he says, Attitude was casting not just reporters but roles.

"Everybody had their place  there were the spunky ones, the funny ones  and I was recruited as the boring one from Canberra who liked politics." So it was basically The Breakfast Club? "Pretty much, yeah." The young Turks had no idea what they were doing, but they were a talented bunch who would go on to major careers in Australian media  actor Aaron Pedersen, producer Laura Waters (Chris Lilley's TV series), music writer Jeff Jenkins, and some of the key talent behind Australian Story among them. They were paired with experienced producers and crew, and given their heads to make long-form TV (Morris's greatest hits: discovering Silverchair; getting Natasha Stott Despoja to put on the Doc Martens for the camera for the first time; and profiling a young ACTU "youth squad" organiser called Bill Shorten). "It was the best job I ever had," says Morris. "I thought that's what television was always going to be about  a fantastic team and great resources to be able to do incredible things. And then after two years the program was axed and I was laid off."

A phrase that keeps popping up in conversation with Gaven Morris is "one thing led to another". It makes it sound like he has never been the architect of his own career, but if that's true he hasn't exactly suffered for it. He's had stints at the 7.30 Report, both as a producer (for Paul Lyneham and later Barrie Cassidy) and as a reporter, at Ten, and at CNN, where he was a field producer and reporter. In that last role, and despite being "a bit of a chicken", one thing led to another and he found himself being shelled in northern Iraq, "wondering how on earth did I get here". His worst experience was in Liberia, he says. "I remember saying one thing I will never do is an African civil war," he says. "And one thing led to another" They were only in Monrovia because George W. Bush had been expected; he never turned up, which was all the evidence the rebels needed to conclude that America wanted no piece of this conflict. They attacked, and CNN broadcast. Those pictures finally convinced the US and the UN to intervene. "It was genuinely the one occasion in my career that our ability to cover an event helped change the course of that event," he says. "I think if a satellite dish hadn't been there, that story would have played out differently."

By 2005, he'd had enough of being shot at. He and his partner Kirsten Aiken (originally from Brisbane, she is now a presenter on News 24) decided to head home via Qatar, where there was an interesting start-up in the wings. "We were among the first dozen people to walk in and say, 'OK, we're going to build Al Jazeera English'. We worked out of this dusty villa for a year while we plotted and schemed how we were going to build an international news channel with unlimited money." It was an exercise in something close to pure journalism, Morris says  "You'd literally make your decisions on the basis of what's most interesting and least covered"  and granted complete editorial independence by the Emir, who was determined to create a channel that was "completely free and fair and had liberty to do any story it likes". (The Arab-language channel was a completely different entity, a mouthpiece reflecting a narrow view; "It was like the Fox News of the Arab world," says Morris.) In 2008, with a baby in tow, they headed home, because "a place that doesn't have any trees is no place to raise an Australian child". Morris landed at the ABC, and was soon involved in the launch of its 24-hour news channel. "My joke was that I'd gone from the world's richest news channel start-up to the world's poorest," he says. "We'd promised we'd be on air for the 2010 election, so on we were going to be. And we were terrible. There were a lot of demoralising moments where we thought, 'We've turned this thing on, we're not very good, but we can't turn it off'."

In a sense, that could be the rallying cry for journalism in the digital age: it has a relentless momentum that isn't always for the good, but there's no stopping it. So, how does the man charged with steering the ABC's news coverage through the turbulent present and the who-knows-what future set the course? It's all about trust. "On a digital platform we could go all clickbait, but that's a recipe for losing the trust of audiences," he says. "Increasingly it's about trusting the audience too  you can help us. They're going to say we want to be in there, we can help, we've got expertise, we've got pictures. It's a challenge to do that well while retaining the trust in the output you're providing." And the government? How do you handle that relationship? "I think if we serve the audience well, we will win the respect of government no matter who it is," he says. "If we're not providing value for money and services that people like and respect, that's when we should be worried."
Law's four siblings and father sit with the writer watching take after take of the scene  the opening act of The Family Law, a six-part television adaptation of Law's 2010 collection of personal essays. Benjamin's humiliating 14th birthday party re-enacted in The Family Law. But she says the contrary is true, adding it is "quite surreal" to watch Fiona Choi mouth the frank words she spoke to her son so many years ago. "They're my words," Jenny says. "Yeah, through the penis hole, you know, child birth is not easy. You ask all the women after they have a child." The youngest Law, Michelle, says Choi's dialogue is "pretty much verbatim".

It takes little time in Jenny's company to realise Choi's performance hems close to the truth. Each of her five children's birthdays is a cause for celebration, Jenny says. "I call it my labour day. I treat myself to fine dining. I buy myself something. "And all the children call their mum and tell them 'Thank you mother'. My Ben call: 'Thank you for pushing me out'." The scene in the fictional Chinese restaurant, with its tacky decor and menu of sweet-and-sour dishes, wrings much of its humour out of Jenny's malapropisms and earthy personality. The real Law family make a cameo appearance in the birthday party scene.

But the six-part SBS series also delves into the fraught territory of family breakdown. Law describes the series as "a comedy about divorce" that gathers the threads of one part of his sprawling memoir, which covers the author's coming out as a gay Chinese-Australian teen, the deportation of relatives from Australia and the death of his grandmother in a Hong Kong nursing home. "To do television you can't really cast 12 Benjamins from different eras and different stages of life," he says. "So very early on in the screenwriting process we sat down and thought 'what's the heart of the story?' " Law, who was raised on the Sunshine Coast, says the series condenses the breakdown of his parent's relationship to "one hot Queensland summer". "In real life, my parent's separation and divorce was this protracted, frayed, never-ending thing that started when I was 12 and ended when I was 17," Law says.

Even with humour provided by Jenny's outlook on life and garish costumes and interiors, The Family Law traverses delicate territory. Living people are easily offended, particularly if they are family, and can easily turn to the courts if their pockets are deep enough. Yet Law distinguishes his memoir from the work of authors like Augusten Burroughs, whose Running with Scissors provoked legal action for defamation and invasion of privacy from people depicted in his bestseller. "I know a lot of memoirists are writing from a place where they are estranged from their family and that's the story they're telling," he says. "But I like my family and I didn't want to be sued by them." He adds: "I was writing from a place of love and if anyone was to be presented as a buffoon, I was going to position myself as a bigger one."

Younger sister Michelle, who is also a writer, says the family's openness paved the way for her brother to reveal personal and painful stories. "When we first read the manuscript, our first reaction was just, wrong spelling here, punctuation mistake there," she says. "With the content, Mum was saying we're quite open about things. It's his truth. He should be allowed to tell it." The bad taste of yesteryear competes with Jenny's colourful language for laughs. Much of the show is set in a modest brick veneer house in the outer Brisbane suburb of Sunnybank Hills filled with the clutter of family life, including portraits of Law's relatives mixed with photos of the actors. "The brief was a lasagne of shit," says production designer Ros Durnford, who raided local op shops and tips to create the appearance of a crowded family home of shared bedrooms, one bathroom and a Hills Hoist in the backyard. The set's biggest extravagance is the garish wallpaper, which was imported from Germany.

"We wanted to find the exact shade of tropical green mixed with Canto chic," Durnford says. However, The Family Law treads lightly around the topic of racism. Law, who observes he had neither the face nor race to achieve his childhood dream of a role on Home and Away, says casual racism is both practised and suffered by characters in the show. But he says, it "wasn't the heart of the story we wanted to tell". "We weren't trying to tell the story of a family trying to find their identity in Australia even though that's a perfectly valid story to tell."

Law says each family is unique, yet aspects of his story  the wallpaper, the frank discussions about bodies, the hardworking, absent father  will be familiar to Chinese-Australians. "A lot of Chinese-Australians will get the cultural references, but they won't come from a family that divorced," he says. The cast of The Family Law is a mix of experienced and novice actors. Choi and Anthony Wong, who plays father Danny, have had extensive careers on stage and screen. Yet Wong, who played Zen Buddhist assassin Ghost in The Matrix Reloaded, says he is often typecast as the "mean underworld Asian". "This is a big deal for these guys," says the show's director Jonathon Brough. "Asian-Australian actors are not normally cast in leading roles. There is still a lot of marginalisation in that way  so they have been doctors or lawyers, you know, or underworld figures."

The challenge for Brough (whose comedian brother Alan will be familiar to viewers of ABC's Spicks and Specks) was to make his cast "feel" like a real family. He says family members can be very rough with each other  physically and emotionally. Law shared a bedroom with brother Andrew, which was often the scene of conflict, he says. "You force two very different animals in a cage long enough, they're going to attack each other. We just didn't have that luxury of space." But the emotional as well as humorous centre of the series is the family matriarch. Brough says he is fascinated by the relationship between Law and his mother.

"They have this extraordinary relationship where Jenny mothers him and then he will come and mother her when she's feeling low," he says. "So we're saying to a 14-year-old boy you should be the parent." Brough says the show's Queensland setting also makes it unique  a heat-induced lassitude that affects behaviour as well as dress sense. "But what do we watch TV for these days?" he asks. "We want to see things we haven't seen before. What Ben's done is given us a world we genuinely haven't seen before and that is riveting." No story about the Law family could be considered complete without the last word belonging to Jenny. Jenny says she has no qualms about her son's depiction of the family's travails.
When Louise Robert-Smith steps in to take control of the troubled MLC school this month, the situation before her will be a familiar one.

Staff resignations, parent revolt and student unrest had divided another Sydney private girls' school before she first walked through its gates a decade ago.

Ascham, in Sydney's eastern suburbs, had been led by three headmistresses in eight months and gone through a public parent revolt when the now 67-year-old took the helm in 2005.
Under food safety laws, Australian eggs are washed, inspected for cracks, graded and kept in cool rooms on farms before being transported in refrigerated trucks to reduce the risk of bacterial survival. But Brian Ahmed, president of the egg group at the Victorian Farmers Federation, said keeping eggs refrigerated in supermarkets remains the "missing link" in the food safety chain. "It should be treated exactly like raw meat  don't look at an egg any different way," he said. Connor Thomas, adjunct senior lecturer in microbiology at the University of Adelaide, also urged grocery stores to keep eggs in a cool environment. "That way you minimise the growth, increase the storage time, and minimise the risk," Dr Thomas said.

The calls come as the rate of salmonella infections rises across the country, with up to 40 per cent of cases linked to contaminated eggs. In 2015 there were 58 cases per 100,000 people in Victoria, twice the infection rate of 10 years ago, health department data shows. A total of 3404 people in Victoria suffered salmonella poisoning in 2015  almost 2000 more than a decade earlier. The National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System figures also show that the first three months of the year are a peak period for infections. A total of 36 per cent of salmonella notifications since 1991 were recorded between January and March each year.

The largest outbreaks tend to be at restaurants, which serve food made from raw egg products like tiramisu or aioli. Last year, Melbourne's Langham Hotel was linked to an outbreak due to raw egg mayonnaise, which left 90 people ill and 16 hospitalised. But an Australian Egg Corporation study also found inappropriate storage in retail stores can substantially increase the risk of salmonella with bacterial growth occurring within 10 days in eggs stored at 22 degrees. "Given that commercially produced and graded eggs are given a shelf life of up to 37 days, there is a risk to consumers that eggs will contain substantial numbers of salmonella," the 2006 study, led by Dr Thomas, concluded. Major grocery stores, however, have taken differing views on the issue since there is no legal requirement to keep eggs refrigerated like the United States and Canada.

Coles released a one-line statement when asked about its stores keeping eggs on shelves: "Coles adheres to all health and safety regulations regarding egg storage." But supermarket rival Woolworths pledged it would move all of its eggs into refrigerated cabinets  and had already done so at many stores. "As we roll out our store refurbishment program across the country, any remaining stores will move to refrigerated displays for all fresh eggs," a company spokesman said. Wholesaler Metcash, a major supplier for IGA, said it urges store owners to keep eggs below 5 degrees, but it's not known how many follow the recommendation since stores are independently operated. In a statement, ALDI did not disclose if any of its stores keep eggs in refrigerators.

Woolworths said it will move all eggs into cold storage while rival Coles said it adheres to all health and safety regulations regarding egg storage. Credit:Quinn Rooney Food Standards Australia New Zealand last updated egg safety laws in 2011, but left out a retail requirement for cool storage because it concluded temperature was not a factor in spreading salmonella here if eggs are clean and intact. A spokeswoman said the strain of salmonella present in Australia cannot grow on egg shells, though it could contaminate other foods or get inside the egg when its protective membrane breaks down or the egg is cracked. "It was acknowledged that refrigeration during retail storage may enhance the quality of eggs," she said. "However, this option was excluded early in the standard development process due to the nature of egg shell contamination in Australia and the substantial cost of implementing such an option."
Four men have been charged after police car searches led to a search of premises in the city.

A 22-year-old East Perth man will appear in the Perth Magistrates Court after a vehicle stop on Friday night.

Police say that around 7:35pm, traffic officers conducted a traffic stop on a Mercedes Benz on Belmont Avenue in Belmont.

They say a passenger in the vehicle tried to conceal a bag of white powder, and a search uncovered about 3.5gm of white powder - believed to be cocaine - and a sum of cash.

Detectives then executed a search warrant on a unit in Adelaide Terrace in East Perth, where they found and seized an amount of cocaine, MDMA and cash.
But outraged residents took to Facebook to vent their frustrations, claiming they had heard about children on bikes looting and had complained at evacuation centres, but police had ignored them.

Andrew Dymock posted: "We reported that our shed had been looted to the head of police today at the town meeting. His response was, `There have been no reports'. What did he think we were doing? We asked if he had a police presence in the town or anyone who was checking on the property and he said, `No it was too dangerous'. Not too dangerous for the scumbags that stole my bike."

But others tried to defend police efforts, like Sue Harmer, who wrote: "Settle down, people. I know it's stressful but the police can't be everywhere. They have rather a large job on at the moment, you of all people should be aware of that."

Kristy Bidwell posted: "Anyone that is having a go at WAPOL, feel free to pop down to where the fires are and help out. These men and woman (along with firefighters and ambos) are putting their lives in danger to help others and they sure don't deserve any negative comments."
Premier Colin Barnett declared the Waroona fires a natural disaster on Saturday morning after visiting those who had lost their homes at the Pinjarra evacuation centre.

Mr Barnett said the fires had devastated several communities and the activation of natural disaster support would release emergency funds to individuals and families, as well local governments.

He praised the spirit of locals who had lost everything and others who had come together to support them.

"Talking to people who've lost their homes, you have to admire their spirit; it's a terrible thing to happen and with the support of the volunteer groups, and the community organisations, it's really heartening to see how Australians respond," he said.
Hargeisa, Somalia: Dozens of Ethiopian and Somali migrants died in the waters off the breakaway Somalia region of Somaliland when their vessel failed mechanically in the course of the voyage and drifted in the sea, a regional Somaliland official said.

Ahmed Abdi Falay, the chairman or governor of Sanag region, said the boat, which had started its journey from the port of Bossaso two weeks ago and was heading to an unidentified port in the Arabian Peninsula, was discovered by the Somaliland Coast Guard.

A Libyan Navy boat carries asylum-seekers back to the coastal city of Misrata. Credit:Reuters

"They climbed into the boat and were shocked to find the dead bodies of 10 people and 72 others who were in different stages of suffering, some of them in serious condition," he said from the port city of Maydh on Friday.

"The Coast Guard brought the 72 survivors and the bodies of the dead people ashore. The wounded are being treated and the dead are being buried."
North Korea's fourth nuclear test on Wednesday angered the United States and China, which was not given prior notice, although the US government and weapons experts doubt the North's claim that the device it set off was a hydrogen bomb.

Seoul: South Korea's loudspeaker broadcasts aimed at North Korea are pushing the rivals to the "brink of war", a top North Korean official has told a propaganda rally.

In retaliation for the test, South Korea on Friday unleashed a ear-splitting propaganda barrage over its border with the North. The last time South Korea deployed the loudspeakers, in August 2015, it triggered an exchange of artillery fire.

North Korean military personnel applaud at a rally in Pyongyang on Friday after North Korea said it had conducted a "successful" hydrogen bomb test. Credit:AP

"Jealous of the successful test of our first H-bomb, the US and its followers are driving the situation to the brink of war, by saying they have resumed psychological broadcasts and brought in strategic bombers," Kim Ki-nam, head of the ruling Workers' Party propaganda department, said at Friday's rally.

State media published images of the rally which appeared to show thousands of people gathered in central Pyongyang, holding propaganda signs glorifying leader Kim Jong-un, whose birthday was also on Friday.

Kim Ki-nam's comments, which are in line with routine propaganda rhetoric, were the North's first official response to the South's broadcasts, which it considers insulting.
Illinois man arrested for trafficking in meth after trying to flee police
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By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 08, 2016 | 06:06 PM | PADUCAH, KY

Two McCracken County teens were arrested Friday afternoon, after police say they sold Xanax and marijuana to an undercover officer across the street from Paducah Tilghman High School.

Police got a call from a concerned citizen about 18-year-old Jared Turner selling marijuana and pills to students at PTHS. An undercover officer reportedly made arrangements Friday via text message  while Turner was in school  to buy drugs from him. Turners twin brother Blake then allegedly contacted the officer and offered to sell him marijuana.

Police said that after school, the teens arrived in separate vehicles to meet the officer in the parking lot of a business across Jackson Street from the school. Jared Turner allegedly sold the officer a Xanax pill and drove away. He was stopped and arrested a short time later. Police said they found four Lortab pills on him during a search. Police said Blake Turner sold a detective about 1 grams of marijuana, and was arrested immediately.

Both suspects were booked into McCracken County Regional Jail.
It is not a bad thing for us, that the route known as the Goldene Strae or the Golden Road as we will get to know it- has escaped the attention of so many. It has been spared being overrun by hordes of tourists and as you will discover the
By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 09, 2016 | 07:24 AM | PADUCAH, KY

The third Kentucky Crafts Beverage Conference sponsored by the Kentucky Innovation Network will be held at West Kentucky Community and Technical College Thursday, Jan. 21. The conference, which is again free and open to the public, will be held from 6  9 pm in Crounse Hall, Room 101.

Community members will have the opportunity to learn from local experts on how to establish a craft brewery in western Kentucky, and why this part of the state is a perfect place to do that, said Dan Lazarevic, director of the Kentucky Innovations Networks Paducah office.

Steve Humphress, general council from Kentuckys Alcohol Beverage Control (ABC) department will attend by Skype and explain ABCs required general guidelines for opening a brewery. Dr. Shawn Wright, agronomist with the University of Kentucky, will cover the production of hops within the region.

Todd Blume, owner/master brewer from Paducah Beer Werks, will discuss some of the challenges of opening a craft brewery. For more information about the conference, call the Kentucky Innovation Network Office at 270-201-2361 or email wkyinnovation@kctcs.edu.

The Kentucky Innovation Network is a network of business leaders and mentors that encourage relationships, grow companies new and existing, and create jobs. The Network, managed in partnership with the Kentucky Cabinet for Economic Development and Kentucky Science and Technology Corporation, consists of 13 offices throughout Kentucky. West Kentucky Community and Technical College is the local partner for the Paducah office.
By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 08, 2016 | 11:40 AM | CAVE-IN-ROCK, IL

The Cave-In-Rock ferry has reopened after being closed since New Year's Eve.

The ferry was forced to close when floodwaters covered KY Highway 91 near the Kentucky landing. The ferry resumed service on its regular schedule at 6:00 am Friday.

The Dorena-Hickman ferry on the Mississippi River remains closed at this time. Officials say they can start to consider putting it back in service once the Cairo river gauge gets below the flood stage of 40 feet. As of 6pm Friday, the river was still over 53 feet, with at least another week before the river may fall to that level.
By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 09, 2016 | 08:24 AM | PADUCAH, KY

After a warm and wet Saturday, temperatures will plummet tonight and precipitation will transition into the first snow of the winter.

The National Weather Service office in Paducah is looking for western Kentucky to receive anywhere from a dusting, up to possibly an inch of snow in places.

Southeast Missouri and southern Illinois are more likely to approach an inch of accumulation. Snow will be heaviest west of Poplar Bluff, Cape Girardeau, and Carbondale. A winter weather advisory has already been issued for the St. Louis area today.

Temperatures will fall more than 20 degrees within a few hours this evening, and there is a possibility of some flash freezing on wet roads tonight.

Gusty winds will be the rule for the rest of the weekend after tonight. Temperatures will stay in the 20s on Sunday and fall to the teens on Sunday night.

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday will see highs in the 30s, before more normal temperatures on Thursday.

On the Net:
VOLATILITY PREDICTED FOR LOCAL GAS PRICES IN 2016

Volatility is a given for any gasoline price forecast as unpredictable geopolitical issues arise, as well as refinery outages and problems, and weather impacts production of products, and this year, GasBuddy forecasts several periods of significant volatility.

With OPECs failure to address over production and falling oil prices, there remains a question of how long OPEC and its members will stay this course. Additionally, new Saudi/Iran tensions and an agreement with Iran to ease sanctions in exchange for throttling back nuclear ambitions may unexpectedly shift during the year.

Refinery maintenance season and a shift back to EPA mandated cleaner burning gasoline during the late winter and early spring generally culminates in an increase of 35-75 cents per gallon in gasoline prices. In a typical year, there are several unexpected problems that arise during complex turnarounds that refineries conduct. The West Coast and Great Lakes states are most susceptible to price shocks if unexpected issues arise during maintenance seasons.

While the U.S. escaped major hurricanes last year, hurricane season has brought significant harm to oil infrastructure in the last decade, and while hurricanes are not guaranteed to impact such facilities, such an event could interrupt notable infrastructure and drive up gasoline and other refined product prices. Gasoline taxes are being evaluated in several states.

In addition, the federal government may look at increasing taxes on gasoline, something it hasnt done since 1993. Several states have already raised prices with the New Year, and several other states are identifying best methods to raise funding for road repairs- any new taxes will push prices higher than expected. The current low cost environment of gasoline makes raising taxes an attractive option for cash-strapped states.
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 09/01/2016 (2475 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Serhii Plokhys The Gates of Europe is a comprehensive, unbiased history commemorating the momentous vote for Ukraines independence on Dec. 1, 1991 which heralded the collapse of the Soviet Union, ending 70 years of subservient status as a socialist republic.

The Gates of Europe is the latest of several scholarly books written by Harvard history professor Plokhy, winner of the Lionel Gerber Award for non-fiction books on foreign affairs (such as 2014s The Last Empire).

Educated at Taras Shevchenko National University in Kyiv, Plokhy specializes in histories of Eastern European states and the Cold War, admitting his newest title is a metaphor, but one that aptly describes Ukraines geographic location at the edge of the Eurasian steppe.

EFREM LUKATSKY / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILES A principal bell tower and Assumption Cathedral of the 1,000-year-old Cve Monastery is shown at sunset in the Ukrainian capital Kiev.

Clarifying why Ukrainians have been identified as Little Russians, Galicians or Ruthenians, the book suggests why the disrespectful term Bohunks was used to identify the thousands of peasants who came to Canada from Eastern Europe prior to the First World War.

Russias President Vladimir Putin claimed Russians and Ukrainians were one and the same when justifying the 2014 annexation of Crimea. But Putins statement is shown to be an oversimplification of historical fact in this lucid, engaging and authoritatively written discourse.

Sources in Plokhys book date back to Herodotus in ancient Greece and include records from the Primary Chronicle, compiled by several generations of monks during Christianitys first millennium.

They affirm that Ukraines origins differ from Russias, but also suggest the intertwining of roots during the long and complicated history of the Ukrainian people led to divided loyalties amongst them, blurring todays Crimean situation.

Several maps show how the gradual formation and shift of provincial boundaries under Polish, Russian and Austro-Hungarian rule left a legacy of disunity amongst its people, yet over time embodied a Ukrainian homeland.

A historical timeline clarifies the chronology of key events, while a section on whos who in Ukrainian history helps readers understand why individuals such as Stepan Bandera or Viktor Yanukovych can be vilified by some Ukrainians and adored by others.

Plokhys search for Ukrainian identity begins with early Greek acknowledgments of nomadic warriors called Cimmerians inhabiting a region north of the Black Sea, a people immortalized by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the 1982 film Conan the Barbarian.

The regions steppe lands facilitated more barbarian invasions which ended Greek and Roman empires, while a main waterway, the Dneiper River, served as a conduit for marauding Vikings who stayed for three centuries and added to the complexity of the Ukrainian genome.

Plokhy reveals why the legacy of the regions Cossack past is more than a glorified interregnum and shows why Ukraines history, like Russias, is defined by the influence of successive invasions dating from the time of Genghis Khans Mongol hordes and culminating with Hitlers quest for a Third Reich.

Centuries of political rule under different empires guided by Eastern or Western Christianity helped linguistic, political and cultural growth, but left behind a people conflicted by Catholic and Orthodox religious traditions. The 20th-century Communist experience, meanwhile, was a religiously barren republic under Russian tutelage, adding to Ukraines angst.

While acknowledging writers and poets who enriched Ukrainian cultural heritage (such as Taras Shevchenko, considered the father of Ukraine), Plokhy also confronts a dark side of Ukraines past, disclosing why the success of Jewish communities became a ticking time bomb.

He recounts how deadly mob attacks called pogroms, driven by economic rivalry and Christian anti-Judaism, became harbingers of the greater horrors of the Second World War when Ukrainian collaborators with Nazi death squads killed close to one million Jewish men, women, and children.

Still, Ukraines future looks hopeful if government corruption and powerful oligarchs can be contained while continuing a compassionate practice of extending membership to people of various ethnic and religious backgrounds.

Joseph Hnatiuk is a retired teacher in Winnipeg.
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This article was published 09/01/2016 (2475 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

This delightful Estonian novel coils and springs with a mix of dark humour, satire and allegorical observation.

Andrus Kivirahks The Man Who Spoke Snakish tells the intriguing story of Leemet, a young boy faced with the burden of trying to hold on to an ancient and beloved way of life against the threat of frightening and bizarre social change.

Its a thought-provoking tale exploring discrimination, social systems, the consequences of ignorance and the importance of respecting other ways of life  all highly relevant themes today.

A journalist by profession, Kivirahk is highly regarded in his home country for his satirical newspaper columns and literary novels. Snakish is his third novel and the first published in English.

The authors skill for social criticism and his literary talents are evident in Snakish, and he clearly has a gift for creating suspenseful, provocative stories.

This story takes place in a fantastical version of medieval Estonia, where a tribe of hunter-gatherer families clings to its traditional life in the forest. In this world, cuddly bears seduce human women, half-ape people raise lice as pets and men and women worship vengeful forest sprites.

But their way of life is disappearing as families move to the village to live as peasant farmers, worship the new Christian religion and give up speaking Snakish, an ancient language that gives humans the power to communicate with and command animals.

Young Leemet is one of the last children being raised as a forest dweller. When he tries to convince his family to move to the village, his Uncle Vootele refuses. Instead, Vootele decides to teach him Snakish to help Leemet preserve their culture.

Ill teach Leemet the Snakish words so well that he wont know anymore whether hes a human or a snake, Uncle Vootele tells Leemets mother. One day, when I die, Leemet will be the one who wont let the Snakish words fade into oblivion.

Leemet masters the language and begins to realize how deeply he loves living in the forest. But as the forest civilization falls apart and the allure of the village grows stronger, Leemet realizes it may not be possible for the two to live peacefully side by side.

Anyone who has felt pulled between two different ideas can appreciate Leemets appreciation for his own life in the forest alongside his obsession with life in the village. Leemets story is long, surprising and never dull.

Rather than portray either way of life as wrong, Kivirahk shows intolerance and prejudice cause the problems: the villagers see the foresters as backwards, dirty and heathen, while the foresters see the villagers as arrogant, ignorant and stupid.

Kivirahk does throw some criticism towards organized religion, mocking both the pagan rituals of the forest and the Christianity of the village. When Leemet questions his Uncle Vootele about Jesus, his uncle replies, One person believes in sprites and visits the sacred grove, and another believes in Jesus and goes to the church. Its just a matter of fashion.

Kivirahk contrasts the darker tones with humour that ranges from biting satire to black comedy to broad slapstick to the simply bizarre.

In one of the novels funniest scenes, Leemet and a friend go to spy on the forest women as they perform a midnight beauty ritual  only to discover the forest bears admiring the women as well.

In another, Leemets mother scolds his sister for carrying on with a bear. His sister shoots back, in typical teenager fashion, Actually, Im not going out with him. We just say hello when we meet.

The Man Who Spoke Snakish is wonderful  dont let it slither away.

Kathryne Cardwell is a Winnipeg writer.
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This article was published 09/01/2016 (2475 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Tired of all of the bad stories in the media? Are all the reports about terrorism, crime, tragedy and suffering wearing you down?

If your answer is yes, youre not alone  Pope Francis feels that way, too.

In his year-end address, the Pope called on the media to tell more positive and inspirational stories to counterbalance all the evil, violence and hate in the world.

He noted 2015 had been a difficult year, what with all the violence, death, unspeakable suffering by so many innocent people, refugees forced to leave their countries, men, women and children without homes, food or means of support, the Pope said.

But, he added, there have also been so many great gestures of goodness to help those in need, even if they are not on television news programs (because) good things dont make news.

Its not true good things dont make the news  this newspaper carries many stories of how people do things to help others. But it is also true many news organizations feature a preponderance of what many would consider bad stories. And a lot of those stories are about radical Islamic terrorism and violence.

So, with the Popes words in mind, heres a good news story about Muslims that didnt make a splash locally.

It happened in Kenya on Dec. 21 when armed al-Shabab extremists stopped a bus carrying more than 60 passengers, mostly women, near the town of Mandera in the northeast part of the country.

According to news reports, after stopping the bus, the terrorists ordered the passengers to form two separate lines. One line was for Muslims, and the other for Christians  who they would then kill.

But something unexpected happened: The female Muslims on board the bus gave the Christian women headscarves to prevent them from being identified. They also helped other Christians hide behind some bags on the bus. And they refused to get into separate lines. They told the attackers if they wanted to kill Christians, they would have to kill all of them.

Unfortunately, two people were killed in the attack: A Christian man who tried to run away was shot, as was the driver of a truck behind the bus. But everyone else survived.

That wasnt the only good news story involving Muslims at Christmas; another happened in Lens, France, when Muslim men stood guard outside a church to protect Christians from any potential attacks during a midnight Christmas Mass.

There were other stories like these as well last year, in places such as Norway, Egypt and Pakistan. But stories like these dont get the same coverage as terrorist attacks.

Part of me understands why; death and destruction usually attracts more readers and viewers, as the click counts on media websites often shows.

But another part of me is sad. Wouldnt it be great if the media spent as much time covering these acts of kindness and solidarity?

In his book The News: A Users Manual, British author Alain de Botton asks why we get so many stories about disaster and celebrities, but not as much about ordinary people doing kind and decent things.

Our nation isnt just a severed hand, a mutilated grandmother, three dead girls in a basement, embarrassment for a minister, trillions of debt, a double-suicide at the railway station and a fatal five-car crash by the coast, he writes.

(Our nation) is also the cloud floating right now unattended over the church spire, the gentle thought in the doctors mind as he approaches the patients bare arm with a needle, the field mice by the hedgerow, the small child tapping the surface of a newly hardboiled egg while her mother looks on lovingly, the nuclear submarine patrolling the maritime borders with efficiency and courage, the factory producing the first prototypes of a new kind of engine and the spouse who, despite extraordinary provocations and unkind words, discovers fresh reserves of patience and forgiveness.

We need the media to report challenging, difficult and tragic news. But the next time you hear about another radical Islamic terrorist attack  and there will be more  or about crime in Winnipeg, political malfeasance at any level or any other number of bad, tragic and painful things, remember these arent the only stories out there.

They are just the ones that made it into the media.

jdl562000@yahoo.com

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A veteran, award-winning Winnipeg firefighter has been accused of pocketing jewelry from an elderly patient in medical distress after responding to a 911 call inside her home, the Free Press has learned.

The 46-year-old was arrested just before Christmas and released on a promise to appear in court on a charge of theft. The Free Press is not naming him until the charge is formally sworn, which likely wont happen until just before his first court date Feb. 9.

Police began investigating after several of the firefighters colleagues recently came forward with information about something they claim to have witnessed weeks earlier while on the first responder call, which ultimately ended with the woman dying, according to several sources.

Firefighters who turned in a veteran comrade are now on the hot seat over the delay in coming forward, sources say.

All members of the fire and paramedic service are shocked at these allegations, as these charges go against everything a firefighter or paramedic stands for, Alex Forrest, president of the United Fire Fighters of Winnipeg, told the Free Press Friday. We hope the allegations are untrue.

The accused firefighter is currently suspended without pay pending a meeting between management and the union. Forrest said its possible he may be put back to work in a role where he would have no contact with the public while his matter remains before the courts.

We will ensure this person will have due process as this person is innocent until proven otherwise in a court of law, said Forrest. We can state that we are not involved in the criminal defence of this person nor are we funding the defence in any way.

The Free Press requested comment from WFPS administration, but a city spokeswoman said they would not be discussing what she called human resource matters.

Sources say the firefighters who turned the accused in are now facing their own scrutiny over the delay in coming forward. They could face internal sanctions if found to have deliberately withheld information.

He wasnt originally turned in by co-workers out of fear of not having enough on him, one firefighter familiar with the case told the Free Press this week. Ninety-nine-point-nine per cent of us believe that our public trust is the only thing that matters. The point-one per cent who dont are just sad.

Police forwarded the findings of their investigation to the Crowns office, which authorized the charge last month following a brief review of the file. Sources did not know the exact quantity and value of jewelry stolen, along with whether it has been recovered.

City records show the accused firefighter has previously been given a commendation for life-saving efforts on the job. This is believed to be the first allegation of its kind involving a WFPS member but has now triggered plenty of internal discussion and debate about how it was handled by all parties.

Hopefully this situation forces the job to build policy regarding these circumstances, a firefighter said this week.

www.mikeoncrime.com
Opinion

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This article was published 09/01/2016 (2475 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Last May, when Scott Newman became the Manitoba Liberal Party candidate in Radisson, he found out pretty quickly there wasnt much in the way of organizational support in his riding.

There was no active constituency association, said Newman, a criminal defence lawyer. There was no bank account. No volunteer list. When I asked for the membership list, I got something with five names on it, and they all had the same last name.

The absence of a riding organization was hardly surprising. The Liberals had become the provinces perennial third-place party, with only a single MLA elected to the legislature and a middling record in the last two decades of elections.

JOE BRYKSA / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Manitoba Liberal Leader Rana Bokhari, right, today announced at the Manitoba Legislature that Althea Guiboche, better known as the Bannock Lady, will run for the Liberals in the constituency of Point Douglas.

Undeterred, Newman has worked diligently over the past eight months to build a basic riding presence. There is still no constituency association executive, but there is a bank account with some funds and a list of about 60 volunteers who have already been out distributing pamphlets.

Ive been in politics before, and from my experience, you can expect to get some resources from the central party office, but other than that, youre on your own, Newman said.

Such is the reality for the 27 Liberal candidates who have been nominated in advance of the April provincial election.

The Liberals have surged in support in the last few months, particularly as the fortunes of the governing NDP continue to fall. A Winnipeg Free Press-Probe Research poll published last month had the Liberals solidly in second place, seven points up on the faltering NDP.

However, that new-found support cannot change the fact the Grits are still struggling to build the kind of political organization needed to fight the next election.

Party officials could not provide a specific number, but admitted many of its riding associations had ceased to exist in the past four years. Fundraising remains a struggle and, to date, the party has not been able to generate a contested nomination. (Officials indicated two candidates were running for the Liberal nomination in Kildonan, but one dropped out when it was apparent the other candidate had sold many more memberships.)

If the Liberals hope to take advantage of their new-found momentum, they will have to build a province-wide electoral machine. And fast.

When I got into this job, there really was no organization, Liberal Leader Rana Bokhari said in an interview. There was nothing.

I felt like I was involved in a political startup with very little time to do it. And it was an organization that was stuck doing things in a way that I felt was not the way of the future.

Bokhari said she decided early on she would focus on recruiting candidates rather than trying to rebuild the riding associations. Once someone was fully vetted and agreed to let his or her name stand, the party set a nomination period to allow anyone else to come forward. If no one else showed interest in contesting the nomination, the recruited candidate would then be acclaimed.

Only one candidate, Althea Guiboche (known as the Bannock Lady for her work preparing and distributing meals to Winnipegs homeless), was directly nominated by Bokhari and only after the pre-existing candidate, Noel Bernier, agreed to move to the neighbouring St. Johns riding.

Can the Liberals get everything in place in time for the spring election, which should start sometime in mid to late March? Possibly, but it is a gargantuan task.

Despite running a virtually full slate in the elections he contested, former leader Jon Gerrard was unable to sustain viable Liberal constituency associations in all 57 ridings. This was a reflection of the fact that during his tenure as leader, the Liberals never rose to a level of pre-election support that would have drawn the volunteers necessary to build and maintain these critical front-line organizations.

The failure to build a legitimate network of constituency associations also weakened the Liberals ability to raise funds and gather voter-identification information in the important years between elections.

The recent surge in support for the Liberals has created the impression that now, on the heels of Prime Minister Justin Trudeaus stunning federal election victory, conditions are ripe for a major breakthrough for the Manitoba Grits.

However, its important to remember ripe does not translate into slam dunk. Even with favourable conditions, there are troublesome issues.

First, its not clear yet Manitobas new and much larger federal Liberal caucus  seven MPs strong  will be much of an asset to Bokhari come provincial election time. The federal Grits are tapped out, tired from a gruelling election campaign and distracted by the burden of learning how to govern again.

Liberal sources confirmed several of the established candidates who triumphed in the 2015 federal election  Kevin Lamoureux (Winnipeg North), Terry Duguid (Winnipeg South), Dan Vandal (Saint Boniface-Saint Vital) and Jim Carr (Winnipeg South Centre)  have significant networks of volunteers and voter-identification information that could help the provincial party. Lamoureux, in particular, is expected to be active in the provincial campaign given his daughter, Cindy Lamoureux, is a candidate in Burrows.

However, in most other areas of the province, there is still little or no meaningful Liberal electoral machine. This includes ridings that were surprise federal wins: MaryAnn Mihychuk (Kildonan-St. Paul), Robert-Falcon Ouellette (Winnipeg Centre) and Doug Eyolfson (Charleswood-St. James-Assiniboia-Headingley).

As well, several federal Liberal sources said there is still a high degree of skepticism about whether Bokhari has the chops to successfully lead an election campaign. Many federal Liberals believe she is too young and too inexperienced to triumph in hand-to-hand combat with the other, more experienced party leaders.

Im not sure our hearts are going to be in (a provincial election campaign), said one senior federal Liberal source. We are so busy right now trying to figure out how to plug into the whole Ottawa scene. And there isnt a lot of faith that Rana can close the deal.

That means Bokhari will have to build a legitimate electoral machine nearly from scratch to compete against two other parties that are much better funded and organized at the riding level. It would mean doing in a few months what it has taken her political opponents years to accomplish.

Look, we have a lot of work to do, Bokhari said. But Ive got my eye on the prize.

dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca
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This article was published 08/01/2016 (2476 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Albertas premier says an east-west power line between Manitobas northern dams and her province is a bit hypothetical and far off.

NDP Premier Rachel Notley was in Winnipeg Friday for a meeting with Premier Greg Selinger on energy and environmental issues. Asked whether the province was considering ways to buy Manitobas hydro power, Notley said the idea is in its infancy.

But, since Albertas new climate change plan includes phasing out coal-fired power plants by 2030, Notley said it makes sense to begin looking at how Alberta can access renewable energy made in Manitoba.

Ruth Bonneville / Winnipeg Free Press Alberta Premier Rachel Notley answers questions from the media after signing documents with Manitoba Premier, Greg Selinger, on energy infrastructure, renewable energy and climate-change priorities at the Legislative Building Friday.

This is something thats a little further down the road, but it would be silly for us not to engage in forward-looking conversation about the possibilities and potential that that east-west grid could contribute, she said.

Manitoba has long advocated for a better network of east-west transmission lines to match the ones going south into the Unites States. Those would allow Manitoba to export  and theoretically profit from  power shipped west or into Ontario.

Selinger said building relationships with premiers on energy helps move the notion of a national grid forward and could help the country meet emissions-reduction targets. He said Manitoba and other provinces already have plenty of transmission lines into the Unites States, but few into neighbouring provinces.

Selinger said as neighbouring provinces such as Alberta look to build more wind farms, it makes sense to use hydro power as a backup because water can be stored in reservoirs for use when the winds are weak.

Last fall, the province finalized a 100-megawatt sale to SaskPower that sparked the need for an 80-kilometre transmission line from Birtle into Saskatchewan. Selinger touted that Friday as progress on a pan-Canadian grid.

Also Friday, the premiers signed a memorandum of understanding, agreeing to share information about energy-conservation programs and climate change policies.
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The outcome of an investigation into a suspended police board member will be made public, board vice-chairman Barry Tuckett said Friday in response to criticism of the boards public silence over its decision to suspend Coun. Ross Eadie.

The decision was made a few days after the board learned Eadie had spent a night in the drunk tank last Nov. 6.

The Mynarski ward councillor and police board member spoke publicly about the incident to the Free Press Nov. 8, saying he had been drinking heavily that night and couldnt remember what happened.

Wayne Glowacki / Winnipeg Free Press files The outcome of an investigation into suspended police board member Ross Eadie (above) will be made public.

A friend got him a cab home, but Eadie then reportedly fell asleep and the cab driver called police when he couldnt wake him. Police took Eadie to the Main Street Project at 75 Martha Street, and a source told the Free Press Eadie was verbally abusive to emergency officials.

As the Free Press reported Thursday, Eadie has been suspended from the police board pending an inquiry into his whether his behaviour breached the police boards code of ethics.

Eadie wasnt present at the next police board meeting in early December and was granted another leave of absence from Fridays meeting. Asked by reporters after the meeting why the police board didnt speak publicly about the suspension sooner, Tuckett said members still need time before making a decision on whether to reinstate Eadie.

The only reason this thing is dragging on is because weve had a little bit of difficulty getting the information that we need, from people who know what happened that night.

Asked whether Eadie would be under investigation now even if he hadnt spoken publicly about the incident initially, Tuckett said yes.

The board has a duty to do this. It doesnt matter whether councillor Eadie raised it or not, he said.

Tuckett said he still expects the boards investigation will be complete by its next meeting on Feb. 5.

Councillor Eadie wants it done, we want it done, everybody wants it done. But just because we want to do it in a hurry, we still have to do it right, he said.

Weve got to make sure that we make a reasonable and an accountable decision  not just to councillor Eadie, but to you (the public), he added.

The police board, formed in 2013, has never before had to deal with a suspension or inquiry into one of its own members.

Eadie said he was off work when he was taken to the drunk tank, so shouldnt be seen to have been representing the police board at the time. He declined to offer further comments about the ongoing investigation, saying to do so could be seen as undermining the police boards work.

Im stuck in the process and Im going to bear it out till the bitter end, the city councillor said.
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This article was published 08/01/2016 (2476 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A motorist speeds down a street in east Winnipeg unaware of being watched.

A nearby Winnipeg police officer hits his cruisers lights and sirens and, a short time later, issues a speeding ticket.

Simple, basic policing, right?

Its more than that. The officer, armed with data crunched by crime analysts back at the district office, knew this stretch of road near Concordia Hospital was a hot spot for infractions. And he, along with other officers, had been targeting the area in an effort to cool down the number of offences.

That, at its core, is what the Smart Policing Initiative is all about  a proactive policing strategy that is being adopted by police departments around the world.

SPI, approved in the WPS strategic plan for 2015-19, is thus: compile information about offenders, add in high-risk locations and vulnerable crime targets and have analysts look for trends and related information, which is forwarded to front-line officers.

The intelligence-led approach is getting results.

I think were one of the only police departments that can back this up, Insp. Greg Burnett said recently. At the end of the day, it is the men and women doing this day in and day out with their own discretion and skills that make this a success.

Winnipegs crime rate has been steadily declining in recent years. Violent crime incidents dropped 24 per cent last year. The violent-crime severity index for the city dropped more than 37 per cent from 2009 to 2013. Youth crime is going down. Property crimes have gone down 27 per cent from the previous five-year averages.

But, the city still has the highest violent-crime severity index in the country. It held the dubious honour of having the second-highest homicide rate of all of Canadas metropolitan areas in 2013. Manitobas youth violent-crime severity index topped all provinces in 2013 and was more than twice the Canadian average.

Winnipeggers spoke at public meetings about how they felt they werent safe in some city neighbourhoods. The WPS and the Winnipeg Police Board heard them and wanted to do more.

Enter SPI. First, in the WPSs sprawling east district, which takes in all of Winnipeg east of the Red River; to be followed by the rest of the city.

Its one thing to give voice to the community, but if you do, you have to pay attention, said WPS Deputy Chief Dave Thorne.

SPI first gained traction in Winnipeg in the fall of 2012, when Thorne, as the officer in charge of the services general patrol division, called Rick Linden for advice.

BORIS MINKEVICH / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Constable Cal Bailey and two other police officers check for curfew at several locations. Linden, a professor at the University of Manitoba who teaches criminology courses, was a key driver in setting up Winnipegs auto-theft-prevention strategy, which reduced the number of stolen vehicles by more than 80 per cent, and he is on the committee that manages Winnipegs gang response and suppression program.

Thorne said there was a group of inspectors who knew they needed a different method to tackle crime and traffic offences.

We needed to provide an environment for our members where they could make more of a difference in our community, he said. We wanted to have more impact on crime and make the city a safer place.

SPI was the result of the conversation, Thorne said.

Linden provided two graduate students who went into the east district station to work alongside officers to set up the program.

Thorne said the reports produced by crime analysts and officers help shape the day of the officers the public sees on the streets and in cruisers.

They give directions to members where the hot spots are, what time and day of week to go, what performances to do, he said. Theres no point having members looking for crime at 3 p.m., when it is happening at 3 a.m.

Aside from identifying high-risk offenders and potential crime areas, the SPI strategy also asks officers to reduce crime in non-traditional ways, including promoting the development of economic, social, health and educational measures.

Its not uncommon for officers to attend community events, go to community clubs and reach out to organizations such as Macdonald Youth Services.

Lets not be reactive anymore, Thorne said. We need to respond in a more prevention and intervention approach.

If we keep dealing with just the symptoms of crime it will be like (the movie) Groundhog Day. Well just keep doing the same things every day.

Were trying to reduce the levels of violence in the crime rate to an acceptable level. People in the North End have every right to feel as safe as people in Fort Garry.

Thorne said what slows down SPI  and other police work  is the amount of non-crime calls officers receive.

About 75 per cent of what drives police work are non-crime-related issues, he said. What churns up a lot of time is public intoxication, mental-health issues and homelessness. For us to give our officers more proactive time, we need to work better with our partners.

Thorne said these include the Main Street Project and Health Sciences Centre.

We need to identify high users of the system. If we do this, it reduces the time spent by our officers and allows them to spend more time on core policing.

East district Staff Sgt. Jim Anderson said he looks at SPI as one more instrument in the police work kit.

Phil Hossack / Winnipeg Free Press files Criminology Prof. Rick Linden.

The officers may already know a park or a bar in their area that is problematic, Anderson said. Through SPI, we provide them (with more information) to use their craftiness thats why it is important for people to report even small crimes.

We all wish we had this when we were street constables.

The new approach is a shift from the reactionary police model of the last two decades, Burnett said.

A call comes in and you react. But that has caused an erosion of police skills. We want to get our people back to thinking and problem-solving. We want general patrol, detectives and community support to bring the entities all together and share information. Break down the silos, he said.

If you want to reduce crime and increase community policing, the proactive policy is the way to go, not reactionary.

It doesnt mean Winnipeg officers will only do SPI-type policing.

Reactive is still the main area we do, we still react to calls, Burnett said. This proactive area is during officers discretionary time. They self-manage themselves.

Were taking old-school and injecting science and analysis.

Const. Cal Bailey is taking an unmarked cruiser for a late-night ride through the east district.

Bailey taps a few keys on the cruisers computer and calls up a list of people who have been tagged by the divisions crime analysts as most in need of being looked in on to see if they are obeying curfew.

In my area, I have 14 guys that need to be checked, he said.

Shortly after, on a dimly lit street in a St. Vital subdivision, two uniformed officers walk up to a modest two-storey house around 11 p.m.

Typically, curfews are in force from 10 (p.m.) to 7 (a.m.), Bailey said, joining the officers.

They knock on the front door, a light comes on upstairs and the door opens, but the screen door remains shut while the officers speak with a woman inside.

The person on curfew isnt there: he moved.

Apparently, it is his girlfriends house, and he had permission to leave from his support worker, Bailey said, dialing the workers number to confirm what the woman said was true.

Well still go to his new residence. Today, with cellphones, he could be talking to the worker from Brandon.

Wayne Glowacki / Winnipeg Free Press Winnipeg Police Const. Sal Signorino monitors the speed drivers after complaints of speeders.

A few minutes later, elsewhere in St. Vital, the man answers his door and, after a brief conversation, his name is entered into the cruisers computer as having been checked successfully.

He was there and he was complying  but, obviously, he was expecting us, Bailey said chuckling, noting the girlfriend gave him a heads-up.

According to Bailey, curfew checks (research shows 20 per cent of offenders commit 80 per cent of crime) reduce crime because, If they are complying, great, but if not, theyre put back into the court system. And we see crime in the area go down.

East district Sgt.-Det. Darrin Kruger, who puts together the bulletins that are sent to the officers, said he knows SPI is working.

I noticed a rash of residential break-ins (in an area), Kruger said. I put together a bulletin and put it out. There was a huge spike of officers to the area, and the number of break-ins has lowered down to zero lately.

Const. Jason Dyck, another east district officer using SPI, said the example shows the ultimate goal of reducing crime can be reached even with no arrests. It was the police visibility which stopped it.

Dyck said it is up to the individual officers whether they want to work on a crime-related SPI bulletin or a traffic-related one.

If its one (oclock) in the afternoon, youre not going to do curfew checks, he said. Or if its night, you might do curfew checks. They pick and choose. It is focused in the area.

Trends and problems identified

Sitting in front of a computer, Sheri Bell is one of six Winnipeg police crime analysts. Bell reads reports from officers on the street, crunches statistics, gazes at maps and even checks the weather, which also has an impact on when offences occur. She then sorts and aggregates the information.

From that, Bell helps formulate reports going out to the general patrol officers that points them towards not only the people who need curfew checks, but hot spots of crime and traffic infractions.

I look at all of the crime that occurs, and I identify trends and problems, Bell said. Have we had a number of break-and-enters? Then I start digging to look for similarities. Then I alert the officers about what is happening.

Bell said part of her role is to look at what is happening throughout the entire police district.

I create target areas for uniform officers to go out during their discretionary time. They can go out to high-problem areas and do high-profile policing.

Such high-profile policing  just driving a cruiser in the area or getting out and walking the beat for a bit  reduces crime, she said.

You dont necessarily see a lot of big arrests or drug busts or seizures of drugs. Its highlighting locations with a problem and, just with police visibility, the problem is declining.

But Bell said the real credit should go to the front-line officers who take the information and act on it. What they do every day is amazing. Theres real buy-in. And now were seeing a lot of the crime rates have dropped.

Wayne Glowacki / Winnipeg Free Press Winnipeg Police Const. Sal Signorino has a chat with a driver regarding his speed.

There had been an 18 per cent drop in crime overall from 2014 to 2015 in the St. Boniface part of the east division, including a 35 per cent decrease in the number of disputes and fights, a 23 per cent drop in vehicle thefts, a three per cent drop in thefts and a two per cent drop in mischief.

Bell said certain calls for service have also declined, including 42 per cent fewer vice-crime calls, 29 per cent fewer disputes-fights calls, 26 per cent fewer weapons calls and seven per cent fewer break-and-enter calls.

She said the Elmwood area of the division has also experienced improvements: overall crime dropped eight per cent, including 14 per cent fewer assaults, compared to the previous year.

As well, Bell said theres been a 35 per cent increase in the number of arrests in Elmwood since the SPI project began in 2014, triple the number of seizures, and the number of people in the area with active warrants went to 36 from 133.

We know crime is on the decline, but in areas with this project, crime is on larger declines, she said. Ive been surprised by just how well the program is working. I didnt expect to see such dramatic drops.

A quick check of the computer, and Baileys cruiser heads to another address in St. Vital. Its 11:45 p.m., time for a curfew check on a man who had been released on parole after serving a prison sentence for manslaughter.

The three officers walk up the darkened driveway of the unlit, single-storey home. Police knock on the door, a light comes on, and a few seconds later a man opens the door. Its not long before officers return to their cruisers.

He was very short with us. He doesnt like us being there. He has been checked 12 times this year.

There is a reason, Bailey said.

(The crime analyst) has a list of everyone with a curfew in the district. If they notice someone hasnt been seen for a couple of weeks, we go.

Its now closer to 1 a.m., and no one is walking the main street in Transcona as the police cruiser turns down another street and into an alley. After passing the back doors of a few buildings, the vehicle rolls to a stop behind a small park with a bandstand.

No one is here, but thats the point of his stop, according to Bailey.

Analysis has determined this is one of the so-called hot spots of negative activity.

There have been complaints about noise, Bailey said. You can see the sign. No one is supposed to be here after 11 (p.m.). No one is here, and thats the goal we wanted to accomplish.

Bailey said officers came on other evenings and met with the teens who had been congregating in the park. The teens no longer go there at night.

Sometimes, its just our presence that does it. Thats why were here tonight.

A quick drive a short distance away leads to another hot spot: the parking lot beside a local centre for senior citizens where youth would noisily meet.

I called their parents, Bailey said. Now they dont come here. It has now been two weeks, and nothing has happened.

Wayne Glowacki / Winnipeg Free Press At left, Winnipeg Police Const. Stephen McIntyre and Const. Justin Hicock travel down back lanes in St. Boniface and St.Vital where recent garages break-ins have occurred.

Sometimes, you just have to do policing a little different. If I wag my finger at them, nothing would happen. But if I talk to their parents, well, you can see whats happened.

Its a gorgeous, sunny afternoon with blue skies and, this time, the cruiser is being driven by Const. Stephen McIntyre, with Const. Justin Hicock in the jump seat.

They are in an alley in the older area of St. Vital, a few blocks off St. Annes Road. Most residents are either at work or elsewhere.

Thats probably why the area became a hot spot. The computer tells the officers thieves have been targeting garages.

Today, theres no sign of suspicious activity, but McIntyre said just the act of driving the alleys every so often serves as a deterrent. His partner agrees.

Depending on how many calls for service we get we can concentrate on things like this a police presence a lot of times eliminates the problem, Hicock said.

If they are busy taking urgent calls, its a no-brainer checking a hot spot, doing a curfew check or arresting a breach of a warrant takes a back seat, McIntyre said.

On a slow day, well concentrate on warrants and hot spots a lot of times, if the people are unaware they have a warrant, it is easier to get them. If they know, they are more tricky because they are actively evading us.

McIntyre is impressed by what the SPI program has accomplished.

I see a difference with us actually focusing on certain areas, he said. Theres definitely a reduction in certain issues in the areas.

Crime has definitely gone down in those areas. It has been an effective program so far.

Focus on youth

A cruiser rolls to a stop outside a two-storey residence in Elmwood. It is one of several operated by Macdonald Youth Services to help young people, who for many reasons, have found themselves in trouble.

Const. Gerry Bernas gets out of the car and walks up the sidewalk. Bernas works in SPIs component of crime prevention through social development, so part of his beat includes regularly visiting youth who end up in group homes.

The youngest Im dealing with are nine and the oldest is 18, Bernas said.

None are in sight  school is in session  but group-home workers greet Bernas like an old friend, apologizing it wasnt a baking day so they had no treats available. After dropping off invitations for residents to attend a seminar being put on by the police, Bernas heads back to his cruiser.

What we are doing is not necessarily to target the younger ones, but the earlier we can intervene and steer them away the better, he said. If we can do anything positive to change them, thats good.

Bernas has been meeting with youth people since last May and has seen favourable progress in their relationships.

One youth had a chance of going to a day camp or going to the farm with myself instantly he said, No, Ill go to the farm. He preferred to go to the farm with a police officer instead of a day camp.

Jenna Sparling, a program manager with Macdonald Youth Services, said youth at the homes where police in the SPI project visit are supervised 24 hours a day.

They have a one-to-one worker at all times, Sparling said. They have all experienced a lot of loss or challenges in their lives. They need much more support.

The visits are beneficial because the young people often have been fearful of police or had a negative experience, she said. Bernas has been able to break through some of those barriers.

Its all about building relationships, she said. Every time Gerry comes and hangs around, hes telling jokes. The kids are always thrilled when he comes. It has been an amazing opportunity.

Sparling said the residents still talk about Bernas taking them to a farm last summer.

They rode on a quad, they hung out with a horse. Its such an investment with the kids. It establishes a community for them. Its something they are proud of. Hes my buddy. We tell jokes. And Gerry is somebody they can talk to. Maybe, if theyre slipping, theyll talk to him about it.

Wayne Glowacki / Winnipeg Free Press Winnipeg Police Const. Sal Signorino checks computer monitor in his unmarked police car.

Bernas said this is one part of the SPI program where it will be difficult to determine if it reduces crime. But he believes it is important.

We would love to say any youth we deal with will not take the path of crime, he said. But if even one of them says that cop wasnt a bad guy or a bad lady, maybe (theyll say), I can just drop this lifestyle and go that way, the positive way To intervene with youth and get them away from the bad things, then mission accomplished.]

Intersections flagged as hot spots

Its mid-morning when an unmarked police cruiser tucks down a street a few metres south of a four-way stop at Concordia Avenue East and Perfanick Drive.

Const. Sal Signorino doesnt even have a chance to come to a complete stop when a black Honda Civic crosses the intersection in front of him, rolling through the stop.

Signorino hits the lights and siren and, within minutes, issues a $203 ticket.

Citizens had complained about people driving too fast along Concordia so a four-way stop was put in, Signorino said. Theres also a playground at this intersection, so there is concern for childrens safety.

We are now monitoring this intersection to see if people are stopping or not stopping. We will speak to anyone who does not stop.

The intersection is one of 14 traffic hot spots in Winnipegs east district identified by analysts.

Signorino drives the cruiser back to the same place off Concordia. Not more than a minute passes before another vehicle, this time a black pickup truck, slows but then rolls through the intersection.

Signorino said drivers behaviour  disobeying a traffic-control device  make it clear why the intersection has been flagged as a hot spot.

A few minutes and a short distance later, Signorino tucks his cruiser into an alley near another hot spot  this time, for speeding vehicles.

He said area residents complained people were speeding on Concordia Avenue East, near Lagimodiere Boulevard. The complaints were verified by community support workers.

Pointing to data on the cruisers computer screen, Signorino said speeding is most rampant Monday to Friday between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m., and again from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. But that doesnt stop him from checking the area around 11 a.m. on this sunny morning.

Wayne Glowacki / Winnipeg Free Press Winnipeg Police Const. Gerry Bernas works on crime prevention through social development.

This file is available to all our members and general patrol is able to attend to these hot spots and support the work that needs to be done to curb whatever crime-related and traffic-related (behaviour thats been identified).

Signorino pulls out his radar gun and points it towards vehicles travelling on Concordia Avenue. A few minutes later, the driver of a black Chevrolet Impala is continuing west accompanied by a newly issued ticket.

Police presence does make a difference here, Signorino said. Can we stop it entirely? Thats very doubtful but we do see a reduction in crime or traffic (infractions) because of the increased police presence.

Similar to auto-theft strategy

You can be forgiven if the SPI project feels a bit like deja vu.

Linden said its similar to the auto theft-suppression strategy the city implemented a few years ago.

Winnipeg was previously known as the auto theft capital of North America. But Linden said the numbers dropped by more than 80 per cent after police used an evidence-based strategy to focus on repeat offenders, in addition to the province creating a compulsory vehicle-immobilizer program.

Linden said it is key having the police executive not only behind setting up a program initially, but also to ensure it continues to be solidly implemented.

The important thing is to take these policies and make it how you do business, he said.

In the past, Linden said, Winnipeg police believed the main job was answering service calls as soon as possible.

They never thought having fewer calls would be better, he said. SPI is actually just taking stuff weve known for a long time works and doing it.

Because of the initial success, the police service is asking the provincial government to support the hiring of crime analysts for other police districts.

And SPI isnt just reducing crime and traffic offences  it has had a positive impact on the officers, Thorne said.

The members themselves are starting to see the advantages of taking a positive evidence-based response, he said. And they feel more productive and more happy.

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 27/07/2013 (3371 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Winnipeg Free Press recently visited Thompson, looking at why the city perpetually leads the country in per-capita violent crime rates. Our series, which begins today, will explore a number of causes, including alcohol and drug addiction, gangs, migration from neighbouring communities, homelessness, poverty and a lack of sufficient resources. Today, justice reporter Mike McIntyre documents a night on the town with the local RCMP and the many challenges which were revealed.

THOMPSON  The first thing you notice is his face. Or at least whats left of it.

Trevor Hagan / Winnipeg Free Press Const. Bob Gass finds an empty bottle of Westminster Sherry - the drink of choice among the destitute in Thompson - at a drinking camp.

Horrific scar tissue covers nearly every inch, the result of being caught inside a burning house a year earlier. By all accounts, he should have been killed. Somehow, he survived.

Call me Halloween, the man says, managing a hearty laugh at his self-deprecating joke. He seems unsteady on his feet, his eyes somewhat glassy.

The second thing you notice is the bag of empty pop and beer cans he is carrying in his scorched hands. On this warm, mid-summer evening, its clear hes been busy.

You should go buy yourself a sandwich, RCMP Cpl. Sheldon Moore tells Halloween after pulling over at the side of the road for a chat. Moore knows his advice is likely to fall on deaf ears, especially after he reminds the man how he bought him a Subway dinner a few nights ago.

Halloween gives a blank stare, clearly having no memory of the kind gesture.

A few hours later, Halloween is seen stumbling through a different part of downtown. The bag of recyclables is gone. In his hand now is a bottle of Westminster Sherry, the drink of choice for those up here in northern Manitoba because of its high potency (20 per cent alcohol) and cheap price.

Hes obviously cashed in his empties. And hes hardly alone. Dozens of others who are destitute  mostly men who look much older than they are  are gathering in various parking lots, stairwells, parks and local landmarks as the sun begins to set.

Not all are as easy-going as Halloween. Reports of harassment, arguments and drunken fights are beginning to come in to the local RCMP detachment.

Its looking like another long night.

Its a little bit like the walking dead, Moore says, as he surveys the growing crowds from his cruiser car. If someone has never been here before, thats what theyd think.

  

Thompson: The Hub Of The North.

Its a place where thousands of people above the 55th parallel are often funnelled to utilize a variety of services: Health, justice and shopping being three of the biggest. It can lead to frequent spikes in the population, which is officially listed at 13,124, making it the 4th largest city in Manitoba.

Yet for the past several years Thompson has been wearing another label, one you wont see on any signs welcoming you to town.

Thompson: The violent crime capital of Canada.

Since 2008, Thompson has been ranked No. 1 out of 239 Canadian cities over the population of 10,000 in terms of per-capita measurements in the Crime Severity Index for violent crime. Thats the guide Statistics Canada began using in 2006 to measure the relative seriousness of crimes in comparison to others. Each offence is assigned a certain weight, which helps comprise a citys overall score.

The only exception for Thompson was 2009, when they finished second.

Trevor Hagan / Winnipeg Free Press Paulette Simkins, Executive Director of the Thompson Homeless Shelter, speaking with a shelter client, John George.

This is an embarrassment to me as the Mayor of Thompson and should be an embarrassment to you as the province of Manitoba, an animated Tim Johnston said in a wide-ranging interview at Thompson City Hall.

Johnston pulls no punches, accusing the provincial government of mostly ignoring the plight of his community. He says addiction and homelessness are two of the biggest factors in the crime rate.

If you took alcohol out of the equation, our stats would be entirely different, says Johnston.

He says a huge challenge is providing so many services to outlying communities, including many remote First Nations where social issues trickle down to Thompson. In fact, Thompson is comprised of nearly 40 per cent of Aboriginal citizens, the highest mark for any Canadian city. Johnston said the badly needed resources havent followed.

Out of sight, out of mind, says Johnston. Weve been tarred and feathered with this No. 1 crime place. But youre never going to solve the problem unless you break it down and address the systemic issues. That is where the province of Manitoba has failed us.

  

As fights go, this was hardly Frazier vs Ali. But when the call came in for a handful of drunks battling in the streets, RCMP had no choice but to respond.

The combatants are now being searched, one by one, inside the local RCMP detachment. None will be charged with any official crime, as it doesnt appear any injuries were sustained. And nobody is in any state to make a formal complaint.

F you, bitches, one of the men says in a badly slurred voice as he is led to the holding cell where local drunks get to sleep it off. Two officers are needed to keep the heavily intoxicated man upright.

Thats hardly the way to treat the people who have repeatedly saved your life. But the man is no stranger to police, who have locked him up hundreds of times under the Intoxicated Persons Detention Act.

Many of those have occurred in winter, when hed be found passed out in a snowbank or on a frozen sidewalk. Only one of his 10 toes remains. The others are all victims of various bouts of frostbite.

When hes sober, hes a really nice guy, says Moore.

The smell of cheap liquor and solvents is thick in the air as the others are searched. A bottle of mouthwash is seized from the only woman in the group, who is put into her own female-only holding cell.

One of the other men, Louie, is sporting a fresh wound on his forehead. But its not from tonights fight. Its from the one he got in last night, which also resulted with him in the drunk tank.

The final fighter, Joseph, is oblivious to the questions being asked of him by police. They notice he is wearing a hat of the Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks and ask him if hes a fan. Joseph doesnt respond.

Moments later, Joseph, Louie and the Man With One Toe are huddled together inside the same concrete drunk tank, practically spooning each other on the floor. Whatever issues they had between them a short time ago seem to have been long forgotten. There are already three others inside the same tiny room, which is one of only two designated to house male drunks.

There have been nights where several dozen will be squished like sardines, especially when government-issued rebate cheques are in the mail.

Trevor Hagan / Winnipeg Free Press The crowd outside a local hotel gets larger as evening wears on. Police often cruise by to try to keep brawls from breaking out.

I remember one 10-hour shift where we locked up about 90, says Moore. Typically, police will keep them lodged for at least five hours, at least until they are deemed sober enough to walk out of the facility on their own. Its far from ideal, but without a designated facility in town such as Winnipegs Main Street Project, its currently the only solution. Approximately 8,000 people will be kept here every year, an average of about 25 per day.

The services provided here in town are very limited, admits RCMP Staff Sgt. Ron Corner. He, and many others including mayor Johnston, believe a comprehensive restorative justice facility and Remand Centre with treatment is badly needed to service the area.

If we had that, a lot of these things wouldnt be repeating themselves, says Corner. But as it stands now, Corner says police are often forced to take on additional roles including social worker and even babysitter.

We do have to go above and beyond, we just cant ignore it, he says. But it seems like we deal with about 10 per cent of the population 90 per cent of the time.

  

It was only a year ago that Thompson officials  including those with police, City Hall, the local homeless shelter and the Addictions Foundation of Manitoba  comprised a list of the 28 locals who are utilizing emergency services most frequently.

Calling it Project Northern Doorway, the idea was to find a way to focus on these high-risk souls with the aim of eventually reducing their strain on the system.

Eight of the people on that list have since died.

These people have died unremarkable deaths. Their systems have just shut down. And nobody seems to notice, said John Donovan, northern region director of the AFM. He has spent the past 10 years working with those battling addictions, and plenty of other demons. This comes after many years working as a counsellor and then vice-principal of the Thompson high school.

Sadly, Donovan now sees many former students living on the streets, struggling to survive. Their addictions often lead to contact with the criminal justice system.

Many of them are feeling pretty hopeless. Theyve tried, theyve failed. Theyve lost hope, theyre in despair. Their primary goal each day isnt to get loaded. Its to stave off withdrawal, said Donovan.

A recent study of all Thompson students, grades 7-12, revealed that 80 per cent currently have someone in their family battling addiction.

Theyre caught in a cycle of saying I dont want to sober up because its going to hurt too much.

  

Thompson RCMP are on their way to yet another call of a drunken fight when something more serious comes across the police radio.

Trevor Hagan / Winnipeg Free Press People hanging around outside the Burntwood Hotel in Thompson quickly leave as an RCMP car pulls into the parking lot.

A man has been spotted entering a known drug house with what appears to be a handgun.

No fighting tonight, Moore yells at a group of intoxicated men who are pushing each other in the parking lot of one of the local beer vendors. Its the best he can do, given the circumstances, and the group seems to comply with his command to go your separate ways.

On this night, nearly all of the dozen officers on shift scramble into action. They have a quick meeting down the street, then decide to call the home in question and order everyone out.

This sort of call is never taken lightly, not after events of the past few years which saw a drug turf war play out between several organized crime groups. The result were several shootings and even a couple execution-style murders.

Police say much of the blame can be put on the fact that there are plenty of Thompson residents with plenty of wealth, the product of about 20 per cent of the workforce making a good wage at the Vale nickel mine.

Theyve got money to burn, says Moore.

Dont be fooled into thinking the drug trade is a poor mans game. It takes serious coin to fuel an industry, especially when hard drugs like cocaine and heroin are involved.

Listen, my friend. I want to do this right, lets do this nice and slow, come out one at a time, Moore barks into the phone with the man who picked up.

Moments later, a middle-aged man emerges, his hands in the air. He is handcuffed at gunpoint. He swears nobody else is in the home, and certainly no handgun.

Police move in slowly, eventually clearing the scene. The gun call was either unfounded  perhaps a gang rival calling it in  or has been hidden from police, for now.

But its not a total loss. The man in the house is wanted on an outstanding warrant.

  

How do you slam the door shut on a homeless person?

Paullette Simkins runs the local shelter and is also employed with the Canadian Mental Health Association. She said their 24-bed facility is maxed out most nights. Between April 1, 2012 and March 31, 2013, they had 8,292 stays out of a possible 8,760. A total of 2,770 people seeking shelter had to be turned away, mostly in winter when overcrowding becomes a huge issue.

And when we say beds, we really mean mats. Thats what they sleep on. The men and women are divided by a couch, said Simkins.

Some clients often find other shelter in makeshift camps set up along the Burntwood River, or in heated outdoor shelters opened when the mercury plunges. The police drunk tank is another option many utilize.

Some even sleep in Blue Boxes on the streets, says Simkins.

TREVOR HAGAN/WINNIPEG FREE PRESS John Donovan, northern region director of the Addictions Foundation of Manitoba: Many of them are feeling pretty hopeless.

Last year, one of their regular clients was savagely beaten by four youths in Thompson. The man is now in a permanent vegetative state in Winnipeg.

Most of our clients are not the ones committing the crime. They are often the victims of crime, she says. Its disheartening. I wish I had more money, and a bigger facility. Thompson seems to be forgotten. The government thinks we can do this on purse strings.

  

The calls for police assistance continue to flood in. A gas-and-dash. A blind man beating a passerby with his walking stick. A man walking his dog who finds a drunk passed out under a tree.

Moore, now on his second tour-of-duty in Thompson, tries to combine enforcement with compassion. Originally from Nelson House, he is one of only two Aboriginal police officers on the staff of 48. He is fluent in Cree, married to a local Child and Family Services worker.

Moore frequently pulls over to check on the well-being of those he sees on the streets. Hell arrest people as IPDAs when warranted, yet drive away if theyre in the company of sober friends. Such is the case with one man who is covered in mosquitoes as he sleeps in the arms of several others outside the local library.

Moore can only shake his head when he realizes its one of the same people he saw earlier in the night shoving and pushing while on his way to the gun call.

Moore has little tolerance for people who over-serve drunks, as demonstrated by a tongue-lashing he gives to a local vendor. Moore orders one heavily intoxicated man to return the king can of beer he just bought while forcing the vendor to issue a refund. He also vows to follow up with the provincial liquor inspector.

He shouldnt be serving him like that, says Moore.

The veteran Mountie also exercises discretion when he sees two 15-year-old boys walking down the street together. Moore knows they are under a court order not to be together, yet opts to give them a verbal warning to go their separate ways rather than arrest them on the spot.

He hopes cutting them a break might pay off down the road and maybe teach them cops arent always the bad guys.

Moore watches the teens disperse, then drives off to tackle yet another call of drunks causing trouble on the streets of Thompson.

He admits it can be a struggle to see brighter days ahead when nights like these are plagued with so many problems.

www.mikeoncrime.com
Brandon James Peacock, 28, is accused of having sexual contact with two Spring Valley, Minn., boys for two years, beginning in January 2010.

Peacock, currently living in Covington, La., appeared in Fillmore County District Court late last month, charged with six counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct and six counts of second-degree criminal sexual conduct.

According to court documents, the Fillmore County Sheriffs Department was contacted by the Cass County, Minn., Sheriffs Department about a situation they were investigating that appeared to have occurred in Fillmore County.

The investigation involved two boys in a family Peacock lived with in 2010 and 2011. The boys were about 4 and 6 years old when Peacock moved in, according to court documents.

According to court documents, each of the boys told Fillmore County investigators that Peacock had fondled and performed oral sex on them while they masturbated him on numerous occasions in the two-year period.

The boys father told investigators the boys had told him and his wife what had happened and they had confronted Peacock, but never contacted law enforcement, court documents state.

Interviewed by a Fillmore County investigator, Peacock denied the accusations, stating that he would never do something like that, and anybody who would would have to be sick.

Peacock is free on conditional bond pending a Jan. 25 hearing.
The number of international students studying at Minnesota colleges and universities is on the rise, following a national trend.

According to a 2015 Open Doors report, nearly 1 million international students are studying in the U.S., with about 14,500 studying in Minnesota, a 60 percent increase from 2007.

Winona is no exception.

In 2014, the latest year for which local data is available, Saint Marys University hosted about 180 international students, a 20 percent increase from 2007, while Winona State University hosted 330 students, a 15 percent increase from 2007.

John Pyle, SMUs executive vice president and chief operating officer, said a number of factors may have contributed to the rising numbers, including improved economies, the perceived value of a U.S. degree, increased recruitment on the universitys end, and a growing interest from young people in experiencing another culture and way of life.

The trend were seeing now in the last two to three years is that students are wanting an international experience  whether its foreign students coming to the U.S. ... or American students wanting to study abroad, he said.

WSU director of international services Kemale Pinar said the university has made a significant push in international recruitment in recent years.

Pinar makes about two trips each semester to countries abroad to attend fairs and recruit directly and foster partnerships.

Right now, China and Saudi Arabia are top recruitment destinations, but the university is looking to reach out more in the Middle East and India, among other countries.

We are gearing up to make a significant increase, utilizing important communications we have in place and doing more outreach, she said.

Both Pinar and Saint Marys director of international services Lupita Garza-Cienfuegos said there are challenges recruiting students to smaller universities, but there are advantages as well, like the fact that both programs know each of their students by name.

Both schools offer programs and support throughout the year to help the students get acquainted with the culture, the campuses and the city  like taking the students grocery shopping, hosting social and cultural events, and getting them involved in the community.

Garza-Cienfuegos said the benefits of having international students go both ways.

We want international students to learn about our culture here, but also American students want to learn about other countries without leaving campus, she said. So its been a gain-gain.

And, according to the latest analysis by the National Association for Foreign Student Advisors, hosting international students has a significant economic impact.

During the 2014-15 academic year, international students contributed $30.5 billion and supported more than 373,000 jobs to the U.S. economy.

For Winonas international students, their reasons for studying abroad vary, but overall confirm that the U.S. is the top destination for international education.

Thao Nguyen, a native of Vietnam who is studying philosophy at Saint Marys, said she chose to study in the U.S. because an American degree is highly valued in her home country.

Its a more well-rounded education system here, she said.

WSU graduate student Asena Cifci, who is from Turkey, said studying abroad is valuable to employers for a number of reasons.

Its an advantage to study abroad, to speak English, to be able to communicate, and to have these different experiences, she said.

William Blanzeisky, a 17-year-old WSU freshman from Indonesia, said he decided to study in the U.S. specifically for the opportunities in the sciences and technology.

In Indonesia, technology is nothing, he said. My dream was to go to the U.S.
Four Ojibwe tribe members have been charged for gathering wild rice and setting gillnets during a protest last summer.

In an attempt to strengthen hunting and gathering rights under the 1855 Treaty, dozens of tribal members from White Earth and Leech Lake bands gathered at Hole-in-the-Day Lake in late August.

Two protesters were handed citations at the time for harvesting wild rice without a permit, and two others for setting gillnets. Late last month Crow Wing County Attorney Donald Ryan decided to officially charge all four protesters.

Ryans move opens the door for exactly the court battle protesters were seeking.

Things are lined up, said Frank Bibeau, a White Earth member and attorney. We believe that federal court will uphold our treaty rights to hunt, fish and gather.

The states longtime position has been that its illegal to harvest wild rice without a license off reservation land. Its also illegal to gillnet off reservation.

Tribe members believe they have the right the hunt, fish and gather on all lands ceded in the 1855 Treaty, which covers much of northern Minnesota.

The Hole-in-the-Day protest was organized by the 1855 Treaty Authority. Bibeau works with the activist group. He said protesters hoped to garner charges and win their land use rights through a series of court appeals.

Morningstar Shabaiash and Harvey Goodsky paddled out into Hole-in-the-Day to gather wild rice, but DNR enforcement officers didnt arrive until two men crossed over into Gull Lake and set a gillnet.

White Earth member Todd Thompson, son of well known Native rights activist Leonard Thompson, and Fond du Lac Band member James Northrup, set a 6-by-200 foot gillnet in Gull Lake.

The DNR doesnt really care about wild rice, Leonard Thompson said at the time, but they get very touchy about their fish.

DNR officers removed the net and handed out citations.

Actually charging tribal protesters is a change for Minnesota. In 2010, a group of 200 tribe members set gillnets on Lake Bemidji. Their nets were taken and reports were filed, but the Beltrami County attorney avoided a court battle by not pressing charges.

Bibeau said Ryan might have filed the charges just to see the longstanding land use issue resolved.

Everyone would like this settled once and for all, he said, so we dont have to wonder about it anymore.

Ryan would not comment on the details of the case, except to say the charges were based upon evidence of crimes and nothing more.

Shabaiash and Goodsky were both charged with misdemeanors for harvesting wild rice without a license.

Thompson and Northrup both face gross misdemeanor charges for gillnetting, as well as a handful of misdemeanor charges for fishing without a license, using an unregistered boat and not wearing life jackets.

All four will appear in District Court in Crow Wing County on Feb. 1.
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The State Bar's Government Relations program connects State Bar members with state government officials--including legislators, executive and judicial branch agencies and their staff--to improve the administration of justice and the delivery of legal services in Wisconsin. The Government Relations team is the lobbying arm of the State Bar and some of its practice sections. It is also responsible for tracking Supreme Court Rules and fostering effective communication and relations with the judicial branch.



The State Bar of Wisconsin takes legislative positions on general policy items of importance to the legal profession; these are expressed in the Board of Governor Policy Positions. In addition to positions on behalf of the entire membership, 15 practice sections lobby on behalf of their own members; these are expressed in the State Bar of Wisconsin Practice Section Positions.



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The State Bar of Wisconsin is a mandatory professional association, created by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, for all attorneys who hold a Wisconsin law license. With more than 25,000 members, the State Bar aids the courts in improving the administration of justice, provides continuing legal education and other services for its members, supports the education of law students, and educates the public about the legal system. The State Bar of Wisconsin also provides public services, including attorney referrals, public education and reduced-fee legal assistance for low-income state residents.

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The Wisconsin Supreme Court requires lawyers to be admitted to practice by the court and to join the State Bar of Wisconsin as a condition of practicing law in the state. Lawyers seeking to practice law in Wisconsin must go through the Board of Bar Examiners (BBE), an 11-member board appointed by the supreme court. BBE evaluates the skills, character, and fitness of lawyers, and also writes and grades the Wisconsin Bar Examination.

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In general, active member lawyers who were admitted to practice law in Wisconsin are required to comply with the 30-hour Wisconsin mandatory continuing legal education (CLE) requirements for each two-year reporting period. There are some exceptions for newly admitted attorneys and emeritus members.

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Bridging the Justice Gap

A 2007 study, Bridging the Gap: Wisconsin's Unmet Legal Needs, commissioned by the State Bar of Wisconsin showed that more than 500,000 of our state's residents face serious civil legal problems without any assistance. This report and its recommendations were adopted by the State Bar Board of Governors on May 8, 2007.

Public Understanding of the Legal System

A key strategic goal (responsibility) of the State Bar of Wisconsin is to ensure Wisconsin's residents understand the importance, value and relevancy of the law and the legal system to their daily lives. In order to guide priority setting, the Public Understanding of the Legal System Committee commissioned a study to determine baseline levels of understanding among those Wisconsinites surveyed.

Ethics 2000 Committee

The Wisconsin Supreme Court created the Ethics 2000 Committee to study the ABA's proposed changes to the model rules. The Ethics Committee's report and petition, which was filed on July 29, 2004, set forth its recommendations. This is the most comprehensive proposal for changes to SCR Chapter 20, Rules of Professional Conduct for Attorneys, since the mid-1980s.
Kilbourn Public Library to hold Lego Day

Kilbourn Public Library will hold Lego Day from 10 a.m. to noon today at the library, 620 Elm St., Wisconsin Dells. This is a free event, no registration needed. For more information on this or other events, call 254-2146.

MACS Macaroni and Cheese Shop holds benefit

MACS Macaroni and Cheese Shop at the Wisconsin Dells and Lake Delton locations will hold a fundraiser for the Wisconsin Dells Education Foundation from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesday. MACS will donate 10 percent of sales. Patrons may enter a drawing to win an art print. Proceeds will support scholarships for graduates of Wisconsin Dells High School.

Community invited to MLK Day of Service

In the spirit of Martin Luther King Jr., Easter Seals AmeriCorps members and Camp Wawbeek staff will hold a morning of service at Easter Seals Wisconsin Camp Wawbeek on Jan. 18. The community is invited to join them for service projects at camp from 9 a.m. to noon, followed by lunch. The morning will be spent constructing benches and decorating the new dining hall addition at Respite Camp. For more information on how to participate in the MLK Day of Service, call 608-254-8319.
Modern technology helped deliver a history lesson Thursday at Baraboo High School.

Students in Steve Argos advanced placement American government classes got to interact  via Skype video chat  with Carol Lobes of McFarland. Lobes shared what she experienced participating in a march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama in 1965.

She was a junior at Valparaiso University in Indiana, and joined a busload of students heading south to protest racial injustice. The protests spurred passage that year of the Voting Rights Act, a landmark of the civil rights movement, and inspired the 2014 film Selma. Argos students recently watched the film, and on Thursday got to interview a real-life participant.

After police and National Guardsmen attacked marchers on what came to be known as Bloody Sunday, Lobes heeded Martin Luther King Jr.s call for volunteers, especially white Christians like her, to join the march.

Lobes had witnessed racial discrimination while teaching as a volunteer in inner-city Detroit. She felt moved to act.

We didnt have slavery anymore, but we had morphed into another kind of thing that was very, very oppressive to people, Lobes said. It was so wrong not to allow people to vote, not to allow people to share water fountains.

Her group joined the march in April, halfway through a 54-mile walk to Montgomery. For the first time, she was the target of racism. It was a situation where the hate was very open and very clear, Lobes said.

She recalled marchers being cheered in African-American neighborhoods, then jeered in white neighborhoods. White children, accustomed to cheering for parades, would wave enthusiastically, only to have parents push their hands down.

We were, in a larger sense, attacking a way of life, Lobes said. To challenge that was no small thing.

One of Argos students, Miles Statz, said the movies depiction of the racial tensions of the time were eye-opening. Its crazy to think about how much actual direct hatred there was, he said.

Argo asked how Lobes views race relations in the U.S. today, as police shootings of African-American suspects have generated protests. Lobes, who in retirement remains active in social justice causes, said those high-profile incidents have brought national attention to misdeeds that previously occurred in the shadows.

She told students they give her hope that race relations will improve. I think your generation doesnt carry a lot of baggage that we were carrying around in my generation, she said.

Lobes appeared via video feed from McFarland High School. Upon learning last year that a march participant lived in the area, Argo worked diligently to reach Lobes. A planned appearance at BHS didnt work out last year, so they settled for Skype this year.

The former director of Dane County Human Services, Lobes is retired in McFarland. Shes active in social justice organizations such as the NAACP.

Her generation prompted social change through the civil rights and feminist movements. She encouraged Argos students to tackle the issues  climate change and economic inequality, for example  at the forefront today. Theres work to be done, she said. And it is work.
The ethanol mandate, known formally as the Renewable Fuel Standard, is an object lesson in misguided government policy surviving long after its original rationales have been destroyed.

The national security rationale was that oil was scarce, but now were the worlds leading oil producer and have begun exporting crude.

The environmental rationale was that ethanol would reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but since a landmark study was published in Nature in 2008 weve known: theres little doubt that ethanol is making global warming worse.

Even the jobs rationale fails. Per the Congressional Budget Office: roughly the same amount of corn ethanol would be used in 2017 if fuel suppliers had to meet requirements equal to EPAs proposed 2014 volumes or if lawmakers repealed the RFS, because suppliers would probably find it cost-effective to use a roughly 10 percent blend of corn ethanol in gasoline in 2017 even in the absence of the RFS.

Even with the decline in oil prices, ethanol is the most cost-effective octane booster. The era of 10 percent ethanol gasoline, E10, as Americas most common transportation fuel isnt going to end if the RFS is repealed. Those ethanol jobs arent going anywhere.

But that doesnt mean this is not a high stakes issue, because under current law the mandate is set to sharply increase, with devastating consequences.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that if the mandate hits as scheduled under current law in 2017, it will raise prices at the pump 30 to 51 cents a gallon for diesel and 13 to 26 cents a gallon for E10.

Thats a lot of money to spend for no environmental benefit.

Even Al Gore has admitted the mandate was a mistake. Gore supported it because: I had a certain fondness for the farmers in the state of Iowa because I was about to run for president.

Unfortunately, many 2016 candidates are repeating Gores mistake.

Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders are enthusiastic supporters, as is Martin OMalley  despite the fact that just a few years ago he begged the EPA to suspend the mandate because of the devastating impact it was having on the cost of feed for Maryland poultry producers.

On the Republican side, the ethanol industry created a group called Americas Renewable Future and hired the son of Iowas governor to run it. The group secured early support from Ben Carson, Chris Christie, Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum and Donald Trump.

Then they added John Kasich, who delightfully explained at an Iowa town hall: Im for your Renewable Fuel Standard. Ive already sold out on that one.

Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio would maintain current law through 2022, which until recently earned them a needs work score from the group. The industry has since deemed that position acceptable in its final scorecard.

That leaves Rand Paul and Ted Cruz as the industrys named enemies, but the latter is leading in the polls.

Cruz recently reiterated his support for actively phasing the mandate down to zero  but Americas Renewable Future, which had been attacking him for taking that position, instead celebrated it. Considering the CBO analysis that a freeze, let alone a phase down, would be economically equivalent to repeal, it suggests the industry is trying to position itself to spin a Cruz victory.

Cruz did also say in a Des Moines Register op-ed that he intends to use anti-trust enforcement to enhance market access for ethanol, including blends of E25 and E30. Cruz claims that higher ethanol blends could prove quite popular with American consumers, who are increasingly concerned with fuel economy. Thats odd because ethanol has about 34 percent less energy per unit volume than gasoline, therefore higher ethanol blends will have worse, not better, fuel economy.

Still, Cruzs position is essentially a prediction, however unlikely, about what would happen in a free market without any energy mandates or subsidies, not a retreat from his plan to repeal the RFS.

No matter who wins Iowa, it is increasingly clear that the RFS is no longer an automatic political imperative for presidential candidates  and thats great news for everybody who fills a gas tank.
The takeover of the federal Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon by armed anti-federal-government zealots might seem like a fresh crisis, but in fact weve been here before. The best option for the government is to practice patient resolve  and have lots of handcuffs ready once the occupation comes to a peaceful end.

The gun toters holed up at Malheur havent issued a political manifesto, but their rhetoric echoes that of movements such as the 1970s Sagebrush Rebellion, in which disaffected Westerners argued that states or counties are the rightful owners of millions of acres of federal land, despite decades of court battles that say otherwise. Three of the occupiers also are sons of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, who, with a contingent of armed supporters, faced down an effort by the Bureau of Land Management nearly two years ago to seize his cattle for nonpayment of grazing fees  a bill that remains unpaid.

The Bundy brigade decamped to Oregon recently to join protests over the re-sentencing of two local ranchers, Dwight Hammond and his son, Steven. Their crimes: burning more than 140 acres of federal land adjacent to their ranch in two separate incidents. The government appealed the Hammonds initial sentence of a few months in prison, winning the argument that federal law mandates a five-year term. Although the Hammonds have acquiesced, the Bundys and their followers seized the opportunity, and federal property, to make a grand and unacceptable show of force and disregard for the law.

The good news is that the Malheur refuge, near Burns in the high desert of eastern Oregon, is remote, and the occupiers pose no imminent public safety threat.

Some critics have sought to contrast the governments measured response with the quick-trigger killing of Tamir Rice, an unarmed, black 12-year-old, by a Cleveland police officer, but it is difficult to compare a police encounter in a populated area with whats happening in Oregon. Nor is the 2011 Occupy Movement a good analogy because those protesters were unarmed. Malheur also differs from federal showdowns in 1992 with anti-government activists at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, and in 1993 with the Branch Davidian cult at Waco, Texas, both of which involved disastrous violence.

A closer parallel would be the American Indian Movements unarmed takeover of the federal landmark of Alcatraz Island, which began in November 1969 and ended, peacefully, 19 months later. Similar restraint leading to a bloodless surrender would be the best outcome here, with the Obama administration pledging to prosecute the occupiers under all applicable laws. Political protest is a welcome part of American life. Armed occupation of public lands by private citizens is another matter entirely.
The dismantling of the 154-year-old feed mill alongside the Portage Canal might resume within days -- at about the time demolition crews start razing other buildings alongside the Portage Canal to make way for two new Columbia County buildings.

The mill and the adjacent Big Chicken antique shop at 131 E. Mullett St. are not on the list of structures to be razed in preparation for the county building construction, because the owners of the mill and the Big Chicken, Joe and Nancy Bonin, have not yet reached an agreement with Columbia County for the propertys acquisition.

Joe Bonin had arranged to have the mill taken apart so that its components could be salvaged and re-used -- a process that ground to a halt in the last days of 2015, because the mill had not been tested for the presence of hazardous materials such as asbestos.

Bonin said Friday that workers from General Engineering Company have taken samples from the mill, and his application to resume the dismantling has been submitted.

Were free to go, he said.

Mark Davis, the DNRs statewide asbestos program coordinator, said DNR officials halted the mills dismantling after receiving a complaint that asbestos testing and abatement had not been done before the work started.

Before any building is taken down, Davis said, it must be tested not only for asbestos, but also for other potentially hazardous materials such as lead-based paint or freon in a climate-control system.

Asbestos is a naturally-occurring mineral, which used to be added to building materials (such as pipe insulation and tiles) because of its sound-absorbing and fire-retardant qualities. Use of asbestos in buildings stopped in the mid-20th century, though its carcinogenic properties -- it can cause illness, or even death, if friable or fibrous asbestos is inhaled -- were well-known long before that.

In a building this old, Davis said, there are many opportunities to add asbestos.

Steve Klaven, senior project manager for J.H. Findorff and Son Inc. of Madison -- the firm managing construction of the three-story county administration building and two-story Health and Human Services building -- said asbestos testing and abatement started on Dec. 28, as scheduled, in the canal-side buildings that are slated to be torn down to make way for the new county buildings.

He said it is likely that the abatement process will be completed in time to start tearing down the buildings on Monday, as previously scheduled or Tuesday at the latest.

Davis said the DNR requires testing and abatement of asbestos and other hazardous materials any time a building is dismantled or razed.

But a municipality can, and often does, issue permits for the demolition without ensuring that the asbestos testing requirement has been fulfilled -- and that happened in the case of the old mill, when H&H Demolition secured a city of Portage permit for the dismantling, which started around Christmas.

He said theres no sign, initially, of asbestos in the old mill, but demolition work has to wait 10 business days, to allow completion of laboratory testing.

It looks like there wont be any issues with it, Davis said, but state law requires inspection nonetheless.

Meanwhile, fences have been erected around the site where the demolition is scheduled to start.

Several buildings are coming down, and Klaven said all have been tested for hazardous materials and abatement, if needed, is in progress.

Buildings that are not being torn down, besides the Big Chicken, include the Gruber Automotive building at 207 E. Edgewater St. (which, like the Big Chicken, has not yet been purchased by the county because a sale price has not been agreed on), and a building at 109 E. Wisconsin St. (which will be Findorffs base of operations during the project).
Reedsburg voters living in one of the citys aldermanic districts will get an opportunity to become candidates themselves in the spring election.

Voters for the District 2 seat on the Common Council will encounter a blank ballot where candidate names would ordinarily appear.

Thats because no one filed to run for the seat.

More than likely, someone will get written in and win, said city Administrator Ken Witt, who also holds the title of clerk. They could vote for themselves and have their spouse vote for them and win with two votes.

The District 2 seat on the Common Council seat is now held by Megan Cowan, who isnt seeking re-election.

Ive seen this two or three times in the last 20 years, Witt said. The highest write-in total Ive ever seen is seven votes.

No write-in candidate is obligated to accept the job, which will pay an annual salary of $3,000.

Theres good news for any District 2 resident whod like run a write-in campaign for the seat: no paperwork needed.

Wisconsin has two rules for candidates who want to wage an official write- in campaign.

If there was a name on the ballot you would have to register to be a write-in candidate, Witt said. But since there is no name on the ballot you do not have to register to run for office. You may have to register if you take campaign contributions but, otherwise, since theres no name on the ballot, you dont have to for the second district.

If no one wins a write-in campaign, or if a write-in candidate declines the post, the Common Council will appoint a person to the District 2 seat.

Candidates for office in the statewide election had until 5 p.m. Jan. 5 to file needed paperwork to get their names onto ballots, and Witt said there were no last-minute filings for Reedsburg offices.

That means Mayor Dave Estes is likely headed for a fourth two-year term in the mayors post because no candidate filed to oppose him. The next mayor will be paid $6,000 annually.

Races for the other two seats on the citys Common Council will be contested.

In District 4, incumbent Dave Knudsen faces a challenge from Tom Seamonson.

In the citys lone at-large district, incumbent Brandt Werner will be challenged by Craig Braunschweig.

The spring election is April 5. Local races wont require a primary election but a three-way race for a single seat on the state Supreme Court will require it.

The primary election is Feb. 16.




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As'ad's Bio

As'ad AbuKhalil, born March 16, 1960. From Tyre, Lebanon, grew up in Beirut. Received his BA and MA from American University of Beirut in pol sc. Came to US in 1983 and received his PhD in comparative government from Georgetown University. Taught at Tufts University, Georgetown University, George Washington University, Colorado College, and Randolph-Macon Woman's College. Served as a Scholar-in-Residence at Middle East Institute in Washington DC. He served as free-lance Middle East consultant for NBC News and ABC News, an experience that only served to increase his disdain for maintream US media. He is now professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus. His favorite food is fried eggplants.
It was announced on Tuesday at the conference of the American Astronomical Society that NASAs planet-seeking Kepler spacecraft has already found more than 100 planets.

According to National Geographic, the Kepler spacecraft, which had recently suffered from minor technical malfunctions, has observed a multitude of new planets, several of which are in multi-planet systems whose stars are brighter than any in the original Kepler field.

During its exploration the Kepler spacecraft has found three planets that are bigger than Earth. Whats more, it has spotted a planet in the Hyades star cluster which is the nearest star cluster to Earth.

The Kepler mission has also resulted in the discovery of a planet being ripped apart by the white dwarf star that it orbits while it orbits it.

In addition to the over 100 planets that have been discovered, there are 234 possible planets that have been observed and are awaiting confirmation, said Andrew Vanderburg of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

Its probing different types of planets, says Tom Barclay of NASAs Ames Research Center in reference to the planets that that the Kepler mission had originally been searching for versus the planets that it is finding now.

Were focusing on stars that are much brighter, stars that are nearer by, stars that are more easy to understand and observe from Earth. The idea here is to find the best systems, the most interesting systems.

These new discoveries come after a malfunction that the Kepler spacecraft suffered in 2013 that rendered it unable to stare at the exact spot while looking for new planets.

A change in the crafts steering ability has re-instilled the Kepler spacecraft with the capability of carrying out its mission of finding a large number of new planets.
New York will open eight dispensaries across the state on Thursday.

New York is finally joining the renaissance in medical marijuana use but with one inhibitive caveat: you cant smoke it.

According to a Manteca Bulletin report, New York will open eight dispensaries across the state on Thursday. Doctors working at the dispensary must first pass a unique training regimen to recommend the drug to their patients adding to a litany of strict regulations, the most stringent among the 20 states that allow medical marijuana. But the turnout of patients and doctor participation is uncertain.

In June 2014, New York legislation drafted a version that appeal to the health benefits while pacifying concerns of unintended recreational use. New York and Minnesota are the only two states to limit usage to non-smokable extracts used in capsules, vaporizers and liquids. And New York is one of few states to require an accreditation course and limiting licensing to only 20 dispensaries with restricted conditions consisting of cancer, AIDS, multiple sclerosis and epilepsy.

Nicholas Vita, CEO of Columbia Care, a Manhattan dispensary, voices, This is a medication. This is a serious opportunity to treat patients who havent necessarily found the treatment they need, and added that the New York mandate is going to be a game-changer for the industry  because nobodys going to let anything slip through the cracks.

New Yorks state Department of Health noted that about 150 physicians statewide are poised to advocate the medical usage, but the agency hasnt divulged the roster. Ambivalence over the laws passing and concerns in the medical community still remain.

But other doctors stand by the evidence of marijuanas welfare despite its associated stigma and federal illegality. Doctor Stephen Dahmer of Vireo Health, a dispensary in White Plains, New York, said, Our hope, with Vireo Health, is to improve that evidence base. Medical advocates also point out that curbing the practice of smoking it may skew an understanding of proper quantity since patients are forced to only ingest it. But Dahmer reinforces that the extracts are precisely measured out.

CEO Ari Huffnung adds that New York doesnt intend to hold a brownie bake-off or mimic Californias dispensaries with open jars of wicked mother nature.Grandmothers dont want to walk into a dispensary and be told by a 27-year-old bud tender that they should buy an AK-47 joint.
Self-driving cars are leading people in highway safety. Adding to mounting evidence lurching towards a unanimous conclusion, Google conducted some more in-house number crunching and found that autonomous vehicles end up in one less crash per million miles driven than people controlled vehicles, according to an Engadget report. That is, a self-driving vehicle is 27-percent more likely to stay in one piece over an extended period of time.

The exercise focused exclusively on Googles self-driving test fleet, and by Googles estimates, has never taken blame in an accident. The data reveals that conventional drivers end up in 4.2 crashes for every million miles driven, whereas peopleless cars result in 3.2 crashes per million miles. Although convincing, studies have only been observed in select states without considering the number of miles people drive over a long course of timeseveral billion milescompared to the short duration of Google cars.

Nonetheless, life imitating art initially suggests that its not as ominous as feared.

Were working toward vehicles that take you where you want to go at the push of a button, Google describes the technology on its website. We started by adding components to existing cars like our Lexus SUVs, then began designing a new prototype from the ground up to better explore what should go into a fully self-driving vehicle. We removed the steering wheel and pedals, and instead designed a prototype that lets the software and sensors handle the driving.

With fully self-driving technology, the car is designed to do all the work of driving and the human driver is never expected to take control of the vehicle at any time, Google added in its FAQ. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) calls this full self-driving automation (level 4). This is the type of technology Google is working on.
Vandals Smash Wrexham Bus Shelters

This article is old - Published: Wednesday, Jan 6th, 2016

Several bus shelters across the county have been damaged after vandals smashed the stands, resulting in shattered glass across the pavements.

Yesterday Gavin tweeted Wrexham.com the above picture of one of two damaged bus shelters on Chester Road  both of which are used as part of the Chester  Wrexham service.

The first shelter is located near Smithy Lane, Little Acton, which was smashed overnight on Monday 4th January / Tuesday 5th January. When Wrexham.com drove past the shelter yesterday, there were workers removing the glass away from the area.

A second bus shelter (pictured above) on Chester Road, Nine Acre, has also had two panes of glass shattered.

Several people have also pointed out that the shelter near Nine Acre had been smashed a few months ago, with the glass not long being replaced.

Weve also been told that two bus shelters on the same side of the road had also been damaged on the same evening in New Broughton.

A spokesperson for Wrexham Council confirmed that the authority do not own the bus stops, however that they have cleaned up the smashed glass from the area.

We have contacted Adshel who own the bus stops to find out when they would be repaired, however we have yet to hear anything. We will update with further information as and when we have it.
In the two months since Canadas Liberal government took office, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his closest allies have made clear that their much vaunted real change to Canadas foreign policy will be almost entirely of a cosmetic character.

The Liberals, who, during the long period in which they were the ruling elites preferred party of government, became associated with a multilateral approach to foreign affairs, are chiefly concerned with repackaging the aggressive militarist policy of Stephen Harpers Conservative government so as to diffuse popular opposition at home and advance Canadian imperialist interests more emphatically abroad. The cornerstone of this policy is a drive to expand Ottawas strategic partnership with the United States, an initiative which gained momentum last week with the announcement that Trudeau will attend a state dinner at the White House on March 10the first for a Canadian prime minister in 19 years.

During the federal election campaign, Trudeau sought to exploit popular opposition to the Mideast war, repeatedly pledging that a Liberal government would end Canadas combat mission in Iraq and Syria by recalling the six CF-18 fighter jets now bombing the two countries. But from the morrow of the Liberals victory, they have been beating a retreat from this pledge.

Trudeau initially refused to name a timetable for the withdrawal of the fighter jets, and Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan has now indicated they could remain in place for months beyond the March 31 deadline set by Harper. The government is now considering a series of options to expand Canadas involvement in the US-led war coalition, including stationing special commando forces in Iraq and sending regular army units to train Kurdish and Iraqi national army proxies. As was demonstrated graphically last month, when the 69 Canadian Special Forces already deployed in the region engaged in a 17-hour battle with ISIS militants, these personnel are involved in combat in all but name.

In just the first two days of the New Year, the six CF-18s flew three separate bombing missions, striking Islamic State targets near Ramadi and Mosul in Iraq.

Whatever the ultimate fate of the Liberals CF-18 recall pledge, Trudeau and his government are determined to maintain Ottawas close alliance with Washington in its drive to bolster US predominance in the worlds most lucrative oil-producing region.

Support for US imperialist aggression

Trudeau has also made clear that his government will align itself with the US in its other major military-strategic offensives around the globe. In so doing, the Canadian government will be intensifying collaboration with the most aggressive and destabilising force on the planet, which, under Obama as Bush, has resorted to wars of aggression, targeted assassinations, mass surveillance, rendition and torture to uphold US global hegemony.

In Eastern Europe, Trudeau is continuing his predecessors belligerent anti-Russian stance over Ukraine and has vowed to increase support for the pro-western regime in Kiev. At a meeting with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on the sidelines of the Paris climate summit in early December, Trudeau committed to implementing a free trade agreement finalized by Harper and Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk in July. The Liberals have endorsed the continued presence of 200 Canadian troops in western Ukraine to train Ukrainian army and National Guard units, and are maintaining Canadas prominent role in NATOs aggressive deployments targeting Russia in Eastern Europe and the Baltic.

Trudeau held his first face-to-face meeting with Obama in November on the sidelines of the Asian-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). The US and its allies used the occasion for bi-lateral talks on escalating their drive to isolate China through economic, geostrategic and military means. The Liberals are in favour of Canada adhering to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal, the economic arm of Washingtons anti-China Pivot to Asia, but for domestic political reasons are holding back from declaring this publicly.

In the Middle East, Trudeau has vowed to uphold the Conservatives staunch support for Israel and its brutal treatment of the Palestinian population. The Liberal government is also determined to maintain the close ties the previous government forged with the despotic Gulf regimes, which constitute a critical source of support for US imperialist interests in the region. This was demonstrated by the Liberals reassertion of their support for a $15 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabiaan announcement made just days after Riyadh carried out the provocative beheading of 47 prisoners, including the dissident Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr.

During a recent trip to Britain, Egypt and Iraq, Sajjan met with the defence minister of the blood-soaked al-Sisi dictatorship in Cairo to discuss increased military-security collaboration. They reportedly discussed the possibility of Canada deploying additional peacekeeping troops in the Sinai. Following the meeting, Sajjan told reporters that in combatting the Islamic State it is necessary to look beyond just Iraq and Syria.

Canadas defence minister has also floated the possibility of deploying Canadian forces to Libya, where Islamic State forces have gained control of areas around the town of Sirte in the wake of the countrys descent into civil war, triggered by the 2011 NATO regime change war. There certainly seems to be movement with respect to some sort of peacekeeping force or training force to emerge in Libya, said George Petrolekas, a former Canadian Armed Forces general who served in the Balkans.

The new government is hoping to use the climate change agreement reached last month in Paris to develop lucrative opportunities for Canadian corporations and advance strategic cooperation on the environment and energy with Canadas North American neighbours. Trudeau has urged the United States and Mexico to come together with Canada to develop a continental energy strategy in order to strengthen North Americas ability to control and compete in the international energy market and uphold the countries interests on the global stage.

This strategy has the support of significant sections of the US ruling elite. In 2014, a paper produced by the Council on Foreign Relations, co-authored by retired General David Petraeus, called for a joint continental energy strategy, arguing that it would be an important means of projecting US power around the globe.

Creating a more agile, better equipped military

To ensure the Canadian bourgeoisie has global reach, the Liberals have committed to significant military spending increases. They have adopted the Conservative governments plan to hike defence spending over the next decade by 10 percent, and intend to undertake a multi-billion dollar procurement program that will include new fighter aircraft, naval ships, and helicopters.

A defence review is set to take place, the first since the Conservatives outlined their priorities in 2008. In their Throne Speech, the Liberals pledged to create a leaner, more agile, better equipped military. The review has won the support of the chief of defence staff, General Jonathan Vance, a veteran of the Afghanistan war, who previously worked closely with Sajjan, who served in Afghanistan as a CAF intelligence officer.

A recent Toronto Star editorial shrilly complained that Canadas military spending, at around 1 percent of GDP, falls far short of NATOs 2 percent target. The Liberal-aligned daily wrote, Given Canadas responsibilities as a partner in the defence of North America, a NATO member and a strong UN supporter, Canadas military should be a modest but genuinely robust fighting force, interoperable with our American and other allies, rather than a lightly armed constabulary geared chiefly to patrolling our skies and coasts.

This outlook reflects that of the militarys top brass. During the election campaign, it emerged that General Tom Lawson, the former chief of defence staff, had met repeatedly with his US counterpart in 2013 to consider the establishment of a joint intervention force made up of military personnel from both countries capable of deploying anywhere around the globe.

The Liberal record

The Liberals have a long record of cloaking predatory imperialist foreign policy aims in progressive rhetoric, and a brief examination of this history reveals that the recent change of tone will bring about no substantive shift in Canadas aggressive role around the globe in alliance with US imperialism.

In 1999, the Liberal government of Jean Chretien led Canada into the NATO war on Yugoslavia on the pretext of protecting civilians. Two years later, the Liberals funded the creation of the International Commission on State Sovereignty, a UN-backed body which formulated the ideological justifications for the responsibility to protect or R2P doctrine, under whose banner one devastating imperialist intervention after another has been launched on largely defenceless countries over the past decade. Just months after the commission concluded its work, the Liberals deployed Canadian troops to invade Afghanistan. In 2004, Liberal Prime Minister Paul Martin ordered Canadian troops to Haiti to support the ouster of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

These policies paved the way for the Conservatives to adopt an even more aggressive and openly militarist agenda when they took power in 2006. The Harper government oversaw an expansion of Canadas participation in the counterinsurgency and neocolonial occupation of Afghanistan, the air bombardment of Libya in 2011, which killed tens of thousands, the deployment of troops, aircraft and warships to Eastern Europe to support Ukraine against Russia, and the current intervention in Syria and Iraq. While in opposition, the Liberals embraced this agenda in all its essentials, repeatedly backing the extension of the Afghanistan deployment, the Libyan war, and the aggressive anti-Russian provocations conducted by NATO. Although Trudeaus party voted against the sending of the CF-18 aircraft to Iraq and Syria, the Liberals always insisted that Canadian troops should be present on the ground to ensure Canadian involvement in the new scramble for dominance in the Middle East.

In certain aspects of foreign policy, the Liberals are preparing to use different methods to realize their goals. Trudeau has appointed University of Ottawa Professor Roland Paris, an advocate of greater involvement in the UN and other multilateral bodies, as his chief foreign policy adviser. Prior to last Octobers election, Paris penned an open letter to the incoming prime minster in which he called for Canada to deepen ties with the United States, abandon its outlier opposition to any action on climate change, and negotiate a free trade deal with China. He previously argued, in line with a growing section of the ruling elite, that the Conservatives helped to marginalize Canada in international affairs by failing to make effective use of diplomacy to achieve Canadian interests.

Paris is also an outspoken advocate of increased military spending. In September, he authored an article entitled Canadas disappearing military budget in which he complained that Canadas military spending as a percentage of GDP is among the lowest of NATO members. Those behind the growing clamour for further military spending hikes hope that a renewed rhetorical focus on peacekeeping and diplomacy and a slightly increased intake of Syrian refugees will enable the Liberals to sell this policy to an overwhelmingly sceptical public. As the recent Toronto Star editorial put it, Defence Minister Sajjans challenge will be to develop a credible vision for Canadas military role, to explain that vision to a public that tends to recoil from sticker shock, and to fight for the funding to implement it.
The new year has begun as the old endedwith a sharp shift to the right by the German ruling elite.

A three-day party meeting of the Christian Social Union (CSU) began 6 January in Wildbad Kreuth, Upper Bavaria. The meeting of the Christian Democratic Unions (CDU) sister party in Bavaria marks the start of the political year. For the first time, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is also travelling to the small town situated between Lake Tegernsee and the Austrian border.

Prior to the meeting, CSU chairman Horst Seehofer once again sought to heat up the current debate over refugee policy. For the first time, he not only demanded an upper limit for the number of refugees coming to Germany, but also named a figure: 200,000 per year. Any additional refugees arriving beyond this number could not be coped with, Seehofer categorically stated.

In the main resolution presented at Kreuth, the CSU combined the upper limit with a series of provocative, anti-refugee demands: restriction of family reunification, benefits in kind instead of financial support, obligation to integrate and learn German, recognition of German values and traditions, accelerated deportations for all from so-called safe countries of origin, strengthening of border security and the European border police, and the rejection of all refugees without valid papers immediately at the border.

The CSU leadership went a step further on Monday, demanding an electronic ankle bracelet for those deemed to represent an Islamist threat by the security agencies.

In the face of the one million refugees who have reached Germany over the last year, the upper limit of 200,000 would practically mean the closure of the border. The basic right to asylum would thereby finally be eliminated. Sending refugees back at the border would violate the European Convention on Human Rights, and the Geneva Convention on Refugees.

Speaking on behalf of Merkel, government spokesman Stefan Seibert said she would take part in the CSU meeting and was looking forward to an open discussion. But, as before, she opposed an upper limit for refugees. We are convinced that a restriction of refugee numbers cannot be achieved nationally alone, said Seibert. The refugee crisis was a European problem. It could be and had to be resolved by Europe.

The German governments understanding of a European solution is the closure of the European Unions external borders, confining refugees to so-called hot spots, combatting of the causes for refugees to flee their homes by collaborating with the authoritarian Turkish regime, and the distribution of a small number of refugees around the EUs member states.

All of this, Seibert said, should result in us making legal migration out of illegal migration, and permanently and noticeably reducing the numbers of those arriving here.

Already last year, Seehofer played a leading role in demanding measures to deter refugees, urging the government to take action. Much of what he demanded at the time has since been implemented in Germany and Europe.

At the CSU party congress in mid-December, the dispute between Seehofer and Merkel on the refugee issue appeared to have been set aside for the time being. Seehofer stated at the time he was not concerned about words. Quotas, upper limitsrepatriation, reductionwe can employ linguists to explain the precise difference to us, he said. The population was merely interested in whether a noticeable reduction in the number of refugees was achieved. He was thus less concerned about a numerical upper limit, but instead about the limit that could be coped with.

He thus accepted the line not only of the CDU, but also of the Social Democrats (SPD). SPD chairman Sigmar Gabriel and foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier stated last October, We cannot permanently accept and integrate more than a million refugees in each year. Both campaigned intensively to prevent refugees from the wars in the Middle East from travelling to Europe and for the mass deportation of asylum seekers from so-called secure third countries.

In spite of this, Seehofer is triggering the dispute once again. For this, the Suddeutsche Zeitung accused him of spreading the poison of easy solutions. A populist-diabolical desire was driving him. His constant anti-refugee agitation was extremely dangerous because it strengthened aggressive anti-refugee sentiments.

But Seehofer is not simply acting out of a populist-diabolical desire. Throughout Europe, the ruling elite as a whole is moving rapidly to the extreme right. Policies that in the past were considered inconceivable have since been demanded and are now common practice: massive foreign and domestic rearmament, participation in wars in the Middle East, and the sealing of borders.

The reasons for this are the global crisis of capitalism and the international tensions which arise from it, as well as the explosive class contradictions existing inside Germany and Europe. As in the first decades of the 20th century, the capitalist elites are responding to the crises they have themselves provoked with war and dictatorship.

The brutal and inhumane treatment of refugees fleeing from the horrific consequences of wars, which have been waged continuously by the US and its allies for over fifteen years, anticipate the reaction of workers and youth rebelling against unemployment and poverty. Brussels and Berlin have already shown in Greece the brutal methods they are prepared to use.

The conflict between Seehofer and Merkel does not revolve around the issue of whether refugees should be accepted or deterred. Both are agreed on this point. But in contrast to Seehofer, Merkel fears that closing the German border would lead to the break-up of the European Union.

Merkel and the majority of the CDU, together with the SPD, share the view that German imperialism can best realise its global ambitions through a European Union which it dominates. But the more the German government acts as a hegemon and Europes disciplinarian, the greater is the opposition from other EU members.

This is shown in refugee policy. As long as the Dublin agreement continued to function and Italy and Greece were responsible for the majority of refugees, Germany firmly refused to accept refugees from these countries. But when the Dublin agreement fell apart and hundreds of thousands of refugees streamed towards Germany, other countries gave their demand for refugee quotas the cold shoulder. Even of the 160,000 refugees already distributed between EU members, only several dozen have travelled to their designated country.

In the meantime, even Sweden, which measured as a percentage of its population has taken in the highest number of refugees, has closed its border with Denmark. Denmark responded by intensifying border controls with Germany. In this way a chain reaction is emerging, which threatens to tear the EU apart and provoke armed conflict.

The dangers arising from the break-up of the EU are very real, the WSWS remarked two weeks ago. New wars and dictatorships, even within Europe, loom. This danger cannot be prevented by defending the EU, but only in a relentless struggle against it and the capitalist system upon which it is predicated.
On Wednesday the International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) at Berlins Humboldt University (HU) held the third meeting of its campaign for the student parliament (StuPa) election which takes place on 19 and 20 January.

In addition to nearly 100 students, two professors of the HU History Institute also attended the meeting which reviewed the latest book by Baberowski, Raume der Gewalt (Spaces of Violence).

One of the IYSSE candidates for the StuPa election, Katja, opened the meeting by noting the extreme right-wing, anti-refugee positions put forward by Baberowski in numerous interviews and talk shows in recent weeks. She then introduced the main speaker, Christoph Vandreier, spokesman for the IYSSE Germany.

Vandreier is well acquainted with Baberowskis writings. He is the author of the article Jorg Baberowskis Geschichtsfalschung (Jorg Baberowskis Falsification of History) which deals extensively with Baberowskis theoretical and historical conceptions. The article appeared in the book Wissenschaft statt Kriegspropaganda (Scholarship Instead of War Propaganda), published in Germany by Mehring Verlag in August last year.

At the start of the meeting, Vandreier stressed that the aim of the IYSSE was not to pursue a personal vendetta against Baberowski, but rather address a number of disturbing trends at the university. He made clear that the IYSSE had undertaken an objective criticism of Baberowskis attempts to falsify the October Revolution, his de-contextualization of Stalinism and his playing down of the crimes of the Nazis. For his part, Baberowski had sought to repeatedly suppress any discussion of his positions.

If you look at his new book, which we will discuss today, one realizes how accurate our estimation was, Vandreier declared. It is a blatant plea for dictatorship and war.

Vandreier explained that his latest book stands in the tradition of the most reactionary thinkers in German history. As was the case with the writings of national conservative circles in the interwar period, Baberowskis book is characterized by a strong streak of epistemological irrationalism and is dominated by anti-democratic conceptions.

The book is devoid of any scientific methodology. At the very start of the work Baberowski stresses that life is just a succession of moments that lack any causality. This is a rejection of any form of science, Vandreier said. He then cited a number of quotes from the text that proved the reactionary character of Baberowskis theory of violence.

Baberowski regards human beings as immutable and inherently violent. He restricts his examination of violence to immediate situations and explicitly argues against the fact that beliefs, reasons or living conditions play any role in the emergence of violence.

If one follows Baberowskis logic of unconditional violence, Vandreier explained, then it is only possible to comprehend a slave revolt or resistance against the Nazis as an expression of the violent nature of man rather than of arising from political convictions or as an expression of the social situation of those affected. Conversely, the industrially organized mass murder of the Nazis is reduced to an expression of the eternal violence of man.

Its obvious that the issue for Baberowski is not to understand violence, but rather justify it, Vandreier stated. Baberowskis work was very explicit in this regard. He declares that a society based on social equality is inconceivable and that, above all, obedience is necessary for social order. The enforcement of social order is only feasible on the basis of violence or threats of violence. This is an anti-democratic argument par excellence, Vandreier explained.

Based on this theory, Baberowski justifies the violence of oppressors against the oppressed. He is also an advocate of new wars. In a recent interview he declared that the only way to fight terrorists was on the principle of an eye for an eye.

Baberowski even links his theory of violence to his attacks on the October Revolution and his trivialization of Nazi crimes. In his book he describes the war of annihilation carried out by the Nazis on the eastern front as a conflict the German army was drawn into against its will, which then got out of control. In this manner the planned mass murder carried out by the Nazis is trivialized and stripped of its significance, Vandreier maintained. Baberowski also provides a basis for xenophobic agitation when he argues in his book that the coexistence of different cultures is not possible.

The fact that such right-wing positions have reemerged and are being defended can only be explained within the context of the rapidly escalating political situation, Vandreier declared. Along with the reemergence of dictatorship and militarism come the reactionary ideologies of the past used to back them up. The German ruling class has used the war against Syria as an opportunity to promote a massive rearmament of the Bundeswehr. This policy is linked to fundamental attacks on democratic rights.

Vandreier explained that the IYSSE opposes this development with a socialist perspective. This is a perspective that explains how violence is ultimately rooted in class society, in social inequality and exploitation, he stated. It is the crisis of capitalism, which brings forth war and oppression. At the same time the capitalist system gives rise to the very contradictions that make it possible to overcome it.

After the report there was an extensive debate about Vandreiers remarks in which the two professors in attendance participated. Most of the audience was shocked by the positions advanced by Baberowski.

Kristin, who is studying history at Humboldt University and was attending an IYSSE meeting for the first time, spoke out early on in the discussion. I am shocked that such a man could teach here at the university, she said to the applause by many students. In part, this book could have been written by a supporter of Hitler. The quotations presented here, especially with regard to the invasion in the East, cannot be dismissed merely as an act of violence, which had gotten out of hand and was comparable to the Russian civil war. The Wehrmacht invaded and slaughtered Jews and Russians.
In the wake of North Koreas nuclear test this week, China yesterday rejected comments by US Secretary of State John Kerry suggesting that Beijing had failed to rein in its ally, Pyongyang, and should take tougher measures to force North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons.

After speaking to his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on Thursday, Kerry told the media that Chinas particular approach to North Korea had not worked and warned that we cannot continue business as usual. The United States and South Korea are reportedly holding top-level discussions on stationing strategic weaponsthat is, nuclear bombs and associated delivery systemson the Korean Peninsula.

Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying responded, saying: China is not the cause and crux of the Korean nuclear issue, nor is it the key to resolving the problem. She declared all other parties should keep a cool head, stay on the path toward a peaceful solution, and avoid taking actions that sharpen disputes and raise tensions.

Hua reiterated Chinas call for the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula and a return to stalled six-party talks involving the two Koreas, the US, China, Japan and Russia. An international agreement on North Koreas nuclear programs broke down in 2008 after the Bush administration unilaterally and provocatively demanded a tougher inspection regime. Obama has stymied any resumption of talks by insisting that North Korea accede to US demands in advance.

Huas reference to denuclearisation is implicitly directed against the US stationing nuclear weapons in South Korea. Following North Koreas previous nuclear test in 2013, the Pentagon flew nuclear capable B-2 and B-52 bombers to South Korea during joint military exercises. Standard US military protocol neither confirms nor denies that warships and strategic bombers are carrying nuclear weapons.

A commentary in Chinas hawkish, state-run Global Times cited academic Lu Chao, who warned that the US was overreacting as military deployment would only aggravate tensions in the region and the situation may spiral out of control. He nevertheless declared that the deployment of military assets was possible as the US will not dismiss the chance to expand its military presence in the Asia-Pacific region, neither will its ally Japan.

The US threat to base nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula is not aimed primarily at North Korea and its rudimentary nuclear arsenal. Rather Washington is engaged in a military build-up throughout the Indo-Pacific region as part of its pivot to Asia directed against China and seeking to ensure continued American hegemony. The stationing of nuclear capable bombers and ships in South Korea, directly adjacent to the Chinese mainland, would represent a major escalation and fuel tensions with Beijing.

China is caught in a bind. It has been pressuring its ally North Korea to wind back its nuclear programs, including by agreeing to new UN sanctions in 2013. At the same time, drastic economic sanctions could precipitate the collapse of the unstable regime in Pyongyang and open up the possibility of a US-aligned state on Chinas northern borders. North Korea depends heavily on trade with China, as well as Chinese aid.

The threatened US military build-up in South Korea underscores the reckless and reactionary character of North Koreas decision to detonate another nuclear weapon. The Stalinist leaderships response to the deepening social and economic crisis at home is to ramp up its nationalist and militaristic rhetoric, which serves only to divide workers in North Korea from those in South Korea, Japan and internationally.

Pyongyangs prime motivation is to exploit its nuclear arsenal as a bargaining chip in refashioning relations with imperialism. No peace treaty was ever reached with the US or South Korea in 1953 to end the Korean War and since then the country has been subject to an economic blockade by the US and its allies.

The North Korean regime is desperate to open up the country as a cheap labour platform for foreign investors and is expanding its network of free trade zones throughout the country. However, without an end to the decades-long confrontation with the US and North Koreas integration into the global capitalist market, foreign investment in the country has remained a tiny trickle.

Reuters reported yesterday that North Korea had sent a message to China declaring that it was seeking a peace treaty with the US, China and South Korea, and warning that it would not stop its nuclear testing until it had one. North Korea will do it to the end until China and the United States want to sign a peace treaty, a high-level North Korean source told the news agency.

The source said he had relayed the message to Beijing immediately after the nuclear test, urging China to support the push for a treaty. China had not been informed of the test in advance. Referring to the US demand that North Korea give up its nuclear programs prior to any negotiations, he urged Beijing not to follow the United States.

Washington has a long history of reaching deals with the North Korea over its nuclear programs and not keeping its promises. Under the 1994 Agreed Framework reached with the Clinton administration, North Korea froze its nuclear activity and shut down its only reactor at Yongbyon in exchange for supplies of fuel oil and the construction of two light water reactors (LWR). By the time Clintons term ended in 2000, virtually no progress had been made on the LWRs.

On taking office, President George Bush ordered a lengthy review of US policy toward North Korea, effectively sabotaged the Agreed Framework and ratcheted up the confrontation with Pyongyang. In 2002, he branded North Korea as part of an axis of evil, along with Iran and Iraq. Bush only agreed to Chinas proposal for six-party talks under conditions where the US occupation forces in Iraq were hard-pressed, then scuttled the resulting agreement in 2008.

US imperialism has repeatedly used North Korea as a convenient pretext to justify its large military presence in North East Asia and to put pressure on China. President Obama, who has deliberately inflamed flashpoints throughout the Asia-Pacific as part of his pivot to Asia, is not about to make any concessions over North Korea and will undoubtedly exploit its nuclear test to accelerate Washingtons war drive against China.
Students of nursing, midwifery and Allied Health Professions (AHPs) are demonstrating today in London against the imposition of tuition fees and scrapping of already underfunded bursaries by the Conservative government.

The demonstration takes place two days before a parliamentary debate on the issue. The debate was triggered after an online petition opposing government plans attracted more than 100,000 signatures within a few weeks of it launching. Several other demonstrations in support of the nurses are taking place nationwide.

Last December hundreds of student nurses took part in a protest organised by the Nursing and Midwifery Society of Kings College London.

These protests coincide with the j unior doctors struggle against new contracts, which will slash their pay by 20-30 percent and create precarious working conditions. Last month, the British Medical Association (BMA) called off scheduled strikes amid massive opposition of junior doctors. Following a failure of the BMA to reach agreement in subsequent talks with Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, they are rescheduled to begin next week.

Chancellor George Osborne in his autumn spending review proposed ending free undergraduate training and scrapping means tested bursaries for student nurses and students of AHPs including midwifery, physiotherapy and radiography. From September 2017, they will have to fund their education, as do other students, through loans amounting to 9,000 a year.

The claim that these changes would create 10,000 more places for nursing, midwifery and AHP students is a lie. The government states this will eliminate chronic staff shortages in hospitals across the country, after they created the shortages through years of underspending and slashing of jobs, including frontline staff.

The 2010-2015 Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition recorded the lowest ever real-term funding of the National Health Service (NHS) in its history, despite claiming that health spending was ring-fenced. Now the Tories are demanding a further 22 billion in NHS efficiency savings by 2020, knowing the disastrous consequences the previous 20 billion in cuts had on staff levels, patient safety and care.

The governments callous indifference towards patient care and safety is demonstrated by its abandonment of the safe staff levels recommended by the Francis Inquiry into the failings of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust. A recent study by the Health Service Journal of 232 hospitals in England found that 207, or 90 percent, were unable to meet safe staff levels during the day.

Central to the imposition of tuition fees on trainee nurses is the plan to slash the 5 billion education and training budget held by the NHSs Health Education England (HEE). NHS Student Bursaries currently pay bursaries worth over 500 million to over 80,000 students at over 120 universities each year. It is estimated that a student nurse graduating in 2020 could leave with debts over 50,000.

The fees of trainee nurses were paid and bursaries awarded for nursing, midwifery and AHPs students in recognition that they spend as much as half of their university time in clinical settings, working alongside qualified staff in order to gain knowledge, skills and experience. They contribute to the day-to-day functioning of the hospital wards, community teams and special units during their placements.

Currently, the tuition fees of Nurses and AHPs students are paid to universities directly by the NHS. Students of these health professions also receive a means tested bursary and 1,000 grant from NHS and a reduced Maintenance Loan from Student Finance England. This means a student outside of London could receive a maximum of 5,915 in support per year, 3,591 from grant and bursary and 2,324 from a loan. A student in London could have a total of 7,391, 4,128 from grant and bursary and 3,263 from loans.

According to a survey by the Unison public sector union, 90 percent of current nurses would not have been able to complete their training without a bursary.

Eliminating this support would have a devastating impact on students from working class backgrounds and students who choose to join these professions after completing a first degree with resulting debts. Many students of nursing, midwifery or AHPs are older than the average student and have families to provide for. Several professional bodies have warned that imposing tuition fees and scrapping bursaries will put off many from choosing a career in the health sector, aggravating the already festering shortages of nurses, midwives and AHPs.

It was the Labour government under Tony Blair that first introduced tuition fees for university students in 2004. The Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition tripled tuition fees to 9,000 a year, scrapped the Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) of 30 per week for young people from low-income families in post-16 education and implemented major cuts at universities and colleges.

Students of nursing, midwifery and AHPs must draw lessons from the previous struggles of the working class and students. There has been no lack of opposition to these attacks by successive governments. More than 50,000 students demonstrated in London against the tuition fee hike in November 2010. There were large nationwide demonstrations against the attacks on education and scrapping EMA.

These struggles were sabotaged by the National Union of Students (NUS), Educational Activist Network and the National Campaign against Cuts and Fees (NCACF), who claimed these attacks could be fought by appealing to the very governments and MPs imposing them.

Several trade unions are now officially backing the student nurses, including Unison, Unite, Royal College of Nursing (RCN) and Royal College of Midwifery (RCM). Once again they are seeking to dissipate the struggles of student nurses in a campaign based on signing petitions and lobbying MPs. In this, the unions are supported by the various pseudo-left outfits such as the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and Socialist Party (S).

NHS FightBack, initiated by the Socialist Equality Party, calls on all NHS workers to link up their struggles with all those facing cuts to their jobs, wages and living standards, through the building of rank-and-file committees in a rebellion against the trade unions. The fight against austerity must be based in a struggle against the capitalist profit system, for the bringing down of the Tories and for a workers government based on socialist policies.

For further information visit HYPERLINK " http://nhsfightback.org " http://nhsfightback.org
Lawyers for the family of Laquan McDonald have accused Chicago police officers of threatening at least three people who witnessed McDonalds murder by Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke in 2014. According to the attorneys the witnesses were interrogated for hours and forced to change their accounts from the night of the shooting.

On October 20th, 2014, Laquan McDonald was shot 16 times as he walked away from Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke. Video of the execution style murder was suppressed by the Chicago Police Department (CPD) and the administration of Mayor Rahm Emanuel, with the complicity of the Obama administration, for over a year.

In an interview with CNN , attorneys for the McDonald family, Jeffrey Neslund and Michael Robbins, stated that they discovered further evidence of a cover-up by the CPD while reading over witness statements from the night of the shooting released as part of a freedom of information request by CNN family.

You have a false narrative put out by police, outright lies to cover up an illegal shooting, corroborated by other officers, Robbins told CNN.

The official witness summaries from the night of the shooting were signed off on and approved by a Chicago police lieutenant on March 15, 2015, nearly five months after the event and nine days after attorneys Neslund and Robbins requested information from the CPD.

The summaries produced by the CPD stated that five people were located in the vicinity of the shooting but none had actually witnessed it. According to the official reports, two witnesses did not see or hear anything, While another witness allegedly heard the gunshots and then saw McDonald lying in the street. The final two witnesses stated they had seen McDonald being chased by police, but did not witness the shooting.

One only needs to take a cursory glance at the video of the killing of Laquan McDonald to see that this is a complete lie. The video itself shows what is most likely a non-police car on the right side of the frame. The car is seen stopping as police cars assemble on the middle of the street and remains there after the shooting. It is highly unlikely that the driver of the vehicle did not witness anything. Additionally, the street where McDonald was murdered, Pulaski Road, is a major street that routinely has significant traffic. With an assemblage of police cars, lights glaring, stationed in the middle of the street, it is also highly unlikely that there would be no witnesses to the shooting

In fact, Robbins told CNN that a father and his son had witnessed the shooting while driving in their car nearby. The father was told by a uniformed officer to get out of there immediately, to drive off or be arrested. Robbins commented, This is somebody who is an occurrence witness to a fatal shooting. Nobody asked him, What did you see?

Meanwhile, three witnesses were brought to a police station by officers where they were interrogated for hours. The witnesses were a truck driver who witnessed the shooting from a Burger King parking lot nearby, and a woman and her friend. All three witnesses were interviewed separately for hours, during which they were intimidated by the police and told to lie about what they had seen.

Speaking on behalf of the truck driver, Robbins said, He kept describing it and he said the police were visibly angry with him and arguing with him about what happened, saying, Thats not what happened, Hed say, Well, thats what I saw. They said, No, youre wrong. Robbins told CNN that the truck driver told the police that he had to leave to go to work for a 6 am shift, at which point, The police said, We dont give a f- about your truck. Lets go through this again.

The truck driver says he did tell police, that it was like an execution, Robbins stated. What he described was what we saw in the video.

We saw these (summaries) by the three witnesses who were interviewed at the stationthat police say they didnt see anything. We said, Wheres the witness statements? We were told there were no witness statements, Robbins concluded.

Neslund stated that the female witness had yelled to Van Dyke as he emptied his clip into Laquan McDonalds body to Stop shooting. According to Neslund, she told the McDonald family, Theres a reason they kept us there til 4 a.m. One officer said he was going to get me.

We saw these (summaries) by the three witnesses who were interviewed at the stationthat police say they didnt see anything. We said, 'Wheres the witness statements? We were told there were no witness statements, Robbins stated to CNN. Significantly in our view, of these three witnessesthe truck driver, the woman and her companionnone of them were asked to sign a statement.

Neslund went on to tell CNN, Its not just the officers on the street. Its a lieutenant, a sergeant and detectivesand the lengths they went to justify what simply was not true. And from there, its Rahm Emanuel, the City Council to all the way Obama Administration and the Democratic Party, who see the police as a mandatory instrument of the state for maintaining class rule of the ruling elite.
The Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Joint Terrorism Task Force arrested 25-year-old Emanuel Lutchman on December 30, claiming the existence of a New Years Eve plot to attack partiers in a bar in Rochester, New York.

Lutchman was charged with [a]ttempt to provide material support  to a designated foreign terrorist organization, namely, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), also known as the Islamic State or ISIS. The charge carries a sentence of up to 20 years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine.

He allegedly prepared to kidnap and kill New Years revelers in a plot instigated by three confidential informants working for the FBI. Because of Lutchmans complete lack of fundsaccording to the Democrat & Chronicle, he was known for his aggressive panhandlingone of the paid informants purchased the $40 of supplies, including knives and zip ties.

Lutchman apparently converted to Islam in prison after being sentenced to five years imprisonment for a robbery he committed in 2006 at the age of 16.

The alleged plot has all the hallmarks of an FBI-concocted scheme, including a vulnerable victim and extensive involvement by federal agents. Lutchman has a history of mental illness, as documented in the official affidavit, including previous state Mental Hygiene arrests. His father, Omar Lutchman, told NBC New York, He has mental issues and hes been having mental issues for a long time.

This thing could have been avoided and it could have been handled better if hed had the right help, the elder Lutchman noted. His son has attempted suicide in the past, including over the past summer. Emanuels grandmother, Beverley Carridice, told NBC News that he was prescribed psychiatric drugs but was inconsistent in taking his medication.

Carridice, who raised Lutchman from age 2 to 13, noted that he was psychologically vulnerable and unlikely to commit an attack without government involvement: Whatever went down, the family is sorry. We do not support radical Islam.  But, they sent this guy to befriend him and set him up in a sting. How is that right? For the federal government to set up youths that they know are vulnerable?

Charma Lutchman, Emanuel Lutchmans former stepmother, told the Democrat & Chronicle that Emanuel had been hit by a car while living with Carridice, an event which permanently changed the youth and caused him to be more withdrawn.

He wasnt the same boy I knew after he got hit by a car, she said. He was different, more quiet.

In addition to Lutchmans psychological vulnerability, the FBI informant known as CS-2 played a main role in the financing and organization of the plot. (CS stands for confidential source, or a paid informant.) Omar Lutchman claims that the alleged plot would not have taken form without federal involvement, saying, We just believe that he was influenced.

Three FBI informants pressured Emanuel Lutchman at every turn. When one of the informants, CS-3, pulled out of the operation on December 29 at the FBIs request, Lutchman texted CS-2, In a way I was thinking about stopping the operation cuz [sic] I was trusting [CS-3] and at the last of our moment [sic] he decided to pull out. According the affidavit CS-2 encouraged Lutchman, telling him not to let CS-3s backing out of the operation upset him.

Lutchman is alleged to have had contact with an individual overseas who claimed to be an ISIS member in Syria. The affidavit does not claim that this individual gave any specific orders to Lutchman, nor does it identify this individual, their allegiance or specific location, leaving the possibility open that they are also involved with American intelligence.

The credibility of the supposed plot is further undermined by the fact that Lutchmans communications with this unidentified individual began between December 25 and 26in other words, about five days before his arrest. As Democrat & Chronicle columnist David Andreatta notes, When was the last time ISIL hatched a terror plot in five days with $40?

This case has several parallels with an earlier case in Rochester last year, in which Mufid Elfgeeh, a 30-year-old food store owner, was also charged with giving material support to ISIS for attempting to send two informants to Syria. The FBI apparently even used at least one of the same informants, CS-2, in both cases.

A comparison published by the Democrat & Chronicle points out the similarities in the affidavits in the Lutchman and Elfgeeh cases. CS-2, identified as such in both documents, played a key role in planning the alleged crimes.

CS-2, like the other informants in this case, was compensated well; he had received at least $7,000 from the FBI before this investigation, and will likely receive thousands more for ensnaring Lutchman in the latest plot.

The World Socialist Web Site has reported extensively on numerous concocted terror plots over the last fifteen years, many of which constitute entrapment. Some of the most brazen federal orchestrations include the Newburgh Four case in 2009 and the so-called JFK plot in 2007.

A report published by Human Rights Watch and Columbia Law Schools Human Rights Institute noted that in some cases the Federal Bureau of Investigation may have created terrorists out of law-abiding individuals by conducting sting operations that facilitated or invented the targets willingness to act.

The report also indicates the difficulty US law places on proving entrapment occurred, and that American law regarding entrapment is not up to the standards of European human rights law.

Authorities at the state and federal level are hailing Lutchmans arrest as a stunning victory that made Americans safer, despite the dubiousness of the planned attack. Governor Andrew Cuomo told Time Warner Cable News, The federal agencies have done a magnificent job."

US Attorney for Western New York William Hochul Jr. took the opportunity to gloat: "This New Year's Eve prosecution underscores the threat of ISIL even in upstate New York but demonstrates our determination to immediately stop any who would cause harm in its name. What began as an ISIL directive to harm the community ended with the arrest of this defendant and a message for other individuals considering similar behavioryou will be caught, you will be prosecuted, and you will be punished."

Even though the police had no knowledge of any remaining specific threats in the city, Rochester canceled its annual New Years Eve fireworks display.

The plot, trumpeted across media in upstate New York in particular, has already been used to retroactively justify an unprecedented police buildup across the country on New Years Eve. It will no doubt also be used to reinforce a climate of fear and justify police-state measures domestically and imperialist barbarism internationally.
The leader of South Koreas second largest labor organization, the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), has been charged with sedition following his arrest last month. The KCTU has been accused of planning violent acts at a rally in November as well as other illegal demonstrations in the past. The charge of sedition has not been used in South Korea since 1986 and represents a deepening of the governments suppression of political dissent.

Han Sang-gyun surrendered to police on December 10 after seeking refuge from arrest at Seouls Jogye Temple, a Buddhist place of worship, where he had resided since November 16. Shortly before being detained, Han said he would expose the illegal detail of his arrest in court.

Following Hans arrest, the police charged him with eight crimes, which included organizing an unapproved rally, obstructing traffic and damaging property. A week later, however, Han was charged with sedition, a crime that carries the threat of up to ten years imprisonment and a fine of 15 million won ($12,700).

The Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency sought to justify the charge by asserting that the extreme illegality and violence that occurred during the demonstration were not spontaneous acts by a few protestors but were rather part of a detailed plan by KCTU leaders and related organizations for a violent demonstration.

When prosecutors formally indicted Han this week, the sedition charge was not included, but they said the charge could be added later, following further investigations into Hans involvement in the November rally. The Seoul Central Public Prosecutors Office said other union leaders could be charged with sedition as well.

The charge of sedition has not been used in South Korea since General Chun Doo-hwans administration, which employed it against protestors at a rally against his dictatorship. Whether or not prosecutors proceed to try Han with the supposed crime, the police and the government are setting a precedent for the use of the sedition charge against other protestors and government opponents.

The November 14 protest, organized by the KCTU and attended by as many as 130,000 people, turned violent in the face of police provocations. Before the event, Justice Minister Kim Hyeon-ung threatened the participants. The police made clear they would utilize bus barricades, which have been declared illegal by the courts, to stop the demonstrators from marching. The government and police have now seized on the violence they provoked to step up a crackdown on dissent.

In particular, the government is seeking to block public opposition to so-called labor reforms, which include the firing of employees at will, as well as to its plans to re-write history textbooks to glorify past South Korean dictators, such as President Park Geun-hyes father, General Park Chung-hee. The government and media have denounced anti-government protestors, as well as the KCTU, with President Park comparing them to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

The ruling Saenuri Party is also pushing anti-terrorism bills to step up domestic surveillance and ban the wearing of masks at demonstrations. The police raided the KCTUs headquarters on November 21 and arrested other leading members. They claimed to have discovered ropes and tools used to commit violent acts at the protest.

Notwithstanding Hans vow to use the courts to expose the charges against him, the KCTU has in effect capitulated to government pressure. It has not called any significant industrial action by the nearly 700,000 workers it claims to represent. A four-hour work stoppage on December 16 was organized at Hyundai and KIA Motors to allow workers to let off steam, while 5,000 people gathered to protest in Seoul. On December 19, the KCTU held a third general peoples uprising protest in Seoul to denounce the government and Hans arrest. However, according to police estimates, only 2,500 people attended.

The KCTU is a pro-big business organization that poses as a progressive and even at times anti-capitalist group. Politically, it attempts to direct workers anger behind the opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy (NPAD), for whom it provides a progressive cover. It has absolutely no intention of taking a stand against capitalism.

Throughout its 25-year history, whenever strikes began to take a serious political toll or were on the verge of spinning out of the control of the trade union bureaucracy, the KCTU has shut them down. This notably took place during the 1997-1998 Asian Financial Crisis, when the KCTU agreed to massive layoffs under the Kim Dae-jung administration. More recently, the KCTU called off the 2009 Ssangyong auto plant occupation and the 2013 railroad strike after facing increased pressure from the government.

Since taking office in February 2013, Park Geun-hye has gone on the offensive against her political opponents. The Unified Progressive Party, once the political appendage of the KCTU, was disbanded under phony charges of supporting North Korea, the first time a political party had been broken up since the Syngman Rhee administration did so in 1958. The Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union (KTU), an ally of the KCTU, was also deprived of its legal status by the government in October 2013.

The Park administration is determined to pursue the KCTU despite its efforts to accommodate itself to the South Korean ruling class by suppressing struggles by workers. The jailing of its leadership represents a serious attack on democratic rights and is above all aimed at preempting any movement of the working class against declining living conditions.
White House officials met with Silicon Valley executives Friday to discuss the US governments expanding efforts to monitor and intervene in online social media and other forms of internet communication.

The meeting, held in San Jose, California, featured high-level figures from Silicon Valley, including Apple CEO Tim Cook, and a government delegation led by White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, NSA Director Michael Rogers and FBI Director James Comey.

According to an official statement issued by the White House, the purpose of the meetings was to work together to combat terrorism and counter violent extremism online.

During the tech summit, the White House delegation circulated proposals calling for tech firms to develop tools to measure radicalization levels among different populations, and to enable more effective dissemination of government-produced anti-terrorist media, documents acquired and published by The Intercept on Friday show.

Also on Friday, with the closed-door discussions still in progress, the White House announced new programs against violent extremism in the United States, including the establishment of a new Countering Violent Extremism task force, to be formed jointly by the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice.

The new CVE task force, based out of DHS facilities, will seek to integrate and harmonize the operations of dozens of federal and local agencies, according to unnamed US officials cited by the Washington Post. The newly formed DHS-led task force will coordinate all of the governments domestic counter-radicalization efforts, according to the US officials who spoke to the Post.

The State Department will also create a new Global Engagement Center to coordinate US government social media work internationally, a White House statement said.

Fridays high-profile Silicon Valley summit and the announcement of the new counterterror programs have confirmed that the Obama administration will make use of its final year in power to further entrench and expand the surveillance apparatus.

The Obama administration aims to spend 2016 overhauling its propaganda war against the Islamic State, the Washington Post reported Thursday, in an article based on leaks from unnamed, high-level US government sources.

New spy programs launched by the administration will seek to collect and analyze data from social media networks and develop covert operations that allow the government to use the networks for its own counter-radicalization schemes, the US officials said.

The Obama White House has already overseen the development of a raft of police-state measures in the name of fighting violent extremism, hosting two major international conferences last year as part of efforts to coordinate surveillance projects among the various imperialist powers.

As early as 2012, the US government began seeking private contractors to conduct surveillance and analysis of social media data on behalf of the agency, through which the bureau could develop pattern of life matrices to enable law enforcement agencies to automatically identify likely radicals.

Recent months have seen growing clamor by the American state against encryption technology, as FBI Director James Comey has staged numerous public appearances to demand that the US government be given unlimited back door access to all encryption systems used by US communications firms.

The US political and media establishments have sought to justify this agenda by lamenting the limitations of previous social media surveillance efforts, endlessly repeating claimswithout any factual basisthat the attacks in San Bernardino and elsewhere could have been stopped through preemptive screening of social media profiles for signs of extremism.

A growing stream of reports from elite universities and US government agencies warnagain without any evidencethat the Internet is enabling mass conversions of US residents into violent terrorists. Media reports this week highlighted one recent contribution, ludicrously titled ISIS in America: From Retweets to Raqqa, published in December 2015 by George Washington Universitys Program on Extremism.

In the period since the exposure by NSA contractor Edward Snowden of massive US government spying on the Internet, many Silicon Valley firms have sought to pose as defenders of privacy against government overreach, although they have cooperated extensively with the governments surveillance operations for years.

The communications firms are mainly concerned to protect the illusion of independence from the government, rather than to actually protect the privacy of their users, as comments by an unnamed Silicon Valley official reported by the Washington Post on Friday made clear. Being seen as having the US government force our hands makes others around the world lose confidence in us, an unnamed Silicon Valley official told the newspaper.

Fridays meeting, with its lineup of virtually every top US official overseeing counterterrorism and surveillance, demonstrates that the US ruling elite is seeking nothing less than to subject the entire world communications system to unlimited scrutiny by US security and intelligence agencies.

Whether or not the leading tech companies will sign on to the specific initiatives being put forward by the White House Friday remains unclear. Nonetheless, as revelations from Snowden have conclusively shown, all the major communications providers have collaborated to varying degrees with the illegal mass spying operations erected by the US government since 9/11.

The events of the past decade-and-a-half have made clear that the entire corporate and political establishment favors an agenda of police-state spying on the American population.

In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, AT&T allowed the CIA and NSA continuous direct access to the companys servers via special rooms installed inside the corporations headquarters.

The NSA has enjoyed virtually unfettered access to the servers of major Internet and telephone providers for years as part of secret deals negotiated in connection with the agencys PRISM program. Since 2007, the US government has successfully recruited Microsoft, Google, Facebook, YouTube, AOL, Skype and Apple as participants in PRISM, giving the NSA complete access to all live communications hosted on the corporate servers, including email, video and voice calls, chats and file exchanges, along with unlimited access to their data archives.

Terrified by the Snowden exposures, the US government has increasingly turned these methods on its own employees, who are now among the most heavily surveilled groups on the planet. As part of the Pentagon-led Insider Threat Program, at least 100,000 US government employees have been targeted by highly intrusive electronic surveillance, a 2015 Congressional report secured in December by a Freedom of Information Act request revealed.
Two young Palestinian men born in Iraq and admitted to the United States as refugees were arrested on terrorism-related charges Thursday in California and Texas. Despite media headlines linking the two to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the two are not charged with taking any concrete action.

Despite the claimed ties to ISIS, neither man is accused of planning any sort of terrorist attack, either in the United States or elsewhere.

Omar Faraj Saeed al-Hardan, 24, was arrested in Houston and charged with attempting to provide material support to ISIS, lying on an application to become a US citizen, and making false statements. He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted on all counts.

The material support charge is based on an extremely wide-ranging statute. By expressing his desire, in an online discussion, to go to Syria and fight with ISIS, al-Hardan was offering, in the language of the indictment, to provide resources, including training, expert advice and assistance, and personnelspecifically himselfto a known foreign terrorist organization.

Aws Mohammed Younis al-Jayab, 23, was arrested in Sacramento and charged with lying to immigration authorities about traveling to Syria in November 2013 to join an Islamist groupnot ISISthat was fighting against the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad. He faces up to eight years in prison if convicted.

Al-Jayab is not charged with a crime for participating in the Syrian civil war. On the contrary, thousands of Arab youth have been recruited by the CIA and by US allies such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar to fight for the overthrow of the Assad government, targeted by Washington because of its close ties to Iran and Russia.

It appears, according to some press reports, that al-Jayab had actually criticized ISIS in his own online comments and was hostile to the group. He apparently fought in Syria as a member of Ansar al-Islam, one of the numerous Islamist formations that have emerged in the course of the civil war.

In a carefully worded statement, John Carlin, assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Departments National Security Division, told the press, Jayab allegedly traveled overseas to fight alongside terrorist organizations and lied to US authorities about his activities.

Nearly every anti-Assad group has fought alongside terrorist organizations, as the US government defines them, including the so-called moderate groups financed, sponsored and equipped by Washington and its allies.

There is no indication that either man came to the United States as a committed radical Islamist and concealed it during the process of being accepted as a refugeethe scenario that has been the basis of fear-mongering on the part of Republican presidential candidates and congressmen of both parties.

Nor did they discuss or contemplate attacks within the United States. Speaking in Sacramento, US Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner said of al-Jayab, there is no indication that he planned any acts of terrorism in this country.

Al-Hardan came to the US in 2009 as a 17-year-old refugee from Iraq, under conditions where Iraqi Sunnis were the targets of persecution, repression and murder by Shiite death squads linked to the US-backed regime in Baghdad. He was granted legal permanent residence in 2011 and apparently came to the attention of US authorities when he exchanged online messages with al-Jayab asking about how to join the fighting in Syria.

Al-Jayab had come later, in 2012, directly from Syria, although he was admitted as a refugee of Iraqi origin. He lived for a time in Arizona and Wisconsin, and in 2012-13 discussed on social media his intention to go to Syria and fight in the civil war. In November 2013 he traveled to Syria, returning to the US in January 2014 and settling in Sacramento.

He was hardly a master conspirator. On his return to the United States, he filled out a customs form declaring that he had visited only Britain and Jordan, but then told immigration officials that he had been visiting his grandmother in Turkey (he was disembarking from a direct flight from that country).

Three other people were arrested in Milwaukee, Wisconsin Thursday, relatives of al-Jayab, according to the US Attorneys office in Sacramento. These arrests are not related to national security, officials said.

The arrests of the al-Jayab and al-Hardan immediately became fodder for the right-wing campaign against Syrian refugees and immigrants in general. Governor Greg Abbott of Texas issued a statement declaring that the arrests showed the dangers of accepting refugees from countries substantially controlled by terrorists. How that description could apply to Iraq in 2009 or 2012, under a US puppet regime and before ISIS was even established, he did not explain.
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) - Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi says she was wrong to urge Medicare to pay for high-priced and unnecessary drug screening tests from a company being investigated for defrauding Florida Medicaid of millions.

Bondi told The Palm Beach Post (http://goo.gl/aHDRQM ) in an email Friday that she never should have issued a 2014 letter to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services supporting the tests performed by Millennium Laboratories. Bondi explained in her email that she believed the letter, drafted by her staff, only supported the general concept of drug testing, not a company that was under federal investigation.

Florida's Agency for Healthcare Administration, which oversees Medicaid, wrote both Millennium and Bondi's office in 2012, stating that company was probably running a kickback scheme.

Millennium agreed to pay $256 million in October to resolve federal kickback and civil fraud charges.

___

Information from: The Palm Beach (Fla.) Post, http://www.pbpost.com

(Copyright 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
LEE, Fl. (WTXL) -- The Madison County Sheriff's Office is concerned with recent changes made to the school zone in front of Lee Elementary School.

The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) has changed school zones so that it does not include any entrance or exit to the school.

FDOT says that the changes followed federal guidelines, taking the highest level of safety into consideration.

The school zone doesn't begin until after the school entrance when travelling east-bound and it ends before the school entrance when travelling west-bound. The crosswalk, however, is included in the school zone boundaries.

The FDOT maintains that the school zones focus on pedestrian safety.

To see the FDOT design standards for school zones, click here.
ATLANTA (AP) - Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal's State of the State address is set for Wednesday.

Deal's office announced the address Friday. The legislative session opens Monday at the Capitol in Atlanta.

Deal, a Republican in his second and final term, is expected to focus on education issues during the 2016 legislative session.

His address will take place in the House chamber at 11 a.m.

Lawmakers also are expected to discuss a contentious religious freedom bill and whether to expand gambling in Georgia during the session.

(Copyright 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
The 2016 Mitsubishi Outlander is a perfectly OK midsize crossover if you want something OK for an almost OK price. (Photo courtesy of Mitsubishi)
You are the owner of this article.
The Gaza Strip's struggling healthcare system will get some much needed help in 2016 after the first new hospital in a decade opened its doors in the territory last month and as two more foreign-funded clinics are set to launch this year.

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After nearly five years of construction, with delays caused by fighting and restrictions on imports imposed by Israel and Egypt, the Indonesia Hospital opened its doors on December 27 and has since been treating more than 250 patients a day.

Built on a hilltop outside Jabalya, Gaza's largest refugee camp, it serves 300,000 people who live in the far north of the territory, an area hard hit in Operation Protective Edge in 2014.

Patients and staff at the Indonesia Hospital in Gaza (Photo: Reuters)

Gaza, home to nearly 2 million people, has around 30 hospitals and major clinics, providing an average of 1.3 beds for every 1,000 people, according to the World Bank.

By comparison, Israel has an average of 3.3 beds per 1,000 and the European Union 5.4 per 1,000.

A member of staff at the Indonesia Hospital in Gaza (Photo: Reuters)

Ashraf al-Qidra, spokesman for the Palestinian Health Ministry, said there was a shortage of doctors in Gaza, especially trained physicians and surgeons. Seriously ill patients must travel to Israel, Egypt and beyond if they need specialist medical treatment, he said.

Because Israel only admits death-threatened patients and Egypt keeps its border crossing with Gaza largely closed, hundreds of lives are at risk, said Qidra.

The largest hospital in the territory is Shifa, in the center of Gaza City, with 750 beds. A vast facility, it is frequently overrun with patients, leading to shortages of medicine, equipment and staff.

"They (the new hospitals) will represent a great contribution to the health situation in Gaza," Qidra said.

The Indonesia Hospital in Gaza (Photo: Reuters)

One hospital expected to open this year is a Qatar-funded center for prosthetics, an area much in demand in Gaza where repeated conflicts with Israel since 2006 have left thousands of people with missing limbs.

Turkey, a major supporter of the Palestinians, is building health facilities in both Gaza and the West Bank. The Indonesia Hospital employs 400 people, paid by the health ministry.

New equipment

Many locals gathered at the hospital compound on Wednesday to get a glimpse of the new facility, the first new hospital in Gaza since 2006.

The two-storey building, pristine and smelling of fresh paint, will provide outpatient clinics, general and orthopaedic surgery and a specialist department for abdominal diseases.

Umm Hashem, a mother bringing her 17-year-old daughter to the hospital to have a stomach problem examined, praised the new facility, saying it was long overdue.

Staff at the new Indonesia Hospital in Gaza (Photo: Reuters)

"The best thing here is the X-ray machine," she said, referring to the CT-scanner. "We used to go to Shifa hospital to get checked, but now we can do it here."

Gaza's health ministry has four other CT scanners, but they are old and have had frequent technical problems in recent years. Some private medical centres in the territory have their own, but the cost is prohibitive for the average Gazan.

"We came to Gaza in 2009 and we saw patients and no medicine and not enough hospitals," said Edy Wahyudi of Indonesia's Medical Emergency Rescue Committee, which funded the facility.

Wahyudi, who oversaw the construction, said the funding had come from individuals in Indonesia who wanted to help Gazans. Rooms in the hospital are named after donors and some of Indonesia's 17,000 islands.
The government is promoting legislation that would increase the benefits for Israel's ultra-Orthodox sector, including state-funded life insurance for yeshiva students and discounts on car insurance to those who don't drive their cars on Saturdays.

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Meanwhile, Likud MK Miki Zohar's legislation aimed at closing all stores on Shabbat, and thus changing the status quo in favor of the ultra-Orthodox, has encountered a bump in the road.

State-funded life insurance

United Torah Judaism has demanded to increase the benefits given to 120,000 yeshiva students so they could buy life insurance.

Upon their return to the government after a term away from the coalition, the ultra-Orthodox parties pushed to double the benefits given to yeshiva students in order to bring them back to what they were before former finance minister Yair Lapid led the move to cut the benefits. Now, yeshiva students will receive an additional NIS 36 million a year to pay for life insurance.

Originally, Shas Deputy Minister Yitzhak Cohen proposed a plan to take the life insurance fee out of the existing benefits given to yeshiva students, thus reducing their salaries slightly.

But Health Minister Yaakov Litzman and Knesset Finance Committee chaiman Moshe Gafni, both of UTJ, opposed the idea and demanded Deputy Minister Cohen find additional funds to finance the plan.

United Torah Judaism MK Gafni, left, and Litzman, right (Photo: Motti Kimchi)

According to the agreement eventually reached with UTJ, benefits given to yeshiva students will increase from about NIS 860 a month to about NIS 885 a month, with the additional NIS 25 used to cover insurance costs. If a yeshiva student were to pass away, his family would receive NIS 500,000 in death benefits, paid in monthly installments for 15 years.

Representatives of Shas, UTJ, and Bayit Yehudi have been holding discussions in order to decide from which of the ministries under their control the money would be taken.

As part of Cohen's maneuver, done in collaboration with Education Minister Naftali Bennett (Bayit Yehudi), the Finance Ministry is expected to issue a tender to determine the insurance provider. "The coverage will be bought in a competitive process, and its cost will be redacted from the budget given to yeshiva students," Cohen's office said.

Discounted car insurance

The Finance Ministry is promoting a reform intended to lower the price of compulsory car insurance significantly, but it will have to wait, as Bayit Yehudi MK Nissan Slomiansky is demanding that a further discount be given to those who do not drive their cars one day a week.

According to the reform led by the Finance Ministry's Capital Market, Insurance, and Savings Department, insurance companies will be able to offer a discount on compulsory car insurance rates based on three parameters: The existence of a Driver Monitoring System in the vehicle, the car owner attending a Driver Improvement Course, and the kilometers the driver is expected to put on the car during that year.

Bayit Yehudi MK Nissan Slomiansky (Photo: Gil Yohanan)

During a discussion at the Knesset's Constitution, Law, and Justice Committee, chaired by Slomiansky, about the reform on Monday, the Bayit Yehudi MK claimed that the car's inactivity for one day a week lowers the risk by one seventh.

Finance Ministry representative Asaf Michaeli quickly responded that "we don't know that the risk goes down, since drivers drive more on other days. I don't know any research that examined the effect (of the inactivity) for one day of the week on risk."

Slomiansky then decided to delay the committee's vote on the car insurance reform until such research is conducted.

Slomiansky's request was in fact intended to give a discount for those who observe Shabbat. MK Mickey Levy (Yesh Atid) slammed the suggestion, saying that "The one-day-a-week discount will screw over the secular people."

Members of the ultra-Orthodox sects quickly backed Slomiansky. "A one-day-a-week shutdown is accepted for comprehensive insurance premiums, there's no reason why it shouldn't be so with compulsory insurance," said MK Uri Maklev of UTJ. "Let's allow the companies to offer the discount if they want to."

His fellow UTJ MK Moshe Gafni added that, "a person who drives less, gets into fewer accidents. It can't be that a person who drives fewer days should pay the same as a person who drives for seven days."

According to insurance companies' estimates, about 20 percent of drivers are either Orthodox or ultra-Orthodox, and about 10 percent others are traditionalists who don't drive on Shabbat.

Some of the insurance companies already offer a symbolic discount to religious drivers in comprehensive insurance premiums. The Ayalon insurance company was the first to offer such a discount, which stood at 7.5 percent.

Ayalon's former CEO, Noga Rachmani, told Calcalist that initially the discount was given without any basis in research. "A few years ago, we decided to do a statistical analysis that showed there wasn't necessarily a justification for that assumption, since the religious public fills in the mileage after the Shabbat ends. We lowered the discount, which is more of a promotional tool these days and less a result of lowered risk."

The Harel Insurance company is also offering such a discount, at five percent. Smaller companies are offering discounts of ten to 15 percent.

The Shabbat law

A controversial proposal by Likud MK Miki Zohar seeks to bar businesses across the country from opening their doors on Saturdays, and sets fines of three days' worth of profits on those who do open on Shabbat.

The legislation, which was approved by the Ministerial Committee for Legislative Affairs three weeks ago, was supposed to be put to a preliminary vote at the Knesset earlier this week. But Zohar decided to pull the legislation the morning of the vote, citing a request by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Likud MK Miki Zohar (Photo: Gil Yohanan)

"This is a complex law that includes wide-scale consequences and has a great Jewish and socialist value," Zohar explained, "and that's why I will work to reach agreements with my colleagues in the coalition and opposition."

The legislation currently does not have a majority within the coalition. Three MKs from Kulanu - Rachel Azaria, Roy Folkman and Eli Cohen - have all announced they would oppose the law, while party leader Moshe Kahlon expressed unease about it.

Likud MKs David Bitan and Amir Ohana also announced they would oppose the bill. "This is an anti-liberal law that deepens religious coercion," Ohana said.

In fact, the ministerial committee decided that the bill cannot move forward until a committee led by PMO Director-General Eli Groner, which is examining the issue of businesses opening on Shabbat, submits its conclusions.
Europe, perhaps in an unprecedented manner, took off the veil of political correctness this week. It happened following a series of mass rioting in three cities in Germany, which were accompanied by robbery, harassment, sexual harassment, and at least one incident of rape. For the first time, the leading media outlets, including the flagbearers of political correctness  the BBC and the Guardian  reported that the rioters were Arab. There is still a debate on whether these were second generation Arabs residents, or refugees who arrived over the past year. It is clear, however, that some of the rioters were carrying documents of asylum seekers.

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Most of the Muslims were, and remain, distant from any violent, criminal or jihadist activity, and yet there is still a problem. A serious problem. It didn't start with the mass rioting near the cathedral at the city of Cologne, which suffered the brunt of the violence. In 2011, the commander of the German Police, Bernhard Witthaut, described police "no-go zones" in the country. "In these areas, crimes no longer result in charges. They are left to themselves. Only in the worst cases do we in the police learn anything about it. The power of the state is completely out of the picture." When it turned out that parts of the city of Duisburg, not far from Cologne, are police "no-go zones, local officials stressed that "anyone who tries anything, is immediately branded as a radical right-winger."

Protesters rally against sexual harassment and rape in the German city of Cologne this week (Photo: Reuters)

Extremist political correctness

Recent events have increased concerns that the radical right is growing stronger. These concerns are justified. Racism has never solved any problems, it just created them. The thing is that political correctness, in its extreme version, has turned into the radical right-wing's biggest promoter. Cologne Mayor Henriette Reker, for example, is still a prisoner of the extreme version of political correctness. She told the women of her city that they were not adopting an appropriate "code of conduct," which must be driving youth of a certain ethnicity wild. They're to blame. Not the men. Reker's comments didn't weaken the radical right-wing. They only served to strengthen it.

It happened on the other side of the ocean as well. More and more commentators in the United States explain Donald Trump's meteoric rise as a counter-reaction to the political correctness "thought police." According to a recently conducted survey, 68 percent of Americans define political correctness as a serious problem, so the support Trump is enjoying is seen as a sort of rebellion against the political correctness police. The thing is that Trump is on the other side of the spectrum. When his leading strategy is "I say what you are thinking," he unleashes dark demons. This is the motto of all racists. This was Meir Kahane's motto. A sane person is supposed to know how to restrain himself every now and again. There's no need to spew out every prejudice. Trump and Kahanists are both ridding themselves of the yoke of restraint. Political correctness extremists, meanwhile, are not restraining themselves. They're lying to themselves. They refuse to look at reality as it is. Blindness strengthens the radical right. A correct outlook on reality could make a difference. A racist outlook will only make things worse.

Donald Trump calls for a halt in all Muslim immigration (Photo: AFP)

Arabs seeking to integrate

Israel is also dealing with problems in the same department. Since the murders on Dizengoff Street, questions keep arising about the Arab sector. The murders happened only days after the most right-wing government Israel has ever had approved the most significant plan yet for the Arab minority: An investment of NIS 15 billion in the sector. Over the past two decades, the relationship between the majority and the minority has been plagued with regular recurrences of crises. The leadership is becoming more and more radical, it's crossing red lines.

The Arab public, however, is showing a little more maturity than the leadership. The most serious survey about the Arab sector's positions is the multi-annual poll conducted by Prof. Sami Samocha. According to the 2015 findings, 56.4 percent of Arabs recognize Israel's right to exist, and 42.7 percent recognize its right to exist as a state that safeguards its Jewish majority. Some of the findings are worrisome, while others are encouraging. Samocha states that there hasn't been an increase in radicalization since 2013.

Outside the world of surveys, there is a consistent rise in the number of Arabs volunteering for national service. In 2011, there were 1,459 volunteers, while in 2015, 4,540 volunteers. This is a significant jump, particularly in light of the leadership's efforts to prevent them from volunteering. This change points to an ever-increasing desire to integrate. And it's working. The rate of employment among Arab women aged 20-29 is between 26 and 30 percent. But among Arab women who volunteered for national service, the rate of employment jumps to between 70 and 90 percent. Those who claim national service for Arabs does not improve the situation should take note of these numbers.

Different circumstances

The circumstances in Europe are different from those in Israel. Over there, they don't have the issue of the conflict, which is like a cloud hovering over the relationship between the majority and the minority; over there, there is no occupation; and over there, the Arabs are immigrants, some new and some second- and third-generation  while in Israel, the Arabs are a native population. And despite the differences, the problems in Europe, even in countries that excel in hospitality, are far graver.

Over the last year, the problem of terrorism has worsened, and it appears the threat in Paris, Munich and Brussels is far more serious than in Tel Aviv. So are the tensions between the populations. Most among the veteran populations of Britain, France and Germany are afraid of the foreigners, and in many countries in Europe there are no-go zones, which he that keepeth his soul holdeth himself far from them. There are no such zones in Israel. So please, let us not use the word "occupation" as an excuse for everything that is going on here. This is mostly self-deception of political correctness's making.

Sweden closes its borders

Two weeks ago I attended a lecture by Prof. Shlomo Avineri. He claims that everything Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said months ago, Europe is doing today. This week, Avineri got further proof of how right he is. Sweden, and no other, passed a decision to introduce border control. The party is over. There will be no more refugees, or not-refugees, coming in non-stop. The resund Bridge, which connects Sweden and Denmark, will no longer be an open border. Six months ago, Orban was portrayed as the dark side of Europe. Now, Sweden is following in his footsteps.

"We're willing to do more than anyone else," said Swedish Migration Minister Morgan Johansson. "But even we have our limits." European media calls this move a "dramatic change." One of the reasons for that is the connection between immigration and the threat of terror attacks. No one knows just how many of the 1 million plus immigrants who came to Europe during 2015 have any ties to terror organizations. In some places, there are estimates the number stands at about two percent.

Relative to the size of the population, Sweden took in more immigrants than any other European country: 163,000 into a population of some 9.5 million, compared to Germany, which took in 1 million into a population of 81 million; Denmark - 18,505 into a population of 5.3 million; Norway - 30,101 into a population of 5 million; and Finland - 30,625 into a population of 5.4 million. Except that Sweden has reached, according to its government, its very limits. And so, drastic measures like closing the borders, which began mostly in Hungary, have reached Sweden as well.

There's no need to mock Sweden. There is no hypocrisy here. There's no double standard. There's a collision between a humane attitude that must not be dismissed and concerns of the country being overrun, terrorism, and that those who are not refugees would take advantage of Sweden's hospitality.

Despite the different historical and regional circumstances, Europe is starting to deal with the same problems that plagued Israel over the past decade. Europe's preaching is being put to the test. Or, to be more accurate, failing that test.
The death of terrorist Nashat Melhem depended solely on if and when he made a fatal mistake. Even a careful and meticulous terrorist, who made sure to think of his attack and escape in very specific detail, has a high chance of making a mistake that would expose his location: Contact with an associate giving him assistance, switching hiding spots, a mobile phone call, and more. Nashat Melhem seems to have done all of these, albeit not all at once.

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Melhem was found, among other reasons, because he apparently took with him the cell phone stolen from taxi driver Amin Shaban, whom Melhem murdered after the attack on Dizengoff Street. The police were told to capture him alive, and Commissioner Roni Alsheikh was in the command center, paying close attention.

Melhem. Killed in a police raid



Melhem fled to the Wadi Ara town of Arara, where his family has lived for generations, and where all of his acquaintances reside. This fact shows that Melhem probably did not work for ISIS or some other terror organization. He did, however, seem to have been assisted by people from the town, as well as people outside it, who had the desire and ability to help him hide away.

It's important to note that the towns of the Triangle area along the Wadi Ara road are a hotbed and support center for the Islamic Movement in Israel. It's very likely that Nashat Melhem received aid from people he knew, and that he hoped to use their help in fleeing to the Palestinian territories. From there he likely hoped to escape to Jordan, and then Turkey or Syria.

Security forces in Melhem's home town of Arara (Photo: Hassan Shaalan)

Melhem cleverly avoided switching hiding spots too many times. Each one of these switches could expose someone who's on the run.

All the while, security forces were working on two fronts: They had a heavy presence in areas which they concluded Melhem might be in, according to different pieces of intelligence, and meanwhile arrested and intensively interrogated members of his family. The result was that he was forced in the end to make the mistake that led to Israeli authorities locating him, and ultimately to his death.

Nashat Melhem (right) and his father (Photo: Hassan Shaalan)

Nashat Melhem was, no doubt, a cold-blooded man who planned his actions and was aware of what might lead security forces to him. However, it's clear that he was driven by personal impulses and anger, which grew and accumulated in his mind. Now what's left is to find out whether or not he was in contact with organization from within Israel or abroad, and whether he was aided by others in planning and perpetrating the attack, and not just during his escape.

The silver lining in this dark cloud was the reaction by Israeli Arabs, specifically Wadi Ara residents, who condemned the attack. These condemnations are, without a doubt, quite extraordinary, since the come during a wave of lone wolf terror attacks that Nashat Melhem seems to have been a part of.

We must also mention that there are details to this story, specifically details pertaining to Nashat Melhem's father and the gun that he had in his possession, which still require examination.
An attempted stabbing attack was foiled early Saturday morning when IDF soldiers shot and killed two Palestinians who tried to attack them with knives at the Beqaot checkpoint in the northern West Bank.

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The two soldiers, part of the new "Lions of Jordan" co-ed battalion, were at the Nablus-area checkpoint as part of routine security operations.

The scene of an attempted stabbing attack in the Nablus area of the West Bank

The two attackers arrived at the checkpoint by car from the Palestinian side, got out of the vehicle and tried to stab the two soldiers going past them. The soldiers identified the Palestinians' intention to attack them, kept their distance and shot them, killing them. No soldiers were wounded in the incident.

The pair were named as Mohammed Abu Marim, 23, from near Jenin; and Said Abu al-Wafa, 38, from Zawiyah near Salfit.

The Lions of Jordan battalion, which was established last year, is now regularly stationed in the Jordan Valley. This is the first attempted attack against the battalion's soldiers.

Beqoat checkpoint, shortly after an attempted stabbing attack

A few months ago, soldiers from the battalion arrested a would-be attacker in the same area after she was found to have a knife in her possession.

The last attempted attack against IDF soldiers took place on Thursday at the Beit Einun junction in in Gush Etzion, when three attackers tried to stab troops who had arrived to search them. The three were shot and killed, and no soldiers were wounded in the incident.
Massive police forces spent the last week going from door to door in Ramat Aviv in search for Nashat Melhem, who was suspected of killing two in a shooting at a Tel Aviv pub and murdering a taxi driver shortly afterwards.

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At the same time, some estimated that Melhem had fled to an area under Palestinian Authority control.

From left-to-right: the body of Nashat Melhem after he was shot dead by security forces; the area in which Melhem was hiding; and the trail down which he fled after apparently being tipped off that the police were on their way

But at 4.20pm on Friday, the speculation was brought to an end when Israeli special police forces (Yamam) and Shin Bet operatives found him in the al-Daharat neighborhood of Arara in the north, not far from where he grew up. Melhem was shot dead by police in between the houses of his relatives.

"We didn't sense that he was hiding in the neighborhood throughout the search," one of Melhem's relatives told Ynet. "The whole time we thought that he had gone to the Palestinian Authority.

"Before the attack in Tel Aviv Nashat visited many family members in the al-Daharat neighborhood," the relative added. "Everyone who lives there knew him. I don't get how they didn't find him in all this time, despite the fact that he was not far from where he lived."

A week-long search was conducted in the area in which Melhem was hiding. Family members were filmed, interviewed and talked about him. When security forces arrived on Friday to apprehend him he fled along a trail in the neighborhood and came out next to the house of Abdallah Younis, a resident of the town.

From there Melhem shot at the security forces using a Falcon sub-machine gun that was in his possession, which he had stolen from his father and had used to carry out the murders in Tel Aviv.

Special police forces in Arara, where Nashat Melhem was hiding (Photo: Hassan Shaalan)

The special police forces returned fire, killing Melhem. No members of the security forces were wounded.

Melhem is dead, but a number of questions remain unanswered, the most central of which are whether he received assistance and whether he was acting on behalf of the Islamic State group.

Police Commissioner Roni Alsheikh, responding to Melhem's death, said: "Our task is not yet complete. The Israel Police and the Shin Bet will continue working decisively and methodically in order to reveal everyone who was involved and bring them to justice."

The Shin Bet's estimate that Melhem was hiding in Arara began to firm up on Wednesday, one day after Commissioner Alsheikh announced to the Israeli public that "the level of tension in Tel Aviv can be reduced."

Intelligence operatives and Shin Bet investigators signposted several buildings Arara as possible hideouts, after analyzing testimony provided by one of Melhem's acquaintances who was arrested and interrogated in the last few days on suspicion that he had aided the suspect.

On Thursday, one day prior to Melhem's death, several additional suspects were arrested in the area. Surveillance technology was also deployed to try and locate Melhem.

Signs of gunfire following a firefight between Nashat Melhem and security forces, ending with Melhem's death (Photo: Hassan Shaalan)

On Friday morning, an intelligence analysis was received that focused the search onto a specific target. Before raiding the building, which seems to have been empty before Melhem went to hide there, large numbers of IDF and police forces closed off the neighborhood.

Security personnel went from house to house and marked the buildings that they had passed. Melhem was apparently tipped off that security forces were on their way and started to run while shooting, at which point he was shot and killed by the return fire from police.

Commissioner Alsheikh directly supervised the operation in cooperation with Shin Bet personnel, and oversaw the activity from a nearby command post.

Melhem's relatives were not surprised by how the manhunt ended. "We called on him a thousand times to hand himself in to the police," said a family member. "It's a pity that it ended with him being shot to death. We're not surprised, we expected it the entire time."

Security forces blocking off a street in Arara while searching for Nashat Melhem (Photo: Mohammed Abu Gosh)

The families of Melhem's victims expressed their relief at his demise. "It's our only consolation," said Dudu Bakal, father of Alon, whom Melhem murdered at the Simta bar on Dizengoff Street. "I had no doubt that they would find him."

Razi Shaban, brother of Amin, the taxi driver killed by Melhem shortly after the shooting, said: "It's good that the security forces got to him."

"I'm happy for my sister that she doesn't have to see the face of this horrible terrorist in court and behind bars, because that would have been intolerable for us," said Mor Peretz, the aunt of Shimon Ruimi, who was also killed by Melhem at the Simta bar.

"It was the one thing that was necessary for us, that they would kill him  an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth."
Yemen's government has reversed a decision to expel a UN human rights envoy after an appeal from U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, a senior official said on Saturday.

The foreign ministry had declared the representative of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, George Abu al-Zulof, persona non grata on Thursday over what it called unfair statements.

"The government has reversed its decision to declare the representative a persona non grata in response to the request of the UN Secretary General," the source, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the issue, told Reuters.

He gave no further details and there was no immediate announcement by President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi's government. or by the United Nations.
Three ultra-Orthodox Jews were attacked in London by a group of anti-Semites on Wednesday evening, who threw gas cylinders at them and shouted "Hitler is on the way." The attackers fled, and no one was hurt in the incident.

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The attack took place while the three  two men and a woman  were shopping in Tottenham. Three men in a pick-up truck overtook the group, who were walking from one shop to another, and threw the objects at them. They also shouted "Heil Hitler," according to UK media outlets.

The gas cylinders thrown by the attackers (Photo: Shomrim)

The police have opened an investigation into the incident and are calling on anyone with information to contact them. Jewish organizations in London have said that this is one attack out of many.

The victims of the attack called volunteers from Shomrim, a Jewish neighborhood watch organization, to help them. One of the volunteers, Michael Blayer, said: "This behavior is appalling, the victims were innocent shoppers at the Tottenham Hale Retail Park, and they were targeted because they were visibly Jewish.

"The verbal abuse was disgusting, and small objects were thrown towards the victims, making them fear for their immediate safety," Blayer added.

Illustrative photo of Shomrim volunteers in London (Photo: AFP)

Jonathan Sacerdoti, from Campaign Against Anti-Semitism, added: "Obviously there are negative connotations conjured up related to gas.

"I have no way to know why they chose these projectiles, (but) the attackers did refer to the Holocaust, Sacerdoti continued.

This disturbing incident is a reminder of the abuse that many Jewish people experience all too often," Sacerdoti added.

It is vital that victims report all anti-Semitic attacks or incidents whenever they happen, and that the police take every report seriously, investigating and charging those responsible wherever possible, he said.
A day after the week-long manhunt for Nashat Melhem ended with his death in Arara, details began to emerge about where he hid during that time and who may have helped him.

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Alongside the operation to catch Melhem, who murdered three people in Tel Aviv, security forces also arrested several area residents on Friday who they suspected of helping him to evade capture.

Residents and family members on Saturday morning declined to go into detail, but individuals in the al-Daharat neighborhood  where Melhem had been hiding  and police officials know that he received assistance, especially from family members, since he arrived in Wadi Ara on the day of the attack.

From right-to-left: Nashat Melhem's body after he was shot by security forces; the area Melhem hid in; and the trail he fled down after apparently being tipped off that the police were on their way

"He slept in a different place each night. They brought him food and looked after him," a source said.

"Nashat grew up in the al-Daharat neighborhood and had good relations with everyone who lives there," said a resident. "Many people knew that he was here, but it was difficult for them to snitch and inform the police.

"His family members also didn't want to be responsible for his arrest and preferred to protect him until the last moment," the resident added.

Police officials admit that continuing to search for Melhem in Tel Aviv even after it became clear that he had fled north was a mistake.

"It was clear that he was in (the north), but we waited until we knew exactly where," an official said. "According to our estimate he got to Arara with the aid of one of the residents."

The police are currently holding Melhem's body, and a small mourning tent has been set up at the family's home. A relative said: "This incident has harmed the Arab population politically. There are people who will make this into a nationalistic incident, but that wasn't the case."

One of Nashat Melhem's hiding places in Arara (Photo: Ido Erez)

The family has decided to hold a small funeral. "After an eight-day, 24-hour-a-day saga, the family is exhausted. I also ask that the Arab population understand that this is a limited affair," the relative added.

Details regarding one of Melhem's hideouts in Arara, located 400 meters from where he was eventually shot dead, also emerged on Saturday morning.

One of Nashat Melhem's hiding places in Arara

Melhem left behind him plates, cigarette butts and clothes strewn across the floor.

One of Nashat Melhem's hiding places in Arara

A used plate and cigarette butts in one of Nashat Melhem's hiding places in Arara (Photo: Ido Erez)

Elsewhere on Saturday, Melhem was praised as a hero in the Gaza Strip, with his picture being displayed at a Hamas demonstration mourning his death. A family from Khan Younis even named their son, who was born on Friday, after Nashat Melhem.

A Hamas demonstration in Gaza mourning the death of Nashat Melhem (Photo: AFP)

Hamas had publicly praised Melhem on Friday, as they have done other terrorists who have been killed during the current wave of terror.
HURGHADA - A local Islamic State affiliate in Egypt has claimed responsibility for an attack that killed two policemen in the country's Giza province on Saturday.

Gunmen killed two policemen while they were on their way to work. However, the ISIS group claims it killed more than two officers, but did not give an exact number.

The Associated Press could not independently verify the online claim, but it bore the design and logo of the group's previous statements. It was circulated by the group's sympathizers on social media.
DUBAI - The US Navy has released video footage showing what it has described as a "provocative" rocket launch by Iran near warships and commercial traffic in the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

The US Navy released the footage Saturday of the Dec. 26 encounter with Iranian Revolutionary Guard vessels. The footage clearly shows them firing rockets near a commercial vessel.

The Navy has said the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier, the USS Bulkeley destroyer and a French frigate were nearby at the time.
CAIRO- Egypt's Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou said on Saturday that the government will announce additional security measures to safeguard tourists after an attack in the Red Sea resort of Hurgada left three injured on Friday.

"The welfare of the tourists visiting Egypt is of the greatest importance to us and will continue to be so. No stone will be left unturned to ensure their security," Zaazou said.

"Over the coming days we will announce even greater security measures to safeguard all tourists visiting Egypt," he said.

Islamic State said on Friday it had carried out an attack on Israeli tourists in Cairo on Thursday, in response to a call by the group's leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, to target Jews "everywhere".

Security sources said those tourists were Israeli Arabs.
Hamas is determined to build up terror infrastructure in the West Bank to carry out attacks and suicide bombings in Israel, as clearly indicated by the breakup of two major cells over the past month.

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Six indictments were filed Thursday by the Jerusalem District Attorney against six members of a Hamas cell planning on kidnapping and murdering an Israeli, in a similar fashion to the kidnapping and murder of Israeli youths Gilad Shaer, Naftali Frenkel and Eyal Yifrach in June 2014. The cell had intended to negotiate with Israel in order to free prisoners in exchange for the body.

The two leaders of the cell, Amar Rajabi and Ziad Abu Hadoan, are indeed residents of Jerusalem's Old City with blue (Israeli) ID cards, but their intention was to act as a full-fledged Hamas terror cell and in order to try and release Hamas prisoners in Israeli prisons

Three members of the Hamas terror cell planning to kidnap and murder an Israeli (Photo: Shin Bet)

This cell's uncovering must be linked to that of the discovery two week ago of a broad Hamas terrorist infrastructure operating in the area of Abu Dis near Jerusalem.

The joint Shin Bet, IDF and police operation led to the arrest of 25 Palestinians so far, mostly students from the University of Abu Dis. The Shin Bet investigation revealed that the cell was headed by Ahmed Gamal Moussa Azzam, 24, from Qalqilya, who was recruited by Hamas in the Gaza Strip a few months ago in order to establish a military infrastructure to carry out deadly attacks against Israeli targets.

Ahmed Azzam was in constant contact with his handlers in the Gaza Strip and was trained by them to serve as an explosives expert to manufacture suicide belts and bombs. As per his handlers instructions, Azzam recruited several other terrorists studying with him at Abu Dis University, to help him purchase materials to manufacture explosives, rent apartments, recruit suicide bombers and get them into Israel.

The clear message from both of these discoveries is that Hamas is trying to establish itself in the West Bank. Its activity there has three dimensions: training local cells consisting of Hamas militants working in their native areas without external guidance; establishing Hamas cells guided and funded by the Gaza Strip's "West Bank Division" to carry out major attacks within Israel, in an effort to provoke a major military operation along the lines of Operation Defensive Shield, as well as the collapse of the Palestinian Authority. All of this without endangering Hamas's control of the Gaza Strip; and activating operatives based mainly in Qatar and Turkey who provide guidance and funding to rehabilitate Hamas in the West Bank.

Over the past year, the Shin Bet has focused its activity on those very cells which pose the greatest threat to Israel, and as a result, in 2015, dozens of local Hamas cells were broken up, and widescale infrastructure guided from abroad were exposed.

But the discovery of the aforementioned two cells proves how highly motivated Hamas is to carry out kidnappings for the purposes of negotiation and suicide attacks within Israel. Meanwhile, Shin Bet's intelligence and operational efforts in most cases put the security forces a step ahead of the terrorists and manages to foil their plans in advance.
Questions remained on Saturday regarding how terrorist Nashat Melhem, who murdered three Israelis in Tel Aviv, was able to evade capture for a whole week.

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A day after Melhem was shot dead by security forces that came to arrest him at his hiding place in Arara, Shin Bet investigators were interrogating at least three of the terrorist's acquaintances, who are suspected of helping him.

They are suspected of aiding and abetting Melhem, conspiring to commit a crime, and being part of an unlawful organization.





Suspect in aiding Melhem arrested.

The Shin Bet and police believe that without help, Melhem would not have been able to hide for a whole week while a manhunt was underway for him.



"He received full assistance, particularly from his relatives, ever since he arrived in Wadi Ara on Friday (the day of the attack). Every day he slept at a different place. They brought him food and worked to protect him," a police official said.

The Haifa Magistrate's Court held a hearing on Saturday night for five suspects in aiding Melhem.

One of the suspects, a business owner in the area, was the one who reported Nashat's hiding place to the police, but was arrested on suspicion he helped the terrorist. His remand was extended by three days.

Attorney Jamil Khatib, who represents two of the suspects, denied the allegations against his clients. "At a later stage we'll know the reasons that led to their arrest. They actually wanted to help, but unfortunately everyone that helps these days will get burned."

"There might have been tarrying in reporting (Melhem's sighting), which wasn't done in real time," the lawyer continued. "But you have to understand the problematic nature of this, in light of the sensitivity of the situation and the fact Nashat Melhem could have recognized whoever saw him, this would've put their lives at risk."

Suspect in aiding Melhem at court (Photo: Hassan Shaalan)

Another suspect told the court that "Someone came up to me, probably the terrorist. But I didn't recognize him, I didn't know it was Nashat. Police asked me why I didn't report him, and I said I didn't even know it was him." His remand was also extended by three days.

A third suspect told the court that "Someone called me and told me he saw Nashat. I didn't believe him, I thought he was lying and I didn't inform the police." His remand was also extended by three days.

Melhem murdered Alon Bakal and Shimon Ruimi at a bar in Tel Aviv last week. Later, while he was on the run, he murdered taxi driver Amin Shaban in northern Tel Aviv. Police and the Shin Bet were looking into suspicions he was influenced by ISIS, and whether he acted out of his own volition or was part of an organized terror cell.

Nashat Melhem

On the same day of the murders, Melhem fled north to his home town of Arara, while special forces were searching for him all over northern Tel Aviv.

DNA on a cigarette butt

The Shin Bet's assessment that Melhem was hiding in Arara increased on Wednesday, one day after Police Commissioner Roni Alsheikh announced to the Israeli public that "the level of tension in Tel Aviv can be reduced."

Suspecting he might have gone home to hide, investigators put pressure on Melhem's relatives and acquaintances in an effort to find where he was hiding. Security forces also put a surveillance detail on several people they suspected might be in contact with the terrorist, including his family members.

Intelligence and Shin Bet forces signposted several buildings in Arara as possible hideouts, based on testimony provided by one of Melhem's acquaintances. They searched the area in which Nashat grew up and the places he recently spent time at, looking for forensic clues, aided by sniffer dogs and methods of criminal identification.

The breakthrough in the investigation came from a cigarette butt containing his DNA that was found by Shin Bet investigators in Arara, showing he was in the area.

Cigarette butt found with Melhem's DNA led security forces to him.

This led security forces to set up roadblocks and checkpoints all over the area and deploy large numbers of troops in an effort to prevent him from leaving the area and crossing into the West Bank.

Investigators received information that pointed to Melhem being in Arara as early as Thursday morning, but it appears that in an effort to capture his accessories, the decision was made to keep monitoring him for afar.

On Friday morning several intelligence reports from different sources led to the conclusion that Melhem was hiding in one of the buildings in his childhood neighborhood.

Before raiding the building, which seems to have been empty before Melhem went to hide there, large numbers of IDF and police forces closed off the neighborhood.

Security personnel went from house to house and marked the buildings that they had passed. Melhem was apparently tipped off that security forces were on their way, left the building and tried to escape. When he realized he was cornered, he opened fire at the security forces using a Falcon sub-machine gun that was in his possession, which he had stolen from his father and had used to carry out the murders in Tel Aviv. The troops returned fire and killed him.
France on Saturday paid hommage to four Jewish hostages murdered at the Hyper Cacher kosher supermarket in Paris a year after a spate of jihadist attacks that began with a deadly assault on the Charlie Hebdo weekly

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The terrorist, Amedy Coulibaly, who pledged allegiance to Islamic State, murdered Yohan Cohen, 22, and Yoav Hattab, 21, Philippe Braham, 45, and Francois-Michel Saada, 64, before being killed in a police raid.

Tributes were also paid to Clarissa Jean-Philippe, 26, a young policewoman who was also murdered by the gunman who went on to carry out the supermarket siege, with President Francois Hollande unveiling a plaque in her honour in the Paris suburb of Montrouge where she died.

A total of 17 people were murdered in the January 2015 attacks which rocked France and touched off a wave of Islamist violence that reached a head in November when a group of gunmen and suicide bombers unleashed mayhem in Paris, killing 130

A gathering to remember the victims was held outside the supermarket after sundown on Saturday organized by the Jewish umbrella group CRIF.

"Despite continuing traumatic feelings, life has returned to normal with a renewed sense of fraternity," said Haim Korsia, France's grand rabbi.

Outside the Hyper Cacher supermarket following the attack (Photo: AFP)

Also this weekend, mosques around the country are opening their doors to visitors in a move to "highlight the real values of Islam, to set straight the cliches about links to violence and terrorism," Anouar Kbibech, head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith, told AFP.

Commemorations will culminate in a public event on Sunday in the Place de la Republique, the vast square that became the rallying point for "Je Suis Charlie" solidarity movement, and for similar movements after the deadly November 13 attacks.

There, a 10-metre (35-foot) oak will be planted as a "tree of remembrance".

Veteran French rocker Johnny Hallyday will perform "Un Dimanche de Janvier" (One January Sunday), a song recalling the vast mobilisation that saw 1.6 million people march in Paris on January 11, 2015.
Eighty-three new medications and medical technologies were added to Israel's "health basket" on Thursday, benfitting 108,500 patients at the cost of NIS 300 million.

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However, 350,000 patients won't get the vital medications they need - out of the 122 drugs defined as "extremely vital" by the Health Basket Committee, at the cost of over NIS 1 billion, only 67 were included (the rest were ranked lower in importance and were only included because they did not require additional funds).

The "health basket" is the list of medical services and medications given to Israeli citizens by the HMOs that are funded by the state.

Illustration (Photo: Shutterstock)

The Health Basket Committee was headed by Prof. Rafael Beyar, the director of the Rambam Medical Center in Haifa, and includes representatives from the Health Ministry led by Dr. Osnat Luxenburg, the director of Medical Technology and Infrastructure Administration, and representatives from the Finance Ministry and the HMOs, elected representatives and representatives of Israel's doctors associations.

Some 700 medications, vaccines and medical technologies were proposed for the health basket at the cost of NIS 2 billion, but with a limited budget, many were not included.

"NIS 300 million is not enough, but I have no complaints towards the Finance Ministry, I understand the limitations," said Health Minister Yaakov Litzman.

A third of the budget, almost NIS 108 million, was allocated to 16 cancer drugs. Among the medications approved are ones to treat Myeloma (bone marrow cancer), leukemia, metastatic pancreatic cancer, kidney cancer, prostate cancer for patients at an advanced stage of the disease, endocrine treatments for patients at an advanced stage of breast cancer, ovarian cancer, lung cancer, and more.

The Keytruda drug which "makes lung cancer tumors disappear," was not included in the health basket.

In the field of genetics, the committee approved DNA tests to discover genetic diseases among Jews of Moroccan heritage as well as a number of common illnesses among the Arab and Druze populations.

Umbilical cord blood banking for families in which a first-degree relative has blood cancer or other blood diseases was also approved.

The scope of drugs used to treat Hepatitis C, which affects the liver, was also expanded. Last year, the committee surprised many when it dedicated a third of the health basket's budget to hepatitis genotype 1 patients who are in stage 3 or 4 of scarring, at the cost of NIS 99 million. This year, the committee expanded the treatment to additional drugs used to treat patients infected with Hepatitis C genotype 1, as well as those infected with genotypes 2, 3 and 4, at stage 3 or 4 of scarring, all at the cost of NIS 54 million.

Almost NIS 7 million was allocated to drugs for diabetes patients. Among the drugs included are Tregludec for treating Type 1 diabetes (juvenile diabetes). This is the first time in a decade a treatment for Type 1 diabetes patients is added to the health basket.

In addition, the drug Actos was approved for second or third line treatment of type 2 diabetes, after the use of another drug was unsuccessful.

Committee members were divided on whether to include the drug Tagrisso, for treating non-small-cell lung carcinoma with a certain mutation, given to patients for whom another treatment was unsuccessful. The committee was wary of the high cost of including the drug - NIS 17.8 million a year. It eventually decided to include the drug mostly out of concern the medication's price would significant rise next year.

Among the medical technologies added to the health basket is Ella - an emergency contraceptive to prevent pregnancy for victims of sexual assaults.

The committee also approved Attent, a treatment for children with ADHD who did not respond to other treatments like Ritalin and Concerta. The cost of the drug is over NIS 10 million.

In the field of dentistry, the committee approved orthodontic treatment to those suffering from a birth defect, at the cost of NIS 5.3 million.

The committee also approved medical food for ALS patients, children until the age of four suffering from kidney failure and children aged 4-19 who are suffering from chronic, metabolic and neurologic illnesses, at the cost of NIS 12 million.

Duodopa, a treatment for patients suffering from advanced stages of Parkinson, was not approved. This is the fourth year the treatment is proposed to the committee and rejected, due to its high cost - NIS 197,244 per patient, for 110 patients, totaling at an overall budget of NIS 24 million.
AFRC Community Spotlight

The British historian, Arnold J. Toynbee said, The supreme accomplishment is to blur the line between work and play.



To accomplish this, one must see their work community as a family. At Headquarters Air Force Reserve Command, this family of co-workers is our community from day-to-day. Each individual in the community plays a critical role in accomplishing the Air Force Reserve mission.



The mission of the headquarters is to ensure its three numbered air forces, one space wing, 33 flying wings, 12 flying groups and other subordinate units are prepared to accomplish their total force missions.



Each individual at the headquarters contributes to the mission and is crucial to the commands success, said Lt. Gen. James Jackson, Air Force Reserve Command commander. I want everyone to know that you may not run AFRC, but you make it run.



Our community, like other major commands, is made up of multiple directorates, but what makes AFRC different is its ability to support every aspect of the Air Force mission. No other command, like the Air Combat Command or Air Force Global Strike Command, provide the depth or breadth of capabilities to combatant commanders.



AFRC also provides specialized capabilities to the Air Force and civil authorities such as hurricane hunters, mobile aerial firefighting systems and fixed-wing aerial spray units.



In Feb. 17, 1997, AFRC became the ninth major command in the Air Force. There are approximately 1,250 people working for Headquarters AFRC.



People at the headquarters support the mission to provide combat ready forces, and I think we do it better than anyone else, said Jackson.



The staff at headquarters AFRC incorporates a mix of regular Air Force members, Air Force Reservists serving in different duty statues, civil service and contract employees to perform the mission.



They provide the headquarters with active duty Air Force expertise, reservist perspective and civilian continuity.



As the backbone of our community, our people take care of individual Reservists and their families located throughout the world.



As a family, we should be there for each other; take care of one another, thats our goal here at the headquarters, Chief Master Sgt. Cameron Kirksey, HQ AFRC command chief.



The intent of this article, and the series of articles to follow, is to help you get to know your family here at the headquarters.



We also want to recognize the people of HQ AFRC because their work is appreciated and important - without it, AFRC would not run.



Just like a balloon rising high into the sky, its not the color or the shape that makes it rise, but its whats inside that makes it rise, said Kirksey. The individual efforts and collective roles of our people, our community is what makes AFRC rise to the occasion.



Throughout the year, directorates at HQ AFRC will be highlighted. We will share with each of you what your work family members do, and why it is important to the Air Force Reserve, the Air Force and our nation.



As a community, we should know our people, said Jackson. This will allow everyone to get to know who does what at the command, and with this knowledge we can work more efficiently and effectively.


"We should always remember that the danger to societies from security services is not that they will spontaneously decide to embrace [Stasi style] mustache twirling and jackboots to bear us bodily into dark places, but that the slowly shifting foundation of policy will make it such that mustaches and jackboots are discovered to prove an operational advantage toward a necessary purpose. ~ Edward Snowden





"America: just a nation of two hundred million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns and no qualms about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable." ~ Hunter S. Thompson



"Let me issue and control a nation's money and I care not who writes the laws." ~ Mayer Rothschild



"News is what somebody does not want you to print. All the rest is advertising." ~ LACUNA



"What matters in journalism isn't politics, which are as universal and inescapable as breathing. What matters -- along with a fundamentally adversarial attitude toward government, without which "journalism" is simply public relations -- is integrity, transparency, evidence, coherence, and principle. These are the principles on which we should evaluate the quality of journalism, and their absence is why some journalists are so desperate to get you to focus on something else." ~ Barry Eisler



"There is no inverse relationship between freedom and security. Less of one does not lead to more of the other. People with no rights are not safe from terrorist attack." ~ Molly Ivins



"The brain of our species is, as we know, made up largely of potassium, phosphorus, propaganda, and politics, with the result that how not to understand what should be clearer is becoming easier and easier for all of us." ~ James Thurber



"The highest patriotism is not a blind acceptance of official policy, but a love of one's country deep enough to call her to a higher plane....When you hold up your arm and swear to uphold the Constitution, you dont say, 'Except in wartime.'" -- George McGovern



"Ill believe that corporations are people when Texas executes one." ~ Bill Moyers






Darbhanga: Sister of dreaded gangster Santosh Jha and her husband were arrested on Saturday from outside Laheriasarai station in connection with gunning down of two engineers of a private road construction company here in the last week of December, police said.

Acting on a tip-off, a police team headed by Deputy Superintendent of Police Anjani Kumar Singh today arrested Munni Devi, who is head of Baheri block and sister of jailed gangster Santosh Jha and her husband Sanjay Laldeo.

The two were absconding and police had attached their property, Singh told PTI.

Santosh Jha, a history sheeter, presently lodged at Gaya jail is alleged to be behind the day-light killing of the two engineers on December 26 for extortion.

Two engineers of the private road construction company -- Brajesh Kumar and Mukesh Kumar -- were shot dead by unidentified assailants on Darbhanga-Kusheshwarsthan state highway in Darbhanga district on December 26.

Non-payment of levy was said to be the motive behind the murder of the two engineers.

The Darbhanga killing had triggered widespread criticism across the country and opposition BJP had raised issue of deteriorating law and order situation in Bihar under Chief Minister Nitish Kumar headed grand secular alliance government.
New Delhi: Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan on Saturday attacked Nitish Kumar government over the murder of an assistant sub-inspector of police in Hajipur, claiming a string of such killings showed that "jungle raj is back" and the Chief Minister is "helpless".

"There are three ministers from Vaishali region in Nitish government including two sons of RJD chief Lalu Prasad of whom one is also Deputy Chief Minister. Still, all this is happening in Vaishali. What will happen to the security of people when the police are not safe in Bihar. Why the Chief Minister is so helpless and silent on all this," Paswan, who is an MP from Hajipur, told PTI.

Paswan will be visiting his constituency tomorrow to take stock of the situation.

Training his guns at the ruling coalition in the state, the LJP chief claimed that this is the third such incident in Hajipur alone.

"He (Nitish) used to take pride in being called Sushashan Babu. After engineers, doctors and traders, now even police men are not safe. There is no government in Bihar. Extortion is being done openly."

"The situation in the state has become worse than what it was in 1990 when RJD ruled the state. When we used to say that jungle raj will be back if Lalu Nitish combine came to power, they used to react strongly. See the jungle raj is back in such a short span of rule," Paswan said.

ASI Ashok Kumar Yadav was shot dead by unidentified assailants and his body was found today in Manua village of Vaishali district. Two engineers of a construction company, Brajesh Kumar and Mukesh Kumar, were gunned in daylight on December 26 in Darbhanga.

Soon after, Ankit Kumar Jha, a Quality Engineer of Reliance IT, was found dead with injury marks on his body in Vaishali district. In another incident, a foodgrain trader was shot dead by unidentified assailants in a locality under Yahiyapur police station in Bihar's Muzaffarpur district.
New Delhi: Noting that St. Stephen's college administration has failed to take corrective measures in a sexual harassment case, the Delhi Commission for Women on Saturday warned its principal Valson Thampu of appropriate action as per law if he fails to reply to its notice within seven days.

The victim, a research scholar, had accused principal Valson Thampu of shielding the perpetrator, when she had reported the matter to him last year.

"The complainant is unable to pursue her research as her guide Mr. Y, accused in the case, has not been changed till date. She has requested for help in completion of her PhD and has sought access to the compounds and research that is not being made available to her by Mr. Y," India Today reported quoting the commission's notice to the principal.

In August last year, the Union HRD Minister Smriti Irani had directed the Delhi University to ensure her stipend was released on time and she was granted unrestricted access to the laboratory besides being assigned a new supervisor.
Hajipur: A bullet-riddled body of an Assistant Sub-Inspector has been found in Vasihali district of Bihar, raising questions over the functioning of state government.

Just days after bodies of two engineers were recovered from Bihar districts, reports of an ASI being shot dead by unknown assailants on Saturday in Hajipur in Vaishali district surfaced.

The locals informed the nearest control room immediately, after which the police reached the spot and took the body in its custody.

After preliminary investigations, it was revealed that the deceased was Bihar ASI Ashok Yadav. Reports say that Yadav, who was shot multiple times, died on the spot. Yadav was on leave since last three days before he was shot dead.

It is being speculated that assailants used Yadav's service revolver to shoot him dead and later took away the revolver with them.

Yadav's body has been sent for post-mortem. Police have registered a case of murder.
New Delhi: The US Secretary of State John Kerry on Saturday spoke to Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and told the former that talks with India should resume despite the recent terror attack at Punjab's Pathankot airbase. Indian intelligence reports says that the groups and people within Pakistan planned and executed the strike.

According to Zee Media, Nawaz Sharif received a phone call from the United States Secretary of State John Kerry who reportedly told PM Nawaz that India-Pakistan negotiations should continue. He also said during his conversation with Sharif that India and Pakistans relations were important for the stability of the region.

A senior State Department official had said, Pakistan should not come out with lame excuses to shield them as has been the case with the Mumbai terrorist attack.

"They (Pakistan) have said publicly that they are going to investigate. They have said publicly that they are not going to discriminate between terrorist groups. We look to see actions to back up those words," the official added.

However, Pak PM's advisor on foreign affairs Sartaj Aziz had earlier today confirmed that the foreign secretaries of Pakistan and India will meet here on January 15.

Kashmir and all other outstanding issues will be on the agenda when Pakistan and India resume their comprehensive bilateral dialogue, Aziz said in the parliament on Friday.

The announcement came after Pakistan launched investigations into the Pathankot airbase attack, The Nation reported.

India had linked the foreign secretary level talks to Pakistan's action against the militants.

Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday chaired a meeting regarding Jaish-e-Muhammad organisation's involvement in the attack and Islamabad's response to New Delhi.

After the Pathankot air base attack, Sharif called Modi assuring him of "prompt and decisive" action against groups or individuals linked to the attack.

Seven security personnel were killed in the attack on the IAF base in Pathankot. Six terrorists, suspected to be from Pakistan, were killed during the gunfight that began on January 2.

Pakistan and India will remain in contact as Islamabad believes it needed solid evidence for a stern action.

Talks between India and Pakistan were in danger of being jeopardised when terrorists attacked an Indian Air Force base in Pathankot, last Saturday. Pathankot lies 25 km from the border with Pakistan. India handed over important leads to Pakistan and Nawaz Sharif had assured India that the attack was being investigated.

Giving a clean chit to the security forces for their handling of the counter-offensive against the terrorist attack on the Pathankot IAF base, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who flew in to Pathankot today, just a week after the attack, said he was satisfied with the "decision-making and its execution".

(With Agency inputs)
New Delhi: The first limited edition of Pravasi Bhartiya Divas, an annual event to mark contribution of the Diaspora to India's development, will be held here on Saturday during which government is likely to pitch for deeper engagement with the community in diverse areas.

The event is being organised for the first time by the External Affairs Ministry (MEA) in the wake of government's decision to merge Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs with it.

Last year, the government had decided to hold larger version of Pravasi Bhartiya Divas (PBD) after every two years and that limited version of the event will be organised in the intervening year.

The 13th edition of the PBD was held in Gujarat last year.

The event today will be addressed by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and her address will be webcast by almost all Indian missions and posts abroad. This will be followed by video conferencing with select Indian Missions.

The government is likely to seek deeper engagement of Indian Diaspora in the country's overall growth and development.

January 9 was chosen as the day for PBD as it was on this day in 1915 that Mahatma Gandhi, the "greatest Pravasi", returned to India from South Africa and led India's freedom struggle.

PBD conventions are being held every year since 2003. During the event, individuals of exceptional merit are honoured with the prestigious Pravasi Bharatiya Samman Award to appreciate their role in India's growth.

The event also provides a forum for discussing key issues concerning the Indian diaspora. The government has directed all Indian Missions to

celebrate the PBD in an appropriate manner.
New Delhi: The Janata Dal-United (JD-U) on Saturday came down heavily on the government over presentation of some papers at Indian Science Congress in Mysuru, saying it smacked of "RSS-backed agenda", which is very "disgusting, ridiculous and dangerous".

"Indian Science Congress is held every year since the year 1914 but we had never seen such a drama-like situation in the Congress as we saw in Mysuru where its main objective to promote the cause of science was missing."

"The RSS-backed agenda was seen at such a place. It is very disgusting, ridiculous and dangerous for the unity and integrity of this country as talking about one religion at such functions is nothing but to provoke sentiments of other religions," party president Sharad Yadav said in a statement.

He noted that it was for the first time that people heard at the Science Congress about Lord Shiva as an environmentalist while someone presented a paper on the medical effects of blowing of conch (Shankh).

Yadav was referring to the 103rd Indian Science Congress that concluded on Thursday in Mysuru, where a paper presented by the Chairman of Madhya Pradesh Private University Regulatory Commission on Lord Shiva hailed him as the greatest environmentalist in the world.

Calling Shiva as Lord of Mount Kailash, the paper talked about his powers of providing purified water to human beings.

A lecture by an additional commissioner of Kanpur talked about about blowing the conch (shankh) to achieve health and wellness.

Yadav felt that such papers should not have been presented and talked about at the event.

This congregation looked like a "circus" as was rightly said by one of the Nobel laureates, who went to the extent of saying that he would never again attend the Indian Science Congress, the JD-U president said.

He also recalled that at last year`s Congress in Mumbai, a session titled "Ancient Sciences through Sanskrit" had dwelt` on aviation technologies. Noting that the session talked about aircrafts which could travel to planets and that speakers also dwelt on how Indians flew planes before the Wright brothers did, Yadav said it was "ridiculous".

At the last year's Science Congress in Mumbai, a session titled "Ancient sciences through Sanskrit" had dwelt on aviation technologies in Maharishi Bharadwaj`s Vaimanika Shastra, attracting ridicule.

"Sensitive conferences like Indian Science Congress which is held every year goes through a rigorous scrutiny like which are the papers being presented and who are presenting the papers and so many other things are intensely verified. But in the context of Mysuru Congress, any scrutiny did not seem to have taken place and it was held with other motives of the current government."

"I oppose this kind of action and the government should come out with a strong statement so that such things are not repeated in future," the JD-U president said.
London: A British website, set up to catalogue the last days of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, has released what it claims are eyewitness accounts of the day he was reportedly killed in a plane crash in Taiwan on August 18, 1945.

The latest set of documents quote several people who were reportedly involved in the matter related to the accident as well as two British intelligence reports that revisited the crash site to establish the facts.

The website also sheds light on what may have been the freedom fighter's dying words, which reflected his devotion to the cause of India's freedom.

"For 70 years, there have been doubts in certain circles whether such a tragedy at all took place. Four separate reports each corroborating the other constitute irresistible evidence to the contrary," says a statement issued by www.bosefiles.info.

The documents say that early in the morning on 18 August 1945, a Japanese Air Force bomber took off from Tourane in Vietnam with Bose and 12 or 13 other passengers and crew.

Also on board was Lt Gen Tsunamasa Shidei of the Japanese Army and the planned flight path was Heito-Taipei-Dairen-Tokyo.

The three-member Netaji Inquiry Committee, instituted by the government of India in 1956 and headed by Major General Shah Nawaz Khan of Bose's Indian National Army (INA), was told that since "the weather was perfect and the engines (of the aircraft) worked smoothly" the pilot decided to overfly Heito and proceed straight to Taipei, arriving there late morning or early afternoon.

Major Taro Kono, a Japanese Air Staff Officer and one of the passengers, told the committee: "I noticed that the engine on the left side of the plane was not functioning properly. I, therefore, went inside the plane and after examining the engine inside, I found it to be working all right."

He added the accompanying engineer "also tested the engine and certified its air-worthiness".

Captain Nakamura alias Yamamoto, the ground engineer in charge of maintenance at the airport, concurred with Major Kono "that the engine of the left side was defective".

He said the pilot told him "it was a brand new engine". He went on to say: "After slowing down the engine, he (the pilot) adjusted it for about five minutes. The engine was tested twice by Major Takizawa (the pilot). After being adjusted, I satisfied myself that the condition of the engine was all right. Major Takizawa also agreed with me that there was nothing wrong with the engine."

However, soon after the aircraft was airborne there was, according to Colonel Habib ur Rahman - Bose's ADC and a co-passenger, a loud explosion.

He described it as "a noise like a cannon shot". Nakamura, who was watching from the ground, said: "Immediately on taking off, the plane tilted to its left side and I saw something fall down from the plane, which I later found was the propeller."

He also maintained that the maximum height gained by the aircraft was 30-40 metres.

He estimated "the plane crashed about 100 metres beyond the concrete runway" and immediately caught fire in the front portion.

Colonel Rahman recounted: "Netaji turned towards me. I said 'Aagey Say Nikaleay, Pichey Say Rasta Nahin Hai'. (Please get out through the front; there is no way in the rear.) "We could not get through the entrance door as it was all blocked and jammed by packages and other things. So Netaji got out through the fire; actually he rushed through the fire. I followed him through the same flames.

"The moment I got out, I saw him about 10 yards ahead of me, standing, looking in the opposite direction to mine towards the west. His clothes were on fire. I rushed and I experienced great difficulty in unfastening his bush-shirt belt. His trousers were not so much on fire and it was not necessary to take them off."

Rahman was in woollen uniform, whereas Bose was in cotton khakis, which, it was assessed, caught fire more easily.

Rahman added: "I laid him down on the ground and noticed a very deep cut on his head, probably on the left side. His face had been scorched by heat and his hair had also caught fire and singed.

"Netaji enquired from me in Hindustani: Aap Ko Ziada To Nahin Lagi?" (Hope you have not been hurt badly). I replied, I feel that I will be all right. About himself he said that he felt that he would not survive."

Bose added: "Jab Apney Mulk Wapis Jayen To Mulki Bhaiyon Ko Batana Ki Mein Akhri Dam Tak Mulk Ki Azadi Ke Liyay Larta Raha Hoon; Woh Jangi Azadi Ko Jari Rakhen. Hindustan Zaroor Azad Hoga, Oos Ko Koi Gulam Nahin Rakh Sakta. (When you go back to the country, tell the people that up to the last I have been fighting for the liberation of my country; they should continue to struggle, and I am sure India will be free before long. Nobody can keep India in bondage now.)"

Lieutenent Col Shiro Nonogaki, who was on the flight, said: "When I first saw Netaji after the plane crash, he was standing somewhere near the left tip of the left wing of the plane. His clothes were on fire and his assistant (Col Rahman) was trying to take off his coat."

There were variations in the details provided by Rahman, Nonogaki, Kono, Takahashi and Nakamura. They were giving evidence 11 years after the accident.

But in essence there was no disagreement between their testimonies on the fact of the crash and Bose suffering severe burns and injuries as a consequence, the website notes.

Netaji was rushed to the nearby Nanmon Military Hospital in a critical condition. In September 1945, British authorities in India sent intelligence teams comprising of Messrs Finney and Davies, HK Roy and KP De to Bangkok, Saigon and Taipei to enquire about the whereabouts of Bose and, if possible, to arrest him. They, instead, returned with the story of the crash.
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control to visit Kyiv through Jan 18-20

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance Frank A. Rose will visit Kyiv through January 18-20 as a part of the January visit to European and Baltic States.

"From January 18-20, Assistant Secretary Rose will visit Kyiv to hold discussions with officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the State Space Agency, and the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine on space security and other topics of mutual interest," reads a post on U.S. Department of State's website.

Besides, Secretary Rose will participate in a ceremony marking the update of the bilateral Nuclear Risk Reduction Center (NRRC) communications link at the Ministry of Defense.

According to the U.S. Department of State, through January 9 to January 27, the Secretary will also travel to France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Finland, Sweden, Estonia and Lithuania.
Pathankot: With terrorists and infiltrators adopting the modus operandi of donning identical Army pattern uniform to carry out terror activities in the country, the Indian Army has asked its citizen to refrain itself from wearing its uniform-pattern dresses.

An advisory issued by the Western Command called use of army uniform and equipment as not only 'illegal' but also asserted that it cannot be termed 'fashionable'. It also stated that sale of such outfits by shopkeepers, happening freely across the country is illegal. Relatives of armed forces and ex-servicemen have also been requested to not use items of uniform, as it may raise false alarms among people. The advisory comes a week after the Pathankot airbase attack in which Pakistani terrorists were found dressed in Indian Army fatigues.

The Army also appealed to the people to start a campaign to prevent misuse of army uniform and equipment, which is mostly termed as 'fashionable'.

The camouflage pattern of the army's commandos and infantry troops has been an attraction for Indian youth since last few decade. The army pattern dress has been a favourite among college-goers, outdoor enthusiasts and fashion lovers, who are often seen carrying it. The military camouflage pattern is also a hit among designers. However, after the recent statement made by Army requesting the prohibition of the 'uniform-patterned dress', the Army uniforms once sold openly, will now have to disappear from the common man's reach.
Islamabad: The foreign secretaries of Pakistan and India will here on January, Sartaj Aziz, the prime minister's advisor on foreign affairs, has said.

Kashmir and all other outstanding issues will be on the agenda when Pakistan and India resume their comprehensive bilateral dialogue, Aziz said in the parliament on Friday.

The announcement came after Pakistan launched investigations into the Pathankot airbase attack, The Nation reported.

India had linked the foreign secretary level talks to Pakistan's action against the militants.

Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday chaired a meeting regarding Jaish-e-Muhammad organisation's involvement in the attack and Islamabad's response to New Delhi.

After the Pathankot air base attack, Sharif called Modi assuring him of "prompt and decisive" action against groups or individuals linked to the attack.

Seven security personnel were killed in the attack on the IAF base in Pathankot. Six terrorists, suspected to be from Pakistan, were killed during the gunfight that began on January 2.

Pakistan and India will remain in contact as Islamabad believes it needed solid evidence for a stern action.

Aziz told the house that the foreign secretaries of both the countries would discuss modalities of comprehensive bilateral dialogue and its timeframe during the meeting in Islamabad.

"As per the joint statement issued during the visit of Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to Pakistan, the comprehensive dialogue would include all outstanding issues including the Kashmir dispute," he said.
Pathankot: Brushing aside criticism over the handling of the counter-offensive againt the terrorist attack on the Pathankot IAF base, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who flew in here on Saturday, a week after the attack, said that he was satisfied with the "decision-making and its execution".

The Prime Minister, who arrived here today morning, was briefed by senior defence and security officers about the terrorist attack, carried out by suspected Pakistani terrorists, on the Pathankot Air Force Station (AFS).

PM Modi spent about 90 minutes at the air base during which he was briefed about the attack and security measures put in place at the facility in its wake.

In a series of tweet, PMO described about Narendra Modi's visit to Pathankot air base:

"Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response," Modi tweeted through his PMO India Twitter handle.

Visited Pathankot air base today. Had a detailed briefing from senior leadership of Army, Air Force, NSG & BSF: PM pic.twitter.com/S6JngIopcY  PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 9, 2016

Was briefed in great detail on how our forces neutralised such a serious terrorist attack: PM @narendramodi after visiting Pathankot  PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 9, 2016

Noted with satisfaction the decision-making & its execution, the considerations that went into our tactical response: PM @narendramodi  PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 9, 2016

Also noted coordination among various field units. Lauded bravery & determination of our men & women on the ground. They are our pride: PM  PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 9, 2016

As per a PMO tweet, the Prime Minister conducted an aerial survey of Pathankot today.

Soon after landing at the airbase, targetted exactly a week ago in a pre-dawn attack, PM Modi met senior Indian Air Force (IAF) and army officers.

Modi was accompanied by National Security Adviser Ajit Doval. The Indian Army chief, General Dalbir Singh, and the IAF chief, Air Chief Marshal Arup Raha were also present at the airbase during the visit.

Tight security arrangements were in place for the prime minister's visit. No one was allowed to enter the area near the Air Force Station (AFS), located 250 km from Chandigarh.

Since the base is a frontline and sensitive one, no live telecast of the visit was allowed. The media were kept away from the airbase.

Security forces had yesterday declared the sprawling Air Force station fully sanitised after a massive combing operation spanning over three days.

Six terrorists, believed to owe allegiance to Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed were gunned down by the security forces after a four-day gun battle.

Seven Indian security personnel also lost their lives. The operation to ensure that no terrorist was hiding was carried out jointly by Army, NSG and IAF's Garud commandos. Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar had also visited the base on January five.

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had called up his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi and promised action against the perpetrators of the brazen attack.

(With Agency inputs)
New Delhi: Congress on Saturday hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his visit to Pathankot Air Force base a week after the terror attack, saying it has got relegated to a mere "photo op".

"Eight days after the Pathankot terror incident depicting failure of Modi Govt on National Security & fight against terror, PM's belated visit has got relegated to a mere photo op.

"Need of the hour is to ensure action by Pakistan against Jaish-e- Mohammad, a through review of internal security safeguards and affixing responsibility for security lapses. We hope Modiji will inform the nation about action taken on

these key issues," AICC Communication Department chief Randeep Surjewala told reporters here.

In a photo tweet on party twitter handle, Congress also told the Prime Minister that "he celebrates the birthday of Pakistani Prime Minister with great enthusiasm but it takes him eight days to take care of Pathankot."

"PM Modi diverted plane to Pakistan to greet Pak PM Nawaz Sharif on his b'day, but took 8 days to reach Pathankot!," the party said in another tweet.

"There is no action on terror. Whether Modi government will run like this (Karte Nahin Aatank pe waar, Kya Aise he chalegi Modi Sarkaar)," Congress said coining a new slogan to attack Modi government.

The party had been targeting Modi government after the Pathankot attack citing BJP's Lok Sabha poll slogan "bahut hua seema par waar; Abki baar Modi sarkaar" (enough of attacks on the border; this time it is Modi government which will respond).

The Prime Minister today visited the strategic Pathankot Air Force base for a first-hand assessment of the situation in the aftermath of the terror attack last Saturday.

Six terrorists, believed to owe allegiance to Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed were gunned down by the security forces after a four-day gun battle. Seven Indian security personnel also lost their lives.

The operation to ensure that no terrorist was hiding was carried out jointly by Army, NSG and IAF's Garud commandos.

Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar had also visited the base on January five.
Kolkata: Jadavpur University students have once again gheraoed their vice-chancellor over holding of students' union elections.

The state higher education department had recently issued an advisory to the state-run varsity, saying that to avoid any disturbance during exams of different boards, students' elections should not be held in February.

Protesting against this, a small group of students from the university gheraoed vice-chancellor Suranjan Das. Till late in the night, he was under gherao, along with other officials in his office.

"I believe that things can be sorted out by negotiations and discussions. I am hoping to sort out the matter with the students," Das told PTI.

The students said they want the VC to notify on their behalf that elections would be held on time.

On several earlier occasions, groups of students have gheraoed the VC over various campus issues. In 2014, Das' predecessor Abhijit Chakrabarti was gheraoed demanding a fresh probe panel in the alleged sexual harassment of a girl student. After months of protest, Chakrabarti was forced to resign.
Washington: The US feels that time has come for Pakistan to walk the talk on the promises it made both in public and in private conversations - that there would be no discrimination in its action against terrorist networks and bring the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack to justice.

Amid Indian intelligence reports that groups and people within Pakistan planned and executed the strike on the Pathankot airbase, a senior State Department official said Pakistan should not come out with lame excuses to shield them as has been the case with the Mumbai terrorist attack.

"They (Pakistan) have said publicly that they are going to investigate. They have said publicly that they are not going to discriminate between terrorist groups. We look to see actions to back up those words," the official added.

The official indicated that the US wants to give the civilian government time and space to act on its words and hoped that Pakistan would not repeat its past trend wherein it is seen reluctant in taking actions against terrorist groups under one excuse or the other.

"They said that they (Pakistan) would investigate it and we need to let that process go forward. But obviously we want to see that the perpetrators be brought to account (as soon as possible)," the State Department official said on anonymity.

The official also expressed a sense of satisfaction over the reaction by the Nawaz Sharif government on the first few days of the attack.

"It is not about believe. We have to take the word that they have given. They have said that they are going to investigate. Let them do that," the official said when asked if they believe in what Pakistan is saying this time.

Senior US Government officials have been in close contact with their Pakistani counterparts in the aftermath of the attacks in Pathankot and Afghanistan's Majar-e-Sharif urging them to take right course of action which, if they do, would not only be a great confidence building measure but would also help improve relationship with India.

Referring to the outpouring of support for India among the US lawmakers in the aftermath of the Pathankot attack, the officials indicated that in the absence of a concrete action by Pakistan against these terrorist groups, it would be a tough call for the Obama Administration to push for any new military aid for Pakistan to through the Congress.

"We understand this is a challenging time. This is a complicated relationship. We do not agree with Pakistan about everything...We look to see actions to back up those words," the official added.

According to officials, it would become very difficult for the US Government to convince the Republican-controlled Congress to approve a sale of eight F-16s to Pakistan if Islamabad is seen as reluctant in taking action against these terrorist groups.

Over 20 lawmakers from both the Republican and Democratic parties have come out in support of India, officials pointed out.
Washington: The US feels that time has come for Pakistan to walk the talk on the promises it made both in public and in private conversations - that there would be no discrimination in its action against terrorist networks and bring the perpetrators of the Pathankot attack to justice.

Amid Indian intelligence reports that groups and people within Pakistan planned and executed the strike on the Pathankot airbase , a senior State Department official said Pakistan should not come out with lame excuses to shield them as has been the case with the Mumbai terrorist attack.

"They (Pakistan) have said publicly that they are going to investigate. They have said publicly that they are not going to discriminate between terrorist groups. We look to see actions to back up those words," the official added.

The official indicated that the US wants to give the civilian government time and space to act on its words and hoped that Pakistan would not repeat its past trend wherein it is seen reluctant in taking actions against terrorist groups under one excuse or the other.

"They said that they (Pakistan) would investigate it and we need to let that process go forward. But obviously we want to see that the perpetrators be brought to account (as soon as possible)," the State Department official said on anonymity.

The official also expressed a sense of satisfaction over the reaction by the Nawaz Sharif government on the first few days of the attack.

"It is not about believe. We have to take the word that they have given. They have said that they are going to investigate. Let them do that," the official said when asked if they believe in what Pakistan is saying this time.

Senior US Government officials have been in close contact with their Pakistani counterparts in the aftermath of the attacks in Pathankot and Afghanistan's Majar-e-Sharif urging them to take right course of action which, if they do, would not only be a great confidence building measure but would also help improve relationship with India.

Referring to the outpouring of support for India among the US lawmakers in the aftermath of the Pathankot attack, the officials indicated that in the absence of a concrete action by Pakistan against these terrorist groups, it would be a tough call for the Obama Administration to push for any new military aid for Pakistan to through the Congress.

"We understand this is a challenging time. This is a complicated relationship. We do not agree with Pakistan about everything...We look to see actions to back up those words," the official added.

According to officials, it would become very difficult for the US Government to convince the Republican-controlled Congress to approve a sale of eight F-16s to Pakistan if Islamabad is seen as reluctant in taking action against these terrorist groups.

Over 20 lawmakers from both the Republican and Democratic parties have come out in support of India, officials pointed out.
Cuddalore/Tamil Nadu: Months after rejecting the mediation suggestions by the Madras High Court , a 22-year-old woman married her rapist for a 'better' future of the child the child born out of assault.

The rape victim from Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu withdrew her case in the Madras High Court against her rapist, who has assaulted her when she was a minor.

The victim said she was not in a position to continue the long legal battle and for the sake of a better future of her child she has decided to reconcile and withdraw the case.

On June 23 last year, Justice P Devadass of Madras High Court had directed the rapist, who was sentenced to seven years imprisonment by a trial court, to go for mediation.

The court ruling directing the mediation in the rape case has created a controversy. The court's suggestion was later rejected by the victim saying that the suspect could go to any extent to escape punishment.
Srinagar/ New Delhi: Jammu and Kashmir was on Saturday night placed under Governor's rule with the process of new government formation following the death of Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed taking some time.

"Governor's rule has been imposed in the state of Jammu and Kashmir," a Home Ministry spokesperson said in Delhi.

Governor NN Vohra, exercising his powers under Section 92 of Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir, issued a proclamation to impose Governor's rule in the state.

A Raj Bhawan spokesperson in Jammu said the Governor's Rule was imposed in the state after receiving concurrence from the President of India.

"Consequent to the sudden passing away of Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed on 7th January 2016, the process to form government had commenced and intimations were still awaited about the respective positions of PDP and BJP.

"Considering the likelihood of some more time being taken before government can be formed, with the approval of the President of India, Governor's Rule has been imposed in the State with effect from 8th January, 2016, under Section 92(1) of the Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir," the spokesperson said.

Earlier, while speaking to news agency ANI, Union Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh, who hails from Jammu region, had said, For now Governor's rule has been imposed in Jammu and Kashmir till a new Chief Minister is sworn-in.

The state had to be put under Governor's rule in view of the reluctance of Mufti's daughter Mehbooba to take oath during the mourning period though her party has already conveyed to the governor that 28 MLAs of the PDP legislature party backed her for the Chief Minister's post.

Sayeed died on Thursday after a brief illness and since then there is a constitutional vacuum.

PDP's coalition ally BJP has also indicated that it would take a decision on new government formation once the four-day morning period is over tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Congress president Sonia Gandhi is expected to visit Kashmir tomorrow to offer condolences to PDP president Mehbooba Mufti.
No casualties were registered among the Ukrainian military in the area of the military operation in southeastern Ukraine in the past 24 hours, Ukrainian presidential administration official Andriy Lysenko said.

"None of our troops were killed or wounded in action in the past 24 hours," he told a briefing in Kyiv on Saturday.

Lysenko said 29 attacks on Ukrainian positions were registered in the past 24 hours.

He said the ceasefire regime remains in place on the Luhansk track and there was shooting on the Donetsk track. Specifically, fire was opened on Ukrainian positions in the Troitske, Novhorodske and Luhanske area. Three ceasefire breaches were registered on the Mariupol track, where fire was opened using firearms.
Mohali: A Border Security Force Jawan has been arrested for allegedly helping smugglers in cross-border smuggling of drugs and ammunitions, Punjab police said here on Saturday.

The accused has been identified as Anil Kumar, a Jawan with 52 Battalion, posted in Rajasthan, a senior Punjab Police official said.

"Anil Kumar, 29, has been arrested from Rai Singh Nagar in Sriganganagar in Rajasthan," said Mohali SSP Gurpreet Singh Bhullar.

Kumar, who joined BSF in 2008, allegedly used to help smugglers in smuggling of drugs like heroin and arms and ammunitions from Pakistan in lieu of money, he said.

The police also found transfer of "ill-gotten" money in his bank accounts. "BSF jawan was made first payment of Rs 50,000 and then Rs 39,000 which was transferred into his wife's bank account in lieu of cross-border smuggling," SSP said.

The alleged involvement of BSF Jawan came to light following questioning of a drug smuggler, Gurjant Singh alias Bholu who along with his two associates was arrested on January 4 from Kharar here.

Bholu was in contact with Kumar through social networking site 'Facebook' and messaging service 'WhatsApp' for taking his help in cross-border smuggling of weapons and drugs from Pakistan, SSP said.

Bholu was also already in contact with Pakistan based smuggler identified as Imtiaz, who used to send delivery of drugs and arms and ammunitions, police said.

Last week, Punjab police had claimed to have busted a drug smuggling syndicate and arrested three persons from near here, and recovered Pakistani SIM card, mobiles, weapons and ammunition from their possession.

Besides, Bholu, two others who were arrested were Sandip Singh and Jatinder Singh alias Jindi. Police have recovered one stengun of .9 mm, two pistols, two pistols .30 bore, one airgun, 190 live cartridges, 31 mobile phones, one Pakistani mobile sim card and one car from them.

Meanwhile, police also arrested one person identified as Deepak Kumar, resident of Ludhiana, who was allegedly involved in making fake driving licenses of Gurjant Singh and his associates.
London: When the world's smartest man speaks, you have got to listen! Renowned scientist Stephen Hawking has some excellent words of advice and hope for people suffering from depression.

Speaking at the Royal Institution in London for the BBC, the day before his 74th birthday, Professor Hawking told the crowd of 400 onlookers it is possible to escape from depression.

The message of this lecture is that black holes aint as black as they are painted, Professor Hawking said at the end of his speech.

They are not the eternal prisons they were once thought.

Things can get out of a black hole both on the outside and possibly to another universe. So if you feel you are in a black hole, dont give up  theres a way out.

Professor Hawking was diagnosed with motor neurone disease in 1963 at the age of 21. His daughter Lucy, 46, told the audience that her father's stubbornness and laughter have kept him alive.
Colombo: Sri Lanka on Saturday began the process of formulating a new Constitution with President Maithripala Sirisena underlining the need for constitutional reforms aimed at achieving reconciliation with the minority Tamil community and preventing another ethnic war.

"We need a Constitution that suits the needs of the 21st century and make sure that all communities live in harmony," Sirisena, who completed one year in office today, said in his address to the Parliament. Outlining the previous attempts in the island nation's history to settle the Tamil issue through various forms of devolution, Sirisena said, "The extremists in the south and the north have caused the loss of thousands of young lives".

"We must ensure reconciliation and harmony so that we will never go back to war." "I believe now, through our past bitter experiences, we must prepare ourselves for future challenges," he said. Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who also spoke in the Parliament, presented a resolution to set a Constitutional Assembly (CA) made up of legislators, who would seek public input and make recommendations for a new Constitution.

In a special session, Wickremesinghe moved the resolution in Parliament to set up CA and a steering committee of 17 members to draft the new Constitution. "We will have the whole Parliament formulating the Constitution unlike the previous instances when the constitutions were drafted outside Parliament," he said. The new Constitution will replace the current executive president headed constitution adopted in 1978.

Sirisena acknowledged the difficulty in drafting a constitution that would satisfy both sides - Sinhalese and Tamils. Sinhalese oppose a federal system that would ensure more political power for minority Tamils. Sirisena said he himself had opposed the India-mooted provincial councils system introduced in 1987 as a solution but later realised that it was "a good thing".

He said a solution has to be found which will lead to lasting peace through consensus. "The move to set up the Constitutional Assembly was done with that aim," he said. Sirisena, who was elected last year after his stunning electoral victory over strongman Mahinda Rajapaka, wants to abolish the present executive presidential system which for long has faced accusations of being authoritarian.

Sri Lankan troops in 2009 defeated the LTTE which was fighting for an independent state for minority ethnic Tamils. At least 40,000 Tamil civilians may have been killed in just the final months of the civil war, according to a UN report. The Sri Lankan government has promised that it will investigate alleged war crime allegations against government troops and Tamil Tiger rebels.

Sirisena's predecessor Rajapaksa had antagonised both Tamil and Muslim minorities in order to appease the Sinhala majority.

The resolution moved in Parliament noted that there shall be a Committee of Parliament referred to as the "Constitutional Assembly" which shall consist of all MPs, for the purpose of deliberating on, and seeking the views and advice of the people, on a new constitution for Sri Lanka, and preparing a draft of a Constitution Bill for the consideration of Parliament.

It said the Speaker of Parliament will be the Chairman of the Constitutional Assembly and there will be seven Deputy Chairmen of the Constitutional Assembly, who shall be elected by the Constitutional Assembly. A Steering Committee consisting of the Prime Minister (Chairman), Leader of the Opposition, Leader of the House, the Minister of Justice, and not more than 11 other Members of the Constitutional Assembly will be appointed by the Constitutional Assembly.

Sirisena in his address denied opposition's accusations that the new Constitution is being drafted to please the international community based on their advise. Sirisena, since coming to power, has reduced his presidential powers and strengthened key areas of governance by setting up independent commissions on police, judiciary elections and public service.
Islamabad: A seven-year-old boy in Pakistan died following his brutal gang-rape and assault, media reports said on Saturday.

The mutilated body of the unnamed boy, who went missing last Tuesday, was discovered in a field.

A post-mortem has revealed that the boy had been gang-raped and then killed.

The suspects belonged to rich families and were drunk when they kidnapped the child and took him to their dera where they raped him, the nydailynews.com quoted a local as saying.

The four assailants then reportedly used a rope to kill the boy. The alleged attack took place in Bahawalnagars Christian district in the Punjab province.

Three of the accused have so far been arrested in connection with the case.

The police are still searching for a fourth man who is understood to have fled the scene, the report quoted police official Sahar Fareed as saying.
Dubai: Iran`s foreign minister has complained to the United Nations about Saudi Arabia`s "provocations" towards Tehran, as a diplomatic crisis between the region`s two major powers entered its second week.

In a letter to the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies on Saturday, Mohammad Javad Zarif said "some people" in Riyadh seemed bent on dragging the whole region into crisis.

The two powers, both major oil exporters, have been locked in a diplomatic battle since Saudi Arabia executed Shi`ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr on January 02. Iranian protesters then stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations.

Zarif said Iran had "no desire" to escalate tensions further, but offered no compromise as he placed the blame for the crisis, and the wider turmoil across the region, squarely on Saudi shoulders.

"They (the Saudis) can continue to support extremist terrorists and promote sectarian hatred, or choose the path of good neighbourliness and play a constructive role in regional security," state news agency IRNA quoted Zarif`s letter as saying in Farsi.

Zarif said Sunni Saudi Arabia had engaged in a series of "direct provocations" towards Shi`ite Iran, including the execution of Nimr and what he described as "persistent mistreatment" of Iranian pilgrims visiting Mecca.

Saudi Arabia says last week`s executions were a domestic matter, and that Iran is the country pursuing sectarian division by casting itself as the champion of Arab Shi`ites.

Zarif also portrayed Saudi Arabia as a threat to regional and global security in the letter, copies of which were sent to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the foreign ministers of several countries.

"Most members of al Qaeda, the Taliban, Islamic State and Nusra Front are Saudi citizens or have been brainwashed by demagogues wielding oil money," IRNA quoted him as writing, in an unusually direct allegation.

Saudi Arabia opposes extremist groups: it executed dozens of al Qaeda members last week alongside Nimr, and last month announced an Islamic coalition against terrorism. But the kingdom`s ultra conservative Wahhabi clergy, which views Shi`ites as heretical, is a cornerstone of Saudi ruling legitimacy.

Riyadh says around 2,500 Saudis have gone to fight in Syria and Iraq, constituting one of the largest groups of foreign fighters, but only a fraction of the total number estimated to be in the tens of thousands.
Islamabad: The deadly Pathankot attack in the Indian state of Punjab is an opportunity for Pakistan to prove to the world that it is committed to eliminate terrorists of all variety, including Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), whether or not they are attacking the country at the moment, a Pakistani author wrote in the online edition of a popular newspaper on Saturday.

In an article titled Curse of non-state actors and published in the online version of The News, Babar Sattar said that if Pakistan wants to be perceived as a responsible nation-state, it should realise that the age of non-state actors as state assets has passed, and it should see Pathankot as an opportunity, and not let the past define the future.

Sattar wrote: Will we dismiss offhand that the attack could have been executed by non-state actors from Pakistan, find glitches in the information shared and why it isnt actionable, or act such that it is for all to see that we are serious about helping India find the perpetrators?

Sattar, who is a lawyer based in Islamabad, further wrote: We have told the world that non-state actors might have been assets once, but are now seen as liabilities that Pakistan is actively fighting to neutralise.

We made loud claims about cutting off the cord connecting state and non-state actors during Musharrafs time. But the world only started paying heed after the initiation of Operation Zarb-e-Azb when we were seen to be walking the talk.

He praised the Indian governments response during the Pathankot attack and said that it was measured and it hasnt gone to town framing Pakistan before an international audience.

It hasnt drummed up anger or unleashed its streets against Pakistan. It has said it has intelligence and indications that the attackers were handled by Jaish-e-Mohammad from Bahawalpur, that it has shared actionable intelligence with us, that it expects us to act on such information and that it wont accept cross-border attacks.

If we put ourselves in Indias shoes, there is nothing wrong with what it has said so far. The ball is in our court, Sattar wrote in the article.

We can make sophisticated arguments about lack of state responsibility for acts of non-state actors and repeat explanations about how legal systems require admissible evidence that is hard to come by in terror cases, especially of the cross-border variety. But that doesnt change the reality that while, as a matter of law, states might not be liable for actions of rouge citizens, as a matter of fact they are. And it isnt just the state but also all citizens of the state who are painted black in the worlds perception due to vile acts of fellow citizens.

Part of how we answer this is linked to how we view our future with India and our place in the world. If we believe that peace with India is in our long-term national interest and terror the foremost threat to our national security, even the Machiavellian motivation to keep some non-state actors alive (even if comatose) should die down, Sattar wrote.
Las Vegas: John McAfee, the antivirus software pioneer and onetime international fugitive who is running for US president, said he was shifting his campaign to the Libertarian Party.

McAfee made the announcement as he unveiled a cybersecurity platform and told reporters he was running for president to highlight the need for better cyber protections.

"We need a dedicated force of hackers focused on national security," McAfee said on the floor of the Consumer Electronics Show, where he was promoting a new mobile security product on which he is collaborating.

He said the United States is in danger "because we are decades behind the Russians and Chinese in weaponised software," while also highlighting the need to improve cyber weapons to counter threats from those countries.

"You can't just have defensive weapons in this world. You have to say, 'You push a button, we'll push a button". The creator of the McAfee antivirus software in September announced his presidential run as part of his own "Cyber Party."

He said yesterday that shifting to the Libertarian Party would make it easier to be on the ballot in all 50 states and he believes he is philosophically aligned with the party. "I was a Libertarian before the word was coined," he said.

"I think the government is too large. I think people should be free to live their own lifestyles without interference from government."

McAfee, who on his own Twitter page refers to himself as an "eccentric millionaire," amassed an estimated $100 million fortune during the early days of the Internet in the 1990s, designing the pioneering anti-virus software that bears his name and which is now owned by Intel.

After cashing out, he became an intrepid adventure-seeker, arriving in Belize in 2009 after losing most of his fortune to bad investments and the financial crisis.

McAfee was briefly incarcerated in that country after police found him living with a 17-year-old girl and discovered an arsenal of seven pump-action shotguns, one single-action shotgun, and two 9-millimetre pistols.

He was living in Belize when police came looking for him to discuss the murder of his neighbour a crime for which he maintains his innocence.
Dubai: Iran`s foreign minister has complained to the United Nations about Saudi Arabia`s "provocations" towards Tehran, as a diplomatic crisis between the region`s two major powers entered its second week.

In a letter to the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies on Saturday, Mohammad Javad Zarif said "some people" in Riyadh seemed bent on dragging the whole region into crisis.

The two powers, both major oil exporters, have been locked in a diplomatic battle since Saudi Arabia executed Shi`ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr on Jan. 2. Iranian protesters then stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations.

Zarif said Iran had "no desire" to escalate tensions further, but offered no compromise as he placed the blame for the crisis, and the wider turmoil across the region, squarely on Saudi shoulders.

"They (the Saudis) can continue to support extremist terrorists and promote sectarian hatred, or choose the path of good neighbourliness and play a constructive role in regional security," state news agency IRNA quoted Zarif`s letter as saying in Farsi.

Zarif said Sunni Saudi Arabia had engaged in a series of "direct provocations" towards Shi`ite Iran, including the execution of Nimr and what he described as "persistent mistreatment" of Iranian pilgrims visiting Mecca.

Saudi Arabia says last week`s executions were a domestic matter, and that Iran is the country pursuing sectarian division by casting itself as the champion of Arab Shi`ites.

Zarif also portrayed Saudi Arabia as a threat to regional and global security in the letter, copies of which were sent to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the foreign ministers of several countries.

"Most members of al Qaeda, the Taliban, Islamic State and Nusra Front are Saudi citizens or have been brainwashed by demagogues wielding oil money," IRNA quoted him as writing, in an unusually direct allegation.

Saudi Arabia opposes extremist groups: it executed dozens of al Qaeda members last week alongside Nimr, and last month announced an Islamic coalition against terrorism. But the kingdom`s ultra conservative Wahhabi clergy, which views Shi`ites as heretical, is a cornerstone of Saudi ruling legitimacy.

Riyadh says around 2,500 Saudis have gone to fight in Syria and Iraq, constituting one of the largest groups of foreign fighters, but only a fraction of the total number estimated to be in the tens of thousands.
Washington: A Pakistani national has been indicted by a US court for trying to smuggle high-end military grade drones for the Pakistan Army by using a Lahore-based shell company.

The individual identified as Syed Vaqar Ashraf, charged on nine counts, transferred more than USD 62,000 to a US company in different money transfers from Pakistan between 2012 and 2014, towards the purchase of a series of high-end drones ? with an estimated cost of more than USD 340,000, according to court documents.

While the court case has been going on for more than a year now, a US court in Phoenix unsealed the documents including federal complaint and indictment on January 6 The 14-page superseding indictment was filed before the court in December last year.

Court officials said Ashraf has been arrested in Brussels about a year ago and extradited to the United States some four months ago. His last court appearance was on December 23, during which he pleaded not guilty. There was no immediate response from the Pakistan Embassy here.

According to the indictment, Ashraf was the CEO of Lahore-based I&E International. Federal prosecutors alleged that this was a front company for the Pakistan Advanced Engineering Research Organisation (AERO), based in Lahore. Ashraf placed orders to a Arizona-based drone company for high-end military-grade drones.

The Arizona company ? not named in the indictment ? specialised in the design, development and manufacturing of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) for the US military. Federal prosecutors claim that Ashraf placed orders through emails for purchase of specific gyroscopes including eight VG34-0803 which is designed for medium size, multi- payload UAC designed for tactical long endurance missions, with a primary mission of reconnaissance, surveillance and communication relay.

He also placed orders for 10 Memsic VG800CA-200 Low Drift MEMS Vertical Gyros, which has a military and non-military applications and is used to increase stability inside a UAV. Both the items come under export control of the US Government. These models, capable of flying more than 20 hours, were designed for Israel and is used for reconnaissance .

The total cost of these military hardware was nearly USD 3,45,000, for which he made an advancement payment of USD 62,000 in five wire transfers.

According to court documents, Ashraf concealed to the representative of the US-based drone company ? who was in fact an official of Homeland Security department? about the actual reason for his purchase of such equipment.

When the officials from the US drone company told Ashraf that this equipment could not be shipped directly to Pakistan, Ashraf gave them a Brussels address.

"Ashraf requested that Person A (from the US drone company) transship the modules to Pakistan, through Belgium," the indictment said.

Federal prosecutors alleged that Ashraf filled out fraudulent documents in the name of Innovative Links, a shell company used by him.

But he was purchasing these for AERO, which is in fact a wing of the Pakistan military, prosecutors said.

According to court documents, Ashraf told the undercover agent that his client was in fact the Pakistani military. The trial is scheduled for February 7.
Mexico City: Mexico recaptured the world`s top drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman with US help after a pre-dawn shootout on Friday, six months after he humiliated the government with his second jaw-dropping escape from a maximum security prison.

The head of the powerful Sinaloa Cartel was captured at a roadside motel after an operation that killed five at a safe house in the city of Los Mochis, in the drug baron`s native northwestern state of Sinaloa.

"Mission accomplished: We have him," President Enrique Pena Nieto said on his Twitter account. "I want to inform all Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested."

For Pena Nieto, the capture of a trafficker who twice slipped out of Mexican prisons is a sorely-needed victory after his presidency was tarnished by graft and human rights scandals and the shame of the kingpin`s flight in July.

It also provides a major boost for US-Mexico relations, strained by the apparent ease with which Guzman gave Mexican authorities the slip after the United States requested his extradition.

Once featured in the Forbes list of billionaires, Guzman has led a cartel that smuggled billions of dollars worth of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamines into the United States and fought vicious turf wars with other Mexican gangs.

Guzman, whose nickname means "Shorty", first escaped prison in 2001 by bribing prison officials, and went on to dominate drug trafficking along much of the Rio Grande.

He was recaptured by Pena Nieto`s government 13 years later but again fled, this time through a mile-long tunnel which burrowed right up into the shower in his cell, capitalizing on the drug-tunneling skills his cartel honed on the U.S. border.

The escape heaped embarrassment on Pena Nieto, who had resisted a U.S. request to extradite Guzman and had said previously that an escape would be "unforgivable."

Dozens of people were arrested over the jailbreak, though details of who Guzman bribed and how his accomplices knew exactly where to dig into the prison remain scarce.

Scant official details were available of his recapture on Friday, but it involved Mexican marines, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and U.S. Marshals, a senior Mexican police source said.

SEARCHING STORM DRAINS

The source said Guzman was captured from the Hotel Doux, a motel on the outskirts of Los Mochis once popular with North Americans travelling south.

Residents described gunfire and explosions from about 3:30 a.m. (0930 GMT) and said Marines stormed house after house and searched storm drains for the fugitive.

Schools were closed as helicopters clattered overhead.

"The teachers were coming out terrified because they had heard the rumours that he was fleeing in the city`s drains," said Ana Bertotti, 30, a housewife who crossed town to find her child`s kindergarten closed.

One photograph widely circulated on social media, but that could not be independently verified by Reuters, appeared to show Guzman sitting handcuffed on a hotel bed, in a room that resembled those shown on the Hotel Doux website. He was wearing a filthy vest and a poster of a scantily clad woman was pinned on the wall behind him.

A receptionist at the motel told Reuters she understood Guzman had been captured there.

Another photo appeared to show Guzman without handcuffs and wearing the same vest in the back of vehicle next to one of his top assassins.

U.S. officials and the DEA, which has had a bumpy relationship with its Mexican counterparts, took no credit and congratulated Mexico on the capture.

"This notorious criminal is  and will remain  behind bars, until he faces justice in a court of law," said DEA Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg.

EXTRADITION WILL `TAKE TIME`

Guzman now faces the prospect of extradition to the United States.

After coming under fire for failing to do so the last time, Mexico`s Attorney General`s office said after his escape in July it had approved an order to extradite him north of the border.

On Friday, the U.S. Justice department said its previous request to extradite Guzman to the United States still stands and U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said the kingpin will have to answer for his alleged crimes.

In a celebratory speech in his ceremonial palace, Pena Nieto said the capture was the result of months of work by Mexican intelligence and security agencies and the attorney general`s office. He did not mention U.S. assistance.

Guzman is wanted by U.S. authorities for various criminal charges including cocaine smuggling and money laundering. An official at the attorney general`s office, speaking on condition of anonymity, said his extradition would "take time".

In 2013, Chicago dubbed him its first Public Enemy No.1 since Al Capone, the gangster who won notoriety in the 1920s.

Guzman`s lawyer in October appealed against possible extradition in case his client was captured.

Guzman, believed to be 58 years old, was born in La Tuna, a village in the Sierra Madre mountains in Sinaloa state where smugglers have been growing opium and marijuana since the early 20th century.

In 1993, police arrested him in Guatemala and extradited him to Mexico. Guzman used money to ease his eight year prison stay, smuggling in lovers, prostitutes and Viagra, according to international and domestic media reports.

The 5-foot, 6-inch gangster`s exploits made him a hero to many poor villagers in and around Sinaloa, where he was immortalized in dozens of ballads and low budget movies.

Still, many people in towns and villages across Mexico remember Guzman better for his squads of armed gunmen who carried out thousands of brutal slayings and kidnappings.

After Guzman`s first prison break, violence began to creep up in Mexico. The situation deteriorated during the 2006-2012 presidency of Pena Nieto`s conservative predecessor Felipe Calderon, when nearly 70,000 people lost their lives in gang-related mayhem.

After he managed to outmaneuver, outfight or outbribe his rivals to stay at the top of the business for over a decade, some security experts see in Guzman`s capture new hope for Mexico.

"This gives important credibility to the Mexican government. And the fact is, they`re starting to move forward in implementing the rule of law," said Mike Vigil, former head of global operations for the DEA.

(With reporting by Gabriel Stargardter, Christine Murray, Cyntia Barrera and Alexandra Alper; Writing by Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Simon Gardner, Kieran Murray and Mary Milliken)


Council of EU to look into visa issues for Ukraine in March-June

Foreign Affairs Council (FAC) of European Union Member States will look into an issue of granting a visa free travel for Ukraine in March or June, Deputy Foreign Minister of Ukraine for European Integration Olen Zerkal reported.

"As soon as we will be able to persuade justice and interior affairs ministers of the European Union member states that we fulfilled everything and continue improving [legislation], and that this process is irreversible, will depend when the Council of EU will consider this issue  in March or June," Zerkal said in an interview with Channel Five TV broadcast on Friday evening.

She said that the foreign ministry after New Year holidays will be engaged "in a very intensive dialogue" with the European colleagues regarding granting visa free travel to Ukraine.
Delhi: U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said recaptured Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman will have to answer to his crimes and the Justice Department confirmed that a previous request to extradite the kingpin to the United States still stands.

Guzman was apprehended by Mexican marines on Friday, with help from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and U.S. Marshals, a senior Mexican police source said. U.S. officials refused to confirm U.S. involvement.

El Chapo was captured in February 2014 but escaped from prison last July in a stunning jailbreak from a maximum security facility.

After the 2014 arrest, "the United States did submit full extradition requests to Mexico," said Justice Department spokesman Peter Carr, adding that there is no need to resubmit an extradition request.

"Guzman`s latest attempt to escape has failed, and he will now have to answer for his alleged crimes, which have resulted in significant violence, suffering, and corruption on multiple continents," Lynch said in a statement.

Lynch did not mention the issue of extradition.

The DEA said in a statement it will work with Mexico "in its efforts to improve security for its citizens and continue to work together to respond to the evolving threats posed by transnational criminal organizations."
United Nations: The UN Security Council on strongly condemned the "heinous" suicide bombing claimed by Islamic State extremists that killed dozens in Libya and called on rival groups to speed up the formation of a unity government.

More than 50 people were killed in the attack on Thursday on a police training school in the coastal city of Zliten, a security source said, in the deadliest single attack in Libya since the fall of Moamer Kadhafi.

The 15-member council described the suicide bombing as a "heinous act" and said those responsible should be brought to justice.

It also condemned a separate attack the same day on a checkpoint in Ras Lanouf, home to a key oil terminal, in which six people died including a baby.

The council "urged all parties in Libya to join efforts to combat the threat posed by transnational terrorist groups exploiting Libya for their own agenda by urgently implementing the Libyan political agreement" setting up the unity government, said a statement.

The United Nations brokered the unity government deal that was signed by politicians last month, but the agreement does not have the full backing of Libya's rival parliaments.

Libya has had rival administrations since August 2014, when an Islamist-backed militia alliance overran Tripoli, forcing the government to take refuge in the east.

EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini yesterday met in Tunis with the prime minister-designate of the new unity government, Fayez al-Sarraj, and unveiled a 100-million-euro aid package.
Washington: Top officials of the Obama administration have met leading Internet companies in Silicon Valley in an effort to build cooperation with them in combating online radicalisation and recruitment by terror groups.

"This meeting is the latest in the administration's continuing dialogue with technology providers and others to ensure we are bringing our best private and public sector thinking to combating terrorism," a senior administration official said after the meeting was over in San Jose yesterday.

The meeting was attended by the White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough, Assistant to the President for Counter Terrorism and Homeland Security Lisa Monaco, US Chief Technology Officer Megan Smith, among other senior administration officials.

Representatives of a number of leading Silicon Valley companies including Google, Facebook, Yahoo and Microsoft attended the meeting.

The meeting comes after Obama's call in his address on December 6 for government and technology community to work together to combat terrorism and counter violent extremism online.

"This engagement is a result of that call. The administration is committed to taking every action possible to confront and interdict terrorist activities wherever they may occur, including in cyberspace," the official said.

Earlier in the day, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest, said the goal of the engagement was to find additional ways to work together to make it even harder for terrorists or criminals to find refuge in cyberspace.

Earnest said this was an opportunity to be a robust discussion about ways they can make it harder for terrorists to leverage internet to recruit, radicalise, and mobilise supporters to carry out acts of violence.

Earnest said there was precedent for this kind of cooperation with tech companies, when they had worked together to combat child pornography and hoped to find common ground

with them

"Many of these technology companies that are participating in the meeting today are run by patriotic Americans who don't have any desire in seeing their technology being used to aid terrorists, or make it easier for terror organisations to recruit followers and incite them to carry out acts of violence".
Hanoi: Vietnam's civil aviation authority has accused Beijing of threatening regional air safety by conducting unannounced flights through its airspace to a disputed reef in the South China Sea, state media said on Saturday.

The Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV) warned that the unannounced flights "threaten the safety of all flights in the region," according to a report in the Tuoi Tre Daily newspaper.

In quotes published in Vietnamese official online newspaper Zing.vn late Friday, CAAV director Lai Xuan Thanh said a protest letter about the flights had been sent to Beijing, as well as a complaint to the United Nations' International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

"Chinese aircraft have ignored all the rules and norms of the ICAO by not providing any flight plans or maintaining any radio contact with Vietnam's air traffic control centre," he added.

In the seven days to January 8, Vietnam logged 46 incidents of Chinese planes flying without warning through airspace monitored by air traffic control in the southern metropolis of Ho Chi Minh City, according to civilian aviation authorities quoted in the Tuoi Tre Daily newspaper report.

Chinese state media on Wednesday said two civilian planes landed on an island in the Fiery Cross reef in the contested Spratly Islands, which have long been at the centre of bitter wrangling between Vietnam and its giant neighbour.

The two "test flights" Wednesday followed an initial aircraft landing on Saturday, which prompted the first formal diplomatic complaint from Hanoi.

The Spratlys are claimed by Hanoi but controlled by Beijing, which has ramped up activity in the area by rapidly building artificial islands, including airstrips said to be capable of hosting military jets.

The recent flights, slammed by Vietnam as a "serious violation" of its sovereignty, have sparked international alarm, with the United States warning Thursday that the move would raise tensions in the disputed waters. The Philippines has also said it would file a protest.

China asserts ownership over virtually all the South China Sea, putting it at odds with regional neighbours the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan, which stake partial claims. Several of these nations, including Vietnam, have also built facilities on islands they control, but at a significantly slower pace and smaller scale than Beijing.

Rioting broke out in Vietnam after Beijing sent an oil rig into contested waters in 2014, and at least three Chinese people were killed.
Maine Gov. Paul LePage insists he wasn't being racist when he claimed heroin dealers with names like "D-Money" come to his state and "impregnate a young white girl before they leave."

Here's the full quote from his town hall event on Thursday.

"These aren't the people who take drugs. These are guys with the name D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty  these types of guys. They come from Connecticut and New York, they come up here, they sell their heroin, they go back home. Incidentally, half the time they impregnate a young white girl before they leave, which is a real sad thing because then we have another issue we've go to deal with down the road," he added.

LePage says his statement can simply be attributed to the fact that "My brain was slower than my mouth." Besides, it wasn't his fault that he said it. The media is to blame for reporting on what he said. "Shame on you. Shame, shame, shame," he said at a press conference.
The government of South Korea is playing loudly amplified anti-North Korea propaganda along the North Korean border today. The sonic assault combines K-Pop music with throwing shade at the North's nuclear program and its leader Kim Jong Un. North Korea considers the broadcasts to be an act of war.

From USA Today:

The South had stopped the broadcasts in August as part of a deal to defuse tensions, but they restarted earlier this week after the North claimed it successfully tested its first hydrogen bomb two days ago, drawing widespread international condemnation and skepticism. North Korea considers the broadcasts an act of war, and the fresh propaganda against Kim could further inflame the country since Friday was believed to be the leader's 33rd birthday.

The music selections Seoul made to annoy Pyongyang are interesting. From the Associated Press:

A song by Lee Ae-ran whose title can be translated as "100 years of life" sends messages to death, or a god from the underworld, saying it isn't yet time to say goodbye to living. It was so popular among young and old that Kakao Talk, South Korea's most popular messenger app, created emoticons, or animated images, from the music video. The song inspired a host of online parodies and memes, and political parties reportedly sought to use it in their campaigns during upcoming general elections. Also echoing over the Demilitarized Zone: GFriend's "Me gustas Tu," about a girl who is trying to muster courage and overcome shyness to ask a boy out. GFriend rose to fame last year when a fan posted a video on YouTube showing its members standing up after falling several times on a slippery stage to complete an outdoor performance. The YouTube video has nearly 9 million views since it was uploaded in September.

K-pop music is prohibited in North Korea. Only government-run TV and radio stations are permitted. People who have fled the North say South Korean music manages to find a way through, though. AP reports that K-pop is very popular in the North, and is smuggled in on USB sticks and DVDs.
Lemmy Kilmister of Motorhead may have been known for his hard drinking, but he'll be forever remembered in an ad for a different beverage. Milk.

Just weeks before he died at age 70 from cancer, he shot a TV ad for the Finnish dairy products company Valio. After the rocker's death, Valio ran some of Lemmy's unscripted, improvised material  which wasn't even part of the ad!  as a tribute to the heavy metal icon.

Because I may never get the chance to type this again, I'd just like to say that I partied with Lemmy when I was 15 or 16, and living on the street as a punk rock urchin. He was 100% Lemmy. Totally cool guy. The Ace of Spades.

From the Finnish dairy giant's YouTube:

This is offered in celebration of the life of a lovely, exceptional man  a man who celebrated life so vibrantly himself. We were first shooting a remake of an iconic Finnish milk ad. The tone of this ad that was shot a month ago was changed to make it a heartfelt tribute, however modest. A take that came late in the shoot was selected  one of Lemmy's brilliant improv moments that was never in the script. This was our magical encounter with a great man  and we're honoured to share it with the world.

Thank you, Lemmy.

Valion kunnianosoitus Lemmy Kilmisterille | Tribute video for Lemmy Kilmister by Valio, and more about the story behind the ad in the Guardian.

Lemmy died at home in Los Angeles just four days after his 70th birthday after being diagnosed with "extremely aggressive cancer," according to reports.

Fans have since signed an online petition for his nom de metal to live on through a newly discovered element, a literally heavy metal element. The proposed name: "Lemmium".
The idea that global politics are a terrifying blend of natural disasters, belligerence, and deadly military potential isn't unique to this decade, but holy fuck, did it ever just get weird.

In a long article, Charlie Stross breaks down the way that climate change, human reactions to climate change, and economics are turning the world into a place overrun by heavily armed racist kooks with the power and willingness to destroy everything in their race to get rich enough to buy a mountaintop retreat before the seas rise.

A good parallel read is Bruce Sterling's "general health-check for our world's many regions and peoples," which includes such nuggets as "Iraq remains a catastrophic mess. Since they're so visibly keen

on sectarian ethnic-cleansing, they ought to abandon the shell of

the national order and form balkanized mini-states. It makes sense,

but I don't think even that would help them."

Oh, and "Russia is so lastingly humiliated by their failure to globalize

that they've become a 'troll state Americans used to have all kinds of practical "reform" advice for

Russia, but that's worse than useless now. If you show up in Russia

and tell 'em to follow the American Dream, it's like showing up with

whooping cough at a house party for tuberculosis."

But anyway, here's my summary of the next decade: 1. The weather's going to get worse. 2. We're going to see more and more unscrupulous huckster types leading revanchist, nativist right wing political movements and banging the anti-immigrant drum, world-wide. Civil rights include the right to free movement; this makes civil rights an easy scapegoat and target for the angry populist nativists. Sensible media capitalists (those with a sense of self-preservation) will pander to these assclowns. Courageous media capitalists (those with the odd ethical bone in their body) will stand up to them and get themselves assassinated or imprisoned. Luckily we have the internet except, oops, Facebook owns it and FB will do whatever they're told. (And if not Facebook, Google. The internet is infrastructure, and if annoying dissidents are drinking from the pure tapwater of honest news and you own the pumping station ) 3. This is going to happen both in nominally/formerly Christian countries and in the Muslim world. Both sides will see each other in a mirror and hiss like cats, but it doesn't really signify anything. Fear of terrorism is a rallying point, so expect unscrupulous politicians to use crack-downs on their local minorities to bolster their popularity. This will of course include crack-downs on civil rights because nothing annoys a political entrepreneur trying to posture as a strong leader like a civil rights lawyer with a good case. 4. The ongoing 1300-year Sunni/Shi'ite cold war will continue, sometimes hotter, thanks to climate-induced disruption in the Middle East and the eventual collapse of the Saudi petrochemical economy. The ongoing Saudi succession crisis isn't going to help (as we just saw). 6 None of this political posturing is going to do jack shit to roll back the already-in-train effects of climate change so the immigration pressure will continue, driving trends (2) and (3). 7. Don't buy long term coal or oil futures.



Long range forecast

[Charlie Stross/Charlie's Diary]

(Image: Erde 3, Karin Frank)
TORONTO, ON--(Marketwired - January 07, 2016) - Plan Canada is pleased with the Government of Canada's announcement to extend the deadline for matching contributions to registered Canadian charities to support humanitarian relief efforts for the Syrian crisis. The decision means Canadians will continue to be able to double the impact of their donations to Syrian relief efforts until February 29, 2016, with the Government setting aside one dollar for the Syria Emergency Relief Fund for each dollar contributed to a charity by generous Canadians.

"We welcome the Government of Canada's decision to extend the matching donation program for Syrian relief efforts," said Marie Staunton, Interim CEO of Plan Canada. "We hope Canadians will continue to be generous in their response to this crisis, not only through sponsoring refugees to come to Canada, but also by contributing to agencies like Plan, who are involved in life-saving work to help Syrian refugees, especially girls and boys."

As part of its commitment to help during global humanitarian emergencies, Plan International is responding directly to the needs of Syrian refugees in Egypt, and is working through partners to provide assistance in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq. The main focus of our work is supporting efforts to improve access to education for refugee children, many of whom have been out of school for months or even years. Plan is also active in protecting the rights of refugee girls and boys, particularly in cases of forced labour, child marriage or other forms of exploitation. In collaboration with other members of the Humanitarian Coalition, Plan supports efforts to boost humanitarian assistance to Syria's neighbours, who have borne the brunt of the refugee crisis since the conflict began in March 2011. The conflict in Syria has led to the largest humanitarian crisis in a generation, affecting more than 12 million people, including more than four million people who have been forced to leave the country.

Story continues

"Almost five years after it started, Syria's agony continues and the suffering of children and their families shows no signs of ending," added Staunton. "While a new year brings new opportunities for millions of Canadians, there's little hope for millions of Syrians unless the global community, including Canada, continues to give generously to help Syria's refugees and displaced people within the country. There is no time to lose."

About Plan and the Because I am a Girl initiative

Founded in 1937, Plan is one of the world's oldest and largest international development agencies, working in partnership with millions of people around the world to end global poverty. Not for profit, independent and inclusive of all faiths and cultures, Plan has only one agenda: to improve the lives of children. Because I am a Girl is Plan's global initiative to end gender inequality, promote girls' rights and lift millions of girls -- and everyone around them -- out of poverty. Visit plancanada.ca and becauseiamagirl.ca for more information.

Find out more

To receive news about Plan Canada, sign up for our media mailing list at plancanada.ca/media
By David Ljunggren OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada added more jobs than expected in December, partly making up for heavy losses the previous month, while the unemployment rate held at 7.1 percent, welcome news for an economy hit by low oil prices. Statistics Canada said on Friday the economy created 22,800 jobs in December, far more than the market forecast of a 10,000 gain, but in sign of possible underlying weakness analysts noted all the gains were in the part-time sector. Derek Burleton, deputy chief economist at Toronto-Dominion bank, said the headline figure was a relief amid market gloom about slumping commodity prices and a stuttering economy. "At the margin, it's reassuring. It's not a robust employment report but given all the negativity it might help to sooth some of the recent fears," he said. The Canadian dollar initially held its own against a broadly stronger U.S. dollar, helped by solid jobs data in both nations. It later weakened to C$1.4132, or 70.76 U.S. cents, down from the official close of C$1.4097, or 70.94 U.S. cents. The economy created 29,200 part-time jobs and lost 6,400 full-time positions in December. The number of employees dropped by 17,500 while the ranks of the self-employed grew by 40,300 positions. "The details are not that great. All of the gain was in part time and all was in self employment, so not a great mix. We'll take any jobs we can get at this point, but it could be better," said Sal Guatieri, senior economist at BMO Capital Markets. Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz on Thursday said it could take the economy from three to five years to adjust to lower commodity prices. The oil price crash has slammed the western energy-producing province of Alberta, which lost 3,900 jobs in December. The jobless rate in the province is now 7.0 percent compared to 4.7 percent in December 2014. Further east, the populous provinces of Ontario and Quebec posted gains of 34,900 and 12,700 positions respectively. For 2015, employment gains totaled 158,100, or 0.9 percent, slightly above the 0.7 percent year-on-year growth rate seen in both 2013 and 2014. The six-month moving average for employment growth was 10,500, up from 10,400 in November. Separately, Statscan said the value of Canadian building permits issued in November fell 19.6 percent on widespread declines in Alberta, which had seen a boom in October. (Additional reporting by Matt Scuffham, Susan Taylor and Fergal Smith in Toronto; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Meredith Mazzilli)
A gas explosion shook a building in central Chisinau on Saturday afternoon.

The press officer for the Moldovan Interior Ministry's Emergency Situations Service told Interfax the explosion was allegedly caused by careless handing of a gas container.

The source said the explosion took place in a building close to the central market. The blast caused panic, including on the central market. The nearby shots were evacuated.

"Four specialized vehicles and some ten ambulances were used for dealing with the aftermath of the blast. Some twenty people are now hospitalized, and four of them are in serious condition," the source said.

The source said the cause of the blast is now being determined, but the most likely cause is careless handing of a gas containing in a public catering establishment.
By Amarjyoti Borah DHUBRI, India (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Golok Das, a farmer in India's northeast Assam state, is happy with the harvest produced by his main 6-hectare farm. But he'd love to sell another 4-hectare plot, just half a kilometer away, even though it's equally fertile. Why? It sits on the other side of a barbed-wire fence marking the Bangladesh border, and that means he can't irrigate it. The fence was built in 1987 to prevent illegal migration from Bangladesh to India. It traces a line about 150 yards inside the actual border, on Indian land, since no treaty agreement allowed a fence to be built on the border itself. Large tracts of Indian land, including some villages, were left on the far side of the fence. In the Golokganj sector of Dhubri district, more than 8,000 farmers struggle with a fence between their homes and their land. They are allowed to cross though the fence each day to work their holdings, but only at set hours. Now changing climatic conditions in the region for the first time require farmers to irrigate their land frequently to get a good crop  but legal and bureaucratic obstacles make it hard to invest in irrigation on the far side of the fence, meaning harvests there are two-thirds lower than those on the Indian side. "With climate change, there has been a change in the rainfall pattern and also the flood intensity, which is making agriculture difficult in many areas in the state, said Girin Chetia of the non-profit North East Affected Areas Development Society. Those changes mean farmer Safikul Islam now wants to get rid of his 5 hectares of land on the wrong side of the fence, and next to Das plot. LESS GRAIN ACROSS THE FENCE Both farmers say their land on the Indian side of the fence yields nearly 1,500 kg of rice a year, while an equivalent area on the Bangladesh side produces no more than 500 kg. "The land on both sides is equally fertile, however we suffer as we dont have any irrigation facilities there. This takes a major toll on our land on the other side of the border, said Das. "We have been traditionally dependent on the rainwater for our cultivation (for) generations, but now as the rainfall has become unpredictable, it is not possible, said Munin Das, a 52-year-old farmer who owes 4 hectares of land on the Bangladeshi side of the fence. "We need irrigation facilities to be able to cultivate our land and get good yields, he said. By law, construction of any concrete or permanent structure is forbidden near the fence, local people say. "Even the idea of building any small irrigation project or building any project for water harvesting does not arise, said Dinesh Kumar Sarkar, a former legislator from Dhubri who also owes agricultural land on the other side of the fence. Sarkar said that even taking tractors onto the land requires a lengthy bureaucratic process. Local people worry they will have to give up farming on the Bangladeshi side of the fence as a result of the weather changes, and complain that neither the district administration nor the Indian governments Border Security Force (BSF) have been sympathetic to their problems. 8 TO 4 FARMERS Gates to cross the border are open from 8 am to 4 pm, Sarkar said, and outside these times no Indian citizen is allowed to work land on the Bangladesh side. The problem is that farming cannot be done within a fixed timeframe, Sarkar said. In particular, the fixed crossing hours create a lot of problems for the farmers, as the farmer needs to reach his field very early in the morning, he said. In addition, he said, people living on the Bangladeshi side of the border sometimes damage Indian-owned crops or harvest them, leaving Indian growers with no produce to show for their labor. Farmers and civil society groups have long urged Indias government to purchase their land on the other side of the fence. Members of Nagarik Unnayan Mancha, a civil society group, say they plan to file a petition on the issue at the Gauhati high court. "Our demands have been ignored for years, and now we are planning to send a delegation to (explain) our situation before the Assam chief minister and the countrys prime minister, said Sarkar. The state government, however, says that it cannot act alone on a matter affecting the countrys border. "This is an international issue and Bangladesh must also be involved, and this could be done only through the Ministry of External Affairs, said Bhumidhar Barman, Assams revenue minister. He said he would take up the issue with the central government. (Reporting by Amarjyoti Borah; editing by James Baer and Laurie Goering :; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, climate change, women's rights, trafficking and corruption. Visit www.trust.org/climate)
When President Barack Obama announced his latest round of executive actions on Tuesday he said more research could help reduce gun violence. So why didn't he order the country's most prominent health and safety agency to start doing it?

The answer is because Obama's been there and tried that before. He attempted executive orders in the wake of the Sandy Hook elementary school shooting in 2012, including a direction to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to resume research into gun violence.

But it hasn't, and it doesn't look like it will start up again until Congress agrees to fund a program, and that appears to be a long shot.

The so-called ban on gun violence research at the CDC, America's premier national public health institute, remains firmly in place.

The reason is because, in the early 1990s, the CDC was accused by the National Rifle Association and other critics of promoting an anti-gun agenda, rather than conducting neutral research.

As a result, the Republican-controlled Congress stripped $2.7 million out of its budget in 1996, the amount that had been dedicated to gun violence research, and threatened further cuts.

A Republican congressman, Jay Dickey, also added an amendment that no CDC funds could be used to advocate or promote gun control. That language has been included in every annual appropriations bill since.

Obama's requests to Congress to earmark $10 million for gun violence research in CDC budgets have been rejected for the last three years.

Gun research a 'hot potato'

Mark Rosenberg was in charge of the CDC's National Center for Injury Control and Prevention in 1996 and fought to maintain the gun violence funding. It ultimately cost him his job when a new head of the CDC took over.

With no money dedicated for either in-house research or external grants, and people afraid of losing their jobs and more cuts, the research dried up.

"It's just I think that they feel it's too hot a potato for them to handle," Rosenberg said in an interview. "And if they can work in other priority areas of public health and global health that don't come with as much political baggage, then they'd prefer to do that."

Story continues

As the U.S. grapples with more than 30,000 gun-related deaths each year, and one mass shooting after another, Rosenberg said research could help answer some of the outstanding questions on gun violence.

"This is where we are really suffering in this country. The stopping of research by CDC stopped us from systematically finding out what works."

Would banning semi-automatic guns reduce mass shootings? Does licensing gun owners cut down on unintentional deaths? Would more people carrying concealed firearms lead to an increase or decrease in homicides?

"The basic questions that we know are so important, we don't know the answers," Rosenberg says.

Jeffrey Swanson, a professor and researcher at Duke University in North Carolina, says that when the CDC left the field of gun-related research, many other scholars did, too.

It had a "chilling effect," he said, adding that anything to do with guns is "politically radioactive" and that some academics saw engaging in that field of research as a "career killer."

Some research has gone on, Swanson says, but given the scale of the problem there should be much more, and the CDC should be playing a leading role.

"We need to focus on this in a way that is commensurate with the size and complexity of the problem."

CDC accused of anti-gun bias

The Dickey amendment shouldn't necessarily discourage the CDC from getting back into the field, as it only prevents research that promotes gun control. "There is an awful lot that can be done that doesn't meet that definition," Swanson says.

But Timothy Wheeler, the California physician who founded the group Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership, said in an interview that the CDC has "an institutional bias against gun ownership."

He testified before a congressional committee in 1996 about what he called "obvious, well-documented instances of blatant political advocacy for gun control" at the CDC.

Wheeler cites public comments by CDC staff, including Rosenberg, and to a study that Rosenberg co-authored, as examples of the CDC's anti-gun agenda. One of the study's recommendations to prevent firearm injuries was to prohibit gun ownership, he said, adding there is no reason to believe anything has changed at the CDC since the '90s.

"Congress should continue its policy of not allowing tax money to be spent on gun control advocacy at the CDC," said Wheeler.

However, Jay Dickey, the former Congressman who helped put the policy in place, has had a change of heart since he left Capitol Hill.

He and Rosenberg, once on opposite sides of the debate, later became friends and now write op-eds together calling on Congress "to let science thrive" and to resume funding for the CDC's gun research.

They argue that it's possible to do research that both protects the rights of gun owners and helps prevent gun violence. "We can do both, we absolutely can. But you need to do the research and try it out and see what works," said Rosenberg.

Science helped make cars, roads and drivers safer, reducing highway fatalities, said Rosenberg, and guns are no different.

"We can stop screaming and start saving lives and protecting gun rights."
By Kizito Makoye DAR ES SALAAM (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - As drought continues to cripple its hydropower plants, Tanzania is struggling to produce enough electricity  and is moving toward using more fossil fuels to make up the shortfall. Hydropower plants normally produce about 35 percent of Tanzanias electricity needs, with gas and oil plants making up most of the difference. But as demand grows and water shortages hit hydropower production, Tanesco  the state-run power utility firm  is investing in more fossil fuel plants to maintain its electricity supply. In October the east African nation was forced to shut down its main hydropower facility for nearly a month because the water level was too low to run the turbines, officials said. In December, the countrys hydropower plants, which can produce as much as 561 megawatts of power, generated only 110 megawatts, according to Tanesco. "The main challenge we have been facing is over reliance on hydropower as the major source of electricity, which is hard to maintain due to unpredictable weather, said Felchesmi Mramba, Tanescos managing director, in an interview. SOLAR, WIND UNTAPPED While Tanzania has significant untapped renewable energy potential from sources such as geothermal, solar and wind, the government has mostly failed to tap this potential as an alternative to hydropower, said Agnes Mwakaje a climate change expert at the Institute of Resources Assessment, at the University of Dar es Salaam. However, Sospeter Muhongo, Tanzanias minister for energy and minerals, said the government is keen to invest in alternative power production, including using wind and solar, to meet the hydropower shortfall and give hydropower dams time to refill. Mtera and Kidatu hydropower dams on the Great Ruaha River at one point shut down for three weeks because water levels fell below the minimum required, officials said. The water level in most of our hydropower dams is not sufficient to generate electricity, yet theres nothing we can do other than waiting for the rains to come, Mramba, of Tanesco, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. The hydropower shortfalls have led Tanesco to suffer losses of about 500 million Tanzanian shillings ($230,000) daily, Mramba said. In an effort to find a more reliable mix of energy sources, Tanesco is now building more gas-fired power plants, and looking at other renewable energy sources to supply the national grid. We are hoping to reduce hydropower dependence to 15 percent once our gas- fired plants become fully operational, Mramba said. According to Tanesco, gas power plants could provide 60 percent of the countrys electricity needs. Tanzanias government last year launched an electricity supply roadmap that aims to boost generating capacity from about 1,590 megawatts today to 10,800 megawatts in a decade, largely by building more gas and coal power plants. Analysts say diversifying power sources is crucial to avoiding shortages like that caused by the current drought. Tanesco must use an energy mix in the order of priority to include natural gas, coal, hydro and renewables if it has to make electricity generation sustainable, said Haji Semboja, an economics professor at the University of Dar es Salaam. Natural gas can keep electricity flowing when the sun doesnt shine and the wind fails to blow. You can switch it on and off pretty quickly, he said. Tanzania might also consider importing electricity from large-scale hydropower projects in Ethiopia, Muhongo said. DIRTY BUT CHEAP Although Tanzania has for many years depended on hydropower, the countrys electricity generation has moved increasingly toward gas over the last decade after off-shore gas deposits were discovered near Mtwara, on the southeast coast. Today, oil and gas facilities account for 63 percent of the countrys power generating capacity, compared to 36 percent for hydropower, the government said. Tanzania has more than 58 trillion cubic feet of gas, equivalent to 9.2 billion barrel of oil, according to the Ministry of Energy and Minerals. The country also has 1.9 billion tons of coal that could also be used to generate electricity, the ministry said. Ministry officials say that Tanzania, facing power shortages, should consider increasing its use of coal to produce electricity, even though burning coal is a major driver of climate change. It is the dirtiest but cheapest source of energy. Many countries are still producing their electricity almost entirely from coal. So why not Tanzania? asked Hosea Mbise, commissioner for petroleum and energy at the Ministry of Energy and Minerals. But the government is also planning to use some solar, wind and geothermal power in its energy mix. A $132 million, 50-megawatt wind facility is being built, Mbise said, and the country hopes to win funding from the African Development Bank to develop geothermal plants. About 36 percent of Tanzanians have access to electricity, and only 7 percent of those are in rural areas, according to the ministry. It said demand for electricity is growing between 10 and 15 percent a year. (Reporting by Kizito Makoye; editing by Laurie Goering :; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, climate change, women's rights, trafficking and corruption. Visit www.trust.org/climate)
The Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn is to hold his first formal talks with Britain's biggest employers' group this week almost four months after his election to the role.

Sky News has learnt that Mr Corbyn is scheduled to meet Carolyn Fairbairn, the CBI director-general, towards the end of the week.

The meeting will take place against a backdrop of criticism of Labour's business policies and its leader's reluctance to engage with major business groups.

Mr Corbyn turned down invitations to speak at the annual conferences of both the CBI and the Institute of Directors, which took place soon after he replaced Ed Miliband as the Labour leader.

Mr Miliband had unnerved business leaders with his threat before last year's General Election to impose a price freeze on energy companies and to break up the biggest UK banks in an effort to spark new competition.

Since becoming leader, Mr Corbyn and his Shadow Cabinet have said little about their broad approach to wealth creation and the private sector, although they have robustly opposed the Government's latest privatisation spree, which includes the planned sale of the state's remaining stake in National Air Traffic Services.

Ms Fairbairn, who took over at the CBI towards the end of last year, has met with Angela Eagle, the shadow business secretary, since both women assumed their current roles.

This week's meeting with Mr Corbyn will allow the Labour leader an opportunity to highlight discontent in the business community about a string of measures announced last year by George Osborne, the Chancellor, including the new National Living Wage and a new levy to fund apprenticeships.

The CBI, which is politically neutral, has itself faced accusations from anti-Europe protesters who believe that it is too closely aligned with the campaign to keep Britain in the European Union.

With (Other OTC: WWTH - news) a referendum on UK membership expected to take place as early as this summer, the main employers' groups see retaining a close dialogue with the major political parties as particularly central to their 2016 agendas.

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"Its important for the CBI to continue to have good relationships with all the main elected political parties and for the country to have a strong opposition," a CBI spokesman said on Monday.

"We look forward to working with the Labour Leader and colleagues to promote pro-growth policies that will benefit everyone."

Labour did not respond to a request for comment.
Riot police have fired water cannon at a rally held by the far-right PEGIDA group after protesters threw fire crackers and beer bottles at officers in Cologne.

Three police officers and a journalist have been wounded in the clashes, and a number of arrests have been made.

The demonstrators were ordered to return to a square near Cologne's main train station, where they set out on a planned march through the city.

The rally comes as German Chancellor Angela Merkel backed a crackdown on convicted refugees after a wave of sex assaults on New Year's Eve which were blamed largely on foreigners.

The reports of attacks on women in Cologne by gangs of men described by police as mostly of "Arab or North African" origin has led to calls for stricter measures in Germany, which took nearly 1.1 million migrants last year.

Cologne police say the number of cases filed over violence during New Year's celebrations near the city's twin-spired Gothic cathedral has risen to 379, adding that asylum seekers and illegal migrants make up the majority of suspects.

"Those in focus of criminal police investigations are mostly people from North African countries," police said in a statement.

"The majority of them are asylum seekers and people who are in Germany illegally."

Police added that around 40% of the cases relate to sexual assault.

The assaults have heightened tensions over immigration and fuelled criticism of Mrs Merkel's refusal to cap the number of migrants entering the country.

Speaking at a meeting of the Christian Democrats on Saturday, Mrs Merkel said: "If a refugee flouts the rules, then there must be consequences, that means that they can lose their residence right here regardless of whether they have a suspended sentence or a prison sentence.

"Serial offenders who consistently, for example, return to theft or time and again insult women must count on the force of the law."

She added: "This is in the interests of the citizens of Germany, but also in the interests of the great majority of the refugees who are here."

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Under current laws, asylum seekers are only deported if they have been sentenced to jail terms of at least three years, and if their lives are not at risk in their countries of origin.

As well as reducing the deportation threshold, the proposal put forward by Mrs Merkel's party would also strengthen the ability of police to conduct checks of identity papers.

The city's chief of police was sacked for his handling of the incidents amid claims officers covered up the involvement of large groups of migrants.

Earlier in the week, German police said they had identified 32 people who were suspected of playing a role in the Cologne attacks of whom 22 were asylum seekers.

Mrs Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) party has said it aims to reduce and control migration to Germany.

The proposal did note "a continuation of the current influx would overwhelm the state and society even in a country like Germany in the long run".
Hundreds demonstrate in Cologne as Merkel pledges new laws following New Year's Eve assaults

COLOGNE, Germany - Women's rights activists, far-right demonstrators and leftwing counter-protesters took to the streets of Cologne on Saturday to voice their opinions in the debate that has followed a string of New Year's Eve sexual assaults and robberies blamed largely on foreigners.

Amid the heightened public pressure, Chancellor Angela Merkel's party proposed stricter laws regulating asylum-seekers in the country  some 1.1 million of whom arrived last year.

Police said that around 1,700 protesters from the anti-Islam PEGIDA movement were kept apart from 1,300 counter-demonstrators in simultaneous protests outside the city's main train station.

PEGIDA members held banners with slogans like "RAPEfugees not welcome" and "Integrate barbarity?" while the counter-protesters pushed the message "refugees welcome."

Specifics of the New Year's Eve assaults and who were behind them are still being investigated. The attackers were among about 1,000 men gathered at Cologne's central train station, some of whom broke off into small groups and surrounded women, groping them and stealing their purses, cellphones and other belongings, according to authorities and witness reports. There are also two allegations of rape.

The PEGIDA demonstration Saturday was shut down early by authorities using water cannons after protesters threw firecrackers and bottles at some of the 1,700 police on hand. Police said four people were taken into custody but no injuries were immediately reported.

Earlier, hundreds of women's rights activists gathered outside Cologne's landmark cathedral to rally against the New Year's Eve violence.

"It's about making clear that we will not stop moving around freely here in Cologne, and to protest against victim bashing and the abuse of women," said 50-year-old city resident Ina Wolf.

In response to the incidents, Merkel said her CDU party on Saturday had approved a proposal seeking stricter laws regulating asylum seekers.

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Merkel said the proposal, which will be discussed with her coalition partners and would need parliamentary approval, would help Germany deport "serial offenders" convicted of lesser crimes.

"This is in the interests of the citizens of Germany, but also in the interests of the great majority of the refugees who are here," Merkel told party members in Mainz.

However, she also reiterated her mantra on the refugee issue, insisting again "we will manage it."

Bonn University political scientist Tilman Mayer said he doesn't see the CDU proposal as either a change of course, nor one likely to dispel many Germans' concerns.

"This is just a building block in a chain of statements from the government and also the chancellor," he said on Phoenix television.

Though Merkel has decried the assaults as "repugnant criminal acts that ... Germany will not accept," they provide fodder for those who have opposed her open-door policy and refusal to set a cap on refugee numbers.

Influential Hamburg broadcaster NDR said in an opinion piece posted online Friday that such crimes threaten to push xenophobia toward the "middle of the population"  which could lead to a backlash against refugees.

"And who is to blame mainly?" the editorial asked. "These young, testosterone-driven time bombs with their image of women from the Middle Ages."

Despite the harsh rhetoric, the case is not yet that clear and the investigation is ongoing.

Of 31 suspects temporarily detained for questioning following the New Year's Eve attacks, there were 18 asylum seekers but also two Germans and an American among others, and none were accused of specifically committing sexual assaults.

Cologne police on Saturday said more than 100 detectives are assigned to the case and are investigating 379 criminal complaints filed with them, about 40 per cent of which involve allegations of sexual offences.

"The people in the focus of the criminal investigation are primarily from North African countries," police said. "Most are asylum seekers or people living illegally in Germany. The investigation into if, and how widely, these people were involved in concrete criminal activity on New Year's Eve is ongoing."

Witness Lieli Shabani told the Guardian newspaper the attacks appeared co-ordinated, saying she watched from the steps of the city's cathedral as three men appeared to be giving instructions to others.

"One time a group of three or four males would come up to them, be given instructions and sent away into the crowd," the 35-year-old teacher was quoted as saying. "Then another group of four or five would come up, and they'd gesticulate in various directions and send them off again."

National broadcaster ARD called the attacks a "wake-up call" that illuminates the difficulty that lies ahead for Germany of integrating the newcomers.

"But we must not give in to our fears," ARD said. "If we now take all the refugees into custody, if we erect fences around our homes and country, if we join the swing to the right that some of our neighbours have, then we give up all we have achieved."

Cologne's police chief was dismissed Friday amid mounting criticism of his force's handling of the incidents, and for being slow with releasing information.

Speaking in Mainz, Merkel said local authorities must not be perceived to be withholding information and urged that the case be "fully clarified."

"Everything has to be put on the table," she said.

The proposal passed by her CDU party's leaders would strengthen the ability of police to conduct checks of identity papers, and also to exclude foreigners from being granted asylum if they have been convicted of crimes and sentenced to terms even as light as probation.

"Serial offenders who consistently, for example, return to theft or time and again insult women must count on the force of the law," Merkel said.

___

Rising reported from Berlin.
Canada must become a "world leader" in stamping out radicalization, because our open, tolerant society is at stake, says Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale.

In a wide-ranging interview with CBC News Network's Power & Politics, Goodale said Canada must become the "best in the world" at community outreach, engagement and counter-radicalization to avert a fundamental threat to Canadian values.

"We're an open society, we're one of the most plural societies in the world; the most inclusive, the most tolerant. In order to preserve that nature of our country, we need to be among the best in the world at identifying radicalization and the techniques for countering radicalization and working with all other Canadians to make sure that's effective," he told host Rosemary Barton.

Goodale could not provide the current number of individuals considered home-grown militants or "foreign fighters."

But he said the government will make a "vigorous" effort to stamp out radicalization. The minister's mandate letter includes an order to create an Office of the Community Outreach and Counter-radicalization Co-ordinator.

More money for the RCMP

Goodale also promised the Mounties would have the necessary resources to keep up the fight. Last year, RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson said he was forced to divert 600 officers from white-collar crime and fraud files to focus on national security investigations.

"We cannot have a situation where your national police force has got to rob Peter to pay Paul," he said. "When we call upon them to perform serious functions in the name of national security, crime prevention, law enforcement and all the other important things that they do, they need to have the physical resources, including budget, to do that well."

Goodale is travelling to London next week for meetings on counter-terrorism, violent extremism and cybersecurity. He will also be gathering information about United Kingdom's Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament as he prepares to adopt a similar model for Canadian parliamentarians.

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Parliamentary oversight for security agencies

Goodale did not provide a time frame of when a committee will be struck, but told Power & Politics that an all-party committee will be sworn to secrecy to monitor activities of Canada's security agencies to ensure they are effective and respecting fundamental rights.

Right now, he said, Canada is an "anomaly" in that it does not have a parliamentary oversight body like those in the U.K., U.S., Australia and New Zealand.

"We'll be following their examples to make sure Canada has this kind of review mechanism in place to ensure we're being effective in keeping Canadians safe, and at the same time protecting rights and values," he said.

The Security Intelligence Review Committee, a civilian oversight body, will remain with an enhanced mandate.

Goodale said the government is committed to repealing key elements of the anti-terrorism legislation known as Bill C-51, including protecting civil protests and better defining "propaganda" and the expanded no-fly list.

No-fly list flaws

Responding to questions about recent media reports about children and others erroneously tagged on the no-fly list and flagged as national security risks, Goodale said existing regulations do not require secondary screening for children under 18 years of age. Airlines may be "going beyond what they are required to do," he said.

"They may have been misinformed or confused about the application of the rules."

Goodale also provided more details on ways the government could strengthen the no-fly list to ensure children aren't erroneously barred from flights or subject to secondary screening.

"It may be the date of birth is the right technique. It may be the SIN [social insurance number], it could be a unique PIN identifier," he said. "But we do need to have other means than the name alone, which can result in great inadvertent confusion."

And on the legalization of marijuana, Goodale said the government will ensure it takes a methodical approach that keeps public safety in mind, including the risks with impaired driving.

MADD Canada is warning that police officers must be equipped with new technology, training and tools to keep pot-impaired drivers off the roads.

"Before any discussion begins about legalizing marijuana, the federal government needs to give police enforcement officers the ability to do saliva testing at roadside to detect drug impaired drivers, similar to the testing for alcohol," CEO Andrew Murie told CBC News. "Without this measure, legalization of marijuana will lead to more impaired driving crashes, deaths and injuries. "
By Angus Berwick MADRID (Reuters) - The leader of Spain's opposition Socialist party, Pedro Sanchez, ruled out a pact with the ruling People's Party during a visit to Portugal on Thursday to study its leftist coalition government's success in booting out a right-wing leader. The centre-right People's Party (PP) failed to win a majority of seats in last month's indecisive general election and its return to government is dependent on forming a German-style grand coalition with the second-placed Socialists to break the political deadlock. "We say 'no' to a grand coalition between the PP and the Socialists, and we say 'yes' to a government that brings together all the progressive forces that want to change Spain and repair the damage the right wing has done over the last four years," Sanchez told a news conference in Lisbon. Socialists and hard-left parties in neighboring Portugal joined forces in November to oust a centre-right government which had won the most votes in an October election but had also lost its parliamentary majority. "What is clear is that when the forces for change join together the people reap the benefits, and Portugal's government is the best evidence of this," Sanchez said after meeting Prime Minister Antonio Costa. Sanchez's PSOE lost much of its support to the anti-austerity party Podemos in the election, but the two might be able to form a coalition along with small regional parties to oust acting Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's PP. However, matters are complicated by Podemos' support for a referendum on independence in Catalonia, which the Socialists have said is unacceptable. The PP criticized Sanchez's overtures to Podemos and said a leftist coalition would be "electoral fraud" as it would be against the Spanish vote. "It would be smart for Sanchez to correct himself, instead of continuing to say 'no,' and be open to agreements and talks (with the PP)," Rafael Hernando, the party's spokesman in congress, told Cadena Ser radio. Earlier on Thursday, Alberto Rivera, leader of the newcomer centrist party Ciudadanos, dismissed comparisons of the Spanish political situation with Portugal because of the Catalan issue. "As far as I know, there is no party in Portugal that wants to break up Portugal. In Spain, there are parties that want to break up Spain," he told reporters at the parliament in Madrid. Rivera, whose party failed to secure enough seats to play a king-maker role, suggested a minority government might be the answer. (Additional reporting by Angus MacSwan and Blanca Rodriguez; Editing by Sonya Dowsett and Andrew Roche)
Police in Guyana have arrested two people in connection with the disappearance of a British teenager.

Dominic Bernard, a 19-year-old from Epsom, flew to the South American country on 14 October last year.

He was set to fly back to England on 5 November but never boarded his flight.

He was in Guyana to visit his godbrother, Aaron Hing, 22.

Mr Hing and another man have now been arrested over Mr Bernard's disappearance.

Police Chief Wendell Blanhum said Hing was arrested as he tried to check into a hotel early on Saturday.

Hing and Mr Bernard, who had reportedly never been to Guyana before, were close, police said.

A Foreign Office spokeswoman said: "We can confirm that a British national has been reported missing in Georgetown, Guyana.

"Embassy staff are in contact with the local authorities and we are providing consular assistance to the family."

After Mr Bernard vanished, his father Andrew Bernard flew to Guyana to appeal for any help in finding his son.

An appeal posted on social media earlier this month said the teenager's family was "extremely worried".

The appeal said: "It would appear that no one picked him up from the airport and that he went missing before he managed to make contact with his friend.

"He didn't take any credit cards with him but was travelling with a large amount of loose cash.

"His family and friends are inevitably extremely worried.

"His father, a Jamaican, is now in Guyana trying to find him but having never been to Guyana before needs all the help he can get."
Spokesman of Presidential Administration for Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) Andriy Lysenko has confirmed the reports that militants illegally detained OSCE SMM observers, searched them and let them go only after that.

Being asked during a briefing in Kyiv on Saturday about authenticity of such information, he said: "This is information contained in the official report of the OSCE mission. It will be transferred to the chief headquarters of the OSCE and the respective conclusions will be made, in particular I think we will inform Russia Federation, which in fact backs these illegal armed formations," Lysenko added.

The OSCE SMM in its report for January 7 posted on its website the day after said that armed members of self-proclaimed 'Donetsk People's Republic' stopped an SMM patrol in Horlivka (39km north-east of Donetsk) and forced the SMM monitors to the ground. The SMM vehicle was searched for video material and SMM monitors were taken to a military-type building. Upon arrival of a 'DPR commander', who apologized for the situation, the monitors were released after 35 minutes.
By Girish Gupta CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela's government upped the ante against the new opposition-led Congress on Thursday with a protest against the removal of images of venerated late socialist leader Hugo Chavez and a legal appeal against the swearing-in of three legislators. Irked by this week's unceremonious removal of the giant Chavez photos from Congress, his successor President Nicolas Maduro had them displayed in a Caracas plaza under military guard and officials vowed to plaster the country with more. "I've given the order that in the coming hours all the streets of Caracas, all the poles, all the fences, have the image of our liberator Simon Bolivar and the image of our Father Chavez," said Socialist Party heavyweight Jorge Rodriguez, with hundreds of government supporters at a Caracas square. The furor symbolizes the ballooning confrontation between Venezuela's opposition, in control of the National Assembly for the first time in nearly 17 years, and Maduro's government. Officials were infuriated by a video of Henry Ramos, the rambunctious new 72-year-old president of the Assembly, telling workers earlier this week to rid the building of Chavez imagery, and adding: "This isn't a cemetery." Maduro has called for nationwide protests. "He doesn't respect the noble sentiment of millions of Venezuelans, the noble memory of a man who died," Maduro said on Wednesday LEGAL APPEAL In another line of attack, pro-government lawmakers filed a complaint of disobedience at the Supreme Court against the assembly's new leadership for swearing-in three opposition lawmakers whose election the tribunal had suspended. The opposition coalition won a two-thirds majority with 112 seats in the Dec. 6 legislative election. But the Supreme Court subsequently barred four lawmakers - including one from the Socialist Party - after allegations of voting irregularities in the jungle state of Amazonas. The opposition swore its three in anyway. Though Maduro's popularity has sunk during an economic crisis, millions of poor Venezuelans still revere his predecessor Chavez for his folksy charisma and oil-fueled social programs. Many were upset by the Ramos video, which will not help the opposition's push to lure disenchanted "Chavistas". "This video shows exactly what this so-called change is all about," said Gloria Torres, 54, who organized vigils for Chavez before his death in 2013. "Such arrogance." The opposition, however, who says Chavez ruined the economy while behaving like a dictator, is aghast at the personality cult. His images and signature still adorn T-shirts and walls across the country. (Editing by Alexandra Ulmer, Andrew Cawthorne and Andrew Hay)
By Norihiko Shirouzu BEIJING (Reuters) - As part of a broader makeover, and even the survival, of its stalled luxury Acura brand, Japan's Honda Motor Co <7267.T> will launch a new small crossover sport utility vehicle this year in China to compete with BMW and Audi in the world's biggest car market, two individuals closely involved in the effort said. Reviving Acura is one of the biggest challenges facing Takahiro Hachigo, who took over as Honda CEO last year. The brand has struggled to carve out a clear identity as a sporty, high-performance luxury label. Since entering China a decade ago, Acura has struggled, selling just over 4,000 cars last year compared with BMW's 460,000 and Audi's 554,000. And in the United States, where Acura debuted three decades ago, sales have failed to top the 201,000 cars it sold as far back as 2006, according to industry consultant IHS. Sales last year were 179,000, around half the number of cars sold by both BMW and Toyota Motor's <7203.T> Lexus luxury marque. That revival effort will kick off with production mid this year of a China-only subcompact crossover SUV at a jointly-run plant with Guangzhou Automobile Group <601238.SS>. The new model will have a "crisp, more expressive" style - the result of four years of effort by Honda product planners and engineers - said the two individuals, who asked not to be named as they are not authorized to speak to the media. "We don't have a strong brand with Acura in China. Our next move could be make or break," one of the individuals said. A Beijing-based Honda spokeswoman said the new Acura crossover SUV is being developed specially for China and demonstrates the company's commitment to that market. One of the knowledgeable individuals said Acura's China sales unit reckons it could eventually sell about 30,000 of the new crossover SUVs a year. But the new model's significance goes beyond China, with the styling of the China-only car highlighting the signature feature of a broader Acura makeover. While the under-wraps China model is unlikely to be unveiled before the Beijing autoshow in April, hints of the new Acura styling should be on show in Detroit on Tuesday. In an e-mailed response to queries, California-based Honda spokeswoman Jessica Fini declined to comment on Acura's product plans, but noted a new concept model to be unveiled at the Detroit autoshow "previews the (brand's) future design direction," and "expresses performance through design". "NO MORE SMILEY FACE" Honda's leadership, already battling a crisis over potentially lethal air bags made by supplier Takata Corp <7312.T>, is aware that a failed makeover could render Acura a "Mercury of Honda," one of the individuals said, referring to the entry-level luxury brand Ford Motor Co killed off in 2010 after years of dwindling sales. Part of the Acura identity issue is that there is little to differentiate between the upscale brand and mainstream Honda cars, with a quiet recognition inside Honda that Acura cars are in many cases merely "re-badged" Honda cars, the two individuals said. "Styling cues in Honda and Acura cars have become more and more common," said one of the knowledgeable individuals. Some Honda cars' strong character lines, he said, are often quickly borrowed by Acura, or the other way around, giving both brands a "family resemblance". "Where's our discipline in that?" he said. The new styling direction under Acura's global design chief Dave Marek will allow Acura to have a new, more sporty look, the people said, making it stand out from Honda models. "No more smiley face," one of the two people said, referring to a common perception of the Acura look. "If you want to be a performance oriented brand, you should not come across as a clown. You should be serious, even mean," he added. CLOSING DOORS Beyond styling, the new Acura model for China is likely to pack more luxury technologies and features, boasting a turbo-charged, 4-cylinder engine and 10-speed automatic transmission, giving it a "more lively character and a spirited and engaged driver feel," said one of the individuals, adding it was aimed at taking on rival BMW X1 and Audi Q3 models. Honda wants Acura to compete better in China's growing market for small, premium crossover SUVs market, but acknowledges its cars need more "upscale quality" - through seemingly small improvements such as the sound the doors make when they are closed, the people said. The new subcompact crossover will be loosely based on Honda's existing Vezel and HR-V SUVs that are sold around the world. Acura is sold in only two major markets, China and the United States, with limited availability also in Canada and a few other countries. Industry experts are puzzled at Honda's failure to make Acura a stand-out performance car - especially given its relative success as a Formula One engine supplier. "It's strange it has taken this long for Honda," said Bumsuk Lim, a Shanghai-based consultant who worked at Honda's Tokyo design studio during the 1990s. "It's not as if Acura doesn't have a design heritage. They had this great second-generation Acura Legend coupe, which was seen at the time as a Japanese BMW." (Reporting by Norihiko Shirouzu; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)
By Angeliki Koutantou

ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece's leftist government will be able to push through a crucial pension reform in parliament, part of measures the country has agreed to under its international bailout, the deputy prime minister said in a newspaper interview released on Saturday.

Greece has drafted a proposal to overhaul its ailing pension system, which envisages merging all six pension funds into one and a possible cut of future main pensions by up to 30 percent. It plans to submit the proposal to parliament by the end of the month and to hold a vote on it in early February.

Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras's government has a parliamentary majority of just three seats and the reform, which opposition parties and many pensioners and workers oppose, will test its resolve to implement actions agreed with international creditors.

Asked whether Tsipras' ruling coalition has secured enough support from lawmakers for the reform, Deputy Prime Minister Yannis Dragasakis said in an interview with Avgi newspaper: "The government has a strong and solid (parliamentary) majority."

"But passing the relevant law won't be enough," he said, adding that the government should also secure backing from workers and political parties to implement the changes.

Hundreds of Greek pensioners and workers marched in central Athens on Friday to protest against the plan, which is part of a package of reforms Athens needs to implement to conclude the first review of its 86 billion-euro (64.7 billion) bailout and start debt relief talks.

A representative of the country's international lenders said on Saturday that the review could be wrapped up within a reasonable time frame as long as Greece stuck to its reform programme.

"The Greek government demonstrated a certain degree of commitment to delivering on its mandate to implement the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) which was agreed last August with the other euro area governments," the ECB's Monetary Policy Strategy division head Rasmus Rueffer said in an interview with Proto Thema newspaper.

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"I trust that this commitment prevails and that the first review will be concluded within a reasonable time frame."

WAIVER FOR GREEK BONDS

Rueffer said that the ECB would consider reinstating a waiver of Greek bonds, which would mean letting Greek banks again swap their country's government bonds for ultra-cheap ECB funding, and including the securities in the euro zone's central bank bond purchasing scheme "once the conditions are right".

He also said that International Monetary Fund's full participation in the Greek programme would "be highly desirable".

The IMF said last year it would wait to see the outcome of Greece's debt relief talks with EU partners before agreeing to inject new cash as part of the country's bailout programme.

Tsipras last month accused the fund of making unrealistic reform demands but eurozone officials have ruled out the fund's exclusion from the bailout.

As Greece seeks support at home and in Europe, Finance Minister Euclides Tsakalotos met Italian Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan on Friday in Rome to discuss the timetable for completion of the first review and debt reprofiling.

He discussed investments, unemployment and the banking union with his Portuguese counterpart Mario Centeno on Saturday, a Greek finance ministry official said.

Greece's mountain of debt is expected to reach 187.8 percent of annual gross domestic product this year.

Dragasakis said that the Greek debt issue was a European problem which should be mutualised.

But if European leaders were reluctant to consider a radical solution at this point, then Greece should seek "a temporary solution, which will make sure that debt and its servicing expenses will not hinder long-term borrowing, investment and social policies, as it is the case now", he said.

Rueffer said that euro zone partners have made clear that a nominal debt "haircut" was not an option. However, there was room for an extension of maturities and grace periods, he said.

(Reporting by Angeliki Koutantou; Editing by Digby Lidstone)
Ukrainian Ambassador to Italy Yevhen Perelyhin has addressed to Limes Italian edition demanding to correct a mistake on the map published by the edition that designates Crimea as a part of Russia.

"Taking into account a tactless designation of Crimea on the map of Russian Federation in the fresh issue of Italy's Limes analytical edition ( https:// mobile. twitter. com/ limeso.../ status/682186628580950017), Ukraine's ambassador to Italy demanded the magazine's editorial staff to bring the maps in line with the norms of the international law," reads a report posted on Ukrainian Foreign Ministry's website on Facebook on Saturday.

The Ukrainian diplomat in his letter also said that such indication on the map is a technical mistake or a deliberate provocation, which "regarded as a challenge to territorial integrity of Ukraine that ignores a consolidated position of EU and UN on non-recognition of Crimea's occupation by Russia."
European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has warned that a Dutch advisory referendum in April on the EU bloc's Association Agreement with Ukraine could lead to a "continental crisis" if voters reject the treaty.

In an interview published by the Dutch daily NRC Handelsblad on Saturday, Juncker said Russia would "pluck the fruits" of a vote in the Netherlands against deepened ties between the European Union and Ukraine.

"I want the Dutch to understand that the importance of this question goes beyond the Netherlands," NRC quoted Juncker as saying. "I don't believe the Dutch will say no, because it would open the door to a big continental crisis," he added.

As reported, public-initiated referendum on Ukraine-EU Association Agreement in the Netherlands on April 6, 2016 is not of obligatory character. However, if the majority of Dutch say no, the government will have to "revise its decision."

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Dutch Foreign Minister Bert Koenders said in January that the Dutch government planned to hold a promotion campaign for Ukraine before the referendum.
On Saturday, militants shelled the village of Zaitseve (not far from militants-controlled Horlivka), a local woman was wounded, an anti-terrorist operation (ATO) centre HQ reported.

"On January 9, in the first half of the day the criminals of one of the illegal armed formations of Russian terrorist troops with small arms and grenade launchers shelled the village of Zaitseve, which lies to north from occupied Horlivka. As a result of this armed provocation a local resident was injured," reads a report from the press centre posted on Facebook.

The headquarters stressed that due to fake media, self-declared 'Donetsk People's Republic' accuses Ukrainian defenders of the shell attacks.

Besides, according to the militants, they helped an inured woman, however, these were Ukrainian military men, who rendered a medical aid to her, and evacuated other local residents from the dangerous place, the ATO press centre said.

Previously, the 'military administration of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic' said Ukrainian military opened fire on the part of the settlement Zaitseve.

The Donetsk news agency reported, citing a source in the so-called 'DPR law enforcement structures', that a local resident, a woman, has been wounded.
Olivia Culpo Supports Steve Harvey After Miss Universe 2015 Pageant Gaffe

Weeks after her relationship with Tim Tebow was revealed to not be much of a relationship at all, Olivia Culpo was one of the witnesses to Steve Harvey's pageant faux pas on Sunday nigh

The former Miss Universe served as a judge for the Miss Universe 2015 pageant, along with Perez Hilton, Niecy Nash, and Emmitt Smith.

Harvey announced Miss Colombia, Ariadna Gutierrez, as the winner, when really Miss Philippines, Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach, was the victor.

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"Poor Steve Harvey!!! But at least he did the right thing and rectified the situation #MissUniverse2015," the Former Miss Universe and Miss Rhode Island USA Olivia Culpo tweeted

Miss Philippines Pia Wurtzbach was crowned Miss Universe on December 20, but Pageant host Steve Harvey first named Miss Colombia Adriadna Gutierrez as the new Miss Universe before he realized he made a mistake.

Moments after Steve Harvey crowned Miss Colombia the winner of the Miss Universe title he took it back and announced the Miss Universe winner was actually Miss Philippines, not Miss Colombia, leading to suggestions that the two women share the crown.

The former Miss Philippines understood the gaffe.

"The way it was written, it was a little confusing," she said. "I understand. It was his first time to judge a pageant, but it's OK. He's human. People make mistakes."

Miss Colombia Ariadna Gutierrez revealed that she "cried a ton" after she was declared the winner of the Miss Universe pageant by host Steve Harvey

"I went up to my parents' room and, obviously, I was very sad, I was in bad shape, I was crying. I cried a ton that night," the 22-year-old Gutierrez Spanish-language network Univision.

Miss Colombia Ariadna Gutierrez is in favor of splitting the title.

"It was very humiliating for me, but also for the whole country and for all the people not only from Colombia but the other Latinos that were in the auditorium," Gutierrez was recently quoted in a radio station interview.

Pia Angela Alonzo Wurtzbach was born on September 24, 1989. She was once professionally known as Pia Romero. The new Miss Universe is a Filipina-German actress, model and beauty queen who was crowned Binibining Pilipinas 2015 on March 15, 2015.

"Immediately after it happened, they asked the pageant people to come to the press conference," Harvey admitted on his first Steve Harvey Morning Show segment of the New Year.

"I wasn't scheduled to be at a press conference, so I went to the press conference and made all the apologies there ... Here's the situation: Now, when the mistake was made, when I said the wrong woman's name, I can only give information I had. No one knows, and that information is not in the teleprompter because you've got two women standing there. I read what was on the teleprompter, then I read what was on the card."

Harvey took to Twitter to apologize for the mistake.

Tim Tebow and Olivia Culpo split over his Christian values, according to gossip sites. It seems the backfield wasn't in motion. Will Tim and Olivia work things out or go back to the showers?

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Tehran (AFP) - Anti-Saudi demonstrators took to the streets of Tehran to protest Riyadh's execution of a prominent Shiite cleric and after Iran accused its rival of bombing its embassy in Yemen.

Shiites also protested in the Saudi city of Qatif, near the hometown of the executed sheikh, Nimr al-Nimr, while in the Pakistani capital 1,500 people rallied against his execution.

The festering diplomatic crisis between the Middle East's leading Sunni and Shiite Muslim powers has raised sectarian tensions across the region and complicated efforts to resolve conflicts in Syria and Yemen.

In a development that could further strain relations, Saudi media reported Friday that four Iranians would go on trial in the kingdom, one for spying and the other three for "terrorism".

Around 1,000 protestors marched through Tehran chanting "death to Al-Saud" -- Riyadh's ruling family, according to an AFP photographer.

Others shouted "death to America" and "death to Israel", frequent rallying cries at demonstrations in Iran.

Some carried placards with the picture of Nimr, the cleric and activist whose execution by Saudi Arabia on Saturday unleashed a wave of anger across the Shiite world.

Relations between the longtime adversaries hit a fresh low Thursday when Iran accused Saudi warplanes of deliberately targeting its embassy in Sanaa, damaging the property and seriously wounding a security guard.

The Saudi-led coalition battling Iran-backed rebels in Yemen denied carrying out an attack and insisted the diplomatic mission was "safe", but Tehran said it would take the matter to the UN Security Council.

- 'Delusional hype' -

Iran said it did not want to escalate tensions in the Middle East, but Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon that Riyadh was "spreading delusional hype about Iran" and accused the kingdom of "sectarian hate-mongering".

Story continues

The Yemeni conflict, which pits Shiite Huthi rebels against pro-government forces backed by Riyadh and other Gulf Arab states, is one of the main sources of dispute between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

During weekly prayers in Tehran, influential cleric Ayatollah Mohammad Emami Kashani told worshippers that Riyadh, along with Israel and the United States, was responsible for "all crimes committed against Muslims".

"The Zionist regime plans, the US supports and Saudi Arabia sources the necessary funds," Kashani said, according to state news agency IRNA.

Shiite protesters in eastern Saudi Arabia called Friday for the "death" of the Sunni-majority kingdom's ruling Al-Saud family at a rally to honour Nimr, a witness said.

Pictures from the city of Qatif showed what appeared to be hundreds of demonstrators, many clad in black.

Around 1,500 people also rallied in Islamabad against the execution.

Nimr was executed along with 46 other prisoners who Riyadh said were "terrorists".

In response, protesters in Iran stormed and set fire to the Saudi embassy in Tehran and consulate in the second city of Mashhad.

Iran denounced those attacks, but the repercussions quickly rippled across the region and beyond with Saudi allies Bahrain, Djibouti, Somalia and Sudan following Riyadh's example and cutting diplomatic ties with Tehran.

At the same time, the United Arab Emirates has downgraded relations with Iran, while Kuwait and Qatar have recalled their ambassadors.

- Opposing sides -

Iran hit back Thursday by announcing a ban on imports from the kingdom, which will reportedly affect goods worth about $40 million (37 million euros).

The latest crisis threatens a fragile UN-backed initiative to end the war in Yemen, where the world body says at least 2,795 civilians have been killed since March.

Special UN envoy for Yemen Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed arrived in Riyadh Friday to meet Yemeni Prime Minister Khaled Bahah, the government's delegation to the talks and political party leaders, as well as senior Saudi officials, the UN said in Geneva.

Iran and Saudi Arabia also support opposing sides in Syria. Tehran is providing military assistance to close ally President Bashar al-Assad against rebel groups, some backed by Saudi Arabia.

The growing tensions have heaped doubt on a UN-backed plan that foresees talks between the Syrian sides this month in a bid to end a war that has claimed more than a quarter of a million lives.

Saudi media said that the four Iranians set to stand trial in Saudi Arabia were arrested in 2013 and 2014, but they were not identified nor were the charges against them spelled out.
By Andy Sullivan, Julia Edwards and Patrick Rucker WASHINGTON (Reuters) - As the armed occupation of U.S. federal buildings in rural Oregon drags on, some blame the U.S. government for failing to arrest anti-government lawbreakers in western United States after the last big standoff in 2014. Some former federal officials and lawmakers say they believe anti-government lawbreakers have been emboldened by the Justice Department's failure to prosecute rancher Cliven Bundy, whose 2014 standoff with the government over Nevada grazing rights ended with federal agents backing down in the face of about 1,000 armed militiamen. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been building a case against participants in that dispute, according to federal and local officials. But prosecutors have yet to bring charges and no arrests of Bundy, his family or others have been made. Bundy's sons, Ammon and Ryan Bundy, are now leading a small group of armed protesters in rural Oregon who seized a federal wildlife center on Saturday in an attempt to win greater local control over federal land. "If people feel like there's no repercussions for their actions, especially if they're acting illegally, it does embolden them," said Bob Abbey, who led the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from 2009 to 2012. "Two years should be sufficient time for bringing people to justice." Cliven Bundy's long-running dispute with the BLM over grazing fees turned into a rallying point for the far right in 2014, when hundreds of heavily armed paramilitary activists flocked to his Nevada ranch to prevent federal agents from seizing his cattle. Bundy's sons were also photographed participating in the dispute. Bundy's perceived victory energized a far-right citizens' militia movement that has waxed and waned in the United States over several decades. The Department of Homeland Security predicted in an intelligence report that it would inspire other acts of violence. The BLM said it was still pursuing the Bundy case through the legal system. "Our primary goal remains to resolve this matter safely and according to the rule of the law," spokesman Tom Gorey said. The FBI, the Department of Justice and the U.S. Attorney's office in Nevada declined to comment. Former federal officials say the Justice Department, on the whole, is quick to handle criminal cases involving public lands. But many BLM agents have expressed frustration that the government has not yet brought any charges related to the 2014 standoff, said Ed Shepard, a former BLM Oregon state director who stays in touch with current employees at the agency. "It's a violation of law and they should be held accountable for it," said Shepard, who as president of the Public Lands Foundation represents retired BLM workers. RIPPLING ACROSS THE WEST In recent years, federal officials have taken a cautious approach when dealing with armed extremists to avoid a repeat of the 1993 siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, that left more than 80 people dead. The hands-off strategy averts bloodshed, but has enabled participants in the 2014 standoff to scatter across the country. Two people involved in the standoff went on to kill two police officers and one civilian in Las Vegas in June 2014, less than two months after the Nevada standoff at the Bundy ranch ended. Others have discussed plans to seize land and attack federal convoys and helicopters, according to the Homeland Security report, which was released in July of that year. One man involved in the standoff, Washington state resident Schuyler Barbeau, was arrested in a separate incident in December on charges of attempting to sell an unregistered firearm. He told an informant that it was his duty to "lynch" public servants he deemed to be unworthy, according to the charges. Armed members of the Oath Keepers, a paramilitary group involved in the standoff, gathered at mines in Montana and Oregon last year at the request of owners who said they worried the government was going to seize their properties. Both disputes are pending in court. In Oregon, Cliven Bundy is advising his sons by telephone from Nevada, according to Reuters reporters on the scene. An Arizona rancher and friend of the family involved in the Oregon standoff, LaVoy Finicum, told a local TV station he would no longer pay grazing fees. The April 2014 standoff also led to an increase in threats and security risks for the federal employees who police rangeland, deter trespassers and round up stray livestock on public land in the western United States, former officials say. In the weeks after federal agents backed down, two BLM rangers were menaced at gunpoint on a Utah highway, said Juan Palma, the agencys state director at the time. Archaeologists, biologists and others who often work alone far out in the wilderness were required to travel in pairs for safety, and the agency carefully tracked who was in and out of the office said Palma, now retired. "Some of our employees didn't feel comfortable wearing the uniform to be identified in a restaurant," he said. Complex cases like the 2014 Nevada standoff that involve hundreds of suspects are often laborious to assemble, current and former law enforcement officials say, and the current occupation in Oregon further complicates the investigation because many of the same suspects are involved. Prosecutors do not want to risk bringing suspects to trial prematurely if the Oregon incident spurs additional charges, said a former federal law enforcement official familiar with the investigation. But officials involved in the latest armed protest are growing impatient. "What Cliven Bundy and his sons and those around him are doing is domestic terrorism," said Steven Horsford, who as a U.S. congressman for southern Nevada at the time of the standoff was involved in negotiations. "They should have absolutely acted by now," he said. (Additional reporting by Jonathan Allen in Oregon and Julia Harte in Washington; Editing by Jason Szep and Lisa Shumaker)
The suspects are escorted off the plane at Quanzhou Airport, east China's Fujian Province on January 8, 2016. [Photo: Chinanews.com]

Chinese police have recently busted a cross-border telecom fraud gang and seized 470 suspects through collaboration with Lao police, the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) said Friday in a statement at its official website.

On December 30, Chinese and Lao police destroyed three dens and seized more than 500 mobile phones, 400 computers and four vehicles in Laos. All suspects were immediately sent to Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture, southwest China's Yunnan Province, under the escort of Chinese police from Laos, according to the statement.

It is the biggest telecom fraud case busted in the recent crackdown launched by MPS, the statement said.

Last November, Yunnan police found a group of Chinese suspected of conducting criminal activity involving telecom fraud in Laos. The MPS dispatched a special investigation team comprising of police officers from Zhejiang, Hunan, Guangdong, Yunnan and Fujian provinces.

Police found the telecom scammers settled at a border area, purchasing or renting local hotel rooms to operate. They set up false lottery betting websites to swindle money from people across China.

Preliminary investigation showed that there are more than 1,000 victims from most Chinese provinces and cities with more than 200 million yuan (around 32 million U.S. dollars) involved, the statement said.

On Friday afternoon, four chartered flights carrying 300 major suspects arrived at Quanzhou Airport of Fujian Province from Xishuangbanna. The MPS asked Fujian police to handle the case because most victims are from Fujian. Another 170 suspects stayed in Xishuangbanna and will be investigated and handled by local police.

Chinese police have cracked 16,708 telecom fraud cases, apprehended 5,825 suspects and destroyed 927 gangs since a special crackdown campaign targeting such crimes was launched on October 30.
New York (AFP) - A man claiming allegiance to the Islamic State extremist group shot and seriously wounded a police officer in Philadelphia, opening fire multiple times at point-blank range with a stolen police gun before he was arrested, officials said

The apparent assassination attempt comes amid heightened security -- and paranoia -- in the United States following last month's assault by a radicalized Muslim couple in California that killed 14 people, and the November terror attacks in Paris.

Policeman Jesse Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in his left arm as he sat in his patrol car late Thursday in the northeastern city. "I'm shot. I'm bleeding heavily," he yelled in a dispatch call.

Authorities said they were astonished he survived.

Philadelphia police commissioner Richard Ross called the attack "absolutely chilling" and described the officer's injuries as "very, very serious."

Stills captured from video surveillance and released to the press show the suspect -- named by police as Edward Archer, 30, a local man -- opening fire as he walked towards the patrol car, extending his arm into the vehicle and then continuing to fire as he flees on foot.

"If that doesn't just make the hairs on your neck just rise when you see that, it's scary," Ross told reporters.

The officer got out of his vehicle, despite being injured, and managed to return fire, hitting the suspect, who was quickly arrested.

"He stated that he pledges his allegiance to Islamic State, follows Allah and that is the reason he was called upon to do this," homicide police Captain James Clark told a news conference.

Police said Archer has a criminal record, but that it was unclear whether he acted alone or as part of a wider conspiracy.

"He doesn't appear to be a stupid individual, just an extremely violent one," Ross said.

Ross added that he was "absolutely amazed" that Hartnett, an officer with four years' experience, had survived. "This man fired at least 11 shots from a nine millimeter at close range," he said.

Story continues

- 'Nothing to do with Islam' -

Police said it was unclear how the suspect obtained the firearm, which was stolen from police in October 2013.

"That is one of the things that you absolutely regret the most, that an officer's gun is stolen and it is used against one of your own," Ross said.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney praised Hartnett's bravery but urged people to draw no link between the criminal act and Islam.

"That is abhorrent, it's terrible and it does not represent the religion in any way, shape or form or any of its teachings," Kenney said.

"This is a criminal with a stolen gun trying to kill one of our officers. It has nothing to do with being a Muslim."

Thursday's shooting is likely to raise further concerns about the threat posed by homegrown extremists within the United States, inspired to act by IS jihadists based in Iraq and Syria.

Muslim community activists have already decried what they call an unprecedented anti-Muslim backlash in the wake of the Paris attacks.

House Homeland Security Committee chairman Michael McCaul told reporters: "Once again we have a radicalized individual in the United States trying to kill law enforcement."

He blamed extremist propaganda on the Internet emanating from Syria.

"The message is clear: Kill military, attack military installations and kill police officers. In my judgment, this individual was carrying out these directives, these orders if you will, coming out of Raqa, Syria from ISIS."

Elsewhere on Friday, two suspects with alleged ties to the IS group were due to appear in court in California and Texas.

Aws Mohammed Younis al-Jayab, an Iraqi-born Palestinian who was arrested on Thursday, came to the United States from Syria as a refugee in 2012.

He is accused of fighting in Syria for various terror groups.

Another Iraqi-born Palestinian, Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan, was due to make an initial court appearance after being indicted in Texas for providing material support to the IS group.
The EU urged Libyan politicians to back a unity government, as the Islamic State group claimed suicide bombings that killed dozens and sparked fears of a jihadist expansion on Europe's doorstep. The deal aims to bring together rival administrations that split the country in August 2014 -- when an Islamist-backed militia alliance overran Tripoli, forcing the internationally-recognised government to take refuge in the east -- and tame chaos that has plagued Libya since 2011. The EU's push is the latest in longstanding diplomatic efforts to bring together the country's warring factions, with European Union foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini also pledging to give Libya 100 million euros ($108 million) to battle IS. The funds would be available from the first day the unity government comes to power because the security situation "needs to be tackled immediately", she said. Mogherini made the remarks in Tunis, where she separately met with Fayez al-Sarraj, a businessman named in a UN-brokered national unity government as prime minister designate, as well as other Libyan lawmakers. Her remarks came as IS claimed responsibility for a truck bomb attack on a police training school which left more than 50 people dead, according to a security source, as well as buildings charred and cars turned into twisted wrecks. It was the deadliest single attack in Libya since the 2011 revolution that toppled longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi. - 'Very worrisome' - IS, which launched an offensive against Libya's oil heartland this week, also said it was behind Thursday's suicide bomb attack on a checkpoint in Ras Lanouf, home to a key oil terminal on the country's northern coast. The Red Crescent said six people, including a baby, died in that attack. Fears the jihadists are establishing a new stronghold on Europe's doorstep have added urgency to efforts to bring together warring factions in a country beset by chaos since 2011. In December, after months of negotiations, a minority of lawmakers from both sides signed on to the UN-brokered national unity deal which has yet to win the full support of the two legislatures. The heads of Libya's parliaments have warned the UN-brokered deal has no legitimacy and that the politicians signing the agreement represented only themselves. Analysts say these divisions are bolstering the position of IS. "The situation has become very worrisome... with IS taking advantage of the chaos, the collapse of the central authorities and wars by proxy," said Karim Bitar, head of research at the French Institute of International Relations. The international community has been pleading for months with Libya's rival parliaments to embrace the UN-brokered deal. Mogherini said she had "fruitful and concrete" talks with Libyan politicians on how the EU can help the future government in the "fight against terrorism and namely against Daesh (IS)". "The best response to terrorism especially to Daesh will be a Libyan response" and a government to unite Libyans, she said, adding that the EU could help provide "training and advising". - 'Reducing the trust deficit' - UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemned Thursday's attacks and also urged unity among Libyans, while the UN Security Council called on the country's rival groups to speed up the formation of a unity government. Bitar said the establishment of a national unity government was a matter of "urgency" but he warned international efforts could fail due to "numerous suspicions" on the ground. Mohamed Eljarh, a non-resident fellow with the Atlantic Council's Hariri Centre, agreed. He said the latest attacks claimed by IS "would not end the feud in Libya, but could at best result in reducing the trust deficit between the various armed and political groups as they attempt to cooperate and help each other in the face of IS's expansion". The chaos in Libya since 2011 has led to its rise as a stepping stone for migrants crossing the Mediterranean to Europe. The IS offensive against the oil terminals in Ras Lanouf and nearby Al-Sidra in Libya's so-called "oil crescent" have, meanwhile, come as the jihadist group has tried for weeks to push east from its stronghold in Sirte. Officials have warned the already crumbling state could be paralysed if IS, which is reported to have at least 3,000 fighters in Libya, seizes control of oil resources.
El Chapo Guzman

Joaquin El Chapo Guzman, the powerful leader of Mexico's Sinaloa cartel, was recaptured on January 8 in a town not far from where he was born in Sinaloa state.

While its leader appears to be out of commission yet again, the Sinaloa cartel is still arguably the largest drug-trafficking organization in the world, and the deep ties to Colombia it uses to influence the global cocaine trade have become more apparent over the last year.

According to a summer 2015 report from from Colombian newspaper El Tiempo, the Sinaloa cartel controls 35% of the cocaine exported from Colombia  the largest producer of the drug in the world, which saw a 30% increase in potential-pure-cocaine production from 2013 to 2014, according to the DEA. DEA analysis also found that 90% of the cocaine consumed in the US was of Colombian origin.

Born in the mountains of Sinaloa state on Mexicos west coast, Guzman's cartel has expanded throughout the country and around the world over the last several decades.

According to Spanish newspaper El Pais, the cartels marijuana and poppy fields in Mexico cover more than 23,000 miles of land, an area larger than Costa Rica. It has operatives in at least 17 Mexican states and operations in up to 50 countries, Insight Crime reports.

Sinaloa

In addition to its reported involvement in the heroin trade in the Middle East, it is active in Europe and in the US, where, according to the DEA in 2013, it supplied "80% of the heroin, cocaine, marijuana and methamphetamine  with a street value of $3 billion  that floods the Chicago region each year."

The cartel is adept at sneaking the drug across borders and into the US. Cocaine has been found smuggled in frozen sharks, sprinkled on donuts, and crammed into cucumbers. The cartel is perhaps best known for the hundreds of elaborate smuggling tunnels it has built (the most recent allowing its boss to escape prison).

Story continues

Sinaloas second-in-command, Ismael El Mayo Zambada, reportedly directs the cartels Colombian business dealings through two Mexicans based in the country, Jairo Ortiz and Montiel  both aliases.

cartel drug map

'Lacoste,' 'Apple,' and 'Made in Colombia'

Documents from police and security forces seen by El Tiempo indicate the Sinaloa cartel works closely with criminal groups and guerrilla forces to run a trafficking network that exports more than one-third of the cocaine produced in Colombia.

Through an unidentified businessman, the Sinaloa cartel works with the criminal organization Los Urabenos, which was formed by remnants of right-wing paramilitaries in the mid-2000s, according to Colombia Reports.

This unidentified businessman works with Los Urabenos, its leader Dario Antonio Usuga, and the cartel to coordinate shipments of drug cargos, labeled Lacoste, Apple, and Made in Colombia, to destinations in Europe and Asia, according to El Tiempo.

Los Urabenos, aka Clan Usuga, is regarded as the most powerful of Colombia's remaining criminal organizations and as the only one with a truly national reach.

Many of the Pacific and Caribbean smuggling routes are controlled by Los Urabenos, and its influence is so extensive that, between 2014 and 2015, 600 Colombian officials had been jailed for supporting the group.

Colombia cocaine submarine

The Sinaloa cartel has also formed an alliance with the left-wing guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

The FARC began peace negotiations with the government in late 2012 (negotiations that have yielded historic results) and agreed to suspend drug trafficking as a part of the talks. Sinaloa then began franchising drug operations from FARC rebels, allowing the cartel to expand its reach into the production stages of the cocaine trade.

The Mexican cartel reportedly works with two FARC leaders in southern Colombia and pays as much as $40,000 per shipment for cocaine that leaves the Pacific coast departments of Narino and Cauca.

The Sinaloa cartel also works with La Empresa, a criminal group based in the Pacific port city of Buenaventura, to direct shipments. La Empresa has, according to Colombia Reports, allied with Colombian criminal group Los Rastrojos (with whom the Sinaloa cartel has also aligned) to fight off the Pacific-coast expansion of Los Urabenos.

(La Empresa, El Tiempo notes, has been linked to the casas de pique  buildings in outlying areas of Buenaventura used to torture and dismember rival gang members.)

US border seizures of cocaine Sinaloa cartel

The Sinaloa cartel has also provided weapons and financing to the Oficina de Envigado, a Medellin-based crime syndicate that assumed much of Pablo Escobars operations after his death in 1993.

Sinaloa retained the services of La Oficina to support drug trafficking around the world, the US Treasury Department has said.

According to El Tiempo, the FARC, los Usuga, and la Empresa are keys in Sinaloa's strategy to control eight ports on the Pacific, from Mexico to Peru.

In Colombia, [the Sinaloa cartel] already directs 50% of the drugs that leave from [the ports of] Tumaco, Buenaventura, and el Uraba, which form a network with ports in Peru (El Callao and Talara), Ecuador (Esmeraldas and San Lorenzo) and Guatemala, according to intelligence documents seen by El Tiempo.

UNODC, responses to annual report questionnaire and individual drug seizure database

Drugs are shipped by fastboat from Colombia, primarily to Guatemala's Puerto Quetzal, which handles almost all of the cocaine coming out of Colombia. The Mexico/Central America corridor handles 87% of the cocaine that reaches the US, according to the DEA.

A kilo of cocaine that reaches Guatemala is worth $10,000, according to El Tiempo. The price hovers around $12,000 to $15,000 at the US border, and a kilo can sell in the low six figures once it reaches the US. (Sinaloa and other cartels typically rely on US-based gangs for most retail-level drug distribution.)

'A possible refuge'

The panoply of ties that the Sinaloa cartel has built throughout the Western Hemisphere led many to believe that Guzman could seek a possible refuge in Colombia. (Local forces also went on high alert in November, when it was reported that he may have been in Argentina, where the cartel gets precursor chemicals for synthetic drugs.)

In fact, on July 19, just eight days after Guzman rode to freedom on a motorcycle through a mile-long, air-conditioned underground tunnel in central Mexico, El Tiempo reported that officials from the DEA and FBI had requested "all available information on the movements, personnel, and contacts of the Sinaloa cartel in the country."

el chapo

In the six months prior to Guzman's escape, the Mexican army captured nearly 2,800 kilos of cocaine  a 340% increase over the same period in 2014. The increase in seizures comes despite UN reports indicating that drug cultivation and trading in Colombia had stabilized.

The hunt for Guzman also drew in several officials from Colombia itself. In late July, El Tiempo reported that three retired Colombian generals and six active police officials were headed north to assist with the search.

The Colombian generals  two former heads of the national police and the former chief of the now disbanded secret service/intelligence agency  were selected because of their roles in a similar mission: The effort to bring down the Cali cartel and Pablo Escobar's Medellin cartel  two of the Colombian drug-trafficking organizations that ran roughshod over Colombian society in 1980s and 1990s.

Colombia pablo escobar

The generals, who a Colombian police source called the most effective three musketeers the country has against the narcos, left Mexico in early August.

But, according to Michael Lohmuller at Insight Crime, whatever advice they left behind may have been of limited use. The 22 years since the controversial killing of Escobar have seen marked advancements in the operations, sophistication, and evasiveness of drug cartels.

Moreover, modern-day Colombian police have failed to catch their countrys own most wanted kingpin: Dario Antonio Usuga  the head of Los Urabenos and Guzmans ally.

NOW WATCH: Inside the dangerous life of Mexican drug lord 'El Chapo'





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German Chancellor Angela Merkel backed stricter laws to expel convicted refugees, as clashes erupted at far-right protests in Cologne over a rash of sexual assaults blamed on asylum seekers. Cologne police said they have now recorded 379 cases of New Year's Eve violence -- ranging from groping to theft to two reported rapes -- with asylum seekers and illegal migrants making up the majority of suspects. With anger growing at the scale of the attacks, supporters of the xenophobic PEGIDA movement marched in protests that briefly turned violent in the western city. Police used tear gas and water cannon to clear the rally of far-right supporters after protesters flung firecrackers and bottles at officers they said had failed to prevent the New Year's attacks on women. Vowing tough action, Merkel declared that any refugee handed a jail term -- even if it was a suspended sentence -- should be kicked out of the country. "If the law does not suffice, then the law must be changed," she said, pledging action to protect not just German citizens, but innocent refugees too. Witnesses described terrifying scenes of hundreds of women running a gauntlet of groping hands, lewd insults and robberies in the mob violence. Of the cases reported so far, 40 percent related to sexual violence, Cologne police said in a statement. "Those in focus of criminal police investigations are mostly people from North African countries. The majority of them are asylum seekers and people who are in Germany illegally," police added, confirming witness accounts. The allegations have stoked criticism of Merkel's liberal open-door policy -- which brought 1.1 million new asylum seekers to Germany last year. As questions grew over the country's ability to integrate the newcomers, it emerged late Saturday that a man who was killed trying to attack a police station in Paris on Thursday had lived in an asylum seeker shelter in Germany. Revealing that they had raided the man's apartment, German police did not specify if he was an asylum seeker, but a source close to the matter told AFP that the man was indeed registered as one. In Tunisia, a woman who claimed to be the man's mother confirmed that he had been living in Germany but denied he had any links to extremist groups. - 'Cologne changed everything' - In Cologne, hundreds of PEGIDA supporters waved German flags and signs saying "Rapefugees not welcome", as they shouted "Merkel raus" (Merkel out). The rattle of a helicopter circling in the skies and the occasional bang of a firecracker added to tensions as counter-protesters, separated from the PEGIDA crowd by police, chanted "Nazis raus". The populist right-wing Alternative for Germany party, which polls show as having 10 percent support ahead of state elections this year, claimed the violence gave a "taste of the looming collapse of culture and civilisation". Playing on popular fears about Europe's migrant influx, the mob violence threatens to cloud what had been a broadly welcoming mood in Germany where crowds cheered as Syrian refugees arrived by train in September. "Cologne has changed everything, people now are doubting," said Volker Bouffier, vice president of Merkel's CDU party. - Asylum seekers among suspects - Details remain hazy of what happened in the frenzied crush on what was supposed to be a night of New Year's celebration. It was unclear how many of the suspects had been in Germany long-term or belonged to a scene of drug dealers and pickpockets known to lurk around the railway station, and how many were newly-arrived asylum seekers. On Friday, the interior ministry said Germany's federal police had identified 32 suspects, 22 of whom were asylum seekers, in connection with 76 offences, 12 of which had a sexual nature. Merkel has so far refused to abandon her welcoming stance towards war refugees but on Saturday had tough words for law breakers. "If a refugee flouts the rules, then there must be consequences, that means that they can lose their residence right here regardless of whether they have a suspended sentence or a prison sentence," she said after a meeting with the top ranks of her party in the southwestern city of Mainz. Under current laws, asylum seekers are only deported if they have been sentenced to jail terms of at least three years, and if their lives are not at risk in their countries of origin.
Vietnam's civil aviation authority has accused Beijing of threatening regional air safety by conducting unannounced flights through its airspace to a disputed reef in the South China Sea, state media said Saturday.

The Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV) warned that the unannounced flights "threaten the safety of all flights in the region," according to a report in the Tuoi Tre Daily newspaper.

In quotes published in Vietnamese official online newspaper Zing.vn late Friday, CAAV director Lai Xuan Thanh said a protest letter about the flights had been sent to Beijing, as well as a complaint to the United Nations' International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

"Chinese aircraft have ignored all the rules and norms of the ICAO by not providing any flight plans or maintaining any radio contact with Vietnam's air traffic control centre," he added.

In the seven days to January 8, Vietnam logged 46 incidents of Chinese planes flying without warning through airspace monitored by air traffic control in the southern metropolis of Ho Chi Minh City, according to civilian aviation authorities quoted in the Tuoi Tre Daily newspaper report.

Chinese state media on Wednesday said two civilian planes landed on an island in the Fiery Cross reef in the contested Spratly Islands, which have long been at the centre of bitter wrangling between Vietnam and its giant neighbour.

The two "test flights" Wednesday followed an initial aircraft landing on Saturday, which prompted the first formal diplomatic complaint from Hanoi.

The Spratlys are claimed by Hanoi but controlled by Beijing, which has ramped up activity in the area by rapidly building artificial islands, including airstrips said to be capable of hosting military jets.

The recent flights, slammed by Vietnam as a "serious violation" of its sovereignty, have sparked international alarm, with the United States warning Thursday that the move would raise tensions in the disputed waters.

The Philippines has also said it would file a protest.

Story continues

China asserts ownership over virtually all the South China Sea, putting it at odds with regional neighbours the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan, which stake partial claims.

Several of these nations, including Vietnam, have also built facilities on islands they control, but at a significantly slower pace and smaller scale than Beijing.

Rioting broke out in Vietnam after Beijing sent an oil rig into contested waters in 2014, and at least three Chinese people were killed.

Since then the two sides have tried to mend relations. China's President Xi Jinping visited Hanoi in November but that visit also saw anti-Chinese protests.

Vietnamese officials said last week they had asked Beijing to investigate the ramming and sinking of a Vietnamese fishing boat by a suspected Chinese boat.

Hanoi has stepped up cooperation with the US, in what analysts say is a hedge against China's rising power.
By Nael Shyoukhi RIYADH (Reuters) - Syria's opposition wants a political transition without President Bashar al-Assad, the coordinator of an opposition negotiating body in future peace talks said on Friday. The United States, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and major European and Arab powers outlined a plan last month for a political process in Syria leading to elections within 18 months, in the hope of ending its five-year-old civil war. It includes a nationwide ceasefire and six months of talks beginning in January between Assad's government and the opposition on forming a unity government. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and more than a dozen other ministers will meet for a third time in New York on Friday in an effort to keep up momentum towards a peace deal. Riad Hijab, elected on Thursday as coordinator by an opposition body set up in Saudi Arabia last week, said Security Council resolutions and the Geneva 1 road map drawn up in 2012 provided for a political transition in Syria without the president and a transitional governing council with full executive powers. "We are going into negotiations on this principle, we are not entering talks (based on) anything else. There will be no concession," he told reporters on Friday. Hijab's position highlights the deep differences over Assad's fate and a future political transition in Syria among the parties to the talks. Western diplomats say Western powers, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and others have reluctantly agreed to allow Assad to remain in place during a transition period, a compromise that has opened the door to a shift in Russia's stance. Moscow has made clear to Western nations that it has no objection to the president stepping down eventually as part of a peace process, in a softening of its staunch backing of Assad, diplomats said. Like Russia, Iran is a firm ally of Assad and is helping him militarily against anti-government forces. TRUST-BUILDING MEASURES On Thursday, Hijab, who defected from Assad's government in 2012, won the backing of more than two thirds of the 34 delegates of opposition groups summoned to Riyadh by world powers in a bid to unite them and settle longstanding rivalries. A new body includes representatives of fighting groups such as the powerful Islamist Ahrar al-Sham and Free Syrian Army units that have received military support from states such as Saudi Arabia and the United States. But it does not include the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front, or Islamic State, among the strongest opponents of Assad. Divisions within the Syrian opposition have hampered efforts to resolve the conflict. Hijab said the body had formed a negotiating delegation and committees that would deal with legal issues and international affairs and support, Saudi state news agency SPA reported. He said that before any negotiations, Assad's forces must implement trust-building measures like releasing prisoners, especially women and children, stopping barrel bombings and allowing humanitarian aid. "We will not accept any pressure. The aims of the revolution and the international resolutions, we cling to them, and we will not give them up," Hijab said. "I call it a battle in terms of the negotiation process and the political process. It is in tandem with what is happening on the ground," he added. "Our first option is the peaceful option. But if it's not complete, the other option will continue and will not stop ... until it fulfils the aims of toppling the illegitimate regime." (Reporting by Nael Shyoukhi; Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Andrew Roche)
Mobile Computing

Google Taps Lenovo To Build Phone Running Project Tango

This summer we can expect to see the first mobile device engineered to run apps using Google's Project Tango, and it has education potential written all over it. Lenovo will be creating the first original equipment manufacturer (OEM) smartphone in collaboration with Google.

Project Tango technology adds spatial perception to a device by adding the ability to track its position as it moves through the physical world and keeping a record of that. The platform runs on Android and adds advanced computer vision, image processing and vision sensors. As the user runs a Project Tango app, specially tuned hardware and software direct the device to track every movement of the user as he or she steps forward or backward or moves side to side,

Unlike GPS the new software can track motion indoors by monitoring the dimensions of the room and the user's position within that space.

As part of the announcement, which came during CES 2016, the two companies also said they are encouraging coders to submit app proposals for Project Tango to be considered for development funding and the chance to have it pre-installed on the new Lenovo device through an app incubator. The submission period ends on February 15, 2016.

Expected in summer 2016, the new smartphone will operate with the Qualcomm Snapdragon processor. The companies said Qualcomm Technologies is working "closely" with them to optimize the technology.

Google has reached out to a number of universities to undertake research and development for its platform. Some of it is internal to the device. George Washington U researchers in its School of Engineering & Applied Science, for example, came up with code to handle camera calibration for Project Tango devices. The U Massachusetts Lowell Robotics Lab is developing ways to link Project Tango to Robot Operating System (ROS) to facilitate the use of robots in scenarios such as search and rescue.

But there are user use cases as well. Purdue U's Envision Center and Institute of Accessible Science has created an app that turns location data into sounds that get louder and more frequent as the user approaches furniture or walls, for use by people with impaired vision.

Then there are the interesting learning projects that can be undertaken by students outfitted with a Lenovo phone. As teacher Rob Letcher suggests, how about having students map their homes and then having "an augmented reality simulation that places historical figures" there on their own furniture and talking about their lives? Or what about science applications, such as watching a ball bounce and then changing "gravity settings to see how the behavior of the ball changes"?

"With Project Tango, the smartphone becomes a magic window into the physical world by enabling it to perceive space and motion that goes beyond the boundaries of a touch screen," said Johnny Lee, Google lead, in a press release. "By working with Lenovo, we'll be able to make Project Tango more accessible to users and developers all over the world to both enjoy and create new experiences that blends the virtual and real world."
BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany's ruling parties promised on Friday to crack down aggressively on migrants who commit crimes, after assaults on women in Cologne on New Year's Eve stoked debate about Chancellor Angela Merkel's welcoming policy towards refugees. Some 121 women are reported to have been robbed, threatened or sexually molested there by gangs of mostly drunk men between 18 and 35 years old while out celebrating. Cologne's police chief has said the perpetrators appeared to be of "Arab or North African" origin and the head of the police union in the region was quoted by German daily Die Welt as saying there were "definitely" refugees among them. In response to the assaults, Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) have called for tougher penalties against offending asylum seekers, according to a draft paper seen by Reuters ahead of a meeting of the party leadership in Mainz. The paper says refugees and asylum seekers who have been sentenced to prison or probation should be barred from eligibility for asylum. This sentiment was echoed by Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, who is also leader of the Social Democrats (SPD), coalition partners to Merkel's conservatives. "Why should German taxpayers pay to imprison foreign criminals," Gabriel said. "The threat of having to spend time behind bars in their home country is far more of a deterrent than a prison sentence in Germany." Cologne police have not confirmed that refugees were among the attackers on New Year's Eve, but Arnold Plickert, chief of the police union in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia said there was no doubt in his mind. "The suggestion that nothing points to refugees as being among the attackers is wrong in my view," Plickert told Die Welt. "There were definitely refugees among the perpetrators." The CDU paper calls for lower barriers to deport criminal asylum seekers, increased video surveillance and the creation of a new criminal offence for physical assault. PRESSURE ON MERKEL The assaults have raised doubts over whether Germany, which took in 1.1 million refugees last year, can succeed in integrating the latest wave and prompted renewed calls for limits on the number of new arrivals. "If a direct link is shown between the assaults and the arrival of Middle Eastern migrants, the CDU could lose ground in state elections in March, and Merkel will come under greater pressure to introduce an upper limit on the number of migrants entering Germany," said Eurasia analyst Mujtaba Rahman. A new poll for public broadcaster ARD showed Merkel's popularity rising 4 points to 58 percent and support for her conservative bloc up to 39 percent. Peter Tauber, general secretary of the CDU, rejected the idea of a cap but appeared to acknowledge that some refugees were not respecting German laws. "There are many refugees that are happy to have survived, to have made it here and who are looking for jobs. These people who can contribute to our country are welcome," he told Deutschlandfunk. "But clearly there are also some who haven't understood what kind of opportunity they've been given." Julia Kloeckner, leader of the CDU in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate who is seen as a possible successor to Merkel one day, told ZDF television the attacks had been a wake up call for Germany. "I think we really need to take off the blinkers," she said. (Reporting by Andreas Rinke, Caroline Copley, Paul Carrel and Noah Barkin; Editing by Noah Barkin)
By Dave Graham and Anahi Rama LOS MOCHIS, Mexico (Reuters) - Mexico aims to extradite drug lord Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman to the United States after security forces recaptured the fugitive cartel leader who blew his cover through a series of slip ups, including an attempt to make a movie about his life. The Mexican Attorney General's office will be working as fast as possible to establish the path to extradition, and Chapo could be sent to the United States by mid-year, a source familiar with the situation said on Saturday. However the timing might depend on injunctions filed by Guzman's legal team. Guzman, the world's top drug smuggler and boss of the powerful Sinaloa Cartel, is wanted by U.S. authorities on a host of criminal charges. His organisation has smuggled billions of dollars worth of drugs into the United States and is blamed for thousands of deaths in Mexico and the United States due to addiction and gang warfare. "The objective is to fulfil the extradition request," another source said. Guzman's dramatic capture in the town of Los Mochis on Friday followed a six month-long intelligence operation during which the drug lord relaxed his security just enough to allow authorities to pick up his trail. Among his errors, Guzman got in touch with people in the film industry to have them make a "biopic" movie of his eventful life journey from rural poverty to untold wealth and dramatic jailbreaks. "Another important aspect which helped locate him was discovering Guzman's intention to have a biographical film made. He contacted actresses and producers, which was part of one line of investigation," Mexico's Attorney General Arely Gomez said. Perhaps more importantly, Gomez said security forces also identified a expert in digging tunnels in Guzman's circle who was outfitting houses in the states of Sinaloa and Sonora. Authorities caught wind of that and began carefully watching a house in Los Mochis, Sinaloa. They spotted unusual activity when a vehicle pulled up before dawn on Jan. 7, and intelligence officials confirmed Guzman was on the property. A raid followed. Mexican Marines chased Guzman and his chief hitman through a drain and then nabbed them as he tried to flee by car. The United States requested Guzmans extradition in late June, just a couple of weeks before his brazen escape from a maximum security prison through a mile-long tunnel which burrowed right up through the floor of his cell. The failure to extradite him before his elaborate jailbreak strained relations with the United States. Juan Pablo Badillo, a lawyer representing Guzman, said on Saturday that the drug kingpin could not be extradited. "In strict accordance with the constitution, he cannot nor should not be extradited to any foreign country," Badillo told local television channel Milenio. "Why? Because he is Mexican, and Mexico has wise laws and a fair constitution, and there is absolute confidence in the prisons authority." Milenio cited Badillo as saying that Guzman's team had filed six injunctions against extradition to the United States. Later, Mexico's Attorney General's office said that none of the injunctions presented would get in the way of starting extradition proceedings. Sending Guzman to the United States would help allay fears the drug lord could use his massive fortune to bribe prison officials and escape from a Mexican maximum security jail yet again. In the Sinaloan state capital of Culiacan, where many view Guzman as a latter-day Robin Hood, some residents fear his arrest and eventual extradition could open the door for other drug gangsters to extort locals. "We hope that other bad people don't come. Here there is no extortion, El Chapo let people work," said Marta Lopez, 44, a street seller hawking candies and peanuts. Though the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and U.S. Marshals helped in the recapture, American officials have taken no credit and instead lavished praise on Mexico. "Criminals like Guzman-Loera are responsible for bringing hundreds of tons of illicit drugs into the United States every year, and are responsible for tremendous amounts of violence and death in our own country and across the world," the U.S. State Department said on Friday. U.S. government sources said the White House and Department of Justice have impressed on government agencies that policy is let Mexico take all the credit for Guzman's capture, and not claim any for themselves. Sources said U.S. agencies were at the very least involved in providing intelligence support during the operation. On Saturday, neither DEA nor U.S. Justice Department officials would comment on whether or not the U.S. was expecting Mexico to extradite Guzman. CLUES IN THE TUNNELS For years the world's most wanted drug lord used tunnels to move tonnes of drugs into the United States and to evade capture. Six months after a brazen jailbreak worthy of Hollywood, escaping a maximum security prison through the tunnel from his cell, Mexico's security forces turned the tables on Guzman on Friday. "During the confrontation, Guzman Loera managed to escape through the city's drainage system, which had already been factored into the capture strategy," Gomez said late on Friday, as Guzman was whisked by helicopter to the same maximum security prison in central Mexico he broke out of in July. Guzman's arrest is a major boost for President Enrique Pena Nieto, who was highly embarrassed by last year's jailbreak, Guzman's second in 15 years. Gomez said Guzman was almost caught in October, when Marines in a helicopter zeroed in on him near a ranch in the rugged northern state of Durango. But he was spied in the company of two women and a young girl, prompting the Marines to hold fire and allowing him to slip their grasp. The encounter pushed Guzman deeper into Mexico's notorious "Golden Triangle", where the bulk of the country's opium and marijuana are produced, limiting his communications and cutting down his security detail to a small core. But for reasons that are unclear, El Chapo had by December decided to hide out in cities. The tunnel-builder began working on homes across Sinaloa and Sonora. Marines formed a cordon around the block on Saturday morning, and said they believed Guzman had been in the property for around 48 hours before the raid was launched. One local resident, who asked not to be named for fear of retribution, said the operation appears to have been triggered after a neighbour complained there were armed men outside his house. Marine helicopters then hovered over nearby storm drains as they sought to capture Guzman. A dead rat lay beside the mouth of one nearby drain that residents suspect he used in his escape. After chasing him through a drain and stopping his getaway car, the Marines took Guzman and made an unscheduled stop - waiting for reinforcements at Hotel Doux, a love motel on the outskirts of town that rents out rooms for a few hours at a time. (With additional reporting by Michael O'Boyle in Culiacan, Alexandra Alper and Ana Isabel Martinez in Mexico City and Mark Hosenball in Washington; Writing by Simon Gardner; Editing by Kieran Murray, Mary Milliken and Alistair Bell)
Homeless individuals returned to sleep at Santa Cruz City Hall on January 5 for the twenty-sixth community sleepout. Facing intermittent downpours of rain, some slept in a large tent on the sidewalk in front of the city hall courtyard. Signs attached to the tent read, "No Sleep Til Justice." Some individuals successfully slept under the eaves of the city offices building itself, which is a no-trespassing zone at night. One person slept directly on city hall's brick walkway with out a blanket. Regardless of the sleep location, it is illegal to sleep in Santa Cruz anywhere in public between the hours of 11 pm and 8:30 am.

Since July 4, community members, many of them calling themselves "Freedom Sleepers," have been organizing the sleepouts one night a week at City Hall to protest laws that criminalize homelessness and the simple act of sleeping.Initially they attempted to sleep on the lawn in the courtyard area of city hall, which is also a no trespassing zone at night. In response, police conducted raids at nearly every one of their sleepouts. After many were cited and or arrested in the courtyard, the sleepers moved the location of their sleep-protest to the sidewalk in front of city hall. Eventually the police raids subsided.To keep the courtyard free of sleepers, the city has instead chosen to hire all night security patrols, who often stand watch over the sleepers for hours at a time. Staying up all night has weighed heavy on some of the guards, who are employed by First Alarm Security Services. Several guards have been caught sleeping in their cars (see: https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2015/09/17/18777749.php#18777759 ), which is a violation of the camping ban, the very same law the sleepers are directly protesting themselves through civil disobedience. Some of the guards have expressed frustration with the protesters, a homeless woman was roughed up while they were arresting her in the courtyard (see: https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2015/09/16/18777700.php ).According to reports from the Freedom Sleepers, there were transgressions from the guards at the last sleepout as well.Toby Nixon, of the Homeless Advocacy & Action Coalition, said that at about 4 am on January 6, a First Alarm security guard began to shine a bright light on the activists' tent and attempted to initiate a "conversation" with the individuals inside it. After exiting the tent, Nixon says he insisted the security guard stop harassing them as they attempted to sleep. He claims the guard responded that he was working there and that it was his right to do whatever he wished.According to Nixon the First Alarm guard left after some coaxing, and the sleepers inside made it through another night at Santa Cruz City Hall.For more information about the Homeless Advocacy & Action Coalition, see:For more information about the Freedom Sleepers, see:Freedom SleepersAlex Darocy
U.S.-backed dirty war Tedr77 [at] aol.com) by Ted Rudow III, MA

In a stunning development, Guatemalan police have arrested 18 ex-military leaders on charges of committing crimes against humanity during the decades-long, U.S.-backed dirty war against Guatemalas indigenous communities. The ex-military leaders face charges of ordering massacres and forced disappearances during the conflict, which led to perhaps a quarter-million deaths.

Many of the arrested former military leaders were backed by the United States, including Manuel Benedicto Lucas Garcia, who had worked closely with U.S. military officials to develop a system of attacking the highlands where Guatemalas indigenous Mayan communities reside. The system involved decapitating and crucifying people.



It's not at all uncommon for the U.S. to step in and change things there if it doesn't like it. When Guatemala elected a Communist president, the U.S.A. sent in the Marines!--Bingo!--Like that! The U.S.A. feels they have a right to interfere in the affairs of Central America. Of course, they did exactly the same thing in Lebanon years ago! When they elected a pro-Communist president, Eisenhower sent in the Marines!--And Lebanon's had nothing but grief ever since. And the same thing happened in Vietnam! When they looked like they were about to have a pro-Communist government, the U.S. stepped in to make sure they didn't!



The U.S. personnel who were there, and who are still alive, can be subpoenaed. The U.S. should be subpoenaed to release all NSA, State Department and Pentagon documents regarding payments they made to these officers, training and advice they gave to them. The Guatemalan authorities, in theory, would have the right to extradite surviving U.S. officials.



Ted Rudow III, MA


Washington, DC A new study suggests a link between A new study suggests a link between SSRI medications and autism , the latest in a long line of studies with conflicting results on the topic. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are a class of antidepressants, but some studies suggest they are linked to childhood autism when expectant mothers take them. Other studies have not found a link, and researchers involved in the latest study recommended caution when reviewing their results.

The most recent study was published in December 2015 in JAMA Pediatrics (from the Journal of the Medical Association). Researchers from Quebec set out to study whether there was a link between antidepressant use during certain trimesters and children being diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. They studied infants born between January 1, 1998 and December 31, 2009, which included 145,456 infants born in Quebec. Antidepressant exposure was then broken down by the class of antidepressant and the trimester in which the antidepressant was taken.Researchers found that antidepressant use during the second and/or third trimester was linked to a risk of autism spectrum disorder, while use of an SSRI during second and/or third trimester was significantly associated with a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder. Researchers noted that the risk could still be found even when a maternal history of depression was factored in.In all, 4,724 infants were exposed to antidepressants prior to birth, with 4,200 exposed in the first trimester and 2,532 exposed during the second and/or third trimester. Of those who were exposed in the first trimester, 40 were diagnosed with autism, while 31 of those exposed in the second/third trimester had a similar diagnosis.Use of antidepressants, specifically selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, during the second and/or third trimester increases the risk of ASD in children, even after considering maternal depression, researchers concluded, before noting that further research would be needed. They also note that the overall number of children born with autism was small.Drugs included in the SSRI class include Prozac, Paxil and Zoloft. Although there have been studies that suggest use of SSRIs during pregnancy contributes to birth defects, there are also studies that suggest no link exists. It is also possible that other environmental factors play a role in the development of autism. Past studies, for example, suggest a history of depression in the family may increase the risk of autism. Women who have depression and are pregnant should not stop taking antidepressant medication without consulting their doctor.
An Illinois district court judge affirmed a $2 million verdict against a Texas-based mortgage servicer for its collection activities against an elderly homeowner.

Alena W. Hammer filed suit in 2013 after Residential Credit Solutions filed two wrongful foreclosures, although Hammer had previously completed a loan modification with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.In April 2015, a federal jury found in Hammers favor on all claims of breach of contract, violations of Illinois Consumer Fraud Act and the real Estate Settlement Procedures Act.Originally, Hammers home loan was serviced through AmTrust Bank, and it initiated foreclosure proceedings after she defaulted on payments in 2009. The foreclosure was stayed after AmTrust failed, and the FDIC took over as the receiver for AmTrust.Hammer testified that she received her loan package a few days after it was due to be signed and returned. However, once she received the package she inquired about additional fees and immediately made the first payment.In July, the loan was transferred to RCS. Up to this point, Hammer had not signed the loan agreement but she continued making the required payments.The agreement was not signed and notarized until late August 2010 when Hammer was instructed by a FDIC loan negotiator to cross out the principal, write the principal amount less additional fees, and return the signed copy to RCS.RCS told Hammer her modification was invalid and she needed to submit a new agreement with RCS directly. Hammer refused and continued making her lower payment.RCS reinstated the 2009 foreclosure proceeding initiated by AmTrust, which was dismissed. Several months later the company filed a second action. Hammer alleged RCS illegally set up a escrow account and charged Hammer for insurance, taxes and 21 unexplained fees after the dismissal of the first suit.RCS raised several contract formation issues in post-trial motions. Because Hammer failed to timely accept the loan modification and made a handwritten change to the principal amount, RCS believed a contract was not formed.District Judge Thomas Durkin stated the defendant waived this argument by failing to raise the issue in their written 50(b) motion. Further stating that arguing timeliness in various points throughout the proceeding is insufficient to preserve the issue for a Rule 50(b) motion. Durkin denied the motions.Hammer and the FDIC had completed their negotiations prior to Hammer receiving the loan package based on the parties intent.The FDIC transferred the loan to RCS including all relevant files and other written communications, this conduct and other written communications showed a clear intent to form a binding loan agreement even though the agreement was not signed by the deadline.The judge wrote Hammers lawsuit against RCS had more to do with how RCS behaved after the initial foreclosure suit rather than as a punishment to the company as RCS argued.Case No 1:2013cv06397, Northern District of Illinois.
Boston, MA Despite many studies conducted worldwide by birth defect researchers, along with exhaustive birth and prescription records linking Despite many studies conducted worldwide by birth defect researchers, along with exhaustive birth and prescription records linking Zofran to birth defects, the anti-nausea drug is still being prescribed off label in the United States to pregnant women.

For the past decade Zofran has been the most popular medication to treat morning sickness, and has made huge profits for GlaxoSmithKline. But the drug was never studied on pregnant women. Thankfully, however, women in Denmark who took Zofran during the first trimester unknowingly became statistics in Zofran studies.The reason most studies involving drugs and birth defects are conducted in Denmark and Sweden is because these countries exhaustively track pregnancy outcomes and prescription drug use. Researchers are able to access Denmarks National Prescription Registry, which indicates who is taking which drugs, and the consequences, if any. That is how a Danish research team was able to review about one million pregnancies between 1997 and 2010 to determine any adverse events. What they discovered should be made known to every pregnant woman and health professional...Women who took Zofran in their first trimester were 60 percent more likely to give birth to babies with heart defects. and more than twice as likely to give birth to children with life-threatening cardiac septal defects - holes in the heart. And they were twice as likely to have babies with cleft palate. Researchers in the United States in 2011 linked Zofran to birth defects, mainly cleft palate. And if those studies werent enough to stop Zofran from being prescribed off label, a study published in the(December 2014) concluded that There is no reason for women to be exposed to a drug of unproven maternal and fetal safety..when there are safer options currently available.But the medication is still being prescribed to expectant mothers!Why? Recent Zofran lawsuits point the finger at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Zofran attorneys are asking why the CDC - that has birth defect tracking programs in place in 41 states - did not warn the public sooner. These questions should be answered in MDL 2657.As of December 2015, up to 160 Zofran lawsuits have been consolidated into a multidistrict litigation. In almost every complaint, the mother was prescribed Zofran off label and was never warned of birth defect risks. Every complaint accuses GlaxoSmithKline of hiding evidence that Zofran causes birth defects.Attorneys are expecting that hundreds more complaints this year will join the MDL in Boston.
The conclusive part of the 2015 gubernatorial election in Bayelsa state has commenced in the southern part of Nigeria.

The incumbent governor, Seriake Dickson will be hoping that his party the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) will win in the dreaded Southern Ijaw area of the state, where the elections were declared inconclusive last year due to reports of violence.

Seriake Dickson and Timipre Sylva battle for the coveted governorship seat in Bayelsa state.

[article_adwert]

His counterpart in the All Progressives Congress (APC), Timipre Sylva, will also against all odds, attempt to claim the district which can all but ensure he is the winner of the election that has been characterised by series of violent reports in recent weeks.

Elections will hold in 17 wards & 104 communities in Southern Ijaw where there are 425 polling units. The remaining 101 polling units are scattered across the state.

Nigerian security operatives on election duty.

Meanwhile, there were report that officers of the Nigerian Navy on Friday December 8, arrested two suspected political thugs in the Peremabiri community of Southern Ijaw area.

The thugs were said to have been hired by one of the political parties to disrupt the gubernatorial election scheduled to hold today.

INEC Officials with some materials for election.

Follow Legit.ng for the live updates here:

16.53pm: Legit.ng crew on ground report that voting has been concluded in most parts of Yenagoa, the state capital and all focus is on the collation centre, where people will be hoping to get the results from other places where voting took place.

16.05pm: Materials and INEC official still yet to arrive at PU06/07/16/017, Ukubie Ward, Southern Ijaw.

15.33pm: Officials/materials yet to arrive at Polling Units 17 - 34, Ukubie Ward, Southern Ijaw LGA.

15.27pm: Men in military uniforms have reportedly taken away election materials meant for polling units in Olodiama II, Southern Ijaw.

15.20pm: INEC officials and election materials yet to arrive PU06/07/15/028, Apoi Ward, Southern Ijaw.

15: 12pm: Photo shows youths escorting Polling Officers to collation centres after voting ended in several Polling Units in Amassoma.

Youths escorting POs to collation centres after voting ended in several PUs in Amassoma.

14.15pm: All roads exiting Amassoma community have been barricaded by thugs preventing people from leaving the area. According to Legit.ng correspondents on ground, everything is getting messier. And a local government chairman is also seemingly involved because the unrest happened in front of his house.

14.06pm: Dozens of youths rampaging parts of Amassoma looking for thugs who snatched ballot boxes.

Dozens of youths rampaging parts of Amassoma looking for thugs snatching ballot boxes.

14.01pm: Two people have been reportedly killed while twelve have been seriously injured with bullet wounds.

13.53pm: Voting just started at PU06/07/07/001, Central Bomo Ward, Southern Ijaw.

13.50pm: Ballot box snatched with result sheets by thugs at Polling Units 11 & 15, Gbarain, Yenagoa

13.50pm: Security agents have reportedly arrested a fake INEC official at Famgbe, Yenagoa who was hired to help rig the election in the area.

He reportedly made confessional statement indicting some government officials.

13.45pm: Accreditation and voting has just commenced in PUs 01 & 02, Central Bomo Ward, Southern Ijaw LGA.

13.33pm: Reports say an APC supporter known as Ateka Ezekiel just ran away with the original election result sheets at polling Unit 6,Ward1, Southern Ijaw.

Soldiers have reportedly arrested a suspect who snatched a ballot box in Southern Ijaw.

13.25pm: No election material or INEC officials sighted in the entire Polling Units in Oporomor V Ward, Ekeremor LGA.

13.05pm: Unit 1 and 2 APC agents just ran away with ballot box and other materials used and unused.

One of the ballot boxes with which the people of Amassoma have been voting. Photo: Michael Obasa

13.04pm: People at the 06/07/09/017 trying to force POs to start counting. Police officer calling for backup

12.56pm: An INEC staff reacts to the snatching of election materials by thugs of the APC.

12.45pm: Sporadic shooting disrupts poll in Amatolo.

12.45pm: Materials and INEC official yet to arrive at any of the PUs in Apoi Ward, Southern Ijaw.

12.21pm: Legit.ng correspondent on ground in Bayelsa reports that ballot boxes were hijacked in Unit 11 in Amassoma, Southern Ijaw and some youths have been sighted creating barricades to apprehend hoodlums who snatched the boxes.

Voting materials for Amatolo community & INEC adhoc staff stranded due to lack of security.

12.06pm: Accreditation yet to start at West Bomo Ward, Southern Ijaw LGA

12.00pm: Election has been halted in PU06/07/01/006, Oporoma I, Southern Ijaw as a result of the APC agent who tore all the result sheets.

11.57am: Voting buying at PU06/07/12/016, East Bomo I, Southern Ijaw.

11.57am: Materials just arrived at the Olodiama II Ward, Southern Ijaw.

An official of INEC nabbed in Southern Ijaw.

11.52am: In Ogobiri community, there is a gun battle between the military and the APC thugs. The military are reportedly in need of backup.

11.50am: At the Amasoma collation centre, Legit.ng correspondent reports that accreditation and voting are ongoing peacefully and encouraging while PDP and APC agents are disagreeing over the mode of traveling to polling units.

11.38am: In Amassoma, in Init 21 Ward 9, reports say APC thugs have allegedly hijacked electoral and diverted to Iseleama Town Hall.

Accreditation ongoing in Southern Ijaw area of Bayelsa state.

11.35am: Legit.ng correspondent on ground in collation centres in Amassoma community, Southern Ijaw reports that INEC officials are waiting to be deployed to various units with transportation mode being the major challenge.

Dejected adhoc committee members at Amassoma collation centre, Southern Ijaw. Photo: Michael Obasa

Some are insisting that they would travel by land and others by road. Security personnel also on ground to monitor the situation as well as the adhoc staff are looking dejected.

11.30am: Accreditation and voting has commenced at PU 06/07/04/019, Olodiama II, Southern Ijaw.

11.17am: Accreditation and voting disrupted in polling units 6, 7 and 10 Biseni by thugs.

Suspected thugs have reportedly disrupted in polling units 6,7 & 10 Biseni.

11.07am: There are reports of thuggery in Ekeremor main town instigated by the minister of state for agriculture.

11.07am: There are reports that the aged people have been given concession for voting. Accreditation and voting are expected to end by 2.00pm.

Ad-hoc officials of INEC on ground in Southern Ijaw. Photo: Michael Obasa

Electorates on a queue for accreditation and voting in Southern Ijaw. Photo: Michael Obasa

Voting going on in Southern Ijaw area of Bayelsa state. Photo: Michael Obasa.

11.03am: Elections have violent-free in all centres where rerun is taking place in the state but Legit.ng correspondent on ground reports that INEC officials and election materials are yet to arrive some polling units in the river side of Southern Ijaw.

11.00am: Materials and INEC officials yet to arrive PUs 06/07/16/026-28.

10.58am: Accreditation and voting ongoing at PU06/04/02/013, Ogbolomabiri 11, Nembe LGA.

Security operatives doing their job in Southern Ijaw area of Bayelsa state. Photo: Michael Obasa

10.55am: Voting has commenced at Aleibiri Ward 2, Unit 4 and 5. Total number of registered voters in Unit 4=566; while Unit 5 has 396 registered voters.

10.54am: Officials of INEC and materials just moved to the various PUs in Central Bomo Ward, Southern Ijaw.

10.54am: Election officers experiencing a little shortage in ballot papers. But so far, the car readers have been working perfectly.

Process commences in Southern Ijaw.

10.35am: Shouting match over locating PU in front of a local politicians house. Ward 9 Unit 1

The shouting match in front of the politician's house.

10.25am: Accreditation and voting going on at PU06/08/10/005, 06/08/10/006 & 06/08/10/009, Ekpetiama, Yenago.

10.25am: Fracas in Amassoma RAC center between PDP and APC agents.

10.20am: Distribution of materials has begun in Oporoma of Southern Ijaw

Voters on the queue in Bayelsa ahead of the accreditation and voting this morning. Photo: Michael Obasa

10.21am: INEC has decided that accreditation and voting will go on simultaneously, so the electorates are going to carry out both concurrently.

10.15am: Very peaceful and orderly accreditation and voting going on in Ward 10 PU 7 Amassoma.

Security operatives on the road in Bayelsa ahead of today's election. Photo: Michael Obasa

10.14am: JTF have reportedly blocked off Amassoma River to prevent unauthorized movement in the region.

10.00am: In Anyama primary school 4 units Anyama community, Southern Ijaw voting and accreditation started. Voters came out in large numbers. Speaking with Legit.ng in the area, Commander Thomas, commissioner for Agriculture, said he is pleased with the peaceful conduct of exercise so far.

A voter carrying out the process in Southern Ijaw. Photo: Michael Obasa

10.00am: Accreditation and voting about to commence in Amassoma.

9.50am: Voting abruptly stopped in PU06/05/02/001, Otuokpoti Ward, Ogbia as violence has erupted.

8:10 am: Voting and accreditation has started in Attissa 3 polling unit Ogbogoro community, Yenagoa.

7.00am: There are reports that violence erupted btwn APC and PDP supporters in Nembe and four persons were killed before accreditation started.

Source: Legit.ng
On Tuesday, a baby giraffe named Wesley died in the hours following what the Zoo Miami is calling a " freak accident ."

Guy Falls In Love With His Little Meatball Of A Foster Dog

The incident occurred around 9 a.m. Zookeepers brought another giraffe to a separate area for a medical checkup. Wesley wanted to see what was going on, so he rested his head over the fence between two poles.

"Curiosity brought him back," Ron Magill, communications director for Zoo Miami told The Dodo.

Had he lifted his head the way he placed it there, he would have been fine. Instead, he pulled back and felt his head caught between the poles. Frightened, his legs buckled from underneath him. That's when the spinal cord injury occurred, according to Magill.

The team was immediately able to remove Wesley from the poles, but the damage had been done. After hours of attempting to save his life, the zoo made the difficult decision to relieve the calf of his pain.

While Wesley's death is the first of its kind at the Zoo Miami, this "freak accident" follows a number of other similar tragedies across America.
<p> Marley's Mutts </p>

Welcome back, Mimi. It wasn't so long ago, this bull mastiff was dropped off at a veterinary clinic in California with a broken, mangled and infected leg. Marley's Mutts

Dodo Shows Faith = Restored Rescued Wild Horse Loves To Play With A Little Donkey

Marley's Mutts

The owner said he couldn't afford medical treatment, suggesting she be put down instead. Then he sped off in a shiny new Hummer. Marley's Mutts

Marley's Mutts

Her leg was in such wretched shape, Zach Skow, founder of Marley's Mutts, said he could smell the rot. It seemed likely the leg would have to be amputated. But, as Skow wrote at the time in a Facebook post, "Hope has arrived, however, and I think she'll be okay. I know she'll be okay." Marley's Mutts

Marley's Mutts

Hope didn't just arrive. It sprang, leapt, bounded, raced, and galloped. Mimi underwent extensive medical treatment at VCA West Los Angeles Medical Hospital, where, as Marley's Mutts notes in a Facebook post, vets "threw everything but the kitchen sink at her leg." She also soaked up the love of a man known for his incredible bond with dogs. And then, she radiated it back a hundredfold. Marley's Mutts

Marley's Mutts

In an Instagram post this week, Marley's Mutt's shared this stunning video of a fully recovered Mimi celebrating in the snow. This is what happens when we don't give up on love.
For more than a decade, this elderly monkey knew nothing other than the rusted wire walls of his tiny, slanted cage. Earlier this week, members of the Laos Wildlife Rescue Center (LWRC) received a call from a woman who said she was keeping a stump-tailed macaque in a cage behind her home. "[We] went to see what they could do for this poor animal that was in crucial need of rescue," LWRC wrote in a Facebook update. Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

What they found was worse than expected. The aged monkey was living in a tiny dilapidated structure built of old metal poles and pieces of mesh. The cage was just a few feet across, leaving the macaque with barely enough room to move. The floor was littered with trash. He had no toys and no source of comfort. Even worse, he had been living there for 13 long years. Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Dodo Shows Soulmates Dog Goes Everywhere In His Dad's Kangaroo Pouch

Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Fortunately, after so many years of locking him up, the woman readily agreed to turn the monkey - now known as Arnold - over to LWRC. The rescue team jumped into action, sedating him and removing him - at long last - from the ramshackle prison. Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Photos of the grizzled monkey show that the years appear to have taken their toll on him. Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Arnold was one of the lucky ones. According to LWRC, an NGO that previously ran the Lao Zoo had been trying for years to rescue Arnold, but never succeeded. "We are delighted to finally see this macaque out of the hideous 'home' he had been confined to," the group wrote on Facebook. Now, Arnold has been relocated to LWRC's sanctuary. While it's unlikely that he'll ever be able to return to the wild, LWRC hopes to give him the next best thing after he's out of quarantine. Laos Wildlife Rescue Center

Laos Wildlife Rescue Center
WALL STREET

SEC settles with SAC Capitals Cohen

Billionaire Steven A. Cohen has been in the crosshairs of federal prosecutors for nearly a decade. His hedge fund, SAC Capital, was once one of the most powerful on Wall Street, managing more than $15 billion for investors and producing stellar returns for years.

But prosecutors suspected that SACs success was too good to be true.

U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in Manhattan once called Cohens hedge fund a veritable magnet for market cheaters. When, in 2013, SAC agreed to pay $1.2 billion to settle charges that it tolerated rampant insider trading, it was one of the highest-profile successes in the governments aggressive push against insider trading.

Still, connecting Cohen, one of the richest people on the world, directly to those misdeeds has remained elusive. And on Friday, the Securities and Exchange Commission essentially conceded. The Wall Street watchdog settled its nearly three-year-old civil case against Cohen, who was accused of failing to properly supervise employees, with no financial penalty.

Instead, Cohens new firm, Point72, which manages his $10 billion personal fortune, must hire an independent consultant to make sure it complies with securities laws. Once at risk of being banned from the industry for life, Cohen can begin managing others money again in 2018, under the agreement.

Inevitably, some will ask why I agreed to settle, Cohen said in a letter to Point72 employees obtained by The Washington Post. The longer the pending litigation lingered, the more it distracted from the world-class Firm that we are building.

 Renae Merle

RETAIL

Mobile shopping jumped over holidays

As expected, numbers out Friday from research firm ComScore confirmed that mobile shopping, which includes buying from smartphones and tablets, jumped in November and December, spurring on holiday retail sales this year.

Online shoppers are increasingly comfortable with shopping on smartphones as screen sizes get larger and shopping apps get better.

I believe that weve seen a paradigm shift in 2016 where the future of retail will increasingly be defined by consumers behavior on mobile, said ComScore chairman emeritus Gian Fulgoni.

Total online spending during November and December rose 13 percent to $69.08 billion from $61.29 billion last year. Spending on desktops rose 6 percent to $56.43 billion, short of comScores expectations of an 8 percent rise to $58.3 billion.

But mobile commerce helped make up some of that shortfall. Shopping on smartphones and tablets jumped 59 percent to $12.65 billion, well above the 47 percent rise ComScore was expecting.

Mobile commerce accounted for 18 percent of total online spending, up from 13 percent last year.

 Associated Press

Also in Business

 From news services
For several months, lawyers from the D.C. attorney generals office observed broken heaters, rodent infestations and badly maintained plumbing at four rent-controlled buildings in one of the poorest corners of Washington. They were appalled.

Now, the District is suing the landlords  Bethesda-based Sanford Capital and its subsidiaries  for maintaining the apartment buildings in Congress Heights in what the suit alleges is such an extreme state of disrepair that they have deteriorated to the point of being uninhabitable by tenants.

The pattern of neglect, D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racines office says, was intentional, lending credence to tenants long-standing claim that they are being pushed out to make way for new development in one of the Districts last remaining affordable pockets.

The lawsuit, filed Friday, caps more than two years of public complaints about broken pipes, persistent flooding, vermin infestations and mold from residents at 1309, 1331 and 1333 Alabama Ave. SE, and at 3210 13th St. SE, many of whom are disabled or elderly and living on fixed incomes.

Will Merrifield, a lawyer at the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, who has represented the tenants in their efforts to seek repairs, said the lawsuit demonstrates appropriate action against a company that has continually showed . . . that theyre not interested in complying with the D.C. housing code, and theyre not interested in the welfare of the people who live in their properties.

A vacant but used apartment sits trashed in a mostly vacant apartment building on 13th Street SE in September. (Jahi Chikwendiu/The Washington Post)

Aubrey Carter Nowell, a principal at Sanford Capital and one of two individuals named in the lawsuit, declined to comment Friday because he said he had not seen the suit.

Nowell said in an email in September that the properties had no outstanding violations. He also said that the company was no longer making capital improvements because it planned to raze the properties as part of a redevelopment plan.

Inspections by the Districts Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs in late October resulted in the issuance of 77 housing code violations for those four buildings, which had already received more than three dozen. Additional inspections of one building a few days before Christmas found residents there living without heat or hot water. A ceiling collapsed on the tenants of one apartment on Dec. 21, the lawsuit says.

Indeed, the refusal of the Respondents to abate their housing code violations in a timely manner is particularly egregious in light of the fact that many of their tenants have modest financial means, and therefore lack viable alternatives to the unsafe and unhealthy rental accommodations inflicted upon them by their landlord, the attorney generals office says in its court filing.

Racine has petitioned the D.C. Superior Court to assign a receiver  a temporary manager  to take control of the buildings to make much-needed repairs, and he has asked the court to order Sanford Capital and its subsidiaries to pay for the damage.

[Read more: Poor tenants fear being pushed out by planned Congress Heights complex]

The four apartment buildings lie at the center of a planned 285,000-square-foot mixed-use development above the Congress Heights Metro. The project, which Sanford Capital and its co-developer City Partners say will include new offices, more than 200 apartments and ground-floor retail, was approved by the citys Zoning Commission last year.

But the lawsuit appears to have alienated Sanford Capitals business partner and chief executor of the development plan, Geoffrey Griffis of City Partners.

The current condition of several of the properties are not something we support, Griffis said in an email Friday. Although Griffis and his company do not own or manage any of the properties in question, he said that a change is required.

He said that he did not know how the lawsuit would affect the development plan he had worked on with Sanford but that he hoped it would effect immediate changes for the residents of Congress Heights and that City Partners would still be able to move forward with the development plan.

We do not want to displace residents, which is why we have made guarantees that all current residents will be offered the chance to move back into the new building at their current lease rates, he said.

Tenants and their advocates said last year that the cityapproved development plan, in spite of repeated code violations by one of the developers, raised questions about the Districts commitment to maintaining affordable housing, even as D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) allocated $100 million to the citys affordable housing trust fund.

Some affordable housing advocates, such as Merrifield, see Congress Heights as part of a broader pattern of swift gentrification amid rising property values.

Whats going on at Congress Heights is going on all over the city, Merrifield said, adding that property owners in poor neighborhoods across the city are trying to cash in on rising housing prices by forcing the tenants out through intentional neglect so that they can develop the land into more profitable ventures.

Bowsers administration also has leverage in the Congress Heights development plan because it controls a key fifth building in the plan, 3200 13th St. SE. Sanford Capital and City Partners have planned to acquire the building, which owes the city roughly a million dollars for an unpaid loan and taxes.

According to the lawsuit, the District may petition the court to appoint a receiver for a rental housing accommodation when the building has been cited for code violations that pose a serious threat to the health, safety, or security of the tenants and the owner, agent, lessor or manager has failed . . . to abate the violations  or when the operation of the building has demonstrated a pattern of neglect.
Maryland House Speaker Michael E. Busch, right and Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr., left, both Democrats, are expected to weather fallout from a budget rift with Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, center. (Linda Davidson/The Washington Post)

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) will greet the lawmakers returning to Annapolis this week with a proposal for tax relief and a demand for more control over spending decisions.

Meanwhile, the Democratic-controlled legislature will try to overturn the six vetoes Hogan issued last spring.

The 90-day legislative session that begins Wednesday is an opportunity for Hogan to capitalize on a highly successful first year as a red governor in a blue state at a time of increasing polarization among governments at both the state and federal levels. For Democratic lawmakers, it is a chance to prove their relevance.

For both sides, theres danger. Hogan doesnt want to come across as too demanding and too partisan, said Todd Eberly, a political science professor at St. Marys College. The Democrats face a similar challenge while they figure out, was Hogan a fluke? Or were voters sending a larger message? . . . I expect to see the testing on both sides to see what they can get away with and what they cant.

[Post poll shows Hogan is highly popular]

Hogan watches as a blighted row house is demolished in Baltimore. Aid for the city will be a focus of the upcoming legislative session. (Amy Davis/AP)

Much of the session will focus on the budget, an issue that caused a major rift last year between Hogan and the two longtime leaders of the General Assembly, House Speaker Michael E. Busch (D-Anne Arundel) and Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert).

Lawmakers will also debate whether Maryland should join a handful of other jurisdictions in the country that allow assisted suicide and require paid sick leave. They will consider bills to address poverty and other problems in Baltimore, reform the criminal justice system, improve the business climate, increase college affordability, boost retirement security and expand early voting.

All this will unfold as Maryland prepares for a late-April primary that will decide the nominations for one open U.S. Senate seat and two open U.S. House seats. Several state lawmakers are running.

As of Friday, the Office of Legislative Services had received 1,684 bill draft requests, 500 more than it had when the session started last year. Many in Annapolis credit the outpouring to the 69 lawmakers who were elected in 2014 and  like Hogan  now have a year of experience under their belts.

They have opened the floodgates, said Sen. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Montgomery).

Opening salvo

Busch said he feels confident that there will be enough votes in the House and Senate to override Hogans vetoes, which dealt with taxes for online hotel-booking sites, voting rights for former inmates, marijuana laws and criminal-asset seizures.

The 47-member Senate, which has 33 Democrats, needs 29 votes to overturn a veto; the 141-member House, with 91 Democrats, needs 85. While the bill on seizures of criminal assets passed both chambers with veto-proof majorities, the other bills were a few votes short.

Miller, left, and Busch are longtime leaders in the Maryland General Assembly. (Brian Witte/AP)

[Hogan killed six bills last spring. Democrats want to revive them]

A string of overrides could set a confrontational tone for the session. It also would send a clear message to Hogan, whose approval ratings soared last year as he battled cancer while continuing to govern.

I think it could be telling. It would be a declaration that We are Democrats first,  said Eberly, who called the vetoes a shot across the bow.

Democrats said that they are wary of Hogans plan to seek more flexibility on mandated spending increases in years when revenue is down. While they are open to tax relief, they do not want to cut funding that is available for schools, public safety, health care and other basics.

Busch said that there is residual bitterness from last years budget battles, especially in populous Prince Georges and Montgomery counties, and in Baltimore City, which all got less money than they expected.

Lawmakers from those areas feel like the good efforts they have put forward to be bipartisan have been rejected, Busch said. It becomes problematic coming into this year.

Republicans, who are a minority in both chambers, said they will support Hogans proposal to relax spending mandates when necessary.

This is important for our long-term fiscal health, said House Minority Leader Nicholaus R. Kipke (R-Anne Arundel). My hope is that Democrats and leaders of the General Assembly will partner with the governor to identify a path towards modernizing our spending formulas.

As a candidate, Hogan promised to free up money for tax relief by eliminating waste and corruption from the state budget. After a year in the governors mansion, however, his focus appears to have shifted.

Hes discovering what many politicians find  that there is not a discrete category of waste, fraud and abuse, said Daniel Scholzman, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University. You essentially dont have the revenue to make everyone happy. You have to fight over what gets cut.

Looking for compromise

Hogan must introduce his spending plan by Jan. 20. He has said little about which bills he plans to push, but aides said that the governor will focus on many of the same issues that dominated his first session  eliminating the structural deficit and improving the states business climate.

He will also push to expand charter schools in Maryland and pass a tax credit for businesses that donate to schools, items that were watered down or killed by Democrats last year.

Some observers said that if Hogan does not find a way to forge a compromise, he risks following in the steps of former governor Robert L. Ehrlich (R), who held high approval ratings in his first year but lost his bid for reelection after constant battles with Miller and Busch.

There are some areas where Democratic legislative leaders and Hogan are expected to agree.

A bipartisan panel, led by a Hogan appointee and created by the legislature, has been studying ways to reduce the state prison population by focusing on re-entry programs for offenders and other community services. If approved, the panels proposals would save the state $247 million over 10 years.

The legislature is also expected to consider a package of bills to reform police practices, hiring and training, including widespread use of police body cameras. Those proposals were shaped by a legislative group that Busch and Miller created following the death of Freddie Gray and the riots in Baltimore last year. The unrest put Maryland at the center of the national discussion about police use of force against minorities.

[In push to reform police work, officers examine their own biases]

Hogan supports body cameras for police. But he has not indicated whether he would back changes to the protections given to officers accused of misconduct or lengthening the time frame for civilians to file brutality complaints.

Boosting Baltimore

The legislature will also take up initiatives to address the persistent economic and social problems in Baltimore, especially the impoverished neighborhoods near where Gray lived.

Busch said city legislators, nonprofit leaders and the mayor have come up with a progressive plan for Baltimore that includes pumping tens of millions of dollars into workforce training, blight removal, drug treatment, investments in universities and hospitals in the city, and possibly opening schools after hours for recreation and other community uses.

Better-quality communities, better-quality schools: Crime rate goes down, revenues go up, Busch said. Everybody in the region has to understand how important Baltimore City is as well.

The plan has reignited a debate between Democrats and Republicans over resources going to Baltimore instead of other parts of the state.

Im not trying to rain down on Baltimore City; I live on the outskirts of Baltimore, said Senate Minority Leader J.B. Jennings (R-Baltimore County). But . . . there are other areas of the state that have issues, and they need to be addressed, too.

State Republican party leaders said that they think Democrats have turned their attention to Baltimore as a way to chip away at Hogans popularity in the city. His approval rating there is 53 percent, lower than elsewhere but high for a Republican in an overwhelmingly Democratic jurisdiction.

The Democrats cant have Baltimore City being any more favorable to the governor, said Joe Cluster, executive director of the state GOP.

If Hogan vetoes the Democrats measures, he could anger Baltimore voters and energize them for upcoming elections. But the governor just announced a $700 million plan to target blight in the city, which will help combat suggestions that he does not care about its residents.
The District

Three shootings leave 1 dead, 2 wounded

A man was shot and killed in the city Friday night, and in a second incident, two young women were shot and wounded after a school basketball game.

The fatal shooting occurred about 9:40 p.m. in t he 3700 block of Hayes Street NE.

The other incident occurred in the 1700 block of East Capitol Street, outside Eastern Senior High School.

Both victims were hit in the legs, after a car drove by and someone inside began shooting, police said.

The victims were 17 and 18. Neither suffered a life-threatening wound, police said.

The homicide followed a 10-day stretch in which no killings were reported in the city.

The period was particularly long in view of last years rate of about two slayings in the District every five days.

Another shooting occurred Friday night in the 2400 block of Martin Luther King Avenue SE.

The victim, a man, was struck in the hip, police said.

 Martin Weil and Clarence Williams

MARYLAND

Poachers aimed for deer, shot robot

Two men took aim at protected deer on state property in St. Marys County  only to find the deer was a robot meant to trick poachers.

Maryland Natural Resources Police said David James Few, 21, of Taneytown, Md., and Brian Kelley Stitely, 24, of Fairfield, Pa., directed flashlights at the Robo-Deer and shot it with crossbows in Leonardtown on Oct. 23.

On Thursday, according to authorities, the men pleaded guilty to spotlighting the deer.

Few was sentenced to 30 days in prison, which has been suspended as long as he completes two years of probation. He also was barred from hunting for two years.

Stitely already had been arrested for deer poaching in Maryland and Pennsylvania, Natural Resources police said, and received a 30-day suspended sentence and three years of probation. Stitely previously was banned from hunting in 45 states through 2018, which the judge extended through 2023, police said.

 Julie Zauzmer

VIRGINIA

Police probe threat at Woodbridge High

Authorities in Prince William County said they are investigating a threat of violence at an area school, scrawled on a wall at Woodbridge High School. It mentioned a date next week.

County school officials said they are working with police to investigate and, above all, to ensure the safety of students and staff.

A Facebook notice added that the community would be told if the threat was found credible or if special precautions were needed.  We take this very seriously, Whomever is responsible will face serious disciplinary action. the posting said.

InsideNOVA was among the first publications to report the threat.

 Dana Hedgpeth

THE REGION

Metro to interrupt track work for game

Metro said it has adjusted scheduled track work on the Orange, Blue and Silver lines to aid fans going to Sundays football playoff game.

Starting at noon Sunday, about 4 1/ 2 hours before the Redskins and Green Bay Packers meet at FedExField, rebuilding on the three lines will end for the weekend, allowing trains to run on a regular Sunday schedule. Work on the Red, Yellow and Green lines will go on as planned, Metro officials said.

 Paul Duggan
A 20-year-old District man was sentenced to 40 years in prison Friday in connection with two home burglaries nearly two years ago in Northeast Washington as well as the sexual assault of one of the homeowners.

Sentencing for the man, Tavon Barber, was delayed after prosecutors questioned DNA findings in evidence in one of the cases. Doubts raised about the findings in Barbers case as well as in other cases, prompted an investigation that led to an overhaul of the Districts DNA lab.

During trial, prosecutors argued that Barber burglarized two houses within a 20-hour period. In the first burglary on June 4, 2013, prosecutors say Barber climbed through an unlocked kitchen window between 9:30 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. as the two occupants slept. Prosecutors say Barber stole several items including two laptops and a set of a car keys that he later used to steal the occupants vehicle.

Less than a day later Barber broke into another house, prosecutors said. According to prosecutors, Barber and an accomplice, went into the bedroom of the second house where the husband and wife were sleeping. Barber held a gun on the husband and sexually assaulted the wife, prosecutors said. The husband and Barber then struggled over the gun, Barber shot at the husband, the bullet missed and entered the wall above the husbands head, prosecutors said. Barber and his accomplice fled with two iPhones, a MacBook, a laptop and the husbands wallet.

Barber was arrested weeks later.

A D.C. Superior Court jury found Barber guilty of first degree burglary, burglary while armed and sexual assault in the case during a 2014 trial. Judge Russell F. Canan sentenced Barber in connection with the burglaries and assault.

Barbers sentencing was delayed after prosecutors questioned DNA findings in evidence in the case. Doubts raised about the findings in Barbers case as well as in other cases, prompted an investigation that led to an overhaul of the Districts DNA lab.
In Cuba to lead a trade mission last week, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe navigated the islands tricky political terrain with relative ease.

McAuliffe (D) was respectful and reserved in formal meetings with Cuban government ministers, nodding his head thoughtfully through sometimes ponderous presentations.

He spoke passionately about his long-standing opposition to the U.S. trade embargo. He even took care to pronounce soft Latin As in words such as Castro and Havana. This from a native upstate New Yorker, who usually hits vowels in ways that jangle Richmonds Southern ears.

When he did cut loose  most notably by taking the wheel of a pink-and-white 1956 Chevy  he did so in a style fitting for a rum-drinking, cigar-smoking, fun-loving culture.

His only seeming slip-up: using an f-word,flag.

Once when speaking to American reporters, and twice in a formal presentation with University of Havana officials, McAuliffe used the word  in an expression thats ordinary enough back home, but in Cuba it has the ring of imperialist ambition.

[In Havana, McAuliffe promotes Virginia trade to Cubans  and Virginians]

Virginia Commonwealth University is putting a flag all over the globe, he said in remarks about future exchange programs with the University of Havana. And we thought it most appropriate that we put our flag down here in Cuba.

Although McAuliffe was clearly speaking metaphorically, talk of flag-planting is maybe not the best choice of words, said James Williams, president of Washington-based Engage Cuba, which advocates for normalizing U.S.-Cuban ties. If theres one thing that Cuba cares about more than anything else, it is their sovereignty.

McAuliffes translator toned it down, maybe in an act of diplomacy, or merely because she couldnt keep up with Virginias voluble chief executive. She only mentioned bandera once, and made it sound as if the flag would just be passing through.

We desire, she said, to carry the flag to other parts of the world.

McAuliffes spokesman, Brian Coy, said there was never any risk that the governors comment would rub Cubans the wrong way.

Both context and common sense make it clear that the Governor was touting the establishment of a new relationship between Virginia and Cuba, Coy said via email. You dont need a degree from VCU or the University of Havana to understand that.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 9



By Anvar Mammadov - Trend:



From Jan.11, 2016, while withdrawing money from plastic cards a conversion fee equal to four percent will be charged, Azerbaijan Banks Association (ABA) told Trend Jan. 9.



The commission will be charged only during conversion operations for withdrawing from plastic cards. This measure is aimed at reducing the cash operations from plastic cards and stimulating non-cash payments.



"Some bank customers use cards not for their intended purpose, and us them only in order to cash out their funds," said the source in the association.



"In recent days, the population began to actively transfer manats to their dollar cards, and then withdraw dollars and sell them, which could lead to the emergence of black market. As a result, other citizens could not cash out their dollar funds from their cards, since the ATMs were empty within 30 minutes," said the association.



This decision does not concern the clearing conversion, ABA said.



"Those who carry out payments (in particular with online purchaes) from their manat cards or vice versa, would be billed through the existing conversion tariffs. So the conversion fee for them will be 0.5 percent as before," ABA said, adding that the new rule doesn't apply to withdrawals of currency, same as the one on the account."



The total number of payment cards in Azerbaijan reached 5.679 million units as of Nov.2015, of which 4.59 million units accounted for debit cards, according to the Central Bank of Azerbaijan.



The official exchange rate is 1,5642 AZN/USD as of Jan. 9.

---

Follow the author on Twitter: @Anvar_Mammadov
Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) delivers his two-year budget proposal to the General Assembly's money committees last month. He is expected to be at odds with Republican lawmakers on several issues during the upcoming legislative session. (P. Kevin Morley/Richmond Times-Dispatch via Associated Press)

Take one governor bent on furthering his liberal policies. Add a Republican-controlled legislature determined to stop him. Its a recipe for partisan fireworks that will heat up Mr. Jeffersons Capitol when the General Assembly reconvenes Wednesday.

But amid expected fights over Medicaid, gun control and climate change, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) and Republican lawmakers are showing signs that they will try something new: compromise.

Education funding and economic development are two areas where the sides have said they can work together  a novel concept in a swing state whose political landscape increasingly resembles Washington.

But any intention to play nice will probably be tempered by national politics when presidential hopefuls visit Virginia ahead of Super Tuesday on March 1.

Virginia is at the center of the electoral-college calculations of both parties that wont be lost on lawmakers in Richmond who want to terrify voters about the other party, said Stephen J. Farnsworth, a political scientist at the University of Mary Washington. Expect a lot of heat but not a lot of illumination in 2016.

McAuliffe, a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, spent the weekend in Iowa campaigning for his good friend and ally Hillary Clinton in her White House bid.

But in a recent speech unveiling his two-year budget proposal, McAuliffe signaled that he is ready to trade the partisan warrior hat for a bipartisan dealmaker one  in Richmond if not on the campaign trail. He urged lawmakers to not get bogged down in the same wasteful partisan bickering.

McAuliffe said he hopes to capitalize on a two-year reprieve from across-the-board federal budget cuts known as sequestration and a state revenue surplus.

His budget plan would pump $1 billion into K-12 and higher education to raise teacher salaries, boost financial aid and promote research. Republicans have expressed concerns about the plan, but echoed the governors need to restore staffing levels and pay to pre-recession levels.

They could also be of similar minds on an economic-development initiative trumpeted by some of the states most powerful players in business, education and government.

Details have yet to be announced, but McAuliffes budget sets aside about $38 million for Go Virginia, an initiative backed by Dominion chief executive Thomas F. Farrell II and John O. Dubby Wynne, chairman of the Hampton Roads Community Foundation and former chief executive of Landmark Communications, as well as the presidents of Virginia Tech and Virginia Commonwealth University, according to a video marketing the project.

But the session is expected to bring its share of partisan tension, as well.

The No. 1 issue both parties have tangled over is Medicaid expansion. For the third straight year, McAuliffe called on lawmakers to cover 400,000 uninsured Virginians under the Affordable Care Act.

In his first year, he and Republicans took the state to the brink of shutdown over Medicaid before the governor and fellow Democrats conceded defeat. In his second, he made only a symbolic pitch for expansion, shifting his focus to economic development and working with Republicans to close a projected $2.4 billion hole in state finances.

This time hes trying something new. He would pay for the states portion of the federal health-care program with a 3 percent tax on hospital revenue. To sweeten the deal, he proposed tying some of the projected savings from expanding Medicaid to favorite projects of Republican lawmakers. But Republicans have said they wont hesitate to strip out the funding.

A defining issue of McAuliffes governorship, Medicaid has been a rallying cry for both parties.

They have politicized this issue shamelessly, Sen. Barbara A. Favola (D-Arlington) said of Medicaid. It is so discouraging to see folks who have been elected to represent the interests of their constituents ignore those constituents and tie themselves to a political mantra simply because its easy to do.

The House GOP majoritys point person on health care, Del. John M. OBannon III (R-Henrico), a neurologist, maintained that the federal program would have cost Virginia more than advertised.

Its a little disappointing because of the last two years, he said of McAuliffes pitch. In the big picture, weve made the right decision to not expand Medicaid in Virginia. The dynamics are pretty much unchanged.

OBannon is also leading the charge to roll back certificate-of-public-need laws, which require doctors and hospitals to get the state health commissioners blessing before they add certain services, such as an ambulatory care center or imaging equipment.

Opponents of the laws, including some cash-strapped rural hospitals, say they stifle innovation, while supporters of the current system  including Inova, Northern Virginias largest hospital system  say the regulations offset charity-care costs.

Like Medicaid, gun regulation represents another partisan flashpoint that could end in a stalemate.

Democratic Attorney General Mark Herrings recent move to sever Virginias concealed-handgun permit reciprocity agreements with 25 states emboldened lawmakers on both sides.

There really was a furious reaction, said Sen. Richard H. Black (R-Loudoun). The phones just rang off the hook. He called Herrings move a break down of the rule of law.

Black submitted a bill that says anyone who can legally possess a gun can also carry it concealed without the need for a permit, which supporters call constitutional carry.

Others want Virginia to adopt universal reciprocity, meaning permits from all states would be recognized. Another bill would roll back a provision that says a person carrying a handgun in a public place while drunk or high would automatically lose their concealed-carry permit.

McAuliffe is expected to veto any measures that make it to his desk.

On the other side, Democrats want to tighten gun restrictions in the wake of mass shootings that have garnered national attention. Some of the proposed measures include: banning gun stores near schools, in reaction to a public outcry in McLean; authorizing local police to enforce federal gun-free school zones; and preventing people convicted of misdemeanors involving domestic violence to possess a gun.

Del. Marcus B. Simon (D-Fairfax) filed bills that would prohibit people on the federal terrorist watch list from obtaining a concealed-handgun permit, or from purchasing, possessing or transporting a firearm.

We will continue to pursue modest, common-sense steps to keep schoolchildren, victims of domestic violence and other vulnerable Virginians from becoming victims of gun violence, he said.

The bills are not expected to go to a vote in either chamber.

Farnsworth, the political scientist, put it like this: The kind of gridlock that has been the norm in recent years in Richmond will be the norm this year.

Laura Vozzella contributed to this report.
Women with little or no health insurance would be eligible for free, long-lasting birth control under a program proposed by Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D).

Announced by Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam (D) at a community college in Alexandria on Friday, the $9 million federal grant would cover intrauterine devices and skin implants as well as outreach to eligible women, training for clinicians and a study of the programs impact.

This is all about educating and empowering women to decide when and if they become pregnant, Northam, a pediatric neurologist, said at Northern Virginia Community College. When women have access to this contraception, they choose on their own time when to start a family.

Northam, who is running for governor in 2017, has been pushing for such a program for months. He wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post in August on the issue and argued for expanded access to birth control during a Brookings Institution event in October.

On Friday, he pointed to a similar program in Colorado that led to a 40 percent decline in the birthrate among teens between 2009 and 2013. The Colorado governors office said the state saved $42.5 million in health-care expenditures associated with teens giving birth and the abortion rate for 15- to 19-year-olds in participating counties fell 35 percent.

[How Colorados teen birthrate dropped 40% in four years]

The devices would be distributed through Department of Health centers across the state. There is no requirement in Virginia for minors to have parental consent before having a contraceptive device implanted.

Its going to help women, and its also going to help the Commonwealth of Virginia economically, Northam, a pediatric neurosurgeon, said of the program.

Although it relies on federal funds, the contraceptive program requires the approval of Virginias legislature, now controlled by Republicans, before it can be launched.

A spokesman for the Virginia House and Senate said lawmakers would review the proposal as part of the budget process. This years legislative session begins Jan. 13.

Northam said that reducing teen pregnancies and teen abortions is a bipartisan goal.

The less unintended pregnancies we have in the Commonwealth of Virginia, the better, and also, the less abortions that we have, the better.

But he also acknowledged that Republicans may not agree with this approach. In 2011, then-Gov. Robert F. McDonnell (R) cut funding for teen-pregnancy prevention programs that provided sex education and birth control. A year later, the legislature passed a bill that would have required transvaginal ultrasounds for women seeking abortions. It was ultimately killed amid backlash against the invasive procedure. Conservative religious groups in Colorado have opposed that states program.

I remind all women in the Commonwealth of Virginia that a group of legislators, most of whom are men, shouldnt be telling women what they should and shouldnt do with their bodies, Northam said  the only explicitly political note struck by the soft-spoken lieutenant governor.

The small crowd of local politicians, health-care providers and advocates applauded.

Certain people are going to notice the budget request, state Sen. Barbara A. Favola (D-Arlington) said after the event. Opposition to birth-control distribution on the grounds that it will encourage teenagers to have sex, she said, was naively based and ill-informed. . . . Teenagers make decisions in the heat of the moment, and whether they have access to birth control or not doesnt factor in.

Several counties in Northern Virginia have already received private grants to expand long-lasting contraceptive access. Stephen A. Haering, director of the Alexandria Health Department, said that IUD or implant use among patients has increased dramatically since its program began in 2013  from 15 that year to 77 in 2015. The vast majority of women who come to their family planning clinic, he said, are uninsured, and without the federal money continuing the program would be difficult.
It was a blind date of sorts, this first meeting between the Cubans and the Virginians who had come wooing with high-tech fish farms and fancy wood flooring, organic chicken and bony, downscale fish.

The icebreaker, proffered by Cubas Ministry of Foreign Trade and Investment, was a slide show meant to stress the safety of pouring big bucks into the communist island nation.

Foreign investments enjoy all-out protection and legal security and could not be expropriated, unless such action is executed for reasons of public or social interest, one slide read.

Members of Virginias business delegation, most of them visiting Cuba for the first time, barely stifled a collective Yikes!

I gotta know Im not going to invest half a million in a mill down here and lose it, Bill Stone, owner of Mountain Lumber Co., said later.

Meghan Hobbs, special assistant to the secretary of agriculture and forestry, screams as she is playfully touched by a living statue in Old Havana during a delegation tour. (Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post)

After a half-century of hostilities and 13 months of detente, U.S.-Cuban business relations are at a moment of tantalizing promise and stomach-churning doubt. Stone, like others on the three-day trade mission that Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) led last week, came away from the encounter keenly interested though not entirely smitten. With the winds of history seemingly at their backs  and a well-connected governor in their corner  they returned to Virginia intent on pushing ahead, however warily, with their Cuban courtship.

[In Havana, Terry McAuliffe sells his state to Cubans  and Virginians]

They face legal and political obstacles on both sides of the Florida Straits, with especially byzantine dos and donts in evolving  but still centrally controlled  Cuba. In many cases, there was no simple answer to even the most basic question: Can I legally sell my product or service to Cuba?

Yet at least so far, those who made the trip returned undaunted, willing to wade into bureaucracies foreign and domestic, to face unknowns and red tape. They felt certain that doors would be opened for them by McAuliffe, who met with the White House and congressional leaders the day after his return, then headed to Iowa to stump for a longtime friend, presidential contender Hillary Clinton. They were also convinced that Cuba will eventually shake off its economic shackles  and pay off for those who get in early.

Its obviously going to take off. and the question is whether we are going to have a part of that, said Stone, who sells wood reclaimed from old barns to Starbucks and others seeking a warm, weathered vibe in their business interiors  something desirable, he thinks, for future Cuban resorts. Theres a win-win if we can get the politics straight.

The rules for commercial engagement between Cuba and the United States are complex and quickly changing. What Washington allows does not always line up with what Havana permits, and vice versa. The Obama administration gave the green light to agricultural equipment exports, for example, but only if the buyers are private-sector farms, a caveat meant to nudge the island closer to capitalism. Yet the Cuban government does not permit private citizens or businesses to import goods. Only Alimport, the states purchasing arm, can buy from abroad.

Theres the Yes, but answer for everything, said James Williams, president of Engage Cuba, a Washington-based nonprofit group that advocates for normalization.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe drives a 1956 pink Chevy Bel Air named Lola to various places in Havana to the dismay of his security detail. (Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post)

There could be ways around those Catch-22s. The Virginians will be pressing  through McAuliffe and others  for Congress, federal regulators and President Obama to smooth their path. At the same time, they plan to work with contacts made in Havana and at the Cuban Embassy in Washington to win approvals on that end.

And things seemed to be moving along. Within days of their return, the Cubans had sent letters to two of the companies, formally expressing interest in doing business with them. The governors staff was in the process of notifying U.S. authorities that those letters, needed before a business can seek Washingtons permission to trade with Cuba, were in hand.

Mitchell Sanner, chief executive of Onduline North America, went to Cuba to peddle plastic paneling used to line metal livestock shelters, which makes them easier to clean. He returned home intending to operate on two tracks. He will seek permission from the United States, maybe through Congress or regulators, to sell the panels to Cuba. At the same time, he will submit samples of the plastic to Cuban officials for required testing. We dont know if its months or years, he said of the testing process.

There was no doubt that the Cubans were interested in their visitors  though seemingly more as potential investors than as suppliers of finished goods. In meeting after meeting, the Virginians said, the Cubans discussed having them set up shop on the island.

They clearly prefer the idea of making the products here, Sanner said.

Stone, the lumber company owner, left with the impression that selling to Cuba could be contingent on investing there.

They want to on-shore some of the manufacturing, he said. The vibe I got from them was, The only way were going to sell down here is if you allow us to do some of the value-added stuff. They need to build industry.

No American governor leads a foreign trade mission with the goal of shipping home-state companies abroad. Administration officials and independent Cuba experts said the complexities of doing business there make off-shoring unlikely, even to a place with a reported literacy rate of 100 percent and a prevailing wage of about $30 a month.

Business leaders on the trip said that if they were to establish manufacturing in Cuba, the facilities would supplement their Virginia operations, not replace them. And for the most part, the Virginians saw investing in Cuba as a far riskier proposition than selling there.

Even before the opening-day slide show raised the specter of expropriation, they had the example of Virginia-based Hilton. The hotel chain opened a grand seaside tower in 1958, less than a year before Fidel Castro swept into power and turned its 22nd-floor presidential suite into his headquarters.

Jason Heckathorn of Forever Oceans was the rare delegation member who came in with the goal of building a Cuban outpost. His company, an unlikely spinoff from Lockheed Martin, applies command-and-control technology developed for defense to deep-sea farms for sushi-grade fish.

[From fighter jets to fish farms: Why Lockheed Martin is taking on climate change]

Rather than sell a $30 million system and leave, the company wants to find a local partner but stay involved to maintain the technology and ensure it is run in an environmentally sensitive way.

Its not as simple as just selling seeds, Heckathorn said. It would be an ongoing relationship.

He is not even sure whether his venture would fall under rules for agricultural equipment or technology. But he went home bent on figuring it all out.

The important thing for this trip was to establish a vision, he said. Whats left is to determine whats feasible.

Although no contracts were signed, the Cubans seemed interested in making deals  even on high-end products that might seem like a stretch for a poor country.

Theyre interested in the organic chickens, said Charles Flowers, owner of Virginia Natural Beef, near Roanoke.

Those whole, organic birds are Flowerss priciest product, fetching about $1 a pound when bought by the 60,000-pound container load. The Cubans wanted the chicken for use in tourist restaurants and hotels, as well more modestly priced items such as croaker, a small fish served whole, bones and all.

The path for Flowers seems easier than for some of the others, since food exports have been allowed for humanitarian reasons for more than a decade. Even so, the veteran exporter left Cuba with a long to-do list  but also high hopes.

Im encouraged, he said. I hope to be back to thank someone for doing business with me.
Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, Jan. 9

By Huseyn Hasanov - Trend:

President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimuhammadov made new appointments, signing the relevant documents, the government's message said Jan. 9.

Dovran Nursahedov has been appointed the Minister of Industry of Turkmenistan.

Seyidmammad Akhmammadov has been appointed the Minister of Labor and Social Protection and the chairman of the board of country's Pension Fund.

Nursahed Sapardurdiyev has been appointed the Minister of Agriculture and Water Resources.

Mergen Annabayev has become the chairman of the State Committee for Environmental Protection and Land Resources.

---
NEW YORK

Officer faces sanction in chokehold death

A sergeant has been stripped of her gun and badge and charged internally in the July 2014 chokehold death of Eric Garner, the first official accusation of wrongdoing in a case that helped spark a national movement on the role of race in policing.

Sgt. Kizzy Adonis was one of the supervising officers at the scene of Garners death on Staten Island during his arrest on suspicion of selling loose, untaxed cigarettes. She was not part of the team out investigating that day but heard the radio call and was nearby and went to the scene. Adonis is black, and so was Garner.

Officials said Friday that Adonis was charged with failure to supervise, an internal disciplinary sanction. Sgt. Ed Mullins, the head of her union, called the charge ridiculous and political. She didnt have to go there  she chose to go there to help out, and look what happens, he said.

The encounter, videotaped by an onlooker, spurred protests about police treatment of black men. Garner, an asthmatic father of six, was heard shouting I cant breathe! 11 times before losing consciousness. The medical examiner found that the chokehold contributed to his death. No one has been charged criminally.

 Associated Press

ALABAMA

Visiting sick daughter, parents OD on heroin

Relieved after a long day awaiting news from a hospital in Cincinnati, Tracey Bice slept peacefully after friends Mary Ann and Wesley Landers of Alabama posted a social media update this week saying their 7-month-old daughters surgery for a congenital throat problem was a success.

Bices gratitude turned to horror within hours when she heard shocking news: Mary Ann Landers was dead of an apparent heroin overdose in the girls hospital room at Cincinnati Childrens Hospital Medical Center, authorities said. Her husband, Wesley Landers, was found unconscious in the bathroom of an apparent overdose. He was arraigned later Friday on charges including drug possession.

Mary Ann Landers never used drugs, as far as friends and family members knew, and she married Wesley Landers only after he cleaned himself up from drug abuse that played a role in his divorce from another woman in 2010, Bice said. I cant answer for what happened in that hospital room, because I cant get my mind around it.

 Associated Press

CALIFORNIA

Gangster convicted on dozens of U.S. charges

San Francisco gangster Raymond Shrimp Boy Chow was found guilty on dozens of charges Friday including allegations that he ran a criminal organization in San Francisco and ordered the murder of a Chinatown rival, according to a spokesman for the Justice Department.

Tony Serra, a lawyer for Chow, said his defense team was in a state of pain and anguish after the verdict, particularly because the government had relied on several witnesses who themselves had pleaded guilty to crimes.

It was trial by snitch, and the jury somehow believed these snitches, Serra said.

 Reuters
Security is ramped up outside a hotel where two attackers opened fire in the Egyptian Red Sea resort town of Hurghada, Egypt, January 8. (Stringer/Reuters)

IRAN

Letter urges Kerry to seek reporters release

Executives from 25 news organizations, including the Associated Press, sent a letter Friday to Secretary of State John F. Kerry urging him to press Iran to release jailed Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian.

The letter said Iran should recognize that independent journalism is a fundamental human right and free Rezaian. The United States has considerable leverage with Iran right now to press that point, and we urge you to continue to do so, the executives wrote.

Rezaian, 39, was born in California and holds U.S. and Iranian citizenships. He was convicted in closed proceedings last year after being charged with espionage and related allegations. The length of his sentence has not been disclosed publicly.

Iran has never offered any evidence that even makes a pretense of justifying this imprisonment, the news executives wrote.

They noted: Many of our organizations employ journalists who, like Jason, operate in countries, like Iran, that do not always hold a high regard for the free flow of information. We understand the risks involved.

School children sing during a presentation, back dropped by an image of Cuban revolutionary leader Ernesto "Che" Guevara, after a caravan tribute marking the 57th anniversary of the original street party that greeted a triumphant Fidel Castro and his rebel army, in Regla, Cuba, Friday. (Ramon Espinosa/AP)

Still, the letter continued, we depend on the United States and other democratic countries to stand behind the values that Jason represents.

Media organizations represented in the letter also included the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN.

The Post has vigorously denied the accusations against Rezaian. Post Publisher Frederick J. Ryan Jr. said in December that the United States, other governments and businesses should keep Rezaian in mind when considering improved relations with Iran.

 Associated Press

EGYPT

Suspected militants attack Red Sea hotel

Two suspected militants on Friday stabbed and wounded three foreign tourists  two Austrians and a Swede  at a hotel in the Egyptian Red Sea resort city of Hurghada, the Interior Ministry says.

Security forces opened fire at the two attackers, killing one and wounding the other, according to the ministry. It said two men armed with knives had entered the hotels outdoor restaurant and attacked the tourists.

Egypt has been battling an insurgency by Islamic militants led by the Islamic States affiliate. The attack came hours after the local affiliate claimed an attack a day earlier on a hotel in Cairo.

 Associated Press

ISRAEL

Manhunt ends with killing of suspect

An Arab Israeli citizen wanted in a Jan. 1 gun rampage in Tel Aviv was killed in a shootout with police Friday, ending a week-long manhunt.

Local media showed pictures of Nashat Melhems body, with a submachine gun next to it, outside what they said was an abandoned building that had served as his hideout in his northern home town, Arara.

Melhem, whose age police gave as 31, was identified by relatives from CCTV footage of the Tel Aviv attack, where he was accused of killing two people in a central restaurant and a taxi driver whose vehicle he used to escape.

 Reuters

231 allegedly abused by choir officials: More than 200 children may have been abused, some of them sexually, by adults working with a Catholic childrens choir in southern Germany, a lawyer tasked with investigating the allegations said Friday. Ulrich Weber said the 231 alleged victims included 50 who made plausible claims of sexual abuse at the Regensburger Domspatzen boys choir and two associated schools between 1953 and 1992.

Iran says Saudis must stop promoting sectarian hatred: Irans foreign minister says Saudi Arabia has to make a crucial choice  either continue supporting extremists and promoting sectarian hatred or promote good neighborliness and regional stability. Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a letter to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon obtained Friday by the Associated Press that Iran has no desire or interest in escalation of tension

in our neighborhood and hopes Saudi Arabia will heed the cause of reason. The current crisis was sparked by Saudi Arabias execution of Nimr Baqr al-Nimr, a prominent Shiite cleric, on Jan. 2.

Mein Kampf is back in German bookstores: An annotated edition of Mein Kampf, the first version of Adolf Hitlers notorious manifesto to be published in Germany since the end of World War II, went on sale Friday in an effort to demystify the book and debunk the Nazi leaders writing. The Munich-based Institute for Contemporary History issued the book days after the copyright of the German-language original expired.

 From news services
Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 9

By Umid Niayesh - Trend:

Iranian Railways and German company Siemens signed Jan. 6 a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for cooperation in various fields.

The document was signed on the sidelines of a meeting between Mohsen Pour Seyed Aghaei, managing director of Iranian Railways, and Siemens trade delegation in Tehran, Iran's Mehr news agency reported.

Based on the agreement the parties will cooperate in electrification project of Tehran-Mashhad railroad, construction of Tehran-Isfahan high-speed railway, providing and maintenance of 500 passenger train coaches, as well as updating railway systems of the Islamic Republic.

Under the agreement Siemens will also take steps to transfer technology to Iran via selecting Iranian partners.
When the Supreme Court contemplates changing its mind, it must weigh the institutional interest in the laws continuity against evidence that a prior decision has done an injury, even a constitutional injury. The court took 58 years to begin undoing, with the 1954 school desegregation decision, its 1896 decision affirming the constitutionality of separate but equal public facilities and services. On Monday, oral arguments at the court will indicate whether it is ready to undo 39 years of damage to the First Amendment rights of millions of government employees.

In a 1977 decision that bolstered public-sector unionism, the court affirmed the constitutionality of a Michigan law requiring public school teachers who are not dues-paying union members to pay agency or fair-share fees. These supposedly fund the unions costs in collective bargaining for contracts that cover members and nonmembers alike. Today, public employees in 23 states are covered by such laws. Only 6.6 percent of private-sector employees are unionized, compared with 35.7 percent of government workers.

In Mondays case, 10 California teachers are challenging that states law, under which nonmembers fees can be as high as 100 percent of members dues. The National Education Association, of which the California union is an affiliate, gets a portion of nonmembers fees. The NEA began endorsing presidential candidates in 1976 (it favored Jimmy Carter, who promised to create the Education Department) and always endorses Democrats for president. Government workers unions provided much of organized labors estimated $1.7 billion in political spending in the 2012 cycle. In the 2014 off-year elections, the NEA was the third-largest political spender, almost entirely for Democratic candidates, groups or causes. In 36 states, from 2000 through 2009, teachers unions spent more on state elections than the combined spending of all business associations.

Interestingly, the 10 California teachers do not stress that they are conscripted into funding such direct, overt and explicit political activity. Rather, they make the more lethal (to public-sector unions power) argument that even the use of their fees to fund core union activities such as collective bargaining constitutes a multihundred-million-dollar regime of compelled  hence unconstitutional  political speech.

Unions, the dissident teachers say, bargain about issues that go to the heart of education policy  teacher evaluation and tenure, class size, seniority preferences, etc.  as well as quintessentially political matters such as governments proper size, its fiscal policies and the allocation of scarce public resources.

Private-sector collective bargaining does not influence governmental policymaking. So, long before public-sector collective bargaining began in the 1950s, President Franklin D. Roosevelt was right to say: The process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service.

Writing for a court majority in two previous opinions, Justice Samuel Alito foreshadowed Mondays drama by calling the 1977 decision discordant with First Amendment precedents, including the unconstitutionality of compelled ideological advocacy.

The governments interests in labor peace and efficient administration may be served by negotiating with a single union. But neither these convenience interests nor the free rider problem (nonmembers benefiting from union bargaining without paying for it) justifies abridging fundamental First Amendment rights by coercing ideological speech on matters of political contention. Or compelling unwanted association: The court has held that freedom of association therefore plainly presupposes a freedom not to associate. Hence, the teachers petition states that government cannot mandate political speech or association as a condition of public employment. Indeed, speaking of precedents, in 2014 the court said: Almost 50 years ago, this court declared that citizens do not surrender their First Amendment rights by accepting public employment.

The courts interest in stare decisis (Latin, meaning to stand by a decision) does not dictate dogmatic adherence to all precedents. The teachers note that the court has never invoked stare decisis to sustain a decision that wrongly eliminated a fundamental right. And the court has said (in the 2010 Citizens United decision) that it has not hesitated to overrule decisions offensive to the First Amendment.

Never in its 225 years has the First Amendment been under so many varied and sustained attacks. In academia, it is increasingly considered a dispensable impediment to superior claims of social justice. In the U.S. Senate, 54 Democrats voted to amend it in order to empower the political class to regulate campaign speech about the political class. So, on Monday it would be exhilarating to hear evidence that the court is prepared to correct its contribution to the practice of subordinating First Amendment protections to supposedly superior considerations.

Read more from George F. Wills archive or follow him on Facebook.
The president of the United States and the mayor of the District of Columbia both used this week to address violence within the sphere of their responsibilities. And they are catching flak for it.

President Obamas focus was on the weapons that now kill as many people as car accidents and on the need for gun-control measures. He said at the White House on Tuesday: Every single year, more than 30,000 Americans have their lives cut short by guns  30,000. Suicides. Domestic violence. Gang shootouts. Accidents. And he added this grabber: In 2013 alone, more than 500 people lost their lives to gun accidents  and that includes 30 children younger than 5 years old.

The next day, D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) went to the citys Eastern Market Metro station to announce the formation of a task force to combat gun robberies, which last year increased to 1,249, 10 percent more than the 1,112 recorded in 2014. This year isnt off to a good start  25 gun robberies in the first six days of 2016. Robberies without guns numbered 28.

Yet robberies arent the only crime on the rise in our nations capital. Last year ended with 162 murders. There were 105 in 2014.

Something, however, may get lost in these numbers. How can the toll taken by death be measured with any degree of accuracy? Its impossible to quantify the sense of loss and grief that follows; the sadness, emptiness and loneliness that death leaves behind.

The families and friends of those 30,000 people whose lives were cut short by guns may have some idea.

The damage isnt limited to gun deaths.

What is the impact of more than 3,000 total street robberies in a city? Gauge the distress of having possessions taken by force  imagine the fear, anger, insecurity and unwanted memories that robbery leaves behind.

The violence assailed by Obama and Bowser is disturbing. So is the opposition mounted against them for trying to do something about it.

Criticism of Obamas proposed regulations to ensure that laws on the books are enforced as written and intended is sickening. Unlike the hes gonna take away your guns rhetoric coming out the mouths of some gun enthusiasts and their sycophantic Republican presidential hopefuls, Obamas plan to reduce gun violence is light stuff. It would:

 Require all those in the business of selling firearms to be licensed and to conduct background checks.

 Overhaul the FBIs background check system to make it more efficient and effective and provide the bureau with more staff.

 Beef up staffing of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to crack down on firearms trafficking.

 Increase funding for mental-health treatment and mental-health reporting to the background check system and direct the departments of Defense, Justice and Homeland Security to pursue research into gun-safety technology.

Several law professors who looked at the constitutionality of Obamas executive actions said that they ensure robust enforcement of the law and are entirely compatible with the will of Congress and the Presidents constitutional authority.

But listen to the resisters.

Obama wants your guns, says Ted Cruzs campaign website.

Obama is making an end-run around the Constitution to restrict one of the basic, fundamental principles of our country, Donald Trumps campaign manager told CNN.

Just one more way to make it harder for law-abiding people to buy weapons to be able to protect their families, said Marco Rubio on Fox News.

Obamas executive orders trample on the 2nd Amendment, said a Jeb Bush tweet.

Obama is advancing his political agenda, a Ben Carson tweet said.

Forget about saving lives. Better to save political hides from National Rifle Association attacks.

The presidents proposals should triumph over demagoguery and plain stupidity. But dont cut the gun lobby short. Fear of NRA money and power makes cowards out of congressmen.

The local climate for reform may not be any better.

This is a city where many people are afraid to venture out of their homes after dark, where going to and from school can be hazardous and where guns  and those who would use them  seem as plentiful as the air.

Though overall crime rates are down in the District, murders and gun robberies are up.

In August, Bowser proposed a public safety plan to combat the violence. She contended that if the D.C. Council had adopted her proposals  more money for more cops in high-crime areas, stiffer penalties for crimes on buses and subway trains and in D.C. parks, cracking down on repeat offenders  last years jump in homicides might have been avoided.

But Bowser is at loggerheads with key council members over the direction of crime-fighting and criminal justice reforms. And so? Nothing. Handwringing, finger-pointing . . .

Obama, urging action, cited the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.s words the fierce urgency of now, because people are dying. The constant excuses for inaction, the president declared, no longer suffice.

Even as national and D.C. lawmakers turn a deaf ear to that message.

Read more from Colbert Kings archive.
Danielle Allen is a political theorist at Harvard University and a contributing columnist for The Post.

The landscape of the 2016 election is seismic. Deep beneath the surface of our daily lives, three tectonic plates have collided, and a tsunami now pounds us. The names of those plates are income inequality;  overcriminalization and excessive punishment in the U.S. Code , to quote Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan; and demographic transition.

On the first two, right and left are actually, weirdly enough, experiencing a meeting of the psyches, or something of the sort. But the third issue casts everything in the light of racial questions and makes the strange fact of latent bipartisan agreement almost impossible to see.

Income inequality began its remarkable climb in the early 1980s, and the income share of the top 10 percent now exceeds the level of the 1920s. In the summer of the 1992 party conventions, as I remember it, commentators had noticed that income inequality was rising, but it was too early to tell whether the curve would descend again. The arc of history didnt turn, and now income inequality is at historic heights. Much of the United States is suffering from wage stagnation, and the money-soaked presidential campaign is largely being funded by a very small number of Americans.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Donald Trump are both tapping into these issues. Both disavow super PACs and promise, with quite different degrees of moral seriousness, to reverse the decline experienced by lower-income segments of the population. Sanders wants to reverse that through redistribution. Trump appears to have placed a gamblers bet on something of a racial protection racket. He stands ready to make his largely white crowds great again by protecting them from a variety of intruders and competitors, generally of different ethnic backgrounds, while he asks for a nice fee in the form of a hefty tax break for the wealthy.

As to overcriminalization, mass incarceration also began its remarkable climb in the early 1980s and has now reached globally historic levels. The Black Lives Matter campaign against police violence has turned our phone cameras on fundamental issues of race, yes, but not only on those issues. It has also focused our eyes on clear examples of an excessive growth of state power, well-exemplified by the war on drugs. Perhaps surprisingly, the effects of the growth of the penal state ramify well beyond city streets, all the way, for instance, to the Gulf of Mexico.

Kagan criticized overcriminalization and excessive punishment in a Supreme Court decision that reversed the felony conviction of John Yates, a commercial gulf fisherman who was accused of throwing 72 undersize grouper overboard when caught with them by a federal agent. On the basis of Sarbanes-Oxley, a law meant to rein in accounting shenanigans, Yates was charged with destroying, concealing, and covering up undersized fish to impede a federal investigation. That is, he was thought to be guilty of tampering with any physical object that might have evidentiary value in any federal investigation into any offense, an act that exposes you to a possible 20-year prison sentence. In other words, until the Supreme Court intervened, throwing grouper overboard could be life-altering.

Every Republican candidate has raised the issue of governmental overreach as a major problem to be tackled in this election.

Now if you are following me, youll notice that I just did something very strange. I just suggested that the Black Lives Matter campaign and the motley cast of characters seeking the Republican nomination are on the same page on something. Ive proposed that they share a concern for excessive state power. As if the activists from Ferguson, Mo., might now be thinking, Where was Ammon Bundy when we needed him? As if Trump fails to see potential allies in the Black Lives Matter protesters who turn up at his rallies.

Why dont these voices on right and left sing in harmony? Because of race.

This brings me to the third seismic issue, the remarkable demographic transition underway in this country. It also brings me to rancher Cliven Bundy, Ammons father, notorious for saying in 2014 that he wondered whether African Americans werent better off as slaves.

The United States days as a home to a white majority are, for all intents and purposes, done. Children born in 2011 are members of this countrys first majority-minority birth cohort. And children who entered kindergarten in fall 2014 were on track to be the first majority-minority school cohort. We may be no more than a dozen years from the entrance of majority-minority age cohorts into our voting ranks.

These facts are forcing upon us, at long last, the question of what will become of the remarkably long-lived tradition in many parts of this country of white social and political control. As a Trump supporter was quoted in a recent Post article as saying, Something has to be done because were shrinking, were being taken over by people that want to change what America is. She added, You cant say it nicely.

The deep question here is whether we will pursue the politics and policies of something like apartheid South Africa or complete, at last, the dream too long deferred of a racially egalitarian democracy. The Republicans are, at best, split on this question. The Democrats are certainly for the latter, but they have been able to avoid engaging too deeply on the issue because they consider the voters who agree with them to be firmly in their camp already.

In other words, with regard to income inequality and concerns about excessive growth in state power, right and left are rubbing up against each other in ways that are awkward, embarrassing and uncomfortable for everyone. Thats one thing that this election season is teaching us, and thats why the potential effects are seismic.

But heres the other thing its teaching us. The question of our racial future divides us utterly, and this third issue makes it impossible for us to see the potential points of solidarity that the political quakes have cast upon our shores.

Riding high on the crests of this tsunami are some fundamental matters that we must certainly face and about which we may, stunningly, but quite possibly, agree. Yet the danger from the quake is none the less for that, and the challenge of figuring out how to master this moment is nothing if not thoroughly daunting.

If only we could do it together, despite our racial history.
Regarding the Jan. 5 front-page article Attacking political correctness taps political gold:

Political correctness is just politeness. Try substituting polite every time you hear or read a complaint about being politically correct, and youll get a different perspective. For example, The Republican front-runner is saying what a lot of Americans are thinking but are afraid to say because they dont think that its [polite], she said.

Politeness does not require anyone to think differently or to be less racist or misogynistic or Islamophobic or homophobic (although that would be nice). But words do matter. And maybe, eventually, underlying beliefs can come to mirror words if we are all vigilantly polite, including to people who disagree with us.

Lucinda Low Swartz, Kensington

Right-wing rhetoric has a new code phrase: politically correct. In real life, being politically correct means being decent to your fellow human beings. It is nothing more and nothing less than the Golden Rule: Treat others as you would have them treat you.

Bruce Harmon, Arlington

Republicans are also guilty of political correctness. For example, Republicans refuse to address the need for gun control. For two decades, Congress has restricted research by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on gun violence, even though about 33,000 people die annually from guns .

Another example of GOP-style political correctness is the no-new-taxes mantra. Congress is unwilling, even with low gasoline prices, to raise the gasoline tax to fund infrastructure investments. Raising taxes as a partial measure to reduce the national debt is similarly excluded. This political correctness has enshrined the notion that any increase in discretionary domestic spending is undesirable. Even a simple and cost-effective increase in funding for Internal Revenue Service enforcement is not done. More spent on enforcement could result in greater compliance and an increase in revenue beyond costs.

GOP-style political correctness has paralyzed bipartisan problem-solving and good governance.

Albert G. Jordan, Vienna
ONE OF the most troubling developments in the debate over educational testing has been the push to get parents to opt their children out of tests. This undermines the collection of needed data while sending students a message that its okay to sit out if something seems too hard. Credit to Delaware Gov. Jack Markell (D), then, for standing up for accountability in vetoing a bill that would encourage parents to exempt their children from state tests.

The story isnt over in Delaware. The states parent-teacher association and teachers unions are urging legislators to override the governors veto when they convene next week. Legislation protecting parents who wont let their children take Delawares Smarter Balanced Assessment passed overwhelmingly in both houses last year, framed as an issue of parental rights. In fact, parents can already prevent their children from taking these tests. But the legislation would give an imprimatur of state approval that would lead more parents to think its okay, even desirable, for children to duck these tests.

That, as Mr. Markell told us, would be bad policy. Assessments are an important tool for teachers and families to have, he said. Backing his decision are civil rights groups that fear minority and other at-risk students will slip through the cracks if there is no objective measure of performance and business groups that believe results should be measured when billions of dollars are spent on schools. Lawmakers also should take note that federal law mandates annual tests and that states that do not meet certain participation levels could lose federal funds.

No doubt there is frustration with what some see as excessive testing, but the solution is not a knee-jerk boycott. Instead, there needs to be, as is being done in Delaware, a thoughtful inventory of tests to eliminate those that are redundant or otherwise unnecessary. Officials in Delaware were pleased with being able to boast last year that the state led the nation in gains in high school graduation rates. If they want to continue to have bragging rights in improving education, they need to preserve accountability and not give in to interest groups that oppose a clear view of how their schools are performing.
Jonathan Capehart is a Post opinion writer.

Just because theres been surprisingly little thunder against the gays of late doesnt mean no one has been busy conjuring up the lightning that precedes it. And just because the Republican presidential candidates have so far been relatively quiet about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans on the campaign trail doesnt mean they wont turn up the volume if it suits them. Thanks to a collision of the primary calendar and actions coming to a head out in the states, it just might suit them.

In September, we had to endure a storm over the illegal antics of Kim Davis, the Rowan County, Ky., clerk who said that her refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples was a matter of acting under Gods authority  the historic Supreme Court ruling legalizing same-sex marriage be damned.

Then, in November, we witnessed the repudiation of an anti-discrimination law that protected LGBT people in Houston. Thanks to a campaign built on lies about transgender people in public bathrooms, a statute that covered 15 protected characteristics was repealed with more than 60 percent of the vote.

Since then, however, we have not seen the anti-gay-marriage backlash that many people expected would be fanned by GOP candidates fighting for the votes of evangelicals and hard-line conservatives. Does this signal widespread acceptance, at last, of the full rights of LGBT people? Or something more like the eye of the hurricane passing through?

Brace yourself. It looks like its going to be the latter.

With this new year will come renewed attempts to use the law to discriminate against LGBT Americans, largely by deploying Daviss Gods authority defense. The uproar last spring over attempts to pass an expansive law in Indiana that would have allowed businesses to use religious belief as a justification for treating LGBT people as second-class citizens has in no way curtailed so-called religious freedom efforts in other parts of the country.

Case in point: Florida.

In the Sunshine State, the legislature is considering HB 401, or the Protection of Religious Freedom bill. This nasty measure would go well beyond what was proposed in Indiana. Yes, as is common with such efforts, it would apply to  and protect from litigation  religious institutions, businesses and private adoption agencies. But it would also cover any health care facility, nursing home, ambulatory surgery center, assisted living facility or health care provider  which would not be required to administer, recommend, or deliver a medical treatment or procedure that would be contrary to the religious or moral convictions or policies of the facility or health care provider.

How would this be morally permissible? Proponents can swaddle such legislation in principled language, but it is discrimination masquerading as religious conviction. Period.

Floridas legislation could well turn into a fight to rival Indianas. Forces are lining up on both sides. Florida state Rep. Holly Raschein (R) has countered by sponsoring a business-backed anti-discrimination bill thats also making its way through the legislature. Broadly written religious exemption bills are solutions looking for problems, can have serious unintended consequences and will move Florida in the wrong direction, she told me. What we should be spending time on is ensuring that all hardworking people  including those who are gay or transgender  are treated fairly and equally.

The issue may flare up in other places, as well. Religious refusal and anti-transgender laws have been or are being considered in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and Wyoming.

As troubling as this Florida bill is, this is just one way in which we are seeing religion being invoked to resist equal rights across the country, Louise Melling, director of the American Civil Liberties Unions Center for Liberty, told me in an email. Religious freedom protects our right to our beliefs, but not to discriminate.

Now, heres whats interesting. With the exception of former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) bear-hugging Davis, the Republican presidential candidates so far havent said much about LGBT issues. But the states listed above represent 10 of the 13 contests in the March 1 Super Tuesday vote, and the 565 bound delegates at stake that day are the largest single-day share on the primary calendar. Two weeks later, Florida and evangelical-heavy Missouri and North Carolina each vote, after which more than half of the bound delegates for the GOP nomination will have been snapped up.

So, in the next few months, the candidates have a huge incentive to do whatever it takes to earn the votes of evangelicals and social conservatives. In a presidential election cycle where not being politically correct has been polling gold, dont be surprised when the silence on LGBT issues ends.
Regarding the Jan. 2 front-page article Obama plans curbs on guns :

It comes as no surprise that this president plans to blow past Congress on these and other issues. Congress is the constitutional entity that represents the will of the people.

If the people wanted more gun control, they would elect members of Congress who would enact the necessary legislation. But they dont. If they had wanted to crown King Barack the First, they would have. But they didnt.

James L. McDonald, Fairfax

Responding to the painful truth that so many lives are lost by gunfire, President Obama shed tears on Tuesday as he announced executive actions to upgrade gun-control laws [Emotional Obama outlines gun initiative, front page, Jan. 6]. Maybe if all Americans considered those lives and lamented their loss, we, too, might cry with shame that the Congress we elected refuses to act.

Carolyn Lewis, Ocean View, Del.

After 40 years of living in Virginia, the Old Dominion is in my rearview window, and obstruction on gun violence is the reason.

The Virginia Way has encouraged Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, to block any legislation, no matter how bipartisan in its construction, from a floor discussion and vote  for three years and counting. The Virginia Way has led the Richmond legislature to vote down good bills, including one that would have kept guns out of the hands of domestic abusers and a bill that would have made it unlawful for children younger than 4 to have a gun.

I lost a dear 18-year-old nephew to suicide by gun. Two-in-three gun deaths nationally are suicides.

As the president said, we have rights, too. The publics right to safety has been disenfranchised by a relatively small minority who shout that any restriction on their interpretation of the Second Amendment is more important than public safety.

Maggie Rheinstein, McLean
H.W. Brands teaches at the University of Texas at Austin. His most recent book is Reagan: The Life.

When Theodore Roosevelt was president of the New York City police board, he discovered that reporters made remarkably effective assistants. Roosevelt would invite the correspondents on his midnight rambles through the seedy sections of the city, where he sought out corrupt patrolmen. He understood the bitterly competitive nature of the newspaper business in New York in the 1890s, and he recognized the pressure the papers felt to deliver headlines that would arrest readers attention. A Baghdad Night, shouted the Commercial Advertiser after a typical trawl. Roosevelt in the Role of Haroun Alraschid. Police Caught Napping.

The board president took pains to cut a dashing figure. Sing, heavenly Muse, the sad dejection of our poor policemen, the World lyricized. We have a real Police Commissioner. His name is Theodore Roosevelt. His teeth are big and white, his eyes are small and piercing, his voice is rasping. He makes our policemen feel as the little froggies did when the stork came out to rule them. The papers didnt uniformly like Roosevelt  the mockery in the Worlds tone was evident  but they couldnt resist the stories he gave them.

David Greenberg rightly begins Republic of Spin, his history of spin and the American presidency, with TR. Roosevelt won the New York governorship on the strength of Rough Riders, a shamelessly self-promoting account of his exploits in the Spanish-American War; from there he vaulted into the vice presidency and, upon the murder of William McKinley, the presidency. Roosevelt employed the publicity tools that had won him office to work the levers of power. He made himself a story no Washington reporter could pass up, gathering around him a coterie of correspondents whose inside access required strict adherence to ground rules he set. They could quote him only with his express permission. A French writer whom Roosevelt wanted to impress was included in one of the seances, as the gatherings were called, and emerged with a notebook of revealing remarks from the American chief executive. The gist shortly appeared in the press. Roosevelt denied having said anything of the sort or even having spoken to the man. He later explained his apparent duplicity: Of course I said it, but I said it as Theodore Roosevelt and not as the President of the United States!

What worked for one president became institutionalized, as successful practices do. And the institutionalization of presidential spin paralleled the permeation of spin throughout American life. Greenberg neatly weaves a history of public relations into his political tale; we see the emergence of PR as an accepted and eventually respected industry during the 1920s and after. Equally crucial was the evolution of technology. To get his message to millions, Roosevelt had to work through the press; his fifth cousin, nephew by marriage and progressive protege Franklin Roosevelt exploited the capacity of radio. The new broadcast mediums apparent absence of spin made its spin all the more powerful. FDRs radio addresses were cast as fireside chats, with the president speaking simply to his fellow Americans as though they were all sitting around a communal hearth. The first chat set the tone. At a moment when the banking system was paralyzed, when millions of Americans had no idea whether they would ever again see their hard-earned deposits, when the chill of the Great Depression clutched at hearts all across America, Roosevelts calm voice came into living rooms and bedrooms like that of a reassuring father and told Americans that everything was going to be all right. They believed him. And their belief became the crucial last link in Roosevelts rescue of the banks.

The success of the spin didnt prevent Americans from realizing they were being spun, and Greenberg devotes another theme of his story to critiques of the whole business. From H.L. Mencken to Hannah Arendt and Garry Trudeau, nearly everyone who has commented on modern politics, modern communications or simply modern life has weighed in on the struggle to shape the terms of debate of democracy. The critiques themselves, meanwhile, contributed to another part of Greenbergs story: the evolution of what amounted to anti-spin defense systems on the part of the media. Responsible journalists had always sought to counter presidential claims with sources of their own, but during the decades of World War II and the early Cold War, a certain symbiosis developed between big government and big media. Citing national security, presidential administrations would warn the media against peering too closely into the black box of policy, and the media obliged.

But when the Vietnam War went badly, and the Pentagon Papers revealed that administrations had been lying about the war for years, and when Watergate, which grew out of the Pentagon Papers, showed that the deceit went far beyond anything touching national security, the cozy compact was blasted to bits. The media went into full opposition mode. Almost everything every administration official uttered or published was presumed to be dangerously misleading; the radar of the anti-spin systems tracked the enemy missiles from launch and sent interceptors to destroy them.

It didnt help the government side in its contest with the media that its high ground was soon seized by conservatives who claimed that government was not the solution to Americas problems but the problem itself. Yet, as Greenberg notes, even the anti-government government forces had their spin specialists, with Ronald Reagan being one of the best. How else to explain the Gippers ability to walk away from the train wreck of Iran-contra with barely a scratch?

Which leads to the most basic question of all: Does any of this matter? Greenberg guides the reader through six ages of efforts to manage the news (Age of Publicity, Age of Ballyhoo, etc.), culminating in todays comprehensive Age of Spin. Yet even in our present advanced era, Greenberg declines to grant the spin machines decisive credit. The Reagan revolution, he says, was marked by shrewd management of the media, but it succeeded on its merits. The idea that Reagan and his team used their media proficiency to fool the public into buying a conservative agenda belonged to the tradition of frustrated protests of antagonists unwilling to credit a rivals successes. By and large Americans knew what they were getting with Reagan. Nor is the resistance President Obama has encountered from the Republicans on health care and other issues due to a failure of his spin skills. You know, I can make some really good arguments defending the Democratic position, and there are going to be some people who just dont agree with me, Obama told 60 Minutes, with Greenberg nodding silently.

Perhaps the spinners offset one another, the way the twin rotors of large helicopters do. Perhaps the American people have become inured to decades of message-massaging. Greenbergs title suggests disdain for its subject: Spin is a label usually reserved for what ones opponents do. Yet Greenberg is far from categorically critical. If spin is used for misleading, it is also used for leading, he writes. Throughout history, presidents, using the machinery of spin, have contributed to wartime hysteria and baleful complacency, resentment and fear. But they have also given us the golden flares of inspiration that moved the public, in their own times and for decades after.

Which shows that historians can do it, too.
Henrietta Lacks is shown in a 1940s photo made available by her family shows Henrietta Lacks. In 1951, a doctor in Baltimore removed cancerous cells from Lacks without her knowledge or consent. Those cells eventually helped lead to a multitude of medical treatments and formed the groundwork for the multibillion-dollar biotech industry. On Wednesday, Aug. 7, 2013, under an agreement announced by the federal government, Lacks family members will have a say in how such research proceeds. (AP Photo/Lacks Family via The Henrietta Lacks Foundation) (Lacks Family via The Henrietta Lacks Foundation/Associated Press)

Christopher Robertson is a law professor and leads the University of Arizona's regulatory science program. Jonathan D. Loe is a fellow at the law school.

In her acclaimed 2010 book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot tells the story of a poor black woman with cervical cancer who checked into Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1951. While performing surgery to remove the cancer, Lackss doctor also took a biopsy of her healthy cells without securing her consent. The samples were given to a researcher who cultured the cells and found that they had amazing resiliency. Over ensuing decades, these HeLa cells, as they came to be known, were used worldwide in biomedical science, saving millions of lives  and making billions of dollars. Unfortunately, Lacks was not so lucky. Neither the surgery nor the later discoveries could save her life.

Now, the federal government has proposed controversial changes to the rules governing medical research using human subjects. The changes would expand regulation to cover new domains in hopes of protecting the Henrietta Lackses of today.

Americans should be wary of reforms such as this one that would expand regulatory oversight of science but, while well-intentioned, provide little real benefit to human subjects. Already, scientists report that they spend more than a third of their time on bureaucratic compliance, leaving them less time to spend in the lab. We should not slow the very science that could have saved Lackss life in the name of paperwork that would not have helped her at all.

Current law and ethical doctrine do not require patient permission for the type of secondary use of biospecimens that occurred in Lackss case as long as samples are not individually identified. But the proposed regulations would require consent for all research whether samples were identified or not.

While respect for people is one of the fundamental principles of bioethics, the kind of broad consent that would be required by the new rules is not the informed consent we typically demand and expect. Such general consent is not able to offer real information about the research to be performed because the aims, methods and results of future biospecimen research are often unknowable when a sample is drawn. If the new rules had applied to Lacks, Johns Hopkins would merely have asked her to sign another form referring generally to potential research on her specimen. Lacks, who was barely literate, likely would have complied  her subordination is a primary theme of Skloots book.

There really is no practical alternative to broad consent in this domain. Still, it is strange to help to advance a national reform by using a story for which the reform would have made little difference.

A different concern is that Lackss name and information were leaked  it was the basis for the name of the HeLa cell line, no less. However, the new reforms would do little more for privacy than what the law provides, other than recognizing that with data in the modern world there is always a risk that de-identified samples could be re-identified. Ironically, Skloots book exacerbated this breach of Lackss privacy far beyond the problem with the cell lines name. The HeLa label was meaningless to the majority of scientists who used it, and few others knew it existed. Still, privacy is important, and de-identified cells should remain so.

Finally, there is criticism that the Lacks family never received a share of the profits from the HeLa cell line. However, de-identification  the primary tool for protecting the privacy of donors  is in tension with compensation, since downstream users would have to know whom to pay. Moreover, the sheer number of samples in storage today means that paying any one subject would be difficult and that payments would be minimal in those cases where they could be made. And do we want to make the sale of human tissue legal, displacing the donation system? The new rule does not address that quandary.

If reforms fail to provide informed consent, the privacy guarantee is inherently imperfect and donations cannot be monetized, why even allow this sort of research? Another pillar of research ethics is beneficence  maximizing benefits while minimizing risks to the subject. With HeLa, there was no harm done to Lacks herself. And, according to Skloot, the Lacks family is rightly proud of the medical advances and millions of lives saved through use of the HeLa cells. This is the kind of balancing that scientists and review boards have long successfully undertaken.

While Henrietta Lackss story is a cautionary tale about privacy, the governments proposed reforms are unnecessary to prevent a repeat and could unnecessarily burden researchers. We should be cautious before implementing reforms that might undermine the continued promise of medical research.
NEW YORK has joined several other states in promising to scale back solitary confinement, the institutionalized torture to which prisons across the country subject thousands of inmates every day. The excuse for extreme prisoner isolation is that it maintains order. The reality is that the punishment is wildly overused, and the conditions are often of the sort youd expect to read about in a human rights report on a Third World dictatorship, a system seemingly designed to break people down, encourage mental illness and inflict deep misery and emotional desperation.

New York has some 4,000 prisoners in solitary confinement, according to the New York Civil Liberties Union, which has been pressing a lawsuit against the state. Under a settlement the NYCLU struck with the state, about a quarter of those prisoners will move out of traditional solitary confinement. This group will include people who were isolated as punishment for minor offenses, prisoners who require intensive behavioral therapy, inmates who need drug treatment, people who are developmentally disabled, minors and prisoners who are set to be released directly from isolation back into their communities. Those who violate prison drug restrictions one time and those who break minor rules will also be ineligible for isolation. Solitary confinement is obviously inappropriate for all of these groups.

New York will also reduce solitary confinement terms. The NYCLU says that the average stay in isolation is roughly five months. Now, the maximum term will be three months, except in a few circumstances. The most stringent term for most inmates in solitary for their first time will be 30 days. Officers will also have to explain in writing why they put a prisoner in solitary.

These changes do not mean that inmates who pose special challenges, such as the mentally ill or the drug-addicted, should simply be thrown back into the general prison population. Programs need to addresses their needs, including various types of treatment to help inmates recover from their time in solitary confinement before they reenter the general prison population or hit the streets. They should have access to reading materials, group recreation time and other programming thats likely to help them rather than incite or exacerbate mental illness, as the current solitary system can do. These steps wont just be good for the prisoners themselves; they also could contribute to good order inside and outside New Yorks prisons.

Some prisoners inevitably will be too dangerous to keep around others. When prison violence is the alternative, these inmates can and should be set apart. But they shouldnt be mistreated. The settlement, therefore, seeks to not just reduce the number of people relegated to solitary confinement but also improve conditions inside. Prisoners who must now spend 23 hours in a 6-by-10-foot concrete cell will have more opportunities for longer periods of out-of-cell recreation and, if its feasible, group interaction. They will be guaranteed access to radios and more reading material. They will be offered mental-health counseling. Isolated prisoners also will no longer have to choke down the loaf  a disgusting melange of bread, root vegetables and potatoes.

New Yorks move wont put it in the top class of states reforming solitary confinement. But its a massive move simply because of the number of prisoners in the state  almost 60,000. Others should follow, whether or not they are facing a lawsuit.
Tehran, Iran, January 9

By Mehdi Sepahvand -- Trend:

Despite a little jump in oil prices as of January 8, it is hard to imagine that crude will witness major alteration in the first half of the current year.

Prices started to go down in early 2014 and have not shown any sign of improvement so far.

On January 7, the US benchmark crude-oil contract tumbled $0.7, or 2.1 percent, to reach $33.27 per barrel to strike the lowest close since 2004.

Asian markets closed mixed on the last day of 2016's first trading week. The week had seen the Chinese market shut down prematurely two times in order to stem rapid selloffs.

On January 8 a rally started after the latest figures pointing to robust US production even as a supply glut drags prices to about lowest on record. Crude recovered after its latest crash, with Brent rising close to 6 percent from its latest trough to above $34 per barrel. However, the rise was due to a recovery in Chinese shares, and warning must be given against reading too much into it.

Fereydoun Barkeshli, former general manager of National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) in OPEC and International Affairs told Trend January 8 that prices will remain low for half a year or so.

My perception is that during the first half of 2016 we will continue to witness a volatile market and even more downward pressure. However, by the second half prices will stabilize in the range of $45-50 per barrel, said Barkeshli, currently a private energy consultant and president of the Vienna Energy Research Group.

When prices started sliding in early 2014, most analysts missed no time to put the blame on Saudi Arabia's oil diplomacy and that there was a US-Saudi conspiracy to push down crude oil prices in an effort to exert pressure on Iran and Russia for obvious reasons.

But as time passed and especially when crude prices went bellow $50 per barrel and began to threaten US Shale oil production, market analysts turned to fundamentals and supply-demand in an effort to explain the fall in prices.

On the supply side, crude oil abundance all over the world and on demand side Chinese economic slowdown which has acted as the engine of oil demand consumption growth for the last ten years were responsible for the situation, according to Barkeshli.

"I consider the above as an intrigue that required consideration. I do not believe that as long as there is no direct threat to actual and physical oil flow in the market, prices show any meaningful sensitivity," he stated.

"Nevertheless, I personally believe that major oil companies are increasingly restless. The value of their share has fallen and stakeholders are uncomfortable. For the first time in eleven years, there is only one oil company in FORBE's top 100 companies. What I intend to say is that investment pattern in oil industry is in bad shape and that hurts IOCs as well as NOCs that might lead to a coalition to stabilize crude prices."

The same was said by Iran's former representative at the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) Mohammad Ali Khatibi.

Putting aside non-economic factors which may alter the market, the existing situations do not indicate any rise to come in the first half of 2016, he said.

Supply is still going to outdo demand throughout the first half of the year, Khatibi stated, adding however that in the second half, a balance is expected to settle and the market will become more powerful.
In his Jan. 5 Washington Sketch column, The Republican field likes to flirt with lawbreakers, Dana Milbank observed that flirting with extremists helps conservative candidates harness the prodigious anger in the electorate. Harnessing the energy of the extreme right so that it is channeled into mainstream politics as established by our Constitution is an invaluable role of a conservative political party. It is the extreme right, however, that is now harnessing the Republican Party.

Rather than drawing the fringe into mainstream politics, the party is being drawn by the fringe into extremist positions, encouraging a sense of victimization that justifies actions such as the armed standoff with authorities in Oregon. The partys strategies for containing the extreme flank of envenomed voters have given way to a competition for votes among candidates who jockey for position by sounding angry and embittered themselves. Similar compromises by established parties and officials allowed fascist leaders to come to power after World War I, when demagogues fanned the flames of resentment, building and capturing mass followings of the disaffected, as they promised to punish their victimizers and restore national greatness.

Nathan Stoltzfus, Tallahassee

I attended a Donald Trump rally in Lowell, Mass., this week. I expected a healthy dose of anti-immigrant rhetoric, and Mr. Trump, a Republican candidate for president, delivered. What I did not expect were constant Build the wall! Build the wall! chants from the 8- and 10-year-old children sitting near me.

One of the Trump campaigns major themes is how the Obama administrations taxing, borrowing and spending have made the country worse off for our children and grandchildren. Given the choice between a questionable fiscal policy and a generation raised on hate, Id take the fiscal policy every time.

Values instilled in the home, not policies instilled in Washington, will determine whether the younger generations will be better or worse off than their ancestors.

Phil Griffin, Philadelphia
Ammon Bundy, one of the sons of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, arrives for a news conference at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge near Burns, Ore., on Jan. 6. (Rick Bowmer/Associated Press)

Regarding Dana Milbanks Jan. 7 Washington Sketch column, In Congress, the Oregon rebellion elicits a sympathy for sedition:

Those who raise animals on a smaller scale than the Bundy family know how dependent on government they are. I cant raise more sheep because the land isnt available; the Bundys can raise more cows than their acreage can support because they can lease federal land for grazing at about 5 percent the cost of grazing on leased private land  my tax dollars subsidize the 95 percent  and even that 5 percent the Bundys refuse to pay.

Tax dollars also provide $26 million each year to cattle ranchers so they dont have to buy hay for winter, as I do. The National Wildlife Service needs about that same amount to shoot native wildlife in the West, removing predation for the Bundys. In the East, we have coyotes, black bears, cougars, foxes and other predators, which some of us recognize as important to the ecosystem. We either have a few losses or use dogs, donkeys or mules at our own expense.

And, as has been pointed out many times, the federal land the Bundys want to claim was Paiute land. Not theirs.

Deborah Wagner, Brookeville

I understand the ideological agreement of many Republicans with armed nationalist groups but not their explicit and tacit support for these insurrectionists. Yes, our nation was birthed in armed revolution, but I think the Founding Fathers, through hard-won experience and enlightened wisdom, gave us a Constitution providing for nonviolent dissent and peaceful change of our laws.

I had hoped that our bloody Civil War had put an end to doomed dreams of secession and that the success of our nonviolent civil rights movement had set us on a better path.

Powerful nations fall more often from internal corruption than foreign attack. The horror of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks ought not discount in our memory the significant carnage of Oklahoma City.

Annlinn Kruger, Bar Harbor, Maine
Given The Posts history, the publication of the Jan. 2 Style article  On the comics pages of major American newspapers, the lack of black voices is no laughing matter made the paper look disingenuous at best and hypocritical at worst. A few years ago, The Posts comics page replaced Watch Your Head, a smart, incisive strip about a historically black college, with Reply All, an inane, poorly drawn strip with a lily-white cast. If The Post wants to support black cartoonists, maybe it should run more comics by them.

Colin Jacobson, Alexandria

The Jan. 2 Style article on black cartoonists informed me about a rich source of humor ignored nationally.

Im not black, but outstanding work needs to be published whatever the race or ethnic background of its authors and readers.

I implore The Post to include Keith Knight and/or his colleagues in The Posts comic pages every day.

Marjorie Silverberg, Alexandria
Fair play can sometimes be a raunchy racket.

In the midst of Hillary Clintons promising presidential bid, a blast from the past blew through the backdoor and rattled the joints of the political edifice of Clinton. Juanita Broaddrick, the Arkansas woman who has claimed that in 1978, then-state Attorney General Bill Clinton raped her, said that Hillary Clinton is not the one to talk about violence against women and tweeted that she is an enabler.

As a heckler promptly inserted herself into a Clinton rally, Donald Trump wasted no time posting a heat-seeking ad on Instagram linking her to a gallery of famous sexual predators and deviants, including alleged rapist Bill Cosby, sexter Anthony Weiner and, of course, her own husband.

Except for the latter, these connections are inarguably tenuous. Hillary Clintons involvement with Weiner is primarily through his wife, Huma Abedin, a close adviser. As for Cosby, the ad shows Clinton in a photograph with the once-brilliant star. How many thousands of others were happy to be caught in the same frame with Cosby, long before anyone knew of his alleged predations?

What does any of this have to do with Clinton? She isnt, after all, a guilty party. Then again, one is judged in part by the company one keeps. The question of character isnt always what did you do? but what were you willing to tolerate? Trumps ad-meister smartly associated Clinton with a cast of characters whose values cant be heralded as exemplary.

Its unlikely, however, that anyones mind will be changed by what is already known. Many younger voters, who may not be as familiar with Clinton history, have been shaped by a world that bears little resemblance to their parents, and they may well find such revelations short of earth-shattering or even interesting.

The Trump ad, though obviously dishonest, is nonetheless shrewd. Trump took Clintons most shining moment  her defense of women and her 1995 speech at the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women  and turned it against her. As the images flick past, we hear then-first lady Clintons famous words: Human rights are womens rights and womens rights are human rights, once and for all. And then, Lets keep fighting for opportunity and dignity.

The ads finale in bold letters is a question posing as a statement: True Defender of Womens Rights.

This is unfortunate. Clinton was brave to say those things in 1995 in Beijing and she truly has influenced and improved the lives of millions of women around the globe. For these achievements to be tarnished by Trump is unfair and, one might say, Clintonesque. If chickens really do come home to roost, the Clintons cant pretend to be bystanders to the idiom. It is a fact of recent history that womens rights have been selectively defended by Hillary Clintons vast left-wing support group, especially when it has come to her husbands extramarital proclivities.

When then-President Clinton had his dalliance with White House intern Monica Lewinsky, it was a clear case of sexual harassment by the very definition promoted by feminists  t hat is, a person in a superior workplace position making (or responding to) sexual overtures toward an employee, regardless of consent. Where were feminists when Lewinsky was scuttled away to a life of lonely infamy?

Similarly, when Paula Jones filed a sexual harassment suit against President Clinton, claiming that he had exposed himself to her in a hotel room when he was governor of Arkansas, the sisterhood dismissed Jones as a political pawn of the right. This was surely true, but it didnt necessarily negate her claim. Isnt the operative feminist principle that the woman is always to be believed? Or is it only certain women?

When Judge Susan Webber Wright rebuffed Joness claim, she ruled in part that Jones had failed to prove she had suffered damages from her encounter. Nary a peep from the girls team. Yet, rewinding to the 1991 Supreme Court confirmation hearings of Clarence Thomas, feminists had no trouble believing that Anita Hill had suffered distress while working for Thomas a decade earlier because of lewd comments he made in her presence.

Wherever one stands on these histories, a double standard is undeniable. This is what Trump hinted at  and what Hillary Clinton will have to navigate as she seeks to convince voters not only that she deserves to live once again in the White House but also that her husband does as well.

Read more from Kathleen Parkers archive, follow her on Twitter or find her on Facebook.
The election year has started as 2015 ended, only more so. If campaigns are always about the future, the 2016 one points to a country that could end this year even more divided against itself than it was after the 2012 election.

The year 2015 will long be remembered as the year of Donald Trump, all the more so because of the unexpectedly strong response his candidacy set off. Other Republican candidates once hoped they could ignore the meaning of Trumps appeal and ride along their own track. Some still think that way, but in reality, all have been subsumed into Trumps world, even if not his worldview.

The other Republican candidates, particularly those in the mainstream conservative wing, now appreciate, as they might not have before, how much they are dealing with an electorate fed up with Washington and the Republican Partys leadership, with economic dislocations that have affected the working and middle classes, and with resentment toward cultural shifts that reflect the diversity and tolerance of a changing country.

Trumps rivals have begun to channel some of that anger, and it has given a different tone to the Republican race than existed even a few months ago. I recognize peoples frustration, and youve got to speak to that, Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.) said in a pre-New Years Day interview. If they dont believe youre in touch with what theyre feeling in their lives, theres no way theyre going to make you president.

Theres still some optimism left in the messages of Republicans such as Rubio, but mostly it has been subsumed in a chorus of angry rhetoric, a sense of foreboding about threats of terrorism and the rise of the Islamic State, petty attacks against one another and harsher criticism of President Obama.

[A GOP campaign about nightmares]

The more the Republican candidates have amped up their rhetoric, the more they have triggered a sharp response from the Democrats. Hillary Clinton, who said last fall that she is proud to think of Republicans as enemies, never seems happier on the campaign trail than when she is denouncing the other party as one captured by extremists.

Its natural at this stage of any campaign, as the first votes in Iowa and New Hampshire near, for the candidates to be speaking to their own party loyalists and not to the country as a whole. In a polarized country, energizing the base of the party is a prerequisite to winning the nomination, if not the general election.

More so than in some past campaigns, however, the effect of all this seems to be accentuating the gap between left and right, between Democrats and Republicans, between elites and the rest of the population. That is likely to continue well into the spring as the GOP candidates try to settle their nomination contest.

For now, there is nothing to pull anyone in the GOP field back from this pell-mell dash into the politics of anger. Between now and mid-March (and possibly beyond), attacks could overwhelm everything else. And in the first days of 2016, attacks and attack ads underscored how little any of the candidates knows about where the race is heading.

The party is in turmoil, most especially the establishment wing. Party elites are alarmed at the prospect of either Trump or Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.) as the nominee, even as they reassess what they once thought of as the minimal chance that either could win that prize.

[Establishment candidates attack one another]

The establishment candidates  former Florida governor Jeb Bush, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Rubio (who claims to wear the establishment label reluctantly)  are in a food fight with one another. All now think that they have a chance to emerge as the dominant candidate who will go on to contest for the nomination against Trump, Cruz or both later this spring.

These establishment candidates started the year in a circular firing squad with a barrage of attacks  both verbal and in TV ads  that could leave all of them badly damaged by the time its clear which of them emerges as the strongest after voters in the first few states have their say. It is the reverse of the traditional pattern in which the establishment coalesces early and the insurgent candidates are left to fight for survival.

Christie, Rubio, Bush and Kasich have traded barbs and insults that will only become louder in the next few weeks. Earlier, Rubio and Cruz were combatants, anticipating a potential showdown for the nomination. Now Rubio and Christie are tangling. Christie attacks Rubio as callow and weak, not the kind of candidate who can go toe-to-toe against Clinton in the fall. Rubio fires back that Christie has a record pock-marked with views anathema to the Republican base. Bush has become the most consistent anti-Trump voice in the field.

[Trump questions Cruzs eligibility to be president]

Meanwhile, Trump regularly and strategically drops grenades into the race, forcing the conversation in unanticipated, divisive and sometimes diversionary directions. He did it late last year with his call for a halt, at least temporarily, on the entry of Muslims into the United States. He did it again last week when he spoke publicly about whether Cruz, who was born in Canada to an American mother, is a natural-born citizen and therefore eligible to be president.

Thats the state of things for now and probably for the foreseeable future. Whats missing is vision. Is there any candidate in either party with a big, positive and hopeful message that looks over the horizon at the challenges to come, particularly one that has broken through? Some might argue that Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is that candidate, but the force of the energy behind his surprising candidacy is grievance toward banks and billionaires and other elites.

As the year begins, most candidates are selling fear of the apocalypse, stark warnings about what happens if the other party wins in November. Some, like Trump, are playing to darker sentiments. In these early weeks, the seeds are being planted for a general election that inflames rather than unites, that hardens the divisions that already exist rather than the opposite.
Former comfort women Gil Won-ok, left, and Lee Yong-soo, who were forced into wartime sexual slavery for Japanese soldiers, sit during an anti-Japanese rally in Seoul on Dec. 30. (Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Images)

The day after North Koreas nuclear weapons test this week, President Obama called Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and South Korean President Park Geun-hye to confer about this latest crisis in the region. But before ending each call, Obama made a point of congratulating the leaders on resolving their dispute over Japans use of wartime sex slaves.

The president praised them for having the courage and vision to forge a lasting settlement to this difficult issue, but the gesture was not just a casual courtesy. It reflected a deep U.S. investment in a diplomatic deal it worked to cultivate  and is working to safeguard  as it comes under fire in both countries.

Deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes described the Dec. 28 accord as a long-standing source of tension between two key U.S. allies in the Asia-Pacific.

According to Rhodes, Obama raised the issue in nearly every meeting hes had with the leaders of Japan and South Korea over the last several years. Repairing the Japan-South Korea relationship was essential to Obama for two reasons. A closer alliance between the two could help counterbalance Chinas growing military and economic influence in the region, and help keep North Korean aggression in check.

This wasnt just a question of wanting our two friends to get along; it mattered strategically, Deputy Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said in an interview.

A statue of a teenage girl symbolizing comfort women who served as sex slaves for Japanese soldiers during World War II, is seen in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul on Wednesday. (Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Images)

The United States did not broker the accord or attempt to perform the type of role it has played in the Mideast peace process or some other foreign disputes. But Obama administration officials  including the president himself  intervened at pivotal points over the past two years to help bring Abe and Park closer together, fostering an environment that made it possible for the two countries to settle their grievances over the comfort women. And it is one of the few remaining spots in foreign policy where congressional Republicans offered full support for the administrationss goal, bolstering its case.

The U.S. factor was very large, because in both bilateral relationships, this was a problem, said Michael J. Green, senior vice president for Asia at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Interviews with more than a half-dozen top officials from all three nations depict a process where the White House decided to press for a resolution of the comfort-women issue even as it sought to minimize responsibility should the reconciliation effort fall apart. Abe and Park each had their own powerful political incentives to strike the deal, which ultimately led them to negotiate a solution so delicate that part of the compromise stipulates that the two sides will stop criticizing each other in the international community.

Under the deal, the Japanese government agreed to put $8.3 million into a South Korean fund to support the 46 surviving comfort women and to help restore their honor and dignity and repair their psychological wounds.

The South Korean government agreed to explore whether the civic group that placed a bronze statue of a comfort woman that sits outside the Japanese Embassy in Seoul would remove it.

While women and girls from other nations  including China, the Philippines and other Southeast Asian nations  were also forced into servitude by the Imperial Japanese Army before and during the war, the issue is especially sensitive in South Korea. By the spring of 2014, Abe and Park had yet to meet despite the fact that they had been in office at the same time for more than a year.

[A comfort womans experience, in her own words]

Students hold portraits of deceased former South Korean comfort women during a weekly anti-Japan rally in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul on Dec. 30. (Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters)

In many ways, the most important U.S. contribution to the process came at the start, when Obama brought the two leaders together during the nuclear security summit meeting at the residence of the U.S. ambassador to the Hague in March 2014. As Abe entered the room, he addressed Park in Korean. She smiled.

While the meeting was focused on North Koreas nuclear program, not disputes stemming from World War II, several aides said it helped open up a line of communication between Abe and Park, and underscored the idea of what was at stake.

Figuratively and politically, it created a platform for them to focus on what united them, and not divided them, said Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel R. Russel, who attended the meeting.

At that point, according to Cho Hyun-dong, deputy chief of mission at South Koreas embassy in Washington, there was enough positive momentum to start bilateral negotiations on the question of the comfort women.

The talks intensified in 2015, a year that marked the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II and the 50th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic ties between South Korea and Japan. Cho said the milestones marked an auspicious opportunity, adding, There was a sense of urgency, because the average age of the victims is about 90.

As a staunch conservative who was eager to propel Japan into a more prominent international role, Abe had his own incentives for striking a deal.

Still, at times even issues not directly related to the negotiations threatened to derail them. In June, a push by Japan to win UNESCO recognition for a handful of industrialized sites angered South Korean officials, who felt the Japanese had not adequately described the use of forced laborers in the factories during wartime.

When both sides contacted the United States, according to a senior administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the talks, it reminded them of the need to focus on the 21st century, rather than the 20th century. The Japanese and South Koreans agreed on how to describe the forced labor, and the talks on the comfort women resumed.

U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Mark Lippert said that throughout the talks, the administration sought to remain impartial even as it encouraged both countries to reach a settlement. Just as Lippert and U.S. Ambassador to Japan Caroline Kennedy worked with officials in their respective countries, Secretary of State John F. Kerry spoke privately with both countrys leaders, hosting a dinner for Abe this spring in his home on Bostons Beacon Hill.

There was listening to both sides  that style of finding the middle was important, he said in an interview. It wasnt a pressure situation. It was, Youre doing the right thing here, and if you could get there, that would be terrific. 

A handful of key Republicans  including Sens. John McCain (Ariz.) and Cory Gardner (Colo.), and Rep. Matt Salmon (Ariz.)  made the same case to the two governments as the president.

Still, the deal has come under criticism from factions on the right in Japan and on the left in South Korea, as well as from the comfort women themselves.

[Could the comfort women deal fall apart?]

Yoo Hee-nam, 86, said in an email that she and other victims should have been allowed to participate in the talks, and that the matter is not a political dispute that needs to be resolved, but the issue of humanity and reclaim[ing part] of it that was destroyed a long time ago.

While Yoo said Japan did not concede enough, conservatives in Japan argue their government gave in too much. Abe faces fierce criticism domestically for making the deal, his special adviser Katsuyuki Kawai said in an interview Friday in Washington.

Kawai said that, given the fragile state of the pact, Its very important that all relevant, involved parties should nurture the spirit of the agreement, and that the United States can play a role in ensuring that.

Cho was just as adamant about Japans obligations, saying it had finally acknowledged responsibility for the comfort women, with no qualifiers. Now, the agreement must be implemented faithfully without backtracking from its unequivocal language.

But even with the pushback against the deal, Kawai said, the comfort-women agreement has already begun to pay dividends. Abe and Park spoke within 24 hours of North Koreas nuclear test, which Kawai said showed working through the thorny issue of the womens wartime claims allowed them to confer through a relationship of trust.

Given Kim Jong Uns penchant for conducting nuclear tests without warning, Kawai quipped, It was right in time for that.
Pressure from rank-and-file members of Congress is forcing Republican and Democratic House leaders to seek ideas for a new authorization for military force against the Islamic State. But despite the urgency on both sides, the process seems likely to push the parties farther apart instead of yielding common ground.

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) revealed this week that he asked Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-Calif.) to hold a series of closed-door listening sessions with Republicans to gauge whether and how a new Authorization for Use of Military Force against the Islamic State could be drafted. The first session, held Thursday, drew about a dozen participants.

On the other side of the aisle, the ranking Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee, Eliot L. Engel (N.Y.), is preparing a discussion draft of a new AUMF that came together after similar conversations with committee Democrats. Engel is expected to release the draft publicly next week.

Yet, the increased interest in a new AUMF does not appear to be bringing lawmakers any closer to the kind of bipartisan compromise that could clear the House, pass a recalcitrant Senate and avoid President Obamas veto pen.

[House, Senate leaders quash hopes for a new authorization to fight ISIS]

View Graphic Map: What a year of Islamic State terror looks like

Obama sent Congress his proposal for a new authorization measure nearly a year ago. Since then, Republicans have not been enthusiastic about the idea of a new AUMF, fearing that any such measure could put limits on the president's ability to effectively fight the Islamic State and, more important, tie the hands of the next president in the fight against the terrorist group. But the attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., sparked a new sense of urgency that Congress should weigh in on the Islamic State fight.

In the past few months, moderate and conservative Republicans have signed on to letters demanding Ryan schedule an AUMF debate, with one arguing that even if the Administration refuses to define the enemy for whom and what they are  radical Islamist terrorists  we must fulfill our responsibilities as Congress by passing a new authorization before the winter holiday break.

Nothing happened, and the matter dragged on. But after Ryan endorsed the idea of an AUMF debate in December, he sparked hope that a formal process of information-gathering could lead to some kind of breakthrough.

Ryans decision to deputize McCarthy and Royce to take the conferences temperature regarding an AUMF is in keeping with his leadership teams style, especially in national security matters. Since he became speaker, Ryan has talked about inclusive leadership. And in the wake of the Paris attacks, McCarthy and Royce were two of several party leaders who formed a task force to come up with legislative responses, such as bills to temporarily halt the inflow of Syrian refugees and amend the countrys visa waiver program.

But there is not much expectation that this time the process of talking about an AUMF will actually yield a workable product.

Most House Republicans who have spoken favorably about a new Islamic State-focused AUMF condition their support on it being broad enough; their big concern is that it would not restrict the president from introducing ground troops or carrying on a long-running fight.

If we can get an AUMF done that ensures our commanders have the flexibility they need to defeat ISIS, I want to move it, Royce said, using another name for the Islamic State. But ultimately, it is going to be up to President Obama to lead. Containment has failed. The administration already has the authority it needs to take the fight to these radical Islamist terrorists, and it needs to step up.

The Islamic State and its supporters use social media to post propaganda and recruit followers. The Washington Post takes a closer look at how several groups in the United States monitor this activity. (Gillian Brockell and Jorge Ribas/The Washington Post)

The Obama administration has been conducting its campaign against the Islamic State under the umbrella of the 2001 AUMF, which let the United States go after the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks and affiliated groups, and the 2002 AUMF that preceded the start of the war in Iraq. In the Senate, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) have accepted the legal basis of those AUMFs as satisfactory.

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul (R-Tex.) said he, like other Republicans, thinks that it would be clearer to update the existing AUMF to send a message that Congress was firmly focused on defeating and destroying the Islamic State. Some House Republicans have even argued that the administration is shoe-horning the fight against the Islamic State into the existing AUMFs.

Yet most Republicans have balked at proposals from Democrats that would replace the AUMFs with measures that sunset the presidents authority to conduct a war against the Islamic State after a few years or require Congress to approve the introduction of ground forces.

In that way, the renewed attention to an AUMF is already yielding political dividends, by giving Republican lawmakers new opportunities to question Obamas commitment to defeating the Islamic State, no matter how long it takes.

We never like timelines when it comes to this kind of stuff, McCaul said. Ive never seen a president ask for less authority to go to war with someone like ISIS.

Democrats, however, are unlikely to let an AUMF proceed that does not impose some restrictions on the presidents authority to fight the Islamic State  and Engel's forthcoming proposal may be the most restrictive of all. As it stands, Engels proposal would replace the 2001 and 2002 AUMFs with a three-year measure focused on al-Qaeda, the Islamic State and affiliated groups and require the president to put any plans to introduce ground forces to Congress before putting boots on the ground, according to Democratic aides on the Foreign Affairs Committee.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 7

By Farhad Daneshvar - Trend:

Iran has entered the 2016 with the good news of the removal of banking sanctions on exporting petrochemical products - a gift to Iranian banking sector, petrochemical industry and its Capital Market in particular the Mercantile Exchange.

On the second day of the New Year, Iranian sources reported that after five years of sanctions on the Islamic Republic's banking system, Tehran finally received payments for exports of its petrochemical products through an international bank in Spain, a breakthrough for both Tehran's petrochemical industry and the financial system as well.

Petrochemicals and oil based products alongside with a range of agricultural products as well as metal and minerals are traded in Iran's Mercantile Exchange (IME). The recent removal of sanctions on Iran's banking system can be considered as a green light for foreigners to think of investing in the IME.

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has also vowed the removal of rest of the sanctions in the coming days which is expected to pave the way for foreigners to invest in the country and its commodities exchange of the IME.

Iran Mercantile Exchange was established in September 2007, following the merger of the agricultural and metal exchanges of Tehran. Trades in the IME are carried out in the spot, derivatives and secondary markets.

According to the Regulations Governing the Foreign Investment in the Exchanges and Over-The-Counter (OTC) Markets, foreigners wishing to invest in Iran's capital market have to obtain a trading License from the Securities and Exchange Organization (SEO).

The IME announced that about $124 million worth of various commodities weighting over 0.292 million tons were traded in its domestic trading and exports halls between Dec. 26-31.

IME Total Market Data Dec.26.2015 - Jan. 6.2016

Meanwhile, in December 2015, 1.42 million tons of different commodities were traded on domestic and export trading floors, including 0.814 million tons of various commodities worth more than $357 million in oil and petrochemical trading floor, 0.594 million tons of different products worth approximately $226 million in metals and minerals trading floor, and approximately 0.109 million tons of agricultural products worth $23 million in agricultural trading floor in the spot market.

Products

Officially, products and commodities are listed and traded in the IME in three classifications: Industrial Products and Commodities, Oil Products and Petrochemicals as well as agricultural products.

Ferrous and non-ferrous metals such as steel, different types of cement, coke, precious metals concentrate, and other basic products are traded in the industrial products and commodities classification in the industrial trading session from 10:30 to 12:00 (GMT+3.5 hours), in metals and minerals trading floor through semi electronic open outcry. Gold bullions are traded from 12:00 to 12:30 (local time) in the same trading floor.

The trades of oil products and petrochemicals are carried out from 13:30 to 16:00.

Products such as cereals, oilseeds, oilcakes, wheat, feed wheat, feed barley, yellow corn, maize, raisin, lentil, chick peas, sugar, meat, eggs, saffron and pistachio are traded in Agricultural classification in the fully electronic multi-commodity trading system.

Offerings and orders

Offerings of the commodities in the spot market are announced and notified 24 hours, before the trading takes place, through the exchange website so the sellers and clients would be able to place their orders with the brokers and rest assured for trading to be matched and cleared.

In the derivatives market the clients order their trades as per specifications of the futures contract and in accordance to the order types specified in terms of order validity and the price.

Tradable contracts in IME:

Seven types of contracts including cash, forward, credit and futures facilitated trade in the IME based on the settlement and clearing terms as well as conditions mentioned in the offering notice of the traded commodities.

1-Cash Contract

In this type of contracts, the buyer is obliged to pay in cash the total contract value in addition to broker's commission fees, and the seller is required to deliver the commodity within 3 days.

2-Forwards Contract

In this type of contract, the whole contract value is paid by the buyer and the seller is committed to deliver the product in specified date and time. This type of contract is considered as a financing instrument for sellers.

3-Credit contract

In this kind of contract, the product is delivered to buyer immediately, and its value will be paid to seller in maturity date. This type of contract is considered as a financing instrument for buyers.

4-Futures contract

Futures contract is a kind of contract in which the seller is committed to sell a certain amount of product at a given price in maturity date and in contrast, the other party undertakes to buy the product with the same characteristics in maturity date. In order to have both sides fulfill their obligations, they shall deposit a certain contract value as collateral to clearing house and in accordance with futures price fluctuations shall adjust the initial collateral. On their behalf, the clearing house can give the possession of a part of collateral to the other party as "concession of the occupation". The juridical meaning is that both parties permit clearing house to tenure the collateral.

5-Call Option Contract

A call option contract is a contract giving the holder the right, but not the obligation, to buy a specified amount of a commodity or a commodity-based security at a specified price within a specified time from the owner. The owner will be committed to sell the commodity or the commodity based security on holder's request.

6-Put Option Contract

A put option contract is a contract giving the owner the right, but not the obligation, to sell a specified amount of a commodity or a commodity based security at a specified price within a specified time to holder. The holder will be committed to buy the commodity or the commodity based security on owner's request.

7-Standard Parallel Forwards Contract

It is a kind of contract in which a given amount of commodity will be sold based on standard parallel forwards contract features. The contract value shall be paid in accordance with contract in settlement deadline and the commodity shall be delivered in maturity date. The buyer can sell the equivalent amount of purchased commodity via standard parallel forwards contract.

Taxes

According to Iranian law ten percent (10%) of income tax gained from sale of the commodities listed on the commodity exchanges and ten percent (10%) of the income tax of the companies whose shares have been listed for trading on the domestic or foreign exchanges and five percent (5%) of the income tax of the companies whose shares have been listed for trading on the domestic or foreign OTC markets shall be exempted with the approval of the SEO as of the listing year to the year during which they have not been de-listed from the listed companies on such exchanges or markets.

The companies whose shares are listed for trading on the domestic or foreign exchanges or on the domestic or foreign OTC markets shall enjoy a tax exemption for doubling the afore-mentioned exemptions provided that they have at least twenty percent (20%) free-floating shares at the end of their fiscal year as confirmed by the SEO.
Egyptian supporters of ousted president Hosni Mubarak turned out for the court ruling in Cairon. (Samer Abdullah/AFP/Getty Images)

Egypts top appeals court on Saturday rejected an appeal by former president Hosni Mubarak and his two sons over a three-year prison sentence handed down after their conviction on corruption and embezzlement charges.

They were charged last May for diverting public funds intended for the maintenance of state owned presidential palaces, and for using the funds to renovate personal properties.

It was revealed that they had embezzled nearly $16 million to this end. They were sentenced to return the money and fined an additional 21 million Egyptian pounds.

It is unclear, however, how much actual time Mubarak will serve. Both his sons were released in October, having already served time in the case. They had been detained since April 2011.

Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for 30 years, has been held in a military hospital since 2011, after he was removed from office by an uprising against his authoritarian regime.

Read more:

Today's coverage from Post correspondents around the world
After German chancellor Angela Merkel pledged to crack down on refugees who commit crimes, both refugee advocates and opponents took to the streets on Saturday, Jan. 9, in Cologne. Some protesters turned violent. (The Washington Post)

After German chancellor Angela Merkel pledged to crack down on refugees who commit crimes, both refugee advocates and opponents took to the streets on Saturday, Jan. 9, in Cologne. Some protesters turned violent. (The Washington Post)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is pledging to crack down on refugees who commit crimes, with her party agreeing to present stricter deportation laws to Parliament following a national outcry over a string of New Years Eve assaults, including a protest that turned violent Saturday in Cologne.

Merkel has taken one of the most welcoming stances in Europe toward desperate refugees fleeing the war-torn Middle East, but she has come under pressure to take a harder line following the spate of attacks and sexual assaults in Cologne and other German cities by dozens of suspects that include refugees and asylum seekers. In response, her center-right Christian Democratic Union on Saturday approved a plan, which will be presented to her coalition partners and Parliament, that could see newcomers who break the law ejected from the country.

[Germany confirms asylum seekers are suspected in New Years Eve assaults]

An initial draft floated on Friday saw the party taking aim at only those who commit serious crimes carrying jail time. But the party line was hardened Saturday: Even refugees sentenced to probation by German courts could face deportation. In addition, the party called for new random identity checks of refugees and asylum seekers and tougher sexual-assault laws.

Merkels partys moves came as protesters  both refugee advocates and opponents  took to the streets on Saturday in Cologne, where police deployed about 1,700 officers to keep the peace. Police said they were forced to intervene to separate the groups.

Protesters marched through the central train station in Cologne, Germany, to call for an end to violence against women after dozens of attacks shook the city on New Years Eve. (Facebook/Rote Antifa [Essen])

The demonstrations turned violent in the late afternoon, local media reported, when protesters of the anti-Islamic Pegida group hurled rocks, bottles and fireworks at the officers, who reacted by using a water cannon to disperse the crowd.

A flash mob of 1,000 people demonstrating against sexism also took to the steps the famous gothic Cologne Cathedral.

The protests came a day after federal police said that at least 21 of 34 suspects in the New Years Eve assaults in Cologne are believed to be asylum seekers.

Of the 379 complaints registered so far, 40 percent involve sexual assault, German authorities say.

[Police report describes chaotic and shameful night of attacks on women]

On Saturday, Merkel denounced the abominably criminal acts that occurred on New Years Eve, adding that they called for decisive answers. A toughening of laws, Merkel said, would not only benefit Germans, but also law-abiding refugees.

When does one forfeit ones right to hospitality here? Merkel said on Friday. I simply must say, yes, one does forfeit ones right for hospitality sooner if he or she breaks the law.

Merkel also reiterated her earlier pledge to reduce the overall number of migrants  Germany saw more than 1.1 million newcomers arrive last year, far more than any other nation in Europe  but she did not offer a new plan.

Merkel has previously called on other European countries to do more to share the migrant burden, but she is also pressing Turkey to do more to stem the flow of asylum seekers through that nation en route to Europe. In general, however, Merkel appeared to uphold her position that Germany should still accept those newcomers with a genuine and legal right to apply for asylum.

[Germany springs to action over hate speech against migrants]

Reports of New Years Eve assaults have also now emerged from Helsinki; Kalmar, Sweden; and two other German cities, Hamburg and Stuttgart. The worst incidents happened in Cologne, where victims have said they were encircled by groups of young men.

In a separate case, four Syrian males, ages 14 to 21, were detained in connection to an alleged New Years Eve gang rape of two teenage girls in the southwestern German town of Weil am Rhein.

Stephanie Kirchner contributed to this report.

Read more:

Eastern European leaders double down on anti-migrant, anti-Muslim rhetoric

Even Europes humanitarian superpower is turning its back on refugees
This picture released by the Mexican website Plaza de Armas shows Joaquin El Chapo Guzman recaptured in a hotel in Los Mochis, Mexico. Mexican marines recaptured the fugitive drug kingpin six months after his spectacular prison break embarrassed authorities.

Jan. 8, 2016 This picture released by the Mexican website Plaza de Armas shows Joaquin El Chapo Guzman recaptured in a hotel in Los Mochis, Mexico. Mexican marines recaptured the fugitive drug kingpin six months after his spectacular prison break embarrassed authorities. Plaza de Armas via AFP/Getty Images

The leader of the Sinaloa cartel, who had been locked up in what has been described as the countrys most impenetrable prison, was recaptured in western Mexico after a shootout that left five dead.

The leader of the Sinaloa cartel, who had been locked up in what has been described as the countrys most impenetrable prison, was recaptured in western Mexico after a shootout that left five dead.

The leader of the Sinaloa cartel, who had been locked up in what has been described as the countrys most impenetrable prison, was recaptured in western Mexico after a shootout that left five dead.

In the rain and darkness Friday morning, Mexican marines crept up in trucks with their lights out and jumped between rooftops on Boulevard Jiquilpan, surrounding a little white house in this coastal city where their countrys most-wanted fugitive, Joaquin El Chapo Guzman, was hiding.

After months of searching, it was Guzmans contact with movie producers and actresses about a biopic based on his life that ultimately helped authorities recapture the chief of the Sinaloa cartel along a highway outside a coastal city, according to Mexican attorney general Arely Gomez Gonzalez.

Actor Sean Penn secretly met with Guzman in his Mexican hideout in October, according to an account Penn wrote for Rolling Stone magazine. Gonzalez did not cite the Penn meeting, which was disclosed when Rolling Stone published the story online Saturday night. But the Associated Press, citing as its source an unidentified Mexican official, reported late Saturday that Guzmans interview with Penn helped lead authorities to Guzmans whereabouts in Durango state in October.

When the shooting started in Los Mochis on Friday, neighbors woke terrified. Marines went door to door rousting people from their beds, desperately trying to keep the billionaire drug lord  who had escaped twice from federal prison  from slipping away again.

Then he did just that. Famous for his Houdini-like disappearing acts, Guzman vanished down an escape hatch and into the sewer. It wasnt until he popped up four blocks away, stole a car, and sped out of town that Mexican authorities finally captured him on the highway and ended six months of national humiliation for letting the worlds top drug lord go free.

I never thought theyd catch him again, said Jose Carlos Castro, a 29-year-old auto shop employee who worked across from the raided house. Much less right here.

[Mexican officials chipped away at El Chapos network to recapture him]

According to the Rolling Stone article, Guzman boasted to Penn about his drug empire. I supply more heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana than anybody else in the world, Guzman said. I have a fleet of submarines, airplanes, trucks and boats.

He acknowledged to Penn that drugs are harmful, saying, Well, its a reality that drugs destroy. Unfortunately, as I said, where I grew up there was no other way and there still isnt a way to survive, no way to work in our economy to be able to make a living.

Guzman said in the interview that he was not a violent man: Look, all I do is defend myself, nothing more. But do I start trouble? Never.

Guzmans capture was celebrated by law enforcement officials in Washington because Guzman runs a drug-trafficking network with vast international reach that has been dumping tons of cocaine and heroin into U.S. cities for years. But more than that, it represented a massive vindication, at least symbolically, for a Mexican government that has often seemed incapable of alleviating the brutal drug war violence that has left some 100,000 dead in the past decade.

After two prison escapes, many expect the Mexican government to extradite Guzman to the United States. After his last capture, it refused to do so, preferring to hold and interrogate Guzman in Mexico. The Mexican attorney generals office said in a statement Saturday that extradition procedures would begin. But that could take weeks or months, as the accusations against Guzman must be reviewed and a judge needs to recommend a course of action.





There are a series of things that could take months, one official said.

From the moment Guzman popped out of his prison escape tunnel six months ago and was whisked to a pair of waiting Cessnas, Mexican authorities undertook a massive manhunt to recapture him, setting up highway checkpoints across several states. Over the next weeks and months, as military operations focused on his home state of Sinaloa, authorities chipped away at the vast network of accomplices who helped Guzman escape from a maximum-security prison. They arrested corrupt prison guards and officials, relatives who handed out bribes and oversaw tunnel construction, and his trusted pilots, who flew him to Sinaloa.

In a news conference Friday night, Gomez said that after weeks of investigation and military and police operations in the region, authorities had acquired an understanding of Guzmans properties and vehicles, including planes. In October, they tracked him to a ranch house in the town of Pueblo Nuevo in the western state of Durango. As Guzman fled  falling and injuring his face and leg  he was accompanied by two women and a young girl, and soldiers circling above in a helicopter didnt want to fire and risk killing them, Gomez said.

[Key dates in Mexicos pursuit of drug lord El Chapo Guzman]

By late December, authorities suspected that Guzman had gone to the coast. They began to focus on Los Mochis, a city nestled amid corn and cane fields in northern Sinaloa, and a white two-story house  obscured by trees and across from a dental office and an auto-glass repair shop  that neighbors said was for rent. The neighborhood was upper middle class: The mayor and the governors mother lived nearby. The house also sat directly above the sewer tunnels.

When the gunfight erupted, some neighbors dived to the floor, desperate to avoid stray bullets. The rattle of gunfire was punctuated by explosions of what might have been the rocket-propelled grenades later found in the house. Buses blocked off the streets, and helicopters swooped low over the rooftops. After more than an hour of fighting, five of Guzmans men lay dead and others had been arrested. One marine was injured.

I thought we were in Syria, said one neighbor who lived a block away and refused, like many others interviewed, to give her name out of fear for her safety. This has been the biggest shock of my life. The worlds most-wanted man is my neighbor.

Guzman and one of his top lieutenants, Jorge Ivan Gastelum, fled through a hatch into the sewer tunnels, a tactic Guzman had used in previous escapes. Some of those hatches were hidden under a bathtub. A Mexican marine at the scene Saturday wouldnt give details but said the passageway in the Los Mochis house was the same system as the others.

About 9 a.m., Guzman, in a dirty tank top, and a shirtless Gastelum emerged from the sewer four blocks east between an Office Depot and a Pollo Feliz restaurant. According to people who work in the area, the two fugitives forced open a square metal manhole but had trouble lifting the hinged cover, so they wedged in one of their shoes to prop it open. At that point, they brandished their guns and ordered a vendor selling the local newspaper, El Debate, to remove the cover so they could reach the street, according to two people who heard the account from the vendor.

He was terrified and shaking, one woman said of the vendor.

Inside the sewer from which they emerged was a weapon that appeared to be an assault rifle, still propped against the wall under the manhole cover Saturday.

A white sedan was stopped at the traffic light when they reached the street. Guzman and Gastelum ordered a man and a woman out of the car and sped off through drizzling rain. Authorities apprehended the vehicle outside of town on Highway 15 and took the men to the Doux Hotel, a mid-range establishment nearby that rents rooms by the night and the hour. The federal police put Guzman in Room 51, away from the road, and searched every room in the hotel , according to hotel staff.

I think its kind of stupid, said a guest from Tijuana who refused to give his name for security reasons. If you have that kind of money, why would you be here in Los Mochis? Youd be in Dubai or Switzerland.

On Saturday, bullet holes could be seen in the neighbors metal gates near the raid, and a woman was hosing off blood in her carport. An architect who lives nearby said marines burst into many houses around their target to try to encircle Guzman. He complained that they took a TV monitor attached to his security system. They just stole it, he said.

[Prison break shines spotlight on Mexicos corruption woes]

Guzman was later flown to Mexico City and returned to Altiplano prison, the facility he escaped from in July. For a year and a half before that, he lived in a tiny concrete cell with a hole in the floor for a toilet. To free him, his accomplices cut through the floor of his shower stall and ferried him into a mile-long tunnel equipped with a motorcycle.

Read more

In Mexican town where Chapo broke out of jail, admiration and awe

The worlds most notorious drug lord has become Mexicos hit Halloween costume

Why El Salvador became the hemispheres murder capital
Dani Dayan, shown in this 2009 photo, is Israels pick to be its next ambassador to Brazil. But some left-wing Brazilian groups have protested his former role as a settler leader. (Olivier Fitoussi/AP)

Israel and Brazil are locked in a rather undiplomatic standoff over the appointment of a new Israeli ambassador to the Latin American country.

Tensions began in September when Israel presented credentials for Dani Dayan, selected for the post by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Usually, it takes just weeks for a country to approve a new ambassador, but Israel is still waiting.

The holdup?

Dayan is the former head of the Yesha Council, a representative body of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank. Most countries, including Brazil, view the settlements as illegal and an impediment to the creation of a future Palestinian state. Israel disputes that. The United States calls the settlements illegitimate.

A few weeks after Netanyahus office announced Dayans appointment  in August via Twitter  some 30 left-wing groups in Brazil, including pro-Palestinian committees, socialist parties and trade unions, signed a manifesto in protest.

In Israel, former Israeli diplomats opposed to the appointment met with Brazils ambassador, Henrique Sardinha Pinto, expressing concern that Dayans commitment to the continued existence of settlements was at odds with Brazils stance regarding the West Bank.

Meanwhile, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, battling a recession and impeachment proceedings, needs support from groups on the left.

While Brazil has made no official comment about Dayan, unofficially it is angry that Israel chose someone so provocative and that he was named publicly before Brazil had time to respond.

There is an initial surprise with the proposal of this gentleman as ambassador, for what he represents. But this surprise gained another dimension when it was done the way it was done, said a Brazilian government official with 20 years of diplomatic experience, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the subject publicly.

[Israel denounces E.U. label rules for products made in settlements]

From Israels  and Dayans  perspective, Brazils reluctance to accept him sets a dangerous precedent. In a recent TV interview, Dayan likened Brazils rejection of an Israeli living in the West Bank to a European Union decision in November to label goods from Jewish settlements there.

This is taking things to a new level. This is the first time a country is labeling people, said Dayan, who declined to be interviewed for this story. The E.U. ambassador in Israel told me that while they are against the settlements as a government policy, they are not against the people who live there.

Dayan said he does not take Brazils stance personally but worries that it could keep Israelis living in the West Bank from joining the foreign service. More than 350,000 people live in about 200 Jewish settlements in the West Bank. An additional 300,000 Jewish Israelis live in parts of Jerusalem that Israel captured from Jordan in the 1967 war and annexed to the city, a move most countries view as illegal.

[Map: The spread of Israeli settlements in the West Bank]

Israels Foreign Ministry spokesman, Emmanuel Nahshon, said that unrelated political issues should not influence Dayans position as an ambassador and that Israel still expects Brazil to approve the appointment.

Brazil has refrained from giving a negative answer, and this is a nice diplomatic way of hinting the person is not wanted, said Robbie Sabel, a former senior Israeli diplomat.

But Israel is in a difficult position, because if it refuses to withdraw the man, this could lead to diplomatic impasse with Brazil. Israel is not interested in that. It sees Brazil as a Latin American superpower, Sabel said. My guess is that the man himself will decide to withdraw.

This is not the first time Brazil and Israel have been at odds. Rousseffs predecessor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, alienated Israel as he worked to build relations with Iran. He also formally recognized the Palestinian state in 2010. In 2014, during Israels 50-day war with Hamas in the Gaza strip, Brazil recalled its ambassador to protest Israels actions.

Regarding Dayans appointment, Marcos de Azambuja, a former Brazilian ambassador to France and Argentina, said: Brazilians immediately recognized he was not the right man. He has a close connection with the settlements in the West Bank, and we find that these settlements are contrary to international law.

But de Azambuja, who is also a board member at the Brazilian Center for International Relations, a Rio de Janeiro think tank, said the long-term relationship between the two countries is not at stake .

It generates some noise, some problems and a sense of frustration and irritation, he said. Brazil wants to strengthen relations with Israel and make things work, because we have enough difficulties at home.

Phillips reported from Rio de Janeiro.

Read more:

Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world
This picture released by the Mexican website Plaza de Armas shows Joaquin El Chapo Guzman recaptured in a hotel in Los Mochis, Mexico. Mexican marines recaptured the fugitive drug kingpin six months after his spectacular prison break embarrassed authorities.

Jan. 8, 2016 This picture released by the Mexican website Plaza de Armas shows Joaquin El Chapo Guzman recaptured in a hotel in Los Mochis, Mexico. Mexican marines recaptured the fugitive drug kingpin six months after his spectacular prison break embarrassed authorities. Plaza de Armas via AFP/Getty Images

The leader of the Sinaloa cartel, who had been locked up in what has been described as the countrys most impenetrable prison, was recaptured in western Mexico after a shootout that left five dead.

The leader of the Sinaloa cartel, who had been locked up in what has been described as the countrys most impenetrable prison, was recaptured in western Mexico after a shootout that left five dead.

The leader of the Sinaloa cartel, who had been locked up in what has been described as the countrys most impenetrable prison, was recaptured in western Mexico after a shootout that left five dead.

The worlds most wanted drug lord, Joaquin El Chapo Guzman, was recaptured by Mexican security forces Friday after a fierce pre-dawn gun battle in a western city that left five people dead, authorities said.

Guzmans capture was the culmination of a furious manhunt that began when the drug lord tunneled out of a maximum-security prison nearly six months ago.

Fridays operation took place in the Pacific town of Los Mochis, in Sinaloa state, the headquarters of Guzmans drug-trafficking cartel, which ships more cocaine and marijuana to the United States than any other cartel, plus more than half the heroin that reaches the country. Members of the Mexican navy raided a home after a tip about gunmen inside, setting off a shootout that also injured one of the Mexican marines, according to a military statement.

[In Mexican town where Chapo broke out of jail, admiration and awe]

Mission accomplished: we have him, President Enrique Pena Nieto wrote on Twitter. I want to inform the Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman . . . has been captured.

The news was an immediate boost to Pena Nieto, who has struggled with corruption scandals, drug violence and the humiliation of the escape last year by Mexicos most famous prisoner. Pena Nieto, speaking later Friday in a televised address from the national palace, shared the credit with Mexicos armed forces and intelligence services.

Day and night, they worked to accomplish the mission I gave them, to recapture this criminal and bring him to justice, Pena Nieto said. Months of intense and careful intelligence work and criminal investigation allowed them to detain this criminal and dismantle his network of influence and protection.

With Guzmans capture, the president said, 98 of Mexicos 122 most wanted criminals had been killed or captured.

Extradition to U.S.?

It was not immediately clear whether Mexico would try again to hold Guzman behind bars or extradite him to the United States, but it seemed likely that U.S. officials would press to have him handed over. After Guzmans last arrest, in 2014, the U.S. government wanted him to face a multitude of pending charges in American courts. But Mexican authorities refused, considering it a point of pride for them to interrogate and prosecute their most important criminal in their own judicial system.

For a year and a half before his escape last year, Guzman had been held in Altiplano prison outside Mexico City, supposedly the nations most secure detention center, where he lived in a tiny concrete cell with a hole in the floor for a toilet. His accomplices cut through the floor of his shower stall and ferried him into a mile-long tunnel equipped with a motorcycle. Several prison officials have since been accused of facilitating his escape.

In a statement Friday, U.S. Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch said Guzmans capture represented a victory for the citizens of both Mexico and the United States, and a vindication of the rule of law in our countries. She later called her Mexican counterpart, Arely Gomez, to congratulate her.

It is unclear what role the United States played in the capture, but U.S. officials have lately been praising their security partnership with the Mexican government. Guzmans capture in Mazatlan in 2014 was due in part to extensive U.S. wiretapping and intelligence work to track the kingpins bodyguards.





Since the billionaire drug lord escaped last year, he had grown into a fugitive of epic proportions in the public imagination. He had broken out of a Mexican prison twice in the past two decades and seemed capable of outwitting authorities at every turn. During his latest period on the lam there were only sporadic reports of his whereabouts, including rumors that he had injured his leg fleeing one of many military operations to find him.

The arrest confirmed what many Chapo-watchers assumed, that he would not flee Mexico but would return to his home state, where he would have protection from residents, corrupt local police and his extensive cartel network. Around his home town, in the remote Sierra Madre mountains of eastern Sinaloa, checkered with plots of marijuana and opium poppy, residents have often praised Guzman for his largesse, which included giving them jobs and medical care and even air-dropping bags of money from Cessnas into peasant villages.

But like the first time he was recaptured, in a 2014 raid on his condominium in the beach resort city of Mazatlan, he was caught on the coast Friday  this time after a battle near a two-story white house on a residential street of Los Mochis, with a palm tree out front, televised images show.

Early-morning gun battle

A neighbor who lives about two blocks from the house, in an upper-middle-class subdivision, said by telephone that the commotion started about 3:40 a.m. Speaking on the condition of anonymity because of security concerns, the neighbor said she heard gunfire and what she assumed to be bombs, and rushed to a windowless room inside her house for safety.

The gun battle lasted for about an hour, stopped for 15 minutes, then resumed, she said. Neighbors exchanged a running commentary on the WhatsApp messaging app, she said, that informed her there were frequent military and police patrols driving with their lights off, while helicopters circled overhead.

The neighbor added that authorities were searching storm drains and that she believed that some of the suspects escaped through them.

Mexican news outlets reported that Guzman escaped the house and fled through a sewer but was ultimately captured at the Hotel Doux, about five miles north of the house. A person who answered the phone at the hotel declined to comment.

Five suspected gunmen were killed in the raid, including one of Guzmans top lieutenants, Ivan Gastelum, a.k.a. El Cholo Ivan, authorities said. They reported recovering four vehicles, two of them armored, plus at least nine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, officials said.

By Friday afternoon, Guzman had been flown to the navy hangar in Mexico City, the same place where he was dragged before news cameras after his last arrest. Pictures circulating online showed him in a disheveled tank-top, a less flattering look than his last perp walk, in a crisp white dress shirt.

In the murky world of Mexican drug trafficking, it is unclear how much the Sinaloa cartel suffered during Guzmans last incarceration  or changed while he was out of prison.

We dont know whether the Sinaloa cartel will simply continue to operate as usual under El Mayo Zambada and other cartel leaders or if it will eventually devolve into smaller groups, said Andrew Selee, a Mexico expert at the Wilson Center in Washington. And if the Sinaloa cartel does fragment, will it produce more violence or lower the death toll?

On Friday morning, the news coursed through a euphoric Mexican government.

We are very happy, Education Secretary Aurelio Nuno, who was Pena Nietos chief of staff when Guzman fled prison, said in an interview.

Nuno noted that the first time Guzman slipped out of federal prison, in 2001, he managed to stay on the lam for more than a decade, while this time he was free for less than a year.

To achieve this for a second time ultimately speaks to the determination of this president, of this government, and a growing capacity of the Mexican state in terms of intelligence, he said.

Elahe Izadi and Sari Horwitz in Washington, Nick Miroff in Havana and Gabriela Martinez in Mexico City contributed to this report.

Read more

In Mexican town where Chapo broke out of jail, admiration and awe

The worlds most notorious drug lord has become Mexicos hit Halloween costume

Key dates in Mexicos pursuit of drug lord El Chapo Guzman
Michelle Lee of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. (Photo: U.S. Department of Commerce)

The tech industry still hates patent trolls, but its starting to have good things to say about the government agency that issues the patents those trolls later wield in what amounts to a legalized extortion racket.

That was the somewhat surprising conclusion of a panel discussion at CES Friday morning that featured some of the leading critics of the current patent system  and was introduced by Michelle Lee, director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

A PTO director had apparently never before spoken at CES, so Lees presence alone represented a change. So did the substance of her remarks: We need to restore a sense of balance to patents, she said, and while the PTO has moved to issue more precise, clearer patents and then provide faster resolution when theyre challenged afterwards, Congress must help.

When our Founding Fathers provided for intellectual property protection in the Constitution itself, they foresaw the need for balance, Lee said. Its that balance that were working with Congress and stakeholders to achieve in patent litigation reform.

The panelists who followed her  Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), Ditto.com CEO Kate Doerksen, NewEgg chief legal officer Lee Cheng, tech entrepreneur Bryan Menell, and Qualcomm counsel Laurie Self  only had nice things to say about Lee.

Trolling is (too) easy

They were nowhere as complimentary about the vague, broad patents handed out under her predecessors and their subsequent abuse by companies that buy them and then threaten other firms and even other firms customers with lawsuits, accusing them of infringing those patents.

The math favors a patent-trolling strategy. The cost of assertion is almost nothing, Cheng said, while challenging a patent at the PTO can add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars and a full-fledged legal defense can run $2 to $3 million.

Right now it makes more sense to settle to save somebodys job, said Doerksen.

Story continues

A bizarrely large share of these lawsuits  44 percent in 2015, according to a report by the patent-services firm Unified Patents  land in a single court, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. There, theyre heard by one judge, Rodney Gilstrap, who has a history of sympathy towards patent litigants. Chengs overall assessment: Its a joke.

A bill that would curb the worst patent-trolling abuses, the Innovation Act, remains stalled in Congress, and the panel revealed some reasons for that holdup.

One is anxiety among companies heavily invested in the current system, such as Qualcomm.

Were talking about an incredibly complex and valuable ecosystem, Self said. You have to be very careful.

Issa  a longtime supporter of patent reform who earlier founded an electronics firm and himself holds 37 patents  sounded fed up with Qualcomms hemming and hawing, leading to the unlikely sight of a Republican not only teeing off on a big American company but one that employs many of his constituents.

We have to get to yes in Congress not based on making Qualcomm 100 percent happy, Issa grumbled.

He added that universities that license patents to non-practicing entities  aka trolls  and then collect a share of the proceedings from infringement lawsuits represent another source of opposition to the Innovation Act.

Incremental improvements

In a chat afterwards with Yahoo Tech, the USPTOs Lee said the agency is doing everything it can within current laws to make it easier to resolve patent disputes.

Most patent claims are not litigated, she said. For those that are, we want to make sure were providing a high-quality, speedy process.

For instance, the new appeals board mandated by an earlier patent-reform law, the America Invents Act, has not only seen widespread use to challenge existing patents in less time and at half the cost of going to court, its rulings are standing up.

Almost all of our cases that have gone up on appeal have been affirmed, Lee said.

She also said the patent office has also chipped away at a huge backlog of patent applications that had peaked in 2009 and was on its way to resolving that by 2019.

But broader fixes need Congress to get to work: Certain changes are clearly going to require legislative changes.

I asked Lee, a computer scientist and lawyer who previously worked for Google (but holds no patents herself), if it bothered her to see the PTOs output exploited to shake down businesses like those wed heard at the panel. Any sort of patent litigation abuse should, I think, offend all of us, she responded.

It ought to, because its customers like you and me who ultimately eat the costs of bogus patent-infringement lawsuits. Or as Cheng said during the panel: Everybody pays the toll of the troll.

Email Rob at rob@robpegoraro.com; follow him on Twitter at @robpegoraro.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 9



By Khalid Kazimov - Trend:



Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has urged people to show a high turnout at the upcoming elections for parliament and the Assembly of Experts to be held in February.



"Elections are not owned by the leader, they belong to the Islamic Republic of Iran," Fars news agency quoted him as saying during his address to a group of people from Qom city in Tehran.



Khamenei also said the elections strengthen the system and increases the credibility and honor of the nation.



"To protect the country and its credibility, everyone should cast vote in the elections even those individuals who do not believe in the system," Ayatollah Khamenei added.



"Everyone should try to make a right choice. The current parliament takes proper stances regarding the international issues," he said.



He said that if people do not know all the candidates personally, they should vote in favor of those introduced by religious and revolutionary individuals who follow the path of late founder of the Islamic Republic Ayatollah Rouhollah Khomeini.



He urged people to refrain from casting votes in those candidates who may act in the favor of the USA.



The Assembly of Experts is of high importance as it is expected to choose the next leader, he added.



He further accused the US of perpetrating the post-election unrests in Iran in 2009 and said the unsuccessful protests were aimed at toppling the Islamic Republic.



He added that Iranians should remain vigilant and stand against the US.



Iranians are getting ready to elect both law makers for parliament and clerics for the Assembly of Experts on February 26.



The Assembly of Experts is comprised of 86 Islamic scholars (Mujtahids) who are elected by the public to eight-year terms. The Assembly of Experts is an influential body in charge of supervising the supreme leader and organizations under his direct control as well as electing a successor for him.
HELSINKI (Reuters) - Finland said on Friday it would extradite a Russian citizen accused of computer fraud and abuse to the United States for trial. Finnish authorities detained Maxim Senakh in August at the request of U.S. federal authorities. Russia says his detention was illegal. Senakh has been accused in the state of Minnesota of infecting computer servers with malware, resulting in criminal gains worth millions of dollars. Russia's foreign ministry said in a statement on Friday that it hoped its Nordic neighbor would take its "position into account" and described the arrest as "an abuse of the law in violation of internationally accepted procedural norms". "We reaffirm our categorical objections to the extradition of Russian citizens to the United States where they are facing absurd kinds of punishment like imprisonment for more than 100 years," the statement said. The Finnish justice ministry said U.S. authorities have 30 days to come and get Senakh. (Reporting by Jussi Rosendahl in Helsinki and Dmitry Solovyov and Jason Bush in Moscow; Editing by Catherine Evans)
Miss Colombia is ready to face off with Steve Harvey.

Ariadna Gutierrez will appear on The Steve Harvey Show in an interview expected to air the week of January 18th. It will mark the first time Harvey and the Miss Universe runner-up have come face-to-face publicly since that cringeworthy pageant mishap.

WATCH: Miss Colombia Pens Heartfelt Letter After Rollercoaster Miss Universe Experience

While hosting the Miss Universe pageant on Dec. 20, Harvey mistakenly announced Miss Colombia as the winner -- only to reveal moments later that the title actually belonged to Miss Philippines, Pia Wurtzbach.

WATCH: Miss Universe Opens Up About Miss Colombia

"I've had a chance to talk to Miss Philippines. I've talked to all the pageant people. I've talked to people backstage. Even me and the director had a long talk, but I haven't been able to reach out and talk to Miss Colombia," Harvey admitted on Tuesday's episode of his eponymous talk show. "Now, have I tried? Yes, but have gotten not a response."

Meanwhile, the new Miss Universe  aka Miss Philippines  recently opened up to ET about the gaffe. "I hope that she realizes that this will open doors for her," Pia said of Ariadna. "I think that she will go far."

See the interview below.

Related Articles
Iran's Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli will pay an official two-day visit to Syria to hold talks with the Arab country's officials, Press TV reported.



Deputy Interior Minister for International Affairs Babak Dinparast said on Saturday that Rahmani Fazli will travel to Damascus on Monday at the invitation of his Syrian counterpart Major General Mohammad al-Shaar.



He added that the visit is aimed at discussing ways to improve Tehran-Damascus relations and implement an already signed agreement between the two sides.



During a visit by Shaar to Tehran in June 2015, the Iranian and Syrian interior ministers signed an agreement to strengthen cooperation in the fight against terrorists, organized crimes and narcotics smuggling.



Earlier this week, Iran's Health Minister Hassan Qazizadeh Hashemi visited Syria, where he held talks with the country's Prime Minister Wael al-Halaqi, his counterpart Nizar Yazigi and Higher Education Minister Mohammad Amer Mardini.



Syria has been gripped by foreign-backed militancy for four and a half years. More than 250,000 have lost their lives and millions displaced as a result of the crisis in the Arab country.



Since late September 2014, the US and some of its allies have carried out airstrikes purportedly against Daesh extremists inside Syria without any authorization from Damascus or a UN mandate.
Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif says the Islamic Republic has so far exercised patience with regard to negative measures adopted by Saudi Arabia as Riyadh steps up its hostile policies against Tehran, Press TV reported.



"We have so far responded to negative Saudi measures with patience because there is a distance between Iranian wisdom and Saudi officials' misguided and immature approaches," Zarif said in a meeting with China's Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Zhang Ming in Tehran on Saturday.



"We are not after tension in the region," the Iranian minister added.

Relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia have been strained in recent days following the Saudi execution of top opposition cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, which was announced on January 2.



Nimr's execution was widely censured by Muslims and human rights activists around the globe as well as different governments.



Saudi Arabia severed diplomatic relations with Iran on January 3 following demonstrations held in front of the Saudi embassy in Tehran and its consulate in the northeastern city of Mashhad by angry protesters censuring the Al Saud family for the killing of Nimr. Some people mounted the walls of the consulate in Mashhad while incendiary devices were hurled at the embassy in Tehran. Some 50 people were detained over the transgression.



In a Friday letter to United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Zarif said Saudi Arabia has to make "a crucial choice" to either promote "sectarian hate-mongering" by its continued support for extremist groups or promote regional stability.



He added that Tehran has "no desire or interest in escalation of tension in our neighborhood" and hopes Riyadh will "heed the cause of reason."



Meanwhile, speaking in a press conference after an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the [Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council in Riyadh on Saturday, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir repeated the kingdom's anti-Iran rhetoric and said Riyadh is considering "additional measures" against Tehran if it "continues with its current policies."



Iran continues to expand China relations: Zarif



During his meeting with the Chinese diplomat, Zarif also said that Iran and China have numerous commonalties on different issues.



He added that Tehran will continue to expand relations with Beijing following the implementation of a nuclear agreement reached between the Islamic Republic and six world powers in July 2015.



The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), reached between Iran and the P5+1 - the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia plus Germany - in the Austrian capital of Vienna on July 14, 2015, puts limits on Iran's nuclear activities in exchange for the removal of all economic and financial nuclear-related sanctions against the Islamic Republic.



The Iranian minister expressed hope that a planned visit by Chinese President Xi Jinping to Tehran in the near future will bring about positive outcomes for the two countries.



He also hoped that Iranian and Chinese officials would open up prospects for comprehensive cooperation during Xi's visit to Tehran.



Iran pursues wise foreign policy: Zhang



The Chinese official, for his part, said Iran and Saudi Arabia play an important role in regional developments.



Iran pursues wise foreign policies, the Chinese official said, adding that his country would spare no effort to contribute to promotion of peace and security.



He also expressed Beijing's full readiness to bolster relations with Tehran and said the Chinese president plans to visit Iran in the near future for the first time after 14 years.
The Arab states of the Persian Gulf will take additional measures against Iran in case of new "hostile" moves by the Islamic Republic, the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (GCC) said in a statement Saturday following an extraordinary meeting of foreign ministers, Sputnik reported.

"Member states of the GCC will take appropriate additional measures to counter these hostile actions," the organization's Secretary General Abdullatif Zayani said, reading the statement.

Last weekend, protesters stormed the Saudi Arabian embassy in Iran after Riyadh executed top Iranian Shiite cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, along with dozens of other people convicted of terrorism. Al-Nimr had demanded more rights for Shiites, who are a minority in Saudi Arabia, where most citizens are Sunni Muslims.

Shortly after the unrest, a diplomatic row erupted in the Middle East, with Saudi Arabia severing diplomatic ties with the region's main Shiite power, Iran. Bahrain followed in Riyadh's footsteps, together with Sudan and Djibouti. The United Arab Emirates also scaled down its diplomatic representation in Iran and Kuwait recalled their ambassadors to Tehran.






Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler's book on his political ideology and plans for Germany, has been republished in Germany following a decades-long ban, Press TV reported.

Hitler's political testament hit the bookshops in Germany on Friday, for the first time in 70 years.

Since World War II, the Allies had refused to allow the republication of the banned book in Germany out of respect for the war victims and to prevent the incitement of hatred among Germans against non-Germans.

Mein Kampf, which translates as My Struggle, outlines Hitler's ideology, which formed the basis for Nazism.

Hitler wrote the semi-autobiographical, which would become the manifesto for the burgeoning National Socialist Party, in 1924, while he was imprisoned in Bavaria for treason.

The book, which depicts life as a struggle, details the racist ideas of Hitler who believed in racial hierarchy and asserted the superiority of the Aryan race as the Herrenvolk (master race), as opposed to the non-Aryan Untermenschen (sub-humans), which included all "people of color" as the inferior races.

The book advocates Nazi militarism stating that, "Those who want to live, let them fight, and those who do not want to fight in this world of eternal struggle do not deserve to live."
Iraq's military says a major commander of the Daesh Takfiri terrorists has been killed during an operation by the country's Air Force against the militant group west of the country, Press TV reported.



The Iraqi Defense Ministry said in a statement on Saturday that its fighter jets had managed to target the whereabouts of Asi Ali Mohammad Nasir al-Obaidi in the town of Barwanah in the western province of Anbar.



The statement said Obaidi was the second deputy to the self-proclaimed Daesh leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, meaning that he was the third in command of the Takfiri group.



It said Obaidi had escaped Abu Ghraib, a notorious prison facility once run by the United States forces west of the capital, Baghdad. A picture of Obaidi was also circulated in the Iraqi media.



The death of the notorious commander comes days after the Iraqi military and volunteer fighters managed to liberate the central districts of Anbar's provincial capital of Ramadi in a major blow to the terrorists.



Sporadic clashes still continue in Ramadi and other parts of Anbar; however, Iraqi forces say they have purged Daesh militants from their key positions.



Over the past few months, Iraqi warplanes have also managed to carry out successful combat sorties against Daesh positions in the northern province of Nineveh.



Iraq's Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi vowed after the liberation of Ramadi that his forces will definitely push back Daesh from the positions it controls in Iraq in 2016, including from its major bastion in Nineveh's capital, Mosul.



He also praised the air force for carrying out successful airstrikes against militants, saying the Iraqi warplanes conduct more than 60 percent of the sorties against Daesh, more than the share of a US-led coalition claiming to fight the group in the Arab country.
Thirty people were injured in a pepper spray attack by an unidentified suspect on a group of refugees in Canada's Vancouver, Sputnik reported.



The male suspect approached the group of refugees, who gathered near the Muslim Association of Canada Centre, on a bicycle and attacked them with the pepper spray, the CBC television reported.



Several children lost consciousness, according to the channel.



Local police have reportedly launched an investigation into the attack and are searching for the perpetrator.



Investigators said it was too early to comment on a possible motive for the attack, according to the media.



Later on Saturday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the attack.



Amid the largest migrant crisis since World War II, in late November 2015, Canada's Ad Hoc Cabinet Committee on Refugees Chair Jane Philpott announced that the country would welcome 25,000 refugees by the end of February, 2016.



Read more: http://sputniknews.com/world/20160109/1032885679/canada-refugees-pepper-spray.html#ixzz3wmpeyGRN
Video released Saturday shows the moment last month when an Iranian Navy ship fired unguided rockets in close proximity to an American aircraft carrier and an American destroyer, NBC News reported.



The Dec. 26 incident prompted US military commanders to criticize Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy for its "highly provocative" actions.



The footage - from the perspective of the viewfinder - reveals how the Iranian Revolutionary Guards (IRCGN) blasted several rockets near a cluster of coalition and commercial ships, according to US Navy Central Command.



The ships, including the USS Harry S. Truman and the USS Bulkeley, were crossing international waters in the Strait of Hormuz when the IRCGN conducted the live-fire exercise, US Central Command said in a statement.



The rockets landed about 1,500 yards away from the ships, according to the statement. The IRGCN vessels announced the exercise over maritime radio 23 minutes before it began, the statement added.



Nobody from Iran's foreign or defense ministries gave official comment immediately following the exercise, but the country's state-run news agency, Fars, said in a report about the event that no vessel was in danger.



"Firing weapons so close to passing coalition ships and commercial traffic within an internationally recognized maritime traffic lane is unsafe, unprofessional, and inconsistent with international maritime law," US Central Command said in a previous statement.
Baku, Azerbaijan, January 9

Trend:

The information that Turkey plans to introduce a visa regime with the 89 countries doesn't correspond to reality, Minister for the EU Affairs of Turkey Volkan Bozkir told, Anadolu agency reported.

"We strive to ensure that our citizens from October 2016 could attend the Schengen area without a visa, and continue to work in this direction. This information doesn't correspond to reality. People should trust the statements of the competent authorities", Bozkir said.

Earlier a number of Turkish media reported Jan. 7 that Turkey will on June 2016 start the visa regime with 89 countries, including Azerbaijan, at a request from the EU.
Aston Martin Lagonda Ltd. Collaborates with LeTV to Get a Tech Makeover for Its Cars

LeTV and Aston Martin Lagonda Ltd. signed a partnership on research collaboration in Dec. 2015. (Photo : YouTube)

The latest and best British luxury sports car, Aston Martin, is adding bang to the buck by collaborating with Beijing-based tech company, LeTV Holdings Co. Ltd., on tech smart cars.



The firm's vehicles, mostly associated with the famous secret agent James Bond, will sport new looks with many tech gizmos incorporated to give the ultimate in driving experience, according to China Daily.



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Aston Martin Lagonda Ltd. and LeTV displayed their first model called the Rapide S, which is powered by LeTV's automobile Operating System, on Thursday, Jan. 8, at the ongoing Consumer Electronics Expo in Las Vegas.



The new car features a 13.3-inch HD touch screen from LeTV as the vehicle's central console, as opposed to the conventional 12.2-inch display dashboard, First Post reported. The publication added that the 2015 version sedan also has LeTV's under-development Speech Recognition Technology. The feature allows the car to take commands from the driver such as lowering windows.



Furthermore, the cloud-based system enables other services like remote monitoring.



The whole project took some months to be completed. By collaborating with LeTV, Aston Martin has indicated that it wants to incorporate high-end tech into its already reputable vehicles.



Ding Lei, co-founder and global vice chairman of LeTV's automobile subsidiary, LeTV Super Car, said that the Chinese firm has added "an Internet brain" to Aston Martin, which has a legacy of over 100 years.



The two companies signed the partnership on research collaboration in Dec. 2015. The projects include manufacturing and the development of the next-generation electric cars.



Meanwhile, Aston Martin's CEO Andrew Palmer said, "The integration of LeTV's advanced connected technologies into this bespoke environment is a natural progression as we look to the future demands of our customers."



LeTV and Aston Martin do not intend to sell the upgraded version of the Rapide S because the technologies utilized on the $610,000 (4 million yuan) speed car will be introduced in future releases.



LeTV, a firm reputable for making smartphones and televisions, announced its automobile intentions in Nov. 2015, adding that it was seeking traditional automakers for partnership. The company as well invested in a two-year-old electric carmaker in the United States to challenge pioneers in the industry such as Tesla Motors Inc. in the near future.


President Xi Jinping bids farewell to Chinese astronauts in 2012, and four years later, China is set to launch more than 20 new space missions including another manned mission. (Photo : www.news.xinhuanet.com)

China is set to conduct more than 20 space missions this year, which include a manned one and the maiden flights of two rockets, the nation's major space contractor said.



According to China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp., it plans to launch the Tiangong 2 space laboratory and the Shenzhou XI manned spacecraft. The contractor said it will also test-fly the Long March 5 and Long March 7 rockets.



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China Daily reported that two satellites will be launched by the country for the domestically developed Beidou Navigation Satellite System, and the Gaofen 3 for the Gaofen High-Resolution (HD) Earth Observation System.



In a statement published in its website, the contractor said "this year will see more than 20 space launches, the most missions in a single year."



In addition, the company said that it will launch a communications satellite for Belarus, the first time that China has exported a communications satellite to Europe.



The Tiangong 2 space laboratory is also scheduled for launching in the first half of the year to test life support and space rendezvous technologies for the country's future space station, the report said.



After Tiangong 2, a Long March 2F rocket will launch the Shenzhou XI spacecraft to send astronauts to and dock with the space laboratory.



According to government sources, China will also launch the core module of its space station in 2018 to research engineering issues and to test related technologies. The station is expected to become fully operational by 2022.



Since all the space projects are proceeding well, the development of the next-generation carrier rockets is now being finalized by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp.



Final tests on the Long March 5, the heaviest and most technologically challenging member of the nation's rocket family, is being undertaken by the company's China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology.



The report added that the academy has increased its annual manufacturing capacity from a maximum of eight rockets to up to 20 to accommodate the frequent space missions. It has also substantially reduced the time required to develop each new rocket.


The architecture of Wuzhen will inspire some of the works to be showcased in the exhibition. (Photo : China Daily)

Wuzhen is embracing contemporary art by holding the first International Contemporary Art Exhibition starting March 27 until June 26, as reported by China Daily.



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The exhibition will showcase works by 40 influential artists from 15 countries and regions with big names like Marina Abramovic, Damien Hirst, Florentijn Hofman, Bill Viola and Araki Nobuyoshi.



There will be a wide range of works on display, including installation sculptures, videos, performance arts, photos, paintings and sound arts.



"The event will be either a biennial or triennial one. It's the first time for a small town in China to hold such a large-scale exhibition with so many star artists from across the globe," said Feng Boyi, the exhibition's curator.



Usually, major events happen in China's big cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. However, this can be seen as an attempt by Wuzhen to attract art resources, said Feng.



Many of the artists are creating works specifically for the show, allowing them to blend with the ancient architecture of the water town, according to Feng.



Visual artist Ann Hamilton is set to create an installation to be placed on a traditional grand stage that is hundreds of years old.



Florentijn Hofman, who is best known for his traveling Rubber Duck, is also set to create a work specifically for Wuzhen.



Half of the 40 artists are Chinese, including Ai Weiwei, Xu Bing, Sui Jianguo and Liu Jianhua.



Sui, one of China's top sculptors, visited Wuzhen in October to conceptualize his work for the show. His work will be showcased in a deserted silk factory that was built in 1970, back when silk was a major industry in the town.



"The silk factory is an old memory of the town. I like it. It's much the same with the 789 art zone in Beijing," said Sui, who owns a studio in 798, an art district in Beijing that was created from old factories.



There are around 21 artists who have visited Wuzhen to draw inspiration for the art show.


Chinese soldiers march past near the Id Kah Mosque, China's largest, in Kashgar, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, on July 31, 2014. (Photo : Getty Images)

Chinese government watchdogs in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region have been clamping down on online audio and video content related to terrorism in the past year, as part of a campaign to combat extremism and maintain security in the troubled region.



Luo Fuyong, director of the Xinjiang Internet Information Office, said that his office has been looking for different ways to counter extremist activity online and has launched several campaigns to remove terrorist content online, according to a report by the Global Times published Thursday.



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Xinjiang has seen a spite of terrorist attacks in recent years, including bombs thrown at police cars and civilians run over with vehicles. In 2014, police busted a total of 181 terror groups in the region.



With Xinjiang as the frontier in the fight against separatism and terrorism, the Internet is the "the main battleground for ideological struggles," Luo said.



Luo credited online audio and video promoting terrorism as the major cause of terrorist attacks, adding that since June 2014, China's central government has launched several special campaigns to curb online terrorist content and severely punish individuals who release, spread or store terrorist material.



In March 2014, the Xinjiang government issued a notice forbidding the circulation of video and audio content promoting terrorism in a bid to control the growing number of attacks on police and civilians.



The notice bans the use of mobile phones, computers and portable storage devices to create, send, play, copy, transfer or store such types of content. Anyone possessing such content must delete or destroy them or submit to the authorities within a month after the notice was issued.



The regulation was enacted in response to claims of Xinjiang police that, in recent years, terrorists were often inspired by audio and video of foreign terrorist activities.



Of the five terrorist attacks that took place in Xinjiang in 2014, most were caused by individuals radicalized by watching videos of terrorist activities, the police said.



Luo said that his office has also been seeking ways to combat extremism outside of the Internet.



In 2014, around 6,000 cultural activities and 20,000 videos were shown to tell the stories of "40,000 models," the Global Times said in its report.



Previous media reports have also cited authorities distributing brochures in Xinjiang describing extreme religious activities and the behavior of extremists and instructing citizens to report such activities to the police.



Xinjiang's authorities have also created an online platform to receive tips and offer rewards to whistleblowers in 14 cities and prefectures across the region. As of the end 2015, the platform has received over 500,000 reports.



Officials also note that many people involved in online crimes are poorly educated and unemployed, and that by spreading extreme religious ideas they have gained thousands of adherents.



In Dec. 2014, Xinjiang police arrested two suspects for spreading rumors about a terrorist attack in Shache County in Kashgar prefecture.


Premier Li Keqiang has been invited to the opening ceremony of BFA 2016. (Photo : www.vishvatimes.com)

The Boao Forum for Asia (BFA) 2016 will focus on new challenges in Asian and emerging economies with the goal of injecting new vitality into the world's economy, as reported by Xinhua.



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The annual conference takes place in Boao, the coastal town in the southern island province of Hainan. This year's BFA is scheduled to happen from March 22-25, with the theme "Asia's New Future: New Dynamics and New Vision," according to a Wednesday press briefing.



Premier Li Keqiang has been invited to attend this year's opening ceremony.



"Asian and emerging economies are in completely different internal and external environments, which challenges their innovation-driven development endeavors and governance models," said Zhou Wenzhong, BFA secretary-general.



"How they steer their economic restructuring, strengthen regional economic cooperation and improve infrastructure and technological innovation capabilities will attract international attention and dominate discussion at the conference," Zhou added.



For this year's BFA, the top priority for the conference will be to discuss how to inject new vitality and foster new sources of growth for the world economy.



Several discussion topics will be covered during the four-day event, including macroeconomy, political affairs, entrepreneurship, innovation, Internet plus, social welfare, culture, sports, religion and civilization.



The annual conference will invite experts from different fields, including, politics, business, academics, media and other communities, as well as heads of state and government.



The BFA will also feature entrepreneurs from different areas like frontier technology, advanced manufacturing and emerging industries.



Aside from heads of state and government leaders, ministerial-level officials from 18 major and emerging economies have been invited to attend the event.



The conference is made up of 83 sessions, including 51 forums, 14 roundtables, six themed dinners and 12 entrepreneur dialogues.



The BFA, a non-governmental and non-profit international organization, was founded in 2001. It is committed to promoting regional economic integration and helping Asian countries reach their development goals.


Starting Jan. 2016, Chinese tourists will be issued two-year multiple-entry visas to encourage them to visit Britain. (Photo : Reuters)

The British Home Office announced that the United Kingdom is set to unveil on Jan. 11 its new two-year visitor visas for Chinese nationals, according to a Xinhua News Agency report.



The visa will allow Chinese applicants to have multiple trips to Britain for a longer period.



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"The launch of this new visa enhances our excellent visa service by offering better value for money and more flexible travel for Chinese visitors, while ensuring that the U.K. border is protected," Government Immigration Minister James Brokenshire said.



Brokenshire added that the move will allow Chinese nationals to get hold of more opportunities in the region. "The number of Chinese visitors to the U.K. is rising year on year and this visa will allow Chinese visitors to further take advantage of the opportunities the U.K. has to offer for both tourism and business purposes," he said.



The new visa is available for 85 pounds, the same cost as the currently existing six-month visitor visa.



The plan was first announced by Prime Minister David Cameron in Oct. 2015, during Chinese President Xi Jinping's state visit to Britain.



Apart from multiple trips, the visa will also offer a better deal to eligible Chinese citizens than what the standard Schengen visitor visa allows. The visa is limited to a maximum of only 90 days.



The new visitor visa can be used for tourism, business and for attending conferences, the article added.



Meanwhile, the Home Office also said that there is an increasing number of British citizens visiting China, adding that the launching will also benefit U.K.'s travelers.



The statement noted that China will also reduce its two-year visitor visa fee to 85 pounds. The Chinese government will also match Britain's offer of a 10-year visitor visa.



As of Sept. 2015, Britain has issued a total of 484,065 visas in China, 404,084 of which were visitor visas.


Policy shifts are needed to adopt to changes on social dynamics and employment brought about by China's two-child policy. (Photo : www.ap7am.com)

As 2016 commenced, People's Daily enumerated the top 10 events that are seen to create great impact on the Chinese people.



First on the list is the implementation of the new regulation for residence permits which mandates every city to offer a basic set of public services for individuals who have lived in their area for at least six months. The regulation that took effect on Jan. 1 was issued by the State Council on Nov. 26, 2015.



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Statistics show that around 170 million people have lived across administrative regions for the past six months and have contributed to their respective local economies. However, they do not enjoy the same equal rights as what the native residents do.



Second, the taking effect of the landmark two-child policy, as stated by the newly revised population and family planning law. The policy change was passed during the Oct. 26-29 Fifth Plenary Session of the 18th Communist Party of China (CPC), while the amendments on the law were passed on Dec. 27, 2015, during a session of the National People's Congress Standing Committee.



This 2016, the newly born population is expected to hit over 20 million. Around 90 million families were qualified for the new policy.



Third, the establishment of a more equitable social security system that will cover all Chinese people, may they be living in the urban or rural area. Though pilot programs were launched for the past two years, the scheme, whose key components include pension and medical care, will go onto a national scale starting this year until 2017.



Currently, the system's pension insurance aspect covers over 80 percent of the population, while the basic medical insurance services cover more than 95 percent.



Fourth, the release of the first draft of law raising the statutory retirement age. According to the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, they will solicit suggestions and make amendments based from those insights this year, and in 2017, the new policy will be announced.



Fifth, the establishment of the new benefits system for the country's 20 million disabled people. First issued in Sept. 2015, the system will provide an allowance (50 to 700 yuan) and subsidy for nursing the disabled (300 yuan).



Sixth, the nationwide implementation of the new air quality standard to be led by the Ministry of Environmental Protection and the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of China. Starting Jan. 1, the standard will set a limit for the first time on the PM2.5, PM10 and ozone concentration levels.



Seventh, the completion of the Shanghai-Kunming High-speed Rail, which is part of the grand 2,264-kilometer railway network project by the government. The project links one municipality directly under the central government and five provincial capital cities.



Eighth, the launching of a pilot program for the changes to the rules in applying for and obtaining a driver's license. The move aims to curb the cases of red tape and corruption involved in license applications and driver training. Under the new scheme, the training model of driving schools will be innovated, requiring independent decision-making capabilities.



Ninth, the full implementation of the unified immovable property registration system, which looks at cutting down on property speculation and the introduction of a property tax. According to the article, the "rules involve the registration of land, waters, forestry and real estate." An information management hub will be set up before 2018.



Lastly, the introduction of the system of ID card acceptance, loss reporting and claims at alien locations, making it easier for citizens to reapply for such cards, report its loss, and search for information in nearby police stations. The system is set to be fulfilled nationwide by July 2017.


The situation in the Korean Peninsula is particularly sensitive, as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) launched a nuclear test recently. (Photo : Getty Images)

According to a China Daily report, Beijing said it has "maximized its efforts" to address the recent Korean Peninsula nuclear issue. The statement comes as the Chinese capital was accused of not doing enough to handle the matter.



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Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said on Thursday that a senior official with the ministry has "elaborated China's stance (on the test) to the leading official of the DPRK embassy in Beijing" after Pyongyang held its first hydrogen bomb test a day earlier.



Reports have also surfaced that countermeasures are currently unfolding on the Korean Peninsula. This includes the news that Seoul and Washington are considering "steps amid rising international criticism of the DPRK's fourth test since 2006," the article cited.



On Thursday, Seoul's Defense Ministry said the Korean leaders are discussing with the U.S. to deploy the latter's strategic assets in the wake of the bomb test, a report from The Associated Press stated.



Hua said that the government "expresses concerns over the development of the situation," urging all those involved to "get back on the track of resolving the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue through the Six-Party Talks."



The talks, which involved the DPRK, the U.S., ROK, Japan, Russia and China, stalled back in Dec. 2008.



For analysts like Yang Xiyu, a senior researcher at the China Institute of International Studies, no single party is winning after the bomb test and that the situation is a "lose-lose" one.



Yang said that the "peninsula is drifting away from the goal of denuclearization, and any countermeasures taken by Seoul and Washington might only worsen the security situation on the peninsula," China Daily said.



Meanwhile, Hua also noted that the country has attended a closed-door meeting of the U.N. Security Council in New York last week. A statement stressed that members of the council will "begin to work immediately on . . . measures in a new Security Council resolution."


China's securities regulator promised to appropriately manage the pace of new share sales. (Photo : YouTube)

On Friday, Jan. 8, China's securities regulator promised to appropriately manage the pace of new share sales as a way of stabilizing investors expectation, underscoring its need to contain more fluctuations after the market rebounded.



The announcement comes after the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index suffered a 10-percent loss in a week, with market shutdowns on Monday and Thursday because of the circuit breaker system.



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According to China Daily, the Shanghai Composite Index dropped by 1.97 percent following the securities administration suspending the controversial circuit breaker system the night before. The authorities blamed the system for worsening liquidity crunch in the market.



China Securities Regulatory Commission spokesman Deng Ge said during a news convention that the regulator will appropriately arrange the new share sales according to the principle of improving trading vitality and stabilizing the market.



As a way of alleviating concerns about the huge new Initial Public Offerings (IPO) draining market liquidity, Ge pointed out that the launch of the long-awaited registration-based IPO mechanism will not happen on March 1 as initially announced.



Since the Chinese market faced first-time volatility in the past week, the regulator has put in place measures to allay investors' anxiety, including scrapping the circuit breaker system and limiting share sales by major players of listed corporations to no more than 1 percent of their firms' total shares within three months.



According to Worldwide News, chief strategist at investment bank BOCOM International, Hong Hao, said: "The circuit breaker is a magnifier, but not trigger, of market volatility. Suspension of the mechanism should decelerate the decline in A shares to reflect China's weakening fundamentals. But it will not reverse the decline."



On the other hand, state-controlled funds stepped into the market by buying stocks on Friday, increasing fiscal shares and those with large weightings in benchmark indexes.



Although it was fascinating that the national team of state institutions will continue purchasing stocks, some critics asserted that the rebound could be short-term, given that investors have been unable to get any positive aspects in the economic principles.



However, it was a relief to investors when the renminbi's decline for eight successive days ended on Friday, displaying the dedication to maintain the currency's stability on the side of the Chinese fiscal authorities.


Premier Li Keqiang visits a Chinese equipment manufacturing exhibition in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil, in May. (Photo : www.scmp.com)

China has overtaken Japan, South Korea and Malaysia in exporting high-tech products, which have now become a key driver of the Chinese economy, according to a Dec. 2015 report from the Asian Development Bank (ADB).



China Daily reported that based on the ADB report, China had become the largest exporter of high-tech products in Asia in 2014, taking up a 43.7-percent share, surpassing Japan with only a 30-percent share, followed by South Korea and Malaysia.



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About one-third of the exports from China were high-tech products and Chinese technologies are now popular overseas, particularly those related to railways, shipbuilding, nuclear power and telecommunications.



The report said that China's manufacturing expertise leads in the following fields:



Information technology

The report said that Chinese manufacturers earn mainly from telecom equipment exports to Asia as companies (like Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd.) help phone companies in Asia to build networks, while selling smartphones and smartwatches in developed markets.



Li Jin'ge, president of Huawei Asia Pacific, said that telecom technologies, particularly broadband, cloud computing and big data, are driving the digitization of all industries that make Asian economies vibrant.



"These technologies are also promoting improvements in planning and construction, management and operations, livable environments, giving a human touch to cities around the world," Li said.



The report added that Huawei is also providing products and services to some oil and gas companies in Central Asia, including Beineu Bozoi Shymkent Gas Pipeline in Kazakhstan, Asia Trans Gas in Uzbekistan and Amu Darya in Turkmenistan. The area is considered as the world's third-largest oilfield and plays an important role in the global oil and gas industry.



Huawei's key projects include the Kazakhstan-China natural gas pipeline, called the AB line, which is the world's first and longest digital natural gas pipeline.



Smaller vendors like Xiaomi Corp. also contribute by selling their own smartphones in India, Indonesia and other Asian countries via local shopping websites.



Lenovo Group Ltd., which started to assemble devices, is planning to tap into the high-end smartphone markets such as Singapore, Japan and South Korea.



Fiberhome Technology Group, on the other hand, is set to take advantage of expanding demand for optical fiber cables in overseas market.



Machinery

Some Chinese heavy equipment manufacturers are also seeking to enter Asian markets which are yet to open up, the report said.



LiuGong Machinery Co. said that its products, such as cranes and excavators, have been exported to Southeast Asia a decade ago and are largely used in government projects in the fields of transportation, hydraulic engineering and infrastructure.



"Countries in Southeast Asia such as Thailand and Cambodia are our target market and we have been in Thailand for more than a decade, because those markets have huge potential for growth with increasing demand for infrastructure construction," said Zeng Guang'an, president of LiuGong.



The report said that the Chinese heavy machinery market had started to pick up around 2000 and saw its golden era after 2008 when the government rolled out a 4-trillion-yuan stimulus package.



The company said that 178 excavators and cranes from LiuGong worth $14 million were exported to Uzbekistan and Cambodia last year.



Some other companies have switched to the farming industry, rolling out tractors, according to the report.



Zoomlion Heavy Industry Science and Technology Development Co. said it is also expanding in the farming machinery industry overseas, targeting Southeast Asian and Central Asian countries such as Cambodia, Vietnam, Pakistan and Kazakhstan.



Shipbuilding

Chinese shipyards have reportedly received orders for new vessels with a total capacity of 11.19 million dead weight tons in the first half of 2015, which account for 27.6 percent of global market share, as statistics from the China Association of the National Shipbuilding Industry showed.



Light rail systems

CRRC Zhuzhou Electric Locomotive, which operates in Malaysia, has built a manufacturing and maintenance plant in the state of Perak. The plant makes trains for the entire ASEAN region. It has an annual production capacity of 100 rakes, including locomotives and light rail cars.



CRRC ZELC, a subsidiary of China Railway Rolling Stock Corp., also got the 8-billion-yuan worth of deals in five rail equipment and service projects in Malaysia, including a 200-kilometer high-speed rail line between Kuala Lumpur and the northern city of Ipoh.



The Chinese company now owns three subsidiaries in Malaysia, the report said. The Chinese subsidiaries form the biggest rail transportation equipment provider in Malaysia, which account for 85 percent of market share.


Male Chores (Photo : Getty Images)

A gory killing in Brooklyn, New York in early December ended a 20-year only family feud in China that could be compared to Mafia or Yakuza wars among Italian or Japanese gangs. However, the feud was not who controls the drug syndicate or prostitution ring in China where the anger started.



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The shooting took place at a Popeye's restaurant, a fried chicken fast food, where 45-year-old Wu Long Chen, a Chinese military veteran, shot 68-year-old Yingguan Chen in the head. Yingguan, the family patriarch who collapsed on the restaurant floor while saying in Mandarin, "I'm going to die," was attending a wedding when Wu spotted him.



ABC reports that Wu had gunshot wounds to the head, torso and right arm. He was rushed to Lutheran Hospital, but was later pronounced dead.



It was over garbage that led Wu to shoot Yingguan to death, reports The New York Post. Trash pranks, like the one below posted in YouTube, may appear to be good prank material, but when the garbage war escalates, it could be fatal.







According to Vicky, Yingguan's daughter, their families were neighbors who fought because Wu's family often threw trash into their yard. However, during that time, Yingguan was in the U.S. already and had no idea his children were having trash battles with their neighbors.



Gary, Yingguan's son, recounts Wu and his brothers coming to their house and intimidating them, including pushing their mother around and hurting her arm. Because it became violent, the police had to step in. The two families were each fined $1,000.



Wu and Yingguan attended the wedding of a mutual friend when the shooting happened. "It's surprising that this man could hold a grudge and make my father a target. It's a complete shock," says Gary.



The gunman attempted to escape to Mexico, but border officials in Loredo, Texas, caught Wu on Monday and brought him back to Brooklyn to face weapons and murder cases.


Mao Giant Statue (Photo : Twitter)

About $465,000 of Henan Province funds went down the drain after embarrassed officials of the Chinese province ordered the tearing down of a giant golden statue of former Communist Party of China Chairman Mao Zedong.



The New York Times reports that demolition teams arrived on Thursday morning and immediately demolished the giant gold statue of China's former leader. A pile of rubble and a big mountain-size embarrassment among province officials was all that was left as of Friday morning.



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It was when the images of the statue become viral on the internet that attracted criticism of extravagance, which led to the destruction of the 120-foot statue that was almost finished two days after. Ironically, the statue was built in the middle of a rice field in Henan, one of the worst hit Chinese provinces by famine attributed to Mao's Great Leap Forward policy.



The demolition crew, men in olive-green greatcoats, were sent by officials of Tongxu Country to demolish the humungous eyesore.







Villagers point to Sun Qingxin, head of conglomerate, Lixing Group, which makes machinery and runs food processing facilities, is said to be the brainchild behind the statue. A local describes Sun is crazy about Mao and has a house full of Mao statues.



It was allegedly built without permits, reports The Washington Post. Despite having died years ago, Mao is considered like a god by many Chinese, along with other deities such as the Jade Emperor and the God of Wealth. His intervention is sought by people from rural area for getting rid of bad luck, having a baby boy and becoming wealthy.


Special-forces raids on an Islamic State (ISIS) stronghold in northern Iraq are under way before a planned offensive to retake Mosul, the largest centre under the group's control, Iraq's parliamentary speaker said.

Several attacks behind ISIS lines around Hawija, 210 kilometres (130 miles) north of Baghdad, were carried out in recent weeks, Salim al-Jabouri told Reuters on Thursday.

Dubai-based al-Hadath and Iraqi media have reported at least half a dozen raids since late December, led by U.S. special forces.

The U.S. said last month it was deploying a new force of around 100 special operations troops to Iraq to conduct raids against ISIS there and in neighbouring Syria, without providing details.

But U.S. Army Col. Steve Warren, a Baghdad-based spokesman for the international coalition bombing ISIS, this week rejected the media reports, calling them "Iranian disinformation" aimed at distracting from the Iraqi military's "success" against ISIS elsewhere.

He told Reuters coalition forces in Iraq have not operated on the ground since October, when U.S. special forces rescued 69 Iraqis in a raid in Hawija that killed one U.S. commando .

Special operations in Hawija "have been repeated a second and third time ... These operations are bearing fruit," said Jabouri, Iraq's senior Sunni Arab official. "They eliminate the terrorists and free innocents, and for us it represents a positive development."

Jabouri said the raids were carried out "from time to time" and "supported by Iraqi forces" but did not specify whether the United States played a role or how many had occurred.

The raids are "not direct ground attacks; they are operations targeting the dens of Daesh in important and sensitive areas," Jabouri said, using an Arabic acronym for the group, which is also known as ISIS and ISIS.

He said they were not enough to get rid of ISIS but "are dealing them strong blows".

He said the raids were related to Baghdad's goal of retaking Mosul, the city 400 km (250 miles) north of Baghdad where ISIS declared its intention to establish a caliphate stretching across the border with Syria.

Strategically located east of the road from Baghdad to Mosul and near the Kurdish-held oil region of Kirkuk, Hawija became an ISIS stronghold when the ultra-hardline Sunni militants swept across northern and western Iraq in 2014.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said has vowed to retake Mosul, this year as a "fatal and final blow" to ISIS militants in Iraq.

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Knifemen stormed a hotel in Egypt's Hurghada on Friday evening, injuring a number of foreign tourists before security forces killed one of the assailants, injured the other and ended the attack.

Speaking to Ahram Online, health ministry spokesperson Khaled Megahed said two Swedish tourists and one Austrian were stabbed and slashed. They were sent to the town's Nile Hospital and Red Sea Hospital.

A police statement, however, said that three foreign tourists were wounded, giving their nationalities as two Austrians and one Danish citizen.

The attack took place at Bella Vista Hotel in the busy downtown area of Hurghada, a popular tourist resort located on the Red Sea.

Police closed off Sheraton Road where the hotel is located following the attack before re-opening it shortly.

Eyewitnesses at the hotel also told Ahram Online that police were asking bystanders gathered outside the hotel during the attack to leave.

In a statement on Facebook, the police said two assailants were carrying bladed weapons and an imitation pistol.

The police said one of the dead assailant's name was Mohamed Hassan Mahfouz, born in 1994. Security forces severely injured the other armed man as both were attempting to escape.

Both men were able to enter the hotel through a restaurant facing the street, according to the police statement.

Reuters earlier reported security sources as saying that the assailants arrived by sea to carry out the attack.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, although Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis  now affiliated with the ISIS group  has claimed responsibility for many lethal militant attacks in Egypt in recent months.

The attack comes a few months after Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis claimed responsibility for the downing of a Russian plane over North Sinai, killing all 224 passengers on board. The airliner was heading from the Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh to Russia's St Petersburg.

Egypt has been battling an Islamist insurgency that has spiked since the 2013 ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi.

The militancy, mostly concentrated in parts of North Sinai, has killed hundreds of police and soldiers. Authorities have also reported that hundreds of militants have been killed in military campaigns in the governorate.

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The inaugural sitting of Egypt's newly-elected parliament Sunday will be mainly procedural, confined to the election of a speaker and two deputies

After four years of political turmoil, Egypt's new parliament, the House of Representatives, is due to hold its procedural sitting on Sunday.

The meeting will be the first of its kind after the country's two previous parliaments were dissolved  the first in February 2011 and the second in June 2012  and after former president Mohamed Morsi was ousted from office in July 2013.

The meeting also represents the completion of the third stage of a political roadmap adopted since the removal of Morsi. The other stages included the passing of a new constitution, in January 2014, and the election of a president, former army chief Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, in June 2014.

According to Ahmed Saadeddin, secretary-general of parliament, the opening sitting will be held at 9am and is expected to continue for seven hours in one day.

"There will be six items of debate on the agenda of the inaugural sitting Sunday," Saaeddin told reporters in a press conference Saturday.

"At the beginning," explained Saadeddin, "Bahaeddin Abu Shuka, secretary-general of Wafd Party and an appointed MP, will be invited by the house's secretariat-general to chair the inaugural meeting in accordance with President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi's decree No 561/2016," said Saadeddin.

According to parliament's internal regulations, the opening procedural meeting should be chaired by three members: the oldest MP as chairman, and the two youngest MPs as deputies.

Abu Shuka, 77, is considered the most senior parliamentarian, while Noha Al-Himili, a 25-year-old female MP from the Upper Egypt governorate of Beni Suef, and Hassan Hassanein, a 25-year-old MP from the Nile Delta governorate of Qalioubiya, were selected as the two youngest MPs.

Saadeddin also explained that before entering the main meeting hall, each MP will be allocated a certain number so he or she can use it to operate a newly-installed electronic voting system in the next meetings. "He or she will be also required to give a copy of her fingerprints so that he or she can use his or her electronic voting card," said Saadeddin.

Second on the agenda, Saadeddin added, Abu Shuka will be required to read out eight decrees on parliamentary elections. "All of these decrees were issued by the High Elections Committee (HEC) that took charge of supervising the polls between 17 October and 16 December 2015," said Saadeddin.

Third, added Saadeddin, Abu Shuka will also have to read out presidential decree No 560/2015 on the appointment of 28 public figures in accordance with Article 102 of the constitution.

Saadeddin estimates that the above procedures will take around half an hour only. "Next," Saaeddin added, "comes the fourth item on the agenda of debates; the necessity that each MP take the national oath in accordance with Article 104 of the constitution."

Saadeddin said: "We estimate that each MP will take 25 seconds only to read out the oath  or a total of around five hours for all MPs (596) to finish this long procedure completely."

According to Article 104, each MP is obliged to read out the following national oath: "I swear by Almighty God to loyally uphold the republican system, respect the constitution and the law, fully observe the interests of the people, and to safeguard the independence of the nation and integrity and unity of its land."

Deputies affiliated with the ultraconservative Salafist Nour Party told reporters Saturday that they will read the oath as it is and without any changes. In 2012, Islamist and Salafist MPs surprised all by adding the words "without violation of principles of Islamic Sharia" at the end of the oath.

Once the oath-taking procedure is finished, MPs will be required to elect a speaker and two deputies. "MPs will be asked to cast their votes in glass boxes as it will be difficult to operate the electronic voting system on the opening day," said Saadeddin.

As many as five MPs have so far expressed their wish to run for the post of speaker: Ali Abdel-Al, a constitutional law professor with Ain Shams University; Ali Al-Moselhi, a former minister of social solidarity; Osama Al-Abd, a former president of Al-Azhar University; independent leftist MP Kamal Ahmed; and TV host Tawfik Okasha.

Al-Abd announced Saturday that he decided not to run for the speaker's post in favor of supporting Abdel-Al. Both Al-Abd and Abdel-Al are members of a pro-Sisi bloc, the "Pro-Egyptian State Coalition."

In an internal election Saturday, MPs affiliated with the pro-Sisi bloc voted in favour of nominating Abdel-Al for the post. The bloc, including around 380 MPs, announced that Abdel-Al will be its official nominee for the post in parliament's inaugural meeting Sunday. The liberal Al-Wafd Party also said it will support Abdel-Al.

A number of pro-Sisi bloc MPs have also announced that they will run for the two posts of deputy speakers. These include journalist Mostafa Bakri, Coptic female politician Margaret Azer, former MP Al-Sayed Al-Sherif, former MP Alaa Abdel-Moneim, and Nasserist female MP Nashwa Al-Deeb. Al-Wafd Party said its candidate for deputy speaker will be MP Soliman Wahdan, while the Free Egyptians Party announced that its candidate for the deputy speaker post will be MP Hatem Batshat.

In an internal election Saturday, pro-Sisi bloc MPs voted in favour of nominating Al-Sayed Al-Sherif and Alaa Abdel as their favoured nominees for the posts of the two deputies.

Saadeddin indicated that a committee including seven MPs from different political factions will be formed to supervise the election of the parliament speaker and the two deputies. "The committee will include two MPs representing independents, in addition to five MPs representing five political parties with the highest number of seats," said Saadeddin.

"If the speaker or his two deputies were not elected from the first round, there will be a second round among those who got the highest number of votes," said Saadeddin.

As long as the speaker is elected, he will be asked to chair the meeting, opening the door for MPs who wish to run for the speaker's two deputies positions.

The election of a speaker and two deputies will be followed by different public speeches. "The elected speaker himself, his two deputies, Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Magdi Al-Agati, representatives from independents and spokesmen of the main victorious political parties, will be required each to deliver a speech about their view for the new parliament," said Saadeddin.

The schedule of debates show that there will be no election for the leading posts of parliament's 19 committees. Minister Al-Agati said parliament's internal regulations have to be amended first to go in line with the new constitution. "These regulations, passed in 1979, only apply to the election of a speaker and two deputies," said Al-Agati.

Saadeddin explained that while the existing internal regulations state that there should be elections for the posts of a speaker and two deputies at the beginning of each parliamentary session, the new constitution states that the elected speaker shall be elected one time and retain his post throughout parliament's five-year term.

Saadeddin dismissed reports that certain seats on the left will be allocated to opposition MPs while seats on the right will be filled by majority MPs. "As you cannot say for now who are the majority MPs and who are the opposition MPs, each deputy will be allowed to sit where he likes," said Saadeddin.

There are strong rumours that the house's committees will be increased from 19 to 30.

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The fishermen were detained for almost a month for trespassing and illegal fishing

Thirteen fishermen who were detained in Tunisia for almost a month for trespassing and illegal fishing returned home Saturday, a security source told the MENA state news agency.

Egypts foreign affairs ministry had been in talks with its Tunisian counterpart to release the fishermen since they were captured near Sfax port.

It was announced last week that the fishermen were freed.

Airport security will question the 13 fishermen before they are allowed to enter the country.

The returned 13 are part of a 16-person ship crew. Three others are scheduled to return within the next few hours, the source added.

This is one of the latest incidents involving Egyptian fishermen arrested in the territorial waters of neighbouring countries like Sudan, Libya and Tunisia.

Egypts foreign ministry has repeatedly intervened in these cases to ensure the release of the fishermen and warned against trespassing in foreign waters.

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One of the tourists has already been discharged from the hospital

The three foreign tourists who were stabbed in an attack in Hurghada Friday night in a hotel have minor injuries, Egypts tourism minister, Hisham Zaazou, told the MENA state news agency.

One of the tourists has already been discharged from hospital.

The attack took place at Bella Vista Hotel in the busy downtown area of Hurghada, a popular tourist resort located on the Red Sea.

Hotel security shot at the attackers, killing one and severely injuring and detaining the other, according to a statement from the interior ministry.

Both men were able to enter the hotel through a restaurant facing the street, according to a police statement.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, although Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis  now affiliated with the Islamic State group  has claimed responsibility for many lethal militant attacks in Egypt in recent months, mainly in troubled North Sinai.

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Following the attack, security checkpoints have been set up throughout the area in an attempt to catch the assailants

Unknown assailants shot dead Saturday a police colonel along with a conscript in their police vehicle while exiting the colonels farm, a security source said, reported the MENA state news agency.

Following the attack, security checkpoints have been set up throughout the area in an attempt to catch the assailants.

It was not immediately clear if the attack had criminal or political motivations.

Egypt has been battling an Islamist insurgency, mainly based in the North Sinai region, that has killed hundreds of police and troops since the 2013 ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi.

Militant group Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, which swore allegiance to the militant Islamic State group in November 2014, has claimed responsibility for some of the deadliest attacks in Egypt.

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The ruling also means Mubarak's sons Alaa and Gamal will be banned from involvement in politics in the foreseeable future

Former president Hosni Mubarak's appeal against a conviction for embezzling public funds was rejected on Saturday, making him the first Egyptian president to be convicted of corruption as the ruling now is final and cannot be further challenged.

The ruling also means that Mubarak will be deprived of privileges granted to former presidents according to Egyptian law.

"Mubarak will be deprived of special privileges such as a special security crew allocated to ex-presidents, as well as some honours which come with an annual income," lawyer Amr Emam with the Hisham Mubarak Law Centre told Ahram Online.

Mubarak's sons Alaa and Gamal were also defendants, and all three men received jail sentences and fines in the case, known in the domestic media as the presidential palaces case, which saw them charged with embezzling LE125 million of public funds originally allocated for the upkeep of presidential buildings.

The ruling means the two men, former heir-apparent Gamal and wealthy businessman Alaa, will not be allowed to return to the political arena in the foreseeable future. "His two sons will be prohibited from practicing politics for five years," Emam added.

However, none of the trio will spend time behind bars after the rejection of the appeal, since they spent more than four years in custody following the ouster of Mubarak in 2011. The ruling gave them credit for time served.

In an initial verdict in May 2014, the trio were fined a total of LE125 million and required to pay an additional LE21 million to the state.

At the time, Mubarak received a three-year prison sentence in the case while his sons both received four years; the younger men's sentences were reduced to three years on appeal.

The three-year jail sentences have already been served during the trio's time in pre-trial detention, and given this Gamal and Alaa Mubarak were released in May 2015. Their father returned to Maadi Military Hospital where he currently resides.

This is the final appeal in the presidential palaces case.

In November 2014, a court threw out a case in which the deposed autocrat was accused of complicity in murdering protesters during the January 2011 protests that led to his downfall. Egypts Court of Cassation can still decide to accept or reject an appeal by the general prosecution on 4 June.

In the same month, Mubarak was also cleared in two other cases.

The 87-year-old was cleared of charges of profiteering from his position by accepting presents in the form of villas in the Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh, as the 10-year statute of limitations had expired.

Graft charges were also dropped in a case in which he was accused of exporting natural gas to Israel at below market prices.

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Last July a chartered boat and a cargo ship collided on the Nile in northern Cairo, killing 40 people

Al-Warraq Misdemeanour Court on Saturday jailed the captains of two ships, which collided on the Nile in July, killing 40 people, to between five and seven years in jail.

A number of the cruise boat passengers who died in the accident, which occurred on the Nile river in Cairo, near Warraq Island, were children.

The captain of the Nile cruise boat received a seven-year prison sentence on Saturday, while the captain of the cargo ship it collided with received five years in prison.

The owner of the cruise boat, who was tried in absentia, received a ten-year sentence.

According to the Egyptian penal code, those who are tried in absentia receive the maximum sentence allowable.

The convictions can still be appealed, while the ship owner may appeal his conviction if he surrenders himself to authorities.

The men were charged with causing the deaths of the victims, operating an unlicensed boat, and sailing on the Nile river at night, which is against the law.

Boat accidents are not uncommon on the Nile or off Egypts coast. They are often blamed on rickety crafts or loose enforcement of water traffic laws.

The countrys deadliest maritime accident occurred in February 2006 when a ferry sank in the Red Sea, killing more than 1,000 people.

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It is still unclear what motivated the two attackers to stab three European tourists inside the Bella Vista hotel on the Red Sea; authorities have ruled out terror as a reason

A stabbing at a hotel in Egypt's Hurghada on Friday which injured three tourists didn't take more than four minutes, Bella Vista hotel's administration said on Saturday, playing down the incident and blaming media outlets for reporting otherwise.

"Two drugged young men attacked one of our hotel restaurants, read the statement, posted on the hotel's Facebook page.

The attackers carried a "fake gun" and "knives," and one attacker "used his knife trying to stab some of our guests, the statement added, repeating the same story released by the interior ministry on Friday following the attack.

"Our security and the hotel police man [sic] dealt immediately within seconds with the 2 attackers and shot them down."

One of the guests had left hospital two hours after the attack and the other two were still recovering, Bella Vista said.

The hotel is located in the busy downtown area of Hurghada, a popular resort town on the Red Sea.

The hotel's Saturday account came amid conflicting media and official reports about the details of the incident, with some media outlets reporting the assailants carried firearms and used them at the hotel. It was also reported that one of them wore an explosive belt.

"Any other rumors or news more than the above is nonsense and crap," the hotel statement added. "Most probably is to make propaganda that will affect the tourism in Egypt badly [sic], and that was the main aim."

On Saturday, Egypt's Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou told the MENA state news agency that three foreign tourists were stabbed in the attack and sustained minor injuries". Zaazou added that "there was no terrorist organisation behind the attack."

Khaled Megahed, health ministry spokesperson, had confirmed to Ahram Online on Friday that two Swedish tourists and one Austrian were stabbed.

A police statement released on Friday said that two Austrians and one Swede were injured in the attack, but gave no further details on the motives of the attackers.

The attack comes two months after Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, a North Sinai based Islamist militant group, claimed responsibility for the downing of a Russian plane over Sinai, killing all 224 passengers on board. Egyptian authorities have not issued a final report on the causes of the downing of the Russian airliner.

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ISIS Egyptian affiliate claimed responsibility for attacks that took place earlier Saturday against security personnel in Egypt's Giza.

"Some elements belonging to our organisation targeted a security checkpoint in Giza's Abu El-Nomors town using light weapons, leaving all security personnel dead," militant group Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis said in a statement released hours after the attack.

However, a security source said told the MENA state news agency that unknown assailants shot dead a police colonel along with a conscript in their police vehicle while exiting the colonels farm, heading to their work premises.

Egypt has been battling an Islamist insurgency, mainly based in the North Sinai region, that has killed hundreds of police and troops since the 2013 ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi.

Militant group Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, which swore allegiance to the IS group in November 2014, has claimed responsibility for most of the deadliest attacks on security forces in Egypt.

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Iran's foreign minister has complained to the United Nations about Saudi Arabia's "provocations" towards Tehran, as a diplomatic crisis between the region's two major powers entered its second week.

In a letter to the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies on Saturday, Mohammad Javad Zarif said "some people" in Riyadh seemed bent on dragging the whole region into crisis.

The two powers, both major oil exporters, have been locked in a diplomatic battle since Saudi Arabia executed Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr on Jan. 2. Iranian protesters then stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations.

Zarif said Iran had "no desire" to escalate tensions further, but offered no compromise as he placed the blame for the crisis, and the wider turmoil across the region, squarely on Saudi shoulders.

"They (the Saudis) can continue to support extremist terrorists and promote sectarian hatred, or choose the path of good neighbourliness and play a constructive role in regional security," state news agency IRNA quoted Zarif's letter as saying in Farsi.

Zarif said Sunni Saudi Arabia had engaged in a series of "direct provocations" towards Shia Iran, including the execution of Nimr and what he described as "persistent mistreatment" of Iranian pilgrims visiting Mecca.

Saudi Arabia says last week's executions were a domestic matter, and that Iran is the country pursuing sectarian division by casting itself as the champion of Arab Shia.

Zarif also portrayed Saudi Arabia as a threat to regional and global security in the letter, copies of which were sent to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the foreign ministers of several countries.

"Most members of al Qaeda, the Taliban, Islamic State and Nusra Front are Saudi citizens or have been brainwashed by demagogues wielding oil money," IRNA quoted him as writing, in an unusually direct allegation.

Saudi Arabia opposes extremist groups: it executed dozens of al Qaeda members last week alongside Nimr, and last month announced an Islamic coalition against terrorism.

Riyadh says around 2,500 Saudis have gone to fight in Syria and Iraq, constituting one of the largest groups of foreign fighters, but only a fraction of the total number estimated to be in the tens of thousands.

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Israeli occupation troops shot and killed two Palestinian men who tried to stab soldiers at a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, the Israeli military said, part of a wave of violence now in its fourth month.

The soldiers were not injured in the confrontation at Bekaot checkpoint in the northern West Bank and Israeli forces "thwarted the attack and shot the assailants," said the military. The Palestinian Health Ministry confirmed the two men were dead.

Israeli occupation forces or armed civilians have killed at least 139 Palestinians since Oct. 1. Most others have been killed in clashes with security forces. 21 Israelis and a U.S. citizen were also killed during this period.

The current wave of protests by Palestinians and repression by Israeli occupation forces started in late July when toddler Ali Dawabsha was burned to death and three other Palestinians were severely injured after their house in the occupied West Bank was set on fire by Israeli settlers.

Palestinian protests were also triggered by an increase in Jewish visitors to Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque, which is considered the third holiest site in Islam. Palestinians fear that Israel is preparing to allow Jewish prayers in the mosque, which are not currently allowed.

Settlement-building, racial discrimination, confiscation of identity cards, long queues at checkpoints, as well as daily clashes and the desecration of Al-Aqsa mosque, have been Palestinians' daily routine.

The anger of Palestinian residents of Jerusalem has increased in the last three years after the Israeli authorities allowed increasing numbers of Jewish settlers to storm the Al-Aqsa mosque.

On Friday an Arab Israeli citizen wanted for a Jan. 1 gun rampage in Tel Aviv, that had left three people dead, was killed in a shootout with police after a week-long manhunt. Authorities have so far said his motives were unclear.

The surge in violence has been fuelled by Palestinians' frustration over Israel's 48-year occupation of land they seek for an independent state, and the expansion of settlements in those territories which were captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.

Palestinian leaders say a younger generation sees no hope for the future living under Israeli security restrictions and with a stifled economy. The latest round of U.S.-brokered peace talks collapsed in April 2014.

*The story has been edited by Ahram Online.

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Saudi Arabia may take further measures against Iran after cutting ties with its regional rival this week, the Saudi foreign minister said on Saturday, in a major row over the kingdom's execution of a Shia Muslim cleric.

Adel al-Jubeir's comments came in a press conference after an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), convened to discuss tensions with Iran after attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions there.

"We are looking at additional measures to be taken if it (Iran) continues with its current policies," Jubeir said, without elaborating on what these measures could be.

The crisis between conservative Sunni kingdom and Shia power Iran, both major oil exporters, started when Saudi Arabia executed Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr on Jan. 2, triggering outrage among Shias across the Middle East.

In Iran, protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever relations. Tehran cut all commercial ties with Riyadh, and banned pilgrims from travelling to Mecca.

"The escalation is coming from Iran, not from Saudi Arabia or the GCC .... We are evaluating Iran's moves and taking steps to counter them..things will be clearer in the near future," Jubeir said.

After the meeting the GCC, which comprises Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, condemned what they said was Iranian interference in the internal affairs of Saudi Arabia and the region.

Jubeir also said his country had asked the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, of which Iran is a member, to convene an extraordinary meeting to discuss the aggression against its embassy.

Iran has said the kingdom is to blame for the diplomatic crisis.

In a letter to the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published by Iranian news agencies earlier on Saturday, Iran's foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif complained about Saudi Arabia's "provocations" towards Tehran.

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Turkish security forces killed 18 militants from the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) as they battled the rebels in curfew-hit towns in the country's troubled southeast, the army said Saturday.

Sixteen were killed in the Cizre district of Sirnak province near the Iraqi border on Friday, while another two died in the Sur district of Diyarbakir, the army said in a statement.

Also in Sur, one soldier was wounded in a gun attack on Saturday while three other soldiers and a civil servant were also wounded when a remote-controlled bomb laid by militants was detonated, security sources said.

The security forces detained 58 members of the PKK in the town of Silopi in Sirnak on Friday as they attemted to flee the area disguised as residents, the army added.

A new upsurge of violence between the security forces and Kurdish rebels erupted in July in the wake of attacks blamed on Islamic extremists, shattering a fragile two-and-a-half year truce.

Silopi and Cizre as well as much of Sur have been under a blanket curfew since early December as Turkey security forces seek to flush out Kurdish militants from the towns.

The army says that that a total of 426 PKK members have been killed in the three towns since the current campaign started.

With the curfew-affected area closed to the outside observers and the media, it has not been possible to independently verify the figures.

The government says such measures are needed to drive out PKK fighters who have effectively taken over towns by erecting barricades and digging trenches, but Kurdish activists say the use of force has been wildly excessive.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said 3,100 Kurdish militants had been killed in 2015 in PKK strongholds in southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq.

The PKK launched a formal insurgency against the Turkish state in 1984, initially fighting for Kurdish independence although it now presses more for greater autonomy and rights for the country's largest ethnic minority. The conflict has left tens of thousands dead.

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Thousands of mourners marched through the streets of Al-Khalil village in Hebron on Saturday, to bury the bodies of four Palestinians who were killed by Israeli occupation forces, Safa Palestinian news agency reported.

The funeral procession took place amid protestors' chants against the Israeli occupation and calls for an end to Israeli aggression against Palestine.

The four Palestinians were killed on Thursday in separate incidents following reported attempts to stab Israeli forces.

Palestinian protests have been escalating in recent months due to an increase in incidents of Jewish settlers storming Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque, which is considered the third holiest site in Islam.

Settlement-building, racial discrimination, confiscation of identity cards, long queues at checkpoints, as well as daily clashes and the desecration of Al-Aqsa have also fueled protests.

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The next round of peace talks between Yemen's government and Iran-backed Houthi rebels scheduled for next week have been postponed, Foreign Minister Abdel Malak al-Mekhlafi said Saturday.



"The negotiations will not take place on the announced date of January 14," Mekhlafi said on the phone from Cairo.



"They will be postponed until January 20 or 23 because the Houthis rejected the date of January 14."



He said UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed would travel to the capital Sanaa on Sunday to "convince the Houthis to participate in the negotiations on the new dates".



The envoy would also seek "confidence-building measures" from the Houthis, including the lifting of their siege of Taez and allowing aid into the southwestern city, he added.



The next round of peace talks would be held in Geneva, said the Yemeni minister.



Yemen's government sat down with the rebels and their allies in Switzerland last month for six days of talks that ended with no major breakthrough. A halt to the violence is sorely needed in the Arabian Peninsula's poorest nation, where the UN says fighting since March has killed thousands of people and left about 80 percent of the population needing humanitarian aid.

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Turkey intends to invite Egypt to the to the 13th Summit of Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Istanbul next April, Turkeys foreign ministry spokesperson said on Friday.

According to the online English version of the Turkish newspaper Hurryiet Daily News, Egypt will decide who will represent it at the summit. The official invitations have yet to be sent.

If the Egyptian president Abdel Fatah al-Sisi decides to be Egypts representative at the summit, it will be the first high-level visit between Turkey and Egypt since former president Mohamed Mursis ouster in 2013.

Hurryiet also reported that according to diplomatic sources, Egypts prime minister Sherif Ismail may also represent Egypt at the summit.

The Egyptian Foreign Ministry is yet to release its comments on the invitation.

According to its official website, the OIC is the second largest inter-governmental organization after the United Nations. It has a membership of 57 states and describes itself as the collective voice of the Muslim world.

The Secretary General of the OIC, Iyad Ameen Madani, met with Sisi on Jan. 3 in the Egyptian presidential palace, where the two discussed how to promote and intensify joint Islamic action in all fields.

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The Libyan political agreement reached last month is a step forward on a path to peace that has been stymied for some time. Nonetheless, implementing the agreement will not be easy

A political entity was finally born from the womb of a long and exhausting dialogue process in Libya. Despite international enthusiasm and regional optimism, there are some points that remain controversial and eventually pose a number of challenges to the actual implementation of this agreement.

Similarly, there are some opportunities that Libya could seize and utilise if this agreement reaches the level of practical implementation. How to face the challenges and maximise the benefits of those opportunities is the central question that Libya needs to answer at the present moment.

The first challenge facing the new coalition government is the manner in which it was manufactured in the first place. Bernardino Leon spent his entire time in Libya trying to reach consensus between the two warring factions in Tripoli and Tobruk over a unified single entity. Leons mandate expired and that consensus was not reached.

In fact, the points of contention between the two camps in the East and the West remained the same despite the recurrent introduction of changes to the agreement and expanding the range of political actors present at dialogue tables. What is different this time is that the UN, backed by massive international pressure in the aftermath of the Paris attacks, decided to let go of the rationale that necessitated the pre-existence of a Tobruk-Tripoli institutional consensus. Instead, the UN and the international community decided to empower the individuals who demonstrated a will to sign the agreement despite the refusal of the institutions they represent.

Whether this is an efficient political tactic or not is a completely different question. But what the UN intentionally or unintentionally did was create a third faction inside Libya: the coalition government faction. It is true that the international community is doing its best to empower this new entity through exclusive recognition and threats of sanctions on those hindering the realisation of peace. However, the fact remains that there will be elements inside each of the two camps who will not acknowledge the coalition government, at least for the time being.

Dismantling the unofficial structure of interaction between the state and other illegitimate entities is another major threat facing the implementation of this agreement. Throughout the past two years, both governments were forced to establish communication and political and economic interactions with illegal entities, mainly armed militias, in order to secure their sovereignty in the absence of an efficient and legitimate coercive force. Those entities control vital components of Libyas oil infrastructure, dominate crucial state facilities and monopolise security and force in some locations. In order for the coalition governments sovereignty to be complete, this structure of interaction must be terminated, either through establishing state control over the different facilities and locations, or through assimilating the various militias into the state structure.

The Islamic State (IS) group is undoubtedly another central challenge to the realisation of this political agreement. It is true that until now there are some doubts about the extent of influence IS has over Sirte, and there are some views that believe in a covert alliance between IS in Libya and remnants of the Gaddafi regime. However, the mere presence of radical and violent Islamist militias in Libya is unquestionable, and the political and geostrategic environment necessary for such militias to expand and flourish is indeed existent. Therefore, whether IS or similar violent entities, the coalition government will have to face the challenge of violent confrontations.

In this regard, it is highly likely that such confrontations may erupt not only between the state and Islamist militias, but also between the state and renegade political or regional militias that exist in Libya and have not shown any potential commitment to acknowledging the legitimacy of the new government.

Finally, the formation of the government itself will have to be carefully and delicately handled. Although the political agreement details the structure of the government, the choice of individuals requires a conscious balance between different political powers.

In choosing a new government, both existing governments must be equally represented or equally dismissed. The struggle over legitimacy between the House of Representatives in Tobruk and the General National Congress in Tripoli should not be allowed to endure in the new government formation.

Despite all those challenges, a range of opportunities exist. International willingness to aid Libya has never been as intense since the fall of Gaddafi in 2011. If the coalition government is capable of achieving sovereignty and stability, then a multitude of economic, military and political reforms will be possible in light of current international support.

Moreover, success for the coalition government will prevent military intervention that would be highly likely in case of failure. Although the international community would back the necessity of intervention, its political and humanitarian consequences would be catastrophic to say the least.

Libya has a real opportunity to avoid further division and fragmentation. Perhaps the political agreement is not the most ideal one, but it is a peaceful last resort that the Libyan people are in dire need of.

The writer is senior researcher at Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies.

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Working with Resonate Global Mission to equip pastors and farmers for God's glory.
CCDI publicizes violations of anti-graft code

From:English.news.cn | 2016-01-09 11:37

BEIJING, Jan. 8 (Xinhua) -- The top discipline watchdog of the Communist Party of China (CPC) on Friday named and shamed people guilty of 119 cases of violating the Party's anti-corruption and frugality rules.

The violations, details of which were published on the website of the CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), included bribery, illegal bonuses, applying for government subsidies with false data, embezzling office funds and abuse of power.

Wrongdoers received punishment ranging from official warnings, demotion, expulsion from the CPC to removal from office. Cases involving criminal liability have been transferred to judicial organs.

While the cases were scattered around the country, north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region reported 20 violations, the highest for a single provincial region.

The CCDI vowed to expose more such cases in the hope that they will serve as warnings for officials.
Li Keqiang urges sound implementation of two-child policy

From:English.news.cn | 2016-01-09 11:37

BEIJING, Jan. 7, 2016 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Vice Premier Liu Yandong (3rd L,rear) attends a national teleconference on family planning in Beijing, capital of China, Jan. 7, 2016.(Xinhua/Yao Dawei)

BEIJING, Jan. 7 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has called for full support in health, education, housing and other fields for the sound implementation of two-child policy.

Li made the remarks in a written instruction to a meeting on family planning Thursday.

Describing the two-child policy as "a good deed that benefits people's livelihoods and the future," Li noted that the policy is a significant move to balance population growth and respond to people's wishes.

The premier urged all departments involved to improve their policies and services in health, education, employment, housing and social insurance to help achieve sustainable and coordinated development between population and economy.

In addition, Li acknowledged the great contributions of family planning workers over the years, calling for better support for them.

Under the new family planning law, which was amended by the national legislature in late December, couples have been allowed to have two children from Jan. 1, ending the one-child policy in place for decades.

During Thursday's meeting, Vice Premier Liu Yandong said the one-child policy had effectively curbed the country's alarming population growth, relieving pressure on resources and the environment.

Liu urged local departments to improve policies, amend rules and map out population growth plans for their own jurisdictions, with a special focus on offering services and care and ensuring laws are followed.

She particularly called for better health services for women and children through cultivating more professionals, prevention of congenital defects, and more beds for obstetric and paediatric departments.
Rock art of ages

From:chinadaily.com.cn | 2016-01-09 11:34

Visitors climb the steps to take a close look at the rock art. [Photo by Cui Jia/China Daily]

Tourism puts ancient drawings in public eye but leaves them exposed to danger

No, sexually explicit pictures did not begin with Marilyn Monroe in Playboy magazine in Chicago in 1953. Three thousand years ago, in the far northwestern reaches of China, men and women were getting their rocks off in what you can call either fertility rituals or sex orgies. Graphic depictions of their deeds, carved in stone, can be seen even today.

The rock art, in Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, includes engravings showing as many as 300 men and women in mass flagrante delicto more than 1,000 years before that expression was even conceived.

Such images that old are rare not only in China but in the world, and these ones are far off the beaten track, so anyone who wants to see them needs to be willing to travel about three hours on a winding mountain road from the county seat of Hutubi.

The site, which has been known to the outside world for less than 30 years, is in Kangjia Shimenzi, in Tianshan Mountains in Hutubi county, west of the regional capital, Urumqi. The message of the depictions is clear, says Wang Binghua, former head of Xinjiang Institute of Relics and Archaeology and among the first experts to study the art: It is an expression of the desire for life and a form of religious worship aimed at securing prosperity for future generations, he says.

Wang says he first heard about the carvings from a local resident in 1987. The name Shimenzi means stone doors, referring to mountains on two sides of a long valley that, from a distance, seem to serve as its towering entrance.

To reach the rock art on one side of the valley entails reaching the foot of a red mountain and then climbing 15 meters. Once there, the hardy trekker will be rewarded with the sight of human figures in many sizes that bear clear facial features.

The tallest figure is about two meters and the smallest 20 centimeters. They were all carved on a flat surface of the mountain and a few meters above a natural platform which can be used as a viewing deck. This platform is also believed to be where a ceremony to pray for fertility took place.

Many of the male figures have exaggerated penises, as long as half their body height, and some are shown copulating with the female figures, with others dancing around them.

Wang says that judging by the facial features of the people shown, there are two distinct groups. Those with relatively wide faces resemble Mongolians today and the others, with deep eye sockets and high nasal bridges, resemble Europeans.

The 300 figures covering an area 14 meters by 9 meters were carved onto the cliff at various times, so the rock art site may have been a regular gathering point where the ancient tribes held religious ceremonies.

Rock art can give an insight into the way ancient people thought, says Wang Jianping, founder and president of the China Rock Art Academy in Inner Mongolia, but to be able to gain that insight you obviously need to know how to decode the messages.

Rock art. [Photo by Cui Jia/China Daily]

Pre-historic rock art widely existed in what are now 120 countries on five continents as the information carrier of different primitive tribes bearing different information.

Experts say that most of the rock art discovered in China is in Xinjiang because its favorable natural environment has always been suitable for sustaining human communities. More than 1,226 rock art sites in 29 province and regions have been found throughout China, and most can be dated back to the Upper Paleolithic period.

In China rock art found in the north and south have completely different styles and themes even when they are from the same age. The ancient northerners normally carved in rock images of animals and scenes of herding while those in the south used red paint depict hunting as well as dancing during religious ceremonies.

Of course, because such rock art is exposed to the elements for so long, it is susceptible to deterioration, Wang Jianping says.

"Many of them have deteriorated to the point of disappearing, and the messages of our ancestors have been lost forever."

Also, because of their remote locations and difficulties in evaluating their true historical value, about 75 percent of rock art in China does not enjoy the protection of the authorities responsible for such relics, he says.

"Dating and interpreting rock art are huge challenges for researchers worldwide. The authorities need to start treating these relics as important parts of the country's heritage."

Ancient rock art continues to be found around China, and the best known sites such as Kangjia Shimenzi have been turned into tourist attractions. In the case of Kangjia Shimenzi that has entailed building steps so visitors can get a close view of the human figures on the cliff. As much as experts welcome the public interest in such rock art, they also worry that growing numbers of tourists put preservation efforts at risk.

The discovery of rock art in Habahe county in Altay prefecture in northern Xinjiang, which includes a pictograph said to resemble an aircraft, has attracted widespread media attention and a growing number of tourists to rock art sites, says Liu Cheng, a professor of archeology at Northwestern University in Xi'an, Shaanxi province.

Liu, who first traveled to Habahe to study the pictographs six years ago, cites one practical example of how increasing numbers of tourists are already proving to be detrimental to preservation efforts.

"Many people are driving a long way to camp near the rock arts sites, and they leave garbage behind when they leave."

His team has found beer bottles and other garbage even inside the rock art site, he says.

"There is evidence, too, that the pictographs have been tainted by beer. That is making our work more urgent."

The most important work for his team is to document all the pictographs for research before they suffer from human intervention, he says.

Previously many local herders regarded the caves where the rock art is preserved as sacred, he says, and that is why they had remained free of human intervention for thousands of years.

It is important that local authorities ease up with their plans to develop the sites into tourist attractions, he says.

Because many rock art sites are highly susceptible to any form of human intervention, protective measures need to be put into place before tourism is developed, he says.

Wang Jianping says: "Rock art is not just art but something that paints a picture for us of how our ancestors thought before writing appeared. People need to realize that understanding our past can help human beings look into the future."
At least five violations have been cited by the Motor Vehicle Department.
YEREVAN, JANUARY 8, ARMENPRESS. Governor of the US Alabama State Robert Bentley has announced the State of Alabama has filed a lawsuit against the federal government for non-compliance of the Refugee Act of 1980. This Act specifically requires the federal government to consult with the state regarding the placement of refugees before those refugees are placed within its borders. That consultation with Alabama has not occurred. Armenpress was informed about this from the official website of Alabama Governor Robert Bentley.

The lawsuit charges that the U.S government agencies named as defendants have failed to provide the State of Alabama with sufficient information about the refugees who have settled or will be settled in the state. The State of Alabama has been denied a meaningful role and input into the process of resettlement of those refugees.

On November 15, 2015, Governor Bentley announced the State of Alabama would not accept Syrian refugees through the federal governments refugee resettlement program, citing security and safety concerns and glaring flaws in the refugee vetting process. Governor Bentley has since pressed the Obama Administration for information regarding the refugee resettlement program.

On three separate occasions I have sent letters to the White House requesting information on the Refugee Reception Program in Alabama and these letters have gone unanswered, Governor Robert Bentley said. As Governor, the Alabama Constitution gives me the sovereign authority and solemn duty to protect the health, safety and welfare of all citizens of Alabama. The process and manner in which the Obama Administration and the federal government are executing the Refugee Reception Program is blatantly excluding the states.
YEREVAN, JANUARY 9, ARMENPRESS. There is a growing panic in Turkey connected with swine influenza or H1N1 virus. As Armenpress reports, referring to Milliyet, 35 people turned to hospitals with high temperature and nausea complaints during the last two days. 5 of those people died, one of them was a child. The other 30 are still under treatment. According to specialists, 20 million people are currently in the risk-group in the country.
YEREVAN, JANUARY 9, ARMENPRESS. Mexico recaptured the world's top drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman in a pre-dawn shootout and chase through drains on Friday, returning him to the same prison he escaped from six months ago, in a boost for the beleaguered government.

As Armenpress reports, referring to Reuters, the head of the powerful Sinaloa Cartel was captured in a car wearing a filthy vest after fleeing through tunnels and drains from a raid on a safe house in the city of Los Mochis, in his native northwestern state of Sinaloa.

"Mission accomplished: We have him," President Enrique Pena Nieto said on his Twitter account. "I want to inform all Mexicans that Joaquin Guzman Loera has been arrested."

For Pena Nieto, the capture of a trafficker who twice slipped out of Mexican prisons is a sorely-needed victory after his presidency was tarnished by graft and human rights scandals and the shame of the kingpin's flight from the maximum security Altiplano prison in July.

Guzman now faces possible extradition to face trial in the United States. That process could take months, although U.S. Republican party presidential hopeful Marco Rubio was among those calling for Washington to immediately pursue extradition.

Once featured in the Forbes list of billionaires, Guzman led a cartel that has smuggled billions of dollars worth of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamines into the United States and fought vicious turf wars with other Mexican gangs.

He was caught early on Friday after Mexican marines raided his safe house, killing five and capturing six of Guzman's henchman. They pursued the drug lord through the northern city's drains and caught him after a car chase through the outskirts, Attorney General Arely Gomez said.

Photo by Reuters
#DP DP bristles at prosecution probes targeting top officials of previous administration The main opposition Democratic Party (DP) strongly protested prosecution investigations that led to arrest warrant requests for former top officials of the previous Moon Jae-in gov...
YEREVAN, JANUARY 9, ARMENPRESS. Borussia Dortmund striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang insists he does not want to join Arsenal. Armenpress reports the aforementioned, referring to Goal.com.

The 26-year-old, who has scored 24 goals in 23 games this season, has been linked with a 44.6 million move to the Gunners.

But after being named African Player of the Year on Thursday night, the Gabon international claims he is not interested in a move to Arsene Wengers side.
Soundtracks really can make or break a film.

Moreover, there's often a specific song that's intrinsically linked with a particular scene to the point that it almost felt as if it were written for that scene. In some cases, the scene is written to that song whereas, in other cases, it's a choice in the editing room. We've picked the ten best musical moments in film that feature a song NOT specifically written for the film.

Any glaring omissions or suggestions? Let us know in the comments!

10. COLLATERAL - Audioslave 'Shadow On The Sun'

Michael Mann's always had a sharp ear for music. Whether it's using Tangerine Dream for some of his earlier films or the rousing soundtrack for Last of the Mohicans, he's always been able to blend the perfect piece of music with a key scene. Case in point is this brilliant moment in Collateral when Tom Cruise's icy assassin and Jamie Foxx's hostage / taxi driver spot a coyote in the middle of Los Angeles.

9. FULL METAL JACKET - Johnnie Wright 'Hello Vietnam'

You can watch Full Metal Jacket the whole way through and not actually realise it's a blistering satire on war. There's a few markers, of course. One of them is the Army officer who talks about how the Viet-Cong are actually Americans trying to get out and the other is this, the opening scene for the film. One by one, the various recruits are shaved with blank expressions whilst tepid, earnest country music plays. You're not really sure whether you should laugh or not and that's exactly the way Stanley Kubrick wanted it.

8. DIRTY DANCING - The Contours 'Do You Love Me'

The thumping sound of The Contours' one and only hit mixes perfectly with the raw sexuality on show when young Baby Houseman witnesses the staff dancing hard to their own music. The whole scene is set up perfectly as she tries to navigate through the rutting dancers - with a watermelon, of course. The loud, overblown music is meant to be jarring and anarchic, just like the impassioned and sexualised dancing on display.

7. DONNIE DARKO - Tears For Fears 'Head Over Heels'

Although most people associate Donnie Darko with another Tears For Fears song, this track works just as well at placing both the viewer in the story and the time as well. While the song doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the scene in question, it's an interesting way of showing us how each of the characters relate to one another without any dialogue needed.

6. APOCALYPSE NOW - Wagner 'Ride Of The Valkyries'

There's endless theories as to why Francis Ford Coppola used this particular piece of music for the stunning village attack scene in Apocalypse Now. It was said that Wagner was Adolf Hitler's favourite composer and wanted to draw parallels between Col. Kilgore's brutal tactics and the Nazi strategy of blitzkrieg. Whatever his reasons might have been, Ride of the Valkyries is now as much associated with Apocalypse Now as any other piece of classical music.

5. GOODFELLAS - Derek And The Dominoes 'Layla'

Using the piano exit from Layla was a particularly inspired choice by Martin Scorsese and, in a way, the two songs paralleled with one another. Eric Clapton wrote Layla as a song to Pattie Boyd, the wife of his close friend George Harrison with whom Clapton was infatuated with. As the song talks about betraying yourself for love, so to do we see Robert DeNiro's character, Jimmy Conway, betraying his friends so he can keep the one thing he loves - money.

4. MIDNIGHT COWBOY - Harry Nilsson 'Everybody's Talkin' At Me'

Harry Nilsson's bright, carefree folk song plays over Jon Voight's hapless and optimistic modern-day cowboy as he sets off for New York in search of his destiny. If you've seen the film, you know that it doesn't exactly end well for Voight. But, at the start, the bright and breezy nature of both the song and Voight's character are in perfect unison. How could a film this dark start off with such a happy tune?

3. JACKIE BROWN - The Brothers Johnson 'Strawberry Letter 23'

Quentin Tarantino's made an art of his song choices for films. Whether's it's Stuck In The Middle With You for Reservoir Dogs, You Never Can Tell for Pulp Fiction or Across 110th Street for Jackie Brown, Tarantino uses disparate song choices that somehow instinctively work with whatever's on screen. Our favourite musical choice / scene from Tarantino is this. It's exactly the type of song that would have been used in a blaxploitation thriller in the '70s and, as well as this, the slickness of the song works so well with Samuel L. Jackson's "pony-tailed motherf***er."

2. AMERICAN PSYCHO - Huey Lewis And The News 'Hip To Be Square'

Bret Easton Ellis' source novel was filled with long paragraphs on popular music of the '80s, including Christian Bale's monologue on Huey Lewis And The News. As Bale / Bateman waxes idiotic about the importance of the song's message, he prepares to bludgeon Jared Leto to death with an axe. The visuals of a blood-spattered, screaming Bateman is in such direct contrast to the upbeat tempo of the song that it makes for pitch-black comedy.

1. HEAT - Moby 'God Moving Over The Face Of The Waters'

We make no secret of how much we love Heat. It's easily the best film Michael Mann's ever made and it was the best film Al Pacino's starred in since then. The finale, which sees Pacino hunting DeNiro through Los Angeles airport before they eventually meet under the lights of an aeroplane. The scream of the plane's turbines and the bright lights immediately contrast with the tender moment as the two join hands. Moby's instrumental track rises softly as Pacino looks out over the runway, gripping DeNiro's hands. A perfect end to a perfect film.
The annual statistics for Pornhub in 2015 have been released and they make for something interesting reading.

If you're into that sort of thing.

The below infographic shows that the pornographic website used 1,892 petabytes of bandwidth. One petabyte is one million gigabytes, so work that one out for yourselves.

As for which country was looking at what, Ireland was ranked as the fourth highest country per capita with 161 whilst New Zealand and Australia ranked 5th and 8th respectively. As well as this, Ireland's highest searched category was MILF. We also had a statistically higher proportion of women logging onto the site than the United Kingdom, France, Portugal and Italy.

Meanwhile, Ireland saw a 16% drop in traffic when the Late Late Toy Show was on - the highest drop compared with a media event for Pornhub. However, in terms of which country had the highest proportion of traffic, Ireland didn't even rank in the Top 20. Moreover, Ireland didn't place in either Top 20 or Bottom 10 in terms of how long they view videos.

Over 87 billion video views were recorded, which correlates to twelve videos for every person on the planet with 21.2 billion visits to the site in 2015. Despite new anti-pornography laws introduced in the United Kingdom, it came (heh) second in per capita views across the globe.

Meanwhile, Kim Kardashian - yes, her - ranked as the most searched name on Pornhub.

Via Pornhub.com
We want your comments and your story tips!

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afarago@bellsouth.net. Actually I never look at my email, Genius, so write to Gimleteye.


YEREVAN, JANUARY 9, ARMENPRESS. The Islamic Republic of Iran expressed hopes that Saudi Arabia will take some measures to promote stability in the region. As Armenpress reports, referring to TASS, Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad JavadZarif said the aforementioned in his letter addressed to the United Nations Security Council, Secretary General of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and foreign ministers of a number of UN member countries.

In his letter, he stated that Saudi Arabia can either continue supporting the extremists, terrorists and take steps aimed at deepening hate in the region or choose friendly relations playing a constructive role in the establishment of the regional stability.

Regarding the latest developments that led to the escalation of relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia, Zarif noted that many things point to the fact that some people are aimed at engaging the region into a large-scale conflict.

Iran's Foreign Minister also announced that Iran had condemned the attack on the Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Tehran on January 2, adding that Iran ensures safety to the diplomats of Saudi Arabia.
Jan 9 (Reuters) - A United flight en route to Denver from Anchorage, Alaska, was diverted on Saturday to Vancouver where a suspect was arrested due to "security concerns," authorities said.

United Air Lines Flight 1104 landed safely at about 4:30 a.m. local time in the western Canadian city, where it was met by law enforcement authorities, the airline said. There were 131 passengers and six crew members aboard the Boeing 737.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Richmond, British Columbia, said on Twitter that a suspect was taken into custody and operations at Vancouver International Airport were not affected by the incident.

Police said no other information was immediately available.

CNN reported that a "threatening message" was found on the aircraft.

(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Milwaukee and Amran Abocar in Toronto; Editing by Meredith Mazzilli)
YEREVAN, JANUARY 9, ARMENPRESS. Daily analysis of epidemic situation was carried out during the consultation of rapid response team at the Republic of Armenia Healthcare Ministry. 662 cases of hospitalization connected with acute respiratory infections (219 of which  that of pneumonia) were registered in Armenia as of January 9. As Armenpress was informed by the Republic of Armenia Healthcare Ministry, 85 pregnant women were hospitalized (20 - diagnosed with pneumonia) on January 9.

83 patients undergo treatment in intensive care units, 7 of them are connected to respiratory apparatuses. The number of patients in grave conditions is the same.

The number of ambulance calls has reduced as of January 8 as compared to those received on the holidays.

The population is again urged to turn to doctors when having symptoms of flu and not to engage into self-treatment. At the suggestion of Armenia Healthcare Ministry, outpatient policlinic facilities of Yerevan and the regions will work on the weekend  January 9 and 10.

The Republic of Armenia Ministry of Healthcare-affiliated State Health Inspectorate was instructed to increase supervision on the provision of sanitary standards in medical facilities. The situation is under control, currently there is no danger of epidemic. However, the population is urged to take

preventive measures.
Record ETF Fund Flows as iShares, Vanguard Kept Top Slots in 2015

(Continued from Prior Part)

International ETFs accounted for 45% of net inflows

The US market dominates the global ETF space, with roughly 72% of global ETF assets. Among the many sponsors in the US ETF space, BlackRock (BLK), Vanguard, and WisdomTree are the top three ETF providers.

iShares, Blackrocks ETF business, offers the most liquid international ETFs. In 2015, international ETFs accounted for 45% of all net inflows despite the fact that these ETFs account for only 20% of aggregate ETF assets.

Investors fled from sector ETFs

The industrial slack across the globe, which affected industry performance, seems to have caused a shift from sector investing to international investing. Volatile times seemed to offer good arbitrage opportunities for investors ready to take on the risk.

In 2015, industry-focused funds recorded net outflows. The Industrial Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLI), the Consumer Staples Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLP), the iShares US Technology ETF (IYW), and the iShares US Real Estate ETF (IYR) recorded net outflows of $2.7 billion, $2.1 billion, $2 billion, and $1.4 billion, respectively.

Europe and Japan were in vogue

On the other hand, Europe (VGK) and Japan (EWJ) seemed to attract a lot of investor interest. We shed light on the relative value offered by these economies in our October 2015 analysis, US Equity Is Expensive: Japan and Europe Offer Relative Value. Seeing the relative devaluation of the currencies perpetuated by monetary policy measures initiated in these economies, investors have been cautious about parking their funds while hedging their forex exposures by using currency-hedged ETFs.

The WisdomTree Europe Hedged Equity ETF (HEDJ), which offers currency-hedged exposure to European equity, recorded about $13.9 billion in net inflows in 2015. The Deutsche X-Trackers MSCI EAFE Hedged Equity ETF (DBEF) is another currency-hedged European (50%) and Japanese (23%) equity-tracking ETF. DBEF recorded $12.6 billion in inflows. Our series Hedged Equity Funds: Must-Knows for Foreign Investment offers relative and trend analysis of European and Japanese (DXJ) currency-hedged ETFs.

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Among the ETF sponsors, BlackRock (BLK) and Vanguard continued to dominate the ETF space in 2015.

Continue to Next Part

Browse this series on Market Realist:
donald trump

Real-estate mogul Donald Trump opened up his Saturday-afternoon speech in Iowa by warning the locals there what would happen if he doesn't win their state's caucus next month.

The Republican front-runner noted that Iowa has not had a great track record of picking presidential nominees in recent history.

"You haven't been good. In fact, some people say, 'Oh, it doesn't matter if you win Iowa.' Now don't let them talk to you that way. Don't let them talk to you that way," Trump said.

He added: "You have not picked a lot of winners. And that will make me feel good only if I don't make it with Iowa."

In 2012, former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pennsylvania) narrowly edged out the eventual nominee, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R). In 2008, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) won Iowa, though the eventual nomination ultimately went to Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona).

Trump has led in the vast majority of Republican-primary polls since last summer, but Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) recently surged to the top in Iowa. A Fox News poll released Friday found Cruz in the No. 1 position with 27% among likely GOP caucus-goers. Trump was four points behind him. The New York Times described Cruz this week as having "plainly become the candidate to beat in the caucuses."

If Cruz wins in Iowa on February 1, Trump said that he would be highlighting the state's history of picking Republican-primary losers.

"You know that I'll be saying that big league: 'They haven't picked a winner in years!'" Trump said. "All right, but you know what, if you pick me, you're going to pick a winner. Because we're going to win. I'm telling you, we're going to win. And it's really time that that happens."

Trump also took some shots at Cruz for allegedly flip-flopping on ethanol subsidies, a popular local issue in Iowa. The Des Moines Register reported Thursday that Cruz has been dogged by questions about where he stands on the subsidy issue. Cruz, like many ideological conservatives, opposes the subsidies, but has recently started stressing that he would phase them out over several years.

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"Ted isn't doing well at all in New Hampshire, but in Iowa he's doing well. And my primary opponent was totally opposed to the ethanol and the ethanol industry. Because he's with the oil industry. You know, he's from Texas. I guess it makes sense," Trump said.

"And he was getting clobbered," he recalled. "And all of a sudden he said, 'Uh, oh, I'm for ethanol.' You can't do that. You can't do that with three weeks to go. You're not allowed to do that."

NOW WATCH: Ted Cruz had an amazing response to Trumps concerns about his presidential eligibility





More From Business Insider


Beirut (AFP) - A rare UN-backed deal between Syria's warring sides saw hundreds of fighters and civilians evacuate three towns on Monday, as bomb blasts in the regime-held city of Homs killed at least 19 people.

President Bashar al-Assad's regime has agreed to several ceasefires with rebel groups in the past but Monday's evacuation plan was one of the most elaborate in the nearly five-year war.

The United Nations has been pushing for such local deals as global powers pursue wider efforts to resolve a conflict that left more than 250,000 dead and forced millions from their homes.

More than 450 fighters and civilians, including the wounded, left three flashpoint areas in Syria as part of a six-month truce reached in September.

In a joint statement, the UN, the Syrian Red Crescent and the International Committee of the Red Cross said they had "successfully" carried out the evacuation of 338 people from the towns of Foua and Kafraya, and 126 from Zabadani city.

"They were simultaneously evacuated by land and air through Turkey and Lebanon to the agreed final destinations where those requiring longer term medical care will receive it," the statement said.

A source at Beirut airport told AFP a plane carrying those evacuated from Zabadani had taken off in the direction of Turkey, from where they were due to return to rebel-controlled areas of Syria.

Another 335 people, also including civilians, travelled from two regime-controlled villages in northwestern Syria into Turkey on Monday, Abdel Rahman said.

Residents of the mainly Shiite villages of Fuaa and Kafraya crossed through the Bab al-Hawa border point and are to fly into Beirut to travel overland to Damascus.

- 'Humanitarian agreement' -

"We appreciate the cooperation of all sides, of the Syrian, Turkish, and Lebanese governments, and all the sides that have signed on to this humanitarian agreement," said UN humanitarian coordinator Yaacoub El Hillo.

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It is the first time the neighbouring countries are involved in such an evacuation deal.

The next part of the agreement, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, would see humanitarian aid delivered into the towns.

Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said Assad's regime was keen to reach such agreements as part of its "efforts to secure the capital by seizing control of rebel-held areas or through ceasefire deals".

Al-Manar, a Lebanese television station affiliated with pro-Assad Shiite group Hezbollah, broadcast live footage of the Zabadani convoy entering Lebanon.

Dozens of people gathered at the Masnaa crossing rushed the buses as ambulance sirens wailed.

The station had provided coverage earlier of bearded fighters wearing military-style fatigues boarding the buses amid bombed-out ruins in Zabadani.

Similar ceasefire deals have been implemented in other parts of the country throughout Syria's war, often after crippling sieges of rebel-held areas.

Government figures and local leaders reached a deal last week to evacuate thousands of jihadists and civilians from southern Damascus, but the agreement was apparently derailed after the death of rebel chief Zahran Alloush on Friday.

Alloush, the head of Jaish al-Islam, the foremost rebel group in Damascus province, was killed in an air strike claimed by Syria's government.

- 'Cowardly attacks' -

In one of the most significant such deals so far, anti-government rebels earlier this month quit the last opposition-held district of the central city of Homs, once dubbed "the capital of the revolution."

But violence has since rocked the city.

On Monday, at least 19 people were killed and dozens wounded in large bomb blasts in the city's Al-Zahraa neighbourhood, Syria's state news agency SANA said.

State television said two explosions caused by car bombs and a blast caused by a suicide attacker wearing an explosives-laden belt hit Al-Zahraa's main square.

The station broadcast scenes of chaos in the central city, as firetrucks tried to extinguish flaming cars and rescue workers carried bloodied victims.

The residents of Al-Zahraa are mostly Alawites, the minority sect of Syria's ruling clan.

"These terrorist, cowardly, and desperate attacks come in response to the growing spirit of national reconciliation throughout Syria," Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi said in comments carried by state news agency SANA.

The Observatory confirmed the blasts and reported at least 32 dead.

The attack came less than three weeks after the Islamic State jihadist group claimed explosions in the same neighbourhood that left 16 people dead.

Elsewhere in Syria, at least 11 people were killed and 40 wounded in rebel shelling of a government-controlled neighbourhood in the northern city of Aleppo, state TV reported.
Honda Motor Co President and Chief Executive Takahiro Hachigo speaks next to NSX during a presentation at the 44th Tokyo Motor Show in Tokyo, Japan, in this October 28, 2015 file photo. REUTERS/Yuya Shino/Files

By Norihiko Shirouzu

BEIJING (Reuters) - As part of a broader makeover, and even the survival, of its stalled luxury Acura brand, Japan's Honda Motor Co will launch a new small crossover sport utility vehicle this year in China to compete with BMW (BMWG.DE) and Audi (NSUG.DE) in the world's biggest car market, two individuals closely involved in the effort said.

Reviving Acura is one of the biggest challenges facing Takahiro Hachigo, who took over as Honda CEO last year. The brand has struggled to carve out a clear identity as a sporty, high-performance luxury label.

Since entering China a decade ago, Acura has struggled, selling just over 4,000 cars last year compared with BMW's 460,000 and Audi's 554,000. And in the United States, where Acura debuted three decades ago, sales have failed to top the 201,000 cars it sold as far back as 2006, according to industry consultant IHS. Sales last year were 179,000, around half the number of cars sold by both BMW and Toyota Motor's Lexus luxury marquee.

That revival effort will kick off with production mid this year of a China-only sub-compact crossover SUV at a jointly-run plant with Guangzhou Automobile Group . The new model will have a "crisp, more expressive" style - the result of four years of effort by Honda product planners and engineers - said the two individuals, who asked not to be named as they are not authorized to speak to the media.

"We don't have a strong brand with Acura in China. Our next move could be make or break," one of the individuals said.

A Beijing-based Honda spokeswoman said the new Acura crossover SUV is being developed specially for China and demonstrates the company's commitment to that market. One of the knowledgeable individuals said Acura's China sales unit reckons it could eventually sell about 30,000 of the new crossover SUVs a year.

But the new model's significance goes beyond China, with the styling of the China-only car highlighting the signature feature of a broader Acura makeover.

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While the under-wraps China model is unlikely to be unveiled before the Beijing autoshow in April, hints of the new Acura styling should be on show in Detroit on Tuesday.

In an e-mailed response to queries, California-based Honda spokeswoman Jessica Fini declined to comment on Acura's product plans, but noted a new concept model to be unveiled at the Detroit autoshow "previews the (brand's) future design direction," and "expresses performance through design".

"NO MORE SMILEY FACE"

Honda's leadership, already battling a crisis over potentially lethal air bags made by supplier Takata Corp (7312.T), is aware that a failed makeover could render Acura a "Mercury of Honda," one of the individuals said, referring to the entry-level luxury brand Ford Motor Co (F.N) killed off in 2010 after years of dwindling sales.

Part of the Acura identity issue is that there is little to differentiate between the upscale brand and mainstream Honda cars, with a quiet recognition inside Honda that Acura cars are in many cases merely "re-badged" Honda cars, the two individuals said.

"Styling cues in Honda and Acura cars have become more and more common," said one of the knowledgeable individuals. Some Honda cars' strong character lines, he said, are often quickly borrowed by Acura, or the other way around, giving both brands a "family resemblance".

"Where's our discipline in that?" he said.

The new styling direction under Acura's global design chief Dave Marek will allow Acura to have a new, more sporty look, the people said, making it stand out from Honda models.

"No more smiley face," one of the two people said, referring to a common perception of the Acura look. "If you want to be a performance oriented brand, you should not come across as a clown. You should be serious, even mean," he added.

CLOSING DOORS

Beyond styling, the new Acura model for China is likely to pack more luxury technologies and features, boasting a turbo-charged, 4-cylinder engine and 10-speed automatic transmission, giving it a "more lively character and a spirited and engaged driver feel," said one of the individuals, adding it was aimed at taking on rival BMW X1 and Audi Q3 models.

Honda wants Acura to compete better in China's growing market for small, premium crossover SUVs market, but acknowledges its cars need more "upscale quality" - through seemingly small improvements such as the sound the doors make when they are closed, the people said.

The new sub-compact crossover will be loosely based on Honda's existing Vezel and HR-V SUVs that are sold around the world. Acura is sold in only two major markets, China and the United States, with limited availability also in Canada and a few other countries.

Industry experts are puzzled at Honda's failure to make Acura a stand-out performance car - especially given its relative success as a Formula One engine supplier.

"It's strange it has taken this long for Honda," said Bumsuk Lim, a Shanghai-based consultant who worked at Honda's Tokyo design studio during the 1990s.

"It's not as if Acura doesn't have a design heritage. They had this great second-generation Acura Legend coupe, which was seen at the time as a Japanese BMW."

(Reporting by Norihiko Shirouzu; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)
The GM logo is seen at the General Motors Lansing Grand River Assembly Plant in Lansing, Michigan October 26, 2015. REUTERS/Rebecca Cook

BERLIN (Reuters) - The European division of General Motors (GM.N) was still loss-making in 2015, but hopes to return to profit this year, the division's chief executive told a German magazine.

General Motors had previously set a target for its European operations, which comprise the Opel and Vauxhall brands, to return to profitability "by 2016". The last time GM made an annual net profit in Europe was in 1999.

"The turnaround is hard. But we still want to reach the break-even in 2016," Opel chief executive Karl-Thomas Neumann told Auto Bild in an interview.

Losses in Europe have been widening in recent months, primarily thanks to lost sales in Russia, GM Europe's third largest market.

GM said its European operations made a third-quarter EBIT loss of $0.2 billion (0.14 billion) , compared with $0.4 billion(0.27 billion) in the year-earlier quarter. This is a deterioration from the flat EBIT ($0.0 billion) the company published in the second quarter.

Asked by Auto Bild if the division had made a profit last year, Neumann replied "No."

"We had one quarter where we almost went into the black. Overall we managed to significantly reduce the losses in the first three quarters of 2015," Neumann was further quoted as saying.

(Reporting by Victoria Bryan and Edward Taylor; Editing by Ruth Pitchford)
TORONTO, ON--(Marketwired - January 08, 2016) - Gran Colombia Gold Corp. (GCM.TO) (OTC PINK: TPRFF) is pleased to announce today that it has received final approval from the Supreme Court of British Colombia for the previously announced comprehensive debt restructuring proposal to be implemented pursuant to a Plan of Arrangement under the Business Corporations Act (British Columbia) as described in the Company's Supplemental Management Information Circular dated November 30, 2015 (the "Supplemental Circular"), modified as described in the December 18, 2015 news release (the "Revised Arrangement").

The Revised Arrangement is expected to close on January 20, 2016. The new 2020 Debentures and 2018 Debentures will be listed for trading shortly after closing, subject to final approval of the Toronto Stock Exchange, under the trading symbols GCM.DB.V and GCM.DB.U, respectively.

As a reminder, pursuant to the Revised Arrangement and as further described in the Supplemental Circular, at their election Noteholders are entitled to receive in exchange for the outstanding principal amount of their Notes plus all accrued and unpaid interest and restructuring fees either:

convertible debentures, including a conversion option at a price of US$0.13 per common share, representing approximately 7,692 common shares for each US$1,000 principal amount of Notes; common shares of the Company at a conversion price of US$0.13 per common share, representing approximately 7,692 common shares for each US$1,000 principal amount of Notes; or a combination thereof.

Noteholders should speak to their broker or other financial and legal advisors regarding their election. The deadline to make an election is January 13, 2016 at 5:00 p.m. Toronto time. If no election is duly submitted by this date, Noteholders will be deemed to have elected convertible debentures.

Registered Noteholders should complete the Letter of Transmittal and Election Form sent by the Company with the meeting materials. Non-registered Noteholders should contact their intermediary if they have any questions regarding this process and to complete the necessary steps to make your election. Should you have any concerns regarding your election, please contact the Company's depositary for the Revised Arrangement, Equity Financial Trust Company, at 1-866-393-4891 or 416-342-1091.

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The Company also announced today details of partial interest payments it will make on January 20, 2016, immediately prior to the exchange for the new debentures, on its Senior Secured Gold-Linked Notes due 2017 and Senior Unsecured Silver-Linked Notes due 2018.

Gold Noteholders of record as of January 19, 2015 will receive approximately US$3.01 per US$1,000 face value of the notes, leaving a balance of interest in arrears after the payment of approximately US$14.25. Silver Noteholders of record as of January 19, 2015 will receive approximately US$1.51 per US$1,000 face value of the notes which will be applied against the interest in arrears from June 30, 2015 and December 31, 2015, leaving a balance of US$27.94 per US$1,000 face value of Silver Notes after the payment. These payments were determined based on amounts payable required to reduce the total principal amounts of the new 2018 Debentures and 2020 Debentures to a level that would maintain the maximum dilution amount for the Company's common shares in accordance with the Revised Arrangement approved by shareholders at the December 22, 2015 meeting. These payments will be made on January 20, 2016 regardless of whether the Revised Arrangement closes as the Company expects.

About Gran Colombia Gold Corp.

Gran Colombia is a Canadian-based gold and silver exploration, development and production company with its primary focus in Colombia. Gran Colombia is currently the largest underground gold and silver producer in Colombia with several underground mines in operation at its Segovia and Marmato Operations. Gran Colombia is currently advancing a project to develop a modern, large-scale, gold and silver mine at its Segovia operations.

Additional information on Gran Colombia can be found on its website at www.grancolombiagold.com and by reviewing its profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com.

Cautionary Statement on Forward-Looking Information:

This news release contains "forward-looking information", which may include, but is not limited to, payments on senior debt, the debt restructuring and the expected timing for the closing on the Revised Arrangement. Often, but not always, forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of words such as "plans", "expects", "is expected", "budget", "scheduled", "estimates", "forecasts", "intends", "anticipates", or "believes" or variations (including negative variations) of such words and phrases, or state that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will" be taken, occur or be achieved. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of Gran Colombia to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated in these forward-looking statements are described under the caption "Risk Factors" in the Company's Annual Information Form dated as of March 31, 2015, which is available for view on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Forward-looking statements contained herein are made as of the date of this press release and Gran Colombia disclaims, other than as required by law, any obligation to update any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, results, future events, circumstances, or if management's estimates or opinions should change, or otherwise. There can be no assurance that forward-looking statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, the reader is cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements.
TORONTO, ON--(Marketwired - December 10, 2015) - Technology and data company Engagement Labs (TSX VENTURE: EL), creator of the eValue score, today released the rankings of Canada's Best Brands 2015 on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, as indicated by a national survey conducted by Rogers Consumer Insights featured in Canadian Business Magazine. In order to be ranked, the brand must have originated in Canada, have a broad consumer profile, and a significant presence in two or more regions across the country.

Top Ten eValue Rankings of Canada's Most Influential Brands According to Their Social Media Channels

Ranking Facebook Twitter Instagram 1 Home Hardware Building Centre Tim Hortons Roots Canada 2 Shoppers Drug Mart Canadian Tire Cirque du Soleil 3 Loblaws TD Canada Trust MEC 4 Royal Bank of Canada Canada Goose lululemon 5 Cirque du Soleil WestJet IMAX 6 Jean Coutu MEC Canadian Tire 7 TD Canada Trust Cirque du Soleil Canada Goose 8 WestJet IMAX Bombardier Business Aircraft 9 Sun Life Financial Canada Shoppers Drug Mart Tim Hortons 10 Tim Hortons Home Hardware Stores Shoppers Drug Mart

Source: Engagement Labs eValue 2015 rankings of top Canadian brands

"Unlike most lists, the selected brands were ranked as the most influential by the Canadian consumer. Not only were they chosen because they are well known brands, but also because they have established successful marketing strategies that enabled them to connect with consumers on many levels," said Bryan Segal, CEO at Engagement Labs. "Social media is a major avenue used by companies to build brand affinity and using our eValue tool, we were able to provide further insight into how these brands are leveraging social media as a platform to stand out among the pack, and win the hearts and minds of Canadians."

Community and consumer centric store, Home Hardware Building Centre, took the top spot on Facebook, according to Engagement Labs' eValue rankings. The dealer-owned co-operative, took pride in its community focused approach to marketing, which featured actual storeowners in commercials and provided do-it-yourself (DIY) tips and tricks for homeowners. The brand had an impressive Responsiveness score of 71.02, out of a possible 100, and a response speed of just fewer than three hours. This further demonstrated the brand's commitment to customer service, not only in-store but also online.

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Shoppers Drug Mart and Loblaws came in at second and third place on Facebook, respectively. Shoppers had an impressive Impact and Responsiveness score while Loblaws garnered the highest Engagement score of 84.49, along with the highest active user base among the brands measured. The supermarket chain also garnered the highest likes per 1,000 fans, which demonstrated its mix of content from recipes and product promotions.

On Twitter, Canadian coffee giant Tim Hortons ranked first with an eValue score of 83.76. The popular hometown coffee chain also took the top Engagement score due to its mix of user-generated content, customer contests and promotion of seasonal food, and drink. TD Canada Trust, ranked third, leveraging its Twitter channel to humanize the financial brand and connect with consumers by responding directly to comments and questions on the channel and signing off with the initials of the administrator. This practice not only showed dedication to its customer service, but also enabled followers to see that there are actual people behind the brand.

Popular clothing company Roots Canada achieved the highest eValue score on Instagram, and garnered the top Engagement score. The brand's eclectic mix of Canadian centric professional images generated more than 2,100 likes per 1,000 fans, showing that Roots' Instagram strategy hit home with its followers. Cirque du Soleil had an impressive Engagement and Impact score, which helped to propel the brands second place eValue ranking. Lululemon came in at fourth place with the highest Impact and Responsiveness scores of the group.

"It is no surprise to see companies like Roots and Lululemon among the top ranked brands on Instagram, as it is the perfect place to showcase products through creative images which inspire followers to like, comment or tag friends in a post. Similarly, we see highly visual brands like Cirque du Soleil, MEC and IMAX ranking high with impressive Engagement scores due to its unique content, which clearly captured the attention of audiences," noted Segal.

About Engagement Labs

Engagement Labs (TSX VENTURE: EL) offers intelligent Total Social data, analytics and insights for marketers and organizations enabling them to track, measure and benchmark the conversations happening around their brand or industry both online and offline. These conversations are proven to drive critical business outcomes, including sales, while Engagement Labs' tools provide data and actionable insight to help guide business decisions and power marketing effectiveness.

Engagement Labs' eValue Analytics tool is the global benchmark for social media scoring. eValue's proprietary data technology offers real-time analysis to measure a brand's social media and digital marketing efforts, distilling it down to a single meaningful number between 0 and 100 -- an eValue score. Composed of a series of metrics and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), an eValue score measures social media Engagement, Impact and Responsiveness which is benchmarked against 100,000+ handpicked and verified brands. The Keller Fay Group, an Engagement Labs company, is the only firm to regularly measure offline conversation via TalkTrack ; independent research finds offline conversation is a significant driver of sales with twice the impact of online conversation.

Engagement Labs maintains offices in Toronto ON, Montreal QC, London UK and New Brunswick NJ. www.engagementlabs.com / www.kellerfay.com

Embedded Video Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEKIkVCtp5c


YEREVAN, JANUARY 9, ARMENPRESS. Artist of Armenian descent Sarkis spoke about the possibility of Turkeys recognition of the Armenian Genocide during his interview on Belgian LCR TV channel.

He said during the interview that Turkey did not recognize the Armenian Genocide and it is Turkeys business, but the Turkish civil society is really changing.

The artist also expressed his confidence that the process of the international recognition of the genocide moves forward. Ha also emphasized the recent steps taken by Turkeys civil society aimed at the recognition of the Armenian Genocide.

The exhibition which has opened in Brussels since September, last year Sarkis avec Paradjanov (Sarkis with Parajanov) was also mentioned during the program. The exhibition will be open until January 31, 2016.

Parajanovs works have been introduced together with Sarkiss works. The latter has been inspired by the renowned Armenian film director.

Sarkis also stated that he attempted to show a dialogue between Parajanov and himself.

The exhibition has been organized with the support of the Boghossian Foundation.
MILAN (Reuters) - Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi pledged to relaunch his Forza Italia party this year and force out the centre-left government of Matteo Renzi, according to an interview with daily Il Giornale on Saturday. Berlusconi, 79, has kept a low profile since he was convicted of tax evasion and banned from public office in 2013, but promised to return to the front lines of Italian politics and strengthen his party, which he said was weakened by his absence. This year "will be the year of the battle against the regime of the left which suspended democracy", Berlusconi told the paper, referring to Renzi, who took office in an internal power struggle within his Democratic Party (PD) but has yet to win a parliamentary election. Berlusconi called for parliament to be dissolved and new elections, adding his own ousting was "unconstitutional". The media magnate won three national elections over 14 years before he was hamstrung by a tax fraud conviction and sex scandals. He dismissed suggestions of friction between Forza Italia and the other two parties of the centre right, the anti-immigrant Northern League and the far-right Brothers of Italy, adding the three would present a united front in upcoming mayoral elections this year in Rome, Milan, Naples and Bologna. The centre-right has often been divided since shortly after a 2013 parliamentary election. The League has maintained hardline opposition to the government while Berlusconi has wavered between modest opposition and collaboration with Renzi. If all three centre-right parties joined forces, according to opinion polls, they could be a threat to Renzi's PD, which is the only major party on the centre-left. The next parliamentary election is due in 2018, but commentators speculate it could come earlier as a result of instability in Renzi's ruling coalition. "My commitment is to take Forza Italia back to above 20 percent so that the centre-right can win the elections at the first round, surpassing 40 percent," Berlusconi said. A new electoral law introduced by Renzi requires a run-off ballot between the two largest parties if none obtain 40 percent of votes in the first round. (Reporting by Agnieszka Flak; editing by Gavin Jones and Digby Lidstone)
gender neutral bathroom

In a year that saw manbun, dadbod, and trigger warning creep into our daily vocabularies, it was a simple pronoun that was deemed the most notable word of them all.

"They" has been named 2015s Word of the Year.

More than 300 linguists, lexicographers and grammarians voted on the award Friday at the American Dialect Society's annual conference, held this year in Washington, D.C.

The word "they" was selected for the considerable traction it gained in 2015 as a singular, gender-neutral pronoun.

English speakers have used "they" and "their" for centuries to refer to someone of unknown gender, like in the sentence "Everyone does their best."

However, more recently, the usage of the pronoun has expanded to include people who choose to identify outside the traditional gender binary.

"There has been a lot of discussion lately about pronouns and people taking on their own pronouns, making that a matter of choice," said Ben Zimmer, chair of the American Dialect Society's new words committee, in an interview with Business Insider.

"Thats an interesting development that singular 'they' is in the middle of."

"It does say something about the way people are exploring gender and sexual identity, and perhaps a greater openness to accepting new ways of expressing that identity through language."

Zimmer pointed to various news outlets that have broadened their linguistic standards in recent months. In November, The New York Times used the honorific "Mx." as an alternative to "Mr." or "Ms." when a subject "preferred not to be assigned a gender."

And a week later, The Washington Post added "they" to their style guide to accommodate "people who identify as neither male nor female."

ben zimmer

For Zimmer, these changes epitomize the evolution of language.

"It moves beyond the traditional binary of 'he' and 'she'," Zimmer told Business Insider.

Story continues

"It feels like an opening up of the language, allowing for a greater possibility of what these pronouns can refer to."

In another Word of the Year category, "manbun"  defined as a man's hairstyle pulled up in a bun  won Most Unnecessary.

Meanwhile, the honor of Most Euphemistic went to "Netflix and chill"  "the sexual come-on masked as a suggestion to watch Netflix and relax."

"Schlong," a word that has a dubious history as a verb and was invoked by Donald Trump at a December campaign rally, lost to "f---boi" in a runoff for Most Shocking.

The American Dialect Society has held the Word of the Year vote since 1991. Previous winners include "occupy" in 2011, "metrosexual" in 2003 and "chad" in 2000. Last year's winner, #BlackLivesMatter, was the first time a hashtag won the vote.

Here's the full list of 2015's winners and nominees (winners in bold):

Word of the Year

Ammosexual: firearm enthusiast.

Ghost: (verb) abruptly end a relationship by cutting off communication, in person or online.

"On fleek": excellent, impeccable, on point.

"Thanks, Obama": sarcastic expression in which a person pretends to blame Barack Obama for a problem.

*They: gender-neutral singular pronoun for a known person, as a non-binary identifier.

Most Useful

"Mic drop": definitive end to a discussion after making an impressive point.

Microaggression: subtle form of racism or bias.

Shade: insult, criticism or disrespect, shown in a subtle or clever manner.

*They: gender-neutral singular pronoun for a known person, as a non-binary identifier.

"Zero f---- given," ZFG: indication of supreme indifference.

Most Creative

Adult: (verb) behave like a grownup.

*Ammosexual: firearm enthusiast.

Lowkey: (adverb) to a small extent, in a subtle manner; opposite of highkey.

Squad: ones posse or close circle of friends.

Yass, yaass, yaaass, etc.: expression of excitement, approval or strong agreement.

Most Unnecessary

Man bun

Dadbod: flabby physique of a typical dad.

*Manbun: mans hairstyle pulled up in a bun.

"Or nah": question tag expressing that something may not occur.

"Trigger warning": alert for potentially distressing material.

"Thanks, Obama": sarcastic expression in which a person pretends to blame Barack Obama for a problem.

Most Outrageous

"Fish gape": posed expression with cheeks sucked in and lips slightly apart.

*f---boy, f---boi: derogatory term for a man who behaves objectionably or promiscuously.

Schlong: (verb) defeat soundly.

Sharewashing: deceptive marketing by companies treating services as sharing.

"White student union": campus organization organized in response to a black student union.

Most Euphemistic

Af, asf: intensifier after an adjective (as f---).

Lit: amazing, exciting or fun.

*"Netflix and chill": sexual come-on masked as a suggestion to watch Netflix and relax.

"Swipe right/left": accept or reject (based on gestures used on Tinder dating app).

Most Likely to Succeed

CRISPR: gene-editing technology allowing biologists to alter and control DNA sequences.

*Ghost: (verb) abruptly end a relationship by cutting off communication, in person or online.

Mom: admiring term of address for a woman seen by younger women as a mother figure.

"On fleek": excellent, impeccable, on point.

Least Likely to Succeed

Berniementum: momentum behind the candidacy of Bernie Sanders.

Hoverboard: self-balancing motorized skateboard.

*Sitbit: device that rewards sedentary lifestyle (play on Fitbit fitness tracker).

"Uber for X": pitch used by startups seeking to emulate Uber in different tech sectors.

Most Notable Hashtag

say her name

#JeSuisParis: expression of solidarity after the Paris terror attacks.

#LoveWins: celebration of Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage.

*#SayHerName: call to bring attention to police violence against black women.

#StayMadAbby: ridiculing plaintiff in University of Texas affirmative action case.

#StayWoke: exhortation to remain vigilant and informed (used by #BlackLivesMatter movement).

Most Notable Emoji

: heart eyes (romantic, passionate)



: winking face (humorous, flirtatious)



: information desk person (sassy, sarcastic)



*: eggplant (male genitalia, sexual innuendo)



: 100 (keep it 100, keep it real)

NOW WATCH: This new app may get a lot more people reading thanks to one genius feature





More From Business Insider


gender neutral bathroom

In a year that saw manbun, dadbod and trigger warning creep into our vocabularies, it was a simple pronoun that was deemed the most notable word of them all.

"They" has been named 2015s Word of the Year.

More than 300 linguists, lexicographers and grammarians voted on the award Friday at the American Dialect Society's annual conference, held this year in Washington, D.C.

The word "they" was selected for the considerable traction it gained in 2015 as a singular, gender-neutral pronoun.

English speakers have used "they" and "their" for centuries to refer to someone of unknown gender, like in the sentence "Everyone does their best." However, more recently, the usage of the pronoun has expanded to include people who choose to identify outside the traditional gender binary.

"There has been a lot of discussion lately about pronouns and people taking on their own pronouns, making that a matter of choice," said Ben Zimmer, president of the American Dialect Society, in an interview with Business Insider. Thats an interesting development that singular 'they' is in the middle of."

"It does say something about the way people are exploring gender and sexual identity, and perhaps a greater openness to accepting new ways of expressing that identity through language."

Zimmer pointed to various news outlets that have broadened their linguistic standards in recent months. In November, the New York Times used the honorific "Mx." as an alternative to "Mr." or "Ms." when a subject "preferred not to be assigned a gender."

And a week later, the Washington Post added "they" to their style guide to accommodate "people who identify as neither male nor female."

For Zimmer, these changes epitomize the evolution of language.

"It moves beyond the traditional binary of 'he' and 'she'," Zimmer told Business Insider. "It feels like an opening up of the language, allowing for a greater possibility of what these pronouns can refer to."

Story continues

In another Word of the Year category, "manbun"  defined as a man's hairstyle pulled up in a bun  won Most Unnecessary. Meanwhile, the honor of Most Euphemistic went to "Netflix and chill"  "the sexual come-on masked as a suggestion to watch Netflix and relax."

"Schlong," whose dubious history as a verb was invoked by Donald Trump at a December campaign rally, lost to "f---boi" in a runoff for Most Shocking.

The American Dialect Society has held the Word of the Year vote since 1991. Previous winners include "occupy" in 2011, "metrosexual" in 2003 and "chad" in 2000. Last year's winner, #blacklivesmatter, was the first time a hashtag won the vote.

Here's the full list of 201 5's winners and nominees (winners in bold):

Word of the Year

ammosexual: firearm enthusiast

ghost: (verb) abruptly end a relationship by cutting off communication, in person or online

on fleek: excellent, impeccable, on point

Thanks, Obama: a sarcastic phrase assigning blame to the President

*they: gender-neutral singular pronoun for a known person, as a non-binary identifier

Most Useful

mic drop: definitive end to a discussion after making an impressive point

microaggression: subtle form of racism or bias

shade: insult, criticism or disrespect, shown in a subtle or clever manner

*they: gender-neutral singular pronoun for a known person, as a non-binary identifier

zero f---- given, ZFG: indication of supreme indifference

Most Creative

adult: (verb) behave like a grownup

*ammosexual: firearm enthusiast

squad: ones posse or close circle of friends

yass, yaass, yaaass, etc.: expression of excitement, approval or strong agreement

Most Unnecessary

dadbod: flabby physique of a typical dad

*manbun: mans hairstyle pulled up in a bun

or nah: question tag expressing that something may not occur

trigger warning: alert for potentially distressing material

Most Outrageous

fish gape: posed expression with cheeks sucked in and lips slightly apart

*f---boy, f---boi: derogatory term for a man who behaves objectionably or promiscuously

schlong: (verb) defeat soundly

sharewashing: deceptive marketing by companies treating services as sharing

Most Euphemistic

af, asf: intensifier after an adjective (as f---)

lit: amazing, exciting or fun

*Netflix and chill: sexual come-on masked as a suggestion to watch Netflix and relax

swipe right/left: accept or reject (based on gestures used on Tinder dating app)

Most Likely to Succeed

CRISPR: gene-editing technology allowing biologists to alter and control DNA sequences

*ghost: (verb) abruptly end a relationship by cutting off communication, in person or online

mom: admiring term of address for a woman seen by younger women as a mother figure

on fleek: excellent, impeccable, on point

Least Likely to Succeed

Berniementum: momentum behind the candidacy of Bernie Sanders

hoverboard: self-balancing motorized skateboard

*sitbit: device that rewards sedentary lifestyle (play on Fitbit fitness tracker)

Uber for X: pitch used by startups seeking to emulate Uber in different tech sectors

Most Notable Hashtag

#JeSuisParis: expression of solidarity after the Paris terror attacks

#LoveWins: celebration of Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage

*#SayHerName: call to bring attention to police violence against black women

#StayMadAbby: ridiculing plaintiff in Univ. of Texas affirmative action case

#StayWoke: exhortation to remain vigilant and informed (used by #BlackLivesMatter movement)

Most Notable Emoji

heart eyes (romantic, passionate)

winking face (humorous, flirtatious)

information desk person (sassy, sarcastic)

*eggplant (male genitalia, sexual innuendo)

100 ("keep it 100," "keep it real")

NOW WATCH: Flakka  the drug they call '$5 insanity'  is overwhelming police and hospitals in Florida





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Firefighters battle a fire near Yarloop in Western Australia, where the out-of-control blaze more than doubled in size in 24 hours (AFP Photo/FIRE AND EMERGENCY SERVICES) (FIRE AND EMERGENCY SERVICES/AFP)

Perth (Australia) (AFP) - At least two people have died in a bushfire which has destroyed 121 homes in Western Australia, reports said Saturday as officials admitted the emergency was not yet over.

Fire crews found two bodies in burnt-out houses in Yarloop, some 110 kilometres (70 miles) south of Perth, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported, citing police. Another two people are missing.

The bodies have not been formally identified but are believed to be those of two men in their 70s who had been reported missing after fire tore through the old mill town early on Friday, destroying scores of homes.

That number of houses rose to 121 on Saturday after a fuller assessment, as hundreds of firefighters continued to battle the huge blaze which threatens nearby areas.

"It is still a cause for concern," Fire and Emergency Services Commissioner Wayne Gregson told reporters of the blaze.

"It has been a very challenging fire for us -- it's still a challenge, (we're) not out of the woods yet."

Residents of Yarloop and other towns in the area were advised to evacuate if possible, with an bushfire emergency warning still in place.

"There is a threat to lives and homes in Harvey, Cookernup, Wokalup and surroundings areas," the Department of Fire and Emergency Services said on its website.

"Unless you are ready and prepared to actively defend your property, evacuate to the south via the South Western Highway if safe to do so," it said.

Western Australia's Premier Colin Barnett said the event had been declared a natural disaster, a measure which gives residents access to greater financial support.

But he admitted that the damage bill was going to be a "large one".

Bushfires are common in Australia's hotter months, with four deaths in Western Australia last November.

Australia's worst firestorm in recent years devastated parts of the southern state of Victoria in 2009, razing thousands of homes and killing 173 people.
Iran

The latest round of tensions between Iran and Saudi Arabia is unsettling what little is left of the Middle East's regional order.

Saudi Arabia's execution of the country's most prominent Shi'ite cleric on January 2nd triggered the apparently state-sanctioned burning of Saudi diplomatic facilities in Tehran and Mershad, a breach of international order that in turn resulted in Saudi Arabia cutting ties with their Persian Gulf neighbor.

Luckily, in the past Saudi Arabia and Iran have demonstrated at least a limited ability to keep their animosity in check.

The countries didn't go to war when an Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the US at an upscale Washington, DC restaurant was revealed in 2011. It's unclear what if any long-term impact the latest series of incidents will have.

But they're likely to have one lasting effect, a political development that could tangibly shift hte terms of the Middle East's sectarian divide.

On January 4th, Sudan announced that it was also severing diplomatic ties with Iran. This move denied Iran of its sole Sunni Arab ally, undercutting the Tehran regime's argument that Iran's Islamic revolution is capable of transcending sectarianism and uniting the world's Muslims.

More practically, the freeze in relations also closes off the Red Sea port of Port Sudan to Iranian warships and weapons shipments, takes away a staging area for Iran's regional arms pipeline, ends a partnership with a fellow revolutionary Islamist regime, and flummoxes whatever remained of Iran's efforts to win over potential supporters in the Sunni world.

Bashir hug

Story continues

The relationship between Iran and Sudan stems from the National Islamic Front's elevating to power after the 1989 military coup in Khartoum, an event that marked the first instance of a revolutionary Islamist movement taking power in an Arab country.

Over the next decade, Sudan's government sheltered Osama bin Laden, attempted to assassinate the anti-Muslim Brotherhood Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak, and tried to impose Islamic law throughout what was then the territorial ly largest country in the African continent.

Even if these measures turned Sudan into an internationally sanctioned rogue state, they created an opportunity for a partnership with a fellow revolutionary regime in Tehran, which had been the world's only revolutionary Islamist government between 1979 and 1989.

The relationship paid off: Iran provided Sudan with weaponry and expertise that allowed the country to set up a fairly extensive domestic arms industry, giving it the capability of building its own automatic weapons, rocket launchers, and even tanks.

The Sudanese regime lost many of it its Islamist trappings. The Islamic Movement changed its name to the National Congress Party (NCP) in the late 1990s and began evolving into a somewhat more conventional dictatorship in hopes of improving the country's economy and relations with the west.

But Sudan maintained close ties with Iran. International isolation over the government's conduct in wars in Darfur and South Sudan gave Sudan the added incentive to deepen ties with a fellow sanctioned regime. Iran and Sudan completed a military cooperation agreement in 2008, while the Sudanese military has deployed Iranian-built drones in both Darfur and the south of the country. The two governments were allies through 2014.

That began to change as the NCP began to faced steep financial crisis  and as Saudi Arabia began mobilizing the Sunni Arab states against Tehran.

south sudan iran

The NCP, which is still under international sanctions related to the Sudanese government's human rights abuses in Darfur, had faced a prolonged economic drought after the southern third of the country became the independent state of South Sudan in 2011. Khartoum and South Sudan failed to reach a durable compromise over the post-independence split of South Sudanese oil revenues (the oil's export is dependent on an oil transit infrastructure in the north of Sudan). Oil from the south had previously constituted nearly the entirety of Sudanese government revenue.

At the same time, the Middle East ignited. The escalating conflict in Syria sharpened the region's sectarian divisions, and events like the Yemeni civil war and the thaw in Iran-US relations heightened the competition between Riyadh and Tehran.

These tensions raised made a potentially swing state like Sudan even more important.

embassy fire

As Alberto Fernandez, current Vice President at the Middle East Media Research Institute and the Charge d'Affaires at the US embassy in Khartoum from 2007 to 2009 explained to Business Insider, amid both domestic and regional turmoil the increasingly pragmatic regime in Khartoum began to realize that its survival depended more on Saudi largess than on its relationship with Iran.

"These guys have been in power now for 26 years," Fernandez says of the NCP. "They're no longer the revolutionaries that they were. They're now a regime that wants to hold onto power. And in that sense they were fruit ripe for the plucking by the Saudis."

The thaw culminated in Sudan's March 2015 decision to join the Saudi-led anti-Houthi rebel coalition in Yemen, which is fighting to restore Yemen's internationally recognized government after an Iranian-supported Shi'ite militant movement deposed it in early 2015.

By that point, the NCP had determined that the Saudis had the unrivaled resources and willingness to secure the regime's long-term survival. "The Saudis can still outbid the Iranians," says Fernandez. "The Iranians have technical expertise and other things they can offer, but they're not swimming in cold hard cash the way the Saudis are."

saudi arabia iran proxy war

The move has strategic implications for Iran. Sudan's partnership was more than just a symbolic victory for Iran, 0r a sign that the the Islamic Republic's state ideology was capable of resonating with Sunni Arab Islamists too. It also gave Iran a strategic way-point for weapons trafficking into both the Gaza Strip and Central and East Africa.

Sudan was a frequent staging area for Iranian weapons shipments heading north, to Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza. Sudan gave the Iranian arms industry, and the Iranian regime, access to regions of strategic and possibly commercial concern. Suspected Israeli attacks targeted Hamas weapons shipments or facilities in Sudan in 2009, 2011, and 2014. And as a 2012 study by Conflict Armaments Research detailed, Iranian munitions have been found throughout Africa, in places spanning from South Sudan to Cote D'Ivoire.

Iran also helped seed a Sudanese domestic weapons industry purported to be the third-largest in Africa, behind only Egypt and South Africa. According to a 2014 Small Arms Survey report, Iran owns a 35% stake in the Yarmouk industrial facility in Khartoum, which is believed to produce artillery, rocket launchers, and military-grade firearms.

Iran's Yamrouk investment hasn't been cost-free for the Sudanese regime: in October of 2012, the Israeli air force attacked the site, likely in order to destroy Iranian-supplied long-range rockets bound for Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Yarmouk was also cited in a 2006 US diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks for its alleged connection to activities "that have the potential to contribute materially to WMD, missile, or certain other weapons programs in Iran or Syria."

As the Small Arms Survey recounts, Sudanese weapons factories produce a range of armaments, including light weaponry and small rocket launchers of Iranian design. Sudan has flown military drones of Iranian origin, and Patrick Megahan, a research associate for military affairs at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, noted in an email to Business Insider that Sudan's state weapons enterprises had exhibited "a copy of an Iranian remote weapons station" at an international defense exhibition in Abu Dhabi in early 2015.

Emile Lebrun, the editor of the Small Arms Survey's Human Security Baseline Assessment for Sudan and South Sudan, speculates that Iranian assistance "was already very limited before the Yemen campaign was underway."

But it's still "unclear," he wrote to Business Insider in an email, "whether the Iranian technicians working in the Sudanese arms factories (some hundreds of workers, according to reports) can be replaced with local specialists."

Saudi Arabia King Salman

Sudan's value as a strategic asset to Iran, and Iran's role in helping Sudan establish a domestic arms production capability, suggest that the relationship between the two countries may continue in some more muted, sub-official form. There might be some enduring (if informal) cooperation between officials from the two countries regarding weapons trafficking or continued Iranian involvement in the arms sector.

"My sense is that we're going to see Sudan inch away from Iran but Iran will maintain lingering assets in the country whether Sudan likes it or not," says Jonathan Schanzer, vice president of research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

But on the geopolitical level, Saudi Arabia was able to ply away Iran's only Sunni Arab ally  a country that enjoyed longstanding military and strategic ties with Tehran.

"It looks like the Saudis have outmaneuvered the Iranians," Schanzer told Business Insider. "They pulled a proxy out from under Iran's wing."

NOW WATCH: These are the biggest risks facing the world in 2016





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oculus rift softkinetic

The coolest announcement of CES 2016, to me, was the news that Lenovo and Google are working together to put the search giant's nifty Project Tango sensors into a forthcoming consumer smartphone.

Project Tango, like similar efforts from Microsoft, Apple, and Intel, is trying to give smartphones and other devices the ability to perceive depth and space the way humans do.

That sounds nerdy, but the potential effects of the shift towards depth perception are profound: Get ready for apps that help you measure furniture or guide you straight to your friends in a crowded club.

It's the future of tech, as our devices learn to make more sense of the world around us. And it's just starting to sneak into all the tech we use.

SoftKinetic, a startup that Sony bought in late 2015, has been doing this for a while now. In fact, it's the technology platform behind the new BMW 7 Series' very high-tech dashboard gesture controls, where a wave or a swipe answers the phone or turns up the music.

Check it out in action:

This is just the first wave of what this technology can do, says SoftKinetic CMO Eric Krzselo.

At first, Krzselo says, this technology's most natural on-ramp will be via the smartphone, since depth perception software can help tremendously with camera features like autofocus.

But once the sensor is in more phones, developers can give their apps the ability to "read" where the human hand is in three-dimensional space, as demonstrated in the BMW 7 Series, it means you can also have people interact with digital objects in virtual or augmented reality, with their own hands.

In plainer terms: I got to use an Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, souped up with a SoftKinetic sensor, that let me wave my hands in front of my face and see them reflected in the screen. I didn't need a controller or a keyboard to grab and throw boxes around in virtual reality. All I needed to do was wave.

Story continues

google project tango

As a Sony subsidiary, SoftKinetic obviously has strong relationships there, and this could well make its way into a future version of the Sony PlayStation 4 virtual reality headset, Krzselo says.

But just as Sony sells its image sensor components to Apple and other sometimes-rivals, there's nothing stopping SoftKinetic from offering these sensors to car manufacturers, phone manufacturers, or Facebook's Oculus Rift VR headset, for them to build into their products as they see fit.

In another virtual reality demo, I used SoftKinetic's gesture technology to control holographically-projected controls on the dashboard of a car, pushing virtual buttons.

Microsoft and Intel have strong investments in this area too, as similar sensors are making their way to the HoloLens holographic computer and Intel-powered systems like the HTC Vive. If you want to see the future, check out Tiltbrush, a VR paint program that lets you step inside a painting, using the depth effect to grand effect.

In short, the future of smartphones is deep, as we get more hardware that understands the world around us like never before.

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YEREVAN, JANUARY 9, ARMENPRESS. His Holiness Aram I, Catholicos of Cilicia received Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran to Lebanon Mohammad FathAli. Armenpress was informed about it by the Armenian Church Catholicosate of Cilicia.

The parties discussed the recent political developments in the Middle East, as well as tension between Iran and Saudi Arabia. The Ambassador introduced to His Holiness Aram I the reasons of the existing situation and Irans position. His Holiness Aram I, Catholicos of Cilicia expressed his concerns about the situation, noting that a solution must be sought to keep the region safe from dangerous estrangement. Issues related to the current situation of Lebanon were also touched upon during the discussion. The interlocutors also talked about the Armenian community and in that context His Holiness Aram I expressed his satisfaction about the special care displayed towards the Armenians of Iran. His Holiness Aram I also welcomed Iran's spiritual leader Ayatollah Ali Khameneis visit to the families of deceased Iranian-Armenian soldiers on Christmas and New Year.
donald trump

Real-estate mogul Donald Trump said on Saturday that North Korea's supreme leader, Kim Jong Un, deserves "credit" for taking over his country at such a young age.

"If you look at North Korea, this guy, I mean, he's like a maniac, OK? And you've got to give him credit. How many young guys  he was like 26 or 25 when his father died  take over these tough generals," Trump said in Ottumwa, Iowa.

The Republican presidential front-runner said Kim's willingness to push aside generals and "wipe out" his uncle demonstrated why the US needs to treat North Korea's nuclear arsenal as a serious threat.

"And all of a sudden  and you know it's pretty amazing when you think of it  how does he do that? Even though it is a culture and it's a cultural thing, he goes in, he takes over, and he's the boss," Trump recalled. "It's incredible. He wiped out the uncle. He wiped out this one, that one. I mean, this guy doesn't play games. And we can't play games with him. Because he really does have missiles. And he really does have nukes."

North Korea drew worldwide condemnation earlier this week when it detonated what it claimed was a hydrogen bomb. If true, North Korea's nuclear weapons would have the potential to be far more devastating. However, experts widely believe that the erratic North Korean regime had actually tested a more conventional nuclear weapon.

During his Iowa speech on Saturday, Trump also said his plan to de-escalate the region is for the US to put pressure on China, which has been North Korea's longtime benefactor. The billionaire businessman accused the Chinese government of ripping the US off for years.

"Here's what we do. We tell China," Trump said. "We rebuilt China. They have taken so much of our money with trade. They have taken everything. They have taken our jobs, our money. ... They've taken so much. And literally, it's one of the great thefts in the history of the world, what they've done to our country."

Story continues

NOW WATCH: A North Korean defector tells us what life was like under a dictatorship





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Spokesman John Kirby speaks at the State Department on January 6, 2015 in Washington, DC (AFP Photo/Mandel Ngan) (AFP/File)

The United States is "disturbed" by reports of the disappearance of five Hong Kong booksellers from the Chinese semi-autonomous city, a US State Department spokesman said Friday.

The missing men all worked for Mighty Current, known for books critical of Beijing, which closely monitors and controls dissenting voices.

The men are feared to have been detained by Chinese authorities, adding to growing unease that freedoms in the former British colony are being eroded.

"We are disturbed by reports of the disappearances of five people associated with the Mighty Current publishing house and we share the concern of the people of Hong Kong regarding these disappearances," State Department spokesman John Kirby said.

"Were following the issue closely," he said.

Kirby made reference to a January 4 statement by Hong Kong's chief executive Leung Chun-ying "expressing concerns about the potential implications of this case, and we share those concerns."

Pro-democracy lawmakers, activists and residents fear that Beijing is trampling the "one country, two systems" deal under which Hong Kong has been governed since it was handed back by Britain to China in 1997.

The two sides agreed Hong Kong was to preserve its freedoms -- which include freedom of speech -- and way of life for 50 years. Chinese law enforcers have no right to operate in the city.

In 2014, tens of thousands of protestors brought parts of Hong Kong to a standstill for more than two months after Beijing imposed restrictions on candidates for the city's next leader.
Baranay is a novelist and, to date, Rascal Rain is her only work of non-fiction. She had not planned to write about her experience, and from comments she makes early on in the book, she had not entirely planned to go to PNG as a volunteer.

It is rather the product of her coming to terms with the anxieties and disappointments that characterised much of her time as a volunteer, with what was then Australian Volunteers Abroad (AVA).

Rascal Rain is a difficult book to categorise, and at times a difficult book to read. While the book is a record of Baranays personal observations of the country and the people she came to know, it is not truly a memoir.

INEZ Baranays 1994 account of her experience as a volunteer in Papua New Guinea was re-released in 2014 by Local Time Publishing.

Yet the books opening chapters quickly captured my interest, and had me feeling that I was in good hands as Baranay began to paint a candid and intriguing picture of her life in Wabag, the provincial capital of Enga Province.

Baranays two-year assignment was to work with the Enga Provincial Womens Council to expand its social and environmental programs, particularly literacy. PNGs provincial womens councils are non-government organisations with a 40-year history.

Established in 1975, their purpose is to support the National Council of Women and advise the national government, and each of the provincial governments, on womens affairs policy.

The National Council of Women was set in place at the same time as both a representative network for women in PNG and a resource centre through which financial, and other support, could be directed.

It quickly becomes clear that Baranays assignment is fraught with organisational inadequacies and numerous other obstacles, and it isnt long before she begins to wonder why the womens council asked for a volunteer, and why AVA sent her.

To compound this, she is somewhat isolated in her frustration and sense of failure, finding other volunteers thriving and moving ahead with their projects.

The thorniest aspect of her role is that, in addition to being employed by the non-government womens council, she is told soon after arriving that she will also be working for the provincial government as their womens officer.

Both Levitica, the President of the Enga Womens Council, and Joseph, the Assistant Secretary of the Division of Community Services, assure her that there is no conflict of interest in this.

In some senses this is true. Baranay comes to understand that neither the Enga Provincial Womens Council nor the National Womens Council itself have much control over their resources or programs in the face of government interests or priorities, and very little influence in womens affairs at the provincial level.

Moreover, Joseph is clearly the boss, and time and again Baranay watches Levitica defer to his preferences, and overlook the needs of the womens council. Indeed, it is this relationship, in addition to being subjected herself to Josephs bullying and abusive behaviour, and not receiving any support from either Levitica or her field officer from AVA, that finally lead Baranay to quit the assignment and leave.

Baranays account of and reflection on her time in Enga, and the unravelling of her vision for what she had hoped to achieve, are told in a very raw, unedited style. I wasnt entirely comfortable with this, and I think the book would have benefitted from being crafted more consciously.

It is partly the uncensored nature of her writing that drew a scathing critique by Susan Ash, to which Baranay responds in an Afterword to the new edition.

Yet this rawness also makes the book valuable. Baranays unfiltered thinking on what it means to be a woman in PNG, what development and feminism mean in the local context, and what her role as a volunteer in promoting them should be  and at what cost to herself and the women around her  is a refreshingly honest way of articulating the complex nature of the questions shes grappling with.

Her great downpours of self-doubt and doubt over the whole enterprise bring into the open the potential for frustration and a sense of failure that are a reality for development volunteers.

Its a topic that has generated a great deal of discussion (see Ashlee Betteridges post on her volunteering experience in Timor-Leste, and Stephen Howes three-part series on the 2014 ODE evaluation of the Australian volunteering program) but which is perhaps not dealt with enough in the recruitment of volunteers, or in the planning and management of their assignments.

Baranays style made for some tough passages to wade through as a reader. As an editor, I found these passages as uncomfortable as I now understand the bumpy, winding drive from Mount Hagen to Wabag to be.

But as a person interested in feminism, development and the role of the development volunteer, and someone for whom PNG is familiar in some ways and unknown in many others, I came away from Rascal Rain with many new insights, and a great deal to ponder.

For more information on Inez Baranay and her work, visit her website.
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BCL once operated the Panguna mine, which sparked a decade-long civil war in 1989 and remains a source of tension between the autonomous island of Bougainville and the PNG mainland.

Such a move would be "completely unacceptable" to Bougainvilleans and would be "potentially a source of conflict", according to a series of leaked letters obtained by the ABC.

THE Papua New Guinea government wants to buy Rio Tinto's shares in the Australian company Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL), according to Bougainville's President.

Rio Tinto holds 53 per cent of shares in BCL and the company still holds an exploration licence for the now-derelict mine area.



The ABC has obtained correspondence between the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) President, the PNG Government and Rio Tinto regarding BCL's future.

"I refer to the Monday 8 December discussion in Kokopo with you [PNG Prime Minister Peter O'Neill], and other ministers concerning proposals for National Government to purchase Rio Tinto's equity in BCL," Bougainville President John Momis wrote to Mr O'Neill, two days after the meeting.

"You emphasised a need for urgent purchase for fear Rio Tinto might otherwise sell the equity to some other entity."

Given the tortured history of the Panguna mine it would be completely unacceptable to virtually all Bougainvilleans if that 53 per cent equity were to be transferred to the National Government.

He also voiced concerns in a separate letter to Rio Tinto's managing director Sam Walsh.

"[PNG State Enterprises] Minister Ben Micah has advised that following a series of meetings with Rio Tinto, PNG wishes to purchase Rio's equity in BCL and is seeking ABG agreement," Dr Momis wrote on December 4.

It is no secret the mining giant is considering its options, launching a review of its stake in BCL in mid-2014.

On December 10, Rio Tinto's chief development officer Craig Kinnell assured Dr Momis that no deal had been done.

"The review has not reached any final conclusions, but as you would expect Rio Tinto has engaged further with interested parties since we met earlier this year," Mr Kinnell wrote to Dr Momis.

The PNG Government said its main priority was to rebuild Bougainville's broken infrastructure and deliver services, but confirmed it was involved in talks about a sell-off.

"There has been some discussion between the ABG, the National Government and Rio Tinto about the possible divestment of Rio Tinto's interest in Bougainville," Mr O'Neill told the ABC.

It would be political suicide for the ABG, and potentially a source of conflict, if the ABG were to agree to the National Government becoming the majority shareholder in BCL.

"But again this is a decision on which the land owners and the people of Bougainville will have to guide the National Government.

"We have no interest in owning the mine or reopening the mine."

Dr Momis has warned Mr O'Neill of the possible consequences of a deal that was perceived to favour the mainland.

"Given the tortured history of the Panguna mine it would be completely unacceptable to virtually all Bougainvilleans if that 53 per cent equity were to be transferred to the National Government," he said in a letter to Mr O'Neill.

"It would be political suicide for the ABG, and potentially a source of conflict, if the ABG were to agree to the National Government becoming the majority shareholder in BCL."

The suggestion of conflict is a serious one, considering the large number of weapons still on the island and the highly factionalised population.

The once-lucrative open cut mine has been abandoned for more than two decades and will need an estimated $8 billion to $10 billion investment to restart operations.

Some commentators, including Matt Morris, an associate with the Australian National University's Development Policy Centre, have questioned PNG Government's interest in Panguna, given the nation's current financial state and its poor track record managing other mines.

"I think the main questions are why does the Government want to buy the mine, what is the value added that the PNG Government would bring to a shareholding in BCL and thirdly what would be the political implications?" Mr Morris told the ABC.

"The last year has been a pretty awful year for the PNG Government's finances with the collapse of the commodity prices and that's led to rising debt levels and the PNG Government's had to cut back on expenditure for things like health and education and infrastructure.

"So it's not really clear how the Government would go about finding the funds to purchase the company or where it would find or borrow the billions of dollars that would be required to reopen the Panguna mine."

In addition to operational costs, any restart at Panguna would have to deal with demands for compensation from locals and expectations of an environmental clean-up around the mine site.

But the potential revenue it could bring is central to Bougainville's political future.

As part of the peace agreement that ended the civil war in 2001, Bougainville will hold a referendum on independence from PNG some time in the next five years.

Dr Momis told Bougainville's Parliament in December that "real autonomy" would only come when the island became financially stable and that would probably mean a large-scale mining project.

"If Rio's decision is to divest itself of the equity then the ABG's considered view is that it is most unlikely that any potential responsible developer will be able to find the $US6 billion to $US7 billion needed to reopen the mine," he said.

"It is therefore most unlikely the mine will reopen in the foreseeable future."
DAVID BRIDIE

THE Wantok Musik Foundation, in association with APRA AMCOS, has announced the inaugural Tony Subam Fellowship, which is open to any band in Papua New Guinea that has a strong element of cultural expression in its work.

The fellowship is named in honour of Tony Subam, a former member of the band, Sanguma, which pioneered the use of traditional PNG music and songs in co-harmony with western styles of music.

The winner will be the band or group which the judges believe Tony Subam would have wanted to support.

Tony had a strong belief that what is unique to PNG music is their traditional songs and sounds, that PNG people must be proud of their cultural heritage and roots, and that too much music in contemporary PNG imitated overseas trends.

The recipient of the Tony Subam Fellowship will be awarded a recording session with acclaimed sound engineer and producer Emmanual Muganaua in Port Moresby.
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Like other days, Marla Cone went to work at Brown Drug Store inside the large Hotel Pathfinder.

The 20-year-old wife and mother was waiting on a customer, when she heard people talking about a natural gas odor. Soon, she and others were told to evacuate the building. Cone was going to get her purse and coat that very cold morning, when the phone rang. Pharmacy tech Delores Fritz went to answer the phone.

An explosion tore through the hotel.

I never made it to my purse or my coat, Cone said.



Across the street, Chris and Tom Rump were getting ready to have breakfast at the nearby Jensens Cafe on Broad Street.

We were waiting on our brother, Jeff, Tom remembered.

Chris was inside the family business, Rumps Furnace and Hardware, with his dad, Bill, and secretary Hazel Hunsucker.

Suddenly, the explosion threw Chris about 8 feet into a wall. The ceiling dropped.

Tom was in an alley behind the building unloading a truck when the horrific blast rocked the area.

I was dodging bits of sidewalk and street lamps and brick and all kinds of stuff, said Tom, who jumped in the trucks cab to escape the falling debris.



Judy Nelson-Rohrig had dropped her son off at her grandmas house. Shed planned to pick up some Christmas photographs at Brown Drug Store, where her mom Delores Fritz worked.

Nelson-Rohrig forgot about the pictures.

Otherwise, I would have been at the drug store with my mom and Marla (Cone), she said.

Instead, she went straight to work at the Nelson Upholstery shop at Fourth and H streets.

She wasnt there more than three minutes when the explosion occurred, shaking the stores windows. Even in the brutally cold winter weather, she hurried outside.

At that time, you could see the debris in the sky, she said. I ran down Fourth Street to Broad Street and looked and I could see the hotel. It looked like a war zone.



On that miserable day, Boyd Hammond and his wife, Louise, co-owners of the hotel, were getting ready to attend the funeral of their 24-year-old daughter Ann, whod been murdered in Lincoln by her husband, Todd Hoppes.

Then came a phone call from Fremont friend and neighbor Boney Schafersman.

I hate to tell you this, but your hotel just blew up, Schafersman said.

***

Four decades after a natural gas explosion ripped through the stately six-story Hotel Pathfinder, Fremonters still remember details of that terrible Saturday. Many people were affected by the tragedy which occurred at 9:32 a.m. Jan. 10, 1976. Twenty people lost their lives due to the blast and dozens more were injured.

No one knows what ignited the blast, but Hammond told the Tribune years later that a coupling popped off an underground plastic pipe (which had contracted each year as it froze during the winters), allowing gas to seep through the dirt under the street and into the hotel.

When the building exploded, the blast soared up through the elevator and mushroomed on the sixth floor, said former fireman Don Sawyer in a 1999 account.

Much of the hotels first two floors, which included the barbershop, drug store, lobby, lounge, dining room, ballroom and business offices, fell into the basement.

The blast flung debris in the air and chunks of concrete were blown into the street. Smoke engulfed the hotel. Surrounding buildings were heavily damaged.

In a 1976 story, Fremont Tribune wire editor Bob Berggren described the scene this way:

Flames billow out the west door of the hotel. It isnt a door anymore, but a large gaping black hole. Firemen run back and forth . on about the fourth or fifth floor, there is this head, this face in the window that appears and then disappears behind the billowing smoke.

Theyre coming! you shout, but you cant tell if she hears you.

Four men rush by with a ladder  A policeman stumbles on broken glass covering a piece of concrete about four feet square  the (Vienna) bakery is across the street  Most of the front of the bakery is blown in  a few doughnuts with colored frosting lie on the sidewalk.

***

Cone, whod been in the drug store, ended up in the basement in a pile of rubble.

How I got out of it, I dont know, she said. I knew Id broken my leg.

I heard the firetrucks coming and in my mind I had to get to higher ground. With the water coming in (from the hoses), I thought, I dont want to drown. So I made it to this old heat register  I was on that, she said.

People had begun calling for help.

I heard screaming, Cone said. Everybody was yelling, Help me, help me!

And one of those voices was obviously mine.

****

In the hardware store, Bill Rump had been thrown to the floor. The World War II veteran later said it sounded like a bomb had detonated.

Chris Rump recalled the explosion in a 2001 Tribune story.

It hit, like a sonic boom and a freight train hitting you in slow motion, he said. First, a deafening bang, followed by a concussion that picked me up and threw me in the air into a wall 8 feet away.

Chris Rump made his way to the front of the store to help his father pull Hunsucker out from under the fallen ceiling. Chris walked out of the front of the store.

The eerie silence was incredible, he recently recalled. There was just nothing. There wasnt a bird or anything. Zero.

It was absolutely crazy.

The silence would be broken by weak voices crying out from the hotels upper floors, where apartments were. People stood in the blown out windows pleading for help.

Tom Rump went to a girder and began pulling people out of the basement. Chris went over to help. They pulled six or seven or more people out. One woman sat on the girder and cried.

We couldnt get her to move, Chris said.

***

In the basement, Cone waited for help.

I could barely see, she said. My eyes were singed.

Her long hair, which had extended to her back, was now singed up to her shoulders. She would tell rescuers that her leg was broken.

Soon, men came down a ladder. Her leg was wrapped in a splint.

Weve got to hurry, the men said. It could explode again.

Cone wrapped her arms around the neck of a rescuer, who got her up the ladder and into a rescue squad. Another woman, JoAnn Lemons, injured in the blast was in the squad, too.

She was screaming, Cone said.

Once at the local hospital, a doctor cleaned up Cones leg.

They said it looked like Id been through a meat grinder, she said.

Cone had a broken left ankle, a compound fracture in her left leg, second and third burns on her face and arms.

***

Earlier that morning, Marv Welstead was getting ready to go to his office in the Equitable Federal building. He heard the explosion from a hallway in his house. A man working for Welstead called and said the hotel had exploded.

Welsteads former employer, Mrs. Will Rowe, had an apartment on the hotels fourth floor. Welstead and his wife, Jean, went to Fifth Street and Park Avenue. There, they saw the smoke billowing out from Rowes apartment window.

I said to Jean, Lets head for the emergency room at the hospital, Welstead recalled.

At the hospital, they saw the first ambulance arrive with Leona Puls from Vienna Bakery. A nurse kept asking the womans name, but she couldnt respond. Welstead told the nurse the womans name.

Do you know these people? the nurse asked Welstead.

Yes, he said.

You stay right here, the nurse said.

And from that morning until about 2 p.m., Welstead remained, identifying people as they came to the emergency room via ambulances.

Mrs. Rowe, he would learn, had been washing hand towels in a kitchen sink when the explosion occurred.

She put a hand towel on her face and crawled on the floor behind the sofa until she heard the firemen in the halls and they took her down in a cherry picker, Welstead recalled.

When she came to the hospital, she was sooty. Jean Welstead and a nurse cleaned her up and later took her to a relatives house.

****

Nelson-Rohrig, who ran to the area after the blast, remembers seeing curtains flying out of windows and hearing older people on top floors screaming for help. Her mother had been in the drug store at the time of the explosion.

I knew at that point she probably would never make it out alive, Nelson-Rohrig said.

She contacted her two sisters and two brothers.

We ended up at the hospital. Somebody had told us, We saw your mom. They took her to the hospital, Nelson-Rohrig remembered.

So the siblings  all in their 20ssat in a waiting room.

We waited and we waited  We thought there was hope that she would have made it, she said.

But eventually, the siblings were sent home.

****

Welstead was at the hospital when Lloyd Sexton and the Rev. John Swearingin learned that their wives had been killed.

They were in shock, he said.

***

Hammond, the hotel owner, later described his own disbelief. First, the Hammonds had lost their only childtheir petite, hazel-eyed daughter, whose body was found Jan. 7 under ice in Lincolns Pawnee Lake.

Now, theyd also lost their business, along with friends and acquaintances, who had died.

I was beyond shock, because I was already in shock from my daughter, he said in a Tribune article 25 years after the explosion.

Boyds business partner, Wally Loerch, drove him to the site.

****

Cone would be transported to what was then Omahas Clarkson Hospital, where she was in an intensive care unit for a week. She would be in the hospital for nine weeks total.

I was in traction because of a compound fracture above my left knee, Cone said.

At eight weeks, Cone was put in a body cast from her chest to her ankle. After her time in the hospital, she was brought home to Fremont by ambulance, where she stayed in a hospital bed in her living room and needed 24-hour care.

She and her husbands daughter, Carrie, was turned 1 year old on Jan. 11  just a day after the explosion.

****

Rohrig-Nelson and her siblings, continued to wait, wondering if their mother was in the basement in water from the fire hoses.

They would wait three days.

It was Tuesday when they finally found her, Nelson-Rohrig said. She was in the basement with Marla (Cone).

About 25 years later Nelson-Rohrig was told that her mother _ whod gone back to answer the telephone  still had it in her hand when she was found. She had burns, but probably never felt anything because of the explosion.

Fritzs children identified their mother by a charm bracelet with pictures of her grandchildren.

The young siblings planned their moms funeral. Fritz, a single mom, who worked full time, had been a good mother and grandmother.

She was a tremendous role model for her five kids, said daughter, Terry Rohloff. She loved the grandkids and spent time with them. She was always there for us.

We ate together almost every Sunday, Rohrig-Nelson added. We had a really close family.

The family has stayed close.

***

A quarter century after the explosion, Hammond, now deceased, was then 82 when he told the Tribune how he believed his faith help his wife and him through those horrible times.

We had a lot of faith in God and did a lot of praying, he said, adding that theyd forgiven the man who murdered their daughter. You cant live with that hate. If Id been bitter, I wouldnt be here.

****

Forty years later, Cone still walks with a limp. She is legally blind in her right eye, injured by a piece of glass.

JoAnn Lemons, the woman in the ambulance, died in 2015.

Her obituary recorded this: She survived many obstacles including colon cancer, and the Hepatitis C outbreak in Fremont, but was unable to completely survive the Pathfinder Hotel explosion in 1976 where she suffered multiple and severe skull fractures and traumatic brain trauma. The continued effect of those injuries ultimately led her to (residing in) the area skilled care facilities.

Bill Rump also has since died, but his sons still recall the day of the explosion.

Welstead still remembers plans made to build another hotel at the site of the Pathfinder, but how they never became reality.

The explosion changed the look of the downtown area. Some buildings in the area were torn down after the blast and others reduced in size. The north side of Fremont Opera House on Broad Street was repaired. The third story of the building that houses the Fremont Area Art Association was removed as was the second story of the Rumps building.

In August 1999, the National Fire Protection Association listed the Hotel Pathfinder explosion as the deadliest blaze in Nebraska in the 20th century. The hotel stood for 14 months before it was torn down.

That was painful to see that building shell, Nelson-Rohrig said. For the longest time, I wouldnt even go downtown.

Some good did come out of the tragedy. Nelson-Rohrig said she feels more for others when they lose a loved one. She added something else:
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)  Iranian Princess Ashraf Pahlavi, the twin sister of the countrys deposed shah whose glamorous life epitomized the excesses of her brothers rule, has died after decades in exile. She was 96.

Many in Iran before the countrys 1979 Islamic Revolution believed Princess Ashraf served as the true power behind her brother, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and pushed him into taking power in a 1953 coup engineered by the U.S.

Immortalized in her royal prime by an Andy Warhol portrait with bright red lips and raven-black hair, Princess Ashrafs years out of power more resembled a Shakespearean tragedy. Assassins killed her son on a Paris street just after the Islamic Revolution, her twin brother died of cancer shortly after, while a niece died of a 2001 drug overdose in London and a nephew killed himself in Boston 10 years later.

Still, she always defended her brothers rule and held onto her royal past.

At night, when I go into my room, thats when all the thoughts come flooding in, the princess told The Associated Press in a 1983 interview in Paris. I stay up until 5 or 6 in the morning. I read, I watch a cassette, I try not to think. But the memories wont leave you.

Reza Pahlavi, a son of the shah, announced his aunts death in a Facebook post on Thursday night. Her personal website said she died Thursday, without elaborating.

Robert F. Armao, a longtime adviser to Princess Ashraf in New York, said the princess died in Europe on Thursday, declining to elaborate on the cause of her death. He said there were no immediate plans for a funeral.

In Iran, local media reported her death relying on international reports. State television reported she died in Monte Carlo and described her as being famous for being corrupt, something Armao criticized.

Her Highness did an awful lot for her country, whatever her human faults, he said.

Born Oct. 26, 1919, Princess Ashraf was the daughter of the monarch Reza Shah, who came to power in a 1921 coup engineered by Britain and later was forced to abdicate the throne after a 1941 invasion by Britain and Russia. By 1953, America helped orchestrate the coup that overthrew Irans popularly elected prime minister, Mohammad Mossadegh, over fears he was tilting toward the Soviet Union. That brought her brother to power and set the stage for decades of mistrust between the countries.

But the shah was a man of indecision, according to a long-classified CIA account of the coup first published by The New York Times in 2000. To push the coup along, the plotters reached out to the shahs dynamic and forceful twin sister who already had been in touch with U.S. and British agents, according to the account. After considerable pressure by her and a U.S. general, the shah reportedly agreed.

As her brothers government ruled in opulence and its secret police tortured political activists, Princess Ashraf focused on womens rights in an appointment to the United Nations. She and her sister, Shams, also were among the first Iranian women to go in public with their hair uncovered, breaking traditional norms in the Shiite country. She also worked on other diplomatic missions for Iran.

She traveled widely and became known for gambling on the French Riviera, the French press dubbing her La Panthere Noire, or the Black Panther. She survived a 1977 apparent assassination attempt in Cannes that killed her aide and wounded her chauffeur.
Snakes dont really bother me.

Ive never been a big fan, but I do appreciate the role they play in the ecosystems of nature.

Our imaginations lead us to believe the floor of the rainforest is crawling with snakes. Its an image created mainly for and by Hollywood. But the truth is, I rarely see them when I come to the rainforest. Most snakes slither the other way when they sense human activity.

But that doesnt mean they arent around.

Twice while I was visiting a community in the Amazon Rainforest, missionary air medical service was required to rush a child for medical treatment after being bitten by a snake.

So, it is wise to be aware of their presence without living in terror of snakes.

I was reminded of this while visiting the community of Llanchamacocha of Sapara Nation in the Ecuadorian Amazon Rainforest. At the invitation of my friend and guide, Cristina Serrano, I was taking photos of the community while she conducted a three-day workshop on ecotourism.

Most communities I visit in the rainforest have dogs. Generally, they are thin and most likely loaded with parasites. As part of my own routine, each time after I visit communities in the rainforest I take an anthelmintic (antiparasitic drug). I dont want to end up looking like the dogs.

Llanchamacocha has dogs, several mutts of various sizes that run all over the place. The owners use them for hunting. But generally the dogs are kept for company and make a good alarm system in case of danger.

In addition to having dogs, Llanchamacocha has a pet monkey. It is a cute little wooly monkey. Several times, I watched it fend for itself through the leftovers in the dishes after dinner. One of the favorite pastimes of the monkey is to ride some of the dogs like a cowboy. The whole chaotic scene of dogs, chickens and a monkey walking between your legs as you eat dinner is something that makes this place special. Its real, unpretentious and fun.

Late in the afternoon of the second day, someone from the community came and told me one of the dogs had been bitten by a snake. Apparently the dog tangled with a bushmaster, one of the most aggressive and venomous snakes in the rainforest.

Wheres the dog? I asked more out of curiosity than having any kind of ability to do something.

Its under a house, with the monkey, the person replied.

With the monkey?

Yes, he answered.

Now my interest level had been stirred to action.

Where?

Come with me, Ill show you, he said.

He led me to a small shack next to a house that was elevated by poles and pointed to the shadows underneath the house.

What I saw was a curled up blond dog. Standing next to it was the monkey. As the monkey stood next to the dog, it laid both hands on the back of the dog. The monkey looked at me with sad eyes before looking around the rest of the area. It was as if he was standing guard over his friend.

I was moved watching two animals from different worlds come together in a struggle for survival. It made my heart ache, knowing there was nothing I could do.

Why is the monkey doing that?

The dogs are his friends, so he cares about them, my companion replied. If the dog lives through the next four hours, it will have a chance to survive. We gave it ginger. This should help with the venom.

The next morning, I went back to the house and found the normal chaos unfolding. The ground was again filled with chickens, dogs and the monkey racing about. I spotted the blond dog, and I noticed the left side of its face was still swollen from the snakebite. But its tail wagged when it found some food.

It lived through the night. And with a little help from its friend, they will hopefully go for a ride once again.
Does Bill Clinton still have his political magic? How much of it can he transfer to his wife? The answers: Yes and not much.

The former president hit the campaign trail this week on behalf of his spouse, the Democratic presidential front-runner. He is the most popular public figure in America and still possesses unrivaled campaign skills. He has learned from his miserable performance eight years ago, when he was a liability for Hillary Clinton as she battled Barack Obama for the nomination.

Still, popularity rarely transfers in American politics. Six decades ago, the mantra was that President Dwight Eisenhowers jacket didnt have coattails: Few Republicans benefited from that presidents enormous popularity. Thats probably even more the case with political figures of today.

Bill Clinton probably helps his wife in some marginal ways: fundraising, appealing to some groups that distrust her, such as young voters. And in the general election he could provide a reminder of what many remember as the golden years of prosperity and peace of the 1990s.

By assailing Hillary Clinton for supposedly enabling her husbands sexual peccadilloes two decades ago, Donald Trump might gain some ground with his partys hardcore, Clinton-hating base. But it certainly wont hurt Bill Clinton; it might even help Hillary with women who resent seeing her blamed for her husbands infidelities by Trump, who could also face criticism for moral failings.

In any case, Trump, who puts more stock in polls  or at least those showing him ahead  than George Gallup, would kill for Bill Clintons ratings.

The former president is the most resilient politician of this, and probably any, era. He seemed doomed when the sex scandal involving a White House intern erupted during his presidency. Republicans then foolishly tried to remove him from office for lying about sex. That backfired: Bill Clinton led his party to unusual gains in the 1998 midterm elections and left office in 2001 with a 66 percent approval rating.

A few days after he left the White House, it came to light that he had used his final hours as president to pardon Marc Rich, a shady hedge fund manager and fugitive from justice. Bill Clinton became persona non grata, especially with elites; his aspirations to join a few blue-chip corporate boards were thwarted.

It didnt take long for him to bounce back with corporations and foreign governments, which paid top dollar to hear his insights.

Then in 2008  rusty after years off the campaign trail  he seemed to implode, frustrated by Obama, a political novice who was getting the better of his wife. Bill Clinton had a bitter feud with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, who was about to endorse Obama. In a private conversation, the former president complained that he didnt understand how the Democratic Party could nominate someone who a few years earlier would have been sent out to get coffee. Such sentiments alienated prominent black leaders, some of whom warned of a permanent rift with the former president.

That April, an unwise columnist  me  wrote a piece headlined: Bill Clinton May Be Biggest Loser of Campaign.

Fat chance. By 2012, he again was the most popular American politician. He gave the most compelling speech at the Democratic convention that year, making the case for Obamas economic performance that the president himself had been unable to make. The weekend before the election, at a big rally in Northern Virginia, Clinton demonstrated again the skills that make him the dominant politician of the day, deriding Mitt Romney and extolling Obama  who was beside him  with sharp humor and rousing rhetoric.

He cant win the Democratic nomination for Hillary; thats her job. But its easy to imagine the anticipation as he approaches the podium at the Philadelphia convention, where Democrats are nominating a Clinton for the third time. In the general election, Republicans will attack him at their own peril.
PHILADELPHIA (AP)  A man using a gun stolen from police said he was acting in the name of Islam when he ambushed an officer sitting in his marked cruiser at an intersection, firing more than a dozen shots at point-blank range, authorities said Friday. The officer and the man were wounded during the barrage of gunfire, they said.

The man, 30-year-old Edward Archer, also pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group when he was questioned after his arrest in the shooting late Thursday, police said. Archer's mother, Valerie Holliday, told The Philadelphia Inquirer he had been hearing voices recently and had felt targeted by police and the family asked him to get help.

Police Commissioner Richard Ross described the attack on Officer Jesse Hartnett, captured on a police surveillance camera, as an attempted assassination.

"He just came out of nowhere and started firing on him," Ross said. "He just started firing with one aim and one aim only, to kill him."

Investigators believe Archer traveled to Saudi Arabia in 2011 and to Egypt in 2012, FBI special agent Eric Ruona said, and the purpose of that travel was being investigated by the FBI. But police said there was no indication anyone else was involved in the officer's ambush.

Ross said Archer told police he believed the police department defends laws that are contrary to Islam. Though Archer "clearly gave us a motive," Ross said, it's up to police to see what the evidence shows.

"It wasn't like laying it out completely, chapter and verse for us," he said. "We're left to say, 'OK, he's leaving a trail for us. Where's it going to lead us, if anywhere?'"

Federal agents joined local police in searching two Philadelphia area properties associated with Archer, including the home where his mother lives in suburban Yeadon, authorities said.

Capt. James Clark said Archer told investigators: "I follow Allah. I pledge my allegiance to the Islamic State, and that's why I did what I did."

Archer's mother described him as a devout Muslim. Jacob Bender, the executive director of the Philadelphia chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, an advocacy group, said he contacted about five inner-city mosques and found no one who knew of Archer. He said the motive for the ambush still appears to be conjecture.

"I think the important point is not to lay the blame for this on the entire Islamic community," he said.

The gunman fired at least 13 shots toward Hartnett, getting up next to the car and reaching through the driver's-side window, investigators said.

Despite being seriously wounded, Hartnett got out of his car, chased the shooter and returned fire, wounding his attacker in the buttocks, police said. Other officers chased Archer and apprehended him.

Hartnett, 33, was shot three times in an arm and will require multiple surgeries; he was listed in stable condition. Archer was treated and released into police custody.

Ross called it "absolutely amazing" that Harnett survived.

"It's nothing short of miraculous, and we're thankful for that," he said.

Last March, Archer pleaded guilty to firearms and assault charges stemming from a 2012 case but was immediately released and placed on probation, court records show. Records also show he was scheduled to be sentenced Monday in suburban Philadelphia in a traffic and forgery case.

The attorney who represented him in the firearms case was unavailable to comment Friday because he was in court, his office said. A message for his lawyer in the forgery case was not immediately returned.

Surveillance footage of the attack showed the gunman dressed in a white, long-sleeved tunic. When asked if the robe was considered Muslim garb, Ross said he didn't know and didn't think it mattered.

The 9mm pistol used by Archer was recovered at the scene of the shooting, police said. It had been stolen from an officer's home in October 2013, investigators said. Officials said they were trying to figure out how Archer got the weapon and whether it passed through other people's hands after the theft.

Hartnett was in good spirits, said his father, Robert Hartnett.

"He's a tough guy," he said.

Hartnett served in the Coast Guard and has been on the Philadelphia force for four years. He always wanted to be a police officer, his father said.

When Hartnett called in to report shots fired, he shouted, "I'm bleeding heavily!" into his police radio.

Jim Kenney, in his first week as mayor of the nation's fifth-largest city, called Archer's actions "abhorrent" and "terrible" and said they have nothing to do with the teachings of Islam.

"This is a criminal with a stolen gun who tried to kill one of our officers," he said. "It has nothing to do with being a Muslim or following the Islamic faith."

In December 2014, a gunman announced online he was planning to shoot two "pigs" in retaliation for the chokehold death of Eric Garner and ambushed two New York police officers in a patrol car, fatally shooting them before running to a subway station and killing himself. Investigators said he had no connection to terrorism.
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"PEACE IS A BY-PRODUCT OF VICTORY. PROSPERITY IS A BY-PRODUCT OF LIBERTY AND JUSTICE. "

"The cost of freedom is always high, but Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender, or submission." - John Fitzgerald Kennedy, 35th President of the United States QUESTION: WHICH VERSION OF ISLAM DID MUHAMMED PRACTICE, "MODERATE ISLAM"OR "RADICAL ISLAM"?



THE ANSWER IS THE ONLY THING YOU REALLY HAVE TO KNOW ABOUT ISLAM - AND ITS APOLOGISTS.

Blog Archive
Political science PhD specializing in delegate selection rules, presidential campaigns and elections. Founder of FHQ Strategies LLC
This blog will deal with large things and little things: spiritual truths, politics and economy, news, comment, food and the State of Texas. Oh, and my poetry and pictures. Enjoy.
STATEMENT OF BENJAMIN FULFORD,

TOKYO, JAPAN





WITNESS STATEMENT





(CJA 1967, S.9: MC Rules 1981, 7 70.)

Magistrates Court Act 1980 S.102





Name: Benjamin Fulford, also known as 

Date of birth: March 19, 1961

Address: 3-6-9 Kichijoji Higashi Machi, Musashino-Shi, Tokyo 180-0002 Japan

This statement is being made at the request of Mr. Michael Shrimpton, who is making an appeal against a conviction for making an untrue bomb hoax to the UK authorities.

I have been a professional journalist for 30 years, working as Tokyo based correspondent for such companies as Knight Ridder Newspapers, the Nikkei Newspaper, The South China Morning Post and as Asia Pacific Bureau Chief for Forbes Magazine. Currently I am editor and publisher of Weekly Geopolitical News and Analysis. I have also published 70 non-fiction books written in Japanese. As a professional journalist I am well acquainted with libel laws and the need for fact checking. As such, the statement below is true to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Some articles of mine have appeared on the respected Veterans Today.com website, whose Editor-in-Chief is Gordon Duff. Mr Duff is well-connected, to my knowledge. I am aware, for example, that he recently travelled, under tight security, to Damascus, capital of the Syrian Arab Republic, for informal peace talks with President Assad.

Mr. Shrimpton has also been a commentator on Veterans Today.com and I have read his columns with interest. From my own knowledge I can say that Mr. Shrimpton is well-known in the Intelligence Community. I am aware that he holds himself out to be a specialist in the black or covert German intelligence agency, the Deutscher Verteidigungs Dienst or DVD.

I have published books (in Japanese) and articles claiming that the tsunami and nuclear disaster that occurred in Fukushima, Japan on March 11, 2011, sometimes known as 3/11 was the result of a deliberate attack. My sources for this assertion and what I am about to write include Japanese military intelligence, former Prime Minister Naoto Kan (whom I have known personally for many years), members of the crew that smuggled the nuclear weapons used in the attack on Fukushima into Japan, members of both the French and British branches of the Rothschild family, senior CIA agents and a member of the team that actually drilled the nuclear weapons into the seabed before the 3/11 attack.

I had no contact at all with Mr. Shrimpton before he was arrested. Mr Shrimpton and I have never met.

The first thing the court needs to know with respect about Fukushima is that the attack was planned many years before it happened. The Japanese business magazine Zaikai Tembo, citing a CIA report, wrote in February of 2007 that the US had decided that Japan was getting too much of its energy from nuclear power and that if that trend continued, Japan would no longer be dependent on US controlled oil and thus would no longer have to obey the US. The conclusion of the report was that the best way to ensure Japan remained a colony would be to destroy the Tokyo Electric Power company, the people who run the Fukushima plant.

The Zaikai Tembo report is in the public domain. It is not readily to hand, but in an endeavour to assist the court I shall try to obtain a copy and annex it to a further short statement, along with copies of any other documents to which I refer, although I have been careful not to refer to documents which are not in the public domain. No discourtesy to the court is intended by my not annexing documents at this time. The reporting of terrorist attacks in Paris, France on Friday November 13 and the aftermath has meant that this is a particularly busy time for me.

Former Senator John Davison Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), great-grandson of John D. Rockefeller, whose family controls (through foundations) General Electric, the manufacturers of the plant, was deeply involved in the Fukushima operation. As a preliminary to destroying Japans nuclear power generation capability, Westinghouse and General Electric sold their nuclear power plant manufacturing businesses to Toshiba and Hitachi. This was insider trading at the highest level. It is in the public domain that Senator Rockefeller is or has been associated with the Trilateral Commission, which Mr Shrimpton identifies in his textSpyhunter: A Secret History of German Intelligence (Totnes: June Press, 2014) as a DVD front organisation.

The ongoing attempt in recent years by an Asian/Western secret society to wrest control of global finance from Western oligarch families is a bigger back-ground to the Fukushima sub-plot. The black or covert world is, almost by definition, opaque. I should explain that what Mr Shrimpton may identify as the DVD may operate in different parts of the world through fronts and secret societies. Intelligence agencies have long favoured the use of secret societies.

For example, Democratic Party of Japan Finance Minister Shoichi Nakagawa was asked at a G7 meeting in 2009 to hand over $100 billion to what I refer to as the Cabal, in order to finance an attempt to start a carbon tax scheme. He answered that he would raise the money by selling $100 billion worth of US Treasury bonds. He was going to say this at the press conference that followed the G7 meeting, so he was drugged to prevent him from doing so. Later, when he returned to Japan, he was murdered by CIA death squads, although I note what Mr. Shrimpton says about the Frankfurt-based COREA Group, Allen Welsh Dulles and DVD penetration of the CIA.

Getting back to Fukushima, the refusal of the Japanese Democratic Party and authorities to hand over any real hard currency to the Western Oligarch families resulted in their decision to go ahead with the Fukushima operation as a way of intimidating the Japanese once again into surrender and obedience.

One key source of mine, who has variously gone by the names of Richard Sorge, Alexander Romanov, etc., was part of a multi-agency Western ring involved in smuggling drugs into Japan. I have confirmed through a long term acquaintance by the name of Steve McClure, a supposed music journalist, that Richard Sorge was his long term supplier of drugs. Sorge, whose real name is, according to his identity papers, Sasha Zaric, says he was a member of the Australian secret service. He also claims to have been recruited into an organization known as the Illuminati by former Chess champion Bobby Fischer. The Illuminati claim to be a secret society established by the Greek Mathematician Pythagoras but having roots that go back to Atlantis. The organisation is real but shrouded in secrecy and self-propagated mythology.

In any case, Sorge told me that he was summoned to Pattaya, Thailand, by a member of the British Special Air Service, a South African going by the name of Spencer and told to bring 70 kilograms of Thai stick marijuana, heavily laced with mind destroying chemicals, into Japan and approach me. He was told to tell me to introduce the Yakuza, or Japanese mafia, to him or else I would be killed. The Yakuza told me it was a trap and to keep away from it, which I did. Sorge also told me that when he was in Thailand, he was shown a 500 kiloton nuclear warhead that he was told was stolen from the Russian submarine the Kursk (K-141) which sank in 2000. He claims that four such warheads were removed from theKursk and that the Kursk was sabotaged for this purpose. This warhead was smuggled into Japan together with the drugs via a yacht from the Philippines.

The man overseeing the smuggling operation was a former Hong Kong deputy police commissioner by the name of Stephens, according to Sorge and Spencer. This is the same Stevens, Sorge says, who was later killed in Libya. The man in overall operational control of this operation against Japan was General Richard Myers, according to CIA and other sources.

Based on subsequent interviews with members of Pentagon military intelligence (the Defense Intelligence Agency, or DIA) and MI5, the route taken by the missile to Japan has been identified. It was part of the batch of four nuclear missiles stolen from the Kursk by Nazi-era underground forces, which Mr. Shrimpton identifies as the DVD, who took them to their submarine base in the Atlantic Island of Sao Tome, according to MI5. From there, it was taken to another submarine base in New Guinea, according to Pentagon Military intelligence.

From there it was taken to the Philippines Yacht Club where Stevens crew then took it by yacht to a remote island on the Okinawan archipelago. From there it was transported by fishing boat to the port of Kyushu. From Kyushu, the warhead was taken by van to a property owned by former Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone in Hi No De Cho, in Western Tokyo. From there it was taken to the North Korean Citizens organization headquarters near the Yasukuni shrine, according to Sorge.

Sorge risked his life and has survived multiple murder attempts because he attempted to warn the Japanese authorities about the impending nuclear terror attack. He told them the warhead was at Nakasones property and he told me as well. The Japanese authorities ignored our warnings. Later we again told them the warhead was located at the North Korean headquarters in Japan. He also went to the Australian embassy in Tokyo, Japan and provided them with similar warnings. As a result of this, he had all his Australian identity papers confiscated and is now, apparently, stateless.

For his efforts, Sorge was arrested by plain clothes police who ignored his warnings about impending nuclear terror and instead asked him to testify falsely that I was a drug dealer. He was also forcibly confined to the Inagidai mental hospital in Musashino, Tokyo where he was heavily drugged. This writer helped obtain his release by pressuring the Japanese authorities and threatening to take legal action against them for their illegal incarceration of Sorge or Zaric. He remains undocumented and unable to leave Japan.

I do not have the slightest reason to suppose that Sorge suffers from any form of mental illness. I should explain to the court that bad faith allegations of insanity are a standard intelligence tactic, refined in the USSR in the 1930s by the NKVD under the leadership or influence of the notorious Soviet spymasters Nikolai Yezhov and Lavrentiy Beria. When intelligence is presented which contains an uncomfortable truth for the state it is sometimes easier for the state to discredit the source by locking him or her up than to deal with the intelligence on its merits. This is sometimes known as political psychiatry.

A South African/British agent by the name of Michael Meiring, who had both legs blown off in the Philippines by a bomb he said was set by George Herbert Walker Bush Senior also began contacting me prior to these events, starting around 2006. He came to me under the name of Dr. Michael Van de Meer and he showed me a bullet proof attache case, 7 passports and an Uzi machine-gun. Dr. Van de Meer told me that Tony Blair had bragged I would be arrested on drug charges. The reason for this contact was, in part I believe, because I held a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan where I presented evidence that the September 11, 2001 terror attacks were the work of a rogue faction inside the Israeli and US governments.

In any case, Japanese authorities failed to react to our warnings and the warhead was loaded onto the deep sea drilling shipChikyu Maru. Local news reports place the Chikyu Maru drilling into the seabed off-shore from Sendai in the months before the March 11, 2011 tsunami and nuclear terror attack against Japan. Takamasa Kawase, of Japanese military intelligence, also told me about the Chikyu Maru drilling.

Furthermore, multiple witnesses have come forth to testify that the Prime Minister Naoto Kan was seen inside the Japan Freemason headquarters building near Tokyo tower on the day before the 3/11 attack. He was being shown a map of Japan missing the Tohoku region where the tsunami hit.

The Israeli company Magna BSP was in charge of security at the Fukushima nuclear plant at the time. A Miyagi prefectural government official says employees of this company loaded plutonium into the plant against his will in the months before 3/11.

Furthermore, on March 10 th , 2011 Kurt Campbell then Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs for the United States State Department requested a meeting with Ichiro Ozawa, a senior member of the then ruling Democratic Party of Japan, according to DPJ officials. At the meeting Campbell told Ozawa the world was entering biblical end times, and that as a result natural disasters were coming. Campbell offered Ozawa the rights to xeolite (a substance used in cleaning up radio-active waste) for Fukushima prefecture if he would abandon his plans to remove his political faction from the ruling party and cause Prime Minister Kan to lose power. Ozawa accepted the offer, according to several sources, including the above mentioned DPJ officials.

On the evening of March 10th, 2011, I was summoned by the daughter of Masaru Takumi, the former number two boss of the Yamaguchi Gumi, Japans largest crime syndicate, to meet a person she described to me as a Japanese style chiropractor (seitaishi). This so-called chiropractor identified himself to me as a Japanese professional assassin. He had somehow gained access to my private medical records and other knowledge about me that was not part of the public domain. He also wrapped me with a cloth that he said contained traditional medicine and told me to keep it on for 24 hours. As soon as I left the meeting, I immediately removed it because I had the distinct unpleasant sensation that it contained a poison. In any case, Takumis daughter asked for my mobile phone because she wanted to set the alarm for 11 AM on March 11, 2011, the day of the tsunami. She now works for the Kroll detective agency in Tokyo, Japan. The very act of writing this information has put her life in danger and I would like to warn explicitly that any attempt to murder her in order to silence her will be met with serious repercussions.

Immediately after the tsunami and nuclear terror attack began, Prime Minister Naoto Kan was asked by officials from Tokyo Electric Power and others to order the evacuation of 40 million people from the Kanto plain, Kan said during a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan.

He also received a phone call from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the day after the attack demanding that he sign over ownership of all Japanese government holdings of US government bonds to cabal oligarchs, which he did, according to Japanese military intelligence.

Following the attacks, a member of the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) who was involved in breaking up the nuclear warhead from the Kursk into several smaller nuclear devices and drilling them into the seabed, presumably for drill-bit diameter compliance, showed up at the Tachikawa Christian church, run by Pastor Paolo Izumi, asking for protection. He said that 14 of his colleagues, who were involved in the drilling operation not understanding the purpose of what they were doing, had been murdered in order to silence them and that he feared for his life. The man was sheltered by the church and is now in the witness protection program.

After the 3/11 attack, this writer went to South Korea at the invitation of Dr. Van de Meer. While in Korea he was told the Rothschild family had planned the attack because they wanted to force 40 million Japanese refugees to take shelter in North and South Korea. The Rothschild family intended to move the base of their Asian operations from Tokyo to a planned new special economic zone in Korea, he said. He knew in advance of the 3/11 attack and looked deeply ashamed when he admitted he did not warn me about it.

Following the 3/11 attack, un-marked planes were spotted dumping radio-active industrial waste containing caesium, according to a Japanese gangster whose gang was sub-contracting for the CIA and Mossad around Fukushima.

The massive propaganda fear campaign following the 3/11 attack can be traced, in my opinion, to Mossad, and rogue factions in the Pentagon and the CIA.

In addition to the people named above, some of the individuals involved in this mass murder and fear propaganda campaign include Kenneth Curtis, the head of CIA Japan, Michael Green, the head of Mossad Japan and Richard Armitage, former Deputy Secretary of State.

According to my sources, other people involved in this mass murder campaign included George Bush Sr. and Jr., Michael Chertoff, James Baker, Paul Wolfowitz, Senator J. Rockefeller, Michael Hayden, Guy de Rothschild, Evelyn de Rothschild, Peter Hans Kolvenbach, former Pope Benedict, and others yet to be named.

The most convincing evidence in the public domain that 3/11 was a nuclear attack on Japan is probably seismic. I have seen the seismic records and hope to annex them to my follow-up statement. From them the court will be able see that the main event, triggering the deadly tsunami, is preceded by a smaller release of energy, consistent in my opinion with a nuclear detonation or detonations.

I went public with what I knew about 3/11 and hope to produce a sample of my writings in my next statement. I have no reason to believe that Mr Shrimpton was unaware of them. To my knowledge a man named Neil Jones in Folkestone, England was, and I now understand that he was in contact with Mr. Shrimpton. Mr. Jones and I have been in contact, although again we have never met.

Here is a copy of the first correspondence I had with Mr. Jones:

- Forwarded message -

From: neil jones <neiljones01@hotmail.com>

Date: 2012/4/19

Subject: Threat to London

To: benjaminoffice88@gmail.com

Dear Benjamin,

Aplogies for repeating this message but the original has found its way onto the comments part of your typepad blog in the section titled RE: March 31st deadline. As my comments to you were not intended for publication it would be great favour if that particular message from me could be removed. I would be very happy to post another if so required. Many thanks.

The real aim of both these messages is to assure you that the threat posed by the Kursk Granit warhead in London is being taken seriously.

Hopefully you gave the warning in part to help prevent the slaughter of innocent people in London. To this end any information you have about the planned attack would be passed to the relevant authorities. It would be incomprehensible for you to be involved in such a plan and so you must have some information which convinced you of the credibilty of the threat. Such information would be useful and in particular more about the present location of the weapon, the date it was planted, whether it will be moved for the attack, and the location and timing of the attack. Anything which convinced you that the threat was real would be more than useful.

As you may realise, like Drake, it is my belief that civilians should not be exposed to this kind of action. It is understood that your Illuminati connections have a problem with the Royal family, Queen Elizabeth in particular, but this does not seem to justify the mass slaughter of innocents. This would directly contradict the good work you are doing on energy, food, water and quality of life for the planet and its occupants.

Thanks for your attention

Best regards

Neil Jones

In or about March 2012 I was informed by my source code-named Richard Sorge that one of the nuclear devices stolen from the Kursk had been smuggled into East London and that the intended target was the Olympic Games. Again I went public with this intelligence. Again, I hope to produce a sample of my writings on the nuclear threat to the London Olympics as an annex to my next statement.

I have no doubt that Neil Jones saw my comments. From what I know of the case Mr. Shrimpton appears to have passed to the British Ministry of Defence substantially the same information supplied by Richard Sorge to me. I do not doubt that Sorge (the code-name was very obviously taken from the famous World War II Soviet double-agent in Tokyo, although I note that in Mr. Shrimptons published opinion the original Richard Sorge was a treble-agent of the German Abwehrintelligence organisation headed by Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the man he says founded the DVD) has sources in Russia, including inside Russian Military Intelligence (the GRU), as well as sources in British and Australian intelligence agencies.

I am also aware that the intelligence provided to me by Richard Sorge has now been verified, amongst others by Veterans Today Editor-in-Chief Gordon Duff. I do not doubt that the United States recovered a total of two ex-Kursk warheads, which had been in East London. So far as I am aware, that is the position of Japanese Intelligence and, in private at least, is the position of the Japanese Government.

I did agree to give evidence for the defence at Mr. Shrimptons trial in London in November 2014. He and I had hoped that I could do that via video-link from Tokyo. When that application was refused he put me in contact with a person in the United States, on the Eastern Seaboard, in possession of a large bank of frequent flyer miles on Delta Airlines.

That person arranged a confirmed seat for me, in my Japanese name, which appears in Hiragana script at the head of my statement, in Upper Class, on a Delta Airlines partner airline, Virgin Atlantic Airways, on their flight VA901 from Tokyos Narita Airport to London Heathrow Airport on Monday November 17 2014. Flight VA901 was scheduled to depart Narita at 1225 hours Japan Standard Time (JST).

My ticket was arranged over that weekend, i.e. the weekend of November 15 and November 16 2014. On Sunday morning November 16 I had to withdraw under pressure from the Japanese Finance Ministry, who arranged a tax audit overnight.

I have no reason to doubt that official pressure was applied to me to prevent me from flying to London to give evidence. I would have told the jury about 3/11 and what is written above, among other things.

In Mr. Shrimptons defense, I would also like to state that a simple internet search would have revealed that the WorldWide Web was full of articles about a nuclear terror threat to the London Olympics appearing long before Mr. Shrimpton made his warnings to the authorities. That alone should have been enough evidence to exonerate him.

I am prepared to attend Court and expand upon the above matters that I say are true and accurate to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Signed.

Dated..

Witnessed by .

Name of Witness 

Address of Witness.
Deal Announced



The Spanish political situation today is a lot different than a week ago. New elections were at hand in Catalonia if pro-independence parties could not resolve their differences.



Today, the bickering parties set aside those differences in a striking deal to form a new government, guaranteed to raise a strong reaction from Madrid.



To understand what led up to today's announcement, let's backtrack to fill in a few pieces.



On January 3, the Financial Times reported Leadership divisions deal a blow to Catalan hopes for independence.



The two main independence parties  the mainstream Junts pel Si movement and the anti-capitalist CUP  won a majority of seats in the Catalan parliament in a landmark regional election last September. Since then, however, the CUP has made it clear that it will not support Artur Mas, the current regional president and the de facto leader of Junts pel Si, for another term in office.



Mr Mas, a relatively late convert to Catalan independence, is seen by many CUP leaders and activists as too centrist and business-friendly. The Catalan president has also been damaged by a string of corruption scandals that hit his party over the past year.



The rejection of Mr Mas leaves the broader Catalan independence campaign in a difficult position  and with a clear sense of an opportunity wasted.



For the Spanish government, meanwhile, Sundays decision will come as a relief. Madrid is fiercely opposed to Catalan independence, arguing that Spanish regions have no right of self-determination and that any step towards separation from Spain violates the constitution.



With the Catalan independence camp in disarray, Spains mainstream parties can focus on resolving their own political dilemma: last months general election produced a highly fragmented parliament, with no party close to holding a governing majority.

The two pro-independence parties in the Spanish region of Catalonia have struck a last-minute deal to form a new government, after regional president Artur Mas agreed to step aside and let another politician lead the planned push towards secession.



Confirming his decision in a press conference on Saturday evening, Mr Mas said: The most important principle is the country and its people. They stand above any party and above any person. Mr Mas and other independence leaders had until midnight on Sunday to either form a new regional government or resign themselves to an early election.



The decision is likely to have important repercussions both for the region and for Spain at large. The new Catalan government plans to steer the region towards a historic break with Spain over the next 18 months, by effectively setting up a state within the state  from a Catalan central bank to a separate tax authority.



Any such move is certain to invite a furious reaction from Madrid. In the short term, the Catalan accord is also likely to raise the pressure on Spanish political leaders from the centre-right to the centre-left to set aside their differences and form a strong unionist government. Party leaders in Madrid have been at loggerheads since Spains inconclusive general election last month, which left even the strongest party  the ruling Popular party of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy  far from a governing majority.



Mr Rajoy has repeatedly urged the centre-left Socialists to support him as part of a national unity government designed to fend off the Catalan challenge. That appeal is now certain to gain in urgency.



Saturdays deal marks a striking reversal for Mr Mas and his Junts pel Si movement, which had insisted until the last moment that it would not sacrifice the veteran leader. But with talks deadlocked, and a repeat election moving ever closer, Mr Mas finally agreed to make way for a party colleague, Carles Puigdemont, the mayor of Girona. The former journalist and editor is expected to be voted in as president of Catalonia in a special session of the regional parliament on Sunday.



The decision to swap out presidents followed months of talks between Junts pel Si, the more mainstream of the independence parties, and the Popular Unity Candidacy (CUP), a far-left secessionist group. Last September, the two parties won a majority of seats in the Catalan parliament, but then fell out over the issue of who should lead the next regional government.



Mr Mass Junts pel Si party is by far the bigger of the two, holding 62 of the 135 seats in the Catalan parliament. But the CUP, a fiercely anti-capitalist party that rejects Catalan membership of both the EU and Nato, refused to back him.

People's Party PP (Conservatives): 123 seats, 28% of vote

PSOE (Socialists): 90 seats, 22% of Vote

Podemos (Eurosceptic, Anti-Austerity Socialists): 69 seats, 20.5% of vote

Ciudadanos (Anti-corruption, nationalistic party): 40 seats, 14% of vote

Others: 28 Seats

The sigh of relief in Madrid was short-lived. At the last minute, a deal has been announced that will make matters worse for Madrid than if CUP had gone along with Artur Mas as president.The new president will likely take an even firmer stance on independence, not only from Spain, but the EU.Expect a major reaction from Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy soon.Please consider Pro-Independence Spanish Parties Strike Deal to Form Government The December 20, Spanish national election left Spain in political shambles.I wrote about the results in Spanish Election: Two-party Dominance Ends; Rojoy's PP Party Fails to Win Majority; Vote Buying Spanish Style; Fragile Coalition Possibilities Here were the results (revised slightly from my original post)Many expected PP and Ciudadanos would have enough seats form a majority. Ciudadanos had been polling above 20% with Podemos sinking.Like PP, Ciudadanos is very much against the separatists in Catalonia, and very pro-euro.But 123 + 40 does not reach the 176 needed for an outright majority.Most of those "other" seats are for various separatist parties. So don't count on those votes.The socialists and conservatives could form a government, but how stable would that be?PSOE, Podemos, and Ciudadanos could in theory form a coalition but huge philosophical differences abound. Podemos is eurosceptic while Ciudadanos is very pro-Europe. In addition, Podemos is open to separatist elections and Ciudadanos would never go along.Ciudadanos, an anti-corruption party can hardly strike a deal with the corrupt and ruling PP without losing face. And even if it did, the votes are not there. Podemos is in the same boat.Prime minister Mariano Rajoy will likely appeal to all the other parties as a way to counteract the Catalan independence movement, but socialists and conservative don't mix well and the resultant government would be very weak.Look for intense pressure from many quarters for a PP/PSOE alliance just to keep the separatists at bay.The Catalonia regional election will stand. But new national elections still seem likely, with unknown consequences.Mike "Mish" Shedlock
Gov. Andrew Cuomo is looking to provide a strong consolidation plan with millions in aid from the state.

The governor's latest proposal is to hold a competition between municipalities to see who can develop the best approach for municipal consolidation. The plan that will lead to the largest permanent reduction in property taxes will win $20 million.

"This competition will help local governments find innovative ways to reduce costs and lower taxes for their constituents  which will make it cheaper to live, work and thrive in their communities," Cuomo said. "This is about building a stronger and more prosperous New York over the long haul, and I am eager to help our local partners across the state move forward."

According to Cuomo's office, the $20 million prize would be the largest incentive offered to encourage local governments to consolidate and share services.

It's not the only proposal Cuomo will include in his 2016-17 executive budget to reduce the number of local governments. His spending plan includes an additional $50 million to encourage municipalities to consolidate or identify other ways to save taxpayer dollars.

Cuomo will roll out his complete 2016 agenda Wednesday in Albany.
CEDAR RAPIDS  In the wake of Gov. Terry Branstads unilateral actions to close mental health hospitals, shift management of a state-run health care program to private companies, create a tax break for manufacturing companies and veto millions of dollars of education funding, legislative Democrats are in no mood to forgive or forget as they begin an election-year session.

Branstad, the longest-serving governor in American history, says its time to turn the page. He wants to focus on joint accomplishments  property tax reform education reform, expanding health care and broadband access, and accelerating improvements to the state transportation system.

Even with a split Legislature, weve been able to accomplish a lot of things, he said. This is a new year. We need to focus on the future and not look back at the past.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, agreed.

Dwelling on the past isnt productive, he said. Its clear the governor, once the Legislature adjourns, will do whatever the heck he wants to do. Thats the reality we will deal with.

It may not be that easy, warned House Minority Leader Mark Smith, D-Marshalltown, who said the relationship between the GOP governor and Democrats is damaged, but not destroyed.

He puts the onus on Branstad to demonstrate that lawmakers can trust him as they negotiate to find common ground on myriad issues. In 2015, lawmakers thought they had, but then the governor vetoed $56 million for public education projects, calling the use of one-time funds unreliable budgeting.

It wasnt only Democrats who were disappointed by that veto.

House Speaker-Select Linda Upmeyer, R-Clear Lake, said Republicans were not happy with Branstads veto of funding because thats what we agreed to and thats what we hoped would happen.

The key to getting beyond last years disappointments may be a quick agreement on K-12 school funding.

The litmus test will be education funding, speculated Rep. Ken Rizer, R-Cedar Rapids. If we get that done in 30 days that will be an indicator of how the session will go. Im hopeful.

However, House Republicans and the governor seem to be proposing a 2 percent increase while Democrats want at least 4 percent.

It doesnt help that the governor has come up with plan to pit water quality funding against education funding, said Rep. Sharon Steckman, D-Mason City, a member of the House Education Committee.

She was referring to Branstads proposal to extend a 1-cent sales tax earmarked for school infrastructure for 20 years, but share the revenue with water quality programs.

Rep. Todd Taylor, D-Cedar Rapids, assumes Upmeyer wants a honeymoon period when she is sworn in Monday as the first female Speaker of the House.

If she wants to get off on right foot, she will deal with education funding appropriately and early, he said. If not, it will send a loud message to us that she wants business as usual.

Its in her best interest to take that issue off the table or well use that in the election, Taylor added.

Election-year politics can make sessions in even-numbered years more interesting and often more difficult.

Smith doesnt think the November election will hinder legislative action, but Sen. David Johnson, R-Ocheyedan, predicted Democrats will want to spend a lot of time talking about privatizing the management of Medicaid and education funding.

Those issues are going to consume a lot of microphone time in the Senate every morning for a while, Johnson said, referring to senators speaking on points of personal privilege. They're going to try to politicize them because this is an election year. Theres just no question about it.

He also noted that at least two senators, Democrat Rob Hogg of Cedar Rapids and Republican Mark Chelgren of Ottumwa, are running for Congress and may be using their microphone time to deliver campaign-like speeches.

Steckman said she wouldnt be surprised if House Democrats dont use the same tactic to make their points.

When you're in the minority you feel thats all you have  your voice, because the majority party doesnt have to look at bills and amendments offered by the minority, she said.

Election-year sessions are supposed to be 100 days  10 days shorter than odd-numbered year sessions. The need to get out on the campaign trail is motivation to finish our work early, Taylor said.

Smith agreed that the need to campaign, especially in a year House Democrats hope to regain the majority, will motivate people, but that isnt what will determine when lawmakers adjourn.

Whether that happens or not will depend on how things are proposed, how willing we are to work through these issues and for there to be compromise for that to be accomplished, he said. If theres not much willingness, then well be here quite a while.

Gronstal said its too early to know if lawmakers will meet the April 19 soft deadline.

Theres always a little more politics in the election years, he said. Ive always thought we should do the states business in this building and to our own political business after the sessions over. That would be my goal.
WAVERLY | Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has been making the case for the past eight months for a national discussion on issues ranging from income inequality to youth unemployment to criminal justice reform to reining in big banks.

Now, hes added a talking point: making the case for himself.

There are some people who suggest that, Well, Bernie Sanders might be a nice guy, or not a nice guy  but, you know what, he cant win. He cant win, so dont bother voting Bernie because he cant win. Let me respectfully disagree with that statement, Sanders told a crowd of more than 600 gathered at Wartburg College on Friday afternoon.

He didnt invoke his Democratic primary challengers as he described his ability to raise funds -- receiving a record 2.5 million individual donations without super political action committee support -- and the polls showing him with a potential to win some early states.

Instead, Sanders, an Independent United States senator from Vermont, pointed to a Quinnipiac poll last month that shows him 13 percentage points ahead of Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump.

But as Sanders worked through his usual talking points, he made sure to draw a contrast with his current main political rival, Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, on a few key issues. Sanders is an average of 12.5 percentage points behind Clinton in Iowa, according to Real Clear Politics, but leads in some polls in New Hampshire.

Sanders on Friday held a news conference in Cedar Rapids to distinguish himself from Clinton on paid family medical leave. He told the Wartburg crowd that Clinton didnt support Senate legislation sponsored by 19 senators, including himself, that would increase payroll taxes $1.61 a week in order to fund three months of paid family leave for new parents and people with illnesses.

I like the idea of a small increase in the payroll tax, because it reminds me very much of what Franklin Delano Roosevelt did with Social Security, and it reminds me of what Lyndon Baines Johnson did on Medicare. When people pay into something, they own it; they are invested in it; and nobody is going to take it away from us, Sanders said to applause.

He contrasted that with Clinton who does not support the tax increase.

Clintons campaign, however, has said that this is not a new issue for her, and shes been advocating on the issue for decades.

Were glad that Sen. Sanders agrees with Hillary Clinton that workers should have 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave and seven paid sick days a year, Clinton campaign Senior Policy Advisor Ann OLeary, said in a statement.Hillary believes we can do this without asking working people to pay for it. Her view is we can ask the wealthy to pay their fair share in taxes and that will cover paid leave.

Sanders also drew a contrast with Clinton on the issue of reining in Wall Street, saying Wall Street analysts will say only Sanders proposals make them nervous.

As Sanders ticked down the issues, he did not need to convince Crescos Miles Hayes.

Hayes earned praise from Sanders -- who said Hayes actions speak to his courage and dignity -- and applause from the audience for sharing his story that showed why Sanders issues spoke so deeply to him. The Iowa State graduate left school $93,000 in debt, and is now working on community sustainability while trying to start a sustainability nonprofit and raising a family in Iowa.

After the event, Hayes said hes planning to caucus for Sanders. He said despite Clintons proposals to address climate change, he sees her as someone beholden to Wall Street and willing to say anything to win rather than holding true to her beliefs.

Bernie Sanders says it all and Im not going to say it better than he does, Hayes said of what he likes about Sanders. Bernie looks me in the eye and he sees me as a human being.
Estimados amigos,

Les doy cordialmente la bienvenida a este Blog informativo con articulos, analisis y comentarios de publicaciones especializadas y especialmente seleccionadas, principalmente sobre temas economicos, financieros y politicos de actualidad, que esperamos y deseamos, sean de su maximo interes, utilidad y conveniencia.

Pensamos que solo comprendiendo cabalmente el presente, es que podemos proyectarnos acertadamente hacia el futuro.

Las convicciones son mas peligrosos enemigos de la verdad que las mentiras.

There are decades when nothing happens and there are weeks when decades happen.

You only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out.

No soy alguien que sabe, sino alguien que busca.

Only Gold is money. Everything else is debt.

Las grandes almas tienen voluntades; las debiles tan solo deseos.

Quien no lo ha dado todo no ha dado nada.

History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.

If you know the other and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.

We are travelers on a cosmic journey, stardust, swirling and dancing in the eddies and whirlpools of infinity. Life is eternal. We have stopped for a moment to encounter each other, to meet, to love, to share.This is a precious moment. It is a little parenthesis in eternity.
Flood Map allows you to view the risk of flooding at any location in the world. Using flood map you can set a water elevation height for ...
The Gorilla Radio archive can be found at: www.Gorilla-Radio.com. G-Radio is dedicated to social justice, the environment, community, and providing a forum for people and issues not covered in State and Corporate media. Gorilla Radio airs live Thursdays between 11-12 noon Pacific Time. Airing in Victoria at 101.9FM, and featured on the internet at: http://cfuv.ca and www.pacificfreepress.com. And check out Pacific Free Press on Twitter @Paciffreepress
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Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2022. Donate today
A Brooklyn woman alleged this week that she was unlawfully strip searched by a female NYPD officer after she jumped a turnstile during a 2014 incident.

Tynneal Grant, 33, testified about her traumatic run in with Officer Shaquanna White in June 2014 during a departmental trial on Friday. Grant said that the incident was sparked when she accidentally swiped to get onto the Manhattan-bound platform of the Nostrand Avenue subway station just before midnight on June 2nd.

According to the Times, a clerk sent her to the Far Rockaway platform "with the promise that someone there would help her get through without having to pay again." When no one appeared, she hopped the turnstile, which is when she crossed paths with White.

White took her to Transit Bureau District 30 station house, and told her to lift her shirt and unzip her pants. When Grant objectedshe wasn't wearing a braWhite told her, "If you dont I will." The Times explains that Civilian Complaint Review Board prosecutor Heather Cook went after White:

Ms. Cook argued that those actions constituted a strip search, which the departments patrol guide defines as any search in which an individuals undergarments (e.g., bra, underwear, etc.) and/or private areas are exposed. The patrol guide says a strip search of a prisoner may not be conducted routinely in connection with an arrest, but rather only in situations where an officer reasonably suspects that a prisoner is hiding weapons or contraband. In a routine search, officers are instructed to check pockets and slide their hands across someones clothes. Officer White, in her testimony, said that she did not suspect that Ms. Grant had anything dangerous. But she said that she typically had women shake out their bras during routine searches to make sure nothing was hidden there. When Ms. Grant said she was not wearing one, I told her that I need to see, Officer White testified.

White's lawyer argued that she never had any physical contact with the suspect, and was only doing her job: "God forbid police officers do their job. I guess if Officer White had control of gravity they [overalls] wouldnt have fallen, he said.

But Cook countered that White "has been violating the women" for years through misunderstanding what constitutes a lawful strip search: "Fear humiliation, shame that is what this case is about," she said. "This is a straightforward case of a veteran officer who shouldve known better."

Grant was ultimately released without charges from the turnstile incident. The judge in White's case will make a recommendation to Police Commissioner Bratton about whether she should be reprimanded for the incident.
La tricolor, la de la estrella solitaria, la mas linda de todas. Distintos apelativos para hablar de la bandera nacional, la cual se oficializo en 1818. Pero, sabias que la bandera chilena actual no ha sido siempre la misma? Antes de nuestra bandera hubo dos mas. Conoce mas detalles sobre este tema. Durante la etapa de la Patria Vieja, por iniciativa de Jose Miguel Carrera, Chile tuvo su primera bandera, con tres franjas: azul, blanca y amarilla, que representaban la majestad, la ley y la fuerza, atributos del estado, segun el literato Camilo Henriquez o, segun otra teoria, el cielo, la nieve cordillerana y los campos de dorados trigales. Flameo por primera vez, el 4 de julio de 1812, bordada por Javiera Carrera, hermana de Jose Miguel, siendo ella quien inculco el ideal de la independencia, a sus hermanos menores. El 30 de septiembre fue al igual que la escarapela, oficialmente adoptada, aunque ningun decreto legalizo su uso. La vida de este simbolo se extinguio, luego
Employment Pathways is a new program administered by Cayuga/Seneca Community Action Agency and located at Cayuga Community College Cayuga Works Career Center. This program is funded with Community Services Block Grant Workforce Development Discretionary Funds through the state Department of State. The Employment Pathways Program connects underemployed or unemployed income-eligible individuals and families with the resources required to move from poverty to economic self-sufficiency. Along with connecting people to local job opportunities, Employment Pathways coordinates local support services, employers, education and soft skills training through extensive case management designed to help overcome barriers to long-term employment and self-sustainability.

The agency has partnered with the Cayuga County Department of Social Services, Cayuga Works Career Center, Cayuga Community College, Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES and several local employers, including TRW Automotive, to address barriers to obtaining and/or retaining employment within our community. Some of the barriers include education, training and/or soft skills deficits, unreliable or no transportation, child care and housing issues, and the shortage of living wage jobs. This collaborative effort engages public, private and nonprofit sectors to connect people in poverty with the community resources necessary to travel the pathway to economic stability.

Employment Pathways provides participants with the opportunity to overcome the hurdles of obtaining and retaining full-time employment. The program focuses on the individual needs of each participant to help ensure their success in the program. Critical soft skills training focuses not only on completing applications, resume writing and interviewing skills, but it also emphasizes a strong work ethic, employer expectations and life management skills.

Subsidies primarily offset the cost to pursue a state High School Equivalency Diploma, or a certificate or degree program offered through Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES or Cayuga Community College, within a local growth field. For example, BOCES offers Certified Nurse Aid and Commercial Drivers License training to prepare program participants for employment in the health and trucking industries; Cayuga Community College offers a Plastics Operator Technology Program to prepare program participants for employment in the plastics industry. Financial assistance is also available to offset ancillary costs including, but not limited to transportation, child care, uniforms and books, to ensure the success of each individual participant.

One program participant who is currently receiving public assistance is now enrolled in the BOCES CNA program. Her family has an income below the federal poverty level, and struggles to make ends meet in a difficult economy. By completing CNA training and acquiring her state license, this mother of three will be prepared for a full-time career in the medical field with room for advancement and job stability. It is the goal of Employment Pathways to follow this young woman through her training and to ensure assistance with any obstacles that may arise that could hinder her success, and to assist her in obtaining employment in her field once training is completed.

The Cayuga/Seneca Community Action Agency looks forward to assisting income-eligible families on their path to economic self-sufficiency. Through successful partnerships and utilization of community programs and services, Employment Pathways strives to make a difference in the lives of participants not only in the short term, but along the pathway of their future as well.

To support the Employment Pathways program, CSCAA is seeking donations to help expand Attire for Hire, which provides underemployed and unemployed individuals with the appropriate professional attire to attend job interviews and/or work within their chosen field. We are currently seeking donations of gently used professional clothing: Dockers, scrubs, dress shoes and other work-appropriate attire. Program participants are also in need of everyday clothing for themselves and their children and small household items including silverware, pots and pans, towels and washcloths, and personal care items. Clothing and small household items may be dropped off to our free clothing site, located at 4 Garfield St. in Auburn, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Mondays and Wednesdays, and 3 to 7 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays. Personal care items, including shampoo and conditioner, soap, razors, laundry detergent, toilet paper, diapers, baby wipes and feminine products, may be dropped off to our agency headquarters located at 89 York St., Suite 1, in Auburn, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays.
News

Husband demands wife to pay Dhs500,000 over false accusation of her jewellery theft in Abu Dhabi

The court explained that the wife used her legitimate right guaranteed to her by law when she resorted to the competent authorities to report the thef...
The Auburn location of Tanning Bed has closed due to the acquisition of the company by Zoom Tan.

The 104 North St. business has paperwork in its door describing the change, which was announced Dec. 29.

"We were very happy to reach a deal with Zoom Tan that will offer our clients more locations and more flexibility (than) they had before," Tanning Bed President Dan Humiston said in the release.

Zoom Tan, based in Naples, Florida, has 91 locations in the United States, including one in Fingerlakes Crossing at 1578 Clark St. Road, Aurelius. At all locations, the paperwork says, the company will honor all Tanning Bed packages and memberships.

Tanning Bed had 18 locations in New York state, making it the third largest chain in New York. Zoom Tan is the largest in the state, and the fourth largest in the country.

The Auburn Tanning Bed opened in 1998, according to The Citizen archives, and almost doubled in size and bed count the following year.

Ron Alscheimer, owner of The Plaza Group that owns the plaza that housed Tanning Bed, said he is talking with a few possible new tenants. He expects to know who'll move into the space by the end of next week, he said.

Are you a former employee or customer of the Auburn location of Tanning Bed, and interested in speaking to The Citizen? Contact David Wilcox at (315) 282-2245 or david.wilcox@lee.net.
-- Thomas JeffersonSyndicated columnist Charley Reese (1937-2013): "Gun control by definition affects only honest people. When a politician tells you he wants to forbid you from owning a firearm or force you to get a license, he is telling you he doesnt trust you. Thats an insult. ... Gun control is not about guns or crime. It is about an elite that fears and despises the common people."The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles -- Jeff Cooper (1920-2006)Note for non-American readers: Crime reports from America which describe an offender just as a "teen" or "teenager" almost invariably mean a BLACK teenager.We are advised to NOT judge ALL Muslims by the actions of a few lunatics, but we are encouraged to judge ALL gun owners by the actions of a few lunatics.Two lines below of a famous hymn that would be incomprehensible to Leftists today ("honor"? "right"? "freedom?" Freedom to agree with them is the only freedom they believe in)It is of course the hymn of the USMC -- still today the relentless warriors that they always were.The intellectual Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius (AD 121-180) said: "The object in life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane."How much do you know about Trayvon Martin? It's all here (Backups here and here An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life. -- Robert A. HeinleinAfter all the serious stuff here, maybe we need a funny picture of a cantankerous cat
After considerable research on the topic of Crumb Rubber Synthetic Turf playing fields, we have decided to vote NO on the Wednesday, Jan. 13 ballot. The potential health risks to our children trumps all arguments supporting the installation of such toxic material.

The fact is, no government agency has concluded artificial turf is safe, not the EPA or the CPSC. The industry gains financially from our use of these fields and has paid consultants to conclude safety assurances. Sadly, the Auburn school district has relied almost exclusively on the industry sales teams for the information they provided the taxpayers. In addition, the EPA, CPSC and CDC each warn players to take precautions when using Synthetic Turf fields. State and local entities are deciding to postpone or abort artificial turf to invest in properly built, properly maintained grass fields instead. Why?

Crumb rubber contains dozens of complex hydrocarbons, heavy metals, carbon black and secret ingredients that are combined to create vulcanized rubber. The tire crumb, once pulverized to bird-shot-sized granules, continues to break down through the friction of play and exposure to the unrelenting ultra violet light from the sun. As the crumb rubber is worn down to dust, every component and molecule within it can become airborne to interact with the natural and human environment.

Public health toxicologist David Brown said the government failed the people. The studies that have been done are narrow and mostly funded by the industry or waste bureaus trying to get rid of tires, said Brown, who is the past chief of environmental epidemiology at Connecticuts Department of Public Health and currently works with the Connecticut-based advocacy group Environmental and Human Health Inc., which opposes the use of recycled tires where children play due to health concerns.

The objective work that needs to be done hasnt been done, Brown said. I see it as a governmental failure across the board that we should try to learn from. Until science concludes that crumb rubber is safe for our children, we will continue to oppose any efforts to install Synthetic Turf fields in Auburn. Check out these web sites for more information. http://www.safehealthyplayingfields.org/, and http://synturf.org

David J. McCarthy and Mary Payne McCarthy

Auburn
A history blog, focusing primarily on the author's research and reading in American (particularly colonial, Revolutionary, and Native American) history.
JUAREZ -- Only half of the 80,000 volunteers needed to form a 25-mile-long human fence to protect Pope Francis during his visit to the city Feb. 17 have registered for the task, according to the Juarez Diocese.

However, church officials hope more residents from both sides of the border will keep volunteering and help meet the goal by the end of January.

"To be part of the human chain is a guaranteed place to see the pope front row," said the Rev. Mario Manriquez, the Juarez Diocese's general coordinator for the papal visit to Juarez. "Those volunteers will be able to see him two times along the pope's route -- one time when he arrives to Juarez and the other one when he leaves."

The diocese began looking for volunteers in mid-December to form the shoulder-to-shoulder human chain.

They will be stationed along the pontiff's route -- keeping the public off the street. The pope's motorcade will mostly use Avenida Panamericana, also known as Avenida Tecnologico.

So far, there are about 40,000 volunteers from Juarez, El Paso and other nearby cities from both sides of the border, including Phoenix, Albuquerque and Delicias, Chihuahua, Manriquez said. Most are in their 20s, 30s and 40s.

Manriquez said that the first group of volunteers began training Tuesday morning with members of the Civil Protection Department at the Santa Teresa de Jesus Parish at the Oasis Revolucion neighborhood in southwest Juarez.

About 30 volunteers had a two-hour class mostly on how to provide first aid and how to keep themselves and others safe by preventing accidents, Manriquez said. Two other same-size groups were scheduled to receive training the same day.

The Rev. Beto Luna, of the Corpus Christi Parish, who is the coordinator of the Human Chain Commission, said recently that some of the volunteers will be given instructions on how to coordinate with staff from the Estado Mayor Presidencial, or the presidential guard, the institution charged with protecting and safeguarding the Mexican president.

He said the presidential guard is expected to be placed along the pope's route and a couple of streets from the main roads where the popemobile will travel.

Church officials said the volunteers also will be asked to meet with homeowners and business owners along the pope's route so that they may provide shelter, food, water and bathrooms for those who will line the streets for hours to get a glimpse of the pope.

The Rev. Heziquio Trevizo, spokesman for the Juarez Diocese, estimated that about 800,000 people will be in the streets wanting to see Francis in the popemobile.

That is why it is critical that all volunteers receive training, Manriquez added.

He said there will be as many as three two-hour classes on a daily basis at the Santa Teresa de Jesus Parish until the end of January. Volunteers will only need to take one class, which is free.

Church officials have said all volunteers in the human chain would need to pass a background check before being accepted. The volunteers will wear white T-shirts with a logo and hats for identification.

They estimated that the human chain will be 25 miles long and will begin to form at 6 a.m. -- about four hours before Francis' arrival. The line is expected to extend from Abraham Gonzalez International Airport to the old Juarez fairgrounds next to Benito Juarez Olympic Stadium, where the pope will celebrate Mass.

A second line will extend from Cereso state prison No. 3 to the Colegio de Bachilleres Gymnasium to the Seminario Conciliar, where the pontiff will stop.

To become a volunteer to form the human chain, call the Corpus Christi Parish in Juarez at 011-52-656-647-1301 or call the Santa Teresa de Jesus Parish in Juarez at 011-52-656-324-17-76.

Lorena Figueroa may be reached at 546-6129; lfigueroa@elpasotimes.com; @LFigueroaEPT on Twitter.
When a rare artifact disappeared from the Montana Historical Society Museum in 2003, there were no suspects nor any real clues as to what happened to the Sioux pipe bag.

"It was kind of an unsolved mystery at the time," said Sgt. Jayson Zander with the Helena Police Department.

The pipe bag was one of many artifacts stolen from Montana museums in that era. The FBI began a case investigating the thieved relics. A suspect was named, but he died in 2005 before any charges were filed, Zander said.

More than a decade passed before the piece was thought of again. This summer, the chief of security for the museum began searching for the pipe bag online.

"Lo and behold, he found it listed on a collector website," Zander said.

It had been sold in Wyoming to a collector in Texas in 2009, he said. Helena police were then asked to assist.

"This particular type of pipe bag is very rare," Zander said. "I felt that we needed to look into it."

The green hue of the leather on the bag is distinctive and led to the retrieval of the artifact, he said.

"We were able to positively identify it as the same pipe bag," Zander said. "They (the auction house) had no idea it was stolen."

The bag had been purchased for $1,900. The auction company offered to refund the collector's money and the owner accepted.

Last week, the pipe bag was returned to Helena and the museum.

"This is a unique bag and it's beautiful," said Amanda Trum, a curator of collections at the museum.

The bag, adorned with beads and porcupine quills, was in the Montana Homeland Exhibit when it disappeared. It was donated to the museum in the 1950s.

The original theft of the bag, its travels and trail of ownership are still under investigation, said museum staff.

This was a very rare theft in the history of MHS. The bag is an important part of Montana history, and we are extremely happy to have it back because it belongs to all of the people of Montana, said Bruce Whittenberg, director of the Montana Historical Society.
Montana State Parks had another banner visitation year in 2015, setting a record for the third consecutive year.

Parks saw more than 2.48 million visitors last year -- up 11 percent from the previous record in 2014 and 34 percent above the 10-year average. Parks officials cite strong visitation in shoulder seasons from February to April and October and November as a major factor in the record.

Were encouraged to see our state park visitation continue to set record numbers in 2015, said Chas Van Genderen, Montana State Parks administrator. Increased park visitation is positive news for Montanas families, communities and local economies as well. Montanas residents and out-of-state visitors understand the value that our park system brings to our great state.

Montana State Parks has faced increasing demand, but has a smaller budget than the state parks in most other western states. The department has a $16 million maintenance backlog and a less than $8 million annual budget.

The funding issue is at the center of the recently released strategic plan for the parks, which calls for prioritizing significant sites and the possible divestment of less significant sites.

In a response to the financial woes, parks supporters launched the Montana State Parks Foundation last year. While the association likely will not directly raise funds, organizers hope it can bring new money and programing into the system while also developing an organized constituency.

While the visitation is reason to celebrate, the shift in seasonal interest presents a challenge, said Pat Doyle, Montana State Parks communication and marketing manager.

It was such a warm shoulder season  the weather was just incredible, he said. But when we have really warm shoulder seasons we may not be adequately staffed for that level of visitation. So its really great to have so many people coming out, but its a challenge for us with how to balance that.

Montana residents made up the bulk of visitors with more than 1.9 million visits.

North central Montana had the highest number of visitors regionally, with nearly 728,000.

Giant Springs State Park near Great Falls was the most-visited park statewide, with 419,800 visits. Rounding out the top five were Flathead Lake State Park with 281,000 visits, Cooney State Park near Roberts with 184,790, Lake Elmo State Park near Billings with 172,200 and Spring Meadow Lake State Park near Helena with 172,000.

Spring Meadow had a big year by local standards, with visitation up 30,000 visits, or 21 percent, over 2014.

Although new to the park, Spring Meadow Manager Craig Putchat suspected warm weather and a better tally of school groups coming over from the nearby Montana WILD education center contributed to the strong count. The park tracked the same statewide uptick with drive-in visitors, but there is an unknown level of visitation from those walking in, he said.

Putchat said after his first month on the job that he is looking at what works well and where improvement may be needed at Spring Meadow. Dog walking in the park has become a hot-button issue, he said.

Theres a big push from some folks to ban dogs year-round, but there are a large number of people who are walking dogs in the winter and 95 percent of them are responsible, he said.

Dogs are prohibited at Spring Meadow in the summer months but are allowed on-leash during the winter. Putchat wants the leash regulation strongly enforced and has added extra signage and encourages visitors witnessing a violation to report it.

Rather than making a hasty decision and prohibiting dogs, we want people to call our wardens so we can take care of the problem, he said.
This blog is written solely by John Ray, who has a Ph.D. degree in psychology and 200+ papers published in the academic journals of the social sciences. It does occasionally comment on issues in psychology but is mainly aimed at giving a conservative psychologist's view on a broad range of topics. There are very few conservative psychologists.The blog originated in Australia and many (but not most) posts discuss Australian matters. Australians have an unusually good awareness of events outside their own country. Australian newspapers feature news from Britain and the USA not as an afterthought but as a major part of their coverage. So Australians do tend to have a truly Western heart, which is the reason behind the old name for this blog. So events in Australia, Britain and the USA all feature frequently here, plus occasional coverage of other places, particularly Israel.SCOTUS is the Supreme Court of the United States, the highest court in the landThe "GOP" stands for "Grand Old Party" and refers to the Republican party. The GOP is at present center/Right, while the Democrats have been undergoing a steady drift Leftwards and now have policies similar to mainstream European Leftist parties.The ideological identity of both parties has however been very fluid -- almost reversing itself over time. In the mid 19th century, the GOP was the party of big government and concern for minorities while the Democrats advertised themselves as "The party of the white man" -- an orientation that lasted into the mid 20th century in the South. The Democrats are still obsessed with race but have now flipped into support for discrimination AGAINST whites.Was Pope Urban VIII the first Warmist? Below we see him refusing to look through Galileo's telescope. People tend to refuse to consider evidence if what they might discover contradicts what they believe.Climate scientist Lennart Bengtsson said. The warming we have had the last 100 years is so small that if we didnt have meteorologists and climatologists to measure it we wouldnt have noticed it at all.The term "Fascism" is mostly used by the Left as a brainless term of abuse. But when they do make a serious attempt to define it, they produce very complex and elaborate definitions -- e.g. here and here . In fact, Fascism is simply extreme socialism plus nationalism. But great gyrations are needed to avoid mentioning the first part of that recipe, of course.Beatrice Webb, a founder of the London School of Economics and the Fabian Society, and married to a Labour MP, mused in 1922 on whether when English children were "dying from lack of milk", one should extend "the charitable impulse" to Russian and Chinese children who, if saved this year, might anyway die next. Besides, she continued, there was "the larger question of whether those races are desirable inhabitants" and "obviously" one wouldn't "spend one's available income" on "a Central African negro".Hugh Dalton, offered the Colonial Office during Attlee's 1945-51 Labour government, turned it down because "I had a horrid vision of pullulating, poverty stricken, diseased nigger communities, for whom one can do nothing in the short run and who, the more one tries to help them, are querulous and ungrateful."The book,, authored by T.W. Adorno et al. in 1950, has been massively popular among psychologists. It claims that a set of ideas that were popular in the "Progressive"-dominated America of the prewar era were "authoritarian". Leftist regimes always are authoritarian so that claim was not a big problem. What was quite amazing however is that Adorno et al. identified such ideas as "conservative". They were in fact simply popular ideas of the day but ones that had been most heavily promoted by the Left right up until the then-recent WWII. See here for details of prewar "Progressive" thinking.R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reasonFranklin Delano Roosevelt was a war criminal. Both British and American codebreakers had cracked the Japanese naval code so FDR knew what was coming at Pearl Harbor. But for his own political reasons he warned no-one there. So responsibility for the civilian and military deaths at Pearl Harbor lies with FDR as well as with the Japanese. The huge firepower available at Pearl Harbor, both aboard ship and on land, could have largely neutered the attack. Can you imagine 8 battleships and various lesser craft firing all their AA batteries as the Japanese came in? The Japanese naval airforce would have been annihilated and the war would have been over before it began. FDR prolonged the Depression . He certainly didn't cure it. WWII did NOT end the Great Depression . It just concealed it. It in fact made living standards worse Joe McCarthy was eventually proved right after the fall of the Soviet Union. To accuse anyone of McCarthyism is to accuse them of accuracy! The KKK was intimately associated with the Democratic party . They ATTACKED Republicans!People who mention differences in black vs. white IQ are these days almost universally howled down and subjected to the most extreme abuse. I am a psychometrician, however, so I feel obliged to defend the scientific truth of the matter:The average African adult has about the same IQ as an average white 11-year-old and African Americans (who are partly white in ancestry) average out at a mental age of 14. The American Psychological Association is generally Left-leaning but it is the world's most prestigious body of academic psychologists. And even they have had to concede that sort of gap (one SD) in black vs. white average IQ. 11-year olds can do a lot of things but they also have their limits and there are times when such limits need to be allowed for. America's uncivil war was caused by trade protectionism . The slavery issue was just camouflage, as Abraham Lincoln himself admitted . See also here Leftist psychologists have an amusingly simplistic conception of military organizations and military men. They seem to base it on occasions they have seen troops marching together on parade rather than any real knowledge of military men and the military life. They think that military men are "rigid" -- automatons who are unable to adjust to new challenges or think for themselves. What is incomprehensible to them is that being(to use the extreme Prussian term for following orders) actually requires great flexibility -- enough flexibility to put your own ideas and wishes aside and do something very difficult. Ask any soldier if all commands are easy to obey.
Stacie Zanzucchi did not grow up in a family of teachers, but in her free time, she and her friends would pretend they were at school.

Lots of kids play house or doctor, Zanzucchi said. We played school and museum.

Even after pretending it as a child, Zanzucchi said she always thought she would be a lawyer or a social worker. She did not take education classes until her junior year of college, but ended up graduating from Northern Arizona University with a degree in Spanish Education.

Zanzucchi worked at Sinagua High School and became the principal at Marshall Elementary School before becoming the principal at Coconino High School.

Ive always loved school, she said. I get a lot of joy out of school and I want school to be enjoyable.

Zanzucchi is one of two principals in Coconino County to be honored as a Rodel Foundation Exemplary Principal. The award honors principals in high-need communities. As a winner, Zanzucchi will be required to mentor aspiring principals.

Its an honor, more than anything, Zanzucchi said when she found out she had been nominated. There are so many amazing principals in Flagstaff. We are fortunate to have a cohort of extraordinary leaders here.

Zanzucchi said she was most proud of the environment of CHS, one that she said creates a sense of belonging where everyone has a voice.

We teach everything here from behavior to academics, she said. We are always learning, growing and improving.

She said in order to create an environment where students can be their best, teachers must feel supported.

In order for the students to be highly successful, the teachers must be highly successful, Zanzucchi said. I dont want teachers to have to spend their own money on pencils or Post-It notes. Its the little things that make a big difference.

FUSD Superintendent Barbara Hickman, who nominated Zanzucchi for the award, said Zanzucchi is known to always support CHS students in their academics and extracurricular activities.

Mrs. Zanzucchi has an incredible passion for her job. She is deeply committed to the students and staff at Coconino High School, Hickman said in an email. Her attention to school climate and personal involvement with the success of her school has made significant and positive impacts on Coconino. She is a relentless believer in public school and the importance of academic achievement coupled with compassion.

Zanzucchi said balancing priorities is key to being a successful principal.

You have to be discerning about what is urgent at that moment, she said. You have to follow through and follow up. It can be an all-consuming job.

She said she devotes the first half hour of her work day to listening to messages, reading emails from parents, making sure substitutes are present for teachers who are out and making sure any problems are understood. But when students arrive she always makes herself visible.

She does formal observations inside classrooms and tries to informally visit classrooms throughout the day as well, in addition to meetings with students and parents daily.

Thats in the absence of any catastrophic event, Zanzucchi said, noting that those events happen often.

Zanzucchi said she is always open to creative input to solve problems, and she said prides the school and staff o- being flexible and creative with problem solving.

We need to create an exciting environment, Zanzucchi said. Find joy in the journey, and make sure all decisions come back to student learning.
DECATUR  Decatur Airport will soon offer more flights to Chicago O'Hare International Airport, a change that Decatur Park District leaders hope will boost traffic.

In fact, Air Choice One CEO Shane Storz is betting that it will. In a contract awarded last month, the U.S. Department of Transportation did not grant a higher subsidy amount to cover the extra flights to Chicago.

Storz said the company would cover the additional expense to test the market and see if the change drew more passengers.

We feel that with the partnership that we've built with the community, that we have to give it a chance, because the community so desires to keep the air service and we want to be there as long as the community wants us there, Storz said.

Ticket prices are not set to increase at this time. The company will begin offering 24 weekly round-trip flights to Chicago and 12 to St. Louis on Feb. 1 for a period of five months.

The airport's commercial air service is subsidized through the federal Essential Air Service program. St. Louis-based Air Choice One has served as Decatur's carrier since late 2009, and the most recent contract awarded it two more years with an annual subsidy of $2.9 million.

Park district leaders had supported more Chicago flights, rather than the current split of 18 weekly flights to each city. The department did not choose that option because the annual subsidy would be nearly $250,000 higher.

One major goal for Decatur is to reach 10,000 enplanements in a year, which would allow the airport to receive more federal money for infrastructure improvements. An enplanement represents a passenger boarding a flight that originates from the airport.

In 2015, the airline had 8,094 enplanements, said Decatur Airport Director Tim Wright. That's an increase from 6,686 in 2014 and 6,622 in 2013.

Park district officials and Storz hope that the additional flights to Chicago will help them pass that benchmark.

Park district Executive Director Bill Clevenger said data shows that Decatur passengers prefer the Chicago destination.

To add four trips daily will give our business community a real opportunity to get up there and back and do whatever they need to do with Chicago, and it gives us better options moving to other points around the country as well, he said.

Wright said the move was exciting and shows that Storz believes in the community.

It would also allow one plane to be kept overnight at Decatur Airport, meaning that bad weather in St. Louis would not delay the first flight of the day.

Shane has made the commitment to the community, Wright said. So now it's up to the community to support the airline that we have in Decatur and fill the seats.
MASON CITY, Iowa - Brian Snell of Nora Springs, Iowa, often gets calls from churches in northern Iowa, asking him if he would like to be their organist.

He has to turn them down because he's already playing at First United Methodist Church in Mason City.

As organists retire or pass away, there aren't enough replacements, said Snell, a retired teacher who has been playing church organs in Iowa for more than 35 years.

First Christian Church in Mason City has been without a regular organist for a long time, according to church council member Bob Ray.

"We have a nice organ, all in good condition and ready to go," he said.

Glennis Lee, who played the organ at First Christian for 35 years, died in 2012.

Ray said the church hired an organist after Lee's death, but she moved away from the area after about a year.

It's not easy to get qualified applicants, according to Ray.

Fortunately, the church is able to get a substitute organist a few times a year for services to keep the organ in tune, Ray said. Several area organists also are available to play at funerals, including Snell.

Snell is an on-call organist for several funeral homes. He plays the organ at funerals not only for churches that don't have an organist but also in cases where the regular organist has a day job and is not available during the week.

Snell also plays the organ at weddings.

Mary Jane Crail, who is in her 40th year as organist at the Clear Lake United Methodist Church, said several churches are now using praise bands or having someone play the piano.

Snell said fewer people play organ than play piano, noting the organ requires "a different touch" and more work with foot pedals.

The cost of repairing aging instruments is another reason fewer churches have organ music, Crail said.

Dwindling attendance at some churches can be an issue when it comes to deciding whether to spend the money to repair an organ, according to Crail.

Sometimes the thinking is "that's a lot of money to shell out for a few people to hear on Sunday morning," she said.

On the other hand, people often want organ music for weddings and funerals, according to Crail.

She said although organists in northern Iowa are getting older, there are some bright young stars.

Crail is a member of the North Iowa Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, which sponsors events such as the annual Brown Bag Bach organ concerts held over the noon hours at Trinity Lutheran Church in Mason City during Lent.

"Organ music hasn't died yet. We are still going pretty strong," Crail said.
MOSCOW -- For much of the Orthodox Christian world, Thursday is celebrated as Christmas Day. Believers in Russia, Ukraine, and parts of Eastern Europe and the Middle East flocked to churches for the holiday.

Some Orthodox churches follow the liturgical calendar observed by the Roman Catholic and Protestant churches and celebrate Christmas on Dec. 25.

A look at Christmas events throughout the world Thursday:_

RUSSIA

Russians flocked to churches for long and solemn Masses. At Moscow's enormous Christ The Savior Cathedral, the service began at 11 p.m. on Wednesday and stretched two and a half hours, led by Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill.

President Vladimir Putin attended a midnight service at a church in the village of Turginovo, 90 miles northwest of Moscow, where his parents were baptized.

In his Christmas greetings to the nation, Putin said: "It is very important in these days that the Russian Orthodox Church and other Christian confessions in Russia continue the traditions of responsible service, help people find belief and give them force in life. They participate actively in upbringing of the growing generations, in development of the institutes of family, maternity and childhood."

EGYPT

Egypt's Coptic Orthodox Christians celebrated Christmas Eve across the mainly Muslim country amid tightened security for fear of militant attacks, which have exponentially increased following the military overthrow of an Islamist president.

Roadblocks were set up before churches nationwide and cars and motorcycles were temporarily banned from idling in front of them, police Maj. Gen. Gamal Halawa said. In Cairo, police searched more than 300 churches for explosives.

Egypt's Orthodox Coptic Christians fervently supported the 2013 ouster of Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.

President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, who as military chief led Morsi's overthrow, gave a rare public apology for the attacks Wednesday in Cairo's St. Mark Cathedral, the papal seat. Egyptian presidents never attended Christmas Masses.

Egypt's Orthodox Coptic Christians make up about 10 percent of the country's 90 million people.

GEORGIA

In Tbilisi, the capital, the main avenue was crowded with colorfully dressed marchers in the traditional Christmas Day procession, collecting gifts and goods to donate to the needy.

The tradition, called "Alilo" (Glory to God), dates back centuries, when people would go out to collect alms for charity after Christmas Mass. It was banned during Soviet times, and restored only in 2000.

The procession included people dressed in robes displaying Georgia's national emblem of a red cross on white background and others in outfits symbolizing scenes of the Nativity. Some rode in carts pulled by donkeys or cattle, and other carried animal mock-ups including a camel and giraffe.

UKRAINE

President Petro Poroshenko and his family attended Christmas services at a village church in the Ivano-Frankiivsk region in the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains. According to the presidential news service, Poroshenko and others prayed for peace and reconciliation "on all Ukrainian land."

Conflict between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine persists, although the intensity has diminished in recent months.

MACEDONIA

In Macedonia, where about 65 percent of the population identify themselves as Orthodox, people gathered in churches before eating traditional Christmas dinners at home.

Children around the country went door to door singing carols Thursday, while large bonfires were lit in neighborhoods overnight.
DECATUR  Deyon Jackson is interested in going into law enforcement when he gets older.

On Friday, he wanted to learn more about what it would take to go into such a career and took particular interest in Macon County sheriff's deputy Elgin Hawthorne's presentation. Hawthorne was one of the speakers during the 8th Grade Career Fair that started Thursday at Richland Community College.

That's one job I want to do, said Jackson, who attends Thomas Jefferson Middle School. It got my attention. I want to learn a lot about it.

Hawthorne said the students can find something they're interested in by working for a police department, as it employs more than just the officers and deputies they might typically encounter.

We have numerous career paths within our department, said Hawthorne, noting that the sheriff's office employs about 150 people in various areas, including corrections, court security, emergency management, records and animal control.

He said the students need the skills they're learning in school to be successful in the jobs, particularly writing and learning to communicate effectively.

Nearly 1,500 students from schools in Richland's service area are expected to attend the career fair over four days, said Renee' Stivers, who organized the event as director of Partners in Education. The career fair, which is in its 19th year, continues Monday and Tuesday.

Speakers from different career clusters spread out across the Richland campus to provide information about what they do, Stivers said. She said more than 100 speakers from about 50 area businesses are scheduled to make presentations over the course of the event.

Members of the Golden K Kiwanis Club helped to keep groups of students moving between sessions.

Stivers said the goal is to start the students thinking about what they need to do to eventually work in a career that interests them.

We're hoping to spark a career interest, Stivers said. We're helping them to find a path and start thinking about what they want to do.

Many of the speakers wanted to spark an interest in the students based on what has interested them.

Pharmacy has been a profession that has been very good for me, said Lance Lercher, a retired pharmacist from Decatur.

Some students might not find what they want to do until later on, but the ideas are starting to form, Macon County State's Attorney Jay Scott said.

Being a prosecutor wasn't on my radar, Scott said. The spark didn't come until after I went to law school. I've made it a career.

Chris Brodnicki, Decatur Civic Center general manager, said he has learned from a variety of experiences to perform the various job duties that are expected from him.

Be flexible and learn from it, Brodnicki said. Get to know other people as relationships are important.

Many businesses such as Brinkoetter and Associates are starting to change to appeal to younger employees, the company's President Carla Brinkoetter said. She said it's been important to realize how information is received, even moving toward completing real estate contracts using a paperless system.

Technology has changed a lot, Brinkoetter said. It's exciting as we're starting to see more young people get into the business.

Brinkoetter said great opportunities exist for those motivated to achieve their goals and meet the necessary qualifications for the jobs they want.
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Brazilian resident Malika Aboussena shared a photo of her friend Rafal Zelbert on Facebook and wrote: Beautiful eyes; where are you now?

Zelbert didnt answer, but Armenias National Security Service (NSS) can.

According to the NSS:

On Nov. 12, based on data received, employees of Armenias National Security Service twice examined Rafal Zelbert, a Polish citizen born in 1980, who had passed through the nothing to declare customs exit at Yerevans Zvartnots Airport after arriving in Armenia on a Sao Paulo-Dubai-Yerevan flight. He had tried to smuggle, with the intent to sell, a particularly large amount of drugs.

The Zelbert incident is the fifth case of alleged cocaine smuggling to be reported in Armenia in 2015.NSS employees say they found 13 kilograms of cocaine, with a street value of US$ 4 million, in Zelberts luggage.

Aboussena, in a Facebook exchange with hetq.am, says she knew nothing about any drug trafficking. We were here together in Brazil. I didnt know that he was going there. We were planning to go back to Netherlands together where he lives, she wrote.

The NSS investigation is continuing.

Cocaine smuggling got off to an early start in 2015.

In January, agents of the NSS arrested Alexander Cordova and Maria Alvarado after they arrived in Armenia from a Lima-Sao Paolo-Abu Dhabi-Yerevan flight. According to law enforcement, they had tried to smuggle in 2.7 kilograms of cocaine.

A few days later, Argentine citizen Alejandro Joel Torres was arrested at Zvartnots Airport after arriving from Sao Paolo, allegedly with 2.6 kilograms of cocaine.

Prosecutors moved swiftly. The two Peruvians, Cordova and Alvarado, were sentenced to 15 years by an Armenian court, while Torres, the Argentinian, got 13 years.

The NSS, in a recent report, notes two primary drug routes via Armenia: one is from Latin America to Turkey and then on to Europe; the other is from Iran to the UAE and then on to Malaysia. The cocaine confiscated in the January cases was headed for Turkey, according to the report.

On Feb. 12, Malek Abas Garib and Al-Shaer Hasan Abdo, ethnic Arabs with Bulgarian citizenship, were arrested by the NSS at Zvartnots Airport. The NSS says they were carrying around 4.8 kilograms of suspected cocaine. The pair were allegedly trying to transfer the drugs to Turkey via a Yerevan-Istanbul flight. A third suspect, Firas Malek Wehbe, was sentenced to 13 years by the Armenian court in connection with the case.

The fourth and fifth attempts to smuggle in cocaine, again from Latin America, were reported in November. According to law enforcement, Ukraine national Ilina Shelever and Zelbert, the Polish national, attempted to smuggle in around 3 and 13 kilograms of cocaine, respectively, after disembarking from different Sao Paulo-Dubai-Yerevan transit flights.

Some of the foreign nationals arrested in Armenia have criminal records.

According to the Armenian Police Departments National Interpol Central Bureau, Cordova, the 34-year-old Peruvian, was arrested in 2012 for transporting 10,900 kilograms of cocaine chloral hydrate from one Peruvian town to another.

In court, the Argentinian Torres stated that in 2012 he transported cocaine to the Republic of South Africa after being promised a payment of US$ 6,000-7,000. He was arrested and spent 19 months in custody. He said he was later freed on a technicality and sent back to Argentina.

Zelbert also has a criminal record. Karineh Khachatryan, his lawyer in Armenia, declined comment.

In 2011, Zelbert was arrested at the Malta airport for drug smuggling. According to the Maltese court registry, Zelbert was charged with smuggling 443.69 grams of cocaine and a diazepam-like tranquilizer drug and sentenced to 4.5 years. In 2015, he was arrested again on suspicion of trafficking more than 20 times that amount of drugs.

occrp.org
Human Rights Watch has called on the Armenian government to release Gevorg Safaryan, a political activist arrested during a public gathering on January 1, 2016, and placed in pretrial detention pending an impartial investigation of the charges against him.

Police arrested Gevorg Safaryan at Yerevans Freedom Square at about 1 a.m. on New Years Day, amid a scuffle during a public event organized by members of the political opposition New Armenia Movement.

The authorities charged Safaryan with using violence against the police, and on January 3, a court granted a police investigators request to hold Safaryan in pretrial custody for two months.

Given the minor nature of the incident, two months of pretrial custody is wholly unjustified, said Giorgi Gogia, South Caucasus director at Human Rights Watch. Pretrial detention should be a last resort, not the general rule, and only in cases where there is a well-founded fear that the person will evade justice or hinder the investigation.

In a January 5 letter to Armenias prosecutor general, Human Rights Watch expressed concern about the charges against and pretrial detention of Safaryan and called for his release pending an investigation.

Read more HERE
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I did it by myself!

"The only thing of my very own which I contribute to my redemption is the sin from which I need to be redeemed."



William Temple